Part 15 (1/2)
”No,” said Garrison. ”What's the next train for New York?”
”Eleven-forty-five,” answered the boy. ”Goes in fifteen minutes.”
”All right. Have my suit-case down at the office.”
He returned to his work.
Ignoring the few piled-up papers in the drawer, he took up the three cigars beside the box, the ones which had come from Hardy's pocket, and scrutinized them with the most minute attention.
So far as he could possibly detect, not one had been altered or repasted on the end. He did not dare to cut them up, greatly as he longed to examine them thoroughly. He opened the box from which they had come.
For a moment his eye was attracted and held by the birthday greeting-card which Dorothy had written. The presence of the card showed a somewhat important fact--the box had been opened once before John Hardy forced up the lid, in order that the card might be deposited within.
His gaze went traveling from one even, nicely finished cigar-end to the next, in his hope to discover signs of meddling. It was not until he came to the end cigar that he caught at the slightest irregularity.
Here, at last, was a change.
He took the cigar out carefully and held it up. There could be no doubt it had been ”mended” on the end. The wrapper was not only slightly discolored, but it bulged a trifle; it was not so faultlessly turned as all the others, and the end was corkscrewed the merest trifle, whereas, none of the others had been twisted to bring them to a point.
Garrison needed that cigar. He was certain not another one in all the box was suspicious. The perpetrator of the poisoning had evidently known that Hardy's habit was to take his cigars from the end of the row and not the center. No chance for mistake had been permitted. The two end cigars had been loaded, and no more.
How to purloin this cigar without having it missed by Mr. Pike was a worry for a moment.
Garrison managed it simply. He took out a dozen cigars in the layer on top and one from the layer next the bottom; then, rearranging the underlying layer so as to fill in the empty s.p.a.ce, he replaced the others in perfect order in the topmost row, and thus had one cigar left over to subst.i.tute for the one he had taken from the end.
He plumped the suspicious-looking weed into his pocket and closed the box.
Eagerly glancing at the letters found among the dead man's possessions, he found a note from Dorothy. It had come from a town in Ma.s.sachusetts. The date was over six weeks old.
It was addressed, ”Dear Uncle John,” and, in a girlish way, informed him she had recently been married to a ”splendid, brilliant young man, named Fairfax,” whom she trusted her uncle would admire. They were off on their honeymoon, it added, but she hoped they would not be long away, for they both looked forward with pleasure to seeing him soon.
It might have been part of her trickery; he could not tell.
The envelope was missing. Where Hardy had been at the time of receiving the note was not revealed. The picture postal-card that Pike had mentioned was also there. It, too, apparently, had come from Dorothy, and had been sent direct to Hickwood.
Once more returning to the box of cigars, Garrison took it up and turned it around in his hand. On the back, to his great delight, he discovered a rubber-stamp legend, which was nothing more or less than a cheap advertis.e.m.e.nt of the dealer who had sold the cigars.
He was one Isaac Blum, of an uptown address on Amsterdam Avenue, New York, dealer in stationery, novelties, and smokers' articles. Garrison jotted down the name and address, together with the brand of the cigars, and was just about to rise and close the drawer when the coroner returned.
”I shall have to go down to New York this morning,” said Garrison. ”I owe you many thanks.”
”Oh, that's all right,” Mr. Pike responded. ”If you're goin' to try to catch fifteen, you'd better git a move. She's whistled for the station just above.”
Garrison hastened away. He was presently whirling back to Dorothy.
His ”shadow,” with his bruised hand gloved, was just behind him in the car.
CHAPTER X
A COMPLICATION