was there, in the distant city, that this talk took place.

Confirming over the long distance telephone the news given in his
agent's telegram, Colonel Ashley, without having revealed to Grafton
what new development had occurred, had made a quick trip to Lango,
where Spotty, in response to a quiet but general alarm sent out, had
been arrested.

A diamond cross had been found in his possession, and was bent and
flattened--crushed by some heavy foot--though all the stones were
intact.

Spotty admitted that the ornament might be the very one wanted, but he
absolutely refused to tell how he had come by it. He was most
emphatic, however, in denying that he had taken it from Mrs. Darcy, or
that he had even seen her or been to her store.

"I'm a bad man, Colonel, you know that, and maybe if I was to go to the
chair--or the rope, according, to where I was caught--I wouldn't be
getting any more than was comin' to me. But, so help me, I never
croaked that old lady!"

"Then how did you get that cross?"

"I won't tell you!"

"I'll make you, Spotty!" and there was a dangerous glint in the eyes of
the colonel.

"You can't!" defied the crook. "There ain't a man livin' that can! Go
on with your third degree if you want to!" he sneered. "But for every
blow you strike--for every hour you keep me awake when I'm dead for
sleep--you'll be sorry, Colonel! You'll be sorry when you think of
what might have happened back there in Colchester!"

"Spotty, you're right!" faltered the colonel. "I almost wish you
hadn't saved me. I've got to do my duty! I've got to break you if
need be, Spotty, to get at the truth. I want to know who killed Mrs.
Darcy and where you got that cross! I want to know, and, by gad! I'm
going to know!"

"Not from me, Colonel! I never saw the old lady, dead or alive, and I
never knew until just now when you told me, that she'd ever had this
cross."

"Who gave it to you?"

"Colonel, did you ever know me to split on a pal unless he split first?"

"No, Spotty. I never did."

"Well, then, you stand a fine chance in getting me to do it now. Go to
it if you like. I'm through spielin'!" and the crook turned away with
an air of indifference.

The colonel knew that Spotty never would tell, until he wanted to, but
it did not deter him. He "went at" Spotty. What happened in the quiet
room, near the police headquarter cells, need not form part of this
record. Enough to say that when they let Spotty go staggering back to
his dungeon, a wreck of a man physically and mentally for the time
being, he had not told.

And the glittering stones in the crushed cross were not more silent
than he in his misery--deserved perhaps, but none the less misery.

And when the colonel, rather upset himself by what he had been forced
to go through, started back for Colchester, he took with him the memory
of Spotty's rather sneering face and the echo of his words:

"Well, Colonel, I didn't tell!"

And he had not. The diamond cross still kept its mystery.

Colonel Ashley fumed, fretted, and fidgeted until he was on the verge
of a sleepless night on his way back in the train. Then he bethought
himself of his little green book, and he read:

"You are to know, then, that there is a night as well as a day fishing
for a trout, and that in the night the best trout come out of their
holes."

"Ah, ha," mused the colonel. "I think I shall have to do a little
night fishing."

So saying, having read a little farther in his Izaak Walton, he went
peacefully to his berth and awoke calmer and himself again.

But if the colonel felt refreshed on reaching Colchester, it was not
because he felt that he was in a fair way to solve the problem--or,
rather, the many problems connected with the Darcy murder.

"It's worse tangled than before," mused the old detective. "I wonder
if Grafton-- No, it couldn't be. But I must have a talk with his
friend Cynthia. Ticklish business when a man goes out walking with a
married woman and steps on her cross. There are complications and
complications. I wonder when I'll begin to unravel some of them?"

For reasons of his own, the colonel said nothing to the police or
county authorities in Colchester about the arrest of Spotty, nor did he
mention that, nor the finding of the diamond cross, to Darcy or


<< previous page | next page >>

Jump to page: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36 | 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42 | 43 | 44 | 45 | 46 | 47 | 48 | 49 | 50 | 51 | 52 | 53 | 54 | 55 | 56 | 57 | 58 | 59 | 60 | 61 | 62 | 63 | 64 | 65 | 66 | 67 | 68 | 69 | 70 | 71 | 72 | 73 | 74 | 75 | 76 | 77 | 78 | 79 | 80 | 81 | 82 | 83 |