The House of the Whispering Pines (17 page)

It was not his intention to revisit the places so thoroughly overhauled
by the police. He carried another list, that of certain small groceries
and quiet unobtrusive hotels where a man could find a private room in
which to drink alone; it being Sweetwater's conviction that in such a
place, and in such a place only, would be found the tokens of those
solitary hours spent by Arthur Cumberland between the time of his
sister's murder and his reappearance the next day. "Had they been spent
in his old haunts or in any of the well-known drinking saloons of the
city, some one would have peached on him before this," he went on, in
silent argument with himself. "He's too well known, too much of a swell
for all his lowering aspect and hang-dog look, to stroll along unnoticed
through any of the principal streets, so soon after the news of his
sister's murder had set the whole town agog. Yet he was not seen till he
struck Garden Street, a good quarter of a mile from his usual resorts."

Here, Sweetwater glanced up at the corner gas-lamp beneath which he
stood, and seeing that he was in Garden Street, tried to locate himself
in the exact spot where this young man had first been seen on the notable
morning in question. Then he looked carefully about him. Nothing in the
street or its immediate neighbourhood suggested the low and secret den he
was in search of.

"I shall have to make use of the list," he decided, and asked the first
passer-by the way to Hubbell's Alley.

It was a mile off. "That settles it," muttered Sweetwater. "Besides, I
doubt if he would go into an
alley
. The man has sunk low, but hardly
so low as that. What's the next address I have? Cuthbert Road.
Where's that?"

Espying a policeman eyeing him with more or less curiosity from the other
side of the street, he crossed over and requested to be directed to
Cuthbert Road.

"Cuthbert Road! That's where the markets are. They're closed at this time
of night," was the somewhat suspicious reply.

Evidently the location was not a savoury one.

"Are there nothing but markets there?" inquired Sweetwater, innocently.
It was his present desire not to be recognised as a detective even by
the men on beat. "I'm looking up a friend. He keeps a grocery or some
kind of small hotel. I have his number, but I don't know how to get to
Cuthbert Road."

"Then turn straight about and go down the first street, and you'll
reach it before the trolley-car you see up there can strike this
corner. But first, sew up your pockets. There's a bad block between you
and the markets."

Sweetwater slapped his trousers and laughed.

"I wasn't born yesterday," he cried; and following the officer's
directions, made straight for the Road. "Worse than the alley," he
muttered; "but too near to be slighted. I wonder if I shouldn't have
borrowed somebody's old coat."

It had been wiser, certainly. In Garden Street all the houses had been
closed and dark, but here they were open and often brightly lighted and
noisy from cellar to roof. Men, women, and frequently children, jostled
him on the pavement, and he felt his pockets touched more than once. But
he wasn't Caleb Sweetwater of the New York department of police for
nothing. He laughed, bantered, fought his way through and finally
reached the quieter region and, at this hour, the almost deserted one,
of the markets. Sixty-two was not far off, and, pausing a moment to
consider his course, he mechanically took in the surroundings. He was
surprised to find himself almost in the open country. The houses
extending on his left were fronted by the booths and stalls of the
market but beyond these were the fields. Interested in this discovery,
and anxious to locate himself exactly, he took his stand under a
favouring gas-lamp, and took out his map.

What he saw, sent him forward in haste. Shops had now taken the place of
tenements, and as these were mostly closed, there were very few persons
on the block, and those were quiet and unobtrusive. He reached a corner
before coming to 62 and was still more interested to perceive that the
street which branched off thus immediately from the markets was a wide
and busy one, offering both a safe and easy approach to dealer and
customer. "I'm on the track," he whispered almost aloud in his secret
self-congratulation. "Sixty-two will prove a decent quiet resort which I
may not be above patronising myself."

But he hesitated when he reached it. Some houses invite and some repel.
This house repelled. Yet there was nothing shabby or mysterious about it.
There was the decent entrance, lighted, but not too brilliantly; a row of
dark windows over it; and, above it all, a sloping roof in which another
sparkle of light drew his attention to an upper row of windows, this
time, of the old dormer shape. An alley ran down one side of the house
to the stables, now locked but later to be thrown open for the use of the
farmers who begin to gather here as early as four o'clock. Nothing wrong
in its appearance, everything ship-shape and yet—"I shall find some
strange characters here," was the Sweetwater comment with which our
detective opened the door and walked into the house.

It was an unusual hour for guests, and the woman whom he saw bending over
a sort of desk in one corner of the room he strode into, looked up
hastily, almost suspiciously.

"Well, and what is your business?" she asked, with her eye on his
clothes, which while not fashionable, were evidently of the sort not
often seen in that place.

"I want a room," he tipsily confided to her, "in which I can drink and
drink till I cannot see. I'm in trouble I am; but I don't want to do any
mischief; I only want to forget. I've money, and—" as he saw her mouth
open, "and I've the stuff. Whiskey, just whiskey. Give me a room. I'll
be quiet."

"I'll give you nothing." She was hot, angry, and full of distrust. "This
house is not for such as you. It's a farmer's lodging; honest men, who'd
stare and go mad to see a feller like you about. Go along, I tell you, or
I'll call Jim. He'll know what to do with you."

"Then, he'll know mor'n I do myself," mumbled the detective, with a
crushed and discouraged air. "Money and not a place to spend it in! Why
can't I go in there?" he peevishly inquired with a tremulous gesture
towards a half-open door through which a glimpse could be got of a neat
little snuggery. "Nobody'll see me. Give me a glass and leave me till I
rap for you in the morning. That's worth a fiver. Don't you think so,
missus?—And we'll begin by passing over the fiver."

"No."

She was mighty peremptory and what was more, she was in a great hurry to
get rid of him. This haste and the anxious ear she turned towards the
hall enlightened him as to the situation. There was some one within
hearing or liable to come within hearing, who possibly was not so stiff
under temptation. Could it be her husband? If so, it might be worth his
own while to await the good man's coming, if only he could manage to hold
his own for the next few minutes.

Changing his tactics, he turned his back on the snuggery and surveyed the
offended woman, with just a touch of maudlin sentiment.

"I say," he cried, just loud enough to attract the attention of any one
within ear-shot. "You're a mighty fine woman and the boss of this here
establishment; that's evident. I'd like to see the man who could say no
to you. He's never sat in that 'ere cashier's seat where you be; of
that I'm dead sure. He wouldn't care for fivers if you didn't, nor for
tens either."

She was really a fine woman for her station, and a buxom, powerful one,
too. But her glance wavered under these words and she showed a desire,
with difficulty suppressed, to use the strength of her white but brawny
arms, in shoving him out of the house. To aid her self-control, he, on
his part, began to edge towards the door, always eyeing her and always
speaking loudly in admirably acted tipsy unconsciousness of the fact.

"I'm a man who likes my own way as well as anybody," were the words with
which he sought to save the situation, and further his own purposes. "But
I never quarrel with a woman. Her whims are sacred to me. I may not
believe in them; they may cost me money and comfort; but I yield, I do,
when they are as strong in their wishes as you be. I'm going, missus
—I'm going—Oh!"

The exclamation burst from him. He could not help it. The door behind him
had opened, and a man stepped in, causing him so much astonishment that
he forgot himself. The woman was big, bigger than most women who rule the
roost and do the work in haunts where work calls for muscle and a good
head behind it. She was also rosy and of a make to draw the eye, if not
the heart. But the man who now entered was small almost to the point of
being a manikin, and more than that, he was weazen of face and
ill-balanced on his two tiny, ridiculous legs. Yet she trembled at his
presence, and turned a shade paler as she uttered the feeble protest:

"Jim!"

"Is she making a fool of herself?" asked the little man in a voice as
shrill as it was weak. "Do your business with me. Women are no good." And
he stalked into the room as only little men can.

Sweetwater took out his ten; pointed to the snuggery, and tapped his
breast-pocket. "Whiskey here," he confided. "Bring me a glass. I don't
mind your farmers. They won't bother me. What I want is a locked door
and a still mouth in your head."

The last he whispered in the husband's ear as the wife crossed
reluctantly back to her books.

The man turned the bill he had received, over and over in his hand; then
scrutinised Sweetwater, with his first show of hesitation.

"You don't want to kill yourself?" he asked.

Sweetwater laughed with a show of good humour that appeared to relieve
the woman, if it did not the man.

"Oh, that's it," he cried. "That's what the missus was afraid of, was it?
Well, I vow! And ten thousand dollars to my credit in the bank! No, I
don't want to kill myself. I just want to booze to my heart's content,
with nobody by to count the glasses. You've known such fellers before,
and that cosey, little room over there has known them, too. Just add me
to the list; it won't harm you."

The man's hand closed on the bill. Sweetwater noted the action out of the
corner of his eye, but his direct glance was on the woman. Her back was
to him, but she had started as he mentioned the snuggery and made as if
to turn; but thought better of it, and bent lower over her books.

"I've struck the spot," he murmured, exultantly to himself. "This is the
place I want and here I'll spend the night; but not to booze my wits
away, oh, no."

Nevertheless it was a night virtually wasted. He learned nothing
more than what was revealed by that one slight movement on the part
of the woman.

Though the man came in and sat with him for an hour, and they drank
together out of the flask Sweetwater had brought with him, he was as
impervious to all Sweetwater's wiles and as blind to every bait he threw
out, as any man the young detective had ever had to do with. When the
door closed on him, and Sweetwater was left to sit out the tedious night
alone, it was with small satisfaction to himself, and some regret for his
sacrificed bill. The driving in of the farmers and the awakening of life
in the market, and all the stir it occasioned inside the house and out,
prevented sleep even if he had been inclined that way. He had to swallow
his pill, and he did it with the best grace possible. Sooner than was
expected of him, sooner than was wise, perhaps, he was on his feet and
peering out of the one small window this most dismal day room contained.
He had not mistaken the outlook. It gave on to the alley, and all that
was visible from behind the curtains where he stood, was the high brick
wall of the neighbouring house. This wall had not even a window in it;
which in itself was a disappointment to one of his resources. He turned
back into the room, disgusted; then crept to the window again, and,
softly raising the sash, cast one of his lightning glances up and down
the alley. Then he softly let the sash fall again and retreated to the
centre of the room, where he stood for a moment with a growing smile of
intelligence and hope on his face. He had detected close against the side
of the wall, a box or hand-cart full of empty bottles. It gave him an
idea. With an impetuosity he would have criticised in another man, he
flung himself out of the room in which he had been for so many hours
confined, and coming face to face with the landlady standing in
unexpected watch before the door, found it a strain on his nerves to
instantly assume the sullen, vaguely abused air with which he had decided
to leave the house. Nevertheless, he made the attempt, and if he did not
succeed to his own satisfaction, he evidently did to hers, for she made
no effort to stop him as he stumbled out, and in her final look, which he
managed with some address to intercept, he perceived nothing but relief.
What had been in her mind? Fear for him or fear for themselves? He could
not decide until he had rummaged that cart of bottles. But how was he to
do this without attracting attention to himself in a way he still felt,
to be undesirable. In his indecision, he paused on the sidewalk and let
his glances wander vaguely over the busy scene before him. Before be knew
it, his eye had left the market and travelled across the snow-covered
fields to a building standing by itself in the far distance. Its
appearance was not unfamiliar. Seizing hold of the first man who passed
him, he pointed it out, crying:

"What building is that?"

"That? That's The Whispering Pines, the country club-house, where—"

He didn't wait for the end of the sentence, but plunged into the thickest
group of people he could find, with a determination greater than ever to
turn those bottles over before he ate.

His manner of going about this was characteristic. Lounging about the
stalls until he found just the sort of old codger he wanted, he scraped
up an acquaintance with him on the spot, and succeeded in making himself
so agreeable that when the old fellow sauntered back to the stables to
take a look at his horse, Sweetwater accompanied him. Hanging round the
stable-door, he kept up his chatter, while sizing up the bottles heaped
in the cart at his side. He even allowed himself to touch one or two in
an absent way, and was meditating an accidental upset of the whole
collection when a woman he had not seen before, thrust her head out of a
rear window, shouting sharply: