FullReads

As we swung around the bend in the road that cut off the little station and its crowd of lookers-on, Kennedy was the first to speak. “Tom,” he said, “first of all, let me ask that when we get to the camp we are to be simply two old classmates whom you had asked to spend a few days before the tragedy occurred. Anything will do. There may be nothing at all to your evident suspicions, and then again there may. At any rate, play the game safely–don’t arouse any feeling which might cause unpleasantness later in case you are mistaken.”

“I quite agree with you,” answered Tom. “You wired, from Albany, I think, to keep the facts out of the papers as much as possible. I’m afraid it is too late for that. Of course the thing became vaguely known in Saranac, although the county officers have been very considerate of us, and this morning a New York Record correspondent was over and talked with us. I couldn’t refuse, that would have put a very bad face on it.”

“Too bad,” I exclaimed. “I had hoped, at least, to be able to keep the report down to a few lines in the Star. But the Record will have such a yellow story about it that I’ll simply have to do something to counteract the effect.”

“Yes,” assented Craig. “But–wait. Let’s see the Record story first. The office doesn’t know you’re up here. You can hold up the Star and give us time to look things over, perhaps get in a beat on the real story and set things right. Anyhow, the news is out. That’s certain. We must work quickly. Tell me, Tom, who are at the camp–anyone except relatives?”

“No,” he replied, guardedly measuring his words. “Uncle Lewis had invited his brother James and his niece and nephew, Isabelle and James, junior–we call him Junior. Then there are Grace and myself and a distant relative, Harrington Brown, and–oh, of course, uncle’s physician, Doctor Putnam.”

“Who is Harrington Brown” asked Craig.

“He’s on the other side of the Langley family, on Uncle Lewis’s mother’s side. I think, or at least Grace thinks, that he is quite in love with Isabelle. Harrington Brown would be quite a catch. Of course he isn’t wealthy, but his family is mighty well connected. Oh, Craig,” sighed Langley, “I wish he hadn’t done it–Uncle Lewis, I mean. Why did he invite his brother up here now when he needed to recover from the swift pace of last winter in New York? You know–or you don’t know, I suppose, but you’ll know it now–when he and Uncle Jim got together there was nothing to it but one drink after another. Doctor Putnam was quite disgusted, at least he professed to be, but, Craig,” he lowered his voice to a whisper, as if the very forest had ears, “they’re all alike–they’ve been just waiting for Uncle Lewis to drink himself to death. Oh,” he added bitterly, “there’s no love lost between me and the relatives on that score, I can assure you.”

“How did you find him that morning?” asked Kennedy, as if to turn off this unlocking of family secrets to strangers.

“That’s the worst part of the whole affair,” replied Tom, and even in the dusk I could see the lines of his face tighten. “You know Uncle Lewis was a hard drinker, but he never seemed to show it much. We had been out on the lake in the motor-boat fishing all the afternoon and–well, I must admit both my uncles had had frequent recourse to ‘pocket pistols,’ and I remember they referred to it each time as ‘bait.’ Then after supper nothing would do but fizzes and rickeys. I was disgusted, and after reading a bit went to bed. Harrington and my uncles sat up with Doctor Putnam–according to Uncle Jim–for a couple of hours longer. Then Harrington, Doctor Putnam, and Uncle Jim went to bed, leaving Uncle Lewis still drinking. I remember waking in the night, and the house seemed saturated with a peculiar odour. I never smelt anything like it in my life. So I got up and slipped into my bathrobe. I met Grace in the hall. She was sniffing.