The step on the stair

by Anna Katharine Green

XXXVIII

“There is some small fact thus far successfully suppressed, which, when known, will alter the trend of public opinion and clarify the whole situation.”

A sentence almost fatuous in its expression of a self-evident truth. One, too, which had been uttered by myself. But foolish and fatuous as it was, it kept ringing on in my brain all that day and far into the night, until I formulated for myself another one less general and more likely to lead to a definite conclusion:

“Something occurred between the hour I left Uncle’s room and my visit to his door at three o’clock in the morning which from its nature was calculated to make Edgar indifferent to the destruction of the will marked with red and Wealthy so apprehensive of harm to him that to save him from the attention of the police she was willing to sacrifice me and perjure herself before the Coroner.” What was it?

You see from declining to connect Edgar with this crime, I had come to the point of not only admitting the possibility of his guilt, but of arguing for and against it in my own mind. I had almost rather have died than do this; but the word having once passed between me and Mr. Jackson, every instinct within me clamored for a confutation of my doubt or a confirmation of it so strong that my duty would be plain and the future of Orpha settled as her father would have it.

To repeat then: to understand this crime and to locate the guilty hand which dropped poison into the sick man’s soothing mixture it was necessary to discover what had happened somewhere in the house between the hours I have mentioned, of sufficient moment to account for Edgar’s attitude and that of the faithful Wealthy.

But one conjecture suggested itself after hours of thought. Was it not possible that while I was below, Clarke in his room, and Wealthy in Orpha’s, that Edgar had made his way for the second time into his uncle’s presence, persuaded him to revoke his decision and even gone so far as to obtain from him the will adverse to his own hopes?

Thus fortified, but still fearful of further vacillation on the part of one whose mind, once so strong, seemed now to veer this way or that with every influence brought to bear upon it, what more natural than, given a criminal’s heart, he should think of the one and only way of ending this indecision and making himself safe from this very hour.

A glass of water—a drop of medicine from the bottle labeled dangerous—a quick good-night—and a hasty departure!

It made the hair stir on my forehead to conceive of all this in connection with a man like Edgar. But my thoughts, once allowed to enter this groove, would run on.

The deed is done; now to regain his room. That room is near. He has but to cross the hall. A few steps and he is at the stair-head,—has passed it, when a noise from below startles him, and peering down, he sees Wealthy coming up from the lower floor.

Wealthy! ready to tell any story when confronted as she soon would be by the fact that death had followed his visit—death which in this case meant murder.

It was base beyond belief: hardly to be thought of, but did it not explain every fact?

I would see.

First, it accounted for the empty envelope and the disappearance of the will which it had held. Also for the fact that this will could not be found in any place accessible to a man too feeble to leave his own room. It had been given to Edgar and he had carried it away.

(Had they searched his room for it? They had searched mine and they had searched me. Had they been fair enough to search his room and to search him?)

Secondly: Edgar’s restlessness on that fatal night. The watch he kept on Uncle’s door. The interest he had shown at seeing me there and possibly his reluctance to incriminate me by any absolute assertion which would link me to a crime which he, above all others, knew that I had not committed.

Thirdly: the comparative calmness with which he saw his uncle, still undecided, or what was fully as probable, confused in mind by his sufferings and the near approach of death, order the destruction of the remaining will, to preserve which and make it operative he had risked the remorse of a lifetime. He knew that with both wills gone, the third and original one which at that time he believed to be still in existence would secure for him even more than the one he saw being consumed before his eyes, viz.: the undisputed possession of the Bartholomew estate.

So much for the time preceding the discovery that crime and not the hazard of disease had caused our uncle’s sudden death. How about Edgar’s conduct since? Was there anything in that to dispute this theory?

Not absolutely. Emotion, under circumstances so tragic, would be expected from him; and with his quick mind and knowledge of the worshipful affection felt for him by every member of the household, he must have had little fear of any unfortunate results to himself and a most lively recognition of where the blame would fall if he acted his part with the skill of which he was the undoubted master.

There was but one remote possibility which might turn the tables. Perhaps, it came across him like a flash; perhaps, he had thought of it before, but considered it of no consequence so long as it was the universally accepted belief that Uncle had died at natural death.

And this brings us to Fourthly:

Was it in accordance with my theory or the reverse, for him, immediately and before the doctor could appear, to rush upstairs in company with Orpha and Nurse Wealthy to inspect the cabinet where the medicines were kept?

In full accordance with my theory. Knowing that he must have left finger-marks there on bottle or shelf, he takes the one way to confound suspicion: adds more of his own, and passes the phial into the hands of the two who accompanied him on this very excusable errand.

Was there any other fact which I could remember which might tip the scale, so heavily weighted, even a trifle the other way?

Yes, one—a big one. The impossibility for me even now to attribute such deviltry to a man who had certainly loved the victim of this monstrous crime.

As I rose from this effort to sound the murky depths into which my thoughts had groveled in spite of myself and all the proprieties, I found by the strong feeling of revulsion which made the memory of the past hour hateful to me, that I could never pursue the road which I had thus carefully mapped out for myself. That, innocent or guilty, Edgar Quenton Bartholomew, beloved by our uncle, was sacred in my eyes because of that love, and that whatever might be done by others to fix this crime upon him, I could do nothing—would do nothing to help them even if I must continue to bear to the very end the opprobrium under which I now labored.

And Orpha? Had I forgotten my fears for her—the duty I had felt to preserve her from a step which might mean more than unhappiness—might mean shame?

No; but in that moment of decision made for me by my own nature, the conviction had come that I need not be apprehensive of Orpha marrying Edgar or marrying me while this question between us remained unsettled.

She would be neutral to the end, aye, even if her heart broke. I knew my darling.

In this mood and in this determination I remained for two weeks. I tried to divert myself by reading, and I think my love for books which presently grew into a passion had its inception in that monotonous succession of day after day without a break in the suspense which held me like a hand upon my throat.

I was not treated ill, I was simply boycotted. This made it unpleasant for me to walk the streets, though I never hesitated to do so when I had a purpose in view.

Of Orpha I heard little, though now and then some whiff of gossip from Quenton Court would reach me. She had filled the house with guests, but there was no gayety. The only young person among them was Lucy Colfax, who was preparing for her wedding. The rest were relatives of humble means and few pleasures to whom life amid the comforts and splendors of Quenton Court was like a visit to fairyland. Edgar had followed my example and taken up his abode in one of the hotels. But he spent most of his evenings at the house where he soon became the idol of the various aunts and cousins who possibly would never have honored me with anything beyond a certain civility.

Ere long I heard of his intention to leave town. With his position no better defined than it was, he found C—— intolerable.

I wondered if they would let him go! By they I meant the police. If they did, I meant to go too, or at least to make an effort to do so. I wanted to work. I wanted to feel my manhood once again active. I wrote to the firm in whose offices I had a desk.

This is my letter robbed of its heading and signature.

I am well aware in what light I have been held up to the public by the New York press. No one accuses me, yet there are many who think me capable of a great crime. If this were true I should be the most despicable of men. For my uncle was my good friend and made a man of me out of very indifferent material. I revered him and as my wish was to please him while he was living so it is my present desire to do as he would have me do now that he is gone.

If on the receipt of this you advise me not to come, I shall not take it as an expression of disbelief in what I have said but as a result of your kindly judgment that my place is in my home town so long as there is any doubt of the innocency of my relations towards my uncle.

This dispatched, I waited three days for a response. Then I received this telegram:

Come.

Going immediately to Headquarters, I sought out the Inspector and showed him this message.

“Shall I go or shall I not?” I asked.

He did not answer at once; seemed to hesitate and finally left the room for a few minutes. When he came back he smiled and said:

“My answer is yes. You are young. If you wait for full justification in this case, you may have to wait a lifetime. And then again you may not.”

I wrung his hand and for the next hour forgot everything but the manner in which I would make the attempt to see Orpha. I could not leave without a word of farewell to the one being for whose sake I kept my soul from despair.

I dared not call without permission. I feared a rebuff at the front door; Orpha would certainly be out. Again, I might write and she might get the letter, but I could not be sure. Bliss handled the mail and—and—Of course I was unreasonably suspicious, but it was so important for me to reach her very self, or to know that any refusal or inability to see me came from her very self, that I wished to take every precaution. In pursuance of this idea I ran over the list of servants to see if there was one who in my estimation could be trusted to hand her a note. From Wealthy down I named them one by one and shook my head over each. Discouraged, I rose and went out and almost at the first corner I ran upon Clarke.

What came over me at the sight of his uncompromising countenance I do not know, but I stopped him and threw myself upon his mercy. It was an act more in keeping with Edgar’s character than with mine, and I cannot account for it save by the certainty I possessed that if he did not want to do what I requested, he would say so. He might be blunt, even accusing, but he would not be insincere or play me false.

“Clarke, well met.” Thus I accosted him. “I am going to leave town. I may come back and I may not. Will you do me this favor? I am very anxious to have Miss Bartholomew know that I greatly desire to say good-by to her, but hardly feel at liberty to telephone. If she is willing to see me I shall feel honored.”

“I have left Quenton Court for the present,” he objected. “I hope to return when it has a master.”

If he noticed my emotion at this straightforward if crude statement, he gave no sign of having done so. He simply remained standing like a man awaiting orders, and I hastened to remark:

“But you will be going there to see your old friends, to-day possibly, to-night at latest if you have any good reason for it.”

“Yes, I have still a trunk or two there. I will call for them to-night, and I will give Miss Orpha your message. Where shall I bring the reply?”

I told him and he walked off, erect, unmoved, and to all appearance totally unconscious of the fact—or if conscious of it totally unaffected by it—that he had thrown a ray of light into a cavern of gloom, and helped a man to face life again who had almost preferred death.

Evening came and with it a telephone message.

“She will see you to-morrow morning at eleven.”