“Well, there is something in support of that theory.” Millard bristled again with an assumption of his former importance. “Just between ourselves, it is known that a machine came tearing down the Drive at a little after one o’clock that night going to beat the devil and it must have passed that spot. The occupants were yelling and carrying on, and the policeman who tried to hold them up at One Hundred and Tenth Street thought they were just a bunch of drunks out on a joy ride. I don’t mind telling you they’ve been scouring the city for that machine ever since.”
Storm gazed into his liqueur glass with inscrutable eyes. He remembered that car and its roisterous crew. It had passed just before. . . . He roused himself to hear George’s dogged, mildly insistent tones.
“It isn’t logical to suppose that people on such an errand would draw attention to themselves. I don’t mean that Jack walked deliberately at that time of night to the spot where he was found murdered, but——”
“It is possible that he may have done just that.” Millard paused to sniff the bouquet of his brandy with the air of a connoisseur and added: “The policeman on the beat reported that two men passed him going north on the Drive toward that identical spot at approximately the hour of the murder. They were walking briskly and talking together in a casual sort of way, and he did not notice them particularly; but from what description he was able to give, one of them might have been Horton.—I say, old chap, you have done it! That cognac is worth its weight in gold!”
The stem of Storm’s glass had snapped between his fingers. That policeman! Thank the fates they had not passed him beneath the street lamp! In spite of himself his mind had been diverted from thought of the money by Millard’s revelations; but the latter’s final word recalled it, and as he dropped the broken fragments of glass upon a plate he murmured:
“Habit of mine. These are Potter’s glasses, too! All this is highly interesting, but it won’t lead anywhere. The authorities will do well to keep their efforts centered on the recovery of that money. By the way, how much of it was in bills and how much in gold?”
“Only about ten thousand in gold, I believe,” Millard responded carelessly. “The more ignorant of the miners for whose wages the money was intended demand gold, you know; they hoard it away and take no stock in paper certificates, but they are in the minority. Roughly speaking, a hundred thousand of it was in greenbacks.”
A hundred thousand of his capital swept away at a word! Storm could have flung himself upon that smiling, selfsatisfied wretch across the table in bitter rage and disappointment! A hundred thousand; only a paltry ten thousand left, little more than enough to get him out of the country! What next would the cursed fates have in store for him?
Then a swift thought made his blood run cold. He should have remembered that the bills would be spotted, of course; that was the one flaw in his reasoning. The fact remained that he had not done so, however. What if he had not gotten Millard here to-night and loosened his tongue? If he had not been so providentially forewarned, all the structure he had so carefully built up might have fallen about him and carried him to ruin beneath it at his first attempt to make use of his newly acquired wealth!
“I wonder if it could have been Jack Horton and another man whom the policeman saw?” George cogitated. “That couple walking, I mean? If it were, it would bear out my theory. Of course, we don’t know who Horton’s intimates were of late years, nor what he could have been doing up in this part of the city so long after he should have been on his way; but it is not impossible, as you say. The policeman doesn’t remember hearing anything a little later? A cry or anything of that sort? Why on earth didn’t he follow them? Two men on that lonely stretch of drive at such an hour! He might have known there would be foul play——!”