“But, consider. You have brains, Mr. Clancy. I am glad the Bureau sent such a man. How can a bit of unthinking generosity on my part be construed as participation in a crime?”
“If you explain matters, Senator, the absurdity of the notion may become clear.”
“Ah, that’s better. Let me assure you that my coffee will not affect your fine sensibilities. Miss Rachel Craik is a lady I have known nearly all my life. I have assisted her, within my means. She resides in East One Hundred and Twelfth Street, and the man about whom she was so concerned last night is her brother. He committed some technical offense years ago, and has always been a ne’er-do-well. To please his sister, and for no other reason, I undertook to provide him with five hundred dollars, and thus enable him to start life anew. I have never met the man. I would not recognize him if I saw him. I believe he is a desperate character; his maniacal behavior last night seems to leave no room for doubt in that respect. Don’t you see, Mr. Clancy, that it was I, and not poor Tower, whom he meant attacking? But for idle chance, it is my corpse, not Tower’s, that would now be floating in the Hudson. You heard what Tower said. I did not. I assume, however, that some allusion was made to the money—which, by the way, is still in my pocketbook—and Tower scoffed at the notion that he had come there to hand over five hundred dollars. There you have the whole story, in so far as I can tell it.”
“For the present, Senator.”
“How?”
“It should yield many more chapters. Is that all you’re going to say? For instance, did you call on Rachel Craik after leaving Eighty-sixth Street?”
Meiklejohn’s jaws closed like a steel trap. He almost lost his temper.
“No,” he said, seemingly conquering the desire to blaze into anger at this gadfly of a detective.
“Sure?”