Dick sat back in his chair and gazed hopelessly at the President, and then at the Secretary. Instantly his thoughts flew to Beatrice. Great Heavens! He was almost afraid to ask the next question.
“Did—did you by chance recognize her voice?”
The Secretary hesitated a moment before answering.
“She spoke with a decided foreign accent”—again he hesitated. “I called her ‘Mrs. Trevor.’”
“Mrs. Trevor!” gasped Dick. For once words failed him.
“Let me describe the scene to you exactly,” went on the Secretary. “I waited only a few minutes for the connection, and then I heard the faint click of the receiver being removed from the hook, then a woman’s cultivated voice asked: ‘Who is eet?’ I promptly replied: ‘Can I speak to your husband, Mrs. Trevor?’ She made no answer, but in a second the Attorney General came to the telephone, gave me the desired information, and I rang off.”
In absolute silence the three men faced each other, with bewilderment and doubt written on their countenances. The long pause was broken by the Secretary.
“When I first heard of the tragedy I, like the rest of the world, thought poor Mrs. Trevor had been murdered by the burglar, Nelson. On the day the inquest was held, I received a telegram saying that my wife was dangerously ill with typhoid fever in Cambridge. She had gone there two weeks before to be with our son, who is at Harvard. I dropped everything and hastened at once to her bedside. Until the crisis was over I never left her. And so deep was my anxiety, for the doctors held out little hope that she would recover, that I neglected everything outside the sick room. I left all my business to my private secretary.
“My wife rallied wonderfully after the crisis was passed, and I returned to Washington on last night’s Federal. On the trip down my secretary told me all the developments in the Trevor case. I was simply thunderstruck!”
“In his direct testimony Mr. Trevor denied being in his private office after his return from the banquet; denied having seen his wife again. He undoubtedly perjured himself,” said the President, thoughtfully. “Still, even in the face of such evidence, he may be innocent of the crime. For the time being I shall give him the benefit of the doubt.”