He was clearing out his always methodical mind, and tabulating his ideas as he went along.
“There are two distinct things to hunt for,” he said to himself; “first, Mr. Kimball Webb, and second the abductor of Mr. Kimball Webb. In fact it doesn’t matter which I find first,—one will doubtless lead to the other. Now, it’s practically hopeless to hunt for Mr. Webb, for if he could have escaped his confinement,—granting that he is confined,—he would have been heard from before this. There’s the theory that he’s staying away willingly, but that I do not believe. Now, so far as I can see, there’s nobody likely to know anything about where he is, except the person or persons who put him there. And while his mother and sister are possible suspects, they are not, to my mind, plausible ones. For,—oh, well, I just can’t see ’em in that light.
“Now, I’m also ready to cross off Wallace Courtney. He’s benefited largely by the absence of his rival playwright, but, even granting his willingness, I don’t see how he could have pulled it off. Owen Thorne is out of the question, also. Just because he is Elsie Powell’s trustee is no reason to think he would stick a finger in her romantic pie. As to his having played ducks and drakes with her money, and daren’t acknowledge it, I’ve yet to find any proof of that. So far as I can get hold of the facts, the Powell fortune is in honest hands, and is intact and safe.
“Now, I’m left with mighty few people to suspect. And those few I propose to run down pretty quick. There’s just one element that’s bothering me and that’s the supernatural one. Those yarns that Kimball Webb told at his club are not to be passed over lightly, for as far as I can make out Mr. Webb is a pretty much worthwhile chap. And judging from the line I’ve got on his character, he’s not the sort to tell those stories unless they were true. True that the things he related happened, I mean. Not true that they happened by supernatural forces. If there’s some sort of hocus-pocus possible in that room of Kimball Webb’s, that means somebody has access to it, when it’s apparently securely locked. It might be his mother, after all,—or that high and mighty sister. But Mrs. Webb is too sincerely a believer in the spirit business to fake it, and—well, it doesn’t fit in with that scheme of things called Henrietta!
“But what it is, or what it may be, I’ve got to find out,—and that with neatness and dispatch.”
Disentangling himself from his easy chair, Coe put on his hat, and started out on his quest.
But, according to his principle, “when in doubt, go to Elsie’s,” he went straight to the Powells’ home.
It was late afternoon, and he was not surprised to find the faithful pair, Allison and Whiting already there, and having tea.
It was no secret now, that these two men were rivals for Elsie’s hand. Urged on by her mother and sister, strongly advised by the Webb ladies, and even besought by her trustee and guardian to marry before her birthday, the poor child felt she would be unable to combat their decrees much longer.
The arguments that she was foolish to throw away a fortune, that she owed it to her mother and sister, that she’d be sorry afterward if she didn’t, all had no effect on her personal inclination, but they had the wearing action of constant dropping of water upon a stone, upon her will.