Not an easy thing to do—disentangle my share in the tragic business from Heloise's and my joint share, and tell only that much while still telling the truth! It is a little out of my line, this lawyer-like sort of thinking.
I must have appeared rather distrait to Hindmann. But if I did, he ignored it. He just sat and smoked—a comfortably fat, round-faced man with shrewd, steady eyes—and talked along in an easy manner. He told me a good deal about his vaudeville business, I remember, and the curious problems that are constantly arising out of the invasion of the entertainment field by the moving pictures. I think I expressed some interest, now and then, even asked an intelligent question or two; but all the time that story was arranging and rearranging itself in the back of my head.
Finally I found myself beginning to tell bits of it to him. After all, why not? He would hear most of it anyway, before night. Then, after a little, it all came rushing out; and I realized that I was making a confidant of this fat man. It had to be, I think. Surely every human being, at certain intense moments of his life, needs a confidant. And I suppose there is never any telling, in a given case, what sort of individual will be chosen for the trust. Crocker chose me—and Sir Robert! I chose Mr. Hindmann, of Cincinnati... sitting there in a corner of the lounge of the Hôtel Wagon-lits, talking in a low voice in order that the little groups of American and British folk and Germans might not hear the details of the love that has so very nearly' torn my life to pieces. The usual row of Chinese merchants were over against the wall, I remember, with their glorious display of embroidered silk coats and skirts and scarves and squares hung higher than their heads. Once a great Mandarin walked by and bowed impersonally to us, attended by a dozen or more of lesser Mandarins who bowed in their turn; and they all wore stiff-fitting frock coats, and American shoes, and silk hats that came down almost to the tops of their ears!
Hindmann said very little—just listened, and smoked. Then, when I had finished, he turned away, looked rather steadily out the window, and muttered something about its being a queer world.
Later on, when it was about time for the Consul-General to arrive, he advised me to tell only of my earlier acquaintance with Crocker, of his drinking and his declared intent to do murder, of my happening to be on the stairway in the Hôtel de Chine when he came running up with a knife in his hand—and the rest in full.
“But,” I protested, “the Consul-General will suspect. There are too many coincidences in that story.”
“Of course there are,” said Hindmann. “And of course he'll see through them. He was n't born yesterday. But he won't say anything about that. Neither will you. And there you are.”
The Consul-General, with his secretary, arrived at four o'clock. He took possession at once of Crocker's effects, locked them in his room and put a seal on the door. Then he called all of us before him in the manager's private office—the two hotel men, Hindmann and myself—and in the course of an hour's steady questioning drew out the story.
After which I and the hotel men withdrew, leaving him with Hindmann for another hour. I don't know what was said; Hindmann has not referred to it since. But a messenger was sent to the Legation and I know that the Consul-General himself did some telephoning.
One curious fact came out during the examination in the manager's office. Before the automobile had got out of the little Chinese street on the way from the Hôtel de Chine, Crocker borrowed a pencil and wrote a few hasty sentences on the back of an envelope. The Consul-General asked for the paper; but no one had thought to look for it. It proved not to be in Crocker's pockets. The automobile was called; and there, sure enough, it was, on the floor of the tonneau, just where he had dropped it.