Three days later at the New York pier the man who had interrupted Howard was arrested for murder committed four years before. “I was once a member of the force,” explained Winton to Howard; “that stiletto was never found until he told where to look for it that night in the smoking-room.”
THE UNANSWERED CALL
By Thomas T. Hoyne
Six months of married life had not staled the two great adventures in each week day of Delia Hetherington’s placid existence—the morning leavetaking and the evening return of her husband. His departure was a climax of lingering kisses, admonitions, and exhortations; his return a triumph. Did he not put all to the touch with Fortune at every parting and go forth to strive all day, a dauntless hero, ’mid motor juggernauts and rushing trolley cars, ’neath dangling safes and dropping tiles, beside treacherous pitfalls and yawning manholes? But ever he bore a charmed life and returned to his love in the dark of the evening with thrilling tales of his salesmanship and of repartee to his boss.
Delia hummed a plaintive, childish melody as she set the little, round dining-table for two persons. As is the habit of brides, she laid the places side by side instead of opposite each other. A light shadow of curiosity flickered across her mind, and she carefully laid a saucer on the table to note the effect of a third place. She snatched it up again, blushing, although there was no one else in all the length and breadth of the four-room apartment where she and Fred, upheld by the installment plan, had built their nest. She resumed her singing, bird-like in its thin simplicity. Such a song, one could imagine, Mrs. Cock Robin sang while awaiting the home-coming of her mate.
A soft knocking at the back door drew Delia from happy contemplation of the glistening forks that lay beside the two plates on the dining-room table. She hurried into the kitchen, wisely remembering Fred’s insistence that she must never unlock the screen door to a stranger before she discovered his design. No well-dressed youth seeking to pay his way through college by getting subscriptions for “The Woman’s Life and Fashion Bazaar” could find in his patter the countersign to win him admittance; no grizzled gypsy with shining tins to barter for old shoes knew the magic word to make the hook fly up under Delia’s cautious hand.
But the man who stood on the narrow porch, panting like a Marathon runner, was none of these.
“The steps,” he gasped, pressing one hand over his heart, “too much for me.”
To climb the four flights of stairs to the Hetherington apartment at the top of the building was a test for a strong man. He who knocked at the screen door was slight in build and looked ill.
With quick sympathy Delia unhooked the door and pushed it open.