“You see,” he said, “Jud Cory told us the truth. When he arrived with the information that he knew of the money that was his, it was like plunging a knife into Boothy’s heart. Money has rather been Boothy’s god. The way to save the money came with Jud’s threat to kill him that so many persons overheard. Boothy went to the bank, drew out five thousand dollars, wrote the will and the note that you found, wrote himself the letter he showed you, and went to Baltimore to await the results he knew would follow. When it was discovered he was gone people remembered Jud’s threat. And so Jud was arrested, and you wrote Otis to come on, and the search began for a body that would never be found.
“Boothy had it figured out nicely. As Otis he would have five thousand dollars to live on. There was no hurry. Let Jud Cory stew in jail. He would never be tried for murder, for without a corpse no murder could be proved. Public opinion, though, might try Jud for threatening life, or for disturbing the peace, or for something else. He might even be sent to the county penitentiary for nine months. All right; let him go. When he was released he would be so sick of the game, so glad to be at liberty again, that he’d take the first train out and never come back. And then, after an interval, Boothy would reappear. What story would he have told? Well, he might have claimed a complete loss of memory—aphasia, as it is called. And there he’d be with his nine thousand dollars intact and Jud Cory gone for good.”
Captain Tucker had recovered from his chagrin. “I can see all that now, Doctor. But how did you know he was Boothy? Man, he had me completely fooled.”
“There were several signs,” Dr. Stone answered. “An apple orchard, for one; a hat for another. But the real give-away—” He passed the pipe under his nose and inhaled the aroma of the burning tobacco. “You wear false teeth, Captain?”
“What has that to do with it?” Captain Tucker demanded impatiently.
“Took you a while to get used to them, didn’t it?”
“Of course.”
“There’s the answer. Boothy didn’t take time to get used to them. They kept straggling out of place and interfering with his speech.”
“What are you talking about?” Captain Tucker cried impatiently. “False teeth?”
“No,” the blind man said mildly. “False whiskers.”