Ah! And he planned to use the safer taxicab, apparently, rather than the truck; and it seemed to Hobart Hitchin that the driver knew his full errand and demanded his share in advance, because Wilkins handed him money. After that, without effort, because David Prentiss had been light and slender in life, Wilkins took his ghastly burden into the back of the cab and drove away.
But Hobart Hitchin, the relentless, was just twenty yards behind, and his driver, spurred by a ten-dollar bill, bent forward and watched every turn of the wheels as he followed. Thus they left the region of the Lasande--and since we all have our personal dreams, it was right enough for Hobart Hitchin to sit back and indulge his own.
As a millionaire now and then makes himself part and parcel of the local fire-department, following faithfully to every blaze, answering every alarm, so Hobart Hitchin, with a patrimony that rendered real work absurd, dreamed of the day when he should be recognized as the most eminent private expert in crime these great United States have ever held.
Mistily, he had been able time and time again to visualize himself, spectacles and all, surrounded by perturbed policemen who had come to the end of their rope in crime detection, who listened respectfully while he expounded the elements of the particular case in hand. But the mists were almost gone now; this brilliant morning, for the very first time, Hobart Hitchin had picked off a live one.
Yes, and it grew more and more live every second, for instead of heading downtown, and trying--as Hobart Hitchin had fully expected--to ship the trunk by express to some out-of-town point, Wilkins had made his way to West End Avenue!
This in itself was very curious; it did not even suggest that Wilkins was headed out of town with the remains; and it did not even hint at the astounding thing which followed, several blocks farther uptown! As the taxi stopped at Theodore Dalton"s side gate, Hitchin all but fell from his cab as he craned forward!
By some lucky accident, he knew that house, and knew, in a general way, of its owner. This was the liniment king--and Anthony Fry was the owner of Fry"s Imperial Liniment; there was a link as of solid steel, made of liniment only, yet utterly unbreakable!
What did it mean? What _could_ it mean?
Hitchin leaned back for an instant and closed his eyes, giving his mighty brain the freest rein of its existence, urging it with every fiber in him to hit upon the correct theory.
And then, eyes opening, it almost seemed that he had hit upon it! These two, Dalton and Fry, were doubtless a.s.sociated in business, whatever the supposed rivalry. Was it not thinkable that the devilish messes of one or the other had ruined the health of the Prentiss boy? Was it not possible that Anthony, luring him to his home, had been trying to buy him off from a threatened suit--get a quit-claim or something of that kind? For that matter, could it be anything else? The boy had refused and--big business had wiped out another individual!
He might well enough be wrong, but if wrong he were, why was Wilkins taking the trunk straight into the premises of Theodore Dalton? He had done that now, and now the gate had closed upon him, and Hobart Hitchin, suddenly determined on the most spectacular act of his life, tapped his driver on the shoulder.
"Go around to the front of this house--yes, the corner one!" he said, and there was a little shake in his voice.
His path was clear enough. Anthony Fry would not seek to escape as yet; they never did at this stage when they fancied the crime itself safely out of the way. Anthony would be there when wanted--and single-handed, Hobart Hitchin meant to take into custody the two most sensational murderers of their generation!
It was a tremendous thing. By the time he had stepped up to the s.p.a.cious door of Theodore Dalton"s home, the tremendousness of it had so overcome Hobart Hitchin that he could not have reasoned out the two times two multiplication table! He was for the time a man bereft of what most of us consider senses, so that he walked straight past Bates and said:
"Mr. Dalton!"
"You"re bringing word, sir?" Bates cried.
"I wish to see Mr. Dalton. He is at home," said Hitchin.
Bates considered for a moment and then nodded; it was no morning for quibbling.
"In here, sir!" he said, pattering off quickly to Dalton"s study.
He pattered out again as quickly, and Hobart Hitchin, having taken a chair, rose from it at once and took to walking, brief-case still clutched in his hand and an exalted smile on his lips. So Theodore Dalton found him when he entered, fifteen seconds later--a mighty man, deep of chest, savage of eye, square of chin, with great hairy hands and a s.h.a.ggy gray head. Not more than a single second did Dalton look at Hitchin before he barked:
"Well? Well? You are bringing word of her?"
"Her?" smiled Hobart Hitchin, with unearthly calm.
"My daughter!" Theodore Dalton thundered. "What----"
"I know nothing about your daughter, Dalton," Hitchin said, with his icy smile. "Will you be seated?"
"No!" said the master of the house. "What the devil do you want here, if it isn"t about my daughter?"
"I want just five minutes conversation with you, on a matter which concerns you most vitally."
Theodore Dalton closed his hairy fists.
"Look here, sir," he said, with a calm of his own which was decidedly impressive. "If you"re jacka.s.s enough to come in here on the morning when my daughter--_my daughter_--has disappeared--if you"re clown enough to try to sell me anything----"
"I"m not trying to sell you anything; I"m trying to tell you something!"
Hitchin said, and there was something so very peculiar about his smile that even Theodore Dalton postponed the forcible eviction for a few minutes.
"Tell me what?"
"Dalton," said Hobart Hitchin, "the game is up!"
"_What?_" rasped Mr. Dalton.
"The boy, David Prentiss--or what remains of the boy, David Prentiss--has just been brought into your house. _And I know!_"
Theodore Dalton said nothing; for a moment he could say nothing.
Hitchin"s teeth showed in a triumphant smile.
"Murder will out!" said he. "Murder----"
"_Murder!_" Theodore Dalton snarled. "What the----"
"David Prentiss, who was murdered last night, has been brought here!"
the palpable lunatic pursued. "Don"t shout! Don"t try to strike me!
_Look!_"
Already he had opened the brief-case; now, with a dramatic whisk, he spread the trousers on the table.
And if he looked for an effect upon Dalton, the effect was there even in excess of any expectation! Theodore Dalton, after one quick downward glance, cried out queerly, thickly, far down in his throat! His eyes seemed to start from his head; his hands, going out together, s.n.a.t.c.hed up the trousers and held them nearer to the window. With a jerk, Theodore Dalton turned one of the rear pockets inside out and looked swiftly at the little linen name-plate sewed therein by the tailor who had made them.
The trousers dropped from his fingers and Theodore Dalton collapsed!
Gray, gasping, unable to speak at first, he crumpled into the chair beside the table and stared up numbly at Hobart Hitchin, who smiled just as he had always meant to smile in the event of such a moment coming before his death.
"You--you!" Dalton choked. "You say--the wearer of those trousers has been _murdered_?"
"As you know," said Hobart Hitchin. "The boy----"
"A boy about twenty-two, smooth shaven--a nice kid--a boy with a shock of brown hair and--and----" Theodore Dalton cried, in a queer, broken little voice, as he gripped the table. "No! No! Not that boy!"
"That boy!" said Hitchin. "David Prentiss!"
Dalton"s whole soul seemed to burst!
"It was no David Prentiss!" he cried. "My--my daughter"s gone and now my only son has been murdered!"