"The reason this is such a hard case," said old Gabe slowly, and choosing his words with care, "is because the murder ain"t completed yet. It"s being did."
"Right now?" exclaimed Philo excitedly. "Why, we oughtn"t to be sitting here like this. We ought--"
"Now, don"t be in such a hurry," said old Gabe. "If you mean we ought to be where the victim of the murder is, we are. He"s right here now.
I"m him. I"m the one that"s being murdered. I"m being murdered by slow murder. I"m liable to drop down dead any minute. But I don"t want to be murdered and not have the feller that murders me hang like he ought. I can"t be expected to. It ain"t human nature."
"No, it ain"t," agreed Philo. "A man can"t help feeling revengeful against the man that murders him. If anybody murdered me I"d feel the same way. How"s he killing you? Slow poison?"
"Gun-shot," said old Gabe. "Shootin" me to death with a gun."
The correspondence school detective looked at old Gabe with amazement.
"Shootin" you to death with a gun!" he exclaimed. "Ain"t you told the police?"
"I come to you, didn"t I?" asked old Gabe. "If I was to set the police on the feller he might rouse up and shoot me to death all at once."
"How is he shootin" you to death?" asked Philo.
"By inches, b"gee," said old Gabe. "Yes, sir, by inches. Every once in a while he takes a shot at me. Sometimes through the window of my house, and sometimes when I"m walkin" on the street."
"And he ain"t ever hit you yet?" asked Philo Gubb.
"Hit me?" exclaimed old Gabe. "Why, he don"t ever miss me. He hits me every time. There ain"t a day he don"t shoot and hit me, and some days he hits me two or three times. I dare say I"m almost dead now, if I knowed it."
Philo Gubb fondled his notebook uncertainly.
"What--what does he shoot you with?" he asked.
"Well, I dunno exactly," said old Gabe. "With a pea-shooter."
Philo Gubb closed his notebook, and slipped it into his pocket.
"If all you was after was to get that two dollars and ten cents, you might have got it without wastin" so much of my time," he said reproachfully.
But old Gabe did not move.
"What"s the matter?" he asked.
"Maybe I"m a fool," Gubb said bitterly, "but I ain"t no such fool as to think anybody is murdering n.o.body with a pea-shooter."
"Was you ever shot with a cannon?" asked old Gabe calmly.
"No, nor n.o.body ever tried to murder me with a pea-shooter," said Philo Gubb.
"If you ever _was_ shot by a thirteen-inch cannon ball," said old Gabe, "you"d know it. When a thirteen-inch cannon ball hits you, there ain"t nothin" left of you at all. But when a one-inch cannon ball hits you, you"ve got a chance to live a minute or two, maybe. That"s the difference between a thirteen-inch cannon ball shootin" you, and a one-inch cannon ball shootin" you. And a rifle ball is different, too."
"I got a job of paper-hangin" as soon as I can get away from here,"
said Philo Gubb meaningly.
"You got a job of detectin" on hand now," said old Gabe. "And, as I was sayin", a rifle ball acts different. Maybe it kills you the first shot, and maybe you can hold three or four rifle bullets before you die, but if they keep on shootin" at you, you get killed sooner or later. Probably five shots is all any man could stand. I guess that"s about it.
[Ill.u.s.tration: "THERE AIN"T A DAY HE DON"T SHOOT AND HIT ME"]
"And then you come down to one of them little twenty-two caliber revolvers. If he don"t hit you in the heart, a murderer could easy enough shoot at you twenty-five times with one of them little twenty-two"s before he killed you dead. But you"d be dead sooner or later. It"s just a matter of what a man shoots you with that makes the difference in time.
"Of course," he continued agreeably, "you don"t expect no pea-shooter to kill me as quick as a thirteen-inch gun would. If you expect that you"re unreasonable. But the principle is just the same. Shootin" is shootin". You know how that pome goes--
"The constant drip of water Wears away the hardest stone--"
and that"s just as true of murderin" a man with a pea-shooter.
"And the beauty of it is that n.o.body knows you"re committin" a murder.
If anybody catches you and asks you what you"re doin" you just say, "Oh, nothin". Just shootin" peas.""
"Maybe that"s so," agreed Philo Gubb. "It sounds reasonable. But the thing for me to do is to wait until you"re dead and then catch the feller. It ain"t a murder until you"re dead."
"It ain"t, ain"t it?" sneered old Gabe. "You"d wait until I am dead, I suppose, and then start out to catch the feller. And you"d lose all the help I can give you. It ain"t often a detective can get the corpse to help him like this."
"No, it ain"t," agreed Philo Gubb.
"I got a suspicion who the feller is," said Gabe.
"Who?" asked Philo Gubb.
"You"ll go ahead with the case? On the terms we settled on?" asked old Gabe.
Philo Gubb considered this carefully.
"Why, yes," he said at length, "I will. Who is the feller you think is doin" it?"
"Farrin"ton Pierce, the cashier of the Farmers" and Citizens" Bank,"
said old Gabe, his eyes shining with malice and shrewdness, as he leaned forward and whispered the words. "My own son-in-law, he is. An"
I"ll tell you why he"s tryin" it. For my money. So his wife"ll get it, an" he can be president of the bank in my place."
"You"ve seen him have a pea-shooter?" asked Philo Gubb.
"No, sir!" said old Gabe. "And I never seen one of the peas. All I ever felt was the sting of it when it hit me."
"Maybe," said Philo Gubb eagerly, "maybe it ain"t a pea-shooter. Maybe it"s a twenty-two short pistol with a silencer onto it. Maybe it"s only because he"s been afraid to come nigh enough to you that he ain"t killed you yet. It don"t seem to me that any man would try to murder any one with a pea-shooter."
"Humph!" said old Gabe. "Maybe you are right, at that. That"s something I never thought of. It sounds likely, too."
"A deteckative has to think of all them things," said Philo simply.
"If I was you I"d be more careful."
"I will!" said old Gabe. "See here, if he"s shootin" at me like that, it ain"t no joke, is it? Tell you what I"ll do. I"ll let you off from payin" me that dollar five a day. Just you hustle onto this case and keep at it, and I"ll leave you work on it for nothin". All I want is that you should send me word reg"lar of what you find out."
"It is the custom of all the graduates of the Rising Sun Correspondence School deteckatives to make reg"lar reports in writing," said Philo Gubb. "I"ll start right in shadowing and trailing Mister Farrington Pierce, according to Lessons Three and Four, and I"ll report reg"lar every day."