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Roy Glashan's Library
Non sibi sed omnibus
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Cosmopolitan, July 1915, with "The Sleep-maker"
Craig Kennedy, supreme expert in those subtle methods of crime which recent investigations and discoveries of scientists have made possible, and even—it is not too much to say—practical, scents a really new experience when the perturbed Broadhurst comes to him. And, as events prove, he is quite right. Little did the great scientist from Berlin think, when he gave the results of his research to the world, that such use would be made of his discovery. As Kennedy says, not even the most expert physician or chemist would ever suspect the cause of the death which his own detective insight and scientific knowledge enable him to uncover.
"PERHAPS race-horses may be a little out of your line, Mr. Kennedy, but I think you will find the case sufficiently interesting to warrant you in taking it up."
Our visitor was a young man, one of the most carefully groomed and correctly dressed I have ever met. His card told us that we were honored by a visit from Montague Broadhurst, a noted society whip, who had lavished many thousands of dollars on his racing-stable out on Long Island.
"You see," he went on hurriedly, "there have been a good many strange things that have happened to my horses lately." He paused a moment, then continued: "They have been losing consistently. Take my favorite, Lady Lee, for instance."
"Do you think they have been doped?" asked Kennedy quickly, eager to get down to the point at issue, for I had never known Craig to be interested in racing.
"I don't know," replied the young millionaire, drawing his eyelids together reflectively. "I've had the best veterinary in the country to look my stable over, and he can't seem to find a thing that's wrong."
"Perhaps a visit out there might show us something," cut in Kennedy, as though he were rather favorably impressed, after all, by the novelty of the case. Broadhurst's face brightened. "Then you will take it up—you are interested?" he queried, adding, "My car is outside."
"I'm interested in anything that promises a new experience," returned Craig, "and I think this affair may be of that sort."
Broadhurst's stable was out on central Long Island, not far from the pretty and fashionable town of Northbury. As we passed down the main street, I could see that Broadhurst was easily the most popular of the wealthy residents of the neighborhood. In fact, the Broadhurst racing-stables were a sort of local industry, one of the show-places of Northbury.
As we swung out again into the country, we could see ahead of us some stable-boys working out several fine thoroughbreds on Broadhurst's private track, while a group of grooms and rubbers watched them.
The stable itself was a circular affair of frame, painted dark red, which contrasted sharply with the green of the early-summer trees. Broadhurst's car pulled up before a large office and lounging-room at one end, above which Murchie, his manager and trainer, had his suite of rooms.
The office into which Broadhurst led us was decidedly "horsy." About the place were handsomely mounted saddles, bridles, and whips, more for exhibition than for use. In velvet-lined cases were scores of glittering bits. All the appointments were brass-mounted. Sporting-prints, trophies, and Mission easy chairs made the room most attractive.
Before a desk sat Murchie. As I looked at him, I thought that he had a cruel expression about his eyes, a predatory mouth and chin. He rose quickly at the sight of Broadhurst.
"Murchie, I would like to have you meet my friends, Mr. Kennedy and Mr. Jameson," introduced Broadhurst. "They are very much interested in horses, and I want you to show them about the place and let them see everything."
We chatted a moment, and then went out to look at the horses.
In the center of the circular group of stalls was a lawn. The stalls of the racers in training were large box stalls.
"You have certainly trained a great horse in Lady Lee," remarked Kennedy casually, as we made our way around the ring of stalls.
Murchie looked up at him quickly.
"Until the last few races, I thought so," he replied, stopping before the stall of the famous racer and opening the door.
Lady Lee was a splendid three-year-old bay, a quivering, sensitive, high-strung animal. Murchie looked at her moment, then at us.
"A horse, you know," he said reflectively, "is just as ambitious to win a race as you are to win success, but must have hard training. I keep horses in training eight or nine months out of the year. I get them into shape in the early spring and am very careful what they eat. If they get a vacation, they may eat green foods, carrots, and grass in open field; but when we prepare them for the ring or a race, they must have grain, bran, and soft foods. They must have careful grooming to put the coats in first-class condition, must be kept exquisitely clean, with the best ventilation."
"How about exercise?" asked Kennedy.
"Well," replied Murchie, "I work out horses according to age, with the distance for fast work gradually increased."
Our trip through the wonderful stable over, we returned to the office, Murchie walking ahead with Broadhurst. As we reached the door, Broadhurst turned to us.
"I hope you will pardon me," he said, "but there is some business up at the house that I must attend to."
"Oh, Mr. Broadhurst," interjected Murchie, "before you go back to town, I want to talk over with you some of the changes that ought to be made about the boys here, as well as their food and quarters."
"All right," returned Broadhurst, "jump into the car and ride with me. We can talk on the way, and you can come right back. I'll pick you gentlemen up later."
Kennedy nodded, quick to perceive the cue that Broadhurst had given him to watch the stables without Murchie watching us.
We sat down in the office, and I looked about at the superb fittings.
"Do you think it is possible for an owner to make a financial success of racing without betting?" I asked Kennedy.
"Possible, but highly improbable," returned Craig. "I believe they consider that they have an excellent year whenever they clear expenses. I don't know about Broadhurst, but I believe that a good many owners don't bet on their horses. They have seen the glaring crookedness of the thing, especially if they have happened to be officers of jockey clubs or stewards of various race-meets. Personally, I should think a man of Broadhurst's stamp would not permit himself to be made a victim of the leeches of the turf—although he may wager a bit, just to give zest to the race. American racing has often been called a purely gambling affair, and I think, before we get through, that we shall see the reason for much of the public opposition to it."
Just then a small man entered the office, and, seeing us, asked for Mr. Murchie. His face was pinched and thin. He wore the latest cut of clothes, but was so very slight that his garments hung loosely on him. One could well imagine that he had tried all sorts of schemes to keep himself down toward the hundred-and-ten-or-twelve-pound mark. He was the very type of jockey. He introduced himself to us as Danny McGee, and I recognized at once the famous twenty-five-thousand-dollar-a-year rider who had so often successfully defended the Broadhurst colors.
"Mr. Murchie has gone up to the house," replied Kennedy to his inquiry.
McGee looked us over a minute.
"Friends of his?" he asked, in a confidential tone. Kennedy smiled.
"Of Mr. Broadhurst's," he said quietly.
There was a noticeable change in McGee's manner.
"Just out here to look the stable over," went on Kennedy; "a wonderful place."
"Yes; we think so," assented McGee.
"It seems strange," ventured Kennedy, "that, with all this care, Lady Lee should not be keeping up to her record."
McGee glanced at us keenly.
"I don't understand it myself," he said. "I suppose lots of people must think it is the fault of the jockey, but I have certainly earned my salary lately with that filly. I don't know what's the matter. I've done the best I can, but there's something wrong."
He spoke with an air of genuine worry, and, although I tried hard, I must confess that I found it impossible to fathom him.
"The filly," he added, "has her regular work-out and the regular feed, and yet she seems to be all tired out most of the time. Even the veterinaries can't seem to find out what's the matter."
An awkward silence followed, during which both Kennedy and myself endeavored to conceal our ignorance of horses by saying nothing about them. Finally, McGee rose and excused himself, saying that he would be back soon.
There were still a few minutes before Murchie would be likely to return. Without saying a word, Kennedy rose and opened the door which led into the stable. Across the lawn in the center we could see a man's figure rapidly retreating through the main entrance, and, somehow or other, I felt that at the sound of the opening of our door he hastened his pace.
Kennedy walked quickly around the circle of box stalls until he came again to Lady Lee. He entered the stall and looked the famous racer over carefully. I was wondering what, if anything, he expected to find, when, almost before I knew it, I saw him jab a little hypodermic needle into her neck and withdraw a few drops of blood.
Lady Lee reared and snorted, but Kennedy managed to quiet her. He returned the hypodermic, with these few drops of blood, carefully into its case again, and we made our way back to the office.
A few minutes later, the drone of Broadhurst's car told us that Murchie had returned. We resumed the talk about horses, up-stairs in Murchie's own apartment, which consisted of living-rooms, a library, and bath. It was a luxuriously appointed place, in keeping with the tastes of its occupant. We sat down in the library.
I was quite interested in looking about me. For one thing, Murchie's idea of art seemed to be a curious blending of horse and woman. There were pictures of all the string of Broadhurst winners, interspersed with Venuses and actresses.
On a little table I noticed, at length, a colored photograph in an oval gilt frame. It was of a very beautiful girl. She was something over medium height, with a fine figure, golden hair, and deep-blue eyes. Somehow, I recalled that I had seen that face before, and when I caught Kennedy looking at it from time to time, I was certain of it.
Suddenly it flashed over me that the picture had been published in the Star. It was Cecilie Safford. I remembered having read of Murchie's escapades, one of which was his elopement with a pretty young stenographer whom he had met at the horse show a couple of years before.
The talk ran along about horses still, but I noticed that Kennedy was even more interested in Murchie's pictures, now, than in his conversation. In the place of honor, over the mantel, hung a portrait, in an artistic panel, of a slender girl with dark hair and hazel eyes, with a soft, swanlike throat and neck, and a somewhat imperious manner of carrying her head.
I followed Craig's glance across the room. There, in a frame upon the wall in a corner, hung an enlargement of a group-photograph. It was of a middle-aged woman, a little boy, and a little girl. Then I remembered the whole story.
At the time of his elopement, Murchie had a wife living. Since then he had been divorced. Although he had promised to marry Cecilie when the divorce was obtained, he was now engaged to marry a wealthy girl, Amélie Guernsey.
Broadhurst returned shortly for us, and we made another tour of the stable, on the outside, including the quarters of the innumerable employees. Finally, at a hint from Kennedy that we had seen enough for the present, Broadhurst motored back to the city with us. That night, instead of going to the laboratory, we walked down Broadway until we came to a hotel much frequented by the sporting fraternity.
"Let's go in here," said Kennedy.
We entered the restaurant, which was one of the most brilliant in the white-light region, took a seat at a table, and Kennedy proceeded to ingratiate himself with the waiter, and, finally, with the head waiter. At last, I saw why Kennedy was apparently wasting so much time over dinner.
"Do you happen to know that girl, Cecilie Safford, that Broadhurst's trainer, Murchie, eloped with?" he asked.
The head waiter nodded.
"I used to know her," he replied. "She used to come in here a good deal, but you won't find her in the Broadway places any more these days. She's more likely to be over on Eighth Avenue." He mentioned the name of a cabaret saloon.
Kennedy paid the check and again we started out. We finally entered a place, down in a basement, and once more Kennedy began to quiz the waiter.
This time he had no trouble. Across the room, the waiter pointed to a girl, seated with a young fellow at a round table. I could scarcely believe what I saw. The face had the same features as that of the photograph in the oval gilt frame in Murchie's apartment, but it was not the same face.
As I studied her, I could imagine her story without even hearing it. The months of waiting for Murchie to marry her and his callous refusal had been her ruin. Cecilie had learned to drink, and from that had gone to drugs.
Her mirror must have told her that she was not the same girl who had eloped with Murchie. Her figure had lost its slim, beautiful lines. Her features were bloated. Her eyes were smaller, and her lips were heavy. Her fresh color had disappeared. She had a gray, pasty look. All she had—her beauty—had vanished.
Murchie had been divorced, and was about to marry—but not Cecilie. It was to a young and lovely girl, with such a face of innocence as Cecilie had when Murchie had first dictated a letter to her in the office at the horse show, and had fascinated her with his glittering talk of wealth and ease. The news of his engagement had driven her frantic.
Curiously enough, the young fellow with her did not seem to be dissipated in the least. There was, on the contrary, an earnestness about him that one was rather sorry to see in such a place. In fact, he was a clean-cut young man, evidently more of a student than a sport. He reminded me of some one I had seen before.
I was getting rather interested in an underworld cabaret when, suddenly, Kennedy grasped my arm. At the same moment, a shot was fired.
We jumped to our feet in time to see a young tough, with a slouch like that of the nibbers and grooms at Broadhurst's. The fellow who had been seated with Cecilie was struggling with him for the possession of a pistol, which had been discharged harmlessly. Evidently the tough had been threatening him with it.
The fellow who had been seated with Cecilie was
struggling with him for the possession of a pistol.
The waiters crowded around them, and the general mêlée about Cecilie's table was at its height when a policeman came dashing in on the run.
The arrest of the gunman and his opponent, as well as of Cecilie as a witness, seemed imminent. Kennedy moved forward slowly, working his way through the crowd, nearer to the table. Instead of interfering, however, he stooped down and picked up something from the floor.
"Let's get out of this as quickly as possible, Walter," he whispered, turning to me.
When we reached the Street, he stopped under an arc-light, and I saw him dive down into his pocket and pull out a little glass vial. He looked at it curiously.
"I saw her take it out of her pocketbook and throw it into a corner as soon as the policeman came in," he explained.
"What do you think it is?" I asked. "Dope? That's what they all do if they get a chance when they are pinched—throw it away."
"Perhaps," answered Kennedy. "But it's worth studying to see what drug she is really using."
Late as it was, Craig insisted on going directly to the laboratory to plunge into work. First, he took the little hypodermic needle with which he had drawn several drops of blood from the race-horse, and emptied the contents into a test-tube.
Finding that I was probably of more use at home in our apartment asleep than bothering Kennedy in the laboratory, I said good-night. But when I awoke in the morning, I found that Kennedy had not been in bed at all.
It was as I expected. He had worked all night, and, as I entered the laboratory, I saw him engaged in checking up two series of tests which he had been making.
"Have you found anything yet?" I asked.
He pointed to a corner where he kept a couple of guinea-pigs. They were sound asleep, rolled up in little fluffy balls of down. Ordinarily, in the morning, I found the little fellows very frisky.
"Yes," he said; "I think I have found something. I have injected just a drop of blood from Lady Lee into one of them, and I think he's good for a long sleep."
"But how about the other one?" I asked.
"That's what puzzles me," ruminated
Kennedy. "Do you remember that bottle I picked up last night? I haven't finished the analysis of the blood or of the contents of the bottle, but they seem to contain at least some of the same substances. Among the things I find are monopotassium phosphate and sarcolactic acid, with just a trace of carbon dioxide. I injected some of the liquid from the bottle into the other fellow, and you see the effect—the same in both cases."
The telephone-bell rang excitedly.
"Is there a Mr. Kennedy there?" asked Long Distance, adding, without waiting for an answer, "Hold the wire, please."
I handed the receiver to Kennedy. The conversation was short, and as he hung up the receiver, Craig turned to me.
"It was Broadhurst at the Idlewild Hotel," he said quickly. "To-day is the day of the great Interurban Handicap at Belmore Park with stakes of twenty-five thousand dollars. Usually they take the horses over to the track at least a week or two before the race, but as Broadhurst's stable is so near, he didn't do it—hoping he might keep a better watch over Lady Lee. But she's no better. If the horse is being tampered with, he wants to know who is doing it and how."
Kennedy paused a moment, then went over to a cabinet and took from it a bottle and a very large-sized hypodermic.
We must have been among the first on the field at Belmore Park that day. Lady Lee had been sent over there after we left Northbury the day before, under the care of Murchie and McGee, and had been stabled in the quarters on the track assigned to Broadhurst.
With Broadhurst, who was waiting for us, we lounged across the field in the direction of the stables. There was no doubt about it, Lady Lee was not in prime condition. It was not that there was anything markedly wrong, but to the trained observer the famous race-horse seemed to lack just a trifle of the élan which meant a win.
While Murchie and the jockey were talking outside to Broadhurst, Kennedy slipped into the stall to look at the racer.
"Stand over by that side of the door, Walter," he muttered. "I'll be through in just a minute. I want you to act as a cover."
Quickly he jabbed the hypodermic into the horse and pressed down the plunger.
Lady Lee reared and snorted as she had done before when he extracted the blood, and instantly Murchie and McGee were crowding past me. But the instant had been long enough for Kennedy. He had dropped the hypodermic into his pocket and was endeavoring to soothe the horse.
"I guess she's not very much used to strangers," he remarked coolly. No one thought any more of it, apparently.
A few minutes later, Broadhurst rejoined Kennedy and myself. I could see that his face showed plainly he was greatly worried.
"I don't understand it," he kept repeating. "And what is worse, the news seems to have leaked out that Lady Lee isn't fit. The odds are going up."
Kennedy looked at him fixedly a moment.
"If you want to win this race, Mr. Broadhurst," he remarked, in a low tone, "I should advise you to watch Lady Lee every minute from now until the start."
"What do you mean?" whispered Broadhurst hoarsely.
"I can't say yet—only watch."
While Broadhurst and Kennedy hovered about the stall on one pretext or another, watching both Murchie and McGee as they directed the rubbers and others who were preparing for the race, I watched the trainer and the jockey minutely. They certainly did nothing, at least now, to excite suspicion. But might not the harm have already been done? Was it too late?
When the bell sounded the paddock call, McGee led the racer out of the stall and to the paddock. Presently the field, Lady Lee at the fore, walked past the grandstand and cantered slowly down the course to the starting-post.
Meanwhile, following Broadhurst, we had already made our way over to the clubhouse enclosure.
It was not like the old days when there was money everywhere, thousands of dollars in plain sight, in the cash-boxes of the book-makers, when men rushed wildly about with handfuls of bills of large denomination and bets were made with frequent rapidity. And yet there was still a certain maelstrom of the betting-ring left; but the book-makers had to carry everything in their heads instead of setting it down on paper. I knew the system, and knew that, in spite of the apparent ease with which it seemed possible to beat it, welshing was almost unheard of.
The grandstand was crowded, although it was quite a different crowd from that at race-meets of former times and on other tracks. Belmore Park lay within motoring-distance of the greatest aggregation of wealth and fashion in the country. It was a wonderful throng. The gay dresses of the women mingled kaleidoscopically with the more somber clothing of the men.
Every eye in that sea of moving humanity seemed to be riveted on Lady Lee and her rider. It was a pretty good example of how swiftly inside news at the race-track may become public property. Ill news, on this occasion, seemed to have traveled apace. Field-glasses were leveled at the horse which should have been the favorite, and one could tell, by the buzz of conversation, that this race was the great event of the season. As the jockeys maneuvered for position, one could almost feel that some wonderful feats of memory were being performed by the bookmakers. The odds, during the morning, had gradually lengthened against Lady Lee.
Like all thoroughbreds, Lady Lee had a most delicate organism, and the good rider, in such a case, was the one who understood his mount. McGee had, in the past at least, that reputation. He had reached pretty near the top of his profession by knowing how to deal with horses of all types. All this and more I had picked up from the gossip of the track.
The barrier was sprung and the flag dropped. They were off! The grandstand rose in a body.
For a moment, it seemed to me that McGee had lost his nerve. Alertness at the post is an important factor. He had not got away from the barrier ahead of the field. Another rider, too, had got the rail, and hence the shortest route. I wondered whether, after all, that had been the trouble all along, for nothing can win or lose a race quicker or better than those little failures of the jockey himself.
Lady Lee, I had heard it said, was one of those horses that do not require urging but go to the front naturally. Just now, it did not seem that she was beaten but that she lacked just the power to lead the field. Did McGee figure that the horses ahead of him were setting such a fast clip that they would drop back to him before the race was over?
Cleverly, however, he avoided being pocketed, as those ahead of and beside him tried to close in and make him pull up.
Around they went until the horses looked to the naked eye like toys strung on wires. Only the tension of the crowd made one feel that this was no play; it was deadly serious sport. On they sped, watched in a lull of deathly stillness. Surely, I felt, this was indeed a great sight—this acid test of the nerves of men and animals pitted against one another.
They were coming into the stretch now!
Suddenly, it seemed that, by some telepathic connection, both the horse and the rider caught the electric tension which swayed us in the club-house enclosure.
I myself was carried away by the frenzied spirit of the race. Broadhurst was leaning forward, oblivious of everything else in the world, straining his eyes through a field-glass. Murchie was watching the race with a supercilious air, which I knew was clearly assumed.
On they came!
I could not help wondering whether McGee had not really planned to throw the race. Would he, perhaps at the last moment, lose his nerve?
Lady Lee suddenly shot through the field. A mighty shout rose from the entire grandstand.
Lady Lee suddenly shot through the field.
A mighty shout rose from the entire grandstand.
It was over in a matter of seconds. She had finished first by a half-length! She had won the classic and the rich stakes.
Pandemonium seemed to reign in the club-house enclosure. Broadhurst slapped Murchie over the back with a blow of congratulation that almost felled him. As for McGee, they nearly carried him off the field on their shoulders. Only Kennedy seemed to be calm. The race had been won—but had the problem been solved?
Broadhurst seemed to have forgotten all about his previous appeal to Kennedy in the unexpected joy of winning.
We paused awhile to watch the frantic crowd, and once, I recall, I caught sight of a stunning, dark-haired woman grasping Murchie's both hands in an ecstasy of joy. Instantly I recognized Amélie Guernsey.
As Kennedy and I motored back to the city alone, he was silent most of the way. Only once did he make a remark.
"The Belmore Inn," he said, as we passed a rather cheap road-house some distance from the track. "That's where I heard one of the rubbers say the former Mrs. Murchie was living."
That night, Craig plunged back again into work in the laboratory, and I, having nothing else to do, wrote a feature-story of the great race for the Star.
Kennedy made up for the rest he had lost and the strain of the day by a long sleep; but early in the morning the telephone-bell rang insistently. Kennedy bounded out of bed to answer it.
I could gather nothing from the monosyllables which he uttered, except that the matter under discussion was profoundly serious. Finally, he jammed down the receiver.
"Good God, Walter," he exclaimed, "Murchie's been murdered!"
He gave me no time for questions, and I had no ability to reconstruct my own theory of the case as we hustled into our clothes to catch the early-morning train.
"Broadhurst is at the Idlewild Hotel," Kennedy said, as we left the apartment, "and I think we can make it quicker by railway than by motor."
The turfman met us at the station. "Tell me, just what happened?" asked Kennedy.
"No one seems to understand just what it was," Broadhurst explained, "but, as nearly as I remember, Murchie was the lion of the Idlewild grill-room all the evening. He had 'come back.' Once, I recall, he was paged, and the boy told him some one was waiting outside. He went out, and returned, considerably flushed and excited.
"By George," he said, "a man never raises his head above the crowd but that there's somebody there to take a crack at it! There must have been some crank outside, for before I could get a look in the dark, I was seized. I managed to get away. I got a little scratch with a knife or a pin, though,' he said, dabbing at a cut on his neck."
"What then?" prompted Kennedy.
"None of us paid much attention to it," resumed Broadhurst, "until just as another toast was proposed to Lady Lee and some one suggested that Murchie respond to it, we turned to find him huddled up in his chair, absolutely unconscious. The house-physician could find nothing wrong apparently—in fact, said it was entirely a case of heart-failure. I don't think any of us would question his opinion if it had not been for Murchie's peculiar actions when he came back to the room that time."
Murchie's body had been removed to the local undertaking establishment. As Broadhurst drove up there and we entered, Kennedy seemed interested only in the little jab and a sort of swelling upon the neck of the dead man. Quickly he made a little incision beside it, and about ten or a dozen drops of what looked like blood-serum oozed out on a piece of gauze which Craig held.
As we turned to leave the undertaker's, a striking, dark-haired girl, with the color gone from her cheeks, hurried past us and fell on her knees beside Murchie's body. It was the woman who had congratulated him the day before, the woman of the panel—Amélie Guernsey.
I had not noticed, up to this point, another woman who was standing apart in the crowd, but now I happened to catch her eye. It was the woman whose picture with the two children hung in Murchie's apartment. Kennedy drew me back into the crowd, and there we watched the strange tragedy of the wife that was and the wife that was to have been.
Craig hurried back to the city after that, and, as we pushed our way up the ramp from the station, he looked hastily at his watch.
"Walter," he said, "I want you to locate Cecilie Safford and let me know at the laboratory the moment you find her. And perhaps it would be well to start at the police station."
It seemed to me as though the girl whom we had found so easily the evening before had now utterly disappeared. At the police station she had not been held, but had given an address which had proved fictitious. At the cabaret saloon no one had seen her since the incident of the fight.
As I left the place, I ran into Donovan, of the Tenderloin squad, and put the case to him. He merely laughed.
"Of course I could find her any time I wanted to," he said. "I knew that was a fake address."
He gave me the real address, and I hurried to the nearest telephone to call up Craig.
"Have Donovan bring her over here as soon as he can find her," he called back.
When I arrived at the laboratory, I found Kennedy engrossed in his tests.
"Have you found anything definite?" I asked anxiously.
He nodded, but would say nothing.
"I've telephoned Broadhurst," he remarked, a moment later. "You remember that the former Mrs. Murchie was at Belmore Inn. I have asked him to stop and get her on the way down here in the car with McGee, and to get Amélie Guernsey at the Idlewild, too." He continued to work. "And, oh yes," he added; "I have asked Inspector O'Connor to take up another line, too."
It was a strange gathering that assembled that forenoon. Donovan arrived soon after I did, and with him, sure enough, was Cecilie Safford. A few moments later, Broadhurst's car swung up to the door, and Broadhurst entered, accompanied by Amélie Guernsey. McGee followed, with the former Mrs. Murchie.
"I don't want another job like that," whispered Broadhurst to Kennedy. "I'm nearly frozen. Neither of those women has spoken a word since we started."
"You can hardly blame them," returned Kennedy.
Mrs. Murchie was still a handsome woman. She now carried herself with an air of assumed dignity. Amélie Guernsey had regained her color in the excitement of the ride and was, if anything, more beautiful than ever. But, as Broadhurst intimated, one could almost feel the frigidity of the atmosphere as the three women who had played such dramatic parts in Murchie's life sat there, trying to watch and, at the same time, avoid each other's gaze.
The suspense was relieved when O'Connor came in in a department car. With him were the young man who had been seated with Cecilie at the table the night of the fight and also the gunman.
"The magistrate in the night court settled the case that night," informed O'Connor, under his breath, laying down two slips of paper before Kennedy, "but I have their pedigrees. That fellow's name is Ronald Mawson," he said, pointing to Cecilie's companion, then indicating the gunman, "That's Frank Giani—Frank the Wop."
I watched Mawson and Cecilie closely, but could discover nothing. They scarcely looked at each other.
McGee, however, glared at both Mawson and the gunman, though none of them said a word.
"They used to be out there as stable-boys at Broadhurst's," I heard O'Connor continue, in a whisper. "I think they had a run-in and were fired. Each says the other got him in wrong."
A moment later Kennedy began.
"When you came to my laboratory the other day, Mr. Broadhurst," he said, "you remarked that perhaps this case might be a little out of my line but that I might find it sufficiently interesting. I can assure you that I have not only found it interesting but astounding. I have seldom had the privilege of unraveling a mystery which was so cleverly rigged and in which there are so many cross-currents of human passion."
"Then you think Lady Lee was doped?" asked Broadhurst.
"Doped?" interjected McGee quickly. "Why, Mr. Broadhurst, you remember what the veterinary said. He couldn't find any signs of heroin or any other dope they use."
"That's the devilish ingenuity of it all," shot out Kennedy suddenly, holding up a little beaker in which there was some colorless fluid. "I am merely going to show you now what can be done by the use of one of the latest discoveries of physiological chemistry."
He took a syringe and, drawing back the plunger, filled it with the liquid. With a slight jab of cocaine to make the little operation absolutely painless, he injected the fluid into the livelier of our two guinea-pigs.
"While you and Murchie were absent the first day that I went out to your stable, I succeeded in drawing off some of the blood of Lady Lee," Craig resumed, talking to Broadhurst. "Here, in my laboratory, I have studied it. Lady Lee, that day, had had no more than the ordinary amount of exercise, yet she was completely fagged."
By this time the little guinea-pig had become more and more listless and was now curled up sound asleep.
"I have had to work very hurriedly this morning," Craig continued, "but it has only been covering ground over which I have already gone. I was already studying a peculiar toxin. And from the fluid I obtained from Murchie's body, I have been able to calculate that a deadly dose of that same powerful poison killed him."
Kennedy plunged directly from this startling revelation into his proof.
"Perhaps you have heard of the famous German scientist, Weichardt, of Berlin," he resumed, "and his remarkable investigations into the toxin of fatigue. Scientists define fatigue as the more or less complete loss of the power of muscles to respond to stimulation due to their normal activity. An interval of rest is usually enough to bring about their return to some degree of power. But for complete return to normal condition, a long interval may be necessary.
"As the result of chemical changes which occur in a muscle from contraction, certain substances are formed which depress or inhibit the power of contraction. Extracts made from the fatigued muscles of one frog, for instance, when injected into the circulation of another frog bring on an appearance of fatigue in the latter. Extracts from unfatigued muscles give no such results. More than that, the production of this toxin of fatigue by the exercise of one set of muscles, such as those of the legs in walking, greatly diminishes the amount of work obtainable from other unused muscles, such as those of the arms."
Kennedy went on, looking at the sleeping guinea-pig rather than at us:
"Weichardt has isolated from fatigued muscles a true toxin of a chemical and physical nature, like the bacterial toxins, which, when introduced into the blood, gives rise to the phenomena of fatigue. This is the toxin of fatigue—kenotoxin. Those who have studied the subject have found at least three fatigue-substances—free sarcolactic acid, carbon dioxide, and monopotassium phosphate, which is so powerful that, after the injection of one-fifteenth of a gram, the poisoned muscle shows signs of fatigue and is scarcely able to lift a weight easily lifted in normal conditions. Other fatigue-products may be discovered; but, if present in large quantity or in small quantity for a long time, each of the substances I have named will cause depression or fatigue of muscles.
"Further than that," continued Kennedy, "the depressing influence of these substances on what is known as striated muscle—heart-muscle—is well known. The physican at the Idlewild might very well have mistaken the cause of the relaxation of Murchie's heart. For German investigators have also found that the toxin of fatigue, when injected into the circulation of a fresh animal, may not only bring on fatigue but may even cause death—as it did finally here."
Kennedy paused. "Lady Lee," he said, looking from one to the other of his audience keenly, "Lady Lee was the first victim of the fiendish cunning of this—"
A shrill voice interrupted.
"But Lady Lee won the race!"
It was McGee, the jockey. Kennedy looked at him a moment, then tapped another beaker on the table before him.
"Weichardt has also obtained, by the usual methods," he replied, "an antitoxin with the power of neutralizing the fatigue-properties of the toxin. You thought Lady Lee was not friendly with strangers that morning at the track. She was not, when the stranger jabbed a needle into her neck and pumped an extra large dose of the antitoxin of fatigue into her just in time to neutralize, before the race, the long series of injections of fatigue toxin."
Kennedy was now traveling rapidly toward the point which he had in view. He drew from his pocket the little bottle which he had picked up that night in the cabaret saloon.
"One word more," he said, as he held up the bottle and faced Cecilie Safford, who was now trembling like a leaf ready to fall: "If one with shattered nerves were unable to sleep, can you imagine what would be a most ideal sedative—especially if to take almost any other drug would be merely to substitute that habit for another?"
He waited a moment, then answered his own question.
"Naturally," he proceeded, "it might be, theoretically at least, a small dose of those products of fatigue by which nature herself brings on sleep. I am not going into the theory of the thing. The fact that you had such a thing is all that interests me."
I watched the girl's eyes as they were riveted on Kennedy. She seemed to be fascinated, horrified.
"This bottle contains a weak solution of the toxin of fatigue," persisted Kennedy.
I thought she would break down, but, by a mighty effort, she kept her composure and said nothing.
"Some one was trying to discredit and ruin Murchie by making the horses he trained lose races—somebody whose life and happiness Murchie himself had already ruined.
"That person," pursued Kennedy relentlessly, "was defeated in the attempt to discredit Murchie when, by my injection of the antitoxin, Lady Lee finally did win. In that person's mind, Murchie, not the horse, had won.
"The wild excitement over Murchie's vindication drove that person to desperation. There was only one more road to revenge. It was to wait until Murchie himself could be easily overpowered, when an overwhelming dose of this fatigue toxin could be shot into him—the weapon that had failed on the horses turned on himself. Besides, no one—not even the most expert physician or chemist—would ever suspect that Murchie's death was not natural."
"That—that bottle is mine—mine!" shouted a wild voice interrupting. "I took it—I used it—I—"
"Just a moment, Miss Safford," entreated Kennedy. "That person," he rapped out sharply, picking up the pedigrees O'Connor had handed him, "that person gave the toxin to a poor dope fiend as a sleeping-potion in one strength, gave it to Lady Lee in still another strength, and to Murchie in its most fatal strength. It was the poor and unknown pharmacist described in this pedigree whose dream of happiness Murchie shattered when he captivated Cecilie Safford—her deserted lover, Ronald Mawson."
Roy Glashan's Library
Non sibi sed omnibus
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