“Somebody,’’ he said in a tone which was accusing in its lugubrious doggedness, “is able to work out actual solutions from the printed reports of crime. And that somebody, sir, beats the police to a solution, hijacks the swag from the crook and makes a perfect get-away every time.”

  Lester Leith chuckled.

  “Yes, Scuttle, I’m beginning to think you’re right. At first I thought this nebulous hijacker was a figment of Sergeant Ackley’s imagination. But now I’m beginning to believe he’s an actual person. But, of course, Scuttle, the fact that the police have concealed a dictograph on us, have made repeated searches of our persons—those things, Scuttle, should demonstrate our innocence, even to the police mind.”

  Lester Leith took out a cigarette, tapped it on his thumb nail, and regarded the valet through lazy-lidded eyes that twinkled.

  “Think so, Scuttle?”

  The valet gulped, nodded. “Yes, sir,” he said, and a deep-seated hostility glittered from his ebony black eyes.

  “Yes, indeed,” purred Leith, “and, now that my innocence is established. I can fling myself into my hobby, the theoretical solutions of crime from newspaper accounts.

  “What have you clipped from the papers lately, Scuttle?”

  The police spy, posing as a well-trained servant, moved his great bulk with catlike tread, opened a drawer and returned with sheaf of clipping.

  “A daylight robbery, sir. The Fifth Avenue branch of the—”

  Lester Leith patted his parted lips to stifle a yawn. “Come, come, that’s getting positively monotonous. Pass it. Get something else, something with a dash of mystery in it, something that has romance.”

  “The murder of Stella Rutland, sir.”

  “What about that?”

  “She was killed by one of two men, but the police can’t tell which. She went riding and never returned. Her body was found, frightfully mutilated, seated in an automobile. The automobile had been stolen. Evidently it was a romantic affair. She had gone into the night with some—”

  Lester Leith straightened in his chair, fixed his servant with an accusing glare.

  “Scuttle, I’m sure of it—positively certain!”

  “Sure of what, sir?”

  “That you’ve been devouring the tabloids again, Scuttle. How many times have I told you to save me only the reports that come from the most conservative newspapers? I must have accuracy. I can supply my own sob sister stuff when it’s necessary.”

  The servant turned a brick red.

  “Well, damn it, I guess I can—”

  He remembered himself, choked off the words of red rage.

  “Tut, tut, Scuttle. You must be more careful; apoplexy, Scuttle.

  And there’s no need for any resentment. I spoke to you as a friend who is interested in your mental development. Come, come, we’re digressing, and that’s the sign of failing concentration. Let’s return to the crime news. What else?”

  “A wife poisoning, sir.”

  “Pass it.”

  “A husband shooting, sir.”

  “Let it go. There’s always one of them.”

  “A mysterious murder in an apartment. The woman—”

  “Young or old, Scuttle?”

  “Rather elderly, sir.”

  “Was the motive clear?”

  “Yes, sir. There was a necklace, sir—”

  “Pass it. I’ve worked on so many necklace cases I’m getting tired of the damn things. Come, come, Scuttle, there must be some crime that’s intriguing. I want something with a dash of mystery. I want something with a hidden motive. In short, I want something complicated, and with a little romantic interest attached to it.”

  The valet shook his ponderous head. “I’m sorry sir. There’s nothing, sir.”

  Lester Leith took a deep drag at the cigarette, held the smoke for a while, looked at the ceiling, frowned, then exhaled as he spoke, clothing the words in a smoky aura.

  “Can you fancy that! And the police complain about the increase of crime. Ever since I can remember, Scuttle, the police have been ‘coping’ with a ‘crime wave,’ and the newspapers have been talking about the annual increase in crime. And here we can’t pick the crime we want. It’s like going to a restaurant and not finding a thing on the menu that fits the appetite.”

  The valet said nothing.

  Of a sudden Lester Leith sat erect, as one does when one has an inspiration. “Scuttle!”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “I have it!”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “Yes, Scuttle. We’ll dig back into the old, unsolved murders. Surely we can pick the sort of a case we want out of the past ten years’ record!”

  “Perhaps, sir, but, I fail to see how you can solve a crime where the clews have been covered by time, where—”

  “Tut, tut, Scuttle. I am only after a theoretical solution.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Yes, indeed. By the way, how about the Marigold murder? Was it ever solved?”

  “No, sir. It never will be now. The jury acquitted Bradbury in that case and the police have marked it as a closed file. Bradbury was guilty, of course, but the police couldn’t convince the jury.”

  “There was a romance in that case, wasn’t there?”

  “There most certainly was, sir. Little Margy Marigold, the most romantic figure that ever came into crime circles, sir.”

  “In what way, Scuttle?”

  “She was married to Bradbury, in California, sir. They lived near Los Angeles for three years, then she got a divorce. It was pretty well established that there was another man, the man she subsequently married, Harley Marigold, sir.

  “But she couldn’t cheat, sir. While she was married to Bradbury she remained absolutely above reproach. The divorce case was bitterly contested, yet that fact established beyond any doubt.”

  Lester Leith had dropped back to the cushions of the reclining chair. He sent a thin streamer of blue smoke drifting upward. His eyes were half closed, lazy with attentive listening.

  “Go on, Scuttle.”

  “In California, sir, they give an interlocutory decree of divorce. A year later they grant a final decree. The parties can’t remarry until after the final decree.

  “And little Mrs. Bradbury disappeared right after the interlocutory decree. Both men were frantic, Bradbury wanted to effect a reconciliation, Marigold wanted her to go to Mexico and be married. Bradbury threatened prosecution for bigamy.

  “Both men employed rival detective agencies to find her. Both men threatened each other. There was a suit pending for alienation of affections, another for defamation of character.

  “All in all, it was a frightful mix up. Both men disappeared from time to time, running down clews that their detectives had unearthed. But neither man ever found anything of value. The detective agencies were forced to bring their reports into court at the murder trial, sir.”

  “Yes, yes, Scuttle, go on!”

  “Well, sir, exactly one year to the day after the interlocutory decree, little Margy Bradbury showed up in this State. She wired her attorney in California to get the final decree. She wired Marigold to come on for the wedding.

  “And she granted interviews to the newspapers. She said a woman could never hold the love of any man unless she made that man respect her. She said that she knew she loved Marigold far too much to resist his entreaties to go to Mexico and be married, yet she knew the marriage would be nothing except a legal mockery.

  “So she concealed herself until the year was up and then made that dramatic appearance right here in town with a little house all furnished, ready for the new romance.

  “She secured the house through an agent, and she picked out the furniture in a single afternoon. Then she got the license and wired Marigold.

  “Of course he was wild with joy. He came on by fastest train. And Bradbury also came on. He took an assumed name, ditched the reporters as well as the detectives Marigold had shadowing him, and took the train following the one Marigold was on.”

  Lester Leith sighed, flipped the cigarette end into the fireplace.

  “Scuttle, this is if! This is the crime! Go on!”

  “But there’s no mystery, sir. The police couldn’t have solved the crime. Anything that has all these subtle motives of characterization couldn’t have been solved in a routine way.”

  “Pray proceed.”

  “Yes, sir. I happen to remember the case very well, sir. It’s been four years ago, sir, but I know all the details. It was striking, dramatic.

  “Marigold reached town first. They were married. They went to the little cottage she had picked out. Newspaper reporters refused to give them any honeymoon. They swarmed all over the place, but the bride and groom were most gracious about it.

  “They posed for pictures, sir, they gave interviews, and Mr. Marigold asked the reporters to be sports. He had given them all the story he could, and he asked them to leave him alone. And the reporters promised a twenty-four-hour recess. They had their stories. They had their pictures. They had their interviews. They knew everything, except just one thing.”

  “What was that, Scuttle?”

  “Where she had been during the year. The newspaper reporters were never able to find that out. During the trial of the case the police moved heaven and earth. They were never able to find it out. She had simply disappeared and she remained disappeared. The detective agencies Marigold and Bradbury were tracking down vague rumors. Neither one had the slightest success.”

  Lester Leith lit another cigarette. His eyes were soft now.

  “This woman, Scuttle, must have been a rather remarkable woman. She had strength of character, and she was able to keep her mouth shut. She never told, never gave a clew?”

  “Not a word, sir.”

  “I see. Then what happened?”

  “The newspaper reporters came to the house the next morning. They were ready for another story of the honeymooners. They got a story—ugh!”

  “Yes, yes, Scuttle, go on. What was it they got?”

  “The house was closed tightly, sir. They knocked and they hammered and they go no answer. Finally they arrived at the conclusion the newlyweds had given them the slip and gone away.

  “Naturally, sir, they were peeved, since they’d have watched the place all night if Marigold hadn’t been so decent about it all. They’d sort of put him on his honor. And the city editors wouldn’t understand the situation.

  “So they decided to get in the house, sir, and see if there wasn’t some little clew that would tell them where the pair had gone.”

  “Yes, yes, Scuttle. Go on.”

  “Well, sir, you’ll remember what they found. Marigold was unconscious, tied to a chair. The woman was in bed. She had been strangled. Evidently the tragedy had occurred sometime before midnight. Margy Marigold had just retired for the night. Harley Marigold had his coat and shirt off, was in his stocking feet.

  “Of course they made a great uproar over it. It was such a horrible finish for a romance. And poor Marigold was almost prostrated when he regained consciousness. And the police surgeons rather fancied there had been some drug administered to him as well as the blow on the head.

  “He could tell almost nothing of what had happened. He had approached a closet in the bedroom to hang up his coat. There had been the rustle of motion. A dark figure had leaped out, and that was the last Harley Marigold remembered until he regained consciousness some twenty-four hours later.

  “He was knotted in a most clever manner. It must have been a sailor who tied those knots. And Bradbury had been a yachtsman. The police caught Bradbury. He had been out all night. He claimed he had tried to see the dead woman, that Marigold had ordered him from the premises, threatened to call the police, and that he had walked the streets all night.

  “Marigold branded that as a lie.”

  The police spy, who posed as a servant, came to a conclusion of his recital, stared at the man he was trailing with glittering eyes.

  “That’s a crime for you, sir.”

  Lester Leith nodded.

  “Solve that crime, sir, and you’ll be solving something.”

  “Yes, yes, Scuttle. There were other facts, though. There was something—let me see, there was some touch of pathos other than the tragedy itself. What was it?”

  “No, sir, I’ve told you the entire facts, sir. But they discovered other facts afterward, sir. There was the man who saw Bradbury sneaking away from the house shortly before midnight. He identified him positively.”

  “Yes, yes!” exclaimed Lester Leith impatiently. “I remember all those, but there was—ah, I have it! The dog!”

  “The dog, sir?” Scuttle’s brows were puckered.

  “Yes, Scuttle, the dog. It was featured in one of the newspaper articles.”

  The valet shook his head.

  “I’m afraid you’re mistaken, sir.”

  “No, I’m not, Scuttle. You go out and dig me up a file of papers showing the reports of the crime, and I’ll try and check through them. That’s the worst of the police, Scuttle, they get a theory of the case and they cram the facts into a mold to fit that theory. The newspaper reporter is more discerning. He sees facts and reports them. He gives all the facts and reports them. He gives all the facts as he sees them. The police only see the facts that tend to support their theories.”

  “But, good heavens, sir! You don’t contend that Bradbury wasn’t the murderer?”

  “The jurors didn’t think so, Scuttle.”

  “Shucks, sir, the jury! Why, the jurors fell for his play acting.”

  “Possibly, Scuttle. It has been known to happen. Tell me, what was done with the body?”

  “Taken to Indianapolis for burial, sir. Her folks lived there. The husband took the body back for burial in the cemetery where her father was buried.”

  “Very touching, Scuttle, very touching. It does the husband credit. But all this isn’t solving the crime. You go get me the newspaper files that covered the crime. Get me the photographs. I particularly want clear photographs.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  And the big valet, his face wearing a look of puzzled bewilderment, opened the door and oozed into the corridor. But he did not immediately go on his various errands. Instead he made a telephone report of the situation to Sergeant Ackley, received implicit instruction.

  Only after that did he put in an afternoon gathering the data Lester Leith had suggested.

  CHAPTER II

  Scuttle Goes Traveling

  It was evening. The fire crackled in the open grate. Lester Leith, attired in faultless evening raiment, sat with his feet stretched toward the fire, a cigarette in his lips.

  The valet shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other.

  “So you see, Scuttle, I was right. There was a dog, and its presence was important.”

  The heavy forehead of the valet wash-boarded. “But I don’t see, sir—”

  “Tut, tut, Scuttle. You wouldn’t.”

  Lester Leith picked up a glossy surfaced print of a newspaper photograph.

  “You see I was right about the dog, Scuttle, and about the dog’s importance.”

  “But what’s important about the dog, sir? It was just a stray, sir, bearing a license from a town in Indiana. Mrs. Marigold took it in and fed it. There’s nothing unusual in that, sir.”

  “No, Scuttle, but the dog was sick with grief after the tragedy. Now this photograph shows the bride with the stray dog in her arms. It’s a clear picture. The dog is a Boston bull and the photograph shows the dog license, Pickets, Indiana, Scuttle.”

  “Doubtless some country town, sir.”

  “Doubtless, Scuttle.”

  The valet squirmed again.

  “Are you making fun of me, sir?”

  “Indeed, no, Scuttle. I am merely suggesting that you go to Pickets, Indiana, and buy a dog. I should like a rather large fox terrier, Scuttle. And I wish you would call him ‘Bobo,’ and get a collar suitably engraved. Just the name, ‘Bobo.’ No address. And be sure you purchase a license.

  “And then I wish you would get me a furnished apartment, and then go to one of the best beauty shops, if the town has a beauty shop, and get me a jar of cold cream, a curling iron, and an electric blowing machine, such as is used for drying hair.

  “And I’d like you to get me a hammer and a cold chisel, and a little anvil. You know what I mean, Scuttle, one of those little affairs such as jewelers have.

  “And I guess that’s all for the present, Scuttle.”

  The man stared at him with sagging jaw. “Good God, sir, are you crazy?”

  “That is hardly a fair question, Scuttle. All medical authorities agree that persons afflicted with insanity think they are sane. Therefore, if I should tell you I was sane, it would not prove anything. In fact it would merely give an impartial observer some grounds for thinking I might not, in fact, be sane.”

  “But—but—why should I go to Pickets, Indiana, and get a dog, an apartment, and all the rest of that junk?”

  “Simply for the change, Scuttle, and, because I have requested you to do so. The fact may have altogether escaped your mind, Scuttle, but it happens that I’m paying you your salary—ah, yes, you had forgotten that, hadn’t you Scuttle?”

  And Lester Leith beamed upon the spy with an expression so smilingly urbane that the man whirled on his heel, walked abruptly toward the bedroom.

  “Shall I start at once, sir?”

  “At once, Scuttle.”

  And, for once, the valet went through a door without his customary oozing of stealthy caution. He jerked open the door, strode into the bedroom, slammed it with a jar that made the plastering quiver.

  But Lester Leith took no notice.

  His face had suddenly become as hard and as keen as a razor blade. His eyes narrowed to mere slits. The cigarette burned in his hand unnoticed, the smoke spiralling towards the darkened ceiling.

  Those who knew only Lester Leith the polished, urbane mocker, would have been dumbfounded at the glittering eyes, the quivering nostrils, the thin lips, the concentration of the features.

  From time to time he nodded his head after the manner of one who is blocking out a strategic campaign in which every single move must dovetail with existing facts.