"Your friend Reid didn't happen to be in love with her, too, did he?"
"Oh, no," was the reply. "Reid came here hoping to win the love of Miss Dow, a society girl. I came with him."
"Miss Dow?" asked Hatch, quickly. "The girl who eloped last night with Morgan Mason?"
"Yes," replied Curtis. "That elopement and this – crime have put Reid almost in as bad a condition as I am."
"What elopement?" asked The Thinking Machine.
Hatch explained how Mason had procured a marriage license, how Miss Dow and Mason had met at the Monarch Inn – where Miss Melrose must have been killed according to all stories – how Miss Dow had written to her parents from there of the elopement and then of their disappearance. The Thinking Machine listened, but without apparent interest.
"Have you such a knife as was used to kill Miss Melrose?" he asked at the end.
"No."
"Did you ever have such a knife?"
"Well, once."
"Where did you carry it when it was not in your auto kit?"
"In my lower coat pocket."
"By the way, what kind of looking woman was Miss Melrose?"
"One of the most beautiful women I ever met," said Curtis with a certain enthusiasm. "Of ordinary height, superb figure – a woman who would attract attention anywhere."
"I believe she wore a veil and an automobile mask at the time she was killed?"
"Yes. They covered all her face except her chin."
"Could she, wearing an automobile mask, see either side of herself without turning?" asked The Thinking Machine, pointedly. "Had you intended to stab her, say while the car was in motion and had the knife in your hand, even in daylight, could she have seen it without turning her head? Or, if she had had the knife, could you have seen it?"
Curtis shuddered a little.
"No, I don't believe so."
"Was she blonde or brunette?"
"Blonde, with great clouds of golden hair," said Curtis, and again there was admiration in his tone.
"Golden hair?" Hatch repeated. "I understood Medical Examiner Francis to say she had dark hair?"
"No, golden hair," was the positive reply.
"Did you see the body, Mr. Hatch?" asked the scientist.
"No. None of us saw it. Dr. Francis makes that a rule."
The Thinking Machine arose, excused himself and passed into another room. They heard the telephone bell ring and then some one closed the door connecting the two rooms. When the scientist returned he went straight to a point, which Hatch had impatiently awaited.
"What happened to you this afternoon in Winter Street?"
Curtis had retained his composure well up to this point; now he became uneasy again. Quick pallor on his face was succeeded by a flush, which crept up to the roots of his hair.
"I've been drinking too much," he said at last. "That and this thing have completely unnerved me. I am afraid I was not myself."
"What did you think you saw?" insisted The Thinking Machine.
"I went into a store for something. I've forgotten what now. I know there was a great crowd of women – they were all about me. There I saw-" He stopped and was silent for a moment. "There I saw," he went on with an effort, "a woman – just a glimpse of her, over the heads of the others in the store – and-"
"And what?" insisted The Thinking Machine.
"At the moment I would have sworn it was Marguerite Melrose," was the reply.
"Of course you know you were mistaken?"
"I know it now," said Curtis. "It was a chance resemblance, but the effect on me was awful. I ran out of there shrieking – it seemed to me. Then I found myself here."
"And you don't know what you said or did from that time until the present?" asked the scientist, curiously.
"No, except in a hazy sort of way."
After awhile Martha, the scientist's aged servant, appeared in the doorway.
"Mr. Mallory and a gentleman, sir."
"Let them come in," said The Thinking Machine. "Mr. Curtis," and he turned to him gravely, "Mr. Reid is here. I sent for him as if at your request to ask him two questions. If he answers those questions, as I believe he will, I can demonstrate that you are not guilty of and have no connection with the murder of Miss Melrose. Let me ask these questions, without any hint or remark from you as to what the answer must be. Are you willing?"
"I am," replied Curtis. His face was white, but his voice was firm.
Detective Mallory, whom Curtis didn't know, and Charles Reid entered the room. Both looked about curiously. Mallory nodded brusquely at Hatch. Reid looked at Curtis and Curtis looked away.
"Mr. Reid," said The Thinking Machine without any preliminary, "Mr. Curtis tells me that the knife used to kill Miss Melrose was your property. Is that so?" he demanded quickly, as Curtis faced about wonderingly.
"No," thundered Reid fiercely.
"Is it Mr. Curtis' knife?" asked The Thinking Machine.
"Yes," flashed Reid. "It's a part of his auto."
Curtis started to speak; The Thinking Machine waved his hand toward him. Detective Mallory caught the gesture and understood that Jack Curtis was his prisoner for murder.
IV.
Curtis was led away and locked up. He raved and bitterly denounced Reid for the information he had given, but he did not deny it. Indeed, after the first burst of fury he said nothing.
Once he was under lock and key the police, led by Detective Mallory, searched his rooms at the Hotel Teutonic and there they found a handkerchief stained with blood. It was slight, still it was a stain. This was immediately placed in the hands of an expert, who pronounced it human blood. Then the case against Curtis seemed complete; it was his knife, he had been in love with Miss Melrose, therefore probably jealous of her, and here was the telltale bloodstain.
Meanwhile Reid was permitted to go his way. He seemed crushed by the rapid sequence of events, and read eagerly every line he could find in the public prints concerning both the murder and the elopement of Miss Dow. This latter affair, indeed, seemed to have greater sway over his mind than the murder, or that a lifetime friend was now held as the murderer.
Meanwhile The Thinking Machine had signified to Hatch his desire to visit the scene of the crime and see what might be done there. Late in the afternoon, therefore, they started, taking a train for a village nearest the Monarch Inn.
"It's a most extraordinary case," The Thinking Machine said, "much more extraordinary than you can imagine."
"In what respect?" asked the reporter.
"In motive, in the actual manner of the girl meeting her death and in a dozen other details which I can't state now because I haven't all the facts."
"You don't doubt but what it was murder?"
"It doesn't necessarily follow," said The Thinking Machine, evasively. "Suppose we were seeking a motive for Miss Melrose's suicide, what would we have? We would have her love affair with this man MacLean whom she refused to marry because she knew he would be disinherited. Suppose she had not seen him for a couple of years – suppose she had made up her mind to give him up – that he had suddenly appeared when she sat alone in the automobile in front of the Monarch Inn – suppose, then, finding all her love reawakened, she had decided to end it all?"
"But Curtis' knife and the blood on his handkerchief?"
"Suppose, having made up her mind to kill herself, she had sought a weapon?" went on The Thinking Machine, as if there had been no interruption. "What is more natural than she should have sought something – the knife, say – in the tool bag or kit, which must have been near her? Suppose she stabbed herself while the men were away from the automobile, or even after they had started on again in the darkness?"
Hatch looked a little crestfallen.
"You believe, then, that she did kill herself?" he asked.
"Certainly not," was the prompt response. "I don't believe Miss Melrose killed herself – but as yet I know nothing to the contrary. As for the blood on Curtis' handkerchief, remember he helped carry the body to Dr. Leonard; it might have come from that – it might have come from a slight spattering of blood."