very notebook which contained them.
His manner was restrained, but it was evident he was highly excited. I introduced him to McKnight, who has the imagination I lack, and who placed him at once, mentally.
“I only learned yesterday that you had been - er - saved,” he said rapidly. “Terrible accident - unspeakable. Dream about it all night and think about it all day. Broken arm?”
“No. He just wears the splint to be different from other people,” McKnight drawled lazily. I glared at him: there was nothing to be gained by antagonizing the little man.
“Yes, a fractured humerus, which isn’t as funny as it sounds.”
“Humerus-humorous! Pretty good,” he cackled. “I must say you keep up your spirits pretty well, considering everything.”
“You seem to have escaped injury,” I parried. He was fumbling for something in his pockets.
“Yes, I escaped,” he replied abstractedly. “Remarkable thing, too. I haven’t a doubt I would have broken my neck, but I landed on - you’ll never guess what! I landed head first on the very pillow which was under inspection at the time of the wreck. You remember, don’t you? Where did I put that package?”
He found it finally and opened it on a table, displaying with some theatricalism a rectangular piece of muslin and a similar patch of striped ticking.
“You recognize it?” he said. “The stains, you see, and the hole made by the dirk. I tried to bring away the entire pillow, but they thought I was stealing it, and made me give it up.”
Richey touched the pieces gingerly. “By George,” he said, “and you carry that around in your pocket! What if you should mistake it for your handkerchief?”
But Mr. Hotchkiss was not listening. He stood bent somewhat forward, leaning over the table, and fixed me with his ferret-like eyes.
“Have you see the evening papers, Mr. Blakeley?” he inquired.
I glanced to where they lay unopened, and shook my head.
“Then I have a disagreeable task,” he said with evident relish. “Of course, you had considered the matter of the man Harrington’s death closed, after the wreck. I did myself. As far as I was concerned, I meant to let it remain so. There were no other survivors, at least none that I knew of, and in spite of circumstances, there were a number of points in your favor.”
“Thank you,” I put in with a sarcasm that was lost on him.
“I verified your identity, for instance, as soon as I recovered from the shock. Also - I found on inquiring of your tailor that you invariably wore dark clothing.”
McKnight came forward threateningly. “Who are you, anyhow?” he demanded. “And how is this any business of yours?” Mr. Hotchkiss was entirely unruffled.
“I have a minor position here,” he said, reaching for a visiting card. “I am a very small patch on the seat of government, sir.”
McKnight muttered something about certain offensive designs against the said patch and retired grumbling to the window. Our visitor was opening the paper with a tremendous expenditure of energy.
“Here it is. Listen.” He read rapidly aloud:
“The Pittsburg police have sent to Baltimore two detectives who are looking up the survivors of the ill-fated Washington Flier. It has transpired that Simon Harrington, the Wood Street merchant of that city, was not killed in the wreck, but was murdered in his berth the night preceding the accident. Shortly before the collision, John Flanders, the conductor of the Flier, sent this telegram to the chief of police:
“‘Body of Simon Harrington found stabbed in his berth, lower ten, Ontario, at six-thirty this morning. JOHN FLANDERS, Conductor.’
“It is hoped that the survivors of the wrecked car Ontario will be found, to tell what they know of the discovery of the crime.
“Mr. John Gilmore, head of the steel company for which Mr. Harrington was purchasing agent, has signified his intention of sifting the matter to the bottom.
“So you see,” Hotchkiss concluded, “there’s trouble brewing. You and I are the only survivors of that unfortunate car.”
I did not contradict him, but I knew of two others, at least: Alison West, and the woman we had left beside the road that morning, babbling incoherently, her black hair tumbling over her white face.
“Unless we can find the man who occupied lower seven,” I suggested.
“I have already tried and failed. To find him would not clear you, of course, unless we could establish some connection between him and the murdered man. It is the only thing I see, however. I have learned this much,” Hotchkiss concluded: “Lower seven was reserved from Cresson.”
Cresson! Where Alison West and Mrs. Curtis had taken the train!
McKnight came forward and suddenly held out his hand. “Mr. Hotchkiss,” he said, “I - I’m sorry if I have been offensive. I thought when you came in, that, like the Irishman and the government, you were ‘forninst’ us. If you will put those cheerful relics out of sight somewhere, I should be glad to have you dine with me at the Incubator.” (His name for his bachelor apartment.) “Compared with Johnson, you are the great original protoplasm.”
The strength of this was lost on Hotchkiss, but the invitation was clear. They went out together, and from my window I watched them get into McKnight’s car. It was raining, and at the corner the Cannonball skidded. Across the street my detective, Johnson, looked after them with his crooked smile. As he turned up his collar he saw me, and lifted his hat.
I left the window and sat down in the growing dusk. So the occupant of lower seven had got on the car at Cresson, probably with Alison West and her companion. There was some one she cared about enough to shield. I
