Adventure, December 3, 1920 — page 89: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Hearts That Beat \ that from the nature of the wound it might ‘have been murder or suicide, but hardly acci- dent. At the inquest late in the day the jury, with a conservatism consistent with its lack of information, reported a verdict of death due to a bullet-wound “inflicted by some person or persons uuknown,”’ The State banking-department sent an audi- tor on the afternoon train which ordinarily did not stop in Lyndholm. With him came a representative of the headquarters of the bank- chain. A cursory examination was made of the bank’s books, cash and vault-contents. It disclosed nothing wrong. Six hundred dollars in currency had been exposed in the cage when the body was found, and the door to the cage was open. If Mel- gaard had been murdered for the bank’s cash, the murderer had been frightened away with- out getting any of it. No note of explanation — found. ‘The cashier’s desk papers told No one seemed to know [whether Melgaard had kept a revolver in the bank. As Jens Melgaard had been. without. known enemies, a theory of malice or revenge was un- tenable. His life had been somewhat dull and colorless without highlights, that of a staid, reserved, decorous country banker. He had lived in Lyndholm nearly thirty of his fifty years, had never been mixed up in any- thing questionable and had divided his time between his business and his family. He had married when past forty and Tillie was the only child. There was no history of grudges, of bad feeling over mortgages foreclosed or loans re- fused. According to Mrs. Melgaard there had been no trouble between her and her husband. She would not listen to the possibility of suicide. It was murder, she held, but she had no helpful suggestion. Sam Thorne was finding Lyndholm inter- esting after all. Though his assignment had petered out, his nerves were tingling with the zest of a mystery after his own heart. “T happen to know,” Lowe told him on the side, “‘that Melgaard had been considerably worried in the last few months over the thing that sent you here. He had spoken to me about it—said I was the only one in town he was men- tioning it to. Never was very talkative about anything, but he felt his job was in jeopardy and just had to spill to somebody. To lose the job or be demoted after all these years was un- thinkable to him. That might point to suicide but for the missing gun.” The industrious Stubble joined them. He had learned who Thorne was, but accepted without suspicion the explanation that Thorne had come down merely to spend a day with his old friend: That the detective might have come on a professional mission never entered Mr. Hinds’ mind. é79 “Me and the sheriff have been checking up the town,” he said. ‘“The sheriff drove in an hour ago, you know. ‘He’s new at this busi- ness, only elected last Fall, but he’s a keen one. We've learned that no strangers were seen in town today before Number Five came in. Mr. Thorne was the only one to get off Number Five, but of course we don’t suspect you. Ha, ha, ha! “Yet the whole town thinks it was murder, or the gun would have been found with the body. I’m about sure it was, myself. You see the outside window of the directors’ room was closed when Jens was found. It hasn’t any marks, pane or sill, inside or out. Dust wasn’t disturbed on the outside sill at all. “The murderer must have gone in and left by the front door—playing in great luck, I’ll say.” Mr. Hinds conteded without the question having been raised that such things were pos- sible without any one’s notice ‘in the noon-hour in Lyndholm. Thorne had looked ‘on in the first examina- tion of the body before its removal. He had seen nothing suggestive of a clue, but had not overlooked a faint spot of red on the inner side of the right shirtsleeve above the elbow. Mel- gaard had died with his coat off. He had worn habitually white, stiff-bosomed shirts to ‘busi- ness, patterns never having appealed to him. He was an old-fashioned type. As for the red, it was not a blood-stain. It was not deep enough in color for that, and it stood up on the surface instead of being ‘ab- sorbed in the fabric. It was such a blur as the dust of a red pencil might have made. Thorne had said nothing about the red mark, as the others hadn’t mentioned it. In his own mind it did not seem especially significant. After a walk around.the village, Thorne went back to the bank to take another look at its interior arrangement. In the space outside the wire enclosure a telephone stood at one end of a wall-desk. It was the only telephone in the bank, placed there as an accommodation to patrons as well as for the cashier’s use. Thorne stepped up to it to ca!l the station agent and ~ ask about a train-schedule. As he reached for the receiver, he saw some- thing that caused him to hesitate. He did not telephone. At the base of the instrument were several fresh pencil-shavings, and on the green blotter on which it rested was a blotch, as of a thumb, in red. He made for the drug-store, where he asked for a red pencil. ‘Much demand for these?” he inquired casually. “Not much,” the clerk replied. “Only three or four persons in town ever want them.”’ Thorne looked a mild interest. He said he supposed the newspaper-editor was one and the school-principal another. CORMICGLOOOKS (C@)