第4章 The Silent Bullet(3)

"Why, I rushed to pick him up.Everything was confusion.I recall someone behind me saying, 'Here, boy, take all these papers off the table and carry them into my office before they get lost in the excitement.' I think it was Bruce's voice.The next moment Iheard someone say, 'Stand back, Mrs.Parker has fainted.' But Ididn't pay much attention, for I was calling to someone not to get a doctor over the telephone, but to go down to the fifth floor where one has an office.I made Mr.Parker as comfortable as I could.There wasn't much I could do.He seemed to want to say something to me, but he couldn't talk.He was paralysed, at least his throat was.But I did manage to make out finally what sounded to me like, 'Tell her I don't believe the scandal, Idon't believe it.' But before he could say whom to tell he had again become unconscious, and by the time the doctor arrived he was dead.I guess you know everything else as well as I do.""You didn't hear the shot fired from any particular direction?"asked Kennedy.

"No, sir."

"Well, where do you think it came from?"

"That's what puzzles me, sir.The only thing I can figure out is that it was fired from the outside office--perhaps by some customer who had lost money and sought revenge.But no one out there heard it either, any more than they did in the directors'

room or the ladies' department."

"About that message," asked Kennedy, ignoring what to me seemed to be the most important feature of the case, the mystery of the silent bullet."Didn't you see it after all was over?""No, sir; in fact I had forgotten about it till this moment when you asked me to reconstruct the circumstances exactly.No, sir, Idon't know a thing about it.I can't say it impressed itself on my mind at the time, either.""What did Mrs.Parker do when she came to?""Oh, she cried as I have never seen a woman cry before.He was dead by that time, of course.""Bruce and I saw her down in the elevator to her car.In fact, the doctor, who had arrived; said that the sooner she was taken home the better she would be.She was quite hysterical.""Did she say anything that you remember" Downey hesitated.

"Out with it Downey," said the inspector."What did she say as she was going down in the elevator?""Nothing"

"Tell us.I'll arrest you if you don't."

"Nothing about the murder, on my honour," protested Downey.

Kennedy leaned over suddenly and shot a remark at him, "Then it was about the note."Downey was surprised, but not quickly enough.Still he seemed to be considering something, and in a moment he said:

"I don't know what it was about, but I feel it is my duty, after all, to tell you.I heard her say, 'I wonder if he knew.'""Nothing else"

"Nothing else."

"What happened after you came back?"

"We entered the ladies' department.No one was there.A woman's automobile-coat was thrown over a chair in a heap.Mr.Bruce picked it up.'It's Mrs.Parker's,' he said.He wrapped it up hastily, and rang for a messenger.""Where did he send it?"

"To Mrs.Parker, I suppose.I didn't hear the address."We next went over the whole suite of offices, conducted by Mr.

Downey.I noted how carefully Kennedy looked into the directors'

room through the open door from the ladies' department.He stood at such an angle that had he been the assassin he could scarcely have been seen except by those sitting immediately next Mr.

Parker at the directors' table.The street windows were directly in front of him, and back of him was the chair on which the motorcoat had been found.

In Parker's own office we spent some time, as well as in Bruce's.

Kennedy made a search for the note, but finding nothing in either office, turned out the contents of Bruce's scrap-basket.There didn't seem to be anything in it to interest him, however, even after he had pieced several torn bits of scraps together with much difficulty, and he was about to turn the papers back again, when he noticed something sticking to the side of the basket.It looked like a mass of wet paper, and that was precisely what it was.

"That's queer," said Kennedy, picking it loose.Then he wrapped it up carefully and put it in his pocket."Inspector, can you lend me one of your men for a couple of days?" he asked, as we were preparing to leave."I shall want to send him out of town to-night, and shall probably need his services when he gets back.""Very well.Riley will be just the fellow.We'll go back to headquarters, and I'll put him under your orders."It was not until late in the following day that haw Kennedy again.It had been a busy day at the Star.We had gone to work that morning expecting to see the very financial heavens fall.

But just about five minutes to ten, before the Stock Exchange opened, the news came in over the wire from our financial man on Broad Street: 'The System' has forced James Bruce, partner of Kerr Parker, the dead banker; to sell his railroad, steamship, and rubber holdings to it.On this condition it promises unlimited support to the market.""Forced!" muttered the managing editor, as he waited on the office phone to get the composing-room, so as to hurry up the few lines in red ink on the first page and beat our rivals on the streets with the first extras."Why, he's been working to bring that about for the past two weeks.What that System doesn't control isn't worth having--it edits the news before our men get it, and as for grist for the divorce courts, and tragedies, well--Hello, Jenkins, yes, a special extra.Change the big heads--copy is on the way up--rush it.""So you think this Parker case is a mess?" I asked.

"I know it.That's a pretty swift bunch of females that have been speculating at Kerr Parker & Co.'s.I understand there's one Titian-haired young lady--who, by the way, has at least one husband who hasn't yet been divorced--who is a sort of ringleader, though she rarely goes personally to her brokers'