Detective Fiction Weekly. Vol. 36, No. 4, October 20, 1928

“All right,” I told him. “Go off by yourself and raise the devil and all his imps if that will relieve you. But, take my advice and don’t let anybody hear you. I have told you to leave things to me. Do that and I’ll promise to do all I can to show Marthe and her dad one or two reasons why there should be no wedding bells ring out for a Bailey-Santelle picnic. Go off alone—”

“Alone, hell!” he exclaimed. “Santelle won’t let me! He’s had a guy tagging me around all evening! On my heels since right after dinner, and I’ve had to keep on the dodge! But I’ve decided to let him catch me now — and when this crook boss of his sees him again he won’t know him! That’s all!”

He was off. Poor Jim! I certainly hoped he wouldn’t tag that madman too close.

So Marthe had already said yes to Flash! Fast work — and because of it I would have to show speed myself from then on. Things were not going in the direction I had expected them to travel when I first came to Willow Bend. No. They were going off at a tangent, and one wholly unprovided for.

But, then, there was that monkey-wrench number two. Somehow or other I couldn’t get away from the notion that monkey-wrench number two would wreck the machinery altogether.

I went prowling for Steel. Within an hour I’d be on my way down the Kaw to Kansas City, and I wanted to make sure that Jim would be aware of my departure.

Chapter XV Uncle Apologizes

Somewhere in the grounds Jim Steel would be playing tag with Tommy, and I set off to round him up, following in the direction the young man had gone. Jim, I judged, had temporarily lost his playmate, which accounted for him being nowhere around when Tommy and I last met.

“Jim is cagy,” I said to myself, “and he’ll have a try for Flash and Marthe, knowing full well that the lad will be snooping around. So I’ll have an eye out for that pair myself.”

But I couldn’t locate either them or Jim. It was getting late, and already some of the guests had gone indoors. The early evenings in that locality are usually pleasant and conducive to nocturnal rambling, but the summer night had begun to grow rather cool. I went to the house, got a light overcoat and returned to the grounds. If I couldn’t find Jim soon I’d have to go on without him.

Fifteen minutes later I found myself on the path to the river and decided to leave Willow Bend for the night, deferring my talk with Jim until I returned next morning.

That sealed letter was calling me. But for the fact that there might be no connection whatever — probably wasn’t — between the woman who gave it to me and the one who had haunted Willow Bend that night, I’d have it open long before the assigned hour. But what if the woman should call for it, and find that I had betrayed her trust? That would be bad — and the Kaw Valley doesn’t do business that way.

I’d have to wait until ten o’clock in the morning. Then, granting she had not called for it in person nor communicated with me about it, I’d not waste a minute reading it. On the other hand, should she present herself at my office before ten, then I’d busy myself in another direction. I’d follow her and dig her out. And that was that.

I started down the path, and came up against Uncle Cato.

“Mr. Norton,” he said, recognizing me, “I want to offer my apologies for to-night. The fact is I am unused to such goings on as my nephew hints at hereabouts — this three-lingered man, you know. I simply can’t take him seriously. That accounts for my failure to attach a great deal of importance to your orders.”

But he had appeared somewhat concerned over those footprints in the lilac bush, if I recalled it correctly. I let that pass.

“No harm has been done, Mr. Santelle,” I told him good-naturedly. “You may be right, at that. There may not be any three-fingered bird mixed up in this. Cletus may be just imagining things — poor chap. Go to bed and don’t let thoughts of this ogre with the mutilated hand disturb your rest, and I’ll guarantee he won’t in the flesh. Good night.”

He went along the path until the night swallowed him, and I stood where I was and pondered. What was Uncle Cato doing in the grounds alone, and the hour nearing twelve? Searching? If so, for whom or what? He had made it a point to inform me that he didn’t take the three-fingered man seriously, and he would hardly be searching for him in whom he did not believe.

Maybe just strolling. All by himself. Yes — maybe. But it didn’t wash with me. He had not impressed me as one who would be out doing a Romeo with a maid, or one of the women guests. A trifle old for such foolishness. Anyhow, I’d have to pass him up until later.

Again I resumed my way toward the river — and again came to a halt before I had gone far. A groan, long-drawn and anguished, seemed to rise out of the depths of a snowball bush just off the path, and I made for the bush.

Jim Steel was in the act of getting shakily to his knees, one hand caressing his jaw, the other groping for something substantial to hold to.