The League of Frightened Men

Leopold Elkus thought Chapin guiltless, even of the warnings, and advised looking elsewhere for the culprit. Some, quite a few at first, were in favor of turning it over to the police, but they were talked down, chiefly by Hibbard and Burton and Elkus. Collard and Gaines came down from Boston, and they tried to reconstruct the evening and definitely outline Chapin's movements, but failed through disagreements. In the end they delegated Burton, Cabot and Lang to call on Chapin. 4 Chapin had smiled at them. At their insistence he described his Saturday evening movements, recollecting them clearly and in detail; he had caught up with them at the cliff and sat there on a bench, and had left with the group that returned to the house; he had not noticed Harrison sitting on the cliffs edge. At the house, not being a card-player, he had got into a chair with a book and had stayed there with it until aroused by the hubbub over Harrison's absence – approaching midnight. That was his smiling story. He had been not angry, but delicately hurt, that his best friends could think him capable of wishing injury to one of them, knowing as they did that the only struggle in his breast was between affection and gratitude, for the lead. Smiling, but hurt.

As for the warnings they had received, that was another matter. Regarding that, he said, his sorrow that they should suspect him not only of violence but threats of additional violence, was lost in his indignation that he should be accused of so miserable a piece of versifying. He criticized it in detail and with force. As a threat it might be thought effective, he couldn't say as to that, but as poetry it was rotten, and he had certainly never supposed that his best friends could accuse. him of such an offense. But then, he had ended, he realized that he would have to forgive them and he did so, fully and without reservation, since it was obvious that they were having quite a scare and so should not be held to account.

Who had sent the warnings, if he hadn't? He had no idea. Of course it could have been done by anyone knowing of that ancient accident who had also learned of this recent one. One guess was as good as another, unless they could uncover something to point their suspicion. The postmark might furnish a hint, or the envelopes and paper, or the typewriting itself. Maybe they had better see if they couldn't find the typewriter.