第58章 PROBLEM VII(5)

But there, I am speaking of Violet again. To prevent a further mischance of this nature, I will introduce at once the above mentioned account.

II

No man in all New York was ever more interested than myself in the Hasbrouck affair, when it was the one and only topic of interest at a period when news was unusually scarce. But, together with many such inexplicable mysteries, it had passed almost completely from my mind, when it was forcibly brought back, one day, by a walk I took through Lafayette Place.

At sight of the long row of uniform buildings, with their pillared fronts and connecting balconies every detail of the crime which had filled the papers at the time with innumerable conjectures returned to me with extraordinary clearness, and, before I knew it, I found myself standing stockstill in the middle of the block with my eye raised to the Hasbrouck house and my ears--or rather my inner consciousness, for no one spoke I am sure--ringing with a question which, whether the echo of some old thought or the expression of a new one, so affected me by the promise it held of some hitherto unsuspected clue, that Ihesitated whether to push this new inquiry then or there by an attempted interview with Mrs. Hasbrouck, or to wait till I had given it the thought which such a stirring of dead bones rightfully demanded.

You know what that question was. I shall have communicated it to you, if you have not already guessed it, before perusing these lines:

"Who uttered the scream which gave the first alarm of Mr.

Hasbrouck's violent death?"

I was in a state of such excitement as I walked away--for Ilistened to my better judgment as to the inadvisability of my disturbing Mrs. Hasbrouck with these new inquiries--that the perspiration stood out on my forehead. The testimony she had given at the inquest recurred to me, and I remembered as distinctly as if she were then speaking, that she had expressly stated that she did not scream when confronted by the sight of her husband's dead body. But someone had screamed and that very loudly. Who was it, then? One of the maids, startled by the sudden summons from below, or someone else--some involuntary witness of the crime, whose testimony had been suppressed at the inquest, by fear or influence?

The possibility of having come upon a clue even at this late day so fired my ambition that I took the first opportunity of revisiting Lafayette Place. Choosing such persons as I thought most open to my questions, I learned that there were many who could testify to having heard a woman's shrill scream on that memorable night, just prior to the alarm given by old Cyrus, but no one who could tell from whose lips it had come. One fact, however, was immediately settled. It had not been the result of the servant-women's fears. Both of the girls were positive that they had uttered no sound, nor had they themselves heard any till Cyrus rushed to the window with his wild cries. As the scream, by whomever given, was uttered before they descended the stairs, Iwas convinced by these assurances that it had issued from one of the front windows, and not from the rear of the house, where their own rooms lay. Could it be that it had sprung from the adjoining dwelling, and that--I remembered who had lived there and was for ringing the bell at once. But, missing the doctor's sign, I made inquiries and found that he had moved from the block. However, a doctor is soon found, and in less than fifteen, minutes I was at the door of his new home, where I asked, not for him, but for Mrs. Zabriskie.

It required some courage to do this, for I had taken particular notice of the doctor's wife at the inquest, and her beauty, at that time, had worn such an aspect of mingled sweetness and dignity that I hesitated to encounter it under any circumstances likely to disturb its pure serenity. But a clue once grasped cannot be lightly set aside by a true detective, and it would have taken more than a woman's frowns to stop me at this point.

However, it was not with frowns she received me, but with a display of emotion for which I was even less prepared. I had sent up my card and I saw it trembling in her hand as she entered the room. As she neared me, she glanced at it, and with a show of gentle indifference which did not in the least disguise her extreme anxiety, she courteously remarked:

"Your name is an unfamiliar one to me. But you told my maid that your business was one of extreme importance, and so I have consented to see you. What can an agent from a private detective office have to say to me?"Startled by this evidence of the existence of some hidden skeleton in her own closet, I made an immediate attempt to reassure her.

"Nothing which concerns you personally," said I. "I simply wish to ask you a question in regard to a small matter connected with Mr. Hasbrouck's violent death in Lafayette Place, a couple of years ago. You were living in the adjoining house at the time Ibelieve, and it has occurred to me that you might on that account be able to settle a point which has never been fully cleared up."Instead of showing the relief I expected, her pallor increased and her fine eyes, which had been fixed curiously upon me, sank in confusion to the floor.

"Great heaven!" thought I. "She looks as if at one more word from me, she would fall at my feet in a faint. What is this I have stumbled upon!""I do not see how you can have any question to ask me on that subject," she began with an effort at composure which for some reason disturbed me more than her previous open display of fear.

"Yet if you have," she continued, with a rapid change of manner that touched my heart in spite of myself, "I shall, of course, do my best to answer you."There are women whose sweetest tones and most charming smiles only serve to awaken distrust in men of my calling; but Mrs.