When he reached the gully he stopped, hesitating whether to cross or go around it, and at that moment he heard a sound above him.
There was at this point no direct light from the street lamp, but a faint reflected radiance. The crest of the hill, however, with the lamp behind it, stood out clearly silhouetted against the night.
And against that outline something was moving; an indistinguishable mass, close to the ground.
It was perhaps eight feet above him, and he had thought at first that it was a dog. He decided to go up the hill and around the head of the wash, and then the thing came at him.
That was all he remembered, and even now that is all we know.
It is probable that nothing more than surveillance of our movements was intended.
But Dick altered his course, recognition was imminent, and the reaction was quick and violent.
Chapter Twenty-two
WITH THE SURPRISING RECUPERATIVE power of youth Dick was out again in a few days.
But although preparations for Jim’s trial were going on rapidly, that attack had not only completely undermined the morale of my household, it was causing Inspector Harrison some sleepless nights also.
He had examined the hillside again but without result.
The weather had been dry as well as warm, and there were no footprints.
He was completely baffled, and he did not hesitate to say so.
“I don’t want any miscarriage of justice,” he said.
“I’m not like the District Attorney.
I do my work and my job goes on, convictions or no convictions; and I don’t give a particular damn for the press.
What I want is the guilty man.
And I’m not so sure we’ve got him.”
Dick had been hurt the twenty-seventh of May, Friday.
On Monday morning I came downstairs to find the Inspector having a comfortable cup of coffee in the pantry.
He was not at all abashed, put down the kitchen clock which he had been examining, said briefly that it needed cleaning, and followed me into the front hall.
After his habit, he stopped at the lavatory and looked inside.
“Has it ever occurred to you,” he said, “that that pencil Walter Somers produced was not what he found in that airshaft?”
“I think Judy—”
“Ha!” he said.
“Trust Miss Judy.
She knows.
Well, it wasn’t.
Now, here are the facts about that pencil, Miss Bell.
In the first place, I believe that it was yours; to be truthful about it, we found your fingerprints on it.
Yours and Walter Somers’.
No others.
In the second place, I believe it was taken from your desk that night, and deliberately placed on that skylight.
I have not said that it was taken for that purpose, although it might have been.
Do you recall Walter Somers using a pencil that night?
Before he started the investigation?”
“I don’t think he did.
He may have.”
“He didn’t look into the skylight, get down and go on some errand into the library?”
“He went in for some matches.”
“Matches, eh? Well, he’s a smoker, and the average cigarette smoker carries them.
I think he got that pencil, and let’s see if I’m right.
We have to remember, of course, that Walter Somers knows something he’s not telling.
Now, he looks down that airshaft, and he sees something there which he recognizes; a key, maybe; or a watch charm, or a fountain pen, or a false tooth!
Anyhow, something that he knows at sight, or suspects.
He comes down, goes into the library for matches and picks up a pencil and slips it in his pocket.
He climbs the ladder, gets this object, shows you the pencil instead, and there you are.
“Being afraid of nothing, he seals it up for the police.
Clever, wasn’t it?
Only it was a bit too clever.”