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The Mystery of Murray Davenport

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"Doctor, I've wanted to meet you," he began, "to speak about a remarkable
case that comes right in your line. I'd like to tell you the story, just
as I know it, and get your opinion on it."

The criminologist evinced a polite but not enthusiastic willingness to
hear, and at once took an attitude of grave attention, which he kept
during the entire recital, his face never changing; his gaze sometimes
turned penetratingly on Bagley, sometimes dropping idly to the table.

"There's a young fellow in this town, a friend of mine," Bagley went on,
"of a literary turn of mind, and altogether what you'd call a queer Dick.
He'd got down on his luck, for one reason and another, and was dead sore
on himself. Now being the sort of man he was, understand, he took the
most remarkable notion you ever heard of." And Bagley gave what Larcher
had inwardly to admit was a very clear and plausible account of the whole
transaction. As the tale advanced, the medico-legal expert's eyes
affected the table less and Bagley's countenance more. By and by they
occasionally sought Larcher's with something of same inquiry that those
of Barry Tompkins had shown. But the courteous attention, the careful
heeding of every word, was maintained to the end of the story.

"And now, sir," said Bagley, triumphantly, "I'd like to ask what you
think of that?"

The criminologist gave a final look at Bagley, questioning for the last
time his seriousness, and then answered, with cold decisiveness: "It's
impossible."

"But I know it to be true!" blurted Bagley.

"Some little transformation might be accomplished in the way you
describe," said the medico-legal man. "But not such as would insure
against recognition by an observant acquaintance for any appreciable
length of time."

"But surely you know what criminals have done to avoid identification?"

"Better than any other man in New York," said the other, simply, without
any boastfulness.

"And you know what these facial surgeons do?"

"Certainly. A friend of mine has written the only really scientific
monograph yet published on the art they profess."

"And yet you say that what my friend has done is impossible?"

"What you say he has done is quite impossible. Mr. Tompkins, for
example, whom you cite as having once met your friend and then failed to
recognize him, would recognize him in ten seconds after any
transformation within possibility. If he failed to recognize the man you
take to be your friend transformed, make up your mind the man is
somebody else."

Bagley drew a deep sigh, curtly thanked the criminologist, and rose,
saying to Larcher: "Well, you better turn over the stakes to your
friend, I guess."

"You're not going yet, are you?" said Larcher.

"Yes, sir. I lose this bet; but I'll try my story on the police just the
same. Truth is mighty and will prevail."

Before Bagley could make his way out, however, Turl, who had been
watching him, managed to get to his side. Larcher, waving a good-night to
Barry Tompkins, followed the two from the room. In the hall, he handed
the stakes to Turl.

"Oh, yes, you win all right enough," admitted Bagley. "My fun will
come later."

"I trust you'll see the funny side of it," replied Turl, accompanying him
forth to the snowy street. "You haven't laughed much at the little
foretaste of the incredulity that awaits you."

"Never you mind. I'll make them believe me, before I'm through." He had
turned toward Sixth Avenue. Turl and Larcher stuck close to him.

"You'll have them suggesting rest-cures for the mind, and that sort of
thing," said Turl, pleasantly.

"And the newspapers will be calling you the Great American Identifier,"
put in Larcher.

"There'll be somebody else as the chief identifier," said Bagley, glaring
at Turl. "Somebody that knows it's you. I heard her say that much."

"Stop a moment, Mr. Bagley." Turl enforced obedience by stepping in
front of the man and facing him. The three stood still, at the corner,
while an elevated train rumbled along overhead. "I don't think you
really mean that. I don't think that, as an American, you would really
subject a woman--such a woman--to such an ordeal, to gain so little.
Would you now?"

"Why shouldn't I?" Despite his defiant look, Bagley had weakened a bit.

"I can't imagine your doing it. But if you did, my lawyer would have to
make you tell how you had heard this wonderful tale."

"Through the door. That's easy enough."

"We could show that the tale couldn't possibly be heard through so thick
a door, except by the most careful attention--at the keyhole. You would
have to tell my lawyer why you were listening at the keyhole--at the
keyhole of that lady's parlor. I can see you now, in my mind's eye,
attempting to answer that question--with the reporters eagerly awaiting
your reply to publish it to the town."

Bagley, still glaring hard, did some silent imagining on his own part. At
last he growled:

"If I do agree to settle this matter on the quiet, how much of that money
have you got left?"

"If you mean the money you placed in Murray Davenport's hands before he
disappeared, I've never heard that any of it has been spent. But isn't it
the case that Davenport considered himself morally entitled to that
amount from you?"

Bagley gave a contemptuous grunt; then, suddenly brightening up, he said:
"S'pose Davenport _was_ entitled to it. As you ain't Davenport, why, of
course, you ain't entitled to it. Now what have you got to say?"

"Merely, that, as you're not Davenport, neither are you entitled to it."

"But I was only supposin'. I don't admit that Davenport was entitled
to it. Ordinary law's good enough for me. I just wanted to show you
where you stand, you not bein' Davenport, even if he had a right to
that money."

"Suppose Davenport had given me the money?"

"Then you'd have to restore it, as it wasn't lawfully his."

"But you can't prove that I have it, to restore."

"If I can establish any sort of connection between you and Davenport, I
can cause your affairs to be thoroughly looked into," retorted Bagley.

"But you can't establish that connection, any more than you can convince
anybody that I'm Murray Davenport."

Bagley was fiercely silent, taking in a deep breath for the cooling of
his rage. He was a man who saw whole vistas of probability in a moment,
and who was correspondingly quick in making decisions.

"We're at a deadlock," said he. "You're a clever boy, Dav,--or Turl, I
might as well call you. I know the game's against me, and Turl you shall
be from now on, for all I've ever got to say. I did swear this evening to
make it hot for you, but I'm not as hot myself now as I was at that
moment. I'll give up the idea of causing trouble for you over that money;
but the money itself I must have."

"Do you need it badly?" asked Turl.

"_Need_ it!" cried Bagley, scorning the imputation. "Not me! The loss of
it would never touch me. But no man can ever say he's done me out of that
much money, no matter how smart he is. So I'll have that back, if I've
got to spend all the rest of my pile to get it. One way or another, I'll
manage to produce evidence connecting you with Murray Davenport at the
time he disappeared with my cash."

Turl pondered. Presently he said: "If it were restored to you,
Davenport's moral right to it would still be insisted on. The restoration
would be merely on grounds of expediency."

"All right," said Bagley.

"Of course," Turl went on, "Davenport no longer needs it; and certainly
_I_ don't need it."

"Oh, don't you, on the level?" inquired Bagley, surprised.

"Certainly not. I can earn a very good income. Fortune smiles on me."

"I shouldn't mind your holding out a thousand or two of that money when
you pay it over,--say two thousand, as a sort of testimonial of my
regard," said Bagley, good-naturedly.

"Thank you very much. You mean to be generous; but I couldn't accept
a dollar as a gift, from the man who wouldn't pay Murray Davenport
as a right."

"Would you accept the two thousand, then, as Murray Davenport's
right,--you being a kind of an heir of his?"

"I would accept the whole amount in dispute; but under that, not a cent."

Bagley looked at Turl long and hard; then said, quietly: "I tell you
what I'll do with you. I'll toss up for that money,--the whole amount. If
you win, keep it, and I'll shut up. But if I win, you turn it over and
never let me hear another word about Davenport's right."

"As I told you before, I'm not a gambling man. And I can't admit that
Davenport's right is open to settlement."

"Well, at least you'll admit that you and I don't agree about it. You
can't deny there's a difference of opinion between us. If you want to
settle that difference once and for ever, inside of a minute, here's your
chance. It's just cases like this that the dice are good for. There's a
saloon over on that corner. Will you come?"

"All right," said Turl. And the three strode diagonally across
Sixth Avenue.

"Gimme a box of dice," said Bagley to the man behind the bar, when they
had entered the brightly lighted place.

"They're usin' it in the back room," was the reply.

"Got a pack o' cards?" then asked Bagley.

The barkeeper handed over a pack which had been reposing in a cigar-box.

"I'll make it as sudden as you like," said Bagley to Turl. "One cut
apiece, and highest wins. Or would you like something not so quick?"

"One cut, and the higher wins," said Turl.

"Shuffle the cards," said Bagley to Larcher, who obeyed. "Help yourself,"
said Bagley to Turl. The latter cut, and turned up a ten-spot. Bagley
cut, and showed a six.

"The money's yours," said Bagley. "And now, gentlemen, what'll you have
to drink?"

The drinks were ordered, and taken in silence. "There's only one thing
I'd like to ask," said Bagley thereupon. "That keyhole business--it
needn't go any further, I s'pose?"

"I give you my word," said Turl. Larcher added his, whereupon Bagley
bade the barkeeper telephone for a four-wheeler, and would have taken
them to their homes in it. But they preferred a walk, and left him
waiting for his cab.

"Well!" exclaimed Larcher, as soon as he was out of the saloon. "I
congratulate you! I feared Bagley would give trouble. But how easily he
came around!"

"You forget how fortunate I am," said Turl, smiling. "Poor Davenport
could never have brought him around."

"There's no doubting your luck," said Larcher; "even with cards."

"Lucky with cards," began Turl, lightly; but broke off all at once, and
looked suddenly dubious as Larcher glanced at him in the electric light.




CHAPTER XVIII.


FLORENCE

The morning brought sunshine and the sound of sleigh-bells. In the
wonderfully clear air of New York, the snow-covered streets dazzled the
eyes. Never did a town look more brilliant, or people feel more blithe,
than on this fine day after the long snow-storm.

"Isn't it glorious?" Edna Hill was looking out on the shining white
gardens from Florence's parlor window. "Certainly, on a day like this, it
doesn't seem natural for one to cling to the past. It's a day for
beginning over again, if ever there are such days." Her words had
allusion to the subject on which the two girls had talked late into the
night. Edna had waited for Florence to resume the theme in the morning,
but the latter had not done so yet, although breakfast was now over.
Perhaps it was her father's presence that had deterred her. The incident
of the meal had been the arrival of a note from Mr. Bagley to Mr. Kenby,
expressing the former's regret that he should be unavoidably prevented
from keeping the engagement to go sleighing. As Florence had forgotten to
give her father Mr. Bagley's verbal message, this note had brought her in
for a quantity of paternal complaint sufficient for the venting of the
ill-humor due to his having stayed up too late, and taken too much
champagne the night before. But now Mr. Kenby had gone out, wrapped up
and overshod, to try the effect of fresh air on his headache, and of
shop-windows and pretty women on his spirits. Florence, however, had
still held off from the all-important topic, until Edna was driven to
introduce it herself.

"It's never a day for abandoning what has been dear to one,"
replied Florence.

"But you wouldn't be abandoning him. After all, he really is the
same man."

"But I can't make myself regard him as the same. And he doesn't regard
himself so."

"But in that case the other man has vanished. It's precisely as if he
were dead. No, it's even worse, for there isn't as much trace of him as
there would be of a man that had died. What's the use of being faithful
to such an utterly non-existent person? Why, there isn't even a grave, to
put flowers on;--or an unknown mound in a distant country, for the
imagination to cling to. There's just nothing to be constant to."

"There are memories."

"Well, they'll remain. Does a widow lose her memories of number one when
she becomes Mrs. Number Two?"

"She changes the character of them; buries them out of sight; kills them
with neglect. Yes, she is false to them."

"But your case isn't even like that. In these peculiar circumstances the
old memories will blend with the new.--And, dear me! he is such a nice
man! I don't see how the other could have been nicer. You couldn't find
anybody more congenial in tastes and manners, I'm sure."

"I can't make you understand, dear. Suppose Tom Larcher went away for a
time, and came back so completely different that you couldn't see the old
Tom Larcher in him at all. And suppose he didn't even consider himself
the same person you had loved. Would you love him then as you do now?"

Edna was silenced for a moment; but for a moment only. "Well, if he came
back such a charming fellow as Turl, and if he loved me as much as Turl
loves you, I could soon manage to drop the old Tom out of my mind. But of
course, you know, in my heart of hearts, I wouldn't forget for a moment
that he really was the old Tom."

The talk was interrupted by a knock at the door. The servant gave the
name of Mr. Turl. Florence turned crimson, and stood at a loss.

"You can't truly say you're out, dear," counselled Edna, in an undertone.

"Show him in," said Florence.

Turl entered.

Florence looked and spoke coldly. "I told you I'd send a message when I
wished you to call."

He was wistful, but resolute. "I know it," he said. "But love doesn't
stand on ceremony; lovers are importunate; they come without
bidding.--Good morning, Miss Hill; you mustn't let me drive you away."

For Edna had swished across the room, and was making for the hall.

"I'm going to the drawing-room," she said, airily, "to see the
sleighs go by."

In another second, the door slammed, and Turl was alone with Florence. He
took a hesitating step toward her.

"It's useless," she said, raising her hand as a barrier between them. "I
can't think of you as the same. I can't see _him_ in you. I should have
to do that before I could offer you his place. All that I can love now
is the memory of him."

"Listen," said Turl, without moving. "I have thought it over. For your
sake, I will be the man I was. It's true, I can't restore the old face;
but the old outlook on life, the old habits, the old pensiveness, will
bring back the old expression. I will resume the old name, the old set of
memories, the old sense of personality. I said last night that a
resumption of the old self could be only mental, and incomplete even so.
But when I said that, I had not surrendered. The mental return can be
complete, and must reveal itself more or less on the surface. And the old
love,--surely where the feeling is the same, its outer showing can't be
utterly new and strange."

He spoke with a more pleading and reverent note than he had yet used
since the revelation. A moist shine came into her eyes.

"Murray--it _is_ you!" she whispered.

"Ah!--sweetheart!" His smile of the utmost tenderness seemed more of a
kind with sadness than with pleasure. It was the smile of a man deeply
sensible of sorrow--of Murray Davenport,--not that of one versed in good
fortune alone--not that which a potent imagination had made habitual to
Francis Turl.

She gave herself to his arms, and for a time neither spoke. It was she
who broke the silence, looking up with tearful but smiling eyes:

"You shall not abandon your design. It's too marvellous, too successful;
it has been too dear to you for that."

"It was dear to me when I thought I had lost you. And since then, the
pride of conceiving and accomplishing it, the labor and pain, kept it
dear to me. But now that I am sure of you, I can resign it without a
murmur. From the moment when I decided to sacrifice it, it has been
nothing to me, provided I could only regain you."

"But the old failure, the old ill luck, the old unrewarded drudgery,--no,
you sha'n't go back to them. You shall be true to the illusion--we shall
be true to it--I will help you in it, strengthen you in it! I needed only
to see the old Murray Davenport appear in you one moment. Hereafter you
shall be Francis Turl, the happy and fortunate! But you and I will have
our secret--before the world you shall be Francis Turl--but to me you
shall be Murray Davenport, too--Murray Davenport hidden away in Francis
Turl. To me alone, for the sake of the old memories. It will be another
tie between us, this secret, something that is solely ours, deep in our
hearts, as the knowledge of your old self would always have been deep in
yours if you hadn't told me. Think how much better it is that I share
this knowledge with you; now nothing of your mind is concealed from me,
and we together shall have our smile at the world's expense."

"For being so kind to Francis Turl, the fortunate, after its cold
treatment of Murray Davenport, the unlucky," said Turl, smiling. "It
shall be as you say, sweetheart. There can be no doubt about my good
fortune. It puts even the old proverb out. With me it is lucky in love as
well as at cards."

"What do you mean, dear?"

"The Bagley money--"

"Ah, that money. Listen, dear. Now that I have some right to speak, you
must return that money. I don't dispute your moral claim to it--such
things are for you to settle. But the danger of keeping it--"

"There's no longer any danger. The money is mine, of Bagley's own free
will and consent. I encountered him last night. He is in my secret now,
but it's safe with him. We cut cards for the money, and I won. I hate
gambling, but the situation was exceptional. He hoped that, once the
matter was settled by the cards, he should never hear a word about it
again. As he hadn't heard a word of it from me--Davenport--for years,
this meant that his own conscience had been troubling him about it all
along. That's why he was ready at last to put the question to a toss-up;
but first he established the fact that he wouldn't be 'done' out of the
money by anybody. I tell you all this, dear, in justice to the man; and
so, exit Bagley. As I said, my secret--_our_ secret--is safe with him. So
it is, of course, with Miss Hill and Larcher. Nobody else knows it,
though others besides you three may have suspected that I had something
to do with the disappearance."

"Only Mr. Bud."

"Larcher can explain away Mr. Bud's suspicions. Larcher has been a good
friend. I can never be grateful enough--"

A knock at the door cut his speech short, and the servant announced
Larcher himself. It had been arranged that he should call for Edna's
orders. That young lady had just intercepted him in the hall, to prevent
his breaking in upon what might be occurring between Turl and Miss Kenby.
But Florence, holding the door open, called out to Edna and Larcher to
come in. Something in her voice and look conveyed news to them both, and
they came swiftly. Edna kissed Florence half a dozen times, while Larcher
was shaking hands with Turl; then waltzed across to the piano, and for a
moment drowned the outside noises--the jingle of sleigh-bells, and the
shouts of children snowballing in the sunshine--with the still more
joyous notes of a celebrated march by Mendelssohn.

THE END.

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