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The Stillwater Tragedy

T >> Thomas Bailey Aldrich >> The Stillwater Tragedy




At midnight the watchman on his lonely beat saw those two candles
still burning.






XX





Mr. Taggett's diary was precisely a diary,--disjoined, full of
curt, obscure phrases and irrelevant reflections,--for which reason
it will not be reproduced here. Though Mr. Slocum pondered every
syllable, and now and then turned back painfully to reconsider some
doubtful passage, it is not presumed that the reader will care to do
so. An abstract of the journal, with occasional quotation where the
writer's words seem to demand it, will be sufficient for the
narrative.

In the opening pages Mr. Taggett described his novel surroundings
with a minuteness which contrasted oddly with the brief, hurried
entries further on. He found himself, as he had anticipated, in a
society composed of some of the most heterogeneous elements.
Stillwater, viewed from a certain point, was a sort of microcosm, a
little international rag-fair to which nearly every country on earth
had contributed one of its shabby human products. "I am moving,"
wrote Mr. Taggett, "in an atmosphere in which any crime is possible.
I give myself seven days at the outside to light upon the traces of
Shackford's murder. I feel him in the air." The writer's theory was
that the man would betray his identity in one of two ways: either by
talking unguardedly, or by indulging in expenditures not warranted by
his means and position. If several persons had been concerned in the
crime, nothing was more likely than a disagreement over the spoil,
and consequent treachery on the part of one of them. Or, again, some
of the confederates might become alarmed, and attempt to save
themselves by giving away their comrades. Mr. Taggett, however,
leaned to the belief that the assassin had had no accomplices.

The sum taken from Mr. Shackford's safe was a comparatively large
one,--five hundred dollars in gold and nearly double that amount in
bank-notes. Neither the gold nor the paper bore any known mark by
which it could be recognized; the burglar had doubtless assured
himself of this, and would not hesitate to disburse the money. That
was even a safer course, judiciously worked, than to secrete it. The
point was, Would he have sufficient self-control to get rid of it by
degrees? The chances, Mr. Taggett argued, were ten to one he would
not.

A few pages further on Mr. Taggett compliments the Unknown on the
adroit manner in which he is conducting himself. He has neither let
slip a suspicious word, nor made an incautious display of his booty.
Snelling's bar was doing an unusually light business. No one appeared
to have any money. Many of the men had run deeply into debt during
the late strike, and were now drinking moderately. In the paragraph
which closes the week's record Mr. Taggett's chagrin is evident. He
confesses that he is at fault. "My invisible friend does not
_materialize_ so successfully as I expected," is Mr. Taggett's
comment.

His faith in the correctness of his theory had not abated; but he
continued his observation sin a less sanguine spirit. These
observations were not limited to the bar-room or the workshop; he
informed himself of the domestic surroundings of his comrades. Where
his own scrutiny could not penetrate, he employed the aid of
correspondents. He knew what workmen had money in the local
savings-bank, and the amount of each deposit. In the course of his
explorations of the shady side of Stillwater life, Mr. Taggett
unearthed many amusing and many pathetic histories, but nothing that
served his end. Finally, he began to be discouraged.

Returning home from the tavern, one night, in a rather desponding
mood, he found the man Wollaston smoking his pipe in bed. Wollaston
was a taciturn man generally, but this night he was conversational,
and Mr. Taggett, too restless to sleep, fell to chatting with him.
Did he know much about the late Mr. Shackford? Yes, he had known him
well enough, in an off way,--not to speak of him; everybody knew him
in Stillwater; he was a sort of miser, hated everybody, and bullied
everybody. It was a wonder somebody didn't knock the old silvertop on
the head years ago.

Thus Mr. Wollaston grimly, with his pores stopped up with
iron-fillings,--a person to whom it would come quite easy to knock
any one on the head for a slight difference of opinion. He amused Mr.
Taggett in his present humor.

No, he wasn't aware that Shackford had had trouble with any
particular individual; believed he did have a difficulty once with
Slocum, the marble man; but he was always fetching suits against the
town and shying lawyers at the mill directors,--a disagreeable old
cuss altogether. Adopted his cousin, one time, but made the house so
hot for him that the lad ran off to sea, and since then had had
nothing to do with the old bilk.

Indeed! What sort of fellow was young Shackford? Mr. Wollaston
could not say of his own knowledge; thought him a plucky chap; he had
put a big Italian named Torrini out of the yard, one day, for talking
back. Who was Torrini? The man that got hurt last week in the Dana
Mill. Who were Richard Shackford's intimates? Couldn't say; had seen
him with Mr. Pinkham, the school-master, and Mr. Craggie,--went with
the upper crust generally. Was going to be partner in the marble yard
and marry Slocum's daughter. Will Durgin knew him. They lived
together one time. He, Wollaston, was going to turn in now.

Several of these facts were not new to Mr. Taggett, but Mr.
Wollaston's presentation of them threw Mr. Taggett into a reverie.

The next evening he got Durgin alone in a corner of the bar-room.
With two or three potations Durgin became autobiographical. Was he
acquainted with Mr. Shackford outside the yard? Rather. Dick
Shackford? His (Durgin's) mother had kept Dick from starving when he
was a baby,--and no thanks for it. Went to school with him, and knew
all about his running off to sea. Was near going with him. Old man
Shackford never liked Dick, who was a proud beggar; they couldn't
pull together, down to the last,--both of a piece. They had a jolly
rumpus a little while before the old man was fixed.

Mr. Taggett pricked up his ears at this.

A rumpus? How did Durgin know that? A girl told him. What girl? A
girl he was sweet on. What was her name? Well, he didn't mind telling
her name; it was Molly Hennessey. She was going through Welch's Court
one forenoon,--may be it was three days before the strike,--and saw
Dick Shackford bolt out of the house, swinging his arms and swearing
to himself at an awful rate. Was Durgin certain that Molly Hennessey
had told him this? Yes, he was ready to take his oath on it.

Here, at last, was something that looked like a glimmer of
daylight.

It was possible that Durgin or the girl had lied; but the story
had an air of truth to it. If it were a fact that there had recently
been a quarrel between these cousins, whose uncousinly attitude
towards each other was fast becoming clear to Mr. Taggett, then here
was a conceivable key to an enigma which had puzzled him.

The conjecture that Lemuel Shackford had himself torn up the
will--if it was a will, for this still remained in dispute--had never
been satisfactory to Mr. Taggett. He had accepted it because he was
unable to imagine an ordinary burglar pausing in the midst of his
work to destroy a paper in which he could have no concern. But
Richard Shackford would have the liveliest possible interest in the
destruction of a document that placed a vast estate beyond his reach.
Here was a motive on a level with the crime. That money had been
taken, and that the fragments of the will had been carelessly thrown
into a waste-paper basket, just as if the old man himself had thrown
them there, was a stroke of art which Mr. Taggett admired more and
more as he reflected upon it.

He did not, however, allow himself to lay too much stress on these
points; for the paper might turn out to be merely an expired lease,
and the girl might have been quizzing Durgin. Mr. Taggett would have
given one of his eye-teeth just then for ten minutes with Mary
Hennessey. But an interview with her at this stage was neither
prudent nor easily compassed.

"If I have not struck a trail," writes Mr. Taggett, "I have come
upon what strongly resembles one; the least I can do is to follow it.
My first move must be to inspect that private workshop in the rear of
Mr. Slocum's house. How shall I accomplish it? I cannot apply to him
for permission, for that would provoke questions which I am not ready
to answer. Moreover, I have yet to assure myself that Mr. Slocum is
not implicated. There seems to have been also a hostile feeling
existing between him and the deceased. Why didn't some one tell me
these things at the start! If young Shackford is the person, there is
a tangled story to be unraveled. _Mem:_ Young Shackford is Miss
Slocum's lover."

Mr. Slocum read this passage twice without drawing breath, and
then laid down the book an instant to wipe the sudden perspiration
from his forehead.

In the note which followed, Mr. Taggett described the difficulty
he met with in procuring a key to fit the wall-door at the rear of
the marble yard, and gave an account of his failure to effect an
entrance into the studio. He had hoped to find a window unfastened;
but the window, as well as the door opening upon the veranda, was
locked, and in the midst of his operations, which were conducted at
noon-time, the approach of a servant had obliged him to retreat.

Forced to lay aside, at least temporarily, his designs on the
workshop, he turned his attention to Richard's lodgings in Lime
Street. Here Mr. Taggett was more successful. On the pretext that he
had been sent for certain drawings which were to be found on the
table or in a writing-desk, he was permitted by Mrs. Spooner to
ascend to the bedroom, where she obligingly insisted on helping him
search for the apocryphal plans, and seriously interfered with his
purpose, which was to find the key of the studio. While Mr. Taggett
was turning over the pages of a large dictionary, in order to gain
time, and was wondering how he could rid himself of the old lady's
importunities, he came upon a half-folded note-sheet, at the bottom
of which his eye caught the name of Lemuel Shackford. It was in the
handwriting of the dead man. Mr. Taggett was very familiar with that
handwriting. He secured the paper at a venture, and put it in his
pocket without examination.

A few minutes later, it being impossible to prolong the pretended
quest for the drawings, Mr. Taggett was obliged to follow Mrs.
Spooner from the apartment. As he did so he noticed a bright object
lying on the corner of the mantel-shelf,--a small nickel-plated key.
In order to take it he had only to reach out his hand in passing. It
was, as Mr. Taggett had instantly surmised, the key of Richard's
workshop.

If it had been gold, instead of brass or iron, that bit of metal
would have taken no additional value in Mr. Taggett's eyes. On
leaving Mrs. Spooner's he held it tightly clasped in his fingers
until he reached an unfrequented street, where he halted a moment in
the shadow of a building to inspect the paper, which he had half
forgotten in his satisfaction at having obtained the key. A stifled
cry rose to Mr. Taggett's lips as he glanced over the crumpled
note-sheet.

It contained three lines, hastily scrawled in lead-pencil,
requesting Richard Shackford to call at the house in Welch's Court at
eight o'clock on a certain Tuesday night. The note had been written,
as the date showed, on the day preceding the Tuesday night in
question--the night of the murder!

For a second or two Mr. Taggett stood paralyzed. Ten minutes
afterwards a message in cipher was pulsing along the wires to New
York, and before the sun went down that evening Richard Shackford was
under the surveillance of the police.

The doubtful, unknown ground upon which Mr. Taggett had been
floundering was now firm under his feet,--unexpected ground, but
solid. Meeting Mary Hennessey in the street, on his way to the marble
yard, Mr. Taggett no longer hesitated to accost her, and question her
as to the story she had told William Durgin. The girl's story was
undoubtedly true, and as a piece of circumstantial evidence was only
less important than the elder Shackford's note. The two cousins had
been for years on the worst of terms. At every step Mr. Taggett had
found corroboration of Wollaston's statement to that effect.

"Where were Coroner Whidden's eyes and ears," wrote Mr.
Taggett,--the words were dashed down impatiently on the page, as if
he had sworn a little internally while writing them,--"when he
conducted that inquest! In all my experience there was never a thing
so stupidly managed."

A thorough and immediate examination of Richard Shackford's
private workshop was now so imperative that Mr. Taggett resolved to
make it even if he had to do so under the authority of a
search-warrant. But he desired as yet to avoid publicity.

A secret visit to the studio seemed equally difficult by day and
night. In the former case he was nearly certain to be deranged by the
servants, and in the latter a light in the unoccupied room would
alarm any of the household who might chance to awaken. From the
watchman no danger was to be apprehended, as the windows of the
extension were not visible from the street.

Mr. Taggett finally decided on the night as the more propitious
time for his attempt,--a decision which his success justified. A
brilliant moon favored the in-door part of the enterprise, though it
exposed him to observation in his approach from the marble yard to
the veranda.

With the dense moonlight streaming outside against the
window-shades, he could safely have used a candle in the studio
instead of the screened lantern which he had provided. Mr. Taggett
passed three hours in the workshop,--the last hour in waiting for the
moon to go down. Then he stole through the marble yard into the
silent street, and hurried home, carrying two small articles
concealed under his blouse. The first was a chisel with a triangular
piece broken out of the centre of the bevel, and the other was a box
of safety-matches. The peculiarity of this box of matches was--that
just one match had been used from it.

Mr. Taggett's work was done.

The last seven pages of the diary were devoted to a review of the
case, every detail of which was held up in various lights, and
examined with the conscientious pains of a lapidary deciding on the
value of a rare stone. The concluding entries ran as follow:--

_"Tuesday Night_. Here the case passes into other hands. I
have been fortunate rather than skillful in unmasking the chief actor
in one of the most singular crimes that ever came under my
investigation. By destroying three objects, very easily destroyed,
Richard Shackford would have put himself beyond the dream of
suspicion. He neglected to remove these dumb witnesses, and now the
dumb witnesses speak! If it could be shown that he was a hundred
miles from Stillwater at the time of the murder, instead of in the
village, as he was, he must still be held, in the face of the proofs
against him, accessory to the deed. These proofs, roughly summarized,
are:--

_"First_. The fact that he had had an altercation with his
cousin a short time previous to the date of the murder,--a murder
which may be regarded not as the result of a chance disagreement, but
of long years of bitter enmity between the two men.

_"Secondly_. The fact that Richard Shackford had had an
appointment with his cousin on the night the crime was committed, and
had concealed that fact from the authorities at the time of the
coroner's inquest.

_"Thirdly_. That the broken chisel found in the private
workshop of the accused explains the peculiar shape of the wound
which caused Lemuel Shackford's death, and corresponds in every
particular with the plaster impression taken of that wound.

_"Fourthly_. That the partially consumed match found on the
scullery floor when the body was discovered (a style of match not
used in the house in Welch's Court) completes the complement of a box
of safety-matches belonging to Richard Shackford, and hidden in a
closet in his workshop.

"Whether Shackford had an accomplice or not is yet to be
ascertained. There is nothing whatever to implicate Mr. Rowland
Slocum. I make the statement because his intimate association with
one party and his deep dislike of the other invited inquiry, and at
first raised an unjust suspicion in my mind."

The little red book slipped from Mr. Slocum's grasp and fell at
his feet. As he rose from the chair, the reflection which he caught
of himself in the dressing-table mirror was that of a wrinkled, white
old man.

Mr. Slocum did not believe, and no human evidence could have
convinced him, that Richard had deliberately killed Lemuel Shackford;
but as Mr. Slocum reached the final pages of the diary, a horrible
probability insinuated itself in his mind. Could Richard have done it
accidentally? Could he--in an instant of passion, stung to sudden
madness by that venomous old man--have struck him involuntarily, and
killed him? A certain speech which Richard had made in Mr. Slocum's
presence not long before came back to him now with fearful
emphasis:--

_"Three or four times in my life I have been carried away by a
devil of a temper which I couldn't control, it seized me so
unawares."_

"It seized me so unawares!" repeated Mr. Slocum, half aloud; and
then with a swift, unconscious gesture, he pressed his hands over his
ears, as if to shut out the words.






XXI





Margaret must be told. It would be like stabbing her to tell her
all this. Mr. Slocum had lain awake long after midnight, appalled by
the calamity that was about to engulf them. At moments, as his
thought reverted to Margaret's illness early in the spring, he felt
that perhaps it would have been a mercy if she had died then. He had
left the candles burning; it was not until the wicks sunk down in the
sockets and went softly out that slumber fell upon him.

He was now sitting at the breakfast-table, absently crumbling bits
of bread beside his plate and leaving his coffee untouched. Margaret
glanced at him wistfully from time to time, and detected the restless
night in the deepened lines of his face.

The house had not been the same since Lemuel Shackford's death; he
had never crossed its threshold; Margaret had scarcely known him by
sight, and Mr. Slocum had not spoken to him for years; but Richard's
connection with the unfortunate old man had brought the tragic event
very close to Margaret and her father. Mr. Slocum was a person easily
depressed, but his depression this morning was so greatly in excess
of the presumable cause that Margaret began to be troubled.

"Papa, has anything happened?"

"No, nothing new has happened; but I am dreadfully disturbed by
some things which Mr. Taggett has been doing here in the village."

"I thought Mr. Taggett had gone."

"He did go; but he came back very quietly without anybody's
knowledge. I knew it, of course; but no one else, to speak of."

"What has he done to disturb you?"

"I want you to be a brave girl, Margaret,--will you promise that?"

"Why, yes," said Margaret, with an anxious look. "You frighten me
with your mysteriousness."

"I do not mean to be mysterious, but I don't quite know how to
tell you about Mr. Taggett. He has been working underground in this
matter of poor Shackford's death,--boring in the dark like a
mole,--and thinks he has discovered some strange things."

"Do you mean he thinks he has found out whoi killed Mr.
Shackford?"

"He believes he has fallen upon clews which will lead to that. The
strange things I alluded to are things which Richard will have to
explain."

"Richard? What has he to do with it?"

"Not much, I hope; but there are several matters which he will be
obliged to clear up in order to save himself from very great
annoyance. Mr. Taggett seems to think that--that"--

"Good heavens, papa! What does he think?"

"Margaret, he thinks that Richard knew something about the murder,
and has not told it."

"What could he know? Is that all?"

"No, that is not all. I am keeping the full truth from you, and it
is useless to do so. You must face it like a brave girl. Mr. Taggett
suspects Richard of being concerned, directly or indirectly, with the
crime."

The color went from Margaret's cheek for an instant. The statement
was too horrible and sudden not to startle her, but it was also too
absurd to have more than an instant's effect. Her quick recovery of
herself reassured Mr. Slocum. Would she meet Mr. Taggett's specific
charges with the like fortitude? Mr. Slocum himself had been
prostrated by them; he prayed to Heaven that Margaret might have more
strength than he, as indeed she had.

"The man has got together a lot of circumstantial evidence,"
continued Mr. Slocum cautiously; "some of it amounts to nothing,
being mere conjecture; but some of it will look badly for Richard, to
outsiders."

"Of course it is all a mistake," said Margaret, in nearly her
natural voice. "It ought to be easy to convince Mr. Taggett of that."

"I have not been able to convince him."

"But you will. What has possessed him to fall into such a
ridiculous error?"

"Mr. Taggett has written out everything at length in this
memorandum-book, and you must read it for yourself. There are
expressions and statements in these pages, Margaret, that will
necessarily shock you very much; but you should remember, as I tried
to while reading them, that Mr. Taggett has a heart of steel; without
it he would be unable to do his distressing work. The cold
impartiality with which he sifts and heaps up circumstances involving
the doom of a fellow-creature appears almost inhuman; but it is his
business. No, don't look at it here!" said Mr. Slocum, recoiling; he
had given the book to Margaret. "Take it into the other room, and
read it carefully by yourself. When you have finished, come back and
tell me what you think."

"But, papa, surely you"--

"I don't believe anything, Margaret! I don't know the true from
the false any more! I want you to help me out of my confusion, and
you cannot do it until you have read that book."

Margaret made no response, but passed into the parlor and closed
the folding-doors behind her.

After an absence of half an hour she reentered the breakfast room,
and laid Mr. Taggett's diary on the table beside her father, who had
not moved from his place during the interval. Margaret's manner was
collected, but it was evident, by the dark circles under her eyes,
and the set, colorless lips, that that half hour had been a cruel
thirty minutes to her. In Margaret's self-possession Mr. Slocum
recognized, not for the first time, the cropping out of an ancestral
trait which had somehow managed to avoid him in its wayward descent.

"Well?" he questioned, looking earnestly at Margaret, and catching
a kind of comfort from her confident bearing.

"It is Mr. Taggett's trade to find somebody guilty," said
Margaret, "and he has been very ingenious and very merciless. He was
plainly at his wits' ends to sustain his reputation, and would not
have hesitated to sacrifice any onen rather than wholly fail."

"But you have been crying, Margaret."

"How could I see Richard dragged down in the dust in this fashion,
and not be mortified and indignant?"

"You don't believe anything at all of this?"

"Do _you?"_ asked Margaret, looking through and through him.

"I confess I am troubled."

"If you doubt Richard for a second," said Margaret, with a slight
quiver of her lip, "that will be the bitterest part of it to me."

"I don't give any more credit to Mr. Taggett's general charges
than you do, Margaret; but I understand their gravity better. A
perfectly guiltless man, one able with a single word to establish his
innocence, is necessarily crushed at first by an accusation of this
kind. Now, can Richard set these matters right with a single word? I
am afraid he has a world of difficulty before him."

"When he returns he will explain everything. How can you question
it?"

"I do not wish to; but there are two things in Mr. Taggett's story
which stagger me. The motive for the destruction of Shackford's
papers,--that's not plain; the box of matches is a puerility unworthy
of a clever man like Mr. Taggett, and as to the chisel he found, why,
there are a hundred broken chisels in the village, and probably a
score of them broken in precisely the same manner; but, Margaret, did
Richard every breathe a word to you of that quarrel with his cousin?"

"No."

"He never mentioned it to me either. As matters stood between you
and him, nothing was more natural than that he should have spoken of
it to you,--so natural that his silence is positively strange."

"He may have considered it too unimportant. Mr. Shackford always
abused Richard; it was nothing new. Then, again, Richard is very
proud, and perhaps he did not care to come to us just at that time
with family grievances. Besides, how do we know they quarreled? The
village is full of gossip."

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