“That will do, Mr. Wheeler,” and Stone dismissed the cook with a glance. “Now, Mr. Keefe?”
“As if that woman’s story mattered,” Keefe sneered, contemptuously, “she is merely mistaken, that’s all. The word of the maid, Rachel, is as good as that of the cook——”
“Oh, no, it isn’t!” Stone interrupted, but, paying no heed to him, Keefe went on; “and you can scarcely doubt the signature after Mr. Wheeler and your friend the cook have both verified it.”
Though his demeanor was quiet, Keefe’s face wore a defiant expression and his voice was a trifle blustering.
“I do not doubt the signature,” Stone declared, “nor do I doubt that you obtained it at the hospital exactly as you have described that incident.”
Keefe’s face relaxed at that, and he recovered his jaunty manner, as he said: “Then you admit I have beaten you at your own game, Mr. Stone?”
“No, Mr. Keefe, but I have beaten you at yours.”
A silence fell for a moment. There was something about Stone’s manner of speaking that made for conviction in the minds of his hearers that he said truth.
“Wait a minute! Oh, wait a minute!” It was Genevieve Lane who cried out the words, and then she sprang from her chair and ran to Keefe’s side.
Flinging her arms about him, she whispered close to his ear.
He listened, and then, with a scornful gesture he flung her off.
“No!” he said to her; “no! a thousand times, no! Do your worst.”
“I shall!” replied Genevieve, and without another word she resumed her seat.
“Yes,” went on Stone, this interruption being over, “your ingenious ‘success’ in the way of detecting is doomed to an ignominious end. You see, sir,” he turned to Daniel Wheeler, “the clever ruse Mr. Keefe has worked, is but a ruse—a stratagem, to deceive us all and to turn the just suspicion of the criminal in an unjust direction.”
“Explain, Mr. Stone,” said Wheeler, apparently not much impressed with what he deemed a last attempt on the part of the detective to redeem his reputation.
“Yes, Mr. Stone,” said Keefe, “if my solution of this mystery is a ruse—a stratagem—what have you to offer in its place? You admit the signed confession?”
“I admit the signature, but not the confession. John Mills signed that paper, Mr. Keefe, but he is not the murderer.”