Landon?”
“Yes.”
“Related to Mr. Trowbridge?”
“I am the nephew of his wife, who died many years ago.”
“Where do you live?”
“For the last five years I have lived in Denver, Colorado.”
“And you are East on a visit?”
“I came East, hoping to persuade my uncle to finance a mining project in which I am interested.”
“And which he refused to do?”
“Which he refused to do.”
There was something about the young man’s manner which was distinctly irritating to Coroner Berg. It was as if the stranger was laughing at him, and yet no one could show a more serious face than the witness presented. The onlookers held their breath in suspense. Avice stared at young Landon. She remembered him well. Five years ago they had been great friends, when she was fifteen and he twenty. Now, he looked much more than five years older. He was bronzed, and his powerful frame had acquired a strong, well-knit effect that told of outdoor life and much exercise. His face was hard and inscrutable of expression. He was not prepossessing, nor of an inviting demeanor, but rather repelling in aspect. His stern, clear-cut mouth showed a haughty curve and a scornful pride shone in the steely glint of his deep gray eyes. He stood erect, his hands carelessly clasped behind him, and seemed to await further questioning.
Nor did he wait long. The coroner’s tongue once loosed, his queries came direct and rapid.
“Will you give an account of your movements yesterday, Mr. Landon?”
“Certainly. The narrative of my uncle’s office boy is substantially true. I reached New York from the West day before yesterday. I went yesterday morning to see my uncle. I asked him for the money I wanted and he refused it. Then I went away.”
“And afterward?”
“Oh, afterward, I looked about the city a bit, and went back to my hotel for luncheon.”
“And after luncheon?”
Landon’s aplomb seemed suddenly to desert him. “After luncheon,” he began, and paused. He shifted his weight to the other foot; he unclasped his hands and put them in his pockets; he frowned as if in a brown study and finally, his eyes fell on Avice and rested there. The girl was gazing at him with an eager, strained face, and it seemed to arrest his attention to the exclusion of all else.
“Well?” said the coroner, impatiently.
Landon’s fair hair was thick and rather longer than the conventions decreed. He shook back this mane, with a defiant gesture, and said clearly, “After luncheon, I went to walk in Van Cortlandt Park.”
The audience gasped. Was this the honesty of innocence or the bravado of shameless guilt?
Leslie Hoyt looked at Landon curiously. Hoyt was a clever man and quick reader of character, but this young Westerner apparently puzzled him. He seemed to take a liking to him, but reserved decision as to the justification of this attitude. Avice went white and was afraid she was going to faint. To her, the admission sounded like a confession of the crime, and it was too incredible to be believed. And yet, as she remembered Kane, it was like him to tell the truth. In their old play days, he had often told the truth, she remembered, even though to his own disadvantage. And she remembered, too, how he had often escaped with a lighter punishment because he had been frank! Was this his idea? Had he really killed his uncle, and fearing discovery, was he trying to forestall the consequences by admission?
“Mr. Landon,” went on the coroner, “that is a more or less incriminating statement. Are you aware your uncle was murdered in Van Cortlandt Park woods yesterday afternoon?”
“Yes,” was the reply, but in a voice so low as to be almost inaudible.
“At what time were you there?”
“I don’t know, exactly. I returned home before sundown.”
“Why did you go there?”
“Because when with my uncle in the morning he happened to remark there were often good golf games played there, and as it was a beautiful afternoon, and I had nothing especial to do, I went out there.”
“Why did you not go to call on your cousin, Miss Trowbridge?”
Landon glared at the speaker. “You are outside your privileges in asking that question. I decline to answer. My personal affairs in no way concern you. Kindly get to the point. Am I under suspicion of being my uncle’s murderer?”
“Perhaps that is too definite a statement, but it is necessary for us to learn the truth about your implication in the matter.”
“Go on, then, with your questions. But for Heaven’s sake, keep to the point, and don’t bring in personal or family affairs. And incidentally, Miss Trowbridge is not my cousin.”
The words were spoken lightly, almost flippantly, and seemed to some listeners as if meant to divert attention from the business in hand.
“But she is the niece of the late Mr. Trowbridge.”
“Miss Trowbridge is the daughter of Mr. Trowbridge’s brother, who died years ago. I am the nephew of Mr. Trowbridge’s late wife, as I believe I have already stated.”
Nobody liked the young man’s manner. It was careless, indifferent, and inattentive. He stood easily, and was in no way embarrassed, but his bravado, whether real or assumed, was distasteful to those who were earnestly trying to discover the facts of the crime that had been committed. There were many who at once leaped to the conclusion that the Swede’s testimony of the victim’s dying words, proved conclusively that the murderer was of a necessity this young man, whose name was Kane, and who so freely admitted his presence near the scene of the tragedy.
“As you suggest, Mr. Landon,” said the coroner, coldly, “we will keep to the point. When you were in Van Cortlandt Park, yesterday, did you see your uncle, Mr. Trowbridge there?”
“I did not.”
The answer was given in a careless, unconcerned way that exasperated the coroner.
“Can you prove that?” he snapped out.
Landon looked at him in mild amazement, almost amusement. “Certainly not,” he replied; “nor do I need to. The burden of proof rests with you. If you suspect me of having killed my uncle, it is for you to produce proof.”
Coroner Berg looked chagrined. He had never met just this sort of a witness before, and did not know quite how to treat him.
And yet Landon was respectful, serious, and polite. Indeed, one might have found it hard to say what was amiss in his attitude, but none could deny there was something. It was after all, an aloofness, a separateness, that seemed to disconnect this man with the proceedings now going on; and which was so, only because the man himself willed it.
Coroner Berg restlessly and only half-consciously sensed this state of things, and gropingly strove to fasten on some facts.
Nor were these hard to find. The facts were clear and startling enough, and were to a legal mind conclusive. There was, so far as known, no eye-witness
