I’ve been under a great strain myself in connection with this
case, trying to catch up with some one I thought would be a
very different type from yourself. But now that I see you and
see how you feel about it all—how really frightened you are
by what has happened—it just occurs to me that there may
be something in connection with this case, some
extenuating circumstances, which, if they were related by
you now, might throw a slightly different light on all this. Of
course, I don’t know. You yourself ought to be the best
judge, but I’m laying the thought before you for what it’s
worth. For, of course, here are these letters. Besides, when
we get to Three Mile Bay to-morrow, as we will, I hope,
there will be those three men who met you the other night
walking south from Big Bittern. And not only those, but the
innkeeper from Grass Lake, the innkeeper from Big Bittern,
the boatkeeper up there who rented that boat, and the
driver who drove you and Roberta Alden over from Gun
Lodge. They will identify you. Do you think they won’t know
you—not any of them—not be able to say whether you
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826
were up there with her or not, or that a jury when the time
comes won’t believe them?”
And all this Clyde registered mentally like a machine
clicking to a coin, yet said nothing,—merely staring, frozen.
“And not only that,” went on Mason, very softly and most
ingratiatingly, “but there’s Mrs. Peyton. She saw me take
these letters and cards out of that trunk of yours in your
room and from the top drawer of your chiffonier. Next, there
are all those girls in that factory where you and Miss Alden
worked. Do you suppose they’re not going to remember all
about you and her when they learn that she is dead? Oh,
what nonsense! You ought to be able to see that for
yourself, whatever you think. You certainly can’t expect to
get away with that. It makes a sort of a fool out of you. You
can see that for yourself.”
He paused again, hoping for a confession. But Clyde still
convinced that any admission in connection with Roberta or
Big Bittern spelled ruin, merely stared while Mason
proceeded to add:
“All right, Griffiths, I’m now going to tell you one more thing,
and I couldn’t give you better advice if you were my own
son or brother and I were trying to get you out of this
instead of merely trying to get you to tell the truth. If you
hope to do anything at all for yourself now, it’s not going to
help you to deny everything in the way you are doing. You
are simply making trouble and condemning yourself in other
people’s eyes. Why not say that you did know her and that
you were up there with her and that she wrote you those
letters, and be done with it? You can’t get out of that,
whatever else you may hope to get out of. Any sane person
—your own mother, if she were here—would tell you the
same thing. It’s too ridiculous and indicates guilt rather than
innocence. Why not come clean here and now as to those
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827
facts, anyhow, before it’s too late to take advantage of any
mitigating circumstances in connection with all this—if there
are any? And if you do now, and I can help you in any way,
I promise you here and now that I’ll be only too glad to do
so. For, after all, I’m not out here just to hound a man to
death or make him confess to something that he hasn’t
done, but merely to get at the truth in the case. But if you’re
going to deny that you even knew this girl when I tell you I
have all the evidence and can prove it, why then——” and
here the district attorney lifted his hands aloft most wearily
and disgustedly.
But now as before Clyde remained silent and pale. In spite
of all Mason had revealed, and all that this seemingly
friendly, intimate advice seemed to imply, still he could not
conceive that it would be anything less than disastrous for
him to admit that he even knew Roberta. The fatality of
such a confession in the eyes of these others here. The
conclusion of all his dreams in connection with Sondra and
this life. And so, in the face of this—silence, still. And at
this, Mason, irritated beyond measure, finally exclaiming:
“Oh, very well, then. So you’ve finally decided not to talk,
have you?” And Clyde, blue and weak, replied: “I had
nothing to do with her death. That’s all I can say now,” and
yet even as he said it thinking that perhaps he had better
not say that—that perhaps he had better say—well, what?
That he knew Roberta, of course, had been up there with
her, for that matter—but that he had never intended to kill
her—that her drowning was an accident. For he had not
struck her at all, except by accident, had he? Only it was
best not to confess to having struck her at all, wasn’t it? For
who under such circumstances would believe that he had
struck her with a camera by accident. Best not to mention
the camera, since there was no mention anywhere in the
papers that he had had one with him.
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828
And he was still cogitating while Mason was exclaiming:
“Then you admit that you knew her?”
“No, sir.”
“Very well, then,” he now added, turning to the others, “I
suppose there’s nothing for it but to take him back there
and see what they know about him. Perhaps that will get
something out of this fine bird—to confront him with his
friends. His bag and things are still back there in one of
those tents, I believe. Suppose we take him down there,
gentlemen, and see what these other people know about
him.”
And now, swiftly and coldly he turned, while Clyde, already
shrinking at the horror of what was coming, exclaimed: “Oh,
please, no! You don’t mean to do that, do you? Oh, you
won’t do that! Oh, please, no!”
And at this point Kraut speaking up and saying: “He asked
me back there in the woods if I wouldn’t ask you not to take
him in there.”“Oh, so that’s the way the wind blows, is it?”
exclaimed Mason at this. “Too thin-skinned to be shown up
before ladies and gentlemen of the Twelfth Lake colony, but
not even willing to admit that you knew the poor little
working-girl who worked for you. Very good. Well, then, my
fine friend, suppose you come through with what you really
do know now, or down there you go.” And he paused a
moment to see what effect that would have. “We’ll call all
those people together and explain just how things are, and
then see if you will be willing to stand there and deny
everything!” But noting still a touch of hesitation in Clyde he
now added: “Bring him along, boys.” And turning toward the
camp he proceeded to walk in that direction a few paces
while Kraut taking one arm, and Swenk another, and
beginning to move Clyde he ended by exclaiming:
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829
“Oh, please, no! Oh, I hope you won’t do anything like that,
will you, Mr. Mason? Oh, I don’t want to go back there if you
don’t mind. It isn’t that I’m guilty, but you can get all my
things without my going back there. And besides it will
mean so much to me just now.” Beads of perspiration once
more burst forth on his pale face and hands and he was
deadly cold.
“Don’t want to go, eh?” exclaimed Mason, pausing as he
heard this. “It would hurt your pride, would it, to have ’em
know? Well, then, supposing you just answer some of the
things I want to know—and come clean and quick, or off we
go—and that without one more moment’s delay! Now, will
you answer or won’t you?” And again he turned to confront
Clyde, who, with lips trembling and eyes confused and
wavering, nervously and emphatically announced:
“Of course I knew her. Of course I did. Sure! Those letters
show that. But what of it? I didn’t kill her. And I didn’t go up
there with her with any intention of killing her, either. I didn’t.
I didn’t, I tell you! It was all an accident. I didn’t even want
to take her up there. She wanted me to go—to go away
with her somewhere, because—because, well you know—
her letters show. And I was only trying to get her to go off
somewhere by herself, so she would let me alone, because
I didn’t want to marry her. That’s all. And I took her out