should leave for the Maine coast or any place satisfactory to
them. Finchley himself proposed to return to Lycurgus and
Albany. It was not wise for any of them to be about where
they could be reached by reporters or questioned by
friends. And forthwith, a hegira of the Finchleys to
Narragansett, where under the name of Wilson they
secluded themselves for the next six weeks. Also, and
because of the same cause the immediate removal of the
Cranstons to one of the Thousand Islands, where there was
a summer colony not entirely unsatisfactory to their fancy.
But on the part of the Baggotts and the Harriets, the
contention that they were not sufficiently incriminated to
bother and so remaining exactly where they were at Twelfth
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Lake. But all talking of Clyde and Sondra—this horrible
crime and the probable social destruction of all those who
had in any way been thus innocently defiled by it.
And in the interim, Smillie, as directed by Griffiths,
proceeding to Bridgeburg, and after two long hours with
Mason, calling at the jail to see Clyde. And because of
authorization from Mason being permitted to see him quite
alone in his cell. Smillie having explained that it was not the
intention of the Griffiths to try to set up any defense for
Clyde, but rather to discover whether under the
circumstances there was a possibility for a defense, Mason
had urged upon him the wisdom of persuading Clyde to
confess, since, as he insisted, there was not the slightest
doubt as to his guilt, and a trial would but cost the county
money without result to Clyde—whereas if he chose to
confess, there might be some undeveloped reasons for
clemency—at any rate, a great social scandal prevented
from being aired in the papers.
And thereupon Smillie proceeding to Clyde in his cell where
brooding most darkly and hopelessly he was wondering
how to do. Yet at the mere mention of Smillie’s name
shrinking as though struck. The Griffiths—Samuel Griffiths
and Gilbert! Their personal representative. And now what
would he say? For no doubt, as he now argued with
himself, Smillie, having talked with Mason, would think him
guilty. And what was he to say now? What sort of a story tell
—the truth or what? But without much time to think, for
even while he was trying to do so Smillie had been ushered
into his presence. And then moistening his dry lips with his
tongue, he could only achieve, “Why, how do you do, Mr.
Smillie?” to which the latter replied, with a mock geniality,
“Why, hello, Clyde, certainly sorry to see you tied up in a
place like this.” And then continuing: “The papers and the
district attorney over here are full of a lot of stuff about
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some trouble you’re in, but I suppose there can’t be much
to it—there must be some mistake, of course. And that’s
what I’m up here to find out. Your uncle telephoned me this
morning that I was to come up and see you to find out how
they come to be holding you. Of course, you can
understand how they feel down there. So they wanted me
to come up and get the straight of it so as to get the charge
dismissed, if possible—so now if you’ll just let me know the
ins and outs of this—you know—that is——”
He paused there, confident because of what the district
attorney had just told him, as well as Clyde’s peculiarly
nervous and recessive manner, that he would not have very
much that was exculpatory to reveal.
And Clyde, after moistening his lips once more, beginning
with: “I suppose things do look pretty bad for me, Mr.
Smillie. I didn’t think at the time that I met Miss Alden that I
would ever get into such a scrape as this. But I didn’t kill
her, and that’s the God’s truth. I never even wanted to kill
her or take her up to that lake in the first place. And that’s
the truth, and that’s what I told the district attorney. I know
he has some letters from her to me, but they only show that
she wanted me to go away with her—not that I wanted to
go with her at all——”
He paused, hoping that Smillie would stamp this with his
approval of faith. And Smillie, noting the agreement
between his and Mason’s assertions, yet anxious to placate
him, returned: “Yes, I know. He was just showing them to
me.”
“I knew he would,” continued Clyde, weakly. “But you know
how it is sometimes, Mr. Smillie,” his voice, because of his
fears that the sheriff or Kraut were listening, pitched very
low. “A man can get in a jam with a girl when he never even
intended to at first. You know that yourself. I did like
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Roberta at first, and that’s the truth, and I did get in with her
just as those letters show. But you know that rule they have
down there, that no one in charge of a department can
have anything to do with any of the women under him.
Well, that’s what started all the trouble for me, I guess. I
was afraid to let any one know about it in the first place, you
see.”
“Oh, I see.”
And so by degrees, and growing less and less tense as he
proceeded, since Smillie appeared to be listening with
sympathy, he now outlined most of the steps of his early
intimacy with Roberta, together with his present defense.
But with no word as to the camera, or the two hats or the
lost suit, which things were constantly and enormously
troubling him. How could he ever explain these, really? And
with Smillie at the conclusion of this and because of what
Mason had told him, asking: “But what about those two
hats, Clyde? This man over here was telling me that you
admit to having two straw hats—the one found on the lake
and the one you wore away from there.”
And Clyde, forced to say something, yet not knowing what,
replying: “But they’re wrong as to my wearing a straw hat
away from there, Mr. Smillie, it was a cap.”
“I see. But still you did have a straw hat up at Bear Lake, he
tells me.”
“Yes, I had one there, but as I told him, that was the one I
had with me when I went up to the Cranstons’ the first time.
I told him that I forgot it and left it there.”
“Oh, I see. But now there was something about a suit—a
gray one, I believe—that he says you were seen wearing up
there but that he can’t find now? Were you wearing one?”
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“No. I was wearing the blue suit I had on when I came down
here. They’ve taken that away now and given me this one.”
“But he says that you say you had it dry-cleaned at Sharon
but that he can’t find any one there who knows anything
about it. How about that? Did you have it dry-cleaned
there?”
“Yes, sir.”
“By whom?”
“Well, I can’t just remember now. But I think I can find the
man if I were to go up there again—he’s near the depot,”
but at the same time looking down and away from Smillie.
And then Smillie, like Mason before him, proceeding to ask
about the bag in the boat, and whether it had not been
possible, if he could swim to shore with his shoes and suit
on, for him to have swam to Roberta and assisted her to
cling to the overturned boat. And Clyde explaining, as
before, that he was afraid of being dragged down, but
adding now, for the first time, that he had called to her to
hang on to the boat, whereas previously he had said that
the boat drifted away from them. And Smillie recalled that
Mason had told him this. Also, in connection with Clyde’s
story of the wind blowing his hat off, Mason had said he
could prove by witnesses, as well as the U. S. Government
reports, that there was not a breath of air stirring on that
most halcyon day. And so, plainly, Clyde was lying. His
story was too thin. Yet Smillie, not wishing to embarrass
him, kept saying: “Oh, I see,” or, “To be sure,” or “That’s the
way it was, was it?”
And then finally asking about the marks on Roberta’s face
and head. For Mason had called his attention to them and
insisted that no blow from a boat would make both
abrasions. But Clyde sure that the boat had only struck her
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once and that all the bruises had come from that or else he
could not guess from what they had come. But then
beginning to see how hopeless was all this explanation. For