"What is it?" asked Jack, as the colonel hung up the receiver.

"Why, Kettridge telephoned to my room, and s.h.a.g took the message and repeated it to me. Sallie Page, the old servant of Mrs. Darcy has just been killed by an electric shock in the jewelry store!"

CHAPTER XVIII

AMY'S TEST

However it was not quite as bad as that, though Sallie Page had received a severe shock, and had been near to death. Prompt action on the part of the physician on the hospital ambulance had started her feeble heart, which had been affected by the current of electricity, to beating.

This, among other things, Colonel Ashley learned when he hastened to the jewelry store from the Homestead, leaving at the latter place his trusty lieutenant, Jack Young, to look after both Larch and Harry King, neither of whom seemed likely to leave the place very soon.

"Tell me more about it," said the colonel, when he was sitting with Mr.

Kettridge in the dimly-lighted jewelry shop after Sallie had been taken to the hospital. "What shocked her?"

"The same electric wires on the showcase that shocked Miss Brill the other day. The electricians had been told to remove them, but had not yet done so."

"But I thought those wires were dead--cut--after the other accident, Mr. Kettridge."

"So they were. But they can be supplied with current from another source, it seems, and I was the innocent cause of doing it."

"You! How?"

"By throwing over a switch on the work bench where James Darcy used to busy himself!"

"An electric switch on Darcy's work bench?"

"Yes, come and see for yourself. I've sent for the electrician to come and rip out everything. I'll have the place all wired over. It was a makeshift job to begin with, and since Darcy complicated the wires with some that he hoped to run his electric lathe with, there is no telling when one may get a shock."

"How did it happen?" asked the colonel, as the jeweler led the way to that part of the store where Darcy had the repair bench, behind the watch showcase. It was now close to midnight, and the excitement over the accident to Sallie, which had occurred after the closing hour for the store, had subsided, not as much of a crowd having gathered at that time of the evening as would have done earlier.

"Well, it happened this way," explained Kettridge. "We're going to have a special sale of a medium-priced line of goods to-morrow. I was getting ready for it after the clerks had gone--setting out the display and the like--when I found I needed help.

"It wasn't much--just the little odds and ends that a woman can do better than a man when it comes to making things look fancy. I might have telephoned for Miss Brill, but I didn't like to bring her back, as she'd worked hard all day.

"Then I thought of Sallie Page. It's true she's deaf, but she has been in the family, so to speak, a long while, and she knows the shop and the goods pretty well. She's quick if she is old, so I got her down about nine o'clock and we started in."

"Then exactly how it happened I don't know. I was puttering around the work table where Darcy used to do his jewel setting and his repair work, and Sallie was over near the showcase. I wanted more light on a certain piece of jewelry I had in my hand, and I thoughtlessly threw over a switch I saw on Darcy's table. It was a switch I hadn't noticed before--in fact, I accidentally uncovered it by moving a collection of his tools I hadn't previously disturbed.

"No sooner had I closed the circuit than I heard a scream from Sallie and saw her fall backwards. I had given her a shock without knowing it."

"That was queer," murmured the colonel. "Let me have a look at that switch."

"And, while you're about it, I'll look too," said another voice in the dimly-lighted store, and, as the two turned in startled surprise, they saw Detective Carroll smiling at them.

"I heard there was another accident up here," he went on, still smiling, "so I came to have a look. The side door was open and I walked in. Guess you didn't hear me. These rubber heels don't make much noise."

"They don't, indeed, when you walk on them and not on the soles,"

observed the colonel grimly. "The question is, what do you want to see?"

"The electric switch on Darcy's table," was the answer. "I couldn't help hearing what you said, Mr. Kettridge," said Carroll, "and I don't know as I would have tried not to if I could. This is important. I rather guess it makes it look a bit bad for your friend, Colonel Ashley," and there was a sneer in the words.

"Well, I don't know," was the cool response. "The wires, as I understand it, are to run an electric lathe, and they might easily have become crossed."

"Oh, yes, of course!" admitted Carroll. "And then, again, they might have been crossed on purpose. It's a new stunt--electrically shocking an old lady before you bang her over the head or stab her, but it's a good one. I'll have a look at that switch. I thought maybe I might find something interesting here when I heard about the shock to the old servant, and I didn't miss my guess."

There was nothing for the colonel or Mr. Kettridge to say or do, and they remained pa.s.sive while Carroll took his time looking about. Then he telephoned for Haliday of the prosecutor's office, and also for the chief electrician of the police signal system, and all three spent some time looking at the wires and testing them.

"What do you think about it?" asked Mr. Kettridge of the colonel, when the store was again dim and quiet.

"What do I think? I don't know! I'm going to have a talk with Darcy in the morning, and if I find he's been deceiving me-- Well, I'll drop his case, that's all."

If Darcy simulated surprise when, the next morning at the jail, told by the colonel of what had happened to Sallie Page, the prisoner was a consummate actor, the detective thought.

"Colonel Ashley!" Darcy exclaimed. "I never knew that my lathe wires crossed or connected with any circuit that might shock a person. It is true I had the wires run in secretly, as I didn't want my cousin to know about them. She didn't favor my experiments on the electrical lathe, and I had to keep quiet about it.

"But I never strung those wires to shock her, and of course you can easily imagine I never could plan to injure Sallie Page that way, or the young lady who was knocked down the other day."

"Well, Darcy, you may be telling the truth, and, again, you may not,"

and the colonel's voice was as noncommittal as possible. "But I am bound to point out to you that the prosecution will make the most of this, and that--it looks bad for you."

"I know it does, Colonel. But I had no more to do with my cousin's death than Carroll or you. Nor have I the least suspicion who did kill her. My G.o.d! what object would I have?" and he turned and paced up and down.

"Well I'll do the best I can," said the colonel. "But I must say it looks black. Then you never knew your wires might, by the closing of the switch on your table, shock some one standing near the show case?"

"I never dreamed of it! The wires must have been changed since I used them."

"That will be looked into. And the stopping of the clocks? Could your apparatus have done that?"

"Never. It is true a strong electrical current might, under certain circ.u.mstances, stop clocks, as well as start them. But it would not stop all the clocks in the store--or all that were going--at different hours."

"Perhaps not. Well, I must see what I can do. Carroll and Thong, with the prosecutor's men, will use this for all it is worth. We must combat it somehow."

"Please find a way, Colonel! I was so hopeful and--now--"

The young man could not go on for a moment because of his emotion.

"Amy--Miss Mason--how does _she_ take this?" he faltered.

"She doesn't know it yet, I believe. It didn't get in this morning's papers, but it will be in this afternoon's."

"I wish you could see her and explain. I--I can't stand it to have her lose faith in me."

"I'll see what I can do. I'll put the best face on it I can for her."

"And you yourself, Colonel! You--you don't believe me guilty because of this new development, do you?"