The Blind Man's Eyes

  CHAPTER XXI

  WHAT ONE CAN DO WITHOUT EYES

  The blind man, lying on his bed in that darkness in which he had livedsince his sixteenth year and which no daylight could lessen, felt thelight and knew that day had come; he stirred impatiently. The nurse,the only other occupant of the room, moved expectantly; then she sankback; Santoine had moved but had not roused from that absorption inwhich he had been ever since returning to his bed. He had not slept.The connections of the electric bells had been repaired,--the wires hadbeen found pulled from their batteries,--but Santoine had not moved ahand to touch a button. He had disregarded the warning of the doctorwho had been summoned at once after the murder and had come to his roomagain just before dawn to warn him that after his recklessness of thenight he must expect a reaction. He had given such injunctions inregard to any new development that he was certain that, even if hisservants believed him asleep, they would report to him. But there hadbeen no report; and Santoine expected none immediately. He had notlain awake awaiting anything; he felt that so much had happened, somany facts were at his command, that somewhere among them must be thekey to what they meant.

  The blind man knew that his daughter was concealing something from him.He could not tell what the importance of the thing she was concealingmight be; but he knew his daughter was enough like himself for it to beuseless for him to try to force from her something she did not mean totell. The new intimacy of the relation between his daughter and Eatonwas perfectly plain to Santoine; but it did not cause him to try toexplain anything in Eaton's favor; nor did it prejudice him againsthim. He had appeared to accept Avery's theory of what had happened inthe study because by doing so he concealed what was going on in his ownmind; he actually accepted it only to the point of agreeing that Eatonmust have met in the study those enemies--or some one representing theenemies--who had attacked him with the motor-car and had beforeattempted to attack him on the train.

  Three men--at least three men--had fought in the study in Santoine'spresence. Eaton, it was certain, had been the only one from the housepresent when the first shots were fired. Had Eaton been alone againstthe other two? Had Eaton been with one of the other two against thethird? It appeared probable to Santoine that Eaton had been alone, orhad come alone, to the study and had met his enemies there. Had theseenemies surprised Eaton in the study or had he surprised them?Santoine was inclined to believe that Eaton had surprised them. Thecontents taken from the safe had certainly been carried away, and thesewould have made rather a bulky bundle. Eaton could not have carried itwithout Harriet knowing it. Santoine believed that, whatever knowledgehis daughter might be concealing from him, she would not have concealedthis. It was certain that some time had been necessary for opening thesafe, before those opening it suffered interruption.

  Santoine felt, therefore, that the probabilities were that Eaton'senemies had opened the safe and had been surprised by Eaton. But ifthey had opened the safe, they were not only Eaton's enemies; they werealso Santoine's; they were the men who threatened Santoine's trust.

  Those whom Eaton had fought in the room had had perfect opportunity forkilling Santoine, if they wished. He had stood first in the dark withthe electric torch in his hand; then he had been before them in thelight after Blatchford had entered. But Santoine felt certain no onehad made any attack upon him at any moment in the room; he had had nofeeling, at any instant, that any of the shots fired had been directedat him. Blatchford, too, had been unattacked until he had made itplain that he had recognized one of the intruders; then, beforeBlatchford could call the name, he had been shot down.

  It was clear, then, that what had protected Santoine was his blindness;he had no doubt that, if he had been able to see and recognize the menin the room after the lights were turned on, he would have been shotdown also. But Santoine recognized that this did not fully account forhis immunity. Two weeks before, an attack which had been meant forEaton had struck down Santoine instead; and no further attempt againstEaton had been made until it had become publicly known that Santoinewas not going to die. If Santoine's death would have served forEaton's death two weeks before, why was Santoine immune now? Didpossession of the contents of Santoine's safe accomplish the same thingas Santoine's death? Or more than his death for these men? For whatmen?

  It was not, Santoine was certain, Eaton's presence in the study whichhad so astounded Blatchford; Wallace and Eaton had passed daystogether, and Blatchford was accustomed to Eaton's presence in thehouse. Some one whom Blatchford knew and whose name Santoine alsowould know and whose presence in the room was so strange andastonishing that Blatchford had tried to prepare Santoine for theannouncement, had been there. The man whose name was on Blatchford'stongue, or the companion of that man, had shot Blatchford rather thanlet Santoine hear the name.

  The blind man stirred upon his bed.

  "Do you want something, Mr. Santoine?" the nurse asked. The blind mandid not answer. He was beginning to find these events fit themselvestogether; but they fitted imperfectly as yet.

  Santoine knew that he lacked the key. Many men could profit bypossessing the contents of Santoine's safe and might have shotBlatchford rather than let Santoine know their presence there; it wasimpossible for Santoine to tell which among these many the man who hadbeen in the study might be. Who Eaton's enemies were was equallyunknown to Santoine. But there could be but one man--or at most onesmall group of men--who could be at the same time Eaton's enemy andSantoine's. To have known who Eaton was would have pointed this man toSantoine.

  The blind man lay upon his back, his open, sightless eyes unwinking inthe intensity of his thought.

  Gabriel Warden had had an appointment with a young man who had comefrom Asia and who--Warden had told his wife--he had discovered latelyhad been greatly wronged. Eaton, under Conductor Connery'squestioning, had admitted himself to be that young man; Santoine hadverified this and had learned that Eaton was, at least, the young manwho had gone to Warden's house that night. But Gabriel Warden had notbeen allowed to help Eaton; so far from that, he had not even beenallowed to meet and talk with Eaton; he had been called out, plainly,to prevent his meeting Eaton, and killed.

  Eaton disappeared and concealed himself at once after Warden's murder,apparently fearing that he would also be attacked. But Eaton was not aman whom this personal fear would have restrained from coming forwardlater to tell why Warden had been killed. He had been urged to comeforward and promised that others would give him help in Warden's place;still, he had concealed himself. This must mean that others thanWarden could not help Eaton; Eaton evidently did not know, or elsecould not hope to prove, what Warden had discovered.

  Santoine held this thought in abeyance; he would see later how itchecked with the facts.

  Eaton had remained in Seattle--or near Seattle--eleven days; apparentlyhe had been able to conceal himself and to escape attack during thattime. He had been obliged, however, to reveal himself when he took thetrain; and as soon as possible a desperate attempt had been madeagainst him, which, through mistake, had struck down Santoine insteadof Eaton. This attack had been made under circumstances which, if ithad been successful, would have made it improbable that Eaton'smurderer could escape. It had not been enough, then, to watch Eatonand await opportunity to attack him; it had been necessary to attackhim at once, at any cost.

  The attack having reached Santoine instead of Eaton, the necessity forimmediate attack upon Eaton, apparently, had ceased to exist; those whofollowed Eaton had thought it enough to watch him and wait for morefavorable opportunity. But as soon as it was publicly known thatSantoine had not been killed but was getting well, then Eaton had againbeen openly and daringly attacked. The reason for the desperatechances taken to attack Eaton, then, was that he was near Santoine.

  Santoine's hands clenched as he recognized this. Eaton had taken thetrain at Seattle because Santoine was on it; he had done this at greatrisk to himself. Santoine had told Eaton that there were but fourpossible reas
ons why he could have taken the train in the manner hedid, and two of those reasons later had been eliminated. The twopossibilities which remained were that Eaton had taken the train toinform Santoine of something or to learn something from him. But Eatonhad had ample opportunity since to inform Santoine of anything hewished; and he had not only not informed him of anything, but hadrefused consistently and determinedly to answer any of Santoine'squestions. It was to learn something from Santoine, then, that Eatonhad taken the train.

  The blind man turned upon his bed; he was finding that these eventsfitted together perfectly. He felt certain now that Eaton had gone toGabriel Warden expecting to get from Warden some information that heneeded, and that to prevent Warden's giving him this, Warden had beenkilled. Then Warden's death had caused Santoine to go to Seattle andtake charge of many of Warden's affairs; Eaton had thought that theinformation which had been in Warden's possession might now be inSantoine's; Eaton, therefore, had followed Santoine onto the train.

  Santoine had not had the information Eaton required, and he could noteven imagine yet what the nature of that information could be. Thiswas not because he was not familiar enough with Warden's affairs; itwas because he was too familiar with them. Warden had been concernedin a hundred enterprises; Santoine had no way of telling which of thishundred had concerned Eaton. He certainly could recall no case inwhich a man of Eaton's age and class had been so terribly wronged thatdouble murder would have been resorted to for the concealment of thefacts. But he understood that, in his familiarity with Warden'saffairs, he had probably been in a position to get the information, ifhe had known what specific matters it concerned. That, then, had beenthe reason why his own death would have served for the time being inplace of Eaton's.

  Those who had followed Eaton had known that Santoine could get thisinformation; that accounted for all that had taken place on the train.It accounted for the subsequent attack on Eaton when it became knownthat Santoine was getting well. It accounted also--Santoine wasbreathing quickly as he recognized this--for the invasion of his studyand the forcing of the safe last night.

  The inference was plain that something which would have given Santoinethe information Warden had had and which Eaton now required had beenbrought into Santoine's house and put in Santoine's safe. It was toget possession of this "something" before it had reached Santoine thatthe safe had been forced.

  Santoine put out his hand and pressed a bell. A servant came to thedoor.

  "Will you find Miss Santoine," the blind man directed, "and ask her tocome here?"

  The servant withdrew.

  Santoine waited. Presently the door again opened, and he heard hisdaughter's step.

  "Have you listed what was taken from the safe, Harriet?" Santoine asked.

  "Not yet, Father."

  The blind man thought an instant. "Day before yesterday, when I askedyou to take charge for the present of the correspondence Avery haslooked after for me, what did you do?"

  "I put it in my own safe--the one that was broken into last night. Butnone of it was taken; the bundles of letters were pulled out of thesafe, but they had not been opened or even disturbed."

  "I know. It was not that I meant." Santoine thought again. "Harriet,something has been brought into the house--or the manner of keepingsomething in the house had been changed--within a very few days--sincethe time, I think, when the attempt to run Eaton down with themotor-car was made. What was that 'something'?"

  His daughter reflected. "The draft of the new agreement about theLatron properties and the lists of stockholders in the properties whichcame through Mr. Warden's office," she replied.

  "Those were in the safe?"

  "Yes; you had not given me any instructions about them, so I had putthem in the other safe; but when I went to get the correspondence I sawthem there and put them with the correspondence in my own safe."

  Santoine lay still.

  "Who besides Donald knew that you did that, daughter?" he asked.

  "No one."

  "Thank you."

  Harriet recognized this as dismissal and went out. The blind man feltthe blood beating fiercely in his temples and at his finger-tips. Itamazed, astounded him to realize that Warden's murder and all that hadfollowed it had sprung from the Latron case. The coupling of Warden'sname with Latron's in the newspapers after Warden's death had seemed tohim only flagrant sensationalism. He himself had known--or had thoughthe had known--more about the Latron case than almost any other man; hehad been a witness at the trial; he had seen--or had thought he hadseen--even-handed justice done there. Now, by Warden's evidence, butmore still by the manner of Warden's death, he was forced to believethat there had been something unknown to him and terrible in what hadbeen done then.

  And as realization of this came to him, he recollected that he had beenvaguely conscious ever since Latron's murder of something strained,something not wholly open, in his relations with those men whoseinterests had been most closely allied with Latron's. It had beennothing open, nothing palpable; it was only that he had felt at timesin them a knowledge of some general condition governing them which wasnot wholly known to himself. As he pressed his hands upon his blindeyes, trying to define this feeling to himself, his thought wentswiftly back to the events on the train and in the study.

  He had had investigated the accounts of themselves given by thepassengers to Conductor Connery; two of these accounts had proved to befalse. The man who under the name of Lawrence Hillward had claimed thecipher telegram from Eaton had been one of these; it had provedimpossible to trace this man and it was now certain that Hillward wasnot his real name; the other, Santoine had had no doubt, was theheavy-set muscular man who had tried to run Eaton down with the motor.These men, Santoine was sure, had been acting for some principal notpresent. One or both of these men might have been in the study lastnight; but the sight of neither of these could have so startled, soastounded Blatchford. Whomever Blatchford had seen was some one wellknown to him, whose presence had been so amazing that speech had failedBlatchford for the moment and he had feared the effect of theannouncement on Santoine. This could have been only the principalhimself.

  Some circumstance which Santoine comprehended only imperfectly as yethad forced this man to come out from behind his agents and to act evenat the risk of revealing himself. It was probably he who, findingBlatchford's presence made revealment inevitable, had killedBlatchford. But these circumstances gave Santoine no clew as to whothe man might be. The blind man tried vainly to guess. The rebellionagainst his blindness, which had seized him the night before, againstirred him. The man had been in the light just before his face; asecond of sight then and everything would have been clear; or anotherword from Blatchford, and he would have known. But Santoine recalledthat if he had had that second of sight, and the other man had knownit, or if Blatchford had spoken that next word, Santoine too wouldprobably be dead.

  The only circumstance regarding the man of which Santoine now felt surewas that he was one of the many concerned in the Latron case or withthe Latron properties. Had the blood in which Santoine had steppedupon the study floor been his, or that of one of the others?

  "What time is it?" the blind man suddenly asked the nurse.

  "It is nearly noon, Mr. Santoine, and you have eaten nothing."

  The blind man did not answer. He recalled vaguely that, several hoursbefore, breakfast had been brought for him and that he had impatientlywaved it away. In his absorption he had felt no need then for food,and he felt none now.

  "Will you leave me alone for a few moments?" he directed.

  He listened till he heard the door close behind the nurse; then heseized the private 'phone beside his bed and called his broker.Instinctively, in his uncertainty, Santoine had turned to thatbarometer which reflects day by day, even from hour to hour, the mostobscure events and the most secret knowledge.

  "How is the market?" he inquired.

  There was something approaching to a panic on the sto
ck-exchange, itappeared. Some movement, arising from causes not yet clear, haddropped the bottom out of a score of important stocks. The broker wasonly able to relate that about an hour after the opening of theexchange, selling had developed in certain issues and prices were goingdown in complete lack of support.

  "How is Pacific Midlands?" Santoine asked.

  "It led the decline."

  Santoine felt the blood in his temples. "M. and N. Smelters?" he asked.

  "Down seven points."

  "S. F. and D.?"

  "Eight points off."

  Santoine's hand, holding the telephone, shook in its agitation; hishead was hot from the blood rushing through it, his body was chilled.An idea so strange, so astounding, so incredible as it first had cometo him that his feelings refused it though his reason told him it wasthe only possible condition which could account for all the facts, nowwas being made all but certain. He named stock after stock; all weredown--seriously depressed or had been supported only by a desperateeffort of their chief holders.

  "A. L. & M. is down too," the broker volunteered.

  "That is only sympathetic," Santoine replied.

  He hung up. His hand, straining to control its agitation, reached forthe bell; he rang; a servant came.

  "Get me note-paper," Santoine commanded.

  The servant went out and returned with paper. The nurse had followedhim in; she turned the leaf of the bed-table for Santoine to write.The blind man could write as well as any other by following theposition of the lines with the fingers of his left hand. He wrote ashort note swiftly now, folded, sealed and addressed it and handed itto the servant.

  "Have that delivered by a messenger at once," he directed. "There willbe no written answer, I think; only something sent back--a photograph.See that it is brought to me at once."

  He heard the servant's footsteps going rapidly away. He was shakingwith anger, horror, resentment; he was almost--not quite--sure now ofall that had taken place; of why Warden had been murdered, of whatvague shape had moved behind and guided all that had happened since.He recalled Eaton's voice as he had heard it first on the train atSeattle; and now he was almost sure--not quite--that he could placethat voice, that he knew where he had heard it before.

  He lay with clenched hands, shaking with rage; then by effort of hiswill he put these thoughts away. The nurse reminded him again of hisneed for food.

  "I want nothing now," he said. "Have it ready when I wake up. Whenthe doctor comes, tell him I am going to get up to-day and dress."

  He turned and stretched himself upon his bed; so, finally, he slept.