There was renewed suspicion in the sheriff’s tone. While Tim Forey waited for a reply, Harry chuckled. This seemed to anger Forey.
“Well?” he growled. “Give me your answer. Why did you start clocking when you passed the lower road?”
“I didn’t,” laughed Harry.
“Then how do you know the distance?” queried Forey.
“After I found the body,” explained Harry, “I remembered seeing a road that I had passed. So I turned the car around, noted the registration on the speedometer, and set out. I wanted to be sure of the distance to the body, so I clocked it coming back.”
Forey emitted a gruff “huh.” Harry smiled. He felt that his explanation had settled the sheriff. He could see that Forey was hard-boiled only on the surface. There should be no trouble from now on. Harry began to slow the car.
“Tenth of a mile more,” remarked Forey, as Harry glanced toward the speedometer.
“Yes,” said Harry, “but I want you to see what I saw. Just as I finished this turn in the road, the lights glared toward the bushes on the right. That’s when I glimpsed the body.”
Harry had slackened to ten miles an hour. Forey was staring with him into the headlight glow. Bushes alone greeted their vision.
“I must have swung wide before,” decided Harry. “I was traveling pretty fast. Funny, though, we didn’t see—”
“Five tenths,” put in Forey.
Harry braked the car. He knew that he had reached the spot. He clambered from the driver’s seat and swung around the back of the coupe, glimmering his flashlight. Forey met him there; the deputies piled out of the touring car and flickered their own torches.
“Right over in here,” declared Harry, sweeping the beam of his light.
“Yeah?” questioned the sheriff. “I don’t see a body lying round.”
“It was here—”
Harry paused. A deputy had gone back to the touring car. There was a click as the man turned on the searchlight that was mounted by the hood. A brilliant glare swept the side of the road for a space of a hundred yards.
Bewildered, Harry Vincent turned to face Sheriff Tim Forey, who was staring at him steadily. For the first time tonight, The Shadow’s agent became confused.
“I was sure,” stammered Harry, “sure that this was the spot. Positive, sheriff — yes — just as — just as certain as we’re standing here right now. Yet — yet—”
“The body isn’t here,” put in Forey. “Which means that you’ve dragged us out here on a hoax.”
“No!” protested Harry. “Why should I be such a fool as to do that? I tell you, sheriff, the body was here! Within ten feet of where I’m standing now! There’s only one answer sheriff.”
“Yeah? Let’s hear it.”
Harry saw that the man was unconvinced. Promptly, The Shadow’s agent resolved upon a bold stroke that he knew would bring Forey a jolt.
“One answer, sheriff,” Harry repeated, in steady tones. “Someone has removed the body of Grantham Breck!”
CHAPTER IV
THE SHADOW LEARNS
“GRANTHAM BRECK!”
Sheriff Forey’s square jaw dropped as the official repeated the name that Harry Vincent had uttered. Until that moment, Forey had regarded Harry as the possible perpetrator of a hoax. Forey had begun to doubt the story of an unidentified body in the road. But this mention of the name of Grantham Breck produced sharp suspicion in the sheriff’s mind.
“Grantham Breck,” declared Harry, with a sober nod. “Yes, sheriff, I believe that he was the dead man.”
“So you knew Breck, eh?” challenged Forey. “Then you had a reason to be coming through here. I thought so. Say, fellow, what’s your game? Come clean.”
“I have no game,” returned Harry. “I merely want to convince you that I actually found a body at this spot where we are now standing. I want you to know that I have been keenly alert from the moment that I made my discovery until—”
“You knew Breck—”
“I did not know him.”
“Then how are you sure that he was the dead man?”
“Let me repeat my description of the body,” responded Harry. “The one that I was giving over the phone, but which you received only imperfectly. A man sixty years old, or thereabouts. Of medium height, wiry in build. Gray hair above a thin, peaked face, with eyes that were gray—”
As at the house, an interruption came at this point. Tim Forey uttered a sharp exclamation as he wheeled to the deputies. The men were nodding. They recognized the description. Forey turned back to stare steadily at Harry Vincent.
“Sounds like Breck,” asserted the sheriff. “But you’re supposed to be a stranger hereabouts. How’d you know who he was?”
“I didn’t, at the time I found the body.” Harry spoke calmly; for this was the opening he wanted. “But when I called from the house, the woman Johanna cried out while I was giving the description. Then the butler dashed into the room. I am sure that he overheard my description, although he pretended that he had not. Then I became positive that the woman was trying to cover up the excitement that she had displayed.
“I was thinking matters over before you arrived, sheriff. It’s only a half mile or so, cross lots, between here and the house. Johanna had told me that Mr. Breck was out. It gave me a hunch that there might be some connection between his absence and the murder on this road. That woman acted scared, sheriff.”
“I get you now,” growled Tim Forey, standing solemn in the glare of the searchlight. “Any fellow as keen as you ought to know what he’s talking about. Take a look around, boys,” — this was to the deputies — “and see what you can find. Maybe somebody lugged that body into the bushes.”
The deputies began their search. There was no dust on the side of the road — nothing that could have left a trace of the missing body. Nor did the deputies discover any dead form in the bushes. Two of them shifted to the hill side of the road and scrambled about on the slope.
“You’re not driving into New York tonight,” the sheriff informed Harry. “I’m keeping you here as a material witness. What’s more, I want to know something about your business. If you’ve got any credentials on you, I’d like to see them.”
Harry opened the back of the coupe. He produced a briefcase; from it, he removed papers. These were proof that he was a real estate salesman, connected with a budding building development on Long Island. The sheriff, nodding in convinced fashion, came across letters from Rutledge Mann. He also found the telegram that Harry had received in Michigan.
“Mann takes care of my investments,” explained Harry. “He is a prominent broker in New York. Moreover, he is connected with the real estate development on Long Island. I would like to telegraph him at his home, telling him that I am detained here.”
The blare of a distant locomotive whistle came as the sheriff nodded. It was the nine o’clock freight, running late. The engineer was blowing for the road crossing.
“What is more,” added Harry, “Mann can send you further proof of my identity. Of course, these letters of credit” — Harry was producing a wallet from his pocket — “can establish me for the present. If you need further information—”
“This is enough,” interrupted the sheriff. “I guess you’re all right, Vincent. But you’d better shoot that wire right away. Too bad I’ve got to keep you here, if you were supposed to be in New York tomorrow morning.”
“Oh, Mann will understand,” stated Harry.
The deputies were coming back to the road. They shook their heads as they faced the sheriff. Forey nudged his thumb toward the lower side of the road.
“Two of you fellows cut through to Breck’s place,” ordered the sheriff. “One of you drive the touring car around. Get the servants together and chin a bit with them. But don’t ask them any questions until I show up with Vincent. We’re going over to the depot in his car. Sending a wire.”