18 - Black Eagle Mystery by Geraldine Bonner

In the heart of New York, a corporate lawyer plunges eighteen stories from the ominously named Black Eagle Building. Police quickly rule it a suicide, but Molly Morgenthau Babbits, an audacious part-time detective, isnt so easily convinced. The deceased, Hollings Harland, was rumored to be involved in a covert organization controlling the copper market, and was on the brink of being exposed. Just before his death, Harland had a heated argument with the affluent Johnston Barker, another suspected member of the secretive organization. Could Harland have been considering defection? Or was there something more sinister at play? With the help of an insider at the Black Eagle, Molly dives headfirst into her own unofficial investigation, suspecting a foul play murder.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Chapter eighteen of The Black Eagle Mystery. This is a
LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
Read by Mike Overbye, Midland, Washington, dedicated to UNI. The

(00:20):
Black Eagle Mystery by Geraldine Bonner, Chapter eighteen, Jack tells
the story. In the moment of silence that followed that sentence,
you could hear the fire snap and the tick of
the clock on the mantle. I saw the men's faces
held in expressions of amazement, so intense they looked like caricatures.
I saw Missus Whitehall try to say something, then, with

(00:43):
a rustle and a broken cry, crumple up in a chair,
her face hidden, stuttering, choked sounds coming from behind her
hands that broke the tension, like a piece of machinery.
Momentarily out of gear, the group adjusted itself and snapped
back into action. All but me. I stood as I
had been standing when Missus Whitehall spoke those words. My

(01:05):
outward visions saw their moving figures, their backs as they
crowded round her, a hand that held a glass to
her lips, her face bent towards the glass Ashen and Haggard,
I saw, but realized nothing. For a moment I was
on another plane of existence, seemed to be shot up
into it. I don't tell it right. A fellow who
doesn't know how to write can't explain a feeling like that.

(01:26):
You've got to fill it in out of your imagination.
A man who's been in hell gets suddenly out. That's
the best way I can describe it. I didn't get
back to my moorings, come down from the clouds to
the solid ground till the scene by the table was over.
Missus Whitehall was sitting up, a little color in her cheeks,
mistress of herself again. They'd evidently said something to lull

(01:47):
her fears about Carol, for the distraction of her mood
was gone. It wasn't till I saw the narrowed interest
of George's eyes, the hungry expectation of O'Malley's watching face,
that I remembered they were still on the scent of
a murder in which Barker's daughter was as much involved
as Barker's fiance. That had brought me back to the
moment and its meaning, Like an electric shock. I made
a stride forward to get closer to hear them, for

(02:10):
they were at the table again, waiting on the words
of Missus Whitehall. The first sentence that struck my ear
aptly matched her pitiful appearance. Gentlemen, I'm broken. I've been
through too much, the Chief answered, very gently, having said
what you have, would it not be wisdom to tell
us everything? We pledge ourselves to secrecy. She nodded a

(02:33):
gesture of we reacquiescence. Oh, yes, I don't mind telling
it was to be told, But she dropped her eyes
to her hands, clasped on her lap. In that position,
her likeness to Carol as she had sat there a
few weeks before, was singularly striking. I'll have to go
back a good many years before my child was born,

(02:56):
before the world had heard of Johnston Barker. Whatever you
want to, Missus Whitehall, the Chief murmured, We're entirely at
your service. She drew a deep breath, and, without raising
her eyes, said, I was married to Johnston Barker twenty
eight years ago in Idaho. He was a miner then,
and I was a school teacher, nineteen years old, an

(03:19):
orphan with no near relations. I was not strong, and
had gone to the far west for my health. Under
the unaccustomed work, I broke down, developing a weakness of
the lungs, and casual friends, the parents of a pupil,
took me with them to a distant mining camp for
the drier air. There I met Johnston and we became engaged.

(03:42):
In those days, in such remote places there were no
churches or clergymen, and contract marriages were recognized. I did
not believe in them, would not at first consent to
such a ceremony. But a great strike taking place in
a distant camp, he prevailed upon me to marry him
by contract. The friends with whom I was living acting

(04:03):
as witnesses. The place to which he took me was
wild and inaccessible, connecting by trails with other camps and
by a long stage journey with a distant railway station.
We lived there for a month, happy as I have
never been Since then, a woman, a snake in the garden,

(04:23):
finding out how I had married, hinted to me that
such contracts were illegal. I don't know why she did it,
I've often wondered, but there are people in the world
who take a pleasure in spoiling the joy of others.
I didn't tell Johnston, but resolved when an opportunity came
to stand up with him before an ordained minister. It
came sooner than I hoped. Not. Six weeks after we

(04:46):
were man and wife, a missioner made a tour through
the mining camps of that part of the state. He
would not come to ours. We were too small and distant,
so I begged my husband to go to him, tell
him our case, and bring him back. It would have
been better for us both to have gone, but I
was sick, too young and ignorant to know the cause
of my illness, and Johnston, who seemed willing to do

(05:09):
anything I wanted, agreed. We calculated that the trip on
horseback over half cut mountain trails would take three or
four days there and back. At the end of the
fifth day, he had not returned, and I was in
a fever of anxiety. Then again, that woman came to
me with her poisoned words. I was not a legal wife.

(05:29):
Could he, knowing this, have taken the opportunity to desert me?
God pity her for the deadly harm she did. Sick alone, inexperienced,
eaten into my horrible doubts. I waited till two weeks
had passed. Then I was sure he had done as
she'd said left me. I won't go over that. The

(05:50):
past is the past. I took what money I had
and made my way to the railway from there by
slow stages, for by this time I was ill in
mind and body. I got as far as Saint Louis,
where my money gone. Unable to work, I wrote to
an uncle of my mother's, a doctor whom I had
never seen, but of whom she had often spoken to me.

(06:11):
Men like him made us realize there is a god
to inspire, a heaven to reward. He came at once,
took me to his home in Indiana, and nursed me
back to health. He was a father to me, more
than a father's to the child I had. No one
knew me there, No one but he ever heard my story.
I took a new name from a distant branch of

(06:32):
his family and passed as a widow. When my little
girl was old enough to understand, I told her her
father had died before she was born. We lived there
for twenty four years. Before the end of that time,
the name of Johnston Barker rose into prominence. My uncle
hated it, would not allow it mentioned in his presence.
When he died three years ago, he left us all

(06:54):
he had fifty thousand dollars, a great fortune to us. Carroll,
who had chafed at the narrow life of a small town,
persuaded me to come to New York. I had no
fear of meeting Barker. Our past would never cross, and
to please her was my life. She is not like me,
fearful and timid, but full of daring and ambition. When

(07:17):
the farm we bought in New Jersey suddenly increased in
value and the land scheme was suggested, she wanted to
try it. At first, it wasn't possible, as we hadn't
enough money. It was not until she met mister Harland
at a friend's house in Azalea that the plan became feasible,
for he was taken with the idea at once. After
visiting the farm a few times and talking it over

(07:39):
with her, he offered to come in as a silent partner,
putting up the capital. The move to town alarmed me.
There in business, she might run across the man who
was her father, and this is exactly what happened. You've
seen my daughter. You know what she is looking at
me now, you may not realize that she is extraordinarily

(08:01):
like what I was. When Johnston Barker married me, he
saw her first in the elevator at the Black Eagle Building.
Men always noticed her. She was used to it. But
that night she told me, laughing, of the old man
who had stared at her in the elevator. Stared and stared,
and couldn't take his eyes off My heart, warned me.

(08:23):
And when I heard her description, I knew who he
was and why he stared. After that, there was no
peace for me. I had a haunting terror that he
would find out who she was and might try to
claim her. This increased when she told me of his
visit to her office to buy the lot, an excuse
I understood, and his questions about her former home. Then

(08:45):
I tried to quiet myself with the assurances that he
could not possibly guess. He had never heard of the
name of Whitehall in connection with me, and he had
never known a child was expected. But a night came
when I was put with my back against the wall.
She returned from work, gay and excited, saying mister Barker
had been in the office that afternoon and asked her

(09:06):
if he might call and meet her mother. The terrible
agitation that threw me into betrayed me. I couldn't evade
her eyes or her questions, and I told her she
was horrified, stunned. I can't tell you what she said.
I can only make you understand her feelings by saying
she loved me as few daughters love their mothers. After that, ah,

(09:30):
it was horrible. She tried to cancel the sale, but he,
of course, he was angry and puzzled by the change
in her, could make nothing out of it, and finally
insisted on knowing what had happened. There was no escape
for her. In taking him into the private office, they
had an interview in which he forced the truth from her.
Johnston Barker's life has been full of great things, triumphs

(09:54):
and conquests, but I think that hour in the Azalea
Woods Estates office must have been the crowning one of
his career. To hear that Carol, my wonderful Carol, was
his child. He had had no suspicion of it until then.
He told her he had been interested by her strange
likeness to me, had thought she might be some distant

(10:16):
connection who could give him news of his lost wife.
For here is the bitter part of it. He had
come back in that long mountain journey an accident, a
fall from his horse, had injured him. He had been
found unconscious by a party of miners, who had taken

(10:36):
him to their camp and cared for him. For two
weeks he lay at death's door, no one knowing who
he was or understanding the wanderings of his delirium. When
he returned, I was gone, lost like a rain drop
in the ocean. He was too poor to hire the
aid that might have found me. Then he went back
to his work, moved to other camps, struggled and thrived.

(11:00):
In time, the story of his marriage was forgotten. Those
who remembered it set it down as an illegal connection,
a familiar incident in the miner's roving life. Years later,
when he grew rich, he hunted for me, but it
was too late. Then he turned his whole attention to business,

(11:20):
flung himself into it. The making of money filled his life,
became his life till he saw the girl in the elevator,
who so strikingly resembled the woman he had loved in
his youth. This was what he told Carol, and this
she believed. She was convinced of the truth of every word,
and tried to convince me. But I was full of suspicions.

(11:43):
Having found himself the father of such a girl, might
he not go to any lengths to gain her love
and confidence? His life was empty, he was lonely. Carroll
would have been the consolation and pride of his old
age gentlemen. She looked at the listening faces. Can you
blame me? A youth blasted years of brooding bitterness? Might

(12:06):
not that make a woman incredulous and slow to trust? Again?
When she saw the way I took it, she went
about the business of proving it. Through a lawyer. She
learned that contract marriages at that time in that state
were valid. I had been Johnston Barker's wife, and she
was legitimate. But I hung back. Many things moved me.

(12:29):
He wanted to acknowledge us, take us to live with him,
and I shrank from all that publicity and clamor. Also,
I am telling everything. I think. I was jealous of him,
fearful that he might take from me some of the
love which had made my life possible. I knew she
saw him often, and that she heard from him by

(12:50):
letter All through the end of December and the early
part of January. She urged and pleaded with me, and
finally I gave in. I had to. I couldn't stand
between her and what he could give her. And the
day came when I consented to see him. That day
was the fifteenth of January. George cleared his throat, and

(13:13):
O'Malley stirred uneasily in his chair. The old man rumbled
and encouraging fifteenth of January, and she went on. She
left in the morning, greatly excited, telling me she would
phone him that she had good news and would bring
him home with her that evening. She was radiant with

(13:33):
joy and hope when I kissed her goodbye. When she
returned that night, long after her usual time, all that
hope and joy were dashed to the ground. As you know.
She did see him that afternoon and told him of
my consent. He appeared overjoyed and said he would come,

(13:54):
but first must go to mister Harland's office on the
floor above to talk over a matter of great importance. This,
he said, would probably occupy half to three quarters of
an hour, after which he would return to her. As
they wished to avoid all possibility of gossip through her
clerks or the people in the building, they decided not
to meet in her offices, but in the church, which

(14:16):
is next door. From there. They would take a cab
and come to me. The appointment was for a quarter
past six. Carol was ahead of time and waited for
him over an hour, then came home, shattered, broken, almost
unable to speak, for as you know, he never came.

(14:38):
She paused, her face tragic with the memory of that
last unexpected blow. No one spoke, and looking round at them,
she threw out her hands with a gesture of pleading appeal.
What could I think? Was it unnatural for me to
disbelieve him again? Hasn't all that's come out shown he
was what I'd already found him, false to his word

(15:00):
and his trust. Does your daughter think that too, asked
the chief. No, she believes in him, even now with
him hiding and branded as a traitor. But that's Carol,
always ready to trust where her heart is. She says,
it's all right that he'll come back and clear himself.
But I can see how she's suffering, how she's struggling

(15:22):
to keep her hopes alive. I burst out. Wild horses
couldn't have kept me quiet any longer. Reaching a long
arm across the table, without any consciousness that I was
doing it, I laid my hand on missus Whitehall's How
did she get out of La Bille in that night?
She looked surprised and strangely enough embarrassed. What she stammered?

(15:44):
And then suddenly you seem to know so much here?
Do you know anything about mister Harland and Carrol? Something?
Said the chief guardedly. Everything I shot out, not caring
for her or him, or the case or anything, but
the answer to mine question. Then I don't mind telling you,
though Carol wouldn't like it. She glanced tentatively at me.

(16:08):
Do you know he was in love with her? All
about it? Yes? Go on? She went down with the
stairs all those flights to avoid him. I guessed the
way he felt about her. I knew it soon after
the business was started, and told her, but she only
laughed at me. That afternoon, when he came to her office,

(16:29):
she saw it was right. Not that he said anything definite,
but by his manner the questions he asked her he
was wrought up and desperate, I suppose, and let her see.
He was jealous of mister Barker, demanding the truth, whether
she loved him, whether she intended marrying him. She was angry,
but seeing he had lost control of himself, told him

(16:52):
that her feeling for mister Barker was that of a
daughter to a father and would never be anything else.
That seemed to quiet him, and he went away. When
she was leaving her offices, she heard footsteps on the
floor above, and, looking up, saw him through the balustrade,
walking to the stair head. She at once thought he
was coming to see her, and, not wanting any more

(17:13):
conversation with him, stole out and down the hall to
the side corridor where the service stairs are. Her intention
was to pick up the elevator on the floor below,
but on second thoughts she gave this up and walked
the whole way, Finding her gone, He would probably take
the elevator himself, and they might meet in the car
or the entrance hall. Of course, we know now she

(17:35):
was all wrong. It was not to see her he
was coming down. It was to make up his mind
to die. My actions must have surprised them, for without
a word to Missus Whitehall. I jumped up and left
the room. I couldn't trust myself to speak. I had
to be alone in my own office. I shut the
door and stood looking with eyes that saw nothing out

(17:56):
of the window, over the roofs, to where the waters
of the bay glittered in the sun. Have you ever
felt a relief so great it made you shaky? Probably not,
but wait till you're in the position I was. The
room rocked, The distance was a golden blue as I
whispered with lips that were stiff and dry. Thank God, Oh,
thank God, Oh, thank God. I don't know how long

(18:18):
a time passed, maybe an hour, maybe five minutes, when
the door opened and George's head was thrust in. What
are you doing? Shut in here, get a move on.
We want you. The telephone returns have come. I followed
him back. Missus Whitehall was not there. The Chief and
O'Malley had their heads together over a slip of paper.
Here you go, Jack, said the old man, turning sharply

(18:40):
on me. You've got to go out tonight with O'Malley
there in Quebec. He handed me the slip of paper.
On it was one memorandum the night before, at twelve
o five New York Lennox thirteen sixty had called up
Quebec Saint Foix five eighty four. End of Chapter eighteen