 19 Proofs and more proofs You are absolutely crazy! I said laughing though the laugh choked in my throat as I looked at stone. You see, fibsy, you've gone dotty over this thing and you're running round in circles. I know both Mrs. Skyler and Miss Van Allen and they've nothing in common. There couldn't be two people more dissimilar. That's just it, that's how I know, wailed the boy. That's how I first got on. You see, oh, tell him Mr. Stone. The boy is right, said Stone slowly, and the... He can't be, it's impossible. I fairly shouted as thoughts came flashing into my mind, dreadful thoughts, appalling thoughts. Ruth, Skyler, and Vicky Van, one person. Why then, Ruth killed... No, a thousand times, no. It couldn't be true. The boy was insane and Stone was too. I'd show them their own foolishness. Stop a minute, Stone. I said trying to speak calmly. You and the boy never knew Vicky Van. You never saw her except as she ran along the street for a few steps at midnight and Terence didn't see her then. It's too absurd, this theory of yours. But it startled me when you sprung it. Now Fibsie, stop your sobbing and tell me what makes you think this foolish thing and I'll relieve your mind of any such ideas. I don't blame you, Mr. Calhoun. And Fibsie mopped his eyes with his wet handkerchief. He was a strange little figure in his new clothes but with his red hair tumbled and his eyes big and swollen with weeping. I know you can't believe it but you listen a bit while I tell Mr. Stone some things. Then you'll see. Yes, Terence, said Stone, go ahead. What about the prince? They prove up and Fibsie's woe increased afresh. They ain't no shatter of doubt. The very reason I know they're the same is because they're so unlike. Yes, I'll explain. Wait a minute. Then a crying spell overwhelmed him and we waited. Now, he said regaining self-control, now I've spilled all my tears all out with it. The first thing that struck me was the absolute unlikeness of those two ladies. I mean in their taste and ways. Why, for instance, and I guess it was just about the very first thing I noticed was the magazines. Even here on Ms. Van Allen's table, as you can see yourself is, just look at them. Vogue, Vanity Fair, Life Cosmopolitan, and lots of lightweight story magazines. In at Skyder's house is Atlantic Monthly, Harper's Century, The Forum, The North American Review, and a lot of other highbrow reading. And it ain't only that the magazines in here are gayer and lighter and in there heavier and wiser, but there isn't a single duplicate. Now, Ms. Vicky Van likes good reading. You can see from her books and all, so why don't she take Harper's and Century? Cos she has them in her other home. But wait, child, I cried getting bewildered. You don't mean Vicky Van lives sometimes in this house and sometimes in the Skyder house as its mistress. That's just what I do mean. I know it sounds like I was baddie, but let me tell more. Well, it seemed queer that there shouldn't be any one magazine took in both houses, but of course that wasn't no real proof. I only noticed it, and it set me a thinking. Then I sized up their situations. Ms. Skyder's dignified and quiet in her ways, simple in her dress, wears only poils, no other sparklers, whatever. Vicky Van's gay of action, likes giddy rags and adores gorgeous jewelry, even if it ain't the most realist kind. Now wait, don't interrupt me, let me talk it out. Cos it's killing me and I gotta get it over with. Well, all Ms. Skyder's things, furniture, I mean, is big and heavy and massive and terribly expensive. Yes, I know her husband made her have it that way, but never mind that. Vicky Van's furniture is all gay and light and pretty and deity-colorin' and so forth. And the day the old sisters-in-law was in there they said, How Ruth would admire to have things like these. Remember how she begged Randolph to do up her boudoir in wicker and pink silk? That's what they said. Oh well, I gotta bug then that the two ladies I'm talking about was just the very oppositeest I ever did see. Then another thing was the records. The phony graft in here is full of light opera and poplar music like that. Not a smell of fugues and classic stuff. And in it, Skyder's as we seen tonight, there's no gay songs, no comic operas, no ragtime. But Terrence, I broke in, that all proves nothing. The Skyder's don't care for ragtime and Vicky Van does. You mustn't distort those plain facts to fit your absurd theory. Yes, he said his eyes burning as they glared into mine. And Mr. Skyder, he wouldn't never let his wife go to the light operas or Wadiville, and she hadn't any records, so how? How, I ask you, comes it that she's so familiar with the song about my pearly girly that she joined in the singing of it with me at the dinner table tonight? That's what's clinched it. Mrs. Skyder, she knew that song as well as I did, and she picked it up where I left off and hummed it straight to the end, words and music. How'd she know it, I say? Why, she might have picked that up anywhere. She goes to see friends, I've no doubt, who are not so straight-laced as the Skyder's, and they play light tunes for her. Not likely. I have run down her friends, and they're all old fogies like the sister dames or like old man Skyder himself. The old ladies are nearly sixty and Mr. Skyder was fifty odd, and all their friends are along about those ages, and Mrs. Skyder, she ain't got any friends of her own age at all. But as Vicky Vanchy has friends of her own age, yes, and her own tastes, and her own ways of life and living, and she's got the record of my pearly girly. It's true, Calhoun, said Flemingstone. I know it's all incredible, but it's true. I couldn't believe it myself when Fipsy hinted it to me, for it's his find, to him belongs all the credit. Credit, I groaned. Credit for fastening this lie, this base lie, for you are well-named, Fipsy, on the best and loveliest woman that ever lived. For it is a lie, not a word of truth in it, a distorted notion of a crazy brain. Ah, hold on, Calhoun, remonstrated Stone, and I dare say I was acting like a madman. Listen to the rest of this more quietly or take your hat and go home. Stone spoke firmly, but not angrily, and I sat still. Then here's some more things, Fipsy continued. I've gone over this house with an eye that sees more in Mr. Stone's lens, and it don't magnify neither. I spotted a lot of stuff in the pantry and storeroom. It's all stuff that keeps, you know, little jugs and pots of fine-eaten, imported table delicacies, that's what they call them. Well, and among them was liquors and things like that, and boxes of candied rose-leaves and salted nuts, oh, all of them things. And that's why I wanted to go to dinner at Mrs. Scotters and see if she liked to eat those things, and she did. She had the rose-leaves and she had the kind of liquor that's down in the pantry covered in this house. And she said it was her favorite, and the old girl said she never used to have those things when her husband was running the house. And, oh, dear, can't you see it all? Yes, I see it, said Stone, but I still shook my head doggedly and angrily. I don't see it, I declared. There's nothing to all this but a pipe dream. Why shouldn't two women like Oda V to Danzig as a liqueur? It's very fashionable, a sort of fad just now. It ain't only this thing or that thing, Mr. Calhoun, said Fibsi earnestly. It's the pile and up of all of them. And I ain't through yet. Here's another point. Miss Van Allen, she ain't got any pictures of nature views, no landscapes nor woodsy dels in this whole house. She just like pictures of people, pretty girls and old cavalier gentlemen and nymphs and kitty babies, but all human, you know? Now Mrs. Skyler, she don't care anything special for nature, neither. I piped up about the beauty scenery out Westchester Way and over the park, and it left her called and uninterested. But she has portfolios of world masterpieces or whatever you call them over to that house, and they're all figurepieces. And her writing desk, prompted stone. Yes, sir, that checked up, too. You know, Mr. Calhoun, they ain't nothing more intimately personal than a writing desk. Well, Miss Van Allen's has a certain make of pen and a certain number and kind of pencils. And Mrs. Skyler, she uses the same identical styles and numbers. And note paper, I suppose. I flung back sarcastically. No, sir, but that helps prove. The note paper in the two houses is teetom-tee totally different. That was planned to be different. Mrs. Skyler's is a pale gray plain paper. Miss Van Allen's is light pink to match her Boudoir, I suppose. And it has that sort of indented frame around it that's extra fashionable and a wiggly gold monogram. Oh, quite a big one. I well remembered Vicki's stationery and the boy described it exactly. Proves nothing, I said contemptuously, but I listened further. All right, Phibse said, wearily pushing back his shock of red hair. Well then, how's this? On Mrs. Skyler's desk, the pen wiper is a fancy little contraption, but it's clean. I mean, it's never had a pen wiped on it. Miss Van Allen's desk hasn't got any pen wiper. On each desk is a pencil sharpener of the same sort. On each desk is a little pin cushion with the same size of tiny pins, like she was in the habit of pinning bills together, or something like that. On each desk, the blotter is in the same place, and it is used the same way. There's a lot of personality about the way folks use a blotter. Some uses both sides, some only one side. Some has their blotters all torn and sort of nibbled around the edges, and some has them neat and trim. Well, the blotters on these two desks is just alike. But Phibse, I cried in triumph, I've seen the handwriting of these two ladies over and over again, and they're not a bit alike. I know it, and Phibse nodded. But Mr. Calhoun, did you know that Miss Van Allen always writes with her left hand? No, and I don't believe she does. Yes, sir. I went to the bank and they said so, and I asked the sewing woman and she said so, and I asked the caterer people and they said so. And the ink stand is on the left hand side of Miss Van Allen's desk. All right, then she is left-handed, but that proves nothing. No, sir, Miss Van Allen ain't left-handed. You know she ain't yourself. You'd have noticed it if she had been. But she writes left-handed, because if she didn't she'd write like Mrs. Skyler. Oh, rubbish, I began, but Flemingstone interrupted. Wait, Calhoun, don't fly to pieces. All Terence is saying is quite true, I vouch for it. Listen further. They ain't no use going further, said Phibse despondently. Mr. Calhoun knows I'm right, only he can't bring himself to believe it and I don't blame him. Why, even now, he's sizing up the case and everything he thinks of proves it and nothing disproves it. But anyway, the prints prove it all. Prints? I said half-dasedly. Yes, sir. I photographed a lot of fingerprints in both houses and the headquarters people fixed them up for me, magnified them, you know, and printed them on little cards and, as you can see, they're all the same. I glanced at the sheaf of cards the boy had and Flemingstone took them to scrutinize. I got those prints from all sorts of places, Phibse went on. Off of the glass bottles and things in the bathrooms and off the hairbrushes and such things, and off the envelopes of letters, and off the chair-bags and any polished wood surfaces, and I got lots of them in both houses and the police people picked out the best and cleanest and fixed them up and there you are. They seemed to think this settled the matter but I would not be convinced. Of course I'd been told dozens of times that no two people in the world have fingerprints alike but that didn't mean a thing to me. It might be, I told them, that Vicky Van and Ruth Schuyler were friends, that Ruth had withheld this fact and that, no, said Stone, not friends but identical, the same woman. And listen to this, Mrs. Schuyler heard us say this evening that Phibse could photograph the brushes and such things over here to get Miss Van Allen's fingerprints and what does she do? She sends tidbits over to scrub and wipe off those same brushes, also the mirrors, chair-bags, and all such possible evidence. A hopeless task for the woman couldn't eradicate all the prints in the house and also it was too late for Phibse had already done his camera work. How do you know she did all that? And I glowered at the detective. Because Phibse just told me he found evidences of this cleaning up and, too, because Mrs. Goddard purposely kept us over there longer than we intended to stay. You know how, when we proposed to say good night, she urged us to stay longer? That was to give her made more time for the work. Now, Mr. Calhoun, go on with your objections to our conclusions. It helps our theory to answer your reputations. Her letters, I mumbled, scarce able to formulate my teeming thoughts. Vicky Van sent a letter to Ms. Skyler. Of course she did, wrote it herself with her left hand and mailed it to her other personality in order to make the police give up the search. And, too, the letter from Ms. Van Allen, found in Randolph Skyler's desk after his death, was written and placed there by Mrs. Skyler for us to find. Impossible, I cried. I won't allow these libels. You'll be saying next that Ruth Skyler killed her husband. She did, asserted Fleming Stone gravely. She did kill him in her character as Vicky Van. Don't you see it all? Skyler came here as Summers never dreaming that Vicky Van was his own wife in disguise, or he may have suspected it and may have come to verify his suspicion. Anyway, when she saw and recognized him, whether he knew her or not, she lured him into the dining room and stabbed him with a caterer's knife. Never, I said. I was not ranting now. I was stunned by the revelations that were coming so thick and fast. I couldn't believe and yet I couldn't doubt. Of one thing I was certain. I would defend Ruth Skyler to the end of time. I would defend her against Vicky Van. Why, if Ruth was Vicky Van, where was this moll to end? I couldn't think coherently. But I suddenly realized what they told me was true. I realized that all along there were things about Ruth that had reminded me of Vicky. I had never put this into words, never had really sensed it, but I saw now looking back that they had much in common. Appearance. Ah, I hadn't yet thought of that. Why, I exclaimed, the two are not in the least alike physically. Miss Van Allen were a black wig, said Stone, a most cleverly constructed one and she rouged her cheeks, penciled her eyelashes and reddened her lips to produce the high coloring that marked her from Miss Skyler. I thought this over, Dolly. Yes, they were the same height and weight. They had the same slight figure, but it had never occurred to me to compare their physical effects. I was a bit nearsighted and I had never taken enough real personal interest in Vicky to learn to love her features as I had Ruth. You see, Fleming Stone was saying, though I scarce listened, you are the only person that I have been able to find who knows both Miss Van Allen and Miss Skyler. No one else has testified who knows them both. So much depends on you. You'll get nothing from me, I fairly shouted. They're not the same woman at all. You're all wrong, you and your lying boy there. Your vehement stultifies your own words, said Stone quietly. It proves your own realization of the truth and your anger and fury at the realization. I don't blame you. I know your regard for Miss Skyler. I know you have always been a friend of Miss Van Allen. It is not strange that one woman attracts you since the other did. But you've got to face this thing. So be a man and look at it squarely. I'll help you all I can, but I assure you there's nothing to be gained by denial of the self-evident truth. But man, I said trying to be calm, the whole thing is impossible. How could Mrs. Randolph Skyler, a well-known society lady, live a double life and enact Miss Van Allen a gay butterfly girl? How could she get from one house to the other unobserved? Why wouldn't her servants know of it, even if her family didn't? How could she hoodwink her husband, her sisters-in-law and her friends? Why didn't people see her leaving one house and entering the other? Why wasn't she missed from one house when she was in the other? All answerable questions, said Stone. You know Miss Van Allen went away frequently on long trips and was in and out of her home all the time. Here today and gone tomorrow, as everyone testifies who knew her. This was true enough. Vicki was never at home more than a few days at a time and then absent for a week or so. Where? In the Fifth Avenue house as Ruth Skyler. Incredible, preposterous. But as I began to believe at last, true. How, I repeated, how could she manage? Walls have tongues, said Stone. These walls and this house tell me all the story. That is, they tell me this wonderful woman did accomplish this seemingly impossible thing. They tell me how she accomplished it, but they do not tell me why. There's no question about the why, I returned. If Ruth Skyler did live two lives, it's easily understood why. Because that brute of a man allowed her no gait, no pleasure, no fun of any sort compatible with her youth and taste, he let her do nothing, have nothing, save in the old, hundrum ways that appealed to his notion of propriety. But he himself was no Puritan. He ran his own gate and unknown to his wife and sisters, he was a roux and a rounder. Whatever Ruth Skyler may have done, she was amply justified, even in killing him. She didn't kill him. Look here, Mr. Stone, even if all you've said is true, you haven't convicted her of murder yet, and you shan't. I'll protect that woman from the breath of scandal or slander, and that's what it is when you accuse her of killing that man. She never did it. That remains to be seen. And Fleming Stone's deep gray eyes showed a sad apprehension. But nothing can be done tonight. Can there, Terrence? No, Mr. Stone, not tonight. No, by no means not tonight. It wouldn't do. The boy's earnestness seemed to me out of all proportion to his simple statement, but I could stand no more and I went home to spend the night in a dazed wonder, a furious disbelief, and finally an enforced conviction that Vicky Van and Ruth Skyler were one and the same. End of Chapter 19. Chapter 20 of Vicky Van by Carolyn Wells. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. 20. The Truth From Ruth. Next morning I was conscious of but one desire to get to Ruth and tell her of my love and faith in her and assure her of my protection and assistance whatever happened. Whatever happened? The thought struck me like a knell. What could happen but her arrest and trial? But as I went out of my own door, I left the house early for I couldn't face Aunt Lucy and Winnie. I suddenly decided it would be better to see Stone first and learn if anything had transpired since I left him. I rang the bell at Vicky Van's house with a terrible feeling of impending disaster that might be worse than any yet known. Fibsi let me in. I wanted to hate that boy and yet his very evident adoration of Ruth Skyler made me love him. I knew all that he had discovered had been as iron entering his soul but his duty led him on and he dared not pause or falter. We may as well tell him, he said to Stone and the detective nodded. But come downstairs with us and have a cup of coffee first, Stone said. You'll need it as you say you've had no breakfast. Fibsi makes first-rate coffee and I can tell you, Calhoun, you've a hard day before you. Have you learned anything further? I managed to stammer out as we went down to the basement room that they used as a dining room now. Yes, as I told you, walls have tongues and the walls have given up the secret of how Mrs. Skyler managed her two-sided existence. But he would not tell me the secret until I had been fortified with two cups of steaming mocha which fully justified his praise of Fibsi's culinary prowess. Fibsi himself said nothing beyond a brief good morning and the lads' eyes were red and his voice shook as he spoke. I knew, Stone said as we finished breakfast, that there must be some means, some secret means of communication between the two houses, the Skyler House and this. You see, the Skyler House, fronting on Fifth Avenue, three doors from the corner runs back 100 feet and abuts on the rear rooms of this house which runs back from the side street. In a word, the two houses form a right angle and the back wall of the Skyler House is directly against the side wall of the rear rooms of this house. Therefore I felt sure there must be an entrance from one house to the other, not perceivable to an observer. And of course it must be in Mrs. Skyler's own rooms. It couldn't be in their dining room or halls. A few questions made me realize that Ms. Van Allen's boudoir was separated from Mrs. Skyler's bathroom by only the partition wall of the houses. And I said that wall must speak to me and it did. We were now on our way upstairs. Stone, ready at last to let me into the secret he had discovered. We went to Vicky's boudoir and he continued, you know you found the strand of gilt beads caught in this mirror frame. We all assumed Ms. Van Allen had flirted it there as she dressed for her party, but I reasoned that it might have caught there as she escaped to the Skyler House the night of the murder. Yes, she did escape this way. Look. Stone touched a hidden spring and the mirror in the Florentine frame slid silently aside into the wall, leaving an aperture that without doubt led into the next house. The frame remained stationary, but the mirror slid away as a sliding door works and so smoothly that there was absolutely no sound or jar. I saw what was like a small closet about two feet deep and perhaps three feet wide. At the back of it, that is against the walls of the adjoining room in the other house, we could see the shape of a similar door and the secret was out. There was no need to open that other door to know that it led to Ruth Scudder's rooms. There was yet more tell-tale evidence. In the little cupboard between the houses was a small safe. This stone had opened and in it was the black wig of Vicky Van and also a brown wig, which I recognized at once as Julie's well-remembered, plainly parted front hair. You see, Tibbets is Julie, said Fibbsy in such a heartbroken and despairing voice that I felt the tears rushed to my own eyes. Vicky's wig, the loops of sleek black hair, the soft loose knot behind, the delicate part, all just as it crowned her little head, Ruth's head. Oh, I couldn't stand it. It was too fearful. This other door, Stone said, opens into Mrs. Scudder's bathroom. That I know. You see, she had to have the sentence from some room absolutely her own. Her bathroom was safe from interruption and when she chose, she slipped through from one house to the other and back at will. No, I can't understand it. I insisted shaking my head. If she came in here as Ruth Scudder, why wasn't she seen? Because before she was seen, she had made herself into Victoria Van Allen. She had dawned wig and makeup safe from interruption here in her boudoir. This makeup she removed before returning to the Skyler house in her role of Mrs. Skyler. It is too unbelievable. No, it is diabolically clever, but quite understandable. Julie and Tibbets are the same. This confidential woman looked after her mistress's safety on both sides. She remained when Vicky Van disappeared. She looked after everything, took care of details, attended to tradesmen and all such matters and when ready followed Mrs. Skyler into the other house or went from here to her rooms a few blocks away and later came from them. When there were to be parties, Julie left the Skyler house early, came here and made preparations and then as late as 10 or 11 o'clock maybe, Mrs. Skyler came in from her home when her own household thought her a bed and a sleep. She could go back in the early morning hours with no one the wiser. Or if she chose and she did when her husband was out of town, she could pretend she had gone away for a visit and stay here for days at a time. I began to see. Truly, the wall's tongue had spoken. If this awful theory of stones were true, it could only be managed in this way. I remembered how long and how often Vicky Van was absent from her home. I remembered that sometimes she was late in arriving at her own parties, although she always came down from upstairs in her party regalia. How did you come to suspect Tibbetts? I asked suddenly. Her teeth, said Fipsy. I saw that Tibbetts had false teeth anyway, and I says, why can't Julie's gold teeth be false too? And they are, they're in the safe. What marvelous precautions they had taken to think of having a set of teeth for the maid Julie that should appear so different from those of Tibbetts. Surely this thing was the result of long and careful planning. Her glasses too, went on Fipsy. You see, they made her different from Tibbetts' in appearance, that was all the disguise Tibbs had. The gold teeth, the big red specks, and the brown scratch, wig, you know. But it was enough. Nobody notices a servant closely, and these things altered her look sufficient. Miss Van Allen now, she had a wig and a lot of color and matter and her giddy clothes. Nothing left to recognize her but her eyes, and they were so darkened by the long dark lashes and brows that she fixed up that it made her eyes seem darker. I got all this from the pictures the artist's lady made. You see, she caught the color likeness but not the actual features. So I sized up the resemblance of the real women. Oh, Mr. Stone, what are we going to do? Our duty, Terrence. Then I put forth my plea that I might be allowed to go and see Ruth first, that I might prepare her for the disclosures they would make, the discoveries they would announce. But Stone denied me. He said they would do or say nothing that would unnecessarily hurt her feelings, but they must accompany me. Indeed, he implied that it might be as well for me not to go. But I insisted on going and we three went on our terrible errand. Ruth received us in the library. She saw it once that her secret was known and she took it calmly. You know, she said quietly to Stone, I am sorry, I hoped to hide my secret and that Victoria Van Allen forever remain a mystery, but it cannot be. I admit all. Wait, Ruth, I cried out. Admit nothing until you are accused. I am accused, she responded with a sad smile. I heard you talking in the passage between the rooms. In my bathroom I could hear you distinctly. There is there a mirror door also. It looks like an ordinary mirror and has a wide flat nickel frame matching the other fittings. Yes, I had the sliding doors built for the purposes which you have surmised. Shall I tell you my story? Yes, and let us hear it too, came from the doorway and the two sisters appeared agog with excitement and curiosity. Come in, said Ruth quietly. Sit down, please, I want you to hear it. Most of it you know, Sarah and Rhoda, but I will tell it briefly to Mr. Stone for I want not leniency, but justice. I seated myself at Ruth's side and though I said no word I knew that she understood that my heart and life were at her disposal and that whatever she might be about to tell would not shake my love and devotion. It is not necessary to use words when a life crisis occurs. I was an orphan, Ruth said, brought up by a stern and puritanical old aunt in New England. I had no joy or pleasures in my childhood or girlhood days. I ran away from home to become an actress. Tibbets, my old nurse who lived in the same village, followed me to keep an eye on me and protect me in need. I was a chorus girl for just one week when Randolph Schuyler discovered me and offered to marry me if I would renounce the stage and also gay life of any sort and become a dignified old-fashioned matron. I willingly accepted. I was only 17 and knew nothing of the world or its ways. As soon as we were married he forbade me any sort of amusement or pleasure other than those practiced by his elderly sisters. I submitted and lived a life of slavery to his whims and his cruelty for five years. He had agreed to let me have Tibbets for my maid as he deemed her a state old woman who would not encourage me in wayward desires. Nor did she. But she realized my thralldom, my lonely unhappy life and knew that I was spining away for want of the simple innocent pleasures that my youth and lighthearted nature craved. I used to beg and plead for permission to have a few young friends or to be allowed to go to a few parties or plays. But Mr. Schuyler kept me as secluded as any woman in a harem. He gave me no liberty, no freedom in the slightest degree. I had been married about four years when I rebelled and began to think up a scheme of a dual existence. I had ample time in the long, lonely hours to perfect my plans, and I had them arranged to the minutest detail long before I put them in operation. Why, I practiced writing with my left hand and acquired a different speaking voice for a year before I needed such subterfuges. Had I been able to persuade my husband to give me even a little pleasure or happiness I would willingly have given up my wild scheme? But he wouldn't. So once when he was away on a long trip I had the passage between the two houses made. I had previously bought the other house under the name of Van Allen, for I had money of my own, left me by an uncle that Mr. Schuyler knew nothing about. Of course, this money came to me after I was married or I never should have wed Randolph Schuyler. Tibbet's cousin, an expert carpenter, did the work, and as he afterward went to England to live I had no fear of discovery that way. Indeed, there was little fear of discovery in any way. I was expected to spend much of my time in my own rooms and my bedroom, dressing room, and bath form a little suite by themselves and can be locked off from the rest of the house. So when I retired to my rooms for the night I could go through into the other house and become Vicky Van at my pleasure. I can't believe such baseness, declared Rhoda Schuyler, such ingratitude to a husband who was so good to you. He wasn't good to me, said Ruth quietly, nor was I ungrateful. Randolph Schuyler spoiled my life. He denied me everything I asked for, every innocent pleasure and amusement. So I found them for myself. I did nothing wrong. As Victoria Van Allen I had friends and pleasures that suited my age and my love of life, but there never was anything wrong or guilty in my house. Until you killed your husband, interrupted Sarah. Until the night of Randolph Schuyler's appearance at Vicky Van's house, Ruth went on. I had been told of a Mr. Sammers who wanted to know me, but I had no idea it was my husband masquerading under a false name. He came there with Mr. Steele. Of course I recognized him, but he did not know me at once. I sat, playing bridge, and wondering how I could best make my escape. I saw that he didn't know me, and then suddenly as I sat holding my carts and he stood beside me, he noticed a tiny scar on my shoulder. He made that scar himself one night when he hit me with a hot curling iron. What? I cried, unable to repress an exclamation of horror. Yes, I was curling my hair with the tongs and he became angry at me for some trivial reason as he often did, and he snatched up the iron and hit my shoulder. It made a deep burn and he was very sorry. Whenever he saw it afterward he said, never again, meaning he would never strike me again. Then when he noticed the scar that night, although I had put on a light scarf to cover it, he said, never again, in that peculiar intonation, and I knew then that he knew Victoria Van Allen was his own wife. I ran out to the dining room and he followed me. And you stabbed him, cried Rhoda, stabbed your husband, murderous. I don't deny it, said Ruth slowly. The jury must decide that. I must be tried, I suppose. Don't, Ruth, I cried in agony. Don't talk like that, you shall not be tried. You didn't kill, Skyler. If you did, it was in self-defense, wasn't it? Didn't he try to kill you? Yes, he did. He snatched the little carver from the sideboard and attacked me, and I, and I. Don't say it, Ruth, keep still. I ordered beside myself with my whirling thoughts, the little carving knife. And you defended yourself with the caterer's knife. But Fipsy wailed, no, no, it wasn't Mrs. Skyler. I have got the prince from the caterer's knife and they ain't Mrs. Skyler's at all. She didn't kill him. No, she didn't, and Tibbets appeared in the library doorway. I did it myself. That's right, and Fipsy's eyes gleamed with satisfaction. She did. It's her finger marks on the knife that stabbed old Skyler. Their plane is sprint. Nobody thought of matching up those marks with Tibbets' mitt, but I'll bet she did it to save Mrs. Skyler's life. I did. And Tibbets came into the room and stood facing us. Tell your story, said Stone abruptly as he looked at the white-faced woman. Here it is. And Tibbets looked fondly at Ruth as the latter's piteous glance met hers. I've loved and watched over Mrs. Skyler all her life. I've protected her from her husband's brutality and helped her to bear his cruelty and unkindness. When she conceived the plan of the double life, I helped her all I could, and I got my cousin to do the work on the houses that made it all possible. Then I was Julie, and I devoted my life and energies to keeping the secret and allowing my mischief to have some pleasure out of her life. And she did. Tibbets looked affectionately even proudly at Ruth. The hours she spent in that house as Victoria Van Allen were full of simple joys and happy occupation. She had the books and pictures and furniture that she craved. She had things to eat and things to wear that she wanted. She went to parties and she had parties. She went to the theater and to the shops and wherever she chose without let-or-hindrance. It did my heart good to see her enjoy herself in those innocent ways. Then Mr. Skyler came. I knew the man. I knew that he came because he had heard of the charm and beauty of Vicky Van. He had no idea he would find her his own wife. When he did discover it, I knew he would kill her. Oh, I knew Randolph Skyler. I knew nothing short of murder would satisfy the rage that possessed him at the discovery. I prepared for it. I got the little boning knife from the pantry, and as Mr. Skyler lifted the carver and aimed it at Ruth's breast, I drove the little knife into his vile, wicked, murderer's heart. And I'm glad I did it. I glory in it. I saved Ruth's life and I rid the world of a scoundrel and a villain who had no right to live and breathe on God's earth. Now you may take me and do with me as you will. I give myself up. It was the truth. On the carving knife appeared plain as print. The finger marks of Randolph Skyler proved a hundred times by Prince Photograph from his own letters, toilet articles, and personal belongings in his own rooms. In his mad fury at the discovery of Ruth masquerading his vicky van, and in his sudden realization of all that it meant, he clutched the first weapon he saw, the little carver, to end her life and gratify his madness for revenge. Just in time, the watching tibets had intervened, stabbed Skyler and then ran upstairs to escape through the hidden doors to the other house. Ruth, stunned at the sight of the blow driven by tibets and dazed by her own narrow escape from a fearful death, picked up the carver that dropped from Skyler's lifeless hand and ran upstairs too. She had, she explained afterward, a hazy idea that she was picking up the knife that tibets had used, so bewildered was she at the swift turn of events. And as she stooped over Skyler and her frenzy, the waiter had seen her and assumed she was the murderer. This too explained the blood on the flounces of her gown. It had brushed the fallen figure of her husband and became stained at the touch. The two women had, of course, slipped through the connecting mirror doors into the Skyler house and, long before the alarm was brought there, they were rehabilitated and ready to receive the news. Then Ruth's squandery was a serious one. Innocent herself, she could not tell of her double life without making the whole affair public and incriminating tibets whom she loved almost as a mother and who had saved Ruth's life by a fraction of a second. An instant's delay and Skyler's knife would have been driven into Ruth's heart. So, for tibet's sake, Ruth, perforce, kept the secret of Vicky Van. I was not ashamed of it, she told us frankly. There was nothing really wrong in my living two lives. My husband denied me the pleasure and joy that life owed me, so I found it for myself. I never had a friend or committed a deed or said a word as Victoria Van Allen that all the world mightn't hear or know of and I should have owned up to the whole scheme at once except that it would bring out the knowledge of tibet's act. I wished not to go back to the other house at all and should not have done so for myself, but I had reasons connected with other people. A friend whom I love had asked the privilege of having certain letters sent her in my care that is in care of Miss Van Allen and I had to go in once or twice to rescue those and so prevent a scandal that would ensue upon their discovery. For her sake, I risked going back there at night. Also, I wanted my address book for it hasn't at many addresses of people who are my charity beneficiaries. Mr. Schuyler never allowed me to contribute to any charitable cause and I have enjoyed giving help to some who need and deserve it. These addresses I had to have and I have them. Mr. Stone was right, the walls had tongues. He first noticed a little defect in the green paint in the living room which I had retouched. When he told me of this and I realized how clever Mr. Stone is. So I threw away the paint I had used which was in here and I carefully thought out what else was incriminating and removed all I could from the other house. Fibbs he noticed when I took a book from a table but that book I wanted because she blushed because Mr. Calhoun had given it to me and I wasn't sure I could get it any other way. But the walls told all and at the last I knew it was only a question of time when Mr. Stone or Terrence would discover the doors. I suppose the strand of beads that caught as I escaped that night gave a hint but they would have found them anyway. They are wonderful doors, in their working I mean. No complicated mechanism but merely so well made and adjusted that a touch opens or closes them and absolutely silently. No one in this house ever dreamed the bathroom mirror was anything but a mirror. And in the other house the elaborate Florentine frame precluded all idea of a secret contrivance. The two feet of thickness of the house walls made a tiny cupboard where I had that small safe installed that we might put our wigs in such definitely incriminating bits of evidence and hiding, also Vicky's jewelry. But I always changed my costumes from one character to the other in Vicky Van's dressing room and so ran little or no chance of discovery. In a futile endeavor to distract attention from Victoria Van Allen I wrote a note to Ruth Schodder and also wrote the one found in Mr. Schodder's desk. I did these things in hopes that the detectives would cease to watch for the return of Miss Van Allen but it turned out differently. I assumed of course if search could be diverted from that house into other channels there would be a possibility of tibets never being suspected. I am sorry she has confessed. I do not want her to be tried. She saved my life and I would do anything to keep her from harm. But tibets was tried and was acquitted. A just jury knowing all of the facts declared it was a case of justifiable homicide and the verdict was not guilty. The Schuyler sisters were finally convinced that Ruth's life had been endangered by their brother's rage and though they condemned tibets in their hearts they said little in the face of public opinion. As for me I couldn't wait until a conventional time had elapsed before telling my darling of my love for her own sweet self and as I now realized for Vicky Van also. I spent hours listening to the details of her double life of the narrow escapes from discovery and the frequent occasions of danger to her scheme. But tibets watchful eyes and Ruth's own cleverness had made the plan feasible for two years and it was only because Ruth had found her dear heart was inclining too greatly toward me that she had begun to think at her duty to give up her double life. She had recently decided to do so for she was not willing to let our mutual interest ripen into love while she was the wife of another man. And so if it hadn't all happened just as it did I should never have won my darling for she was about to give up the Van Allen house and I never should have had occasion to meet Mrs. Randolph-Skyler. It is all past history now and Ruth and I are striving to forget even the memories of it. We live in another city and tibets is our faithful and beloved housekeeper. And often Ruth says to me, I know you love me, Chet, but sometimes I can't help feeling a little jealous of the girl you cared for, that what's her name? Oh yes, Vicky Van. Vicky Van was all right, I stoutly maintain. I never knew a more charming, sweeter, prettier, dearer little girl than Vicky, but she was awfully made up. Yes, that's where you score an advantage. The only thing about Vicky I disapproved of was her paint and powder. Thank heaven, my wife has a complexion that's all her own. And I kissed the soft pale cheek of my own Ruth. End of chapter 20. End of Vicky Van by Carolyn Wells. Recorded by Celine Majore.