27
“Good Heavens, they must be mad! I am sure that your father was at the zenith of his successful career, and as for dishonor, surely, Anita, no one who knew him could credit that!”
“Mr. Rockamore and the other two who were so closely associated with him made a solemn promise to my father shortly before his death, it seems, that they would care for and provide for me. They sent Dr. Franklin to me this afternoon to explain the circumstances to me, and to assure me of their protection. Save for you, they consider me absolutely in their hands; and when I sent for you, you were almost killed in the attempt to come to me. Ramon, don’t you see, don’t you understand, there is some mystery on foot, some terrible conspiracy? That unknown visitor, my father’s death so soon after, and now this sudden revelation of his bankruptcy, together with this accident to you? Ramon, we must have advice and help. I do not believe that my father was a pauper. I know that he has done nothing dishonorable; I am convinced that the accident to you was a premeditated attempt at murder.”
“My God! I can’t believe it, Anita; I don’t know what to think. If it turns out that there really is something crooked about it all, and Rockamore and the others are concerned in it, it will be the biggest conspiracy that was ever hatched in the world of high finance. You were right, dear, bless your woman’s intuition; we must have help. This matter must be thoroughly investigated. There is only one man in America to-day, who is capable of carrying it through, successfully. I shall send at once for the Master Mind.”
“The Master Mind?”
“Yes, dear––Henry Blaine, the most eminent detective the English-speaking world has produced.”
28
“I have heard of him, of course. I think father knew him, did he not?”
“Yes, on one occasion he was of inestimable service to your father. I will summon him at once.”
Ramon went to the telephone and by good luck found the detective free for the moment and at his service.
He returned to the girl. She noticed that he reeled slightly in his walk; that his lips were white and set with pain.
“Ramon, you are ill, suffering. That cut on your head and your poor arm––”
“It is nothing. I don’t mind, Anita darling; it will soon pass. Thank Heavens, I found Mr. Blaine free. He will get to the truth of this matter for us even if no one else on earth could. He has brought more notorious malefactors to justice than any detective of modern times; fearlessly, he has unearthed political scandals which lay dangerously close to the highest executives of the land. He cannot be cajoled, bribed or intimidated; you will be safe in his hands from the machinations of every scoundrel who ever lived.”
“I have read of some of his marvelous exploits, but; what service was it that he rendered to my father?”
“I––I cannot tell you, dearest. It was very long ago, and a matter which affected your father solely. Perhaps some time you may learn the truth of it.”
“I may not know! I may not know! Why must I be so hedged in? Why must everything be kept from me? I feel as if I were living in a maze of mystery. I must know the truth.”
She wrung her hands hysterically, but he soothed her and they talked in low tones until Wilkes suddenly appeared in the doorway and announced:
“Mr. Henry Blaine!”
29CHAPTER IIIHENRY BLAINE TAKES A HAND
A manstood upon the threshold: a man of medium height, with sandy hair and mustache slightly tinged with gray. His face was alert and keenly intelligent. His eyes shrewd, but kindly, the brows sloping downward toward the nose, with the peculiar look of concentration of one given to quick decisions and instant, fearless action.
His eyes traveled quickly from the young girl’s face to Ramon Hamilton, as the latter advanced with outstretched hand.
“Mr. Blaine, it was fortunate that we found you at liberty and able to assist us in a matter which is of vital importance to us both. This is Miss Anita Lawton, daughter of the late Pennington Lawton, who desires your aid on a most urgent matter.”
“Miss Lawton.” Mr. Elaine bowed over her hand.
When they were seated she said, shyly: “I understand from Ramon––Mr. Hamilton––that you were at one time of great service to my father. I trust that you will be able to help me now, for I feel that I am in the meshes of a conspiracy. You know that my father died suddenly, almost a week ago.”
“Yes, of course. His death was a great loss to the whole country, Miss Lawton.”
“Something occurred a few hours before his death,30of which even the coroner is unaware, Mr. Blaine. I told Mr. Hamilton what I knew, but he advised me to say nothing of it, unless further developments ensued.”
“And they have ensued?” the detective asked quietly.
“Yes.”
Anita then detailed to Mr. Blaine the incident of her father’s nocturnal visitor. As she told him the conversation she had overheard, it seemed to her that the eyes of the detective narrowed slightly, but no other change of expression betrayed the fact that the incident might have held a significance in his mind.
“The voice was entirely strange to you?” he asked.
“Yes; I have never heard it before, but it made such an impression upon me that I think I would recognize it instantly whenever or wherever I might happen to hear it.”
“You caught no glimpse of the man through the half-opened door?”
“No, I was not far enough downstairs to see into the room.”
“And when you fled, after hearing your father groan, you returned immediately to your room?”
“Yes. I closed my door and buried my face deeply in the pillows on my bed. I did not want to hear or know any more. I was frightened; I did not know what to think. After a time I must have drifted off into an uneasy sort of sleep, for I knew nothing more until my maid came to tell me that Wilkes, the butler, wished to speak to me. My father had been found dead in his chair. No one in the household seemed to know of my father’s late visitor, for they made no mention of his coming. I would have told no one, except Ramon, but for the fact that this afternoon my minister informed me that my father, instead of being the multi-millionaire31we had all supposed him, had in reality died a bankrupt.”
The detective received this information with inscrutable calm. Only by a thoughtful pursing of his lips did he give indication that the news had any visible effect upon him.
Anita continued, giving him all the details of the minister’s visit, and the magnanimous promise of her father’s three associates to stand inloco parentistoward her.
It was only when she told of summoning her lover, and the accident which befell him on his way to her, that that peculiar gleam returned again to the eyes of Mr. Blaine, and they glanced narrowly at the young man opposite him.
“As I told Ramon, I cannot help but feel that it is not true. My father could not have become a pauper, much less could he, the soul of honor, have been guilty of anything derogatory to his good name. Until a few days prior to his death, he had been in his usual excellent spirits, and surely had there been any financial difficulties in his path he would have retrenched, in some measure. He made no effort to do so, however, and in the last few weeks has given even more generously than usual to the various philanthropic projects in which he was so interested. Does that look as if he was on the verge of bankruptcy? He bought me a string of pearls on my birthday, two months ago, which for their size are considered by experts to be the most perfectly matched in America. A fortnight ago, he presented me with a new car. Only three days before his death he spoke of an ancient château in France which he had desired to purchase. Oh, the whole affair is utterly inexplicable to me!”
32
“We will take the matter up at once, Miss Lawton. The main thing that I must impress upon you for the present is to acquiesce with the utmost docility and unsuspicion in every proposition made to you by the three men, Carlis, Mallowe and Rockamore; in other words, place yourself absolutely in their hands, but keep me informed of every move they make. You understand that the most important factor in this case is to keep them absolutely unsuspecting of your distrust, or that you have called me to your assistance. I must not be seen coming here or to Mr. Hamilton’s office, nor must you come to mine. I will have a private wire installed for you to-morrow morning, by means of which you can communicate with me, or one of my operatives, at any hour of the day or night, in the presence of anyone. This telephone will connect only with my office, but the number will be, supposedly, that of your dressmaker, and if you require aid, advice, or the presence of one of my operatives, you have merely to call up the number and say: ‘Is my gown ready? If it is, please send it around immediately.’ Let me know through this medium whatever occurs, and take absolutely no one into your confidence.”
“I understand, Mr. Blaine; and I will try to follow your instructions to the letter. Oh, by the way, there is something I wish to tell you, which no one, not even Mr. Hamilton, knows, much less my father’s friends, or my minister. Four years ago, my father financed a philanthropic venture of mine, the Anita Lawton Club for Working Girls. It is not a purely charitable institution, but a home club, where worthy young women could live by paying a nominal sum––merely to preserve their self-respect––and be aided in obtaining positions. Stenographers, telephone and telegraph operators,33clerks, all find homes there. No one knew, however, that under my management, the club grew in less than a year not only to have paid for itself, but to have yielded a small income, over and above expenses. I did not tell my father––I don’t know why, perhaps it was because I inherited a little of his business acumen, but I manipulated the net income in various minor undertakings, even in time buying small plots of unimproved real-estate, meaning after a year or two more to surprise my father with the result of my venture, but his death intervened before I could tell him about it.”
“Your father’s associates, then, believe you to be without funds or private income of your own?” the detective asked.
“Yes, Mr. Blaine. And whatever money is necessary for the investigation, will, of course, be forthcoming from this source.”
“Let me strongly advise you to make no mention of it to anyone else; let these men believe you to be utterly within their power financially. And now, Miss Lawton, I will leave you, for I have work to do.” The detective rose. “The private wire will be installed to-morrow morning. Remember to be absolutely unsuspicious, to appear deeply grateful for the kindness offered you; receive these men and your spiritual adviser whenever they call, and above all, keep me informed of everything that occurs, no matter howinsignificantor irrelevant it may seem to you to be. Keep me advised on even the smallest details––anything, everything concerning you and them.”
Thus it was, that when two days later, President Mallowe of the Street Railways, called upon his new ward, she received him with downcast eyes, and a charmingly deferential manner. His long-nosed, heavy-jowled34face, with the bristling gray side-whiskers, flushed darkly when she placed her trembling little hand in his and shyly voiced her gratitude for his great kindness to her.
“My dear young lady, this has been a most sad and unfortunate affair, but I have come to assure you again of the sentiments of myself and my associates toward you. We come, your self-appointed guardians; we will see that no financial worriments shall come to you. Remember, my dear, that I have three married daughters of my own, and I could not permit the child of my old friend to want for anything. You may remain on here in this house, which has been your home, indefinitely, and it will be maintained for you in the manner to which you have always been accustomed.”
“Remain here in my home?” Anita stammered. “Why it––it is my home, isn’t it?”
“You must consider it as such. I do not like to tell you this, but it is necessary that you should know. I hold a mortgage of eighty thousand dollars on the house, but I have never recorded it, because of my friendship and close affiliation with your father. I shall not have it recorded now, of course, but there is a slight condition, purely a matter of business, which in view of the fact that through your coming marriage you will have a home of your own, Mr. Rockamore, Mr. Carlis and myself, feel that we should agree upon. Your father has a shadowy interest in some old bonds which have for years been unremunerative. Should they prove of ultimate value, we feel that they should be transferred to us as our reimbursement for the present large sum which we shall lay out for you.”
“Of course, Mr. Mallowe. That would only be just. I am glad that I may perhaps have an opportunity to35repay some of the kindness which in your great-hearted charity, you are now bestowing upon me. I will see that my father’s attorneys attend to the matter, as soon as possible. It may be some little time before the estate is settled, as of course it must be horribly complicated and involved, but I will bring this to their immediate attention.”
“You are a very brave young woman, Miss Lawton, and I am glad that you are taking such a clear-sighted view of this double catastrophe which has come upon you. Ah, I had almost forgotten; here is a duplicate of the mortgage which I hold upon this house, which your father made out to me some months ago.”
Anita scarcely glanced at it, but laid it quietly by upon the table, as though it were of small interest to her.
“Mr. Mallowe, although I understand that Mr. Rockamore, being a promoter, was more closely associated with my father in various projects than you, I believe that he always considered you his best friend. Can you tell me what it was which brought my father’s affairs to such a pass as this?”
“Dear young lady, do not ask me. It is a painful subject to discuss, and as you are a mere child, you cannot be supposed to understand the financial manœuvres of a man of your father’s passion for gigantic operations. Years of success had possibly made him overconfident; and then you know, we are none of us infallible; we are liable to make mistakes, at one time or another. Your father interested himself daringly in many schemes which we more conservative ones would have hesitated to enter; indeed, we not only hesitated, but repeatedly declined when your father placed the propositions before us. As you know, unfortunately,36he was a man who would have resented any attempt at advice, and although for a long time we have seen his approaching financial downfall, and have helped him in every way we could to avert it, he would not relinquish his plans while there was yet time. Do not ask me to go into any further details. It is really most distressing. Your father’s attorneys will understand the matter fully when the estate is finally settled.”
“I cannot understand it,” Anita murmured. “I thought my father’s judgment almost infallible. However, Mr. Mallowe, I cannot express my gratitude to you and my father’s other associates for your great kindness toward me. Believe me, I am deeply affected by it. I shall never forget what you have done.”
“Do not speak of it, dear Miss Lawton. I only wish for your sake that your poor father had heeded poorer heads than his, but it is too late to speak of that now. We will do all in our power to aid you, rest assured of that. Should you require anything, you have only to call upon Mr. Rockamore, Mr. Carlis or myself.”
When he had bowed himself out, Anita flew to the table, seized the duplicate of the mortgage which he had given her, and slipped it between the pages of a book lying there. Then she went directly to her dressing-room where on a little stand near her bed reposed a telephone instrument which had not been there three days previously.
“Grosvenor 0760,” she demanded, and when a voice replied to her at the other end of the wire, she asked querulously, “Is not my new gown ready yet? If it is, will you kindly send it over at once? I have also found your last quarterly bill, and I think there is something wrong with it. I will send it back by the messenger, who brings my gown. Thank you; good-by.”
37
She took an envelope from the desk and returning to the drawing-room slipped the duplicate mortgage within it and sealed it carefully.
When, a few minutes later, a tall, dark, stolid-faced young man appeared, with a large dressmaker’s box, she placed the envelope in his hand.
“For Mr. Blaine,” she whispered. “See that it reaches him immediately.”
A half hour afterward, Ramon Hamilton went to the telephone in his office, and heard the detective’s voice over the wire.
“Mr. Hamilton, have you among the letters and documents at your office the signature of the person we were discussing the other day?”
“Why, yes, I think so. I will look and see. If I have do you wish me to send it around to you?”
“No, thank you. A messenger boy will call for it in a few minutes.”
Wondering, Ramon Hamilton shuffled hastily through the paper in the pigeon-holes of his desk until he came to a letter from Pennington Lawton. He carefully tore off the signature, and when the messenger boy appeared, gave it to him. He would not have been so puzzled, had he seen the great Henry Blaine, when a few minutes had elapsed, seated before the desk in his office, comparing the signature of the torn slip which he had sent with that affixed to the duplicate mortgage.
A long, close, breathless scrutiny, with the most powerful magnifying glasses, and the detective jumped to his feet.
“That’s no signature of Pennington Lawton,” he exulted to himself. “I thought I knew that fine hand, perfectly as the forgery has been done. That’s the work of James Brunell, by the Lord!”
38CHAPTER IVTHE SEARCH
Henry Blaine,the man of decision, wasted no time in vain thought. Instantly, upon his discovery that the signature of Pennington Lawton had been forged, and that it had been done by an old and well-known offender, he touched the bell on his desk, which brought his confidential secretary.
“Has Guy Morrow returned yet from that blackmail case in Denver?”
“Yes, sir. He’s in his private office now, making out his report to you.”
A moment later, there entered a tall, dark young man, strong and muscular in build, but not apparently heavy, with a smooth face and firm-set jaw.
“I haven’t finished my report yet, sir––”
“The report can wait. You remember James Brunell, the forger?”
“James Brunell?” Morrow repeated. “He was before my time, of course, but I’ve heard of him and his exploits. Pretty slick article, wasn’t he! I understand he has been dead for years––at least nothing has been heard of his activities since I have been in the sleuth game.”
“Did you ever hear of any of his associates?”
“I can’t say that I have, sir, except Crimmins and Dolan; Crimmins died in San Quentin before his time was up; Dolan after his release went to Japan.”
39
“I want to find Brunell. His closest associate was Walter Pennold. I think Pennold is living somewhere in Brooklyn, and through him you may be able to locate Brunell––”
Morrow shrugged his shoulders.
“A retired crook in the suburbs. That’s going to take time.”
“Not the way we’ll work it. Listen.”
The next morning, a tall, dark young man, strong and muscular in build, with a smooth face and firm-set jaw, appeared at the Bank of Brooklyn & Queens, and was immediately installed as a clerk, after a private interview with the vice-president.
His fellow clerks looked at him askance at first, for they knew there had been no vacancy, and there was a long waiting list ahead of him, but the young man bore himself with such a quiet, modest air ofcamaraderieabout him that by the noon hour they had quite accepted him as one of themselves.
During the morning a package came to the bank and a letter which read in part:
... I am returning these securities to you in the hope that you may be able to place them in the possession of Jimmy Brunell. They belong to him, and my conscience is responsible for their return. I don’t know where to find him. I do know that at one time he did some banking at the Brooklyn & Queens Institution. If he does not do so now, kindly hold these securities for Jimmy Brunell until called for, and in the meantime see Walter Pennold of Brooklyn.
With the package and letter came a request from Henry Blaine which those in power at the Brooklyn & Queens Bank were only too glad to accede to, in order to ingratiate themselves with the great investigator.
In accordance with this request, therefore, the affair was made known by the bank-officials to the clerks as a40matter of long standing which had only just been rediscovered in an old vault, and the subordinates discussed it among themselves with the gusto of those whose lives were bounded by gilt cages, and circumscribed by rules of silence. It was not unusual, therefore, that the new clerk, Alfred Hicks, should have heard of it, but it was unusual that he should find it expedient to make a detour on his way to work the next morning which would take him to the gate of Walter Pennold’s modest home. Perhaps the fact that Alfred Hicks’ real name was Guy Morrow and that a letter received early that morning from Henry Blaine’s office, giving Pennold’s address and a single line of instruction may have had much to do with his matutinal visit.
Be that as it may, Morrow, the dapper young bank-clerk, found in the Pennold household a grizzled, middle-aged man, with shifty, suspicious eyes and a moist hand-clasp; behind him appeared a shrewish, thin-haired wife who eyed the intruder from the first with ill-concealed animosity.
He smiled––that frank, winning smile which had helped to land more men behind the bars than the astuteness of many of his seniors––and said: “I’m a clerk in the Brooklyn & Queens Bank, Mr. Pennold, and we have a box of securities there evidently belonging to one Jimmy Brunell. No one knows anything about it and no note came with it except a line which read: ‘Hold for Jim Brunell. See Walter Pennold of Brooklyn.’ Now you’re the only Walter Pennold who banks with the B. & Q. and I thought you might like to know about it. There are over two hundred thousand dollars in securities and they have evidently been left there by somebody as conscience-money. You can go to the bank and see the people about it, of course. In fact, I understand41they are going to write you a letter concerning it, but I thought you might like to know of it in advance. In case this Mr. Brunell is alive, they will pay him the money on demand, or if dead, to his heirs after him.”
The middle-aged man with the shifty eyes spat cautiously, and then, rubbing his stubby chin with a hairy, freckled hand, observed:
“Well, young man, I’m Pennold, all right. I do some business with the Brooklyn & Queens people––small business, of course, for we poor honest folk haven’t the money to put in finance that the big stock-holders have. I don’t know where you can find this man Brunell, haven’t heard of him in years, but I understand he went wrong. Ain’t that so, Mame?”
The hatchet-faced woman nodded her head in slow and non-committal thought.
Pennold edged a little nearer his unknown guest and asked in a tone of would-be heartiness. “And what might your name be? You’re a bright-looking feller to be a bank-clerk––not the stolid, plodding kind.”
Morrow chuckled again.
“My name is Hicks. I live at 46 Jefferson Place. It’s only a little way from here, you know.” He swung his lunch-box nonchalantly. “Of course, bank-clerking don’t get you anywhere, but it’s steady, such as it is, and I go out with the boys a lot.” He added confidentially: “The ponies are still running, you know, even if the betting-ring is closed––and there are other ways––” He paused significantly.
“I see, a sport, eh?” Pennold darted a quick glance at his wife. “Well, don’t let it get the best of you, young feller. Remember what I told you about Jimmy Brunell––at least, what the report of him was. If I hear anything of where he is, I’ll let the bank know.”
42
“I’ll be getting on; I’m late now––” Morrow paused on the bottom step of the little porch and turned. “See you again, Mr. Pennold, and your wife, if you’ll let me. I pass by here often––I’ve been boarding with Mrs. Lindsay, on Jefferson Place, for some time now. By the way, have you seen the sporting page of theGazettethis morning? Al Goetz edits it, you know, and he gives you the straight dope. There’ll be nothing to that fight they’re pulling off Saturday night at the Zucker Athletic Club––Hennessey’ll put it all over Schnabel in the first round. Good-by! If you hear anything of this Brunell, be sure you let me or the bank know!”
For a long moment after his buoyant stride had carried him out of sight around the corner, Walter Pennold and his wife sat in thoughtful silence. Then the woman spoke.
“What d’ye think of it all, Wally?”
“Dunno.” The gentleman addressed drew from his pocket a blackened, odoriferous pipe and sucked upon it. “Must be some lay, of course. I’ll go up to the bank and find out what I can, but I don’t think that young feller, Hicks, is in on it. I’ve been in the game for forty years, and if I’m a judge, he’s no ’tec. Fool kid spendin’ more’n he earns and out for what coin he can grab. I’ll look up that landlady of his, too, Mame; and if he’s on the level there, and at the bank––”
“And if those securities are at the bank, he ought to be willin’ to come in with us on a share,” the wife supplemented shrewdly. “But it seems like some kind of a gag to me. You knew all Jimmy Brunell’s jobs till he got religion or somethin’, and turned honest––I can’t think of any old crook who’d turn over that money to him, two hundred thousand cold, because his conscience43hurt him, can you? You know, too, how decent and respectable Jimmy’s been livin’ all these years, putting up a front for the sake of that daughter of his; suppose this was a put-up game to catch him––what do the bulls want him for?”
“I ain’t no mind-reader. I’ll look up this business of securities, and then if the young feller’s talked straight, we’ll try to work it through him, if we can get to him, and I guess we can, so long as I ain’t lost the gift of the gab in twenty years. We’ll be as good, sorrowing heirs as ever Jimmy Brunell could find anywheres.”
Before Walter Pennold could reach the bank, however, an unimpeachably official letter arrived from that institution, confirming the news imparted by the bank-clerk concerning the securities left for James Brunell. Pennold, going to the bank ostensibly to assure those in authority there of his cordial willingness to assist in the search for the heir, incidentally assured himself of Alfred Hicks’ seemingly legitimate occupation. A later visit to Mrs. Lindsay of 46 Jefferson Place convinced him that the young man had lived there for some months and was as generous, open-handed, easy-going a boarder as that excellent woman had ever taken into her house. Just what price was paid by Henry Blaine to Mrs. Lindsay for that statement is immaterial to this narrative, but it suffices that Walter Pennold returned to the sharp-tongued wife of his bosom with only one obstacle in his thoughts between himself and a goodly share of the coveted two hundred thousand dollars.
That obstacle was an extremely healthy fear of Jimmy Brunell. It was true that there had been no connection between them in years, but he remembered Jimmy’s attitude toward the “snitcher,” as well as toward the man who “held out” on his pals; and behind44his cupidity was a lurking caution which was made manifest when he walked into the kitchen and found Mrs. Pennold with her shriveled arms immersed in the washtub.
“Say, Mame, the young feller, Hicks, is all right, and so is the bank; but how about Jimmy himself? If I can fix the young feller, and we can pull it off with the bank, that’s all well and good. But s’pose Jimmy should hear of it? Know what would happen to us, don’t you?”
“If he ain’t heard of them securities all this time they’ve been lyin’ forgotten in the bank, it’s safe he won’t hear of ’em now unless you tell him,” retorted his shrewder half, dryly. “Of course, if he’s lived straight, as he has for near twenty years as far as we know, and he finds it out, he’ll grab everything for himself. Why shouldn’t he? But s’pose the bulls are after him for somethin’, and the bank’s hood-winked as well as us, where are we if we mix up in this? Tell me that!”
“There’s another side of it, too, Mame.”
Pennold walked to the window, and regarded the sordid lines of washed clothes contemplatively. “What if Jimmy has been up to somethin’ on the quiet, that the bulls ain’t on to, and this bunch of securities is on the level? If I went to him on the square, and offered him a percentage to play dead, wouldn’t he be ready and willin’ to divide?”
“Of course he would; he’s no fool,” returned Mrs. Pennold shortly. “But let me tell you, Wally, I don’t like the look of that ‘See Walter Pennold of Brooklyn,’ on the note in the bank. S’pose they was trying to trace him through us?”
“You’re talkin’ like a blame’ fool, Mame. Them securities45has been there for years, forgotten. Everybody knows that me and Brunell was pals in the old days, but no one’s got nothin’ on us now, and he give up the game years ago.”
“How d’you know he did?” persisted his wife doggedly. “That’s what you better find out, but you’ve gotter be careful about it, in case this whole thing should be a plant.”
“You don’t have to tell me!” Pennold grumbled. “I’ll write him first and then wait a few days, and if anyone’s tailing me in the meantime, they’ll have a run for their money.”
“Write him!”
“Of course. You may have forgotten the old cipher, but I haven’t. You know yourself we invented it, Jimmy and me, and the police tried their level best to get on to it, but failed.”
“You can’t address it in cipher, and if you’re tailed you won’t get a chance to mail it, Wally. Better wait and try to see him without writing.”
For answer Pennold opened a drawer in the table, drew forth a grimy sheet of paper and an envelope, and bent laboriously to his task. It was long past dusk when he had finished, and tossed the paper across the table for his wife’s perusal. This is what she saw:
When she had gazed long at the characters, she shook her head at him, and a slow smile came over her face.
46
“You’ve forgotten a little yourself, Wally. You made a mistake in thek.”
He glanced half-incredulously at it, and then laid his huge, rough hand on her thin hair in the first caress he had given her in years.
“By God, old girl, you’re a smart one! You’re right. Now listen. You’ve got to do the rest for me, the hardest part. Mail it.”
“How? If we’re tailed––”
“There’ll be only one on the job, if we are, and I’ll keep him busy to-morrow morning. You go to the market as usual, then go into that big department store, Ahearn & McManus’. There’s a mail chute there, next the notion counter on the ground floor. Buy a spool of thread or somethin’, and while you’re waitin’ for change, drop the letter in the box. You used to be pretty slick in department stores, Mame––”
“Smoothest shoplifter in New York until I got palsy!” she interrupted proudly, an unaccustomed glow on her sallow face. “I’ll do it, Wally; I know I can!”
The next morning Alfred Hicks was a little late in getting to his work at the bank––so late, in fact, that he had only time to wave a cordial greeting to his new friends in their cages as he passed. He paused, however, that evening, with a pot of flowering bloom for Mrs. Pennold’s dingy, not over-clean window-sill, and a packet of tobacco which he shared generously with his host. He talked much, with the garrulous self-confidence of youth, but did not mention the matter of the securities, and left the crafty couple completely disarmed.
Neither on entering nor leaving did Hicks appear to notice a short, swarthy figure loitering in the shadow of a dejected-looking ailanthus tree near the corner.47It would have appeared curious, therefore, that the lurking figure followed the bank-clerk almost to his lodgings, had it not been for the fact that just before Jefferson Place was reached the figure sidled up to Hicks’ side and whispered:
“No news yet, Morrow. Pennold went this morning to old Loui the Grabber and tried to borrow money from him, but didn’t get it. I heard the whole talk. Then he went to Tanbark Pete’s and got a ten-spot. After that, he divided his time between two saloons, where he played dominoes and pinochle, and his own house. I’ve got to report to H. B. when I’m sure the subject is safe for the night. Have you found anything yet?”
“Only that I’ve got him on the run. If he knows where our man is, Suraci, he’ll go after him in a day or two. Meantime, tell H. B., in case I don’t get a chance to let him know, that the securities stunt went, all right, and my end of it is O. K.”
The next day, and the following, Pennold did indeed set for the young Italian detective a swift pace. He departed upon long rambles, which started briskly and ended aimlessly; he called upon harmless and tedious acquaintances, from Jamaica to Fordham; he went––apparently and ostentatiously to look for a position as janitor––to many office-buildings in lower Manhattan, which he invariably entered and left by different doors. In the evenings he sat blandly upon his own stoop, smoking and chatting amiably if monosyllabically with his wife and their new-found friend, Alfred Hicks, while his indefatigable shadow glowered apparently unnoticed from the gloom of the ailanthus tree.
On Thursday morning, however, Pennold betook himself leisurely to the nearest subway station, and there the real trial of strength between him and his unseen48antagonist began. From the Brooklyn Bridge station he rode to the Grand Central; then with a speed which belied his physical appearance, he raced across the bridge to the downtown platform, and caught a train for Fourteenth Street. There he swiftly turned north to Seventy-second Street––then to the Grand Central, again to Ninety-sixth, and so on, doubling from station to station until finally he felt that he must be entirely secure from pursuit.
He alighted at length at a station far up in the Bronx, and after looking carefully about he started off toward the west, where the mushroom growth of the new city sprang up in rows ofrococobrick and stone houses with oases of green fields and open lots between. He turned up a little lane of tiny frame houses, each set in its trim garden, and stopped at the fourth cottage.
With a last furtive backward glance, Pennold mounted the steps and rang the bell nervously. The door was opened from within so suddenly that it seemed as if the man who faced his visitor on the threshold must have been awaiting the summons. He stepped quickly out, shutting the door behind him, and for a short space the two stood talking in low tones––Pennold eagerly, insistently, the other man evasively, slowly, as if choosing his words with care. He was as erect as Pennold was shambling and stoop-shouldered, and although gray and lined of features, his eyes were clear and more steady, his chin more firm, his whole bearing more elastic and forceful.
He did not invite his visitor to enter, and the colloquy between them was brief. It was significant that they did not shake hands, but parted with a brief though not unfriendly nod. The tall man turned and re-entered his house, closing the door again behind him, while Pennold49scuttled away, without a farewell glance. It might have been well had he looked once more over his shoulder, for there, crouching against the veranda rail where he had managed to overhear the last of the conversation, was that short, swarthy figure which had followed so indefatigably on his trail for three days––which had clung to him, closely but unseen, through all his devious journey of that morning. Suraci had not failed.
He tailed Pennold to his home, then went in person with his report to the great Blaine himself, who heard him through in silence, and then brought his mighty fist down upon his desk with a blow which made the massive bronze ink-well quiver.
“That’s our man! You’ve got him, Suraci. Good work! Now wait a little; I want you to take some instructions yourself over to Morrow.”
The next day the Pennolds missed the cheery greeting of their new friend, the bank-clerk. Since the acquaintanceship had been so recently formed, it was odd that they should have been as deeply concerned over his defection as they were. They said little that evening, but when his absence continued the second day, Pennold himself ambled down to the Brooklyn & Queens Bank and reluctantly deposited twenty dollars, merely for the pleasure of a chat with young Hicks. The latter’s cheery face failed to greet him, however, within its portals, and a craftily worded inquiry merely elicited the information that he was no longer connected with that institution.
“What do you make of it, Mame?” he asked anxiously of his wife when he reached home. His step was more shambling than ever, and his hands, clutching his hat-brim, trembled more than her gnarled, palsied ones.
“I’ll tell you what I think when I’ve been around to50Mrs. Lindsay’s this afternoon––to 46 Jefferson Place.”
“What’re you goin’ to do there? You can’t ask for him, very well,” objected her spouse.
“Do?” she retorted tartly. “What would I do in a boarding-house? Look for rooms for us, of course, and inquire about the other lodgers to be sure it’s respectable for a decent, middle-aged, married couple. Do you think I’m goin’ lookin’ for a long-lost son? The life must be gettin’ you at last, Wally! Your head ain’t what it used to be.”
But Mrs. Pennold’s vaunted astuteness gained her little knowledge which could be of value to her in their late acquaintance. Mrs. Lindsay was a beetle-browed, enormously stout old lady, with a stern eye and commanding presence, who looked as if in her younger days she might well have been a police-matron––as indeed she had been. She had two double rooms and a single hall bedroom to show for inspection, and she waxed surprisingly voluble concerning the vacancy of the latter, at the first tentative mention of her other lodgers, by her visitor.
“As nice a young man as ever you’d wish to see, ma’am. I don’t have none but the most refined people in my house. Lived with me a year and a half, Mr. Hicks did, except for his vacation––regular as clockwork in his bills, and free and open-handed with his tips to Delia. Of course, he wasn’t just what you might call steady in his goings-out and comings-in, but there never was nothin’ objectionable in his habits. You know what young men is! He had a fine position in a bank here in Brooklyn, but I don’t think the company he kep’ was all that it might have been. Kind of flashy and sporty, his friends was, and I guess that’s what got51him into trouble. For trouble he was in, ma’am, when he paid me yesterday in full even to the shavin’ mug which I’d bought for his dresser, and meant him to keep for a present––and picked up bag and baggage and left. I always did think Friday was an unlucky day! He stood in the vestibule and shook both my hands, and there wasn’t a dry eye in his head or mine!
“‘Mis’ Lindsay!’ he says to me, just like I’m tellin’ it to you. ‘Mis’ Lindsay, I can’t stay here no longer. I wisht to heavings I could, for you’ve given me a real home,’ he says, ‘but I’m not at the bank no more, and I’m going away. I’m in trouble!’ he says. ‘I needn’t tell you where I’m goin’ for I ain’t got a friend who’ll ask after me or care, but I just want to thank you for all your kindness to me, an’ to ask you to accept this present, and give this dollar-bill to Delia, when she comes in from the fish-store.’
“This is what he give me as a present, ma’am!” Mrs. Lindsay pointed dramatically to a German silver brooch set with a doubtful garnet, at her throat. “And I was so broke up over it all, that I forgot and give Delia the whole dollar, instead of just a quarter, like I should’ve done. I s’pose I’d ought to write to his folks, but I don’t know where they are. He comes from up-State somewheres, and I never was one to pry in a boarder’s letters or bureau-drawers. I’m just worried sick about it all!”
Mrs. Lindsay would have made a superb actress.
When the interview was at an end and Mrs. Pennold had rejoined her husband, they discussed the disappearance of Alfred Hicks from every standpoint and came finally to the conclusion that the young bank-clerk’s sporting proclivities had brought him to ruin.
Meanwhile, in a modest cottage in Meadow Lane, in52the Bronx, a small card reading “Room to Let” had been removed from the bay window, and just behind its curtains a young man sat, his eyes fastened upon the house across the way––the fourth from the end of the line. He was a tall, dark young man with a smooth face and firm-set jaw, and his new land-lady knew him as Guy Morrow.
All at once, as he sat watching, the door of the cottage opened, and a girl came out. There was nothing remarkable about her; she was quite a common type of girl: slender, not too tall, with a wealth of red-brown hair and soft hazel eyes; yet there was something about her which made Guy Morrow catch his breath; and throwing caution to the winds, he parted the curtains and leaned forward, looking down upon her. As she reached the gate, his gaze drew hers, and she lifted her gentle eyes and looked into his.
Then her lids drooped swiftly; a faint flush tinged her delicate face, and with lowered head she walked quickly on.
Guy Morrow sank back in his chair, and after the warm glow which had surged up so suddenly within him, a chill crept about his heart. What could that slender, brown-haired, clear-eyed girl be to the man he had been sent to spy upon––to Jimmy Brunell, the forger?