Miss Maitland, Private Secretary

He had gained the last landing, which broadened into a small square of hall cut by three doors. As he turned to one on the left, O'Malley slipped by him and drew away toward that on the right. There was a moment of silence, broken by the clinking of the man's keys. He had trouble in finding the right one and set his lamp down on a chair, his head bent over the bunch. George was aware of O'Malley's figure casting a huge wavering shadow up the wall, edging closer to the right hand door.

The key was found and inserted in the lock and the janitor entered the room, his lamp diffusing a yellow aura in the midst of which he moved, a black, retreating shape. With his withdrawal the light in the hall, furnished by a bead of gas, faded to a flickering obscurity. O'Malley's shadow disappeared, and George could see him as a formless oblong, pressed against the panel. There was a moment of intense stillness, the guitar tinkling faint as if coming through illimitable distances. The detective's voice rose in a whisper, vital and intimate, against the music's spectral thinness:

"Queer. There's not a sound."

His hand stole to the handle, clasped it, turned it. Noiselessly the door opened upon darkness into which he slipped equally noiseless.

That slow opening was so surprising, so dreamlike in its quality of the totally unexpected, that George stood rooted. He stared at the square of the door, waiting for voices, clamor, the anticipated in some form. Then he saw the darkness pierced by the white ray of an electric torch and heard a sound – a rumbled oath from O'Malley. It brought him to the threshold. In the middle of the room, his torch sending its shaft over walls and floor, stood the detective alone, his face, the light shining upward on the chin and the tip of his nose, grotesque in its enraged dismay.

"Not here – d – n them!" and his voice trailed off into furious curses.

"Gone?" The surprise had made George forgetful.

"Gone – no!" The man almost shouted in his anger. "How could they go? – Didn't I say every outlet was blocked. They ain't been here. They ain't had her here. Get a match, light the gas – I got to see the place anyway."

The torch's ray had touched a gas fixture on the wall and hung steady there. As the men fumbled for matches, the janitor came clumping across the hall, calling in querulous protest:

"Say – how'd you get in there? That ain't the place – it's rented."

He stopped in the doorway, scowling at them under the glow of his upheld lamp. A match sputtered over the gas and a flame burst up with a whistling rush. In the combined illumination the room was revealed as bleak and hideous, the walls with blistered paper peeling off in shreds, the carpet worn in paths and patches, an iron bed, a bureau, by the one window, a table. The janitor continuing his expostulations, O'Malley turned on him and flashed his badge with a fierce:

"Shut up there. Keep still and get out. We've got a right here and if you make any trouble you'll hear from us."

The man shrank, scared.

"Police!" he faltered, then looking from one to the other. "But what for? There's no one here, there ain't ever been any one – it's took but it's been empty ever since."

O'Malley who had sent an exploring glance about him, made a dive for a newspaper lying crumpled on the floor by the bed. One look at it, and he was at the man's side, shaking it in his face:

"What do you say to this? Yesterday's – how'd it get here? Blew in through the window maybe."

The janitor scanned the top of the page, then raised his eyes to the watching faces. His fright had given place to bewilderment and he began a stammering explanation – if any one had been there he'd never known it, never seen no one come in or go out, never heard a sound from the inside.

"Did you see any one – any one that isn't a regular resident – come into the house yesterday or to-day?" It was George's question.

He didn't know as he'd seen anybody – not to notice. The tenants had friends, they was in and out all day and part of the night. And anyway he wasn't around much after he'd swept the halls and taken down the pails. Yesterday and to-day he guessed he'd stayed in the basement most of the time. If anybody had been in the room – and it looked like they had – it was unbeknownst to him. The lady had the key; she could have come in without him seeing; it wasn't his business to keep tab on the tenants. He showed a tendency to diverge to the subject of his duties and George cut him off with a greenback pushed into his grimy claw and an order to keep their visit secret.

Meantime O'Malley had started on an examination of the room. There was more than the paper to prove the presence of a recent occupant. The bed showed the imprint of a body; pillow and counterpane were indented by the pressure of a recumbent form. On its foot lay a book, an unworn copy, as if newly bought, of "The Forest Lovers." The table held an ink bottle, the ink still moist round its uncorked mouth, some paper and envelopes and a pen. There was a scattering of pins on the bureau, two gilt hairpins and a black net veil, crumpled into a bunch. Pushed back toward the mirror was the cover of the soap dish containing ashes and the butts of four cigarettes.

O'Malley studied the bureau closely, ran the light of his torch back and forth across it, shook out the veil, sniffed it, and put it and the two hairpins carefully into his wallet. Then with the book and the paper in his hand he straightened up, turned to George, and said:

"That about cleans it up. There's nothing for it now but to go back."

The janitor, anxiously watchful, followed on their heels as they went down the stairs. Their clattering descent was followed by the strains of the guitar, thinly debonair and mocking as if exulting over their discomfiture. In the street the same shape emerged from the shadows and slouched toward them. A grunted phrase from O'Malley sent it drifting away, spiritless and without response, like a lonely ghost come in timid expectation and repelled by a rebuff.

O'Malley dropped into a corner of the taxi and as it glided off, said:

"That's the last of 76 Gayle Street as far as they're concerned."

"Why do you say that?"

In the darkness the detective permitted himself a sidelong glance of scorn.

"You don't leave the door unlocked in that sort of place unless you're done with it. They've got all they wanted out of it and quit."

"Abandoned it?"

"That's right – made a neat, quiet get-away. They didn't say they were going, didn't give up the key – it was on the inside of the door. Just slid out and vanished."

"Some one was there yesterday."

"Um," O'Malley's voice showed a pondering concentration of thought. "Some one was lying on the bed reading; waiting or passing time."

"They couldn't have been there to-day – before your men were on the job?"

O'Malley drew himself to the edge of the seat, his chest inflated with a sudden breath:

"Why couldn't they? Why couldn't that have been the rendezvous? Why couldn't she have lost the child down here on Gayle Street instead of opposite Justin's? Price was there beforehand: up she comes, tips him off that the taxi's in the street, sees him leave and goes herself, across to Fifth Avenue where she picks up a cab. It's safer than the other way – no cops round, janitor in the basement, if she's seen nothing to be remarked – a lady known to have a room on the top floor." He brought his fist down on his knee. "That's what they did and it explains what's been puzzling me."

"What?"

"There was no dust on the top of the bureau; it had been wiped off to-day. There was no dust on that veil; it hadn't been there since yesterday. A woman fixed herself at that glass not so long ago. Price had a date with her to deliver the child and he was lying on the bed reading while he waited. When he heard her he threw down the book, got the good word and lit out. After he'd gone she took off her veil – what for? To get her face up to show to Mrs. Price – whiten it, make it look right for the news she was bringing. When she left she was made up for the part she was to play. And I take my hat off to her, for she played it like a star."

CHAPTER XIX – MOLLY'S STORY

It was nearly seven when we got back to Grasslands. We alighted as silent as we started, and I was following Miss Maitland into the hall, Ferguson behind me, when she turned in the doorway and spoke. She had orders that the servants must know nothing; she was to tell them that the family would stay in town for a few days, and for me to be careful what I said before them. Then, before I could answer, she glanced at Ferguson and said good-by, her eyes just touching him for a moment and passing, cold and weary, back to me. She'd wish me good-night, she was going to her room and not coming down again – no, thanks, she'd take no dinner, she was very tired. She didn't need to say that. If I ever saw a person dead beat and at the end of her string she was it.

Ferguson stood looking after her. I think for the moment he forgot me, or maybe he wasn't conscious of what his face showed. Some way or other I didn't like to look at him; it was as if I was spying on something I had no right to see. So I turned away and dropped into one of the balcony chairs, sunk down against the back and feeling limp as a rag.

Presently came his step and he was in front of me, his head bent down with the hair hanging loose on his forehead, and his eyes like they were hooks that would pull the words out of me:

"What happened up there at the Whitneys?"

"Mr. Ferguson," I answered solemn, "I've told you more than I ought already. Is it the right thing for me to go on doing wrong?"

"Yes," he says, sharp and decided, "it's exactly the right thing. Keep on doing it and we'll get somewhere."

I set my lips tight and looked past him at the lawn. He waited a minute then said:

"I thought you agreed to trust me."

"There's a good deal more to it now than there was then."

"All the more reason for telling me. Of course I can get all I want from Mrs. Janney or either of the Whitneys; they don't let ladylike scruples stand in the way. But that means a trip to town and I'm not ready to take it."

It was surprising how that young man could make you feel like a worm who had a conscience in place of common sense.

"Have I got your word, sworn to on the Bible, if we had one here, not to give her a hint of it?"

"Good Lord!" he groaned. "Don't talk like the ingénue in a melodrama. Let me see why the Whitneys think so much of you. You must have someintelligence – give me a sample of it."

That settled it.

"Take a seat," I said. "You make me nervous staring at me like the lion in the menagerie at the fat child."

He sat down and I told him – the whole business, what she had said, what they had thought – everything. When I'd finished he rose up and, with his hands burrowed deep in his pockets, began pacing up and down the balcony. I didn't give a peep, watching him cautious from under my eyelids.

After a bit he said in a low voice:

"Preposterous – crazy! She had no more to do with it than you have."

"They think different."

"I've gathered that. And Price had nothing to do with it either."

It was all very well for him to stand by her, but to sweep Price off the map! I couldn't sit still and let him rave on.

"Price hadn't? Take another guess. Price is the mainspring of it."

"I'll leave guessing to you – it's your business, and you appear to do it very well."

"Say, drop me altogether. I'm only a paid servant. But you'll have to admit that Mr. Whitney and his son count pretty big in their line."

"Very big, Miss Rogers. But they've made a mistake this time – or possibly been misled. The Janneys have never been fair to Price. They're prejudiced and they've branded the prejudice on. He isn't an angel, neither is he a rascal. He didn't take his child, he never thought of it, he couldn't do it."

"Then who did?"

"That's what I want to find out."

"Jerusalem!" I said, sitting up, feeling like the peaceful scene around me was suddenly dark and strange. "You don't think she's really been kidnaped?"

"I can't think anything else." He stopped in front of me, looking at me hard and stern. "I'd like to find another solution but I'm unable to."

"But, gee-whizz!" I stared at him, all worried and mixed. "You can't get away from the facts. They're all there – there's hardly a break."

"I don't admit that. This man and woman have got characters and records that haven't been considered – but even if you had a hole-proof case against them I wouldn't believe it."

"Oh, pshaw!" I said, simmering down, "you just believe what you want to. I've seen people like that before."

"I daresay you have, I'm not a unique specimen in the human family. But I'll tell you what I am just at this juncture – the only one among you that's right." He drew back and gave a vengeful wag of his head at me. "You've all gone off at half-cock – doing your best to ruin a man who's harmless and a girl who's – who's – " he stopped, and wheeled away from me. "Tch – it makes me sick! Hate and anger and jealousy – that's what's at the bottom of it. I can't talk about it any longer – it's too beastly. Good-night!"

He turned on his heel, ran down the steps and over the grass, clearing the terrace wall with a leap. I looked after him, fading into the early night, disturbed and with a sort of cold heaviness in my heart. He was no fool – suppose what he thought was true? Suppose that dear child whom I'd grown to love – but, rubbish! I wouldn't think of it. It was easy to account for the way he felt. Every little movement has a meaning of its own – and the meaning in all his little movements was love. He had it bad, poor chap, out on him like the measles, and while you have to be gentle with the sick you don't pay much attention to what they say.

That was a dreary evening. There being no one but me around they served my dinner in the dining room, and it added to the strain. Some of the food I didn't know whether to eat with a fork or a spoon, so I had to pass up a lot which was hard seeing I was hungry. But when you're born in an east side tenement you feel touchy that way – I wasn't going to be criticized by two corn-fed menials. I'm glad I'm not rich; it's grand all right, but it isn't comfortable.

The next day – Saturday – it rained and I sat round in the hall and my room where I could hear the 'phone and keep an eye on Miss Maitland. All she did was to go for a walk, and in the afternoon stay in her study. We saw each other at meals, our conversation specially edited for Dixon and Isaac.

Sunday was fine weather again and Ferguson came round at twelve. Miss Maitland had gone for another walk and he and I had the hall to ourselves. He'd been in town the day before, seen George Whitney and told him what he thought. When I asked how Mr. George took it, he gave a sarcastic smile and said, "He listened very politely but didn't seem much impressed." He also told me they'd hoped to find the child Friday night in the room at 76 Gayle Street and had been disappointed.

"Of course she wasn't there," and he ended with "it was only wasting valuable time, but there's a proverb about none being so blind as those who won't see."

After that he dropped the subject – I think he wanted to get away from it – and pow-wowing together we worked around to the robbery, which had been side-tracked by the bigger matter. He said it had been in his mind to tell me a curious circumstance that he'd come on the night the jewels were taken and that he thought might be helpful to me. It was about a cigar band that Miss Maitland had found in the woods that evening when he and she had walked home together. Before he was half through I was listening attentive as a cat at a mouse hole, for it was a queer story and had possibilities. After I put some questions and had it all clear, we mulled it over – the way I love to do.

"A man dropped it," I said slowly, my thoughts chasing ahead of my words, "who went through the woods after the storm."

"Exactly – between eight-thirty and ten-thirty. And do you grasp the fact that those were the hours the house was vacated – the logical time to rob it?"

"Yes, I've thought of that often – wondered why they waited."

"And do you grasp another fact – that Hannah a little before nine heard the dogs barking and then quieting down as if they scented some one they knew?"

I nodded; that too I'd made a mental note of.

"It couldn't have been Price for he was on the way to town then."

"Oh, Price – " he gave an impatient jerk of his head – "of course it wasn't Price, but it was some one the dogs knew. That would have been just about the time a man, watching the house and seeing the ground floor dark, would have come across the lawn to make his entrance."

I pondered for a spell then said:

"Did you ever tell this to Mrs. Janney or any of them?"

"No, I didn't think of it myself until a little while ago – the night I dined here and saw it was one of Mr. Janney's cigars. And then what was the use – the light by the safe had fixed the time."

"Yes – if it wasn't for that light you'd have got a real lead. Too bad, for it's a bully starting point, and it would have let out those other two."

He stiffened up, suddenly haughty looking.

"There's no necessity of letting out people who never were in. But if that light was eliminated you could work on the theory that a professional thief – an expert safe opener – had done the business."

"How would the dogs know him?" I asked.

He leaned toward me, looking with a quiet sort of meaning into my face:

"Suppose you put that mind of yours, that Wilbur Whitney values so highly and I'm beginning to see indications of, on that question."

"What's the sense of wasting it? My mind's my capital and I don't draw on it unless there's a need. You get rid of that light at one-thirty and I'll expend some of it."

I laughed, but he didn't, looking on the ground frowning and thoughtful. Then a step on the balcony made us both turn. It was Miss Maitland, back from her walk, looking much better, a smile at the sight of him, and a little color in her face. She joined us and, Dixon announcing lunch, Ferguson invited himself to stay. It was the first human meal I'd eaten since the doors of the dining room had opened to me.

After lunch I left them on the balcony and went upstairs to my room. I tried to read but the air, blowing in warm and sweet and the scent of the garden coming up, made the book seem dull, and I went to the window and leaned out.

A while passed that way and then I saw Ferguson going home, a long figure in white flannels striding across the lawn to the wood path. Then out from the kitchen come the servants, all togged up, six girls and Isaac, and away they go on their bikes to the beach. From what I've seen of the homes of the rich I'd rather be in the kitchen than the parlor – the help have it all over the quality for plain enjoyment. They went off bawling gayly, and presently Dixon appears, looking like a parson on his day off, all brisk and cheerful. Last of all comes Hannah, her hair as slick as a seal's, a dinky little hat set on top of it, and a parasol held over it all. She waddled off, large and slow, in another direction, toward the woods – for a cup of tea and a neighborly gossip in Ferguson's kitchen, I guess. How I wished I was along with them!

There I was left, lolling back and forth on the sill, kicking with my toes on the floor, and wondering what my poor, deserted boy was doing in town. Then sudden, piercing the stillness with a sort of tingling thrill, comes the ring of the hall telephone.

I gave a soft jump, snatched up my pad and pencil, and was at the table and had the receiver off before she'd got to the closet downstairs. It was so quiet, not a sound in the house, that I could hear every catch in her breath and every tone in her voice. And what I heard was worth listening to. A man spoke first:

"Hello, who's this?"

"Esther Maitland. Is it – is it?"

"Yes – C. P. I've waited until now as I knew there wouldn't be anybody around. It's all right."

"Truly. You're not saying it to keep me quiet?"

"Not a bit. There's no need for any worry. Everything's gone without a hitch."

"And you think it's safe – to – to – take the next step?"

"Perfectly. We're going to get her out of town on Tuesday night."

"Oh!" I could hear the relief in her voice. "You don't know what this means to me?"

He gave a little, dry laugh:

"Me too – I'll admit it's been something of a strain. That's all I wanted to say. Good-by."

I scratched it on the pad, and tiptoed back to my room, short of breath a bit myself. What would Ferguson say to this? I stood by the window, thinking how to send it in, and things went right for out she came from the balcony and walked across to a place on the lawn where there were some chairs under a group of maples. She sat down and began to read, and I stole back to the hall and took a call for the Whitney house. Being Sunday they might be out, but that went right too, for I got the Chief himself. I told him and asked for instructions and they came straight and quick:

"Bring her into town to-morrow morning. There's a train at nine-thirty you can take. Get a taxi at the depot and come right up to the office. You'll have to tell her in what capacity you're serving the family. That'll be easy – you were engaged for the robbery. Don't let her think you have any interest in the kidnaping, and on no account let her guess we suspect her. Say you've had a message from me, that some new facts have come in and I want to ask her a few questions – see if the information tallies with what she saw. Keep her quiet and calm. Got that straight? All right – so long."

CHAPTER XX – MOLLY'S STORY

The next morning, in the hall, right after breakfast I told her what I had to tell – I mean who I was. It gave her a start – held her listening with her eyes hard on mine – then when I explained it was for inside work on the robbery she eased up, got cool and nodded her head at me, politely agreeing. She understood perfectly and would go wherever she was wanted; she was glad to do anything that would be of assistance; no one was more anxious than she to help the family in their distress, and so forth and so on.

On the way in she was quiet, but I don't think as peaceful as she acted. She asked me some questions about my work. I answered brisk and bright and she said it must be a very interesting profession. I've seen nervy people in my time but no woman that beat her for cool sand, and the way I'm built I can't help but respect courage no matter what the person's like who has it. Before we reached town I was full of admiration for that girl who, as far as I could judge, was a crook from the ground up.

When we reached the office I was called into an inner room where the Chief and Mr. George were waiting. I gave them my paper with the 'phone message on it, and answered the few questions they had to ask. I learned then that they'd got hold of more evidence against her. O'Malley had snooped round the Gayle Street locality and heard that on Friday morning about half-past eleven a taxi, containing a child resembling Bébita, had been seen opposite a book bindery on the corner of the block. I didn't hear any particulars but I saw by the Chief's manner, quiet and sort of absorbed, and by Mr. George, like a blue-ribbon pup straining at the leash, that they had Esther Maitland dead to rights and the end was in sight.

After that I was sent back into the hall where I'd left her and told to bring her into the old man's private office. We went up the passage, a murmur of voices growing louder as we advanced. She was ahead and, as the door opened, she stopped for a moment on the threshold, quick, like a horse that wants to shy. Over her shoulder I could see in, and I don't wonder she pulled up – any one would. There, beside the Chief and Mr. George, were the two old Janneys and Mrs. Price, sitting stiff as statues, each of them with their eyes on her, gimlet-sharp and gimlet-hard. They said some sort of "How d'ye do" business and made bows like Chinese mandarins, but their faces would have made a chorus girl get thoughtful. I guessed then they knew about the tapped message and had come to see Miss Maitland get the third degree. She scented the trouble ahead too – I don't see how she could have helped it; there was thunder in the air. But she said good-morning to them, cordial and easy, and walked over to the chair Mr. George pushed forward for her.