THE PENALTY OF PROCRASTINATION.
A pencil of sunlight has struggled through the heavy draperies at the
windows and laid a tiny straight line across the carpet in the
comfortable apartments of Jack Ashley on West Thirty-fourth Street. The
oriole timepiece on the mantel chimes the hour of 9 when that individual
awakens with a series of prodigious yawns.
Fifteen minutes more and Ashley’s toilet is complete, and with heels
elevated to a comfortable angle, he proceeds to scan the pages of his
morning paper. His own story of the French ball first claims his
attention, and with a comment of satisfaction on the size of the
headlines with which it is introduced, he runs his eye approvingly over
the dozen or so illustrations with which the article is embellished.
A scare head of the largest size catches his eye, and with awakening
interest he reads the sensational headlines. “Gaining Ground—Cuban
Revolutionists Driving Spaniards before Them—Hemisphere’s Exclusive
Interview with Senor Manada Creates Excitement in Washington—United
States Man-of-War to Be Sent to Cuba to protect American Interests,” and
much more of the same tenor. As Jack skims over the voluminous
dispatches that follow the head, he reads with interest one brief item,
dated Santiago de Cuba, via Nassau, N. P. It is as follows:
“The Government is redoubling its efforts to suppress the news,
and is apparently determined that the press of the United States
and elsewhere shall not learn the exact state of affairs on the
island. Nine-tenths of the local newspaper men have been fined
by the press censor. Several editions of the leading papers have
been seized, and telegrams for transmission abroad from eastern
Cuba are now absolutely forbidden. It is also a fact that
foreign correspondents have been threatened with expulsion. The
Spanish authorities allege that the mysterious steamer fired
upon by the warship Galicia was not the American ward liner
Santiago, but a rebel vessel which the insurrectionists have
purchased in the United States and fitted up as a gunboat. A
blockade of all the ports of the island, as previously
intimated, has been formally announced.”
“It looks as if the paper would be obliged to send a man down there,”
Ashley reflects, as he struggles into his topcoat. “What a superb day
for the trial trip,” as he opens the street door and steps into the
sunlight. “And this is the day, too, that Barker is to arrest Felton. He
didn’t specify any time, probably not till afternoon, anyway. I almost
wish I wasn’t assigned to that trial trip. I should like to interview
him after the arrest. However, my story is all written up and I can get
the details of the arrest from Barker after I return from the America. I
wonder how Miss Hathaway will take the affair,” a softer light shining
in his eyes as his thoughts revert to the beautiful ward of Cyrus
Felton. “She treats him with the utmost deference and respect, but I
cannot think that she cares especially for him. Heigho! Now for a cup of
coffee and then for another tete-a-tete with the beautiful unknown of
the Raymond hotel.”
It is on the stroke of 10 as Ashley saunters up to the clerk’s desk in
the Kensington and requests that his card, upon which he has penciled a
few lines explaining his identity, be taken to Mrs. Winthrop.
“Mrs. Winthrop?” the urbane clerk repeats. “There is no such lady
stopping here, to my knowledge.”
Ashley is nonplused. So he has been duped, he thinks, by the fair
unknown. But why has not Barker kept his agreement? A nice sort of a
shadow if he cannot follow as striking-looking a woman as “Mrs.
Winthrop.” But stay! Perhaps she has given a fictitious name, but is
actually stopping at the Kensington after all. Barker could not have
slipped upon a simple matter like that.
Abstractedly twirling his glove, Jack leans over the desk and says in a
low tone to the clerk, an old acquaintance: “Is there a rather
striking-looking young woman, with dark eyes and midnight hair, stopping
at the house?”
The clerk smiles.
“Sorry, Jack, but you are too late, I’m afraid. The beautiful Mrs.
Harding left at 9 o’clock, bag and baggage.”
Ashley turns thoughtfully away and repairs to the reading-room for a
quiet think. So her name—for the present at least—is Mrs. Harding. But
where is Barker? The detective is probably shadowing Mrs. Harding now.
Ashley concludes that there is nothing for him to do but await Barker’s
return. He has been on the watch barely half an hour when the detective
swings himself from a cable car in front of the hotel.
“Well?” is Jack’s impatient salutation as he leads the way to a retired
corner of the reading-room.
Barker is not in exuberant spirits; his brows are knitted in a frown and
he is nervously biting his mustache.
“Well, she has gone—left town, and is apparently en route from the
country—for Cuba, I believe.”
“For Cuba!” and Jack stares at the detective in mild amaze. Verily,
either a most remarkable series of coincidences or the tangled threads
of the Raymond mystery are pointing unmistakably to the fair isle of the
Antilles.
“Yes, for Cuba. Let me impress it upon your mind in the beginning that
Mrs. Isabel Harding—that’s the name she is sailing under—is no ordinary
woman. Why—but to begin at the beginning. According to our understanding
last night, I followed her to this hotel, where I found she was actually
stopping. I naturally concluded that she made the engagement with you in
good faith, else she would have given another hotel.”
“She did give me a fictitious name,” breaks in Jack. “Or, rather, she
led me to believe that her name was still Winthrop.”
“Did she? Well, that was useless. Anyhow, I decided to stop here last
night, to be on guard early this morning. I found that my lady had
breakfasted early. This made me suspicious and I kept close watch of
her. Shortly after 9 o’clock she settled her bill at the hotel and with
her trunks was driven to the Jersey City ferry. Of course I followed. At
the Pennsylvania depot she was joined by a foreign-looking
chap—Spaniard. Quite a distinguished-looking duffer. If you should ever
run across him you will know him by a small, crescent-shaped scar on his
left cheek. I was successful in getting close enough to them to hear
some of the conversation. It appeared from their talk, Ashley, that your
Mrs. Harding is, in addition to her other accomplishments, a spy in the
pay of the Spanish Government, and that she has been successful in
learning some of the secret plans and plots of the Cuban filibusters in
this city. She is now on her way to Port Tampa aboard the Florida
limited, and I should judge it is their intention to proceed from Key
West at once to Havana.”
“Their intention? Did the Spanish officer accompany her?”
Barker nods. “He looked as if he was right out of the hospital; his head
was bandaged. Perhaps some of the Cuban sympathizers had it out with
him. However, that episode is closed, for the present at least. And now
for Cyrus Felton. I shall take him directly to the Tombs, and according
to our compact he will be invisible to any of the newspaper fraternity.
Will you come with me to the St. James while I nab the bird?”
Ashley starts. He has for a moment forgotten the catastrophe that is
about to overcome Cyrus Felton. He looks at his watch. “I am overdue at
the office,” he says. “But say, Barker, I had an engagement to lunch
with Felton and Miss Hathaway at 1 o’clock. Can’t you put off the arrest
until to-morrow?”
Barker shakes his head. “Not a minute,” he replies, emphatically. “I
have delayed long enough. If you intended to lunch with the fair Miss
Hathaway you will have an opportunity to do so just the same and your
presence will doubtless be appreciated in her tremendous confusion. If
you can’t come with me I will drop round at the office and see you
later.”
“All right, then. Do the job in as gentlemanly a manner as possible,”
grins Ashley.
Barker nods and walks rapidly toward the St. James, while Ashley boards
a Broadway car and rolls downtown.
The detective saunters up to the hotel office desk, writes the name
“Cyrus Felton” on a bit of cardboard, and, passing it to the clerk,
inquires: “Is that gentleman in?”
“No, sir; gone. Left an hour ago.”
“When will he return?”
“Well, that’s rather beyond me,” smiles the clerk. “Mr. Felton and a
lady sailed this morning for Cuba, on the City of Havana. I assume that
they did. They were driven from here to the pier.”
“What time does the steamer sail?” asks Barker, taking out his watch.
“Eleven o’clock.”
“Too late!” grits the detective. It is even now five minutes past the
hour.
For a moment Barker permits his emotions to master his self-possession,
and he startles even the debonair clerk, accustomed as the latter is to
the strong terms sometimes employed by irritable guests.
His feelings relieved in a measure by this unusual outbreak, the
detective sits down for a moment to consider the situation. Cyrus
Felton, then, is on his way to Cuba, doubtless to join his son. Mrs.
Harding, a valuable quantity in the mystery, is also headed for the
Antilles. Everything seems to point to Cuba. Barker picks up a railroad
timetable.
“Twelve m.; Florida express for Savannah, Jacksonville and Port Tampa,”
he reads.
“By the gods, I’ll do it!” he exclaims, as he starts for the street.
“First to the pier and make sure that the steamer has gone, and, if so,
then to Key West. I shall be only two hours behind the woman, and I may
reach Havana ahead of Felton. Hi, there, cabby!”
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