“That’s All We Know”
Next morning I had to deal with a suspicious and indignant Larry, with
smoldering rebellion in every line of him. Nothing would convince him
that the shot that broke the picture was not intended for me. In fact,
I found him, just after breakfast, polishing up the revolver of his
lawless days and whistling softly the while. I felt pretty certain
that another such unconventional visitor as the man who had died at my
feet would get a warm reception in my absence.
Larry had a grievance that morning; in fact, two of them. In the first
place I told him that I was going to meet Moore, but had not told him
why, nor what I was going to do. This was grievance number one, for up
to now he had shared my plans.
But far greater than this was his grievance over the amazing
metamorphosis of the graceful and negligent Moore. The glimpse Larry
had caught of him, standing, smoking revolver in hand, over the dead
man, had upset Larry’s calculations completely. He seemed to take it
rather as a personal affront that this gentle soul should turn into a
killer like that, behind his back. Perhaps the way Moore had ordered
him out of the room afterwards had something to do with it.
However, I left him in charge of everything, and even commissioned him
to wander about the city where his fancy led, to see whether he could
pick up any clews. From a study of portraits and photographs, he had
long since impressed my sister’s face on his memory, and he knew by
heart the details of the dress she wore that day. This and his post in
command of the fort, as it were, cheered him up a bit. I left him
finally resigned and whistling over his revolver.
Personally, I felt considerably more cheerful that morning than I had
felt for a long time. In the strain and fatigue of endless search,
questing here, there, and wherever impulse led, I had had no time to
brood over the fact that I was doing it alone. I had been in some
pretty tight corners in my search, where, I believe now, only fixity
of purpose had pulled me through.
I had not realized this at the time. But I am naturally rather of a
peaceful disposition; I had my fill of fighting with the Lafayette
Esquadrille during the war and had no desire for further excitement.
So the new sense I had this morning of companionship, encouragement
and backing waiting for me ahead put new heart into me. I felt somehow
that things had taken a turn for the better in my quest. And I was
filled with an even greater determination to see the thing through,
however long it took and whatever happened. But for all this, I think
it was as well that I could not see what lay ahead for me in the weeks
to come.
I could find no one to meet me when I reached the rendezvous which
Moore had designated. As I paused irresolute at the curb edge, a
workman, lounging against a lamp-post and sucking on a dry cutty pipe,
leisurely uncrossed his legs and sauntered up to me.
“Say, Mister, got a match on ye?” said he.
I handed him my box rather absently. But as he struck a match and
stooped to light his pipe, he moved a little closer to me as though to
shelter the flame. “Your cab’s across the way, sir,” he whispered. “At
the corner, there. The driver knows.”
A moment later he straightened up and flipped away the match. “Much
obliged, Mister,” he said. Then he handed me the box of matches and
sauntered back to his lamp-post.
I moved across the street without looking at the man again. What I had
seen of Moore and the man who had followed him the night before gave
me no reason to believe that he and his associates would go in for a
needless display of melodramatic secrecy. Therefore, if my arrival and
destination seemed to them best kept secret, it was up to me to take
the hint and fall in with their plans.
The car across the street was an ordinary taxi. As I came up to him
the driver called, “Taxi, sir?” and reached back to open the door,
quite in the natural manner.
“You know where to go?” I asked him.
He nodded. “Right you are, sir. Jump in!” he said, as though I had
given him an address. A moment later we were speeding away. My new
life and associations had begun.
Once started, I fell to wondering again as to why I had been sent for
and how I could serve the ends of the Department, for of course the
Department must have some definite object in view. I pictured the
interview, imagining myself in some spick and span Municipal Office
temporarily placed at the disposal of this distinguished visitor from
Washington, chatting with some elderly gentleman of a curt and
somewhat pompous mien. I was never more mistaken in my life!
We drove for ten or fifteen minutes, in and out among the little
streets of Greenwich Village. Then suddenly the taxi pulled up in
front of a little hotel below Washington Square, of which I had never
even heard.
As I got out, the man glanced at the meter and raised his flag. “It’s
sixty cents, sir,” he said casually.
Somewhat at a loss, I handed him a dollar bill. At that he dived into
his pocket, picked out a dollar in change and presented it to me with
a grin. He leaned forward as he did so. “Room 333, sir,” he said
softly. Then, raising his voice: “All right, sir, I’ll be here at
ten!”
A moment later he and his taxi had disappeared.
I entered the hotel, walked through the lobby, nodded to the
elevator-boy and told him the third floor. And presently I was
knocking at the door of Room 333.
It flew open and disclosed Moore, as immaculate as ever, but with an
anxious look on his face which disappeared when he saw me. He reached
out and pulled me into the room, shutting and locking the door again
without wasting an instant.
“Thank goodness you got here all right. I was getting nervous. Now let
me introduce you to the Chief.”
Instead of the pompous individual I had expected to meet, I found
myself shaking hands with a big, genial fellow, with a jaw like the
prow of a ship and a warm twinkle in his keen blue eyes. I took a
liking to him at once.
“Well, sir,” he said, “glad to meet you—and glad you got here all
serene. Mr. Clayton, isn’t it? Now let’s get to business.”
The room was an ordinary hotel bedroom and small at that. The Chief
waved Moore and myself to seats on the bed and sat himself down
somewhat cautiously in the only chair, which groaned under his bulk.
He was still smiling, but his eyes were keen and cold, and I realized
that the smile was purely automatic. He leaned forward in the groaning
chair and made his points, as he talked, by tapping the forefinger of
one hand in the palm of the other.
“Now, Mister Clayton,” he said, “Moore here suggested that you might
be of use to us and I told him to bring you along, so that we could
talk it over. You see, I am being frank with you, because I don’t
suppose you imagined for a minute that this was a philanthropic
proposition, eh?”
“No,” I told him bluntly, “neither on your side nor on mine.”
He laughed. “Well, we’ll call it a mutual benefit association. Anyhow,
I know something about your search for the last two months and about
you yourself, and your record in the war. Of course our men have had
Miss Clayton on their minds. But that’s not entirely because of the
dust you kicked up. There’s a bigger reason, too.”
“Bigger because it’s pretty nearly national,” Moore interjected
softly.
The Chief nodded. “Yes, I might have put that differently. But my work
comes first, you understand.”
“How do you think I can help you and help myself at the same time?” I
asked him.
“I’m coming to that.” He broke off for a moment and glanced about the
tiny green and brown bedroom. The glaring electrics in the central
chandelier showed up every line of the grim, resourceful face with the
grizzled hair above and the firm, heavy jaw. It was a face to inspire
confidence certainly—if you happened to be on the same side with it.
Otherwise it was distinctly a face to avoid.
“The fact is, Clayton,” he said suddenly, “that the Department is up
against about the biggest thing in its history. German spies were
pretty nearly as easy as picking cherries compared to this. And unless
I’m very much mistaken, you’re up against exactly the same
proposition. There’s the thing in a nutshell.”
“You mean——”
“I mean that if we can’t get anywhere with it—and we haven’t got far,
I’ll admit—why your chances are pretty slim, working on your own.
What’s more, if you should stumble on to something, the chances are
one million to one that you’ll just get your throat cut for your
pains. On the other hand, if you work for us—that is, if we work
together on the proposition—why, perhaps we can help you in your
search with our organization. And I believe you may be able to help
_us_, or I wouldn’t have sent for you.”
“But what _is_ this thing I’m—you’re up against?” I demanded.
The Chief scratched his head at this. “That’s just it. We don’t
know—anything definite. However, I’ll tell you all there is to tell,
and then you can make up your mind whether you’ll accept or not. I
think Moore here told you that I’d like to have you working for me as
an unofficial and fairly independent operative?”
“He was damned uncommunicative on the subject,” I answered.
Both the others laughed. “We don’t shout about our business from the
housetops much,” said the Chief. “But this is a little of what we
know. First of all, statistics. During the last six months no less
than thirty girls have disappeared from the best families in and
around New York—and not one of them has been traced.”
“Thirty-four, with the Schyller case,” said Moore softly.
“Exactly,” nodded the Chief. “Now, of course, girls are disappearing
all the time, running away to go on the stage, eloping with the
chauffeur, and so on. But very few of these are from the older,
quieter families—the best families in the real sense. But the girls
I’m talking about, of whom your sister was one, are practically _all_
from the best families, all very young and all very prepossessing.”
The Chief broke off and ran his blunt fingers through his hair. “And,
believe me, the pressure that’s been brought to bear on us to find
them has turned my hair gray. But—we—haven’t—found—one!”
“Good God!” I began, but the Chief held up a warning finger and
glanced at the door. I went on more quietly: “Do you mean to say it’s
some sort of a gigantic gang of—of——” I couldn’t finish.
“White slavers? No-o, I don’t think so,” he answered. “Though I tell
you, we don’t know.”
He paused at this and sat thinking for so long that impatience got the
better of me, and I urged him to go on and tell me what they did know.
“Well, here’s the situation,” he said at last. “These girls have
disappeared in New York, in Atlantic City, in Jersey towns and in Long
Island, and two of them in Philadelphia. But most of them in New York.
They have disappeared while shopping, while calling, while going to or
coming from the theater, some of them on their way to hotels, and so
on. Moreover, from what we can gather, it looks as if they actually
were engaged in these innocent pursuits. I mean, these were not
ostensible occupations to cloak escapades or elopements.
“Therefore the evidence points overwhelmingly to the fact that the
disappearances were unwilling ones. So far as we can tell, none of the
girls, or very few of them, were engaged in love affairs of a serious
nature. So much for that.”
Suddenly the Chief made a wry face and the stubbly fingers ran through
his hair rapidly two or three times. “As we _haven’t_ been able to
find out anything definite, we have had to fall back on deduction,
which hasn’t taken us far. But perhaps we _have_ learned something
from it.
“You see, none of these girls were much in the public eye. At the time
they disappeared, they were on the most ordinary and quietest of
errands. But, in the vast majority of cases, the errands were planned
at least two days in advance. That’s all we know.
“Perhaps that doesn’t tell us much and perhaps it does. It is
possible, of course, that they were drugged in some way, by people on
the watch in public places. I mean without regard to their identity.
On the other hand, it _looks_ as if most of the abductions must have
been planned in advance, _with a foreknowledge_ of the _girls’
movements_.
“You know as well as I do, that it isn’t so simple to drug and kidnap
a person in broad daylight, or, at least, in a public place. These
were not the type of girls to be easily drawn into a more secluded
place with strangers, whether male or female, even if the girls were
alone. Do you see what I mean?”
“You mean spies in their homes? Servants?” I began.
The Chief shook his head. “Not likely. Servants aren’t so well
informed as all that, as a rule. No, the conclusion that’s just forced
itself on me is that, unlikely as it may seem, the person or persons
mixed up in this business belong to the same class of Society as the
girls themselves.”
“But, good Lord, man—what—why——”
The Chief leaned forward suddenly, his jaw setting into flinty lines.
“For example, what do you know about this Mrs. Furneau, who took your
sister out to tea that day?”
I sat back and stared at him, my mind racing back to the night of
Margaret’s disappearance. For an instant it fastened on the vague
sense of resentment I had felt toward Mrs. Furneau for her part in the
business. Then common sense prevailed.
“But what on earth could she have had to do with it? You don’t suppose
she followed the child into the store? And how could she abduct her if
she had? That was the most public of places,” I answered.
“Exactly,” said the Chief slowly; “if she ever went to the store at
all!”
“But—but——”
“Did any one in the store actually see her? Did they remember and
describe her?”
I shook my head. “But that doesn’t prove anything.”
“No, it doesn’t. I’m not trying to prove anything now. I’m trying to
show you our line of deduction. But what _do_ you know about the
woman?”
“Very little. She was an acquaintance only. But many of her friends
are above suspicion.”
“And the people where she took your sister?”
“I don’t know so much about them.” I stared at him in growing
amazement. “But what could they have to do with it? You don’t mean to
say that you think——”
“I don’t think anything. I’m asking questions. What did Mrs. Furneau’s
chauffeur have to tell you?”
“Nothing more than she had to tell. He just corroborated the fact that
Margaret had gone into the store.”
“H’m,” said the Chief. “But of course that doesn’t help much, one way
or the other.”
“Do you mean to say you think it’s possible that Mrs. Furneau took the
child to some house where she was kept a prisoner? And Mrs. Furneau
invented all that business about the store? And her chauffeur was in
it too?”
“I don’t know,” said the Chief. “But it’s a possible line of
investigation, isn’t it? And it’s one that you haven’t touched? Now do
you see where the Department might be of some help to you in your
search?”
“But Mrs. Furneau—why, the Morrisons know her quite well. The thing’s
out of the question.”
The Chief smiled slowly. “That’s the trouble with you amateurs. You go
into an investigation like this with preconceived ideas—and all you
look for is clews that fit in with those ideas. We suspect everybody
until we can prove that they’ve had nothing to do with the affair. Do
you see the difference?”
I nodded. “Well, I’ll try it.”
“Now here’s something else,” he went on. “We’ve come to the conclusion
that, without a previous fairly intimate knowledge of the future
movements of some of these girls, the abductions would have been
impossible. We also deduce that they would have been very difficult,
if not impossible, without actual acquaintanceship, in several cases
at least. That places the gang, for I think it must be a gang, within
certain high social limits.
“But during the time that these girls have been disappearing, there
have also been a great many cases of addiction to drugs coming to
light—and all these cases, without exception, have been highly placed
socially. In fact, the Department began investigating the drug cases
long before the abductions began. Many of the drug addicts are women.
All the ones to whom I have reference are addicts of a peculiar kind.
But almost without exception these addicts are men and women of
importance and influence, either through position or wealth.”
“Can you connect them in any way with the abductions?” I asked.
“No. Not definitely. In fact, not at all, except by inference through
the facts peculiar to both. But the very fact that we cannot get
anything on any of these people, either the people who supply these
drugs or the abductors, goes to prove that there is an extraordinary
power and skill in organization behind each gang. Therefore, by
inference, it may be the same organizer or group of organizers behind
both. But, so far, we have not been able to connect the two things
further than that, even by inference.”
Moore stirred in his place on the bed beside me and the Chief glanced
up at him.
“There’s one other feature to it, sir,” he said. “I’ve been working on
the abductions and nothing else. But they had a damned good try at
picking me off. Clarke worked on the drug smuggling only—and——”
The Chief nodded. “Neither the one gang—nor the other, if there are
two gangs, will hesitate at murder,” he said quietly.
“Good Lord, do you mean to say in this day and age——”
“This day and age is just about the same as any other day and
age—because human nature doesn’t vary much,” he interrupted. “We were
just about due for something new and startling in the criminal line,
after this war, and it looks as if we’ve got it. I’ll tell you
something more: we’ve had three highly trusted men on this job—two
on the drugs, and Moore here, on the abductions. Moore has one or
two leads started, though nothing very definite—and they tried to
get him that night in your rooms. Of the other two operatives, one
hasn’t been able to find out a thing—not a damned thing—and he’s a
good man too. The other—this man Clarke, that Moore was talking
about—has—disappeared.”
“But haven’t you traced him?”
“Traced him, nothing. He’s simply vanished into thin air. And, believe
me, it’s no cinch for one of our men to disappear without our tracing
him pretty quick. No, this gang is no slouch, I’ll say that for it.”
As I learned later on, a descent into slang was a sign of considerable
feeling on the part of the Chief. But at this time his attitude struck
me as a little unfeeling.
“Well,” I said, “it looks to me as if you were up against something
pretty difficult. But do you mean that I can really be of some
assistance to you in the business?”
“That’s it exactly. For this type of work, with this type of people,
don’t you see that we’ve got to have operatives who have the social
entry if we’re to get anywhere? Moore’s all right. But he can’t do it
all alone. And besides, he won’t last long alone, probably, as you saw
for yourself. Now if you join us in this work, you’ll be looking for
your sister with the whole power of the Department back of you. But we
want you to find her _and bust up the gang_, as much as you do
yourself. There’s the situation. You’re fitted for the work, you’re
vitally interested, and we can help each other. Afterwards, we’ll
release you as soon as you like, if——” He left the sentence
unfinished.
“If there’s anything left to release,” I added dryly.
“You’ve hit it exactly,” he smiled.
It did not take me long to make up my mind. I had nothing to lose and
possibly everything to gain by joining the Department, if they were
willing for me to continue my search in my own way. And working with
the consciousness of a powerful organization back of me was infinitely
preferable to doing it alone. I had expected that they might want me
to work entirely under their direction, possibly in remote parts of
the country. But the next words of the Chief set my mind at rest on
that point.
“We want you to stay in New York and take up your life just where you
left it off to-day. We want you to get back into Society and become a
regular lounge lizard if necessary. And we want you to let the
Department help you with hints when it can. But for the rest, you and
Moore are to work together. It will be safer and better for both of
you. Will you do it?”
“I’ll do it,” I told him.
The Chief got to his feet and held out a massive hand. “Right,” he
said, “I’m mighty glad. And I think you’ve made a wise decision. Now
I’ve got a lot of work to do. Moore has full instructions for you
both. Anything else you want to know he can tell you. Wait here for
ten minutes. Good-by and good luck!” With that he went to the door.
Then he suddenly turned back to me again: “And by the way, Clayton!”
“Yes, sir,” I answered, smiling.
“Don’t talk about this business to anybody—_anybody_. Is that clear
with you?”
“Quite clear,” I assured him.
“You’ll meet some of the other operatives perhaps. You’re almost sure
to. But unless they come to you with the proper credentials for this
job, which Moore will explain to you, don’t tell them things. There’s
a reason.”
Moore interrupted. “Don’t you think, Chief, that we might tell him the
reason?”
The Chief frowned. Then suddenly he made a wry face again. “All right,
I suppose so. The fact of the matter is, Clayton, that for the first
time in its history either we’ve had the rottenest of bad luck,
or—there’s a leak somewhere in the Department. Now you understand.”
Without another word he strode to the door again and went out.
I turned to Moore and found him smiling whimsically.
“Nothing slow about your Chief,” I remarked.
He laughed. “Not so’s you could notice it!” Then he held out his hand.
“Well,” he said, “I think you’re the sort of fellow I’d like to have
with me in a real row. This is going to be a real row. Don’t make any
mistake about that. But I believe we’re going to pull it off, eh?”
“I’ll give you mine on that,” I told him, and we shook hands.