Hastily Craig wrote on the paper, while Hastings and I read in silence:
“We’ll lay a trap by a fake conversation about the garage.”
Neither of us spoke a word, waiting for our cue from him.
“Well,” he said, in a rather loud tone, as though he had just come into
the office, “one thing that we must do is to find out whether there was
a car that came into the city from Westport that night――and perhaps
went back there. There’s a clue in that garage, Walter. Some one is
making that a headquarters. But we can’t do anything to-night――not
after your experience. No, we’ll have to wait until daylight to-morrow
and then we’ll make a thorough search.”
“You won’t get me there again alone at night,” I put in, and my tone
was rather convincing after my experience.
“I’m sure there’s something there, all right,” added Hastings,
following the lead, although he seemed to have only the most indefinite
notion of where it took him.
“Indeed there is,” agreed Kennedy, quickly.
“Personally, I think that Mito knows more than he should about the
whole business,” I added. “The Jap is a mystery to me.”
“And Sanchez, too,” put in Hastings, evidently thinking of how he
seemed always to be crossing our path.
“Yes, that’s the place to look into, all right,” concluded Craig,
beckoning us to leave the room and the conversation.
“If that doesn’t sink into somebody’s mind,” he chuckled, when we were
outside, “I shall be surprised. We must get back to Westport before it
is too late.”
“Why didn’t you follow the wire down and find out where it ended?” I
asked, as we left Hastings’s office. “You might have――”
“Surprised a stenographer at the other end taking notes,” he
interrupted. “We can do that any time. What I wanted was to plant
something that would make the real criminal act and throw him off his
guard. We’ll have to stop again at the laboratory. There’s something
there I must take out with me. That will give us just time to catch the
late afternoon express if we hurry.”
While Hastings and I waited outside Kennedy went in and soon returned
with the instrument he sought. Even yet, Hastings could not resist the
impulse to gaze about nervously, recalling the shot that had been fired
at him on the occasion of his first visit. Nothing happened this time,
however, and we made the train by a matter of seconds.
Frances Maddox and her husband were the only persons on the express
whom we knew. The others seemed to have returned already. I saw that we
would have to rely on Riley and the Secret Service men to get anything
that might have happened in the meanwhile. Once or twice I caught
the eye of Mrs. Walcott furtively gazing in Kennedy’s direction, and
I fancied she was a trifle nervous. Walcott himself read a magazine
stolidly, as though declining to get excited, and I wondered, from his
manner, whether the affair and the constant feud in the family into
which he had married might not be getting on his nerves. They did not
talk much, nor did we, and it was with a sense of relief that we all
arrived finally at Westport.
“Well,” I remarked, aside to Kennedy, as we three piled into the little
“flivver” that did public hack duty at the station, “I wonder what we
shall run into now.”
“Things ought to develop fast, I should say,” he returned. “I think
we’ve laid a good foundation.”
Without even looking about or inquiring for Burke or Riley, Kennedy
rather ostentatiously went directly to the hotel office on our arrival
at the Harbor House.
“Our rooms are at the north side of the hotel,” he began. “I wonder if
there are any vacant on the bay side?”
The clerk turned to look at his list and I took the opportunity to
pluck at Kennedy’s sleeve.
“Why don’t you get rooms in the rear?” I whispered. “That’s the side on
which the garage is.”
Kennedy nodded hastily to me to be silent and a moment later the clerk
turned.
“I can fix you up on the bay side,” he reported, indicating a suite on
a printed floor-plan.
“Very fine,” agreed Craig. “If you will send a porter I will have our
baggage transferred immediately.”
As we left the desk Kennedy whispered his explanation. “Don’t you
understand? We’ll be observed. Everything we do is watched, I am
convinced. Just think it over. Selecting a room like this will disarm
suspicion.”
In the lobby of the hotel Riley was waiting for us anxiously.
“Where’s Mr. Burke?” asked Kennedy. “Hasn’t he returned?”
“No, sir. And not a word from him yet. I don’t know where he can be.
But we are handling the case at this end very well alone. I got your
wire,” he nodded to me. “We haven’t missed Sanchez since he got back.”
“Then he didn’t make any attempt to get away,” I remarked, gratified
that I had lost nothing by not following him on the earlier train. “Is
Paquita back?”
“Yes; she came on the train just before yours.”
“What has she done――anything?”
Riley shook his head in perplexity.
“If it didn’t sound ridiculous,” he replied, slowly, “I would say that
that fellow Sanchez was on the trail of Paquita more than we are.”
“How’s that?”
“Why, he follows her about like a dog. While we’re watching her he
seems to be watching us.”
“Perhaps he’s part of her gang――her bodyguard, if there is such a thing
as a gang,” I remarked.
“Well, he acts very strangely,” returned Riley, doubtfully. “I’m not
the only one who has noticed it.”
“Who else has?” demanded Kennedy, quickly.
“Mrs. Maddox, for one. She went up to the city later――oh, you know?
Miss Walcott went with her. You know that, too? They returned on the
train with Paquita.”
“What has Mrs. Maddox done since she came back?” inquired Craig.
“It wasn’t half an hour before they returned that Paquita came
down-stairs,” replied the Secret Service man. “As usual Sanchez was
waiting, in the background, of course. As luck would have it, just as
she passed out of the door Mrs. Maddox happened along. She saw Sanchez
following Paquita――you remember she had already paid him off for the
shadowing he had done for her. I don’t know what it was, but she went
right up to him. Oh, she was some mad!”
“What was it all about?” asked Craig, interested.
“I didn’t hear it all. But I did hear her accuse him of being in with
Paquita even at the time he was supposed to be shadowing her for Mrs.
Maddox. He didn’t answer directly. ‘Did I ever make a false report
about her?’ he asked Mrs. Maddox. She fairly sputtered, but she didn’t
say that he had. ‘You’re working for her――you’re working for somebody.
You’re all against _me_!’ she cried. Sanchez never turned a hair.
Either he’s a fool or else he’s perfectly sure of his ground, as far as
that end of it went.”
“I suppose he might have double-crossed her and still made honest
reports to her,” considered Kennedy; “that is, if he made the same
reports to some one else who was interested, I mean.”
Riley nodded, though it was evident the remark conveyed no more idea to
him than it did to me.
“Shelby Maddox has returned, too,” added Riley. “I found out that he
sent that Jap, Mito, with a note to Paquita. I don’t know what it was,
but I have a man out trying to get a line on it.”
“Mito,” repeated Kennedy, as though the Japanese suggested merely by
his name a theory on which his mind was working.
There seemed to be nothing that could be done just now but to wait,
and we decided to take the opportunity to get a late dinner. Winifred
Walcott and Mrs. Maddox had already dined, but Frances Walcott and her
husband were at their table. They seemed to be hurrying to finish and
we did the same――not because they did, but because we had work to do.
Dinner over, Hastings excused himself from us, saying that he had some
letters to write, and Kennedy made no objection. I think he was rather
pleased than otherwise to have the opportunity to get away.
Outside we met Riley again, this time with one of his operatives.
“What’s the matter?” inquired Kennedy.
“Matter enough,” returned Riley, much exercised. “You know I told
you that Shelby had come ashore from the _Sybarite_ with Mito? Well,
we’ve been following them both pretty closely. I think I told you of
his sending a note to Paquita. Both Shelby and Mito have been acting
suspiciously. I had this man detailed to watch Shelby. That confounded
Jap is always in the way, though. Tell Mr. Kennedy what happened,” he
directed.
The operative rubbed his back ruefully. “I was following Mr. Maddox
down to the beach,” he began. “It was rather dark and I tried to keep
in the shadow. Mr. Maddox never would have known that he was being
followed. All of a sudden, from behind, comes that Jap. Before I knew
it he had me――like this.”
The man illustrated his remark by lunging forward at Kennedy and
seizing both his hands. He stuck his crooked knee upward and started to
fall back, just catching himself before he quite lost his balance.
“Over he went backwards, like a tumbler,” went on the man, “threw me
clean over his head. If it had been on a stone walk or there had been a
wall there, it would have broken my head.”
“Jiu-jitsu!” exclaimed Kennedy.
“I wonder why Mito was so anxious to cover his master?” considered
Riley. “He must have had some reason――either of his own or orders from
Maddox. Anyhow, they both of them managed to get away, clean.”
Riley looked from Craig to me in chagrin.
“Quite possibly orders,” put in the man, “although it’s not beyond him
even to be double-crossing Mr. Maddox, at that.”
“Well, try to pick them up again,” directed Kennedy, turning to me.
“I’ve some rather important business just now. If Mr. Burke comes back,
let me know at once.”
“You bet I’ll try to pick them up again,” promised the Secret Service
man, viciously, as we left him and went to our room.
There Craig quickly unwrapped one of the two packages which he had
brought from the laboratory while I watched him curiously but did not
interrupt him, since he seemed to be in a great hurry.
As I watched Kennedy placed on a table what looked like a miniature
telephone receiver.
Next he opened the window and looked out to make sure that there was no
one below. Satisfied, he returned to the table again and took up a pair
of wires which he attached to some small dry cells from the package.
Then he took the free ends of the wires and carefully let them fall out
of the window until they reached down to the ground. Leaning far out,
he so disposed the wires under the window that they fell to one side of
the windows of the rooms below us and would not be noticed running up
the side wall of the hotel, at least not in the twilight. Then he took
the other package from the table and was ready to return down-stairs.
We had scarcely reached the lobby again when we ran into Hastings,
alone and apparently searching for us.
“Is there anything new?” inquired Kennedy, eagerly.
Hastings seemed to be in doubt. “None of the Maddox family are about,”
he began. “I thought it might be strange and was looking for you.
Where do you suppose they all can be? I haven’t seen either Paquita or
Sanchez. But I just saw Winifred, alone.”
“What was she doing? Where is she?” demanded Kennedy.
Hastings shook his head. “I don’t know. I was really looking for
Shelby. I think she was going toward the Casino. Have you heard
anything?”
“Not a thing,” returned Kennedy, brusquely. “You will pardon me, I have
a very important matter in hand just now. I’ll let you know the moment
I hear anything.”
Kennedy hurried from the Lodge toward the Casino, leaving Hastings
standing in the hotel, amazed.
“Nothing new!” he almost snorted as he suddenly paused where he could
see the Casino. “Yet Hastings sees Winifred going out in a hurry,
evidently bent on something. If he was so confounded eager to find
Shelby, why didn’t it occur to him to stick about and follow Winifred?”
It was quite dark by this time and almost impossible to see any one in
the shadows unless very close. Kennedy and I took a few turns about the
Casino and along some of the gravel paths, but could find no trace of
any of those whom we were watching.
“I oughtn’t to let anything interfere with this ‘plant’ I am laying,”
he fretted. “Riley and the rest ought to be able to cover the case for
a time. Anyhow, I must take a chance.”
He turned and for several minutes we waited, as if to make perfectly
sure that we were not being watched or followed.
Finally he worked his way by a round-about path from the Casino, turned
away from the Lodge into another path, and at last we found ourselves
emerging from a little hedge of dwarf poplars just back of the little
garage, which had evidently been his objective point.
Mindful of my own experience there, I looked about in some trepidation.
I had no intention of running again into the same trap that had nearly
finished me before. Nor had Kennedy.
Cautiously, in the darkness, he entered. This time it was deserted.
No asphyxiating gun greeted us. He looked about, then went to work
immediately.
Back of the tool-box in a far corner he bent down and unwrapped the
other package which he had been carrying. As nearly as I could make
it out in the darkness, there were two rods that looked as though
they might be electric-light carbons, fixed horizontally in a wooden
support, with a spindle-shaped bit of carbon between the two ends of
the rods, the points of the spindles resting in hollows in the two
rods. To binding screws on the free ends of the carbon rods he attached
wires, and led them out through a window, just above.
“We don’t want to stay here a minute longer than necessary,” he said,
rising hurriedly. “Come――I must take up those wires outside and carry
them around the wing of the Harbor House, where our room is.”
Without a word we went out. A keen glance about revealed no one
looking, and, trusting that we were right, Kennedy picked up the wires
and we dove back into the shadow of the grove from which we came.
Carefully as he could, so that no one would trip on them and rip them
out, Kennedy laid the wires along the ground, made the connection with
those he had dropped from the window, and then, retracing our steps,
managed to come into the hotel from the opposite side from the garage
and the other wing from our room.
“Just had a wire from Mr. Burke,” announced Riley, who had been looking
all over for us, a fact that gave Craig some satisfaction, for it
showed that we had covered ourselves pretty well. “He’s coming up from
the city and I imagine he has dug up something pretty good. That’s not
what I wanted to tell you, though. You remember I said Shelby Maddox
had sent Mito with a note to Paquita?”
Kennedy nodded. No encouragement was necessary for Riley to continue
his whispered report.
“Well, Shelby just met her on the beach.”
“Met Paquita?” I exclaimed, in surprise at Shelby’s secret meeting
after his public ignoring of the little adventuress.
“On the beach, alone,” reiterated Riley, pleased at retailing even this
apparent bit of scandal.
“What then?” demanded Craig.
“They strolled off down the shore together.”
“Have you followed them?”
“Yes, confound it, but it’s low tide and following them is difficult,
without their knowing it. I told the men to do the best they could,
though――short of getting into another fight. Mito may be about, and,
anyhow, Shelby might give a very good account of himself.”
“You’re not sure of Mito, then?”
“No. No one saw him again after he threw my operative. He may have
disappeared. However, I took no chance that Shelby was alone.”
For a moment Kennedy seemed to consider the surprising turn that
Shelby’s secret meeting with the little dancer might give to the affair.
“Walter,” he said at last, turning to me significantly, “would you
like to take a stroll down to the dock? This matter begins to look
interesting.”
We left Riley, after cautioning him to make sure that Burke saw us the
moment he arrived, and again made our way quietly from the Lodge toward
the Casino, in which we now could hear the orchestra.
A glance was sufficient to reveal that none of those whom he sought
were there, and Kennedy continued down the bank toward the shore and
the Harbor House dock.