FACE TO FACE
When the two men got into the house the dim rooms made them stumble
for a moment after the brilliant sunshine of the outer skies; but in
a second Birdsall’s groping hand had found an electric push-button
and the room was flooded with light. They were in a small office
off the kitchen, apparently. Smoke of a peculiarly pungent odor and
eye-smarting character blurred all the surroundings; but during the
moment the Jap halted to explore its cause the others perceived two
doors and made for them. One was locked, but the other must have been
free to open, since Haley, with his watering-can, bounded through it
while they were tugging at the other. Almost immediately, however,
Haley was back again shouting and pointing down the dark passage.
“The fire’s _there_,” screamed the detective. “I can smell smoke!
The smoke comes through the keyhole!” But while the Jap fitted a key
in the lock and swung back the door, and Haley, who had paused to
replenish his watering-can at a convenient faucet, darted after the
other two, the colonel stood listening with every auditory nerve
strained to catch some sound. He yelled “Fire! help!” at the top of his
voice, but not moving a muscle. “Too far off,” he muttered, then he
yelled again and threw a heavy chair as if he had stumbled against it.
Another pause; he got down on his knees to put his ear to the floor.
Directly he rose; he did not speak, but the words that he said to
himself were only: “Just possible. Some one down cellar; but not under
here.” Meanwhile he was hurrying in pursuit of the others as swiftly as
his stiff knee would allow. He found them in a side hall with tiled or
brick floor, gathered about a water-soaked heap of charred red paper.
“’Tis terrible!” announced Haley, “a bum for sure! a dinnermite
bum!”--fishing out something like a tin tomato can from the sodden mass.
“Anyhow, _there_ goes the real thing,” observed the colonel coolly, as
a formidable explosion jarred the air.
“If you blow us up, I kill you flist!” hissed the Jap, and his knife
flashed.
“_Chito, Chito!_” soothed the colonel, lifting his revolver almost
carelessly. Simultaneously two brawny arms pinioned the Jap’s own arms
at his sides.
“Shure, Mister Samurai, ’tis the ongrateful chap youse is,”
expostulated Haley. “I hate to reshtrain ye, but if ye thry any
jehujits on me ’twill be sahanara wid youse mighty quick.”
“No understan’,” murmured the Jap plaintively. “Why you hult me?”
“Come, put out the fire first,” said the colonel; “you know the house,
you go ahead.”
The Jap darted on ahead so swiftly that they had some ado to follow;
which seemed necessary, since he might have clashed a bolt on them at
any turn. The colonel’s stiff leg kept him in the rear, but Haley was
never a hand’s-breadth behind the runner.
They found smoke in two places, but they easily extinguished the tiny
flames. In both cases the bombs turned out to be no more dangerous
than a common kind of fireworks yielding a suffocating smoke in an
inclosure, but doing no especial damage on safe and fire-proof ground,
like a hearth. They were quickly extinguished. In their search they
passed from one luxurious room to another, the Jap leading, until he
finally halted in a spacious library hung in Spanish leather, with
ancient, richly carved Spanish tables and entrancing Spanish chairs of
turned wood and age-mellowed cane, and bookcases sumptuously tempting
a book-lover. But the colonel cared only for the soul of a book, not
its body; the richest and clearest of black letter or the daintiest
of tooling had left him cold; moreover, every fiber in him was strung
by his quest; and Haley, naturally, was immune; strangely enough, it
was the cheerful, vulgar little detective who gave a glance, rapid but
full of admiration, at the shelves and pile of missals on the table,
incongruously jostled by magazines of the day.
Winter faced the Jap, who was sheathed again in his bland and impassive
politeness. “Where is Mr. Mercer?” said he.
The Jap waved his hands in an eloquent oriental gesture. He assured the
honorable questioner that he did not know any Mr. Mercer. There was no
one in the house.
The colonel had seated himself in a priceless arm-chair in Cordova
stamped leather; he no longer looked like an invalid. “Show your star,
please,” he commanded Birdsall, and the latter silently flung back the
lapel of his coat.
“I ought to tell you,” continued Rupert Winter, “that the game is up.
It would do no good for you to run that poisoned bit of steel of yours
into me or into any of us; we have only to stay here a little too long
and the police of San Francisco will be down on you--oh, I know all
about what sort they are, but we have money to spend as well as you.
You take the note I shall write to Mr. Mercer, or whatever you choose
to call him, and bring his answer. We stay here until he comes.”
Having thus spoken in an even, gentle voice, he scribbled a few words
on a piece of paper which he took out of his note-book. This he
proffered to the Jap.
On his part, the latter kept his self-respect; he abated no jot of
his assurance that they were alone in the house; he insinuated his
suspicion that they were there for no honest purpose; finally he was
willing to search the house if they would stay where they were.
“I am not often mistaken in people,” was the colonel’s rather oblique
answer, “and I think you are a gentleman who might kill me if you had
a chance, but would not break his word to me. If you will promise to
play fair with us, do no harm to my nephew, take this letter and bring
me an answer--if you find any one--on your word of honor as a Japanese
soldier and gentleman, you may go; we will not signal the police. Is it
a bargain?”
The Jap gravely assented, still in the language of the East, “saving
his face” by the declaration of the absence of his principals. And
he went off as gracefully and courteously as if only the highest
civilities had passed between them.
“Won’t he try some skin game on us?” the detective questioned; but
Winter only motioned toward the telephone desk. “Listen at it,” he
said, “you can tell if the wires are cut; and he knows your men are
outside hiding, somewhere; he doesn’t know how many. You see, we have
the advantage of them there; to be safe they don’t dare to let many
people into their secret. _We_ can have a whole gang. We haven’t many,
but they may _think_ we have.”
Birdsall, who had lifted the receiver to his ear, laid it down with
an appeased nod. Immediately he proceeded to satisfy his professional
conscience by a search in every nook and cranny of the apartment. But
no result appeared important enough to justify the production of his
red morocco note-book and his fountain-pen. He had paused in disgust
when the colonel sat up suddenly, erect in his chair; his keener
ears had caught some sound which made him dart to all the windows in
succession. He called Haley (whom he had posted outside to guard the
door) and despatched him across the hall to reconnoiter. “I am sure it
was the sound of wheels,” he explained, “but Haley will be too late; we
are on the wrong side of the house.”
As he spoke the buzz of an electric bell jarred their ears. “Somebody
is coming in the front door,” hazarded Birdsall.
“Evidently,” returned the colonel dryly. “How can our absent friends
get in otherwise--at least how can they let us understand they have
come in? I think we are going to have the pleasure of an interview with
the elusive Mr. Mercer.”
They waited. The colonel motioned Birdsall to a seat by the table,
within breathing distance of the telephone. He himself fluttered the
loose journals and magazines, his ironic smile creasing his cheek.
“Our Japanese friend reads the newspapers,” he remarked. “Here are
to-day’s papers; yes, _Examiner_ and _Chronicle_, unfolded and smoked
over. Cigar, too, not cigarette, for here is a stump--decidedly our
cherry-blossom friends are getting civilized!”
“Oh, there is somebody _in_ here all right,” grunted Birdsall. “Say,
Colonel, you are sure Mrs. Winter has had no answer to her ad? No kind
of notice about sending money?”
“I haven’t seen her for a few hours, but I saw Mrs. Melville Winter;
she was positive no word had come. She thought my aunt was more worried
than she would admit, and Miss Smith looked pale, although she seemed
hopeful.”
“She didn’t really want to give me the letter, I thought,” said the
detective. The colonel gave him no reply save a black look. A silence
fell. A footfall outside broke it, a firm, in nowise stealthy footfall.
Birdsall slipped his hand inside his coat. The colonel rose and bowed
gravely to Cary Mercer.
On his part, Mercer was not in the least flurried; he looked at the
two men, not with the arrogant suspicion which had stung Winter on the
train, but with the melancholy courtesy of his bearing at Cambridge,
three years before.
“This, I think, is Colonel Winter?” he said, returning the bow, but not
extending his hand, which hung down, slack and empty at his side.
“I am glad you recognized me this time, Mr. Mercer.”
“I am sorry that I did not recognize you before,” answered Mercer.
“Will you gentlemen be seated? I am not the owner of the house nor his
son; I am not even a friend, only a casual acquaintance of the young
man, but I seem to be rather in the position of host, so will you be
seated, and may I offer you some Scotch and Shasta--Mr.--ah--”
“Mr. Horatio Birdsall, of the Birdsall and Gwen Detective Agency,”
interposed Winter. Birdsall bowed. Mercer bowed. “Excuse me if I
decline for us both; our time is limited--no, thank you, not a cigar,
either. Now, Mr. Mercer, to come to the point, I want my nephew. I
understand he is in this house.”
“You are quite mistaken,” Mercer responded with unshaken calm. “He is
not.”
“Where is he, then?”
“I do not know, Colonel Winter. What I should recommend is for you to
go back to the Palace, and if you do not find him there--why, come and
shoot us up again!” His eye strayed for a second to the blackened,
reeking mass on the great stone hearth.
“Have you sent him home? Is that what you mean to imply?”
“I imply nothing, Colonel; I don’t dare to with such strenuous fighters
as you gentlemen; only go and see, and if you do find the young
gentleman has had no ill treatment, no scare--only a little adventure
such as boys like, I hope you will come out here, or wherever I may be,
and have that cigar you are refusing.”
The colonel was frankly puzzled. He couldn’t quite focus his wits on
this bravado which had nothing of the bravo about it, in fact had
a tinge of wistfulness in its quiet. One would have said the man
regretted his compulsory attitude of antagonism; that he wanted peace.
Mercer smiled faintly. “You ought to know by this time when a man is
lying, Colonel,” he continued, “but I will go further. I may have done
plenty of wrong things in my life, some things, maybe, which the law
might call a crime; but I have never done anything which would debar
me from passing my word of honor as a gentleman; nor any one else from
taking it. I give you my word of honor that I have meant and I do mean
no slightest harm to Archie Winter; and that, while I do not _know_
where he is at this speaking, I believe you will find him safe under
your aunt’s protection when you get back to the Palace.”
“Call up the Palace Hotel, Mr. Birdsall,” was the colonel’s reply. “Mr.
Mercer, I do not distrust that you are speaking exactly, but you know
your Shakespeare; and there are promises which keep their word to the
ear but break it to the sense.”
“I don’t wonder at your mistake; but you are mistaken, suh.”
Birdsall was phlegmatically ringing up Mrs. Winter, having the usual
experience of the rash person who intrudes his paltry needs on the
complex workings of a great hotel system.
“No, I don’t know the number, I haven’t the book here, but
_you_ know, Palace Hotel. Well give me Information, then--Busy?
Well, give me another Information, then--yes, I want the Palace
Hotel--P-a-l-a-c-e--yes, yes, Palace Hotel; yes, certainly. Yes? Mrs.
Archibald Winter. Yes--line busy? Well, hold on until it is disengaged.
Say, Miss Furber, that you? This is Birdsall and Gwen. Yes. Give me
Mrs. Winter, will you, 337? This Mrs. Winter? Oh! When will she be
back? Is Mrs. Melville Winter in? Well, Miss Smith in? She’s gone,
too? Has Master Archibald got back, yet, to the hotel? Hasn’t? Thank
you--eh?” in answer to the colonel’s interruption. “What say, Colonel?”
“Tell her to call up this number,”--the colonel read it out of the
telephone book--“when Master Archie does get back, will you? I am
afraid, Mr. Mercer, that you will have to allow us to trespass on your
hospitality for a little longer.”
He suspected that Mercer was annoyed, although he answered lightly
enough: “As you please, Colonel Winter. I am sure you will hear very
soon. Now, there is another matter, your machine; I understand you left
it outside. Will you ring for Kito, Colonel? Under the circumstances
you may prefer to do your own ringing. I will ask him to attend to the
car.”
The colonel made proper acknowledgments. He was thinking that had
Mercer cared to confiscate the motor, he would have done it without
ringing; on the other hand, did he desire some special intercourse
with his retainer, wherein, under their very noses, he could issue his
orders--well, possibly they might get a whiff of the secret themselves
were he allowed to try. At present the game baffled him. Therefore he
nodded at Birdsall’s puckered face behind Mercer’s shoulder. And he
rang the bell.
The Jap answered it with suspicious alacrity.
“Kito,” said Mercer, “will you attend to General Winter’s car? Bring it
up to the court.”
Absolutely harmless, to all appearances, but Birdsall, from his safe
position behind master and man, looked shrewd suspicion at the soldier.
“Shall your man in the hall go with him?” asked Mercer.
The colonel shook his head. “No,” he said quietly, “we have other
men outside if he needs help. Call Skid, please.” But when Birdsall
attempted to get Central there was no response.
The colonel merely shrugged his shoulders, although Birdsall frowned
with vexation. “What a pity!” said Winter softly. “Now the fellows will
come when the time is up; we can’t call them off.”
Mercer smiled faintly. “There are two more telephones in the house,” he
observed. “You can call off your dogs easily any time you wish. Also
you can hear from the Palace. Will you come up-stairs with me? I assure
you I have not the least intention to harm you or the honest sergeant.”
“You take the first trick, Mercer,” said the colonel. “I supposed the
bell was your signal to have the wires cut. But about going; no, I
think we will stay here. There is a door out on the court which, if you
will open--thank you. A charming prospect! Excuse me if I send Haley
out there; and may I go myself?”
Anticipating the answer, he stepped under the low mission lintel into
a fairy-like Californian court or _patio_ of pepper-trees and palms
and a moss-grown fountain. There was the usual colonnade with a stone
seat running round the wall. Mercer, smiling, motioned to one of them.
“I wish I could convince you, Colonel, that you are in no need of
that plaything in your hand, and that you are going to dine with your
boy--isn’t he a fine fellow?”
The colonel did not note either his admission that he had seen Archie,
nor a curious warming of his tone; he had stiffened and grown rigid
like a man who receives a blow which he will not admit. He stole a
glance at the detective and met an atrocious smirk of complacency.
They both had caught a glimpse of a figure flitting into a door of the
court. They both had seen a woman’s profile and a hand holding a little
steel tool which had ends like an alligator’s nose. And both men had
recognized Miss Smith.