An Enforced Vacation
When Gertrude Van Deusen decided to go to see Newton Fitzgerald on that
eventful evening, she thought first, as has been intimated already, of
calling on Bailey Armstrong to escort her. But as she hoped to win
Newton's confidence, and did not like to have her visit known to others,
she believed that by going quietly, alone with Mary Snow, she would be
doing wisely. And so the two met at the drug-store, as previously
arranged, and attracted no attention whatever.
When they arrived at the address given them, they found a big apartment
block, with stores underneath. There was no one in the vestibule as
they entered, but a man stood waiting at the elevator--apparently the
functionary who had charge of the lift.
"Does Newton Fitzgerald live here?" asked Gertrude.
The man motioned to the elevator and the two young women entered and
were quickly borne to the top floor.
"This way," said the man, leading the way down a narrow corridor, and
pressing an electric button at the last door on the right.
It was opened by a neatly dressed Irish woman, who led the way into a
comfortably furnished living-room.
"Be seated," she said. "I'll be back in a while." She spoke with a
brogue, and they did not notice the peculiar expression. For some
moments they remained quietly waiting; but no one came.
"He must be pretty sick, the place is so quiet," said Mary Snow, at
last.
"Probably," assented Gertrude. "But I suppose they'll call us when they
are ready."
Fifteen minutes, thirty, forty-five--an hour went by, and still no one
came. The place was oppressively still. The electric lights burned
brightly; a breeze came in from an open window; the street sounds below
floated up to them, insistent and garish. But no rustle of garments, no
hushed voices, no slightest motion in the rooms beyond came through the
door.
"This is strange," said Gertrude at last. "Newton must be very ill--or
something." She arose. "I wonder if we'd better investigate. I hate to
intrude, but we ought to be getting back, I didn't tell anybody at home
where I was going."
"Nor I--I didn't tell anybody," said Mary. "I thought we should be back
long ago. Yes, let us find someone."
They went on through the open door into a bedroom. Out of this opened a
small dining room, and beyond that a little kitchen. There was a tiny
bathroom, and lights were burning in all the rooms. But there was no
sign of the sick man.
They looked at one another, puzzled and anxious.
"They seem to have gone out," said Mary. "Here is another bedroom.
Perhaps Fitzgerald is here."
But the bed, all clean and white, had not been disturbed.
Simultaneously, they turned and went back to the door by which they had
entered the flat. It was locked.
"We've been trapped," said Gertrude in a low voice. "Let's look through
the place."
They began another search, opening closet doors and looking into
wardrobes and cupboards and under the furniture. They went to the
kitchen and tried the door into the back passage; but that, too, was
locked. There was nobody else in the flat; there was no possible way of
getting out.
"The windows," said Gertrude. "There should be fire escapes."
But there were not. They could not raise the windows from the bottom,
either, although they could lower them slightly from the top for air.
They climbed up and peeped over, only to discover that they were seven
stories from the ground, and looked only into a light-well. The flat
across from them was unoccupied.
They looked at their watches. It was ten o'clock--even then the churches
were chiming out the hour.
"Let us look for a note, or some intimation of what to expect," said
Mary. "I wonder if they are going to keep us here all night."
"It's a trick," said Gertrude. "There's no knowing how long we may
stay--nor what will happen to us. I'm glad I thought of this before I
started out alone tonight." And she produced a small revolver from her
coat pocket.
"Mercy!" cried Mary, "do you carry that? Would you know how to use it?"
"I carried it when father and I walked through the Pyrenees a few years
ago," answered Gertrude. "I used it once--to good advantage--and I could
again, if I had to," she added. "Now, let us see what the gods--or the
other thing--have provided."
Another search showed them that their flat was well-provisioned,
well-furnished, heated and lighted. There were a few books and
magazines, a piano, a writing desk, even a pack of playing cards.
"We may have to resort to solitaire yet," laughed Mary. "Though nothing
short of imprisonment could induce me to fool away my time with the
silly game."
"Well, they have provided for an indefinite stay, I fear," said
Gertrude. "Somehow, I have a feeling that we are not going to get out
easily. We must think up some way of letting our friends know we are
here."
But their jailers had looked out for that. They could hang towels from
their upper windows, but to what end, since these could not be seen?
There was no stationery in the desk, but Mary had a pocket diary in her
chatelaine bag. "We will write a note and shove it through the crack
under the door," they said--and did, repeatedly, the ensuing week--but
no answer came.
"I should think somebody would question the elevator boy," said Mary.
"Or, that, when he hears we are gone, he will remember bringing us
here."
"That was not the regular boy--depend upon it," answered Gertrude. "It
was one of the conspirators, if there was a conspiracy, and he will not
tell. It was Orlando Vickery who was behind this."
"Shall we go to bed tonight?" asked Mary.
"No, indeed," said Gertrude. "We couldn't possibly sleep. And
besides--something might happen."
But nothing did happen. The slow night wore away and morning came. When
the whistles below were calling people to their work, the two young
women got up from their couch and easy-chair, and went to the windows
again; but they could see nothing but the blank wall of a light-well.
They were trapped and helpless.
"Well, we may as well be philosophical while we can," said Mary. "There
are coffee and breakfast things in the pantry. I saw them last night.
I'm used to getting my own light breakfast. Let's eat."
They prepared and ate their simple meal and went back, to wonder and
speculate and devise new ways of getting some message to the outside
world; but nothing came of it. They could do nothing more than scribble
notes on pages torn from the diary and throw them from the tops of the
windows into the light-well, where they fell harmlessly into the rubbish
heap that gathered unnoticed in the corners. The day wore monotonously
along and was succeeded by another and another. Then a note was found
shoved under the front door in the early dawn.
"Open the little door to the dumbwaiter in the pantry and find
supplies."
They obeyed, and found a basket of fruit, cream, vegetables and meat.
They wrote an appealing note and placed in the basket and tried to send
it down; but they could not manipulate the dumbwaiter. They left the
little door open, to know when the basket descended, but it did not go
down until some time during the following night. The only reply to their
note--if it was a reply--was a second typewritten note, that came under
the door late the fourth evening.
"You can be let out any time that Miss Van Deusen will send down
her signed and witnessed resignation from the office of mayor.
Push it through the crack and the door will be opened for you."
When they read it, Gertrude's face flushed hotly. "So they think to
force me out, do they?"
"Don't you resign, Miss Van Deusen," said Mary. "We'll stay here and
starve, first. Somebody will find us--some time."
"I've not the slightest intention of resigning," replied the other.
"And how often have I asked you to call me Gertrude? We aren't mayor and
secretary now--or I'd command you to call me by my given name. We are
just two prisoners."
"Then I'll do as you say--if I don't forget--Gertrude," answered Mary.
"I wonder what they are doing down below," said Mary later in the day.
"How many times do you think we've said that this week?" laughed
Gertrude. "We've heard the usual street sounds, and an unusual amount of
bell-ringing--which may or may not have been on our account."
"At least, we haven't heard them toll the bells for us!" interrupted
Mary. "That's something."
"But not a paper, not a line, not a breath from the outside world has
reached up--except the basket of provisions," exclaimed Gertrude,
ruefully.
"And the demand for your resignation," interrupted Mary again.
"Honestly, now, Gertrude, don't you wish at the bottom of your heart,
that you had never gone into politics? That you'd let the office of
mayor go begging last fall?"
Gertrude's face was a study. For an instant her friend thought she was
about to confess that she had made a mistake. Then the old spirit flared
up. Gertrude held her head high.
"I would never own it if I did," she said. "When the next election comes
around, however--"
She did not finish her remark, but picked up a book and fell to reading.
"This 'Fated to Conquer' isn't a bad story, Mary," she said after a
while. "When I read such a book--of love and romance and all that--I
wish I were, or had been, of the marrying kind of women. As it is--I'm
going to say it in confidence, Mary--I believe, when we get out of this,
I'll marry Bailey."
She did not notice her friend's peculiar expression, but talked idly on.
"You know he has wanted to marry me several times in the past. To be
sure, he hasn't proposed for a couple of years, but he will. A man will
always propose to the woman he loves if she gives him half a chance."
"Why didn't you marry him?" asked Mary in an expressionless voice.
"O, I never loved him, or thought I didn't," answered Gertrude. "I
didn't fully believe in his love for me, either; that is, he did not
love me as I wanted to be loved. We are comrades from childhood, and
sort of cousins. He's been as near a brother to me as he could and I've
been fond of him in that kind of way."
"Then you don't love him--not really?" asked Mary; and she could not
entirely suppress a joyous note in her voice.
"Well, yes," blandly replied Gertrude. "I love Bailey in a way. Not the
passionate kind of love one reads of in novels--like this, for
instance;" she indicated the book she had been reading. "The heroine
goes through all sorts of tribulations for love's sake, and the hero
finally renounces everything for her sake; but that is only in books.
People don't love in that violent fashion. Mutual esteem and confidence
are what I see between the happiest married couples of my acquaintance.
Bailey is thoroughly reliable, helpful and honorable. I am tired of
standing up to the world alone. It must be a comfort to have a good
husband to take care of you."
"It must indeed," replied Mary, inscrutably.