“THE COUNTESS”
The next morning Anthony Trent observed that Mrs. Kinney was filled with
the excitement that attended the reading of an unusual crime as set
forth by the morning papers. It was in those crimes committed in the
higher circles of society which intrigued her most, that society which
she had served.
As a rule Trent let her wander on feeling that her pleasures were few.
Sometimes he thought it a little curious that she should concern herself
with affairs in which he was sure, sooner or later, to be involved. It
was a relief to know she spoke of them to none but him. He rarely
bothered to follow her rambling recitals, contenting himself now and
again with exclamations of supposed interest. But this morning he was
suddenly roused from his meditations by the mention of the word
Guestwick.
“What’s that?” he demanded.
“I was telling you about the Guestwick robbery, sir,” she said as she
filled his cup.
He did not as a rule look at the paper until his breakfast was done. To
send her for it now might, later, be used as a chain in the evidence
that might even now be forging for him. He affected a luke-warm
interest.
“What was it?” he asked.
“Money mad!” returned Mrs. Kinney, shaking her head. “All money mad. The
root of all evil.”
“A robbery was it?”
“It was like this,” Mrs. Kinney responded, strangely gratified that her
employer found her recital worth listening to. “There was fifty-thousand
dollars in cash in the safe in Mr. Guestwick’s library. He’s a
millionaire and lives on Fifth Avenue. It’s a most mysterious case. The
butler swears his master rang him up and told him to send all the
servants to bed.”
At length Mrs. Kinney recited Briggs’s evidence before the police
captain who was hurriedly summoned to the mansion. “They arrested the
butler,” said Mrs. Kinney. “Mr. Guestwick says he came from one of those
castles in England where dissolute noblemen do nothing but shoot foxes
all day and play cards all night. The police theory is that the butler
admitted them and then went bed so as to prove an alibi.”
“Mr. Guestwick denies sending any such message?”
“Yes. He was at the Opera.”
Anthony Trent fought down the desire to rush out into the kitchen and
take the paper from before Mrs. Kinney’s plate. She had said that Briggs
was to have admitted more than one person.
“How many did this suspected butler let in?”
“Only one, the man. He was in evening dress. Briggs suspected him from
the first, but daren’t go against his master’s positive instructions.
Briggs, the butler, says the man must have opened the door to his
accomplice when he’d been sent off to bed with instructions not to
answer any bell or telephone. The other was a beautiful young woman
dressed just as she’d come from the Opera herself.”
“Who saw her if Briggs did not?” he demanded.
“They caught her,” Mrs. Kinney returned triumphantly, “and the arrest of
her accomplice is expected any minute. They know who he is.”
Anthony Trent put down his untasted coffee.
“That’s interesting,” he commented. “Do they mention his name?”
“I don’t know as they did,” she replied. “I’ll go fetch the paper.”
He read it through with a deeper interest than he had ever taken in
printed sheet before. Such was Guestwick’s importance that two columns
had been devoted to him.
Mr. Guestwick on returning from the Opera was incensed to find none to
let him in his own house. He was compelled to use a latchkey. The house
was silent and unlighted. Mr. Guestwick, although a man of courage, felt
the safety of his women folk would be better guarded if he called in a
passing policeman. In the library they came face to face with crime.
There, standing at the closed safe, her skirt caught as the heavy doors
had swung to, was a beautiful woman engaged as they came upon her in
trying to tear off the imprisoning garments. Five minutes later and she
would have escaped said police sapience.
Finger prints revealed her as a very well-known criminal known to the
continental police as “The Countess.” She was one of a high-class gang
which operated as a rule on the French and Italian Riviera, and owed its
success to the ease with which it could assume the manners and customs
of the aristocracy it planned to steal from. “The Countess,” for
example, spoke English with a perfection of idiom and inflection that
was unequaled by a foreigner. She was believed to come from an old
family of Tuscany. Despite a rigid examination by the police she had
declined to make any explanation. That, she told them, would be done in
court.
Anthony Trent looked at the clock. It was nine and she would be brought
before a magistrate at half-past ten.
So he had been fooled! All those high resolves of his had been brought
into being by a woman who must have been laughing at him all the while,
who must have congratulated herself that her lies had touched a man’s
heart and left fifty thousand dollars for her.
It was a bitter and harder Anthony Trent that came to the police court;
a man who was now almost as ashamed at his determination of last night
to abandon his career as he was now anxious to pursue it.
There was possibly some danger in going. Briggs would be there. The
woman might point at him in open court. There were a hundred dangers,
but they had no power to deter him. He swore to watch her, gain what
particulars he might as to her past life and associates, and then take
his revenge. God! How she had hoodwinked him!
His face he must, of course, disguise in some simple manner. It was not
difficult. In court he took a seat not too far back. Chewing gum, as he
had often observed in the subway, had a marvelous power in altering an
expression. He sat there, his lower jaw thrust out and his mouth drawn
down, ceaselessly chewing. And one eye was partially closed. He had
brought the thing to perfection. With shoulders hunched he looked
without fear of detection into the fascinating green eyes of “The
Countess.”
By this time her defense was arranged. Last night, her lawyer explained,
she was so overcome with the shock that she could not make even a simple
statement to the police.
Miss Violet Benyon, he declared, of London, England, and temporarily at
the Plaza, had felt on the previous evening need for a walk. Knowing
Fifth Avenue to be absolutely safe she walked North. Passing the
Guestwick mansion she saw a man in evening dress stealing down the
steps, across the road and into the Park. Fearing robbery she had rung
the bell. Getting no answer and finding the door open she went in. The
only light was in the library. Of a fearless nature, Miss Benyon of
London went boldly in. There was an open safe. This she closed and in
the doing of it was imprisoned. That was all. The lawyer swept the
finger-prints aside as unworthy evidence. He was appearing before a
neolithic magistrate who was prejudiced against them.
An imposing old lady who claimed to be Miss Benyon’s aunt went bail for
her niece’s appearance to the amount of ten thousand dollars. She
mentioned as close friends names of well known Americans, socially
elect, who would rush to her rescue ere the day was out. So impressive
was she, and so splendid a witness did Miss Benyon make, that the
magistrate disregarded Mr. Guestwick’s plea and admitted her to bail.
Trent knew very well that Central Office men would dog the steps of aunt
and niece, making escape almost impossible. But he was nevertheless
convinced that Miss Violet Benyon of London, or the Countess from the
Riviera, would never return to the magistrate’s court as that trusting
jurist anticipated.
And Anthony Trent was right. The two women, despite police surveillance,
left the hotel and merged themselves among the millions. The younger
woman taking advantage of a new maid’s inexperience offered her a reward
for permitting her to escape by back ways in order to win, as she
averred, a bet. The aunt’s escape was unexplained by the police. They
found awaiting the elder woman’s coming a girl from a milliner’s shop.
She was allowed to go without examination. Trent read the account very
carefully and stored every published particular in his trained memory.
There was no doubt in his mind that the milliner’s assistant was the
so-called aunt. He remembered her as a slim, elderly woman, very much
made-up.
On his own account he called at the milliner’s and made some inquiries.
He found that there was no account with the Benyons and no assistant had
been sent to the hotel. It was none of his business to aid police
authorities. And he was not anxious that the two should be caught in
that way. There would come a time when he was retired from his present
occupation when he would feel the need of excitement. Getting even with
the clever actress who prevented him from taking the Guestwick money
would call for his astutest planning.