To this day, Average Jones maintains that he felt a distinct thrill at
first sight of the advertisement. Yet Fate might well have chosen a
more appropriate ambush in any one of a hundred of the strange
clippings which were grist to the Ad-Visor’s mill. Out of a bulky pile
of the day’s paragraphs, however, it was this one that leaped,
significant, to his eye.
WANTED—Ten thousand loathly black beetles, by A leaseholder who
contracted to leave a house in the same condition as he found it.
Ackroyd, 100 W. Sixteenth St. New York
“Black beetles, eh?” observed Average Jones. “This Ackroyd person seems
to be a merry little jester. Well, I’m feeling rather jocular, myself,
this morning. How does one collect black beetles, I wonder? When in
doubt, inquire of the resourceful Simpson.”
He pressed a button and his confidential clerk entered.
“Good morning, Simpson,” said Average Jones.
“Are you acquainted with that shy but pervasive animal, the domestic
black beetle?”
“Yes, sir; I board,” said Simpson simply.
“I suppose there aren’t ten thousand black beetles in your
boarding-house, though?” inquired Average Jones.
Simpson took it under advisement. “Hardly,” he decided.
“I’ve got to have ’em to fill an order. At least, I’ve got to have an
installment of ’em, and to-morrow.”
Being wholly without imagination, the confidential clerk was impervious
to surprise or shock. This was fortunate, for otherwise, his employment
as practical aide to Average Jones would probably have driven him into
a madhouse. He now ran his long, thin, clerkly hands through his long,
thin, clerkly hair.
“Ramson, down on Fulton Street, will have them, if any one has,” he
said presently. “He does business under the title of the Insect
Nemesis, you know. I’ll go there at once.”
Returning to his routine work, Average Jones found himself unable to
dislodge the advertisement from his mind. So presently he gave way to
temptation, called up Bertram at the Cosmic Club, and asked him to come
to the Astor Court Temple office at his convenience. Scenting more
adventure, Bertram found it convenient to come promptly. Average Jones
handed him the clipping. Bertram read it with ascending eyebrows.
“Hoots!” he said. “The man’s mad.”
“I didn’t ask you here to diagnose the advertiser’s trouble. That’s
plain enough—though you’ve made a bad guess. What I want of you is to
tap your flow of information about old New York. What’s at One Hundred
West Sixteenth Street?”
“One hundred West Sixteenth; let me see. Why, of course; it’s the old
Feltner mansion. You must know it. It has a walled garden at the side;
the only one left in the city, south of Central Park.”
“Any one named Ackroyd there?”
“That must be Hawley Ackroyd. I remember, now, hearing that he had
rented it. Judge Ackroyd, you know, better known as ‘Oily’ Ackroyd.
He’s a smooth old rascal.”
“Indeed? What particular sort?”
“Oh, most sorts, in private. Professionally, he’s a legislative crook;
head lobbyist of the Consolidated.”
“Ever hear of his collecting insects?”
“Never heard of his collecting anything but graft. In fact, he’d have
been in jail years ago, but for his family connections. He married a
Van Haltern. You remember the famous Van Haltern will case, surely; the
million-dollar dog. The papers fairly, reeked of it a year ago. Sylvia
Graham had to take the dog and leave the country to escape the
notoriety. She’s back now, I believe.”
“I’ve heard of Miss Graham,” remarked Average Jones, “through friends
of mine whom she visits.”
“Well, if you’ve only heard of her and not seen her,” returned Bertram,
with something as nearly resembling enthusiasm as his habitual languor
permitted, “you’ve got something to look forward to. Sylvia Graham is a
distinct asset to the Scheme of Creation.”
“An asset with assets of her own, I believe,” said Average Jones. “The
million dollars left by her grandmother, old Mrs. Van Haltern, goes to
her eventually; doesn’t it?”
“Provided she carries out the terms of the will, keeps the dog in
proper luxury and buries him in the grave on the family estate at
Schuylkill designated by the testator. If these terms are not rigidly
carried out, the fortune is to be divided, most of it going to Mrs.
Hawley Ackroyd, which would mean the judge himself. I should say that
the dog was as good as sausage meat if ‘Oily’ ever gets hold of him.”
“H’m. What about Mrs. Ackroyd?”
“Poor, sickly, frightened lady! She’s very fond of Sylvia Graham, who
is her niece. But she’s completely dominated by her husband.”
“Information is your long suit, Bert. Now, if you only had intelligence
to correspond—” Average Jones broke off and grinned mildly, first at
his friend, then at the advertisement.
Bertram caught up the paper and studied it. “Well, what does it mean?”
he demanded.
“It means that Ackroyd, being about to give up his rented house,
intends to saddle it with a bad name. Probably he’s had a row with the
agent or owner, and is getting even by making the place difficult to
rent again. Nobody wants to take a house with the reputation of an
entomological resort.”
“It would be just like Oily Ackroyd,” remarked Bertram. “He’s a
vindictive scoundrel. Only a few days ago, he nearly killed a poor
devil of a drug clerk, over some trifling dispute. He managed to keep
it out of the newspapers but he had to pay a stiff fine.”
“That might be worth looking up, too,” ruminated Average Jones
thoughtfully.
He turned to his telephone in answer to a ring. “All right, come, in,
Simpson,” he said.
The confidential clerk appeared. “Ramson says that regular black
beetles are out of season, sir,” he reported. “But he can send to the
country and dig up plenty of red-and-black ones.”
“That will do,” returned the Ad-Visor. “Tell him to have two or three
hundred here to-morrow morning.”
Bertram bent a severe gaze on his friend. “Meaning that you’re going to
follow up this freak affair?” he inquired.
“Just that. I can’t explain why, but—well, Bert, I’ve a hunch. At the
worst, Ackroyd’s face when he sees the beetles should be worth the
money.”
“When you frivol, Average, I wash my hands of you. But I warn you, look
out for Ackroyd. He’s as big as he is ugly; a tough customer.”
“All right. I’ll just put on some old clothes, to dress the part of a
beetle-purveyor correctly, and also in case I get ’em torn in my
meeting with judge ‘Oily.’ I’ll see you later—and report, if I survive
his wrath.”
Thus it was that, on the morning after this dialogue, a clean-built
young fellow walked along West Sixteenth Street, appreciatively
sniffing the sunny crispness of the May air. He was rather shabby
looking, yet his demeanor was by no means shabby. It was confident and
easy. On the evidence of the bandbox which he carried, his mission
should have been menial; but he bore himself wholly unlike one subdued
to petty employments. His steady, gray eyes showed a glint of
anticipation as he turned in at the gate of the high, broad, brown
house standing back, aloof and indignant, from the roaring
encroachments of trade. He set his burden down and, pulled the bell.
The door opened promptly to the deep, far-away clangor. A flashing
impression of girlish freshness, vigor, and grace was disclosed to the
caller against a background of interior gloom. He stared a little more
patently than was polite. Whatever his expectation of amusement, this,
evidently, was not the manifestation looked for. The girl glanced not
at him, but at the box, and spoke a trifle impatiently.
“If it’s my hat, it’s very late. You should have gone to the basement.”
“It isn’t, miss,” said the young man, in a form of address, the
semi-servility of which seemed distinctly out of tone with the quietly
clear and assured voice. “It’s the insects.”
“The what?”
“The bugs, miss.”
He extracted from his pocket a slip of paper, looked from it to the
numbered door, as one verifying an address, and handed it to her.
“From yesterday’s copy of the Banner, miss. You’re not going back on
that, surely,” he said somewhat reproachfully.
She read, and as she read her eyes widened to lakes of limpid brown.
Then they crinkled at the corners, and her laugh rose from the mid-tone
contralto, to a high, bird-like trill of joyousness. The infection of
it tugged at the young man’s throat, but he successfully preserved his
mask of flat and respectful dullness.
“It must have been Uncle,” she gasped finally. “He said he’d be quits
with the real estate agent before he left. How perfectly absurd! And
are those the creatures in that box?”
“The first couple of hundred of ’em, miss.”
“Two hundred!” Again the access of laughter swelled the rounded bosom
as the breeze fills a sail. “Where did you get them?”
“Woodpile, ash-heap, garbage-pail,” said the young man stolidly. “Any
particular kind preferred, Miss Ackroyd?”
The girl looked at him with suspicion, but his face was blankly
innocent.
“I’m not Miss Ackroyd,” she began with emphasis, when a querulous voice
from an inner room called out: “Whom are you talking to, Sylvia?”
“A young man with a boxful of beetles,” returned the girl, adding in
brisk French: “_Il est tres amusant ce farceur. Je ne le comprends pas
du tout. Cest une blague, peut-être. Si on l’invitait dans la maison
pour un moment?_”
Through one of the air-holes, considerately punched in the cardboard
cover of the box, a sturdy crawler had succeeded in pushing himself. He
was, in the main, of a shiny and well-groomed black, but two large
patches of crimson gave him the festive appearance of being garbed in a
brilliant sash. As he stood rubbing his fore-legs together in
self-congratulation over his exploit, his bearer addressed him in
French quite as ready as the girl’s:
“_Permettez-moi, Monsieur le Coléoptère, de vous presenter mes excuses
pour cette demoiselle qui s’exprime en langue étrangère chez elle._”
“Don’t apologize to the beetle on my account,” retorted the girl with
spirit. “You’re here on your own terms, you know, both of you.”
Average Jones mutely held up the box in one hand and the advertisement
in the other. The adventurer-bug flourished a farewell to the girl with
his antennae, and retired within to advise his fellows of the charms of
freedom.
“Very well,” said the girl, in demure tones, though lambent mirth still
flickered, golden, in the depths of the brown eyes. “If you persist, I
can only suggest that you come back when Judge Ackroyd is here. You
won’t find him particularly amenable to humor, particularly when
perpetrated by a practical joker in masquerade.”
“Discovered,” murmured Average Jones. “I shouldn’t have vaunted my poor
French. But must I really take my little friends all the way back? You
suggested to the mystic voice within that I might be invited inside.”
“You seem a decidedly unconventional person,” began the other with
dawning disfavor.
“Conventionality, like charity, begins at home,” he replied quickly.
“And one would hardly call this advertisement a pattern of formal
etiquette.”
“True enough,” she admitted, dimpling, and Average Jones was
congratulating himself on his diplomacy, when the querulous voice broke
in again, this time too low for his ears.
“I don’t ask you the real reason for your extraordinary call,” pursued
the girl with a glint of mischief in her eyes, after she had responded
in an aside, “but auntie thinks you’ve come to steal my dog. She thinks
that of every one lately.”
“Auntie? Your dog? Then you’re Sylvia Graham. I might have known it.”
“I don’t know how you might have known it. But I am Sylvia Graham—if
you insist on introducing me to yourself.”
“Miss Graham,” said the visitor promptly and gravely, “let me present
A.V.R.E. Jones: a friend—”
“Not the famous Average Jones!” cried the girl. “That is why your face
seemed so familiar. I’ve seen your picture at Edna Hale’s. You got her
‘blue fires’ back for her. But really, that hardly explains your being
here, in this way, you know.”
“Frankly, Miss Graham, it was just as a lark that I answered the
advertisement. But now that I’m here and find you here, it looks—er—as
if it might—er—be more serious.”
A tinge of pink came into the girl’s cheeks, but she answered lightly
enough:
“Indeed, it may, for you, if uncle finds you here with those beetles.”
“Never mind me or the beetles. I’d like to know about the dog that your
aunt is worrying over. Is he here with you?”
The soft curve of Miss Graham’s lips straightened a little. “I really
think,” she said with decision, “that you had better explain further
before questioning.”
“Nothing simpler. Once upon a time there lived a crack-brained young
Don Quixote who wandered through an age of buried romance piously
searching for trouble. And, twice upon a time, there dwelt in an
enchanted stone castle in West Sixteenth Street an enchanting young
damsel in distress—”
“I’m not a damsel in distress,” interrupted Miss Graham, passing over
the adjective.
The young man leaned to her. The half smile had passed from his lips,
and his eyes were very grave.
“Not—er—if your dog were to—er—disappear?” he drawled quietly.
The swift unexpectedness of the counter broke down the girl’s guard.
“You mean Uncle Hawley,” she said.
“And your suspicions jump with mine.”
“They don’t!” she denied hotly. “You’re very unjust and impertinent.”
“I don’t mean to be impertinent,” he said evenly. “And I have no
monopoly of injustice.”
“What do you know about Uncle Hawley?”
“Your aunt—”
“I won’t hear a word against my aunt.”
“Not from me, be assured. Your aunt, so you have just told me, believes
that your dog is in danger of being stolen. Why? Because she knows that
the person most interested has been scheming against the animal, and
yet she is afraid to warn you openly. Doesn’t that indicate who it is?”
“Mr. Jones, I’ve no right even to let you talk like this to me. Have
you anything definite against Judge Ackroyd?”
“In this case, only suspicion.”
Her head went up. “Then I think there is nothing more to be said.”
The young man flushed, but his voice was steady as he returned:
“I disagree with you. And I beg you to cut short your visit here, and
return to your home at once.”
In spite of herself the girl was shaken by his persistence. “I can’t do
that,” she said uneasily. And added, with a flash of anger, “I think
you had better leave this house.”
“If I leave this house now I may never have any chance to see you
again.”
The girl regarded him with level, non-committal eyes.
“And I have every intention of seeing you again—and—again—and again.
Give me a chance; a moment.”
Average Jones’ mind was of the emergency type. It summoned to its aid,
without effort of cerebration on the part of its owner, whatever was
most needed at the moment. Now it came to his rescue with the memory of
judge Ackroyd’s encounter with the drug clerk, as mentioned by Bertram.
There was a strangely hopeful suggestion of some link between a
drug-store quarrel and the arrival of a million-dollar dog, “better
dead” in the hopes of his host.
“Miss Graham; I’ve gone rather far, I’ll admit,” said Jones; “but, if
you’ll give me the benefit of the doubt, I think I can show you some
basis to work on. If I can produce something tangible, may I come back
here this afternoon? I’ll promise not to come unless I have good
reason.”
“Very well,” conceded Miss Graham reluctantly, “it’s a most unusual
thing. But I’ll agree to that.”
“_Au revoir_, then,” he said, and was gone.
Somewhat to her surprise and uneasiness, Sylvia Graham experienced a
distinct satisfaction when, late that afternoon, she beheld her
unconventional acquaintance mounting the steps with a buoyant and
assured step. Upon being admitted, he went promptly to the point.
“I’ve got it.”
“Your justification for coming back?” she asked.
“Exactly. Have you heard anything of some trouble in which judge
Ackroyd was involved last week?”
“Uncle has a very violent temper,” admitted the girl evasively. “But I
don’t see what—”
“Pardon me. You will see. That row was with a drug clerk.”
“In an obscure drug store several blocks from here.”
“Yes.”
“The drug clerk insisted—as the law requires—on judge Ackroyd
registering for a certain purchase.”
“Perhaps he was impertinent about it.”
“Possibly. The point is that the prospective purchase was cyanide of
potassium, a deadly and instantaneous poison.”
“Are you sure?” asked the girl, in a low voice.
“I’ve just come from the store. How long have you been here at your
uncle’s?”
“A week.”
“Then just about the time of your coming with the dog, your uncle
undertook to obtain a swift and sure poison. Have I gone far enough?”
“I—I don’t know.”
“Well, am I still ordered out of the house?”
“N-n-no.”
“Thank you for your enthusiastic hospitality,” said Average Jones so
dryly that a smile relaxed the girl’s troubled face. “With that
encouragement we’ll go on. What is your uncle’s attitude toward the
dog?”
“Almost what you might call ingratiating. But Peter Paul—that’s my
dog’s name, you know—doesn’t take to uncle. He’s a crotchety old
doggie.”
“He’s a wise old doggie,” amended the other, with emphasis. “Has your
uncle taken him out, at all?”
“Once he tried to. I met them at the corner. All four of Peter Paul’s
poor old fat legs were braced, and he was hauling back as hard as he
could against the leash.”
“And the occurrence didn’t strike you as peculiar?”
“Well, not then.”
“When does your uncle give up this house?”
“At the end of the week. Uncle and aunt leave for Europe.”
“Then let me suggest again that you and Peter Paul go at once.”
Miss Graham pondered. “That would mean explanations and a quarrel, and
more strain for auntie, who is nervous enough, anyway. No, I can’t do
that.”
“Do you realize that every day Peter Paul remains here is an added
opportunity for judge Ackroyd to make a million dollars, or a big share
of it, by some very simple stratagem?”
“I haven’t admitted yet that I believe my uncle to be a—a murderer,”
Miss Graham quietly reminded him.
“A strong word,” said Average Jones smiling. “The law would hardly
support your view. Now, Miss Graham, would it grieve you very much if
Peter Paul were to die?”
“I won’t have him put to death,” said she quickly. “That would be,
cheating my grandmother’s intentions.”
“I supposed you wouldn’t. Yet it would be the simplest way. Once dead,
and buried in accordance with the terms of the will, the dog would be
out of his troubles, and you would be out of yours.”
“It would really be a relief. Peter Paul suffers so from asthma, poor
old beastie. The vet says he can live only a month or two longer,
anyway. But I’ve got to do as Grandmother wished, and keep Peter Paul
alive as long as possible.”
“Admitted.” Average Jones fell into a baffled silence, studying the
pattern of the rug with restless eyes. When he looked up into Miss
Graham’s face again it was with a changed expression.
“Miss Graham,” he said slowly, “won’t you try to forget, for the
moment, the circumstances of our meeting, and think of me only as a
friend of your friends who is very honestly eager to be a friend to
you, when you most need one?”
Now, Average Jones’s birth-fairy had endowed him with one priceless
gift: the power of inspiring an instinctive confidence in himself.
Sylvia Graham felt, suddenly, that a hand, sure and firm, had been
outstretched to guide her on a dark path. In one of those rare flashes
of companionship which come only when clean and honorable spirits
recognize one another, all consciousness of sex was lost between them.
The girl’s gaze met the man’s level, and was held in a long, silent
regard.
“Yes,” she said simply; and the heart of Average Jones rose and swore a
high loyalty.
“Listen, then. I think I see a clear way. Judge Ackroyd will kill the
dog if he can, and so effectually conceal the body that no funeral can
be held over it, thereby rendering your grandmother’s bequest to you
void. He has only a few days to do it in, but I don’t think that all
your watchfulness can restrain him. Now, on the other hand, if the dog
should die a natural death and be buried, he can still contest the
will. But if he should kill Peter Paul and hide the body where we could
discover it, the game would be up for him, as he then wouldn’t even
dare to come into court with a contest. Do you follow me?”
“Yes. But you wouldn’t ask me to be a party to any such thing.”
“You’re a party, involuntarily, by remaining here. But do your best to
save Peter Paul, if you will. And please call me up immediately at the
Cosmic Club, if anything in my line turns up.”
“What is your line?” asked Miss Graham, the smile returning to her
lips. “Creepy, crawly bugs? Or imperiled dogs? Or rescuing
prospectively distressed damsels?”
“Technically it’s advertising,” replied Average Jones, who had been
formulating a shrewd little plan of his own. “Let me recommend to you
the advertising columns of the daily press. They’re often amusing.
Moreover your uncle might break out in print again. Who knows?”
“Who, indeed? I’ll read religiously.”
“And, by the way, my beetles. I forgot and left them here. Oh, there’s
the box. I may have a very specific use for them later. Au revoir—and
may it be soon!”
The two days succeeding seemed to Average Jones, haunted as he was by
an importunate craving to look again into Miss Graham’s limpid and
changeful eyes, a dull and sodden period of probation. The messenger
boy who finally brought her expected note, looked to him like a Greek
godling. The note enclosed this clipping:
LOST—Pug dog answering to the name of Peter Paul. Very old and
asthmatic. Last seen on West 16th Street. Liberal reward for
information to Anxious. Care of Banner office.
_Dear Mr. Jones_ (she had written):
_Are you a prophet?_ (Average Jones chuckled, at this point.) _The
enclosed seems to be distinctly in our line. Could you come some
time this afternoon? I’m puzzled and a little anxious._
_Sincerely yours,
Sylvia Graham._
Average Jones could, and did. He found Miss Graham’s piquant face under
the stress of excitement, distinctly more alluring than before.
“Isn’t it strange?” she said, holding out a hand in welcome. “Why
should any one advertise for my Peter Paul? He isn’t lost.”
“I am glad to hear that,” said the caller gravely.
“I’ve kept my promise, you see,” pursued the girl. “Can you do as well,
and live up to your profession of aid?”
“Try me.”
“Very well, do you know what that advertisement means?”
“Perfectly.”
“Then you’re a very extraordinary person.”
“Not in the least. I wrote it.”
“Wrote it! You? Well—really! Why in the world did _you_ write it?”
“Because of an unconquerable longing to see,” Average Jones paused, and
his quick glance caught the storm signal in her eyes, “your uncle,” he
concluded calmly.
For one fleeting instant a dimple flickered at the corner of her mouth.
It departed. But departing, it swept the storm before it.
“What do you want to see uncle about, if it isn’t an impertinent
question?”
“It is, rather,” returned the young man judicially. “Particularly, as
I’m not sure, myself. I may want to quarrel with him.”
“You won’t have the slightest difficulty in that,” the girl assured
him.
She rang the bell, dispatched a servant, and presently judge Ackroyd
stalked into the room. As Average Jones was being presented, he took
comprehensive note and estimate of the broad-cheeked, thin-lipped face;
the square shoulders and corded neck, and the lithe and formidable
carriage of the man. Judge “Oily” Ackroyd’s greeting of the guest
within his gates did not bear out the sobriquet of his public life. It
was curt to the verge of harshness.
“What is the market quotation on beetles, judge?” asked the young man,
tapping the rug with his stick.
“What are you talking about?” demanded the other, drawing down his
heavy brows.
“The black beetle; the humble but brisk haunter of household crevices,”
explained Average Jones. “You advertised for ten thousand specimens.
I’ve got a few thousand I’d like to dispose of, if the inducements are
sufficient.”
“I’m in no mood for joking, young man,” retorted the other, rising.
“You seldom are, I understand,” replied Average Jones blandly. “Well,
if you won’t talk about bugs, let’s talk about dogs.”
“The topic does not interest me, sir,” retorted the other, and the
glance of his eye was baleful, but uneasy.
The tapping of the young man’s cane ceased. He looked up into his
host’s glowering face with a seraphic and innocent smile.
“Not even if it—er—touched upon a device for guarding the street
corners in case—er—Peter Paul went walking—er—once too often?”
Judge Ackroyd took one step forward. Average Jones was on his feet
instantly, and, even in her alarm, Sylvia Graham noticed how swiftly
and naturally his whole form “set.” But the big man turned away, and
abruptly left the room.
“Were you wise to anger him?” asked the girl, as the heavy tread died
away on the stairs.
“Sometimes open declaration of war is the soundest strategy.”
“War?” she repeated. “You make me feel like a traitor to my own
family.”
“That’s the unfortunate part of it,” he said; “but it can’t be helped.”
“You spoke of having some one guard the corners of the block,”
continued the girl, after a thoughtful silence. “Do you think I’d
better arrange for that?”
“No need. There’ll be a hundred people on watch.”
“Have you called out the militia?” she asked, twinkling.
“Better than that. I’ve employed the tools of my trade.”
He handed her a galley proof marked with many corrections. She ran
through it with growing amazement.
HAVE YOU SEEN THE DOG?
$100-One Hundred Dollars-$100
FOR THE BEST ANSWER IN 500 WORDS
OPEN TO ALL HIGH SCHOOL BOYS
Between now and next Saturday an old Pug Dog
will come out of a big House on West 16th Street,
between 5th and 6th Avenues. It may be by Day.
It may be at any hour of the Night. Now, you Boys,
get to work.
REMEMBER: $100 IN CASH
HERE ARE THE POINTS TO MIND—
1. Description of the Dog.
2. Description of Person with him.
3. Description of House he Comes from.
4. Account of Where they Go.
5. Account of What they Do.
Manuscripts must be written plainly and mailed
within twenty-four hours of the discovery of the
dog to
A. JONES: AD-VISOR
ASTOR COURT TEMPLE, NEW YORK
“That will appear in every New York paper tomorrow morning,” explained
its deviser.
“I see,” said the girl. “Any one who attempts to take Peter Paul away
will be tracked by a band of boy detectives. A stroke of genius, Mr.
Average. Jones.”
She curtsied low to him. But Average Jones was in no mood for
playfulness now.
“That restricts the judge’s endeavors to the house and garden,” said
he, “since, of course he’ll see the advertisement.”
“I’ll see that he does,” said Miss Graham maliciously.
“Good! I’ll also ask you to watch the garden for any suspicious
excavating.”
“Very well. But is that all?” Miss Graham’s voice was wistful.
“Isn’t it enough?”
“You’ve been so good to me,” she said hesitantly. “I don’t like to
think of you as setting those boys to an impossible task.”
“Oh, bless you!” returned the Ad-Visor heartily; “that’s all arranged
for. One of my men will duly parade with a canine especially obtained
for the occasion. I’m not going to swindle the youngsters.”
“It didn’t seem like you,” returned Miss Graham warmly. “But you must
let me pay for it, that and the advertising bill.”
“As an unauthorized expense—” he began.
She laid a small, persuasive hand on his arm.
“You must let me pay it. Won’t you?”
Average Jones was conscious of a strange sensation, starting from the
point where the firm, little hand lay. It spread in his veins and
thickened his speech.
“Of course,” he drawled, uncertainly, “if you—er—put it—er—that way!”
The hand lifted. “Mr. Average Jones,” said the owner, “do you know you
haven’t once disappointed me in speech or action during our short but
rather eventful acquaintance?”
“I hope you’ll be able to say the same ten years from now,” he returned
significantly.
She flushed a little at the implication. “What am I to do next?” she
asked.
“Do as you would ordinarily do; only don’t take Peter Paul, into the
street, or you’ll have a score of high-school boys trailing you.
And—this is the most important—if the dog fails to answer your call at
any time, and you can’t readily find him by searching, telephone me, at
once, at my office. Good-by.”
“I think you are a very staunch friend to those who need you,” she
said, gravely and sweetly, giving him her hand.
She clung in his mind like a remembered fragrance, after he had gone
back to Astor Court Temple to wait. And though he plunged into an
intricate scheme of political advertising which was to launch a new
local party, her eyes and her voice haunted him. Nor had he banished
them, when, two days later, the telephone brought him her clear
accents, a little tremulous now.
“Peter Paul is gone.”
“Since when?”
“Since ten this morning. The house is in an uproar.”
“I’ll be up in half an hour at the latest.”
“Do come quickly. I’m—I’m a little frightened.”
“Then you must have something to do,” said Average Jones decisively.
“Have you been keeping an eye on the garden?”
“Yes.”
“Go through it again, looking carefully for signs of disarranged earth.
I don’t think you’ll find it, but it’s well to be sure. Let me in at
the basement door at half-past one. Judge Ackroyd mustn’t see me.”
It was a strangely misshapen presentation of the normally
spick-and-span Average Jones that gently rang the basement bell of the
old house at the specified hour. All his pockets bulged with lumpy
angles. Immediately, upon being admitted by Miss Graham herself, he
proceeded to disenburden himself of box after box, such as elastic
bands come in, all exhibiting a homogeneous peculiarity, a hole at one
end thinly covered with a gelatinous substance.
“Be very careful not to let that get broken,” he instructed the
mystified girl. “In the course of an hour or so it will melt away
itself. Did you see anything suspicious in the garden?”
“No!” replied the girl. She picked up one of the boxes. “How odd!” she
cried. “Why, there’s something in it that’s alive!”
“Very much so. Your friends, the beetles, in fact.”
“What! Again? Aren’t you carrying the joke rather far?”
“It’s not a joke any more. It’s deadly serious. I’m quite sure,” he
concluded in the manner of one who picks his words carefully, “that it
may turn out to be just the most serious matter in the world to me.”
“As bad as that?” she queried, but the color that flamed in her cheeks
belied the lightness of her tone.
“Quite. However, that must wait. Where is your uncle?”
“Up-stairs in his study.”
“Do you think you could take me all through the house sometime this
afternoon without his seeing me?”
“No, I’m sure I couldn’t. He’s been wandering like an uneasy spirit
since Peter Paul disappeared. And he won’t go out, because he is
packing.”
“So much the worse, either for him or me. Where are your rooms?”
“On the second floor.”
“Very well. Now, I want one of these little boxes left in every room in
the house, if possible, except on your floor, which is probably out of
the reckoning. Do you think you could manage it soon?”
“I think so. I’ll try.”
“Do most of the rooms open into one another?”
“Yes, all through the house.”
“Please see that they’re all unlocked, and as far as possible, open.
I’ll be here at four o’clock, and will call for judge Ackroyd. You must
be sure that he receives me. Tell him it is a matter of great
importance. It is.”
“You’re putting a fearful strain on my feminine curiosity,” said Miss
Graham, the provocative smile quirking at the comers of her mouth.
“Doubtless,” returned the other dryly. “If you strictly follow
directions, I’ll undertake to satisfy it in time. Four o’clock sharp,
I’ll be here. Don’t be frightened whatever happens. You keep ready, but
out of the way, until I call you. Good-by.”
With even more than his usual nicety was Average Jones attired, when,
at four o’clock, he sent his card to judge Ackroyd. Small favor,
however, did his appearance find, in the scowling eyes of the judge.
“What do _you_ want?” he growled.
“I’ll take a cigar, thank you very much,” said Average Jones
innocently.
“You’ll take your leave, or state your business.”
“It has to do with your niece.”
“Then what do you take my time for, damn your impudence.”
“Don’t swear.” Average Jones was deliberately provoking the older man
to an outbreak. “Let’s—er—sit down and—er—be chatty.”
The drawl, actually an evidence of excitement, had all the effect of
studied insolence. Judge Ackroyd’s big frame shook.
“I’m going to k-k-kick you out into the street, you young p-p-p-pup,”
he stuttered in his rage.
His knotted fingers writhed out for a hold on the other’s collar. With
a sinuous movement, the visitor swerved aside and struck the other man,
flat-handed, across the face. There was an answering howl of demoniac
fury. Then a strange thing happened. The assailant turned and fled, not
to the ready egress of the front door, but down the dark stairway to
the basement. The judge thundered after, in maddened, unthinking
pursuit. Average Jones ran fleetly and easily. And his running was not
for the purpose of flight alone, for as he sped through the basement
rooms, he kept casting swift glances from side to side, and up and down
the walls. The heavyweight pursuer could not get nearer than half a
dozen paces.
From the kitchen Average Jones burst into the hallway, doubled back up
the stairs and made a tour of the big drawing-rooms and living-rooms of
the first floor. Here, too, his glance swept room after room, from
floor to ceiling. The chase then led upward to the second floor, and by
direct ascent to the third. Breathing heavily, judge Ackroyd lumbered
after the more active man. In his dogged rage, he never thought to stop
and block the hall-way; but trailed his quarry like a bloodhound
through every room of the third floor, and upward to the fourth.
Half-way up this stairway, Average Jones checked his speed and surveyed
the hall above. As he started again he stumbled and sprawled. A more
competent observer than the infuriated pursuer might have noticed that
he fell cunningly. But judge Ackroyd gave a shout of savage triumph and
increased his speed. He stretched his hand to grip the fugitive. It had
almost touched him when he leaped, to his feet and resumed his flight.
“I’ll get you now!” panted the judge.
The fourth floor of the old house was almost bare. In a hall-embrasure
hung a full-length mirror. All along the borders of this, Average
Jones’ quick ranging vision had discerned small red-banded objects
which moved and shifted. As the glass reflected his extended figure, it
showed, almost at the same instant, the outstretched, bony hand of
“Oily” Ackroyd. With a snarl, half rage, half satisfaction, the pursuer
hurled himself forward—and fell, with a plunge that rattled the house’s
old bones. For, as he reached, Jones, trained on many a foot-ball
field, had whirled and dived at his knees. Before the fallen man could
gather his shaken wits, he was pinned with the most disabling grip
known in the science of combat, a strangle-hold with the assailant’s
wrist clamped in below and behind the ear. Average Jones lifted his
voice and the name that came to his lips was the name that had lurked
subconsciously, in his heart, for days.
“Sylvia!” he cried. “The fourth floor! Come!”
There was a stir and a cry from two floors below. Sylvia Graham had
broken from the grasp of her terrified aunt, and now came up the sharp
ascent like a deer, her eyes blazing with resolve and courage.
“The mirror,” said Average Jones. “Push it aside. Pull it down. Get
behind it somehow. Lie quiet, Ackroyd or I’ll have to choke your
worthless head off.”
With an effort of nervous strength, the girl lifted aside the big
glass. Behind it a hundred scarlet banded insects swarmed and
scampered.
“It’s a panel. Open it.”
She tugged at the woodwork with quick, clever fingers. A section
loosened and fell outward with a bang. The red-and-black beetles fled
in all directions. And now, judge Ackroyd found his voice.
“Help!” he roared. “Murder!”
The sinewy pressure of Average Jones’ wrist smothered further attempts
at vocality to a gurgle. He looked up into Sylvia Graham’s tense, face,
and jerked his head toward the opening.
“Unless my little detectives have deceived me,” he said, “you’ll find
the body in there.”
She groped, and drew forth a large box. In it was packed the body of
Peter Paul. There was a cord about the fat neck.
“Strangled,” whispered the girl. “Poor old doggie!” Then she whirled
upon the prostrate man. “You murderer!” she said very low.
“It’s not murder to put a dying brute out of the way,” said the shaken
man sullenly.
“But it’s fraud, in this case,” retorted Average Jones. “A fraud of
which you’re self-convicted. Get up.” He himself rose and stepped back,
but his eye was intent, and his muscles were in readiness.
There was no more fight in judge “Oily” Ackroyd. He slunk to the stairs
and limped heavily down to his frightened and sobbing wife. Miss Graham
leaned against the wall, white and spent. Average Jones, his heart in
his eyes, took a step forward.
“No!” she said peremptorily. “Don’t touch me. I shall be all right.”
“Do you mind my saying,” said he, very low, “that you are the bravest
and finest human being I’ve met in a—a somewhat varied career.”
The girl shuddered. “I could have stood it all,” she said, “but for
those awful, crawling, red creatures.”
“Those?” said Average Jones. “Why, they were my bloodhounds, my little
detectives. There’s nothing very awful about those, Sylvia. They’ve
done their work as nature gave ’em to do it. I knew that as soon as
they got out, they would find the trail.”
“And what are they?”
“Carrion beetles,” said Average Jones. “Where the vultures of the
insect kingdom are gathered together, there the quarry lies.”
Sylvia Graham drew a long breath. “I’m all right now,” she pronounced.
“There’s nothing left, I suppose, but to leave this house. And to thank
you. How am I ever to thank you?” She lifted her eyes to his.
“Never mind the thanks,” said Average Jones unevenly. “It was nothing.”
“It was everything! It was wonderful!” cried the girl, and held out her
slender hands to him.
As they clasped warmly upon his, Average Jones’ reason lost its
balance. He forgot that he was in that house on an equivocal footing;
he forgot that he had exposed and disgraced Sylvia Graham’s near
relative; he forgot that this was but his third meeting with Sylvia
Graham herself; he forgot everything except that the sum total of all
that was sweetest and finest and most desirable in womanhood stood warm
and vivid before him; and, bending over the little, clinging hands, he
pressed his lips to them. Only for a moment. The hands slipped from
his. There was a quick, frightened gasp, and the girl’s face, all
aflush with a new, sweet fearfulness and wondering confusion, vanished
behind a ponderous swinging door.
The young man’s knees shook a little as he walked forward and put his
lips close to the lintel.
“Sylvia.”
There was a faint rustle from within.
“I’m sorry. I mean, I’m glad. Gladder than of anything I’ve ever done
in my life.”
Silence from within.
“If I’ve frightened you, forgive me. I couldn’t help it. It was
stronger than I. This isn’t the place where I can tell you. Sylvia, I’m
going now.”
No answer.
“The work is done,” he continued. “You won’t need me any more.” Did he
hear, from within, a faint indrawn breath? “Not for any help that I can
give. But I—I shall need you always, and long for you. Listen, there
mustn’t be any misunderstanding about this, dear. If you send for me,
it must be because you want me; knowing that, when I come, I shall come
for you. Good-by, dear.”
“Good-by.” It was the merest whisper from behind the door. But it
echoed in the tones of a thousand golden hopes and dismal fears in the
whirling brain of Average Jones as he walked back to his offices.
Two days later he sat at his desk, in a murk of woe. Nor word nor sign
had come to him from Miss Sylvia Graham. He frowned heavily as Simpson
entered the inner sanctum with the usual packet of clippings.
“Leave them,” he ordered.
“Yes, sir.” The confidential clerk lingered, looking uncomfortable.
“Anything from yesterday’s lot, sir?”
“Haven’t looked them over yet.”
“Or day before’s?”
“Haven’t taken those up either.”
“Pardon me, Mr. Jones., but—are you ill, sir?”
“No,” snapped Average Jones.
“Ramson is inquiring whether he shall ship more beetles. I see in the
paper that judge Ackroyd has sailed for Europe on six hours’ notice, so
I suppose you won’t want any more?”
Average Jones mentioned a destination for Rawson’s beetles deeper than
they had, ever digged for prey.
“Yes, Sir,” assented Simpson. “But if I might suggest, there’s a very
interesting advertisement in yesterday’s paper repeated this morn—”
“I don’t want to see it.”
“No, Sir. But—but still—it—it seems to have a strange reference to the
burial of the million-dollar dog, and an invitation that I thought—”
“Where is it? Give it to me!” For once in his life, high pressure of
excitement had blotted out Average Jones’ drawl. His employee thrust
into his hand this announcement from the _Banner_ of that morning:
DIED—At 100 West 26th Street, Sept. 14, Peter Paul, a dog, for many
years the faithful and fond companion of the late Amelia Van Haltern.
Burial in accordance with the wish and will of Mrs. Van Haltern, at the
family estate, Schuylkill, Sept. 17, at o’clock. His friend, Don
Quixote, is especially bidden to come, if he will.
Average Jones leaped to his feet. “My parable,” he cried. “Don Quixote
and the damsel in distress. Where’s my hat? Where’s the time-table? Get
a cab! Simpson, you idiot, why didn’t you make me read this before,
confound you! I mean God bless you. Your salary’s doubled from to-day.
I’m off.”
“Yes, Sir,” said the bewildered Simpson, “but about Ramson’s beetles?”
“Tell him, to turn ’em out to pasture and keep ’em as long as they
live, at my expense,” called back Average Jones as the door slammed
behind him.
Miss Sylvia Graham looked down upon a slender finger ornamented with
the oddest and the most appropriate of engagement rings, a scarab
beetle red-banded with three deep-hued rubies.
“But, Average,” she said, and the golden laughter flickered again in
the brown depths of her eyes, “not even you could expect a girl to
accept a man through a keyhole.”
“I suppose not,” said Average Jones with a sigh of profoundest content.
“Some are for privacy in these matters; others for publicity. But I
suppose I’m the first man in history who ever got his heart’s answer in
an advertisement.”
THE END