"We're having a big shake-up down at the office, none of your 'new
broom' business, either. Real reform it is, this time."
"And you--are you going or coming?" inquired Craig with an interested
twinkle.
"Coming, Craig, coming," answered Jack enthusiastically. "They've put
me in charge of a sort of detective force as a special deputy surveyor
to rout out some smuggling that we know is going on. If I make good it
will go a long way for me--with all this talk of efficiency and economy
down in Washington these days."
"What's on your mind now?" asked Kennedy observantly. "Can I help you
in any way?"
Herndon had taken each of us by an arm and walked us over to a stone
bench in the shade of the library building.
"You have read the accounts in the afternoon papers of the peculiar
death of Mademoiselle Violette, the little French modiste, up here on
Forty-sixth Street?" he inquired.
"Yes," answered Kennedy. "What has that to do with customs reform?"
"A good deal, I fear," Herndon continued. "It's part of a case that has
been bothering us all summer. It's the first really big thing I've been
up against and it's as ticklish a bit of business as even a veteran
treasury agent could wish."
Herndon looked thoughtfully at the passing crowd on the other side of
the balustrade and continued. "It started, like many of our cases, with
the anonymous letter writer. Early in the summer the letters began to
come in to the deputy surveyor's office, all unsigned, though quite
evidently written in a woman's hand, disguised of course, and on rather
dainty notepaper. They warned us of a big plot to smuggle gowns and
jewellery from Paris. Smuggling jewellery is pretty common because
jewels take up little space and are very valuable. Perhaps it doesn't
sound to you like a big thing to smuggle dresses, but when you realise
that one of those filmy lacy creations may often be worth several
hundred, if not thousand, dollars, and that it needs only a few of them
on each ship that comes in to run up into the thousands, perhaps
hundreds of thousands in a season, you will see how essential it is to
break up that sort of thing. We've been getting after the individual
private smugglers pretty sharply this summer and we've had lots of
criticism. If we could land a big fellow and make an object-lesson of
the extent of the thing I believe it would leave our critics of the
press without a leg to stand on.
"At least that was why I was interested in the letters. But it was not
until a few days ago that we got a tip that gave us a real working
clue, for the anonymous letters had been very vague as to names, dates,
and places, though bold enough as to general charges, as if the writer
were fearful of incriminating herself--or himself. Strange to say, this
new clue came from the wife of one of the customs men. She happened to
be in a Broadway manicure shop one day when she heard a woman talking
with the manicurist about fall styles, and she was all attention when
she heard the customer say, 'You remember Mademoiselle Violette's--that
place that had the exquisite things straight from Paris, and so
cheaply, too? Well, Violette says she'll have to raise her prices so
that they will be nearly as high as the regular stores. She says the
tariff has gone up, or something, but it hasn't, has it?'
"The manicurist laughed knowingly, and the next remark caught the
woman's attention. 'No, indeed. But then, I guess she meant that she
had to pay the duty now. You know they are getting much stricter. To
tell the truth, I imagine most of Violette's goods were--well--'
"'Smuggled?' supplied the customer in an undertone.
"The manicurist gave a slight shrug of the shoulders and a bright
little yes of a laugh.
"That was all. But it was enough. I set a special customs officer to
watch Mademoiselle, a clever fellow. He didn't have time to find out
much, but on the other hand I am sure he didn't do anything to alarm
Mademoiselle. That would have been a bad game. His case was progressing
favourably and he had become acquainted with one of the girls who
worked in the shop. We might have got some evidence, but suddenly this
morning he walked up to my desk and handed me an early edition of an
afternoon paper. Mademoiselle Violette had been discovered dead in her
shop by the girls when they came to work this morning. Apparently she
had been there all night, but the report was quite indefinite and I am
on my way up there now to meet the coroner, who has agreed to wait for
me."
"You think there is some connection between her death and the letters?"
put in Craig.
"Of course I can't say, yet," answered Herndon dubiously. "The papers
seem to think it was a suicide. But then why should she commit suicide?
My man found out that among the girls it was common gossip that she was
to marry Jean Pierre, the Fifth Avenue jeweller, of the firm of Lang
goods by Americans abroad. Well, the chief of our men in Paris cables
me that Pierre is known to have made extraordinarily heavy purchases of
made-up jewellery this season. For one thing, we believe he has
acquired from a syndicate a rather famous diamond necklace which it has
taken years to assemble and match up, worth about three hundred
thousand. You know the duty on made-up jewellery is sixty per cent.,
and even if he brought the stones in loose it would be ten per cent.,
which on a valuation of, say, two hundred thousand, means twenty
thousand dollars duty alone. Then he has a splendid 'dog collar' of
pearls, and, oh, a lot of other stuff. I know because we get our tips
from all sorts of sources and they are usually pretty straight. Some
come from dealers who are sore about not making sales themselves. So
you see there is a good deal at stake in this case and it may be that
in following it out we shall kill more than one bird. I wish you'd come
along with me up to Mademoiselle Violette's and give me an opinion."
Craig had already risen from the bench and we were walking up the
Avenue.
The establishment of Mademoiselle Violette consisted of a three-story
and basement brownstone house in which the basement and first floor had
been remodelled for business purposes. Mademoiselle's place, which was
on the first floor, was announced to the world by a neat little oval
gilt sign on the handrailing of the steps.
We ascended and rang the bell. As we waited I noticed that there were
several other modistes on the same street, while almost directly across
was a sign which proclaimed that on September 15 Mademoiselle Gabrielle
would open with a high class exhibition of imported gowns from Paris.
We entered. The coroner and an undertaker were already there, and the
former was expecting Herndon. Kennedy and I had already met him and he
shook hands cordially.
Mademoiselle Violette, it seemed, had rented the entire house and then
had sublet the basement to a milliner, using the first floor herself,
the second as a workroom for the girls whom she employed, while she
lived on the top floor, which had been fitted for light housekeeping
with a kitchenette. It was in the back room of the shop itself on the
first floor that her body had been discovered, lying on a davenport.
"The newspaper reports were very indefinite," began Herndon,
endeavouring to take in the situation. "I suppose they told nearly all
the story, but what caused her death? Have you found that out yet? Was
it poison or violence?"
The coroner said nothing, but with a significant glance at Kennedy he
drew a peculiar contrivance from his pocket. It had four round holes in
it and through each hole he slipped a finger, then closed his hand, and
exhibited his clenched fist. It looked as if he wore a series of four
metal rings on his fingers.
"Brass knuckles?" suggested Herndon, looking hastily at the body, which
showed not a sign of violence on the stony face.
The coroner shook his head knowingly. Suddenly he raised his fist. I
saw him press hard with his thumb on the upper end of the metal
contrivance. From the other end, just concealed under his little
finger, there shot out as if released by a magic spring a thin keen
little blade of the brightest and toughest steel. He was holding,
instead of a meaningless contrivance of four rings, a most dangerous
kind of stiletto or dagger upraised. He lifted his thumb and the blade
sprang back into its sheath like an extinguished spark of light.
"An Apache dagger, such as is used in the underworld of Paris," broke
out Kennedy, his eyes gleaming with interest.
The coroner nodded. "We found it," he said, "clasped loosely in her
hand. But it is only by expert medical testimony that we can determine
whether it was placed on her fingers before or after this happened. We
have photographed it, and the prints are being developed."
He had now uncovered the slight figure of the little French modiste. On
the dress, instead of the profuse flow of blood which we had expected
to see, there was a single round spot. And in the white marble skin of
her breast was a little, nearly microscopic puncture, directly over the
heart.
"She must have died almost instantly," commented Kennedy, glancing from
the Apache weapon to the dead woman and back again. "Internal
hemorrhage. I suppose you have searched her effects. Have you found
anything that gives a hint among them?"
"No," replied the coroner doubtfully, "I can't say we have--unless it
is the bundle of letters from Pierre, the jeweller. They seem to have
been engaged, and yet the letters stopped abruptly, and, well, from the
tone of the last one from him I should say there was a quarrel brewing."
An exclamation from Herndon followed. "The same notepaper and the same
handwriting as the anonymous letters," he cried.
But that was all. Go over the ground as Kennedy might he could find
nothing further than the coroner and Herndon had already revealed.
"About these people, Lang & Pierre," asked Craig thoughtfully when we
had left Mademoiselle's and were riding downtown to the customs house
with Herndon. "What do you know about them? I presume that Lang is in
America, if his partner is abroad."
"Yes, he is here in New York. I believe the firm has a rather unsavoury
reputation; they have to be watched, I am told. Then, too, one or the
other of the partners makes frequent trips abroad, mostly Pierre.
Pierre, as you see, was very intimate with Mademoiselle, and the
letters simply confirm what the girls told my detective. He was
believed to be engaged to her and I see no reason now to doubt that.
The fact is, Kennedy, it wouldn't surprise me in the least to learn
that it was he who engineered the smuggling for her as well as himself."
"What about the partner? What role does he play in your suspicions?"
"That's another curious feature. Lang doesn't seem to bother much with
the business. He is a sort of silent partner, although nominally the
head of the firm. Still, they both seem always to be plentifully
supplied with money and to have a good trade. Lang lives most of the
time up on the west shore of the Hudson, and seems to be more
interested in his position as commodore of the Riverledge Yacht Club
than in his business down here. He is quite a sport, a great motor-boat
enthusiast, and has lately taken to hydroplanes."
"I meant," repeated Kennedy, "what about Lang and Mademoiselle
Violette. Were they--ah--friendly?"
"Oh," replied Herndon, seeming to catch the idea. "I see. Of
course--Pierre abroad and Lang here. I see what you mean. Why, the girl
told my man that Mademoiselle Violette used to go motor-boating with
Lang, but only when her fiance, Pierre, was along. No, I don't think
she ever had anything to do with Lang, if that's what you are driving
at. He may have paid attentions to her, but Pierre was her lover, and I
haven't a doubt but that if Lang made any advances she repelled them.
She seems to have thought everything of Pierre."
We had reached Herndon's office by this time. Leaving word with his
stenographer to get the very latest reports from La Montaigne, he
continued talking to us about his work.
"Dressmakers, milliners, and jewellers are our worst offenders now," he
remarked as we stood gazing out of the window at the panorama of the
bay off the sea-wall of the Battery. "Why, time and again we unearth
what looks for all the world like a 'dressmakers' syndicate,' though
this case is the first I've had that involved a death. Really, I've
come to look on smuggling as one of the fine arts among crimes. Once
the smuggler, like the pirate and the highwayman, was a sort of
gentleman-rogue. But now it has become a very ladylike art. The extent
of it is almost beyond belief, too. It begins with the steerage and
runs right up to the absolute unblushing cynicism of the first cabin. I
suppose you know that women, particularly a certain brand of society
women, are the worst and most persistent offenders. Why, they even
boast of it. Smuggling isn't merely popular--it's aristocratic. But
we're going to take some of the flavour out of it before we finish."
He tore open a cable message which a boy had brought in. "Now, take
this, for instance," he continued. "You remember the sign across the
street from Mademoiselle Violette's, announcing that a Mademoiselle
Gabrielle was going to open a salon or whatever they call it? Well,
here's another cable from our Paris Secret Service with a belated tip.
They tell us to look out for a Mademoiselle Gabrielle--on La Montaigne,
too. That's another interesting thing. You know the various lines are
all ranked, at least in our estimation, according to the likelihood of
such offences being perpetrated by their passengers. We watch ships
from London, Liverpool, and Paris most carefully. Scandinavian ships
are the least likely to need watching. Well, Miss Roberts?"
"We have just had a wireless about La Montaigne" reported his
stenographer, who had entered while he was speaking, "and she is three
hundred miles east of Sandy Hook. She won't dock until to-morrow."
"Thank you. Well, fellows, it is getting late and that means nothing
more doing to-night. Can you be here early in the morning? We'll go
down the bay and 'bring in the ship,' as our men call it when the
deputy surveyor and his acting deputies go down to meet it at
Quarantine. I can't tell you how much I appreciate your kindness in
helping me. If my men get anything connecting Lang with Mademoiselle
Violette's case I'll let you know immediately."
It was a bright clear snappy morning, in contrast with the heat of the
day before, when we boarded the revenue tug at the Barge Office. The
waters of the harbour never looked more blue as they danced in the
early sunlight, flecked here and there by a foaming whitecap as the
conflicting tides eddied about. The shores of Staten Island were almost
as green as in the spring, and even the haze over the Brooklyn
factories had lifted. It looked almost like a stage scene, clear and
sharp, new and brightly coloured.
Perhaps the least known and certainly one of the least recognised of
the government services is that which includes the vigilant ships of
the revenue service. It was not a revenue cutter, however, on which we
were ploughing down the bay. The cutter lay, white and gleaming in the
morning sun, at anchor off Stapleton, like a miniature warship,
saluting as we passed. The revenue boats which steam down to Quarantine
and make fast to the incoming ocean greyhounds are revenue tugs.
Down the bay we puffed and buffeted for about forty minutes before we
arrived at the little speck of an island that is Quarantine. Long
before we were there we sighted the great La Montaigne near the group
of buildings on the island, where she had been waiting since early
morning for the tide and the customs officials. The tug steamed
alongside, and quickly up the high ladders swarmed the boarding officer
and the deputy collectors. We followed Herndon straight to the main
saloon, where the collectors began to receive the declarations which
had been made out on blanks furnished to the passengers on the voyage
over. They had had several days to write them out--the less excuse for
omissions.
Glancing at each hastily the collector detached from it the slip with
the number at the bottom and handed the number back, to be presented at
the inspector's desk at the pier, where customs inspectors were
assigned in turn.
"Number 140 is the one we want to watch," I heard Herndon whisper to
Kennedy. "That tall dark fellow over there."
I followed his direction cautiously and saw a sparely built, striking
looking man who had just filed his declaration and was chatting
vivaciously with a lady who was just about to file hers. She was a
clinging looking little thing with that sort of doll-like innocence
that deceives nobody.
"No, you don't have to swear to it," he said. "You used to do that, but
now you simply sign your name--and take a chance," he added, smiling
and showing a row of perfect teeth.
"Number 156," Herndon noted as the collector detached the stub and
handed it to her. "That was Mademoiselle Gabrielle."
The couple passed out to the deck, still chatting gaily.
"In the old days, before they got to be so beastly particular," I heard
him say, "I always used to get the courtesy of the port, an official
expedite. But that is over now."
The ship was now under way, her flags snapping in the brisk coolish
breeze that told of approaching autumn. We had passed up the lower bay
and the Narrows, and the passengers were crowded forward to catch the
first glimpse of the skyscrapers of New York.
On up the bay we ploughed, throwing the spray proudly as we went
Herndon employed the time in keeping a sharp watch on the tall, thin
man. Incidentally he sought out the wireless operator and from him
learned that a code wireless message had been received for Pierre,
apparently from his partner, Lang.
"There is no mention of anything dutiable in this declaration by 140
which corresponds with any of the goods mentioned in the first cable
from Paris," a collector remarked unobtrusively to Herndon, "nor in 156
corresponding to the second cable."
"I didn't suppose there would be," was his laconic reply. "That's our
job--to find the stuff."
At last La Montaigne was warped into the dock. The piles of first-class
baggage on the ship were raucously deposited on the wharf and slowly
the passengers filed down the plank to meet the line of white-capped
uniformed inspectors and plain-clothes appraisers. The comedy and
tragedy of the customs inspection had begun.
We were among the first to land. Herndon took up a position from which
he could see without being seen. In the semi-light of the little
windows in the enclosed sides of the pier, under the steel girders of
the arched roof like a vast hall, there was a panorama of a huge mass
of open luggage.
At last Number 140 came down, alone, to the roped-off dock. He walked
nonchalantly over to the little deputy surveyor's desk, and an
inspector was quickly assigned to him. It was all done neatly in the
regular course of business apparently. He did not know that in the
orderly rush the sharpest of Herndon's men had been picked out, much as
a trick card player will force a card on his victim.
Already the customs inspection was well along. One inspector had been
assigned to about each five passengers, and big piles of finery were
being remorselessly tumbled out in shapeless heaps and exposed to the
gaze of that part of the public which was not too much concerned over
the same thing as to its own goods and chattels. Reticules and purses
were being inspected. Every trunk was presumed to have a false bottom,
and things wrapped up in paper were viewed suspiciously and unrolled.
Clothes were being shaken and pawed. There did not seem to be much
opportunity for concealment.
Herndon now had donned the regulation straw hat of the appraiser, and
accompanied by us, posing as visitors, was sauntering about. At last we
came within earshot of the spot where the inspector was going through
the effects of 140.
Out of the corner of my eyes I could see that a dispute was in progress
over some trifling matter. The man was cool and calm. "Call the
appraiser," he said at last, with the air of a man standing on his
rights. "I object to this frisking of passengers. Uncle Sam is little
better than a pickpocket. Besides, I can't wait here all day. My
partner is waiting for me uptown."
Herndon immediately took notice. But it was quite evidently, after all,
only an altercation for the benefit of those who were watching. I am
sure he knew he was being watched, but as the dispute proceeded he
assumed the look of a man keenly amused. The matter, involving only a
few dollars, was finally adjusted by his yielding gracefully and with
an air of resignation. Still Herndon did not go and I am sure it
annoyed him.
Suddenly he turned and faced Herndon. I could not help thinking, in
spite of all that he must be so expert, that, if he really were a
smuggler, he had all the poise and skill at evasion that would entitle
him to be called a cast master of the art.
"You see that woman over there?" he whispered. "She says she is just
coming home after studying music in Paris."
We looked. It was the guileless ingenue, Mademoiselle Gabrielle.
"She has dutiable goods, all right. I saw her declaration. She is
trying to bring in as personal effects of a foreign resident gowns
which, I believe, she intends to wear on the stage. She's an actress."
There was nothing for Herndon to do but to act on the tip. The man had
got rid of us temporarily, but we knew the inspector would be, if
anything, more vigilant. I think he took even longer than usual.
Mademoiselle Gabrielle and her maid pouted and fussed over the renewed
examination which Herndon ordered. According to the inspector
everything was new and expensive; according to her, old, shabby, and
cheap. She denied everything, raged and threatened. But when, instead
of ordering the stamp "Passed" to be placed on her half dozen trunks
and bags which contained in reality only a few dutiable articles,
Herndon threatened to order them to the appraiser's stores and herself
to go to the Law Division if she did not admit the points in dispute,
there was a real scene.
"Generally, madame," he remonstrated, though I could see he was baffled
at finding nothing of the goods he had really expected to find,
"generally even for a first offence the goods are confiscated and the
court or district attorney is content to let the person off with a
fine. If this happens again we'll be more severe. So you had better pay
the duty on these few little matters, without that."
If he had been expecting to "throw a scare" into her, it did not
succeed. "Well, I suppose if I must, I must," she said, and the only
result of the diversion was that she paid a few dollars more than had
been expected and went off in a high state of mind.
Herndon had disappeared for a moment, after a whisper from Kennedy, to
instruct two of his men to shadow Mademoiselle Gabrielle and, later,
Pierre. He soon rejoined us and we casually returned to the vicinity of
our tall friend, Number 140, for whom I felt even less respect than
ever after his apparently ungallant action toward the lady he had been
talking with. He seemed to notice my attitude and he remarked
defensively for my benefit, "Only a patriotic act."
His inspector by this time had finished a most minute examination.
There was nothing that could be discovered, not a false book with a
secret spring that might disclose instead of reading matter a heap of
almost priceless jewels, not a suspicious bulging of any garment or of
the lining of a trunk or grip. Some of the goods might have been on his
person, but not much, and certainly there was no excuse for ordering a
personal examination, for he could not have hidden a tenth part of what
we knew he had, even under the proverbial porous plaster. He was
impeccable. Accordingly there was nothing for the inspector to do but
to declare a polite armistice.
"So you didn't find 'Mona Lisa' in a false bottom, and my trunks were
not lined with smuggled cigars after all," he rasped savagely as the
stamp "Passed" was at last affixed and he paid in cash at the little
window with its sign, "Pay Duty Here: U. S. Custom House," some hundred
dollars instead of the thousands Herndon had been hoping to collect, if
not to seize.