'IT IS OUR FIRST CLUE.'
Miss Jenrys met me that morning almost at the threshold. She had
passed a restless night, for my message had not wholly allayed her
fear, and she did not conceal the fact.
'I have been very anxious,' were her first words. 'Perhaps I have been
foolish, but somehow I seem to have got into a new world, and I might
very well pose for a Braddon heroine. I believe I am growing
hysterical. What with my own little mystery, which seems to have
stepped into the background, happily for me, and all the bigger
mysteries--but there,' breaking into a nervous laugh, 'I can hold my
tongue. Now tell me what happened last night. Oh!' catching my look of
surprise, 'something happened, I know. I felt it.'
She was indeed woefully nervous, but to withhold anything would only
increase the strain; so I told her as briefly as possible the story of
my encounter, and the part played in it by Lossing and Dave. But I did
not speak of Dave's meeting with Monsieur Voisin, and I hardly needed
to tell her how it happened that my friend and Lossing were so
fortunately at hand.
'I am not surprised,' she said, when I had told my story, 'but I am,
oh, so thankful that you escaped with nothing worse. I felt so sure
there was danger, and I urged you into it. But if you had not gone, I
feel certain it would have been worse.'
She talked on in this strain for some moments, and it was plain to me,
though she did not put the thought into words, that she believed the
attack was meant for Lossing, and not for myself.
Suddenly she sprang up. 'I am forgetting poor Gerald Trent!' she
exclaimed, and crossing the room, unlocked her desk, took out the
letter, and placed it in my hands. It was a long letter, full of
lamentations and repetitions; telling the story in a rambling,
exclamatory, hysterical fashion; the letter of a young girl, a
stranger to sorrow and its discipline, who finds herself suddenly
plunged into a labyrinth of fear, terror, suspense; loving much and
tortured through that love; and her story was briefly this:
Mr. Trent had seized the opportunity afforded by the change in his
wife's condition, which, while neither really better nor worse, was
much quieter. 'In fact,' wrote Miss O'Neil, 'while she does not
recognise any of us, she constantly fancies us all about her, and she
talks to him in such a low, pathetic, pitiful tone, half an hour at a
time, and then drops into a doze, only to wake up and begin over
again. She does not know us, and while in this state, Dr. Lane says,
she is better alone with the nurse.' This being the case, Mr. Trent
had left home for a day to look after some long-neglected business
matter, and in his absence the letter had arrived. It was addressed to
Mr. Trent in a strange hand, a woman's hand it would seem, and it was
from Chicago. They had waited in anxious suspense until, chancing to
think that it might be an important message and a prompt answer
required, Miss Trent had, after some hesitation, opened the letter, a
copy of which was at this point inserted. It ran thus, beginning with
Mr. Trent's full name and correct address:
'SIR,
'In writing this I am perhaps risking my own life, as your
son's is risked every day that he passes a prisoner in a
place where he is as safely hidden as if he were already out
of the world.
'Not only is your boy a prisoner, but he is a sick man. Your
advertised rewards have been read and laughed at. The men who
have him in charge are no common criminals. They mean to
secure a fortune in return for young Trent. They know that
his father is a millionaire, and his sweetheart an heiress in
her own right.
'It is in my power, as one of the party in possession, to
release your son. I waste no time in platitudes, but state
frankly here my object in thus addressing you. I wish to
leave the clique for reasons of my own, and to do this I must
have money. This is why I propose to help you for a
consideration. The "clique" will take no less than a modest
fortune, hundreds of thousands of dollars. I will accept ten
thousand. For this sum I will find a way to set your son at
liberty.
'This is my plan: You no doubt have in Chicago some friend
who can and will oblige you. Request this friend to insert in
three of the city papers here an advertisement as follows: If
you accept you will say, "Number three, we decline," which I
will read by contraries. You will then send by express, to be
called for, a package containing ten thousand dollars in
bank-notes--none larger than one hundred nor smaller than
ten--and a letter in which you shall bind yourself not to
take advantage in any way of my application for this packet
at the express office; not to set a watch upon me, or in any
way attempt to entrap me. This done, I will agree on my part
to send you, twenty-four hours after receipt of your package,
a letter telling you in detail where your son is and how to
reach him. I will not agree to betray his captors; I would
not be safe anywhere if I did; and it is liberty without a
master, and an easier and a safer life, that I seek. I will
also let your son know that he may expect a rescue.
'In proposing this I am running a risk, and in accepting it,
while you will risk your money, I, if you betray me, risk my
life. If you accept this proposal you will see your son
alive, and soon. If you refuse--he is in the hands of
desperate men, who will never give him up except on their own
terms; they will wait until, driven to despair, you will
offer them, through the press, a fortune, and--even then you
may receive, after long waiting, only a corpse. As to the
search you are making, we know your men and their methods,
and they are capable of taking a bribe if it is large enough.
It may interest you to know that they have already held one
amicable meeting with our leaders, and in the end you are
likely to pay them double. As to finding your son, the men
who have him safe and secure will not hesitate to take his
life the moment they know that they are likely to lose the
game. I do not threaten, but I do assure you that your best
chance of seeing your son alive and in his right mind lies
in your sending me the two words, "We decline," with express
to E. Roe.
'Yours,
'ON THE SQUARE.'
A horrible letter, indeed! and the awful pictures which poor Hilda
O'Neil's excited imagination drew of the possible situations, in some
one of which her lover might be suffering, lent the last touch of
gloom to the wretched whole. She saw him in some dingy cellar, ill
unto death, neglected, helpless, and heartbroken; she saw him drugged
into insanity, a possibility hinted at by the artful writer of the
anonymous letter, and which I had, more than once, considered as both
possible and probable, and she implored Miss Jenrys to help her and
save her lover.
'June, my life, my very life is in your hands! I cannot wait for Mr.
Trent; eight long hours almost! I must act. Papa left me _carte
blanche_ at the bank; I was to draw as I needed, and I will go at
once, as soon as this letter is despatched, and see that the money is
secured and sent to you; and the letter--the promise--Mr. Trent must
make it, and he will. But the answer, June, put that in the paper at
once, so that Gerry may soon know that he is to be released. You won't
refuse, I know; and, June, telegraph me the moment it is done,' etc.
When I had put the letter down, after reading the copied portion
twice, Miss Jenrys asked breathlessly:
'What must be done?'
I put into her hand Mr. Trent's letter, received the previous night,
and when she had read it, she looked troubled.
'He seems to doubt this letter?'
'And so do I.'
'But why? how? It sounds plausible.'
'Too plausible. I must think this matter over. Mind, I do not say the
letter was not written by some dissatisfied member of the band, but
don't you see its weak point? He may wish to leave them, and doubtless
would like to depart with a full pocket; but he would never dare to
release Trent, even if he could. It's simply a trick. They are playing
artfully upon the anxiety, the suspense, the wretched state of fear
and hope and dread in which young Trent's friends are held, to extort
from them a little money, which will keep them in comfort while they
wear out either the father or the son.'
'How? Tell me how.'
'I wish I could! I will tell you how it looks to me. Young Trent has
been missing now more than a fortnight----'
'Three weeks, almost.'
'You are right. Now, here are three theories: First, he may be dead.
He would hardly submit to capture and imprisonment without resistance,
and may have died while a prisoner. Next, he may have been so drugged
as to have driven him out of his senses. Or, he may be a prisoner in
some secure retreat, while his captors are trying to break his spirit
and force him to write to his friends for a great sum of money by way
of ransom. But we must act now and speculate later upon all these
possibilities. Do you think Miss O'Neil can have secured the money?'
'I do; yes. Her father's liberality is well known. She could borrow
the amount if need be; she comes into her mother's fortune in a few
months.'
'Then we must keep a man constantly at the express office on the
look-out for E. Roe.' I got up and caught at my hat.
'Are you going now?'
'Miss Jenrys, there is not a moment to lose. That money, if sent, must
be stopped, if it is possible! And I must see my partner. Thank
goodness, we have an actual clue at last!'
'At last! A clue! What do you mean?'
I turned at the door. 'Don't you see that this is really the first
hint we have had to indicate that young Trent is still alive and a
prisoner. Up to this moment all has been theory and surmise. If this
letter is not a wretched fraud, a bold scheme to obtain money, hatched
in the brain of some villain who has seen the advertised rewards and
knows nothing about Trent, it is our first clue, and through it we may
find him.' And promising to call upon her again that evening, or
sooner if possible, I hastened to the nearest telegraph-office.