THE TAN SATCHEL
Ordinarily Hugh Podmore, secretary to the President of the Canadian
Lake Shores Railway, took a keen interest in his work. If anything, he
applied himself more industriously during the many absences of his
chief than when President Wade was there to observe and commend, a zeal
which might or might not have been a tribute to his conscientiousness.
But to-day Mr. Podmore, although dressed with that care which
habitually imparted to his well proportioned figure something of the
beau brummel,--to-day he was not quite his customary polite self.
Things irritated him which ordinarily he would not have noticed, and
the morning had dragged for him in quite an unusual way. He had spent
much time gazing absently out of the office window at the traffic in
the street below, with many futile glances at his watch.
The first shop whistle that led the noonday medley found him pulling
down the lid of his roll-top desk and he was reaching for his raincoat
when his stenographer entered to inform him that there was a gentleman
outside who would not take "No" for an answer. In no very gracious
mood he snatched the card from the girl's hand; but the name meant
nothing to him and he flung aside his gloves in resentment of the
interruption.
"Show'm in," he growled, unlocking the desk and shoving back the lid
with a bang.
The big young man who entered in answer to the summons enquired for the
President. Everybody who came into that anteroom began the same way
and Podmore tilted back in his chair and appraised the other coldly,
noting two things particularly--the young man's athletic build and the
very marked discoloration of his left eye. Another job hunter!
"State your business, please."
"You will excuse me," said Kendrick, "but the matter is entirely
personal between Mr. Wade and myself. Is he in?"
It was a little thing to arouse Podmore's ire. Ordinarily Hugh Podmore
was an excellent secretary; but the caller's refusal to state his
business or produce his credentials for inspection angered him. He was
used to this extreme anxiety of visitors to see the Chief in person; it
was a characteristic of the job-hunting crowd.
"The President's out of town," he said irritably. "Besides, he
wouldn't see you until you had told me your business anyway. What do
you think he keeps a secretary for?"
"To be civil to the public," said Kendrick evenly. "When do you expect
him back?" and there was a directness in his look which Podmore found
unexpectedly disconcerting.
"Hard to say. He's on the go continually. If your business is
important----"
"It is important."
"Then, if you'll give me particulars----," suggested Podmore, reaching
for his memorandum pad.
"Be good enough to answer my question, please. When will Mr. Wade be
in his office?"
"Sorry, but it's impossible to say, Mr."--he glanced at the card
deliberately--"Kendrick. If you are looking for a job----"
"I want to see Mr. Wade personally and as soon as possible," repeated
Kendrick, keeping his temper with difficulty. "When will he be
available?"
"He's gone on a trip--to the Hot Springs," snapped Podmore. "Come back
in a month or six weeks and perhaps you can see him then. Good day,
sir."
For a few minutes after the big young man had bowed himself out with
mock humility, Mr. Podmore stood fingering the card and frowning at the
window. It was an engraved card, his fingers told him. He did not
like feeling that he had made a mistake in any way; but that is
precisely how he did feel. Yet he was sure he had never met this young
man before, in spite of a certain familiarity of face that haunted him.
Not being a regular reader of the sporting pages, he was at a loss to
account for this, as he prided himself on his memory for faces.
With a shrug in dismissal of the inconsequential, Mr. Podmore went to
lunch. He had comfortable quarters at the Queen's Hotel, just a block
from the Union Station, and after a light lunch in the big dining-room
he idled about the rambling old rotunda for an hour or more, smoking
many cigarettes and attempting to read a magazine. The solicitous
anxiety of his waiter during luncheon had earned that surprised
individual a rebuke and cost him the usual tip; the friendly advances
of a hotel guest, which ordinarily would have been met by equal
geniality, finally sent Podmore up in the old-fashioned elevator to his
room, where he locked the door and began pacing restlessly back and
forth. Not until a sixth glance at his watch indicated the approach of
2 o'clock did his unusual fidgetiness begin to disappear; but when at
last he walked briskly out of the hotel Mr. Podmore, to all intents,
had regained his normal self-possession.
He went straight to the down-town offices of the Alderson Construction
Company, arriving punctual to the minute of his appointment. Both
Nickleby and Alderson were already there.
"Well, we're all here, Alderson. Are you waiting for somebody to open
with prayer?" complained J. Cuthbert Nickleby with an impatient glance
at his watch after the greetings were over. "I don't see why the devil
you needed me here at all, Pod. Why all the ceremony?" The President
of the Interprovincial Loan & Savings Company was a thin, sallow man
with a thin, tight line of a mouth. The cynicism of his expression was
chronic.
"Because you'd be the first to holler if anything went wrong," retorted
Podmore, eyeing him pointedly as he tilted his hat to the back of his
head and proceeded calmly to skin the glove from his left hand. "We're
all in this together, J. C., and that's why I insisted on you being
here--to see that everything is according to Hoyle."
"Aint getting cold feet already are you?"
An easy laugh was Mr. Podmore's only rejoinder to this insult. They
both watched Alderson, who had swung open the door of the safe and was
reaching into its depths. The contractor was stout and florid, and his
face was flushed as he rose jerkingly from his knee and tossed a
package of crisp bank notes to the table.
"Well, there 'tis, just as it come from the Inter-provincial this
mornin'," he remarked, and picked up his cigar from the edge of the
safe.
"Look at the way he tosses it around, would you!" chuckled Podmore.
"You could buy a bunch of peanuts with that package, Frank,--a million
bags at a nickle the bag." This was a hit at Alderson's fondness for
munching peanuts, and Alderson's tenor laugh led the trio. Podmore
picked up the package and riffled the bills carelessly. "Counted it,
J. C.?"
"Fifty thousand," nodded Nickleby.
"That satchel come, Alderson? Thanks." Podmore held it up--an
ordinary cheap satchel of medium size, tan in color, imitation leather
and imitation brass catches. "I bought this, J. C., so that we'd have
one that hadn't been tampered with and that couldn't be identified as
belonging to any of us, you understand. All right, Frank, seal her up."
Alderson placed the package of bills in a large, strong blue linen
envelope which he had ready to hand, and carefully gummed down the
flap. Under the amused eye of Nickleby he proceeded to hold a stick of
gray sealing-wax in the flame of a match and to daub this additional
precaution upon the flap. The envelope was then placed in the new tan
satchel, the catches snapped and the satchel locked by Podmore, who
thereupon walked over to the President of the Interprovincial Loan &
Savings Company and handed him the key.
"That stays in your pocket till you get to Blatch Ferguson's office,
Nickleby. You hand it to Ferguson personally," and again Podmore eyed
the banker keenly. "Let him do the opening himself. All you're there
for is to see that he actually gets this money, and that ends the
transaction so far as we're concerned." He winked, and both the
gentlemen laughed as if much humor underlay the remark.
"I will now proceed to put on our little private identification mark,"
continued Podmore with an air of having thought of everything, and he
made a triangular scratch on one end of the satchel with his
pocket-knife.
"Good Lord, Pod!" exclaimed the financier with a laugh. "Is it
necessary to have all this fuss over this thing?"
"Take all the chances you like when you're by your lonesome, old man;
but you don't do it when I'm with you," said Mr. Hugh Podmore,
smilingly unperturbed by ridicule. "It's the fellow who overlooks
these very things that sometimes gets stung. It isn't at all likely,
I'll admit, that the simple delivery of this money a distance of a few
blocks requires all this 'fuss,' as you call it; but why take chances
just to save a little trouble? Pays to play safe every time, J. C.
What about that detective, Alderson?"
"Oh, that feller's on the job. Here, you can see'm standin' out there
on the corner, waitin' fer our man to show up." Podmore followed
Alderson to the window. "Naw, over there to the right--beside the
post. Must be a good half hour since his office phoned he was leavin'.
Say, he's lookin' up here. I'll give 'm the high sign now."
"Well, I guess everything's O.K., then. Call in your messenger and get
a move on. I'm due at the depot soon to meet the Chief." Podmore
dropped into a chair and lighted a cigarette with a look of
satisfaction on his face.
Alderson leaned over and pressed a button. The young man who responded
was James Stiles, bookkeeper and general office clerk. As he stood in
the doorway, respectful enquiry in his whole attitude, pen in hand,
linen office jacket sagging at the pockets, forearms encased in black
sateen sleeve-protectors and a daub of ink on his fingers, there was
little to distinguish him from hundreds of his type to be seen in
modern offices. He had rather a pleasant face, Podmore thought, a
little dull perhaps in its ingenuousness. He was not much more than a
boy.
"Jimmy," instructed Alderson briskly, "drop whatever you're at and take
this satchel over to Mr. Ferguson's office in the Brokers' Bank
Building. It's got some mighty important legal papers inside an' I
want you to be sure an' hand it personally to Mr. Ferguson himself. I
told him I'd send 'em over right after lunch; so you don't need to say
nothin'--just hand it to Mr. Ferguson, y'understand. Blatchford
Ferguson, the lawyer,--you know where his office is."
"Yes, sir. Want me to ask for a receipt?"
"Uh? No, never mind a receipt. It'll be all right."
The young bookkeeper picked up the satchel, nodding respectfully to the
President of the Interprovincial Loan & Savings Company as he quietly
closed the door behind him. He had been formerly employed at the
Interprovincial; in fact, it was to Nickleby's personal recommendation
that he owed his present position with the construction company.
The departure of Stiles with the satchel, of whose precious contents he
had been kept in ignorance, was a signal for the separation of the trio
in Alderson's office. With a wave of the hand Podmore hurried off
towards the Union Station, and presently J. Cuthbert Nickleby made his
way more leisurely to his waiting automobile.
On the corner opposite the building in which the Alderson Construction
Company had its down-town offices the man from the Brady Detective
Agency was lighting a fresh cigar. He sauntered around the corner,
then quickened his pace to get closer to the briskly walking young man
with the tan satchel. He continued to follow the bookkeeper at a
convenient distance.
It was the season when those who have the misfortune to be confined to
indoor tasks chafe most in the leash--a beautiful May day of blue sky
and sunshine and balmy air that called insistently to open places of
green grass and the luxury of idleness and vagrant dreaming. Young
Jimmy Stiles felt the call and he skipped along with carefree enjoyment
of his brief respite. He laughed gaily at a pair of dogs who seemed
inclined to question each other's veracity and sent them scampering
with a whoop, swinging the satchel around his head. He pulled down his
vest, felt his tie and winked boldly as he passed a pretty girl. He
broke into a whistle presently, practising the latest rag-time air with
an earnestness which found no ennui in repetition of tune, and it was
while thus absorbed that he went by the Jessup Grill. He was well
beyond the entrance before he realized that his name was being called
and that somebody had darted out from the doorway to overtake him.
"Oh, there, Jimmy! Won't you say good-bye to me?"
"Why, hello, Mr. Clayton," grinned Stiles as he took the extended hand.
"Goin' away?"
"Holidays can't last forever, Jimmy. I'm leaving for home this
afternoon--just getting ready to go to the depot when I saw you. Come
on in and join me in a glass of beer for good luck."
"Nothin' doin'! 'The lips that touch liquor shall never touch mine',"
recited Stiles, rolling his eyes in exaggerated piety. "No, honest, I
can't," he protested as the other pulled on his arm. "I'm on an
important message for the boss an' I got to hustle right back to the
office."
"Aw, come on. It won't take a minute. I'm in a hustle myself to catch
the train; but I want to give you a message for----" Robert Clayton
hesitated, coughed in slight embarrassment, and looked helpless.
"----for somebody you know up at the church," he pleaded.
Jimmy Stiles nodded in grinning comprehension.
"Well, you know how to pick 'em, Mr. Clayton. I'll say that for you.
Anne's a mighty swell girl."
"I've never met a finer one," said Mr. Clayton, looking serious.
"Oh, this town's full of 'em," cried Jimmy generously. "Say, they got
a long lemonade they don't make bad in here--sliced orange and a cherry
on top. I'll go you one. I guess it won't take a jiff."
"Good!" cried Clayton, leading the way without more ado into the Jessup.
He picked up his raincoat which he had left on a chair near the door,
flung over his travelling bag, and carried both with him through the
swing doors into the buffet. Here they found a vacant table and
Clayton beckoned a waiter and set his grip and coat on the floor
between the two chairs. Stiles dropped the tan satchel alongside the
raincoat and grinned across at Clayton with evident pleasure. This was
the right way for gentlemen to bid each other farewell, and he helped
himself from the other's proffered cigarette case with the air of doing
this sort of thing every day. Neither of them appeared to pay any
attention to the man who entered behind them, sat down at the table
next the wall and ordered a glass of beer; patrons were coming and
going and the man was just an ordinary citizen entitled to quench his
thirst if he so desired.
The two young fellows chatted and laughed over their refreshments for
perhaps five or ten minutes. It was Clayton who finally glanced at his
watch and jumped to his feet. He picked up raincoat and grip and shook
hands. Stiles picked up the tan satchel and out on the street they
shook hands once more. Clayton boarded a street-car, and with a final
wave of good-will Jimmy Stiles continued on his way.
At a convenient distance the private detective followed. He walked
into the Brokers' Bank Building just as the bookkeeper pushed the
elevator bell. They went up in the same elevator to the fifth floor,
where they both got out. The detective, sauntering down the corridor,
observed Stiles enter the office of Blatchford Ferguson, Barrister,
Notary Public, etc.
With a grunt he turned on his heel and descended to the street, where
he lighted another stogey and returned the way he had come. Arriving
finally at the offices of the Alderson Construction Company, he was
admitted at once to Alderson's presence and reported that the tan
satchel had been delivered at its destination without mishap.
As he finished speaking the telephone rang and Alderson lifted down the
receiver with a nod of dismissal. The detective's hand was on the
doorknob when he turned quickly, viewing with alarm the sudden
bewilderment and blank consternation which had crept into the
contractor's heavy face as he listened to the agitated voice of J.
Cuthbert Nickleby.
"Brady's man? Yes, he's here now--Sure, I'll hold him--No, not back
yet--Sure. Sure I will--Eh? Say, Mr. Nickleby, fer the love o' Mike,
what's wrong?--WHA-AT!"
Alderson wildly jiggled the hook of the telephone instrument, but
Nickleby had rung off. He stared across at the anxious representative
of the Brady Detective Agency, his thick loose lower lip hanging in
dismay. For the moment he was bereft of speech.
"What's the matter?"
"Uh? Matter?" echoed Alderson vacuously. Then he pounded the desk
with his fat fist while his face grew red. "_Matter!_" he shouted.
"You're a heluva detective, you are! That's what's the matter. The
mon--I mean--the papers--in the satchel, you fathead!--stolen right
under your nose!"