important duties in order to appear before Dr. Leslie in the coroner’s
inquest over the death of the chef. Dr. Lord was held for the Grand
Jury, but it was not until nearly noon that Craig returned.
We were just about to go out to luncheon, when the door buzzer sounded.
“A note for Mr. Kennedy,” announced a man in a police uniform, with a
blue anchor edged with white on his coat sleeve.
Craig tore open the envelope quickly with his forefinger. Headed
“Harbour Police, Station No. 3, Staten Island,” was an urgent message
from our old friend Deputy Commissioner O’Connor.
“I have taken personal charge of a case here that is sufficiently out
of the ordinary to interest you,” I read when Kennedy tossed the note
over to me and nodded to the man from the harbour squad to wait for us.
“The Curtis family wish to retain a private detective to work in
conjunction with the police in investigating the death of Bertha
Curtis, whose body was found this morning in the waters of Kill van
Kull.”
Kennedy and I lost no time in starting downtown with the policeman who
had brought the note.
The Curtises, as we knew, were among the prominent families of
Manhattan and I recalled having heard that at one time Bertha Curtis
had been an actress, in spite of the means and social position of her
family, from whom she had become estranged as a result.
At the station of the harbour police, O’Connor and another man, who was
in a state of extreme excitement, greeted us almost before we had
landed.
“There have been some queer doings about here,” exclaimed the deputy as
he grasped Kennedy’s hand, “but first of all let me introduce Mr.
Walker Curtis.”
In a lower tone as we walked up the dock O’Connor continued, “He is the
brother of the girl whose body the men in the launch at the station
found in the Kill this morning. They thought at first that the girl had
committed suicide, making it doubly sure by jumping into the water, but
he will not believe it and,—well, if you’ll just come over with us to
the local undertaking establishment, I’d like to have you take a look
at the body and see if your opinion coincides with mine.
“Ordinarily,” pursued O’Connor, “there isn’t much romance in harbour
police work nowadays, but in this case some other elements seem to be
present which are not usually associated with violent deaths in the
waters of the bay, and I have, as you will see, thought it necessary to
take personal charge of the investigation.
“Now, to shorten the story as much as possible, Kennedy, you know of
course that the legislature at the last session enacted laws
prohibiting the sale of such drugs as opium, morphine, cocaine, chloral
and others, under much heavier penalties than before. The Health
authorities not long ago reported to us that dope was being sold almost
openly, without orders from physicians, at several scores of places and
we have begun a crusade for the enforcement of the law. Of course you
know how prohibition works in many places and how the law is beaten.
The dope fiends seem to be doing the same thing with this law.
“Of course nowadays everybody talks about a ‘system’ controlling
everything, so I suppose people would say that there is a ‘dope trust.’
At any rate we have run up against at least a number of places that
seem to be banded together in some way, from the lowest down in
Chinatown to one very swell joint uptown around what the newspapers are
calling ‘Crime Square.’ It is not that this place is pandering to
criminals or the women of the Tenderloin that interests us so much as
that its patrons are men and women of fashionable society whose jangled
nerves seem to demand a strong narcotic.
“This particular place seems to be a headquarters for obtaining them,
especially opium and its derivatives.
“One of the frequenters of the place was this unfortunate girl, Bertha
Curtis. I have watched her go in and out myself, wild-eyed, nervous,
mentally and physically wrecked for life. Perhaps twenty-five or thirty
persons visit the place each day. It is run by a man known as ‘Big
Jack’ Clendenin who was once an actor and, I believe, met and
fascinated Miss Curtis during her brief career on the stage. He has an
attendant there, a Jap, named Nichi Moto, who is a perfect enigma. I
can’t understand him on any reasonable theory. A long time ago we
raided the place and packed up a lot of opium, pipes, material and
other stuff. We found Clendenin there, this girl, several others, and
the Jap. I never understood just how it was but somehow Clendenin got
off with a nominal fine and a few days later opened up again. We were
watching the place, getting ready to raid it again and present such
evidence that Clendenin couldn’t possibly beat it, when all of a sudden
along came this—this tragedy.”
We had at last arrived at the private establishment which was doing
duty as a morgue. The bedraggled form that had been bandied about by
the tides all night lay covered up in the cold damp basement. Bertha
Curtis had been a girl of striking beauty once. For a long time I gazed
at the swollen features before I realised what it was that fascinated
and puzzled me about her. Kennedy, however, after a casual glance had
arrived at at least a part of her story.
“That girl,” he whispered to me so that her brother could not hear,
“has led a pretty fast life. Look at those nails, yellow and dark. It
isn’t a weak face, either. I wouldn’t be surprised if the whole thing,
the Oriental glamour and all that, fascinated her as much as the drug.”
So far the case with its heartrending tragedy had all the earmarks of
suicide.
XI
THE OPIUM JOINT
O’Connor drew back the sheet which covered her and in the calf of the
leg disclosed an ugly bullet hole. Ugly as it was, however, it was
anything but dangerous and seemed to indicate nothing as to the real
cause of her death. He drew from his pocket a slightly misshapen bullet
which had been probed from the wound and handed it to Kennedy, who
examined both the wound and the bullet carefully. It seemed to be an
ordinary bullet except that in the pointed end were three or four
little round, very shallow wells or depressions only the minutest
fraction of an inch deep.
“Very extraordinary,” he remarked slowly. “No, I don’t think this was a
case of suicide. Nor was it a murder for money, else the jewels would
have been taken.”
O’Connor looked approvingly at me. “Exactly what I said,” he exclaimed.
“She was dead before her body was thrown into the water.”
“No, I don’t agree with you there,” corrected Craig, continuing his
examination of the body. “And yet it is not a case of drowning exactly,
either.”
“Strangled?” suggested O’Connor.
“By some jiu jitsu trick?” I put in, mindful of the queer-acting Jap at
Clendenin’s.
Kennedy shook his head.
“Perhaps the shock of the bullet wound rendered her unconscious and in
that state she was thrown in,” ventured Walker Curtis, apparently much
relieved that Kennedy coincided with O’Connor in disagreeing with the
harbour police as to the suicide theory.
Kennedy shrugged his shoulders and looked at the bullet again. “It is
very extraordinary,” was all he replied. “I think you said a few
moments ago, O’Connor, that there had been some queer doings about
here. What did you mean?”
“Well, as I said, the work of the harbour squad isn’t ordinarily very
remarkable. Harbour pirates aren’t murderous as a rule any more. For
the most part they are plain sneak thieves or bogus junk dealers who
work with dishonest pier watchmen and crooked canal boat captains and
lighter hands.
“But in this instance,” continued the deputy, his face knitting at the
thought that he had to confess another mystery to which he had no
solution, “it is something quite different. You know that all along the
shore on this side of the island are old, dilapidated and, some of
them, deserted houses. For several days the residents of the
neighbourhood have been complaining of strange occurrences about one
place in particular which was the home of a wealthy family in a past
generation. It is about a mile from here, facing the road along the
shore, and has in front of it and across the road the remains of an old
dock sticking out a few feet into the water at high tide.
“Now, as nearly as any one can get the story, there seems to have been
a mysterious, phantom boat, very swift, without lights, and with an
engine carefully muffled down which has been coming up to the old dock
for the past few nights when the tide was high enough. A light has been
seen moving on the dock, then suddenly extinguished, only to reappear
again. Who carried it and why, no one knows. Any one who has tried to
approach the place has had a scare thrown into him which he will not
easily forget. For instance, one man crept up and though he did not
think he was seen he was suddenly shot at from behind a tree. He felt
the bullet pierce his arm, started to run, stumbled, and next morning
woke up in the exact spot on which he had fallen, none the worse for
his experience except that he had a slight wound that will prevent his
using his right arm for some time for heavy work.
“After each visit of the phantom boat there is heard, according to the
story of the few neighbours who have observed it, the tramp of feet up
the overgrown stone walk from the dock and some have said that they
heard an automobile as silent and ghostly as the boat. We have been all
through the weird old house, but have found nothing there, except
enough loose boards and shutters to account for almost any noise or
combination of noises. However, no one has said there was anything
there except the tramp of feet going back and forth on the old
pavements outside. Two or three times shots have been heard, and on the
dock where most of the alleged mysterious doings have taken place we
have found one very new exploded shell of a cartridge.”
Craig took the shell which O’Connor drew from another pocket and trying
to fit the bullet and the cartridge together remarked “both from a .44,
probably one of those old-fashioned, long-barrelled makes.”
“There,” concluded O’Connor ruefully, “you know all we know of the
thing so far.”
“I may keep these for the present?” inquired Kennedy, preparing to
pocket the shell and the bullet, and from his very manner I could see
that as a matter of fact he already knew a great deal more about the
case than the police. “Take us down to this old house and dock, if you
please.”
Over and over, Craig paced up and down the dilapidated dock, his keen
eyes fastened to the ground, seeking some clue, anything that would
point to the marauders. Real persons they certainly were, and not any
ghostly crew of the bygone days of harbour pirates, for there was every
evidence of some one who had gone up and down the walk recently, not
once but many times.
Suddenly Kennedy stumbled over what looked like a sardine tin can,
except that it had no label or trace of one. It was lying in the thick
long matted grass by the side of the walk as if it had tumbled there
and had been left unnoticed.
Yet there was nothing so very remarkable about it in itself. Tin cans
were lying all about, those marks of decadent civilisation. But to
Craig it had instantly presented an idea. It was a new can. The others
were rusted.
He had pried off the lid and inside was a blackish, viscous mass.
“Smoking opium,” Craig said at last.
We retraced our steps pondering on the significance of the discovery.
O’Connor had had men out endeavouring all day to get a clue to the
motor car that had been mentioned in some of the accounts given by the
natives. So far the best he had been able to find was a report of a
large red touring car which crossed from New York on a late ferry. In
it were a man and a girl as well as a chauffeur who wore goggles and a
cap pulled down over his head so that he was practically
unrecognisable. The girl might have been Miss Curtis and, as for the
man, it might have been Clendenin. No one had bothered much with them;
no one had taken their number; no one had paid any attention where they
went after the ferry landed. In fact, there would have been no
significance to the report if it had not been learned that early in the
morning on the first ferry from the lower end of the island to New
Jersey a large red touring car answering about the same description had
crossed, with a single man and driver but no woman.
“I should like to watch here with you to-night, O’Connor,” said Craig
as we parted. “Meet us here. In the meantime I shall call on Jameson
with his well-known newspaper connections in the white light district,”
here he gave me a half facetious wink, “to see what he can do toward
getting me admitted to this gilded palace of dope up there on
Forty-fourth Street.”
After no little trouble Kennedy and I discovered our “hop joint” and
were admitted by Nichi Moto, of whom we had heard. Kennedy gave me a
final injunction to watch, but to be very careful not to seem to watch.
Nichi Moto with an eye to business and not to our absorbing more than
enough to whet our descriptive powers quickly conducted us into a large
room where, on single bamboo couches or bunks, rather tastefully made,
perhaps half a dozen habitues lay stretched at full length smoking
their pipes in peace, or preparing them in great expectation from the
implements on the trays before them.
Kennedy relieved me of the responsibility of cooking the opium by doing
it for both of us and, incidentally, dropping a hint not to inhale it
and to breathe as little of it as possible. Even then it made me feel
badly, though he must have contrived in some way to get even less of
the stuff than I. A couple of pipes, and Kennedy beckoned to Nichi.
“Where is Mr. Clendenin?” he asked familiarly. “I haven’t seen him yet.”
The Japanese smiled his engaging smile. “Not know,” was all he said,
and yet I knew the fellow at least knew better English, if not more
facts.
Kennedy had about started on our faking a third “pipe” when a new,
unexpected arrival beckoned excitedly to Nichi. I could not catch all
that was said but two words that I did catch were “the boss” and “hop
toy,” the latter the word for opium. No sooner had the man disappeared
without joining the smokers than Nichi seemed to grow very restless and
anxious. Evidently he had received orders to do something. He seemed
anxious to close the place and get away. I thought that some one might
have given a tip that the place was to be raided, but Kennedy, who had
been closer, had overheard more than I had and among other things he
had caught the word, “meet him at the same place.”
It was not long before we were all politely hustled out.
“At least we know this,” commented Kennedy, as I congratulated myself
on our fortunate escape, “Clendenin was not there, and there is
something doing to-night, for he has sent for Nichi.”
We dropped into our apartment to freshen up a bit against the long
vigil that we knew was coming that night. To our surprise Walker Curtis
had left a message that he wished to see Kennedy immediately and alone,
and although I was not present I give the substance of what he said. It
seemed that he had not wished to tell O’Connor for fear that it would
get into the papers and cause an even greater scandal, but it had come
to his knowledge a few days before the tragedy that his sister was
determined to marry a very wealthy Chinese merchant, an importer of
tea, named Chin Jung. Whether or not this had any bearing on the case
he did not know. He thought it had, because for a long time, both when
she was on the stage and later, Clendenin had had a great influence
over her and had watched with a jealous eye the advances of every one
else. Curtis was especially bitter against Clendenin.
As Kennedy related the conversation to me on our way over to Staten
Island I tried to piece the thing together, but like one of the famous
Chinese puzzles, it would not come out. I had to admit the possibility
that it was Clendenin who might have quarrelled over her attachment to
Chin Jung, even though I have never yet been able to understand what
the fascination is that some Orientals have over certain American girls.
All that night we watched patiently from a vantage point of an old shed
near both the house and the decayed pier. It was weird in the extreme,
especially as we had no idea what might happen if we had success and
saw something. But there was no reward for our patience. Absolutely
nothing happened. It was as though they knew, whoever they were, that
we were there. During the hours that passed O’Connor whiled away the
time in a subdued whisper now and then in telling us of his experiences
in Chinatown which he was now engaged in trying to clean up. From
Chinatown, its dens, its gamblers and its tongs we drifted to the
legitimate business interests there, and I, at least, was surprised to
find that there were some of the merchants for whom even O’Connor had a
great deal of respect. Kennedy evidently did not wish to violate in any
way the confidence of Walker Curtis, and mention of the name of Chin
Jung, but by a judicious question as to who the best men were in the
Celestial settlement he did get a list of half a dozen or so from
O’Connor. Chin Jung was well up in the list. However, the night wore
away and still nothing happened.
It was in the middle of the morning when we were taking a snatch of
sleep in our own rooms uptown that the telephone began to ring
insistently. Kennedy, who was resting, I verily believe, merely out of
consideration for my own human frailties, was at the receiver in an
instant. It proved to be O’Connor. He had just gone back to his office
at headquarters and there he had found a report of another murder.
“Who is it?” asked Kennedy, “and why do you connect it with this case?”
O’Connor’s answer must have been a poser, judging from the look of
surprise on Craig’s face. “The Jap—Nichi Moto?” he repeated. “And it
is the same sort of non-fatal wound, the same evidence of asphyxia, the
same circumstances, even down to the red car reported by residents in
the neighbourhood.”
Nothing further happened that day except this thickening of the plot by
the murder of the peculiar-acting Nichi. We saw his body and it was as
O’Connor said.
“That fellow wasn’t on the level toward Clendenin,” Craig mused after
we had viewed the second murder in the case. “The question is, who and
what was he working for?”
There was as yet no hint of answer, and our only plan was to watch
again that night. This time O’Connor, not knowing where the lightning
would strike next, took Craig’s suggestion and we determined to spend
the time cruising about in the fastest of the police motor boats, while
the force of watchers along the entire shore front of the city was
quietly augmented and ordered to be extra vigilant.
O’Connor at the last moment had to withdraw and let us go alone, for
the worst, and not the unexpected, happened in his effort to clean up
Chinatown. The war between the old rivals, the Hep Sing Tong and the On
Leong Tong, those ancient societies of troublemakers in the little
district, had broken out afresh during the day and three Orientals had
been killed already.
It is not a particularly pleasant occupation cruising aimlessly up and
down the harbour in a fifty-foot police boat, staunch and fast as she
may be.
Every hour we called at a police post to report and to keep in touch
with anything that might interest us. It came at about two o’clock in
the morning and of all places, near the Battery itself. From the front
of a ferry boat that ran far down on the Brooklyn side, what looked
like two flashlights gleamed out over the water once, then twice.
“Headlights of an automobile,” remarked Craig, scarcely taking more
notice of it, for they might have simply been turned up and down twice
by a late returning traveller to test them. We were ourselves near the
Brooklyn shore. Imagine our surprise to see an answering light from a
small boat in the river which was otherwise lightless. We promptly put
out our own lights and with every cylinder working made for the spot
where the light had flashed up on the river. There was something there
all right and we went for it.
On we raced after the strange craft, the phantom that had scared Staten
Island. For a mile or so we seemed to be gaining, but one of our
cylinders began to miss—the boat turned sharply around a bend in the
shore. We had to give it up as well as trying to overtake the ferry
boat going in the opposite direction.
Kennedy’s equanimity in our apparent defeat surprised me. “Oh, it’s
nothing, Walter,” he said. “They slipped away to-night, but I have
found the clue. To-morrow as soon as the Customs House is open you will
understand. It all centres about opium.”
At least a large part of the secret was cleared, too, as a result of
Kennedy’s visit to the Customs House. After years of fighting with the
opium ring on the Pacific coast, the ring had tried to “put one over”
on the revenue officers and smuggle the drug in through New York.
It did not take long to find the right man among the revenue officers
to talk with. Nor was Kennedy surprised to learn that Nichi Moto had
been in fact a Japanese detective, a sort of stool pigeon in
Clendenin’s establishment working to keep the government in touch with
the latest scheme.
The finding of the can of opium on the scene of the murder of Bertha
Curtis, and the chase after the lightless motor boat had at last placed
Kennedy on the right track. With one of the revenue officers we made a
quick trip to Brooklyn and spent the morning inspecting the ships from
South American ports docked in the neighbourhood where the phantom boat
had disappeared.
From ship to ship we journeyed until at last we came to one on which,
down in the chain locker, we found a false floor with a locker under
that. There was a compartment six feet square and in it lay, neatly
packed, fourteen large hermetically sealed cylinders, each full of the
little oblong tins such as Kennedy had picked up the other day—forty
thousand dollars’ worth of the stuff at one haul, to say nothing of the
thousands that had already been landed at one place or another.
It had been a good day’s work, but as yet it had not caught the slayer
or cleared up the mystery of Bertha Curtis. Some one or something had
had a power over the girl to lure her on. Was it Clendenin? The place
in Forty-fourth Street, on inquiry, proved to be really closed as tight
as a drum. Where was he?
All the deaths had been mysterious, were still mysterious. Bertha
Curtis had carried her secret with her to the grave to which she had
been borne, willingly it seemed, in the red car with the unknown
companion and the goggled chauffeur. I found myself still asking what
possible connection she could have with smuggling opium.
Kennedy, however, was indulging in no such speculations. It was enough
for him that the scene had suddenly shifted and in a most unexpected
manner. I found him voraciously reading practically everything that was
being printed in the papers about the revival of the tong war.
“They say much about the war, but little about the cause,” was his dry
comment. “I wish I could make up my mind whether it is due to the
closing of the joints by O’Connor, or the belief that one tong is
informing on the other about opium smuggling.”
Kennedy passed over all the picturesque features in the newspapers, and
from it all picked out the one point that was most important for the
case which he was working to clear up. One tong used revolvers of a
certain make; the other of a different make. The bullet which had
killed Bertha Curtis and later Nichi Moto was from a pistol like that
of the Hep Sings.
The difference in the makes of guns seemed at once to suggest something
to Kennedy and instead of mixing actively in the war of the highbinders
he retired to his unfailing laboratory, leaving me to pass the time
gathering such information as I could. Once I dropped in on him but
found him unsociably surrounded by microscopes and a very sensitive
arrangement for taking microphotographs. Some of his negatives were
nearly a foot in diameter, and might have been, for all I knew,
pictures of the surface of the moon.
While I was there O’Connor came in. Craig questioned him about the war
of the tongs.