IN THIN AIR
“Glad you could come at once, McCarty.” Eustace Goddard’s ruddy face
was pale, and the humorous quirk beneath the ends of the small,
sandy mustache had given place to a tremulous droop. “Your inspector
thought I had some information for you about that valet’s death when I
telephoned headquarters to ask for your address and I didn’t undeceive
him. Don’t want any notoriety about this while a shadow of doubt
remains—but God! I—I’m worried!”
“You’ll recall Special Deputy Riordan from that first talk we had at
Orbit’s?” McCarty indicated his colleague who stood in the doorway.
“You told me over the ’phone that your boy had been kidnapped; he’s
pretty big for that, ain’t he, and in broad day?”
“What else can we think?” Goddard threw out his arms in a helpless
gesture. “Horry vanished in thin air this afternoon! He hadn’t any idea
of going out, in fact, he complained of a headache after lunch—he has
never been very strong—and his mother left him curled up on the couch
in the library here when she went shopping. She returned late to dress
for Orbit’s musicale and didn’t inquire for him, supposing him to be
with Trafford, his tutor. I reached home from the club about half-past
five and found Trafford very much disturbed—But here he is! He’ll tell
you himself. Mr. Trafford, these are the men for whom I sent. Will you
tell them when you first missed Horry?”
The thin, anxious-looking, bespectacled young man, whom they had seen
in conversation with the watchman that afternoon, came slowly forward.
“I went to the library at three to tell him it was time for his Latin
lesson,” he began, his voice dazed and shaken. “He wasn’t there and
I searched the house for him, surprised that he should have gone
out without mentioning it. Then it occurred to me that he might
have slipped over to Mr. Orbit’s house next door, where there is an
exceptionally fine collection of paintings which fascinate him. His
ruling ambition is to become an artist and Mr. Orbit has encouraged
him—but I digress. I went there to inquire for him but no one had seen
him, and then, really anxious, I questioned the watchman who assured me
that he had not gone out either gate.”
“H’m!” remarked McCarty as Dennis shuffled his feet uneasily. “And what
did you do after, Mr. Trafford?”
“I concluded that Horace had gone to see the artist who has been
instructing him in drawing and of whom he is very fond; I could think
of nothing else that would account for his disappearance, but it seemed
probable some neighbor with a key to the Mall had entered just as he
left so that the watchman need not have been called upon to open the
gate for him.” The young man’s hands were clenching and unclenching
nervously and beads of moisture stood out upon his forehead. “I
therefore didn’t mention it to Mrs. Goddard before she went to the
musicale but waited, believing Horace would return at any moment. When
the afternoon grew late I searched the house again, questioned the
servants, even went across the street to inquire at the Sloane house
for him; young Mr. Sloane has taken an interest also in his artistic
efforts and it is the only other house on the block he is privileged to
visit by himself, since the Burminsters are still away. I—I met with no
success!—If I had only given the alarm earlier!”
He was turning away with a groan when McCarty asked:
“Why didn’t you think to ’phone Blaisdell and ask if the lad had been
there, Trafford?”
The wretched tutor stared and Goddard, who had been standing with his
elbows on the mantel and his head in his hands, suddenly wheeled.
“How did you know Blaisdell is the artist who has been giving him
lessons?” he demanded.
McCarty smiled.
“I heard him say himself that Blaisdell was going on a sketching tour
next month and would take him, only you wouldn’t hear of it,” he
explained. “The boy was wild to go along——”
“Mr. Blaisdell started yesterday,” the tutor interrupted. “I learned
this when I telephoned to his studio this afternoon, as I did as soon
as the idea occurred to me that Horace might have gone there. I forgot
to mention it but my anxiety—! I feel criminally negligent in having
taken the situation so easily!”
“Don’t the boy ever get a chance to play with other lads?” Dennis spoke
for the first time, his tone filled with pitying contempt. “Couldn’t he
have gone to the Park and then home to supper with one or another of
them?”
“My son does not play in the Park,” Goddard responded with dignity. “He
rides there with a class from the Academy on two mornings of the week
but the season does not reopen until next month. Horace is delicate as
I told you and has never cared for rough, physical exercise, although
he is far from being a mollycoddle. He has a few friends of his own age
but they are all still at their country homes; Mr. Trafford and I have
telephoned to every one we can think of! Mrs. Goddard is prostrated
and under the care of her physician; when she returned from Orbit’s
musicale and learned of Horace’s disappearance she was almost beside
herself. He is our only child, you know. If anything has happened to
him—!”
He ran his hand violently through his scanty fringe of hair and McCarty
observed:
“’Tis queer the lad didn’t tell you himself that Blaisdell was going
away yesterday.”
“He hasn’t talked of him very much lately.” Goddard hesitated and then
went on: “Horace is an unusual boy, very sensitive and reserved. I
don’t pretend to understand him. He took it very much to heart when
we declined to allow him to go on this sketching tour but, of course,
it was out of the question; no one but an artist would have suggested
such an impractical thing for a boy of his age, and with his frail
constitution!—Damn that dog! He’ll drive me out of my mind!”
A doleful, long-drawn howl, subdued but eloquent, reached their ears
from below-stairs and McCarty remembered his brief talk with the boy in
that very room three days before.
“Is that Max, the police dog your son was telling me about when I
called here?”
“Yes. He wandered around whining until I couldn’t stand it any longer
and had him shut up. Devilish clever animal and devoted to Horry—knows
there’s something wrong! By God, hear that! Midnight! What can have
happened to my boy?”
He dropped into a chair burying his face in his hands as the clock
struck and once more Dennis spoke.
“Have you any notion how much pocket money the lad had this day?”
It was Trafford who replied to him.
“Six dollars and seventy-five cents. I am teaching him to keep a budget
and he carefully puts down whatever he spends each day.”
“Little and red-headed, wasn’t he, with a narrow chest and spindling
legs—”
“Riordan means is he small for his age and kind of delicate looking?”
McCarty amended hastily, glaring at the tactless interrogator. “How was
he dressed when you last saw him and what’s missing from his things?”
“He wore a brown pedestrian suit and brown shoes and golf stockings,”
the tutor answered. “He had a plain platinum wrist watch on a leather
strap and a gold seal ring with the family coat of arms. Nothing else
is missing except a brown cloth cap with the manufacturer’s name,
‘Knowles,’ inside. Before communicating with you, Mr. Goddard and I
telephoned to every hospital in the city, fearing that some street
accident might have occurred, but no child whose appearance tallied
in the least degree with his had been brought in. The only remaining
possibility is that he is being detained somewhere for a ransom.”
“Have you any other reason for thinking the lad may have been
kidnapped?” McCarty turned to Goddard. “Know of anybody with a grudge
against you or your family? Had any threatening letters?”
“Great heavens, no!” The bereaved father raised his head. “Horry is a
little chap for fourteen, looks nearer twelve in fact, and Mr. Trafford
usually accompanies him when he leaves the Mall, but he begged so hard
to go to Blaisdell’s studio by himself that I allowed it, though it was
against his mother’s wishes; I wanted him to be manly and self-reliant,
and the Madison Avenue cars pass Blaisdell’s door near Fiftieth. I
thought it was perfectly safe, but he may have been watched and marked
by some criminal as a victim for kidnapping.”
“That don’t explain how or why he passed out of one gate or the other
with not one on the whole block seeing him.” McCarty shook his head.
“You say you’re wishful to avoid notoriety, or I’d advise you to report
the lad’s disappearance to the Bureau of Missing Persons and let the
investigation take its regular course, but there’s a chance still
that he’s not been kidnapped nor yet met with an accident. ’Twas for
Riordan and me to try to locate him and get him back without having the
newspapers getting out extras that you sent for me to-night?”
Dennis caught his breath audibly at this highly irregular supposition,
but Goddard nodded eagerly.
“That’s it, exactly! It would kill Mrs. Goddard to have the press make
a sensational case of this while there is the slightest hope that
Horace may be restored to us without publicity. You’ll do what you can?
I’ll pay anything, a fortune, to have my son again, safe!”
“We’ll do our best, Mr. Goddard,” McCarty rose. “If we’ve no news for
you by morning can we have a word with Mrs. Goddard then?”
“Of course. I’d take you to her now, but the doctor has given her
something to quiet her. The servants don’t know anything; I’ve
questioned them till I’m hoarse and been in touch with every one to
whom Horry might have gone. For God’s sake, find my boy!”
Young Trafford showed them out and McCarty glanced keenly into his
pale, troubled face as he held the door open. He seemed on the point of
speech but glanced back over his shoulder and then resolutely closed
his lips. McCarty paused.
“Before we come in the morning you’d do well to tell the lad’s father
to come clean with us,” he admonished in a lowered tone. “’Tis not by
keeping anything back that he’ll help!”
Trafford started.
“Do you think he is?” he countered quickly. “I’ve told you all I know,
at any rate, but let me hear if there’s anything more I can do. I’ll
sit up all night by the telephone.”
“Where are we going now?” Dennis asked as his companion turned toward
the east gate. “’Twas to find who killed Hughes that the inspector made
deputies of us, not to be chasing runaway kids, but I’m trailing right
with you.”
“‘Runaway,’ is it? I thought that was your hunch when you asked what
pocket money the lad had and then described him with more truth than
politeness!” McCarty chuckled. “You think he’s gone to join this artist
fellow Blaisdell? ’Twill be easy to settle that when we find out where
that tour was to commence, for Horace could not have gone far on six
seventy-five.”
“And we know how he got out all right,” Dennis supplemented. “’Twas
by that east gate ahead when Bill left it open so convenient!—Look at
Orbit’s house! Do you suppose his afternoon party is lasting on through
the night?”
The awning and carpet were still stretched from the entrance door to
curb, and, seemingly borne upon the subdued radiance of the glow which
filtered through the curtained windows of the conservatory, there came
to them faintly the strains of the organ. It was no majestic harmony
this time, however, but a simple, insistently repetitive measure.
McCarty paused to listen, shaking his head.
“Orbit’s by himself and just kind of thinking through the organ; can’t
you tell, the way he’s just wandering along, amusing himself? That’s an
easy little tune, too, that would stick in your head.—Come on. I’ve a
notion to see part of this Mall we’ve not thought to examine yet.”
“If there’s a foot of it we’ve not been over, barring the insides of
the other houses—!” began Dennis in obvious disappointment. “I thought
we’d be getting after whoever takes care of Blaisdell’s place to find
where he’s gone—”
“At this time of night?” snorted McCarty. “Has it come to you that
Goddard may not be so far wrong at that, especially if he’s got some
reason he hasn’t told for thinking the lad was stolen? I’m beginning to
see the practical workings of those books of mine you turn your nose up
at and I ask you, did Horace look to have nerve enough to run away? If
he went outside these gates it was of his own free will, of course, and
during the time Bill left the one of them open, but what if he’d been
paid to do it? What if the lad had been decoyed outside? How do we know
there’s not others on the block concerned in it?”
“‘Others on the block!’” repeated Dennis, stopping short as they passed
the dark Bellamy house. “Mac! You’re not thinking there could be any
connection between what happened to Hughes four days ago and the
Goddard kid’s disappearance! You’re not looking to have him found dead
somewhere, poisoned! Glory be! What’s come to this street all of a
sudden?”
“I’m asking myself that,” returned the other grimly. “I’m going no
further in my mind, though, just saying it looks funny, that’s all.
Here’s a handful of rich families living behind their gates in peace
and seclusion for generations, with nothing ever happening except maybe
a funeral now and then, for they could not shut out death. Then a
murder takes place right in their midst, even if the victim did go far
before he dropped in his tracks, and while there’s still no answer to
it somebody in the next house disappears.”
“So that’s why you hinted at notoriety, if Goddard took the case to
headquarters instead of leaving it to us! We’re still on the Hughes
affair after all!” exclaimed Dennis, adding: “What’s down here?”
McCarty had turned down the black passage or court between Mrs.
Bellamy’s and the closed Falkingham house next door on the east, and he
vouchsafed no response to the companion who followed curiously at his
heels until they had reached the rear of the boarded-up residence. Then
he whispered cautiously:
“Got your flashlight?”
For answer Dennis produced the pocket electric torch without which he
seldom went on a nocturnal adventure with McCarty. The latter took it
from him, and, pressing the button, darted a minute but piercing ray of
light along the rear of the houses whose front sidewalks they had just
traversed.
“See that, Denny?” he whispered. “An open court as clear as the palm of
your hand straight past the Bellamys’ and Orbit’s to Goddard’s on the
corner. If the kid had wanted to get out without being seen he might
have left the back of his house and come along this court to any of the
passage-ways that lead out to the sidewalk nearer the gate.”
“True for you,” Dennis assented. “Turn the light along the back wall
till we see how high it is, and whether there are any little doors in
it or not.”
But the wall, not of brick but of ancient brownstone, was as high as
the city’s regulations permitted, bare save in the rear of Orbit’s
miniature palace, where it was covered by a thick, impenetrable curtain
of ivy, sable and glossy like black satin in the moving finger of light.
All at once heavy footsteps pounded along the sidewalk to the mouth
of the passage-way they had just left and a brighter beam was trained
suddenly upon them. Dennis dodged instinctively but McCarty turned and
faced it, calling cautiously:
“Is it you, Dave Hollis? We’ve not gone yet, just taking a look around.”
They had encountered the night watchman when they let themselves in at
the west gate earlier in response to Eustace Goddard’s summons, and now
he merely grunted in acknowledgment and passed on.
“There’s nothing more to be seen here,” Dennis remarked. “No one could
cross that wall without a ladder and though they might climb that ivy
it could not be done carrying a boy the size of Horace.”
“To say nothing of it being broad day and the back windows of all
the houses in this row looking out at the performance,” McCarty
interjected. “All the same we’ll stroll along to the Goddards’ kitchen
door and back, Denny.”
The rear of Mrs. Bellamy’s mansion was as dark as the front and in
Orbit’s also the lights had by now been extinguished. In the dead
stillness their stealthy footsteps seemed to ring unnaturally loudly to
their own ears. Only in the Goddard house did the dull glow from roof
to cellar gleam forth through shrouded windows like sleepless, anxious
eyes.
“’Tis almost unhealthy, the cleanness of everything!” Dennis looked
about him as the flashlight circled over the spacious, immaculate
court. “Not an ashcan nor so much as a garbage pail that a cat could
hide behind! We’re wasting our time here, Mac!”
But McCarty did not answer. He had gone halfway down the tradesmen’s
passage leading to the sidewalk and paused before a door in the side
wall of the Goddard house. Dennis saw the light play in narrowing arcs
over the paved ground before it and then settle to a mere pin-point as
McCarty stooped. After a moment he straightened and came swiftly back,
cat-footed despite his bulk. He was holding out some small object in
his extended hand and as he reached his companion’s side he played the
light upon it—a small, plain platinum watch, crushed beyond repair, on
a pathetically short leather wristband.