turn loose every man they've got--though they've been working on the
case long enough, Heaven knows!"
The next morning when Gregory and his society manner strolled into the
customhouse in New York he found the place buzzing. Evidently the
instructions from Washington had been such as to make the entire force
fear for their jobs unless the smuggling combination was broken up
quickly. It didn't take Joe very long to get the details. They weren't
many and he immediately discarded the idea of possible collusion between
the buyers of the stones abroad. It looked to be a certainty on the face
of it, but, once you had discovered that, what good did it do you? It
wasn't possible to jail a man just because he bought some jewels in
Europe--and, besides, the orders from Washington were very clear that
the case was to be handled strictly from this side--at least, the final
arrest was to be made on American soil, to avoid extradition
complications and the like.
So when Joe got all the facts they simply were that some valuable jewels
had been purchased in Europe and had turned up in America, without going
through the formality of visiting the customhouse, anywhere from six
weeks to three months later.
"Not much to work on," grumbled Gregory, "and I suppose, as usual, that
the chief will be as peevish as Hades if we don't nab the guilty party
within the week."
"It's more than possible," admitted one of the men who had handled the
case.
Gregory studied the dates on which the jewels had been purchased and
those on which they had been located in this country for a few moments
in silence. Then:
"Get me copies of the passenger lists of every steamer that has docked
here in the past year," he directed. "Of course it's possible that these
things might have been landed at Boston or Philadelphia, but New York's
the most likely port."
When the lists had been secured Gregory stuffed them into his suit case
and started for the door.
"Where you going?" inquired McMahon, the man in charge of the New York
office.
"Up to the Adirondacks for a few days," Gregory replied.
"What's the idea? Think the stuff is being brought over by airplane and
landed inland? Liners don't dock upstate, you know."
"No," said Gregory, "but that's where I'm going to dock until I can
digest this stuff," and he tapped his suit case. "Somewhere in this
bunch of booklets there's a clue to this case and it's up to me to spot
it. Good-by."
Five days later when he sauntered back into the New York office the suit
case was surprisingly light. Apparently every one of the passenger lists
had vanished. As a matter of fact, they had been boiled down to three
names which were carefully inscribed in Joe's notebook.
"Did you pick up any jewels in the Catskills?" was the question that
greeted him when he entered.
"Wasn't in the Catskills," he growled. "Went up to a camp in the
Adirondacks--colder'n blazes. Any more stuff turn up?"
"No, but a wire came from Washington just after you left to watch out
for a hundred-thousand-dollar string of pearls sold at a private auction
in London last week to an American named--"
"I don't care what _his_ name was," Gregory cut in. "What was the date
they were sold?"
"The sixteenth."
Gregory glanced at the calendar.
"And to-day is the twenty-second," he mused. "What boats are due in the
next three days?"
"The _Cretic_ docks this afternoon and the _Tasmania_ ought to get in
to-morrow. That'll be all until the end of the week."
"Right!" snapped Gregory. "Don't let a soul off the _Cretic_ until I've
had a look at her passenger list. It's too late to go down the harbor
now, but not a person's to get off that ship until I've had a chance to
look 'em over. Also cable for a copy of the _Tasmania's_ passenger list.
Hurry it up!"
Less than ten minutes after he had slipped on board the _Cretic_,
however, Gregory gave the signal which permitted the gangplank to be
lowered and the passengers to proceed as usual--except for the fact that
the luggage of everyone and the persons of not a few were searched with
more than the average carefulness. But not a trace of the pearls was
found, as Joe had anticipated. A careful inspection of the passenger
list and a few moments with the purser had convinced him that none of
his three suspects were on board.
Shortly after he returned to the office, the list of the _Tasmania's_
passengers began to come over the cables. Less than half a page had been
received when Gregory uttered a sudden exclamation, reached for his
notebook, compared a name in it with one which appeared on the cabled
report, and indulged in the luxury of a deep-throated chuckle.
"Greg's got a nibble somewhere," commented one of the bystanders.
"Yes," admitted his companion, "but landin' the fish is a different
matter. Whoever's on the other end of that line is a mighty cagy
individual."
But, though he undoubtedly overheard the remark, Gregory didn't seem to
be the least bit worried. In fact, his hat was at a more rakish angle
than usual and his cane fairly whistled through the air as he wandered
up the Avenue half an hour later.
The next the customs force heard of him was when he boarded the
quarantine boat the next morning, clambering on the liner a little later
with all the skill of a pilot.
"You have a passenger on board by the name of Dodge," he informed the
purser, after he had shown his badge. "Mrs. Mortimer C. Dodge. What do
you know about her?"
"Not a thing in the world," said the purser, "except that she is a most
beautiful and apparently attractive woman. Crossed with us once
before--"
"Twice," corrected Gregory. "Came over in January and went right back."
"That's right," said the purser, "so she did. I'd forgotten that. But,
beyond that fact, there isn't anything that I can add."
"Seem to be familiar with anyone on board?"
"Not particularly. Mixes with the younger married set and I've noticed
her on deck with the Mortons quite frequently. Probably met them on her
return trip last winter. They were along then, if I remember rightly."
"Thanks," said the customs operative. "You needn't mention anything
about my inquiries, of course," and he mixed with the throng of
newspaper reporters who were picking up news in various sections of the
big vessel.
When the _Tasmania_ docked, Gregory was the first one off.
"Search Mrs. Mortimer C. Dodge to the skin," he directed the matron.
"Take down her hair, tap the heels of her shoes, and go through all the
usual stunts, but be as gentle as you can about it. Say that we've
received word that some uncut diamonds--not pearls, mind you--are
concealed on the _Tasmania_ and that orders have been given to go over
everybody thoroughly. Pass the word along the line to give out the same
information, so she won't be suspicious. I don't think you'll find
anything, but you never can tell."
At that, Joe was right. The matron didn't locate a blessed thing out of
the way. Mrs. Dodge had brought in a few dutiable trinkets, but they
were all down on her declaration, and within the hour she was headed
uptown in a taxi, accompanied by a maid who had met her as she stepped
out of the customs office.
Not far behind them trailed another taxi, top up and Gregory's eyes
glued to the window behind the chauffeur.
The first machine finally drew up at the Astor, and Mrs. Dodge and the
maid went in, followed by a pile of luggage which had been searched
until it was a moral certainty that not a needle would have been
concealed in it.
Gregory waited until they were out of sight and then followed.
In answer to his inquiries at the desk he learned that Mrs. Dodge had
stopped at the hotel several times before and the house detective
assured him that there was nothing suspicious about her conduct.
"How about the maid?" inquired Gregory.
"Don't know a thing about her, either, except that she is the same one
she had before. Pretty little thing, too--though not as good-looking as
her mistress."
For the next three days Joe hung around the hotel or followed the lady
from the _Tasmania_ wherever she went. Something in the back of his
head--call it intuition or a hunch or whatever you please, but it's the
feeling that a good operative gets when he's on the right trail--told
him that he was "warm," as the kids say. Appearances seemed to deny that
fact. Mrs. Dodge went only to the most natural places--a few visits to
the stores, a couple to fashionable modistes and milliners, and some
drives through the Park, always accompanied by her maid and always in
the most sedate and open manner.
But on the evening of the third day the house detective tipped Joe off
that his prey was leaving in the morning.
"Guess she's going back to Europe," reported the house man. "Gave orders
to have a taxi ready at nine and her trunks taken down to the docks
before them. Better get busy if you want to land her."
"I'm not ready for that just yet," Gregory admitted with a scowl.
When Mrs. Dodge's taxi drove off the following morning Joe wasn't far
away, and, acting on orders which he had delivered over the phone, no
less than half a dozen operatives watched the lady and the maid very
closely when they reached the dock.
Not a thing came of it, however. Both of them went to the stateroom
which had been reserved and the maid remained to help with the unpacking
until the "All-ashore-that-'re-going-ashore" was bellowed through the
boat. Then she left and stood on the pier until the ship had cleared the
dock.
"It beats me," muttered Gregory. "But I'm willing to gamble my job that
I'm right." And that night he wired to Washington to keep a close
lookout for the London pearls, adding that he felt certain they would
turn up before long.
"In that case," muttered the chief at the other end of the wire, "why in
Heaven's name didn't he get them when they came in?"
Sure enough, not a fortnight had passed before St. Louis reported that a
string of pearls, perfectly matched, answering to the description of the
missing jewels, had been offered for sale there through private
channels.
The first reaction was a telegram to Gregory that fairly burned the
wires, short but to the point. "Either the man who smuggled that
necklace or your job in ten days," it read.
And Gregory replied, "Give me three weeks and you'll have one or the
other."
Meanwhile he had been far from inactive. Still playing his hunch that
Phyllis Dodge had something to do with the smuggling game, he had put in
time cultivating the only person on this side that appeared to know
her--the maid.
It was far from a thankless task, for Alyce--she spelled it with a
"y"--was pretty and knew it. Furthermore, she appeared to be entirely
out of her element in a cheap room on Twenty-fourth Street. Most of the
time she spent in wandering up the Avenue, and it was there that Gregory
made her acquaintance--through the expedient of bumping her bag out of
her hands and restoring it with one of his courtly bows. The next minute
he was strolling alongside, remarking on the beauty of the weather.
But, although he soon got to know Alyce well enough to take her to the
theater and to the cabarets, it didn't seem to get him anywhere. She was
perfectly frank about her position. Said she was a hair dresser by trade
and that she acted as lady's maid to a Mrs. Dodge, who spent the better
part of her time abroad.
"In fact," she said, "Mrs. Dodge is only here three or four days every
two months or so."
"And she pays you for your time in between?"
"Oh yes," Alyce replied; "she's more than generous."
"I should say she was," Gregory thought to himself--but he considered it
best to change the subject.
During the days that followed, Joe exerted every ounce of his
personality in order to make the best possible impression. Posing as a
man who had made money in the West, he took Alyce everywhere and treated
her royally. Finally, when he considered the time ripe, he injected a
little love into the equation and hinted that he thought it was about
time to settle down and that he appeared to have found the proper person
to settle with.
But there, for the first time, Alyce balked. She didn't refuse him, but
she stated in so many words that she had a place that suited her for the
time being, and that, until the fall, at least, she preferred to keep on
with it.
"That suits me all right," declared Gregory. "Take your time about it.
Meanwhile we'll continue to be good friends and trail around together,
eh?"
"Certainly," said Alyce, "er--that is--until Tuesday."
"Tuesday?" inquired Joe. "What's coming off Tuesday?"
"Mrs. Dodge will arrive on the _Atlantic_," was the reply, "and I'll
have to be with her for three days at least."
"Three days--" commenced Gregory, and halted himself. It wasn't wise to
show too much interest. But that night he called the chief on long
distance and inquired if there had been any recent reports of suspicious
jewel sales abroad. "Yes," came the voice from Washington, "pearls
again. Loose ones, this time. And your three weeks' grace is up at noon
Saturday." The click that followed as the receiver hung up was finality
itself.
The same procedure, altered in a few minor details, was followed when
Mrs. Dodge landed. Again she was searched to the skin; again her luggage
was gone over with microscopic care, and again nothing was found.
This time she stayed at the Knickerbocker, but Alyce was with her as
usual.
Deprived of his usual company and left to his own devices, Gregory took
a long walk up the Drive and tried to thrash out the problem.
"Comes over on a different boat almost every trip," he thought, "so that
eliminates collusion with any of the crew. Doesn't stay at the same
hotel two times running, so there's nothing there. Has the same maid and
always returns--"
Then it was that motorists on Riverside Drive were treated to the sight
of a young and extremely prepossessing man, dressed in the height of
fashion, throwing his hat in the air and uttering a yell that could be
heard for blocks. After which he disappeared hurriedly in the direction
of the nearest drug store.
A hasty search through the phone book gave him the number he wanted--the
offices of the Black Star line.
"Is Mr. MacPherson, the purser of the _Atlantic_, there?" he inquired.
Then: "Hello! Mr. MacPherson? This is Gregory, Customs Division. You
remember me, don't you? Worked on the Maitland diamond case with you two
years ago.... Wonder if you could tell me something I want to know--is
Mrs. Mortimer C. Dodge booked to go back with you to-morrow?... She is?
What's the number of her stateroom? And--er--what was the number of the
room she had coming over?... I thank you."
If the motorists whom Gregory had startled on the Drive had seen him
emerge from the phone booth they would have marveled at the look of keen
satisfaction and relief that was spread over his face. The cat that
swallowed the canary was tired of life, compared with Joe at that
moment.
Next morning the Customs operatives were rather surprised to see Gregory
stroll down to the _Atlantic_ dock about ten o'clock.
"Thought you were somewhere uptown on the chief's pet case," said one of
them.
"So I was," answered Joe. "But that's practically cleaned up."
With that he went aboard, and no one saw him until just before the
"All-ashore" call. Then he took up his place beside the gangplank, with
three other men placed near by in case of accident.
"Follow my lead," he directed. "I'll speak to the girl. Two of you stick
here to make certain that she doesn't get away, and you, Bill, beat it
on board then and tell the captain that the boat's not to clear until we
give the word. We won't delay him more than ten minutes at the outside."
When Alyce came down the gangplank a few minutes later, in the midst of
people who had been saying good-by to friends and relatives, she spotted
Joe waiting for her, and started to move hurriedly away. Gregory caught
up with her before she had gone a dozen feet.
"Good morning, Alyce," he said. "Thought I'd come down to meet you.
What've you got in the bag there?" indicating her maid's handbag.
"Not--not a thing," said the girl, flushing. Just then the matron joined
the party, as previously arranged, and Joe's tone took on its official
hardness.
"Hurry up and search her! We don't want to keep the boat any longer than
we have to."
Less than a minute later the matron thrust her head out of the door long
enough to report: "We found 'em--the pearls. She had 'em in the front of
her dress."
Gregory was up the gangplank in a single bound. A moment later he was
knocking at the door of Mrs. Dodge's stateroom. The instant the knob
turned he was inside, informing Phyllis that she was under arrest on a
charge of bringing jewels into the United States without the formality
of paying duty. Of course, the lady protested--but the _Atlantic_
sailed, less than ten minutes behind schedule time, without her.
Promptly at twelve the phone on the desk of the chief of the Customs
Division in Washington buzzed noisily.
"Gregory speaking," came through the receiver. "My time's up--and I've
got the party you want. Claims to be from Cleveland and sails under the
name of Mrs. Mortimer C. Dodge--first name Phyllis. She's confessed and
promises to turn state's evidence if we'll go light with her."
* * * * *
"That," added Quinn, "was the finish of Mrs. Dodge, so far as the
government was concerned. In order to land the whole crew--the people
who were handling the stuff on this side as well as the ones who were
mixed up in the scheme abroad--they let her go scot-free, with the
proviso that she's to be rushed to Atlanta if she ever pokes her nose
into the United States again. The last I heard of her she was in Monaco,
tangled up in a blackmail case there.
"Gregory told me all about it sometime later. Said that the first hunch
had come to him when he studied the passengers' lists in the wilds of
the Adirondacks. Went there to be alone and concentrate. He found that
of all the people listed, only three--two men and a Mrs. Dodge--had made
the trip frequently in the past six months. The frequency of Mrs.
Dodge's travel evidently made it impracticable for her to use different
aliases. Some one would be sure to spot her.
"But it wasn't until that night on Riverside Drive that the significance
of the data struck him. Each time she took the same boat on which she
had come over! Did she have the same stateroom? The phone call to
MacPherson established the fact that she did--this time at least. The
rest was almost as obvious as the original plan. The jewels were brought
aboard, passed on to Phyllis, and she tucked them away somewhere in her
stateroom. Her bags and her person could, of course, be searched with
perfect safety. Then, what was more natural than that her maid should
accompany her on board when she was leaving? Nobody ever pays any
attention to people who board the boat at _this_ end, so Alyce was able
to walk off with the stuff under the very eyes of the customs
authorities--and they found later that she had the nerve to place it in
the hands of the government for the next twenty-four hours. She sent it
by registered mail to Pittsburgh and it was passed along through an
underground "fence" channel until a prospective purchaser appeared.
"Perfectly obvious and perfectly simple--that's why the plan succeeded
until Gregory began to make love to Alyce and got the idea that Mrs.
Dodge was going right back to Europe hammered into his head. It had
occurred to him before, but he hadn't placed much value on it....
"O-o-o-o!" yawned Quinn. "I'm getting dry. Trot out some grape juice and
put on that Kreisler record--'Drigo's Serenade.' I love to hear it.
Makes me think of the time when they landed that scoundrel Weimar."
VI
A MATTER OF RECORD
"What was that you mentioned last week--something about the record of
Kreisler's 'Drigo's Serenade' reminding you of the capture of some one?"
I asked Bill Quinn one summer evening as he painfully hoisted his game
leg upon the porch railing.
"Sure it does," replied Quinn. "Never fails. Put it on again so I can
get the necessary atmosphere, as you writers call it, and possibly I'll
spill the yarn--provided you guarantee to keep the ginger ale flowing
freely. That and olive oil are about the only throat lubricants left
us."
So I slipped on the record, rustled a couple of bottles from the ice
box, and settled back comfortably, for when Quinn once started on one of
his reminiscences of government detective work he didn't like to be
interrupted.
"That's the piece, all right," Bill remarked, as the strains of the
violin drifted off into the night. "Funny how a few notes of music like
that could nail a criminal while at the same time it was saving the
lives of nobody knows how many other people--"
* * * * *
Remember Paul Weimar [continued Quinn, picking up the thread of his
story]. He was the most dangerous of the entire gang that helped von
Bernstorff, von Papen, and the rest of that crew plot against the United
States at a time when we were supposed to be entirely neutral.
An Austrian by birth, Weimar was as thoroughly a Hun at heart as anyone
who ever served the Hohenzollerns and, in spite of his size, he was as
slippery as they make 'em. Back in the past somewhere he had been a
detective in the service of the Atlas Line, but for some years before
the war was superintendent of the police attached to the
Hamburg-American boats. That, of course, gave him the inside track in
every bit of deviltry he wanted to be mixed up in, for he had made it
his business to cultivate the acquaintance of wharf rats, dive keepers,
and all the rest of the scum of the Seven Seas that haunts the docks.
Standing well over six feet, Weimar had a pair of fists that came in
mighty handy in a scuffle, and a tongue that could curl itself around
all the blasphemies of a dozen languages. There wasn't a water front
where they didn't hate him--neither was there a water front where they
didn't fear him.
Of course, when the war broke in August, 1914, the Hamburg-American line
didn't have any further official use for Weimar. Their ships were tied
up in neutral or home ports and Herr Paul was out of a job--for at least
ten minutes. But he was entirely too valuable a man for the German
organization to overlook for longer than that, and von Papen, in
Washington, immediately added him to his organization--with blanket
instructions to go the limit on any dirty work he cared to undertake.
Later, he worked for von Bernstorff; Doctor Dumba, the Austrian
ambassador; and Doctor von Nuber, the Austrian consul in New York--but
von Papen had first claim upon his services and did not hesitate to
press them, as proven by certain entries in the checkbook of the
military attache during the spring and summer of 1915.
Of course, it didn't take the Secret Service and the men from the
Department of Justice very long to get on to the fact that Weimar was
altogether too close to the German embassy for the safety and comfort of
the United States government. But what were they to do about it? We
weren't at war then and you couldn't arrest a man merely because he
happened to know von Papen and the rest of his precious companions. You
had to have something on him--something that would stand up in
court--and Paul Weimar was too almighty clever to let that happen.
When you remember that it took precisely one year to land this
Austrian--one year of constant watching and unceasing espionage--you
will see how well he conducted himself.
And the government's sleuths weren't the only ones who were after him,
either.
Captain Kenney, of the New York Police Force, lent mighty efficient aid
and actually invented a new system of trailing in order to find out just
what he was up to.
In the old days, you told a man to go out and follow a suspect and that
was all there was to it. The "shadow" would trail along half a block or
so in the rear, keeping his man always in view, and bring home a full
account of what he had done all day. But you couldn't do that with
Weimar--he was too foxy. From what some of the boys have told me, I
think he took a positive delight in throwing them off the scent, whether
he had anything up his sleeve or not.