OFFICER 666
[Illustration: HIS GAZE HAD WANDERED TO THE GREAT CHEST, THE LID OF WHICH
WAS DISTINCTLY RISING.]
OFFICER 666
BARTON W. CURRIE & AUGUSTIN McHUGH
NEW YORK
A. L. BURT COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
Copyright, 1912, By The H. K. Fly Company
CONTENTS
I. A Grapefruit Prelude. 9
II. Mr. Hogg Enters the Lists. 15
III. Whitney Barnes Under Fire. 21
IV. Smiles and Tears. 28
V. Whitney Barnes Telephones to the Ritz. 33
VI. Officer 666 on Patrol. 38
VII. The Little Brown Jap. 44
VIII. Art, Mystery and Love. 50
IX. The Curse of Millions. 56
X. The Heartbeats of Mr. Hogg. 61
XI. Gainsborough "Blue Boy." 65
XII. Approaching a World of Mystery. 73
VIII. Travers Gladwin Gets a Thrill. 77
XIV. Thrill Begets Thrill. 83
XV. Heroism, Love and Something Else. 90
XVI. The Torment of Officer 666. 96
XVII. Travers Gladwin Is Considerably Jarred. 100
XVIII. Sadie Becomes a Conspirator. 106
XIX. Helen Leaves an Important Message. 112
XX. Michael Phelan to the Rescue. 118
XXI. Travers Gladwin Goes in Search of Himself. 127
XXII. A Millionaire Policeman on Patrol. 133
XXIII. Old Grim Barnes Gets a Thrill. 142
XXIV. Auntie Takes the Trail. 148
XXV. Phelan Meets His Uniform Again. 159
XXVI. Gladwin Meets Himself. 168
XXVII. Misadventures of Whitney Barnes. 179
XXVIII. An Instance of Epic Nerve. 187
XXIX. In Which the Hero Is Kept on the Hop. 192
XXX. Gladwin Comes out of His Shell. 202
XXXI. A Visit to the Exiled Phelan. 207
XXXII. In Which Bluff Is Trumps. 214
XXXIII. Bateato Summons Big Much Police. 222
XXXIV. Phelan Loses His Bribe. 228
XXXV. Bateato Keeps His Promise. 236
XXXVI. Repartee and a Revolver Muzzle. 247
XXXVII. Handcuffs and Love. 254
XXXVIII. Kearney Meets His Match. 262
XXXIX. Piling on Phelan's Agony. 269
XL. Striking While the Iron Is Hot. 278
XLI. The Escape. 285
XLII. Michael Phelan's Predicament. 291
XLIII. The Circumvention of Auntie. 298
XLIV. Miss Featherington's Shattered Dream. 304
ILLUSTRATIONS
His gaze had wandered to the great chest, the lid of
which was distinctly rising. Frontispiece
"Now here's a cunning little line", he pursued. "That
shows something too." 110
"Give me me uniform an' let me git out of here." 164
"He's almost as madly in love with her as I am." 282
The Publishers wish to acknowledge, with thanks, the permission to
use some sketches of the H. C. MINER LITHOGRAPHING COMPANY in
illustrating this book.
OFFICER 666
CHAPTER I.
A GRAPEFRUIT PRELUDE.
Splash! The grapefruit hit her in the eye!
Splash! His psychic wave was dashed to smithereens!
"Oh! Oh!" the two girls screamed in unison.
"D----!" the young man sitting near ejaculated.
For ten minutes there in the Oak Room of the Ritz-Carlton he had been
hurling across the narrow intervening space this mental command to the
girl facing him:
"Look here! Look at me! Let me see your eyes! Look here!"
For half that time she had been conscious of his insistent gaze and
his message. But with as much will power as he himself displayed she
bent her head over her plate and sent back along his telepathic
transmission this reply:
"I won't! I won't!"
But she was weakening.
"Sadie," she said to her companion, "I do awfully want to look up. I
want to see who is looking at me so fiercely. I can just feel it all
through me. Of course it wouldn't be proper, would it?"
"Well, that all depends on who is looking at you, dear, doesn't it? If
it were some horrid old man"--
"No, it doesn't feel a bit like that, Sadie. I don't know just how to
explain it--really it isn't unpleasant at all."
"Why, Helen! And you engaged and going to elo"----
"Hush, Sadie, you mustn't say that in here. Somebody might--but I
positively cannot keep my eyes down another moment. I'm"----
Then splash!
A vicious little jab of the spoon and there followed a disastrous
geyser--a grapefruit geyser.
With a smothered little cry of pain Helen's eyes shut tight and she
groped for her napkin. And to make a good job of it the Fates dragged
in at that moment Helen's guardian aunt, the tall and statuesque Mrs.
Elvira Burton of Omaha, Neb.
The young man who had failed so signally in what was perhaps his
maiden effort at hypnotism viciously seized all the change the waiter
proffered on the little silver tray, flung it back with a snarl, got
up and stamped out of the room.
He was a mighty good looking chap, smartly attired, and if you care
for details, he wore a heliotrope scarf in which there gleamed a
superb black pearl for which he had paid a superb price.
"Can you beat it!" he muttered as he climbed the stairs to the lobby
and mingled with the throng that stood about in stiff groups, idly
chattering and looking as if they bored one another to the verge of
desperation.
"Can you beat it!" he exclaimed again, fairly biting off the words.
So vehemently occupied was he with his chagrin and annoyance that he
stamped heavily upon the pet corn of a retired rear admiral, rudely
bumped a Roumanian duchess, kicked the pink poodle of a famous prima
donna and brought up with a thud against the heroic brawn and muscle
of the house detective, who stood as solidly in the middle of the
lobby as if he had taken root somewhere down in the foundations.
"Can I beat what?" asked the house detective frigidly.
My, but he was an angry young man, and he fairly snarled at the
magnificent individual he had collided with:
"Beat a drum, beat an egg, beat around the bush--go as far as you
like--beat your grandmother if you prefer!"
The granite faced house detective was not used to that sort of
treatment; furthermore it distinctly galled him to be asked to beat
his grandmother, whom he recalled as an estimable old lady who made an
odd noise when she ate soup, owing to an absence of teeth.
"What's that you said about my grandmother?" he said, bridling.
"Bother your grandmother," shot back the insolent retort, whereat the
lordly house detective plucked the young man by the arm.
"Staggerin' an' loony talk don't go in the Ritz," he said under his
breath. "You've been havin' too much."
"Preposterous!" exclaimed the young man, vainly endeavoring to shake
his arm free.
"Are you a guest of the house?" demanded the immaculately garbed
minion of the Ritz.
"I am, so kindly remove the pair of pincers you are crushing my arm
with."
"What's your name?"
"I don't know--that is, I've forgotten."
"Now I know you need lookin' after. Come over here to the desk."
The house detective had manifested no more outward passion than a
block of ice, and so adroit was he in marching the young man to the
desk that not an eye in the lobby was attracted to the little scene.
The young man was at first inclined to make a fuss about it and demand
an abject apology for this untoward treatment. The absurdity of his
predicament, however, stirred his sense of humor and he was meekly
docile when his captor arraigned him at the desk and addressed one of
the clerks:
"Do you know this young man, Mr. Horton?"
"Why, yes, Reagan--this is Mr. Smith--why"--
"That's it--Smith!" cried the young man. "How could I ever forget that
name? Thomas Smith, isn't it, Mr. Horton, or is it James?"
"Thomas, of course; at least that's the way you registered, Mr.
Smith--Thomas Smith and valet." The clerk's eyebrows started straight
up his head.
"Thomas Smith, exactly. Now are you satisfied, Mr. House Detective, or
do you want to go up and examine my luggage? Having convinced you that
I am a registered guest, how would you like to have me walk a chalk
line and convince you that I am sober?"
The house detective froze up tighter than ever, pivoted on his heel
and walked majestically away.
"What is the trouble, Mr. Smith?" asked the clerk deferentially, for
he was a better student of exteriors than John Reagan, twenty years a
precinct detective and retired to take up the haughtier rôle of
plain-clothes man in this most fastidious of metropolitan hostelries.
"No trouble at all, old chap," laughed the young man. "I lost my
little _capri_, and then by accident I discovered a stray member of
the herd belonging to yonder Ajax. Some day he's going to turn
into solid marble from the dome down, when you will have a most
extraordinary piece of statuary on your hands. By the way, have there
been any telephone messages for me? I am expecting a very important
one."
"I will see, Mr. Smith," said the clerk briskly, and began searching
through the pigeonholes. "Yes, Mr. Whitney Barnes called up--left word
he would call up again at 2 sharp. Will you be in your room, sir?"
"Do you think I'll be safe in my room?" asked the young man solemnly.
"Safe!" exclaimed the clerk. "Why, what do you mean, sir?"
"Oh, nothing, only Sir Ivory Ajax seems suspicious of me and might
take it into his head to come up and see if I hadn't murdered my
valet. That's all. I'm going to my room now to wait for Mr. Barnes's
telephone call. Kindly be sure that he is connected with my room."
"There _is_ something strange about that young fellow," murmured the
clerk as he watched the object of suspicion vanish into the lift.
"Though if he is a friend of Whitney Barnes," the clerk added after a
pause, "he ought to be all right. I think I'll look him up in the
Social Register."
Which he did--without enlightenment.
CHAPTER II.
MR. HOGG ENTERS THE LISTS.
Having arrived in the grill room of the Ritz coincident with a
devastating eruption of grapefruit, Mrs. Elvira Burton set out
forthwith to demonstrate that her unexpected advent was likewise
somewhat in the nature of a lemon. Even her smile was acid as she
spread out her rich sable furs and sat down at the table with her two
pretty nieces.
"I have just received a letter from Mr. Hogg, Helen," she began with a
rush, regardless of the anguish that was still evident in Helen's
lovely grapefruit bespattered eyes.
A twinge of something more than mere physical pain twisted the young
girl's features at the mention of the name--Hogg.
"Oh, auntie," she almost sobbed, "can't you leave Mr. Hogg out of my
luncheon. We had him last night for dinner and again this morning for
breakfast."
"Helen!" exclaimed Mrs. Burton in accents of bitter reproach.
"I just won't have him for luncheon, and with all this grapefruit in
my eye," insisted Helen, hotly.
"It must hurt terribly," sympathized Mrs. Burton's other pretty
charge, then twisted her head and looked behind her.
"What are you looking at, Sadie?" demanded Mrs. Burton, suspiciously.
Sadie turned with a start and blushed furiously. She started to
stammer a reply when the less timid cousin came to her rescue.
"Some ridiculous man was trying to flirt with us and we were both
awfully nervous. I suppose Sadie looked to see if _you_ had frightened
him off."
The blushing Sadie was amazed at her cousin's resourcefulness, and
stole a glance from under the curling fuzz of her golden bang to note
the effect produced upon her august guardian and aunt. Mrs. Burton
groped in her mind for some subtlety that might have been contained in
her niece's remark, failed at any plausible solution and then almost
vindictively returned to her original line of attack.
"Helen Burton, I must insist that you listen to me. I have broken an
engagement for the matinée with my friend, Mrs. Hobbs-Smathers of
Chicago, for the express purpose of communicating to you the contents
of Mr. Hogg's letter. He informs me, Helen, that you are treating him
scandalously; that you do not pay the slightest attention to his
letters or even answer his telegrams."
"Did he say he was getting thin--that would be charming," teased the
incorrigible Helen.
Mrs. Burton gasped and the color surged into her cheeks in two flaming
danger signals. The glance she turned upon the mischievously laughing
eyes of her niece was intended to annihilate every vestige of
frivolity. Her ample bosom struggled in its purple velvet casement.
Sadie Burton actually shook in her tiny boots as she pictured her aunt
in one of her hysterical outbursts right there in the midst of a host
of strangers who seemed to the unsophisticated miss from Omaha to
represent the very cream of New York society.
Even Helen was sobered by the gathering storm warnings. The smile left
her curving red lips and the dimples vanished. All that lingered of
her playful humor showed in the impish lights that danced in her
expressive eyes.
But she was spared the storm. A tiny page, resplendant with myriad
buttons, appeared in the entrance to the Oak Room and lisped the
name:
"Mith Helen Burthon."
He bore in his arms a bouquet of magnificent orchids. Every eye in the
room focussed upon the tiny flower bearer, among them the wrathful
pair of Mrs. Elvira Burton.
"Mith Helen Burthon."
The rage of the older woman had somewhat cooled. She managed to
nod her head haughtily to the boy. He came forward briskly with
his precious burden of blooms and laid them on the table, then
right-about-faced with military precision and marched away.
Now it was Helen Burton's turn to blush and her agitation was as
pretty to see as anything those who continued to stare in her
direction had ever witnessed. Her dimples were positive hollows from
which her blushes seemed to fountain. She did not reach for the
bouquet, though, because her hand trembled so and there was actual
fear in her eyes as she shrank back in her seat and regarded her
aunt.
Mrs. Burton was not loath to seize upon any leverage that might
give her sway over her rebellious niece. With a smile that was
unequivocally malicious she slowly raised the bunch of orchids and
turned them over. The bouquet was tied with a delicate mauve satin
ribbon that perfectly matched the gown worn by her niece.
Mrs. Burton looked at the ribbon and then at Helen's dress. There was
accusation in the glance. Her eyes studied the orchids. They were of a
peculiar rich golden brown, matching the splendor of Miss Burton's
hair. There was conviction in the second glance. She turned the
bouquet over several times, looking for a card.
There was none.
Now, here was a mystery! Could Miss Helen explain? Mrs. Burton inhaled
a deep breath, then said with exaggerated sweetness:
"Helen, dear, who could have sent you these beautiful flowers? They
are positively superb. He must certainly be an artist."
Great as was her first panic, the young girl quickly rallied to her
own defense. She had only waited to be sure there was no card, no
incriminating mark of identification. She leaned forward on her
elbows, sighed rapturously and exclaimed:
"Aren't they exquisite, Aunt El!"
"I asked you, Helen dear, who could have sent them?" There was
something distinctly feline in the purring tones as the question was
repeated.
"Why, isn't there any card, Aunt El?" fenced the girl.
"Come, come, my dear, why keep me in suspense? You can see there is no
card. Can it be one of the young men we met at the Grangers last
night? I hardly think so, for it is execrably bad form to send flowers
to a public dining room by a page in buttons."
Helen shook her head and assumed an air of great perplexity. She stole
a glance across the table at Sadie, but that shy little cousin seemed
on the verge of tears. Mrs. Burton intercepted the wireless appeal and
shifted her cross-questioning to Sadie. She was determined to unravel
the mystery. She read Sadie's panic as a symptom of guilty knowledge.
But Sadie was loyal to the cousin and chum she adored and proved
surprisingly game under fire. Indeed, she succeeded in breaking down
her aunt's cross-examination and bringing the inquest to ruins by
suddenly clapping her hands and blurting:
"Maybe Mr. Hogg sent them by telegraph."
The outrageous absurdity of the statement gave it cataclysmic force.
Helen embraced Sadie with her eyes and then added her own broadside:
"That really was splendid of him, Auntie El? Now you can tell me all
about his letter."
"I will reserve that until later," said Mrs. Burton, icily. "If you
have finished your luncheon, Helen, please pay the check and we shall
go."
CHAPTER III.
WHITNEY BARNES UNDER FIRE.
Joshua Barnes, sometimes referred to in the daily press as Old Grim
Barnes, the mustard millionaire, turned suddenly upon his son and
pinioned him:
"Why don't you get married?"
"That's just it, pater--why don't I?" replied the young man, blandly.
"Well, why don't you, then?" stormed Joshua Barnes, banging his fist
down upon the mahogany table. "It's time you did."
Another bang lifted the red-headed office boy in the next room clear
out of Deep Blood Gulch just as Derringer Dick was rescuing the
beautiful damsel from the Apaches. Even Miss Featherington dropped
"The Mystery of the Purple Room" on the floor and made a wild
onslaught on the keys of her typewriter.
Whitney Barnes smiled benevolently upon his parent and nonchalantly
lighted a cigarette.
"As I've said before," he parried easily between the puffing of smoke
rings, "I haven't found the girl."
"Dod rot the girl," started Joshua Barnes, then stopped.
"Now, you know, my dear father, that I couldn't treat my wife like
that. The trouble with you, pater, is that you reason from false
premises."
"Nothing of the sort," choked out Barnes senior. "You know well enough
what I mean, young man. You have any number of--of--well, eligible
young ladies, to choose from. You go everywhere and meet everybody.
And you spend my money like water."
"Somebody has got to spend it," spoke up the sole heir to the mustard
millions, cheerfully. "I'll tell you what I'll do, pater--you stop
making it and I'll stop spending it. That's a bargain. It'll be a
great lark for us both. It keeps me awake nights figuring out how I'm
going to spend it and it keeps you awake nights puzzling over how you
can make it--or, that is, make more of it."
"_Stop_!" thundered Joshua Barnes. "For once in my life, Whitney
Barnes, I am going to have a serious talk with you. If your poor
mother had only lived all this wouldn't have been necessary. She'd
have had you married off and there'd be a houseful of grand-children
by this time, and"----
"Just a moment, pater--did triplets or that sort of thing ever run in
our family?"
"Certainly not! What are you driving at?"
"Nothing; nothing, my father. Only I was just wondering. We have a
pretty big house, you know."
For a moment Joshua Barnes seemed on the verge of apoplexy, but he
came around quickly, and moreover with a twinkle in his eye. Even a
life devoted to mustard has its brighter side and Old Grim Barnes was
not entirely devoid of a sense of humor. He was his grim old self
again, however, when he resumed:
"Again I insist that you be serious. I intend that you shall be
married within a year. Otherwise I will put you to work on a salary of
ten dollars a week and compel you to live on it. If you persist in
refusing to interest yourself in my business, the business that my
grandfather founded and that my father and I built up, you can at
least settle down and lead a respectable married life.
"To be candid with you, Whitney," and Joshua Barnes's big voice
suddenly softened, "I want to see some little grand-children round me
before I die. I have some pride of blood, my boy, and I want to see
our name perpetuated. You have frivolled enough, Whitney. You are
twenty-four. I can honestly thank God that you've been nothing more
than a fool. You are not vicious."
"Thanks, awfully, pater. Being nothing more than a fool I suppose it
is up to me to get married. Very well, then, I will. Give me your
hand, dad; it's a bargain."
Whitney Barnes tossed away his cigarette and grasped his father's hand
in both of his. He had become intensely serious. There was a depth of
affection in that handclasp that neither father nor son permitted to
show above the surface. Yet both felt it keenly within. Picking up his
hat and stick, the tall, slim, graceful young man said:
"You have no further commands on the subject, dad? Do you want to pick
the girl, or will you leave it to the taste and sometimes good
judgment of a fool?"
"Haven't you any one in mind, son?" asked Joshua Barnes, anxiously.
"Absolutely not one, pater. You see, the trouble is that I can't ever
seem to get real chummy with a girl but what her mother has to come
and camp on my trail and scare me into fits. You haven't the least
idea what a catch your son is, Joshua Barnes. Why, a mother-in-law
looks to me like something in petticoats that comes creeping up with a
catlike tread, carrying in one hand a net and in the other a
bale-hook. I can't sit out two dances with a debutante before this
nightmare is looking over my shoulder, grinning like a gargoyle and
counting up the number of millions you are going to leave me."
"Oh, bosh!" ejaculated Joshua Barnes. "It's all in your fool
imagination. Grow up and be a man, Whitney. You have given me your
word and I expect you to make good. And by the way, son, there is my
old friend Charley Calker's girl, just out of college. I hear she's a
stunner."
"Mary Calker is a stunner, dad, and then a trifle. But I regret to say
that she is too fresh from the cloistered halls of learning. You see I
have been out of college three years and have managed to forget such a
jolly lot that I really couldn't talk to her. She'd want me to make
love in Latin and correspond in Greek. Worse than that, she
understands Browning. No, poor Mary will have to marry a prescription
clerk, or a florist or something else out of the classics. But, don't
lose heart, pater, I may be engaged before night. By-by."
It was a vastly more solemn Whitney Barnes who strolled out of the
office of the mustard magnate and dragged his feet through the
anteroom where sat Marietta Featherington and Teddie O'Toole. The
comely Miss Featherington could scarcely believe what she saw from
under her jutting puffs.
This good looking, dandified young man, with his perpetual smile and
sparkling gray eyes had long been her conception of all that was noble
and cultured and aristocratic. He was her Viscount Reginald Vere de
Vere, speaking to her as from between yellow paper covers. He was her
prince incognito who fell in love with Lily, the Lovely Laundress. He
had threaded the mazes of more than one of her palpitating dreams, and
in her innermost heart of hearts she had cherished the fond belief
that one day their orbs would meet and their souls would rush together
in such a head-on collision as is sometimes referred to as love at
first sight. But in Miss Featherington's hero worship gloom had no
part. Her ideals never ceased to smile, whether they slew or caressed,
and perpetually they carried themselves with a jaunty swing or a
dashing stride.
The fact that there had been storm mutterings within the awful cave of
Old Grim Barnes had never before had a depressing effect upon her
hero. He had always sallied forth with airy tread, humming a tune or
laughing with his eyes. What could have happened at this fateful
meeting? Perhaps he had been disinherited. Rapture of raptures, he had
confessed his love for some howling beauty of humble station, had been
cut off with the inevitable shilling and was now going forth to earn
his bread.
Marietta Featherington's heart came up and throbbed in her throat as
Whitney Barnes suddenly wheeled and confronted her. Leaning back upon
his cane, he looked at her--very, very solemnly.
"Miss Featherington," he pronounced slowly, "I wish to ask you a
question. May I?"
Marietta was sure that her puffs were on fire, so fierce was the heat
that blazed under her fair skin. She concentrated all her mental
forces in an effort to summon an elegant reply. But all she could get
out was a stifled:
"Sure thing."
"Thank you, Miss Featherington," said the young man. "My question is
this: Do you believe in soul mates? That is, do you, judging from what
you have observed and any experience you may have had, believe that
true love is controlled by the hand of Fate or that you yourself can
take hold and guide your own footsteps in affairs of the heart?"
Teddie O'Toole had crammed "Deep Blood Gulch" into his hip pocket and
was grinning from ear to ear.
Miss Featherington was positive that her puffs were all ablaze. She
could almost smell them burning. She looked down and she looked up and
she drew a long, desperate sigh.
"I believe in Fate!" she said with emotion that would have done honor
to Sarah Bernhardt.
"Thank you, Miss Featherington," said Whitney Barnes, with profound
respect, then turned on his heel and went out into the corridor of the
great office building.
Unconsciously he had dealt a ruthless blow and there is not a
scintilla of doubt but that he was responsible for the box on the ears
that made Teddie O'Toole's head ring for the remainder of the day and
thereby took all the flavor from the thrills he had found in "Deep
Blood Gulch."
CHAPTER IV.
SMILES AND TEARS.
"Now there is no use in your arguing, Sadie--I love him and I have
given him my promise."
The two cousins were alone again speeding up Fifth avenue in an
automobile, a long-bodied foreign car that had been put at the
disposal of Mrs. Burton by the New York agent of Mr. Hogg. The Omaha
suitor for the hand of the fair Helen had also thrown in a red-headed
French chauffeur, which is travelling a bit in the matter of
chauffeurs. But as he understood only automobile English it was a
delightful arrangement for Helen and Sadie, and permitted them
absolute freedom of speech while riding behind him.
"If I had only known him longer, or had been introduced to him
differently," sighed Sadie.
"But haven't I known all about him for years?" protested Helen Burton.
"Of course, we were only school girls when he made that wonderful
rescue at Narragansett Pier. Don't you remember how we rushed down to
the beach to see him, but got there just too late? He had gone out to
his yacht or something. Oh, it was just splendid, Sadie. And he is so
wonderfully modest about it. Why, when I reminded him of his heroism
he pretended to have forgotten all about it. Just imagine Mr. Hogg
forgetting a thing like that! Do you know what Jabez Hogg would do
under similar circumstances, Sadie Burton? Well, I'll tell you--he'd
hire the biggest hall in Omaha and reproduce the whole thing with
moving pictures as an advertisement for his beef canneries."
The young girl had worked herself into a passion and was making savage
little gestures with her clenched fists.
"But what I can't understand, Helen dear, is why a man like Travers
Gladwin should make such a mystery of himself and try to avoid
introducing you to his friends. I am sure," persisted Sadie, despite
the gathering anger in her companion's eyes, "that Aunt Elvira would
not object to him. You know she is just crazy to break into the swim
here in New York, and the Gladwins are the very best of people. I
think it wouldn't take much to urge her even to throw over Mr. Hogg
for Gladwin, if you'd only let her take charge of the wedding."
"Nothing of the sort," denied Helen hotly. "Aunt Elvira is bound on
her solemn word of honor to Mr. Hogg. She will fight for him to the
last ditch, though she knows I hate him."
"Don't you think, Helen," said the younger girl, more soberly, "that
you are simply trying to make yourself look at it that way? I know Mr.
Hogg isn't a pretty man and he has an awful name, but"----
"There is no but about it, Sadie Burton. I have given my word to
Travers Gladwin and I am going to elope with him to-night. I packed my
trunk this morning and gave the porter $10 to take it secretly to the
Grand Central Station. Travers told me just how to arrange it. Oh,
there's his house now, Sadie; the big white one on the corner. It just
thrills me to go by it. On our way back from Riverside Drive we must
stop there. I must leave word that auntie insists on our going to the
opera and that I won't be able to get to him at the time we agreed."
"Oh, I _do_ wish something would turn up and prevent it," cried Sadie,
almost in tears.
"You horrid little thing!" retorted Helen. "It is dreadful of you to
talk like that when you know how much I care for him."
"It isn't that I don't think you care for him," returned Sadie with
trembling lip. "It's something inside of me that warns me. All this
secrecy frightens me. I can't understand why a man of Travers
Gladwin's wealth and social position would want to do such a thing."
"But we both have tried to tell you," insisted Helen, "that there is
an important business reason for it."
"He didn't tell what that reason was," persisted the tearfully
stubborn cousin. "You admitted he didn't give you any definite reason
at all."
Helen Burton stamped her foot and bit her lip. By this time the big
touring car was gliding through the East Drive of Central Park with
the swift, noiseless motion that denotes the highest development of
the modern motor vehicle. Fully a mile of the curving roadway had slid
under the wheels of the car before Helen resumed the conversation with
the sudden outburst:
"You don't doubt for an instant, Sadie, that he is a gentleman!"
Sadie made no reply.
"His knowledge of painting and art is simply wonderful. At that art
sale, where we met, he knew every painting at a glance. He didn't even
have to look for the signatures. You know, if it hadn't been for him I
would have bought that awful imitation Fragonard and just thrown away
two months of my allowance. Sadie Burton, he is the cleverest man I
ever met. He has travelled everywhere and knows everything, and I love
him, I love him, I love him!" In proof of which the charming young
woman burst into tears and took refuge in her vast muff.
This sentimental explosion was too much for tender-hearted Sadie. She
gave way completely and swore not to breathe another word in
opposition to the elopement. And as she felt her beloved cousin's body
shaken with sobs, she forced herself to go into ecstasies over Travers
Gladwin's manly beauty and god-like intellect. In her haste to soothe
she went to extravagant lengths and cried:
"And he must have looked heavenly in his bathing suit when he made
that wonderful rescue."
Down fell Helen's muff with as much of a crash as a muff could make
and she turned upon her companion the most profoundly shocked
expression of a bride-about-to-be.
"Sadie," she reproved stiffly, "you have gone far enough."
Whereupon it was Sadie's turn to seek the sanctuary of tears.
CHAPTER V.
WHITNEY BARNES TELEPHONES TO THE RITZ.
Glancing up into the solemn face of an unusually good-looking young
man who wore his silk hat at a jaunty angle and whose every detail of
attire suggested that he was of that singularly blessed class who toil
not neither do they spin, Miss Mamie McCorkle, public telephone
operator in the tallest-but-one skyscraper below the Fulton street
dead line, expected to be asked to look up some number in the
telephone book and be generously rewarded for the trifling exertion.
It wasn't any wonder, then, that she broke the connections of two
captains of industry and one get-rich-quick millionaire when this was
what she got:
"Suppose, my dear young lady, that you had a premonition--a hunch, I
might say--that you were destined this current day of the calendar
week to meet your Kismet in petticoats, wouldn't it make you feel a
bit hollow inside and justify you in taking your first drink before
your customary hour for absorbing the same?"
Usually a live wire at repartee, Mamie McCorkle was stumped. With a
captain of industry swearing in each ear and the get-rich-quick
millionaire trying to break in with his more artistic specialties in
profanity, she was for a moment frozen into silence. When she did come
to the surface, she set the captains of industry down where they
belonged, retorted upon the get-rich-quick millionaire that he was no
gentleman and she hoped he would inform the manager she said so and
then raised her eyebrows at the interrogator who leaned against her
desk.
"If that's an invitation to lunch, _No_! I'm already dated," she said.
"If you're trying to kid me, ring off, the line is busy."
"All of which," said the young man, in the same slow, sober voice, "is
sage counsel for the frivolous. I am not. As you look like a very
sensible young woman, I put a sensible question to you. Perhaps my
language was vague. What I meant to convey was: do you think I would
be justified in taking a drink at this early hour of the day to brace
me for the ordeal of falling in love with an unknown affinity?"
"If your language is personal," replied Miss McCorkle, with a
sarcastic laugh, "my advice is to take six drinks. I'm in love with a
chauffeur."
"Good," said the young man, brightly, "and may I ask if it was a
sudden or a swift affair?"
"Swift," snapped Miss McCorkle. "He ran over my stepmother, then
brought her home. I let him in. We were engaged next day. Here's the
ring, one and one-half carats, white!--now, what number do you want?"
"A thousand thanks--get me the Ritz-Carlton, please, and don't break
this ten-dollar bill. I hate change, it spoils the set of one's
pockets."
As Whitney Barnes squeezed himself into the booth, Miss McCorkle
squinted one eye at the crisp bill he had laid before her and smiled.
"There's more than one way," she thought, "of being asked not to
listen to dove talk, and I like this method best."
The shrewd hello girl, however, had erred in the case of Whitney
Barnes, for this is the way his end of the conversation in booth No. 7
ran:
--This the Ritz? Yes. Kindly connect me with Mr. Smith.
--What Smith? Newest one you got. Forget the first name. Thomas Smith,
you say. Well, give me Tom.
--Hello, there, Trav--that is, Tom, or do you prefer Thomas?
--What's that? Came in by way of Boston on a Cunarder? What's all the
row? Read you were in Egypt, doing the pyramids.
--Can't explain over the wire, eh. Hope it isn't a divorce case;
they're beastly.
--Ought to know you better than that. Say, what's the matter with your
little angora?
--Be serious; it's no joking matter. Well, if it wasn't serious how
could I joke about it? You can't joke about a joke.
--I'm a fool! I wonder where I heard that before. Oh, yes--a few
minutes ago. My paternal parent said the same thing.
--Can I meet you at your house? Where is it? I ought to know? I don't
see why, you keep building it over all the time and then go way and
leave it for two years at a stretch. Then when you do come home you go
and live under the----
--Cut that out! My glory, but there is a mystery here.
--Certainly, I don't want to spoil everything.
--Have I an engagement? I should say I have. Just you call up Joshua
Barnes and ask for the dope on it--a whole flock of engagements
bunched into one large contract, the biggest I ever tackled.
--No, I guess it won't prevent me from meeting you. Not unless I
happen to see her on the way uptown.
--Blessed if I know her any more than you. Wish I did, but whoever she
is she's got to be pretty awful horrible nice.
--Have I been drinking? No; but you better have one ready for me. Seen
any of the chaps at the club? What's that? You gave it a wide berth.
This is beginning to sound like a detective novel or a breach of
promise case.
--You don't tell me. Really, I'd never looked at myself in that light
before. Sure, I'm stuck on myself. Head over heels in love with
myself. I'm a classy little party, I am, and you better make the best
of me while I'm here. Where am I going? Nowhere in particular. Just
going to merge my individuality, bite a chunk out of an apple and get
kicked out of the Garden of Eden.
--Now you're sure I'm piffled. No such luck. Trav--that is, Mr.
Smith--Mr. Thomas Smith! Shall I ask for Smith when I drop up at that
little marble palace of yours? No. Oh, Bateato will be there if you
happen to be delayed. How is the little son of Nippon? Oh, that's
good. Five sharp. Tata, Smitty, old chap. By Jove, he's rung off with
a curse----
CHAPTER VI.
OFFICER 666 ON PATROL.
Michael Phelan had been two years on the force and considered himself
a very fly young man. He had lost something of his romantic outline
during the six months he pounded the Third avenue pave past two
breweries and four saloons to a block, and it was at his own request,
made through his mother's second cousin, District Leader McNaught,
that he had been provided with a saloonless beat on Fifth avenue.
A certain blue-eyed, raven-haired nursemaid, who fed a tiny
millionaire with a solid gold spoon and trundled an imported
perambulator along the east walk of Central Park, may have had
something to do with Patrolman Phelan's choice of beat, but he failed
to mention the fact to his mother. He laid it all on the breweries and
the temptations they offered.
Humble as was Michael Phelan's station on the force, he was already
famous from the wooded wastes of Staten Island to the wilds of the
Bronx. Even the graven-featured chief inspector permitted himself to
smile when the name of Michael Phelan was mentioned.
He was a fresh, rosy-cheeked, greener-than-grass probationary cop when
fame came to him all in one clap and awoke a thunderous roll of
laughter throughout the city.
It was his first detail on the lower east side in the precinct
commanded from the Eldridge street station. The time was July and the
day was a broiler. He was sitting in the reserve room playing dominoes
with the doorman and mopping his forehead with a green bandana when
the captain sent for him.
"Phelan," said the captain shortly, "there's a lady dead without a
doctor at 311 Essex street, three flights up, rear. They've told the
Coroner's Office, but all the Coroners are busy. The corpse is a lone
widow lady with no kin, so you go up and take charge and wait for the
Coroner."
Officer 666 tipped his cap with military salute and set out. Turning
the corner into Essex street, he met plain-clothes man Tim Feeney, who
stopped him and asked him where he was bound. Michael Phelan explained
and then said:
"Tim, if you don't mind, will you give me a tip? What do I do when I
get up to that flat, and how long will I have to wait?"
"You'll have to wait, Mike," replied Tim Feeney, "till the Coroner
gets good and ready to come. When you get to the flat don't knock;
walk right in. Then sit down by the bed and wait. Be sure you keep the
door shut and let no soul in till the Coroner arrives."
"It'll be powerful hot and I'm perishing o' thirst now," said Mike.
"Take off your coat," said Tim, "and send a kid for a can of beer.
When you hear the Coroner comin' slip the can under the bed."
Tim Feeney went on his way with his hand over his mouth.
Patrolman Phelan had missed the twinkle in Tim Feeney's eye and a few
minutes later found him sitting beside a bed with his coat off and a
foaming can on the floor by his chair. On his way up the steep, narrow
staircases he had met a boy and sent him for the liquid refreshment.
He had instructed the lad where to deliver the beer and had gone
quietly in to his unpleasant vigil.
The door he opened led directly into the bedroom. He had glanced once
at the bed and then looked away with a shudder. Perspiration fairly
cascaded down his flaming cheeks as he tiptoed to a chair and placed
it beside the bed. He placed his chair at a slight angle away from the
bed and then fixed his eyes on the opposite wall. When he heard the
tread of the boy in the hall he made a pussy-footed dash for the door,
took in the growler, shut the boy out and buried his face in the
froth. He was in better heart, but still mighty uneasy when he wiped
his mouth on the back of his fist.
Somewhere in the flat a clock ticked dismally. Through two small open
windows puffed superheated gusts of air. The muffled clamor of many
voices in strange tongues sifted through the windows and walls, but
served only to increase the awful stillness in the room. Despite his
efforts to the contrary, Phelan stole a glance at the bed, then looked
away while his heart stopped beating. There was a naked foot where he
had seen only a sheet before.
"Mebbe the wind blew it off," he tried to tell himself, but something
inside him rejected the explanation and he felt an icy finger drawn up
and down his spine. Again he plunged his head into the capacious can
and succeeded in reviving his heart action.
More minutes of dreadful suspense passed. A leaden silence had filled
the sweltering room. Even the voices of the tenements had died away to
a funereal murmur. Battle as he did with all his will, Phelan's eyes
were again drawn from their fixed gaze upon the wall, and what he saw
this time induced a strangling sensation.
Three toes had distinctly wiggled.
He withdrew his eyes on the instant and his shaking hand reached down
for the can. His fingers had barely touched it when an awful shriek
rent the air. The shriek came from the bed, and it was followed by a
second yell and then by a third.
Michael Phelan did not open the door as he passed out. It was not a
very strong door and it went down like cardboard before the impact.
The third shriek awoke the echoes just as Officer 666 was coasting
down the stairs on the seat of his departmental trousers. His
departmental coat and his departmental hat were in no way connected
with his precipitate transit. A raging Polish woman brought these
details of Michael's uniform to the Eldridge street station a little
later. Likewise she prefered charges against Phelan that come under
the heading of "conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman."
It was a tremendous trial, in the course of which the Deputy Police
Commissioner who sat in judgment barely missed having a serious
stroke. It was adduced in evidence that Officer 666 had entered the
wrong flat, the Coroner's case being one flight up.
But while the whole town rocked with laughter Michael Phelan failed to
see the joke, and his hatred of Precinct Detective Tim Feeney never
cooled. That he got off with a light sentence of one day's fine did
not in the least improve his humor. He knew he was a marked man from
that day, and it was all his mother could do to urge him to stay on
the force.
In the course of time, however, the sting had worn off and the young
patrolman learned to smile again. His hollow cheeks had filled out
amazingly during the period of the brewery beat and on that late
autumn day when he stepped into the pages of this narrative he looked
mighty good, not only to the raven-haired Rosalind O'Neill but to a
host of other pretty nursemaids who were wheeling their aristocratic
little charges up and down The Avenue.
Nor was Michael Phelan at all unconscious of this as he sauntered
along the broad pavement and gracefully twirled his baton. His chest
jutted out like the breast of a pouter pigeon and he wore the solemnly
self-conscious expression of a peacock on parade.
When he came to the great white square mansion of Travers Gladwin, he
paused and studied it shrewdly with his eye. It was one of the most
important functions of his patrol to study the fronts of all
unoccupied dwellings and see that every window was down and every door
was closed. First he looked into the areaway of the Gladwin home and
then his eye travelled up the wide balustraded stoop to the ornamental
bronze doors.
"What's this!" he gasped in astonishment. "Sure, I read in the papers
on'y this morning that Travers Gladwin was in Agypt. 'Tis a bold thafe
who'll go in the front door in broad day, so here's where Mary
Phelan's son makes the grand pinch he's been dreamin' on this six
months back and gets his picture in the papers."
CHAPTER VII.
THE LITTLE BROWN JAP.
Patrolman Phelan wrapped his sinewy fist about the handle of his club
with a vicious grip as he proceeded cautiously up the steps. The heavy
bronze door had been left ajar, and he squeezed through without
opening it further, then paused in the vestibule and listened. What he
heard seemed no more than the tread of a spider, and the thought
rushed into his head:
"'Tis one of that felt-soled kind. 'Tis tip-toes for Phelan."
He had noted that even the inside door was open, and he swiftly
divined from this that the thief had left it open for his own
convenience or for some other purpose connected with the mysteries of
burglar alarms. Inch by inch the policeman moved across the vestibule
and wriggled through the door into the richly carpeted hallway.
It was with a distinct sense of relief that he felt his heavy boots
sink noiselessly into the deep ply of a precious Daghestan rug. One of
Phelan's boots had a bad creak in it, and he knew that the master
crook who would attempt such a robbery as this would have an acute
sense of hearing.
It was dark as a pocket down the stretch of the heavily curtained
foyer, save for a meagre shaft of light that came through a slightly
parted pair of portières to the left and not a dozen feet from where
he stood. He strained his ear toward this shaft of light until there
came an unmistakable swish of sound, whereupon he moved forward in
short, gliding steps.
When he reached the break in the portières and looked in he was
astonished to see a short little man with shiny black hair deftly
removing the linen covers from chairs and tables and statuary. The
little man had his back to Phelan as the policeman stepped inside, but
he turned in a flash and confronted the intruder with the peculiar
glazed grimness of the Japanese.
"Well, what matter?" ripped out the little Jap, without moving a
muscle.
"That's what I come to find out," retorted Phelan, with accusing
severity of tone.
"How you get in here?" retorted the Jap in the same sharp, emotionless
tones.
"I saw ye snakin' in an' ye didn't latch the door after yez," blurted
Phelan, taking a step nearer the Jap and still watching him with
profound suspicion.
"What you want?" asked the Jap with a slight tremor of apprehension.
"Information!" cried Phelan. "What are yez doin' in here?" Phelan's
eye swept the room for some evidence of an attempt to despoil. Though
he saw none he did not relinquish his attitude of suspicion. The Jap
seemed about to speak and then stopped. As Phelan continued to glower
at him, he snapped out:
"I no can tell."
Triumph blazed in Phelan's eyes. Now he was sure he had a thief and he
determined to handle the situation with all the majesty of his
official person.
"So yez can't tell what yez're doin' in this house," he said with fine
sarcasm.
The Jap shook his head emphatically and returned a positive, "No
tell!"
Phelan balanced his club for a moment and strode toward the Jap.
"Yez better come with me," he said through compressed lips.
The Jap started back with a frightened exclamation.
"You no take me to jail?" he uttered, while his yellow features
twitched with fear.
"In a minute," replied the elated officer, "if yez don't tell me what
yez're doin' here. I've been lookin' out for this place while Mr.
Gladwin was in foreign parts, and"----
"You know Mr. Gladwin?" broke in the Jap, excitedly.
"No, I ain't never seen him," said Phelan, "but I know this is his
house an' I been keepin' my eye on it fer him."
"Mr. Gladwin--he my boss!" and the Jap grinned from ear to ear.
This solution of the mystery never entered the policeman's head and he
resented the surprise.
"Do yez mean yez're his valley?" he asked vindictively, refusing to
relinquish his suspicion.
"Ees!" and again the Jap grinned.
Phelan read the grin as a distinct insult to his intelligence and he
pounced upon the little brown man in an even more caustic tone:
"If yez're are Mr. Gladwin's valley, what are ye doin' here an' him
thousands o' miles away across the ocean in Agypt an' Jerusalem an'
the like?"
Now it was Phelan's turn to grin as he saw the Jap shrink and turn
upon him a pair of wildly alarmed eyes.
"Come! Come! I'm waitin' fer an answer," The cat had his mouse backed
into a corner and mentally licked his chops.
"I no can tell," stammered the Jap, desperately.
"That's enough!" ripped out Officer 666, grabbing the Jap by the
shoulder and yanking him toward the doorway.
"No--no--wait!" gasped the struggling prisoner. "You no say if I tell
you, plees?"
"Tell me first," grunted Phelan, releasing his grip.
The Jap ducked his head in every direction as if fearful that the
walls had ears, then said in an impressive whisper:
"My boss--Mr. Gladwin--home!"
"Misther Gladwin home! Here in New York!" There was both incredulity
and amazement in Phelan's voice.
"Ees!" bleated the Jap and his grin returned.
"Well, why didn't you say so before?" said Phelan angrily, at which
the fidgety little brown son of Nippon hastened to explain:
"No one should know. He come all in much secret. He go boat to Boston.
No use name. No one know he Mr. Gladwin. He say, 'Bateato'--me
Bateato--'Bateato,' he say, 'no tell I come home--sure,' he say, and
Bateato he no tell."
Officer Phelan yielded to the grip of the mystery and his attitude
toward the Jap changed.
"What did he want to snake home that away fer?"
"I no know," nodded Bateato.
"Yez no know, eh? Well, is he comin' here?--do yez no know that?"
"He tell me--come here and wait--feex thees room--he come here or
telephone."
The straightforward manner of the little Jap had almost completely
disarmed the policeman's suspicion, but he surrendered reluctantly.
"Did he give yez a key to get in here?" Phelan fired as his last
shot.
"Ees--he give me all bunch keys--look!" and Bateato produced a gold
key ring with a gold tag and a number of keys attached. Phelan
examined it and read aloud the name Travers Gladwin engraved on the
tag. Handing them back to the Jap, he addressed him impressively,
gesturing his emphasis with his baton:
"I guess yez're all right, but I'll have me eye on yez from the
outside, mind that--and if yez're foolin' me or tryin' to get away
with anythin'"----
Phelan snapped his lips together and with a mighty lunge plucked an
imaginary prisoner out of the atmosphere and shook it ferociously.
Then stepping back to the doorway he shut one eye with a fierce wink
and jerked out:
"Are yez wise?"
The profound pantomime was too much for Bateato, who stared after the
vanishing officer in open-mouthed amazement.
CHAPTER VIII.
ART, MYSTERY AND LOVE.
The little Jap was still posed in an attitude of bewilderment as the
two outside doors slammed and Officer 666 went down the front steps to
resume the tread of his beat and the breaking of fragile hearts.
When he did emerge from his trance he returned to the task of getting
the great room in order with the same snappy energy he had displayed
when the uniformed minion of the law broke in upon him. He had removed
the covers from the chairs and was dusting off a great carved chest
that stood against the wall to the right of the doorway when the door
bell rang. Bateato jumped and then waited for a second ring. Stepping
warily out into the hallway, he looked to see if it was the grim
official in blue and buttons.
"Ha!" he exclaimed. "No more police," and he shot to the door and
opened it for that debonnair young gentleman who was one day to
inherit the mustard millions of Old Grim Barnes.
"Hello there, Bateato," Whitney Barnes greeted the little Jap
cordially. "Did your master show up yet?"
"He no come," grinned Bateato, shutting the door and leading the way
into the room he had been preparing for his master's arrival. As
Whitney Barnes stepped into the room the Jap asked:
"'Scuse me, Mr. Barnes--you see Mr. Gladwin?"
"No, nor his double, Thomas Smith of the Ritz; but he asked me to meet
him here at 5 o'clock, Bateato."
"Ees sair!" lisped the Jap, with a bob of the head; then dived back to
his occupation of making the long deserted room look presentable.
As Bateato followed his master's friend into the room he switched on
the full glare of electric lights that depended from the ceiling or
blazed through the shades of many lamps. Whitney Barnes blinked for a
moment, and then started as his gaze was directed to the walls hung
with masterpieces.
The work of Rubens, Rembrandt, Coret, Meissonier, Lely, Cazzin, Vegas,
Fragonard, Reynolds and a score others of the world's greatest masters
leaped across his vision as he turned from wall to wall, revolving on
his heel.
"Whew!" he ejaculated. "I didn't know that Travers went in for this
sort of thing. He certainly is the secretive little oyster when he
wants to be."
Still studying the portraits and landscapes and allegorical groups, he
voiced to Bateato a sudden thought.
"By the way, Bateato, do you know what it was that brought your master
back in this strange fashion and the reason for all this secrecy?"
"No, sair," responded the Jap.
"Well, it's damned peculiar!" muttered the young man to himself, and
proceeded on a tour about the room to examine more closely its wealth
of art treasure. He had been engaged in this way about five minutes
when the door bell rang and Bateato cried:
"Here Mr. Gladwin now."
"How do you know that Bateato?" quizzed the young man absently, his
attention being gripped by a stunning aphrodite rising from the sea in
a glory of nudity and rainbows.
The Jap paused a second on his way to the door, and replied:
"'Cause no one know he home but Mr. Barnes. Thees house close up much
long time and Mr. Gladwin make papers say he in Egypt."
In the same breath in which he maximed this volley of words the little
Jap projectiled himself from the room.
"His deductions are marvellous," said Whitney Barnes, solemnly
addressing a bronze bust of Philip of Macedon. He turned in time to
meet the brisk entrance of Travers Gladwin, alias Thomas Smith of the
Ritz.
The two shook hands warmly and looked into each other's faces with
quizzical smiles. They were about of an age, both unusually good
looking and bearing themselves with that breezy, confident manner that
is characteristic of young men who have been coddled in swan's-down
all their lives.
"Well, well, well, Travers!"
"Hello, Whitney, old boy!"
The greeting sprang from their lips simultaneously, and after he had
tossed his hat and cane to his valet Travers Gladwin continued:
"Didn't expect to see me so soon, did you, old scout?"
"I should say I didn't. Why, when I got that telegram of yours to call
up Thomas Smith at the Ritz it certainly was some jar to my delicate
nervous system."
Travers Gladwin laughed and rubbed his hands.
"Did it, though?" he cried. "Gave you a real thrill, eh?"
"Exact and specific--a real thrill."
"Well, you're lucky--a surprise and a thrill. I'd give anything for a
real surprise--I've hunted this little planet's four corners for one
and failed to connect."
"If you can't achieve 'em you seem to be in the business of
manufacturing 'em. Come along now, what's all this thundering mystery.
I'm shot to pieces with curiosity. What's happened to make you come
home like this?"
"Watkins!" replied Travers Gladwin curtly.
"Watkins! What Watkins? Who's Watkins?"
"Watkins is my man--I mean, Watkins was my man before I found out that
he was systematically robbing me."
"Oh, I remember now. A jolly good servant, though. So he robbed you,
did he? But they all do."
"Yes, but they don't always get found out--caught with the goods, as
the police say. I caught Watkins with the goods and sacked him."
"But you don't mean to tell me that you came kiting home from the
pyramids and the lovely Sahara desert just because this chap Watkins
was dishonest?" said Whitney Barnes, in tones of incredulity.
"No, Whitney," replied Gladwin, dropping into a chair and puckering
his forehead with a frown. "Watkins was only the start of it. I got
rid of him six months ago. But while I was on my way to Egypt I
learned that Watkins and my lawyer had been in some sort of a secret
correspondence before I gave Watkins the bounce."
"What lawyer? Not 'Old Reliable' Forbes? Why, I thought he wore a
certified halo."
"So did I, but I've got news to the contrary, and you know he has
charge of everything for me--keeps all my securities--has a power of
attorney--signs checks and all that."
"That sounds bad," said Whitney Barnes, sympathetically. "The old
saint could come pretty close to ruining you."
"Now you've hit it," assented Gladwin. "So I've come home to
investigate--sleuthing expedition, you might say. Didn't want him to
hear I was coming and climb out. Now you've got the answer to the
gumshoe riddle. My plan is to lie low and have you look him up.
Nothing else on foot, Whitney? Haven't gone into mustard or Wall
street, have you?"
It was Whitney Barnes's turn to construct a frown and take on an air
of intense seriousness, while his friend smiled at him, thinking it
was one of his humorous moods.
"Can't say I have anything definite on foot," said Barnes slowly, "but
the pater has given me a rather important commission to fulfil, though
not exactly in mustard."
"Well, then," said Travers Gladwin with a trace of annoyance, "I'd
better call on somebody else. I"--
"Nothing of the sort," broke in Whitney Barnes. "It may fit right in
with my plans. It'll keep me circulating round a lot and that's just
what I want--that and what Bateato is bringing," as the little brown
man entered the room on the run, bearing a silver tray, decanter and
glasses.
CHAPTER IX.
THE CURSE OF MILLIONS.
As Travers Gladwin's valet filled the tall, slim glasses with the
fizzing amber-colored fluid which constitutes the great American
highball, the two friends stretched their legs and lost themselves for
a few moments in aimless reverie. Bateato looked from one to the
other, puzzled by their seriousness. He clinked the glasses to rouse
them and glided from the room. Whitney Barnes was the first to look up
and shake himself free of the sober spell that gripped him.
"What the deuce made you skip abroad in such a hurry, Travers?" he
asked, reaching for his glass.
Travers Gladwin sat up with a start, pulled a lugubrious smile and
replied:
"Bored to death--nothing interested me--living the most commonplace,
humdrum, unromantic existence imaginable. Teas and dances, dances and
teas, clubs and theatres, theatres and clubs, motors and yachts,
yachts and motors. It was horrible, and I can't help thinking it was
all my dear old governor's fault. He had no consideration for me."
"He left you a tidy lot of millions," drawled Whitney Barnes.
Young Gladwin drained his glass, jumped to his feet and began to pace
the room, hands deep in his trousers pockets.
"That was just it!" he flung out. "If he'd left me nothing but a
shilling or two there'd be some joy in living. I'd have had to buckle
down. There's variety, interest, pleasure in having to make your own
way in the world."
Whitney Barnes laughed mockingly.
"Go out and tell that to the toiling masses," he chuckled, "and listen
to them give you the ha-ha. You're in a bad way, old chap--better see
a brain specialist."
"I know I'm in a bad way," Gladwin ran on fiercely, "but doctors can't
do me any good. It was all right while I was a frolicking lamb, but
after I got over the age of thinking myself a devil of a fellow things
began to grow tame. I was romantic, sentimental--wanted to fall in
love."
"Now you interest me," Whitney Barnes interjected, stiffening to
attention.
"Yes, I wanted to fall in love, Whitney, but I couldn't get it out of
my head that every girl I met had her eye on my fortune and not on me.
And if it wasn't the girl it was her mother, and mothers, that is
mothers-in-law-to-be or mothers-that-want-to-be-in-law or--what the
deuce do I mean?"
"I get you, Steve--they're awful. Go on."
"Well, I gave it up--the hunt for the right girl."
"The dickens you say! I wish you hadn't told me that."
"And I went in for art," Gladwin raced on, carried breathlessly on the
tide of his emotions and ignoring his friend's observations. "I went
in for these things on the walls, statuary, ceramics, rugs, and
tapestries."
"You've got a mighty fine collection," struck in Barnes.
"Yes, but I soon got tired of art--I still hungered for romance. I
went abroad to find it. I said to myself, 'If there's a real thrill
anywhere on this earth for a poor millionaire, I'll try and find
it--make a thorough search. It wasn't any use. Every country I went to
was the same. All I could find were things my money could buy and all
those things have long ceased to interest me. There was only once in
all the years I've been craving a romance"----
"Hold up there, Travers Gladwin, you're talking like Methusaleh.
You've been of age only a few years."
"Seems centuries, but as I started to say--there was only once. Two
years ago in a trolley car, right here in the midst of this heartless
city. Seated opposite me was a girl--a blonde--most beautiful hair you
ever saw. No use my trying to describe her eyes, clearest, bluest and
keep right on piling up the superlatives--peaches and cream complexion
with a transparent down on it, dimples and all that sort of thing. You
know the kind--a goddess every inch of her. Her clothes were poor and
I knew by that she was honest."
The young man paused and gazed rapturously into space.
"Go on; go on," urged Barnes. "Poor but honest."
"I caught her eye once and my heart thumped--could feel it beating
against my cigarette case."
"That's the real soul-mate stuff; go on!" cried Barnes.
"Well, she got off at one of the big shops. I followed. She went in
one of the employees' entrances. She worked there--I could see that."
"And did you wait for her to go out to lunch?"
"No, I had an engagement. Next day I caught that same car, but she was
not on it. I kept on trying and the fourth day she was on the car,
looking lovelier than ever. When she got off the car I got off. I
stepped up and raised my hat.
"'Forgive me for approaching you in this impertinent manner,' I said,
'but I would like to introduce myself,' and I handed her my card."
The youthful head of the house of Gladwin stopped abruptly and slid
listlessly into a chair.
"I demand to hear what she replied," insisted Barnes.
"It wasn't just what she said," mused Gladwin, "though that was bad
enough, but it was the way she said it. These were her exact words,
'Go on, yer fresh slob, an' sneak yer biscuits!' How does that suit
you for exploding a romance?"
"Blown to powder and bits," murmured Whitney Barnes, sombrely. "Sorry
you told me this--never mind why--but there's one thing I've been
wanting to ask you for a long time: How about that girl you rescued
from drowning four years ago? I remember it made you quite famous at
the time. According to all standards of romance, you should have
married her."
Travers Gladwin looked up with a wry smile.
"Did you ever see the lady?" he asked sharply.
"No. Wasn't she pretty?"
"She was a brunette."
"You don't fancy brunettes?"
"She was a dark brunette."
"Dark?"
"Yes, from Africa."
"That was tough luck!" exclaimed Barnes without cracking a smile.
CHAPTER X.
THE HEARTBEATS OF MR. HOGG.
In a magnificently furnished apartment on Madison avenue, which Mrs.
Elvira Burton had rented for New York's winter season, that augustly
beautiful or beautifully august lady sat writing. I may say that she
was writing grimly and that there was Jovian determination stamped
upon her high, broad forehead and indented at the corners of her tense
lips.
She had just returned from a consultation with two matrons of the same
stern fibre as herself. No group of gray-bearded physicians had ever
weighed the fate of a patient with more attention to pathological
detail than had Mrs. Burton and her two friends weighed the fate of
Helen Burton, but whereas it rarely happens that pork is prescribed in
a delicate case, the result of that petticoated conclave was that Hogg
was prescribed for the flower-like ward of the leader of Omaha's
socially elect.
While Mrs. Burton had done most of the talking, her two friends who
had broken into New York's next-to-the-top layer of society by means
of the hyphens with which they coupled the names of their first and
second husbands; her two friends, I say, had managed to wedge in a
word or two--all in favor of Jabez Hogg.
The guardian of the two prettiest girls who had ever debutanted in the
Nebraska metropolis emerged from that conference on fire with resolve.
She would marry Helen to Mr. Hogg, thus link together the Hogg and
Burton millions and thereby create an alliance that would take its
place beside any in the country in the matter of bank account.
So confident was she of the power of her will that she did not even
remove her wraps before she sat down to answer Jabez Hogg's letter.
Nor did she bother to ask her maid if Helen and Sadie had returned
from their ride. She did not care to discuss the matter with them. She
had decided. It remained only for weaker wills to yield.
Beginning with a regal flourish of the pen, she wrote:
"MY DEAR MR. HOGG: I received this morning your courteous note,
begging me to persuade Helen to give you a final answer. It pains
me deeply that you should suffer so from her neglect--after all
your kindness. I trust that you will forgive it on the score of
her youth. She is very young and her head has been turned with too
much flattery. She shall be yours--that I can promise you. When
you come on for your annual slaughter-house directors' meeting you
may bring the ring. I have already given the order for the
engraving of the engagement announcements, and I will arrange to
give a reception and dance for Helen at the Plaza. I do not know
how to thank you for putting your French car at our disposal. It
has saved us a great deal of annoyance and bother. Helen has
spoken often of your thoughtfulness"----
Mrs. Burton stayed her flying pen and grimly read the last sentence
aloud. It was not the strict truth, as she was writing it. Helen had
spoken frequently of the convenience of the car, but she had added
that she could never ride in it without feeling that she was going to
run over a pig and hear it squeal.
Mrs. Burton did not waver for more than an instant, however. In a way
of speaking she gripped her conscience by the neck, strangled it, and
threw it into the discard. Then she continued with her letter:
"I have been looking at houses on the avenue and would suggest
that you try and negotiate for the Gladwin mansion. The owner
lives abroad, and while it is not in the market I am advised that
the young man would be glad to get rid of it. He is said to be
living a fast life in Paris, and while he was left a great fortune
he would probably be glad to get the ready money. I know of no
finer home in New York for you to settle down in after your
honeymoon.
"Thanking you again for your constant thoughtfulness and hoping
that you will now banish every doubt from your mind, I remain,
"Faithfully yours,
"ELVIRA BURTON."
The smile with which Mrs. Burton sealed this letter and delivered it
to her maid was more than a smile of triumph. It was a positively
fiendish smile of victory.
CHAPTER XI.
GAINSBOROUGH "BLUE BOY."
Having discounted the romantic element of his thrilling rescue at
Narragansett Pier, Travers Gladwin fell into a moody silence. The more
volatile Barnes felt the influence and strove to fight it off. While
he, too, had been set upon the trail of romance at the behest of his
father, he felt it was too early to indulge in pessimistic reveries,
so he groped for another subject with which to revive the interest of
his friend.
"I say, Travers," he led off, rising from his chair and indicating the
walls with a sweep of his hand, "as I remarked before, you've got a
wonderful collection here."
"Yes," assented the young millionaire without animation, "but, as _I_
said before, I soon got tired of it. The pastime of collecting
pictures became a burden, and I was glad to get abroad and forget
it."
"Well," said Barnes, "I guess the only thing for you to do is to go to
work at something."
"I know it," grumbled Gladwin, "but what's the incentive? I don't want
any more money--what I have now is the biggest sort of a nuisance.
Just see the trouble I'm in for with my lawyer and that man Watkins,
though to tell you the truth I am beginning to enjoy the novelty of
that."
The young man got up and assumed a more lively expression.
"Do you know, Whitney," he ran on, "this travelling incognito isn't
half bad. They are really getting suspicious of me at the Ritz."
"But surely some one there ought to know you."
"Not a soul! It was opened while I was abroad. You know I registered
as Thomas Smith and I even took a chance and went down into the grill
room for lunch. And there, Whitney," cried Gladwin with an explosive
burst of enthusiasm, "I nearly got a thrill--another one like that on
the trolley car. The last place you'd expect it, too, in the midst of
stiff formality and waiters so cold and haughty they might have risen
from the dead."
"I suppose this was the ravishing girl at the cigar counter?" said
Barnes, ironically.
"Nothing of the sort--never smoked a cigar in her life--I mean, that
is, well, something entirely different. But she was a beauty! Golden
bronze hair--Titian never painted anything like it; the bluest eyes
behind the most wonderful dark lashes, creamy white skin"----
"And you followed her to a cloak factory, where you found"----
"Please wait till I finish, Whitney. I followed her nowhere, though
she interested me tremendously. I wish you could have seen her eat."
"Eat?"
"Particularly the grapefruit. By Jove, Barnes, that girl certainly
loves grapefruit! It was fascinating. I couldn't keep my eyes off of
her."
"And did she notice you?" quizzed Barnes, raising his eyebrows.
"She was too busy," came the gloomy rejoinder. "I watched her
steadily, fairly bored her with my eyes--tried to will her to look at
me. They say you can do that, you know--mental telepathy, projecting
thought waves or something of the sort."
"Oh, rot!" cried Barnes, impatiently. "I tried that on a dog once and
I've got the scar yet."
"But I tell you, Whitney, it almost worked. After a time her eyelids
began to flutter and the roses in her cheeks bloomed darker. But just
as I felt sure she would look up and see me--splash! the grapefruit
hit her in the eye!"
"What!" ejaculated Whitney Barnes, wheeling open-mouthed and facing
his friend.
"The juice, I mean," Gladwin laughed ruefully, "and, of course, the
spell was broken. She never looked again. Dash it all, there's some
sort of a lemon in all my romances!"
"You certainly do play in tough luck," sympathized Barnes. "I can see
that you need bucking up, and I think I've got the right kind of
remedy for you. Wait, I'll call Bateato."
Whitney Barnes stepped briskly across the room and pressed a button.
In a twinkling the little Jap appeared.
"Bateato," said Barnes, "has your master any hunting clothes at the
hotel?"
"Ees, sair!" responded the Jap. "Plenty hotel--plenty house. We no
time pack all clothes--go sail too quick."
"Plenty here--splendid!" enthused Barnes. "Pack a bag for him,
Bateato, this instant--enough things to last a couple of weeks."
"What's all this?" cut in Gladwin. "What are you going to do?"
"Never you mind," retorted Barnes, importantly; "you do as I say,
Bateato--I'm going to show your master some excitement. He'll never
get it here in town."
"Ees, sair! I pack him queeck," and Bateato vanished noiselessly,
seemingly to shoot through the doorway and up the broad staircase as
if sucked up a flue.
"But see here"----objected Travers Gladwin.
"Not a word now," his friend choked him off. "If you don't like it you
don't have to stay, but I'm going to take you in hand and show you a
time you're not used to."
"But I don't"----
"Don't let's argue about it," said Barnes, lightly. "You called me in
here to take charge of things and I'm taking charge. Just to change
the subject, tell me something about your paintings. This one, for
instance--who is that haughty looking old chap?"
Whitney Barnes had planted himself with legs spread wide apart in
front of one of the largest portraits in the room, a life-size
painting of an aristocratic looking old man who seemed on the point of
strangling in his stock.
Travers Gladwin turned to the painting and said with an unmistakable
note of pride:
"The original Gladwin, my great-grandfather. Painted more than a
hundred years ago by Gilbert Stuart."
"I guess you beat me, Travers--the original Barnes hadn't discovered
mustard a hundred years ago. But I say, here's a Gainsborough, 'The
Blue Boy.' By George! that's a stunner! Worth a small fortune, I
suppose."
Whitney Barnes had crossed the room and stood before the most striking
looking portrait in the collection, a tall, handsome boy in a vividly
blue costume of the Gainsborough period.
The owner of "The Blue Boy" turned around, cast a fleeting glimpse at
the portrait and turned away with a peculiar grimace.
"You suppose wrong, Whitney," he said, shortly. "That
isn't--so--horribly--valuable."
"What! A big painting like that, by a chap famous enough to have a hat
named after him."
"That was just about the way it struck me at first," answered
Gladwin, "so I begged two old gentlemen in London to let me have it.
Persuaded them to part with it for a mere five hundred pounds, on
condition--close attention, Whitney--that I keep the matter a
secret. I was delighted with my bargain--until I saw _the original_."
"The original?"
"Ah ha! the original. It was quite a shock for me to come face to face
with that and realize that my 'Blue Boy' had a streak of yellow in
him."
"That sounds exciting," cried Barnes. "What did you do? Put the case
in the hands of the police?"
"Not much," denied Gladwin emphatically. "That would have given the
public a fine laugh. It deceived me, so I hung it up there to deceive
others. It got you, you see. But you are the only one I've let into
the secret--don't repeat it, will you?"
"Never!" promised Barnes. "It'll be too much of a lark to hear others
rave over it."
"Thank you," acknowledged the bitten collector, curtly.
Barnes wandered from "The Blue Boy" and signalled out another
painting.
"Who painted this?" he asked.
"That's a Veber--but do you know, Whitney, the more I think of
it--there's something about that grapefruit girl, something gripping
that"----
"I like these two," commented Barnes.
"There's something different about her--something"----
"Who is this by?" inquired Barnes, lost in admiration of a Meissonier.
"A blonde"----
"What?"
"And very young, and I know her smile"----
"Look here, Travers, what are these two worth?"
Gladwin volplaned to earth, climbed out of his sky chariot and was
back in the midst of his art treasures again.
"I beg your pardon," he said hastily. "Which two?"
Barnes pointed to two of the smaller pictures.
"Guess," suggested his host.
"Five thousand."
"Multiply it by ten--then add something."
"No, really."
"Yes, really! That one on the left is a Rembrandt! and the other is a
Corot!"
"My word; they're corkers, eh!"
"Yes, when you know who painted them, and if you happen to have the
eye of a connoisseur."
"And what in creation is this?" exclaimed Barnes, as he stumbled
against the great ornamental chest which stood against the wall just
beneath the Rembrandt and Corot.
"Oh, let's get the exhibition over," said Gladwin, peevishly. "That's
a treasure chest. Cost me a barrel--picked it up in Egypt."
"You never picked it up in your life," retorted Barnes, grasping the
great metal bound chest and striving vainly to lift it. "Anything in
it?" he asked, lifting the lid and answering himself in the negative.
"What's the whole collection worth?" asked Barnes, as he returned to
where his friend was standing, gazing ruefully at "The Blue Boy."
"Oh, half a million or more. I really never kept track."
"Half a million! And you go abroad and leave all these things
unguarded? You certainly are fond of taking chances. It's a marvel
they haven't been stolen before now."
"Nonsense," said Gladwin. "I have a burglar alarm set here, and I'll
wager there aren't half a dozen persons who know the Gladwin
collection is hung in this house."
"Just the same--but I say, Travers, there's the door bell. Were you
expecting anybody else."
Gladwin glanced about him nervously.
"No," he said sharply. "On the contrary, I didn't wish--what the deuce
does it mean?"
"It means some one is at the door."
CHAPTER XII.
APPROACHING A WORLD OF MYSTERY.
Gaston Brielle, the strawberry blonde French chauffeur who piloted the
big, luxurious motor car Jabez Hogg of Omaha had placed at the service
of Mrs. Elvira Burton and her two charming young nieces, did not have
his mind entirely concentrated upon manipulating the wheel and
throttle of the car as he swung around Grant's Tomb and sped southward
down the Drive. While his knowledge of English was confined to a few
expletives of a profane nature and the mystic jargon of the garage, he
was nevertheless thrilled by the belief that the two mademoiselles
behind him were plotting some mysterious enterprise.
From time to time they had unconsciously dropped their voices to the
low tones commonly used by conspirators, or at least that was the way
Gaston had sensed it. Along the silent roads of Central Park and
Riverside Drive, where even the taxis seemed to employ their mufflers
and to resort less frequently to the warning racket of their exhausts,
the Frenchman had been straining his ears to listen.
He had heard on two occasions what he divined as a manifest sob, first
when the emotional Sadie gave way to tears and again when Helen was
aggravated to a petulant outburst of grief.
Later when he heard bright laughter and gay exclamations he could
hardly believe his ears. He was profoundly troubled and completely
bewildered--a dangerous state of mind for a man who has the power of
seventy horses under the pressure of his thumb.
Nor was his mental turmoil in the least alleviated when, having turned
south and being on the point of coasting down a precipitous hill he
felt a touch on his shoulder and heard the elder of his two pretty
passengers command him in worse French than his own poor English to go
slow when he turned into Fifth avenue again and be prepared to stop.
Gaston knew that this was in direct violation of his orders from Mrs.
Burton, but when he saw a yellow-backed bill flutter down over his
shoulder his quick intelligence blazed with understanding. His first
groping suspicions had been justified. There was romance in the wind.
Steering easily with one hand, Gaston deftly seized the bill and
caused it to vanish somewhere in his great fur coat.
Sadie Burton had been horror-stricken at this bold proffer of a bribe.
Likewise she was alarmed that Helen should put so much trust in
Gaston, who seemed to be in mortal terror of her aunt and to quake all
through his body when he listened to her commands.
As Helen sank back beside her, after letting fall the bribe, the
agitated Sadie whispered tremulously:
"Are you sure you can trust him, Helen? If he should tell Auntie El
she would surely make you a prisoner. You will never get a chance to
leave her side at the opera to-night."
"Gaston is a Frenchman, my dear," laughed Helen, confidently, "and
most Frenchmen--even chauffeurs, I am sure--would cut their hearts out
before they would oppose a barrier to the course of true love."
But Helen's gayety did not communicate itself to Sadie. That shy miss
trembled apprehensively as she sought to picture herself in Helen's
place--on the verge of an elopement. Not that such a prospect did not
have its alluring thrill even to such a shrinking maiden as the
violet-eyed Sadie, but her fear of her aunt seemed to crush and
obliterate these titillating sensations. As the car shot through
Seventy-second street and headed for the entrance to the West Drive of
Central Park, she ventured another word of caution.
"Wouldn't it be better to send a messenger to Mr. Gladwin's house,
Helen? Suppose we should run into somebody there who knew auntie?"
"You ridiculously little fraid-cat," Helen caught her up. "Of course
there'll be nobody there but Travers, or perhaps his man or some of
the other servants. He has good reason for keeping very quiet now and
sees absolutely nobody, not even--not even--not even his grandmother,
if he has one."
"And didn't he tell you whether or not he had a grandmother, Helen?"
gasped Sadie.
But Helen disdained to reply, her heart suddenly filling with rapture
at the prospect of an immediate meeting with her betrothed.
CHAPTER VIII.
TRAVERS GLADWIN GETS A THRILL.
A ring at the door bell should suggest to the ordinary mind that some
person or persons clamored for admission, but Whitney Barnes's
announcement seemed to have difficulty in hammering its way into
Travers Gladwin's gray matter and thence downward into the white
matter of his brain cells.
"What is some one at the door for?" he asked vacuously.
"To see you, of course," snapped Barnes.
"Nonsense!" exclaimed the other with annoyance. "The house has been
closed for ages and you are the only one who knows I am home. Why
I"----
Bateato skimmed in, grinning like a full moon.
"Well, what is it?" his master asked, shortly,
"Two ladies, sair!"
"Two--that's good!" chimed in Barnes. "They must have got a wireless
that I was here."
"What do they want?" Gladwin addressed Bateato.
"You, sair," replied the Jap. "They say you come to door one minute."
"Two ladies to see me? Are you sure?" Travers Gladwin was both
bewildered and embarrassed.
"Ees, sair!" Bateato assured him.
"Did you tell them that I was here?"
"They no ask. They say, 'Please, Mr. Gladwin come to door!'"
"Well, you tell them Mr. Gladwin is not at home--that I'm out,
away--in Egypt."
"Ees, sair," and Bateato was about to skim out into the hallway again
when Barnes stopped him.
"Wait a minute, Bateato--what do they look like?"
"Look nice, sair," and Bateato's moon-like grin returned in full
beam.
"You're sure?" asked Barnes, gravely.
"Oh, fine," uttered the Jap, enthusiastically.
"Young?" inquired Barnes.
"Ees, sair--much young--come in autbile. I tell them you no home?"
turning to Gladwin.
"No, wait," responded Gladwin, his curiosity taking fire. "You tell
them to come in."
"They say you come door."
"Very well," but Whitney Barnes stopped him.
"Better see them in here, Travers. If they really want to see you
they'll come in. Ask them to come in, Bateato."
The little Jap was gone with the speed and noiselessness of a mouse.
"Who in heaven's name can it be?" whispered Travers Gladwin as Bateato
could be heard lisping in the vestibule. Before Whitney Barnes managed
to frame a reply a swift, muffled step was audible and Helen Burton
stood framed in the narrow space between the portières. Her timid
cousin stopped behind her, staring timidly over her shoulder. She was
manifestly surprised and startled as she paused and regarded the two
young men.
In point of startled surprise, however, Travers Gladwin's emotion
matched hers. He stared at her almost rudely in his amazement and
involuntarily he turned to Whitney Barnes and said under his breath:
"The grapefruit girl!"
Whitney Barnes's lips merely framed: "No! You don't mean it!"
He was going to add something more, when the two girls came on into
the room diffidently and stood by the great carved table, close
together, as if prepared to cling to one another in case something
extraordinary happened. Travers Gladwin was the first of the two young
men to come to their rescue.
"Pardon me! Did you wish to see me?" he said with his best bow.
"No," replied Helen Burton quickly, her lips trembling; "we want to
see Mr. Gladwin, please."
The young man did not recover instantly from this staggering jolt, and
a clock somewhere in the great hall nearby ticked a dozen strokes
before he managed to mumble:
"Well--er--I am"--
"Isn't he here?" broke in the brown-haired beauty, breathlessly. "His
man just asked us to come into this room to see him."
"What Mr. Gladwin did you want?" asked that young man incoherently.
"Why, Mr. Travers Gladwin!" exclaimed the girl indignantly, the color
mantling to her forehead. "Is there more than one?"
"Well--er--that is," the young man turned desperately to his friend,
"do you know Mr. Gladwin?"
"Do I know him?" cried Helen Burton, and then, with a hysterical
little laugh as she turned to her cousin, "I should think I did know
him. I know him very, very well."
Sadie Burton appeared both distressed and frightened and slipped
limply down into one of the great chairs beside her. As Travers
Gladwin's features passed through a series of vacant and bewildered
expressions and as the attention of Whitney Barnes seemed to be
focussed with strange intensity upon the prettiness of the shy and
silent Sadie, anger flashed in Helen's expressive eyes as she again
addressed the young man, who felt as if some mysterious force had just
robbed him of his identity.
"You don't suppose," she said, drawing herself to the full height of
her graceful figure, "that I would come here to see Travers Gladwin if
I didn't know him, do you?"
"No, no, no--of course not!" sputtered the young man. "It was stupid
of me to ask such a question. Please forgive me. I--er"--
Helen turned from him as if to speak to Sadie, who sat with erect
primness suffering from what she sensed as a strange and overpowering
stroke. She had permitted herself to look straight into the eyes of
Whitney Barnes and hold the look for a long, palpitating second.
While Sadie was groping in her mind for some explanation of the
strange thrill, Whitney Barnes had flung himself headlong into a new
sensation and was determined to make the most of it, so when Travers
Gladwin turned to him and asked:
"I rather think Gladwin's gone out, don't you?" Barnes nodded and
answered positively:
"He was here only a few minutes ago."
This reply drew Helen's attention immediately to Barnes and taking a
step forward she said eagerly:
"Oh, I hope he's here. You see, it's awfully important--what I want to
see him about."
Whitney Barnes nodded with extraordinary animation and turning to
Gladwin impaled that young man with the query:
"Why don't you find out if he's in?"
While Gladwin had come up for air he was still partially drowned.
Turning to Helen Burton, he forced an agreeable smile and said
hurriedly:
"Yes, if you'll excuse me a moment I'll see, but may I give him your
name?"
It was Helen's turn to recoil and stepping to where Sadie had at last
got upon her feet, she whispered:
"Shall I tell him? They both act so strangely."
"Oh, no, Helen, dear," fluttered Sadie. "It may be some awful trap or
something."
While this whispered conclave was going on Travers Gladwin made a
frantic signal to Whitney Barnes behind his back and mumbled:
"Try and find out what it's all about?"
"I will--leave that to me," said Barnes confidently.
Leaving her cousin's side, Helen again confronted the two young men
and said tremulously:
"I'd rather not give my name. I know that sounds odd, but for certain
reasons"----
"Oh, of course, if you'd rather not," answered Gladwin.
"If you will just say," Helen ran on breathlessly, "that I had to come
early to tell him something--something about to-night--he'll
understand and know who I am."
"Certainly, certainly," said the baffled young millionaire. "Say
that you want to see him about something that's going to happen
to-night"----
"Yes, if you'll be so kind," and Helen gave the young man a smile that
furnished him the thrill he had hunted for all over the globe, with a
margin to boot.
"I'll be right back," he gasped, spun on his heel and passed dizzily
out into the hallway.