THE VENEER OF INTELLIGENCE
The doctor’s face betrayed his anxiety, as Cole repeated what he had
just heard over the telephone.
“That settles it,” muttered the physician. “We must find Miss Brownell
at once.”
Cole nodded. For several minutes he had been watching the physician
closely. It was as if a veil had been removed from one phase of
Latham’s many-sided character. Cole looked through the contradictions
of his personality, and he knew that on one point, at least, the doctor
was sincere. That was in his attitude toward Miss Brownell.
“There’s no hurry,” he said calmly. “Nothing is going to happen to her
for twenty-four hours.”
“But why delay?”
“Because we can do nothing else. Another reason is that I need sleep.
The third reason is Toots.”
“Toots?” Latham frowned. “Who is Toots?”
“The most distracted cat in the State of New York at the present
moment. My rooms were invaded by prowlers this afternoon, everything
thrown helter-skelter, and Toots just can’t bear fuss of any kind.
She is a very temperamental cat, doctor. You will hear from me in the
morning.”
He left the scowling physician and walked toward the door. There he
stopped and looked back. “Don’t worry,” he said. “We will see Miss
Brownell out of this. There’s something of a plan buzzing around in my
mind. So long, doctor.”
Cole walked out. Despite his cheerful tone he was not altogether free
from worry. The situation, as far as Miss Brownell was concerned,
looked critical enough. With the fate of Reeves and McKendrick in mind,
Cole knew the gang would not stop short of murder, if it suited their
plans. The hope he had tried to instill in Doctor Latham was based on
the advantages which he held over the other side. So far Ballinger
did not know that he was being suspected, and this was an important
point in Cole’s favor. A man who thinks himself safe is apt to make
blunders and become incautious. Another advantage lay in the fact that
the conspirators knew nothing of the deductions Cole had made from
Carmody’s visit to the offices of the Bureau of Civic Research, or of
his suspicions in regard to the big safe standing there.
Cole went home, noticed with approval that Mrs. Armstrong had tidied
up his rooms, and that Toots was sleeping tranquilly on her favorite
cushion. In a few minutes Cole himself was sound asleep. Five hours he
slept, and then he awoke clear-eyed and vigorous. After feeding Toots
and getting his own breakfast, he went to the offices of The Unknown
Seven. On his desk he found a note from Carlin announcing that the
lawyer had, in accordance with Cole’s instructions, detailed one of the
operatives to watch room 2512 and report at once if the safe should be
taken out.
Cole crumpled the note in his fist. It was yet early, and only a few
members of the staff were on duty. He went to the end of the hall and
glanced into the room where the body of McKendrick lay. What to do with
it was a delicate problem in view of the fact that the operations of
The Unknown Seven were being conducted secretly. Perhaps the best way,
was Cole’s reflection, would be to encase it in a plain box and ship
it anonymously to the morgue. Later, in some indirect way, he would
endeavor to see that the hunchback was duly punished.
He locked the door of the little room and went back to his office.
He had been there only a few minutes when Doctor Ballinger, after a
discreet knock, stepped in.
“You are early, doctor,” remarked Cole genially.
Ballinger sat down and crossed his long legs. “I’ve been looking for
Miss Brownell,” he explained. “Seen anything of her?”
“No,” said Cole casually, knowing that the doctor was watching him
keenly. “A bit too early for her, I guess. No doubt she will be
strolling in soon.”
“Making any progress?”
“Rome wasn’t built in one day,” said Cole evasively, knowing that the
question was a subtle feeler. “I’m just taking hold of the job, you
know.”
“Still think there’s a traitor among us?”
“I not only think it, but I am sure of it,” declared Cole testily, as
if reproaching himself for his failure to expose the renegade. He was
on the point of saying more, but just then the telephone rang. It was
Fessenden, the operative who had been detailed to watch room 2512.
“They’re just taking it out, sir,” reported Fessenden, cautiously
hiding the gist of his statement behind the neutral pronoun.
“Well, stay on the job and report developments to me,” said Cole in
tones that seemed to indicate that the matter was of no particular
importance. “You see,” he went on, turning to the doctor, as he hung up
the receiver, “I spilled the beans at dinner. The traitor has had his
warning, and from now on he will be a hard man to catch.”
The doctor agreed with him. They discussed the matter from various
angles and finally the telephone rang again. Fessenden reported that
“it” had been loaded onto a truck.
“Stay with it,” said Cole laconically. “Telephone me when you can.”
He was aware of a questioning gleam in the doctor’s eyes, as he hung
up, but he pretended to have noticed nothing. “Fessenden thinks he has
come across a clew,” he added for Ballinger’s benefit. “Don’t think it
amounts to anything, but it’s just as well to run it down.”
“What sort of clew?”
“It seems to have something to do with the murder of Reeves,” said Cole
indifferently. “Not more than one clew out of twenty ever pans out, and
I haven’t much hope for this one.”
The doctor seemed to have been deceived by his tone. After a few more
remarks he walked out. In spite of what he had told Carlin the night
before, he had been far from certain that the safe would be taken out;
at any rate he had not expected it would be done before another night.
Fessenden’s report had started a long train of thoughts in his mind.
Shortly before noon the lawyer walked in.
“I’ve just made some inquiries about the Bureau of Civic Research,”
he reported, after he had been told that there was no news of Miss
Brownell. “There isn’t the slightest doubt about its genuineness.
Some of the biggest men in town belong to it. It’s a sort of reform
organization; interested in political uplift and that kind of thing.
They’ve occupied the two offices down below ever since the building
opened.”
“That’s interesting,” said Cole, looking as if his trend of thought had
taken a sharp quirk. “By the way, the safe was taken out of room 2512 a
little while ago.”
“Anything startling in that?”
“Well, it’s just possible that, if we can follow the safe to its
destination, we shall find Miss Brownell.”
“How do you make that out? What has the safe to do with Miss Brownell?”
“My reasoning is based on the assumption that certain parties are as
anxious to hide the one as the other. If that is so then it is only
natural to suppose that they will hide both in one place. That safe,
Carlin, represents our only hope of getting Miss Brownell out of
danger.”
The lawyer scratched his head thoughtfully. “I would advise you to move
cautiously. Those blackguards would kill her without the slightest
hesitancy if——”
“Oh, I’ll be careful,” promised Cole. “All the same we must move
quickly. I think your hunch yesterday was right, Carlin. The gang is
getting ready to cash in their chips. They are holding the threat of
death over Miss Brownell in the hope of influencing us through her and
making us let them alone till after the clean-up. The miserable cowards
are hiding behind a woman. The idea makes me mad clean through.”
“You look it,” observed Carlin. Shortly afterward he withdrew, and
a little while later Fessenden telephoned that the safe had been
transferred to a private yacht, moored at the foot of West One Hundred
and Thirtieth Street. Fessenden did not know to whom the craft
belonged. He added that it did not look as though the boat would start
for a while, for the crew were on shore leave. Cole instructed him to
report at once if it should appear that the yacht was about to sail.
“They’ll probably wait till after dark,” he told himself after
Fessenden had finished. “Rather bold of them to put it aboard a yacht
in broad daylight. Really no reason why they shouldn’t, though,” was
his second thought. “As far as they know, nobody suspects anything. It
would look as if the safe was being shipped to a summer home somewhere
along the shore. Many people keep jewelry and other valuables in
such places, and a safe comes in handy. And to transport it by water
on a private yacht is less risky than intrusting it to the express
companies. There’ll be a merry little chase to-night.”
Cole looked as if a whimsical idea had occurred to him. He called up
Latham and inquired if the doctor owned a motor boat. The physician
replied that he did; it was a small affair, he explained, but a demon
for speed. Cole promised that he would learn something interesting if
he would have the boat ready within an hour, at a certain point along
the river. Latham’s imagination seemed to cover the gaps in Cole’s
statement, for he promptly agreed to do as suggested.
After giving several orders Cole left the office. His rendezvous with
Latham was a short distance below the point where the larger craft was
moored. Before boarding the doctor’s boat Cole went cautiously forward
and sought out Fessenden.
“The wind is slack, and the engine seems to be out of order,” explained
the operative. “I believe somebody is tinkering with it.”
“Have you learned who owns the yacht?”
“I’ve made several inquiries, but nobody seems to know. She is
brand-new, as you can see, and this appears to be the first time she
has been anchored here.”
Cole cast a glance at the queenly craft, its fresh coat of paint
gleaming in the pale autumnal sunlight. After telling Fessenden that he
could take the rest of the afternoon off he went back to Doctor Latham.
The physician, looking fresh and crisp in blue coat and creamy flannel
trousers, sat at the tiller.
“When do we start?” he inquired anxiously.
“We’re waiting for the other party to make the first move,” explained
Cole, pointing out the larger boat, easily distinguishable among the
craft of various types that littered the surface of the river.
“Any news of Miss Brownell?”
“Not a word, doctor. Are you in the mood for a little excitement?”
The physician said nothing, but his smile and the squaring of his
shoulders spoke more loudly than words. Cole glanced out over the
horizon. A frieze of clouds was creeping up in the south, and a rising
wind rippled the water.
“I suppose you are armed?” he asked after a while.
The doctor slapped his hip pocket significantly. “Are we likely to have
a scrap?” he inquired in a tone hinting that the prospect appealed to
him hugely.
“Quite likely! The rats are scenting danger and crawling into their
hole. We may have to tackle a whole nest of them.”
The afternoon waned and still they waited. Darkness fell, and a
spanking breeze blew up. At Cole’s suggestion the doctor moved the
motor boat a little closer to the larger craft.
“They are hoisting the sail,” observed Latham, as he brought the boat
to a stop at a point from which they could watch the yacht without
danger of being seen by its crew. Here and there the black ribbon
of water was broken by twinkling lights. An excursion steamer swept
majestically up the Hudson, with a tail of foaming silver in its wake.
Presently the yacht moved. The two men in the motor boat waited a while
to give it headway. Then the doctor flipped the wheel, and, with a
gleeful phut-phut, the little boat darted forward. Like an animated
thing it skipped giddily across the water, darting in and out among
larger vessels. After a little the sprinkling of boats thinned out,
and they hugged the shore closely, in order to avoid being seen by the
yacht’s crew.
“Think you can keep her in sight, doctor?” asked Cole, noticing with
concern that the larger boat was gaining speed.
“Easily,” said the doctor confidently, “unless the motor should start
missing, and there’s little danger of that.”
They were silent for a time. Cole, sitting close by, watched the intent
look on the doctor’s face as he guided the boat along the curving river
bank. The shore line grew more rugged; here and there earth and sky
melted into a blur. Now and then the lights of a town threw a yellow
sheen over the murky water. At intervals the yacht disappeared from
view behind a jutting tongue of land, but it was never out of sight for
long.
“Doctor,” said Cole abruptly, “I don’t quite know what to make of you,
but we seem to have one interest in common. Both of us are concerned
over Miss Brownell. I am partly responsible for whatever happens to
her, while you—— But I think you told me that your emotional self is
dead.”
A queer little chuckle drifted out on the breeze. There was a note of
grim despair in it.
“Anyhow,” Cole went on, “there is a bond of interest between you and
me for the present. Seems we ought to understand each other a little
better. The other night, when I trailed the hunchback to your house and
later found him asleep on the operating table, your conduct was as
mysterious as the deuce. What had happened?”
The doctor, one hand on the tiller, gazed rigidly out over the black
water to where the gray blur of a sail was visible against the darkness.
“The thing which we call human intelligence is only a thin veneer,” he
remarked in whimsical tones. “Sometimes only a slight thrust is needed
to break through it. It is very amusing to watch the antics that a
supposedly sane being will perform when a crisis of some sort comes
along and gives him a jolt. My own part in this affair is an example
of what happens when the veneer of intelligence cracks. You would not
believe me if I were to tell you, so what is the use?”
“You might try,” suggested Cole. The doctor had been a changed man
since he learned that Miss Brownell was in danger. Before that he had
been all subterfuge, evasions, and bewildering subtleties. Now Cole
felt that he was face to face with the man’s real self.
“The hunchback came to my house that night to dispatch me to a better
world,” Latham said.
“He had just performed a similar service for Malcolm Reeves,” Cole
observed.
“He had orders to get me, too. The gang feared both of us, and they had
come to a pass where they couldn’t afford to stand on ceremony. Well,
that night I heard some one getting in the basement way. That’s the
advantage of being a light sleeper. I collared the fellow as he came up
the stairs. Not knowing what to do with him I gave him a hypodermic to
keep him quiet. Then you came and complicated the situation.”
“If the hunchback came to your house to murder you,” said Cole
doubtfully, “why didn’t you turn him over to the police?”
The doctor chuckled softly. “That shows how incongruously we sometimes
act, strutting around like hens with their heads chopped off. Your own
conduct was very peculiar that night. I was wondering why, instead of
handcuffing the culprit to my operating table, you didn’t telephone for
the police wagon.”
“I had a reason.”
“And so did I.” The doctor chuckled again. “At least I thought I had
a sound reason for my conduct. As a matter of fact my reason was at a
standstill; no doubt yours was likewise. At any rate I didn’t dare hand
the fellow over to the police. Certain things had happened that made it
undesirable for me to communicate with the authorities.”
“The operation on Reeves?” Cole suggested.
Again a queer little laugh drifted out on the wind. Cole suddenly
sat erect, gazing hard at the shadowy figure beside him. A shaft
of intuition had suddenly pierced the fog of contradictions and
incongruities in his mind.
“There were two operations, weren’t there?” he asked.
“That’s a very shrewd deduction,” declared the doctor, raising his
voice above the roar of the wind. “There were two. I performed one
of them. I strongly suspect that Ballinger performed the other. The
interesting point about them is that there is an official record of the
first, but none of the second.”
For a moment Cole peered sharply ahead. The yacht was momentarily out
of sight, but he caught a glimpse of it again, as they rounded a curve
in the river bank.
“Go on,” he said. “You were involved with this golden coterie, weren’t
you?”
“For a time. I thought they were engaged in strictly scientific and
legitimate pursuits. I had known Carmody for some time, as a quiet and
scholarly man. It was through him I became connected with the group.
For a time all went well. My specialized training helped them solve two
or three minor technical problems that came up in connection with their
experiments.”
“Then one evening Carmody telephoned me that an accident had occurred
at his house on Bleecker Street. He asked me to come over at once.
When I arrived he told me that Malcolm Reeves, who was visiting him
that evening, had stumbled and fallen down the stairs. My examination
revealed a compound fracture and convinced me that the pressure of the
bones against the brain made an immediate operation necessary.”
“I had Reeves removed to the nearest hospital. It happened to be one of
the smaller private ones. I was assisted by a nurse. She was a little
nervous, and I could see that she was new at the game, but at first I
thought nothing of it, not until I discovered that there was something
wrong with the anæsthetic. She had blundered in administering it. I
shudder whenever I think of the result. Perhaps you can realize
something of what it means to have a patient awake in the midst of an
operation.”
“Did Reeves see you?” asked Cole suddenly.
The tiller wabbled for a moment in Latham’s hand. “He not only saw me,
but he recognized me. I shall never forget the expression on his face.
It was horrible! Well, luckily there were no serious consequences.
After a while Reeves was brought under the anæsthetic again, and the
operation was successfully finished. In due time he was taken to his
home. To this day I don’t know whether Carmody told me the truth and
the injury was accidental, or whether some one deliberately inflicted
it.”
“Couldn’t you tell from the nature of the wound?”
“Not with any degree of positiveness. I suspect some one tried to
murder him that night, but failed. Perhaps the assassin lost his nerve.
Carmody didn’t dare to have Reeves die on his hands, and so he sent for
me. I do know that Reeves had been troublesome toward the last, and
that the other members of the gang were afraid of him. They had ample
reason for wishing him out of the way, or at least rendered harmless.”
“And so they performed a second operation that destroyed his memory?”
guessed Cole.
“Presumably, but that’s only a surmise on my part. Reeves recuperated
very rapidly after the first operation. One evening, shortly after he
became able to move about, he started out on a mysterious errand. He
never returned, and the police found no trace of him. About the same
time I began to grow suspicious in regard to the activities of the
gang. I had no tangible proof, but it was my strong impression that
their aims were not strictly legitimate.”
“Isn’t anybody entitled to make all the gold he wants to, if he’s lucky
enough to know how?”
“That’s just the point. Carmody assured me he had discovered a process
whereby real gold could be produced synthetically. It would not only
look like gold, he told me, but it would assay up to the required
standard when turned over to the government mints. Carmody put it so
convincingly that at the time I believed him, especially when he showed
me samples. Later I began to have grave suspicions. Certain things
led me to doubt that the gang had sufficient faith in its products to
turn it over to the government in the form of bullion. In short, I had
reason to believe that I was involved in a huge counterfeiting project.”
“What!” exclaimed Cole. The doctor’s revelation went beyond what he had
learned from The Unknown Seven.
“To eliminate all risk the gang decided to take a short cut,” Latham
went on. “Instead of taking the gold to Uncle Sam’s mint they set up
a mint of their own. In a short time the country will be flooded with
spurious gold coins that are practically indistinguishable from the
real.”
“And you have kept silent all this time?”
“What did I tell you about the fragile quality of our veneer of
intelligence? I went to Carmody’s house and told him of my suspicions.
The old fox said nothing for a time, but merely smiled that freezing
smile of his. Then he took me to a small room on the second floor.
There sat Reeves, a gibbering maniac. Carmody bluntly accused me of
having performed the operation that deprived him of his reason and
smoothly suggested that it might be well for me to keep my suspicions
to myself.”
“Carmody went on talking, mentioning among other things that it was
on record that I had performed an operation on Reeves’ skull. Call me
a simpleton if you like, but the professor’s words sank in. I guessed
that a second operation had been performed under cover of the original
one, but I had no means of proving it. I could see nothing but ruin
and disaster ahead. The only one who had witnessed my operation was
the nurse, and I could expect no help from her. I argued and argued
with myself, but, in the end, I decided to say nothing, at least for a
time. Sooner or later I suppose I should have spoken, but just then I
played the coward’s part. I was very neatly caught. In what was left of
Reeves’ mind was a picture of myself, as he had seen me when he woke
up in the midst of the operation. Occasionally, when the recollection
came back to him, he would shriek my name. The second operation, on the
other hand, had been performed under circumstances so deftly arranged
that they had left no impression whatever. There, my friend, you have
the whole story. Sounds like a travesty, eh? I shan’t feel at all hurt
if you refuse to believe me.”
Cole had no reason to doubt him. What Latham had told him coincided at
various points of contact with what he had learned at the headquarters
of The Unknown Seven. He could piece out the rest. Agents of The
Unknown Seven had kidnaped Reeves from the Carmody residence and taken
him to headquarters. There he had been placed under Doctor Ballinger’s
care, and Ballinger had gone through with the pretense of trying to
restore Reeves’ mental functions. Only one contradiction remained.
Since Reeves was in the hands of a physician who was friendly to the
gang and could be depended upon to destroy any symptoms of returning
sanity in Reeves, why had it been thought necessary to kill him?
Ballinger himself evidently shrank from such a coarse crime as murder.
He must have had several chances to kill Reeves by safe and subtle
means, and yet the hunchback had been commissioned to do the crime. Why
had Reeves been killed?
For a while the answer to that question eluded Cole. Then he recalled
something Carlin had told him. After Reeves had been under Ballinger’s
care for a time, without showing any signs of improvement, it had been
suggested that he should be removed to a hospital and a consulting
physician called in. Evidently Ballinger had seen a danger to himself
in that suggestion, and so the murder had been decided upon.
“I have no reason to doubt you,” Cole said. “I don’t know but what I
would have acted pretty much the same if I had been in your place. I
think, though, that you have done a lot of needless worrying. Ballinger
is not at all confident of being able to fasten the second operation on
you.”
“How is that?” asked Latham quickly.
“I can’t tell you, but I have every reason to believe that Ballinger
is afraid of what an autopsy on the body might show. Not being a
scientific man I can’t grasp the details. All I know is that Ballinger
is so anxious to prevent an autopsy that he is having the body spirited
away.”
Latham’s hand left the tiller, and the boat lurched dangerously. In a
moment he had regained control of it.
“Unless I am a very poor guesser,” Cole went on, “the body is on the
yacht ahead of us. They are taking it to a place where it can be safely
destroyed. It’s hard to do such things in the city.”
Latham stared at him speechlessly through the dusk. The wind had
increased, and the waves were swishing and churning against the bow of
the little craft.
“It may be Ballinger is suffering from an uneasy conscience,” the
doctor murmured. “That’s one of the things that happen when the veneer
of intelligence cracks. Conscience makes a man do queer things.
However, if your guess is right——”
He stopped short, at the same time peering sharply ahead. Suddenly his
hand went out, and the chugging of the motor ceased.
“The chase is over,” he said.
Cole followed his glance. The yacht, with sails lowered, was turning
into a small inlet.
“And here is where the excitement begins,” he declared.