Mr. Larkin had lingered on at Cedar Brook. He said that he needed a
holiday, the prosperity of the last year had worn him out, also the
bungalow sites were many and a decision difficult.
He saw a good deal of Willitts; they had become very friendly, almost
chums. Their lodgings were but a few yards apart and of evenings they
smoked neighborly pipes on the porch steps, and of afternoons took walks
into the country. During these hours their talk ranged over many
subjects, the valet proving himself a brightly loquacious companion. But
upon a subject that Mr. Larkin introduced with delicate artfulness—Price
and Esther Maitland—he maintained the evasive reticence that had marked
him at their first meeting. For all the walks and talks Mr. Larkin
learned no more, and as his curiosity remained unsatisfied his
inclination for Willitts’ society increased.
It was a few days after that first meeting that, strolling down Main
Street toward Sommers’ garage, the detective stopped short, staring at
two figures emerging from the garage entrance. One was Sommers, the
other a fat, red-faced man with a sunburned Panama on the back of his
head. A glance at this man and Mr. Larkin turned on his heel and made
down a side lane at a swinging gait. Safe out of range behind a lilac
hedge, he slowed up, lifted his hat from a perspiring brow and swore to
himself, low and fiercely. He had recognized Gus O’Malley, private
detective of Whitney & Whitney, and he knew that Whitney & Whitney were
Mrs. Janney’s lawyers. Another investigation was on foot, evidently
following on the lines of his own.
After two days O’Malley left by the evening train and Mr. Larkin emerged
from a temporary retirement, and sought coolness and solitude on the
front porch. Here, when night had fallen, Willitts joined him taking a
seat on the top step.
The house behind them was empty of all other tenants, its open front
door letting a long gush of light down the steps and across the pebbled
path to the gate. It was a warm night, heavy and breathless, and Mr.
Larkin, in his shirt sleeves, lolled comfortably, his chair tilted back,
his feet on the railing. The place where he sat was shaded with vines,
and he was discernible as a long, out-stretched bulk, detailless in the
shadow.
Willitts had good news to impart; that afternoon he had been to Council
Oaks to see Mr. Ferguson who had engaged him as valet. It was an A1
place, the pay high, the duties light, Mr. Ferguson known to be generous
and easy tempered. Congratulations were in order from Mr. Larkin, and if
they lacked in warmth Willitts did not appear to notice it.
A pause fell, and his next remark caused the detective to deflect his
gaze from the darkling street to the head of the steps:
"Did you notice a chap about here yesterday—a fat, untidy looking man in
a Panama hat and a brown sack suit?"
Mr. Larkin had and wanted to know where Willitts had seen him.
"In Sommers’ garage. He was hiring a motor, wanted to see the
country—and Sommers telling him I knew it well, asked me to go with
him."
"Did you go?"
"I did; I had nothing else to do. We went a long way, through Berkeley
and beyond. He’s what you’d call here ’some talker’ and curious—I’d say
very curious if you asked me."
"Curious about what?"
"Everything in the neighborhood, but especially the robbery."
"Did he have any theories about it?"
"None that I hadn’t heard before."
The detective laughed:
"That accounts for the drive—hoped he’d get some racy gossip about the
family out of you."
"Maybe that _was_ his idea."
"Of course it was. I’ll bet he pumped you about Price."
"I don’t know that I’d call it pumping—he did ask some questions."
Willitts was sitting with his elbows on his knees, his hands supporting
his chin. The light from the open door behind him lay over his back,
gilded the top of his smooth head and slanted across his cheek. He was
not smoking and he was very still, facts noted by Mr. Larkin.
The detective stretched, yawned with a sleepy sound and said:
"So it’s still a subject of popular curiosity, is it?"
"Yes, _it_ is, but why should Mr. Price be?"
The valet’s voice was low and quiet, holding a quality hard to define;
the listener decided it was less uneasiness than resentment. After a
moment’s silence he spoke again, very softly, as if the words were
self-communings:
"I’d like to know who the feller is."
Mr. Larkin’s feet came down from the rail striking the floor with a
thud. He sat up and looked at his friend:
"I can tell you. He’s a detective, Gus O’Malley, employed by Whitney &
Whitney."
Willitts’ hands dropped and he squared round:
"A detective! _That’s_ it, is it? _That_ accounts for the milk in the
cocoanut. I might have guessed it. And what’s he after me for?"
"You lived at Grasslands. Something might be dug out of you."
"But tell me, why should he be curious about Mr. Price?"
He had dropped one hand on the flooring and supported by it leaned
forward toward his companion. The boyish good humor had gone from his
face; it looked sharp-set and pugnacious.
The other shrugged:
"Ask _him_. All I can tell you is that Whitney & Whitney are Mrs.
Janney’s lawyers."
Willitts pondered, and while he pondered his eyes stared past the
shadowy shape that was Mr. Larkin into the vine-draped blackness of the
porch. Then he said:
"Mrs. Janney’s down on Mr. Price. She’s all for her daughter. I think
she ’ates ’im."
The two h’s dropped off with a simple unconsciousness that surprised Mr.
Larkin. Never before in his intercourse with Willitts had he heard the
letter so much as slighted. He made a mental note of it and said dryly:
"So I’ve heard."
The man again relapsed into thought, his glance riveted on the darkness,
his expression obviously perturbed. Suddenly he looked at the vague bulk
of Mr. Larkin and said sharply:
"’Ow do _you_ know so much about ’im?"
Mr. Larkin’s answer came out of the shadow with businesslike promptness:
"Because I’m a detective myself."
For a moment the valet’s face seemed to set, lose its flesh and blood
mobility and harden into something stony, its lines fixed, vitality
suspended,—a vacuous, staring mask. Then life came back to it, broke its
iciness, and flooded it with a frank, almost ludicrous astonishment.
"You—you!" he stammered out, "and me never so much as thinking it! Would
any one, I’m asking you? Would—" he stopped, his amazement gone, a
sudden belligerent fierceness taking its place, "And are you after Mr.
Price too?"
Mr. Larkin laughed:
"I’m after no one at this stage. I’m only assembling data. If O’Malley’s
got to the point of finding a suspect he’s far ahead of me."
Willitts’ excitement instantly subsided; his answer showed a hurried
urgence:
"No, no—he didn’t say anything one could take ’old of—only a few
questions. And it’s maybe all in my feelings. I couldn’t bear a person
to think evil of Mr. Price. It ’urts me; I’d be sensitive; I might see
it if it wasn’t there."
"If you got that impression I guess it _was_ there."
This remark, delivered with a sardonic dryness, appeared to rekindle
Willitts’ anger. It flared up like the leap of a flame:
"Then to ’ell with ’im. If they’re working up any dirty suspicions
against my gentleman they’ve come to the wrong man. I’ve got nothing to
say; there’s no information to be wormed out of _me_ for I ’ave none.
Umph—lies, trickery—that’s what _I_ call it!"
He dropped back into his former position, his angry breathings loud on
the silence, mutterings of rage breaking through them.
"Well," said Mr. Larkin, "now I’ve put you wise you can form your own
conclusion as to what’s in their minds."
"Is it in yours, too?"
The question came quick, shot out between the deep-drawn breaths. Mr.
Larkin was ready for it:
"I told you I hadn’t got as far as that; I’m just feeling my way. But
let me say something to you." He rose and, going to the steps, sat down
beside Willitts, dropping his voice to a confidential key. "I’ll be
frank with you—I’ll show you how I stand. I didn’t intend to tell you
what I was, but this fellow coming up here has forced my hand. He knows
me, he’ll be after you again, and you’d have found it out. Now, here’s
my position: I want to get this case; it’s my first big one and it’ll
make me every way—professionally and financially."
He looked at the man beside him who, gazing into the street, nodded
without speaking.
"There’s ten thousand dollars offered for the restoration of the jewels.
If I could get them I’d share that money with the person
who—who—er—helped."
Willitts repeated his silent nod.
"And even if I didn’t get them I’d pay and pay well for any information
that would be useful."
"I see," said the other, "’oever ’elps along in the good work gets ’is
reward."
Mr. Larkin did not like the words or the tone, but went on, his
confidential manner growing persuasive:
"I’m engaged on the side of law and order. All I’m trying to do is to
restore stolen property to its owner. Any one that helps me is only
doing his duty."
"A duty that gets its dues, as you might say."
"Exactly. The money made by such services is earned honestly and there’s
plenty of it to earn."
"Righto! When the Janneys want a thing they’ll open the purse wide and
generous."
"And here’s a point worth noticing: What I’m hired for is to get the
jewels, not the thief. The party behind me isn’t out for vengeance or
prosecution. If I could deliver the goods it would be all right and no
questions asked. But the Whitneys wouldn’t stop there—they’re
bloodhounds when it comes to the chase. If they got anything on Price
they’d come down on him good and hard and Mrs. Janney’d stand in with
them."
He was looking with anxious intentness at Willitts’ profile. As he
finished it turned slowly, until the face was offered in full to his
watchful scrutiny. It was forbidding, the eyes sweeping him with a cold
contempt:
"I can’t ’elp understanding you, Larkin, and I’m sorry to ’ear you got
your suspicions of my gentleman and of _me_. The first is too low to
take notice of; the second is as bad, but I’ll answer it to put us both
straight. I’m not the kind you take me for; I’m not to be bought. Even
if I did know anything that would be ’useful’ as you say, wild ’orses
wouldn’t drag it out of me. And no more will filthy lucre. Filthy—it’s
the right name for it, you couldn’t get a better." He rose, not so much
angry as hurt and haughty. "I can’t find it in me to sit ’ere any
longer. I could talk of insults, but I won’t. All I’ll say is that I’ve
'ad a bit too much, and not wanting to ’ear more I’ll bid you
good-night."
Before the detective could find words to answer he had gone down the
path and vanished in the darkness.