Detective Fiction Weekly. Vol. 36, No. 4, October 20, 1928

This story began in Detective Fiction Weekly for September 29

Puzzling out the slain gambler’s last words, Chief MacCray discovers the first clew to the master mind behind the murder plot.

Harry Lethrop, son of an eminent Chicago jurist, rescued a beautiful girl from the attack of a thief.

The incident was, apparently, the first step in a frame-up. Young Lethrop was drawn into an elaborate trap and accused of the murder of a Chicago gambler, Francis Keene. Evidence against him was strong.

The girl, Christine Vincennes, disappeared. Judge Lethrop, of the State Supreme Court, appealed to the police chief for aid in establishing his son’s innocence. Chief Quentin summoned Chief of Detectives MacCray.

In a few short hours, MacCray, dynamic sleuth, learned several important things. He learned that Keene, gasping out his life’s breath, had murmured an unintelligible sentence and the name Elihu.

He learned that Judge Lethrop was the jurist selected to pass on the appeal of a Joseph Crawley from conviction for the murder of his wife, and he discovered similarities between the two murders. Mrs. Crawley had also uttered the name Elihu.

Joseph Crawley was convicted on the evidence of his finger-prints on the murder pistol. Harry Lethrop’s fingerprints were found on the Keene murder gun. MacCray was convinced Lethrop was framed. Could Crawley have been framed too? While he was wandering, Judge Lethrop received a message which read:

The judge was bewildered. He had never heard of the man.

And then another mysterious name entered the case — John E. Duke.

John Duke, MacCray later discovered, had paid the expenses of Crawley’s trial; Duke also had employed Keene to run his gambling den. And the weapon which had killed Keene and had been stolen from Meadow’s department store with Harry Lethrop’s finger-prints on it, was registered in Duke’s name.

MacCray subjected Crawley, who was in prison awaiting execution, to an odd third degree, and the prisoner, in a hypnotic state, made wild statements about a strange portrait in the Duke residence.

Harry Lethrop, free on bail, picked up the trail of the chauffeur who had attacked Christine Vincennes, and discovered she was a prisoner in an apartment rented by a man named Carlotti. She dropped a note to him appealing for help.

Chapter XIV The Kidnapers’ Lair

The red-haired clerk popped up from his chair behind his counter like a jack-in-the-box. At sight of Harry Lethrop his jaw slacked and his eyes bulged.

“My God!” he articulated. “You back again?”

“Who is manager of this house, and where can I find him?” demanded Harry tersely.

The clerk considered.

“Why do you want to know?” he countered.

Harry had a secret suspicion that he was not going to like this clerk, but he could not afford to antagonize him, considering the plans he had made, so he replied very civilly.

“You have a notice outside that a janitor is wanted,” he said. “I want to apply for that job. I must have it I’ve got to have it!”

The clerk leaned far out over his counter and stared incredulously.

“Ha!” he snorted, mildly for him. “Ha! So you really would work for a living, eh? You don’t look in hard shape. What’s your game?”

“There isn’t any game. I tell you I must get that job. Where can I find the proper person to apply to?”

“Right here,” rejoined the clerk. “Mr. Starlatch is the manager and owner of this place. You can see him, if you are in earnest. Where are your references?”

“Do I have to have references to shovel coal?”

The clerk laughed loudly.

“Shovel coal? My boy, you don’t know the first thing about the duties of a janitor, I see. A janitor, my lad,” he went on, “must be horny-handed. Let’s see your hands! I thought as much! Soft! Soft! Not only must his hands be hard — so must his heart.

“He must know how to swear. He must be bard so that he can demand — and collect. Shovel coal? My son, that is one of his minor duties. He must handle luggage, do odd carpenter work all over the building, be a handy man with plumber’s wrenches, be a jack of all trades. In brief, the janitor of to-day is the czar of the apartment house. You wouldn’t suit. Besides, we hired a janitor this morning.”

“Are you really telling me the truth?” asked Harry. “Did you really hire a man for the job?”

The clerk shrugged.

“Ha!” he reflected. “Not the first time the truthfulness of Jack Durant has been questioned. Go ask Mr. Starlatch. First door to your right behind you. Knock before you enter.”

Harry read nothing but truth in the impish blue eyes before him. He could not repress a slight groan of disappointment. He looked woebegone.

“Say, what’s eating you, anyhow?” Durant demanded. “Are you on your uppers sure enough?”

“You don’t have any idea,” confided Harry desperately. “I... I just have to do something about this. It’s... it’s on account of a — girl.”

“Ah, ha!” exclaimed Mr. Durant wisely, cocking his bristling head. “I see. I see. Oh, ha! Ha! Ha! Let me think! Let me think!”

Harry made no attempt to interrupt the process.

“I say, now,” remarked Mr. Durant very suddenly. “You don’t seem such a half bad sort after all. Tell me all about it. Maybe I can help you find a job somewhere.”

“But I must have it here,” groaned Harry.

“Here? What d’you mean?”

“My girl,” explained Harry, playing on the chord of romance which seemed to have touched the red-haired clerk’s heart. “She lives here. She isn’t allowed to see me. I... I must be near her so I can... can arrange to elope with her. And I must keep everything secret.”

“Ha!” snorted Mr. Durant. “I see it all now. Magazine peddling in order to visit sweetheart! Romance of youth! Love tryst thwarted by house clerk! Stark tragedy! Gloom! Janitor’s job next best bet! Capital!”

Harry began recovering himself. He allowed the other to enlarge on the theme to his heart’s content. It was not so far from the truth at that. While the delighted Mr. Durant ran riot, he considered the advisability of calling MacCray and raiding the Bon Ton.

But would such an act result in the rescue of Christine? Was she really here? It would never do to make a mistake and lose what little advantage he had gained thus far. He would, if he failed to find the girl, merely warn the criminals that the law was hot on their trail.

No, the idea which was formulating, thanks to Mr. Durant’s assistance, was by far the best. He must somehow manage to get a job here and survey the situation carefully before he made any rash moves.

Money was no object. If nothing better offered, perhaps he could bribe Durant to let him take his job for a week or two. At least, he should be able to use the clerk as a source of information. But he had to make sure of the fellow, first.

“Ha!” chuckled Mr. Durant. “I’m going to help you. What’s your name?”

Harry started. The first name which rose to his lips was his own, and that would never do. He cast wildly about for a suitable cognomen. The only name which suggested itself was the name MacCray had given him at the department store that morning.

“Jones,” he said aloud. “Harry Jones. Call me Harry.”

He had given his own Christian name purposely; he knew that he would not be caught napping by failing to respond to it. Otherwise, he was now a complete creation of Chief MacCray, name, identity, and physical characteristics. Harry Lethrop, the material witness in the Keene murder case, had dropped out of existence.

“All right, Harry. Listen to me? Mr. Starlatch spoke to me only this morning about hiring a night man. This is a new place, it ain’t completely filled up yet, and he has to go easy on the expenses. I’m working for less than I’m worth right now. Ha! Never mind that. Anyway, we need a sort of combination night clerk and elevator man. If you’d work reasonably, I guess I could get you the job. Would that do you any good — working here from six to six?”

“Would it? Just try me!” said Harry fervently.

“There wouldn’t be much to do after ten o’clock. I figure you can make some plan to talk to your girl over the phone, or meet her in one of the corridors, or something. Say, do her folks know you?”

“Not by sight.”

“That’s fine. Wait here while I go talk to Mr. Starlatch.”

“You were yelling for him awhile ago. What if—”

“He didn’t come out of his office. Ha! You’ll have to admit you were acting cuckoo. Being in love makes a fellow real batty, don’t it?”

“It certainly does,” agreed Harry fervently.

“I’ll be right back,” promised Durant, vaulting the counter. “If anybody comes in after their keys or their mail, ask them their name. You’ll find a card hanging on the key rack with the names of the tenants and their apartments.”

Willingly Harry accepted the task.

“Mum’s the word,” he cautioned his new friend. “This is strictly between us.”

“You bet it is, kid. Leave it to me. Ha!”

Mr. Durant jerked himself through the door leading to the owner’s office, and Harry immediately installed himself behind the counter. He wasted no time finding the indexed card and searching feverishly for a certain name.

His luck had been so phenomenal that he feared a sudden check. But no, there was the name he sought — Antonio Carlotti, Suite 307. He looked quickly at his sheet of paper. The name was the same.

A rapid buzzing caused him to start. He looked up and saw that the sound came from a small telephone switchboard at the end of the counter. He approached and glanced at it. It was the type of board found in office buildings and apartment houses, a hoard with ten sets of jacks and some forty numbers on it. There were two trunk lines, their telephone numbers just above them, which entered the board in the lower right-hand corner. It was the light above one of these which was glowing, indicating a call from outside.

Harry hesitated an instant and then thrust one of the outer jacks into the hole, slipped the received over his head, pressed the proper key, and answered the call.

“Bon Ton Apartments,” he said into the mouthpiece.

“Three hundred and seven,” an energetic voice spoke crisply in his ear.

“I beg pardon?” answer Harry, nonplused for the moment.

“Connect me with 307 — Carlotti’s apartment,” the voice crackled impatiently.

Harry was electrified. For an instant his fingers were all thumbs. At last he managed to plug the inner jack of the proper pair into the hole marked “307” and then pressed the inner key on the board to ring the apartment. Almost instantly a man’s voice answered the call. Shamelessly Harry left his key open and listened in.

“Hello!”

“Carlotti?”

“Yas.”

“Neal there?”

“No, sir. He justa lef’.”

“Are you sure?”

“Sure? Sure. He was here coupla hour, but all gone now.”

“He is on his way here,” decided the gentleman of the crisp voice. “All right, never mind.”

“Wassa mat?” demanded Carlotti, his accent thickening in excitement.

“Nothing,” replied the other curtly. “Don’t flare up. Everything all right there?”

“Oh, sure, yas, sir.”

“Gentle treatment, mind! You know me!”

“Oh, sure. You bet. Everything all wat you calla okayed.”

“Good. It won’t be long now. That will be all — no! If you see Neal before I do, tell him to keep an eye out for a tall, well-built fellow wearing-glasses and a mustache. It is barely possible that he has been shadowed.”

Signor Carlotti promptly erupted with a torrent of voluble Italian, while Harry nearly dropped the operator’s ear phones from his head in his astonishment.

“Silenzio, pazzo!” cut in the other sharply. “Importa poco.”

“Ahhh, signore!” almost whimpered the melodious voice of Carlotti, and he was off again in a stream of fluent Italian.

The other man cut him off with a razor-edged voice. Thereafter followed what Harry took to be a series of commands and directions all in Italian which was too swift for him to follow. This ended abruptly with a sharp click which indicated that the caller had hung up his receiver.

Harry heard the worried Signor Carlotti sigh heavily as he hung up his own receiver.

The buzzer reawakened on the switchboard, and Harry jerked out the pair of plugs and removed his head phones just as Jack Durant returned with an individual in tow.

“Ha!” he ejaculated in surprise. “You can work a switchboard, Harry? Fine!”

“Yes,” replied Harry as calmly as possible. “I’m familiar with small outfits like this.”

“Incoming or outgoing call?”

“Incoming.”

“No charge, then. This is Mr. Star-latch. Mr. Starlatch, Harry Jones.”

Mr. Starlatch was a little man with a big mustache. He looked to Harry like a London cabby who had risen considerably above his station. His nose was bulbous and of a faintly suspicious hue. His speech was thick and mushy, as though his words found it difficult to escape through the hairy entanglement on his lips. Otherwise, he appeared a quiet and harmless person.

“Mr. Jones, it is?” he managed to get out. “Durant has recommended you for this job as night man.”

“I’m very grateful,” replied Harry.

“I hadn’t fully made up my mind that we can afford a night cleric,” Mr. Starlatch mumbled away as distinctly as possible. “But since you are here, and recommended by Jack, why — I might start you at a small salary. It might not pay, you see.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’ll give you ten dollars a week and a room to sleep in. I’m sorry, but that’s the very best. Maybe — if business justifies it—”

“That’s all right,” declared Harry quickly. “I’ll take it, sir.”

Mr. Starlatch looked a trifle put out, as though he resented this interruption.

“I usually demand references,” Mr. Starlatch went on, parting his mustache dexterously. “But Jack has recommended you very highly. I guess — yes, I guess that will do. You can go to work to-night. Jack will start directing you now, if you’re ready. Then you go out for supper and go to work when you come back. All right?”

“Perfectly. And thank you, sir.”

“All right,” responded Mr. Starlatch abstractedly, waving one hand as he wondered why he had not offered six dollars per week to this anxious worker. “Show him the basement room, Jack, for his sleeping quarters. Better have one of the maids see if the bed is made up.”

The newly born Harry Jones now had a station in life. Moreover, he had a burning mission, and the enemy was already taking him into account. Quite a record for an eight-hour-old fledgling.

The next two days proved the busiest and most arduous Harry had ever experienced, not excepting even the day of the murder. For one thing, he was under a double strain which he had not known before. He knew that the criminals were on the alert for him as Harry Jones, probably were seeking him hourly, and this was by no means less painful than to be held as a material witness by the law.

The second matter which almost carried him to the heights of frenzy was the little note appealing for help which he carried over his heart. It was from the one girl in the world he would gladly have sacrificed everything for, he was in the same building with her, he was planning and scheming to get in touch with her, and he had not so much as seen her at a distance. And she had no way of knowing whether or not her pitiful little SOS had reached a responsive station.

And with all this to beset him, he was busy learning the ways of a night clerk in an apartment house, learning to change his days into nights and his nights into days, watching out for the wary Neal, worrying about his father and MacCray, knowing that they would fear something had happened to him.

But he dared not try to communicate with either of them in any manner until he felt he could do so safely.

The afternoon that he took his new job he left the place about five o’clock. His first objective was a cheap clothing store which was not in the immediate neighborhood. He bought a ready made sack suit, two or three inexpensive shirts, ties, socks, undergarments, and a suit of pyjamas. Two or three other little items, and a straw suitcase to carry them in, completed his purchases. Farther down the street he bought a cheap cap. At the drug store where the taxi pirate had deserted him he found the necessary toilet articles to complete his kit.

Before he went on duty he retired to his room and changed his tailored suit for the inferior garment he had bought. His eyeglasses he also discarded, resolving to risk the upper part of his face in order to obliterate more perfectly the described shadower of Neal.

He was in a quandary as to how to dispose of his own clothes and the soft felt hat. He dared not give them away, nor yet sell them to any second-hand store for fear they might be traced. Finally he decided to parcel post them to himself at home. This he did the first thing the following morning. He put no return address on the bundle, and he dared not put in a message of any sort to his father for fear the package might fail to reach its destination, but he wrote his name and address in his natural hand and prayed that his father would observe and quiet his fears.

The first night on duty he was too busy to proceed with his effort to reach the imprisoned Christine. His duties were too new to him for him to know just how and when he could desert his post.

He confined his efforts to the first floor and basement and, after midnight, dozed intermittently until daylight.

Upon the return of Jack Durant, who did not live in the house, he attended to his mailing business, had breakfast at a delicatessen, and returned to chat with the alert Mr. Durant before thinking of going to bed.

From him he learned many things about the building, the floor plan, the description, names, and idiosyncrasies of the various tenants, and a great deal about Mr. Durant himself. He was still on guard, fearing even yet to take the obliging young fellow into his confidence. Finally he went to bed for several hours.

In the early afternoon he returned to the clerk’s office. At Durant’s suggestion he made a personal tour of the house in order to make sure of the plans. He located the Carlotti apartment without trouble on the third floor overlooking the street.

It was a four-room affair, bathroom, kitchen, and the two living rooms with disappearing closet beds. There was a tiny hallway just inside the corridor door, which connected the two bedrooms.

He dared not tarry near the door with the number 307, much as he felt the urge to assault the barrier with his bare hands. Upon his return to the lobby of the house he was saved the trouble of approaching the matter of his affair by the blunt interest of Mr. Durant.

“Ha!” boomed the latter at sight of him. “Come behind the counter so we can talk. Well? What have you planned on doing? Which is your girl, anyhow? You haven’t told me a damn thing.”

Harry eyed his untried friend. Then he drew a deep breath, and plunged.

“Her name is Christine,” he said soberly. “I don’t think you have ever seen—”

“I know I haven’t,” butted in Mr. Durant promptly. “There ain’t a Christine in the Bon Ton.”

Harry smiled sadly.

“She is kept a prisoner by Antonio Carlotti,” he explained.

Durant studied him anxiously. Then:

“Say!” he exclaimed. “You’re clear off your nut. I’ve already told you about the Carlottis. They’re ham actors out of work — just the pair of them — singers they think they are — I’ve heard ’em yodel. Ha! I doubt if they’re man and wife. They ain’t old enough to have a grown daughter. Why, Harry—”

“I didn’t say she was their daughter. I merely said she is a prisoner here. And that is—”

“When did she arrive?”

“Tuesday.”

“Ha! They must have smuggled her in at night. I can swear that no young woman was brought here while I was on the job.”

“I don’t know how it was done at all,” replied Harry wearily. “But I know she is here, and I’m going to see her.”

“Sure you ain’t dreaming?”

“If I didn’t think it would spoil everything, I’d break into that apartment right now,” stated Harry violently.

“She’s here,” decided Mr. Durant wisely. “Easy, kid, easy! Ha! I’ll help you. We’ve got to get both Carlotti and his wife away at the same time so you can see the girl alone. Ha! Let me think! Let me think!”

But all the thinking both of them could do yielded no results. Signor and Signorina Carlotti could not be pried from their apartment at the same time by any sort of subterfuge. And great care had to be exercised in order to keep from arousing their suspicions.

Jack Durant entered into the game with the greatest of zest. They tried everything except a fire alarm to get into the apartment quietly. The signor was called down to the desk on some business while the signorina was out shopping. He did not appear until the signorina had returned.

As a plumber Harry went up to fix the sink trap. He was not admitted. While the signor was out on business the signorina could not be beguiled to stick her nose out of Number 307.

Jack Durant borrowed a spyglass from a pawnshop — for a consideration, and spied on the third floor windows from the building across the street. And all to no avail.

A fake accident call, a fire alarm, a fake burglary, an impersonation over the phone of the mysterious leader — none of these drastic measures were tried because failure would result in swift and inevitable warning.

Thursday, Thursday night, and Friday morning passed without the slightest result having been obtained. Harry was nearly distracted.

“It’s damn funny the girl don’t set up a yowl of some sort,” jerked out Durant in disgust. “I thought prisoners created disturbances. You don’t suppose she’s tied and gagged, do you?”

“I don’t know,” worried Harry. “The man over the phone warned Carlotti about kind treatment.”

“The man? You mean her father?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“No,” blundered on Harry, so wrapped in his thoughts that he failed to note he was revealing some very puzzling information to Durant. “I’ve been thinking and thinking of all the voices I have heard in hopes that I would recognize it. I don’t know whether it could be that of the beer keg chap’s or not. If he would only come here himself! Now, if—”

“Say!” ejaculated Mr. Durant, thrusting his sharp face almost under Harry’s nose. “What kind of a business is this? What the hell have you let me in for? What sort of a game am I sitting in on?”

Harry recalled himself with a jerk and drew back, staring at the shrewdly alert Durant in some fright. Then he recovered himself and smiled grimly. He was in for it now. He decided to make a job of it.

“A deeper game than you ever sat in before, Tack,” he stated in flat, level tones. “A game with a wonderful girl as the stake and the gallows as the first booby prize. A game of crime, with murder as the first move.

“I’ve given too much away, but I was on the verge of trusting you to the limit, anyway. Listen! Do you know who I really am? I am the man who was arrested for the murder of Francis W. Keene. My real name is Harry Lethrop.”

“Julius Cæsar!” gurgled Mr. Durant. “The Avalon Arms affair! And here you are at work in another apartment house before the first victim is in the ground. Holy Moses! Mother! Mother! Your little boy Jack’s in one helluva jam.”

“And he’s going to be in a tighter one if he doesn’t stick!” added Harry ominously. “My sweetheart was abducted — kidnaped — stolen from that Avalon Arms apartment at the same time that murder was fixed on me. I’ve traced her here. I’ll really do murder this time if anybody gets in my way before I rescue her!”

“By golly, I believe you!” said Mr. Durant.

“Do you want to hear my story and stick with me? Or shall we have it out between us right now before you can betray me?”

“I like good stories,” replied Mr. Durant ingenuously. “And I very seldom betray a friend.”

It took the rest of the afternoon to lay Harry’s exact case before the solemnly judicious and thoroughly sobered Mr. Durant.

“Now,” said the narrator desperately. “I’m getting wilder every minute. You’ve got that note in your hand. What would you do if you were me? We’ve tried everything except a police raid.”

“You want my advice?” said Durant.

“I need it before I run amuck,” declared the young lover earnestly.

“All right. Here it is!” snorted the other tersely. “To hell with the risk! Go see MacCray and get his advice before you bungle things. Don’t start looking up your friends to reassure them about your safety — MacCray can do that. Just see him and spill your story. Get out now! I’ll stick on your shift until you get back. Ha!”

And thus Chief MacCray learned of the one and only lucky break which chance handed him in the case of the Avalon Arms murder.

Chapter XV Grady Blunders

The new lodger at Mrs. Yeager’s boarding house in Union Park Court aroused neither great interest nor comment. He was a quiet, almost abashed individual with rather large hands and feet — Mr. Hiram Burke from Boone Corners, Indiana, visiting the big city to see the sights, perhaps accept a position in gents’ burnishing at Meadow’s or Hubbs’, and keep Chicago lead out of his system.

He was no trouble at all, he never pushed himself forward, he never usurped any old boarder’s favorite chair or nook, he never elbowed himself a conspicuous amount of food and room at the table, he never raised a loud voice in argument or offensive opinion. He never made any noise, he never got in the way, and he made no overt moves.

At the same time he managed to become acquainted with every boarder in the house within forty-eight hours. In brief, he was a country cousin who knew his proper place and stayed in it. A refreshing novelty.

Nobody disliked him, and several of the elderly ladies were quite charmed by his naive shyness. The very morning he arrived he won the sympathy of Miss Edwina Gilchrist. Mrs. Yeager had scarcely installed him in his room, giving him — during this process — the names of his immediate neighbors, the rates of the various rooms, the history of the chiffonier in his chamber, and a brief biographical sketch of herself, and had toddled away on her round of duties when he knocked timidly on Miss Gilchrist’s door.

Miss Edwina was not the thin-nosed, close-mouthed type of New Englander. Instead, while her eyes and her tongue and her accent were sharp enough, she was a fleshy woman — as many victims of heart trouble are — with a countenance and mind pleasingly broad. She was small in stature, and a dainty lady despite her weight. She was possibly sixty years of age, and her unwrinkled cheeks were as soft as swan’s-down.

She opened the door, her tatting still in one hand, and looked in surprise at the young man who clung, panting and gasping, to the casing.

“For pity’s sake!” she exclaimed in her gentle voice. “What’s the matter?”

“I... I am the new lodger in the next room, ma’am,” murmured Mr. Burke weakly. “I suffer with occasional heart spells. Will you be so good as to — to call a doctor for me?”

“You poor boy! Of course!”

She would have helped him to a chair, but he shook his head in polite refusal, clutched at his breast, and staggered back into his own chamber.

Thus it was that Dr. Fordyce added a second patient with angina pectoris to his list at Mrs. Yeager’s establishment. Right speedily he relieved the suffering Mr. Burke of his attack without suspecting the depressant that gentleman had cautiously administered to himself just prior to the heart attack.

During this first and only visit, with the quiet Mr. Burke’s adroit help, Dr. Fordyce also revealed the fact that Miss Edwina Gilchrist was his regular patient, that he was treating her for this same affliction, and that she had been coming along nicely of late — in fact, had not had an attack of any nature for more than two weeks.

For all of which Mr. Burke thanked him, paid his fee, dutifully promised to have the two prescriptions filled and to report to the doctor within the week, and promptly dismissed the worthy physician from his mind except as a possible witness on the stand.

With the exception of this sudden illness Mr. Burke created no disturbance whatever about the place. He slipped quietly into the life of the house like a pair of old carpet slippers. His heart attack won him instant sympathy and served as an admirable reason why he remained closely at home for the ensuing few days.

In fact, he stayed so close and saw so little of the city that it came as a complete surprise to Mrs. Yeager when he hesitantly informed her that he was expecting company Sunday and could he have dinner for three served in his room if he paid extra for it.

“Why, certainly, Mr. Burke. But, land, I didn’t s’pose you knew anybody in Chicago outside of the house.”

“It’s my cousin Bert who lives in Chicago,” he explained shyly. “He’s bringing over a friend to meet me. It ’ll... it ’ll be all right if we have a game of dominoes in my room, won’t it? We won’t be noisy.”

Mrs. Yeager could not refrain from giving him a gentle pat on the shoulder as she assured him he could do what he pleased as long as he did not annoy the other roomers.

Hence, Sunday morning, while the devout were at church, two gentlemen callers to see Mr. Hiram Burke were admitted to the house. There were no sharp eyes, if we except Lizzie the parlor maid and old man Saxle, the shoe salesman, who dozed over the papers in his favorite chair, to recognize the visitors as police officers pretending to be surface car conductors off duty.

It was all in the day’s work to Mr. Grady, and he took things calmly as he asked for his cousin from Boone Corners. Sergeant Brill, however, felt as comfortable in this elegant old boarding house as a fish on ice. Nevertheless, orders were orders, and he waded into this business as stoically as he would have gone on duty at the Robey Street station. However, it proved to be less boring than they had anticipated.

Chief MacCray had said this was to be a social visit; evidently Burke had received instructions to make it so.

He greeted them cordially at the head of the stairs and ushered them into his private chamber immediately.

“Everything is very quiet here,” he informed them. “And I’m the quietest chap in the house. My party — Miss Edwina Gilchrist — is reading her Bible in the next room. Her niece, Edna Boatwright, has gone to church with the landlady. I don’t know of anything that is to prevent us from having a friendly afternoon together. I’ve ordered dinner to be sent up here for the three of us. Cigars and cigarettes on the table Sunday papers if you want to read. Dominoes and cards if you want to play.”

“What the dickens are we here for?” inquired Grady, tossing his hat onto the bed and seating himself lazily.

Burke glanced at him in surprise and then shrugged.

“If you don’t know,” he replied, “I can’t tell you. My orders are to entertain you two and still keep an eye on the old lady in yonder. I’ve made three peepholes for us through the wall — they’re corked up now, but we can see and hear pretty well what goes on in the next room if we’re close to the wall — five-inch walls they are, too.

“The holes are not as convenient as they might be, but I had to match the dark spots of the wall paper in that sitting room. It took me one whole day to make ’em. I only had half an hour in that room to mark ’em while the old lady was out in the park.”

“I suppose we are to let events guide us,” yawned Grady, lighting a cigarette.

“I suppose,” agreed Burke. “I turned in a full report on my party the day after I was assigned to this case, and the chief said to stay here and carry on until further orders. Don’t look so glum, sergeant. We have good meals here.”

Brill grunted and opened the box of dominoes.

“No use just sitting around,” he commented. “Come on. I’ll play you two plainclothes cops for a penny a point. I might as well pass the time profitably.”

“Bull from a harness bull,” remarked Grady in blunt humor. “Pull up a chair, Burke, and we’ll give this overfed flatfoot the works.”

“Wait’ll l open a window to let out the smoke. And you are both out of character,” rejoined Burke. “While we would have to talk rather loud for our voices even to be heard out of this room, I suggest we carry out our parts — Cousin Bert, and Mister Nichols.”

Presently they were engrossed in a game of the ebony counters. The time slipped away as the play became more deeply interesting. The noon hour came, and the growing confusion and chatter downstairs, the noise of incoming diners, disturbed them not.

Then the odor of cooking smote their nostrils. It was mealtime. The opening and closing of the corridor door to the adjoining room aroused them.

Burke motioned his companions toward the dividing wall, and quickly removed the plugs from his peepholes. A thrillingly melodious voice fell on their ears.

“—lovely, Aunt Edwina. I wish you had felt strong enough to go. Dinner is about ready, dear. Are you hungry?”

Sergeant Brill stiffened all over. His shoes creaked as he glued his ear firmly against his side of the wall. Grady watched him curiously, all the while listening to the conversation.

“I’ll eat a bit, my child,” responded the voice of Miss Gilchrist.

“I’m glad,” went on Edna Boatwright, seating herself before the dressing table to give a few unnecessary touches to her toilet. “I thought we might take the ‘L’ or a taxi down to Jackson Park this afternoon. The outing will do you worlds of good, and it’s a perfectly gorgeous day.”

Sergeant Brill was gurgling in his throat by now. His eyes were popping, and his usually red face was a solid brick color.

“That voice?” he gasped out in a painful whisper. “That voice!”

“Well? What about it?” hissed Grady at him tersely.

“That... that is the voice of the woman who called the station about the Keene murder!” was Brill’s surprising answer. “I’d know it in a million! Who is that in the next room?”

Grady’s big hand closed like a clamp about the excited sergeant’s arm as Burke answered the query.

“That is Edna Boatwright,” the latter said. “The private secretary of Judge Lethrop.”

“Shut up, the pair of you!” hissed Grady savagely. “Shut up, and listen!”

“Why can’t we go? It won’t hurt you a bit,” the young woman was saying in response to an obvious refusal on the part of her aunt.

“He called over the telephone while you were at church,” replied Miss Gilchrist in sharp emphasis.

Edna Boatwright’s hands flew to her lovely auburn hair, not so much to arrange its shimmering coils as to permit her forearms to hide her flushing-face from the eyes of her aunt.

“Who? Mr. Warner?”

Miss Gilchrist almost snorted.

“Certainly not! Since, when did I start speaking of a gentleman as ‘he’?”

“Oh!” the young woman exclaimed, her face hardening as the rosy hue paled. “You mean—”

“Precisely,” snapped the aunt. “Mrs. Yeager called me to the phone. He said to tell you that he would be here to see you this afternoon on a matter of importance.”

“We shan’t be here!” declared the young woman defiantly. “He shan’t spoil our afternoon for us by keeping us in. Besides, I don’t want to see him.”

“He said that would be likely,” remarked the older woman anxiously. “And he said to be sure to tell you that you had better be here to receive him.”

The young woman looked for a moment like a Diana at bay. Grady, who was looking through his peephole, thrilled at her beauty. Slowly she wilted, leaned across one corner of the dressing table, and bowed her head on one arm.

“Oh, my God!” she almost whispered. “Why doesn’t he leave me alone now?”

“I’ve noticed a peculiar change in you the past two weeks, Edna,” said the elderly lady sharply. “It isn’t becoming at all. What is there between you and Jim Rindawn that I do not share? Come, my dear, I insist on your confidence.”

“How I wish I might give it to you,” the girl murmured brokenly.

Miss Gilchrist came within the range of Grady’s vision and tenderly embraced her niece.

“There, now, my darling,” she soothed, kissing the pale brow and stroking the smooth young cheek which was uppermost. “Tell Aunt Eddie all about it, like you used to do when you were a child. Come, my child, tell me. Your old aunt isn’t too old and too decrepit to help you. What is the matter?”

“My dear, my dear,” sobbed the young woman, her lovely voice vibrant with anguish. “I... I can’t tell you. Really, it’s nothing — much. I’m just a silly girl, I think. Please—”

“And maybe I’m just a silly old woman,” cut in the other sharply, “but I can still see what is right under my eyes. You don’t mention Judge Lethrop to me as you formerly did. And to-day is the first time the name of Cecil Warner has passed your lips in I don’t know how long. Are you worried over the judge’s son? Are you interested in this — this Harry Lethrop?”

“Yes, yes,” cried the young woman. “That is it.”

“Then what has Jim Rindawn to do with it?” demanded the old lady crisply. “Answer me that!”

There was a silence.

“Very well, then,” said Miss Gilchrist with a toss of her head, “I shall most certainly be present when Mr. Rindawn calls.”

“Oh, yes, yes,” cried Edna feverishly. “I want you to be here. Stay close by me. Don’t leave me for an instant.”

“Never fear,” reassured the elderly woman grimly. “And I shall give Mr. Rindawn the severest tongue lashing he ever received in his sanctimonious life if he doesn’t explain a few things to me.”

“Oh, for pity’s sake, Aunt Eddie!” exclaimed the young lady anxiously. “Don’t... don’t say anything. Remember what he has done for us!”

“We are able to get along without him now,” sniffed Miss Gilchrist. “There is such a thing as imposing on people who are under obligations. But I won’t say anything to him if you—”

“There goes the dinner bell,” interrupted the girl quickly, hastily powdering her nose and wiping her eyes. “Come, let us go. Hurry, dear. We will talk again later.”

The girl hastened her aunt out into the corridor. The three police officers relaxed and gazed at each other in amazement. Burke very cautiously replugged the peepholes and locked the door of his room so a secret council of war could be held.

Brill exploded first.

“That was the woman who telephoned me!” he said vehemently. “I’d swear to it on a stack of Bibles higher than the Wrigley Tower. I tell you I’d know that voice anywhere. And it still has the same thrill. Gad! What an actress that woman would make!”

“Would make?” barked Grady curtly. “My dear chap, she is one! You should see her in her secretarial pose at Judge Lethrop’s office. No comparison.”

“Get hold of Chief MacCray,” hurried on Brill in tense excitement. “He wants this woman, I know. Burke, call him on the phone. Quick! Do something before she gets away. I tell you—”

“She’s not going anywhere except to the dinner table,” said Grady. “Pipe down, sergeant, pipe down. MacCray knows all about it already. Why do you imagine he had me drag you over here if not to identify that golden voice? Snap out of the stupor!”

Sergeant Brill merely stared, opening and closing his mouth like a fish out of water. It was Grady’s turn next.

“What I am interested in,” he went on, his voice sharpening as he warmed to his subject, “is this fellow Rindawn. My fingers are itching to curl around his throat. Every way I turn he crops up in my path. He’s guilty as hell, and the chief won’t let me pull him.

“Why, here we come to check up on this young woman, and Rindawn crosses our trail even here. This is going to yield much that MacCray did not anticipate. They must hold that little get-together meeting in the next room where we can hear it. This is going to be the best break of the entire—”

“Rindawn?” spluttered Brill. “Who is he?”

“James Rindawn!” declared Grady vehemently. “John Duke’s butler! Alias the Beer-keg, alias Willis Gorms, alias Falstaff, alias the rich looking old gent who stole the murder gun from the Meadow’s store — one of the main crooks! And he is coming here to commit himself, sure as you’re born. Ye gods, what luck!”

“Sh-hhh!” cautioned Burke. “You are both too loud. Ease up on that talk. Unlock the door, Mr. Nickols, and we will resume our domino game. Our dinner will be here directly.”

Dinner had become a matter of history along with half a dozen games of dominoes before anything of interest developed in the adjoining room. Immediately after the meal, however, the young woman and her aunt returned to their double chamber.

But there was no resumption of the topic interrupted for dinner. The girl pleaded a headache and straightway retired to the bedroom to lie down. The aunt remained in the sitting room. She pulled her rocker over to where she could stare squarely out the window, and there she sat as the afternoon waned, rocking and tatting.

It must have been nearly three o’clock when footsteps sounded on the stairs and approached the chamber in which Miss Gilchrist waited. There was a gentle knock on the door and a woman’s voice saying:

“Oh, Miss Boatwright?”

“That’s Mrs. Yeager,” whispered Burke, again removing the wall plugs.

“What is it, Mrs. Yeager?”

“A gentleman is calling on your niece, ma’am,” answered the landlady. “He is in the parlor. Shall I tell him to wait?”

“What’s the name?” demanded the elderly spinster quickly.

“Mr. Rindawn.”

“Send him up here, please. My niece will receive him in our own sitting room.”

The landlady’s footsteps died away. Instantly Edna Boatwright came out of the bedroom and began pacing the floor before her aunt, her slim white fingers clenched tightly against her palms.

“Sit down, girl. You make me nervous,” declared the old woman almost pettishly.

“Oh, Aunt Eddie, don’t say or do anything rash,” begged the girl. “Leave it to me. Just stay with me.”

“I shall do as I see fit,” replied Miss Gilchrist primly. “You can govern yourself accordingly.”

“Please, my dear,” gasped the girl in great fear. “You don’t understand. Oh, for Heaven’s sake! I had better go downstairs to him. I—”

A knock on the door halted her before she took two steps.

“Come in,” crisply invited Miss Gilchrist.

“Mr. Rindawn, ma’am,” said the voice of Mrs. Yeager.

And the figure of a man entered Grady’s restricted field of view. The big detective would have needed no name to identify that pompous, roly-poly little form with the double chin settled in the cleft of the stiffly starched collar.

John Duke’s butler had put in his appearance to damn Edna Boatwright utterly in the eyes of Mr. Grady and link her with the murder of Francis W. Keene.

“Well, well,” said Mr. Rindawn in his solemn voice. “Good afternoon, ladies. I trust I see you both in excellent health. And I hope your heart condition is improving, my dear Miss Gilchrist.”

“James Rindawn,” began the lady directly addressed, “you—”

“You have spoiled our afternoon,” cut in Edna Boatwright swiftly. “We had to remain cooped up here to wait for you when I wanted to take Aunt Edwina out for an airing. These lovely fall days don’t come often. What do you want to see us about that is so urgent?”

“I did not come to see us, my dear,” replied Rindawn, calmly seating himself. “I came to talk to you. Sit down, my love. Relax. Let us visit a while.”

“What do you want?” she spat at him, relaxing not a whit, her tawny eyes flashing fire. “Haven’t I done enough? I have betrayed a noble gentleman and his son and... and—”

“Not to speak of a very interesting lawyer by the name of Warner, eh?” added Rindawn mildly.

She flushed furiously.

“Oh, how I hate you!” she cried passionately. “Don’t you dare mention his name to me in that sanctimonious way of yours. You lied to me. You deceived me cruelly. You have used me as a pawn. Why didn’t you tell me that that telephone call was about a real murder and was setting the police after an innocent boy — after Harry Lethrop of all people? God only knows how I have suffered ever since.”

“Why didn’t I tell you, you ask? Because, my dear, I knew you might object.”

“Might object?” she said bitterly. “You knew I would refuse.”

“James Rindawn,” Miss Gilchrist finally found speech for a second attempt, “what nonsense is this you are talking? What terrible thing have you forced my niece to do? What is it? Edna! For the love of Heaven, tell me what this means!”

“Oh, Aunt Eddie, I am in terrible trouble! You’ll not forsake me, will you? You’ll stand by me, no matter what happens, won’t you? I’ve betrayed my best friends and lost the right to accept the advances of a gallant man. Oh, have pity on me!”

Before Miss Gilchrist could more than put a protecting arm about the tempestuously sobbing girl there was a very definite interruption. The door burst violently open, and three men stepped quickly into the room.

Detective Grady could stand the pressure no longer. While his two companions leveled guns on the cherubic figure of John Duke’s butler he drew forth a pair of handcuffs.

“James Rindawn, alias Willis Gorms,” he said grimly, “and Edna Boatwright, I arrest both of you for criminal complicity in the murder of Francis W. Keene at the Avalon Arms Apartments on Tuesday last.”

This startling denouement was too much for the weak heart of the maiden aunt. She gave vent to one queer sound and fainted dead away. The girl quivered convulsively, then straightened herself rigidly, clamped her pretty mouth in that prim secretarial manner, and stood silently eying the leader of the intruders with smoldering eyes which scorched despite the lowered lids.

Mr. Rindawn stared into the mouths of the drawn guns of Burke and Brill and then into the fierce and watchful face of Mr. Grady with an incredulous expression. Slowly an unmistakable wrath kindled in his blue-gray eyes.

“Stick out your mitts!” snapped the big detective curtly. “I must warn you that anything you now say may be used against you.”

Instead of complying with the sharp instruction, Mr. Rindawn calmly placed his hands behind his back, arched his chest until there was a distinct sag in his abdomen, settled more flat-footedly on the floor, and smiled in the face of Mr. Grady. It was not a pleasant smile, but it was a smile that actually appeared on that solemn countenance. He spoke.

“Bert Grady,” he ripped out, “you are a damned jackass! Didn’t I tell you that no arrests were to be made until I gave the word? If this young woman were criminally guilty, you would have played the devil by this blunder.”

The tone of that incisive voice, as well as the startling speech, made all three of the officers jump and stare at John Duke’s butler in amazement. Edna Boatwright started and turned swiftly to peer at the speaker. She made three swift steps to his side and peered into his face, eye to eye. She paled in fear as she recoiled from his level gaze. Then she flushed in rising anger. Her smoldering eyes flashed fire and her lovely lips curled in hate.

With a suddenness that was tigerish she shot out her hand and grasped the thinning gray locks atop his head. One fierce jerk — and the entire scalp lifted from Mr. Rindawn’s cranium, baring the close-cropped and bristling sandy hair of Philip MacCray.

“Holy Moses!” ejaculated Grady and Burke in one breath. “The chief!”

Sergeant Brill only blinked as he lowered his revolver. Then he turned it in the direction of the passionately aroused young woman. Fastening his gaze intently on her tense figure, he began edging closer. MacCray held up one dissuading hand as he felt tenderly of the spots where his disguising silk wig had been fastened to his head.

“Never mind, Brill,” said he quickly. “Miss Boatwright means no further violence. She is innocent of all intentional wrongdoing. I’ll take charge here, if you please.”

To the panting girl he bowed.

“I am sorry to have deceived you, my dear young lady, but it was necessary. I will explain. Won’t you please be seated while we see about your aunt?”

He took the wig which still dangled from her clenched fingers and gently urged her toward a chair. Like a figure in a dream she obeyed him. Then, as she sank into the seat, she suddenly burst into tears.

“Burke,” grated MacCray sharply, “see to the elderly lady; you know something about the heart. Brill, guard the door. Let no one enter. This disturbance may have been loud enough to attract attention.”

“What... what shall I do, chief?” asked Grady uncertainly.

“Sit down and keep quiet until I have time to read the riot act to you,” rejoined MacCray grimly. “I’ll do the talking from now on.”

There was a silence broken only by the sobs of the girl and the low murmur between MacCray and Burke as they resuscitated Edwina Gilchrist. No other sounds were heard, but it was a most eloquent silence.

In a few minutes Miss Gilchrist was restored to consciousness. She was still dazed, and MacCray used her condition to steady the nerves of the young woman. He led the docile young lady to the side of her aunt, admonishing her to get a firm grip on herself and quiet the old lady. Then he stepped back and waited while the two women clung to each other convulsively for a moment.

After a space the younger woman looked up.

“Well, sir?” she inquired coldly. “What is the meaning of all this?”

It was the prim and impersonal secretary who now spoke.

“You are a thoroughbred, Miss Boatwright,” admired MacCray. “I will now briefly—”

“Where is James Rindawn?” she interrupted anxiously. “The real James Rindawn!”

“I imagine he is beginning to give orders concerning his master’s Sunday dinner at this hour,” replied the detective chief dryly.

“He knows nothing of this masquerade of yours?”

“I hope not. Now, if you—”

“What do you mean by assuming his guise and coming here? How did you know — how do you know that I am even aware of his existence?”

“Young lady, if you don’t mind,” MacCray snapped, “I’ll ask the questions while you do the answering. First, let me inform you that James Rindawn is in imminent danger of having his neck stretched at the expense of the State. I am not trying to threaten you or intimidate you; I am merely stating a fact.”

“I’ve always had a feeling that man would come to a bad end,” commented Miss Gilchrist at this juncture, “although I cannot believe murder of him.”

“I have not said he is guilty of murder — exactly, Miss Gilchrist,” rejoined MacCray hopefully. “I merely said that he is in a bad position.”

“What’s your name, young man?” she went on sharply. “Who are you?”

“Hush, Aunt Edwina,” cautioned the young woman, tightening her embrace about her relative’s waist. “This is Detective Chief MacCray.”

“I won’t hush,” stated that lady positively. “I intend getting at the bottom of this matter.”

“Which sentiment does you honor,” put in MacCray gallantly. “And such is my own desire.”

“No, I see you do not resemble Jim Rindawn in the least,” murmured the old lady, peering at him and shaking her head. “Your eyes are too gray, you are too young. No wonder you stood at a distance with the light behind you. But you are very clever.”

“Thank you,” he bowed. “Now, if I may resume, allow me to suggest that your niece answer my questions truthfully and fully.

“I have already learned from her own lips that she is not criminally guilty of any misdemeanor. For the sake of justice, for the sake of the Lethrop family that she seems to honor, for the sake of her invalid aunt, for her own sake, I ask her to be frank with me.

“To be silent will not shield James Rindawn. I already have enough on him to send him to the penitentiary for the rest of his natural life. If you refuse to talk, I will be put to the necessity of arresting you, Miss Boatwright, and I will have to let Detective Grady make that arrest of Rindawn he is so anxious to do. I am not bluffing, believe me.”

The four men waited. The elderly lady stroked her niece’s hand encouragingly, silently urging her to meet MacCray halfway. At last the girl raised her head and gazed at the detective chief.

She rose slowly to her feet — she was fully as tall as he — and revealed to him the full splendor of her widely opened eyes. It was difficult to maintain a sense of superiority, or even of equality, face to face with this vibrant creature.

“I... I believe you and trust you, Mr. MacCray,” she said wearily. “Oh, I know you too well to doubt. But you seem to know all there is to know about me. What on earth can I reveal to a man like you?”

Chapter XVI Judge Lethrop Remembers

MacCray took her hand and pressed it gently. Then he placed a chair for her.

“Thank you for your faith,” he said simply. “Please sit down. Your nerves are as taut as fiddle strings. Not only do I need your help; I see that you need mine, and you are going to have it. While you compose yourself I will explain how and why I come to be here in this manner.

“I got the first clew to the identity of the mysterious woman who called the Robey Street station from Sergeant Brill. He had been so strongly impressed by the voice that he was able to give me a very good description. Particularly did he stress the accent of the lady’s ‘a.’

“Then I learned from the Duke housekeeper of the veiled woman who came there between eleven and eleven-thirty that fateful morning. That evening I saw the veiled lady at Harry Lethrop’s hearing and shadowed her. She proved to be none other than Miss Edna Boatwright.

“Don’t start in such surprise, my dear; you left a trail as broad as a boulevard. After that, at Judge Lethrop’s office, you yourself informed me that you came from Boston. That tallied with the accent of the mysterious veiled lady. The conclusion was obvious.

“However, a guilty person — one criminally involved, I mean — would never have risked so much as to appear at the hearing. But you had lied about your aunt’s health twice. At least, I knew that your second excuse to leave the office was a lie. That is why I said before you that I would order the arrest of this Signor Vincennes if he did not appear to set up a howl about his missing daughter. Since then I have checked up on your first story.

“From the moment you left the judge’s office that night up to this very moment you have been shadowed. I was watching to see if there was any connection between you and this missing gentleman, or between you and the man who signs his name as Carlos Fernandez. And I found nothing except the initial connection between you and James Rindawn.

“As I was almost persuaded of your innocence, I arranged this little business this afternoon to get to the meat of the matter. I really did not need Brill’s presence in the next room to identify your voice, but it is always best to cover everything possible.

“So that, Miss Edna, is the reason I passed myself off as James Rindawn. And I flatter myself that I was getting along in an excellent fashion, feeling my way along on what I already knew and what you were letting drop, until our impetuous friend, Mr. Grady over there, rushed in and spoiled the proceedings.

“Had you been a criminal accomplice, and he had no means of knowing that you were not, he would have played havoc. You see, I know what you did and how you did it. But I do not know why you have done this. That is what I must ask you. What is your connection with James Rindawn and with this crime? What hold over you has John Duke’s butler?”

The young woman averted her face and answered in a low voice:

“He... he is my — uncle.”

“Uncle?” This in a gasp from Grady, who had been anticipating a clandestine love complex.

“Tell your story in your own way, please,” murmured MacCray, his tone betraying neither surprise nor curiosity.

At first she spoke haltingly and with difficulty. Then, as her passionate nature asserted itself, her speech became rapid, her words became living, vital things. Her listeners were spellbound, their imaginations filling in the details about her graphic phrases.

“James Rindawn is my uncle,” she repeated. “He is not — related to Aunt Edwina here. She is my father’s half sister — he is — my mother’s own brother. Both sides of my family are New Englanders.

“My father — was supposed to have married beneath himself. He didn’t know then that Uncle Jim — my mother’s brother — was a butler. If he had — I don’t suppose it would have made any difference. Both my parents died when I was a small child, my father losing all his own and Aunt Edwina’s inheritance in bad business management. Aunt Edwina took me.

“But we would have starved if Uncle Jim had not come forward with assistance. I was too young to care, and for my sake Aunt Edwina humbled the pride of the Gilchrist and Boatwright families to accept an annuity from — from a butler.

“But this wasn’t so bad. Uncle Jim was my own relative, and he meant well. I have never been ashamed of the relationship nor of his profession,” she declared defiantly, her head lifting proudly. “It was Aunt Edwina who made a pact with him that he was never to claim relationship and never presume on the blood tie or the financial obligation. And you must not think harshly of her for that; she did it for my sake and the sake of my future.

“Thus, I went to the best schools, mingled in the society to which Aunt Edwina was accustomed, and held up my head as a Boatwright in respectable circumstances. I must say that Uncle Jim held strictly to his bargain during those early years. I have even been a guest in a home where he was in service, and he never presumed once. Oh, I felt so sorry for him and so ashamed of myself at that time. I never went back to that home.

“Then things changed. Uncle Jim showed us that steel could lie under the velvet glove. He came to us one day and informed us that he was changing masters. He was coming to Chicago with Mr. John Duke. He told us bluntly that we must come with him or he would stop his allowance. There was nothing else to do.

“But that wasn’t all. As soon as he got us here he informed me that I was nothing but a parasite and now that I was away from my silk stocking friends I was going to work and help bear the burden of our expenses. Not only that, but I was to obey his orders implicitly or he would starve us to death as well as disgrace us back in Boston.

“I didn’t mind. I was glad to be doing something. Perhaps the way he had been excluded all the years before — maybe the social gulf between him and father’s family had embittered him. At least, there has never been any great affection between us in spite of all he has done for me. Maybe it is my fault!

“Well, to go on. Uncle Jim got me my position with Judge Lethrop as an office girl. I rose to the position of private secretary through my own efforts. None of you know how hard I worked, how I struggled to succeed. And I had to fight — fight to subdue my impulsive nature and be nothing but an efficient underling.

“And now that I have made good on my own accord, that obligation of the past which I could not ignore — which is responsible for my present state of being — has reached forth and dragged me down into the mire of crime.

“My benefactor, without my knowledge, has made a criminal accomplice of me. He has forced me to betray the finest gentleman I have ever known — Judge Lethrop. Fool that I was, I paid back my obligation to him in the way that he demanded! Yes, I did all that you accuse me of!

“I did more! It was through me that James Rindawn knew all about the Crawley case though I still do not understand what that had to do with the Keene murder. I am a guilty, criminal, deceitful woman! And here at the last I turn and betray James Rindawn.

“I am a faithless, worthless Tildas who has turned against everybody in turn. Oh, God, what a useless life mine has been!”

With this last tragic utterance she was on her feet with arms flung widely apart in abandon, her young bosom heaving passionately. She was glorious in this moment of abandonment. And she had stripped her soul so bare that MacCray felt as though she stood naked before him. Even Detective Grady averted his eyes, feeling a sense of shame that he had driven such a splendid creature against the wall of despair.

Miss Gilchrist got to her feet and folded her niece in her arms.

“You poor, poor child,” she murmured tenderly. “You are not a bad girl at all. You have done nothing terribly wrong. You are not a Judas. You have never deserted or betrayed me. Hush! Don’t sob so. Aunt Eddie will stand by you against the whole world. Come, dry your eyes, my precious. Now then, gentlemen, I trust you are satisfied!”

MacCray did not answer for the moment. Silently he motioned his subordinates out of the room. They departed quietly. Only when he was alone with the two women did MacCray speak. He approached and laid a gentle hand upon Edna Boatwright’s arm.

“My dear,” he said softly, “I will not say you have not erred, but you have betrayed no one. You have merely been used as one little pawn on a very large board in a game all the moves of which I do not yet understand. I am deeply sorry for you, and I shall help you.

“What you have said this afternoon will be held in the strictest confidence. You will continue on in Judge Lethrop’s employ as though nothing has happened. I shall do all in my power to shield you from all further annoyance.

“However, I cannot guarantee one hundred per cent protection from the master mind who plays the black men. I have not yet run him to earth, although the scent is growing stronger. Therefore, should anything else develop, should anything befall you that my men might overlook, I simply ask you to telephone me personally. In brief, I am asking for your confidence from this moment on. Will you trust me? Will you help me?”

The girl had become calm. She raised her reddened eyes, dried them hastily on her aunt’s kerchief, and smiled tremulously, a full-lipped smile which made her face beautiful.

“You are the most wonderful man I ever knew,” she murmured fervently. “I did not know a detective could be so wise — and so human.”

“That is undeserved praise, my dear. I think I am human, but I am not wise — at least, not wise enough. If I had not been such a suspicious person I would have made a confidant of you that first night we met and thus have spared us both unpleasantness. Do you feel composed enough now for me to ask you a few questions?”

“I’ll tell you anything I can,” she promised earnestly.

“Then tell me what you know about: Joseph Crawley. Where did you ever hear of him before? Why should your uncle be interested in Judge Lethrop’s action in the case?”

“Mr. MacCray, that is an utter mystery to me,” she said solemnly. “I think that is partly what worried me — my ignorance. I never heard of the man before, I know nothing about him save what I have seen in the papers and through the work I have done on Judge Lethrop’s papers, and I see no reason for my — my uncle being interested in the matter unless it is that the crime was committed almost under his nose.

“What — ah! Merciful Heaven! Can it be that he was implicated in that murder? Was there something which was not revealed by the evidence? Oh, don’t tell me he is... is guilty of the actual deed.”

“Calm your fears,” smiled the little man gently, reassuringly. “I can safely state that James Rindawn is entirely innocent of the crime for which Joseph Crawley is condemned to hang. But there is a deep-seated reason for his interest in the affair. I have grounds for one line of suspicion, but I always try to exhaust every angle of a subject before I reach a decision. Then, if you can tell me nothing of Mr. Crawley, what can you tell about this Carlos Fernandez and his mysterious note — now that we are working together?”

The young woman blushed in faint self-consciousness, but she met his gaze.

“I swear that I know nothing about it,” she responded. “Mr. Warner and I really did go through the judge’s files trying to find that name and associate it with some case in which Judge Lethrop had participated in the past. We found absolutely nothing. Neither of us has any knowledge of such a person.”

MacCray nodded calmly.

“And, a last question, now about the unknown Signor Vincennes and his daughter Christine?”

“I never heard of them before Harry Lethrop mentioned their names. I haven’t the remotest idea who they are, or what they are, but Harry said they existed — and therefore I believe it.”

“You are interested in Harry Lethrop?” This, softly.

“Not in a personal way,” she answered openly. “I am two or three years older than he is. But he is a dear boy, and I admire him. If he said these people existed, I would swear to it.”

“You are right,” replied MacCray quietly. “They do, and they are both missing. I won’t trouble you any longer, and neither will Mr. Burke. However, he will remain here as a lodger, not to shadow you, but to be near in case you should need him.

“And all I ask of you two ladies is to remain as silent about this afternoon’s affairs as I shall be. Keep it strictly to yourselves! Forget that I have been here! Forget that Burke is a detective unless you need him! Is it a bargain?”

“It is, sir. What... what are you going to do with my... my uncle?”

“James Rindawn? Absolutely nothing at present. Rest easy on that score. And, while I may be mistaken, let me whisper a word of consolation. I do not suspect him of being a murderer. Good afternoon, ladies. Keep a stiff upper lip.”

In Burke’s room MacCray confronted the guilty-looking trio of officers with an air that boded them no good. Detective Grady sought to evade the brewing storm by conjuring up a windy outburst of his own.

“Chief, I’m sorry I disobeyed orders, but I thought I was following the proper lead. You know, you sent me here without very definite instructions. Anyway, it’s all my fault. Don’t blame Burke or Brill.

“But I guess you’re satisfied now about this Rindawn-Gorms bird. Are you ready for me to slap the bracelets on him? The idea of dragging a girl like that down in the mud! That guy is causing more trouble than prohibition. I never knew you to play cat and mouse so long with a murderer before.”

“Murderer?” ripped out MacCray in ugly tones. “Murderer! Aren’t you jumping at conclusions, Grady? Rindawn-Gorms, you call him? You did the same thing yesterday morning after we sweated Crawley. Grady, I thought you were a bright detective!

“How in hell can James Rindawn be at his post in John Duke’s home and admit his niece to make the telephone call and be on the job at the Avalon Arms Apartments as janitor at the came time? How in the name of all that’s holy can you persist in this silly idea that James Rindawn and Willis Gorms are the same man? No matter how guilty Rindawn may be, he is not twins.

“You’ve let a physical similarity confuse you. If you are going to insist on being so dumb, go take the manager of the Avalon Arms over to view Duke’s butler. As soon as young Lethrop comes back I’ll let him go out with you. I warned you before you ever saw Duke’s butler not to be surprised or alarmed at his appearance.

“My God! What sort of dumbbells do I have on my staff of detectives?”

Detective Grady collapsed utterly Burke stared foolishly. Sergeant Brill began whistling soundlessly and stood gazing out the window.

MacCray opened his mouth for a stronger and more scathing attack, but the abject condition of Grady halted him. The big fellow was actually on the verge of tears. The detective chief closed his lips silently.

“You’re right, chief,” murmured Grady leadenly. “I’m nothing but a big boob. If I hadn’t been so anxious I’d have stopped to think of anything as plain as that. I... I... well, I’ll resign from the force if you ask me to.”

“Just what were you so anxious about?” inquired MacCray in a milder voice.

Grady flushed and made a clean breast of it.

“I... I felt sorry for the Lethrop kid,” he muttered. “I believed his yarn, and I wanted to help him out.”

“How do you feel about Edna Boatwright now?”

“Her? Why... er... well, you know, I feel just as bad about her,” admitted Grady.

“Doesn’t it strike you as a poor policy for a detective to get sympathetic over each suspect he follows in turn?” inquired MacCray ironically. “I suppose you would break down after you put the bracelets on Rindawn and let him go free because of his heartbroken grandmother?”

“You are soft on Lethrop and this skirt yourself,” flung Grady defensively.

“My friend,” smiled MacCray, “your heart is, like mine, too big for you to be a perfect detective. I begin to have an idea that this case is going to break us both. If I resign and start a private agency, will you work for me?”

“For next to nothing,” declared Grady earnestly.

MacCray laughed in pleased tones. The storm was over.

“All right, men,” he said crisply. “Sergeant Brill, you’re relieved from further duty. Burke, you stay on as a sort of protective guard for Miss Boatwright and her aunt in this house.

“Grady, since you are so anxious to help young Lethrop, I’m going to put you on his end of the case. You’ve already surveyed the lay of things at Jefferson Park. Now you can go down to the Bon Ton Apartments near Cicero and join Huhan, who is on duty there watching over Lethrop. I promised the lad that I wouldn’t interfere with his own investigations, but, of course, I had to cover him.”

The three men saluted in relief.

“As for me,” went on MacCray briskly, “I think I shall have the privilege of scanning a page from the past of somebody else before the day is over. I hope to have better luck this time.”

It was scarcely six o’clock when the coupe of the detective chief turned in at the hedge-bordered drive to Judge Henry Lethrop’s home in Bittersweet Place. The massive old clock on the stair landing bonged out the hour in its deep, cathedral tones as he was assisted out of his topcoat and shown into the library.

No one would have recognized this exquisitely turned out gentleman as the man who had been at Mrs. Yeager’s west side boarding-house not three hours before. All resemblance to the preternaturally grave Mr. Rindawn had vanished. In fact, this was not the well known figure of Philip MacCray himself. For this gentleman wore a tuxedo, an attire which his broad shoulders carried to perfection.

Mr. MacCray had made an unusual sacrifice in sartorial effects. In short, Mr. MacCray had a dinner engagement which he was filling properly.

There was only one person in the library, however, upon the detective chief’s entrance. This individual, similarly attired, rose from his armchair and came forward cordially to greet the guest. His step was firm and his back was as straight as ever, but the face of Judge Lethrop was careworn and drawn. If anything, his mane of hair was whiter than it had been a week ago.

Judge Lethrop was showing his age under the strain.

“It was good of you to come for dinner,” he greeted MacCray warmly. “I don’t think I could have gone through the ghastly motions of dining alone. Yet I could not bear the thought of going out where others could see me. This is the first Sunday night in years that Harry hasn’t sat across the table from me.”

The detective chief pressed his hand sympathetically.

“I can readily understand how lonely you feel under the circumstances, Judge Lethrop. And, believe me, I was glad to accept the dinner invitation. I am habitually a lonely man. When I am not at work on a case, Sundays are trackless wastes for me.”

“I wonder that you are not a married man, Mr. MacCray.”

A shadow fell across the smaller man’s face. He stared with eyes of pain into the fireplace. Judge Lethrop was quick to perceive.

“Pardon me,” he said gently. “I did not mean to touch a tender spot.”

MacCray smiled at him and imperceptibly straightened his shoulders.

“That is quite all right, sir,” said he. “As I am here with the intention of prying into your past this evening, it is only fair that I feel no delicacy about my own. Shall we talk now, or do you prefer waiting until after dinner?”

“As you please,” replied the judge, glancing at his watch. “Dinner won’t be served until six-thirty. Will you have a cigar?”

“Thank you,” said MacCray, accepting one and settling down comfortably in his chair. “Suppose we talk about me now and about you after dinner?”

The judge, looking politely puzzled at this second reference to himself, made a gesture of assent.

“How old a man do you take me to be?” asked MacCray after a silence.

“That is hard to say,” hazarded Judge Lethrop slowly, “although I should think you are in your early thirties.”

“I will be forty-one my next birthday,” said MacCray soberly. “Rather an old dog to be taught marital tricks, don’t you think?”

“Perhaps not,” smiled the other. “Wait until the right woman comes along.”

“She came — eleven years ago this fall,” answered the detective chief reminiscently. “She swept across the path of my life like a vivid, exotic flame and then went away, leaving my future a ruin of black and smoldering fields.”

“Do you wish me to ask what you mean, my friend?” said Lethrop gently.

MacCray winked the moisture from his eyes and gripped his cigar fiercely between a row of strong jaw teeth so that one side of his face was wrinkled. When he spoke again his voice was hard and cold.

“I have every reason to believe that she was shot at Brussels as a Prussian spy.”

“Ah!” murmured the old judge softly. “Then you saw service during the war?”

“I was in the same profession,” replied MacCray in faint bitterness. “But I was luckier and on the victorious side. In retrospect, now that the bitter war hatred has died down, I see no reason for even condemning, more than any other, the cause for which she gave her life. Anyway, that is the reason I am a lonely old devil to-day. I can sympathize with your present state. But, unless I have been reading signs wrong, this is going to be a still livelier household than before when Harry comes out of this affair.”

“You mean the missing girl?”

MacCray nodded.

Judge Lethrop looked very grave. “I don’t know what to think about it. I am greatly worried.”

“Forget it,” admonished the detective chief. “Your son has a very level head for a man of his age. Don’t try to think about it. Let matters work out in that direction of their own accord. You may be surprised at the result.”

A soft-footed butler entered the library.

“Dinner is served, Judge Lethrop,” he announced in a low voice.

It was not until after the meal that MacCray broached the subject he had come to discuss. Settled once more in the library, he opened the topic he had been careful to avoid at the table.

“Judge Lethrop,” he said, “have you thought any more about the mysterious note you received the day of the murder?”

“I have thought of it constantly,” was the low rejoinder.

“What do you make of it by now?”

“Absolutely nothing. It is a profound mystery to me.”

“You do not recall Mr. Carlos Fernandez?”

“Not at all.”

“But you concede the fact that he must have existed at one time in your life?”

“Obviously,” shrugged Judge Lethrop. “Else the message would be pointless.”

“It would,” agreed MacCray. “Let me help you rediscover the gentleman in question. Do you mind?”

“If you only can, sir.”

“Very well, I can try. You remember that Francis Keene died with a verbal message on his lips to one Elihu, the words he spoke to your son. Well, I have not yet informed you that these words were meant for the ears of John — Elihu — Duke. Does this information convey anything to you?”

The judge started. “You mean the philanthropist?” Then he slowly shook his head. “Not a thing.”

“All right,” said MacCray, not at all discouraged. “Let us analyze the words themselves. I have here a copy of the speech as Harry remembered it. Read it. The dashes stand for missing words.”

The judge accepted the sheet of plain white paper upon which the detective chief had typed the following:

“You will note that the last nine words are closer together than the rest of the broken speech,” said MacCray. “That is Harry’s recollection of the way it was spoken, as though fewer syllables were missing. The lad is very positive about the exact way the dying man spoke.”

“I can make nothing of it,” said the judge after a brief study.

“Neither could I — until Captain Holman interviewed Joseph Crawley the other morning for me. And that really disinterested gentleman, without knowing it, revealed the clew which has enabled me to decipher the message.

“It is not a code of any kind, merely broken speech. It is, of course, impossible to fill in exactly the gaps where two or more words are missing, but I can give the latter part of the speech exactly as it was meant. There are no words missing in that; the spacing and pronunciation are merely at fault.

“Listen as I point it out and read it aloud. And carry your memory back thirty years for me while you listen.”

MacCray slowly spoke the last eight words with an entirely different syllable grouping. He said:

“Carlost Fornotease, Bumpay, Ingdear.”

He quickly drew a second paper from his pocket, thrusting it under the judge’s thumb and over the first sheet.

“Translated,” he explained, “it looked like this.”

The old jurist stared at the words.

“Roughly,” went on MacCray hypnotically, “the entire speech went something like this: ‘I’m dying, Elihu. Forgive me for what I have done. I should have known better than to trust that devil after all the years with you, who are my real friend. You are known to your most implacable enemy who hates you with the hate of hell. Bend closer! Forgive me, Elihu, and beware your enemy — Carlos Fernandez, Bombay, India.”

“Great God!” ejaculated Judge Lethrop in tones of horror. “I... I begin to have a dim recollection — let me think what that affair was. There was so many escapades— I was in a drunken stupor at the time— The details are very hazy— I can’t conceive of such bitter and deadly animosity— Thirty years! Merciful God!”

“Suppose you explain,” murmured MacCray, his nostrils expanding eagerly with the warmth of the scent.