Three Gold Crowns

CHAPTER X Blank Paper

Everyone was gone from the Bleek Street headquarters save Nellie and Harriet Smith and Rosabel, Josh Newton’s pretty wife. They were all out working on the Farquar blackmail case.

And now, on the murder of Salloway. One of the three big-time blackmailers was dead, leaving just the two to cope with in Farquar’s defense. But who had killed Salloway? And why?

Nellie and Harriet were talking that over. But they were really more concerned with another thing.

That was the bulky white envelope Nellie had brought back from the house in which Harriet had almost been burned like a piece of scorched toast.

The name A.A. Ismail, and the address, was on the envelope in pencil. Perhaps the writing of that very address was the one that had left its impression on Smathers’s desk blotter at Farquar’s ofice.

A name written outside. But that was all.

Presumably, Smathers had taken that envelope, secretly and late at night, to Ismail’s house. Possibly, it was for this that he had been killed, after which his body had been taken to the freight yard.

Presumably, it was to retrieve that envelope, suddenly remembered, that the killer had returned to the house and caught and nearly killed Harriet Smith.

All these things in the envelope. And there was nothing in it! Nothing, that is, but a thick sheaf of blank paper folded to resemble, from the outside of the sealed envelope, a lot of documents.

Just blank paper. The Avenger had tried every test known to science to see if invisible writing came out on the paper — and a few tests known to no one but himself — and nothing had appeared.

Worthless blank paper in a sealed envelope, with murder and sudden death inexplicably revolving around it.

Incidentally, investigation had disclosed that there was no such person as A.A. Ismail. At least, not at that address. The house was owned by a bank which had foreclosed a mortgage. It had been lived in for many years by a Mr. Watkins, who had gone away some months before. No one in the neighborhood or connected with the bank had ever heard of anyone called Ismail.

“It’s crazy,” said Nellie, staring at the envelope. “People don’t kill for nothing. And this seems to be nothing.”

“I’m not so sure,” said Harriet suddenly.

“What do you mean?”

The two made an attractive picture — Nellie, dainty and small and blonde, Harriet taller and more mature but almost equally pretty.

“I think I’ve seen envelopes like this before,” said Harriet.

“You have?” Nellie’s eyes flashed. “Where?”

Harriet seemed to think that over a long time, as if wondering whether to say it or not. But finally she did.

“I think I’ve seen that kind of envelope, with that kind of watermark, at the offices of the Beall Paper Manufacturing Company.”

Nellie’s keen brain caught several curious hints in those words and promptly came out with them. After all, none of them knew anything to speak of about this girl.

“How is it you know anything about watermarks?” she demanded. “Usually only people in the business, and the police, know anything about such an obscure subject.”

“I was in the business,” said Harriet, after another hesitation.

“And how do you know what kind of envelopes there are in the Beall offices?”

“I… I worked there for a while,” said Harriet. “That’s where I learned something about watermarks. And I really do remember these envelopes. They have a special watermark that was used in all the company stationery.”

“Maybe we’re beginning to get somewhere, then,” said Nellie, eyes kindling again. “After all, Beall is one of the three we’re fighting, one of the blackmailers”

“He’s not a blackmailer!” Harriet snapped.

Nellie looked at her curiously. Harriet’s eyes had a glary look in them, and there was angry red over each cheekbone.

“He’s blackmailing Farquar,” Nellie said. “That’s the case we’re all working on. You know that.”

“Mr. Beall is no blackmailer. He’s an honest, decent man. I know! After all, I worked in his office, didn’t I?”

“I don’t think a mere stenographer in a large office could give a very accurate character description of the big boss,” said Nellie. She shrugged. “Have it your own way, though. The important thing is the envelope. That will have to be checked. We’ve got to know whether this is from the Beall office.”

“There’s one way to find out,” said Harriet, a bit breathlessly. “We can go there, right now, with this envelope and compare them.”

Anybody else would have replied that this was no work for a couple of girls. It was dark out. To prowl through a large factory office at night was a job for men.

But Nellie grabbed at the suggestion.

“Swell! We’ll do it!”

Thus she confirmed once more the perpetual wail of the giant Smitty: That Nellie hadn’t enough sense to stay in out of a rain of machine-gun bullets; that she was always taking on work that should have been assigned to two large policemen, and that someday she was bound to have her pretty little head knocked off her slim shoulders.

Nellie did leave word with Rosabel where they were going, as a precaution. But that was all. The two girls barged out the door, down to the basement where The Avenger’s fast cars were kept, and rolled up the ramp in the sleek coupé that Nellie usually drove.

“I hope,” said Nellie, “that nobody else has had the sudden idea, too, that the envelope supply in Beall’s office should be investigated.”

“Why would that happen?” demanded Harriet.

Nellie took a corner on two wheels.

“Somebody remembered the envelope might be in the house with the name Ismail on it,” she pointed out. “That person didn’t get the envelope. He may feel now that we will be able to trace it — and he may try to get there first.”

“M-maybe we shouldn’t go on,” Harriet said.

“Why not?” Nellie said. “I’m just pointing out that we’ll have to be on guard, that’s all.”

The Beall plant was up the East River, on the Queens side. From the car, Nellie looked over its five-story bulk, dark in the night.

“Thank heaven for fire escapes,” she said.

She drove the coupé into an alley beside the building and stopped under the drawn-up lower stair of the escape.

“Get on the top of the coupé and swing up to the first platform,” she directed. “Then lower the thing for me.”

Harriet dutifully climbed to the top of the car and then to the escape. Nellie drove back and parked her car innocently down the block. Then she joined Harriet on the iron rungs.

“Office?” she whispered.

“Top floor,” said Harriet, through chattering teeth.

“Watchman?”

“He stays on the ground floor except when he’s making his rounds.”

The two girls, like a pair of lovely burglars, crept to the top of the fire escape. The iron escape door was locked, of course. With a sideways leap to a narrow ledge that would have done credit to a cat, Nellie got to the nearest window, which was not locked. In a moment she had gone in through it, out to the hall and back. The door was opened from the inside and Harriet went in.

“I’m s-sorry I suggested this,” she chattered.

Nellie gripped her arm a minute. “Shh! Buck up.”

With eyes accustomed to the dimness, they got the layout of the top floor — though Harriet moved with a certainty indicating that she’d had the layout firmly in mind.

There was a general office, taking up most of the floor, and private offices along two walls, partitioned off with paneling and frosted glass.

“Would all those desks have the envelopes in them?” Nellie whispered, pointing to dozens of stenographic desks and chairs in rows in the big office.

“Probably,” Harriet whispered back.

Nellie went to the first desk in the first row and opened the drawers. It seemed that Harriet had guessed wrong. There were envelopes — but none of that type. The second desk had none, either. Nor the third—

Nellie was moving cautiously, senses tuned to the slightest breath of sound. And this was fortunate, for it allowed her to hear the barest perceptible scrape of a shoe.

The sound came from one of the walls along the private offices. Instantly she sank behind a desk, drawing Harriet down with her.

The last door along the line of private cubicles opened. A dark figure, looking more like a slinking shadow than a human being, slunk out of the office. And Nellie felt the hot blood buzzing in her ears.

There was no way of telling whether or not Harriet recognized the slinking figure. But Nellie recognized it — from the way it moved and from its general size and shape. Recognized it, and reached for the tiny gun in her purse.

It was the man who had been at the house of Ismail!

The figure came slowly toward where the two girls were crouching. Under its arm could be seen a large package. Then the two could make out what the package was.

Envelopes, tied tightly with string, but not wrapped.

“He c-cleared out the desks before we looked—” Harriet whispered.

‘Shut up!” breathed Nellie, fingers biting Harriet’s arm.

It was apparent enough without a whisper from the girl. This man was here after the envelopes, too. He had cleaned all the desks in the general office, and probably the private offices, too, since he had just emerged from the last in the line. They were all in that package under his arm.

And now he was coming directly toward them! Did he know they were there?

It was with difficulty that Nellie repressed a sigh of relief that would have been profound enough for the shadowy figure to hear. It had turned, and was going toward a blank wall at the rear.

“What’s there?” breathed Nellie, when she judged the figure was far enough away not to overhear.

“The vault the office things are kept in,” Harriet whispered softly. “I guess he’s going to get the envelopes in there, too.”

Nellie pressed her arm to remind her against unnecessary words. But she was thinking triumphant thoughts.

Vault! Oh, boy! Steel walls; steel door — better than any prison cell!

She stole after the figure. Harriet hesitated, then crept after her, scared to death of the wraithlike figure, but even more frightened to stay alone. The two saw the man working at the vault door. It was so dark, and the figure was so perfectly blended with the darkness, that they wouldn’t have seen it if they hadn’t known just where to look.

Nellie was wondering how he expected to open the vault. How would he know the combination?

Then she heard a slight creak as the door swung open, and she figured she had the answer. And at the same time, an almost certain answer for the blackmailing case.

This must be Beall himself. No one else could get the door open so easily and quickly. It was a regular safe door. An outsider would have to blow or drill it.

Beall himself, suddenly worried about the envelope; Beall, who had sent Smathers to that house of Death with an envelope containing only blank papers—

This thought ran against a wall of uncertainty. Why would Beall, in blackmailing Farquar, feel that he had to get rid of Farquar’s veteran clerk?

While she was thinking so furiously, Nellie was still moving toward the vault where the office supplies were kept. She could see the white blur of the package of envelopes the shadow-figure had set down outside the vault. She could see the door, half open.

The plan was as simple as it was certain. All she had to do was bang that door shut on the man inside. That solid steel door.

Then they had the murderer of Smathers and the key to the whole affair they were working on. And Nellie, singlehanded, would have wound it all up.

They reached the wall near the door. Nellie crept along that. She could hear the man inside the vault, rustling through papers. There were probably many boxes of the envelopes. But, methodically, he meant to collect them all.

She got to the door. Harriet was right behind her. Nellie could feel her trembling, and she felt like trembling a little herself.

Everything seemed to be going well. In a second they’d have their villain trapped. Nothing could possibly happen to upset the plan. Yet she felt cold chills running up and down her back. The vast, black expanse of the general office seemed like a great tomb in its desertion and eerie silence.

Nellie’s hand went to the door to slam it—

It was as if she had thrust it into a bear trap that suddenly clamped shut on her wrist!

Crushing fingers gripped her. A powerful arm jerked her forward. She half fell the length of the little steel room and smashed against steel filing cabinets. She had half turned when she was smashed back again by Harriet’s hurtling body. There was an almost animal snarl of triumph from the door.

The shadow-figure! The killer! He had known they were there, after all; had known and baited a trap by letting them think they had him bottled in that same trap.

Nellie’s little gun spat once, twice. But the bullets only flattened on steel as the vault door swung ponderously on them. It clanged shut. And then there was the silence of death in their ears!