The House of the Missing

by

Sinclair Gluck

A. L. Burt Company

New York

Published by arrangement with Dodd, Mead & Company

Copyright, 1922, by The Inter-continental Publishing Corporation of New York

Contents

to

My Sister

whose help and encouragement

brought it to a happy ending

this book is affectionately

dedicated

Chapter I.
I Acquire a Friend

High on the roof of the apartment house, in the darkness, the insatiable, ceaseless murmur of the city came hushed and muted to my ears. I leaned against the parapet, staring out over the glow of clashing lights below and letting the breeze touch my face with its gentle fingers. It had a soothing influence of which I was badly in need that night. For I had come to the end of two months of ceaseless search—and consistent, unvarying failure.

I had not dared to lose faith that somewhere down there, in that brimming human river, still existed the sweetest little sister a fellow ever had. It was possible even that one of the little dots now passing in the street far below knew where she was and what her fate had been. But I, who would have given the aching heart out of my body to find her, could not tell. I could only remember her sweetness; her little wide-eyed glances; her happy, bubbling laughter and her adorable innocence.

Perhaps fate had been envious of our happiness together, for it had played us the cruellest of tricks, wresting my little sister away to God knew what horrors and leaving me with a ceaseless, gnawing grief. My imagination is none too vivid, perhaps, at ordinary times, but during those two months I had had to school it rigidly. A mind that is balked of a great desire, turns on itself like a scorpion. But it did not help my search to picture scenes in which she might be the victim, scenes going on even at that moment and just around the corner perhaps. And madness lay that way, as I had long since had cause to realize.

Looking back, there on the roof, it seemed a weary waste of years since that morning, only two months before, when she came laughing, dancing into my studio to ask her favor. A Mrs. Furneau, whom I knew slightly, had offered to drive her into New York that day, to a luncheon party at the house of some friends and a matinée afterwards. Margaret was just seventeen, with an innocent, slender, childlike beauty that set me nearly crazy in my efforts to transfer it to canvas. She had come home for the summer holidays, and as usual her dainty wishes were my law. This party was to be a “Special treat, please!” So I had let her go.

I gazed down at the darkened city, and for the thousand-and-first time went wearily over the events of that terrible time, seeking for the faintest clew.

The first intimation that I had had of impending tragedy had come from Mrs. Furneau, the woman who had taken Margaret into New York. I had been working hard on a portrait and had hardly missed the child. But about seven o’clock, an hour after she should have been home, the telephone rang and a gasping voice came to me over the long-distance wire: “Is Margaret with you? Did she come home?”

Mrs. Furneau sounded nearly distracted, but I had managed to drag the details out of her at length. They had gone to the luncheon and then to the matinée in a party, she told me. A little after five, they had left the others and started for home in Mrs. Furneau’s car. Then, at 34th Street, Margaret had begged for ten minutes in which to do some shopping in one of the big stores near by. Mrs. Furneau had agreed to wait for her, and had pulled up in front of the store while Margaret got out and ran inside. And that was all!

Mrs. Furneau had waited for nearly half an hour, and then, as she could see that the store was closing for the night, had gone inside to look for her. Not finding her, she had returned to the car. But Margaret had not come out, according to Mrs. Furneau’s chauffeur. So she went back again and searched the nearly empty store thoroughly this time. But she could learn nothing—could find no one who had even seen the child. Margaret had certainly entered the store, for the older woman said she had watched her graceful figure until it passed through the revolving doors. But after that she had vanished!

Thinking that Margaret might have met and talked with friends or gone to another store in search of what she wanted, Mrs. Furneau had waited in the car for nearly an hour more. By that time all the stores were closed. And besides, Margaret was a considerate child and would never have stayed away so long of her own volition without telling her hostess. Mrs. Furneau became really frightened then and telephoned to me.

Half an hour later I met her in New York. She repeated the details of Margaret’s disappearance and we talked over possibilities, but there was no clew to work on, as to what could have become of my little sister. We called up all the friends she had in New York that I knew about, but could learn nothing. And there was very little that I could do that night. The store workers were scattered to the four winds by that time.

So I had given all the details of the disappearance to the police, and after sending Mrs. Furneau home—she was frightened and tired out—I went to a hotel myself, so that I could be close at hand if the police wanted me.

As long as I live the recollection of that night will be vivid in my memory. Hour after hour I paced the floor, stopping every ten minutes or so to ring up my house, only to learn from the frightened servants that there was no news. Margaret had not returned. And at last the gray dawn crept into the room and found me still fully dressed and still pacing back and forth.

The store opened at nine, and at that hour Mrs. Furneau, who had come into town again to help, joined me. We went through the store together and questioned the workers—door-men, floor-walkers, salesgirls—every one. But we could learn nothing. There was simply no trace of any kind.

And another hasty telephone call told me that there was no news of my little sister at home.

That night and morning had been the beginning of two months of fear that haunted me like the terrible figments of a nightmare. At first, the number of investigations that suggested themselves, among the people in the store and among Margaret’s friends, had kept my mind occupied and kept hope alive that nothing serious had happened to the child. Then there had been the hospitals to search and city officials to interview, to say nothing of social workers and charitable organizations. Mrs. Furneau spent days with me, helping in the search. But as time passed and we could learn nothing, despair settled on me like a choking cloud, and with it an unreasonable sense of resentment towards Mrs. Furneau for her part in it all. I did my best to conceal it; but her intuition must have told her that there was something wrong, and after a week or so she gave up the search and I continued my efforts alone.

But the days grew into weeks and the combined efforts of the police, the best detective agencies in the country, and every other agency that money and determination could press into the service, failed to find a shadow of a trace, until at length other crimes and an epidemic of disappearances among young Society girls distracted their attention and I continued the search alone.

Hope dies hard; and there was always the chance that the child might make her way home again, or that I might hear of her or from her in some roundabout way; for at least her body had not been found. But after two months of utterly unsuccessful search, almost continuous by day and night, I was pretty desperate now, standing up there on the roof of the building in New York in which I had taken an apartment.

Everything else had been dropped and I had moved to New York. I had been in queer places and seen queer sights during those eight weeks. I had pierced the outer, commonplace integument of a great city—the shifting scene of blank, reserved humanity that meets the casual eye—and had been caught up and swept nearly off my feet once or twice in the seething welter of passion and crime that swells and ebbs beneath the city’s impassive exterior.

But of the slip of a girl I sought and now almost dreaded to find I could learn—nothing.

Stretching away below me as I watched, the city crouched purring, like some great animal motionless and watchful. I hated it actively for what it had done to me, longing to tear out its secret by violence, if need be. But after a while sanity slowly returned and the momentary madness faded. I can only say in excuse that the gnawing anxiety of those two months must have somewhat undermined a pretty normal point of view.

But with returning sanity came a slow resolve. Up to now I had been seeking blindly, with no plan—no definite aim, no thought of the future. From now on I vowed that my life should be given up to the search; that nothing should interfere with it; that only death or success should put an end to it. The resolve brought me a curious sense of peace. That much I could do—even though it were all I could do. But that much should be done.

With the thought I turned away from the parapet to go to my rooms below and try to lay out some sort of a campaign for the future. As I turned a touch fell upon my arm and I found Larry standing beside me. In the dim light from the open doorway that led to the roof I could detect the half-veiled pity in his eyes.

I had acquired Larry a couple of weeks before, or rather had had him more or less thrust upon me, and had not regretted it.

Early in the search I bought a small light car and scoured the city night after night in it, in the hope of catching a glimpse of Margaret. One night I had been driving slowly along the Bowery. It was very late and the long, wide, cobbled street under the L structure was deserted. But as I came to a corner, Larry darted out of a side street, yanked open the rear door of the car and dropped into the obscurity of the tonneau behind me, with “For God’s sake, d‑r‑r‑rive on, sor. It’s half a dozen of them gangsters is after me!”

The sheer impudence of it took my breath away for a moment, and with the sudden natural impulse of a sporting chance for the hunted thing, I stood on the accelerator and whisked around a corner and out of sight before it came home to me that I was probably defeating the ends of justice. Then, too, there had been a quality of warmth and a hint of laughter in the rich brogue of the speaker that appealed to me and seemed to lift him out of the common run of malefactors.

Once committed, however, I turned a lot more corners and put a good bit of the city between us and his pursuers before I pulled into the curb and turned to have it out with my “fare.”

He forestalled me. He jumped to his feet at once. “Do but wait now, sor, and lave me have a look at ye!” said he.

Surprise and wrathful amazement kept me silent for a moment while he stared into my face. Then just as I was preparing to give him an extensive and unvarnished account of what I thought of him and his impudence, he slapped his thigh, and leaning forward took my hand and touched the top of his head with it, in a queer old-fashioned gesture.

“Faith, sor, I knew ut! You’re the man for me and I’m your man from this day forth. See now, tell me what it is you want in the world and I’ll get it ye. Ye have the look of a seeker, sor. Tell me what it is ye seek and I’ll find it. There now!”

I could not answer for a moment. The beggar was so impudent and so amazingly penetrating. Then I recovered my tongue and proceeded to give him a dressing down that I’m proud of even now, when I think of it. He listened without a word and with only an occasional wriggle of the body to show that some comment of mine upon his personal appearance had gone home. I wound up with the observation that I now proposed to take him and hand him over to the nearest policeman with a full account of our meeting.

“That’s it, sor!” he broke in, as I finished, “you’re the master for a lawless lad like me. I knew it from the fir‑r‑rst. An’ ye’ll not be for givin’ me up to thim cops at the latter end, afther the way ye’d made such a rescue an’ all. Faith, ’twas a small matther av a colleen av wan av thim gangsters, sor!”

He paused and looked at me with something of anxiety in his eyes. “See now, give me up to thim thin if ye must, sor. Thim bhoys is nothin’ an’ I’ll soon be quit of the pack of thim again. But ye’ll not be the sort that’s met with every day. An’—an’ I’d like fine to serve ye, sor!”

To tell the truth, I was puzzled. The man had been clever enough not to threaten me in return with the disclosure of my part in his escape, supposing I were to give him up. If he had, I should have handed him over at once. And at his first appearance there had been something of exultation mixed with his fear, so that I doubted in him any great depth of depravity for its own sake. Moreover, his first words about seeker and search had been a wild stab in the dark from an arrant braggart, but—they had struck home. God knows, I needed help in my search, and what right had I to refuse it, in however wild a guise it presented itself? The fellow was young, with the slimness of youth, but he was big-boned and powerful-looking and his eyes were bright with intelligence. He might prove a useful ally enough if he were sincere. For the moment I could only temporize.

“What do you mean by ‘serve me’? Do you think I want a chauffeur or what?” I demanded.

His answering look was full of reproach. At least his face was frank and open for any man to read, the emotions chasing each other across it like ripples of wind on a mountain lake. There was something attractive, too, about the youth and vitality and daring of his make-up.

“Faith, that’s not yerself, sor. Did I not tell ye there was the look of the seeker about ye? There’s lines of pain an’ fear an’ anxious nights and days in yer face, sor, an’ that’s God’s truth, beggin’ yer pardon, sor. I saw that at once. An’ I’d like foine to hilp ye to yer desire, the way we would be worrkin’ together on it. If there’s a bit of excitement about it, so much the better, sor. Have ye a ‘man’ already?”

“You know who I am, then,” I told him sharply; “that is evident.”

“I do not, sor,” he answered, triumph in his voice. “But I’m right then, sor?”

“Yes, you’re right,” I answered wearily. “Well—you’d better come home with me now and we’ll talk over what’s to be done with you.” I started the car again and so drove home with him.

I put the car away and then took him up to my study, set him down and fell to cross-examining him on his past life, with a view to getting a better line on the man himself from his way of answering. Some mix-up over a colleen had sent him out of Ireland as a boy and he had drifted to New York, that Mecca of the Irish. He told me frankly that his father had argued and occasionally beaten into him the conviction that the world owed him a living and a good one. In New York he had tried common labor, odd jobs and work as a shipping clerk, but had found no good living at any of them. So he had drifted into bad company and a manner of life that promised an easy existence, plenty of pickings, and above all, the excitement that his soul craved. The pickings had not been all he had hoped, it seemed. But there had certainly been plenty of excitement.

“So,” I told him calmly, “I’m to take you on here and install you, so that you can clean the place out in my absence, without even the trouble of breaking in!”

The hurt, resentful look on his face was enough to convince me. But he turned away and started for the door, his cap in his hand. “Faith, sor,” he answered quietly, “I took ye for a man of more—sinse, beggin’ yer pardon, sor. I’ll just be goin’, unless ye’d like to give me up still?”

“Come back here and turn out your pockets.”

He came slowly back to the table, a glint in his eye and rebellion latent in every line of him. I took a quick step forward. “On the table,” I told him quietly.

It was a sorry collection. Bits of string, a heavy clasp knife, a half-eaten sandwich, a letter or two from the old country made up the total with a few small coins.

“Is that all?”

“That’s all.”

“All right, put them back. I’m glad we’ve nothing to return to the rightful owners. Now come with me and I’ll show you your room. The first thing you’d better do is to take a bath.”

“By God, sor,” he said, and stopped, the blood flooding his face. “Ye’ll—ye’ll not regret it!” he added quietly, a moment later.

So I took him into my service, ostensibly as a valet, a nuisance which I did not want in the least, but actually for the aid his knowledge of the under-world might prove in my search. But before a week had passed I had learned to like the man for himself, for his cheery optimism, his courage and his faithfulness, also somewhat for his incurable laziness and bragging, though it would never have done to let him know it; and I spent most of our time together outlining the most unflattering views on his ancestry and personal habits.

We had already pulled out of some pretty tight corners together, but through it all he had stood by me, plucky, optimistic, for ever bragging and for ever ready for anything. To tell the truth he had pulled me back to a sane frame of mind more than once with his nonsense. But whether he knew this and did it on purpose or not I could not tell.

Up on the roof now, he stood beside me for a moment before he spoke.

“Well?” I demanded, sharply.

“There’s a gintleman to see ye, sor. Says his name is Bertrand Moore, or some such thruck as that. He gave me no cyard. I did tell him, sor, that ye would not be wishful to be disturbed. But he was all for seein’ ye, whether or no. Sure he folleyed me up here a ways, till I turned back to him. Shall I sind him about his business?”

With this he lapsed into silence, waiting calmly for directions. He was quite ready, as I knew, either to throw the visitor out bodily or to make him at home, whichever he was told. Aside from myself, matters of ethics did not trouble Larry in the slightest, and it was this quality in him that had brought back to me the power to laugh.

“What does he want? Do you know?” I asked.

“That I don’t, sor. There’s a lackadaisical air about him, an’ yet I’ve a notion he’s used to havin’ his way, sor. He wud not tell me more than just that he wanted to be seein’ ye, an’ see ye he wud!”

The name conveyed nothing to me, and it was not until I entered my small drawing-room and my visitor rose to his feet that I placed him. I had seen him once or twice hanging round the police station when my search had taken me there, and had also met him once at the house of some friends. I had put him down as a bit of a lounge lizard, his dress and manner of speech giving me that impression rather than his face. So, after shaking hands, I waited with some interest and secret amusement to learn what he wanted with me.

“How do you do, Mr. Clayton?” he began in his mincing voice. Then he glanced at Larry, who was hovering about in the background. “May I have—er—five minutes of your time—alone?”

“I suppose so,” I answered, smiling. “You can go, Larry. Sit down Mr.—Moore, isn’t it?”

Chapter II.
“The Shadow of the Web”

My visitor nodded and sank gracefully into a chair, leaning back negligently. But as soon as the door had closed on Larry he seemed to stiffen in a surprising manner, his negligence dropped from him and he leaned forward with a certain eagerness. There was a force about him now of which I had not been conscious before.

“Mr. Clayton,” he began, “I want to talk to you about your own affairs—and I can only hope that you will hear me out before you resent the apparent impertinence. I assure you that there is a reason—and a good one—for my action. Have I your leave to go on?”

I nodded shortly. “Let’s hear what’s on your mind,” I told him. “But I won’t guarantee not to resent any impertinence, as you call it,” I added grimly.

He bowed and smiled. “That’s only natural and to be expected,” he said. “But this is what I came to talk to you about.” He paused a moment as though to collect his ideas, and then continued quickly: “You have, I believe, spent the last two months searching for your sister. I believe that, to a certain extent, I can help you in this search, or, rather, that I can put you in the way of helping yourself—seeking at a greater advantage and perhaps to better purpose. If you care to listen to me, I will tell you what I have in mind. But before doing so, I am forced to ask you for a pledge of absolute secrecy. That is quite essential.”

He waited then, and I stared at him in growing amazement. Of all the queer rigmarole——

He saw my expression and smiled. “Sounds like something straight out of a melodrama, doesn’t it?” he said. Then the smile left his face and he went on soberly: “Nevertheless, I am very much in earnest. I was never more serious in my life than I am now, in assuring you that I believe I can help you and that the pledge of secrecy is quite essential. You will see why at once, if you give it. As you know nothing at all about me, I might add that such a pledge will bind you to nothing at all dishonorable, nor will it force you to connive at anything dishonorable by your silence.”

“Good Lord, man,” I broke out at this, “what kind of a bee have you got in your bonnet? You seem to be in earnest, but what’s all this talk about secrecy? If you know anything about my sister, for God’s sake tell it to me and have done. I’ve been disappointed so often——”

He shook his head, his face sobering instantly. “I’m sorry to say I haven’t,” he answered; “I’ve done my best, too. But there, give the pledge, man. It’s little enough to give and I know you’ll keep it.”

“Very well,” I said at last, “I’ll keep secret anything you tell me, provided—well, you understand. I’ll give you my word on that.”

He sat up, smiling again. “Good, I took you for a man of sense and I was right. The suggestion I have to make to you is, that if you allied yourself with a certain organization, you would be in a better position to pursue your search. The organization can help you in many ways, and your search itself will be of help to the others—the men affiliated with you.”

“And the organization?” I demanded.

“The organization is the Secret Service of the United States!” he answered quietly.

I sat and stared at him at this. And the longer I stared the more indignant I grew. The thing was preposterous on the face of it. In the first place, what had he to do with the detection of crime—this fastidious young fop? Secondly, how could I pursue my own search if I joined such an organization, presuming for a moment that I could do so? And lastly, how could my search be of any possible benefit to the United States? Still he seemed sane enough. There was an earnestness about him that bade me hesitate in my indignation even. And he must have some object in his proposal.

At last the funny side of it struck me and I laughed. “Well, one of us is crazy, I think, and I don’t think it’s I. Now will you tell me what grounds you have for making such a proposal—what possible use I would be to the Secret Service—and how on earth it would help me to join them?” I demanded.

He laughed in his turn. “I admit it sounds absurd,” he said, “but I think I can answer your questions to some extent. Under your pledge of secrecy I can at least tell you that I have the honor to be an operative of the Bureau of Investigation of the Department of Justice. That is one of my reasons for making you this proposal. Secondly, I am not alone in believing that you might be of great service to us at this time, even,” he added, smiling, “if you do give food, shelter and comfort, as we say, to a young gangster!”

I nodded grimly. “Is there anything else that you know about me?”

He laughed. “Yes, quite a lot. In fact, practically everything. I know that you have considerable independent means, that you are, or were, fairly successful as an artist—portrait painter; that your parents are dead; that you are an athlete; that in spite of prohibition you still buy bonded gin and whisky occasionally, by the case, and where you get it; that during your search for your sister you narrowly escaped getting mixed up in that Gerachty murder case; that you were in the room when the man was stabbed, and that you got out by a clever dodge of walking backward, so that when the police entered they thought you were just coming in; that you haven’t by any means given up the hope of finding your sister, and that——” Here I held up my hand and he stopped.

“You certainly have the advantage of me,” I told him. “Now suppose you proceed and tell me why you think the Department will help me in my search?”

He shook his head. “In spite of your pledge, I cannot tell you that, unless and until you decide to join. There is too much in the balance and I have pledges of my own to consider.” He leaned forward and spoke eagerly. “But listen. This is a bona fide offer and I am empowered to make it. You are mixing yourself up, or are trying to, in something far bigger than you have any idea of—something far too big for you to handle alone. Join us! You have got nowhere this way—that I happen to know. Indeed, if you had, almost certainly you would not be here to give me this interview. That much I will tell you. Come with me to-morrow and see the Chief and listen to what he has to say. Perhaps he will make things clearer than I have the right to. But you have nothing to lose and, I believe, everything to gain by joining us. Our Chief is in town for a few days. Will you come?”

I sat taking him in for a moment. “Well,” I answered at last, “I don’t believe you’re crazy anyhow, though the thing sounds absurd enough in all conscience. Moreover, I hate to spare even one day from my search, just because I have got nowhere, as you say. But I think I’ll take a chance and see this chief of yours, whoever he is.”

I broke off short because my visitor had got slowly and silently to his feet and was tiptoeing toward the window, where heavy curtains were drawn half-way back to let in the evening air.

As he passed me, he nodded and motioned me to go on talking, his lips forming the words “Go on!”

“What time do you want me to meet you and where?” I went on at random.

My visitor reached the window and snatched one of the heavy curtains aside. I caught a glimpse of a startled face—saw the face twist into a sudden, frightened snarl. Then Moore’s hand flashed to his hip as I got to my feet. The room rang with the crash of a revolver shot and I clapped my hand to the side of my head. I saw the intruder stumble forward into the room through the smoke, tearing with both hands at his chest, and then sink limply to the floor. A small metal object shaped something like a hammer-head dropped from his hand as he fell.

Glass was still tinkling on the floor from a broken picture behind me as my visitor slipped his revolver back in his pocket and stooped over the fallen man. “Good Lord, so soon?” I heard him whisper.

I stumbled over to him, speechless, as Larry came running into the room, a ludicrous look of apprehension on his face. It cleared a little when he saw me. Then a moment later he caught sight of the blood on the side of my face and came running over to me. “My God, sor, did he get you bad? I’ll tear the heart out av him.” He turned on Moore, and then for the first time caught sight of the man on the floor. Moore turned to me at the same moment.

“Did he get you? Not badly, did he?” He strode over to me. “Let’s have a look! No, just a scratch, thank goodness. Close call though.”

“Say, what the devil is it all about?” I began. “Who is this fellow, and what the hell did he get me with? I’ll swear there was only one revolver shot and that was yours.”

But Moore interrupted me. “Listen,” he said quickly. “That one is dead, I think, and a good job too. But you and I are also, or as good as dead, if a word of this gets into the papers. I want you to ’phone to police headquarters, if your head will let you, and ask for Captain Peters. Don’t talk to any one else on any account. When you get him, give him this address and tell him to come here at once. Give him no name, but tell him he’s wanted. Better wash out that wound first, though. Get rid of your man and keep his mouth shut, will you? I’m going to search this fellow.”

Whatever it was that had struck me, the wound on the side of my head was only a scratch. Larry, seething with indignation and curiosity, washed it out for me, keeping up a running fire of questions the while, to which I returned no answer. My visitor’s manner, to say nothing of my own narrow escape, had convinced me that the matter was serious, and the less Larry knew the less he could talk, though I doubted anything but his discretion. A few moments later I went to the telephone, leaving Larry in his room with orders to stay there and to keep his mouth shut in future, and leaving Moore still busy with his victim. My own head was seething with remonstrance and questions, to say nothing of a slight dizziness induced by the blow it had received. But I succeeded in getting Captain Peters and delivering my message. “I’ll be there in ten minutes, tell him!” came over the wire to me, followed by the crash of the receiver in its socket. Then I turned back to Moore and the thing he was searching.

He looked up as I gave him the captain’s message. “Thanks,” he said. Then, indicating the man on the floor, “Nothing at all on him except—this! What do you make of it? Be careful!”

I took the metal object that the intruder had dropped as he fell. But I could make nothing of it. It resembled nothing I had ever seen except that there was a projection about an inch long from the middle of it that might be a muzzle. It was made of blued steel and built to fit in the hand when half closed, so that the muzzle protruded between the second and third fingers.

“It’s some sort of an air revolver,” Moore explained; “but I’ve never seen anything just like it before. Maybe it’ll come in useful, though. Gad, I hope this fellow was alone!” he added.

“But who is he?” I demanded at last, “and how on earth did he get in here?”

“As to who he is,” Moore smiled, a little grimly, “you’ll find out all about that to-morrow—if he was alone. Otherwise you probably won’t live that long. As to how he got in: like a fool I misunderstood your man and followed him a little way toward the roof when he first started after you. He had left the door of the apartment open and this poor devil must have slipped in then. Your man turned back and showed me in here, but I suppose he must have hidden behind the curtain at once. The time was so short that I never thought to suspect anything or look for eavesdroppers, until I saw the curtain bulge a little in a way no summer breeze would move it. You saw the rest, and I’ll say it was a damned close thing at that, that he didn’t get the two of us. But come on, let’s get him out of this.”

Together we carried the man to a chair and sat him up in it. I put my ear to his chest, but the burnt hole in his coat and in the shirt beneath, through which bright red blood was still slowly oozing, was directly over the heart. The man was stone dead.

Moore stood looking down at him a moment. “Poor devil,” he said. “He was only a tool, but, none the less, I think he was here to finish my little business, and yours too, probably, after what I had told you.” He hesitated. “What’s more,” he went on, “it’s probably a good job for both of us that he’s dead. The only good Indian is a dead Indian, and this fellow is one of that breed.”

At this moment the bell rang and I went to the door. Coming just after the recent scene I had witnessed, the burly police captain who stood there gave me a twinge of uneasiness on Moore’s account, for I had taken a strong liking to my unconventional and quick-witted visitor. But the captain only nodded and passed in front of me through the hall, as I stood back, entering the room where Moore still hung over his victim, as though to wring the last bit of information out of him.

Moore nodded and spoke at once. “Captain Peters, I’m sorry to say I’ve killed this man. I caught him behind that curtain, and it was a close thing at that, as you can see by that picture over there and by this gentleman’s head.”

The police captain whistled and, striding over to the body, stared down at it for a moment. Then he turned back to Moore. “I don’t know him, do you?” he asked.

“No,” the other answered, “I don’t. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen him before. But I want you to get a taxi and get him out of here at once, if you will. You can find him somewhere else; anywhere, you know. But keep the thing entirely out of the papers if you can, in any case. That’s important, as you can guess. Above all, captain, don’t let it get about that he had anything to do with me or with this gentleman or that he was killed in this building. If you do, my life will be a poor risk for any insurance company, though I guess it’s that already. You know enough about this business to know that! Will you fix it for me?”

“I’ll fix it,” the captain answered, laconically. He turned in my direction, “Who’s this?” he asked curiously.

“Meet Mr. Clayton, Captain Peters,” Moore answered, with a shadow of a wink at me for the style of introduction. “He’s not with us yet, but I believe he will be before long,” he added.

“Good enough!” said the captain and shook hands, his manner thawing considerably. “Glad to meet you, Mr. Clayton. Well, if you’ll ’phone for the taxi, I guess I can manage to get this downstairs by myself. I guess it will be better if neither of you gentlemen show yourselves.”

A few moments later the taxi arrived, and after putting a fresh coat on the body—one of Larry’s, by the way—and closing the eyes, we rang for the elevator. When the boy finally woke up and arrived at our floor, I had an opportunity to observe something of the quality that had brought the captain his rank. He marched into the elevator with his arm around the body, supporting it. He set it down on the seat and sat down beside it, and as the elevator door closed on the round, startled eyes of the operator, I heard the captain gruffly admonishing his charge, in the usual tone: “Come on now, you ain’t as drunk as all that.”

As soon as I rejoined Moore, he turned away from the window where he had been standing and, walking up to me, held out his hand.

“I’m sorry—damned sorry—that this happened here, Clayton. Of course I’m sorry that it happened at all, except that it’s one less to reckon with, and of course that bump on the head you got is at my door. But what you’ve seen to-night is a little—just a very little shadow of what you’re up against—if you only knew it. Now I must go. Be at 7th Avenue and 16th Street to-morrow at 3.30. There’s no need to mix you up with this yet until you make up your mind. And it will be best, I think, if we’re not seen together. Will you do it?”

“I’ll be there,” I told him.

“Right,” he answered. “Good-night. Don’t come out to the elevator with me. I’m going to walk down a few flights anyway,” and with a smile and a graceful wave of the hand that brought back his original simpering manner, he let himself out and was gone.

I called Larry at last and set him, sullen and rebellious, to picking up the pieces of the broken picture glass and to washing away the blood-stains on the floor. Then I sat down to ponder upon the events of the night and the new features they had introduced into my search.

Chapter III.
“That’s All We Know”

Next morning I had to deal with a suspicious and indignant Larry, with smoldering rebellion in every line of him. Nothing would convince him that the shot that broke the picture was not intended for me. In fact, I found him, just after breakfast, polishing up the revolver of his lawless days and whistling softly the while. I felt pretty certain that another such unconventional visitor as the man who had died at my feet would get a warm reception in my absence.

Larry had a grievance that morning; in fact, two of them. In the first place I told him that I was going to meet Moore, but had not told him why, nor what I was going to do. This was grievance number one, for up to now he had shared my plans.

But far greater than this was his grievance over the amazing metamorphosis of the graceful and negligent Moore. The glimpse Larry had caught of him, standing, smoking revolver in hand, over the dead man, had upset Larry’s calculations completely. He seemed to take it rather as a personal affront that this gentle soul should turn into a killer like that, behind his back. Perhaps the way Moore had ordered him out of the room afterwards had something to do with it.

However, I left him in charge of everything, and even commissioned him to wander about the city where his fancy led, to see whether he could pick up any clews. From a study of portraits and photographs, he had long since impressed my sister’s face on his memory, and he knew by heart the details of the dress she wore that day. This and his post in command of the fort, as it were, cheered him up a bit. I left him finally resigned and whistling over his revolver.

Personally, I felt considerably more cheerful that morning than I had felt for a long time. In the strain and fatigue of endless search, questing here, there, and wherever impulse led, I had had no time to brood over the fact that I was doing it alone. I had been in some pretty tight corners in my search, where, I believe now, only fixity of purpose had pulled me through.

I had not realized this at the time. But I am naturally rather of a peaceful disposition; I had my fill of fighting with the Lafayette Esquadrille during the war and had no desire for further excitement. So the new sense I had this morning of companionship, encouragement and backing waiting for me ahead put new heart into me. I felt somehow that things had taken a turn for the better in my quest. And I was filled with an even greater determination to see the thing through, however long it took and whatever happened. But for all this, I think it was as well that I could not see what lay ahead for me in the weeks to come.

I could find no one to meet me when I reached the rendezvous which Moore had designated. As I paused irresolute at the curb edge, a workman, lounging against a lamp-post and sucking on a dry cutty pipe, leisurely uncrossed his legs and sauntered up to me.

“Say, Mister, got a match on ye?” said he.

I handed him my box rather absently. But as he struck a match and stooped to light his pipe, he moved a little closer to me as though to shelter the flame. “Your cab’s across the way, sir,” he whispered. “At the corner, there. The driver knows.”

A moment later he straightened up and flipped away the match. “Much obliged, Mister,” he said. Then he handed me the box of matches and sauntered back to his lamp-post.

I moved across the street without looking at the man again. What I had seen of Moore and the man who had followed him the night before gave me no reason to believe that he and his associates would go in for a needless display of melodramatic secrecy. Therefore, if my arrival and destination seemed to them best kept secret, it was up to me to take the hint and fall in with their plans.

The car across the street was an ordinary taxi. As I came up to him the driver called, “Taxi, sir?” and reached back to open the door, quite in the natural manner.

“You know where to go?” I asked him.

He nodded. “Right you are, sir. Jump in!” he said, as though I had given him an address. A moment later we were speeding away. My new life and associations had begun.

Once started, I fell to wondering again as to why I had been sent for and how I could serve the ends of the Department, for of course the Department must have some definite object in view. I pictured the interview, imagining myself in some spick and span Municipal Office temporarily placed at the disposal of this distinguished visitor from Washington, chatting with some elderly gentleman of a curt and somewhat pompous mien. I was never more mistaken in my life!

We drove for ten or fifteen minutes, in and out among the little streets of Greenwich Village. Then suddenly the taxi pulled up in front of a little hotel below Washington Square, of which I had never even heard.

As I got out, the man glanced at the meter and raised his flag. “It’s sixty cents, sir,” he said casually.

Somewhat at a loss, I handed him a dollar bill. At that he dived into his pocket, picked out a dollar in change and presented it to me with a grin. He leaned forward as he did so. “Room 333, sir,” he said softly. Then, raising his voice: “All right, sir, I’ll be here at ten!”

A moment later he and his taxi had disappeared.

I entered the hotel, walked through the lobby, nodded to the elevator-boy and told him the third floor. And presently I was knocking at the door of Room 333.

It flew open and disclosed Moore, as immaculate as ever, but with an anxious look on his face which disappeared when he saw me. He reached out and pulled me into the room, shutting and locking the door again without wasting an instant.

“Thank goodness you got here all right. I was getting nervous. Now let me introduce you to the Chief.”

Instead of the pompous individual I had expected to meet, I found myself shaking hands with a big, genial fellow, with a jaw like the prow of a ship and a warm twinkle in his keen blue eyes. I took a liking to him at once.

“Well, sir,” he said, “glad to meet you—and glad you got here all serene. Mr. Clayton, isn’t it? Now let’s get to business.”

The room was an ordinary hotel bedroom and small at that. The Chief waved Moore and myself to seats on the bed and sat himself down somewhat cautiously in the only chair, which groaned under his bulk. He was still smiling, but his eyes were keen and cold, and I realized that the smile was purely automatic. He leaned forward in the groaning chair and made his points, as he talked, by tapping the forefinger of one hand in the palm of the other.

“Now, Mister Clayton,” he said, “Moore here suggested that you might be of use to us and I told him to bring you along, so that we could talk it over. You see, I am being frank with you, because I don’t suppose you imagined for a minute that this was a philanthropic proposition, eh?”

“No,” I told him bluntly, “neither on your side nor on mine.”

He laughed. “Well, we’ll call it a mutual benefit association. Anyhow, I know something about your search for the last two months and about you yourself, and your record in the war. Of course our men have had Miss Clayton on their minds. But that’s not entirely because of the dust you kicked up. There’s a bigger reason, too.”

“Bigger because it’s pretty nearly national,” Moore interjected softly.

The Chief nodded. “Yes, I might have put that differently. But my work comes first, you understand.”

“How do you think I can help you and help myself at the same time?” I asked him.

“I’m coming to that.” He broke off for a moment and glanced about the tiny green and brown bedroom. The glaring electrics in the central chandelier showed up every line of the grim, resourceful face with the grizzled hair above and the firm, heavy jaw. It was a face to inspire confidence certainly—if you happened to be on the same side with it. Otherwise it was distinctly a face to avoid.

“The fact is, Clayton,” he said suddenly, “that the Department is up against about the biggest thing in its history. German spies were pretty nearly as easy as picking cherries compared to this. And unless I’m very much mistaken, you’re up against exactly the same proposition. There’s the thing in a nutshell.”

“You mean——”

“I mean that if we can’t get anywhere with it—and we haven’t got far, I’ll admit—why your chances are pretty slim, working on your own. What’s more, if you should stumble on to something, the chances are one million to one that you’ll just get your throat cut for your pains. On the other hand, if you work for us—that is, if we work together on the proposition—why, perhaps we can help you in your search with our organization. And I believe you may be able to help us, or I wouldn’t have sent for you.”

“But what is this thing I’m—you’re up against?” I demanded.

The Chief scratched his head at this. “That’s just it. We don’t know—anything definite. However, I’ll tell you all there is to tell, and then you can make up your mind whether you’ll accept or not. I think Moore here told you that I’d like to have you working for me as an unofficial and fairly independent operative?”

“He was damned uncommunicative on the subject,” I answered.

Both the others laughed. “We don’t shout about our business from the housetops much,” said the Chief. “But this is a little of what we know. First of all, statistics. During the last six months no less than thirty girls have disappeared from the best families in and around New York—and not one of them has been traced.”

“Thirty-four, with the Schyller case,” said Moore softly.

“Exactly,” nodded the Chief. “Now, of course, girls are disappearing all the time, running away to go on the stage, eloping with the chauffeur, and so on. But very few of these are from the older, quieter families—the best families in the real sense. But the girls I’m talking about, of whom your sister was one, are practically all from the best families, all very young and all very prepossessing.”

The Chief broke off and ran his blunt fingers through his hair. “And, believe me, the pressure that’s been brought to bear on us to find them has turned my hair gray. But—we—haven’t—found—one!”

“Good God!” I began, but the Chief held up a warning finger and glanced at the door. I went on more quietly: “Do you mean to say it’s some sort of a gigantic gang of—of——” I couldn’t finish.

“White slavers? No-o, I don’t think so,” he answered. “Though I tell you, we don’t know.”

He paused at this and sat thinking for so long that impatience got the better of me, and I urged him to go on and tell me what they did know.

“Well, here’s the situation,” he said at last. “These girls have disappeared in New York, in Atlantic City, in Jersey towns and in Long Island, and two of them in Philadelphia. But most of them in New York. They have disappeared while shopping, while calling, while going to or coming from the theater, some of them on their way to hotels, and so on. Moreover, from what we can gather, it looks as if they actually were engaged in these innocent pursuits. I mean, these were not ostensible occupations to cloak escapades or elopements.

“Therefore the evidence points overwhelmingly to the fact that the disappearances were unwilling ones. So far as we can tell, none of the girls, or very few of them, were engaged in love affairs of a serious nature. So much for that.”

Suddenly the Chief made a wry face and the stubbly fingers ran through his hair rapidly two or three times. “As we haven’t been able to find out anything definite, we have had to fall back on deduction, which hasn’t taken us far. But perhaps we have learned something from it.

“You see, none of these girls were much in the public eye. At the time they disappeared, they were on the most ordinary and quietest of errands. But, in the vast majority of cases, the errands were planned at least two days in advance. That’s all we know.

“Perhaps that doesn’t tell us much and perhaps it does. It is possible, of course, that they were drugged in some way, by people on the watch in public places. I mean without regard to their identity. On the other hand, it looks as if most of the abductions must have been planned in advance, with a foreknowledge of the girls’ movements.

“You know as well as I do, that it isn’t so simple to drug and kidnap a person in broad daylight, or, at least, in a public place. These were not the type of girls to be easily drawn into a more secluded place with strangers, whether male or female, even if the girls were alone. Do you see what I mean?”

“You mean spies in their homes? Servants?” I began.

The Chief shook his head. “Not likely. Servants aren’t so well informed as all that, as a rule. No, the conclusion that’s just forced itself on me is that, unlikely as it may seem, the person or persons mixed up in this business belong to the same class of Society as the girls themselves.”

“But, good Lord, man—what—why——”

The Chief leaned forward suddenly, his jaw setting into flinty lines. “For example, what do you know about this Mrs. Furneau, who took your sister out to tea that day?”

I sat back and stared at him, my mind racing back to the night of Margaret’s disappearance. For an instant it fastened on the vague sense of resentment I had felt toward Mrs. Furneau for her part in the business. Then common sense prevailed.

“But what on earth could she have had to do with it? You don’t suppose she followed the child into the store? And how could she abduct her if she had? That was the most public of places,” I answered.

“Exactly,” said the Chief slowly; “if she ever went to the store at all!”

“But—but——”

“Did any one in the store actually see her? Did they remember and describe her?”

I shook my head. “But that doesn’t prove anything.”

“No, it doesn’t. I’m not trying to prove anything now. I’m trying to show you our line of deduction. But what do you know about the woman?”

“Very little. She was an acquaintance only. But many of her friends are above suspicion.”

“And the people where she took your sister?”

“I don’t know so much about them.” I stared at him in growing amazement. “But what could they have to do with it? You don’t mean to say that you think——”

“I don’t think anything. I’m asking questions. What did Mrs. Furneau’s chauffeur have to tell you?”

“Nothing more than she had to tell. He just corroborated the fact that Margaret had gone into the store.”

“H’m,” said the Chief. “But of course that doesn’t help much, one way or the other.”

“Do you mean to say you think it’s possible that Mrs. Furneau took the child to some house where she was kept a prisoner? And Mrs. Furneau invented all that business about the store? And her chauffeur was in it too?”

“I don’t know,” said the Chief. “But it’s a possible line of investigation, isn’t it? And it’s one that you haven’t touched? Now do you see where the Department might be of some help to you in your search?”

“But Mrs. Furneau—why, the Morrisons know her quite well. The thing’s out of the question.”

The Chief smiled slowly. “That’s the trouble with you amateurs. You go into an investigation like this with preconceived ideas—and all you look for is clews that fit in with those ideas. We suspect everybody until we can prove that they’ve had nothing to do with the affair. Do you see the difference?”

I nodded. “Well, I’ll try it.”

“Now here’s something else,” he went on. “We’ve come to the conclusion that, without a previous fairly intimate knowledge of the future movements of some of these girls, the abductions would have been impossible. We also deduce that they would have been very difficult, if not impossible, without actual acquaintanceship, in several cases at least. That places the gang, for I think it must be a gang, within certain high social limits.

“But during the time that these girls have been disappearing, there have also been a great many cases of addiction to drugs coming to light—and all these cases, without exception, have been highly placed socially. In fact, the Department began investigating the drug cases long before the abductions began. Many of the drug addicts are women. All the ones to whom I have reference are addicts of a peculiar kind. But almost without exception these addicts are men and women of importance and influence, either through position or wealth.”

“Can you connect them in any way with the abductions?” I asked.

“No. Not definitely. In fact, not at all, except by inference through the facts peculiar to both. But the very fact that we cannot get anything on any of these people, either the people who supply these drugs or the abductors, goes to prove that there is an extraordinary power and skill in organization behind each gang. Therefore, by inference, it may be the same organizer or group of organizers behind both. But, so far, we have not been able to connect the two things further than that, even by inference.”

Moore stirred in his place on the bed beside me and the Chief glanced up at him.

“There’s one other feature to it, sir,” he said. “I’ve been working on the abductions and nothing else. But they had a damned good try at picking me off. Clarke worked on the drug smuggling only—and——”

The Chief nodded. “Neither the one gang—nor the other, if there are two gangs, will hesitate at murder,” he said quietly.

“Good Lord, do you mean to say in this day and age——”

“This day and age is just about the same as any other day and age—because human nature doesn’t vary much,” he interrupted. “We were just about due for something new and startling in the criminal line, after this war, and it looks as if we’ve got it. I’ll tell you something more: we’ve had three highly trusted men on this job—two on the drugs, and Moore here, on the abductions. Moore has one or two leads started, though nothing very definite—and they tried to get him that night in your rooms. Of the other two operatives, one hasn’t been able to find out a thing—not a damned thing—and he’s a good man too. The other—this man Clarke, that Moore was talking about—has—disappeared.”

“But haven’t you traced him?”

“Traced him, nothing. He’s simply vanished into thin air. And, believe me, it’s no cinch for one of our men to disappear without our tracing him pretty quick. No, this gang is no slouch, I’ll say that for it.”

As I learned later on, a descent into slang was a sign of considerable feeling on the part of the Chief. But at this time his attitude struck me as a little unfeeling.

“Well,” I said, “it looks to me as if you were up against something pretty difficult. But do you mean that I can really be of some assistance to you in the business?”

“That’s it exactly. For this type of work, with this type of people, don’t you see that we’ve got to have operatives who have the social entry if we’re to get anywhere? Moore’s all right. But he can’t do it all alone. And besides, he won’t last long alone, probably, as you saw for yourself. Now if you join us in this work, you’ll be looking for your sister with the whole power of the Department back of you. But we want you to find her and bust up the gang, as much as you do yourself. There’s the situation. You’re fitted for the work, you’re vitally interested, and we can help each other. Afterwards, we’ll release you as soon as you like, if——” He left the sentence unfinished.

“If there’s anything left to release,” I added dryly.

“You’ve hit it exactly,” he smiled.

It did not take me long to make up my mind. I had nothing to lose and possibly everything to gain by joining the Department, if they were willing for me to continue my search in my own way. And working with the consciousness of a powerful organization back of me was infinitely preferable to doing it alone. I had expected that they might want me to work entirely under their direction, possibly in remote parts of the country. But the next words of the Chief set my mind at rest on that point.

“We want you to stay in New York and take up your life just where you left it off to-day. We want you to get back into Society and become a regular lounge lizard if necessary. And we want you to let the Department help you with hints when it can. But for the rest, you and Moore are to work together. It will be safer and better for both of you. Will you do it?”

“I’ll do it,” I told him.

The Chief got to his feet and held out a massive hand. “Right,” he said, “I’m mighty glad. And I think you’ve made a wise decision. Now I’ve got a lot of work to do. Moore has full instructions for you both. Anything else you want to know he can tell you. Wait here for ten minutes. Good-by and good luck!” With that he went to the door. Then he suddenly turned back to me again: “And by the way, Clayton!”

“Yes, sir,” I answered, smiling.

“Don’t talk about this business to anybody—anybody. Is that clear with you?”

“Quite clear,” I assured him.

“You’ll meet some of the other operatives perhaps. You’re almost sure to. But unless they come to you with the proper credentials for this job, which Moore will explain to you, don’t tell them things. There’s a reason.”

Moore interrupted. “Don’t you think, Chief, that we might tell him the reason?”

The Chief frowned. Then suddenly he made a wry face again. “All right, I suppose so. The fact of the matter is, Clayton, that for the first time in its history either we’ve had the rottenest of bad luck, or—there’s a leak somewhere in the Department. Now you understand.”

Without another word he strode to the door again and went out.

I turned to Moore and found him smiling whimsically.

“Nothing slow about your Chief,” I remarked.

He laughed. “Not so’s you could notice it!” Then he held out his hand. “Well,” he said, “I think you’re the sort of fellow I’d like to have with me in a real row. This is going to be a real row. Don’t make any mistake about that. But I believe we’re going to pull it off, eh?”

“I’ll give you mine on that,” I told him, and we shook hands.

Chapter IV.
Roving Commissions

After the Chief left, Moore gave me my instructions for that night. We were to leave the room separately. I was to get into the same taxi which I would find waiting and I was to pick up Moore at the corner of Waverley Place and Fifth Avenue.

I followed instructions, found the taxi waiting and told the man to drive to Washington Square. Five minutes later my driver stopped without being told and Moore jumped in beside me. The driver started off uptown at once.

Moore turned to me with a smile. “Well, I guess you’ll do. You caught the idea like a shot. Now let’s get to business, for we’ve got one heluva lot to talk about.”

“Fire ahead.”

“One of the first things I am to impress on you is the fact that from now on both our lives may depend upon eternal vigilance. A single false step, a single unguarded word or glance may easily mean—finish—for us. Stow that away in your brain and don’t forget it. Take it out and look at it every five minutes if you can.” He paused a moment. “I’m not fussy myself, Clayton. I’ve gone into this game for my own reasons. But this is the meanest-looking job I’ve ever tackled, and that’s the truth. And I don’t want to get bumped off before we’ve put the job through.”

“I’ll remember,” I told him, “and I’m just as eager to put it through as you are.”

“I know,” he answered. “Well, I want to tell you something about the plan for you and me, so far as we’ve mapped it out. The Chief told you his theory—that these abductions and the smuggled drugs are the work of the same gang. And he told you his reasons for believing that the gang is highly placed, or has members highly placed, socially.”

I nodded.

“Well, that’s where you and I come in. He wants us to work together. And he wants us to be regular lounge lizards, worming our way into all sorts of social circles, fast, slow and medium. His idea is that sooner or later we’ll run across something in the nature of a clew. And when that happens we’re to follow it up like grim death.”

“Seems pretty vague stuff to work on,” I observed.

“It is and it isn’t. As far as the girls are concerned, we haven’t anything very definite to go on until after the event—and then it’s too late, for they will have covered up their tracks, in their skillful way. But it’s different with the drug business. For there there ought to be something to work on, if we’re smart enough to see it. And if the Chief is right about it being the same gang, why that helps us with the other affair, do you see!”

“If he is right!” I said.

“Well, I think he is. Anyhow it seems reasonable and it’s about all we have got. But here’s another thing. We had a talk yesterday before you turned up, and the Chief agreed with me that it might be better for us not to know each other. I mean, of course, we may meet casually, but it’s highly probable that they have their suspicions about me as it is, and it’s no use dragging you down with me. For if we’re pretty thick, they’ll suspect you too if they suspect me. That business in your rooms that night looked bad, for I haven’t any other enemies that I can think of.”

“But look here,” I told him, “we’ll have to work together to some extent—compare notes and all that—and besides, I’m quite ready to stand in with you on the risk and that sort of thing.”

Moore shook his head and smiled. “Spoken like a pal,” he said. “But this is a business proposition, Clayton, and a tough one. And if we don’t work together, why that leaves you all the freer to step in and haul me out, if I get in a tight corner, don’t you see?”

I didn’t like it very much, but there was no point in arguing about it just then. He knew more about the game than I did, anyway. And I found out very soon how wise his decision had been.

“Then,” he went on, “although we’re not connected in any way in the public eye, we’ve got to fix up some method of getting in touch with each other at any time, on the instant and privately. Now this is what I doped out to that end. I thought I’d take a room or rooms somewhere near you. Perhaps I might take one in the same building, anyway in the same block, so that we had no street between. Then, with the aid of that young Irishman of yours, we ought to be able to lay a private wire between your room and mine. What do you think of it?”

I laughed at the reference to Larry. “Sounds all right to me,” I answered, “if you can get the room. They’re pretty hard to find nowadays. But that building I’m in seems to have quite a number of bachelor apartments. I don’t see that your being in the same building would connect us any, unless we blew into each other’s rooms when some one was watching. That private wire sounds good, but I don’t see how we’re going to lay it where it won’t be seen, or without being seen doing it.”

“Do it at night. That’s easy enough. But we will have to dope out some way so that it won’t be found, except on the wildest of bad luck. Of course they’re always making repairs and putting in telephones in those apartment houses, and we’ll have to watch out for that.”

“Did the Chief mention any particular sets in New York that he wanted us to go for? There are so many thousands of cliques and social groups that we might wander around for years without striking the right one. And then we might not know it for the right one if we saw it.”

“No. He left it pretty much up to us. But he did suggest leaning toward the faster semi-Bohemian sets as being more likely to indulge in drugs.”

Moore paused a moment. “Anyhow, Clayton, that’s the gist of it. Work all your introductions for all you’re worth. I thought at first that it might be well for you to change your name and begin all over again, on account of the gang knowing that you had lost your sister, and therefore suspecting you of being still on their trail. But that would mean giving up all your introductions and losing a lot of time, and also the possibility of running into people that you’d known before, which would make complications. So the Chief decided that it would be better to run the risk of their suspicion, because your principal value in the search is your actual and potential social entrée.”

“Did he map out any particular attitude he wanted me to take—sort of character line?”

“No. But he thought you might let it escape you that you had given up all hope of finding your sister, and that you were broken by it and letting yourself go to the dogs as the easiest way out. That would serve your ends both ways. For taking to drugs would be the most natural thing in the world for a man in your position, and before you could do that, you would have to get hold of the drugs. So that gives you a line to work on.”

“Pretty smart of the Chief, I think.”

“Oh, he’s no slouch. Now I’m going to bed. But before I go, take this.” He drew from his pocket a tiny golden panther strung on a black cord. “Wear it where you can get at it, but where no one else would see it or could pick your pocket for it. And if any one shows you one like it, trust him. It’s the symbol for this particular job. I won’t see you in the morning at all. But to-morrow night suppose you meet me upstairs in a little chop-suey joint in Broadway at 39th Street. The tables are screened off and no one will notice us. We can talk there in peace and quiet and make some more definite plans for keeping in touch with each other. In the meantime try to get started on the social stuff. Dig up all your old friends and start things going. Maybe that Mrs. Furneau might be a good one to start on. After all you don’t know much about her.”

Moore got up. “Well, meet me at that chop-suey joint, remember. Broadway at 39th at eight, and we’ll have another powwow. In the meantime, good luck!”

He gave me a quick handshake, rapped on the window of the cab and as the vehicle slowed up, flung open the door and slipped out. A moment later he had disappeared among the shifting pedestrians on the Avenue.

When I got back I found that Larry was disposed to consider his feelings hurt. The affliction took the form of an attitude of exaggerated servitude which was irritating in the extreme. He wanted as much disciplining as a puppy.

However, something occurred almost at once that brought him out of it with a bump.

I asked him whether anything had happened in my absence.

“No, sir,” he answered in the true butler manner. “Nothing of any moment, sir.” His English was excellent when he wanted to make it so.

“What do you mean—nothing of any moment?” I demanded curiously.

“Why, nothing, sir, nothing happened at all.” He bowed deferentially. “Have you breakfasted, sir?”

I felt like kicking him. “Drop it, Larry,” I told him. “I don’t know what’s biting you and I haven’t the time to bother to find out. But if you take my advice, you’ll drop that butler business, you ignoramus. Now get out of it.”

Larry departed and I went to my desk to look up the address of some of my one-time friends and to drop a line to Mrs. Furneau. A moment later I rang for Larry.

“How many times have I told you to leave my desk alone?” I demanded.

Larry scratched his head. “Sure, times and thin times,” he answered. “But faith, I haven’t so much as laid a finger on it.”

“Don’t talk nonsense. I left these papers under that folded map of New York. Now the papers are all mixed up and the paper-weight is on them. I found the map over here—and, by golly, you’ve even unfolded it and folded it up again the wrong way. What do you mean by it?”

Larry’s butler manner dropped from him now like a garment. “Faith, thin, sor, I haven’t so much as touched the desk, that I haven’t!” he declared earnestly. “Maybe you forgot, like, the way you left things.”

I shook my head and stood staring at him a moment. “Are you sure?” I demanded.

“Sure and sartin, sor. I haven’t touched it.”

“Well then, Larry, somebody else has!” I told him. “I thought you said nothing had happened. Who’s been here, anyway?”

“Not a soul, sor,” he answered quickly.

“Have you been here all the time yourself?” I demanded.

“Ivery minute, sor, except for a walk round yesterday afternoon and a trip to the corner last night, to lay in a bit of bread and meat like.”

I had never known Larry to lie about anything at all serious, and he was obviously speaking the truth this time. “All right, never mind, Larry. No harm done,” I told him. And again Larry took himself off, thoroughly crestfallen now.

But I stowed away another bit of news for Moore that night. For I was certain that my papers had been tampered with in my absence, although, fortunately, they were merely personal letters and bills.

I wrote to Mrs. Furneau, asking her whether she had heard anything at all in the way of possible clews, and whether I might call and talk things over with her once more, adding that I had practically given up hope. It went against the grain a little, in view of my earlier distrust, but perhaps she was as good a starting-place as any for my social career. And perhaps, in view of the Chief’s wild suspicion of her, she was a shade better than most people, as being at least remotely connected with Margaret’s disappearance.

Later in the day, I told Larry that the search was to continue and that Moore was going to help. I also told him that he was to let Moore in at any time and ask no questions, but that if he should happen to meet him outside in any way, he was not to know him at all.

Traces of the green-eyed monster became apparent in Larry at once. “Oh,” said he, “ ’tis himself will find her no doubt, when we could not. But I’m thinkin’ he’s a mysterious kind of a man altogether. Sure the next toime I let him in, I’ll be keepin’ an eye on him pretty close, the way he wouldn’t be bringin’ in some more of his murtherin’ friends.”

This would never do. “Now look here, Larry,” I told him, “this man Moore is my very good friend. And as such he’s your very good friend too. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, and don’t forget it. I can’t tell you as much about things as I’d like to at present, but I can tell you that this search is running us up against something pretty stiff—and Moore’s a mighty good friend to have in a pinch. If you don’t want to put the whole thing on the fritz, do just what I’ve told you to, and help Moore in any way possible. This is serious!”

Larry shifted from one foot to the other and then suddenly he grinned in a sheepish way. “Sure, I was only foolin’,” he said, and took himself off.

Never, from the beginning of our acquaintance, have I had any doubts of Larry.

At eight that night I met Moore and we compared notes over our dinner. I told him about finding that my papers had been disturbed, and also that I had written to Mrs. Furneau. Then he told me his news.

“Well, Clayton, I’ve taken a couple of rooms in the house that is back to back with your apartment house. It’s an old-fashioned place and I had no difficulty in getting the rooms. Unfortunately, as you’re way up on the eighth floor and I’m on the second in this place, we’ll have some trouble running that wire. I think as soon as we get through here we’d better get started on it. Then we can take care of the outdoor part of it later in the night.”

We were sitting in a sort of cubicle against the wall, shut off from the others like it by the high wooden backs of the seats. Each table was lit by a softly shaded electric globe, which threw little light beyond the table, and the rest of the room was but dimly lit.

In the middle of our conversation about our house-to-house wire, I looked up to order our coffee, and suddenly saw that the soft-footed Chinese boy was standing quite close to Moore, although beyond the end of the seat, so that I could only see his elbow. We had spoken in very low tones and I thought nothing about it at the time. But I had cause to remember that Chinese boy later on.

A few moments later we left the restaurant separately and made our way by separate routes to Moore’s new rooms, to begin work on our private wire. It seemed like making defensive preparations in advance before declaring war. For even after Moore’s warning I failed to realize fully that, with our murderous visitor that night and the subsequent search of my papers, if such it was, war had already been declared—and not by us.

Chapter V.
Our First Clew

The house in which Moore had taken his rooms was of the ordinary brown-stone type and had once been occupied, presumably, by a single family. Now, owing to changes in the neighborhood and ever-mounting rents, it had been split up into apartments.

The basement was occupied, he told me, by a grocer, his wife and two children. The first floor served as office and home for a young doctor, while the second floor had been subdivided into two smaller apartments of three rooms each, with a bathroom common to both, Of these two, the front apartment belonged to a returned soldier and his somewhat shrill-voiced French bride. Moore had rented the back part of this floor, consisting of a bedroom, a small kitchen and a living-room. The third floor was unoccupied, but was similar in design to the second.

The house was a large square one, each apartment on the second floor being self-contained and well-lighted, with the common bathroom between, lit only by a small shaft and skylight above. The door to Moore’s rooms was just at the head of the stairs and opened into his living-room. This room looked out on to the back garden, so called, as did his smaller bedroom beyond. His kitchen was the same width as the hall and was the continuation of it, but opened into his living-room and not into the hall, so that the rooms had a single door into the hall. This was fitted with a Yale lock.

The common bathroom was, of course, the difficulty and was probably the reason why he had found the rooms empty. With the somewhat embarrassing sociability of some old southern and a few old New York houses, this bathroom had three doors, one into the hall, one into the front flat, and one at the back, into what was now Moore’s bedroom. Of these, only the door into the hall was now in use, the other two being nailed up.

There was only one door-bell to the house, which rang in the basement, and for a small monthly gratuity the grocer’s wife or one of her numerous children opened the door for all visitors. The tenants had keys.

Moore got home first and was waiting at the front door of the house to let me in. He ushered me proudly into his living-room, furnished in seedy-looking plush and china ornaments that looked as if they had been manufactured by an absent-minded anarchist in his moments of relaxation. The door was open into his bedroom beyond, and the first thing I noticed was a lot of wire lying on the floor in there.