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The First Problem
The Keyboard of Silence
I.
Not often did mere man attract attention in the
famous dining-room of the " Regal," but men and
women alike, who were seated near the East Archway, raised their eyes to stare at the man who
stood in the doorway, calmly surveying them. The
smoke-glass, tortoise-shell library spectacles, which
made of his eyes two great circles of dull brown,
brought out the whiteness of the face strikingly.
The nose, with its delicately sensitive nostrils, was
thin and straight; the lips, now curved in a smile,
somehow gave one the impression that, released by
the mind, they would suddenly spring back to their
accustomed thin, straight line. For a smile seemed
out of place on that pale, masterful face, with its
lean, cleft chin. The snow-white hair of silky
fineness that curled away from the part to show
the pink scalp underneath contrasted sharply with
the sober black of the faultless dinner-coat that fell
in just the proper folds from the broad shoulders
and deep chest.
The eyes of the girl at the sixth table seemed to
be held, fascinated. The elder woman, who was with her, toyed with her salad and conformed to
convention by stealing covert glances at the man
in the archway, and the square-chinned, clean-looking young man who made the third of the party
stared openly, unashamed; but his eyes held not
the other diners' rude questioning, nor yet the girl's
frank fascination.
" You are staring, Rhoda," rebuked the elder
woman mildly.
The girl turned her eyes with a little sigh.
" What wonderful character there is in his face! "
she murmured.
" He is a wonderful character," asserted the man,
his face lighting up boyishly, his tone one of
admiration.
" You know him? " Both asked it in a breath,
eyes eager.
" Yes. He is Thornley Colton, man about town,
club member, musician, whose recreation is the
solving of problems that baffle other men. It was
he who found the murderer of President Parkins
of the up-town National, and, when the crash came,
secured me my position in the Berkley Trust."
" A detective? " The elder woman asked it;
the girl's eyes were again on Colton.
" No." The man shook his head. " He jokingly
calls himself a problemist, and accepts only those
cases that he thinks will prove interesting, for the
solving of them is merely his recreation. He takes
no fees. The man with him is his secretary, Sydney
Thames, whose name is pronounced like that of the
river. He, too, is a remarkably handsome man, but
he is never noticed when with Thornley Colton,
except as his coal-black hair and eyes, and red
cheeks, form a striking contrast to Colton."
" I had not even noticed him," confessed the
elder woman, as she glanced for the first time at the slim young man of twenty-five or six, who stood
at Colton's side, eyes apparently taking in every
detail of the big dining-room. Then she remembered
her duty as mentor. " You must not stare so rudely,
Rhoda! " she chided.
" I don't think Mr. Colton minds the stare," the
man said quietly. " He has been totally blind since
birth, though many people refuse to believe it."
" Blind! " They both breathed it, in their voices
the tender sympathy all women feel for the misfortunes of others.
" He is coming," warned the elder woman unnecessarily.
They had seen the headwaiter apparently apologize to Colton, and step aside. The secretary had
whispered a few words, and Thornley Colton, his
slim stick held lightly and idly in his fingers, started
down the aisle between the rows of tables, shoulders
swung back, chin up, followed by Sydney Thames.
The woman and the girl watched his approach with
parted lips, in their eyes mother fear for his safety
as he hurried toward them, stepping aside at exactly
the proper moment to avoid a hurrying waiter,
walking around the very much overdressed, stout
woman whose chair projected a foot over the unmarked aisle line. As he neared their table, they
saw the thin lips frame a smile of friendly greeting,
" How do you do, Mr. Norris? " His voice, rich,
of wonderful musical timbre, seemed to thrill the
girl with its kindliness and strength, as he stepped
around her chair to shake hands with her escort.
" Sydney saw you while we were waiting for our
table."
" Will you meet Miss Richmond? " asked Norris,
when he had answered the greeting in kind. Colton
turned instantly to face the girl, his slim white
hand, with its long, tapering fingers, outstretched.
"It is a concession we of the darkness ask of
every one," he apologized.
Their hands met, the girl felt the warm grip, and
her sensitive wrist seemed to feel a touch, light as
the touch of wind-blown thistle-down, but it was
gone instantly, and she knew it was but the telepathic thrill of the meeting palms. She murmured
a commonplace, and bit her Hps in vexation, because
it was a commonplace. The man before her seemed
to call for more.
" Your singing is wonderful, Miss Richmond," he
declared enthusiastically. " Sydney and I have
had orchestra seats three nights this week. You
know, to me music must give the combined pleasures
of painting, sculpture, architecture, and other
beautiful things the average person doesn't even
appreciate.' '
Her eyes expressed their pity, but her lips said
only : " My mother, Mr. Colton." They shook
hands across the table, Mrs. Richmond with a
heartiness that was not part of the artificial code
New York has fixed, he with a few words that
brought a flush of pleasure to her faded cheeks.
" Why didn't Mr. Thames stay? " asked Norris
curiously. " He hurried on as though he thought
we were plague victims."
" He usually does," smiled Colton. " He has a
very curious fear. I'll tell you about it some
time."
" Why don't you drop into the bank and see me
some day? You haven't been in my tomb-like
office for months. Miss Richmond and her mother
saw me at work for a few minutes this afternoon.
It compares very favourably with the dressing-rooms given to opera-singers, they say."
" 1 should say so! " laughed the girl. " If you
can compare Persian rugs and mahogany with our cracked walls, and box-propped dressing-tables, and
plugged gas-jets! "
" Men always do take the best," conceded Colton
smilingly. Then he addressed Norris directly.
" How is Simpson attending to business nowadays?"
" He has been away for a week. He came in
this afternoon to amaze us with the news that he
had just been married. He didn't have much to
say about his wife, however, except that he was
going to turn over a new leaf."
" That's news! " whistled Colton. " He never
struck me as the marrying kind."
" Nor any one else," laughed Norris, with a
tender, significant glance at the girl across the table.
" I'll have to look him up and congratulate him.
Till we meet again, then." And with a pleasant-nod of parting to each of them, a touch of a chair
leg with his slim stick, Colton hurried down the
aisle to the small table in the far corner, where
Sydney Thames was giving his order to the waiter.
The serving-man responded to a friendly nod from
Colton, closed his order tablet, and hurried away.
Thornley took a cigarette from his case, scratched
a match on the bronze box, and leaned comfortably
back in his chair.
" Some time, Sydney, your terrible fear of beautiful women is going to get me into a very embarrassing position." He said it half seriously, half
smilingly. ' 6 Instead of seventeen steps, it was but
sixteen and a short half. If it hadn't been for
Norris' s habit of nervously tapping his glass with
his finger-tips, my outstretched hand would have
gone back of his neck."
" I thought I had figured it exactly! " There
was earnest contrition in the tone; the sombre,
black eyes showed the pain of the mistake.
"It is forgotten," dismissed Colton. Then :
" But you should have stopped, Sydney. Miss
Richmond's personality is as remarkable as her
singing, and her mother is so proud and happy she
forgets to be embarrassed at the difference between
Keokuk and the Regal. Norris is lucky, for she loves him, and he " The smiling lips needed no finishing words.
" But she is already commanding two hundred
dollars a week at the very beginning of her career,
and Norris cannot be earning more than five
thousand a year," protested Thames.
" You poor boy! " smiled Colton. " You'll
never know women; that susceptible heart of yours,
which drives you away like a scared sheep whenever
a beautiful woman approaches, will never be good
for anything but pumping blood."
" Thorn, don't I know my weakness! " The
tone was indescribably bitter. " I must keep away,
though I'm starving for the society of good women.
To meet one would be to fall in love, hopelessly,
helplessly. I'd forget that I was a thing of shame,
a brat picked up on the banks of the river that gave
me the only name I know."
Colton was instantly serious. " Starvation seems
a peculiar cure for hunger," he mused. " But we have argued that so many times " Again the thin, expressive lips finished the sentence.
Then came the waiter with a club sandwich for
Thames and Colton's invariable after-theatre supper
that was always ready when he came, and which
he never needed to order; two slices of graham
bread covered with rich, red beef-blood gravy, and
a bottle of mineral water. Colton's slim cane, hollow,
and light as a feather, the slightest touch of which
sent its warning to his supersensitive finger-tips,
rested between his knees as he ate.
Sydney Thames nibbled his sandwich absentmindedly, eyes roving around the dining-room, now
stopping at a gaudily-dressed dowager, now at an
overpainted lady who smiled her fixed smile at the
bull-necked man at her table, now at the circleeyed girl who stabbed the cherry from her empty
cocktail glass with a curved tine of her oyster fork;
but always coming back to the fresh, wholesomely
beautiful face of Rhoda Richmond. Then the
sombre eyes would light up; for a beautiful face,
to Sydney Thames, was more intoxicating than
wine, and, to his highly sensitive nature, more
dangerous.
Colton pushed his plate aside as the other's eyes
once more started their round of the dining-room.
" The gods give gaudiness in recompense for the
eye-sparkle they have taken, and the wrinkles they
have given," Thornley Colton murmured quietly.
" One must come to a New York restaurant to
realize the true pathos of beauty." Colton's mood
had been curiously serious since those few words
at Norris's table.
Thames did not answer, for no answer was
needed. His wandering eyes had rested on a table
to the left.
" One often wonders," continued Colton, in that
same musing, low-pitched voice, " why a stout
woman, like that one two tables to our left, for
instance, will suffer the tortures of her hereafter for
the sake of drinking high balls in a tight, purple
gown."
Sydney had turned his eyes to stare at Colton,
as he always did when the man who had picked
him up as a bundle of baby-clothes on the banks
of the Thames, twenty-five years before, made an
observation of this kind. Many such had he heard,
but never did they fail to startle him.
" It is forgotten," dismissed Colton. Then :
" But you should have stopped, Sydney. Miss
Richmond's personality is as remarkable as her
singing, and her mother is so proud and happy she
forgets to be embarrassed at the difference between
Keokuk and the Regal. Norris is lucky, for she loves him, and he " The smiling lips needed no finishing words.
" But she is already commanding two hundred
dollars a week at the very beginning of her career,
and Norris cannot be earning more than five
thousand a year," protested Thames.
"You poor boy!" smiled Colton. "You'll
never know women; that susceptible heart of yours,
which drives you away like a scared sheep whenever
a beautiful woman approaches, will never be good
for anything but pumping blood."
" Thorn, don't I know my weakness! " The
tone was indescribably bitter. " I must keep away,
though I'm starving for the society of good women.
To meet one would be to fall in love, hopelessly,
helplessly. I'd forget that I was a thing of shame,
a brat picked up on the banks of the river that gave
me the only name I know."
Colton was instantly serious. " Starvation seems
a peculiar cure for hunger," he mused. " But we have argued that so many times " Again the thin, expressive lips finished the sentence.
Then came the waiter with a club sandwich for
Thames and Colton' s invariable after-theatre supper
that was always ready when he came, and which
he never needed to order; two slices of graham
bread covered with rich, red beef -blood gravy, and
a bottle of mineral water. Colton's slim cane, hollow,
and light as a feather, the slightest touch of which
sent its warning to his supersensitive finger-tips,
rested between his knees as he ate.
Sydney Thames nibbled his sandwich absentmindedly, eyes roving around the dining-room, now
stopping at a gaudily-dressed dowager, now at an
overpainted lady who smiled her fixed smile at the
bull-necked man at her table, now at the circleeyed girl who stabbed the cherry from her empty
cocktail glass with a curved tine of her oyster fork;
but always coming back to the fresh, wholesomely
beautiful face of Rhoda Richmond. Then the
sombre eyes would light up; for a beautiful face,
to Sydney Thames, was more intoxicating than
wine, and, to his highly sensitive nature, more
dangerous.
Colton pushed his plate aside as the other's eyes
once more started their round of the dining-room.
" The gods give gaudiness in recompense for the
eye-sparkle they have taken, and the wrinkles they
have given," Thornley Colton murmured quietly.
" One must come to a New York restaurant to
realize the true pathos of beauty." Colton's mood
had been curiously serious since those few words
at Norris's table.
Thames did not answer, for no answer was
needed. His wandering eyes had rested on a table
to the left.
" One often wonders," continued Colton, in that
same musing, low-pitched voice, " why a stout
woman, like that one two tables to our left, for
instance, will suffer the tortures of her hereafter for
the sake of drinking high balls in a tight, purple
gown."
Sydney had turned his eyes to stare at Colton,
as he always did when the man who had picked
him up as a bundle of baby-clothes on the banks
of the Thames, twenty-five years before, made an
observation of this kind. Many such had he heard,
but never did they fail to startle him.
" How, in Heaven's name, did you know what
I was doing, or that she was dressed in purple? "
he demanded.
" You should keep both feet flat on the floor if
you want to keep your staring a secret," laughed
Colton quietly. " You forget that crossed knees
make your suspended foot tell my cane each time
you turn your head ever so slightly. See that my
fingers are not on my stick when you covertly
watch the women you fear to meet."
" But the purple gown? " demanded Sydney,
repressing the inclination to uncross his knees, and
flushing at the amused smile the involuntary first
motion of the foot had brought to the lips of
Colton.
" All stout women who breathe asthmatically
wear purple," declared Colton emphatically. " It
is the only unfailing rule of femininity. And to one
who has practised the locating of sounds that come
to doubly sharp ears the breathing part was easy.
There is no one at the next table on the left, you'll
observe. Now you can resume your overt watching
of Miss Richmond; see " — he laid both hands on
the white table-cloth before him — " I won't look."
The head-waiter stopped at the table.
" Mr. Simpson would like to have you come to
his table, Mr. Colton. He wants you to meet his
wife."
" His wife? " put in Thames quickly.
" She is, sir." It was said with a positiveness
there was no gainsaying.
" Where is Mr. Simpson? " asked Colton. " We
had not seen him."
" In the east wing, sir 3 where the palms are."
" We will go to him immediately."
" I'll tell him, sir." His beckoning finger brought
the waiter who had served them with the check.
Sydney Thames spoke. " Some one of his cheap
actress friends has roped him at last," he said
scornfully. " He's a pretty specimen of man to be
first vice-president of the conservative Berkley
Trust Company."
" I'll wager you're wrong," declared Colton
quietly, as he handed the waiter a two-dollar bill
from his fold. " If it were one of the women for
whom he has been buying wine suppers for the
past two years, she wouldn't be * where the palms
are,' nor would the waiter be so positive of the
marriage relation."
" I'm not going," protested Thames quickly.
" Surely, Sydney, you are not afraid a married
woman will kidnap you? " smiled Colton, as he
took the stick between his fingers and prepared to
rise. " How many? "
Sydney, who had turned half around in his chair
to gaze toward the entrance to the east wing, faced
him. " I'll go," he said shortly; another hasty
glance, and he rose with Colton. " Thirty-seven
straight, eighteen left, nine right. We will stop at
the door of the east wing. I can't see it."
" There are no pretty women to disturb the
distance judgment you have been so many years
acquiring? " queried Colton mildly.
Without answering, Thames turned on his heel,
and made his way rapidly between the tables toward
the east wing. Colton laughed silently, picked up his
change, and hurried after, his perfectly trained
brain counting the steps automatically, his thoughts
busy elsewhere. He was thinking of Simpson, who
had gained such an unenviable reputation as a
spender along the gay White Way during the past
two years.
Simpson had always interested him, student of
human nature that he was, as the one man who had never lived up to the impression Colton's
unerring instinct had told him was the right one
the first time they had met. The problemist had
expected things of Simpson, and Simpson had done
nothing but idle as much time as possible in the
position as first vice-president of one of the most
conservative banks in the city, and spend money
on women.
Colton stopped for an instant beside Thames in
the archway, apparently gazing idly at the crowd
of men and women at the palm-shaded tables.
" Two left, nineteen straight, half in," directed
Thames, stepping aside to follow.
The heavy-lidded, thickset man, with the faint
lines of blue vein traceries in his cheeks, rose to
meet them.
" This is a pleasure, Mr. Colton," he exclaimed,
in heavy-voiced heartiness. " You are the one man
I wanted to see; though I hardly believed it would
be my luck to catch you this night of all nights.
You knew the pace I was going, and I want you to
meet the little girl I went back to the old town to
marry. We've been friends since we were tots.
Thank God, I waked up in time to know what a
good woman means! When next you see us it will
be in our own home. One moment, please " — his
voice sank to an almost reverent whisper — " my
wife is deaf and dumb, Mr. Colton."
Thames had heard; had seen, with curiously
mixed feelings, the little woman with the small,
boyish face around which the tendrils of brown hair
curled from under the close-fitting toque, and had
appraised the slim, quietly dressed figure, the half
smile as she stared inquiringly at them. The girl
seemed but a child, but he saw that her face was
heavily daubed with powder and rouge, as though
its application had neither been taught nor practised.
Until those last explaining words he had stood back
with a half-pitying light in his eyes, for he knew
Simpson's reputation with women. But at the
quietly spoken sentence he had undergone an instant
change of feeling, such as only highly-strung, hypersensitive men like him are capable of, toward the
man who had gone away from his women of wine
to marry a simple country girl who could neither
speak nor hear.
Simpson's fingers had been moving rapidly; he
bowed toward Thornley Colton. The girl smiled,
and put out her small hand, the movement throwing back from her wrist the filmy lace of the long
sleeve. For a moment they clasped hands; then
the girl's fingers worked again.
Simpson laughed. " She does not believe you are
blind, Mr. Colton; she says you have eyes like
every one else."
Thornley Colton smiled. " If you tell her that
I've got to wear these large-lensed, smoked glasses
to prevent the light giving me a headache you
will probably never convince her," he observed,
as he refused the chair the waiter had drawn
up.
Sydney Thames acknowledged his introduction
with a bow and the usual meaningless words, but
his eyes were soft and tender as a woman's as they
met those of the girl in the instant's glance she gave
him before the lashes were lowered. A woman's
face never failed to stir him.
" Won't you sit down? " pleaded Simpson. " It
will probably be the last time you will ever find
me in one of these gilded palaces. A man who has
been my kind of a fool can appreciate his own
fireside, and Gertie, who was all aflutter to visit
one of the famous Broadway restaurants, recognized
in ten mica tag the crass artificiality it took me years Colton pulled his crystalless watch from his
pocket, and touched it with a finger-tip. " One-thirty; we are fifteen minutes late." He put his
hand on the door catch as the big machine slowed
up before his home. And it was not until they were
ascending the broad brownstone steps that he
answered the question.
" You have missed the first act of what promises
to be a very remarkable crime, Sydney," he said
quietly.
II.
Colton scowled when the red jack failed to turn
up, but the mouth corners smiled when the ace of
diamonds slid between the sensitive fingers to take
its place in the top row of Mr. Canfield's famous
game. The deuce followed, the red jack immediately after; then the problemist looked up toward
the doorway of the library.
" Well, Shrimp? " he smiled.
" They's the theatrical papers yuh wanted."
The red-headed, freckle-faced boy with the slightly-twisted nose came forward with an armful of big
magazines and newspapers, the front pages of which
were adorned with full-length portraits of stage
celebrities. Before he quite reached the table he
stopped short, eyes crackling their excitement.
" Snakes! You're gettin' it, Mr. Colton! They's
the four of hearts and the five of spades. Don't
stop now."
Colton laughed. " All right, Shrimp. Do you
want to do a little detective work for me? "
" Do I? " The eyes danced with eagerness.
" Ain't I been studyin' % Nineteen steps from the
kitchen t' the first chair in the dinin'-room. Six "
" I know," assured Colton hastily. " But you
take those papers to your room and write down the names of all the vaudeville actors — men, you
know — who have quit the stage within the last two
months; where they have gone, and why, if
possible."
" Snakes!" The boy's face showed his disappointment. " Nick Carter never had t' do
that."
" He never had to count steps for a blind man,
either," smiled Thornley Colton. " You do that
and there'll probably be some real detective work —
shadowing, disguises, and the rest of it."
There was no answer. The boy had taken a
firmer grip on the papers, and was already out of
the room.
The four of hearts and the five of spades had
been placed when Sydney, face broad in a smile,
entered.
" What's the matter with * The Fee ?" he
demanded. " He ran past me as though he were
on his way to a fire." Thames always referred to
Shrimp as The Fee, because the red-headed, freckle-faced boy had become part of the Colton household
after a particularly baffling case, at the conclusion
of which the joy of capturing the murderer had been
overshadowed by the blind man's sorrow for the
broken-nosed boy who had jumped between him
and a vicious blackjack. And Shrimp had been
his fee for the case. As the boy's mother was the
murdered one, and his father the murderer, there
had been no one to object.
Before Colton had a chance to voice his laughing
explanation, the tinkling telephone-bell on the desk
demanded attention. At the first words the thin
lips tautened to a straight line, the voice became
pistol-like in its crispness, the muscles under the
pale skin of the face became tense.
The problemist had a problem.
" When? Last night. All right. Still that two-wire burglar connection on the safe? Never mind
further details. We'll be right down."
As his hand dropped the receiver on the hook a
finger pressed the garage bell button that would
bring his machine instantly at any hour of the day
or night.
" Get your hat and coat, Sydney," he ordered
curtly. " We're going to the Berkley Trust Company. Somebody's gotten away with half a million
in negotiable bonds! "; " Half a million? " gasped Thames.
" So they said. Didn't wait for details." Colton
grabbed his private phone-book of often-needed
numbers, and ran his fingers down the backs of the
thin pages on which the names and numbers had
been heavily written with a hard pencil. As Sydney
hurried out he heard the curt voice give a number
over the phone. And it was fully five minutes
before Colton took his place in the car.
In the smooth-running machine, with the wooden-faced Irish chauffeur at the wheel, Sydney Thames
voiced the question :
" Last night, you said? "
" Yes, the second act came sooner than I expected," broke in Thornley Colton. " I underrated
the man." And the expression on the pale face
augured ill for some one.
The funereal atmosphere of the Berkley Trust
Company could be felt as they entered. In the
office of the third secretary, the white-haired
president of the institution stopped his nervous
pacing to mumble a greeting in tremulous accents.
First Vice-President Simpson's grave face broke
into a smile of welcome. Norris raised his bowed
head from his hands, and came forward joyfully,
pleadingly. The red-faced man who had been standing over him kept a step away, but always
near enough to touch him with an outstretched
hand.
" My God, Mr. Colton! They think I'm guilty! "
There was agony unutterable in Norris's voice.
" Ridiculous! " snapped Simpson, his heavy-lidded eyes half closed. " Mr. Colton will soon put
this detective right. "
The problemist nodded a grim acquiescence, and
took the outstretched hand of Norris. " I know
better," he said kindly. The red-faced man gave
voice to a grunt, and Colton instantly swung around
to face him. " So you've cleaned it up already,
Jamison? " he asked mildly.
" Nobody said he was guilty," growled the red-faced central-office man significantly. " I just been
questionin' him, that's all."
" And accusing him with every question! "
snapped Colton. " Like the rest of your kind,
you haven't the intelligence to suit your methods
to the crime. Every crime must be worked
according to the old Mulberry Street formula.
That didn't change with the modern Centre Street
building."
" But we know enough not to make any cracks
till we get all the information," sneered Jamison.
" We don't hand out that know-it-all stuff till we
know something! "
" True," smiled the problemist with his lips, but
there was no smile in his tone. Two hectic spots
glowed in his cheeks, the muscles worked under the
pale skin. " What do you think, President Montrose? " The white-haired president halted his
pacing once more, and stroked his Vandyke.
" The first stain on the unsullied escutcheon of the
Berkley Trust Company," he groaned. "In all of
the half century. "
" I know all that! " broke in Colton impatiently.
" What happened? Why are the police here
instead of the protective-agency men? "
" I was excited," moaned the president. " It was
the first thing that occurred to me. In all the half
century of "
" I guess we were all excited," interjected Simpson, his lips twisted in a wry smile. " I know I \
was up in the air. I came down here, happier than
I ever was before in my life, to arrange for a short
vacation to take a wedding trip. Now this comes
up. When I came to my senses I telephoned for
you, because I want the robbery solved as soon as
possible. The little girl has banked so much on
our little time."
"Too bad," murmured Colton. "Tell me the
Btory, Norris." Before he could get an answer he
turned to Thames, who always stayed discreetly in
the background when Colton was on a case. " See
that no one goes near that safe, Sydney; I may
want to examine it."
" Kind of dropped that bluff of being blind, ain't
you? " sneered Jamison, who was one of the
hundreds of persons in New York who would not
believe that Thornley Colton was really sightless.
And the problemist did not deign to explain that
once he had been in a room and touched its objects
with his cane his trained brain held the correct
mental picture for ever.
" The bonds were fifty in number, ten thousand
each, government fours, negotiable anywhere,"
began Norris, licking his dry lips to make the words
come easier. " They were the bulk of the Stillson
estate, on which I was working. We are settling it
up. As third secretary my work is with trusts and
estates. It was necessary to have everything
finished by to-night. I worked late yesterday, so late that the bonds and other papers could not go
into the time-locked vaults, and I had to be at
work on them this morning before the clock-release
time."
"Is it customary to keep valuable bonds in the
small safe in this office? " interrupted Colton.
"It is not unusual. The safe is practically as
strong as the big vaults, and only lacks the clocks.
This office is really part of the vault itself, the walls
are windowless, and of four-foot concrete reinforced
by interlocked steel rails. The sheet-steel door, the
only entrance to the room, opens into a small cage
that is occupied during the day by Thompson, head
of the trust and estate routine clerks, and at night
by one of our two watchmen. The watchmen never
leave it, because it often happens that valuable
papers and bonds are left out of the big vaults
so that we can work on them before nine o'clock,
the hour set on the vault's clocks. To get to the
steel door of this office one would have to enter the
outer and inner steel cages, the steel-barred door
of the small ante-room, besides setting off burglar-alarms on all, disturbing the watchman, and ringing
the bells in the burglar-alarm department of the
Bankers' Protective Association, of which we are a
member. And there was no sign of a break, the safe
was opened with the combination that only Mr.
Montrose and Mr. Simpson and myself know."
" The watchman could get to this door without
any trouble? "
" Both have been in the employ of the bank for
forty years. They are absolutely above suspicion.
Both are illiterate. Even though they could enter
the office, they could not open the safe, and even
if they did that they would not know enough to steal
all the notes I had made regarding the estate, or
the bonds that have so utterly vanished. They have been sent for, however, and should be here
any minute."
" Were the notes you made stolen, too? "
" All of them."
" Any of the other employees of the bank know
the bonds were in this safe? "
" Several, probably."
" All have access to this room, at any time? "
" Only Thomas, the head of the T. and E. clerks."
" Trustworthy? "
" He grew up with the bank."
" You require other clerical assistance at times? "
" Thomas takes the papers from this office, and
the clerks get them from him outside. All must
be returned to me before closing time. I carefully
checked over every one last night before any of them
went away."
" Any one in here yesterday while you were at
work on the papers; any one who could have seen
the bonds? "
For a moment there was no answer; then it
came, almost in a whisper : " Miss Richmond and
her mother were in for a few moments "
" And I was, too, by Jove! " The interruption
came from Simpson. " And I remember asking you
how you were getting on with the Stillson estate.
I just finished my part when I went away. I guess
I really held them up longer than I should."
" Has Miss Richmond been sent f or? " Colt on
paid absolutely no heed to the first vice-president.
A grunting laugh from the detective. " She
sure has, bo. After I found out this guy's stage
lady had been in here with a tailor's suit-box after
closin' time, my partner went right up to her hotel."
" By Heaven! You " Norris rose to his
feet, face black with fury. Colton's hand on his
shoulder forced him back into the chair. Sydney Thames, to whom all women were angels, clenched
his fists.
" Is that true? " There was a new tone to
Colton's voice.
Norris seemed to recognize the menace. " She
isn't guilty, I tell you! She can't be. She's
Listen, man I She's my wife! "
" Your wife! " They all echoed it. The detective
with laughing triumph; President Montrose with
horror; Sydney Thames in dazed surprise; Simpson
with a half -suppressed, significant gasp.
" We were married two days ago; but it was to
be a secret until the end of her season."
" How long ago was she sent for? "
The detective answered : " My side kick ought
to be back now. We was on the job there, all
right, all right."
Voices outside came to their ears — the harsh,
commanding voice of a man, the half-subdued
sobbing of a woman. The door was thrown open,
and Rhoda Richmond, opera singer, and wife of
Norris, was half pushed, half carried into the small
room.
" Good work, Jim! " grinned Jamison. " Did
she put up a howl at the hotel? "
" Hotel? " growled the other scornfully. " No
hotel for hers. I had a lot of luck or I'd never've
got her. She was boardin' a boat fer South America
that sails in an hour."
" It's a lie! " Norris screamed the words as he
leaped toward the man whose rough hand was
clenched around the slim arm of the girl. Sydney
Thames, obeying Colton's silent signal, forced him
back, his own hands trembling. The problemist
without a word untwisted the central-office man's
fingers, and gently seated the girl in a chair at the
long table.
" Who the " The blustering detective was cut off suddenly.
" We've had enough of your strong-arm methods!"
Colton's voice was hard as flint. " We'll get some
facts now." The hardness vanished; in its place
came gentle sympathy. " When did you get the
message, Miss Richmond? " he asked.
The voice seemed to have the reassuring effect of
a pat on the head of a hurt child. With an effort
the girl controlled her sobs, and answered as though
it had been the most natural question in the world :
" An hour ago — over the telephone — I thought I
recognized How — Mr. Norris's voice. He wanted me
to meet him at the Buenos Aires dock. He had to
go to South America secretly, he said, and I must
tell no one. I hurried to the dock without even
telling mother. I waited for an hour, but he did not
come; then I decided to go aboard and see if he
had missed me and gone to his state room. This man — said Howard had — robbed — I thought "
She broke down again.
" I guess that's bad! " grinned Jamison gloatingly.
" In another hour there'd of been a clean get-away."
" The whereabouts of the bonds doesn't seem to
worry you! " snapped Colton sarcastically.
" The stuff ain't never far away from the guy
that took it," growled Jamison. " When you get
through your know-it-all talk we'll sweat that out,
aU right."
" Did you have a tailor's suit-box with you
yesterday? " asked Colton abruptly of the girl.
" Yes. I called to see if my new walking-suit
was finished. It was all ready to be sent to my home,
but when I saw the poor, tired little boy who would
have to carry it I took it myself. The tailor is just
around the corner, on the avenue; that is why
mother and I dropped in here."
" Of course," nodded Colton, his teeth snapping
together as he seemed to sense the derisive grins on
the faces of the detectives. " Did you recognize the
bonds among the papers on which Mr. Norris was
working? "
" Oh, he showed them to me, and we laughingly
spoke of what we could do with half a million dollars.
Then, when he took mother out to show her around
the bank — I was too tired — I picked one up and
read it."
" Rhoda! " cried Norris. He could realize the
present significance of yesterday's innocent words.
" That'll be about all from you! " scowled
Jamison. " If this guy wants to third-degree her,
and cinch it for us, let him."
" An' if he don't cinch it this will." The other
detective pulled a paper from his pocket. " Here's
the Buenos Aires' 's passenger list, and here's Mr. and
Mrs. Frank Morris, who booked yesterday, added
in pencil. Morris for Norris 1 Slick enough to be
almost good."
Every one in the room but Colton seemed to be
shocked into a state of stupefied rigidity.
" Now " Jamison said that word in the tone one uses to introduce some especially clever
thing, and accompanied it with a sarcastic glance
toward the blind man, who tapped his trouser leg
with his cane in thoughtful silence. " If you ain't
got no objection we'll take these two to headquarters, and get a line on where they got the stuff
cached." He paused suggestively, mockingly.
The permission came, with a deprecatory wave
of the cane, and a smile that was menacing in its
very suaveness. " Go as far as you like, Jamison.
Don't be too gentle with them."
" My God, Mr. Colton! You don't think... "
The words choked in Norris's throat.
" I think you had better go." The problemist's
tone was peculiarly quiet. " Jamison and his
partner have the reputation of being the two
wealthiest detectives in the department. No one
knows how they got it, but they've enough to give
you and your wife a twenty-thousand-dollar nest
egg each on a false-arrest suit. Isn't that worth
a few hours' discomfort? I can prove your innocence when they have gone. They worry me here."
Simpson whistled, and turned it into a jerky
laugh. " Gad, that was clever! " he exclaimed.
" Oh, is that so! " The detectives chorused it,
in their voices sarcasm — and just a tinge of something else, too. Colton knew the one thing that
would make them stop and think.
" Are you going? " snapped Colton.
" We'll see them two watchmen first," growled
Jamison.
" Good! " The problemist laughed at the sudden
change. " I think you'll have quite a crowd to
take down to head-quarters if you hang around long
enough. Before I started I telephoned to the
burglar-alarm telegraph department of the protective agency to get hold of the men who answered
the alarm that rang in from this office early this
morning."
" What burglar-alarm? " snarled Jamison. He
whirled on the white-haired president. " Why
didn't you tell us there was an alarm rung in? "
" Really " — the Vandyke received several severe
yanks — " I didn't know it. We do not receive the
clock reports and emergency alarm sheets until
about noon. Er — Mr. Colton, might I ask where
you got this information? "
" I telephoned for it," answered Colton curtly.
" If these policemen hadn't been so anxious to
make arrests, and the robbery hadn't been too obvious for their thick heads, they might have
investigated. But they are just head-quarters men;
the obvious arrest is the one they always make.
Feet make good central-office men, not heads. Ah,
here are the men, all together."
They came in slowly, two old men first; one
with straggly, white whiskers that concealed the
weak chin and grew up around the faded, watery
eyes; the other's parchment-like face a network of
wrinkles. Honesty shone from every part of them;
the weak, helpless honesty of their kind.
As Colton took each man's hand with a murmured
greeting he felt it tremble in his. The aged watchmen knew that something had happened; something that concerned them and the bank they had
guarded so long. The two men from the burglar-alarm company nodded to the two detectives, and
their eyes narrowed as they shook the hand of the
problemist. Both knew him, and both knew this
had been no common summons. Thornley Colton
never bothered with common things. Sydney
Thames had pulled two chairs up to the table, and
the old men sat down. Colton lighted a cigarette
thoughtfully, then he spoke :
" This morning, gentlemen, that small safe was
robbed of five hundred thousand dollars' worth of
government bonds." His slim cane, apparently
held idly between his fingers, touching the chair of
the man nearest him,felt the watchman's involuntary
jump. The others saw the old jaws drop, saw the
watchmen glance helplessly at each other, their
trembling fingers picking at worn trouser-knees.
Colton heard the gasp of the two protective-agency
men.
" I knowed it! " quavered the white-whiskered
watchman. " I knowed something'd happen when
Mary took sick."
" Who's Mary? " queried Colt on interestedly.
The others crowded forward.
" She's Mary, my wife. She's been scrubbin' the
bank floors fer thirty years, an' nobody ever said
a word against her." He glanced at them all with
pathetic belligerence. " She even picked up the
pins she found on the floor, and put 'em in a box
on the cashier's desk."
" That's true," laughed Simpson. " It's the joke
of the bank."
" And she was taken sick last night? " Thornley
asked gently.
" A week ago." The other watchman answered,
while the first brushed his dry lips with his work-gnarled hand. " Mrs. Bowden, she's got the consumption, and lives across the hall from us and "
" Where do you live? " interrupted Colton.
" Sixteen hundred Third Avenue. I been boardin*
with him an' his wife fer thirty years. Mrs. Bowden's
been doin' Mary's work. We didn't say nothin'
ibout Mary bein' sick, 'cause she might get laid off. An' Mrs. Bowden's awful poor." His voice was a
childish, quavering treble.
" Last night, after Mrs. Bowden had gained your
confidence, you allowed her to scrub Mr. Norris's
office? " encouraged Colton.
Norris started. " I'd forgotten that! " he
ejaculated. A motion from Colton commanded
silence.
" Yes," trembled Mary's husband. " John
opened the door, an' started to punch his clocks,
an' I stayed in the ante-room, like I alius do, to
watch Mrs. Bowden. Then somehow the door got
closed. An' Mrs. Bowden got scared there in the
dark. She screamed an' cried till it was real sad.
But John had the key, an' he had to punch his
clocks on the minute, er Mr. Montrose'd be mad when he got the records next day. An' I couldn't
leave my place in the ante-room. So I encouraged
her, sayin' that John'ld be back in half an hour an'
let her out. She quieted after a while, an* didn't
scream so loud, but I could hear her stumblin*
around. Then John had to run to the front door
to see who was knockin', an' he let these gentlemen
in. The burglar-alarm on the safe had rung, they
said, an' "
" Never mind that part," halted Colton. " One
of these men will tell me that part."
" We was called at seven-eighteen," began the
taller of the two Bankers' Protective Agency men,
" by the safe bell. The safe is connected with one
wire, and under the carpet, running all around the
safe, is a thin steel plate connected with the other.
A man standing near enough to touch the safe forms
a connection that rings our gong. In the day-time,
of course, we pull the switch. We got here, and
found the door locked, an* we could hear moaning.
This guy " — he indicated the one with the straggly
beard — " unlocked the door, and behind it was a
woman, her skirt pinned up around her, laying on
the floor, frightened to death. When she seen us
she jumped to her feet with a little screech, and
muttered something about thanking God."
" You were satisfied that she was frightened? "
" Sure I But we didn't let it go at that. We
snapped on every light, and examined the room.
Nothing had been touched. We frisked the woman,
gentle, of course, but enough to know that she
hadn't a thing on her. We finally got it out of her
that she'd feU against the safe trying to find the
door in the dark. She didn't know enough to snap
on a light."
" She couldn't have had fifty ten-thousand-dollar
bonds on her person? "
Both men laughed. " Gee, Mr. Colton," laughed
the short one. " She was so frail you could almost
see through her. She couldn't hardly have hid a
cigarette paper without making a hump."
" What happened then? "
" She picked up the pail she had — it was full of
dirty scrub water, and the yellow bar of soap was
bobbing around in it — and John, here, took her
into the cashier's cage. We hung around, talking,
an' watching her scrub and weep into the pail until
it was time fer her to go home. She was so all in
I put her on a car."
" Um! " Colton puffed his cigarette in silence;
then he turned to Jamison and his partner. " Looks
mighty suspicious, doesn't it, Jamison? I'd advise
you to arrest these four men and get the woman.
Five hundred thousand is likely to make any honest
man a crook."
" Some kidder, ain't you? " sneered Jamison.
" I know Pete, there, an' if he says it was all right,
it was. We got the guilty parties first off, an' we'll
get the stuff, too! "
The smile went from Colton's lips instantly.
" You arrest them, and we'll start false-arrest
proceedings in an hour! " he warned. " You leave
Norris and Miss Richmond here! Any one but a
fool detective would know they weren't guilty."
As he said the last word he jumped toward the
safe, ran his highly sensitive fingers over the steel
surface, knelt down, brushed the heavy carpet
lightly with his finger tips. The two hectic spots
on his cheeks glowed redder; the nostrils quivered
like those of a hound on the scent, even the eyes,
behind the great, round, smoked glass lenses seemed
to shine. Silently they watched him. He lowered
his face almost to the floor, the cane was laid down,
and his hand gave the carpet a resounding slap.
They crowded closer. One hand went to his hippocket, a handkerchief brushed the hardwood floor
under the safe, between the edge of the rug and
the wall. He rose, touched the burning end of
his cigarette ever so lightly to the linen handkerchief that was now covered with a fine yellow
powder.
" See it! See it! " he snapped. " You couldn't
before because it was the same colour as the hardwood floor."
" It's wood-polish powder, used for cleaning the
varnished wood," sneered Jamison, stepping forward. " We don't want "
" Smell it, then! " The blind man thrust the
handkerchief under the central-office man's nose.
" Do you recognize it now? It's sulphur. Ordinary
powdered sulphur. The thing that would tell any
man how the bonds were taken out of the office.
Go to a drug store and find out what sulphur is
used for."
He thrust the handkerchief into his coat-pocket,
brushed off the knees of his trousers, and picked
up his stick.
" Come, Sydney," he said quietly. " We've
finished."
Before the astonished men could make move or
protest he hurried from the office, automatically
counting the steps. He jumped into the waiting
machine, Sydney Thames followed, and as Simpson
and Jamison ran to the door, he snapped : " Home,
John! " to the Irish chauffeur, and the machine
sped away.
Around the first corner he leaned forward.
" Sixteen hundred Third Avenue — quick! " he
ordered.
" You don't think those two old watchmen
guilty? " asked Thames, in surprise.
" No! " The tone was almost brusque. " Merely
an unimportant detail I want to clear up."
" You certainly left that crowd in the office at
sixes and sevens." Thames laughed at the recollection.
" I intended to. That's why I went into all those
details. I wanted to leave every one up in the air,
especially the two detectives. They'll begin to
think now. And they won't let any one get away
before we have made this call. I want to think,
now."
; Sydney Thames knew the moods of the blind
man; knew he could expect no explanations, or
even replies, until Colton was ready to give
them; so they sped in silence to the upper East
Side.
Soon they were on upper Third Avenue. Overhead the clanking " L " trains pounded their din
into the two men's ears. The streets were crowded
with their heterogeneous mass of men, women, and
children. The rusty fire-escapes staggered drunkenly
across the dirty, red tenement-fronts.
The look of tense concentration left Colton's face.
" A far cry from the luxurious, staidly conservative
Berkley Trust, eh, Sydney? " He smiled, leaning
back in the cushions, puffing his cigarette as though
untroubled by a serious thought; his eyes, behind
the smoked library glasses, seemingly fixed on the
narrow strip of blue sky overhead.
The car came to a stop.
" Is this it, John? "
" Th' saloon on th' corner is fifteen-ninety-four,
sorr."
" Lead the way, Sydney." Again the twin red
spots glowed in Colton's white cheeks, he jumped
to the sidewalk, his slim stick tapping his trouserleg eagerly.
Thames stepped along beside him, close enough
for his coat-sleeve to touch that of Thornley Colton.
And with that slight touch to guide him the problemist followed; for Thornley Colton was a trifle
sensitive over his blindness, and nothing made him
angrier than an attempt to lead him. Sydney
found the entrance, between a second-hand-clothing
store and a pawnbroker's shop. As he stopped to
make sure of the weather-dimmed, painted number
the clothing-store proprietor popped out, rubbing
his dirty palms together, and coughing apologetically.
" On which floor does Mrs. Bowden live? "
asked Colton sharply.
" Der fourt', front. You maybe like some
clo'es? "
" Is her husband watchman at the Berkley Trust
Company? "
" He's dead. You means Mrs. Schneider, across*
the hall. Her man watches. Dere boarder also.
You like a elegant skirt for der poor vimens. Such
Thames opened the door, and they left the
clothing man in the middle of his sentence. In
the dark hall Sydney made his way cautiously.
Colton, cane lightly touching the heels of the man
ahead, followed unhesitatingly. The journey up
the rickety steps was torture to Colton. To his
doubly acute ears and sense of smell the odours, the
squalling of half -starved babies were terrible, but
his brain automatically counted the steps so that
he would have not the slightest difficulty in finding
his way back to the automobile.
" Schneider first," whispered Colton, as Thames
stopped in the fourth-floor hall.
In the dim light Thames saw that they were
standing between two doors.
" I don't know which it is, but I'll take a chance."
He knocked on the one at his left.
The one behind immediately popped open.
" Mrs. Bowden's gone away," shrilly proclaimed
a tottery old woman, bobbing her head.
" Could you give us her address? " asked Colton,
doffing his hat and bowing politely.
" Laws! " The woman's fluttering hand set her
spectacles farther askew, in a hurried effort to
straighten them. " She's gone to spend the day
with her sister in Brooklyn. Them boys of mine
pestered her till she's near sick. And she bein' so
delicat' an* out late last night washin' dishes at
the church sociable."
" Are you Mrs. Schneider? "
The darkness hid the smile the reference to the
' ' boys " had caused.
" I'm her. Be you the Associated Charities?
Mis' Bowden said she'd asked fer help. She came
here two weeks ago, after losin' her job in the
department store on account of her weak lungs.
She had to take in odd day's work. Asthma, she
calls it, but I ain't fooled on consumption. Two
of my »
" And you helped her by pretending you were ill?"
interrupted Colton.
" I was sick fer two days." The woman hastened
to set him right. " But she was so powerful glad
to earn a few cents fer her asthma snuff, not that
it is asthma. My sister's brother "
" Of course she left the key with you until her
return? " Colton left the sister's brother in mid-air.
" Yes; but " There was just a shade of
suspicion in the voice.
" As agents of the Associated Charities we must
make an examination of the room, to prove that
she is really in need of financial help," assured Colton gravely. " We can wait until she returns,
of course, but this is the last application day for
this month."
" Laws! I'll get it right away." She darted
back into the room with surprising agility, and
returned a moment later with an iron key tied to
a broken-tined fork.
" There's no need of bothering you, Mrs.
Schneider," declared Colton earnestly, as Thames
took the key.
" Laws! Soon's I get these pataters on I'll be
right with you. My boys had to go down to their bank " The rest of the sentence was lost, for as she turned to the stove Colton had jerked Thames
from the door.
" Quick! " he whispered. In an instant the
key was in the lock, and the door was open. Colton
pushed his way in, his cane touching the scarred,
tumbled bed and the one broken chair. " Where's
the trunk? " he queried, cane feeling around.
" No sign of one, nor a case."
" Damn! " snapped Colton. " The bureau
drawers! See what your eyes find."
Thames had the top drawer open almost before
he had finished. He whistled in amazement.
" Nothing but an empty pill-box, with no druggist's
label, three quills with the feathers cut off, and a
tuft of cotton. What the "
" Those are what I want! Put them in your
pocket! " The tenseness went out of his voice; it
became politely ingratiating, for his keen ears had
heard the woman coming. " There is no doubt that
Mrs. Bowden is in need of our assistance, Mrs.
Schneider," he said smoothly. " Er — -is that some
of her asthma snuff in the top bureau-drawer? "
She ran past him, and bobbed her head over the
open drawer. " Yes, sir; there is a little sprinkled over the bottom. You got mighty powerful eyes,
mister." She nodded vigorously at the blind man.
He had not been within five feet of the bureau.
" She's dead set on it bein' asthma, but my sister's brother was "
" Do you know anything against Mrs. Bowden's
character? " Again the sister's brother was left
dangling.
" Laws, no. She's that frightened she's afraid of
her own shadow. I'm the on'y one in the house she
took to, an' even me she kept at a distance."
Another vigorous nod. " An* so modest! Laws,
she wouldn't ha' come into the halls half dressed,
like some of the other women does. An' clean!
Laws! She lugged all her clo'es over to her sister's
in Brooklyn to-day, to be washed in their Thirtieth
Century Washer; not that I "
" Ah, thank you, but we have four other calls
to make." And, bowing gravely, Colton backed
from the room, and hurried toward the head of the
stairs, followed by Thames and the shrill-voiced
encomiums of the woman.
They took their places in the car silently, and it
was not until they had left the noise of the avenue
for the quiet of the side-streets that Colton spoke.
" What do you think of it, Sydney?" asked the
problemist gravely.
" I'm completely at sea," confessed Thames, with
a shake of his head. " It looked awfully bad for
Norris when we arrived at the bank. Then that
South American boat business. How did you know
she had received a message? " he asked suddenly.
" Didn't. But I knew Miss Richmond, or rather
Mrs. Norris. Common sense would have told any
one that could be the only reason for her presence
at the dock. Jamison and his kind don't use
common sense. They use the old policeman's formula; arrest the logical suspect and then
convict him. With persons like Norris and his
wife, each half doubting, half suspecting, either
would have confessed to save the other. It was an
ideal arrest, from the police view-point. "
" Then you seemed to involve the two watchmen
and the two men from the protective agency.
Jamison will have a whole waggon-load."
" He'll take no one," answered Colton. " I know
him. He'll spend the rest of the day trying to find
out what I was talking about. Then he'll telephone
to head-quarters, and they'll send men to find out
who sent the message to Miss Richmond, and to
locate Mrs. Bowden."
" There's the woman, Thorn! " Thames spoke
nervously, excitedly. " She took a dress-suit case,
presumably full of clothes, to her ' sister 5 in Brooklyn. The bonds "
" You forget that the agency men saw her come
out of the room empty-handed; they even searched
her, and one put her on the trolley." Colton smiled
curiously. " This was wholly a man's job, Sydney,
The work of the rarest kind of criminal; a detailist.
This crime, while perfectly simple, is, I think, unique
in its attention to details. That's why it interests me."
" Simple! " ejaculated Thames. " Simple? You
speak as though you knew the guilty man."
" I do. Perfectly. I knew last night."
" Last night? The "
" The robbery was committed early to-day.
Exactly."
' ' Why — why " Helpless amazement was in
Sydney Thames's voice. Why don't you arrest
him? Why all this "
" Simply because I would be laughed at. I
haven't the proof — yet. The usual criminal stumbles
on his opportunity, and seizes it in a haphazard fashion. The rare criminal, the detailist, attends
to every detail; works his problem out with the
shrewdness and forethought of a captain of finance,
plans a coup months ahead. Then he creates the
opportunity. You must understand, Sydney, that
half a million is worth a few months' work."
" But suspicion points only to Miss Richmond,
Norris, and this Mrs. Bowden."
" Suspicion points to every one," corrected the
problemist. " Doesn't it seem suspicious that
President Montrose should call in the police when
he would naturally take all steps in his power to
avoid publicity? Doesn't the very eagerness of
the central-office men to arrest Norris and his wife
seem queer? Isn't there a bit of suspicion in
Simpson's confession that he delayed the Stillson
estate until Norris was compelled to work after
hours on them? Doesn't Miss Richmond's story
that she was carrying her suit home to save work
for a delivery boy seem highly improbable and
unwomanlike? How about Norris telling his wife
of the bonds? An unbusinesslike proceeding in
the case of half a million's worth of negotiable
bonds, truly. Didn't the two men who answered
the early-morning alarm seem a bit too sure that
nothing was wrong? Weren't the two watchmen
in the conspiracy to pretend that Mrs. Schneider
was ill, so that a woman whom they had known
but two weeks could gain access to the bank?
Doesn't the finding of an unlabelled pill-box, three
featherless quills, and surgeon's cotton in the otherwise empty room of a woman dying with tuberculosis strike you as strange? As a further detail in
this crime of details, doesn't my confession that I
knew the criminal before the crime was committed
seem a trifle like guilty knowledge? " He smiled
broadly.
" Great Scott, Thorn! " Sydney Thames's voice
trailed off in a whistle of pure bewilderment.
" You've involved every one."
" Oh, no." Colt on snapped his cigarette into the
street. " Not every one. An unfortunate vaudeville
actor will appear on the scene as soon as I get the
list on which I left Shrimp busily at work."
III.
In the absolute darkness of the shade-drawn library
Thornley Colton softly whistled a syncopated version
of Mendelssohn's " Spring Song" as his deft fingers
filled an empty goose-quill with a fine white powder
from an improvised paper funnel. He plugged the
open end with a small wad of cotton; then his
wonderfully sharp ears caught the rustle of the
double portieres.
" Oh, Sydney," he called, " have you heard any*
thing from the bank this morning? "
Thames entered the darkness unhesitatingly, for
his constant practice of judging distance and
figuring steps for Colton had made him almost as
much at home in the darkness as the blind man
himself.
" No," he answered shortly. Then, with the
frank criticism of long friendship : " It's a crime,
Thorn, for you to be idle while that girl is being
dogged, and harassed, and "
" I thought she sang remarkably well last night
for a person under such a strain," interrupted Colton
musingly.
" It was wonderful, wonderful! " Sydney Thames
spoke with the breathless enthusiasm a beautiful
girl always aroused in his woman-hungry heart.
" Here, here! " protested the problemist laughingly. " Remember that she is another man's wife! "
" Great heavens, Thorn! How can you laugh? "
cried Thames resentfully. " Think of those two
dogs of detectives, questioning, bulldozing, shadowing! Why, they didn't let Miss Richmond get
away from the bank until late in the afternoon, then
Jamison insisted on going with her. His partner
hung around the bank till it closed "
" Trying to discover the use of powdered sulphur,"
smiled Colton. " I thought he would. Any one
but a central-office man would have gone to a
drug store, as I suggested."
" Two other head-quarters men hauled that frail
old Mrs. Schneider and the two watchmen to police
head-quarters, and put them through the third
degree."
" And a half-dozen more were on the trail of
Mrs. Bowden, while we were enjoying the opera
and an alleged cabaret show afterward, for which
this dark room is the penalty. Too much light
yesterday gave me a frightful headache."
The sudden ringing of the telephone in the
darkness made Thames jump, and Colton's cane,
which was never away from him, felt the movement.
" Answer it, Sydney," he requested.
The secretary's hands had not the sureness of his
feet, and he had to fumble a moment. When he
had given the customary salutation and had listened
a moment he gasped :
" It's Simpson, Thorn. His wife is missing!
He wants you." He extended the phone in the
darkness, but Thornley Colton made no move to
take it.
" Tell him I'll be down to the bank in an hour
or so. I'll see him then." Colton spoke idly.
Sydney repeated the message. Followed a silence.
" He's frantic, Thorn! " Thames's voice shook with
excitement. " When he got home last night she was gone. The doorman at his apartment house
said that she had gone out in the morning, for a
short walk, he supposed. Simpson was so excited
about the robbery he did not telephone her during
the day, as he had promised. He spent half the
night searching, and tried a dozen times to get you.
She is deaf and dumb, Thorn. Think of it! Deaf
and dumb, and lost! " It only needed a woman
in trouble to shatter Sydney Thames's nerves.
" Tell him that I'm trying to figure out that
robbery. Tell him also that I never let one case
interfere with another. I'm not a detective. There's
nothing interesting about a missing woman.
Hundreds of 'em every day. I find my pleasure in
interesting problems, not in police work." Colton'a
voice was sharp, curt, utterly devoid of sympathy.
Sydney knew that tone, as he knew the man who
used it. He repeated part of the message, added
gentle-voiced apologies, and hung up the receiver
with a sigh.
"That was heartless, Thorn! Think of that
woman, deaf and dumb, lost in this "
" Sometimes, Sydney, that susceptible heart of
yours becomes wearisome." Colton spoke a bit
sharply. " A moment ago you were protesting
because I was here instead of running around after
the man who stole the half-million in bonds from
the Berkley Trust Company."
" But Mrs. Norris is not helpless " And for
fifteen minutes he argued, while Colton smiled
imperturbably in the darkness, and filled two other
quills with the white powder, and plugged the ends
with tufts of cotton.
Suddenly Thames stopped, for Colton had picked
up the telephone and was giving a number.
" Hello, Shrimp! " he called, when the connection had been made. " Everything all right? Fine business. Three hours, eh? Good! Be on time,
and obey orders. Good-bye! "
" Where's The Fee? " demanded Sydney. " I
haven't seen him since yesterday."
" Emulating the example of his worthy hero,
Nick Carter. Shrimp is a real detective now."
Colton returned the crystalless watch to his pocket,
picked up the three quills, and arose. " Come on,
Sydney. We'll walk over to the bank."
" Walk? " ejaculated Thames, for he knew the
blind man's aversion to walking when he could ride.
" Where's the machine? "
" John and the machine are helping Shrimp in
his detective work," explained Colton. And in the
twenty minutes' walk to the Berkley Trust Company he absolutely refused to answer questions, but
kept up a continuous conversation on trivial topics,
that was maddening to the nervous secretary.
The effect of the previous day's badgering, questioning, and threats of the central-office men could
be seen as one entered the bank. The aged cashier's
hands trembled as he tried to count a sheaf of new
bills. Book-keepers in the rear wrote figures and
erased them. Thompson, head of the trust and
estate clerks, in his little ante-room cage, was in a
pitiable state of nerves. The typewriter's chair by
President Montrose's desk was vacant, because the
lady stenographer was at home under the care of a
doctor. The fifty years of staid, conservative calm
that had characterized the Berkley Trust Company
during its long and useful life had been hit by a
five-hundred-thousand-dollar storm.
The group in the vaultlike office of Second
Secretary Norris was little better. President
Montrose could hardly control his trembling hand
to stroke his Vandyke; Norris's eyes showed the
sleeplessness of the night before; Miss Richmond was calm with the calmness that means coming
nervous collapse; her mother was crying softly;
Simpson seemed positively haggard, and Sydney
Thames murmured words of sympathy for the man
who had two troubles. Jamison and the other
central-office man could not make their sneers
wholly sceptical. The protective-agency men were
plainly puzzled.
" I see you are all on hand." There was no smile
in Colton's voice now, or on his lips; he was deadly
calm, coldly earnest. " You didn't think it necessary
to send for the two watchmen? "
" We got merr watchin' them," put in the surly
Jamison.
" Thanks! " came curtly from Colton. " Sit
down at this table, all of you. I want to tell you
a story."
" We didn't come to hear "
Simpson interrupted the detective :
"For God's
sake, make it short, Mr. Colton! My wife "
" I'll look into that later." Colton's cane assured
him that the chairs were around the long table,
and his finger-tips felt the face of his watch in his
pocket.
" Will you? " Simpson's voice was almost
sarcastically eager, his heavy-lidded eyes narrowed.
Thames could not blame the man's natural resentment for Colton's offhandedness.
Silently they took seats. Colton sat facing the
closed door; across the table was Simpson and
Norris. Miss Richmond and her mother were at
the end. The four detectives were on either side
of the problemist.
" This is a story of a criminal who was born a
criminal; who couldn't be honest if he tried,"
began Colton, in his quietly expressive voice. One
hand lay idly on the table before him, the other on his knees, fingers holding the slim, hollow cane.
" He wasn't just born crooked. He started petty
thieving before he was out of short trousers. He
was the rare criminal that works years as an honest
man to pave the way for criminality. He had brains.
He could have been a wonderful success as an
honest man. But he couldn't be straight. The
criminal instinct was there. He was waiting for
the proper time. But the coarser side of his nature
refused to be held in leash. He needed money.
And with the inherent craft of his kind he began
to plan the robbery of the Berkley Trust Company.
It wasn't so hard, because, being an old, conservative institution, in which men had grown gray, the
personal side entered as it cannot in the modern,
up-to-date institutions where men come and go.
Instead of elaborate safeguards the simple protection of proven honesty entered largely into the
protection of the bank's valuables. And where there
is simple honesty there is always vulnerability.
" This criminal had found the vulnerable spot
years before the robbery was actually planned;
when the time came for its consummation luck
came to his aid, as it often does." He paused.
On the outside door came a knock, so faint that
only his wonderfully sharp ears heard it. " There
was no possibility of suspicion attaching itself to
him, for he had planned an elaborate programme
to foist suspicion on others. And this robbery was
but one of a series, for the method his shrewd brain
had devised was capable of endless combinations.
In a few years the Berkley Trust losses would have
mounted to millions! "
His fist crashed down on the heavy table. The
door opened. Between the sober-faced Shrimp and
the expressionless Irish chauffeur was a sunken-eyed, tottering creature, unshaven.
" There's your wife, Simpson! " In the silence
Colton's voice came like the crack of a pistol.
" My God, Thorn, it's a man! " In Sydney
Thames's tone was agony that the sensitive blind
man whom he loved could have made such a
mistake.
" Yes, a man! Sit still, Simpson |!" With a
movement as quick as light itself Colton's fingers
had dropped the slim cane that had given its warning, and held a blue-steel automatic. " Or rather
what was once a man." His tone rang with deadly
menace. " Charlie de Roque, vaudeville actor, the
youngest and best female impersonator on the stage;
Mrs. Bowden, the consumptive who played so well
on the sympathies of the three simple-minded souls
at sixteen-hundred Third Avenue; Mrs. Simpson,
the deaf-and-dumb little girl who was going to
make Simpson lead a better life."
" You lie! " The shambling shadow of a man
screamed it as he tried to jerk away from the
chauffeur. " They told me they were going to take
me to a sanatorium. I don't know what you're talking about. They've kept me " His whole body racked with sobs.
" Would you tell the truth for these? " The
automatic did not waver a fraction of an inch as
Colton's unoccupied hand threw down on the table
three cotton-plugged quills.
" Merciful God! Yes I " With insane strength
he broke away from the big Irishman and darted
to the table. His twitching fingers snatched a quill,
pulled the cotton from the end, threw his head
back
" Enough of these damn' theatrics! " Simpson
snarled it viciously, but he did not move. " By
Heaven, Colton, you can't railroad me to save
Norris and his wife with the fool ravings of a cocaine snuffler! " His face was purple, the veins in his
forehead seemed ready to burst. " Mrs. Bowden! "
He scoffed. " How did she get the bonds? Where
are they % Find 'em! " he laughed triumphantly
at Colt on across the table, and the two central-office
men who now stood over him.
" Here yuh are, Mr. Colton." It was Shrimp,
staggering under the weight of a big bucket of
dirty water. He set it down beside the problemist's
chair.
" The bonds are here, Simpson! " Colton's hand
plunged into the water, and came up with a dripping,
shiny black object. " There's the first package, in
an all-rubber ice bag! "
" You devil!" Simpson's rage made his voice
a scream.
" Take your prisoner, policemen." Colton could
not refrain from adding that last scornful word to
the two detectives who had not seen until a blind
man had shown them.
IV.
" Of course, De Roque, who was merely the drugcrazed tool of the real criminal, would have told
where the bonds were," declared Thornley Colton,
when they were once more in the shade-drawn
library of the big, old-fashioned house. " But
Simpson would have had time to be on his guard.
The finding of the bonds, as I did, before he had
time to recover his nerve, drew from him those
last betraying words. The police can establish his
connection with the telephone message to Miss
Richmond, the booking of the two passages under
the name of Morris, and the place where he and De
Roque met while the fake Mrs. Bowden was supposed
to be out at day's work. Those details were not even worth bothering with, for me, because the
keyboard of silence told me the guilty persons before
the robbery was committed."
" I am as much at sea as ever," confessed Sydney
Thames.
" In the Regal we saw the first act. Simpson,
with the dare-devilishness that characterizes the
type, introduced me to the accomplice. It was not
wholly dare-devilishness, however, for it was to
prepare the get-away. He wanted, before the time
came for her to disappear, to arouse your sympathy
and my interest in the deaf-and-dumb woman,
whom he had married to accomplish his reformation.
After a fruitless search he would need a long vacation
in Europe, with the bonds, of course, to recover
from the shock. There could be no suspicion
attached to him. No sane man would look for a
deaf-and-dumb wife in the person of a vaudeville
actor dying of tuberculosis and cocaine who had
drug dreams of money coming his way. Once
Simpson had gotten out of the country, De Roque
could have raved and stormed, even confessed, and
his confession would have been accepted as nothing
but cocaine dementia. Simpson never intended to
play fair; it isn't his nature. From the first time
I ever shook his hand I have known him to be a
born criminal, for I can read hands as the physiognomist reads faces. And I have the advantage,
because men like Simpson, with the aid of their
strong wills, can mask their emotions behind eyes
and faces so that no man can read their minds.
But they have never given a thought to their hands."
" Do you mean to say you could tell what Simpson
was planning by shaking his hands there in the
Regal?" demanded Thames incredulously.
" Not quite," protested Colton laughingly. " But
you know how I shake hands. My long index finger always rests lightly on the keyboard of silence — the
wrist. With a touch like mine, so light that I can
read handwriting by feeling the ridges left on the
blank side of the paper, not one person in a million
could feel it. I think Miss Richmond did, when I
shook hands with her, because I felt a responsive
thrill. In the case of Simpson his heart was working like a steam-engine, though his face and eyes
were a mask that neither you nor any man with
eyes could read; my finger-tip on his pulse told
me that he was labouring under some strong excitement. When I shook hands with his ' wife/ I
discovered why."
" Why? " echoed Thames blankly.
" Because the wife was a man, and a drug-fiend.' '
" Your hand told you that, and my eyes were
deceived! "
" My knowledge of anatomy told me the man
part. Don't you know that over the muscles of a
woman is a layer of fat that gives the beautiful
feminine curves? The man's muscles play directly
under the skin, and the curves of female impersonators are due to flabby muscles, and not the
feminine fat layer. Besides, the cocaine pulse of
the ' wife,' my finger-tip immediately felt the play
of the muscles as the hand gripped mine. Knowing
Simpson, the impersonation could mean nothing
else but a contemplated crime. I further proved it
by getting her to put out her hand before she could
have had any knowledge, by signs, of my intention
to say good-bye. Remember my reference to lip-reading? Simpson was taking no chance of letting
her talk. The cocaine gave her the brightness of
eye, and the heavily-daubed rouge I knew would
have to be there to convince you that she was really
a country girl who didn't know the use of cosmetics,
and also to cover any trace of man's beard and cocaine pastiness of skin. It would have deceived
any one who had eyes, where an artistic make-up
would immediately have aroused suspicion. Simpson was a wonderful detailist.
" Commonsense told me that Simpson could not
risk working with an amateur. Therefore I set
Shrimp to looking up actors who had been forced
to leave the stage on account of ill health within the
last two months. The whole thing must have been
rehearsed many times, for the detailist would
overlook no detail. In Shrimp's list was De Roque.
A few telephone inquiries proved that he was really
a cocaine fiend of the worst kind, also that he had
returned, yesterday morning, from a sanitarium,
no better, to his old boarding-house. It was Simpson's scheme to let him do that, for it eliminated
him. As soon as I found out that Simpson would
not risk visiting him, Shrimp and John got him on
the pretence that they were from Simpson. Cocaine
snufflers as far gone as he need the drug every hour.
For three hours before the time arranged for Shrimp
to bring him to the bank De Roque hadn't had a
pinch; he was insane with craving. The visit to
Third Avenue, and the finding of the quills which
cocaine snufflers use to hide the stuff on their bodies
and conceal it in their palms so that no one can see
them snuff it gave me the things I needed to make
him talk. You saw how they worked."
" But the detectives who helped him out of the
room? How did you ever figure the possibility of
the bonds being in the scrub water?"
" The protective-agency men told me. Their
eyes saw what my lack of eyes understood. The
yellow bar of soap bobbing on top of the water, I
think one of them expressed it. An instant's
intelligent thought would tell any one that the
yellow soap used for scrubbing floors never floats.
The finding of the powdered sulphur showed me the
clever ice-bag trick, for powdered sulphur is always
used by druggists to keep the thin rubber from
sticking together when the bags are in the boxes.
Of course, De Roque carried it with him every night
waiting for his opportunity, and in pulling it out
the powder scattered on the carpet. The natural
thing was to brush it under the safe, where my
handkerchief found it after my slapping hand had
raised the scattered grains he had missed.
" The ringing of the burglar-alarm was a master-stroke. It was the link necessary to establish the
innocence of Mrs. Bowden. Simpson, of course,
knew of the connection. De Roque probably
removed his shoes and stood on the rubber ice-bags
while he opened the safe and took out the bonds
and papers Simpson had so accurately described.
Then, when they had all been packed and the safe
closed, a natural stumbling against the safe would
bring the protective-agency men to swear that
nothing could have been taken from the room.
When the time came to leave the building, the pail,
still full of water, was carefully put in a far, dark
corner of the cellar closet, where the scrub pails and
mops are kept. It would have been safe until
Simpson was ready to take the bonds away. That
was why I worked to keep Jamison and his partner
around the bank; I didn't want Simpson to have
any opportunity to get the loot out.
" Of course, it was he who suggested the calling
of the regular police to the flustered President
Montrose. Because, while he was sure that he
could deceive me, he wasn't taking any foolish
risks. He wanted the central-office men to muddle
the thing as much as possible, and he was shrewd
enough not to overdo the casting of suspicion on
Norris and his wife; the way he put in a word here and there, and looks, of course, was quite in keeping
with the other details. This morning, I think, he
had begun to realize what I was doing, but there
was nothing he could do but count on a bluff. I
took him off his guard."
For several minutes the two men smoked in
silence.
" But why didn't you warn some one instead of
letting the robbery go on? " Sydney asked finally.
Colton's expressive lips framed a wry smile.
" You will insist on showing the fly in the ointment,
Sydney. The truth is, I was caught napping. But
I guess it's just as well I didn't. Jails are built for
the protection of society, and Simpson is the one
man in a thousand against whom society needs
protection."
THE END
Thornley Colton is a "blind detective" from the golden age of mystery fiction. Relying on his keen senses and intelligence, he only takes the most puzzling cases, strictly for the enjoyment of unraveling a mystery. Author
Clinton H. Stagg was only 26 when he died (in 1916), but left a remarkable detective for mystery enthusiasts to explore.
ϟ
excerpt of
Thornley Colton, Blind Detective
by CLINTON H. STAGG
Copyright, 1923, by G. HOWARD WATT
NEW YORK
Printed in the United States of America
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