Dr. Poggioli: Criminologist (The Lost Classics Book 14)

by T. S. Stribling

  The psychiatrist gave a nod of acquiescence, and they went through an inner hallway to an automatic elevator. In the little cage Samuels asked suddenly: “What was it you said to me just then?”

  “When?”

  “A few moments ago—you were asking—something?”

  “Oh, yes, I was puzzled.... I’m not so much now.”

  “Why, what have you found out?”

  “I’ve found out why you invented that story about Mrs. Hessland wanting matches and how she drove off while you were gone to get them.”

  Samuels looked intently at his companion.

  “The story is perfectly true! Why do you think I invented it?”

  “You and Mrs. Hessland invented it together—to tell at the hospital when you returned to explain her disappearance.”

  “But she did drive away!”

  “I know it; but you both had planned for her to do it. You knew she would go on the moment you went into the cigar stand—that is if you actually went into a cigar stand. I imagine you just stepped out of the cab and let her ride on.”

  Samuels broke out in an annoyed voice:

  “Why do you say that? You know I wouldn’t deliberately desert an invalid from a sanitarium on the street!”

  Poggioli shrugged patiently.

  “You did it because you didn’t want to be seen entering the new apartment with her for the first time.”

  “What apartment?”

  “The one you had furnished for her, of course.” Samuels frowned, and moistened his lips.

  “Why shouldn’t I enter it with her the first time—if there was any such apartment?”

  “Oh, that was bank-clerkly caution,” hazarded the psychologist dryly. “Anybody is allowed to have an establishment in New York except a bank clerk. You thought after Mrs. Hessland had settled, and a few other friends had called, you might drop in—casually—and avoid the appearance of evil.”

  The elevator clicked to a halt, and Samuels stood looking at the scientist with a dropped face.

  “Well, ye-es, we had planned something like that.” The scientist nodded.

  “Those were your plans; but—something went wrong....She never appeared at the apartment you furnished.”

  “What makes you say that?” asked the bank clerk, almost in terror.

  “Why, your shock at being mentioned with her in the divorce papers. That tells me with equal certitude that you don’t know where she is now, and you’ve never been with her at all.”

  The bank clerk caught the psychologist’s arm. “Mr. Poggioli, if you know that, for God’s sake tell me where she went—and what made her go! You don’t know the uncertainty, the suspense—waiting day after day, running blind ads in the papers—”

  The psychologist opened the elevator door, and the two men moved automatically into the upper hallway.

  “Where she went I can’t tell you, Mr. Samuels. When she found herself free, she may have decided to make a new start, alone.”

  “But she loved me! She had been ill-treated, and I loved her!”

  “If she really loved you, that would be a reason for a certain type of woman not to live with you illicitly, Mr. Samuels.”

  “But where is she now? Has she got herself a job somewhere? How can I find her again?”

  The psychologist held up his hand and shook it to signify that he could not answer.

  “But you’ve told everything else—why can’t you tell that?”

  Samuels led the way to his apartment, and unlocked the door.

  “Look here,” said Poggioli, “I believe there is a little gap in the logic of this disappearance. If she suggested it, why—why should she be the one to disappear?”

  Samuels looked at him blankly. “She suggested it?”

  “Yes—didn’t she?”

  “Why, no. I did, of course.”

  Poggioli smiled slightly, and shook his head.

  “You think that, Samuels, because men always believe they originate such ideas. But you were concerned about her health, about her physical well-being; you were wrought up because she was miserable....You still are....That feeling would never have suggested an elopement....I think it must have come about through her.”

  The bank clerk was bewildered.

  “Why, I know I’m the one who sug—”

  “How did you communicate with her?”

  “Through notes.”

  “Well, you probably saved those notes. Working in a bank would cause you to—”

  “I did; certainly I would save Margaret’s letters.”

  “Could you find out just who did originate the idea of an elopement?”

  “Sit down,” invited the host. He went to a closet and returned with a filingcase of letters, drew a chair to a reading-lamp and began going through them with the carefulness of a teller investigating an account. Presently he turned rather blankly to Poggioli.

  “This seems to be the first letter mentioning—such a thing.”

  “So she did write it, after all?”

  “Apparently.”

  “May I see it?”

  Samuels hesitated, but finally folded the paper so Poggioli could see only one sentence. It read:

  . . . continue like this when we could be together. I don’t know what New York may have done to your ideas about things, Oliver, but I feel as if Everbrook were a thousand miles away—

  Here the lower fold cut off the sentence. Poggioli sat frowning blankly at the writing. “That’s extraordinary,” he said slowly. “Why?” enquired the bank clerk.

  “A woman—a girl suggesting an elopement, and breaking off to say she doesn’t know what New York has done to your ideas about things.... You didn’t give me a copy of your letter to her, did you, Samuels, by mistake?”

  “Oh, no, certainly not.... Why do you say that?”

  “Because to consider how the idea came into one’s head, to break off a suggestion to consider that—a man might think of that, Samuels, but a woman would not.”

  “Yes, but she did.”

  “H’m! So it appears.... And she disappeared afterward—in the midst of carrying out her plans?”

  The bank clerk assented dully.

  Poggioli pulled at his chin and nodded slowly as he stared at and through the paper. Finally he turned to his host.

  “Let me see two or three more of her letters, noncommittal ones, near the beginning of the correspondence.”

  Samuels selected a half-dozen and handed them across. Poggioli made a place on the table beside him and spread out the letters. He let his glance brush over them, then shook his head.

  “You know, Samuels, it’s a difficult task to counterfeit another person’s signature; it’s still harder to reproduce her general handwriting, and that is the mere mechanical side of it. The mental and spiritual side, for a man to duplicate the thoughts a woman would think and write—that, I am sure, is an impossibility.”

  The bank clerk strode over to the table and looked at the exhibits.

  “Do you mean to say her letter was—” He checked himself to ejaculate: “Why, it was forged, wasn’t it?”

  “Exactly! I knew some man had dictated this note, when I read it.”

  “But who forged it?”

  “There is only one person in the world who could have any interest in the matter.”

  “Who’s that?”

  “Hessland, of course.”

  Samuels looked at his companion with horror in his eyes.

  “You mean her own husband—you think he would deliberately inject the idea of an elopement into—”

  “Certainly. That would give him easy grounds for divorce—and avoid the possibility of alimony.”

  “But how did he get into the correspondence?”

  “Why, through the nurses at the hospital. They doubtless read all the notes that passed between you and Mrs. Hessland....He paid them, you know.”

  “Then—then what has happened to her? Did he follow her to the apartment—and take some sort of reve
nge?”

  “That I can’t say....Let me see....What do you know about Hessland? You say he posed as a man of wealth?”

  “Yes, Margaret married him under the impression that he was very wealthy.” Poggioli nodded and quirked his lips.

  “That doesn’t get us very far. There are so many men who pose as wealthy, you couldn’t possibly deduce Hessland’s type from that....What about the woman herself? Would she incite revenge if she betrayed a husband?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Was she young?”

  “Twenty-three—her birthday was the fourteenth of May.”

  “Pretty?”

  The bank clerk drew a breath.

  “The most beautiful girl I have ever known.”

  “Happen to have a photograph of her?”

  “Yes, I’ll show it to you.”

  The clerk went back to his closet and brought out a “cabinet” portrait. Poggioli took it, looked at the fluffy lace dress and flowers in the figure’s hands. He glanced at the back of the picture.

  “This was made by a photographer in Everbrook; it must have been done some time ago?”

  “Yes, when she finished high school....It was taken for our Annual.”

  “She probably doesn’t look like this now. Have you anything later?”

  “No, I haven’t.” Samuels took the high school portrait. As he replaced it in its folder, he remembered something. “Yes, I have a recent picture of her, too; but it isn’t much good.” He handed Poggioli a postcard picture of a very pretty woman.

  The psychologist took the cheap photograph, glanced at it; then something seemed to catch his attention, for he gave it a closer look and asked:

  “Where did you get this one?”

  “Why, she handed it to me when she came out of the sanitarium and got into the taxicab with me. She said she had got a picture made for me, too—” The bank clerk came to a full stop, and ejaculated: “Why, of course—she was fixing to leave me right then—it was her way of telling me goodbye.”

  As the psychologist continued to study the picture, he shook his head slowly. “No—no—that’s not probable. When she handed you this picture, Mr. Samuels, she must have been in a light mood; she did it casually. Really at the time she must have meant to live with you, as you had planned.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because this picture is plainly no prettier than Mrs. Hessland is herself; it has not even been retouched.”

  “Well, what’s that got to do with it? Why couldn’t she have said goodbye with—”

  “Because no woman would have given you a farewell picture that was not as pretty as she could have it made. She would want to be remembered at her best,

  naturally. No; when Mrs. Hessland got into the taxicab with you, she had not the slightest idea of deserting you, Mr. Samuels; this picture is proof positive of that.” The smallish man was puzzled, and annoyed at this hopeful logic which was obviously false.

  “But look here, she did leave me, Mr. Poggioli; there’s no use your sitting there saying she didn’t mean to leave me, when she did!”

  Poggioli waved a patient forefinger at his client.

  “I didn’t say she didn’t leave you; I merely said she didn’t mean to leave you when she handed you this postcard....What happened in the taxi?”

  “Why, nothing!”

  “You didn’t—make her angry?”

  “Why, of course not. I—I drew shut the—No, I didn’t make her angry at all,

  not in the least.”

  The psychologist frowned.

  “H’m. If she left you and did not intend to leave you, then somebody—some third person must have—”

  Samuels leaned across the table.

  “You are not suggesting that somebody did something to Margaret? How could they, driving through the street in a public taxi, to the apartment I had furnished?”

  The psychiatrist waved down this lead to ask carefully:

  “She couldn’t have got this picture made just for you; did she say what she did with the others?”

  “Why, as a matter of fact, she didn’t have the pictures made at all, Mr. Poggioli;

  the sanitarium did that. When they were turned in, she simply kept one out for me.”

  “The sanitarium? You mean the authorities there in the sanitarium?”

  “Yes, of course that was what she meant.”

  “And did she happen to tell you what the authorities wanted with a picture like this?”

  The bank clerk considered.

  “Yes,” he recalled, “she said she was giving me this to show me how she looked in the sanitarium records.”

  “Their records?”

  “Yes; she said the sanitarium kept a photograph of each patient in their records.”

  “But she wasn’t just entering the sanitarium, was she?”

  “Oh, no; she had been there about a year.”

  “And after a year’s residence the authorities suddenly decided they must have a postcard photograph of Mrs. Hessland for their records?”

  Samuels looked at his guest. “That is a queer thing, isn’t it?”

  “No, it isn’t queer at all; it is simply a bald misstatement to throw Mrs. Hessland off the track....They had some reason—”

  The bank clerk suddenly sat up. “Look here, you don’t suppose they knew she was going to run away . . . and with me . . . and they wanted her photograph so the police could trace her!” He broke off, wetting his lips.

  “The idea of taking a photograph to trace her when they had her in their hands!” Poggioli pointed out.

  “Yes, that is so,” agreed the smaller man, breathing a little more easily but still apprehensive.

  The scientist sat tapping his lips and studying the photograph. Then he suddenly opened his eyes and ejaculated abruptly:

  “Why, my God, making all this mystery out of this, when here the thing is before us!”

  “What?”

  “Why, this: if the sanitarium didn’t want the photograph for their records, and Mrs. Hessland didn’t order it, then there is only one thing left for it to be used for!”

  “What’s that?” asked Samuels blankly.

  “Why, a passport, of course! It’s passport size, passport finish—”

  “Passport!” echoed Mr. Samuels, becoming alarmed on a new tack. “Certainly. Then the husband must have really had it made. He got a passport for her—Mrs. Hessland has gone abroad.” Samuels’ hands fell limply on the table. “Then she did run away from me after all!”

  “No, no, she didn’t run away from you—not after giving you that picture for a keepsake.”

  “But her husband has taken her back—he’s gone abroad with her!”

  “Good Lord, man, not after he had arranged for you two to elope . . . No man in his position would be so wishy-washy.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because it takes persistence and nerve and a lack of sentiment to keep up an appearance of wealth on nothing a year. No, Hessland is unprincipled. He had arranged for you to elope with his wife and save himself alimony; then— then something or other popped into his head that seemed even better than that—something or other—” Poggioli beat a nervous tattoo on the desk with his fingers. “Whatever it was, probably—yes, by God, it would be that—it would bring him in money!”

  “It was what? What would bring him in money?”

  “Why, when he read your letter and found she would go to the apartment alone, he hurried her passport through, and—sold her!”

  “What!”

  “Certainly, kidnapped her, shanghaied her, sold her! When did you say she disappeared?”

  “Day before yesterday!”

  “Have you got the papers for that day?”

  “Certainly—but Mr. Poggioli, where in the world could he sell—”

  “Bring me the sailing lists.... What boats sailed at midnight day before yesterday?”

  Samuels produced the papers—opened them shakily at
the shipping news. Poggioli skimmed down the list.

  “Megantic . . . Cape Verde . . . Queen of India . . . Uruguay . . . Montevideo . . . I imagine, I am almost sure, she will be on a South American steamer.”

  “What makes you say that?”

  “Because Europe has plenty of women of its own.... By the way, we might save radioing to all of these steamers . . . Where does Hessland live in New York?”

  “Park Avenue near Eightieth.”

  “What’s the nearest telegraph to Park and Eightieth?” He picked up the Manhattan telephone-lists, answered his own question, and dialed a number. He sat listening to the buzz for ten or fifteen seconds, then began:

  “Western Union, this is William Hessland speaking....I am expecting a wireless....Oh, you’ve sent it up to me already....Was it from the Montevideo? . . . The Uruguay? . . . Very well—take this message, will you:

  Captain Uruguay, a young woman is aboard your ship in the charge of man or woman who purports to be her medical attendant. She was brought aboard under color of being very ill or insane. Her passport is forged. She is a victim of abduction. Arrest attendant, liberate prisoner. Will have police wire you confirmation of this order.

  Sign the name, ‘Henry Poggioli.’ Yes, that’s correct, operator: the Captain of the Uruguay, whoever he is, will know Henry Poggioli.”

  Samuels leaned across the table with eyes starting from his head.

  “My God—sold her—shipped her like an animal! Haven’t you made some horrible mistake?”

  Poggioli turned and snapped out:

  “How could I have made a mistake? If she gave you that photograph, she didn’t know she was going away; since it was for a passport, someone else got it for her; if they forged her passport, they kidnapped her; if her husband had her kidnapped, he had her sold. There is no other solution.”

  Samuels sat staring wordlessly.

  Poggioli leaned back, regarding the clerk with a thoughtful half-frown.

  “And look here,” he proceeded presently, “this couldn’t have been Hessland’s first offense. The whole thing worked too smoothly. I’ll venture he’s got a record of divorces from missing wives.” He leaned forward on some impulse and picked up the receiver again.