The Incendiary: A Story of Mystery

by William Augustine Leahy

  CHAPTER XXIX.

  JACOB AND DELILAH.

  "Put your wrists together!"

  The voice was totally different from Dobbs' whine; a strong, deepregister, like a ledge of the basal rock peeping out from a smilingmeadow. For the first time Robert felt the veiled strength which residedin the detective's character. There was no option but to obey.

  "Pull up the curtains, Johnnie."

  The servant had been attracted by the crash of the lamp. A faint streamof daylight entered the chamber, and the noises of the city could beheard in the distance. McCausland's face seemed to have altered in everyline.

  "Get a hack! Jump into those shoes!" He tossed a curt order right andleft, one for Johnnie, the other for Robert.

  "To the county jail," was his direction to the hack driver. Robertwondered at this, but he sat back smiling and said nothing during allthe ride.

  "Here's your prisoner," said McCausland when they arrived. It was notyet 6 o'clock, but the sheriff was up and showed no great surprise.Robert wondered at this again and his amazement was not abated when theyassigned him to his original cell in murderers' row. However, the changewas to his liking, for the surroundings were less presageful ofpermanency.

  "You missed your vocation as a character actor," was his parting shot atMcCausland.

  It is easy to imagine the dismay in the prison that morning when theescape was discovered. Col. Mainwaring was a very different man fromWarden Tapp, and for a time it looked as though McCausland might losehis badge. But when he showed an order from the sheriff empowering himto bring the body of Robert Floyd from the state prison back to thecounty jail, which had now been put in repair, Col. Mainwaring saw alight; and when McCausland pointed out that he had laid his fingerprecisely on certain weaknesses of the bastile, frequently suggestedwithout avail to Tapp, the new warden thanked him pleasantly.

  The story at first was given to the public that Inspector McCausland hadcaptured the fugitive, Robert Floyd, and for a time not only did thedetective's cap wear a bright new feather but all the credit of Robert'sconduct during the riot was canceled by this outbreak, which wasconstrued as a confession of guilt. But of course the truth leaked out,and the failure of his "nest-egg game," with its brilliant but desperateclimax, was made the occasion of much chaffing to the contriver.

  "Has Bill Dobbs been taken yet?" a brother-in-buttons would ask him; andthe two lovers had many a good laugh over the game which they had playedand won. For the first time since the great shadow fell across them theywere as happy and hopeful as lovers should be, and for several dayslittle smiles of reminiscence would creep into the corners of Emily'slips while she was touching out the blemishes in some negative destinedto pass from young Amaryllis to her Strephon or old Darby to his Joan.

  Meanwhile Shagarach, too, was interesting himself in the study ofphotographs.

  "Have they all been returned?" he asked Aronson one morning.

  "All but Meester Davidson's."

  "And none of the neighbors saw Arnold coming out?"

  "They all shake their heads and say no, they don't know that face."

  "Very well. Jacob may put them in his desk. We shall hardly need themagain. Go over to the second session and answer for me in the Morrowcase. I am expecting Mr. McCausland."

  "Speak of angels," said the inspector, entering cordially. "You know therest of the saying."

  "Good-morning. Be seated."

  It did not escape even modest Saul Aronson what a contrast theantagonists made, sitting with the table between them. McCausland had,apparently, not glanced around with more than casual interest, yet, ifblindfolded then and there and put to the test, he could have surprisedthose who did not know him with the minute and copious inventory of theoffice, not excluding its occupants, which this glance had furnishedhim. It was this, with his almost infallible memory, which made him soformidable an opponent at whist. Shagarach was hardly his equal in mereperception, perhaps not his superior in analysis, when the subject waswithin McCausland's range. His advantage lay, if anywhere, as he hadsaid himself, in his deeper insight into the human soul, in hispsychological reach.

  "Sorry I was out when you called the other day," said McCausland. "I'vebeen looking up your matter."

  "With what result?"

  "These clippings may interest you."

  Shagarach glanced rapidly over the newspaper scraps.

  "The Broadbane murder--I remember that well."

  "It occurred about a week before your first attack. You rememberBroadbane lured the young woman to a lonely bridge in his carriage andthrew her into the river."

  "The circumstances were similar to my adventure. The second item isstrange to me."

  "It's from a New York paper, dated July 28--the very day before yoursecond attack. The circumstances are closely similar this time again. Ajealous husband shot his wife through the window of her room."

  "Our monster reads, then."

  "He is a lunatic (puff)," said McCausland, who had lighted hisinvariable cigar.

  "You believe so?"

  "The evidence convinces me. They have an itch to imitate, as you areaware. This man is a victim of homicidal mania, of which you haveunfortunately become the object (puff)."

  "Why Shagarach and not another?"

  "Newspaper notoriety. You should see my crop of cranks. This particularcrack-brain has aimed his illusion at you. We must strait-jacket himbefore it goes further."

  "You expect, then, to have him soon?"

  "Sooner or later (puff). Let us know if you hear anything. I see youwere hurrying off as I came in. Good-day."

  McCausland had been deputed to investigate the attacks on Shagarach,because they connected themselves so manifestly, through the threateningletters, with the Floyd case, which he was handling. Neither he norShagarach had objected to this opportunity to meet and possibly forceeach other's hands a little.

  "I shall be in the Criminal Court, second session, Jacob. Remain heretill Mr. Aronson comes." Shagarach was gone and Jacob left alone to hismeditations.

  To judge from his expression, they were never very pleasant. Perhaps,like Job of old, he daringly questioned the power behind human destiny,why he showers cleverness and attraction on one boy of 14, while anotheris afflicted with a manner of nose preposterous, conspicuous andundistinguishable, to carry which is a burden. That godlike young man inthe photograph, how he would like to be as handsome as he! Was there noway to attain it? He took the bundle of photographs out of his drawerand laid them on his desk to study and admire.

  While thus engaged the jingle of harness outside attracted him. He knewby the sound that the carriage had stopped before his door. It wasn'toften that equipages, sprinkling sleigh-bell music in their course,paused at the door of the dingy old business building. So Jacob becameinterested enough to approach the window of the inner office languidlyand peep down into the street.

  There stood a covered black carriage, as polished as a mirror, with abuff-liveried coachman holding the reins. His seat was perched so highthat his legs made one straight, unbending line to the footrest, and hisback was as vertical as a carpenter's plummet. Mrs. Arnold was notcareless of these niceties. It would have shocked her sense of thefitness of things almost as much to publish the fact that her coachmanhad knees, as if her own lorgnette should stray from the proscenium boxhigher than the first balcony--an impropriety which had happened onlyonce to her knowledge, and that by inadvertence, on an opera night.

  "This is Mr. Shagarach's office, I believe," said the grand lady toJacob.

  "Yes'm," he mumbled, abashed.

  "He is out, I perceive. Does he return soon?"

  "No'm."

  "About when could I see him if I should wait?"

  "He is trying a case'm, over in the second court'm, criminal session,"answered Jacob, mixing things badly in his confusion.

  "Couldn't you send for him?"

  "Mr. Aronson will be here soon. Perhaps he would know."

  "I will wait a few minutes," said the la
dy, sitting down with hauteur inthe cushioned chair which Jacob pushed toward her. After a spell ofsilence she addressed him again in a gentler tone:

  "What is your name, little boy?" she asked.

  "Jacob," he answered. Servants and office boys grow to think ofthemselves as having only one name.

  "Jacob. That is a very old and dignified name. Are you Mr. Shagarach'sclerk?"

  "No'm."

  "His errand boy, then?"

  "Yes'm."

  "It's too bad you had to leave school so young. I suppose you give allyou earn to your mother?"

  "Yes'm."

  "Haven't you any father?"

  "No'm."

  Jacob thought he had never met such a kind lady. How sympathetic sheseemed and was it not gracious of her to inquire about his father andmother? How much more agreeable it was to deal with real ladies andreal gentlemen who never, never would call vulgar names. He would havegiven almost half his week's spending money to oblige this sweet-tonguedlady then, and his only regret was that he could think of no betteranswer to her questions than "Yes'm" and "No'm."

  "If you are an errand boy perhaps you could do a little errand for me,"said the lady sweetly after a pause.

  "Yes'm," answered Jacob, putting a world of eagerness into the word.

  "You are sure you can do errands and not make a mistake?"

  "No'm--yes'm," he replied, a little puzzled as to which of the two wordswhich seemed to constitute his whole vocabulary fitted into his meaninghere.

  "Then, perhaps, I will let you take this for me."

  She drew out the tiniest, daintiest purse Jacob's eyes had ever beheld,and, opening its clasp, gingerly fingered forth a bill.

  "I want very much to have this changed. Mr. Shagarach will not be backimmediately, you say?"

  "No'm."

  "Then perhaps you can spare a moment to run down to the corner and getsome silver for this."

  "They'll change it upstairs," said Jacob, at last finding his voice.

  "Upstairs? Very well, you may take it upstairs and bring me back smallsilver, Jacob."

  With a skip of elation Jacob mounted the stairs. There was a littledelay in the mission, to which he had repaired. When he came downstairs,the silver clutched in his hand, his heart rose to his mouth atdiscovering that the office was empty. To think that he had kept thekind lady waiting so long! Probably she had become disgusted with him.He stood a moment in perplexity. Then glancing at his own desk, heopened his mouth in horror.

  "My pictures!" cried Jacob. The photographs were gone.

  If there was one being that Jacob reverenced and feared it was hismaster. To feel now that he had betrayed him at the prompting of a grandlady, who deceived him with honeyed words and was undoubtedly one of hismaster's enemies--how could he ever face Shagarach again?

  "My pictures!" he cried a second time, running into the entry. But hereat the head of the stairs a dubitation seized him. Shrill and re-echoingthrough the narrow passage came the flute-like warble which Jacob knewonly too well. It was the precursor of torment for him. True, theWhistler himself had almost ceased to pick on the office boy and eventaken him under his wing of late, but Turkey Fenton and Toot Watts wereas implacable as inquisitors turning a heretic on a lukewarm gridiron.

  Turkey's tyranny was of the grosser order, as became an urchin who inJacob's presence had swallowed a whole banana, skin and all. Toot'snature was subtle and spiderlike. He possessed the enviable distinctionof being able to wag his ears, and his devices of torture werecorrespondingly refined and ingenious. During the last visit of the boyshe had played a small mirror into Jacob's eyes all the while behindShagarach's back, and it wasn't until they were going out that Jacobdiscovered why he had been dazzled almost to blindness.

  If he took the stair route down he would be stopped and teased and thewicked lady would get away. Perhaps she was already gone--gone with thephotographs which should have been securely locked in his drawer. Whyhad he ever taken them out?

  The emergency was desperate and Jacob met it heroically. Rushing toShagarach's window, he saw the grand lady just crossing the sidewalk andwaving her parasol to the coachman. In a moment she would be ensconcedon the cushions within and the disaster would be beyond remedy. Thewindow was open, and there was a little piazza outside. Jacob steppedout and shouted. The lady looked up and hastened her pace. Leading downto the first story from the piazza was a flight of steps, and from thefirst story down to within twelve feet of the ground, another--anold-fashioned fire-escape.

  Down these steps Jacob scrambled, scratching his hands and nearly losinghis balance, to the first piazza and thence to the lowermost round,where the awful fall of twelve feet checked him. But the sight of thecoachman mounting his box nerved his courage and he released his hands.For a moment he felt dizzy. But the horses were already started. With aflying leap he caught the tailboard in his hand, and after being draggedalong with great giraffe-like bounds for nearly a block managed to drawhimself up to something like a sitting position.

  There, through an eye-shaped dead-light in the back of the carriage heobtained a dim view of its occupant. His master's stolen pictures werein her hand. What was she kissing them for--and crying? But Jacob wasdetermined to have no pity upon her. He had just resolved to call outand demand her attention, when the crack of a lash made him turn and hislip began to tingle. The coachman had discovered his unlawful presenceon the tailboard and had reached him with just the tip end of his whip.

  Probably he had meant only to frighten the lad. If so, he had thoroughlysucceeded. Again the whip curled backward over the coachman's shoulderand snapped like a pistol shot close to Jacob's ear. To add to hisdiscomfort a great St. Bernard, which had been running under thecarriage, had become aware of his intrusion, and began rearing at him ina manner more alarming than dangerous, to be sure, but sufficient tomake a peaceable lad tremble. Between the whip and the dog's teeth hisride had begun to be worse torture than the gantlet of the stairway,flanked by the three gamins, would have been, when the ordeal wasbrought to a sudden end by the stopping of the carriage at a great brickrailroad station.

  Jacob's time had come. Disregarding the St. Bernard, he jumped down andstood on the sidewalk. The dog growled and the coachman spoke to himroughly as he opened the door with practiced alacrity for his mistress.But Jacob was now within his legal rights.

  "I want my pictures," he said, catching the grand lady by the arm. Mrs.Arnold looked down at him with amazement not unmingled with fear. It wasthe same stupid little boy she had bribed to go upstairs in the officewhere Harry's photographs had been lying--for no good purpose, herinstincts told her.

  "What does this little ragamuffin say?" she asked.

  "I want my photographs," said Jacob, doggedly, as the coachman shovedhim aside. He ran after Mrs. Arnold, the tears in his eyes, and clung toher dress. A scene was imminent. The policeman approached, doubtless torender assistance to the lady in distress. But Mrs. Arnold did notdesire his assistance just then. With a quick motion she removed aparcel from her pocket and placed it in Jacob's hands.

  "Take back your things, then, and don't bother me," she said, with aflushed face.

  Jacob gloated on his recovered treasures. Then his hands likewise soughthis trousers pocket, and he jingled a handful of silver into Mrs.Arnold's hand.

  "Take the money, Joseph," she said to the coachman. "These smallstorekeepers are so ill-mannered."

  The policeman gave Jacob a hard look as he passed him, but the officeboy was obliviously counting his pictures.

  When he returned to the office the gamins were gone and Aronson wasthere alone. To Aronson's question where he had been, Jacob, not beingan imaginative boy, gave an answer which was strictly truthful,whereupon Aronson, not being a humorous young man (for such are alwaysgrave), laughed immoderately, and proposed that the fire escapehenceforth be known as Jacob's ladder.