The House Without a Key

by Earl Der Biggers

  “He will be here soon,” the Hawaiian replied. “I wait on the lanai.” He went out the side door, still carrying his clumsy burden. John Quincy and the girl stared at each other.

  “‘We move, we advance!’” John Quincy quoted in a low voice. “Brade will be here soon! Would you mind going out on the lanai and telling me where Kaohla is now?”

  Quickly the girl complied. She returned in a few seconds. “He’s taken a chair at the far end.”

  “Out of earshot?”

  “Quite. You want the telephone—”

  But John Quincy was already in the booth. Charlie Chan’s voice came back over the wire.

  “Most warm congratulations. You are number one detective yourself. Should my self-starter not indulge in stubborn spasm, I will make immediate connection with you.”

  John Quincy returned to the desk, smiling. “Charlie’s flying to us in his Ford. Begins to look as though we were getting somewhere now. But about this bill. Mrs. Brade’s board and room I make sixteen dollars. The charge against Mr. Brade—one week’s board and room minus four days’ board—totals nine dollars and sixty-two cents.”

  “How can I ever thank you?” said the girl.

  “By telling me again about your childhood on this beach.” A shadow crossed her face. “Oh, I’m sorry I’ve made you unhappy.”

  “Oh, no—you couldn’t.” She shook her head. “I’ve never been—so very happy. Always an ‘if’ in it, as I told you before. That morning on the ferry I think I was nearest to real happiness. I seemed to have escaped from life for a moment.”

  “I remember how you laughed at my hat.”

  “Oh—I hope you’ve forgiven me.”

  “Nonsense. I’m mighty glad I was able to make you laugh like that.” Her great eyes stared into the future, and John Quincy pitied her. He had known others like her, others who loved their fathers, built high hopes for them, then saw them drift into a baffled old age. One of the girl’s slender, tanned hands lay on the desk, John Quincy put his own upon it. “Don’t be unhappy,” he urged. “It’s such a wonderful night. The moon—you’re a what-you-may-call-it—a kamaaina, I know, but I’ll bet you never saw the moon looking so well before. It’s like a thousand-dollar gold piece, pale but negotiable. Shall we go out and spend it?”

  Gently she drew her hand away. “There were seven bottles of charged water sent to the room. Thirty-five cents each—”

  “What? Oh, the Brades’ bill. Yes, that means two forty-five more. I’d like to mention the stars too. Isn’t it odd how close the stars seem in the tropics—”

  She smiled. “We mustn’t forget the trunks and bags. Three dollars for bringing them up from the dock.”

  “Say—that’s rather steep. Well, it goes down on the record. Have I ever told you that all this natural beauty out here has left its imprint on your face? In the midst of so much loveliness, one couldn’t be anything but—”

  “Mrs. Brade had three trays to the room. That’s seventy-five cents more.”

  “Extravagant lady! Brade will be sorry he came back, for more reasons than one. Well, I’ve got that. Anything else?”

  “Just the laundry. Ninety-seven cents.”

  “Fair enough. Adding it all up, I get thirty-two dollars and sixty-nine cents. Let’s call it an even thirty-three.”

  She laughed. “Oh, no. We can’t do that.”

  Mrs. Brade came slowly into the lobby from the lanai. She paused at the desk. “Has there been a message?” she inquired.

  “No, Mrs. Brade,” the girl answered. She handed over the slip of paper. “Your bill.”

  “Ah, yes. Mr. Brade will attend to this the moment he returns.”

  “You expect him soon?”

  “I really can’t say.” The Englishwoman moved on into the corridor leading to nineteen.

  “Full of information, as usual,” smiled John Quincy. “Why, here’s Charlie now.”

  Chan came briskly to the desk, followed by another policeman, also in plain clothes.

  “Automobile act noble,” he announced, “having fondly feeling for night air.” He nodded toward his companion. “Introducing Mr. Spencer. Now, what are the situation? Humbly hinting you speak fast.”

  John Quincy told him Kaohla was waiting on the lanai, and mentioned the unwieldy package carried by the boy. Chan nodded.

  “Events are turning over rapidly,” he said. He addressed the girl. “Please kindly relate to this Kaohla that Brade has arrived and would wish to encounter him here.” She hesitated. “No, no,” added Chan hastily, “I forget nice heathen delicacy. It is not pretty I should ask a lady to scatter false lies from ruby lips. I humbly demand forgiveness. Content yourself with a veiled pretext bringing him here.”

  The girl smiled and went out. “Mr. Spencer,” said Chan, “I make bold to suggest you interrogate this Hawaiian. My reckless wanderings among words of unlimitable English language often fail to penetrate sort of skulls plentiful round here.”

  Spencer nodded and went to the side door, standing where he would not be seen by anyone entering there. In a moment Kaohla appeared, followed by the girl. The Hawaiian came in quickly but seeing Chan, stopped, and a frightened look crossed his face. Spencer startled him further by seizing his arm.

  “Come over here,” said the detective. “We want to talk to you.” He led the boy to a far corner of the room. Chan and John Quincy followed. “Sit down—here, I’ll take that.” He removed the heavy package from under the boy’s arm. For a moment the Hawaiian seemed about to protest, but evidently he thought better of it. Spencer placed the package on a table and stood over Kaohla.

  “Want to see Brade, eh?” he began in a threatening tone.

  “Yes.”

  “What for?”

  “Business is private.”

  “Well, I’m telling you to come across. You’re in bad. Better change your mind and talk.”

  “No.”

  “All right. We’ll see about that. What have you got in that package?” The boy’s eyes went to the table, but he made no answer.

  Chan took out a pocket knife. “Simple matter to discover,” he said. He cut the rough twine, unwound several layers of newspapers. John Quincy pressed close; he felt that something important was about to be divulged.

  The last layer of paper came off. “Hot dog!” cried Chan. He turned quickly to John Quincy. “Oh, I am so sorry—I pickup atrocious phrase like that from my cousin Mr. Willie Chan, Captain of All Chinese baseball team—”

  But John Quincy did not hear, his eyes were glued to the object that lay on the table. An ohia wood box, bound with copper—the initials T.M.B.

  “We will unlatch it,” said Chan. He made an examination. “No, locked most strongly. We will crash into it at police station, where you and I and this silent Hawaiian will now hasten. Mr. Spencer, you will remain on spot here. Should Brade appear, you know your duty.”

  “I do,” said Spencer.

  “Mr. Kaohla, do me the honor to accompany,” continued Chan. “At police headquarters much talk will be extracted out of you.”

  They turned toward the door. As they did so, Carlotta Egan came up. “May I speak to you a moment?” she said to John Quincy.

  “Surely.” He walked with her to the desk.

  “I went to the lanai just now,” she whispered breathlessly. “Some one was crouching outside the window near where you were talking. I went closer and it was—Mr. Saladine!”

  “Aha,” said John Quincy. “Mr. Saladine had better drop that sort of thing, or he’ll get himself in trouble.”

  “Should we tell Chan?”

  “Not yet. You and I will do a little investigating ourselves first. Chan has other things to think about. And we don’t want any of our guests to leave unless it’s absolutely necessary.”

  “We certainly don’t,” she smiled. “I’m glad you’ve got the interests of the house at heart.”

  “That’s just where I’ve got them—” John Quincy began, but Chan cut in.

&nb
sp; “Humbly begging pardon,” he said, “we must speed. Captain Hallet will have high delight to encounter this Kaohla, to say nothing of ohia wood box.”

  In the doorway, Kaohla crowded close to John Quincy, and the latter was startled by the look of hate he saw in the boy’s stormy eyes. “You did this,” muttered the Hawaiian. “I don’t forget.”

  Chapter 15

  The Man from India

  They clattered along Kalakaua Avenue in Chan’s car. John Quincy sat alone on the rear seat; at the detective’s request he held the ohia wood box on his knees.

  He rested his hands upon it. Once it had eluded him, but he had it now. His mind went back to that night in the attic two thousand miles away, the shadow against the moonlit window, the sting of a jewel cutting across his cheek. Roger’s heartfelt cry of “Poor old Dan!” Did they hold at last, in this ohia wood box, the answer to the mystery of Dan’s death?

  Hallet was waiting in his room. With him was a keen-eyed, efficient-looking man evidently in his late thirties.

  “Hello, boys,” said the captain. “Mr. Winterslip, meet Mr. Greene, our district court prosecutor.”

  Greene shook hands cordially. “I’ve been wanting to meet you, sir,” he said. “I know your city rather well. Spent three years at your Harvard Law School.”

  “Really?” replied John Quincy with enthusiasm.

  “Yes. I went there after I got through at New Haven. I’m a Yale man, you know.”

  “Oh,” remarked John Quincy, without any enthusiasm at all. But Greene seemed a pleasant fellow, despite his choice of college.

  Chan had set the box on the table before Hallet, and was explaining how they had come upon it. The captain’s thin face had brightened perceptibly. He inspected the treasure. “Locked, eh?” he remarked. “You got the key, Kaohla?”

  The Hawaiian shook his head sullenly. “No.”

  “Watch your step, boy,” warned Hallet. “Go over him, Charlie.”

  Chan went over him, rapidly and thoroughly. He found a key ring, but none of the keys fitted the lock on the box. He also brought to light a fat roll of bills.

  “Where’d you get all that money, Dick?” Hallet inquired.

  “I got it,” glowered the boy.

  But Hallet was more interested in the box. He tapped it lovingly. “This is important, Mr. Greene. We may find the solution of our puzzle in here.” He took a small chisel from his desk, and after a brief struggle, pried open the lid.

  John Quincy, Chan and the prosecutor pressed close, their eyes staring eagerly as the captain lifted the lid. The box was empty.

  “Filled with nothing,” murmured Chan. “Another dream go smash against stone wall.”

  The disappointment angered Hallet. He turned on Kaohla. “Now, my lad,” he said. “I want to hear from you. You’ve been in touch with Brade, you talked with him last Sunday night, you’ve heard he’s returning to-night. You’ve got some deal on with him. Come across and be quick about it.”

  “Nothing to tell,” said the Hawaiian stubbornly.

  Hallet leaped to his feet. “Oh, yes you have. And by heaven, you’re going to tell it. I’m not any too patient tonight and I warn you if you don’t talk and talk quick I’m likely to get rough.” He stopped suddenly and turned to Chan. “Charlie, that Inter-Island boat is due from Maui about now. Get down to the dock and watch for Brade. You’ve got his description?”

  “Sure,” answered Chan. “Thin pale face, one shoulder descended below other, gray mustaches that droop in saddened mood.”

  “That’s right. Keep a sharp lookout. And leave this lad to us. He won’t have any secrets when we get through with him, eh, Mr. Greene?”

  The prosecutor, more discreet, merely smiled.

  “Mr. Winterslip,” said Chan. “The night is delicious. A little stroll to moonly dock—”

  “I’m with you,” John Quincy replied. He looked back over his shoulder as he went, and reflected that he wouldn’t care to be in Kaohla’s shoes.

  The pier-shed was dimly lighted and a small but diversified group awaited the incoming boat. Chan and John Quincy walked to the far end and there, seated on a packing-case, they found the waterfront reporter of the evening paper.

  “Hello, Charlie,” cried Mr. Mayberry. “What you doing here?”

  “Maybe friend arrive on boat,” grinned Chan.

  “Is that so?” responded Mayberry. “You boys over at the station have certainly become pretty mysterious all of a sudden. What’s doing, Charlie?”

  “All pronouncements come from captain,” advised Chan.

  “Yeah, we’ve heard his pronouncements,” sneered Mayberry. “The police have unearthed clues and are working on them. Nothing to report at present. It’s sickening. Well, sit down, Charlie. Oh—Mr. Winterslip—good evening. I didn’t recognize you at first.”

  “How are you,” said John Quincy. He and Chan also found packing-cases. There was a penetrating odor of sugar in the air. Through a wide opening in the pier-shed they gazed along the waterfront and out upon the moonlit harbor. A rather exotic and intriguing scene, John Quincy reflected, and he said as much.

  “Think so?” answered Mayberry. “Well, I don’t. To me it’s just like Seattle or Galveston or any of those stereotyped ports. But you see—I knew it when—”

  “I think you mentioned that before,” John Quincy smiled.

  “I’m likely to mention it at any moment. As far as I’m concerned, the harbor of Honolulu has lost its romance. Once this was the most picturesque waterfront in the world, my boy. And now look at the damned thing!” The reporter relighted his pipe. “Charlie can tell you—he remembers. The old ramshackle, low-lying wharves. Old Naval Row with its sailing ships. The wooden-hulled steamers with a mast or two—not too proud to use God’s good winds occasionally. The bright little row-boats, the Aloha, the Manu, the Emma. Eh, Chan?”

  “All extinct,” agreed Chan.

  “You wouldn’t see a Rotary Club gang like this on a pier in those days,” Mayberry continued. “Just Hawaiian stevedores with leis on their hats and ukuleles in their hands. Fishermen with their nets, and maybe a breezy old-time purser—a glad-hander and not a mere machine.” He puffed a moment in sad silence. “Those were the days, Mr. Winterslip, the days of Hawaii’s isolation, and her charm. The cable and the radio hadn’t linked us up with the so-called civilization of the mainland. Every boat that came in we’d scamper over it, hunting a newspaper with the very latest news of the outside world. Remember those steamer days, Charlie, when everybody went down to the wharf in the good old hacks of yesteryear, when the women wore holokus and lauhala hats, and Berger was there with his band, and maybe a prince or two—”

  “And the nights,” suggested Charlie.

  “Yeah, old-timer, I was coming to the nights. The soft nights when the serenaders drifted about the harbor in rowboats, and the lanterns speared long paths on the water—”

  He seemed about to weep. John Quincy’s mind went back to books he had read in his boyhood.

  “And occasionally,” he said, “I presume somebody went aboard a ship against his will?”

  “I’ll say he did,” replied Mr. Mayberry, brightening at the thought. “Why, it was only in the ’nineties I was sitting one night on a dock a few yards down, when I saw a scuffle near the landing, and one of my best friends shouted to me: ‘Good-by, Pete!’ I was up and off in a minute, and I got him away from them—I was younger in those days. He was a good fellow, a sailorman, and he wasn’t intending to take the journey that bunch had planned for him. They’d got him into a saloon and drugged him, but he pulled out of it just in time—oh, well, those days are gone forever now. Just like Galveston or Seattle. Yes, sir, this harbor of Honolulu has lost its romance.”

  The little Inter-Island boat was drawing up to the pier, and they watched it come. As the gangplank went down, Chan rose.

  “Who you expecting, Charlie?” asked Mayberry.

  “We grope about,” said Chan. “Maybe on this boat are Mr. Brad
e.”

  “Brade!” Mayberry leaped to his feet.

  “Not so sure,” warned Chan. “Only a matter we suppose. If correct, humbly suggest you follow to the station. You might capture news.”

  John Quincy and Chan moved up to the gangplank as the passengers descended. There were not many aboard. A few Island business men, a scattering of tourists, a party of Japanese in Western clothes, ceremoniously received by friends ashore—a quaint little group all bowing from the waist. John Quincy was watching them with interest when Chan touched his arm.

  A tall stooped Englishman was coming down the plank. Thomas Macan Brade would have been easily spotted in any crowd. His mustache was patterned after that of the Earl of Pawtucket, and to make identification even simpler, he wore a white pith helmet. Pith helmets are not necessary under the kindly skies of Hawaii; this was evidently a relic of Indian days.

  Chan stepped forward. “Mr. Brade?”

  The man had a tired look in his eyes. He started nervously. “Y—yes,” he hesitated.

  “I am Detective-Sergeant Chan. Honolulu police. You will do me the great honor to accompany me to the station, if you please.”

  Brade stared at him, then shook his head. “It’s quite impossible,” he said.

  “Pardon me, please,” answered Chan. “It are unevitable.”

  “I—I have just returned from a journey,” protested the man. “My wife may be worried regarding me. I must have a talk with her, and after that—”

  “Regret,” purred Chan, “are scorching me. But duty remains duty. Chief’s words are law. Humbly suggest we squander valuable time.”

  “Am I to understand that I’m under arrest?” flared Brade.

  “The idea is preposterous,” Chan assured him. “But the captain waits eager for statement from you. You will walk this way, I am sure. A moment’s pardon. I introduce my fine friend, Mr. John Quincy Winterslip, of Boston.”

  At mention of the name, Brade turned and regarded John Quincy with deep interest. “Very good,” he said. “I’ll go with you.”

  They went out to the street, Brade carrying a small handbag. The flurry of arrival was dying fast. Honolulu would shortly return to its accustomed evening calm.