by Harold Lamb
Lemoire cast a fleeting glance at his sister, and was silent for a calculating moment. Gladys’s beautiful face was impassive, but he knew that she seldom showed her thoughts—if it were not advisable.
“Haven’t you?” he meditated. “What was the idea of the Boston sleeper, then? I’ll go over what happened again—if you’ve maybe forgot something, sister. First-off, there’s you and me at the Charity Ball, real swells, just like in the movie fetes. Close-up of the Hoffman jewels in the necklace worn by old Mrs. S. Van D. Hoffman. You get me, Gladys? This is the way the movies would have it. Sub-title: fifty thousand bucks’ worth of family heirloom. All right. Another close-up of me and you passing the Hoffman table at supper-time. Business of snipping the gold chain—necklace falls into your cloak. Old-time stuff, that, but good, all the same!”
“I ain’t forgotten,” amended Gladys.
“Nothing? Well—scene changes. Modern apartment on Riverside, the den of the thieves. Fo Lon, butler of the Lemoires, appears and announces the bulls are all stirred up over the theft—going to raid the apartment on suspicion, just because we was there at the Charity Ball. What’s to be done? Close-up of Tom Lemoire outwitting the police. He takes the jewels outa their setting in front of the beautiful vamp—that’s you, Gladys—and hides them in the legs of a ivory elephant. Subtitle: Where will he put the elephant?”
“It was my idea to send it to Wong Li,” observed the woman. “Wong is a good fence; we could trust him. Look here, Torn! Fo Lon couldn’t have known the jewels was in the elephant, could he? And we didn’t put Wong wise. All we told him, in the message Fo took, was to keep the thing in his shop and not to sell it because we was going to call for it.”
“Let me finish me drama,” Lemoire settled himself in his chair and lit another cigarette. “Scene showing the bulls giving the apartment the once-over. Nothin’ doin’. Lemoire is outraged. Good Raffles stuff there, Gladys! The phone rings. Close-up of police-sergeant at Lemoire phone. Sub-title: Gladys Lemoire is caught in New Haven.”
The woman leaned back with a smile.
“Did I have the sapphires? The cops didn’t find anything on me.”
Once more Lemoire’s darting glance sought his sister, and his faded eyes closed thoughtfully. Women, he thought, had a way of doing things you could not figure on. Perhaps Gladys did not have the jewels. But the fact that the cops found nothing did not prove it. Lemoire watched her as he talked.
“Scene changes again. Front of Wong’s elegant art shop. Crowd rushes into the shop. Sub-title: Who shot Wong? Close-up of the shop counter. The elephant is missin’. Loud music and drums. Sub-title: Ten minutes later. Flash of beautiful vamp boardin’ the train—”
Gladys Lemoire sprang to her feet, her eyes narrowed dangerously.
“Where d’you get that stuff, Tom? You mean to say I did in Wong and got away with that ivory elephant? I can prove I was never in the store that day!”
Lemoire raised a deprecating hand.
“Don’t you like my drama, sister? I never said you was in Wong’s. I said he was shot—by somebody. We won’t get wise to who it is, ’cause we don’t get admitted into the hospital, if we dare try. Wong’s pretty near kicked in. And Fo ain’t here to tell us. Got onto the raid on the apartment, and lays low for a while—maybe in Chinatown.
“Now there’s two people knew them sapphires was in that elephant. Me and you, sister. The cops had me all the while the shooting was done. Get me? But you was near the spot—got on the train a few minutes later. Likewise—I heard the sergeant talkin’ with New Haven over the wire—they found an ivory elephant in your bag. Now, come across, sister. All I want to know is—where are the Hoffman jewels? That’s all.”
CHAPTER VI
Cross-Purposes
The blue in Gladys Lemoire’s eyes deepened to the hue of the missing sapphires. Her shapely mouth curved slightly, allowing some of the cigarette-smoke she had in her lungs to issue forth, tracing a hazy spiral to the ceiling. Certain patrons of Broadway taverns would have opened rare, imported wines to see that friendly, faintly malicious smile that Tom Lemoire now saw. Her voice was its gentlest contralto.
“Tom,” she responded softly, “you’re guessing both ways from the ace. So you’re goin’ to bawl me, because your fool play lost us the Hoffman sapphires? Ain’t you proud of yourself, now, bleating like a sucker? You think I got the sapphires?”
“I know somebody got ’em,” retorted Lemoire blandly, “and I know you had the ivory elephant in your bag when the cops found you on the Boston train, sister. All I’m askin’ is—put me wise! Let’s hear you talk: I’m a good listener.”
“Yes—you didn’t miss nothing the sergeant said over the wire. Well, I’ll tell you just what I did Friday night. I quit the city because I knew the bulls was goin’ to watch the Lemoire family for a coupla days, like they loved us. Would I try that if I had those sparklers of yours on me?”
Lemoire made no response beyond a slight shrug. Gladys tucked an errant curl neatly into place, with a glance into the French mirror that took in her brother’s sulky face.
“I wasn’t fool enough to go near Wong’s place. You know he’s got a clean slate with the bulls, Tom, and he’s treated us well. That Fifth Av’noo joint of his is a swell blind. I went to the train in a taxi and got on the sleeper too late to buy a berth. I sat down in a section with a man I never seen before. After the train started he pulled out his grip and looked at—”
‘’The ivory elephant, I suppose?’’
“That’s what he did. I wasn’t sure it was ours. But I had to find out. So when the young gent went to the diner and the porter made up the berth, I pulled the lonesome-lady stuff—said I had to have a berth. I tipped the darky two bucks and he let me stay in the section. The guy’s bag was on the berth. I drew the curtains and started to work it open with some of my keys, keeping quiet as I could, naturally.
“The next minute in comes a hand through the curtains with this elephant in it. It gave me the sudden chills, but I saw it wasn’t the guy’s hand, because it set down this beast and started to feel around the bag for the lock. I tapped it with my keys, and it shot back between the curtains, leavin’ the ivory animal—which I grabbed.”
Tom Lemoire studied the tracery of smoke hovering about the ceiling, and a sneer crept to his thin lips.
“You learned a lot on the stage, sister. But I got no softenin’ of the upper-works—”
“Tom, the elephant that hand dropped wasn’t our pachyderm, but it was a whole lot like it.”
“Poor stuff, sister. Why didn’t you grab the real one in the guy’s bag?”
“Because twenty minutes later we was in New Haven and the bulls rushed me off. Besides, the porter came for the bag before I could open it.”
“Then what was the dark, mysterious hand doin’ with an ivory elephant like the one we had—eh? Them things don’t grow twins, that I know of!”
“You know as much about that as I’ll tell you.”
“Let’s see the elephant.”
The woman motioned indifferently toward her bedroom, and Lemoire presently returned with her suitcase. From it he took a carved ivory curio.
“Looks like ours,” he admitted.
“Sure, I figure somebody else knew the real article was in that bag and tried to get it,” assented Gladys, “and plant the dummy, not being wise to the fact I was in the berth.”
Lemoire pushed at the animal’s eyes and scrutinized its feet with practiced glance. Then he tossed it on the table with an oath. The sneer crept to his eyes.
“I’m damned if I’ll let you make a sucker out of me, Gladys. You’ve slipped your cute little tricks over on me too often—just once too often. I got a brain, and that brain tells me what you pulled off on Wong—and me. Listen to Tom, sister! This mysterious gent, who had lower eight, is in with you—one of your gilt-edge boys that you figure to double-cross me with. All right.
“You tip him off about the sapphires and their hidin’-place
. He gets the elephant from Wong—shoots him up some—catches the Boston train. I read about the guy with the suitcase in the papers yesterday morning. This cute animal here is a plant—see! Your friend was goin’ to switch elephants on Wong, only his play was interfered with. You keep the dummy for future use. And try to string me with this fade-away mystery stuff! Your friend kept the sapphires. He follows you back to town and hands over the stuff—just to see you smile at him.”
Gladys smiled, and Lemoire was not quick enough to read something like triumph in his sister’s face.
“If it makes you feel good to think that, I won’t quarrel, Tom,” she said. “I’ve done all the explaining I’m goin’ to. If you’d trusted Wong more, or not at all, you’d have had the Hoffman stones now. Instead, you half-trusted him. That was your idea. I didn’t ask you to try it out. It looked bad to me. Wong wouldn’t have put the wheeze on us if he’d known the sapphires was in the elephant. Now they’re gone. It’s a free-for-all. After your lovin’ words, I’ll play my hand alone for a while!”
Lemoire halted before her, hands twisting against his sides, eyes narrowed. She paid no attention to him.
“There’s fifty thousand bucks’ worth of blue stones planted away somewhere, Gladys,” he snarled, “and I’ll bet the limit you know where!”
“I think I do,” she responded.
Her brother’s imprecation was cut short by the whir of the telephone. Lemoire jerked up the receiver. His face changed after the first word over the wire.
“It’s Fo Lon talkin’,” he announced grimly, replacing the receiver. “He’s cool-in’ his heels in Mott Street—wants to know why the bulls is out after him. I guess they know he’s one of our crowd. He wants to see me, Gladys. I’m goin’ to chin with him now. I’ll get him to see Wong, as soon as it can be done. Today’s Sunday. Well, Fo can see Wong by Tuesday, maybe, and I’ll know what happened in that shop.”
“You’ll be wise, then.”
Lemoire caught up his hat.
“If Wong tells us,” he said slowly, “that this guy who shot him and made the getaway came to his joint lookin’ for the ivory elephant there—well, I’ll know who tipped him off to it. I ain’t forgot, Gladys, that only you and me knew them sapphires was there.”
The smile with which the girl watched her brother depart vanished as soon as the door slammed after him. Her face was serious as she sought her suitcase. Taking a slip of paper from her hand-bag, she caught up the telephone directory. She ran through the pages until she came to something that satisfied her. After comparing the slip of paper with the directory she took up the receiver.
CHAPTER VII
At Macdougal Street
Mrs. Hollis had selected her nephew’s rooms for the accommodation of herself and Ruth during their stay in New York for good reasons. The rooms were in Macdougal Street, near the artists’ colony of Washington Square—always a spot of interest to visitors—and consisted of a sunny bedroom, sitting-room, and bath. Much to be preferred, thought Mrs. Hollis, to an expensive hotel—especially as she knew her nephew to be well endowed with the neatness of some bachelors of twenty-six. They would find, she told Ruth, every chair and book in the apartment in its place.
So it was with a gasp of surprise that she surveyed the sitting-room when Hollis flung the door open upon their arrival in Washington Square Tuesday noon. Hollis, at her heels, stared and whistled softly. Ruth cast an inquiring glance from the room to him and her aunt.
Neat and orderly the place might have been once. Now, however, the contents of the table lay upon the rug; cigarette ashes strewed the floor. The books in the shelves were piled haphazard where they had once stood in orderly array. A cupboard stood open, disclosing a medley of tobacco tins, pipes, and beer steins.
Mrs. Hollis advanced to the bedroom with compressed lips. The condition of this was even worse. The bedclothes lay in a tousled heap. Garments of masculine gender littered the chairs. She even scented a stale odor of tobacco about the chamber.
“Andy Hollis!” she uttered. “Have you lost every sense of decency? My goodness! To leave your things like this and not tell me about it, when you knew I was bringing Ruth here.”
Hollis set down the suitcases he was carrying and glanced about his quarters quizzically. He avoided the eye of Miss Carruthers. Indeed, that young lady had exchanged scarcely a word with him since leaving New Hampshire.
“Remember, Aunt Emma,” he responded, “you came here at your own suggestion and risk. However, I assure you I left this place in decent condition. All this must have happened while I was away. Probably some friend has exercised a sense of humor in a rather poor sort of joke.”
His aunt dived among the pile of garments on a chair and emerged with a woman’s kid glove crumpled into a ball.
“Andy”—her voice echoed genuine surprise—“I never knew a lady to play a joke like this. This glove isn’t yours, is it?”
Hollis shook his head, frowning. He felt that Ruth Carruthers was looking at him. Why that should disturb him, he did not know. Somehow he found that his cousin’s calm indifference to his presence was disturbing—strangely so, in view of the fact that he cared nothing for her, as he told himself.
“Probably there was a girl with whoever did this,” he suggested. “Wild kind of creatures around these diggings on the Square, you know.”
Mrs. Hollis sniffed audibly and muttered something about cigarettes. Hollis thought he heard his cousin giggle, but when he glanced at her, Ruth’s expression was quite serious. He moved to the telephone and asked the housekeeper to come up.
When Mrs. Henderson presented her bulky, apron-enveloped figure and good-natured Irish face at the door, Hollis pointed to his violated chambers dramatically.
“If this is a house-warming, in honor of my return, Mrs. Henderson,” he said grimly, “I’ll thank you to assure my aunt of the fact. If not, what kind of a crowd did you let into the apartment?”
Mrs. Henderson’s solid jaw dropped and the curtsy she had started for Mrs. Hollis was arrested midway.
“Now, what d’ye think o’ that?” she ejaculated. “These rooms was as neat as me own when I showed up your visitor Sunday night.”
“My visitor? What was his name?”
The housekeeper shook her head in dumb bewilderment.
“I tell ye, Mrs. Hollis, I never seen the like. We keep this place as clean for Mr. Hollis as yer heart could wish.”
“I don’t doubt that, Mrs. Henderson,” admitted that lady significantly. “It must have been one of his friends, playing a joke.”
Mrs. Henderson looked puzzled.
“Now it was a lady I showed up here Sunday night—came in a taxi, and asked if Mr. Hollis was back yet. When I told her no, she said she’d just run up an’ leave a note for him, seein’ as she was to meet him at the Boston Express Friday an’ didn’t do it. She said she was afeared he’d be grievin’ if she didn’t leave the note. Sur-re, I knew Mr. Hollis had took the Boston train, and I thought it was all right.”
Hollis ransacked his brain for the identity of a possible feminine correspondent without success. He had always shunned the society of women. Moreover, he had made no appointment with anyone to see him off Friday.
“No one else has been here?”
“Not a soul. I haven’t been up mesilf, thinkin’ the place was all to rights, an’ the key has never left me pocket.”
Hollis followed Mrs. Henderson to the door and stepped outside after her, at her summoning nod.
“Whist! Mr. Hollis,” she whispered, “I thought I’d best tell ye alone what the lady said—bein’ as Mrs. Hollis seems to be distur-rbed. The lady said to tell ye she would like your comp’ny at the Green Pig tearoom on Eighth Street tonight at seven thir-rty. She said it was important.”
“Did she give her name?”
“Not a word. She was a big, fine-lookin’ blond lady, wearin’ furs. I thought ye would know her, now.”
“Well, I don’t.” The description, however, stirr
ed Hollis’s memory. Coupled with the mention of the Boston Express, it guided his thoughts to the striking-looking woman who had shared his seat on the sleeper. But she had not known his name. There was the letter he had read, however, within a yard of her. Moreover, he had left the letter addressed to him loosely stuffed in the pocket of his overcoat on the seat.
It was possible that the woman, if she had desired, had learned his name from the letter. But why was she interested in him? Because of the yellow elephant? Again, why?
Suddenly Hollis whistled softly, meditatively The yellow elephant? Worth fourteen dollars and a half, according to Wong Li himself. But had he put the imitation animal in his bag? It had been standing beside the valuable Ming curio. In his haste he had scarcely observed the one he had caught up. And they had looked very much alike—to Hollis, who did not know real ivory from the imitation.
Enlightenment flooded on him swiftly.
“The real, good solid ivory is where my brains ought to be,” he thought. “Great Scott! The beast I took from Wong Li’s was the Ming antique. No wonder Aunt Emma was pleased with it.”
Several things were now clear. He recalled the startled shout of Wong Li as he ran from the shop, the assertion of Mrs. Hollis that his gift was a treasure. But there was the attempted theft in the train to be explained. If the light-fingered Oriental had known that he had the Ming antique, the individual in question must have come from Wong Li’s shop.
If so, why had he not simply explained the mistake to Hollis and claimed the curio? Then there was the woman of lower eight, who was sufficiently interested to search his apartment. Why? The secret compartments of the curio? Empty. And the shooting of Wong Li?
“As the novels have it, there is more in this than meets the eye,” he thought. “And Gladys is the one who can explain it.”
Hollis grinned. Here was a woman who appropriated his berth, rifled his baggage, ransacked his apartment, and invited herself to dinner with him. Very well. He would meet her and find out what she wanted. The fact that he was completely in the dark as to what his visitor wanted only clinched his decision. Still, he was not to dine with Ruth. He had vaguely hoped to restore the intimacy between them. It would not be unpleasant to show his pretty cousin the sights of the town. Yes, he knew now that she was pretty.