The Oblivious Heiress: A Jane Carter Historical Cozy (Book Four) (Jane Carter Historical Cozy Mysteries 4)

by Alice Simpson

  Mr. Roberts shook his head.

  “I have made my decision,” he said. “As long as I can, I shall abide by it.”

  There was nothing I could do but bid Mr. Roberts good evening and leave the house. His secret troubled me. If he had been entirely truthful with me, it seemed very foolish of him to meet the demands of a blackmailer. I wondered if there were aspects of the case which Mr. Roberts had kept from me.

  I pulled Bouncing Betsy into our driveway and jumped out to open the garage doors. I was startled by a man who had been sitting on the back doorstep of the house. He got up and came toward me. His face was hidden, but I knew it was not my father. It was not Jack, either.

  “Who is it?” I called out uneasily.

  “It’s Harry, Mrs. Carter. I’ve been waiting for you.”

  “What brings you here?” I asked, hurrying to meet him. “I hope nothing bad has happened at the Press building.”

  “Everything’s fine there, but I’ve got a letter here that I thought you would want to see right away. Found it tonight when I was sweeping up. It answers a lot of questions you’ve been askin’.”

  I took the paper from Harry’s gnarled hand.

  “Not about Marcus Roberts?” I asked.

  “Read it and you’ll see. Roberts was blackmailed just as I always thought. And by the man who signed this letter.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  It was too dark for me to read the letter. Stepping to the car, I switched on Bouncing Betsy’s headlights and held the paper in her brilliant beam.

  The letter read:

  Dear Marcus,

  Sorry to bother you again, Old Pal, but I know you’re always willing to give an old buddy and cellmate a helping hand. I don’t want to tip off the New York cops where you are, and you can trust me to keep mum if you come through with another six thousand. This is my last request.

  Paul F.

  “Paul Firth!” I said. “And it’s no surprise, either! Harry, where did you find this letter?”

  “It was in a pile of rubbish down in the basement. I don’t know how it got there.”

  “Paul Firth has a habit of leaving notes on Mr. Roberts’ desk,” I said. “This one may have blown off and been swept out without the publisher seeing it!”

  “Don’t you figure it’s a blackmail attempt?”

  “Without question. You’ve not shown the letter to anyone?”

  “Only to you. From the threat, it seems that Roberts was sent to prison years ago, but never finished his sentence, and he’s still wanted.”

  I nodded as I placed the letter in my pocketbook. Harry’s guess was a shrewd one, but I could tell him nothing without breaking my promise to Mr. Roberts.

  “Mr. Horner,” I said, “a great deal hinges upon this letter. You’ll not tell anyone what you’ve learned?”

  “I’ll keep it to myself. I’m not one to get Roberts into additional trouble. He’s had enough of it already.”

  Father’s car was not in the garage. Since he had not come home, he must be working late at the Examiner office as he frequently did.

  “Jump in, Mr. Horner,” I said, swinging wide the car door. “I’m going downtown to find Dad. I’ll give you a ride.”

  I was grateful that the pressman had little to say as we sped through dimly-lit residential streets. How much he suspected I could only guess, but the letter had made it clear to me that the former publisher never had completed his ten-year prison sentence. That was why he didn’t answer me when I asked about Henrietta’s age. He must have escaped from prison soon after he was sent there. No longer did I wonder why Mr. Roberts had not refused Paul Firth’s repeated demands for money. Obviously, he had feared a far worse fate than exposure—he had feared being returned to the New York state prison.

  I parked Bouncing Betsy next to the deserted loading dock at the back of the Examiner building. A few windows were lighted. At this hour, the day staff had gone home, and only the scrub women were at work. I could not see the windows of my father’s office from the street.

  Harry stepped from the running board and thanked me for the ride.

  “Guess I’ll amble up the street and get a cup of coffee.”

  “You’ll be sure not to mention the letter?” I reminded him.

  “I won’t tell a soul. You know, I was thinkin’ about it as we rode downtown. Paul Firth came into the office a couple of times just before Roberts closed the plant. He was a dirty blackmailer, all right. Wouldn’t that letter I gave you be enough to send him up?”

  “I should think so, Harry. But the problem is how to take care of him without ruining Mr. Roberts.”

  “Better show the letter to your father. Maybe, he’ll have some ideas.”

  Harry tipped his hat headed down the sidewalk.

  I entered the rear vestibule, speaking to three scrub women who were locking up their cleaning equipment in preparation to leave the building. Not even the elevator man was on duty, so I climbed the stairs. I switched on a light in the newsroom as I passed through it to my father’s office.

  The room was dark. My father was gone. I decided to telephone home, so I left my handbag sitting on Jack’s desk and entered one of the glass-enclosed telephone booths at the end of the newsroom.

  As I lifted the receiver, a voice from behind me said, “Put that down!”

  I whirled around. Paul Firth stood in the doorway of the booth.

  “Come out of there!” he ordered.

  I obeyed. I was likely alone in the building, save for Firth who stood between me and the outside door.

  “What do you want here, Mr. Firth?” I demanded with far more confidence than I felt.

  “The letter.”

  I stared back at him.

  “Don’t pretend you don’t know,” Firth said. “I want the letter you and that old man were talking about.”

  “You heard our conversation?”

  “I happened to be standing in the loading dock. I know you have the letter. Hand it over.”

  I pushed past Mr. Firth and he let me. Then I backed a few steps away toward my father’s office.

  “So, you admit you wrote it?” I challenged.

  “I admit nothing. But I want that letter.”

  “You’ll not get it,” I said. “Paul Firth, you were the one who put that warning note on my desk a few days ago. And I know why, too. You were afraid I’d learn too much about the octopus tattoo. Well, I’ve learned plenty.”

  Firth’s face contorted with rage.

  “You’ve been down in the cave!” he snarled and finally made a move to grab me.

  I gave him a sharp kick in the shin with my pointed-toed pump. He cried out in pain, and I eluded his grasp. I darted into my father’s office and slammed the door. Bracing my body against it, I managed to turn the key before Firth could force it open.

  “Come out of there!” he shouted. “Come out, I say!”

  “And I say I won’t! Just try to get in!”

  I managed to push my father’s heavy desk across the room, jamming it up against the door.

  Firth rattled the handle several times and threw his body against the panel once or twice. Then I heard footsteps as he walked away. It was only a trick to get me to come out. There was no way he’d give up that easily. Doubtless, he was still lurking outside in the newsroom. I decided to stay where I was.

  I walked to the window and looked down at the cars passing along the street. If I shouted for help someone might hear me. However, it might prove difficult to explain my predicament from three stories up.

  The telephone had fallen from the desk to the floor. I picked it up and dialed the number of my own house. Mrs. Timms answered.

  “Hello,” I said, falsely cheerful. “Dad hasn’t come home yet, by any chance?”

  “He’s just now driving into the garage,” the housekeeper replied. “I’ll call him.”

  A moment later I heard my father’s voice at the other end of the wire.

  “Dad,” I said, “I’m
down at your office, sitting behind a barbed wire barricade. I wish you’d get a policeman and see what you can do about rescuing me.”

  “Is this one of your jokes?” My father demanded.

  I was afraid my father would hang up the receiver, so I talked fast and to the point. Dad promised that he would come without a moment’s delay.

  I was optimistic that my father—hopefully accompanied by a couple of burly officers of the law—would catch Paul Firth lurking, and the man would be arrested. With Mr. Firth safely locked away for at least a few hours, I could drive out to the Willows and learn what he was hiding in his storm cellar.

  I was just congratulating myself on my cleverness when I sniffed the air. I smelled smoke, and I thought it must be coming from a cigarette. I figured Firth had decided to pass the time waiting for me to emerge by having a gasper.

  But, as the odor of smoke grew stronger, I saw a wisp of it filter beneath the crack at the bottom of the door. My heart caught in my throat. That was no mere cigarette burning in the newsroom. I decided that perhaps Firth was burning the papers from a scrap basket just to frighten me into coming out of my father’s barricaded office.

  I pulled the heavy desk away from the door and stood with my ear against the door. I heard the crackle of flames. The wood felt warm to my cheek. That was no mere burning waste paper.

  Frantically, I turned the key in the lock.

  The door swung outward to the pressure of my shoulder. A wave of heat rushed in.

  I staggered backward, horrified. At the end of the newsroom, where the exit should have been, rose a towering barrier of flames.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Escape through the newsroom was cut off. Panic seized me, but only for an instant. I retreated to Dad’s office and telephoned the fire department. Then I doused my cardigan in the water I dumped out of the vase of flowers on Dad’s desk and placed it over my nose and mouth. I went out of Dad’s office, hastily shutting the door tight behind me and retrieved the chemical extinguisher which hung on the wall of the newsroom. I attempted to fight the flames, but black, rolling smoke billowed into my face, choking and blinding me. The heat drove me back into my father’s office.

  From far down the street came the wail of a siren. I rushed to a window. A pumper and a hook-and-ladder truck swung around the corner, lurching to a stop.

  I raised the sash, stepped out onto the ledge, and waved to the men below.

  “Stay where you are!” shouted a fireman. “We’ll come to you!”

  A ladder shot up, but I did not wait to be carried to safety. Before a fireman could mount, I scrambled down it.

  “The fire started in the newsroom,” I said when I reached the street. “But it’s already spread into the composing department.”

  “Anyone else in the building?”

  “I don’t think so. There were three scrubwomen, but they’ve probably gone home by now.”

  Lines of hose were stretched to the hydrants, and streams of water began to play on the flames. A crowd, following in the wake of the fire engines, was ordered back by the police.

  As I stood in the street watching the flames, a felt an arm go around me.

  “Jack!”

  “How did it start?” he demanded. “Jane, your hair is singed!”

  “I was inside there, until a few minutes ago,” I said. “Until the boys in red sent up a ladder, and I scrabbled down it. I can’t explain it all now, but the fire was started by Paul Firth.”

  “On purpose?”

  “I don’t know that for certain. He was smoking a cigarette.”

  “Have you told the police?”

  “Not yet. I’m waiting for Dad.”

  A car inched through the crowd, stopping a few yards away. Dad leaped out and ran toward the burning building. He was stopped at the entrance by a fireman.

  “Let me in there! My daughter’s inside!”

  “No, here I am, Dad!”

  I ran toward him and grasped his hand.

  Dad pulled me to him in a rough embrace, but the next moment he was trying once more to enter the building, intent on saving important papers.

  “Take it easy, Mr. Fielding,” advised the fireman, barring the door with his hose. “The smoke’s bad in there, you wouldn’t make it halfway up the stairs before you’d pass out from breathing in fumes.”

  “Will the building go?”

  “We’ll save most of it,” the fireman assured him.

  I plucked at my father’s sleeve.

  “Dad, oughtn’t the police be sent after Paul Firth? He’s responsible for this, and a lot of other things, too!”

  “You mean Firth set the fire?”

  Above the roar of flames, I explained how the man had compelled me to take refuge in my father’s inner office and barricade the door. Jack also heard the story, and when I had finished, he said Dad: “Chief, let me take a couple of policemen and nail that fellow! Maybe we can arrest him at the farm before he makes a get-away.”

  “Go ahead,” said my father.

  “I’m going along,” I said, and darted away before my father could protest.

  Twenty minutes later, with a police cruiser dispatched some ten minutes behind us, Jack and I drove to the Willows in Dad’s car.

  We parked down the road and walked cautiously toward the farmhouse which loomed dark against the sky. No lights burned in the windows. The grounds appeared deserted.

  “Looks as if Firth isn’t here,” observed Jack. “No use waiting for the police.”

  Boldly going to the front door, Jack pounded on it, ordering in a loud voice: “Open up!”

  “He’s not here,” I said. “Unless perhaps, he’s hiding.”

  “The place looks deserted to me.”

  I still had the key to the padlock on the door of Paul Firth’s storm cellar in my pocket. I walked over to the entrance to the cave.

  “It’s locked,” Jack said, indicating the padlock.

  “I have the key.”

  Jack held the flashlight as I tried to fit the key into the lock.

  “It’s no go, Jane,” Jack said. “You must have gotten the wrong key, somehow.”

  “But I was so sure, Jack.” I stooped to examine the padlock. “Well, no wonder! It’s been changed.”

  “Then we’re out of luck until the police get here.”

  “Isn’t there any way we can open it ourselves?”

  “Maybe I can break it.”

  “There should be tools in the barn, Jack.”

  “I’ll see what I can find.”

  Jack disappeared in the direction of the barn. I extinguished the flashlight and waited. Jack had been gone only a moment when I heard running footsteps. Barely had I crouched down behind the storm cave before a man emerged from among the pine trees adjoining the road. It was Paul Firth, and he was breathing hard.

  He ran straight to the cave. He paused in front of the door, looked furtively about and then fumbled with the padlock. In desperate haste, he jerked it loose, swung back the hinged door and descended the stone steps.

  I crept to the entrance.

  Firth had not taken time to close the door behind him. A light shone from an underground room at one side of the main passageway, and I could hear the man’s heavy boots scuffing on a cement floor.

  I considered waiting for Jack and decided against it. Firth’s frantic haste suggested that he might not linger long in the cave. What could he be doing beneath ground?

  With Jack so near, I felt that it would not be too dangerous to investigate. I crept noiselessly down the steps.

  A low, rounded doorway opened from the descending passage. When I peered into the dimly lighted room, I did not immediately see Paul Firth.

  Instead, I saw what appeared to be a workshop. Tools were neatly arranged over a bench, while a cupboard of shelves contained miscellaneous mechanical parts.

  At the far end of the cave stood an urn-like contrivance which I took to be an electric furnace. An armored cable ran from it to a h
eavy wall switch having two blades and a sizable wooden handle. Plainly it was designed to carry a very heavy current.

  Paul Firth came from behind the furnace and threw the switch. Almost immediately the metal oven began to hiss. The furnace heated until it emitted a red glow.

  I heard a slight sound at the stairway entrance. Thinking that Jack had returned, I started up the steps. Not one figure but three loomed in the doorway.

  I flattened myself against the dirt wall, but I could not avoid being seen. A flashlight beam blinded me, and the next instant a revolver muzzle bit into my side.

  “Keep quiet! You won’t be hurt!”

  I stared into the grim face of Anchor Jim. Behind him came Richard Hamsted, and a man I had never seen before. As quietly as the men had moved, they had been heard in the next room.

  “Who’s there?” Firth called out.

  Richard Hamsted and Anchor Jim stepped into the rectangle of light, their revolvers trained upon the man.

  “Just three of your old pals, Otto,” drawled Anchor Jim. “Reach!”

  “Listen, Jim, you got me all wrong,” Paul Firth whined. “I can explain why I kept the gold. I’ll give it all to you if that’s what you want. I’ll do anything—don’t shoot.”

  “Shootin’ would be too good for you,” retorted Anchor Jim, his face dark with rage. “We got other plans.”

  “Sure, we know how to deal with a traitor,” added Richard Hamsted, whisking a revolver from Firth’s hip pocket. “You thought you could hide from us. You thought by changing your name and coming to this out-of-the-way town you could fool us. You dirty rat, you even thought you could get by with pushing me off a bridge!”

  “Your greed kept you here,” taunted Anchor Jim. “You couldn’t bear to leave any of those gold bars behind.”

  “You thought you’d melt down the last of ’em tonight and skip,” added Richard Hamsted. “You’re goin’ on a long trip all right, but with us!”

  Hamsted slipped a pair of steel cuffs over Firth’s wrists. The sailors hastily searched the cave, gathering up several bags of what I assumed to be gold.