Maddox Munitions was saved!
CHAPTER XXV
THE ADVENTURESS
THERE was no use in our staying longer in New York, for the turn in the market had come, and it was able to take care of itself.
Up in our little office, Kennedy began hastily to pack up what of the stuff he wanted to save, and was just finishing when the telephone rang.
It was Hastings, who had been trying to locate us all the morning. The flurry in the market had very much excited him, and the final upward turn had not served to decrease his excitement.
‘There don’t seem to be many trains to Westport in the middle of the day,’ I heard Kennedy consider over the wire. ‘Your car is here? Well, can you go back there with us? Yes—right away.’
As he hung up he turned to me. ‘Poor old Hastings hasn’t been able to practise his profession for the last few days,’ Craig smiled. ‘He wants me to hurry up the case. We’ll see what we can do. He’s coming up for us in his car, and then we’ll shoot out to Westport.’
It was a beautiful day, but none of us appreciated it much as we slid along the splendid roads from the city. There was only one subject uppermost in my mind, at least. Whence had come this new stock-market attack? Who was back of the series of violent deeds which had taken place in less than a week? Above all, where were the precious telautomaton plans?
At least it was some relief, when we swung into Westport, to know that we were back again at the main scene of action, and I felt that now events would develop rapidly.
Burke was waiting impatiently at the Lodge, though it did not seem as though our arrival was the only thing he had on his mind.
‘What was it you found in the little store-room in the cellar?’ demanded Kennedy, jumping from the car as we pulled up at the Lodge porte-cochère.
Without comment, Burke pulled a crumpled bit of paper from his pocket and handed it to Craig. We crowded around and read:
If a hair of her head is harmed I will have revenge, though it sends me to prison for life.
We looked at the Secret Service man inquiringly.
‘Not a soul has been near the store-room since we began to watch it this morning,’ he explained hurriedly. ‘It must have been left there before we got up—just tucked under the telephone instrument. Paquita’s disappeared!’
‘Disappeared?’ we exclaimed, almost together, as Burke blurted out his startling budget of news.
‘Yes—and not a trace of her. She must have got away before you fellows were up.’
I looked again at the crumpled bit of paper. What did it mean? Was it that someone had actually kicked over the traces in working for one higher up?
To whom did it refer? Instantly there flashed through my mind the picture of Winifred as we had seen her borne off by the abductors whom we had foiled. Could it be she?
Taught by Kennedy, I did not allow a first impression to rule. Might it be anyone else? I thought of Irene Maddox, of Frances Walcott. It did not seem to fit them.
Paquita? Perhaps the note referred to her. If so, who would have sent it? Sanchez? And if from Sanchez, to whom was it sent?
‘How about Sanchez?’ I queried.
‘As much surprised at her disappearance as the rest of us,’ replied Burke.
‘How was that?’
‘I picked him up and had him shadowed. I know that her disappearance mystified him, for he had no idea he was observed, at the time. He got away again, though. If we are ever to pick that girl up again, shadowing Sanchez may be the best way. I have had Riley out—’
‘Not the same hand that wrote the cipher,’ interrupted Kennedy, studying the note. ‘I beg pardon. What of Riley? Any word?’
‘I should say,’ burst out Burke. ‘Down in the cove—Little Neck they call it—in a deserted barn we’ve found a racer—answers the description of the one seen in New York the morning of the robbery and on the road out here. It’s my dope that you made the little garage here untenable, Kennedy, and that whoever it was took the car to the cove to hide it.’
He paused, but for want of something to say. Before we could urge him he added: ‘And that scout cruiser, too. She’s been scuttled, out past the point, at the entrance to the cove. Whoever it is, he’s been wiping out all the evidence against him that he can.’
‘No word of Paquita or Sanchez?’ inquired Kennedy again.
Burke shook his head.
‘How is Shelby Maddox?’
‘Much better. I was in the room during the flurry. You should have seen him when the turn came. We could hardly keep him in bed. He was frantic.’
Kennedy had continued studying the anonymous note very carefully as we talked.
‘It squares with my theory,’ he mused, more to himself than to us. ‘Yes—it is time to act. And we must act quickly. Burke, can you get all the Maddoxes up to Shelby’s room—right away? Perhaps by that time we may have word from Riley. At any rate we shall be ready.’
Shelby was propped up in bed with pillows, quite reconciled now to being an invalid, when we entered.
‘The best little nurse ever,’ he greeted us, scarcely taking his eyes from Winifred. ‘And a financier, too,’ he added, with a laugh; ‘a power in the market.’
‘You mustn’t forget Professor Kennedy’s machine,’ put in Winifred, welcoming us with a smile that covered the trace of a blush which glowed through the pretty tan of her cheeks.
Shelby grasped Craig’s hand. ‘You said you wouldn’t work for me,’ he grinned, ‘but you certainly didn’t work against me. Just let me get on my feet again. You won’t regret, old man, that you—’
A knock on the door cut him short. It was Frances and Johnson Walcott.
For a moment the two women looked at each other. Not a word was said, but each understood. Whatever differences had kept them apart seemed to have been swept aside by the emotions of the moment. Frances whispered something in Winifred’s ear as she flung her arms about the girl, then turned to her brother and bent over him.
Man-like, Johnson Walcott stood awkwardly. His wife saw it.
‘Congratulate them, Johnson,’ she cried. ‘Don’t you understand?’
Before he could reply there came another tap on the door. It was Burke again, escorting Irene Maddox, reluctant and suspicious.
Surprised, she glanced from the Walcotts to Shelby, then at us.
‘Congratulate whom?’ she asked quickly. ‘What is it all about?’
There was a moment of embarrassment, when Kennedy came to the rescue, stepping forward and looking at his watch.
‘I’m waiting word from Señorita Paquita and Mr Sanchez,’ he interrupted, ‘but that is no reason why I should not at least begin to tell you what I have discovered.’
We watched him as he slowly drew from his pocket the crumpled note which Burke had discovered that morning, and the apparently blank sheet of paper we had picked up in Paquita’s room.
It seemed as if Kennedy’s words had recalled them all to their former selves. In an instant each seemed to be on guard, even Shelby.
‘I suppose you have heard of what we call the science of graphology?’ he inquired, motioning in pantomime to me to fill a basin with warm water. ‘It is the reading of character in handwriting.’
Into the basin he dropped the blank sheet. We waited in silence. I, at least, was not surprised when he held up the wet paper, now covered with figures scrawled over it.
‘Even though there is writing on this sheet,’ he observed, holding up the note, ‘and figures on the other, I think anyone could tell at a glance that they were not made by the same hand. This was by no means my first clue.’ He was waving the wet paper with the figures. ‘But it decided me. Though the message was hidden both by sympathetic ink and a cryptogram, still, in the light of this new science, the character of the writer stands out as plain as if it were shouted from the house-top.’
He paused again. ‘Graphology tells me,’ he proceeded slowly, ‘that the hand that wrote these figure is the hand of one who
has all the characteristics of a spy and a traitor. Before we go further, let me call to your mind some rather remarkable deductions and discoveries I have made. By the way, Burke, you left word where we were, in case we get any news?’
The Secret Service man nodded, but said nothing, as if he did not wish his voice to break the thread of Kennedy’s disclosure.
‘The plot against Maddox Munitions and particularly the wonderful telautomaton,’ continued Kennedy gravely, ‘was subtle. Apparently all was to be accomplished at one coup. The plans were to be stolen on the Sybarite the same night that the model was to be taken from the safe in New York. How the latter was accomplished we know well enough, now, for all practical purposes. Marshall Maddox’s keys were to admit the thief to the office. The burglar’s microphone did the rest.
‘How it was accomplished here I know, too. Without a doubt, the Japanese, Mito, admitted the plotter to the Sybarite, at least signalled so that it was possible to creep up quietly in a cruiser and throw a chlorine-gas bomb through a marked port. Marshall Maddox was overcome—killed. Through the same port-hole his body was thrown.
‘Thus at once both the plans and the keys that gave access to the model were obtained.’
As Craig spoke, my mind hastily reviewed the events of what seemed now weeks instead of days past. It was as though he had failed in an explanation of the events in a silent drama.
‘Mito was seen ashore that night,’ he resumed. ‘He was suspected. I was watching him. Worse than that, he knew too much. He was a weak link, an ever-present danger. Therefore he must be got out of the way. He was killed. But his mute lips tell quite as eloquent a story as if he were here before us now. There is another who played an even more important part. She is not here, but I know you all know whom I mean.’
Kennedy had thus deftly shifted the picture to the little dancer. As he spoke, Irene Maddox leaned forward, her face burning with indignation at the mere mention of her hated rival.
‘Paquita,’ Kennedy continued, carefully choosing his words, ‘has been an enigma to me in this case. There is no use mincing matters. There had long been a feud in the family, before she appeared. I think there is no need for me here to elaborate how she has brought matters to a crisis, or the enmity which she stirred up.’
Mrs Maddox murmured something bitterly under her breath, but Kennedy quickly changed the subject.
‘We know, also, that Paquita met Shelby Maddox,’ he hurried on. ‘In the minds of some it looked as though she might break Shelby, too. But it was just because of the reasons that made them think so that precisely the opposite happened. Strangely enough, the little dancer seems to have fallen in love with him herself.’
Out of the corner of my eye I was watching Winifred. Her face was set in deep lines as Kennedy went ahead in his merciless analysis of the case. Shelby coloured, but said nothing, though his manner was of the man who might have said much, if he had not learned that defence was worse than silence. Winifred’s face questioned as plainly as words whether there must always be present that sinister shadow of Paquita. I wondered whether she was yet convinced that he had never loved the little dancer.
Kennedy seemed to feel the situation. ‘But,’ he added slowly and significantly, ‘in the meantime something else had happened. Shelby Maddox had met someone else.’
He had not dwelt on the gossip about Paquita. I could almost feel the relief of Shelby, for Paquita had been a cause of disagreement even between Mrs Walcott and the others.
‘Even this new turn of events was used in desperation by the criminal. In aiming a blow at Shelby, after having been defeated at every other point, as a last desperate resort an attempt was directed at Winifred Walcott herself. It was as though someone had tried to strike at Shelby himself, and had decided that the surest way to control him was through someone whom he loved. Who was it,’ he concluded, facing us pointedly, ‘that kidnapped Winifred, and why?’
As far as I am able to answer it might have been anybody. I had even considered the possibility that Shelby might have carried her off himself in order to make her turn to him for protection. In fact, I had never been able to account for the presence of Sanchez with us at the time. Had I been mistaken in Sanchez?
‘Attack after attack on those who were getting closer had failed,’ continued Kennedy. ‘That being the case, those who might talk must be silenced. Mito was dead. Still Paquita remained. She, too, must be silenced. And so my suspicion, in turn, was thrown on her. By this cipher which I have here she was ordered to go to New York, in order to mislead me. The plan failed. Always in the most clever schemes of crime, they fail at some point. Unless I am very much mistaken, Paquita has seen through the designs. What she will do I do not profess to know. For, in addition to the mixed motives of her hopeless love for Shelby Maddox and jealousy of Miss Walcott, her disappearance this morning indicates that she is in mortal fear of an attack inspired by the plotter.’
Unavoidably my mind raced ahead to Sanchez, who had followed her so jealously. Had he really been in love with her—a love as hopeless as her own for Maddox? Or was he a more sinister figure? Had they been playing a game, each having an insight into the weakness of this unhappy family? I recalled the conversation I had had with Henri in the cabaret and his non-committal shrug. Perhaps Sanchez and Paquita had been deeper than we had thought.
‘And now,’ resumed Kennedy, evidently temporising in the hope that word would soon come from the searchers whom we had out, ‘now we find that a final effort has been made to remove all incriminating traces of crime. The car which we could not locate in the garage here has been found hidden miles away. The fast motor-boat which escaped us last night lies at the bottom of the bay. At the same time an insidious stock-market attack has been wrecked, for it was a final purpose in this ambitious scheme evidently to wreck Maddox Munitions in order to gain control of it. Even my own resources of science must have failed if it had not been for the loyalty of one who cast all into the balance at the final moment.’
We were following Kennedy intently now, and I did not betray that I saw Shelby’s hand steal out and clasp that of Winifred, which was resting on a table beside his bed. She did not withdraw her own hand.
The telephone rang and Burke, who was nearest it, answered.
The conversation was brief. Evidently the party at the other end was doing most of the talking, but as we scanned the detective’s face we could see that something important had happened.
‘You do not know where Sanchez has gone?’ asked Burke finally, adding, ‘Keep the boys on the trail, then, until you get some clue. Goodbye.’
He hung up the receiver slowly and turned toward Kennedy, but I do not think any of us were prepared for his message.
‘Paquita has committed suicide!’ he blurted out suddenly.
We looked at one another in amazement at this startling turn of events.
What did it mean? Had she seen nothing more to live for, or had someone pursued her and was she anticipating fate?
‘It was Riley,’ recounted Burke briefly. ‘Evidently she had taken poison. They found her body in the woods not far from where we discovered the car and the sunken boat. Some children say they saw a man there—he answers the description of Sanchez. Riley is following the clue.’
‘What drove her to it? Was there no word, no note?’ asked Irene Maddox, awed by the tragedy.
‘Yes,’ replied Burke. ‘On a piece of paper she had written, “I have mailed a letter to Shelby Maddox. May God forgive me for what I have done. There is nothing left in life for me.” That is all.’
We gazed at one another in consternation.
‘Poor girl!’ repeated Kennedy in a low tone. ‘She was merely a pawn in the hands of another. But it is a dangerous game—this game of hearts—even with the heart of an adventuress.’
‘I think we should organise a search for this fellow Sanchez before he can get away,’ proposed Johnson Walcott, taking a step toward Kennedy. ‘My own car is below. We can get up a posse in
no time right at the Lodge.’
Before anyone could take up the suggestion the door of the room flew open.
There stood Sanchez himself—pale, his eyes staring, his whole manner that of one who had reached the last point of desperation.
Half-way across the room he stopped, faced us, and tossed down on a table before Kennedy a package wrapped in oiled silk.
‘That is my revenge!’ he exclaimed in a voice almost sepulchral. ‘I found it in the boat before I scuttled it.’
Craig tore it open. There, unrolled before us, at last lay the plans of the deadly telautomaton.
Of a sudden I realised that the model had destroyed itself in sinking the Sybarite. With the plans in our possession the secret was safe.
Slowly Sanchez raised an accusing finger, but before he could utter a word Craig had backed against the door and stood holding it.
‘Someone has been keeping undercover here,’ Craig shot out suddenly, ‘hiding behind others who were his tools—first Mito, then Paquita, who has been driven to her death, now Sanchez.
‘Graphology first betrayed his fine hand of crime to me. The stock-market attack confirmed my suspicion. Sanchez has completed— Don’t shoot! Burke has you covered already. Walter—will you be so kind as to disarm Johnson Walcott?’
THE END
Footnote
fn1 This figure is more conservative than the claim on the jacket of The Clutching Hand (Reilly & Lee, 1934): ‘His books have sold 2,000,000 copies in the United States, 1,000,000 in Great Britain.’
THE DETECTIVE STORY CLUB
LIST OF TITLES
THE MAYFAIR MYSTERY • FRANK RICHARDSON
THE PERFECT CRIME • ISRAEL ZANGWILL
CALLED BACK • HUGH CONWAY
THE MYSTERY OF THE SKELETON KEY • BERNARD CAPES
THE GRELL MYSTERY • FRANK FROËST
DR JEKYLL AND MR HYDE • R. L. STEVENSON
THE RASP • PHILIP MACDONALD
THE HOUSE OPPOSITE • J. JEFFERSON FARJEON
THE PONSON CASE • FREEMAN WILLS CROFTS
The Adventuress Page 22