The Crevice Part 7

Henry Blaine seated himself, and as she started to turn back to her desk, he asked quickly:

"You must find the work here very interesting, do you not? We--our firm--have erected several philanthropic inst.i.tutions of learning and recreation, but none precisely on this order. Miss Lawton has shown us the plans of this present club and we consider the arrangement of the dormitories particularly ingenious, with regard to economy of s.p.a.ce and the requisite sunlight and air."

"Oh, yes!" The girl turned toward him swiftly, her face suffused with interest. "Miss Lawton drew all the plans herself, and they were not changed in the least. I don't see how they could possibly be improved upon. Miss Lawton has done splendid work here, sir; the club has been a wonderful success since it was first opened."

"It must have been." The detective paused, then added easily, "I know that her late father was very proud of her executive ability.

You--er--you educate young women here, do you not, and train them for positions?"

"We not only train the members of the club, but obtain positions for them, with reputable business firms," the girl answered.

"Indeed?" Blaine asked, with apparent surprise. "What sort of positions do the members of your club fill?"

"Whatever they are capable of acquiring a working knowledge of.

Filing clerks, stenographers, secretaries, switchboard operators, telegraphers, even governesses. We have never had a failure, and I think it is because Miss Lawton gives not only her personal attention, but real love and faith to each girl. She is--wonderful."

The face of the young woman was rapt as she spoke, and Blaine could guess without further explanation that she herself was a protegee of Miss Lawton's, and a grateful one--unless she were playing a part. If so, she was an actress of transcendent ability.

"You say that you have never had a failure. That must, indeed, be encouraging," Blaine remarked, tentatively. "Perhaps we might arrange later with you or Miss Lawton to place one or two of your clerks or stenographers. We are enlarging our offices--"

"Good morning!" a fresh young voice interrupted him, and Anita Lawton stood upon the threshold. "Did Mr. Banks come yet?--ah, yes, I see.

How do you do?"

Blaine arose, and Anita gave him her hand cordially. His quick eyes observed that in pa.s.sing she patted the shoulder of her secretary affectionately, and the girl looked up at her quickly, with eyes aglow. The truth was no longer concealed from his discernment. The girl was staunch in every fiber of her being.

"Miss Lawton, I am sorry, but I have really not any too much time this morning. If we could proceed to business at once."

"Certainly. If you will come this way, Mr. Banks--" At the door she paused, and turned to the secretary: "I will see you later, dear."

Anita led the detective swiftly through the wide, clean halls and up the stairs, explaining in clear, distinct tones the floor-plan. On the second floor she opened the door leading into a little ante-room at the front of the house just over the office, and when they were seated, she said quickly, with rising excitement, although her voice was carefully hushed.

"Mr. Bl--Banks, I have something to show you--my father's will! It was discovered, or rather, produced, yesterday. The lawyers who have charge of the estate--Anderson & Wallace, you know--seem to me to be perfectly disinterested, and honest, but I am so hedged in on every hand by a stifling feeling of deceit and treachery that I feel I can trust no one save you and Mr. Hamilton--not even poor old Ellen, my maid, who has been with me since I was born!"

"I quite understand, Miss Lawton, and I realize how difficult the situation is for you, but I want you to trust no one--at least, to the extent of giving them your confidence. Now about the will; it was produced by your late father's attorneys?"

"No, by President Mallowe, of the Street Railways. It appears that Father left it in his charge. Mr. Anderson drew it; his partner, Mr.

Wallace, witnessed it; and they both a.s.sure me that it is absolutely authentic. Here it is."

She opened her bag and handed a long envelope to him, but at first his attention was held by what she had said, and he frowned as he repeated quickly:

"'Authentic?' I trust you did not show any suspicion that you doubted for a moment that it was genuine?"

"Oh, by no means! It was Mr. Anderson himself who took especial pains to a.s.sure me of its authenticity."

Blaine regarded the envelope reflectively for a moment before he raised the flap. Why had the attorney considered it necessary to a.s.sure his late client's daughter that the will which he had himself drawn was genuine?

The will was short and to the point. In it Pennington Lawton left everything of which he died possessed to his daughter, unconditionally and without reservation.

"Of course, Miss Lawton, since you are only twenty, and your father has named no guardian or trustee, the courts will at once appoint one, and I have no hesitation in saying that I believe the guardian so appointed will be one of your father's three a.s.sociates, presumably Mr. Mallowe. However, that will make little difference in our investigation, and, since it is claimed that all your father's huge fortune is lost, the matter of a guardian cannot tie our hands in any way. Now, just a moment, please."

He drew from his pocket a small but powerful magnifying gla.s.s and the slip of paper which Ramon Hamilton had sent him, on which was the signature of the late Pennington Lawton. Through the microscope he carefully compared it with that affixed to the will and then looked up rea.s.suringly.

"It is quite all right, Miss Lawton. In my estimation the will is authentic and your father's signature genuine." He folded the paper, slipped it in its envelope and returned it to her. "There is one thing now which I must most earnestly caution you against. Do not sign any paper, no matter who wishes it or orders it--no matter if it is the most trivial household receipt. Do not write any letters yourself, or notes to any one, even to Mr. Hamilton; you understand they might be intercepted. If anyone wishes you to sign a paper relating to the matter of your father's estate, say you cannot do so until you have shown it in private to Mr. Hamilton--that you have promised you will not do so. Any other papers you can easily evade signing. As for your private correspondence, obtain a social secretary, and permit her to sign everything--one whom you can trust--say, one of your girls from here, that girl downstairs, for instance. What is her name?"

Anita Lawton rose, and a peculiar pained expression pa.s.sed over her features.

"I am sorry, Mr. Blaine--really, really I am sorry. I cannot tell you her name. That was one of the conditions under which she came to us here--that is why I have given her an official position here in the Club. She is staunch and faithful and true; I know it, I feel it; and she is too high-principled to pa.s.s under any name not her own. I know and am heartily in sympathy with the reason for her secretiveness. You know that I trust you implicitly, but I know you would not have me go back on my word when once it has been given."

"Certainly not, Miss Lawton. I realize that many of your protegees here may come of unfortunate antecedents. If you feel that you can trust her, use her. Do you feel equally sure of the other members of your Club?"

"Absolutely. I feel that they all really love me; that they would do anything for me they could in the world, and yet I have done so little for them--only given them the little help which I was able to bestow, which we should all do for those less fortunate than ourselves.... Why did you ask me, Mr. Blaine, if I felt that I could trust the girls who have placed themselves under my care?"

"Because we may have need of them in the future. They may be of the most vital a.s.sistance to us in this investigation, should events turn out as I antic.i.p.ate and they prove worthy of the charge it may be necessary for me to impose on them. But enough of that for now. If at any time you wish to see me, personally, telephone me as you did this morning and I will meet you here."

The detective left her in the office of the secretary, and as he made his adieus to them both he cast a last quick, penetrating glance at the girl behind the desk. Again that vague sense of resemblance possessed him. With whom was she connected? Why was her name so significantly withheld?

In the meantime Guy Morrow, from his post of observation in the window of the little cottage on Meadow Lane, had watched the object of his espionage for several fruitless days--fruitless, because the actions of the man Brunell had been so obviously those of one who felt himself utterly beyond suspicion.

The erect, gray-haired, clear-eyed man had come and gone about his business, without the slightest attempt at concealment. A few of the simplest inquiries of his land-lady had elicited the fact that the gentleman opposite, old Mr. Brunell, was a map-maker, and worked at his trade in a little shop in the nearest row of brick buildings just around the corner--that he had lived in the little cottage since it had first been erected, six years before, alone with his daughter Emily, and before that, they had for many years occupied a small apartment near by--in fact, the girl had grown up in that neighborhood. He was a quiet man, not very talkative, but well liked by his neighbors, and his daughter was devoted to him. According to Mrs. Quinlan, Guy Morrow's aforesaid land-lady, Emily Brunell was a dear, sweet girl, very popular among the young people in the neighborhood, but she kept strictly at home in her leisure hours and preferred her father's companionship to that of anyone else. She was employed in some business capacity downtown, from nine until six; just what it was Mrs. Quinlan did not know.

Morrow kept well in the background, in case Mr. Pennold should put in an appearance again, but he did not. Evidently that conversation overheard by Suraci had been a final one, concerning the securities at least, and no one else called at the little cottage door over the way, except a vapid-faced young man to whom Morrow took an instant and inexplicable dislike.

Morrow made it a point to visit and investigate the little shop at an hour when he knew Brunell would not be there, and found in the cursory examination possible at that time that its purpose seemed to be strictly legitimate. A shock-headed boy of fifteen or thereabout was in charge, and the operative easily succeeded in engaging his stolid attention elsewhere while, with a bit of soft wax carefully palmed in his left hand, he succeeded in gaining an impression of the lock on the flimsy door. From this he had a key made in antic.i.p.ation of orders from his chief, requiring a thorough search of the little shop--orders which for the first time in his career, he shrank from.

He made no effort to sc.r.a.pe an acquaintance with Brunell himself, but frequently encountered, as if by accident, the daughter Emily, on her way to and from the subway station. If she recognized in him the young lodger across the street, she made no sign, and as the days pa.s.sed, Morrow, the man, despaired of gaining her friendship, save through her father, whom Morrow--the operative--had received orders not to approach personally.

Before he had seen her, had he known that the old forger possessed a daughter, he would have laid his plans to worm himself into the confidence of the little family through the girl, but having once laid eyes upon her face in all its gentle, trusting purity, every manly instinct in him revolted at the thought of making her a tool of her father's probable downfall.

There was a third member of the Brunell household whom Morrow had observed frequently seated upon the doorstep, or on one of the lower window sills--a small, scraggly black kitten, with stiff outstanding fur, and an absurdly belligerent att.i.tude whenever a dog chanced to pa.s.s through the lane. It waited in the doorway each night for the return of its mistress, and in the soft glow of the lamplight which streamed from within, he had seen her catch the little creature up affectionately and cuddle it up against her neck before the door closed upon them.

One afternoon in the early November twilight, as Morrow was returning to his own door after shadowing Brunell on an aimless and chilly walk, he saw the kitten lying curled up just outside its own gate, and an inspiration sprang to his ingenious mind. He seated himself upon the steps of Mrs. Quinlan's front porch and waited until the darkness had deepened sufficiently to cloak his nefarious scheme. Then, with soft beguiling tone--and a few _sotto voce_ remarks, for he hated cats--Morrow began a deliberate attempt to entice the kitten across to him.

"Come here, kitty, kitty," he called softly. "Come, p.u.s.s.y dear! Come here, you mangy, rat-tailed little beast! Come cattykins."

At his first words the kitten raised its head and regarded him with yellow eyes gleaming through the dusk, in unconcealed antagonism. But, at the soft, purring flattery of his voice, the gleam softened to a glow of pleased interest, and the little creature rose lazily, stretched itself, and tripped lightly over to him, its tail erect in optimistic confidence.

Morrow picked it up gingerly by the neck and tucked it beneath his coat, stroking its head with a reluctant thumb, while it purred loudly in sleepy content, at the warmth of its welcome. The hour was approaching when Emily Brunell usually made her appearance, and he trusted to luck to keep the little animal quiet until she had entered her home and discovered its loss, but the fickle G.o.ddess failed him.

The kitten grew suddenly uneasy, as if some intuition warned it of treachery, and tried valiantly to escape from his grasp, and never did Spartan boy with wolf concealed beneath his tunic suffer more tortures than Morrow with the wretched little creature clawing at his hands.

Would Emily Brunell never come? What could be keeping her to-night, of all nights? Morrow gripped the soft, elusive bundle of fur with desperate firmness and looked across the street. Evidently he was not the only one impatient for her arrival. The doorway opposite had opened, and Jimmy Brunell stood peering anxiously forth into the darkness.

At that moment the kitten emitted a fearsome yowl, which Morrow smothered hastily with his coat. He fancied that the old man turned his head quickly and glanced in his direction, and never had the operative felt guiltier.

Brunell, however, retired within, closing the door after him, and the kitten's struggles gradually grew weaker and finally ceased.

Morrow felt a horrible fear surging up within him that he had strangled the little beast, and his grasp gradually relaxed. Then he opened his overcoat cautiously and peered within. The kitten was sleeping peacefully, and he heaved a sigh of relief, glancing up just in time to see Emily Brunell pa.s.s quickly through her own gate and up to the door.

He sat motionless on the steps of Mrs. Quinlan's, and his patience was rewarded when after a few moments the Brunell's door re-opened and he heard the girl's voice calling anxiously: "Kitty! Kitty!"