The Ear in the Wall Part 9

"Just now it is more important for us to become acquainted with this Little Montmartre," he remarked. "I suppose, Miss Kendall, we may depend on you to join us?"

"Indeed you may," she replied energetically. "There is nothing that we would welcome more than evidence that would lead to the closing of that place."

Kennedy seemed to be impressed by the frankness and energy of the young woman.

"Perhaps if we three should go there, hire a private dining-room, and look about without making any move against the place that would excite suspicion, we might at least find out what it is that we are fighting.

Of course we must dine somewhere, and up there at the same time we can plan our campaign."

"I think that would be ripping," she laughed, as the humour of the situation dawned on her. "Why, we shall be laying our plans right in the heart of the enemy's country and they will never realize it.

Perhaps, too, we may get a glimpse of some of those people mentioned in the anonymous letter."

To Clare Kendall it was simply another phase of the game which she had been playing against the forces of evil in the city.

The Little Montmartre was, as I already knew, one of the smaller hotels in a side street just off Broadway, eight or ten stories in height, of modern construction, and for all the world exactly like a score of other of the smaller hostelries of the famous city of hotels.

Clare, Craig, and myself pulled up before the entrance in a taxicab, that seeming to be the accepted method of entering with eclat. A boy opened the door. I jumped out and settled with the driver without a demur at the usual overcharge, while Craig a.s.sisted Clare.

Laughing and chatting, we entered the bronze plate-gla.s.s doors and walked slowly down a richly carpeted corridor. It was elegantly furnished and decorated with large palms set at intervals, quite the equal in luxuriousness, though on a smaller scale, of any of the larger and well-known hotels. Beautifully marked marbles and expensive hangings greeted the eye at every turn. Faultlessly liveried servants solicitously waited about for tips.

Craig and Clare, who were slightly ahead of me, turned quickly into a little alcove, or reception room and Craig placed a chair for her.

Farther down the corridor I could see the office, and beyond a large main dining-room from which strains of music came and now and then the buzz of conversation and laughter from gay parties at the immaculately white tables.

"Boy," called Kennedy quietly, catching the eye of a pa.s.sing bell hop and unostentatiously slipping a quarter into his hand, which closed over the coin almost automatically, "the head waiter, please.

Oh--er--by the way--what is his name?"

"Julius," returned the boy, to whom the proceeding seemed to present nothing novel, although the whole atmosphere of the place was beyond his years. "I'll get him in a minute, sir. He's in the main dining-room. He's having some trouble with the cabaret singers. One of them is late--as usual."

We sat in the easy chairs watching the people pa.s.sing and repa.s.sing in the corridor. There was no effort at concealment here.

A few minutes later Julius appeared, a young man, tall and rather good-looking, suave and easy. A word or two with Kennedy followed, during which a greenback changed hands--in fact that seemed to be the open sesame to everything here--and we were in the elevator decorously escorted by the polished Julius.

The door of the elevator shut noiselessly and it shot up to the next floor. Julius preceded us down the thickly carpeted corridor leading the way to a large apartment, or rather a suite of rooms, as handsomely furnished as any in other hotels. He switched on the lights and left us, with the remark, "When you want the waiter or anything, just press the b.u.t.ton."

In the largest of the rooms was a dining-table and several chairs of Jacobean oak. A heavy sideboard and serving-table stood against opposite walls. Another, smaller room was furnished very attractively as a sitting-room. Deep, easy chairs stood in the corners and a wide, capacious davenport stretched across one wall. In another nook was a little divan or cosy corner.

Electric bulbs burned pinkly in the chandeliers and on silver candelabra on the table, giving a half light that was very romantic and fascinating. From a curtained window that opened upon an interior court we could catch strains from the cabaret singers below in the main dining-room. Everything was new and bright.

Kennedy pressed the b.u.t.ton and a waiter brought a menu, imposing in length and breath-taking in rates.

"The cost of vice seems to have gone up with the cost of living,"

remarked Miss Kendall, as the waiter disappeared as silently as he had responded to the bell. It was a phrase that stuck in my head, so apt was it in describing the anomalous state of things we found as the case unrolled.

Craig ordered, now and then consulting Clare about some detail. The care and attention devoted to us could not have been more punctilious if it had been an elaborate dinner party.

"Well," he remarked, as the waiter at last closed the door of the private dining-room to give the order in downstairs in the kitchen, "the Little Montmartre makes a brave showing. I suppose it will be some time before the dinner arrives, though. There is certainly some piquancy to this," he added, looking about at the furnishings.

"Yes," remarked Miss Kendall, "risque from the moment you enter the door."

She said it with an impersonal tone as if there were complete detachment between herself as an observer and as a guest of the Montmartre.

"Miss Kendall," asked Kennedy, "did you notice anything particularly downstairs? I'd like to check up my own impressions by yours."

"I noticed that t.i.tian beauty in the hotel office as we left the reception room and entered the elevator."

Craig smiled.

"So did I. I thought you would be both woman enough and detective enough to notice her. Well, I suppose if a man likes that sort of girl that's the sort of girl he likes. That's point number one. But did you notice anything else--as we came in, for instance?"

"No--except that everything seems to be a matter of scientific management here to get the most out of the suckers. This is no place for a piker. It all seems to run so smoothly, too. Still, I'm sure that our investigators might get something on the place if they kept right after it, although on the surface it doesn't look as if any law was being openly violated here. What do you mean? What is your point number two?"

"In the front window," resumed Craig, "just as you enter, I noticed one of those little oblong signs printed neatly in black on white--'Dr.

Vernon Harris, M. D.' You recall that the letter said something about a doctor who was very friendly with that clique the writer mentioned?

It's even money that this Harris is the one the writer meant. I suppose he is the 'house physician' of this gilded palace."

Clare nodded appreciatively. "Quite right," she agreed. "Just how do you think he might be involved?"

"Of course I can't say. But I think, without going any further, that a man like that in a place like this will bear watching anyway, without our needing more than the fact that he is here. Naturally we don't know anything about him as a doctor, but he must have some training; and in an environment like this--well, a little training may be a dangerous thing."

"The letter said something about drugs," mused Clare.

"Yes," added Kennedy. "As you know, alcohol is absolutely necessary to a thing like this. Girls must keep gay and attractive; they must meet men with a bright, unfaltering look, and alcohol just dulls the edge of conscience. Besides, look over that wine list--it fills the till of the Montmartre, judging by the prices. But then, alcohol palls when the pace is as swift as it seems to be here. Even more essential are drugs.

You know, after all, it is no wonder so many drug fiends and drunkards are created by this life. Now, a doctor who is not over-scrupulous, and he would have to be not over-scrupulous to be here at all, would find a gold mine in the dispensing of drugs and the toning up of drug fiends and others who have been going the pace too rapidly."

"Yes," she said. "We have found that some of these doctors are a great factor in the life of various sections of the city where they hang out.

I know one who is deeply in the local politics and boasts that any resort that patronizes him is immune. Yes, that's a good point about Dr. Harris."

"I suppose your investigators have had more or less to do with watching the progress of drug habits?" ventured Craig.

"Very much," she replied, catching the drift of his remarks. "We have found, for instance, that there are a great many cases where it seems that drugs have been used in luring young and innocent girls. Not the old knockout drops--chloral, you know--but modern drugs, not so powerful, perhaps, but more insidious, and in that respect, I suppose, more dangerous. There are cocaine fiends, opium smokers; oh, lots of them. But those we find in the slums mostly. Still, I suppose there are all kinds of drugs up here in the White Light District--belladonna to keep the eyes bright, a.r.s.enic to whiten the complexion, and so on."

"Yes," a.s.serted Craig. "This section of the city may not be so brutal in its drug taking as others, but it is here--yes, and it is over on Fifth Avenue, too, right in society. Before we get through I'm sure we'll both learn much more than we even dream of now."

The door opened after a discreet tap from the waiter and the lavish dinner which Craig had ordered appeared. The door stayed open for a moment as the bus boy carried in the dishes. A rustle of skirts and low musical laughter was wafted in to us and we caught a glimpse of another gay party pa.s.sing down the hall.

"How many private dining-rooms are there?" asked Craig of the waiter.

"Just this one, sir, and the next one, which is smaller," replied the model waiter, with the air of one who could be blind and deaf and dumb if he chose.

"Oh, then we were lucky to get this."

"Yes, sir. It is really best to telephone first to Julius to make sure and have one of the rooms reserved, sir."

Craig made a mental note of the information. The party in the next room were hilariously ordering, mostly from the wine list. None of us had recognized any of them, nor had they paid much attention to us.

Craig had eaten little, although the food was very good.

"It's a shame to come here and not see the whole place," he remarked.

"I wonder if you would excuse me while I drop downstairs to look over things there--perhaps ingratiate myself with that t.i.tian? Tell Miss Kendall about our visit to Langhorne's office while I am gone, Walter."