Three People Part 31

CHAPTER XXI.

MIDNIGHT WORK.

"Ting-a-ling-ling," said Mr. Stephens' door-bell just before midnight.

Mr. Stephens glanced up in surprise from the paper which he was studying and hesitated a moment. Who could be ringing his bell at that late hour?

Presently he stepped out into the hall, slipped the bolt and admitted Theodore Mallery. The young man followed his employer into the brightly-lighted library; it was the same room, with the same furnishings that it had worn that evening when he, a forlorn, trembling boy, had made his first call, and at midnight, on Mr. Stephens.

"What unearthly business brought you out at this hour?" said the wondering Mr. Stephens.

"Premonitions of evil," answered Theodore, laughing. "Do you believe in them?" And he glanced about the familiar room, and dropped himself into the great arm-chair, where he remembered to have seated himself once at least before.

"What is the matter with this room?" he asked, as his eyes roved over the surrounding. "Something looks different."

"I have been having a general clearing out and turning around of furniture since you were in--moved the books and rubbish out of that corner closet for one thing, and prepared it for those closed ledgers.

Good place, don't you think?"

"Has it strong locks?" asked Theodore, glancing around to the closet in question.

"Splendid ones, and is built fire-proof."

Theodore took in both the lock and the fact that the key was in it.

"An excellent place for them," he answered. "Is there anything in it now?"

"No, empty. What brought you here, Mallery? I hope you have no more work for me to do to-night. I was just thinking of my bed."

"A very little, sir. I have those papers ready for your signature, and it occurred to me if you could add that to-night I could get them off by the early mail."

"What an indefatigable plodder you are to get those papers ready so soon, and an unmerciful man besides to make me go over them to-night.

What will ten or a dozen hours signify?"

"I don't know," answered Theodore, gravely. "Great results have arisen from more trivial delays than ten or a dozen hours." Then he looked straight before him, apparently at the mirror, but really at the closet door. It was closed when he looked before; it was very slightly ajar now. Wind? No, there _was_ no wind within reach; it was a surly November night, and doors and windows were tightly closed.

"Then there is really no escape for me?" yawned Mr. Stephens, in an inquiring tone.

"None whatever," answered Theodore, playfully. "It won't take you half an hour, sir, and you know it is a very important matter, involving not only ourselves but others."

"True," said Mr. Stephens, more gravely. "Well, pa.s.s them along."

And while Theodore obeyed the order, and appeared engrossed in the papers, he was really watching that closet door. It certainly moved, very slightly and noiselessly, and it certainly was not the wind, for the wind had no eyes, and at least one very sharp eye was distinctly discernible in the mirror, peering out at them from that door! The owner of the eyes seemed to have forgotten the long mirror, and Theodore's convenient position for seeing what pa.s.sed behind him. Whose eye was it?

and why was the possessor of it shut up in that closet? Theodore watched it stealthily and sharply. It grew bolder, and the door was pushed open a little more, a _very_ little, just enough to reveal the shape of the forehead and a few curls of black hair. Then suspicion became certainty--they belonged to the young man whom he had disliked and distrusted since the day in which he had first entered the employ of Mr. Stephens, six months before. Very strange and just a little unreasonable had seemed his distrust. Mr. Stephens had tried sober argument and good-humored raillery by turns to convince his confidential clerk that he was prejudiced. All to no purpose. Theodore could give no tangible reasons for his unwavering opinion; but his early living by his wits, among all sorts of people, had so sharpened his ideas that he felt almost hopelessly certain that a villain was being harbored among them.

Now while he tried to answer coherently Mr. Stephens' questions, he was thinking hard and nervously what was to be done. What was the man's object in hiding at midnight in his employer's house? Was Mr. Stephens'

life in danger? Was the man a murderer, or simply a thief? What did he know of their private affairs? What had Mr. Stephens in his house that proved a special temptation? How should he get all these questions answered? The hot blood surged to his very temples as he remembered Mr.

Stephens' departure from the store that very afternoon with twenty thousand dollars for deposit. What if for some reason the deposit had not been made, and was still in Mr. Stephens' possession--in this very room perhaps! He remembered with a shiver that the young man in question was in the private office during the making up of the money package, and that Mr. Stephens talked freely before him, that they had gone out together, that Mr. Stephens had directed his clerk to walk down to the bank with him while he gave certain orders for the next day's business.

Should he risk a bold question and so discover the truth in regard to the deposit, and perhaps at the same time discover to the thief its present whereabouts? He saw no other way, and feeling that he had little time to lose plunged into the question.

"By the way, Mr. Stephens, was the deposit all right?"

Mr. Stephens glanced up quickly.

"What possessed you to ask that troublesome question?" he said, laughingly.

"Natural curiosity, sir. Were you in time?"

"I am almost afraid to answer you," said Mr. Stephens, still laughing, "lest you will put me under lock and key at once as a person suspected of insanity. If I must confess, though, I stopped with Winters ten minutes to introduce him to the new librarian at the reading-room, and thereby _just_ lost my chance at the bank."

Theodore promptly controlled the shiver that ran through his frame.

Winters, in the closet there, probably knew the facts, and all others connected with the money, as well as Mr. Stephens did. He spoke in his usual tone.

"What did you do with the money, sir? It was not in the safe when I closed it for the night?"

"That I suppose is the very wickedest of all my wicked deeds. I was too thoroughly tired, besides being too hurried, to tramp back to the store.

I came near intrusting the bundle to Winters to take back, but I had respect for your ugly prejudices, and concluded to make a safe of my own house for one night."

For an instant Theodore hesitated. Should he risk the possibility of giving the inmate of the closet the information which he did not already possess by asking what had been done with the money? His precaution was in vain. Mr. Stephens continued his confession:

"I've locked it up though, _double_ locked it indeed, over in that iron box, and put the key belonging to the box on the shelf in that closet and locked _them_ up. Shall I bury that key in the cellar now?"

Now indeed Theodore's face paled. _Could_ anything be more fearfully arranged? He asked but one more question:

"Where _is_ the key now?"

"_Here_ in my pocket; and I declare I'll deliver it over to you for safe keeping. I shall feel ten degrees less wicked."

Theodore reached out his hand mechanically for the key, and turned it over in cold fingers. Then a skeleton key had been used, for there was the key in the lock at this moment. Winters must have been startled into his retreat by some sudden noise, and have forgotten to remove the evidence of his perfidy. Rapidly were several schemes turned over in his mind. Should he walk over that way and attempt to lock the closet? No, for then in view of all the conversation that had just occurred Winters was sharp enough to know that he had been discovered, and desperate enough, Theodore believed, to do anything. There was room enough in the closet for two, or indeed three men, and perhaps the villain had accomplices. Could he propose to Mr. Stephens that they carry the strong box to his private room? No, for that would give the thief a chance to escape if he chose through the library window; the same thing might occur if he enticed Mr. Stephens from the room and told him the story.

Winters might suspect, was undoubtedly armed and ready for any desperate action. All these thoughts flashed through Theodore's brain while Mr.

Stephens was reading down one page, and ere the leaf was turned he had decided on his plan of action.

"Mr. Stephens," he said, speaking in his usual tone, and rising as he spoke, "I have a little matter of business just around the corner from here, which I think I will attend to while you are reading those papers."

Mr. Stephens glanced up and laughed.

"I will recommend you for one of the night police," he said, gayly. "You have business at all hours of the night in all imaginable places."

Meantime Theodore had been taking in the position of the strong box, and decided that he could get a nearer view of it without exciting the suspicion of Winters in the closet. It was, as he feared, unlocked and empty! Now at all hazards the thief must not be suffered to escape.

"I will take your night-key, Mr. Stephens," said Theodore, quietly, "and let myself in without ringing on my return."

A moment more and he stood alone on the granite steps. The night was still and gloomy, the moon gave only a fitful glimmering now and then as it peeped from between heavy clouds, the air was sharp and piercing, but the young man on the steps felt in a white heat as he waited in breathless anxiety for the advent of a policeman.

One thing he had determined upon, not to leave the steps where he stood guard over the gray-haired unsuspicious man inside. There was no telling how soon Winters might weary of his cramped quarters, and attempt to escape by first shooting his employer. Would the policeman never come?

He heard steps and voices in the distance.

"Come out here, old moon, and give a fellow a little light on the subject. What you pouting about, I'd like to know? You haven't got to blunder along home in the dark. This is the most extraordinary street I ever saw anyhow; it keeps whirling round and turning somersaults, instead of walking straight ahead like a respectable street."