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Putting Crime Over:
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Putting Crime Over
by
Hulbert Footner
First published in Argosy All-Story Weekly,
November 20, 1926
This e-book edition: Project Gutenberg Australia. 2023
Argosy All-Story Weekly, November 20, 1926, with
"Putting Crime Over"
TABLE OF CONTENTS
●Chapter I.
●Chapter II.
●Chapter III.
●Chapter IV.
●Chapter V.
●Chapter VI.
●Chapter VII.
●Chapter VIII.
●Chapter IX.
●Chapter X.
●Chapter XI.
●Chapter XII.
●Chapter XIII.
●Chapter XIV.
●Chapter XV.
●Chapter XVI.
CHAPTER I.
IT was owing to the last-minute illness of Mrs.
Cornelius Marquardt that I had the good fortune to be included in
this little dinner of Mme. Storey's. Her guests do not often
disappoint.
Everybody in the know is aware that the best talk in New York
is to be heard around her table. She picks her guests with that
end in view, careless of their social position. One may meet a
visiting marquis or a tramp poet—the poet more often than
the marquis.
Mme. Storey herself is a better talker, in my opinion, than
any of them, but one would be slow to learn that at her own
table. Her object there is merely to keep the ball rolling
briskly. She likes to listen better than to talk.
On this occasion the men included Ambrose G. Larned, the
brilliant advertising man, who had introduced so many new ideas
into his profession; John Durward, the famous English novelist;
Harry Evans Colter, our own clever and popular short story
writer; and Inspector Rumsey, of the New York police.
Rumsey, the dear little man, is not at all a brilliant person;
but he is a perfect compendium of crime, and, since crime seems
to be the most interesting of all subjects to persons of every
degree nowadays, Mme. Storey finds him very useful at the dinner
table. When people try to draw her out on the subject of
crime, she shifts them on to Rumsey.
Foreigners regard us Americans as pre-eminent in crime; they
come over here to see crime; and when we have a distinguished
visitor like Mr. Durward, Rumsey is pretty sure to be
included.
My mistress, as you know, is not enamoured of crime, and she
managed to divert the talk to other subjects until after we had
left the table. When the little company was grouped around the
amusing 1850 living room upstairs, it could no longer be staved
off, and she let it have its way.
I must tell you that New York was experiencing a crime wave at
the moment—but indeed it always is. It is like an ocean
beach, with one crime wave falling right on top of the one
before.
This was the time of the bobbed-hair bandit sensation, when
many of the smaller jewelers were putting in defensive
arrangements of siren whistles and tear gas. These things were
always going off accidentally and throwing whole neighborhoods
into a panic. The Englishman was all agog as he listened.
Everybody is familiar with Mr. Durward's fine head with its
silvery hair and delicately chiseled features. He supplied a
chorus of "Amazing! Extraordinary! Incredible!" to all the
stories that were told.
"In the middle of the day!" I remember him saying. "With
crowds passing in the street, these fellows go boldly into your
jewelry shops, and point their guns, and take what they please,
and get away scot-free! Such a thing would be impossible in
London!"
"Not impossible," Inspector Rumsey pointed out good-humoredly.
"It has happened even in London. Your police are luckier than we
are, that's all. For London streets are narrow and crooked, and
the few main thoroughfares are always crowded. It is exceedingly
difficult to make a get-away. Now, our streets are broad and
straight, and only one of them is completely full of traffic
during business hours. You may have noticed that our holdups
never take place in the center, but always in busy neighborhoods
off the center, where there is enough traffic to conceal the
bandits in their get-away, but not enough to stop them."
"Well, what's to be done? Are you just going to submit to this
state of affairs?"
"There is a remedy," said Inspector Rumsey quietly, "whenever
the public is willing to pay for it."
"And what is that?"
"It is ridiculous and humiliating to the police to be forced
to go on foot, when every bandit is provided with an automobile.
All patrolmen should be mounted on motorcycles."
"Hear! Hear!" said Mme. Storey.
"Even the women are taking to banditry!" murmured Mr. Durward.
"An incredible country!"
"There's a good deal of nonsense about her," said the
inspector.﹃The newspapers have played up the bobbed-hair bandit
so hard that their credulous readers see a bobbed-hair bandit
everywhere they look. And I notice that the police are
advertising in the subway cars,﹄Mr. Durward went on. "Cards
addressed to the bandits, warning them that they will certainly
be caught in the end. Surely that is very naïve."
"Well," said the inspector, smiling and firm in the defense of
his beloved department, "we must try everything."
Colter spoke up, a young man quick in his movements, with an
eager, warm-colored face:
"If you're sure to get him in the end, why bother to
advertise?"
"It was Mr. Larned, here, who persuaded the commissioner to
use those cards," said Rumsey.
"Anything can be accomplished by intelligent publicity," said
Larned.
He went on to sing the praises of the wonderful new science,
of which he was one of the most brilliant professors. A handsome
man in his forties, with the full, beaming eye of the enthusiast,
we were all sensible of his charm. He was of that type not
uncommon in our country, the artist turned business man.
They said his private life was rather scandalous, but I know
nothing about that. His new wife was among the ladies present, a
pretty woman, but negligible as far as conversation went.
"That's all true," said Harry Colter, when he could get an
opening, "but publicity, is a two-edged sword which is apt to cut
in unexpected directions."
"Take these subway cards," went on Larned. "The idea was that
the bandit lives in a world of his own, supported and encouraged
by those of his kind, and cut off from all others. It was thought
that it would be a good thing to remind him in this unexpected
fashion of the existence of the real world which would not
tolerate his actions. I appeal to Mme. Storey to tell us if this
is not sound psychology."
My mistress smiled in a way that told me what her opinion was,
but refused to commit herself.
"Harry has something more to say on the subject," she
remarked.
"It's a confession of weakness on the part of the police,"
said Colter energetically. "Mr. Durward, with his fresh point of
view, instantly perceived that. Irrespective of the effect on an
occasional bandit, it certainly lowers the morale of the whole
public that rides in the subway. For the public relies on the
stern and secret measures of the police in dealing with crooks,
and to have them come out in the open like this and beg the
bandits to be good cannot help but be demoralizing."
Inspector Rumsey agreed with Colter, though nothing could
induce him to admit that the department could be in the
wrong.
"It is true," he said, "the stick-up boys have the public
scared. And every story of a successful holdup that the
newspapers print is just that much additional publicity for the
bandits."
"You can't blame the newspapers for that," said Larned.
"I don't. It's their job to purvey the news. But it's too bad
they've got to feature it the way they do."
"That just proves my point," said Larned. "You've got to have
a counter-publicity to deal with it."
I felt impelled to put in my oar at this point. Though I'm
only a humble secretary, Mme. Storey expects me to keep my end
up. There must be no dummies at her table.
"But a true counter-publicity would be directed toward
boosting the public morale instead of further depressing it," I
suggested.
Mr. Larned gave me a cold look, as much as to say: Who is this
red-haired female? His eyes quickly passed on to my mistress.
"Perhaps Mme. Storey will tell us how she would handle the
situation," he said.
My mistress held up her hands in mock dismay.
"Thank Heaven, I'm not obliged to answer that," she said
laughing. "My job is quite difficult enough. Bandits are a little
out of my line."
CHAPTER II.
SOME days or weeks after the dinner party, when
all recollection of this conversation had passed out of my mind,
I was working in the outer office of our suite on Gramercy Park
one morning, when a good-looking young man came in. He was a mere
lad of nineteen or so, but his face wore that unnatural look of
experience and assurance that suggests a childhood spent on the
streets.
"Are you Mme. Storey?" he
"No; her secretary." I could see that the little wretch was
only trying to flatter me.
"Well, is she in?"
"Mme. Storey can only receive visitors by appointment," I
said. "Will you tell me your business?"
"Sure," he said, with an appearance of the utmost good humor,
plumping himself into a chair without waiting for an invitation.
His bright eyes traveled around the room, taking everything in.
"You sure got a swell joint here," he remarked sociably.
I ignored this. "What can I do for you?" I asked coldly.
I could see from the beginning that he was just stringing me
along; but it never occurred to me to suspect he might have a
sinister motive. All kinds of people come into the office, and
waste my time, particularly when we have been engaged on a big
case, with all its attendant publicity.
"I just wanted to apply for a job," he answered.
"A job?" I said, surprised. "What sort of job?"
"Anything at all," he said, grinning. "I read in the papers
how Mme. Storey employed a whole raft of men, operatives,
private detectives like, in the Harker case."
"It is only occasionally that she is engaged on a criminal
case," said I. "And then any operatives that we may require are
secured temporarily from a list that we keep."
"Well, put me down on your list," he said. "John Casey, 123
East Broadway."
He was no Casey! However, as the quickest way of getting rid
of him, I wrote the address on a pad.
"You got a swell job here, secretary to Mme. Storey and all,"
he said while I was writing. "Somepin' doin' alla time, I
guess."
I made no answer.
"Don't she employ no clerk nor office boy nor nothin'?" he
asked.
"No," I told him.
"There'd be the job for me," he said.
"Well, let me have a sample of your handwriting," I suggested,
pushing the pad toward him. I thought I had him there.
He drew back. "I got a cramp in me hand to-day," he said
without batting an eye. "Along of catching a swift one yestiddy.
But say, I could make myself useful here, receivin' callers and
runnin' errands and all. And when you needed an outside man I'd
be on the spot."
I shook my head.
"And say, when she was out I'd be company for you," he said
with a sidelong grin. The good-looking little wretch was actually
trying to vamp me. I was highly amused. His sharp eyes perceived
my amusement, and it encouraged him to go further.
"Say, what's your name?" he asked.
"I don't see that that matters," I said.
"Just in case I wanted to write you later to see if there was
an openin'."
"I will write to you if there is an opening," I said
dryly.
He affected to laugh heartily. "Gee, you're wise, all right!
You're there with the comeback!"
He came close to me and smiled insinuatingly. I suppose with a
certain type of girl he had found himself irresistible. "Me and
you'd get along fine, eh?"
"I dare say," I said coldly. "But you will have to excuse me.
I'm busy."
"Is that the door to her room?" he asked, pointing.
I did not answer. He knew that it was the door to her room,
because there was no other except that by which he had
entered.
"Let me take a look in," he said cajolingly. "I bet it's a
swell room!"
"Certainly not!" I said, rising to forestall any move to open
the door. "Mme. Storey must not be disturbed."
"Oh, I didn't know she was in there," he remarked with an
innocent air. "Well, so long, kid," with a final grin over his
shoulder. "You know where to find me." And went out.
It did not occur to me to be angry. Indeed, after he had gone,
I sat down at my desk, smiling. Such is the power of youth and
good looks. I merely put him down in my mind as another fresh
kid.
Immediately afterward Mme. Storey called me in to take
dictation. We were still suffering from the publicity attendant
upon the famous Harker case, and there was a pile of letters six
inches high on her desk.
My mistress as a matter of courtesy insists on writing once to
everybody who writes to her. Of course if they continue to send
in trifling letters they go into the wastebasket. Had we been
less busy, I would no doubt have related the incident of my
caller just for her amusement, and the whole course of subsequent
events might have been changed; but as it was, I did not mention
him.
I have on several former occasions described the arrangements
of my mistress's beautiful room. There is nothing about it to
connote the word office.
Once the front drawing-room of a great house on Gramercy Park,
it is now furnished with priceless Italian antiques, and forms a
fit setting for Mme. Storey, who is herself like a vivid figure
out of the Renaissance—but not antique. In spite of all
pressure from the outside, she preserves her individuality.
She refuses to organize her genius, nor will she work herself
to death either. She accepts the few cases that most appeal to
her; all the others are turned down. I constitute her entire
office force; and when we feel like it we close up the office
altogether, and go for a jaunt.
Mine. Storey sits at an immense oak table, black with age, her
back to the row of casement windows which look out on the square.
At her right hand is the door into my room; and in the same wall
near the back of the long room, another door leading directly
into the hall.
This door, which is closed with a spring lock, permits her to
escape from anybody waiting in my room, whom she may not want to
bother with. In the middle of the back wall is a door giving on
what we call the middle room, which is used for the multitudinous
requirements of our peculiar business—dressing-room, hiding
place, temporary jail, and what not. The three rooms constitute
our suite.
In taking dictation I sit at my mistress's right hand, with my
back to the door from my room. We were in the middle of our work
without a thought in our minds except the desire to get to the
bottom of that pile of silly letters, when the buzzer sounded
that announced the opening of the outer door into my room.
I finished the sentence I was putting down, and rose to my
feet. I got no farther, for at that moment the door from my room
burst open, and two men ran in, each grasping an ugly
automatic.
One was my visitor of half an hour before; the other was a few
years older.
What a moment that was! Death itself could not have been worse
than what I suffered. My heart turned to water in my breast; I
seemed to lose all strength, all control of my body.
How I longed to shrivel up to nothing before those guns! I
dared not look at my mistress, who was alongside, and a little
behind me. My eyes were glued to those hideous weapons.
"Stick 'em up!" barked the older man. My hands went over my
head like a shot. They strained away from me, as if desirous of
flying up under the ceiling on their own account. I heard Mme.
Storey drawl:
"I'll put mine on the table if you don't mind. The other
attitude is so ungraceful."
I stole a look at her. Good Heavens! What a woman! She was
actually smiling. The sight of her smile did not put any heart
into me, though. It gave me a dreadful pang to realize that those
worthless youths, the sweepings of the streets, held the life of
such a glorious woman in their hands.
"None of your tricks!" growled the leader.
"Bless your heart, I wouldn't think of it!" drawled Mme.
Storey. "I have a gun in the drawer of this table, but I'm not
going to try to get it out. I value my skin too highly."
"Look through those two doors," the leader said to his
companion. "I'll keep the women covered."
As silently as a shadow, the younger man ran to the two
doors.
"This door goes out into the hall," he said at the first; and
at the other, "Nobody in this room."
"Do you mind if I smoke?" said Mme. Storey, moving her hand
toward the big silver box that stood on her table.
"Keep your hands in front of you!" barked the leader.
Taking a step forward, he threw back the cover of the box.
Seeing that it contained only cigarettes, he shrugged, and
allowed my mistress to take one.
"Won't you join me?" she drawled mockingly.
He helped himself, tossing the cigarette up to his mouth
without taking his eyes from Mme. Storey's face. She nonchalantly
lighted up, and offered him the burning match. He put the
cigarette to it, with his eyes fixed on hers.
What a picture! While the first one was merely a good looking
boy, this one was infernally handsome. Mme. Storey's face still
wore the mocking half smile; his was like a mask.
It was perfectly inhuman in its immobility; not a muscle
quivered; his very eyes appeared to be glazed. It made a cold
shiver run down my spine.
"Hand over your pearls," he said.
Putting down the cigarette for a moment, Mme. Storey
unfastened the string about her neck.
"I'm sorry they're not my best ones," she said.﹃Still,
they're pretty good.﹄She tossed them over.
"Your watch, your rings," he went on, dropping the pearls in
his pockets.
She unfastened her watch with calm deliberation, holding her
head on one side to keep the cigarette smoke out of her eyes, and
drew off her lovely emerald, and the three diamonds. They
followed the pearls into his pocket.
Meanwhile the other man commanded me to hand over my
pearls.
"A-ah!" snarled his leader out of the side of his mouth.
"They're only fish-skin. Don't yeh know the difference?"
The young man refused my beads then, with an abashed look like
a schoolboy. But I had to hand over the watch that Mme. Storey
gave me, and the little diamond I bought with my own savings.
My heart burned with helpless anger. My little stone had not a
fraction of the value of Mme. Storey's, but she could replace
hers the next day, whereas mine represented years of self-denial.
What kind of a world was it, I thought, where such wrongs were
permitted?
"Your money!" said the leader harshly to my mistress.
"It's in the same drawer with my gun," she told him
pleasantly.
He put a hand on the table, and leaned over, bringing his
mask-like face close to hers.
"Get it out," he said curtly, "and let me see you touch the
gun, that's all."
"By no means!" said Mme. Storey, smiling. "I just wanted to
warn you, so you wouldn't shoot at the sight of it."
Pulling the drawer toward her, she picked up her gold mesh
bag, and tossed it on the table in front of him.
"Now the gun," he added. "Pick it up by the muzzle."
She obeyed.﹃I'd be glad if you'd let me have my hanky out of
the bag,﹄she said. "I may need it."
"Ah, cut the comedy," he told her with his indifferent air.
"Where's your safe?"
"In the outer office. There's nothing in it but business
papers. My secretary will open it for you."
"You go with her," said the leader to his man.
I leave you to imagine what my feelings were when I had to
turn my back on the gun, and walk out of the room with it
following me. I nearly died out of sheer terror. I felt a hundred
bullets tearing through my body.
But I got the safe open somehow, and satisfied the young
bandit that it contained nothing of value to him.
We returned to the other room. My mistress was smiling still.
The old bandit was sitting now, with his chair tipped back in a
parade of indifference.
No muscle of his waxen face had changed, but there was a glint
in his eyes as he watched Mme. Storey. He contemptuously
permitted her to see that he approved of her as a woman.
When his man reported that there was nothing in the safe, he
stood up.
"Then back out," he said, with a jerk of his head toward the
door into the hall.
"Why hurry?" drawled my mistress. "Let's have in tea."
The leader stopped. An open, scornful admiration leaped up in
his eyes. The insolence of it was simply indescribable.
"You're a pretty game chicken, ain't yeh?" he drawled, putting
a hand on his hip in a swaggering fashion. "You look good to
me."
He dropped his gun in his pocket—he knew he had her
disarmed—and returned a step or two toward the table. He
drew a ring off his finger and tossed it toward her.
"Wear that," he said. In a flash he was gone.
When the door closed after them I collapsed. I could hear
myself bawling like a child, without any power to stop it. The
next thing I knew I was pulling frantically at one of the
casements, so that I might alarm the street.
Mme. Storey drew me away before I got it open.
"No good," she said. "They'll have a car waiting. You'll only
start a panic among the kiddies in the park."
I could still hear myself crying and carrying on like somebody
else.
"Why didn't you send for the engineer? The button is there
under the edge of your table for just such an emergency."
"What!" she said, smiling at me. "And bring John in here
empty-handed to get shot?"
"It's outrageous!" I cried. "Coming in here like that! And you
take it so calmly. The way that man looked at you was
intolerable."
Mme. Storey smilingly quoted the childish couplet, slightly
amended:
"Sticks and stones will break my bones,
But looks will never hurt me."
"Such insolence!" I cried. "I cannot bear it!"
"Oh, a shot of heroin will do wonders to buck up a man's
self-esteem," she said calmly.
She was sitting there smiling, and examining the fellow's ring
with the eye of a connoisseur. It was a handsome carnelian in a
wonderful antique setting. Heaven knows from whom it had been
stolen.
The sight of her indifference drove me almost into a
frenzy.
"Aren't you going to do anything?" I cried.
"Oh, surely," she said, partly arousing herself. "Do all the
usual things; my Bella; telephone to the police and to the
newspapers. But as for me"—she relapsed into her smiling,
musing upon the ring—"I intend to have a little fun out of
this."
CHAPTER III.
WITH proper management this affair need never
have got into the newspapers, since no whisper of an alarm had
been raised. But Mme. Storey disdained to conceal it; on the
contrary, she informed the press herself.
"It would make such a good story, it would be a shame to keep
it from them," she said in her provoking way.
Of course, as I was to learn later, this publicity was
necessary to the plan that was even then shaping itself in her
mind; but I couldn't guess that in the beginning.
Well, you can imagine what a sensation was created by the
news. The famous Mme. Storey held up in her own office by a pair
of youthful bandits! To come as it did, right on the heels of her
brilliant success in the Harker case, when her name and fame was
on everybody's lips, gave point to the tale. While the newspapers
were still terming her the greatest criminologist of modern
times, here she was stuck up by a couple of boys and robbed of
her pearls!
It is a weakness of all democracies, they say, that when a
citizen is elevated above the heads of the mob, nothing pleases
the said mob better than to find an excuse to turn and shy things
at the hero. We had to submit to an unmerciful razzing, both
public and private. What a chance it gave to the cartoonists!
Mme. Storey, I need hardly say, took it all smilingly. Borne
up by her secret knowledge of the retribution she was preparing,
I think she actually enjoyed it. She encouraged the razzers that
her revenge might be more complete in the end.
But it was a bad time for me. I ground my teeth every time the
telephone rang. My temper was in a continual state of
exacerbation. Not the least of what I had to submit to were the
hypocritical condolences of all the old cats in the boarding
house where I live.
Inspector Rumsey suffered no less than I did. That his police
had allowed Mme. Storey to be robbed right under their noses, so
to speak, caused the worthy little man almost to burst with
chagrin. He wanted to surround us afterward with a whole cordon
of police wherever we went, but of course Mme. Storey would not
hear of anything like that.
What she had termed all the usual things were done, of course,
and nothing came of it. We furnished the police with exact
descriptions of the bandits, which were sent broadcast. Several
of the best men attached to the Central Office were put on the
case.
Mme. Storey and I went down to headquarters and turned over
hundreds of pages of the Rogues' Gallery, without finding the
faces we were in search of. Inspector Rumsey was not surprised by
it.
"Every year," he said bitterly, "we have a fresh crop of young
desperadoes to deal with."
I could not but be sorry for our friend during these days. His
difficulties were owing to no fault of his own. After our robbery
the crime wave mounted to still greater heights. Nearly every day
the police had a fresh holdup to deal with, and on some days
three or four.
"The publicity attached to your case has bucked them up all
down the line," Inspector Rumsey said bitterly.
Mine. Storey herself took no direct measures toward searching
for the bandits.
One day when I was burning with indignation at the facetious
comments of some newspaper or another, I ventured to remonstrate
with her on this.
"Oh, our little holdup boys were merely pawns in the game, my
Bella," she told me. "I'm after the commanding pieces."
I was relieved to learn that she was not entirely idle in the
matter.
One morning, when she took off her hat I cried out in dismay
upon perceiving that she had acquired a boy's haircut
overnight.
I must confess that it was very becoming, revealing as it did
the beautiful shape of her head and emphasizing the pure line of
her profile. Still I hated to see her adopt so extreme a
fashion.
She smiled at my distress.
"Wait!" she said, holding up hand, and disappeared within the
middle room.
An hour later she called me to her. I stopped in the doorway,
aghast. She stood in the middle of the room, striking an
attitude.
I say "she," but at the first glance it seemed to me as if my
mistress had vanished, leaving a horrible changeling in her
stead. The closely cut hair was now silvered, and her face
heavily made up, one might almost say enameled.
Around the eyes and mouth it was cunningly shadowed to suggest
the hollows of growing age; in a phrase, the fashionable,
hard-living woman of fifty.
She was wearing a costume cut in severe mannish lines, showing
a rolling silk collar at the neck, and a Bohemian tie. A little
tough hat went with it, and a malacca stick with a plain ivory
knob. I'm sure you get the picture: an elderly charmer of the
highest fashion, handsome, hard, and utterly reckless.
"Will it pass?" she asked in a throaty voice with a hint of
huskiness.
"It is marvelous," I murmured.
"I am Kate Arkledon," she went on, with a half sneer which was
fixed in her face; to smile would have ruined the effect. "Have
you ever heard of her?"
I shook my head.
"A little before your time, I suppose. Ten years ago Kate
Arkledon was one of the cleverest confidence women in the United
States. She was famous in her way. Then suddenly she dropped out
of sight of all her former associates. As a matter of fact, she
is living in respectability and affluence not a dozen doors from
me. Once upon a time I did her a service which she has never
forgotten.
"Well, with her permission, I am staging a come-back for Kate
Arkledon. There is a slight resemblance between us, which I have
built upon. It will be good enough at least to deceive anybody
who has not seen her for ten years."
I foresaw danger ahead, and my heart sank.
Mme. Storey broke off, to study me through narrowed eyes.
"Turn around," she said.
"What do you want of me?" I faltered.
"Get a permanent wave," she said.
"But I will look like a Hottentot!" I cried.
"Of course," she said calmly. "They all do when they come out
from under the curlers. You will make a very effective red-haired
vamp, my Bella. I will dress you and teach you how to make up
for it."
"But the make-up is only the beginning!" I gasped. "I could
not possibly keep up such a part."
"Certainly you could. It will not be nearly so difficult as
the character of Canada Annie, which you carried off so well. You
can be a Dumb Dora this time with nothing to do but sit and look
unutterable things at men. All you will have to say is 'Ain't it
the truth!' when you agree, or very scornfully, 'So's yer old
man!' when you disagree."
All this was uttered in the sneering, husky tones of the
character she was portraying. It made me shiver.
"What are we going to do?" I asked fearfully.
"We are going to organize a little holdup gang of our own,"
said Kate Arkledon with a wicked grin.
A cry was forced from me. I could not imagine anybody less
fitted for the part of bandit than myself.
"Not really—not really!" I faltered.
"It will be just as real as I can make it appear," she said.
"I mean to pull off a stunt or two in the most spectacular
style."
I groaned inwardly.
"This is how I figure it out, Bella," she said in her natural
voice. "There is certainly an organization behind the crime wave;
but it's operating along new lines. It's a very loose and
flexible organization, with all the units working independently
of each other. Well, my idea is to form a unit of my own which
will function so brilliantly that the organization will be forced
to make overtures to us. Inspector Rumsey is in the secret."
I tasted in advance the awful excitement that was in store,
and my heart was like lead in my breast. But I would have torn my
tongue out sooner than protest aloud.
CHAPTER IV.
BUSY days followed. It was impossible to let our
other business slide, and we had to lead double lives.
By day Mme. Storey and her secretary, Bella Brickley, worked
in the offices on Gramercy Park, taking care to give out an
interview to the newspapers occasionally, so that our presence
there was regularly established. By night Kate Arkledon and her
pal, Peggy Ray, showed themselves in certain gilded resorts on
the West Side.
A good many days passed before I got accustomed to the sight
of my painted and bedizened self in the mirror. On the whole,
though, I had an easy rôle to play. All that was required of me
was to act as a foil for my mistress.
For the purpose of enabling us to change from one character to
another and back again, we engaged a room in one of the
nondescript warrens on West Forty-Seventh Street, where all kinds
of queer little businesses are carried on by all kinds of queer
characters. One could enter or leave such a building at any hour
without exciting remark.
For Kate Arkledon's regular hang-out we chose a well-known
West Side street, once fashionable, and now much favored of the
white collar gentry. It often breaks into the news. However, I
shall not name it for fear of depressing real estate values.
We rented a four room flat in a pretentious apartment house,
where the tenants' references were not too closely scanned; and
here we immediately began to gather our gang round us.
Mme. Storey's principal aid in this affair was the man I shall
call Benny Abell, though that was not his real name, nor yet the
name by which he had become famous in the underworld. If you have
read my account of the Melanie Soupert case you will remember
him.
His specialty had been sticking up the box offices of
theaters, always working alone, and displaying a truly superhuman
nerve. Since my mistress had broken up the Varick Street gang he
had become reunited with his family, and had gone straight.
Mme. Storey needed him now as a sort of liaison officer with
crookdom, where his exploits were still remembered. She never had
any intention of using him in an actual hold-up, which would have
been like a nightmare to the poor fellow who had been through so
much.
Abell, when I first knew him, was a small, determined,
white-faced man, of an elegant appearance. Trained to a finish by
danger, he was like a sheaf of quivering nerves.
Now happiness had caused him to take on flesh, and his face to
assume a serene expression. However, he worked hard to reduce for
this emergency, and played his part admirably.
Next we took in George Stephens, one of our regular
operatives, and the best man we had after Crider. I should have
been glad to have had Crider himself at our back, but he has
worked for us so long Mme. Storey feared the danger of his being
recognized. She didn't want to have any more disguises than she
could help. Stephens had the advantage of not having been in
America long. A young fellow of aristocratic appearance, he soon
acquired the soubriquet of English George.
Our remaining man was Bert Farren, a mere boy who has done
good work for us on one or two occasions. Mme. Storey chose him
because boy bandits seemed to be the fashion.
We still lacked a direct, present connection with the world of
crooks; but mistress said we would have to wait for circumstances
to furnish that.
Very early in the game the scene of our first exploit was
chosen. This was the jewelry store of B. & J. Fossberg, a
large and handsome establishment on Broadway not a hundred miles
from One Hundredth Street. It is the finest establishment of the
sort on the upper West Side.
Inspector Rumsey was acquainted with Benjamin Fossberg, one of
the proprietors, and after a great deal of persuasion won his
consent to the staged hold-up. His brother was told, of course,
but the clerks were kept in the dark.
It was arranged that the guns which were kept in the store for
protection should be removed as if for repairs on the day of the
stick-up.
Night after night the five of us met in the flat on West
—— Street to discuss and rehearse our plans. I had no
idea that such elaborate preparations were required to stage an
affair which would be all over in a minute or two.
By day our three men watched the store until they were
familiar with every detail of the business routine. The Fossbergs
had not fallen for any of the idiotic safeguards such as tear
gas, sirens, etc. They trusted to the imposing appearance of
their establishment to overawe gunmen.
It was on a corner, and occupied the space of three ordinary
stores. No such big place had ever been attacked.
A detailed plan of the store was drawn out, together with a
map of the neighborhood. This we all studied. Each of us was
allotted his station, and many rehearsals took place.
To me fell the comparatively easy job of acting as look-out on
the sidewalk. Mme. Storey was to enter, and ask to have goods
shown her. George and Bert were to cover her get-away with their
guns, while Abell was to drive the car, which was to be waiting
in the side street.
When the business of the evening was over, it was our custom
to show ourselves at one or another of the gilded resorts in the
neighborhood. Gradually we settled on the Boule 'Miche' as our
public hangout.
Abell, who had been making inquiries, said that it had become
a favorite gathering place of the white collar gangs. It occupied
the site of a famous old New York restaurant on Columbus Avenue,
which had rapidly gone downhill after prohibition, and changed
its name half a dozen times.
You would never have guessed the characters of its frequenters
from their appearance. Everybody looks alike nowadays. In the
Boule 'Miche' you found exactly the same sort of sleek, showy
women, accompanied by sleek and not so showy men, that you would
see in any other night club.
It was only when you possessed a key to their occupation that
you began to perceive a certain wary look in the eyes of the men;
a tendency to glance toward the door every time it was opened.
Once in a while strange snatches of conversation would reach your
ears. Of course, many perfectly respectable people must have been
included among the patrons of the place.
The present proprietor was a dark-skinned gentleman, with a
perpetual gleaming smile, and a hard eye that was anything but
smiling. His evening clothes fitted him to a marvel. His name was
Bat Bartley, and Abell knew him.
He was one of those mysterious New York characters whom
everybody knows, and nobody knows anything about. It was the
custom of all his patrons to fawn on him, as they always do in
such places—I can't tell you why; and while he smiled he
scarcely troubled to conceal his contempt of them.
When Abell introduced my mistress to him as Kate Arkledon I
saw the wary eyes narrow slightly. Evidently he was familiar with
that name. My mistress treated him with cool disdain, whereupon
he immediately began to fawn on her! Such is human nature!
Upon our first visits to the Boule 'Miche' nobody attempted to
address us, though, of course, so striking a figure as that of my
mistress could not pass unnoticed. People stared at her, and
whispered to each other, clearly asking who she was.
No doubt they asked the proprietor, and no doubt he told
them—or at least such of them as he could trust. By degrees
a tinge of respect and admiration appeared in the glances of the
regular habitués. One could almost pick out those who belonged to
the fraternity of crooks by the way they looked at the supposed
Kate Arkledon.
And then one night we had an encounter which terrified me; I
thought our whole elaborate structure was about to collapse. I
needn't have been terrified. I underrated my mistress's superb
aplomb.
An old boy with a red face and bulging blue eyes, who had been
talking to Bat Bartley, came to our table. His tuxedo, while of
good material, was of an old fashion; an air of having seen
better days clung around him. Fixing his bloodshot eyes on my
mistress, he asked:
"Is this Kate Arkledon?"
"The same," she said, with an air of cynical indifference she
now affected.
"Well, well, well!" he said. "I never should have known you,
Kate. And you, I see, have completely forgotten me."
My mistress made believe to study him.﹃Your face is very
familiar to me,﹄she said. "But the name—the
name—"
He shook his head mournfully. "To think that you should
have forgotten met; Remember the St. Louis Fair?"
Mme. Storey must have had Kate Arkledon's biography at her
finger tips.
"Chad Herring!" she said instantly, and offered the old fellow
her hand. "But how changed!"
"Ah, don't rub it in!" he said. "I know it! Chad Herring's on
the shelf! But you, good Heaven, you're fresh as paint!"
"Paint is right!" said my mistress, with her scornful smile,
touching her cheek meanwhile.
He laughed uproariously. "Just as smart as ever, I see! You're
a wonder, Kate!"
"Sit down," she said.
I trembled at her temerity. Surely the least slip would be
fatal. She introduced us all to him by our underworld names.
"Young blood—young blood!" he muttered, sadly shaking
his head. He turned to her with a pathetic eagerness.﹃Kate, what
do you hear of Bill Blandick and Paddy Nolan—﹄He named a
whole string of names. "The old gang."
"All gone," she said, spreading out her hands. "That is, gone
from me. I have not heard of any of them for more than ten
years."
"What have you been doing, Kate?"
"Leading a godly, righteous and sober life," she replied with
a bitter sneer.
"You don't look it," he said innocently.
"Ah, there's nothing like dullness to break you up!" she told
him. "I'm done with a respectable life. I've come back."
"Come back?" he repeated almost with horror. "At your age!
Remember, I know how old you are."
"Well, you needn't broadcast it," she said sharply.
What a wonderful piece of acting she was giving!
"Come back!" he repeated again. "Do you think you can keep
your end up in this day of youth and jazz and high-powered
automobiles?"
"And why not?" she demanded proudly.﹃My nerve is as steady as
ever. Look at that hand.﹄She held it out. "And I can teach these
youngsters a thing or two. Good God, Chad—think of the
opportunities nowadays! There was never anything like it in the
old days!"
He looked at her with that same fear. I suppose that the
fierce energy she expressed made him feel old and broken by way
of contrast.
After a little desultory talk he ambled away. Presently we saw
him telling Bat Bartley about it.
"That will help establish our characters," said my mistress
calmly.
CHAPTER V.
ON the morning of the appointed day I awoke in
blessed unconsciousness and lay staring at the ceiling. Then the
realization of what was before me came winging back, and the
bottom seemed to drop out of my stomach. I suppose it was much
the same feeling as that experienced by a murderer on the morning
of his execution. The worst of it was, our stunt was not to be
pulled off until four o'clock, the most crowded time on upper
Broadway, and I had all those miserable hours to put in
beforehand. My breakfast choked me.
Every detail having been completed the night before, there was
nothing for Mme. Storey and I to do but proceed to the office in
our own characters and attend to our usual business.
During the day that amazing woman, my mistress, gave out
interviews, talked over the telephone, and dictated letters as if
it was no different from any other day in the year. If she
noticed that my hand was prone to tremble and my voice to shake,
she never spoke of it. Indeed, no reference of any kind was made
to what was almost immediately before us.
At three o'clock she locked the drawer of her desk and said to
me casually:
"Well, Bella, let's go."
I declare, from the openness of her smile and the brightness
of her eye, one might have thought it was a picnic we were bound
on. She enjoyed it!
Proceeding by taxi to the room on Forty-Seventh Street, we
transformed ourselves into Kate Arkledon and Peggy Ray. I noticed
that my mistress, while carefully preserving the same character,
toned down her make-up somewhat. For the jewelers she did not
wish to emphasize the hardness, the recklessness that she
flaunted in the Boule 'Miche' every night.
As it was, the perfection of her plain, smart get-up and her
high manner created a figure that any jeweler would rejoice to
see coming into his shop. Around her neck she clasped a short
string of valuable pearls, her only ornaments.
"Decoys," she said to me with a grin.
Me you must picture with my red hair frizzed to a
fare-you-well, and my face made up like the American flag,
wearing a showy hat, a smartly cut caracul coat and high-heeled
satin slippers. The make-up robbed my face of all character, and
I looked to the life the expensive, empty-headed woman that you
may find on upper Broadway in her hundreds. But I doubted my
ability to run in those high-heeled slippers.
"Then kick 'em off," said Mme. Storey. "It will add a
picturesque touch to the story."
We continued uptown to the flat on West —— Street,
where we found our three men waiting for us, all smartly rigged
out according to the custom of the modern gunman, all cool and
smiling. The youngster in particular seemed to regard it as a
great lark.
I could almost have hated them all for their unconcern. I
wished myself anywhere but there. Mme. Storey dealt out guns to
all. They were loaded with blanks. Mine went into a specially
prepared pocket of my fur coat.
Inspector Rumsey came to us here for a final consultation.
"How about the Fossbergs?" asked Mme. Storey. "Do you think
they will play their parts satisfactorily?"
"I haven't a doubt of it?" said the inspector dryly. "They
couldn't be in a worse state of funk if they expected to be
robbed in earnest. I persuaded them to stay away from the store
until just before you came, so their clerks wouldn't get on to
anything."
"And the guns?"
"It's the custom of the store to keep four loaded guns in
different places under the counter. These were collected
yesterday and sent to the makers to be cleaned and
inspected."
I thought, with a shiver: How does he know but that one of the
clerks may have a gun of his own? However, there was nothing to
be gained by bringing that up then, and I kept my mouth shut.
"What are the police arrangements?" asked Mme. Storey.
"According to your instructions, I did not attempt to
interfere with them," returned the inspector. "I have taken
nobody in the department into my confidence. There is a man on
fixed post on Broadway two blocks south of the store, and another
stationed in the little park three blocks north. These men are
far enough away not to interfere with you, but you must be
careful not to drive past them, or they might shoot if they hear
the alarm.
"In addition there are two patrolmen whose beats meet in the
middle of the street alongside the store. You will have to watch
for these. After they have met and gone back you can depend upon
about twelve minutes before they return. Don't forget that there
are many men on fixed post along Riverside Drive."
"We will keep off the Drive," said Mme. Storey dryly.
The final arrangements were that we were to proceed to the
Fossberg store separately; Abell in the car was to wait in the
side street near the corner of West End Avenue with his engine
running; the rest of us were to walk up and down, keeping in
sight of each other, until the two policemen had met.
Two minutes after the policemen had gone back Mme. Storey was
to enter the store, and I was to take up my position at the door,
glancing up and down the street as if I was waiting for somebody.
Abell and Farren were then to be looking in the window. Two
minutes after Mme. Storey had entered they were to follow her
into the store.
"Well, good-by and good luck," said Inspector Rumsey, smiling.
"I must say it seems like a mad scheme to me; but I have had too
many lessons in the past to venture to oppose any plan of Mme.
Storey's."
A few minutes later four of us were separately strolling up
and down outside Fossberg's store. I was thankful for the rouge
which covered my pale cheeks. However, we were not in the least
conspicuous on the well filled sidewalk.
A policeman passed, swinging his club, without looking twice
at us. In the side street, down near the end of the short block,
I could see the car waiting; a touring car, with the top down in
true bandit fashion. It was a "stolen" car, too, to add
verisimilitude—stolen from one of Mme. Storey's friends,
however.
Broadway uptown is an immensely wide street with grass plots
down the middle.
Trees used to grow there; but nowadays they would have nothing
to root in but the subway.
Both sides of the way are filled in with immense and expensive
apartment houses with entrances in the side streets. The Broadway
level is given up to shops, not large in size, but nearly all
dealing in expensive luxuries.
While it is not a fashionable street, I suppose there is as
much money to the mile as in any other street in the world. The
people of that neighborhood have a fat, soft look that must be
tempting to a bandit.
Fossberg's, as I said before, is the finest establishment in
that part of town. Only a few very choice objects are displayed
in the show windows. There is but the one entrance, which is cut
across the corner; at that season it was closed by a revolving
door.
Inside, the four walls were lined by showcases, the tops of
which served as counters; and there was in addition a square
inclosure in the middle of the store, surrounded by other cases
to display goods. Within this inclosure was a block of low safes,
in which many valuable objects were kept.
Well, the two policemen met, exchanged a word or two, and each
slowly retraced his steps. The two minutes passed; then Mme.
Storey with her languid, graceful carriage went through the
revolving door, and I took up my station outside it.
At this moment, when I expected to have died with terror, all
fear suddenly left me. Explain it how you will, my heart
rebounded; all my faculties became preternaturally sharpened; the
scene of that street was bitten on my brain as if with an acid;
the towering apartment houses, red electric cars, smoothly moving
motor cars, well dressed people drifting up and down.
Stephens and Farren were close by, looking in one of the show
windows. The former was carrying an umbrella hanging from his
arm. He had his eye on the chronometer exhibited in a corner of
the window to inform passers-by of the correct time. When the
proper interval had elapsed they followed Mme. Storey through
the revolving door.
In order not to interrupt my narrative, I will describe here
what happened inside while I was waiting outside, poised like an
animal ready for I knew not what.
There were eight or nine customers in the store, Mme. Storey
said, mostly in couples, since people generally like to have a
friend along when they are choosing costly objects. There were
five clerks on duty. Mr. Benjamin Fossberg ought to have been
waiting to receive my mistress, but he and his brother were both
too nervous to show themselves openly. They watched the
preliminaries from their office at the back.
Mme. Storey went to the center inclosure. She had waited a
moment or two for a clerk. In the meantime her two men entered;
Stephens turning to the left, where watches were displayed, and
Farren making his way toward a case of jeweled cufflinks.
Mme. Storey told the clerk who came to her that she wanted a
diamond ring. She affected not to be able to decide whether she
wanted three diamonds in a marquise setting, or an emerald with a
diamond on each side. We knew that the most valuable rings were
kept in a certain safe, and her object was to make him open it.
She said her clerk was an exquisite young gentleman like a model
for a clothier's advertisement, and it was a shame to frighten
him so rudely.
When he had opened the safe and brought a small velvet lined
tray of rings to lay before Mme. Storey, he found himself looking
into the stubby barrel of her automatic. His face turned as white
as the starched collar he wore; his eyes started from his head;
no sound escaped him but a little throaty gasp.
"Fetch out all the trays from that safe and put them on the
counter," said Mme. Storey quietly.
Like a man in a dream he started to obey, reaching blindly for
the trays while he kept his terrified eyes fixed on the gun. As
he put the trays on the counter, Mme. Storey, always keeping him
covered, with her free hand coolly emptied the contents on the
square of velvet which covered the glass counter and put the
trays to one side.
So quietly was all this done that several
of the trays had been brought out and emptied before anybody else in the store got on to what was happening. Then a woman customer on the other side of the center enclosure caught sight of Mme. Storey's gun. A low, terrified cry broke from her, and instantly everybody in the store took alarm.
Stephens and Farren then slipped forward with their guns out, one on one side of her, one on the other. Standing back to back, they commanded the whole store between them.
"Keep still or I shoot!" growled Stephens.
"If you move a step I'll plug you!" added the boy.
There was no other sound, they said, except the hoarse breathing of the terror-stricken men and women. Everybody was frozen where they stood.
In sheer panic the two proprietors had dropped down behind the office partition. Stephens described to me the semi-circle of still, ghastly faces that remained turned toward him.
There was one fat, overdressed woman in a near-seal coat, whose
lips moved continually. But whether she thought she was gabbling
a prayer or beseeching Stephens to spare her life, he never knew,
because no sound escaped her.
There were only three persons on Farren's side of the store.
None moved. Mme. Storey meanwhile continued to concentrate on the
clerk who was serving her.
"Move sharp!" she said, raising the gun a little.
He dumped the remaining trays on the counter in a heap. Mme.
Storey deliberately emptied them. There was now a glittering,
sparkling mound of rings on the square of velvet.
Mme. Storey picked up the corners of the square, one after
another, and, giving the sack a twirl which confined the contents
in a ball, dropped it into her hand bag. She then started to back
toward the door, the two men covering her retreat.
During all this I was playing my part outside. Immediately
after Stephens and Farren went in a woman entered, and I made no
attempt to stop her; but when, a moment or two later two more
women came along, according to instructions I attempted to hold
them in conversation. I asked for information about vacant
apartments in the neighborhood.
It is a fruitful subject, and I detained them without
difficulty until out of the corner of my eye I saw Mme. Storey
backing toward the door. You must remember that all this happened
in much less time than it takes to tell it.
I gave the revolving door a push to facilitate my mistress's
exit. She came out, the gun already hidden. Farren followed, then
Stephens.
There was no appearance of hurry. Stephens slyly dropped his
umbrella in such a fashion that the revolving door jammed on it,
and stuck. These doors will only turn in one direction, you
know.
My last impression was of white faces inside, and fists
beating on the glass; and the two foolish women that I had been
talking to, vainly pushing at the door to get in. They had no
idea of what had happened.
The people inside were shrieking at them, and pointing down
toward the jammed umbrella. But the two women never got it; they
only looked indignant.
Meanwhile we four walked rapidly, but with perfect sedateness
toward our waiting car. There was never any need for me to kick
off the satin slippers.
Just as we were getting into the car, the clerks broke out of
the store with a roar; but in a jiffy we were around the corner
and bowling down West End Avenue at thirty miles an hour.
Conditions were just right; there was enough traffic in the
street to conceal us, and not enough to hold us up. The pursuit
never came within sight or sound of us.
We kept right on down West End Avenue past the point where it
becomes plain Eleventh Avenue, and scattered at Forty-Second
Street, leaving the "stolen" car to be found by the police in due
course.
Such was out first holdup. I expect you will smile at me, just
as my mistress did, but I felt disappointed at the outcome, it
seemed so easy. After getting so tremendously wrought up as I did
at the last moment I required more excitement to satisfy me.
"It will do for a beginning," said Mine. Storey cryptically.
"If we appeared to get along too well without outside help, it
would only be to defeat our own purpose."
CHAPTER VI.
YOU can imagine with what eagerness I searched
the newspapers next morning. Once more I was disappointed.
It appeared that while we were turning our trick at
Fossberg's, the famous Bobbed-Hair Bandit had been conducting a
sensational raid on the pay-roll of a factory in Brooklyn. She
got a whole column and a half whereas they only gave us a couple
of short paragraphs tacked on to the end of her story.
According to this account which had been given out by one of
the clerks, he and his mates had put up a bold resistance, and
had succeeded in driving us off with only a trifling loss to the
establishment. These lies made me good and sore.
Why, the value of the rings taken by Mme. Storey was upward of
fifty thousand dollars. I experienced the psychology of a real
gunman. I felt that we had been cheated of our due.
Mme. Storey was highly amused when I voiced my feelings.
"Oh, never, mind the general public," she said soothingly; "if
we get credit among our professional friends at the Boule
'Miche', it will be more to the point."
That night Benny Abell was sent on ahead to the resort to act
as a sort of advance agent for the company. We were to join him
there after midnight.
The Boule 'Miche' calls itself a "club," of course, though it
hangs out a glittering electric sign to the street. Only
"members" are admitted upon presentation of their cards. It is
not difficult to get one's self elected.
The entrance is ingeniously protected by a series of dressing
rooms and lobbies swarming with employees. Beyond is the
restaurant proper, consisting of three large rooms, all done in a
florid rococo style with slashings of gilt scroll work.
In the center of each room a little fountain throws up a jet
of water with colored lights playing upon it. At this time the
place was enjoying a wonderful run of prosperity owing, no doubt,
to the widespread connections of the genial proprietor.
Pretty soon Bat Bartley would sell out and the Boule 'Miche'
blossom out under a new proprietor and a new name. For obvious
reasons none of these places lasts long.
As soon as we took our seats in the principal room, it became
apparent that Abell had done his work well. Those whom we had
spotted as the shady habitués of the place bore themselves toward
us with an increased respect.
In particular Bat Bartley was even more supple and suave than
usual. He came hurrying up to ask with a meaning air if we would
like a private room that night.
"I do my best to keep out the wrong sort of persons," he said,
"but once in awhile they will get by." He was referring to agents
of the police.
"No, thanks," said Mme. Storey with her cool smile. "I enjoy
watching the crowd. Nobody is looking for us yet."
Bat Bartley laughed as if she had made an excellent joke. As a
matter of fact, no descriptions of us had been published; and we
had learned through Inspector Rumsey that the clerk at Fossbergs
had been incapable of furnishing the police with working
descriptions.
"Well, anyhow," said Bartley with a wink, "have a bottle of
cider on the house."
This beverage, which was served from a plain bottle, unless I
miss my guess, originated in a cellar of Reims.
Abell did not remain with us continuously, but visited his
acquaintances through the rooms as occasion offered. By and by he
brought one of them up to our table.
"Meet my friend, Mr. Tinker," he said, "you know, Muggsy
Tinker between friends."
It was a comical figure. He had the look of a little boy who
had become middle-aged without growing up.
He had a boy's curly pate now streaked with gray, and a
schoolboy's sheepish smile, though his face was seamed and
wrinkled.
A large, staring glass eye which matched very ill with its
little twinkling mate added to the peculiarity of his
appearance.
He was wearing the conventional dinner coat, but would have
looked more at home in a rough jacket with a dirty handkerchief
around his neck.
"Please' to meet yeh. Please' to meet yeh," he said, grinning
affably all around. He sat down and accepted a glass of
cider.
"I've heard of you," said Mme. Storey. "You and Buck Millings
used to work together years ago."
"That's right. That's right," he said, greatly pleased. "Buck
and me pulled off many a job together. He was an A-1 partner.
They don't make his like nowadays: Poor Buck, he met his end
under a freight train in the Joliet yards. To think of anybody
remembering them days! We used to hear of you then, ma'am. Oh,
yes, you was famous. Way out of our class. You for the classy kid
glove work, us for the rough!"
Mine. Storey toasted him with her glass.
Mr. Tinker, without saying anything plainly, went on to let us
know that he had heard of our exploit of the day before, and
highly commended it.
"Say, that was pulled off in a real big style," he said. "It
was just what you'd expect of Kate Arkledon."
"Just a beginning," said Mme. Storey with a casual air.
"Say, the papers gave you a rotten deal on that," he went on.
"It made me sore. A brilliant piece of work like that ought to
get proper credit."
My heart quite went out to the little man for his
sympathy.
"Oh, well, we're not looking for publicity," said Mme.
Storey.
The little man gave her a sharp look.
"Oh, I don't know," he replied. "Times have changed."
The talk drifted away to other matters. After awhile he said,
apropos of nothing that had gone before:
"You ought to see Jake."
"Jake who?" asked Mme. Storey with an idle air.
"I don't know his proper name. We just call him Jake the
Canvasser."
"Whom does he canvass for?"
"Oh, his organization," said Muggsy vaguely.
I pricked up my ears at that.
Mme. Storey refused to betray any interest in this Jake; but
Muggsy returned to the subject of his own account. "Jake may have
a proposition to put up to you. You ought to talk to him. He's an
A-1 feller."
"What sort of proposition?"
"Oh, let him name it to you himself. You'll find him better
than his word. We all deals with Jake. He earns his commission
all right, and then some."
"I know these Jakes," said Mme. Storey scornfully. "They
belong to the family of bloodsuckers. They live off us who do the
work and take the risk."
Muggsy wagged his hand back and forth.
"No, no," he said, "you get this wrong. Jake ain't no common
receiver. He's got a new proposition. Up-to-date."
"Oh, I guess I can run my business without him," said Mme.
Storey.
An ugly look appeared in Muggsy's face.
"You'll find you gotta deal with Jake," he said. "We all do.
The service that Jake supplies is for the benefit of all, and all
are expected to pay their share. Nachelly, if anybody tried to
profit by Jake's service without puttin' up for it, it would make
the crowd sore."
"I'll hear what he has to say," said Mme. Storey, coolly.
"Times has changed, ma'am," said Muggsy meaningly. "It used to
be everything was individuality, but nowadays it's organization.
You can't do nothin' without organizing. Either you gotta climb
aboard the band wagon, or the wheels will sure go over yeh!"
CHAPTER VII.
ON the following evening the redoubtable Jake
turned up at the Boule 'Miche' in person. Bat Bartley brought him
to our table. He was as smooth as a well-whipped mayonnaise.
In appearance he was the prosperous business man—well,
not quite, for the marvelously cut blue suit, a little lighter in
color than men usually wear, the pale pink shirt and tie of a
darker hue gave him a sporting character. He wore an immense
diamond on the middle finger of his left hand.
He was more the successful theatrical manager or baseball
magnate. He had one of these smooth full faces that lent
themselves naturally to an unctuous smile; his handsome, dark
eyes rolled and beamed mysteriously, and gave nothing away.
His first act was to order up a bottle of "cider." I found
that he was always amply supplied with funds. He was driven about
town by a smart chauffeur in an elegant new car of the most
expensive make. He was liberal, too, in making loans to any
member of "the crowd" who was out of luck.
You are not to suppose that he sat down and came out plump and
plain with his proposition. By no means. A good hour was spent in
laying the foundations for a beautiful friendship.
A second bottle followed the first. He made no secret of his
admiration for my mistress, and in that I think he was honest. I
believe he was a little astonished by her superb style after the
commonplace material he was accustomed to deal with.
He entertained us with pleasant gossip of the great world. He
seemed to know everybody worth knowing, and I was greatly
impressed until he gave the snap away by bringing in the name of
Mme. Storey.
"Oh, Rose and I are intimate friends," he said carelessly.
"She owes her success to the fact that she keeps in close touch
with men like me who know all sides of life. But," he added with
a confidential smile, "I don't tell her too much, you bet. I look
after my friends. Anybody will tell you that, Rose don't get as
much out of me as I get out of her."
I wish you could have seen my mistress's innocent expression
while he was getting this off. She looked like the cat who has
swallowed the canary.
By insidious degrees he approached the real business in hand.
He was careful never to give the plain brutal names to
things.
"The organization that I represent," he explained, "has two
main objects; first to advertise the business as a whole; second,
to see that the individual operator gets proper recognition. You
can't rise in any profession without publicity. Look at the mean
way the papers used you the other day. That couldn't happen if
you were in with us.
"Providing publicity to the nervy boys and girls that live
dangerously," he went on, "that's our line." The phrase﹃live
dangerously﹄was continually on his lips. I wondered where he had
picked it up.
"Look where they stand to-day as the result of our publicity,"
he went on. "The police helpless, the public terror-stricken. You
have only to pull your gat anywhere for every boob in the
neighborhood to freeze solid. All due to intelligent publicity;
to such stunts as the Bobbed-Haired Bandit. That's our stuff.
That's reached such a point that we don't even have to furnish
the stories any more. The papers run it spontaneously. They hand
it to us."
"So it seems," said my mistress.
"But we don't stop with one stunt," he resumed. "Always
something new. It was my people who staged the holdup of Mme.
Storey awhile ago. That was a wow of a stunt. Just look at the
publicity we got out of it. It had a tremendous moral effect. For
everybody says to themselves: 'My God! If they can get away with
that what chance have we got?' And they give up without a
struggle!"
Here a certain compunction appeared to attack him, and he
assumed a deprecatory tone.
"Of course, I told you just now that Rose Storey was my
friend, and so she is in a manner of speaking. I know her well,
but she ain't a real friend, like. She only goes with me for what
she thinks she can get out of me, so I don't feel under any
obligations to her. I just go her one better. That's fair, ain't
it?"
"Absolutely," agreed my mistress. "By the way, who pulled off
that trick?"
I kept my eyes on my plate during this amazing scene. I
distrusted my own powers of dissimulation.
"Two young fellows that I'm bringing out," said Jake.
"Falseface Petro and Tony Lanza."
"Say, with a person of your style and your reputation," he
went on, "there's no limit to what we could do! What a chance!
What a chance! Why, we'd leave the Bob-Haired Bandit tied to the
post!"
"All for nothing?" queried Mme. Storey dryly.
"You would agree if you were satisfied with the publicity to
pay us our usual commission. Ten per cent of the proceeds. That's
all."
"In goods?" she asked slyly.
His face hardened.
"In cash. All our dealings are in cash. We don't want to
interfere with your arrangements for disposing of the goods."
"I see," said Mme. Storey. "Well, look here. I'll tell you
what I'll do. You ask your people to furnish me with a suggestion
for a sensational stunt that will break into the headlines, and
if it appeals to me I'll do business with you."
"Fine!" cried Jake. "You shall have it to-morrow night!"
Shortly after this we went home, it being then about half past
two. We left Jake the Canvasser circulating from table to table
amongst his customers.
The Boule 'Miche' closed officially at the legal hour, but
behind its darkened front the privileged guests lingered on until
morning. In the midst of a gay party in the outer room I saw the
face of Madge Caswell, a young woman who works for us sometimes.
She has a faculty for trailing a suspect that amounts to
genius.
She was there by Mme. Storey's orders, and in a fleeting
glance of intelligence my mistress signified to her that Jake was
her man. Madge's instructions were to spare no expense in keeping
in contact with him, even if it meant hiring half a dozen
assistants, but to allow him to slip at any moment sooner than
risk letting him suspect he was watched.
The following night found us in our usual places at the Boule
'Miche' after midnight, surrounded by the same showy and noisy
crowd with flushed faces and glassy eyes. The Boule 'Miche'
represented a good time to these people, but they were not really
having it. They whooped themselves up to it.
What a lot of time and money mortals waste in the constant
pursuit of so-called pleasure!
We saw Jake the Canvasser from time to time with one party or
another, but he was coy to-night and allowed a good while to
elapse before he came to our table. Perhaps he wished to force
Mme. Storey to send for him. But she was a better waiter than he
was, and in the end he had to come of his own accord.
He sat down and entertained us with his anecdotes. My mistress
would not deign to question him. Finally he said:
"—Er—I heard from my people."
"Yes?" said Mme. Storey, with perfect indifference.
Jake glanced questioningly at the rest of us.
"Oh, you may speak freely," she told him; "these people are in
on everything I do."
"Well," said Jake, "the organization suggests that you go back
to Fossberg's and turn a second trick. First-rate publicity in
that. It will be the last place they'd expect you. If you make
your second visit before the clerks have time to recover their
nerve, it'll be a walk-away!"
"Not a bad idea," said Mme. Storey, with a subtle smile.
My heart began to beat with the same old suffocating fear of
the future.
CHAPTER VIII.
NEXT morning we plunged into our preparations
again. We already had full information as to the plan and layout
of the Fossberg store, and had now to concoct a new line of
approach that would stand as good a chance of success as the
old.
Bert Farren, who was sent up to make a preliminary
reconnaissance, reported that the revolving door had been
replaced with two pairs of swinging doors. These doors swung
either way. Also, a carriage opener had been hired to stand
outside.
It was obvious that he was a detective in disguise, and armed.
This man seemed to me like a fatal obstacle in the way of our
success, but Mme. Storey smiled when she heard about him.
"It will make the problem more interesting," she said.
We struck another snag when Inspector Rumsey approached
Benjamin Fossberg with our proposition. He met with a flat
refusal.
It was somebody else's turn to be the goat, Fossberg said; he
and his brother had not recovered from the shock of the first
hold-up. The inspector was finally forced to bring him down to
our office, for Mme. Storey to exert her charm upon him.
She finally won a reluctant consent, with the stipulation that
both brothers be allowed to absent themselves from the store when
the stunt was pulled off. Mme. Storey had no objection to this,
of course.
Fossberg pointed out that he had now no excuse to deprive the
clerks of their guns.
"Then load them with blanks," said Mme. Storey. "They'll never
know the difference. Let there be an exchange of shots. It will
add drama to the affair."
In these preliminary discussions it soon developed that I was
to be put forward this time as the principal performer. Mme.
Storey could not be the first to enter the store without adding a
disguise to her disguise, and this she could not do since it was
necessary for the success of the affair that the clerks should
recognize her in the end.
The realization of what they expected of me almost overwhelmed
me, but not quite, for now I was borne up by the secret hope that
when the actual moment came I should be able to play my part as
well as any of them. In the meantime, though, I suffered all the
torments of the damned.
This "living dangerously," as Jake termed it, was not all that
it was cracked up to be.
We continued to frequent the Boule 'Miche' late at night, and
our prestige there was growing. Through Jake and through Bat
Bartley we were gradually becoming acquainted with all the
"operators" or "adventurers," as they termed themselves. Most of
them were incredibly young, and all distinguished by the childish
vanity which seems to be inseparable from the modern crook. Among
them were several of the girls who alternated in the rôle of the
Bobbed-Haired Bandit.
I understood that there were at least half a dozen bobbed-hair
bandits. These youngsters, recognizing a great character in Mme.
Storey, instinctively deferred to her. She would have made good
with them, even without the infernal halo of Kate Arkledon's
reputation around her head.
One of the girls quite won my heart. They called her Brownie.
She was not strictly beautiful, her mouth being too wide and her
blue eyes set too far apart, but she had that indefinable
something which is called charm.
Her frank gayety was irresistible. It was her finest qualities
which had driven her into association with these thieves—a
hatred of smugness and sham. Under happier circumstances she
might have adorned the highest circles.
After it was all over we tried to find this girl, but she had
disappeared. Like Mayflies they enjoy their brief dance in the
sun—then oblivion.
I may say here that none of these young people suffered as a
result of Mme. Storey's activities in the case. It was agreed
between her and Inspector Rumsey that the police must do their
own work in respect to apprehending the small fry.
My mistress's interest lay with the cold-hearted man or men
who remained in safety in the background, profiting by the
recklessness of the young. But of course she always meant to get
Falseface Petro and Tony Lanza; that she owed to herself.
My heart gave a great jump when I first saw these two enter
the Boule 'Miche'. Now for the acid test of our disguise, I
thought, glancing at my mistress and at my own reflection in the
mirror.
We had been playing our rôles for many days now, and they had
become second nature to us; there was little likelihood that they
would recognize us separately. True, for them to find us together
added to the danger somewhat; but we were now in the midst of
quite a large party, most of whom were known to Falseface and
Tony as "safe."
The two young men had been told all about us, and that is the
secret of a successful disguise—i.e., to prepare in
advance the minds of those whom you wish to deceive.
Jake brought them up to our table from behind me. I could
feel them coming. My heart beat thickly as at the approach
of a dangerous animal. Fortunately I was playing an insignificant
rôle, and they scarcely deigned to notice me.
Little Tony was hailed by the crowd as a good fellow, while
Falseface was greeted with more respect. The latter, though he
was not now in action, still maintained his pose of
inscrutability.
He stood there with a good-humored sneer, as much as to say he
would permit the ladies to admire him. And the worst of it was,
you couldn't help but admire him.
Conceited and empty as he was, there was power in his
unnatural self-control. In that circle of grinning faces he never
smiled.
It was quite thrilling to see him and Mme. Storey together.
Neither would yield an inch. Each affected to ignore the other;
but it was none the less evident that for these two the others at
the table simply did not exist.
Neither had much to say. Mme. Storey smoked one cigarette
after another, and through the haze of tobacco fumes her
expression appeared even more cynical and reckless. Falseface
Petro gave himself the languid, elegant airs of a celebrated
screen star.
We had made room for the newcomers at our table, and the
inevitable "cider" circulated. Of course in company like that we
never discussed business; the talk was just as empty and
meaningless as might have been heard at any table in the place.
It was merely a noise.
"Well, what's the good word, Falseface?"
"Nobody's got a good word for you, Butch."
Loud laughter greeted this sally.
"Say, you're so quick you're ahead of yourself. Wait till you
catch up, fella."
"If I waited for you, I'd be there yet."
"Is 'at so?"
Somebody broke into song:
"My gal's a high-bawn lady;
She's dahk, but not too shady—"
"Where'd you dig that up, Brownie? That song was laid away
when mother was a girl."
"I don't care. I like it."
Louder:
"Fedders lak a peacock, just as gay;
She's not cullud, she was bawn that way."
"What yeh tryin' to do, compete wit' t' orchester?"
"T' orchester ain't in it wit' me."
Fortissimo:
"Down the line they can't outshine
This high-bawn gal of mine!"
"...Odds of sixty-four to one, and she romped home. I had a
tip, too, and I wouldn't play it. I wisht somebody would kick me
now."
"Hey, fellas, Tony wants somebody to kick him!"
"That's a good show down at the Booth."
"Yeah. Lee Shubert sent me a box last week."
"Yes, he did!"
"...They're gonna call it the Sans Sowcy."
"What's 'at mean?"
"Soich me! Vincent Astor and young Morgan and all the big
fellas belongs."
"Well, they're nottin' in my life."
There was dancing in the middle room, and the crowd at our
table was continually breaking up and reforming in different
combinations. When an opportunity presented itself Mme. Storey
whispered to me to pass the word to our fellows to let us go home
alone this night.
It turned out in the end that Falseface Petro was not as
indifferent as he seemed. When Mme. Storey rose to leave, he got
up also in his lordly way and squired us out.
Tony followed after like his shadow. Falseface signaled a taxi
at the curb.
"Can I drop you anywhere?" he drawled.
"I live in —— Street," said Mme. Storey.
The upshot was that Falseface and Tony accepted an invitation
to come up for a last drink and a smoke. By this time we had
thoroughly established our characters with them, and there was
little chance of a discovery. But the sense of danger was always
present; one could not relax for a moment.
How strange it seemed to be hobnobbing with those two sleek
young savages!
Arrived in our own little flat, none of us needed to put a
curb on our tongues.
"Jake told me about the stunt you pulled off at Fossberg's
last week," said Falseface. "That was a damn neat piece of
work."
"Oh, I was just getting my hand in after quite an extended
rest," said my mistress carelessly.
"What you get out of it?"
"Twenty-five thousand. That was about half what the stuff was
worth."
"It's better than I can do. Those fellows are
bloodsuckers."
"You're no slouch at the game yourself," said Mme. Storey.
"That was a nervy stunt you pulled in Mme. Storey's office. I
like to see a woman like that get it. She's too big for her
shoes, she is."
"If you've got the nerve they can't stop you," said Falseface,
pluming himself.
"Sure. That's the principle I've always gone on."
"Me and you ought to be in on something together," he said
with an elaborate show of indifference.
"Suits me," said my mistress. "We're going to pull a big stunt
next week. Going back to Fossberg's to make a second cleanup.
There will be good publicity in it this time."
"Well, Tony and me 's got nothing on next week," said
Falseface carelessly.
"I could use a couple more men if they were the right sort,"
said Mme. Storey. "I take a third; I'll give you a quarter; and
the rest divide what's left. There won't be but six or seven of
us in it."
"We're on," said Falseface, without troubling to consult his
partner.
"All right," said Mme. Storey. "Be here at nine to-morrow
night to meet the crowd and talk things over. We'll go on to the
Boule 'Miche' after."
CHAPTER IX.
THE gang was completed by a dandy chauffeur
borrowed by Mme. Storey from a wealthy friend. The car "stolen"
for the occasion was an elegant new limousine.
On Saturday morning at nine we met at the flat. I was in a
miserable state of funk. I hope I succeeded in concealing
it.
Mine. Storey served out the guns, and she herself made sure
that Falseface and Tony were not carrying any additional weapons.
They protested against the blank shells, but our leader stood
firm.
"Our object is robbery, and not murder," she said coolly. "If
you are obliged to shoot, the blanks will go off with just as
much noise and have the same moral effect. And if there is any
slip-up in our plans, you won't land in the death chamber."
They appeared to see the force of her argument.
We left the flat separately. It fell to my part to ride uptown
in the elegant car with the dandy chauffeur.
But I was in no condition to enjoy all this grandeur. My knees
trembled, my hands were clammy, my tongue clove to the roof of my
mouth. I wore a close hat which completely hid my red hair, and
certain changes had been made in my facial decorations.
On the first occasion the clerks at Fossberg's could not have
had but the briefest glimpse of me; still there was a possibility
of my face having been photographed on somebody's mind, and we
were not taking any chances.
Two blocks below the store I halted in order to make sure that
I was not arriving too soon. Mme. Storey came to the car door as
if to greet an acquaintance.
"All here," she said cheerfully. "Give us two minutes, then
drive on, and go ahead with the program. Do not look about for us
as you are entering the store."
"How about the two policemen on beat?" I asked.
"You can disregard them to-day."
When I drove up in front of Fossberg's in my fine car, the
door opener hastened to help me out. As I stepped down I made
believe to stumble, and allowed a little cry of pain to escape
me.
"Oh, my ankle!"
The man caught hold, of my arm to support me.
"Will you get back in your car?" he asked.
"No, let him drive on," I said. "I will sit down in the store
for a moment."
He helped me across the sidewalk. This trick was to draw him
inside the store, you understand.
I was half paralyzed with fear. He must have felt how my arm
was trembling; but I suppose he ascribed it to the pain I was
suffering.
Inside the store, a clerk made haste to push up a chair, and I
sank into it. In a glance I saw that the place was fairly well
filled, and then things began to happen.
As the door opener left me to return to his post, he found
himself facing Falseface, Tony, and young Farren, who had entered
behind me, each with a gun in his hand. Instinctively the
doorkeeper's hand went toward his pocket; but at a harsh command
from Falseface, he thought better of it, and flung his hands
above his head.
In a twinkling Tony had disarmed him. Behind them, in the
space between the two pairs of doors, Mme. Storey was coolly
bolting the outside doors, and pulling down the shades. To the
glass of the door she affixed a little notice which had been
prepared in readiness:
"Closed on account of death in the family."
Stephens had been sent around through the apartment house to
cut off the escape of anybody who might try to get out by the
rear door of the store. This door opened into the lobby of the
apartment house.
For the moment I remained sitting where I was. All fear left
me, and I seemed to be able to see all round my head.
Mme. Storey joined the three men, and the four of them spread
out, and advanced across the store like skirmishers. When they
came abreast of me, I fell into line with them.
A strange silence filled the place. Then Mme. Storey ordered
everybody, clerks and customers, over to the far side out of our
way, and they scurried like rats at her bidding.
The human creature is not a pretty object when he is in the
grip of terror: Over in the corner they struggled insanely to get
behind each other.
Never will I forget the sight. There was one big woman
squeaking in terror, and struggling with all her might. In spite
of her struggles, one of the men clerks who had her by the
elbows, continued to hold her in front of him.
Another clerk, instead of following the crowd, silently
dropped out of sight behind the counter on my left. I knew he had
a gun back there, though it was loaded with blanks. I told Mme.
Storey about him.
"Well, if he sticks his head over the counter, blow it off,"
she said harshly, loud enough for him to hear.
Nobody but me could hear the faint ring of laughter in her
voice. She was enjoying herself.
A third clerk slipped out through the office at the back, but
we were not concerned about him. Presently he reappeared, walking
backward, stepping high, and holding his hands above his head.
Stephens followed, covering him with his gun.
Mme. Storey ordered Stephens to dislodge the man behind the
counter. As Stephens looked around the counter, the clerk
fired.
Low, terrified cries broke from the people across the store.
My own heart failed me at the sound of the explosion, though I
knew it was all a comedy.
Stephens did not return his fire, but flung himself upon the
clerk, and dragged him out of his hiding place. At the back of
the store there was a tall safe with the door standing open.
Stephens flung his man inside, and closed the door.
Meanwhile Falseface, Tony, and I had made for the safes in the
center of the store. Each of us was provided with big pockets
inside the skirts of our coats. I had the combination of each of
these four safes, but they were not called for since all stood
open.
Dropping on our knees, we began to pour the contents of the
trays into our pockets. Such a cascade of glittering necklaces,
pins, bracelets and rings!
While I worked, I could see Mme. Storey out of the tail of my
eye, helping to cover the cowering crowd in the far corner.
Without lowering her gun, she took a tiny cigar from the breast
pocket of her neat jacket, and, sticking it in her mouth, lit a
match with her thumb nail. I think this display of coolness
intimidated our victims as much as the guns.
It took us but a minute or two to empty the safes. We did not
bother with the show case stuff.
Coming out from behind the counter we made for the rear door.
Mme. Storey and the other two men backed slowly toward us. Then
from the midst of the crowd they were covering somebody fired,
and instantly pandemonium broke loose. Whipping out their guns
involuntarily, Falseface and Tony returned the fire as fast as
they could shoot.
Nobody could be hurt, of course; but from the shrieks and
yells which rose, you would have thought that every shot had
found its mark. Somebody was shoved through a show-case with a
horrifying crash.
As we backed through the office, a loud pounding was heard on
the street door. We had not a moment to lose. Somehow, we found
ourselves in the lobby of the apartment house, and got the door
closed.
It was quiet there. The door closed with a spring lock, and
opened inward toward the store. There was no means of fastening
it from the outside; but Stephens had brought a long, thin bar
for the purpose. When this was laid obliquely across the door,
caught inside the handle, the ends projected beyond the door
frame; and those inside were unable to pull the door toward
them.
I say it was quiet in the lobby, and the way clear. The door
from the street was locked, and Stephens, upon first entering,
had bound and gagged the elevator attendant, and had thrown him
in a little office alongside the entrance.
To be sure, the door of one of the rear apartments opened, and
a white face showed for a moment, but we had nothing to fear from
this direction. The door was quickly slammed again.
We crowded into the elevator. Stephens knew how to operate it.
The last thing we saw, as we shot upward, was a crowd of people
headed by a policeman turning in from the sidewalk toward the
street door.
My knees weakened at the sight of the blue coat. A policeman is such an obstinate fact to face.
On the top landing a couple of people were waiting for the
elevator. They fell back in affright as we poured out. We ran up
the final flight of stairs to the roof.
I should explain that this apartment house was one of a pair
exactly alike, which occupied the whole block fronting on
Broadway. All we had to do therefore was to run across the roof,
and descend into the twin house, whose entrance was in the next
cross street. The door from the roof was armed with a bolt on the
inside, and this we shot as we passed through.
In such a state of excitement, one's instinct was to run right
down through the house; but Mme. Storey would not permit it. She
feared that the noise of our descent might alarm somebody below,
and result in our being cut off.
She forced us to wait on the top landing for the elevator. Oh,
but it was hard to wait with one's nerves jumping!
The elevator came at last. As we were getting in, we heard
running feet on the roof, and fists began to pound on the door we
had bolted. The negro elevator boy looked at us terrified, and
hesitated.
Mme. Storey, smiling, took out her gun, and affected to
examine it. The boy's black face turned gray with terror, and he
took us down in a hurry. Not a word was spoken.
We issued out of the house without any appearance of hurry.
Our elegant limousine was waiting at the door with the engine
running. The alarm had not yet penetrated into this street.
We could see people running down Broadway. Mme. Storey was the
last of us to get in the car.
As she pulled the door after her, the people running down
Broadway stopped, and a crowd came pouring around the corner from
the other direction. They were headed by a policeman with a gun
in his band. They were not in any too great a hurry, though.
They stopped to reconnoiter prudently. I was looking out of
the rear window of the limousine. As the policeman raised his arm
I dropped.
We roared away down the street. The policeman sent a couple of
shots after us, while I made myself small. However, they went
wide. We turned the corner on two wheels; turned another corner
and slowed down.
We were safe. Away from the actual scene nobody would ever
have suspected that handsome car with its dandy chauffeur of
having taken part in a holdup.
When I realized that we were really safe, I suddenly dissolved
in weakness. I seemed to lose all grip, all control of myself.
Simultaneously perspiring and shivering in an agony of
after-fear, I groaned to myself: Never again! Never again!
At Eighty-Sixth Street we turned east, and making our way
through the park by the transverse road, abandoned the car in
Yorkville, and scattered. As Mme. Storey and I made our way
decorously down Madison Avenue, all that had happened, seemed
like a dream. However, the weight of jewelry bumping against my
knees reminded me that it was no vision.
My mistress went into a drug store to telephone. With a grin
in my direction, she left the door of the booth open a crack, and
I heard this astonishing conversation:
"Is this Fossberg's jewelry store?...This is the lady who just
held you up...Held you up, I said. Can't you understand English?
I just wanted to tell you, in case you had overlooked it, that
one of your clerks is shut up in the big safe at the back of the
store...Better let him out before he suffocates...Oh, that's all
right. Don't mention it. Good-by."
CHAPTER X.
BY two o'clock the first brief accounts of the
affair were on the streets. The late afternoon editions carried
the complete story. And it was a story!
As a feature we had no competition that day. Jake the
Canvasser had certainly delivered the goods. Mme. Storey and I
read the newspapers, chuckling.
It appeared that the chief source of information was a
customer (!) who happened to be in the store at the time. The
clerks, as before, were too flustered to give a coherent account
of what had happened:
I shall not give the newspaper story in full since I have
already described what happened. The best part of the story was
that it was true, except for certain artistic details added by
the narrator. As when he said he heard the bandits address their
leader as "Duchess."
There was a clever touch! The soubriquet stuck, of course; we
never appeared in the newspapers after that but Mme. Storey was
termed the Duchess, or the Duchess-Bandit.
What a marvelous thing is publicity! Only start it once, and
it rolls up like a snowball. Every day some new story of the
Duchess's exploits appeared.
People claimed to have seen her here, there, everywhere.
Moreover, the newspapers all carried indignant editorials asking
what was the matter with the police that such things were allowed
to go on. That was good publicity, too.
In that first story every possible detail concerning Mme.
Storey was played up; her elegant appearance, her extraordinary
coolness, the humorous remarks that she addressed to her
trembling victims. The fact that it was our second descent on the
place was not omitted.
Fantastic were the accounts of the loot we had secured. It
appeared that so far as the more valuable part of the stock was
concerned, Fossberg's was completely cleaned out. In point of
magnitude it was the greatest jewel robbery that had ever taken
place in New York.
Two policemen added their quota to the story. Officer James
Crear said:
"I was on fixed post at the corner of Broadway and
—— Street about ten thirty this morning, when a
fellow ran over to me, and said there was something wrong in
Fossberg's jewelry store on the corner. Said he heard shooting
and yelling inside as he passed by. So I ran over there, and I
found the store closed, and a notice on the door reading:
'Closed on account of death in the family.'
"I thought this was funny, because I had seen folks going in
and out just a few minutes before. I could hear a racket inside,
and I rapped on the door with my stick. Pretty soon it was opened
by one of the clerks, who was so scared he couldn't tell a
straight story. But I understood there had been a holdup, and the
bandits were making their way out through the apartment house
lobby in the rear of the store.
"I ran around outside to the door of the apartment house. It
was locked. I forced it, and inside I found the elevator boy tied
up and gagged. He told me the gang had gone up in the elevator. I
ran up the stairs after them. They went over the roof, and down
through the adjoining apartment house. They bolted the roof door
after them, and I lost more time forcing it. When I got down to
the street they were out of sight."
Officer William Rohrback said:
"I was patrolling the west side of Broadway at ——
Street, when I heard Officer Crear rap for assistance. I was two
blocks away from his post. When I got there I found a crowd
milling around Fossberg's jewelry store. I was told that a holdup
had taken place and that the bandits had gone upstairs in the
apartment house, and with the help of Officer Regan, who had also
run up, we put a watch at every exit from the house.
"The janitor came up and told me there was a way over the roof
into the adjoining house, so, leaving the others on watch, I ran
around into the next street. When I turned the corner, I saw a
woman getting into a limousine car. It was such an elegant
looking outfit I hesitated; but when it started down the street
at forty miles an hour or better, I fired three shots in the air.
The car failed to stop."
The "customer" in Fossberg's who supplied the real story to
the reporter had this to say about the Duchess:
"She was a woman of about forty-five, but well preserved. Must
have been a beauty in her youth. In figure still as slender and
active as a young woman. She looked more like one of those
fashionable dames than a bandit; and more like Park Avenue than
Upper Broadway; the real thing. She had the hardest boiled face I
ever saw on a woman. I mean by that, she meant business. A
desperate character. I wouldn't have thought of opposing her.
"As she was standing squarely in front of me all the time we
were herded over at the side of the store, I had plenty of time
to size her up. She looked at us as if we were dirt under her
feet. The most striking features about her were her eyes, the
pupils of which closed up to mere slits, like a cat's eyes in
daylight. It gave her a terrible look."
You see how cleverly he blended fact and fiction.
An amusing outcome of the affair was, that two days later a
committee of West Side merchants waited upon Mme. Storey in her
office, and did their best to persuade her to take the job of
running down the Duchess. My mistress smilingly declined.
But I am getting a little ahead of my story. On the night of
the hold-up we telephoned ahead to the Boule 'Miche' asking for a
private room. Such detailed descriptions of all of us had been
published, it was no longer prudent to appear in the general
room. We entered by a side door, and were taken upstairs by a
private stairway.
In the "Diamond Room," as they called it, we held a sort of
reception, which lasted half the night. Everybody "in the
know"—that is to say, every shady character who frequented
the place, came up to congratulate us. Our fame was great in the
underworld; the Duchess had thrown the Bobbed-Hair Bandit in the
shade.
When Jake the Canvasser came to us that night, what an
exchange of compliments took place! For once Jake lost his cagey
air; enthusiasm carried him away. He held Mme. Storey's hand in
both of his, and gazed in her face like a lover.
"Finest thing I ever heard of!" he said. "Finest thing I ever
heard of! You're the queen of them all!"
"I had A-1 support," she said, including us all in her
glance.
"Are you satisfied with the way we handled it?" asked Jake.
"Of course, there'll be a lot of new stuff in the morning
papers."
"More than satisfied!" said my mistress. "The man who got up
that story was a genius!"
"Of course, we put our best man on it," said Jake. "I may say
he is a well-known literary guy, who just does this on the side.
But at that, he couldn't have done a thing if you hadn't given
him the stuff to work on. Say, that notice, 'Closed on account of
death in the family,' and the little cigar, and that trick of
lighting a match with your thumbnail while you kept the crowd
covered; that was better than anything he could invent."
"Oh, I don't know," she said, not to be outdone; "that name he
hung on me, 'the Duchess,' that was a master-stroke. To a
professional person a good name is more than half the battle. And
that touch about the cat's eyes; it couldn't have been bettered.
I hope your people are pleased with the way we pulled the thing
off."
"I haven't had any communication with them yet," said Jake,
"but I know they must be. In fact, the affair reflects credit on
both sides. It shows that we were just waiting for each other;
you feel that, don't you?"
"I'll never make a move without consulting you," she said.
Later, Jake contrived to get all outsiders out of the room, so
that he could talk business with my mistress.
"Have you any notion what the stuff is worth?" he asked
eagerly.
In respect to this matter, Mme. Storey intended to string Jake
along as far as she could, of course.
"Not yet," she told him. "I've got good people working for me,
and the stuff is all in their hands. But there's so damn much of
it it'll take a while for the market to absorb it. They have paid
me twenty-five thousand on account. I brought yours."
It was paid over in twenty-five crisp hundred dollar bills. I
may say that this money was not marked. In dealing with men so
astute as Jake and his employers, it would have been too risky.
But we had the numbers of the bills, of course, and hoped to be
able to trace them by that means.
Jake put away the money.
"Well, how about our next grandstand play?" he said, rubbing
his hands.
"Oh, give us a chance," laughed Mme. Storey.
"Oh, there's no desire to overwork you," said Jake, in his
oily way; "no, indeed! But we mustn't miss the psychological
moment, either. This thing that we've started will run along for
a week or ten days without any help from us. They'll all be
workin' to hand us publicity. But when she begins to slack off,
that's the time we've got to strike again, and strike hard in a
new quarter. And we've got to be ready."
In my mistress's eyes I could read the determination: Not if I
can help myself!
But Jake could not see that. For all her cool and careless
airs, Mme. Storey was fully aware of the terrible risks we ran in
staging these affairs, and she had no intention of attempting
fate any oftener than was absolutely necessary.
"Well, it's no harm to talk over what we're going to do," she
said carelessly. "I'm always open to suggestions."
With the lines we had out, we hoped to have Jake and the men
who were back of him lodged behind the bars before another such
affair could be made ready. But in this, as you will see, we were
disappointed.
CHAPTER XI.
IN order to avoid repetition, I will combine the
gist of several of Madge Caswell's reports into one.
For a number of years, she said, Jake the Canvasser has been a
widely-known character throughout the white light district of
Broadway. He passes there as Jake Golden, which is his right
name. He has two brothers, prosperous manufacturers, and belongs
to a widespread family connection, with which he keeps in close
touch.
None of these people have any reason to suspect his
association with the criminal world. Indeed, so open and
aboveboard appears his whole life, that even after watching him
for two weeks, I should not have succeeded in turning up anything
suspicious, had it not been for the information you gave me in
the beginning.
He passes on Broadway as a "sporting character," i.e.,
a man who makes his living by promoting and backing sporting
events and theatrical enterprises. As a matter of fact, he has
various small interests in these lines, but not anywhere near
enough to support him in the lavish style in which he lives. He
has a comfortable apartment in the —— Hotel, one of
the best in town, that he leases by the year. He has hundreds of
friends in every walk of life, who believe that they know him
well. The only mystery about him is, where does he get all the
money he spends.
In, sporting circles individuals come up and disappear with
great frequency; men's memories are short, and none of Jake's
present associates remember, if indeed they ever knew, that Jake
Golden served a sentence in Sing Sing for swindling, some years
ago. Previous to that he had been confined in the Elmira
Reformatory.
I have three operatives besides myself engaged on this job. We
all have a number of disguises, so there is no danger of his
being struck by seeing the same face about him day after day. We
have been somewhat handicapped by your instructions that we are
not under any circumstances to allow him to suspect that he was
being followed.
Once or twice we have had to let him slip when we seemed to be
about to learn something interesting. However, it probably would
not have been definite. He has his tracks too well covered. He
does not yet suspect that he is being watched. It is second
nature with the man to take the most elaborate precautions to
keep his real business secret.
I am prepared to assert that he has not in all this time met
his principal. I believe that it is the cornerstone of their
whole system of defense, never to meet. Every day he drops into
some pay-station or another to call up his principal. It is
always another pay-station that he calls up, and every day a
different one.
It is usually a call to Newark, Paterson, Hackensack, White
Plains, Flushing, Jamaica, et cetera; some large town on
the outskirts of New York. Once or twice, by getting the next
booth, we heard his conversation over the phone, or a part of it.
But as the details of the affairs that he reports are already
known to you, this throws no fresh light on the matter.
Two of his talks had to do with "Kate Arkledon." He has no
suspicion that she is other than she seems. He merely reports
what has happened since the day before, and receives his
instructions. In speaking over the phone, he never names the man
he is talking to. At the end of the talk he receives the number
that he is to call next day. He comes out of the booth with his
lips moving, as if to commit it to memory. As he never writes it
down, there is no way in which we can learn that number
beforehand.
On Monday last he called up—Passaic. I sent one of my boys
over there as quickly as possible. It proved to be the principal
drugstore of the place. Now, as it is somewhat out of the common
for a man to wait around a pay-station to be called up, one of
the clerks happened to remember the incident. The call came in
for "Mr. Wilkins," and a large, well-dressed, good-looking man of
about forty-five stepped forward to take it, the clerk said. He
had dark hair; dark eyes, he said; couldn't say if he was bald
because he kept his hat on.
Clean shaven; gentlemanly manner; looked like a retired
business man. I send you this description for what it is worth.
It would fit about one hundred thousand men around New York, I
suppose.
On Tuesday Golden called up St. George ——. This is
the municipal ferry station on Staten Island. Got nothing there.
On Wednesday it was another drugstore, this one in Flushing. We
were there forty minutes afterwards, and a clerk remembered the
call coming in.
It was for "Mr. Adams." This clerk described the man who
received the call as middle-aged and "funny looking." Was unable
to explain just what he meant by funny-looking. Thought his eyes
were blue, and that he had a heavy mustache, but couldn't swear
to it. Yet it was undoubtedly the same man. Very few learn to use
their eyes.
However, this clerk added one more item to our store of
knowledge. After "Mr. Adams" had finished talking he got into a
fine limousine car at the door. It had a chauffeur in livery. Of
course, he would have to have a car if he's going to get around
from Passaic to Staten Island to Flushing day after day.
It was in sending money to his principal that Golden evinced
the greatest ingenuity. Golden maintained accounts in four
different banks up-town. In each place his credit was high. None
of these banks were aware of his other accounts.
By splitting his business into four like this, the volume of
it did not appear large enough to excite suspicion. You told me
on the night of the twenty-third Golden was handed eighteen
hundred dollars in cash at the Boule 'Miche' by a man known as
Hutch Diver, and you asked me to trace what became of this money,
if this were possible.
Well, I am able to report that he deposited the money in the
—— National Bank on the following morning. He puts
all cash in the bank as received, so there is no use trying to
get him by marked bills. He may draw it out later.
One of his favorite stunts is to buy American Express Company
checks, and mail them to his principal. These checks are being
more and more widely used by automobile tourists and others who
do not wish to carry cash on their travels. They have to be
signed when purchased, and again when cashed; but Golden's
unknown principal has no difficulty in making a passable
imitation of his agent's signature when he cashes the checks.
A number of these checks have been returned paid to the head
office of the Express Company, and I have traced them back, but
without results. Anybody will cash such checks without question;
banks, hotels, stores, et cetera. They are for moderate
amounts, consequently the transactions leave no impression on the
memories of the parties who cash them.
These checks have all been returned from towns near New York,
the same towns, in fact, that Golden calls up on the telephone.
Another method that Golden has of transmitting money to his
principal is to draw checks to bearer, and have his bank certify
them. Such checks are as good as cash anywhere.
Golden mails these checks to his principal by means of the
mail chute in the hotel corridor outside his apartment. As it is
impossible for me to keep a man on watch in the corridor, I
cannot catch him in the act of mailing them, consequently there
is no way in which I can recover the envelope and get a sight of
the address. I know, however, that the checks are mailed in plain
envelopes, and that Golden keeps a typewriter in his room for the
purpose of addressing them.
CHAPTER XII.
FROM the foregoing report, which embodies
several of the same tenor, it will be seen that we had been
brought to a stand. We were between the devil and the deep sea.
We could neither go forward nor back.
Consequently, when the suggestion came through from "headquarters" that we prepare to hold up the Beauvoir Hospital
on the day that the pay-roll was made up, we had no choice but to
agree. Alas for my vow, that I would never do it again! I could
not abandon my mistress. Feeling a sickness of the heart, I had
to go in with the rest.
Beauvoir Hospital! In the mere naming of it you will perceive
what a stupendous task we had been given. Up to this time nobody
had ever thought of holding up a hospital. And Beauvoir, the
great charity hospital which spreads over several city blocks,
was by far the largest and the best known of them all.
With its psychopathic cases, its accidents, its victims of
murderous assaults, it is continually in the news. In fact, it
receives more publicity than all the other city institutions put
together. Beauvoir is an essential part of the fabric of New York
life.
Imagine being asked to attack such a place. Why, it is a very
hive of industry, with crowds entering and leaving at all hours;
police bringing in accidents cases; police sitting at the
bedsides of wounded prisoners. It seemed to me like a bad joke on
the part of Jake's employers.
I wondered if perhaps they had not penetrated our disguises,
and were using this ingenious means of bringing about our
downfall. But Madge Caswell's reports continued to assure us that
they did not suspect us; and Mme. Storey, after a study of the
problem, considered that the trick might be turned, though it was
appallingly difficult.
Beauvoir, as everybody knows, is on the East River front. It
consists of an ancient stone building which forms a nucleus for
innumerable more or less modern wings spreading in every
direction. The office of the hospital, which was our mark, is in
this old building, just inside the main entrance.
There are other entrances for patients and their visitors. The
main entrance is used principally by officials of the hospital,
and those having business with them. Unfortunately for us, the
old building fronts on a courtyard, which is overlooked by
literally hundreds of windows. The grand difficulty would be to
get out of that courtyard with whole skins.
You may gauge the size of the institution when I tell you that
the weekly pay-roll amounted to nearly seventy thousand dollars.
This money was brought to the hospital every Thursday morning by
armored car. In the office it was made up into pay-envelopes by a
force of clerks; payment to the employees was spread over the
whole week.
Our attack was timed for Thursday just before noon, when the
clerks would have the money spread out in the office in the act
of making up the envelopes. The force consisted of a head
bookkeeper, three male clerks and two women. No additional guards
were employed. I suppose nobody had ever dreamed of the
possibility that a hospital might be attacked.
The first thing we had to decide was whether or not to take
the hospital authorities into our confidence in respect to the
proposed raid. We held several anxious consultations with
Inspector Rumsey upon this matter.
It appeared that the cashier, whose name was Tabor, was in
full charge of all financial matters, and the inspector
volunteered to sound him out. He reported later that Mr. Tabor
was a testy gentleman, whose whole life had centered in
Beauvoir.
He had an overwhelming sense of the dignity and importance of
the institution he served, and the inspector said it would be
quite useless to put up any such scheme to him. He would
certainly have a fit at the bare mention of such a thing.
"Very well," said Mme. Storey coolly; "then as far as Mr.
Tabor is concerned this must be a bona fide holdup."
"Suppose he puts up a fight?" asked the inspector anxiously.
"He's a determined old party. He is almost certain to be armed,
and perhaps his clerks also. You have a big enough risk to run
from chance shots outside, without facing a point-blank fire
inside. I could not permit that under any circumstances."
"Pull the right wires," suggested Mme. Storey, "and introduce
a man of your own as clerk in the office."
This was done. Inspector Rumsey's man subsequently reported
that there was only one gun in the hospital office. This was an
old-fashioned revolver in the drawer of Mr. Tabor's desk, which
had apparently not been shot off nor cleaned in many years. It
was not, however, any the less dangerous on that account.
Since Mr. Tabor made a point of being the first in the office
every day and the last to leave, our agent said it was doubtful
if he could secure the gun beforehand to unload it; but he
guaranteed to seize it when the attack was made. We let it go at
that.
It fell to my part to make the first preliminary examination
of the ground. I confess I did not like it at all. Beauvoir
Hospital bore too strong a resemblance to a prison.
The entrance was by a triple gateway from the street. The two
narrow side gates were for visitors to the various wards, and the
center gate, which was double, admitted to the courtyard and the
main building.
The three gates were divided by two little buildings where
guards, presumably armed, were on duty at all hours. Visitors to
patients were provided with cards of admission, and it was the
duty of these men to examine the cards, and set the holders on
the right path.
If we took our automobile inside the courtyard, the guards had
only to close the iron gates to block us. If we left our car
outside, we would have to run the gantlet of the guards on
foot.
I should say that the windows of the office looked out on the
courtyard; the first shout from the clerks would alarm the
guards. In short, it seemed to be just about as perfect a trap as
could be devised. I did not like it.
There was a doorman on duty at the main entrance; but he was a
doddering old fellow, incapable of putting up any serious
resistance. Inside, a corridor ran right and left throughout the
length of the old building. You turned to the right, and the
first door on your right admitted you to the office.
It was an old-fashioned double door of solid wood; it stood
open during business hours. The room was about thirty feet long,
with an old-fashioned wooden counter running the length of it,
topped by a brass grille some three feet high, with several
wickets in it.
At one side a door made of heavy brass wire gave entrance to
the clerks' inclosure. I noticed that there was no way out for
them, except by this door, thence by the door into the
corridor.
I had chosen a Thursday morning for this visit, and they were
all busy at a long table in the middle of the room putting the
money in pay-envelopes. Certainly it was tempting Providence to
handle their cash practically in public like that.
When I reported to Mme. Storey the difficulty of getting out
past the guards, she said:
"Well, there must be other ways out of that old warren. We'll
study the floor plans."
Inspector Rumsey, who was looking up the police arrangements
in the neighborhood, subsequently informed us that since First
Avenue had become an important motor thoroughfare, a motorcycle
policeman had been assigned to patrol it; and that he spent a
good part of his time standing in front of the hospital. Verily,
the difficulties surrounding the adventure seemed to be
pyramiding against us!
Mme. Storey said thoughtfully:
"We have a reputation for originality to maintain. We must do
something quite new this time. Let us dispense with a car
altogether, and make our get-away by water."
CHAPTER XIII.
From the New York Sphere,
January —, 192—.
THE DUCHESS MAKES ANOTHER HAUL
Beauvoir Hospital the Victim; Loss $67,000
Boldest Robbery in History of City
"The Duchess," that most amazing criminal of modern times,
played a return engagement this morning. It scarcely seems
possible, but she actually succeeded in capping her own exploits;
in exceeding her reputation. This time it was no mere jewelry
store that was the object of her raid, but Beauvoir Hospital.
Everybody in town is asking: What next? In the teeth of all
the orderlies, police and armed guards who are to be found around
the hospital, she and her gang relieved the office force of the
week's pay-roll to the tune of sixty-seven thousand dollars, and
made a clean get-away.
The crime had been carefully planned. The bandits displayed a
perfect familiarity with the rambling old building. They made
their way out through the rear to the bulkhead adjoining the
river, and were picked up by a speedy motor boat. One of their
number was wounded in the retreat, but his comrades carried him
off. As usual there is no clew.
Every Thursday morning an armored car brings the money for the
week's pay-roll to Beauvoir Hospital. The amount averages close
to seventy thousand dollars. Though the institution has doubled
and quadrupled in size since those early days, the pay-envelopes
are still made up in the office in sight of all and sundry, just
as they were twenty-five years ago. In some manner this reached
the ears of the Duchess, and the inevitable happened.
At eleven forty-five this morning Emerson Tabor, the cashier
of the hospital, and his five clerks were engaged upon this
regular weekly task. In another fifteen minutes the money, would
have been locked in the safe for the noon hour. All six persons
were working at a long table in the hospital office.
They were cut off from the public by a stout wooden counter
running the length of the room, upon which is superimposed a
heavy brass grill. The whole structure is about six feet high.
Four of the clerks were filling the envelopes while Mr. Tabor and
another checked them. There was no one else in the office at the
moment except Rudolph Glassberg, of 400 West Ninety-Third Street,
who had called to obtain the address of a former employee of the
hospital. It was this accidental witness of the affair who was
able to give the most comprehensive account of what happened.
Mr. Tabor had just told Mr. Glassberg that he had no record of
the employee in question, when a tall, elegantly dressed lady
entered the office. At first glance Mr. Tabor was struck by
nothing unusual in her appearance, except that she was rather a
fine lady to be calling at old Beauvoir. She had an envelope in
her hand, which she partly extended toward him.
In a low, musical voice she asked him in what part of the
building that person was to be found. As Mr. Tabor put a hand
through the wicket to take the envelope, his wrist was seized in
a grip of steel. The woman dropped the envelope, and from
somewhere about her person whipped a pair of handcuffs.
In a trice the cashier was handcuffed to his own brass grill.
He found himself looking into those baleful cat's eyes with the
narrowed pupils which have been so often described.
Mr. Glassberg happened to be looking directly at the woman. He
was dazed by the suddenness of her act. So was Mr. Tabor.
For a moment there was no sound. The clerks in the rear had no
suspicion of anything wrong. Then Mr. Glassberg heard the woman
say in her courteous, well-bred voice:
"So sorry to discommode you, but I can't let you get to your
gun, you know."
The cashier gave a shout of warning, and yanked at the chain;
his clerks jumped up, knocking over their chairs. At that moment
the rest of the gang entered swiftly and quietly from the
corridor.
Mr. Glassberg tried to leave then, but was harshly ordered to
remain where he was. He frankly confessed that he squeezed into
the farthest corner, not daring to make a sound, nor to stir
during what followed.
It was the same gang which held up Fossberg's jewelry store
last month; four good looking, well dressed lads, showing none of
the obvious marks of the gunman, none of them over twenty-five
years old, and one a mere boy; and the showily dressed, red-haired
girl who appears to be the Duchess's first lieutenant. The
four men, as if performing a well rehearsed drill, leaped on the
edge of the counter, and vaulted over the brass grill.
Mr. Tabor shouted to his clerk, William Hughes, to get his gun
out. Another clerk, Edward Ensor, beat him to it. Ensor had only
been working at the hospital for a few days. He snatched the gun
out of the drawer where it was kept and fired at the oncoming
bandits.
The shot went wild. Immediately two of the bandits dived, and,
tackling Ensor low, flung him to the floor. He was disarmed
before he could recover himself. Of the two women clerks, Miss
Mary Phillips fainted dead away at the sound of the shot, while
Miss Gertie Colpas dived under the table, where she kept up a
continuous screaming until all was over.
Mr. Glassberg said what with the screaming of the woman, the
shouting of Mr. Tabor, and his frantic efforts to free himself,
the noise in the room was deafening. The bandits coolly
disregarded it. No sound escaped from any of them.
Two of the men covered the clerks, while the other two
producing black silk bags from under their coats, started
sweeping up the money and the pay-envelopes on the table. All
moved as by clockwork.
When the gang entered, the Duchess coolly closed the door from
the corridor. She and her woman aide took up their places one on
each side of the door, ready for anyone who might enter. The
Duchess produced the inevitable little cigar while she
waited.
Mr. Glassberg said she watched what was going on within the
clerks' inclosure with a half contemptuous smile, as one might
look at a second rate play. There was something about the woman's
unnatural coolness that froze his very blood, he said.
As on the former occasion, the Duchess's attire expressed the
very acme of elegant simplicity. She was wearing a severely cut
costume of brown, which set off her slender figure to perfection
Inside the collar of the coat was wound a gayly colored silk
scarf, and a handkerchief to match it, peeped out of her breast
pocket.
Her hat was one of those smart little recent importations that
closely outline the shape of the head. Her shoes were smart
English brogues, and a pair of chamois gloves completed the
ensemble.
Within a minute or so the money was gathered up, and the four
men as one, leaped back upon the counter, and vaulted over the
brass grill. The Duchess opened the door, and they all ran out
into the corridor. Mr. Glassberg peeped around the door frame to
see what became of them, but did not dare to follow.
At the entrance to the building was stationed John Staley, the
doorkeeper; but as he was a man of sixty-nine, and unarmed, he
could do nothing to stop the bandits. However, six or more of the
husky orderlies for which Beauvoir is famous came tumbling down
the stairs from the wards above, attracted by the noise.
Though these men were unarmed, they boldly ranged themselves
in a line across the corridor to block the bandits. The latter
instantly formed a flying wedge with the biggest among them, the
one who resembles an Englishman, in the center, and charged,
bowling the orderlies over like nine pins.
It was at this point that the bandits revealed their uncanny
knowledge of the premises. Instead of turning out of the main
entrance, where they would presently have run into half a dozen
armed guards, they opened a door under the stairs, and charged
down a concealed flight into the basement.
The basement of the old building at Beauvoir is cut up into a
multitude of serving rooms: laundry, kitchen, pantries,
storerooms, and the like; nevertheless, the bandits made their
way out unerringly, while the orderlies who were in pursuit of
them got lost. The bandits burst through the kitchen, bringing
terror into the hearts of cooks and dishwashers, and ran out into
the open space between the hospital and the river.
In the summer this is a pleasant grass plot. It is surrounded
on three sides by tier above tier of balconies, where, in
pleasant weather the patients are wheeled out to get the air.
At this season there were few patients on the balconies; but
the doctors, nurses, and orderlies ran out to see what was the
matter below, adding their shouts to the uproar. Several shots
were fired from the balconies at the fleeing bandits, but none
took effect.
They made straight across for the bulkhead alongside the
river. Here they met with a check, for their boat could be seen
stalled a hundred feet or so out in the stream, the mechanic
working frantically to start his engine. A shout of triumph went
up from the watchers on the balconies.
At this moment it was touch and go with the Duchess and her
pals. Six armed guards had made their way through the hospital,
and the bandits were cut off between the buildings and the river.
The guards did not immediately rush them, but stood close to the
building, firing as fast as they could pull the trigger.
The bandits returned their fire without effect. Finally the
Englishman dropped, wounded. Heartened by the sight, the guards
charged across the open space, firing as they ran.
However, by this time the motor boat had come alongside the
bulkhead; the bandits leaped in pell-mell, carrying their wounded
comrade, and the boat shot out into the river.
The guards continued to fire after it, but as the occupants
all flung themselves into the bottom of the boat, it is not
likely that any more of them were hit. In a moment they had
disappeared around the end of a long pier.
The motor boat was a rakish, sharp-prowed mahogany tender of
great speed. It had the look of a millionaire's plaything, and
was, no doubt, stolen for the occasion, though no such loss has
as yet been reported to the police. Her name had been painted
out. All the observers agreed that the craft was not one which
customarily frequents the East River.
Police launch A-22 is stationed in a slip immediately to the
south of the hospital, and in less than five minutes she was in
pursuit. But the bandit craft was already out of sight down the
stream. The police launch was no match for her in speed.
They caught sight of her again off Corlear's Hook; but by that
time she had been abandoned, and was already awash. When the
police reached the spot she had sunk, leaving only a patch of oil
on the surface. What happened to her cannot be known for certain;
the police hold to the theory that she was deliberately
scuttled.
Children playing in the park at Corlear's Hook told the police
that they had seen the mahogany launch come alongside a waiting
tug, which had presently passed on, leaving the launch to sink.
The tug was too far offshore for her name to be read.
The police are questioning the captain and crew of every tug
in the harbor, but it is admitted that the chance of picking up a
clew by this means is a slender one. Once again the Duchess
appears to have vanished into thin air.
CHAPTER XIV.
SUCH was the first account of the affair. Later
editions of the newspapers only amplified and elaborated the
story. While a conventional horror of the deed was expressed, you
can see by reading between the lines that the ultimate effect of
these stories was to glorify the daring and successful
bandit.
Such is the evil effect of too much publicity. If a man
becomes famous enough, thoughtless persons do not stop to inquire
into the quality of his fame.
During the days that followed our gang had to lie very close,
for the police were roused to a fury of activity by this
"outrage." I suspect that Inspector Rumsey had a very difficult
part to play, for he was put in charge of the case. Of all the
force, only he and the commissioner were in on the secret.
One problem that faced us was how to return the money to the
hospital without giving the whole game away. We solved it by
having the same millionaire who had loaned us his automobile on a
former occasion come forward and donate to Beauvoir Hospital the
sum they had lost. He got great credit for this act.
Stephens was carried to a sanatorium up in Westchester to
recover from his wound, which was not a dangerous one. Falseface
and Tony were sent under care of Abell to rusticate in a camp
belonging to another of Mme. Storey's friends in the neighborhood
of Saranac Lake.
Abell's real job, of course, was to keep them under
surveillance until we were ready to order their arrest. Young
Farren was sent off to amuse himself down in Florida.
Mme. Storey and I were perfectly safe working in our office
every day in our own proper characters; but as she was obliged to
keep in touch with Jake the Canvasser, we had to disguise our
disguises for the evening. Madge Caswell's reports still held out
no hope of reaching the principal through Jake, and it was
necessary to take other measures.
I donned a black wig, blackened my eyebrows and lashes, made
up my face dead white, and wore a pair of horn-rimmed glasses,
while Mme. Storey, past mistress in the art of disguise,
transformed herself into a shapeless old woman dressed in tawdry
finery.
On the night following the robbery we telephoned to Bat
Bartley at the Boule 'Miche', and asked him to save us a private
room. It would be better, we said, if we did not receive our
friends that night, however safe they were. The risk was too
great. But we wanted to see Jake.
Well, Jake came to us there in due course, and was much amused
by our disguises. Mme. Storey paid over his share of the loot. We
hated to see that good money go, but there appeared to be no help
for it.
Jake was in great form. I will pass over all his fulsome
praises and compliments; for you are already familiar with his
style. The Duchess would become as famous as Jesse James, he
said, a national hero. The crown of courage had passed to a
woman. And so on.
My mistress let him run on until he said something to the
effect that all of us would have to do some hard thinking in
order to cap the previous day's work; whereupon Mme. Storey held
up her hand.
"Nothing doing," she declared firmly.
"Hey?" said Jake, with a falling face.
"I'm done!"
"What!" he cried. "Why, we've just started!"
"No," she said. "I've made a nice little stake out of these
two jobs. I'm satisfied. As for publicity, I can scarcely better
what I've got. Better quit while I'm on the crest of the wave.
You may make out in your newspaper stories that I'm a superwoman,
but as a matter of fact I'm just the common or garden variety
like any other. And if I try to bite off more than I can chew
I'll choke."
"Have you lost your nerve?" he asked with a sneer.
"Not my nerve," said my mistress coolly; "it's as steady as
ever it was, and my wits are better. But my body is beginning to
rebel. After all, I'm no longer young. A woman of fifty-five,
even though she may have kept a passable figure, is not expected
to run like a gazelle. When I got home yesterday I collapsed. I
had to have a heart stimulant to bring me around."
"Well," said Jake smoothly, "we'll bear that in mind when
we're planning our next stunt."
"No," affirmed Mme. Storey, "I would not take anything safe
and easy, either. I wouldn't appear before the public at all
unless I could better this show, and as I don't see my way clear
to doing that, I think it's a good place to quit."
Jake lost his smooth air. His distress was very real.
"Wait a minute—wait a minute!" he said. "You don't have
to decide anything to-night. This is just a sort of reaction,
like. Just let things run along for awhile. You've earned a good
rest. Then my boss may have an idea that will appeal to you. He
has the most brilliant mind in America to-day—a soaring
mind."
"Just so," rejoined Mme. Storey;﹃but if you keep on flying
higher and higher, you're bound to crash in the end. Not but
what I hate to give it up, too,﹄she added pensively. "I love the
game. I love to match my wits against those who have money!"
"What'll I say to the boss?" asked Jake plaintively. "He's
countin' on you. You ought to hear the way he talked about you
over the phone to-day. 'Jake,' he says, 'this is the best
material we ever had to work with!'"
"Nice of him to say so," said Mme. Storey.
Jake did not perceive the dryness of her tone.
"Oh, the boss is never one to hold back credit from anybody,"
he said.
For an hour longer he continued to argue with her. By the end
of that time she had convinced him that she meant what she
said.
He was greatly depressed. More than anything else he was
alarmed by a suggestion she let fall, that she was just going to
drop out of things and travel.
He finally exacted a promise from her that she would not
disappear until he had a chance to consult with the boss. When we
left he asked anxiously:
"Be here to-morrow night?"
"Oh, I expect so," said my mistress indifferently. "We can't
stay shut up in our rooms all the time."
On the following night Jake turned up with an entirely new
line of arguments, which had no doubt been furnished him over the
telephone during the day. When all these proved to be of no avail
he said with an offhand air:
"How would you like a job inside the organization?"
I started inwardly. So this was where my mistress's elaborate
comedy had been tending! I had not perceived her drift
before.
"What sort of job?" she asked indifferently.
"To run our advisory department."
"What's that?"
"You would investigate likely plants, and furnish the
operators with full details. You would think up big spectacular
stunts, plan all the details, and coach the operators."
"Yes," said Mme. Storey, "and have somebody else take all the
credit!"
"Oh, I don't know," replied Jake. "We could keep the Duchess
alive in the public mind, though you never appeared in
person."
"What would there be in it for me?"
Jake made a magniloquent gesture.
"Oh, there wouldn't be any difficulty about that. The boss is
the soul of generosity."
"Sure. But just what would it run to?"
"Well, say fifty thousand a year."
"Liberal enough," said Mme. Storey indifferently; "but it
don't appeal to me much. I hate to be tied up in an organization.
I like to be on my own."
Jake set himself to work to persuade her. Little by little she
allowed it to appear that she was coming around. Finally we heard
that which we were silently praying for. Jake said:
"The heads of the organization never meet. It's better so. We
have other ways of communicating. But you and the boss would have
to have one talk to settle the details."
"Plenty of time for that," said Mme. Storey carelessly. "We'd
better wait until the search for me lets up a little."
"No need for that," said Jake. "Your present disguise is
plenty good enough."
"Well, that's up to the boss," she said, shrugging. "If he
wants to see me I'm at his service."
CHAPTER XV.
THREE days later Mme. Storey and I started out
to keep our rendezvous with the "boss." You can imagine how my
heart was beating. I could scarcely believe that we were in sight
of the end of our difficult and dangerous job.
I was tormented with anxiety. So much mystery had been made of
this powerful boss that he seemed to me to be invested with
almost superhuman attributes. I dreaded lest he might slip
through our fingers after all.
We were on our way to the Madagascar Hotel, where we were to
ask for Mr. Peter Endicott. All the arrangements for the visit
had been made with the greatest care.
Jake the Canvasser was not to accompany us. Jake had wished
Mme. Storey to go alone, but she had declined to do so. Any offer
that might be made to her must include me, she said; and Jake
finally conceded the point.
From the moment when the meeting had first been proposed we
had been shadowed, as we were quick to perceive; and thereafter
we never came out of the characters of Kate Arkledon and Peggy
Ray. Our ordinary haunts knew us not. By day we remained shut up
in the little flat on West —— Street. There was a
telephone in the flat, but we dared not use it; the danger was
too great that the boys at the switchboard might have been
tampered with.
We finally solved the problem of communicating with Inspector
Rumsey by taking a leaf out of Jake's book. We wrote the
inspector a letter, and posted it in the mail chute outside the
door of our flat.
The inspector could not communicate with us, and before
setting out, Mme. Storey had armed herself with a pair of
handcuffs, intending to make the arrest herself if the police
failed her.
The lobby of the Madagascar displayed its usual animated
aspect. Since they cut off the front to make a row of shops on
the street it is always overcrowded. I felt rather than saw that
we were objects of interest to several of the prosperously
dressed men who were sitting and standing about. These I supposed
to be police, and my heart rose. Inspector Rumsey was not showing
himself—his face is too well known—but I had no doubt
that he was near.
It appeared that our journey was not to end at the Madagascar.
As we made inquiry at the desk, a slender, gentlemanly young chap
stepped up from behind us.
"Good morning, ladies," he said, smiling. "I was waiting for
you."
"Oh, are you Mr. Endicott?" said Mme. Storey, not without
surprise. She had hardly expected to be received by such a
stripling.
"His secretary, at your service. I am to take you to him."
I confess I did not like this at all. Mme. Storey appeared
quite unconcerned.
"Where is it?" she asked.
"Half an hour's drive. I have a car waiting."
He led the way out. I hoped that the police were behind us,
but did not like to turn my head to see. We stood waiting under
the glass canopy in front, and presently an inconspicuous sedan
drove up. Our conductor, always smiling, opened the door for us,
and we drove off. I silently prayed that the police might have a
car handy also. In the press of traffic it was impossible to
tell if we were being followed.
Our route lay over the Queensboro Bridge and out Queens
Boulevard. The young man made agreeable small talk all the way.
He had all the savoir faire of a diplomatic secretary.
On the bridge and beyond it seemed to me that there were more
motorcycle policemen than usual about, and I took hope from that.
Perhaps they were under Inspector Rumsey's orders.
We drove very fast. Once on the boulevard we were stopped and
warned by a policeman. Later, after we had turned to the right in
a busy crossroad, another passed us at great speed and came back
a few minutes afterward.
We now turned to the left and lost ourselves in one of the
amazing new subdivisions that have sprung up so thickly in that
district. Picture to yourself rows of little new wooden houses,
all alike, stretching on every side as far as you could see. All
designed alike, painted alike, the same number of shingles on
each roof, I could swear; built so close together there was but
just room for a man to walk between; not a tree in sight, and
scarcely a blade of grass.
Thousands upon thousands of the little boxes, all alike. To me
it was like a nightmare. Consider the numbing effect of this
sameness upon the people who lived there! Then another thought
came to me: what an admirable hiding place!
We turned right and left; right and left again so many times I
was dizzied. All this was unnecessary, of course; the little
streets were all laid out at right angles, and we could have
reached our destination with one turn.
There were street signs in the usual haphazard New York
fashion, but we turned the corners so quickly, and the signs were
so hard to find, I could rarely read them. And when at last we
came to a stop before one of the little houses, no different from
thousands of others, I didn't know what the name of the street
was. The number of the house was 154.
"Is this Mr. Endicott's home?" asked Mme. Storey.
"One of them," said our conductor, smiling.
The instant we were out of the car, it whisked out of sight
around a corner. We were admitted by a neat, elderly maid servant
who looked as if she had seen all and told nothing.
The inside of the house was as standardized as the outside;
the furnishings looked as if they had been purchased en
bloc from an instalment shop. But it was comfortable
enough.
The servant requested us to follow her upstairs to take off
our things. She led us into the front bedroom above.
"As you have so much to discuss with Mr. Endicott," she said
in her quiet, courteous voice, "and as it would be imprudent for
you to leave, and come back again, he hopes that you will remain
as his guests here, until everything is settled."
Mme. Storey bowed.
"Does that mean we are prisoners?" I asked when the woman had
left us.
"Pooh!" said Mme. Storey. "They couldn't keep us in this
match-box against our will. We could kick our way out."
The front door closed, and we saw the young man who had
brought us, making his way quickly up the street. A moment later
we heard a motorcycle. As silently as a shadow, Mme. Storey ran
to the window, but did not succeed in attracting the rider's
attention.
"He was clever to follow us so far into this maze," she
said.
"But how can he pick out the house now?" I groaned.
"We'll hang out a sign," she said, fishing in her bag for a
pencil. "A sheet of paper. Oh, for a sheet of paper!"
It was not forthcoming.
"Never mind," she said, "the upper part of the house is
painted white."
We locked the door, and she stationed me beside it to listen
for the return of the maid. She threw up one of the windows, and
sitting upon the sill, leaned over and began to pencil her
initials in big black letters on the white space between the two
windows: R. S. In the absolute sameness of that street, it must
have stuck out like a sore finger.
We had the window closed, and were standing decorously in the
middle of the room, when the maid returned.
"If you are ready," she said.
"Please lead the way," said Mme. Storey. On the floor below
the maid opened the door into the rear room, and stood aside to
let us enter. I followed my Mistress with a fast beating
heart.
It was a narrow room with a single window in the corner,
looking out on a cement paved space between two kitchen
extensions. It was furnished with a "dining suite" and two easy
chairs, one on each side of the gas logs. A man stood with his
back to us, looking out of the window.
At the sound of our entrance he turned around, and my heart
gave a great jump.
I knew that face! That clever face with the full, dark,
beaming eye of the enthusiast; where had I seen it before?
My brain spun around like a teetotum, and then settled down
soberly. I remembered. It was Ambrose G. Larned, the publicity
genius; and the last time I had seen him was at Mme. Storey's own
dinner table!
I stole a glance at my mistress. Under the grease paint her
expression was very bland.
"So this is the Duchess!" said our host, coming forward with
outstretched hand. "And her trusty lieutenant! Sit down ladies,
we have much to talk over."
CHAPTER XVI.
WELL, there we sat, the three of us, in front of
the tawdry fireplace, Mme. Storey and I in the two easy chairs,
and the unsuspecting Mr. Larned between us in a straightbacked
chair. My mistress was smoking one of the famous little cigars,
and Mr. Larned waved a cigarette about while he talked.
Each recognizing a great spirit in the other, they mostly
ignored me. I was quite content to look and listen.
"We strike in the spot of our own choosing," Mr. Larned said
enthusiastically; "and with a high-powered automobile at hand, or
as in your case a speedy motor boat, the danger of capture is
almost non-existent—that is, if the affair has been
properly planned. And no policeman can tell in advance where the
next blow will fall.
"Just look at our record during the last few weeks. First, the
creation of the bobbed hair bandit with the numerous exploits to
her credit; then the robbery of Mme. Storey in her office; then
the double holdup of Fossberg's; and finally your magnificent
raid on Beauvoir last week to cap the climax. What can the police
do? What could Mme. Storey do with all her boasted cleverness?
Why, nothing.
"A vastly overrated woman, by the way," he went on, lighting a
fresh cigarette. "I know her. There is nothing much to her.
Publicity has made her. Which is a further illustration of my
point. Publicity will do anything."
I heard the doorbell sound somewhere in the house. Mr.
Larned's eyelids flickered, but he kept right on talking:
"Publicity is man's greatest discovery. He doesn't know what
he's got yet. There are any number of professors and
practitioners and promoters of publicity; but they haven't
scratched the surface of their subject."
I noticed that nobody went to the door. The suspense became
almost more than I could bear, sitting still.
"Rather a good scheme this of ours, don't you think?" said Mr.
Larned. "One directing head, and a number of units working quite
independently."
"And taking all the risk," put in Mme. Storey slyly.
"Surely," he said with the utmost coolness; "and quite right,
too. It would not be fitting for the commanders to expose
themselves on the firing line. The individual operators must fail
sometimes, but the organization goes on—"
The front door went in with a crash. A second later Inspector
Rumsey entered the room, with other men behind him. Larned
swelled up like a pouter pigeon.
"How dare you?" he cried. "What do you mean by this
outrage?"
"Inspector Rumsey of the police department," said our friend
coolly. "You are under arrest." Then he recognized his prisoner.
"Ah, Mr. Larned, so we meet again!"
Larned still essayed to bluff it out.
"You know me," he cried. "Everybody knows Ambrose G. Larned.
How dare you break into my private dwelling?"
"It won't go, Larned," said the inspector smiling. "Thanks to
the activities of this lady, we know all about you and your
organization. Jake Golden is already under arrest."
"Who is this woman?" queried Larned.
"The Duchess," said Rumsey with relish; "alias Kate Arkledon;
but in reality, Mme. Rosika Storey."
Larned collapsed like a pricked balloon. The sight was both
tragic and absurd. He slunk to one side, and dropped into a
chair.
Well, that ended one crime wave. If another one rolled up
almost immediately afterward it was not our fault. Abell and a
plainclothes man brought a chopfallen little pair of bandits back
from Saranac next day. I would not have missed the scene when
Mme. Storey returned Falseface's ring with a smile.
What an extraordinary psychological study Larned was. I
believe he was a little mad. Mme. Storey and I visited him in
jail. Even in his downfall he played the great man, and displayed
no rancor toward her.
He still loved to air his theories on publicity. It was his
theories which had led him into crime. He explained that having
tasted all the possible successes of a regular business career,
he craved a greater excitement; and finally yielded to the
temptation of wielding this enormously powerful weapon in
secret.
THE END
Project Gutenberg Australia