The Washington Square Enigma, Page 3

  Harling scarcely dared breathe. He wished, with a feeling of irritation, that he had seen the thing through and told his side of the case, but now it was too late for such a course. He pressed back against the wall and felt tiny pins and needles break over him as the man stood in the doorway of the basement room idly tapping his club against the door frame.

  Harling pressed back still closer to the wall in the darkness, but as he did so, he felt something soft and round under foot. A second later, the intense quiet of the room was rent by a shrill, feline yell that seemed to split the very air. His heart dropped to his toes. He had stepped on the tail of the Maltese cat, and knew now that his hiding place was no longer to be a place of concealment.

  Only for a second did the man outside hesitate. Then ponderous footsteps started across the floor of the room. As for Harling, he thought quicker that second than ever before in his life. Not for an instant did he feel in the mood for being hauled to a police station and held there for days and cross-questioned over and over again on account of his unfortunate connection with what seemed to be a crime and his more than suspicious actions afterwards.

  So he did the only thing that remained to be done. With one stout kick, he sent the pantry door spinning open. He bounded through the opening like a catapult. In his swift flight toward the open window, he caught a fleeting glimpse of a blue-coated figure staring wide-eyed and bewildered at him, but not making so much as a move to block his escape. Over the sill he vaulted; then he tripped and fell flat in the yard outside. But like a flash he was up again, across the littered space, and through the hole in the rear fence.

  Like an arrow he sped along the whole line of rear fences, and bolted into the court which led to Chestnut Street. Even as he turned, he caught sight of a blue-clothed figure, far behind him, tumbling through the fence and sprawling in a heap on the ground. Whereupon Harling quickened his pace more than ever.

  Out through the court he flew, and there floundered helplessly for the barest fraction of a second, paralyzed by the knowledge that he could run either east or west, but that in either case the blue-coat whom he had so surprised would be fast on his tracks within a quarter of a minute. But as he made up his mind quickly, and turned to run eastward, his gaze was riveted by a shiny purple coupé which rolled out of the garage across the street and turned sharply in the same direction he was fleeing.

  Now he remembered that machine, if for no other reason than its rich, gleaming purple hue. It was the same one he had seen in the garage as he slunk into the court a short time before — the machine on which the two men in overalls had been working with wrenches. As it shot ahead of him he saw that it was driven by a woman; his quick glance also took in another feature — that its driver and the seat where she sat, were beautifully enclosed, but the rearmost part of the machine stuck out behind the driver’s enclosure in a squarish sort of ledge — a ledge wide enough, and flat enough, moreover, to carry an unseen passenger. A Rollison Runabout coupé he knew it now to be. Typical rich man’s toy! And now, perhaps, a poor man’s — He looked behind him and what he saw caused him to make up his mind in an instant. His pursuer had already reached the open end of the court, and was staring along the street westward. In another second, the bluecoat would be gazing eastward, and the chase would be on in earnest.

  With a mighty effort, Harling sprinted after the purple coupé, and succeeded in catching up with it just as it reached Dearborn Avenue. As the machine turned short and shot northward on that elm-lined thoroughfare, he clambered up, panting, on the broad rear projection, and quite concealed from the feminine driver ahead, lay flat on his stomach, his hands clutching the right rear mud guard. His last gaze along Chestnut Street gave him a picture of a bewildered officer of the law standing, panting, in the opening of the court, his eyes watching the disappearing machine.

  Harling lay very quiet where he was for a long time. Block after block rolled by to the tune of the whirring engine. A few passers-by on Dearborn Avenue stared curiously after the coupé, but not one so much as indicated to the feminine driver that she had a passenger on the rear of her machine.

  As he began to congratulate himself that Fate had whisked him away from the dangerous district so smoothly, he began also to note with some surprise the unusual speed of the machine for that quiet, sedate avenue. Also strange, he reflected, was the manner in which the machine swerved occasionally from side to side as if the lone driver were inexperienced or else nervous. So he ventured to raise his head a trifle and, peeping through the glass window of the back seat, took cautious cognizance of the pivoted rear-traffic mirror. Sometimes, he knew, women drivers used such things to help them powder their noses when — and as — they got out of their cars. And quite evidently, this traffic mirror had been used in exactly this manner, for it pointed outward to the right — and groundward, as well, where the fair nose-powderer must have last dismounted. And so, safe from being discovered, he turned his attention to the woman whose hands held the steering wheel.

  She was young, a mere girl, even, he observed at the first glance. She was clad in brown velvet and around her neck was a white fox fur. She wore a brown velvet picture hat, from under which peeped a cluster of golden curls; her tiny hands were neatly gloved.

  He watched her back, pondering over the speed with which she ran the car, and wondering, too, what the officers back in the deserted house on Washington Square were thinking by this time, after seeing a man jump out and run from the place. Better that, though, he reflected, than to have been taken up and compelled to make an explanation.

  As he stared through the glass he noticed the girl slowly unclasp the palm of one of her gloved hands, and stare down at an object held there. To his amazement he saw that the object was the head of an ornamental hat pin — an intricately carved dragon of green jade with the finest silver filigree work over its body. His first glance showed him that both the head of the dragon and the tail were missing. Where the first member was, Harling did not know, but he did know full well where that dragon had come from and where the tail was.

  It was the remainder of the hat pin that had been thrust through the dead man’s eye into his brain, and the tail of the carved creature was reposing at that very moment in Harling’s own pocket.

  CHAPTER V

  ON THE WAY TO SANGAMON STREET

  IF HARLING had previously entertained any intention of slipping off the back of the coupé, that intention now disappeared. Indeed his thoughts were sent scattering by his sudden discovery of the object that the girl held in her hand. As he crouched flat again on the projecting rear of the whirring vehicle, he tried in vain to construct some explanation as to why this slim girl, speeding away from Washington Square, held in her possession a part of the very instrument which had caused the death of the well-dressed, elderly man in the deserted house.

  But one explanation seemed possible. Was she the other party to the struggle that had taken place in that front room? One thing at least was certain: The coupé had slipped from a garage squarely in the rear of the block where the dead man lay. And its driver held the one part of the weapon that might have served to identify the wielder.

  At this juncture in Harling’s bewildered thoughts, the machine turned sharply with a lurch that almost threw him off on to the pavement; then it proceeded eastward two blocks until Lake Shore Drive was reached. Here it turned again but slowed up considerably, and Harling realizing that it was shortly to come to a stop before one of the massive and elegant residences that line the Drive, dropped easily off and crossed the street where he watched the machine come to a stop half a block ahead of him.

  The residence before which it stood was a great brownstone, turretted one, with a high, ornamental iron fence around it and a paved driveway that ran along the side to a garage in the rear. A flight of broad stone steps led up to the front vestibule, closed with a gate made of polished copper bars.

  The girl who had steered the machine slipped out, and Harling, from his point of vantage
up the street, could see her proceed up the steps of the house. Although he was not near enough to make out her face, he could perceive plainly that she was fumbling nervously in a tiny handbag for a latchkey.

  At this point the door suddenly opened, then the polished copper gates, and the figure of a short, slim, dark-skinned manservant was revealed in the opening, wearing a white apron. The girl evidently said a few words to him and passed in. The servant came quickly down the steps, climbed into the purple coupé, and, throwing on a lever, drove the machine up the driveway where it disappeared behind the mansion.

  For several long minutes Harling stood staring up the drive to the brownstone house; then with a short, hard laugh, he shrugged his shoulders and turned away. Beyond all doubt he had stumbled upon something that was not according to Hoyle; but one thing was certain, however: he assuredly was not going to meddle farther in the case. Chicago was not his town; neither were Chicago’s doings nor Chicago’s crimes of vital significance to him; yet he realized with a sense of irritation, as he walked westward on the nearest side street and left the Drive, that he had played a small part in some strange drama that as yet held no explanation.

  As he neared North Clark Street the sight of the street car line caused him to stop in his tracks. Again his mind jumped back to the drama of his own life, and to the problem that had confronted him a while ago; the problem of how to get sufficient carfare to reach the address of a man who had advertised that he would buy twelve-star nickels for five dollars apiece.

  Harling saw now that by his unlucky venture into that deserted house after a piece of chandelier or old electric fixture, and the resultant necessity of climbing on the nearest moving vehicle to get away from the pursuing bluecoat, he had added just about another mile to the eight miles that separated him from No. 7440 South Sangamon Street. Indeed it seemed that the fates were taking the utmost pains to prevent him from realizing on his last piece of luck.

  As he stood on the curb of an alley, wondering whether to start out on the long hike to the South Side address, his attention was attracted by four negro boys who came out of what was evidently an old stable, but which now bore a huge sign proclaiming that cars would be washed for 25 cents and stored for the same price — per day. Crouching down near the mouth of the alley, they started to roll out a pair of dice, wagering pennies and nickels on the throw of the two bone cubes. A sudden idea came to Harling as he saw one of the boys roll two ones and then throw up his hands in disgust and exclaim: “Ah’se jonahed, Ah is! Ah done wish Ah had mah lucky cat’s eye w’at Ah done had las’ week. Ah’d clean up heah, Ah would.”

  From his vest pocket Harling withdrew the diminutive cone of jade with the network of silver over it, the tail of the headless green dragon that the girl had clenched in her tiny hand. He was more than anxious to get rid of it now, and, knowing the superstitions of negroes, and especially of all persons who are fond of indulging in games of chance, he stepped down the alley to where the game was in progress.

  Like lightning the dice and the money disappeared. Nothing daunted, Harling tossed the green cone in the air and caught it deftly. The sun, peeping from behind a cloud for a bare instant, glistened on the bit of jade. Whereupon the negro boy who had just been indulging in self-recriminations on account of the absence of his “cat’s eye” peered toward Harling curiously.

  “Whut’s dat?” he inquired.

  “That,” said Harling easily, “is a piece of stone from the famous good luck stone of — of — Ireland.” Even as he spoke he saw that he had got the Blarney Stone mixed up in his explanation. But he forged ahead: “And if you had that, Sam, you’d be able to roll more sevens and elevens than you’ll ever need.”

  “Whut you-all want fer it?” the negro boy inquired cautiously. “Ah ain’t sup’stitious ‘tall, only Ah kin always use a lucky stone.”

  “What’ll you give?” asked Harling.

  The negro boy studied the man in front of him and particularly his frayed trousers. Then he fumbled in his pocket and rattled his loose change.

  “You-all’s lucky stone may be mah unlucky stone,” he remarked, “but Ah’ll give you fifteen cents fer it, w’ite man.”

  “It’s yours,” said Harling with an inward sigh of relief. He had reason to feel relieved, for he had killed two birds with one stone.

  He had rid himself of something that he didn’t want to be carrying about with him, and at the same time he had raised the precious carfare to the man Rafferty, of No. 7440 South Sangamon Street. He held out the green jade tail. The negro boy inspected it gingerly, and then reluctantly put a smooth dime and a Buffalo nickel in Harling’s palm. A second later the boy was on his knees, making cryptic passes over the green fragment preparatory to his roll of the dice when it came to his turn.

  Harling boarded the first Clark Street car that passed, and, paying the conductor his fare out of the dime the negro boy had given him for the dragon tail, settled down in a seat and began the long ride out to No. 7440 South Sangamon Street.

  CHAPTER VI

  WHAT THE NEWSPAPER SAID

  IT WAS nearly three-thirty when Harling reached the vicinity of the address mentioned in the advertisement. The district was a poor one, a region of frame dwellings, all old, and the whole cut through here and there by tangles of railroad tracks

  Searching his way along Sangamon Street, he finally came to a stop in front of No. 7440 itself, a narrow, tottering frame dwelling from which the paint was peeling off in great, gray scabs. In front of it a crowd of dirty-faced children were sailing shingle boats in a huge pool of stagnant water that filled one of the larger holes in the street.

  Harling’s dubious knock at the door was answered by a slatternly looking, calico-clad woman. “I’m looking for a Mr. Rafferty who put an adver — ” he began but she interrupted him by turning and calling in a shrill voice:

  “Hey, Raff’ty, here’s another in answer to that crazy ad o’ yourn.”

  A door opened in a narrow hallway and an undersized man thrust out his head. He was in his shirt sleeves. His face bore a two-days’ growth of beard, and his ears were cauliflowered like those of a creature of the underworld who had been in many a fistic encounter. Two of his teeth were gone in front; the gap showed plainly as he smiled a welcome to Harling, still standing in the doorway. “Come in, frien’, if you will,” he invited.

  Harling stepped into the hallway, and the woman closed the door after him. He entered a room, the door of which the man Rafferty was holding open for him, and waited till the other had closed it. His quick glance around showed him a narrow iron bed with half of the fixtures gone, carelessly made up with a greasy crazy-quilt; a piece of straw matting on the floor; a battered trunk in the corner; and a few cheap chromos adorning the walls.

  The shirt-sleeved man smiled reassuringly at him, again displaying the gap in his front teeth. “You got one o’ them twelve-star nickels?” he inquired quickly.

  Harling nodded, but made no move to produce it. “I have. The paper said you would pay five dollars for each one brought to you. Is that correct?”

  “Yes, sir,” said the little man testily, scratching one ear; “that was c’rrect.” He reached into his hip pocket and produced a fat leather wallet, full to bursting. He opened it with a flourish, displaying to Harling’s amazed eyes a great, thick wad of crisp, five-dollar bills, strapped together with a rubber band. “Five plunks is w’at I’m payin’, my frien’. My business, o’ course.”

  He peeled off a five and tendered it to Harling. The latter, reassured by the exhibition of so much worldly wealth, and more than astonished at its display in such poor surroundings, took the proffered bill and with a glance at the numeral in the corner jammed it into his pocket. Then he pulled out his nickel and tendered it to the little man. The latter seized it eagerly; tremblingly, and scanned it, but even as he did so, the look on his face faded to a look of profound disappointment.

  He gazed up sadly. “You want the nickel back again in thirty days?” he
asked wearily. “You k’n have it then if you want it.”

  Harling shook his head wonderingly: “No, I’m thinking in thirty days I’ll be on a blind baggage of a Frisco flyer if not in Frisco itself. All I wanted was the five, according to your statement in your advertisement.”

  Rafferty opened his mouth to speak but before he had uttered a word the shrill voice of the woman again shouted from without: “Hey, Raff’ty, here’s another person come in reply to that there ad o’ yourn.”

  Like a flash the little man threw open the door, and poked out his head. “Come in, frien’,” he said, pleasantly, the look of eager, even pleasurable anticipation on his face returning in all its intensity. He essayed but a passing, disinterested glance at Harling and nodded toward the door. “Thanks fer your trouble, frien’. Jus’ pass out the way you come in.”

  Harling stepped out, more than puzzled. On the way to the door, held open by the slatternly woman, he passed a slender boy coming in, his hand clutching what was no doubt still another of the twelve-star nickels in circulation. Harling’s own hand, jammed down in his trouser’s pocket, was clutched tight on the precious, crisp five that Rafferty had given him, and he left the house at a rapid pace, almost fearful lest he should hear the footsteps of the little man running after him to tell him the deal was off.

  The minute he could find a car, he boarded it, heaving a sigh of relief as it started away from the unsavory neighborhood. With the change from the ten cents, he rode back to the downtown section again, and dismounted in the Loop, intending to go straight to the Public Library and examine their directories of Evanston, Oak Park and the countless other cities and suburbs that Red Saunders had informed him lay on the fringe of Chicago.

  A wagon full of newspapers drew up at a nearby stand, and the driver tossed down a bundle to the waiting newsboy. Harling, passing by, stiffened up as he saw the words, “Washington Square,” in headlines across the top of the page.