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Title: Suspense

Author: Isabel Ostrander

Release date: January 29, 2025 [eBook #75240]

Language: English

Original publication: New York: Robert M. McBride & Co, 1918

Credits: Tim Miller, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from scanned images of public domain material from the Google Books project.)


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SUSPENSE ***





                               SUSPENSE

                          By ISABEL OSTRANDER

                               AUTHOR OF
                        "THE CLUE IN THE AIR,"
                           "THE PRIMAL LAW,"
                                 ETC.

                               NEW YORK
                        ROBERT M. McBRIDE & CO.
                                 1918

                          Copyright, 1918, by
                        ROBERT M. MCBRIDE & CO.

                         Published March, 1918




                               CONTENTS


                         I THE GIRL WITH THE SCAR

                        II THE SILENT INTRUDER

                       III THE VELVET GLOVE

                        IV BLINDFOLD

                         V BOX A-46

                        VI A MESSAGE FROM PHARAOH

                       VII TEN THOUSAND SHEEP

                      VIII THE ORCHID LADY

                        IX CROSSROADS

                         X FACE TO FACE

                        XI THE FOURTH PEW

                       XII THE FANGS OF THE WOLF

                      XIII JUSTICE NODS

                       XIV NAKED FOILS

                        XV THE PORTRAIT OF BEETHOVEN

                       XVI THE CLOSING NET

                      XVII TURNED TABLES

                     XVIII UNMASKED

                       XIX THE HONOR OF THE NAME

                        XX TREASURE TROVE




                               SUSPENSE




                              CHAPTER I.

                       _The Girl With the Scar._


"Young woman, well-bred, educated, stranger in city, and without
relatives, desires situation as companion or social secretary with lady
of established reputation and position. Good oral reader, pianist,
quick and accurate household accountant, intelligent amanuensis,
willing and obliging. Amount of salary optional. Address Miss Betty
Shaw, 160 Wakefield Avenue."

The girl read the advertisement for the twentieth time, then dropped
the newspaper upon the shabbily ornate center table with a shrug of
impatience, a frown gathering between her level brows.

The boarding house parlor was shrouded in gloom, and outside the window
whirling snowflakes showed white against the deepening dusk. A little
heap of torn envelopes and a card or two upon the mantel bore evidence
that the naïve appeal had evoked response, yet it was with a hopeless
gesture that the girl turned from them and began pacing the floor, her
brooding eyes fixed as though they would pierce the shadows which crept
about her.

All at once she paused tense and alert with lifted chin and quickened
breath. The throbbing purr of a motor had pulsed upon the stillness of
the snow-enwrapped street, and halted with a dull grinding of brakes
before the door.

She darted to the window and peered eagerly out between the dingy
curtains. A massive limousine stood at the curb, its bulk looming
blackly against the lesser darkness, with broad diagonal lines of white
striping the lower body, and a rakish torpedo-shaped hood. It was just
such a car as a person of somewhat bizarre taste and the wealth with
which to gratify it might have chosen, yet had it been a veritable
juggernaut its effect upon the girl could have been no more sinister.
She recoiled from the window, her hands clenched, her breast heaving
tumultuously, and shadowed as it was, her face seemed distorted into a
mere mask of malevolent fury akin to triumph.

Then the small hands relaxed, and with a visible effort at control, she
turned toward the door, as laggard feet shuffled along the passageway
and a murmur of voices arose.

"'Nother lady to see you, Miss." A frowsy head appeared in the doorway
and the girl advanced to meet the summons.

"Ask her to come in, please, Susan." Her voice was guilelessly soft and
low. "No, wait, I must light the gas--"

But the servant had already disappeared and in her place stood a tall,
commanding figure, swathed in furs and heavily veiled. For a moment the
girl hesitated, then with a steady hand she struck a match and a flare
of light streamed from the gas jet. In the full flow of its radiance,
she turned and faced her visitor.

The woman in the doorway took a step forward and paused involuntarily,
with a slight murmur of shocked surprise. The girl before her was
slender and of quite a usual type, with soft brown hair and moderately
large blue eyes, but a spreading blood-red scar with five curved
streaks reaching out from it like an angry clutching hand covered her
left cheek from brow to neck.

If the girl observed the other's momentary loss of poise she gave no
sign. Her level brows were arched ingenuously, her expression childlike
in its bland candor, but the smile which parted her lips did not reach
her shadowed, inscrutable eyes.

"Won't you take this chair? You wished to see me regarding my
advertisement for a position?"

The woman advanced and sank into the seat indicated, loosening her furs
deliberately before she replied. The heavy veil still obliterated her
features, but through its meshes her eyes glowed fixedly.

"Yes." She inclined her head slightly. "You are Miss Shaw?"

The girl nodded in turn.

"I have had no previous experience, but it has become necessary for me
to earn my own living and I have not had any specialized training. I am
quite alone in the world--"

The woman leaned suddenly forward.

"May I ask why you stated that in your advertisement, Miss Shaw?
You are very young and doubtless inexperienced, but you must have
realized that to announce yourself as alone and friendless would invite
unsuitable and even dangerous response."

The girl glanced at the cards on the mantel and then back to her
visitor in wide-eyed amazement.

"Why, no!" she exclaimed. "I wanted to make it clear that I could give
no references except social ones from my own home town, and that my
object was not so much a matter of salary as a home of refinement where
I could feel safe and sheltered. It is dreadful to be adrift, with
no one to take a personal interest, but back in Greenville there was
nothing for me to do."

"Greenville?"

"In Iowa. My mother and I moved out there to live with an uncle of
hers when my father died. I was a little girl then. Last year Uncle
Will died, and six months ago, my mother." She glanced down at the
simple black gown. "There is no one left belonging to me, and very
little money, so I came back to the city where I was born to try to
find a position. I have been here only a few days, but it is more
difficult than I had thought. You are looking for a companion or
secretary? I did not put it in the advertisement, but I am quite
capable of taking charge of a household and managing servants. If--if
you have children I can amuse them, too, they always take to me."

The woman's eyes searched the flushed, eager face but seemed to linger,
repelled yet fascinated, on the sinister scar.

"You--er, you have had an accident?" she asked.

"Accident?" The girl repeated. Then with a smile of understanding quite
free from bitterness she touched her cheek. "You mean--this? It is a
birthmark and everyone around me is so accustomed to it that I scarcely
ever think of it. It must be awfully unpleasant to strangers, though. I
suppose it--it would be a drawback----"

Her tone was wistful, almost pleading, and she paused with a catch in
her breath. There was a long minute of silence before her visitor spoke.

"Not unpleasant. It will merely be necessary, as you so sensibly
say, for one to become accustomed to it. I am not sure that it is
a disadvantage--" she caught herself up abruptly. "You spoke of
social references from Greenville. You have friends there to whom I
can write, if we come to an understanding? You realize that I, too,
must be careful about whom I take into my household in so intimate a
relationship as that of companion."

"Of course," the girl assented quickly. Then she hesitated. "You live
here in the city?"

"On the North Drive. I am Mrs. Atterbury." The woman spoke as if the
mere mention of her name sufficed to establish her status, and with
a deliberate gesture she threw back her veil. The face revealed to
the girl's frankly curious gaze was colorless, the thin, arched nose
and firm, straight lines of her lips as immobile as if carved from
marble. Only the eyes, sloe-black and glittering, gave a semblance of
life to the flawless, masklike expression. The smooth, dark hair was
coiled tightly about her head and brought low over the ears, but did
not cover them sufficiently to conceal their peculiar formation. Small
and delicately pink, they were lobeless and narrowed toward the top so
sharply that the girl wondered if beneath the hair they might not be
pointed, like a cat's.

As if intuitively aware of the other's scrutiny, the woman drew her
furs more closely about her neck and spoke hurriedly.

"I forgot for a moment that you were a stranger here. My husband was
one of the most prominent financiers in the city, but since his death
I have lived very quietly, receiving only a few old friends quite
informally. I am childless, and, like you, alone in the world." She
paused, with a slight suggestion of a smile and the girl's intent gaze
shifted and dropped. "My home is one which you would perhaps consider
luxurious, but it needs a youthful presence. I want the companionship
of a bright, cheerful young girl, gently reared, who can amuse and
interest me, and assist in the occasional entertainment of my guests.
Practically the only duty you would have would be to attend to my
correspondence, which is large as I have financial interests and
property all over the country. I would require your time unreservedly,
however. That is why I prefer a stranger, with no affiliations to
distract her. For such services I am willing to pay well, but there are
certain conditions I should impose."

The girl had listened without a change of expression, but now she
glanced up quickly.

"Mourning depresses me. Would you be willing to lay it aside and dress
in colors, such colors as I choose for you?"

"Oh, yes. I thought of that, in any event."

"Do you speak any foreign language?"

The girl shook her head.

"There were no foreigners in Greenville but the Italian road builders."

"You are prepared to place yourself absolutely at my disposal? There
will, of course, be hours when I will not need you, but I shall want
you within call. Moreover, if I make you a member of my household I
shall feel responsible for you. You must not attempt to go about the
city alone without consulting me first. That is understood?"

The girl's eyes narrowed and for an instant her lips compressed, but
she replied quietly:

"Of course. I appreciate the interest you take in me, Mrs. Atterbury,
and I am grateful for it. I shall do my best to please you."

A few details followed.

"Then we will consider the matter settled." The women glanced at the
jeweled watch on her wrist. "How long will it take you to pack?"

"You mean you wish me to go with you at once?" The girl's face had
whitened until the scar stood out in cruel clarity upon her cheek. "I
had thought of taking a few days to prepare--"

"Anything you need can be purchased tomorrow." There was a hardened
note of dominance in the cold voice which brooked no denial. "I am
a person of quick decisions, as you will discover, Betty--that is
your name, isn't it? I came to take you home with me if I found you
suitable, but I cannot keep my car waiting long in this storm."

Betty rose submissively.

"I have no trunk, only two bags. It will take me only a few minutes to
pack, if you will excuse me."

Mrs. Atterbury sat immovable until the sound of the girl's footsteps
had died away upon the creaking stairs far overhead. Then she rose and
gliding swiftly to the mantel, glanced over the cards and notes of her
predecessors. Tossing them aside contemptuously, her eyes fell upon
an open desk between the windows. A sheet of note-paper half covered
with writing lay upon it and picking it up she scanned it deliberately,
nodding in evident satisfaction.

"'Reverend Doctor Slade,'" she repeated aloud. "Greenville, Iowa."

A quarter of an hour later, two figures emerged from the dingy
vestibule and descended to the waiting car, the girl cringing in her
thin black cloak against the icy blast which swirled about them, the
older woman erect as if the very elements themselves could not compel
her to bow her head.

With her foot upon the step the girl hesitated and her eyes swept the
bleak snowy darkness in swift terror, like a trapped animal. The look
was gone as quickly as it had come, however, and into her face crept
a trace of the sinister, resolute triumph which had crossed it while
she waited behind the curtains of her window for the entrance of this
woman in whose hands she had placed herself.

In silence she seated herself beside her new employer, the footman
closed the door with a snap and they glided swiftly away through the
snow-muffled streets. Few words were spoken during the brief journey,
and they were mere commonplaces, but beneath the casual banality ran an
undercurrent of sharp tension almost tangible enough to be felt. It was
as if, unconsciously, they were adversaries, pausing by tacit consent
to take breath for a second encounter. The girl lay back relaxed with
half-closed eyes, the woman sat with her veiled face averted, and each
seemed buried in her own thoughts, yet each was aware of the sly,
furtive glances of mutual speculative appraisal which passed between
them.

The droning wind arose to a shrieking gale when they turned into the
North Drive, the merging strands of electric light breaking into widely
detached clusters as compact rows of brick and stone gave place to
exclusive residences, each sequestered within its private park. The
whistles of the river boats rose eerily above the blast of the storm
and the girl shuddered and drew the straggling fur collar more closely
about her throat.

"You must have warmer clothing." The woman spoke without turning
her head. "You will need one or two dinner frocks also. That can be
arranged tomorrow, and I will supply them, as you are disposing of
your mourning at my request. We are home at last."

The car swerved from the broad avenue and turning in between two high
gate-posts, followed a short winding drive to a brilliantly lighted
_porte-cochère_. Light streamed, too, from the opened doorway, upon the
threshold of which stood a thick-set man in the conventional black of a
butler.

"Welch," Mrs. Atterbury spoke with curt authority, "Miss Shaw will take
Miss Harly's place. Show her to her room, please." Turning, she added
to her companion: "We dine at seven. You need not change."

The butler bowed obsequiously, but his beady eyes surveyed the girl
deliberately from head to foot in a coolly impudent stare before he
picked up her bags and started for the staircase.

The hall was square and of spacious dimensions, with a gallery
encircling the second floor landing, from which rare tapestries were
hung. The leaping flames of the hearth played upon their soft, mellow
hues and glancing off in darting rays from the brass andirons, turned
the dull brown of the leather wall paneling into burnished gold.

Betty Shaw mechanically noted the general effect as she followed her
surly guide. There was little surprise and no curiosity in her gaze,
which had flown straight to the door opposite the hearth. As she
reached the foot of the stairs this door was flung violently open, and
a man sprang forward, confronting her employer.

"Good God, where have you been?" he demanded, his voice grating harshly
with anxiety. "'Ranza has been trying to locate you all the afternoon.
She saw him, but he has broken! He's going to--"

No countering exclamation from the woman had interrupted him, yet he
paused with a strangling gasp, as if a hand had been laid suddenly upon
his throat.

Betty glanced over her shoulder. Mrs. Atterbury stood silently drawn up
to her full height regarding the intruder with eyes which blazed from a
face that might well have given pause. The impassivity which had masked
it was gone, the brows were drawn and knotted and the lips curled back
in a distortion of silent rage so that her strong, white teeth gleamed
menacingly in the firelight. The girl caught one swift glimpse of the
man who cringed in the doorway, then turned and fairly fled up the
stair.

The hall was dimly lighted but a rosy glow came from an opened door
around a turning, and approaching, Betty found herself in a veritable
bower of a room, spacious but cozy, with flowered chintz draperies and
soft, rose-shaded lamps.

"If you want the maid, Miss, there's the bell." Welch had deposited
her bags beside the dressing-table, and was again surveying her with
his curiously intent, lowering gaze. "Should you be liking a cup of
tea, now,--"

"Thank you. I shall require nothing before dinner." Her quiet tone was
in itself a dismissal, yet the man still lingered as if on the point of
further speech. Before her steady eyes, however, his own shifted and
fell, and turning, he shambled from the room.

Betty waited until his stealthy, cat-like footsteps had passed
well down the hall, then closed her door softly and began a minute
examination of her apartment. It faced the side of the house, with two
long French windows opening on a narrow balcony. A door in each wall
led presumably to connecting rooms, but upon examination the first
proved to be fastened, evidently by a bolt on the farther side, for
the keyhole was plugged with a hard substance resembling sealing wax.
The opposite door disclosed a well-appointed bathroom, with no opening
other than a ventilator, high up in the wall.

Completing her simple preparations for dinner, the girl sank in a low
chair before the glowing coals in the English grate and chin in hand,
lost herself in a reverie. The eager, childishly trustful expression
had vanished when she found herself alone and in its place had crept
a hardened, crafty look which robbed her face of its youthful charm.
The scar leaped again into prominence, and seemed to throb as if its
clutching fingers were tightening in a relentless grip, and in her
somber eyes abiding passion brooded.

The silver tones of a gong echoing up from below aroused her and she
sprang to her feet, her clenched hands pressed to her burning temples.
For an instant she stood swaying in the intensity of some all but
overmastering emotion. Then her hands fell to her sides, revealing
again the mask of disingenuousness.

But behind it there lurked, not wholly concealed, an air of joyous
triumph, and she glanced exultantly about her as if out of all the
world, the shelter of this roof had been her goal, and in winning
her way into the household she had brought some deep-laid plan to
consummation.

While she hesitated at the stair's foot, Mrs. Atterbury's voice
summoned her to the drawing-room, where she found beside her employer a
sallow little woman, dull-eyed and slender to the point of angularity,
who was presented as Madame Cimmino. As Betty responded timidly to
the conventional greeting another figure came forward from a shadowed
corner and paused, smiling and urbane.

"Betty, this is an old friend, Mr. Wolvert." An odd smile twisted Mrs.
Atterbury's attenuated lips. "Don't make love to Miss Shaw, Jack. She
seeks sanctuary with me from the world, the flesh and the devil."

"Dear lady!" He raised a deprecating hand before extending it to the
shrinking girl. "You malign me! Let me assure you of your immunity from
evil here, Miss Shaw. Our hostess tolerates no serpents in her garden,
as you will find."

The man's tone was smooth and unctuous, but there was an undercurrent
deeper than mere mockery in the careless words, and Mrs. Atterbury's
eyes glittered dangerously, although she shrugged in cold distaste.

"Shall we go in? Cook times her soufflés to the instant and she is the
only mortal before whom I quail. Come, Speranza."

Madame Cimmino laid her hand lightly on Jack Wolvert's arm as she
passed him, but his gaze was riveted upon the girl, and followed her
slim figure curiously until the curtains fell behind her.

"She is attractive, this new little one, eh?" Madame Cimmino had halted
in the doorway and there was a hard ring in her voice. "It is an added
charm, perhaps, that brand upon her face!"

"Don't be absurd, 'Ranza." The man frowned impatiently. "There's
something queer about that girl, something oddly reminiscent. I could
almost swear I had seen her before, or at least heard her voice."

During the simple but perfectly served meal, Betty unobtrusively
studied the two guests seated at either hand. Madame Cimmino was
evidently of Latin birth, although her quick, impulsive speech was
interlarded with ejaculations in many tongues. Huge opal hoops dragged
at the lobes of her ears and her brown, clawlike hands were loaded
with rings which glistened barbarically in her ceaseless gesturing.
She ignored the newcomer as far as courtesy permitted, snubbed Wolvert
with a proprietary air, which failed to carry weight before his bland
equanimity, but showed an anxious almost fawning deference to her
hostess.

Wolvert made a half-playful attempt to draw out the little companion,
but finding no encouragement in her shy, monosyllabic replies, he
devoted himself to his dinner, and Betty found opportunity to observe
him at her leisure. He was a man of approximately forty, lean and wiry
with olive skin and curiously light eyes in grotesque contrast with his
crisply curling, black hair and small, military mustache. The man's
whole personality seemed oddly at variance. His hands were slender and
shapely, with the tapering, sensitive fingers of an artist, yet the
high Slavic cheekbones, spreading nostrils and heavy jaw belied a finer
sensibility, and his face in repose was saturnine.

Regarding him, Betty could scarcely bring herself to believe that he
was the same man who had burst upon the scene at the moment of her
arrival with his impassioned outcry. The inexplicable words still rang
in her ears. "'Ranza," was evidently Madame Speranza Cimmino, but why
had she tried so frantically to ascertain Mrs. Atterbury's whereabouts
during the long afternoon? Who was the man she had seen, and what was
the meaning of the phrase that he had broken?

Dinner concluded, they returned to the drawing-room, and after a brief
desultory conversation Betty was dismissed, to her infinite relief.
Wolvert sprang forward gallantly to open the door for her departure and
stood staring after her until she disappeared around the turning at the
stair's head, the same puzzled, questioning look in his eyes with which
he had regarded her at their meeting.

Her light extinguished, Betty lay motionless and seemingly relaxed, but
her sleepless eyes were fixed as though they would pierce the darkness,
and her ears strained for the slightest sound. The storm swirled
unabated outside the windows, and the tall clock on the stairs droned
out the hours at all but interminable intervals.

Midnight came, and with it the hum of a high-powered motor on the
drive. A subdued murmur of voices floated up to her from the hall, the
front door closed with a thud and the motor snorted its way through
the piling snowdrifts to the gate. A few minutes later there was a
faint silken rustle of skirts past her door, then the cat-like tread
of Welch as he went his final rounds and darkness and utter silence
reigned supreme.

One o'clock struck, then two, and as the echo of the second stroke died
away, Betty threw back the covers, and slipping from bed stole to her
dressing bag. She fumbled for a moment and then a tiny, thread-like
ray of light leaped from her hand. With the electric torch carefully
shielded, she enveloped herself in a dark kimona, thrust her feet into
soft felt slippers, and unbolting her door, crept silently out into
the hall. The gleaming strand of light wavered, then steadied and
moved slowly along to the turning into the gallery. Its pale afterglow
lingered like a nimbus for a minute and then vanished, and darkness
descended once more about the sleeping house.




                              CHAPTER II.

                        _The Silent Intruder._


The storm ceased with the coming of day, and when Betty awoke a
glistening expanse of diamond-encrusted snow met her gaze between the
parted curtains of her window. Softened by sleep, her face was flushed
and girlishly winsome as she lay with the cruel scar pressed deep into
her pillow, her bewildered eyes roving the unfamiliar room. Then,
with returning consciousness, the shadow descended once more and her
expression perceptibly hardened.

Rising, she walked to the window and flung the curtains wide. The view
of park and clustering, frost-spangled cedars was intersected sharply
with vertical bars of iron and she gave a little involuntary gasp of
dismayed surprise at the discovery that the narrow balcony beyond her
windows was stoutly enclosed, like a huge cage.

The same trapped look of terror which had leaped to the girl's eyes
on the previous day when she faltered at the door of the limousine
returned anew, but she steeled herself against the sudden tide of
emotion which all but overwhelmed her and moved resolutely to her
mirror. The birthmark flamed back angrily at her, but she touched it
almost caressingly as if the knowledge of it gave her strength, and an
enigmatic smile wreathed her lips.

She breakfasted alone in the sunny morning room, attended by Welch,
whose scrutiny of her at her arrival seemed to have satisfied him, for
his bearing was that of a mere well-trained automaton. Betty observed
him surreptitiously as he moved about the room, his heavy-jowled face
and massive bulk incongruous with the light, springing, silent tread
and his shifting eyes obsequiously lowered.

"If you please, miss," he coughed apologetically, as she rose, "Mrs.
Atterbury will see you in the library."

Betty submissively followed him to a door at the left of the entrance
hall. A voice bade her enter and she found her employer seated at an
official-looking desk, already deeply engrossed in her correspondence.
Her dress was severely plain, her hair coiffed low over the lobeless
ears and to the girl's shy morning greeting she turned a face waxen in
its pallor but inscrutable as on their first meeting.

"You are not late, my dear," she responded to Betty's contrite query.
"I rose unusually early and have been sorting my mail in order to show
you just what your task will be."

She motioned to a chair by the desk, and Betty eyed with inward
misgiving the formidable heap of unopened envelopes which still
remained.

"Any letters which may be marked with a small cross in the corner,
like this, for instance," Mrs. Atterbury held one out for inspection,
"you may put aside. The rest you are to open and read, dividing them
into two separate piles, business and purely social, for me to glance
over later. Begging letters, even from personal friends for charity
subscriptions, belong in the financial stack. Do you think you can
manage now with these?"

"Yes, Mrs. Atterbury. Do you wish me to reply to them?"

"At my dictation. I will come back in an hour and we can go over them
together." Mrs. Atterbury rose. "My seamstress will be here this
afternoon to measure you for some new frocks."

When the door had closed behind her, Betty applied herself to her task.
The social letters were few and formal in tone without intimate detail.
Four of the remainder bore crosses and these she laid obediently aside.
The others were palpably business communications and from their tenor
it would have appeared that Mrs. Atterbury's financial interests were
amazingly varied, and of a magnitude which even the luxury of her
environment had not conveyed.

Mines, oil wells, railroads, stock companies and enterprises of every
sort were represented in the heterogeneous collection, from the latest
invention to live stock on the hoof. One letter, evidently concerning
the latter, made Betty pause with a puzzled frown. It began without
any form of address and was unsigned, its few lines being hurriedly
scrawled, but unmistakably legible, although they conveyed no sense to
the girl.

"Five thousand sheep no go," she read. "Bulls instead. Pink wash fed.
Clearing den. Tail comet yellow."

In bewilderment she took up the envelope; the superscription was in the
same irregular hand, and it was postmarked Laramie, Wyoming.

The desk telephone rang as she laid it aside, and hesitatingly she
picked up the receiver.

"Marcia!" It was unmistakably the voice of Wolvert, but the bantering
derisive note was gone, and stark fear rasped in every syllable. "Some
one has squealed! He's got the dope and it's all--"

"I beg your pardon." Betty's tones were cool and steady, but her heart
stood still, for her quick ear had caught the rustle of a skirt just
behind her. "This is Mrs. Atterbury's secretary. To whom did you wish
to speak?"

There was a smothered exclamation at the other end of the wire, and
Mrs. Atterbury snatched the receiver from the girl's hand.

"What is it?" she demanded in a voice which she strove in vain to
control.

"I-I don't know," Betty murmured. "The person spoke so quickly I could
not distinguish a word." "Mrs. Atterbury speaking.... Oh, the market
has broken? Well, sell the shares I hold in that company at whatever
price you can obtain, do you understand? At whatever price! There will
be no panic, tell your partner not to lose his head. It must be made
clear that I will trade no more in that stock.... It will be enough, it
must be. Remember, I look to you to settle the matter absolutely. Let
me have an accounting by tonight."

She hung up the receiver and turned with a shrug but Betty saw that her
lips were white.

"My broker," she remarked, with studied carelessness. "Conscientious
man, but not resourceful. By the way, my dear, I neglected to tell you
that you need never answer this telephone. It is my own private wire.
Call me if it rings when I am at home, but pay no attention to it if I
am not here."

"I am sorry--" began Betty, but the other silenced her.

"It is of no consequence. We will take up the letters now. You did not
find them difficult?"

"No-o," Betty responded hesitatingly. "There is one, however, which I
could not understand at all. It seems to be a business matter, but the
wording doesn't make any sense; it's something about sheep."

"Sheep?" Mrs. Atterbury's level tones sharpened. "Where is the
envelope? Was there no cross upon it?"

"No. At least I didn't see any, and I am quite sure I looked carefully.
This is the one."

"Idiot!" The ejaculation was clearly not intended for the girl, as Mrs.
Atterbury looked vainly for the distinguishing mark, and filliped the
envelope angrily aside. "Give me the letter, please."

She glanced over it rapidly, without comment or change of expression
and put it on the little heap of private letters.

"We will get rid of the social ones first--" she was beginning, when
Betty suddenly interrupted her.

"There is a motor car coming up the drive."

"Ah, it is Mme. Cimmino." Mrs. Atterbury arose, her glance following
the trim little electric brougham as it lurched over the hillocks of
snow. "She will probably stay to lunch, and that means the letters will
have to be held over until tomorrow. Amuse yourself as well as you can,
my dear. You'll find plenty of books here and there is a phonograph in
the corner."

But Betty did not turn to the well-filled bookcases which lined the
walls. Instead she sat with the strange letter spread out before her,
reading and re-reading it as if to memorize every word. That it was a
code of some sort she did not doubt, and without the key it would seem
a hopeless task to attempt to decipher it, yet the young girl pored
over it as eagerly as though its possible solution contained a message
of vital import to herself as well as her employer.

Welch brought her lunch upon a tray and the afternoon was well advanced
before the summons came for her to go to the sewing room. She spent the
intervening hours in a searching examination of the library itself, but
it yielded nothing of seeming interest or import to her. There was no
sign of Mme. Cimmino, but her car had not left the drive and a subdued
murmur as of several voices came from behind the tightly-closed door
of the drawing-room as the girl passed. Welch ushered her to a large
sunny room at the top of the house where she found Mrs. Atterbury deep
in consultation with a faded little woman of indeterminate age who
fluttered nervously on being presented.

"Miss Pope knows what you require, I think," observed Mrs. Atterbury.
"Everything must be as simple as possible, you know."

Miss Pope nodded, her mouth full of pins which she was sticking with
mathematical precision into the little flat cushion that hung from her
belt. When the last was in place, she took up her tape measure.

"Now, miss, if you please."

Betty stood patiently, marvelling at the odd tremulousness of the
withered hands which fumbled about her. Could it be merely nerves, or
was the worn, pallid, little creature under the spell of some emotion
too strong to be wholly controlled?

Mrs. Atterbury had strolled to the window with a fashion book and the
seamstress dropped to her knees before Betty to measure the skirt
length. Glancing down, the girl met the tired eyes of the older woman
and found them fixed on hers with a mute insistent appeal in their
depths.

Involuntarily she started, and Miss Pope, with a warning gesture,
turned over the pincushion at her belt. Upon the under side worked out
in rough irregular letters formed by the pin heads, Betty read the
words, "Go away."

Her eyes sought those of the seamstress once more in puzzled
questioning, but the woman, after a vehement nod, evaded her glance,
and her quivering fingers plucked at the pins until the strange message
was obliterated.

"Have you finished?" Mrs. Atterbury's calm tones cut the pregnant
silence.

"Yes, ma'am. I will come tomorrow for the lining fitting." The
seamstress barely breathed the words, as she scrambled to her feet, but
there seemed a shade of significance as she added: "I-I hope the young
lady will be satisfied."

"_I_ shall be," Mrs. Atterbury responded with good-humored but
unmistakable emphasis. A faint flush mounted in Miss Pope's wan cheeks
and she did not glance again toward Betty, even as she bowed herself
out.

"My dear, I shall not need you again this afternoon. Would you care to
go out for a little while?"

Betty's eyes eagerly turned to the window were sufficient answer.

"You will find several paths leading around the grounds if you don't
mind the snow, but do not go beyond the gate." Mrs. Atterbury smiled,
but she watched the girl's face keenly. "You look pale, and the fresh
air will do you good. We must not keep you cooped up in the house too
much, but I do not want you to go about the city aimlessly until you
learn your way."

"I will not leave the grounds," promised Betty.

"One thing more," Mrs. Atterbury paused at the door. "Don't go near the
garage, for Demon may be unleashed. He is the watch dog and underfed to
keep him savage. Be sure you come in at dusk."

When Betty, as warmly clad as her meagre wardrobe would allow, slipped
out at the side door, the pale wintry sun was already sinking in the
West and the still air nipped her sharply, bringing a tingling glow to
her cheeks. She set out jauntily down the first path which led among
the cedars, her footsteps ringing on the hard packed snow and the
frosty vapor of her breath floating like a veil before her.

The events of the past twenty-four hours, culminating in the
inexplicable attitude of the seamstress, had wrought upon her nerves
and the sense of freedom and solitude was grateful, illusive though
she knew it to be. No doubt of Miss Pope's good will or sanity came to
her, but she wondered what part the faded little creature was called
upon to play in the strange scene of which she herself had become a
supernumerary.

What crisis had arisen in the mysterious affairs of her new employer
and why were her friends, Mme. Cimmino and the man Wolvert, so deeply
concerned for her? The voice of the latter over the telephone that
morning had revealed a frenzy of emotion which his debonair assurance
on the previous evening had utterly belied. Then his impetuous outburst
at the moment of her arrival returned to her mind. Who was the
mysterious "he?" The frantic telephone message of a few hours before
had concerned the same man. Who could he be, and through him what
menace threatened the quiet woman with the inscrutable face to whom her
services were bound?

So engrossed was Betty in her maze of thought, that she had followed
the path unheedingly and only paused when she found her way blocked
by a square granite post. She had reached the entrance gates beyond
which she might not stray. For a moment she lingered, her eyes turned
wistfully down the broad, bleak avenue, a mad, incomprehensible impulse
to escape surging up within her, as if tangible bonds held her to her
voluntarily assumed duty, and danger lurked for her in the house behind
the cedars. The next minute she had turned resolutely and started to
retrace her steps.

The early dusk was already descending and Betty quickened her pace lest
she prolong the hour of freedom beyond the time allotted her. Midway,
the path entered a thick clump of trees, and all at once she became
aware of the rapid thud of feet on the snow behind her. Someone was
running toward the house.

The thought that she was being pursued flashed into her mind, but
she banished it, and turning hastily aside, concealed herself behind
a screen of tangled evergreens. Scarcely had she done so, when a
man appeared around a turn in the path, and passed her with almost
incredible speed.

The single fleeting glimpse she obtained of his gray, set face,
however, had sufficed for recognition. It was Wolvert, and some
unnameable terror sped with him through the eerie gloom.

Betty shivered and looked blindly about her for another way out of the
grove. She dared not enter the house on the heels of this visitor, nor
from the same direction in which he had come, lest she seem to have
been spying upon him, and she desired above all else to reach her own
room unobserved.

At length she discerned a break in the trees at her right and
approaching found a second path branching off in a curve which promised
to lead around the house. Mrs. Atterbury's warning had passed from
her memory and only when the low square bulk of the garage loomed up
before her and a rumbling growl assailed her ears, did she remember the
presence of the dog.

She hesitated, a new and very tangible fright gripping her, but it
was too late to turn back. Even as she paused, the growl changed to
a deep, full-throated cry, and a huge shape bounded toward her out
of the shadows. To attempt escape would only betray her fear to the
brute intelligence and precipitate an attack upon her. Betty knew and
understood canine nature and she realized that her safety depended on
coolness now.

Motionless, she waited until the dog was almost upon her, and then held
out her hand, palm uppermost. The great beast halted in his tracks, his
slavering jaws agape and every hair bristling on his neck.

"Demon! Good Demon!" she called softly. "Steady, old boy. Come here."

Slowly the fire died out of his gleaming eyes and he approached warily,
step by step, while her own eyes held his unwaveringly. He sniffed at
her hand, gazed up at her in mute question and reading confidence and
mastery in her face, dropped obediently in the snow at her feet.

The wave of relief which swept over her was checked by a fresh
disquieting thought. Was the dog merely guarding her until his keeper
appeared to relieve him of his charge? The slightest movement on her
part might bring him up with a spring at her throat, but to wait until
help came would mean the discovery of her disobedience.

Chance solved the problem for her before many minutes had passed. A
shrill whistle sounded from the direction of the garage, and the dog,
lifting his head, gave tongue in response. The whistle was repeated,
followed by a hoarse, blasphemous command. Demon rose reluctantly,
brushed against her knee in friendly farewell, and loped away in the
fast-gathering darkness.

"Oh, Demon!" The girl breathed a sobbing little cry after him.
"Remember me well, the sound of my voice and the scent of me. Sometime
I may need you!"

Then ashamed of the momentary, hysterical weakness, Betty turned and
fairly flew to the house. Slipping in at the side door by which she had
left, she reached her room, breathless, but unobserved, and sank into a
chair.

The house was oddly silent. No sound of voices had met her ears, but
a narrow streak of light had shone from under the library door as
she passed, and her overwrought imagination pictured for her a tense,
constrained group within. In spite of Mrs. Atterbury's specious
explanation, Betty knew beyond question whose voice had come to her
over the telephone, and no mere financial crisis could have brought to
Wolvert's face the look which she had seen upon it when he unwittingly
crossed her path among the trees.

A half-hour went slowly by and then the whirring of the electric
brougham broke the stillness and droned diminishingly into the
distance. Mme. Cimmino had evidently taken her belated departure. Had
Wolvert accompanied her? Betty shrank from encountering him at dinner
and the effort to meet his forced banter serenely, conscious of what
lay beneath it seemed beyond her power.

When she obeyed the gong's summons, however, she found the table laid
only for two, and Mrs. Atterbury already in her place.

"You enjoyed your walk, my dear?" The latter raised imperturbable eyes
to greet the girl. "You did not find it too cold?"

"Oh, no, the air was wonderfully bracing," Betty replied at random,
scarcely aware of what she was saying. "I very nearly lost my way,
though. There are so many paths and the trees quite hide the house."

"Yes. I purchased the property mainly because of the privacy and
seclusion it promised. I am not a hermit," Mrs. Atterbury added, with
the shadow of a smile, "but the rush and turmoil of an active social
existence bore me. You will, perhaps, find it rather monotonous here,
Betty, but there will be more tasks for you to do when you have settled
down and learned your way about the city. I shall have many errands for
you."

"I am glad," Betty responded with nervous eagerness. "The thought of
the city doesn't frighten me any more, now that I feel anchored, Mrs.
Atterbury, and I want to do anything I can. You know I have been idle
all day and it does not seem as if I were earning my salary."

Mrs. Atterbury scrutinized the girl's face, and her own relaxed for
an instant and sagged into deeply graven lines of utter weariness and
exhaustion. The necessity for rigid self-command had faltered before
Betty's seemingly innocent candor; the mask had slipped momentarily
and from beneath it peered a shadow of the anxiety and dread which had
beset her unexpected guest of the afternoon.

With the next breath, however, she had herself again in hand.

"You will not complain of that tomorrow." Her voice was amusedly
tolerant. "We shall have a double amount of correspondence to attend
to, remember, and I will positively be at home to no one until it is
finished. I think I shall retire almost immediately after dinner, my
dear, for I have a slight headache."

The warmth of the house after the sharp, nipping atmosphere outdoors
brought an early drowsiness to Betty, who went directly to her room
after the meal. In spite of the puzzling events of the day, and the air
of mystery which seemed to envelop the household, a lassitude stole
over her and her heavy eyelids drooped and fell.

The dropping of coals in the tiny grate awakened her and she started up
to find that it was close on to midnight. Stumbling softly to the door
she opened it and listened, but the silence was unbroken.

Disrobing, she laid her dressing gown and slippers ready to hand,
extinguished the lamp and crept into bed. Her first deep sleep was over
and Betty lay wide-eyed, staring into the darkness. A vague sensation
of suspense set her brain a-tingle and she felt as if she were waiting
with every nerve taut for something which she could not name.

Gradually, however, the feeling was dispelled and she was sinking
into an uneasy slumber when all at once she started up in bed with a
shivering gasp, her heart leaping wildly and the very hair upon her
brow seeming to stir and rise as though an unseen hand were lifting
it. A sudden, muffled crash had pierced her consciousness and the very
air seemed to quiver with the jar of impact, although no further sound
broke the stillness. Betty listened with bated breath for a moment,
then rose, impelled by an impulse stronger than her power to combat.

Throwing her gown about her, she snatched the electric torch from the
drawer of her dressing-table and made her way to the door. Impenetrable
darkness greeted her as before, but it seemed to her overwrought fancy
that a shuddering tension filled the air and the ticking of the tall
clock beat like a tocsin upon her brain.

As one in a trance she moved mechanically to the stairs and down,
the thread of light which played from her hand guiding her cautious
footsteps. The doors of the library and drawing-room were closed, but
that of the dining-room was opened wide and a frigid draft blew through
it, whipping the gown about her bare ankles.

Betty flashed her light upon the aperture and the outline of the
heavily carved dining table leaped into view, while all about it on the
floor lay fragments of something which scintillated in the shaft of
radiance like scattered diamonds.

Slowly she approached the door, the darting rays from her torch
piercing the sinister darkness, the very breath hushed in her throat.
On the threshold she paused and stood transfixed.

The dining table had been slewed to one side, chairs were overturned,
draperies pulled from their rings and the great glass punch bowl lay
shattered on the floor.

But it was not upon these signs of violence that her eyes were fastened
in a glaze of horror. A man lay stretched before the hearth with
upturned face and arms flung wide, a man whose eyes stared with tragic
vacuity and from whose breast a sluggish crimson stream had flowed to
form a spreading pool upon the rug.

For a long minute the girl stood staring with eyes as fixed as those of
the dead. She opened her lips, but no sound issued from them to raise
an alarm or summon aid. Instead she lifted her hands jerkily to her
throat as if struggling to draw breath, and turning, fled silently for
her very life up the stairs.




                             CHAPTER III.

                          _The Velvet Glove._


Betty was seated before her mirror, gazing somewhat doubtfully from
the small round box of rouge in her hand to her wan reflection. Dare
she hope successfully to conceal the ravages of a sleepless, tortured
night? Her cheeks and very lips were blanched and her eyes sunken and
heavily circled. Only the birthmark, like a scarlet stain, glowed
sullenly and served but to accentuate her pallor. It were better by far
that her employer's keen eyes should note a condition which she could
attribute to illness than that her effort to conceal it would be so
palpable as to invite suspicion of a graver nature.

How she had managed to reach her room after the shock of her tragic
discovery, she could not have told. No memory remained with her of
that swift silent flight from the room of death. She only knew that
she found herself back in bed once more, trembling in every limb and
with an icy, pulseless void in her breast where her heart had been.
Reason itself seemed to have fled, and her thoughts become a whirling
phantasmagoria of horror in which but one thing stood out as if stamped
indelibly upon her mind: the face of the slain man.

It floated before her in the darkness as distinctly as the pitiless
glare of her torch had revealed it, strangely calm and detached amid
the debris of the devastated room below, and the girl cowered as if
once more in its dread presence.

For hours which seemed like years she lay in an agony of expectancy,
waiting for a cry of alarm when the inevitable discovery should be
made. But no sound broke the tomb-like stillness save once, when a
vague muffled thud came to her ears. Even that she could not be sure
of, for her senses were tottering on the verge of hysteria, and the
night passed in the hideous unreality of a dream.

With the dawn came utter exhaustion, but she desperately combatted its
lethargy, in fear lest sleep bring a nightmare which would wring from
her unconscious lips a shriek of betrayal.

The hazy patch of light at her window broadened into day and at last
faint but unmistakable sounds came to her from below. The servants were
stirring, and surely now, at any moment, the alarm would be raised.

Wonder succeeded expectancy as the minutes passed and the normal
tranquility of the house remained unbroken. At length, unable to endure
the torture of inaction, she had arisen. Whatever the immediate future
held in store, she, at least, must appear ignorant of all that had
occurred during the silent watches of the night.

The breakfast gong sounded as she replaced her rouge unused in the
drawer, and with leaden feet she descended the stairs. The door of the
dining-room was open and from within it issued the cheerful clatter of
silver and purr of the coffee urn.

As if hypnotized, Betty made her way down the hall but paused
involuntarily on the threshold. The room was in perfect order, the
furniture arranged as usual; even the great cut-glass bowl, which she
had seen only a few hours before shattered into a score of fragments,
stood whole and unmarred in its accustomed place upon the sideboard.

The girl's eyes turned incredulously to the hearth where the ghastly
figure had lain. It was spic and span, and the pale gray of the silken
rug showed no slightest trace of the sinister pool which had reddened
it a few short hours before. The bright sunlight, streaming in between
the curtains at the window, added the last touch of solid reality to
the scene, and Betty felt that her sanity was rocking in the balance.
Had she indeed been the victim of some fearful hallucination? Was the
tragedy upon which she had stumbled but the figment of a dream?

All at once she became conscious of eyes upon her and turned sharply.
Mrs. Atterbury stood just behind her, smiling her calm, inscrutable
smile.

"Good morning, my dear. Did you sleep well?"

"Not very." Betty forced her stiffened lips to frame the words. "I
awoke toward morning with a terrific headache, but it is better now."

She stood boldly, with a shaft of sunlight full upon her face,
conscious of the keen scrutiny to which she was being subjected, but
determined to avoid possible suspicion by as realistic a semblance of
candor as she could command.

The pause seemed interminable, but Mrs. Atterbury broke it at last.

"You are very pale. I must give you a headache powder before your
coffee. Welch!"

A figure moved in the shadowed corner of the china closet, and Betty
all but cried out in dismay. Had the sly, soft-footed butler been
standing there, silently noting her hesitation on the threshold, and
her significant glances about the room?

"Madame?"

"Tell Caroline to give you one of the powders from the blue box in my
medicine chest; remember, the blue box."

"Yes, Madame."

Mrs. Atterbury seated herself in her accustomed place, and Betty took
the chair opposite. She dared not refuse the proffered medicine but a
hideous fear gripped her. Suppose her subterfuge had been suspected
and she was now to be done away with, like that other whose body she
had seen! Or had he really never existed, save in her distraught
imagination?

She managed to drink her coffee, but the food repelled her. As her
nerves steadied and self-command returned to her, she furtively studied
the faces of her employer and the butler. There was no mistaking the
significance of their suddenly acute espionage. She could not account
to herself for the magic rehabilitation of the room, but as the chaos
of her mind subsided one fact resolved itself irrefutably; the event of
the night had been no dream or vision born of hysteria.

Upon that rug so miraculously cleansed had lain the body of the
murdered man. How it had been spirited away, or how, indeed, the
intruder had gained entrance, and the violent struggle which the
condition of the room had indicated could take place without its noise
alarming the house, were mysteries Betty made no attempt to solve.

Every sense was alert to her own danger, and she realized that her
very life depended now upon her powers of dissimulation. The watchers
had become the watched, and she noted that Welch's pasty face was gray
in the strong light of morning and his shifty, ratlike eyes darted
furtively over his shoulder when he crossed before the hearth.

Mrs. Atterbury, too, left her food practically untouched, and the hand
with which she raised her cup shook visibly, but her indomitable brain
was evidently schooled to the utmost concentration, for immediately
after the farce of breakfast was concluded she conducted Betty to the
library and dictated steadily for more than two hours.

The social letters were devoid of interest to the girl, and under the
stress of the moment seemed curiously banal. Those concerning financial
matters were for the most part unintelligible, but she strove to fix
her mind on them and banish the hideous vision which still obsessed
her. No allusion was made to the private letters marked with a cross,
nor did Mrs. Atterbury dictate any reply to the cryptic communication
concerning five thousand sheep which had arrived on the previous day.

However, when the voluminous correspondence had been seemingly disposed
of and Betty's eyes were turning longingly toward the crisp sunshine
beyond the window, Mrs. Atterbury rose and going to a tall, narrow
bookcase built in a corner of the wall, swung it nonchalantly outward
with a light practised touch.

A compact steel safe was revealed, imbedded in the solid brick of the
wall, and Betty watched eagerly, striving to note each twirl and stop
of the combination as the other woman swiftly manipulated it. With a
final click the door swung open, disclosing row after row of numbered
pigeonholes like a post-office rack, each containing its quota of long,
legal-looking envelopes.

The girl's gaze was riveted, tense and fascinated upon the movements of
her employer, and unhidden there crossed her face once more that sly,
subtle look of Machiavelian cunning and triumph, maturing yet debasing
its artless charm.

Had Mrs. Atterbury turned at that moment she might have read a warning
in the silent strained figure, but she was engrossed in her occupation.
When at length she selected a packet and closing the safe carefully
came back to her desk, the girl was rearranging its contents, her face
averted.

"Here are rough drafts of some letters which I want you to copy for
me. Be careful that you transcribe them exactly; I think you will find
them readily legible. When you have finished, mark the envelopes with a
cross and place them with the others, for Welch to mail."

The new task occupied Betty until lunch time, and when Welch appeared
with her tray, as on the previous day, she ate with relish, grateful
to escape the ordeal of another hour in that room of mystery under the
Argus eyes of Mrs. Atterbury and her servitor.

The former returned as she concluded her simple meal.

"You have finished the letters? Good! I can see that you are going to
be a valuable aid. Your predecessor, Inez Harly, was a conscientious
girl, but stupid--!" Mrs. Atterbury rolled her eyes with an expressive
shrug. "My dear, have you ever done any library work at home in--let me
see, where did you come from?--Greenville, Iowa?"

"'Library work'?" Betty repeated with a smile. "Our community was not
important enough to have attracted the attention of Mr. Carnegie, but
we had quite an extensive library of our own, and I always took care of
it for my--my mother."

If Mrs. Atterbury noted the odd hesitation in the last words she gave
no sign.

"Then you understand the rearrangement, classification and listing
of books? I wonder if you will attend to mine? There are, I believe,
over four hundred in this room alone and many others are scattered
practically all over the house. The sets are all in a jumble and I
never seem able to put my hand on any particular volume when I want it."

"I think I can do it." Betty's eyes had turned again wistfully to the
window and her heart sank. "It will take me several days, I am afraid,
but if you have nothing more pressing for me to do--"

"I haven't at the moment." Mrs. Atterbury moved toward the door. "I
shall be glad if you will begin this afternoon. Take all the time you
require and when the books are arranged, please catalogue them for me.
There are a few rare volumes among them which may interest you, if you
are a student. I will send for you when Miss Pope comes."

The books were in an almost hopeless state of confusion and Betty had
no mind for her task. She was still shaken with the horror of the
previous night's discovery, and the imperturbability of the other woman
had suggested to her a new and startling train of thought. What if Mrs.
Atterbury herself were ignorant of the tragedy which had taken place
beneath her roof? Could it have been the work of Welch? The girl had
read the evidence of his guilty knowledge unmistakably stamped upon his
elemental, brutish face that morning, but Mrs. Atterbury's inscrutable
countenance defied analysis.

The continued strain was telling upon the girl and she longed
unspeakably for the cold, bracing air of out of doors, but it was
evident that her employer intended to grant her no leisure that day.
Could the rearrangement of the books have been merely an expedient
to keep her occupied and close at hand? Mrs. Atterbury had shown her
nothing but kindness, yet she was conscious of the woman's dominant
character, and that beneath all her suavity lurked the pitiless tyranny
of an inflexible will. She was beginning to feel the iron hand within
the velvet glove, and she shuddered at the mere fancy that it might
some time close about her.

It was significant that no thought of escape came to her. She had met
the new danger as something which must be faced and lived down, and
the natural alternative of notifying the authorities of the foul play
to which she had been an unwitting accessory after the fact never
entered her mind. Instead, with a singleness of purpose which seemed
inexplicable she resolutely forced her thoughts into other channels
than those which led to the appalling mystery, and strove to focus her
attention on the books.

Through the long afternoon Betty plodded on at her tedious task, for
it was dusk when Welch came to announce the seamstress' arrival. The
silence in the house had remained unbroken, but as she left the library
the girl became aware of distant and confused shouting in the street
beyond the great gates. It sounded upon her ears like the clamor of an
approaching mob, and her heart beat fast as she hurried upstairs.

"What can it be?" she voiced her query aloud as Mrs. Atterbury met her
at the door of the sewing room. "Those cries upon the street! Did you
hear them? Could there have been a--an accident?"

"It is just the news-sellers crying an 'extra'," the other responded,
adding with an amused smile, "No wonder it startled you! I suppose they
are unknown in your home town. They are an unmitigated nuisance, but
the public feeds on cheap sensation--"

"There's been a murder!" the little dressmaker croaked suddenly
from the corner where she had been waiting. "A gentleman was found
stabbed--"

Mrs. Atterbury's lips tightened and she lifted an authoritative hand.

"If you please, Miss Pope!" Her voice was as cold as the ringing of
steel on steel. "Horrors do not appeal to me, and I am averse to
discussing them."

"I'm very sorry, I'm sure." Miss Pope fluttered in distress, her pallid
face flushing darkly. "I didn't think when I spoke, but I saw it in
big staring headlines in a man's paper on the car, and the words just
popped out of my mouth. I wouldn't say anything to upset anybody for
the world----"

"You haven't." Mrs. Atterbury stemmed the quick, nervous flow of
speech, and her own voice had sunk to its normal unemotional level. "I
do not believe in encouraging a tendency to morbidity, especially in
the young. We all know, unfortunately, that crime exists, but we who
do not come in contact with it should spare ourselves the revolting
details. Now let us see how the gown will fit."

Tremblingly, the cowed little creature busied herself about the girl's
slender figure. Betty stood like an automaton, turning obediently at a
touch of the seamstress' hand, but oblivious to all that went on about
her. Miss Pope's inadvertent words had seared themselves on her brain
in letters of fire and for an instant everything grew black before her
eyes. Then out of the whirling darkness had come a fleeting glimpse of
Mrs. Atterbury's face and all doubt of her knowledge of the midnight
tragedy was gone forever. Stunned by the confirmation of her own secret
fears, Betty gave no heed to the seamstress, until Welch appeared to
call his mistress to the telephone.

When they were alone, Miss Pope glanced up with a strange intensity in
her lack-lustre eyes.

"You--stay?" The words were barely formed by the woman's shaking lips.

"I think so," Betty murmured in response. "If Mrs. Atterbury likes me."

"Oh, she'll like you, fast enough." Miss Pope looked fearfully behind
her as if the shadow of her employer lingered in the doorway. "Before
you know it you'll be caught, too, and you'll never be able to get
free. Why didn't you go yesterday when I warned you?"

"What did you mean? Mrs. Atterbury is kind and I must earn my living.
Why should I leave this place?"

"Because you are young, with all your life before you! I can't explain.
I'm taking an awful chance now, but oh! believe me, miss, and go! You'd
be better off homeless, in the streets, than here!"

"You must tell me more!" Betty urged. "What is wrong here? What harm
can come to me? I cannot give up a good position without even knowing
why!"

The seamstress' hands fluttered in a little hopeless gesture, and she
laid one finger warningly on her lips. When she spoke, it was in an
altered tone.

"Yes, Miss, as you say, a little more fullness here. Mrs. Atterbury
will advise me about the draping."

Her ear had been quicker than the girl's, for even as she paused the
rustle of a skirt came to them down the hall and the mistress of the
house appeared in the doorway. She darted a keen glance from one to
the other, but Betty met her eyes calmly, and the seamstress' face was
averted.

The fitting concluded and Miss Pope dismissed, Mrs. Atterbury turned to
the girl.

"A few friends are dining with me tonight and I do not want you to
appear in that sombre black. I have had Caroline put one of my waists
in your room which I think you can manage to wear. Come down to the
drawing-room early, please."

Betty obeyed, but found that some of the guests had already arrived.
Mme. Cimmino was curled up felinely in a corner of the great davenport,
a cigarette between her fingers and a spot of red glowing in each
sallow cheek. She was talking rapidly with shrugs and darting, nervous
gestures, to a tall, white-haired, distinguished stranger who was
introduced as Doctor Bayard.

Wolvert stood alone, with one arm resting on the mantel. He was gazing
into the fire and his face in the flickering glare seemed aged and
shrunken, the high cheek bones glazed like those of a skull and the
pale eyes shadowed.

Mrs. Atterbury was conversing with two other men by the door and as
Betty was presented she took furtive note of them. The first, Leonard
Ide, was a mere youth with a receding chin and vacant, glassy eyes. His
dinner coat was extreme to the point of foppishness, but its dashing
lines could not conceal the narrow stooped shoulders and hollow chest
beneath. The hand he extended was cold and clammy to the girl's touch,
and his high, thin voice grated unpleasantly on her ear.

The other was in appearance almost humorously antithetical. Short and
stocky, with a rotund paunch, and bushy, iron-gray hair, he stood with
his plump legs set wide apart and his eyes twinkled benignly behind
huge rimmed glasses as he bowed his salutations. His voice was deep
and gutteral with a decided accent and his ruddy face glowed in the
firelight. Betty did not catch his name, but the others called him
"Professor."

The pale youth attempted to engage her in conversation with an air of
bored patronage which would have amused her under other circumstances,
but as she looked from face to face, one question rang insistently
through her brain. Did they know? The old gentleman with the air of an
aristocrat, the jovial Professor, the spineless youth--could they bear
the burden of guilty knowledge in common with the rest?

There was an undercurrent of perfect understanding, a veiled intimacy
about the scattered group, ill-assorted as it was, which suggested a
closer bond than that of old acquaintanceship. Betty could not have
defined the sensation which assailed her but she felt that her every
move and intonation were being weighed in the balance, as one brought
before a tribunal.

Wolvert had turned from the fire-place and was approaching her, when
the door was once more flung open, and Welch announced:

"Mr. and Mrs. Dana."

There was nothing distinctive at first glance about the couple who
entered. The man was smooth shaven and of middle-age, slightly florid,
slightly bald with lines of fatigue or dissipation about his eyes. The
woman, a trifle younger, carried herself with a certain indolent grace,
but her complexion was a shade too brilliant, her hair meretriciously
yellow, and her voluptuous figure in its shimmering gown resembled a
gorgeous over-blown flower.

The others addressed them familiarly as "Mortie" and "Louise," but with
their entrance Betty noted a perceptible change in the spirit of the
assembled party. The talk became disjointed, but more general in tone,
and the note of intimacy was lacking.

At dinner, Betty was seated between the fatuous young man and Mr. Dana,
with Wolvert again facing her across the table, as on the evening
of her arrival. The debonair, bantering manner was gone, and he sat
in moody silence, the food untouched before him, but his wine glass
emptied as quickly as Welch could replenish it. A dull red gathered
beneath his cheek bones, and his eyes glowed fitfully as the dinner
progressed.

Betty could feel his gaze fastened upon a point just back of her,
and involuntarily she glanced over her shoulder. The table had been
enlarged to accommodate the augmented circle, and she realized with a
start that she was seated directly in front of the hearth, almost upon
the very spot where the body of the dead man had lain.

Madame Cimmino leaned over swiftly with her hand on Wolvert's arm, and
whispered a few words in his ear, then deliberately she reached across
for his wine glass and placed it beside her own plate.

He straightened as if suddenly awakened and flashed a lightening glance
around the table, and at that moment the nasal tones of Mrs. Dana were
raised in lazy derision.

"Ghosts! They went out of fashion with moated granges and secret
panels. Good Lord, who believes in 'em nowadays?"

The professor shook his shaggy gray head.

"There is much that not yet scientifically explained has been," he
remarked argumentatively. "It is the talk of a child to say, 'This
cannot be,' because we know it not. I, myself, haff seen----"

"My dear Professor!" Doctor Bayard lifted a slim, blue-veined hand in
deprecation. "I suffer from insomnia. Do not present me, I beg of you,
with a group of shades to evoke about my bed! If the ghosts of men
live after them, it can be only in the thoughts of those who are left
behind."

"Household pets, eh!" Wolvert's voice rang out in a strident laugh and
he seized the wine glass from Madame Cimmino's detaining hand. "Let's
drink to them! To the ghosts of yester-year! May their shadows never
grow less!"

Watching, Betty saw his eyes stray past her once more, and the glass
halted half-way to his lips. For an instant a sick horror stole over
her and then she heard Mrs. Atterbury's calm, level tones.

"That is a toast for Hallowe'en, Jack, but not apropos now. Why drag in
bogies when you can pledge other things more to your taste?"

"Beauty, my boy, and youth. That's the ticket, eh?" Mortie Dana looked
up from the hothouse pear he was peeling with placid precision. "Me
for the youth thing every time--until Louise tries to teach me the new
dance steps. Then I pass."

Under cover of the titter which ran around the table, Mrs. Atterbury
collected the eyes of her women guests, and they retired to the
drawing-room for coffee. Betty hesitated in the doorway, declining
Welch's proffered tray and her employer smiled tolerantly.

"You are tired? My dear, run along to bed, if you like. You have been
indoors all day and busy, and I forgot that your head ached. If you
cannot sleep, ring for Caroline, and she will give you a bromide."

Betty thankfully availed herself of the opportunity and made her
escape, but sleep was furthest from her thoughts. The hideous mystery
still hammered at the gates of her brain, and could not be dismissed,
but she was grateful at least for solitude that she might relax from
the strain of dissimulation.

She wrapped a loose robe about her, unbound her hair and extinguishing
the light threw herself on the _chaise longue_ before the hearth. A
pale moon rode high in the sky, glinting on the frost-laden cedars
beyond her window, and the smouldering coals in the grate cast a
cheerful ruddy glow about her. In the tranquil reality, it seemed
incredible that tragedy and crime could have lurked beneath that roof
so short a time before. In a swift revulsion of feeling the girl
wondered if the suspicion and watchfulness which she had read on every
face save those of the Danas, could have been, after all, but the
product of her imagination.

A sudden sharp scream, muffled but unmistakable, brought her to her
feet with her heart beating wildly. How long she had lain there, in
the lethargy of a complete reaction, she had no means of knowing. The
cry was not repeated, but the silence seemed pregnable with unnameable
horror, and unable to control herself, Betty stole to her door and
opened it. Then she paused, rigid with surprise. A few paces away, the
maid, Caroline, sat on guard.

"Did you want something, Miss?" The woman rose respectfully, but her
eyes did not meet the girl's. "Mrs. Atterbury said you might need me."

Betty started indignantly to speak, but checked the words which had
risen to her lips. After a pause, she said quietly:

"No, but I fancied someone called."

"Oh, that was just somebody laughing, Miss. They're playing cards,
Welch tells me."

Betty bade the woman a brief goodnight and closing her door, locked it
with an emphatic click. The cry still echoed in her ears. Muffled as it
had been, she recognized the voice of Mrs. Dana, and knew that no mirth
had sounded in its shrill crescendo, but stark terror. Was a fresh
tragedy being enacted below?

One point, at least, was clear beyond further doubt; the espionage and
surveillance had been no vain imagining. The woman outside her door was
there as jailor, not servitor. She herself, was a virtual prisoner!




                              CHAPTER IV.

                             _Blindfold._


The offices of the Joseph P. McCormick Detective Agency, Incorporated,
occupied the entire nineteenth floor of the Leicester Building and
more nearly resembled those of a potentate of finance than a private
investigator. The Chief's sanctum was protected by a series of smaller
communicating offices presided over by subordinates of ascending rank
and importance, through whose hands the visitor, client or culprit,
must pass before gaining audience with the great man himself; a process
which tended either to crush or irritate the stranger, according to his
temperament.

The lady who sent in her card to the Chief on a certain crisp morning
in late winter, however, seemed to find food for amusement in the
ceremonious progression. She was of the type which proclaims rather
than admits age, but in spite of her snow-white hair, her tall figure
was as erect as that of a girl and her snapping gray eyes behind the
gold _pince-nez_ were neither dimmed nor mellowed by time.

A dry smile tightened the fine lines about her lips as she was ushered
into the last of these offices, which served as an ante-chamber to the
supreme consulting room. A slim, mild-looking youth with the face of a
student was seated behind a typewriter table and raised his eyebrows
superciliously as he greeted her with the question which through
reiteration had appealed to her sense of humor.

"You wish to see Mr. McCormick himself?"

"That fact should be self-evident even to a detective, since I
have gained admittance as far as this." Her tone was pleasant, but
peremptory, as if she were addressing an inquisitive schoolboy, and the
young man gasped, but preceded doggedly with the formula.

"You have no appointment?"

"None. I have already stated that to a red-headed boy, two totally
uninterested young ladies and several men, as you are doubtless aware."

A harassed look was creeping into the eyes of her inquisitor.

"If you will kindly state the nature of your business, Madame--"

"I came here to consult a private detective, not to discuss my affairs
with his subordinates or shout them from the housetops." A sharper note
had penetrated her tones as if a smooth weapon were suddenly turned
edge upwards. "If your Mr. McCormick is too busy to talk to me in
person, I prefer not to waste further time."

The young man rose resignedly.

"I think the Chief is at liberty now. Step this way, Madame."

He threw back a door at the farther end of the office, revealing a huge
corner room walled on two sides by windows, from which a dazzling glare
shone full upon their faces. A heavy-set, brawny figure, with keen eyes
beneath beetling brows and a straight-clipped black mustache, rose
impressively to receive her as the door closed behind her guide.

The old lady brusquely forestalled his opening remark.

"Young man," the Chief was at least forty-five, "I've been presented at
five European courts with less fuss and bother than I have experienced
in trying to reach you. Let us come to the point. I want someone found;
if you think you can accomplish it for me, name your price."

The Chief smiled slightly as he glanced at her card on the desk before
him.

"It is possible that I can be of service, Madame Dumois." His voice was
blandly ingratiating. "Take this seat and give me the particulars. Is
the missing person a relative?"

Madame Dumois seated herself as he had indicated and her lips set in a
straight line.

"I did not come here to be cross-examined, my good man, and I haven't
said the person was missing. I mean there has been no mysterious
disappearance, if that is what you are getting at. I will tell you
as much as I have a mind to and no more, and if you do not find it
sufficient to work on, we can stop right here. I have lost track of a
certain young woman, and I want to locate her. Never mind why, or what
our relations have been. I'd pay a good price to lay eyes on her again."

Her voice hardened perceptibly and a faint, angry flush mounted in her
faded cheeks and boded ill for the unfortunate object of her search.
Detective McCormick leaned forward persuasively in his chair.

"But my dear Madame, I must have a few personal details or I shall not
know what type of operative to assign to the case. I take it that it is
strictly confidential?"

"I congratulate you!" Her lips twitched again in grim humor. "I seemed
unable to convey that impression to your various secretaries. Your
operative will have to be a person of intelligence and tact, and if
he is to come in personal contact with this young woman, he must be a
gentleman. She is what you would call a lady, I'll say that much for
her."

"You do not care to give me her name?"

"It is immaterial."

The detective lifted his shaggy brows.

"May I ask if this young woman is a fugitive? Is there a likelihood
that you will bring charges, criminal or civil, when she is located?"

"It is possible, under certain conditions." Madame Dumois' tones
trembled for the first time, then steadied and she added in a sharper
key. "That is beside the point. I want her found; your case ends there.
The rest is my affair. Call in your operative and I will put him in
possession of such facts as I consider essential."

"It is absolutely essential that I should know more, myself, before I
can assign anyone to the case." The detective squared himself firmly in
his chair. "Have you any idea where this young woman may be found? Any
possible clue? Where and when was she last seen?"

Madame Dumois rose majestically.

"I will not take up more of your valuable time, Mr. McCormick. I see
that we will be unable to come to an understanding. Good morning."

She turned to the door, but he extended a swift detaining hand.

"My dear Madame Dumois! I am prepared to do anything that is possible
to be of service to you, but you must realize that you have given me no
data whatever to work upon."

"I was under the impression that you would not undertake this matter
personally in any event." She had halted, but there was no yielding in
her tone. "If you have a moderately clever, discreet operative with
the bearing and appearance of a gentleman, I will talk with him. I do
not wish to discuss the details of the case any more than is absolutely
necessary. I will give him a description of the young woman, nothing
more. The rest will be in his hands."

The detective reflected.

"I think I have just the man for you," he announced at last.
"Unfortunately, he is out on a case at the present moment, but I will
recall him and send him up to see you this afternoon, if you will leave
your address."

"I will meet him here," Madame Dumois replied hastily. "If he has tact
enough to accept what information I am prepared to give him, and brains
enough to turn it to account, it will be all I shall ask. At what hour
can you have him here?"

"Shall we say three o'clock? I am confident that you will find Mr. Ross
eminently suitable for your purposes. He is young, good-looking and
discreet, with great personal magnetism--"

"I am not requesting him to make love to the girl." A flash of her old
humor returned. "And now, Mr. McCormick, what are your terms?"

The business arrangement was briefly concluded and the detective bowed
his visitor out with grudging admiration in his eyes. He waited until
her firm, methodical footsteps had died away down the corridor,
and then pressed a button upon the under edge of his desk top. The
studious-looking young man made his appearance almost instantaneously
from the adjoining office.

"Yes, sir?"

"Disappearance. Young woman, good standing. Probable social scandal.
Detail Clark to tail Madame Dumois and get what info he can. Try the
hotels, the old-fashioned conservative ones first. Wire Ross, 192-A.
Spring Garden Street, Philadelphia, to return immediately earliest
train and report here at two-thirty. Send Luders out to take his place."

The young man whipped out a pad, wrote rapidly and then paused with an
inquiring glance. His chief nodded, chuckling.

"That's all. Peppery old lady, but she knows her business. Ross is the
chap to handle her."

At precisely half-past two a young man bounded up the steps of the
Leicester Building and, elbowing his way good-naturedly into the
already packed elevator, shot up to the nineteenth floor. He was
boyish-looking and slim, but his broad, straight shoulders and lithe
hips betokened the athlete and his laughing eyes had a habit of
narrowing suddenly in keen intensity.

He nodded a careless greeting to the red-headed boy and the burly
strong-arm man who guarded the outer office, and made his way
unceremoniously into the presence of his chief.

The latter explained the reason for his recall and told him succinctly
of the morning's interview.

"Tactful and brainy and a gentleman; that's what the old lady says
she wants, and I guess you fill the bill, Bert," McCormick added.
"You're the gentleman, all right, because you were born one, and that's
something you never lose and can't fake. For kid glove cases no one
stands in the same class with you, but you'll need more than that in
handling Madame Dumois; asbestos gloves would be safer. She wants to
find the girl, but she's dead scared of our getting a line on her.
Sharp as a steel trap, she is--a regular Tartar!"

"Um--French?" Herbert Ross seemed in no wise perturbed by the
formidable description.

"No. Yankee accent, but there's a Paris look to her clothes. Dressy old
party, in spite of her widow's cap. Shouldn't wonder if she's just back
from the other side. That's why I had her looked up at the hotels, but
I couldn't smoke her out. Don't antagonize her by asking questions or
you're a goner. Just let her do the talking and pick up what scraps of
data you can. I'm not worrying about your ability to make a success of
it, Bert, if you can only get enough out of the old lady to work on,
but blood from a stone would be a cinch in comparison."

"Any hint as to why she wants the subject located?"

Ross lighted a cigarette and leaned forward in his chair.

"Not in words, but from her manner I judge it is not from any desire
to remember the young woman in her will," the Chief responded dryly.
"Looks more like a scandal than anything else, as she's so anxious to
keep the girl's identity a secret. I tried my level best to worm some
information from her, but she flared up and threatened to call it all
off. The best I've got is that the subject is young, refined and to
all appearances a lady, although Madame Dumois seemed to grudge that
fact. You go to it, Bert, and see what you can do." The young operator
pondered for a moment.

"Well, sir," he began at last, "I can't hope to succeed where you have
failed, if I work along the same lines. In your official capacity you
have had the bad luck to antagonize her, so I think I shall try another
scheme. May I have the reference library for an hour? I'll receive her
there instead of here."

"Take the whole shop if you want it, but get the right dope from her
about the girl!" The detective brought his hand down on the desk in a
resounding slap. "It will be a long step up the ladder for you if you
can start to make a reputation for yourself of successful discreet work
among conservative people of the sort the old lady belongs to. That's
why I put you on this; I haven't the time to go after it myself and it
requires class as well as brains. The woods are full of refined young
ladies who have turned one trick or another; a chance word may give
you a line on how to locate this one. Try any scheme you like, but get
results. That's all we're after."

The reference library was more like a club room than the sanctum of a
private detective. A long, mahogany table surrounded by heavily carved
chairs occupied the center of the room, and the walls were lined with
bookcases, interspersed with tall glass cabinets filled with curios. A
few prints and signed photographs hung above them and over the mantel
was mounted a neat arrangement of firearms and various weapons.

There was nothing remarkable about the room or its appointments at
first glance, save its obvious incongruity with the rest of the
suite, but a closer inspection would have revealed the fact that all
the volumes--with the exception of those in a small case between two
windows--dealt with one subject; crime. The curios in the cabinets, the
weapons above the mantel, each had its individual history, tragic or
sordid, to bear mute testimony to the futility of defiance of the law.

Madame Dumois' return was punctual to the moment and she was ushered
without delay to the apartment, where Ross awaited her. She stared
critically at the slim, straight, immaculate figure as he turned
toward her from the low bookcase, a quaint vellum-covered volume open
in his hands.

"Madame Dumois?" he bowed low with continental courtesy over her hand.
"I have come from Philadelphia to be of what service to you I may; I am
Herbert Ross."

"Mr. McCormick suggested you--" she began, but he interrupted her
swiftly.

"Do you know, while awaiting you I have come upon a real treasure here?
The collected verse of Nizami!"

Mme. Dumois stepped backward, blinking.

"Poetry!" she ejaculated faintly, in blank amazement.

"Ah! I see you are interested." His face lightened in boyish eagerness.
"Nothing so appeals to the woman of rare discernment and feeling as the
lilting charm of the early Persians. The casual reader knows only the
Bacchanalian philosophy of Omar, but you, I am sure are familiar with
Rumi and this greatest of lyricists, Nizami, to say nothing of Hafiz--"

"Upon my soul!" Mme. Dumois had backed until the table barred her
retreat. "You are a most extraordinary young man!"

"Should one permit the ugliness of life to blind one to the beauties
of expression? But I see you have not done so. You possess that rarest
of all gifts, sympathetic appreciation, Madame Dumois!" He beamed
upon her. "Do you remember this lament of Majnun over the grave of
Laili? Where even in the exquisite love letters of your own Abelard to
Heloise, can you find such haunting beauty? Listen, I beg of you:

    "_Oh, bower of joy, with blossoms fresh and fair,
    But doomed, alas! no ripened fruit to bear.
    Where shall I find thee now in darkness shrouded!
    Those eyes of liquid fire forever clouded--_"

He sighed dramatically and closed the book. "Your French poets--but I
forgot; I had fancied from your name that you were a native of France--"

"I am American--" Madame Dumois stammered, still dazed from his
unexpected onslaught.

"That I realized at once when I saw you. I knew even the part of the
country from which you came, Madame." He bowed again. "Only the women
of New England retain their girlhood grace and beauty of form with
their native charm of manner through years of cosmopolitan life, as
this little volume has retained its beauty of thought and inspiration
in spite of the fact that it was discovered in the pocket of an arch
murderer when he was searched in the death house."

A faint flush had risen to the faded cheeks of the old lady at his
daring flattery, but she paled again with an involuntary shudder.

"Mercy! Put the horrid thing away!"

He laid the book upon the table.

"Forgive the digression, Madame Dumois. I am at your service."

For once she seemed at a loss.

"You are really a detective?" Her eyes searched his face keenly, as he
pulled out a chair for her.

"That is my profession," responded Ross, with a touch of quiet dignity.

"This McCormick person has told you what I require?"

"You wish to find a certain young lady, whom you will describe to me."

"Precisely." Madame Dumois' tone was gracious. "I think, Mr. Ross, that
we shall get on. This young woman appears refined, well-bred and rather
more comprehensively educated than the average girl of today, but in
appearance she is quite a usual type, neither blonde nor brunette, not
actually pretty nor strikingly plain."

Ross nodded encouragingly as if he found valuable points in the
negative description, and the old lady warmed to her task.

"She has brown hair and blue eyes, and her taste in dress is
conservative, but her manner when last I saw her was altogether too
self-reliant; pert, it would have been considered when I was a girl.
There is very little more that I can tell you about her, but I believe
her to be in the city somewhere."

"Your description is remarkably clear." The young detective preserved
an inscrutable face as he added blandly: "No doubt you have a
photograph of her?"

"If I had, young man, I should not exhibit it," the old lady retorted.

"Only to me," he smiled persuasively, then dodged the issue. "You say,
Madame Dumois, that the young woman is well educated. Is she also
accomplished? Music, art, languages?"

"A mere smattering of music, but she is a perfect parrot in picking
up strange tongues; a born linguist." She caught herself up abruptly.
"However, I did not come here to answer questions, Mr. Ross, as I
explained very definitely this morning. I want this young woman found.
You have her description; now go ahead and find her."

"I will do my best." His smile had not wavered, and he bent forward
ingratiatingly. "But will you permit one solitary question? It will
not be an impertinent one, and it would simplify matters greatly. It
has been said, you know, that the most passive, idle-minded of us has
one pet enthusiasm, one hobby or talent, call it what you will, which
interests us above all other things. Has this young woman any special
predilection?"

"I hadn't thought of that!" Madame Dumois exclaimed. "Of course, she
has, and a most ridiculous one for a gentlewoman: Egyptology."

The detective gave no sign that at last a clue lay within his grasp,
but remarked with studied carelessness:

"Oh, that sort of thing is a fad nowadays, to acquire the patter
of some science or art and pose as a savant or connoisseur. In all
probability the young woman has no real knowledge of the subject."

"If she hasn't it is her own fault." The old lady returned in unguarded
haste. "She was a pupil of the greatest authority of the age, Professor
Mallory, of Cairo."

"Indeed. I have not heard of him." Ross brushed the information aside
with a slight gesture, as if it were of no moment. "I think, however,
that I shall be able to proceed with the data you have given me."

Madame Dumois rose, and her sharp eyes flashed in a sort of grim
exultation.

"In that case, I can only wait for your success. If you can lay
your hands on that young woman, Mr. Ross, you will not find me
unappreciative. You will report to me----?"

"But not here!" he expostulated. "The atmosphere, you know, for a
person of your delicate sensibility in frequent visits to a detective
agency would be too repellent to be borne. I will be delighted to
come to you, Madame Dumois. I do not anticipate any insurmountable
difficulty in the case, but if I find myself in a quandary I am sure
your opinion and advice would be of inestimable value."

The broad touch of flattery proved the final straw to break the back of
her prejudice, and the old lady capitulated.

"Well, you may call, if you like. I am staying with an old friend, Mrs.
Hemmingway, on the North Drive, but I do not care to have my address
bandied about this office, Mr. Ross."

"I quite understand." As he held the door open for her to depart he
added coolly: "I will come tomorrow for the photograph."

"Which you will not get!" She chuckled in frank enjoyment of his
pertinacity. Then the stern lines tightened about her mouth. "Find this
young woman with the information I have given you, Mr. Ross, or drop
the case. You have wormed more out of me than I meant you to, but I
think I can trust you not to take advantage of it in any way other than
to promote my object. The girl must be found."




                              CHAPTER V.

                              _Box A-46._


On the morning after Mrs. Atterbury's dinner party, Betty awoke from
a deep sleep of mental and physical exhaustion to find that a fresh
snowstorm was raging. The fine, hard-driven flakes swirled past her
windows like a heavy meshed veil, obscuring even the cedars just
outside and piling in soft drifts between the iron bars of the balcony.

The terrified scream which had aroused her from her reverie at midnight
still rang in her ears. She was sure that it had been the voice of Mrs.
Dana, and she dared not allow her thoughts to dwell on what it might
portend.

Her own position in the household, now clearly defined by her discovery
that she was indeed under surveillance, left her no alternative but to
disarm the suspicion directed against her at all costs. An instant off
guard would be fatal and she summoned all her self-command to her aid.

Nevertheless, it was with a sinking heart that she dragged herself
downstairs in response to the breakfast gong, dreading lest she come
upon evidences of a second tragedy. The sedate, seemingly tranquil
house had become for her an abode of horror, and with each reluctant
step fear gripped her more tenaciously by the throat.

To her unspeakable relief, however, she heard Mrs. Dana's high, nasal
tones issuing from the dining-room and entered to find the lady herself
already seated opposite her hostess. She was attired in a teagown
belonging to the latter, beneath which her ample figure sagged, and her
face in the cold light was ghastly and drawn.

"Sit down, my dear." Mrs. Atterbury nodded her good-morning from behind
the coffee urn. "You slept well?"

"Yes, thank you. My headache has quite disappeared," Betty murmured,
adding deliberately: "It was kind of you to have Caroline at hand, but
I did not need her services."

For a moment they looked squarely into each other's eyes; Mrs.
Atterbury's were the first to fall.

"I kept Mrs. Dana with me as you see, because of the storm. Mr. Dana
stayed over night, too, of course, but he left for his office half an
hour ago. We played bridge until very late."

"I'm a wreck this morning," Mrs. Dana remarked fretfully, but there was
a curious quiver in her voice. "Mortie says I am the original daylight
saver; I only make use of the night hours."

"The moon was ever so bright when I went to bed," ventured Betty. "The
storm must have come very quickly."

"Quickly enough to give me quite a house party," Mrs. Atterbury
replied. "Madame Cimmino remained also, and Professor Stolz, but they
have not risen yet. I hope you will have an opportunity to talk with
the Professor, Betty, you would find him most interesting. He is an
eminent scientist and justly celebrated in his own country."

Betty would have liked to ask what branch of science had claimed him,
but she discreetly remained silent, with a mental reservation to find
out for herself, if possible.

Madame Cimmino appeared shortly, looking more sallow and shrunken than
ever, and while her hostess greeted her, Betty slipped away to the
library to sort the morning's mail.

The room had not yet been put in order for the day, and the girl's
attention was caught by a heap of torn papers, half charred, on the
cold hearth. The writing upon the scraps seemed oddly familiar, and she
stopped hastily and examined them. They were the letters she herself
had painstakingly copied from the originals which Mrs. Atterbury
had taken from the safe and given to her on the previous day. Like
the rearrangement of the bookcases, the letters had been merely a
subterfuge to keep her employed and under watchful eyes.

Nevertheless, she doggedly assailed her uncongenial task and was midway
through the morning's mail, when a heavy foot sounded in the hall, and
Professor Stolz stuck his shaggy head in the door.

"Pardon. I a book would wish to have and Mrs. Atterbury says it here
is," he translated idiomatically from his native tongue. "I disturb
you, no?"

"Not at all." Betty rose. "Perhaps I can help you, Professor. What sort
of book are you looking for?"

"It is Egyptian--a history of the twelfth dynasty."

"Egyptian!"

The professor had been peering along the bookshelves, but at her
exclamation he turned.

"Yes. Professor of Egyptology I have been for fifteen years already, in
the University of Leipzig. The book you have perhaps seen, Fräulein.
Very old and rare it is, with the cover much stained--"

"Is this it?" Betty held out a quaint, time-worn volume, which he
seized with avidity.

"In here an inscription is, from the tomb of Ameni-emhat, at
Beni-Hasan, for which long looking have I been." He turned the pages
eagerly, then paused with a snort of satisfaction, and read in a
mumbling undertone: "'_Renpit XLIII Xer hen en Horu anx mest suten net
xeper-ka-Ra anx Petta--_'"

"Year forty-three, under the Majesty of Horus, living one of births,
king of the North, Kheper-ka-Ra, living forever--" Betty translated
softly, in utter self-forgetfulness.

"Himmel! What is this?" The professor stared at her over his
huge-rimmed glasses. "You know Egyptian!"

Betty flushed.

"I--I knew a young man in my home town who had studied it abroad, and
he taught me a little," she stammered hastily.

"A little? Donnerwetter! For my assistant I should like you, so
fluently you translate!" His eyes shone with the fire of an enthusiast.
"After my own heart you are, Fräulein, and to teach you more, proud I
should be!"

"Thank you, Professor, but I--I have no time at present." Betty turned
back to her desk with a determined air and after futile efforts to
engage her further in conversation he departed, shaking his head in
stupefaction.

For several days thereafter no untoward incident disturbed the surface
monotony of the household routine, and only the unobtrusive but
persistent surveillance to which she was subjected remained to keep the
tragic mystery uppermost in Betty's thoughts.

Of her knowledge of the espionage she gave no sign, but went about her
daily tasks with winning docility and an outward serenity of bearing
which brought the hoped-for reward. After the third night, Caroline
was no longer installed on guard outside her door, and before the week
was out the girl felt that she had at last lulled all suspicion. Mrs.
Atterbury had not suggested that she walk again in the grounds of the
estate, however, and although the confinement was telling upon her,
Betty feared to risk a direct refusal by seeking permission.

However, from the hour that Caroline's vigil ceased, Betty had pursued
her secret exploration of the home. As on the first night after her
arrival, and the second, when she made her gruesome discovery, she had
continued her mysterious quest throughout the sleeping house and every
spare moment during the day, when she could escape detection, found
her delving in odd nooks and corners. She managed in time to visit
each of the sleeping apartments and even penetrated to the attic, but
her efforts continued to be fruitless. The object of her clandestine
activities seemed still to elude her.

She attended to the correspondence each morning and completed the
rearrangement of the books in the library. Miss Pope appeared on two
subsequent occasions, but made no further effort to communicate by
stealth with the girl even upon the day she delivered the finished
gowns. Whatever her motive had been, her courage was not equal to a
second attempt.

The Danas made no reappearance, nor did the pale, foppish youth, Jordan
Ide, but Mme. Cimmino and the ubiquitous Wolvert were constant visitors
and on more than one occasion Betty heard Dr. Bayard's measured tones
issuing from the drawing-room. By tacit arrangement, she now retired to
her own room immediately after dinner on such evenings as there were
guests present and the silent hours of readjustment and utter mental
relaxation gave her renewed strength to play her daily part.

By the end of the week a thaw set in which swept the cedars bare of
frost and turned the unbroken expanse of white into a veritable sea of
mud. Mrs. Atterbury herself had not left the house since she acquired
her new companion, but early one morning she entered the library where
Betty sat wearily anticipating her secretarial duties, with a proposal
which made the girl's eyes dance.

"My dear, I wonder if you will undertake an errand for me? The walking
is atrocious, I know, but you have been cooped up indoors quite long
enough and the fresh air will do you good."

"Oh, I shall be glad to go!" Betty cried warmly, adding in haste, "Of
course, I don't know my way about, but if you will direct me I am sure
I shall not make any mistake."

"I don't think there is a likelihood of your getting lost," Mrs.
Atterbury smiled. "But if you do, you can always reach a telephone, you
know, and I will send the car to conduct you home. I want you to go
to Madame Cimmino's and bring back a package which she will give you
for me. She lives in the Lorilton Apartments on Falmouth Avenue; walk
three blocks across town from the corner here, and take a southbound
red 'bus. Tell the conductor your destination and he will see that you
reach it safely."

"That seems quite clear, Mrs. Atterbury." Betty rose with alacrity. "Do
you wish me to go at once?"

"If you will, please. The mail can wait until later, but this is rather
important."

The air was as mild as on a spring day and Betty's heart leaped as she
passed out of the gateway to the broad, untrammeled avenue. She glanced
back sharply at the house, but no one was visible, and its windows
stared blankly at her.

Rounding the corner, she set out across town at a brisk pace, her blood
tingling in her veins and the soft wind bringing a flush to her pale
cheeks. Her gaze was introspective rather than curious and she boarded
the southbound omnibus almost mechanically, although she scrutinized
her fellow passengers with grave intentness.

A ride of some twenty minutes brought her to the doors of the Lorilton,
which proved to be a huge, ornately constructed apartment house in a
somewhat less exclusive locality than the North Drive.

A gaudily upholstered elevator deposited Betty on the tenth floor and
in response to her ring, the apartment door was opened by a smug-faced
Japanese butler who ushered her silently into the drawing-room.

She took a swift mental inventory of her surroundings as she waited.
The room presented an odd mixture of real artistic treasures, and the
basest of imitations; rare tapestries hung upon the walls between
wretched copies of masterpieces, a hideous terra cotta statuette
overshadowing a Ming vase, and an exquisite Buhl cabinet was filled
with the most trumpery of knickknacks.

Madame Cimmino made her appearance in a gorgeous but somewhat soiled
kimona. Her sallow cheeks were highly rouged and the jeweled hoops
which tugged at her ears seemed oddly garish in the light of day.

"The packet? Ah, yes, I have it," she murmured in response to Betty's
request. "You came alone? You are learning, then, to find your way in
this strange city; that is well."

She clapped her hands, and when the butler appeared, jabbered rapidly
to him in his native tongue, while Betty sat with her face averted. The
functionary disappeared, to return almost immediately bearing a small
package which Madame Cimmino placed in the girl's hands.

"Be careful that you do not lose it, my dear," she warned her at the
door, adding with a flash of her white teeth, "Some day when you have
leisure, little mouse, you shall come and have tea with me, if Mrs.
Atterbury permits. I like American young girls."

Betty thanked her and departed. She thrust the precious package in her
muff without a second glance, and a peculiar, hard light glowered in
her eyes until she reached once more the house in the cedars.

Mrs. Atterbury accepted the package without comment, and thereafter
Betty roamed the grounds at will. Her position save for the morning's
correspondence had become a sinecure, but she felt a presentiment of
impending change, and awaited developments with keen expectancy.

They ensued more quickly than she had anticipated. She was summoned
to Mrs. Atterbury's room late one afternoon, to find her employer
critically examining a gown which had just arrived; an exquisite affair
of filmy tulle and creamy lace.

Betty could not suppress a little cry of admiration, and Mrs. Atterbury
smilingly held it out to her.

"I wish you to try this on, my dear. If it fits you, it is yours."

Wondering, Betty placed herself in Caroline's hands and when the
change had been effected Mrs. Atterbury herself gasped. In the simple
blouse and skirt Betty had been winsomely attractive in spite of the
disfiguring birthmark, but the delicate beauty of the gown transformed
her as if some fairy godmother had touched her with a magic wand.

"Really, you are quite wonderful!" There was amazement mingled with the
unfeigned admiration in Mrs. Atterbury's tones. "I had no idea that
you would develop such possibilities, Betty. I did well to select this
model for you."

"It is really mine?" The girl turned her flushed face from the mirror.
"I--I don't know how to thank you, Mrs. Atterbury, but when shall I
have an occasion to wear it?"

"Tonight." The reply came with startling brevity and promptitude. "You
are going to hear 'Aida'. Have you ever been to the opera?"

"Aida!" gasped Betty. There was a pause, and then she added with a
change of tone, "No, I--I have never heard any opera except on a
phonograph. It will be like a dream come true."

And as if in a dream she completed her toilet for the evening. She
had schooled herself to accept without visible surprise anything
which might eventuate, but to appear at the opera in company with
Mrs. Atterbury and her probable guests, was a move she had not in her
wildest fancy anticipated.

A fresh surprise awaited her when she descended to the dining-room.
Only Mrs. Atterbury was present, and she was still attired in the
somber gray gown she had worn throughout the day.

"Perhaps I should have waited to dress later, also," Betty murmured,
glancing down at her own shimmering elegance. "I did not know we would
have sufficient time after dinner."

"I am not going with you," Mrs. Atterbury replied to the implied
question with calm directness. "I am sending you quite alone, Betty.
The car will take you, and wait to bring you home when you have
accomplished your errand."

"'My--errand?'" faltered Betty, off guard in her amazement.

"You will occupy Box A-48, in the grand tier," the older woman
continued as if she had not heard the interjection. "In A-46, on your
left, there will be seated a party of ladies and gentlemen. You will
take no apparent notice of them--I can depend upon your breeding to
prohibit your staring--but be sure to take a chair close to the rail
which separates the two boxes and allow your arm to rest upon it. At
some time during the singing of the opera, one of the gentlemen in
the next box will place an envelope in your hand. Do not betray any
surprise, whatever you do, but remain quietly for a few minutes longer,
then slip away as unobtrusively as possible and descend immediately
to the carriage entrance, where the car will be awaiting you. This is
a confidential matter, but you are discreet and I am sure that I can
trust you, my dear. It is really quite simple; do you think you will be
able to carry it through successfully?"

"I--I think so," responded Betty, faintly. She was dazed, but a new
light had broken over her consciousness and much that had puzzled her
was made clear. She shrank from the task before her, yet no thought of
a refusal entered her mind. She had voluntarily placed herself in this
woman's hands, and whatever commands were given her, she was prepared
to obey.

"You do not seem very confident." Mrs. Atterbury's level tone had
become suddenly stern. "If you follow my directions carefully you can
make no mistake. I do not find it convenient to go myself, but if you
object--"

"Oh, it isn't that!" cried Betty in haste to cover her momentary
hesitation. "I'm sure I shall not have any difficulty in merely
accepting the envelope and bringing it to you, but I never went to the
opera before or sat in a box, and I shall feel as if everyone were
looking at me. I am afraid that I am a trifle self-conscious, after
all, about the birthmark on my face."

The lines about Mrs. Atterbury's mouth relaxed, and she smiled
tolerantly.

"So that is all! You need not think of it, my dear, for I assure you
it is rather attractive than otherwise. It serves to render you
distinctive, at all events, and that is what everyone is striving for,
nowadays. The car will be brought around to the door for you at ten,
when you will be in time for the last act. You will have only one thing
to remember; be sure that you seat yourself on the extreme _left_ of
the box, and that your hand is within reach."

"If you will describe the gentleman to me--" Betty began, but the other
interrupted quickly.

"That is quite unnecessary, as you are to make no advances, nor indeed
appear cognizant of his existence. Permit him to place the envelope
in your hand, but do not even glance in his direction. That is quite
clear?"

"Oh, yes!" laughed Betty ingenuously. "I should be an adept at
that sort of thing; I have had practice enough at school, passing
surreptitious notes."

Mrs. Atterbury permitted herself to laugh softly.

"Then I shall take your success for granted. Come to me before you
start, my dear. I have some flowers for you to wear, and I am going to
lend you a string of my pearls."

When Betty, wrapped in an ermine cloak the value of which she dared not
attempt to compute, drew up before the opera house she was tingling
with excitement, but her brain was clear, and her nerves steady. She
had realized in a swift flash of comprehension that she was assuming
the first of her real tasks. Whatever was written in the mysterious
letter which was to be entrusted to her, and whoever the stranger might
be from whose hand she would receive it, she was convinced it was for
this and no other purpose that she had been engaged. The secretarial
work, the companionship, were mere subterfuges to conceal her true
mission, although she could not fathom its meaning.

The third act was drawing to a close as she entered her box and Aida's
exquisite pleading cry: "_Ah no! ti calma--ascoltami_," thrilled her
very soul. A daring idea came to her. She had been directed to return
as soon as she received the letter, but why could she not delay its
delivery until the very end of the opera? She longed to hear the final
aria, and it would be a simple matter to keep out of arm's reach.

The box on her left was occupied, for although she did not glance
toward it, a rustling and soft murmur reached her ears as if her
entrance had occasioned comment, unobtrusive though it had been.

For a moment she hesitated, then obeying the swift impulse she dropped
her cloak and seated herself in a chair well to the right, her face
averted. Scarcely had she composed herself when the curtain fell.

Betty sat motionless in the sudden blaze of light, her eyes idly
sweeping the glittering horseshoe which extended at her right, her
heart beating wildly. She was conscious only of one pair of eyes upon
her and she fought down an almost irresistible impulse to turn and meet
them. Someone was staring at her from the box at her left, staring as
if mutely compelling her gaze and she flushed darkly beneath the scar
upon her cheek.

Whoever they were, it was evident that this man and his companions were
well known, for from the fall of the curtain until its rise again, a
constant stream of visitors eddied about their box and scraps of gay
chatter and soft tinkling laughter came to her ears. One chance phrase,
in a vivacious feminine voice made her breath catch in her throat:

"Oh, don't mind Toddie! He is fuming inwardly, although he won't tell
why. Anyway, it's a positive comfort to know that there's something on
his mind beside his hat. How were the ducks in North Carolina?"

Betty stirred uneasily in her chair. If "Toddie" were the man who had
come to deliver the letter into her hands she could well understand
the reason for his ill humor. What must he think of her presence yet
deliberate evasion of him? Her determination did not falter, however.
Come what might, she meant to drain to its dregs this cup of unalloyed
happiness which so unexpectedly had been held to her lips.

Just as the lights were lowered, and the first soft strains of Amneris'
lamentation swelled from the orchestra, she ventured a swift glance at
the box on her left.

A portly, gray-haired dowager was directly beside Betty with two
younger women on her left, and all three were glittering with jewels
like miniature constellations. Behind them an obese elderly gentleman
dropped his lowest chin upon his broad expanse of shirt bosom in
well-calculated repose, a younger one bent forward to whisper into
the ear of the girl in front of him, and a third, a round-faced man
with a downy blond mustache turned squarely and met Betty's eyes, with
exasperation glowering in his own.

She permitted her gaze to rest on him impersonally for a moment then
slowly shifted it to the stage as the curtain rose.

The scene held her, and the beauty of the music so enthralled her
senses that she forgot herself and the strange errand which had brought
her there until a chair rasped against the box rail in unmistakable
signal. With a start she threw off the spell which had entranced her,
and just as the divine notes of Aida's "_Vedi? di morte l'angelo--_"
rose winging through the vast house, she moved silently to the chair at
her left and rested her arm upon the barrier.

There was a sound very like a sigh from the next box, and an envelope
was thrust almost roughly beneath her fingers.

For a space of interminable minutes she sat as motionless as if carved
from stone, save that the hand holding the letter was clenched to her
breast, crushing the cluster of white roses which she wore, and feeling
like a pulseless lump of ice. The perfume of the flowers, cloyingly
sweet, all but suffocated her, and the band of pearls seemed to tighten
about her throat.

The strains of "_O Terra Adio_" were dying away in haunting sadness as
she rose, and snatching up the ermine cloak, slipped from the box and
down the promenade like a wraith.




                              CHAPTER VI.

                       _A Message From Pharaoh._


On the morning following her visit to the opera, Betty sat at her
desk in the library, with a copy of the _Literary Digest_, which had
just arrived in the mail spread out before her. The waiting heap of
correspondence was forgotten, and she read and reread as if hypnotized
the chance advertisement which had caught her eye:

"Wanted:--Translator of Egyptian inscriptions and papyri of later
dynastic periods. Scholar conversant with Mallory method preferred.
Exceptionally high rates, tripling those ever previously paid in
America will be given for accurate authentic work. No immediate time
limit. Call office nine, National Egyptological Museum."

A gray haze of exuding frost arose from the bare dun lawns stretching
before the window and the cedars drooped their branches as if weary
of the long wait for spring, but she was blind to the somber prospect
before her. Instead rose gorgeous pictures of the East and her vision
was peopled with the glory of long-buried kings.

Her own precarious position, the inexplicable shadow which lay like a
pall over the house, even the dead man upon whom she had stumbled on
that never-to-be-forgotten night had faded alike from her thoughts, and
her eyes glowed with an eagerness almost fanatical.

If only she dared to reply in person to the advertisement! Aside from
the emolument, which might prove an asset by no means to be despised in
her straitened circumstances, the work would relieve her mind from the
terrific strain under which she had placed herself.

Why should she not avail herself of this opportunity to pursue a study
which possessed for her an irresistible fascination? In spite of her
preoccupation, time hung heavily upon her hands and she had come to
dread the many hours during which she was left to her own devices with
only the wretched treadmill of her thoughts to bear her company.

It might be that with the successful accomplishment of her strange
mission at the opera house she would enter upon a new phase of her
present situation, with exciting adventures in store for her, on like
mysterious errands, but she looked forward to that contingency with no
lightening of her spirit. It would be merely a part of the task which
she had assumed, and was constrained to carry through.

But to feel again the rustle of ancient papyrus beneath her fingers; to
decipher the messages pictured in quaint hieroglyphs by patient hands
long since turned to dust, that the unborn legions of the future might
sit at the feet of ageless philosophy; to delve once more into a past
which was of a bygone age even when three wise men journeyed out of the
East--the desire became an obsession which she tried vainly to exorcise.

She did indeed thrust the idea from her while the letters demanded
her attention, but it returned again with unabated force with the
first moment of leisure. Why should she not at least investigate the
advertisement?

At luncheon, Mrs. Atterbury herself precipitated her decision.

"My dear, I wish you would go to Jennings' Art Shop for me this
afternoon and select a Colonial frame for that tall mirror which hangs
in my room. They sent me a gilt monstrosity when I ordered by 'phone,
and I don't want the bother of going myself. If you walk straight
across town until you come to the park, and follow its wall around the
southern end to the east side you cannot miss it. The Egyptian Museum
is on the opposite corner. By the way, Professor Stolz tells me that
you, too, are interested in Egyptology. How did you ever acquire a
liking for that sort of thing in the middle west?"

"Through a neighbor, who had made a study of it in Egypt," Betty
replied readily enough. "It is really fascinating, like a grown-up
picture puzzle. But about the mirror, does the shopman know the size
you require?"

With the details of her commission carefully pigeon-holed in her mind,
the girl started upon her errand. She walked briskly, for she realized
that her time must be accounted for, and she had determined to use a
portion of it for her own ends. Reaching the park, she struck boldly
through it instead of following the longer way around, and no one who
had known its every path could have chosen a more direct course than
she, a self-confessed stranger.

The purchase was quickly consummated and she had turned to leave the
shop, when a figure barred her way. She glanced up to find herself
confronted by a tiny, fairy-like creature wrapped in sables with a
great bunch of livid purple orchids at her belt. Her hair shimmered
like spun gold beneath the fur toque and her face, innocent of
cosmetics, was exquisitely fair.

For an instant the stranger visibly hesitated and then as if resolutely
checking her impulse, turned and walked to a distant counter.

Betty, too, halted in uncontrollable surprise, then made her way to the
street as if in a daze. She had never, to her knowledge, encountered
the other before, yet the stranger's face had blanched at sight of her
and in the round, babyish blue eyes which for a fleeting moment had
met hers, she read unmistakable repulsion and an underlying desperate
fear. For whom had the woman mistaken her? She was veiled, but the
birthmark must have been plainly discernible. Could it be that her
disfigurement was so great as to cause such repugnance and almost
hysterical fear in a chance observer?

The sight of the museum, however, drove all thought of the odd
encounter from her mind, and as she ascended the low, broad steps
to the revolving entrance door she resolved to accept the proffered
opportunity, whatever the result should Mrs. Atterbury discover her
dereliction.

The gray-haired attendant directed her to an upper floor where in a
broad echoing marble corridor she found a double row of office doors.
Number nine was ajar, and when she knocked a pleasant, masculine voice
bade her enter.

The office was small, with files and glass cases lining the walls above
which hung framed sections of parchment, time-frayed and shrunken.
The westering sun shone through the single window full upon the desk,
behind which sat a boyish-looking young man, with merry twinkling eyes
and more than a suspicion of red in his chestnut hair.

Betty had been prepared to confront a sedate philologist of settled age
and perhaps stern demeanor, and she came forward rather shyly.

"I am looking for the person who advertised in the current issue of
the _Literary Digest_ for an Egyptian translator," she remarked.

The young man rose from the chair, his eyes still fixed on hers, and
she observed that they had narrowed swiftly with a keen intensity which
lent maturity to his expression.

"Please be seated." His tone was quietly courteous. "I placed the
advertisement in the magazine you mention. Do you understand the
Mallory method?"

"If you mean the system employed by Professor Mallory, of Cairo, and
the form of transliteration used by him so that the ancient phraseology
might be retained, I can claim to be thoroughly conversant with it."
Betty sank into the chair indicated, her breath ending in a little
gasp. For all her self-possession, the young man's impersonal but fixed
regard had a disturbing effect, and in the attempt to combat it her
manner grew strained. "I have made practical use of it in translations
for the Museum at Gizeh--"

She paused, biting her lip, but the young man appeared unobservant of
her sudden check.

"You have studied under Professor Mallory?" The question was casually
uttered, yet it brought a swift blush to her brow.

"I was a pupil of an associate of his." She spoke slowly as if choosing
her words with care. "You mention the later dynastic periods in
your advertisement; you refer doubtless to the era of the Persian
influence?"

"Precisely. One papyrus in particular which we wish translated as
literally as possible for purposes of record is believed to be a
message from one of the kings of the twenty-seventh dynasty, who was
called 'the Great Pharaoh'." The young man diverted his gaze at last,
as he fumbled in a desk drawer. "I have a copy here. He isn't the same
chap as the one mentioned in the Bible, whose daughter found Moses in
the bulrushes, you know."

Betty could scarcely believe her ears. The flippant display of
ignorance on the part of one who must be an important official of the
museum seemed incredible, and a dim suspicion came to her that she was
being made the victim of a hoax.

"I am aware of that fact," she responded frigidly. "The twenty-seventh
dynasty was inaugurated only some five hundred years before Christ. Two
of its rulers were known as 'the Great Pharaoh'; Xerxes and Artaxerxes.
By which was this papyrus believed to have been inscribed?"

"I will let you judge that." He smiled in winning friendliness, quite
unabashed by her icy tone. "To tell you the truth, I am not very well
posted on it."

If this were indeed a hoax, Betty determined to obtain some personal
satisfaction from it.

"Can you tell me, however, if an interlinear transliteration is
required, as well as a translation?"

The young man lifted his hands in a gesture of helplessness almost
comic.

"I mean," she explained, dimpling behind her veil, "do you wish the
corresponding letter in our alphabet placed beneath each pictured
letter or hieroglyph, with the translation of the whole phrase on a
third line? That is the form used by Professor Mallory."

"Then I presume that is what will be required. I am not going to try to
impose on you by any false display of a knowledge I do not possess,"
he said with engaging candor. "As a matter of fact, I am lamentably
ignorant of Egyptology in general, but I happen to be a sort of
honorary member of the board of directors governing the museum, and the
task of finding a translator was delegated to me, with instructions to
obtain, if possible, a pupil of Professor Mallory for the work. The
official translator for the museum is in Egypt at the present time.
Here is the photographic copy of the papyrus in question."

He opened a portfolio and took from it several large sheets which he
passed to her across the desk. Her momentary resentment was forgotten
and a little exclamation of fervid interest escaped her lips as she
spread the pages out before her and threw back her veil the more
clearly to scrutinize them.

The young man leaned slightly forward studying her face, then quietly
he touched a button in the wall and the room was suddenly flooded with
light.

"That is better, isn't it?" he asked.

Betty glanced up, blinking in the sudden glare, then nodded
abstractedly and bent again over the hieroglyphic scrawl. Several
minutes passed while she sat absorbed, no sound breaking the stillness
but the occasional rustle of the papers beneath her hand. At length she
rearranged them with a sigh of satisfaction.

"This purports to be a message from Khshiarsha, or Xerxes, the first
ruler of the twenty-seventh dynasty to be called 'the Great Pharaoh'
and if the date of the original papyrus has been authenticated, it is
a wonderful find, and a valuable addition to Egyptiana. This copy will
serve perfectly for translation, but I should like very much to see the
original sometime, if it is in the possession of the museum----"

The eager words died on her lips, and her glowing face paled, then
flushed hotly. She had looked up to find that the young man's eyes were
fixed with an expression which she could not fathom upon the birthmark
on her cheek, and it burned her like a newly-seared brand. With a swift
gesture she lowered her veil.

"I will see that you have access to it." The young man rose. "I could
place it in your hands now, but the curator is out. However, if, as you
say, this copy is suitable for translation, do you care to undertake
the work? I cannot, of course, judge of your proficiency, but I am
willing to take it for granted."

"Thank you," Betty responded, simply. "I am confident that my
translation will be satisfactory. It will take me a few days to
complete it; shall I bring it here to you?"

"If you will, please. Should I not be here, leave it with the assistant
curator for Mr. Ross. The fee for translation will be fifty dollars.
Now, if you will give me your name and address----?" He paused
expectantly, and Betty's heart sank.

This was a contingency which had not occurred to her. To name her
present abode would mean that letters or instructions might be
forwarded to her there, and inevitable discovery on Mrs. Atterbury's
part would ensue with the probable consequence of immediate dismissal.
This risk despite the shadow of tragic mystery which enveloped the
house and her own undoubted peril should the extent of her knowledge
become known, she would not hazard. A determination stronger than fear
of death itself bound her to Mrs. Atterbury's service.

But the pause was lengthening, and the young man eyed her in puzzled
inquiry.

"My name is Shaw--Betty Shaw," she stammered, adding with a sudden
inspiration: "I live at 160 Wakefield Avenue. Have you any special
instructions for me, Mr. Ross?"

"None. I will leave the work entirely in your hands. You say you will
require a few days in which to complete it. Can you bring it here to me
by Tuesday afternoon, at this time?"

"I will try." Betty flushed behind her veil. "My time is not absolutely
my own, so I cannot make a definite appointment, but I shall make every
effort to be here."

"There will be more work when this is finished, you know; inscriptions
from tombs and that sort of thing," he added, as if on a sudden
inspiration. "By the way, have you done any translating from the modern
languages--French, German?"

Betty shook her head, and although the young man waited, she vouchsafed
no further response.

"Well, we are in no hurry for this." He opened the door for her at last
and held out his hand smilingly. "We only want to file the translations
before the originals are placed on exhibition. Good afternoon, Miss
Shaw."

Betty hurried from the museum, now grim and shadowy in the gathering
dusk and started south toward Wakefield Avenue with the precious
transcript clasped tightly in her muff. Late as it was she felt that
she must arrange to have her change of address concealed should
the exceedingly frank young man with the laughing eyes attempt to
communicate with her. His personality had impressed her so strongly
that the oddity of the whole interview did not present itself to her
mind. If the translations to be placed on record in a National museum
were left to the discretion of a young man who was avowedly ignorant
of the work, it was a proceeding which aroused no suspicion in her
mind. She knew nothing of the directorship of similar institutions
in America, and gave it no thought. Her chief concern was that her
subterfuge should not be discovered.

The work itself, fascinating though it would prove, shrunk to
insignificance beside the interest the strange young man had aroused
in her. Isolated as was her voluntarily assumed position, hedged in
by mystery and distrust and even danger, the candid, disinterested
friendliness of his attitude had made an appeal to which her lonely
spirit responded joyously. The crafty, scheming expression which
sometimes hardened her face was gone as if it had never existed, and
her eyes glowed with a new unconscious happiness as she turned the
corner of Wakefield Avenue, and ran lightly up the dingy steps of the
once familiar house.

Meanwhile, the young man upon whom her thoughts were centered had also
left the museum and was hastening across the park as fast as a taxi
could carry him. Blue eyes, brown hair, education, refinement, youth;
every attribute tallied with the rather vague description furnished to
him, and the knowledge of Egyptology which the girl had displayed,
unless it were the most improbable of coincidences, seemed the last
detail needed to prove the identification complete.

And yet his client had made no mention of the one salient point which
would render the girl who had just left his presence distinctive in a
multitude; the strange scar or birthmark, like a clutching hand upon
her cheek.

The sincerity of Madame Dumois' search, whatever her ultimate motive
might be, was unquestionable. She could serve no object by deliberately
eliminating so conspicuous a detail from her description, and it was
incredible that she could have forgotten it, had the young woman she
sought possessed such a means of recognition.

His taxi slewed recklessly through the mud as it rounded a corner into
the North Drive and he glanced idly out of the window at a square stone
house, half-hidden in a grove of cedars past which he was being rapidly
whirled. A figure which appeared to be loitering beside the gate turned
at the sound of the motor and for an instant his face loomed with
almost grotesque distinctness against the enveloping dusk.

Herbert Ross uttered a sharp exclamation, and starting forward in his
seat, reached for the speaking tube. The next moment he had checked
the impulse and sunk back once more, but his round, candid eyes had
narrowed to mere slits in each of which a steely point glittered and
his jaw was set in a grim line of dogged relentlessness.

Some half-mile further down the Drive, his taxi turned in at the modest
ivy-clad gate of an estate smaller than its pretentious neighbors, but
surrounded with an air of solid, unchanging antiquity which they could
not boast.

A white-haired butler opened the door and ushered Herbert Ross
ceremoniously into the drawing-room. It was a long, narrow apartment,
stiff and ugly with the prim austerity of the mid-Victorian period from
which it obviously dated, and the conservative handful of coals in the
grate served only to accentuate the chill and gloom in the lurking
shadows beyond its proscribed radius.

Madame Dumois appeared with businesslike promptitude.

"Have you news for me, Mr. Ross?" She regarded him shrewdly as she
extended her hand. "Or are you going to try to wheedle some more
information from me? If you are, you may spare yourself the trouble. I
admit that the surprise of encountering a detective who talked Persian
poetry loosened my tongue the other day but you have all the data I
can give you to help you locate the young woman, and what takes place
between us when you have found her, will be my affair."

"Are you sure that I really have all the data, Madame Dumois?" he
asked earnestly. "Is there not something that you have forgotten or
purposely withheld, which would be a distinctive means of recognition?"

"I don't know what you mean!" Her voice was guarded, but her eyes
snapped with sudden fire. "You have a description of the young woman's
appearance, together with a lot of quite irrelevant detail which I was
a babbling fool to disclose--"

"Have I?" he insisted. "You have given me a description which would
fit probably four-fifths of the young women one meets, without a
single distinguishing feature. Has she none? Think, please. The
smallest scar, or physical peculiarity would be of inestimable value in
identification."

He watched her narrowly, but her expression did not change an iota.

"She is unfortunately not branded, like Western cattle!" The old lady
snorted contemptuously. "Nor is she, as far as I know, six toed like
a cat. She is just an average, normal, young person, with an abnormal
amount of duplicity."

"Then she possesses no scar, or birthmark?" Ross inquired slowly.

"Good heavens, no!" Madame Dumois exclaimed. "I wouldn't consider her
actually pretty, but she has no disfigurement or blemish unless she has
been injured recently."

"How recently?" He shot the question at her, but she was on her guard.

"It would have to be a comparatively fresh scar." She smiled grimly
at his discomfiture. "No, Mr. Ross. The young woman for whom I am
searching has absolutely no feature to distinguish her from a thousand
and one others. I see your point, and I regret that I can give you no
fuller information concerning her."

She rose as if to terminate the interview, and he was constrained to
accept the hint.

"You still could aid me greatly, Madame Dumois, if you would." The
detective spoke in his most persuasive manner. "Let me see the
photograph of her, which I am sure you possess."

The old lady drew herself up to her full commanding height.

"There are no grounds for your assurance, sir," she declared coldly. "I
have no photograph of the young woman."

"Then I will not detain you longer." He bowed. "I cannot accost a
stranger, claiming her as the girl you seek, unless I can be absolutely
certain of my ground, no matter how conclusive my suspicions are."

"You mean that you have found some one who answers the description,
only that she has a scar?" Madame Dumois spoke with rigid control.
"Take me where I can see her, and I will soon tell you whether your
suspicions are correct or not."

"Unfortunately, that would be impossible." Mr. Ross shook his head
gravely. "If I should prove to have been mistaken, explanations might
involve you in the very notoriety you are seeking to avoid. But if you
can obtain a likeness of her the question will be settled once and for
all."

He paused and there was a brief silence while the old lady seemed to
hesitate. At length she said grudgingly:

"I will try to get one. In the meantime, Mr. Ross, do not lose sight of
the person you suspect."

He reassured her on that score and departed. He was confident that
his client would produce the photograph at his next interview with
her, but a grave doubt filled his mind that the girl who had come to
him that afternoon was the one sought. The old lady's astonishment at
the suggestion of a scar or birthmark had been unfeigned, and that
single incontrovertible fact would overthrow the whole structure of his
theory. The case which he had assumed practically blindfold seemed no
nearer a solution and no other translator had risen to the bait offered
by the advertisement who could by any possibility have been associated
with his subject.

Meanwhile, Betty had concluded a satisfactory arrangement with her
former landlady and was hastening homeward. A confused babel of voices
arose as she crossed the avenue, and amid the raucous shouts one phrase
beat upon her brain:

"Wuxtry! Wuxtry! Latest news about the big murder! Coroner's inquest
adjourned. Wuxtry!"

She purchased a paper from the first newsboy who accosted her, and
stopped in the rosy reflected glow from a drugstore window to scan the
headlines. The light shining through a crimson globe dyed the page a
sinister hue and from it there stared out at her the face of a man in
the prime of life, with a square, determined chin and fine eyes, albeit
there clustered about them the unmistakable lines of world knowledge
and satiety.

Beneath it in double type she read:

"Breckinridge inquest adjourned. Coroner holds case open for further
evidence. Rumor that detectives are working on new and startling clue.
Close friend of George W. Breckinridge, millionaire clubman whose body
stabbed to the heart was found in a secluded spot on Vanderduycken
Road, declares that he has for some time been under a cloud--"

The letters ran together and blurred before Betty's eyes, and crumpling
the sheet convulsively, she dropped it at her feet. Then as if suddenly
conscious of the conspicuous spot in which she stood, the girl slipped
quickly away into the shadows. Her pulse pounded in her ears and her
brain seemed reeling, but one fact stood out in terrible, relentless
clarity; the pictured face was that of the man who had lain dead in the
dining-room of the house among the cedars.




                             CHAPTER VII.

                         _Ten Thousand Sheep._


For several days thereafter Betty was kept closely confined to the
house. Mrs. Atterbury had accepted her statement that she lost her way
in attempting a short cut through the park as the explanation of her
late return and attributed her own agitation to anxiety over the young
girl's welfare. The mask was lifted for an instant, however, and Betty
had a glimpse of the sullen fury which seethed beneath her employer's
calm austerity.

She was in no sense made to feel like a virtual prisoner once more, but
Mrs. Atterbury made constant demands upon her which practically filled
her hours of daylight, and no further errands were broached.

The evenings were usually her own, however, and she spent them in
fascinated study of the Egyptian translation. Her enthusiasm grew with
its development, but she resolutely banished it from her mind during
the daily routine, for fear her abstraction be noticed and questioned.
Yet always, with every hour of freedom from espionage, she continued
her protracted search. Whatever her object she sought it in every
place of concealment which suggested itself to her. Betty learned
quickly to know when the servants' tasks would lead them to various
parts of the house, and managed skilfully to elude them. It was from
her employer herself that she most feared discovery, but in this
eventuality fortune had so far been with her.

Mrs. Atterbury's correspondence continued to prove negative and devoid
of interest, but one morning she dictated a letter which caught Betty's
wandering attention. It was evidently in reply to one which had not
passed through the girl's hands, and the oddity of its phrasing
impressed her so acutely that when her employer went to receive a
caller, she sorted it from the pile of envelopes and read it again:

    "My dear Shirley:

    Your letter received. Send me ten of the thousand circulars quoting
    sheep prices for March. Home market good this week for forty or
    fifty and even more points rise if my brokers handled the situation
    properly. State Senator Laramie advocates strict game laws now
    up before house. Comet, my horse, sold. Speranza invited us last
    Thursday out for week-end to see her pink hothouse roses bud. The
    frost killed them, however. Her sister is safe from submarines
    on the northern way home from Japan. Demon won red ribbon show
    held last month in Littleton, near Denver. Mrs. Ardmore's 'Alibi'
    beat him straight. John will meet your friend Professor Blythe, of
    Chicago University, on Saturday at eight. He says he has obeyed
    your instructions about buying new machinery; to substitute old
    endangers success. He fears block contracts will head off buyers,
    but he is conscientious. There is no longer any danger of piracy,
    discovery now patented so you can use the invention this year.
    Unwritten code among manufacturers in America is letting unions
    ruin us. Do you know what the result was out West in the Cote vs.
    Williams affair? Was the end satisfactory to all concerned?

    Write soon.

                                                             Sincerely,
                                                     Marcia Atterbury."

The abrupt change of subject matter throughout, the short sentences and
inconsistent style of the missive--now terse with telegraphic brevity,
then verbose in unexpected and seemingly irrelevant detail--was utterly
unlike her employer's usual concise mode of expression, and Betty's
wonderment grew.

What had game laws to do with the market value of sheep, and who were
"Professor Blythe," and "John" and the mysterious "Shirley" to whom
the puzzling letter was addressed? The girl had not known that Mrs.
Atterbury owned horses, or Mme. Cimmino a country residence; surely the
latter had no conservatory in which to raise hothouse roses connected
with her stuffy, overcrowded town apartment!

A minor point, too, stood out in challenging mendacity; Betty was too
discriminating a judge of dogs to credit Demon with having taken a
ribbon at any show. He might possess many traits which would render him
invaluable as a watchdog, but his mixed breeding was too evident to
admit of his qualifying on points.

As she further analyzed the letter two coincidences sprang to her mind,
which brought back vividly the mysterious communication in code that
she had opened on the first morning of her secretarial work. That, too,
had contained a reference to sheep, but the number mentioned had been
five thousand. The last sentence contained the word "comet," and Mrs.
Atterbury had made use of it also in her present letter.

Another code! Betty stifled an exclamation as the truth burst upon her.
It would be compatible with her employer's imperturbable daring to
dictate a private and possibly incriminating letter to her unconscious
amanuensis, secure in the belief that it would never occur to her to
question its superficial meaning or seek to solve it without the key.
Then, too, it might be that for certain cogent reasons, Mrs. Atterbury
did not wish her own handwriting to appear in the communication,
although she had said she would address the envelope herself. Betty had
even signed the former's name, at her request.

If only she might hit upon the key! Concentration was impossible with
the imminent fear of discovery before her, but she felt that she could
not relinquish this rare opportunity to pierce the web of mystery
without at least an effort.

Transcribing the letter hastily, she thrust the copy in her blouse, and
when her employer returned she found the girl apparently deep in a book.

That afternoon, for the first time since her recent escapade, a
suggestion was made that she go for a walk, and Betty eagerly availed
herself of the permission.

"Be sure you do not get lost again!" Mrs. Atterbury warned her, with a
smile which struck a chill to the girl's heart. "If you go beyond the
gates, turn only in one direction and when you are tired, retrace your
steps. I shall expect you home in an hour."

There was more than a hint of spring in the languorous, humid air, and
the sight of a venturesome robin preening his scarlet breast on the
lawn made the blood leap in her veins. In spite of the dark shadows
which surrounded her, and the problematic future looming ahead, the
youth in Betty responded joyously to the burgeoning year and she
quickened her pace as she passed out of the tall gate.

Chance led her to turn southward along the drive and at the corner
she came face to face with a man lounging against a lamp-post. He was
smooth shaven and respectable in appearance, but the cap pulled low
over his eyes gave him a furtive air and his burly figure and truculent
bearing made her think somehow of a policeman, although the clothes
he wore resembled those of an artisan. He glanced at her sharply and
moved on, but the trail of cigarette stubs about the lamp-post told of
a lengthy vigil, and Betty's heart contracted in sudden apprehension.

Could he be a detective watching the house? Had the law already found a
trail from that secluded spot on Vanderduycken Road to the place where
George Breckinridge had so mysteriously come to his end? Would swift
retribution descend and engulf her also, the innocent with the guilty,
while yet her position had availed her nothing?

She walked on quickly without looking back, conscious of the stranger's
scrutiny. Her step was still brisk, although the buoyancy had died out
of it as the momentary, carefree happiness was blotted from her face.
The future, black and uncertain, stretched forth tentacles of doubt and
dismay which dragged at her spirit and the bright day seemed suddenly
lowering and chill.

A half-mile further on, she came to a low, square, ivy-covered
gate-post, and paused almost wistfully to examine the springing green
of the new shoots, when a sedate step upon the stone flagging made her
glance upward.

A woman was coming toward her down the path which flanked the driveway
from the house; an erect, elderly woman with smooth, white hair beneath
her severe toque and a figure as trim as that of a girl. She was
peering about her with an alert, bird-like movement of her head as if
unaccustomed to viewing the world without artificial aid for her eyes
and she had evidently not as yet observed the girl at the gate.

For an instant Betty stood rooted to the spot, staring as though she
could scarcely credit the evidence of her senses. Slowly the blood
receded from her face, leaving it blanched and ghastly, and into her
eyes, dulled with introspection but a moment since, there crept a look
of livid fear.

She swayed, then with a sobbing gasp turned blindly and fled as if the
very fiends of darkness were pursuing her, back toward the doubtful
haven of the house among the cedars.

She had scarcely traversed a hundred yards, however, when she collided
violently with a young man whose approach she had not been conscious
of in her supreme agitation. She clutched at him instinctively as the
impact threatened to sweep her off her feet and he put out a steadying
arm.

"I beg your pardon--" His tone was conventionally contrite, but he
broke off in unfeigned surprise when she raised her head. "Why, Miss
Shaw!"

It was the young man from the museum!

"Mr. Ross!" she gasped. "How stupid of me! I must have run full tilt
into you."

"I'm not seriously injured," he assured her gravely, although his eyes
twinkled. "But you were going at a most extraordinary pace. Tell me
what villian was pursuing you and I will cheerfully annihiliate him."

Betty laughed with a note of sheer hysteria in her trembling tones.

"I have an appointment for which I am late." She lowered her tell-tale
eyes. "I did not see you coming and the long deserted avenue tempted me
to run for it. I--I cannot wait--"

"You are a long way from home." He had caught the dismayed, hunted
look which she cast involuntarily over her shoulder. "If anyone has
annoyed or frightened you, won't you allow me to walk with you to your
destination?"

"Oh, no!" Her alarm at the suggestion was unmistakable. "Thank you, but
I shall be quite all right, and I must go on alone. Nothing frightened
me, Mr. Ross, I was only surprised at meeting you so unexpectedly in
this part of town."

"And the Egyptian translation?" He was studying her face.

"I will bring it to you on Tuesday. Good bye."

Betty nodded in farewell, and turning, sped lightly off down the Drive,
the fear that he might follow lending wings to her feet. The broad
avenue stretched straight away for miles to the northward without a
curve or obstruction which would serve to screen her destination from
view, but she felt that in any event she could have gone no farther.

The close confinement of her position had ill prepared her for a
test of physical endurance and when she reached the gateway of home
her limbs were trembling beneath her and her panting breath came
in agonized strangling sobs. Reckless of the young man's possible
observation she turned in between the high gates, and staggering up
the side path to a little knoll ringed with low-growing holly bushes,
she sank breathlessly upon a stone bench, and crouched waiting, but
her solitude was undisturbed and no tread of an approaching footstep
sounded upon the graveled walk. Gradually her composure returned
and with the gathering of her scattered forces she remembered her
employer's final warning. Whatever the future held in store, she must
play the game.

Herbert Ross had watched the girl until she disappeared within the
gates, then slowly proceeded on his way. The surprise in their meeting
had been mutual, but he made no attempt to fathom the reason for her
presence in the neighborhood. His thoughts were busied with the cause
of her evident terror. From whom or what was she flying when chance
precipitated her into his arms?

She had recovered herself quickly, but her attempt to dissemble had
been vain. The detective had read aright the hunted, cowering look in
her eyes. What had so changed her from the confident, self-assured
young woman of a few days previous to the trembling, terrified creature
who had shrunk from him in dismay and attempted so vainly to conceal
her consternation?

The solution of the enigma was approaching even as he cogitated, but
so unprepared was he for the revelation that it was with a distinct
sensation of shock he beheld Madame Dumois coming toward him down the
avenue. The full significance of the scene burst upon his brain and the
momentary flash of self-disgust for his stupidity was followed by the
exultation of achievement. He had solved the case!

With the slenderest of clues to work upon and the most difficult of
clients to handle; blindfold, knowing nothing of his subject's past or
her relations with the stern old woman who was so relentlessly running
her to earth, without even a name to guide him, he had found her!
Nothing remained but to produce her and take his fee.

Then, unaccountably, the girl's face, as he had last seen it, rose
before him, frightened, appealing in its very helplessness and
despair. What would be her fate at the hands of his grim client? She
was so young, with a sufficiently long future before her in which to
atone for any mistake of the past. He shrank even in thought from the
suggestion of crime in connection with her, and for the first time in
his professional career he hesitated in the face of his duty.

And the scar! If indeed it was a birthmark as he had concluded, why
had Madame Dumois not only eliminated it from her description, but
deliberately denied its existence when he himself had referred to it?
What had Betty Shaw to fear from her?

If he could only have felt assured of his client's motive in seeking
out the girl, his course would have been clearly defined, but his
experience forced him to conclude it could only be in a spirit of
retribution for some real or fancied offense. If she were trying to
find a missing relative, a daughter, perhaps, who had disappeared, her
anxiety would have been more marked in spite of her iron self-control,
and why would the other have flown from her? There could have been no
reason for her secrecy with one professionally bound to preserve her
confidence, save in the incredible contingency that the young girl was
a fugitive from justice.

An impulse came to him to turn and flee, even as the girl herself had
done; to put off the interview until he had made up his mind to face
the issue. The next moment he banished the thought resolutely and
stepped forward with extended hand.

"Madame Dumois! This is a fortunate meeting. I was just on my way to
call upon you, although I rather fancied you could not resist the lure
of this wonderful spring day!"

"It isn't the weather which has brought me out, young man." She spoke
dryly, but her sharp eyes softened and her smile was one of unalloyed
welcome. "When you reach my age you will remember your rheumatism and
think twice before you venture out in this wonderful humid atmosphere.
You have news?"

He shook his head.

"If you have an engagement, and I am detaining you----" he began
weakly, raging within himself in self-contempt at his irresolution, but
the old lady placed her hand upon his arm.

"No, Mr. Ross. I have no interests which supersede in importance the
case on which you are working. Come back to the house and tell me why
you wished to see me. Where is the young woman you mentioned? You have
not lost sight of her?"

Her voice trembled with eagerness and the angular gloved hand upon
his coat sleeve trembled too. It was the first sign of emotion she
had betrayed in the detective's presence, but whether anxiety or
vindictiveness actuated it, he was at a loss to determine.

"The resemblance can only be a casual one, on the strength of your
description." He evaded the direct question. "Then, too, remember that
the young woman whom I have seen bears a mark upon her face. That would
seem to prove my mistake, would it not?"

They had turned and were walking together up the path which led to the
house and for a short space the old lady maintained silence. When she
replied her voice was low, but quite steady once more.

"But as you suggested it might be a fresh scar." She gave him a shrewd
sidelong glance. "If my description of her appearance were so casual,
and the mark would seem to disprove it, you must have surer grounds on
which to base your theory."

He flashed one of his rare, winning smiles upon her.

"Madame Dumois, if you were not beyond the necessity of making a career
for yourself, permit me to say quite without impertinence that you
would have been an ornament to my profession."

A delicate flush tinted her cheeks like old ivory and a spark twinkled
in her eyes.

"You are a most refreshing young man!" She tapped his arm with a long
forefinger. "But you have not replied to my question."

"I have based my theory on more than the young woman's appearance,"
Herbert Ross admitted quietly. "Some of the data which you considered
irrelevant furnished me with a clue to work from. But that is beside
the point. I came this afternoon to find if you have been able to
secure the photograph we talked of."

They had mounted the steps and the old lady rang the bell before she
replied.

"Yes. I will get it for you at once."

While he waited in the gloom of the drawing-room he tried again to
force his mind to a decision, and once more the girl's face loomed
before his mental vision, but this time with a haunting entreaty in her
soft eyes, and the pitiful scar seemed to plead for at least a respite
from final judgment. He cursed himself for a soft-hearted weakling,
a susceptible fool to be swerved from his course by the girl's
unconscious appeal to the innate chivalry he had believed to have been
burned out long ago by the fire of his experiences and vicissitudes in
his chosen profession. If only the photograph would prove him mistaken!

The rustle of Madame Dumois' gown sounded upon the stair and in another
moment she had entered the room and silently placed in his hand a
cabinet size square of cardboard. He walked over to the lamp ostensibly
to obtain a better light, but he paused with his shoulder turned to
her. Trained as he was to disguise his own thoughts, he dared not trust
himself to the old lady's keen scrutiny.

The lower part of the photograph had been cut away, perhaps to destroy
a tell-tale inscription, but the upper portion disclosed the picture
of a young girl seated in a high cathedral-backed chair, with her head
turned sharply to the left, so that only her profile and the right side
of her face were visible.

Herbert Ross drew a long breath and Madame Dumois' voice grated
hoarsely upon the stillness.

"Well? Is it the girl?"

"I cannot tell." He turned and faced her squarely. "The scar I spoke of
is on the young lady's left cheek, which as you see, does not show in
this photograph. I only succeeded in obtaining a casual glimpse of her,
and although there is a general resemblance, the scar changes the whole
expression, and I cannot be certain until I have had an opportunity to
observe her more closely."

The old lady seated herself heavily in the nearest chair and the lines
seemed suddenly to deepen in her face.

"You're not sure?" She clenched her hands upon the chair arms until the
knuckles showed white beneath the soft lace frills which fell from her
sleeves. "But there is a resemblance, you say. It must be the girl I am
searching for! Go to her at once, Mr. Ross. I cannot endure the strain
of waiting longer!"

"One must have patience, Madame Dumois, in a case of this sort. If the
young woman knows of your search, and is hiding from you; if she has
committed a wrong and fears retribution----"

"That is beside the point!" She glared at him. "Never mind what I want
of the girl, Mr. Ross. That is not your province. Only produce her for
me and I will be responsible for the consequences."

Madame Dumois set her jaws with a snap, although her breath came
quickly and her old eyes flashed.

The detective rose.

"I will see the subject I have in mind at the earliest possible
opportunity, and if my suspicions are verified, I will bring her to
you."

       *       *       *       *       *

Late that night, Betty, all unconscious of the meeting between the two
people who had so unexpectedly crossed her path that day, sat before
the fire in her room, with a paper spread out between her hands. It was
not the Egyptian translation tonight, however, which held her absorbed,
but the copy of Mrs. Atterbury's strange letter.

She knew nothing of codes or ciphers and racked her brains vainly for
a clue which would enable her to glean the hidden meaning from the
cryptic sentences. The word "sheep" she felt intuitively would prove
a starting point, since it had appeared in the first secret message;
"comet," too, must have been indispensable, for the wording of the
letter was obviously forced to give it space. But "ten of the thousand
circulars quoting sheep prices for March" read lucidly enough and
seemed devoid of any suggestion of ambiguity, yet----

All at once Betty started forward in her chair and with parted lips and
eyes shining with repressed excitement she scanned the page once more.
She had found it! The key which she had sought so vainly lay revealed
and the words of the hidden message leaped out at her as in letters of
fire.

Her mobile face in the light from the glowing hearth reflected each
successive emotion as she read, and her expression changed from avid
interest to a dawning horror. Then quite suddenly she threw back her
head and laughed silently, in a convulsion of ironic mirth which ended
in a little sob; and she sat staring at the name "Marcia Atterbury,"
which she herself had obediently signed to the note that morning, with
a slowly gathering menace in her eyes. As the firelight flared and died
again, the spreading birthmark upon her cheek seemed to move as if the
five curved tentacles which radiated from it were writhing to grasp
their prey and her small hands clenched until the paper tore.

At last she rose with a determined air, and thrusting the letter into
the bosom of her loose, dark robe, she took her electric torch from its
hiding place behind a loosened tile of the hearth.

Then extinguishing her lamp, she crept to the door, unbolted it softly
and stood for a moment listening with every nerve tense. No sound
echoed back to her from the sleeping house, no light pierced the
darkness save the thread-like ray which played from her hand, and with
cautious, silent footsteps she descended the stairs, and entering the
library, closed the door behind her.




                             CHAPTER VIII.

                          _The Orchid Lady._


"I shall return in time for lunch." Mrs. Atterbury paused in the
doorway. "You have quite enough work to keep you occupied, I imagine.
Don't leave the house until I return, Betty, for you may be called
to the other telephone. Welch is so stupid I dare not trust him with
messages and I am expecting a rather important one from Doctor Bayard."

"I doubt if I shall be able to finish before lunch, but I'll try."
Betty glanced rather ruefully at the loose assortment of letters
scattered about the desk top.

"Do, please, for this afternoon I shall want you to go on an errand for
me which may keep you until late. Don't tire yourself, though, my dear."

She nodded a careless farewell, and a few moments later her car whirled
off down the drive.

Betty waited until its rather bizarre stripes had disappeared and then
resolutely applied herself to her task. Seated there at the desk in her
severely simple morning frock, with every hair in place and a serene,
intent expression masking all emotion, she made a vastly different
picture from that of a few hours earlier when she had crept into that
very room in the darkness just before the dawn, trembling with fear of
discovery yet urged on as if hypnotized by a stronger will than her own.

If her thoughts reverted to that hour and what she had accomplished
therein, she gave no outward sign, but worked systematically until
order resolved itself from the chaos before her, and two neatly
arranged piles of envelopes marked the result of her labors.

A light knock interrupted her and before she could speak the door
opened and Jack Wolvert entered, smiling in bland assumption of his
welcome.

"I felt sure I should find somebody about!" he remarked. "Welch left me
to cool my heels in the drawing-room, but I am not over fond of my own
society. Do be charitable and give me permission to bore you a little,
Miss Shaw!"

He lounged with easy grace over to her desk and rested his elbows
upon its top staring boldly down into her eyes. She averted them and
leaned back in her chair, an unpleasant sensation, almost of repulsion,
tingling to her fingertips.

"Mrs. Atterbury will not be back until lunch time, Mr. Wolvert." Her
voice was coolly impersonal. "If you care to wait until then, however,
there are books here and Welch will bring you the morning papers or
anything else you may require."

"But I much prefer to talk to you." The smile deepened and an impish,
mocking light danced in his pale eyes. "It really is time that we
became better acquainted, now that we are to see so much more of each
other."

Betty gasped. She did not understand the final observation but the
man's audacity disconcerted her. Instinctively disliking him from
the moment of their first meeting, his appearance on the occasion
of Mrs. Atterbury's dinner party had not tended to raise him in the
girl's estimation. His immoderate drinking, the strange toast he had
proposed like a challenge flung into the spirit world, and his reckless
abandonment to whatever mood swayed him lingered disquietingly in
Betty's mind, and she longed to be rid of his presence.

"I am very busy, as you see." She took up her pen suggestively. "Mrs.
Atterbury will expect me to have finished with her letters----"

"Busy? By Jove, I should think you were! What an industrious little
person! Our charming hostess certainly believes in Satan's influence
over idle hands, and has guarded you well against him." He reached down
deliberately and picked up one of the letters. "Quite distinctive, your
handwriting; like your personality, it baffles by its lucidity."

Betty's quick eye had followed the action and noted the purpose beneath
his studied carelessness.

"Give me that letter, please." She spoke courteously, but there was a
hint of underlying firmness in her tone.

"But there is no harm." He smiled. "Surely you know that Mrs. Atterbury
consults me about all her affairs. Whatever you may write for her, I
may read."

"That is for Mrs. Atterbury to say," retorted Betty, flushing with
resentment at the man's insolence. "I will ask her on her return.
Meanwhile, her correspondence is in my charge."

Wolvert shrugged and the smile changed to a snarl which showed his
long, white teeth like suddenly bared fangs, but the letter fluttered
from his fingers to the desk.

"Mrs. Atterbury is to be congratulated on her choice of a secretary.
Your honesty exceeds your tact, my dear young lady. You are
inexperienced and in a strange position; do not handicap yourself by
making enemies. A friend at court might be very useful to you, more
useful than you can realize."

He had bent still lower, until his dark saturnine face was within a few
inches of her own, and he spoke with calculated significance. For the
first time a little shudder of fear swept over her, but she met his
eyes calmly.

"I have need of no one's friendship, Mr. Wolvert, on the score of
usefulness, for I ask no favors and grant none. Mrs. Atterbury is my
employer and I serve her interests."

He straightened and, thrusting his hands in his pockets, strolled to
the window, where he stood with his back turned to the room, whistling
softly between his teeth.

Betty pulled a fresh sheet of paper toward her and when he wheeled
about, she was apparently absorbed once more in her work.

"I, too, am wholly at Mrs. Atterbury's service." He strode back to her
side. "You must not doubt that, Miss Shaw. I like you for your loyalty,
even if you are ungracious to me. Will you not give me your hand, and
say that we shall be friends?"

"If you insist." Betty forced a smile. "I am sorry if I appeared
ungracious, but I am really very busy. Rudeness to any friend of Mrs.
Atterbury is furthest from my thoughts."

She placed her hand shrinkingly in his, and he raised it to his lips in
exaggerated gallantry.

"'The friends of my friends are my friends,'" he quoted. "You will
find me at your service also, Miss Shaw. I will leave you now to your
labors, and see if I am sufficiently in Welch's good graces to coax a
cocktail from him."

When the door had closed behind him Betty rubbed her hand resentfully
as if a stain remained from contact with his lips. Her thoughts were
disquieting. What if she had indeed made an enemy of him? Was the
extent of his influence in the household great enough to sow seeds of
suspicion against her, and render her already difficult position all
but intolerable? Was a new obstacle to be added to those which even now
crowded everywhere about her path?

At luncheon she learned from Mrs. Atterbury's own lips what the visitor
had meant about their seeing more of each other. Both Jack Wolvert and
Madame Cimmino were to be house guests for a time, the latter having
temporarily closed her apartment, and Wolvert coming on the plea of
quiet and seclusion in which to finish a new composition.

Betty glanced at him with fresh interest. She had frequently heard
snatches of brilliantly executed melody from the music room during the
evening and knew that a master hand was touching the keys, but she had
never entertained the idea that it might be Wolvert.

All idle thoughts were driven from her mind, however, when at the
conclusion of the meal, Mrs. Atterbury summoned her to her room. As on
the occasion of her appearance at the opera, a new costume was spread
out before her, this time a gown and cloak of daintiest gray, with soft
silvery furs.

"My dear, I am sending you to execute another errand for me, since you
were so successful with the last. This should be no more difficult than
the other, and it will give you a glimpse of a new side of city life.
Here are some furs and a suit of which you have been in need."

"But, Mrs. Atterbury, I really cannot accept these costly things from
you," Betty stammered. "The salary you are paying me----"

"Nonsense, child! Consider them as commission for the extra work which
is apart from our original understanding, and for your rare discretion.
The last errand must have seemed strange to you and this one will
doubtless be more of an enigma, but I can assure you that when I am
free to explain it to you fully you will appreciate the reason for my
reticence, as well as the necessity for putting to use all your finesse
and diplomacy."

"I had no thought of prying or curiosity, Mrs. Atterbury." The girl's
face flushed. "I am ready to do whatever you require, as I told you
when you engaged me. Where am I to go this afternoon?"

"To the Carnival Room at the Café de Luxe. A table for two has been
reserved in your name, but you will go alone, as before. You will find
a tea dance in progress and presently a lady will join you at the
table."

"A lady?" Betty murmured.

"Yes." Mrs. Atterbury paused, and then went on carefully. "A young lady
with golden hair and very richly gowned. She has a letter to deliver to
you. You will be able to identify her absolutely by the enormous bunch
of purple orchids which she will wear. Please remember this carefully,
Betty, for it is imperative. Should any persons approach you except
the lady I describe, cut them, absolutely. If they persist, conduct
yourself just as you would if accosted by any stranger and return home
immediately. Do you understand quite clearly?"

"Quite, Mrs. Atterbury. When shall I be ready?"

"The car will be brought around for you at four and will wait to bring
you home."

When, at the hour named, Betty descended the stairs, demure but
radiant in the dovelike costume, Mrs. Atterbury intercepted her at the
drawing-room door.

"Charming, my dear! But why do you wear a veil? It really spoils the
whole effect and you do not need it."

"My face!" Betty seemed to shrink within herself. "The birthmark, you
know. I--I find the people here look at me so strangely."

Her employer shot a keen glance at her.

"You must not permit yourself to grow self-conscious. The mark is not
an absolute disfigurement, as I have told you, and even if it were,
it is irremediable. You can only make yourself needlessly wretched by
thinking morbidly of it." Her level tones sharpened with the note of
stern authority which the girl remembered. "Remove the veil at once
and do not wear it when you go on an assignment for me."

Betty's fingers trembled as she obeyed. Could Mrs. Atterbury have
divined her subterfuge? When she raised her eyes, however, the other
woman was smiling graciously.

"Ah! that is better. The fur brings out your color, my dear. Remember
to hold no communication with anyone except the lady you are going to
meet."

The Café de Luxe was the most cosmopolitan of the newer establishments
which had sprung up mushroomlike throughout the theatre district of the
city to meet the latest demands of an amusement-crazed public. Garishly
appointed, it was as blatant in character as the clientele to whom for
the most part it catered. The many mirrors and dazzling-colored lights,
combined with the blare of the orchestra and the heated, heavily
perfumed air, confused Betty for a moment and a sensation of faintness
stole over her.

Through the parted lobby curtains she beheld a vista of crowded tables
each with its mutually engrossed couple, and behind them in a roped-off
square the dancers, jerking and swaying like marionettes. As she
hesitated, a small, white-gloved hand was laid upon her arm and a merry
voice, glad with surprise, sounded in her ears.

"Ruth! Where have you been all this while? Everyone is asking about
you! Fancy meeting you here! Isn't this simply fascinating?"

Betty turned slowly. A plump, fair-haired girl with a pretty, doll-like
face stood beside her. She was dressed in the extreme of fashion but
valley lilies instead of orchids were clustered at her belt. Betty
bestowed upon her a slow, deliberate stare of non-recognition, which
the other returned in wide-eyed bewilderment which swiftly changed
to confusion and dismay when her eyes encountered the birthmark.
With a crimson face, she murmured a halting apology and turning,
fled precipitately. Betty watched the stranger until she vanished in
the congested group at the entrance door, then made her way into the
restaurant.

The headwaiter bowed profoundly and with elaborate circumstance led her
to a retired spot behind a cluster of palms, where covers had been laid
for two. A low bowl of purple orchids graced the center of her table,
but she noted that all those nearby were decorated only with daffodils
in tall vases. Were the flowers meant for a sign by which her own
identity was to have been disclosed to the mysterious other woman?

The waiter hovered obsequiously about and Betty ordered tea to be
rid, for the moment at least, of his unwelcome attention. Her eyes
mechanically swept the moving kaleidoscope of faces about her, but all
seemed too preoccupied to give a passing glance to the solitary figure
half-hidden behind the towering palms.

The tea, long since placed before her, grew cold untasted; the
tintinabulation of the orchestra ceased, then after an interval
recommenced, and still Betty sat alone. The hands she clenched beneath
the tablecloth were icy, but her cheeks burned and her heart pounded
suffocatingly.

How long must she wait? She had not been told the hour of this strange
appointment, but Mrs. Atterbury had remarked that morning that the
errand might keep her out until late. The incident of the girl with
the valley lilies kept recurring to her thoughts, and as the minutes
lengthened into a half-hour she felt an all but overmastering impulse
to spring up and run from the chattering, inconsequent throng to the
seclusion of the waiting car, even if it meant facing the unleashed
fury of her employer.

All at once she became conscious that a young man had appeared
beside her; a strange young man, with a clean-cut face and square
shoulders beneath an irreproachably fitting coat. Betty's swift glance
encompassed his general appearance, but her eyes fixed themselves upon
his lapel where nodded a single orchid of a livid purple hue.

The young man bowed stiffly and without waiting for an invitation,
pulled out the opposite chair and seated himself.

"So sorry to have been late, but I was unavoidably detained," he began
in a loud, forced voice. Then bending swiftly across to her he added
in a rapid undertone: "The lady could not come, but I am here in her
place. Put your muff on the table and I will slip the packet into it."

Betty eyed him steadily.

"You have made some mistake." She spoke in a low voice with quiet
distinctness. "I do not know you."

"Good heavens, don't make a scene! It is all right, I tell you! Can't
you understand? The lady was unable to come in person but she sent me
to deliver it to you. Look! Don't you recognize this?" He spoke with
half-savage insistence and the girl noticed that beads of perspiration
had started upon his brow. He touched the flower in his buttonhole,
then pointed to the others in the bowl between them, but she gave no
sign of comprehension.

"I do not know who you are, or what you are talking about," Betty said
coldly. "I must ask you to leave my table at once."

"What sort of a game are you trying to play?" he demanded. "You are
the woman I came here to find. I recognized you at once from the
description--"

Betty rose.

"Wait!" The young man put out a detaining hand. "What is the good of
all this bluff? I give you my word of honor that I am acting in good
faith with you--"

"You must be mad!" Her eyes flashed with unfeigned resentment and
indignation. "If you attempt to follow or annoy me further, sir, I
shall complain to the management."

Turning, she swept from the restaurant and out to where the car awaited
her at the curb, but as it rolled swiftly away, she sank back and
buried her burning face among the cushions.

When the strangely pertinacious young man had declared his recognition
of her, his eyes had been upon the birthmark on her cheek. This, then,
was the reason for Mrs. Atterbury's peremptory command to her to remove
her veil. Her very infirmity was being made to serve her employer's
ends!

Betty laughed softly, bitterly, and struck her small, clenched fist
against the window frame, in impotent anger. Then her head drooped upon
her arm and for the first time since she had entered Mrs. Atterbury's
service, she broke down utterly. Sobbing the weary, heartbreaking sobs
of a forsaken child, she cowered in her corner, while street after
street flitted by in the ghostly gray dusk.

At length, spent with the storm of her emotion she lay back, exhausted
but calm once more. The dusk was deepening to darkness and as she
watched the chain of lights twinkling past, Betty suddenly came to a
realization of the flight of time. Surely she should have reached the
house on the North Drive long before this! Had an hour gone by while
she sat huddled there, weakly giving way to tears?--

Tears! Betty's very heart stood still for a moment in deathly fear.
Then she switched on the light and seized the mirror from the leather
case before her. The face which stared back at her was pale, the eyes
puffed and reddened, but a dab of cosmetic and powder would conceal the
ravages of her emotion from even Mrs. Atterbury's keen eyes until she
could reach the haven of her own room.

The necessary articles were in her wristbag and she applied them
quickly, then turned off the light once more and peered again from the
window. The streets were narrow and unfamiliar, even squalid; where was
she being taken?

Pressing a button, she caught up the speaking tube.

"I wished to go directly home and I cannot understand why we have not
reached there. Did Mrs. Atterbury give any different instructions?"

"No, miss, only to drive back along the Western Parkway, but I find the
streets are closed for repairs, and I have to go around. I'm sorry;
I'll hurry, miss."

The car zig-zagged for several blocks further, then turned a corner
sharply and swung into the North Drive, shooting forward with
lightning speed. Betty held her breath as the car skidded between the
towering entrance gates and she drew a deep sigh of relief when it
swooped under the _porte-cochère_ and came to a jarring halt before the
lighted doorway.

Mrs. Atterbury was awaiting her and drew her into the library.

"What has happened?" Her tone was low but vibrating as if she spoke
with bated breath. "The lady did not appear?"

Betty shook her head.

"A man came instead. He wore an orchid boutonniere, and he tried to
make me listen to him. He had your letter with him, and wanted to put
it in my muff but I pretended not to understand, but to be insulted at
his daring to address me. He would not go, so I left him."

She described her experience of the afternoon in detail, omitting
only to mention the girl who had accosted her in the lobby, and Mrs.
Atterbury heard her without interruption to the end, then placing her
hand beneath the girl's chin, she lifted her face to the light.

"You have been crying, my child. Is there something which you have not
told me?"

Betty was thankful for the burning blush which swept to her brow.

"I did cry a little, in the car coming home," she admitted. "It was
silly of me, I know, but the man frightened me, he was so persistent,
and rather fierce. I'm very sorry I failed, Mrs. Atterbury."

"'Failed!' My dear, you have succeeded! You carried out my instructions
to the letter, and no one could ask more. I regret that you were
annoyed, but the gentleman who came to meet you did not himself
understand the situation. I can promise you that you will not have that
sort of thing to contend with another time." Mrs. Atterbury's black
eyes flashed ominously, but they softened when they rested again upon
the girl's face. "Now run and dress, Betty, for we dine very shortly.
And remember, child, that I am very well pleased with what you have
done, and I shall not forget it."

Betty's heart was heavy, nevertheless, as she obeyed. The adventure
at the opera had brought a thrill of excitement and she had given
little thought to its possible consequences, but the afternoon through
which she had just passed brought a swift revulsion of feeling and she
tore off the costly furs as if they stifled her. She was filled with
loathing of her task and its instigators and a growing dread of the
future. Why was she singled out to be the bearer of these mysterious
missives? She had been prepared to carry out the agreement under which
she had been engaged, but she shrank from the role of confidential
messenger and hoped fervently that she would not soon again be called
upon to play it.

The hope was vain, however, for on the following afternoon she found
herself again in the car and speeding toward the lower part of town.
Her destination on this occasion was not the garish Café de Luxe, but
the old Hotel Rochefoucauld on Jefferson Square, whose conservative
roof sheltered now only the elect of an older regime, which still clung
to the aristocratic purlieus of a bygone generation.

"But if the lady with the orchids does not come this time," Betty had
faltered to her employer, when she received her parting instructions,
"if the man who met me yesterday appears again, what shall I say to
him?"

"He will not, never fear." Mrs. Atterbury had smiled, but the cold
light glinted in her eyes once more. "The lady will be there herself,
and you need exchange no words with her; just take my letter from her
hands and bring it to me."

Betty made her way down the wide, dim corridor of the ancient hostelry
to the writing-room to which she had been directed. The heavy velvet
curtains at the windows almost wholly obscured the light and she
fancied at first that the room was deserted, but as her eyes became
accustomed to the gloom she descried a small figure half-hidden in a
huge leather chair.

As she approached it, she was conscious only of a heap of soft, brown
fur with a deep purple blur of orchids nestling in it, but she halted
abruptly a few feet away. The other rose slowly and for a moment the
two young women stared at each other.

It was the girl of the art shop! The blonde, fairy-like creature who
had regarded her with such evident repulsion and fear! Betty stood
rigid with amazement and then the truth came to her in a flash of
understanding.

The purchase of the mirror was a mere subterfuge to get her to the shop
at a certain hour, where this other woman had doubtless been directed
to note her appearance for future recognition. She remembered how the
stranger's eyes had lingered on her birthmark, which she evidently
described to the man who had attempted to take her place on the
previous day. Every action, no matter how trivial, which was suggested
by Mrs. Atterbury must be a part of some deep-laid, far-reaching plan.

The same look of fear was intensified now in the eyes fastened upon her
and a tiny gloved hand was extended as if to ward off a blow.

"I couldn't come yesterday, for I was really ill." The stranger spoke
in a low, fluttering voice. "I sent him, I played fair, why would you
not deal with him? Here is what you have come for; take it, and let me
go!"

She drew from her breast a long, sealed, blank envelope and held it
out, but Betty's fingers had not closed upon it before the other's
touch was withdrawn as though contaminated. She glided quickly to the
door, but paused upon its threshold and turned, her golden head erect.

"Remember!" she cried, her flute-like tones suddenly shrill. "Tell
those who sent you that I shall have nothing more to do with this
affair. If a further attempt is made to drag me into it I shall kill
myself. I will accept no more commands, expose myself to no future
danger. I am almost mad now, but I shall have enough sanity left to
take myself beyond your reach. I have kept my wretched compact; see to
it that you keep yours."

The doorway was empty, but a faint elusive perfume lingered in the air,
and upon the floor at Betty's feet lay a crushed and trampled orchid,
its livid petals outspread like the wings of some wounded tropic bird.

Betty stood staring down at it for a moment, then abruptly thrusting
the envelope into her muff, she turned and made her way to the street.




                              CHAPTER IX.

                             _Crossroads._


The rain was falling in torrents, hard driven before the gusty March
wind, and turning the gutters into miniature foam-crested freshets when
Betty struggled up the steps of the Egyptological Museum, with the
completed translation beneath her arm.

The attendant who took possession of her dripping umbrella stared
curiously at her unveiled face and his gaze followed her as she
ascended to the upper floor, but Betty was oblivious to the interest
her presence created. Her thoughts were travelling ahead of her
down the corridor to the office numbered nine, and the friendly,
laughing-eyed young man who awaited her there.

The hour of her previous visit was the one bright spot in the gloom and
mystery which had surrounded her since she made her entrance into Mrs.
Atterbury's service, and his protective concern when she had rushed
blindly into his arms at that unexpected meeting almost at the gates of
her new home, lingered comfortingly in her memory.

As she entered, Herbert Ross rose from behind his desk with extended
hand and a beaming smile of welcome.

"You are punctual, Miss Shaw, in spite of the rain. How is the work
coming on?"

"It is finished." Betty laid the roll of manuscript upon the desk
before him. "I hope that it will prove satisfactory, Mr. Ross."

"You found it difficult?" He spread the papers out, glancing over them
rapidly as he spoke.

"No. I have translated almost literally as you can see--But I forgot
that you were not an Egyptologist yourself."

"Nevertheless, I am sure this will be an admirable addition to our
collection of translated papyri. What sonorous, mouthfilling phrases
the old chaps used in those days!" He quoted from her page: "'Hail ye
living ones upon earth, ye who pass on the Nile, scribes all, readers
and priests of the ka all, this the great Pharaoh and royal Xerxes,
triumphant.'--I will place this at once in the hands of the keeper of
antiquities."

He pressed a button in the wall beside him, then abruptly swung his
chair around until he faced her. His eyes had narrowed slightly and
there was no longer a hint of a smile about his firm lips.

"Miss Shaw, you told me when you were last here that your time was not
wholly your own. Does that mean that you are employed at indeterminate
hours? I ask this in reference to future work, of course."

Betty nodded, and moistened her lips nervously.

"I did most of this translating at night."

"Ah! You are free, then, in the evenings? What is the nature of your
work, if I may ask? Are you a teacher?"

A knock upon the door saved her from an immediate reply. A uniformed
attendant entered and to him Herbert Ross entrusted the manuscript with
instructions to take it to Professor Carmody. When the door had closed
once more he turned to her inquiringly, and noted a swift pallor which
seemed to have blotted all the wind-blown color from her face.

"You teach?" he repeated.

Betty shook her head. She dared not risk his asking where she taught if
she took refuge in that evasion. The truth, or at least as much of it
as was possible under the circumstances, would be safest.

"I am a--a visiting secretary."

"Indeed. That explains your presence on the North Drive the other day
when you literally ran into me." His lips relaxed. "You told me you
were late for an appointment, I remember. You are not living at present
at the address which you gave me, Miss Shaw."

It was neither question nor accusation, but a mere statement of fact
casually uttered, and yet a bomb-shell could not more effectively have
stunned the girl. Could her former landlady have betrayed her? Her head
whirled and it seemed another voice than hers which replied quietly:

"No. I am staying temporarily at the home of my employer, but I have my
mail sent to my permanent address."

"I see. You are not a native of the city, then? Your home is not here?"

What did this continued catechism portend? In so far as the translating
provided an excuse for this insistent young man's questions she would
reply, but her personal affairs and former life were surely no concern
of a museum director.

"No, my home is not here." She paused deliberately. "Perhaps, if this
translation proves satisfactory and you have other work for me, Mr.
Ross, you will mail it. I will arrange to have it forwarded--"

She got no farther for the door was suddenly flung wide and a
shrivelled grey little man precipitated himself into the room. With
bent shoulders and head thrust forward, he peered eagerly at the
younger man through thick tortoise-shell glasses and demanded in a high
voice crackling with nervous excitement:

"Ross, who is she? The young woman you said had undertaken this
translation for you? I must see her--"

"She is here." The young man rose. "Miss Shaw, allow me to present
Professor Carmody."

The girl bowed distantly, but the little professor advanced to her with
outstretched hands.

"My dear young lady, I want to congratulate--" He stopped abruptly,
amazement and a dawning recognition in his eyes. "It can't be--is it
possible----?"

"You find my translation satisfactory then, Professor Carmody?" Betty
darted a swift glance at him, and then turned her head sharply as
if to gaze from the window. This move presented her profile to the
nearsighted eyes bent upon her, and brought the birthmark out with
cruel distinctness upon her cheek.

Professor Carmody halted, stammering, and the look of expectancy died
from his weazened face.

"I beg your pardon. I fancied for a moment that I had met you before. I
intruded just now, Miss--Miss--"

"Betty Shaw." The girl prompted him steadily.

"Miss Shaw, I wanted to tell you that your work is admirable! The
translation is masterly and I doubt if even my friend Professor Mallory
himself could have improved upon it. You have kept to the text with
extraordinary fidelity, and retained the spirit as well as the letter
to a marked degree!"

"Thank you." In spite of herself Betty flushed at the fervent praise,
but she kept her face averted. "The work was intensely interesting,
but I feared I had forgotten a great deal."

"Miss Shaw studied with an associate of Professor Mallory," Ross
remarked.

"Really. I should have believed her to have been a pupil of the great
man himself." Professor Carmody's eyes still glistened with enthusiasm.
"I shall be happy to show you several original papyri of profound
interest, if you will call some morning, my dear Miss Shaw. In this
intensely modern age, it is a genuine pleasure to encounter a young
person who appreciates the wisdom and greatness of the past."

He bowed and had turned to the door when Herbert Ross stopped him with
a reminder.

"You, er--you have the check, Professor?"

"Bless me, of course!" The little man fumbled in his pocket for a
moment, then drew out a narrow slip of paper which he laid upon the
desk. "There are one or two inscriptions from tombs of the eleventh
dynasty, I believe, which have been awaiting translation. You will find
them in that drawer, there. Good afternoon, Miss Shaw."

When the sound of his quick, nervous footsteps had died away down the
corridor, Ross handed the check to Betty. It was made out for fifty
dollars and signed by the secretary of the Egyptological Society.
Murmuring a conventional expression of thanks, the girl placed it in
her handbag and rose.

"Would you care to undertake some more translation immediately?" the
young man asked, opening the drawer tentatively.

"I should, very much," Betty responded, her eyes alight with eagerness.

"In that case, it will be necessary for me to have your present
address, Miss Shaw." There was no mistaking the businesslike finality
in his tone, and Betty hesitated. If she refused, she would not only
forfeit the translating which was a fascinating study, but she might
never again see this young man, her only link with the world beyond
Mrs. Atterbury's forbidding gates. On the other hand, her reticence
would undoubtedly arouse his curiosity and suspicion and if he were
sufficiently interested, he might institute awkward inquiries and
precipitate the very crisis she sought to avoid. Would frankness be her
wisest course? She hesitated only a moment.

"Mr. Ross, I gave you the address of my boarding house because I have
undertaken this translation unknown to my present employer. I work at
it only in my leisure hours, but I do not think she would approve of my
doing anything which lay outside of her own immediate interests. She is
Mrs. Atterbury, of Three Hundred and Thirty-five North Drive. However,
I should like all communications sent to the first address I gave you."

Herbert Ross drew his hand quickly across his forehead and there was
an odd, repressed note in his voice.

"I quite understand. You will remain for some little time in your
present position? I believe you said it was temporary."

"I--I cannot tell." Betty's tone was very low and her eyes wandered
restlessly to the door. "I shall have finished this translation, at any
rate, before I leave."

"Very well." He arose and held out his hand to her. "Bring it to me,
please, when it is completed. The terms will be the same as before. I
wish you the best of luck with it, Miss Shaw."

When she had gone he dropped back into his chair and sat for some
minutes lost in a profound reverie which, judging by his frown, was not
a happy one. At length he struck the desk an emphatic blow with his
fist as if to register some vital decisions and springing to his feet,
he started precipitately for the sanctum of Professor Carmody.

"My dear Ross!" The grey little man glanced up in mild deprecation
from a heap of yellowed parchments as the other burst in upon him. "I
trust my abrupt intrusion on your conference did not complicate matters
for you. I had completely forgotten, in my enthusiasm over the young
woman's remarkable work, that she was a subject for your own especial
study."

"On the contrary, Professor, your entrance was fortunate; it lent
verisimilitude to the little farce I have been playing with your
valuable assistance. But I want to ask you a question upon which much
depends. For whom did you mistake Miss Shaw, when you first saw her?"

Professor Carmody pondered for a space.

"I do not know," he responded at length, thoughtfully. "I cannot recall
her name, but I was forcibly reminded of a young girl whom I had met
in Cairo some two years ago, who was studying under Professor Mallory.
When Miss Shaw turned her head I realized my mistake at once, for the
girl I speak of had no blemish upon her face. It is rather odd, as
the translation bears unmistakable earmarks of Professor Mallory's
tutelage, but the association of ideas is undoubtedly responsible for
my misapprehension."

"Undoubtedly," echoed Ross. "Nevertheless, if you can recall the name
of the young woman in Cairo, by any chance, I shall be grateful."

It was Professor Carmody's turn to halt his visitor at the door.

"This Miss Shaw to whom you just presented me--I trust that, er, she is
not under your professional interest as a suspect? A young person of
such a high order of intelligence, of intellectuality----"

"By no means, Professor. She is merely an unimportant witness in a
civil case; rather curious, but with no criminal features. I'll look in
on you tomorrow. Try to remember the other girl's name for me; the one
in Cairo."

Twenty minutes later, when the young detective was ushered into the
presence of Madame Dumois, even that astute lady could read nothing in
his grave non-committal face.

"You have found her?" The aged voice quivered with the tension of her
control, but there was no hint of a tenderer emotion. "The young person
you suspected, is she the original of the photograph I showed you?"

Ross shook his head.

"I have been unable to determine." His voice was very low. "She has
succeeded in eluding me, Madame Dumois. I am sorry to be obliged to
confess it, but I was too confident. Either I have underestimated
her intelligence and inadvertently put her on the defensive, or
circumstances have combined to effect her disappearance a second time.
She has slipped from my grasp."

The old lady uttered an exclamation of bitter disappointment and anger.

"Why did you not take me to her at once?" she demanded. "A fig for your
conscientious scruples, sir! Had she not proved to be the young woman I
am looking for, what harm could it have done?"

"None, save precipitate the notoriety you wish to avoid, Madame
Dumois." He leaned toward her with a ring of passionate earnestness in
his tones. "Why will you not be frank with me? What is your interest
in this girl? What do you mean to do with her when you have found her?"

"I repeat, that is solely my affair." She fixed him with a shrewd
glance. "I might answer your question by another, young man. What
interest have you in my motive for instituting this search? You have
found someone whom you believe to be the one I wish to see, yet you
claim to be unable to produce her. What has my object to do with your
chances of locating her once more?"

His interrogator's keen directness took the young detective by
surprise, but he countered swiftly.

"Everything, my dear Madame! If I were assured that her disappearance
was a purely voluntary one, resulting from inclination alone, rather
than any sinister or criminal cause, I could prosecute my search along
far different lines than those I am compelled to adopt, as long as I am
working in the dark."

"You have not entirely lost track of your suspect, then?" The old lady
leaned forward in her chair. "You will be able to find her again?"

"I firmly believe that I shall, but it may require some little time,"
he responded cautiously.

Madame Dumois straightened herself with an air of conscious triumph.

"In that case, Mr. Ross, our original compact holds, unless you
voluntarily relinquish it. Find her with the information I have
already given you, or drop the case. That is positively my last word
in the matter. I decline to take you or anyone into my confidence.
What I have to say to that young woman shall be said to her alone, and
what disposition I shall make of her will be strictly according to her
deserts. If I did not believe you to be above suspicion, upon my soul,
I should accuse you of knowing more than you will admit and actually
trying to shield her!"

"My dear lady!" He raised protesting hands. "I shall not refer you to
my chief, or call upon my record to witness my utter singlemindedness
in this, as in every other case I have handled. It is one of the
generally accepted prejudices against those engaged in my profession
that we are devoid of any finer feeling and insensible to injustice,
but I had believed myself immune from such a suspicion, especially in
the eyes of a person of your rare discernment."

"I haven't accused you of bribery, young man!" There was a softer,
almost contrite note in her dry tones. "But a baby stare has forced
many a hasty conclusion. However, we won't quarrel about it. I can
assure you of one thing; in placing that young woman in my hands you'll
be saving her from far worse ones. Whether she has dabbled in crime or
not, the quicker she is located the better for her."

"I shall do my best," Ross said earnestly. "Be assured that I have
no interest in this but to serve you. My questions may have seemed
impertinent, but they were not prompted by idle curiosity, you know. I
shall not intrude again until I have something definite to report."

He bowed over her hand and her withered fingers tightened about his in
a cordial clasp.

"I hope it will be soon, Mr. Ross," she added in impulsive candor.
"Call whenever you wish and I shall be at home. I won't promise you any
further information, but I am a lonely old woman and I find our little
tilts highly diverting. If you have not yet succeeded in my quest you
have at least brought me a new interest in life, and I positively look
forward to your visits."

"Thank you." He smiled boyishly. "I will avail myself of your
invitation gladly, Madame Dumois, but remember I mean to succeed, even
if I must work blindfold."

The smile did not linger as he made his way down the path to the Drive.
The old lady's shrewd instinct had divined his procrastination and
unerringly probed its cause, and his chief, too, would be clamoring for
a report. Why should he hesitate? The girl was within reach of his hand
and his duty was clear. Scar or no scar, he could not blind himself to
the conviction that in Betty Shaw his search was ended. What was it
that, stronger than his will, deeper-rooted than his loyalty still held
him back from the step which sooner or later would be inevitable?

As the toils closed tighter about the girl and the clouds which
encompassed her grew darker and more sinister, her face shone clearer
before his mental vision and her steady eyes seemed to meet his in
sorrowful questioning.

He was a detective, but he was also a man; must he in willful ignorance
of the consequences, deliver her to the tender mercies of Madame
Dumois? She had trusted him, she had replied in simple faith to the
decoy advertisement and placed herself in his hands. Madame Dumois had
also given him her confidence, relying upon his professional honor.
Which would be the greater betrayal?

Detective McCormick was in the best of humors, and shook hands heartily
with his young operative.

"My boy, that was the finest bit of sheer luck that has come our way in
many a long day!" he exclaimed. "Your running into Ide hanging around
the gates of that place out on the North Drive has given the whole
investigation a new turn, and I shouldn't wonder if the results would
be sensational."

"I wouldn't be too sanguine, sir." Ross spoke with curious repression.
"It was dusk, as I told you, and I only had a momentary glimpse as I
flashed past in a taxi. I may have been mistaken."

"You didn't think so the other day." The Chief turned in his swivel
chair and stared up at him. "You were sure enough then of the
identification, and I think myself that you were right. I've had the
place covered ever since, and there's something queer doing there, as
sure as shooting!"

"Doesn't seem likely." Ross shook his head. "People of the social
standing of those who live on the North Drive couldn't be mixed up in
any game of Ide's. What did you mean 'queer,' sir? Who's on the job?"

"Clark. The house is owned by a woman named Atterbury; lived there for
years and seems to rate A1 in the neighborhood, but she's laying mighty
low, too low for a person who is on the level. She's comparatively
young and a good looker, but she lives like a hermit, and there's a
young girl in the household, a girl with a scar on her face, who will
bear watching."

"I think it's a mistake, sir, it must be." Ross spoke with all the
assurance he could command. "There's nothing wrong with the Atterbury
woman, and as for the girl--"

"As for her, what?" demanded his chief, as he paused. "What do you know
about them?"

"Nothing, except in a general way," he hedged lamely. "But if she's the
Mrs. Atterbury I imagine, Clark is barking up the wrong tree and he'll
only make a fool of himself if you let him push this matter. Ide--if it
was really Ide whom I saw--may have been passing by. That is a blind
trail, Chief."

"Look here, Ross, what's got into you?" McCormick blustered. "You were
as keen on the scent as Clark is now and all of a sudden you back down.
The fellow was Ide, all right; I've never known you to make a mistake
yet in spotting a man, and I tell you this Atterbury woman, whoever she
is, has an ace in the hole, somewhere. What's the dope?"

"Simply that she is too well known, too prominent. You couldn't touch
her, sir. It's out of the question."

"Is it?" McCormick swore a vigorous oath. "Nobody ever flew so high yet
that I couldn't bring 'em down when I had the goods on them. And I'll
get it, Ross, don't make any mistake about that! This is the first time
you've laid down on anything, but Clark will stick like a burr and even
if Ide is out of it, there's some other little game being pulled off up
there, you mark my words. We'll get to the bottom of it before I call
Clark off it. But what's the good word in your own case?"

"Nothing doing." Ross raised his eyes with an effort to those of his
chief. "I've been stalling Madame Dumois and trying to kid her into
giving me enough data to work on, but you know how it was with you. She
is fighting so shy of possible notoriety that she won't loosen, but I
haven't given up hope. I found one clue that looked promising, but I
was on the wrong track. It wasn't the right girl."

"Well, keep after the old lady." McCormick resumed the cigar butt he
had relinquished at the other's appearance. "You can get around her in
time if anyone can. Let me know when something turns up."

"Very well, sir." Ross accepted the hint and departed, but long after
the door had closed behind him, McCormick sat gazing reflectively
before him with a startled half-incredulous query in his eyes.




                              CHAPTER X.

                            _Face to Face._


Betty attacked the new translation that evening with undiminished
enthusiasm but her mind wandered and when midnight came a few meager
lines proved to be the result of her labors. She paused to read them
over before putting them away and the quaint phraseology fell strangely
from her lips upon the stillness of the room.

"To the Stele of Abu I have come in peace to sepulchre this of eternity
which I have made in the horizon western of the home of Abydos--"

Her voice halted and trembled into silence and she stood listening
with every nerve strained. A dull jarring crash had sounded from below
accompanied by the muffled but harsh tones of a man's voice raised in
anger or expostulation.

Hastily disposing of her work she extinguished the light and
groping her way to the door, opened it. The voice had sunk to an
indistinguishable rumble, and mingled with it was a murmur in a higher,
clearer tone which she had no difficulty in recognizing as that of Mrs.
Atterbury.

The girl hesitated, then crept to the head of the stairs. The house
was in darkness save for a narrow shaft of light which glowed from the
open door of the music room. Clinging to the banisters and keeping well
in shadow, Betty made her way down the staircase and from behind the
shelter of the newel post she peered into the room.

Jack Wolvert was crouched half over the table, both fists full of
crumpled papers and his dark face, half-defiant, half-cringing, leered
up at his hostess who stood before him drawn up to her full height in
imperious disdain.

"You're crazy!" he ejaculated. "What's the good of playing a waiting
game? Come out in the open and make one big bluff, that's my idea."

"You'll find it decidedly dangerous, my man, to execute your ideas
without my sanction." Mrs. Atterbury's quiet tones dominated his
blustering whine. "Remember, I am master and I will not brook any
rebellion against my authority. I might remind you that the last time
you took matters into your own hands the result was unfortunate."

"Ah-h!" The sound which issued from his lips was between a snarl and
a groan, and Betty saw his whole body quiver as he cowered back. Mrs.
Atterbury advanced a step and her cameo-like face suddenly hardened.

"We're all in this for life or death. If one succeeds, all succeed; if
one fails, he fails alone. That was my rule, but once I broke it for
you. Hereafter you fare with the rest. You have your uses, I admit, but
no one is indispensable to me. You know what happened to the Comet;
remember her luck when you are tempted to play a lone hand, my friend."

Betty waited to hear no more, but turned and fled silently up the
stair, her heart beating tumultuously. The level unemotional voice of
Mrs. Atterbury had not raised in pitch or increased in volume, yet
there had been something far more sinister in its measured utterance
than any display of ungoverned wrath could have evidenced.

The girl sank trembling upon her couch and for the first time a vision
came to her of her own possible fate should the extent of her knowledge
be even suspected by the ruthless woman downstairs. She had learned
from the cipher letter of the retribution which had overtaken "The
Comet," and once again the stark face of Breckinridge rose before her,
his sightless eyes fixed on hers in mute warning.

She covered her face with her hands, striving to shut out the dread
picture imagination conjured for her. She, like the Comet, was playing
a lone hand, but the stakes were worth the hazard! At that thought her
momentary weakness dropped from her like a cloak and she straightened,
her eyes aflame with resolution. She would win, she must!

Disrobing in the dark, she lay for long listening intently, but no
sound reached her from below, and the strained effort brought its
own reaction of fatigue. She slept at last, to awaken only when the
sunlight of broad day streamed through the uncurtained window and
flooded her face.

There was no hint of the previous night's quarrel in the genial
camaraderie of Mrs. Atterbury's attitude toward Wolvert, but Betty
fancied that Madame Cimmino regarded them both with ill-concealed
anxiety and the girl was glad to escape to the seclusion of the library.

The morning's correspondence awaited her, and she opened the first
letter in listless abstraction, her thoughts still centered on the
implacable words she had overheard. One glance at the sheet of
note-paper in her hand, however, and everything else was banished from
her mind.

    "My dear Marcia:

    "Professor Blythe has caught pneumonia in Chicago. Doctor's
    consultation held over him on Monday. Too old for recovery,
    Hamilton says is verdict. Much grieved but still hope. McCormick
    has been getting orders which evidence strong market. New machinery
    no trouble to operate. Marked Mary's improved letters; she has
    seized her opportunity. Hear from out west that John Cote won
    appeal. Sanitarium being planned for consumptives here. Good
    air but nothing can be doing if Mayor refuses permit. Please
    communicate in care Trust Company. Give nobody business confidence
    but me. They lie who say low prices ruin business. It is dead if
    the end of the superfluous stock is not sold out regardless of cost.

    "With kindest regards,

                                                                "Yours,
                                                             "Shirley."

With a curious set smile Betty read and reread the missive, then laid
it aside, and sat for some minutes staring out of the window. The
hidden message was pregnant with meaning and a shade of anxiety crossed
her face. The man whom she had seen loitering under the lamp-post just
outside the gates a few days before loomed up as a possibility more to
be dreaded than any present contingency within the house and she felt
that she was being irresistibly carried forward in a chain of events
forged by circumstance which she could not break if she would.

When Mrs. Atterbury came to her, Betty watched surreptitiously for her
reception of the cipher letter and saw that after a quick glance her
employer thrust it without a perusal into her belt. The girl marveled
anew at her stoicism; she must at least have gleaned the purport of
the first sentence, yet her eyes were as clear and her voice as steady
as though it had been the most casual of communications.

Her dictation was interrupted by the abrupt entrance of Madame Cimmino.

"Look!" the latter exclaimed with an excited gesture toward the window.
"It is Louise Dana, but in what haste! Without a hat, too, in this most
detestable of climates! Is it that something has happened? An accident?"

She spoke lightly, but her eyes smouldered as they met Mrs.
Atterbury's, and the rouge stood out in patches of vivid scarlet
against the sudden pallor which blanched her cheeks.

Mrs. Dana was running swiftly up the path from the gate, her
meretriciously golden head bare and gleaming in the sunlight. A cloak
had been flung carelessly about her figure, but as she sped past the
window Betty noted that her feet were encased in the thinnest of
boudoir slippers.

With a murmured ejaculation Mrs. Atterbury hurried from the room
followed by Madame Cimmino, and the girl was left to her own thoughts.
A bell pealed wildly through the house and its echo had not died
away when there came a slam of the front door and a piercing cry
which reached even to the secluded library, although Betty could only
distinguish a word or two.

"Mortie--caught--help--!"

"Good God!" It was unmistakably Wolvert's voice but shaken with the
same craven fear which had actuated it on the day of Betty's arrival.
"What do you mean by coming here? Do you want to give us all--"

"Silence!" Mrs. Atterbury dominated him and after a confused murmur
from which not a separate word could be gleaned another door closed and
the hysterical sobs of Louise Dana were hushed.

What had happened to bring that woman in terror to the house? For it
was mortal terror which had distorted her face as she passed the window
and had rung in her desperate cry. She had come for help, but what
help could she find there? Betty remembered her single meeting with
the florid middle-aged man whose eyes were lined with weariness and
dissipation. What had he "caught," or was it that he himself had been
caught in some difficulty?

For half an hour Betty restlessly paced the library, fearing to
venture forth lest she be suspected of eavesdropping yet longing to
escape to her own room. The hum of a motor drew her to the window, and
she reached it in time to see the familiar bizarre stripes of Mrs.
Atterbury's own car whirl past and down the drive, with a fleeting
glimpse of a golden head within it. Whatever her trouble, the woman had
not remained to add its shadow to those already clustering about the
household.

It was with somewhat of a shock that Betty turned to find her employer
standing on the threshold.

"Yes, she has gone." Mrs. Atterbury nodded, following the girl's
glance. "Such a ridiculously nervous, excitable, young woman!
Just fancy, my dear! Mr. Dana--you met him at my last dinner, if
you remember--has been ailing for some days, and this morning the
physician was called and found that he was suffering an acute attack of
diphtheria. It is very sad, of course, although I do not doubt that he
will pull through, but that silly wife of his rushed out of the house
just as she was with only a cloak over her negligee, jumped into a taxi
and came straight to me. Unfortunately, the car broke down a short
distance beyond our gates and what the neighbors will think of her
running about bareheaded I cannot imagine!"

"I am sorry about Mr. Dana," Betty remarked in a lowered tone.
"Diphtheria is very dangerous, isn't it?"

"Not since medicine has become the science that it is today," responded
the other, indifferently. "Mr. Wolvert was quite annoyed. Did you hear
him? He is an arrant coward about contagion, like most men, and he
feared she would give the disease to all of us! It really was stupid of
her, but they are strangers here, you know, and I am practically the
only friend she has. I arranged by 'phone for Mr. Dana's reception in a
private hospital and she has gone back to him with her nerves steadied.
What empty-headed fools most modern women are!"

Her tone was a skillful blend of indignation and amusement but she bent
her eyes upon the girl in a keen, unwavering scrutiny as if to satisfy
herself that the explanation was received in good faith.

Betty smiled back at her steadily.

"People are apt to lose their heads when someone they love is in
trouble, don't you think?" she asked.

"Some people, not those with any self-control. I don't believe that you
would, for instance, my dear. I think that you could be counted upon
to act in any emergency which presented itself with quick decision and
courage if you were sufficiently interested."

Betty flushed but she replied without a tremor.

"Perhaps I should. I hope so. We never can tell until the moment comes."

Luncheon was a constrained meal. Madame Cimmino maintained a
non-committal silence and her nervous fluttering hands were still,
but Wolvert's mood had changed to a mocking frivolity which Betty
had learned to recognize as the reaction of his lawless nature from
any emotional stress. Divining the girl's aversion, he directed his
witticisms at her, and sought in impish perversity to compel her
response. Madame Cimmino listened and watched with sombre eyes and Mrs.
Atterbury flashed an ominous warning to him as they rose.

For the better part of the afternoon her employer kept Betty beside
her, busied with the mending of household linen, while from the music
room came strange intermittent bursts of melody, rippling, elusive,
hauntingly sweet. Long moments of silence would ensue and then a
thunderous crash of chords as if in very fury the musician sought to
smother the softer, tenderer strain.

Betty was fascinated in spite of herself. It was as though the man's
inmost soul were revealed racked with the storm of his passions yet
alluring in its reckless gay abandon. A dangerous man to himself as
well as to others she felt, and to her own heart there came again that
thrill of fear.

When she descended the stairs at dusk, she found Wolvert standing
before the great hearth in the hall staring moodily into the flames.
She would have passed him with a mere nod, but he stepped forward
impulsively.

"Where have you been hiding yourself since lunch? I looked for you in
every corner, but you had vanished."

"For me?" Betty paused in unguarded surprise.

"For you, mademoiselle!" he mimicked her slyly. "Why will you not be
kind and talk to me? I know that you disapprove of me most heartily,
but you have promised to be friendly and I am bored with my own
exclusive society. Come and sit here and tell me what goes on behind
those grave, wise, young eyes of yours."

He pushed a chair forward coaxingly but she shook her head.

"I--I have a message for Welch--" she began.

"A plague take Welch!" Wolvert interrupted. "In all this great house,
where no one ever does anything and nothing ever happens, must you
alone be always busy, you who alone are worth talking to? You could
tell me much, if you would."

There was a note of studied intent in his tone which held her as much
as the choice of phrase piqued her curiosity.

"What do you mean, Mr. Wolvert? What could I tell you?"

He shrugged, laughing lightly.

"Why you are always so still, for one thing, like a little mouse. Your
silence intrigues me. Why your glance is always so distrait as if
you were listening to a far-off voice." He knelt upon the chair his
arms folded across its back and brought his dark face close to hers.
"Perhaps you will tell me also why your smile is so sad and so bitter.
What has life taught you, Little Mouse?"

"To keep my own counsel, Mr. Wolvert." Betty retreated a step or two,
but her eyes met his gravely. "To walk warily, and to do my appointed
work."

"That is a wise creed." He seemed to muse aloud. "But is this your
appointed work? To write at another's dictation, to fetch and carry,
to serve and wait and to be finally dismissed! You are so demure, so
docile, so perfectly in the picture, that I sometimes wonder if you are
not playing a part."

He paused and she waited breathlessly seeking to read in his sardonic
smile how much of serious purpose lay behind the facetious drawl.

"Your work is still new to you, but are you content?" He rose and
strode around the chair to face her. His manner had changed and the
words fell in a rapid, insistent undertone from his lips. "Will you
be satisfied always to stay in the background, to occupy the extra
chair, to be commanded when you might command? You have too much
intelligence to be without ambition, too much common sense to work for
a mere pittance when you might share, too much personality to remain a
nonentity. You are quick-witted and discreet, you would go far if you
were shown the way, and I----"

"Jack!" Madame Cimmino's querulous voice sounded from the stairs, and
Betty shrank guiltily. Wolvert straightened and uttered an oath beneath
his breath, but the next instant the little mocking smile was curling
about his lips.

"Ah, Speranza! Now that I have ceased torturing the piano, you come
forth from your refuge! I have been trying to beguile Miss Shaw from
her duty and succeeded only in boring her. Come down and tell me how
you liked my concerto; you must have heard it for I thundered it to the
gods."

"Miss Shaw does not look bored." Madame Cimmino flashed a look of
unconcealed hostility at the girl, her usually dull eyes snapping fire.
"Marcia has sent me for you. She is in her private sitting-room."

"At your service, Madame." He shrugged, glanced at Betty from beneath
lowered lids and bounded lightly up the stair. Midway he passed the
woman and she caught his arm, murmuring something in a staccato patter
of Italian. He shook himself free and laughing vanished around the
gallery overhead.

"Will you be satisfied always to be commanded when you might command?"
His words still rang in Betty's ears and his dark face, sinister and
insurgent rose before her mental vision. Had he not spoken as much to
himself as to her? He, too, appeared to be at Mrs. Atterbury's command
and the girl recalled his half-cringing defiance in that secret quarrel
of the previous evening. Was he contemplating revolt?

All at once she was aware that Madame Cimmino stood staring with
insolent hauteur into her face.

"I must find Welch; I have a message for him." She stammered and was
turning away when the other woman detained her with a gesture.

"Surely a further delay will make but little difference, Miss Shaw."
Her tones were silky. "There is something I wish to say to you and you
would do well to listen to me. You are clever even for an American
young girl, but you rely too much upon your ability to take care of
yourself. For your own good I speak; do not try to play with Jack
Wolvert."

"I don't understand you, Madame," Betty said coldly. "What have I to do
with any guest of Mrs. Atterbury?"

"What indeed?" The woman came close and thrust her sallow pointed chin
forward. "Do you think I have no eyes, that I have not seen your sly
crude efforts to engage his attention? _Mille tonneres!_ You are but a
conceited, over confident child! Your very gaucherie may amuse him for
the moment but you could not hold him a day. Do I not know him? Have
I not studied his every mood these many years? Could you think in the
insolence of your youth to take him from me?"

"You are mistaken, Madame." The girl spoke in quiet control, but she
met the snakelike glitter in the other's eyes with an answering gleam.
"I have no interest whatever in Mr. Wolvert and his inclinations and
prejudices are alike of no moment to me. In any case I am accountable
to my employer alone for my conduct and I have received no complaint
from Mrs. Atterbury. Let me pass, please."

"Then I warn you!" Madame Cimmino turned livid. "You are treading
on dangerous ground, more dangerous than you know. Keep your silly
schoolgirl wiles for others, but leave Jack Wolvert to me or I will
make you wish that the earth had opened and engulfed you before you
crossed my path!"

Betty smiled.

"Your threats do not interest me, Madame Cimmino. I shall accept
censure only from Mrs. Atterbury, and I beg that you will go to her. I
really cannot listen any longer to these unfounded accusations."

She turned and left the other inarticulate with rage. Her own heart
was filled with a dull ache of resentment, not against the hysterical
virago and her absurd charge, but against the perverse fate which
through no act or fault of hers, seemed rearing difficulty after
difficulty in the way of her purpose. She did not underestimate the
intelligence of Wolvert or the danger of arousing his suspicions, while
she realized that the jealous animosity of Madame Cimmino might at any
moment precipitate a crisis. She must walk warily, indeed.

Her message delivered to Welch, she ascended the back stairs to avoid
a second encounter with the woman who had become her enemy, and was
rounding the gallery shadowed in the gathering dusk, when a blotch of
white lying against the baseboard caught her eye.

It was a folded paper, crumpled in the center and even before she
opened it, a premonition warned her of its contents. The cipher letter!
The significant words leaped out at her anew from the irrelevancies
with which they were cloaked and on a swift impulse she thrust the
letter into her breast.

Late that night when all was still Betty crept from her room and down
the stairs like an unquiet wraith intent upon the secret motive which
actuated her, yet on her guard for the slightest warning of discovery.

The darting ray from her electric torch played before her, dancing in a
diminutive circle of light upon the wall and piercing the almost opaque
darkness like a flash of forked lightning. The midnight silence was
oppressive in its intensity and for the first time there seemed to be a
brooding menace in the soundless void.

The girl's nerves were tingling and the torch wavered fitfully in her
hand. A hallucination, vague but terrible, took possession of her
that something unnameable lurked in the shadows watching, crouched to
spring. In vain she summoned her resolute will to her aid, lashing
herself with scorn for her weakness. A swift unreasoning fear clutched
her by the throat and her trembling limbs all but refused her support.

Doggedly she forced herself to go on but the distance from stair foot
to library door seemed interminable and when she had traversed it Betty
paused, an unexplainable reluctance staying her hand upon the knob.

At length she set her teeth and with an impatient jerk opened the door.
Her torch light circled about the familiar room, the desk with its
orderly array of papers, the center table, the bookcases--

Her breath caught in a strangling gasp. One bookcase was swinging
loosely on its secret hinge and the safe in the aperture behind was
open, a handful of documents scattered upon the floor.

Slowly her light travelled along the wall creeping ever nearer and
nearer to the hearth. The brass andirons glittered dazzlingly from the
darkness and the outline of a massive chair leaped into prominence.
Something lay relaxed upon its arm, and the wavering light stopped.

It was a black coatsleeve, motionless but seemingly vibrant with life
and from it protruded a pallid hand shapely and slender, its tapering
fingers loosely extended.

There was a roaring as of many waters in Betty's ears and her heart
seemed to have ceased to beat, but mechanically she trained the light
upward. Jack Wolvert's face, diabolic in triumph, leered at her.




                              CHAPTER XI.

                           _The Fourth Pew._


For a long moment Betty stood transfixed with the electric torch rigid
in her hand and her eyes held by the insolent challenging ones so near
hers. Then with an almost physical effort she wrenched her gaze away
just as his cynical voice, drawling no longer, but keen with malign
exultation, cut the silence like a knife thrust.

"So, Little Mouse! You venture forth from your hiding place at night
when all are sleeping, to nibble at forbidden dainties, eh?"

He sprang from his chair with the agility of a cat and seized her wrist
in a viselike grip which forced her tortured fingers to relax their
hold and the torch clattered to the hearth. His hot breath, laden with
the fumes of wine, played upon her neck, and she felt, rather than
realized, the menace in his low, breathed words.

"I thought there was a traitor in camp! Who sent you here to spy upon
us, girl? In whose pay are you? Quick, or I'll--"

"I don't know what you mean!" Betty whimpered into the darkness. "Let
me go, you are hurting me, Mr. Wolvert! I--I--could not sleep, I came
down for a book I left unfinished and you frightened me!"

"That doesn't go; it's too thin!" he growled harshly. "Young ladies
don't prowl about at night with electric torches for any innocent
purpose. What's the lay?"

"I don't understand!" Betty reeled against him, then shrank away. "I--I
feel faint--"

His grip insensibly relaxed and the girl, seizing her opportunity,
tore herself from his grasp and vanished into the black void of the
hall. She could hear the crash of the massive chair behind her as he
overturned it in his stumbling pursuit and a rumble of oaths followed
her up the stair. Miraculously she cleared every obstacle and her alert
brain out-paced her flying feet. One desperate move was left her to
turn certain exposure into possible victory. Its failure could not
increase the peril of her present position and success would serve to
entrench her more firmly in the confidence of the woman who would be
her judge.

She groped her way noiselessly to her own door, found the switch in the
wall and flooded the room with light. A pink boudoir candle stood upon
her dressing-table and seizing it she thrust it into the live coals in
the grate until it was partly consumed. Then shielding its flickering
flame, she went straight to her employer's door and knocked boldly.

A murmur responded, a light flared up within and Mrs. Atterbury stood
on the threshold. In her white robe with her long, dusky hair in two
heavy plaits upon her shoulders and her waxen expressionless face, she
might have been an effigy taken from some ancient place of worship; all
but her eyes which gleamed like banked fires suddenly revealed.

"What is it?" she asked calmly. "You are not well, my dear?"

"Oh, it isn't that. I am quite well, but I thought you would wish to
know that your safe is open downstairs," Betty whispered.

"My safe!" Mrs. Atterbury fell back a step and her pale face grayed.

"Yes, the one in the library. I suppose it is all right, as Mr. Wolvert
is there, but I felt that I could not sleep without telling you."

"And what were you doing in the library at this hour?" The woman's
scrutiny fairly burned into Betty's brain, but her wide ingenuous eyes
did not flinch nor her voice falter.

"I was restless and wakeful and I remembered a book I had left there,
so I lighted my candle and went down. Everything was dark, but when I
opened the library door I saw a man with an electric torch in his hand.
He sprang forward and seized me and I thought it must be a burglar,
until he spoke and I recognized Mr. Wolvert's voice. The safe was open
and papers all scattered about, and somehow his manner frightened me.
I--I thought I had better come straight to you."

"An electric torch?" Mrs. Atterbury repeated and paused, her lips
pursed thoughtfully. Betty waited in an agony of suspense. Would the
slender thread of her fabrication bear the weight of this woman's
keen analysis or would it snap beneath her swift inexorable judgment?
Freedom, perhaps life itself, hung upon the issue.

"You did the proper thing, my dear, and I am very glad that I can
rely on you to let me know at once if anything seems wrong in the
household." Mrs. Atterbury's smile announced the verdict. "But in this
instance, everything is quite all right. Mr. Wolvert was going over
some private accounts for me at my request, and doubtless you startled
him by your sudden appearance as much as his presence surprised you."

"I am sorry I disturbed you--" Betty began in well-simulated
contrition, but the other stopped her with a gesture.

"You did not, but in any case it would have been your duty, my dear.
However, I do not approve of your going about the house so late at
night, for Welch has an inordinate apprehension of burglars and is
likely to blaze away promiscuously with his revolver if he hears any
untoward sound. Be careful in future. And now good night, Betty, and
thank you."

The reaction from the strain through which she had passed was so great
that the girl all but collapsed when her own door had been closed once
more behind her. She had forestalled Wolvert's betrayal, but would
her version of the evening's encounter prevail against his narration,
bearing as it must the stamp of truth?

Then another contingency presented itself to her mind. What if
Wolvert's visit to the library had been, like her own, a surreptitious
one? She remembered his significant phrase of the afternoon: "You
have too much common sense to work for a mere pittance when you might
share." She had fancied then that he was but voicing his own inmost
thought, the aftermath of his open rebellion which Mrs. Atterbury had
so imperiously quelled on the previous night. Had he turned traitor
to the mysterious compact that bound him and all of their circle in a
sinister secret alliance? Had she, by this betrayal, made of him an
implacable enemy? Even if she had succeeded in lulling her employer's
possible suspicion, her presence in the library had disclosed her true
position in the household to Wolvert and she realized that a powerful
weapon lay within his reach if it were to be war to the knife between
them.

To her amazement, the matter was not again referred to in the days that
immediately ensued and if Wolvert had gone to Mrs. Atterbury with his
tale, or learned of the girl's disclosure, he gave no sign. While he
did not openly avoid her, he made no effort to arrange a tête-à-tête,
only his gaze burning with a strange intensity of questioning, filled
her with troubled unrest.

Madame Cimmino treated the girl with frigid indifference, but
unconsciously played into her hands by constant demands upon Wolvert's
time and attention.

Mrs. Atterbury's manner did not betray an iota of change and the days
followed one another in an unbroken routine until the following Sunday,
when there occurred an event which plunged Betty deeper than ever into
the toils of difficulty and danger.

The breakfast gong, sounding a full hour earlier than usual, aroused
the girl from slumber and she descended to find Mrs. Atterbury already
at the table, the coffee urn bubbling at her elbow.

"My dear, I am going to send you to church this morning," she began,
nodding as Betty lifted inquiring eyes to hers. "It is another letter
which I wish you to obtain from one of our outstanding members, and he
has arranged to meet you there. You may object to making use of a house
of worship for a mundane transaction, even though the cause be a worthy
one, but the better the day, the better the deed, you know."

"I have no scruples." Betty smiled slightly. "It will be interesting to
see what the churches here are like; I have not attended service since
coming East."

"St. Jude's is one of the most prominent in the city. The minister is
noted and the congregation representative of the best society. I am not
a church-goer myself, as you have seen, but laziness, not prejudice,
is responsible for my dereliction. You won't be bored, I promise you,
and the incidental errand will not be complicated by any such annoying
misunderstanding as on the last occasion. You will enter by the door
leading to the center aisle and tell the usher that you wish to be
placed in the fourth pew from the back of the church on the right as
you face the altar. Be careful of this, as the location is of the
utmost importance. Seat yourself at the end of the pew next the aisle
and pay no attention to anyone. When an envelope is presented to you,
no matter in what manner or from what quarter, accept it without a word
and at the conclusion of the service bring it home to me."

"I shall remember, the fourth pew from the back," Betty repeated. "The
service commences at eleven, does it not?"

"Yes. The car will be here for you at a quarter before the hour, but it
will be necessary for you to return without it. However, I will direct
you explicitly and you will be in no danger of losing your way a second
time. Come to me when you are ready."

Betty's pulse quickened in spite of her inward reluctance to perform
the task before her. That it had been given her, proved to her own
satisfaction that her daring move on the night of her discovery had
really achieved the result she had hoped for, and that she was more
firmly established than ever in her employer's confidence.

Attired in the gray suit and silvery furs, she presented herself for
Mrs. Atterbury's final instructions, and the latter regarded with
approval her dainty appearance and unveiled face.

"You have determined like a sensible girl to overcome that absurd
self-consciousness about your birthmark? That is well." She placed an
ivory-bound prayer book in the girl's hands. "This adds the finishing
touch to your costume, my dear. You look quite like a modern Puritan.
Now as to the directions for finding your way home. St. Jude's is on
the corner of Carlton Avenue and Brinsley Square. Walk five blocks
north and two east and you will come to the terminus of the Highmount
trolley line. Take a green car and ride to Wellesley Place. There you
can connect with a red bus which will drop you three blocks from the
corner here, at the same spot you alighted when returning from Madame
Cimmino's apartment. Do you think you will be able to remember?"

"I think so," Betty replied slowly. "About the letter, Mrs. Atterbury;
it makes no difference who offers it to me in this instance, I am to
accept it without question?"

"Certainly. There will be no difficulty about that. There is the car,
now. Remember, Betty, the fourth pew."

The girl nodded reassuringly and started upon her way. To her relief,
there had been no sign of either of the house guests that morning and
it was with freer breath that she found herself departing even for an
hour from their vicinity. The gloom and apprehension which enveloped
her and insensibly sapped her nerves in the environment of mystery
and repression within the house, lifted as soon as she was beyond the
gates, although a little frown gathered upon her brow.

Beneath the lamp-post stood the same idly-lounging figure she had
seen on the day of her unexpected encounter with Herbert Ross, and he
peered keenly into the limousine as it whirled by, making no attempt to
cloak his eager interest. Whatever the motive of his protracted vigil,
his presence alone indicated that it had not yet borne result, yet it
served as a goad to her own secret intent.

A short, shrill whistle sounded upon the air as the car rounded the
corner, but Betty was only subconsciously aware of it, so preoccupied
was she with her own thoughts. Since the night of her encounter with
Wolvert in the library and Mrs. Atterbury's adroitly conveyed command
that she indulge in no future nocturnal wanderings, she had not
ventured to leave her room in the small hours, but now the realization
came to her that if she were not to be forestalled she must risk all.

The car took its place in the decorous line and Betty alighted before
the doors of the imposing edifice, mingling with the brilliant
stream which eddied about the vestibule. The measured chant of the
processional welled forth when the inner door was opened and the
girl waited until the others had preceded her to their places before
venturing into the nave.

A tall, tow-haired usher, very young and very self-important, bowed
stiffly and turned to conduct her down the aisle, when she touched his
arm and whispered:

"The fourth pew on the right, please, if it is vacant. I have a
particular reason for wishing to occupy that seat."

Betty fancied that his expression changed; it was patent, at any rate,
that he regarded her curiously, although he responded with ready
courtesy:

"Certainly, madam. The rear pews are all reserved for strangers."

She slipped into the pew designated and knelt for a moment in silent
prayer before taking her seat. Her mind was filled with unrest but the
quiet and solemn peace which pervaded the atmosphere was like balm
upon her troubled spirit and insensibly she relaxed beneath its gentle
influence.

The vaulted arches high above, shadowy and vague in the half-light,
rang with the clear, swelling notes of the white-robed choir which
she could glimpse above the sea of heads before her; and when their
echo had died away, the sonorous well-rounded tones from the pulpit
fell with soothing monotony upon her ear, lulling her to a temporary
forgetfulness of her errand.

Not for long, however. A late comer, a woman, was ushered into the
pew beside her and Betty's drugged senses awoke to instant alertness.
She had been given no hint as to what manner of person would keep the
strange appointment with her and no one could so unobtrusively pass an
envelope to her as an occupant of the same pew.

She darted a furtive glance at her unknown companion, but could form no
conclusion. The woman was of middle-age, neatly but plainly dressed in
contrast with the brilliant assemblage about her, and her comely serene
face bore no indication of one engaged upon a secret mission.

The seat behind Betty was occupied by a governess and three restive
children; that before her contained two elderly ladies, an anæmic youth
and a bent old man, his white head nodding above a gold-topped cane.
Surely none of these could have entered the church with an ulterior
motive.

Betty had been placed so that the left side of her face was turned to
the aisle and the birthmark prominently visible. She realized that this
must have been planned to proclaim her identity, but the woman seated
beside her politely ignored her existence and as the lengthy sermon
drew to a close, the girl was forced to conclude that the unknown
associate in the transaction would approach her on the way out.

A hymn, a prayer, and then from the pulpit the familiar: "Let your
light so shine before men--" proclaimed the collection. The opening
notes of the offertory sounded from the choir and Betty abstracted some
money from her purse and idly watched the approach of the smug-faced
rotund little man who minced down the aisle, pausing at each pew to
extend apologetically his felt-lined silver salver.

She heard the rustle of banknotes and clink of coins as he drew nearer,
and when he had reached the pew immediately in front of her, Betty saw
that the salver was heaped high with offerings.

The bearer paused over long and she glanced up to find that his small
pouched eyes were fixed as though fascinated upon her face. A swift
forewarning of the truth darted across her mind, even before she
observed that with surprising dexterity he had whipped from his pocket
of his frock coat an envelope which he laid upon the pile of currency.

Two short strides brought him to her side and he thrust the salver
nervously before her. She had no need to glance again into his face
to confirm her thought for upon the envelope had been scrawled an
odd, fantastic mark, meaningless to others but of unmistakable
significance to her. It was the outline of an irregular formless blotch
with five curving tentacles reaching out from it; a crudely sketched
representation of the scar upon her cheek!

With a hot flush mounting to her brow, Betty dropped her offering upon
the salver and deftly palmed the envelope, not daring to raise her
eyes. The woman beside her was intently fumbling in her purse and the
swift furtive movement of the girl had been unobserved.

The bearer of the salver emitted a gasping breath that was almost a
snort, and as the stranger's bank-note was added to the rest he bowed
and passed on with obvious relief to the next pew.

Wedging the envelope between the pages of her prayer book, Betty
watched as the smug-faced man joined his colleague who had passed down
the opposite row and marched beside him with grave dignity back to the
altar rail. The solemnity, the calm spiritual peace had vanished for
the girl and the warm, incense-laden air stifled her as the recessional
died away in the dim recesses of the vestry, and she knelt mechanically
for the final prayer.

The slow, crowded egress from the edifice tortured her beyond measure
and when at length she stood in the dazzling sunshine on the steps she
drew a deep breath of profound relief.

It was a blustery day and the treacherous March wind caught her roughly
in its grasp, but she faced it boldly as though welcoming the physical
exertion.

Amazement at the daring manner in which the missive had been placed in
her hands had momentarily numbed her faculties. Its donor was the last
person from whom she would have expected to receive it. His strutting
importance, his bland, patronizing air of conscious dignity and social
eminence accorded ill with her preconceived idea of the type of person
she would meet.

His predecessors passed in quick, mental review before her; the
weak-chinned, downy-mustached scion of society in the opera box, the
timorous, fragile, exquisite lady with the orchids, and now this
rotund, pragmatical pillar of the church! What mysterious bond held
these three, widely diversified as they were, in a common fellowship
with Mrs. Atterbury and her coterie?

So absorbed was she in her reflections that Betty gave only a passing
glance at a man who had elbowed his way through the throng at the
church steps and in apparent inadvertence followed her as she walked
north from Brinsley square and turned eastward in her footsteps. She
was vaguely aware that someone boarded the Highmount car when she
did, alighting behind her at Wellesley Place. Ignorant of the city
as she had claimed to be, she could not fail in the realization that
the directions given her to follow were curiously roundabout ones and
had taken her several unnecessary miles out of her way. Why had Mrs.
Atterbury chosen this route for her?

Her mind was filled with this new problem and she did not observe her
pursuer enter a taxicab as she boarded a red bus. It was only when she
noted that the smaller vehicle deliberately stalked the larger, halting
when the bus stopped and following it doggedly through the mazes of
Sunday traffic, that her interest was aroused, and as one after another
of the passengers descended until she was left in sole possession of
the conveyance and still the taxi cab clung tenaciously behind, a
suspicion came to her that she might be the subject of espionage.

A memory came to her of the circuitous route followed by the limousine
in bringing her home from the Café de Luxe. Could the motive have been
to elude pursuit? Had the same purpose prevailed in Mrs. Atterbury's
mind when she issued these devious directions for her messenger's
return?

Betty alighted at her corner and walked swiftly off toward the North
Drive without a backward glance, but her acute ear told her that the
taxicab had turned and was trailing slowly in her wake.

Deliberately she slackened her pace and the machine stopped, hastening
on she heard it start again. The first cross street was but a few yards
away, and on a sudden inspiration Betty started to run, turning the
corner sharply, and darting into a narrow tradesman's alley between two
houses. There she crouched motionless while the taxicab veered around
the corner, stopped with a harsh grating of brakes and then chugged
uncertainly on and out of sight.

Betty's face was scarlet, and her eyes ablaze, but her heart was turned
to lead within her breast, for her pursuer had leaned for an instant
from the cab window and she had recognized the face of Herbert Ross.




                             CHAPTER XII.

                       _The Fangs of the Wolf._


"Misfortune seems to be treading upon the heels of our friends more
relentlessly this season than before." Doctor Bayard looked up from
his salad with a sympathetic sigh. "Our poor dear Professor dying in
Chicago, Mortimer dangerously ill, and yet another gone down under the
strain of financial worries and cares."

Betty glanced quickly at his grave ascetic face crowned with its wealth
of snowy hair and then her eyes wandered to her employer.

Mrs. Atterbury was sitting very straight in her chair, her expression
as immobile as ever, but the girl fancied that a shade of weariness
had clouded the glitter of the keen, black eyes and the fine lines had
deepened about the firm, chiselled lips.

"Professor Blythe will recover." There was a finality in her tone which
brooked no argument. "He has been in a far more critical condition than
this and regained his health almost miraculously."

"But consider the attendant circumstances, my dear Marcia." Wolvert's
voice, coolly ironical, intervened. "The previous illnesses must have
weakened his constitution, and--er--complications may set in at any
time."

"As a diagnostician, Jack, let me remind you that your conclusions have
been erroneous more than once." Mrs. Atterbury raised her eyebrows
significantly. "As for Mortie Dana, we have every reason to believe
that he will pull through. The doctor's report is highly satisfactory,
although of course he is likely to be quarantined for some time to
come."

"That would seem to be a foregone conclusion." Wolvert was in no wise
abashed by the snubbing he had received. "Louise is in no danger of
contagion, however, and the change of air will do her good."

Betty could not repress a little gleam of interest. She had wondered
why Mrs. Dana did not come again to the house, but had not previously
heard of her departure from town.

"Personally, I shall be pleased if she remains away indefinitely."
Madame Cimmino shrugged. "She gets upon one's nerves, with her
hysterics. One never knows when she may make a scene."

"To say nothing of the possibility of contagion--" Wolvert caught his
hostess' eye and turned in obvious haste to Doctor Bayard. "But of whom
were you speaking just now, Doctor, who has gone to pieces?"

The doctor held his wineglass up to the light and gazed into its amber
depths reflectively as he replies.

"My old friend--Cote. I had heard depressing reports of his mental
condition, but I would not believe them until I had investigated
personally." He shook his venerable head. "I returned only a few days
ago from a visit to him and I seriously fear that his usefulness is
passed. He is unable to handle his financial affairs and his permanent
retirement is all that can be looked for."

"But surely the others in his firm will assume his obligations!"
Wolvert's bantering tone had sharpened. "It is almost as vital to them
that his affairs should be straightened out as it was to him. They must
be made to understand the situation."

"You talk like a child!" exclaimed Madame Cimmino. "What is to
prevent them from going into voluntary bankruptcy, now that he is
incapacitated? Others have done that before, when driven to the wall."

Betty sat with downcast eyes and a politely detached air but her hands
were clenched tightly in her lap and her breath came quickly. If those
about her at the luncheon table remembered her presence they must have
believed their conversation unintelligible to her, yet every word was
fraught with meaning, and she waited with leaping pulses for the next
disclosure.

"That would scarcely be possible in this instance." There was an
implacable note in the old Doctor's measured tones. "His is not a
corporation, you know; he has one silent partner who without doubt
will carry out the contract entered into by my friend when he learns of
it. Unfortunately, it will be necessary to locate this partner first
and I have not the address."

"That can be arranged." Mrs. Atterbury rose. "Jack, come and play the
new concerto for Doctor Bayard."

Betty had been granted permission to go out for an hour but her heart
was heavy as she dressed. The discovery of the previous day that the
supposed museum director was shadowing her had come with a shock which
had benumbed her brain, but the reaction aroused all her faculties to
the alert against this new threatened danger. Through the long hours of
the night she lay in silent combat between the dictates of common sense
and a strange, incomprehensible influence which sought to undermine her
surer judgment and defy the evidence of her reason.

Herbert Ross a spy! It was unthinkable! His merry, candid eyes, his
grave sympathetic manner, the latent boyishness and straightforward
simplicity--all belied the possibility of such a role, and yet her
coolly analytical mind forced her to the contemplation of hitherto
unconsidered trifles which, viewed in the light of her discovery,
assumed new and alarming proportions.

His confessed ignorance of Egyptiana in contradistinction to his avowed
position of museum official; the readiness with which he had assigned
the work of translation to her with no assurance of her qualifications,
seeking only to learn her address; the personal questions he had later
plied her with and his discovery that she no longer resided at the
boarding house she had claimed as her home, all puzzled her and seemed
to point at some ulterior motive in his conduct.

Could the advertisement itself have been a bait to draw her into
his net? If so, from whom could he have learned of her penchant for
Egyptology?

The grim, old woman whose unexpected presence in the neighborhood
had so disconcerted her flashed across Betty's thoughts. Was Ross in
her employ or was he in turn making a tool of the woman, using her
knowledge to aid in snaring his prey for other and more desperate
opponents?

Reason won in the unequal contest with the emotion which she could not
name, and instinct warned her that no alternative remained but to sever
all relations with the young man who had occupied her thoughts more
than she realized until the decisive moment came.

With the completed translation secreted in her muff, she let herself
out of the side door and proceeded to the gates from whence she chose
a widely deviating course to the museum. In the maze of suspicion
and distrust through which she walked she must guard herself on all
sides and the knowledge that she might be trailed from the house at
Wolvert's instigation or perhaps by the man on his own initiative led
her to exercise all precaution.

Mr. Ross was absent when she reached the museum and to her inward
dismay she was ushered into the study of Professor Carmody. The
shrivelled little man greeted her with flattering warmth and reviewed
the inscription from the Stele of Abu in glowing terms, but she felt
his nearsighted eyes upon her in recurring perplexity and doubt and she
longed to bring the interview to an end.

The tinkle of a telephone in an adjoining office interrupted her
tentative move of departure and Professor Carmody returned from it
rubbing his withered hands in obvious relief.

"That was our young friend, Ross," he announced in high feather. "He
will be here directly and he begs that you will wait. In the meantime,
I have here a genuine papyrus of rare antiquity, presented to me by
Professor Mallory himself. It dates from the pre-dynastic period and
some of the symbols, as you see, are Sammarian in form."

"But it has been restored!" Betty cried protestingly, resentment of
the sacrilege overruling her caution. "What a pity! The word 'suten'
or king, has been inserted here where the text would clearly indicate
'priest' and the whole tenor of the theme is changed. Surely Professor
Mallory did not sanction such a desecration!"

"Then you have seen the papyrus before?" Professor Carmody spoke in
quiet satisfaction as if a mooted question had been settled in his own
mind. "I was under the impression that I had met you in Cairo, but your
name had escaped me. You know the great man himself?"

"No. I studied with an associate of his, in this country," Betty
stammered desperately. "I have never been in Cairo and I do not know
Professor Mallory, but I have seen a copy of the papyrus before this
attempt was made to restore it."

"I myself presented it to the museum here, and the restoration was
done at another's suggestion, overruling my objection." The professor
returned the ancient scroll to its glass case as he added, dryly: "I
was not aware that a copy was in existence."

Betty writhed, but resolutely turned the conversation to some
newly-discovered monoliths which had created a mild sensation in
archeological circles, and the arrival of Ross on the heels of his
message shortly brought the disquieting interview to a close.

The young man ushered Betty into his private office, but she declined
the chair he indicated and stood before him with her grave eyes
fastened upon his in cold disdain.

"There really was no need of my waiting to see you, Mr. Ross," she
observed. "The translation is finished and approved by Professor
Carmody and the matter is closed."

"I don't understand!" he exclaimed in haste, adding lamely: "I have
other work for you, you know. There is more translating to be done--"

Betty shook her head decisively.

"I shall undertake no more at present." There was finality in her tone,
and her expression had hardened. "As I have explained, my time is not
at my own disposal and I am late now for an engagement. If you will
permit me--"

"But surely you will not relinquish the work without a reason! If your
other duties interfere, perhaps some arrangement can be made--"

"My other duties concern no one but myself!" Betty retorted, in a flash
of temper which instantly subsided. "I do not wish, for reasons of my
own, to continue with this work and nothing further remains to be said.
Good afternoon, Mr. Ross."

"Wait, please." His tone was quiet, but there was a compelling quality
in it which halted Betty against her will. "Something has occurred to
annoy you and make the work distasteful. Won't you tell me what it is
that I may take steps to remedy it? Surely you owe me an explanation."

"The work is not distasteful; it has merely ceased to interest me. In
undertaking it I assumed no obligations to continue it indefinitely,
Mr. Ross, and I do not feel that any explanation is due from me."

"Is it that meddling old fool Carmody?" Ross demanded. "Has he offended
you in any way?"

"By no means. I am not offended in the least, I have simply changed my
mind. My secretarial work is sufficient occupation."

"But you were so absorbed, so enthusiastic about the translation." His
eyes narrowed and he leaned forward. "I cannot believe that it has
ceased to interest you; it must be more suitable for a young woman of
your attainments, more congenial than the task to which you have been
assigned."

There was no mistaking the deliberate intent in his tone and Betty
countered swiftly.

"Mr. Ross, may I ask why you are so solicitous in this matter? On
my last interview with you, you asked me many irrelevant and highly
personal questions. I responded to your advertisement, I came in good
faith to accept the work if it were offered me. I did not anticipate a
cross-examination, or interference with my private affairs." Resentment
was fast getting the better of her discretion and she spoke with all
the bitterness of a lost illusion. "I might ask you in turn how long
you have been officially connected with this museum, and whether that
advertisement was really inserted in good faith or with an ulterior
motive. I would demand also to know why you have been following me
about the streets, but the motive for your annoyance does not interest
me. I decline absolutely to have anything further to do with this
work, and I must request that you let me go at once."

Herbert Ross sprang from his chair and placed himself between her and
the door.

"Miss Shaw, you shall not leave until one thing is plain to you. I
have tried to be your friend. You have repelled every overture from
me, but believe it or not as you please, my only desire is to protect
you. If I have followed you in the street, it was from a motive far
removed from any intention to annoy you." The young man, too, seemed in
danger of losing his self-control. His face flushed and his voice grew
hoarse. "Suppose I were to tell you that I have followed you because
I could not help myself, because in spite of appearances, in spite of
my certain knowledge, I believe in you, I want your friendship, your
confidence, your--your liking--"

"I cannot suppose you would venture such an assertion, Mr. Ross; you
are far too shrewd to insult my intelligence." Betty made as if to pass
him but he suddenly laid his hands upon her shoulders and looked deep
into her eyes.

"Will you at least try to believe this? I mean to be your friend
whether you desire it or not. If the time ever comes when you need the
help of a man, call me up here. Professor Carmody can reach me, and you
will find me at your side."

His hands fell and he walked swiftly to the window where he stood with
his shoulders turned to her and his head bowed.

Betty regarded him thoughtfully, a little soft gleam of compunction
appearing unbidden in her eyes. She opened her lips to speak, but
paused uncertainly and in another moment she had slipped silently from
the room.

She stumbled down the steps of the museum and entered the park,
her feet mechanically seeking the right path. The naked trees and
clustering skeletons of shrubbery upon the brown patches of lawn were
blurred and shapeless before her and she seemed to see again the face
of Herbert Ross as he wistfully proffered his friendship, the stab of
pain in his clear eyes when she refused it.

Once she hesitated and turned as if to go back, but the vague impulse
died and she pressed resolutely on. He had found her by a trick, a
mere subterfuge; perhaps his offer of friendship was another trap to
gain her confidence now. He had sought her out, followed her, spied
upon her, and for what purpose than to serve those who were working
against her, who might even now be planning a coup which would mean the
demolition of her own hopes and drag her down into the ruins?

Matters were in a state of armed truce now between them. When they met
again--if they met--it must be open war.

Betty had taken no note of distance or direction and she came to a
realization of her surroundings only when the roar of traffic sounded
in her ears, and she found that she had traversed the park and was
within a few blocks of the North Drive. As she hurried homeward she
forced her thoughts resolutely to the future and the work which still
lay to her hand, but the long hours of early evening loomed before
her, robbed of the absorbing study which had proved such a stimulating
relief from the continuous mental strain; and the days to come would
be empty indeed with the budding friendship, which had come to mean so
much to her, brought so swiftly to an end.

She was dispirited, tired in mind and body as she entered the gates
of home, and her feet lagged wearily along the path. The house looked
blank and forbidding, and the wind soughed dismally in the sagging
branches of the trees.

Faintly the high-strung wailing note of a dog's whine reached her and
she remembered her encounter with Demon when first she walked in the
snowy garden. Would the dog know her again, if chance should deliver
her to his mercy?

Memory returned to her also of that other encounter in the same hour
when, unconscious of her presence, Wolvert had passed her place of
concealment as if racing with the very fiends of darkness, cowardly
fear stamped upon every lineament of his dark face. Why had he avoided
her since their mutual surprise meeting in the library? Was he
deliberately evading the issue or delaying it for some sinister purpose
of his own?

She had reached the clump of trees through which the path wound, and
even as her thoughts were centered on Wolvert the man himself stepped
from the tangle of evergreens which had screened her on the former
occasion, and confronted her. It was evident from his smile and air
of easy assurance that he had lain in wait for her, and Betty's first
feeling of dismay was superseded by a sensation of relief that the
long anticipated moment had arrived and the contest between them at
immediate issue.

"You have been long upon your foraging expedition, Little Mouse, and
you have strayed far from your hiding place." He laid his hand upon
her arm in an insolent assumption of familiarity. "Not so fast, my
dear. The mistress you serve so conscientiously is not in need of your
presence and the time has come for an understanding between us."

"I have nothing to say to you, Mr. Wolvert." She met his sneering smile
with one of calm defiance. "I think we understand each other fairly
well."

"Perhaps, but the knowledge has not yet accrued to our mutual
advantage. We have been working at cross purposes and that means
disaster. I warned you once that a friend at court is not to be
despised, but as an enemy you would not find it advisable to cross
swords with me. I do not underestimate your pluck and resourcefulness;
sheer admiration for your audacity has stayed my hand against you
so far. Your move in carrying the war into my camp by going to Mrs.
Atterbury with your naïve little story was a bold one. Gad, you even
explained away the evidence against you, the electric torch, better
than I did later, I don't mind confessing; but do you suppose I could
not have smashed your transparent subterfuge to atoms if I had wished?"

"Why did you not, in that case?" Betty asked coolly. "I am not in the
least afraid of you or what you can do. Come now to Mrs. Atterbury
if you care to; I will go with you to face her and she shall choose
between us."

His grip upon her arm tightened.

"Do you think that I am imbecile enough to call your bluff?" he
demanded. "When I find you seriously in my way I shall crush you like
this! Until then, my dear, you will prove mildly amusing. You interest
me as I never thought to be interested again in a woman. Your eyes,
your smile are branded upon my brain even as that brand is upon your
cheek like a hand reaching out for the unattainable. You might set a
man's blood on fire, sear his very soul and drive him to madness, but
you would never bore him. Little, quiet, inscrutable mouse, with you
beside him there is nothing that a man who gambles with life might not
win!"

"You talk in riddles, Mr. Wolvert." Betty disengaged her arm and
stepped back from the savage light in his empassioned eyes. "Your
opinion of me is flattering, but if you are detaining me for further
expression of it, I must beg leave to continue on my way to the house."

"You may go when you have answered one question: what is your game? I
knew from the moment I saw you that you were superior to the position
you chose to occupy, but not until I encountered you in the library did
I guess the truth. How much do you know? Are you a free lance or in
someone's pay?"

"If I had an ulterior motive in entering Mrs. Atterbury's service, is
it likely that I would make a confident of you whether you are her ally
or a traitor?" Betty shrugged. "Your attitude is a matter of absolute
indifference to me; why should I reply to your questions?"

"Because you may find me useful." He came close to her once more. "What
is it you desire within those walls that you court danger to obtain?
Perhaps I can get it for you. What is your purpose? It may be that I
can aid in its accomplishment. Traitor or not, I am at your service!"

"But why?" A swift thrill of fear darted through her, and she glanced
about, but the tall bushes ringed them on all sides and they seemed
as isolated as in a wilderness. "Suppose that another purpose actuated
me than to fulfill the duties for which I was engaged--and I do not
for a moment admit that there is any truth in your wild assertion--why
should you offer me your aid? Why should you, Mrs. Atterbury's guest
and friend, conspire with one you profess to regard as a deceitful and
dishonest servant?"

"Because you have driven me mad!" He seized her, dragging her into a
half-savage embrace. "Because I want you as I've never wanted any other
woman!"

"Let me go!" Betty panted struggling with all her strength, but her
heart sank within her for no help could reach her from the house and
her efforts to free herself were unavailing against the man's brute
grasp.

He laughed exultantly and drew her closer.

"'Little Mouse,' I called you; Little Wild-Cat! But I'll tame you, or
break you with my hands! What I want I take, and you're mine, do you
understand; you're mine!"

All at once a new sound broke upon Betty's ears. The dog's continuous
whine, of which she had been dimly aware like an undercurrent in the
swift torrent of Wolvert's words, had changed suddenly to a deep,
full-throated cry which seemed to her excited fancy to be drawing
nearer and nearer. A swift thought like a prayer mounted in her brain
and by a supreme effort she extricated her head from the stifling folds
of her captor's coat where he had crushed her to his breast.

The cry came again and with it the soft rush of padded feet on moist
yielding ground. Betty drew a deep breath and screamed with all the
power of her pent-up fear.

"Demon! Here! Come here!"

With an oath, Wolvert's arms dropped from about her and he sprang
backward as a huge, dark shape lunged through the undergrowth and
sprang full at his throat. The force of the impact hurled Betty aside
and when she had picked herself up she turned to find Wolvert stretched
upon the ground, the great dog standing over him, with every hair
a-bristle and yellow fangs bared in a snarl, as he hesitated at the
sound of her voice.

"Demon!"

He turned his shaggy head obediently to glance up into her eyes, but
one great paw remained planted upon Wolvert's breast.

"Guard him, Demon! If he moves, take him by the throat!" An
inarticulate murmur issued from the lips of the prostrate man and the
snarl changed to a growl of menace.

"Don't let him get away! Until your master comes. Demon, on guard!"

The dog's eyes answered her and he dropped his out-thrust jaw upon his
paws, within an inch of Wolvert's throat.

Betty turned swiftly and walked off among the trees. As she neared the
house a man came running from the direction of the garage and paused
beside her, touching his cap.

"Excuse me, Miss, but did you see anything of a dog? He's broke loose,
and he's that savage that he may hurt somebody."

Betty smiled and extracted a bill from her purse.

"You will find him in that knoll by the drive. He is standing over Mr.
Wolvert, but he has not hurt him in the least. Understand, no matter
what orders Mr. Wolvert gives, the dog is not to be ill-treated or
punished. Demon and I are old friends and he was protecting me from
annoyance. I called him to my aid. You understand, don't you? I do not
wish to worry Mrs. Atterbury, but if Mr. Wolvert makes any trouble, I
will tell the truth. I can rely on you to see that no harm comes to
Demon?"

"That you can, Miss." The man pocketed his fee with added respect.

"He's no gentleman, that Mr. Wolvert, if you'll excuse me for saying
so, and I'm glad the dog was loose. I'll see that he don't get hurt."

As she let herself in at the side door and mounted the stairs to her
room a heavy sense of foreboding descended upon Betty's spirit. She
had made two powerful enemies in one day, for Herbert Ross, in spite
of his protestations, she felt to be a potential antagonist. Would she
alone be able to stand against them, or would she go down to defeat
with that for which she had entered the lists almost within her grasp?




                             CHAPTER XIII.

                            _Justice Nods._


Jack Wolvert did not put in an appearance at dinner and Mrs. Atterbury
explained that he was suffering from one of his severe headaches and
had taken an opiate. Her manner gave no indication that she possessed
an inkling of the truth, but Betty's apprehensions were not lulled
into a false security. That Wolvert had not immediately betrayed her
in blind rage argued that he was biding his own time for a personal
revenge all the more complete and she realized that when the hour came
she could expect no mercy.

Madame Cimmino's dull eyes glowered at her in undiminished animosity
and suspicion, but she forced herself to a show of civility in the
presence of her hostess; and in the greater danger which menaced her
Betty gave little heed to the woman who looked upon her as a rival.

The following day, however, Wolvert reappeared, his debonair, ironic
spirit of raillery unquenched. There was an unaccustomed pallor on his
dark face and it was noticeable that he held one arm stiffly, but to
Madame Cimmino's solicitous queries he responded only with a petulant
shrug.

Throughout the morning meal he kept up a running fire of facetious
comment directed with suave impertinence at Betty and she seized
the first opportunity to retire to her work in the library. She had
anticipated this attitude on his part but her nerves were beginning
to play her false and she wondered despairingly how long the crisis
would be delayed. For the first time she felt a doubt of herself; not
that her resolution should falter but lest her strength fail under the
strain and at the crucial moment sheer weakness rob her purpose of its
fulfillment.

Mrs. Atterbury followed her into the library as she seated herself
before the desk.

"Not that this morning, my dear." She shook her head with a slow smile.
"The letters must wait. Have you ever been in a courtroom, Betty?"

"No." The girl turned to her, wonderingly. "There is a county
court house at home, but I have never been inside it. Do people go
here--women, I mean--unless----?"

She faltered and Mrs. Atterbury completed the question for her.

"Unless they are prisoners or witnesses, you mean? Indeed, yes! There
are seats apportioned off for spectators and a particularly grewsome
and revolting murder trial will bring out as many feminine auditors as
a fashionable divorce. As you know, I personally avoid all horrors, but
there is a case now before the Bar which presents some very interesting
features to a student of human nature. A poor wretch named Huston is on
trial for the murder of his wife, who by all accounts richly deserved
to be done away with. Would you mind running down there for an hour
this morning, my dear? Do you think you could venture into the presence
of a murderer without succumbing to hysterics?"

"I think so," the girl responded quietly. "In all probability I may
have been in the presence of one before this, without knowing it."

"What a strange thought!" Mrs. Atterbury eyed her keenly. "You have an
odd philosophy all your own, as I have discovered; but what put such an
idea into your head, Betty!"

"The very people one passes in the street may have murder in their
hearts or upon their consciences. Who can tell?" Betty paused and drew
a deep breath. "Consider the number of murder mysteries which are never
solved; this Breckinridge case, for instance."

"What do you mean?" Mrs. Atterbury shifted her gaze to the window.

"Haven't you been reading about it in the papers?" persisted the girl,
inwardly quaking at her own temerity, but determined to discover if
the woman before her would betray any knowledge of what had taken
place beneath her roof. "They call it the greatest sensation of years."

"I remember the name, but I carefully avoided the details." Her
employer observed coolly. "That sort of thing repels me and it is not
from any interest in this present trial that I am sending you there
this morning. There will be a man in the courtroom who has a message
for me and for certain reasons, as on the other occasions when you
have acted for me, it is inadvisable for me to appear personally in
the transaction. I have tested you, my dear, and I feel that you
are to be trusted, at least as far as is compatible with my oath.
We are all members of a powerful secret organization working for
broad humanitarian ends. I need not assure you that there is nothing
unlawful about it, for you can realize that I would not lend my name
or influence to any purpose no matter how charitable, the methods of
which could be questioned. It is necessary, however, for diplomatic
and political considerations, that the work shall proceed as quietly
as possible until the strained relations which exist between certain
European powers shall have been adjusted. That is all I am at liberty
to tell you now, but later everything will be made plain to you, and
you will never regret the slight services you have rendered."

"I am sure that I shall not," Betty remarked quietly. "It is good of
you to take me into your confidence, Mrs. Atterbury, and you know that
I will respect it, but it was unnecessary as far as I am concerned. It
is enough for me that you wished me to go upon these errands."

"You are a model!" There was unusual warmth in her tone, but her eyes,
as they rested upon the girl, narrowed with a slow, amused contempt.
"Unquestioning obedience is rare and you will find it a valuable asset.
Now, my dear, I shall want you to be in the courtroom by eleven. Dress
very plainly; your old dark cloak will do. Present this card at the
door and you will be ushered into a seat which has been reserved for
you. Remain until court adjourns at the end of the morning session and
hang back until you are among the last of the spectators to leave. A
man will approach you as before and give you a letter for me. Take no
more notice of him than you did of the others, and come straight home.
You must use the public conveyances, as the car is being overhauled,
but I will direct you when you are ready."

The route laid down to her was even more circuitous than that of the
previous Sunday and Betty followed it faithfully, keeping a sharp
lookout for a possible trailing taxicab, but those which surrounded her
in the mazes of traffic seemed bent solely on their own affairs and
nowhere did she glimpse the kindly, keen gray eyes of Herbert Ross.

However, the idle artisan was again beneath the lamp-post at the gate
and a man in overalls with a plumber's kit emerged from a house midway
of the block and sauntered after her, boarding the same car. When she
mounted the steps of the courthouse, after many changes of conveyance
and crosstown divergencies, a man brushed against her with a swift
glance at her scarred cheek. Without the kit of tools and buttoned into
a greatcoat which covered him to his knees, she yet had no difficulty
in recognizing in him the erstwhile plumber's assistant, and Betty's
lips tightened.

Others, then, besides Ross held her under espionage, and the mysterious
words of the little dressmaker, Miss Pope, flashed across her memory:
"Before you know it you'll be caught, too, and you'll never be able to
get free!" Had Mrs. Atterbury employed her in these errands not only
for their accomplishment but to identify her secretary irrevocably with
the organization of which she had spoken? Was she to be scapegoat as
well as catspaw? The price she must pay for her temerity was looming
more sinisterly before her with each passing hour, but her will was all
the more indomitably fixed. Though she stood within the very shadow of
the law she would still fight on.

Finding her way with some difficulty to the grand jury room, Betty
presented her pass to the gray-haired doorman. She had received it in a
sealed envelope from Mrs. Atterbury and had made no attempt to tamper
with it, but as the court attendant extricated the card and read the
words pencilled upon it he eyed her with amazement, in which an added
respect was mingled, and without a word led her to a seat apart from
the other spectators.

It was near the press rail, facing the jury box and almost on a line
with the Bench, beside a narrow aisle leading to a single door. Betty
seated herself and once again her mission was temporarily forgotten in
absorbed interest in the scene before her.

She had no difficulty in picking out the prisoner; a mild-faced,
sandy-haired little man, shrunken and bowed in his place beside his
lawyers. Just back of him sat a slender woman in rusty black, whose
face was hidden from Betty's gaze and whose tremulous hand reached out
in pathetic tenderness to the man before her.

Betty looked again at the prisoner and the puzzled look in her eyes
gave place to a flash of recognition. She leaned forward in her chair,
agape with amazement and startled interest, until the consciousness of
shrewd glances from the assembled representatives of the press made her
draw back in belated caution.

Vaguely, almost subconsciously, she observed the stolid jury and
the stern, inflexible countenance of the judge. The faces of the
spectators, too, passed before her in meaningless review, not one
impressing itself individually upon her agitated mind.

As the case progressed, and witness succeeded witness, it became
evident that the whole defense hinged upon an alibi which the
prisoner's attorneys found difficulty in proving. The testimony offered
was inconclusive and the prosecutor riddled it with ease or blasted it
with deftly turned ridicule.

The hideous story was gradually unfolded in all its revolting detail,
and Betty's heart sank within her as the evidence, circumstantial, but
damning, was heaped upon the prisoner's bowed head. The little woman
behind him did not waver in her attitude of protective tenderness and
something in her tremulous, almost furtive, gestures appealed to Betty
as being vaguely familiar, although the face was still turned from her.

A particularly brilliant shaft of ironic wit from the prosecutor
created a stir of amusement among the spectators and as the clerk
of the court rapped for order, Betty's eyes again sought the judge.
Beneath the huge mural painting of Justice he sat immovable, his thin
lips set in a straight line, his cold, gray eyes fastened with grim
intentness upon the prisoner. No mercy tempered his jurisdiction, she
felt certain; no slightest benefit of a doubt would be permitted to
weigh in the scales for any unfortunate mortal whose life might hang
in the balance. She shuddered, her gaze once more descending to the
little ignominiously isolated group below and at that instant the woman
behind the prisoner turned her head and the cold light from the tall
window fell full upon her face.

It was little Miss Pope! The timid, nervous, self-effacing seamstress
who had warned her of danger and begged her to leave almost beneath the
argus eyes of Mrs. Atterbury, and whose strange words had returned to
the girl's mind within the hour, after a lapse of many eventful days.
What connection could exist between her and the wretched creature at
the Bar? Were Mrs. Atterbury's affairs also somehow involved in this
tragic crisis?

Her employer had declared herself uninterested in the case herself and
no mention had been made of Miss Pope, yet she must have known the girl
would recognize her. The letter was to be delivered by a man; could it
be that it would come from the prisoner himself or one of his friends?
He seemed singularly alone in his trouble and sat as if hypnotized,
gazing straight before him in a dull stupor of misery. Once his eyes
met Betty's and the girl swiftly paled, but there was no consciousness
of recognition in their fixed stare.

Until the morning session ended the girl sat tense and motionless,
listening to the testimony, but only receiving a general impression
of its tenor. A conflict was raging within her, and she faced the
most vital problem which had ever presented itself for her decision.
Heretofore her path, beset with difficulties as it was, had been
plainly marked before her and her will had driven her on relentlessly
over every obstacle, but now she had reached without warning an
insurmountable barrier and she hesitated which course to pursue around
it.

A rustle of papers and shuffling of feet in the press enclosure
and a concerted movement among the spectators aroused her from her
thoughts and apprised her that court had adjourned. The judge rose in
all the awful majesty of his black robes and sweeping down from the
Bench, came toward her along the narrow aisle. Betty noted the stern
preoccupation in his averted eyes and the grim, inexorable set of his
lean, shaven jaw and her vision blurred in pity for the hapless victim
of circumstances whose doom seemed already sealed.

The judge passed her so closely that his robe fluttered against her
knee; then he disappeared through the door which led to his private
chambers. Betty, fumbling for her glove, glanced down into her lap and
then sat as if petrified with her eyes fairly starting from her head.

There upon her knee, half-hidden by her muff, lay a small thick
envelope, its square, blank expanse staring up at her in uncompromising
self-evidence! The judge himself! Mrs. Atterbury's organization must be
indeed powerful when it could command the services of an administrator
of justice!

Betty slipped the envelope into the capacious pocket of her cloak and
rose as if in a trance. The shock of surprise had fairly taken her
breath away and she strove vainly to collect herself as she lingered in
obedience to her employer's instructions until only a few stragglers
remained in the courtroom. Little knots of people had gathered in the
corridor outside and she was threading her way through them when a
convulsive clutch fell upon her arm, and looking up hastily, she found
herself face to face with Miss Pope.

The little dressmaker's eyes were reddened and sunken and she seemed to
have aged many years in the brief period that had elapsed since their
last meeting.

"Miss Shaw!" The name fell from her lips in a quivering whisper.
"You remember me, don't you? I made those dresses for you at Mrs.
Atterbury's----"

"Yes." Betty took her hand in a little sympathetic squeeze. "I remember
you, of course, Miss Pope. I recognized you in the courtroom and I am
so sorry that a friend of yours is in trouble."

"He is my brother, and he is innocent!" The whisper changed to a low
wail, and she clung to the girl's arm as if for support. "Oh, Miss, you
don't know what it means to sit there day after day and listen to them
hounding him to his death, knowing all the time that a word would save
him! But there's nobody to say it, and they'll send him to the chair;
him that never hurt a fly, he was so tender-hearted!"

"Your brother!" Betty murmured. "But the name--?"

"My half-brother, I should say. He's fifteen years younger than me, but
he's all I have in the world and I love him like a mother and sister in
one. Oh, Miss, if you only knew----!"

"We cannot talk here." Betty interrupted the little woman's
grief-stricken outburst and drew her aside nervously. "I have not much
time, I must return almost at once, but I should so like to comfort
you. You look faint and ill; isn't there a lunchroom near where we can
get some coffee?"

"There's a little place just around the corner where I usually go, but
I can't eat. It's just as if my heart had settled up in my throat and
closed it." Her face was working piteously. "I shall go crazy if I
can't talk to somebody, Miss. I feel as if each hour was the end; that
I couldn't go on any longer."

Betty led the way to the modest little restaurant and when they were
seated opposite each other at the narrow, linoleum topped table and the
order given, she leaned compassionately toward her sorrowful guest.

"Tell me what you can, Miss Pope. I sympathize with you deeply, more
deeply than you know, and I would do anything that I could to help you
in your trouble. I have not forgotten that you tried to do me a good
turn, even if you could not explain, and I am grateful."

Miss Pope's faded eyes lighted with sudden interest.

"You're still there, in that house? You haven't been dismissed yet, and
you are free to come and go as you please! Oh, Miss Shaw, keep your
eyes open and think twice of anything you are asked to do. Don't let
yourself be led into what you don't understand. I'm talking too much, I
know, but I can't seem to even think straight these days." She paused,
and the old look of hopeless misery dulled her eyes once more. "Since
Robbie's wife was killed, and they took him away, it seems as if I'd
lived in a nightmare."

"How did it all happen?" asked Betty.

"Robbie and his wife lived apart. She's dead, and the least said about
her the better, but she was a disgrace to a decent man. One morning,
about three months ago, they found her dead in her bed with her head
beaten in. Robbie was questioned, but he didn't know anything about
it, he hadn't seen her in nearly a year. He was left free then and the
police went after another man, but, because they couldn't find him,
they fastened on Robbie again. You heard the evidence this morning,
Miss. He has a temper, for all he's so meek-looking, and he had cause
enough to kill her, Heaven knows, but he never did it, never, although
he had made threats, like anybody who is tried beyond endurance."

She paused in her rapid flow of words and wiped her eyes on a wisp of
handkerchief while Betty sat silent, with every nerve taut.

"There was a terrible snowstorm, the biggest one of the year, on the
night she was killed," Miss Pope went on. "Robbie is the chauffeur for
the King family, of Hempstead; it's Mr. King who is paying for the
defense. He ordered Robbie to take the car into town that night to meet
some folks who were arriving from the West, but Robbie never got there;
he was stalled in a snowdrift all night on a lonely part of the road.
That's why he's got no alibi."

"Did no one see him or talk to him?" Betty's voice was low and strained.

"Only one person and we can't find her. She won't come forward and
speak for him; most likely she forgot all about him an hour after,
although we've advertised and done everything we can."

"Does he know who she is?" Betty asked, her eyes upon her plate.

"No, Miss. It was some little time before he got stalled, when he was
plowing along in the storm through that string of fashionable colonies
on the North Shore that run together with no beginning or end. He
doesn't rightly know where he was, when somebody called out to him and
he stopped to see a young lady beside the road in a little run-about
car that had got stuck. The engine was frozen and Robbie offered to tow
her home, although it would have been a hard job. The young lady said
it wasn't necessary, she didn't mind leaving the car there all night
if he would take her to where she was going; that it wasn't far. She
perched herself up beside Robbie at the wheel and directed him on the
way, and a couple of miles further on he set her down at a big house.
He wouldn't know it again if he saw it, because the snow was driving so
hard against the lights that he could only see a few feet in front of
him. The young lady offered him some money but he wouldn't take it. Oh,
if she'd only come forward now!"

Betty looked up slowly.

"Maybe she will. It isn't too late even now."

"We've about given up hope." Miss Pope shook her head. "Robbie was
in prison waiting for his trial when I came to sew for you, but the
lawyers were so sure the young lady would be found and his name
cleared that I wasn't worrying, except about the disgrace of his being
suspected at all."

"Does Mrs. Atterbury know of your trouble?" The question came as an
afterthought.

"No. The name being different she wouldn't connect it with me, and I
guess she's got enough on her own mind. Why should I have told her?
There would have been no help from her, even if she could have given
it. She's too careful about keeping her own skirts clean."

There was concentrated bitterness in the dreary voice, and Betty
regarded her expectantly; but the little woman's thoughts had evidently
reverted to her own trouble and she said no more.

The girl comforted her as well as she was able, and took leave of her
at the door of the restaurant, to continue her homeward way, sunk in a
horrified perplexity which deepened with each passing moment.

The story she had just heard weighed upon her spirit and she shrank
from thought of the man whose life hung on an unspoken word. Her own
problem had faded into insignificance in the face of this potential
tragedy and had she been personally involved in it, she could not have
hoped more fervently for the prisoner's acquittal, even as she realized
its futility. Would the mysterious young woman speak? Betty herself
wondered.




                             CHAPTER XIV.

                            _Naked Foils._


Detective Joseph P. McCormick was pacing his office like a caged bear,
and his retinue of aides in the outer strongholds, recognizing the
storm signals, went about their various tasks as expeditiously as they
were able without venturing into his presence to discuss the details of
the day's routine. Once his bell whirred viciously and to the scared
office boy who reluctantly obeyed the summons the Chief turned a face
like a thunder cloud.

"Ross shown up yet?" he barked.

"No, sir. He got your message when he 'phoned and he said he'd be here
at once. There's hardly been time, sir--"

"When I want any observations from you I'll ask for them." The Chief
brought his hand down smartly on the desk. "Bring Ross here the instant
he arrives."

The door closed precipitately and the Chief resumed his restless tramp
about the room, his heavy footsteps making the bronze electrolier
on his desk vibrate until its dangling chains tinkled a protest.
The clock ticked off five slow minutes, then ten, and the cigar butt
between his strong white teeth was chewed to a pulp before the door
opened quietly once more and Herbert Ross entered.

"You sent for me, sir?" His voice was gravely respectful, and his clear
eyes were very sober, as he raised them steadily to meet those of his
superior.

"Where the devil have you been?" McCormick's tone was ominously calm.

"I came as quickly as a taxi would bring me, sir."

"I don't mean now." The chief threw his cigar butt into the cuspidor
and seated himself with deliberation behind his desk. "I mean since
your last report; a report, let me remind you, which amounted to
nothing."

"I have been working on the case, sir, as far as I was able along the
lines laid down at that time. I thought it was understood that I was
not to put in an appearance until I had something definite to report."

"When would that have been?" McCormick leaned back in his chair. "Look
here, Ross, I've sent for you because something is going on that I
don't understand, or rather I don't want to understand it, the way
things seem to lie now. I want to give you a chance to explain, if you
can. I've taken a personal interest in you from the time you walked
into my office to look for a job, with nothing but your nerve to
recommend you, and a college education against you, to say nothing of
the fact that you were born a gentleman. I gave you a chance to show me
what you could do and you made good, and since then I've come to depend
on you more than I realized until this thing hit me between the eyes!
I'd have banked on your honesty as I would on my own, and thank God!
I've always been square, but, Ross, you've got to speak out now like a
man!"

"What is it, sir?" Herbert Ross straightened himself and his steadfast
gaze never wavered. "Are you accusing me of crooked work?"

"I'm accusing you of nothing." The Chief's face had turned a dull,
mottled red. "You may have good reasons for what you're pulling, but
whatever they are it's time you let me in on your game. You spotted Ide
hanging around the gates of that Atterbury house on the North Drive
and tipped me off. You were sure of yourself and as keen about nabbing
him as anybody. I didn't ask you then what you were doing in that
neighborhood, and if I asked you now I know devilish well you'd say you
had been on your way to see the old lady, Madame Dumois."

Ross looked up quickly.

"It would be the truth," he remarked.

"Well, we'll let that slide, for a minute." The detective waved his
hand, as if brushing something tangible aside. "The next thing I know
you come to me with a complete change of front and do your level best
to make me lay off the Ide matter, claiming to know that the Atterbury
woman is too high up, socially and every other way, for anybody around
her place to be mixed in anything shady. When I told you I had enough
dope already to work on and mentioned the girl with a scar on her face
you did everything you could to throw me off the trail."

"That is rather a sweeping assertion, Chief." Ross's face had gone
very white. "Mrs. Atterbury is well known on the Street as one of the
biggest women traders, powerful enough to swing the market in a crisis,
and her social connections are irreproachable and of long standing. I
know nothing about the girl with the scar or any other member of her
household."

"Don't you?" The Chief eyed him steadily. "When you reported to me in
the Dumois case, you said you had found one clue that looked promising
but that it didn't turn out to be the girl you were after. But you
didn't mention, Ross, that the girl whose trail you dropped so quickly,
without giving Madame Dumois a chance to identify her, had a scar on
her face. Don't try to flim-flam me, the old lady herself has tipped me
off to that, and I tell you the whole thing dovetails too well to be a
coincidence. Are you shielding that girl?--But no, I should not have
asked that, Ross. I have never yet had cause to doubt your professional
honor."

The young man flushed darkly.

"Thank you, sir, I'm not going to make a fool of myself and bring
ridicule on the office by following a wild goose chase. I hope I am
experienced enough to know when to drop a false clue! The girl I
located has had a mark upon her face from birth; the one for whom
Madame Dumois is searching has no blemish whatever and never had. I
have the old lady's word for it and that is conclusive enough. As for
the other girl at Mrs. Atterbury's I have nothing to say about her. She
may be a daughter, or a dependant for all I know."

"Or a pretty shrewd accomplice!" McCormick banged the desk and swung
his chair around to face his operative. "You remember the case J.
Todhunter Crane put in my hands? He'd done business with a girl with a
scar; Mrs. Haddon Cheever brought a similar affair to my notice, but
weakened. She knew the result to her if the police got hold of it, but
she, too, described the girl. I've got enough to take her on suspicion
now, if I can get her identified, and things are coming to a head. The
police will beat me to it, if I don't hustle."

"But what is a scar? If you are going to pull a suspect on a serious
charge with no other evidence than that he or she has a birthmark,
Chief, you're going to let yourself in for trouble." The young man's
tone was a shade too eager and McCormick watched him from beneath
lowering brows. "You can't drag a woman of Mrs. Atterbury's position
through the mire unless you are mighty sure some of it will cling to
her skirts."

"What if I tell you that I've got her already? At least, not enough to
tap her on the shoulder with, but a line that connects her in a way
she'll find it hard to explain, with a lot that has puzzled us for the
past five years. In fact, ever since Brooke Hamilton came to me from
Chicago; you remember the case?"

"Great Lord!" Herbert Ross shrank as if he had received a sudden blow,
and his voice was a hoarse whisper. "You don't mean that Mrs. Atterbury
is mixed up in that--?"

"If I'm not mistaken, she's the brains of the whole outfit. I'll have
to prove it, of course, but I'm pretty confident that I can put it
over. Oh, it's not just that you spotted Ide outside her gate, or the
evidence of the girl--"

"Remember, I'm not certain about Ide. I warned you of that!" The young
man broke in, but his superior smiled.

"I am. I could put my hand on him within an hour, but I'm giving him a
little more rope. You know that Larne murder out in Denver the other
day?"

"Of course. 'The Comet' they called her."

"She was deep in the game and just on the point of squealing when 'Red'
Rathbone put her out of the way in a fit of jealousy, but we got to her
for a little dope first up in Wyoming, and it's a straight tip to the
North Drive bunch. Added to that, the Professor is under lock and key
out in Chicago; we're holding him on the old Hamilton affair, but I'm
working on him, and I've got a hunch he's in league with the others
here. In fact, every clue focuses true, and you mark my words, the
round-up will be the most sensational in years! My boy," McCormick rose
and circling the desk, laid one hand upon the younger man's shoulder.
"It's not my habit to talk to my operatives about cases they're not
concerned with, but I can't help feeling that you're in pretty deep in
this. You haven't chosen to be frank with me, but my cards are on the
table, and I'm going to speak plainer still. If you've been fascinated
by the scarred face, and let yourself be kidded into the knight-errant
stuff, forget it! They're all tarred with the same brush and it's a
mighty black one!"

"I--I don't understand, sir!"

"Because you don't want to. Many a good fellow has fallen for the old
injured innocence gag and come to, to find his job gone, his career
blasted and no guy willing to trust him with a plugged nickel. If
there's another reason," the Chief's face hardened perceptibly, "if
this Atterbury woman's financial resources have dazzled you, just
remember you're selling what you can't buy back again. A lot of us
believe we haven't got a price until the offer is put up to us. I'm
giving you a chance before you close the deal."

"Bribery!" Ross stood as if turned to stone and McCormick studied him
with an almost paternal anxiety. At length the younger man squared
himself and said doggedly: "After that, sir, there's only one thing
left for me to say. Unless you take me off it, I'll finish up the
Dumois case, and I'll find the girl if she's above ground. I don't
think you can recall a case that I've relinquished, admitting failure.
After that, I'm through; I'll hand in my resignation to you and quit
the game for good."

"I'm sorry," McCormick remarked simply, but his face clouded in
profound disappointment. "I spoke as man to man, and I didn't think
you'd fall down this way. If you're on the level, Ross, for God's sake
prove it! As to your resignation, we'll discuss that later. I'll be the
first to apologize if I've misjudged you, but you've got to show me. Go
out now and make good."

There was an unaccustomed blur before Herbert Ross's eyes as for
the only time in their long association he left the presence of the
Chief without the cordial handclasp which had conveyed so much of
trust and understanding. He did not see the red-headed office boy's
commiserating nod nor the meaning glances cast after him by his fellow
operatives as he stumbled blindly from the outer office, and he found
himself hastening along the crowded thoroughfare with no definite
destination in his mind.

The Chief's voice, gruff with the effort to conceal his emotion, still
rang in his ears and a wonderment mingled with his self-loathing. Why
was he so caught in the toils of treachery and double-dealing, he
who had guarded his professional honor with a jealousy transcending
that of man to his mate? What was this girl to him, this strange,
gentle, indomitable little creature with the pitifully marred face and
soul-searching eyes, that her protection should have come to mean more
to him than all the world beside?

If McCormick's suspicions concerning Mrs. Atterbury and her friends
were justifiable, and the girl was being used as a tool to further
their ends she must be warned without delay! The Chief had said that
the police authorities would forestall him if he lost much time. Betty
Shaw might be in actual peril that very day!

Without any clear idea of what he meant to do, Ross hailed a passing
taxi and directed the chauffeur to the North Drive. He must see her
at all costs, and a vague notion of presenting himself boldly at the
house and demanding an interview with her was taking possession of
his thoughts, when not a block from his destination he came upon Betty
herself just as she took an envelope furtively from her muff and
dropped it into a mail-box.

Jumping from the taxi, he dismissed the chauffeur summarily and
hastened toward her. He fancied that she looked pale and careworn in
the fresh morning sunlight, but when she saw him an unmistakable light
leaped into her eyes.

It died instantly, however, and she bowed with cold aloofness,
affecting not to notice his outstretched hand.

"Miss Shaw, I am not going to pretend that this meeting is not of my
seeking for I was on my way to try to see you if I could."

She raised her eyebrows.

"I fancied that our last meeting was quite conclusive, Mr. Ross."

"I told you that I meant to be your friend, whether you wished it or
not, and it is as your friend that I am here." He spoke very gravely.
"Won't you let me walk with you for a little way? What I have to say is
vital to you and in speaking I am practically betraying a trust, but I
am convinced that you stand in a false position; that through no fault
of your own, you are in actual danger!"

Betty paused, regarding him steadily, but made no comment.

"You know my name, but I can tell you nothing more of myself; I can
offer you no personal guarantees of my good faith. I only ask you
to believe that I speak with good authority. You may consider it an
unwarranted intrusion into your affairs, but I must warn you. Miss
Shaw, give up this position you hold! Give it up on whatever pretext is
possible, or run away if you have to, only go at once, before it is too
late!"

"Mr. Ross, this is a most extraordinary request! Will you be good
enough to explain? My position is a highly advantageous one; why should
I relinquish it?"

"For your own safety. You do not know the sort of trap you are in, or
the people for whom you are working. They are using you as a tool, and
worse--"

"I think you must be a little mad!" Betty exclaimed. "My employer is
a most charming and sympathetic person, the salary is high and the
work very congenial.--But I don't know why I should trouble to defend
my occupation to you, Mr. Ross. The little I know of you would not
predispose me in your favor, and your wild assertions are ridiculous!"

"I cannot explain. Oh, won't you understand that my hands are tied, and
I can only warn you of your danger? Please try to trust me, and believe
that I am trying to protect you." In his eagerness he laid his hand
upon her arm, but she shook it off coldly.

"You cannot be in earnest! I am a secretary and companion to a person
whose reputation is unassailable. Surely you can tell me in what way am
I being used as a tool?"

"The letters you write, the commissions you execute for her! Are the
letters always intelligible to you? Do you know the real purpose of the
errands upon which you are sent and what lies behind them?"

"Mr. Ross, your questions would be impertinent if they could be taken
seriously. Mrs. Atterbury's correspondence is the usual one of a woman
with large financial interests and a host of friends." Betty spoke
hastily, her calmly disdainful attitude giving place to half-suppressed
eagerness. "Every letter passes through my hands and I may say that her
private affairs are an open book. Her charities are innumerable and her
friends come to her with all their troubles, sure of help and comfort.
The errands I attend to for her are such as anyone who disliked
shopping would relegate to another. Really, you have been grossly
misinformed; I am in no trap, I can assure you."

Herbert Ross gazed at her flushed face with eyes that had narrowed
swiftly. Her change of manner was too palpable to be spontaneous, and
it had come only when he had betrayed a knowledge of her activities.
She might be a tool indeed but a willing one, closing her eyes to what
she did not wish to see. Although his whole nature rebelled against the
thought, a fertile seed of doubt was sown.

"It can't be!" He seemed to muse aloud. "You are inexperienced,
trusting, blind! You believe what you are told by this woman, and
completely under her influence, but you must open your eyes to
the truth. Surely the thought must have come to you at times that
everything was not well; have you never had a misgiving?"

She lifted her eyes to his in a bland, wondering stare.

"Misgiving of what? If we are to continue this conversation, Mr. Ross,
you really must not talk in riddles. What could be wrong?"

His detective instinct was uppermost now and he realized that instead
of quizzing her, he himself was being shrewdly drawn out. Was she
trying to discover how much he really knew that she might the better
arm herself against him? The seed had not taken firm root as yet,
however, and in a swift revulsion of feeling he inwardly cursed his
momentary suspicion. Her eyes were as clear and steady as the sun!
Surely they could mask no scheming, no subterfuge. Yet if McCormick
had spoken truly, the most innocent and unsophisticated mind must have
found food for puzzled thought in that house of mystery.

"Nothing has ever occurred, no slightest whisper or suggestion from
Mrs. Atterbury or her friends to lead you to feel that something was
going on which you could not understand? Think, Miss Shaw! You are not
stupid; surely some inkling of the truth must have reached you."

"Mr. Ross, you refuse to speak plainly and I cannot imagine what you
are hinting, but I can see that you are really in earnest, and there
is a terrible mistake somewhere. Mrs. Atterbury's friends are people
of the world, learned men and brilliant women whom it is an education
as well as a pleasure for a girl like me to meet. Believe me, you are
laboring under an absurd illusion! I am very happy in my position and I
would not think of giving it up and going away for no reason."

"I can easily obtain another for you," he pleaded. "You will not suffer
by the change. This woman is nothing to you; surely you would be
willing to relinquish this for a better position--"

"Nothing could induce me to leave Mrs. Atterbury." Betty spoke with
calm finality, but across her face had flitted unbidden that hardened,
crafty expression which robbed it of its candid charm, and sudden,
passionate determination flashed from her eyes. It was gone in an
instant but not before Herbert Ross had grasped its significance and
his latent suspicion burst into full flower.

'They are all tarred with the same brush.' The Chief had spoken with a
wisdom which no puerile emotion had stultified, and Ross's heart turned
to lead within him.

"Then there is nothing further for me to say. I have warned you, I have
done my utmost to protect you, but if you wilfully refuse to listen to
me you must abide by the consequences." His voice trembled in spite of
himself and he cried out in bitter denunciation: "There must be some
desperate game of your own which you are playing here! If you are not
an active accomplice of this woman, what hidden purpose holds you to
this house, what common bond links you with these people? Who are you,
what have you done that others should hunt you down, and what are you
doing now?"

The girl's face blanched swiftly, but her eyes blazed a menace and she
drew herself up to her full height before him.

"I have listened patiently to your vague melodramatic attack upon my
employer and her friends, but you have gone too far, Mr. Ross, when you
extend your mad accusations to me! You have followed me, spied upon me,
but this final insult is too much to be endured! I must ask you not to
annoy me again. Let me pass, please!"

He stepped back almost mechanically as with her head proudly erect she
swept by him and on down the Drive. His gaze followed her until she
disappeared, his thoughts a chaos of conflicting emotion.

The swift light which had glowed in her eyes at the moment of
their meeting only to be so quickly effaced, her refusal of his
proffered hand, the attitude of disdainful aloofness which she has
maintained, until driven to the wall, and then her simulation of naïve
innocence--what could these changing moods portend? She had striven
desperately to disarm his suspicion and when that failed had met him
with passionate defiance.

If she were innocent of deliberate voluntary complicity in the
machinations of Mrs. Atterbury, would not a girl in her position have
welcomed the opportunity of fleeing from such a situation? She must be
more than a mere tool, and yet....

It could not be true! Her little sensitive face, piquant despite
its scar, rose once more before his mental vision. Her clear steady
eyes seemed searching his own, proudly yet piteously imploring. He
must believe in her! In spite of appearances which would have been
conclusive proof to any other man, he must have faith to the end.

But why should he disdain that proof if anyone else would have accepted
it? Why should he believe in her? What was she to him that he must
struggle to find excuses for her in his own mind, champion her against
all reason, hold desperately to a blind faith where no grounds for it
existed?

Then all at once a swift self-revelation came and his heart gave a
mighty leap within him as he realized at last what had been behind his
vacillation and final renunciation of the scruples which had governed
his career. Schemer or dupe, criminal or victim of circumstances, he
loved her! Her safety meant more to him than his professional honor,
and were she an adventuress of the deepest dye he still would protect
her if he could against all the world!

As Ross turned, his foot encountered something soft and yielding upon
the pavement and glancing downward he saw a twisted wisp of limp tan
suede. For a moment he regarded it, his face a maze of conflicting
emotion. Then with a gesture that was almost a caress he stooped,
picked up the little glove and strode rapidly away.

Betty meanwhile had made her way to the house, with one unguarded
phrase of his ringing in her ears: "What have you done that others
should hunt you down?" In spite of her trepidation at the knowledge he
had revealed of her employer's affairs and the part she had played in
promoting them, that sentence had brought a glow of warmth, strange and
inexplicable, to her heart.

Her reverie met with a rude awakening on her arrival. Mrs. Atterbury
confronted her at the door and one glance at her stern, threatening
face made Betty's blood turn to water in her veins as she obeyed the
silent gesture and followed her employer to the library.

Mrs. Atterbury closed the door and faced her.

"Where have you been?" There was a menacing undercurrent in the level
unemotional tones, but the girl chose desperately to ignore it.

"I went for a walk. You gave me permission, Mrs. Atterbury."

"Who is the young man with whom you were talking?"

Betty's eyes opened widely.

"I don't know." Her hand had flown to her breast and chance directed
her fingers to the little brooch she wore. On a swift inspiration she
added: "I dropped my scarab and he came along and found it for me. I
thanked him, naturally."

Mrs. Atterbury hesitated eying the girl's candid face keenly.

"You did not enter into conversation with him? He asked you no personal
questions, did not seek to draw you out about yourself?" The wrath
had given place to a cautious repressed note, and Betty took instant
advantage of the hesitancy.

"Certainly not!" Her tone was the epitome of wounded pride
and resentment. "I am not in the habit of forming promiscuous
acquaintances. If I have given you such an impression, Mrs. Atterbury,
I am very sorry--"

"My dear, you must not be offended." A smile curved the set lips and
her employer laid a conciliatory hand upon her arm. "I spoke only for
your well being; I feel responsible for you, you know, and a young
girl cannot be too careful, especially in a huge city like this. Come,
we will say no more about it, child, but do not talk to strangers upon
any pretext whatever, and let me know instantly if anyone tries to
converse with you or engage your attention."

For the rest of the day Betty maintained an attitude of reproachful
dignity, however, which enabled her to keep to herself and gave her
ample time to formulate her immediate plans. Events were rapidly
approaching a crisis, and she realized that not an hour could be lost.

At midnight she stole forth, the half-consumed candle from her
dressing-table serving in lieu of her electric torch, and was
descending the stairs, when a dim flickering glow from the music room
made her pause in affright. She had assured herself that the household
had long since retired to slumber; who, then, was this nocturnal
intruder? Could it be Wolvert, lying in wait for her?

Hastily blowing out her candle flame, she crept down the stairs and
peered cautiously in at the door of the music room. A huge portrait
of Beethoven covered a central space in the left wall and before it,
silent and motionless, stood a tall figure in a straight, white gown.

The girl paused in awed amazement; there was something detached
and remote about the strange apparition, like a worshipper at some
mysterious shrine. Then, slowly the figure turned and Betty slipped
quickly behind the shelter of the grand piano's upraised top, a gasp of
almost superstitious fear escaped her lips.

The strange figure was that of Mrs. Atterbury and her eyes were fixed
in a glassy unseeing stare. Rigidly as if hypnotized, she moved toward
the shrinking girl and Betty grasped the truth in a flash of mingled
horror and relief. The woman was walking in her sleep.




                              CHAPTER XV.

                     _The Portrait of Beethoven._


Betty held her breath as the tall figure in flowing white threaded its
way unerringly among the grouped furniture and passing her so closely
that she might have stretched forth her hand and touched it, glided
through the doorway and up the stairs. The light she carried glimmered
with diminishing radiance until it was suddenly extinguished and there
came the echo of a softly-closing door.

The girl waited motionless, her very heartbeats stilled for an
interminable length of time, but the house remained wrapped in utter
darkness and no sound disturbed the eerie silence.

At last, convinced that the somnambulist had settled once more to rest
and that no eye but her own had witnessed the weird visitation, Betty
ventured from her hiding place, and groping her way to the smokers'
stand, procured a match. Its flame sputtered angrily in her fingers as
she applied it to her candle and she glanced about her in fresh terror
lest its stroke had been heard, but the shadows were empty.

With faltering steps she approached the portrait and stood for long
gazing into the benign eyes which seemed to meet hers with an almost
living response. What was there about the huge picture which had so
impressed itself upon her employer's unquiet mind that her subconscious
instinct drew her to it? Surely not the subject alone, for Mrs.
Atterbury had never evinced the slightest interest in it in the girl's
presence.

Betty stepped back a few paces and regarded the portrait critically.
Including the massive gold frame which surrounded it, the space it
occupied was approximately five feet by eight or ten, and it had been
hung with no consideration of the lighting effect, either from window
or chandelier. The spacing, too, was bad, and its position was far too
low upon the wall.

Had there been some special design in placing it there? Was it merely
for ornamental purposes, or did it serve as a screen for something
behind? Betty thought of the bookcase in the library which swung out,
masking the safe that had been built into the wall; could it be that
within a few paces of her another and more secret repository was
concealed?

The frame appeared as though it had not been moved from its place for
years, its dull burnished gold seemingly embedded in the wall and the
ivory tint of the paper behind it was unsullied by even a finger mark.
She approached the portrait again and held her candle so that its rays
swept the oiled surface of the painting, bringing out each brush stroke
in clear relief. No crevice showed in its broad expanse and it seemed
as securely fastened in its frame as though a part of it.

The portrait in its entirety was too heavy and cumbersome to be moved
without tackle. If it were indeed a blind for something which lay
behind, it must be turned by means of leverage on some secret mechanism
operated with a touch upon a spring or button, but no such article was
visible.

Betty turned her attention to the frame. It was old-fashioned and
heavily carved with a continuous scroll-work with innumerable
protuberances, but none stood out more prominently than the rest and no
flaw or disjointure appeared to the most minute scrutiny. The raised
edges of the scrolls and high convex points of the decoration between
were brightly burnished, the background lustreless and deepened to a
brownish shade resembling bronze.

The candle had burned low and was guttering in her fingers when Betty
suddenly observed that one of the smaller knob-like anaglyphs which
projected from the lower right hand corner of the frame was more highly
burnished than the others and the gilt seemed worn as if by friction.
Impulsively she pressed it.

It gave beneath her hand and she stepped back quickly as the portrait
itself lurched and swung widely out from the frame, grazing her
shoulder before she could spring aside from its path. At the same
instant a bell shrilled loudly through the sleeping house and its echo
had not died away before a hubbub of voices arose from above.

Betty paused only to give a maddened push with all the strength of
her terror behind it, to the picture which yawned from the wall, then
turning, she fled wildly to the stairs.

Her candle was extinguished in the sudden draught, but she had found
the banisters and glided up as swiftly and silently as a ghost. Lights
appeared behind her as she rounded the corner of the hall, but she
reached her room without encountering anyone and turned the key softly
in the lock behind her.

The steady gleam of the live coals in the grate illuminated the
room with a rosy glow and Betty thrust her candle end deep into
the smoldering embers. Then, taking a fresh, unused one from the
many-branched sconce above the mantel, she placed it in the candlestick
upon her dressing-table from which she had taken the first.

Loosening her robe, she jumped into bed, and pulling the covers about
her, lay listening to the hubbub outside. She could clearly distinguish
in the general uproar the high-pitched staccato voice of Madame
Cimmino and Welch's deep-throated bellow of rage.

The sounds came nearer and she heard a thundering knock upon a door
down the hall. A startled cry from Mrs. Atterbury answered it and a
door was slammed back. An excited babel arose once more, and high above
it Madame Cimmino shrilled:

"It was you! You have walked again! See, here is your candle half
burned and still warm, and there are drops of wax upon the floor before
the picture. Would you ruin us all that you will not have a guard at
night?"

Another murmur, and then the voice of Wolvert, smooth and silky,
dominated the others.

"It is all right, Marcia. The portrait is back in its place. You must
have closed it before you came upstairs, although it is a mystery to
me how you reached your room so quickly. I thought somnambulists moved
step by step, but you must have fairly flown. I wonder that the alarm
did not awaken you, or our lights and yells, but at least no harm has
been done."

His last words conveyed a swift suggestion to the girl's mind, and
lest she court suspicion by effacing herself, she sprang from bed, and
switching on the lights, opened the door.

"What is the matter? Is anyone ill?" She blinked realistically in the
sudden glare and her clear, young voice rang out above the others.
Madame Cimmino turned like an avenging fury.

"What is it to you?" she screamed. "Go back to your bed and do not
meddle! _Sancta Maria!_ Must we find you always at our heels? This
comes of admitting an outsider--"

"Speranza, you are beside yourself!" Mrs. Atterbury's voice, poised
and dominant once more, broke in sternly. "You have been startled, I
know, but that does not excuse your lack of self-control. Everything is
quite all right, Betty. Welch happened to touch one of the wires of the
burglar alarm and aroused the house. Don't allow it to disturb you, it
was just a stupid mistake."

Betty closed her door with a little sigh of relief for her narrow
escape, and the confusion of voices in the hall gradually subsided
until silence reigned once more. Mrs. Atterbury's burned candle and
the wax which had fallen from her own combined to form unassailable
if falsely corroborative evidence that her employer alone had been in
the music room, and Betty breathed a prayer of thankfulness for the
fortuitous chance which had saved her from exposure. The portrait of
Beethoven was before her eyes when she at length fell asleep, and in
the darkness, as her heavy lids closed, she seemed again to see it
swing from its massive frame and in the aperture loomed that which she
had scarcely noted in the excitement of the moment; the dull sheen of
a sheet of steel, with the combination knob in the center. The safe was
there as she had suspected, but would chance, which had served her so
well that night, enable her to glimpse what lay within it?

Her first waking thought reverted to it in the morning, but when she
descended at the sound of the breakfast gong she sensed a new tension
in the atmosphere which put her instantly on her guard.

Mrs. Atterbury was in her accustomed place at the head of the table but
she avoided the girl's eyes as she bade her good morning and her level
tones were oddly shaken. Welch turned from the sideboard at the sound
of her voice and the silver dish-cover which he held clattered to the
floor. His face was pasty and gray and he stared at Betty in a sort of
horror until a sharp word from his hostess sent him hastily about his
duties.

Madame Cimmino pushed back her plate abruptly and swept from the room
as the girl seated herself, and Wolvert glanced up with a nod, but his
usually facile tongue was stilled and his eyes seemed to blaze as they
rested upon her. Into his expression Betty read a shadow of that terror
which had lurked there on two previous occasions and when she turned in
growing wonder to her employer she found stamped upon her face also a
look of dazed consternation akin to fear.

She drank her coffee and essayed to eat with her face averted, feeling
that their eyes were fixed upon her in an intensity which seemed to
burn into her consciousness. Had they discovered some clue to her
presence in the music room on the previous night? Did they know that
it was she who had tampered with the portrait and were they even now
planning her punishment?

The food choked her and the ghastly pretense of a meal seemed unending,
but at last Mrs. Atterbury rose.

"You need not attend to the mail this morning, my dear." She tried to
speak casually, but the odd quaver persisted in her tones. "I shall be
too busy to dictate replies, and it will have to wait until another
time. There is a pile of mending in the sewing room, however, which I
wish you would go over carefully."

Betty accepted her dismissal and ascended to the secluded room on the
top floor, where she spent a lonely and anxious morning. The hours
dragged and the silence wrought upon her nerves until she bit her lips
to keep from shrieking out in the sheer agony of protracted suspense.
Why were they waiting to visit their vengeance upon her if they were
assured of her guilt? Anything would be better than this hideous
uncertainty.

That the task which had been arranged for her was the most transparent
of subterfuges for getting her out of the way became apparent when
she examined the work laid out upon the table. The linen was of the
coarsest variety, evidently from the servants' quarters, and it had
long outlived its usefulness. It was yellowed, too, and creased, as
though it had been laid away, forgotten in some musty recess, and she
made but little progress, her thread tearing through the frail, worn
fabric with each stitch.

What was going on below? Her window opened upon a rear view and from it
she could see only the tops of the cedars, and the garage roof, but no
sound of a motor approaching or leaving the house came to her in her
solitude and she felt cut off from all the world.

The silence within doors remained unbroken, save once when she fancied
that the echo of faint, hysterical sobbing reached her ears, but she
could not be sure that her overstrained nerves were not playing her
false.

Gradually the conviction grew within her that the ill-suppressed
excitement and dismay were due to some cause other than the event of
the night before, yet something which concerned her vitally. She could
not forget the glances of horror and fear which had been directed
at her. What could it be? What contingency had arisen of which she
herself was in ignorance, yet which wrought the others to a condition
bordering on panic? Was it that through her they dreaded interference
and possible disaster from an outside source?

Betty anticipated that her lunch would be brought to her and her
virtual isolation continued indefinitely, and she was surprised when
Welch came to summon her to the meal. He still regarded her furtively
and his huge, hairy hands clenched and unclenched as he stood before
her. She gazed at them, repelled yet fascinated as if she could feel
them already closing about her throat. Had they wielded the knife which
had slain Breckinridge? She passed him with a shudder and descended.

A further surprise awaited her; there was a marked change in the
attitude of Mrs. Atterbury and her guests. The former was again her
well-poised self, serene and calmly detached. Madame Cimmino exhibited
a volatile gayety of temperament bordering on hysteria and Wolvert was
in his most reckless, brilliant vein.

Sheer amazement held the girl dumb before his raillery, but she made
a supreme effort to flog her failing spirit into a response to the
general lightness of mood, forced though she instinctively knew it to
be. The hour passed more easily than Betty could have dared to hope
and at its conclusion as she paused in the doorway, uncertain whether
to return to her task or await other instructions, Mrs. Atterbury came
and slipped her arm in the girl's in a rare gesture that was almost a
caress.

"Come up to my sitting-room, my dear. I have a suggestion to make to
you which I think will please you very much, and we will have an
opportunity to talk privately there."

Betty turned obediently and side by side they went up the stair. In
spite of the indulgent tone, the girl was filled with foreboding, but
Mrs. Atterbury was still smiling as she closed the door and motioned
Betty to a low chair near the window.

"I want to speak to you, Betty, about the birthmark on your cheek."
She began without preface. "I am afraid that you must have thought me
needlessly tyrannical in ordering you to go unveiled, but it was the
only way to put a stop to the self-consciousness which was growing upon
you and would only have increased until your life became a burden.
When I engaged you, you assured me that you did not mind the mark, and
scarcely ever thought of it, but you were unaccustomed to the city and
did not realize that strangers will stare at anything unusual in your
appearance. Have you ever made an attempt to have the blemish removed?"

Betty gazed at her in wordless astonishment for a moment before she
found her voice.

"Oh, yes, but it could not be done, and the doctors tell me that only
a worse disfigurement would result from tampering with it. I did try
once, but I hurt myself dreadfully. I really don't mind going unveiled
now, Mrs. Atterbury."

"But you would be glad if the blemish did not exist?" Her tone was
beguilingly insinuating. "It cannot be wholly eradicated, of course,
but I have learned of a method of treatment by which it could be
rendered almost invisible. I was interested on your account, child, and
procured the necessary materials. I have them here."

"Oh, please, no!" Betty cried in genuine alarm. "I would not dare use
acids or anything of that sort! When I attempted it before, it nearly
caused blood-poisoning. Nothing could induce me to expose myself to
such danger a second time."

"But, my dear, this is absolutely harmless. Do you think I would
suggest or even permit you to run any risk of injury?" She opened a
drawer of her dressing-table and took from it several small jars and
a camel's hair brush. "It does not act upon the birthmark itself and
would not irritate the most sensitive skin. It is merely a covering
which almost defies detection. This solution of wax forms a sort of
enamel and the other jars contain merely paint to produce a natural
effect. I do not approve of cosmetics for young girls on general
principles, but this is a different matter, and you will marvel at the
result. The birthmark will seem to have disappeared absolutely."

"But won't that militate against my usefulness, Mrs. Atterbury?" The
girl looked unflinchingly into her eyes. "The people you send me to
meet identify me by means of this mark. How will they recognize me if
it is covered?"

Mrs. Atterbury drew her breath in sharply between her teeth, and her
fingers tightened about the little jar, but she replied coolly:

"You will not be called upon to go on any errands of that sort for some
time to come. In describing your appearance the scar was naturally
mentioned but it is not essential for your identification. Remember
I am not asking you to hide it solely for your own benefit, Betty. I
find that it has a disagreeable effect upon my guests and those about
us in the household and I am considering their feelings as well as
yours when I insist that you disguise it as much as possible. This may
seem brutally frank to you, but you know that the blemish makes no
difference to me personally, nor to anyone who really cares for you.
Come, sit here, and let me show you what a magical change I can effect."

Betty drew back and stood very straight and tall before her employer.

"I am sorry, Mrs. Atterbury, but I cannot allow anyone to touch my
face. You are very kind to have taken this interest in me and I
appreciate it. I will gladly accept the preparations and use them
myself if you will give me the directions, but if anyone else attempted
it I should go mad with nervous torture. I hope you understand; I may
seem abnormally sensitive to you, but I really could not endure it."

Mrs. Atterbury, with a shrug, capitulated:

"Very well, my dear, you must do as you like, of course. The directions
are upon each jar. Use it this afternoon and let me see at dinner how
much it has improved your appearance."

Betty took the articles murmuring her thanks and went to her own room.
There she carefully extracted a small quantity of their contents from
each of the jars, wrapped it in paper and burnt it in the grate. This
done she seated herself before her dressing-table, and with cosmetics
of her own applied herself to her task.

She worked long and painstakingly, but at length the result was
achieved to her satisfaction and she sat back and surveyed herself in
the mirror.

The mark was almost obliterated, only the faintest shadow of deeper
color showing beneath the rose-pink glow which tinted her cheeks from
brow to neck, and with the disfigurement banished her whole expression
changed. It was as if a different personality were reflected before
her, and Betty's first gleam of pleasure at her handiwork gave place to
a little frown of doubt and uncertainty, not unmixed with trepidation.
What motive lay behind this suggestion from Mrs. Atterbury?

At dusk when Betty descended the stairs she discovered a man standing
in the shadowed doorway of the drawing-room. At first she though it
was Wolvert, but a second glance showed that the intruder was of more
slender build and younger, and his face seemed overspread with an
unhealthy greenish pallor.

He stood motionless staring glassily at her and when she was half way
down he stepped forward.

"Who are you? What are you doing here?" His high-pitched quavering
voice shrilled just as the firelight fell full upon his face, and Betty
recognized him at once. It was the pale, overdressed, foppish youth
of the dinner party on the night when Wolvert had uttered his strange
toast.

"Mr. Ide! Don't you remember me? I am Mrs. Atterbury's companion."

"Oh--er--of course! Stupid of me, but my nerves are a bit on edge and
seeing you so suddenly in the half-light--"

His voice trailed off into silence and he still stood with his eyes
fixed in wondering perplexity on her face.

"It was a natural mistake, Mr. Ide. You are waiting for Mrs. Atterbury?
I will go to her--"

"Thank you, Welch has taken my message." He spoke as if dazed. "It is
extraordinary, but do you know I fancied for a moment that you were
someone else? There was something about you, Miss--Miss--"

"My name is Betty Shaw," the girl interrupted quietly. "I happen to
be of quite a usual type, I believe, except for this birthmark on my
cheek. I have powdered it over tonight, so it is no wonder you did not
recognize me at once. No doubt Mrs. Atterbury will be down in a few
minutes."

She nodded and turning abruptly entered the library, leaving the young
man gazing after her with vacant eyes, and jaws agape.

The library was empty and in darkness, even the hearth fire having
died, and a chill dampness pervaded the air. Betty switched on the
lights and looked about her. The morning's correspondence was still
heaped untouched upon the desk, but the rest of the room was in order
save that a huge mass of fluffy charred fragments, as of burned paper,
choked the chimney opening, smothering the logs beneath.

What could have been destroyed there in such quantities? The whole
contents of desk and safe combined would not have produced such a
mound of ashes. She took up the poker and stirred them about idly, her
thoughts reverting to the strange manner of the young man in the hall,
when all at once a scrap of paper fluttered from the rest which showed
a gleam of white. It was part of the upper half of a news-sheet; the
date of that morning was plainly visible at the top and just beneath it
the fragment of a sentence in double heading type caught her eye:

                  "Police Find Promising Clue to B--
                     Looking For Girl With Scar--"

Betty dropped the paper as if it burned her.




                             CHAPTER XVI.

                          _The Closing Net._


A light tapping, faint but insistent came to Betty's ears in the midst
of her consternation and her hands dropped to her sides as she turned
quickly from the hearth. The sound was brittle and crisp rather than
metallic and seemed to come from the window which showed a square black
void against the light of the room.

As she approached, however, a face appeared out of the surrounding
gloom and flattened itself against the pane. It was that of a man,
youthful and clean shaven, with a cap pulled low over his eyes, and
as he perceived that he had succeeded in attracting her attention, he
beckoned eagerly.

Betty hesitated but as he repeated the gesture with anxious impatience,
she walked over to the window and opened it.

"Good evening, Miss. I had Demon out for a bit of a run just now and he
got away from me. I whistled and whistled but he didn't come back and
finally I found him out by the gate jumping all around a strange man.
It was funny, for he's pretty fierce usually; you're the only one he's
taken to that I can remember. Then I saw that the young fellow had a
glove in his hand, that he was making Demon jump for; this glove, Miss.
Is it yours?"

"Why, yes!" Betty stammered, flushing warmly. It was the glove she
had dropped during her last stormy interview with Herbert Ross. Her
companion she had recognized at once as Demon's keeper whom she
encountered on the afternoon when the dog rescued her from Wolvert's
unwelcome attentions. "Did he give it to you for me?"

"And something else besides. We got talking and he asked would I give
you the glove and this letter. He said it was very private and I was
to tell nobody, but put it in your own hands the first chance I got,
so I come straight here and nosed around until I saw you over by the
fire-place."

"Thank you!" Betty seized the envelope and thrust it in her breast. "I
will see that you are well paid--"

"Oh, that's all right, Miss. The young gentleman fixed me up, but I'd
have done it anyway. Demon's a good judge of character, he is! I'll
beat it now, Miss. It's as much as my place is worth to be seen around
here."

He vanished into the darkness and Betty closed the window and sank into
the chair before the desk. The letter lay like a living hand upon her
heart and she longed for solitude and security to read it in peace,
but Mrs. Atterbury's voice sounded from the hall and she knew that at
any moment the others would descend for dinner. Why had Ross taken this
desperate chance to communicate with her? Was it to implore forgiveness
for his accusation, or in final warning of disaster?

She fumbled at her breast in a desperate impulse to brave discovery if
necessary but to glean at all costs the purport of his message, when
the door opened and Welch stood on the threshold, announcing dinner.

How she managed to struggle through the hour that followed she could
scarcely remember. The expression of half-startled amazement with which
the others greeted her changed appearance and the awkward attempt to
bridge over their surprise lingered but vaguely in her thoughts. She
could feel their gaze turning to her again and again in the pauses of
the disjointed conversation, but she kept her face assiduously averted,
fearing lest they read in her eyes the knowledge she had gained from
the charred fragment of paper.

To her relief Mrs. Atterbury dismissed her as soon as the meal was
concluded, drawing her aside at the foot of the stairs to whisper
commendingly:

"My dear, the improvement is marvellous, as I told you it would be.
Use the wax regularly in future and you will have no cause to pity
yourself, I can assure you. No one would believe there was a blemish
beneath the rouge which you have so cleverly applied, but be careful
not to overdo it. Your coloring is just a little too brilliant tonight."

Betty glanced at herself hurriedly in the mirror when she reached
the privacy of her room. Her eyes glittered and her cheeks burned
feverishly beneath the artificial glow. With trembling fingers she drew
the envelope from its hiding place and broke the seal.

"Come to me"--it began without form of address, "--if you value your
safety. I will wait near the gate until midnight. Don't delay, for the
danger of which I told you is culminating and any hour may precipitate
the crisis when it will be beyond my power to help or warn you."

The brief note was unsigned and the flowing characteristic hand was
unfamiliar to her, but no question of evading the command entered her
thoughts. She must get to him, though it meant running the gauntlet of
sharp eyes and ears below, and actual peril should she be discovered.
She threw a dark cloak over her dinner gown, determined if she were
intercepted to plead a headache and the desire for a turn in the fresh
air before retiring. Once clear of the house she feared nothing for
she knew that Demon was held in wholesome awe by even the redoubtable
Welch. The only danger would be that the dog himself might spring upon
her in the dark, but that risk she must face.

Opening her door softly, Betty listened to the low murmur of voices
from below. It seemed to come from the music room, and she waited until
she had distinguished each voice and assured herself that all three of
Mrs. Atterbury's guests were with her before venturing down the hall.

The main staircase was out of the question and she chose the one at the
rear. It descended to the servants' quarters, but she knew that the
cook had long since retired and the rattle of silverware told her that
Welch was busied in the dining-room. There remained only Caroline to be
considered and she was seldom in evidence at this hour.

Betty moved to the head of the stairs and listened again intently.
No sound penetrated from the lower regions of the house and the hall
light was dim. Cautiously, with her heart pounding in her throat, she
descended to a narrow landing midway of the staircase, when the kitchen
door was suddenly opened emitting a broad stream of light and Caroline
appeared, bearing a steaming pitcher.

Trapped, Betty glanced wildly about her and saw a small door at the
left of the landing. Flinging it open she sprang into the black void
beyond, her forehead striking smartly against the edge of a shelf.
As she grasped it to steady herself her fingers came in contact with
glass jars placed solidly in rows; evidently she had stumbled into a
store-closet.

Behind her she heard slow heavy steps mounting the stairs and she
scarcely breathed as they paused on the landing within arm's length
of her refuge. Had the woman seen her? But even as the fear gripped
her, Betty heard the complaining creak of the stairs once more and the
ponderous tread ascended, diminishing to silence along the upper hall.

Waiting no longer, she slipped from the closet and fairly flew down to
the kitchen. Welch had not yet made his rounds and the heavy back door,
unlatched, swung wide at her touch. With a sob of thankfulness she
found herself out in the pine-scented darkness, with only the whisper
of the wind in the evergreens and the distant shriek of whistles upon
the river to break the silence. She was free!

There was a low light in the upper story of the garage and with it to
guide her she sped around the corner of the house on the opposite side
from that on which the music room was located, crouching low beneath
the window sills and darting from one sheltering clump of trees to
another. She found the path but the darkness confused her and more than
once she strayed from it to strike against a wide spreading branch or
sink to her knees in a tangle of underbrush.

The distance seemed interminable to the gate, and Betty was commencing
to fear that she had lost her way when a low rumbling growl reached her
ears, and a cautious masculine voice, silencing it, brought a soft
little cry from her own lips.

"I knew it must be you!"

Although they had parted in bitterness and anger she seemed to have
forgotten it, for her hand reached out and found his in the black void
of the night.

For a long minute they stood silently together, then a pleading paw
raked at her knee, and Demon's eyes glistened up to her in reproachful
greeting. With a murmured laugh that was half a sob Betty released her
hand and stooping, patted the great shaggy head.

"You had my note?" Ross's tone was breathless. "I thought that fellow
was to be trusted! The dog came to me a half-hour ago but he remembered
my voice and I kept him here for fear he would mistake you in the
dark and attack you. You must listen to me. Whatever you think of me,
whether you are still resentful or not makes no difference now. You are
in frightful danger and you must escape from these people while you
can. Come! We have no time to lose. There is a car waiting around the
corner and your absence from the house may be discovered at any moment."

Betty slowly drew back.

"Come where?" she asked. "My place is here."

"Here? In this den of criminals? Here to wait until the house is
surrounded and you are captured with the rest to face the hideous
ignominy of a trial? Do you know what you are guilty of in the eyes
of the law? Not only compounding a felony but being accessory after
the fact to a murder! Not the most adroit counsel could save you from
imprisonment, if not worse!"

"Murder!" Betty's voice was a mere whisper.

"Do you know that a man was done to death beneath that roof even while
it sheltered you? That the police and every detective in the country
have been moving heaven and earth to find a clue to his murderers and
a trail has been picked up which leads unmistakably here? Even if you
know nothing about it you must have seen it in the papers; they've
been full of the case for nearly three weeks, ever since the body was
found--"

"I know." She spoke in unguarded haste. "You mean Breckinridge. I saw
his picture in a paper which I bought downtown and I recognized him--"

"Recognized him!" repeated Ross, aghast. "Do you mean that you were
dragged into even this? You knew him?"

"I saw him once." Betty hesitated and then went on impetuously as if
glad to rid herself of the hideous burden she had borne so long. "I
came downstairs alone at midnight, and I found him lying dead upon the
floor. I don't know how he got in or who killed him. There wasn't the
slightest trace left in the morning and it all seemed like an awful
dream."

Ross groaned.

"And you told no one? You kept it to yourself and stayed on? Good
God, what is it that has held you here? What obsession controls
you, stronger than the fear of death!! How could you, a tender,
highly-strung girl, force yourself to intimate association with
desperate criminals whom you knew had not hesitated to take human life?
What manner of woman are you?"

"I don't know," Betty answered truthfully enough. "If anyone had told
me that I could endure what I have gone through I should have fancied
them quite mad, but I have not given up my purpose and I cannot leave
while a single chance remains for its fulfillment. You must think what
you please of me. I shall not attempt to explain or defend myself to
you, and if the worst comes and I am taken with the others, I will face
the consequences. No one can help me, and no one can stop me."

"I mean to take you away now, tonight, if I have to do it by force!"
Ross spoke through set teeth. "I know who you are and everything about
you except the mission which brought you here, and that I can guess. I
mean to save you from yourself and the result of your mad recklessness!"

"You know?" Betty echoed faintly.

"Oh, my dear, give it up and come away with me!" He had drawn close to
her and the thrilling tenderness in his tone made the blood leap in her
veins. "I will take you where you will be safe, where not a breath of
this hideous monster of crime can touch you. You are the bravest little
woman in the world but you are acting from a mistaken sense of loyalty,
I know, I feel it. Dear, I love you! Whatever you think of me, whatever
the future may hold, I love you! When I have seemed to be hounding you
down I was trying always to protect you. Before I knew the truth, when
everything seemed blackest against you and I believed the worst I loved
you. Criminal or not, I wanted to hold you against all the world! Won't
you trust me, dear? Won't you let me save you while there is yet time?"

"Oh, please!" Betty cried a trifle breathlessly. "You cannot realize
what you are saying. You know nothing of me, nothing, and as to my
leaving here, I--I am not free to go."

"And do you think that I will allow you to remain here another hour?"
he cried. "Do you think that I will let you face this unspeakable
danger, you whom I love?--For I do love you, Betty! Whether you believe
me or not, whether you listen or turn from me, I love you! That is
why I trusted you from the first, believed in you when appearances
were blackest, had faith, blindly, instinctively against reason and
logic and circumstantial evidence of the most conclusive kind! The
net is closing around this horrible high priestess of crime and her
accomplices; it will be only a matter of hours now before the end. Oh,
my dear, drive this mad, quixotic idea from your thoughts and come with
me!"

Betty slowly retreated a step or two from him.

"I do believe in you--in your friendship, I mean. I know that you want
to help me, that you have my interests, my very safety at heart and I
am grateful. But there is something stronger than the fear of death.
Don't make it any harder for me than it is. I realize my position; I
know the danger in which I stand alone, the end that waits for me if
they discover my purpose, or the consequences if the police come. And
still I must remain! No power on earth can move me!"

"I can't believe you do fully realize your danger!" Ross pleaded. "I
did not mean to tell you, I did not want to frighten you until I had
taken you to a place of safety, but dear, you must know the truth. It
is not the Atterbury creature or the others of her gang for whom the
police are searching, but you--you! The newspapers today fairly blazed
with it and every detective in the city is out after 'the girl with the
scar'! Do you know what you have been doing, what you have been guilty
of on these commissions as the tool of this woman?"

"Yes," answered Betty quietly. "I knew, but if I had refused, someone
else would have gone in my place and I would have been dismissed, my
own plan thwarted. I suppose I was hard and bitter, but it seemed to
me that the ends justified any means. Those people came voluntarily
to meet me; they had an alternative but they made their choice. If I
had gone to the police myself I would not only have defeated my own
purpose, but theirs also. Let the detectives search for the girl with
the scar! I am safe until they trace me here and by that time I may
have succeeded in my plan. No one can know where I am to be found but
you, and I am not afraid that you will betray me!"

"But I have!" he groaned. "My chief knows. As a private detective
myself I was employed in the first place to find you, you can guess by
whom. My chief learned that I was on the trail of a girl with a scar
and he thinks I've double-crossed him and gone crooked in trying to
protect you. He's honest and he's got bull-dog courage; you can't bluff
him or buy him."

"Not even with information?" Betty asked on a swift inspiration. "Will
he hold off for only a day or two, just to give me another chance, if
you can tell him something that will be of great value to him?"

"What do you mean, dear? What have you learned?" The question sprang
eagerly from his lips. "I could not bribe McCormick, but I might stall
him until I can take you out of his reach--"

"McCormick!" A sentence she had read a week before stood out across the
girl's consciousness in letters of fire. "Listen! There's a man who
uses the title of Professor--Professor Stolz, they called him here--who
has just been arrested in Chicago."

Ross uttered a startled exclamation, but she went on:

"I believe he has escaped or broken parole before, because he is being
held on an old verdict concerning someone named Hamilton, but your
Mr. McCormick is trying to find new evidence against him. He's an
accomplice of Mrs. Atterbury and the evidence is in this house. Have
you ever heard of a woman called 'The Comet'?"

"Yes! Maisie Larne! She was murdered in Denver, in a fit of jealousy,
by a man nicknamed 'Red' Rathbone--"

"She was murdered because she sold out Mrs. Atterbury's accomplice,
this person called 'Red,' to detectives in Laramie, Wyoming, and they
communicated with the federal authorities in Washington, and spoiled
that particular plot. 'Red' escaped to Denver, she followed him and she
was killed by a man known as 'Bud'--"

"Bud Malone! And we never suspected it! The Chief will get him--"

"He's on his way to Japan," interrupted Betty.

"Then he is as good as in our hands! We will have all the ports watched
and he can't escape," Ross cried. Then impetuously he held out his
hands to her. "I can't endure it that all this hideous knowledge should
have come to you! It is as if you were being steeped in defilement! You
know that you can trust me! Tell me what this impossible task is which
you have set your hand to. Let me undertake it for you, let me bear the
burden!"

"Please, please don't ask me! You cannot help me, no one can. I must
see it through alone!"

"Then you--you mean that I am to leave you here?" His arms dropped to
his sides. "Nothing can move you? I may not even stay to protect you,
lest I draw suspicion upon you! I can't! No man could leave the woman
he loved in such peril! What if I were to take you away now by sheer
force?"

"But you will not." Betty spoke softly but with absolute finality. "I
trusted you, I came to you here because you asked it, you will not take
advantage of my faith to destroy it. And you must not mention--love.
I am grateful to you for risking your chief's displeasure, your very
career for my sake, but I must stand alone. There is stern work ahead
of me and I shall succeed; I feel it in my very heart and nothing can
make me turn from that which lies before me."

Herbert Ross drew a deep breath and his voice was husky with pent-up
emotion as he said solemnly:

"Then may God keep you, dear! It may be that you are right; such
bravery as yours should have its reward, no matter what your object may
be. Remember that day and night I shall be on guard as near as I can
get to you without bringing harm upon your head. Take this and wear it;
do not leave it for an instant out of reach, and if danger threatens
you blow as loudly as you can upon it. A man will be stationed where
he can hear it and pass the signal along, and you will find me at your
side. I must not keep you now, but God! how I dread to let you go back
into their clutches!"

Betty fingered the slender chain he had placed about her neck. A
whistle hung upon it and she thrust it quickly beneath her cloak.

"I shall not forget, nor be afraid, knowing that you are here. I am
glad, too, that you do not think me a criminal, even if I have broken
the law. When I thought that you were trailing me, spying upon me, I
felt that I hated you, but now--"

"'Now'?" he repeated gently, as she hesitated.

"I am deeply grateful, and we--we shall be friends." Betty held out her
hand once more, but shyly this time. "Thank you, oh, thank you for all
that you have done for me, for all that you would do, and--goodnight."

He took her small hand in both his own and held it tightly for a
moment without words. Then she slowly withdrew it and turning moved off
into the darkness with the great dog trotting noiselessly at her heels.

For the first time since she had entered that house her spirit was
light within her and a great peace and contentment filled her heart.
Despite the danger in which she stood, all fear had fallen from her,
for was not he there, on guard? Surely nothing would harm her now, no
power of darkness or evil would touch her while he waited there, while
that little whistle hung about her neck to summon him to her aid. He
had believed in her when all the world would have doubted, because he
cared for her. And she?

Betty stopped in the wintry path and her clasped hands flew to her
breast. What could this strange feeling of happiness mean, which had
come to her in the face of her danger, and why had that danger itself
become minimized at the mere thought of his watchful presence. Why did
she trust him so wholly? Could it be that her faith, her trust in turn,
was rooted in something deeper than friendship?

Even as she asked herself the question, the girl's own heart, awakened
and singing, gave her answer. It was love!




                             CHAPTER XVII.

                           _Turned Tables._


Betty reached the house in safety but there an unforeseen difficulty
confronted her. In her haste to obey the summons, she had given no
thought as to how she might gain re-entrance, if Welch had made his
rounds and locked up for the night. She knew with what caution the
house was guarded and if she encountered one of the alarm wires all
would be lost. Even that would presuppose a window or door left
unfastened and that was a contingency too remote to be considered.

The lower floor was still lighted and moving shadows blurred against
the curtains of the windows as she skirted the side of the house on
which the music room was located. Betty had taken no account of time
but she felt that it must be very late and it was with a forlorn hope
that she tried the kitchen door.

To her surprise it yielded against her hand and she pushed it slowly
open, halting upon the threshold in sudden dread. A low light was still
burning in the room and she saw a man seated at the table. His head
rested upon his outflung arms and from where the girl stood she could
hear his heavy stertorous breathing. The face was turned sidewise
toward her and she had no difficulty in recognizing Welch, although
his expression was oddly distorted and his heavy jowls were tinged a
mottled purplish hue.

Betty tiptoed past him, scarcely daring to breathe, but he did not
awaken and his rasping snore followed her as she fled silently up
the stair. Her own room was reached at last and bolting the door she
removed her damp, chilling garments, heavy with the night's dew and
prepared for the task which remained to her when the household should
finally retire.

The slender chain clung reassuringly to her neck and she drew out
the little whistle and examined it. It was of silver, delicately
chased, and bore upon a plain oval shield the initials H. R. It seemed
incredible that so fragile and toylike an instrument could summon aid
and yet upon it might sometime depend life or death for her. It was
Ross's own that he had given to her, and she pressed it to her breast
fervently as though it were a talisman to keep all danger and evil from
her.

The hour dragged, but at length she heard the rustle of feet upon the
stair and a murmur of voices which grew less and less as doors closed
until silence fell once more.

Betty was in a fever of impatience, but she resolutely fixed her eyes
upon the tiny clock on the mantel and waited in an excess of caution
until the hands pointed to half-past one. Then with her dark robe
girded about her and her felt-covered feet making no sound, she opened
her door.

The next moment she started back in amazement. A chair had been placed
a short distance down the hall near the entrance to Mrs. Atterbury's
bedroom but it was empty and an oddly huddled figure lay beside it upon
the floor. It was a woman, collapsed as though she had been overcome by
slumber and slipped from her chair, but there was something about the
inert, helpless figure and hoarse stertorous breath not unlike that of
the other downstairs which warned Betty that this was no ordinary sleep.

Holding her breath she drew near the recumbent form and recognized
Caroline. The woman's face was empurpled like that of Welch and her
relaxed chin had fallen upon her breast giving her an expression of
repellant brutish vacuity. Betty had always considered her a stolid
unintelligent creature whose chief virtue was faithfulness, but now it
was as if something malevolent and bestial had made itself manifest,
betraying her real nature in her unconsciousness.

Hesitating no longer, Betty stole to the stairs and was descending as
on the previous night, when again a light in the music room warned
her of an alien presence. This time, however, it was not dim and
flickering but a slender, dazzlingly brilliant ray, like the dart of a
rapier, which swept the doorway in a flash and was gone, leaving behind
a shimmering hazy glow.

Betty crept down, her unlighted candle and box of matches clutched to
her breast. The glow still remained as that of a searchlight which has
been shifted in another direction and while she paused breathless, the
clink of metal and a low-muttered ejaculation in an unknown masculine
voice came to her ears.

Step by step, with her heart fluttering like a wild thing, the girl
advanced to the doorway and cautiously reconnoitred. The portrait of
Beethoven was in its place, but before it knelt a man in rough dark
clothes, the soles of his boots upturned and glistening with fresh
gobbets of mud. A canvas bag open on the floor beside him displayed
odd shapes of metal whose edges caught the light, and the bull's-eye
lantern in the intruder's hand cast a steady stream of radiance about
the benign pictured face above.

While his back was still turned, Betty slipped silently across the
doorsill and to her hiding place of the night before where she crouched
peering out from beneath the upraised piano top. The man was passing
his hands hurriedly over the lower part of the frame, grunting in his
impatience as the secret spring eluded his search. Once he turned his
head slightly and she caught a glimpse of a heavy, protruding, unshaven
jaw and flattened nose. The low visor of his cap concealed the forehead
and eyes, but the profile was startling in its ferocity and sullen
strength.

Although she realized that the clumsy fingers might at any moment touch
the knob and a shrill alarm peal through the house the girl lingered,
held by a slender thread of hope. Welch was sleeping, perhaps drugged,
and there was a chance that he might not have attached the alarm system
for the night before unconsciousness descended upon him. In that case,
if she could but remain undiscovered until the burglar had accomplished
his purpose and was gone, she could examine the rifled safe for herself.

"You're ahead of time, Mike. Admiring the portrait?" A low, sarcastic
drawl sounded from the doorway and the man turned with an oath, holding
something in his free hand which glittered ominously. Betty cowered
back, her fluttering heart still and cold within her breast.

Leaning nonchalantly against the wall by the door, his hands in the
pockets of his dressing gown and his dark face wreathed with a derisive
smile, stood Jack Wolvert.

The man before the picture swore again, but in a relieved fashion.

"You don't mind taking chances, do you?" he growled. "I might have
plugged you full of holes without lookin' first."

"Oh, no you wouldn't!" retorted Wolvert amiably. "If you'd been quick
on the trigger you wouldn't have done your stretch at St. Quentin.
Nifty portrait that, isn't it? Serves a two-fold purpose; immortalizes
the likeness of the gentleman who composed what may be your funeral
march, if you are lucky, and--"

"Say, cut the comedy, an' let's get down to business!" the other
interrupted gruffly. "You'll have Welch lumberin' in on us before you
know it."

"Not he!" Wolvert shrugged and strolled over to the picture. "He is
sleeping the sleep of one who finishes off the wine-glasses left from
dinner. I prepared one for his especial benefit."

"God!" The man called "Mike" recoiled. "You don't mean--"

"Of course not!" The languid tone was edged sharply. "I don't go in for
anything crude! Caroline, too, is _hors de combat_ or, as you would
express it, dead to the world. Her midnight cup of tea before she went
on guard outside Marcia's door was of specific brewing. Our beloved
Marcia, I may add, has resumed her Macbethan promenades."

"Walkin' again in her sleep?" Mike paused uneasily. "I don't like that!
It always means bad luck for some of us! I ain't stuck on this job
anyway; we could drop it now an' stick to the old game, fifty-fifty--"

"Forget it!" Wolvert snatched the lantern from the other's hand and
trained its single ray upon the right hand corner of the frame. "Watch
me, and duck when the big swing starts."

Betty watched also, her heart racing once more as Wolvert's facile
fingers found the spring and the portrait swung out in a mighty sweep,
revealing the square steel sheet built compactly into the wall. The
buzzer of the alarm whirred impotently and was still, and Mike dropped
to his knees before the aperture with a grunt of satisfaction, his
suddenly aroused scruples forgotten in professional interest.

His bullet-shaped head completely blocked Betty's view of the
combination, but she heard the clink of the knob as it whirled under
his hand. At length Mike sat back on his heels, swearing softly.

"It's no go!" he breathed. "Can't feel the drop of the tumblers. I'll
have to use the soup, after all."

"Go to it," responded Wolvert savagely. "It's a tough layer but thin;
look out she doesn't eat through."

Then followed an interminable age while Betty crouched, tense and
cramped, listening to the click of tools and pressing a fold of her
gown across her mouth and nostrils to keep out the pungent fumes which
stole upon the air. Would they penetrate the closed doors above and
give warning that treachery was afoot?

"Ha!" Wolvert's ejaculation of triumph broke the protracted tension,
just as the heavy door, with a grating jar, split like a crust before
their eyes and fell outward, yawning upon one hinge.

"Got it!" Mike pushed back his cap and wiped his brow. "Armor plate's
made of cheese compared to that! Now which is the pay dirt?"

Wolvert knelt beside him and threw the light upon the gaping cavity.
Betty's eyes were watering but the fumes were gradually passing away
and she could see that the interior of the safe was filled with packets
of paper, neatly pigeon-holed in rows.

"Three hundred thousand!" Wolvert crooned, gloatingly. "Three hundred
thousand and maybe more! God, what a haul! Think of it, Mike, the
pickings of five years, salted down and waiting for us, to say nothing
of rich veins that have scarcely been tapped yet!"

"I can lick my chops over 'em just as well when I've got 'em safe away
from here!" Mike glanced apprehensively over his shoulder and Betty
could see his eyes glistening like those of a cat in the shadow of his
visored cap. "Hurry up and pick out the live wires from the dead ones.
The old girl may take it into her head to walk again!"

"You can drop her with the blackjack if she does," Wolvert returned
carelessly. His long, slender hands were darting in and out among the
pigeonholes, sorting the various packets deftly and ranging them in two
piles. "Got the wallets?"

"Here!" Mike produced oblong leather folders from each of his breast
pockets. "Sure you don't overlook any good bets, Jack."

"No fear!" Wolvert passed over package after package of envelopes as he
talked. "Here's the dope on the Texas matter; that's good for thirty
or forty thousand to start with; this is the certificate for those two
hundred shares of copper you've heard about. To the right party they're
worth twenty thousand. These we might take on speculation; lumping
them together we may figure on realizing a hundred thousand from them,
roughly speaking."

"Some dough!" Mike chuckled, stowing away the packets as fast as they
were handed to him. "What's this bunch?"

"Can't stop now to go over them, Mike, but I know what they are and
I'll open your eyes when we sort them out over at your joint. Now, if
I can only lay my hands on that Crane contract; I wonder where our
careful Marcia cached it?"

"What's this, any good?" Mike had stuffed one bulging wallet back into
his pocket and drawn a long envelope from one of the upper pigeonholes.

Wolvert glanced over his shoulder at the label and shrugged.

"Small change, a thousand or so, but take it along if you want it. It's
easy money."

"A thousand cold iron men look good to me. I can feel 'em rolling into
my hand right now, but those big figures make me afraid the alarm
clock's liable to go off any minute an' wake me up. Say, get a move on,
Jack. I'm gettin' a cold chill like someone was watchin' me!"

Betty gasped inaudibly and shrank still further back in her retreat,
but Wolvert only shrugged in impatience.

"That Crane contract is the main thing; it's worth more than all the
rest put together, to us!" he grumbled. "Get your head out of the
light, Mike!"

"Is this it, in the long blue envelope?" The other had overcome his
momentary uneasiness and resumed his search. "Feels kinder thick."

"No, don't pay dividends any more. It's the West--what's that?"

Betty had caught at the leg of the piano as her cramped limbs wavered
beneath her and a little silver ring which she wore rapped smartly upon
the polished surface of the wood. For one thrilling moment she held her
breath, but the lantern swept around the opposite side of the room to
the door and then flashed back and Mike swore once more.

"I've had enough of this, I tell you! I don't feel right and I've got
a hunch that I'd better be movin'. Let the bloomin' contract go if you
can't find it; we've got enough as it is!"

"Nothing doing!" Wolvert spoke through set teeth in a tone which the
listening girl remembered with a shudder. "You don't beat it unless you
take that with you!"

"Oh, don't I?" snarled Mike, leaping to his feet in swift rage. "I'll
show you, my fine gentleman, that you ain't dealin' with a skirt now,
to bully or soft-soap as you feel like it! I wouldn't be here if I
wasn't through takin' orders from nobody--!"

"Easy there with the bluff!" Wolvert interrupted coolly. "You can't get
along without me, you know. What you've got there is just so much waste
paper to you, if I don't negotiate it for you. Don't be a quitter!"

"Nobody ain't ever called me that yet, but I'm hep that there's
somethin' wrong. Give it up, Jack, an' let's lay the plant--"

"Here it is!" Wolvert swooped down upon a single folded paper and waved
it exultantly. "Take it, Mike, and keep it well; it's a gold mine! Now
come on and set the stage."

Before Betty's amazed eyes a curious scene was enacted. Seizing one
after another of the heavy leather chairs which were grouped about
the room, Wolvert and his accomplice noiselessly overturned them,
easing them gently to the floor where they lay at grotesque angles.
Next they turned their attention to the smokers' stand, rolling the
smaller articles upon it in every direction until the rug was strewn
with cigarettes and matches. The stand itself they placed upon its side
against the wall as if it had been flung there with violence.

"How about the piano?" Mike's eyes travelled speculatively to the
shadowed corner and Betty's senses reeled. "Gonna bang it up a little?"

"No, don't overdo the wreckage. Just move the center table over against
it." Wolvert was busy scattering the remaining contents of the safe
about before it. "Too bad we can't smash that bit of crockery; it would
be the last finishing touch."

He gestured toward a priceless Royal Worcester vase which stood upon a
teakwood taboret near the portrait, and Mike grinned.

"That's easy! Watch me knock it to smithereens!"

"And have the house about our ears?" Wolvert sneered, but the other
paid no heed.

He had caught up a small silk prayer rug and, wrapping it about the
vase, laid it upon the floor. Then, raising a sausage-like roll of
cloth heavily weighed which he took from his bag, he struck it a blow
with all the force of his brawny arm behind it. There was a dull thud
and a soft, shivery tinkle, and when the rug was unwrapped a heap of
jagged, richly-colored fragments was revealed. It was, as Wolvert had
said, the finishing touch to a scene of havoc which seemingly only a
hand-to-hand struggle could have wrought.

"Now for the rough stuff." Wolvert rose from his knees and with one
quick, muscular jerk, ripped his dressing gown from thigh to shoulder,
tearing one sleeve loose. Then he coolly turned his back to Mike and
crossed his wrists behind him. "Tie them good and tight, Mike. We don't
want to fake this part of the game."

Mike obeyed with alacrity, twisting the cord until Betty could see the
slender wrists writhe.

"Now my ankles." Wolvert gritted his teeth, and in the light from the
lantern beads of perspiration glittered on his forehead. He knelt again
and then lay flat upon his back, facing the safe, his outstretched feet
almost within the aperture.

Mike lashed them firmly and turning to his bag, produced a sponge and a
small phial with which he approached his victim, grinning slyly.

"Easy on that!" warned Wolvert. "Don't put me out, Mike. Use just
enough to leave the scent on my hair and shirt."

"I hate to beat it without my kit." Mike cast a reluctant eye on the
bag at his feet. "Prettiest set of tools I ever had!"

"You won't need it again after we've turned this trick," responded his
co-conspirator. "It's got to look as though you were scared off, you
know. Don't forget to leave the chloroform too. Come on with it, I'm
ready."

"Remember, Two Forty-seven Porter Street. I'll wait till midnight
and if you don't show up by then I'll clear for the old hang-out in
Baltimore. Here goes, pleasant dreams!"

He pulled the cork from the phial and a cloying sweetish odor choked
the air. Producing a grimy handkerchief, Mike poured a few drops upon
it and applied it to the head and throat of the prostrate man.

"Not--too--much!" The smothered tones died away in a mumble, and
placing the phial upon the floor beside the recumbent figure Mike gave
one last sweeping glance about the room and slipped like an eel through
the door, the flash of his lantern vanishing with him into the gloom.

Waiting only until the rasp of a softly opening window had assured her
that the intruder was gone, Betty crept from her hiding place, her
pulses leaping madly. She had made a desperate resolve and realized
that she must put it into immediate execution, before the fumes of the
anæsthetic had cleared from the momentarily dulled brain of the man
lying before her.

Lighting her candle, she placed it upon the floor and crept on her
hands and knees toward the phial, keeping well out of the possible
upward range of Wolvert's vision.

The half-stupefied man stirred and muttered as her fingers closed about
the phial, but she dared not hesitate. With a shaking hand she poured
an ounce of the pungent liquid over the grimy handkerchief which lay
beneath her hand, and creeping to Wolvert, suddenly dropped it like a
cone down over his upturned face, holding the sides drawn tightly down.

His limbs twitched and his head moved feebly, but she did not
relinquish her pressure until the muscular action ceased and the body
lay limp and flaccid as that of the dead. Then, with a little sob
of exultation, she flung herself upon the safe and seizing the blue
envelope of which Mike had spoken, she tore it open.

A swift glance over the single folded sheet of letter paper and long
narrow slip, much creased and yellowed with age, which formed its
contents, and Betty clasped it convulsively to her breast. Her face
was transfigured as she crept to her candle and with it crossed to the
hearth.

A moment more and a clear flame sprang up, flaring fitfully in her
trembling hands, then died and only a tiny heap of fluffy black flakes
among the heavier wood ashes told of her desperate plan's consummation.

She turned to escape, but a glance at the motionless form halted her
in mid-flight. Suppose she had killed him!

Betty's heart contracted and fearfully she approached him once more.
The handkerchief had slipped from his face and its deathlike pallor
seemed to confirm her misgiving.

Kneeling beside him, she had placed her hand upon his breast, when a
lurching shuffle in the hall made her recoil.

Stumbling and clinging to the wall for support, Welch reeled in at
the doorway, and his drug-dulled eyes burst into sudden flame as they
lighted upon her.

"D---- you!" he bellowed. "Got you with the goods at last!"




                            CHAPTER XVIII.

                              _Unmasked._


Betty sprang to her feet and in a swift inspiration born of her
extremity, tottered toward Welch with outstretched arms.

"Help!" she shrieked, her clear ringing voice echoing through the
silent house. "Burglars! Thieves! Help!"

Muffled screams answered her from above and lights began to waver down
the stairway. Welch seized the girl roughly by the shoulder.

"What's the game!" His thick tones rumbled in her ear, and he pointed
with a shaking hand. "Is that your work?"

"They've killed him!" she cried, wrenching herself from his grasp. "I
heard a struggle and came down and found him--oh; Mrs. Atterbury! Mrs.
Atterbury!"

A fresh chorus of shrieks told of the finding of Caroline and mingling
with them sounded a deeper masculine note. Who could it be? The only
male members of the household were there before her.

"Betty, where are you? What has happened?" Mrs. Atterbury rushed
down the stairs with Madame Cimmino clinging to her gown and behind
them appeared two pajama-clad forms which the girl did not at first
recognize.

Someone turned the wall-switch, flooding the room with light and Welch
lurched dazedly to Wolvert's recumbent figure, toppling down to his
knees beside him.

Although every nerve in her body recoiled from the contact, Betty
nevertheless precipitated herself upon her employer's unresponsive
form, sobbing as if in genuine hysteria. Mrs. Atterbury, after one
swift comprehensive glance about the wrecked room stood as if turned to
stone, her eyes fixed immovably upon the yawning safe, a bluish tinge
slowly overspreading her waxen pallor.

Madame Cimmino, however, passed her like a white flame and cast herself
shrieking upon Wolvert's unconscious breast. One of the pajamaed
figures halted aghast in the doorway, but the other stepped forward and
with an added shock Betty recognized Doctor Bayard's venerable head
even before his commanding tones dominated the tumult.

"What does this mean? Who first discovered this affair? Welch! Young
woman!"

"I found her here!" Welch pointed an accusing finger at Betty but his
head lolled drunkenly upon his short bull neck. "She was kneelin'
beside him. He ain't dead, only put to sleep. Ask her how it happened!"

"We're sold out!" A high-pitched male voice squeaked like that of a
cornered rat from the doorway and Ide's glassy eyes fastened venomously
on the girl. She became conscious, too, that Madame Cimmino's cries
were stilled, the tumult had subsided and she herself was the cynosure
of all eyes.

Straightening, her hands fell to her sides and she stepped forward.

"Something woke me," she began unsteadily. "I didn't know what it
was at first, then I heard a thumping, banging noise down here as if
furniture was being moved around. I got up and opened my door just as
there came a heavy thud like the sound of a body falling and terrible
groans that died slowly away.

"I was frightened and I didn't know what to do. Mrs. Atterbury had told
me not to venture downstairs late at night for Welch might mistake
me for a burglar and injure me, but I did not want to disturb her
unnecessarily and I thought I had better investigate.

"I lighted my candle and crept downstairs. There was a funny sweetish
odor on the air and I traced it to this door. When I looked in I saw
Mr. Wolvert lying there and all the room upset, but no sign of anyone
else. I ran to him and was kneeling beside him, trying to feel if his
heart was still beating, when Welch stumbled into the room and accused
me. Oh, have the burglars killed him?"

It was superb acting but the girl was wrought up to such an emotional
pitch that she was scarcely conscious of its effect. She lived in her
vivid imagination each phase of the story she was narrating and it bore
the impress of truth.

The rest looked at one another, reading in each face the belief which
confirmed their own. It was Madame Cimmino, however, who broke the
silence crying out in a paroxysm of jealous fury:

"What is it to you if he lives or dies? He is not yours, but mine! My
husband!"

"Betty." Mrs. Atterbury spoke for the first time and her tones were
dull and lifeless as she wrenched her eyes with an almost visible
effort from the rifled safe. "You had better go to your room, if you
are not afraid of being alone. You might try to revive Caroline if you
will; she is lying ill in the hall upstairs. Cook is a heavy sleeper,
but should she awaken and attempt to come down, please detain her; we
must have no more excitement."

Betty accepted her dismissal with a swift leap of her heart. Her task
was accomplished; there remained only to make her escape and the way
seemed clear before her.

"I am not afraid, Mrs. Atterbury," she said quietly. "If you need me,
please call."

She slipped up the stairs and past the still unconscious form of
Caroline with feet that trod on air. To throw on her cloak and boots
and steal out the kitchen door by which she had entered only a few
short hours before would be a simple matter and the man who loved her
would be waiting, on guard.

Removing her felt slippers, she had picked up her shoes, when an
imperative rap on her locked door made her drop them hastily, her
spirit sinking in a premonition of further trouble.

"Who's there?" she demanded in a trembling voice.

"It is I; Madame Cimmino." The tones were repressed and oddly civil
after the tempestuous outburst of a few minutes previous. "Open the
door, please; I have a message from Mrs. Atterbury."

Betty drew on her slippers and, wondering, obeyed. The sallow face
of the Italian was still flushed and her dull eyes glowed with
undiminished resentment, but she essayed a faint smile.

"You must not mind what I have said to you just now. I was quite mad!
My nerves are shattered by this sudden calamity and I, too, feared that
Mr. Wolvert had been killed." She spoke reluctantly with an obvious
effort, and Betty realized at whose instigation the halting apology was
tendered. "Mrs. Atterbury requests that you sleep in her room for the
rest of the night. She will join you presently and does not wish to be
left alone. You need not trouble about Caroline. I, myself, will attend
to her. Come at once, please."

There was a veiled command beneath her studied courtesy and she had
placed herself upon the threshold so that the door could not be closed
again barring her out.

Betty's gleam of hope died within her, but she forced herself to reply
composedly:

"Certainly, Madame Cimmino. If you will wait a moment I shall be with
you."

Her simple preparations made before the unwavering eyes of the other
woman, she followed docilely down the hall to Mrs. Atterbury's room.
The bed was in disorder and the embers dying in the grate, but her
companion replenished them and closed and locked the windows, drawing
the heavy parted curtains tightly together.

"Sleep if you can, Miss Shaw." She paused in the doorway, a little
triumphant gleam lighting her eyes. "There is nothing now to fear. No
intruder can enter for he will be shot on sight. I hope you will rest
comfortably."

She closed the door and the lock clicked as a key was deliberately
turned in it and withdrawn. Betty was a prisoner!

For a time the girl stood motionless in the middle of the floor where
the other had left her. She was trying to fathom the motive for this
sudden move. What had occurred, what suspicion had arisen the instant
she had left the room, for Madame Cimmino to be despatched upon
her very heels to intercept and guard her? Had Jack Wolvert been
conscious enough to realize her swift attack on him, and recovering,
denounce her? In terror at the thought her hands flew to her breast
and encountered the whistle hanging from its slender chain beneath
her gown. Her fingers closed convulsively upon it and a little sob of
gratitude tore its way from her throat. If actual peril came there
was one chance left to her; she was not utterly at the mercy of these
wolves.

When Mrs. Atterbury unlocked the door and entered an hour later, she
found the girl curled up on the couch seemingly asleep. She stood over
her for a long moment staring down at the tranquil face upon which the
birthmark glowed in the light from the grate, and listening to the
gentle regular breathing. At last she turned away and Betty, opening
her eyes cautiously, beheld her employer crouching before the hearth,
her dark, unbound hair increasing the pallor of her waxen face and her
inscrutable gaze fixed upon the gleaming coals. The girl fell into a
troubled slumber at dawn, but when she awakened the other still sat
immovable, staring into the dead embers with unseeing eyes.

"You are awake, Betty? Run to your own room and dress and then come
back to me quickly. We have much to do today." She barely glanced at
the girl, and her tones were lifeless.

"Was--was the burglar caught?" Betty stammered as she rose to obey.
"Did you lose very much of value?"

"The man whoever he was escaped, but the police have been notified,"
Mrs. Atterbury replied without turning her head. "I cannot tell how
much has been taken until I have made an inventory of what is left.
Hurry, please."

Betty returned to her room, to find Caroline on the couch at the bed's
foot. The woman seemed dazed and shaken, but her eyes followed Betty
craftily and the girl realized that her presence meant continued
surveillance.

Wolvert appeared little the worse for his experience of the previous
night when he joined the others at breakfast and he greeted Betty with
perfect sang-froid, but she fancied that a speculative gleam lightened
his pale eyes when they rested on her; and as the day wore on, he
attached himself to her with an assiduity which left her in no doubt of
his lurking suspicion.

Although the subject of the burglary was avoided as much as possible,
there was a tension in the atmosphere which no one attempted to
disguise, an air of repressed apprehension greater than the exigency
demanded. In spite of Mrs. Atterbury's assertion that the day would be
a busy one, a state of enforced idleness prevailed and Betty wandered
about like an unquiet ghost with some one of the household inevitably
at her heels.

As dusk drew down the espionage became more openly manifest and the
girl's self-control faltered beneath the protracted strain. Was
she destined to be held in duress until the raid which Herbert had
predicted took place and escape was forever cut off? A new anxiety
was added to the rest; if she were to continue this ghastly farce
indefinitely a few minutes of absolute privacy in her own room would be
essential, but how was this to be obtained?

No suggestion of leaving the house had been made by anyone during the
day, but toward evening Welch was dispatched with a telegram to the
nearest office. He went with marked reluctance, a furtive look of fear
in his heavy-lidded eyes, still dazed from the effects of the drug.
Betty watched his departing figure in bitter envy from behind the
library curtains. Would her moment never come?

"You are very quiet, Little Mouse." Wolvert had come up silently behind
her in the gathering gloom of the room. "Last night's excitement has
depressed you?"

"On the contrary," she responded coolly. "I am sorry, of course, for
Mrs. Atterbury's loss, but I am quiet because I have been thinking. So
many things about the affair puzzle me."

"Indeed? What, for instance?" He flung himself into a chair and smiled
up at her.

"Why it was that I did not hear the smash of that vase in your
struggle, and why, although your hands were tied after you were
chloroformed, of course, the burglar did not also gag you. It was no
doubt an oversight on his part, but it impressed me as being odd."

The mocking smile had vanished and he was staring at her with a
narrowed intensity of gaze as if to read her very soul. When he replied
it was in a hurried, uneasy tone distinctly at variance with his usual
aplomb.

"It was the crash of the vase that awakened you, perhaps, and the thief
must have been frightened away. He left his tools, you know, and he
probably did not dare stop to finish his work with me.--But I did not
realize that we had such an efficient detective in our midst!"

He added the last sentence with deliberate intent and Betty met his
gaze with a little mocking light in her own eyes.

"I think the burglar finished his work with you very thoroughly, Mr.
Wolvert!"

Leaving him to ponder over the ambiguity of her remark she passed out
to the hall just as Welch burst in at the side door, his ratlike eyes
fairly starting from his head. Sheer panic was written upon his pasty
face and he charged headlong up the stairs like a maddened beast.

Betty was torn with the conflict of hope and fear. Had he encountered
Herbert on guard, or was the house already surrounded by officers of
the law?

No comment was made upon his abrupt return, but Betty sensed a
redoubled tension in the air. To her relief, however, the onus of
suspicion seemed to have been lifted from her, although the house was
so palpably under guard by the masculine members of the group that
immediate escape was out of the question.

Betty had no need, as the hours lengthened, to feign fatigue. Her
nervous exhaustion was manifest in her drawn face, and Mrs. Atterbury
at length laid her hand upon the girl's arm.

"You are tired, my dear. Go to bed if you like but you will be obliged
to sleep, for a while at least, with closed windows. Welch has
connected all those on the second floor with the alarm system down
here, and if one is raised during the night the whole house will be
aroused again."

Betty understood the covert warning, but rejoiced that the privacy so
vital to her was assured. Murmuring good night she ascended the stairs
and disappeared around the gallery.

Scarcely had the soft thud of her closing door broken the silence, when
Welch entered from the dining-room and approached the circle seated
about the hearth, took his place uninvited among the rest.

"How're we going to make our get-away?" he demanded gruffly. "That's
what I want to know, with the place surrounded--"

"Rot!" interrupted Wolvert. "For a thorough-going coward, commend me
to a strong-arm bully every time. Yes, I mean you, Welch, don't try to
bluff me, my man! You're in a blue funk and you'd conjure up a copper
behind every tree! Why haven't they closed in on us, if the bulls are
on the job?"

Welch muttered sullenly beneath his breath, but Doctor Bayard leaned
forward in his chair.

"That is a reasonable conclusion," he remarked in his quiet, well-bred
tones. "I admit, however, that taken in conjunction with the crowning
misfortune which has come to us, the possibility is disquieting.
You have examined the papers thoroughly, Marcia? You are sure that
practically everything of value has been taken?"

"Everything." Mrs. Atterbury spread out her hands in an eloquent
gesture. "We are cleaned! The result of five years of planning and
scheming and desperate risk has vanished in an hour!"

"Except what we may have saved from our individual profits," Wolvert
observed smoothly. "You at least will not starve, my dear Marcia."

Mrs. Atterbury darted a vicious glance at him, as Madame Cimmino said
with a shudder:

"Unless the end has come, and we are lost! As for me I shall kill
myself before again the doors of a hideous American prison close on me!"

"Don't be morbid, Speranza." Mrs. Atterbury shrugged impatiently. "I am
not even thinking of that. I am concerned only with one question:--Who
among us is the traitor?"

Wolvert raised his eyebrows.

"Us?" he queried. "You speak with painful directness, Marcia! Surely
you except our own immediate circle!"

"If you ask me, it was an inside job," asserted Welch bluntly. "I was
doped and so was Caroline. There's no gettin' around that!"

Ide coughed nervously.

"I hope the loyalty of none of us is in question." His thin high voice
quavered. "Personally I--"

"Personally, you're absolved!" interrupted Wolvert with a sneer. "You
wouldn't have the nerve to chloroform a blind kitten!"

"Someone has betrayed us," Mrs. Atterbury re-iterated. "Only one who
possessed the most intimate knowledge of our plans and the deals we are
working on now could have chosen so well among all the papers in the
safe. With one trifling exception everything missing was negotiable."

Wolvert darted a keen glance at her.

"'One exception'?" he repeated. "What was that?"

"The packet containing the Westcote documents," replied Mrs. Atterbury.
"That has vanished with the rest."

"Impossible!" Wolvert started visibly. "He didn't take that!"

"What does it matter?" Dr. Bayard shrugged. "It was worthless!"

"But he didn't take it, I know!" insisted Wolvert, caution forgotten in
his surprise. "It must be there! There's some mistake--"

"Why are you so sure?" Mrs. Atterbury flashed at him. "How can you know
that it was not stolen?"

"Because I was certain it was there when we first went through the safe
after I recovered consciousness, don't you remember?" he stammered,
taken aback. "I distinctly saw a blue envelope----"

"There was no blue envelope in the safe." Mrs. Atterbury spoke with
absolute finality. "It had disappeared."

"Then by God! it is an inside job!" Wolvert sprang from his chair. "And
I know who is back of it--that girl!"

"What!" Doctor Bayard exclaimed, as the rest sat spellbound. "The young
woman upstairs?"

"The young spy, d--n her!" retorted Wolvert, his dark face ablaze. "I
had a hazy idea that I saw her last night while the thief was pressing
the sponge over my mouth but I laid it to delirium. I tell you she was
in league with him, and what is more, I don't think he was one of our
gang gone crooked. I didn't tell you before because I didn't want to
throw you all into a panic but I'm convinced he's a 'tec and she was
working in with him. He heard Welch coming and beat it, but she didn't
have a chance and we've kept too close a watch on her for her to get
away since!"

"I knew it!" Madame Cimmino shrilled. "I knew there was something wrong
when she came!"

"I, too!" exclaimed Ide. "I've had a deucedly queer feeling since I
first met her at your dinner, Marcia, as if I had seen her before
somewhere."

"She's the only outsider!" Welch put in dazedly. "I always said no good
would come of draggin' in strange girls and usin' them for a blind, but
you knew it all!"

He glared at Mrs. Atterbury who sat gazing intently straight before her.

"It is impossible," she said at last. "I chose the girl myself, and she
has kept her position perfectly--"

"Too perfectly!" Wolvert snarled. "She was too good to be true, going
wherever you sent her without question. You've been a blind fool! She
was planted here, I tell you! That advertisement was a trick and you
fell for it! 'Stranger in city and without relatives!' Bah! it was too
easy!"

Mrs. Atterbury's immobile face was distorted with gathering menace but
her voice was still controlled.

"She is not a detective. I have encountered a few of them and I know
the earmarks. Whose game could she be playing?"

"The game of someone with whom we are doing business, perhaps. How can
we know?" Ide squeaked. "Remember I 'phoned you only two days ago that
I saw her talking with a man up the Drive! She's sold us out!"

"What was she nosing around the house at night for, with an electric
torch?" demanded Wolvert savagely. "Is that a usual part of a social
secretary's equipment?"

"A torch!" Mrs. Atterbury turned on him in sudden fury. "She told me
you had it when she came upon you in the library and you corroborated
her story afterward by saying it was yours!"

"I lied," he admitted through set teeth. "This is no time to defend
myself or dodge the facts. I'm not the first infatuated ass!"

"Infatuated! A-ah!" Madame Cimmino leaped for him like a tigress,
but Welch seized her roughly and dragged her back. "That simpering
she-devil with the brand upon her face! For her you have betrayed us
all!"

"Cut it out!" Welch admonished roughly. "Forget the sentiment stuff!
This is business!"

"I'll make a clean breast of it," Wolvert shrugged. "I suspected her
vaguely from the first. There was something about her that baffled me
but it fascinated me, too. I had her number from that night in the
library, but I thought she was playing a lone hand and I could handle
her. I even had a notion I could win her over and get her to go in
with us, but she's beaten us at our own game!"

"Not yet!" Mrs. Atterbury rose and even Welch shuddered at the new
ominous note in her voice. "Don't forget that something else has taken
place beneath this roof since she came. She cannot leave it to bear
witness against us! I will go to her and wring the truth from her!"

She mounted the stairs, the others following silently in her wake. The
rigid emotionless poise with which she had maintained her domination
over them all for years had in a moment been swept aside and the real
woman stood revealed in all the nakedness of her sinister malevolent
passion.

Like a vengeful fury she crouched before the girl's locked door and
motioned savagely to Welch to break it down. He put his massive
shoulder against it and with a single mighty heave crashed it in.

A startled cry echoed in their ears and the girl seated before her
dressing-table turned her face to them, full in the glare of the
boudoir lights. It was a blanched terror-stricken face, but they, too,
paused aghast, for the birthmark had vanished utterly and the girl who
rose slowly before them was like yet vastly unlike the personality they
had known.

For a tense moment they paused and then Ide's trembling voice cried:

"I know her now! I was sure I'd seen her before! It's old Westcote's
daughter!"

The girl's hand flashed from her breast to her lips and a shrill,
ear-splitting whistle cleaved the air as Welch sprang upon her with a
bull-throated roar.

The world crashed down about her head and darkness came; a darkness
filled with shots and shouts and vague struggling forms. Then all at
once a shaft of brilliant light seemed to break over her and full in
its radiance the face of Herbert Ross hovered close.

"Herbert!" It was little more than a whisper but her weak, hot hands
fluttered out and clutched him convulsively and in her eyes shone the
light of a faith which had not faltered. "I knew--I knew that you would
come!"

"My wonderful, brave dear!" His voice had a curious, throaty catch in
it. "You have been in frightful danger but you are safe now, thank God!"

Betty smiled wanly.

"I was not afraid, for I knew that you were there. No harm could come
to me while you waited."

"You mean that?" His arms tightened about her. "Oh, my dearest, you had
such faith in me?"

"As you trusted me, believed in me through everything. And--and for the
same reason."

"You mean that you care?" he whispered close to her ear. "Dear, is it
that? Is it--love?"

Her eyes gave him his answer and for a moment he lowered his head upon
her breast as she lay propped up in his arms.

Then she became dimly aware of lights once more, low moving lights
which revealed shadowy tense forms and a jumble of wrecked furniture.

As Herbert raised his head a strange freak of vagrant memory darted
through her numbed brain and a still, small voice which she did not
recognize as her own gasped:

"Mike has the evidence! Porter Street, two forty-seven. Before
midnight!"

Herbert's face wavered and blurred before her eyes, a whirling,
crashing void encompassed her and darkness descended again.




                             CHAPTER XIX.

                       _The Honor of the Name._


Chief McCormick's honest face beamed as he sat back in his office chair
and regarded the pale young girl before him with the frank, genuine
admiration of one colleague for another.

"It was wonderful! I couldn't have engineered it better myself. You've
pulled off the greatest stunt in years, Miss Shaw."

"Westcote," she corrected him, smilingly. "I'm glad to drop my friend's
name at last, and sail under no more false colors. But I did very
little, Mr. McCormick. If it hadn't been for Herbert I would have been
murdered as poor George Breckinridge was, and the man called 'Mike'
would have escaped."

"'Herbert,' eh?" The detective glanced quizzically at the
self-conscious young man who stood beside the girl's chair. "I suppose
congratulations are in order, but first let us get down to business.
You used the name of some friend, Miss Westcote?"

"And her birthmark. It proved to be a frightful nuisance, wearing off
and having to be renewed every day. That was what ultimately betrayed
me, you know. But I want to tell you my story from the beginning; I
know you will respect my confidence and you have earned it by your
kindness in saving me from the police.

"My real name is Ruth Westcote, and I am the daughter of Alden
Westcote, a retired broker. My mother died years ago, and we lived
alone together in Bruce Manor, an exclusive colony on Long Island. As
I grew up I noticed that father was aging rapidly and seemed breaking
in spirit and it was borne in upon me that something was preying on his
mind. I watched him and observed that his nervous depression reached
an acute state regularly every three months on the arrival of certain
visitors who came late at night and were received privately in his
study.

"When I insisted upon knowing their errand he put me off on the plea
of a confidential business transaction which I would not understand,
and he had become so unapproachable of late that I dared not press the
matter, although it worried me to distraction.

"One night about three months ago--it was the eighth of December, and
the first big snowstorm of the year--I returned home late. I had been
spending a day or two with a girl friend who lived on the South Shore
and was motoring back in my own little car when I stuck in a snowdrift
and the engine froze. A chauffeur came along with a big limousine just
as I was on the point of freezing, myself, and took me home. I noticed
the huge bulk of another limousine with gaudy wide stripes standing
beneath our _porte-cochère_ and there was a light in father's study
window. My heart sank, for it was about the time for those mysterious
visitors to call once more. I had never seen them, but I had heard
their voices raised in dispute on several occasions.

"To my surprise, that night it was the murmur of a woman's voice
which drifted out to me as I started up the stairs to my room, and on
a sudden impulse I turned and ran down to the library to wait until
she had gone. She seemed to be urging father to something and once
I thought I heard him groan. A low choking cough interrupted her
constantly and when at last the door opened and she came out into the
hall, I could see at a glance from where I was standing behind the
library portieres, that she was very ill.

"Father followed her from the study but he did not speak to her again;
instead he turned and groped his way up the stairs, bowed and shaking
as if he had received a blow.

"The woman tottered toward the door, but she had taken only a few steps
when she reeled, gasping, with her hands tearing at her breast, and
would have fallen if I had not rushed out and caught her. I managed
to get her to the couch in the library and brought her the water she
begged for, but I knew the meaning of her terrible thirst. I had had
pneumonia myself and no matter what misfortune her visit had brought to
father, I could not help being sorry for her.

"She was a tall, dark, willowly creature and must have been very
handsome in her youth. Her eyes were bright with fever and the hectic
patches on her thin cheeks heightened their glitter, but she had a
hardened expression which made the general effect she produced coarse
and repellent.

"She seemed half delirious and kept moaning that she must go, but it
would have been death to her to face the storm, even if she had not
been too weak to rise from the couch. I told her that she would have to
remain and let me send for a doctor, and at length she realized herself
the futility of further effort.

"'Who are you?' she gasped, clinging to my hand. I told her and she
stared long at me before she spoke again.

"'I have a letter here, a message from your father which must be
delivered tonight, or the consequences for him will be disastrous. I
cannot go; I feel as if I were dying! Will you take my place? Your
father must not know, he would sacrifice himself and his own vital
interests rather than have you brave the storm. My car is waiting. Can
you do this? Remember, it means much to him!'

"Her eyes were burning into mine and something in her deadly
earnestness decided me. I nodded and she fell back in relief. When she
had gathered her remaining strength together, she went on:

"'You have only to permit my chauffeur to take you to a certain house
and deliver this letter to the man servant who opens the door. The
chauffeur will explain what is necessary to him, and then bring you
home immediately. I will accept your hospitality for tonight because I
must, but I shall be able to go in the morning. No doctor is necessary
and I forbid you to send for one. I will not see him! You must lose
no time, but go at once. Call my chauffeur in and I will give him his
instructions.'

"I aroused the housemaid to prepare a bed and get the stranger into it
without disturbing father, and then I started on my journey. I shall
never forget that ride! For hours we plowed through drifts and over
hummocks, the car swaying and rocking like a ship and the intense cold
penetrating my very bones.

"The miles seemed endless and I was so numb and dazed that I scarcely
realized when we entered the city, the string of lights were a
meaningless blur.

"We drew up at last before a big house and I managed to descend,
although my limbs were half frozen. The door opened before I could
ring, and the man servant stared at me as if he saw a ghost, but the
chauffeur called sharply to him and he ran down bareheaded in the snow
and talked to him. Then he returned and conducted me into the hall
where a great hearth fire was burning, and I gave him the square,
blank, sealed envelope which the woman had handed to me. He took it and
ascended the stairs, to return presently with a goblet of mulled wine.
His manner was respectful enough, but I thought the way he stared at
me was very strange and he was evidently relieved when he conducted me
outside and saw me once more safely in the car.

"I slept nearly all the way home and the chauffeur had difficulty in
rousing me. The dawn had come, clear, but intensely cold, as I stumbled
up to bed.

"When I awakened, the woman was raving in delirium and I was compelled
to call a doctor in spite of her prohibition. Of course, I had to tell
father of our strange guest and he flared out in fury and would have
driven her from the house if he could. I was horrified, for he is the
dearest, most tender-hearted man in the world, but no inkling of the
truth came to me. He asked if she had sent anything back to town by her
chauffeur, and he looked utterly crushed when I told him the man had
taken a letter to deliver for her.

"The doctor looked very grave when he came and said he would send a
nurse, but when she arrived I had to dismiss her. Mr. McCormick, I sat
by that woman for an hour and I knew that no one else must learn from
her lips what she disclosed in her delirium!

"There was no hope for her from the first, but she lingered, and I
nursed her day and night, not even allowing the housemaid to relieve me
for an hour. Her raving filled me with loathing and bitter resentment,
but she was a fellow creature dying and I could not help doing all that
was possible, in sheer humanity.

"The night before she died consciousness returned to her and she
realized everything and knew the end was approaching. She tried
brokenly to thank me for the kindness I had shown her, and in gratitude
told me the whole truth.

"Years ago, when father was in a desperate financial strait, he forged
a check. Oh, if it is hard for me to tell you now, think how hard it
must have been for me to learn of it from that wretched woman's lips.
Father had great provocation, for the man whose name he used had
defrauded him, but the dreadful fact remained. He made full restitution
anonymously long ago, and the other man is dead, but somehow the forged
check and a letter proving father's guilt had fallen into the hands of
a blackmailing gang, through a dishonest law clerk, who found them in
going over the man's private papers to settle up his estate.

"The blackmailers had for years preyed on father and he was broken and
on the verge of ruin from the continued strain. Imagine how I felt when
I realized that I had been used as a tool to deliver to his enemies the
very money wrung from my own father!

"The check and letter denouncing him were in the possession of this
Mrs. Atterbury, who was the leader of the greatest band of criminals
ever organized in America. Their operations covered every state in the
Union and they had extorted hundreds of thousands from unhappy victims
all over the country. It was to Mrs. Atterbury's house that I had been
sent, but the dying woman would not tell me the address. She admitted,
however, that it was the meeting place for the sub-leaders of the gang
and the incriminating documents were kept there.

"A wild idea came to me to get into that house somehow and destroy that
check and letter which held father in such hideous bondage, and the
woman's next words showed me the way.

"It appeared that Mrs. Atterbury always employed a private secretary
who was not a member of the gang as a blind, and chose a girl who was
alone and friendless. If she proved really stupid but trustworthy, she
was frequently sent to collect money from victims so that if she later
became suspicious she would be technically guilty with the rest and
they could hold that as a weapon over her. That had not yet occurred,
because Mrs. Atterbury dismissed each one after a short period and
replaced her with another young and fairly unintelligent stranger. The
time had come for the present incumbent to be sent away before she
learned too much, and I made up my mind to take her place, if I could.

"The woman was sinking rapidly and I begged her to tell me her name.

"'I have come into your life unknown and in a cruel, base fashion; let
me go out of it a stranger. A stranger, that is it! Once I was called
Lucille and that will do for the end; Lucille L'Etrangere! Only, if you
have still more compassion left for me in your warm, young heart, save
me from burial at their hands! Put me away quietly somewhere, I beg of
you, in an unmarked grave!'

"She died at dawn and then I went down and had it out with father. I
hope never to live through another such hour! His grief and shame were
pitiful, but he seemed relieved, too, that I knew the truth at last. He
had been driven to the wall, and was almost mad.

"He arranged for the woman's burial in a little forgotten graveyard
nearby. The coroner was an old friend and everything was managed very
quietly and without question.

"When it was over I told father that I would be able to save him from
further persecution if he would consent to go to a sanitarium and
spread the rumor that his mind was permanently wrecked so that the gang
would cease their activities in his direction until my purpose was
accomplished. I withheld the details of my plan, for he would never
have consented to my facing the danger, but his tortured mind was on
the verge of giving way and he agreed helplessly to my proposal.

"In the meantime I had received a letter from an old school friend,
Betty Shaw, who is like me in type and coloring, but has a huge
birthmark like a clutching hand upon her cheek. She had moved West
ages ago, but when her mother died she went to Chicago to earn her
living, and there received a proposal from an old sweetheart who is
now in British Columbia. Her letter was to tell me that she had gone
out there to marry him, and I resolved to take her name and imitate
her appearance, so that if I succeeded in gaining a position with Mrs.
Atterbury and she wrote for reference out to the Western town where
Betty had lived, my supposed identity could be established beyond
question.

"I closed our house, leaving no address, painted the scar on my face
and, as Betty Shaw, went to a cheap boarding house in the city. From
there I inserted an advertisement in the papers, asking for a position
as secretary and emphasizing my friendlessness as much as I dared.

"It succeeded, for Mrs. Atterbury herself was one of the applicants
for my services. I cannot describe my sensations when I saw the very
car in which I had made that memorable trip draw up before the door! I
went back with her to the house I had visited that night, but the man
servant I had interviewed was gone and I have never encountered him
since.

"Much of the rest of my story must have been told to you by Herbert;
how I searched every night that I dared for the check and letter, and
how I found the murdered man on the floor of the dining-room.

"There was a little dressmaker whom Mrs. Atterbury hired during the
first days of my stay to make some things for me, and she tried to warn
me that I was in danger of being led into a trap, and begged me to go.
She was afraid to explain, however, and her visits soon ceased. No one
else tried to help me but her.

"I felt that I was being watched and tested, and although I was on my
guard I came very near betraying myself more than once.

"When at last they were convinced that I was as stupid as I tried to
appear, I was sent on my first errand to collect money from another
victim. Looking back now, I can scarcely realize the mood in which I
accepted such a horrible task, but my own suffering and the threatened
disgrace to my father had hardened me to the troubles of others. That
initial experience was at the opera, and a man in the next box handed
me an envelope; he had a round, plump face and a little downy mustache,
and a woman companion spoke of him as 'Toddie.'"

"J. Todhunter Crane!" exploded McCormick, interrupting for the first
time. "They had him on a fraudulent government contract and could have
got to him for a huge sum in time! But go on, please."

She told of her meeting with the beautiful golden-haired woman in the
art shop and her response to Herbert's advertisement for an Egyptian
translator. During this portion of her recital the young gentleman
in question carefully avoided the eyes of his chief and the latter
forebore to interrupt again, but when the girl told of her fruitless
visit to the Café de Luxe and subsequent encounter with the blonde
lady of the art shop at the Hotel Rochefoucauld, he could not contain
himself.

"Mrs. Haddon Cheever!" he ejaculated. "Young wife of a rich, jealous,
old husband, and the Atterbury crew got hold of a bunch of silly
letters she wrote to that Willie-boy who tried to stall you in the
Carnival Room. Ten thousand cold she handed over to you in the hotel!"

"I had another disquieting experience on the same afternoon at the Café
de Luxe. The girl from whose house I returned home on the night of the
storm came up and greeted me, and I was obliged to cut her, fearing
some spy would hear her call me by my own name. She was one of my most
intimate friends, and I felt ashamed.

"I had other worries, too. The man Wolvert, whom you have just placed
in custody, had begun to annoy me with his attentions and would not
be snubbed. Then I seemed to be forever dodging people I knew! On
my second visit to the museum, Herbert introduced me to a dear old
professor whom I had met previously in Cairo, where I was studying
under the great Mallory. He remembered me, in spite of the birthmark,
and he was suspicious enough to trap me later with a papyrus I had
seen, but I admitted nothing.

"My search for the incriminating documents continued whenever an
opportunity presented itself, but I seemed no nearer finding them. One
night I came face to face with Wolvert in the library, but I reached
Mrs. Atterbury first with a plausible story and she believed me.

"The next place to which I was sent to receive the blackmail was the
very last I could have anticipated--a church. It was the aristocratic
St. Jude's, on Brinsley Square, and the envelope containing the money
was presented to me on the collection plate!"

She described the event in detail and when she had finished the
detective asked eagerly:

"It was a fat, smug-faced little man, with heavy pouches under his eyes
and a cocky air about him? That's Hobart Wallace, or I'm a Dutchman!
Among the papers we found in Mike Hannigan's bag when we nabbed him at
the Porter Street address on your plucky tip, were two hundred shares
in a fake copper mine with his endorsement. He would have let himself
be bled dry rather than have an inkling of that reach the press!"

"I was sent on one more errand," the girl continued, "to the courtroom
where the Huston trial was in progress. I recognized the prisoner as
the young chauffeur who had rescued me in the storm and brought me home
the night the strange woman came, and as I listened to the testimony
and learned that the murder of his wife had been committed on that
night and his life depended on the alibi which I alone could supply,
I faced the worst moment of all! Seated with him was poor Miss Pope,
the dressmaker, who had risked everything to warn me to leave Mrs.
Atterbury. I met her afterward in the corridor, and when she told me
that Huston was her half-brother, all she had in the world to care for,
and I heard his story from her lips, I did not know what to do! My
father's good name was very dear to me, but here was a human life at
stake. All that night I fought my battle, but in the morning I wrote a
letter to Huston's lawyers, signing my real name and assuring them that
I would appear if necessary and testify on a certain date. I had just
placed the letter in the postbox that morning when I met you on the
North Drive, Herbert."

She turned to Ross and he answered her with a quick pressure of her
hand, but his eyes twinkled as he remarked:

"You haven't told the Chief yet who paid the blackmail to you in the
courtroom, dear!"

"It was the judge, himself," she exclaimed. "He dropped the envelope in
my lap as he passed out to his chambers when court adjourned."

"Judge Garford!" McCormick started in his chair. "What on earth could
they have on him? It doesn't seem possible!"

"Don't forget there was more than a suspicion of bribery in connection
with the Taylor case," Ross reminded him. "The opposition made a lot
of it at the last election. The Atterbury crowd may have held some
evidence of that over his head."

"Lord! They didn't mind who they tackled, did they?" McCormick
chuckled. "It took just one little woman, though, to put the whole
bunch out of business! Go on, Miss Westcote; I am anxious to hear the
rest."

The girl told her story to the end, and when she had finished dusk
was fast settling down outside the office windows. The Chief's eyes
sparkled with admiration as she told of her desperate venture in the
music room and the chloroforming of Wolvert, but his bluff, kindly
face grew grave when he learned of the concerted rush upon her by the
conspirators and the blast of the whistle which meant life or death to
the girl who had dared all, and won out in the face of inconceivable
odds.

"You ought to have taken me into your confidence, Ross." He turned
reproachfully to his operative. "When you came to me with all that
inside dope about the murder of 'the Comet' and the rest of it, and
told me to round the boys up for a raid on the North Drive at the
signal of a whistle, I agreed to let you boss the job, but if you'd
given me an inkling that this young lady was in danger at the hands of
that pack of thugs--!"

"You might have pulled them too soon and spoiled her game, Chief." Ross
smiled slyly. "Besides, you had said something about being tarred with
the same brush, remember, and I wanted to prove to you who was crooked
and who wasn't."

McCormick reddened.

"My boy, I told you I'd be the first to apologize, and I do, most
heartily. But what could I think? You were shielding the young lady
with the scar at every turn, double-crossing me, and--say!" He broke
off and faced the girl. "Did you ever hear of a peppery old lady named
Madame Dumois?"

"Oh, yes!" She dimpled, delightfully. "Herbert is going to produce me
in--in a little while!"

Then her face clouded and she shuddered.

"There is one question I have not dared to ask, although it has beaten
into my brain day and night since that awful hour. Who killed George
Breckinridge?"

"Jack Wolvert," the Chief responded slowly. "He has confessed, and will
pay the penalty of his crime."




                              CHAPTER XX.

                           _Treasure Trove._


"You see the murder of Breckinridge was an unexpected complication in
the plans of the gang," McCormick explained, when the girl's first
intense horror at the knowledge of the slayer's identity had been
partially overcome. "They had never before gone so far as to take
life. Breckinridge had the reputation of being pretty swift and he's
been mixed up in more than one scandal. He must have been meat for
the Atterbury gang until he revolted, but he made a big mistake then.
Instead of going to the police and braving a public inquiry, or coming
to me, he chose to play a lone hand against the blackmailers, and
lost. He traced the ringleaders to the Atterbury house and attempted
to confront them single-handed. How he managed to elude the watchdog
isn't known, but he got in through a dining-room window which Welch had
left unfastened. It was only after the murder that the crook who played
butler was so careful to lock up the house at night.

"Breckinridge had unfortunately taken a bracer or two before he
started on his foolhardy expedition and when he found himself face to
face with Wolvert he let his feelings get the better of him and in his
resentment blustered out how much he knew against the gang. If he had
only realized it he was confirming his own death-warrant, for he had
found out too much to go free. Wolvert didn't wait to consult the head
of the gang, Mrs. Atterbury, but seized a knife from the sideboard and
a fight for life began. It must have been a silent one and quickly
over, for no one heard it except Welch who slept on the ground floor
at the back. He arrived on the scene in time to see Wolvert plunge the
knife in Breckinridge's breast.

"Afterward, in desperation, they consulted as to the best method of
disposing of the body and Wolvert suggested taking it up the road and
leaving it. Welch tied up the dog and then went off to a junk dealer
and fence whom he knew, and hired a horse and cart which he brought
back to the gate.

"Wolvert, meanwhile, had gone to tell Mrs. Atterbury the truth and it
must have been at that time you discovered the body, Miss Westcote.

"When Welch returned, the two men between them carried the body wrapped
in an old rug down to the gate, where they loaded it on the wagon and
drove to the secluded spot on Vanderduycken Road."

"The body must have been discovered very soon," the girl murmured with
a little shiver. "I heard the extras announcing the murder in the
early afternoon."

"It was found at dawn. The junk dealer's wagon had been seen and it
was traced down finally and spots found which the chemists proved were
human blood. The man wouldn't confess who had used his wagon, though he
was put through the third degree. He claimed that if it was out at all
he had known nothing of it and easily proved his own alibi.

"The case was at a standstill when one of Breckinridge's friends, to
whom he had hinted that he was being besieged for hush-money came to
me. With what I already knew of the Atterbury gang I put two and two
together, but the police were not far from the truth. If we hadn't
forestalled them it would only have been a matter of hours before they
knocked at the gates on the North Drive and in the cellar of the house
they would have found convincing proof; pieces of a rug, blood-stained
and charred, where an unsuccessful attempt had been made to destroy it
in the furnace. Shreds from the same rug were found twisted about the
buttons of the dead man's coat, and clotted in his wound.

"But let us have done with that, Miss Westcote," the detective added
hastily as he saw her pale lips quiver. "There are still a few points
to be cleared up in my mind. How did you get all that information about
the outside members of the gang?"

"From one queer abbreviated note and two cipher letters," the girl
responded. "The note was the first and I remember it word for word.
It read: 'Five thousand sheep no go. Bulls instead. Pink wash fed.
Clearing den. Tail comet yellow.' I couldn't understand it then, but
later when I had solved the cipher letters I realized the general drift
of it. It evidently meant that five thousand dollars could not be
gotten out of somebody although I don't comprehend the significance of
the word 'sheep.'"

"Slang among them for shearing the sheep, or blackmail," McCormick
explained. "What did you make out of the rest of it?"

"That the police were after them, and detectives had communicated with
the federal authorities at Washington," she went on. "The writer was
clearing for Denver and he advised Mrs. Atterbury to 'tail' or trace
the movements of 'The Comet,' that she was 'yellow' or crooked."

"Well done!" The detective thumped the desk in his enthusiasm. "There's
a place here for you if ever you want to take it, Miss Westcote! That
letter was written by 'Red' Rathbone."

"What does he look like?" the girl asked suddenly.

"Tall and shambling, bright red hair," McCormick replied with an
inquiring look. "No eyebrows or lashes; they were burned off in a
prison fire the last time he was sent up. Got a curious way of
carrying his head on one side----"

"Then I know him, too!" she exclaimed. "His soubriquet 'Red' reminded
me. He must have been the manservant who opened Mrs. Atterbury's door
to me on my first visit! I wonder I did not think of him when I read
the cipher letters."

"What were they?"

"I have them here." She produced two papers from her handbag and placed
them before him. "The first is a copy of a letter which Mrs. Atterbury
dictated to me."

"'My dear Shirley,'" read McCormick. "'Your letter received. Send me
ten of the thousand circulars quoting sheep prices for March. Home
market good this week for forty or fifty and even more points rise if
my brokers handled the situation properly.' H--m! I don't quite get it."

"You will if you read every third word, eliminating the two between."
The girl rose and bent over the desk. "You see? It really means:
'Received ten thousand sheep. March good for fifty more if handled
properly.'

"I was convinced that this could only be read aright by choosing
certain combinations of words, and I tried all that I could think of,
backward and forward, until I came upon the key."

"Good Lord! So somebody named March fell for a ten thousand dollar jolt
and was willing to disgorge fifty thousand more under pressure, eh?
Let's see what the rest of it says." He picked out the words slowly
with a thick forefinger: "'Laramie game up. Comet sold us out to pink.
Bud killed her; safe on way Japan. Red held in Denver, alibi straight.
Meet Professor Chicago Saturday, he has instructions. New substitute
success, blockhead but conscientious. No danger discovery so use this
code in letting us know result Westcote affair. End.' So she calls you
a blockhead, does she? Whoever 'Shirley' may be, he didn't meet the
professor after all, for I got to him first."

"Yes. 'Shirley' replied to her in the same code. This is his original
letter. Mrs. Atterbury dropped it in the hallway and I took possession
of it. Stripped of the superfluous words, it reads:--'Professor caught
Chicago. Held on old Hamilton verdict but McCormick getting evidence
new trouble. Marked letters seized. Hear Westcote sanitarium for good.
Nothing doing, refuses communicate. Trust nobody, but lie low. Business
dead. End.'"

"They felt the net closing!" McCormick brought his great fist down upon
the desk. "One by one we were gathering them in: Red in Denver, the
'Professor' in Chicago, Mortimer Dana here--"

"Oh, then it was you?" cried the girl. "Mrs. Dana came rushing to the
house one day crying out that her husband was caught, but they quieted
her and sent her away as quickly as they could, to avert suspicion
from themselves, I suppose. She fled the city, but I don't know where
she went--"

"To Bermuda," the detective interrupted grimly. "She's coming back,
though, under escort. She fought the extradition like a wild-cat, but
I think she will be in a communicative mood when she reaches here, and
if she tells us a few things I want to know, I'll see that she gets off
comparatively easy. She wasn't in it as deep as the rest."

"There is one person I would help if I only could." The girl hesitated.
"I don't know what she has done, or how closely she is allied to the
gang, but she did as much as she dared for me. I mean poor little Miss
Pope. She is in trouble enough about her brother as it is, and she is
so timid and long-suffering!"

"Don't you worry on her account, Miss Westcote." McCormick smiled
beneath his short-clipped mustache. "If I can get you off scot free
I ought to be able to handle her case. She went to Mrs. Atterbury,
innocently enough, as a visiting seamstress and they roped her in, just
as they thought they were doing with you, to collect money from their
victims. When she found out the truth she was in too deep herself to go
to the police, but she was too broken-spirited to be of any further use
to them. They didn't let her out of sight, though, you may depend on
that. She's free from them at last."

"Suppose--suppose they try to drag me in after all, if any of them
makes a confession." The girl's pallid face whitened still more, but
the detective laid a reassuring hand on her arm.

"If the police find Betty Shaw, the girl with the scar, they'll find
her in British Columbia, with a husband and an alibi, won't they? If
the Atterbury gang try to bring Ruth Westcote into the case, there's
no shred of evidence left to connect her with it or prove that she or
any of her people ever had dealings with them. That birthmark was your
salvation, for not one of those from whom you accepted the blackmail
would dare swear under oath that you were the same girl. Wolvert's wife
has already confessed but made no mention of you."

"Wolvert's wife!" The girl repeated aghast, yet a light was breaking
over her and it scarcely needed his reply to confirm it.

"Yes. The woman you knew as Madame Cimmino. She served her time in the
West, for pulling off an insurance swindle some years back. She is
known, and wanted, pretty much all over Europe. Wolvert is the black
sheep of a good family, half-English, half-Spanish; Welch is a former
heavy-weight pug, gone to the bad, but Mrs. Atterbury herself is the
real wonder of the lot. She is the widow of old Jonas Atterbury, one
of the shrewdest financiers that ever bucked the market. She went
through the money he left her and then, as luxury was as necessary to
her as the air she breathed, she went after it in the one way that
her brilliant, unscrupulous mind suggested. We'll never know how she
fell in with the gang or became their leader, for she's not the sort
to confess, if she was put on the rack, but it's a safe bet that she
planned every successful coup they've made in the last five years, and
she was foxy enough to realize what an asset her social reputation was
in averting suspicion. Her aristocratic neighbors on the North Drive
must have had a sensation when they read the papers after the raid!"

"And Professor Stolz?" the girl asked.

"A thorough-going scoundrel, of brilliant attainments but with a
crooked twist in his brain. He was expelled from the faculty of
the University of Leipzig for trying to sponsor fake antiquarian
discoveries and raise money for research work that was never attempted.
Doctor Bayard is another scientist gone wrong, and the rest are all
more or less well known for their criminal operations. You certainly
showed your pluck, Miss Westcote, when you tackled single-handed the
most dangerous bunch of crooks on record! It was enough of a miracle
that you escaped with your life, but to have succeeded in what you set
out to do, and annihilated their organization besides is an achievement
almost beyond belief! I take off my hat to you!" The Chief beamed upon
her. "I thought I knew something about the detective game, but you
can give me cards and spades and then beat me to it! Don't forget my
offer; if ever you want to go into the business, there's a partnership
here for you."

"Thank you," Ruth Westcote responded demurely. "I have already agreed
to become a partner in a different concern and I think it is going to
be a success!"

Her eyes, soft and glowing with a new, tender light turned to those of
Herbert Ross, and he smiled back at her.

"It ought to be," he said, "for it is founded on the greatest thing in
the world!"

       *       *       *       *       *

"Young man!" Madame Dumois fixed her gold _pince-nez_ more firmly
on her high arched nose and glared at the guileless individual who
stood before her. "It is a good three weeks since I sent for you, to
find out if you had made any headway with my case, and your McCormick
person informed me you were out of town. What have you got to say for
yourself?"

"Quite a good deal, if you will listen, Madame Dumois." Herbert Ross
smiled ingratiatingly. "I only learned of your message yesterday, when
I returned. Very important business called me away; I wonder if you can
guess what it was?"

"The missing young woman?" she demanded eagerly.

Ross nodded and the smile broadened into a boyish laugh.

"Yes! The young woman you employed me to find!"

"And you have found her?" She eyed him warily, puzzled by his manner.

Ross's face changed and he drew down his lips lugubriously at the
corners, but the twinkle remained.

"She is a most elusive person!" he sighed.

"I don't need you to tell me that!" the old lady retorted bitterly.
"And I cannot see any cause for levity! I would not have believed your
Mr. McCormick capable of finding a lost canary, but I admit I expected
more of you!"

"You have heard no news of the young woman for whom you are searching?"
he asked.

A faint spot of color appeared in her faded cheeks and her keen, gray
eyes snapped.

"Nothing that I consider authentic. Why do you ask that, Mr. Ross?"

"Because I was under the impression that her natural guardian had
communicated with you." He spoke in bland surprise.

"'Her natural guardian!'" she repeated indignantly. "Her natural
guardian is a natural born fool, as I've often told him to his face!
But it appears to me that you have learned more about this affair than
I meant you to. Just what do you know?"

"That you returned from Europe to find your only brother in a
sanitarium, his home closed and his daughter missing. You interviewed
him, but he would give you no satisfaction, and knowing something of
the independent character of the young lady----"

"Independent!" Madame Dumois drew a deep breath. "She defied me when
she was three years old! The only member of the family who dared to
stand up to me!"

"Knowing that she possessed the courage of her convictions," Ross
continued, "you made up your mind to find out for yourself where she
was and what she was doing."

"What she was up to!" The old lady corrected him grimly. "Never since
she was born have I known what she was going to do next!"

"I have seen your brother, Mr. Westcote, and I am happy to be able to
tell you that his health is much improved."

"I gathered that from his letter--" A flash of her old humor crossed
her face. "He called me a meddlesome busybody, and that is more spirit
than he has shown in years! I don't know how you have found out all
this, but I cannot say that I am sorry. I did not care to put myself
or my family affairs at the mercy of a detective agency, that was the
reason why I would not tell you my motive in seeking her, yet I trust
and like you, Mr. Ross."

"Thank you," he responded gravely.

"Now, if you will only find this perverse, incorrigible, young woman
for me--"

"What if I have?" his eyes danced. "I did not say that I had failed,
Madame Dumois."

"You have--you have found her?" The old lady gasped, and her sharp eyes
blurred. "She hasn't gotten into any trouble, Mr. Ross? Where is she?"

"At home." He caught the two trembling wrinkled hands in his. "At our
home, breaking in the new cook I believe. I have come to take you to
her."

Madame Dumois looked long into his happy face and the color slowly came
back to her own. A dry smile hovered about her lips, and then broke
into a chuckle.

"Well! I do not usually indulge in slang, but that is one on the
lawyers! I won't have to change my will again! When I quarreled with my
brother and made up my mind that Ruth had disgraced the family by this
unaccountable disappearance, I added a codicil in your favor. You were
the best type of young American I had encountered in many a long day,
and as the choice lay between you and a cat asylum, I decided on you.
Now it is all in the family, and I am proud of you both. She is the
most provoking, self-willed, irrepressible young woman in the world,
and the dearest! Take me to her!"





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