Author of “The Perfect Crime,” “The Fugitive Statue,” etc.
WHEN AN IMPORTANT BROKER AND AN EMINENT ACTOR MYSTERIOUSLY AND SIMULTANEOUSLY VANISHED, IT HAD THE POLICE WORRIED. WHEN ON TOP OF THAT THE BEAUTIFUL DAUGHTER OF A RETIRED BUSINESS MAN HYSTERICALLY REPORTED HER FATHER GONE WITHOUT A TRACE, IT BECAME A MATTER FOR THE FAMOUS DETECTIVE LAVENDER HIMSELF.
My friend Lavender dwelt up four flights of steps, a wearisome climb unless one were in training. Only the little landings at the end of every flight kept me from perishing of thirst and fatigue on more than one ascent. So at least I told Lavender. The journey offered no difficulties to that agile young man himself. The trouble with me was that I inclined toward—well, stoutness.
“The rooms are comfortable,” he would reply to my protests, “the windows afford an excellent view of an interesting corner of town, and the stairs are at once a protection and a blessing. The exercise I get in going up and down is distinctly beneficial, while four flights are sufficiently formidable to daunt bores and any but very determined clients and friends. Thus my practice is kept within reasonable bounds, my bank account is not the envy of the criminal class, and my circle of intimates does not overflow the social space at my disposal. Besides, the rooms are cheap.”
The really important thing about Lavender’s rooms was their convenience to transportation. Overlooking a minor business section, not too far from the Chicago Loop to be remote, the windows fronted north and west and beneath them to the north actually lay an elevated railroad station.
And Morley of the Central Detail, who patronized the “L,” never found the place too far nor the steps too numerous. He was a clever young detective sergeant of the regular force, who occasionally visited Lavender—clever chiefly in that he had sense enough to come to Lavender when he was in difficulties. One morning he came up the steps in an unusually bad humor, and that is part of the story I have to tell.
I had spent the night with Lavender and we had just finished breakfast, sent up by the restaurateur on the corner, when we heard Morley’s footsteps and shortly beheld his morose countenance. He gave me a patronizing nod and shook hands warmly with Lavender.
We listened to his tale of woe. It seemed this time that one Peter Vanderdonck, a picture broker of some importance, had disappeared and that Morley was at his wit’s end.
“Usually,” said he, “there’s some sort of a clue, but in this case there isn’t any thing that resembles one. I can’t get started without a clue of some kind,” he grumbled with pathetic profanity.
“Who reported him missing?” asked Lavender.
“His damn landlord,” said Morley. “This Vanderdonck didn’t send a check for his rent or something like that, so the guy—name’s Giles—sends for the police. Thinks we’re bill collectors, I guess. Damn silly in my opinion. Vanderdonck’s probably just gone out of town and forgotten his rent.”
Lavender grinned. “Is the usual ‘foul play’ suspected?”
“By the landlord and the newspapers, sure!” replied Morley with heavy irony. “There’s nothing to indicate it. I’ve been through his office. No signs of a struggle. Nothing! Just as he must have left it. Not a thing moved. He might never even have used it, for all the evidence.”
“Well,” smiled Lavender, “murder doesn’t always occur in a man’s office. It’s conceivable that a man may be killed in the street or in his home.”
“Sure,” agreed the detective. “I ain’t a fool. But where do I start when there ain’t a clue? Nobody seems to know Vanderdonck but this Giles person, and nobody seems to know where he lives or whether he’s got relatives or when he was last seen. It’s just a blank wall,” he ended, with more profanity.
“A blankety-blank wall, evidently,” observed Lavender. “Well, Morley, I don’t know what you expect me to do. I can’t reach into my vest pocket and pull out the missing man. Wish I could! I’m going down town this afternoon though, and I’ll look over this fellow’s rooms with you if that’s what you want. Give me the address, and let’s say two o’clock.”
He smiled and picked up a morning newspaper.
“By the way, Morley,” he continued, “I hope an epidemic of disappearances is not about to begin. There are two others recorded in this morning’s paper, and your case makes three.”
Morley looked suspicious, as though he thought his leg was being pulled.
“I didn’t notice ’em,” he admitted.
“Charles Merritt is one of them. Know him? Rather well known and popular comedian. He was playing in the ‘Tinfoil Revue.’ He didn’t show up at the theatre a few nights ago, or at least, nobody seems to have seen him. And nobody missed him until his first cue, which seems strange. When he didn’t respond, of course everybody missed him. He wasn’t to be found and there was some excitement before the difficulty could be straightened out. Eventually they went ahead without him. The case is several days old but the press has just got hold of it. The theatre tried to keep it quiet. A queer case, don’t you think?”
“Drunk!” declared Morley without hesitation. “Who’s the other fellow?”
“It’s not a fellow, it’s a woman,” replied Lavender. “A Mrs.—Mrs.—” he referred to the paper—“Mrs. Jameson of Rogers Park. Nice little suburban widow. She went shopping yesterday morning and didn’t come home.”
“In a hospital somewhere,” asserted Morley promptly. “Run down, unconscious, and can’t tell who she is. She’ll be found before night.”
Lavender sighed whimsically.
“It’s uncanny the way you solve these mysteries, Morley,” he said. “I wish I could do it in twice the time! Well, well, I’m not trying to suggest that there is any connection between your case and these others. I’ll see you at two.”
He cocked an eye at me when our visitor had departed.
“The worst of it is, Lavender,” I said, “he’s probably right about one or both of those cases. One case does resemble another very closely, for the most part, and the obvious solution is often enough the correct one as you yourself told me.”
“True,” agreed my friend. “He may even be right about his own case. This Vanderdonck may have gone out of town very innocently, as Morley suggests. It’s because it is so nearly always the expected that happens, in spite of the old maxim, that the police are on the whole a successful body of men. But, hello! Who’s this?”
There had interrupted him a long ring at the doorbell.
“I hope, speaking of epidemics, that an epidemic of visitors is not about to begin,” he continued. “No heavy steps this time, Gilruth, nor do they come two at a time. Light—rapid, but light. Chuck the dishes out of sight like a good fellow, Gilly. We are about to receive a woman.”
“I have a feeling,” said I, “that we are going to hear about another mysterious disappearance.”
Lavender looked interested.
“The deuce you have! Do you know, Gilly, I also had one for a moment. But it is really too much to expect, right on the heels of Sergeant Morley.”
The lady’s knock fell upon the door panel.
“Nevertheless,” whispered Lavender, “I am sure you are right.”
He opened the door, and there entered Miss Shirley Minor.
Of course, we did not know her by sight or by instinct. We learned her name from her own lips some seconds after her appearance. We knew only in that first glance that an extraordinarily lovely young woman stood on the doorsill. Small, dark, alert. Her eyes, blue and anxious, looked from one to the other of us and settled upon Lavender. A little smile at once eager and wistful played about her lips.
Then she said, “I am Shirley Minor. May I come in?”
The name meant nothing in the world to either of us but we smiled in unison, like a vaudeville duo.
“Of course,” said Lavender, and I think I added, “Please do!”
“You had a visitor,” she said, “so I waited until he had gone.”
We seated her near the window where she at once exploded her bombshell. It was not quite unexpected.
“Mr. Lavender,” she said piteously, “my father has disappeared!”
I looked at Lavender. He was looking at Shirley Minor. He was not in the least surprised nor excited. He merely smiled encouragingly at the girl.
“Yes?” he said. “And of course you want me to assist you to find him. I shall be happy to aid, of course. Just take a fresh grip on your nerves, Miss Minor, and tell us all about it. It is our business to help.”
His calm interest and his cheerful smile had the desired effect. The anxiety faded from her eyes, and in a moment she smiled back at him.
“I’m afraid you will think me foolish, for after all father may have disappeared in a very usual manner. I mean, he may have gone away for a little while without bothering to leave word. Just the same I am anxious. You see, I have been away for some time myself. Only yesterday I returned from New York where I have been for some months. Father is hardly a notable correspondent, but I did hear from him once in a while, just a note to say that he was well. He always hated to write letters. I wrote reams to him, of course. Yesterday when I returned I found my three last letters to him in the mailbox. Apparently he hadn’t been home to receive them. And I hadn’t heard from him before I left New York for nearly two weeks.”
“Was he expecting you to return?” asked Lavender, still cheerful.
“No, he wasn’t,” admitted Miss Minor with an air of guilt. “You see, I was somewhat anxious about not hearing from father, but not actively alarmed. I supposed that he didn’t feel like writing. But in the background of my thought there was a slight fear that perhaps he was ill. I knew that if I wired that I was coming home and he was ill, he would wire back to stop me. That’s his way, he doesn’t like to be fussed over. So as I was tired of New York anyway I just thought I’d come home and surprise him.”
“When did he expect you to return?”
“Well, not for another month at least, I’m afraid.”
“And your mother——?”
“My mother is dead,” said Miss Minor.
“I see! Your father, I fancy, is Cyril Minor? I thought so. Well, Miss Minor, you are probably alarming yourself about nothing in particular. Inasmuch as he did not expect you to return there was no reason why he should not leave town for a while, if it occurred to him. Still you probably did well to come to me. If anything has happened it is well to know about it early, isn’t it? You have no idea where he might have gone, supposing him to have left town for a visit?”
“None in the world. His interests were all in Chicago, in recent years anyway; in his home and his club. Except for an old aunt up in Canada I don’t believe he has a relative in the world, other than I.”
“Most men have friends,” said Lavender, “and if I remember your father’s reputation, he had no enemies. You haven’t been to the police, I suppose?”
Miss Minor had not.
“Good,” nodded Lavender. “Don’t bother them just now. Leave the matter in my hands for a time. Probably you’ll hear from your father when your mail is forwarded from New York, but in any case don’t worry. Now tell me something of your father’s habits.”
After considerable questioning it developed that Cyril Minor was quite a creature of habit, with a trail that ordinarily a blind man could follow. He arose late as a rule, breakfasted at home, and went for a walk. His walk led him usually to his club, the Waldron, where he lunched and read the papers. Presumably he remained at the club during most of the afternoon, and dined there. He had no office of his own, for although only forty-four years of age he had retired from business. A man of considerable wealth obviously, with wide interests that brought him a constant and comfortable flow of money without the necessity of desk labor. In the evening he often went to the theatre, usually alone, since he was a widower, and he reached his home about eleven o’clock or between eleven and twelve. Very seldom was he later than midnight.
It was a commendable and consequently prosy record.
“There were three of your letters, I understand, that he did not receive,” continued Lavender, probing for a gleam of light. “About when would the first of them have been written?”
“About a week ago. I wrote pretty often.”
“So that he may have been away for a week, possibly a little less. All right, Miss Minor, I’ll make the proper inquiries and report as soon as I have anything to report. And be sure to let me know if you hear of anything.”
I looked at Lavender when she had gone. “Well?” I said.
“Well what?”
“The fourth disappearance!” said I. “It does look like an epidemic, doesn’t it?”
He smiled. “Well, yes, superficially. Of course it’s nothing of the sort. People disappear every day, I’m sure, and most of them don’t get a line in the papers. This looks significant to us because of Morley’s visit and because of my remarks about the two cases mentioned by the press. Miss Minor’s visit so immediately followed Morley’s that the temptation to find a connection is natural. Natural, but romantic,” he added dryly. “Which is not to say that both cases are not serious. They may be very serious indeed, and again they may be very trifling and unimportant. At the moment I prefer not to reach conclusions.”
He lighted a cigarette and lost himself in thought for a few minutes. Then, looking at the clock, he got quickly to his feet.
“Just the same, since I’ve undertaken this case and have promised Morley to have a look at his case, I must not waste time. But I’m bound to say, Gilly, that on the face of things I never knew two cases that promised less.”
Even Lavender, however, was no prophet.
—— II ——
We drew a stiff though courteous blank at the Waldron. Without being outstandingly eager to aid us, the club staff was polite and answered what questions Lavender had to put. This was natural, for we had said nothing about Miss Minor’s visit to us and the club attendants naturally wondered what our call portended. Lavender is a plausible person, however, and merely let it be known that he was anxious to get into touch with Cyril Minor, who was not to be found at his home.
Mr. Minor, it seemed, had not been seen about the club for a week. Yes, it was a bit unusual but not perhaps extraordinary. There was no mail waiting for him. He received very little mail at the club, however. None of his particular friends were in, at the moment. Perhaps Mr. Minor himself would be back before long. Who was he to be told had called?
As this latter suggestion was something more than a possibility Lavender penned a brief note, sealed it, and left it to await the return of the missing man. In it he advised Mr. Minor to get into immediate communication with his daughter who was at home and anxious about him.
“Whether the fellow is a good citizen or a scoundrel, I suppose he’s fond of his daughter,” remarked Lavender as we left the building. “I would be,” he added. “And now, Gilly, we are exactly where we began. I shall have to visit Miss Minor in her home apparently, and look over her father’s papers if she will permit it. Meanwhile we are in the general neighborhood of Morley’s difficulties, suppose we have a look at Vanderdonck’s office.”
“It’s a long way to two o’clock,” I reminded him.
“So it is,” agreed Lavender, stepping out briskly. “The absence of Sergeant Morley at the scene of his failure will greatly expedite our own investigation, I am sure.”
A few blocks lay between us and the building in part occupied by the picture broker’s establishment. We covered them rapidly. A dingy building it was, too, when we had found it. A building occupied for the most part by second-rate lawyers and booking agents, with one creaking elevator and four flights of toilsome, reminiscent stairs. We took the elevator for choice and ascended to the third story, where in time we came upon the dismal office of Peter Vanderdonck. The name was on the door. On the door also was a fly-specked card with the legend in black. “Back in an hour.” No doubt it had been used for years; it looked as if it were never taken down. No doubt also it had been put up on the occasion of Peter Vanderdonck’s last farewell to his office. Had he expected to be back in an hour, I wondered? Or had his going been voluntary and final? Or for the matter of that, had it been involuntary and final?
It was an old key-lock, typical of the building, and Lavender had hardly touched it with a little steel instrument that he carried when the door opened. Used to my friend and his ways, I was not at all shocked. I had watched him pick many a lock in my time, although I had never seen him pick one with greater ease.
There were two rooms within, an anteroom and an inner sanctum. The anteroom, into which we first penetrated, was soberly, even dingily, furnished with a table, a couch, three chairs, and a telephone. Some framed prints were on the walls, some books and magazines were on the table beside the telephone. It was all old but in good enough taste, and it reminded me of a small doctor’s anteroom more than anything else. I wondered why a picture broker should inhabit such a dull hole.
With a comprehensive glance Lavender pushed through into the inner chamber. To our surprise it was no more handsomely furnished than the outer room had been. A great safe stood alongside one wall, with the name “Peter Vanderdonck” upon it in letters of red and gold. There was a small rolltop desk standing open, a swivel chair, a small table, and a telephone extension. In a corner, quite unscreened, was a porcelain washstand, and in the closet we found towels—three of them, one of which was dirty. There were no pictures whatever on the walls, although there were marks to show where pictures once had hung, and there were screw holes in the floor near the window where evidently something once had been clamped to the floor. All in all it was an amazing office to be occupied by a “well known picture broker.” Lavender thought so, too.
Besides the closet door there was one other. It was paneled with ground glass and was obviously another entrance, or exit, giving onto the other corridor of the building. No lettering appeared on it and the door was locked. There was no key.
I looked my distaste.
“Queer place, isn’t it?” Lavender answered my glance. “I don’t wonder that Morley was stumped. I begin to think better of this case than I do of my own, Gilly.”
He picked the lock of the door leading to the second corridor and looked out. He tried the door on its hinges.
“Works well,” said he. “I suppose Vanderdonck has the key, wherever Mr. Vanderdonck is! A place with two entrances and exits is always useful.”
He examined the dirty towel hanging in the closet, carrying it to the light for a better scrutiny. Then he cocked an eye at the big safe. I knew that he was seriously considering a more serious pick-lock job than the earlier ones. Finally he walked over to the washstand and examined the bowl. He touched the porcelain with his sensitive fingers, looked at his forefinger, sniffed it, and turned on the water.
“Doesn’t run out very readily,” he remarked at length. “A bit clogged, I fancy. And notice how the drops at the last cling to the sides of the bowl.”
“Very interesting,” I smiled, “but what do you gather from that?”
“I’d like to see the contents of that safe,” he answered thoughtfully.
Once more putting temptation away from him, however, he turned his attention to the holes in the floor, then to the small desk. The latter yielded little. There was a quantity of stationery, letterheads and envelopes, all bearing the name of Peter Vanderdonck, and the top sheet and envelope of each pile was dusty save where a thumb had smeared the dust into a smudge.
“Morley’s thumb,” grunted Lavender, staccato.
In the meantime I devoted myself to an investigation of the anteroom. But the table drawer was empty and nothing offered but the books and magazines. In the heap of the latter was one newspaper a month old, which I resurrected and idly glanced over. Then I noticed that a paragraph had been ringed with a blue pencil mark and I read the notice. After which I carried it to Lavender.
“Do you suppose this is important?” I asked and handed him the paper.
He carefully read the marked paragraph and a quaint wrinkle appeared above the bridge of his nose.
“An interesting coincidence, at any rate,” he said half to himself.
“A dramatic criticism—” I began.
“In which he happened to be interested? Just that, Gilly. But why was he interested, supposing Vanderdonck to have marked the paper? For that matter, why was he interested, supposing someone else to have marked the paper and sent it to him? Did you note the cast of characters?”
“Yes,” I replied, “I did.” Then an idea struck me, and I added with a smile, “But Charles Merritt’s name is not in the cast, Jimmie. You can’t connect up that case.”
“So you thought of the Merritt mystery, did you? Well, it’s true that his name isn’t here, but someone else’s name is. The part of ‘Mabel Greensleeve’ is played, if you please, by Miss Sidney Kane. And who is Miss Sidney Kane, Gilly?”
“I don’t know. Do you?”
“She is, although somewhat elderly, one of the bright and shining stars, I believe, of the ‘Tinfoil Revue,’ in which Charles Merritt played a character sketch until his disappearance.”
I considered this in silence.
“It’s pretty thin, Lavender,” I said at length.
“Of course it’s thin! But she’s there, and it’s an interesting coincidence, as I remarked. In connection with the disappearance of Mr. Vanderdonck and the condition of his washstand, it’s doubly interesting.”
“His washstand?” I echoed feebly.
“And his towel,” said Lavender.
A moment later his eye was again on the great safe against the wall.
“I’d give a cookie to see the contents of that thing,” he observed thoughtfully. “But it’s Morley’s job after all, and if it’s to be opened it must be his responsibility. I suspect the police are waiting for relatives to turn up.”
Saying which, he strolled over to the safe and began to play with the knob. What would have happened had he continued, I have no idea, but he had barely begun when a key was inserted in the outer door, and Lavender desisted and rose to his feet.
“Morley. Ahead of time,” I ventured.
But it was not Morley. There entered instead a little old man with a warty face, hooked nose, and wide mouth. These with his stooping shoulders and small beady eyes gave him a generally inferior presence that was offensive. The apparition looked from Lavender to me and back at Lavender.
“What are you doing here?” it barked.
“Mr. Giles, I believe?” responded Lavender with suave courtesy. “Your question is surprising, to say the least. I had supposed our investigation to have been undertaken by your desire and authority.”
The extraordinary ability possessed by my friend to convey a false impression without falsehood always has been my envy and delight. The ironic purport of the remark quite bowled over the little man in the doorway.
“I beg your pardon,” he stammered. “I thought Sergeant Morley was in charge of the case.”
“Sergeant Morley will be here at two,” said Lavender icily. “But it’s all right, Mr. Giles. Now that you are here perhaps you can give us some information.”
“Anything at all, anything at all,” stuttered Giles. He now appeared to be eager and able to solve any difficulty we might propound to him, including the riddle of the Sphinx.
“How long had Mr. Vanderdonck been a tenant of yours?”
“Two years, Sergeant——”
“Lieutenant!” I said severely. “Lieutenant Lavender!”
“I beg your pardon! Two years, Lieutenant Lavender.”
Lavender threw me a venomous glance and proceeded. “He had never vanished this way before, of course?”
“He always paid his rent promptly, that’s all I know,” responded Giles. “He sent a check the first of every month. When it didn’t come this month, or on the second or third, neither, I came over to see him. Hadn’t seen him since he took the rooms. Well, he wasn’t here and he hasn’t been here since.”
Lavender appeared to be shocked by this delinquency.
“So you very properly went to the police,” he agreed. “Do I understand that you only saw this Mr. Vanderdonck once in your life?”
“The day he took the rooms,” answered Giles with a nod. “I don’t bother them that pays their rent, and this Vanderdonck never bothered me.”
“Hm-m!” mumbled Lavender. “Do you remember him? How he looked?”
“I never forget a face,” declared Giles with emphasis. “He was middle aged, rather dark, and his hair was beginning to get gray. Pretty tall man he was, and heavy I should say, though he didn’t look it.”
“You know nothing about his business?”
“Not a thing. Looks to me now as if he didn’t have any!”
Lavender smiled sweetly.
“You are quite right, Mr. Giles. He didn’t.”
“What!” cried the landlord.
“Who occupied these rooms before Mr. Vanderdonck took them?” demanded Lavender.
“A dentist fellow named Bradbury.”
Lavender chuckled and rubbed his hands. “Ah,” said he, “it’s a black, black case. But we have it in hand, Mr. Giles. Trust us, leave it entirely in our hands, and say nothing!”
We got rid of the old fool at last, and Lavender looked at his watch.
“Half past dinner time,” he announced. “We’re wasting moments, Gilly. I’ll leave a note here for Morley to say we’ve been here and won’t be back, then we’ll go to luncheon and afterward we’ll transfer our attentions to the more pleasant and lucrative task of aiding Miss Minor.”
“But what did you mean by telling that fellow that Vanderdonck had no business?” I asked.
“Just that,” was the reply. “He came here as a blind. The whole office shows it. Everything is practically as the dentist left it two years ago. Vanderdonck just moved in. The holes in the floor indicate where the chair of pain used to be, the walls have not been cleaned since the dentist took down his pictures, and the books and magazines for the most part were left there by the old tenant. The place was never intended for occupancy. Vanderdonck came here when it was necessary only. But someone else came here, too—came here and didn’t leave again. The safe will tell the story. I’ll tell Morley enough to make it look like his discovery. But the fact is, Gilly, I’m as sure as I’m here that the safe contains all that is left of Charles Merritt!”
I spun about and looked with horror at the great black hideous thing, and a dreadful picture formed in my mind as I seemed to see the door swing open, upon—what? But Lavender, without a shudder, sat down to pen his note to Morley.
—— III ——
At luncheon I questioned Lavender vigorously, but he had little information to impart. He ate in silence for the greater part of the meal and afterward smoked several thoughtful cigarettes.
“I’ve told you practically all I know about the case, Gilly,” was all he said in direct reply to my questions. “And what I know, I know chiefly because it must be so. Of actual evidence I have very little, but there certainly have been many significant indications.”
“And now we go back to Miss Minor and her troubles?”
“Exactly! You’ve no objections to going back to Miss Minor, surely?”
I laughed. “None in the world. I like her very much. But what did you say in your note to Morley, Lavender?”
“Just this: Morley, open safe at earliest opportunity. It contains the solution of two mysteries. See morning papers. Now will you call a taxi?”
On that we fared forth to attack the problem we, or at any rate Lavender, had been employed to solve. As we drove north across the Loop in a swirling ocean of traffic my mind became occupied with thoughts of the charming young person we were going to see, and I looked forward with pleasure to our second meeting. Lavender, whatever his thoughts were, smoked many cigarettes and drummed impatiently with his fingers on the narrow window ledge. When he had finished with one cigarette, he lighted another from the glowing tip of the old one and resumed his drumming. I supposed him to be in deep thought.
The progress of the taxi was slow, for the press was bewildering. A mounted policeman, dancing his horse in the maelstrom, recognized Lavender and gave him a nod of greeting. The line of automobiles had stopped for perhaps the twelfth time. The officer’s greeting called my friend’s wandering attention back to his surroundings, and suddenly he was sitting straight up and looking at a shop window within line of his vision. It was a barber shop, as it happened, and as vastly uninteresting as most barber shops, as far as I could see. But Lavender had seen more than the shop.
“See the placard, Gilly,” he nodded. “The ‘Tinfoil Revue’ again. We can’t dodge it, it seems. The woman in the picture, if I’m not mistaken, is the very person we were discussing. No, not Miss Minor. I mean Miss Sidney Kane.”
I looked and saw that he was right. Her name appeared below the portrait in letters of some size.
“An atrocious portrait, too, I should imagine,” he continued. “Do you know, Gilly, on second thought I think I shall be altruistic this afternoon. You shall go alone to Miss Minor, pay our respects, and listen to anything she may have to tell us. I will inform you what further you are to ascertain. As for myself, I shall—this is Wednesday, isn’t it, Gilly?—I shall go to a matinee, I think, against the sterner labors that lie ahead of us. Thus we shall both be benefited, according to our tastes.”
I am, of course, frequently a fool, but I am never as big a fool as Lavender’s remarks often would suggest. I looked back at him sternly.
“What you mean is, that you will go to the ‘Tinfoil Revue’ and see Miss Kane,” I corrected.
“Well, if you put it that way, yes,” he grinned. “The fact is, Gilly, the lady attracts me, and there already has been so much coincidence in this case, or in these cases I should say, that I’m determined to check them against each other and see what happens. The theatre, I believe, is just around the corner.”
“What am I to ask Miss Minor?” I demanded.
“First, whether she has heard from her father. I’m inclined to think that she has not, but ask her anyway. Tell her that I think she will hear from him shortly, but not to be too sanguine. Then ask her permission to look casually over his desk, or whatever he uses, to see if there are any clues to his movements. Probably the young lady will have done this herself, but you will make a more thorough job of it. Look at the letters if there are any, however far back they may go, and don’t leap at any wild conclusions whatever you find. Your principal task is to remember what you see so that you can tell me about it to-night.”
“And when shall I see you?”
He hesitated. “You have a key. Be in my rooms at six. I may join you for dinner. If I’m not there by six, though, I won’t be in for dinner. Sit around until about eight, as I may call you up if I don’t come. If you don’t hear from me by eight—well, I’m darned if I know when you will.”
It sounded very dubious indeed. “Look here. Lavender,” I said uneasily, “does that mean that you are going into some danger?”
“Without you, Gilly? Not by a large majority! I wouldn’t think of going into danger without my second line of defense. No, it means that I may be detained longer than I now expect, that’s all. If there is any danger it will come later and you shall have your full share, I promise.”
With that I was forced to be content, although what new idea had possessed my eccentric friend I could not imagine. No doubt he would see Miss Kane and confront her with her apparent knowledge of Vanderdonck, and no doubt he would ask about the disappearance of Charles Merritt. I thought again of that sinister safe in Vanderdonck’s rooms, and in fancy I saw a slow dark stream issuing from the impassable crack of its heavy door.
Lavender climbed from the machine, and with a wave of his hand disappeared for a moment in the throng of cars. An instant later I saw him standing before the barber shop window, studying the libelous portrait of Sidney Kane. Then again I lost him as the whirlpool shifted, and he did not reappear. I continued on my way alone.
It was a pleasant enough ride to the Minor mansion far out on the north side, and it was pleasant to find Miss Minor at home. Her exclamation of delight at sight of me was enough to pay for any disappointment caused by Lavender’s desertion.
But charming as was Miss Shirley Minor and happy as was the hour or two I spent in her company, I learned not a thing calculated to further our investigations. There were few letters from persons other than Miss Minor herself. Her letters, Cyril Minor had saved for years back; he seemed to have saved all she had ever written to him. But for the rest I found nothing but a scattering of business communications of no particular interest save as they furnished the names of a number of Minor’s early ventures. As Lavender had foretold, Miss Minor had heard nothing from her father, so at the close of my visit I made her happy with my friend’s message of cheer, and took my departure. I was convinced not only that I was in love with Shirley Minor, but also that I was a very poor detective indeed.
It was growing toward dusk as I climbed the interminable and familiar steps to Lavender’s rooms, and as I let myself in the clock struck five. I helped myself to a cigar, placed the humidor within reach, and picked up a magazine. But I did not read. I dozed instead, and finally I slept. When I awoke with a start, it was quite dark outside and the clock, when I had flooded the room with light, showed the hour to be well past eight. Lavender had not come and there had been no call. Evidently he had found work to do. So I went downstairs to dinner on the opposite corner, and then climbed the stairs again. I read diligently until past midnight, then as there was still no sign of Lavender I turned in on the bed I called mine.
It seemed that I had been asleep for no time at all when something wakened me. I sat up in bed to find Lavender in the room. It was two o’clock in the morning and he was whistling quietly to himself as he undressed.
“Jimmie,” I said sleepily, “where the devil have you been?”
“Hullo, Gilly,” said he. “Didn’t intend to wake you. I was later than I thought I’d be, but it was worth while. I’ve got half the mystery solved.”
My brain cells began to function. “Tell me!” I commanded.
“Can you follow me? All right.” He lighted a cigarette and dropped into an easy chair. “Well, after I left you, Gilly, I had a look at the portrait of Miss Kane, as you probably saw, and then I went to the matinee and had a look at the lady herself. She’s very clever, although nearer forty than thirty. After the show I sent around my card with a few words penciled on it, and she consented to see me.”
“What did you write?” I asked, deeply interested.
“I wrote under my name ‘In connection with the case of Charles Merritt.’”
“Go on!”
“Well, she saw me. I told her I was looking into the Merritt affair and asked her if she could tell me anything. She asked why I had come to her. I said I had heard that they were friends. She replied that it was a fact but she didn’t know who could have told me. Anyway, she told me about the disappearance which was much as it was reported in the newspapers. He didn’t answer his cue, and wasn’t to be found. He hasn’t been seen since. Was he a drinker, I asked. She was indignant. Not more than the average man! Had he any love affairs? She hesitated, then she believed not. I was shooting more or less in the dark, of course, although not entirely so. When she had told me all that I already knew and all that she cared to volunteer, which wasn’t much, I asked her point blank if she knew Peter Vanderdonck.”
He paused and chuckled.
“She nearly fainted. I thought she was going to faint. Then she said, no, she did not. I asked her what had frightened her. She said she was not frightened but that her part tired her. I asked whether it were not a fact that Merritt and Vanderdonck were friends or acquaintances. I phrased it that way on purpose to put her mind at ease. She replied that she believed they were. She thought she had heard Mr. Merritt mention Mr. Vanderdonck but she couldn’t be sure. Anyway, she had not deceived me; she did not know Mr. Vanderdonck! I let it go at that. But I asked her if she did not think it strange that Mr. Merritt and Mr. Vanderdonck should disappear at the same time. She did not know that Mr. Vanderdonck had disappeared, she said, but if it were so, why certainly it was strange. You see, she was getting her wits back more rapidly than at first and the longer I talked the better she became. Finally I told her that I knew where Merritt was, and that threw her into a funk again. ‘Where?’ she asked. I looked her in the eye and said, ‘He’s in Mr. Vanderdonck’s safe!’
“At this point she sat down. She’d been standing, up to then, hoping I’d go. ‘Just who are you?’ she demanded. And I said, ‘Actually, Miss Kane, I’m just a private investigator hired by a Miss Minor to find her father, who is missing. But accidentally I blundered onto this other case, through helping a friend in the police department. I’m still helping him.’ I told her I was sorry to have had to disturb her, thanked her for her information, and got out before she had time to catch her breath. I hope I didn’t upset her so that she could not play her part in the evening.”
“Did you, Jimmie?”
“No, I didn’t,” he chuckled. “She was there, for I saw her come out after the show. She appeared quite calm and perfectly at ease, and I fancy she was, too. I have no doubt that she did some important telephoning as soon as I’d left her in the afternoon.”
“And where have you been until this hour?”
“Out scouting in the neighborhood of Miss Kane’s home, which is in Elmhurst and a jolly long way from here.”
“Looking for Vanderdonck? You think she has been concealing him?”
“Well, yes, I do. I think she is still concealing him. Anyway, I didn’t find him. Of course, he may not be there.”
“You think that this Vanderdonck murdered Merritt, don’t you, Lavender?”
“My dear fellow, no. There’s no murder in this case, not yet, anyway. It’s plain comedy from beginning to end. I played with you a bit about it and I played with Morley, but I’ll quit now since you won’t see for yourself. Morley, in point of fact, has seen, for he took my tip and opened the safe.”
“And he didn’t find the body of Charles Merritt?”
“Not even a hair. Well, yes, perhaps a hair. What I told you, Gilly, was that the safe contained all that was left of Charles Merritt, and it was strictly true. In other words, it contained his clothing and part of his makeup. You see, old man, Merritt and Peter Vanderdonck were the same individual. Vanderdonck decided to quit being Merritt, so he quit and packed Merritt, so to speak, in the safe. Then he vanished himself. Of course it was guesswork until Morley opened the safe, but it was safe guessing, if I may be permitted a bad pun. Everything pointed to the accuracy of my deductions—the unused office, the greasy wash bowl to which the water clung as it receded, the dirty towel smelling of grease paint, the notice in the paper of Miss Kane’s success, and so on. Merritt made certain changes at the theatre after his performances but the final cleaning up he reserved for Vanderdonck’s rooms, where he was safer from recognition in the event of an uncontemplated meeting.”
I digested all this in silence. At length I said, “And Miss Kane is concealing Vanderdonck from pursuit? Why?”
“She probably loves him,” opined Lavender, “and for reasons of his own he doesn’t want to appear as yet. I called Morley and told him all this, after he’d told me that he’d opened the safe, and now I suppose the police will drop the case. There’s no real crime in it after all, and they are not hired to catch Giles’ delinquent tenants.”
“Meanwhile,” I said ironically, “we continue to search for another missing man, who is as far away, or as near, as ever. Probably he’ll turn out to be the missing Mrs. Jameson about whom we read in the paper this morning.”
Lavender laughed at my bitterness.
“No, Gilly, nothing like that. But I’m afraid that by morning we, too, will be out of a job. I expect that by morning Miss Minor will have heard from her father and will call off the hunt. I have been so sure of it all day that I haven’t bothered much with that case. Somewhere along the line of our investigations, he will have received word of our search and he will instantly communicate with his daughter, whom, you must remember, he does not know to be in town.”
—— IV ——
As usual, Lavender was right. His prescience was astounding. We were not finished with breakfast in the morning when the telephone bell rang, and at the other end of the connection was Miss Minor. Lavender listened to her message.
“I see,” he replied. “Yes, I quite expected it, Miss Minor. In fact, I have waiting for your call. Naturally there is no further occasion for my services. Was it a phone call, may I ask, or a wire.”
He listened again.
“I understand. Very well, Miss Minor. And if ever again I can be of service to you, remember that I shall be glad to serve. Good-by!”
The last words fell like clods upon my heart. Lavender was smiling oddly as he turned away.
“Finis coronat opus,” said he. “That means, Gilly, ‘the end crowns the work.’ We are politely, courteously, but definitely and conclusively ‘fired,’ as it were. Miss Minor has heard from her father—a wire early this morning, saying merely that he was well and would be home soon.”
“How did you know she would hear from him?” I asked morosely.
“I knew that she was bound to. You see, he found out that I was on his trail and was afraid that I would make his disappearance look like something it was never intended to be. When he went away he had no idea of the publicity that would follow his action, and he had no thought that his daughter would return and start a hunt for him. He managed it all rather badly, as a matter of fact.”
“Do you suppose he returned to the club and they told him there that we were looking for him?”
“No, I don’t believe he’s been near the club. I think Miss Kane told him.”
“Miss Kane!” I shouted. “What has Miss Kane to do with this case?”
“A great deal,” said Lavender, “since she was undoubtedly at the bottom of Minor’s disappearance, as she was at the bottom of the Vanderdonck-Merritt disappearance. You remember I told you that I had contrived to bring Minor’s name into my conversation with her yesterday? I did it purposely, so she would tell him. I thought it would inform him of his daughter’s return and that this action would follow.”
“Good Lord,” I groaned. “What is the secret of it all, Lavender? Why did he go away? Why did Merritt masquerade as Vanderdonck, or Vanderdonck as Merritt? And what has Miss Kane to do with all of them?”
“I’ll tell you how it works out, Gilly, as nearly as I can. And I must tell you about my investigations of last night. They have a bearing on your questions.
“I went to Elmhurst, as I explained. In fact, I went twice—once after leaving Miss Kane in the afternoon, and once after the evening performance. On the latter occasion I followed Miss Kane. In the afternoon I merely made inquiries in the neighborhood. Miss Kane has lived there for about three months, I was informed by the rental agency, with an invalid brother and a maid. At first I naturally thought that the invalid brother was the man I wanted, but the three months knocked that idea in the head for Minor has been living at home and has been at his club until a week ago, while the invalid brother lives with Miss Kane and doesn’t go out any place.”
“Then he’s Vanderdonck!” I said.
“Well,” demurred Lavender, “I suppose it’s conceivable, but I don’t agree, Gilly. Really, the same objection applies to Vanderdonck. No, in my theory of this amusing case, he can’t be Vanderdonck, either. I may as well tell you at once that I believe not only that Vanderdonck was Merritt, but that Minor was both of them!”
I sat up very straight in my chair and stared at him for a moment in silence.
“I’m not crazy,” he replied to my glance. “I don’t think I am, Gilly. I’m admitting that the invalid brother may be Vanderdonck, and that Minor may be some place else. I’m even admitting that the invalid brother may be just himself, an honest-to-goodness invalid brother of Miss Kane. But I don’t think so. Everything points to the truth of my idea that Merritt, Vanderdonck, and Minor are one and the same individual, playing a game. And Minor isn’t anxious that his daughter shall discover what that game is, as least not until it is played out. That’s why he wired Miss Shirley and why we were called off. We were getting too ‘warm,’ as the boys say. Of course Miss Minor had no idea that in releasing us she was playing her father’s game.”
He shook his head. “What puzzles me, however, is that invalid brother. If he isn’t Minor, and isn’t Vanderdonck, to accept your idea for a moment, who is he, unless he is just himself?”
“I think he’s Mrs. Jameson,” I said with a grin.
Lavender laughed. “No,” he replied. “She, at least, has nothing to do with this case. She just happens to have disappeared on the same day.
“Well, to continue. Having learned nothing in particular yesterday afternoon, I followed Miss Kane home last night. I wanted to see whom, if anybody, she would meet at her home. She met nobody. There were lights in the place for some time, chiefly upstairs, but after she had closed the door I didn’t have even a second glimpse of Miss Kane. Not a shadow on the blind. Finally darkness fell over the house, and I came home. I’m very much afraid indeed that the invalid brother is not a myth, that he actually exists—if for no other reason than to complicate this case.”
“And you have no idea why Minor is doing all this?”
“Oh, yes, a sort of an idea, Gilly, but it isn’t complete. I don’t understand why Miss Shirley has not known all about it from the beginning. There’s nothing heinous in it that I can see.”
“And now I suppose we shall never know,” I suggested.
“I think we will,” said Lavender. “I think that Minor himself will look us up to see how much we know, and to tell us the rest, so that we will keep our mouths shut.”
However, it came about rather differently, for we had talked barely an hour when again our telephone bell rang and again it was Miss Shirley Minor who called. Lavender’s expression was one of comical relief as he listened to what she had to say.
“Quite right, quite right!” he said. And a minute later, “Yes, I think I can. Can you join us? Then please do. Come at once!”
There was a gleam in his eye when he had hung up the receiver.
“Off again, on again,” he chuckled. “It gets better, Gilly! Miss Minor distrusts her wire. She doesn’t believe her father sent it and she is more alarmed than ever. It seems that the telegram was signed ‘Father,’ instead of ‘Dad,’ and I think the young lady’s point is well taken. If he always signed himself ‘Dad,’ he should have done so this time. It is such slips that betray criminals. Now I know what happened. Minor didn’t send the wire and Miss Kane did, probably unknown to Minor.
“Well, it should be over shortly. Miss Minor asked me if I knew where her father was. She had an idea that I did because I had told her that she would hear from him. I took a chance and said ‘Yes!’ She’s on her way here now.”
I looked startled. “Can you make good on that, Jimmie?” I cautiously asked.
“Well, I can at least bluff Miss Kane,” he replied, “and that is what I propose to do. We’ll drive out with Miss Shirley herself and surprise the actress lady at her tardy breakfast. I think something interesting will develop. It will be dramatic and you had better possess your soul in patience till we get there. I won’t spoil it for you.”
He flung himself into a chair and gave himself over to some deep thinking. “Please don’t talk for a few minutes, Gilly,” he cautioned me.
It was exactly twenty minutes before he sprang to his feet, in which time he had smoked a great many cigarettes. A new gleam was in his eye, and without a word he strode to the telephone. From his pocket he produced a list of numbers, then lifted the receiver. In a moment or two he was talking apparently to a shopkeeper in Elmhurst.
“You remember my asking you yesterday about Miss Kane and her brother?” he queried. “I forgot one thing. Do you often see Mr. Kane, the brother, in the streets?”
He listened eagerly to the reply.
“Thank you, that’s all.”
He swung on me. “Gilly, what do you think the fellow said? He said, ‘No, nor anybody else. He don’t go out. Nobody ever sees him.’”
“Well, that’s natural enough,” I started to reply.
But Lavender was calling another number and asking the same question. Again he turned to me.
“That was a neighbor,” he crowed. “She said, ‘I only saw him once. That was about a week ago. It was getting along toward dark, and I didn’t see him very clear. I guess he’s pretty sick.’ Excuse her grammar, Gilly, but digest her remarks. Don’t they tell you anything? What an ass I was not to have guessed before!”
“I confess—” I began.
“Don’t!” he laughed. “I’ve been as big an idiot as you have. Bless our poor innocent hearts! Why, it means only one thing. This invalid is never seen, and never has been seen, except once by this neighbor—and then at night—for the very good reason that he never existed. Until a week ago, when this neighbor saw him going in, he’d never been there! For three months he had been an invention of Miss Kane’s, to take care of emergencies. She knew that sometime Minor would come, and that when he did he might be seen. She had to provide for that. I’ll bet she moved in at night. She started the fiction somehow or other, right after she moved in, so that if ever Minor came and was seen at a window, his presence would be accounted for; so that if Minor even had to leave in daylight, he could do it without talk. A week ago he came, and for the first time the ‘invalid brother’ was seen, and whoever saw him thought he was the ‘invalid brother.’ And he’s there now, too, keeping out of sight. The place isn’t thickly populated, the houses are pretty far apart, and not many people would be inclined to ask questions. What gossip there has been about the ‘invalid brother’ has come from the shops, where I have no doubt Miss Kane herself began it. The shopkeepers talked as they always do, to any who will listen, and those of their customers who were interested, remembered.”
“Very clever,” I commented.
Lavender agreed heartily, except that he was thinking of Miss Kane’s scheme, and I was thinking of his solution of the problem.
So it came about that an hour and a half after our conversation Lavender and I and Miss Shirley Minor rang a doorbell out in Elmhurst, or at any rate, one of us did, and directed a startled maid to take our cards to Miss Kane. At the same time Lavender quietly inserted his foot in the door opening. The maid had no alternative. She let us into the sitting room.
And then a curious thing happened. Miss Minor’s eyes fell upon a photograph on the mantel, and a puzzled look spread over her face. Following her glance I saw what must have been a portrait of Miss Kane taken some years before, and I, too, was startled. For it might have been a portrait of Shirley Minor herself.
Lavender was watching us. He smiled very kindly at the girl.
“Yes,” he said, “it is a little older than Miss Minor, of course, but on the whole a very good portrait, don’t you think?”
Shirley Minor turned to him swiftly. “You are going to tell me something very strange,” she said. “Tell me at once! Who is that woman?”
“I believe her to be your mother,” answered Lavender, quietly.
The girl’s hand shook and her face twitched.
“My m-mother,” she stammered, “is dead! I knew her! She died about three years ago, Mr. Lavender!”
“God knows, I have no desire to cause you distress,” replied my friend, “but I firmly believe the original of that portrait to be Miss Sidney Kane, your mother.”
Then the curtains were swept aside, and a tall handsome woman was in the room. Her entrance was theatrical. Her face was the face of Shirley Minor, but older and sadder.
“Yes,” she said, in a harsh strained voice, “he is right. I am Miss Sidney Kane, dear—and your mother. After this, there is nothing to be concealed.”
“Surely there never has been?” suggested Lavender.
“Cyril thought so,” she replied defiantly.
“No doubt,” was Lavender’s reply. “It is too bad.”
“Oh, tell me!” cried Shirley Minor. “Tell me before I scream!”
The older woman crossed the room and laid a hand on her daughter’s head. The gesture was timid and caressing.
“I hope you will love me,” she said simply. “Listen, dear. Your father and I were divorced when you were a tiny baby. There had been trouble. His family objected to his marrying an actress. Shortly afterward, he married again. She was a charming woman, and she treated you as her own daughter and loved you. Your father tried to forget, and as part of the effort he allowed you always to believe that his wife was your mother. I think they were happy; I hope they were. You grew up, the years passed, and at length Mrs. Minor died, as you know. While she lived your father was content. After her death, he had you, and your face was a constant reminder of me. He felt that he had treated me badly and he set about finding me. He did find me, and we loved each other again. We have been married now for more than a year, but until recently we had not been together except for a few days at a time. I kept my position on the stage, and your father, who as a young man had wanted to be an actor, decided to join me there for in that way he could often be with me. He actually became popular as a comedian, to the great surprise of us both.”
She smiled almost brightly for a moment, then her face saddened again.
“But he had to keep it all very quiet, or he thought he did. He hated publicity and he didn’t want the old story raked up. You had been happy with your second mother, and he didn’t want to take that from you. So he became two other men. On the stage he was Charles Merritt, but he never left this city. He played only here in Chicago. And he loved his work so much that he didn’t care to leave it. When his part was over he would quietly dress for the street, leave the theatre, and become for a time Peter Vanderdonck. But Peter Vanderdonck was only a myth. He used the office as a place to hide himself while he became again Cyril Minor.
“I knew that some day he would break under the strain of the situation. I could see it coming, and I made a home ready for him to go to when the time came. A week ago, he became ill—don’t be alarmed; he is better now! Someone had to care for him and I had the best right. I brought him to my home here, but at the same time, of course, both Peter Vanderdonck and Charles Merritt also disappeared. I couldn’t even explain Charles Merritt’s disappearance without betraying Cyril. And so I did nothing.”
Lavender nodded, and took up the tale.
“And, of course, you had no idea that Shirley would come home and miss her father, nor that this old idiot of a landlord would start a search for Vanderdonck. It was all unfortunate in a way, and yet it has ended very happily. But Mr. Minor would have done better to have trusted Shirley entirely from the beginning.”
“As if I would have cared!” cried Miss Minor, springing to her feet. “Where is he?”
The look in her mother’s eyes stopped her. She retraced her steps, and pulling down the older head to her own, kissed the sorrowful eyes.
“I’m sure I shall love you,” she said, “but it is still so strange and new, and, of course—Dad——!”
“Of course!” said Miss Sidney Kane, and with a lift of her finger to us, she led the way upstairs.
