Jane Carter Historical Cozies: Omnibus Edition (Six Mystery Novels)

by Alice Simpson

  “That’s just when I’d like to stay. Maybe, I could hide behind the filing cabinet.”

  “You’re forgetting that you’re not the heroine of one of those melodramatic serials you insist on squandering your literary talents on,” Dad said. “Just sit in that chair and try to look normal.”

  The door opened and a middle-sized, middle-aged man in a brown suit who walked with a quick, energetic stride, came into the room. Dad stood up to shake his hand. He introduced the man to me and offered him the comfortable leather chair reserved for visitors.

  “Well, what may I do for you? You don’t mind my daughter being here?”

  “No, no, not at all. I represent the McClure and Allison firm in Chicago. You may have heard of us.”

  “Oh, yes, the well-known jewelry concern.”

  “I came here upon a rather strange mission,” the man continued. “Do you recall a certain story about our firm which ran in your paper perhaps ten days ago? It was to the effect that one of the officers of our company had disappeared with a considerable number of valuable jewels in his possession?”

  “Yes, I remember the story. Man by the name of Merriweather, wasn’t he?”

  “Yes, J. D. Merriweather.”

  I leaned forward in my chair, but I did not interrupt.

  “At first, we were inclined to believe Mr. Merriweather had been delayed on his trip from New York,” Dad’s visitor continued. “He was traveling by motor, combining business with pleasure. Then later, when we became alarmed and tried to trace him, all we could learn was that he last seen at a filling station about two hundred miles from here.”

  “That was in the story, I believe. Company officials assumed that Merriweather had stolen the jewels.”

  “The man who talked with your reporter over long distance telephone never should have given out such a statement.” Mr. Harwood frowned. “Merriweather was a close friend of mine. He was highly respected in the firm.”

  “Then you believe that he did not steal the jewels?”

  “James Merriweather wasn’t the type of man to resort to theft. He was well fixed financially and had a wife and two small children. Often he carried more valuable jewels with him than upon this occasion.”

  “Then it is your thought that he met with foul play?”

  “Either that or an accident,” said Mr. Harwood. “Merriweather was a rather careless driver.”

  “What quantity of jewels did your friend carry on his person?”

  “The firm has estimated the loss at approximately fifteen thousand dollars. The greater part of this is represented by a pearl necklace. Merriweather was bringing it from New York for a special customer of ours.”

  “The loss was covered by insurance?”

  “Yes, we’re not worried upon that account. Our fears concern James Merriweather. Now my purpose in coming to you was this: since he disappeared somewhere in this state, or so we believe, we thought your paper might be able to aid in the search.”

  “We’ll give you every possible cooperation,” Dad said. “However, I should suggest that you engage a detective.”

  “We turned the case over to the Pallman-White Agency several days ago. However, so far they have made no progress.”

  “You have talked with the police, I suppose?”

  “Yes, but they hold the theory that James Merriweather yielded to temptation and stole the jewels. The insurance company is working on this angle too, keeping watch of various places where the jewels might be offered for sale.”

  “I will be very glad to give you any possible assistance,” my father repeated. “However, I don’t see just what our paper can do. I am willing to assign a special reporter to the story for a few days.”

  “Our firm will appreciate your cooperation.” Mr. Harwood picked up his hat. “Thank you for giving me so much of your time.”

  “Just a minute, please,” I said standing to my feet. “I think perhaps I have a clue which might help you.”

  Both Mr. Harwood and Dad were startled.

  “Did you say that your friend’s initials were, ‘J. D.’?” I asked.

  “Yes, that is correct,” Mr. Harwood said.

  “I happen to know that a J. D. Merriweather spent a night at a small hotel in White Falls. The man registered from Chicago.”

  “Then that must have been James Merriweather! Where is White Falls?”

  “Not far from here, along the Grassy River,” I explained. “The hotel is run by a Mr. and Mrs. Conrad and is called Old Mansion.”

  “Jane, how do you know that Merriweather stayed there?” questioned my father.

  “Because I saw his name on the register.”

  “I shall drive to White Falls at once and talk with the Conrads,” Mr. Harwood said. “Thank you very much for the clue, Miss Fielding.”

  I decided not to inform Mr. Harwood that he was speaking to Mrs. Carter.

  “You might telephone us and report what success you have,” Dad suggested.

  “I certainly shall. You may expect a call from me not later than tomorrow morning. If something important develops, I’ll telephone earlier.”

  Dad walked Mr. Harwood to the door and shook hands with him as they parted. I crossed over to the window and looked down into the street.

  “Dad,” I confessed, “I didn’t give Mr. Harwood quite all of my information. When James Merriweather spent the night at Old Mansion, he was assigned room seven— the room, according to Thom Vhorst, where a man mysteriously disappeared!”

  CHAPTER 10

  “You are certain of your facts?” Dad asked. “There is really a rumor going around town that a man disappeared from room seven.”

  “I’m certain of what I saw in the register when I signed it. At the time, I thought very little about it. I suppose the name and the number stuck in my mind because the Conrads acted so funny about that particular room.”

  “I believe you said it appeared they didn’t wish you to occupy it?”

  “Mrs. Conrad didn’t. Her husband was all for chucking Flo and me in with those hideous portraits.”

  “Portraits in a bedroom?”

  “Four of them. One fellow in a red cocked hat has eyes that give you the shivers.”

  “I’m not interested in that part,” said Dad. “But you may have stumbled into something, Jane.”

  “I think so myself, Dad.”

  “I’ll assign Jack Bancroft to the story,” my father said. “He has a nose for news, and he may dig up some interesting facts.”

  “But I take it you don’t consider mine especially interesting.”

  “Interesting, but a trifle too fanciful for the Greenville Examiner. We can’t print stories about portraits that wink and roll their eyes, even if it would brighten up the art section! I’ll admit that once not so long ago you proved your old Dad to be a bit too conservative—something about a witch doll, wasn’t it?”

  “That’s right,” I said. “Dad, if you send Jack out to Old Mansion, warn him not to mention my name. It might get Emma into trouble with the Conrads.”

  “I’ll remember. Anyway, Jack probably won’t get out there today. He’ll be tied up with the Elks convention story. I’ll have him contact the Conrads by telephone.”

  “He’ll learn nothing that way, Dad.”

  “Then I’ll send Jack or some other reporter to White Falls tomorrow.”

  “I thought news stories were supposed to be timely, Dad. If you hurry, you might get a big scoop!”

  “Or we might get a big libel suit. We’ll have to feel our way cautiously on a story like this, Jane. It’s dangerous business publishing that a man disappeared from a certain hotel, especially when there has been no arrest.”

  “I suppose you’re right.”

  I turned to leave.

  “Please ask Jack to come here if he’s in the office,” Dad said. “I’ll give him his new assignment.”

  I closed the door behind me and spoke politely to Mr. DeWitt, the city editor. I paused beside Jack’s
desk. He was hammering away at his typewriter and didn’t notice I was there until I spoke.

  “Well, if it isn’t our very own Mrs. Carter, back again so soon. What’s the latest news from the front?”

  “I hate to break it to you,” I said. “But Dad wishes to see you in his sanctum sanctorum right away.”

  Jack’s chair scraped on the floor as he got quickly to his feet.

  “What is it, Jane?”

  “Shouldn’t be surprised if he intends to fire you,” I said.

  Jack just smiled one of his dazzling smiles, and I had to look up at the ceiling to keep from smiling back.

  “We still haven’t agreed on what picture we’re going to see?” Jack said, abruptly changing the subject.

  “I have to iron my shoelaces,” I said, turned on my heel and hurried downstairs.

  When I arrived home, Mrs. Timms was rather worried over my lengthy absence. I generally abhor displays of sentimentality, but Mrs. Timms is a sweet old thing who practically raised me from a pup, so I make allowances.

  “Have you had your breakfast?” Mrs. Timms asked when she was done mauling me.

  “Yes, hours ago in White Falls. Still, if you’d urge me, I could eat a dish of those fresh strawberries you’re picking over.”

  “I declare, you’re always hungry. But I wish you would put on a little flesh.”

  “I don’t. Fleshy girls simply get nowhere these days. But I do wish my brains would expand a little. I have a job on my hands which requires deep thinking.”

  “What are you up to now? I hope it’s nothing like that witch doll affair.”

  “No, I am cogitating upon how to find a stolen houseboat —not to mention a man who disappeared mysteriously from Old Mansion.”

  “Quite a large order, I should say.”

  Between strawberries, I told Mrs. Timms about my experiences in White Falls. Mrs. Timms promised to send a box of food to Mud Cat Joe and his family the next time she made the trip to the river town.

  “Oh, by the way, Jane,” said Mrs. Timms, “while you were gone, Albert Layman telephoned. He said he would like to have you play tennis with him this afternoon.”

  “He’ll have to find some other girl,” I said. “I’m staying close to home today. Anyway, Al’s too tall and gangly.”

  “Can he help that?”

  “Yes, and he’s always talking about his latest get-rich-quick scheme. No constancy. I prefer my men with steady purpose.”

  “Such as that reporter, Jack Bancroft, I suppose,” Mrs. Timms observed.

  “Certainly not,” I said. “I’m fond of old Jack, but if I’m going to play mixed-doubles for life with someone, it won’t be with any newspaperman.”

  I put my empty berry dish in the sink and went upstairs to my room to do a few hours hard labor on the next installment of my latest serial, “Evangeline: The Horse Thief’s Unwilling Fiancée.”

  When last I’d left Evangeline, her father had declared that the only man Evangeline had ever truly loved was a beggarly dog and had vowed to marry her off to the dastardly villain who was pretending to be an upstanding rancher and not the ringleader of a murderous gang of horse thieves. I was pleased with the dramatic start, but now I was faced with fabricating part two of the tale and deeply uncertain what subsequent misfortune should befall Evangeline.

  Later in the morning, when Albert Layman telephoned again, I gave him the icy mitt and firmly declined his invitation to play tennis.

  All afternoon I remained at home polishing the mud from Bouncing Betsy, doing odd jobs which had accumulated, and contemplating the fate of Evangeline.

  Recently, Mr. Pittman, Editor of Pittman’s All-Story Weekly Magazine and the man who writes the checks compensating me for my little literary efforts, had complained. The readers of Pittman’s, he insisted, preferred a rather more feminine heroine than I’d featured in my previous serials. It was all fine and good, Mr. Pittman pointed out, to have characters going about conking the villain on the head with heavy objects or prodding the antagonist in the ribs with sharp implements, but wasn’t that rather more the job of the hero?

  I begged to differ with Mr. Pittman, but he’s the man who writes the checks. I resolved to prevent my latest heroine from getting off on the wrong foot with my editor by plunging her into a dread delirium in the opening paragraph of my current installment. I then intended to leave her on her bed of sickness for the next twenty pages while the villain went off and plotted dastardly deeds with his band of desperados. I decided that a secret cave would be involved. Readers of Pittman’s would surely put their stamp of approval on a secret cave.

  At four o’clock Dad came home from the office.

  “Did he telephone?” I asked.

  “Did who telephone?”

  “Mr. Harwood, of course.”

  “No, not while I was at the office.”

  “I thought surely he would.”

  “Mr. Harwood told us he might not telephone before tomorrow.”

  “Yes, that is true. You heard nothing more about the disappearance?”

  “No, Jack will get to work on the story tomorrow after he talks with Harwood. But don’t count upon it developing into anything tremendous, Jane.”

  I slept fitfully that night. I couldn’t stop thinking of might develop at Old Mansion. In the morning, I surprised Dad by climbing into the car beside him when he was ready to start for the newspaper office.

  “Why am I thus honored?” he inquired.

  “Oh, I’d like to be on hand when that telephone call comes through from Mr. Harwood.”

  “I can let you know from the office.”

  “You might forget,” I said. “No, if you don’t mind me being underfoot, I’ll just tag along.”

  I busied myself in Dad’s office with typing up another installment of, “Evangeline: The Horse Thief’s Unwilling Fiancée.” During the first hour, I wrote the unfortunate Evangeline into a delirium of sufficient dreadfulness to ensure she’d be confined to bed for at least the next twenty pages. During the second hour, I worked on getting the dastardly villain from his ranch to the secret cave. I’d turned out four pages of the villain wandering the trackless wasteland in search of the secret cave before my poor beleaguered brain rebelled at the task of describing another cactus.

  I wandered out to the pressroom to watch Burt Kissinger draw a cartoon. I looked over at Jack’s desk, but it was vacant. I wandered into the photographer’s quarters to see what my friend Shep was doing, but he was also absent. Finally, I went back into my father’s private office and wrote my dastardly villain all the way to the sturdy wooden gate which barred entrance to the secret cave.

  “I want your opinion,” I said to Dad. “What do you think of this password: ‘Death to Traitors’?”

  “Really, Jane,” my father said peevishly, “this is a newsroom, not some sort of spy organization.”

  “Imagine you are a vicious desperado masquerading as an upstanding rancher who has been wandering for three days in a trackless wasteland, you’ve run out of water, your horse has gone lame from a tangle with a barrel cactus, but you’ve finally come upon the secret cave you’ve been searching for? Would you consider ‘Death to Traitors’ to be a sufficiently dramatic password to make you stick around the entrance for another page and a half until someone opens the gate for you and lets you in?”

  My father did not dignify my query with a reply.

  The telephone rang many times, and always I straightened alertly, but the call was never from Mr. Harwood.

  “What do you suppose is the matter with that man?” I said to Dad. “Here it is eleven o’clock, and not a word from him.”

  “He probably forgot,” my father said. “After you’ve been in the newspaper business for as long as I have, you’ll learn promises don’t mean a great deal.”

  “But he was so emphatic, Dad. I can’t help thinking he would have telephoned if something hadn’t happened.”

  “No doubt your clue about Merriweather was a dud. P
ossibly, Mr. Harwood decided to return to Chicago yesterday.”

  “That needn’t have prevented him from letting us know.“ I walked over to my father’s desk. “Dad, I have a notion to telephone Emma. She could tell me whether or not Mr. Harwood went to Old Mansion yesterday.”

  “Not a bad idea. Go right ahead.”

  I placed the call. Mrs. Earnestine Conrad answered.

  “May I speak with Emma?”

  “Miss Brown is very busy.” Mrs. Conrad sounded agitated. “Can’t I take the message?”

  “No, thank you, I must speak with Emma,” I insisted. “I assure you it is important.”

  “You’re not a reporter?” Mrs. Conrad demanded.

  “No.”

  It was a very strange question. Why should she suspect that I was reporter?

  “Just a minute then,” Mrs. Conrad said.

  There was a long wait while I held the receiver. Several times I glanced at my wrist watch, wondering why Mrs. Conrad delayed in bringing Emma to the telephone. I should have insisted on making a person to person call, for the newspaper was now being charged for the elapsed time. I was on the verge of hanging up the receiver when I voice on the other end said hello.

  “Hello, is that you, Emma? This is Jane. I called to ask—”

  “I can’t talk now,” Emma interrupted. “Oh, Jane, dreadful things go on here! Mr. Harwood—”

  Then there was a sharp click as if a receiver had been replaced in its cradle. The connection was broken.

  CHAPTER 11

  “Hello, operator!” I said urgently. “I’ve been disconnected from my party.”

  “There is no one on the line now,” the operator said. “Shall I ring again?”

  “Please.”

  After a long wait, the operator reported that she was unable to reestablish the connection. I hung up the receiver, turned to my father, and repeated Emma’s strange message.

  “Dad, something is wrong out there!”

  “It does seem odd she would refuse to talk.”

  “Mr. Harwood must have arrived yesterday, for she mentioned his name just as she was cut off. I suppose Mrs. Conrad may have been listening to the conversation, but even that doesn’t account for what she said: ‘Dreadful things go on here!’”