Corwin whirled on Hanvey.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about! This man has that proxy! He just stole it from me!”
Jim was unperturbed. He turned mildly reproving eyes upon the amused countenance of his friend.
“You didn’t go an’ do that, did you, Billy?”
Scanlan grinned.
“Mr. Corwin seems to think so.”
“Well, I’ll be dog-goned! Let’s git together an’ kinder talk things over.”
Back through the swaying, grinding cars went the procession, Scanlan leading, Hanvey next and Corwin bringing up the rear. Corwin was in a cold fury. He felt that he was being made ridiculous—they were laughing at him. He didn’t like the looks of the whole business anyway. What assurance had he that Hanvey and Scanlan were not confederates? They were suspiciously intimate, and Hanvey must have seen Scanlan——In the privacy of their drawing-room Corwin’s sinewy figure towered over Scanlan.
“If you don’t give me back that proxy I’ll break every bone in your rotten body.”
Jim restrained the young man.
“Them’s awful harsh words, Jack Dalton.”30
Corwin shook him off.
“I think you’re as crooked as he is. I’ve had my suspicions from the first, and I’m not going to allow any pair like you to make a monkey of me.”
It was Scanlan who spoke.
“Just what are you going to do about it, Mr. Corwin?”
“I’ll do a-plenty!”
“Giving me a licking isn’t going to get you anywhere except in jail. We’re in New Mexico now; and if you lay a finger on me I’ll have you dumped in the Albuquerque lockup tonight; and you can’t do the same to me, because you haven’t got a lick of proof.”
“Will you let us search you and your compartment?”
“Surest thing you know!” He turned to the detective. “C’mon, Jim. Get busy.”
Hanvey shrugged and reached for one of his black cigars.
“Ain’t gonna waste my time, Billy. If you’ve got that proxy there ain’t no use of my searchin’ for it now. I’ve just got to think things over and get a hunch where you put it. Then I’ll get it.”
“Do you mean,” interrogated Corwin furiously, “that you’re not even going to search this man?”
“I do. I mean just that exact thing, son.”
“Well, I will!”
Scanlan meekly submitted to the search. Once as Corwin’s trembling, clumsy fingers probed into a pocket he deliberately winked at Hanvey, and at the conclusion of the personal search Scanlan led the way to his compartment. Twenty minutes later Corwin, dispirited and dully angry, returned to the drawing-room, where he found Hanvey gazing stolidly out of the window. The detective spoke without turning his head.
“When you git peeved, son, you sure git peeved all over.”
The younger man did not answer. He slouched opposite and tried to think, to piece together the ends of this tangled skein. He was distrustful of every one, particularly of the slothful Hanvey. Jim’s only other remark did not add to his comfort.
“You sure was careless with that coat, Mr. Corwin—awful careless.”
Hanvey was right. He had been careless, inexcusably so. True, there had been a feeling of safety in the knowledge that Hanvey was also in the barber shop; but there was small solace in the thought that it wasn’t entirely his fault that too great confidence had been placed by his employer in Hanvey’s ability. And now, should Hanvey fail to recover the proxy; he—Corwin—was ruined, a brilliant career abruptly and ignominiously terminated.
Meanwhile, in Compartment C, behind a locked door, Scanlan was busy. He obtained a table from the porter and then proceeded to open his suitcase, to unpack it, to remove a false bottom and extract from the space disclosed a sheaf of legal appearing documents. Each of these was strikingly similar to the proxy which lay beside them on the table.
Then slowly and painstakingly Scanlan prepared a duplicate proxy, being very careful that his forging of Colonel Warrington’s name should be patently a forgery. The finished job was a masterpiece. No one unfamiliar with Warrington’s signature could guess that this was not genuine, yet a comparison left no room for doubt that Scanlan’s work was a forgery. Carefully he inscribed the attestation, affixing thereto the impress of the notarial seal he had stolen from the office of Mr. Leopold Jones. That done, he viewed his handiwork with pardonable pride. He next destroyed the other blank proxies which had been prepared by the Quincy-Scott crowd in New York, placed the forged proxy in the false bottom of his suitcase and put the genuine proxy in an outside pocket of his coat.
At lunch time Scanlan found Hanvey sitting alone at one end of the diner while Corwin sulked at the other. The crook paused by the detective’s table and cheerfully accepted Hanvey’s invitation to join. Jim nodded toward the tragic figure at the other end of the car.
“You sure have played tarnation thunder with that, kid, Billy.”
Scanlan shook his head. Naturally tender-hearted, he was genuinely regretful. “Business is business, Jim.”
“Yep, so it is. Kinda tough on the kid, though. He feels bad, knowin’ he played right into your hands. An’ I ain’t feelin’ any too spry myself.” The detective’s dull eyes turned toward his companion and blinked slowly. “Where have you got that proxy, Billy?”
Scanlan laughed.
“I haven’t admitted that I have it.”
“No-o. An’ I didn’t ask you to admit nothin’. The point bein’ that you can’t get away with it, kid. I’ll have you held when we get to Chicago and search you—a search that is a search.”
Scanlan registered apprehension.
“That ain’t fair, Jim. You ain’t got a lick of proof that I have the proxy.”
“Nope. But I intend to get it.”
From the diner Scanlan went back to the observation platform to think things over. He did not relish the prospect of an additional thirty-six hours on the same car with Hanvey. He contemplated dropping off at Albuquerque, then thought better of it. Jim would merely remain with him. And then an idea came.
At eight o’clock the train pulled into the handsome station at the capital of New Mexico for a one-hour layover. Scanlan walked swiftly up the street toward the post office. There he prevailed upon a registry clerk to accept a letter. In a long envelope he inclosed a note to Phares Scott and with it the proxy he had that day stolen from Gerald Corwin. He sent the document both special delivery and registered. It would get to New York a day or two late, perhaps, but still in ample time for the meeting. Besides, it was not essential that it get there at all. It was only necessary that the McIntosh forces be deprived of its possession.
Scanlan would have destroyed the thing in preference, but he knew that he would have difficulty in collecting his fee unless the document itself was produced.
But even though Billy Scanlan had left the train at Albuquerque, Hanvey and Corwin had not. Hanvey, making quite sure that Scanlan had gone, entered Scanlan’s compartment in Corwin’s company. The manner of the big detective had momentarily lost its sluggishness. He questioned Corwin.
“Where’d you search?”
Corwin told him. Jim shook his massive head.
“How ’bout his suitcase?”
“I looked in there, of course.”
“Sure—of course you did, son. Naturally. But let’s us try it again.”
Jim dumped the contents unceremoniously on the seat. With deft fingers he went through every garment and even inspected the contents of the rolled traveling case.
“You see,” commented Corwin resentfully. “I told you nothing was there.”
Hanvey paid him no heed. He had closed the suitcase and was inspecting it carefully. Then suddenly he turned it over and thumped it with a heavy, spatulate finger. His pursy lips creased into a smile.
�
��Think we got somethin’, son.”
“What?”
“We’ll see.”
The suitcase was reopened and Hanvey fumbled inside for a moment. Then a button unfastened here and one there and he removed the false bottom. He extended the envelope to Corwin.
“Better see that he don’t get another chance at it, son.”
With fingers that trembled the younger man spread open the forged proxy, never questioning its genuineness. There it was—Warrington’s signature, Jones’ attestation, the notarial seal. Corwin seized Jim’s hand and wrung it gratefully. His voice was choky.
“I’ve been a rotter, Mr. Hanvey. I suspected you of being a confederate——”
“’Sall right, Mr. Corwin. ’Sall right. Don’t slop over.”
“I can’t help it. I feel like a cur.”
“Gwan!” Hanvey was touched by the boyish gratitude of his young friend. “Let’s get this stuff back in here. Scanlan’ll spot that we have the thing, but it wouldn’t be decent to leave his stuff all spread out like this.”
Ten minutes before leaving time Scanlan returned to his compartment. He opened his suitcase, discerned the disorder—and grinned. Then, pretending disappointment and fury, he rapped on the door of Drawing-room A. Inside he faced Corwin.
“You wanted to start something a little while ago, Mr. Corwin,” he snapped, “when you thought I copped a paper from your coat. Well, I’m here to say that whenever you’re ready you just wade right in, because, no matter what I’ve done, I never robbed a gent’s suitcase.”
A hard, chill smile appeared on Corwin’s lips. He rose slowly. From the window seat Hanvey viewed the tableau amusedly.
“Get out!” ordered Corwin.
“Put me out!”
“Get out or I shall!”
Scanlan’s eyes met those of the other man, and Scanlan discreetly withdrew.
But that night Scanlan lay in his berth, smoking and smiling. Success had blessed his strategy. The Warrington proxy was en route to New York by registered mail, the envelope specifically marked “For Delivery to Addressee Only.” Better still, Jim Hanvey thought he had recovered the document. There was the strongest point in Scanlan’s favor—the fact that Jim was smugly contented. Now all he had to do was to assume the attitude of a man thwarted. He was a trifle sorry for poor old Jim, yet it was no lack of acumen on Jim’s part, but rather a superlative cunning on his own.
During the final twenty-four hours of the journey to Chicago, Gerald Corwin clung to the supposed proxy with a pitiful grimness. Alone with Hanvey in their drawing-room, he sat with his hand against the pocket of his coat. He shaved himself. He slept with the coat for a pillow.
“He got it once,” he explained to Hanvey. “He won’t again.”
Jim smiled.
“Once ought to be enough for any man.”
“What made you think of a false bottom to that suitcase, Mr. Hanvey?”
“Same thing that made Billy think of the lining of your coat. Plumb obvious. Gosh! I’ll bet Billy’s ravin’.”
Corwin was frankly admiring.
“And I thought you were no good! I even thought you might be double-crossing McIntosh!”
“That’s right, son; that’s right. Never trust nobody an’ you’ll never get a shock. That’s my motto. The honester a person is supposed to be the easier he can crook you.”
They reached Chicago at noon of the following day, Hanvey and Corwin boarded the Pennsylvania for New York. Scanlan secured a berth on the New York Central. Freed from the Scanlan menace, Corwin thawed slightly and attempted to make late amends to his benefactor. He even summoned sufficient courage to request a closer inspection of Jim’s gold toothpick and to say complimentary things about the fearful weapon which had been anathema to him. Jim bloomed under the praise of his decoration.
“Feller that gave me that had sense,” he said earnestly. “It ain’t only beautiful—it’s useful.”
Corwin repressed a shudder.
“I suppose it is.”
The gratitude of the younger man was pathetic. He grimly determined to invite Jim to dinner some night—the ultimate test of his fortitude.
They reached New York on time and repaired immediately to the offices of the K. R. & P. There Gerald Corwin delivered over to Garet McIntosh the Warrington proxy. McIntosh congratulated the young man and assured him of the directors’ appreciation. But before leaving the room Corwin made a straight-eyed confession.
“You must thank Mr. Hanvey,” he said. “The proxy was stolen from me on the train and Mr. Hanvey recovered it.”
“Good!” McIntosh dismissed Corwin with a nod and reached for his notebook. “How about it, Hanvey?”
Jim grinned. “Don’t listen to nothin’ the kid says, Mr. McIntosh. He’s game all through, that lad. But it was funny.”
At that moment Billy Scanlan faced Phares Scott and gave a detailed report of the success of his mission. A gleam of admiration appeared in the steely eyes of the financier.
“Good work!” he commented briefly. “You’ll get your pay when the proxy arrives.”
The following day at noon, Scanlan presented himself at Scott’s office. His reward was paid in legal tender——“To avoid the embarrassment of a check.” Scanlan nodded and pocketed the money.
“The proxy?” he questioned.
“We’ve destroyed it. Simply wanted to look it over to make sure we were safe.”
That night Billy Scanlan celebrated. The following morning he awakened with a violent headache, and was aroused by a ringing of his telephone.
“Jim Hanvey,” announced the slow, drawling voice on the other end. “Can I come up?”
Jim came. He regarded Scanlan interestedly.
“I judge they paid you off all right,” he commented.
“They did,” admitted Scanlan. “What about it?”
“Nothin’; nothin’ in particular.” Hanvey glanced at his watch, a tremendous affair, gaudily engraved. “Only that the stockholders’ meetin’ takes place in just about one hour, an’ as a friend I advise you to beat it an’ beat it quick.”
Scanlan sat upright, hands pressed against his throbbing forehead.
“Me beat it?”
“Uh-huh.”
“What for?”
“Takin’ pay from the Quincy-Scott crowd for somethin’ you didn’t do. They’re li’ble to get awful sore.”
“What are you talking about, Jim? You know good and well I got away with it.”
Hanvey shook his head. “Nothin’ of the kind, Billy; an’ I’m advisin’ you as a friend to beat it—an’ stay put.”
The eyes of the other man narrowed.
“You must be gettin’ into your second childhood, Jim. Do you mean to tell me that you haven’t yet found out that the proxy you stole from my suitcase was a fake?”
Hanvey’s voice was quite matter of fact.
“Oh, that? Sure, I knew all the time that was a fake.”
“Well, then——”
“What you ain’t never stopped to realize,” explained the detective, “is this: The proxy you swiped from young Corwin wasn’t no good either.”
Scanlan rose abruptly.
“What do you mean—no good? Old man Warrington executed it——”
“Sure he did! An’ the next day he executed another to McIntosh. That second one was the only one worth the paper it was written on. It nullified the first, an’ I had it in my pocket all the time. An’ when that real proxy appears at the meetin’ today the gang you were workin’ for is li’ble to get all het up. You see, Billy, you and Corwin both had the wrong dope. I wasn’t on that train to keep you from gettin’ that proxy off Corwin; I was there to see you did get it so you wouldn’t bother me none, me bein’ the real messenger.”
Headache forgotten, Billy Scanlan leaped for his s
uitcase and commenced a frenzy of packing.
“I might’ve known you were too easy, Jim! I might’ve known it! Anyway, they paid me off yesterday——”
“That’s what tickles me,” replied Jim; “you gittin’ paid for that proxy. It’s a swell joke on them fellers. An’ say, I got somethin’ to show you. You know young Corwin was awful grateful for what I done.”
“He should have been.”
“He was. He sent me a present this morning. Ain’t it swell?”
And beaming with pride Hanvey exhibited the gift of the fastidious Gerald Corwin.
It was a gold-handled toothbrush.
* * *
26 A malapropism is a mistaken pairing of words (e.g., “neon stockings” instead of “nylon stockings”). Mrs. Malaprop was a foolish, mixed-up character in Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s 1775 play The Rivals.
27 At least two popular inexpensive cigar makers, King Edward and White Owl, marketed cigars with the brand name of “Invincibles.”
28 Income tax returns never required notarization or “attestation.”
29 Also known as pitch or auction pitch, this bidding, trick-playing card game originated in the mid-nineteenth century.
30 James “Jack” Dalton, a.k.a. “the Tiger,” was the melodramatic villain of the popular play The Ticket-of-Leave Man by Tom Taylor (1863). “I know you, James Dalton” was the catchphrase of the hero, Hawkshaw the detective, and the name “Jack Dalton” became a moniker for daring thieves around the world. That there was also a notorious Dalton gang—brothers, none of whom was named Jack—who robbed trains in the late nineteenth century only burnished the legend of the mythic criminal.
Helen of Troy, N.Y.
THE first summer blast of a Southern springtime failed to inspire Jim Hanvey to hallelujahs. The mammoth detective lounged uncomfortably in his tiny apartment, cursing the unkind fates which had first been too liberal in their apportionment of avoirdupois and then caused him to be temporarily located in that section of the country where the intense heat makes for healthy cotton and lethargic humanity.
Jim Hanvey, Detective Page 9
