The Riddle of the Yellow Zuri

by Harry Stephen Keeler

  “And if you do such a thing as that, Mr. Allenuza, I’ll sue you for defamation and damages if it’s the last thing I ever do.”

  Mr. Allenuza laughed raucously. “Sue a lawyer? Ha!”

  Which was only too right. Sue a lawyer! Might as well try to stem the flow of water in the Mississippi River with a dime turned flatside against the current. Carson reflected a moment. Confound such things as dreams and fortune tellers! He thought hard. Then he spoke.

  “Mr. Allenuza, do you see that vault over there?”

  Mr. Allenuza turned his head, and surveyed the vault which, however, had no doors on its hinges.

  “I see a vault — weethout any doors,” he said blankly.

  “Well then you see one reason, at any rate, why there is no certificate as valuable as that Texas Helium certificate in these offices. That answers your first question. Now for the second question: I will not return it to you, even though you are Mrs. Galioto’s lawyer, because there is something highly vital I must tell Mrs. Galioto — with you present of course — when she returns to Chicago Thursday. And what I shall have to say has nothing to do with either dreams nor fortune tellers. It has — well — bring in Mrs. Galioto. That’s all I’ll say. And,” Carson warned, raising his own forefinger, “if, Mr. Allenuza, you send so much as a single word to Washington against me, I’ll — I’ll — have you disbarred.”

  Mr. Allenuza’s face fell. He was evidently not at all afraid of suits, but disbarment — in a land of American lawyers — was something to make him cringe.

  “In view of the facts,” he proclaimed sonorously, rising, “I shall take no steps such as I threatened. If those steps become later necessary, I weell instruct my client herself to sign such wires to Washington which will, I think, leave Joe Allenuza quite safe. What I believe” — and again he waved a forefinger — ”is that you are working weeth som’body to make a corner in this stock, and that you are holding this certeeficate trying to buy it from us by force. But I am frank to say that Mrs. Galioto will never sell that certeeficate, considering her dream about Mr. Galioto and the peculiar combination of numbers involved, not to omit her fortune teller in Milwaukee who has told her many wonderful things in the past.”

  “Maybe not,” said Carson troubledly, rising. “However, I certainly have a right to talk to her anyway.”

  “Quite so, quite so,” intoned Mr. Allenuza with firm graciousness. He looked at his watch, a huge silver thing that ticked audibly. “We, then, will return Thursday, sometime after lunch. Say — about 1 P.M. I will ask you to have the certificate — No. 347 — itself ready for my client — ” he jerked his head quite emphatically, “for I shall have in Mrs. Galioto’s possession a telegram, dictated for her, to the Committee of Mining Stock Investigation at Washington.”

  “But see that you don’t send one word of that telegram before then,” warned Carson, “else you may have to forsake the law and go into the produce business. I warn you, Mr. Allenuza. Remember.”

  Mr. Allenuza bowed, with true Sicilian graciousness, and smiling a greenish smile of half-defeat and half-victory, melted away from the office.

  And Carson, seating himself back in his swivel chair, suddenly realized that he was going to have to face a woman Thursday at 1 P.M., who talked no English, who thought in terms of dreams and fortune tellers, and who, if he failed to swing her from those miscellaneous fatidical guideposts, would in spite of all the extraordinary luck he and Cary had enjoyed, place him pronto in a beautiful jam with Washington. For Washington would ask but the one salient question: “Where is the client’s property?”

  “Surely,” he said to himself, shaking his head slowly, “I ought to be able to out-talk and out-reason a Sicilian fortune teller and a set of crazy dreams based on Milwaukee cheese and probably red wine.” But as he gave it up for the present, and fell back to work, partially comfortable at least in the thought that he possessed ten thousand dollars with which to argue, his spirit was troubled.

  By 2:30 that afternoon, however, working on his own matters, he had about forgotten the morning’s flurry, for as a bright red passenger station on a railroad line recedes into a mere postage stamp to the passenger on the observation platform, so too did this little passage-at-arms shrink into a mere interchange of words and threats with the passing of a few hours. And when he closed down his desk a few minutes after that hour, and with a few instructions to the stenographer about locking up, took his hat and embarked on the long ride out to St. Giles Lane, he had completely forgotten Mr. Allenuza. Particularly so, when he reached there, nearly an hour and a quarter later, and found a pink and white, rested and budding Marcia, with eyes bright, cheeks glowing with color, clad in a little green silk house dress protected by a bungalow-apron, and busy in the preparation of a fancy salad on the kitchen table and some delectable dessert which she hastily screened from his vision by a silver cover.

  “I thought, Cliff,” she told him as he peered curiously in at the preparations on the kitchen table, “that you surely earned your supper by coming ‘way out here just to interview these people with snakes.” She gave a little shiver, and smiled at him reassuringly.

  It was a few minutes past four when the first ring at the doorbell came. Carson answered it. A boy of about fifteen stood on the threshold with a newspaper-wrapped package in his hand. He stepped in diffidently at Carson’s friendly invitation, and with his cap in his hand delivered his brief peroration in the inner hall.

  “Mister, it was me that called up this morning. I seen your ad in the paper when I was lookin’ for the colyum on secon’-hand bicycles. An’ I sorta thought I had that yellow snake you was lookin’ for. I caught it yesterday afternoon in Lincoln Park.” He deposited his cap on the post of the banister and unwrapping his package exposed a glass mason jar, screened at the top with a piece of cheesecloth, and containing a tiny threadlike snake with a pronounced yellow-greenish tint. But vestige of black rings running around the body, as described by Mr. Jake Jennings, there was none whatever.

  Carson, the mason jar in his hand, surveyed the little grass snake a moment and then shook his head slowly. “I’m very sorry, my boy, but this isn’t the serpent advertised for. The one that is wanted is not only yellow — even more yellow than this — but has circular stripes on its body.” He handed it back to the boy, and the look of disappointment on the youngster’s face was so keen that Carson couldn’t resist digging down into his pocket with his other hand and abstracting a dollar bill which he tucked into the boy’s fingers.

  “It’s too bad, sonny, but you just take this to partly pay you for the long trip out here to the prairies.” He laughed. “Pretty long trip, wasn’t it, and worth a dollar at least, don’t you think?”

  The boy, like all those blessed with youth, was a philosopher. He grinned. He stuffed the bill in his pocket, and drew his cap on his head. “Thank you, mister. I’m awful sorry I troubled you.” And he allowed Carson to usher him out the same door by which he had come in, and a second later was tramping down the narrow flower-adorned path that led to the sidewalk. And Carson and the girl, peeping at him from behind the curtains of the parlor, saw him liberate the tiny harmless reptile on one of the nearby unsold lots of the district, and then toss the mason jar away into the heavy weeds which grew up close to the cement sidewalk.

  He had not been gone from sight long before a middle-aged man with bushy mustaches came trudging along the sidewalk, a covered basket in his hand, his gaze fixed upon the little lone cottage. Carson smiled to Marcia. “Better get back to that little supper you’re fixing, kidlets. A few more of these reptilian exhibits, and you won’t have any appetite left.”

  She repaired back to the kitchen, and a second later the doorbell rang for the second time. Again Carson opened it. “I called up this morning,” began the bushy mustached man in the doorway, but Carson cut him off by motioning him inside the inner hallway. “I was the one who called up this morning,” the newcomer repeated, once inside. “Tom Foley was the name.” Carso
n nodded. “I’m a gardener for Mrs. Hartley Blaine of Oak Park,” the man continued, “and I killed this here rep-tile with a rake early this mornin’. At breakfus’ when I was readin’ the paper, I seen your ad and — well here I am.” He lowered the basket to the floor, removed the cloth from it, and raising it up by the handle showed to Carson what was lying therein on a clean newspaper: the body of a thick short serpent with a bright yellow head, several rows of yellow diamond-shaped patches joined point-to-point along its back from its head to its tail, and a more or less intricately laced pattern of reds, greens and blacks covering all the other portions.

  But one look at the squat hideous thing, and Carson shook his head. “I’m sorry, Mr. Foley, very sorry, but while this has a good proportion of yellow in its markings, it isn’t a tiger-snake — or Zuri. The species of serpent which was advertised for is a bright yellow with circular black stripes running around the body.” And with several motions of his finger he described to the heavily mustached Foley the general pattern by which the Zuri identified himself with the bright foliage and sharp shadows of far off India.

  Mr. Foley was a bit disappointed, but evidently had been aiming for the prize only as one takes a shot in the dark, for he silently packed the worthless body of his reptile back in his basket as though it were worth a million dollars in gold, and lighting a corncob pipe, pulled his hat over his head. With a tweak at his long mustaches, he raised his basket to his arm and took his departure, aided by two extra good cigars from the person of one Mr. Clifford Carson, who was beginning to feel by this time that Mr. Jake Jennings’ proposition was costing him something personally in the requirements it imposed toward easing the feelings of disappointed applicants.

  He was less polite with the next comer, for the reason that that visitor proved very shortly to be nothing else but an astute business man, alive to the opportunity of the hour. The latter was a dark, short individual, obviously a Persian or a Hindoo, whose flamboyantly printed card proved that he dealt in animals of all sorts for circuses, zoos and museums. He brought with him a phlegmatic, even apathetic, little reptile in a glass cylinder screened at each end.

  “Nalon Toorah,” he said, bowing deeply. “My name, sair, eez on card in your hand. I see ad — your ad — in paper las’ night. So you wan’ tiger snake — Indian tiger snake, eh? Was ever snake w’at I can no provide? I doubt him much, sair.” And as he rattled off his accomplishments in his special line, he held aloft with much éclat the glass cylinder he had brought. But while the reptile lying therein was yellow indeed, it was mottled with black spots like a leopard — there was no sign of black rings on its body.

  “Is that an Indian tiger snake?” asked Carson pointedly.

  Nalon Toorah looked a bit sheepish. “Sair, eet eez tigair snake — joos’ like Tigair snake of India — no deefrence much account at all, sair. We call ‘im Crawling Leopard. He eez same snake.”

  “But is that snake the one known as the Zuri?”

  Nalon Toorah was a crafty dodger. “Sair, zere eez no deefrence. I know w’at you wan’ snake for. You wan’ mak’ experiments weez poison in ‘im. But he is same poison — I assure you, sair. Leopard — tigair — w’at deefrence zat mak’, I ask? You wan’ mak’ venom serum, eh? Sure. Then theez snake joos’ w’at you lookin’ for.”

  Carson’s voice was a bit sharp. He did not like to be made the recipient of specious arguments tending to convince him that he should purchase something he had not called for. In other words he was not in the market for reptiles just because they came from India.

  “Mr. Toorah, if you’ll go back home and read my advertisement carefully, you’ll find that the reptile asked for is the Zuri, or Indian tiger snake — a yellow-bodied snake with black rings running around its body from head to tail. This is a yellow snake and it’s got plenty of black on it — but it isn’t a Zuri. You know that and I know it. Now if you’ve got a Zuri — well, for instance, have you added such a reptile to your stock during the last twenty-four hours?”

  Mr. Toorah scratched his chin. “Zuri is common enough snake,” he replied. “He is use’ in all circuses an’ museums by snak’ charmers w’at wan’ make beeg show — him and coral snake and ze Texas rattler. But I no have exactly Zuri in stock. I can get you Zuri from New York for mooch less zan thousan’ dollars, if you wait — say — a week. If you can wait ninety days, I get you big bunch from India — all kinds Zuri, and cost you less than ten dollars ‘piece. I can — ”

  “Have you got a Zuri in stock this minute?” interrupted Carson abruptly.

  Mr. Toorah shook his head sadly. “No, not now, sair. Have no had Zuri for long, long time. Can get — can easy get, sair.”

  “Then I’m very sorry, Mr. Toorah, but we can do no business together. I am after one certain reptile that is already in Chicago. It can be identified if it is brought here. I am not in the market for tiger snakes in general, nor for so-called leopard snakes. This fellow you’ve got here will not do at all.”

  Mr. Toorah attempted to argue further the merits of the Indian leopard snake against the Indian tiger snake, but Carson gave him short shrift. He was thoroughly irritated by the attempt of the man to secure the offered thousand dollars for a specimen worth only around ten dollars, as well as the manner in which the latter had failed to play fair even regarding the species of the creature. And by being more sharp in his tones than he had been at any time this far, Carson had the pleasure of seeing Mr. Toorah literally forced to take his departure, muttering under his breath, his dark face sullen.

  It was fully five-twenty by the little mantel clock in the parlor when a fat negro woman bustled up the front steps entirely out of breath, her black roly-poly face the countenance of an innocent child, her surplus avoirdupois bouncing up and down in front of her, her ponderous skirts sweeping a pair of old shoes several sizes too large for her. Carson wondered as he answered the door whether she had come to solicit washing, but he was soon to find that his quest had reached what appeared to be its end. He gave her a seat in the parlor so that she could regain her breath, and as soon as she had gotten a long respiration she poured forth her errand.

  “Dat wuthless husban’ o’ mine, Sam Johnson,” her story ran, punctuated by more or less wheezing, “done got dat ah snek you’s lookin’ fo’, sah. Dat man is a wu’ker on de railroad tracks down roun’ de Union Station — he jes’ wu’ks on de roadbed roun’ de railroad yahds, yo’ undahstan’ — he don’ go out wid none ob dem wuthless section gangs. An’ dataway he done cotch dat ah yellah tigah snek yo’ all talked ‘bout in de paper.”

  “You believe your husband got the snake we advertised for?” Carson asked, more than interested by her mention of the Union Station.

  “Yessah. Ah knows it. But lemme tell you ‘bout dat wuthless man an’ what happen ‘bout dat snek. He done was wu’kin’ Sunday, like he always do, caze he gets Mondays off instid. An’ as he wuz tampin’ down one ob dem railroad ties, he done see a streak o’ yeller skinnin’ along undah de futhest rail. He go aftah it quick and he raise de i’on tampin’ bah and he kill it wid one quick blow. He — ”

  “Now just a minute, Mrs. Johnson,” said Carson. “The Union Station yards are where the trains from the West would come in. Did your husband make any comment as to what was the last train in prior to his killing this snake?”

  “Yes, he did, sah. Sam say he bet dat snek was brung in on dat train f’um Montana w’at comes in roun’ two o’clock in de aftahnoon. ‘Tannyrate, he think it come in dataway. But as I is tellin’ you he kill dat reptile jes’ like as what I done ‘scribe to you. Den w’at you thinks dat wuthless niggah done? Been alwuz lookin’ fo’ a Jonah fo’ to use in de crap games w’ut he plays in; so he done tek dat snek yistiddy mo’nin’ — Monday mo’nin’ — to one ob dem w’ite man taximdermics ‘count o’getting’ de day off cause o’ wu’kin’ Sunday. An’ he go an’ have de snek skinned w’ile he wait, an’ de skin baked in a little oven, an’ den stuffed wid wool. An’ den he ca’y off dat snek fo’ a Jon
ah in de crap games. He say a yaller snek mek’ a man rich — his pappy tel’ ‘im dat w’en he was a boy.

  “He nevah even go back to his job dis mohnin’,” continued the colored woman dolefully, “fo’ he been shootin’ craps evah since yistiddy afta’noon. All night dat niggah been rollin’ dem bones, an’ dis mohnin’ he show up in a ol’ suit wid ol’ shoes an’ no hat — done los’ all his good clothin’ an’ all his money. But he jes’ as cheerful as do’ he had a millyun dollahs, fo’ he say he got a Jonah dat goin’ to mek him an’ me and de chilluns pow’ful rich soons as it th’ows a h’ant ober dem dice. Den he roll up in de bed an’ go to sleep. Ah tells Mistess Alexandah, de w’ite lady on Prairie Av’nue who ah washes fo’, ‘bout it. An’ Mistess Alexandah says: ‘W’y, Em’line, I ‘members ‘stinctly heahin’ Ham an’ Abnah on de radio las’ night talkin’ ‘bout a ad fur jes’ sich a snek. An’ dey talked ‘bout de Union Station, too. We go git de paper wot owns Station WXOY, an’ look fo’ de ad. Dat snek mebbe de pet ob somebody like a snek-chahmah.’ So we stops de washin’, hunts up de las’ ebenin’s papah, and she looks all fru it — and suah ‘nough we see all ‘bout dat snek in dem los’ an’ foun’ ads. Now, Mistah, if dat snek ain’t de one you’s lookin’ fo’, ah suah will be a mighty dis’pinted ‘ooman. It’s a tigah, jes, like you ‘scribes. An’ ah ought to know, seein’ as ah went right home an’ sneaked de snek outen dat niggah’s pocket, him bein’ still snoahin’ an’ dreamin’ ‘bout how he goin’ to go out tonight and win a lot o’ money by bettin’ ouah fun’iture. So heah ah is, and heah is de snek.”

  From a capacious bosom she withdrew a white cloth, and unrolling it exposed its contents. Carson, now standing above her so that he could inspect those contents accurately, saw that it was indeed something that tallied exactly with what both Mr. Jennings and the encyclopedia termed the tiger snake. It was about a foot long, perhaps a couple of inches over that, and a fine flexible wire evidently concealed in the stuffing allowed it to be bent into various lifelike positions, as the colored woman demonstrated with her black digits. Its color was a brilliant yellow, broken only by narrow jet-black rings which ran from the very tip of its black tail clear to its nose. The skin, as the colored woman had narrated, had evidently been neatly removed, baked in an oven, stuffed with wool stuffing and sewed up with very fine stitches of silk. It had a somewhat lifelike appearance, however, in spite of its drastic treatment, for two bright blue beads had been sewn in for its eyes. It was, all in all, though, a more or less embarrassed and stiff-looking snake, a snake that looked as though it wasn’t enjoying itself — a snake which suggested a man in a dress suit at a wake!