The old man nodded. “Yes, sir. A girl came in, looked around, said she was trying to pick up an alarm clock so that she could get up in the morning on time, and bought it. Let’s see — she paid me fifty cents for it.”
“You know the young lady?” queried Darrell.
Old Daddy Rees shook his head. “I do not, sir. Many of the people over in this district I know, but likewise many I do not know. Like all other neighborhoods, people come and go continually.”
“You don’t even know whether she was of the neighborhood, then?”
“No, sir, I don’t. She had a hat on. That shows at least that she didn’t live in this block.”
Darrell frowned. The old man was truthful. That characteristic showed from every inflection of his voice. Yet one of the two clocks which he had consented to obtain had already eluded him. His newspaper sense suggested odd possibilities to him. Could this girl by any chance have been mixed up in this game of chronometrical hide and seek — this strange hidden story? Had a tip gone out already to some one to secure the clocks? Was she connected in any way with the mysterious Mr. Catherwood who was mentioned in the Foy message as the man who was to be circumvented — the same Mr. Catherwood whom the dark-eyed girl in the Bradbury had calmly informed Darrell could not be located by any recourse to city directories? If so, it behooved him not to waste any time in getting to Schimski’s. But yet, he assured himself, the purchase of the clock could easily be a quite innocent incident. Somebody in this region of thrifty people of slender means had heard of this old gentleman, and had come to his little basement shop. That was all. Yet in spite of the innocent aspect of it, he was checkmated. He spoke.
“Well, Mr. Rees, as I say, I came over here to buy that alarm clock back from you. I suppose you wouldn’t have refused to accept — say — twenty dollars for it, eh?” The old man’s eyes widened. “Now, I’ll tell you what I want you to do. You spend your time to-day and to-morrow combing this whole district thoroughly. Ask all of your many friends if they’ve recommended you to any girl of the description of the one who came in your shop either to the east, west, north, or south of the region. Try the very best you can to get on this young lady’s track. As soon as you find her, just buy back the clock. Here — you’re an honest man — ”
Darrell peeled off from the roll of bills in his pocket, without exposing that bundle of money to the gaze of the old man, a twenty-dollar bill. “You take this money and buy in that clock if you locate it just as though you were again buying in some furniture. I’ll see that you not only are paid for your time in combing the district, but that you make a full twenty dollars net for yourself by the transaction. Say nothing to anyone, of course. And — ” He tore from his notebook a sheet of paper and with a fountain pen he wrote out the telephone number of the house where he roomed. “If you locate this girl, call me at this number. Ask for Mr. Darrell. If I’m out then just leave your message with my landlady who will answer the phone, and I’ll get it. Shortly after I’ll be right out.”
Darrell put away the notebook and held out the bill. The old man accepted it reluctantly. “Sir, I don’t like to take this money from you. I feel that I ought to regain the clock for you myself, at my own expense. If for sentimental reasons it — ”
“Say no more,” commanded Darrell reassuringly. “I want you to make your best efforts to locate it.” And looking at his watch he rose.
Daddy Rees rose, too. He opened the basement door of his shop, to a steep flight of wooden stairs which rose to the street. “Immediately after my lunch, sir, I shall start out and see if I can locate this young woman. But mind, sir, I don’t say that I can.”
And as Darrell took his departure and once more stood upon the hot sidewalk, he said to himself: “Nor do I likewise say that you can locate her if by any chance she was pursuing any search such as I am. However — ” He shrugged his shoulders. “It isn’t my funeral, one way or the other. I’m just a chivalrous Mike, trotting about town like a well-trained, little dog for a young lady with a most marvelous pair of big, dark eyes.”
In a very short time he came to the other dealer’s place. Wells Street, at this point, which housed Mr. Schimski’s establishment, was a street of the cheaper sort of tradesmen, containing second-hand stores of various sorts, yet here and there a little German bakery whose sweet smell coming out on the air mingled with the odor from little once-convivial Teutonic wein-stubes, now, alas, de-alcoholized. Mr. Jacob Schimski, whose name adorned his furniture store, proved to be not in sight, as Darrell found after he had wound his way to the back of the store through a tangle of every kind and description of outlawed furniture. But a greasy-looking woman with a very red face and tousled hair, together with a dusty calico waist surmounted by a tough canvas apron, came forward. To his query for Mr. Jacob Schimski, she informed him that she was Mrs. Jake, that Mr. Jake had gone over to Michigan that morning to see his brother for a week, and that she would be pleased to do business with him.
Darrell gazed about him for a moment. He saw on shelves along each side of the store every article, no matter how trivial, that might furnish or adorn a house, from plaster bric-à-brac to match safes. Then he turned to her.
“Do you recall, Mrs. Schimski, buying some effects over on Ritchie Court a little less than a month ago from the home of a man by the name of Jarndyce?”
The woman looked suspiciously at him. “Yes. We bought a bunch of his stuff. What about it?”
“Nothing serious,” he ventured to assure her with his smile that had so often won over to him people who were suspicious of his motives. “There was an alarm clock among the stuff, wasn’t there? I just wanted to buy it back. Providing you still have it. I suppose you tag everything, eh?”
“Alarm clock, eh?” said Mrs. Schimski. “Well, — yes, we got an alarm clock out o’ that there house on Ritchie Court. What’d you want of it, mister?”
“Some one who knew Mr. Jarndyce wishes his clock,” replied Darrell friendlily. The woman’s face lost its suspicion as she jumped manifestly to the conclusion that sentimental factors were involved in the line of questioning. But her reply was a bit disconcerting to her customer.
“Seems like this here old Mr. Jarndyce must have a lot o’ friends that wants a keepsake of hisn, for a gent was here yesterday afternoon late, tryin’ to get the clock, too.”
“A man was here, eh?” returned Darrell sharply. So some one else, as in the case of Daddy Rees of Grady Court, was already dabbling in the affair. “I see. Did he buy it?”
The woman shook her head. “I wasn’t here myself. I was upstairs cookin’ supper. Jake told me about it durin’ supper. The clock was already gone, he had to tell the gent. You see a young couple — a pair o’ hicks from down in Illinois — was up in Chicago here visitin’ an aunt in this neighborhood, and bein’ as they expected to get married soon’s they get back they come in here last week an’ bought a whole lot o’ furniture and small stuff to start up housekeepin’ on. Among the pictures and bric-à-bracs they bought was this here alarm clock which we took in among the Jarndyce stuff. We packed all that small stuff in a big wooden box.”
“So it’s gone, eh? Where was the box shipped to?” asked Darrell.
“The young couple lived in Barnesville, Illinois,” said Mrs. Schimski, nervously wiping off her hands on her canvas apron. “The names we stenciled on the crates an’ boxes was Jackson — Mr. and Mrs. Bert Jackson.”
“When did you ship it out?”
“Yesterday morning Jake had it called for by a teamin’ comp’ny an’ delivered to the freight offices of the C. & E. I.”
“So the man who came to buy the clock was just about nine hours too late, eh?” Darrell paused. “And not being here yourself, you don’t know his description.” He paused again. “May I ask, Mrs. Schimski, just what he offered you for the clock?”
“He seemed willin’ to pay a pretty good price for the clock alone, mister, but so long as it was gone, him an’ Jake couldn’t get down to prices. What h
e done was this: He paid Jake thirty-five dollars cash for the box o’ stuff it was packed in. Jake was to write out a order to the freight offices of the C. & E. I. to give the box up an’ send the rest o’ the stuff to Barnesville accordin’ to the waybill. So that’s what Jake done. He wrote out th’ order — that is — well Jake can’t write himself, so the man wrote out the order for him on Jake’s letterhead, an’ Jake signed it. And the man left after payin’ Jake the thirty-five dollars.”
“Um, I see.” Darrell’s face was grave. What strange affair was in the air? Which way to turn now? The Schimski clock gone — the Rees clock likewise. He asked a further question.
“How did you people happen to buy in the Jarndyce stuff?”
“Jake was called up on the phone,” was her prompt answer. “His ad in the phone book brought th’ business. He went over and made a figure on the stuff. Some young fellow had a order from the probate court, Jake told me, and Jake bought up the lot the same day — that is, all but a small bunch o’ books an’ stuff which was set aside in one o’ th’ rooms f’r some other dealer.” She was looking at Darrell a bit peculiarly now.
As for Darrell, he stood irresolutely. He had to confess to himself that he knew no way to turn. But at this juncture the woman in front of him did a strange thing. She leaned forward. Her eyes shone with a strangely avaricious light. “Say, mister, it’s plain to be seen you’re disappointed about that there alarm clock. How — how much would you have been willin’ to pay for it?”
“If you people hadn’t parted with it,” he said with a shrug, “you might have been one hundred dollars to the good.”
“You’d pay a hundred dollars, mister, if you could get the clock?”
“Yes,” he said quickly, peering into her eyes. “Is there some way you know of by which you can get your hands on it at this late stage of the game?” He saw for some unexplainable reason that the moment had come to emphasize his offer. “Mrs. Schimski, if you know of a way to get that clock now, I’ll pay you that hundred so quick it’ll make your head swim.”
“Mister, I’m goin’ to tell you somethin’. I packed that box of stuff for Jake last Saturday, an’ when I went to put in that nice clock we got out o’ the Jarndyce stuff, I — well, say, mister — I switched it an’ put in an old ticker what’s been around here for years and won’t run only except when it’s on its face.”
“Then the man who paid thirty-five dollars for the box got the clock you substituted?” asked Darrell hastily. Some one had been neatly hoodwinked by the woman’s greed.
“Yes,” she nodded. She looked about her apprehensively. “Jake don’t know it, though. I — I thought I could sell the best clock for enough more to — to get a few pennies to help Becky graduate from the grammar school — Becky, my little girl.” And in her eyes came a tender look of mother’s love. Poor devil, thought Darrell, skimping even to the pennies in order to help her little daughter hold up her head. He lowered his voice.
“Then where is the clock which this Bert Jackson of Barnesville bought with the rest of his stuff and which you failed to pack in the box, Mrs. Schimski?”
For answer the woman dived down into a sawed-off barrel seemingly filled with burlap rags, dusty and dirty, and up from its depths withdrew a bright, decent looking alarm clock, with scarcely a nick on it. It gave forth a neat, clear-cut trick. “That’s it, mister. Will — will you pay me what you said?”
Darrell looked fast and deep into her eyes. Was her story some sudden concoction to entrap a man who appeared to be possessed of both money and sentiment? He took the clock from her hand. He looked at it. He shook it. Nothing inside rattled. Was it the right one of the two clocks mentioned in the mystery message? Was it either one of the two clocks at all? It was all too bewildering. He knew that it would be easy to pay out some one else’s money rashly — yet — what to do? At length he spoke.
“I’ll take a chance, Mrs. Schimski. Wrap it up, please.” He dived down into his pocket and withdrew the roll with which Rita Thorne — or should he now call her Iris Shaftsbury? — of the Bradbury had intrusted him. The woman’s eyes bulged. He peeled off five twenties. After all — why should he worry as to whether he was expending some one else’s money wisely or not? He was following directions — he could do no more. The woman lost no time in wrapping up the clock. Her hands trembled as she took the money and pressed it down into her soiled waist. It was plain that the mate of her bosom was not going to get that hundred dollars — much less know of its existence. Under her breath Darrell heard her breathe the words: “Becky — my little Becky!”
With the clock under his arm he went out into the sunlight again. Twenty-five minutes later he was entering the out-freight offices of the C. & E. I. There, threading his way through a veritable confusion of crates, boxes and barrels, he soon found the foreman with pencil behind ear and body garbed in bright blue jeans and jumper. He explained his errand quickly, first showing the foreman his reporter’s badge. A man had come here yesterday evening, presumably, with a written order for a box from one Schimski, a furniture dealer on North Wells Street. Had he secured the box? Had the rest of the crated furniture gone out yet?
“Yep, Bud Kelso, the night agent, told me about it this morning,” said the foreman. “Fellow come in about six-thirty last night and presented the order from Schimski. Bud called up Schimski, verified it, and let the fellow have the box out of the Barnesville consignment. Fellow took a claw hammer from over there on th’ rack, opened up the box right here in the office, took out an old alarm clock and told Bud to dump the rest of the box out in the alley. Gave him a five for the work.”
“Where is Bud now?” asked Darrell.
“Had to send him down to Sullivan, Illinois, this morning, to work to-night. They’re short o’ help down there. Bud’s a traveling freight helper. Relief man, you know. Here to-day, gone to-morrow.”
Darrell nodded. “By the way, could you let me see that written order, my friend?” He passed a dollar bill into the foreman’s palm. “Get yourself a good cigar on me to-night.”
The man in the blue jeans proceeded to hop lively. He led the way to a tall desk of undressed pine lighted only by a single unshaded bright bulb. A set of cloth ledgers, pencils, printed forms and carbon sheets lay scattered over its surface. Voices throughout the big room were bellowing out addresses, helpers were checking off, and a big burly teamster was calling for the foreman as the latter dug hastily into a square compartment and withdrew a sheet of paper bearing at the top in the cheapest of printing the name of Jacob Schimski, dealer in furniture. “Here you are, my friend. I got to get over and straighten out that fellow’s shipment. Thanks for the smoke.”
Darrell sat down at the high stool in front of the desk and proceeded to inspect the order. But as he studied the handwriting, his face slowly took on a look of astonishment. Within a few seconds he had dived down into his pocket and from a worn leather billfold which he carried was withdrawing an old tattered and torn paper — a paper which he had carried now for about five years — a paper which he had exhibited to many of his personal friends. It was his discharge from the terrible prison camp of Innesbaden, which had provided him safe and unhindered passage to Holland, certified and signed by Ober-Lieutenant Carl von Tresseler, the notorious Blonde Beast of Bremen, the man who with his clenched fist had struck Darrell, wounded and sick and temporarily blinded, to his knees as he thrust the paper roughly into his hand. The handwriting of the Schimski order — at least all but the painfully written signature of Jacob Schimski himself — and the handwriting at the bottom of the discharge paper tallied in every curve, in every loop, in every detail. The handwritings were identical!
Darrell’s heart beat with a furious exultation. A strange game — a big game of some sort — was afoot in Chicago, and the Blonde Beast of Bremen, swindler extraordinary, paragon of cruelty, wanted for an atrocious murder in New York, was in the thick of it. And Darrell gave vent suddenly to a long-drawn sigh of satisfaction. For he, too, was
also in the thick of that same mystifying game. At last he had touched horns in the dark with the man he had most reason in the world to loathe and despise.
CHAPTER IX
The Perturbation of Pat McFee
FOR several long seconds Darrell continued to stare, almost unbelievingly, at the two pieces of angular, even impudent, handwriting, one in German, one in English, which marked indisputably the appearance in the simple case of the clocks of no other than the Blonde Beast of Bremen, murderer and swindler. Then at last, the Schimski order in his hand, he stepped over to the foreman.
“Darrell’s my name,” he told the other very briefly. “Jeffrey Darrell of the Call. I’m going to ask you to let me have this order to take with me over to the newspaper. How about it, old man? I’ll be quite responsible for it.” He drew forth from his vest pocket a five-dollar bill which he tendered the other.
The foreman surveyed the outstretched bill and scratched his head. “Well — I guess it’s all right, providing you keep it safe over at your office. O’ course, it’s our only proof here why the consignment’s short by one box — shipper’s orders.” He reached gingerly out and took the five-dollar bill. “Take the order along, friend, but if anything comes up I’ll have to send over there for it.”
“It will be kept quite safe,” Darrell assured the other decisively. “Schimski will rebate to the consignees, I think, but you shall have the order back in due course.” He tucked it carefully away in his breast pocket, and with a smile to the foreman stepped out into the busy street once more, jammed with drays and motor trucks.
Here he paused, almost undecided which way to turn next. There were serious lines now about his forehead and mouth. The girl in the Bradbury, in her vehement objections to giving him the full details underlying the Foy note, had suggested that she herself was not cognizant of those same details — that she recognized only a message from some one who was known to her and that she felt it incumbent upon her to fulfill the terms of the message. Whether all this was clever acting or not, Darrell could not determine; and he was more than troubled by the fact of her concealment of her true identity. What did it betoken anyway? But one thing was certain: if she were acting more or less in the dark, as she suggested by her manner, then she was not deeply involved in this strange case. This being so, it would seem that to Darrell now belonged the right to investigate matters as thoroughly as he wished. And when he reflected upon the discovery he had just made in the C. & E. I. freight offices, he no longer felt any qualms of conscience upon that score.
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