“I still insist that you have made a mistake.”
“How?”
“In the crowd you lost your man and have trailed the wrong man.”
“I am certain he is the same man.”
“But I know the man.”
“Who is he?”
“I asked his name a few days ago. His name is Woodford Dunne. He is not an officer—a bank clerk, I think, or possibly a traveling salesman. One thing is certain: he was not trailing your man, not trailing any one.”
The man who had asked “Who is he?” was thoughtful a moment and then said:
“Our danger may be greater than you imagine.”
“Nonsense!”
“I say yes.”
“How?”
“Are you dead certain that man Woodford Dunne is not in this club to shadow you?”
The man addressed turned pale—very pale.
“How long have you known him as a member?”
“I am certain he has been a member for a number of months.”
“It’s all very strange. I tell you we have made no mistake. That man was listening at the door of Wadleigh, and it is Mrs. Wadleigh that we expect to employ. He came from Wadleigh’s rooms, where he had been peeping, to this clubhouse.”
The men were talking in very low tones. Oscar had sneaked in and had not been observed by them, so intensely were they engrossed in their talk. He had dropped into a seat near them and had picked up a paper.
“How do you know he was listening at Wadleigh’s keyhole?”
“You know our orders. Having agreed to employ Mrs. Wadleigh, the governor gave us orders to shadow Wadleigh. We have been on his track. I was going to take a peep and a listen, and silently ascended the stairs when I saw I had been anticipated. I slipped back to the street and we lay around. That man who you say is Dunne came from the house and we followed him here.”
“He may have come from some other part of the house.”
“I would like to think so, but I know better. He lay around after he left the house for Wadleigh to come forth, but we managed to give Wadleigh a tip and he stayed in his rooms. There is no mistake; the man Woodford Dunne was the man we saw dodging at Wadleigh’s keyhole. What his real lay was I don’t know, and we might assume it was an off play but for the fact that he came here. You are here. Is he not on your shadow? That’s what I want to know.”
“This is very serious.”
“Yes, it is.”
“We must go into this man Dunne.”
“We must.”
“And if your suspicions are correct the flag of the clubhouse must soon float at half mast for a dead member. We cannot afford to be tripped up now.”
“That is true.”
At this moment one of the men for the first time observed the presence of our hero. They had no reason to suspect that the man reading the paper understood the subject matter of their discourse and again, they did not realize how distinctly in their engrossment they had spoken. The presence of the club member did not give them much concern, but they changed their theme.
Oscar still maintained his position, and strange thoughts were running through his mind. He had obtained the information that many supposedly reputable men were in the great steal, and here he had evidence that a member of a very respectable social club was possibly in the great organization. It was not a startling discovery in one sense, for the police records will show that many a man who lived a reputable life before the great public for many years has been in the end discovered to be a cool, calculating rogue in alliance with criminals. Even while we write this statement one of these disclosures has been made to a startled public. Accident unmasked a millionaire, a man who has posed before the public for twenty years, and this accidental discovery led to the positive proof that this same man has been a systematic criminal for years; and even after having acquired a million he continued his evil criminal game until exposure came, as it is always sure to come and overtake the guilty sooner or later.
The men left the café. Oscar had a good lead and he knew he must go very slowly, as he had some very keen men to deal with. Again he went to a private room and worked back to Mr. Woodford Dunne. He had played his little game around the men and determined to let them play moth around his light.
A little later he left the clubhouse. He had determined to give the men a chance. Instead of being a shadower he learned that he was being “shadowed.” He had been there before. He could stand a shadow as well as he could shadow others. He determined to give the men a fair show, a better show than he usually got when playing the same game. He went to a well-known gambling place. There was not a resort in New York City that our hero could not locate, and in every one of these resorts, under one guise or another, he had an entrée. In some places he was known under one character, and in others under a very different guise. He had laid out all this piping for as many different emergencies. Having become a detective, he made the methods of his profession an exact science. Oscar had not been long in the gambling den when his original suspicions were all fully confirmed. The two men who had shadowed him to the club entered, and our hero mentally argued:
“Those fellows certainly stick to my identity.”
The detective engaged in the game. He was not a gambler—he abhorred gambling. He had seen so many men drop down to poverty who had taken their first step back in a gambling den, and during the course of his career he had warned, and in some instances saved young clerks who were just beginning to slide downward. Gambling is a fatal amusement and sooner or later leads to disaster. Oscar, however, knew how to gamble. He had learned the various games merely as aids in his profession, for most criminals are inveterate gamblers, and it is in gambling dens where detectives find their richest fields for “dead shadows.”
A few moments after Oscar had gotten into the game one of the men who were shadowing him also got in. It proved to be a very commonplace play. No large bets were made, no great sums were lost or won. The shadower had managed to crowd in beside our hero, and Oscar had favored him in securing the seat, and as was expected the man opened a conversation.
“A slow game,” he said.
“Very,” answered our hero laconically.
“I don’t like this faro anyhow,” said the man.
“It passes time.”
“I prefer a good game of draw.”
Oscar detected that the man was just playing a good game of draw—he was trying to draw our hero into a private little game of draw-poker; but it was not the poker that he wanted to inaugurate. His game was to draw our hero to some convenient place where he could play a still more significant game of draw.
“I like a game of draw myself,” said Oscar, nowise loath to favor the man’s game.
The detective did not know where it was all leading to, or what it was leading up to as a final denouement, but he was inured to the taking of desperate chances. Peril was a pastime to him. He was ever watchful and always prepared for danger.
“I think I’ve seen you before,” said the man.
“Where?”
“I can’t recall; possibly in some club.”
Our hero had detected that he was dealing with a very smart man—a man of nerve and coolness—a man who went slow but sure. He also discerned that it was to be a play of skill and experience in roguery against experience and skill in detective work.
“Let’s take a little of their whisky,” said the man. “It’s about all we can get out of this game.”
Oscar, having set out to be led, rose from the table, cashed in his checks, as his whilom friend did, and followed to the sideboard where they were joined by the second man, and number one said:
“My friend Thatford. I don’t know your name, sir.”
“Woodford Dunne,” answered our hero promptly.
“Yes, I’ve heard the name. I reckon you are acquainted with some friend of mine, for I’ve certainly heard the name.”
The men had poured out their drink, when number one, who had announced his own name as Girard, said:
“That’s mighty poor whisky. It’s like the game—bad.”
Thatford said:
“Let’s go and have a little lunch and a good drink to wash out that vile stuff.”
“Will you go with us?” said Girard.
“You must excuse me, gentlemen; I am a stranger. I cannot thrust myself upon you.”
“It’s no thrusting; we would be glad to have you join us. Thatford and I are no strangers in New York. Really, I am glad to have met you. I know a good fellow when I meet him. I am a sort of mind reader in picking out thoroughbreds.”
“If you will excuse me, gentlemen, I will decline your invitation. I thought I’d drop around to the theater and see the closing act.”
“That ain’t a bad scheme. We’ll go with you and have a little cold snack afterward.”
As the men had invited our hero to accompany them he could not well refuse to permit them to accompany him, especially in view of the little plan he had settled to act in regard to them.
The three men did proceed to a theater, and our hero was surprised to see one of the men, Girard, bow to a very innocent-looking and beautiful girl who was in a private box in company with quite a stylish party. Girard was a good-looking man and he dressed with faultless taste. No one would suspect him as a rogue on his appearance, and besides his manners were excellent—quite gentlemanly.
Oscar fixed his gaze on the fair girl between whom and Girard the nod of recognition had passed, and as he stood there in the theater he revolved in his mind the singular facts. He wondered how a man of Girard’s polished exterior should have been chosen to act the spy on a common confederate rogue.
Later he was destined to learn why Girard had been selected.
When the curtain went down on the last act Girard said:
“Thatford, you will have to excuse me to-night. I see a lady friend here. I may receive an invitation to dine with the party she accompanies.”
“I won’t excuse you,” said Thatford.
“Our friend here will keep you company.”
“No, you must go with me.”
“Where will you go?”
“To the Brunswick.”
“I may join you later.”
Oscar discerned the fine play that was being worked on him. He fell to the whole business, and more keenly appreciated what an excellent actor the man Girard really was.
“I fear I will have to beg off,” said Oscar.
“No, no, gentleman, this will not do. I am as hungry as a bear, but do not propose to sit down to a solitary meal. Come, Mr. Dunne, you must certainly be my guest.”
“All right, sir, as you insist. I did intend to go home and retire early to-night, but recognizing how your friend here has deserted you I will go with you.”
“I am obliged to you, and we will have a meal that shall amply compensate you. Girard will lose it, and when we tell him of our good time to-morrow we will make him green with envy.”
“I may be with you. I am not sure yet I will receive an invitation from the other party.”
“That chap,” thought Oscar, “is a quick thinker. He knows how to take advantage of the slightest incident when he is playing a game. All right, he is a bright player. We shall see how to scheme against him.”
Girard went away, and Thatford and Oscar proceeded to the Brunswick. The former became quite confidential after the first glass of wine, and his confidences were conventional and natural.
“My friend Girard is a great chap,” he said, “one of the biggest-hearted fellows in the world. He is very rich and generous.”
“He appears like a very generous man,” said Oscar.
“He is just what he appears to be. He has but one weakness—he is excessively fond of draw.”
“Yes,” thought Oscar, “he is playing a big game of draw with me, and he expects to draw me into some sort of a web. Well, he may succeed; we can’t tell, Mr. Spider.”
Oscar did not speak out just what he thought, but said:
“I am partial to a little game myself under the proper conditions.”
“What do you consider the proper conditions?”
“My companions in the game gentlemen, who, like myself, play for the sake of amusement, and not to win for the sake of the money.”
“Then Girard is your man, and I think he has taken a great fancy to you, Dunne. He is a queer fellow in some things, but when he takes a fancy to a man, he clings to him, and is always ready to do a good turn.”
“That is a good trait.”
“Do you know, or rather would you suspect, that he was a poor orphan, and the architect of his own great fortune?”
“No, he acts to me like a man born to wealth.”
“On the contrary, he is the son of Irish parents. He was born out West. His father was a ne’er-do-well. Girard at the age of twelve started in to provide for his mother and brothers and sisters. He went to Chicago and got in with a firm on the produce exchange. He served them well for several years and saved money until he could speculate on his own account. He is an honorable fellow. He resigned his position the moment he started in to deal on his own account, and he moved right along, making little successes, until finally he had money enough to go in for a big strike. He caught the market just right and at the age of twenty-eight got out of business with half a million to the right side of his hank account. He then came on to New York, and here he has lead an easy life, just enjoying himself in a quiet way; and, as I said, his great weakness is poker. He don’t play a heavy game, but loses with a good grace and wins with exceeding courtesy.”
“I reckon he must be a pretty good fellow.”
“He is, and hang me, if we are not going to have the pleasure of his company. That pretty girl did not ring him into her party, and he has come to make things pleasant for us. I am glad he is here.”
Girard, looking as innocent and jovial as a “let her go easy,” honest man, joined Oscar and Thatford, and started in with a pretty compliment, saying:
“Well, gentlemen, I got left, but I am stranded on a pleasant shore when my ‘renig’ sends me to such excellent company and such a bountiful repast.”
CHAPTER V
The Game Goes on and Fine Play Is Displayed on Both Sides.
“Well, you are a good one,” thought Oscar, and he mentally questioned whether or not he was coming out ahead of such a bold schemer, for the detective was well aware that the invitation business was a misleader—what is called a “fake.” The fellow really intended to gain time to put up his job for “doing” our hero, in case it was decided that he was to be “done up.” Herein Girard had the advantage. He had fixed his plan and our hero was going it blind, not having had time to arrange a trick against the one he well knew was being set up for him.
Girard sat down and commenced a lively talk. He spoke in glowing terms of the lady who had recognized him in the theater. Indeed, he was as jolly and pleasant as a man who had no evil design in his heart.
The meal was finally concluded. Oscar had placed his end of it well and appeared about as jolly as a man should appear who had imbibed his share of several bottles of wine.
“What shall we do?” asked Girard. “I don’t wish to go to bed; I prefer having a nice time. Can’t we go somewhere and have a jolly little game of draw?”
Oscar was not loath. He desired to let the men draw him, believing that while they were playing their little trick he might work a little on his own hook.
“Hang it!” said our hero, “I am not in the habit of staying away from my home all night, but sinc
e I’ve started in I don’t care what I do for the rest of the night.”
“Where can we go?” asked Thatford.
“To some hotel. We will take a room,” suggested Oscar. His suggestion was only a “flyer.” He knew the men did not wish to go to a hotel. It was a part of their game to draw him to some place where they could open up the scheme they had in their minds.
“I have a friend who always keeps open house.”
Thatford laughed and said:
“Yes, a pretty close friend. You want us to go to your bachelor quarters.”
“Well, why not at my rooms? We can play as long as we please and turn in when we get ready.”
“I have taken advantage of your hospitality so often I’d rather cry off,” said Thatford.
“Oh, nonsense! come on. What do you say, Dunne?”
The intimacy under the influence of the wine had progressed so far that the men addressed each other as though they had been friends for years. Wine softens down the austerities and makes apparent friends with great readiness. It was decided to go to the bachelor rooms of Girard, and the three men passed to the street. Oscar meantime became quite gay and very plainly showed the effects of the wine, but really he was fearfully on the alert, and when we write fearfully we mean it just as we write it; for he did not know at what moment one of the men might plunge a knife through his heart or send a bullet through his brain. He knew that their purpose was a dire one, and the only question was, how would they work out their plan? Keen were his glances under his seeming inebriety, and he beheld the men exchange glances, and also recognized looks of triumph, intimating, “We’ve done it well. He is ours.”
The three men walked on and at length halted in front of a house which our hero had once had under suspicion.
“Here we are,” said Girard.
“All right,” responded Oscar.
“Say, my friend,” suggested Thatford, “we must not play for large stakes. Remember I am not a rich man; I can’t lose like some of you golden bucks.”
The Lady Sleuths MEGAPACK ™: 20 Modern and Classic Tales of Female Detectives Page 163
