“That was easy, Chief,” Heath explained with satisfaction. “I had a red electric flood-light put on a traffic-light post on the north-bound road near the tree, and when I switch that on, with a traveling switch I’ll have in my pocket, that will be the signal.”
“What else, Sergeant?”
“Well, sir, I got three guys in taxicabs stationed along Fifth Avenue, all dressed up like chauffeurs, and they’ll swing into the park at the same time the searchlights go on. I got a couple of taxicabs at every entrance on the east side of the park that’ll plug up the place good and tight; and I also got a bunch of innocent-looking family cars running along the east and west roads every two or three minutes. On top of that, you can’t stop people strolling in the park—there’s always a bunch of lovers moving around in the evening—but this time it ain’t gonna be only lovers on the path by that tree—there’s gonna be some tough babies too. We’ll stroll back and forth down the east lane ourselves where we can see the tree; and Mr. Vance and Mr. Van Dine will be up in the branches—which are pretty thick at this time of year, and will make good cover.… I don’t see how the guys can get away from us, unless they’re mighty slick.” He chuckled and turned to Vance. “I don’t think there’ll be much for you two to do, sir, except lookin’ on from a ringside seat.”
“I’m sure we won’t be annoyed,” answered Vance good-naturedly. “You’re so thorough, Sergeant—and so trustin’.”
“What about the package?” Markham asked of Heath.
“Don’t worry about that, sir. I got that all fixed too.” The Sergeant’s voice, though serious and earnest, exuded pride. “I had a talk with Fleel, like Mr. Vance suggested, and he’s gonna put it in the tree a little while before eleven. And it’s a swell package. Exactly the size and weight of that bunch of greenbacks Kenting brought to your office this afternoon.”
“What about Kenting himself?”
“He’s meeting us at half-past ten, and so is Fleel, in the superintendent’s room at the new yellow brick apartment house on Fifth Avenue. I gave ’em both the number, and you can bet your sweet life they’ll be there.… Don’t you think Mr. Vance and Mr. Van Dine had better be gettin’ themselves fixed in the tree pretty pronto?”
“Oh, quite, Sergeant. Bully idea. I think we’ll be staggerin’ along now.” Vance rose and stretched himself in mock weariness. “Good luck, and cheerio.”
It seemed to me that he was still treating the matter like an unnecessary farce.
Vance dismissed our taxicab at the corner of 83rd Street and Fifth Avenue, and we continued northward on foot to the pedestrians’ entrance to the park. As we walked along without undue haste, a chauffeur from a near-by taxi jumped to the sidewalk with alacrity and, overtaking us, stepped leisurely in front of us across our path. I immediately recognized Snitkin in the old tan duster and chauffeur’s cap. He apparently took no notice of us but must have recognized Vance, for he turned back, and when I looked over my shoulder a moment later, he had returned to the cab and taken his place again at the wheel.
It was a warm, sultry night, and I confess I felt a certain tinge of excitement as we walked slowly down the winding flagged pathway southward. There were several couples seated in the dark benches along the pathway, and an occasional shambling pedestrian. I looked at all of them closely, trying to determine their status, and wondering if they were sinister figures who might have some connection with the kidnapping. Vance paid no attention to them. His eyebrows were lifted cynically, and his surroundings seemed not to interest him at all.
“What a silly adventure,” he murmured as he took my arm and led me due west into a narrow footpath toward a clump of oak trees, silhouetted against the silvered waters of the reservoir beyond. “Still, who can prophesy? One can never tell what may happen in this fickle world. One never knows, y’ know. Maybe when you get atop your favorite limb in the tree you’d better shift your automatic. And I think I’ll unbutton the flap on my hip pocket.”
This was the first indication Vance had given that he attached any importance to the matter.
Far across the park the gaunt structures on Central Park West loomed against the dark blue western sky, and the lights in the windows suddenly seemed unusually friendly to me.
Vance led the way across a wide stretch of lawn to a large oak tree whose size set it apart from the others. It stood in comparative darkness, at least fifty feet from the nearest dimly flickering electric light.
“Well, here we are, Van,” he announced in a low voice. “Now for the fun—if you regard emulating the sparrow as fun.… I’ll go up first. Find yourself a limb where you won’t be exposed, but where you can see pretty well all around you through the leaves.”
He paused a moment, and then reaching upward to one of the lower branches of the tree, he pulled himself up easily. I saw him stand up on the branch, reach over his head to the next one, and draw himself up again. In a moment he had disappeared among the black foliage.
I followed at once, although I had not the skill he displayed—in fact, I had to sit down astride the lower limb for a moment or two before I could work myself upward into the outspreading branches. It was very dark, and I had difficulty keeping a sure foothold while I gave my attention to climbing higher. At last I found a fork-shaped limb on which I could establish myself with more or less comfort, and from which I could see, through various narrow openings in the leaves, in nearly all directions. After a few moments I heard Vance’s voice at my left—he was evidently on the other side of the broad trunk.
“Well, well,” he drawled. “What an experience! I thought my boyhood days were over. And there’s not an apple on the tree. No, not so much as a cherry. A pillow would be most comfortin’.”
We had been sitting in silence in our precarious seclusion for about ten minutes when a corpulent figure, which I recognized as Fleel, came into sight on the pathway to the left. He stood irresolutely opposite the tree for several moments and looked about him. Then he strolled along the footpath, across the greensward, and approached the tree. If any one had been watching, Fleel must certainly have been observed, for he chose a moment when there was no other person visible within a considerable radius of him.
He paused beneath where I sat twelve or fourteen feet above him, and ran his hand around the trunk of the tree until he found the large irregular hole on the east side; then he took a package from under his coat. The package was about ten inches long and four inches square, and he inserted it slowly and carefully into the hole. Backing away, he ostentatiously relighted his cigar, tossed the burnt match-end aside, and walked slowly toward the west, to another pathway at least a hundred yards away.
At that moment I happened to glance toward the narrow path by which we had entered the park and, by the light from a passing car, I suddenly noticed a shabbily dressed man leaning lazily against a bench in the shadows and evidently watching Fleel as he moved away in the distance. After a few moments I saw the same man step out from the darkness, stretch his arms, and move along the pathway to the north.
“My word!” muttered Vance in the darkness, in a low, guarded tone, “the assiduous Fleel has been observed—which is probably what the Sergeant wished. If everything moves according to schedule we shouldn’t have to cling here precariously for more than fifteen minutes longer. I do hope the abductor or his agent is a prompt chappie. I’m gettin’ jolly well worn out.”
It was, in fact, less than ten minutes later that I saw a figure moving toward us from the north. No one had passed along that little-known, illy-lighted pathway since we had taken our places in the tree. At each succeeding light I picked out an additional detail of the approaching figure: a long dark cape which seemed to trail on the ground; a curious toque-shaped, dark hat, with a turned-down visor extending far over the eyes; and a slim walking-stick.
I felt an involuntary tightening of my muscles: I was not only expectant, but half frightened. Holding tightly with my left hand to the branch on which I was sitting, I reached into my
coat pocket and fingered the butt of the automatic, to make sure that it was handy.
“How positively thrillin’!” I heard Vance whisper, though his voice did not sound in the least excited. “This may be the culprit we’re waitin’ for. But what in the world will we do with him when we catch him? If only he wouldn’t walk so deuced slowly.”
As a matter of fact, the dark-caped figure was moving at a most deliberate gait, pausing frequently to look right and left, as if sizing up the situation in all directions. It was impossible to tell whether the figure was stout or thin, because of the flowing cape. It was a sinister-looking form, moving along in the semidarkness, and cast a grotesque shadow on the path as it proceeded toward us. Its gait was so dilatory and cautious that a chill ran over me as I watched—it was like a mysterious nemesis, imperceptibly but inevitably creeping up on us.
“A purely fictional character,” murmured Vance. “Only Eugène Sue could have thought of it. I do hope this tree is its destination. That would be most fittin’—eh, what?”
The shapeless form was now opposite us and, halting ominously, looked in our direction. Then it peered forward up the narrow winding path and backward along the route it had come. After a few moments the black form turned and approached the cluster of oak trees. Its progress over the lawn was even slower than on the cement walk. It seemed an interminable time before the dim shape reached the tree in which Vance and I were perched, and I could feel cold chills running up and down my spine. The figure was there beneath the branches, and stood several feet from the trunk, turning and gazing in all directions.
Then, as if with a burst of vigor, the cloaked form stepped toward the natural cache on the east side of the trunk and, fumbling round a moment or two, withdrew the package that Fleel had placed there a quarter of an hour earlier.
I glanced apprehensively at the red flood-light on the lamppost Heath had described to us, and saw it flash on and off like a grotesquely winking monster. Suddenly there were wide shafts of white light from the direction of Fifth Avenue splitting the gloom; and the whole tree and its immediate environs were flooded with brilliant illumination. For a moment I was blinded by the glare, but I could hear a bustle of activity all about us. Then came Vance’s startled and awestruck voice somewhere at my left.
“Oh, my word!” he exclaimed over and over again; and there was the sound of his scrambling down the tree. At length I saw him swing from the lower limb and drop gracefully to the ground, like a well balanced pole-vaulter.
Everything seemed to happen simultaneously. Markham and Fleel and Kenyon Kenting came rushing across the eastern lawn, preceded by Heath and Sullivan.252 The two detectives were the first to reach the spot, and they grasped the black-clad figure just as it straightened up to move away from the tree. Each man had an arm tight in his clasp, and escape was impossible.
“Pretty nice work,” Heath sang out with satisfaction, just as I reached the ground and took a tighter hold on my automatic. Vance brushed by me from around the tree and stood directly in front of Heath.
“My dear fellow—oh, my dear fellow!” he said with quick sternness. “Don’t be too precipitate.”
As he spoke, two taxicabs swung crazily along the pedestrian walk on the left with a continuous shrill blowing of horns. They came to a jerky stop with a tremendous clatter and squeaking of brakes. Then the two chauffeurs leaped out of the cabs and came rushing to the scene with sub-machine guns poised ominously before them.
Heath and Sullivan looked at Vance in angry amazement.
“Step back, Sergeant,” Vance commanded. “You’re far too rough. I’ll handle this situation.” Something in his voice overrode Heath’s zeal—there was no ignoring the authority his words carried. Both Heath and Sullivan released their hold on the silent figure between them and took a backward step, bumping unseeingly into the startled group formed by Markham, Fleel and Kenting behind them.
The apprehended culprit did not move, except to reach up and push back the visor of the toque cap, revealing the face in the glare of the searchlights.
There before us, leaning weakly and shakily on a straight snakewood stick, the package of false bank notes still clutched tightly in the left hand, was the benign, yet cynical, Mrs. Andrews Falloway. Her face showed no trace of fear or of agitation. In fact, there was an air of calm satisfaction in her somewhat triumphant gaze.
In her deep, cultured voice she said, as if exchanging pleasantries with some one at an afternoon tea:
“How are you, Mr. Vance?” A slight smile played over her features.
“I am quite well, thank you, Mrs. Falloway,” Vance returned suavely, with a courteous bow; “although I must admit the rough limb which I chose in the dark was a bit sharp and uncomfortable.”
“Truly I am desolated, Mr. Vance.” The woman was still smiling.
Just then a slender form skulked swiftly across the lawn from the near-by path and, without a word, joined the group directly behind the woman. It was Fraim Falloway. His expression was both puzzled and downcast. Vance threw him a quick glance, but took no more notice of him. His mother must have seen him out of the corner of her eye, but she showed no indication that she was aware of her son’s presence.
“You’re out late tonight, Mrs. Falloway,” Vance was saying graciously. “Did you enjoy your evening stroll?”
“I at least found it very profitable,” the woman answered with a hardening voice. As she spoke she held out the package. “Here’s the bundle—containing money, I believe—which I found in the hole of the tree. You know,” she added lightly, “I’m getting rather old for lovers’ trysts. Don’t you think so?”
Vance took the package and threw it to Heath who caught it with automatic dexterity. The Sergeant, as well as the rest of the group, was looking on in stupefied astonishment at the strange and unexpected little drama.
“I am sure you will never be too old for lovers’ trysts,” murmured Vance gallantly.
“You’re an outrageous flatterer, Mr. Vance,” smiled the woman. “Tell me, what do you really think of me after this little—what shall we call it?—escapade tonight?”
Vance looked at her, and his light cynical expression quickly changed to one of solemnity.
“I think you’re a very loyal mother,” he said in a low voice, his eyes fixed on the woman. Quickly his mood changed again. “But, really, y’ know, it’s dampish, and far too late for you to walk home.” Then he looked at the gaping Heath. “Sergeant, can either of your pseudo-chauffeurs drive his taxi with a modicum of safety?”
“Sure they can,” stammered Heath. “Snitkin was a private chauffeur for years before he took up police work.” (I now noticed that one of the two men who had dashed across the lawn with the sub-machine guns, which they had now lowered in utter astonishment, was the same driver who had crossed in front of us as we entered the park.)
“That’s bully—what?” said Vance. He moved to Mrs. Falloway’s side and offered her his arm. “May I have the pleasure of taking you home?”
The woman took his arm without hesitation.
“You’re very chivalrous, Mr. Vance, and I would appreciate the courtesy.”
Vance started across the lawn with the woman.
“Come, Snitkin,” he called peremptorily, and the detective walked swiftly to his cab and opened the door. A moment later they were headed toward the main traffic artery which leads to Central Park West.
235 See The Garden Murder Case.
236 This famous case had taken place just three months earlier.
237 As I learned later, he was referring to his Scottish terrier, Pibroch Sandyman. Incidentally, this dog won the puppy class that day and received Reserve Winners as well. Later he became a Champion.
238 Markham and Vance had been close friends for over fifteen years, and, although Vance’s unofficial connection with the District Attorney’s office had begun somewhat in the spirit of an experimental adventure, Markham had now come to depend implicitly upon his friend as a vital assoc
iate in his criminal investigations.
239 There had been several recent kidnappings at this time, two of a particularly atrocious nature, and the District Attorney’s office and the Commissioner of Police were being constantly and severely criticized by the press for their apparent helplessness in the situation.
240 Vance was referring to the gambling establishment which figured so prominently in the Casino murder case.
241 Vance was mistaken about this, as Kenting belonged to the old, or original, Klan, in which there was no such title as King Keagle. This title did not come into existence until 1915, with the modern Klan. Kenting probably had been a Grand Dragon (or State head) in the original Klan.
242 Robert A. MacDermott was Vance’s kennel manager.
243 Captain Dubois and Detective Bellamy were finger-print experts attached to the New York Police Department.
244 Peter Quackenbush was the official police photographer.
245 The official time of sunrise on that day was 4:45, local mean time, or 4:41, Eastern standard time; but daylight saving time was then in effect, and Mrs. Kenting’s reference to sunrise in New York at approximately six o’clock was correct.
246 Although Vance never collected semiprecious stones himself, he had become deeply interested in the subject as early as his college days.
247 See The Benson Murder Case.
248 Captain Anthony P. Jerym, Bertillon expert of the New York Police Department.
249 The sensational Davis cup winner and America’s first seeded player at the time.
250 This was the same Mr. Hannix whom Vance had already met both at Bowie and at Empire, and who had acted as Floyd Garden’s book-maker before that young man lost his interest in racing as a result of the tragic events related in “The Garden Murder Case.”
The Philo Vance Megapack Page 235
