The Dream Doctor

by Arthur B. Reeve

  XI

  THE OPIUM JOINT

  O'Connor drew back the sheet which covered her and in the calf of theleg disclosed an ugly bullet hole. Ugly as it was, however, it wasanything but dangerous and seemed to indicate nothing as to the realcause of her death. He drew from his pocket a slightly misshapen bulletwhich had been probed from the wound and handed it to Kennedy, whoexamined both the wound and the bullet carefully. It seemed to be anordinary bullet except that in the pointed end were three or fourlittle round, very shallow wells or depressions only the minutestfraction of an inch deep.

  "Very extraordinary," he remarked slowly. "No, I don't think this was acase of suicide. Nor was it a murder for money, else the jewels wouldhave been taken."

  O'Connor looked approvingly at me. "Exactly what I said," he exclaimed."She was dead before her body was thrown into the water."

  "No, I don't agree with you there," corrected Craig, continuing hisexamination of the body. "And yet it is not a case of drowning exactly,either."

  "Strangled?" suggested O'Connor.

  "By some jiu jitsu trick?" I put in, mindful of the queer-acting Jap atClendenin's.

  Kennedy shook his head.

  "Perhaps the shock of the bullet wound rendered her unconscious and inthat state she was thrown in," ventured Walker Curtis, apparently muchrelieved that Kennedy coincided with O'Connor in disagreeing with theharbour police as to the suicide theory.

  Kennedy shrugged his shoulders and looked at the bullet again. "It isvery extraordinary," was all he replied. "I think you said a fewmoments ago, O'Connor, that there had been some queer doings abouthere. What did you mean?"

  "Well, as I said, the work of the harbour squad isn't ordinarily veryremarkable. Harbour pirates aren't murderous as a rule any more. Forthe most part they are plain sneak thieves or bogus junk dealers whowork with dishonest pier watchmen and crooked canal boat captains andlighter hands.

  "But in this instance," continued the deputy, his face knitting at thethought that he had to confess another mystery to which he had nosolution, "it is something quite different. You know that all along theshore on this side of the island are old, dilapidated and, some ofthem, deserted houses. For several days the residents of theneighbourhood have been complaining of strange occurrences about oneplace in particular which was the home of a wealthy family in a pastgeneration. It is about a mile from here, facing the road along theshore, and has in front of it and across the road the remains of an olddock sticking out a few feet into the water at high tide.

  "Now, as nearly as any one can get the story, there seems to have beena mysterious, phantom boat, very swift, without lights, and with anengine carefully muffled down which has been coming up to the old dockfor the past few nights when the tide was high enough. A light has beenseen moving on the dock, then suddenly extinguished, only to reappearagain. Who carried it and why, no one knows. Any one who has tried toapproach the place has had a scare thrown into him which he will noteasily forget. For instance, one man crept up and though he did notthink he was seen he was suddenly shot at from behind a tree. He feltthe bullet pierce his arm, started to run, stumbled, and next morningwoke up in the exact spot on which he had fallen, none the worse forhis experience except that he had a slight wound that will prevent hisusing his right arm for some time for heavy work.

  "After each visit of the phantom boat there is heard, according to thestory of the few neighbours who have observed it, the tramp of feet upthe overgrown stone walk from the dock and some have said that theyheard an automobile as silent and ghostly as the boat. We have been allthrough the weird old house, but have found nothing there, exceptenough loose boards and shutters to account for almost any noise orcombination of noises. However, no one has said there was anythingthere except the tramp of feet going back and forth on the oldpavements outside. Two or three times shots have been heard, and on thedock where most of the alleged mysterious doings have taken place wehave found one very new exploded shell of a cartridge."

  Craig took the shell which O'Connor drew from another pocket and tryingto fit the bullet and the cartridge together remarked "both from a .44,probably one of those old-fashioned, long-barrelled makes."

  "There," concluded O'Connor ruefully, "you know all we know of thething so far."

  "I may keep these for the present?" inquired Kennedy, preparing topocket the shell and the bullet, and from his very manner I could seethat as a matter of fact he already knew a great deal more about thecase than the police. "Take us down to this old house and dock, if youplease."

  Over and over, Craig paced up and down the dilapidated dock, his keeneyes fastened to the ground, seeking some clue, anything that wouldpoint to the marauders. Real persons they certainly were, and not anyghostly crew of the bygone days of harbour pirates, for there was everyevidence of some one who had gone up and down the walk recently, notonce but many times.

  Suddenly Kennedy stumbled over what looked like a sardine tin can,except that it had no label or trace of one. It was lying in the thicklong matted grass by the side of the walk as if it had tumbled thereand had been left unnoticed.

  Yet there was nothing so very remarkable about it in itself. Tin canswere lying all about, those marks of decadent civilisation. But toCraig it had instantly presented an idea. It was a new can. The otherswere rusted.

  He had pried off the lid and inside was a blackish, viscous mass.

  "Smoking opium," Craig said at last.

  We retraced our steps pondering on the significance of the discovery.

  O'Connor had had men out endeavouring all day to get a clue to themotor car that had been mentioned in some of the accounts given by thenatives. So far the best he had been able to find was a report of alarge red touring car which crossed from New York on a late ferry. Init were a man and a girl as well as a chauffeur who wore goggles and acap pulled down over his head so that he was practicallyunrecognisable. The girl might have been Miss Curtis and, as for theman, it might have been Clendenin. No one had bothered much with them;no one had taken their number; no one had paid any attention where theywent after the ferry landed. In fact, there would have been nosignificance to the report if it had not been learned that early in themorning on the first ferry from the lower end of the island to NewJersey a large red touring car answering about the same description hadcrossed, with a single man and driver but no woman.

  "I should like to watch here with you to-night, O'Connor," said Craigas we parted. "Meet us here. In the meantime I shall call on Jamesonwith his well-known newspaper connections in the white light district,"here he gave me a half facetious wink, "to see what he can do towardgetting me admitted to this gilded palace of dope up there onForty-fourth Street."

  After no little trouble Kennedy and I discovered our "hop joint" andwere admitted by Nichi Moto, of whom we had heard. Kennedy gave me afinal injunction to watch, but to be very careful not to seem to watch.

  Nichi Moto with an eye to business and not to our absorbing more thanenough to whet our descriptive powers quickly conducted us into a largeroom where, on single bamboo couches or bunks, rather tastefully made,perhaps half a dozen habitues lay stretched at full length smokingtheir pipes in peace, or preparing them in great expectation from theimplements on the trays before them.

  Kennedy relieved me of the responsibility of cooking the opium by doingit for both of us and, incidentally, dropping a hint not to inhale itand to breathe as little of it as possible. Even then it made me feelbadly, though he must have contrived in some way to get even less ofthe stuff than I. A couple of pipes, and Kennedy beckoned to Nichi.

  "Where is Mr. Clendenin?" he asked familiarly. "I haven't seen him yet."

  The Japanese smiled his engaging smile. "Not know," was all he said,and yet I knew the fellow at least knew better English, if not morefacts.

  Kennedy had about started on our faking a third "pipe" when a new,unexpected arrival beckoned excitedly to Nichi. I could not catch allthat was said but two words that I did catch were "the boss" and "ho
ptoy," the latter the word for opium. No sooner had the man disappearedwithout joining the smokers than Nichi seemed to grow very restless andanxious. Evidently he had received orders to do something. He seemedanxious to close the place and get away. I thought that some one mighthave given a tip that the place was to be raided, but Kennedy, who hadbeen closer, had overheard more than I had and among other things hehad caught the word, "meet him at the same place."

  It was not long before we were all politely hustled out.

  "At least we know this," commented Kennedy, as I congratulated myselfon our fortunate escape, "Clendenin was not there, and there issomething doing to-night, for he has sent for Nichi."

  We dropped into our apartment to freshen up a bit against the longvigil that we knew was coming that night. To our surprise Walker Curtishad left a message that he wished to see Kennedy immediately and alone,and although I was not present I give the substance of what he said. Itseemed that he had not wished to tell O'Connor for fear that it wouldget into the papers and cause an even greater scandal, but it had cometo his knowledge a few days before the tragedy that his sister wasdetermined to marry a very wealthy Chinese merchant, an importer oftea, named Chin Jung. Whether or not this had any bearing on the casehe did not know. He thought it had, because for a long time, both whenshe was on the stage and later, Clendenin had had a great influenceover her and had watched with a jealous eye the advances of every oneelse. Curtis was especially bitter against Clendenin.

  As Kennedy related the conversation to me on our way over to StatenIsland I tried to piece the thing together, but like one of the famousChinese puzzles, it would not come out. I had to admit the possibilitythat it was Clendenin who might have quarrelled over her attachment toChin Jung, even though I have never yet been able to understand whatthe fascination is that some Orientals have over certain American girls.

  All that night we watched patiently from a vantage point of an old shednear both the house and the decayed pier. It was weird in the extreme,especially as we had no idea what might happen if we had success andsaw something. But there was no reward for our patience. Absolutelynothing happened. It was as though they knew, whoever they were, thatwe were there. During the hours that passed O'Connor whiled away thetime in a subdued whisper now and then in telling us of his experiencesin Chinatown which he was now engaged in trying to clean up. FromChinatown, its dens, its gamblers and its tongs we drifted to thelegitimate business interests there, and I, at least, was surprised tofind that there were some of the merchants for whom even O'Connor had agreat deal of respect. Kennedy evidently did not wish to violate in anyway the confidence of Walker Curtis, and mention of the name of ChinJung, but by a judicious question as to who the best men were in theCelestial settlement he did get a list of half a dozen or so fromO'Connor. Chin Jung was well up in the list. However, the night woreaway and still nothing happened.

  It was in the middle of the morning when we were taking a snatch ofsleep in our own rooms uptown that the telephone began to ringinsistently. Kennedy, who was resting, I verily believe, merely out ofconsideration for my own human frailties, was at the receiver in aninstant. It proved to be O'Connor. He had just gone back to his officeat headquarters and there he had found a report of another murder.

  "Who is it?" asked Kennedy, "and why do you connect it with this case?"

  O'Connor's answer must have been a poser, judging from the look ofsurprise on Craig's face. "The Jap--Nichi Moto?" he repeated. "And itis the same sort of non-fatal wound, the same evidence of asphyxia, thesame circumstances, even down to the red car reported by residents inthe neighbourhood."

  Nothing further happened that day except this thickening of the plot bythe murder of the peculiar-acting Nichi. We saw his body and it was asO'Connor said.

  "That fellow wasn't on the level toward Clendenin," Craig mused afterwe had viewed the second murder in the case. "The question is, who andwhat was he working for?"

  There was as yet no hint of answer, and our only plan was to watchagain that night. This time O'Connor, not knowing where the lightningwould strike next, took Craig's suggestion and we determined to spendthe time cruising about in the fastest of the police motor boats, whilethe force of watchers along the entire shore front of the city wasquietly augmented and ordered to be extra vigilant.

  O'Connor at the last moment had to withdraw and let us go alone, forthe worst, and not the unexpected, happened in his effort to clean upChinatown. The war between the old rivals, the Hep Sing Tong and the OnLeong Tong, those ancient societies of troublemakers in the littledistrict, had broken out afresh during the day and three Orientals hadbeen killed already.

  It is not a particularly pleasant occupation cruising aimlessly up anddown the harbour in a fifty-foot police boat, staunch and fast as shemay be.

  Every hour we called at a police post to report and to keep in touchwith anything that might interest us. It came at about two o'clock inthe morning and of all places, near the Battery itself. From the frontof a ferry boat that ran far down on the Brooklyn side, what lookedlike two flashlights gleamed out over the water once, then twice.

  "Headlights of an automobile," remarked Craig, scarcely taking morenotice of it, for they might have simply been turned up and down twiceby a late returning traveller to test them. We were ourselves near theBrooklyn shore. Imagine our surprise to see an answering light from asmall boat in the river which was otherwise lightless. We promptly putout our own lights and with every cylinder working made for the spotwhere the light had flashed up on the river. There was something thereall right and we went for it.

  On we raced after the strange craft, the phantom that had scared StatenIsland. For a mile or so we seemed to be gaining, but one of ourcylinders began to miss--the boat turned sharply around a bend in theshore. We had to give it up as well as trying to overtake the ferryboat going in the opposite direction.

  Kennedy's equanimity in our apparent defeat surprised me. "Oh, it'snothing, Walter," he said. "They slipped away to-night, but I havefound the clue. To-morrow as soon as the Customs House is open you willunderstand. It all centres about opium."

  At least a large part of the secret was cleared, too, as a result ofKennedy's visit to the Customs House. After years of fighting with theopium ring on the Pacific coast, the ring had tried to "put one over"on the revenue officers and smuggle the drug in through New York.

  It did not take long to find the right man among the revenue officersto talk with. Nor was Kennedy surprised to learn that Nichi Moto hadbeen in fact a Japanese detective, a sort of stool pigeon inClendenin's establishment working to keep the government in touch withthe latest scheme.

  The finding of the can of opium on the scene of the murder of BerthaCurtis, and the chase after the lightless motor boat had at last placedKennedy on the right track. With one of the revenue officers we made aquick trip to Brooklyn and spent the morning inspecting the ships fromSouth American ports docked in the neighbourhood where the phantom boathad disappeared.

  From ship to ship we journeyed until at last we came to one on which,down in the chain locker, we found a false floor with a locker underthat. There was a compartment six feet square and in it lay, neatlypacked, fourteen large hermetically sealed cylinders, each full of thelittle oblong tins such as Kennedy had picked up the other day--fortythousand dollars' worth of the stuff at one haul, to say nothing of thethousands that had already been landed at one place or another.

  It had been a good day's work, but as yet it had not caught the slayeror cleared up the mystery of Bertha Curtis. Some one or something hadhad a power over the girl to lure her on. Was it Clendenin? The placein Forty-fourth Street, on inquiry, proved to be really closed as tightas a drum. Where was he?

  All the deaths had been mysterious, were still mysterious. BerthaCurtis had carried her secret with her to the grave to which she hadbeen borne, willingly it seemed, in the red car with the unknowncompanion and the goggled chauffeur. I found myself still asking whatpossible connection she could have with smuggli
ng opium.

  Kennedy, however, was indulging in no such speculations. It was enoughfor him that the scene had suddenly shifted and in a most unexpectedmanner. I found him voraciously reading practically everything that wasbeing printed in the papers about the revival of the tong war.

  "They say much about the war, but little about the cause," was his drycomment. "I wish I could make up my mind whether it is due to theclosing of the joints by O'Connor, or the belief that one tong isinforming on the other about opium smuggling."

  Kennedy passed over all the picturesque features in the newspapers, andfrom it all picked out the one point that was most important for thecase which he was working to clear up. One tong used revolvers of acertain make; the other of a different make. The bullet which hadkilled Bertha Curtis and later Nichi Moto was from a pistol like thatof the Hep Sings.

  The difference in the makes of guns seemed at once to suggest somethingto Kennedy and instead of mixing actively in the war of the highbindershe retired to his unfailing laboratory, leaving me to pass the timegathering such information as I could. Once I dropped in on him butfound him unsociably surrounded by microscopes and a very sensitivearrangement for taking microphotographs. Some of his negatives werenearly a foot in diameter, and might have been, for all I knew,pictures of the surface of the moon.

  While I was there O'Connor came in. Craig questioned him about the warof the tongs.

  "Why," O'Connor cried, almost bubbling over with satisfaction, "thisafternoon I was waited on by Chin Jung, you remember?--one of theleading merchants down there. Of course you know that Chinatown doesn'tbelieve in hurting business and it seems that he and some of the otherslike him are afraid that if the tong war is not hushed up pretty soonit will cost a lot--in money. They are going to have an anniversary ofthe founding of the Chinese republic soon and of the Chinese New Yearand they are afraid that if the war doesn't stop they'll be ruined."

  "Which tong does he belong to?" asked Kennedy, still scrutinising aphotograph through his lens.

  "Neither," replied O'Connor. "With his aid and that of a Judge of oneof our courts who knows the Chinaman like a book we have had aconference this afternoon between the two tongs and the truce isrestored again for two weeks."

  "Very good," answered Kennedy, "but it doesn't catch the murderer ofBertha Curtis and the Jap. Where is Clendenin, do you suppose?"

  "I don't know, but it at least leaves me free to carry on that case.What are all these pictures?"

  "Well," began Kennedy, taking his glass from his eye and wiping itcarefully, "a Paris crime specialist has formulated a system foridentifying revolver bullets which is very like that of Dr. Bertillonfor identifying human beings."

  He picked up a handful of the greatly enlarged photographs. "These arephotographs of bullets which he has sent me. The barrel of every gunleaves marks on the bullet that are always the same for the same barrelbut never identical for two different barrels. In these big negativesevery detail appears very distinctly and it can be decided withabsolute certainty whether a given bullet was fired from a givenrevolver. Now, using this same method, I have made similar greatlyenlarged photographs of the two bullets that have figured so far inthis case. The bullet that killed Miss Curtis shows the same marks asthat which killed Nichi."

  He picked up another bunch of prints. "Now," he continued, "taking upthe firing pin of a rifle or the hammer of a revolver, you may not knowit but they are different in every case. Even among the same makes theyare different, and can be detected.

  "The cartridge in either a gun or revolver is struck at a point whichis never in the exact centre or edge, as the case may be, but is alwaysthe same for the same weapon. Now the end of the hammer when examinedwith the microscope bears certain irregularities of marking differentfrom those of every other gun and the shell fired in it is impressedwith the particular markings of that hammer, just as paper is by type.On making microphotographs of firing pins or hammers, with specialreference to the rounded ends and also photographs of the correspondingrounded depressions in the primers fired by them it is forced on anyone that cartridges fired by each individual rifle or pistol canpositively be identified.

  "You will see on the edge of the photographs I have made a rough sketchcalling attention to the 'L'-shaped mark which is the chiefcharacteristic of this hammer, although there are other detailedmarkings which show well under the microscope but not well in aphotograph. You will notice that the characters on the firing hammerare reversed on the cartridge in the same way that a metal type and thecharacter printed by it are reversed as regards one another. Again,depressions on the end of the hammer become raised characters on thecartridge, and raised characters on the hammer become depressions onthe cartridge.

  "Look at some of these old photographs and you will see that theydiffer from this. They lack the 'L' mark. Some have circles, others avery different series of pits and elevations, a set of characters whenexamined and measured under the microscope utterly different from thosein every other case. Each is unique, in its pits, lines, circles andirregularities. The laws of chance are as much against two of themhaving the same markings as they are against the thumb prints of twohuman subjects being identical. The firing-pin theory, which was usedin a famous case in Maine, is just as infallible as the finger-printtheory. In this case when we find the owner of the gun making an 'L'mark we shall have the murderer."

  Something, I could see, was working on O'Connor's mind. "That's allright," he interjected, "but you know in neither case was the victimshot to death. They were asphyxiated."

  "I was coming to that," rejoined Craig. "You recall the peculiarmarking on the nose of those bullets? They were what is known asnarcotic bullets, an invention of a Pittsburg scientist. They have theproperty of lulling their victims to almost instant slumber. A slightscratch from these sleep-producing bullets is all that is necessary, asit was in the case of the man who spied on the queer doings on StatenIsland. The drug, usually morphia, is carried in tiny wells on the capof the bullet, is absorbed by the system and acts almost instantly."

  The door burst open and Walker Curtis strode in excitedly. He seemedsurprised to see us all there, hesitated, then motioned to Kennedy thathe wished to see him. For a few moments they talked and finally Icaught the remark from Kennedy, "But, Mr. Curtis, I must do it. It isthe only way."

  Curtis gave a resigned nod and Kennedy turned to us. "Gentlemen," hesaid, "Mr. Curtis in going over the effects of his sister has found anote from Clendenin which mentions another opium joint down inChinatown. He wished me to investigate privately, but I have told himit would be impossible."

  At the mention of a den in the district he was cleaning up O'Connor hadpricked up his ears. "Where is it?" he demanded.

  Curtis mentioned a number on Dover Street.

  "The Amoy restaurant," ejaculated O'Connor, seizing the telephone. Amoment later he was arranging with the captain at the Elizabeth Streetstation for the warrants for an instant raid.