The Dayless Diamonds

by Arthur Somers Roche

 

THE DAYLESS DIAMONDS

BY ARTHUR SOMERS ROCHE

The Gray Ghost is the most daring and accomplished big scale thief of the time. He has so far outwitted Pelham and Tryon, detectives. Every big crime is attributed automatically by the Public to the Gray Ghost.

PELHAM slipped his key into the lock, but before he could turn it the door was opened from within. Slim Dickenson stared at his master. "This is one deuce of a time to come home, Mr. Pelham," said the ex-guide severely. "You may picture yourself a gay young buck, but you look eighty-five!"

Pelham surrendered his hat and coat and walked into the living room of his apartment. He surveyed the bubbling percolator upon a table, and rubbed his hands together in delightful anticipation, He spoke over his shoulder. "Slim! you're a jewel." He sat down before the laden table and reached for a napkin.

Slim crossed the little living room almost in a stride. Then he reappeared. bearing a bowl of oatmeal. "I went to bed at 11 last night, but I didn't go to sleep. And at 3 I got up, and I've been up ever since," he said acidly.

Pelham rose with a suddenness of movement that bespoke nervous energy allied to trained muscles. His arm went around the ex-guide's shoulders. "Some day I'm going to forget what a puny specimen you are," smiled Pelham. "And I'm going to show you what a right cross is like."

The dour look left Dickenson's eyes; his mouth parted in a grin.

"How many times have you filled that percolator since 3 o'clock?" demanded Pelham.

"Plenty," replied Slim.

"Then you're due to drink some of it."

A light of mischief appeared in Dickenson's light blue eyes. "I guess I know my place."

"Your place will be standing on your ear in a corner in about a second."

Dickenson's grin grew broader. "Oh, well, if that's the way you feel." But he sighed hungrily as he pulled up a chair to the table.

Pelham was famished, and so was Slim. As often together in the Maine woods, ravenous from a day's fishing, they had eaten in silence, so they ate now. But finally Pelham lighted a cigarette. "Not for a bath and ten hours' sleep," he announced.

"It seems to me that before you pound your ear, you ought to be makin' some comment on a remark of mine," suggested Slim.

Pelham's gray eyes twinkled.

"Quite true," he agreed. "I've been talking, arguing, pleading, cajoling, bribing, and promising all night long, with the sweetest collection of rascals ever gathered together in one room."

"The Gray Ghost's gang?" asked Slim.

"Those of them whom, on various occasions, we've managed to capture. There isn't one of then who doesn't face at least fifteen years in prison, and yet not a single word did I get that would lead me one inch nearer to the Gray Ghost than I am at this minute. They won't betray him. The district attorney rounded them all up, and I kept after them all night."

"Didn't you get anything?" asked Slim.

"Well," conceded Pelham reluctantly, "maybe the barest possible dclue—but I don't think so. And now I'm going to bed."

But on the threshold of his bedroom he paused. "Sorry. Slim, that I didn't think to telephone you where I was."

"That's all right, Mr. Pelham," replied Slim gruffly. He was busy a few minutes clearing away the breakfast dishes. Then silence descended upon the little apartment.

****

IT was 5 in the afternoon when insistent knocking on the front door broke the slumbers of master and man. Slim opened the door, disclosing the aggressive face of jerry Tryon, the ex-lieutenant of police, who now headed the detective agency in which Pelham was consulting partner. In his hand he bore a copy of a Sunday newspaper.

"Mr. Pelham isn't up yet," said Slim.

"Yes, I am too," called Pelham from his bedroom.

The two men met in the living room.

"Haven't read the papers eh?" demanded Tryon. He unfolded the Sphere as he spoke, and showed an illustrated double-page article in the magazine section. Pelham glanced at it carelessly, then looked at Jerry.

"What does it say?" he asked.

"This man Dayless," cried Jerry, "has described for the benefit of the world—and the Gray Ghost—every safeguard that he has used to protect his house. He has described in detail every painting, every jewel, in the collection. And when the reporter—I'll say for that lad that he has a lot more sense than Dayless—asked him if he wished the details published, Dayless replied——"

Ho snatched the paper from Pelham's hand and read the offensive sentences.

"'Certainly,' replied the former governor. 'I'm not afraid of burglars. In fact, I'll be glad to have them warned of the uselessness of attempting to rob my home. And if these electrical alarms, and the presence of ten armed watchmen, are not sufficient to warn criminals away from my house, perhaps the fact that the Tryon Detective Agency is under contract to keep operatives here day and night will be an added deterrent." Jerry hurled the paper into a corner, and almost danced in his rage.

Pelham laughed at him. "I don't see anything to become excited about, Jerry," he said. "You're afraid that the Gray Ghost will rob Dayless, and that we will be laughed at again," said Pelham.

Jerry shrugged his thick shoulders. "I don't care how much we're laughed at," he said. "But, you know, we did hope that the Gray Ghost would attempt a raid on Dayless' home. Now, read this."

He handed Pelham a letter. The younger man opened it. it read:

My Dear Mr. Tryon:

I have read this morning's Sphere. In order to relieve your mind, let me tell you that plans already made by me to releive your client, Governor Dayless, of certain articles which he is to vulgar to appreciate, have been abandoned by me. I feel it would be unfair for me to permit you to indulge in useless worry. Faithfully yours,

PETER BALLANTYNE.

Pelham whistled. "Thoughtful of him," he commented. "Becoming a sportsman in his later years."

"All right, laugh If you can," grumbled Jerry. "But it would be just like him to double-cross us."

"Oh, forget him," counseled Pelham. "He's on our mind too much."

"On yours," corrected Jerry. "And that's another reason I came over here today." He looked appraisingly at the young-old man whom circumstances had changed from a sport-loving millionaire into the keenest detective of his day, the one person who had been able to cope, with comparative success, with the Gray Ghost, whose return after years of silence to predatory activity had rendered panic-stricken the bankers and jewelers of New York.

"You look like the devil," said Jerry severely.

"Up all night giving the third degree to some of our friends," Pelham defended. "Os course, I look tired. Who wouldn't?"

"You shouldn't," replied Jerry. "You see, I've been a cop all my days, and I ain't got a nerve in my system. I ain't a genius; I'm a bull. But you are different. You are made of steel wire, and wire snaps. Do you know what you are going to do?"

****

FROM the pocket of his dressing gown Jimmy Pelham produced a silver case; from it he took a cigarette which he lighted and puffed before replying. Then he said: "All right, Mr. Bones, I'll bite. What am I going to do?"

Into Tryon's blue eyes crept a gleam of satisfaction. From his waistcoat pocket he drew an envelope. He handed it to Pelham, who opened it and examined its contents. Upon the face of the younger man appeared an expression of pleasure.

"A drawing room to Palm Beach, eh?" His eyes clouded suddenly. "Hang it, Jerry, this is no time——"

"The train leaves at 8 tonight. This is Sunday. You'll arrive Tuesday in time for eighteen holes in the afternoon. Then you'll have dinner and you'll go to bed. Dr. Tryon speaking, if you don't mind. On Wednesday you stay In bed until 11, then you go for a swim. In the afternoon you do twenty-seven holes and go to bed early. Same thing on Thursday. On Friday you play thirty-six holes. By Saturday you ought to be able to lick your weight in wildcats. So you stay up until 9 o'clock." He raised his hand warningly. "Wait a minute; I'm not through yet. On Sunday you go over to the club, taking with you $1,000 of Tryon agency money, and invest it according to your own judgment. I myself have a fancy for red, but I leave it to you."

"Get thee behind me, Satan," said Pelham.

"Never mind the pet names; get dressed and we'll go out to dinner. Dickenson will pack your bags and bring your golf clubs to the train." Jerry was quite masterful.

Into Pelham's eyes flashed a light of excitement. He looked away from his friend and partner when he spoke.

"It's early yet, Jerry," he said. "I'll have to write some letters after I'm dressed. Suppose we meet at 7."

They dined in a quiet little restaurant. Jerry accompanied his friend to the train. He sighed with relief as the car disappeared in the direction of the tube to Jersey. Jimmy Pelham was not merely the greatest detective in the world, to Tryon's thinking, but he was also the finest man alive. Jerry had been worrying for weeks about his partner. And when in Saturday's papers he read that Pelham had qualified for the first sixteen in the play for the Lake Worth cup, Tryon was overjoyed.

****

A WELL TRAINED servant, deft, yet whose deference suggested to the caller his thoroughly British contempt for his vulgar American surroundings, ushered the visitor into the presence of the Hon. George Dayless.

"Mr. Reginald Minturn,” he said, stepping aside to permit Mr. Minturn’s entrance into the Dayless library.

Dayless looked up from behind the onyx table at which he sat. He was a gross-seeming person, very bristly of mustache and red of neck. Yet his face was kindly.

He pushed back his chair and heavily gained his feet. He thrust out a fat hand.

"Glad to see you, Minturn," he said. Then he sat down and rubbed his hands together. "I've been an ambitious man all my life, but I never hoped to have a duke's nephew working for me. it certainly would make my father laugh!"

Minturn smiled. He was a well set-up man of about thirty-five, immaculately dressed. He looked around the library.

"I say. there isn't much order to it all, now is there, what?"

Dayless chuckled. "That's what you're here for, young feller, me lad. You're catalogued and appraised sixty or seventy museums——"

Minturn raised a protesting hand. "Two, or perhaps three, Mr. Dayless."

"Well, you got the gaudiest references I ever saw. Go to it, kid, and let me know just what I have in this place, and how it all should be arranged."

Minturn smiled pleasantly; he had a charming, ingenuous air. "Thank you; I'll look around a bit first, what?"

"Nice boy." said Dayless to his wife that night. They had dined en famille, and the new secretary had charmed his employer's wife....

****

AT 11 that night a knock sounded sounded upon the door of Dayless' library. He was seated again behind the onyx table, a medieval piece of furniture rendered bizarre by the filing cases on one end.

He looked up. calling: "Come in." The door opened, and Minturn entered the room.

"Sorry to disturb you, sir," said the young Englishman, "but there was something I wished to ask you."

"Not disturbing me at all," said Dayless. His small eyes twinkled approvingly at his visitor. "I wish to goodness that I could get a valet who knew how to fasten a dress tie. You English certainly have the knack."

Minturn smiled. "Let me show you."

Dayless sat up straight, his head tilted back. Minturn stepped behind him. His hand flashed into the pocket of his dinner jacket, to reappear holding a handkerchief. There was the faint tinkle of broken glass, and then the chloroform-saturated bit of linen was thrust against the nose and mouth of Dayless. Beyond one convulsive struggle, Dayless offered no resistance. He grew limp: he slid from his chair. But his watchful assailant slipping his hand under his employer's arms, eased his fall so that no sound could be heard in the hall beyond the closed door of the library.

For a moment Minturn stared down at his victim. His eyes showed alarm. He bent swiftly over and felt the heart of Dayless. Dayless, although unconscious, was alive. And now Minturn showed a brisk alertness very different from the methodical manner which seemed to belong to him.

From Dayless' pocket he drew a key ring. He walked directly to a huge safe in a corner of the great room.

The Englishman tried several keys. He was finally successful. The heavy door swung silently open, disclosing numerous compartments, each labeled. He attacked the compartment which bore the superscription "Jenny's Necklace."

The third key which he inserted, opened the drawer. He drew out a limp object wrapped in tissue paper. He opened it, glanced at the jewels that sparkled in the electric light, and thrust his booty into an inside pocket. He inserted another key into a lock above which were the words "Unset Rubies." The lock did not yield to his pressure; he turned the key violently, and it broke in his hand.

The same thing happened with the next compartment which he endeavored to open. And then Dayless moved and groaned.

Like a flash Minturn crossed the room. He opened the door, passed through it, and closed it softly behind him. He walked along the hall to the great stairway that descended to the street floor. Leisurely he walked to the lower floor. There he encountered the footman who had admitted him earlier in the day. The man ventured a smile.

"Anything I can do for you, sir?" He recognized in Minturn that superior clay which he so rarely encountered in America.

"No thank you," replied the latest addition to the Dayless household. "I'm always a bit restless my first night in new quarters, and I thought I'd take a look at the avenue before I turned in."

"Quite so," said the servant.

He fetched Minturn's hat and coat and assisted him in donning the latter. He opened the door and ushered Minturn out of the house. Across the street a man woke from watchful inactivity. He gained the front steps before the door was closed. But the footman smilingly reassured him.

"It's all right; this is Mr. Reginald Minturn, secretary to Mr. Dayless."

****

THE outside guardian of the Dayless palace scrutinized the young Englishman carefully. He saw a plump-faced young man, whose hair was quite black and whose tiny mustache was equally dark. He nodded respectfully.

"All right, sir; we have to be careful, you know," he said.

"And quite right too," agreed Minturn. "If I were Mr. Dayless, I'd keep an army here."

The man grinned. "Well, we don't need quite that." He was tolerant and affable in his manner. Evidently Dayless' new secretary didn't know that the Tryon Detective Agency was guarding this house.

"Where's the nearest entrance to the park?" asked Minturn.

"Sixty-fifth street," was the guard's reply. "But I wouldn't advise any one to go strolling there this time of night. There've been too many hold-ups there lately."

Minturn laughed. "How exciting! I fancy I've nothing on me worth a footpad's time and trouble. And I wouldn't mind a little tussle."

"You could take care of yourself, at that," said the Tryon operative. He looked over the lithe figure of the secretary with admiration. "Still, don't look for trouble."

"I won't," promised Minturn.

"Nice chap," said the operative to the footman, who lingered at the open door.

"His uncle's the Duke of Bournemouth," said the footman.

"I don't care; he's a nice chap just the same." said the free-born American citizen. Then he walked across the street and ensconced himself on the low stone wall that guarded the park, hidden in the shade of a great tree. Motor cars were not yet returning from the theaters. In a quarter of an hour the street would be noisy, filled with bustle, but now it was quiet.

It did not remain so. Exactly seven minutes after Minturn had left the house the footman discovered his master, in a semi-conscious condition, on the library floor. Within three minutes after that men on motor cycles were scouring the park in search of Reginald Minturn. But they were exactly eight minutes too late. For two minutes after the secretary had left the footman and the operative he had entered the 65th street entrance to the park, stepped into a waiting limousine and sped away. A little later he changed to another car, which machine deposited him five minutes afterward in front of a house on Stuyvesant Square whose recent renovations had made it extremely suitable for bachelors. Mr. Minturn alighted from the car, bade a cheery good night to his chauffeur, opened the outer door with one latchkey, entered and a moment later opened with a second key the door to a snug apartment on the second floor.

He awoke at 9 the following morning. rang a bell, and in fifteen minutes, bathed and shaved and attired in a dressing gown, was attacking breakfast and the morning paper simultaneously. Glaring headlines leaped at him from the front page.

Dayless had consented to receive newspaper men shortly after the police had been summoned to his house. He was weak and pale, but emphatic in his belief that his secretary was an emissary of the Gray Ghost. His credentials had been flawless, but doubtless forgeries.

The reporters agreed with Dayless. Only the fact that the robber had been content with one bit of loot argued against the theory that the Gray Ghost had been responsible for the crime. For it was not the Gray Ghost's way to be content with a fraction of the whole, even though that fraction was worth half a million dollars. Still, the broken keys in the locks of the safe compartments tended to show that the robber had had but little time in which to effect his purpose.

Minturn smiled. Having breakfasted, he dressed leisurely, with extreme care, avoiding any article of apparel which had been worn in the Dayless household. Somehow he seemed no longer an Englishman. He might have passed, minus the mustache which he removed, as an alert but indistinguishable broker or lawyer or certified accountant.

****

FOR a man sought by the whole city he seemed quite confident in his bearing. He crossed Stuyvesant Square and turned to the west. He made his way to Broadway, and at 14th street engaged a taxi, in which he drove to Maiden lane. There he dismissed his driver, walked half a block and darted suddenly into a shop on whose window were printed the words "F. H. Lewis. Diamonds."

A suave, olive-skinned youth greeted him. Minturn was brusque. "I want to talk with Mr. Lewis," he said.

The clerk looked at him doubtfully. "Mr. Lewis is busy," he stated. He glanced toward a door on which appeared the word "Private."

Minturn acted in a decisive fashion. He strolled by the clerk, reached the door, opened it, and entered the room. A bearded man, short and fat, looked up from the table at which he sat. A magnifying glass that was screwed, monocle-fashion, into his eye, fell to the table. He was a man of as quick decision as his caller. With the lightning motions of a prestidigitator his hand opened a drawer and reappeared holding a revolver. The unset jewels on the table amply justified his precaution. Also the clerk had followed the visitor into the private office, and he was armed.

But Minturn laughed. "Send your clerk out of the room," he said. "Keep your gun trained on me if you like. But do I look like a robber?"

Lewis motioned to the clerk, who promptly stepped across the threshold and closed the door.

"What do you want?" asked Lewis. His weapon was ready, and his small black eyes stared at his visitor.

"I am going to put my hand in my pocket, but I'm not going to produce a gun," smiled Minturn.

Lewis shrugged. "You won't if you're wise," he stated. . His visitor took the words as permission to go ahead. From the inner pocket of his coat he produced the tissue paper parcel that he had taken the night before from the Dayless safe. He placed it upon the table and opened it. Lewis glanced at it; drops of moisture appeared suddenly upon his forehead. His tongue showed between his thick lips, as he moistened them.

"My foot is on a button," he said. "All I have to do is press it, and in less than five minutes the police will be here."

Minturn smiled again. "But you aren't going to press it," he retorted confidently.

"Get to the point," snapped Lewis.

"These are the Dayless diamonds; you know that without my telling you. If you deliver me to the police, you may get ten thousand dollars as a reward. If you buy them from me, your profit should be a quarter of a million. You don't look like a fool."

"Do I look like a thief?" said Lewis.

"Do I?" continued Minturn. "I can't see that our appearances matter particularly. Do we do business?" He carefully rewrapped the necklace and placed it in his pocket. "Well?" he demanded.

"Come back this afternoon," said Lewis hoarsely.

****

MINTURN nodded, and without another word left the office. He walked toward Broadway, but a few doors from that street he stepped into a taxi drawn up at the curb. So it was that, when the olive-skinned clerk emerged, a few moments later, from the jewelry establishment, he was followed by a taxicab whose driver, having some difficulty with his carburetor, could proceed only at a snail's pace.

The clerk was watchfully suspicious, but it never occurred to him that if he were followed it was by a person in an automobile. And Minturn's taxi man was clever. Although the clerk, entering an automobile near Park Row, dodged and doubled and retraced his course, when at last he entered an apartment house in West End avenue, Minturn was close enough to note the number. He was then driven to Union Square. There he dismissed the taxi man, and walked rapidly toward the apartment which he had left a couple of hours earlier. Ho was whistling as he unlocked the door of his apartment. But the whisle died away as he entered the room.

For three men awaited him and were upon him. One of them was the Tyron operative who had conversed with him the previous night. Handcuffs were on his wrists before he could utter a word of protest.

"Not so clever as you thought, Mr. Minturn," said one of the men.

Minturn held out his hands.

"Take these blasted things off," he ordered. "I'm Pelham."

One of the men ran his hands over his clothing and brought to light the Dayless necklace. "Sure you ain't the King of Spain?" he laughed.

Their prisoner gave up protest. "All right, rush me down to headquarters as fast as you can; I won't argue with you."

"Sensible man," said his acquaintance of the night before.

Now, detectives are ordinary human beings; it was not to be expected that, having achieved so brilliant a capture, they should fail to inform the newspaper men whom they found loitering in the corridor outside the detective bureau of their triumph. By the time that important police officials had finally yielded to the urgent messages sent to them by the prisoner and had consented to see him, extra editions were upon the street proclaming to an applauding public that the Dayless robber had been captured, and that he professed to be James Pelham of the Tryon Detective Agency.

And when released, Pelham sped in a police automobile, to the address on West End avenue, he found that a hurried exodus had been achieved fifteen minutes earlier by the tenants of the apartment on the second floor. And the description which the apartment house employes gave him of one of those tenants fitted the Gray Ghost perfectly....

"I'm sorry, Jerry," said Pelham, a little later in the day. "Here's what happened. The Gray Ghost had written that he would make no effort to rob Dayless. I knew, from a hint dropped by one of the Gray Ghost's men, during the course of the third degree I put them through that Lewis was acting as 'fence' for the disposal of much of the Gray Ghost's plunder I decided that if I robbed Dayless and showed the result to Lewis he would at once ask the Gray Ghost's advice—that Lewis could lead me to his hiding place.

"You see, when you left me that Sunday we talked about my going to Palm Beach, I saw two people. One of them was my cousin, Freddie Thurlow. He looks something like me, so I took the chance that there'd be no one at Palm Beach just now who knew either of us.

"Then I went to Dayless. I told him frankly what a fool he'd made of himself by his interview, and explained to him my plan. He's a roughneck, but a regular fellow, just the same. In fact, he insisted that I actually chloroform him so that there'd not be a suspicion aroused in the minds of the servants or detectives around the place. He went through with it like the good sport that he is. And then you, confound your ugly face——"

"It wasn't me," said Jerry ungrammatically. "It's just that you didn't give due credit to our men. You see, I'd issued orders, after all that publicity, that if Dayless was robbed I'd fire the whole staff. And so every man in our employ was combing the city. It happened that a taxi man had seen the number of the car that waited for you in Central Park. The driver of that car told of leaving you outside a hotel. The starter happened to notice you. Oh, the boys had luck, but even so it was slick work. If only you'd told me that you were doing—why didn't you telephone me the minute you saw where Lewis' clerk went?"

"1 wanted to be certain; I'd only suspicions. I intended waiting until afternoon, then calling again upon Lewis, making sure that he really did deal with the Gray Ghost——"

"But why the deuce," demanded Jerry in exasperation, "didn't you tell me what you planned to do?"

Pelham grinned feebly. "Hang it all, Jerry, you were so dead sure that I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown that I couldn't stand the gaff any longer. I wanted to show you how wrong you were."

"Much obliged," said Jerry dryly. Then he relented. "It's all right, Mr. Pelham, only I don't think you ought to forget again that we are partners."

"I won't," promised Pelham humbly.

Jerry sighed. "A fine laugh the Gray Ghost is having at us, and tho whole city is joining in with him."

Pelham flushed. "He laughs best who laughs last," he reminded Tryon.

"I've heard that before," grunted Jerry. "But I think I'm getting a permanently cracked lip."

(Copyright, 1923.)