The Whisper on the Stair/Chapter 17
Eddie Hughes’ interview with the night man confirmed his suspicions. A taxi chauffeur had called with a personal message for Mr. Morley—a message which he was at pains to deliver personally. And Mr. Morley had gone away with him in the taxicab with no loss of time.
Eddie nodded his head in confirmation of what he had been thinking. There was just one thing that would call Valentine Morley out at that time of the night—a message from Miss Pomeroy. She was in trouble, and Mr. Morley had gone to her assistance. Or—and this came to Eddie like a sudden shaft of light—suppose Mr. Morley had been told that Miss Pomeroy needed him. Suppose that somebody wanted Mr. Morley out of the way—and conceived this means of removing him.
Having removed him thus, what had they done with him then? That was something for Eddie to find out, supposing his assumption was correct and his employer was not on some legitimate business that was none of his, Eddie’s, affair. But Eddie rather thought that if Mr. Morley was able to come home, he would already have done so. Not having done so was an indication to him either that his employer could not, physically, come home, or that the business upon which he was engaged was of such magnitude that it necessitated his staying out until morning—in which event Eddie imagined that perhaps he could be of service to his employer.
Eddie was helped in these suppositions by the fact that Valentine Morley led a regular, decent life. He was not a midnight rounder, despite his wealth and the temptations to so become; he loved his home and his own fireside and his books—and if he was to stay out later than in any way usual, he would be sure to inform Eddie of that fact. It was now nearly morning, and he was not home. That meant that Eddie had better begin to look him up.
Eddie went around the comer to the house garage and got out the low, speedy roadster.
“Goin’ outta see how the night’s holdin’ up, me bucko?” inquired the night watchman at the garage.
“Naw,” said Eddie. “I’m going out to the park to do Greek dances in the dewy grass, get me? Barefoot stuff, an’ flowin’ robes, far from the maddin’ throng. Us esthetic guys get that way sometimes, see!”
With a look of disgust the watchman settled back in his seat. “Which the same ain’t sayin’ that you nor that fool millionaire boss a’ yourn ain’t capable av doin’ such,” he offered.
“Cheerio!” remarked Eddie with a wave of his hand. He had learned the word in France, having heard British officers use it occasionally, and he lost no opportunity of getting it off.
“Now, don’t git them little feetsies av yourn damp, love,” called out the watchman after Eddie as the car slid out of the garage. The roadster swept around the corner with a roar and was lost in the darkness in a moment.
If a message from Miss Pomeroy had called his employer out, that, then, was the place to start looking for him. It occurred to Eddie that he might be butting into something where he would not be very welcome, but he cast off the thought with a shrug of his broad shoulders. Perhaps. On the other hand, perhaps Mr. Morley needed him.
And if Mr. Morley needed him, hell was not too hot for him to cross, nor the ocean too damp. He would carry on, on the chance of his being useful.
Running his engine as quietly as possible, he drew up at the door of the flat house where Jessica Pomeroy lived. He sat in his seat, before the darkened, silent house, for a few minutes, deliberating on what his next move should be. Of course, the straightforward move, and the obvious one, was simply to ring Miss Pomeroy’s bell and go on up. It was as simple as that.
But actually it was not as easy as all that. One hesitated to ring the bell of a stranger at this time of the night; that is, unless one were very sure of his ground. And Eddie was not any too sure of what he was doing. After all, was it his business? It was not, he decided.
Then why shouldn’t he turn the car in the direction of home, go there, and finish his sleep? No doubt, by morning, Mr. Morley would return, and no one would be any the wiser for this little nocturnal trip. And there is little doubt that that is just what Eddie would have done, had it been simply a case of Valentine Morley not coming home. But his being out at this time of the night, coupled with the fact of the theft of the books (again); these two things together gave the matter an ugly look. Eddie could not cast out of his mind the thought that his master had been lured out of the house. That being so, he might need him rather badly.
With a muttered curse on all men who were thick headed enough to get mixed up with female women, Eddie climbed out of the car and entered the vestibule.
He rang the Pomeroy bell and waited for the answering tick. There was none, though he gave the occupants of the Pomeroy flat plenty of time to get out of bed and open the door. He rang again, loudly and insistently this time, but still he got no answer. He rang again, and shook impatiently at the door. It opened, though there was no tick of the electric push button. Like many flat house doors, it was open more often than it was shut.
He peered into the silent gloom of the hall, but could see nothing. On a last chance he rang the bell again, keeping the door open with his foot. There was no answer, and on a sudden determination he entered the dark hall and made his way upstairs to the Pomeroy flat.
Here he rang the bell loudly and heard it reverberating inside, but there was no answer and he became convinced that nobody was home. He tried the door, and to his surprise it opened. The lock was not of the spring type, and evidently whoever had charge of such matters had forgotten to turn the key.
“H-m-m, must’ve been in an awful rush to get out,” muttered Eddie, straining his eyes to see into the apartment. He could see nothing, and resolving to press his luck he entered. He struck a match and lighted the gas in the hall, and from there went into the living room, where he also struck a light.
The place was deserted. He did not need an inspection of the rooms to convince him that there was nobody in the house.
“Nobody alive, that is,” he commented to himself.
In one of the bedrooms he found the door of the closet open, and the scattered condition of the clothes, both in the closet and around the room persuaded him that the occupant or occupants had left in a hurry. The dresser top was swept bare of toilet articles, and lying on the floor was a timetable.
They had left in a hurry, certainly. So far, so good; but where did his employer come in here. Had he left with them? And if so, where had they gone?
The timetable gave him a slight hint. It was a railroad having its terminus in Norfolk, Virginia. He knew that in Virginia the Pomeroys had an estate, somewhere outside of Hampton, which is very near Norfolk. Had they gone down there?
Probably. But would Mr. Morley have gone down there with them so suddenly without leaving with him some word of his travels? He had to admit that, based on past performances, that was unlikely. At any rate, he had never done anything of that nature before.
This led to another train of thought. Was Valentine Morley with Miss Pomeroy? He had decided that his employer had been lured out of his house—certainly it wasn’t Miss Pomeroy who had done the luring. No, it was quite likely that Miss Pomeroy had departed without his master, for the simple reason that his master was somewhere else at the time.
But where? Eddie’s brow furrowed in thought. Who would find it necessary or expedient to lure Mr. Morley out of his house? Why, the man who wanted to steal the books. Who was that? Eddie’s brow cleared. That was simple; why, the bird without no hands, to be sure. How dumb he had been not to think of that!
Well, he knew where he lived, at all events. A visit down there might do no harm, though one had better be careful how he prowled around in that neighborhood. Though, come to think of it, that was rather a glorious fight they had had there earlier in the evening. Eddie’s eyes brightened. There was much in this affair he could not understand, but a fight was a fight in any language, and there were few people who enjoyed one better than he. Now, if a man was looking for a fight, where was a better place to go than to the house of Ignace Teck?
Closing the door behind him, Eddie made his way softly downstairs and entered his car. As silently as his engine would permit, he swung out into the center of the roadway and hit the dust for the corner. At the corner he swung the nose of his car downtown, in the direction of the residence of Ignace Teck.
Dawn was beginning to break over the sleeping city as Eddie Hughes sped downtown in his employer’s roadster. In black, bold relief, like the background of an etching, the houses to the east stood out against the slowly rising light. Suddenly the street lamps went out, leaving the city in a tenebrous, gray light that peopled the disappearing shadows with velvet darkness.
The city began to awake. There was the clank of the milkman’s bottles, and the clang of the street cleaner’s cart. To the east the roar of the elevated railway punctuated hoarsely the sleep of those within range. Newsdealers appeared on the street comers with the morning edition of some papers and the afternoon and evening editions of certain other sensational papers which shall here be nameless.
At Spring Street Eddie turned east to the elevated railway. He did not think it wise to pay his intended visit to Teck in this expensive car. It was not the kind of a neighborhood for that sort of thing, and besides, he did not wish to advertise his interest in the matter. If his employer was anywhere around Teck’s rooms, it would be because he couldn’t get away; certainly, then, secrecy was a necessity. The way to serve secrecy would be to come on foot, silently, and unobtrusively.
Under the elevated railway Eddie hunted up an all night garage where he was familiar with the proprietor. He stored his car there, saying that he would be back soon. Then, slipping his hand into his pocket to see that he still had his automatic, he turned his face in the direction of the house of Ignace Teck.