R. Holmes & Co. - John Kendrick Bangs (classic books to read TXT) 📗

finds out what I know--but, if he isn't, well, don't I represent law and order?" and Holmes displayed a detective's badge, which he wore for use in emergency cases, pinned to the inner side of his suspenders.

As he spoke, Darlington reappeared, and, leaving his key at the office, went out through the revolving doorway, and jumped into a hansom.

"Where to, sir?" asked the cabman.

"The Abbey," said Darlington.

"They're off!" whispered Holmes, with a laugh. "And now for Mr. Cato."

We walked back through the office, and, as we passed the bench upon which the bell-boys sat, Raffles stopped before the lad who had delivered the telegram to him.

"Here, son," he said, handing him a quarter, "run over to the news-stand and get me a copy of this months _Salmagundi_--I'll be in the smoking-room."

The boy went off on his errand, and in a few minutes returned with a magazine.

"Thanks," said Holmes. "Now get me my key and we'll call it square."

"Four hundred and seven, sir?" said the boy, with a smile of recognition.

"Yep," said Holmes, laconically, as he leaned back in his chair and pretended to read.

"Gad, Holmes, what a nerve!" I muttered.

"We need it in this business," said he.

The buttons returned and delivered the key of Sir Henry Darlington's apartment into the hands of Raffles Holmes.

Ten minutes later we sat in room 407--I in a blue funk from sheer nervousness, Raffles Holmes as imperturbable as the rock of Gibraltar from sheer nerve. It was the usual style of hotel room, with bath, pictures, telephone, what-nots, wardrobes, and centre-table. The last proved to be the main point of interest upon our arrival. It was littered up with papers of one sort and another: letters, bills receipted and otherwise, and a large assortment of railway and steamship folders. "He knows how to get away," was Holmes's comment on the latter. Most of the letters were addressed to Sir Henry Darlington, in care of Bruce, Watkins, Brownleigh & Co., bankers.

"Same old game," laughed Holmes, as he read the superscription. "The most conservative banking-house in New York! It's amazing how such institutions issue letters indiscriminately to any Tom, Dick, or Harry who comes along and planks down his cash. They don't seem to realize that they thereby unconsciously lend the glamour of their own respectability and credit to people who, instead of travelling abroad, should be locked up in the most convenient penitentiary at home. Aha!" Holmes added, as he ran his eye over some of the other documents and came upon a receipted bill. "We're getting close to it, Jenkins. Here's a receipted bill from Bar, LeDuc & Co., of Fifth Avenue, for $15,000--three rings, one diamond necklace, a ruby stick- pin, and a set of pearl shirt-studs."

"Yes," said I, "but what is there suspicious about that? If the things are paid for--"

"Precisely," laughed Holmes. "They're paid for. Sir Henry Darlington has enough working capital to buy all the credit he needs with Messrs. Bar, LeDuc & Co. There isn't a house in this town that, after a cash transaction of that kind, conducted through Bruce, Watkins, Brownleigh & Co., wouldn't send its own soul up on approval to a nice, clean-cut member of the British aristocracy like Sir Henry Darlington. We're on the trail, Jenkins--we're on the trail. Here's a letter from Bar, LeDuc & Co.--let's see what light that sheds on the matter."

Holmes took a letter from an envelope and read, rapidly:

Sir Henry Darlington--care of Bruce, Watkins and so forth--dear Sir Henry-- We are having some difficulty matching the pearls--they are of unusual quality, but we hope to have the necklace ready for delivery as requested on Wednesday afternoon at the office of Messrs. Bruce, Watkins and so forth, between five and six o'clock. Trusting the delay will not--and so forth--and hoping to merit a continuance of your valued favors, we beg to remain, and so forth, and so forth.

"That's it," said Holmes. "It's a necklace that Mr. Cato is bringing up to Sir Henry Darlington--and, once in his possession--it's Sir Henry for some place on one of these folders."

"Why don't they send them directly here?" I inquired.

"It is better for Darlington to emphasize Bruce, Watkins, Brownleigh & Co., and not to bank to much on the Hotel Powhatan, that's why," said Holmes. "What's the good of having bankers like that back of you if you don't underscore their endorsement? Anyhow, we've discovered the job, Jenkins; to- day is Wednesday, and the 'goods' Cato has to deliver and referred to in his telegram is the pearl necklace of unusual quality--hence not less than a $50,000 stake."

At this point the telephone bell rang.

"Hello," said Holmes, answering immediately, and in a voice entirely unlike his own. "Yes--what? Oh yes. Ask him to come up."

He hung up the receiver, put a cigar in his mouth, lit it, and turned to me.

"It's Cato--just called. Coming up," said he.

"I wish to Heavens I was going down," I ejaculated.

"You're a queer duck, Jenkins," grinned Holmes. "Here you are with a front seat at what promises to be one of the greatest shows on earth, a real live melodrama, and all you can think of is home and mother. Brace up--for here he is."

There was a knock on the door.

"Come in," said Holmes, cheerily.

A tall cadaverous-looking man opened the door and entered. As his eye fell upon us, he paused on the threshold.

"I beg your pardon," he said. "I--I'm afraid I'm in the wrong--"

"Not at all--come in and sit down," said Holmes, cordially. "That is if you are our friend and partner, Cato--Darlington couldn't wait--"

"Couldn't wait?" said Cato.

"Nope," said Holmes. "He was very much annoyed by the delay, Cato. You see he's on bigger jobs than this puny little affair of Bar, LeDuc's, and your failure to appear on schedule time threw him out. Pearls aren't the only chips in Darlington's game, my boy."

"Well--I couldn't help it," said Cato. "Bar, LeDuc's messenger didn't get down there until five minutes of six."

"Why should that have kept you until eight?" said Holmes.

"I've got a few side jobs of my own," growled Cato.

"That's what Darlington imagined," said Holmes, "and I don't envy you your meeting with him when he comes in. He's a cyclone when he's mad and if you've got a cellar handy I'd advise you to get it ready for occupancy. Where's the stuff?"

"In here, said Cato, tapping his chest.

"Well," observed Holmes, quietly, "we'd better make ourselves easy until the Chief returns. You don't mind if I write a letter, do you?"

"Go ahead," said Cato. "Don't mind me."

"Light up," said Holmes, tossing him a cigar, and turning to the table where he busied himself for the next five minutes, apparently in writing.

Cato smoked away in silence, and picked up Holmes's copy of the _Salmagundi Magazine_ which lay on the bureau, and shortly became absorbed in its contents. As for me, I had to grip both sides of my chair to conceal my nervousness. My legs fairly shook with terror. The silence, broken only by the scratching of Holmes's pen, was becoming unendurable and I think I should have given way and screamed had not Holmes suddenly risen and walked to the telephone, directly back of where Cato was sitting.

"I must ring for stamps," he said. "There don't seem to be any here. Darlington's getting stingy in his old age. Hello," he called, but without removing the receiver from the hook. "Hello--send me up a dollar's worth of two-cent stamps--thank you. Good-bye."

Cato read on, but, in a moment, the magazine dropped from his hand to the floor. Holmes was at his side and the cold muzzle of a revolver pressed uncomfortably against his right temple.

"That bureau cover--quick," Raffles cried, sharply, to me.

"What are you doing?" gasped Cato, his face turning a greenish-yellow with fear.

"Another sound from you and you're a dead one," said Holmes. "You'll see what I'm doing quickly enough. Twist it into a rope, Jim," he added, addressing me. I did as I was bade with the linen cover, snatching it from the bureau, and a second later we had Cato gagged. "Now tie his hands and feet with those curtain cords," Holmes went on.

Heavens! how I hated the job, but there was no drawing back now! We had gone too far for that.

"There!" said Holmes, as we laid our victim out on the floor, tied hand and foot and as powerless to speak as though he had been born deaf and dumb. "We'll just rifle your chest, Cato, and stow you away in the bath-tub with a sofa-cushion under your head to make you comfortable, and bid you farewell-- not au revoir, Cato, but just plain farewell forever."

The words were hardly spoken before the deed was accomplished. Tearing aside poor Cato's vest and shirt-front, Raffles placed himself in possession of the treasure from Bar, LeDuc & Co., after which we lay Darlington's unhappy confederate at full length in the porcelain-lined tub, placed a sofa-cushion under his head to mitigate his sufferings, locked him in, and started for the elevator.

"Great Heavens, Raffles!" I chattered, as we emerged upon the street. "What will be the end of this? It's awful. When Sir Henry returns--"

"I wish I could be there to see," said he, with a chuckle.

"I guess we'll see, quick enough. I leave town to-morrow," said I.

"Nonsense," said Holmes. "Don't you worry. I put a quietus on Sir Henry Darlington. _He'll_ leave town to-night, and we'll never hear from him again--that is, not in this matter."

"But how?" I demanded, far from convinced.

"I wrote him a letter in which I said: 'You will find your treasure in the bath-tub,'" laughed Holmes.

"And _that_ will drive him from New York, and close his mouth forever!" I observed, sarcastically. "So very likely!"

"No, Jenkins, not that, but the address, my dear boy, the address. I put that message in an envelope, and left it on his table where he'll surely see it the first thing when he gets back to-night, addressed to 'Bob Hollister,' Diamond Merchant, Cell No. 99, Pentonville Prison."

"Aha!" said I, my doubts clearing.

"Likewise--Ho-ho," said Holmes. "It is a delicate intimation to Sir Henry Darlington that somebody is on to his little game, and he'll evaporate before dawn."


A week later, Holmes brought me a magnificent pearl scarf-pin.

"What's that?" I asked.

"Your share of the swag," he answered. "I returned the pearl necklace to Bar, LeDuc & Co., with a full statement of how it came into my possession. They rewarded me with this ruby ring and that stick-pin."

Holmes held up his right hand, on the fourth finger of which glistened a brilliant blood-red stone worth not less than fifteen hundred dollars.

I breathed a sigh of relief.

"I wondered what you were going to do with the necklace," I said.

"So did I--for three days," said Holmes, "and then, when I realized that I was a single man, I decided to give it up. If I'd had a wife to wear a necklace--well, I'm a little afraid the Raffles side of my nature would have won out."

"I wonder whatever became of Darlington," said I.

"I don't know. Sommers says he left town suddenly that same Wednesday night, without paying his bill," Holmes answered.

"And Cato?"