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

too deep for me, Holmes," said I. "What's the game?"

"Now don't say game, Jenkins," he protested. "I never indulge in games. My quarry is not a game, but a scheme. For the past two weeks, with three days off, I have been acting as a workman in the Gaffany ship, with the ostensible purpose of keeping my eye on certain employes who are under suspicion. Each day the remaining two pendant-stones--these--have been handed to me to work on, merely to carry out the illusion. The first day, in odd moments, I made sketches of them, and on the night of the second I had 'em down in such detail as to cut and color, that Robinstein had no difficulty in reproducing them in the materials at his disposal in Markoo's shop. And to-night all I had to do to get them was to keep them and hand in the Robinstein substitutes when the hour of closing came."

"So that now, in place of four $50,000 diamonds, Gaffany & Co. are in possession of--"

"Two paste pendants, worth about $40 apiece," said Holmes. "If I fail to find the originals I shall have to use the paste ones to carry the scheme through, but I hate to do it. It's so confoundly inartistic and as old a trick as the pyramids."

"And to-morrow--"

Raffles Holmes got up and paced the floor nervously.

"Ah, Jenkins," he said, with a heart-rending sigh, "that is the point. To- morrow! Heavens! what will to-morrow's story be? I--I cannot tell."

"What's the matter, Holmes?" said. "Are you in danger?"

"Physically, no--morally, my God! Jenkins, yes. I shall need all of your help," he cried.

"What can I do?" I asked. "You know you have only to command me."

"Don't leave me this night for a minute," he groaned. "If you do, I am lost. The Raffles in me is rampant when I look at those jewels and think of what they will mean if I keep them. An independent fortune forever. All I have to do is to get aboard a ship and go to Japan and live in comfort the rest of my days with the wealth in my possession, and all the instincts of honest that I possess, through the father in me, will be powerless to prevent my indulgence in this crime. Keep me in sight, and if I show the slightest inclination to give you the slip, knock me over the head, will you, for my own good?"

I promised faithfully that I would do as he asked, but, as an easier way out of an unpleasant situation, I drugged his Remsen cooler with a sleeping- powder, and an hour later he was lying off on my divan lost to the world for eight hours at least. As a further precaution I put the jewels in my own safe.

The night's sleep had the desired effect, and with the returning day Holmes's better nature asserted itself. Raffles was subdued, and he returned to Gaffany's to put the finishing touches to his work.


"Here's your check, Jenkins," said Raffles Holmes, handing me a draft for $5000. "The gems were found to-day in the water-cooler in the work-room, and Gaffany & Co. paid up like gentlemen."

"And the thief?" I asked.

"Under arrest," said Raffles Holmes. "We caught him fishing for them."

"And your past jewels, where are they?"

"I wish I knew," he answered, his face clouding over. "In the excitement of the moment of the arrest I got 'em mixed with the originals I had last night, and they didn't give me time or opportunity to pick 'em out. The four were mounted immediately and sent under guard to the purchaser. Gaffany & Co. didn't want to keep them a minute longer than was necessary. But the purchaser is so rich he will never have to sell 'em--so, you see, Jenkins, we're as safe as a church."

"Your friend Robinstein was a character, Holmes," said I.

"Yes," sighed Holmes. "Poor chap--he was a great loss to his friends. He taught me the art of making paste gems when I was in Paris. I miss him like the dickens."

"Miss him!" said I, getting anxious for Robinstein. "What happened? He isn't--"

"Dead," said Holmes. "Two years ago--dear old chap."

"Oh, come now, Holmes," I said. "What new game is this you are rigging on me? I met him only five nights ago--and you know it."

"Oh--that one," said Raffles Holmes, with a laugh. "_I_ was that Robinstein."

"You?" I cried.

"Yes, me," said Holmes. "You don't suppose I'd let a third party into our secret, do you?"

And then he gave me one of those sweet, wistful smiles that made the wonder of the man all the greater.

"I wish to the dickens I knew whether these were real or paste!" he muttered, taking the extra pendants from his wallet as he spoke. "I don't dare ask anybody, and I haven't got any means of telling myself."

"Give them to me," said I, sternly, noting a glitter in his eye that suggested the domination for the moment of the Raffles in him.

"Tush, Jenkins," he began, uneasily.

"Give them to me, or I'll brain you, Holmes," said I, standing over him with a soda-water bottle gripped in my right hand, "for your own good. Come, give up."

He meekly obeyed.

"Come now, get on your hat," said I. "I want you to go out with me."

"What for, Jenkins?" he almost snarled.

"You'll see what for," said I.

And Raffles Holmes obeying, we walked down to the river's edge, where I stood for a moment, and then hurled the remaining stones far out into the waters.

Holmes gave a gasp and then a sigh of relief.

"There," I said. "It doesn't matter much to us now whether the confounded things were real or not."



V THE ADVENTURE OF THE BRASS CHECK

"Jenkins," said Raffles Holmes to me the other night as we sat in my den looking over the criminal news in the evening papers, in search of some interesting material for him to work on, "this paper says that Mrs. Wilbraham Ward-Smythe has gone to Atlantic City for a week, and will lend her gracious presence to the social functions of the Hotel Garrymore, at that interesting city by the sea, until Monday, the 27th, when she will depart for Chicago, where her sister is to be married on the 29th. How would you like to spend the week with me at the Garrymore?"

"It all depends upon what we are going for," said I. "Also, what in thunder has Mrs. Wilbraham Ward-Smythe got to do with us, or we with her?"

"Nothing at all," said Holmes. "That is, nothing much."

"Who is she?" I asked, eying him suspiciously.

"All I know is what I have seen in the papers," said Holmes. "She came in on the _Altruria_ two weeks ago, and attracted considerable attention by declaring $130,000 worth of pearl rope that she bought in Paris, instead of, woman-like, trying to smuggle it through the custom-house. It broke the heart of pretty nearly every inspector in the service. She'd been watched very carefully by the detective bureau in Paris, and when she purchased the rope there, the news of it was cabled over in cipher, so that they'd all be on the lookout for it when she came in. The whole force on the pier was on the qui vive, and one of the most expert women searchers on the pay-roll was detailed to give her special attention the minute she set foot on shore; but instead of doing as they all believed she would do, and giving the inspectors a chance to catch her at trying to evade the duties, to their very great profit, she calmly and coolly declared the stuff, paid her little sixty-five per cent. like a major, and drove off to the Castoria in full possession of her jewels. The Collector of the Port had all he could do to keep 'em from draping the custom-house for thirty days, they were all so grief-stricken. She'll probably take the rope to Atlantic City with her."

"Aha!" said I. "That's the milk in the cocoanut, is it? You're after that pearl rope, are you, Raffles?"

"On my honor as a Holmes," said he, "I am not. I shall not touch the pearl rope, although I have no doubt that I shall have some unhappy moments during the week that I am in the same hotel with it. That's one reason why I'd like to have you go along, Jenkins--just to keep me out of temptation. Raffles may need more than Holmes to keep him out of mischief. I am confident, however, that with you to watch out for me, I shall be able to suppress the strong tendency towards evil which at times besets me."

"We'd better keep out of it altogether, Holmes," said I, not liking the weight of responsibility for his good behavior that more than once he had placed on my shoulders. "You don't deny, I suppose, that the pearl rope is a factor in your intentions, whatever they may be."

"Of course I don't, Jenkins," was his response. "If it were not for her pearl rope, Mrs. Wilbraham Ward-Smythe could go anywhere she pleased without attracting any more attention from me than a passing motor-car. It would be futile for me to deny that, as a matter of fact, the pearl rope is an essential part of my scheme, and, even if it were not futile to do so, I should still not deny it, because neither my father nor my grandfather, Holmes nor Raffles, ever forgot that a gentleman does not lie."

"Then count me out," said I.

"Even if there is $7500 in it for you?" he said, with a twinkle in his eye.

"If it were $107,500 you could still count me out," I retorted. "I don't like the business."

"Very well," said he, with a sight. "I shall have to go alone and endeavor to fight the terrible temptation unaided, with a strong probability that I shall fail, and, yielding to it, commit my first real act of crime, and in that event, with the possibility of a term at Trenton prison, if I am caught."

"Give it up, Raffles," I pleaded.

"And all because, in the hour of my need, my best friend, whose aid I begged, refused me," he went on, absolutely ignoring my plea.

"Oh, well, if you put it on that score," I said, "I'll go--but you must promise me not to touch the pearls."

"I'll do my best not to," he replied. "As usual, you have carte-blanche to put me out of business if you catch me trying it."

With this understanding I accompanied Raffles Holmes to Atlantic City the following afternoon, and the following evening we were registered at the Hotel Garrymore.

Holmes was not mistaken in his belief that Mrs. Wilbraham Ward-Smythe would take her famous pearl rope to Atlantic City with her. That very evening, while we were sitting at dinner, the lady entered, and draped about her stately neck and shoulders was the thing itself, and a more beautiful decoration was never worn by woman from the days of the Queen of Sheba to this day of lavish display in jewels. It was a marvel, indeed, but the moment I saw it I ceased to give the lady credit for superior virtue in failing to smuggle it through the custom-house, for its very size would have precluded the possibility