Part 2

Miss Hamerton introduced me all around in her casual way, and left me to sink or swim by my own efforts. None of the people put themselves out to be agreeable to me. I could see that each was wondering jealously where I came in. However, since I had a right to be there, I didn't let it trouble me. This is life! I told myself, and kept my eyes and ears open. I was not long in discovering that these "brilliant" people chattered about as foolishly as the humblest I knew. Only my beautiful young lady was always dignified and wistful. She let others do the talking.

I stubbornly outstayed them all. The men very reluctantly left me in possession of the field. As for the lady companion I saw in her eye that she was determined to learn what I had come for. However, Miss Hamerton coolly disposed of her by asking her to entertain a newcomer in the next room while she talked business with me.

These people wearied her. She relaxed when they had gone. She said to me: "I had you shown right up because I want my friends to become accustomed to seeing you. I hope you did not mind."

I replied that I was delighted.

"I suppose I ought to account for you in some way," she went on, "or their curiosity will run riot. What would you suggest?"

"Oh, let them suppose that I am a playwright whose work you are interested in."

She accepted the idea. How delightful it was for me to share secrets with her!

My particular purpose in making this call was to urge her again to take the jeweller into her confidence. I pointed out to her that we could hope to do nothing unless we blocked the thief from disposing of the pearls. Very reluctantly she finally consented, stipulating, however, that the jeweller must be told that she had just discovered her loss. I explained to her that we must look back to make sure that the jewels had not already been offered for sale, but on this point she stood firm. She gave me a note of introduction to Mr. Alfred Mount.

I delivered it the following morning. At this time Mount's was the very last word in fashion. It was a smallish store but most richly fitted up, on one of the best corners of the avenue, up near the cathedral. Every one of the salesmen had the air of a younger son of the aristocracy. They dealt only in precious stones, none of your common stuff like gold or silver.

I was shown into a private office at the back, a gem of a private office, exquisite and simple. And in Mr. Alfred Mount I saw that I had a notable man. One guessed that he would have been a big man in any line. So far I knew him only as one of the city's leading jewellers. By degrees I learned that his interests were widespread.

He was a man of about fifty who looked younger, owing to his flashing dark eyes, and his lips, full and crimson as a youth's. In a general way he had a foreign look, though you couldn't exactly place him as a Frenchman, an Italian or a Spaniard. It was only, I suppose, that he wore his black hair and curly beard a little more luxuriantly than a good American. His manner was of the whole world.

My involuntary first impression was dead against the man. He was too much in character with the strange little orchid that decorated his buttonhole. Later I decided that this was only my Anglo-Saxon narrowness. True, he kept a guard on his bright eyes, and his red lips were firmly closed--but do we not all have to train our features? He was a jeweller who earned his bread by kow-towing to the rich. My own face was not an open book, yet I considered myself a fairly honest creature.

He read my letter of introduction which stated that I would explain my business to him. Upon his asking what that was I told him quietly that Miss Hamerton had been robbed of her pearls.

He started in his chair, and pierced me through and through with those brilliant black eyes.

"Give me the facts!" he snapped.

I did so.

"But you," he said impatiently, "I don't know you."

I offered him my card, and explained that Miss Hamerton had retained my services.

He was silent for a few moments, chewing his moustache. It was impossible to guess what was going on behind the mask of his features. Suddenly he started to cross-question me like a criminal lawyer. How long had I been in business? Was I accustomed to handling big cases? Had I any financial standing? What references could I give? And so on, and so on.

My patience finally gave way under it. "I beg your pardon," I said stiffly. "I recognise the right of only one person to examine me in this manner. That is my client."

He pulled himself together, and, I must say, apologised handsomely. Like all big men he was often surprisingly frank. "Forgive me," he said winningly. "You are quite right. I am terribly upset by your news. I forgot myself. I confess, too, I am hurt that Miss Hamerton should have acted in this matter without first consulting me. I am a very old friend."

I was glad she had done so, for something told me I never should have got the job from him. I did not tell him how she had come to engage me, though he gave me several openings to do so.

"I am not a narrow man," he said in his best manner. "I will not hold it against you. Only show me that you are the man for the job, and I will aid you with all my power."

I accepted the olive branch. "I spoke too hastily myself," I returned. "I shall be glad to tell you anything you want to know about myself."

We basked in the rays of mutual politeness for a while. Still that instinctive dislike of the man would not quite down. He asked no more personal questions.

"Have the police been notified?" he enquired.

"Miss Hamerton imposes absolute secrecy."

"Quite so," he said quickly. "That is wise."

I had my doubts of it, but I didn't air them.

"Have you any clues?" he asked.

"None as yet."

"What do you want me to do?"

"To publish the loss through the channels of the trade, with the request that if any attempt is made to dispose of the pearls we should instantly be notified. The owner's name, and the circumstances of the robbery must be kept secret."

"Very good," he said, making a memo on a pad. "I will attend to it at once, and discreetly. Is there anything else I can do?"

"I hoped that with your knowledge of jewels and the jewel market you could give me something to work on," I said.

"All I know is at your command," said he. He talked at length about jewels and jewel thieves, but it was all in generalities. There was nothing that I could get my teeth into. He gave it as his opinion that the pearls were already on their way abroad, perhaps to India.

"Then you think that the robbery was engineered by experts?"

He spread out his expressive hands. "How can I tell?"

We parted with mutual expressions of good will. I said, "I expect I shall have to come often to you for help."

"I expect you to," he said earnestly. "I want you to. Myself and my establishment are at your service. Let no question of expense hamper you."

I found later that he really meant this. I was, however, very reluctant to draw on him.

When I saw Miss Hamerton the next day I asked her a question or two concerning Mr. Alfred Mount with the object of finding out if he were really such an old friend as he made out.

"I have always known him," she said simply. "That I happen to buy things from him is merely incidental. He was a friend of my father's and he is a very good friend to me. He has proved it more than once."

I was tempted to ask: "Then why were you so reluctant to take him into your confidence?" But I reflected that since she had already refused to tell me, I had better keep my mouth shut, and find out otherwise.

"Mr. Mount asked if we had notified the police," I said, merely to see how she would take it.

I regretted it. Her expression of pain and terror went to my heart. She was no longer the remote and lovely goddess, but only a suffering woman.

"Oh, you did not, you have not?" she stammered.

"Certainly not," I said quickly. "I knew you didn't wish it."

She turned away to recover herself. What was I to make of it? One would almost have said that she was a party to the theft of her own jewels.

And yet only a few minutes later she burst out in a passionate plea to me to discover the thief.

"It tortures me!" she cried, "the suspense, the uncertainty! This atmosphere of doubt and suspicion is suffocating! I wish I never had had any pearls! I wish I were a farmer's daughter or a mill girl! Please, _please_ settle it one way or the other. I shall never have a quiet sleep until I _know_!"

"Know what?" I asked quietly.

But she made believe not to have heard me.

4

I spent the next two or three days in quiet work here and there. The most considerable advance I made was in picking an acquaintance with McArdle, the property man of Miss Hamerton's company. Watching the stage door I discovered that the working-force behind the scenes frequented the back room of a saloon on Sixth avenue for lunch after the show. The rest was easy. By the third night McArdle and I were on quite a confidential footing.

From him I heard any amount of gossip. McArdle was of the garrulous, emotional type and very free with his opinions. The star was the only one he spared. From his talk I got the principal members of the company fixed in my mind. Beside Mr. Quarles there was George Casanova, the heavy man, a well-known actor but, according to McArdle, a loud-mouthed, empty braggart, and Richard Richards, the character heavy, a silly old fool, he said, devoured by vanity. Among the women the next in importance after the star was Miss Beulah Maddox, the heavy lady, who in the opinion of my amiable informant giggled and ogled like a sewing-machine girl, and she forty if she was a day.

Discreet questioning satisfied me that McArdle was quite unaware that a robbery had been committed in the theatre. If he didn't know it, certainly it was not known.

Out of bushels of gossip I sifted now and then a grain of valuable information. He informed me that Roland Quarles was in love with the star. For some reason that I could not fathom he was especially bitter against the young leading man. He would rail against him by the hour, but there seemed to be no solid basis for his dislike.

"Does she favour him?" I asked.

"Nah!" he said. "She's got too much sense. He's a four-flusher, a counter-jumper, a hall-room boy! Lord! the airs he gives himself you'd think he had a million a year! He's a tail-ender with her, and he knows it. He's sore."

"Who seems to be ahead of him?" I asked with strong curiosity.

"There's a dozen regulars," said McArdle. "Two Pittsburgh millionaires, a newspaper editor, a playwright and so on. But if you ask me, the jeweller is ahead in the running."

"The jeweller?" I said, pricking up my ears.

"Spanish looking gent with whiskers," said McArdle. "Keeps a swell joint on the avenue. Mount, his name is. He's a wise guy, does the old family friend act, see? He's a liberal feller. I hope he gets her."

This bit of information gave me food for thought. I thought it explained my intuitive dislike of Mount. The thought of that old fellow presuming to court the exquisite Irma made me hot under the collar.

I went to the store of Roberts, the manufacturer of artificial pearls. This place was as well-known in its way as Mount's, since Roberts had sued the Duke of Downshire and the public had learned that the pearls His Grace had presented to Miss Van Alstine on the occasion of their marriage were--phony. It also was a very fancy establishment but like its wares, on a much less expensive scale.

I fell in with a sociable and talkative young salesman, who at my request showed me a whole tray full of pearl necklaces. Among them I spotted another replica of Miss Hamerton's beautiful string.

"What's this?" I asked carelessly.

"Blue pearls," he rattled off. "Latest smart novelty. A hit. Mrs. Minturn Vesey had one sent up only yesterday. She wore it to the opera last night."

"There isn't such a thing really as a blue pearl, is there?" I asked idly.

"Certainly. These are copies of genuine stones like all our stock. Some time ago a customer sent in the real necklace to have it copied, like they all do. This was such a novelty Mr. Roberts had a pattern made and put them on sale. It's a winner!"

"I wouldn't want a thing everybody had bought," I said.

"I don't mean everybody," he said. "But just a few of the very smartest. It's too expensive for everybody. Seven hundred and fifty. The original is priceless."

"How many have you sold?"

"About ten."

"Who else bought them?"

He reeled off a string of fashionable names.

"That's only six."

"The others were sold over the counter."

The affable youngster was a little aggrieved when I left without buying.

Mr. Mount was both surprised and deeply chagrined when I told him that exact replicas of Miss Hamerton's pearls were to be had at Roberts' by anybody with the price. He didn't see how he could stop it either. It appeared there was a standing feud between Roberts and the fashionable jewellers, in which Roberts had somewhat the advantage because the regular trade was obliged to employ him. No one else could make such artificial pearls.

With Mr. Mount's assistance I had the sales of the replicas quietly traced. Nothing resulted from this. All but two of the sales were to persons above suspicion. These two had been sold over the counter, one to a man, one to a woman, and as the transactions were over two months old, I could not get a working description of the buyers.

On another occasion I went into Dunsany's, the largest and best-known jewelry store in America, if not in the world, and asked to see some one who could give me some information about pearls. I was steered up to a large, pale gentleman wearing glasses, very elegantly dressed, of course. I put on my most youthful and engaging manner. I heard him addressed as Mr. Freer.

"Look here," I said, "I expect you'll want to have me thrown out for bothering you, but I'm in a hole."

My smile disarmed him. "What can I do for you?" he asked impressively.

"I'm a fiction writer," I said. "I'm writing a story about blue pearls, and somebody told me there was no such thing. Was he right?"

"Sometimes the black pearl has a bluish light in it," said Mr. Freer. "But it would take an expert to distinguish it. Such pearls are called blue pearls in the trade."

"I suppose you haven't got one you could show me?" I said.

He shook his head. "They rarely come into the market. There is only one place in New York where they may be found."

"And that is?"

"Mount's. Mr. Alfred Mount has a hobby for collecting them. Naturally when a blue pearl appears it is generally offered first to him. You'd better go to see him. He knows more about blue pearls than any man in the world."

"One more question?" I said cajolingly, "in my story I have to imagine the existence of a necklace of sixty-seven blue pearls ranging in size from a currant down to a pea, all perfectly matched, perfect in form and lustre. If there was such a thing what would it be worth?"

When I described the necklace I received a mild shock, for the pale eyes of the man who was watching me suddenly contracted like a frightened animal's. The muscles of his large pale face never moved, but I saw the eyes bolt. He smiled stiffly.

"I couldn't say," he said. "Its value would be fabulous."

"But give me some idea," I said, "just for the sake of the story."

He moistened his lips. "Oh, say half a million," he said. "It would not be too much."

I swallowed my astonishment, and thanked him, and made my way out.

Here was more food for cogitation. Why should a few idle questions throw the pearl expert at Dunsany's into such visible agitation? I had to give it up. Perhaps it was a twinge of indigestion or a troublesome corn. Anyhow I lost sight of it in the greater discovery. Half a million for the necklace, and Miss Hamerton had told me that buying it pearl by pearl it had cost her little more than twenty-five thousand!

Meanwhile there was an idea going through my head that I had not quite nerve enough to open to my client. It must be remembered that though I was making strides, I was still green at my business. I was not nearly so sure of myself as my manner might have led you to suppose. To my great joy Miss Hamerton herself broached the subject.

One afternoon she said, apropos of nothing that had gone before: "I'm sorry now that I introduced you to my friends. Though I do not see how I could have seen you without their knowing it."

"Why sorry?" I asked.

She went on with charming diffidence--how was one to resist her when she pleaded with an humble air: "I have thought--if it would not tie you down too closely--that you might take a minor rôle in my company."

My heart leaped--but of course I was not going to betray my eagerness if I could help it.

"As to your friends having seen me," I said, "that doesn't make any difference. Disguise is part of my business."

"Then will you?" she eagerly asked.

I made believe to consider it doubtfully. "It would tie me down!" I said.

"Oh, I hope you can arrange it!" she said.

"Could it be managed without exciting comment in the company?"

"Easily. I have thought it all out. I have an assistant stage manager who plays a small part. By increasing his duties behind, I can in a perfectly natural way make it necessary to engage somebody to play his bit. I shall not appear in the matter."

"I have had no experience," I objected.

"I will coach you."

Could I resist that?

"It would be better to put in an operative."

"Oh, no! No one but you!"

"Well, I'll manage it somehow," I said.

She sighed with relief, and started that moment to coach me.

"You are a thug, a desperate character. You appear in only one scene, a cellar dimly lighted, so you will not be conspicuous from in front. You must practise speaking in a throaty, husky growl."

In order to prolong the delightful lessons I made out to be a little stupider than I was.

I was engaged the next day but one through a well-known theatrical agent where Miss Hamerton had instructed me to apply for a job. Just how she contrived it I can't say, but I know I came into the company without anybody suspecting that it was upon the star's recommendation. In the theatre, of course, she ignored me.

Two nights later I made my debut. Mine was such a very small part no one in the company paid any attention to me, but for me it was a big occasion, I can tell you. In the way of business I have faced death on several occasions with a quieter heart than I had upon first marching out into view of that thousand-headed creature across the footlights. With the usual egotism of the amateur I was sure they were all waiting to guy me. But they didn't. I spoke my half dozen lines without disaster. I felt as if the real me was sitting up in the flies watching his body act down below. Indeed, I could write several chapters upon my sensations that night, but as somebody else has said, that is another story.

What is more important is the discovery of my first piece of evidence.

At the end of the performance I was crossing the quiet stage on my way out of the theatre, when I saw a group of stage-hands and some of the minor members of the company by the stage-door with their heads together over a piece of paper. I joined the group, taking care not to bring myself forward. Another happened along, and he asked for me:

"What's the matter?"

Richards answered: "McArdle here found a piece of paper on the stage with funny writing on it. It's a mystery like."

"Let's have a squint at it," said the newcomer.

I looked over his shoulder. It was a single sheet of cheap note-paper of the style they call "dimity." It had evidently been torn from a pad. It seemed to be the last of several sheets of a letter, and it was written in a cryptogram which made my mouth water. I may say that I have a passion for this kind of a puzzle. I give it as I first saw it:

&FQZZDRR CV REW RIPN PFRBQ AT HXV DGGZT EP FOBQ IVTCVMXK SJQ TZXD EA TJTI ZK.

S CEDBBWYB SWOCNA VMD Y&F GC AVSNY NCA &MW&M&L. HZF EDM HYW ZUM IKQ BSCOAIIQVV ZXK FJOP WOD. KWX DWVXJ. LEE FVTHV G&HJT LSZAND EBCC BFKY NCAFP VEDFSF. BSQ ZWVXJ YXM II PL GC DCR FPBV EA&BO ULS RLZQ WB NELJ KZNEDLKDUAA. CSQVE VDEV-FBACP! S'WX OS QQTB EHHZXV.

J.

I had no proof on beholding this meaningless assortment of letters that it had anything to do with my case, but I had a hunch. The question was how to get possession of it without showing my hand. I kept silent for a while, and let the discussion rage as to the proper way to translate it.

My excitable friend McArdle (who did not know me, of course, in my present character), naturally as the finder of the paper took a leading

## part in the discussion. The principals of the company had not yet

emerged from their dressing-rooms. My opportunity came when McArdle stated in his positive way that it was a code, and that it was not possible to translate it without having the code-book.

"A code is generally regular words," I suggested mildly, as became the newest and humblest member of the company. "Nobody would ever think up these crazy combinations of letters. I should say it was a cryptogram."

McArdle wouldn't acknowledge that he didn't know what a cryptogram was, but somebody else asked.

"Substituting one letter for another according to a numerical key," I said. "Easy enough to translate it if you can hit on the key."

One thing led to another and soon came the inevitable challenge.

"Bet you a dollar you can't read it!" cried McArdle.