CHAPTER X
THE STENOGRAPHER STILL LISTENING
The visitors who came and went occasionally up the back stairs at Blatchford Ferguson's office were a motley lot. Silk hats and expensive overcoats sometimes hung on the hooks in the corner. Again, ill-kempt figures slunk up that back way and signal-tapped an entrance; for in his police-reporter days Blatch Ferguson had been interested in the study of underworld types and he made no secret of his intention of one day writing an authoritative work upon the psychology of crime.
The big leather chair, so placed that it faced the light and left the lawyer in partial shadow behind his desk, had held many a strange and anxious caller in its day. Great men, men of national importance, had sat in that deep old leather chair; but with fine passivity it yielded the same comforts to men who only thought they were important.
Just now it was occupied by Mr. Hugh Podmore—within an hour of that worthy's arrival in the city. At three p.m. his new-found friend, Philip Kendrick, had agreed to call upon Ferguson to corroborate the story which Mr. Podmore had just finished telling and to which his auditor had listened with great intentness, that being the only indication of surprise which the practiced Mr. Ferguson permitted himself to exhibit.
"You always were pretty cock-sure of yourself, Poddy, even back in the days when we both worked on the old Tribune," commented Ferguson with a smirk of amusement. "But this proposition of yours is the deckle-edged limit and no mistake. If you were anybody else I'd have a lot of fun—kicking you downstairs!"
"Old stuff, Fergey!" grinned Podmore, unperturbed. "You don't need to pull that for my benefit. Talk brass tacks. Kendrick will be here in ten minutes with all the proof you want that I'm handing it to you straight and that that campaign-fund wad of Nickleby's is where I can lay hands on it. Do I pass it to you or must I hand it over to Charlie Cady? Guess the Opposition'll know what to do with it. I'm asking you this: What's it worth to the Government to win the next election? That's the little old answer I want."
"Would a couple of million satisfy you? How'll you have it?—in fives and tens?" and Mr. Ferguson gravely stroked his fleshy red nose.
"Be serious, Fergey," protested Podmore. "You can see for yourself that I came near getting killed, lining this thing up."
"I could not be more serious if you really had got killed, Poddy," and again he stroked the emblem of his entrez to the social functions of John Barleycorn. "I'm afraid your mind is warping in the sunshine of your own cleverness, Poddy. This fool notion of yours—coming to me about this money Nickleby's lost—if anybody had told me that once that long green was in your possession you'd come away back here——"
"What do you take me for, Ferguson?—a thief?" glared Podmore angrily.
"Opportunist is not so harsh a word," soothed the lawyer, thoroughly enjoying the baiting. He frowned with an abrupt change of manner. "You want brass tacks, do you? Here they are, then. That money is none of my business, none of the Government's business. Understand that clearly. You say it was a campaign-fund contribution. How do I know it was? It never reached us. It's Nickleby's money and its loss is his funeral. Go and report to him and try to understand the meaning of the word 'loyalty.' Our party doesn't care a tinker's dam who has had, now has, or will have that envelope. And if you want to get thrown out by the scruff of the neck just try going to headquarters with your crazy proposition."
"You—surely you don't mean that, Fergey, old man?" said Podmore, searching the other's face with misgiving.
"Every word of it. And here's something else, Podmore, that I won't charge you for. If you're wise you'll take a straight tip and get out of this office as fast as you know how—out of town—clean out of the country! You don't seem to keep as well posted on the latest news as you used to. Have you read that?"
Ferguson had opened a drawer as he spoke and tossed out a newspaper, so folded that an item encircled by red ink was uppermost. Podmore slowly picked up the paper. As his glance travelled quickly through the marked item his face paled—what part of it was not black and blue.
"Oh, Rives, eh? I—No, I didn't know he was out of the pen." He tried hard to keep his voice steady, but did not succeed very well.
"He's been out over two weeks now," nodded Ferguson, making no effort to conceal his contempt. "And he hasn't forgotten that a fresh newspaper reporter by the name of Podmore played him a dirty trick twelve years ago. He's sworn to get you for that."
"How—how do you know this?" asked Podmore hoarsely.
"'Itchy' McGuire called to see me day before yesterday. He's met Rives. If I were you I'd hunt me up a nice little island somewhere in the Tropics where you can live with the rest of the monkeys; they might elect you to Parliament or crown you king or something. Rives is one bad actor and he's sore—good and sore."
Podmore's attempted laugh had no mirth in it. He reached for his hat, and as he said a hasty good-bye he did not look at all well. For several minutes after he had closed the rear door Blatchford Ferguson leaned back in his chair, chuckling.
Now, while this remarkable interview was taking place in the inner sanctum Phil Kendrick was again shaking hands with Conway in the outer office. A moment later he went on through to the secretary's office, speculating on just what he should say to the self-contained Miss Williams. But, as before, he found her office deserted. To his amazement when he glanced through the inner doorway he saw her for the second time on one knee in front of the keyhole of Ferguson's private office.
She came towards him swiftly, closing the doors behind her as she had done on the occasion of his first visit. She was very angry; that much was apparent.
"I'll admit, Miss Williams, that it is often extremely difficult to break off a bad habit——"
"Mr. Ferguson is busy," she snapped.
"I would judge as much," said Kendrick dryly. "He is expecting me. If you will just hand him my card please,—Thank you."
He was surprised at the look of disdain with which she took his card. Surely this girl whom he had caught twice in the act of eavesdropping upon her employer ought to be grateful for his silence, his toleration of such an utter misdemeanor! Instead, her whole attitude was one of dislike. She made no attempt to conceal it. It might do her good to get a sharp rebuke from Ferguson, and he was of two minds whether or not to speak to the lawyer about her. Then he remembered that she was only substituting and that dismissal would not mean much to her. There was the chance that it was just her woman's curiosity to know what was going on. Women were often like that, he had heard.
"Mr. Ferguson will see you now. Tell him anything you like." She eyed him coolly.
Phil gave her a cheerful smile as he passed on into the private office.
Podmore had just gone.
"I had no trouble in getting a line on him for you, Phil. He came in right after you 'phoned and has been here ever since. Now, what the devil's the meaning of all this? What are you up to?"
"Tell me just what he said to you, Blatch," said Kendrick, refusing a cigar and filling his pipe.
"He said he gave you the envelope to mail and that you hid it for him in a hollow stump near the water-tank at Thorlakson Siding when Wade came after it. He said that Wade and Cranston gave both of you the third degree and that you lit into Wade and gave him one awful calling down for not accepting your word that you hadn't seen any envelope and knew nothing about it. He said it made Wade so mad that he not only fired Podmore but told you also that you couldn't work for the C.L.S. another minute, so it was no use you rejoining this survey party you were with. It's a swell kettle of fish you've got into, Phil. What's your uncle going to say to all this?"
"Nothing. Unless you tell him he won't know I've bumped into this mix.
He's got enough worries of his own without bothering about me."
"But Phil,——"
"Listen, Blatch. I know what was in that envelope and where it came from. I want to know where Uncle Milt stands in connection with this campaign-fund money, and I want to know what Podmore is trying to do. What did he want?"
"Podmore isn't as clever as he thinks he is," Ferguson laughed. "He actually came here to see if he could work out a little graft proposition by threatening to expose a deal which he imagines has taken place between the Alderson Construction Company and your uncle. His mind works that way. He thinks everybody is as crooked as himself and that all governments are like the late Rives administration. Well, he knows different now."
"Then no such deal is involved?"
"Good heavens, Phil! Surely you didn't think that? Neither your uncle nor the Party cares a hang about this money of Nickleby's or Alderson's, or whoever owns it. We're not interested in what becomes of it. There's been no deal of any kind."
"That's all I want to know, Blatch," said Kendrick, rising. "It's just one of those things a fellow bumps into now and then, and if Uncle Milt needed my help at all I wanted to know it, that's all. I know he's absolutely on the square, of course."
"Absolutely," assured Ferguson earnestly. "Your uncle is one of the hardest working, most conscientious and high principled public men of the day, Phil, and perhaps I have had greater opportunity of knowing that than most. No man can hold high public office, seemingly, without paying the penalty of prominence—petty jealousy, envy, deliberate misrepresentation, even underhand attacks upon his character. A certain class of political aspirant seems to look on that sort of thing as part of the game, and you don't want to believe all you see in some newspapers around election time. That's the way it's been. But false accusation never yet downed an honest man, Phil. Remember that."
As Kendrick noted the expression on the lawyer's face he thought to himself that in spite of the marks of dissipation which marred it, there was a finer side to Blatch Ferguson's character which few would suspect.
"Please say nothing about my connection with Podmore, Blatch. It was an unavoidable unpleasantness which is now over. Some day soon when I have more time I'll drop in and give you all the details."
Miss Margaret Williams was nowhere about, he noted, as he took his departure.
Kendrick caught the next ferry across the bay to the Island and walked in on his uncle's housekeeper. He found that once more he had the big summer residence to himself, that his uncle had taken a flying trip to New York. That meant that his aunt would be alone in the summer cottage at Sparrow Lake, except for the servants, and he decided suddenly to run up and see her that very evening. After glancing through a slight accumulation of mail he changed to outing flannels and hied to the boathouse for an hour's run in the launch—out through the Eastern Gap into the open lake, where he could cut away across miles of blue water that danced invitingly in the golden sunshine on and on to the horizon's clear rim. All alone out there with the wash of the water, the steady undertone of the engine throbbing in his ears and the cool breeze blowing through his hair, he could sort out his thoughts.
They were inclined to tangle. He had yet to plan how he would proceed to obtain the information which Ben Wade wanted in regard to J. C. Nickleby. The railroad executive had traced certain consignments of cheap whisky which had been run through to construction camps in the northern part of the province and had his own suspicions as to the source from which the bootleggers were obtaining funds. If the luck which had attended Phil's first efforts to learn what Podmore was planning held good, it ought not to be difficult; but there would be no Blatch Ferguson to help him out in a task which would call for the utmost circumspection.
Podmore could be dismissed as of the brood of Esau, willing to sell to the highest bidder anybody's birthright upon which he could lay hands. Ferguson's confident assurance that the stolen campaign fund contribution,—if that was what it had been intended to be,—implicated the Government in no way, could be accepted without question. Had it been otherwise, Ferguson would have been galvanized to action of some sort. At any rate, the sudden disappearance of the money before it reached its destination eliminated it so far as the Government was concerned.
This much was clear to Kendrick. Beyond wondering greatly how such a substantial sum as fifty thousand dollars could drop from sight mysteriously without creating general excitement, he dismissed the matter as outside his immediate concern. If the actual money had been in Wade's possession, as Podmore had been led to believe, Phil would have been more perplexed about it; even Wade's evident inside knowledge of the transaction was sufficiently mystifying. That probably was part of the "puzzle" which would be divulged in due course. Kendrick knew that in the modern business world with its constant clashes between powerful financial interests there were many undercurrents which a young man fresh from college could not hope to gauge. He was content, therefore, to accept Wade's superior judgment without question, to follow instructions faithfully, secure in the knowledge that Benjamin Wade was a man of the highest integrity.
The railroad president had gone on to Montreal and beyond delivery of a letter to Nathaniel Lawson and the obtaining of an answer to it, his final instructions to his new secretary had been simple.
"If you can get Nat Lawson to tell you his story, Phil, you'll spend one interesting evening," he had suggested. "Good business for you to know all about the Interprovincial. Use your own judgment and good luck to you."
There was no hurry about calling on Lawson; it could wait till he got back from this rush visit to Sparrow Lake. But what about this girl in Ferguson's office? What a pippin! Phil was unable to decide whether she had been listening at the keyhole because she had gone there for that very purpose or whether he had surprised her merely taking advantage of accidental opportunity to satisfy her curiosity. She interested him greatly—probably because she was so pretty and had rebuffed him so unmistakably.
He amused himself by absurd speculations about her. If she did have a definite object in spying on Ferguson, the solitaire diamond on her engagement finger might be a bluff; her cheap manner, so out of keeping with refinement of feature and dress,—that might be faked likewise. If she were one of these female detectives you read about, who had hired her? Was she in the pay of Nickleby? If she were, it was Kendrick's duty to keep an eye on her, wasn't it? And she was a tonic for any eye!
Phil laughed at himself as he put the wheel over and swung back towards home. He was becoming an utter fool! Darn girls, anyway! This was the second one on whom he had wasted thought—one probably a thief and the other a gum-chewing stenographer who was going to marry somebody in Buffalo! And that, too, after each had told him quite plainly that if he would just remove himself entirely from their ken they could go on living happily! Just because he had happened to meet these two girls under exceptional circumstances was no justification for placing them on pedestals. King Solomon had the right idea. Poof! the seven seas were full of fish!
With which swaggering philosophy did this strong-minded young man sweep all womenkind from his thoughts—all but Aunt Dolly, who had no equal anywhere in the world. He had left himself just enough time to get to the station without undue haste. Sparrow Lake was a popular summer resort for those who wished to forget the noise of the city and enjoy the quiet surroundings of forest and lake, where good fishing was to be had in combination with fresh cream daily and vegetables in season. The cottage the Warings had rented for the season was on one of the islands, and two hours later Phil was rowing eagerly over from the station landing. He let out a whoop like a wild Indian to announce his arrival and his aunt came running down to meet him, her gentle face alight with pleasure and surprise. He swept her up off her feet and kissed her till her cheeks were wild-rose pink, very becoming with her fluffy aureole of snow-white hair.
Arm in arm they went towards the cottage, talking and laughing. The two were very near to each other and he had a lot of interesting things to tell her. He knew she would be delighted to learn of his new position as Ben Wade's private secretary and she was; but he was careful to keep from her any details of recent happenings that would be liable to cause her anxiety. The conversation arranged its own itinerary over such a wide range of topics that it was late that evening before they had "talked themselves to a standstill," as he put it.
Phil did not feel sleepy. Instead of retiring at once he lingered on the screened balcony just off his room and lighted a final pipe of tobacco. Back came the two mysterious young women to trouble his thoughts and he did not dismiss them. The night was in harmony with mystery; also there was a rising moon, hung low, golden like a lamp, its dull glow lighting only the outer water spaces.
In that lake and forest country Nature seemed to brood in a deep hush which but gathered accentuation from the raucous bass of the bullfrogs and occasional weird night sounds of birds and animals in the depths of the woods. The deep quiet was oppressive after the city's multitude of noises. Earlier in the evening while he talked with his aunt he had remarked upon the great distinctness with which the putt-putt of a motorboat somewhere on the lake had carried. Now when a whip-poor-will flew to a nearby tree its rapid-fire call flung wide insistently: Whip'rweel, whip'rweel, whip'rweel, whip'rweel, whip'rweel, whip'rweel. . . .
"Go to it, old boy;" murmured Phil with some amusement, his thoughts recalled at last to his surroundings.
As if insulted, the bird ceased abruptly and flew away. A dead stick snapped at the edge of the clearing. It sounded like the report of a small pistol and as Kendrick smiled at the start the sound gave him he was sub-consciously aware that the bellowings of the frogs had stopped. His glance in the direction of the sound was purely automatic, but his attention was rivetted instantly by a movement among the trees at a point where they thinned out against a silvering background of the lake.
There was no mistake about it. The slinking figure of a man was visible against the water.