CONCERNING THE IDENTITY OF THE MAN WITH THE HIGH VOICE
I had my first good look at him while he moved deliberately past me and up to the door of the house: A man past middle age, in frock-coat and silk hat in spite of the season, heavy without portliness, a figure of an elderly athlete. A shock of iron-gray hair brushed the back of his collar, and his face was a face to ponder over, a face at once square and aquiline, broad forehead, predatory nose, and the massive lips and jawbones of a conqueror, clear-cut under a skin of creamy ivory. He might have been a Roman emperor in time-worn marble. While I stood irresolute, wondering whether to follow, and on what pretext I should do so, the door swung open and he passed ponderously within; and the next instant Mrs. Tabor appeared at the ground-floor window, motioning to me frantically. I came forward, but she as frantically waved me back, and seemed to indicate by her gestures that I was to keep the taxicab where it was. A moment later she slipped out of the door like a fugitive, ran across the sidewalk, and fell in a heap inside the cab, crying: "Take me away, quickly! Oh, take me away!"
I directed the astonished driver to the Grand Central, and sprang in beside her. She was very pale and breathing in sobbing gasps; and remembering her weak heart, I was alarmed almost for her life. But she began to recover as soon as we were fairly in motion, and by the time we had gone a few blocks was apparently beyond the immediate danger of collapse. She was still, however, pitifully pale and shaken, clutching unconsciously at my arm, and whispering: "That man—that man—" like a frightened child.
"Whom do you mean?" I asked. "Not the chauffeur? He went the other way as soon as you were inside."
"Chauffeur? No, what chauffeur? I mean the old man that came in after me. He comes after me everywhere. I can't get away from him. Is he coming now?" She tried to look out of the window.
"There's no one coming," I said blindly. "He sent his car away, and he couldn't follow us if he tried. It's all right."
"Really? Are you quite sure?" She sat up, and began setting her hair to rights with little aimless pats and pushes. "You must think me ill or crazy, Mr. Crosby," she went on with a faint smile, "but if you could only understand, you would see that I'm not so absurd as I seem."
"But who is he?"
"He's the worst of them all. He's the head of it. My own people would hear reason if it weren't for him. He knows—oh, he knows all the things that nobody ought to. He doesn't want me ever to see Miriam— I can't get away from him. I can't possibly get away from him." She was growing hysterical again, and I dared not let her go on, much as I wanted to hear more.
"He isn't here, anyway," I said. "He isn't anywhere about, and he isn't coming, and you have got away from him this time. And I'm going to take you safe home and see that no one troubles you any more."
I felt that I was talking like a fool, but my reassurance, fatuous as it was, had its suggestive effect. She grew steadier, and I was able to lead her mind away from its terror, until, as we reached the station, she had become almost like herself.
"Mr. Crosby," she said as the cab stopped, "you've done me a difficult service very tactfully, and you are a wonderful nurse; I'm really quite myself now, and there's no need at all of your coming home with me. But I want you to understand a little why I had such an absurd shock. That man is insane, and I'm afraid of him. But I can't make the family believe it."
I tried to pay the least possible attention. "I'd better come with you anyhow," I said carelessly, "just to be on hand. There's no harm in having a man along."
She protested that she was quite well, and that there was not the slightest occasion for my trouble. And indeed, she was so marvelously recovered that it was hard for me to believe my own memory of the last few minutes: the oppression had passed from her as a slate is cleared by a sponge, and there was hardly a sign of visible nervousness to show that she had been excited. Nevertheless, I could not leave her so, though I was racking my brain for an explanation, and raging at the responsibility which prevented me from hurrying back to seek it. As I was buying the tickets, a god from the machine appeared in the person of Sheila, armed for travel and looking more anxious than ourselves. She took possession of the older woman like a nurse discovering a lost child.
"Here ye are on your way home again," she cried, "an' me thinkin' I'd have to go all the way out alone on the hot thrain, with no one better than meself. That man of mine's off to sea, Mrs. Tabor, an' Miss Margaret sent me word to come back an' make meself useful. But ye'd be knowin' that already. Ye're only in the city for the day?"
"Mrs. Tabor and I have been lunching together," I said, "and it seemed so hot in town that I hardly liked to have her go home alone."
"Ye've been—" Sheila shot a quick glance at me. "Well, there'll be no need, Mr. Crosby, unless ye were to come to Stamford yourself anyway," and she began to inquire volubly after the health of the family.
Mrs. Tabor turned to me. "There really is nothing for you to do, Mr. Crosby, except to come soon and see me again," she said brightly. "I'm quite well, and I'm in safe hands, as you see—"
So far as I could tell, she was right; and I had no further need of overriding dismissal. I saw them both safely on the train, and hurried back; resolved to reach the bottom of at least this new mystery before I slept that night. My telephone call was answered by Reid, upon whom I wasted no unnecessary words, telling him only that Mrs. Tabor had been continuously with me, and was now on her way home in charge of Sheila.
"Why on earth didn't you 'phone before?" he snapped.
"Couldn't," said I shortly. "Good-by," and I raced for the subway.
A north-bound express was just leaving, and I had barely time to squeeze inside the door. The nearest station to the house would be Sixty-sixth Street; but by taking the express to Seventy-second, and running back on a local, I should save time. I hung on my strap, fidgeting with impatience while we howled through the clashing darkness and flashed past the blurred brilliancy of the stations. As we passed Sixty-sixth Street, a local drew out in the same direction as ourselves, running for a moment side by side with us before it fell behind. Its rows of lighted windows balanced almost within reach; and close inside, in one of the cross-seats amidships of the car, sat the man whose mere presence had so terrified Mrs. Tabor.
There was no mistaking that face, even if the silk hat and formal frock-coat had not been at that season almost an identification in themselves. I could as soon have mistaken Ibsen or Napoleon appearing before me in the flesh. The massive head was bent forward thoughtfully, and one broad white hand lay loose along the window-sill. I noticed a plain gold ring on the little finger. Then, as the express began to slacken speed, the window moved slowly past me and out of sight ahead. I had a strong sense of having seen the face many times before, though, try as I would, I could not fit it to a name. He was either some person well enough known to have his picture often in print or else the striking distinction of his features had given me that impression.
The local was standing at the platform as we drew into Seventy-second Street, and I pushed out and across to it with small regard for the amenities of the crowded station. A score of people, it seemed, were possessed of personal designs to block my way. I dodged a chanticleer hat, caromed off a hot and angry commuter or so, and found myself scrambling at the tail of the impatient cluster before the sliding-doors.
"Little lively, please!" roared the guard. "Lennux 'n West Farms, local train! Both gates!"
I did my best, but there were too many ahead of me. Even as I reached for that grip on the door-casing, which meant the right to squeeze inside, the door clicked shut before my face; and two dull clanks of the gong sealed my disappointment. I ran wildly along the train, trying to overtake the relay of sliding doors and jangling bells; but it was of no use. Then for an infuriating minute or two the train stood still, locked and inviolable, while the station alarm chattered overhead, and through the gleaming window I could see my man sitting calmly in his place. As it creaked out into the darkness, another express growled in behind me; and I had still presence of mind enough to slip aboard. My one chance was that we might overtake that local in a favorable spot.
Seventy-ninth and Eighty-sixth Streets blurred past without a sign. Then a little beyond the latter I caught sight of the local, and gradually we drew alongside. He was still there, drumming idly on the window-pane with his white fingers, and looking disinterestedly straight across at me. I had a momentary impulse to conceal my face, until I remembered that he had never seen me. So for a second we stared at each other, pursuer and pursued, the one utterly unconscious of the other. My train passed forward with increasing speed, while I counted the cars—one—two—three—he was in the fourth. Either he must come into Ninety-sixth Street or get off at Ninety-first; and the chances were in favor of my finding him still in the train at Ninety-sixth.
I got out there, crossed over to the local platform, and waited. When the train came in, I was opposite the fourth car. The center seat was empty, and I sought in vain among the passengers thronging to the doors. Then I hurried back ahead of the crowd, and from before the ticket window ran my eyes again over the platform to make sure. Well, he had left the train at the last station; it was a question of seconds. I was in the street above in less time than it takes to tell it, and swung myself recklessly aboard a passing south-bound surface car; but a stream of trucks and automobiles blocked the track; and before we passed the next corner I jumped off and ran. Three blocks I went at the top of my speed, my breath growing shorter at every stride. And then, nearly a block away to the westward, I caught sight of the silk hat against the reddening sky.
It was an easy matter enough to overtake the man. He walked along slowly and rather heavily, glancing upward at the numbers of the houses; and presently he paused to verify an address in a pocketbook. I might have spoken to him then, but I hesitated for a pretext. His name was what I wanted first; and in my ignorance of the circumstances it would be safer to settle one thing at a time. While I debated with myself, he went up the steps of a house near West End Avenue. Since it was evidently not his home, nothing could be lost by a little patient consideration; so lighting a cigarette, of which by now I felt considerable need, I strolled to and fro before the house, while I pondered my next move. Five or ten minutes went by, and I was on the point of ringing the bell and asking who it was that had just come in, when the electric brougham purred around the corner, with my friend Thomas sitting stolidly at the wheel. At the moment, I happened to be nearly at the other end of the block, and before I reached the spot where the brougham had drawn up my man had come out of the house. I could hardly question his servant before his face. And the next minute he had clambered in and driven decorously away.
I ran as far as the corner, looking about in all directions for a taxicab. None was in sight; and to follow afoot for any distance was, of course, impossible. I should have to be content with the number of the brougham and such information as inquiries at the two houses I knew the man to have visited might yield. Then a boy came by on a decrepit bicycle, and I caught at his handles.
"Let me take your wheel," I panted. He twisted his face into position for a howl. "Nonsense, kid, I'm not going to steal it. Look at me. Here," I thrust a bill into his hand. "That's more than your machine's worth, and I'll send it back to you in an hour. Where do you live?"
He told me in a dazed sort of tone, and I was wavering on my way almost before he had finished. The wheel ran abominably hard, and was so much too low for me that my knees barely cleared the handle-bars; still, it meant all the difference between losing the brougham altogether and being able to follow it easily. All the way down to the fifties it led me, and eastward beyond Madison Avenue, halting at last before a rigid-looking domicile whose lower window displayed a strip of ground glass with the legend: "Immanuel Paulus, M. D."
Somehow, the name was indefinitely familiar, as the face had been. I wasted no time in surmise, but went straight up to the door.
"Was that Doctor Paulus who just came in?" I asked the maid. She looked me over cautiously.
"Who was it wanted to see him, sir?"
"He wouldn't know me," I said, "it's only that I have something which I think he lost in the street."
The trick worked, as I had expected, and a moment later my man stood before me identified, even to the shrill precision of his voice with its tinge of German accent.
"I found this in front of your door, Doctor," said I, "and I thought you had dropped it as you went in." And I handed him my silver pocket-knife. Deliberately he produced his own, and with deliberate courtesy pointed out my mistake. I thought as the door closed behind me that there had been a glint of recognition in his eyes. But the final step remained to take; and with an aching swarm of suspicions writhing in my brain, I sought out a public telephone.
"Mac," I asked, "who and what is Doctor Immanuel Paulus?" and the answer I had expected set the keystone upon a whole arch of tottering reminiscences.
"Biggest alienist and nerve-shark in town; biggest in the country, I guess. He was the old guy sittin' alone in the corner at that spook-hunt. D'you remember?"