We retraced our steps pondering on the significance of the discovery.
O’Connor had had men out endeavouring all day to get a clue to the motor car that had been mentioned in some of the accounts given by the natives. So far the best he had been able to find was a report of a large red touring car which crossed from New York on a late ferry. In it were a man and a girl as well as a chauffeur who wore goggles and a cap pulled down over his head so that he was practically unrecognisable. The girl might have been Miss Curtis and, as for the man, it might have been Clendenin. No one had bothered much with them; no one had taken their number; no one had paid any attention where they went after the ferry landed. In fact, there would have been no significance to the report if it had not been learned that early in the morning on the first ferry from the lower end of the island to New Jersey a large red touring car answering about the same description had crossed, with a single man and driver but no woman.
“I should like to watch here with you to-night, O’Connor,” said Craig as we parted. “Meet us here. In the meantime I shall call on Jameson with his well-known newspaper connections in the white light district,” here he gave me a half facetious wink, “to see what he can do toward getting me admitted to this gilded palace of dope up there on Forty-fourth Street.”
After no little trouble Kennedy and I discovered our “hop joint” and were admitted by Nichi Moto, of whom we had heard. Kennedy gave me a final injunction to watch, but to be very careful not to seem to watch.
Nichi Moto with an eye to business and not to our absorbing more than enough to whet our descriptive powers quickly conducted us into a large room where, on single bamboo couches or bunks, rather tastefully made, perhaps half a dozen habitues lay stretched at full length smoking their pipes in peace, or preparing them in great expectation from the implements on the trays before them.
Kennedy relieved me of the responsibility of cooking the opium by doing it for both of us and, incidentally, dropping a hint not to inhale it and to breathe as little of it as possible. Even then it made me feel badly, though he must have contrived in some way to get even less of the stuff than I. A couple of pipes, and Kennedy beckoned to Nichi.
“Where is Mr. Clendenin?” he asked familiarly. “I haven’t seen him yet.”
The Japanese smiled his engaging smile. “Not know,” was all he said, and yet I knew the fellow at least knew better English, if not more facts.
Kennedy had about started on our faking a third “pipe” when a new, unexpected arrival beckoned excitedly to Nichi. I could not catch all that was said but two words that I did catch were “the boss” and “hop toy,” the latter the word for opium. No sooner had the man disappeared without joining the smokers than Nichi seemed to grow very restless and anxious. Evidently he had received orders to do something. He seemed anxious to close the place and get away. I thought that some one might have given a tip that the place was to be raided, but Kennedy, who had been closer, had overheard more than I had and among other things he had caught the word, “meet him at the same place.”
It was not long before we were all politely hustled out.