When at length the file of the newspaper was before him and he was turning the pages, he noted that his fingers were unsteady and that perspiration was oozing from every pore. Carefully he scanned each headline, running down column after column with keen scrutiny. Ten minutes passed and he had reached nearly the middle of the month without finding so much as a line of what he sought. Much of the matter, however, was familiar, from which he argued that the date of revelation must be farther on. Each leaf of the book of days he turned now with dread expectation. He had been standing, the file on a table at arm’s length, but suddenly he sat down, stunned by the message of the types that faced him:
“Carey Grey an Embezzler—Well-known Wall Street Broker Hypothecates Firm’s Securities and Disappears—Upwards of a Hundred Thousand Dollars Gone.”
His heart was pounding very hard and his head was bursting.
“It’s a lie,” he muttered, inaudibly, “an outrageous, despicable lie. It’s impossible. It’s preposterous. Embezzle from my own firm? It’s ridiculous.”
He leaned forward and pulled the file of papers down until one end rested in his lap, and then he read hastily, but with the scrupulous heed of absolute concentration, every word of the two columns that told with minute detail the story of his defalcation and flight.
“Carey Grey, of the firm of Mallory & Grey, stockbrokers, with offices in the Mills Building,” began the account, “has been missing for a week and securities to the value of $110,000, it was discovered yesterday, have disappeared from the firm’s safe deposit vault. Most of the securities, including first mortgage bonds of the Chicago & Northwestern Railroad Company, to the amount of $40,000, and Brooklyn Rapid Transit 5s, worth $40,000 more, Grey hypothecated, personally, with the Shoe and Leather Bank on the day prior to his flight.
“The news of the defalcation caused a sensation in the Street and in society as well. Carey Grey was one of the most popular members of the Stock Exchange and his character had always been regarded as beyond reproach. A member of an old New York family—his mother was a Livingstone—his social position was of the best. He occupied bachelor apartments in the Dunscombe, on Sixty-sixth street, near Madison avenue, and his name appears on the membership lists of the Union, Knickerbocker, and other clubs.
“Mr. Mallory, his partner, said yesterday: ‘Mr. Grey was at his desk last Wednesday when I reached the office, and he was there when I went away at half-past three. There was nothing unusual in his manner. He discussed with me several matters of business and spoke of a certain directors’ meeting that he should attend the next day. I have not seen or heard from him since. When he did not appear on Thursday I feared he was ill and telephoned to his rooms, but the answer came that he was not in. The whole business is to me inexplicable. I have known Carey Grey from childhood, and I would have been willing to swear that there was not a dishonest bone in his body. But the evidence against him is simply indisputable. The loss struck us at an especially bad time, but we shall pull through all right.’
“Inspector McClusky admitted that he was all at sea concerning Grey’s whereabouts. The case was not reported to him for a week—not until the securities were missed—and so it was quite possible the absconder had left the country; nevertheless he was doing all in his power to locate him.
“At Grey’s apartments yesterday Franz Lutz, his valet, was preparing to seek employment elsewhere.