Uncle Sam, Detective

by William Atherton DuPuy

"Third floor, sir," he replied.

"You bar the exits," Gard said to the house detective, "and I will get back to the third."

On that floor the hallman said that the white-haired gentleman had run down the steps to the second. Gard followed, but was able to find no one on that floor who had seen the fugitive. He ran hastily about looking for possible exits, and then instituted a thorough search. He investigated every possible avenue of escape and hastened downstairs to his ally to help cut off the line of retreat. Every possible barrier was put up and the house was well gone over. The gray-haired fugitive had, however, eluded pursuit.

Gard immediately called upon the Chicago police to throw out a dragnet and a general alarm, and this was done. All railway stations were watched with particular care. But none of these efforts were of any avail, as Berliner was never reported to have been seen again in Chicago. Nor was Gard able to get so much as the glimmer of a trace of him nor a suggestion as to where he might have gone.

It was a task of infinite patience that brought Special Agent William H. Gard to London two months later on the trail of a woman whom he had traced half around the world. The Titian-haired guest of the Chicago hotel, the wife of the fugitive broker, here installed herself for a while and lived in a manner that amounted to absolute seclusion.

Then she went to Paris. There she took rooms in a quiet side street and seemed to settle down with some idea of permanence. There was nothing in her mode of life that would indicate that she lived differently from any other woman who was alone in the world and sought quiet. She went out for a long walk every afternoon, purchased the necessities of her establishment, or books, of which she seemed to read great numbers.

Special Agent Gard established a close watch over the house in which she lived. This was easy because there was but a front entrance and apartments opposite looked out upon the street. He determined that nobody should enter this house without being observed. He asked the Paris police to provide him with two reliable men who could watch with him in shifts from the quarters he rented across the street.

A vigil of two weeks revealed absolutely nothing. With the exception of the servant who came at noon each day and remained not more than four hours, no living creature entered the house. In all that two weeks the postman left no mail. Billy Gard seemed to be up against a blank wall. He held, however, that if a man kept awake on the most hopeless job for a sufficient length of time some clue was sure to develop or some idea present itself that would lead toward results.

Gard investigated the maid who worked the daily short shift in the quarters of the red-haired woman from America. He found her a placid and stupid creature who knew nothing nor had intelligence sufficient for his purpose. Incidentally he found that she had secured her place through an employment agency located at a considerable distance. He immediately made use of this information.

The special agent, through the Paris police force, secured the cooperation of the employment bureau. A position that paid much better was offered to the servant of Mrs. Berliner. It was, quite naturally, accepted. That lady, finding herself without a servant, returned to the agency that had formerly provided her with one who was entirely satisfactory. She asked for a second maid.