It was true that to Trent’s room much dry gin and lemon juice found its way, together with siphons of iced carbonic. The carbonic and the lemon juice was drunk since a belated heat wave was visiting the Sunset Park Hotel. The gin found its way into his flower laden window boxes, which should have bloomed into juniper berries. Trent liked a drink as well as any other golfer, but he found that it just took the keen edge off his nerves. He was less keen to realize danger and too ready to meet a risk when he drank. As a conscientious workman he put it behind him when professionally engaged.
On the night of the ball he was, to quote a bell boy, dead to the world, which proves that bell boys may be deceived by appearances. On the night of the ball he was keyed up to his highest personal efficiency.
Physically he was at his best. His muscles were always hard and his wind good. The resisting exercises he practised maintained the former and a little running every day aided the latter.
The great costume ball was to take place on the third of September, when the sun would set at half-past six. The Uplands was no more than a half hour motor spin distant from the hotel. The time set was half-past nine, which meant few would be there before ten. It was plain then that Mrs. Jerome Dangerfield would not commence her preparations for dressing until after the dinner. She was devoted to the pleasures of the table, as her maid lamented when she harnessed her mistress within her corsets.
Looking from his window, Trent saw that the sun had retired behind clouds early in the afternoon. Darkness would not be delayed, and the success of his venture depended upon this.
Reviewing the amazing events of the evening of September the third, it is only fair to let Jerome Dangerfield relieve his feelings in a letter to his closest friend, the president of the First Agricultural Bank of New York.
“You were right in warning me not to bring the Mt. Aubyn ruby up to this place. It was Adele’s fault. She wanted it for the wedding. The damned thing has gone, Steve, vanished into thin air. If you told me what I’m going to tell you, I should say you were crazy. The people here and the fool police thought I’d been drinking. I’d had three or four cocktails, but what is that to me—or you? I was absolutely in possession of my senses.
“We dined early and we dined alone. At eight I went down for the jewels Adele wanted to wear. The ruby was the pièce de résistance of course. I went down my own private stairway as usual and unlocked the door leading from it to the hotel lobby. Devlin is here, and O’Brien, but they were both outside keeping tabs on strangers. The papers have played this costume ball up so much that every crook in the land knew what we had to offer in the way of loot. Graham, the hotel clerk, came with me to the private stairway and swears he pushed the door to as I started to go up the stairs. And he swears also that, although it wasn’t lighted as well as usual, there was nobody in sight. They are steep stairs, Steve, but they save me rubbing shoulders with every man or woman who might want to get acquainted in the public elevators; and, naturally, I wasn’t carrying a fortune where any crook could get a crack at me.
“Read this carefully. I was on the fifteenth step of the flight of twenty-two steps when the thing happened. The light was dim because one of the bulbs wasn’t working and the only illumination came from a red light at the head of the stairway.
“I was holding the jewel box in both hands resting it almost on my chest when the thing happened. There was suddenly a noise that might have been made by the beating of wings and something swooped out of nowhere and hit me on my wrists with such violence that I went backwards down the stairs and was unconscious for more than ten minutes. On each wrist there is an abrasion that might be caused by the sharp bill of a big bird. I’m bruised all over and have three stitches over one eye.