The unknown seven A detective story
communication was signed by Hector Englebreth’s secretary. The prim
type and the severe plainness of the engraved name and address in the
upper left-hand corner seemed to convey a breath of the heavy, tomblike
atmosphere that pervaded the Englebreth house.
He chuckled lightly as he flung the letter aside. It was not the first
time that his independent conduct had lost him a client, and the fact
that he was now cut off from all official contact with the Reeves
mystery did not worry him in the least. There was nothing to prevent
him from attacking the problem on his own account. The curt dismissal
puzzled him, however. He wondered what he had done to displease
Englebreth. His client’s warning, spoken just as Cole was leaving the
somber old house the other day, flashed across his mind.
“Be careful,” Englebreth had said.
The words had had a cryptic sound. Cole had wondered at their meaning
then, and he wondered now. Had Englebreth dismissed him because of
his failure to heed a warning which he had not understood? Once
before it had occurred to him that perhaps his client had learned,
in some mysterious manner, of his relations with The Unknown Seven.
Was that what had been in Englebreth’s mind when he uttered that
strange warning? Did his client suspect that Cole was betraying him by
conducting secret negotiations with an enemy? The idea did not seem
very plausible, but he could think of no other solution. On the whole
he felt Englebreth had treated him rather shabbily. He had worked
hard and loyally on the case. The abrupt dismissal was, in reality, a
reflection on his honesty. In his resentment he resolved to demand an
explanation of his former client.
He glanced dubiously at the telephone, recalling that on several
occasions Englebreth had expressed a dislike to holding conversations
over the wire, and he decided that an interview, face to face, would be
more satisfactory. He poured out another saucerful of milk for Toots,
and half an hour later he was ringing the doorbell of the Englebreth
house on Fifth Avenue.
The drizzle and the leaden sky conferred an added touch of melancholy
upon the dismal mansion. The chill, which he always felt on entering
the house, had a keener edge this time. The rooms, with the window
shades lowered as always, seemed darker and more oppressively silent
than usual. The manservant who admitted him regarded him with an air of
thinly veiled suspicion.
“I’ll see if Mr. Englebreth is at home, sir,” he announced. His feet
made no sound as he crossed the thickly carpeted floor and passed
through a door that turned silently on its hinges. In a few moments he
was back. “Mr. Englebreth is not at home,” he declared, dropping the
habitual “sir.”
Cole got up from his chair and gave the servant a playful poke in the
ribs. It was a grotesque piece of levity in that house of frigid
dignity, but he could not resist the temptation.
“You’re a cheerful liar,” he told the man. Then, while the servant
gaped after him in a scandalized way, he strode to the door of the
library and pushed it open. In his wheel chair, beside the black walnut
table, sat Hector Englebreth. A faint color tinged his white face as he
saw the detective.
“Good morning, Mr. Englebreth,” said Cole genially, and he drew up
a chair and sat down. “I know that ‘not at home’ is a polite way of
saying ‘get out,’ and so I walked right in. Hope you don’t mind.”
Englebreth leaned forward in the chair and scowled forbiddingly. His
long white fingers beat a restless tattoo on the table. “Why have you
come?” he demanded. “Did you not receive my letter?”
“I did, and the check, too. Many thanks. The check was quite
satisfactory, but the letter left too many things unsaid. I am here to
ask you why I am being fired off the job.”
Englebreth glanced meaningly at the door. Instead of the long dressing
gown which he usually wore, he was dressed in a suit of plain gray.
“I shall be going out in a few minutes,” he declared stiffly.
“It won’t take you long to answer my question. Don’t you think I am
entitled to an explanation?”
“Of course, if you insist. I instructed my secretary to write you after
I had consulted my wife about the matter. Since it is her brother’s
life that is at stake, she is more vitally concerned than I am, so I
thought it only proper that she should have her say. After I had placed
certain facts before her, she agreed with me that your usefulness to us
is past.”
“Certain facts? What were they?”
“I think you know,” said Englebreth in a hard, dry tone. His deep-set
eyes, oddly brilliant in contrast to his pale face, regarded Cole
accusingly. “I am disappointed in you, Mr. Cole. You impressed me as an
upright, honest man, and I had hoped for better things from you. One of
the harshest experiences in life is the discovery that one has placed
his trust in a person who isn’t worthy of it.”
Cole’s face hardened, and there was an ominous gleam in his eye. “I
think you had better explain that statement, Mr. Englebreth,” he said
with slow emphasis.
Englebreth shrugged. “You are not candid with me. You know quite well
what I mean, so why pretend? For instance, can you look me straight in
the eyes and tell me that you gave a full and truthful report when you
were here the other day?”
“It was truthful,” said Cole, “and as complete as I could make it under
the circumstances. If I did not tell quite all I knew, it was because I
was uncertain in regard to some of the facts.”
A wraith of a smile twisted Englebreth’s thin lips. “And what about the
warning I gave you? I hoped it would serve as a hint that I was aware
of certain mysterious movements on your part. Why did you disregard it?”
A long silence ensued. Each man gazed sharply into the other’s eyes.
There was a glint of steel in Cole’s, a look of stern reproach in
Englebreth’s.
“Well?” said the invalid. The pale, mirthless smile was still hovering
about his lips. “What have you to say, Mr. Cole?”
“You have been spying on me evidently?”
“You are using an unpleasant word. I have merely verified certain
suspicions that concern you. I have also discovered certain facts which
you have seen fit to conceal from me, facts which have a direct bearing
on the fate of my brother-in-law. I don’t think there is anything
further to be said.”
Cole got up. He could not understand where, or by what means, the
invalid had obtained his information, but it was evident that
Englebreth’s mind was made up, and that no amount of argument could
make him change his views.
“You are wrong, Mr. Englebreth,” he said evenly. “A lot of queer things
have happened, things I don’t understand myself. But, believe it or
not, I have played fair with you from beginning to end. Some time
before long I hope to prove it to you.”
“Indeed!” said Englebreth. “I am sure it will be interesting.”
His tone and the smile that accompanied the words made Cole
instinctively clench his fists. Then he turned away, before his anger
should get the better of him, and hurried from the house. Out in the
drizzle and under the gray sky he shook off his resentment and laughed
at himself. It was ridiculous that a peevish old invalid should make
him lose his temper. Some day, when he had probed the Reeves affair to
the bottom, he would make Englebreth eat his words. Just now he had
more important things to consider than the aspersions of an infirm old
man.
He crossed the street and was about to board a bus when he chanced
to look back and saw a large car draw up in front of the house. A
moment later the massive front door opened, and two servants appeared,
carrying Englebreth between them. They assisted him into the car, and
Cole gazed speculatively after the vehicle, as it glided away down
Fifth Avenue. It was a rare thing for Englebreth to venture beyond
the gloomy confines of his house, and Cole wondered where he might
be going. Perhaps he was about to get into touch with his mysterious
source of information. In that case Cole might learn a great deal by
following him.
“Taxi, sir,” said a voice, and a cab slowed down at the corner where he
stood. Cole’s hesitation lasted only a moment longer.
“Follow that green car over there,” he directed. The chauffeur nodded,
and Cole jumped in. The pursuit proved long and devious; again and
again Cole chided himself for wasting valuable time. Then the green car
stopped in front of an office building, and the chauffeur went inside.
Cole dismissed the taxi and took up a position across the street. From
where he stood he could catch an occasional glimpse of Englebreth
through the partly shaded window of the car.
“Guess I’m chasing a wild goose,” he glumly told himself.
Englebreth’s chauffeur reappeared, accompanied by another man, and
the two lifted the invalid from the car and carried him inside the
building. Slowly Cole started to cross the street. The man assisting
the chauffeur seemed to carry his part of the burden awkwardly, and
Cole could hear the infirm man’s peevish protests. The two men entered
an elevator with their load, and the cage started upward, just as Cole
stepped inside the building.
A strange, unaccountable feeling came over him as he gazed after the
disappearing lift. He was conscious of a faint tingling from head
to foot. With an abstracted look in his eyes he gazed upward, then
to the sides. He moved about along the row of elevators, and even
his footfalls had a curious sound, a sound that he seemed to vaguely
recognize. The elevator starter approached and inquired what he was
looking for, but Cole only shook his head in a preoccupied way.
Suddenly he laughed aloud. In a twinkling all his confused impressions
clarified. Once more he glanced upward. He knew, though he could not
tell why or how, that far overhead was the rendezvous of The Unknown
Seven.
CHAPTER XIV
COLE’S RUSE
Cole’s conviction that he had found the building occupied by The
Unknown Seven was a matter of instinct rather than reason. He felt that
once before, and not so long ago, his feet had trod the squares of
stone that composed the floor. The surroundings had a remotely familiar
appearance; perhaps he had subconsciously caught a glimpse of them as
he rushed out in pursuit of the hunchback. Along the wall opposite the
elevators was a row of small shops, a cigar store, a haberdashery, a
news stand, and, on the corner, the office of a broker. Cole glanced at
the signs, and they stirred hazy recollections in the back of his mind.
There could be no doubt of it; chance and Mr. Englebreth had led him to
the very place he had been most anxious to find.
On the wall in the back was a directory of the tenants. “Security
Building” it said at the top, and the very name smacked of
conservatism, stability, and decorum. It spelled efficiency and prose
and left the imagination untouched. It hinted of things far removed
from the secret activities of the group of strange men who occupied
the top floor. He ran his eyes down the names of corporations and
individuals, but there was none that interested him. Among the former
were probably several in which members of The Unknown Seven were
concerned, but he had no means of identifying them.
He turned away and grinned sheepishly, as he noticed that the elevator
starter was squinting at him in a suspicious way. There were five
elevators, but, after he had seen them all come up and down, he knew
that none of them was the automatic one used privately by the members
of the organization. For a time he was puzzled. At the farther side
of the shaft was a door marked “Private,” and beyond this a flight of
stairs. No doubt they were the same stairs he had rushed down the night
before, after stopping his dizzy descent at the second floor.