The unknown seven A detective story
Fessenden had finished. “Rather bold of them to put it aboard a yacht
in broad daylight. Really no reason why they shouldn’t, though,” was
his second thought. “As far as they know, nobody suspects anything. It
would look as if the safe was being shipped to a summer home somewhere
along the shore. Many people keep jewelry and other valuables in
such places, and a safe comes in handy. And to transport it by water
on a private yacht is less risky than intrusting it to the express
companies. There’ll be a merry little chase to-night.”
Cole looked as if a whimsical idea had occurred to him. He called up
Latham and inquired if the doctor owned a motor boat. The physician
replied that he did; it was a small affair, he explained, but a demon
for speed. Cole promised that he would learn something interesting if
he would have the boat ready within an hour, at a certain point along
the river. Latham’s imagination seemed to cover the gaps in Cole’s
statement, for he promptly agreed to do as suggested.
After giving several orders Cole left the office. His rendezvous with
Latham was a short distance below the point where the larger craft was
moored. Before boarding the doctor’s boat Cole went cautiously forward
and sought out Fessenden.
“The wind is slack, and the engine seems to be out of order,” explained
the operative. “I believe somebody is tinkering with it.”
“Have you learned who owns the yacht?”
“I’ve made several inquiries, but nobody seems to know. She is
brand-new, as you can see, and this appears to be the first time she
has been anchored here.”
Cole cast a glance at the queenly craft, its fresh coat of paint
gleaming in the pale autumnal sunlight. After telling Fessenden that he
could take the rest of the afternoon off he went back to Doctor Latham.
The physician, looking fresh and crisp in blue coat and creamy flannel
trousers, sat at the tiller.
“When do we start?” he inquired anxiously.
“We’re waiting for the other party to make the first move,” explained
Cole, pointing out the larger boat, easily distinguishable among the
craft of various types that littered the surface of the river.
“Any news of Miss Brownell?”
“Not a word, doctor. Are you in the mood for a little excitement?”
The physician said nothing, but his smile and the squaring of his
shoulders spoke more loudly than words. Cole glanced out over the
horizon. A frieze of clouds was creeping up in the south, and a rising
wind rippled the water.
“I suppose you are armed?” he asked after a while.
The doctor slapped his hip pocket significantly. “Are we likely to have
a scrap?” he inquired in a tone hinting that the prospect appealed to
him hugely.
“Quite likely! The rats are scenting danger and crawling into their
hole. We may have to tackle a whole nest of them.”
The afternoon waned and still they waited. Darkness fell, and a
spanking breeze blew up. At Cole’s suggestion the doctor moved the
motor boat a little closer to the larger craft.
“They are hoisting the sail,” observed Latham, as he brought the boat
to a stop at a point from which they could watch the yacht without
danger of being seen by its crew. Here and there the black ribbon
of water was broken by twinkling lights. An excursion steamer swept
majestically up the Hudson, with a tail of foaming silver in its wake.
Presently the yacht moved. The two men in the motor boat waited a while
to give it headway. Then the doctor flipped the wheel, and, with a
gleeful phut-phut, the little boat darted forward. Like an animated
thing it skipped giddily across the water, darting in and out among
larger vessels. After a little the sprinkling of boats thinned out,
and they hugged the shore closely, in order to avoid being seen by the
yacht’s crew.
“Think you can keep her in sight, doctor?” asked Cole, noticing with
concern that the larger boat was gaining speed.
“Easily,” said the doctor confidently, “unless the motor should start
missing, and there’s little danger of that.”
They were silent for a time. Cole, sitting close by, watched the intent
look on the doctor’s face as he guided the boat along the curving river
bank. The shore line grew more rugged; here and there earth and sky
melted into a blur. Now and then the lights of a town threw a yellow
sheen over the murky water. At intervals the yacht disappeared from
view behind a jutting tongue of land, but it was never out of sight for
long.
“Doctor,” said Cole abruptly, “I don’t quite know what to make of you,
but we seem to have one interest in common. Both of us are concerned
over Miss Brownell. I am partly responsible for whatever happens to
her, while you—— But I think you told me that your emotional self is
dead.”
A queer little chuckle drifted out on the breeze. There was a note of
grim despair in it.
“Anyhow,” Cole went on, “there is a bond of interest between you and
me for the present. Seems we ought to understand each other a little
better. The other night, when I trailed the hunchback to your house and
later found him asleep on the operating table, your conduct was as
mysterious as the deuce. What had happened?”
The doctor, one hand on the tiller, gazed rigidly out over the black
water to where the gray blur of a sail was visible against the darkness.
“The thing which we call human intelligence is only a thin veneer,” he
remarked in whimsical tones. “Sometimes only a slight thrust is needed
to break through it. It is very amusing to watch the antics that a
supposedly sane being will perform when a crisis of some sort comes
along and gives him a jolt. My own part in this affair is an example
of what happens when the veneer of intelligence cracks. You would not
believe me if I were to tell you, so what is the use?”
“You might try,” suggested Cole. The doctor had been a changed man
since he learned that Miss Brownell was in danger. Before that he had
been all subterfuge, evasions, and bewildering subtleties. Now Cole
felt that he was face to face with the man’s real self.
“The hunchback came to my house that night to dispatch me to a better
world,” Latham said.
“He had just performed a similar service for Malcolm Reeves,” Cole
observed.
“He had orders to get me, too. The gang feared both of us, and they had
come to a pass where they couldn’t afford to stand on ceremony. Well,
that night I heard some one getting in the basement way. That’s the
advantage of being a light sleeper. I collared the fellow as he came up
the stairs. Not knowing what to do with him I gave him a hypodermic to
keep him quiet. Then you came and complicated the situation.”
“If the hunchback came to your house to murder you,” said Cole
doubtfully, “why didn’t you turn him over to the police?”
The doctor chuckled softly. “That shows how incongruously we sometimes
act, strutting around like hens with their heads chopped off. Your own
conduct was very peculiar that night. I was wondering why, instead of
handcuffing the culprit to my operating table, you didn’t telephone for
the police wagon.”
“I had a reason.”
“And so did I.” The doctor chuckled again. “At least I thought I had
a sound reason for my conduct. As a matter of fact my reason was at a
standstill; no doubt yours was likewise. At any rate I didn’t dare hand
the fellow over to the police. Certain things had happened that made it
undesirable for me to communicate with the authorities.”
“The operation on Reeves?” Cole suggested.
Again a queer little laugh drifted out on the wind. Cole suddenly
sat erect, gazing hard at the shadowy figure beside him. A shaft
of intuition had suddenly pierced the fog of contradictions and
incongruities in his mind.
“There were two operations, weren’t there?” he asked.
“That’s a very shrewd deduction,” declared the doctor, raising his
voice above the roar of the wind. “There were two. I performed one
of them. I strongly suspect that Ballinger performed the other. The
interesting point about them is that there is an official record of the
first, but none of the second.”
For a moment Cole peered sharply ahead. The yacht was momentarily out
of sight, but he caught a glimpse of it again, as they rounded a curve
in the river bank.
“Go on,” he said. “You were involved with this golden coterie, weren’t
you?”
“For a time. I thought they were engaged in strictly scientific and
legitimate pursuits. I had known Carmody for some time, as a quiet and
scholarly man. It was through him I became connected with the group.
For a time all went well. My specialized training helped them solve two
or three minor technical problems that came up in connection with their
experiments.”
“Then one evening Carmody telephoned me that an accident had occurred
at his house on Bleecker Street. He asked me to come over at once.
When I arrived he told me that Malcolm Reeves, who was visiting him
that evening, had stumbled and fallen down the stairs. My examination
revealed a compound fracture and convinced me that the pressure of the
bones against the brain made an immediate operation necessary.”
“I had Reeves removed to the nearest hospital. It happened to be one of
the smaller private ones. I was assisted by a nurse. She was a little
nervous, and I could see that she was new at the game, but at first I
thought nothing of it, not until I discovered that there was something
wrong with the anæsthetic. She had blundered in administering it. I
shudder whenever I think of the result. Perhaps you can realize
something of what it means to have a patient awake in the midst of an
operation.”
“Did Reeves see you?” asked Cole suddenly.
The tiller wabbled for a moment in Latham’s hand. “He not only saw me,
but he recognized me. I shall never forget the expression on his face.
It was horrible! Well, luckily there were no serious consequences.
After a while Reeves was brought under the anæsthetic again, and the
operation was successfully finished. In due time he was taken to his
home. To this day I don’t know whether Carmody told me the truth and
the injury was accidental, or whether some one deliberately inflicted
it.”
“Couldn’t you tell from the nature of the wound?”
“Not with any degree of positiveness. I suspect some one tried to
murder him that night, but failed. Perhaps the assassin lost his nerve.
Carmody didn’t dare to have Reeves die on his hands, and so he sent for
me. I do know that Reeves had been troublesome toward the last, and
that the other members of the gang were afraid of him. They had ample
reason for wishing him out of the way, or at least rendered harmless.”
“And so they performed a second operation that destroyed his memory?”
guessed Cole.
“Presumably, but that’s only a surmise on my part. Reeves recuperated
very rapidly after the first operation. One evening, shortly after he
became able to move about, he started out on a mysterious errand. He
never returned, and the police found no trace of him. About the same
time I began to grow suspicious in regard to the activities of the
gang. I had no tangible proof, but it was my strong impression that
their aims were not strictly legitimate.”
“Isn’t anybody entitled to make all the gold he wants to, if he’s lucky
enough to know how?”
“That’s just the point. Carmody assured me he had discovered a process
whereby real gold could be produced synthetically. It would not only
look like gold, he told me, but it would assay up to the required
standard when turned over to the government mints. Carmody put it so
convincingly that at the time I believed him, especially when he showed
me samples. Later I began to have grave suspicions. Certain things
led me to doubt that the gang had sufficient faith in its products to
turn it over to the government in the form of bullion. In short, I had