The Social Gangster Part 9

Renee Rawaruska, I knew, was a popular little Russian dancer abroad who had come to America the season previous and had made a big hit on Broadway. Beautiful, strange, fiery, she incarnated the mysterious Slav.

I knew her to be one of those Russian dancers before whose performances Parisian audiences had gone wild with admiration, one who had carried her art beyond anything known in other countries, fascinating, subtle.

Hastily over the telephone Kennedy made arrangements to go down to Quarantine on a revenue tug that was leaving to meet the _Sylvania_.

It was a weird trip through the choppy winter seas of the upper bay and the Narrows, in the dark, with the wind cold and bleak.

The tug had scarcely cast off from the Battery, where we met it, when a man, who had been watching us from a crevice of his turned-up ulster collar, quietly edged over.

"You are Professor Kennedy, the detective?" he began, more as if a.s.serting it than asking the question.

Craig eyed him a moment, but said nothing.

"I understand," he went on, not waiting for a reply, "that you are interested in the case of that little Russian actress, Rawaruska?"

Still Kennedy said nothing.

"My name is Wade--of the Customs Service," pursued the man, nothing abashed. Sticking his head forward between the corners of his high collar he added, in a lowered voice, "You have heard, I suppose, of the great amber diamond, 'The Invincible'?"

Kennedy nodded and I thought hurriedly of all the big stones I had ever heard--the Pitt, the Orloff, the Koh-i-noor, the Star of the South, the Cullinan, and others.

"The Invincible, you know," he added, "is the largest amber diamond in the world, almost the size of the famous Cullinan, over three hundred carats. It was found in the dry diggings of the Vaal River, a few miles from Kimberley. The dry diggings are independent of the De Beers combine, of course. Well, its owner has always been in the position of Mark Twain's man with the million-dollar bank-note who found it too large to cash. No one knows just what an amber diamond of that size is really worth. This one is almost perfect, resembles the huge top of a decanter stopper. It's a beautiful orange color and has been estimated at--well, as high as close to a quarter of a million, though, as I said, that is all guesswork."

"Yes?" remarked Kennedy, more for politeness than anything else.

Wade leaned over closer.

"The Invincible," he whispered, s.h.i.+elding his lips from the keen, biting gale, "was last known to belong to the De Guerres, of Antwerp. One of my special agents abroad has cabled me to look out for it. He thinks there is reason to believe it will be smuggled into America for safe keeping during the troubles in Belgium."

It seemed to make no difference to the customs man that Kennedy did not exactly welcome him with open arms. "The De Guerres are well-known dealers in diamonds, one of the leading houses in the 'city of diamonds,' as Antwerp has been called. One of the De Guerres is on the _Sylvania_, the junior partner--" he paused, then added,--"the husband, I believe, of Rawaruska. I thought perhaps you might be willing to try to help me."

"I should be glad to," replied Kennedy tersely, pondering what the officer had told us.

Nothing more was said on the trip and at last we came to the _Sylvania_, lying grim and dark of hull off the little cl.u.s.ter of Quarantine buildings, with myriads of twinkling lights on her, far above but scarcely relieving the blackness of the leviathan form.

Thompson, the purser, a quiet, unexcitable Englishman, met us as we came over the side, and for the moment we lost sight of our new-found friend, Wade.

"Perhaps you didn't know it," informed Thompson as we made our way through the s.h.i.+p, "but Rawaruska was married--had been for some time."

"Who was her husband?" queried Kennedy, seeking confirmation of what we had already heard.

"Armand De Guerre, a Belgian, of Antwerp," was the reply, "one of the partners in a famous old diamond-cutting firm of that city."

Kennedy looked at the purser keenly for a moment, then asked, "Were they traveling together?"

"Oh, yes,--that is, he had engaged a room, but you know how crowded the boats are with refugees fleeing to America from the war. He gave up his room, or rather his share of it, to a woman, a professional saleswoman, well known, I believe, in Antwerp as well as the Rue de la Paix in Paris and Maiden Lane and Fifth Avenue of your city, a Miss Hoffman--Elsa Hoffman. She shared the room with Rawaruska, while De Guerre took his chances in the steerage."

As we walked down one of the main corridors we noticed ahead of us a seemingly very nervous and excited gentleman engaged apparently in a heated conversation with another.

"Monsieur De Guerre," whispered Thompson as we approached.

The two seemed to be just on the point of parting, as we neared them, and, I think, our approach hastened them. I could not hear what one of them said, but I heard De Guerre almost hiss, as he turned on his heel, "Well, sir, you were the last one seen with her alive."

A moment later the purser introduced us to De Guerre. There was something about him which I can hardly express on paper, a sort of hypnotic fascination. I felt instinctively that such a man would wield a powerful influence over some women. Was it in his eyes, or was it merely his ardent foreign grace?

"You _must_ find out the truth," he cried eagerly. "Already they are saying that it was suicide. But I cannot believe it. It cannot be.

No,--she was murdered!"

Kennedy ventured no opinion, but now, more than ever, hastened to signify to the purser that he wanted to look over the ground as quickly as possible before the s.h.i.+p docked.

Rawaruska, we found, had occupied Room 186, on the port side of one of the lower decks. Kennedy seemed to be keenly interested, as we approached the room in which the body still lay, awaiting arrival at the pier a few hours later.

The stateroom, apparently, ran to the very skin of the vessel and the ports opened directly on the water, not upon an outside deck, as with the rooms above it. It was an outside room at the end of a sort of cross alleyway, and it was impossible that anyone could have reached it except through the corridors.

Attached to it was a little bath and directly across from the bath, on the other side, was another small room which was occupied by her maid, Cecilie, a French girl.

In the main bedroom was a double bed, a couch, a wardrobe, and a small, thin-legged writing or dressing table.

On the white bed lay the now cold and marble figure of the once vivacious little dancer who had enchanted thousands in life--pet.i.te, brunette, voluptuous. Rawaruska was beautiful, even in death.

Her finely chiseled features, lacking that heaviness which often characterizes European women, were, however, terribly drawn and her perfect complexion on which she had prided herself was now all mottled and bluish.

As Kennedy examined the body, I could not help observing that there seemed to be every evidence that the girl had been asphyxiated in some strange manner.

Had it been by a deft touch on a nerve of her beautiful, soft neck that had constricted the throat and cut off her breath? I had heard of such things. Or had it been asphyxiation due to a poison that had paralyzed the chest muscles?

The purser, as soon as we came aboard, had summoned the s.h.i.+p's surgeon, and we had scarcely arrived at Rawaruska's room when he joined us. He was one of those solid, reliable doctors, not brilliant, but one in whom you might place great confidence, a Dr. Sanderson, educated in Edinburgh, and long a follower of the sea.

"Was there any evidence of a struggle?" asked Kennedy.

"No, none whatever," replied the doctor.

"No peculiar odor, no receptacle of any kind near her that might have held poison?"

"No, nothing that could have been used to hold poison or a drug."

Kennedy was regarding the face of the little dancer attentively. "Most extraordinary," he remarked slowly, "that congested look she has."

"Yes," agreed Dr. Sanderson, "her face was flushed and blue when I got to her--cyanotic, I should say. There seemed to be a great dryness of her throat and the muscles of her throat were paretic. Her pupils were dilated, too, and her pulse was rapid, as if from a greatly increased blood pressure."

"Was she conscious?" asked Kennedy, almost reverently turning over her rigid body and looking at the back of her neck and the upper spine. "Did she recognize anything, say anything?"

"She seemed to be in a state of amnesia," replied Sanderson slowly.

"Evidently if she had seen anything she had forgotten or wouldn't tell,"

he added cautiously.

"Who found her?" asked Craig. "How was she discovered?"

"Why, Miss Hoffman found her," replied the purser quickly. "She called one of the stewards. She had been sitting in the library reading until quite late and Rawaruska had retired early, for she was not a good sailor, they tell me. It must have been nearly midnight when De Guerre and a friend, pausing at the library door on their way from the smoking room, saw Miss Hoffman, and all three stopped in the Ritz restaurant for a bite to eat.