Miss Maitland Private Secretary Part 28

He answered very gently:

"Mrs. Price, I appreciate your feelings to the full, but this is a hazardous undertaking. You don't want to rush into it without realizing what it means. There is the question of money for example-the ransom.

Your family is known for its wealth. You can be pretty certain that the parties you're dealing with will hold the child for a large sum."

Suzanne clasped her hands on her breast and the tears, br.i.m.m.i.n.g in her eyes, spilled over, falling in a trickle down her cheeks.

"Oh, what's money!" she wailed. "I'd give all the money I have, I've ever had, I ever thought of having, to get my baby back."

Larkin was moved. He looked away from that pitiful, quivering face and his voice showed a slight huskiness as he answered:

"Well, that's all right, Mrs. Price-and don't take it so hard, don't let your fears get the upper hand. There's no harm can come to her; it's to their interest to take care of her. If we do our part cleverly, follow their instructions and keep our heads, you'll have her back in no time."

He stopped, arrested by a sudden thought. "I say 'we,' but maybe I'm presupposing too much. Was it your intention to ask for my a.s.sistance?"

She dashed her tears away and leaned forward in eager urgence:

"Of course-that's why I came. And you will give it-you will? The letter says it has to be some one having no ties or interests with the family-some one I could trust. I couldn't think of any one at first, and then when I remembered you it was like an inspiration. Oh, you must do it-I'll pay you anything if you will."

Larkin's face satisfied her; she dropped back with a moan of relief.

"I'll undertake it willingly-not only to give you any help I can, but because it will be a good thing for me. Don't be shocked at my plain speaking, but I want to be frank and straight with you. I'm not referring to pay-we can arrange about that later-it's work done for the Janney family, successful work. And with your cooperation, Mrs. Price, this is going to be successful. Now let's get to business." He picked up the letter and glanced over it. "Headed 'Clansmen' and signed 'S. O. S.'

I'll copy it, insert my name and address, and have it in to-morrow's _Daily Record_. Then we'll see what happens."

He smiled at her, rea.s.suring and kindly. There was no response in her tragic face.

"It may be days before they answer," she murmured.

But he was determined to uphold her fainting spirit.

"I think not. They want to end this thing as quickly as they can-get their loot and go. You've got to remember that their position is terribly dangerous and at the first sign from us they'll get busy."

She rose, took the letter and put it in her purse:

"I hope to Heaven you're right. It's so awful to wait."

"I don't think you'll have to. They'll see our answer to-morrow morning and I'll expect a move from them by that evening or the next day. If they communicate with me, I'll let you know at once, and if you hear, do the same by me. It's going to be all right. Keep up your courage and remember-not a word or a sign to any one."

"Oh, I know," she said, drawing down her veil with limp hands, "you needn't be afraid I'll spoil it. You thought me a fool, perhaps, when I first consulted you, and I _was_, bothering about things that didn't matter-jewels! There isn't one of us that hasn't forgotten all about them now. Good-by. No, don't come out with me. I have a taxi waiting."

CHAPTER XXII-SUZANNE FINDS A FRIEND

On Monday evening Ferguson heard from Molly of the scene in the Whitney office. He was incredulous and enraged, refusing to accept what she insisted were irrefutable proofs of Esther's guilt.

"What do I care about your 'phone messages and your suppositions!" he had almost shouted at her. "What do I care about what you _think_. You say she didn't answer the charges-she did, she denied them. That's enough for me."

There was no use arguing with him, he was beyond reason. She lapsed into silence, letting him rage on, seething in his wrath at the Janneys, the Whitneys, herself. When he tried to find out where Esther was, she was obdurate-_that_ she couldn't tell him. All the satisfaction he got was that Miss Maitland was not under arrest, that she was "put away somewhere" and had agreed to the arrangement. He left, too angry for good-nights, with a last scattering of maledictions, leaping down the steps and swinging off across the garden.

The next morning he telephoned in to the St. Boniface Hotel and heard that the Janney party were out. Then he tried the Whitney office, got George on the wire, and was told brusquely that Miss Maitland's whereabouts could not be divulged to any one. He spent the rest of the day in a state of morose disquiet, denying himself to visitors, short and surly with his servants. Willitts was solicitous, inquired after his health and was told to go to the devil. In the kitchen quarters they talked about his queer behavior; the butler was afraid he'd had "a touch of sun."

Wednesday wore through to the early afternoon and his inaction became unendurable. He decided to go into town, look up the Janneys and force them to tell him where Esther was. He laid upon his spirit a cautioning charge of self-control; he must keep his head and his temper, use strategy before coercion. He had no idea of what he intended doing when he did find her, but the idea of getting to her, seeing her, championing her, transformed his moody restlessness into a savage energy. His servants flew before his commands; in the garage the chauffeur muttered angrily as orders to hurry were shouted at him from the drive.

Tuesday had been a day of strain for the Janneys. According to the telephone message, that night Chapman was to move the child from the city. He had been under a close surveillance for the two preceding days, and every depot and ferry housed watching detectives. Hope ran high until after midnight when reports and 'phone messages came dropping in upon the group congregated in the library of the Whitney house. No child resembling Bebita had left the city at any of the guarded points.

Chapman had been in his office all day, had dined at a hotel and afterward had gone to his rooms and remained there. The plan of moving her had either been abandoned or had been intrusted to unknown parties who had taken her by motor through the city's northern end.

On Wednesday morning a consultation had been held at the Whitney office.

This had been stormy, developing the first disagreements in what had been a unity of opinion. Mr. Janney was for going to Chapman and demanding the child and was seconded by the elder Whitney. Mrs. Janney was in opposition. She had no fear for Bebita's welfare-Chapman could be trusted to care for her-and maintained that a direct appeal to him would be an admission of weakness and place them at his mercy. In her opinion he would threaten exposure-he was shameless-or make an offer of a financial settlement. George agreed with her; from the start he had thought Chapman was actuated less by a desire for vengeance than a hope of gain. Mrs. Janney, thus backed up, became adamant. She would have no dealings with him, would run him to earth, and when he was caught, crush and ruin him.

Suzanne had listened to it all very silent and taking neither side. Her hunted air was set down to mental strain and she was allowed to remain an unconsulted spectator, treated by everybody with subdued gentleness.

Back in the hotel, Mrs. Janney had suggested a doctor, but her querulous pleadings to be let alone had conquered, and the old people had gone for their afternoon drive, leaving her in the curtained quietness of the sitting room.

The door was hardly shut on them when she drew out of her belt a letter.

She had found it in her room on her return from the office and had read it there before lunch. It was a prompter answer than she had dared to hope for.

"Mrs. Suzanne Price,

"_Dear Madam_:

"In answer to your ad. we would say that we are willing to deal through the agent you name. We take your word for it that he is to be trusted, that both you and he understand any attempt to betray us will be visited on your child.

"_Remember Charley Ross!_

"The sum necessary for her release will be thirty thousand dollars. On payment of this we will deliver her over at a time and place to be specified later. If you agree to our terms insert following ad. in the _Daily Record_. 'John-O. K. See you later. Mary.'

"(Signed) _Clansmen_."

On the second perusal of this ominous doc.u.ment Suzanne felt the strangling rush of dread, the breathless contraction of the heart, that had seized her when she first read it. Horrors had piled on horrors-as she had risen to each new step of her progress up this Via Dolorosa, another more fearful and unsurmountable had faced her. When she had spoken to Larkin of the money she had never thought of it, how much it might be, how she was to get it. Now, with a stunning impact, she was brought against the appalling fact that she had none of her own and did not dare ask her mother for any.

There was no use in lies; she had lied too much and too diversely to be believed. She would have to tell what it was for, and she knew the mood in which her mother would meet the demand. Money would be forthcoming-any amount-but Mrs. Janney, with her iron nerve and her implacable spirit, would never consent to a tame submission. Suzanne knew that her fortune and her energies would be spent in an effort to apprehend the criminals, and Suzanne had not the courage to take a chance. All she wanted was Bebita, back in her arms again, the fiends who had taken her could go free.

She sat down, pus.h.i.+ng the damp hair from her forehead and trying to think. One fact stood out in the midst of her blind, confused suffering.

She could not go to Larkin till she had the thirty thousand dollars.

Every moment she sat there was a moment lost, a moment added to Bebita's term of imprisonment. She stared about the room, the gleam of her s.h.i.+fting eyes, the rise and fall of her breast, the only movements in her stone-still figure.

Suddenly, piercing her tense preoccupation with a buzzing note, came the sound of the telephone. It made her jump, then mechanically, hardly conscious of her action, she rose to answer it. A woman's voice, languidly nasal, came along the wire:

"Mr. Richard Ferguson is calling."

"Send him up," she gasped and fumbled back the receiver with a shaking hand. With the other she steadied herself against the wall; the room had swung for a moment, blurred before her vision. She closed her eyes and breathed out her relief in a moaning exhalation. It was like an answer to prayer, like the finger of G.o.d.

Of course d.i.c.k was the person-d.i.c.k who could always be trusted, who could always understand. He would give it and say nothing; she could make him. He was not like the others-he would sympathize, would agree with her, in trouble he was a rock to cling to. A broken series of answers to unput questions coursed through her head; she could go to Larkin now-she needn't tell him how she'd got it, he thought she was rich-after it was all over her mother would pay d.i.c.k back-in a few days she'd have Bebita, the kidnapers would have made their escape-and it would be all right, all right, all right!

Ferguson had come up, grim-visaged, steeled for battle, but when he saw her his fighting spirit died. There was nothing left of her but a blighted shadow, the cloud of golden hair crowning in gay mockery her drawn and haggard face. Before he could speak she made a clutch at his arm, drawing him into the room, babbling a broken greeting about wanting him, wanting his help. He put his hand on hers and felt it trembling; he would not have been surprised if she had dropped unconscious at his feet.

"Lord, Suzanne, you don't want to take it this way," he soothed, guiding her to the sofa. "You must get hold of yourself; you've been brooding too much. Of course I'll help you-anything I can do-and we'll get her back, it'll be only a few days." He didn't know what to say, he was so sorry for her.

She was past parleys and preliminaries, past coquetry and artifice. The whole of her had resolved itself into one raw longing, and before they were seated on the sofa, she had broken into her story. He didn't at first believe her, thought grief had unsettled her brain, but when she thrust the two letters into his hand all doubts left him.