XVI THE FINESSE

"What's the next move?" I inquired of Kennedy as we entered the elevator.

He did not answer, and I thought it was because he did not care to do so.

"Didn't like to talk, even though we were alone with the elevator boy," he explained, with his usual caution, when we had arrived at the ground floor. "You never can tell who is listening in public places."

"No," I answered, dryly. "That was how I found out where she was in the first place."

Kennedy smiled. "Very good, Walter. Still, it just goes to prove what I said. Mrs. Lathrop might do the same thing to find out about us."

We sauntered along a few steps through the lobby in silence.

"I don't suppose Shattuck will be in his own apartment after that talk with Honora," Kennedy considered, glancing at his watch. "Guess we'd better try to see him at his office, if we want to see him anywhere."

I saw what he was thinking about—the relations [235] of Vina and Shattuck and the construction that Doctor Lathrop had put on them.

"The finding of that Calabar bean in Shattuck's apartment has puzzled me," I confessed. "I've often wondered whether he ever missed it, whether he knows."

"Just what I was thinking about," admitted Kennedy. "On the way down-town I'm going to drop in and see Mrs. Wilford's detective, Chase."

"Why, Mr. Jameson, you've beaten me to it—and have you got the story?"

I turned in surprise at hearing my name spoken by a woman whom I hadn't noticed. It was Belle Balcom, always enterprising and on the alert for a good story for her column of society gossip.

"I thought I had a scoop," she pouted. "And I get here only to see you coming out."

"Where did you find out?" I asked, in surprise, careful, however, not to admit that I knew what she meant, although I was certain that it must be to see Mrs. Lathrop that she had come.

"Never mind," Belle tantalized. "Where did you find out?"

"That would be telling," I begged the question, turning and introducing Craig.

"Oh, I'm so glad to meet you," she smiled. "Of course I've heard a great deal about you from Mr. Jameson and I've always admired your wonderful work."

"Indeed you've helped us a great deal in this [236] case, yourself," returned Craig, ignoring the flattery, as he always did.

"I'm so glad," thanked Belle, sincerely. "If there's anything I can do, ever, I hope you'll ask me. It isn't often that I feel that the stuff I do has any real importance. More often people think I'm a prying pest, I imagine. But then without that eternal curiosity, who could write? Isn't that so?" she appealed to me.

"Quite," I agreed.

"Especially in a woman," thrust Belle.

"I'm sure that can't be so," remarked Craig. "Reporters and detectives have much in common. Women make good in both fields—very good."

Belle smiled. Sophisticated she might be. Yet no woman can be said exactly to hate flattery of the right sort.

"How does Mrs. Lathrop take the affair—with bravado?" inquired Belle. "You see, that expedition down to Greenwich Village with Mr. Jameson has made me look on this case with a sort of proprietary interest."

Kennedy smiled seriously. "There, now," he nodded, "you're interviewing me."

Belle smiled back in turn, taking the hint. "I'm sure you'd be hard to interview, if you didn't want to be interviewed, Professor Kennedy," she said.

"How did you find out where she had gone—really?" I asked. "Tell us. It might help—and you remember what you said just a moment ago."

Belle considered an instant.
[237]

"Well," she thought, "I don't know as it would be violating any confidence, after all."

Kennedy, always thoughtful, had gradually edged our way into a sort of alcove.

"You see," she began, "first I tried to get at Doctor Lathrop himself. But I guess you must have been there first. He was barricaded, so to speak. I posed as a patient, tried to think up all kinds of ailments I could, just to get in. But he had an assistant who interviewed every patient. I think that fellow would make a medical detective. I thought I was clever, but he found me out and I was politely requested to step outside."

I glanced at Kennedy. Evidently Lathrop did not intend to talk. Was it wholly natural reticence?

"Then," resumed Belle to me, "I thought of our friend, Zona Dare. I remembered that she had been intimate with Vina Lathrop. Zona wouldn't say anything. But I didn't need that. From her I got the cue. I knew she was keeping something from me, just knew it—woman's intuition, I guess. I knew that Zona lived here at the Sainte-Germaine."

"But Mrs. Lathrop is alone," I hastened.

"Surely. You wouldn't see them together. Trust Zona. She's too clever for that."

Again I glanced at Kennedy without getting anything from the expression of his face. Was it a clue? Did it mean anything, this immediate appeal by Vina for help from the Freudian interpreter of the Village?
[238]

We chatted a few minutes longer, as Kennedy turned away further inquisitorial shafts of the clever reporter. However, somehow I felt that Belle still had something on her mind.

"Then you aren't going to write it, after all?" she asked, eagerly, of me, as Kennedy showed signs of leaving.

"Of course not," I assured. "It wouldn't look right—at this stage of the case—for me to write, do you think? However, that's no reason why The Star shouldn't have the story."

She beamed.

"Very well, then. I'll try to get it," she replied, rather relieved at the thought that whatever clever work she had done to get the tip that had located Vina would not go for naught and would be credited to her.

We bowed ourselves away, leaving Belle the difficult and unenviable job of getting at Mrs. Lathrop again, something I should not have wanted to do, judging by the fiery glance that had been shot at us from behind the slammed door.

"That will be a last straw to Vina Lathrop—when she knows the newspapers have found her out here," I remarked, as we turned toward the street entrance.

Kennedy drew me back and we sidled into the protection of the fronds of a thick clump of palms.

I looked out cautiously. There was Doyle just coming up the steps of the hotel.

Doyle bustled in, and we let him pass, unaccosted.
[239]

"Where did he get his information?" I wondered.

"Not so difficult. If the police drag-net is out, a hotel like the Sainte-Germaine isn't at all safe," replied Craig. "I imagine we can leave Vina to their tender mercies—the police and the press."

We left the hotel hurriedly lest we might encounter any one else, and a few minutes later found ourselves again at Chase's detective agency. Chase was in and regarded us inquiringly as we entered.

"About this Lathrop case," introduced Kennedy. "You know that she was very intimate with Mr. Shattuck."

Chase nodded.

"It occurred to me," went on Kennedy, "that since you were working for Mrs. Wilford you might be able to help me. There were several things you told me the other day that I've been thinking about."

Chase narrowed his eyes as if trying to fathom what Kennedy was thinking. "I admit breaking into Shattuck's apartment," he said. "Do you mean that?"

"Partly. Why did you do it?"

"It was to get some letters Mrs. Lathrop had written to him," returned Chase, without quizzing.

"Did you get them?"

"I did."

"Where are they?"

Chase balked.

"Did you read them?"
[240]

"Yes," he answered, reluctantly.

"What was in them? Shattuck had been pursuing Mrs. Lathrop, hadn't he?" fenced Kennedy, keenly.

"No—he had not. She had been pursuing him," snapped Chase, though why he was so evidently put out about it I could not make out at first.

"How about that Calabar bean?"

"I found it in a cabinet, while I was searching for the letters," he answered, his face betraying no expression.

"Why did you tell me that in the first place?" demanded Kennedy, suddenly switching the subject. "Did you have any motive?"

"Motive? I thought you ought to know—that's all. He's not my client, you know."

"But he's a friend of your client and—"

"Say, Kennedy, I know how Doyle has been hounding that poor little woman. If you want the truth, I didn't tell Doyle because it wouldn't do any good. I thought you could be fair."

"Well, what's your opinion?"

"I haven't any opinion. I know what I found. It's for you to have an opinion. Besides, I won't sacrifice a client for a friend of the client. Get me?" he asked, pointedly.

"She has won you, hasn't she?" asked Kennedy, somewhat, I thought, in Doyle's style.

Chase looked at him a minute. "Say, Kennedy," he returned, "I've always regarded you as something more than the rest of us."
[241]

He stopped as though he would have said more, but considered he had said enough.

What he meant by his cryptic remarks I could not make out. Was he determined to save his client, even at the cost of her lover? Kennedy's face was inscrutable. If he knew what Chase meant, I am sure Chase read no answer.

We left immediately afterward and soon were back again in the Subway. As we waited for the train, Kennedy paced the platform.

"I think I'm right, Walter," he remarked. "The thing is to prove it. I'm going to use a little more of Freud—to apply him to some detective work—in other words, I'm going to play upon suppressed desires. Just watch how it works."

Somewhat less than half an hour later we found ourselves in the hurly-burly of the Wall Street district. Shattuck, I knew, had an office around the corner not very far from that which Vail Wilford had occupied.

Kennedy, who had been there before, easily located it and called the floor from memory.

"It's not a large office," I remarked, as I followed Craig down the hall and stopped before a single glass door that bore Shattuck's name, adding, "Banker & Broker."

"But probably it's large enough for all the brokerage business that Shattuck really does," he returned. "I have an idea that it is just about enough to keep him from being classed as an idler. Besides, it gives him standing."
[242]

Kennedy handed his card to the boy who presided over a sort of swinging gate in the outer office.

The door to Shattuck's inner office happened to be open and we could see him. Consequently it was not possible for him to send out word that he was not in.

It was a rather nettled office-boy who returned to us.

"For what, may I ask, am I indebted to you for this visit?" inquired Shattuck with almost insulting bruskness as the boy stood at the door, admitting us, then carefully closed the door to the outer office.

I felt angry at the tone, but Kennedy kept his temper admirably.

"I suppose," began Craig, clearing his throat and speaking as deliberately as ever Shattuck did, "that you know the story about Mrs. Lathrop?"

"Some one on the street called my attention to it," Shattuck prevaricated, rather than admit interest.

"I thought you might be in a position to explain it—at least to throw some light on it," pursued Kennedy, directly. "I'm quite interested, naturally."

"Explain it?" flared Shattuck, eagerly seizing on something that would divert the main issue. "Explain it? Why, you and Doyle and the newspapers"—nodding insultingly at me—"ought to be able to do that best, don't you think? It's you all that have caused a great deal of trouble. Judging [243] by what I read and hear, you know more about our affairs in this case than we do ourselves. I'd suggest that perhaps our positions should be reversed. I might appeal to you for information, rather than have you coming around here appealing to me."

Not only was it what he said, but it was even more the tone and manner in which he said it that seemed to rub Kennedy the wrong way. As for myself, I must confess that I was boiling over at the bravado of the man.

I would have come back with a quick remark—and probably have exposed my hand and done exactly what Shattuck expected, for there was no denying that he was clever with a gambler's cleverness and nerve.

It was not so with Kennedy. For a moment he paused, as though checking a first remark; then he spoke in the same measured and considered tones as at the start.

"I can tell you, Shattuck, that I don't like the attitude either you or Mrs. Wilford assume."

Shattuck merely shrugged superciliously, and would have turned to some papers on his desk, had not Kennedy possessed one of those compelling personalities that demand that you hear them out, whether you like it or not.

"Mrs. Wilford seems to have assumed a sort of passive attitude toward me," Kennedy resumed.

"You don't expect her to help you?" inquired Shattuck.

"As for yourself," continued Craig, unperturbed, [244] "I am frankly of the opinion, Shattuck, that your attitude is quite one of open hostility. I would not presume to dictate to either of you how you should order your conduct—but—it seems to me that, under the circumstances, it might not be unwise to take care not to prejudice your cases, you know."

Shattuck involuntarily shot a quick glance from under his heavy eyebrows at Kennedy. But not even Shattuck's cleverness could read anything in Craig's face.

What is it that this man knows? Quite apparently that was the sudden thought working back of Shattuck's beetling brows.

"For instance," continued Kennedy, as though determined to have his way in the matter and ram the words down Shattuck's throat, "I am sure you know of that Calabar bean which I—or rather Mr. Jameson—discovered in Mr. Wilford's office—not very far away from here, I see."

Shattuck's face was a study. Not once did the man lose his poise. It was not that.

"Well, it raises some interesting problems. I won't say that I haven't settled them. But, for the sake of argument, let us take the circumstance—just in itself."

Shattuck calmly lighted a cigarette and deliberately inhaled it, bored.

"Of course," Craig went on, after a pause, "we all know that Doctor Lathrop is a doctor and hence likely to dabble in almost anything relating to his profession. Perhaps he knew of the existence and [245] the properties of the Calabar bean. Quite certainly, I should say. No doubt he has used the drug—physostigmine. In fact, he tells me he has. Very well, then. So much for that.

"Take yourself, for example. I think I recall seeing many African trophies in that very cozy den of yours. Now, the Calabar bean is well known in Africa, not only in the Calabar, on the west coast, but in many other parts of the continent that travelers and tourists visit. So, you see, although at first sight such a bean might seem to have very little to do with a prosperous broker on Broad Street, it is not impossible that a judge or jury—or a detective—might see a connection."

Kennedy paused to watch the effect of the home thrust. I cannot say that Shattuck even winced. He was a man with too much control over himself for that. I longed for some of the psychological laboratory instruments that will reveal, often, what a nerve-strong exterior hides.

"But, quite more important still," continued Kennedy, "is the fact that the bean, or rather its derivative, physostigmine—which we know was the poison that killed Wilford—is known and used by oculists for its curious effect on the pupils. Now, from what I have learned on unimpeachable authority about Mrs. Wilford as a girl, her father, Honore Chappelle, a Frenchman, was a well-known oculist. He had no sons and often used to wish that his only child had not been a girl. For a time he had some vague idea, I believe, that his daughter [246] might take up his place in the business. However, that was merely fanciful. As Honora grew to womanhood and tasted the advantages of the not small fortune her father had piled up, the social life appealed to her. And yet, in the girlhood days, who shall say she did not learn something of the Calabar bean, of the drug, and of its properties? It would be most unlikely if she did not."

Kennedy paused for a moment, leaving Shattuck almost speechless and hiding a secret fear.

"You can draw your own conclusions from what I have just said," finished Craig. "Sometimes, you know, actions speak louder than words."

Shattuck had risen, almost angrily as two red spots of passion appeared on his face over the cheek-bones.

"Don't you think you have done enough, hounding Mrs. Wilford with your confounded science?" he demanded.

"I cannot say," replied Kennedy, coolly, reaching for his hat and deliberately turning away. "I am telling you this only for your own benefit. Good morning, sir."

Just what Kennedy was attempting I began to understand as we closed the door to the hall and turned again to the elevator. The seeking out of Shattuck was quite in keeping with the plan of campaign Craig had mapped out at the start.

I saw that he was counting on planting something that would make Shattuck fear for Honora, if not for himself. And, it was evident that behind his bravado Shattuck did have a fear for Honora.