CHAPTER XXIII
THE SECRET OF THE BLACK BAG
THE dinner was a wearisome affair to Trent. His companions were vulgar,their conversation tedious and the flattery they offered him nauseous.It was exactly half-past nine when a waiter came to his side and toldhim there was a long distance call for him from Denver. Apologizing heleft the table.
"His brother is a mining man out in Colorado," Weiller informed thecompany. "They're a rich bunch, the Chicago Maltbys."
"They can't come too rich for us," one of his friends chuckled. "Pass methe wine, George."
"This is a great little opportunity for rehearsing," Weiller remindedthem. "I've got to sign this bird up to-night. If I do we'll haveanother little dinner on Saturday with a souvenir beside each plate."
Directly Trent reached the hotel lobby he slipped the waiter a fivedollar bill. "If they get impatient," he cautioned the man, "say I'mstill busy on the long distance and must not be interrupted."
Five minutes later he opened the door of Norah's flat and turned on thelight. There, upon a chair, was the bag on which he had built so manyhopes. His long sensitive fingers felt each of the pendants. Then withthe small blade of a pocket knife he cut a few stitches and drew out theTakowaja emerald. For a full minute he gazed at its green glitteringglory. Then from a waistcoat pocket he took the brilliant which had beenpurchased with the Benares lamp. They were much of a size and he placedthe glass where the jewel had been and with a needle of black silkalready prepared sewed up the cut stitches. The whole time occupied fromentering the apartment to leaving it was not five minutes. He was backwith his guests within a quarter of an hour.
"You must have had good news," Norah exclaimed when he took his seat.His face which had been expressionless before was now lighted up. He wasa new man, vivacious, witty and bubbling over with fun.
"I had very good news," he smiled, "I put through a deal which means awhole lot to me. Let's have some more wine to celebrate."
The dinner was taking place in a private room and he had insisted thatthe service be of the best. Now he was free from the tension thatinevitably preceded one of his adventures he could enjoy himself. Forthe first time he looked at the omnibus by the door behind him. It wasnot the youthful fledgling waiter he expected to see but a big, dark manwith a black moustache and imperial. Norah observed his glance.
"George offered to star him as the mysterious count but the poor wopdon't speak English."
"I'll bet he left spaghetti land because he done a murder," Georgecommented, "a nasty looking rummy I call him."
"I'll swear he wasn't here when I went to the 'phone," said Trent. "Ishould have noticed him."
None heard him. The new bottle demanded attention. There was somethingvaguely familiar about the face but for the life of him Trent could notplace it. Uneasily he was aware that the man of whom this strange waiterreminded him had come at a moment of danger. The more he looked the morecertain he was that imperial and moustache were the disguising features.But it is not easy to strip such appendages off in the mind's eye andsee clearly what lies beneath. But there was a way to do so. On the backof an envelope Trent sketched the waiter as he appeared. It was a goodlikeness. Then with the rubber on his pencil end he erased moustache andimperial. The face staring at him now was beyond a question that ofDevlin, the man who had run foul of him over the case of the Mount Aubynruby. He remembered now that Devlin had left Jerome Dangerfield's employto join a New York detective agency.
What was Devlin doing here disguised as a waiter if not on his trail?And pressed against his side was a stone of world fame. There was nopossibility of escape. The dining room was twenty feet from the streetbelow and he had no way of reaching it. The door was guarded by Devlinand outside in the corridor waiters flitted to and fro. "Old Sir Richardcaught at last."
He was roused from his eager scheming by a waiter asking what liqueur hewould have. Automatically he ordered the only liqueur he liked, greenchartreuse. Would Devlin allow the party to break up? If so he had aplace of safety already prepared for the emerald. But if arrest andsearch were to take place before he could reach his room there was nohelp. He would be lucky to get off with fifteen years.
Something told him that Devlin was about to act. Waiters were nowgrouped about the door. He knew that Devlin must long ago have markedhim down and this was the final scene. And yet, oddly enough, whensuddenly the door closed and a truculent detective advanced to the tabletearing off moustache and imperial, Anthony Trent, who had not left hisseat, had no longer the incriminating stone upon him. He felt, in fact,reasonably secure.
"Quiet youze," Devlin shouted and flashed a badge at them. Five of theeight felt certain he had come for them. Weiller owed much money in thevicinity of Fort Lee, New Jersey and was never secure. And more thanthat he had passed many opprobrious remarks concerning the waiter whomhe supposed did not understand him.
"I'm employed," said Devlin, "to recover the emerald stolen from thehome of the late Andrew Apthorpe of Groton, Massachusetts, on the thirdof last month, and you can be searched here or in the station house."
"It's an outrage," exclaimed Miss Richards the character woman.
"Sure it is," Devlin agreed cynically, "but what are you going to doabout it?"
A woman operative was introduced who took the ladies of the party intoan adjoining room for search. The emerald was not found. The searchrevealed merely, that Miss Richards had been souvenir hunting and herspoils were a knife, spoon and olive fork.
The men had passed the ordeal successfully. That they had made the mostof their host's temporary absence the pockets full of cigars, cigarettesand salted almonds testified. Anthony Trent seemed hugely amused at theprocedure. Alone of them he did not breathe suits for defamation ofcharacter and the like.
"I have rooms here," he reminded Devlin, "by all means search them."
"I have," snapped the other, showing his teeth.
"I regret I didn't bring my golf clubs," Trent taunted him.
"I hope I'll put you in a place where they don't play golf," Devlincried angrily. "I'm wise to you."
"It's good he's wise to something," shouted Miss Richards.
"Isn't it?" Trent returned equably. "I've had no experience of it sofar." He resumed his seat and beckoned a waiter, "Some more coffee. Sitdown, ladies, the ordeal is over."
"Not by a long shot," snarled Devlin, "I've got a search warrant tosearch the apartment rented by Norah Thompson and I want you, Weiller,to come with me." He turned to the moving picture celebrities--selfconfessed celebrities--"as for you, you'd better beat it quick."
Devlin's last impression of the ornate dining room was the sight of thedebonair Trent sipping his green chartreuse. Devlin ground his strongteeth when the other raised the green filled glass and drank his health.
He was not to know that in the glass invisible amid the enveloping fluidwas the Takowaja emerald, slipped there in the moment of peril.