CHAPTER XX.
JERRY BUCK PLAYS THE PART OF A DETECTIVE AGAIN.
It was after eight o'clock when Mr. Elijah Callister left the ----Building, Broad street, by the side door opening upon Exchange Place,and the night had turned off cold.
Detective Cutts was still with him, and buttoning their overcoats aboutthem, both hurried off in the direction of William Street, with the airof men having business on hand.
As for Frank Mansfield, he had left the office of the stock-broker agood three hours before, with his mind full of doubts and fears.
"My daughter is quite capable of taking care of herself, Mr. Maxwell,"the broker had said in his usual oily tones, as Frank returned to theoffice after the little scene enacted at the elevator door. "In futureI beg you will be less attentive to any ladies who may chance to favormy office with a visit."
With this rebuke he had shut himself up in the private office withMr. Billy Cutts again, and was seen no more up to the usual hourfor closing the office, when Frank, without attempting to even saygood-night, simply put on his hat and walked out, wholly undeterminedas to whether his hasty communication with Miss Edna Callister had beenoverheard.
As the stock broker and the detective hurried along the southerlyside of Exchange place--we mean the side where the street dealers ingovernment bonds spend their entire time during business hours inleaning against the iron railings of the basement offices awaitingcustomers for their wares--there crept out from a doorway a ragged,shivering newsboy, hugging a great bundle of the evening papers tightlyunder his arm.
Shooting a hasty glance at the men before him, he bounded ahead overthe icy sidewalk, shouting at the top of his voice:
"Fo'rt Commercial, Nooiz or Telegram! Evenin' papers, gents?"
Evidently the "gents" were disinclined for the evening paper, forCallister, rudely pushing the boy aside, crossed William street andpaused opposite the great stone building occupied by the LispenardBank, one of the wealthiest of the wealthy financial institutions inNew York.
For an instant only the pause was made; but during that instant thestock broker, with a hurried glance up and down the street--there wasno one but the newsboy in sight, and he was half a block away--unrolleda stiff paper plan which he took from under his coat, and giving oneend of it to Cutts to hold, pointed first at the plan and then at thebuilding of the Lispenard Bank again.
"Fo'rt Commercial! Nooiz! Telegram or German! Evenin' paper, gents?"
Again the newsboy stood by their side, looking almost over theirshoulder at the plan they held between them, as he thrust his bunch ofpapers in the broker's face.
"No, you young imp!" exclaimed Callister. "These newsboys are thickerthan flies about here. I tell you, Billy, there's no trouble aboutit--no trouble at all. An entrance can be effected as easy as rollingoff a log. And as to money, why, good Lord, it's the clearing house,you know, and there's always money there. Come, let's get down and showthese to your father, and see what he thinks of the idea."
He rolled up the plans hastily, and putting them under his overcoat,moved off up William street toward Wall, the detective keeping pace byhis side.
At that moment the newsboy crept out from under the shadows of theCustom House fence and followed them, dodging from one side of thestreet to the other, calling his papers, and occasionally stopping tosell one, but always keeping the forms of Messrs. Cutts and Callisterplainly in view.
"I've got yer now, yer sly old rat!" he muttered, as he crossed Wallstreet close at their heels. "An', by gracious, I orter after all thetime I spent a-watchin'. I seen them papers wat's got the picter of theLispenard bank onter them. If she an' me don't spoil yer little gamethis time 'twon't be no faalt of Jerry Buck's, an' don't yer forget it!"
Who "she was" did not appear as yet.
Certainly, in his present position, Master Jerry Buck was playing thepart of a detective quite alone.
Down William street to Liberty, down Liberty to its junction withMalden Lane, down Malden Lane to Pearl street the men advanced, allunconscious of the ragged youth who followed close at their heels.
Turning to the left, they kept along Pearl street, beneath the shadowsof the great structure of the elevated railroad, nor did they makeanother turn until Franklin Square was reached.
And when they passed beneath the roadway of the Brooklyn Bridge andentered Cherry street, smelling of a thousand and one ill odors,suggestive of anything save the luscious fruit from which its name isderived, Jerry Buck was still behind them.
He had ceased to call his papers now, but stood silently watching themfrom between two empty trucks drawn up by the side of the curbstone, asthey entered the very house on the easterly side of Cherry street, justbeyond Catherine, which he had pointed out to Frank Mansfield upon theoccasion of their Sunday morning visit to the Catherine Market as theone into which the burglars of the Webster Bank had disappeared.
No sooner had the two men passed through the doorway than the newsboy,pulling his tattered felt hat low down over his eyes, quietly crossedthe street, entered the house himself, and crept silently after themup the rickety stairs, just in time to see Detective Cutts, the manpaid by the City for the detection of crime, and Mr. Elijah Callister,the pious brother of the Tenth Baptist Church, disappear within therear room on the second landing of the tenement, the door of which wasimmediately closed.
Then Jerry Buck, giving utterance to a peculiar chuckle, slipped pastthe door, mounted still another pair of stairs and tapped lightly uponthe panels of the door of the room immediately above.
It was presently opened, and a woman's head and shoulders thrust outinto the hall.
"Is that you, Jerry?"
"Yes, missus, it's me."
The door was softly opened wide and closed again, the boy slipping intothe room.
"Them fellers meets down-stairs again to-night, missus. They meansbusiness this time, and no mistake."
"Is he there?" asked the woman.
"You bet! Didn't I jest see him go in! I've been a-layin' for him,a-followin' of him since five o'clock. Cutts the detective is with him,too."
"You are a good boy, Jerry," said the woman, tears springing to hereyes. "God will reward you for what you've done for me."
"Do you think so, missus? 'Twan't much, after all. When I seed youa-tryin' to jump inter the river I stopped you. When you told me yertroubles, an' how that old mean snide, Callister, had robbed yourhusband and killed him, an' how he had treated you an' was a-tryin' totreat yer boy, why I jest took a-holt an' helped yer, an' the rest hascome about of itself."
For reply, the woman stroked the boy's tumbled hair, and then, as ifmoved by some sudden impulse, stooped and kissed him.
"Looka here!" exclaimed Jerry, half pleased, half ashamed. "I never hadno one do that to me before, but then you seem somehow jest as thoughyou were my own mother, so I suppose it's all right."
"And you never knew your mother?" asked the woman, regarding the boywith a wistful air.
She was a person who had evidently seen much sorrow.
Tall and thin, with gray hair tied tightly in a knot behind her head,poorly but respectably dressed, there was about her an unmistakable airof refinement, indicative of quite a different position in life fromthe one in which we now find her.
For surely the carpetless room, cheap table and chairs, the littlestove and scanty display of common dishes through the half open closetdoor were indicative of anything but plenty and comfort, to say theleast.
But they were miles and miles ahead of anything Jerry Buck wasaccustomed to, and he regarded them with an almost respectful air, ashe replied:
"No, missus, I never had no father nor mother as I remember. I'vealways lived about the streets."
"But you must have some early remembrances," continued the woman."Can't you tell me what they are?"
"Yes, some other time. Them fellers have been in the room below forfull five minutes. If we are a-goin' to ketch onto their racket, we'dbetter be about it, I should say."
And as he spoke Jerry Buck, creeping behind the stove, threw himselfflat on his stomach upon the uncarpeted floor, close by the mouth of asmall round hole, through which in some former time, when the house hadbeen occupied by the old Quaker families once resident in this part ofNew York, a stove-pipe had passed, conveying heat to this upper chamberfrom the room beneath.
A thin sheet of paper covered the opening upon the ceiling in the roombelow them, through which a light could be seen shining dimly and thesounds of men's voices distinctly heard.
The woman now seated herself likewise upon the floor, and, in commonwith the boy, bent over the hole.
Had they been in the chamber beneath them, they could not have heardthe words of its occupants more plainly.
Sound rises, as is well known to every one. Through the round openingevery syllable uttered fell with startling distinctness upon their ears.
"I tell you the job's an immense one, Rube, whether Sam Cutts can seeit or not."
"That's old Callister," murmured Jerry in a low whisper.
"Hush!" replied the woman, speaking in tones equally low, at the sametime holding up her hand. "I know his wicked voice only too well, I'mnot likely to forget the voice of one who has brought the ruin he hasdone upon me and mine."
"Well, I'm not kicking," came a man's voice up the tube.
"The plan looks all right, and Lije talks all right. It's a big schemeon paper, but the question is, won't it prove another Webster bankaffair? Providin' it works, will there be enough shug in the vault topay us for our trouble? That's what I want to know in advance."
"Why, it's the Clearing House for all the other banks, man," repliedCallister's voice, impatiently. "There's always money, thousands uponthousands, in the vaults of the Lispenard bank, I'm a director in itmyself, and I guess I ought to know."
"And these plans----"
"Are drawn from personal knowledge of the interior of the bank and itsvault. Let me tell you, Sam Cutts, this is the biggest thing of thekind I ever put you on to. Billy here knows that I'm giving it to youstraight."
"Rat-tat-tat! Rat-tat-tat!" Both Jerry Buck and the woman were upontheir feet in an instant.
The rapping was upon the door of the room in which the listeners were.
"Who can it be!" whispered the woman, turning pale.
"Give it up. Better throw suthin over the hole while I open the dooran' see. It's some of the neighbors have come to borry suthin', mostlike, or a peddler mebbe."
"Rat-tat-tat! Rat-tat-tat!"
The boy hastily crossed the room, and turning the key, cautiouslyopened the door upon the crack.
Instantly a man sprang into the room, and seizing Jerry by theshoulders with a vise-like grip, clapped one hand over his mouth.