CHAPTER IV.
THE STRANGE DISAPPEARANCE BENEATH THE CHURCH-YARD WALL.
"Come, speak up! Are you dumb? What are you doing at the door of theWebster Bank at this hour of the night?"
It was Mr. Caleb Hook, the famous New York detective, who spoke, as heseized Frank Mansfield by the coat-collar and jerked him violently intothe dark hallway which formed the rear entrance to the bank.
At the same instant the forms of the three policemen were to be seenfilling the open door.
Even as he spoke the detective threw the full glare of a dark lanternupon the pale and frightened countenance of the boy who stood tremblingin his grasp.
"I--I--work in the bank," he stammered, brokenly. "I wanted---- I amthe assistant cashier. I came here with my friend, Detective Cutts, totry the door and see that all was right."
It was a bold stroke, but a useless one.
Detective Hook laughed in his face.
"Well, and where is Cutts?" he asked, sneeringly.
"He was here a moment ago, just outside the door. I went into the bankand found that the vault had been blown open, and turned to call him inas you seized me on the steps."
"I don't see him anywhere around," said the detective, coolly, at thesame time pulling Frank toward the door, and looking quickly up anddown Rector street.
It was deserted.
Cutts, the strange woman, and the two young fellows who held her downhad alike disappeared.
There was nothing to be seen save the dark outlines of Trinity Church,the old burial ground about it, and the white flakes of the everfalling snow.
And the heart of Frank Mansfield sank within him as the full meaning ofhis perilous position burst upon his bewildered brain.
The bank robbed--Cutts and his companions gone.
Who would believe his story, now that he had been caught almost infront of the rifled vault?
"Now look here, young fellow," said the detective, "you might justas well own up and tell the truth. Where are your pals? Who are you?What's your name?"
"My name is Frank Mansfield. I'm assistant cashier of the bank."
There was nothing to be gained by attempting to conceal his identity;Frank saw that at a glance.
"I thought as much," replied the detective grimly, "and I'm a littlebehind time, I see. But you don't answer my other question. Where areyour pals?"
"I don't know what you mean."
"Spread yourself, you Jones and Brady," exclaimed the detective,turning suddenly upon the officers. "Examine every doorway, one of you,the other make for the church-yard wall. Schneider, you come with me.We'll soon see what's been going on in here. This comes from the follyof the chief in keeping me so long engaged. I might have been here anhour ago at the very least."
He turned quickly upon the boy as he spoke, and without a word ofwarning snapped a pair of handcuffs about his wrists.
"Move on ahead there," he exclaimed, pushing Frank before him into thehall. "You say this bank has been robbed. I believe you. Show me whatyou have done."
The vault door, wrenched out of all shape and hanging by one hinge, theburglar's tools, the books and papers scattered upon the floor around,were quite answer enough without a word from the wretched Frank, whostood trembling by his side.
The detective surveyed the scene grimly.
"I was born a day too late, it seems," was all he said.
Then, turning toward his youthful prisoner, he gazed intently upon hisface.
"You and your friends have made a clean job of it here, young man," hesaid, at length.
Frank stared at him dumbly.
Could he hope to win the hand of Edna Callister after such a fatal slipas this?
What was he to do?
What should he say?
Ah, if he had but heeded the warning voice of that mother who had kneltbefore him in the snow!
But no! He had for the meanest of motives, money, been willing toviolate the confidence and trust reposed in him by the officers of thebank, and this was his reward.
Not without his fair share of natural shrewdness, Frank at onceperceived that his only hope lay in silence and a strict adhesion tothe story he had told, which to a certain extent was true.
He had come to the bank with Cutts--as for his reason for so doing, hedetermined to keep that to himself, for the present, at least.
"Well," said the detective, "why don't you speak?"
"Because I've nothing to say. I've told you all I know."
"Do you persist in the statement that you came here with Mr. Cutts?"
"I do."
"For what reason?"
"I've already told you that."
"To see that all was right about the bank?"
"Yes."
"Is that your business?"
"Not particularly. We had been spending the evening together, andhappened to be passing, and I thought I would try the door."
"Mistake added to wrong doing."
Lies never yet availed any man in an emergency.
Better by far would it have been for the boy if he had confessed hisfault and told the simple truth.
"And upon entering you found things as we see them now?" continued thedetective, with an incredulous air.
"Yes."
"Do you carry a key to those doors?"
"Yes. Both the cashier and myself have keys."
"Suppose you give them to me."
Frank motioned toward his pocket, into which Detective Hook now thrusthis hand, drawing forth the keys, and embracing the opportunity tosearch the boy thoroughly at the same time, but finding, as a matter ofcourse, nothing to further indicate any connection with the affair.
He examined the keys attentively, and turning, tried them in the lockof the door.
One of them fitted perfectly.
The detective appeared surprised.
"You told the truth, then, my boy," he said, regarding the handsomeface of the youth before him meditatively as he spoke. "I don't knowwhat to make of this. Either you are other than what you seem to be, orI've been most outrageously sold."
"I assure you, sir," exclaimed Frank, plucking up a spirit, "that I amjust what I tell you, as any officer of the bank can testify, if youwill take the trouble to ask. The janitor of this building knows me.Were it only daylight, I could prove my identity in a dozen ways. Whathas become of Cutts and those who were with him, I am sure is more thanI can tell, but I----"
"Ha! Then there were others here besides Cutts and yourself?"
A deep flush overspread the countenance of the boy.
Here was a fatal slip.
Until now he had relied upon Cutts' desire to shield himself to becautious in what he might say, but as for Ed Wilson and Jim Morrow,who were nothing more or less than two very fast young clerks in aneighboring steamship office, he saw instinctively that he could hopeto exercise no control whatever with them.
But there was no use in trying to conceal anything from the keen eyesof the detective, now fixed upon him as though seeking to read hisinmost thoughts.
"Yes, there were two other fellows with us," he answered, with evidentreluctance.
"Who were they?"
"Acquaintances of mine."
"And their names?"
"Wilson and Morrow."
"Hem! And they, likewise, seem to have disappeared, most unluckily foryou."
"So it seems," said Frank, gloomily. "I'm sure I don't understand itany more than you."
"We'll understand it better by and by," replied the detective, quietly."Meanwhile, think the matter over, if you will allow me to offer myadvice, and make up your mind to tell the truth, the whole truth andnothing but the truth. You'll find it will pay you better in the end."
"Schneider," he added, turning abruptly to the policeman who had beena silent witness to the scene, "take this young man to the New Churchstreet station, and let him be held until I come."
"Very good, Mr. Hook," replied the officer.
Without another word he took Fr
ank by the arm and led him through thehall and out into the street.
The snow was still falling, sidewalk and roofs, church-yard and wall,everything within range of the eye, was clothed in a mantle of white.
"Now, den, de nex' question is how ve not our necks already preak,"muttered the officer, with a strong German accent, as he moved heavilydown the sloping sidewalk toward New Church street, which skirts therear of the burial ground at the bottom of the hill.
For he was a clumsy man, and had evidently no wish to measure thelength of his Teutonic form upon the slippery walk beneath his feet.
"Keep close beside me, young feller," he added, releasing his holdupon Frank's arm, the better to steady himself by aid of the hand-railseparating the sidewalk from the sunken areas before the basement shopswith which this block on Rector street is lined. "You notings can domit tem pracelets on your hands, so dere's no use in trying to run."
"I'm not running to-night," replied Frank, shortly. "Lead on, I shallfollow; you need have no fear."
"Nein, you go ahead, den I keeps you in sight," said the policeman,pushing the boy before him. "You gets not pehind me ef I knows vat Ido."
Frank made no reply, but plowed his way on through the snow, OfficerSchneider following close in his rear.
At a word from that individual, upon reaching New Church street,he turned to the right and moved slowly along the wall of Trinitychurch-yard, here rising high above their heads.
To the left rose the structure of the elevated railroad, to the rightthe wall itself, the iron railing still surmounting it, from whichhung, depending, clusters of the snow-covered vines.
Not a soul was to be seen moving about them.
The street was deserted for as great a distance as the eye could reach.
They had hardly proceeded half the length of the wall, when, proceedingapparently from the clustered vines above them, a shrill, piping soundwas heard.
It was precisely such a sound as bats are sometimes heard to make justat nightfall as they go whizzing through the air.
"Vat in tonder ish dat?" exclaimed Officer Schneider, coming to asudden halt, and looking up into the air.
Again the strange sound broke upon the stillness of the night a littleahead of them through the thick mass of falling snow.
Both Frank and the policeman had now checked their steps close to thechurch-yard wall.
At the recurrence of the sound, forgetting for the instant that he hada prisoner on his hands, Officer Schneider moved a few steps in advanceof the boy, and raising his head, tried to peer in among the clusteredvines, all laden with snow, which overhung the iron fence upon the topof the wall, leaving the boy standing behind.
"I can't see notings," he muttered, "but dere's something crooked goingon up dere. Dis is not de first time nor de second I hear dot sound.Who goes up mit dem valls on top, I'd schust like to know?"
Now this was a little private mystery of the officer's own, thisself-same bat-like sound.
Several times previous to the present occasion had he heard it, and----
Hello!
And what ails Officer Schneider now?
Enough to make him stare as he does, and shower all the Germanimprecations known to his vocabulary upon the air around.
For the handcuffed prisoner, whom he supposed to be standing so closeto him that it was only necessary to reach out and touch him, hadduring that one moment in which he had raised his head to the top ofthe wall above him, from which proceeded the bat-like sound, mostmysteriously vanished.
There were his footprints on the snow-covered walk, nor was there otherprints anywhere to be seen upon the smooth surface of the street, savethose made by the boy and himself, and pointing up--not down the street.
And this was all.
His handcuffed prisoner, who could not by any possibility have advanceda dozen steps through the snow in the brief space of time duringwhich the policeman's attention had been withdrawn, had strangely,marvelously disappeared.