CHAPTER VII.
A STILL GREATER CRIME UNEARTHED.
Detective Hook stared at the strange sight before him in dumb amazement.
There could be no question concerning the genuineness of the coinsdisplayed before him among the masses of frozen fish scattered over thesnow-covered walk.
They were silver dollars, and bran new ones at that, as fresh as onthe day which they left the coiner's hands.
Meanwhile, the man who had borne this most singular variety of fish haddisappeared around the corner of Cherry street with all possible speed,as had the two boys but a moment before, never pausing even to lookbehind him, to all appearance utterly heedless of the loss of his coin.
"Well, upon my word, this is a night of adventures for a positivefact," muttered Hook, stooping down and examining this singular find."There's something crooked here, or I'm no judge; and as I could notcatch those boys if I tried, I had best----"
"Hello! What's this?" he added, half aloud, examining each of theunbroken bags of dollars in turn. "Webster National Bank, as I'm asinner, stamped on the bottom of each of these bags. Here's some of theplunder now--there can be no mistake about that."
It was even as he said.
Upon each bag, in plain black letters, the name of the Webster Bank wasplainly stamped.
Without a word he seized the basket and emptied out the remainder ofthe fish on the snow.
Two other bags of smaller size appeared, one evidently containing gold.
Meanwhile several persons, early purchasers in the Catherine Market,had stopped to gaze upon the strange sight of a well-dressed manpicking dollars out of the snow, for the detective was now tossing intothe basket the contents of the broken bag, placing the others upon thetop of the shining heap thus formed.
"Here, officer," he exclaimed, beckoning to a policeman who nowsuddenly appeared, bustling out of the side door of the market oppositewith an air of authority, which suddenly changed into one of meeknessas he recognized in the man before him one of the most noted detectiveson the New York force.
"I want you to take charge of these. Take them to the Oak streetstation. They are part of the haul made in a down-town bank last night."
The words were spoken in a tone calculated to reach the officer's earsalone, while the little crowd which had now gathered around stoodstaring wonderingly on.
"Very good, Mr. Hook," replied the policeman, nervously. "I just wentinside the market for a moment to----"
"Never mind that," returned the detective, quickly. "I have no interestin your private affairs, and you need have no fear of me. Now, tellme quick, what sort of a place is that saloon before us--the DonegalShades? Who is this Slattery? What sort of shop does he keep?"
Evidently a most law-abiding establishment, so far as all outwardappearance was concerned, for the interior of the saloon, a moment agoablaze with light behind the curtains, was now totally dark, showing nosigns of life within at all.
"Bad lot in there," replied the officer, briefly.
"Do you know them?"
"Some of them."
"Anything going on outside of regular business?"
"I think so, but I never could get a charge agin 'em. There's a mightycrooked lot goes in there, Mr. Hook; river thieves and confidence men,to say nothing of a whole lot of dirty loafers always hanging roundinside."
"Just so," answered the detective, coolly. "Now go on with your basket.Tell the captain I'll be around in a little while."
He had kept his gaze fixed upon the darkened windows of the worthy Mr.Slattery's establishment during this brief conversation, and thoughhe felt that he might be mistaken, it certainly seemed to him that hesaw an eye appear at the open space at the edge of the curtain, and assuddenly disappear within.
He stepped to the door and tried the knob.
The door was locked, as he had supposed.
He raised his fist and struck blow after blow upon it, with an evidentintention of making himself heard.
To attempt to conceal his identity he knew perfectly well would be asimple impossibility.
He had been observed by entirely too many persons for that.
Presently the door was noisily unlocked from within, and a head coveredwith a fiery red shock of tousled hair thrust outside.
"Well, an' what d'ye want?"
"To come in," replied the detective, sternly, throwing the weight ofhis body against the door. "I have a few questions for you, my man, anddon't propose to ask them here on the street."
"An' who are yez, entering the house of an honest man on the Sabbathmorn? This place is closed, I'd have ye know."
"Nonsense!" cried Hook, pushing his way boldly in. "I'm a detectiveofficer, and have no time to waste in idle words. Your place wasrunning full blast a moment ago, and but for what has just occurredwould be running now. Shut that door."
The man obeyed.
Caleb Hook stood alone in the darkened saloon with itsruffianly-looking proprietor by his side.
Few men would have cared to place themselves in such a position, buthis was a nature which knew not the meaning of the word fear.
Coolly striking a match upon the bar, he touched the gas burner abovehis head, and in the light which followed glanced around him.
He stood within a low groggery of the ordinary type found in this partof the city--there was nothing singular in its appearance at all.
He and the red-headed individual occupied the place alone.
"What's your name, my man?" he asked, at the same time carelesslyshowing his shield.
"Slattery," was the gruff reply, "and I'll bet it's good for more moneynor yours."
"Very likely, but it may be good for less if you should happen to loseyour license. Who was that old man with the basket of fish that justwent out of here?"
"No one went out of here. The place is closed. I'm just after gettingup out of me bed."
"You lie, Slattery, and you know it!" exclaimed the detective, sternly."Now, answer my questions, and I promise that you shall not beinterfered with in any way; refuse, and I shall make it warm for you,now you may depend."
"Well, then, I don't know him from a crow. He just stopped in here fora sup of beer."
"You saw what happened to him outside?"
"Suppose I did?"
"How long before was it that he entered your place?"
"Tin minutes, mebbe--mebbe not more nor five."
"And you don't know him?"
"I do not. I tould ye that before."
"And how about the old woman in the worsted hood that entered thisplace a moment before this man came out? Who was she, and where is shenow?"
"That? Oh, that was Mrs. Marley," replied the saloon-keeper, with theair of a man relieved to be questioned on a point upon which he couldanswer freely at last.
"And who is Mrs. Marley?"
"The woman what lives on the top flure of the house in the rear; shepassed through by way of the store, as she often does."
"What sort of a person is she?"
"Faix, an' ye'd better ax hersilf; I've as much as I can do to attindto me own concerns. She lives all alone by hersilf, pays her rintpromptly, and goes an' comes whin she likes. The neighbors say she'smad, and mebbe she is--it's no business at all of mine."
"Show me her room," said Caleb Hook, abruptly. "I'll question her formyself."
"Well, then, go through the back dure, cross the yard, and you see ahouse in the rear--"
"I shall do nothing of the sort. You will go ahead and show me the wayto this woman's room. Come, be lively, I've no time to waste."
The saloon-keeper hesitated for an instant, and then moved towards theroom beyond.
That the detective was a man not to be trifled with he now fullyrealized.
"Come, then," he said, gruffly. "I want to be through with thisbusiness as soon as I can, for I've something else to do beside wastingme time like this."
He opened a rear door and led the way across a narrow courtyard.
A small frame d
welling stood before them. Connecting with the streetwas a narrow alley, now choked up with snow.
In the hurried survey of the scene taken by the detective, he observedthat the snow was much trodden down by feet, as though several personshad passed in and out, notwithstanding the earliness of the hour.
"This way," said P. Slattery, opening the door of the rear house andadvancing up a pair of rickety stairs.
The detective followed in silence.
Arriving at the top of the flight, the proprietor of the Donegal Shadesknocked at the door opening immediately from the head of the stairs.
There was no answer from within.
An ominous stillness seemed to pervade the place, which was totallydark, save for the dim starlight which found its way through a brokenwindow at the end of the hall.
"This is blamed strange!" muttered the man, rapping smartly again. "Shecan't be asleep, for it's only just now she went in."
But if the strange woman whom Caleb Hook had shadowed was within andawake, she did not reply.
Except the muttered words of the man beside him, not a sound fell uponthe detective's ear.
A strange feeling of creeping horror seemed to come over him--a whollyunaccountable feeling, something which he had never experienced before.
Without being able to explain why, even to himself, he was seized witha sudden desire to penetrate behind that plain deal door, upon whichhis companion was still exercising his knuckles wholly without avail.
Pushing the saloon-keeper to one side, he rapped smartly himself, atthe same time grasping the knob in his hand.
It yielded to his grasp--yielded so suddenly and unexpectedly that boththe detective and P. Slattery were precipitated forward into the room.
With a cry of horror bursting from his lips the saloon-keeper sprangback toward the door.
"Holy Mother! what mutherin' work is this?" he ejaculated, everyseveral hair upon his fiery pate seeming to rise with terror as hestared at the sight which met the gaze of both Detective Hook andhimself.
For there, stretched upon the uncarpeted boards before them, amidsurroundings the most poverty stricken, lay a fearful, sickening sight,rendered more plainly visible by the light of a guttering candlestanding upon a plain wooden table, which, with a bed and a chair ortwo, formed the sole furniture of the room.
Nor was the detective scarcely less affected, for the sight which henow beheld was one calculated to move the strongest man.
The strange woman whose steps he had followed through the streets laybefore him in the dim light of that cheerless room--dead upon the floor.