X
THE ELUSIVE FUGITIVE
When one individual in a great world goes forth secretively to hidehimself and a second man starts forth to find him, it would appear thatall the advantage was with the fugitive. Particularly would this seem tobe the case when the man in flight is of a high degree of intelligenceand is thoroughly informed as to the methods that will be employed inthe pursuit.
Yet the detective who knows his business and who sticks to the trailmonth after month nearly always turns up his man. He may do this byfollowing out, one after another, the probabilities in the case. Thereis almost no man who will refrain from performing some one of thoseeveryday actions that it is but natural he should take. There is almostno man who will flee without leaving a trail behind himself. If he isthe criminal genius who succeeds in doing all these things, there isthe element of chance that will turn up some bit of information whichwill put the vigilant sleuth on his track. For there are many pulsesupon which the detective finger may rest long after the criminal gets tofeel so secure as to become careless. Particularly is this true of thesleuths of the Federal Government, whose instructions are never toabandon the pursuit of an escaped criminal.
There is the case of Alexander Berliner, for instance. He was a princeof frauds, a man of exceptional ability, a cosmopolitan, one who knewdetective methods, a man with money. He had a month the start of BillyGard of the Federal Department of Justice. He knew that the specialagent was after him. He appreciated the danger of a long term in prisonif he were caught.
Would you think, under the circumstances, that the detective in the casecould make sufficient splash among the tides of humanity that surgearound a great world to disturb the tranquillity of Berliner? Let us seehow the case developed.
Gard had the advantage of having got "a spot" on Berliner. That is tosay, he had seen him. Berliner was a customs broker. His business wasto act as agent for American purchasers and European dealers. He knewhis Europe and he knew New York. The details of customs regulations andduties to be paid were an open book to him. He spoke many languages andhad customers among the wealthiest people in America.
It was when a mere suspicion arose as to the fidelity with which he waspaying his duties that Billy Gard, on some pretext, went to see him. Alarge, upstanding, white-haired man he was--unusually handsome anddominant.
"May I ask," said Gard, "if you think table linens of good quality couldbe procured from Ireland within six weeks? My sister is opening anestablishment at that time and is not satisfied with the offeringshere."
"Who is your sister?" asked Berliner, rather more directly than acustomer would expect to be questioned by a broker.
"Mrs. Jonathan Moulton," said the special agent glibly, giving the nameof a woman friend. "She lives in Seventy-second Street."
"Do you mind if I call her for a confirmation of your inquiry?" saidthe broker, still noncommittal.
"Such a request is not usually addressed to a prospective customer,"said Gard, appearing a bit nettled, "but I have no objection whatever."
As a matter of fact the special agent was very much disconcerted. He hadforeseen the possibility of having to use the name of some individualwho might afterward be called upon to verify the genuineness of hisinterest in linens. Mrs. Moulton was a good friend who would be entirelywilling to help him in a little deception of this sort, but he had notas yet coached her as to the part she might be called upon to play. Hehad thought there would be plenty of time later if it became necessaryto identify the supposed customer. But Berliner was evidently suspiciousof bright young men who called upon him. He evidently knew that he wasunder investigation. Gard's particular hope, if the broker insisted oncalling his alleged sister, was that he would find that she was not athome.
But luck was not with him. Mrs. Moulton herself answered the telephone.
"May I ask," said the broker, "if you will give me the name of theyoung man whom you have commissioned to buy linens for you?"
The manner in which the question was put, Gard realized, gave Mrs.Moulton no intimation of the situation. He knew she was sufficientlyclever to be entirely noncommittal if the broker mentioned his name. ButBerliner was too shrewd for this.
"You have authorized no one to buy for you?" the broker was saying. "Youare not in the market for linens at all? I see. There must have beensome mistake."
Berliner turned to his caller.
"Young Mr. Detective," he said, urbanely, "your work is a bitamateurish. May I present you with your hat? I trust there will be nooccasion for our acquaintance to develop further."
The case against Berliner did not come to a crisis immediately. It wastwo months later that the customs agents reported that he was gone andthat they had evidence that he had long resorted to undervaluing theimports of his clients. By getting an article through the customs houseat less than its value, he would defraud the Government of just thedifference between the amount paid and the amount that should have beenpaid. But this money was not saved for his customer. That individual wascharged the full amount due and the broker pocketed the difference.There was evidence that the Government had lost $100,000 through theseoperations.
Because Gard had seen the customs broker he was assigned to the captureof the fugitive. He set about the task methodically.
The special agent diligently searched out every one of Berliner'sintimates. There was a wife and brother to begin with. It is the A, B, Cof fugitive catching that every man will communicate with some one ofhis relatives or intimates. It is not human nature to break off everytie. Against the possibility of this fugitive writing Gard established aclose watch over the mail of each of the fugitive's relatives and closefriends. The postman who delivered mail to each was given samples ofBerliner's handwriting, was instructed to report the arrival of anyletter that might be suspected of coming from him, to have tracingsmade of its envelope, to note its postmark, before it was delivered.
But a month passed and no suspicious letter arrived.
In the meantime every possibility of getting directly on the trail wasexhausted. Even in a great city like New York it is difficult foranybody to take a train without having fixed the attention of somebodyelse. An expressman must be called to get a truck to the station. Ataxicab may be used. Servants are aware of a departure. Tickets must bebought. Conductors on trains must take up those tickets.
It is a tedious task to interview innumerable expressmen and ask each ifhe had had a summons from a certain apartment. The taxicab records ofcalls are equally confusing, but each may be traced to a driver and thatindividual may be questioned. Every ticket seller in a city may be seenin a day or two, the photograph of the man wanted may be shown and arecollection of him developed. If the fugitive is of strikingappearance, as was Berliner, the chances of his being remembered areincreased. If the trail is once crossed the going is easier.
Yet all these and many other devices failed in this case, and chancefirst pointed the way. The goddess of coincidence made her appearance ina modest motion picture theater where Gard and a friend were killing abit of time. Among the reels shown was one which portrayed a visit ofthe President to New York. It began with the arrival at the station,among throngs of people.
"By the Lord Harry!" suddenly exclaimed the special agent. "Would youpipe that gray-haired gent in the foreground. I have been looking forhim for a month."
It was Berliner. He had chosen the moment when the station was mostcrowded to make his getaway. Oblivious to the presence of the motionpicture operator, he had stopped for a moment to say good-by to anotherman, his brother, as Gard thought. The two had spoken a few words andparted.
"I wonder," soliloquized Gard, "what those two men said to each other."
Then he thought of Jane Gates, the Lily Maid, the deaf copyist atheadquarters, the cameo-faced girl, best loved of the special agents.
"The Lily Maid might read the lips of those unconscious motion pictureactors," he thought. "They are right out in front."
So it happened that the deaf ty
pist got a half-holiday and she and Gardspent it at the picture show, where her lack of the sense of hearing inno way detracted from her enjoyment.
The scene at the station came on. Gard pointed out the two men in theforeground, who, fortunately, were facing the machine. The deaf girlpicked their words from their lips and repeated them in the hollow tonesof those who have learned to talk without hearing.
"Send Margaret to London in three months," the customs broker wassaying. "I shall not write."
"But how shall we know of your whereabouts?" the brother asked.
"You will not know. I take no chances," was the answer.
"But where are you going?"
"First to Montreal, eventually to Europe. There I will hide and live inpeace."
This much of the talk of the brothers was definitely made out. A returnfor three performances thoroughly confirmed the conversation.
"You are the best detective on the force," Gard told the deaf girl withhis lips, thereby making her very happy, for she was full of theenthusiasm of the service.
"But more remarkable than this," he continued, watching for the flush ofpink which such sallies always drew to her cheeks, "is that the bestdetective in the great city should, at the same time, be its veryprettiest girl."
The next day the special agent was on the cold trail in Montreal. Thefact that a fugitive must eat and sleep is a great help to a detective.All the hotels in a city may be canvassed and are likely to yieldresults. It was at a little family hostelry in the suburbs that agray-haired man of distinction had passed a week. He had been gone ninedays. Yes, he had a trunk. The porter knew that it had gone to a certainstation. The ticket agent thought he remembered selling the man whosepicture was shown him a ticket to Chicago. Dave White was the conductoron the train to that point on the day in question and remembered thegray-haired man.
In Chicago the trail grew warmer. The fugitive had been at theAuditorium but four days earlier, but the porters were unable to recallany of the details of his going away. The special agent asked to see theroom Berliner had occupied. It was taken by another guest, but Gard wasallowed to explain himself to the successor of the fugitive and wasgiven permission to search the room. A close examination of it developedbut one clue. Sticking inside a waste basket were three fragments of aletterhead that had been torn into small pieces. One of these fragmentsshowed part of the picture of another hotel. An arrow, drawn in ink,pointed to a certain window.
Gard took the fragments of the picture of the hotel to a traveler'sguide and searched for the house that would compare with it. Eventuallyhe found the duplicate, and it was a Chicago hostelry. He hurried to it.After showing his credentials to the house detective, information wasfreely supplied. The room in question was occupied by a woman and hadbeen so occupied for two weeks. She was a handsome and stylishred-haired woman of thirty-five. She had been carefully watched for areason that presently developed.
"Has she received any callers?" asked the special agent.
"But one person, a man, has visited her," answered the house detective.
"What sort of a man?" asked Gard.
"A large man with gray hair," said the house detective. "He is in herroom now."
"Will you go up with me immediately?" ejaculated the special agent. "Imust not fail to see this man."
"Assuredly," was the response, and they caught the next elevator.
The car they took was an express and was not to stop until it reachedthe eleventh floor. The next to it was a local, stopping at all floors.The express, going up with the detectives aboard, slackened its speed atthe eighth floor while its operator gave some message to the boy on thelocal which had stopped there to take on a passenger. The cars were ofan open-work structure and the passengers in one could see quite plainlythose on the other as they passed. As the express passed Gard lookedthrough at those riding on the other car. Imagine his consternationwhen, not two feet from him, he saw the man for whom he had beensearching for months. As he gazed through the checked steel slats of thecar side he was close enough to have put out his hand and laid it on hisman had nothing intervened. Berliner faced him and, as the car paused,he and the special agent gazed directly into the eyes of each other.This was for but an instant and both cars were in motion again. Thedetective was being borne rapidly toward the top of the building and thefugitive less rapidly toward the ground.
"There is my man on the other elevator," Gard whispered hurriedly to thehouse detective. "Have the boy reverse and run down again."
The message was given to the operator, who obeyed instantly and someexcuse was made to the passengers on the car. The local had beenstopping at each floor and the express passed it and barely reached theground floor first. There the two detectives stepped out and waited forthe coming of the other car.
A moment later it arrived, much crowded, and began to disgorge itself.The two officers waited in instant readiness to capture the man whomthey had seen at the eighth floor. But the car was emptied and he wasnot among the passengers.
"Where did the big gray-haired man get off?" the boy was asked.
"Third floor, sir," he replied.
"You bar the exits," Gard said to the house detective, "and I will getback to the third."
On that floor the hallman said that the white-haired gentleman had rundown the steps to the second. Gard followed, but was able to find no oneon that floor who had seen the fugitive. He ran hastily about lookingfor possible exits, and then instituted a thorough search. Heinvestigated every possible avenue of escape and hastened downstairs tohis ally to help cut off the line of retreat. Every possible barrier wasput up and the house was well gone over. The gray-haired fugitive had,however, eluded pursuit.
Gard immediately called upon the Chicago police to throw out a dragnetand a general alarm, and this was done. All railway stations werewatched with particular care. But none of these efforts were of anyavail, as Berliner was never reported to have been seen again inChicago. Nor was Gard able to get so much as the glimmer of a trace ofhim nor a suggestion as to where he might have gone.
It was a task of infinite patience that brought Special Agent William H.Gard to London two months later on the trail of a woman whom he hadtraced half around the world. The Titian-haired guest of the Chicagohotel, the wife of the fugitive broker, here installed herself for awhile and lived in a manner that amounted to absolute seclusion.
Then she went to Paris. There she took rooms in a quiet side street andseemed to settle down with some idea of permanence. There was nothing inher mode of life that would indicate that she lived differently from anyother woman who was alone in the world and sought quiet. She went outfor a long walk every afternoon, purchased the necessities of herestablishment, or books, of which she seemed to read great numbers.
Special Agent Gard established a close watch over the house in which shelived. This was easy because there was but a front entrance andapartments opposite looked out upon the street. He determined thatnobody should enter this house without being observed. He asked theParis police to provide him with two reliable men who could watch withhim in shifts from the quarters he rented across the street.
A vigil of two weeks revealed absolutely nothing. With the exception ofthe servant who came at noon each day and remained not more than fourhours, no living creature entered the house. In all that two weeks thepostman left no mail. Billy Gard seemed to be up against a blank wall.He held, however, that if a man kept awake on the most hopeless job fora sufficient length of time some clue was sure to develop or some ideapresent itself that would lead toward results.
Gard investigated the maid who worked the daily short shift in thequarters of the red-haired woman from America. He found her a placid andstupid creature who knew nothing nor had intelligence sufficient for hispurpose. Incidentally he found that she had secured her place through anemployment agency located at a considerable distance. He immediatelymade use of this information.
The special agent, through the Paris police force, secured thecooperati
on of the employment bureau. A position that paid much betterwas offered to the servant of Mrs. Berliner. It was, quite naturally,accepted. That lady, finding herself without a servant, returned to theagency that had formerly provided her with one who was entirelysatisfactory. She asked for a second maid.
The employment bureau immediately supplied her demand. The woman who wassent was, in secret, more than she seemed to be. She was connected withthe Paris police department and was a detective of some cleverness.Almost immediately she took up her new activities.
Three days later she reported to Agent Gard from America. She had foundin her red-haired mistress a woman who led a quiet life that seemed inno way irregular, who followed a normal routine of housekeeping,walking, shopping. She seemed to have no acquaintances. But one thingirregular appeared in the whole establishment. There was one room in therear of the suite which remained locked. The mistress had stated that itwas a storage room. This seemed somewhat strange, as it must look outupon the interior court and therefore be the most attractive room ofthem all. It seemed peculiar that such a room should be used forstorage and, even so, that it should be locked up.
Gard put together the two facts--the locked room and the short hours ofthe servant--and drew a conclusion. It was as the result of thisconclusion that he asked the woman detective to install a dictagraphbeneath the table in the sunny little dining room just off the apartmentof the locked door. This was easy of accomplishment during the hour ofthe afternoon stroll of the mistress of the house. The wires of thedictagraph were run across the street and into the watch-tower rooms ofthe special agent.
When the dinner hour approached that evening Billy Gard sat patientlywith the headpiece of the dictagraph securely in place. The first soundthat he caught from across the street was that of feet, supposedly thoseof the woman of the Titian hair, passing back and forth about the room,then an occasional snatch of a song while she worked. He gathered thatshe was arranging for the evening meal, the servant having gone homehours before.
Ten minutes passed and then there came over the wire a sound that mighthave been a bit surprising to the observer of this ultra quiethousehold, the watcher at the entrance through which none had passedunseen since the day it was rented, had not the listener alreadydeveloped a theory.
"Well, Margaret," said a full-throated man's voice, as transmitted bythe dictagraph, "this is not so bad. I never dreamed that you had thehousewifely instincts that would make it possible for you to arrangewith your own hands the dainty dinners we are having. I am beginning tothink that the man is lucky who cannot afford servants."
"And don't you know," said a woman's voice, "I never enjoyed anythingmore in my life. For almost the only time I can remember I have adefinite occupation. I have to provide our creature comforts. I haven'tbeen so happy in years. I really don't care how long they keep us coopedup."
"I will confess," said the man, "that the novelty has worn off of theview into the courtyard. But it might be worse. For a while they had methinking quite regularly of striped suits and the lockstep which arepart of a life even more confining than this. And here I have you. I amquite content to wait for the atmosphere to clear."
"But I am very sure we are still being watched," said the woman. "Ialways feel that I am being followed when I go out."
"Very likely," said the man. "But no detective will pursue fruitlessquests indefinitely. Even though they know you are here, they willultimately lose interest in a surveillance that yields nothing. We canafford to wait. The time will come when we can steal away in safety."
"When it is all over," she responded, "I do wish that we could find away to let those detectives know that you were here under their verynoses all the time."
Billy Gard, it may here be set down, was most anxious to learn how thishad been possible. He had followed Margaret Berliner to the house whenshe had first come to see it. He had been notified immediately when shehad rented it. From that moment he had watched every detail of hertaking possession; had, with the aid of his men, seen everything thathad gone into the house. Yet Berliner had installed himself without hisknowledge and had been living there all the time.
"It would have been impossible without Archie," Berliner was saying. "Aman in a position like mine needs, upon occasion, some one he can trustto do little things for him. We may quarrel with blood relatives all ourlives, but they have the advantage of being safe to trust in time oftrouble. It is a very small thing to send a man to a rent agent for akey to inspect lodgings and to send him back with the key after they areinspected. But had I not been able to trust Archie absolutely I wouldnot have been able to get in here a day ahead of you and this snuglittle arrangement would not have been possible."
It was because of what he here overheard that Special Agent Gard,assisted by Coleman of the Paris office and the police of that city,considerately waited until Mrs. Berliner went shopping the following dayand were admitted by the woman detective, who was at the time washingthe accumulated dishes of the household. They so surrounded the lockeddoor as to make escape impossible and then announced their presence.Gard told Berliner, through the locked door, of the situation thatexisted on the outside. He suggested that the easiest way was to unboltthe entrance, thereby saving the necessity of breaking it down.Whereupon the customs broker walked out and surrendered, and a verytedious fugitive case was brought to a successful conclusion.