ACAVº


HARVARD COLLEGE LIBRARY
purchased from THE
BOSTON LIBRARY SOCIETY
WITH INCOME FROM THE
AMEY RICHMOND SHELDON FUND
I94I








BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS





Britz, of Headquarters
By
MARCIN BARBER
NEW YORK
MOFFAT, YARD AND COMPANY
1910


HARVARD
Ufºlvº 129 |TY
L E RARY
| MAR 1941
`-- --~~
Copyright, 1910, by
MOFFAT, YARD AND COMPANY
NEW YORK
Published May, 1910


chapter
II.
III.
IV.
VI.
VII.
VIII.
IX.
XII.
XIII.
XIV.
XV.
XVI.
XVII.
XVIII.
XIX.
XXI.
XXII.
XXIII.
XXIV.
XXV.
XXVI.
CONTENTS
IN THE DIAMond Horseshoe
THE MAN OF ACTION
A SEARCHING ExAMINATION.
“THE CHIEF WANTS TO SEE YoU "
THE BRow Nstone House
THE THIRD DEGREE
REMANDED To THE Tombs
BRItz TAKES Action
WoRD FROM Logan
DOROTHY MARCH TALKS
A WILD RIDE
THE EMPTY APARTMENT
INTERVIEwing the Swami
Old FRIENDs
AT WARD's ISLAND - -
THE ASSISTANT DISTRICT Attorney
A PAIR OF THIEVES
THE GLITTERING DANCE
THE MYSTERIous MILLICENT
KANANDA's MISSION
STOP, THIEF | - - - -
Hot on THE Scent
MRS. MISSIONER's VISITOR
BRITz SHows His HAND
THE ATTACK on THE YAcHT
MUTUAL ExPLANATIONs - -
Pace
I2
2O
33
49
72
82
93
I09
I33
I44
I55
185
I97
2IO
229
253
279
3IO
33L
342
361
372
V





BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
CHAPTER I
IN THE DIAMOND HORSESHOE
A GIRL's scream clashed with the soprano's high
note in the Jewel Song, and in a moment the Metro-
politan Opera House was in confusion. The cry,
half suppressed, broke the spell peculiar to a “Faust”
night. The somewhat portly Marguerite, her voice
soaring like a cage-born bird suddenly freed, was
decking her mature person with the glistening stage
gems left on her scenic doorstep by the suavest of
devils. As the singer hung about her neck the rope
of pearls with which Mephisto planned to fetter her
soul, Mrs. Missioner, swinging her fan with a freer
motion, struck the slenderest part of her diamond
collarette. The blow was sharp. The golden thread
on which the choicest of the Missioner jewels in their
perforated settings were strung, snapped. Instantly
most of the freed drops of frozen fire that consti-
tuted Mrs. Missioner's magnificent necklace—the one
with the Maharanee diamond—were rolling on the
floor of the box.
Mrs. Missioner, as the little scream broke from
Dorothy March, a débutante she had taken under her
wing for the evening, clutched at the few diamonds
that fell into her lap. Miss March drew her skirts


2 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
tightly about her ankles and shrank into a corner of
the box, making room for the man who sprang to
Mrs. Missioner's aid. Before another moment sped,
Curtis Griswold was on his knees scooping together
the scattered jewels with snow-gloved hands. Brux-
ton Sands, slower of movement, bent with more dig-
nity to the task. In the next box, separated from
Mrs. Missioner's only by a low velvet rail, a man of
Oriental features and complexion turned to watch
the scramble for the jewels. Though he did not
stir from his place, his hawk-like face seemed to
thrust itself into the center of the excited group.
The confusion throughout the house died slowly.
By that subtle magnetism that inspires masses of
humanity, everybody seemed to know whence the
scream had come, and all eyes were turned from the
stage to the Missioner box. They saw the usually tran-
quil mistress of a hundred millions yielding publicly
to emotions that her poorest sister on losing her only
trinkets might have shared with her. So distracting
was the excitement in the Missioner box that for a
second the great soprano paused in her cadenzas, and
the conductor halted the beat of his baton. There
was danger of the orchestra committing the crime of
a break in its strains. But the musicians, deterred by
discipline from imitating their leader's swift back
glances at the auditorium, played steadily on.
“Someone has fainted,” came in ill-repressed tones
from somewhere in the orchestra seats. Marguerite,
her fingers at her throat, paused almost imperceptibly,
but long enough for a quick look at the focus of ex-
citement.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 3
“Continue ! Continue!” she urged, as she bent her
gaze from the box to the conductor.
“What's the matter? Go on! Go on!” the stage
manager cried in undertones from the wings. Ushers
in the back of the house sought to cover the confusion
with ill-timed applause. The moment was big with
potential tragedy. One cry of “Fire!” might have
sent those thousands of startled women and men bat-
tling along the aisles in an elemental fury of self-
preservation. Mere prolongation of the situation with-
out that terrible tocsin might have ended in a smaller
panic. But the liquid notes of the soprano soaring
again in the pyrotechnics of the Jewel Song reclaimed
the attention of the audience. The conductor, evi-
dently eager to hide his own momentary loss of poise,
fairly lifted his men through the intricacies of the
accompaniment. Promptness of action by the stage
manager restored order behind the scenes.
Nothing of all those incidents struck the sense of
anyone in the Missioner box. All four of its occu-
pants were concerned for the immediate recovery of
the diamonds that had sprung from Mrs. Missioner's
neck to her lap, and then stampeded across the floor.
Griswold, still on his knees, rescued the greater num-
ber. Sands, a man of action as well as of millions,
picked up the larger gems. Miss March shrank fur-
ther into her corner of the box, and dragged her
petticoats ever more closely until her immature form
seemed chiseled in tulle.
“Look in all the corners—look everywhere,” Mrs.
Missioner urged. “There's one behind the chair,”
she pointed.


4 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“There's another,” cried Dorothy, pointing at Gris-
wold's feet. A glance from the dark stranger in the
next box directed the searchers toward still another
part of the floor, and every move was rewarded by
the recovery of a gleaming stone. One by one, by
twos, by threes, the diamonds were gathered, and
still the search went on. Fast as they scooped them
up, Sands and Griswold poured the glittering treas-
ure into Mrs. Missioner's lap.
“Are they all there?” asked the millionaire.
“No, no,” answered the widow. “There are sev-
eral more. Please look again—look everywhere.
Dorothy, help me count them.”
The women sorted and counted the gems, indiffer-
ent to the thousands of eyes as if in the seclusion of
a boudoir.
Griswold and Sands renewed their search, peering
into the remotest corners, pushing chairs about, look-
ing, reaching, grasping with the zeal of Klon-
dikers, urged again and again by the owner of the
jewels.
The glittering horseshoe of the Metropolitan de-
serves its name. The Kaffirs of Kimberly, the pearl-
divers of Polynesia, the gold-seekers of the Klondike,
the diggers into earth's secrets the world over toil
ceaselessly to maintain the brilliance of that big jewel
show. They send their diamonds and rubies and em-
eralds and sapphires, their pearls and opals and gold,
to gleam on the heads and breasts and gowns of
women whom the industry of one generation, or the
stock-market luck of another, has crowned with riches.
A night at the opera is a parade of the wonders gems


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 5
can work and of that which, too often, gems can
buy.
In all that electric sparkle, no gems outshone
the Missioner jewels, of which the necklace Mrs.
Missioner wore that night was the masterpiece.
For in its center blazed the famous Maharanee
diamond.
“I think we've found them all,” said Sands, rising
and emptying his cupped hand into the miniature
mountain in Mrs. Missioner's lap.
“No more in the box, that's certain,” supplemented
Griswold, dusting his knees studiously.
“Are you sure?” asked Dorothy.
“Please be sure,” begged the widow. “I must have
them all.”
Sands and Griswold nodded in chorus. Neither
noticed the fascination with which the eyes of
the Easterner, like twin searchlights, swept the
floor.
Sands and Griswold returned to their chairs. Re-
luctantly realizing the thrilling little by-scene was at
an end, the other members of the audience again
focused their attention on the stage. Mephisto be-
fooled Dame Martha, Faust won Marguerite, and the
curtain descended on an operatic triumph, only to be
raised and lowered and raised again as boxes, orches-
tra, and balconies recalled the singers for their meed
of praise.
As they passed, bowing and smiling, before the
curtain, a low cry came from Mrs. Missioner's
throat.
“O-o-ohl” she exclaimed, half-rising in her ex-


6 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
citement, “the largest of all is gone! The Maha-
raneel ”
Instantly the turmoil was renewed. Dorothy
sprang to her feet and, before either of the men could
anticipate her, began pushing the chairs about until
all save Mrs. Missioner's were grouped in a corner
of the box. Then the little débutante, regardless of
her fluffy frock, raked the floor with her fan, with
her free hand, her feet, in almost hysterical quest
of the still missing diamond. Griswold, nearly
as excited as the women, recommenced his own
search.
All the energy of the thousands of women and
men in the house was in their eyes, and those
eyes were concentrated on the box where the mil-
lionaire widow, half-frenzied, was sacrificing her
Paquin gown to the hunt for her more treasured
possession.
All the action in Sands leaped to the fore. Stretch-
ing a long arm across the bent backs of Griswold and
little Miss March, he thrust a thumb against an elec-
tric button.
“It can't be in the box,” he said decisively, and
when a breathless usher rapped on the door, the mil-
lionaire tore it open and whispered, “Run down to the
orchestra and look everywhere around this box. A
diamond has fallen over the rail.”
“What can be the matter?” asked a thousand
women of a thousand escorts. In many parts of the
audience, they were standing between the seats for a
better view of the box around which the little tempest
of excitement swirled. t


8 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
excitedly. “Don’t you really know, Mr. Gris-
WOld P”
“Know what, Miss March?” asked the clubman.
“Why, the history of that stone ! Don't you know
Mrs. Missioner's husband bought it from a Maharanee,
that they brought it all the way from India? Don't
you know it's the finest diamond in America?”
Griswold shook his head. He was pursuing the
search perfunctorily. His hands were busy, but his
eyes roved over the house. Idly he noted the slowly
ebbing interest of the audience, the departure of hun-
dreds by twos and threes and larger groups, the throng-
ing toward the lobby for the usual visits between the
acts. It was with faint interest that he saw several
swarthy faces weaving through the crowd. Had his
eyes been able to follow those faces, he would have
seen them converse in the corridor behind the box—
the box in which sat the Oriental with the face of a
hawk. -
The hawk watched the Missioner box. So steadily
did he direct his gaze at Mrs. Missioner that she was
on the point of averting her glance when the stranger's
flashlight gaze struck a spark from her memory. She
bowed, coolly as she began the inclination of her head,
but in the end graciously. Her dark neighbor was
satisfied with that dubious encouragement.
“You are fond of your jewels as ever, I see,” he
said, in a low tone, as of one claiming a share in in-
timate memories.
“Yes,” she answered with an abstracted air. She
was harking back to days long gone, and evidently
the recollection was not unpleasant.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 9
“I cannot blame you,” said the Oriental. “Every-
one knows you have the most wonderful jewels in the
world—one of them, at any rate.”
Little Miss March listened wide-eyed. Sands bent
toward Griswold with a brief whisper.
“These,” returned Mrs. Missioner, “are among my
very finest diamonds. But they are nothing to the
Maharanee, and that is gone.”
A leaping flash in the Oriental's eyes soon faded to
a gleam of polite interest.
“You are brave,” was all he said, “to wear them
in public. Many a woman, save in her own ballroom,
would content herself with the duplicates.”
“Duplicates!” There was unmistakable contempt
in Mrs. Missioner's tone.
“I trust,” the Easterner continued, “you will re-
cover the Maharanee, too.”
Mrs. Missioner had no time for more than another
slow bending of her head when the usher who had
gone to the orchestra hurried into the box.
“I’ve looked thoroughly, sir,” he said to Sands,
“and I can't find the diamond anywhere.”
The millionaire slipped a banknote into the man's
hand.
“Try again,” he said quietly. “There's a good
deal more than this in it for you if you find it.”
Griswold, as he moved to let the usher pass, stepped
backward with such abruptness as to drive his heel
sharply down upon something that slipped under his
tread like a peach kernel. In the very moment when
Mrs. Missioner, resuming her talk with the Oriental,
said, with emphasis, “I leave imitations to others,”


IO BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
that blundering heel crushed into and through the
velvet carpet, crushed, against the unyielding hard-
wood of the floor, what had been the most conspicu-
ous diamond in all the richly jeweled collarette—
crushed it until only a tiny heap of pallid powder lay
there, save where a great flake had slipped from the
pressure and remained to betray what the little pile of
dust had been.
“Jove!” exclaimed Sands.
“The Maharanee!” gasped Dorothy.
The widow paled.
The light in the Oriental's eyes flared to a flame.
With a smile as inscrutable as his thoughts, he leaned
across the low partition, picked up a pinch of the
powder and the telltale flake and laid them defer-
entially on Mrs. Missioner's outspread fan.
“Your maid is more cautious,” he said, his smile
softening slightly, “or, it may be, your jeweler has
made a mistake.”
Mrs. Missioner did not faint. She only clutched
the soft hand of little Miss March so tightly that the
débutante with difficulty suppressed a scream. This
time there was silence in the Missioner box, for Gris-
wold, even as he began to stammer an apology for his
awkwardness, let the words die on his lips as he saw
the cruel pallor of the widow's face. The silence of
Sands was grim, that of the Oriental suavely self-
effacing.
“Then,” said Mrs. Missioner at last, in a low, tense
tone, “this is—this is y?
“Not the Maharanee diamond,” replied the Ori-
ental. “In a sense, madame, I congratulate you.”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS II
She stopped him with a look.
- “This—this thing is ” She could say no more.
- “Pastel ” thundered Sands.
- “I have been robbed,” said Mrs. Missioner in a
stifled voice. “Take me home, Bruxton.”
s


CHAPTER II
THE MAN OF ACTION
THE conference that followed in the quiet of Mrs.
Missioner's library threw no light on the mystery of
the Maharanee's disappearance. Mrs. Missioner was
not of the fainting type, and when she entered her
Fifth Avenue home, followed by Dorothy, Sands, and
Griswold, she went straight to the room in which she
kept her jewels. Half library, half boudoir, the big
apartment was a triumph of the decorator's art. It
was lighted by slender vacuum tubes running along
the walls, which could flood the farthest corner with
noonday brilliance or soften the gloom to the faintest
twilight gleam. A grateful glow from logs of giant
Georgia oak ruddied the Colonial fireplace.
Mrs. Missioner herself switched on the lights to
their full radiance. She hastened across the room, her
opera cloak slipping from her white shoulders, and
paused in front of the safe.
“You don't expect to find your diamond there?”
inquired Griswold amazedly.
She flung a glance over her shoulder.
“Perhaps all the other stones are paste,” she an-
swered. “I am going to see how many have been
stolen.”
She dropped to her knees before the steel door of
the bank-like vault built into the wall, and turned the
nickel knob to right and left. The door, painted to
I2


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I3
harmonize with the Flemish oak of the wainscot, was
ornamented with only the widow's crest. Silence held
the others as her gloved fingers whirled the little knob.
Not until a click announced that the bolts were thrown
did Sands speak.
“You are sure all the other stones are here?” he
asked, picking up Mrs. Missioner's lorgnon bag, into
which she had slipped the recovered gems on leaving
her opera box. -
“Yes,” the widow replied, “but, Bruxton, the Ma-
haranee, the beautiful Maharanee diamond'! If you
could know how I prize it!”
Sands, absently counting the lesser jewels, did not
see the massive safe door swing open. His disciplined
mind was working slowly, steadily. Dorothy, her
small face cameo clear in the intense light of the mer-
cury, watched the shining gems as the millionaire's
strong fingers flicked them delicately from the silken
bag to the table. Plainly she, too, was groping for a
clew. Griswold alone, therefore, saw the widow's
gloved hand tremble as, swiftly, she turned a smaller
knob controlling the combination of the compartment
in which she kept her jewels. His eyes still upon her,
he felt for a cigarette.
The match fell from his fingers as the inner door
opened to his searching glance. Lances of many-
colored light slashed the comparative gloom of the
compartment as Mrs. Missioner brought forth tray
after tray from the jewel vault. The steel box in the
center of the safe was an Aladdin's cave in miniature.
It held stones of every sort in settings of every
fashion, ranging from the product of twentieth cen-


I4 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
tury jewelers back to the loved works of Byzantine
artificers. Little Miss March gasped again as the
widow spread the trays on the Persian rug.
The widow's guests saw what few persons other
than Mrs. Missioner had seen—all the Missioner
jewels at once. The gems were the collection of a
lifetime. Missioner, in the intervals of amassing
millions, had devoted himself to gathering them from
the earth's four corners. It had been his only hobby,
and he had pursued it with the enthusiasm of a man
to whom an extra numeral or two on a check meant
little. Globe-girdling trips to which the financial and
industrial press attached mysterious importance had
meant nothing more than jewel hunts to Missioner.
He bagged railroads from habit, he stalked diamonds
for pleasure. And, despite her fondness for social
conquests the multi-millionaire considered trivial, so
sympathetic had been the bond between Missioner and
his wife that at his death not only the great collection,
but the passion of augmenting it, passed to her.
“You have an inventory, of course?” asked Sands.
Even his sturdy individuality paid passing tribute to
the magnificence of the collection. He left the stones
of the necklace on the table and strolled over to stare
at the rubies and emeralds, the sapphires and tour-
malines and amethysts, above all at the unrivaled
group of diamonds graded from a firefly's sparkle to
the gloryburst of radium. Little Miss March, true
daughter of Eve, sank on the broad rug beside the
shining trays and gazed at them in an ecstasy of
adoration.
Mrs. Missioner drew from a shelf in the jewel box a


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I5
catalogue of her treasures. Item by item she read
from it, the others checking tray by tray until the last
stone was accounted for, the last save the wonderful
Maharanee diamond.
“The big stone gone,” mused Sands. “Then,
Doris,” and there was conviction in his tones, as he
gathered up the jewels scattered on the table, “these
others are false, too.”
“Oh, do you think so?” asked Dorothy, her fingers
interlacing in repressed hysteria.
“Sure of it,” said Sands, holding one of the sus-
pected gems to the light. “I’m not an expert, but I
haven't the slightest doubt.”
“Let me see them,” Griswold interposed. He
scrutinized three or four for more than a minute.
“They look genuine enough to me.” He offered them
to Miss March, whose fingers did not unlock to take
them.
“We can be certain very quickly,” said Mrs. Mis-
sioner. She was studying Griswold's whitening
fingers—steady enough, but deadly white. It was a
peculiarity of the man that he turned pale only in his
hands. “I will send for a jeweler.”
“My dear! At this hour?” came in Dorothy's
child treble.
Mrs. Missioner smiled in a way that said there were
jewelers of no small importance in commercial circles
who would be glad to answer a summons from her
at any hour—that it was not in vain she was known
to dealers as one of the most liberal collectors in
the world. She turned to a rosewood desk and took
up a telephone.


I6 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“Gramercy, 9–7–4–6,” she called. “The
Effingham 2–Mr. Ranscome, please.—This is Mrs.
Missioner, Mr. Ranscome.—Yes, I am at home.—Can
you come up for a few minutes?—Thank you,” and
as she returned the receiver to the hook, she ex-
plained: “Ranscome is the oldest expert in New
York.”
“While we are about it,” said Sands slowly, “we
may as well call headquarters.” He reached for the
telephone, but his hand was stayed by Dorothy's flut-
tering fingers.
“Oh, Bruxton,” she said, “please don't call the
police,” and as his eyebrows went up, she added, “I am
so frightened.”
“I wouldn't be hasty, Sands,” said Griswold. “The
newspapers follow the sleuths, you know.”
The millionaire hesitated.
“Have you thought of anything better to do?” he
returned. Then, as the widow's silence made itself
felt, he turned to her. “Your pardon, Doris. Per-
haps your own wishes are—but it seems such a natural
thing to do.”
“I’m not thinking of the newspapers,” replied Mrs.
Missioner, “but maybe we'd better wait for Mr. Rans-
come. You see,” and there was perplexity in the glance
that swept the group, “this is no ordinary theft.”
“Not a burglary, you think?” asked Griswold
quickly. He had lighted his cigarette, and, leaning
back in a cozy corner of the inglenook, was smoking
with little abrupt puffs that contrasted with the ease
of his position. He studied the widow covertly
through weaving wreaths.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 17
“If a burglar could reach this room, I must re-
organize my household,” she murmured. She was
gazing into the flames. Her shoulders drooped, and
Sands, noticing her weariness, switched off the lights.
The rainbow sparkle of the jewel trays varied fan-
tastically the pattern of the rug on which they lay, but
the background of dusk rested her.
“And there is no one you suspect?”
“There is no one in the house I can suspect.”
“You are to be congratulated,” Griswold com-
mented, with a smile discreetly divided between sin-
cerity and satire. “And, of course, having such an
impeccable household 33
“If I were you, Doris,” Sands broke in impatiently,
“I’d send for the police at once.” His slow logic had
carried him to the fact that even now the thief might
be on the road to escape. Little Miss March glanced
at him admiringly. Swift or slow of wit, the man of
action appeals.
“I think Mr. Sands is right, Mrs. Missioner,” she
said softly. “It frightened me at first, but Bruxton
knows.”
“Advise me,” said the widow, her satin slipper tap-
tap-tapping the fender of burnished brass. “I am not
jesting when I say I am in the hands of my friends.
All this is more than puzzling.”
“Puzzling!” echoed Dorothy. “It’s a mystery—
and it's all very dreadful, too.” Sands looked at her,
smiling. There was eloquence in those rare smiles of
his, much more than in his speech. Not without
cause did Wall Street know him as “Silent” Sands.
“Why not a private detective?” Griswold sug-


18 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
gested. “It is the best way to recover stolen prop-
erty.”
“Not always,” Sands objected.
“Almost always,” Griswold pursued. “The police
usually are useless in a case like this.” Turning to
Mrs. Missioner, he continued, “I can recommend an
excellent agency.”
“Mr. Ranscome, madam.”
A footman of conventional pattern stood on the
threshold as if on a pedestal and looked at Mrs. Mis-
sioner from a carven face.
“Let him come up, Blodgett,” she responded. The
carven features blurred into the background. A round
little man with the face of a dreamer and the eyes of a
student entered, almost on his toes. Mrs. Missioner
greeted him pleasantly, and as she pressed the button
that filled the room with light again, she presented
him to her friends. “Mr. Ranscome,” she added, “is
an expert of experts.”
Briefly the widow recounted the accident in the
opera box, the discovery of the supposed Maharanee
diamond's worthlessness, and her suspicion as to the
other stones of her necklace. During her recital,
Ranscome's glance caressed the gems in the scattered
trays, and it was by a visible effort that he wrested
his eyes from them to look at the stones on the table.
“Are they real?” asked the widow.
The little man seemed not to hear her.
“Did you say, madam, the Maharanee diamond?”
“Yes,” she answered, and waves of pain rippled
across her face. “Oh, Mr. Ranscome, think of it—
think of it!” She clasped her hands so tensely the


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I9
rings upon them bit her flesh. “Think of it, Mr.
Ranscome!”
“The Maharaneel” he murmured—say, rather,
groaned in an undertone. “A glorious jewel, a won-
derful jewel, a queen's jewell Gone, did you say?
Absolutely gone—not a trace of it?”
With the flat of his hand, he spread the smaller
stones on the table, stroking their gloss with sensitive
fingers. He held three or four to the light, then, with
a disdainful gesture, smeared the glistening pile broad-
cast across the board.
“None,” replied the widow. “And those?”
“These, Mrs. Missioner,” the expert said, as if wak-
ing from a dream, “are the most beautiful imitations
I have ever seen.”
Sands reached for the telephone again.


CHAPTER III
A SEARCHING EXAMINATION
WHEN the millionaire stopped talking over the tele-
phone, he turned to the widow with an air of finality.
“I have taken it on myself,” he told her, “to in-
form the Detective Bureau. This is no time for Sher-
locking. There’ll be a couple of detectives here in
half an hour.”
Mrs. Missioner looked at him admiringly. But her
eyes turned to Griswold with a light it would have
taken a woman to read, a woman more experienced
than little Dorothy March.
Ranscome, ignoring the counterfeits, stood in ab-
sorbed study of the jewel trays' kaleidoscopic contents.
That peculiar pallor returned to Griswold's hands.
With fingers that bent and straightened ceaselessly, he
drummed his fist.
“The robbery is the more incomprehensible,” said
Mrs. Missioner thoughtfully, “because of the ex-
traordinary precautions I have taken against burglars.
I cannot understand how the thief got to the neck-
lace.”
“Your safe seems strong enough,” Ranscome ven-
tured. Stepping around the trays, he passed his hand
over the outer door and looked at the twenty-four steel
bolts curiously.
“It should be strong,” returned Mrs. Missioner.
“It was built on the lines of the great safe in the
2O


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 2I
Gramercy National. It differs only in size and in
the absence of a time lock.”
Ranscome, staring at the safe, shook his head.
Sands walked over to him and, thrusting both hands
in his pockets, stood gazing at the bolts. Griswold,
smoking quietly in the inglenook, mustered a show of
interest in the safe from time to time, but always his
glance returned to the glittering trays.
“I wish you'd put those away, Doris,” said Gris-
wold suddenly. “With all this mystery in the air, I
don't like to see them lying around.”
Mrs. Missioner laughed.
“Surely they're safe among us,” she answered, gra-
ciously including Ranscome with an extra smile. She
drew off her gloves decisively and, rising as if from
folds of conjecture, rang for Blodgett. “I think—”
she said, then stopped with her hand on Dorothy's
shoulder.
Inquiry reached toward her from four pairs of
eyes.
“I think,” she went on, “Miss March wants some
tea, and—I think we all need something to drink.”
It was when Blodgett, tray-laden, was tinkling his
way to the library that the detectives arrived. The
hostess and her guests, the footman having been bid-
den to show the policemen in, heard heavy breathing
outside the door, where Donnelly and Carson, of the
Central Office, were gripped in a panicky pause. Next
moment, a large man with a small head, and another
So aggressively average as to be a nondescript, came
in. Donnelly, the big man, turned out his toes as he
walked. A charm the size and shape of a double


22 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
eagle, bearing a Bacchante whose pose would have
been indecorous if it had not been impossible, swung
from his equatorial waist line. One could tell at a
glance he used perfume. One could tell nothing in
many glances about Carson. There was nothing to
tell.
“We’ve come up here, Mrs. Missioner,” said Don-
nelly, addressing Miss March, “to find your dia-
monds.”
“Oh, thank you!” murmured the widow, sweeping
toward him. “I am Mrs. Missioner. Won't you be
seated?”
“Why, huh!—no, Miss Missioner—Mrs. Mis-
sioner—no, thanks!” answered the sleuth, with all the
airy ease of a highly embarrassed man. “We'll just
—huh!—walk around a little, thanks—just walk
around.” Carson, neutral echo of his colleague's
words, did walk around. Donnelly, as if, having
announced the action, he had done his share, stood
still.
Dorothy and Griswold exchanged glances. Sands
stared stolidly at the sleuths. Mrs. Missioner, with a
permissive inclination of her head, began chatting with
Ranscome. Even as he spoke with her, the veteran
expert could not drag his eyes from the jewels.
“Now, then, Mis' Missioner,” said Donnelly
briskly. “Who-huh !—do you suspect?” There
seemed to be a sort of astigmatism in his breathing.
Carson faced the group with an expression that said
bluntly he suspected everybody.
“I don't suspect anybody,” Mrs. Missioner replied,
resuming her talk with Ranscome.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 23
“You notice that—huh!—Carson?” said Donnelly,
wheeling on his mate. “Nobody suspected—huh!”
He breathed in dialect.
Carson, instantly complaisant, banished suspicion
from his look.
“Now, you know, there's always somebody, ma'am
— huh ! — Mis' Missioner,” Donnelly persisted.
“Somebody suspected in every case. Think a mo-
ment. Have to suspect before you convict, you know.
Never heard—huh!—of a case without suspects—
eh?”
The “eh’’ was meant to be a javelin hurled straight
at the widow's inner consciousness. It fell short.
“There is no one to be suspected—no one I can sus-
pect,” she said.
Carson, the reticent, unbosomed himself.
“Somebody,” he said assertively, “did it.”
“Oh, well—huh !—ma'am,” chugged Donnelly,
“we’ll just look around—just look around a little.”
And Carson looked.
Feet at right angles, Bacchante dancing desperately
as the fob rose and fell, the large man from the Cen-
tral Office moved toward the safe. Mrs. Missioner
shuddered at thought of the peril to her jewels from
his plate armor soles. Her imploring eye-sweep
brought ready response from Sands and Griswold,
and in a second's fraction they were piling the trays
on chairs and tables. Ranscome, helping, handled the
morocco cases with loving touch.
Donnelly stopped short at sight of the gems in the
trays. An interrogative snort vibrated somewhere
inside him, but found no oral expression. He passed


24 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
on to the safe. With a masterful grasp, he swung the
great door to and fro.
“We'll soon know,” he said reassuringly, “who to
—huh!—yes, who to suspect. Carson l’’
The echo crossed the room with whispering tread.
Both detectives began an examination of the door.
Eyes close to the daintily tinted steel, they dragged
their combined gaze along its front from top to bot-
tom, from side to side. Then they shifted their eyes
to the thick edge of the door, and their scrutiny bored
its way past bolt after bolt until it switched to the
inner panel. That done, they examined the rectangle
into which the big door fitted as thoroughly. Dur-
ing most of this procedure, the Bacchante stood on her
hands and flourished her heels in the air, as Donnelly
doubled himself until the equator of his waist line al-
most touched the poles.
The big man straightened abruptly. Bacchante's
heels came down and her hands fluttered aloft. The
catch in his voice, characteristic of him when in the
presence of the rich, was brushed out of his throat by
a burst of professional zeal. He recognized a situa-
tion that enabled him to play inquisitor in a home of
wealth.
“Where were the jewels stolen from?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” said Mrs. Missioner.
“When did you miss them?”
Again the widow recited the incident of the opera
box.
“Who was in the party?”
Mrs. Missioner told him. She did not mention the
Oriental in the next box. It did not occur to her.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 25
Donnelly stroked a heavy jaw ponderously.
“I understand your diamonds are worth a pot of
money, ma'am,” he half inquired.
“They are valuable,” said the widow.
“What do you value them at?”
“Half a million dollars.”
An appreciative “Huh!” broke from Donnelly.
Carson echoed it in his face.
“Isn't there anybody you can think of,” pursued the
big detective, “who could have taken them?”
“Nobody who would,” answered Mrs. Missioner.
“Did anybody else have the combination of the
safe?”
“One,” responded Mrs. Missioner. She answered
defensively, like a witness under hostile cross-exam-
ination, volunteering nothing. Donnelly seemed not
to hear her. He was examining the safe again. He
passed his hand over the door and its frame again,
turned the handle that shot the bolts, noted their
strength and smoothness, turned them back, and
wheeled on Mrs. Missioner abruptly.
“There's been no forcing here,” he said sagely.
“It's an inside job.”
Mrs. Missioner's eyebrows went up.
“Yes'm,” the detective went on, “an inside job.
Who did you say had the combination?”
Mrs. Missioner hadn't said, but she answered
naturally:
“My secretary—Miss Holcomb.”
“Oh!” said Donnelly. Carson's lips rounded in
mute repetition.
Sands, impatient of the detective's awkward ques-


26 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
tioning, shook himself lion-like and went to a window.
Griswold swung his foot idly, and smoked in shorter
measure. Ranscome looked nervously at the inquisitor,
then swung his gaze back to the jewel trays. Dorothy
listened with wide-eyed interest.
“What do you know about this Miss Holcomb?”
asked Donnelly, squaring himself as if for a trial of
strength with the widow and turning out his toes
farther than ever.
“I have known her many years,” said Mrs. Mis-
sioner quietly, adding with warmth, “She is a young
woman of high character.”
“Oh, she is, is she?” returned the sleuth. “And
how, may I ask, ma'am, do you know that?”
“I say, I have known her many years,” said Mrs.
Missioner.
“Oh, you have? And are you sure you know her
thoroughly?” Donnelly manifestly was enjoying his
rôle to the utmost. Carson's face became a super-
cilious interrogation point.
“Mr.—what did you say your name was P’ replied
the widow.
“Donnelly, ma'am—Detective Donnelly, of the Cen-
tral Office.”
“Thank you.” The exact shade of Mrs. Mis-
sioner's meaning was indeterminate. She may have
been genuinely grateful for the information. There
was nothing uncertain about her next words. “If
you think, Mr. Donnelly,” she said, “Miss Holcomb
can be connected with the disappearance of my jewels
in any way, you are on the wrong course. She is
above suspicion.”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 27
There was a man in Mulberry Street who might
have told her nobody was above suspicion in the eyes
of the ordinary Central Office man. But Mrs. Mis-
sioner had not yet met him, and when she did, both
were too interested for philosophical observations.
Donnelly did not reply. He held whispered con-
sultation with his mate. Then he asked if he might
question the servants.
“Certainly, if you think it necessary,” assented the
widow. “But I should warn you that I cannot bring
myself to suspect any of them.”
“Everybody seems to be above suspicion,” snapped
Donnelly. “It’s always the way, until we begin to
get on the trail, and then everybody becomes sus-
picious. I think I'll question the servants, ma'am.
Shall I have 'em in here?”
Mrs. Missioner bowed and sent Blodgett to sum-
mon his comrades.
“One at a time, please,” said Donnelly. The first
to enter was the housekeeper, a staid woman in a black
gown with narrow white ruching about her withered
neck. She knew nothing of the jewels save that
madam always locked them in the safe herself, unless
Miss Holcomb was there to do it for her. Yes, Miss
Holcomb put them away pretty often. Took them out
pretty often, too, when madam wished to wear them.
No, none of the maids had access to the safe. They
were proper young women and knew their place. It
was out of the question to think any of them would
meddle with madam's jewels. Yes, some of the maids
had followers, but always respectable young men, who
worked for a living. No, she herself would not ven-


28 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
ture to disturb any of madam's possessions which
madam had not placed under her immediate
Care.
The answers of the other servants were equally
straightforward. The butler, under-butler, chef, sec-
ond footman, pantry-boy, parlor-maid, chamber-
maids, and kitchen-maid, and the majestic Blodgett
himself were interrogated persistently, minutely, dog-
gedly, even bullyingly, and in the end the net result
of what they had to tell was zero. That is to say, as
far as Mrs. Missioner and her friends and the dia-
mond expert were concerned. Donnelly thought
otherwise. Carson's mind was a receptive blank.
“Are these all the servants?” asked the large de-
tective.
“All at present,” answered Mrs. Missioner. “My
own maid is away on leave. Oh, yes, there's Ali.”
“Is Allie the name of your maid?”
“No, Ali is a man—an Indian.”
“And what's his job?” This aggressively.
“He is a courier.”
Donnelly was puzzled.
“When I travel, he looks after the transportation
and baggage,” Mrs. Missioner explained.
The detective stroked his jaw and whispered with
Carson again.
“How long has your maid been away?”
“About a month,” the widow told him.
“Have you had the real sparklers since then?”
“The real 3 y
“Sparklers—shiners—diamonds?”
“I don't know,” said Mrs. Missioner doubtfully.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 29
“How can I be sure? I do not know when the sub-
stitution was made. I thought I had the genuine
necklace to-night.”
Exactly why Donnelly and Carson examined the
safe a third time must remain a mystery to everyone
outside the ranks of headquarters sleuths. Perhaps
they were seized by a common idea. Perhaps they
only did it to gain time. At any rate, there was a
world of wisdom in the big Central Office man's ex-
pression as he faced Mrs. Missioner again.
“This advance agent of yours—this Ali–where is
he P’’
“Blodgett,” called the widow, “send Ali here.”
The presence faded into the perspective of the
passage and in a few minutes materialized on the
threshold—alone.
“Ali is not in the house, madam,” the footman re-
ported.
“Ask Mrs. Janason when he will return.”
“Mrs. Janason does not know, madam. She did
not know he was out until I inquired for him.”
“Ask Miss Holcomb if she sent him anywhere.”
“What tribe does this Indian belong to?” Don-
nelly inquired importantly. “Choctaw P Cherokee?
Sioux 2 Maybe he's an Apache?”
Mrs. Missioner smiled. It was not an unpleasant
smile, but it jarred an unconscious “Huh !” out of the
detective. All the others save the serious Ranscome
smiled too, and Griswold laughed aloud.
“He isn't that kind of an Indian,” Sands enlight-
ened the sleuth. “He’s a native of India—a Hin-
doo.” -


3O BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“Of course,” rumbled the Central Office man, in-
dignantly. “I know that. What I want to know is
what kind of a Hindoo?”
“I should say he was a Sepoy,” remarked Griswold.
There was a malicious gleam in his eyes.
“Sepoy—huh?” Donnelly turned to Carson.
“What do you know about that?” he asked. Carson
knew nothing whatever about that. It would have
been disloyal to know more than his colleague.
“If these investigators have all the information
they require,” said Sands to the widow, “I suppose
they're anxious to be off at work on the case.” It was
plain he half regretted having rung up 3 IOO Spring.
Griswold glanced at him triumphantly.
“Well, ma'am—huh !—I guess we'll search the
rooms,” was Donnelly's next inquisitorial ven-
ture.
“Which rooms?” Mrs. Missioner was not at all
pleased.
“The servants', of course. That's the next step.”
Donnelly was back in his routine now, and the catch
left his voice again. He was effective, too. Mrs.
Missioner really gasped.
“That is entirely unnecessary,” she said icily. “I
told you I could not suspect anybody.”
“Never mind that, ma'am. We'll do all the sus-
pecting that's necessary. Needn't disturb you, I sup-
pose. This gentleman can show us the way?” and
Donnelly turned inquiringly to the footman.
Blodgett's face, always stony, became adamant.
But Mrs. Missioner made no sign of dissent, so he
glided away with the Central Office men in his wake.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 3I
Sands gazed after the detective ruefully, Griswold
watching him with unmistakable malice. Little Miss
March began asking questions, but the widow stopped
her with a playful caress.
“Let them look, dear,” she said resignedly. “They
won't find anything, of course, but I suppose they
would not be contented otherwise. Tell me,” she
added to Griswold, “are there any really intelligent
detectives?”
“Ask me something easy,” he replied, lapsing into
the vernacular of the clubs. “Mulberry Street has
many men of many minds. I suppose it must have
Some without any. Bruxton is unlucky, that's
all.”
There was a man in Mulberry Street Bruxton was
to find much more efficient than the present visitors
from headquarters. As the widow did not know that,
she was a good deal bored, and some of her first dis-
tress at the loss of her jewels, particularly the Ma-
haranee diamond, returned. She was almost de-
spondent when the detectives, after an exhaustive
search of the servants’ quarters, returned. They had
ransacked even the room of Mrs. Missioner's absent
maid, but to no purpose. Blodgett, frozen in the
doorway, gave no other sign than a malignant side
glance without turning his head. It was apparent,
however, Blodgett didn't like Central Office men.
Whatever his reasons, he didn't like them, and only
the presence of Mrs. Missioner and her guests de-
terred him from manifesting his dislike. Still,
Blodgett was nobody's fool. He had submitted to a
search of his room without protest.


32 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“Is there anything more you wish to know?” asked
Mrs. Missioner, rising. Donnelly was oblivious to the
hint.
“Yes, ma'am, Mis' Missioner,” he answered. “I
think we'll talk to your secretary now.”


CHAPTER IV
“THE CHIEF wants to SEE YOU”
ELINOR Holcomb, tall, graceful, gray-eyed, stood
framed between crimson portières like a Velasquez
portrait. Her refinement differed from Mrs. Mission-
er's climatically, but, despite the polaric oppositeness
of their coloring, there was a resemblance between
them. Mrs. Missioner's eyes turned to her apologet-
ically.
“I regret to disturb you so late, Elinor,” she said,
“but these gentlemen insist on seeing you. I suppose
you were sleeping?” -
“I was dozing, I fear,” smiled the girl. “I had
been reading.” She held a book in her hand.
“The necklace with the Maharanee diamond is
gone,” the widow explained, “and paste jewels have
been put in their place. This is Detective Donnelly,
of the Central Office, and this is Detective—ah—”
“Carson, ma'am,” said Donnelly. Carson himself
had been about to speak, but his big colleague, as usual,
hastened to do the talking for him.
“I’m sure I'm very glad to see Mr. Donnelly and
Mr. Carson, since there has been a robbery,” said
Elinor easily. She moved softly to the center of the
room and stood looking at the Headquarters men.
“Are you sure the real diamonds are gone?”
Mrs. Missioner made a gesture toward the safe and
indicated the heap of false gems on the table.
yy
33


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 35
Mrs. Missioner's return from the opera, until the
housekeeper knocked on my door with the information
Mrs. Missioner wished to see me in the library.”
“Housekeeper a friend of yours?”
Elinor regarded him freezingly.
“You evidently misunderstand,” she said. “I am
Mrs. Missioner's secretary.” The widow looked at
her protectingly.
“Well, you're one of her employés, ain't you?”
growled Donnelly. “I’m not here to split hairs, miss.
A necklace worth a half-million dollars has been stolen,
and I’m here to find out who stole it. Get me?”
Miss Holcomb “got him " in the sense he meant.
A deep flush started below her well-chiseled chin and
mounted to the soft, dark waves of her hair. She
turned an apprehensive glance upon the little circle
of Mrs. Missioner's friends, ending with an appealing
look at Mrs. Missioner herself.
“I really regard this as wholly unnecessary, Mr.
Donnelly,” said the widow, with slow insistence.
“Miss Holcomb is not only my secretary, but my
trusted friend. Her elder sister was in my class at
Smith. I have known the Holcombs many years.”
“You may think you know them, ma'am,” Don-
nelly persisted, “but my experience is you never can
tell who you know in a case like this. Me and my
side-partner have been sent here to recover your jewels
and locate the thief, and if you don't let us do it in our
own way, we can't be held responsible.”
“I’m afraid you'd better not interfere, Doris,” said
Sands.
“Can't expect results if you do,” observed Griswold.
2-


36 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
It was difficult for him to hide his enjoyment of the
turn the affair had taken. He watched Elinor as if he
reveled in her distress.
“Besides, ma'am, if you'll pardon me,” said Don-
nelly, “the case is out of your hands now; it's in the
hands of the Detective Bureau.”
“Very well,” Mrs. Missioner submitted. “But I
know you're wasting your time. If Miss Holcomb
could aid us in any way, she'd tell all she knew without
being questioned.”
“Perhaps she would,” Donnelly rejoined, shooting
a glance at Carson that seemed to say, “And perhaps
she wouldn't.” Again there came that squaring of
himself, coupled with an occasional “Huh !” of em-
barrassment, as he plunged into an examination of
the widow's secretary. “Do you ever wear dia-
monds?” he asked mysteriously.
Elinor was on the point of saying that if she were
the possessor of diamonds, she would not be a secretary
to the kindest of employers, but she reflected useless
words were undesirable to such a man and contented
herself with a gentle “No.”
Elinor then did something that was unaccountable to
the widow who thought she knew her so well, and
which rather startled Sands. She turned to little Miss
March and, laying her head on the younger girl's
shoulder, wept unrestrainedly. Dorothy, patting her
shoulder, stood looking helplessly at Mrs. Missioner.
One of those awkward pauses followed in which
nobody seemed to know what to do. Sands stared
hard at the floor. Ranscome wriggled in his chair
uncomfortably. Even Blodgett's carven features


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 37
twitched for an instant. Mrs. Missioner gazed at
Elinor, plainly perplexed. Sympathy struggled slowly
to the surface of her gaze. She went up to her sec-
retary, and put her arm about the weeping girl's waist.
“This cannot be necessary, Mr. Donnelly,” she said.
“I would rather lose jewels twice as valuable than
have Miss Holcomb distressed in this way. She
knows nothing she will not tell us.”
“Then why ” began Donnelly.
“Your accusing tone frightens her,” explained the
widow. “She has never been subjected to such treat-
ment. You should recollect you are talking to a gen-
tlewoman—and my friend.”
Donnelly and Carson whispered fervently to one
another at a little distance from the central group.
Blodgett's eyes, turning slowly in a graven face,
traversed the length and breadth of them as if nothing
could please him better than to still the Bacchante with
a mighty blow and jolt Carson out of the room. The
only person entirely at ease was Griswold. He
smoked tranquilly, his glance traveling from one to
another in rotation with the appreciativeness of a con-
noisseur studying a great picture. There was some-
thing of the dilettante in the man. He was the op-
posite of Sands in every particular save breeding, and
even in that respect there was a difference.
Sands broke the tension with a suddenness that
fairly shouted his whole character. Rising so
abruptly that his chair fell backward with a crash,
he strode to the telephone and seized the instrument
savagely. He was calling Police Headquarters before
either of the detectives recovered from his surprise.
y


38 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
Donnelly hastened toward him, the Bacchante in great
agitation. He pushed out a fat hand as if to stop the
millionaire.
“What are you going to do?” asked the sleuth,
visibly anxious. -
“I’m going to have Manning call you fellows back
to Mulberry Street,” said Sands, his jaw hardening.
“He’s sent the wrong men. This isn't a Tenderloin
case.”
“Now, see here, Mr. Sands—” snarled Donnelly
threateningly.
“I’m seeing straight enough,” returned Sands. “I
asked the Detective Bureau to send up on an important
case, and the wires crossed before my message got to
the Chief. Somebody told him it was a Chinatown
hold-up. Now I’m going to talk to him straight.
Hello, Spring ! What's the matter with that num-
ber?”
“You’re going strong, Mr. Sands, even for a society
man,” said Donnelly, doing his best to quiet the Bac-
chante, “but I don't see any shield on your shirtfront,
and me and my partner ain't got any call taking orders
from you. We're on this case, and we’re going to
stay on it. And if you start anything with Manning,
you want to be sure you can finish it.” He was white,
shaking—whether with rage or fear no one could say.
Turning to Mrs. Missioner, he went on: “I suppose
you know, ma'am, interference with an officer is a
pretty serious thing. We're here on duty, and it's up
to you to see we're not bothered.”
Mrs. Missioner paled. She dreaded, not the law,
but a scene.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 39
“I think we would better let them have their way,
Bruxton,” she murmured, the light of admiration in
her eyes in contrast to her words. “Mr. Donnelly
knows Miss Holcomb's standing now. He will re-
member.”
Donnelly didn't know precisely what he was ex-
pected to remember, but he realized gentler tactics were
safer toward the widow's secretary while Sands was
around. It did not escape even his observation that
neither Ranscome nor Griswold had said anything in
Miss Holcomb's defense.
“Now, this is all wrong, young lady,” he said to
Elinor, bearing on the soft pedal as much as he could.
“It isn't right for you to go on like this, you know.
You'll get yourself all worked up and then you won't
be able to answer our questions. Take my word for
it, it's best for you to keep yourself in hand.”
Elinor couldn't keep herself in hand while that
raucous voice was thrust into her self-respect like a
rusty file gripped as a poniard. She fought for self-
mastery, but the shock was too much for her deter-
mination. Dorothy's sisterly comforting only made
her tears flow more freely. Her whole form quiv-
ered with staccato sobs. Carson, still on his little
journey around the room, came full within range of
Blodgett's right-angled gaze. As he sensed the foot-
man's expression, he started violently, and, stepping
back swiftly, turned away in confusion. Not a muscle
of Blodgett's other features moved, but his eyes seemed
to reach for the detective.
Donnelly was rapidly recovering his place on the
pedestal. Hands wrist-deep in his pockets, he rocked


4O BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
on his heels and looked at Elinor piercingly with his
little eyes. The girl, in an interval between sobs,
raised her head and saw that gaze. A slow flush swept
her face. She detached herself gently from little Miss
March, and lifting that graceful head of hers higher,
ever higher, faced the sleuth with composure as star-
tling as had been her loss of control.
“If you have anything more to ask, sir,” she said
in a low tone, “I will try to answer.”
“Thanks!” came the curt reply. “I knew you'd
come around. You see, Miss Elinor > *
“Miss Holcomb!” burst from Sands in a thunder
tone. “H-o-1-c-o-m-b—you understand—Miss Hol-
comb.” Donnelly pretended not to notice the inter-
ruption, but he did not address Elinor by her first
name again. But Carson seemed as perturbed as he
had been under the malignant gaze of the motionless
Blodgett.
“What were you doing in Maiden Lane the other
day?” asked Donnelly sharply.
“I was not in Maiden Lane. I haven’t been
downtown in weeks. The last time I went south
of the shopping district was more than a month
ago.”
“That is true,” said Mrs. Missioner hurriedly,
“Miss Holcomb went to the Battery Trust Company
for me.”
“Much obliged, ma'am.” Donnelly was learning to
show more deference to the widow. Carson had whis-
pered to him something of her social importance. Yes,
Carson, although he was only a neutral tint in the
human color scheme, knew a few things.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 4I
“Was that the day you took the diamonds to Tif-
fany's P’’ queried the big detective quickly. “To have
one of the small stones made tighter, you know.”
Miss Holcomb's disdain had given place to dull
wonder. Where had the man got his misinformation?
Could it be he really thought—but, no. It was im-
possible. She felt as if something suffocating was
closing about her. She lifted her hand to her throat
to force back the sobs that would come.
“I am completely confused by your questions,” she
stammered. “I-I do not know how to answer.
What you say is so strange.” She looked at the others
with a world of appeal in those gray eyes. Astonish-
ment, sympathy, affection, cynicism, mutely replied.
Stretching both hands toward Mrs. Missioner, advanc-
ing with faltering steps, the victim of the detective's
persecution cried, “Mrs. Missioner, is it possible you
can think—do you even imagine I—I—oh,” with a
swift turn to Miss March, “Dorothy, Dorothy | "
To the credit of little Miss March be it remembered
she met Elinor's second appeal with undiminished ten-
derness. Mrs. Missioner, too, was kind, but her
gentle “No, Elinor,” was not as reassuring as the lov-
ing pats Dorothy squandered on the bent shoulders of
the distressed girl. Sands swore in his thoughts. His
big fingers bent a gold penholder into wavy lines.
Ranscome, with alternate finger-tips, traced lines in his
palms. Griswold turned his cigarette 'round and
'round with agile fingers and thumb. Blodgett's eyes
seemed to lunge at the detectives.
“I guess Miss Holcomb isn't ready to tell all she
knows—yet,” said Donnelly meaningly. “While


42 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
we're waiting for her to steady her nerves, we'll just
have a look in her room.”
Mrs. Missioner was about to negative the sug-
gestion, but a glance at Elinor's shaking form stopped
her. She did not reply, and the detectives walked out
of the room in silence. A look from the widow sent
Blodgett stalking in their wake. The footman kept
his eyes on Donnelly's turned-out toes as if calculating
how much strength was required to seize those thick
ankles with a sudden heave. Not until the Central
Office men were at the end of the passage did the sob-
bing secretary start in great agitation toward the door.
On the threshold she paused and turned slowly till she
faced the mute group.
“Since they are going to search my—the room,”
she said, in a choking voice, “I wish you would all
come there with me. I–I feel that—won't you all
come—please?”
The men hung back, but Doris and Dorothy joined
her on the instant and together the three women fol-
lowed the detectives into the lift. Blodgett backed
from the car and stood staring at the detectives
through the rose-tinted grill. A boy in quiet livery
threw the lever and the steel cage shot upward. The
car stopped at the third floor and the little party
proceeded to a room at the end of a softly lighted
corridor.
It was a charming little boudoir into which Don-
nelly's spreading feet and Carson's flat tread carried
the detectives. Mrs. Missioner, Elinor, and Dorothy
went only a little way in and looked on silently. The
men made their search according to their natures, Car-


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 43
son with moderate indifference and dispatch, Don-
nelly exhaustively, lingeringly, gloatingly. When the
large sleuth's thick fingers and beady gaze became
more than ordinarily intrusive, Mrs. Missioner seemed
about to protest, but each time she checked herself.
“It is better to let them search thoroughly,” said
Elinor. “Since this is considered necessary, I wish it
to be made complete. Please do not interfere with
them.” She handed to Carson a small silver keyring.
He passed it to his mate, and Donnelly's enjoyment of
the situation increased by leaps and bounds. No single
key on the tiny ring escaped use of his hands. He un-
locked boxes, a dressing-case, and other places of pos-
sible concealment. His method would have drawn a
derisive smile from Chief of Detectives Manning. But
Manning was far downtown in Mulberry Street, and
could not know the course his subordinates were pur-
suing.
From a drawer in Elinor's Chippendale secretary,
Donnelly took a box of rare lacquer and fitted a key
to it. He stopped to gaze searchingly at Miss Hol-
comb for a few moments, then he unlocked the box.
“I hate to pry into any young lady's little keep-
sakes,” he said in a ponderously patronizing manner,
“but, as Miss Holcomb hasn't been to Maiden Lane in
such a long time, I know she won't object. Now, this
little box, of course, contains nothing but trinkets or
odds and ends—love-letters, maybe P” Elinor's heart
sickened at the leer in his face. She turned her eyes
to Dorothy's loving little face, and clung to the
débutante's hand. Donnelly, fumbling with the key
for awhile, opened the lacquered box.


44 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“Just what I said, you see,” he exclaimed.
“Nothing but trinkets and other little souvenirs—huh !
—of old romances, perhaps. Eh, it's great to be a
summer girl, Miss Holcomb. If only you had jewels
like Mrs. Missioner's, you'd shine with the best of
them. Gee, but that must be a beauty, that necklace,
if the imitation is so pretty.”
He stirred the contents of the box idly. Nothing
else remained to be searched. He had ransacked the
intimate sanctity of the girl's room. He felt baffled
and sorely irritated. At the thought of failure, he
thrust his fingers into the box with such violence that
everything it held fell to the floor. Carson stooped
to pick up the scattered jewelry, placing it in Don-
nelly's hand to be returned to the box. After recov-
ering several bits of jewelry he laid in his big col-
league's greedy clutch a small, round object wrapped in
silk tissue.
“Hello, what's this!” exclaimed Donnelly, rolling
the fairy parcel between finger and thumb. “You
won't mind if I peep in the paper, young lady? Of
course you won't. And this is only a-say, what the
mischief is it? Oh, glory!”
Even Carson was startled into an echoing “Oh!”
and the three women almost screamed. For, nestling
in the folds of the tissue, its facets twinkling in the in-
sistent green glow of the vacuum lights, flashed a dia-
mond—an unmistakable diamond—which Mrs. Mis-
sioner and Dorothy and Elinor recognized as one
of the lesser gems from the Maharanee necklace
—much smaller than the Maharanee diamond,
but twice the size of an ordinary stone. And


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 45
it was a diamond even a novice could tell was
genuine !
All the blood left Elinor's face. The muscles of
her throat leaped and knotted as if she were strangling.
She swayed for a moment, then took a long step
toward the detective and stood trembling, covering her
face with quivering hands. Donnelly, holding the dia-
mond to the light, was about to speak—in what words,
what manner, one can guess. But the misery in the
girl's attitude struck the triumphant grin from his
face, and there was momentary compassion in the tone
in which he said:
“We'd better go back to the library, I guess. Will
you go with my side-partner, Miss Holcomb?”
Carson's advance to the secretary's side was checked
by the violence with which she whirled toward Mrs.
Missioner, again with outstretched hands. This time
the widow was slower in meeting the appeal. She was
stunned by the detective's discovery. All the finer
sensibilities of her womanhood were benumbed.
Astonishment, large and compelling, was all she could
feel for the moment. Still, she took Elinor's implor-
ing hands in hers and stood motionless, listening to the
girl's passionate entreaty not to believe the evidence
of her eyes, not to believe her kindness could be out-
raged in such a way, not to believe that Elinor for all
the jewels in the mines of the world could be tempted
from the high honor in which she had been reared.
Clasping the younger woman's locked fingers in her
own soft palm, she slipped her arm about Elinor's waist
and walked with her to the lift. Dorothy, crying al-
most childishly, controlled her voice once or twice long


46 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
enough to beg Elinor not to give way to such torturing
emotion.
But Elinor Holcomb, shaking, sobbing, wildly be-
seeching, was oblivious to the silent watchfulness of
the Central Office men, the covert glances from Blod-
gett's mask-like countenance, the amazed stare of the
liveried youth in the elevator. All the way to the
room in which Sands and Griswold and Ranscome
waited, all the way across the old English library to
the ruddy zone before the fireplace, she continued her
prayers to Mrs. Missioner to hold her guiltless. That
was the one thought that shaped her thoughts; that the
woman to whom she owed the shelter of her later
youth should not think her capable of such ignoble
ingratitude. There was no slightest shade of appeal
to the detectives, no regard for the conclusions others
in the room might draw. But that Mrs. Missioner
should give credit to the cold accusation that glittered
in the diamond Donnelly had found—that plainly was
the unbearable thing in the wretched young woman's
present position.
“You won't have to telephone the Chief, Mr.
Man,” said Donnelly to Sands with as direct a sneer
as he thought advisable. “This has been one of our
easiest cases.”
His fat hand was extended toward the millionaire.
In a crease of the palm, the diamond blazed as if in-
dignant at such a setting. Sands glared at the stone,
Griswold gazed at it as if spellbound. Ranscome pol-
ished his glasses with much deliberation and, adjust-
ing them with equal precision, looked at the gem
fixedly.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 47
“This one's the goods, eh?” the detective went on.
Ranscome, with marked fastidiousness, took the jewel
from his hand and examined it as if his reputation as
an expert depended on his test. Reluctantly, he re-
turned the gem to Donnelly and said, gently, with a
pitying glance at Elinor:
“It is a diamond.”
A sweeping gesture from Sands as he sprang to his
feet flung the telephone from the desk. He reached
Donnelly in two strides and appeared on the point of
gripping him by the throat. But the big detective,
for all his bulk and mental slowness, could be quick
enough on his feet when he must, and he readily sacri-
ficed dignity to safety. With a single backward spring,
he clutched a light chair and confronted Sands.
“It’ll pay you to remember I'm an officer l’” he
shouted. “You ain't dealing with club stewards here,
Mr. Sands. I know you and I know how much you
think your money can do. But you can't put anything
like that across with me.”
Sands, breathing hard, took another step toward
him. Donnelly gripped the chair for a defensive
swing.
“I don't care if you know a million Mannings,”
said the sleuth huskily. “If you can't behave like one
gentleman to another, it'll be the worse for you. If
you don't want to be run in, keep away.”
Mrs. Missioner's annoyance and Dorothy's fright,
no less than Elinor's distress, restrained Sands
again.
“What does all this mean?” he said to Carson, ig-
noring the other. But Donnelly was not to be ignored.


48 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
His successful defiance of a millionaire had height-
ened his desire for the center of the stage.
“It means,” he rasped, “that we know who took
Mrs. Missioner's diamonds, and all we've got to do
now is to find the rest of 'em. And I guess that won't
be hard. Where there’s one bird, the flock won't be
far away. Come, Miss Holcomb, we and you'll be
getting downtown. The Chief wants to see you.”


CHAPTER V.
THE BROWNSTONE HOUSE
WHILE Elinor, helpless in the reaction from her
grief, was speeding to Mulberry Street in a taxicab
with Donnelly and Carson, a swart, slim man glided
out by the servants' door of the Missioner home. His
modern garments, Oriental only by faint suggestion in
the English looseness of their cut, caught the eye
merely by contrast with the snowy turban that cov-
ered his head. He moved with the cat tread of one
long accustomed to walking on his own soles. His
shoes were conventional enough in appearance, but of
softer leather than that of ordinary American make.
It was evident that he relied on the silence of his foot-
gear and, judging from the caution with which he let
himself out of the house and looked up and down the
street before quitting the threshold, he wished to get
away without trumpeting his departure. Seeing no
one in the block, he walked swiftly toward Fifth Ave-
nue and turned the corner so sharply that he bowled
over a district messenger. A few words in a foreign
tongue were his response to the select vernacular the
rising youngster hurled at him—words so mysterious
that a final “Ah, garn!” was the utmost of which the
astonished boy was capable by way of reply. To be
flung to the sidewalk by a personage in a British tour-
ist's suit with a headgear out of the Arabian Nights
49


50 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
well may be disconcerting, even to No. 4762 of the
A. D. T.
The dark man hailed a hansom, muttered “The
park” to the driver, and sat well back in the vehicle,
closing the apron doors and lowering the upper cur-
tain until he left only a narrow space for observation.
In the interior gloom, laced by chance lances of light
from arc lamps, he sprinkled himself freely with many
drops from a silver vial that smelled of the East. He
readjusted the folds of his turban, settled his collar
and scarf, and shook himself more closely into his
clothes, which, despite their loose cut, seemingly were
tighter than he liked.
North of the Casino, in the East Drive of Central
Park, the Hindoo pulled the check strap and gave new
directions to the cabman. The hansom turned out of
the park at Seventy-second Street and rolled on rub-
ber tires in an easterly direction, crossing several ave-
nues before it stopped in front of a brownstone house
exactly like several dozen others in the block. The
Oriental paid the cabman and stood on the sidewalk
until the hansom turned the corner. Then he walked
east a few yards, crossed the street, turned west, and
darted into the vestibule of a house that was the twin
of the one at which the cab had stopped. He did not
ring the bell, but scratched lightly on the ground glass
pane of the inner door. The door swung inward and
he entered a hall lighted only by a glimmer that filtered
through the glass from a gas lamp in the street. A
voice in the dark asked a question in a language
somewhat like that the Hindoo had flung over his
shoulder at the messenger boy. The visitor answered


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 5.I
with a single word, and a sunburst of light burst upon
him from a cluster of incandescent bulbs above his
head.
“If you are false, turn back,” said the voice in one
of the higher tongues of India.
“True though lowly follower of the Light am I,”
the Hindoo replied, with a profound salaam toward
ink-black portières at the far end of the hall. He
moved slowly toward the curtains and stretched forth
his hand. Again the voice spoke.
“If there be aught of doubting in your heart, turn
back ere it be too late,” it said. “There is no repent-
ance this side of the screen. Beware! Turn back!”
But the Hindoo, with another deep bow, parted the
heavy curtains and stepped through the opening.
Without a single glance at the sumptuous Eastern fur-
nishing of the room, he bent his body forward with
touching, outstretched hands until his fingers well-nigh
reached the floor. In that posture he remained until,
in the tones of the voice that had sounded through the
outer darkness, a man sitting cross-legged on a divan
at the other end of the room murmured an acknowl-
edgment of the salutation. Slowly the visitor straight-
ened himself and looked at the divan, without raising
his eyes to the face of the man upon it.
“The peace of the Immutable One be upon you,”
he said in his harsher dialect. “Your servant Ali
comes to report upon his mission.”
“Peace be to you, faithful one,” answered the
other. Not until then did Ali look his master in the
face.
The master seemingly did not wear the evening


52 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
dress of the Occident in which he had appeared in the
opera box adjoining Mrs. Missioner's. His slender,
well-knit figure was swathed in the clinging garments
of the East—garments of silken stuff that fluttered and
rippled with every movement, that seemed to rustle
in echo of his thoughts.
“What are your tidings, Ali’” asked the man on
the divan. He gave little thoughtful tugs at a punkah-
string and the resultant breeze stirred the smoke
wreaths from his narghileh.
“The jewel, O Swami!”
The other's eyes glistened.
“What of it?” he inquired.
“Gone!” returned the humbler Hindoo. “Van-
ished 1 ''
“And you did not get it?”
“Swami, I did not. Your servant is a dog and the
son of a dog, but he has done his best.”
The man on the divan watched his servant through
slitted eyes.
“Where is the jewel?” he asked sternly.
“Who knows, holy man?” replied the visitor. “It
has taken unto itself wings and in its place a false
stone was left. The wit of your servant is com-
pletely at fault. I know not where the diamond is.”
The Swami did not tell him he had seen the de-
struction of the false Maharanee by Griswold's heel in
the Metropolitan Opera House. He smoked thought-
fully, his fingers knotting and raveling the punkah-
string in an absent way.
“And you have come straightway with the news?”
he asked. -


54 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
he walked softly to a door at one side of the room, and
opening it a little way, called softly:
“Kananda.”
A man of mature years came in quietly and looked
inquiringly at the Swami. He was of portly build,
but his vigor still showed traces of the athletic train-
ing he had followed in English schools and colleges.
His Western manner and excellent English were not
in surprising contrast to his Indian swarthiness among
those who remembered the vogue a British education
had among India's petty princes in the reign of Vic-
toria, Queen and Empress. Prince Kananda had been
one of the best batsmen on the Cambridge eleven. His
popularity among the democratic young aristocrats of
the period had sprung from the day when he remarked
it was not his fault his father was a Maharajah, and
that it shouldn't be treasured against him, even though
he couldn't live it down. Nandy, as they called him
on the banks of the Cam, was voted a good sort. The
classification had stuck to him wherever men foregath-
ered, from the Strangers' Club of the Straits Settle-
ment to White's and the Union League.
“What's the row, your reverence?” he asked. On
the surface, he took the faith of his fathers lightly,
Oriental though he was in the marrow.
“The Maharanee has disappeared,” said the Swami.
“Whee-eel ” returned Kananda. “If that blessed
stone isn't the Wandering Jew of jewels! How long
has it been missing this time?”
“Nobody knows, unless it be its present possessor.
Moreover, prince you are, ruler you may be, but I
cannot overlook your levity in connection with so


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 55
sacred a gem. Besides, my friend, remember the
brethren.”
Nandy's face became serious immediately.
“I wasn't exactly poking fun at the Maharanee,”
he apologized, “and they who suffer are never long
absent from my thoughts. It's a Western habit, this
flippancy—comes from trying to graft a Hindoo sprig
on a British oak, you know.”
“We are of the Orient,” said the Swami, still re-
bukingly. “We should not copy the barbarisms of
the Occident.”
Nandy's eyes twinkled as the humor of such an ob-
servation in the heart of Manhattan flashed upon him.
In a moment, he was grave again, however. He
swung himself to a table, lightly for one of his bulk,
and sat kicking his heels as he awaited the Hindoo
priest's narrative.
“There's little to tell,” the Swami went on, himself
dropping into the easier speech of the West as his
companion stopped smiling. “The great diamond is
gone and Ali has no idea of its whereabouts. Night
and day on the watch in the woman's home, he has
nothing to tell further than that the jewel has dis-
appeared and an arrest has been made.”
“So they've caught the thief?”
“Perhaps. The bunglers of this uncouth country
may have stumbled upon her by chance. She's in
custody, anyway.”
Nandy slid from the table and balanced himself on
his toes.
“A woman, eh? Good-looking?” Not without
influence on his ideals had he taken a post-graduate


56 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
course among London's Gaiety girls. He was a con-
noisseur in the femininity of the “’alls.” Serious
women bored him. But surely a young person clever
enough to get away with a diamond the size of the
Maharanee couldn't be stupid?
“Mrs. Missioner's secretary,” the Swami told him.
“A close friend of hers, too, says Ali.”
Kananda's whistle was expressive.
“Is there evidence to convict?” he asked inter-
estedly.
“A paste necklace was substituted for the one con-
taining the Maharanee,” replied the Swami. “One of
the real diamonds was found in the prisoner's room.”
“Now, that's funny,” said the Prince. “Devilish
funny! And they took her in tow for that?”
The priest nodded.
“What rotters these American policemen are l’”
snapped Kananda in the slang he had used as Nandy of
Cambridge. “Fancy any self-respecting Oriental do-
ing that! Why, the bulldoggiest little terrier in the
Mikado's secret service wouldn't make such a break!”
The Swami nodded again.
“Ali searched her room, of course, before the de-
tectives got there,” he continued. “Soon after Mrs.
Missioner's return from the opera, he went straight
from the hall outside the library to Miss Holcomb's
apartment and investigated thoroughly.”
“Look here, old man,” jerked Kananda. “If Ali
has the stone, it's all well enough to put it over
On 3 *
“He hasn't it,” the Swami answered. “The thing
for us to do now is to find out who has.”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 59
other profound salaam. In measured tones, the
Swami, who had resumed his Oriental robes, gave him
instructions to which the Hindoo servant listened with
intent respect, the Prince from time to time emphasiz-
ing the priest's orders with a nod.
“You may go, Ali,” said the Swami in conclusion.
“I go, master,” the Hindoo replied, backing through
the portières. He maintained his respectful bearing
all the way along the hall, out the door, and down the
brownstone steps. Then, when he had walked quickly
to a point several houses on and his face was well out
of the angle of vision of the conventionally curtained
windows at the front of the strange dwelling, a pe-
culiar expression spread over his features. Once
round the corner, he wheeled and gazed piercingly
toward the house he had quitted, as if his eyes could
penetrate the intervening walls.
“Is thy servant a dog or the son of a dog?” he
said under his breath menacingly.


CHAPTER VI
THE THIRD DEGREE
PolicE HEADQUARTERs—the old headquarters of
Mulberry Street—was one of the architectural mon-
strosities of New York. Fronting Mulberry Street,
its faded brick walls presented a forbidding aspect
to the ancient, tumbledown rookeries across the way.
Its rear walls faced Mott Street, harmonizing with the
squalid tenements of that narrow, ill-smelling thor-
oughfare. It was a type of public building now hap-
pily obsolete, which an awakened artistic sense is rap-
idly relegating to the scrap heap. Its rigid lines were
a monotony of ugliness, unrelieved by column or cap-
ital. One viewed its hideous bulk with a shuddering
sense of apprehension, almost expecting to see it
crumble on the unfortunates penned within.
Visitors to the Detective Bureau entered a dingy
room, approached by a narrow hall, on the Mott
Street side of the building. Its most conspicuous fur-
nishings were several brass rails which crossed one
another in bewildering fashion. Half-open doors led
boldly into other offices, as if to dispel the atmosphere
of secrecy that hovered perpetually over the place.
Two uniformed lieutenants of police were constantly
on guard at oaken desks backed against opposite walls.
On the morning following the Missioner diamond rob-
bery, the two guardians were busy sorting piles of
documents scattered on their desks.
Óo


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 61
“Guess it's time for the line-up,” remarked one of
the lieutenants.
He entered the adjoining room, a large, square
chamber, in which the rays from clusters of electric
bulbs mingled with the pale, shivery light of the sun.
“Here's the list,” he called to the desk lieutenant,
at the same time throwing a bundle of documents to
him.
Massed against the opposite wall in listless attitudes
were fifty or sixty detectives, their faces covered by
long masks. They shifted about uneasily while wait-
ing for the hapless prisoners captured the night before
to be lined up for inspection. This daily spectacle, ter-
rifying to the innocent suspects, amusing to the old-
time lawbreakers, marks the beginning of the morn-
ing's routine of the men detailed to prevent crime
and hunt down criminals. Not a pleasing exhibition,
but a necessary one. For the opportunity must be
provided for the detectives to become familiar with
the countenances of the lawbreakers. And by the
simple device of the masks, the hunters are shielded
from becoming equally familiar to the hunted.
The opening of the door at the rear of the room
brought the waiting detectives to attention. Their
forms stiffened to military erectness, their manner be-
came watchfully alert.
“Good-morning,” greeted Chief of Detectives Man-
ning. The men saluted in return.
With quick, nervous strides the Chief made his way
behind the long desk that ran half the length of the
room, and took up a position of survey. His eyes, of
hawk-like penetration, swept the room while the desk


62 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
lieutenant called the roll. The absentees having been
entered on the blotter, the process of lining up the
prisoners began without further ceremony.
A line of bedraggled, disheveled men and women,
their eyes bleary from a night of wakefulness in nar-
row, ill-ventilated cells, shuffled into the room.
“Michael Noonan,” droned the lieutenant.
An emaciated, weak-faced man, the wretchedness of
his lot emphasized by the frayed clothing that hung in
loose, broken lines from his form, stepped forward.
A look of dull misery was stamped on his countenance,
a hopeless disregard of the fate in store for him
showed in his manner.
“Take a good look at this crook,” commanded the
Chief. “Never was pinched before. Caught with
the goods on, however, by Wiggins and Wolf. Swipin'
lead pipe from a half-finished house.”
The eyes of the detectives bent on the human wreck
as he shrank back into line.
“Philip Pratt,” called the lieutenant.
A young man, not more than thirty, whose sullen
mien and restless eyes betrayed his occupation even
before the Chief announced it, faced the masked bat-
tery of eyes. His thin lips curled into a disdainful
smile as the Chief read his record from a slip of
paper.
“Another old friend back,” the head of the de-
tective force commented. “Philip Pratt, alias Morse,
alias Charlie Dodge, alias Toledo Phil. Confidence
gent. Did a term in Elmira, two short stretches up
the river, and a long leg in Joliet.”
The particular offense for which the prisoner was


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 63
in the toils again was described, and he, too, retired to
temporary obscurity in the lines of unfortunates.
“Carrie Chase,” came from the lieutenant.
Member of that frail sisterhood whose shame is no
deeper than that of the civilization from which it
springs, she carried herself with an easy dignity born
of familiarity with her surroundings. The heavy lines
of her face were drawn into an expression of grim
defiance, but her eyes, dulled by long dissipation, could
not hide the dumb fear that lurked in her soul.
“Got away with a gent's super,” the Chief drawled.
He displayed a gold watch as if it held all the triumph
of his years of pursuit in the underworld. “But we
found the goods on her,” he added smilingly.
Her career was part of the elemental knowledge of
the assembled detectives and the Chief dismissed her
quickly.
“The chances are she'll do a long stretch this trip,”
he commented.
Every condition of moral obliquity was represented
in that shifting line of prisoners. There were youths,
still in the formative period of their criminal careers,
vying with the old-timers in the forced bravado of
their demeanors. Others there were, shamefaced and
sad, overcome with remorse and praying silently for
the termination of the painful spectacle. Still others,
old men and young men, regarding the proceedings
with the indifference of disinterested spectators. And
there were women, too, from the bedizened “badger
queen,” her hair and complexion as false as the jewels
shimmering from her fingers and throat, to the trem-
ulous, weeping restaurant cashier accused of some


64 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
petty defalcation. They represented types as varied
as the emotions struggling within them, but as they
stood side by side facing the expressionless masks, they
seemed headed toward the same ultimate destiny. One
after another they stepped forward for inspection un-
til the line was exhausted. When the last of them
had filed out of the room, the detectives did not re-
move their masks, as was the custom. Instead, they
stood about in a high fever of expectancy. Quizzical
glances were cast in the direction of the door leading
to the cells. Suddenly the men bulked forward, as if
inspired by a common impulse of curiosity. The swish
of skirts, accompanied by the tread of masculine feet,
sounded in the doorway. A woman's form, her head
bent to her breast, her limbs unable to bear the weight-
of her frail body, was being half dragged, half carried
into the room. All the life seemed to have drained out
of her. Her hair hung disordered over her shoulders,
her hands swung limply, like loose pendulums.
“Elinor Holcomb!” cried the lieutenant.
Donnelly and Carson, each with an arm under her
shoulder, propped her sinking form.
“Lift your head,” commanded the Chief.
The order fell on deaf ears. She seemed as one in
the last agony of a mortal illness.
“Lift it for her,” came in a voice of mingled stern-
ness and compassion.
Donnelly's hand flew to her chin, tilting her face
upward. For an instant she raised her heavy eyelids;
then recoiled as from a blow. The crowd of masked
spectators floated before her eyes like hideous specters
of a horrid dream. A low groan, like the last lament


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 65
of a tortured soul, came from her lips. She seemed
turned into a mass of jelly.
“Take her away,” commanded the Chief, and the
two detectives carried her out of the room.
“Accused of stealing the Missioner diamonds,” was
the curt explanation of her presence. In a harsh
monotone, the Chief read the various Headquarters
orders to the force, and then the men not engaged on
old work received their assignments of new cases. As
abruptly as he had entered, the head of the Bureau
left the room and retired to his private office. Then he
summoned Donnelly and Carson.
“Takes it pretty bad, eh?” he asked.
“Like all the swell ones when they're nabbed the
first time,” answered Carson.
“Had to call the doctor twice during the night, the
matron tells me,” informed Donnelly.
“Did she make any statement on the way to Head-
quarters?” inquired the Chief.
“Nothing but hysterics,” Carson answered.
“And she's in no condition to be questioned now,”
added Donnelly.
“Anyone been inquiring for her?” the Chief sud-
denly snapped.
“Yes,” flashed back Donnelly. His eyes lit with a
crafty glow. “Some guy who says he's a doctor and
engaged to marry her has been hanging around here
all morning. Wants to know how he can get her out.
Looks as if he might be mixed up in it, so I'm having
him shadowed.”
“Good!” commented the Chief. “If any lawyer
calls, tell him she's in no condition to be seen. We


66 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
don't want anyone to see her until we've questioned
her.”
It was late in the afternoon before Miss Holcomb
was escorted into the inquisitorial chamber. She had
fallen into a fitful slumber on the rude iron bed that
projected from the wall of her cell, when Donnelly
and Carson opened the grated door and called her out
of her sleep. She gave a startled gasp when she
saw them, a convulsive shudder racked her frame. A
sudden influx of painful memories overwhelmed her
with a pitiful sense of helplessness as she dragged her-
self to the office of the Chief.
With a weak show of courage, she eyed Manning
resolutely, and then sank into a soft leather chair close
to his desk. Donnelly and Carson occupied seats at
her elbow.
“What did you do with those stones?” blurted the
Chief.
Her lips framed a reply, but it died without utter-
ance.
“Come, come!” he cried impatiently. “We don't
want any acting here. I know you're only a tool in
this matter. We've got the principal under arrest
and I’m giving you a chance to save yourself. You
turn State's evidence against him and I’ll see that no
harm comes to you. He's the fellow we want to land.
Now tell me just what you did with the jewels.”
In the midst of his outburst, a door opened silently
and a sharp-featured, smooth-shaven man of middle
age entered and seated himself in an obscure corner of
the room. His form seemed to merge into the shadow
of the walls as he dropped noiselessly into his chair.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 67
Miss Holcomb did not see him enter. Her increasing
terror gave her a fictitious energy and she lifted her
head with a sharp jerk.
“I didn't steal the jewels,” she said. “I had nothing
to do with their disappearance.”
The mocking laughter of three deep voices sounded
in the room.
“Does it well!” chuckled Donnelly.
“Too bad she ain't an actress,” joined Carson.
The Chief's beady eyes narrowed on her as if he
would read her innermost thoughts.
“There's no use trying to lie to me,” he snarled. “I
know who's got the diamonds. The man who hired
you to steal them is locked up now. He says he didn't
know they were stolen 5 *
“Who says that?” she interrupted.
Donnelly and Carson nudged each other in boister-
ous glee.
“She wants to know who says it!” piped the
former.
“Ain’t she the slick one!” laughed his partner.
The Chief's face hardened until a menace seemed
to lurk in every one of its deep-cut lines.
“Now, you know who says it,” he informed her.
“I don’t have to mention any names. It's simply a
question of you going to jail or of sending him to jail.
I don't take any stock in what he says. He can't tell
me he didn't know you stole the jewels. I ain't as
easy as all that! Now, I'm giving you a chance to
make a full confession and save yourself. Will you
confess?” His tone carried the weight of a threat,
but her unresponsive mind was unable to grasp its sig-


68 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
nificance. She stared blankly before her, as if her
eyes were chained to some distant spot.
“Will you confess?” the Chief repeated with added
menace.
As if roused from a long abstraction, she gazed ap-
pealingly at her tormentor.
“I have nothing to confess,” she murmured weakly.
The Chief drew back in studied anger. His fist
banged the desk as if the blow was meant to convey
a sudden resolve.
“Very well!” he burst forth. “Go right ahead
and be the goat if you want to. Look here, little girl,
I was just kiddin' you when I said we had the principal
under arrest,” he said with a quick change of tactics.
“You’re the only one that's locked up. I don't believe
there's anyone else mixed up in the case at all. I be-
lieve you did the job alone. If there's anyone behind
you, you'll have to show me. There's only one thief
involved, and that's you.”
An expression, as of a hunted animal, crept into her
face. She turned to the left and met the fixed stare
of Donnelly. Averting her head, her eyes looked into
those of Carson. Directly in front, close to her face,
the cold gleam from the Chief's eyes fell on her. So
she turned around, only to look into an impenetrable
background of gloom, sinister and depressing.
“I haven't done anything,” she pleaded. “I don't
know who took Mrs. Missioner's diamonds.” As if
cut by a sudden thought, Miss Holcomb bent for-
ward in her seat. “She can't believe I did it?”
she moaned.
“You bet your life she believes you did it,” the


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 69
Chief announced. “And I know you did it. So
what's the use of denying it?”
“I do deny it, I do deny it,” she protested. “How
can they think me capable of it?”
The Chief opened a drawer of his desk and brought
forth the accusing diamond. He held it close to her
face, permitting the rays to distribute themselves on
her features.
“Pretty fine stone !” he commented. “A peach of
a shiner! Looked good to you, didn't it? Came so
easy it was a shame to take it—eh? Now how did it
get mixed up with your trinkets?”
“I don't know,” she moaned.
The Chief turned from her wearily.
“You take her in hand, Donnelly,” he said.
The detective bent over the woman, his face so
close that she felt his warm breath against her
cheeks.
“Don’t try any nonsense down here,” he snarled.
“We got the goods on you, and we ain't going to
stand any fooling. Now, where are those dia-
monds?”
She eyed him in mild protest.
“I don't know, sir,” she murmured weakly.
Donnelly shoved his clenched fist under her chin.
His face contorted into an expression of tigerish
ferocity; he peered at her with an intensity that chilled
her blood.
“You’re a liar,” he snapped. “You think you're a
slick one, but you'll be sorry you was ever born if you
don't cough up the goods. We know how to handle
customers like you down here. We're used to 'em.


7o BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
We get ’em every day. Now, just save yourself a lot
of trouble by telling the whereabouts of the dia-
monds.”
“They ain't going to do you any good,” interjected
the Chief. “They don't wear diamonds where you're
going to. The less trouble you give us, the less trouble
we'll make for you. And we can make more trouble
for you than you can make for us.”
A look of such utter helplessness overspread her face
that even the detectives realized the utter futility of
their attack. She seemed as one under the influence
of a torpifying drug. Her capability for new feel-
ings had been crushed out of her by the crowded inci-
dents following her arrest. All she felt was a dull
pain of body and mind.
“Don’t sit there like a white mummy,” burst forth
Donnelly. “Come, now,” he added impatiently,
“don’t exhaust our patience; we haven't treated you
roughly, but we know how to bring you out of your
silence.”
He seized her wrist, his clenched hand squeezing it
until she uttered a sharp cry of pain.
“Are you going to answer my questions?” he
blurted.
She sank back in the chair with a despairing moan.
Her heavy eyelids dropped, a tremor contracted her
brow, then her head fell limply to one side.
“I guess we won’t gain anything by going any
stronger with her to-day. Take her back!” com-
manded the Chief.
Donnelly and Carson shook her into consciousness.
They steadied her as she dragged herself through the


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 71
dark corridor and down two flights of narrow iron
stairs to her cell.
When she was out of the room, the silent visitor
came out of the obscurity of his corner and seated
himself in the chair vacated by Miss Holcomb.
“What do you think of it, Britz?” asked Man-
ning.
Detective-Lieutenant Britz stared hard, as if trying
to concentrate his thoughts. His keen face, screwed
into an expression of uncertainty, contrasted sharply
with the big heavy features of his superior. Side by
side, the two men suggested the delicate surgeon's
probe and the heavy blacksmith's sledge.
“It’s a great mystery,” Britz declared. “A great
mystery,” he repeated in a tone of deep conviction.
“The most puzzling one that has ever come under my
observation.”
“Very well,” the Chief drawled. “It's Donnelly
and Carson's case, but you go out and solve it—you go
out and get the goods.”


CHAPTER VII
w
REMANDED TO THE TOMBS
LIEUTENANT BRItz, seated at the flat-top desk of
his office, peered steadily at the ceiling, as if he ex-
pected to find written there the solution of the great
mystery into which he had been called. A worried ex-
pression was on his face, as if anxiety had taken pos-
session of his soul. He became submerged in deep
meditation, in which he sought to arrange in consecu-
tive order the information gathered by Donnelly and
Carson. The conviction forced itself on his mind that
Miss Holcomb's arrest was based on circumstances
from which more than one inference might be drawn.
The fact that she knew the combination of Mrs. Mis-
sioner's safe did not mean, of course, that she took the
jewels. On the surface, it looked as if hers was the
exclusive opportunity to possess herself of the gems,
outside of Mrs. Missioner herself. But Britz felt that
the depth of the case had not been sounded; in fact,
that the surface had not even been penetrated.
Whether there were others who had equal opportunity
with Miss Holcomb, or had even a remote opportunity
to help themselves to the necklace, must be determined
by careful investigation.
The only thread that connected Miss Holcomb with
the theft was the diamond found in her room. But to
Britz's experienced mind, this circumstance pointed
72


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 73
rather toward innocence than guilt. For, he argued,
if she had taken those jewels, she would not have been
so careless as to leave one of them in her boudoir. That
diamond, Britz was convinced, was placed there in-
tentionally and with sinister purpose by a hand other
than Miss Holcomb's.
Britz rose from his seat, donned his topcoat and
hat, and made his way to the tier of cells one of which
held Miss Holcomb. He encountered Donnelly and
Carson on the way.
“What time are you going to arraign her?” he
asked.
“Right now,” Donnelly replied. “We got the
magistrate to hold court an hour longer for us.”
A turnkey swung open the iron door of the cell.
The detectives found Miss Holcomb huddled in a cor-
ner, the wan light of the corridor falling on her tear-
bathed face.
“Don’t take me back! They want to harm me! I
haven't done anything!” she cried, when she saw the
visitors. Britz stepped forward with an air of com-
mand and waved the other detectives back. He
, scraped his shoulders through the cell door and sat on
the rude cot, facing the woman.
“Miss Holcomb,” he said pleasantly, “there will be
no further inquisition in the Chief's office, no more
third-degree methods will be applied to you. It is
necessary under the law to bring you before a magis-
trate within twenty-four hours after your arrest.
Now, brace yourself, please, for the ordeal. If you
are innocent, you have absolutely nothing to fear.
You will have an opportunity in court of consulting


74 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
with your friends and engaging a lawyer. Your in-
terests will be protected.”
Instinctively, although in the gloom of her surround-
ings she could make out only a dim outline of his face,
she felt a confidence in the detective that braced her
like a tonic.
“I have a carriage waiting for you, Miss Holcomb,”
Britz informed her. “It will enable you to avoid the
many curious eyes in the street.”
She murmured her thanks as she stepped out of the
cell and followed Britz and his companions through a
maze of corridors to the street. They were driven
rapidly to the Jefferson Market Court and ushered
into the private room of the magistrate. A crowd of
reporters was already on hand for the hearing. The
curious eyes aimed pitilessly at her inspired in her a
terror that made her shrink behind the broad shoul-
ders of Donnelly. The magistrate motioned her to a
seat close to his desk, and said:
“Madam, it is your privilege to engage counsel. I
would advise you to do so at once, for anything you
say may be used against you.”
“I have done nothing wrong,” she murmured.
The deep lines of her face, the lusterless eyes red
from long weeping, the anguished expression of her
countenance, combined to arouse a feeling of pity
among the onlookers. Her features seemed instinct
with candor. It was impossible to reconcile the vel-
vet Smoothness of that artless brow with the ruffle of
an unworthy thought, or the faultless carving of those
frank lips with the blemish of an uttered lie.
Her simple expression of innocence carried convic-


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 75
tion to all, save, perhaps, the detectives. It was plain
that her bewildered mind could not fashion clever de-
ceits for her lips to speak. Whatever came from her
mouth must be the natural outpouring of thoughts
aroused spontaneously, without effort of will, without
any conscious attempt at evasion or falsehood.
“You had better get a lawyer,” the Magistrate
urged.
As if in response to his advice, the door opened
abruptly and two men entered. One was sharp-faced,
gray-haired, nervous, with the unmistakable air of the
lawyer. The other was a young man, his face marked
with heavy lines of worry, as if he also had passed a
sleepless night. At sight of him, Miss Holcomb
sprang forward and threw herself in his arms.
“Oh, Lawrence!” she exclaimed. “How I have
missed you!”
“Don’t worry,” he soothed. “Everything will turn
out all right. I have engaged a lawyer for you. I be-
lieve in you implicitly.”
Donnelly and Carson asked for a week in which to
work up the case against the prisoner.
“We are informed that the stolen jewels are worth
close to half a million. There was one big diamond
in the bunch that is said to be worth a quarter of a
million alone. I think she ought to be put under
heavy bonds.”
“On what grounds do you base your accusation of
theft against this young woman?” demanded the
lawyer.
Donnelly displayed the diamond he had found in
her room.


76 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS ~g-
“She was the only one, outside of Mrs. Missioner,
who knew the combination of the safe,” he said. “We
found this diamond, which is one of the original stones,
in her room.”
“Does Mrs. Missioner charge this girl with the
theft of the collarette?” asked the lawyer.
“The police make the accusation,” Donnelly replied.
“Mrs. Missioner is too upset to appear in court to-
day.”
Following the usual course, the magistrate ad-
journed the case for a week, and held Miss Holcomb
in $50,000 bail. There being no bondsman present,
she was committed to the Tombs.
“May I speak with Miss Holcomb in private a few
moments?” asked the young man into whose arms she
had fallen.
“Who are you?” gruffly demanded Donnelly.
“I’m Dr. Lawrence Fitch, the fiancé of Miss Hol-
comb.”
“You can see her in the Tombs,” Donnelly retorted.
Lieutenant Britz did not accompany Donnelly and
Carson with their prisoner to the jail. When the court
hearing was over, he returned to his office, summoned
two subordinate detectives, and gave them hasty in-
structions. Then he sauntered slowly to the Tombs.
As the barred steel door swung open to admit Britz,
Dr. Fitch crossed the stone-flagged courtyard that
separates the women's wing of the prison from that
of the men.
“Was it Dr. Fitch who called to see the prisoner in
the Missioner diamond robbery?” he asked the door-
IIlail.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 77
“Yes,” came the prompt response.
Britz waited in the shadow of the massive gray front
of the jail until the young physician came out. He
observed the pallor of the doctor's cheeks, his uncer-
tain gait, as if the turmoil of his mind had exhausted
his physical energy. The detective noted, also, the
clear-cut, straightforward features of the physician,
the resolute aspect of his face, and the purposeful
gleam of his clear eyes.
“Just a moment, doctor,” Britz said, tapping Dr.
Fitch on the shoulder.
“What can I do for you?” asked the doctor.
“I am Lieutenant Britz, of Headquarters,” the de-
tective explained. “I am in charge of the active work
on this case. I want your help.”
“My help?” A gleam of anxious inquiry darted
from the doctor's eyes.
“You can be of great service to Miss Holcomb,”
Britz said.
“How?” quickly asked Dr. Fitch.
“By following my orders,” flashed Britz.
“What are your orders?” asked the doctor.
“Don’t try to get bail for the young woman,” said
Britz. “It is absolutely necessary that all suspicion
be directed toward her. No effort must be made at
the present time to clear her.”
“What!” exclaimed Dr. Fitch. “Permit my
fiancée to suffer the tortures of this prison and live
under the stigma of this terrible accusation?”
“It is necessary,” assured Britz.
“The two detectives who arrested her seem to be
convinced of her guilt,” Fitch said angrily. “They in-


78 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
flicted tortures on her that might have crushed a
stronger woman; she told me as best she could what
took place at the inquisition in Police Headquarters.
Were you present at that brutal scene?”
“I was.”
Fitch eyed the detective suspiciously.
“Then you, too, believe she is guilty?” he asked.
“I have come to no conclusion with regard to the
case,” answered Britz. “I am simply going to ascer-
tain the truth. Are you willing to help?”
“If it is a search for truth and not an attempt to
convict an innocent woman, I am willing.”
“Very well,” said Britz. “I am working inde-
pendently, regardless of anything Donnelly and Car-
son, the two men who made the arrest, may do. They
blundered grievously when they arrested the young
woman. We must overcome that blunder, but the
time is not ripe for her release. If she leaves the
Tombs, it must be with her name cleared of suspi-
cion.”
Dr. Fitch looked gratefully at the detective.
“I know your reputation, Lieutenant Britz,” he said.
“This terrible blow came out of a clear sky. I feel
as helpless as a little child. The first intimation I had
that my fiancée was accused of theft was when I picked
up the morning papers. I could hardly believe my
eyes; it seemed to me my senses were deceiving me. I
read and re-read the newspaper accounts until I
seemed to know them by heart. I could not under-
stand why she did not send for me at once.”
“She was too dazed to think,” Britz said. “I will
pursue my inquiry on my own lines, and I want you


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 79
to hold yourself in readiness to respond to any call I
may make on you. Furthermore, I would advise that
you see Miss Holcomb again and inform her that if she
is innocent, all the resources of the Police Depart-
ment will be used in her behalf. I am looking only
for the real thief. It may be necessary for me to see
her occasionally. If she is innocent, she may be en-
tirely frank with me. I will not see her, however,
until she has had time to compose herself.”
Dr. Fitch returned to the prison and was permitted
to see the prisoner in the little reception room on the
ground floor of the women's wing. Her lawyer had
left instructions that the physician be allowed to con-
sult with his fiancée at any time. On his first visit, he
had found her distraught, hardly able to tell a coherent
story. His call had a cheering effect on her, however,
and she entered the reception room with a firmer step.
“I hope you have brought good news,” she called.
“I have just talked with Lieutenant Britz, who is
in charge of your case,” he replied. “He has assured
me he will do everything to prove your innocence and
find the real criminal, but he wants you to remain here
until you can leave with your name entirely cleared.”
For an instant her face clouded. She felt a painful
contraction of heart; a mist floated before her eyes.
“Remain here?” she murmured questioningly.
Then, as if a sudden thought illumined her mind, she
added, “I would rather stay here than go out and face
the world with this charge hanging over me.”
He pressed her hand as if to instill into her new con-
fidence. She sensed the meaning of that encouraging
pressure and rewarded him with a responsive smile.


8O BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“You believe in me, don't you?” she murmured.
“All those who know you must believe in you,” he
answered. “The very innocence of your nature is
sufficient reply to the accusation against you.”
“It is good to have you with me,” she said, and he
saw tears welling in her eyes. Her suffering touched
the tenderest chord of his nature, and he felt a pain as
of a hundred knife thrusts.
“Don’t lose courage,” was all he could say. “I’ll
be here every day.”
As he hastened down the steps of the prison, he
again met Britz. The two men walked to Broadway
and up that thoroughfare to Twenty-third Street.
When they parted, Britz knew the life history of Miss
Holcomb.
She had been born in good circumstances, and was
a graduate of Smith College. All her life, she had
been reared to the belief that her future was well pro-
vided for. As the only child of a Boston banker, she
lived in an environment of tranquil ease that seemed
her permanent heritage in life. Her father and mother
died within a year of each other, during the stress of
a financial panic. When the estate came to be settled,
it was found insufficient to meet the outstanding obliga-
tions of the father. Left penniless, amid the luxuries
of her birth, she found employment as a governess,
and two years before the discovery of the substituted
paste jewels, she was engaged by Mrs. Missioner as
secretary. -
Fitch met Miss Holcomb in Boston, and their friend-
ship was renewed in New York. Their engagement
was announced only a month before her arrest. Britz,


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 8I
trying to square the circumstances surrounding her ar-
rest with the conclusion of guilt, decided that if she
took the jewels, it must have been in a sudden tempta-
tion born of the luxury of her past. But, on more
mature reflection, he concluded that her birth, her
breeding, all the training of her life placed her above
any such temptation; and when he entered his home
to study the case in the quiet of his library, he was pos-
sessed of the strong conviction that Miss Holcomb was
guiltless of the charge entered against her on the rec-
ords of the Court.


CHAPTER VIII
BRITZ TAKES ACTION
LIEUTENANT BRITz occupied a unique position in
the Detective Bureau. His official grade was the same
as that of Donnelly and Carson, but, by sheer force of
his ability, he had lifted himself so far above them
that when working on a case they accepted his orders
like subordinates. Britz was one of the four or five
men of the entire detective force who could not be
classed as a “stool-pigeon man.” That is, he did not
depend on the use of stool-pigeons for his results. He
needed no staff of thieves to inform him of the doings
of other thieves. His detective ability was developed
to a high degree, combining an acute analytic sense
with remarkable industry. These talents were re-
inforced by a rare detective instinct, which often led
him irresistibly to the goal of his pursuit.
He was a bundle of twitching nerves beneath a
placid exterior. Nature had endowed him with an in-
scrutable countenance, an iron will, and a restless
energy that seemed to flow from an inexhaustible inner
fountain. He matched his resourcefulness against the
tricks of the criminals he pursued and, having the
keener mind, he invariably won.
Britz's enthusiasm never bubbled to the surface. He
carried himself with an appearance of masterly ease,
as if he held his impulses in complete subjection. There
was nothing striking in his stature, yet he left an im-
82


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 83
pression of hidden strength as of a steel framework be-
hind a light coating of plaster. His eyes, set deep be-
neath the arched outline of his eyebrows, seemed to
emit a mysterious, inexplicable current that circled
around one and drew one closer within its constantly
narrowing circumference. The shade of melancholy
that gloomed his nature was not hidden by the mask
of superb indifference that rested on his well-defined
features, with their crowning breadth of lightly fur-
rowed forehead. It revealed itself with the slightest
twitch of his facial muscles as well as in the drooping
line of his mouth. By some peculiarity of the blood,
his complexion ran a yellow ivory, never varying its
color under the stress of the strongest emotions. It
required superhuman courage to meet the steady gaze
of his eyes and lie to him. Though somewhat abrupt
of manner and speech, there was something engaging
about him, some subtle magic of personality that
brought one under the thrall of his mind. Almost
without the utterance of a syllable, he could bend weak
natures to his will. Only the strongest persons were
able to resist his domination.
Crime to Britz was something impersonal, like an
abstract problem in mathematics. Relentless as was
his pursuit of criminals, he felt no personal animosity
toward them, regarding them rather as shadow-beings
playing his game.
He was one of those strange beings who live mostly
within themselves, yet there were times when he felt a
desolation of heart, a longing for companionship, for
intimate association with his fellow beings. On such
occasions, his life seemed to lack something of the


84 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
beauty of other lives, as if it had been cast in a more
somber shade. He could feel a wave of melancholy
coming on him, and to avoid its depressing influence,
he turned his mind resolutely to his work, feasting on
the crime at hand as on some tempting dish. Without
knowing why, the Missioner diamond robbery held for
him a fascination more powerful than that called up
by any other crime within his memory. He recognized
surface indications of a deep cunning in the conception
and execution of the theft. His experienced eye saw
that no ignorant or vulgar mind had engineered the
substitution of those marvelous diamonds. The pur-
suit of the criminal fairly sparkled with exciting pos-
sibilities, and Britz felt the thrill of the chase even be-
fore he started the pursuit.
Britz paced nervously up and down his room, re-
volving the incidents surrounding the discovery of the
theft in his mind, but he was unable to pick a clew on
which to work. Nor did the occurrences in which
Donnelly and Carson participated furnish any prom-
ising material.
“I’ll begin at the very bottom,” he murmured, “and
work gradually to the top.” He sauntered out of the
house, walking with the air of one trying to lengthen
moments of reflection. In front of the Missioner
home he stopped, surveying the massive stone walls,
as if trying to figure the possibility of nocturnal
intrusion. The front door was of heavy bronze and
was swung open by the butler in response to the ring-
ing of the bell.
“Is Mrs. Missioner at home?” asked Britz.
The butler eyed him suspiciously.


86 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
stones were gathered from time to time, and were
strung together in the form of the collarette at Tif-
fany's.”
“That was ten years ago?”
“It was.”
“Since then, has the collarette been out of your pos-
session at any time?”
Mrs. Missioner sank into deep reflection. Her slip-
pered feet tapped the floor, her hands opened and
closed automatically.
“I recall only one instance,” she replied.
Britz bent forward eagerly.
“When was that?” he asked.
“About two years ago. I sent it to Tiffany's for
resetting.”
“The substitution was hardly made there,” he
smiled. “You are absolutely sure the collarette, with
that one exception, has been in no one else's pos-
session?”
“Absolutely sure,” the widow answered.
Britz moved thoughtfully about the room. He
tapped the walls with his fist, alert for a hollow sound.
Bending to his knees, he examined the floor carefully,
after which his eyes lingered on every inch of the win-
dows.
“May I examine the safe?” he asked.
Through a magnifying glass he studied the steel
door of the compartment, after which the widow set
the combination and swung open the safe. The in-
terior was as bare of suspicious marks as the exterior.
“Donnelly and Carson are right to this extent. It
is an inside job,” he pronounced.


88 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
and Mr. Griswold arrived, and were shown into the
room. I recall that I had difficulty in adjusting the
clasp, and Mr. Griswold snapped it shut.”
“Were you out of the room for even a moment
while the collarette lay on the table?”
“No,” Mrs. Missioner answered.
“Did you observe anything suspicious in the move-
ments, actions, or conduct of Miss Holcomb that even-
ing?”
“Nothing.”
“What occurred after you came home? Who
helped you to undress?”
“My maids were asleep,” said Mrs. Missioner, “and
I called Miss Holcomb, who occupies the room next
to mine. She helped me take off the jewels and she
saw me place them in the safe.”
“And with the exception of yourself, Miss Holcomb
is the only one who knew the combination of the
safe?” Britz flashed.
“Only Miss Holcomb,” responded the widow.
“On the night of the opera, who was with you when
you put on the collarette?” -
“Miss Holcomb, Mr. Griswold, Mr. Sands, and
Miss March,” the widow informed him.
“Did any of those present help you place it about
your neck?”
“No. Mr. Sands had taken the collarette from the
table, and was looking at it. I took it from him and
fastened it myself.”
Britz meditated a second or two, then asked:
“After you took the collarette from the safe on
those two nights, did any servant enter the room?”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 89
Mrs. Missioner's brow contracted in thought. It
was difficult for her to recall such small incidents as
the passing of servants through the room.
“The footman, of course, announced Mr. Griswold
and Mr. Sands. I remember, too, that my East In-
dian servant brought my new dress.”
“Do you believe Miss Holcomb is the thief?” sud-
denly fired Britz.
Mrs. Missioner started as if a coil of flame had shot
through her. Her pale lips trembled and she shook
her head negatively.
“I cannot believe her capable of it,” she said.
“Then if we eliminate her,” Britz retorted, “we
must look for the thief among Mr. Sands, Mr. Gris-
wold, the footman, and the East Indian servant. Miss
March, of course, is out of the question.”
“So are Mr. Sands and Mr. Griswold,” came in
positive tones from Mrs. Missioner.
Britz made no comment. His eyes moved restlessly
about the room, falling finally in a steady gaze on the
widow.
“How long has the footman been in your employ?”
he asked.
“More than fifteen years,” she responded promptly.
“And the other servant?”
“About a year. He came very highly recom-
mended, and I do not see how he possibly could
have substituted the paste necklace for the real
one.”
“Neither do I,” agreed Britz. “Did either Mr.
Sands or Mr. Griswold ever have opportunity to pass
through Miss Holcomb's room?”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 9I
“We must do nothing of the kind,” corrected the
detective. “We must allow all suspicion to be di-
rected toward her.”
“But it is cruel, it is inhuman, to keep her in
prison,” protested Mrs. Missioner.
“It is necessary,” assured Britz.
“I will not permit it, even if it means the loss of the
necklace,” said the woman.
“My dear madam,” Britz returned, “don’t excite
yourself. My blundering colleagues have done all the
harm they can possibly do to Miss Holcomb. Far
more important than the recovery of the necklace is
the establishment of her innocence in the eyes of the
world. With all the suspicious circumstances of this
case woven about her, your mere belief in her inno-
cence will not clear her. Therefore, you will have to
leave this entire matter in my hands.”
The widow bowed submissively. A shade of sor-
row crept over her face as she contemplated the plight
of her secretary.
“May I go to the jail and assure her of my belief
in her?” she asked.
“That would be fatal,” replied the detective.
“Then what can I do—I must do something for
her,” groaned Mrs. Missioner.
“The only thing we can do for her is to find the
real thief,” said Britz.
“I trust it won't be long,” sighed the widow.
“Kindly give me the addresses of Mr. Sands and
Mr. Griswold,” asked the detective.
“You surely don't suspect either of them?” re-
turned Mrs. Missioner.


92 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“I suspect no one, as yet,” Britz hastened to assure
her.
He wrote the addresses of the two men on the back
of a card and left. Britz headed straight for Head-
quarters and entered the office of the Chief. He threw
himself wearily into a chair with the air of one vainly
trying to discern a glimmer of light in the enshrouding
darkness.
“It’s going to be hard work,” he said.
“I expected it would be when I put you on it,” the
Chief replied.
Britz recounted the information he had gathered
from Mrs. Missioner and then walked into his own
office. Summoning two subordinates, he directed
them to go to the Missioner house and trail the foot-
man and the East Indian servant. Two other men
were assigned to shadow Sands and Griswold.
“That's all I can do to-day,” he murmured.


CHAPTER IX
WORD FROM LOGAN
A week of agonized suspense in the Tombs seemed
drawn into an eternity of suffering to Miss Holcomb.
Conscious of her own innocence, she had, nevertheless,
ceased to struggle against the relentless fate that
marked her as its victim. Her sensitive nature re-
coiled from contact with the miserable creatures into
whose midst she was suddenly thrust. No longer
could she find solace in tears, for the long drain had
exhausted the supply. The gloom of her surround-
ings penetrated the innermost sanctuary of her soul,
and she became possessed of a deep melancholy which
even the encouraging words of Dr. Fitch could not
relieve.
“Don’t give up to despair; truth and justice will
prevail,” Dr. Fitch had urged every day. But the grim
prison walls shut out hope as effectually as if the knell
of her final fate had been sounded. Only one prop
remained to sustain her through the long days and
nights of confinement in the Tombs. It was the be-
lief that she would be speedily freed at her second hear-
ing, but even that prop was rudely torn from under
her. Instead of regaining her liberty, she was sent
back to the Tombs under heavy bail to await the ac-
tion of the Grand Jury. It was the work of a few
brief minutes to make out a prima facie case against
her, and in her benumbed state of mind, she hardly
93


94 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
knew what was transpiring in the courtroom. Her
eyes had a vacant stare, as if peering into a heavy
mist. When court adjourned, she followed the jailer
automatically back to her cell. When the door clicked
behind her, a violent tremor shook her frame and she
gave herself up, body, mind, and soul, to the bitter
spirit of despair that had seized her.
She was recalled to her senses by the matron, who
announced that Dr. Fitch was in the reception room.
Hastily coiling her disarranged hair into a knot, she
passed along the narrow corridors and descended to
the visitors’ room. This chamber, filled with the
echoes of past tragedies, marked with the invisible
footprints of the surging undercurrent of human life,
is the gateway through which pass innocent and guilty
alike, to freedom or to penal servitude. Here the
world within meets the world without; here messages
of hope are poured into tears of despair. Here is said
the final farewell of the woman condemned; through
this room the innocent pass out of the grim shadow
of the barred corridors to the welcome sunlight of
the street.
No woman may enter this room without a shudder
of despair; none may leave it without a prayer of de-
liverance. Bare of furnishings, there is nothing to
relieve the drab monotony of its walls. A gray-haired
matron of buxom form sits stolidly at the door. Her
cold eyes carry no message of encouragement. She is
not there to encourage; she is there to watch. Even to
visitors, the room imparts a feeling of misty terror, a
longing to escape its sinister aspect.
A groan, as of physical pain, came from Fitch as


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 95
he beheld Miss Holcomb in the wan light that filtered
through the window. Her distress reacted on his
sensibilities; he could utter no word of encouragement.
“It is awful,” he moaned, as he led her into a cor-
ner of the room.
“And they all believe me guilty?” she asked
despairingly.
“Not all,” he returned, “there is one whose faith
is unshaken.”
“Mrs. Missioner—what of her?” she asked.
“I don't know,” Dr. Fitch replied.
“Have the police discovered no clew to the theft?”
“I haven't heard a word from them,” Dr. Fitch
said.
They remained silent, as if fearful of inflicting pain
on each other by further discussion of the discouraging
outlook. The doctor's eyes were fixed on the tips of
his boots; hers roved aimlessly about the room.
“I talked with the lawyer to-day,” he broke the
silence. “He says they haven't sufficient evidence to
convict, and that while the case looks ugly, there is
nothing to fear. He is in favor of a speedy trial.”
“Then even if I am set free my name will remain
smirched,” she declared.
His spirits sank lower as he contemplated the dark
outlook of her future. With a heroic effort he brought
himself out of his dejection, and, eying her intently,
said:
“Your name will be cleared of all suspicion.”
She could read encouragement in that purposeful
face and the set determination of those lips. His res-
olute features were eloquent with promise in her be-


96 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
half. No matter how fierce the fires of accusation
blazed about her, there was one whose belief would re-
main unshaken. The finger of contumely might point
at her, but in his eyes it would carry no reproach.
Yet, as she realized how deeply her future was inter-
woven with his, she felt an anguish of heart more
poignant than the pain of her own predicament.
“What a terrible blow this must be to you,” was
all she could say.
“It means to me only the opportunity to prove my-
self worthy of you,” he replied.
“But suppose,” she breathed, “they do not find the
thief and the world is made to believe me guilty?”
The mere suggestion of failure to clear the woman
he loved aroused all the combativeness of his nature.
He brought his clenched fist down on his knee
and thundered forth an eloquent challenge to the
world.
“I’ll stand between you and the creatures who are
trying to crush you!” he exclaimed. “Let them come
like a thousand furies! Your fight is my fight,” he
whispered, bending closer to her, “and your victory
will be mine.”
His eyes darted points of fire that kindled a re-
sponsive light in the glance she turned on him.
“You will never desert me?” she murmured grate-
fully.
“Never!”
She felt his arm about her waist, and with a sigh
almost of happiness she surrendered herself to his em-
brace. He pressed her close to him, his lips seeking
hers in the fading light of the room. The faint kiss


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 97
that broke the stillness glorified the love of these two
souls and struck a divine radiance that seemed to bring
a message of hope from above.
“It is so good to have you near me,” she said. “I
feel as if no harm could come to me.”
They became vaguely conscious of a man's form out-
lined in the murky light of the room. As the figure
gradually shaped itself to Fitch's eyes, his hand slipped
from her waist and he rose to his feet.
“Lieutenant Britz!” he exclaimed.
The detective came out of the obscurity of the op-
posite wall, and, doffing his hat, respectfully addressed
them:
“It is unusual, I know, for a police officer to ask
information of a prisoner held for the Grand Jury.
Before Miss Holcomb replies to the questions I am
about to ask, I think it might be well for her to seek
the advice of counsel.”
“Miss Holcomb will answer any questions you may
ask,” Fitch replied. “She has nothing to hide.”
The impenetrable face of the detective gave no in-
sight to his thoughts. He drew a chair close to the
expectant couple, shifting his gaze from Fitch to the
face of the young woman. Though he gave no sign of
it, he read the acute suffering she felt.
“Miss Holcomb,” he began, “when were you last
in Europe with Mrs. Missioner?”
“A little less than a year and a half ago,” came the
quick response.
“Was that before or after the East Indian servant
entered the employ of Mrs. Missioner?”
“He was engaged after we came back.”


98 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“Did you meet Mr. Sands or Mr. Griswold
abroad 2 ”
“We met both of them in London and Paris.”
“Did Mrs. Missioner have the collarette with her?
I mean the one with the Maharanee diamond?”
“She did.”
The detective settled back in his chair, his chin in
his hands, as if lost in deep thought. The strange
pallor of his face, shaded by the waning light, gave
him the appearance of a dark clay image. Miss Hol-
comb looked inquiringly at him, seeking some explana-
tion of his puzzling questions.
“The case is more baffling than ever,” he said in
response to her questioning look. “When I began my
investigation, I was firmly convinced of your in-
nocence—”
“And now?” interrupted Dr. Fitch.
Britz replied with an equivocal shrug of the shoul-
ders. A moment or two passed before he spoke. “I
am seeking the light,” he said.
“Do you wish to ask Miss Holcomb any further
questions?” Fitch asked. “She is only too anxious
to enlighten you.”
The detective's eyes narrowed on the young
WOInan.
“There is some information that I want, Miss Hol-
comb; I believe you can supply it.” After brief reflec-
tion, he asked: “Mr. Sands and Mr. Griswold are fre-
quent visitors at the house of Mrs. Missioner?”
“Both call very frequently,” Miss Holcomb replied.
“And their visits are inspired by a feeling that is
stronger than friendship?”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 99
Miss Holcomb looked at Fitch as if in doubt what to
Say.
“Be perfectly frank,” he advised.
“I believe both have proposed marriage to her,” she
informed him.
“And Mrs. Missioner—she prefers which one?”
“I don't know,” came the prompt response.
“You mean she has never indicated her prefer-
ence to you? Come now, surely in a burst of
confidence she dropped some hint as to her incli-
nations?”
It was plain to Britz that Miss Holcomb revolted
against violating the intimate confidences of her em-
ployer. To reveal the secrets that had come to her
through association with the woman who seemingly
had turned her back on her now was so inconsistent
with Miss Holcomb's entire character that Britz recog-
nized the necessity of urging his question.
“I am not asking this out of any motive of idle
curiosity,” he said. “It is of vital importance I
should be informed of Mrs. Missioner's relations with
Mr. Sands and Mr. Griswold, as well as of the oppor-
tunity each had for obtaining the diamonds.”
“I am sure neither of them would or could have
taken them,” Miss Holcomb said.
“That may be perfectly true,” replied Britz. “I do
not say either of them took the diamonds, but I must
follow every line of inquiry that reveals itself to me.
Now, isn't it a fact, Miss Holcomb, that Griswold was
the preferred suitor?”
“I do not think so,” she said in a low voice.
“You mean she preferred Sands?”


IOO BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
*
“Yes.”
“What makes you think so?”
“Her general demeanor toward the two men.”
“You mean she showed more fondness for Sands?”
Miss Holcomb knitted her brows. Her perplexity
made her slow and hesitating of speech.
“I cannot say that,” she answered. “Sometimes I
thought she cared more for Mr. Griswold, and then
again I would feel certain she preferred Mr. Sands.
In the main, however, I always believed that Mr. Sands
held her affections; while Mr. Griswold simply pleased
her with his attentions.”
“Possibly Mrs. Missioner didn't know her own
mind?” the detective asked.
“Perhaps not,” agreed Miss Holcomb.
“Did she ever make any remarks to you that led
you to believe she cared more for one than for the
Other P’’
“None that I recall.”
“Miss Holcomb, do you know the history of the
Maharanee diamond?” he suddenly fired.
A quick spark of memory kindled her mind, and
with the first flash, she understood the import of his
question.
“Mrs. Missioner told me the history of the stone,”
she said. “I believe there was some scandal con-
nected with its purchase in India. She told me that
when her husband obtained it, there was some talk of it
having been stolen from a temple and that the pro-
vincial native government tried to regain possession of
it. Mr. Missioner succeeded, however, in retaining it
as part of his collection.”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS or
“What opportunity did the Indian servant have of
obtaining the necklace?”
“None at all,” she answered hopelessly, “unless he
broke into the safe, and I believe that was not
done.”
“Mrs. Missioner informed me that on one occasion,
when the necklace was lying on the table, the servant
entered the room with a box. You were in the room
at the time. Was he close enough to the table to touch
the necklace?”
“I remember the incident very well,” she replied.
“I took the box from him at the door and he turned
around and went downstairs. I do not believe he was
within ten feet of the table at any time.”
“I don't know what to think,” Britz said, after some
reflection. “Almost as soon as a new clew bobs up,
it falls down and I have to begin all over again. I
have no more questions to ask to-day.”
Fitch accompanied the detective out of the prison,
begging vainly for some word of encouragement.
Britz answered his questions with monosyllables, as
if he feared to commit himself with regard to the out-
come of his investigation. Just before parting, how-
ever, Britz said:
“Every line that develops in this case, you can rest
assured, will be followed to the end. So far, nothing
has been discovered that changes the aspect of the
case in the slightest degree.”
The detective walked to Headquarters and entered
the office of the Chief.
“Has Donnelly or Carson reported anything new?”
he inquired.


IO2 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“Nothing,” answered the Chief. “And you?”
“Nothing that throws any light on the case.”
“Britz,” the Chief remarked, as though delivering
some weighty conclusion, “I think you're working on
the wrong hypothesis. You seem to have decided
that Miss Holcomb is innocent. If you will survey the
case as it stands, you will have to acknowledge that ab-
solutely everything in it points to her guilt. I do not
undertake to say what her motive was in stealing the
jewels, unless it was simply the feminine lust for orna-
ments. I feel certain, also, that she was not alone in
the crime. My belief is that she took the necklace out
of the safe, turned it over to Dr. Fitch, or someone
else, to have the duplicate made, and then returned the
false jewels to the safe.”
“But where were the paste gems made?” inquired
Britz.
“That's for you to find out,” snapped the Chief.
“I have personally visited every manufacturer of
paste gems in this city and in Philadelphia, Boston,
Buffalo, and Washington. My men have been to all
the places in the smaller cities. Manufacturers in all
the other cities of the country have been visited by the
local police, and I feel absolutely sure that the dupli-
cates were not made in this country. Logan is on the
way to Paris now, and until we hear from him I don't
think we are safe in venturing any opinion as to the
identity of the thief. I am receiving daily reports of
the movements of Sands, Griswold, the butler, and the
Indian servant, but they show nothing.”
“Why do you think Logan will discover anything?
Has the real necklace ever been abroad?”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 103
“Mrs. Missioner had it with her on the other side,
but I don't know that it ever left her possession.”
The Chief's lips coiled into an amused smile.
“Kind o' looks as if you're on the wrong scent,”
he baited.
“Wait till we hear from Paris,” Britz returned.
“You're 'way off the trail,” the Chief persisted.
“You’re not even following the lines of your own de-
duction. The other day you said you were convinced
the necklace was stolen within the last month. How
do you suppose they got it to Paris, had it duplicated,
and then had the counterfeit sent back here in four
weeks? You don't give them any time for the manu-
facture of the pastes.”
“The crime was not conceived and executed in a
day,” Britz returned. “It is the work of long thought
and careful planning. The duplicates may have been
made any time within five years. The substitution
was made since the expert saw the necklace fifteen
months ago. A man like Ranscome would have de-
tected the paste at a glance. I saw him yesterday and
he informed me the stones he saw were genuine.”
“Then, following your line of reasoning, we must
conclude that the original was out of the possession of
Mrs. Missioner without her knowledge long enough to
enable the thief to have the duplicate made? And if
that is the case, then only one person could have
succeeded in the crime. The secretary was the only
one who had access to the safe, and she also would
have known Mrs. Missioner's plans well enough to en-
able her to judge the length of time she could with-
hold the necklace without detection. Of course, the


IO4 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
theft would have been discovered at once if Mrs. Mis-
sioner wanted to wear the necklace while it was gone.”
“The original stones were never stolen from the
safe,” Britz said in a positive tone.
“Then how was the substitution made?” queried the
other.
“I don't know,” replied the detective gloomily. “I
have yet to discover the time of the substitution.”
“It seems to me,” said the Chief, “you have still
to discover a good many things with regard to this
case. As a matter of fact, you're as much at sea as
on the day you took charge.”
“I have only begun to throw out my lines,” Britz
declared. “I’ll land the fish before I'm through, and
it won't be Miss Holcomb.”
As the detective left the office, he could not help
a feeling of depression at the slow progress of events.
As yet, the intricacies of the mystery were vaguely
outlined in his mind. He saw them as a floating mist,
heavy with possibilities but charged with delusive
signs of beckoning trails that he instinctively knew led
to nowhere. He was still treading lightly the mazes
of the case. One false step might be fatal, and he
preferred to remain in a crouching attitude of watch-
fulness, ready to spring from cover at the proper
moment.
Much as he deplored his enforced inactivity, he
nevertheless had faith in the final outcome. A quick
mental survey of the case convinced him that the first
necessity was to find the maker of the paste stones.
Whoever made the duplicate Maharanee would surely
recall having done so. There were few European


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 105
firms that could have made the stone. It was doubtful
whether any American manufacturer could have
turned out a substitute to fool the eyes of Mrs. Mis-
sioner, even for a night. It is hard enough to get
the compact brilliance of the diamond in a small paste
gem; infinitely more difficult is it to manufacture a
counterfeit Maharanee. Britz knew that whoever
copied the cut and luster of that marvelous stone was
an expert of high caliber. No faint shimmer of glass
could have availed to deceive Mrs. Missioner. The
laboratory fire that gleamed from the duplicate was the
work of years of experiment, and only in Paris, Britz
believed, was the art of manufacturing paste gems suf-
ficiently developed to bring forth a satisfactory dupli-
cate of the Maharanee.
Three weeks, at least, must elapse before word
would come from Logan. The emissary sent abroad
was himself a diamond expert. Before entering the
Detective Bureau, he had been a foreign agent of the
United States Treasury Department. If the duplicate
necklace was manufactured abroad, Logan would find
the manufacturer without delay. Britz had faith in
his man, and he waited impatiently through three
weeks of torment for the first cablegram. It came
finally, and he opened it with nervous fingers.
“Missioner necklace manufactured from drawings
by three firms. Original never in possession of manu-
facturers.”
Britz let the telegram flutter to the floor. -
“I knew it!” he burst forth. “They wouldn't have
dared to take the original out of the safe without im-
mediately replacing it with the duplicate.”


IO6 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
He picked up the message and burst into the Chief's
TOOIn.
“Read it!” he exclaimed.
The Chief's eyes drank in the words, but his brain
failed to grasp their underlying meaning.
“I don't see that this proves anything,” he re-
marked.
“It proves everything,” volleyed Britz. “It
proves that the thief was a clever draughtsman. It
proves that he spent weeks sketching the necklace,
stone by stone, and it proves, too, that he went to.
Paris to have the duplicate made.”
“It proves all that,” agreed the Chief. “But who
had the opportunity to see the necklace a sufficient
number of times and long enough to make the
sketches? Who but Miss Holcomb?”
“I will find someone who had almost as good an
opportunity,” Britz returned confidently.
“And if you do, what will it mean?” asked the
Chief.
“It will mean something to work on,” the detective
said.
The next twenty-four hours Britz spent in the
quiet of his home, his mind focused on the problem
before him, trying to map out his line of procedure.
Plan after plan he discarded as worthless. He could
have struck out blindly in the hope of stumbling on a
trail, but that was not Britz's method. Crime mys-
teries were to him scientific problems to be solved by
scientific means. Step by step he went over the ground
already covered, and then swept the outlook with the
keen searchlight of his mind.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 107
By a process of elimination he tried to sift the real
thief from the group of suspects on whom his mental
efforts were concentrated. He was unable to drag
forth the culprit. Then he sought to discern the mo-
tive for the crime in the action of each possible crim-
inal, but he could come to no satisfactory conclusion.
“More information, more information is needed be-
fore the real work can begin!” he murmured.
In his preoccupation he did not observe the door
open and the servant show in a subordinate from
Headquarters. Not until the visitor spoke did he be-
come aware of his presence.
“Two cablegrams for you, sir,
said.
The first cablegram aroused no emotions in the de-
tective.
“Have obtained original drawings. Will sail to-
morrow with them,” the message from Logan read.
He opened the second envelope and read the con-
tents half a dozen times, as if to stamp them indelibly
on his mind.
“Drawings for duplicates taken to manufacturer by
young woman. Gave name of Elinor Holcomb.”
Britz dismissed the visitor, left the house, and has-
tened to the office of Dr. Fitch. Taking the important
cablegram from his pocket, he handed it to the physi-
cian. The doctor's eyes lingered on each word. His
face paled, his eyes bulged forward, a violent tremor
ran up and down his frame.
“This is awful!” he groaned.
“It's great news for you and Miss Holcomb,” the
detective smiled.
22
the subordinate


IO8 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
Fitch eyed him in perplexity. The detective met
his inquiring gaze steadily, and, slowly folding the
cablegram, he said:
“It proves beyond question she had no part in the
crime.”
“How P” Fitch demanded eagerly.
“If Miss Holcomb had been clever enough to plan
the theft, she'd have known better than to go about
Paris ordering the duplicates. Also, if she had taken
the diamonds, she'd never have permitted one of them
to remain in her room in Mrs. Missioner's house. No,
whoever stole those gems deliberately tried to throw
suspicion on her.”
“But who could have conceived such a dastardly
crime?” Fitch blurted, a wave of anger sweeping his
frame.
“Whoever it was,” Britz returned, “either was actu-
ated by enmity toward the young woman, or knew
enough about the Missioner household to realize that
suspicion would naturally fall on her, and therefore
he decided to use her as a cloak to hide his own
identity. However, I now have something to work
on, something that will produce quick results. Dr.
Fitch, you may tell Miss Holcomb that in my cal-
culations she is entirely eliminated from participation
in the crime. You may inform her also that the hunt
for the thief has begun.”
Before the physician recovered from the pleasant
shock of the detective's words, Britz was hurrying
down the steps.


CHAPTER X
DOROTHY MARCH TALKS
MATINEE girls in the Forrest Theater differ from
their sisters of other New York playhouses in that
they are far more serious than anybody in the evening
audiences. Caramels, marshmallows, chocolate creams
are forbidden by the unwritten law of their cult. The
utmost nourishment one of them can allow herself
is a salted almond nibbled surreptitiously between de-
corous little outbursts of kid-gloved applause. It is
not the sort of gathering in which one would expect
to find the busiest sleuth of the headquarters staff,
especially with a great diamond mystery on his hands.
Yet, on one of those warm January afternoons that
make the metropolis wonder if it is being metamor-
phosed into a winter resort, one of the most interested
auditors in the select little theater was Detective-Lieu-
tenant Britz, of Manning's staff.
On the surface, that is to say. In reality, he was
not listening to a word of the Thespian culture that
trickled over the footlights. But if his ears were un-
occupied, not so his eyes. His glance circled the audi-
torium like a ramrod swung on a swivel, resting on
the stage at long intervals in a perfunctory way.
Manning could have told in a moment that his alert
lieutenant was not at all interested in the unfolding
of the attenuated plot on the boards; that Britz was
looking for somebody.
Io9


I IO BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
Britz found the somebody he sought when his gaze
fell on a slim little figure in the trimmest of dove-col-
ored gowns, sitting in the fifth row off the center aisle.
Instantly his last pretense of attention to the play
vanished. Keeping his eyes on the gray curves of the
girl in the fifth row, he quitted his post at one side
of the house and walked slowly to the main exit,
whence he watched her until the curtain fell on the
first act. Meanwhile, he scribbled on a card, slipped
a liberal tip into the receptive hand of an usher, and
indicated the object of his interest. When the curtain
fell on the first act, the usher hurried down the aisle,
and presented the card to the girl in gray.
“If Miss March,” read the young woman, “will
spare a few minutes to Britz, of Headquarters, she will
confer a favor and serve her friend, Mrs. Missioner.”
Dorothy gathered her wrap, glasses, and program
quickly and followed the usher to the back of the
theater. The youth led her to the famous detective,
whom, though she had heard of him through Doris
Missioner, she beheld for the first time. She had
expected to see a man whose cleverness was writ large
on his exterior; she was disappointed by the almost
commonplace appearance of the man who faced her.
But she acknowledged his self-introduction with
the sweetness inseparable from her mignon features,
and, at his request, strolled with him to a corner of
the lobby, where they seated themselves on softly
tinted bent-wood chairs.
“You wished to see me?” inquired Dorothy. It
was a banal question, and a flush tinged her cheeks
as she realized its superfluousness could not escape the


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS III
greatest detective in New York. But Britz seemed not
to notice it, and the simple directness of his manner
put the girl at her ease.
“I took the liberty, Miss March,” he said pleasantly,
“because I saw you across the orchestra, and I need
a short course in social knowledge.” His smile robbed
the reply of flippancy.
“Fancy!” said Dorothy. She was so utterly at
sea as to the detective's purpose she could think of
nothing else to say save, “I fear you have sought a
poor teacher.”
“Well, I don't know now,” Britz returned, looking
at her with respectful admiration. “You see, you're
a society girl, and I know nothing of society, and
there's something I want to know—something I ought
to know.”
“If there's anything I can tell you, Mr. Britz, I'll
be glad to do so,” Dorothy volunteered. “Especially
if it will help you to find Mrs. Missioner's diamonds.”
“I’m not sure it will,” said Britz. “It may, how-
ever, save me from seeking them in the wrong place.
You seemed to enjoy the play, Miss March.”
This shift of subjects was so abrupt that if Dorothy's
breath had not already been coming in catches, she
might have gasped. It was evident detectives were
more original than society men. She wondered ab-
sently if the type was worth studying.
“Why, yes,” her hesitating answer came. “I be-
lieve it's considered one of the best hits of the season.
Very elevating, you know, and—well, different.”
“Modern, Miss March?’”
“It has two periods. The first deals with the life


II2 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
of to-day, the second harks back to the early Victorian
period, with, I understand, an abrupt return to the
present.”
She was chatting quite easily with the detective now.
Had she been reared in Mulberry Street instead
of on Murray Hill, she could not have felt more
natural.
“Now, this society subject—by the way, Miss
March,” Britz switched again, “is there as much differ-
ence between social life then and now P”
“Oh, a great deal, I should say.” Her eyes
twinkled. “Of course I cannot speak with authority
—from personal observation.”
“I wouldn't ask you to tell me anything about Ward
McAllister from personal observation, Miss March,”
said the sleuth. His gallantry on occasion was the
wonder of the Central Office.
Dorothy looked alarmed. Could it be great detec-
tives wasted time on compliments, too? But a side
glance at the detective's serious expression reassured
her. It was manifest even to a débutante he had no
idea of making an impression along that line. She
laughed frankly and looked at him again in the friend-
liest way.
“I know you don't want to ask me about anything
so recent as the Spanish War,” she said, “now, do
you?”
“Candidly, I don't,” he rejoined. “To tell you the
plain truth, I don't know exactly what I wish to ask
you nor how to ask it, but I have an idea you can
help me, and I’m sure you will for Mrs. Missioner's
sake.”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 113
“And Miss Holcomb's?” asked the girl eagerly.
“She, too, you know, is a dear friend of mine.”
“And Miss Holcomb's,” answered the Headquarters
man warmly. “Let me say, too, my dear young lady,
as one old enough to be your—your 3 *
“Don’t say my brother, Mr. Britz,” interposed Dor-
othy mischievously. “I—I—well, I don't really see
how I can be a sister to anybody else.” She felt im-
pelled to treat this strangely natural man naturally—
she, who despite her inexperience, could freeze pre-
sumption with a glance, felt that way. It was a tribute
to his adaptability.
Britz laughed.
“Miss March,” he said with more heartiness in
his tone than had colored it in many a day, “if I
were not so busy, it would be a delight to be an
elder brother to you. But I guess you're not inter-
ested in my impulses, and we were talking of the
play.”
“Oh, yes, ‘the play's the thing,’” Dorothy coun-
tered with keen relish of the situation. If subtlety was
his intention, she would show him what a woman—
Dorothy was all of nineteen—a woman could do. “I
never would have supposed,” she added, allowing her-
self full measure of mischief, “that a famous detective
could be a matinée man.”
Britz winced. His ready good nature parried her
shafts, however, and it was with the same slow smile
that he replied:
“Does the author reconcile the manners of the two
periods, or, is the piece one of those problem plays
that leave everything to the audience? You see, Miss


II.4 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
March,” he went on, “Mulberry Street gets to Broad-
way occasionally.”
“I don't know, Mr. Britz.” She tried to recall the
advance notice of the production. “This is the first
time I’ve seen it. I dare say the playwright has
bridged the gap somehow.”
“It’s a wide gap to bridge,” observed the detective
thoughtfully. “From reading nineteenth century
novels, I should say it would be hard for the writer
to hold interest with such a groundwork for his plot.
Things were so different fifty years ago.”
“Exactly what my grandfather says,” Dorothy re-
torted, fun flashing in that mignon face. “But we'll
know soon how the author has succeeded,” she added.
“The orchestra is nearing the end of this selection.”
“Even their amusements were different,” mused
Britz. “Instead of golf, tennis, autoing, yachting,
they had archery, croquet, sketching, and square dances
—I don't suppose anybody in society sketches nowa-
days, Miss March?”
“I’d hardly say that,” she replied. “There are a
few talented men 5 y
“And many women—”
“Oh, almost all women are more or less artistic,”
said Dorothy with conviction. “But one must not be
unjust to the men on that account.”
“I’ll venture to say—well, of course, you're in soci-
ety, Miss March, and I’m not,” Britz apologized, “but
still I feel pretty certain you can't think of—”
“Of course, if you don't think I can think, Mr.
Britz,” said Dorothy with mock indignation that ac-
cented her prettiness as a shadowy background em-


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 115
phasizes a jewel, “why, you can't expect—but I told
you you'd find me a poor teacher.”
“Now, Miss March, Miss March,” Britz protested,
hitching his chair around to gaze at her more directly.
Over his shoulder he saw curious eyes, and he realized
their tète-à-tête soon must end. Lobby flirtations were
not approved by Forrest audiences.
“Well, Mr. Britz?” This challengingly.
“Well, Miss March,” and his smile from a younger
man would have been called caressing, “we’ve started
with discussion of the play, and we touched on author-
ship, the founder of the Four Hundred, the War with
Spain, and a dozen other subjects. Funny how chatter
zigzags, isn't it? I was about to say that from all
I understand the society men of to-day are not as
accomplished, even if they are as talented, as the beaux
of good Queen Victoria's girlhood. Come, now, I'd
be willing to bet a box of bonbons you don't know
half a dozen men who can draw anything except
checks.”
“Oh, yes, I do!” she cried gayly. Then, medita-
tively, “Half a dozen, you say? Do you know, Mr.
Britz, I think you win.”
“You don't know as many as six?” Britz inquired,
as if the fate of empires hung on his winning the wager
that as yet was only a hypothesis.
“It's humiliating, isn't it?” she said naively. “But
I don't. There are two or three, though—Teddy Lor-
imer and Mr. Griswold, and that queer little French-
man, Anatole—Anatole—oh, you know whom I
mean?”
“Anatole Daubigny?”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 117
you wished to ask me—something that was to help
you find the diamonds?”
“Some other time, Miss March, thank you,” said
Britz, smiling. “I won't detain you now. Perhaps
we'll meet at another matinée soon, with a longer
intermission between the acts. Delighted to have
made your acquaintance, Miss March. I know you're
in a hurry to get back to your seat. Forrest audiences
don't like to be disturbed, you know. Good-afternoon,
Miss March, and—thank you so much !”
“Good-afternoon, then, Mr. Britz,” and she flitted
down the aisle.
“Yes, thank you so much, Miss March!” murmured
Britz as he left the theater and merged himself with
the afternoon tide in Broadway.
He had cause to thank her, he believed. For, in her
girlish talk, she had given him the first Missioner clew
of the week—or, rather, she had extended for him a
thread in the mystery that had occupied much of his
thoughts from the moment when he received Logan's
cable saying the paste jewels were made from sketches.
For days, he had sought to learn who among Mrs.
Missioner's intimates was artist enough to make such
delicate draughts of the diamonds as would be re-
quired by an artificer for the manufacture of imita-
tions. With that object, he had ascertained Dorothy's
intention to go to the matinée in the Forrest and had
gone to the theater to meet her under conditions not
likely to interfere with such gentle questioning of her
as he meant to do. His veiled interrogation of the
society girl had brought forth the fact that Curtis
Griswold could sketch—that the clubman was suffi-


I 18 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
ciently master of his pencil to have his skill pretty
generally known among his acquaintances. Lorimer
and Daubigny, the other society artists she had
mentioned, were not, he knew, in Mrs. Missioner's
circle.
It was fortunate for Lieutenant Britz, as well as for
Elinor Holcomb and Dr. Fitch, and everybody whose
hopes hinged on the detective's success in solving the
great Missioner diamond mystery, that long custom
made him thread the traffic of the city's throbbing
artery automatically, for so deeply did the sleuth pon-
der the possibilities of his newest information that he
had several close escapes from taxicabs, private auto-
mobiles, and trolley cars as he crossed Broadway and
bent his steps toward Fifth Avenue. The case had
cleared a little, but his course was not much plainer
than it had been when he had dropped into the theater
in quest of further knowledge.
“It won't do to call Miss March as a witness,” he
mused, walking north in the carriage-crowded avenue,
with that briskness characteristic of him when his
brain was most active. “She can't absolutely prove
anything.” It was necessary to obtain tangible evi-
dence of Griswold's ability as a draughtsman. How
to do so without alarming the clubman was the present
problem.
Britz by no means was prepared to suspect Griswold
of the robbery. He realized thoroughly that Doro-
thy's information was all he had to indicate Griswold
any more than Sands, or two or three others. He did
not even know whether Miss Holcomb could draw, and
it was no part of his purpose to distress the im-
- --


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS II9
prisoned girl with questions betraying the smallest
belief in the accusation against her. No; Britz, always
honest with himself, could not say he suspected Gris-
wold. His method was the opposite of Donnelly's
and Carson's. Instead of suspecting everybody, as
they invariably did in cases at all mysterious, he would
not attach suspicion to anyone without satisfactory
proof. That was the secret of his success. He was
more than a detective; he was prosecutor, judge, jury,
and counsel to the defense. It accounted for the
fact that he rarely made a mistaken arrest, and
that when he caused man or woman to be placed
in the prisoner's dock, a conviction almost always
followed.
“Griswold, Sands, Ali, Blodgett 22
The names presented themselves to the sleuth's mind
in that order as he hastened along with no particular
place as an objective—merely walking to stimulate his
mental process. It always brightened Britz to pass
the panorama of fashion in Fifth Avenue. It was
with an almost fatherly feeling he glanced at the rich,
the debonair, the gay sauntering along the sidewalks
or rolling in automobiles and carriages up and down
the asphalt. The safety of their wealth, sometimes of
their very lives, depended on the vigilance, courage,
and efficiency of himself, and of the few men like him
on the police force of New York. So far as the rank
and file of the Department were concerned, those care-
free sons and daughters of opportunity might be at the
mercy of the ablest birds of prey in the human flock.
It was because Britz and his compeers worked and
watched and waited so patiently, so devotedly, so


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I2 I
by a man the watching detective was somewhat sur-
prised to see—Bruxton Sands.
“Home,” said Mrs. Missioner to her chauffeur.
Britz could not hear the word, but he read it from
her lips. He saw the widow step into her limousine,
saw Sands and Griswold follow, saw the chauffeur
throw his clutch, saw the big car glide swiftly south
to wheel for a northward trip along the avenue. Be-
fore the automobile reached a turning point, the de-
tective sprang into the cab, whispered an address to
the driver, and added in a low tone:
“Double your fare for speed.”
The cabman lashed his horse and, knowing his craft,
threaded his way through the traffic so quickly that
in a short time he was several blocks ahead of the
limousine. All the way up the avenue the race con-
tinued, Britz well in the lead. At the Fifty-ninth
Street entrance, the automobile swung into the park,
but the cabman urged his horse straight up Fifth Ave-
nue, and so great was the gain made by the short cut
that a few blocks further north he dropped his fare
in front of a mansion of imposing ugliness, touched.
his hat in acknowledgment of a generous fee, and was
bowling eastward, halfway to Madison Avenue, when
the Missioner car reappeared from the Park's Seventy-
second Street gate.
“You at least can stop for a minute of gossip,”
said Mrs. Missioner over her shoulder as she preceded
Sands and Griswold into her library. “Finance and
club affairs can wait a little while, and—oh !”
She stopped in the act of throwing off her furs,
and stood gazing at the middle of the room. There,


I22 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
absorbed in his task, at ease in a big chair before the
crackling grate, sat Detective-Lieutenant Britz. Pad
in one hand, pencil in the other, he was sketching
busily.
Mrs. Missioner extended a hand behind her to
silence her companions. She turned her head with a
smile almost as mischievous as Dorothy could flash.
“Hush l’” she whispered. She and the others
watched Britz quietly as his pencil moved slowly, awk-
wardly over the paper. From his frequent glances
at the end of the room that held the big safe, it was
evident he was making a drawing of it. The laborious
dragging of his pencil point proved he was not accus-
tomed to such work—at least, so it seemed to one of
the three who watched him. But the sleuth stuck to
the task doggedly, and at last he bore so heavily on
a corner of his sketch that the point of his pencil broke.
He laid down the pad, took out a pocket-knife, and
began to sharpen the pencil. When the point was
fashioned to his liking, he looked up. Then and then
only did he seem to see the widow and her friends.
He arose instantly and bowed to Mrs. Missioner, fol-
lowing that with a short nod to the men behind her.
“I told your man to let me come in, madam, be-
cause I had no time to spare,” said the sleuth.
Mrs. Missioner inclined her head in assent.
“You wish to see me?” she inquired. “There is
something more you wish to know?”
She was not in the mood for discussion of the de-
tective's quest this evening. The afternoon tea in
Sherry's, the short ride home, including the turn in
the park, with her two most persistent admirers, this


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I23
cozy home-coming in the dusk of a winter day, how-
ever unreasonable the weather, had made her medita-
tive. Even as she spoke to the detective and sank
dreamily into a conversation chair beside the fire, her
eyes strayed from Sands to Griswold, from Griswold
to Sands, with the vague look of a woman trying to
decide a momentous question. Griswold, ever ready to
seize the smallest advantage, promptly occupied the
other end of the chair. Facing the beautiful widow,
he ignored both Britz and Sands, and he threw into
the glances he showered upon the woman all the caress
at his command.
Britz eyed Sands sharply before replying. He
gripped his chin with thumb and finger, and seemed
studying the big millionaire. As a matter of fact, he
was watching Griswold. His gaze, even as it appeared
focused most strongly on Sands, in reality was con-
centrated on the clubman who shared the serpentine
chair with the wealthy widow.
“I want a plan of the room,” said Britz at length.
“A sketch of the safe, too. One of my men was to
have made draughts for me, but I had to send him
out of town at short notice on another end of the case.
So,” and he smiled slowly at his poor workmanship,
“I’m doing the best I can.”
“May I see what you have drawn?” asked Mrs.
Missioner pleasantly. “Oh, Mr. Britz,” she laughed,
holding the paper at arm's length, “I’m afraid you'll
never make an artist. I hope,” she added hastily,
“you have no professional pride on that point?”
“None whatever,” returned the detective. He liked
a woman with a sense of humor, and there was some-


I24 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
thing about Mrs. Missioner that appealed to him any-
way. “I told you I was merely a substitute.”
Sands, towering above the widow on the hearth-
rug, shot a single, indifferent look at the drawing.
Griswold's glance brushed it carelessly, but the widow's
interest in it was echoed by him in so far that he took
the diagram from her and examined it for a few
seconds. Then, with a short, harsh laugh, he half
turned to Britz, alternately bending and straightening
the paper in his fingers.
“Ever hear of such a thing as perspective, de-
tective?” he asked condescendingly. Britz overlooked
the air of superiority. He shook his head thought-
fully. There was inquiry in his eyes as he waited for
Griswold's next words. “You’d starve to death in a
studio,” the clubman continued scornfully.
A crisp little laugh from Britz was the only reply.
He crossed the floor and made a microscopic examina-
tion of the safe. Then he circled the room, tapping
the walls again, moving pieces of furniture to look
behind them, turning up corners of the rug, and gaz-
ing reflectively at the ceiling. Ali, the Indian servant,
appeared noiselessly at the door, started slightly at
sight of the detective, and vanished as silently. Britz
pretended not to see the Hindoo, but, in his movements
about the room, he paused at the threshold, and
glanced quickly down the passage. There was no one
in sight.
All that time, Curtis Griswold, having ripped off
the sheet on which Britz had drawn the rude diagram,
was sketching idly as he talked in an undertone to the
widow. His words held her attention. She took no


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I25
note of the detective's wandering, the heavy silence of
Sands, the soundless appearance and disappearance of
the Hindoo. Ripples of laughter revealed that she, at
least, was amused by what Griswold was saying. It
was when Britz, having finished his detailed examina-
tion of the room, stopped close beside him that they
looked up.
“I see you are an artist, Mr. Griswold,” remarked
the sleuth, his eyes on the paper under the clubman's
pencil.
Griswold was genuinely surprised. For the first
time, he seemed to become aware of the shape his idle
tracing on the pad had taken. In the course of his
brief chat with Mrs. Missioner, he had sketched clearly,
accurately, artistically, not only the room, but the great
safe at its farther end—sketched them far better in
those few minutes than Britz could have done in as
many hours. His drawing, almost automatic, showed
the subconscious skill of to say the least—an excel-
lent amateur.
“Why, that's so,” he said, holding up the drawing
indifferently. His prowess with the pencil was an old
story to the widow and his rival. Griswold tossed the
pad and pencil on the table, and resumed his talk with
Mrs. Missioner, turning the coldest of cold shoulders
toward the sleuth.
But Britz was not to be shouldered aside so easily.
He addressed himself to the widow, winning her in-
stant attention with his first query:
“Has Miss Holcomb ever told you much about her
last year in Smith?” he asked.
Mrs. Missioner's eyebrows arched.


I26 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“Nothing important enough to remember, Mr.
Britz,” she said, staring incredulously. The detective
had already assured her warmly of his belief in Eli-
nor's innocence. Could it be he was not going to
clear the girl after all?
“You know nothing of her engagement to a Har-
vard undergraduate, then?” he persisted.
The widow shook her head.
“Before her father lost his fortune, I mean,” said
the sleuth.
“Neither before nor after, Mr. Britz,” replied Mrs.
Missioner, rising impatiently. “Miss Holcomb, being
a beauty, naturally received a great deal of attention,
but I never heard of a betrothal.”
Lieutenant Britz, still standing before the hearth,
moved to let Mrs. Missioner pass. The widow pushed
aside the heavy hangings of a window and peered into
the twilight backed by the trees in the park. Britz,
having moved, took another step. Those gray eyes
of his shifted so rapidly they were upon the three
others almost simultaneously. So gradually, so slowly
did he approach the table that no one noticed his hand
upon it. Resting that hand upon the edge, he went on.
“I am sorry you are not more minutely informed
concerning Miss Holcomb's university days.” Slowly
his fingers extended until the tips rested on the tiny
pad. “In a case like this, the smallest knowledge
may be of value.” Slowly, ever so slowly, the fingers
contracted, drawing the pad with them. “Perhaps if
you make an effort, you can recall something about
the-the prisoner's past, Mrs. Missioner?” The pad
was in his hand. Deftly, he tore off the top sheet and


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 127
inclosed it in his fingers. As the widow started to
speak, and entirely unobserved by Griswold or Sands,
the detective slipped that agile hand into his pocket.
When the hand came out, it was empty.
“No,” said the rich woman with more emphasis than
would be expected of her large good-nature, “I can
recall nothing. I am sure there is nothing to recall.
You must look elsewhere if you seek to forge links
in a chain of evidence against Miss Holcomb.
I have told you all I know—all I could possibly
know.”
“That being the case,” said Britz briskly, “there is
nothing more to say. With your permission, I will
send a draughtsman to make plans of the room and
diagrams of the safe.” He hesitated. “I suppose
these little art gems of mine,” he resumed with a dry
smile, “may as well meet the fate they deserve.”
With a quick movement, he threw all the sheets of
paper on the table and the pad as well into the heart of
the fire.
“Guess I’ll say “Good-afternoon,’” and with a bow
to Mrs. Missioner and the coolest of nods to the men,
he left the room, the widow’s detached “Good-after-
noon, Mr. Britz” floating after him.
Was he mistaken, Britz asked himself as he walked
quickly along the passage, or did he see a pair of eyes
beneath a towering turban peer at him from the corner
of a cross-corridor? He made a mental note to have
the Hindoo servant watched more closely as, treating
Blodgett's loftiness with exasperating indifference, he
tripped down the steps of the Missioner mansion, and
hurried along a path in the park. Once in the shelter


I28 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
of the shadows, the detective quickened his pace, head-
ing south.
His hands were clasped behind him, and his thoughts
kept time with his steps as he swung along under the
scraping January boughs. On the whole, he was very
well satisfied with his day's work. Not that he had
any idea of calling a halt for the night. He allowed
himself plenty of sleep, but he wasted little time on
recreation. Work was his relaxation. He had an
infallible specific against fatigue. When his duties
became wearying, he crowded on more steam or
switched to another phase of the case. A change of
points was as restful to Britz as a change of air.
Grudging as he was to himself in the matter of
praise, he had to admit, however, he had spent his
afternoon profitably. From little Miss March he had
learned that Griswold was a draughtsman, and from
Griswold himself he had tangible proof of that fact
in the shape of the tiny sheet of paper from the scratch
pad. He took the paper out of his pocket and paused
in the light zone of a roadside lamp. Yes, it was
beyond question that the hand which in idleness had
traced that plan of the Missioner library was able, with
care, to make a precise drawing of the Missioner
diamonds—even of the great Maharanee. On that
count, Griswold was convicted by his own hand.
But Britz, as he resumed his swinging stride, did
not delude himself with the idea he had a clear case
against the clubman. All he had was evidence that
Griswold could have made the sketches by means of
which the Missioner jewels were duplicated without
the necklace itself as a model. He was not even pre-


130 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
his deduction that her course from first to last had
been that of one guiltless of crime. He maintained
the judicial attitude of his mind toward the successive
discoveries he made, but he did not see how the stern-
est jurist could listen with patience to the strongest
of briefs against such an open nature as Elinor Hol-
comb's. Donnelly's finding the genuine diamond in
her room meant nothing, save that the real thief had
left the jewel there by accident or design. To his
mind, the exact whereabouts of the stone argued a
deliberate attempt had been made to destroy the girl.
It remained to be ascertained whether that attempt
was born of enmity, or was due simply to a desire to
throw off suspicion. He realized perfectly the possi-
bility that it sprang from a combination of the two
motives.
Who, then, was most likely to have placed the dia-
mond in the secretary's room? Who could have most
to gain by causing her arrest and conviction? Was
it the purpose of the criminal to have the girl sus-
pected only long enough for him to cover his trail
permanently, or did he desire that she be found guilty
and condemned to penal servitude? If the latter plan
was formed, would the thief content himself with the
almost overpowering circumstantial evidence already
accumulated against Elinor, or would he venture to
throw further suspicion upon her? And if the crim-
inal contemplated pursuing the prisoner beyond the
threshold of the Tombs, would he operate through the
stupidity of Donnelly and Carson, or would he bend
his energies on the District Attorney? Britz consid-
ered briefly the chance that the thief would be bold


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 131
enough to appear as a witness for the prosecution,
then dismissed it as too improbable to affect the present
development of the case.
The detective flung himself on a bench and pon-
dered the day's developments until the first ting of
his Jurgensen, the gift of a grateful captain of in-
dustry, told him it was long past his dinner hour.
Then he arose, lighted a cigar, broke the match med-
itatively into a dozen bits, and once more took up his
southward stride. On two points he had made up his
mind. The first was that, since Griswold's delicately
manipulated crayon had drawn him far enough into
the case to be a possible factor, he would have the
clubman trailed more thoroughly than had been done
thus far—he would set Merritt, tireless tracker, at
Griswold's heels. The lieutenant's second decision
came from that real or fancied glimpse of the tur-
baned head flicking around the corner of the passage.
He would make a little visit to the home of the
mysterious Oriental who had called Mrs. Missioner's
attention to the falsity of the supposed Maharanee
diamond she wore in the opera box, and—he would not
go as Britz, of Headquarters.
He stopped under the low-hanging bough of a great
oak tree to get a better light. As he was about to
strike a match, his use for that particular cigar Sud-
denly ceased, for, gripping, clinging, strangling, some-
thing soft and silky was drawn tightly about his neck,
his elbows were jammed against his sides, his knees
were squeezed together so closely he could not take a
step, and in another minute, he found himself bound,


132 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
gagged, helpless, with three men sitting on him, bowl-
ing rapidly in a cab along the park drive in a direction
which, owing to the swirling excitement of the last
sixty seconds, he could not ascertain. All he knew
was that he was a captive; that he had been seized in
a way unusual to city highwaymen, and that for the
present, a struggle for release would be simply a use-
less—perhaps worse than useless—expenditure of his
strength.


CHAPTER XI
A WILD RIDE
ONCE he realized the futility of resistance, Britz
busied himself with efforts to get a line on his direc-
tion. He was in an ordinary brougham, drawn by a
pair of high-stepping horses. That much he could tell
from the dimensions of the vehicle, and the peculiar
ping of the hoofs on the hard-rolled park drive. He
knew, too, the animals were traveling at a brisk pace.
Despite its delicately adjusted springs, the carriage
lurched violently at times, the weight of the three men
who held him being thrown on the rear seat so sud-
denly as to threaten disruption of the superstructure.
He was lying on the floor, but on a pile of rugs.
The silk scarf with which he had been fastened had
been loosed from his neck only to be drawn tightly
about his mouth. A smaller strip of silk, rolled into
a ball, had been thrust between his teeth, gagging him
beyond his power to utter a cry. His wrists and ankles
were bound with similar scarves. He was as helpless
as if in the electric chair. His life, it might be, de-
pended on his self-control and resourcefulness.
The carriage sped on, its swaying increasing as the
driver evidently urged his horses to a faster pace.
Britz speculated on the possibility of an arrest by a
park policeman for violation of the speed law. A mo-
ment's reflection told him it was improbable. Unless
the horses were running away, or the coachman was
I33


134 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
lashing them vindictively, no ordinary bluecoat was
likely to stop them. Automobiles had educated the
police to a new speed standard. What a dozen years
before would have caught the instant attention of a
mounted policeman, now, by contrast, would seem an
ordinary gait. If Britz could smash a pane in a door
of the brougham with a timely kick, he would attract
notice from a policeman—provided there chanced to
be one in sight. What would happen if he broke the
glass uselessly the detective was confident would be
disagreeable, if not disastrous. Besides, his feet were
tied pretty tightly. He was not at all sure he could
work them out of their bonds.
In the faint light that flashed from time to time
through the windows of the brougham as it whirled
past park lamps, Britz saw that all three of his captors
were dark of feature and lithe of form. He strained
his gaze to fix their faces in his memory, but he knew
as he did it the outlines he visualized were too hazy
to make future recognition certain. One moment he
was convinced there was something foreign in the
appearance of the men. The next, he was less certain
they were not American. A hawkish sharpness of
profile, however, inclined him more strongly to the
former belief. He had seen recently, he thought, a
face that in such a light would resemble those bending
above him. As he was striving to recall it, and the
circumstances surrounding it, a fourth scarf was passed
about his eyes and knotted behind his head. The
silken strip was light in texture, but folded so many
times that he could not see the dimmest glimmer of
light.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I35
That act assured the lieutenant that he was approach-
ing the climax of his adventure. He had been blind-
folded, he had no smallest doubt, because his captors
were about to take him out of the carriage, and did
not wish him to see where he was going. Their pre-
caution, also, was directed against his study of their
faces. Britz drew quick comfort from that reflection.
If the three intended to kill him, they would not care
how closely he scanned their features. That they
wished to make it impossible for him to recognize
them indicated it was their design soon or late to set
him free. No sooner was that conviction firmly in
his mind than he resolved to make the most of his
captivity. It must be important to him as it was to
the strangers. That it bore in greater or less degree
on the Missioner mystery he hardly questioned.
“Every little helps,” thought Britz, twisting to make
himself as comfortable as possible. “I may be close
to something worth while.” That did not sway him
from his determination to make one bold strike for
liberty at the first chance. Profitable though his pres-
ent situation might prove in a sense, it could not be as
valuable as freedom to follow the case in his own
way. Something told him it was urgent that he have
his little chat with the Oriental of the opera box.
The more he thought about that mysterious individual,
and the part played by the Indian in the discovery of
the false Maharanee, the more eager he became to
talk with him about things in general, and diamonds
in particular. Britz was not given to gossip, but some-
how he felt the Oriental was a brilliant conversational-
ist, and that anything the Easterner might say would


136 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
be interesting. He did not neglect to make allowance
for the possibility that what the Hindoo might not say
would interest him still more.
“It’s a small world,” said Britz to himself. “Who
knows?”
A slight jolt, and three more in swift succession,
told the detective the carriage had turned out of the
park and was crossing Central Park West. That was
certain because there were no car lines in Fifth Avenue
nor in 110th Street, and in Fifty-ninth Street the
stretch of asphalt between the macadam of the drive
and the crosstown tracks was much wider than the
brougham had crossed before the first of the jolts.
By which gate the brougham had made its exit was
another question. All the cross streets leading to park
entrances were asphalted, and most of them were wide.
The only way he could ascertain how far uptown he was
lay in counting the blocks and listening for further
aural indications. The trouble was he could not hear
very well. The scarf that gagged him also covered
his ears. He craned his neck gently, first to one side,
then to the other, until he worked one ear free. For-
tunately, it was the ear next the rugs. He rubbed his
head patiently against the soft fabrics until he made
a space through which he could press his ear to the
floor. It was a cold application, but it enabled the
sleuth to hear more clearly. The carriage floor served
as a sounding board that microphoned the smallest
noises with expansive emphasis. He could hear, amid
all the thudding of the horses' hoofs, the slight suction
every time a crack in one of the rubber tires left the
asphalt.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I37
Britz focused his forces on the task of ascertaining
his whereabouts and direction. One, two, three blocks
the brougham sped westward. There had been no
swerve in the course since the parting from the park.
Britz knew he was headed for the Hudson. Had not
his blindfolding convinced him his life was not in peril,
he might have thought his captors were hurrying him
to the river to make an end of him. He continued
counting the blocks until, wheeling sharply to the right,
the horses headed north, and a change in the sound of
their hoofs betrayed that they had left the asphalt and
were on the macadam again. -
“The Drive!” Britz told himself with a slight glow
of satisfaction. The distance traveled from the park,
the change of direction, and the altered pounding of
the highsteppers' hoofs could mean but one thing: the
vehicle was bowling along the beautiful Riverside
concourse New Yorkers have come to appreciate only
in recent years.
It was at that point Britz made his first mistake
of the trip. The latch of the left door was jarred
loose by an uneven crossing, and the detective felt
the door give slightly against his shoulder. He sensed
in an eyeflash the door had not swung open. Prob-
ably an end of the rug had caught under it sufficiently
to hold it shut. But it undoubtedly was unfastened,
and that evidently without the knowledge of his cap-
tors. Had any of the three noticed the unlatching of
the door, he would have drawn it close immediately.
There was momentary danger of that. There was
not a moment to spare. Britz had little time for
thought. With a powerful contortion of his wiry


138 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
frame, he threw off the men above him long enough
to fling himself against the door.
Britz reckoned on the likelihood that his fall from
the carriage would be seen by a patrolman—at any rate,
that his attempt at escape would cause a commotion
sure to result in police interference. He did not ex-
pect to get away unaided; he was bound too securely
for that. It was more than possible bad bruises, if
not broken bones, would be among the consequences.
He was willing to take that chance rather than to
hazard indefinite captivity with the great Missioner
diamond mystery unsolved. In the very moment of
hurling himself against the door, nothing was stronger
in his mind than a yearning to see the Swami. He
felt he positively must chat with that mysterious per-
sonage about diamonds and steel safes, and other
things. Until he made the Oriental's acquaintance,
his social development would be stunted.
The detective omitted from his reckoning the astute-
ness and readiness of his captors. He thought the
surprise hinging on his desperate attempt at escape
would be of sufficient duration to let him roll to the
road. He was shocked mentally as well as physically,
therefore, when his fall was stopped with a jerk, and
the back of his head struck with cruel force against
the carriage step. Just for a second's flight, reinforced
steel and rubber though he was, he lost consciousness.
When his senses returned, he was in the same position
—head dangling, shoulders resting against the rods
of the step, back bent painfully over the steel-shod
threshold of the carriage floor, legs inside, gripped in
a hold not all his struggles could break. His ankles


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 139
still were bound. So, for that matter, were his wrists,
with his hands behind him. The scarf bandaging his
eyes had slipped partly to his forehead, so that he
could see a little; but, in his upside-down position, he
could not see the sidewalk; only the treetops and the
dusk line of the Palisades were in his line of vision.
The gag was fixed as firmly as ever. He tried
to call for help, but the cry was smothered in his
throat.
Then began as strange a struggle as any in which
Britz had engaged in all his exciting career. The
men in the cab strove to pull him inside; he battled
against their efforts. Bound though his hands were,
his fingers were twined tightly about the step rods.
He had a grip on the rods as powerful as that with
which one of his captors held his ankles. The cross-
ing of his hands to bind his wrists had made his hold
only the firmer. All the leverage of each sinewy
wrist strengthened the other. The rods were so small
they hurt his hands, but unless they broke his grip could
not be loosened. Britz clutched them with an iron
resolve not to be drawn into the brougham again.
Safe though his life might have been at the outset,
he was not certain it would be secure after his daring
defiance of the odds against him. He still knew noth-
ing of his captors. Even their nationality was prob-
lematical, to say nothing of their purpose. He felt
that his grip on the rods might be his last hold on
existence—and Britz, in any stage of his career,
would have said he was tolerably satisfied with life,
thank you!
“This,” said Britz to his inner consciousness, with


I4O BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
a touch of the grim humor his colleagues often found
disconcerting, “is hill-climbing under difficulties.”
For the coachman, in spite of perhaps because of
the silent struggle going on furiously at the door of
the cab, had whipped his horses to a gallop, and was
speeding them up a slope. Over the edge of the scarf
that had slipped from his eyes, Britz got a glimpse
of the Soldiers' and Sailors' Monument. He knew
exactly where he was then. Next moment his eyes
fastened themselves on the faces in the carriage, and
he tried with all his might to make out the dark
features of the three in the gloom of the cab; but
their features still were shadowy. He would not have
liked to have to pick them out of a line in a police
station. It was a point of honor with the lieutenant
always to be sure of his man before making an identi-
fication. In part, that accounted for the failure of
almost every defendant in any of his cases to establish
an alibi.
Lean hands stretched forth from the dark interior
and caught him about the middle. Other hands seized
his legs, while the pair clutching his ankle tightened
their grasp, but he only twined his fingers the more
firmly around their slight circumference. By now the
carriage was rolling and pitching like a seagoing tug.
Had he not been held so stoutly by the six lean hands
above, and his own iron clutch below, the motion might
have swung his head against the step again with force
to crack it in a dozen places. The very fury of the
battle made for his safety.
The horses struck a slope that took them out of
the Drive. Britz guessed they could not go far with-


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I4 I
out encountering a policeman. If they did not meet
a mounted patrolman or a bicycle bluecoat in the
avenue, it was almost certain they would strike an
ordinary policeman in one of the by-streets. Britz
chewed the gag savagely in the hope of freeing his
voice. Finding the bandage too tight to force it out of
his mouth, he tried to swallow the silken ball inside his
teeth. Gulp as he might, his reversed position dis-
tressed him so he could not get the ball behind his
tongue. And, owing to the elusive texture of the
gag, not all the biting and grinding of his strong teeth
could shred it.
Abrupt as its beginning was the end of the struggle.
Britz, his eyes still boring into the inner murk, saw
one of the long, lean hands slip forth again. This
time, the hand clutched something between thumb and
forefinger. The arm extended until the hand was
close to the detective's wrists. Suddenly, the sleuth
felt a frightful burning pain in the back of his hand.
The agony was duplicated in the knuckles of the other.
Strive though he did with all his grit and strength
to retain his grip, his fingers opened against his will,
the tendons contracted by the biting agony, and Britz
knew a powerful acid had been sprinkled on his hands.
He could not close them again in the first moment of
his torment, and before his muscles could recover from
the shock, the sway of the brougham swung him clear
of the rods. Then, by the united strength of the three
inside, he was jerked upward, and dragged with a
single tug into the carriage. The door was slammed,
and the coachman brought his horses back to their
high-stepping trot. Suddenly they slowed to a walk.
Ar


I42 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“What's wrong here?” asked a voice at the win-
dow.
“Hallo, Rafferty,’” said the driver with the easy
familiarity of a nighthawk toward the rank and file
of the force. “Just a bunch of drunks I’m taking
to their little white cots,” he added in an undertone.
A patrolman pressed his face against the pane and
looked inside. Already, the three dark, slender men
who had kidnapped the detective were lolling and
nodding in a way suggestive of safe but satisfied
intoxication. Britz, trussed more securely than ever,
was under their feet, well out of the policeman's
range.
“They're sure a fine lot of rummies!” exclaimed
the bluecoat to his friend the coachman. “The sooner
they hit the hay, the better. On your way!” And,
the driver flicking his horses in a leisurely way, the
brougham resumed its journey with Detective-Lieu-
tent Britz raging in enforced silence among the silk
rugs on its floor.
It was just about then that Britz made his second
mistake. He breathed too deeply. True, he was
blown sadly by the desperate struggle as he hung head-
down from the vehicle and his lungs had almost
stoppped working when he was jerked so violently
back into the carriage. The air near the floor was cool
and refreshing. No ordinary man would have hesi-
tated to renew his strength by drawing it as far down
into his lungs as the cramped position would permit;
but Britz himself, in cooler moments, would have
observed sagely that air itself was not always an un-
mixed blessing. He would have told inquiring minds


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I43
that, under suspicious circumstances, it should be taken
with caution and, if possible, should be well shaken
before taken. In this instance, the air Britz breathed
was mixed with a subtle something that gradually
stole his senses and left him, though healthily alive,
an inert heap under the feet of his captors.
So potent, so gentle was the action of that strange
Something that the stoppage of the carriage, the lifting
from its floor of the inanimate detective, the carrying
of his limp form up darkened stairs in dead silence
to a room at the remote end of a suite at the top of
the building, and that which happened to the Head-
quarters man as, sodden with the subtle Soporific, he
remained at the mercy of the strangers three, were
things Britz for many a long day could only guess.
So groping was his conjecture through those weary
days of uncertainty that whenever he recalled the ex-
perience, it was with a certain gliding movement of
the jaws that boded ill for the three dark, slim men
if ever he should be able to enfold them in the meshes
of the law as they had wrapped him in their scarves.
No, Britz was not vindictive, but he was—human.


CHAPTER XII
THE EMPTY APARTMENT
WHEN Britz groped his way out of the soundest
sleep he had known in many a year, it was in absolute
ignorance of his whereabouts. One cause of that un-
pleasant fact was the inky darkness that covered him
like a pall. Even if he had been able to put his hand
before his face, he could not have glimpsed its sketch-
iest outline. The darkness wrapped him so closely
it seemed to clasp him in a deadly embrace. He felt
like the Inquisition victim in the steadily contracting
room. The darkness pressed upon him. With the
remorseless insistence of some murky monster of the
deep, it forced its way into his eyes, his ears, his
mouth. It made its way between his teeth and into his
throat until he fancied he could taste it—until he
almost suffocated. He gasped desperately several
times before he returned to anything like his normal
breathing.
Mingled with the peculiar taste of the smothering
dark was a faint odor unlike anything in the Head-
quarters man's experience. Britz, in the course of his
long career, had worked on cases in which subtle
chemical agents were important factors. He had
solved one mystery hinging on murderous use of pois-
onous perfumes from Persia and Asiatic Turkey, and
in another instance duty had compelled him to study the
fatal narcotics of South America. This ghostly scent
I44


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I45
that hovered about him was unlike any of those drugs
or essences. Neither did it suggest any of the anes-
thetics that are the servants of surgery. So delicate
was it that after the first whiff it was only by an effort
the detective could make his doubting senses record
its presence. Yet it had a persistence all its own, and
when he tried to persuade himself his sensory nerves
had played a trick upon him, it wreathed into his
nostrils with unmistakable individuality.
Britz needed no effort to rise to tell him he still
was bound hand and foot, and in the first instant of
his full awakening he realized the silken gag still
held his speech in thrall. So unlike all other waking
was his return to consciousness that just for a moment
he fancied his thoughts were spoken aloud. It was
when he tried to call to whoever might be within ear-
shot that the complete awakening came upon him and
with it the knowledge he could not make himself heard
more than a few feet off. He bit the ball of silk
savagely, and strained his tongue until the roots ached
in endeavors to force the gag out of his mouth. As
well might he, helpless as to hands and feet as he was,
have tried to shake off a gorilla's grip at his throat.
Yet the seeming hopelessness of his plight did not
disturb him greatly. He had been in worse places.
It was a question of patience, perseverance, and pluck,
and when it came to virile qualities the famous Central
Office man was abundantly and alliteratively equipped.
“This,” said the sleuth to himself, for want of a
more appreciative auditor, “is a proposition that calls
for both thought and action. It is both a theoretical
and practical pickle. Much time might be spent in


146 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
following it out logically. Guess I'll save a few hours
by considering the condition and not the theory.”
He tested his bonds—gently at first, then vigorously,
then with all his strength. They held because they
yielded. They followed every movement of his well-
trained muscles elastically. At no time did they offer
direct resistance in such manner as to give him oppor-
tunity to snap them. They did not clasp; they clung.
Shrewdly had his captors planned the holding power of
those soft bandages. The scarves were of silk from
foreign looms, and their softness was equaled by
their strength. They could have been split into half-
inch strips without becoming breakable, save in the
hands of a strong man pulling with excellent purchase.
Circling the detective's wrists and ankles as they did,
it was impossible, tug as he might, for him to apply
his power to them effectively. The more furious his
struggles, the closer their clinging.
Not without profit to his physical, as well as mental,
well-being had Britz throughout his service in the
Detective Bureau devoted half an hour daily to gym-
nasium work. He was not a Sandow, but he had
abundance of pliant and serviceable strength. After
many minutes passed in vain efforts to free himself,
he relaxed his body and limbs for a short but complete
rest, meanwhile bending his mind to the task of de-
termining where he was. The result of his mental
endeavor was as fruitless as the other. All he knew
at the end of it was that he lay on a bare floor in a
room which, from the sound of his heels on the
boards, he judged was small. That thought suggested
to him a means of summoning help other than vocal.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I47
He began drumming on the boards with his heels. It
was tiring work, for his ankles were held so close
that, with his feet beating in alternation, he could not
make such noise. To make a sound likely to carry
far, he had to raise and lower his heels together—an
achievement that sounds easy until one has tried doing
it many times. With all his endurance he could not
keep it up for many minutes at a stretch. In the
intervals he strained his hearing for a response. None
Carne.
The hollow thud of his boot heels told him the room
below was bare too. Evidently, he was in a building
that was abandoned in whole or in part. The re-
flection made him just a little uncomfortable. If
there was one thing that got on the cool detective's
nerves it was the idea of being helpless in a fire. He
would not mind fighting his way out of a burning
house—he had done so more than once. But the
thought of being hemmed in by four walls, unable
to move hand or foot, with flames sweeping through
the structure or crawling hungrily toward him had
been the phantasy of his few nightmares. He dreaded
it with all the dread of a strong man who lusts for
action in danger. So long as Britz could battle for
life or liberty, he was sure to be happy. He would
have shone only in a literal sense as the hero of an
auto-da-fé.
The Headquarters sleuth, however, quickly dis-
missed from his mind the unpleasant possibility that
suggested itself. It was true he would have preferred
even the return of his abductors to the probability
of being roasted like a trussed fowl, but it also was


I48 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
true that there was no especial reason to fear the
building would blaze. The important thing was to
escape before he could be assailed by either kidnappers
or flames. That he had been deserted by the three
men who seized him in the park did not then occur
to him. He thought of them as coming back to carry
out the purpose of their daring capture. It was far
from desirable that he be there on their return. Yet
how should he get away? Already he felt the futility
of striving to snap his bonds by main strength. He
must have recourse to another method. But what?
Britz rolled over on his face. As his hands were
tied behind his back, his chin rested on the floor, and
he had little leverage by which to lift himself. Sev-
eral times he tried to rise to his knees, only to slip
and bruise his face on the hard floor. Those mishaps
were painful, but not discouraging to a man of Britz's
resoluteness. Again and again he made the attempt,
again and again he failed, but at last, with a mighty
heave that left him panting, he raised himself by a
catapult movement and sat back on his heels, waiting
to catch his breath.
It was a harder task to get on his feet. He could
not do it in the middle of the floor. Slowly, carefully,
he worked his way on his knees to the wall, against
which he braced himself. Then, bit by bit, he bent
his feet forward in a demilune until his weight was
on knees and toes. His progress was as painful as
it was slow, for the silk scarf compelled his ankles
to bend in unison, if at all, and even when he had
bent his toes to the requisite point it was a great strain
to keep them there.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 149
A whim of fancy, in that moment when he knelt
and balanced himself with such extreme difficulty,
threw on his mental moving picture screen the memory
of little Dorothy March as she looked that afternoon
in the Forrest Theater when, unwilling as he was in
one way to play upon her girlish ingenuousness, he
had deemed it permissible to get from her the informa-
tion he needed in regard to the drawings from which
the fraudulent Missioner necklace was made. Of
course, it was only natural that anyone in any way
connected with the case should come into his mind,
yet it undoubtedly was strange that the picture of
the demure débutante should present itself to his
inner vision so vividly and so persistently. Close be-
hind it came recollection of another afternoon on
which he had seen little Miss March cantering along
the bridle path near the obelisk—an afternoon months
before he ever heard of the Missioner mystery.
The detective, after a brief pause to gather his
strength, set his shoulder against the wall and threw
all his force into a single, vigorous push. The move-
ment almost threw him to the floor again, but he re-
covered his poise quickly and stood erect. For a few
moments he was content to revel in the relaxation
that was so welcome after his long continuance in a
cramped and prostrate position. Then a second's for-
getfulness, natural enough to one accustomed to his
freedom of movement, almost undid the work of the
last half-hour. He tried to step away from the wall,
oblivious to the scarf that bound his ankles, and pitched
forward heavily. He did not fall to the floor, how-
ever, for something sharp and hard stopped him. He


150 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
found himself wedged between a metallic framework
and the wall. A venomous hiss and the contact of
his bound hands with hot metal told him he had fallen
on a steam radiator, and as the hissing sound increased
he guessed the shock had broken the little safety valve
close to the top of the curved pipes. If the detective's
position had been perilous before it was extra hazard-
ous now. He was gripped in the jaws formed by
the radiator and the wall, and with neither hands nor
feet at liberty, it seemed next to impossible for him
to free himself. He kicked and struggled furiously,
the hiss of the steam constantly growing louder, and
in his endeavor to escape, he bent forward until his
face was scalded by the rushing steam. The pain of
that mishap aided him, however, for the involuntary
recoil it caused culminated in a final effort that loosed
the grip in which he was held and sent him staggering
in a series of two-footed hops along the wall.
“Things are warming up a little too fast for com-
fort,” thought Britz as he listened to the sibilant
menace of the escaping steam. “Looks as if those
fellows might be going to have a little steamed de-
tective on the side.” But whereas, as a merciless
student of self, he was glad to note that even in
such a predicament he had a saving sense of humor,
Britz appreciated the added danger thoroughly. Once
away from immediate contact with the radiator he
knew there was no chance he would be scalded seri-
ously, for the room, though small, was large enough
to let the steam dissipate its heat. But with doors
and windows tightly shut there was a very strong
likelihood that if he remained in that room long


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I51
enough with the steam escaping at its present rate,
he would suffocate in the surcharged air—would, in
fact, be drowned many stories above the street level.
Britz could not repress an inward smile at the grim
humor of the thought, but he resolved he would not
let circumstances carry the joke too far.
“I wouldn't look natural parboiled,” he said to
himself. The great detective was not without his
percentage of vanity, and one of his few weaknesses
was a lifelong determination to lie in such state as
his Assembly District could afford in a casket of real
rosewood that should cost at least four figures. A
resolve to do full credit to that luxurious encasement
when his time should come had helped, in its time,
to pull Britz unscathed out of many a tight place in
which otherwise the plan of his construction might
have been altered violently.
Bracing his shoulders once more against the wall,
Britz began another series of vigorous attempts to
break the silken scarves, or to slip out of them. Ex-
erting all his strength, he strained alternately at wrist
and ankles, and ground between his teeth the little
ball of silk that blocked his voice. But it was all to
no purpose. His captors knew their trade, and the
clinging bonds, while yielding, did not give at any
point sufficiently to set the sleuth at liberty. Suddenly
a thought, swift and keen as a saber flash, clove its
way straight through his perplexity. That which im-
periled his life should give him his liberty. He sidled
along the wall until he stood beside the radiator at
the end away from the safety valve. Pressing against
the edge of the metal the scarf that held his hands,


I52 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
he began swinging himself from side to side. The
corrugated edge of the ornamental ironwork served as
a saw, and although more than once the man gasped
as clouds of steam whirled about his head, in fewer
minutes than would seem probable the metallic edge
gnawed its way through the silk, and the kerchief
parted with abruptness that sent Britz reeling back
against the wall and crashing headlong to the floor.
His hands were free! And as that welcome reali-
zation followed the jarring impact of his head against
an angle of the baseboard, Lieutenant Britz laughed
softly as with busy fingers he loosed the scarf about
his ankles, snatched the gag from his mouth, and, with
a single shake of his shoulders that rippled the kinks
out of his cramped muscles, strode to the window and
flung up the sash. One deep intake of good, cold air,
then half a dozen more, and he felt as fit as if he had
not been close to a distressing and altogether igno-
minious end. He gripped the sill and leaned far out,
looking first downward, then all around in quest of
a landmark. There were not many lights on that
side of the building, but a faint gleam in the depths
enabled him to judge that he was about at the tenth
story, and that the building was in an unfrequented
uptown street. Withdrawing his head he pressed the
button of a pocket electric torch and explored the room.
From the style of its finish it evidently was a section
of an unoccupied apartment in a new and rather pre-
tentious building, a room planned to be cut off from
the rest of the suite, for it seemed to give directly
on the hall, and was separated from its neighbor by
a fireproof door of massive steel. He seized the


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 153
handle. It turned readily, but the door did not open.
The same was true of the door between the room and
the hall. He shook both doors with all his strength,
but they had been locked too stoutly to yield. It
was apparent the kidnappers had made him a prisoner
in full knowledge of the unlikelihood he would be
released speedily. That they had plotted his death
was not certain, but it was unmistakable they had
given themselves little, if any, concern in that respect.
Britz thought of the possibilities of fire as he had lain
bound on the floor, and an unpleasant sensation passed
over him; but he hastened back to the window and
examined the outside of the building with a view to
escape in that direction. He did not expect to over-
take his abductors quickly, nor was he even of a mind
to devote the bulk of his time to that purpose. But he
regarded the capture of his recent captors as an im-
portant side enterprise to the solution of the great
diamond mystery, and habit made him eager to begin
working without delay.
There was a fire escape on the floor whence he
looked out—a thoroughly modern contrivance with
flat steps, and a really serviceable handrail—but it did
not run to the window at which he stood. However,
Britz had more than one attribute of the lynx, and it
did not tax his agility greatly to reach the balcony
while still gripping the window frame securely, and,
with one quick movement, to swing himself over the
ladder rail. It was the work of a minute or two to
run down the easy steps to the first floor above the
street and, from that point, he had only a short drop
to the sidewalk. He strolled in a casual way to the


154 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
front of the big apartment building, which looked
toward the Hudson, and, noting its location, quickened
his pace, walking south until he came to a cab-stand.
He gave a chauffeur the number of the Swami's
house, jumped into a taxicab and continued his course
in a southerly direction, the driver in obedience to his
instructions wheeling east at Seventy-second Street
and turning into the Park.


CHAPTER XIII -
INTERVIEWING THE SWAMI
THE more Britz thought about his kidnapping, the
more convinced he became that he had been mistaken
for another man. It was evident that his captors ex-
pected to find in his possession something of value,
and from all the circumstances he was inclined to
think the object of their daring search was the Maha-
ranee diamond. By this time the detective had pretty
well made up his mind that the men who surprised
him so humiliatingly in Central Park were Orientals.
Britz was a studious man. In connection with his
calling he had gone fairly deeply into the criminal
history of other lands. For one who had never been
in India, he was thoroughly conversant with the strange
crimes common to that country. He knew there were
as many varieties of murder in Hindostan as there were
tribes under the benevolent protection of His Majesty,
King Edward. He was also aware that robbery in
India had been reduced not only to an exact science,
but refined to an art. Britz, in delving through the
memoirs of many a gallant Anglo-Indian army officer
and Civil Service chief, had read thrilling details
of thuggee, that remarkable form of assassination
which is at once a religion and a trade. In fancy,
he had seen the sinuous glide of the Indian thug along
the overhanging branches of an umbrageous tree; had
I55


156 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
watched the patient waiting of the human lynx for
his quarry to come along the path; had seen the light-
ning flash of a silken scarf utilized as a slip-noose
as it coiled about the victim's throat; and had beheld
the death struggle that followed, with the murderer's
knee in the small of the other's back, and two brown,
cruel hands drawing tightly the soft but stout ends
of the silken scarf.
The manner of his capture bore in upon him the
conviction that it had been achieved by men who, if
not actual thugs in the original sense of that word,
were skilled in their methods. That clear to him, it
was plausible to connect his abductors not only with
the Hindoo servant in Mrs. Missioner's employ, but
also with the mysterious Oriental of the Metropolitan
Opera box. That he had decided only a few moments
before the attack upon him to visit the Swami was,
Britz felt, only a coincidence. It was impossible for
the Oriental to have guessed that the detective meant
to call upon him. Why, therefore, were his own move-
ments watched so closely that the thugs were able
to anticipate the exact moment of his arrival in that
part of the park as soon as he was whisked away
in the brougham P
Britz, as the taxicab bore him along that same drive
he had traversed a few hours before under such un-
favorable circumstances, pondered persistently upon
the interest of the Hindoos in his doings. Days be-
fore he had made up his mind that there was more
than a casual interest in the Missioner diamonds on
the part of the Oriental who had exposed the falsity
of the supposed Maharanee in the opera box. What


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I57
that interest was might be the keynote of the entire
mystery. Were the Easterners merely a well-organ-
ized band of jewel thieves? Was the attention they
had bestowed and were undoubtedly bestowing on the
widow's necklace the result merely of cupidity, or
of a less sordid motive? Britz resolved he would
settle that question at the earliest opportunity. He was
not prepared to say, even to himself, that the Swami
had anything directly to do with the disappearance
of the gems; on the other hand, it would not astonish
him to learn that the Oriental had some idea as to
their whereabouts. The possibility that the Hindoo
did not know where the diamonds were, that instead
of playing at cross-purposes he and the Swami were
unconsciously uniting in a common purpose, came to
Britz for a moment, only to be pigeon-holed in that
wonderful mind of his as at present the least logical
hypothesis on which he had to work. The one point
that stood out most plainly was that his prospective
visit to the Swami would be fraught with much in-
terest, and might prove profitable in forwarding his
hunt for the Maharanee diamond.
While Britz was speeding southward in the taxicab
two men were in the midst of animated discussion
in the Swami's rooms. They were the scholar him-
self and his up-to-date friend, Prince Kananda. The
Prince had arrived in the gloom-enshrouded house only
a few minutes before. He had uttered several short,
sharp sentences big with interest that had stirred the
Swami from the repose usual to the Oriental priest.
It was evident that Kananda expected a responsive
remark from his friend, and that the Swami, feeling


158 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
the obligation, was weighing his words before utter-
ance.
“Nothing of the slightest interest to us was found,”
said Kananda, evidently in repetition. He had seen
a skeptical expression spread over the Swami's bronze
face, and anticipated an inquiry.
“The search was thorough?” asked the scholar.
“My dear old chap,” said the Prince, “is it likely
we would go to such extraordinary lengths without
being most painstaking in that respect? A speck of
diamond dust could not have escaped us.”
A slow smile gleamed through the mask that com-
prised the scholar's features. Mock deference colored
his manner as, taking the mouthpiece of the Oriental
pipe from between his lips and tossing the tube over
to the divan, he arose and paced the length of the
TOO111.
“Far be it from thy servant, O Prince,” he said
with palpable sarcasm, “to question the method pur-
sued by so illustrious a personage; but,” and he here
returned to the easy familiarity of their ordinary
intercourse, “since the search was made so thoroughly,
since it was a climax to a deed so venturesome that
it might have embroiled you even with such slow-
witted persons as the policemen of the Western world,
would it not have been well to have got the right
man?”
“You mean ?”
“I mean, your Royal Highness,” said the priest
with another touch of ironic homage, “that the man
whom the brilliant Ali and his equally intelligent
assistants seized so boldly in the park, and then spirited


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I59
away with a skill hardly to be equaled by an Indian
schoolboy, was not the person whom it was worth
your distinguished while to search.”
The Prince was dumfounded. He circled the table,
fished in his pocket for a cigarette, rolled it abstractedly
between his thumb and middle finger, lighted it, and
then watched the inscrutable features of him whom
for so many years he had called “master.”
“Is it possible?” he exclaimed at last. “And I
gave my personal attention to the task, too! I in-
structed Ali explicitly, and I ordered him to see that
the men who aided him should be among the shrewd-
est and most praiseworthy of our followers. Ali had
tracked the man for days. He said he was as familiar
with his face as with that of his own father. How
could they have been mistaken?”
“Easily enough,” said the Swami. “The men
went into Mrs. Missioner's home about the same time.
There is a slight resemblance in their general build,
and—the wrong man came out!”
“Then we have lost twelve hours,” said Kananda.
“You have lost more than that,” said the priest,
“—opportunity. These Occidentals are singularly
fraternal. It is not probable that the man you searched
will let the other go unwarned.”
The Prince tossed his cigarette into the fire, and
with the springing glide of a panther, and as silently,
crossed to the string of gongs that hung opposite the
divan, and struck them smartly. Almost at the same
instant the heavy portières at the other end of the
room parted, and Ali's immobile face appeared be-
tween them. The servant advanced with salaams that


I6o BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
increased in profundity as he noted the storm cloud on
Kananda's brow.
“Son of a pig, and fool of a thousand fools!” cried
the Prince, his eyes blazing at the low-caste Hindoo.
“What misguided dotard told you that you were fit
to be intrusted with a man's task?”
Ali’s whole form stiffened, and he remained in the
obsequious attitude of his last salaam, not daring to
lift his eyes to the level of Kananda's.
“Your place,” continued the Prince, “is among the
women, and, even there, you would require a guardian
to see that you did not exchange rupees for copper
coins.”
Ali remained motionless, as one about whom light-
ning has flashed, and who feels his only chance of
safety lies in escaping the notice of the next bolt.
The Swami signaled to Kananda, and the Prince, fol-
lowing the habits of the Occident, seated himself on the
divan in Oriental fashion, and calmed himself with
deep draughts from the pipe that bubbled on a low
table. As he smoked, the severity of his features
relaxed a little, and at length he recovered his com-
posure so far as to take pity on the exceedingly un-
comfortable Ali.
“Rise, dog!” he said, “ and give us, if you can,
an explanation of the disgraceful bungling on this
simple mission.”
What explanation the servant might have mustered
is a problem. Before he could collect his thoughts,
the electric bell of the outer door burr-r-rd sharply.
Kananda, the stem of the pipe in his hand, looked
toward the curtains expectantly, and the Swami sig-


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I61
naled to Ali to answer the summons without. The
servant glided, ghost-like, from the room, returning
shortly with the announcement that a visitor desired
audience with the famed Oriental scholar. The Prince
disappeared between the portières of a small door oppo-
site the main entrance of the room, the priest nodded
slowly to the servant, and the next moment, Ali
ushered into the presence of the sage the man who
had had the temerity to let himself be attacked in
place of him the Easterners had desired to search.
“I am a special reporter for ‘The Times,’” said
Britz. “I understand you are a scholar of distinction
in your native land. I should like to have a talk with
you for a Sunday story.”
The Swami’s face wreathed into an interrogation
point.
“My good friend,” he said, “you have come to the
wrong person. I am not in the least interested in
fiction. Scientific research, with perhaps a glimpse
now and then of the psychic, limits my activity in
literature.”
“You don't understand,” said Britz. “Newspaper
men call everything a “story.’ I should have said an
article—an interview, you know.”
“Well,” said the Oriental indulgently, “it is not
the policy of the propaganda to seek publicity through
the columns of the press; but, if I can serve you in
any way, command me.”
“Well, you see, Swami,” said Britz, “everything
pertaining to that illustrious land of yours is of in-
terest to Americans; your religion, your politics, your
customs, your women, your jewels, your boundless


I62 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
wealth. Everything you can tell me about India is sure
to interest our readers.”
“If I am to tell you everything about India,” said
the Swami, “we may as well make ourselves comfort-
able.”
He signed to Ali again, and, rising with much
dignity, he placed a chair at the disposal of his visitor.
By the time Britz, who knew enough about the ways
of newspaper men not to flourish either pad or pencil,
was at his ease in a chair that seemed the embodiment
of all the luxury in the luxurious East, the Hindoo
servant was back with a tray bearing coffee, cigarettes,
and strangely perfumed sweetmeats. Britz, who would
have made a pretty fair reporter if only he had known
how to put his experiences on paper, helped himself
to a musk-scented cigarette, lighted it with a nonchalant
scraping of a match across his sole, nibbled a bit of
highly spiced preserved ginger, took in the general
appearance of the room with a general eye-sweep, and
then, in the most leisurely way imaginable, waited for
his host to speak.
“The East is a pretty big subject,” said the Swami,
and then he spent many minutes sketching Oriental
ways and thoughts for the entertainment of his visitor.
To follow him would be to recapitulate the history of
Hindostan from centuries before the British invasion.
When he had finished, Britz knew enough about India
to fill the pages of all the Sunday papers of New
York; but this was not what the detective wanted.
“Your women evidently lead a pretty secluded life,”
he said, “but I suppose they have their compensations
—their music, embroidery, delicacies, gems—by the
y


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 163
way, Swami, jewels figure largely in your religion,
don't they?”
The same inscrutable gleam again flickered in the
eyes of the scholar.
“It would be difficult to make you understand in
what way they do,” he answered. “In the ordinary
commercial sense, they do not. We of India care
less for the intrinsic value of the beautiful jewels
which you of the West characterize as precious stones.
They are precious to us, but in a different way. We
love them for their loveliness—not merely for their
brilliance and cost. To us, there is a world of meta-
physical meaning in the lambent glow of a ruby, or the
imprisoned rainbow of a diamond. An emerald to
us is the spirit of the sea—the spirit of the water
itself; just as the pearl suggests that other world on
the floor of the deep. Jewels, as we see them, are
the crystallized expression of divine emotions. Dia-
monds are the tears of Buddha—pearls so many drops
of wisdom from his lips, and sapphires the heavenly
aspirations of his thoughts. What to the Occident
means profit, to us means poetry.”
His visitor seemed duly impressed; nevertheless, he
did not depart from his rule to pursue the subject
with the enterprising pertinacity of all the newspaper
men he knew.
“Some of your jewels,” he said, “are, I dare say,
a great deal more important than others; for example,
the Kohinoor. Has that no larger value than the
ordinary stone in your eyes?”
Only so far as it is connected with the traditions
of our faith,” said the Swami. “Diamonds there are


164 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
in India, one hundred of which would not make a
Kohinoor, yet each a thousand times more precious to
true believers. Wars have been fought, races ex-
terminated for gems less beautiful than those which
many of the minor women of your public stage can
boast. They have a meaning impossible of compre-
hension to the Western mind.”
“And do Hindoos of your generation set as much
store by that sort of thing as your ancestors did?”
asked Britz.
“The faith of the East is immutable,” the Swami
replied. “Centuries roll by, but we change not. Na-
tions have broken themselves to shards in efforts to
shake the stability of our land and people. What was
true before your Prophet left the carpenter's bench is
true to-day.”
“Now, do you know,” said Britz, vivaciously, “all
this interests me very much, and will make a cracking
good story for ‘The Times.’ Fancy a whole people—
how many millions did you say?—so wrapped up in
gems that would not fill a showcase in a Maiden Lane
jewelry shop, that they are willing to sacrifice their
very lives for them!”
Britz threw all his skill as a questioner into drawing
from the Swami descriptions of the more famous
jewels of India, deftly keeping the line of his interro-
gations on the subject of diamonds. The Hindoo, his
entire personality an eloquent expression of the indo-
lence of the East, was alike luxuriant in his narghileh
and in reminiscences of the sacred gems that had
adorned the temples of his faith from Delhi to Benares.
Slowly, dreamily, mystically, stories came from his


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 165
lips of greed and piety, deeds of daring and romance,
statecraft and intrigues, until Britz became so inter-
ested that for a time even his trained, vigilant mind
lost sight of the purpose that had animated all his
actions since the day he learned that the famous Mis-
sioner necklace was missing.
When the Easterner ended his string of tales, many
of them replicas in miniature of the Arabian Nights,
and of still more thrilling Oriental legends, the Head-
quarters man had an exhaustive knowledge of all the
great diamonds in the history of Hindostan.
“Your marvelous gems are not proof against imita-
tion?” he said inquiringly.
“The lesser of them are not,” said the Swami.
“But the Kohinoor, the Light of Calcutta, the Dawn
of the World, and similar stones defy the best efforts
of your artificers. In them nature has wrought mas-
terpieces of glory no human plagiarist can reproduce.”
“Not even in Paris?” inquired the visitor. “There
is a good deal of talk just now, you know, about the
theft of a society woman's diamonds. You know she
discovered that paste diamonds were substituted, and
I understand the central jewel was one of exceptional
size.”
“Neither Paris, nor Venice, nor yet Stamboul can
manufacture colorable imitations of such a stone,” in-
sisted the Swami. “Imitations, that is to say, that
would deceive anyone with the crudest knowledge.”
“But the Maharanee was undoubtedly copied,” pur-
sued Britz. “If you have read the newspapers, you
know it was through the discovery of that fact that
Mrs. Missioner learned her necklace had been stolen.”


I66 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
All the cordiality of the Swami vanished. He
seemed to wrap himself in the impenetrable dignity
of his caste, and he dismissed the subject with the
conclusive remark of his race, “I have spoken.” In
spite of the most adroit efforts of his visitor, and de-
spite interrogations direct and indirect, he could not
be induced to discuss the subject again.
Britz, somewhat baffled, finally led the conversation
into other channels by bethinking himself of his rôle
in time to ask the Swami the purpose and probable
length of his stay in New York.
“I have no objection to telling you,” answered the
priest, “that I am here to spread the propaganda, to
turn the lamp of the true faith upon the gloom of your
Western civilization.” He continued. “Yes, I am
making proselytes; I am conducting gatherings of
seekers after the Light, and I am instructing all who
come to me with open minds and honest hearts.”
Britz put down the musk-scented cigarette, picked
up his hat and coat with a reluctant air, and took
leave of the Oriental with not over-profuse expressions
of gratitude for his reception. The scholar struck the
gong, the Hindoo servant appeared in the farther door-
way, and in a few seconds the faint echoes of the
visitor's footsteps ended in the quiet closing of the
street door.
Kananda, with a carriage akin to the swagger of
the English Guardsman, re-entered the room and
looked at the Swami quizzically.
“You certainly have a masterful way of dealing
with our friends of the press,” he said; “but I am


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 167
dreadfully concerned for our young friend's educa-
tion. I fear you have given him a bad start as a
student of our jewel lore.”
The Swami Smiled.
“He already knows all that is good for him to
know,” he answered. “And perhaps more; and, tak-
ing into consideration his little adventure in the park
and the events that followed it, I think he has had all
the Aladdin experiences a New Yorker may reasonably
expect in one day. It is nothing. No genius is re-
quired to befog these Western minds. We have graver
subjects for consideration, Your Highness. Patience
may be a convenient virtue for us, but—let us re-
member the brethren.”
A shadow darkened the face of the Prince briefly,
but the next moment he laughed lightly.
“I think, however,” he said, “I shall spare a few
minutes to read that chap's—what did he call it, story?
A strange tale it will be.”
“You need not put yourself to the trouble of look-
ing through the Sunday papers,” said the Swami.
“There will be nothing about this interview in ‘The
Times.’”
“No?” returned Kananda. “I heard the reporter
say he wanted the facts for the next issue of his
Sunday supplement.”
“He is not interested in supplements,” replied the
priest, “sequels are his speciality. When he interests
himself in a story he begins at the ‘continued line.
He is not a reporter.”
The Prince looked at him inquiringly.
“Nor is he the man Ali should have searched,”


I68 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
continued the sage. “He is—one of the cleverest
detectives in New York—Britz, of Headquarters!”
Britz, of Headquarters, did not waste any time in
gloating over the result of his interview with the
Brahmin. In the first place, he did not consider that
he had scored anything like a signal victory. He knew
enough of the subtleties of the Orient to be aware that
such grains of truth as had come to him in the Swami's
answers had been merged into a voluminous fabric of
mendacity—well, call it diplomacy—and that to win-
now out the few facts vouchsafed to him was a task
for the cloistered seclusion of his own room, supple-
mented by the silent help of many books of reference.
But he was ready to take it for granted that the
Brahmin had spoken truly in regard to the difficulty
of imitating diamonds of great size. There was no
question the Maharanee had been copied; how closely
he could not say, as he had unfortunately never had
a glimpse of the false stone. The questions that gim-
leted their way into his brain were: Where was the
copying done; how was it done; and, of course, cor-
relatively, by whom was it done?
He walked from the mysterious house only as far
as the first corner; turning that, he jumped into a
taxicab and, half an hour later, strolled into his private
office in Police Headquarters. On the way to his
room he passed Manning. The Chief of Detectives,
in a waistcoat more than audible and pink-and-white-
striped shirt sleeves embroidered with a glorified mon-
ogram, was seated at his desk wading through a stack
of reports from his subordinates, in writing that ranged


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 169
from that of a grammar school to the sign manual of
illiteracy.
“What's new P” he called to Britz.
The lieutenant shook his head. “Very little,” he
answered.
“Still working on that line?” inquired Manning,
permitting himself the luxury of a slightly sarcastic
inflection. He was not over fond of Britz, perhaps
as no departmental head ever feels really cordial to-
ward a too capable second-in-command. In his direc-
tion of the Bureau he needed the shrewd sleuth's brain,
and so it was seldom he risked offending him. The
faint asperity of his superior's tone was not lost upon
Britz, but he ignored it.
“Yes,” said he, pausing near the threshold for a
second ere he went his way to the other room, “I
propose to fight it out on that line if it takes all
winter | *
... Manning grinned.
It was a busy quarter of an hour Detective-Lieu-
tenant Britz passed in his Mulberry Street office.
Awaiting him was a cablegram from Logan, saying
briefly he was trailing all the workmen who had
taken part in the manufacture of the paste Mis-
sioner necklace, and that none of them had left
Paris.
Britz frowned slightly as he read the message, then
with a heavy fountain pen that fairly raced over the
paper, and, addressing his far-away assistant by his
cable word, he wrote
“Logan, Paris. Was Maharanee made there,
too?”


17o BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
Britz tapped a bell and looked up as a Headquarters
patrolman opened the door.
“Rush this down to the Western Union office,” he
said. “Take it yourself, and see that it goes at
once.”
Then as he saw a question struggling for escape
from the bluecoat's muscle-bound intelligence, he
added: w
“No, don't send it over our loop; take it right down
to 195 Broadway, and take it yourself; and, what's
more, take it right away; don't let there be any mis-
take about this.”
The patrolman saluted stiffly, and Britz swung his
feet to the leaf of his desk. The lieutenant took from
his pocket a cigar, black and clumsy enough to indi-
cate its value to any connoisseur; made his teeth meet
with a savage crunch in one end, struck a match with
a rasp that evidently was a slight outlet for his emo-
tions, and smoked studiously. He had learned some-
thing in the course of the last twenty-four hours.
First was the fact that Griswold was a master of the
pencil; and next came the knowledge that men who
would stop at nothing, even in the heart of New York,
were on the alert for somebody they anticipated would
come out of the Missioner house.
An equally interesting point in connection with these
men was that they were not of the West. Britz's
memory was a criminal directory of Manhattan. He
had at his thoughts' ends a picture of every crook
who had ever been caught on the island. Desperate
as many of them were, and daring as not a few of
them had shown themselves to be, he recalled vividly


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 171
several instances that had gripped the attention of
specialists in many lines, and there was not one among
them, he felt sure, who would have dared the abduc-
tion of a valuable man in that particular way and in
that particular place. The deed had been committed
unquestionably by a band of desperadoes from an-
other land. They came from some mysterious country
where midnight crimes on occasion braved noonday
achievement. Now, it hardly would pay the Hindoo
ruffians, however expert, to become pioneers of their
peculiar brand of crime in a place so distant from
the scenes of their normal operations unless they were
inspired by a purpose big enough to attract them the
width of the world, and make them pursue it in in-
difference to the probability of their safe return. Un-
doubtedly, New York at that moment was the uncon-
scious possessor of about as enterprising a band of
thugs as Hindostan could produce; but those thugs
had not come to establish thuggee as one of America's
protected industries. They were here for a specific ob-
ject, and in the clarity of the great sleuth's intelligence,
that object showed forth luminously—they were here
for the Maharanee diamond.
The Swami had done his best to deceive him. It
went without saying the Brahmin was connected in
Some way with the acts of the low-caste Hindoos, and,
moreover, even in the darkness of the hall in the
Missioner house, Britz had not failed to recognize the
Swart and sinister features of the man Ali. Of Kan-
anda, Britz as yet knew nothing. That Anglicized
potentate had absented himself from the scholar's
room throughout the detective's visit, and Nandy so


172 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
far forgot the club ethics he had learned in London
as to peer and listen through the unnoticeable opening
between the portières of the inner doorway; but Britz
did not know this. The Headquarters man was con-
vinced, however, that the Swami had cognizance of
even if he did not actually direct—the attempt upon
his liberty. He guessed, too, that it was by accident
he was whirled away from the park path, instead of a
man the Orientals evidently considered it worth their
while to capture and search.
True, he was not much closer to isolation of the
germs of suspicion that sprouted in his mind in regard
to Sands, Griswold, Blodgett, and Ali. Motives for
the theft were easy to conjecture in the cases of two
or three of them, but how to account for its achieve-
ment by any one of the four was something that still
puzzled the acute mentality of him whom the Swami
had called “New York's cleverest detective.”
Where was the Maharanee made? How could it
have been made? He saw no reason for deception on
the part of the Swami in that regard. If the priest
wished merely to hide from his visitor his interest
in a priceless diamond, nothing would be more natural
than for him to admit the possibility of such a jewel
being false. Britz believed the Swami to be sincere
in saying he knew of no one in any European capital
who could fashion a duplicate of the giant diamond.
It was when his thoughts were tangled in the tightest
of knots in that line that a card was brought to him
by the twin brother of the heavy-footed bluecoat who
even then was supposedly on his way to the Western
Union office with the cable to Logan.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 173
“Show him in,” said Britz after a glance at the
name; and, as his visitor entered, he swung his feet
from the desk, advancing halfway to the door, and
extended his hand cordially.
“How do you do, doctor?” he said. “I hope I
see you cheerful.”
A wan smile broke the fixity of the doctor's coun-
tenance for an instant, and he shook his head slightly.
“I don't see how there can be any cheer for me,”
he said, “as long as that poor girl is a prisoner in
the Tombs. When are we going to get her out?”
“I know just how you feel about it, doctor,” said
Britz sympathetically, “but you'll have to leave that
in my hands for the present. Miss Holcomb must
stay where she is awhile longer.”
“But surely,” persisted the physician, “it cannot
be necessary to leave her there forever to establish her
innocence. You know she is guiltless; I know it; Mrs.
Missioner knows it, and it would not take much to
bring all her acquaintances to the same view. Why
must we wait?”
“My dear fellow,” said the detective, “you forget
that a large proportion of our fellowmen are not
prepared to believe anything of the kind. In the eyes
of the public your fiancée is the only person who
can be suspected of having stolen Mrs. Missioner's
jewels. All the circumstantial evidence points in
her direction; in fact, as far as the public knows, she
was caught redhand. Bear in mind my esteemed
colleagues are not given to over-modesty. You may
depend on it, they've filled up the Headquarters re-
porters with big stories about their discovery of one


I74 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
of the diamonds in Miss Holcomb's room. Trust
Donnelly for that.”
“Oh, what do I care about the public!” cried Fitch.
“What has it done for us? What does the public
amount to, anyhow 2 What's the use of talking to me
about the public? All I'm thinking about is the fact
that a girl who has never harmed anybody in her
life is locked up in the Tombs with jailbirds and felons
of every kind' It's enough to make a criminal out
of a parson! And with nothing to sustain her except
the hope of what you and I may do to get her out;
and here we are dragging along, digging out facts
inch by inch like a pair of relic-hunters prodding the
ruins of Herculaneum !”
The usually mild-mannered physician was goaded to
rudeness by the imperturbability of the thief-taker
who confronted him. He started to fling himself in
a chair, then brought himself up roundly, and with
a quick step reached the detective's desk. Planting
his fists upon it with force that drove the blood from
his knuckles he looked the lieutenant directly in the
eyes and asked:
“Are you playing fair with me, Britz? Are you
really trying to clear my fiancée of all this horrible
mass of false evidence which has been collected about
her? Are you really, deep down inside of you, con-
vinced of her innocence—are you as convinced as
I am?”
A steady look was the only response. Britz was
a man who made his words his servants. He saw no
reason for multiplying them now against the perfectly
natural impetuosity of Miss Holcomb's lover.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 175
“My God, man! It's not possible you're playing
with me in a case like this?” Fitch continued. “You
wouldn't use me as a tool to build up a case against
that girl? It cannot be you have permitted yourself
to think she is guilty, and that you hope, by keeping me
on the string, to get information about her you could
not get anywhere else? Why, that would be—it’s too
damnable to think of !”
The sleuth's look never wavered. His cool, gray
eyes projected their self-possession through the doctor's
excitement into the inner justice chamber of his brain.
Fitch gazed into them a few moments longer; then
the tension of his knuckles relaxed; his eyes fell away
from the lieutenant's, and, turning slightly, he sud-
denly and rather weakly sat on the edge of the desk.
“I’m sorry I broke out like that, old man,” he said.
“Of course, you are acting in good faith. It is not
conceivable that any man of your stamp could be
guilty of double-dealing with two persons as helpless
to protect themselves in a case like this as are Miss
Holcomb and myself. But, by all the gods ! this long-
drawn out uncertainty is enough to shatter anybody's
nerves. It is playing havoc with mine. It's knocking
all my experiments, my ambitions, my very practice
itself into several kinds of a cocked hat. How much
longer can I do anything, think of anything, plan any-
thing while Miss Holcomb rests under such a suspicion
and is subject to such daily, hourly, and momentary
wretchedness as I know she suffers in that infernal
hole! You are asking too much of flesh and blood!”
“Now, doctor,” said Fitch, lowering himself gently
into a revolving chair, and restoring his carefully


176 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
polished feet to their very comfortable position on the
desk leaf, “let us be reasonable. You say I expect
too much of you. Now, what do you expect of me?
Do you think I am a whole Russian Secret Service
system rolled into one? Are you jollying yourself
with the idea that I’m a Turkish Grand Vizier with
all the genii at my command? You know very well
I am doing the best I can with the material the De-
partment appropriation permits. I have taken the
pick of the force, but only a few of my assistants
have anything on their shoulders. You cannot drive
dubs.”
Fitch nodded impatiently.
“I’ll tell you what I’ll do,” continued the detective,
relighting his cigar, and drumming on the table
thoughtfully. “I will make a bargain with you. I
know you want to get that girl out of jail, and I don't
blame you a bit. She is altogether too fine a girl for
that sort of thing—not that anything can contaminate
her though; the stuff in her is too good for that.
You can't spoil the real sort by a few weeks' associa-
tion with undesirable citizens, but just the same, you
want to get her out. I’m going to tell you something.
I do, too. I know you are in love with Elinor Hol-
comb, and I know you are not a bit more anxious to
see her out of that place a free woman than I am,
and I know I am not a bit more eager to see her come
out with her reputation as white as milk than you are.
It stands to reason, as you are the man to be responsi-
ble for her name all your life. I only hold myself
accountable until this case is ended. How, then, can
you think of suggesting such a thing as setting her


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 177
free as long as the smallest scrap of suspicion stands
against her? Why, you must be crazy!”
Fitch winced. -
“See here,” he said, “you don't have to talk to
me that way. You know perfectly well when I say
I want her out, I mean I want her out in exactly
the same position in the eyes of her friends she was
in before she went there. I know I'm an impetuous
chump, and of course I have not any real idea of forc-
ing your hand in any way. But you needn't pretend
you don't understand how hard it is for a man in
my position to hold himself in.”
Britz laughed—not unpleasantly. In fact, there was
a ring of hope in the sound that made the doctor prick
up his ears and turn to him expectantly.
“Say,” said Fitch, “you know something?”
Britz nodded.
“Something important? Good news?”
The detective's head was motionless. With excru-
ciating deliberation he took the pencil from his pocket,
examined its point, used that point to push the ashes
off his cigar, slipped the pencil back into his pocket,
and then nipped the cigar between his teeth. He then
brought the fingers of his two hands together, tip to
tip, and looked at the physician with an air of judicial
abstraction.
“Good, boy!” he said. “I don't know just how
good it is. I don't know just how bad. It may be
the key to the whole situation, and it may only deepen
the mystery. All I can tell you about it is that it's
a new lead. I can't tell you anything more about it
until I run it down.”


178 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
A sound of impatience came from Fitch. He started
to spring from the desk, then whirled his back toward
the detective and poised himself on the edge, drum-
ming a lower panel with his heels.
The tension of the situation did not diminish as
the minutes passed, the silence broken only by the elec-
tric thud of the doctor's heels. The strain became
unbearable to Fitch, and with one final backward kick
that seemed to shake away the desk, the detective,
the room, and even the Missioner mystery itself, he
landed with both feet midway of the space to the door
and reached for the knob as if bent on hurling himself
out of the place.
“Not so fast, doctor!” called Britz, without mov-
ing from his comfortable pose. “I said I couldn't tell
you anything,” continued the detective, “but I don't
see why I can't learn something from you. I'd like
to have your advice on a question of science.”
It was by a visible effort the physician controlled
himself, returned to the center of the room, and finally
sat down in the chair which Britz indicated with a
wave of his hand.
“I know you're a scientist,” Britz said, “but
you've never told me how far your curriculum ex-
tended.”
“Why,” said the doctor impatiently, “you know
I'm a physician, and as I'm in good standing with the
County Medical Society, it goes without saying I at
least made a stab at learning everything preliminary
to the taking of my degree.”
“What do you know about chemistry?” asked
Britz.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 179
“Why, that's part of the curriculum, you know. I
don't quite know what you mean.”
“Oh, curriculum be—everlastingly condemned'
What do you really know about it?”
Fitch looked his astonishment.
“Ever try to make an elixir of youth?” inquired
the detective. “Ever have a whack at the philoso-
pher's stone? Ever do anything along transmutation
lines?”
Fitch, despite his anxiety for Elinor, grinned. “You
must take me for a crank,” he said. “The only dab-
bling I have done in transmutation has been trying
to transmute what I know about medicine and surgery
into the silver of the moderately well-to-do. I have
not wasted any energy in going after the gold of
Millionaires' Row—not yet.”
“Now, let us talk,” said Britz. “You and I have
fenced long enough along this line; let's get down to
business. You know something about chemistry, that's
certain. Do you know enough about it to tell me
whether any progress has been made in recent years
in the manufacture of paste jewels?”
“Can't say I do; haven't been much interested in
that line until this outrageous attempt to prove Miss
Holcomb a-thief.”
“Well, it's about time you did,” said Britz mean-
ingly. “I don't see what good it is to a girl to have
an M.D. for a lover if he can't be of any more use
to her in a case of this sort than Binks of the Hard-
ware Club, or Jenks of the Retail Grocers' Associa-
tion. Now, you know how these false gems are made,
don't you?”


I8O BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“I know pretty well,” and Fitch gave him the
formula with which the minute men of the jewel
trade were familiar for purposes of self-protection.
“Well, I'm quite free to tell you,” continued Britz,
“that the whole question of Miss Holcomb's stay in
the Tombs depends on our success in finding out who
made the Maharanee diamond. I know who turned
out the other stones—had Logan over there for several
weeks in Paris, you know.” The detective then
sketched rapidly for Fitch the detailed information sent
to him by his assistant across the water. “But I can-
not get a line on the Maharanee diamond. I’ve been
over every place in this neck of woods—in fact, I’ve
gone over the whole country with a fine-tooth comb.
I’ve had every important city in Europe canvassed, and
the sum-total of all these inquiries is that nobody
knows any live man who could make an imitation of
the real Maharanee anything like good enough to de-
ceive Simple Simon. Now, you just get that scientific
thinking apparatus of yours going, and help me puzzle
out the problem. We know there was a fake Mahara-
nee diamond. It was ground to pieces under Gris-
wold's heel in Mrs. Missioner's opera box. It was
picked up by a man from the Orient—this Swami—
whatever his name is, the sort of combination priest
and scholar who says he's here to spread the propa-
ganda of the Buddhist faith among the elect of New
York Society. Sands saw the diamond; Miss March
saw it; Griswold saw it, and, of course, Mrs. Mis-
sioner herself had it in her own hand. There is no
doubt about its existence. In fact, here is a piece of
it now,” and he showed Fitch a flake of the false


182 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
second-hand furniture stores, art dens, old curio shops,
and so on, on the west side of the avenue, somewhere
in the Twenties?” A nod from Britz was the only
reply. “Well,” continued the doctor, “this call was
to one of those curiosity shops. It was kept by a
queer little old chap who must have starved himself
to death to carry out some object he had. He sold
curios for a living, and played at alchemy for amuse-
ment—cracked, you know. At any rate, he wasn't
all there. His neighbors looked on him as a harmless
lunatic, and in spite of his solitary habits, he was
pretty popular. It was owing to this popularity that
he didn't die in the back part of his own store with
all the busy traffic of a busy city just a few rods out-
side. A neighbor heard a noise like an explosion
and, running in, found him on his back all covered
with some chemical that was turning his clothes into
porous plasters. The neighbor turned in an ambulance
call, and I was the answer. I found the old man half
suffocated and wholly unconscious, and as T was pretty
nervous from inexperience, it was about all I could
do to bring him around. I wanted to take him back
with me, but he wouldn't have it; said he was just as
well off where he was; didn't like the hospital anyhow
and wouldn't go, so I fixed him up where he was.
Afterward, in the exuberance of my youthful zeal,
I called on him outside of working hours, and kind
of looked after him. He pulled through all right, but
he was a pretty badly charred old person for a long
time after that. As soon as he was well enough to
take care of himself, I left off going there, and that
is the last I have seen of him.”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 183
“What caused the explosion?” asked Britz.
“I believe he was experimenting with some chemical
—couldn't get him to tell me anything about it; he
got mad as a hornet every time I touched upon it. I
learned, however, from the neighbors that he was in-
terested in precious stones, and in his later years the
idea became firmly fixed in his mind that if he only
tried long enough, spent money enough, mortified the
flesh sufficiently, he would be able to make diamonds.”
“What sort of stuff did he succeed in making?”
asked the detective.
“You can search me,” said Fitch. “I never got
a look at any of it. His cranklets would never make
any sort of admission to me about the stuff he was
making. All I know is that the man who told me
about the experiments was quite positive that was the
crack in the old chap's brain—that he could make
diamonds, and could make them just as well in a few
hours as nature could in a thousand years.”
“So the explosion must have been * *
“Some fussing around with the ingredients he was
going to convert into gleam and glitter. That's all I
know about it. There you have it. Now, what do
you make of it?”
“Well,” said Britz as he put his heels to the floor
with a click, “what we'll make of it won't be made
down here. I'm glad that memory of yours worked
in the long run; but it might have saved me an extra
hazardous ‘joy ride' if it had worked sooner. Come
along !” and he moved toward the door.
“Where are you going?” asked the physician.
“To the Bleecker Street station,” replied Britz, “and


184 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
from there to Fourth Avenue as fast as the local
can take us. Guess we won't wait for a taxi.”
“Then you think,” said Fitch eagerly, “there may
be a clew in what I’ve told you?”
“What's the use of thinking,” almost snapped
Britz, “when we can know? There's just one way
to know, and that's to go. Come, let's go.”
As they walked briskly down the Headquarters
building, Britz paused at Manning's office, pushed a
button and, when the door swung open, thrust his head
in long enough to say:
“See you later, Chief; going up town for a little
while.”
“Still fighting it out on that line, eh?” was Man-
ning's return.
“Yes,” said Britz calmly, “and it may not take
all winter either.”
The detective and the doctor were so absorbed in
the subject as they raced down the subway stairs that
they did not notice a dark-faced man who, after a
keen glance at their faces, hastened east in Bleecker
Street and sprang into a waiting cab at the next
COrner. -


CHAPTER XIV
OLD FRIENDS
"BRUxton SANDs was as genuinely astonished as a
man of deliberateness could be when a clerk entered
the private room of his office suite in a Bowling Green
skyscraper and told him a lady wished to see him. He
was about to instruct the clerk to ask for the lady's
card when, glancing over the youth's head, he glimpsed
a golden gleam under a big hat with sweeping plumes
through the doorway and in an instant was crossing
the threshold with both hands extended.
“My dear Doris!” he said. “This is really good
of you. Things were getting a bit dull this morn-
ing.”
Mrs. Missioner smiled in that pervading way that
long ago had penetrated to the very core of the mil-
lionaire's inner consciousness. That smile illuminated
Sands' somewhat gloomy sanctuary. He welcomed
Mrs. Missioner to a comfortable chair beside his broad
desk, swept aside the heap of formidable papers with
great gold seals and fluttering legal ribbons, and
leaned back in his chair quite content to wait a cen-
tury for his visitor to speak again, provided her smile
should continue to beam upon him.
“No, it is not about investments,” said Mrs. Mis-
sioner, noting the restrained inquiry in her admirer's
eyes. “I felt I had to talk to somebody about Elinor;
and Dorothy, you know, is too amiably responsive to
185


I86 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
be of any use. Bruxton, what am I to do about that
girl?”
The millionaire was visibly perplexed.
“I’m sure I don't know,” he said at length. “I
suppose something ought to be done.”
“Something certainly should be done; something
must be done,” returned Mrs. Missioner. “I cannot
bear any longer the idea of her suffering in that dread-
ful place.”
“Well, what are we going to do about it?” asked
Sands. “The case has been taken out of your hands,
and when I offered to give a bond in any amount for
her appearance, this detective urgently requested me
to do nothing of the sort.” Mr. Sands played
nervously with an ivory paper cutter as he spoke, and
then looked at Mrs. Missioner. She placed her elbows
on the corner of his desk and leaned her chin on her
clasped hands.
“Bruxton,” said she, “there is something much
more extraordinary about this case than appears on
the surface, or even below the surface. Why does
this Mr.—Mr. >>
“Britz,” interpolated Sands.
“Yes; why does he wish to keep Elinor in the
Tombs when we all believe—know, in fact, that she is
absolutely incapable of doing anything wrong. It is
one of the most terrible things I ever heard of. I
didn't know it was possible in a city like this in the
twentieth century. It sounds like the dark ages.”
“Well, you see,” said Sands, “in many respects
we are not yet out of the dark ages. The police of
this town have power that was not exceeded by that of


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 187
any body of men in the most mediaeval period. True,
they are subject to the restrictions of the law in theory.
The law says they shall keep suspected persons in cells
only for so many hours; that preliminary examina-
tions of prisoners shall be made within such and such a
time, and that every accused man or woman is entitled
to a speedy trial. That is the theory. In practice, it
is altogether different. The Central Office detective
can, and does, take his own time about submitting to
the District Attorney his evidence. The prosecutor in
turn takes the case to the Grand Jury at his own con-
venience. Now and then there is a howl in the press
about the law's delay, and whenever that happens,
there is an immediate protest from the Bench against
the enormous volume of business the courts are com-
pelled to handle. After all, it is up to the public. The
people pretend they want prompt justice; but if the
judiciary is to be believed, the people do not prove their
sincerity by providing enough judges to try the cases.
As for the District Attorneys, many of them in New
York and in other cities seem busier in making ex-
planations and issuing statistics than in prosecuting of-
fenders, and having it over and done with.”
“Well, isn't there some way we can help that poor
girl?” asked Mrs. Missioner again.
“Can't see any way just now,” returned Sands.
“As I told you, I was more than willing to give bail
for her, but Lieutenant Britz, who says he is just as
much convinced of her innocence as you or I, assured
me it would be one of the worst things I could do in
her behalf. You see, as he rightly remarked, it is not
merely a question of setting her free, nor even of


188 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
having her acquitted. Some acquittals, you can very
well understand, are tantamount to convictions. The
man unquestionably is right in that respect. Miss Hol-
comb must regain, not only her liberty, but the un-
grudging respect of everyone who knows her, and
everyone who has ever heard about her.”
“And how is that to be done?” the widow pur-
sued.
“Only by the conviction of the real thief, I guess,”
said Sands. “Britz tells me he has the case pretty well
in hand, and that if no false move is made he will un-
doubtedly bring the crime home to the criminal. I
have consulted counsel; I have even taken the matter
up pretty thoroughly with friends, both here and in
Albany, and from all I can learn, the detective is justi-
fied in his attitude. Wealth, influence, can get her out,
but they cannot clear her. You cannot buy the pub-
lic's conclusions, you know.”
Tears rose to Mrs. Missioner's eyes as the realiza-
tion of her helplessness came to her like a blow. Never
before had she known what it was to have a wish
denied. Generous impulse had been followed by gen-
erous deed. Those she wished to aid she had been
able to provide with immediate assistance by virtue
of her great wealth, or her great womanliness. She
detested playing a part in any way. She was the
soul of sincerity, and though so fond of her jewels that
the fondness rose at times to passionate heights, she
was a woman of unusual simplicity for one in her
position.
Sands incidentally became as nervous as a man of
his type must always be at the sight of a woman's


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 189
weeping. Though a bachelor, he knew enough of the
sex not to blunder into awkward attempt at consola-
tion. All he did was to sit there twisting the paper
cutter in his fingers, and looking uncomfortably out
of the window until Mrs. Missioner had time to regain
her composure. So great was the tension upon him,
however, that when the widow had regained her poise,
and proved it by speaking in decisive tones, the ivory
blade snapped in his hand with a sound like that of a
pistol shot.
“I don't care what the detective says!” exclaimed
Mrs. Missioner, as she arose and gathered her furs
about her, “I am not going to let Elinor Holcomb
think any longer that her friend of years believes
her to be a thief. It is unbearable ! Yes, the man
told me, too, that I must not interfere in the case if I
expected him to vindicate my secretary; but I am not
going to be governed by anyone to that extent. I
am going to see Elinor to-day. I am going straight to
that terrible place and assure her that even though I
permit her to be kept there, I refuse to entertain for
a moment the idea that she has broken any law of
God or man!”
“Are you sure this is wise, Doris?” inquired Sands
gravely. As he stood beside her, it was difficult to
control the impulse to pour out before her the adora-
tion he felt at sight of her new loveliness. She had
never seemed more beautiful than when she was
moved by sympathy for the girl who at that moment,
doubtless, was wondering if she had forsaken her.
“Wise or not,” returned the widow, “I shall do it.
Something tells me she is in need of sympathy this


I90 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
very day. Why, Bruxton, how do we know what
effect this dreadful incarceration might have upon
her? It may warp her entire nature; it may wreck
her health. Please do not try to dissuade me. I have
made up my mind to see her, and I shall go there at
once.”
Sands knew Mrs. Missioner, if he did not know
women in general, altogether too well to waste time in
opposing her when she had declared herself as em-
phatically as that.
“Your car is downstairs?” he inquired. The
widow nodded. “I will go with you,” he said, “since
you are resolved to pay a visit to such a place. You
must not go unattended there.”
“Thank you,” said Mrs. Missioner sweetly. “I
know I can always depend on you. In fact, Bruxton,
you are altogether the most dependable man I
know.”
If anything was needed to wing the usually slow
impulses and emotions of Sands, that last remark of
hers would have done it. He and the widow went out
of the office together, crossed the sidewalk, and were
tête-à-tête in the sheltering embrace of Mrs. Mis-
sioner's limousine.
It was a short dash for the auto up Broadway, up
Centre Street to the Tombs, and it was with little dif-
ficulty that Sands obtained for Mrs. Missioner per-
mission to see the prisoner.
“Miss Holcomb will be here immediately,” said the
turnkey, who had taken Mrs. Missioner's card to the
girl's cell, and with a courtesy that surprised the
widow in such a place, he drew chairs, and without a


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 191
suspicion of irony, invited the visitors to “make them-
selves at home.”
Elinor came around the corner of the corridor with
more animation in her step than it had shown in
many a day. She had hardly been able to believe her
eyes on reading Mrs. Missioner's name on the card
thrust through the grating of her cell. Long ago she
had made up her mind that the chain of circumstances,
or perhaps an enemy, had sown in her kind friend's
mind suspicion that she was guilty. As the days rolled
on and she received no word from Mrs. Missioner, the
conviction grew upon her. Even this very day she
had given up the hope of rehabilitating herself in the
eyes of her employer. Not that it was an employer
she mourned in loss of Mrs. Missioner's confidence.
The rich widow was her friend; had been her family's
friend, and had been the first to offer her a refuge in
the terrible days following discovery of the fact that
her kindly, gentle father, after a lifetime of high en-
deavor, had left her without the provision she knew
he always intended to make.
“Dear Mrs. Missioner!” cried Elinor, hastening
toward the widow as she read affection and complete
belief in her countenance. “You have done many
lovely things for me, but this is quite the dearest ! It
seems hard even to picture you in such a place, and
the reality—”
“You poor child !” exclaimed Mrs. Missioner,
hardly controlling her voice. “What about yourself?
If it is distressing to me to come here, it is terrible
for you to be here. How can you stand it?”
Elinor shuddered.


I92 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
y
“One learns to stand many things,” she answered,
“when fate commands; yet if anyone had told me a
few weeks ago that I could so much as retain my rea-
son in a place like this! Now that you are here, it
seems far easier. Oh, but it is good of you to come!”
The widow took the girl's hands in her own and
patted them softly as she whispered words of encour-
agement. She could not trust her voice to speak for
the first few moments. As she looked at Elinor's slen-
der grace and the deathless honesty in her soft, gray
eyes, the horror of the girl's situation came home to
her with redoubled force. It was by a mighty effort,
and by that alone, that she prevented herself from
sweeping the girl into her arms and making a dash
with her for the freedom beyond the great steel door.
For an instant that impulse almost got the upper hand
of her common sense. Had not Sands been there, she
might have done something so foolish as to complicate
her young friend's position still further in the eyes of
all the city's newspapers and their readers. As it was,
she increased the tenderness of her caresses, and
sought to soothe Elinor's agitation with little love
words such as had long been common in their daily
intercourse. But this tenderness only recalled to
Elinor all the affection, safety, and shelter she had left
behind her in Mrs. Missioner's home, and at the
thought she broke into uncontrollable sobs.
The millionaire's discomfort was augmented a thou-
sandfold by this scene between the women. He
shifted his weight from one foot to the other,
crumpled the rim of his derby hat until it bent like the
brim of an Alpine, and at length, unable to view the


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I93
girl's distress with anything like equanimity, he
walked to the other end of the reception-room and
stood looking through the giant latticework at the tide
of traffic in Centre Street.
It was not until the widow had restored Elinor's
calmness, not until she had assured the trembling pris-
oner of her love, confidence, and full belief in her in-
nocence a hundred times, not until their emotion had
affected even the matron long inured to human woe,
that the girl saw Sands. His sturdy bulk, the square
set of his shoulders, the uncompromising fidelity in
his strong face, gave her a new sense of pleasure.
Surely her case could not be desperate with two such
loyal friends to defend her! For the space of a star-
flash, she forgot even Fitch, although her lover at
that moment was hastening uptown with Britz in quest
of the missing thread that should lead to her vindica-
tion. Still with her arm around Mrs. Missioner's
waist, she extended her hand to Sands, and thanked
him in a way more effective than any mere girlish pret-
tiness for the proof of his faith in her that he had
given in coming with Mrs. Missioner to see her.
“Not that it would take much persuasion to make
you accompany Doris anywhere,” she said with a smile,
and she was not at all remorseful when she noted the
dark flush of pleasure that spread over his features.
“But I cannot help taking comfort in the fact that you
have come to see me, and that very evidently it has
cost you no struggle to do so. If all of you could only
know what these long weeks have been to me, you
would understand how deeply the sight of old friends
affects me. Here I have been in a world apart. The


I94 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
poor creatures who share this dreadful home with me
only make my situation worse, for I can do nothing
for them, and yet the sight of their misery distresses
me beyond words.”
Elinor did not know how much she had been spared
by the considerateness of the warden in assigning her
to a tier of cells in which the more brutal inmates of
the Tombs never were confined. She had had only a
glance of the nether depths. Grave though the charge
against her was, the good old man, whom an accident
of politics had placed in control of the prison, had
recognized from the first that she was of finer mould
than anyone who had been entrusted to his custody
in his whole term of office, and he had seen to it that
her eyes and ears were not assaulted by the sights and
scenes of the blacker depths. Years passed, and
Elinor was a woman of much graver maturity ere
she knew how much of misery she had escaped.
The visit of Mrs. Missioner and Sands did Elinor so
much good that, when they went away, it was with a
lighter heart she returned to her cell, with renewed
courage she steeled herself to await the efforts of the
good friends and the devoted lover she knew were
working to clear her name of the frightful charge Don-
nelly and Carson had lodged against her.
Her confidence in Dr. Fitch was not misplaced,
for in the short time when Mrs. Missioner in her
limousine was speeding back to her home in Million-
aires' Row, and Sands, in a brougham, was returning
to his office in the Bowling Green building, Fitch and
Britz were standing on a Fourth Avenue corner a
short distance north of Twenty-third Street, gazing


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 195
with dismay at a twenty-story skyscraper that stood
on the site of the little old curio shop to which duty
had called the young ambulance surgeon years before.
“You are sure this is the place?” asked the de-
tective.
“Absolutely,” said the doctor. “I went over there
to get some brandy for the old man when I was work-
ing him out of his stupor.”
“Well,” said the sleuth, “so far as that old curi-
osity shop is concerned, we're up against it; or, what
is worse, we are not up against it. We are confronted
by this steel and stone monstrosity, and I guess there's
no use wasting time making inquiries there; but there
may be a few old-timers with memories along this
block, and we'll see what we can find out. You take
that side of the street, and I’ll take this.”
Britz and Fitch went into one shop after another,
patiently repeating persistent inquiries as to what had
become of the veteran curio dealer. Blank stares and
equally blank answers were the result until Britz, in a
tiny tobacco shop that was the center of all the old-
time places huddled together for protection against
the encroachment of progress, unearthed a memory in-
carnate in a man who, Fitch said, might have been
the twin brother of the amateur alchemist.
“Yes,” said the man, “I remember him, and it's a
funny thing to me that anybody who ever saw him
could ever forget him. He was the queerest little old
duck I ever ran across.”
Britz thought if anyone could be queerer than the
ancient tobacconist he would have to step out of a page
of Dickens.


I96 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
The incarnate memory recalled that the curio dealer
had been taken away a week or two before his shop
was torn down to clear the ground for the foundation
work of the great skyscraper. No, he didn't go away.
He was taken away.
“Anything wrong with him?” asked Britz.
“Well, not exactly what you might call wrong, so to
speak,” quavered the old tobacco merchant. “I would-
n’t go so far as to say there was anything you might
exactly call wrong with him, but neither would I under-
take to tell you that he was altogether what you might
call right,” and he touched his forehead significantly.
“Oh!” said Britz, “Ward's or Randall's?”
“Huh,” said the old tobacconist, “I don't know
what you mean.”
“Why,” said the detective, “what I mean is did
they take him to the Asylum or to the Workhouse?”
“I reckon it wouldn't have been any use to take
him to the Workhouse,” said the tobacco dealer, “be-
cause, so far as I know, he never done no work in
all his life, and he was too old a dog to learn the habit
by that time. No, I guess they took him to the other
place; but what do you want to know for? Are you
missing heirs?”
Britz and Fitch laughed.
“No,” he said, “my friend here just wants to brush
up an old acquaintance.” When the two had bought
enough cigars to recall faintly the dreams of prosper-
ity that had inspired the old man's youth, they strolled
to the Twenty-third Street corner, where they jumped
aboard a crosstown car that took them to the Island
ferry.


CHAPTER XV
AT warD's ISLAND
“It's rather a remarkable coincidence, I'll admit,”
said Britz to Fitch, as they stood on the deck of the
little ferry boat that bore them toward the Island;
“but it's possible your little old friend had some-
thing to do with the making of the imitation Maha-
ranee diamond. You realize thoroughly, I'm sure,
the importance of that link in our chain of evidence.
It may be difficult to fasten the responsibility for
manufacturing all the other fraudulent diamonds of the
necklace upon the guilty person, because diamonds
of that size can be imitated in any one of several
large cities; but the man who made the fake Maha-
ranee is a past master of his craft; a man so skillful
that even the most expert artificers of Europe and
America do not pretend they can equal him.”
“What makes you think the curio dealer had any-
thing to do with it?” asked Fitch. “How could it
be done? I thought the Maharanee was made quite
recently?”
“I don't know how long it's been,” the detective
replied. “It may have been only a few months, and
the diamond, it is possible, may have been copied any
time within the past year. That big office building
has been less than a year in construction, and it's well
within the bounds of fact that the curio dealer received
I97


198 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
the commission for the work twelve months ago, or
possibly more.”
“Oh,” said the physician, “there is one flaw in
your theory. He was not a fakir. All the informa-
tion I gleaned about him convinced me he was not
engaged in the manufacture of bogus jewels. His
grand purpose in life was to make real diamonds.”
“Precisely,” said Britz. “It is that fact, much
more than anything else, that leads me to think he
may be in the employ of the persons we are trailing.
Doesn't it occur to you that the false Maharanee, in
order to deceive Mrs. Missioner and all her friends for
so long a time, must have been such a beautiful piece
of work that it could not have been intended as an
imitation? In other words, didn't the man who made
the imitation Maharanee believe he was manufacturing
a genuine diamond?”
The physician was struck by the force of the de-
tective's logic. He realized instantly the possibilities
of this new clew. He glanced at the Headquarters
man with unmistakable admiration for his cleverness,
as he said:
“Lieutenant, I owe an apology to at least one mem-
ber of the force—yourself. For many years I’ve had
the idea that the last thing any policeman required to
succeed in his work was real intelligence. I accepted
the popular conception of the force, including the De-
tective Bureau, which is that “the finest’” are men of
brawn and little else. I now perceive that brain is an
essential to a real detective, and I am free to admit that
you display not only intelligence, but a high order of
intellect.”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS I99
Britz's features relaxed into his inscrutable smile.
“It's well not to generalize, doctor,” he returned.
“The Lexow investigations and other legislative
probes, as the newspapers are so fond of calling them,
have certainly put the force in a bad light in many
ways. Then, too, the performances of some of my
colleagues are not calculated to inspire the thinking
portion of the public with any great confidence in our
ability; but we are not all dubs. I'm glad you recog-
nize my endeavor to thresh out this case along logical
lines. After all, successful detective work is only
applied common sense.”
The little boat grated its nose against the Island
pièr, and the two investigators sprang ashore. As
Soon as they entered the asylum grounds, their posi-
tions were reversed. Fitch became the mentor, Britz
the willing pupil, for in that abode of darkened reason
were medical men whose hourly association with that
phase of existence made them welcome gladly visitors
from the outer world—especially members of their
own profession. Fitch, as he ran up the steps of the
visitors' entrance, was received royally in the office by
three or four physicians and surgeons who had known
him in his Bellevue days. There was no jealousy of
his success among them. He had shot ahead of sev-
eral of them, and it was pretty well understood among
the Island doctors that Lawrence Fitch was rapidly
forging to the fore as a fashionable physician. What
was more important in their eyes was the fact that he
had gained real distinction in his profession. Several
minor but helpful discoveries of his had been recorded
gratifyingly in the “Lancet,” and more than once his


2OO BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
name had been mentioned with flattering recognition at
meetings of the County Medical Society.
Fitch was now in his element. He grasped warmly
the hands held out to him, clapped two or three of his
closer cronies on the back, and presented Britz to the
little group with a few words of introduction that
won respect for the man from Mulberry Street.
“Got a patient here, Larry?” they asked him
jokingly.
“No,” said Fitch, “not exactly a patient; but it's
possible you have a case here I'm a little bit interested
in.” He recited the history of the curio dealer, with
an urgent request that everything in connection with
the old man be revealed to him. Britz, accustomed
as he was to glean his facts toilsomely, was unmis-
takably surprised by the readiness with which each
of Fitch's friends promised aid, and hastened to put
their promise into execution.
One of the younger doctors showed himself familiar
with the old diamond maker's case, and seemed thor-
oughly to understand his delusion.
“He is now in my ward,” he said. “He has been
there six months; rather unusual case; harmless but
hopeless. Can't rid himself of the idea that diamonds
are banked up all around him, and that all he has ,
to do is to make one with his own hands to possess
the whole of that wealth in jewels. He does his best
to make it, too. Unfortunately the ingredients he de-
mands include several dangerous chemicals, and of
course he cannot be trusted to go pounding away with
a pestle and mortar when his brain is so far gone
that he is likely to forget the combination.”


2O2 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
young Dr. Fitch first had seen him. His pliant
hands had been plunged many times into a dough-like
lump plastic as a sculptor's clay at one end of the
bench. A row of jars at the back of the bench was
flanked by a phalanx of vials. An earthen bowl half
full of water stood at his right hand. Directly in
front of him, scattered in workmanlike confusion, were
several palette knives and mixing brushes. Cease-
lessly his fingers plucked tiny pellets from the plastic
lump, rolled and patted them, dipped them in the bowl
of water, coated them with the many-colored contents
of the vials and jars, then trundled them upon the
board with industry purposeful of performance, but
purposeless of achievement.
At times a spectral smile seemed to glow upon his
cadaverous features—a faint gleam like the specter of
a corpse-light. The sunlight, refracted from the rows
of jars and bottles, played queer tricks with the con-
tour of his face and gave his tireless hands a ghost-
like appearance. He was a poor little shriveled rem-
nant of a man, the dried core of what had been a
dabbler in the occult, and which along normal channels
might have been a distinguished scientist. No one
looking at him could ever have pictured him as pos-
sessed of the greed of gain. Britz, though he made no
pretense of being a psychologist, comprehended at a
glance the outer vision of the former curiosity shop
proprietor conveyed little to his distraught scientific
mind. Beyond doubt, the old man, as Fitch had said,
had run the shop merely as a means to an end. Fitch
and Britz stood looking at him for a few moments
before he became aware of their presence. When at


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 2O3
last he glanced up, a shade of perplexity flitted across
his face, his fingers halted, but they did not stop in
their studious task, and he looked at them inquiringly.
With a slight shake of his head he apparently gave
up the attempt to puzzle out their identity, and once
more bent his eyes on the bench he firmly regarded
as the threshold to Golconda.
“Guess you don't remember me, Mr. Martin,” said
the doctor. The old man appeared not to hear. Britz
and Fitch exchanged glances, and the detective took
up the attempt to awaken a response from the aged
inmate's mental vacuum.
“Pretty busy man, eh?” said Britz.
He had touched the right chord. Any reference
to the industry that absorbed his fading senses was
sure to arouse the intelligence of the old curio dealer.
He nodded briskly, and went on with his work more
zealously than before.
“Got to finish a contract on time?” the Head-
quarters man pursued.
Another vigorous little nod, followed by a swift
search of the detective's face on the part of the old
man's sunken eyes.
“Rather interesting work you're doing,” pursued
the detective.
Thereupon Mr. Martin rejoined:
“It is the only work that can interest me. I have
given my life to it.”
“Find it profitable?” inquired the sleuth.
For an instant those gray fingers paused in their
manipulation of the clay pellets.
“Well, it depends on what you call profitable, young


—- - T –
_`
– 2O4 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
>>
man,” answered the ward of the State. “There are
things more important than monetary gain.”
“Oh, yes, I know, I know,” said the detective
hastily. “I suppose your work is purely scientific?”
“It is more than science,” answered Martin. “It
is art, philosophy, philanthropy—everything. It is the
crystallization of the beautiful. Love is beauty, and
beauty is life. All mankind needs is beauty in greater
measure and higher degree to attain perfection of
happiness.”
“And you are engaged in forwarding that theory?”
“Yes,” said the old man simply. “I have taken
upon myself the task of glorifying every home in the
world with the prisoned sunshine of the centuries.
Every abode of man, however humble, should be il-
luminated by the light of diamonds. The diamond is
the most exquisite expression of creative love we have.
The only trouble is that we have not enough of them.
It has remained for me—it has remained for the poor
old student of mysteries to find the key to the true
jewel wealth of the universe. For thousands of years
men have been seeking diamonds in the ground. I
take them from the air.”
In similar vein he ran on, his words betraying the
strange groping of a clouded mind that in its time
had been nearer the truth than most men's. There
was something extraordinary about the little old fel-
low's brain. It had not cracked; rather, it had been
attenuated by overstrain. It was after a process of
patient questioning covering so long a time that it
ended in the twilight, that Britz led the tireless worker
back to days before his arrival in the asylum. The


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 2O5
protracted inquiry taxed all the detective's skill in
word-handling, for each time he lifted the patient's
prostrate intelligence above the horizon of sanity, it
was only to see it slip back in a few seconds.
Fitch, scientist though he was, long conversant with
the phenomena of the mind as he had been, marveled
at the Headquarters man's adroitness. Long before
Britz had finished his task, the doctor, in sheer weari-
ness, dropped into a chair and stayed there in silent
attention. But the detective remained on his feet,
immutable as the incarnation of will itself, and slowly,
cautiously, persistently piloted that darkened intelli-
gence out of its depths back to at least a gloaming of
coherent memory. So guided, so aided and lifted
along the difficult backward path, Martin's mind re-
verted to instances that hung like stalactites from the
cavern ceiling of retrospection. It was in a flash of
intelligence, briefly eliminated as a twinkle of daylight
seen from the recesses of a cave, that the old man
recalled the great triumph of his strange craft.
“I have made diamonds, yes,” he said in response
to a query from the detective, swift and searching as
a rapier thrust, “beautiful enough to hang about the
neck of a princess; brilliant enough to glorify the hut
of a toiler in the fields; but there was one—ah!”
His recollection reveled in widening circles until its
force was spent. For a long time, his hands motion-
less again, he sat gazing into the past. Britz, feeling
that he was on the edge of an important disclosure,
waited patiently. Fitch scarcely breathed.
“I mind me,” the one-time curio dealer resumed,
“of the one great diamond that came as the grand


2O6 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
reward of all my labor. Ah, that was a diamond'
But though it was a wonderful achievement, I dishon-
ored myself in the making of it for—” and a faint
flush deepened on his parchment face, “I fashioned
it for gain!”
Without an instant's warning he pushed away the
bench, dropped his face into his hands and gave way
to grief that moved equally the man long hardened to
dissection of the body and the veteran crime hunter
accustomed to vivisection of the soul. Few things are
more terrible than to see an old man weep. It is a
dual surrender, for tears are the prerogative of youth
and womanhood. Britz and Fitch with difficulty con-
trolled their own emotions just for a moment, for tears
streamed over the ashen countenance of the broken
amateur alchemist, and his wasted form writhed and
rocked in convulsive sobs.
“I have had my punishment,” said Martin when
at last the tempest had spent itself; “but, oh, the long
years—the long years of remorse! Urged by poverty,
that enemy of seekers after truth and beauty, I suc-
cumbed to the temptation the stranger held out to me.
. I made the great diamond as he desired—and I gave it
to him for his gold!”
The doctor glanced swiftly at the detective and
started to speak. Britz raised a warning hand, and
Fitch checked his exclamation. Seating himself for
the first time the Central Office man—the prober of
mysteries—laid his hand encouragingly on the dia-
mond-maker's shoulder, and said:
“There now; don't let it distress you so much.
Other men have done things far worse than that!”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 207
“Nothing could be worse!” screamed Martin,
springing from the low stool on which he sat and
facing his visitors in an agony of abasement. “I sold
the delight of my eyes, the light of my life, the star
of my soul—the queen of all jewels, the purest, truest,
most beautiful diamond the world has ever known l’’
“Yes,” said the detective, “but don't forget it was
yours to sell. You had a right to do as you pleased.
with it.”
“I had no such right,” cried the alchemist. “That
diamond was the product of my laboring hours. I
brought it forth from the air, the sunshine, the silver
water, the milk of the moon, as an Aphrodite is fash-
ioned of dew and mist. It was not a mere stone; it
had thought and sense and soul; it was a microcosm
of the marvelous!”
Fitch could not hide his astonishment at the learning
and poetry the fearfully agitated old man displayed.
Britz himself, had not his thoughts been focused
rigorously on his purpose, would have stopped to
wonder at them. As it was he struck the iron of the
alchemist's remorse at white heat.
“What did the stranger want with it?” demanded
the detective.
“I don't know,” said Martin. His voice still
trembled, his features worked, his hands fluttered and
knotted themselves in the intensity of his emotion.
“He came to me a stranger; he went away the same,
and with him went my queen of jewels, my beautiful,
beautiful diamond of diamonds! But I will find him,”
he shrieked. “For centuries I have been upon his
path. He thought all things ended between us when


208 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
he lured me into parting with my treasure. He said
because he had suggested the outline and color of the
stone he had a right to make me give it to him for
his money; but it was I–I who thrust into the center
of the glorious gem the fire from heaven. I penned
the sunbursts in the priceless prism, and it is mine !
It is mine by right of creation!”
This outburst excited the old man, but in a little
while there was another outburst of his emotions. He
fairly shouted:
“I will have him though. I will come up with him
yet, and when I do, I will give him back his money
and make him return the diamond to me. He thought
he left nothing to tell me who he was. He thought I
never would be able to find him in this big town.
He felt sure the old curiosity dealer would not venture
far enough away from his shop to track such a fine
gentleman. But he forgot one thing. I have kept
it all these years, and through it, I will find him
yet!”
Abstractedly he thrust his hand into an inner pocket
and fished out a bit of cardboard. Excitedly he waved
it in front of the detective's eyes. Britz resisted for
a moment the impulse to snatch it from his grasp,
but he gripped himself sharply. Awaiting develop-
ments was one of the detective's strong points. As
he expected, the old alchemist was in a state of mind
to share his knowledge with anybody. After a few
more flourishes, Martin laid in Britz's hand a man's
visiting card, face down.
Studiously avoiding any appearance of haste, Britz
turned it up and read the single line engraved upon it.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 209
Without the tremor of a muscle, and with only one
swift significant look, he passed the card to Fitch.
The doctor, a little less self-restrained than the de-
tective, looked steadily at a drawing on the back, gazed
earnestly at the inscription on the face, then wonder-
ingly, before the card fluttered from his fingers, he
read the line aloud. -
“MR. BRUXTON SANDs.”


CHAPTER XVI
THE ASSISTANT DISTRICT ATTORNEY
WHILE Britz was struggling with the tangled
threads of contradictory circumstances that constituted
the fabric of the diamond mystery, the District Attor-
ney's office was not inactive. With the slow stealthi-
ness of a cat approaching its prey it combined the
disconnected fragments of evidence gathered by the
police into the semblance of a perfect case, and pre-
pared to present it to a jury. The Grand Jury had
indicted Elinor Holcomb, and again she was dragged
into the glare of a courtroom, this time to plead to
the indictment. There remained only the verdict of a
petit jury to open the gates of State prison for her.
Her lawyer was served with the fateful notice of trial,
and she was made to realize the great struggle was
about to begin.
Assistant District Attorney Mott was taking a last
survey of the depositions in the case, mentally picturing
the curtain of guilt he would weave before the jury.
To his mind the evidence was conclusive. It pointed
irresistibly to Miss Holcomb as the thief. Experience
had taught him that it was not an easy task to convict
a woman on anything but the most direct evidence, yet
he felt that the net of circumstances had drawn about
her so tightly as to leave her helpless in its meshes.
It was a compelling picture of sordidness that the
assistant district attorney would draw in the courtroom.
2 Io


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 2II
The central figure, a young woman, beautiful, accom-
plished, refined, impoverished in an environment of
plenty. In her bosom angry passions of resentment
and discontent seethe and boil into fury against the
conditions of her existence. She longs for the splendor
and social position in which she was reared, and of
which she feels she has been robbed. There is one
way to break from the ruins of her early prospects.
It is a dangerous way. The diamond necklace, valued
at half a million dollars, looms as the beacon out of
her perplexity. She yields to the temptation, but, with
the inexperience of the amateur, fails to cover her
tracks. The evidence gathered by the detectives points
in only one direction, and the prosecutor feels certain
the twelve good men and true will not shirk the stern
duty that justice calls on them to perform.
The evidence massed in Mott's mind seemed to bulge
with the weight of Elinor's guilt. And yet, the pros-
ecutor felt there was something strangely lacking in
the structure; something that made it appear hollow
and unreal. No other reasonable explanation of the
disappearance of Mrs. Missioner's necklace offered
itself, and still it was hard to conceive Miss Holcomb
as the thief. Mott knew that the same uncertainty in
the minds of the jurors would inevitably result in a
verdict of acquittal. The benefit of any reasonable
doubt as to her guilt must go to her, and he realized
he had yet to eliminate that last slim possibility of a
verdict favorable to the prisoner. Were it an ordinary
larceny case he would be content to offer the testimony
at hand and leave the verdict to the conscience of the
jurors. But this trial would fill thousands of news-


2I2 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
paper columns. The press of the entire country was
on the alert for it. It meant much to a struggling
assistant to obtain a conviction in so famous a case.
To lose, he feared, would reflect on his own com-
petence.
The entrance of Britz brought the prosecutor out
of his absorption.
“Just the man I wanted to see,” he greeted.
“And I'm equally glad to find you in,” the detective
returned. His eyes lingered on the documents piled
on the desk, and then sought the face of the assistant.
“Haven't got the case quite clear in your mind?”
he questioned.
“I’ve got the evidence down pat,” Mott responded.
“It seems complete; and yet, somehow, I feel that it is
not entirely convincing. I want to get something to
clinch it. It's a pretty tough proposition at best to
get a conviction on circumstantial evidence when the
defendant is a woman of good appearance, and I don't
want to slip up on this case. We haven't got much
time left. The case is on the calendar for next
Monday.”
“That’s what I came to see you about,” informed
Britz. “I want to get you to adjourn the trial a
month.”
“Another adjournment!” burst forth Mott in irri-
tation. “We’ve put the case off twice without gaining
anything. What do you expect to get in the next
four weeks?”
“Conclusive evidence of Miss Holcomb's innocence,”
solemnly announced Britz. Mott eyed him incredu-
lously.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 2I3
“You really don't believe her innocent?” he
asked.
“I do,” came the swift retort.
“Is that just a guess, or is it based on evidence?”
“It is the inference I draw from facts that I have
discovered.”
“New facts?” anxiously inquired the prosecutor.
“Yes.”
“Then, for Heaven's sake, tell me what they are,”
demanded Mott.
“I haven't got them in shape to offer yet,” Britz
returned. “But the case is shaping itself rapidly and
within a month—perhaps in a week—I’ll have the real
thief under arrest.”
“I think your judgment is astray in this matter,” the
prosecutor opined, “but, of course, I don't know what
you've got up your sleeve. We've worked together on
too many cases for me to treat flippantly anything you
say. But we can't keep that girl in jail forever. If
she's innocent she ought to be freed. If she's guilty
she ought to be relieved of the awful suspense she must
be suffering now.”
Britz squirmed uneasily in his seat.
“I hate to see her over there in the Tombs,” he said,
“but it is best to make the guilty man believe we are
concentrating our efforts against the girl. There are
still so many hurdles to jump before this race is over
that I don't want to have him throw any more in our
way. As long as he remains in fancied security he'll
stay inactive. That's the way I want him to remain.”
“Who do you think did the trick?” suddenly ques-
tioned Mott.


2I4 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“Sands, Griswold, or the Indian servant,” came
from the detective's hesitant lips.
The prosecutor's hands went above his head in a
despairing gesture.
“Holy smoke!” he burst forth vehemently. “Is
that as far as you've arrived? Three suspects, and
you've no idea which one you want! What sort of
weak stuff is in your possession that you don't know
whom you're after?”
“The circle is narrowing very quickly,” Britz ob-
served. “In the next few days I’ll know who com-
mitted the robbery, how it was committed, and where
the jewels were taken. But I have got to have the
necessary time.”
“All right,” agreed the prosecutor. He called a
clerk and directed him to inform Miss Holcomb's
lawyer that the case had been withdrawn from the
calendar for a month.
“Thank you,” murmured the detective. “You’ll
see the wisdom of the move pretty soon.”
“I don't want to send an innocent woman to jail,”
drawled Mott, “but I'll be hanged if I see how you're
going to convince anyone that she didn't take those
jewels. That telltale diamond in her room is more
eloquent than all the theories you can propound.
However, Britz, go ahead and do your worst,” he
laughed.
The detective was reaching for his hat when Don-
nelly and Carson burst into the room. Donnelly's
face was flushed with the news of a great dis-
covery. Carson was smiling approvingly on his
partner.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 2I5
“We’ve got the motive for the crime,” the two men
shouted in one breath.
Britz assumed an attitude of eager interest. The
prosecutor looked significantly at him.
“What have you discovered?” he asked.
“That man Fitch is mixed up in the case just as
I always thought,” Donnelly informed him. “She
stole those diamonds for his sake. It's another case
of the girl turning thief to help her lover.”
Meaning glances darted between Britz and the assist-
ant district attorney.
“Well,” drawled Donnelly, as if to prolong the
suspense, “we’ve run the whole thing down and we
have it here in black and white.” His fingers clasped
three or four letters which he flaunted temptingly be-
fore the eyes of the prosecutor. “They confirm our
suspicion that Fitch is at the bottom of the whole case.
Rather, that he's the man ‘higher up.’”
Mott gathered the contents of the missives in three
or four sweeping glances. An exultant smile lit his
face as he handed them to Britz. He perused them
closely, as if weighing their import while noting their
contents. His impassive face masked the emotions
they aroused in him, and he returned them to the
assistant district attorney with an air of indifference.
“These letters are conclusive,” Mott pronounced.
“Conclusive of what?” demanded Britz.
“That Miss Holcomb was the tool of her fiancé,
and that the two have combined to enlist your sym-
pathy.”
“I guess it wasn't a bad bit of detective work to
get those letters,” Donnelly smiled.
2-


216 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“I guess not,” agreed Carson, anxious to justify
his partner's little outburst of self-adulation.
Britz turned to them abruptly. Their flippant tones
irritated him. His nature revolted at the ill-bred
rejoicing over the prospective degradation of a
WOrnan.
“How did you get the letters?” he asked brusquely.
Donnelly, ready to burst with the important evidence
he had gathered, needed no urging to impart the de-
sired information.
“I had Dr. Fitch shadowed from the day he
appeared at Headquarters to inquire about Miss Hol-
comb,” he said. “That's how I got on that he was
negotiating with a real estate agent. Luckily, the
agent was a friend of mine, and he informed me that
Fitch had purchased and paid for a site on which to
build a modern sanitorium. Yes, sir, he put up $90,-
OOO for the ground; and the buildings and furnishings,
I learned, are to cost nearly a quarter of a million.
It wasn't easy to get the agent to turn over Fitch's
letters, but I told him he'd have to produce them before
the grand jury under a subpoena, so he handed them
over.”
“Have you tried to learn where he got the money?”
Britz demanded.
Donnelly smiled a blighting smile.
“It's plain enough where he got the money,”
he replied. “The individual stones of the neck-
lace would bring all the money he needed for the
deal.”
“But have you tried to make sure that he sold the
diamonds?” Britz persisted.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 217
“I’ll get all that without much trouble,” was the
confident reply.
“Well, go ahead and get it,” Britz ordered.
When the two detectives left the room Mott found
it impossible to restrain his gratification.
“I guess you'll admit you're on the wrong lay?”
he jeered. “You’ve bewildered yourself with your
own zeal. This is the sort of stuff I want,” he de-
clared, fingering the letters. “You’ve been led astray.
Now get on the right trail and accomplish something.”
An attendant entered with a card. The prosecutor
glanced at it and passed it over to the detective.
“He’s an old friend,” Mott remarked. “We were
in college together.”
A dark flush suffused Britz's countenance and deep-
ened his yellow ivory complexion to a dull gray. He
fixed a look of anxious interrogation on Mott, as if
doubtful of the wisdom of admitting the visitor into
this back room of the temple of justice.
“I know he's one of your suspects,” the prosecutor
laughed, at the same time pressing a button which
sounded a buzzer in the reception room. “Yes, he's
one of the figures in this comedy of errors you're
playing, but I’ll not inform him that, in your eyes,
he's one of the possible thieves. You may go ahead
suspecting whom you will without interference on my
part.”
The swinging door opened, and Griswold sauntered
into the room. The cordial smile he bestowed on
Mott faded to superciliousness when he beheld Britz.
He glanced at the detective as if resentful of his pres-
ence.


218 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“I presume you can guess why I called,” he said
familiarly to the prosecutor.
“It requires no mind reader to fathom the object
of your visit,” Mott laughed back.
“Mrs. Missioner is on the verge of nervous pros-
tration,” Griswold informed. “She asked me to in-
quire about the progress of the case. Do you know,
she can't get herself to believe Elinor guilty. Sands
is inclined to agree with her to the extent of offering
to go on Miss Holcomb's bond.”
“Why doesn't he do so?” inquired the prosecutor.
“Because Mrs. Missioner objects,” Griswold re-
plied. “She believes that the swiftest way to clear
Elinor is to permit her to remain in the Tombs. I
confess I cannot see the force of her argument, but she
is evidently acting under what she believes to be com-
petent advice.”
Britz's eyes traveled up and down Griswold's form,
taking in the jaunty cut of his clothing, his drooping
reddish blond mustache, his pale, watery eyes and
narrow forehead, in which three long veins pulsed
under the transparent skin. Griswold's bland smile
carried no suggestion of his inner nature. Its geniality
was plainly forced and lost what ingratiating qualities
it was meant to convey. The furtive glances he darted
at the detective did not go unobserved by Britz. It
was as if Griswold was trying to take the measure of
the police lieutenant, and Britz, conscious of the mental
effort of the other man, drew within himself, present-
ing an impenetrable exterior to his silent questioner.
“What's doing in this case anyhow?” suddenly
flashed Griswold.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 219
“Looks kind of bad for Miss Holcomb,” returned
Mott.
“I’m sorry,” commented Griswold. “I hate to
believe her guilty of such base ingratitude. But senti-
ment must clear the way for facts, and if the evidence
points to her, I don't see how I can get away from
the unpleasant conclusion that she stole the gems. But
really, I do wish this nasty mess were over and done
with. I hope there'll be no further delay in bringing
the case to trial.”
Britz cushioned his head against the back of the
chair in the attitude of an indifferent listener to the
conversation between the other men. If he had any
views on the subject under discussion, he gave no
audible indication of them.
“The case has been adjourned for a month,” Mott
said.
A flash of disappointment darkened Griswold's
features.
“This interminable delay is exceedingly annoying
to Mrs. Missioner,” he commented. “The uncertainty
as to the outcome of the case is upsetting all her plans.
She is anxious to have the whole thing over, and I
agree with her that the case ought to be wound up
at once.”
“Why are you in a hurry to bring the case to trial?”
suddenly flashed Britz. The blunt query aroused Gris-
wold to a recognition of the peculiar position into
which he had thrust himself.
“Of course, I have no right to inject my wishes
into a criminal prosecution,” he hastened to explain.
“But I am deeply concerned for Mrs. Missioner, and


22O BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
I only echo her expressed desire when I request a
speedy termination of the intolerable situation in which
she finds herself.”
“The intricacies of the case necessitate further de-
lay,” Mott remarked.
“Intricacies' "repeated Griswold. “Why, the case
is simplicity itself. All the circumstances point in one
direction, and circumstances never lie.”
“No, but the inferences drawn from them are fre-
quently incorrect,” Britz amended.
“You don’t mean to hint that you believe Miss
Holcomb innocent?” flashed Griswold.
“I’m not hinting at anything,” the detective flared
back. “I only mean that if she's guilty we want more
time to fasten the guilt on her.”
The detective's tone carried a menace that Griswold
understood. To urge haste in bringing Elinor to trial,
the society man realized, would result in an unpleasant
verbal encounter with Britz. And, above all other
things, Griswold detested unpleasant outbursts of
temper.
“By the way, have you discovered any new evi-
dence?” he asked in a tone of unconcern.
Mott's hand went unconsciously to the letters. One
by one he handed them to Griswold for perusal.
“It looks as if we were now getting to the bottom
of the case,” the society man commented. He turned,
with a frank expression of gratification, to Britz. “I
see now why further delay is necessary,” he said.
“Dr. Fitch appears to furnish the motive for the
theft. I never have thought Miss Holcomb capable
of it without outside prompting.”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 22I
An affirmative nod from the detective signified his
acquiescence in the other's words.
“May I inform Mrs. Missioner of the contents of
the letters?” he asked.
“You may,” agreed Mott.
“I guess Sands won't be so anxious to go on Miss
Holcomb's bond after he learns the latest developments
in the case,” Griswold remarked. “Prudence will
temper his sympathy.”
“This man Sands,” suddenly queried Mott, “seems
to be an accepted suitor of Mrs. Missioner, doesn't
he P”
A wave of red mounted to Griswold's forehead.
An angry twitch of the corners of his mouth revealed
that the prosecutor had touched a tender spot.
“He seems to divide his time between pursuing
Mrs. Missioner and dropping his inherited millions in
Wall Street,” Griswold replied. “I understand he's
been hard hit in the Street, and that his fortune is
dwindling at a rapid rate.”
“Is that so?” came a meaning query from Britz.
He exchanged significant glances with Mott.
“Do you happen to know anything of his financial
affairs?” asked the prosecutor. The question threw
Griswold into a deep study, out of which he came
gradually by slow stages of mental effort.
“I know he's been hard hit,” he drawled. “And I
know also that he's trying to conceal his reduced
circumstances from Mrs. Missioner. In fact, I believe
he needs money with which to carry his stocks.”
Conscious of the shaft he had thrust, and of the
vague insinuation his words carried, Griswold stopped


222 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
to watch the effect. Britz stared vacantly at the ceil-
ing, as if unconscious of the hint conveyed by Gris-
wold. Mott seemed interested.
“You don't think it possible he also is implicated
in the theft?” he asked.
“I should regard such a supposition as absurd,”
Griswold declared. “But,” he added hastily, “I’ve
had no experience with criminals.”
With a sly look at the detective Griswold arose and
left the room. As the door swung behind him Britz
asked:
“Mott, what do you know about Griswold?”
The prosecutor's eyes narrowed significantly on the
detective.
“Nothing that could be of any service to you in
hunting down the Missioner diamond thief.”
“Perhaps not,” the detective frowned. “But if
you’ll inform me of his private life it will save me the
trouble of hunting it up elsewhere.”
“You don't mean you're going to pry into his
private affairs?” puffed the prosecutor. “Why, it's
outrageous! He's no more connected with the crime
than my grandfather. I tell you, you're making a
horrible mess of this thing.”
An angry wave swept Britz's face, but he controlled
the impulse to fire a sharp retort. The momentary re-
sentment he felt at having his ability assailed passed
without an outburst, and he returned to the discussion
of the case entirely unruffled.
“I am not directing my energies exclusively toward
Griswold,” Britz informed. “I am probing the entire
mystery, trying to drag from the tangle of contradic-


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 223
tory circumstances something that will point unerringly
toward the real thief. I believe that the raveling of
the case is close at hand; therefore, it is essential that
I overlook nothing, no matter how remote its bearing
on the theft of the jewels.”
“I appreciate the care and patience with which you
are working,” Mott said in a more moderate tone, “and
I'll not hamper you in your work.”
“Was Griswold born in this city?” suddenly flashed
the detective.
“No, he's from somewhere in the South,” the
prosecutor replied. “At least, he told me so in
college.”
“How long has he been in business here?”
“About ten or fifteen years I should say.”
“And you have known him intimately all that
time?”
“Not intimately. We met occasionally and, of
course, our attitude toward each other has been that
of old college friends.”
“He’s been engaged in various enterprises since
leaving college, hasn't he? Most of the ventures
proved failures?”
“You seem to know something of his business
affairs,” Mott fired back.
“At present he's secretary of the Iroquois Trust
Company,” Britz continued, disregarding the pros-
ecutor's remark. “Do you know what salary he is
receiving?”
“He gets $10,000 a year,” the attorney informed
him.
“So I understood,” said Britz.


224 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“Well, what of it?” asked Mott. “Anything sig-
nificant in that?”
“No, only his fortune would be materially im-
proved if he married Mrs. Missioner.”
“And you believe the theft of her jewels would
help his suit?” the prosecutor asked sarcastically.
The detective vouchsafed no reply. With character-
istic abruptness, he switched to Sands.
“If Sands has lost heavily in Wall Street we ought
to look into it. He had equal opportunity with Gris-
wold to steal the collarette,” he said.
“I have no objection,” Mott smiled. “By the
way,” he suddenly asked, “have you obtained any trace
of the truth as to who manufactured the Maharanee?”
“I have found the manufacturer,” Britz replied
calmly.
“What!” The prosecutor bounded out of his chair
as if released by a spring. “And you've withheld the
information from me?”
“The manufacturer of the stone is useless as a
witness. He's hopelessly insane.”
“Has he thrown no light on the case at all?”
“Yes, some light,” Britz admitted reluctantly. He
was not prepared to disclose his hand yet. In fact,
he realized an abundance of work still was necessary
before the result of the interview in the insane asylum
could be shaped into tangible evidence against the man
who had ordered the duplicate diamond.
“Doesn't he recall who ordered the duplicate?” the
prosecutor asked.
“No,” the detective replied. “He is in the last
stage of dementia. But we searched his effects and


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 225
found a sketch of the Maharanee drawn on the back
of a visiting card.”
Triumphant beams shot from Mott's eyes. He
faced the detective, one hand extended in congratu-
lation.
“I take back everything I said about your having
botched the case,” he offered apologetically. “What-
ever the outcome, you certainly are close to the heart
of the mystery. Britz, was it a man or a woman who
ordered the stone?”
The detective's hand slipped into the inner pocket
of his coat. It produced a long envelope from which
he took the card, passing it over to the prosecutor.
Mott looked at the name engraved on the pasteboard
with widening eyes. His lips extended until the mouth
seemed a thin, shapeless slit. Suddenly his jaw opened
and snapped, as if he had come to a quick determina-
tion.
“Sands!” he exclaimed. “So he ordered the fake
Maharaneel By George, I now see the importance of
Griswold's information with regard to his financial
affairs. Sands is hit hard in the market,” he con-
tinued slowly as if viewing the case from a new angle.
“He’s hard up. Needs cash to cover his margins!
Has a duplicate necklace made Of course, if he had
the Maharanee counterfeited, he also had the rest of
the paste gems manufactured.” Mott was talking half
to himself, but his words kindled a pleasant light in
the detective's eyes. “Sands has the motive for the
crime, and he has the opportunity to commit it.” The
prosecutor's hand closed about Britz's palm. “I con-
gratulate you,” he finished.


226 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“Not yet,” the detective flashed back. “I’ve only
hit the trail. It may lead into strange lanes.”
He said nothing of his kidnaping in Central Park
nor of the inferences he drew from the discovery of
the card with the drawing on the back. Mott, how-
ever, kept his mind fixed on the important evidence.
“Sands is hard up for money; that's certain > *
“Not altogether,” interrupted the detective. “Have
you seen the afternoon papers?”
“No,” the prosecutor replied.
From the pocket of his coat Britz drew a newspaper
and pointed to the big headlines of the first column.
“MORE THAN TWO MILLIONS
FOR TUBERCULOSIS CURE *
“What has that to do with the diamond robbery?”
Mott inquired.
“‘The Committee for the Prevention and Cure of
Tuberculosis,’” the detective read, ““acknowledges
receipt of the following amounts from the following
donors.’” He pointed halfway down the column, and
emphasizing each syllable, he said:
“‘Bruxton Sands—$200,000.’”
It was the second largest individual donation and
Mott grasped its significance instantly.
“He certainly didn't steal the necklace to raise
money for the cure of tuberculosis,” he commented.
“And he certainly couldn't have afforded that big
check if he needed money for stock speculation.” He
turned sharply to Britz. “What do you make of it?”
he snapped.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 227
“It is one of the guideposts to the diamond theft,”
Britz pronounced:
The look of inquiry which the prosecutor bestowed
on the detective remained unanswered. As if fearful
of having committed some indiscretion in giving even
this meager hint of his thoughts, Britz rose hastily and,
with a parting hint as to the complexity of the case,
swung through the door and hastened out of the build-
ing. Unconsciously, his footsteps took him to Head-
quarters, and into Manning's presence.
“Griswold was down here to see me about the case,”
the Chief informed him. “He tells me you induced
Mott to postpone it for a month?’”
“That is true,” the detective responded.
“Why?” demanded Manning.
“Because I’m reaching out for the real thief,”
Britz returned with increasing satisfaction. “I’ve got
him, Manning. He can't get away.”
“Well, who's the thief?” the Chief inquired tersely.
Britz averted his face to conceal the unwonted agi-
tation that had suddenly sprung up within him. A
new light gleamed in his eyes—a light not called up
by the excitement of the chase. The mere tracking
of criminals was part of the routine of his life; he
followed the course of his trails unemotionally, like a
well-oiled machine. But the contemplation of saving
a human soul in distress, the consciousness of exercis-
ing his talents in behalf of a woman who had touched
his utmost pity, the knowledge that he alone stood
between her and the living death that awaited her in
State prison, increased the pulsation of his heart,
thrilled him with a sense of noble purpose that was


23o BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
lowed the deindividualizing experience of every man
in the stress of industrial strife, and this had finished
the process. Sands, so far as externals went, was
about as impressionable as a totem pole; but deep
within the man, in the still reaches where his thoughts
threw off the veneer of civilization, he plunged into a
wilderness of fancy that was his principal relaxation,
and it was there that there existed sentiments as chival-
rously romantic as any that ever actuated the finest
squire of dames.
Mightiest of all his hidden emotions was his love
of Doris Missioner. He had been fond of her in
her girlhood. He had admired her in her glittering
triumph as the wife of the multi-millionaire, Mis-
sioner, and from the days of her early widowhood he
had loved her with an ardor that made the devotion
of youth to maiden seem pale indeed.
A logical paradox was the result of his tardy recog-
nition of his heart attitude toward her. As often hap-
pens in the case of a man who has repressed the
romances of his real nature, who has incased himself
in armorplate proof against bombardment by whole
flotillas of summer girls and flying squadrons of
match-making mammas, Sands, in his love, had
adopted in part the viewpoint of the other sex. His
love of Doris had become, instead of merely an im-
portant incident in his career, the horizon boundary
of his life, and the winning of her was the only thing
he had not achieved that could take on, in his eyes,
the dignity of an event. He had everything else—
wealth, family, position, health, and strong mentality.
All those things were of little value unless the posses-


232 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
home. He hoped it would reach her while yet her
heart was softened by the sight of Elinor's separation
from her lover, and that she would send a favorable
reply to his apartment soon enough for him to find
it on his return from the office. Then habit took him
back to his desk; habit made him call his secretary,
and dictate letters that had awaited his attention since
morning; habit made him attend, with a magnificent
semblance of interest, a particularly prosy meeting
of an exceptionally dry directorate. From first to
last, as the afternoon sped on, his heart asked him,
“What are you doing here? Why are you wasting
hours in pursuing all this additional wealth—hours
that you might devote to the winning of your life's
desire?” So insistent was that inner questioning that
in the end it reduced his resolve to a negligible quantity
that soon dwindled beyond the vanishing point. Al-
most in the midst of a telephonic conversation with
a man in Chicago following the directors' meeting,
the millionaire abruptly flung the receiver on the hook,
thrust himself into an overcoat of fur, but of gossamer
lightness, seized his hat and stick, and, disdaining
all vehicles in his eagerness, strode swiftly up Broad-
way at a pace that took him to the Parthenon-sculp-
tured entrance of the St. Barnabas apartment house.
Britz walked there too. But it was to think, and
not to regain control of his emotions, that he chose
normal locomotion in preference to cab or carriage.
It had been such a busy day even for him that his
thoughts required marshaling, his logic called for ad-
justment, and his analysis demanded new setting of
the screws to restore it to its finer focus. Britz did


234 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
consideration of the case, the Headquarters man had
eliminated Sands almost as quickly as he had Elinor
Holcomb. If an Easterner stole the gems it could
be none other than Mrs. Missioner's Indian servant,
Ali, unless—and Britz did some pretty deep thinking
on this point—the crime was done by another East
Indian, also in the employ of the mysterious Brahmin
priest. Up to that afternoon the issue had seemed
squarely joined. Griswold or Blodgett on one hand,
Ali or a compatriot on the other—brown man or white,
son of yesterday, or heir of to-morrow. -
But that card | Sands's cardſ Against the back-
ground of the electric signs beginning to gleam in the
Great White Way ahead of him, Britz saw, as if
stippled on the twilight sky, that incriminating inscrip-
tion, “Mr. Bruxton Sands.”
Lieutenant Britz admitted that that simple line on
the little white card apparently snapped in twain the
long chain of facts he had linked together with so much
skill and patience. If Sands got Martin to make the
false Maharanee diamond why did he do so? Why
should he have done so, unless with the idea of sub-
stituting it for the real diamond? Was there a com-
pact between Sands and Griswold? Did the clubman
make the sketches only to have the millionaire give
them to the artisan with the order for the manufacture
of a fraudulent gem? How could there well be a
league between men as antipodally dissimilar as these
two—Sands and Griswold? What motive could there
have been to despoil the widow whom both wished to
marry? It seemed impossible that a man of the sub-
stantial worth of Bruxton Sands could entertain a


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 235
dishonest thought. It seemed equally unlikely that
Griswold would waste time in so perilous a hazard.
“Object, matrimony,” was the keynote to all Gris-
wold's pursuit of the widow. Britz did not believe
the clubman was in love with her in the right sense
and, cautious though he was about attributing mo-
tives, he could not credit Griswold with disinterested
impulses. Open though his mind was to the reception
of incontrovertible facts, he was unwilling to arraign
Sands as either a hypocrite or a thief. The very word
thief seemed incongruous in connection with the mil-
lionaire, no matter how large the prize. Sands might
not be able to buy as many stones like the Maharanee
diamond as the wealthy widow, for where he counted
his fortune in seven figures, she could count hers in
eight or nine. Nor was there the nth quantity—the
possibility that Sands had stolen the jewel in the col-
lector's lust of possession. Sands was not a collector;
not, at any rate, in the sense of being a faddist, to say
nothing of a monomaniac.
Every detail in the millionaire's suite in the St.
Barnabas and of his private room in the Bowling
Green office was known to Britz even more minutely
than to the owner. That had been among the early
activities of the sleuth in connection with the case.
He was able to assure himself, therefore, that no
matter how much Sands might admire the Maharanee
diamond, especially when it encircled the white throat
of the wealthy widow, it would be nonsensical to sup-
pose this admiration could descend to covetousness.
Clearly, Britz was in some sort of blind alley. He
was not, however, prepared to retire from a cul-de-sac


238 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
rising and falling. It crouched outside the window
in such a way as showed Britz it was on a fire escape,
or a balcony of some sort. The rustling sound in-
creased, and it was followed by a faint “cheep,” like
a sparrow's call. A second shadow fluttered from
a point above the window and melted into the outlines
of the first. Then came a slightly rasping sound, and
the lower sash, Britz noticed, trembled. By well-nigh
imperceptible degrees the sash was lifted. The next
instant two men noiselessly lowered themselves to the
floor and glanced hastily about the room. Reassured
by the swift look they tiptoed along the walls from
right to left; one of them stopped at the chiffonier,
the other continued his little journey of investigation
until he arrived at the portières. Then it was that
Britz held his breath. He held it for seconds that
seemed tedious as hours, while the nearer of the
strange visitors, separated from him only by the thick-
ness of the leather, peered through the parting between
the curtains into the library where the detective stood.
Britz had not obtained a good view of the intruder's
face, for it was half hidden by a loose fold of the
turban upon his head that indicated the stranger's
nationality. Britz's eyes still were fixed at the hole,
and by that time the stranger was out of his line
of vision. Had such not been the case, it is possible
that even the imperturbable Britz would have moved
at least to the extent of a swift reach to a side pocket
in his coat. For it was about as evil a countenance as
one could expect to see anywhere, save under the
shadow of the gallows. In it rapacity, ferocity, blood-
thirstiness, and cruelty of every degree spoke loudly.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 239
If that savage face had advanced an inch or two
nearer, those snaky eyes would have seen the man
from Mulberry Street who shrank into himself behind
the shelter of the protecting strip of leather. But it
did not; and, after a leisurely survey of the interior,
the Oriental returned to the other end of the inner
room and rejoined his companion.
Hardly had Britz begun to let the air seep out of
his lungs, and before he had indulged in the luxury
of an intake of breath, when he became an interested
spectator in the gentlemanly art of searching a gentle-
man's room. The Central Office man was no Vidocq.
It is doubtful if he had even read Poe's story of
“The Missing Letter,” and had he done so, it is by
no means certain he would have adapted the methods
of the French police to metropolitan detective work.
Nevertheless, he had flattered himself that he usually
made a pretty thorough search for anything he wanted;
but what he saw through that tiny pin hole in the
leather portière showed him that he was the veriest
tyro in that sort of thing. The two visitors went
through the millionaire's furniture and other posses-
sions with a minuteness that would have made a fine-
tooth comb look like a garden rake. There could
not have remained anything—any nook or corner, any
crack or crevice, not anything larger than a bacillus
which they happened to covet. If an article no bigger
than a pinhead had been the object of their hunt,
their untiring scrutiny would have brought it to light.
Yet so deftly had they searched that, granting them
a minute's respite, they could have left the room with-
out any traces of their activity.


242 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
erners were bound with silk handkerchiefs as soft, yet
strong, as any scarf they could have produced in the
bazaars of Calcutta or Cawnpore. When the task
was done, and it was done pretty neatly, Britz relaxed
his hold on the half-struggling men's throats and
pushed them against the back of the sofa until they
half-sat, half-lay there, head to head. Then he stepped
back, rested his hands on his hips, and eyed them
mockingly.
“You are not very clever,” he said, “but anyway,
you're a fine-looking body of men. What do you think
of yourselves, anyhow P Think you'll cut out this
‘second story' game? Or will you content yourselves
with the safer occupation of dips? My private advice
to you is to try hencoops for a while. Cut out the
big circuit, and go and get a reputation.”
How much of his biting irony, if any, the Orientals
understood they did not indicate. They only gazed
at him in dumb misery, evidently in expectation of an
ignoble end. They followed Britz with their joint
gaze as he paced up and down the room, both pitifully
watchful, and manifestly most wholesomely afraid.
“You saw part of what these chaps were doing,
Mr. Sands,” said Britz, “but what you saw was only
the last of it. I want to tell you the way they went
through this room was amazing. I hope you didn't
lose many valuables.”
Sands, in his slow way, assured the detective that
it was not likely the searchers had found anything he
would miss very greatly; but the Headquarters man
was not satisfied. The mystery of the proceeding, he
was inclined to think, did not begin and end with the


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 243
Orientals. It was possible, of course, they had
searched Sands's room simply as a matter of routine
in the same way that at the first opportunity they prob-
ably would search the home of everyone who might
be connected in any way with the Missioner jewel
robbery. Yet something stirred uneasily in Britz's
mind as he reflected on the possibility that the coming
of the Orientals held a deeper significance. What if
they had reason to believe they would surely find what
they sought in that room? If Sands did not know
there was justification for the search, why did he
take it so calmly? It did not seem natural for a man
to keep his temper whose apartments had been invaded
so thoroughly. If the millionaire had expressed any
indignation he, Britz, would have felt better satisfied.
Besides, what was it the Hindoos had taken from
Sands's desk? Sands had not seen them take any-
thing, as they were ending their search when he got
the first glimpse of them. Britz watched Sands closely
to see if the millionaire's eyes would turn anxiously
toward that part of his furniture. He almost started
when the first move Sands made, after finishing his
task of binding the prisoners, was to saunter with a
careless air across the room and, in passing, glance
swiftly and questioningly into the pigeon-holes whence
the thieves had abstracted the mysterious articles that
so actively engaged Britz's always active curiosity.
“It’s about up to us to do a little searching now,
isn't it?” asked Britz. “These bright young men
have had their innings, and I believe it’s our turn at
bat. What do you say, Mr. Sands?”
Sands said nothing. He nodded his head in assent,


244 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
however, and Britz began a search of the Orientals
fully as exhaustive as that they had performed on the
room. Before he had gone far in his quest, Sands
volunteered assistance, and each explored the folds
of the Hindoos' raiment with the clumsiness that might
be expected of men not accustomed to that sort of
work.
Britz, working more swiftly than the millionaire,
made his first find. It was a sheet of notepaper of
fashionable size and tint, on which had been written
a few lines in a feminine hand. Britz had not the
slightest compunction of conscience about reading it.
Chivalry was all very well in its way, but it played
no part in detective work, especially when the lady
most concerned was not present to make a protest.
He moved to the center of the room, and in the light
of a cluster of incandescent lamps read aloud to Sands
the following enigmatical missive:
“CURTIS DEAR: When are you coming up to the hotel? If
you do not come or send me a check quickly, I shall have to sell
some of the jewels. MILLICENT.”
That was all. Whether that “all” was much or
little, Britz, offhand, was not prepared to say. The
use of Griswold's given name at the beginning of the
note apparently meant a good deal. But who was
Millicent? In the course of his probing of the Mis-
sioner diamond mystery, Britz had canvassed the com-
plete visiting list of everyone who was in the opera
box on the night when the falsity of the Maharanee
diamond was discovered. He had had compiled a
social register of everyone interested in the case—


BRITZ; OF HEADQUARTERS 245
everyone that Mrs. Missioner, Sands, Griswold, Miss
Holcomb, Miss March, and the Swami knew. In all
that long roster there was no one named “Millicent.”
Neither, for that matter, was there a “Mildred.”
There the signature was, too clear to admit of any
mistake. The writing was excellent, and while it
did not go to the extreme of the current fashion in
chirography, it was what Britz called in his vivid
vernacular “classy.”
“Ever seen that fist before?” asked the detective
as he handed the note to Sands.
The millionaire shook his head. While it was true,
Britz reflected, that the big man was known as
“Silent" Sands in Wall Street society, he was
certainly more economical of words than anyone
he had ever known in his life. Aloud, he con-
tinued:
“Are you sure you have never seen any writing at
all like that before?”
Another shake of the head was Sands's only con-
cession to the detective's right to question him. He
gave the note back to the Headquarters man, who re-
turned to the circle of light under the incandescent lamp
and studied it again. Meanwhile, Sands went on
with his search of the second Oriental. He was not
as clever in his movements as Britz, and when he tried
to conceal something, he signally failed. For the de-
tective, though his eyes seemingly were fastened on
the note addressed to Griswold, saw the millionaire
take something out of the Oriental's tunic and then
slip it into his waistcoat pocket.
“Something else, eh?” asked Britz. Sands nodded.
A-


246 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“Mind letting me see what it is?” Sands shook
his head slowly, decisively.
“What's the objection?”
“It is not anything that can possibly interest you,”
returned the millionaire.
“How do you know that, Mr. Sands?” asked the
detective.
“I do know it,” said Sands emphatically.
“Well, I don't know about that,” Britz returned.
“I think I'm the best judge of what interests me;
and, as I have played a pretty active part in this little
incident, it seems to me the least you can do is to
gratify my curiosity.”
“Well, I will not,” was Sands's defiant answer.
“And while we are on the subject, Lieutenant Britz,
let me say I should like to understand the purpose of
your visit to my rooms.”
“Oh, you would, would you?” snapped Britz.
“I certainly should,” Sands replied. “I come home
to find you peeping through a hole in my portière, and
two Easterners, with whom apparently you have had
nothing to do, going through my desk and other
belongings. I rather think I am entitled to know
the why and the wherefore.”
“I rather think you are, Mr. Sands,” said Britz,
“and I don't mind telling you I came here to see
you privately, and arrived just in time to see these
gentlemen drop to that fire escape and come in by
that window. After that I had the pleasure of wit-
nessing the dexterity with which they ransacked your
chiffonier, your desk, your bedside table, your bed,
your chairs, your rugs, and everything else in the


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 247
room. Maybe you will explain to me the reason they
have such a deep interest in your housekeeping
arrangements?”
“Maybe you will do a little more explaining, Lieu-
tenant Britz,” said the millionaire. “You will ob-
serve that when I said these fellows had no connec-
tion with you, I qualified the assertion?”
“Oh, that was very good of you,” said Britz.
Sands continued.
“I should like-to know right here and now just how
far this qualification extends.”
“Well, Mr. Sands,” answered the detective as he
relighted his cigar and disposed himself in the most
comfortable of attitudes in the chair beside the desk,
“there are a good many things we may like to explain.
I should like, for instance, to know how your visiting
card came to be in the possession of a man who is an
inmate of the State Hospital for the Insane on Ward's
Island P’’
If Britz expected to startle Sands into any physical
expression of guilt, he was disappointed. The mil-
lionaire's muscles were as inflexible as his determina-
tion not to satisfy the detective's inquisitiveness in
regard to that which he had taken from the
Hindoo.
“You are in a mood for riddles, lieutenant,” said
Sands slowly. “Now, you see, I am not. My time
is too valuable.”
“Well, what are you going to do about these fel-
lows?” asked Britz.
“Oh, don't you bother about them,” said Sands.
“I guess I can take care of them.”
2-


248 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“I guess you'll guess again,” said Britz, “for
if anybody is going to take care of these gen-
tlemen, behold in me the only original little care-
taker.”
Britz turned to the Hindoos.
“Now, then, you dusky beauties, suppose you come
along with me.”
“Going to carry them?” asked Sands.
Britz blushed; yes, Britz fairly and squarely blushed.
In his momentary exasperation at the millionaire's
stubbornness he had forgotten that not only the hands,
but also the feet of the Orientals were bound. How-
ever, he was not to be disconcerted, and it was with
sufficient readiness that he replied:
“You don't suppose I take my prisoners through
the streets like a member of the Traffic Squad, do
you? Where's your telephone?”
Sands indicated the instrument and Britz took it
up and called for 31oo Spring.
“Headquarters?” he asked over the wire. “Yes,
this is Britz. Have a wagon sent from the West
Thirtieth Street Station to the St. Barnabas Apartment
house. No, don't send the reserves; just send a
couple of men. Good-by.”
As he rung off, he turned and faced his host.
“Mr. Sands,” said he, “there are one or two
points about which I would like to talk to you this
evening. I came to you frankly and directly because
I found one of your cards in the possession of a man
who, while mentally unbalanced, knows something
about the fake Maharanee diamond. After arriving
here, I had the opportunity to serve you in the way


250 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
addicted to cigars or cigarettes to the exclusion of all
other forms of the weed, permit me to suggest that
when we have left you alone, you retire to the remote
background of your apartment, put that in your pipe,
and smoke it!”
Sands became genuinely angry. It took a good deal
to disturb his equanimity, but the detective's manner, as
he saw it, was offensive. Sands seriously meditated
for an instant an attempt to grasp the Headquarters
man by the collar, rush him to the door, and drop him
down at least one flight of stairs. The sleuth's cool-
ness and courage avoided any unpleasantness of that
sort, and his unwilling host quickly regained his grip
upon himself.
The tension of the situation was relaxed by the
buzzing of the electric bell at the outer door of the
apartment, and the entrance of a somewhat bluster-
ing bellboy with an announcement that a patrol
wagon was at the door and two policemen were ask-
ing for Detective Britz of Headquarters, who was
visiting Mr. Sands.
“Bring them up,” said Britz, wasting no further
time on courtesy. Then he turned to the millionaire
and said:
“I wouldn't have brought the patrol wagon here,
Mr. Sands, if you had been a little more considerate.
A couple of plain-clothes men could have taken these
fellows to the police station easily enough; but, when a
man, through a rush of emotion to the brain, or—for-
some—other reason—makes faces at the law as openly
as you have done, why, let the law take its course, I
say.”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 251
Sands maintained a dignified silence as a pair of blue-
coats, stumbling over a bearskin rug in the library,
came into the suite, and at a sign from Britz, seized
the shrinking Orientals. One by one the prisoners
were lifted, neck and heels, and taken to the patrol
wagon. Britz, of course, could have had the bandages
about their feet removed, for it would have been per-
fectly safe to let those sturdy policemen escort them
to the sidewalk in the ordinary way; but Britz was only
human. The memory of the grip in which those very
men had held him in the ride along Riverside Drive,
of the smothering solitude of the desolate apartment
house, and the struggle which had followed, came to
him in the moment when he was on the point of
ordering the unfettering of the captives. With a grin
that struck terror to their cringing Eastern souls, he
said to them:
“You two artists are so fond of silk that I guess
I'll let you wear those ornaments a little while
longer.”
When the Hindoos were gone, Britz turned to
Sands, and said with emphasis:
“If you experience a change of heart, Mr. Sands, I
shall be very glad to hear from you in regard to what
you found on our dark friend. Of course, since you
are in your own rooms, and since the article was evi-
dently stolen in this place by the fellow, I cannot com-
pel you, without a great deal of trouble, to let me see
it. It is not at all certain it would be worth my while
to take that trouble; but it may dawn upon you before
very long that it will be well worth your while, Mr.
Sands, not only to let me see the thing, but to tell me


252 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
everything you know about it. Good-night, Mr.
Sands.” -
And there was something ominous in the military
click of the detective's heels as he walked across the
echoing marquetry to the elevator.


CHAPTER XVIII
THE GLITTERING DANCE
DoRIS MISSIONER was affected much more deeply
than she would have thought probable when she read
the ardor-breathing proposal of marriage from Brux-
ton Sands. To say that it surprised her would be to
set feminine intuition at a discount. She had known
for a long time that Sands was in love with her, and
on several occasions had been perilously close to the
necessity of accepting or rejecting him.
He was not the sort of man with whom any woman
could trifle, even if she wished to do so; and Mrs. Mis-
sioner, in spite of the adulation shown to her on all
sides from the beginning of her social career, was not
that sort of woman. She had no desire to keep her
millionaire lover in suspense; but, on the other hand,
she did not wish to take so important a step without
knowing to the full the exact state of her heart's feel-
ings. In all the long period of the industry captain's
wooing, she had never been able to decide for herself
whether she cared for him sufficiently to become his
wife. Matrimony was a grave subject in her eyes—a
much more formidable one than would be imagined
by those who knew how happy her first union had
been. But, there is happiness, and then again, there
is happiness. Doris had been happy as Missioner's
wife, it is true, in the sense that she had everything
she wanted; that she had a great deal more than she
253


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 255
with which, she told herself, he must be content for
the present. When she had written it, she dressed for
dinner rather earlier than usual, dined with only little
Dorothy March as a vis-à-vis, and, after an hour or so
spent in working out pretty problems with her youth-
ful protégée, rang for her limousine and was whirled
away to a dance at the home of one of her dear five
hundred friends. Mrs. Missioner's arrival was an
instant triumph, a royal progress. She laughed and
chatted with men who adored her, and with women
who would have done the same if they had not been—
WOmen.
Yet there was a monotony about it all to her, for
although she was fond of society, she had seen the
same faces, heard the same small talk, listened to the
same music, and danced the same dances many, many
times in the course of that season. Just when her
vague wish for the unusual was shaping itself into a
materialization of the grisly phantom, boredom, a little
stir at the entrance to the ballroom heralded the ar-
rival of a man who quickly drove the little drab devil
of ennui from his perch upon Mrs. Missioner's satin
shoulder.
The newcomer was a tall person, wearing the
ordinary evening attire of gentlemen, with the addi-
tion, however, of a showy turban that crowned his
long black hair, like a wreath of snow upon a darkling
mountain-side. It needed no second glance to tell
Mrs. Missioner that they had already met. She knew
it long before the Swami’s dark eyes swung their twin
searchlight glance in her direction. Mrs. Missioner
recognized readily the mysterious stranger of the opera


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 257
seated herself on a Louis Quinze chair and said, al-
most coaxingly:
“I feel pretty sure you know more about the history
of that jewel than I do.”
“Indeed!” was the Swami’s only concession.
“Yes, indeed and indeed,” said the widow, with a
gay little laugh. “Of course, a sage cannot be ex-
pected to occupy his thoughts with anything so friv-
olous as a diamond, however beautiful. Yet I am con-
vinced that if you were to unbend from your medita-
tions of the occult long enough to scan your memory,
you would recall facts in connection with it that would
be very interesting to me.” -
“May I inquire your reason for so thinking, dear
madam?”
“It is a reasonable request on your part,” she re-
plied. “I remember my husband told me the stone
had come from the treasure casket of the most beauti-
ful queen in India—is not that why it is called the Ma-
haranee diamond?”
“It would be difficult to explain the name of every
great diamond in Hindostan,” said the Swami
evasively. “Since your husband gave you a history
of the stone, surely you cannot doubt its authen-
ticity?”
“Oh, of course not,” said the widow. “It is not
in regard to its more recent history that I am ques-
tioning you. I think you know not only all the
traditions hinging upon it, but that you are also con-
versant with its journeyings through your native land
before it became the possession of the Maharanee from
whom my husband bought it.”


26o BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
few hours made Mrs. Missioner seem more willing to
be monopolized by the clubman than she would have
been under any other circumstances. Who so debonair
as Griswold when he led the beautiful widow through
the mazes of the square dance, or floated with her
about the room to the melody of the Gitana waltz?
Who more worthy of the homage due a conquistador
as he paraded the wealthy woman's acquiescence to his
open wooing the length and breadth of the most
brilliant and exclusive ballroom in Fifth Avenue 2 It
was not to be expected that Curtis, under such condi-
tions, could be anything but gay. He glittered. His
conversation sparkled like the receiver of a wireless
instrument. Little Dorothy March was so impressed
by the exceptional gallantry and animation of the
palpably delighted clubman—so deeply impressed, in ,
fact, that it was long ere the memory of that evening
faded in more recent recollections of chocolate nougats
and Forrest Theater matinées.
Now, the question is, would Curtis Griswold have
been as light-hearted if he had known that a letter
addressed to him was intercepted at the door of this
same mansion in Millionaires' Row by a swarthy gen-
tleman of Oriental aspect, who had dazzled the unsus-
pecting district messenger with a tip of gleaming gold?
Whether he would remains a question. Griswold
never knew it, but Prince Kananda, after a swift
perusal of the note in a secluded smoking room, lost
no time in letting the Swami know it, and it was
worthy of note, though perhaps nobody noticed it, that
within a very few minutes after their second meeting
in the ballroom, Prince and scholar took their separate


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 263
was in a hurry to accept any clew at its face value;
nevertheless, he felt he had at last something which, if
not a direct link between his knowledge and his sup-
positions, would go far toward connecting them. That
the note was addressed to Curtis Griswold he had lit-
tle doubt. It required small effort of reasoning to con-
clude that the Easterners had gone to Sands's apart-
ment soon after visiting Griswold. By this time, Britz
had learned enough to convince him that the Brahmin
scholar was as eager to get possession of the Missioner
necklace as he was—to get the Maharanee diamond,
anyway, if not all the other gems belonging to the
famous string. By a patient, patchwork process, Britz
had pieced together the tiniest details of the Swami's
movements. He knew all about the scholar's presence
in the Metropolitan Opera House on the night of the
disappearance of the jewels, and he had made himself
acquainted with the system of espionage maintained
by the sage and his subordinates ever since that time.
That system, he was aware, covered everyone con-
nected, however distantly, with the mystery. It was
apparent to Britz that he was working against men
who, while not trained detectives in the Occidental
sense, were fully as persistent in their quest as himself.
There was no question the Swami had directed all the
energies of the Easterners which the detective had
followed interestedly throughout their various mani-
festations. Britz was convinced that he had the Brah-
min priest to thank for his own kidnaping; and he
was equally certain that the same little band of broth-
ers had searched the homes of Bruxton Sands and
Curtis Griswold. He was not given to attaching


264 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
much weight to intuition, regarding that faculty as a
pale and usually ineffective feminine reflection of
masculine logic.
But something told him he must bestir himself even
more vigorously than he had done to date, if he was
to trace the Missioner diamonds before the suave,
subtle men from the East could find them and put them
forever beyond the reach of any Westerner. One
thing was in his favor. Undoubtedly he had broken
the Swami's line of communication by seizing the spies
before they could report the finding of the Millicent
note in Sands's apartment. He had a vague sense
that the scrap of paper would be of immediate value
as a clue to the Brahmin—that if he had not inter-
cepted it, the scholar by now would have been close
upon the discovery of the diamonds. It remained for
Britz himself to ascertain the identity and whereabouts
of Millicent before the Oriental prisoners could com-
municate with their chief. Those prisoners were safe
enough for the present in the Tenderloin Police Sta-
tion; but, although it was in the detective's power to
prevent their immediate arraignment in the Night
Court by a word to the precinct commander, he could
not long keep them in cells. They were entitled to a
speedy examination before the magistrate, and he was
certain that unless their failure to report to the Swami
should alarm that gentleman sooner, steps would be
taken in the morning to have the prisoners produced
in court. They were sure to be arraigned in Jefferson
Market at next day's afternoon session, if not earlier.
Britz felt that, once in their presence, the Swami,
, though he might be separated from them by the length


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 265
of the room, would find means to learn all they knew,
to the last microscopic detail.
He must find Millicent that night. That done, he
had little doubt he would be close to the Missioner
jewels, and probably to the person who had taken
them from their snug harbor in Mrs. Missioner's
library.
“I’ll send for the copies, Burlen,” Britz said, as he
slipped from the stool and started to the door, “but
don't let the original leave your hands until I call for
it myself.”
The detective was so absorbed in his thoughts as he
walked down flight after flight of the dark stairs that
he did not see a pair of eyes gleaming at him from
the gloom at the rear of one of the lower halls. Those
eyes were as black as the darkness that formed their
background, and the Headquarters man would have
been even more than ordinarily on the alert if he had
seen them glistening in the remote recess. As the de-
tective passed on toward the street, the eyes advanced
along the dusk of the hall, and in the faint glow of a
lowered gas-jet at the foot of one of the higher flights
of stairs, there became visible behind them a man who,
in most respects, was a counterpart of the two Ori-
entals at that moment detained in the West Thirtieth
Street Station. The owner of the eyes, while Britz
walked downstairs, as quickly and far more quietly
went up.
Britz turned his steps toward 300 Mulberry Street.
In his own office, after a glance into Manning's room
that showed him it was empty, he called Dr. Fitch
on the telephone and made an appointment to


266 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
meet him in two hours in the bar of the Holland
House.
“It’s one of the quietest places in Manhattan,” said
the detective, “and I want to talk to you very pri-
vately. They are not likely to know me there.”
Britz pushed a button, and when a Headquarters at-
tendant appeared, sent him for the Central Office man
whom, next to himself, he trusted most.
“Send down to Burlen's place in an hour and a
half, Rawson,” said Britz to the other detective.
“He'll have a hundred facsimiles of a letter signed
Millicent. Have as many men as possible get busy
among the hotels. I want to trace the woman who
wrote that signature. They will have to look through
every register for a year past. It's got to be done
thoroughly, and I want it done quickly. Here, I'll
give you a list,” and he hastily scribbled the names of
a half-hundred hostelries of a class such as he thought
the fair Millicent might patronize.
“What time will I see you?” asked Rawson.
“If I'm not back in three hours, I'll call you up,”
said the detective. -
Then, having arrived at a pause in the pursuit of the
jewels, he hastened to a Turkish bath, where, being a
little weary from much metropolitan journeying and
muscle-bound from loss of sleep, he had himself
baked, steamed, chilled, kneaded, and pounded into
shape.
The great detective's indulgence in that luxury all
unknowingly gave to the other side an advantage in
the race for the Missioner jewels that well might
prove fatal to his success. Long before Britz reached


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 267
the hot-air room of the bath, the man with the glisten-
ing eyes who had passed him in the hall of the tumble-
down loft building was at the door of Burlen's work-
shop, straining the angle of his vision to follow the
photo-engraver at work. Those glittering eyes fo–
cused their gaze through the keyhole on a piece of
paper which Burlen had fastened with thumbtacks to
a board, and which, in the glare of an arc lamp, con-
fronted a big camera with a powerful lens. Although
the eyes followed Burlen as well as they could about
the room, their owner was not so much interested in
the artisan's activity as he was in the small white sheet
of paper on which he could discern lines traced in a
woman's hand. Patiently waited the owner of the
eyes. He was of a race that had cultivated patience
through the centuries. Soon or late, undoubtedly, the
man inside would go from the bench beside that great
white light to another part of the room. A few yards
would suffice for the man with the eyes, and even while
Britz still was talking to Rawson in Police Headquar-
ters, Burlen briskly covered those dozen or so feet to
get a chemical in the row of bottles in the rack at the
far end of the shop. The man outside, crouching un-
til he was little higher than an upreared cobra of his
native land, slipped through the doorway, crawled
across the intervening space between the threshold
and the camera, whisked the Millicent note from the
board, and as silently made his escape before Burlen
had replaced the cork in the bottle. By the time De-
tective-Lieutenant Britz was enveloped in the fog of
the steam room, that little note was in the possession
of the Swami and Prince Kananda, and those worthies


268 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
were studying it so swiftly and so profitably that ere
Britz took his cold plunge, the sage and the Maha-
rajah's son made a swifter, deeper dive toward the
heart of the Missioner mystery. It was as a result of
what they learned from Millicent's missive that the
Swami and the Prince went separately to the ballroom
of Doris Missioner's most fashionable friend. It was
also in consequence of the information gleaned from
those petulant feminine lines that the Swami found
Mrs. Missioner's society so interesting, and that the
Prince, before and after that téte-à-tête, experienced
keen curiosity concerning the doings, characteristics,
and state of mind of Curtis Griswold. The third re-
sult of Millicent's little letter and the Easterners' joint
visit to the Fifth Avenue ballroom, was their dash in
separate cabs to a bachelor apartment in a side street
just off Central Park, where, shortly after their sev-
eral arrivals, they were in close consultation for an
hour or more with Ali, the supposedly devoted retainer
of the rich Mrs. Missioner.
For the second note to Curtis Griswold that fell into
the hands of the Hindoos—the one Prince Kananda
intercepted at the door of the Fifth Avenue mansion
in which the great ball was held—was written on a
letterhead that revealed to Nandy and the Swami an
address they very much desired to know. Had that
address found its way to Detective-Lieutenant Britz as
soon, it would have saved him much delay, and would
have spared a large part of the city's detective force the
necessity of a laborious search through Manhattan's
hotel registers.
Burlen was one of the most astonished young men


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 269
*
in lower Manhattan when, turning from his row of
bottles, he found the note entrusted to him by Britz
had vanished. At first he assumed he had fastened
it carelessly and that it had fallen to the floor. A quick
hunt showed him he was wrong. He extended his
search to every part of the room, and it was not until
he had disturbed the dust of ages that he realized the
scrap of paper actually was gone. His sensations fol-
lowing that realization were not of the pleasantest.
Britz was one of his best customers, and he knew from
the detective's earnestness the note was of exceptional
importance. It solaced him only in part to find on tak-
ing the plate from the camera and putting it through
a developing process that the lens had done its work
more faithfully than he. He held in his hand a per-
fect duplicate of the letter. That would not satisfy
Britz, of course, but it was better than it would have
been if the note had disappeared before the photo-
graphing was complete. Burlen hastened to subject
the little plate of copper to the acid bath, and as the
minute points of the halftone came out with gratifying
distinctness, the young man rejoiced that he at least
was able to produce the facsimiles the Headquarters
man had ordered. Remorse spurred him so effectively
that all the hundred impressions were ready when
Rawson sent for them. Half an hour afterward, as
many detectives were comparing the halftone prints
with the signatures of all the Millicents in the registers
of New York's more fashionable hotels.
Britz, as fit as a fiddle after his parboiling, walked
briskly to the marble lobby of the Holland House and
joined Fitch in the bar. That hotel is not patronized


270 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
by the Bright Light set, one reason being that it
sturdily repels all attempts at such patronage. Half a
dozen men of undoubted fashion were in the café when
Britz and Fitch draped themselves over one end of
the bar, and began absorbing long, cold drinks in
punctuation of their interested talk.
“We’re getting warm, as the youngsters say,” said
Britz, and he told him of all that had happened since
their last meeting. “Your young lady won't have to
stay in the Tombs much longer, I’m thinking, unless
we have a stroke of bad luck. I'm puzzled on one
point, however, and that's what I wanted to see you
about. What do you know about Bruxton Sands?”
“I know he's all right,” Fitch replied. “One of
the best ever.”
“Known him long?”
“Several years. I was fortunate in the case of a
brother of his, and that made me pretty solid with
the whole family. Bruxton has done me several good
turns.”
“You think that square look of his is not a front,
then?” inquired the detective.
“No,” said the doctor, who talked more at his ease
with the detective than he would have dreamed of do-
ing with any of his fashionable patients. “He’s ‘the
goods.’”
“Well,” rejoined the sleuth, “I’m glad to hear you
say so. I don't mind telling you he made me a little
suspicious this evening. I must say that for an honest
man his attitude was a little queer.”
“In what way?”
“Well,” said Britz, “he wouldn't let me see a bit


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 271
of paper that might have helped me a whole lot in this
matter; and just for a moment I began to wonder
whether he was as eager to have the Missioner mys-
tery solved as he pretended to be.”
“There's no pretense about Bruxton Sands,” said
Fitch very positively. “He does want this thing
straightened out, and he wouldn't do anything in any
way, if he could help it, to hinder you.”
Britz then told the physician more fully how stub-
born Sands had been in regard to the note the million-
aire himself had taken from one of the Hindoo
burglars.
“I’ll admit it seemed strange,” said Fitch. “But
if you go on the assumption there is anything wrong
behind it, you'll lose your point. Sands is as square as
they make 'em.”
“You don't think, then,” asked the detective, “it is
possible his infatuation for Mrs. Missioner would lead
him to do anything to queer his rivals?”
“Most assuredly not,” replied Fitch. “In the
first place, he is not infatuated. Bruxton Sands is
genuinely in love with Doris Missioner, and he is the
kind of man who knows the sort of woman he wants.
In the next place, he wouldn't dream of doing any-
thing underhand, even if he saw the other fellow was
undoubtedly winning out. He always plays the
game.”
“Well, maybe he does,” said Britz; “but, from what
I’ve observed in my journeying through life, this love
game is one that is played without any rules. I've
known men who wouldn't take a million if it were
handed to them on a platter, yet who'd go pretty close


272 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
to a mix-up with the Grand Jury to cut out a fellow
who was after the same girl.”
“You talk as if your experience in the heart line
were all second-hand,” said Fitch, smiling.
“Never been in love in my life and never expect to
be,” said Britz. “But I have eyes in my head and
ears behind them. I also know what women can do
to a man's common sense even when they don't know
they're doing it. The lady who gets the loot isn't al-
ways a party to the crime.”
“Well,” responded Fitch, “I won't undertake to
pit my experience against yours; but there's nothing of
that sort in this case. Sands loves Mrs. Missioner
about as much as a man can. He was fond of her
before her marriage, and most of us thought he'd win
her then. I don't know why he didn't, but I do know
that from the day he learned of her husband's death,
he has been twice as attentive to her as before, and
even in the days when she was the star bud of Auntie
Paran's beauty show, his fondness for her was pretty
noticeable. I remember particularly one Patriarchs'
Ball when he grabbed every dance on her card and
got her to sit out most of them.”
“But he knows Griswold is trying to win her, too,”
said Britz, “and if he has any reason to think the
other fellow has a good chance he might be tempted to
put him down and out, even if he had to go to such
lengths as taking the Missioner diamonds, and then
throwing suspicion on Griswold?”
“Not a bit of it!” exclaimed Fitch. “I tell you,
the man is dead square. He wouldn't do anything of
that kind if Mrs. Missioner were the only woman in


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 273
the world, as she really is, so far as he is concerned.
You don't know Bruxton Sands the way I do. He
may be short on conversation, but he's long on honor.
He plays the game right out on the gridiron without
any monkey business on the side lines, and you can just
bank on that!”
Britz raised his glass and drank slowly, meditatively,
until the ice chilled his nose. Then he set the tumbler
firmly on the bar, faced Fitch, and said with an air of
finality:
“If that's the case, Griswold's the man! He may
have had assistance from Blodgett, but I doubt it.
He's too foxy to trust his neck to a servant. As for
Ali, I thought he might have turned the trick, but he
didn't, because if he had, he and all the rest of that
Calcutta bunch would be well on their way toward
their heathen temples by this time. There is now only
Mr. Curtis Griswold to consider.”
Fitch looked at him with a perplexed air. He had
his own thoughts in regard to the identity of the thief,
but he recognized the detective's superior ability in
solving the mystery and, being a scientist, he had an
open mind.
“What causes you to suspect him?” he asked.
“I’ve had my eye on that young man for some
time,” Britz said. “There were two or three things
connected with the arrest of Miss Holcomb that didn't
please me a little bit. I didn't like the satisfaction he
showed when suspicion was directed toward her.”
“Did he seem pleased?” inquired Fitch.
“More than pleased—he seemed relieved,” an-
Swered the detective. “Maybe Donnelly and Carson


274 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
did some real work, after all, without knowing it.
If they hadn't arrested Miss Holcomb, Griswold
mightn't have shown his hand so easily.”
“Have you any other evidence?” asked the doc-
tor. He appeared to be gratified by the trend of the
detective's thoughts.
“Several things,” said Britz. “One of our Wall
Street men tells me half a dozen inquiries about Gris-
wold have been sent to the financial agencies lately. I
had that end worked up, and I found out Griswold had
been bumped by a bear raid.”
“ Hurt much P ''
“Pretty badly. He tried hard to sell a block of
suburban real estate soon after that.”
“These things are only straws, however,” said the
doctor. “Of course, we'll have to have much more
substantial evidence before we can do anything.”
“Well, for one thing,” returned Britz, “I expect
to know in a few hours just where the diamonds are.
At any rate, how they were taken out of the city, if
they are not in New York. I've got a hundred men
working the hotels to find out, and if you'll come down
to Headquarters with me in a little while you can see
the result.”
The detective stopped short in his words as Curtis
Griswold entered the bar. The clubman went to the
cigar counter, lighted a cigarette, and by the impatient
gesture with which he snatched it from his lips and
threw it to the floor, he betrayed the fact that he had
applied the flame to the cork tip. His manner was
nervous, his face slightly drawn, and his hand trem-
bled as he took another cigarette from the case and


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 275
once more puffed at it in his staccato fashion. He did
not see Britz and Fitch, as they were at the other end
of the bar. The detective's back was turned toward
him, while the doctor's face was partly hidden by the
Headquarters man's head. Fitch looked over Britz's
shoulder at Griswold, and Britz himself watched the
clubman's reflection in a mirror.
“Get me a messenger!” Griswold said to the bar-
tender, and as the man pulled the crank of a call box,
the clubman took a card from his pocket and wrote a
few lines hastily upon it. Then he called for an en-
velope, and when the messenger came, he handed it to
him with a banknote, with a few words spoken in a
low tone. The messenger gone, Griswold called for a
brandy-and-soda, gulped it down in a way that showed
his state of nervous excitement and, still without see-
ing the doctor or the detective, hurried out of the bar-
TOO111.
Britz gripped the doctor's arm.
“Go after that boy!” he said. “Find out where
he is going, and join me at Headquarters. Make it
quick, doc' "
Fitch hastened in pursuit of the messenger boy.
Britz walked with quick strides to the subway, where
he boarded a local for Bleecker Street.
The physician's pursuit of the district messenger
who had carried the note from Griswold ended at the
Thirty-third Street Station of the Sixth Avenue Ele-
vated Railway. All Fitch wanted to know was the
destination of the note. Fitch, though an amateur,
had acquired so much skill from association with the
famous Headquarters man in efforts to free his sweet-


276 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
heart that it required no prompting to look over the
boy's shoulder as he stopped to buy a ticket. While
fishing in his pocket for a grubby nickel, the mes-
senger momentarily held the envelope in such a posi-
tion that Fitch was able to read both name and ad-
dress. The doctor hastily jotted both on the margin
of a newspaper, and then he crossed to the downtown
station, and in twenty minutes knocked at the door of
the detective's room in Police Headquarters.
“This must be the woman,” he heard Britz say to
Rawson, as he entered after a sharp “Come in ” The
detective's finger rested on a name in a list of a dozen
or more Rawson had submitted.
“Hello, docl” said Britz. “I guess we've found
her. These are the full names of all the Millicents
registered in New York hotels, and my man reports
this signature is exactly like the name attached to the
note I found in the Indian's clothes.”
“What's the name?” asked Fitch.
“Millicent Delaroche,” answered the detective.
“That's the lady,” answered the physician. “The
same name is on that envelope Griswold gave the mes-
senger. She lives in the—”
“Hotel Renaissance,” said Britz decisively. “Doc-
tor, I tell you we’re getting warm. As the kids say,
‘We’re burning up!’”
A conference followed, in the course of which
Britz, Fitch, and Rawson elaborated a plan to ascertain
whether the jewels Millicent Delaroche mentioned in
her note to Griswold were the original Missioner dia-
monds, or merely gems the clubman had bought for
her. To learn that fact was not so easy as it sounded.


278 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
whether wife, widow, or divorcee the management
could not tell. She had been in the hotel several
months; she had one of the most luxurious suites in
the big building, and she seemed to be bountifully sup-
plied with money. Her gowns were gorgeous, and
when she went out, it was in an electric brougham she
kept in the hotel's garage.
Mrs. Delaroche had few visitors. The most fre-
quent was a man about town who sent many roses and
huge boxes of bonbons to Madame's apartment. Did
the management know him? Oh, yes. If his name
was of any real importance to the interrogator, the
manager did not mind telling it. What was it? Why,
it was Mr. Griswold—Curtis Griswold, secretary of
the Iroquois Trust Company, and a leading member
of the Stuyvesant Club.


CHAPTER XX
KANANDA's MISSION
KANANDA and the Swami, in the uptown bachelor
apartment whither they sped from the Fifth Avenue
ballroom, bent above a table on which were spread
various diagrams. Ali, Mrs. Missioner's servant,
stood at a respectful distance. He wore a concerned
look that intimated he had been subjected to some
pretty stiff questioning by his masters. At times his
eyes furtively sought the scholar's face, but though in
those moments they held some slight alarm, there was
no such fear in them as when a glance from the Prince
now and then swept his way. The high-caste Ori-
entals paid little attention to him. They leaned over
the table until their heads almost touched, studying
diligently the papers that lay upon it, occasionally fol-
lowing the lines with pencils, and pausing to make hur-
ried calculations on the margins of the sheets. At
length the Swami leaned back and gazed fixedly at the
Prince.
“It is evident we're on the right track at last,” he
said. “Chunda and Gazim could not have done their
work thoroughly.”
“They didn't do it at all, when it comes to that,”
answered the Prince. “Instead of finding only a
loose end of the thread, they ought to have untangled
the whole skein.”
“However,” said the Swami, “this note shows my
A
279


28o BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
original suppositions were accurate. The jewels were
taken by the man who trod on the false diamond in
the opera box.”
“It looks as if that were so,” Kananda replied.
“The question is, where are they now?”
“The woman has them,” returned the scholar.
“ Unless,” sneered Nandy, “she is beating our en-
terprising clubman at his own game. How do you
know she hasn’t sold them?”
“This note »y
“Oh, I know all about that,” laughed the Prince.
“It is plain you have not given sufficient thought to
the ways of these Western women. If only you would
take your head out of those esoteric clouds once in a
while, and come to earth for a look around, you
wouldn't be quite so ingenuous.”
“But she says in this note she will have to sell some
of the jewels,” the Swami persisted. “That certainly
indicates they are still in her possession.”
“On the surface it does,” said Nandy.
“But the woman when she wrote it could not have
supposed it was to be read by anyone save Gris-
wold.” *
“How do you know she didn't intend to deceive
him?” asked Kananda. “It’s a good thing you chose
the scholar's life in early youth, my friend. As a so-
ciety man, you'd make an exceedingly interesting, but
distressingly hopeless ‘innocent abroad.’”
Nandy had learned his philosophy of femininity in
one of the swiftest sets of Cambridge town; in the
most exclusive London clubs; in the Olympian gath-
erings of Heidelberg students, and in the most fin-de-


282 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
foot on his chair, raised his elbow to his knee and
lowered his chin to his hand.
“I believe we're close to the end of our quest,” he
mused. “I have a feeling we must get the Maharanee
to-night, if we are to recover it at all. We have played
a waiting game for many months, and it is time now to
act. You are prepared?”
“I am prepared.”
“You will not stay your hand when it comes to
the point?”
The Swami did not answer. He sat with folded
arms staring at the documents on the table. It was
in an altered voice that at length he spoke:
“Prince,” he said, “already the sacred gem should
be ruby red with the blood that has been spilled for it.
There is something in the air of this strange land that
makes it distasteful to me—the thought of further
bloodshed. Regain the jewel we must; but I would it
could be done without new sacrifice of life.”
An expression of demoniacal scorn overspread
Kananda's features until he confronted the sage with
the face of a gargoyle.
“And the brethren?” he asked angrily. “Can it
be you have a thought for these Western dogs when
your own brothers of the faith are suffering the shame
and pain in which we left them? Has your heart
turned to water?”
The Swami did not answer. Still with folded arms,
he kept his gaze on the papers, his features set in quiet
determination.
“Are you afraid?” pursued the Prince. “Does
your soul shrink, your hand draw back, now that the


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 283
appointed hour is night Are you a true believer and
master of the faith, or ” and he almost screamed
the words, “an apostate?”
The Swami’s copper face turned a darker shade. A
flash of fury seared his eyes as he raised them to those
of the Prince. He lowered them again, however, and
said stolidly:
“I am unable to conquer the feeling that it cannot
be for the good of the brothers to wade through blood
as did our fathers for possession of what, after all, is
simply a stone. I know what it means to the chosen
ones—to have that stone taken back to the Temple. I
feel more keenly than you can feel the yearning they
send across the seas for the success of our mission.
But, Prince, the Maharanee diamond, in its journey
across the world, has been purged perhaps of the
scarlet stains that were upon it. Can we not take it
back in all its present purity? Are we not skilled
enough in the ways of the East to recover our own
without bearing death to the men of the West?”
Kananda spurned the chair away and, gripping the
table with both hands, leaned toward the scholar.
“Listen to me, master!” he said savagely. “It
was all these possibilities my father anticipated when
he sent me as your companion in this enterprise. He
knew I was experienced in the wiles of these Western
dogs. He was aware that in the English university
and the British capital, as well as in the cities of the
European continent, I had mingled with them in their
pastimes and in their homes—that I had seen and
heard their puerile philosophy—that I had studied
their womanish religions, and that I had experienced


284 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
all the soul poison by which their so-called civiliza-
tion turns men to children. Can you guess the orders
the Maharajah laid upon me when he bade me come
with you?”
The Swami still maintained a dignified silence.
“I will tell you,” continued the Prince. “My
father said, ‘The time may come, my son, when your
friend, the great teacher, quails from that which is be-
fore him. If it comes, then when it comes, strike as
swiftly and surely as you would strike to save your
throne.’ And I will strike, my master!” Kananda
added, grimly resolute. “If you flinch from any
necessity that arises in carrying out this task of ours,
I will warn you once—even as I am warning you now
—and then, if you still stay your hand or seek to save
the least of those who may stand between us and the
sacred jewel, by God I'll kill you!”
The scholar's imperturbability was proof against
Kananda's violence of word and manner. The only
sign he gave was a slight tightening of his fingers as
they clasped his arms, and a lightning look straight
into the eyes of the young man across the table. It
was in a tone of perfect control that he replied:
“Death, when it comes to myself, is the least of my
concerns. You may strike when you will, Your High-
ness. I am a master of the faith, but, none the less, a
servant of the throne. My life belongs to your royal
father to do with it as he pleases. And since you tell
me that you are the long arm of the Maharajah, it is at
your disposal, too.”
His calmness reminded the Prince of his own Ori-
ental origin. The vehemence of speech he had ac-


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 285
quired in Western lands slipped from him like a
loosened robe. In an instant, under his outward seem-
ing of an English or American man-about-town, he
repossessed the composure of his race.
“Sorry,” he said with a little forced laugh.
“Rather bad, you know, to take things to heart that
way, but this really is a serious proposition, and we
mustn't fall down on it. As we are so near success, I
will tell you it is a question not only of piety, but of
politics. There is a dash of mild statecraft in it. The
Maharajah has a pretty well-rooted idea that the per-
manence of his reign depends on restoring the diamond
to the Temple.”
The sage looked at him interrogatively.
“Funny, I know,” continued Nandy, “but, after
all, it is the twentieth century, and the P. and O. boats
take some pretty restless people to India. Those busy-
bodies have stirred up a good deal of discontent in our
part of the world, and my father is an observant
man.”
“I had no thought of giving up the quest,” the
Swami explained. “All I wished to do was to move
more deliberately. I believe we can recover the stone
without great violence, and I incline to these West-
erners’ views far enough to think it would be better
for our religion, for your father, and for the brethren
—to say nothing of ourselves—if we could do so. The
easiest way sometimes really is the best.”
“I know all that,” insisted the Prince, “but we have
not the time. This hunt is drawing close to a hot
finish. You forget that we have the cleverest de-
tective in New York—one of the cleverest in the world


286 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
—to beat. If he got the diamond, he would not recog-
nize our claim to it for an instant. He'd turn it over
to Mrs. Missioner, and we would not stand the ghost
of a chance in any court of law. This is a case where
we must help ourselves to our own. Besides, there is
Griswold. How do we know he is not getting ready
to flee with the jewels to-night? They may be in his
possession, or he may have given them to the woman
who signs herself Millicent.”
The Prince paused, framed his fingers tip to tip, and
looked between them at the note as if peering into a
crystal gazer's globe.
“I am convinced the woman has the necklace,” he
went on. “Our men have had time to search Gris-
wold's apartment from end to end, and the other
men's, too. If they had found the jewels in either
place, we would know it by now. The whole ques-
tion presents itself clearly enough to my mind.
The old French proverb holds good, cherchez la
femme.”
The Swami arose. As he did so, Ali re-entered the
room with more salaams, and extended toward his
master a silver tray on which lay a tiny scroll, written
in minute hieroglyphs of the Orient. The scholar
broke the seal and scanned the paper swiftly. A slight
exclamation betrayed that the information contained
in the little scroll broke through even his magnificent
reserve. His hand trembled a little as he handed the
paper to the Prince. A hurried reading sufficed to de-
stroy all of that young man's recently gained calm.
He fairly hurled himself into a sealskin coat, and
thrust his head into an opera hat.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 287
“Quick!” he said, “we have not a moment to
lose | *
It would have been well for Britz if the young
photographer had acquainted him promptly with the
fact of the disappearance of the Millicent note. The
detective's acute intelligence would have argued from
that incident the need of even greater haste than he
was making in pushing his pursuit of the Missioner
diamond to a close. But Burlen, conscience-stricken
though he was, was loath to send the information to
the Headquarters man until he could have time to
make further and more exhaustive search of his shop,
as well as of the courtyard in the rear of the building
on which its windows gave. It was dark in the court,
and the imperfect light of his candle made his search
so slow that by the time he was sure the note was gone
beyond possibility of its recovery, it was too late for
him to find Detective Britz at Police Headquarters.
When his messenger returned with the report that the
Central Office man had left his room, and that no one
in the Mulberry Street building knew where to find
him, Burlen became so alarmed that he hastened to
Headquarters to try to take up the hunt for Britz from
that point. He was as unsuccessful as his emissary,
and he spent many anxious hours in the waiting-room,
hoping for the detective's return. The photo-en-
graver tried to console himself with the thought that
the negative had been spared, and he therefore had
been able to send to Britz's office the hundred fac-
similes of the “Curtis dear ” missive his customer
had ordered. But it was poor consolation when he re-
called the earnestness with which the detective had en-


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 289
might have escorted Mrs. Missioner to her home and
passed a short time with her in the interval.
Dorothy's request flattered the clubman's vanity so
greatly, however, that he did not hesitate to defer his
visit to the Renaissance in order to keep the interest-
ing appointment the débutante, with more conscience
than discretion, made for him. The consequence was
that by the time Griswold's interview with little Dor-
othy March was at an end, the hours had passed be-
yond a point to which even his ingenuity could stretch
conventionality far enough to make it practicable for
him to see Mrs. Delaroche that night.
Dorothy was dancing abstractedly when Griswold
found her. She was so impatient to adjust the harm
she felt she had done him that she saw him from her
partner's shoulder before he picked her out from a
score of other comely young women on the floor. Miss
March instantly wearied of the waltz, to the dismay
of the youth whose arm encircled her, and who rather
fancied himself as a dancer. She lost no time in hav-
ing herself escorted to a small conservatory, where she
dismissed her partner with scant ceremony, and where,
a few moments afterward, she was joined by Gris-
wold.
Even then the débutante's unwitting tangling of the
threads of Griswold's fate might not have had such in-
fluence upon his future if she had approached her sub-
ject with directness. Had she told Griswold at once
what she had said to the detective concerning his skill
as a draughtsman, the clubman's suspicions would
have been aroused, and he might have taken steps that
would have had a marked effect upon the development


290 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
of the great Missioner mystery. But Dorothy was
too fluttered, too prettily remorseful, to go straight to
the heart of the subject, and in her innocent endeavor
to post Griswold in respect of her chat with Britz with-
out making him think she was a gossiping little busy-
body, she protracted her interview with the clubman
through so many dances that when it ended Griswold
persuaded himself the morning would be ample time
to do that which he felt must be done to avert the
probable consequences of Dorothy's girlish frankness.
His vanity again played its part, too, for when he had
thanked little Miss March for what he was pleased to
consider her interest in him, and when Dorothy, hav-
ing signally failed to impress upon him the impersonal
nature of her conscience stroke, found herself in a
further flutter of bewilderment, Curtis Griswold pro-
ceeded to parade her up and down the dancing floor
as effectively as he had shown off the rich and beauti-
ful widow in the larger ballroom a little farther up the
Avenue. Griswold prided himself on his versatility.
He argued that it was as easy for him, as he would
have expressed it to his club intimates, “to put a filly
through her paces” as it had been to advertise the
fact before the whole ballroom that Doris Missioner,
the fastidious beauty and worshiped possessor of many
millions, apparently was on the point of accepting him
as her second matrimonial venture.
All of which resulted in Griswold's long stay at the
dance, in his ride with Dorothy to her home in an auto-
mobile otherwise occupied only by a satisfactorily self-
centered chaperon; and in his waste of further time at
one of his clubs after parting with Miss March and


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 29I
her duenna—a waste of hours any one of which might
have been made as useful to him as a year of ordinary
time. He was further disposed to procrastinate in this
crucial moment by the success of the Headquarters
man in throwing all suspected persons off their guard
by keeping Elinor Holcomb in the Tombs. Through all
his work on the Missioner case, Britz had been beset
with requests from Mrs. Missioner, Sands, and other
friends of the widow's secretary, to permit them to
give bail for her. Sands and Mrs. Missioner were
particularly insistent in their desire to see Elinor at
liberty. Fitch, though normally his wish to see his
fiancée free must have been stronger than that of any-
one else, was partly reconciled to her protracted im-
prisonment by the detective's frequent assurance of
her ultimate vindication. Moreover, the doctor, in
consequence of his work on the case with Britz, had
direct knowledge of the importance that the suspicions
of others should not be alarmed. He had been with
the detective when the card of Bruxton Sands was dis-
covered in the possession of the old curiosity shop
man; he knew of the note addressed to “Curtis dear”
and signed “Millicent,” and also of the desperate
attempts made by the Hindoos to find the diamonds.
So Fitch did not bother the sleuth as much as did other
friends of Elinor's, and it was well; for Britz several
times was at his wits' ends to dissuade Mrs. Missioner
and Sands from going to the District Attorney and
offering a heavy security for Miss Holcomb's appear-
ance in the trial court. However, Britz had held them
off, and it followed that Griswold nursed the delusion
that Elinor and Fitch and Sands were suspected so


292 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
strongly by the Central Office men that no search for
evidence against anybody else was in progress. Don-
nelly and Carson also had fostered that misconception
on the clubman's part by their unabated activity in
hunting proofs of the girl secretary's guilt. Those
worthies spent every day of their work on the case in
tracing Elinor's past, and in efforts to couple Fitch
with her suspicious theft of the jewels. Furthermore,
being the sort of men who would rather win credit for
detective work than do anything quietly in the way of
real detection of crime or criminals, they could not
refrain from expressing their belief in Elinor's dis-
honesty at every turn. They talked liberally to the
seasoned reporters in the newspaper rookeries opposite
Police Headquarters, to the newspaper men in the po-
lice stations, and the magistrates' courts, and to the
several star reporters of the more enterprising morning
papers who had been assigned especially on the case.
Every word they uttered hinged on their evidence in
the return of a verdict against Miss Holcomb, and,
with the exception of two or three unusually sapient
newspaper men who discounted the opinions of Don-
nelly and Carson because they knew Britz was doing
the real work, and because Britz had as yet made no
revelations, the reporters quoted them at great length.
Therefore, practically all the New York papers pub-
lished stories in which Elinor Holcomb was tried, con-
victed, and sentenced in advance of her arraignment
for the theft of the Missioner necklace. Over-enter-
prising Sunday papers went so far as to publish page
stories, purporting to be psychological studies of the
mental bent that made the trusted secretary of a multi-


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 293
millionaire society woman, with a comfortable career
in expectation, throw all chances to the winds by yield-
ing to a momentary feminine impulse to possess her-
self of glittering baubles. Those psychological studies
were interesting to the multitude, and might have been
worth publishing had they been based on either psy-
chology or truth. They had their effect on Griswold,
though, and a consequence of that fact was that the
clubman's mind was at ease so far as the possibility
that he would be connected with the disappearance of
the gems was concerned.
So Griswold did not go to the Renaissance that
night, nor did he disturb Mrs. Delaroche with a tele-
phone message, although an instrument stood on
a convenient desk in her boudoir, and an exten-
sion wire connected it with a duplicate device that
rested on a little Russian table beside her bed. It
would have been the work of a moment for Gris-
wold to get into conversational touch with Mrs. Dela-
roche, and he would have had the excuse of replying
to her urgent and somewhat petulant note—if he had
received it; unfortunately for him, he never had seen
that missive. Kananda's guess in regard to the activ-
ity of his followers, Chunda and Gazim, was accurate,
for those adroit Orientals had stolen the missing note
from Griswold's apartment before it came under the
observation of “Curtis dear,” to whom it was ad-
dressed. Altogether, once more, as he would have
expressed it, things were not “breaking ” for the
suave secretary of the Iroquois Trust Company.


CHAPTER XXI
STOP, THIEFl
MILLICENT DELARoche slept soundly. Hers was
the type of beauty that retains its freshness through
indulgence in creature comforts. Not all her fondness
for amusement could lead her to rob herself for many
nights of the repose she instinctively knew was es-
sential to the preservation of her charms. She was
the sort of woman, past thirty, who retains a false
youth sometimes more effective than the immaturity
which is measured by the calendar. Her complexion
was as delicate as a débutante's. Her eyes were
brighter than those of the average athletic young
woman, and no silver thread shot the dusk of her
luxuriant hair. All this was due largely, she was con-
vinced, to her lifelong habit of sleeping early and
often, and of resolutely refusing to let her slumber be
disturbed by any such useless things as dreams, which,
after all, are the mere ghosts of thought—and too
much thinking was not one of her foibles. The beauty
of Mrs. Delaroche was, in short, the kind that leads
the lowly worshiper of Buddha to hang garlands about
the necks of sleek, white zebus in the temples of the
East; which causes the Alaskan aborigine to carve the
smooth surface of his totem poles, and which prompts
the benighted black of darkest Africa to lay offerings
at the feet of his Mumbo Jumbo. Most men who
saw Mrs. Delaroche felt a strange impulse to place
294


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 295
burnt offerings upon the shrine of her loveliness.
Hers was the beauty of a Ninon, a Sappho. It was
its own excuse for existence, and ’twas well it was,
since no other reason could be advanced by any man
for his adoration of the magnificent Millicent.
Though Mrs. Delaroche slept profoundly, her ex-
ternal senses were not wholly unvigilant. Long study
of herself had made her sensitive to disagreeable im-
pressions that were purely corporeal; and so, though
no intrusive vision of mind could interrupt the fluid
calm of her beauty sleep, a slightly uncomfortable feel-
ing at the precise spot whence her tresses swept up-
ward in an elaborate coiffure or parted in the braids
of negligee had the effect of arousing her as no mere
dream possibly could have done. It required not many
seconds, allowing for the habits of her mind, and the
fact that she suddenly was recalled from deep repose,
for Mrs. Delaroche to realize there was a hand beneath
her pillow, and that hand was not one of her own.
Rigid with fright, she waited an instant to assure her-
self she had not committed the innovation of dreaming,
then she made a swift reach for the alien hand—too
late. It had been withdrawn swiftly in the few mo-
ments requisite to complete comprehension of the situ-
ation, and if Mrs. Delaroche had not been so certain
that she never dreamed, she might have thought she
still was sleeping. Hasty exploration of the space
beneath her pillow, however, told her the midnight
hand had not gone away empty. Realizing that, she
was broad awake in an instant. She sat erect so
swiftly that she bruised her forehead slightly against
something cold and hard and round and smooth that


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 297
shrinking flesh. She did as much thinking as it was
possible for her to do, and concluded she at least must
pretend to obey the command for silence until the
burglar should go far enough away to give her a
chance to escape. The door of her boudoir, with a
strong thumb-bolt on its inner side, offered protection
could she but reach it. She knew its exact situation,
and in spite of the darkness, could have made her way
to it without swerving. But to do so she must cross
half the width of the bedroom, and after the burglar's
latest words she did not doubt he would put his threat
into execution before she could reach the floor. So
she lay still, trembling in every inch of her unseen
loveliness, hoping for an opportunity to dash through
the boudoir door and summon help ere the thief could
escape from the hotel. She had a fair supply of ani-
mal courage, and if she had not been taken at so great
a disadvantage might have made a fight for that which
the burglar had taken from beneath her pillow. But
life fitted her altogether too comfortably at all points
to risk any hopeless daring of danger. She lay still.
The cold pressure was removed from her forehead,
and the burglar moved about the room. The thick
carpet and doubtless the felt soles on the man's feet as
auxiliaries, made his steps soundless. He went from
her dressing table to a writing desk, lighting each in
turn with a vivid circle of rays from an electric pocket
torch, but holding the little illuminating device always
in such position that no faintest gleam fell upon him-
self. Not for a moment, however, did he slacken his
alertness sufficiently for Mrs. Delaroche to have a good
chance to get to the inner room. He pretended to


298 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
search thoroughly several places where money or
jewels might be kept, but, even to a woman of her
slow wit, it was apparent he did so in a half-hearted
way. Millicent felt assured the man knew just what
he had taken from beneath her pillow, and that he was
satisfied with it. He showed that to be true when he
gave up the pretended search without so much as try-
ing the handle of a small safe in a far corner of the
room. Returning to the bedside, he renewed his
warning, throwing so much savage meaning into his
words that Mrs. Delaroche was certain there was no
pretense about that.
Then he walked to the door giving on the corridor,
turned the handle cautiously, thrust his head through a
second opening, and looked up and down the hall.
Evidently reassured, he opened the door, stepped out-
side, and closed it swiftly and silently. There was
not a sound to indicate whether he had gone along
the corridor, or still stood just outside the door. Mrs.
Delaroche waited, listening intently in the hope of hear-
ing his footsteps, but she listened vainly. She waited
perhaps a minute, for she had no desire to hazard a
shot from that terrible thing the burglar had pressed
against her brow. Then her courage oozed back, and
she bounded to the floor, screaming with all her might,
pausing only long enough to snatch a peignoir and
throw it about her shoulders ere she pulled open the
outer door of her suite and sent her shrieks shrilling
down the long hall. Her cries, for she was a mag-
nificently constructed animal of most expansive lung
power, not only echoed far along the corridor, but
penetrated even the sound-proof doors of the other


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 299
apartments. The disturbance she made was alarm-
ingly novel to the exclusive calm of the Hotel Renais-
sance. Doors were flung open, heads popped out, and
a dozen inquiries were flung at her from as many parts
of the hall; but Mrs. Delaroche had exhausted her co-
herence in framing that one purpose of screaming with
all her might until some man of action should speed to
her assistance. She did not waste any strength in
articulation. She simply screamed, and so eloquent
were her shrieks that although she uttered no concrete
word, only a few of them were needed to tell the more
intelligent of her auditors that she had been robbed,
and that what she had lost was of priceless value to
her.
Before the fusillade of her cries died away in a
scattering fire of gasping sobs, half a dozen pajamaed
specters were racing down the corridor in the direc-
tion they deemed the burglar had taken. What ac-
count they would have given of themselves had they
come up with the fugitive is conjectural. They were
spared the disagreeable necessity of submitting their
courage to that test, for as the burglar turned a cor-
ner of the hall many yards in advance of his pursuers,
he was tripped by a foot adroitly interpolated in his
path, and when he recovered his breath after a jarring
fall, it was to find two men of sturdy build sitting
upon him as composedly as if nature had planned him
for a conversation chair. The pistol he had carried
in his hands throughout the pursuit was snatched
from his grasp, and although he struggled furiously,
his arms were dragged behind his back and handcuffs
were snapped upon his wrists. Then he was dragged


3OO BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
to his feet by four insistent arms and impelled with
much vigor along the hallway in the reverse direction
to that which he had followed.
Unmistakable was the rejoicing of the pajama squad
at the sight of his captivity. Undeniably heroic was
its surge toward him. Faces grim with postscript
bravery were thrust into the prisoner's, and voices
ranging from mockery to indignation bombarded him
with questions. All of which the prisoner met with
sullen silence and with looks that made the squad re-
treat a pace or two in spite of the firmness with which
his captors held him. Mrs. Delaroche's fading screams
guided the little group to her apartment, where the
hands of ministering angels had adjusted her peignoir
to its normal position upon her Junoesque form and
fastened its fluttering ribbons in becoming bows. She
there received the heroes of the man hunt with aston-
ishing composure.
“Is this the man who robbed you, madam?” asked
one of the two men who had caught the burglar. He
was the house detective. “Stand behind him, Jim,”
he said to his colleague, a porter with a fullback's
shoulders. -
“It must be,” said Mrs. Delaroche, “but I cannot
tell by his face. I did not see it. It looks like the
man, though. Make him speak.”
But that was a task beyond the house detective's
powers. Irresponsible though his kind might be as
compared with the city's sleuths and bluecoats, he
hardly felt justified in employing the most mediaeval
forms of torture to accomplish that purpose. Seem-
ingly, nothing short of the boot, the thumbscrew, and


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 3OI
the Iron Maiden would drag a word from the captive.
He maintained his sullen silence, although it might
be said he broke it in a way, for the furious looks he
cast at the pajama squad were almost audible. Those
looks caused several of the squad's doughty heroes
suddenly to realize the unconventionality of their at-
tire, and to send them precipitously in search of dress-
ing gowns. One or two of them remained, however,
and the house detective, who, in hotels as frostily
patrician as the Renaissance, did not often have an op-
portunity to hold the center of the stage, was fairly
well content with his audience.
“Now, then, you!” he said, brusquely addressing
the prisoner, “speak up. What were you doing
here?”
A slow grin was the response. It was such a pal-
pably superfluous question. The house sleuth realized
that, and hastened to cover his confusion by asking:
“What did you get?”
A ripple of excitement started at the toes of Mrs.
Delaroche's Juliette slippers and quivered along her
length until it found expression in a half-hysterical ut-
terance :
“He got my jewels!”
The prisoner turned one of his sullen looks upon
her, but, conscious that she was robed as daintily as
the most fastidious society actress in the DuBarryest
of bedroom scenes could be, her equanimity was not so
vulnerable as that of the deserters from the pajama
Squad.
“He took the whole case of jewels from under my
pillow,” she continued, addressing the house detective.


3O2 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“They must be in his possession still, unless he dropped
them while he was running away.”
This suggestion gave the remainder of the squad
the brilliant idea of searching the corridor, and thus
escaping a situation that was becoming, in spite of
their natural curiosity, increasingly awkward to them.
“We will soon find out,” said the leading man,
“Jim, go through him!”
Jim only shrugged those fullback shoulders when the
burglar attempted to petrify him with a look, and his
search through the prisoner's pockets was thorough.
Mrs. Delaroche gasped her delight when from the cap-
tive's coat the porter drew forth a heavy silver casket,
and held it toward her.
“Is that your property, madam?” asked the house
detective.
“Yes, yes,” said Mrs. Delaroche eagerly. “Oh
dear, I am so glad he did not escape with it. What
would »y
She checked herself hastily.
“You must come to me in the morning, Mr.—Mr.—
for a reward,” she added in tones so sweetly suggestive
of a golden guerdon that the detective's eyes glistened.
“Thank you, madam, that is not necessary,” he re-
plied perfunctorily. “Let’s see what else this fellow
has got.”
He and the porter explored the captive's pockets
further, but found nothing more in the way of loot.
Mrs. Delaroche looked hastily through her desk and
dressing table and told the man apparently nothing else
was missing.
“Then,” said the house detective, “I guess there is


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 303
nothing else for us to do but to turn this burglar
over to the police. May we use your telephone,
madam?”
Mrs. Delaroche gladly nodded assent, and the sleuth
continued: -
“Jim, call up Headquarters, and have a couple of
men sent here to take this fellow away.”
The effect of that command upon the prisoner
startled everyone. Not only did it cause him to break
his sullen silence, but it drew from him words that
made the house detective involuntarily loose his hold
on the man and step back, staring. Jim's jaw fell, and
Mrs. Delaroche gazed at the fellow, wide-eyed.
“I can save you that trouble,” said the burglar.
“You need not telephone for the Central Office men.
I am Lieutenant-Detective Britz, of Headquarters!
And these,” and he nodded toward the silver casket,
“are the missing Missioner diamonds that were stolen
from the richest woman in America.”
Turning to Mrs. Delaroche abruptly, he said:
“Madam, how do you come to be in possession of
these jewels?”
All the panting loveliness of Mrs. Delaroche shiv-
ered as the sharp question bored its way to her inner
consciousness. It was now her turn to be silent. She
looked at the Headquarters man as if he held in his
hand her life, liberty, and whatever chance remained
to her of happiness. A gleam of appeal glowed in her
beautiful eyes for a moment. Plainly, if she did not
speak it was not for lack of will. Her words were as
frozen as the normal condition of her thoughts. She
put her hands to her breast and gazed at the Central


3o4 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
Office man as piteously as a woman of her Junoesque
charms could be expected to do. The ingénue rôle
was impossible to Mrs. Delaroche; but had it not been
so, undoubtedly she would have assumed it in this
emergency.
“Answer me, madam; this calls for an immediate
explanation. You told this man these jewels belonged
to you. How does it come you have the diamonds
everybody in New York knows as the Maharanee
necklace of Mrs. Doris Missioner?”
Mrs. Delaroche still struggled faintly for speech.
Her lids quivered; her eyes alternately closed and then
were fixed upon the detective, and a tremor, beginning
at the crown of her adorable head, moved in waves
to her perfect feet. She sank into a chair and let her
head fall upon her arms as they stretched inertly across
a little table. There was no smallest streak of pity in
the look Detective Britz bent upon her. He had dealt
with women of her type before many times, he told
himself, and now that he was so near the heart of the
great Missioner mystery, it was not his purpose to be
influenced in the slightest degree by the distress of a
Diana, to say nothing of an Aphrodite. Dry sobs
choked the woman. Her eyes strained at their ten-
dons so painfully that tears would have been a divine
relief. Whether she was grieved or frightened was
not so apparent as that she was sorely distressed.
Minutes passed before she lifted her face and once
more looked at the detective. The house sleuth and
his porter had retreated a yard or more, and the erst-
while pajama squad, now an astounded force of Cos-
sacks and Bedouins in a varied array of dressing


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 305
gowns and bathrobes, looked and listened in hushed
expectancy.
“Come, Mrs. Delaroche,” said Britz sternly. “You
really must not waste any more of my time. I have
spent an hour in getting these jewels away from you,
and I don't intend to put in many more words in get-
ting the facts from you. You have got to answer
soon or late, and you may as well do it at once.”
If there was to be any third degree in her case, the
detective was determined to apply it then and there.
“They were given to me,” said the woman faintly.
“By whom?”
“By—by a friend of mine,” she replied.
“And his name?” inquired the detective curtly.
“I do not care to tell his name,” said Mrs. Dela-
roche, who had recovered a little of her calmness.
“You must tell it!” Britz insisted.
“I cannot,” she said.
“But I tell you you must!” returned the detective.
“Don’t you see you have got to tell it to square your-
Self?” -
“What do you mean, sir?” she asked with a pretty
show of indignation.
“Now, now, don't try any of those games on me,”
said Britz. In his impatience, he was descending
close to the methods of Donnelly and Carson. He re-
membered that in a moment and resumed more per-
suasively:
“It will save a great deal of trouble for you, Mrs.
Delaroche, if you tell me the truth, and tell it at
once, without holding anything back. You under-
stand, I am a detective from Police Headquarters, and


306 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
I was assigned weeks ago to find Mrs. Missioner's dia-
monds. I have found the diamonds, and now I must
find the thief.”
Mrs. Delaroche's start was now genuine. The word
plainly stung her into frankness.
“What thief ?” she asked.
“The thief who stole the Maharanee necklace,”
Britz explained. “Have I not told you, madam, the
jewels were stolen?”
Thrills were shooting through the bathrobe squad
at the rate of a hundred a minute. Here was a sensa-
tion such as the ultra-refined Renaissance had not
known before in all its history. A beautiful woman,
stolen gems, and a thief she seemingly sought to
shield ! This was better than the most delectable di-
vorce could hope to be.
Mrs. Delaroche shivered, and started slowly to her
feet. She turned a disdainful glance on the group at
the door, then faced Britz once more, and in a voice
little more than a whisper she said:
“Whatever you may think, I did not know the
jewels were stolen. I did not know they ever be-
longed to Mrs. Missioner. I never heard of Mrs.
Missioner before to-night, except through the papers.
I did not know that any of my acquaintances knew
her. I was not aware she had lost any of her dia-
monds. What you tell me about the theft of a neck-
lace from Mrs. Missioner is entirely new to me. I
seldom read the papers, and when I do, I do not read
accounts of crime.”
“All you say may be true,” Britz persisted, “but
you may take my word for it—the jewels are Mrs.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 307
Missioner's; they were stolen from her, and you must
tell me the name of the person who gave them to you.”
The beautiful woman's distress at this time was so
sincere that the Headquarters man involuntarily dealt
more gently with her. He urged her to be seated
again, and then for the first time apparently remem-
bered his hands still were gripped by the bands of steel
the house detective had snapped upon them.
“Take these off!” he said curtly to the hotel sleuth,
and he was obeyed instantly. His hands free, Britz
picked up the silver jewel case and examined its ex-
terior curiously, waiting for the revelation he was re-
solved to get from the woman. Not until many more
minutes had passed and it was evident she would re-
veal nothing without more insistent urging did Britz
turn to her again.
“Madam,” said he, “since you will not give the
information to me, I shall have to take you to Police
Headquarters, where, I can assure you, you will soon
be convinced it is to your own interest to tell all you
know.”
“Oh, not that, not that! No, no!” gasped Mrs.
Delaroche. “I will tell you. The diamonds were
given to me by—”
Her voice sank to so low a pitch that Britz had to
lean toward her to hear her.
“By the man I intended to marry!” She cov-
ered her face with her hands, and once more those
terrible dry sobs racked her body. Had Britz not
been so bent upon probing the mystery of the stolen
diamonds to its core, he might have relented in his in-
quisition for the time; but he felt the demands of


308 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
justice gave him no choice. If the man he suspected
was to be seized and punished, it must be done quickly,
else there would be great danger of his escape.
“His name !” he demanded with increased stern-
ness. “Come, madam, I must have his name. It is
altogether useless for you to try to conceal it.”
She did not answer. The men at the door strained
toward the interior of the room while the house de-
tective and the porter stared in amazement at the
woman whose hauteur had become proverbial through-
out the big hotel.
“Madam, I must insist once more that you tell me
the man's name,” Britz said.
“His name?” she returned wonderingly.
“Yes, Mrs. Delaroche, his name,” the detective said.
“Or, perhaps, I had better tell it to you?”
An inquiring look was her reply.
“It is Curtis Griswold, isn't it?” said the Head-
quarters man incisively.
Mrs. Delaroche, with a little cry which showed more
emotion than anyone would expect from so self-
centered a woman, sprang to her feet and advanced
toward Britz with hands outstretched in protest.
“You don't mean to say that you believe Mr. Gris-
wold to be a thief ' " she exclaimed.
“We shall see, madam,” rejoined Britz, “how suc-
cessful he has been in at least one robbery.”
The detective laid his hand lovingly on the silver
box.
“Inside this little casket,” he said, “are jewels
worth more than half a million dollars. Please let
me have the key to this jewel box.”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 309
Reluctantly, she unfastened a slender gold chain that
hung about her neck, from which depended a tiny sil-
ver key. Britz fitted it into the lock and turned the
bolt. Triumphantly he seized the lid, and as every-
one else in the room focused eager eyes upon the sil-
ver box, Britz opened it; then dropped it on the table
with a furious exclamation.
The box was empty


CHAPTER XXII
HOT ON THE SCENT
BRITz bounded into the inner room and made a
quick examination of every window. He found
marks on one of the casements that told his practiced
eye entry to the apartment had been made through
the window by someone skilled in daring burglary.
It gave on the fire escape. Britz flung up the sash
and looked out. As he expected, there was a long
string of ladders and balconies that ended one story
above the street. The fire escape was at the least
frequented end of the big hotel, and an awning threw
a shadow from the arc lamp on the globe big enough
to afford opportunity for an agile man to mount on the
shoulders of comrades, grasp the second-story window
and swing himself up unseen. He let his eyes fall on
the balcony one story below the window. On it lay
something yellow, crumpled as if dropped inadvert-
ently. Britz ran down the ladder and returned to the
room with the object. It was an Oriental handkerchief
such as he had seen in the Swami’s possession.
It was perfectly plain to Britz that the Hindoos had
been beforehand with him in recovering the Missioner
jewels. By this time he knew enough to be certain
that their object in getting possession of the gems was
even stronger than the professional pride that had actu-
ated him to recover them for their owner. He was
aware they had a reason yet to be explained why they
3IO


3I2 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
tion tell him to take charge of this woman until he
hears from me. Meanwhile, you keep an eye on her
yourself. She must not leave this room. Tell the
precinct man if she tries to go out, to put her under
arrest and take her down to Manning.”
“Madam,” said Britz, turning to Mrs. Delaroche
with a trace of bitterness in his tone, “you may have
fooled me in this matter, but I'm not sure you have,
and I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt.
You heard my orders? You will not be arrested for
the present if you stay quietly in your rooms; but you
must not attempt to leave, and you must not try to
communicate with anybody. Here, I'll make sure of
that l”
He seized the telephone instrument, wrenched it
from its connection, and handed it to the porter.
“Take that downstairs,” he said, “and don't put
another telephone in this room as long as Mrs. Dela-
roche occupies it, unless you hear from me. And as
for you, gentlemen,” he said cuttingly to the bathrobe
squad, “I’d suggest that if your insomnia is as bad as
that, you'd better either go back to bed and count the
sheep going over the stile, or else put some more
clothes on and go out for a walk. This show is
ended.” And he shooed the group from the room
and, followed by the porter, hurried out, leaving
Mrs. Delaroche in her apartment in the custody of
the house detective, with only the solace of a single
maid.
Britz found Dr. Fitch waiting for him on the
sidewalk, as he had arranged before entering the apart-
ment of Mrs. Delaroche in the guise of a burglar, and


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 313
in a single word told the physician how he had been
balked in the chief object of his nocturnal visit.
“Quick's the word now, docl” said Britz.
“Where are you going?” asked Fitch.
“To head off the Hindoos,” cried Britz. “Let's
get a cab.” But the last taxicab on the Renaissance
stand had been chartered an hour before by a swarthy
man who seemed to be in great haste. That much Britz
learned from the inspector in charge of the stand.
Britz and Fitch rounded the corner of the hotel. Close
to the curb stood a private coupé. The coachman,
doubtless on a long wait, was nodding sleepily. Britz
jerked open a door of the carriage.
“Jump in, quick!” he cried, and Fitch, who long
ago had learned to carry out Britz's suggestions
without stopping to ask questions, sprang into the cab.
Britz slammed the door with violence that awoke the
coachman. Before the driver could utter a word of
protest, the athletic detective reached the box beside
him in a single leap, pushed him off with a shove that
landed the amazed jehu on his hands and knees on the
sidewalk, seized the reins, snatched the whip, and put
the horse to a gallop. As he sped away, he hastily
changed the whip to the hand that held the ribbons
and, whipping from his pocket a card that read, “De-
tective-Lieutenant Britz, Police Headquarters,” he
flung it at the prostrate coachman with the words,
“Call there to-morrow for your rig.”
Then, with the horse straining at the traces in in-
dignant surprise, Britz drove at breakneck speed down
the avenue, turning sharply at the first convenient
corner and heading east toward the mysterious brown-


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 315
freely, and at a gentle push the door swung inward.
The inner door of the vestibule was ajar. Britz and
Fitch entered cautiously. Their feet fell silently on the
heavy Oriental rug. They found themselves in com-
plete darkness. The glimmer from the street lamp did
not penetrate more than a foot or two beyond the in-
ner door. Britz whisked out his electric torch and
turned its miniature headlight on the passage and on
the area leading to the upper part of the house.
“Hello!” he called. “Is anybody in?”
Silence as heavy and oppressive as the darkness be-
yond the radiance of his little pocket lamp answered
him again. The two men, the detective slightly in ad-
vance, walked quickly along the hall to the door at
the rear, where Britz parted the portières and looked
into the big room in which he had interviewed the
Eastern scholar. Its appearance was much the same
as it had been on his preceding visit, save that as his
practiced eye dwelt more persistently upon it, he
noted the disappearance of many small articles, par-
ticularly a porphyry Buddha that had sat within a lit-
tle shrine upon the wall. The apartment had the
seeming of having been subjected to a surface strip-
ping by persons about to leave it in a hurry. Few of
the solemn books that had been scattered about the
room remained. Among the Oriental objects still in
the room was the narghileh from which the sage was
fond of drawing a smoker's consolation.
“Gone, eh?” said Fitch, in an undertone.
Britz nodded.
“Think we had better look upstairs?” asked the
doctor.


316 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
With another swift nod the detective turned on
his heel and led the way from floor to floor until they
reached the top of the house. They glanced into every
room and explored the larger apartments thoroughly.
All were empty. Here and there they found evidences
of hasty packing. In various rooms were queer jum-
bles of the East and West—linen collars with single
hairline stripes of delicate tints lay beside Oriental
scraps of manifest fineness. On one rack hung a
Derby hat, on another a turban like that worn by the
Swami, and like the kerchief Britz had found on the
fire escape of the Hotel Renaissance. One of the
most interesting finds was a scimetar with a jeweled
hilt and a blade of wonderful keenness. Britz drew it
from its scabbard and was about to feel the edge
when Fitch stopped him with a sharp gesture.
“Don’t touch it, lieutenant,” said the doctor. “One
never knows what criminal tricks these beggars play
with their weapons.”
As the detective looked at him inquiringly, he
added:
“A sword or dagger is as likely to be poisoned as
not. In fact, they prefer poisons to straight fight-
ing.”
Convinced there was no one in the upper part of
the house, the two men descended to the main floor and
re-entered the reception room at the rear.
“This was their den,” said Britz explanatorily, as he
began a closer search of the room. “We may find a
trace of them in some of their papers. It's worth a
few minutes to make a hunt. Get busy, doc' " And
the detective rummaged through drawer after drawer,


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 319
can experience—death by a cobra's poison. Science
has not yet found an antidote. If a rattler bites you,
you may save your life with whiskey if you get it
soon enough. When a cobra sets his teeth in you,
you don't have time to drink the whiskey, even if the
glass is at your lips, and nobody knows whether it
would do any good if you had time to drink it.”
A long low whistle was the detective's only ex-
pression of his appreciation of their predicament. His
study of Oriental lore did not acquaint him with the
characteristics of the cobra. But the doctor was a
scientist, and Britz was willing to take the informa-
tion on trust. It was a situation in which he felt he
could afford to dispense with experimental knowledge.
The thick, beautifully rounded snake, ashen in color
and sinuous of movement, apparently was not alarmed
by the scramble of the doctor and the detective to the
top of the chiffonier, nor even by the swing of the
divan under the vigorous push of Fitch's foot. It
lowered the head it had lifted a few inches from the
floor, and continued its passage across the room; but a
short, dry laugh from the sleuth evidently angered it
more than any of the louder noises. It stopped mid-
way of the room, turning its head once more toward
the men on their narrow perch. An involuntary shiver
ran through Fitch, and even Britz felt a little uncom-
fortable under the serpent's glittering gaze. The
creature coiled itself in the center of the floor, its head
lifted, and those beady eyes twinkling furiously. Then
began a motion of the head like that of a waterspout to
a point at least knee-high of a tall man. The head
bent forward slightly, and the neck on both sides dis-


322 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
Moreover, it was as good as certain that the Swami,
the Prince, and their followers would not seek to flee
the city by any ordinary route. Britz himself, had he
been free to continue the pursuit, would have looked
first to the most extraordinary modes of flight com-
patible with practical conditions. From what he knew
of the men, by this time it would not amaze him
greatly to find they had left the city by airship or sub-
marine, slightly improbable as either means of transit
might have been a few years before.
“Bottled up, doc' " he exclaimed gloomily.
“That’s what it looks like,” assented Fitch.
“ Unless,” Britz continued, “we can get that
gun 33
“And use it effectively,” put in Fitch.
“I’m something of a shot,” the detective ventured,
meditatively. “Maybe I could hit it, and maybe I
could get that gun.”
His eyes, ranging the room in the immediate neigh-
borhood of the chiffonier, had alighted upon the water
pipe. The long, flexible rubber stem of the narghileh
was stretched across the table and the mouthpiece
hung over the back of a chair within a few feet of the
top of the chiffonier.
“I’ll try it,” said the detective decisively. “Give a
hand here, doc' "
Fitch hooked one arm about the ornamental knob
at the back of the chiffonier, and with his free hand
gripped the detective's left wrist. Britz, his left hand
clutching the doctor's sleeve, the toe of his left boot
thrust between the chiffonier and the wall, leaned far
out in an attempt to reach the tube of the water pipe.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 327
uncertain refuge on the chiffonier. Crooking his left
arm, he used the angle made by his elbow as a rest and
leveled the long blue barrel of the big-calibered
weapon steadily. Pausing until the swaying of the
serpent diminished as much as it apparently was go-
ing to do, he fired. º
A writhing, twisting snarl was the result. The
cobra coiled and uncoiled with electric rapidity, travel-
ing in circles all over the space between the chiffonier
and the table whence Britz had lassoed the pistol.
Plainly the reptile was hit—mortally wounded, he
thought, but as he started to descend impatiently,
Fitch seized him and literally flung him back on the
chiffonier's smooth top.
“Not yet,” said the doctor nervously. “Let's wait,
a minute.”
It was profitable patience. For after probably a
minute of terrible struggling, the cobra returned to its
coil and once more reared its head. The gray body
throbbed fiercely, but closer scrutiny showed the man
the snake had not been hit with fatal result. Suddenly
the physician seized Britz's arm in a nervous grasp.
“By Jupiter!” he exclaimed. “You’ve shot out its
tongue!”
True enough. The fifth bullet had passed between
the gaping jaws of the reptile and taken off the greater
part of that darting scarlet thread as neatly as a sharp
instrument could snuff a candle. While the wound
doubtless caused agony to the snake, it did not lessen
its anger. The poison-charged fangs remained in its
mouth, and the cutting off of its tongue swelled its
fury to the ultimate degree.


328 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
Britz dropped the pistol on the chiffonier and thrust
both hands in his pockets.
“Up a tree for fair,” he said. “Nothing more do-
ing in the artillery line.”
“That was your last cartridge?”
Britz bent his head affirmatively. An expression of
slow wrath gathered force in the Headquarters man's
face, as he stared at the swaying serpent such a short
distance below. One could see he was angry enough
to take the desperate chance of springing from his
perch and trying to strike the cobra with his heels, or,
failing that, seizing it by the neck, seeking to throttle
it. The instinct of self-preservation, however, was
stronger than rage. Britz was willing enough to risk
his life in the fulfilling of his duty, so long as the risk
meant a fighting chance to win. He was too sensible
absolutely to throw his life away, and something told
him that in spite of all the courage in the world, no
man would have an appreciable percentage of oppor-
tunity in a battle at close quarters with so venomous a
serpent. Yet he must get out of that house. He felt
he was the only man on the police force who could be
sure of heading off the Orientals. In that very mo-
ment they might be beyond the city's limits, bearing
the booty he had pursued so many weeks. It was
more than his self-poise could stand. He gave rein to
his anger, and for the first time in all the doctor's ac-
quaintance with him he swore hard and fast and
long. His flow of profanity stopped as suddenly as
it had commenced. He drew one hand from his
pocket, and slowly, as if he hardly dared to trust his
senses, held up his fingers and looked at what they


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 329
clasped. Then he held the object out triumphantly for
the physician to see. It was a loaded cartridge for-
gotten when last he emptied his pockets of their supply
of extra ammunition!
“We'll make no miss with this one,” said the sleuth.
“Don’t you think you can use it better, doc?”
“No,” said Fitch, “I am not in your class when it
comes to snuffing out serpents' tongues. You may fire
when you are ready, lieutenant.”
Britz grinned, shook the empty shells out of the re-
volver, slipped the full cartridge into one of the cham-
bers, and twirled it until it paralleled the barrel. Then,
once more using his arm as a rest, he took careful aim,
and was about to pull the trigger, when the door was
flung open, and the uniformed policeman stood on the
threshold. - -
“Well,” said the bluecoat, “excuse me for butting
in, but I thought something might have 33
Fitch checked him with an upraised hand, and the
patrolman's eyes almost burst in their sockets as,
lowering his gaze, he saw the up-reaching death cov-
ered by the Headquarters man's pistol. For a sec-
ond's space, none of the three men moved. Then a
metallic click broke the suspense, only to leave it in an-
other instant more taut than ever as all three realized
the cartridge had missed fire. The bluecoat's hand
reached for his club. Panic-stricken though he had
been at first sight of the cobra, he had the pluck com-
mon to the humblest member of “the finest,” and he
plainly meditated taking the serpent from the rear.
He would not trust to his revolver lest his aim, spoiled
by the intensity of the situation, should fly high and


CHAPTER XXIII
MRS. MISSIONER's VISITOR
MRS. MISSIONER, after the ball, took in the fag-end
of a bridge party, and stayed so late that when she
returned to her home the east was striped with dawn,
and the maid who had waited up for her was sleeping
soundly in a chair. The widow was not yet disposed
for slumber. It had been an exciting night. Her
fancy had been stimulated so greatly by her brief talk
with the Swami in the ballroom that she was unable
to turn it from the mysterious Oriental history of the
Maharanee diamond. She knew no more of the jewel's
past than she had related to the sage, for her husband
had not acquainted her with all the details connected
with his acquisition of it. Something in the Swami's
manner caused her to regard the stone with more or
less aversion. She began to doubt the purity of its
record. Fond though she was of gems, even to the
point of being a jewel worshiper, she was American
to her finger-tips, and would shrink in terror from any
bauble that came to her stained with the tiniest drop
of human blood. She had loved her husband in a
way; at any rate, she had always respected and ad-
mired him. It seemed impossible he would be a party
to wrongdoing. Yet she could not shake off a sen-
sation of dread whenever she remembered how in-
timately the jewel had nestled in the snows of her
throat, and rivaled the brightness of her eyes. Could
331


332 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
it be she had worn a gem whose fire was more suited
to the glow of an inferno than to the Eden of a good
woman's loveliness?
Drawing about her shoulders a soft, warm shawl,
she took a seat at a window in her boudoir and sat
gazing into a sky pink and gray with daybreak, trying
to solve her real feelings in regard to the recovery of
the Maharanee diamond. She was in the midst of her
meditation when she heard the faint ringing of a bell
at the other end of her big house. In a little while,
a footman rapped on the door of her boudoir. It
awakened her maid, and the girl, her eyes swollen with
sleep, approached the widow with a card bearing no
name, but inscribed with the message:
“It is important that I be permitted to see you at
once.”
At such an hour? Mrs. Missioner was astonished
by the request. Who could her early visitor be?
Surely no one in her own circle of acquaintances
would venture upon such a liberty. If it were a ques-
tion of life or death, there was still the telephone.
Secrecy was indicated by the attempt of the person to
see her face to face. Haste breathed in every word
of the scholarly scrawl. Mrs. Missioner was not ultra-
conventional, but the request for an interview at that
time of day—an hour that almost might be called a
time of night—was beyond the scope of even her lib-
eral views. However, curiosity conquered, as it has
been doing in the cases of women, jewels, and apples
since the world began, and she informed her maid she
would see the visitor in the library.
She controlled her eagerness for understanding of


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 337
the brow of the god. That he was not blasted in his
tracks by the lightning of divine wrath proves that the
mind of the god at that moment was shrouded in med-
itation for the benefit of his children. The stone was
missed at dawn. Within the hour, armed men were
scouring the city for the apostate thief. No trace of
him was found. The Maharajah of that kingdom,
lax though he had been in certain observances of the
faith, was too true a son of the Temple to let the care-
less priests go unpunished. By his order they were
seized, a hundred of them, and thrown into prison. A
royal decree was promulgated, the effect of which is
that none of those unhappy captives is to see the light
of day until the diamond is returned to its place in
Buddha's forehead. The Temple was draped in the
mourning colors of the East, and those colors still
deck its lonely walls. No true believer's foot may be
seen within its portals while the great stone is missing.
The brethren of the priesthood languish in dungeons,
hoping against hope that Buddha may manifest his
mercy by causing the gem to be regained and replaced
upon his brow. Untended, unworshiped, the god sits
upon his throne within the shrine, waiting for the
restoration of his own.”
Mrs. Missioner was thrilled by the narrative. She
was somewhat at a loss, however, to account for the
depth of the Swami’s interest in the recapture of the
great diamond. Until he unfolded his story further,
she did not know how personal that interest was.
“How does this affect you?” she asked. “Why
should you be at such pains to find and restore the dia-
mond? And to return these other stones to me?”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 339
tween her hands the packet containing the other stones
of her necklace, and gazed dreamily into the fire.
“What is it, then, you wish?” she asked. “What
can I do for you? Is it a question of a reward?”
“Not in that sense,” said the Swami quickly. “I
want no recompense for returning to you that which
belongs to you. Those stones are yours. It would
be as wicked for me to keep them, according to the
light of my faith, as in the moral intelligence of yours.
But I do want a reward in a way. I ask your per-
mission to return to my native land, and I request
that you cause all further efforts to recover the big
diamond to end at once.”
“How can I do that?” inquired the widow.
“The matter is now in the hands of the police. You
can say truthfully to the police,” the Swami replied,
“that your diamonds have been returned to you; that
you are satisfied with the explanation of their disap-
pearance that accompanied their restoration, and that
you wish all further activity on the part of the author-
ities to cease.”
“But will they do that?” pursued the widow.
“Will they let fall a case that has aroused so much
public interest as the Missioner diamond mystery P
Can I persuade them to end the search and to take no
further steps?”
“I think you can,” he said. “All you have to do
is to inform the police that you have your diamonds,
and that you will not be a complainant against anyone
connected with their disappearance. When you do
that, I feel certain they will be glad enough to drop
the case. If you have promised a large reward for


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 34I
to a combat, would be, madam, your own servant,
Ali.”
“Alil" cried the widow. “Why, he is devoted to
me.”
“So?” The Swami's eyebrows went up. “He is
devoted to you, madam, in all other respects; but in
everything connected with the restoration of the jewel,
you will find him devoted to-me. I have owned his
devotion, Mrs. Missioner, since infancy. He was my
father's most trusted servant, and he has been mine
since my father's death. It was I who put him in the
way of being employed by you before you left Cal-
cutta. Even then, I had reason to think the great dia-
mond was in your possession, although that reason was
not strong enough to warrant me in refraining from
careful search in other directions until all the clews not
connected with you were exhausted. The hunt for the
jewel, Mrs. Missioner, has been to me not a pastime of
a month or a year, but the task of several years—a
duty which, if I had not carried it to a successful con-
clusion, would have been the task of a lifetime.”
Mrs. Missioner did not reply. She seemed lost
in thought. The only sign she gave was to tighten
her clasp upon the package of gems, as the visitor
with punctilious Oriental courtesy bowed his way to
the door.
“I will come for your decision at noon,” said the
Swami. “It is the safest time for me to pass through
the streets, as they are then at their busiest. Think
well upon my request, if you please, madam. Let not
the sacred stone go back to its shrine with Western
blood upon it.”


346 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
was to substitute an imitation for the genuine article.
Naturally, too, the imitation had to be made without
Mrs. Missioner's knowledge, and the man he meant
to have make it had to have either the original as a
copy or a very accurate drawing. It was beyond all
possibility that Griswold could get the necklace into
his possession long enough to have a bogus collarette
made. Mrs. Missioner, in spite of her many millions,
and like all other women of wealth, guarded her jewels
closely. She may intrust her Government bonds and
other negotiable securities to attorneys or banks, but
she keeps her jewels under her own eyes. None of us
knows just how much she thought of Griswold; but
the chances are that, even if she had been engaged
to him, she wouldn't have let him have possession of
the Maharanee necklace for any length of time. My
experience is that these rich New Yorkers don't be-
lieve in throwing temptation in one another's way—
anyhow, not at any risk to themselves.”
“Your powers of deduction are truly marvelous,
Britz,” said Manning with a short laugh, in which
Britz thought he heard a faint note of mockery.
“Now, let's don't do any kidding, Chief,” Britz
rejoined with just a shade of acid in his voice. “This
is a pretty serious case, and I’ve been up a few nights
without any too much sleep. I’m not on the witness
stand now, recollect, and I don't feel as if I’d got
to parcel out my words when I'm talking to friends.”
There was the least little lift of his eyebrows as he
uttered the last word.
Manning laughed again—apologetically this time,
and the lieutenant, once more unruffled, continued:


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 347
“So Griswold had to make sketches and diagrams
of the widow's necklace. Even that couldn't have
been easy, for I guess he had to use his pencil when
Mrs. Missioner wasn't in the room. It isn't likely
she gave him many opportunities of being alone with
the jewels she prized above all the others in her col-
lection. You see, when her husband gave her that
necklace and told her about the Maharanee diamond,
he made up a pretty little fairy story that probably
gave the big stone much greater value in her eyes
than if she'd really known the truth. Women,” said
Britz solemnly, “are funny. They are about the fun-
niest things in this little old world of ours—particu-
larly when it comes to jewels and gowns, with the
jewels leading by a city block.”
Fitch, in his capacity as a lover, became somewhat
restive under the detective's cynical summing up of
the sex, and relieved himself with the remark:
“If women are any funnier than men, I’d like you to
show me how. Your experience is all very well,
lieutenant; but I’ve seen them in their little white cots
in hospitals—both kinds; and I have seen them on
the operating table, and I can tell you the woman
has yet to be born that can do as many fool stunts
as the average man!” After this burst of romance-
born frankness he subsided.
“Well, we won't quarrel about the sex, doctor,”
said Britz, “though I must say I don't like to hear
you getting off these suffragette sentiments. Any-
way, it's safe to assume Mrs. Missioner didn't let
Curtis Griswold have time to drape that necklace of
hers on an art model when he started in to sketch it.


352 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
in less than a week after the theft of Mrs. Missioner's
jewels was discovered.”
Manning felt he had no choice save to comply. He
wasn't exactly pleased by the insistence of his lieu-
tenant's request; but when Britz, at a nod from him,
pressed a push button and an attendant appeared in
the doorway, Chief Manning ordered the bluecoat to
ask Donnelly and Carson to report to him in the lieu-
tenant's room at once.
“Right here,” Britz proceeded, “is where an in-
teresting side feature of the mystery comes in. Gris-
wold would have probably been more alert if he had
known that men ten times as adroit as he, and a
hundred times more unscrupulous, had journeyed half
around the world to get one of those very gems, he
was preparing to steal from the woman he hoped to
marry. I don't know exactly what's at the bottom of
the interest those Hindoos have in the great Maharanee
diamond; but I do know they’re willing to go pretty
close to the electric chair to get it. I understand it
was not really bought from the wife of an Indian
prince, as Missioner told his wife it was. My best
information is that it came from a Hindoo temple.
You know those savages set great store by their idols.
At any rate, from a half-dozen to a dozen Indians
of various degrees came here from Calcutta some time
ago and camped on the trail of the Maharanee dia-
mond. They played a waiting game and, apparently,
they were on the point of making a grand effort to
get the stone when the head of this organization hap-
pened to be in the box next to Mrs. Missioner at the
Metropolitan Opera House on the night when the


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 353
necklace turned out to be a fake. He then learned
that the original diamonds were not in the widow's
keeping any longer.
“Griswold also was in the Missioner box that night,
as you know, and he must have noticed the Oriental
who butted in during the search for the diamonds.”
Britz paused a little, and then resumed:
“These Hindoos worked about as fast as I did.
They must have made up their minds pretty early
in the game that Miss Holcomb knew nothing about
the necklace, and, of course, nobody would be foolish
enough to suspect little Miss March. Our dark friends
from the East concentrated their attention on Griswold
and Sands. For a long time, Ali had been in Mrs.
Missioner's employ. He wasn't, however, Mrs. Mis-
sioner's employee in the true sense of the word. He
was there as one of the subordinates of this Swami
chap, along with the other Oriental fellows, one of
whom calls himself Prince Kananda. In fact, Ali was
on the job from the day he became a member of Mrs.
Missioner's household. He was sent there for the
precise purpose of piping off the place, and either get-
ting the big diamond himself, or tipping the Swami
and all the rest of them when it would be safe for them
to make a try. It stands to reason Mrs. Missioner
watched her jewels pretty closely, and that her safe
was a jim-dandy, since that necklace in all those long
months could not be lifted by the Hindoo servant.
He would have been perfectly willing to throttle her
in order to get it had he felt reasonably sure
of a getaway as easily after a murder as after a
robbery.”


354 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“You must have been reading about Ali Baba and
the Forty Thieves, Britz,” said Manning with another
harsh laugh. “This sounds altogether too much like
the Arabian Nights to be the goods.”
“Well, there weren't as many as forty of the thieves,
and the Ali in this case wasn't an honest man. I'm
giving it to you straight, Chief. I haven't worked
day and night on this proposition for nothing. You'll
find it just as I'm telling it to you, and if you'll sus-
pend judgment until I get through, I’ll deliver the
goods all right.”
“I think,” remarked Fitch to Manning, “we shall
find that Lieutenant Britz comes pretty near knowing
what he is talking about. I've seen him work on this
case, and I know something of the facts he has dis-
covered. If you have ever studied the ways of Ori-
entals you'll be surprised at nothing they do. They
look at life from altogether a different angle. Life
is about the cheapest thing in life to them.”
“Very good,” said Manning. “I’m willing to be
convinced, but it seems hard to believe that a woman
worth a hundred millions could live for months with
death hanging over her head in her own household,
and yet know nothing about it. What's the use of
being a multi-millionaire if you're no safer than in
an eighteen-dollar flat? For my part, I don't take
much stock in your Hindoos.”
“You’ll take a lot of stock in them before the
morning is over, Chief, if you stay with us,” Britz
retorted. “I’m going to show you not only the Hin-
doos in the act of attempting to get away, but I'll
turn up the goods in their possession. They have the


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 355
diamond now, but I’ll have both them and the diamond
in a very few hours!”
“I believe you,” Fitch chimed in. “You see,
Chief,” he explained to Manning, “this lieutenant of
yours has made the capture of the Hindoos more or
less of a personal matter.”
A choppy laugh from the detective interrupted the
physician.
“Yes,” he agreed, “I don't mind telling you that
I'm almost as eager to get those fellows as I am
to recover the widow's jewels. They got just a little
bit too gay with me for their own good.” He flushed
slightly as he recalled how utterly he had been at
the mercy of the Hindoos when he lay like a holiday
turkey on the floor of that bare room in the unoccu-
pied uptown apartment.
“The Hindoos,” said Britz, “went through the
apartments of Sands and Griswold with what Sam
Weller would call a double-million-magnifying micro-
scope. They didn't leave a postage stamp unsearched.
They looked into every hole and corner, ransacked
every drawer, and turned every place inside out. I
caught 'em at it—two of them, anyway—in Sands's
room, and they're now in the West Thirtieth Street
Station. They must have gone through Griswold's
apartment first, for it was there, I guess, they found
this note from Millicent to “Curtis dear,’ and it was
this note that gave me a line on how brother Griswold
stood with the lady of the Hotel Renaissance. I knew
Griswold was in the habit of visiting that hotel, but
I didn't know whom he went there to see. I felt
pretty certain when I got the note that it came from


356 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
somebody in the Renaissance, and I got Rawson to
send the bunch out on the hunt so that I could make
certain I'd made no mistake.
“One of the men reported there was a Mme. Dela-
roche at the Renaissance. That looked good enough
to me. I went there that same night, with the doctor
on the sidewalk, as the lookout. I did a little burglary
stunt that would have landed the jewels if the Hindoos
had not got there ahead of me. In some way or other,
those fellows learned about the acquaintance between
Griswold and the Delaroche lady about the same time
I did, or perhaps a little earlier. One of them got
into her apartment by the fire escape route and sneaked
the jewels from under her pillow. What's more, he
contented himself with the diamonds themselves, and
didn't even take the casket they were in. The jewel
case was still under her pillow when I got there, and
it wasn't until after the lady, under the impression
the gems were in the case, gave herself away more
or less, that I found the little box was empty. When
I looked out on the fire escape, I saw the handkerchief
the dark-skinned cracksman had dropped in his hurry.
That sent us hot-footed to the Swami’s house.”
When Britz had sketched the history of the Mis-
sioner case, Manning and Fitch looked at him ad-
miringly. Both his hearers were thoughtful for a
minute or two. Then the Chief, though he realized
Britz had solved the mystery, could not refrain from
picking flaws.
“You have not explained fully,” he said, “how
Griswold contrived to smuggle the small diamond into
Miss Holcomb's room.”


358 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
take the drawings to the French manufacturers and
telling her to introduce herself as Elinor Holcomb, or
by any other name he desired.”
Manning nodded reluctantly, Fitch approvingly.
“As for old Martin's possession of Sands's card,”
continued the lieutenant, “I see no explanation about
that except that Griswold handed it to him. There
seems to be a streak of malicious mischief in our club
friend. As a side exploit in pulling off a big crime,
he would enjoy making trouble for another—especially
for a man he had reason to fear as a rival, which was
the case with Sands. It may be he even hoped to
cast suspicion permanently on the millionaire, though
that seems hardly possible. Even when Sands acted
so mysteriously in regard to that letter he recovered
from the Hindoo burglar, he did not make me suspect
he had stolen the diamonds; the strongest suspicion I
had was that he might be shielding the thief, and that
didn't last long.”
“And your own little adventure?” asked the chief
of detectives with a trace of malice.
“Oh, that was only a precaution on their part.
They took the chance I might have recovered the
Maharanee, I suppose. Maybe they expected to find
in my possession something that would give them a
clew to the whereabouts of the stone. Then, once
they got me, they thought they might as well keep
me out of the running until they got what they wanted.
. It was no part of their plan to let me find the jewels
and turn them over to Mrs. Missioner.”
“You had a close call there, lieutenant,” observed
the physician.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 359
“Close enough,” said Britz calmly. “But it's all
in the day's work.”
As Britz finished there was a timid tap on the door.
In response to Manning's curt “Come in 1" Donnelly
and Carson crossed the threshold, and did their best
to stand at ease in front of the lieutenant's desk.
“You sent, huh, for us, Chief ?”
“Yes,” said Manning. “Lieutenant Britz wants
you to attend to a little matter for him.”
“Yes, Donnelly,” said Britz coolly; “if you have
nothing better to do just now, suppose you run up
to Curtis Griswold's apartment, and tell him the Chief
wants to talk to him.”
“Suppose he won't come,” said Donnelly, who evi-
dently did not yet suspect it was desired that the
clubman be taken into custody.
“Bring him, then,” said Britz. “You haven't for-
gotten how to show a gentleman down to Head-
quarters, have you?”
Donnelly winced under the lieutenant's scorn, and
Carson turned gray.
“And you, Mr. Carson,” said Britz, renewing his
instructions, “be good enough to take a trip to the
Hotel Renaissance, and ask Mrs. Delaroche to come
down to see us for a little while.”
Carson, in the crisis, felt he could not be too precise.
“Suppose she declines?” he asked.
“Bring her l’” said Britz.
Fitch laughed aloud at the consternation in the faces
of the two detectives. It was manifest both Donnelly
and Carson were so far from the facts in the mystery
that not only had neither of them dreamed of making


360 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
a prisoner of Griswold, that suave society man who
had volunteered so much assistance to them in their
efforts to weave a web of circumstantial evidence
against Elinor Holcomb, but that they were absolutely
ignorant of the existence of such a person as Millicent
Delaroche. They shuffled their feet with increasing
nervousness as they felt the eyes of their chief upon
them. Donnelly shot a glance of ill-repressed hatred
at Britz as the lieutenant, at ease in his revolving chair,
faced the crestfallen detectives with a satirical smile.
Once or twice Donnelly essayed to speak, but each
time he caught the frozen expression on the faces of
the Chief and Britz, and the words died in his throat.
Nothing remained save for the two brilliant crime-
hunters to carry out the lieutenant's orders. As they
turned to go their discomfiture was augmented by
the real detective's mock solicitude.
“You’ll find it an easy job, boys. Just ask the two
of them to come down here quietly, and if they don't
want to come, make 'em. Show them your shields,
you know, and all that sort of thing.”
As Donnelly and Carson crossed the threshold on
their way out, they fairly snorted with exasperation.
When they had gone, Britz indulged his amusement
to the extent of a laugh; Fitch joined him, and Man-
ning, after a brief attempt to keep his face straight,
also laughed heartily.


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 363
the sound. A pioneer ray gilded the Spuyten Duyvil
headland, caroming thither from the crest of Marble
Hill.
Fitch, waiting the signal for action, stole a moment
from the business in hand for an appreciative glance
at the beauty of the scene—one with which few New
Yorkers are familiar. The water rippled freely in the
cut. The yacht was almost motionless, rising gently
at long intervals as wind gusts from the Palisades
ruffled the surface of the strait. Far to the west, he
glimpsed the Hudson's stately stream. Then he turned
his eyes again to Britz, who was in command of
the little expedition. After a whispered conference
with Hicks, Britz slipped his hand into a side pocket
of his coat, and took out something that glittered in
the sunshine. At a single word from Britz, Gordon
and Hicks wormed their way along the bank until
they were at the bow of the yacht. Britz, Fitch, and
Manning stayed near the stern. Suddenly the lieu-
tenant fired a shot over the yacht that echoed metal-
lically from the cliffs, and at the signal, all five of
the attacking party leaped aboard the yacht, their
feet striking the polished deck with a concerted thud
that must have made those within the cabin think they
were feeling the first shock of a landslide.
The five men on the deck gave those below little time
for analysis of their sensations. Gordon and Hicks
raced around the wheelhouse to the starboard side
of the craft, and dashed down the companionway from
that direction, while Britz, Manning, and Fitch hurled
themselves into the port entrance to the cabin, alight-
ing on a richly carpeted floor a dozen feet below the


364 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
deck. Two shots followed before the police party
could seize Prince Kananda and Ali, who, facing in
opposite directions, stood at bay in the center of the
cabin. Britz and Gordon struck upward the revolvers
of the Indians as the triggers were pulled. The bullets
flew high, harming no one. Behind Kananda and
Ali, using a table as a breastwork, stood two more
Hindoos, both of them strangers to Britz. They were
unarmed save for wicked-looking Malay krises they
gripped nervously as they crouched in waiting for an
attack. Britz and Manning jammed their pistols into
the faces of the men with the krises; but the Indians,
undismayed, made savage slashes at them with their
razor-edged long knives. Gordon and Fitch sprang
upon the kris-bearers, Hicks with a pistol in each hand
standing off Kananda and Ali. Again and again the
Hindoos slashed at their assailants, and that they did
not split at least one head was due to the wary agility
of the four who attacked them. Shots from the de-
tectives’ revolvers would have brought them down at
such short range, of course; but the policemen seemed
bent on capturing them alive, and Fitch was not a
man to have recourse to bloodshed until he could be
certain it was inevitable. Britz and Manning waited
their chance. After futile swings at the Indians, they
closed with them, clubbing their revolvers and bring-
ing them down with crashing force on the gaudy
turbans of the Orientals. A few seconds of that
vicious pounding stunned the Hindoos, and it was then
but the work of a moment to slip handcuffs on them.
Kananda and Ali, in the meanwhile, had made no
further attempts to use their pistols. They read death


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 365
in Hicks's eyes as he confronted them with his long,
blue gleaming barrels aimed straight at them. Their
hesitation was fatal to their hope of escape. For
even as Ali, doubtless at a whisper or signal from
the Prince, swung himself about to interpose himself
between Hicks and the petty potentate's son, while
Kananda turned for a dash to the deck, Britz, Fitch,
and Manning, leaving Gordon in charge of the cap-
tured Indians, surrounded the other two and disarmed
them. Breathing heavily from the short but sharp
struggle, the captors marched their prisoners to the
far end of the cabin and seated themselves between the
Hindoos and the doors. They were still on the alert
to prevent an attempt to escape on the part of
Kananda or Ali. The other two Indians being hand-
cuffed, it was less likely they would make a spurt for
liberty, but the policeman took no chances.
“Now, Mr. Kananda,” said Britz to the Prince
cheerily, “I reckon we'll have those diamonds.”
Kananda eyed him with snaky malignity. Fitch
could not account for the little shudder that ran
through him until he remembered the gleam of the
cobra's eyes. There was the same look of frozen
death in the glance of the Oriental kinglet.
“Perhaps you will be good enough to explain,”
parried the Prince with his most blasé Cambridge
Inanner.
“Explain nothing!” shouted Britz. “I’ve fenced
with you fellows long enough. We've caught you
now and we want the goods.”
All his customary self-control vanished at the sight
of faces like those that had grinned at him from the


366 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
interior of the cab as he rode, head down, at top
speed up Riverside Drive.
“I haven't the slightest idea what you mean,”
Kananda persisted. “Your demand is inexplicable
to me, as is this unwarranted invasion of a private
yacht. What are you? Government agents or river
pirates?”
“Neither,” answered Britz, “as you very well know,
Mr. Kananda. You may be a prince in your own
country, or you may be a piker. I don't know which,
and I don't care. Here you are just a common bur-
glar, or, at best, a receiver of stolen goods. You, or
one of your men, broke into a lady's apartment in
the Hotel Renaissance, and stole a diamond necklace.
We're here to get that necklace.”
A sneering laugh was Kananda's only reply. Ali
glowered at the detective, and the handcuffed Hindoos
glared as if, despite their shackles, at a word from
their leader they would hurl themselves at the lieu-
tenant's throat. Britz noted the menace in their looks
and scoffed at them.
“You’re not at a necktie party now,” he said, “and
it's a good thing for you, or you might find that some-
body else knows how to tie four-in-hands. Fortu-
nately for you, we do not adopt your sneaking Eastern
methods. When we fight, it's on the level and in the
open. You're just a bunch of second-story men, and
a pretty cheap bunch at that. Princel Oh, cut it
out !”
Manning smiled at the lieutenant's wrath, while
Gordon and Hicks listened wonderingly. Fitch was
too much engrossed in his anxiety to see the Mis-


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 367
sioner jewels recovered to perceive any comedy in the
situation. His hands gripped each other as he leaned
forward from his chair waiting for the information
sought from the Prince.
“When you have amused yourself sufficiently,” said
Kananda with an unabated show of scorn, “possibly
you will be kind enough to restore our property, re-
lease my companions, and take yourselves off. If
this is a drunken frolic, I would suggest that all five
of you seem to be rather beyond the undergraduate
age.” -
“You’ll find it's no joke, my dark friend,” Britz
rejoined. “The sooner you hand over those diamonds
you stole, the better it will be for you. You'll do your
bit up the river for this, anyhow, but there's no use
getting extra time for resisting the police.”
“Police, eh?”
“Yes, police l’ Britz, contrary to the custom of
professional sleuths, did not throw back his coat and
show a shining shield. He contented himself with
the simple assertion, and left it to the man he was
addressing to accept or reject it as he liked. What
mattered it? The thieves were caught.
“Since you are resolved to carry this miserable
farce farther,” said the Prince, “I suppose we shall
have to submit.”
“You’ll submit to a search, that's what you'll do!”
interrupted Manning. “I don't blame you, Britz, for
losing your temper with this crowd; fresh is no name
for it.”
The Chief nodded to Gordon and Hicks, and they
began a search of the four prisoners that left nothing


368 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
undone to find the diamonds. When they had exam-
ined every article of the Indians' apparel, from the
Oriental costumes of the low-caste Hindoos to the
conventional attire of the Prince, they looked to Man-
ning for further instructions, for they had found
nothing.
Then all four of the detectives, with the Chief
and the doctor, ransacked the cabin, fore and aft and
from starboard to port, as thoroughly as the Indian
burglars had gone through the apartments of Griswold
and Sands. They even lifted the carpet on all sides,
rolled the heavy furniture about, and prodded every
locker. In vain. If the diamonds were on board the
yacht, they were not in the saloon.
Fitch, at Manning's request, mounted guard over
the captives, while the four policemen went over the
remainder of the vessel. Half an hour passed before
Manning and Britz gave up the search. They, as
well as Gordon and Hicks, were ready to make oath
that not one of the jewels was on board. But Britz
did not flinch from his course. He was convinced
he had the right man, and that in the end he would
get the gems. Turning to Gordon, he asked:
“Do you know how to run this sort of boat?”
Gordon did know. He had handled naphtha craft
of all sizes and needed little assistance to navigate
the yacht.
“Very well,” Britz continued, “run her down the
North River to Pier A. I don't want this ship to
get out of the Department's hands for a moment.”
Gordon went to the wheel, while Hicks, who had
some knowledge of machinery, watched and regulated


BRITZ, OF JEADQUARTERs 369
the feed of the motor. Silently as a giant swan, and
as smoothly, the yacht threaded the cut to the broader
stretch beyond the Spuyten Duyvil creek and, passing
under the long railroad bridge on which the famous
little Dolly Varden train toddled from bank to bank,
swung downstream in the Hudson and headed for
the Battery. The yacht was off Grant's Tomb before
an idea occurred to Fitch, for which Britz not only
gave him full credit, but blessed him heartily.
“See if any one of those men is wounded, lieu-
tenant,” Fitch suggested.
Britz and Manning looked the Orientals over, and
made them walk up and down the cabin. The Prince
halted slightly in his gait for an instant, then re-
covered control of his muscles, and strode as steadily
as his low-caste compatriots.
“That man has the Maharanee,” Fitch declared.
“You’ll find it in the calf of his leg.”
Britz seized Kananda by the collar and shook him
savagely.
“If you don't give up that diamond, your finish
will be the operating table,” said the detective.
Kananda forced another laugh. Britz, Manning,
and Fitch seized him, and baring his leg to the
knee, searched for marks of a wound. Strangely
enough, there was a little lump in the calf. The de-
tectives looked at the doctor.
“Here's a slight protuberance, doctor,” said Britz.
“I guess the rest is up to you.”
Fitch took out a pocket instrument case, and
selected a tiny knife. Kananda, on the point of be-
ginning another struggle to escape, was choked and


37O BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
held powerless by Britz and Manning. Gripping the
Prince's leg firmly, the doctor worked his scalpel
gently into the small lump in the flesh—a wound so re-
cent that it had been bound together by pieces of court
plaster the color of the skin. Then he triumphantly
extracted something which, though ruddied, sparkled
in the gleam of the incandescent lamps with which the
cabin, despite the daylight, still was illuminated.
“The Maharanee diamond l’’ cried Britz and Man-
ning together.
“Only that, and nothing more,” answered Fitch.
“But where can the rest of the jewels be?”
Fitch was pitiless in his purpose now, as his sweet-
heart's vindication hinged on the recovery of the
smallest stones belonging to the Missioner necklace.
It wasn't enough that they had found only the Maha-
ranee itself.
A similar examination was made of the other Hin-
doos, but without result. No other protuberances of
flesh were found. The gem-hunters were obliged
to rest content with the recovery of the greatest
diamond.
Britz looked admiringly at Fitch.
“How did you ever think of it?” he asked.
“It was suggested by the way the Kohinoor was
carried out of India,” the doctor replied. “The coolie
who stole it made a gash in his leg and then thrust
the jewel within the wound. Then he waited for
the wound to heal. When the edges were knit together
there was no evidence of the stone except a slight
protuberance in the flesh. The jewel hurt, of course,
but the coolie stood the pain through a walk of many


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 371
hundred miles until he was well outside the border
of his native land.”
They were now at Pier A and Gordon stopped the
yacht alongside the police boat Patrol. Britz and
Manning went aboard the Patrol, and the chief of
detectives turned over the yacht to the captain of
the Harbor Police. Then the detectives took their
prisoners ashore, and in a couple of taxicabs all were
whirled to Mulberry Street.


CHAPTER XXVI
MUTUAL EXPLANATIONS
It was breakfast time, and Britz and Fitch after
their exciting night were hungry enough to eat a
Hindoo, but they did not stop to show consideration
to their inner men. The great Missioner mystery was
too close to a climax for thought of self. The lieu-
tenant and the physician were equally eager to bring
the case to a close. The doctor's one thought was of
the lonely girl in the Tombs who in that moment
doubtless was wondering whether she ever would be
released; who perhaps was terrified by the prospect
of her trial's approach, and who, it might be, had
begun to doubt not the will, but the skill of her lover
and the Headquarters man in their efforts to free her
from the predicament in which the density of Don-
nelly and Carson had placed her.
Britz, in whose mind the incidents were rapidly
arranging themselves in orderly array, was none the
less eager for the actual fruition of his triumph. By
that time, all the other prisoners must be in the De-
tective Bureau unless Donnelly and Carson had bungled
even more seriously than he was prepared to believe
they could do.
As he expected, Britz found Griswold and Mrs.
Delaroche in the big reception room of the Detective
Bureau with the detectives who had arrested them
372


374 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
but for the first time in all the wearying work for his
sweetheart's freedom and vindication, his voice failed
him utterly. He could only grip the strong hand of
the detective and shake it as if Britz was the first
friend he had ever had and he expected him to be the
last.
A man with a pleasant face came out of the Detective
Bureau, and Britz introduced him to Dr. Fitch as
Detective Williams.
“Here's an order from the Chief to bring Miss
Holcomb here, Williams,” said Britz. “The doctor
will go along with you, -and-well, it won't be neces-
sary for you to stick to them too closely on the way
back. You understand, Williams; you're a married
man, you know.”
The detective replied with a sympathetic smile, and
Fitch, with another hearty grasp of the detective's
hand, hurried away with Williams.
Britz walked slowly to his own room, where the
scowling Orientals were penned in a corner, while
the chief of detectives and his two subordinates were
taking well-earned rest in the lieutenant's easy-chairs.
Britz talked to Manning in whispers, then went to the
telephone and called Mrs. Missioner's house.
“Good-morning, Mrs. Missioner!” he said over the
wire. “This is Lieutenant Britz—Britz, of Head-
quarters. I called you up to tell you we had arrested
the jewel thieves and—beg pardon? What did you
say—your jewels have been returned to you? That's
strange. I have one of them in my pocket now.
IHow's that? You say you have all your jewels?
Then whose is this—the Maharanee? Pardon me,


376 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
right. We'll have quite an audience, Chief, when we
ring up the curtain. While we're waiting for Mrs.
Missioner, we may as well get out the facts in the case
of Mrs. Delaroche.” Turning to Gordon and Hicks,
he said: “Will you take these second-story dark men
into the next room for a little while P”
The two detectives hastened to comply with the lieu-
tenant's request, and Manning braced himself to put
the lady of the Renaissance through the third degree
mercilessly as he had done in the case of Elinor Hol-
comb. Mrs. Delaroche was brought in by a private
of the detective force, and Britz, with elaborate polite-
ness, bowed her to a chair. She was too angry to
acknowledge his courtesy, and she sat looking at the
lieutenant and the Chief with flashing eyes.
“Mrs. Delaroche,” said Britz, “I may as well tell
you at the outset that the game is up. We know all
about your connection with this case, and the best
thing for you to do is to tell us everything you know.
Your friend, Mr. Griswold, as you have seen, is under
arrest. What do you know about him?”
“I shall answer no questions,” said Mrs. Delaroche,
“until I shall have had an opportunity to engage
counsel.”
“You won't need any counsel in this case, madam,”
the Chief interposed.
“No, indeed,” said Britz. “I don't want to be rude,
Mrs. Delaroche, but I may as well tell you that the
District Attorney will give you all the legal advice you
require, if you persist in withholding your informa-
tion from the authorities. We know pretty nearly all
we need to know about Griswold, and when you tell us


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 377
—as you are going to do—what you know about him,
the Missioner mystery will have been cleared.”
“I know nothing about Mr. Griswold that can mili-
tate against him in any way,” said Mrs. Delaroche.
“He is a gentleman whose only misfortune is that he
has fallen into the hands of such men as you!”
“Oh, indeed!” said Britz. “Well, misfortunes
never come singly, and if Mr. Griswold is unfortunate
enough to find himself here, you won't find any little
golden horseshoes hung about your presence in Police
Headquarters—I suppose you know this is Police
Headquarters, madam?”
“So I was told by the boor who brought me here,”
replied the woman.
“Never mind calling honest men any names,
madam,” said Manning. “We don't hire Chester-
fields to arrest crooks.”
She sprang from her seat like a panther and glided
across the room until she towered over the Chief. She
seemed about to strike him, but restrained herself by
a visible effort, and then, covering her face with her
hands, burst into a storm of tears that would have
swept the two men off their feet if they had not been
accustomed to that sort of thing a dozen times a month.
Manning and Britz waited for the storm to subside.
Then Britz said, a little more gently:
“There's no occasion for hysterics, Mrs. Delaroche.
I only want you to tell me everything.”
“I shall tell you nothing,” she replied again. Al-
though her voice was shaken with sobs, there was a
note of resolve in it that spoke the strength of her
courage.


378 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“Yes, you will; you'll tell me everything, but first
of all I'm going to tell you something. You are en-
gaged to Mr. Curtis Griswold, aren't you?”
“Not that it's any affair of yours,” she returned,
“but merely that you may understand I am not at all
ashamed of it, yes, I am.”
“Does that mean that Mr. Griswold is engaged to
marry you?”
“Of course!” she replied with an indignant flush.
“Now, Mrs. Delaroche,” Britz replied, “I’m going
to tell you that you are the most mistaken lady in
Manhattan Island right now. Griswold is not en-
gaged to you; at any rate, he doesn't understand that
he is.”
The woman was threatened with a return of her
passionate outburst, but curiosity got the better of her
through her emotions, and whirling toward the lieu-
tenant, she asked:
“What do you mean, sir?”
“I mean, madam,” answered Britz, “that Mr. Curtis
Griswold, though he engaged himself to marry you—
though he gave you reason to believe that you and
he would be married very shortly, has been indus-
triously engaged for some time past in attempting to
become engaged to another woman.”
“Who is she?” asked the lady of the Renaissance
eagerly.
“A most natural question, madam,” said Britz, “but
one which an innate sense of delicacy restrains me
from satisfying. However, the lady to whom I refer
is on her way here now, and in half an hour at most,
you will have the pleasure of seeing her.”


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 379
“Who is she? What is she? Where is she?”
exclaimed Mrs. Delaroche.
Doris Missioner's blond beauty would have fared
badly at her hands, perhaps, had the multi-millionaire
widow been in the room at that moment.
“She is the possessor of many millions,” said
Britz, “a woman of acknowledged beauty and of un-
deniable charm. Of course, I don't undertake to say
for a moment, madam, that her attractiveness equals
yours. Doubtless, Mr. Griswold, being an enterpris-
ing young man, has eyes more to her millions than
to her looks. Nevertheless, she is a beauty.”
He watched closely the effect of her words on the
high-strung woman facing him, and saw that he had
touched a responsive chord. Her eyes flashed as if
her very soul vibrated with jealous rage. Her breath
came and went in short gasps. Her fingers twisted
and untwisted nervously, and she seemed to be on
the point of a violent revelation when the situation
was interrupted by a knock on the door.
Britz, a flash of amusement in his face, walked to
the door, opened it, and thrust his head out. In the
corridor stood a man from the Detective Bureau who
said:
“The prisoner, Griswold, requests an immediate
interview with Lieutenant Britz.”
Britz hesitated a minute, then said: “Bring him in
here,” and then returned to Mrs. Delaroche.
“I shall not ask you to take my word for it, madam,”
he said. “I’ll soon give you proof of the very best
kind that what I have told you about Mr. Griswold
is true. Just sit over here in this alcove where you


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 381
Britz turned to the Chief and remarked: “Ever see
such cheek as this before?”
“Cheek, eh?” cried Griswold. “Why, you blun-
dering * x
“None of that now, Mr. Griswold. I've got the
goods on you. The less of that kind of talk you
indulge in, the better for all concerned. Mrs. Dela-
roche has told everything!”
Griswold inquired sarcastically, “And what, pray,
had she to tell ?”
“A great deal more than Mrs. Missioner knows,”
answered Britz craftily.
“Don’t you mention that lady's name in such a place
as this!” exclaimed Griswold with a show of chivalry
that would have gone very well before a jury, but
which was lost on such hardened thief-takers as Britz
and Manning.
“No harm in mentioning her name, is there, when
the lady herself will be here in a few minutes?”
This time there was no simulation in the start
Griswold gave. He stared at the detective as if he
doubted his own hearing.
“For God's sake, man, you're not going to bring
her down here?”
“That's just what I'm going to do, Mr. Griswold,”
replied Britz. “She's on her way here now.”
“Why—why—you simply must not let her come
here,” said Griswold again. “I would not have her
see me here for anything in the world. Can't this be
arranged somehow P Say, you know I am not a poor
man—”
Britz grinned at him.


382 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
“Oh, I know you can't be bought,” said Griswold.
“But this is a serious matter to me. It means my
whole future. I don't want Mrs. Missioner to come
here and see me a prisoner. It will be different when
the case comes to trial. I will have counsel then, and
I can take care of myself, but just now I'm helpless.
Don't bring the woman here to make her lose all
respect for me; oh, damn it, man, don't queer
me!”
Millicent Delaroche from the alcove heard and saw
all that passed between the men. She gripped the
slender arm of her chair until her tapering fingers
curving around it bit into her pink palm. She watched
the unmistakable agitation of the prisoner until no
doubt remained in her mind of his attitude toward
Mrs. Missioner. Then her rage broke through all
restraint. Casting the detective's caution to the winds,
she strode to the center of the room and towered above
Griswold, as, thunderstruck at sight of her—in his
self-centered pride of what might happen, he
had utterly forgotten for a while her presence
in Police Headquarters—he moved uneasily in his
chair.
“Perjurer!” she screamed. “Liar! Ingratel
Thief 1?”
Each word was like the snap of a lash that brought
a wincing start from Griswold as if a black snake whip
had stung him. He stretched his hands toward her
imploringly.
“Millicent!” he cried.
“Never call me by that name again,” she almost
screamed. “I wish I could forget every occasion on


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 383
which you have dared to utter it. You wretch!” and
she wrung her hands futilely, as if she would like to
clasp them about his throat.
Fitch opened the door softly and looked in. Behind
him stood Elinor Holcomb and Detective Williams.
At a sign from Britz, they entered the room noise-
lessly and stood beside the door. Before Williams
could close it upon them, Mrs. Missioner and Bruxton
Sands appeared on the threshold.
Mrs. Delaroche turned to Britz in cold fury, an
icy reaction from her volcanic rage of the moment
before.
“I will tell you all you wish to know, lieutenant,”
she said. “I will tell you all I know about Mr.
Griswold.”
Britz poised himself in an attitude of polite inquiry.
“That is the man,” Mrs. Delaroche continued, “who
stole Mrs. Missioner's diamonds!”
The wealthy widow, standing near the door, put her
hand to her heart as if about to faint from the shock.
Sands, his only thought being to support her in such
a trying moment, forgot the presence of all the others,
and passed his arm about her shoulders to steady her
slightly swaying form. Elinor, with a little sigh,
turned to Fitch and clasped both his hands with un-
mistakable tenderness. Then her head sank upon his
shoulder, and the doctor, bolder than Sands, encircled
her waist with his arm. -
Britz, without making a move to interrupt Mrs.
Delaroche, stretched one hand behind him and pressed
a button that communicated with the room where
Gordon and Hicks waited with the four Hindoos,


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 385
equaling that of anyone in New York society. I be-
lieved him. He explained that he wished me to take
charge of the necklace at once as he feared to keep
it in his own apartment, and for business reasons did
not wish to intrust it to a safe deposit company. When
the news of the Missioner diamond robbery was pub-
lished in the newspapers, I commented upon it to the
man I supposed to be my fiancé, and expressed wonder
as to whether Mrs. Missioner's diamonds were as
beautiful as those he had given me. He asked me to
say nothing about my possession of the necklace until
our wedding day. He said he did not wish the direct-
ors of the Iroquois Trust Company to know he had
laid out such a large sum of money yet awhile.
“When you, Mr. Britz, tried to steal the necklace
from my room; when, in fact, you did take the case
that had contained them, I supposed you to be an
ordinary burglar. Naturally I became excited at the
thought of losing such magnificent gems. How the
jewels were ever taken from my custody I do not yet
know. I have no idea where they are. All I do know
is that Curtis Griswold stole them, and that, in turn,
they were stolen from him.
“As for you,” and she turned upon Griswold anew,
“I pray Heaven I shall never hear your name again
unless it be under circumstances that will give
me further opportunity to revenge myself upon
you!”
Silence followed the theatrical outburst of the
woman. Griswold stood with clasped hands, his eyes
on the floor. Mrs. Missioner, her eyes resolutely
averted from his crouching form, gazed at Britz ex-


386 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
pectantly. Elinor, her fine womanhood athrill with
sympathy in spite of her weeks of suffering—more
keenly because of it, perhaps—sought to soothe the
agitation of Mrs. Delaroche, who was close to collapse.
Fitch, too, strove to calm the woman. As a man he
pitied her; as a physician, he felt some alarm for her
because of the great excitement to which she had
wrought herself—excitement plainly beyond the en-
durance of her emotional nature. A feeling akin to
indignation stirred him when, glancing toward Britz,
he saw a sarcastic smile on the detective's face. His
hands in his pockets, he was rocking gently on his
heels, and watching Mrs. Delaroche as one would con-
centrate his vision on a great tragedienne near the
grand finale of her performance.
“Bravo!” said the lieutenant detective at last.
“Bravissimo, Mrs. Delaroche! If it were not for de-
taining our good friends, I'd insist upon an encore.
Really, you know, you're entitled to any number of
curtain calls for that.”
The heroine of the Renaissance burglary flashed
furious eyes upon him. Fitch, despite all he knew
Britz had done for Elinor, could not conceal his anger.
Even Miss Holcomb was indignant. Mrs. Missioner
and Sands looked at the detective expectantly. Man-
ning's face was impassive. He was prepared for any
surprise from his shrewd lieutenant.
“You behold in Mrs. Delaroche,” said Britz, in-
cluding everybody in a sweep of his hand, “one of
the most talented actresses in America. True, she isn't
on the stage, but that's only because the managers
haven't discovered her. If any of the big managers


388 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
come in the Latin Quarter. A bright, clever little girl
she was, to be sure, and it was too bad she had such a
hard struggle to realize her artistic dreams!”
All his hearers listened attentively—Mrs. Dela-
roche, in spite of resolute efforts to appear indifferent,
full as faithfully as the others.
Prince Kananda moved forward until he stood
within several feet of Mrs. Delaroche. She turned
her head slightly and saw him. A glance of mutual
recognition passed between them, but so quickly that
it was unobserved by the others. The Prince eyed her
steadily, with malignant gaze, as of a man who has
been tricked. A wild fear leaped into her eyes and
she moved away, edging closer to Britz.
“It isn't to be wondered at,” said Britz sympa-
thetically, “when you recall the many hardships Miss
Vincent endured—when you remember on how many
mornings she had to trudge to her copying work in
the Louvre without even the poor consolation of a
French breakfast, that she permitted a young Hindoo
gentleman to spend a little money upon her. It wasn't
exactly in line with New England conventionality,
of course, but the aristocratic Easterner had been in-
troduced to her formally enough, his behavior was
always respectful, and she—well, she was very lonely
and very blue and often very hungry.”
Mrs. Delaroche bit her lip and turned on Britz a
look of such resentment that Mrs. Missioner and Miss
Holcomb shrank away a little.
“And it needn't astonish us,” Britz continued, “that
when the polished Oriental brought about her acquaint-
ance with an American multi-millionaire she accepted


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 389
friendly little courtesies from the rich man, even go-
ing so far as to dine with him in several of the lux-
urious cafés for which Paris is famous. The Amer-
ican was a man from her own country—a big, good-
natured, whole-souled chap, thoroughly satisfied with
his fortune and himself.
“Therefore, why shouldn't the lonely, starving Miss
Vincent enjoy gay little dinners and, perhaps, gayer
little suppers with him? She was always chaperoned.
By whom? By the Hindoo, of course. Besides, the
millionaire's wife knew there was a dash of romance
in her husband that made him delight in these excur-
sions into the realm of the unusual.”
Mrs. Delaroche sat with those brilliant eyes of hers
bent rigorously on the rug. The other women glanced
at her curiously, Manning with suspicion, Kananda
with a glitter in his eyes that seemed to command
silence. But she did not look at the Prince.
“However,” ran the detective's monologue, “you'll
have to admit, Mrs. Delaroche, that it wasn't exactly
grateful on Miss Vincent's part to listen to the Hindoo
when he offered her a large bribe to—shall we say,
steal a certain rare and very beautiful diamond from
the multi-millionaire.”
Mrs. Delaroche's breath came in a series of soft
gasps—almost in sobs. A rose film seemed to spread
over her exquisite complexion.
The famous detective paused for a moment and
looked accusingly at her. When he spoke, it was with
finality.
“Mrs. Delaroche, you were Miss Vincent,” he said;
“you were the impoverished girl artist of the Latin
º


390 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS.
Quarter. You have been married since, and now you
are a divorcée—but you were Miss Vincent.”
She recovered her poise for a moment and gazed
at him defiantly. Then her courage broke again, and
she answered:
“It is true. How you have learned it I cannot
guess, but—it is true.”
Doris Missioner, despite the suggestion conveyed in
the lieutenant's revelations, gazed at Millicent Dela-
roche commiseratingly. Elinor's pity was more open.
“And now,” Britz went on, “Mrs. Delaroche either
stole those jewels in Paris or in New York. If they
were stolen in Paris, the authorities of this city have
no jurisdiction in the case. On the other hand, we
can prove the necklace was in her possession only a
day or two ago, and if the crime was committed in
this country, we will call in the District Attorney.”
He turned abruptly f ward the woman. “Mrs. Dela-
roche,” Britz said, I do not believe Mrs. Missioner
will call on the Freiich authorities to act, if the crime
was committed in their jurisdiction. If the jewels
were taken here, Mrs. Missioner will have no choice in
the matter.”
She seized at the bait. Turning her flashing eyes on
the detective, she burst forth:
“The jewels were stolen in Paris.”
A tense silence was broken by Britz.
“You’ll have to show me,” he snapped. “It’s your
last chance to tell the truth.”
“I stole the collarette from Mr. Missioner,” she ad-
mitted. “It was shortly before his death, a long
time ago. The plot had all been laid. Griswold and


392 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
she added in a voice laden with the vindictiveness she
felt.
The semicircle of listeners contracted until Mrs.
Missioner, Miss Holcomb, Sands, and Fitch were close
to Britz. The detective, turning to the others, said:
“I have had the good fortune to recover the Ma-
haranee diamond for you, Mrs. Missioner, and it re-
mains only to trace the other jewels of the necklace.
I dare say Prince Kananda can tell us where they are.”
“As I told you over the telephone, Lieutenant
Britz,” Mrs. Missioner answered, “I have recovered
my jewels.”
“All?” asked the detective, slightly astonished.
“All,” replied the widow. “Moreover, I do not
care to prosecute anyone connected with their disap-
pearance.”
“Not the Hindoos who were responsible for their
second disappearance—is it possible you do not wish
them to be punished?” Britz expostulated.
“I do not,” said Mrs. Missioner quietly. “I under-
stand their connection with the mystery thoroughly.
In spite of the drastic methods they pursued, I do not
blame them. They did not seek the lesser stones of
the necklace. In fact, those gems were returned to
me this morning by one of the Orientals—a man of
scholarly attainment and high character, whom I met
in the East. These devotees—fanatics, if you will—
have braved death and imprisonment to recover a jewel .
which I take it is precious in their eyes as was the
Holy Grail to the Crusaders. It is a question not
merely of religion, but of extreme piety with them.
Under such circumstances, I cannot consent to appear


BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS 393
against them, nor to countenance any attempt to pun-
ish them. Besides, there was a mistake in the acquisi-
tion of the Maharanee diamond. It belongs to these
men of the East. They are free to take it. I sur-
render all claim upon it.”
With an air of unmistakable respect Britz turned
toward the widow.
“In the eyes of the law,” he said, extending the
big Maharanee, “this stone is yours. You may do
with it as you choose.”
Mrs. Missioner accepted the stone, permitting her
eyes to linger a moment on its blazing splendor. Then
she wheeled abruptly and passed the diamond to the
Prince.
“It is yours,” she said. “Take it.”
Kananda's eager fingers closed on the gem.
“Mrs. Missioner has restored your property,” Britz
said, turning to the Oriental, “and I dare say the Chief
will agree with me that it is not necessary for us to
take your case as far as the District Attorney's office.
You and your fellow countrymen are at liberty to go.
I advise you to go quickly before I get to thinking too
strongly about that little upside-down ride you gave
me in Riverside Drive. I have the honor to wish
Your Royal Highness a very good-morning !”
He made a mock obeisance as the Hindoos, released
from their shining steel bonds, filed silently out of the
TOO111.
“Miss Holcomb,” said Britz, “ Chief Manning will
procure your release in just about the time it takes us
to go from here to the court. You will be discharged
at once. Yes, doctor, that will be a complete vindica-


394 BRITZ, OF HEADQUARTERS
tion of your fiancée. My best wishes for your happi-
ness.”
Britz then turned to Mrs. Missioner.
“As for the prisoner, Griswold, Mrs. Missioner,”
he said, “it makes little difference to him that he was
not arrested for the theft of your diamonds. The di-
rectors of the Iroquois Trust Company have a case
against him strong enough to send him up the river
for a long while. I trust, Mr. Sands,” Britz added
significantly, “that in your new-found happiness you
will forget the momentary unpleasantness between us.
After all, you see, I was acting in your interests.”
The rare smile the millionaire flashed at the lieu-
tenant as with a proprietary air he took Doris Mis-
sioner's hand in his was as eloquent an expression of
friendly gratitude as anyone in society or “the
Street” would expect of “Silent” Sands.
THE END