CHAPTER VII

LARRY SEEKS CLEWS

“Well, there’s not much to be gotten out of him, in his present state of mind,” mused Larry as he went down in the hotel elevator, with a vision of the excited Parloti before him. “But I sure did stumble on a mystery. That man in the other room showed his face just at the right time for me, and at the wrong time for Parloti.

“I’ll wager Parloti didn’t want it known that he was in the same apartment with him. Now if I could only locate the other one I’d be pretty close to where the boy is. Maybe he’s in that hotel!”

For a moment Larry had half a notion to go back and demand to be allowed to search the rooms. Then a moment’s reflection told him that his wild and half-formed idea could not be true.

The hotel was a well-known one, and above suspicion. It would be impossible to conceal a kidnapped boy in it, unknown to the management, especially after all the publicity that had been given to the case, for, after Larry’s paper came out with the big “scoop,” all the other New York journals followed, and the whole city was ringing with the story. The police were urged by editorials, and by frenzied letters, written to the papers by frantic fathers and mothers, to leave nothing undone to get the kidnappers, and recover the boy.

“Parloti thought he could bluff me,” thought Larry, “but I’m certain he had a hand in this. He’s playing a bold game. I guess I need some real police aid on this case. I’ll go down to headquarters.”

This he did and after a consultation with a certain officer, whom he knew well, Larry and the latter decided on a plan of action.

On the reporter’s promise that the detective should get the proper newspaper credit due him, the latter offered to proceed in the case, and hold for Larry exclusively all the information he got. Larry needed some one with the proper legal authority to make a search of Parloti’s rooms, and also look up the two men whom the young reporter believed were the tools of the chief plotter.

“Sure I’ll do it,” agreed Detective Nyler, who had helped Larry with suggestions in the bank mystery. “It’ll be a feather in my cap if I can arrest the kidnappers.”

But it was decided to act cautiously, and to this end a watch was put on the suspected man, his hotel being under surveillance day and night. It was ascertained that the man who had been with him had gone out soon after Larry’s visit, and no one knew who he was. It would have been worse than useless, the young reporter knew, to question Parloti again.

The Italian did not carry out his threat to “call out” the editor of the _Leader_ unless a retraction was made. And the only retraction that was made was a statement to the effect that Parloti denied knowing anything of the whereabouts of the stolen boy, or that he ever planned to take him.

Meanwhile Madame Androletti was plunged in grief, in spite of her brave attitude, and of the aid she had given Larry in trying to solve the mystery. She gave up her concert tour and, to avoid further publicity, went to a small quiet hotel in New York, under an assumed name, Larry alone, of those outside her manager and immediate friends, knowing where she was.

“And now!” exclaimed Larry, late that night, “I’ve got to get after some other clews. Let’s see, where’s the first place to start? At the music hall, of course, from where the boy disappeared. I ought to have gone there at first, but I couldn’t cover everything. I’ll go there now. It will be some time before the evening performance.”

For a theatrical company had replaced the singer as an attraction. The magic of Larry’s card admitted him behind the scenes. He wanted to talk with some of the scene-shifters, the door-keeper, and others, for he had been unable to learn anything of moment from those who made up the personal company of Madame Androletti. They had been too busy with the performance to pay much attention to the boy.

All that they knew was that he had been roving about the wings, watching his mother sing. Then he had mysteriously vanished.

And, after much questioning, Larry was forced to admit that the stage hands and the door-keeper knew little more. A number of the scene-shifters and mechanics had noted the lad, for the singer had played a week’s engagement, and the boy had been present each night, and at the matinees.

“But did any of you see him taken away?” asked Larry.

None of them had.

“How many stage doors are there?” asked the young reporter, and, learning that there were several ways of getting behind the scenes, aside from passing back of them from the front of the theater, Larry inquired of the door-keepers.

None of them had seen the boy go out alone, or in company with any one. The door-keepers were positive that this was so, and they were veterans at their business, and thoroughly to be relied upon.

For it is hard to pass the door-keeper of the stage, unless you are known, or have proper credentials, and no strangers had entered or come out that night, each guard was certain.

“But the boy disappeared!” insisted Larry. “Where did he go to? He certainly didn’t vanish into the air. Some one must have taken him out.”

“Or else he walked out himself, and was captured later,” suggested a stage hand.

“In that case some of the door-keepers would have seen him,” replied Larry, and that closed this phase of the matter.

The boy’s hat and light coat were found in his mother’s dressing-room, showing that he had been taken away suddenly, and without time for the plotters to properly attire him for going out. Or perhaps they had brought along a cap and a coat for him. This was likely.

“There are almost as many ends to this case as there were to the bank mystery,” mused Larry when his questioning had brought him no new clews. “But I’ll find something sooner or later.”

He even questioned the musicians, for he thought it possible that Lorenzo might have, in some way, slipped down into the under-stage apartment set aside for the use of the orchestra. But none of them had seen the stolen lad.

Baffled, but not discouraged, Larry went home, hoping that the morning would bring some new information. It did not, though he managed to get a story concerning the activities of his friend, Detective Nyler, who had made a search of Parloti’s rooms in the hotel. There had been no trace of the stolen boy there.

“But I found out the name of the fellow you saw in the room,” said the officer. “One of those who were in the back of the theater, and to whom Parloti signaled.”

“You did! Good! What is it?”

“Well, it may be a fake one, but Parloti called him Giovanni Ferrot. So you can put that down as part of a clew, though it doesn’t amount to much.”

“And where is Ferrot?”

“Gone. Nobody knows where. But I’m going to look for him. I have a good description of him.”

The next few days brought forth little that was new. Larry kept relentlessly on the trail of Parloti, as did the police.

Though the young reporter did not visit the suspected man openly, he hung about his hotel, trailed and followed him when he went out, and kept so close a watch over the Italian that the quarry became nervously indignant.

“When are you going to let me alone?” he cried to Larry, one afternoon, turning suddenly on the reporter.

“When you tell me what I want to know,” was the calm answer.

“But I know nothing, I tell you! I have not the stolen boy! If I had, would I remain openly here as I do?”

That was rather a poser for Larry. He did not know what to say. But still he kept his watch on Parloti.