Part 2

“This I'll sell for sixty-five thousand dollars!” Immediately he regretted it. Perhaps he was overestimating the advertising value of the Princess Patricia's beautiful neck to exhibit his pearls on. The price was exactly thirty-five thousand dollars less than he had expected to get for it during the next steel boom.

“Oh, come now, I say,” remonstrated Colonel Lowther, impatiently. “That's thirteen thousand pounds. It's too much, you know.”

“Colonel Lowther,” said Boon, pale but determined, “I am losing considerable money on this, which I am charging to advertising account and may never get back. If the price is not satisfactory, I'm sorry; and I can only suggest that you'd better go to the other firms you've mentioned. They are all,” he finished quietly, “very good firms.”

Colonel Lowther, who had not taken his keen eyes off the jeweler's face during the speech, appeared impressed by Mr. Boon's earnestness. His neck jerked spasmodically half a dozen times before he said:

“I believe you. I'll take it. But first mark it--in pounds; thirteen thousand pounds.” And he looked on, eagle-eyed, while Mr. Boon himself wrote out a new price-tag. Evidently he would take no chances with sleight-of-hand substitutions. “Put it here,” he said, “beside me.”

It made Mr. Boon say, half angry, half amused: “We won't change it for an imitation string. We are really a reputable firm, Colonel Lowther.”

“Oh! Ah! Really, I--ah!” stammered the colonel, “I wasn't thinking of such a thing!” He looked so absurdly guilty, however, that Mr. Boon forgave him. “I think you'd better show me others--ah!--cheaper, you know, in case the duke should not wish to go above ten thousand pounds. Say, that one--and this!--and this!”

He had selected the three next best; but Boon figured very closely and in all instances named a price below cost: fifty-seven thousand five hundred dollars, fifty thousand dollars, and forty-five thousand dollars.

“Put them here also with the first one,” said Colonel Lowther..

“Don't you wish us to put them in boxes?” asked Mr. Boon.

“Ah--ah!--I say, bring the boxes in and I'll put them in. We'll do it more quickly,” he finished, lamely.

There flashed across Mr. Boon's mind the possibility of crookedness. Colonel Lowther did not trust them--perhaps because he hoped to avert suspicions by that same attitude of distrust! Mr. Boon determined to watch closely. He asked a clerk to bring some cases for the necklaces.

“You fix them, Boon,” said Colonel Lowther, who was watching the jeweler's hands as children watch the hands of a prestidigitator.

It actually eased Boon's mind to be taken for a crook. He arranged the necklaces, each in its own Russia-leather case, and then gratefully helped Colonel Lowther to select two dozen scarf-pins, amounting in value to eighteen thousand dollars, a score of rings worth in all a little over twenty-five thousand dollars, and a few lorgnette-chains and other trinkets. Once all these were duly price-tagged, packed, and placed beside the necklaces, Colonel Lowther, after a series of mild cervical convulsions, said, calmly:

“Now, Boon, you and I must settle a personal matter. You know, of course, the royal party never pays cash.”

“Then,” said the impetuous Mr. Boon, “the deal is off!”

“Silly ass! The royal family of England always pays. You know very well that the jewels bought by King George for gifts for his coronation guests have not been paid for yet. It's all a matter of red tape. The money is as safe as the Bank of England! Any banker here would be glad to guarantee the account--only that would never do, of course. Now you know I can't take any commission. I've made you give me the lowest prices for the duke, haven't I? What?”

“Yes, you have; and therefore I can't--”

“If I were a bally Russian I'd have made you name a price twice the usual figure and I'd have taken the difference as a commission. It's what you Americans call graft, I believe. What?”

“Of course,” said Boon, coldly, disgusted with the venal aristocracy, “we'd never have done such a--”

“Tut, tut! It's done everywhere; but not to me!” Colonel Lowther said, so sternly that Mr. Boon considered himself accused of unnamed crimes. He resented this, but, being unable to fix the exact accusation, contented himself with remarking, diplomatically:

“Of course not! But at the same time--”

“Yes, yes,” rudely broke in the colonel, with a silencing wave of his gloved hand. “Now I can myself pay you in cash for whatever the duke buys--say, up to twenty thousand or twenty-five thousand pounds. For advancing this money, which will not be paid to me for months, I ask you to allow me a half-year's interest. That,” finished Colonel Lowther, impressively, “is banking. What?”

“At what rate?”

“Oh, eight or ten per cent.”

“Impossible!”

“Then, Mr. Welch, Boon, or whatever your name is, I wish you a very good morning!”

“But we'll allow you interest at the rate of six per cent, a year.”

“But I myself have to pay five for the use--ah!--that is--er--” floundered the Englishman. Mr. Boon perceived instantly that the colonel borrowed the money from Canadian bankers at five per cent, and got ten per cent. It was not a bad scheme for high-class aristocratic graft! Even a jeweler could philosophize about wilful self-delusion, the point of view, custom, and so on. “Make it seven per cent. What?”

Mr. Boon could not help admiring the persistency of the Englishman in coating his graft-pills with the sugar of legitimacy. Doubtless the colonel had really convinced himself this was not graft!

“Very well,” said Mr. Boon, with a smile. “I'll take three and a half per cent, off for cash.”

“But we agreed on seven!” remonstrated the Englishman.

“Well, three and a half per cent, of the whole is the same as six months at seven per cent.”

“Oh!” The colonel began to figure in his mind. His cervical contortions, twitchings, and jerkings were painful to behold. Mr. Boon thought it was a mild form of St. Vitus's dance. It would enable him to recognize the colonel in a crowd of ten thousand.

“Quite so! Yes--three and a half per cent, of the total bill. It will be at least twenty thousand pounds--that's one hundred thousand dollars. Not half bad! What?”

“Do you mean your commission will be one hundred thousand dollars? I'm delighted to hear it!” Mr. Boon was so pleased that he jested. He would play up the royal patronage to the limit.

“Oh no! I meant the total amount, you know,” corrected the colonel, earnestly. He saw that Boon was smiling, and gradually it dawned on him that the jeweler was an American humorist. “Oh! Ah! Yes! Very funny! Quite so! I wish it were! How many millions would the bill have to be for the cash discount to be twenty thousand pounds? What? Right-O! Well, now bring the pearls and the other things to the motor. I shall show them to his Royal Highness at once. I can let you know in a half-hour which he will keep.” And he rose.

“Ah!--er--Colonel, you know we don't like to--ah!--there's over two hundred thousand dollars' worth of jewels, worth four hundred thousand dollars in any other place in New York; and if anything happened--”

“Nothing will happen,” said the colonel, with assurance.

“And then, it will take a long time to prepare the memorandum of--”

“Why do you need a memorandum?” inquired the colonel, coldly. He looked as if he began to suspect that Mr. Boon distrusted a member of the suite of his Royal Highness, Prince Arthur William Patrick Albert, K.G., K.T., K.P., P.C., G.M.B., G.3. S.I., G.C.M.G., G.C.I.E., G.C.V.O., Duke of Connaught and Stratheam, Earl of Sussex, Prince of Coburg and Gotha, Governor-General of Canada, and potential customer of the world-renowned firm of Welch, Boon & Shaw.

Reading the emotions on the colonel's face and not desiring to offend, but at the same time determined not to deliver two hundred thousand dollars' worth of goods to a stranger, who might be the duke's secretary, but might not be a reliable man financially, for all that, Mr. Boon groped for an excuse. But Colonel Lowther pursued, frigidly:

“Why should you need a memorandum if you yourself will bring the jewels? Did you think I was a bally clerk to sell your jewels for you? You do the talking--and don't change the prices!”

So profoundly relieved as not to resent the last insult, Mr. Boon smiled pleasantly and said, “I must take a man to carry them.”

“Take a regiment if you wish; but there's room for only three in the motor,” said the Englishman, his neck twitching and twisting and jerking quite violently. Anger seemed to aggravate his nervous malady. Wherefore Mr. Boon hastily gathered up the packages, put them into a jeweler's strong valise, and followed the colonel, accompanied by Terry Donnelly, the store's private policeman, who carried the precious satchel in one hand, and in the other--in his overcoat pocket--an automatic pistol of the latest model.

One of the clerks must have told of the affair, for there was an eager crowd on the sidewalk. They had heard that the Duke of Connaught's secretary was in the store, buying diamonds. By the time it had passed seven mouths it was the duke himself. Mr. Boon heard: “There he comes!” and, “Is the princess with him?” and, “Which is the duke?” And he had pleasant visions of free reading-notices and renewed popularity among the ultra-fashionable. One of the traffic squad was trying to make the crowd move on--in vain.

The colonel good-naturedly forced his way through the mob to the motor, followed by the jeweler and the store policeman, who saw on the door of the limousine the letters “W. R.” And both of them concluded that this stood for the well-known initials of the duke's host.

A short woman, with red hair and a self-assertive bust, stared boldly at the colonel and said, “He don't look like his pictures.”

“Say, are you the duke?” asked a messenger-boy.

However, the colonel merely said “Home!” and entered the motor, followed by Mr. Boon and T. Donnelly. The store footman closed the door as if it were made of priceless cut-glass. The traffic policeman touched his cap and the motor went up the Avenue.

The colonel picked up a newspaper from the seat and turned to Mr. Boon.

“See!” he said, “our pictures. Your reporters are--ah!--very enterprising and clever. But the photographers are worse!” He laughed and went on: “The pictures don't look like me, d'ye think?”

“I recognize the coat and the fur cap,” laughed Mr. Boon.

“Oh, do you?” said the colonel, seriously. He looked at it and said: “But it might be my other fur cap, you know. What?” He looked challengingly at the jeweler.

“It might be,” admitted Mr. Boon, diplomatically confessing his error.

“Quite so!” said the owner of the fur cap, triumphantly.

Mr. Boon, finding himself nearer the house of the duke's host, began to feel more confident of putting through the epoch-making deal. It is not often that a New York jeweler sells pearls to an uncle of the King of England, to be used by the king's most beautiful cousin! He would have the princess's photograph in his window. It should show the famous necklace!

The motor took its place last in the long string of automobiles and carriages that were creeping toward the door of the house which his Royal Highness was honoring.

“Democracy meekly leaving its card at the house of royalty,” laughed the colonel, pointing to the twoscore vehicles ahead of theirs.

“Americans paying their respects to an Englishman who is honored even in his own country,” said Mr. Boon.

“Oh, now, I say, Boon, that's uncommonly neat, you know. What? But perhaps we'd better get out and walk; otherwise it may be a half-hour before--”

A footman in livery came up to their motor, touched his hat with a respect that entitled him to a bank president's wages, and said to the colonel:

“I beg pardon, sir, but 'is Royal 'ighness 'as gone to Mr. Walton's, sir, at number 899 Fifth Avenue. I was hinstructed to tell you to go there, sir.”

“Tell the chauffeur where to go,” said the colonel, briefly.

“Yes, sir--very good, sir.” The man touched his hat and told the chauffeur.

Their motor pulled out of the line and turned to the west.

“Mr. Walton was at Eton with the duke,” explained the colonel to Mr. Boon.

“J. G. Walton?” asked Mr. Boon.

“Yes.”

“I didn't know he was educated in England,” said Mr. Boon in a tone that implied he knew Mr. Walton well.

“Didn't you?” said the colonel, more sharply than the occasion warranted.

“But then, we never discussed the subject,” apologized the jeweler.

“Do you know the house?”

“Yes. I've been in it several times. I understood Mr. Walton was in Florida and had rented his residence for the winter.”

“I don't know a bally thing about his private affairs,” said the colonel, coldly; “but I do know the duke intended to visit him, and I've been told to go there.”

It occurred to the store detective that if the Englishman was rude to Mr. Boon it was altogether likely the duke treated his private secretary as a servant. It gave the detective pleasure to imagine this, for whenever the colonel had looked at Mr. Donnelly it was with the casual indifference with which men look at chairs or cobblestones. This made T. Donnelly feel that he was not alive, and he disliked the aristocratic undertaker.

The motor turned into Fifth Avenue, sped northward, and halted before a house. Mr. Boon recognized Mr. Walton's residence.

The colonel alighted quickly and said “Come with me!” in the tone foreigners use to menials, and didn't even turn his head to see if he was followed, but walked up to the door and rang the bell.

A man in livery opened the door.

“I am Colonel Lowther!”

“Yes, sir. His Royal Highness said you were to wait in the drawing-room unless there was somebody with you; in which case you were to be taken to him, sir.”

“Come on!” said the colonel to Mr. Boon and the private policeman. The footman preceded them to a door at the back of the foyer hall, opened it, drew back heavy portières, and announced, solemnly:

“Colonel Lowther!”

The colonel entered. So did Mr. Boon and Donnelly. A man stood gazing out of a window. His back was toward them. For the first time Mr. Boon--so he said later--felt that something was wrong. Yet he made no effort to protect himself.

“Your Highness, here are the pearls.”

The duke turned round. He had a kindly face, had white hair and mustaches.

“Let me have them!” said his Royal Highness, in the husky whisper of a man suffering from acute laryngitis or partial paralysis of the vocal cords.

“I know that voice!” shouted Donnelly, and the jeweler knew he might fear the worst; but, before they could put their hands in their pockets for their revolvers, strong fingers took strangle-holds on their throats, a spray of ammonia had been squirted into their nostrils and eyes, and they were helpless. In a jiffy their wrists were handcuffed behind their backs, their feet were fastened with leg-irons, their mouths pried open with a bowie-knife blade that made them cease struggling. Pear-gags were inserted into their mouths. Donnelly squirmed and carried on like a frightened child--but at the same time kept unfrightened eyes on the duke. Not so Boon, who was as pale as ivory.

The duke turned his back on his captives and put on a black cloth mask, but the watchful Donnelly noticed that he put into his pocket what looked like false mustaches. He also donned a pair of black gloves, but not before the policeman had seen a long, white scar, beginning at the knuckles and disappearing up the wrist into the cuff. Donnelly recalled having heard or read a description of a professional crook that tallied with what he had seen. It would make the work of capture easier.

The masked duke picked up the precious valise and said, “Take them to the others.”

The four men who had nearly strangled the jeweler and the policeman were dressed in overalls and jumpers, had on black masks, and wore gloves. They carried the helpless victims into what seemed to be the servants' dining-room.

Propped up in high-backed chairs, Mr. Jesse L. Boon, of Welch, Boon & Shaw, saw Mr. Wilfred Gaylord, president of Goffony's, Mr. Percival Pierce, of Johnson & Pierce, Mr. J. Sumner Storrs, of J. Storrs' Sons, and five of their clerks. Beside Mr. Pierce was an empty chair. Mr. Boon was placed on it. The detective was dumped on one near Goffony's clerk.

“Tie 'em in couples,” whispered the duke. Each man was tied to the back of his chair--and the chairs themselves were tied back to back.

“That,” explained the colonel, “will prevent you from hurting yourselves by toppling over in regrettable efforts to reach the door. We wish no harm to befall you. What?”

The masked men in overalls left the room like perfectly trained servants.

“You are a damned fool!” whispered the duke, angrily.

“Why?” amiably asked the Englishman.

“The only people that don't talk are those that can't.”

“I know--but murder will out! Never knew it to fail. We have--ah!--you might say--ah!--borrowed a few trinkets from these gentlemen. They may get them back, possibly; but you can't ever bring back the breath of life if you decapitate them. What?”

“I tell you I will not leave them here to blab!” hissed the duke; and Boon could not help thinking of the anger of a rattlesnake with laryngitis. “A slight nick in the jugular and they'll bleed away painlessly. Just before the end they will begin to dream. By------, I'll do it! Right now!”

The duke pulled out a barber's razor, opened it, and approached Boon.

Something about his manner told the jeweler that this creature was about to cut their throats as much for the pleasure of it as because of the supposed safety. It was confirmed when the masked fiend wheezed, malignantly:

“It's sterilized!”

Mr. Boon was suddenly conscious of an extreme cold, as if he had been thrown naked into an ice-cave. On Pierce's face, grown gray, the sweat stood in a microscopic dew. Gaylord's florid face was livid and tense; J. Sumner Storrs had closed his eyes and seemed asleep, but the breath whistled unpleasantly through his nostrils.

“Stop!” said the colonel so sharply that the duke turned like a flash--to look into the barrel of a blue-steel automatic.

“Drop the razor, old chap! I can't let you kill the beggars in cold blood. Upon my soul, I can't, you know!” His head was jerking and twisting at a furious rate, but the revolver was as steady as a rock.

“It's our only chance. It won't hurt them. They won't feel it any more than a feather--it's so sharp,” whispered the black-masked devil.

“Drop it, I say!” said the colonel, peremptorily. They heard a gritting of teeth from behind the mask as the duke closed the razor and dropped it on the floor. Still covering his accomplice, the colonel put his foot on the weapon. “Thanks, old chap!” he said, pleasantly. At that very moment he could have capitalized the gratitude of the ten prisoners at many thousands.

“Fool!” came in a husky whisper.

“Oh, now! I say!”

“What's the difference between twenty years in the pen and twenty seconds in the electric chair? I myself prefer the chair. But I'd rather cut their throats and keep out of danger. I tell you, it's tempting Providence to leave these men--”

“Is it as much as twenty years, old fellow?” queried the colonel, obviously perturbed.

The duke nodded.

“I say, gentlemen, I don't want to stay twenty years indoors, you know. Really, it's not a pleasant thought. What? If I give you your lives you must not take away my liberty. So I will go out now and leave you here with my friend, unless you promise not to tell the police anything that will serve as a clue and yourselves do nothing to harm us. If you will act like gentlemen I'll undertake to prevent my friend here from severing your respective jugulars. Nod for 'Yes' and shake your heads for 'No.' Promise not to talk?”

Ten heads nodded vehemently.

“Come, old chap; you must take their words. Gentlemen, you will be released this evening without fail. We must have time to leave New York. Avoid the reporters as you would the plague. It would not be wise to publish the facts! Think of it--the heads of the great firms! In parting from you, gentlemen, I wish to thank you in behalf of the Plunder Recovery Syndicate, to the success of whose operations you have in this instance so generously contributed. Gratitude surely is not incompatible with business methods. Gentleman, again I say, Thank you kindly, and-- why not?--_au revoir!_”

And that was the last the captives saw of the man who, on behalf of the Plunder Recovery Syndicate, had reduced the holdings of pearls and trinkets of New York's most famous jewelers by a trifle over one million dollars' worth.

It was nearly closing-time--midnight--that night when two men entered P. T. Ayres's corner drugstore. One of them wore a fur overcoat and a silk hat. The other was dressed in black, had a mourning-band about his hat, and wore black gloves. He carried a bag on which the sleepy lady cashier saw the “L” and the cabin tags of a transatlantic line. The man in black said to her:

“May this gentleman telephone for me, miss? My throat is in pretty bad shape, and I don't want to use it.”

It was in bad shape, indeed. She could hardly hear him.

“But, I say, dear chap--” remonstrated the fur-coated man, whose collar was so tight that he wiggled his head violently as if in search of comfort.

“This is as good a place as any,” whispered the man in black, impatiently. “Call 'em up! I say, miss, have you got any slippery elm or some kind of troches good for laryngitis?”

She remembered afterward that when she said she would call the proprietor he kept her from it by engaging her in conversation, which likewise prevented her from trying to hear what his companion was saying.

The fur-coated man had called up Spring 3100, which is police headquarters.

“Are you there? I say, are you there? Yes, I know this is not London. You know Mr. Pierce and Mr. Storrs and Mr. Boon and Mr. Gaylord? Well, tell your men they are in a residence on Fifth Avenue, in the servants' dining-room. It's Colonel Walton's house. Right-O! That's not your business. Go to the devil!” He came out of the booth with an angry face. “Confound their impudence! Where is my friend?”

“He's gone,” said the cashier. “Here--come back and pay for that call; five cents!”

The telephone clerk at police headquarters promptly told the news of the whereabouts of the missing jewelers--for whom the star men had been searching six hours diligently and secretly--and then tried, through the telephone Central, to get in touch with the pay station from which the “tip” had come, but couldn't, as they would not answer. The reason Ayres's drug-store wouldn't answer was that the Englishman in his ignorance had disarranged the connection without betraying that fact. The detectives said it showed a technical knowledge of telephones and their construction.

The news was kept from the newspapers, in the first place, because the jewelers requested it of the Police Department; and, secondly, because it was deemed wise by the sleuths to fight mystery with mystery. As a matter of fact, the detectives were confident of apprehending the miscreants shortly--for had they not left a trail as broad as Fifth Avenue?