Anthony Trent, Master Criminal

CHAPTER XX

“WANTED – AN EMERALD”

Since Anthony Trent had replaced the red glass in his Benares lamp with the Mount Aubyn ruby, the other pieces of cut glass seemed so dull by comparison that had his visitors been many, suspicion must have arisen from the very difference they exhibited. The lamp was discreetly swung in a distant corner and the button which lighted the lamp carefully concealed.

Reading one morning that owing to the financial trouble into which the war had plunged a great West of England family, the celebrated Edgcumbe sapphire had been purchased by a New York manufacturer of ammunition – one of the new millionaires created by the war to buy what other countries had to sacrifice.

The papers gave every necessary particular. At ten o’clock one morning Anthony Trent sallied forth to loot. By dinner time the Edgcumbe sapphire had replaced the blue cube of cut glass and in his lamp the papers were devoting front page space to its daring abduction. How he accomplished it properly belongs to another chapter in the life of the master criminal. So easy was it of consummation that he planned to use the same technique for a greater coup.

When these two great stones were making his brazen lamp a thing of flashing beauty they threw into infinite dullness the cube of green. Looking at it night after night when Mrs. Kinney was long abed and the grateful silences had drowned the noise of day, Anthony Trent longed for an emerald to bear these lordly jewels company.

There was an excellent second-hand book store on Thirty-second street, between Seventh avenue and Sixth, where he browsed often among waiting volumes. One day he picked up a book, written in French, “Romances of Precious Stones.” It was by a Madame Sernin, grandniece of the great Russian novelist Feoder Vladimir Larrovitch. Trent remembered that he had read her translation of Crasny Baba and Gospodi Pomi, and looked at this original work with interest. It was published in Paris just before the war.

He knew well that most of the great stones which had became famous historically were still in Europe. And Europe, until the long war was over, was closed to him. He hoped Madame Sernin had something to say about American-owned jewels. There was a reference in the index and later, in his rooms, he read it eagerly. There were, Mme. Sernin announced, but two of the great emeralds in the United States. One belonged to the wife of the Colombian minister and was found in Colombia. Trent considered this stone carefully. It might not be in the United States after all. Mme. Sernin was doubtful herself. But of the second stone she was certain. It was known as the Takowaja Emerald. A century and a half before it had been dug from the Ural Mountains. That great “commenceuse,” the second Catherine of Russia, had given it to her favorite, Gregory Orlov, who had sold it to a traveling English noble in a day before American gold was known in Continental Europe.

It was now the property of Andrew Apthorpe, of Boston in Massachusetts. Presumably the man was a collector, and assuredly he was wealthy, but Anthony Trent had never heard of him. A trip by boat to Boston would make a pleasant break and a day later he was steaming north. His inevitable golf clubs accompanied him. Trent was one of those natural-born players whose game suffer little if short of practice. And of late he had not stinted himself of play. He told Mrs. Kinney he was going to Edgartown for a few days. He had sometimes played around these island links; and his bag of clubs was always an excellent excuse for traveling in strange parts.

Directly he had registered at the Adams House he consulted a city directory. Andrew Apthorpe’s town house was in the same block on Beacon street which held the Clent Bulstrode mansion.

It was a vast, forbidding residence of red brick running back to the Charles embankment. The windows were small and barred and the shades drawn. An empty milk bottle and a morning paper at a basement door gave evidence of occupancy. And at the garage at the rear a burly chauffeur was cleaning the brass work of a touring car. Looking wisely and suspiciously at Trent as he sauntered by was an Airedale. The family, Trent surmised, was absent and the caretaker, who rose late if the neglected Post was a sign, and this man and dog were left to guard the place.

If the Takowaja emerald were housed here with two such guardians its recovery might not be difficult. But the more Trent thought of it the more improbable it seemed that the owner of such a gem should leave it prey to any organized attack. The curious part about this Ural emerald was that Trent had never before heard of it and he knew American owned stones well. Most of the owners of famous jewels were ready to talk of them, lend them for exhibition purposes when they were properly guarded, but he had never seen a line about the Apthorpe emerald.

A few minutes before midday Anthony Trent strolled into the Ames building and saw that Andrew Apthorpe, cotton broker, occupied very large offices. A little later he followed one of the Apthorpe clerks, a well-dressed, good-looking young man, to the place where he lunched. It was curiously unlike a New York restaurant. Circular mahogany counters surrounded self possessed young women who permitted themselves to attend to those who hungered. To such as they knew and liked they were affable. To others their front was cold and severe.

The Apthorpe employee was a favorite, apt at retort and not ill pleased if others noted it. Soon he drifted into conversation with Trent, who with his careful mind had read through the column devoted to cotton in the morning papers and was ready with a carefully remembered phrase or two for the stranger who responded in kind.

Gradually, by way of the Red Sox, the beauties of Norumbega Park and the architectural qualities of Keith’s, the young man lapsed into personalities and told Anthony Trent all he desired to know of Andrew Apthorpe. Andrew, it seemed, was not beloved of his employees. He was unappreciative of merit unless it accompanied female beauty. He was old; he was ill. His family had abandoned him with the sincere reluctance that wealth is ever abandoned.

“He lives up at Groton,” said Trent’s loquacious informant, “in a sort of castle on a hill fitted with every burglar resisting device that was ever invented.”

“What’s he afraid of?” Trent demanded.

“He’s got a lot of valuables,” the other answered, “cut gems and cameos and intaglios and things that wouldn’t interest any one but an old miser like him. I have to go up there once in a while. The old boy has an automatic in his pocket all the while. I think he’s crazy.”

There were two or three men at Camp Devens whom Trent knew slightly. The Camp was within walking distance of Groton, he learned. By half past nine on the following morning Anthony Trent left Ayer behind him and breasted the rising ground towards Groton. He could go to the Camp later. He might not go at all but if questioned as to his presence the excuse would be a just one. He was always anxious that his motives would pass muster with the police if ever he came in contact with them.

After a couple of miles he came in sight of the beautiful tower of Groton School Chapel. Two or three times he had played for his school against this famous institution in the years that seemed now so far behind him. The town of Groton, some distance from the more modern school, charmed his senses. Restful houses among immemorial elms, well kept gardens and a general air of contentment made the town one to be remembered even in New England.

He hoped he would be able to find something about Apthorpe from some local historian without having to lead openly to the matter. A luncheon at the famous Inn might discover some such informant. But he was not destined to enter that admirable hostelry for coming toward him, with dignified carriage and an aura of fragrant havana smoke about him, was Mr. Westward whom he had known slightly at Kennebago. This Mr. Westward was the most widely known fisherman on the famous lake, an authority wherever wet-fly men foregathered.

Trent would have preferred to meet none who knew him by name. This was a professional adventure and not a trout fishing vacation. But the angler had already recognized him and there was no help for it. Westward rather liked Anthony Trent as he liked all men who were skilled in the use of the wet-fly and were, in his own published words, “high-minded, fly-fishing sportsmen.”

“Why, my dear fellow,” said Westward genially, “what are you doing in my home town?”

“I’d no idea you lived here,” Trent said, shaking his hand. “I thought you were a New Yorker.”

Westward pointed to a modest house. “This is what I call my office,” he explained. “I do my writing there and house my fishing tackle and my specimens.”

“I wish you’d let me see them,” Trent suggested smiling. “I’ve often marveled at the way you catch ’em.”

It was past twelve when he had finished talking over what Mr. Westward had to show. He realized he had forgotten the matter which brought him to Groton. When Mr. Westward asked him to luncheon he hesitated a moment. This hesitation was born not of a disinclination to accept the angler’s hospitality but rather to the feeling that he was out for business and if he failed at it might be led as a criminal to whatever jail was handy. And were he thus a prisoner it would embarrass a good sportsman. But Mr. Westward gained his point and led Trent to a big rambling house further down the street that was a rich store house of the old and quaint furniture of Colonial days.

Mrs. Westward proved to be a woman of charm and culture, endowed with a quick wit and a gift of entertaining comment on what local happenings were out of the ordinary.

“Has Charles told you of the murder?” she asked.

“We’ve been talking fish,” Anthony Trent explained.

“Oh you fishermen!” she laughed. “I often tell my husband he won’t take any notice of the Last Trump if he’s fishing or talking of trout. We actually had a murder here last night.”

“I hope it was some one who could be easily spared,” Trent returned, “and not a friend.”

“I could spare him,” Mrs. Westward said decisively. “I know his wife and she has my friendship but for Andrew Apthorpe I have never cared.”

“Apthorpe?” Trent cried. “The cotton man?”

“The same,” Mrs. Westward assured him.

Anthony Trent was suddenly all attention. He surmised that the murder of so rich a man was actuated by a desire for his collection. And if so, where was the Takowaja emerald?

“Please tell me,” he entreated, “murders fascinate me. If the penalty were not so severe I should engage in murder constantly. What was it? Revenge? Robbery?”

“Yes and no,” Charles Westward observed with that judicial air which confounded questioners. “Revenge no doubt. Robbery perhaps, but we are awaiting the arrival of Mrs. Apthorpe and her daughter. We shall not know until then whether his collection of valuables has been stolen.”

“What about the revenge theory?” Trent inquired.

“Apthorpe made many enemies as a younger man. Physically he was violent. There are no doubt many who detested him. Personally I had no quarrel with him. I sent him a mess of trout from the Unkety brook this season and had a little talk with him over the phone but he saw few except his lawyer and business associates.”

“Is any one suspected in particular?” Trent asked.

“The whole thing is mysterious,” Mrs. Westward declared with animation. “Last night at eight o’clock I received a telephone message from his nurse, a Miss Thompson, a woman I hardly know. Once or twice I have seen her at the Red Cross meetings but that is all. She apologized for calling but said she felt nervous. It seems that Mr. Apthorpe had let all the servants go off to the band concert at Ayer. There were two automobiles filled with them. The only people left were Miss Thompson in the house and a gardener who lives in a cottage on the grounds. They left the house just after dinner – say half past seven. At a quarter to eight a stranger called to see Mr. Apthorpe.”

“Accurately timed,” commented Mr. Westward.

“Miss Thompson declined to admit him. You must understand, Mr. Trent, that Andrew Apthorpe was a very sick man, heart trouble mainly, and she was within her rights. The man who would not give his name put his foot in the door and said he would see Mr. Apthorpe if he waited there all night. While she was arguing with him, begging him, in fact, to go away, her employer came to the head of the stairs that lead from the main rooms to the hall. Miss Thompson explained what had happened. To her surprise he said, ‘I have been expecting him for twenty years. Let him in.’”

“Why should she call you up?” Trent asked.

“Merely because she was nervous and knew other people even less than she did me.” Mrs. Westward hesitated a moment. “There have been rumors about her and Mr. Apthorpe which were not pleasant. They were probably not true but when a man has lived as he had it was not surprising. She called me up at eight because the two men were quarreling. My husband told you he was a man of violent temper. That is putting it mildly. I told her there was nothing to be alarmed about. At nine she called me up again to say that she would be grateful if Mr. Westward and my nephew Richmond, who is staying with me, would go up there as she had heard blows struck and Mr. Apthorpe was too ill to engage in any sort of tussle. I told her my two men were out but that the police should be called in. While I was talking she gave a shriek – it was a most dramatic moment and I could hear her steps running from the telephone.”

“My nephew and I came in at that moment,” Westward interrupted, “and went up the hill to the house as fast as possible. Mrs. Westward meanwhile had telephoned for the police. Miss Thompson was waiting on the steps. She was hysterical and afraid to go back into the lonely house.”

“Richmond said he thought she had been drinking,” his wife interjected.

“That meant nothing,” Westward observed, “she was hysterical and I don’t wonder in that great lonely house. When we went in with the police we found the big living room door locked with the key on the inside. We had to break it open and found it bolted. Evidently the stranger had seen to that. Old Apthorpe was lying dead shot through the head with a bullet from his own revolver. The window was open. There was a twelve-foot drop to the grass outside and the man had lowered himself by a portiere. So far not a trace has been found of him. A great many people pass through here on the way to or from Boston and we have become so used to strangers that no heed is paid to them any more.”

“Was there any evidence of robbery?” Trent asked.

“Not a trace so far as we could see. I mean by that there was no disorder. Things of value might have been taken but nothing had been broken open. We shan’t know until Mrs. Apthorpe comes.”

“It was evidently,” Mr. Westward declared, “some man whom he had been expecting. Miss Thompson, according to her story, did not know the man’s name and yet was told to admit him. It may be the police will find it from correspondence.”

“I doubt it,” Trent observed shaking his head. “If it was a man Apthorpe had dreaded for a score of years he wouldn’t be corresponding with him.”

“Then why was he admitted?” asked Mrs. Westward.

“Consider the circumstances,” Anthony Trent reminded her. He was becoming thoroughly interested. “Here he was almost in the house, his foot in the door. All the servants were away. No matter what Apthorpe said he would have got in. What more likely than that the proud overbearing old man felt sufficient confidence in his nerve and his revolver? Or if he didn’t he would not admit it. The curious part to my mind was how this unknown timed it so exactly. He turned up just as the servants were going out for the evening.” He turned to Mrs. Westward, “Why didn’t Miss Thompson telephone for police aid do you suppose? Does it seem strange to you that she telephoned to you instead?”

“Knowing Andrew Apthorpe it does not,” she answered. “He would have been furious if she had done so. To begin with he has had many squabbles with the local authorities over trumpery matters. He was most unpopular. The last thing he would have desired would be to have them in his house. None of the servants were from Groton and he would not have them associating with local people.”

Anthony Trent ruminated for a little. So far nothing had been developed which offered a reasonable solution of the problem. And the problem for him was a different one from that which would confront the police. Trent’s problem was to secure the Takowaja emerald. So far neither of the Westwards had mentioned it. Probably for the reason that they did not know of its existence. It would be unwise, he decided, to try to lead them to talk of the dead man’s collection of jewels. But he felt reasonably certain in his own mind that in this carefully guarded house, replete with burglar alarms and safety appliances, the treasure from the Ural Mountains had been reposing within a dozen hours. The stranger who had come after a score of years and had left murder in his trail, was more likely to have come for the great green stone than anything else.

“I wish I could have a look at the place,” he said presently.

“Amateur detective?” laughed Mrs. Westward.

“I can’t imagine anything being more exciting,” he admitted, “than to follow this mysterious man except, perhaps, to be the man himself and outwit the detectives.”

“Why not take Mr. Trent up there, Charles?”

Plainly Mr. Westward was not eager to do so. This was due to a dislike to invade premises under police supervision to which he had no business except a friendly curiosity. Still there would be no harm done. He had known the Apthorpes for years and perhaps Anthony Trent might be an aid. Some one had told him Trent was an expert in the oil market. He had no reason to believe him anything but a man of probity.

“It might be arranged,” he said slowly.

CHAPTER XXI

THE MURDER OF ANDREW APTHORPE

THE Apthorpe estate ran parallel to the main street of the town but the house itself was perched on a hill almost a mile distant from it. A long winding ascent led to a big stone, turreted mansion commanding an extensive view of the country that lay about it. A well kept lawn three hundred yards in width surrounded the house.

“The place was built,” Mr. Westward explained, “by Colonel Crofton, the railroad man. On this lawn were great beds of rhododendrons which cost a great deal of money. When Apthorpe bought it he had them torn up and sown in grass. He said the flower beds and shrubberies were places where burglars might conceal themselves by day to break in by night.”

“He was certainly suspicious,” Trent commented.

Westward pointed to the house which rose like a fortress above them.

“When Crofton had it there were windows on the ground level and several entrances. Apthorpe had them filled with granite all except that big doorway opposite.”

By this time Trent was near enough to see that the house was not remote from buildings such as the stables and garages which are adjacent to most such residences. He remarked on the peculiarity.

“The automobiles are kept in the basement of the house,” Westward explained. “The big doors I pointed out to you cannot be opened by the chauffeurs. When they want to go out or come in they have to phone for permission. Then Mr. Apthorpe or some one else would touch a button in his big living room and the gates would swing open. He had a searchlight on the tower until the Federal authorities forbade it.”

“It seems to me he must have lived in dread of violence,” Trent observed, “and yet why should he? He was a well known Boston broker of an old New England family, not the kind one would think involved in crime. In fiction it is the man who comes home after spending half his life in the mysterious East that one suspects of robbing gods of their jeweled eyes and incurring the sworn vengeances of their priests.”

“All men who collect precious stones live in dread,” Charles Westward said. “I’ve never seen any of his things. I’m not interested in them particularly. I’ve always talked about fishing when I’ve been there, but it’s common knowledge that he was going to leave his valuables to the Museum of Fine Arts. One of the things which incensed his wife was that he wouldn’t give her or her daughter any of the jewels but preferred to keep them locked away.”

A flight of twenty granite steps led to the main entrance, two heavily built, metal studded doors. A lofty hall was disclosed with a circular stairway around it. Leading from the hall to what seemed the main room on that floor was a flight of six steps. The chestnut doors had been shattered. Obviously it was the room in which Apthorpe had met his death. For the rest it looked in no way different from half a hundred other rooms in big houses which Trent had investigated professionally. Bookshelves not more than four feet in height lined three sides of the apartment. Making a pretense of reading the titles Trent looked to see whether they were indeed volumes or mere blinds. The policeman in charge, knowing Mr. Westward well, was only too willing to show him and his friend what was to be seen. The body, he explained, was in an upper chamber.