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The Midnight Passenger

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A wild idea came to him that the bank employees might have stolen
the money, lured Clayton into some Bowery or Fourth Avenue dive,
some room on Eighth Street, and then stolen the tell-tale bank-book.
"What would not any man do for a quarter of a million?" groaned
Ferris in despair.

And all these long days, while the New York community was daily
forgetting the flight of Clayton, the theft, and the dead millionaire
to whom all the worshippers of the Golden Calf had bowed, the
"Mesopotamia" was slowly nearing Stettin, now breasting the North
Sea surges.

Irma Gluyas, awakened from her narcotic stupor, felt in her wild,
wayward heart that Mr. August Meyer had lied to her.

But there was an apparent peace on the liner. The passionate-hearted
singer amused the captain and half deceived her watchful tyrant.

But, deep in her heart, she had evolved a plan. Once safely in
Stettin, she would telegraph to Clayton.

True, she had no money; but her fingers were covered with flashing
rings. Partner of some of Fritz Braun's smuggling secrets, she was
free of all crime, but the desire to innocently lure Clayton away
while the Cattle Trust's safes could be robbed in the holidays.

Step by step her old-time paramour had lured her on to betray
Randall Clayton, and yet, at the last, the good angel struggled
with the spirit of evil in that stormy heart. There was a smiling
calm on Fritz Braun's face which did not deceive her. She knew
that the great game had been pulled off. But how--with what golden
harvest--she knew not.

And yet she marked Braun's trembling hands, the lines graven on
his face, his deep potations, his fierce fever to reach the land.
And so, deep in her heart, she swore, "If he has harmed him, it is
his life or mine!"

Gazing out on the leaden surges of the ocean, she could see the face
of her manly lover, the one man who had believed in her underlying
womanhood. There was no stain on the red roses worn on her breast
for him; only truth in her gleaming Magyar eyes. "He loved me, for
what he saw in me--the innocent woman that I once was." And bitter
tears mingled with the salt brine flashing by--the tears of a
repentent magdalen.

Fritz Braun never knew that the woman who submitted to his caresses
was a spirit of wrath. Fool in his own conceit, he was yet watchful.
If she makes a single false move at Stettin, she seals her own
fate, he darkly pledged his familiar demon. And so, stealthily
eying each other, the fugitive and his fascinating dupe neared the
sandy dunes of the German Baltic land.

And yet God's wrath followed them. There was the throb of guilt in
both their bosoms, resting in one the betrayal of a soul, on the
other the crushing weight of innocent blood crying for vengeance.

And still, as yet, they slept in peace, for the dark waters of the
East River had not given up that ghastly mute witness whirling and
diving in the black under eddies around the rock-hewn pyramids of
the Brooklyn Bridge.

A thousand pairs of eager eyes now watched the money exchanges of
America and Europe for any paltry bit of the plunder stored away
in Fritz Braun's black valise. But the vengeance of God slept only
while the sinners fled away from the place of the betrayal of a
noble heart.

Vice-President Arthur Ferris of the Western Trading Company found
in the proud and formal reserve of the reinstated officials an
armor proof against all his legal acumen.

Some subtle spirit of unexpressed defiance seemed to have banded them
all against him. He felt that the stately oak which had sheltered
him was now fallen indeed. It was in an agony of spirit that he
awaited the appearance of his unacknowledged wife.

The "private agency" which he had secretly employed brought a new
discovery to his heart, when, ten days after Hugh Worthington's
death, Ferris was awakened before his breakfast by a sudden report.
The spy handed, in silence, to the astounded man a sealed envelope,
which was the tidings of an impending Waterloo.

"Miss Worthington arrived night before last, with Boardman and
Warner. They came on in a special car via the Pennsylvania road.
She is at A. C. Stillwell's town house on Central Park West. The
lawyers are both at the University Club. She has not left the house,
and there have been many business-looking callers at the Stillwell
house. Boardman or Warner is there on duty all the while, in
alternation. Watch them."

Shame, rage, and fear struggled for the mastery on Ferris' pale
cheeks as he dismissed the paid spy. "Tell your chief I'll call in
and give him my final directions to-day," he curtly said.

In two hours Arthur Ferris had made the formal toilet for
a professional duel of wits. He was the first caller when the
silver-haired counselor had dispatched his morning mail.

Mr. Stillwell's frosty blue eyes gleamed with an Arctic light as
Arthur Ferris opened his masked batteries. In all that long ride
down Broadway, Ferris had arranged the "subject matter" evidently
to his own satisfaction. But he floundered under the mute inquiry
of those frosty eyes, and the floundering finally ceased.

"Do I understand that you ask or demand an interview with Miss
Worthington?" icily said the old lawyer. "If you will put your
wishes in writing, I will convey them to her. That is all I can
say. I admit that she is my guest, and I also desire to say that
she shuns all intrusion."

"Messrs. Boardman and Warner,"--began Ferris. "With them I have
nothing to do," coldly replied Stillwell. "You will hear of them
and from them in due time."

With trembling fingers, Arthur Ferris wrote a few lines, sealed
them, and handed them to the lawyer, whose formal bow froze the
words trembling upon his lips.

Two long days of mental agony passed before Ferris, seated at his
desk in the Trading Company's executive offices, received a formal
letter from the men whom now he most feared on earth. "Not much to
speculate on here," growled Ferris, as he pondered over the curt
permission.

"Our client, Miss Alice Worthington, will receive you, on business,
at No. 248 Central Park West, at 2 P.M. to-day. "BOARDMAN AND
WARNER, "Executors, Hugh Worthington Estate."

The signature seemed to be a fluttering banner of hostile hosts.

And yet, summoning all his trained calm, Arthur Ferris, with
unmoved gravity, bowed as he was ushered into the drawing-room of
the great New York pleader. He knew the flag of no surrender was
flying. He saluted, in silence, the two gentlemen who advanced to
meet him.

And then an angry flush stole over his pale face. It was not the
chilly greeting of the massive Lemuel Boardman, not the sharp,
attentive nod of Mr. Ezra Warner, which sent the blood leaping to
his heart; it was the slight inclination of the head of Mr. John
Witherspoon, his secret antagonist. For he scented danger when
the young Detroit lawyer appeared here in the stronghold of his
rebellious wife in name.

"Miss Worthington will join us in a few moments," said Mr. Boardman.

There was the rustling of heavy, trailing robes, and Arthur Ferris
scarcely dared raise his eyes as the figure of his girl bride
darkened the door.

And he knew his fate at the first glance! He knew that he had lost
her forever, the bride of a crime.

There was a majesty in that slight figure, clad in its sombre
mourning drapery, which awed him. There was a set, marble pallor
upon the beautiful face, and Arthur Ferris could not see the sapphire
blue eyes veiled with their fringing lashes. He had started forward,
had stretched out appealing hands, and murmured "Alice," but the
youthful heiress merely glided past him in a stern silence. He
could see her now, her face buried in her thin, white hands, the
coronal of golden hair gleaming out over the black gown.

There was the faint sound of a sob as Ferris turned angrily to the
senior, while Warner bent pityingly over the young girl.

"I demand a private interview with Miss Worthington," the husband
quickly said, as he indicated the unwelcome presence of Witherspoon.

"We are here, Mr. Ferris," said Boardman, in a steady voice, "to
allow you to communicate, properly, with Miss Worthington. As her
legal representatives and the executors of her father's estate, we
are requested to remain by her. You may proceed."

"I insist that Mr. Witherspoon shall, at once, retire. He is an
interloper here," hotly replied Ferris.

"So much so," icily answered Boardman, "that he has been selected
by us as the general managing director of the Western Trading
Company to succeed the late Mr. Hugh Worthington."

The clock, ticking on noisily, seemed to sound the knell of Ferris'
last hopes. But his affections were now only a mirage of the past.
"That gives him no power over me here," stubbornly said the defeated
husband.

"True; but THIS does," quietly said Boardman, handing him a paper.

With a sickening feeling at heart, Ferris read a formal appointment,
signed by Miss Worthington, and countersigned by Boardman and
Warner, appointing John Witherspoon as resident attorney, in law
and fact, for Miss Alice Worthington.

"If that is not satisfactory, sir," gravely concluded the lawyer,
"we have named Mr. Witherspoon as special New York counsel for
the executors, and he will hold the proxy to cast the vote of the
estate in the ensuing special election. I suggest that you now
proceed with the matters in hand."

"One word!" cried Ferris, leaping to his wife's side, and seizing
her wrists. "Do you confirm this outrage?"

"I do," suddenly cried the weeping girl, springing up and facing
him with a defiant brow.

"What have you done with my brother? Where is the man whom you
falsely accused of leading a vile life? You poisoned my father's
mind against Randall. He has been led away and killed among you."

"Before God, I know nothing of his fate!" stammered Arthur Ferris,
in despair.

"Then prove your innocence!" cried Alice Worthington, her lovely
face lit with the anger of an avenging angel. "There is a gulf
between us which will never be crossed, so help me, God!"

The girl fell back, weeping, in the arms of Warner, while Boardman
sternly seized the trembling Ferris. "Another such outbreak and
you can say adieu forever to the woman whose life you have wrecked,"
whispered Boardman. "Now, sir," he continued, raising his voice,
"proceed! For, after to-day all your communications will be in
writing, and only through us!"

"I demand your authority for all these high-handed actions," snarled
the deposed autocrat of the Trading Company. His heart hardened as
he reflected that, after all, he was the legal marital master of
the slim girl there, hidden in her shrouding black robes.

"Nothing easier," calmly answered Boardman. "Here is a certified
copy of the will of Hugh Worthington, which leaves his entire
estate, real and personal, to his only child.

"As Miss Worthington has passed the age of eighteen, she needs no
guardian of the person.

"We have obtained a special sanction of the Michigan courts for
the appointment of Mr. Witherspoon to represent the estate here. I
will leave you this copy, and Mr. Witherspoon will now deliver to
you our written order to cease all functions in connection with the
Trading Company except in so far as you represent your own stock.

"And, as you were not a qualified stockholder (a bona fide one) at
the last election manipulated by you, your office as vice-president
will be vacated at this special meeting."

Arthur Ferris' eyes flashed fire as Witherspoon, without a word,
handed him the second document.

He essayed vainly to speak, but his parched tongue was powerless,
his lips were fever-glued. Finally, the man who now feared a further
stroke of malevolent fortune, said, in a low voice, "I desire a
few words in private with Miss Worthington."

To the astonishment of the three men, Alice Worthington arose and
glided into the rear drawing-room, where Ferris sprang to her side.

In low whispers he essayed to recall his lost bride to her perfunctory
duties of wife. The men in the great front hall gazed at Fashion's
throng sweeping by on the avenue as Ferris led his last trumps and
endeavored to develop the hidden enemy's line of reserve.

His last hope failed when his legal wife quietly whispered, "Our
union was brought about by treachery, duress, and fraud. Do you
wish to proclaim your own share publicly? I know all now. I have
all my father's dispatches, his cipher book, his telegrams from
you, and the last, from Randall Clayton."

"You are my wife," fiercely whispered Ferris.

"In name only," defiantly replied Alice Worthington. "You will
learn my father's last wishes later, and to your sorrow. You lied
when you said that Clayton led a vile life. You poisoned my father's
mind. Thank God! I am my own mistress now.

"I have friends who will protect me and punish you. I dare you ever
to claim me as your wife. Beyond that mere civil ceremony, the sale
of a soul for Senator Dunham's influence, you have never laid your
hand in mine."

"You cannot frighten me, Madame," bitterly retorted Ferris. "I hold
your father's good name in my power."

"Stop!" coldly rejoined the angered woman. "I have the whole history
of the past. My father repaired the wrong done with his own hand,
before his death.

"You betrayed Clayton, as your life comrade; you stole upon me,
a lonely child, with your wily flatteries. I believed you to be
true, and Clayton false. You murdered his good name, you estranged
him from us. You have branded his memory as a fugitive thief! And
you have failed, with your police, detectives, and lawyers, to
find a clue! One word of charity from you and the dead man's memory
would have been cleared of the stain of theft.

"And, the prison door yawns for you! You opened Clayton's desk,
stole his telegraph-book and papers, and have secreted them."

"It is false," snarled Ferris. "Too late," cried Alice Worthington.
"We have the office boy's evidence who saw you rifle his desk.
Touch that boy if you dare! He is under our protection! We obtained
copies from the Western Union of all the last telegrams sent and
received by my poor brother."

"He plotted this robbery months ago, and sent all those as a mere
decoy," faltered Ferris. "I was merely holding them back to assist
the police." Alice Worthington's lip curled in scorn.

"Why did you not search the roads to Cheyenne? Why did you not send
detectives over to Bay Ridge? Why did you not reveal your secret
find to the chief of police?"

Suddenly Ferris saw the jaws of the trap closing upon him.

"He has been murdered!" sobbed Alice. "The money may have been
hidden, the bank-book destroyed."

"By some of the bank's people," hesitatingly said Ferris.

"You alone knew all of these details! You came here and secreted
yourself at the time of the election," sternly answered the avenging
Little Sister. "You did not even sleep once in the rooms which
you professed to share with him!"

"I acted under your father's orders," boldly rejoined Ferris.

"He is dead; it is useless to say that! No one will believe you.
And you are lying to me now. You know and I know that Randall
Clayton was no thief. I know, in my heart, and all men now believe,
that he was murdered."

Ferris' teeth chattered as he faced the accusing woman. "I am
innocent of all this," he faltered.

"Then, find his murderers!" solemnly said the rebellious wife. "You
know the crime of the past which leaves its dread legacy of shame
now crushing you. If you can aid the police, do it! You may
communicate with our company's lawyers here.

"But if you interfere at the office, if you dare to approach me,
you will be apprehended under warrants for robbing the private
records of the man who was decoyed to his death among you. One
word against my father's memory, one single hint of our marriage,
and the jail doors will close on you."

"And, the future?" whispered Ferris. "Our lives are bound together."

"The law in one year will give me a separation for desertion,"
said Alice. "The divorce will be quietly obtained in the West; if
you resist, you know the penalty! There is a gulf between us for
Time and Eternity.

"My father's murdered confidence, your Judas plots to gain a motherless
girl's hand, your wrecking Clayton's life! You can purchase your
safety in but one way: by obedience."

The astounded husband raised his hand as she glided by him. He
followed her dumbly into the front drawing-room, where the three
lawyers waited for the end of the colloquy.

"It is understood, gentlemen," said Alice Worthington, "that Mr.
Ferris has intruded upon me for the last time. I leave it to you to
demand and enforce the absolute protection of my privacy. Nothing
can induce me to consent to another interview, or to answer any
further communications."

There reigned a dismal silence in the room as Alice Worthington
glided out into the great hall. Standing on the lowest stair, she
turned, a desolate and pathetic figure, with the golden hair rippling
over the marble brows.

She steadied herself with one arm, and a slight cry of affright
trembled upon her parted lips as Ferris sprang forward, crying "For
God's sake, hear me! Just one word!"

But Boardman's heavy, restraining hand grasped the deserted
husband's arm. "Mr. Ferris," he gravely said. "Our future course
will be dictated by your behavior. You must only communicate with
the Trading Company's lawyers on these affairs. As to the Worthington
Estate, there is our representative, Mr. Witherspoon. And, in the
interests of justice, bestir yourself now to find Randall Clayton's
murderer.

"The chief of police has his eyes specially upon you, and so, I
give you a fair warning."

Ferris, with flashing eyes, essayed to speak, but Boardman
significantly ushered him to the door. "It is peace or war, as you
will have it! We three men have all the secrets of the past. If you
attempt, in the slightest degree, to annoy our principal, we will
strike, and without mercy."

As the defeated husband drove home along the leafy borders of the
beautiful Central Park--the one lovely oasis in New York's scattered
maze of brick and iron monstrosity--he saw his life lying sere and
yellow around him, his bare uplands scorched before their time.

"Ruin, ruin," he murmured, and a craven fear now possessed him--a
fear born of his ignorance of the awful remorse of the dying hours
of the Croesus, the moneyed giant cut off in the midst of all his
schemes!

"How much do they know?" he murmured.

Rage filled his stormy heart; he would have struck back as madly as
the blind rattlesnake but for the craven fears which now assailed
him.

"I must await my time for revenge," he muttered. "One touch of
publicity in this, and Senator Dunham would chase me out of America.
He must, at the last, protect me, if only to save himself."

Stunned by the sudden onslaught of the girl whom he had supposed
to be but a pliant, hoodwinked child, Ferris sat long pondering
gloomily in his rooms at the Fifth Avenue, his head buried in his
hands.

The weary hours passed in alternations of rage and despair.
Haggard-eyed Ferris sprang to the door in the early evening gloom,
as a sharp knock roused him. When Policeman Dennis McNerney entered,
he gazed wonderingly at the young lawyer.

"What's come over you?" demanded the officer. "You have heard the
news? I did not dare to go up to the office, and so I waited till
you had finished your dinner."

Ferris wearily gazed at his visitor. "What do you mean? I'm sick.
I'm going away for a change, and I've turned the whole thief-catching
business over to Stillwell, the company's lawyer."

The policeman stepped back and softly locked the door.

"See here, Mr. Ferris," he soberly said. "You should not leave
till the whole thing's cleared up. If you don't want me to follow
up your private inquiry, just say so." He handed to the astonished
man an evening paper. There, marked with a great scrawl, was a
brief item.

"BODY FOUND IN RIVER"

"Was That of a Young Man of Evidently Good Station--No Clue as to
the Deceased's Identity--Another Mysterious Crime."

"A body was found this morning in the East River off the foot of
Baltic Street, Brooklyn. It was that of a young man about twenty-eight
years of age. The deceased was about five feet eleven inches in
height, of light complexion and brown hair. It was entirely naked
and considerably bruised by the contact of the wharves and passing
vessels. There was no mark found upon the body, which is that of
a man of apparent refinement and one unused to labor. It was found
floating by an Italian boatman and taken to the morgue. It had
been in the water about three weeks."

"Well!" demanded Ferris, his hand trembling, as he handed back
the paper. "I have been on the lookout for your missing cashier,"
quietly answered McNerney, with a searching glance at the agitated
man.

"I have watched the morgue and all the police reports. When I heard
of this, I captured that Jew office boy, ran him over to the morgue
in a coupe, and he and I instantly recognized poor Mr. Clayton.
God rest his soul, all that's left of him!"

Ferris dropped into a chair, shivering violently. "It will be
featured in all the morning papers," coolly continued McNerney.
"There's your problem solved. The poor fellow was decoyed in some
black-hearted, cowardly manner and done up for the stuff. It was
no common gang who fixed him for fair," gloomily concluded the
dissatisfied officer. "There were no marks of violence upon the
body."

Ferris staggered to the sideboard and took a draught of brandy. "I
wash my hands of the whole thing," he huskily said. "If you wish
to follow it up, go and see Stillwell."

"That's all you have to say?" cried the now suspicious policeman.
"I'm sick of the whole job, and shall leave town," sullenly answered
Ferris, as he opened the door and said, "Call our affair off! I'll
telegraph to Stillwell, and he can handle the company's interests."

Dennis McNerney watched Ferris disappear in the swarm of Broadway's
evening loungers, and then directed his steps to Magdal's Pharmacy.
"I'll take that boy under my wing; and the published reward must
be mine. This cold-hearted brute may have had a hand in it. I'll
watch him night and day, and let the boy get over all his fears.
Inside of a month I'll find that woman, the hack-driver, and perhaps
this lame duck caught in the meshes. I'll lay low for a week, but
that boy and that woman shall tell their story to me alone, and
it's worth a fortune. I fancy I see daylight. It's a case of soft
and easy. Once the boy would be frightened, I would lose this blind
trail forever!"






CHAPTER XII.

THE LONELY PURSUER.





Arthur Ferris was secluded from all callers in his rooms at the
Fifth Avenue Hotel until late on the morning when a million people
read the "featured" details of the mysterious murder of Randall
Clayton.

Exhausted by the mental struggle with his now defiant wife, he
yet retained enough of his cunning to heed Policeman McNerney's
roughly-given advice.

Ferris' rooms were littered with the score of newspapers over
which he had been busied since daybreak, and his breakfast stood
still untasted at his side. He wavered between his desire for
self-protection and his fear of the hard-featured Stillwell.

In his own heart Ferris cared not a whit whether Clayton had been
waylaid by accidental thugs, betrayed at the bank, duped by some
insidious woman, or slain by an inner conspiracy of the employees.

"The money is gone, the cheques will probably be replaced," he
grumbled. "Damn the company's interests! I am glad of their loss.
The Worthington Estate will probably make it good.

"But I must go over and show up. I cannot afford to be suspected
here. God knows what game is on, with Stillwell now as chief of
scouts!"

He had decided to make a brief visit at the office, and to then
visit Stillwell, and resign his vice-presidency, on the ground of
ill-health. "I'll lay off then, watch the game, keep silence, and
frighten them."

The long, weary hours of the night had brought him one consolation.
As he reached for his hat and gloves, he laughed bitterly. "She
may pay a round price to be rid of me, and then I'll keep all her
secrets as well as mine! A kind of armed neutrality!"

At the door, he was confronted by the grave-faced captain of
detectives. "You are wanted, Mr. Ferris, at once, at the company's
office," sharply said the official, with a comprehensive glance at
the room.

"Stillwell is there, and we wish to take your statement. We propose
to avenge poor Clayton's murder. You were probably the last person
who had a confidential interview with him."

"I know it," frankly answered Ferris, "and was on my way over when
you knocked." The two men soon joined a silent circle of the higher
officials of the company, gathered about Counsellor Stillwell,
in Manager Wade's office. Ferris felt the freezing taciturnity of
the detective on the short walk, and even more the greeting of the
gloomy circle.

Bowing to Stillwell, the defeated schemer said, "Before we begin,
I wish a word with you in private."

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