The Blue Lights Part 4

Mr. Stapleton rose. "If I receive any further news of importance from Paris, Mr. Duvall, I will advise you at your hotel. Where are you stopping?"

Duvall gave the name of a Times Square hotel at which he usually stopped, and with a quick "good night" left the house.

It was shortly after nine o'clock the next morning when he descended from the train at Paterson, and going to a nearby drug store, consulted the directory for the address of Patrick Lanahan. He found it without difficulty, and, by means of an electric car, was soon before the florist's door.

The place was situated on the outskirts of the town, and consisted of a small, rather mean-looking cottage, from which spread out on each side, like the two wings of an aeroplane, the long gla.s.s greenhouses.

A little gate opened to a short brick path, leading to the front door of the house.

Duvall went up the path and rang the door bell. A wholesome-looking Irish woman, of perhaps fifty, opened the door, and, in response to his questions, told him that her husband, Patrick, was out in the garden at the rear of the house, busy with his plants.

She directed the detective along a narrow areaway at the side of the house, and in a moment reappeared at the back door.

"Pat," she called. "Oh, Pat! Here's a gentleman to see you."

A short, heavy-set man, with gray hair and mustache and a ruddy and weatherbeaten face, arose from among a litter of flower pots and bulbs.

"What can I do for you, sir?" he asked, coming forward and wiping his hands upon his overalls.

The detective studied the man before him intently. The honest and clear-looking eyes told him nothing that was not favorable.

"I came to ask you a few questions, Mr. Lanahan."

"Questions, is it? About what?" The blue eyes showed a sudden flare of suspicion.

"About yourself, and your family."

"Who may you be, then? Is it the tax man?"

Duvall smiled. "Not the tax man," he said. "I represent a firm of lawyers in Was.h.i.+ngton. My name is Johnson."

Lanahan, still suspicious, pointed to a couple of kitchen chairs that stood on the brick-paved yard beneath a trellis covered with hop vines.

"Sit down, sir. I'll have a smoke, if you don't mind." He began to fill his short clay pipe. "What would lawyers in Was.h.i.+ngton be wantin' with me?"

"That is what I wish to find out, Mr. Lanahan. We--my firm--have been advised that a certain Michael Lanahan, of Dublin, recently died, leaving a large estate. We are trying to find his heirs. Tell me something about yourself and your family."

The look of suspicion and reserve which the old man had up to this time shown faded from his face, and was replaced by a smile of incredulity.

"Money, is it?" he laughed. "Mary--that's my wife--has been seein'

bubbles in her tay for the week past. What is it you would know?"

"Are you from Dublin?"

"Me father was. I was born right here in Jersey, meself."

"What was his name?"

"Patrick, the same as me own. But he had a brother, Mike."

"Ah. It may be the same." Duvall pretended a sudden interest. "His business?"

"Mike's? Faith--I never heard he had any, lest it was drinkin' all the good liquor he could lay his hands on."

Duvall pretended to make a series of entries in his notebook. "Now about yourself, Mr. Lanahan. Have you any children? Of course, should there be any money coming to you, they would share in it."

"Children, is it? I have two."

"Boys?"

"One is a boy--a man be now, I should say. He's in the city--workin'.

His name is Barney."

"What does he do?"

Lanahan looked up with a quick frown. "The last I heard tell, he was tendin' bar, Mr. Johnson--over at Callahan's saloon, on the Bowery. He's wild--wild--like me uncle Mike, I should say."

"And the other?"

The old man's face took on a contented look. "The other is me daughter Mary, bless her. She's nurse in the family of old man Stapleton, the millionaire."

Duvall closed his book. "I see," he remarked, pleasantly. "She's not married, I suppose?"

"Mary? Divil a bit! For a time, she was sweet on a French chuffer that worked for Mr. Stapleton; but the fellow's gone, now, and she's clane forgot him. That was near a year ago."

"Ah, yes. Do you happen to remember his name?"

"Alphonse, it was--Alphonse Valentin, or some such joke of a name. A comic valentine he was, too, with his d.i.n.ky little mustache and his cigarettes." He laughed loudly. "Imagine my Mary, married to a gink like that!"

Duvall replaced his notebook in his pocket and rose. "I'm mightily obliged to you, Mr. Lanahan. We will advise you at once, if our investigations show that you are related to the Michael Lanahan whose fortune is in our hands. I'm obliged to you for your courtesy."

The florist nodded. "You're welcome, sir. I guess them Lanahan's must be a different breed. I never heard tell of any of my people makin' any fortune. Good day, sir." He turned to his work, chuckling.

Duvall rode back to the station, and took the first train for New York.

It was clear that Mary Lanahan's parents had nothing in common with blackmailers and kidnappers. Their honesty was as evident as the blueness of their eyes, or the redness of their hair. But the information about Alphonse Valentin, the chauffeur, and Barney, Mr.

Lanahan's son, seemed more promising.

It was close to one o'clock when Duvall arrived at Callahan's saloon, on the Bowery, near Ca.n.a.l Street. Here a disappointment awaited him. Barney Lanahan had thrown up his job and left two months before. Callahan had no idea where he had gone. He had not been about the place since. A negro porter volunteered the information that he had seen the man entering the Broadway saloon of an ex-prizefighter some weeks before; but, beyond that, Duvall could learn nothing.

After a hasty luncheon he went to his office on Union Square, where his unexpected appearance caused his a.s.sistants unlimited surprise. He directed them to locate Barney Lanahan at the earliest possible moment.

He then called up Mr. Stapleton's secretary, Mr. Hodgman, and inquired about the chauffeur.

Mr. Hodgman informed him that the banker had employed Valentin in Paris some eighteen months previous, and had brought him to this country, where he had remained in his employ for about six months. He had been discharged, through some dishonesty in the matter of purchasing supplies, and nothing further had been seen or heard of him.

Duvall, on receiving this information, proceeded at once to the office of the French line, and asked permission to inspect their pa.s.senger lists for the past year. He concluded that if Valentin had anything to do with the kidnapping of Mr. Stapleton's boy, he was, in all probability, in Paris, and, if so, would almost certainly have crossed by this line. He was therefore not at all surprised to find the name of Alphonse Valentin among those sailing during the preceding March.

There was little more that he could accomplish, now, beyond writing a long letter to Grace, whom he naturally supposed to be patiently awaiting his return in the country. He had a short interview with Mr.

Hodgman in the evening, and was lucky enough to secure a photograph of Alphonse Valentin, the chauffeur, taken at the steering wheel of his machine. The car had, it seemed, been photographed, along with a party of guests, by a friend of Mr. Stapleton's with a leaning toward amateur photography. Duvall placed the photograph among his belongings with a smile of satisfaction. He felt that his delay had been by no means unprofitable.

One other step he took, before leaving. Accompanied by Mr. Hodgman, he made a careful inspection of the room which had been occupied by the nurse, Mary Lanahan, at the Stapleton house. The results were distressingly meager. All the woman's belongings she had evidently taken with her, on going abroad. There appeared to be nothing which would afford the slightest clue to her character or habits.