Constance Dunlap Part 14

Meanwhile I will have thought out a plan."

It was late in the afternoon when Constance saw Halsey again, this time in his office, where he had been waiting impatiently for some word from her. The relief at seeing her showed only too plainly on his face.

"This inaction is killing me," he remarked huskily. "Has anything happened to-day!"

She said nothing about the visit of Mrs. n.o.ble. Perhaps it was better that each should not know yet that the other was worried.

"Yes," she replied, "much has happened. I cannot tell you now. But to-night let us all go again as though nothing had occurred."

"They have twenty-five thousand dollars in stock certificates already which I have given them," he remarked anxiously.

"Some way--any way, you must get them back for a time. Let me see some of the blanks."

Halsey shut the door. From a secret drawer of his desk he drew a package of beautifully engraved paper.

Constance looked at it a moment. Then with a fountain pen, across the front of each, she made a few marks. Halsey looked on eagerly. As she handed them back to him, not a sign showed on any part of them.

"You must tell them that there is something wrong with the others, that you will give them other certificates of your own about which there is no question. Tell them anything to get them back. Here--take this other fountain pen, sign the new certificates with that, in their presence so that they will suspect nothing. To-night I shall expect you to play up to the limit, to play into Mrs. n.o.ble's hand and a.s.sume her losses, too. I shall meet you there at nine."'

Constance had laid her plans quickly. That night she waited in her own apartment until she heard Halsey enter across the hall. She had determined to give him plenty of time to obtain the old forged certificates and subst.i.tute for them the new forgeries.

Perhaps half an hour later she heard Mrs. n.o.ble enter. As Constance followed her in, the effusive greeting of Bella LeMar showed that as yet she suspected nothing. A quick glance at Halsey brought an answering nod and an unconscious motion toward his pocket where he had stuffed the old certificates carelessly.

A moment later they had plunged into the game. The play that night was spirited. Soon the limit was the roof.

From the start things seemed to run against Halsey and Mrs. n.o.ble even worse than before. At the same time fortune seemed to favor Constance.

Again and again she won, until even Watson seemed to think there was something uncanny about it.

"Beginner's luck," remarked Bella with a forced laugh.

Still Constance won, not much, but steadily, though not enough to offset the larger winnings of Watson.

Fast and furious became the play and as steadily did it go against Halsey. Mrs. n.o.ble retired, scarcely repressing the tears. Constance dropped out. Only Halsey and Watson remained, fighting as if it were a duel to the death.

"Please stop, Halsey," pleaded Mrs. n.o.ble. "What is the use of tempting fortune?"

An insane half light seemed to glow in his eyes as, with a quick glance at Constance and a covert nod of approval from her, he forced a smile and playfully laid his finger on Mrs. n.o.ble's lips.

"Double or quits, Watson," he cried. "Return the new certificates or take others for twice the amount. Are you game?"

"I'm on," agreed Watson coolly.

Halsey laid down his hand in triumph. There were four kings.

"I win," ground out Watson viciously, as he tossed down four aces.

Constance was on her feet in a moment.

"You are a lot of cheats and swindlers," she cried, seizing the cards before any one could interfere.

Deftly she laid out the four aces beside the four deuces, the four kings beside the four queens. It was done so quickly that even Halsey, in his amazement, could find nothing to say. Mrs. n.o.ble paled and was speechless. As for Bella and Watson, nothing could have aroused them more than the open charge that they were using false devices.

Yet never for a moment did Watson lose his iron cynicism.

"Prove it," he demanded. "As for Mr. Halsey, he may pay or I'll show the stock I already hold to the proper people."

Constance was facing Watson, as calm as he.

"Show it," she said quietly.

There was a knock at the door.

"Don't let any one in," ordered Bella of the maid, who had already opened the door.

A man's foot had been inserted into the opening. "What's the matter, Chloe?"

"Good Lawd, Mis' Bella--we done been raided!" burst out the maid as the door flew wholly open.

Halsey staggered back. "A detective!" he exclaimed.

"Oh, what shall I do!" wailed Mrs. n.o.ble. "My husband will never forgive me if this becomes known."

Bella was as calm as a good player with a royal straight flush.

"I've caught you at last," fairly hissed Drummond. "And you, too, Mrs.

Dunlap. Watson, I overheard something about some stock. Let me see it.

I think it will interest International Surety as well as Exporters and Manufacturers."

Through the still open door Constance had darted across the hall to her apartment.

"Not so fast," cried Drummond. "You can't escape. The front door is guarded. You can't get out."

She was gone, but a moment later emerged from the darkness of her rooms, carrying the oak box.

As she set it down on the card table, no one said a word. Deliberately she opened the box, disclosing two spools of wire inside. To the machine she attached several head pieces such as a telephone operator wears. She turned a switch and the wire began to unroll from one spool and wind up on the other again.

A voice, or rather voices, seemed to come from the box itself. It was uncanny.

"h.e.l.lo, is this Mrs. LeMar?" came from it.

"What is it?" whispered Halsey, as if fearful of being overheard.

"A telegraphone," replied Constance, shutting it off for a moment.

"A telegraphone? What is that?"

"A machine for registering telephone conversations, dictation, anything of the sort you wish. It was invented by Valdemar Poulsen, the Danish Edison. This is one of his new wire machines. The record is made by a new process, localized charges of magnetism on this wire. It is as permanent as the wire itself. There is only one thing that can destroy them--rubbing over the wire with this magnet. Listen."

She had started the machine again. Whose voice was it calling Bella?