Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 182, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 August 1915 — The Strange Adventures of Christopher Poe [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

The Strange Adventures of Christopher Poe

Storisv of .Srranffe Cam Solved in Secret by a Banker-Detective

By ROBERT CARLTON BROWN

(Copyright. 1815, by W. G. Chapman.)

THE MACGREGOR MYSTERY

'Tm going to take a vacation, Buras,** said Christopher Poe one Sunday, as he was leaving bis brother banker after dining with him. "You’ll be lucky If you get one, old man. You’ve had no less than a dozen tough things to work out In the past four months,** answered Burns, “and most of them came when you were trying to get away for a vacation.** "Oh, I’ll fool them this time. Tm going to get away to New Orleans this week, and if I can’t get a rest there I’m going abroad.” “I hope you succeed,” smiled Bums. “You’ve certainly earned a day off. But don't get too far from New York. We might need you.” That evening Poe superintended the packing of his white flannels and lightest clothes. But, in spite of his intention, the following in the morning paper compelled him to instantly change his plans:

Between one and two o’clock this morning, as near as can be ascertained, Geordie MacGregor was stolen from his ivopy inlaid bed which stood .next to the one his mother was occupying at the time. Mrs. MacGregor herself miesed the boy, and telephoned the police at two o’clock this morning. Mrs. MacGregor, suffering with hay-fever, had slept but fitfully since retiring with her son at nine o’clock last evening. At one o’clock she noted her son was sleeping sweetly and sound. At two o’clock her asthmatic trouble again awakened her. She arose from bed to get a fresh handkerchief from her bureau. In doing so she passed Geordie’s bed, and found it empty. As her four-year-old son was not In the habit of rising during the night, she flew into great alarm, and hurried into the small room adjoining, where Rose McDermott, Geordie’s old nurse, slept. The nurse was on her feet almost the moment her mistress passed through the open doorway between their rooms. "It’s Geordie!” she cried. “Yes. Where is he?” Mrs. MacGregor turned on a light above the faithful old nurse’s head, and scanned her face with calm intensity. "I thought I heard something,” cried the nurse. “Tell me, Rose, what?” “I was just uneasy. I thought I heard Geordie whisper for his horse, Ponto; I’m sure I heard the word,” cried Rose. She rushed at once to the butler’s quarters. Since Brian MacGregor, the Mad Millionaire, finished his life as a raving maniac in the padded cell he had built as a chess-room in the top turret of the house, the servants have been given all the rooms on the third floor. Andrew was awakened from a sound sleep, and hurried back with Rose at once. All lights were turned on, the four other servants called from their quarters in the basement, and a general search was instituted. The strangest part of the case is that nothing was found out of order. Not a window was unlatched. Not a door had been tampered with. The police came, and unhesitatingly called it an inside job. The servants are now all under suspicion, though old Rose is thought to be innocent. Of course, particular significance should be attached to the fact that Geordie MacGregor is the richest boy in the world, and it would be quite worth the while of any man to prepare an elaborate scheme and steal the boy. It is hardly thought, however, that if the usual method of kidnaping is employed the criminals will be able to conceal their victim, for with the mass of money Mrs. MacGregor has at her command she will be able to put every detective in New York city on the case.

A Blight shiver ran through Christopher Poe as he looked at the accompanying illustrations of the MacGregor mansion; that grim, mysterious old stone pile, sprawling amply on Fifth avenue, across from the park; in the “sixties." He shuddered on seeing a picture of little Geordie in a gold brocade walking-euit, and another of Geordie in his inlaid ivory crib. There were photographs, too, of the beautiful Mrs. MacGregor and Geordie’s mad ancestors, who Poe had known intimately. Even the stern face of the old family butler appeared in uncompromising print. Sending out his man for later papers, the banker dressed, called up a railroad office to countermand a reservation for New Orleans, and, when the papers arrived, eagerly read the latest report, spread across the top half of the paper in high head-lines: M’GREGOR BOY SIGNS NOTE • TO MOTHER. At seven o’clock this morning one of the maids of the MacGregor household was sweeping the front porch when a thick square envelope bearing on the. outside a < hideous skull and cross-bones, fell

beneath her gaze. She picked It up, and hurried in to her mistress with it. When the sinister envelope was opened, a large cartridge for a .44 caliber revolver fell into Mrs. MacGregor’s lap. She recoiled in horror, and tremblingly opened out the carefully folded sheet of heavy wrapping-paper which the envelope contained. The note, written in an Ignorant hand with a mussy lead pencil, read as follows: “We have kidnap your boy and we kil him unless you get one hundred thousand dollars in hundred dollar bills and be ready for notice where to put them. No monkey bizness now. The bullet means death and we have more of them for your boy Gord.” Beneath that was a scrawl in the same hand which read: "I am all right, mamma, but I like to be back wit you. “GORD.” The second note bore in addition a mark which the fearful mother readily recognized as Geordie’s drawing of a bird, which he had printed all over his childish possessions.

Throwing down the eheet, Christopher Poe ate a hasty breakfast, and hurried out of the house. When he was within a block or two of the MaoGregor mansion, his pace slackened, and he sauntered slowly, looking about him like a gentleman taking a morning walk. Outwardly he seemed like a person perfectly at home in the neighborhood, and only idly interested in the MacGregor house. So well did he play his part that two detectives loitering in the vicinity took only passing notice of him. Twice he strolled past the house on the opposite side of the street, swinging a modish Piccadilly stick, and sauntering leisurely. He stopped to drop a coin in the hat of a black-spec-tacled blind beggar sitting with crossed legs on the sidewalk, his back against the park fence as he drawled out plaintive tunes on a wheezy accordion. Then he crossed the street, and went up the steps to the MacGregor mansion. The two watchful detectives followed quickly, scenting a development. The man was recognized by Andrew, the butler, who opened the door. A minute later he was shown into the living-room, wheie Mrs. (MacGregor lay on a couch, Rose rubbing her head. “Oh, I’m so glad you came, Mr. Poe,” she cried, half rising, and extending a limp hand. “I hope I can help," replied Christopher Poe. “I have never known the time when I wouldn’t give up the silly business of banking for an interesting criminal itudy, and when I may serve an old friend the pleasure is doubled. But I must make a secret of anything I may do in that line. The servants will remember me as an old family friend. I am to appear here only as a buffer between you and the outside world. To everybody but the servants I am Mr. Hardy.” “I understand. You speak so calmly. It is so encouraging. You think there is a chance to get Geordie back? It isn’t the money, only the police; they won’t let me meet the terms of ransom and I am so afraid something will happen to—” “The police are quite right We all have a duty toward each other. If you accede to the ransom terms, you increase the criminal’s chances against the law. But I don’t anticipate much trouble. Geordie is somewhere, and you can be quite sure he is safe from harm while his abductors have hope of getting money.” He smiled reassuringly. Turning to the nurse, he said quickly:

"I read in the paper this morning, Miss McDermott, that you vaguely heard Geordie calling ‘Ponto.’ Is the account true, and can you be quite certain it was Geordie’s voice?” "Oh, I’m not at all sure about anything, Mr. Poe,” cried the woman, a numb, fixed stare of pain in her faithful eyes as she raised them fully to Poe’s. “I should have awakened. I felt so sort of strange.” “Might the whispered word have been Pronto?” asked Poe. "Yes, but I can’t see why Geordie should say that I never heard the word, and ‘Ponto’ is the name of his pony.” “And you are not sure that it was Geordie’s voice at all?” “Not at all, sir. It is all so hazy. I must have dreamt it.” “I’m afraid not I only wish you were more sure of the voice.” He turned abruptly to Mrs. MacGregor, who lay back with eyelids closed quiveringly. She twitched nervously, and tossed in an endeavor to find comfort on her couch. “Does that wheezing accordion bother you?" asked Poe, as a garbled version of “Nellie Gray" came distinctly through the window from the blind beggar across the street “He plays such dreadful things!” cried Mrs. MacGregor, opening her eyes. “The poor fellow is probably as badly off as L It’s only my nerves. I don’t like to-—”

"I’ll ass Mm to go away." Poe started for the door. The blind beggar began a new tune, and Poe hurried out and across the street “Would you mind moving further along?” he said gently. “There’s a sick lady in the house opposite. You’ll find more people up at the park entrance.” He dropped a fifty-cent piece into the quivering hand. “This one tune and then I go, sir.” "If you wouldn’t mind,” said Poe, "you can finish it further along.” “Oh, all right sir, all right” answered the beggar quickly, getting stiffly to Ms feet, and standing still a moment as he finished a few final bare, and then hobbled on toward the park entrance, feeling his way with his staff. The soft violet shade in Christopher Poe’s eyes became more vivid, he drew the corners of his nostrils and lips together in two deep wrinkles, and watched the man for half a minute. Then he returned to the MacGregor mansion and entered by the servants* door. The maids were sufficiently familiar with hie face to defer to him, as a close friend of their former master. With their aid he found the several entrances to the basement, and inspected them carefully. Then Andrew took him to the rooms above, where he examined the window-locks and found them all quite In order. But he was not satisfied with examining this floor or the one above; he went on up to the dread Peacock room, looking everywhere for traces of the mai or men who had spirited Geordie away. On up to the turret he climbed, only glancing at the big barred door behind which Geordie’s grandfather had raved a lunatic for so many years. “The door’s been plastered up since I was here last,” he remarked, passing on into the attic. "Yes, sir, near two months ago, sir, when the rooms were redecorated. It was madame’s orders,” said Andrew. Having casually examined the attic and finding nothing of interest, Poe went on downstairs, and found Rose busy in the nursery.

He made a second examination of

Geordie’s bed, but found nothing of interest. Going directly to a little-used smoking-room in the front of the house on the second floor, he asked Andrew to see that he wasn’t disturbed, and, as soon as the door was closed, fell to pacing back and forth reflectively, his hands behind bis back, a cigar clenched in his teeth, his head well forward. For two hours he paced back and forth, sometimes mumbling to himself, according to an ineradicable habit of summing up matters in short phrases and seemingly disconnected words: “Pronto! Pronto! A single tap. No shuffle. Heavy bullet ‘Nellie Gray.’ Odd!" He opened the door, went downstairs, and found the maid who had discovered the kidnapers’ note on the porch. After a careful questioning he had her take him to the very spot where the note had been found. There he carefully calculated -the distance from the street, and stooped to make a hasty examination of a mark on the cement floor of the porch. Then hs asked for the bullet found in the note, and carefully examined that and the envelope, finding that some of the lead had been grazed from the nose of the cartridge and a corresponding hole had been scraped in the envelope. He lunched alone in the smokingroom at about three o’clock, Mrs. MacGregor still being asleep. As he was in the middle of his cigar, he jumped up, and peered out of the small front window, standing well back, though the window was curtained, so no passer-by could see him. The wheezy accordion was again playing plaintively; the air was “Tenting Tonight on the Old Camp-Ground.” Something in the drawling execution struck Poe's ear strangely. The tune was repeated with strong emphasis again on the first two words “Ten-ting tonight,” repeated Poe, nulling back the edge of a wlndcw-cur-

tain. “He has a peculiar way of playing that.** The beggar across the street chopped his song in the middle, and changed to a popular air, ‘TVs Up to You to Do the Rest" He rose suddenly, swayed back and forth on his rickety legs, ceased playing, and shambled down the street “Strange that a blind man across the street should have seen me touch the window-curtain. He must have very keen eyes,” mused Poe, stepping to a mirror, and putting on a-neces-sary Hawkshawlan disguise in the shape of a neat little mustache. With a quick twist of his tie and a rumpling of his hair he changed his appearance remarkably, donned a raincoat Andrew procured for him, put on a soft black felt hat, and went down to the street, following two blocks behind the blind beggar and not taking his eyes off him once. At Fiftieth street the ragged fellow took a Fifth avenue bus down-town. Poe followed in a taxi. The beggar left the bus at Washington arch, and started rapidly toward Bleecker street. “He’s forgetting his shuffle. Doesn’t stop to tap his cane often enough,” Poe noted with amusement, as he followed on foot At a dismal alley the street musician turned in. Poe listened, and heard him clump up two flights of squeaky stairs. Following into the tenement, he cautiously ascended to the third floor. There he found a dark corner, and waited. From a room at the front of the hall came the sound of a mouthorgan repeating two tunes alternately, only the first part of each. Poe noted the words of the songs carefully. Five minutes later the door opened, and a young, bright-eyed foreign-look-ing fellow stepped out, going quickly down the stairs. “Our blind beggar,” Poe smiled to himself. “He didn’t stop to change his shoes, and only brushed the ashes off his hat and altered its shape a little.” Poe crossed to the door the young fellow had left, and unlocked it with a slender skeleton key as easily as though he were entering his own home. As soon as he was Inside, he

made a careful survey of the small, cluttered room, found he was alone, and quickly sorted over a pile of thumbed sheet-music on the bed. Some of it was new. The two eongs he had heard on the mouth-organ lay together. He selected those and several other pieces of music, among them “Tenting on the Old Camp-Ground,'* placed them in his pocket, and, after a casual examination of the other things in the room, left directly. At dinner alone he read carefully the words of the songs he had taken with him. Having finished, he expressed his satisfaction in the contemplative smoking of a long after-dinner cigar, and took an hour’s stroll. At length he found himself In front of the MacGregor mansion. *

Near by was a cab, with a uniformed coachman standing on the curb. Poe approached him, and slipped a flve-dollar bill in his palm. "I’m Mr. Hardy, the man you mistook for one of the looters at the Gramercy National, Clancy,” he said. “I’m anxious to be let alone on this job. You won’t waste any of your detective prowess on me tonight, I hope. You’ll have plenty to do in the regular direction of your work.” “Oh, no, no, sir,” said the hired detective, laughing awkwardly. "1. recognize you now, sir. I won’t mistake you again. You were Mrs. MacGregor all this morning.” ' "Yes. I may ask you to help me tonight,” answered Christopher Poe, gliding up to the MacGregor porch, and taking his stand in a shadow behind a pillar.

Twice he drew out his watch anxiously. At length the chimes of a neighboring clock sharply recorded the hour of ten on the monotonous, even hum of the city night. Poe started. Something whizzed past Its face. Before he eould jump back there was an explosion, and a flash of light leaped at his feet. He

snatcned up an indistinct object, and rushed to the door, pressing the bell. Andrew, with wild eyes, flung the door wide open to him. “Quick! Where is Mrs. MacGregor?” ordered Poe. A minute later he was opening the object that had landed at his feet at the same moment that the sharp explosion had alarmed the whole household. It was a small tin tobacco box, powder-blackened, with a dent in it Inside was a note, intact, which read: The time haz arrive. Wrap the money in tight roll, put it in a straw hat, tie it in tight an hang it by a string six inch long from lowest branch of elum tree at the dark corner along the park, oppositive of the new building at Six-ty-eighth street & Fifth avenue. Be Carefull! You are being watched. The bullet that came with this order means bizness. There is lots more of them. Hang the hat there at 2 minutes to one o’clock, then the police is at the uther end of his beat an if you are carefull nobody sees you. You can throw the string over the end of the branch and pull the hat up. Don’t let it be ceen or Death is Yours and Gord’s. Don’t be foolish an try games with us for if there is any dectetlves around the money will not be tuched and you an Gord will both get Death for yours. At 2 minutes to 1. Remember. If all is well and you play no

underhand the boy Gord is return immediatte. P. S. Speslal. Mama, do as the man says or he will kill me. Gord. “What are you going to do?” breathed Mrs. MacGregor, repressing her horror with an effort which strained every feature. “Exacty as they say,” replied Poe, "except that cut paper will take the place of the money.” “But when they disc —” “Now don’t lose control!” Poe clasped her hand firmly in his. “It isn’t right for them to prey on you with appeals they make Geordie sign. The boy’s all right Don’t worry.” He took the kidnaper’s note, and went up to the smoking room. There he cut some heavy bond paper into strips the size of paper currency, pressed a large bunch into a neat bundle, and forced it into the crown of an old straw hat, tying it In. He sent Andrew out for Clancy, posing as a coachman, and when the excited detective came in, Poe gave him definite orders about tying the hat x>n the tree exactly according to orders at two minutes to one, added advice as to his movements after that, and dismissed him.

He called up a certain number, where he was known as Mr. Hardy, received some information which seemed satisfactory, and then took a taxi to Washington Square, where the blind beggar had alighted that afternoon. He met a man by appointment, and went with him to a nearby room, where he changed quickly to the garb of a conductor on the Fifth avenue bus line, starting from Washington Square. “You’ll have just time to take out your car,” said the bus-line employe who had brought him the uniform. “There won’t be many passengers. It’s the last trip. Be careful, Mr. Hardy.” Poe ran down the stairs, and hurried up to the big green auto bus, whose conductor he was to be for the trip. Forty minutes later the bus had passed the MacGregor mansion on its up-town trip, and had come to a stop at its terminal in the "Nineties.” Poe held a whispered conversation with the driver, there being nobody about, and at schedule time rang the bell for the return trip down-town. There wasn’t a passenger aboard, except a drunken old woman in shabby clothing who sat Inside the bus. Poe paid no attention to her. At Eightysixth street the bus came to a stop, hailed by a street-corner passenger. Poe had his face averted as he rang the bell to go ahead. The passenger glanced at the drunken woman within, ran lightly up the steps, and took a seat alone outside, on the bus top, sitting on the side nearest the park. Poe went up presently, and collected his fare.

He turned to his platform below, but at Seventieth street climbed the stairs again, and cried in the weary tone of bus conductors, "Look out for low branches.’’’ The lone passenger turned sharply. He had been sitting tense, straining forward in the front seat.’' At Poe’s caution he made an irascible motion for him to go down and cried: “AU right! All right! I take care of myself.” Poe had started as if to return to hfs platform, and the young man seemed satisfied, turning at once to gaze ahead along the Une of low boughs. Poe, taking advantage of the passenger’s absorption, slipped down in the passage-way between the seats, crouching so that his head was out of sight A sudden snap of a branch. Poe leaped forward, and in a single bound secured the young feUow's arms from behind, wresting from his frantic grip the straw hat snatched from the elm tree. Poe stamped his foot three times on the floor above the motorman’s head, by way of prearranged signal, and the motor came to an abrupt stop. Poe, kicking the straw hat with its wad of cut paper under a seat, secured both arms of the young fellow with one of his own, and with his other hand searched quickly in the man’s pocket. He pulled out a mouth-organ. Holding it before the other’s eyes, he tightened his hold and cried sharply: “Quick! What tune was it? Don’t lie. I know the whole thing.”

A guttural cry came from the prfe»i oner; he wrenched to free his arms, and tried clumsily to trip Poa. "We’ve got your pal. Tell me the tune. Was it ’Hold the Fort’?” the banker-detective insisted. A crafty gleam lurked In the prisoner’s eyes, as his sullen face turned full toward Poe. “Yes,” he gurgled. '1 thought I was right,” cried Poe, stamping his heel twice on the bus roof.

The bus lurched forward, and two minutes later passed in front of the MacGregor mansion. Poe, having slipped to the seat beside his prisoner to maintain a better hold on him, placed the mouth-organ to his lips, and played the first few bars of "I’ve Got Mine” just as they were passing the MacGregor home. The notes struck clear in the quiet night, and, contenting himself with a few bars, Poe flung the mouth-organ away, and proceeded, to tie his man with a stout cord he had brought along. Two blocks lower the bus came to a halt, Clancy jumped aboard, and took charge of the prisoner. Poe leaped down and dashed back to the MacGregor mansion. He passed through the basement door behind the servants* quarters and down into the cellar. There he stationed himself beside an old iron ash-door near the furnace, recently plastered up. There, mentally and physically on tiptoe, be waited until a dark figure suddenly outlined itself in the gray light of the cellar, sneaking down from above by means of a little-used stairway.

The dark figure never knew how if happened, but as he reached for the handle of the plastered-up iron door, a gunny-sack was jerked over hia head, and the next he knew he was whizzed away in an auto, and his eyes opened on the interesting spectacle of five earnest policemen and a desk sergeant with pen dipped, ready to book him. As soon as Poe had turned this basement skulker over to Andrew and a detective who took him to the star tion, he rushed upstairs, and knocked on the door of the room in which he had left Mrs. MacGregor. She flew to the door herself, and opened it, her eyes questioning him incisively. "Come,” he said, taking her on one arm and Rose McDermott on the other, and leading them upstairs to Mrs. MacGregor’s own boudoir. There he switched on the lights, and pointed to the ivory-inlaid crib. There lay Geordie MacGregor, richest boy in the world, sleeping quietlyMrs. MacGregor and old Rose hurled themselves on him together, laving him with kisses and tears. Geordie spluttered and awakened. "If you’ll stop making a fuss over me, mamma, I’d rather like to go to sleep,” he said drowsily. But he was aroused out of that state, and soon surrounded by a rejoicing household of summoned relatives, servants and detectives. Poe took Mrs. MacGregor aside for a moment, as he excused himself to go home before the sensation was announced. He handed her the sheets of music taken from the blind beggar’s room. “These may prove interesting mementos to Geordie at some future date. They are from the extensive repertory of the accordion player who bothered your rest this morning. He renders the first few bars of this copy of ’Tenting Tonight’ remarkably. He puts all his emphasis on the ten and tonight. That was how I knew we might expect a second message from the kidnapers at ten tonight. On the mouth-organ he can play ‘l’ve Got Mine’ and ‘Hold the Fort’ quite nicely. “But I don’t understand. What do you mean?” "It’s very simple. The blind beggar was pal to the man who has held Geordie in captivity the past twentyfour hours. He had a score of tunee which he played, emphasizing certain words or titles in such a way that by a prearranged plan he could warn the man in charge of Geordie just what was going on in the outer world and exactly what move to make next. If he had been successful in getting away with the money tonight, he had arranged to play ‘l’ve Got Mine,’ which would be the cue to his pal to put Geordie back in bed where he found him. If he failed, he was to play ‘Hold the Fort’ I heard him practicing." “But how could he signal the man with Geordie from across the street, in front of our very house?” "Because Geordie hasn’t been out of the house. He has been spending his time very pleasantly, I am sure, with the kidnaper, in the turret at the top of the house, in the padded cell that Bryan MacGregor used to have for his chessroom and —” “But I had the door to that frightful place plastered up only last month.” "And you were exceedingly unfortunate in your selection of plasterers, Mrs. MacGregor. They did the work is such a way that the doors could still be easily opened without disarranging the plaster." "I remember Andrew was suspicious of some of the decorators. They looked like Italians or Spaniards, and they snooped around a good deal.” “Yes. Rose was first to inform me of their nationality. ‘Pronto* is an exceedingly common Spanish word, which means ’quick’ or ‘hurry.’” “But how were those awful notes delivered?" cried Mrs. MacGregor. “Nothing easier, The man in the turret with Geordie dropped theig through the open window, and placed a big bullet in each, to attract attention and strengthen his bluff, but ths real business of the bullets was to furnish sufficient weight to carry the notes down to the porch in a straight line.'’