IT WAS during the dark days at the beginning of our recent unpleasantness with Mexico that Craig Kennedy and I dropped in one evening at the new Vanderveer Hotel to glance at the ticker to see how affairs were going.
We were bending over the tape, oblivious to everything else about us, when we felt a hand on each of our shoulders.
“We’ve just had a most remarkable tragedy right here in the hotel,” a voice whispered. “Are you busy tonight, Kennedy?”
Craig and I turned simultaneously and found Michael McBride, the house-detective of the hotel, an old friend of ours some years before in the city detective-bureau.
McBride was evidently making a great effort to appear calm, but it was very apparent that something had completely upset him.
“How’s that?” asked Kennedy shaking hands.
McBride gave a hasty glance about and edged us over into a quiet corner away from the ticker.
“Why,” he replied in an undertone, “we’ve just discovered one of our guests—a Madame Valcour—in her room—dead!”
“Dead?” repeated Kennedy in amazement.
“Yes—the most incomprehensible thing you can imagine. Come upstairs with me, before the coroner gets here,” he urged. “I’d like you to see the case, Kennedy, before he musses things up.”
We followed the house-detective to the tenth floor. As we left the elevator he nodded to the young woman floor-clerk who led the way down the thickly carpeted hall. She stopped at a door, and through the transom overhead we could see that the room was dimly lighted. She opened the door and we caught a glimpse of a sumptuously furnished suite.
On the snowy white bed, in all her cold, stony beauty, lay the beautiful Madame Valcour, fully dressed in the latest of Parisian creations, perfect from her hat which breathed of the Rue de la Paix to her dainty tango-slippers peeping from a loosely draped skirt which accentuated rather than concealed her exquisite form.
She was a striking woman, dark of hair and skin. In life she must have been sensuously attractive. But now her face was drawn and contorted with a ghastly look.
There she lay, alone, in an elegantly appointed room of an exclusive hotel. Only a few feet away were hundreds of gay guests chatting and laughing, with no idea of the terrible tragedy so near them.
In the comer of the room I could see her maid sobbing hysterically.
“Oh—niña—niña,” cried the maid, whose name I learned afterward was Juanita. “She was muy simpatica—muy simpatica.”
“ ‘Niña,’ ” remarked Kennedy to us in an undertone, “means ‘little girl,’ the familiar term for mistress. As for ‘muy simpatica,’ it means, literally, ‘very sympathetic,’ but really can not be done justice to in English. It is that charming characteristic of personal attractiveness, the result of a sweet disposition.”
He looked down keenly at the woman before us.
“I can well imagine that she had it, that she was muy simpatica."
While Craig was taking in the situation, I turned to McBride and asked—
“Who was Madame Valcour—where did she come from?”
“You haven’t heard of her?” he repeated. "Well—I’m not surprised after all. Really I can’t say I know much about her myself—except that she was a beauty and attracted everybody’s attention here at the hotel. Among other things, she was a friend of Colonel Sinclair, I believe. You know him, don’t you—the retired army-engineer—interested in Mexican mines and railroads, and a whole lot of things? Oh, you’ve seen his name in the newspapers often enough. Lately, you know, he has been experimenting with air-ships for the army—has a big estate out on Long Island.”
Kennedy nodded.
“Rather a remarkable chap, I’ve heard.”
“I don’t know whether you know it or not,” continued McBride, “but we seem to have quite a colony of Mexican refugees here at the Vanderveer. She seemed to be one of them—at least she seemed to know them all. I think she was a Frenchwoman. At least, you know how all the Latin-Americans seem naturally to gravitate to Paris and how friendly the French are toward them.”
“How did you come to discover her?” asked Kennedy, bending over her again. “She couldn’t have been dead very long.”
“Well—she came into the hotel during the dinner-hour. As nearly as I can find out, the elevator boy, who seems to have been the only person who observed her closely, says that she acted as if she were dazed.
“They tell me her maid was out at the time. But about half an hour after Madame came in, there was a call for her over the telephone. The operator got no answer from her room, although the boy had seen her go up and the young lady who is floor-clerk on the tenth floor said she had not gone out.”
“Did the person on the telephone leave any message—give any name?” asked Craig.
“Yes. It was a man who seemed to be very much excited—said that it was Señor Morelos—just Senor Morelos—she would know.”
“What then?”
“Why, when he found he couldn’t get her, he rang off. A few minutes later her maid Juanita came in. The moment she opened the door with her key, she gave a scream and fainted.”
“Suicide?” I ventured under my breath to Kennedy, as McBride paused.
Craig said nothing. He was making a careful examination of both the room and of the body on the bed.
A moment later he looked up quickly, then bent down farther.
On her arm he had discovered a peculiar little red mark!
Gently, as if he would not hurt such an exquisite creature even in death, he squeezed a tiny drop of blood from the little puncture and caught it on a sterilized glass slide of a microscope, which he carried in a small compact emergency-case in his pocket.
He continued to rummage the room.
Thrown carelessly into a top drawer of the dressing-table was a chatelaine. He opened it. There seemed to be nothing there except several articles of feminine vanity. In the bottom, however, was a little silver box which he opened. There lay a number of queer little fuzzy buttons—at least they looked like buttons. He took one, examined it closely, found it rather soft, tasted it—made a wry face and dropped the whole thing into his pocket.
A HEAVY tap sounded on the door. McBride opened it. It was our old friend, Dr. Leslie, the coroner.
“Well,” he exclaimed taking in the whole situation, and hardly more surprised seeing us than at the strangeness of the handsome figure on the bed. “Well—what is all this?”
McBride shook his head gravely and repeated substantially what he had already told us.
There is no need to go into the lengthy investigation that the coroner conducted. He questioned one servant and employee after another, without eliciting any more real information than we had already obtained.
The maid was quite evidently a Mexican and spoke very little and very poor English. She seemed to be in great distress, and as far as we could determine it was genuine. Through her broken English and our own fragmentary knowledge of Spanish, we managed to extract her story, about as McBride had told it.
Madame Valcour had engaged her in Paris, where she had been taken and later had been thrown on her own resources by a family which had been ruined in the revolution in Mexico. As for a Monsieur Valcour, she had never seen him. She thought that Madame was a widow.
As the questioning continued, I read between the lines, however, that Madame Valcour was in all probability an adventuress of a high order, one of those female soldiers of fortune who, in Paris, London, New York, and all large cities, seem to have a way of bobbing up at the most unexpected moments, in some way connected, through masculine frailty, with great national and international events.
The questioning over, the coroner ordered that the body be sent down to one of the city hospitals where an autopsy could be performed, and we rode down in the elevator together.
“Extraordinary—most extraordinary,” repeated Dr. Leslie as we paused for a moment in an angle of the lobby to discuss the conclusion of his preliminary investigation. “There is just one big point, though, that we shall have to clear up before we can go ahead with anything else. What was the cause of death? There was no gas in the room. It couldn’t have been illuminating gas, then. It must have been a poison of some kind.”
“You assume then that it was suicide?” asked Kennedy keenly.
“Well,” he exclaimed taking in the whole “I assume nothing—yet,” replied the coroner, quickly backing water, and affecting the air of one who could say much if he chose but was stopped by professional and official etiquette.
“You’ll keep me informed as to what you do discover?” asked Kennedy with a deference that could not fail to be ingratiating.
“Indeed I will,” answered the coroner, cordially taking the flattery. “Now I must be off—let me see—an accident case. Yes indeed, Kennedy, I shall be only too glad to keep you informed and to have your co-operation on the case.”
“Poison of some kind,” repeated Kennedy as Dr. Leslie disappeared. “Sounds very simple when you put it that way. I wish I could handle the whole thing for him. However, I suspect he’ll come around in a day or two—begging me to help him save his precious reputation and find out what it really is.”
“I know what he’ll do,” asserted McBride with a scowl. “He’ll take this chance to rub it in on the Vanderveer. We’ve had a couple of suicides since we opened. It isn’t our fault if such things happen. But somehow or other it seems to appeal to the city official to blame some private agency for anything like this. I tell you, Kennedy, we’ve got to protect the reputation of the hotel against such things. Now, if you’ll take the case, I’ll see that you don’t lose anything by it.”
“Gladly,” replied Kennedy, to whom a mystery was as the breath of life. Then he added with a smile, “I had tacitly assumed as much after you spoke to me.”
“I meant that you should,” agreed McBride, “and I thank you. Only it is just as well that we understand each other clearly at the outset.”
“Exactly. Has anything in Madame Valcour’s actions about the hotel offered a clue—ever so slight?” asked Craig, plunging into the case eagerly.
“Perhaps,” hesitated McBride as if trying to separate something that might be trivial from that which might be really important. “When she came here about a week ago, she left word at the telephone-desk that if a Señor Morelos should call, she was at home.”
“Morelos?” repeated Kennedy. “That is the name of the man who called up to night. Did he call?”
“Not as far as I can find out.”
“But she must have had other callers,” pursued Craig, evidently thinking of the attractiveness of the woman.
“Yes indeed,” answered McBride, “plenty of them. In fact, she seemed never to be able to stir about downstairs without having some one looking at her and ogling.”
“Which is no crime,” put in Craig.
“No,” agreed McBride, “and to be perfectly fair to her, she never gave any of them any encouragement, as far as I could see.”
“You mentioned that she was a friend of Colonel Sinclair’s,” prompted Kennedy.
“Oh yes,” recollected McBride. “He called on her—once, I think. Then for a couple of days she was away—out on Long Island, I believe she left word. It seems that there is a sort of Summer settlement of Mexicans and Latin-Americans generally out there, at a place called Seaville. It was only today that she returned from her visit.”
“Seaville,” repeated Kennedy. “That is out somewhere near Westport, the home of Sinclair, isn’t it?”
“I believe it is,” remarked McBride.
He was chewing his unlighted cigar thoughtfully, as we tried to piece together the fragmentary bits of the story.
Suddenly he removed the cigar contemplatively.
“I have been wondering,” he said slowly, “just what she was here for anyway. I can’t say that there is anything that throws much light on the subject. But she was so secretive, she threw such an air of mystery about herself, never told any one much about her goings-out or comings-in, and in fact seemed to be so careful—well, I’ve just been wondering whether she wasn’t mixed up in some plot or other, wasn’t playing a deeper game than we suspect with these precious friends of hers.”
I looked at McBride attentively. Was he merely mystified by having had to deal with a foreigner who naturally was not as easy to understand as a native, or was the general impression he sought to convey really founded on that instinct which no true detective can afford to be without?
“In other words,” McBride pursued, uninterrupted by Kennedy who was only too glad to glean any impression the house-man might have received, “I was never quite able to fathom her. You see, yourself, that she could not even have made much of a confidant of her maid. She was just the type I should pick out as—as the agent of somebody.”
“You mean that she was playing a game?” I interjected.
“Yes,” he acquiesced. “You know as well as I do that if any one wants to accomplish anything, get information that it is hard to get, the first thing necessary is to employ a woman of the world. Why men will tell their inmost secrets to a clever woman, if she knows how to play the game right. I can’t persuade myself that—that it was all perfectly straight. She must have had a purpose in being here. I don’t know what it could be. But—well—this tragedy shows that there must be something hidden under the surface. She—she might have been a spy.”
Kennedy was watching McBride’s face encouragingly, but without a word so far.
He was evidently thinking of Colonel Sinclair. Sinclair, I knew, was a very wealthy mine-owner down in the southern state of Oaxaca in Mexico. I recalled having seen him once or twice—a tall, wiry, muscular man on whose face the deep tan showed that he had lived for years in the neighborhood of the tropical sun. Could Colonel Sinclair know anything of the mysterious death of Madame Valcour?
“A spy,” pondered Kennedy at length. “What other people have you seen her with—or have reason to think she was with?”
“Why,” replied McBride contemplatively, “I understand that she used to go around a good deal to a place which they call the Mexican-American Tea-Room—just around the corner from here.”
“The Mexican-American Tea-Room. Do you know anything of the place?”
“Not much—only that it seems to be frequented largely by people in the city who want to discuss affairs down in Mexico to the accompaniment of dishes that are hot with peppers and chillies. It’s a peculiar place. They have a cabaret upstairs in the evening. I believe it is—well—pretty swift.”
Kennedy seemed at last to have received some hint that indicated a possible line of action.
“I think I’ll drop in there before Leslie gives this thing out to the papers,” he decided. “Walter—come on—this is the life!”
WE EASILY found the Mexican-American cabaret and tea-room which McBride had mentioned. McBride himself refused to accompany us because it was likely that some of Valcour’s visitors, if they happened to be there, might recognize him. Kennedy was better pleased to have it that way also, for McBride, whatever his other merits, had detective stamped over him from his hat on the back of his head down to his square-toed shoes.
The house was an old-fashioned, high-stooped structure, just around the corner from the Vanderveer, in the neighborhood where business was rapidly replacing residences.
Apparently the entrance was through what had once been a basement, but which had been remodeled.
We entered the low door. There did not seem to be anybody dining downstairs. But now and then sounds indicated that up stairs there were many people, and that they were thoroughly enjoying the entertainment the cabaret afforded.
Passing by a dark-skinned individual who seemed to serve as both waiter and look-out for the room downstairs, we mounted the steps, and on the parlor-floor found a full-fledged cabaret in operation.
With a hasty, all-inclusive glance about, Craig selected a seat down near a little platform where there were several performers and a small dancing-floor fringed with little tables and chairs.
Fortunately it was such a place as New Yorkers in search of the picturesque often drop in upon, especially with friends from out of town, and our entrance did not, therefore, excite any comment whatever.
A waiter promptly appeared beside us, and Kennedy leisurely scanned a bill of fare which enumerated all sorts of tortillas, chilli con carnes, tamals and frijoles. We ordered and began to look about us.
It was as strange and interesting a gathering as one could have found anywhere in the city. As nearly as I could make out there were refugees from Mexico, of every class and condition and nationality, who seemed to be in the habit of meeting there nightly. There were soldiers of fortune preparing to go down there if they got the chance. Here was a man who had fled from Vera Cruz on a transport, there was another aching to get away and break into the country as soon as there were any signs of the lifting of the embargo.
There were Mexicans, Americans, English, French, Germans—all who were interested in the unhappy republic south of us, all talking in animated tones, except now and then when a mutual confidence was exchanged between some of them, all seeming to know each other, if not to be on friendly terms with one another. What was seething under the surface an outsider could not judge. But of one thing I felt certain. If Valcour had been of this group, certainly none of them showed any knowledge of the tragedy, or if they did they were consummate actors and actresses.
THE music, furnished by a piano, mandolins and guitars on the platform, started up.
Across from us was a party of men and women talking to a woman, dark-eyed and olive-skinned, the type of Spanish dancing-girl. As the music started the girl rose.
“Who is that?” asked Craig of the waiter who had brought us our order.
“Señora Ruiz,” he replied briefly, “one of our best dancers.”
We watched her intently. There was something fascinating about the woman. From the snap of her black eyes to the vibrating grace of her shapely ankle there was something that stamped her as unique. She seemed to realize the power nature had given her over the passions of men, to have the keen wit to play them off, and the joy of living to appreciate the dramas which were enacted.
She began with the danza de sombrero. A sombrero was placed on the floor and she danced about it, in and out, now drawing near and now gliding away without touching it. There was something fascinating, not so much about the dance as about the dancer, for the dance itself was interminable, monotonous.
Several times I saw that Kennedy had caught her eye, and when at last the dance ended she contrived to finish close to our table, so close that it was but a turn, an exchange of looks, a word or two, and, as cabaret dancers will, she was sitting at our table a moment later and Kennedy was ordering something.
The Señora spoke very good English and French, and the conversation glided along like a dance from one subject to another, for she had danced her way into almost every quarter of the gay world of America and Europe.
It was not long before Kennedy and she were discussing Mexican dances and some how or other those of the south of Mexico were mentioned. The orchestra, meanwhile, had burst forth into a tango, followed by a maxixe, and many of the habitues of the cabaret were now themselves dancing.
“The Zapotecs,” remarked Kennedy, “have a number of strange dances. There is one called the Devil Dance that I have often wished to see.”
“The Devil Dance?” she repeated. “That usually takes place on feast-days of the saints. I have seen it often. On those occasions some of the dancers have their bodies painted to represent skeletons, and they also wear strange, feathered head-dresses.”
The waiter responded with our order.
“The Zapotec ballroom,” she continued reminiscently, “is an open space near a village, and there the dance goes on by the light of a blazing fire. The dancers, men and women, are dressed in all kinds of fantastic costumes.”
So from dancing the conversation drifted along to one topic after another, Kennedy showing a marvelous knowledge of things Mexican, mostly, I suspected, second-hand, for he had a sort of skill in such a situation of confining the subjects, if he chose, to those on which he was already somewhat acquainted.
“Señora,” called a voice from the other table at which she had been sitting.
She turned with a gay smile. Evidently the party of friends were eager to have her back.
Some words passed, and in a few moments we found ourselves at the other table with the rest of Señora Ruiz’s friends. No one seemed to think it strange in this Bohemian atmosphere that two newcomers should be added to the party. In fact, I rather suspected that they welcomed us as possibly lightening the load of paying the checks which the waiters brought for various things ordered, none of which were exactly reasonable in price.
AMONG others whom we met was an American, a Western mining-woman whom all seemed to know as Hattie Hawley. She was of the breezy type that the West has produced, interested in Mexican affairs through having purchased an interest in some mines in the southern part of the country, and seemed to be thoroughly acquainted with the methods of Wall Street in exploiting mines.
It was a rapid-fire conversation that they carried on, and I kept silent for the most part, fearing that I might say the wrong thing, and following Kennedy’s lead as much as possible.
Mrs. Hawley happened to be sitting next to Kennedy, and as the talk turned on the situation in the country in which all seemed to be interested in some way, Kennedy ventured to her—
“Do you know Colonel Sinclair?”
“I should say I do,” she replied frankly. “Why, it was only a few days ago that he came in here and we were all sitting at this very table discussing the situation down in Oaxaca. You know, I’m interested in some mines near Colonel Sinclair’s, and in the same railroad through the region which he controls.”
“He isn’t here tonight, then?” pursued Kennedy.
“No,” she answered. “I suppose he is out on Long Island at his place at Westport. A fine boy, the Colonel. We all like him.”
There was no mistaking the tone in which she made the remark. Even if it sounded a little unconventional, it was merely her way of testifying that she had a high regard for the gentleman.
“I have known the Colonel fairly well for a number of years,” prevaricated Kennedy, and the conversation drifted on to other topics.
Kennedy managed to lead it about again so that in a perfectly inconsequential way, after the mention of Sinclair’s name, he could say—
“I have heard him mention the name of a Madame Val—” he hesitated, as if the name were not familiar, “a Madame Valoour, I think it is. Is she here? Does she come around to the cabaret?”
“Oh yes,” replied Hattie Hawley. “She comes around here quite often. I haven’t seen her tonight though. She has been away for a few days—down on Long Island, I believe. Perhaps she is there yet.”
I caught her looking significantly at Kennedy, and wondered what was coming next.
She leaned over and whispered—
“Between you and me, I think the Colonel is stuck on her, only I wouldn’t say that aloud here.”
She flashed a glance at one of the men who had been sitting in the shadow, talking with Señora Ruiz.
“He could tell you more about her than I could,” she remarked under her breath. “I never saw any one so crazy over a woman as he is over Valcour.”
“And does she care for him?” asked Kennedy.
Hattie Hawley considered for a moment.
“I don’t believe she cares for anybody,” she answered.
At least there was no hint that the tragedy was known yet here.