The Brand of Silence: A Detective Story by Johnston McCulley (read book txt) 📖

ate luncheon, and then went out upon the streets, walking briskly and swinging his stick, going about New York like a stranger who never had seen it before.

As a matter of fact, he never had seen this New York before. He had expected a multitude of changes, but nothing compared to what he found. He watched the crowds on the Avenue, cut over to Broadway and investigated the electric signs by daylight, observed the congestion of vehicles and the efforts of traffic policemen to straighten it out. He darted into the subway and rode far downtown and back again just for the sport of it. After that he got on an omnibus and rode up to Central Park, and acted as if every tree and twig were an old friend.

He made himself acquainted with the animals in the zoo there, and promised himself to go to the other zoo in the Bronx before the end of the week. He stood back at the curb and lifted his head to look at new buildings after the manner of the comic supplement farmer with a straw between his teeth.

"Great—great!" said Sidney Prale.

Then he hurried back to the hotel, dressed for dinner, and went down to the dining room, stopping on the way to obtain a ticket for a musical revue that was the talk of the town at the moment.

Prale ordered a dinner that made the waiter open his eyes. He made it a point to select things that were not on the menus of the hotels in Honduras. Then he sat back in his chair and listened to the orchestra, and watched well-dressed men and women come in and get their places at the tables.

But the dinner was a disappointment to Prale after all. It seemed to him that the waiter was a long time giving him service. He remonstrated, and the man asked pardon and said that he would do better, but he did not.

Prale found that his soup was lukewarm, his salad dressing prepared imperfectly, the salad itself a mere mess of vegetables. The fish and fowl he had ordered were not served properly, the dessert was without flavor, the cheese was stale. He sent for the head waiter.

"I'm disgusted with the food and the service," he complained. "I rarely find fault, but I am compelled to do so this time. The man who has been serving me seems to be a rank amateur, and twice he was almost insolent. This hotel has a reputation which it scarcely is maintaining this evening."

"I'll see about it, sir," the head waiter said.

Prale saw him stop the waiter and speak to him, and the waiter glared at him when he brought the demi-tasse. Prale did not care. He glared back at the man, drank the coffee, and touched the match to a cigar. Then he signed the check and went from the dining room, an angry and disgusted man.

"Another thing like that, and I look for the manager," he told himself.

He supposed that he was a victim of circumstances—that the waiter was a new man and that it happened that the portions he served were poor portions. His happiness at being home again prevented Sidney Prale from feeling anger for any length of time. He got his hat and coat and went out upon the street again.

He had an hour before time to go to the theater. He walked over to Broadway and went toward the north, looking at the bright lights and the crowds. He passed through two or three hotel lobbies, satisfied for the time merely to be in the midst of the throngs.

At the proper time, he hurried to the theater and claimed his seat. The performance was a mediocre one, but it pleased Sidney Prale. He had seen a better show in Honduras a month before, had seen better dancing and heard better singing and comedy, but this was New York!

The show at an end, Prale claimed his hat and coat at the check room and walked down the street toward a cabaret restaurant. He reached into his overcoat pocket for his gloves, and his hand encountered a slip of paper. He took it out.

There was the same rough handwriting on the same kind of paper, and evidently with the same blunt pencil.

"Remember—retribution is sure!"

"This thing ceases to be a joke!" Prale told himself.

His face flushed with anger, and he turned back toward the theater. But he had been among the last to leave, and already the lights of the playhouse were being turned out. The boy in charge of the check room would be gone, Prale knew.

He thought of Kate Gilbert again, and the bit of paper she had dropped as she got into the limousine down on the water front. Surely she could have no hand in this, he thought. What interest could Kate Gilbert, a casual acquaintance and reputed daughter of a wealthy house, have in him and his affairs?

"Somebody is making a mistake," he declared to himself, "or else it is some sort of a new advertising dodge. If I ever catch the jokesmith who is responsible for these dainty little messages, I'll tell him a thing or two."

Prale turned into the restaurant and found a seat at a little table at one side of the room. The after-theater crowd was filling the place. The orchestra was playing furiously, and the cabaret performance was beginning. Sidney Prale leaned back in his chair and watched the show. The waiter came to his side, and he ordered something to eat and drink.

Then he saw Kate Gilbert again, at a table not very far away from his. She was dressed in an evening gown, as if she had just come from the theater or opera. She was in the company of the elderly man who had met her at the wharf, and a young man and an older woman were at the same table.

Prale's eyes met hers for an instant, and he inclined his head a bit in a respectful manner. But Kate Gilbert looked through him as if he had not been present, and then turned her head and began talking to the elderly man.

Prale's face flushed. He hadn't done anything wrong, he told himself. He merely had bowed to her, as he would have bowed to any woman to whom he had been properly introduced. She had seen fit to cut him. Well, he could exist without Kate Gilbert, he told himself, but he wondered at her peculiar manner.

He left the place within the hour and went back to the hotel and to bed. In the morning he walked up the Avenue as far as the Circle, dropped into a restaurant for a good breakfast, and then engaged a taxicab and drove downtown to the financial district. He had remembered that he was a man with a million, and that he had to pay some attention to business.

He went into the establishment of a famous trust company and sent his card in to the president. An attendant ushered him into the president's private office immediately.

"Sit down, Mr. Prale," said the financier. "I am glad that you came to see me this morning. I was just about to have somebody look you up."

"Anything the matter?" Prale asked.

"Your funds were transferred to us by our Honduras correspondent," the financier said. "Since you were leaving Honduras almost immediately, we decided to care for the funds until you arrived and we could talk to you."

"I shall want some good investments, of course," Prale said. "I have disposed of all my holdings in Honduras, and I don't want the money to be idle."

"Idleness is as bad for dollars as for men," said the financier, clearing his throat.

"Can you suggest some investments? I have engaged no broker as yet, of course."

"I—er—I am afraid that we have nothing at the present moment," the financier said.

"The market must be good," Prale observed. "I never knew a time when investments were lacking."

"I would not offer you a poor one, and good ones are scarce with us at present," said the banker. "Sorry that we cannot attend to the business for you. Perhaps some other trust company——"

"Well, I can wait for something to turn up," Prale said. "There is no hurry, of course. Probably you'll have something in a few weeks that will take care of at least a part of the money."

The banker cleared his throat again, and looked a trifle embarrassed as he spoke. "The fact of the matter is, Mr. Prale," he said, "that we do not care for the account."

"I beg your pardon!" Prale exclaimed. "You mean you don't want me to leave my money in your bank?"

"Just that, Mr. Prale."

"But in Heaven's name, why? I should think that any financial institution would be glad to get a new account of that size."

"I—er—I cannot go into details, sir," the banker said. "But I must tell you that we'd be glad if you'd make arrangements to move the deposit to some other bank."

"I suppose you don't like to be bothered with small accounts," said Prale, with the suspicion of a sneer in his voice. "Very well, sir! I'll see that the deposit is transferred before night. Perhaps I can find banks that will be glad to take the money and treat me with respect. And I shall remember this, sir!"

"I—er—have no choice in the matter," the banker said.

"Can't you explain what it means?"

"I have nothing to say—nothing at all to say," stammered the financier. "We took the money because of our Honduras correspondent, but we'll appreciate it very much if you do business with some other institution."

"You can bet I'll do that little thing!" Prale exclaimed.

He left the office angrily and stalked from the building. Were the big financiers of New York insane? A man with a million in cold cash has the right to expect that he will be treated decently in a bank. Prale walked down the street and grew angrier with every step he took.

Before going to Honduras he had worked for a firm of brokers. He hurried toward their office now. He would send in his card to his old employer, Griffin, he decided, and ask his advice about banking his funds, and incidentally whether the financier he had just left was an imbecile.

He found the Griffin concern in the same building, though the offices were twice as large now, and there were evidences of prosperity on every side.

"Got an appointment?" an office boy demanded.

"No, but I fancy that Mr. Griffin will see me," said Prale. "I used to work for him years ago."

Then he sat down to wait. Griffin would be glad to see him, he thought. Griffin was a man who always liked to see younger men get along. He would want to know how Sidney Prale got his million. He would want to take him to luncheon and exhibit him to his friends—tell how one of his young men had forged ahead in the world.

The boy came back with his card. "Mr. Griffin can't see you," he announced.

"Oh, he's busy, eh? Did he make an appointment?"

"No, he ain't busy," said the boy. "He's got his feet set up on the desk and he's readin' about yesterday's ball game. He said to say that he didn't have time to see you this mornin', and that he wouldn't ever have time to see you."

"Don't be discourteous, you young imp!" Prale said, his face flushing. "You're sure you handed Mr. Griffin my card?"

"Oh, I handed it to him—and don't you try to run any bluff on me!" the boy answered. "From the way the boss acted, I guess you don't stand very high with him!"

The boy went back to his chair, and Sidney Prale went from the office, a puzzled and angry man. There probably was some mistake, he told himself. He'd meet Griffin during the day and tell him about the adventure.

He was anxious to meet some of the men with whom he had worked ten years before, but he did not know where to find them. He'd have to wait and ask Griffin what had become of them. Then, too, he wanted to transfer his funds.

Prale got another taxicab and started making the rounds of the banks he knew to be solid institutions. Within a few hours he had made arrangements to transfer the account, using four financial institutions. He said nothing, except that the money had been transferred to the trust company from Honduras, because the company had a correspondent there.

His funds secure, Prale went back uptown and to the hotel. The clerk handed him a note with his key. Prale tore it open after he stepped into the elevator. This time it was a sheet of paper upon which a message had been typewritten.

"You can't dodge the law of