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Wynne had deliberately made a monkey of him Steven Birnes! Reluctantly the detective permitted himself to remember that he didn't know whether there was anybody in that cab or not when Mr. Wynne entered it, and and ! Then he remembered that he did know one thing the number of the cab! He arose abruptly, with the light of a great determination in his face. "Whose diamonds were they?" he demanded.
Birnes' men, on duty in Thirty-seventh Street, was attracted to a woman who had turned in from Park Avenue, and was coming rapidly toward him, on the opposite side of the street. She was young, with the elasticity of perfect health in her step; and closely veiled. She wore a blue tailor-made gown, with hat to match; and recalcitrant strands of hair gleamed a golden brown.
He paused on the edge of the curb long enough for an automobile to pass, then went on across Thirty-fourth Street to the uptown side and, turning flatly, looked Mr. Birnes over pensively, after which he leaned up against an electric-light pole and scribbled something on an envelope. A closed cab came wriggling and squirming up Fifth Avenue. As it reached the middle of Thirty-fourth Street Mr.
Half-way between Thirty-third and Thirty-fourth Streets, Jerry Malone approached and passed Mr. Wynne without so much as a glance at him, and went on toward his chief. "Drop in behind here," Mr. Birnes remarked crisply to Malone, without looking around. "I'll walk on ahead and turn east in Thirty-fourth Street to nail him if he swings a car. Claflin's got him going west." Mr.
"And what was the result?" demanded Mr. Latham quickly. "My agents have covered all the Atlantic ports and they did not come in through the Custom House," replied Mr. Birnes. "I have not heard from the western agents as yet, but my opinion is is that they were perhaps smuggled in. Smuggling, after all, is simple with the thousands of miles of unguarded coasts of this country.
They passed the "Widow Gardiner's hog-lot" and came into a pleasant country road, which, turning, brought them to a shabby little cottage, embowered in trees. Through the foliage, farther on, they caught the amber gleam of a languid river; and around their feet, as they entered the yard, scores of pigeons fluttered. "Carriers!" ejaculated Mr. Birnes, as if startled.
Wynne knew who he was, and admitting that he knew he was being followed, was not this apparent frankness an attempt to throw him off the scent? He would see, would Mr. Birnes. He quickened his pace a little, then slowed up instantly, because Mr. Wynne had stopped on the corner of Madison Avenue, and as a downtown car came rushing along he stepped out to board it. Mr.
Birnes was not at all backward about detailing the persistence and skill it had required on his part to establish this fact; and he went on at length to acquaint them with the search that had been made by a dozen of his men to find a trace of the woman from the time she climbed the elevated stairs at Fifty-eighth Street.
He didn't even look up; he was still gazing at the figure on the floor. "Well, what have you got to say for yourself?" demanded Chief Arkwright coldly. Mr. Czenki met the accusing stare of the chief squarely for an instant, then the keen eyes shifted to the slightly flushed face of Mr. Birnes and lingered there interrogatively.
Ten minutes after having passed into a room where sat Chief Arkwright, of the Mulberry Street force, and three of his men, and Steven Birnes, of the Birnes Detective Agency, Haney remembered that he hadn't found the diamonds at all somebody had given them to him. "Who gave them to you?" demanded the chief. "I don't know the guy's name, Boss," Haney replied humbly. "This is to remind you of it."
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