The Ear in the Wall | Page 7

to see, that he alone could do anything for her, would do something.
Her face paled as she met his earnest look. She had risen and now, half chagrined, half frightened, she stood irresolute. Her lips quivered and tears stood in her eyes as she realized that, instead of protecting herself by her confidence, she had, perhaps, made matters worse by telling an outsider.
Carton, too, had risen and in a low voice which we could not overhear was trying to reassure her.
In her confusion she was moving toward the door, utterly oblivious, now, to us. Carton tactfully took her arm and led her to a private entrance that opened from his office down the corridor and out of sight of the watchful eyes of the reporters and attendants in the outer hall.
I did not understand just what it was all about, but I could see Kennedy's eye following Carton keenly.
"What was that--a plant?" he asked, still trying to read Carton's face, as he returned to us alone a moment later. "Did she come to see whether you got the record?"
"No--I don't think so," replied Carton quickly. "No, I think that was all on the level--her part of it."
"But who did put in the instrument, really--did you?" asked Kennedy, still quizzing.
"No," exclaimed Carton hastily, this time meeting Craig's eye frankly. "No. I wish I had. Why--the fact is, I don't know who did--no one seems to know, yet, evidently. But," he added, leaning forward and speaking rapidly, "I think I could give a shrewd guess."
Kennedy said nothing, but nodded encouragingly.
"I think," continued Carton impressively, "that it must have been Langhorne and the Wall Street crowd he represents."
"Langhorne," repeated Kennedy, his mind working rapidly. "Why, it was his stenographer that Miss Blackwell was. Why do you suspect Langhorne?"
"Because," exclaimed Carton, more excited than ever at Kennedy's quick deduction, bringing his fist down on the desk to emphasize his own suspicion, "because they aren't getting their share of the graft that Dorgan is passing out--probably are sore, and think that if they can get something on the Boss or some of those who are close to him, they may force him to take them into partnership in the deals."
Carton looked from Kennedy to me, to see what impression his theory made. On me at least it did make an impression. Hartley Langhorne, I knew, was a Wall Street broker and speculator who dealt in real estate, securities, in fact in anything that would appeal to a plunger as promising a quick and easy return.
Kennedy made no direct comment on the theory. "In what shape is the record, do you suppose?" he asked merely.
"I gathered from Mrs. Ogleby," returned Carton watchfully, "that it had been taken down by a stenographer at the receiving end of the detectaphone, transcribed in typewriting, and loosely bound in a book of limp black leather. Oh," he concluded, "Dorgan would give almost anything to find out what is in that little record, you may be sure. Perhaps even, rather than have such a thing out, he would come to terms with Langhorne."
Kennedy said nothing. He was merely absorbing the case as Carton presented it.
"Don't you see?" continued the District Attorney, pacing his office and gazing now and then out of the window, "here's this record hidden away somewhere in the city. If I could only get it-- I'd win my fight against Dorgan--and Mrs. Ogleby need not suffer for her mistake in coming to me, at all."
He was apparently thinking aloud. Kennedy did not attempt to quiz him. He was considering the importance of the situation. For, as I have said, it was at the height of the political campaign in which Carton had been renominated independently by the Reform League--of which, more later.
"You don't think that Langhorne is really in the inner ring, then?" questioned Craig.
"No, not yet."
"Well, then," I put in hastily, "can't you approach him or someone close to him, and get---"
"Say," interrupted Carton, "anything that took place in that private dining-room at Gastron's would be just as likely to incriminate Langhorne and some of his crowd as not. It is a difference in degree of graft--that is all. They don't want an open fight. It was just a piece of finesse on Langhorne's part. You may be sure of that. No, neither of them wants a fight. That's the last thing. They're both afraid. What Langhorne wanted was a line on Dorgan. And we should never have known anything about this Black Book, if some of the women, I suppose, hadn't talked too much. Mrs. Ogleby added two and two and got five. She thought it must be I who put the instrument in."
Carton was growing more and more excited again, "It's exasperating," he continued. "There's the record--somewhere--if I could only get it. Think of it,