The Midnight Passenger | Page 8

respectable business station. He might well be taken for the precious
"only son" of some well-to-do Jewish-American merchant.
Quick to learn, he had aped the mien of his American fellow employees,
and his "educational evenings" at the "Irving Place," the "Thalia," and
the "Germania" had given to his bearing what he fondly deemed an
"irresistible social swing."

Greedy of pleasures, gluttonous and covetous, the young Ishmael
ardently looked forward to a comfortable ill-gotten revenue at the
hands of the man, who--through a skilful manipulation of the German
janitor of the Western Trading Company's office--had obtained the
place of office boy, "with substantial references," for the son of his
cast-off paramour.
Leah Einstein had long forgotten the face of the reckless Polish country
noble who was the real father of this budding criminal, and the lad
himself but dimly discerned the drift of his Mephistophelian patron's
proposed villainy.
Timid and cowardly at heart, the young waif would have shuddered had
he known of the callous-handed and desperate murders which had
shocked Vienna just before Hugo Landor, a talented and handsome
young chemist, disappeared forever in flight, lost under a cloud of
scandal caused by drink and a maddening devotion to a baby-faced
devil of the Ring Strasse Theater chorus, a woman at whose feet the
hungry-eyed aristocrats had knelt to sue, a man-eater, a hard-hearted,
velvet-eyed, reckless and defiant devil.
At an almost imperceptible nod Einstein drew near to his patron, taking
the vacant place in the little alcove, à deux, with his back prudently
screening him from any chance visitor who might know the Western
Trading Company's personnel. Braun was eager for his spy's report
now.
"All right, at last!" the youth huskily whispered. "I watched him meet
her, at the picture window, you know. I had posted her! And then he
slyly followed her over here and went three blocks out of his way to
pipe her off here! So, after his lunch at Taylor's, I put her again onto his
homeward way! And he's caught on! No matter! She will tell you the
rest herself!"
When the eager lad had finished, Fritz Braun growled under his breath,
"You are sure you made no bungle?"
"Dead sure," gaily answered the boy, draining his bock of Muenchner,
"I followed him to the bank and to Taylor's, and he is unsuspecting of
any plant, I know."
Braun's face relaxed as he pushed over a twenty-dollar bill to the young
Judas. "Come in Monday, about ten," he said, carelessly. "You can go,
now! I must hurry over to the river. I am late!"

There was a shifty light in Einstein's eyes as he mumbled, "I can tell
you something else, if you'll do the right thing." Braun searched the
young villain's face. "Go ahead! I'll pay you."
Emboldened by his success, Einstein loudly rapped to replenish his
glass. He was now panting to escape for certain tender engagements of
his own.
"The firm's lawyer, Ferris, the man who lived with Mr. Clayton, has
gone West for six months, so he will be left alone! I followed them and
saw Ferris off on the train. I took a telegram to the office for Ferris and
Clayton, so Clayton will be alone in the rooms. He's going to keep
them, and I'm to go around there Monday and pack up all Mr. Ferris'
little things."
"Good, capital!" said Fritz Braun, his eyes gleaming. "You must
manage to get me a duplicate key of Clayton's rooms!"
"Easy enough," proudly answered the young rascal. "Mr. Clayton trusts
me in all things, and often gives me his latch-key and the room keys
when he wants anything from the apartment. Anything else?"
"Yes," stammered the lad, surprised at the stern glare of Braun's
expectant eyes. "The Fidelity fellows have been piping off all Mr.
Clayton's movements. They watch him on account of the big money
that he handles every day. I know the man who shadows Clayton, twice
a week, regular, on all his evening trips. They've got their spotters, too,
in all the big bar-rooms, and all around the gambling houses, the race
courses, Wall Street and the Tenderloin.
"Now, after Clayton left, to-day, Ferris the lawyer came in and told Mr.
Robert Wade, that's our chief manager, that the Fidelity Company
would make their, written reports twice a month to him, while the
lawyer's gone."
"I must have these reports!" cried Braun, forgetting the raised pitch of
his voice, but the Venus and Tannhauser coterie around were all now
fondly busied with each other.
"I can get them! I have a key to Wade's own desk," glibly mouthed the
young spy.
"How did you get it?" eagerly demanded the astonished Braun.
"I had it made to get at his cigars," proudly boasted the unabashed lad.
"Wade keeps a