Perth Amboy Evening News

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Sir Norman Greyes, formerly of Scotland Yard, is devoting his time to tracking down an arch criminal of many disguises known to him as Michael Sayers.

Janet Soale, maid in Sayers' cottage in England, is in love with her master. She shoots down a police officer who has tracked Michael to his abode.

Sayers known at the golf club as Mr. Stanfield, plays a game with Sir Norman during which the suspicions of the latter are aroused as to Mr. Stanfield's real identity.

After a three-months' vacation, Greyes meets Stanfield in a hotel lobby. An insurance company asks Sir Norman to question a South American widow, living at the hotel regarding a policy of a hundred thousand pounds carried on her remarkable rope of pearls.

Now Go On With the Story

"Have you had any intimation of thieves working in this neighborhood?" I asked him.

"None whatever," he replied. "I will be perfectly frank with you. It is not an ordinary robbery of which we are afraid. For some reason or other, our inquiry department has formed a dubious opinion of Mrs. De Mendoza herself."

"I see," I remarked. "You are afraid of a fraud?"

"Precisely! Directly we received the letter from the hotel detective, we rang up the manager here. All that we could learn was that the illness was altogether unexpected, and that the man had been compelled to go home at a moment's notice. In reply to our request that a trained detective might take his place, the management assured us that they considered nothing of the sort necessary. No robbery of jewels had ever taken place from this hotel, and they considered their night porter fully competent to watch over the interests of their guests.

"Sir William Greaves, our manager, desired me to suggest a fee of two hundred guineas," my visitor concluded.

"I will accept the commission," I promised.

The next morning I interviewed the manager of the hotel, to whom I was well known. He showed some irritation when I spoke of Mrs. De Mendoza's necklace and her nervousness concerning it.

"To be quite frank with you," he confessed, "although Mrs. De Mendoza is a good client and pays her accounts regularly, I am inclined to be sorry that we ever let her the rooms."

"Why?" I asked.

"People with valuable jewelry should accept its possession with a certain resignation," he replied. "This is the last hotel in London where a jewel robbery would be likely. The lady herself, I understand, takes every possible care and caution. She wears her necklace nowhere except in the restaurant and lounge, and every night it is deposited in the hotel safe. However, you may rely upon it, Sir Norman that every facility will be given to you in your task. I would suggest that you pay a visit to the lady herself."

The idea had already occurred to me, and later in the day I sent up my card to Mrs. De Mendoza and was at once invited to enter her sitting-room. I found her writing letters, simply dressed in a black negligee and wearing the pearls. As she turned and invited me to seat myself, she stirred in my memory a faint suggestion of reminiscence. She listened to the few words with which I introduced myself, and smiled deprecatingly.

"It is true that I am very foolish," she admitted, "but then I have always been a person of superstitions. I have owned my necklace for some years, and I have had it with me in quite lawless places. I have never, however, felt just the same amount of apprehension as I do at the present moment."

She came over to my side, and without unclasping the necklace, let it rest in my hands. The pearls were all marvelously matched, all of considerable size, and with that milky softness which she pointed out to me as being proof of their great perfection. As we stood there, necessarily close together, a wisp of her hair touched my forehead. Something in the timbre of her low laugh as she brushed it back induced me to look up. There were qualities about her smile and the peculiar expression of her eyes which gave me a momentary thrill.

"Do you admire my pearls?" she asked softly.

"They are very wonderful," I admitted.

She moved slowly away. I breathed more easily as the distance increased between us. She looked over her shoulder unexpectedly, and I believe that she realized my sensation. The slight frown passed from her forehead. She was obviously more content.

"Tell me how you propose to guard my treasures, Sir Norman?" she inquired as she sank into an easy chair. "Shall you stand behind my chair at dinner, disguised as a waiter, and lie on my mat at night? It gives one quite a shivery sensation to think of such espionage!"

"Believe me," I assured her, "I shall not be in the least obtrusive. I understand that you send your pearls down every night to the hotel safe."

"I have always done so," she answered. "Do you think it would be better to keep them up here? Will you promise to sit in this easy-chair, with a revolver on your knee, all night, if I do so?"

"Not for the world," I declared. "The hotel safe is much the better place."

"I am glad to hear your decision," she said with a slight smile. "I should sleep very little if I thought that my pearls were near me--and that you were sitting here, on guard. The idea would be disturbing.

"One cannot guard against miracles," I observed, "but I think you can make your mind quite easy about the necklace. If you should need me at any time, the number of my room is Four-thirty-two."

"On this floor?"

"On this floor."

"Tell me," she asked a little abruptly as I rose to take my leave, "who was the man with whom you were talking last night in the lounge--a slim, middle-aged man with a very hard face? I am always seeing him in the lift."

"A man I know scarcely anything of," I replied. "His name, I believe, is Stanfield. I once played golf with him down at Woking."

"Stanfield?" she repeated. "Was it in his grounds near Woking that a murder was committed--a policeman was found shot there?"

I nodded. "I was playing with Mr. Stanfield at the time," I told her.

"And the murderer was never discovered?"

"Never!"

"I wonder you didn't take an interest in the case yourself," she remarked.

"I did," I told her.

She made a little grimace.

"My fears for my necklace are reawakened," she declared. "Surely it ought to have been an easy task for a clever man like you, one who used to be called a really great detective, to discover the murderer?"

"It is beyond my powers to bring him to justice, at any rate," I replied. "There are many criminals walking about today, of whose guilt the police are perfectly well aware. They cannot be arrested, however, for lack of evidence."

"How thrilling!" she murmured. "Will you ask me to dine with you some night and tell me some of your adventures?"

"I shall be happy to do so," I replied. "Meanwhile--"

She accepted my departure a little unwillingly. I am not a vain man, and I felt inclined to wonder at a certain graciousness of attitude on her part which more than once during our interview had forced itself upon my notice.

Later, about seven o'clock, a note was brought into my room.

Dear Sir Norman,

A lady and her husband who were dining, have disappointed me. Can you, by any chance, be my guest? If so, let us meet at eight o'clock in the lounge.

Hopefully yours,

Blanche de Mendoza.

I scribbled a line of acceptance. I felt, as I descended into the lounge that evening, a premonition that life for the next few hours was going to be very interesting indeed.

At eight o'clock, precisely, Mrs. De Mendoza came into the lounge. She was wearing a white lace evening dress, with an ermine wrap which hung loosely around her, disclosing the pearls underneath. Her entrance made a mild sensation. Mr. Stanfield, who was seated in his accustomed corner, drinking his cocktail, watched our meeting and departure into the restaurant with obvious surprise.

"The little man was there again who stares at me so much--Mr. Stanfield, I think you called him?" she remarked as we took our places.

I nodded.

"I dare say he was surprised to see us together," I said.

"I asked him who you were on the night of my arrival here."

"Why?"

"For the same reason that a great many other people ask the same question," I replied.

She made a little grimace.

"You are determined to pay me no compliments this evening, and I am wearing my favorite gown."

"I admire your taste," I assured her.

"Anything else?"

"You are the best-dressed and the best-looking woman in the room."

"Too impersonal," she complained.

I turned the conversation to the subject of the necklace. The pearls were collected for her, she told me, by her husband, some in India, some in the Malay states, some in Paris, some in Rio. She spoke of him quite frankly--a prosperous fruit-broker who had achieved sudden opulence.

"It was quite as much a change for me as for him," she remarked. "I was a typist in Buenos Aires before we were married. I have known what it is to be poor."

She answered all my questions without reserve, displaying later on much interest in the recounting of such of my adventures as were public property. I began to feel that I had been mistaken with regard to her, that she was really exactly what she seemed--a very wealthy woman of adventurous type, suddenly released from matrimonial obligations and a little uncertain what to make of her life. We took our coffee in the lounge afterward. In the background my golfing friend, Mr. Stanfield, was seated, smoking a cigaret in a retired corner, and having the air of studying everyone who passed.

(Continued in our next issue)