Chapter XIV Followed
Having completed his purchases at several shops along the avenue, Lawrence finally emerged from the last one near Thirty-first Street, and paused on the sidewalk to consider how he should put in the time before lunch. It was not long after twelve, and he did not feel as if he could possibly lunch before half past one or two o’clock.
He glanced back at the dull-red façade of the Waldorf. He might go back there and take his place among the loungers in one of the corridors or smoking rooms, but he had an instinctive dislike for that sort of thing.
His eyes, ranging swiftly in the other direction, suddenly encountered the shifting glance of a man who stood looking into a window of the shop Barry had just come from; and at once Lawrence’s mind, for some reason or another, reverted to the mysterious fellow with the beard.
There was no resemblance between the two. This one was young and tall, smooth-shaven, and very blond. His clothes, while inconspicuous, bore a certain foreign touch which Barry had learned to recognize in that year he had spent abroad, directly after leaving college, as secretary to Doctor Grenfell, wealthy scientist and Harvard lecturer.
Nevertheless, there was something in that hastily averted glance he had surprised which made Lawrence wonder whether the unknown stranger was anything more than an ordinary lounger, and decided him to put into operation a little test he had found extremely effective during his late unpleasant experience with Tappin’s detectives.
Still swinging his stick gently back and forth and humming a tune under his breath, he turned and began to survey the man critically. Slowly his gaze wandered from the narrow-brimmed, precisely dented felt hat, down the length of belted overcoat to the narrow, flat, rather clumsily shaped shoes. Then he reversed the process. And when his eyes came to rest upon the strong, rather rough-hewn profile presented to him, Barry was interested to observe that the stranger was fidgeting nervously, and that a dull red was slowly stealing upward from the high, close-fitting collar.
All this proved nothing, for any man was likely to be embarrassed by being stared at in such a pointed way. But when, as the scrutiny continued, the fellow finally turned from the window, and walked slowly on down the avenue, without so much as a glance at Barry, the latter felt that his suspicions were more than justified. An ordinary individual would have glared at him, or shown other signs of ill temper.
The affair was only beginning, however, and, as Lawrence moved leisurely toward Thirty-first Street, he decided that he would have no difficulty in being entertained until luncheon time.
Rounding the corner, he hurried toward Broadway for a hundred feet or so, then stopped abruptly to look into a shop window.
As he expected, the blond individual appeared almost instantly, crossed the street, and came briskly along on the opposite side.
From that moment the game progressed merrily for nearly an hour. Barry did not exert himself at first. He wanted to test the stranger’s cleverness, so he confined himself to entering one door of a department store or hotel, and hastily departing by another; leaping on a surface car just as it was starting, only to alight as swiftly a few blocks farther on, and take one going in the opposite direction.
These, and half a dozen other tricks of a like nature, he tried, only to end up at Fourteenth Street and Sixth Avenue with the blond fellow sticking to him like a leech.
“He’s no slouch,” Barry reflected, as he turned slowly eastward. “I reckon I’ll have to be a little spryer.”
Turning uptown at Fifth Avenue, he kept a sharp lookout for a solitary taxi. When one finally came along behind him, he hailed it swiftly, ran out into the street, and leaped in almost before the car had come to a stop.
“Metropolitan Building—Madison Avenue entrance,” he said quickly. “Hustle!”
The chauffeur did hustle, and Lawrence, glancing back through the little window, was pleased to see his pursuer swiftly lost in the crowd of noon-day pedestrians.
There was a short delay at the Flatiron Building, then the car sped up the west side of the square, on account of traffic regulations, east along Twenty-sixth, and thence into Madison. It was just as they rounded the last corner that Lawrence spied another flying taxi which seemed to be following them.
He had a bill ready, however, and, as the car slowed down, he leaped out, thrust it into the chauffeur’s hand, and darted into the building.
The arcade was full of people moving in both directions, and Barry, hurrying through them, slipped suddenly into a little cigar store midway to Fourth Avenue, which had another entrance on Twenty-third Street. Less than a minute later he was diving into the subway entrance.
Fortunately a local was just drawing into the station, and, as he took his seat, he chuckled a little to himself.
“You’ll have some trouble in following that trail, my friend,” he murmured.
He got out at Fourteenth Street, and took an uptown train, but long before reaching Fifty-ninth Street the smile had vanished, and a puzzled frown furrowed his forehead.
There seemed no doubt now that his encounter with the bearded man last night had not been the result of chance. He was being followed deliberately, and there were at least two men who seemed tremendously interested in every move he made. What was their object? What motive governed this inexplicable pursuit?
Try as he would, Barry could find no answer to the questions. If they had been attracted by the emerald ring, and were following him for the purpose of robbery—and last night’s experience certainly pointed strongly toward that solution—what earthly sense was there in the actions of the blond stranger? Did he expect to sandbag and rob a victim in broad daylight, amid the crowds which swarmed the city streets? It was absurd, Barry told himself, yet what else was there to think?
The problem occupied him on his way over to the Plaza, and made him somewhat absent during the progress of the simple luncheon he ordered. He did not, in fact, really pay much attention to his surroundings until an odd event effectually brought him to himself.
He had arisen from his table, and was making his way slowly to the door, his progress somewhat impeded by the simultaneous departure of a large luncheon party. As he trailed along behind the laughing crowd of girls, he happened to glance casually to the left, and encountered the gaze of a woman sitting at a table near the wall.
She was not young, but there was a stately distinction in her looks and manner which impressed Lawrence. Her face was a perfect oval, showing remnants of great beauty, and Barry had a vague impression that he had seen her before. She was perfectly gowned, and wore no jewels, save a single strand of wonderful pearls. Her companions were much younger, and wholly charming. The head waiter hovered obsequiously about the table.
As their eyes met, Barry saw her start slightly and stare for a second, a look of puzzled astonishment on her face. The next instant she smiled and bowed in a manner which was even more than cordial.
Automatically Lawrence returned the bow with what grace he could assume, and passed on. At the door he turned for a backward glance. and was surprised to see that the lady had moved a little in her chair, and was following him with her eyes.
“I suppose I’ve met her somewhere,” he thought, pausing in the doorway. “I wish I could remember her name. She’s certainly somebody.”
An instant later he caught the eye of the head waiter, and summoned him with a slight gesture.
“Who is the lady at the fourth table from the door?” he asked briefly. “I seem to have forgotten her name.”
The haughty functionary followed the direction of Barry’s glance, and then turned back, an odd expression in his eyes.
“That is Mrs. Winslow Courtney, sir,” he answered stiffly.
For a second Lawrence was almost feezed. Then, with a short nod, he passed on into the corridor.
Mrs. Winslow Courtney! No wonder he could not recall meeting her before. He doubted whether he had ever even seen her, save, perhaps, in her box at the opera; for it was she, more than any other woman, who ruled New York society. With family, vast wealth, and a charming personality, she had taken her place in that innermost circle around which the social life of the entire country revolved. One of her daughters was the wife of Prince von Lauenberg, the wealthiest nobleman in Prussia; another was the Duchess of Wilton.
Decidedly Barry had no right to that charming smile from Mrs. Winslow Courtney.
“I suppose she took me for some one else,” he murmured, as he left the Plaza. “I wouldn’t mind knowing her, though. Her friends, her acquaintances, have to be somebody.”