Mary Louise Solves a Mystery

"Quite likely. You'll say she didn't know anything about it, or where it was; but the fact remains that Alora left the hotel. I'd like to see that chambermaid. I believe you told me she comes on duty at six o'clock in the morning. All right. I'll catch her at six a. m. to- morrow."

"The detective interviewed her," stated Colonel.

"I know, and she answered all his questions. My questions will be different. If Alora used the servants' entrance, she went out with a servant or with someone who knew the ways of the hotel intimately."

"I don't see that," objected Mary Louise.

"Nor do I, but there lies our trail. Alora didn't pass out through the office, nor did she make her exit through the less public Ladies' Entrance. There are only two other ways to get out of here: through the baggage door and by the servants' entrance at the rear, which lets into an alley. The head porter will know whether Alora went out the baggage door, but as it's usually very high – on a level with the platform of a baggage-wagon – I don't believe she jumped it. That leaves the servants' entrance as the probable exit for our missing one, and as she was a perfect stranger to the arrangements of this hotel, she couldn't have gone that way unless someone guided her. So our course is clear, Mary Louise. Find out who enticed Alora from the hotel and it won't be difficult to trace her and discover what has become of her."

"Enticed, Josie?"

"Had force been used, she would have screamed and attracted attention. Let us say she was decoyed."

"You think, then, that Alora was kidnapped?"

"Let us reason. The girl couldn't have had an enemy in Chicago, according to her history, for she was only eleven when she left here and no one hates an eleven year old child. Having no enemy, she has doubtless escaped personal harm. But Alora is an heiress, and a lot of people in Chicago know that. You suggest kidnapping. Well, perhaps that's the solution: held for ransom."

"That would be the first idea of Jason Jones!" exclaimed Mary Louise. "He has always seemed afraid of such a thing."

"In that case, however, I do not believe her father would pay a ransom," declared Colonel Hathaway.

"Oh, indeed he would!" asserted Mary Louise, emphatically; "we mustn't forget that if Alora isn't found and restored to him within a given time he will lose all her income for the next three years."

Josie looked at her friend admiringly. Then she laughed.

"You're a better detective than any of us," she remarked. "What I've been groping for is the object of the abduction, and you've hit the nail squarely on the head. Now we're getting down to brass tacks, so to speak. The whole thing is explained by the one word – 'blackmail.' Girl disappears; papa is threatened with the lose of thousands. Very well, Papa! pay up. Relinquish a part of the income and you may keep the rest. Refuse, and you lose it all. Ergo, papa pays."

"That certainly seems a logical conclusion," admitted the Colonel.

"Then," said Josie, thoughtfully, "we must decide whether to put it up to Mr. Jones, and let him pay, or to go on with the search."

"We'll go on!" exclaimed Mary Louise. "We may be wrong, and poor Alora may be in danger, or suffering. We must rescue her as soon as possible."

"The girl was in my care," said the Colonel, "and I feel responsible for her safety. Moreover blackmail is a crime against society, and the plot should be foiled even were we not interested in the victim of it. I am anxious to find Alora before her father is approached."

"Then," Josie decided, "we will leave no stone unturned in our efforts to locate and recover her. If we have diagnosed the case correctly, we have to deal with a shrewd and unprincipled, if not clever person. Cleverness, too, we may encounter, and then our task will be doubly hard."

"Poor, dear Alora!" sighed Mary Louise. "It's a shame she should suffer because some cruel person wants her father's money. The fortune her mother left her has been a misfortune to her daughter, instead of a blessing."

"Money," said Josie sententiously, "is a dangerous thing. Its possession, or the lack of it, leads to four-fifths of the world's crimes. The other one-fifth is charged to hatred and jealousy. But – dear me! – here I am philosophizing, when I ought to be thinking."

"Then think, Josie, and think to some purpose," pleaded Mary Louise.

"If our hastily constructed theory is correct," remarked John O'Gorman's daughter, "Papa Jones will soon hear from Alora's abductor, with a financial proposition."

"I hope we shall find her before then," returned the Colonel earnestly. "We ought not to delay an instant, with that idea in view. Indeed, our theory may be quite wrong and Alora be in desperate need of immediate assistance."

"Correct, sir," agreed Josie. "But we won't abandon our theory until we evolve a better one and in following this lead we must first discover who in Chicago is aware of the terms of the will of Antoinette Seaver Jones. Also who is familiar enough with Papa Jones' love of money to believe he can be successfully blackmailed. What information can either of you give me along those lines?"

"Alora has talked to Irene a good deal about that dreadful will," replied Mary Louise, "Irene has repeated many of her statements to me. Also Alora has frankly spoken to me, at times, and her queer history has interested us all. But I cannot remember that any such person as you describe is in any way mixed up with the story. Judge Bernsted drew up the will for Alora's mother. He was her lawyer, and she trusted him fully."

"She was justified," declared Josie. "I know of Judge Bernsted, by reputation. He died a year ago."

"Then," continued Mary Louise, reflectively, "there was Mrs. Jones' doctor, who was very kind to Alora and who also enjoyed her mother's confidence. His name was Anstruther – Dr. Anstruther."

"He is a prominent physician in Chicago," declared Josie, who seemed to know every important person of every locality, for this had been part of her education. "It is impossible that Dr. Anstruther could have any knowledge of this plot. Moreover, it doesn't seem to me like a man's plot. I don't believe Alora would have accompanied a strange man, under any circumstances, for she's knocked around the world enough to have learned prudence. The crime is feminine. What woman knew of this will, and was an intimate friend of Mrs. Jones, or of Mr. Jones?"

"Really," said Mary Louise, "I don't know."

"Nor you, Colonel?"

"I do not recollect hearing of any woman connected with the Jones history – except Alora's former governess, a Miss Gorham, who was discharged by Mr. Jones at the time he took his daughter from Chicago to New York."

"That isn't such a bad clew!" Josie quickly returned, sitting up straight and staring reflectively at the old gentleman. "Miss Gorham, eh? Now, how long had she been Alora's governess?"

"For some years, I believe." It was Mary Louise who answered this question.

"Then she doubtless knew the family secrets. Was Alora fond of her?"

"I think not. She has told me that at the time they separated she was glad to be rid of the woman."

"Then the woman may be the kind that would resort to blackmail. Discharged from a good place, where she had drawn pay for years, she would be angry. Brooded during the last four years on her imagined wrongs and figured out a neat revenge. Had sized up Papa Jones and knew he clung to money with a desperate grip and would pay some rather than lose all. Couldn't get another job; was poor; had no money to chase up Jones, but figured he would some time return to Chicago and give her an opportunity play her game. Discovered that Alora had arrived at this hotel, and – See here! What would prevent the former governess, now in reduced circumstances, from being employed as a servant in this very hotel? Perhaps as a night chambermaid. May have seen Alora enter her room and recognized her former pupil. During the long night she figured and planned how to take advantage of the fortunate circumstances. Early in the morning, before she left here, went to Alora and in some way induced the girl to go out with her. Alora would accompany her old governess without suspicion. So – there's the whole story, in a nutshell, rather cleverly figured out."

"Oh, Josie, it must be true!" cried Mary Louise, who had eagerly followed this plausible reasoning.

"And it may not," laughed Josie. "It's just a theory, and good detectives distrust theories, which often befog clever brains. Still, the deduction sounds mighty logical. I'm going to my room, now, to give the suggestion some serious thought. I'll try to tear it to pieces, or at least to pick holes in it. When I came away Daddy said to me: 'Josie, beware that imagination of yours. If it asserts itself, sit on it.' Daddy was glad to have me tackle the case, and try to help you, for these little affairs give me practice; but he hates to have me make a flat failure. So, for dear old Daddy's sake, I'm not going to let any good-looking theory lead me astray. Good night. You'd both better go to bed, for I can see you had little sleep last night. But your strain must now relax, for you've pushed the responsibility onto my poor little shoulders and now it's up to me to worry."

CHAPTER XVIII

ON THE TRAIL

Josie O'Gorman loved mysteries for their own sake. She loved them because they required solutions, and to solve a mystery is not only interesting but requires a definite amount of talent. Since she was a wee thing perched on her father's knee, Officer O'Gorman had flooded her ears with the problems he daily encountered, had turned the problems inside out and canvassed them from every possible viewpoint, questioning the child if this, or that, was most probable. By this odd method he not only enjoyed the society of his beloved daughter but argued himself, through shrewd reasoning, into a lucid explanation of many puzzling cases. To his pleased surprise, as little Josie grew older she began to answer his questions, taking a part in his professional arguments with himself, and from that time her training as a detective began.

John O'Gorman had never been quite sure whether his fatherly adoration unduly influenced him or whether Josie was indeed an exceptionally talented girl; so, having firmly determined to train her to become a girl detective, he had so far held her in leash, permitting her to investigate various private cases but refusing to place her in professional work – such as the secret service – until she had gained experience and acquired confidence in herself. Confidence was the one thing Josie lacked most. She took her mistakes too much to heart.

The girl was full of enthusiasm, however, and now meant to untangle the mystery of Alora Jones if it were possible to do so, both to please Mary Louise and to enjoy the satisfaction of success. After saying good night to her friends, and before going to her own room, the girl wandered about the big hotel making casual inquiries and obtaining more or less useful information. Afterward, she sat in her room and arranged in her mind the complete history of Alora, so far as she was informed of it, and made notes of all facts which seemed to bear on the present problem.

Next morning she inquired for the housekeeper and found that lady seated in her little office on the third floor of the hotel.

"I'm trying to trace one of the servants who left you Monday night, or early Tuesday morning," she said, after informing the woman that she was engaged in tracing the missing girl, Alora Jones. "I am not sure what name you knew her by, but her real name was Gorham."

"No one has left us this week," returned the housekeeper, who seemed disposed to converse freely with her visitor.

"Are you sure of that?"

"Why, I'm positive. We treat our help well and they seldom leave us. I'm sure no woman employed in this hotel, down to the lowest kitchen scullion, has resigned or been discharged during the last few days."

"And there is no one still in your service named Gorham?"