Mary Roberts Rinehart

“ When the three new-comers went up-stairs, instead of going into the grill-room, I looked at Hunter.
"Is this where the political game is played?" I asked.
"Yes, if the political game is poker," he replied, and led the way into the room which adjoined the kitchen.
No one paid any attention to us. Bare tables, a wooden floor, and almost as many cuspidors as chairs, comprised the furniture of the long room. In one corner was a battered upright piano, and there were two fireplaces with old-fashioned mantels. ”

“ I could shake Heppie! Then I tried to call you mentally. I fixed my mind on you and said over and over, 'Come, please come.' Didn't you feel anything at all?"
"Good old trap-door!" I said. "I know I was thinking about you, but I never suspected the reason. And then to have walked past here twenty minutes ago! Why didn't you call me then?" I was tugging at the door, but it was fast, with the skirts to hold it tight.
"I looked such a fright," she explained. "Can't you pry it up with something?"
I tried several things without success, while Margery explained her plight. ”

“ Neither of us cared to eat, and the empty places—Wardrop's and Miss Letitia's—Miss Jane's had not been set—were like skeletons at the board.
It was Margery who, after our pretense of a meal, voiced the suspicion I think we both felt.
"It is a strange time for Harry to go away," she said quietly, from the library window.
"He probably has a reason."
"Why don't you say it?" she said suddenly, turning on me. "I know what you think. You believe he only pretended he was robbed!" ”

“ Perhaps a dozen men were sitting around, talking loudly, with much scraping of chairs on the bare floor. At one table they were throwing poker dice, but the rest were drinking beer and talking in a desultory way. At the piano a man with a red mustache was mimicking the sextette from Lucia and a roar of applause met us as we entered the room. Hunter led the way to a corner and put down his bottles. ”

“ An especially malignant foe might rob, or even murder, but it was almost ludicrous to think of his carrying away by force Miss Jane's ninety pounds of austere flesh. The solution, had it not been for the blood-stains, might have been a peaceful one, leaving out the pearls, altogether, but later developments showed that the pearls refused to be omitted. To my mind, however, at that time, the issue seemed a double one. I believed that some one, perhaps Harry Wardrop, had stolen the pearls, hidden them in the secret closet, and disposed of them later. ”

“ I opened two doors, to find only the usual poker table, with the winners sitting quietly, their cards bunched in the palms of their hands, and the losers, growing more voluble as the night went on, buying chips recklessly, drinking more than they should. ”

“ There was no reason, or, so far as I could see, no legitimate reason, why a car should have stopped there, yet it had stopped and for some time. Deeper tracks in the sand at the side of the lane showed that.
I felt that I had made some progress: I had found where the pearls had been hidden after the theft, and this put Bella out of the question. And I had found—or thought I had—the way in which Miss Jane had been taken away from Bellwood. ”

“ It would have been easy enough for him to rob himself, and, if he had an eye for the theatrical, to work out just some such plot. It was even possible that he had hidden for a few hours in the secret closet the contents of the Russia leather bag. But, whatever Wardrop might or might not be, he gave me little chance to find out, for he left the house before Hunter did that afternoon, and it was later, and under strange circumstances, that I met him again. ”

“ Hunter was thoroughly at home. He took my coat and his own and hung them somewhere to dry. Then he went into a sort of pantry opening off the kitchen and came out with four bottles of beer.
"We take care of ourselves here," he explained, as the newly barbered youth washed some glasses. "If you want a sandwich, there is cooked ham in the refrigerator and cheese—if our friend at the sink has left any." ”

“ So a new character had been introduced into the play—a woman, too!
"You were not the only person, Mr. Knox, who could not sleep last night," she went on. "Oh, I know a great many things. I know about the pearls, and what you think about them, and I know more than that, I—"
She stopped then. She had said more than she intended to, and all at once her bravado left her, and she looked like a frightened child. I went over to her and took one trembling hand. ”

“ A man could hide here for a year safely. The police never come here, and a man's business is his own."
"He is up-stairs now?"
"Yes. There are four rooms up there for cards, and a bath-room. It's an old dwelling house. Would Fleming know you?"
"No, but of course Wardrop would."
As if in answer to my objection, Wardrop appeared at that moment. He ran down the painted wooden stairs and hurried through the room without looking to right or left. The piano kept on, and the men at the tables were still engrossed with their glasses and one another. Wardrop was very pale ”