Meredith Nicholson

“ Burgess returned; "and don't kick when I come back for your money."
"Here's good luck, Web," cried Burke, lifting a highball glass and shaking it so the ice clinked derisively.
"And don't keep us waiting all night," mocked Ramsay. "If you do, we'll appoint somebody else to go out and look for a story."
Burgess left the room with the lazy, indifferent air with which he strolled about his bank after the morning hour of desk work that he particularly hated. ”

“ Men were calling excitedly; a police whistle piped shrilly. Burgess was cheered by this manifestation of activity; after all, something might happen. As he curbed an inclination to dash round the house into the street and investigate the cause of the uproar he heard furtive steps in the alley back of him. Then through the mist he saw a man poise for a moment on the top of the fence and drop silently into the yard. A noisy pursuing party charged through the alley. ”

“ If something exciting happens at the dinner—if some critical manufacturer throws a bottle at that senator who's going to talk about the Monroe Doctrine—that will make an acceptable story; and if the infuriated diner misses the senator and lands on you, please hurry back so we can watch Ramsay patch you up."
"I've told you a hundred times," said Burgess, thrusting his hands into the pockets of his dinner coat, "that the biggest moose always jumps up just where you're not expecting him, and you can't order an adventure as you do a cocktail or a taxi. ”

“ It's the unexpected that makes life interesting, though of course you've got to be ready when the hour strikes. An honest detective will always admit that luck's a big element in his game, and the crooks themselves are superstitious about it. I'd tell you some stories along that line if you hadn't been so insulting all evening. The trouble with you fellows is that you wouldn't know an adventure if it came up and hit you with a club; what you'd do in such an event would be to telephone for the police and beg the reporters for Heaven's sake to keep your names out of the papers. ”

“ They welcomed Hill joyously and made room for him at the end of the table.
"Well, Web, you look pretty fresh for this hour of the night," said Hill, accepting a cigar.
"Considering that you planted me in a nasty back yard to watch a house you weren't at all interested in, and that I spoiled a suit of clothes doing it, just to accommodate you, I feel pretty good," said Burgess.
"You always try to be helpful," said the detective tolerantly, "and I like to use you when I can." ”

“ Burgess scowled and went on:
"The best fun I've ever had has been right here at home, so Ramsay's dig about my chasing around looking for trouble is all bosh. You might think that just sitting in a bank and saying no to you fellows when you try to borrow more money than you're entitled to is about all there is to the banking business. But even in a bank a lot of strange things happen."
"Yes," laughed Ramsay; "we all remember how you entertained that counterfeiter in the directors' room, and smuggled him out the back way while Cap Hill was waiting to nab him in the lobby. ”

“ One of his best friends was Tom Hill, the Secret Service veteran, who is known and admired wherever the Hoosier language is spoken; and he had several times pitted his wits against Hill's to the detective's discomfiture.
"Of course, Web, if we all cultivated the society of crooks as you do, and hid them in our houses when our wives were out of town, and did other things that are just a little shady, we might turn up here once a month with yarns like yours," said Billy Kemp, the steel-castings manufacturer, who was one of the beat customers of Burgess's bank. ”

“ What about the lantern you thought you saw on the roof? You can't see the roofs of these houses from the club windows."
"Don't try to bluff me. Of course I saw it, from the back window on the second floor. You've been camped here watching somebody, and that light was a signal."
Burgess heard a grunt as the two men went down.
"You must stop reading detective stories, Web," said Hill. "They're written for boys and not for grown men. There hasn't been any lantern on this roof."
"All right," observed Burgess ironically; "if you didn't see the light, then there wasn't any." ”

“ The light that filtered in from the arc lamp at the corner made it barely possible to distinguish near-by objects in the yard. The rain was falling through a thin fog that gave an eerie appearance to everything in sight. This interested him for a moment; thieves must of necessity be expert in judging the range and density of light. He must ask some of his friends in the underworld about this....
HE was roused by shots in the street followed by shouts and the quick patter of feet. He ran to the kitchen door, thinking Towne might have returned, but Hill's assistant was nowhere visible. ”

“ Sam and I are spending all you give us to make you happy and comfortable.
"Well, that's all I can do now. My hand shakes so I can hardly write. It must be that medicine. I sleep so much I lose all track of time."
"Don't trouble, dearie; the sleep's good for you. And we're going to a quiet place where you'll soon be well again. I've got to finish packing now. We're going for a nice automobile ride just as soon as Sam comes. Go to sleep now; that's a dear. I'll unlock the door. Maybe Sam will come this way. Don't be afraid, dearie."
The perspiration was trickling down Burgess's face. ”

“ That was what the big chap was signaling for with his lantern when you saw it from these windows, but the rumpus we made getting our men scared the auto away till the lantern showed up again on the roof. No doubt one of the gents you locked in the cellar is the pal of the woman who had been keeping the old lady in pickle, just as you say; but the other is no counterfeiter—not by a long shot!"
HILL was having his innings, and he deliberated to prolong Burgess's agony. The room was very quiet as they all waited for the detective to conclude. ”

“ The trouble with the rest of us is that we're all so highly respectable that we don't dare expose ourselves to temptation the way Web does."
A cold chill crept down his spine as he saw what bank the check was drawn on
"For that insult," said Burgess good-naturedly, "I'll fine you a hundred dollars which I'll turn into the Prisoners' Aid Society. ”

“ Burgess went to the telephone and satisfied himself by a coversation with the police surgeon that Ramsay was not seriously injured. He was feeling better when he returned to the table and made a neat pile of their checks.
"There's just one thing about it, Tom," he remarked to Hill; "you and I would do our work much easier if these confounded amateurs only kept their hands off. They make the business dangerous." ”

“ The woman in charge is all ready to bolt, but for God's sake don't let her get away."
He went into the drug store and called the club first and gave the order for his car to be sent, and was still perspiring in the booth trying to satisfy Mrs. Burgess that he was not insane when the machine drew up at the curb. As an afterthought he called the club again and gave the clerk orders to seek Hill by telephone at a list of places he suggested and ask the Secret Service man to go to the club immediately. ”

“ The withdrawals continued until now she's drawn out about seven thousand dollars."
"There oughtn't to be anything mysterious about that," remarked Ramsay. "All you'd have to do would be to have one of the clerks step out from behind the counter and follow the woman who brought the check, or you might hold it up and ask her to tell Miss Raymond you wanted to see her. As you don't seem equal to your responsibility in the matter, I'll move over to the bank and do the job for you."
"Thank you, Ramsay. We all know that you're a very clever person, but I've already tried following her. ”

“ Now, you've all got the idea that because Thursday night prayer meeting is still well patronized in Indianapolis and all good women go to market on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays, nothing amusing ever happens here except candidates for the vice presidency and little things like that. But you're all wrong, as I've tried to prove to you ever since we began having these little parties. Visitors are always asking why Indiana is a literary center, and the real reason is that the Hoosiers are different and do things differently. ”

“ It seems that the trust company holds a nice bunch of securities for her account—several hundred thousand dollars' worth of good stuff. The income has been piling up, and they've grown curious as to what's become of her."
"She probably autographed a lot of blank checks on your bank and then went out and got run over by an automobile," suggested Ramsay. "The average daily mortality from motor accidents in this town is scandalously high. Miserly old woman, hiding from her greedy relations and that sort of stuff. ”

“ Why, my grandfather used to shoot wild turkeys up there where the Art Institute stands, and it takes the breath out of you to think of all the things that have happened here since Henry Ward Beecher was pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church. Just a block from here is the big flat General Wallace built with money he got out of books he wrote sitting in a rocking chair under a beech tree over at Crawfordsville. We see Riley riding around in his big touring car every day, and the whole American people bought his poems to pay for it! ”

“ They make the business dangerous"
"A very comfortable sort of customer," said Billings, the dry-goods merchant, "providing she hasn't checked out all the money."
"That," said Burgess, "is the queerest thing about it. Her first check came in a week after she opened her account. It was payable to bearer and called for a thousand and some odd dollars and cents. A respectable-looking woman presented it. The signature tallied exactly with the writing on the card the old lady had filled out for our file, and the check was paid, of course. ”

“ The counterfeiter was never in that yard. He skipped across Meridian Street and hid in the Blind Asylum grounds where I picked him out of a lilac bush." This was greeted with loud laughter. Burgess affected an ease he did not feel.
"You make mistakes, Web," continued the detective, "in not finishing up your jobs as you go along. That's the first law of this business. Old Martin isn't altogether a fool. You didn't tell him about the two fellows in the cellar ”