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Title: The Million Dollar Mystery
       Novelized from the Scenario of F. Lonergan

Author: Harold MacGrath

Release Date: March 14, 2012 [EBook #39134]

Language: English


*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MILLION DOLLAR MYSTERY ***




Produced by Al Haines

THE PAPER SHE HAD PURLOINED WAS INDEED BLANK
THE PAPER SHE HAD PURLOINED WAS INDEED BLANK

THE MILLION DOLLAR MYSTERY

Novelized from the Scenario of
F. LONERGAN

BY

HAROLD MACGRATH

AUTHOR OF
THE MAN ON THE BOX,
THE GOOSE GIRL, HEARTS AND MASKS, ETC.

PROFUSELY ILLUSTRATED
WITH SCENES FROM THE PHOTO PLAY

GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHERS : NEW YORK

COPYRIGHT, 1915
HAROLD MACGRATH

Published by arrangement with
The Bobbs-Merrill Company.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

The paper she had purloined was indeed blank . . . . . . Frontispiece.

Miss Farlow's Private School

You might have marked him for a successful lawyer.

The Princess Perigoff

The Black Hundred

Friends from Tophet

The Peaceful Butler entered into the field of action

She had gained the confidence of Florence

There was a stormy scene between Braine and the Princess

Norton reached the Captain first

She read with Susan

"Who is it?" Jones whispered, his lips white and dry.

He read: "Florence—the hiding place is discovered."

That night there was a meeting of the organization

Jones engaged a motorboat

"Leo, are you using any drugs these days?"

The Secret Panel

Four men were told off

"Better be sensible," he said

They had become secretly engaged

With her he was happy, for he had no time to plan over the future

They were to be married

Florence was permitted to wander about the ship as she pleased

Every one felt extremely sorry for this beautiful girl

Florence steals out in the night to jump overboard

A young and beautiful woman did not jump from a big Atlantic liner without the newspapers getting hold of the facts

"The poor young thing!" murmured the motherly Mrs. Barnes

"Come out o' that now!"

"I ain't goin' t' hurt ye"

Florence fought; but she was weak, and so the conquest was easy

"I know it now," she said, and she kissed him

He had put Florence and Braine in the boat and had landed them

They bound Florence and left her seated in a chair

They did not care a snap of the finger what Jones thought

She first thought of changing the clock

He took her straight to the executive chamber of the Black Hundred

Here was an operation that needed all his care and skill.

He examined the blotter with care

The men rioted about the house, searching nooks and corners

They were mapping out a plan when Susan's message came

Norton was idling at his desk when the city editor called him

"Give this to your father. He knows how to read it."

Florence discovers the cave

Florence steals the papers from Braine's pocket

Braine procured a launch and began to prowl about

Braine reached the girl and pulled her into the boat

From the shore came another boat

"They have all three taken out naturalization papers."

"Just a minute, gentlemen!"

The Police Captain's desk

They were tumbling through the library and the living room

Braine sank inertly to the floor, dead

Instantly they sought the fallen man's side

A quick clutch and the policeman had her by the wrist

The Mystic Million

"Florence, that is all yours."

Immediately after the ceremony

After the storm, the sunshine

The Million Dollar Mystery


CHAPTER I

There are few things darker than a country road at night, particularly if one does not know the lay of the land. It is not difficult to traverse a known path; no matter how dark it is, one is able to find the way by the aid of a mental photograph taken in the daytime. But supposing you have never been over the road in the daytime, that you know nothing whatever of its topography, where it dips or rises, where it narrows or forks. You find yourself in the same unhappy state of mind as a blind man suddenly thrust into a strange house.

One black night, along a certain country road in the heart of New Jersey, in the days when the only good roads were city thoroughfares and country highways were routes to limbo, a carriage went forward cautiously. From time to time it careened like a blunt-nosed barge in a beam sea. The wheels and springs voiced their anguish continually; for it was a good carriage, unaccustomed to such ruts and hummocks.

"Faster, faster!" came a muffled voice from the interior.

"Sir, I dare not drive any faster," replied the coachman. "I can't see the horses' heads, sir, let alone the road. I've blown out the lamps, but I can't see the road any better for that."

"Let the horses have their heads; they'll find the way. It can't be much farther. You'll see lights."

The coachman swore in his teeth. All right. This man who was in such a hurry would probably send them all into the ditch. Save for the few stars above, he might have been driving Beelzebub's coach in the bottomless pit. Black velvet, everywhere black velvet. A wind was blowing, and yet the blackness was so thick that it gave the coachman the sensation of mild suffocation.

By and by, through the trees, he saw a flicker of light. It might or might not be the destination. He cracked his whip recklessly and the carriage lurched on two wheels. The man in the carriage balanced himself carefully, so that the bundle in his arms should not be unduly disturbed. His arms ached. He stuck his head out of the window.

"That's the place," he said. "And when you drive up make as little noise as you can."

"Yes, sir," called down the driver.

When the carriage drew up at its journey's end the man inside jumped out and hastened toward the gates. He scrutinized the sign on one of the posts. This was the place:

MISS FARLOW'S PRIVATE SCHOOL

MISS FARLOW'S PRIVATE SCHOOL
MISS FARLOW'S PRIVATE SCHOOL

The bundle in his arms stirred and he hurried up the path to the door of the house. He seized the ancient knocker and struck several times. He then placed the bundle on the steps and ran back to the waiting carriage, into which he stepped.

"Off with you!"

"That's a good word, sir. Maybe we can make your train."

"Do you think you could find this place again?"

"You couldn't get me on this pike again, sir, for a thousand; not me!"

The door slammed and the unknown sank back against the cushions. He took out his handkerchief and wiped the damp perspiration from his forehead. The big burden was off his mind. Whatever happened in the future, they would never be able to get him through his heart. So much for the folly of his youth.

It was a quarter after ten. Miss Susan Farlow had just returned to the reception room from her nightly tour of the upper halls to see if all her charges were in bed, where the rules of the school confined them after nine-thirty. It was at this moment that she heard the thunderous knocking at the door. The old maid felt her heart stop beating for a moment. Who could it be, at this time of night? Then the thought came swiftly that perhaps the parent of some one of her charges was ill and this was the summons. Stilling her fears, she went resolutely to the door and opened it.

"Who is it?" she called.

No one answered. She cupped her hand to her ear. She could hear the clatter of horses dimly.

"Well!" she exclaimed; rather angrily, too.

She was in the act of closing the door when the light from the hall discovered to her the bundle on the steps. She stooped and touched it.

"Good heavens, it's a child!"

She picked the bundle up. A whimper came from it, a tired little whimper of protest. She ran back to the reception room. A foundling! And on her doorstep! It was incredible. What in the world should she do? It would create a scandal and hurt the prestige of the school. Some one had mistaken her select private school for a farmhouse. It was frightful.

Then she unwrapped the child. It was about a year old, dimpled and golden haired. A thumb was in its rosebud mouth and its blue eyes looked up trustfully into her own.

"Why, you cherub!" cried the old maid, a strange turmoil in her heart. She caught the child to her breast, and then for the first time noticed the thick envelope pinned to the child's cloak. She put the baby into a chair and broke open the envelope.

"Name this child Florence Gray. I will send annually a liberal sum for her support and reclaim her on her eighteenth birthday. The other half of the inclosed bracelet will identify me. Treat the girl well, for I shall watch over her in secret."

Into the fixed routine of her humdrum life had come a mystery, a tantalizing, fascinating mystery. She had read of foundlings left on doorsteps—from paper-covered novels confiscated from her pupils—but that one should be placed upon her own respectable doorstep! Suddenly she smiled down at the child and the child smiled back. And there was nothing more to be done except to bow before the decrees of fate. Like all prim old maids, her heart was full of unrequited romance, and here was something she might spend its floods upon without let or hindrance. Already she was hoping that the man or woman who had left it might never come back.

The child grew. Regularly each year, upon a certain date, Miss Farlow received a registered letter with money. These letters came from all parts of the world; always the same sum, always the same line—"I am watching."

Thus seventeen years passed; and to Susan Farlow each year seemed shorter than the one before. For she loved the child with all her heart. She had not trained young girls all these years without becoming adept in the art of reading the true signs of breeding. There was no ordinary blood in Florence; the fact was emphasized by her exquisite face, her small hands and feet, her spirit and gentleness. And now, at any day, some one with a broken bracelet might come for her. As the days went on the heart of Susan Farlow grew heavy.

"Never mind, aunty," said Florence; "I shall always come back to see you."

She meant it, poor child; but how was she to know the terrors which lay beyond the horizon!

The house of Stanley