American Sherlocks by Nick Rennison (reading like a writer .TXT) 📕

The chauffeur of the car might have been an accomplice, but it was not necessary to suppose so. It looked as if the wily Grantley had hunted up a machine of the same make as Doctor Lightfoot’s, and had engaged it for a week or a month, paying for it in advance.

There are many cars to be had in New York on such terms, and they are extensively used by people who wish to give the impression, for a limited time, that they own a fine car.

It is a favorite way of overawing visitors, and chauffeurs in various sorts of livery go with the cars, both being always at the command of the renter.

It would not, therefore, have aroused suspicion if Grantley had furnished a livery of his own choice for his temporary chauffeur.

The first step was to ascertain the make of Doctor Lightfoot’s car. Another make might have been used, of course, but it was not likely, since the easiest way to duplicate the machine would have been to choose another having the same lines and color.

‘Mine is a Palgrave,’ the physician informed Nick, in response to the latter’s question.

‘Humph! That made it easy for Grantley,’ remarked the detective; ‘but it won’t be so easy for us. The Palgrave is the favorite car for renting by the week or month, and there are numerous places where that particular machine might have been obtained. We’ll have to go the rounds.’

Nick and his assistants set to work at once, with the help of the telephone directory, which listed the various agencies for automobiles. There were nearly twenty of them, but that meant comparatively little delay, with several investigators at work.

A little over an hour after the search began, Chick ‘struck oil.’

Grantley, disguised as Doctor Lightfoot, had engaged a Palgrave town car of the latest model at an agency on ‘Automobile Row,’ as that section of Broadway near Fifty-ninth Street is sometimes called.

The machine had been engaged for a week – not under Lightfoot’s name, however – and Grantley had furnished the suit of livery. The car had been used by its transient possessor for the first time the night before, had returned to the garage about eleven o’clock, and had not since been sent for.

The chauffeur was there, and, at Nick’s request, the manager sent for him.

The detective was about to learn something of Grantley’s movements; but was it to be much, or little?

He feared that the latter would prove to be the case.

VII

The detective had revealed his identity, and the chauffeur was quite willing to tell all he knew.

He had driven his temporary employer and the woman in nurse’s garb to the Yellow Anchor Line pier, near the Battery. Grantley – or Thomas Worthington, as he had called himself in this connection – had volunteered the information that his companion was his niece, who had been sent for suddenly to take care of someone who was to sail on the Laurentian at five o’clock in the morning.

Both of the occupants of the car had alighted at the pier, and the man had told the chauffeur not to wait, the explanation being that he might be detained on board for some time.

The pier was a long one, and the chauffeur could not, of course, say whether the pair had actually gone on board the vessel or not. He had obeyed orders and driven away at once.

Neither the man nor the woman had carried any baggage. The chauffeur had gathered that the person who was ill was a relative of both of them, and that the nurse’s rather bewildered manner was due to her anxiety and the suddenness of the call.

That was all Nick could learn from him, and an immediate visit to the Yellow Anchor Line’s pier was imperative.

There it was learned that a man and woman answering the description given had been noticed in the crowd of people who had come to bid goodbye to relatives and friends. One man was sure he had seen them enter a taxi which had just dropped its passengers. When interrogated further, he gave it as his impression that the taxi was a red-and-black machine. He naturally did not notice its number, and no one else could be found who had seen even that much.

A wireless inquiry brought a prompt reply from the Laurentian, to the effect that no couple of that description was on board, or had been seen on the vessel the night before.

It was clear that Grantley had made a false trail, for the purpose of throwing off his pursuers. It had been a characteristic move, and no more than Nick had expected.

The detective turned his attention to the taxi clue. Red and black were the distinctive colors of the Flanders-Jackson Taxicab Company’s machines. Consequently, the main garage of that concern was next visited.

Luckily, the man at the pier had been right. One of the company’s taxis had been at the Yellow Anchor Line pier the previous night, and had picked up a couple of new passengers there, after having been dismissed by those who had originally engaged it.,

Nick obtained the name and address of the chauffeur, who was off duty until night. He was not at home when the detective called, but, after a vexatious delay, he was eventually located.

A tip loosened his tongue.

‘I remember them well, sir,’ he declared. ‘The man looked like a doctor, I thought, and, if I’m not mistaken, the woman had on a nurse’s uniform under her long coat. I couldn’t see her face, though, on account of the heavy veil she wore. She acted queer – sick or something. The fellow told me, when they got in, to drive them to the Wentworth-Belding, but when I got up to Fourteenth Street, he said to take them to the Metropolitan Building. I did, and they got out. That’s all I know about it. I drove them to