Ashton Kirk, Secret Agent Part 24

There was a laugh at the other end; then the postman answered:

"This ain't the police?"

"Not exactly, but something of the sort."

"Well, I've kind of expected that somebody would ask me about that old scout; they seem to have asked everybody else."

"Would you mind telling me about the trouble you had with him regarding some letters?"

"Oh, that! Sure. You see, Karkowsky for the first while that he lived at Brekling's place received a letter a couple of times a week that always got my attention. It was in a woman's writing--kind of a foreign writing that was mighty hard to make out. It was always a brown, square envelope, and it was always post-marked at Central Station. I couldn't tell you all this about most of the letters I handle, but this one gave me so much trouble at first finding out what the address was that I knew it by heart.

"One day I handed one of them to Karkowsky, and he threw it back at me.

"'That's not for me,' he said. And sure enough it wasn't. It was for another party a couple of blocks away--a party that was new to my route.

This same mistake happened a couple of times--me being so used to the letters that I never looked at 'em twice--and every time old Karkowsky got his back up. One day I kidded him about losing his girl and said I guessed some other fellow had won her out, seeing that he was getting all the letters, and Karkowsky swore. He called me some hard names that day and threatened to report me. So I cut out the jokes."

"When the letters began arriving for the second person they ceased for Karkowsky?"

"Right away. He never got another one."

There was a moment's silence; then the secret agent asked:

"Can you recall this other person's name?"

"Oh, yes. It's Kendreg. He lives on the top floor of 424 Lowe Street."

After Ashton-Kirk had hung up he sat for a few moments, a peculiar expression on his face. Then he pressed one of the row of b.u.t.tons. While awaiting a response, he penciled a few lines upon a tablet; when Fuller came in he tore off the sheet and handed it to him.

"Give this to Burgess," he requested. "Have him look this person up quietly. Tell him to work under cover as much as possible; and to especially note if he has any women visitors."

"Very well," said Fuller; and turning he left the room.

CHAPTER XIII

OLD NANON SPEAKS

Ashton-Kirk was at breakfast next morning when Fuller entered.

"I beg pardon," said the a.s.sistant, "but I've just had a call from Burgess, and I thought you'd like to hear what he had to say."

"Good. Let's have it."

"He went to 424 Lowe Street last night after I gave him your instructions. It's a large building, once used as a factory, but now rearranged as an apartment house. There was a gas-lighted sign over the door which said rooms might be had. Burgess took one on the fourth floor, and in a conversation with the caretaker mentioned that he had a friend, a Pole, who had lived there.

"'Do you know Kendreg?' says the caretaker. 'He's right across the hall from you.'

"But Burgess says no, that's not the name. And when the man went away he waited a while, and then knocked at the door opposite. The person who opened in answer to the knock was a middle-aged man, stout and with grayish hair. Burgess says he was enough like the description we had of Karkowsky to be his twin brother."

Ashton-Kirk set down his coffee cup, a smile upon his face.

"It is Karkowsky himself, just as I expected," said he. "But," glancing at Fuller, "what happened then?"

"Burgess merely asked if he could bother him for a match, which the stout man provided willingly enough, and then promptly closed his door."

"Nothing more?"

"That is all, so far."

"What do the papers report that is new?"

"Nothing, except that Osborne has returned and will now plunge into the intricacies of the case with renewed zeal. They seem to suspect him of having made wonderful discoveries of some sort."

"Have you heard anything from Purvis?"

"Yes. He reports that no one but Drevenoff has made any movement away from the house in Fordham Road, Eastbury. And that _he_ has merely walked about a little, apparently for exercise, or gone to the nearest post-box to mail some letters."

"Dr. Morse is to be buried to-day, I believe?"

"Yes, at about noon."

It was at that hour that Stumph entered the study.

"There is a woman below, sir," said he. "She is quite old--and quite remarkable. She wishes to speak to you, and says that I'm to inform you that she is from Dr. Morse's."

"Bring her up."

Old Nanon came in a few moments later, grim, erect and angular. Her keen eyes seemed somewhat sunken, and her wrinkled face more gaunt; but her glance was as sharp as ever, and her mouth was set in the same stern line.

"You are surprised," she said, when she had seated herself and studied him for a moment. "You thought that because Simon Morse was being carried to the grave that I, an old servant of his family, would remain near him to the last."

"It's the sort of thing that's usually expected," said the secret agent.

"No one who knows would expect it from me," said the old woman. "No one who knows would expect it from me," she repeated, her lips forming the words slowly, and her gray head swaying from side to side. "I knew him from a child. He was evil--possessed of evil; and what he was in the last days of his life, so he was always."

Ashton-Kirk said nothing; he remained gazing at the old Breton woman, his hands clasping his knee and his head tilted so as to rest upon the back of his chair.

"There was never any other in the family like him," she continued. "Not one. I have known them for four generations. His great-grandmother it was who employed me first; I was a girl then, and she was good to me.

They were _all_ good to me, and I remained with them and served them as well as I could. But there must have been something wicked in them somewhere, something hidden and black, and in this son it showed itself." Here her voice lowered and she leaned toward the secret agent.

"In Brittany there is a belief that there are those gifted with a strange vision. Have I that, I wonder? Sometimes I have thought so; for it was I alone who saw Simon Morse entirely as he was. To be sure, others have heard him blaspheme, and still others have read his books.

But I alone knew him for what he was."

The secret agent still sat attentively silent; if he wondered what all this would eventually lead to, he made no sign.

"I have always been thankful," proceeded Nanon, "that only one of the family was so cursed. All those who had gone before were mild and religious and gentle. And because of this I felt that I should not desert this tainted one, but remain and strive with him, even if it did no good." She paused for a moment, and the bony old hands, with their thick blue veins, were locked tightly together. "Yes," she resumed, "I was always thankful that only one of them was evil of heart, but now,"