Detective Story/Alibi on the Board Walk

by Anna Alice Chapin

Alibi on the
Board Walk

by Anna Alice Chapin
Author of “For the Crapeau Honor,” “Stinging Butterflies,” “Reuben Carstair’s Journey,” etc.

A Boston Betty Story

AND that,” said Boston Betty reflectively, curling one of Alibi's clever silken ears over her forefinger, “makes six. Or is it seven? Did you keep count, mummy?”

“I did. It was seven,” rejoined Mrs. Mullen, and sneezed.

Mrs. Mullen had been born with a cold in her head and undoubtedly would die with one. The sea air had done it no good. She was not one to roam abroad; fortune came to her too gently at home. But her erratic daughter Elizabeth, the most brilliant girl crook in the East, had lured her away from the respectable lodging house she had kept from time immemorial, and persuaded her to taste the joys of Atlantic City. Mrs. Mullen adored Betty, so she had come, but she thought wistfully of her own dark kitchen, where she was wont to consume gallons of tea and count her savings, honest and otherwise.

No; Mrs. Mullen was not keen about Atlantic City, nor the board walk with its endless procession of rolling chairs, its well-dressed people, its smart little shops, its great glinting expanse of water with now and again an aëroplane dashing by overhead like a wonderful golden bird.

Betty asked her if she didn't like to look at the ocean, and she simply and truthfully replied that she didn't; for the reason that it looked so damp.

There was, however, one other bright spot besides being with her clever daughter and Alibi, the pluperfect crook dog, a fox terrier worth many times his weight in anything you could mention. The other bright spot in Mrs. Mullen's unexciting holiday was being away from Danny Lonsdell. Lonsdell was nothing but a poor wretch of a plain-clothes man who had tried his best to “get” Betty when she did New York the honor to pay it a professional visit. He never had succeeded and he had never quite happened to “connect” the mother and daughter together. Indeed he had the highest respect for the sneezing landlady, a respect deepened by sheer wonder and awe before so perfect a specimen of feeble, persistent stupidity.

It is scarcely necessary to say that Mrs. Mullen, who in her day had put over more and prettier deals than Dan could ever guess at, looked upon the detective with scorn, but she liked him three hours away a good deal better than three blocks. Any one who hung round like he did might happen on something—not by skill but by the law of chance. This was only reasonable, and Mrs. Mullen, in her dual callings of landlady and crook, was nothing if not strictly and carefully reasonable.

Now Betty was of fierier fiber and liked to plunge. She was always thinking up wild schemes that made her mother's few lank hairs stand on end, but she got away with them. It was the sort of breakneck success that goes with genius, and with the immortal confidence that goes with it. Boston Betty aimed high and she scarcely ever failed. She had been in jail only once, and it was her boast to give the dull-witted officers of the law a good running start on every job—and then beat them! When she arrived in Manhattan and was ready to do business, she invariably tipped some one off—usually Lonsdell; that was only sporting, since he was so keen on catching her—and then blithely proceeded with her operations, certain to leave on the next train for Massachusetts.

She, unlike her mother, delighted in Atlantic City. Her clever dark eyes sparkled with enjoyment at the mere sight of so much money being exhibited in clothes and merchandise and so on. She wanted that money! Oh, well, she might get some of it!

“It might be worked,” she said, cuddling the dog against her very smart dark coat. Betty was good looking and dressed excellently, and Alibi would have been a decoration to a gown of rags. “Yes, mother, I really think it might be worked.”

Mrs. Mullen's mind had a beautiful way of eliminating possible new trains of thoughts. She took up the conversation precisely where it had paused and said:

“You mean them seven packages that we seen dropped outer the roller chairs?”

“I do. Two weren't picked up at all—at least I didn't see they were. The men pushing the chairs picked up the other five; one took something out before he returned it. It ought to be a great graft if it could be systematized a bit.”

Mrs. Mullen sighed heavily and blew her nose. At this point Betty's own purse slipped from her fur-robed lap on to the board walk. A young man seized it and presented it, hat in hand, smiling hopefully—a beautiful young man, beautifully clothed.

“Thank you,” said Elizabeth sweetly, and as he still loitered gazing ardently, she drew a dollar bill from the recovered purse and held it out.

The youth recoiled flaming. “You didn't think I meant——” he gasped huskily.

Mrs. Mullen leaned forward as well as two hundred and thirty pounds would permit and fixed him with her watery eyes.

“Have a lozenge,” she said. “It'd do your throat good.”

They passed serenely on, and Betty laughed.

“That'll hold him for a while,” she vouchsafed. “Just the same I wish he weren't working here. What? Don't you know? He's Pretty Lester, the guy who pals with Baby Jane of Frisco, that cheap dip who's forever trying to double cross me at my own game. If he's here, Jane probably is too. I heard they'd got married. So foolish! I wonder what their line is just now?”

She fell silent, but Mrs. Mullen had returned to the point of departure which had chiefly interested her.

“'Bout them dropped packages you said was a good graft,” she reminded her child in a gentle and reproachful wheeze. “All you got to do is collect 'em. Ain't that right? Just collect 'em as they drop, one after the other.”

“Mother, you ought to have been a president or something!” exclaimed Boston Betty in a tone of awe and joy. “Collect them is the answer; and Alibi will do it!”

Just here Alibi deserves a generous paragraph all to his small and marvelous self. He was a superdog, impeccable as to breed, incredible as to intellect, charming as to manners, beguiling as to appearance. He worked with Boston Betty on all her big jobs, and knew himself to be of alien and superior clay to all other created dogs. Sometimes he eyed them a bit wistfully, wondering what ordinary, irresponsible dogdom might be like; but these were only foolish dreams, he knew, easily to be crushed by the character and intelligence of one fit to be the partner of perhaps the best girl crook in the underworld. He adored his mistress and understood her very thoughts. As a working partner, he made a mere human look awkward and undiscerning. He knew it, and so was Alibi most justly proud.

He could feel through his sensitive, satin-skinned head that there was something doing. His idol's touch, caressing yet calculating, told him that. He turned and lifted his slender, slightly too-long nose to gaze at her out of liquid, questioning, gold-brown eyes.

“And bless his heart, the dear,” murmurmed Mrs. Mullen fondly. “If he don't know already!”

“Sure he knows,” responded Betty. “It'll be a cinch—though a bit risky except after dark. Alibi can retrieve like no other dog alive. It's to be fetch and carry, Alibi, love!”

Alibi's ears understood and acquiesced. He waited for further directions, still wisely and lovingly looking upward at his dark-eyed deity.

Betty, when she once started, planned rapidly. She now spoke to the negro who was stolidly pushing their wheeled chair along.

“We want to sit still here in the sun for a while,” she said. “Yes, up against the railing, where I can see the sea. No, my mother doesn't like the wind. She wants to face the other way. Now you may do as you please for half an hour. Here's fifty cents. You may spend it, but don't get drunk,”

“I don't drink,” said the stolid chair pusher.

“Well, spend it—only not on soda water, because I'm going to vote against soft drinks. Run along!”

The man ambled off.

“Mother, go to sleep. Do you understand?” said the young lady who was gazing soulfully across the purple miles of waves.

“Sure,” said Mrs. Mullen, and delivered herself of a low, asthmatic snore, whereat her affectionate and admiring daughter chuckled contentedly. Mummy was the goods, all right, she said to herself for the thousandth time. Then she sat still, stroking the fox terrier, and waited.

The sun was bright. Two aëroplanes flew past over the sea, pure gold in that light, dream birds of unimaginable beauty. The foam purred deeply on the sand.

“Now——” snored Mrs. Mullen.

“Fetch!” whispered Betty, and Alibi flashed out of her lap. Her heart beat a little faster than usual for it was daring, but after all, suppose it should be discovered? Nothing but a cunning little dog picking up a parcel in play. So sorry, madam, but it's a regular game——”

“All right,” came in muffled accents from Mrs. Mullen's always troublesome vocal chords. “And just as easy an' pretty as takin' off your shoe.”

And Alibi was back in Betty's arms with a very small white package in his mouth and triumph in his eyes. He knew he had been told to fetch something that had been dropped. There had been only one thing, and here it was. Was it all right? he wanted to know.

Betty slipped the little parcel under the robe and said, “Good dog!” That was all, for she was not through yet. The package looked like a jeweler's box, which promised hopefully, but it might be salt-water taffy!

Mrs. Mullen snored gently for a minute or two, then a snore turned rather spasmodically into a short, choked snort. She said no word, but that sound meant a warning if anything could. Betty stiffened and turned her head slowly and warily. Then she whistled softly and laughed. She was far from pleased, but open fray was never wholly distasteful to her. She disliked many, if not most, women, but none quite so much as the one who stood looking at her with spiteful eyes.

“Hello, Jane!” she said cheerfully. “Thought I'd run into you when I spotted your 'What the men will wear' friend a little while ago! All dressed up and no place to go he was for fair. Why don't you take better care of him, Baby?”'

Baby Jane flushed a flush which did not match the number 18 rouge already spread upon her round cheek. She was a blonde by nature, artifice and persistence, and had something of the temperament of a plump white cat.

“Say, Bet,” she demanded, low but viciously, “what're you doing here? Massachusett's your ground, not New Jersey.”

“And California's yours,” said Betty pleasantly. “What are you and Charlie Lester working on now, Jane? Hope we don't get in each other's way!”

Jane scowled temperishly. “We—we ain't working!” she declared aggressively. “We're doing just like any other respectable married couple—seeing the sights and taking the sea air!”

“Fine for you!” approved Betty. “Fine for me, too,” she added thoughtfully.

Baby Jane looked at her from round and suspicious blue eyes. “Then you're working, Betty?” she queried.

“I didn't say so. Want to meet my mother? She's asleep, but——”

Mrs. Mullen had lowered a faded, opaque green veil and through it was snoring in a slow, gurgling way all her own.

“No, thanks, don't disturb her!” said Jane hastily. “But—Betty—sure you're working! All this morning just rolling round easy, same's the chairs?”

“I see you feel it, too!” sighed Betty sympathetically. Her fingers under the lap rug toyed with the little package.

Jane hesitated, then blurted out: “Lookit here, Betty, I ain't tipping you off 'cause I like you——”

“What do you know about that?” softly murmured Elizabeth, gazing at the sea.

“It's because,” persisted Baby Jane with cautious truculence, “I want your room 'stead of your company. I don't like your looks, nor I don't like your beastly pup's looks. They just about spoil living for me. So, I'll just tell you right out. Danny Lonsdell's here!”

Betty sat up straight. “Dan Lonsdell! The dick! Are you bluffing, Baby?”

“You can look at the hotel register. He's stopping at the same joint we are, the Mandeville.”

Betty laughed aloud. “So nice for you, Janey! Was he glad to see you?”

“He give me the glad hand and my husband, too,” said the other sulkily. “Said he was glad we was straight.”

“Of course he is,” said Betty. “So much less trouble for him. I suppose he's here for his health like the rest of us.”

“Well,” suggested her rival defiantly, “I suppose detectives have health.”

Betty chuckled. “He'll need all his before I'm done with him!” she remarked amiably.

“Betty!” cried the other girl, staring. “Aren't you going to leave?”

“Sure——when I'm ready.”

“To-day?”

“It might be to-day,” said Elizabeth, and raised a hand to politely suppress a yawn. “Anyway, I'm delighted Dan is in town, and you, and Pretty Lester. Mummy and I were saying this morning we didn't know a soul. This makes it just right. I wasn't going to stay, but I don't know—I really don't know! I'd almost lost interest in the board walk, but if anything could fetch it back——”

The word was inadvertent, but it was too late to stop Alibi. He had heard the mystic command “fetch,” even though spoken in an ordinary conversational tone, and he obeyed it. He darted from Betty's lap, approached the moving line of chairs and trotted along, looking for what he was to retrieve. The god of all good thieves saw that a long narrow bundle should slip from one of the chairs almost immediately, and the dog had it before any human being could notice it. He made his way back with no unseemly haste, even pausing to wag his brief tail when a pretty girl said:

“What a duck of a dog! And what a pretty trick, carrying parcels for his mistress! I must teach Foxy that!”

Ali returned to Betty and presented his spoils, and Betty shook with laughter. He had made a mistake—a bad mistake—but it was funny!

“So that's it!” muttered Baby Jane, regarding them both in a dazed way. “Well—of all the nerve!”

“He was an angel, chuckle-headed, wise, idiot beast, wasn't he!” crooned Betty to her beloved pet. “Just for once you knew too much, Ali darling, but what's the odds?”

“Will you divvy?” proposed Baby Jane bluntly.

“What for? I'm not after your graft, and you can't butt in on mine, for you've no Alibi.”

“I can put Lonsdell wise——” Jane began uncertainly.

Betty cut her short. “I would!” she advised sarcastically. “Can the 'straight' gag, Frisco Baby of the Barbary Coast; it doesn't go with me any better than it does with Danny Lonsdell. You're no more on the straight than—than Ali and I are. Or if you are,” she added maliciously, “it's because you aren't clever enough to go quite so far as we! Now, with these few pleasant words—I see my push-man coming back, so I'm on my way.”

“I might tell him!” Jane blustered, but weakly, for telling was not where she cared to shine.

“Do!” said Betty cordially. “Here he is. Anything to say, Jane?”

Jane had nothing to say and walked off with fury vibrating in every loud-colored ruffle of her.

Betty turned to look after her. “Of all the rigs!” she murmured. “You could spot her a mile off. Back, John? All right. Wake up, mummy. We're going back to the hotel for lunch!”

After luncheon, Betty called up Atlantic City police headquarters. No; Mr. Daniel Lonsdell hadn't been there in six months. Yes, Captain Bates knew him. Was there any message in case he should drop in?

“Tell him,” Elizabeth said in her sweetest accents, “that Betty was looking for him!”

A message of which poor Dan Lonsdell has not yet heard the last!

Betty herself hung up with a sigh and a slight wrinkling of her fine forehead. If Danny were here on his own, not working with the police, he would have more time to spot her. There was always, of course, the large chance that Jane was lying to get her off the ground. Anyway, there was nothing more to do about it but keep six watchful pairs of eyes wide open.

They went on the board walk early that afternoon and so did the Lesters. At last Betty understood their game. They were playing around with a plump, firm-featured, prosperous-looking lady, in too-fashionable widow's weeds and showy ornaments. She and Jane traveled in a chair while Charlie strolled alongside, and the three of them stopped every two minutes to look at shop windows, sometimes to go in. The widow was lavish; she bought expensive candy and violets for herself and Jane, and a gardenia for Charlie. They made several purchases, and Betty, whose chair was near, heard much chatter about “my jewels,” “my money,” “my expenses,' and—several times—“my Burmese ruby pendant that ought to be mended this afternoon. They promised it!”

Betty nodded sagely. “So that's the dope!” she thought. “A Burmese ruby pendant to be ready this afternoon certainly oughtn't to fall into the hands of the Lesters! Oh, well, Heaven looks out for these things.”

Aloud she remarked to her mother, who was looking bitterly at the shining ocean: “The sea's full of gold, mummy, did you know that? All the scientists say so. Only trouble is, they haven't found a way of getting it out.”

“Haven't, eh?” said Mrs. Mullen, wiping her moist red nose. “I guess they've found it down here all right! Are we workin'?”

“I don't know,” said Betty. “I'm sort of looking for another friend.”

Where was Dan Lonsdell? Not shadowing the three ahead.

“As a detective,” inwardly commented Elizabeth disdainfully, “he would make a great street-car conductor!”

The chair ahead pulled up at a very small, very smart, very expensive jeweler's shop where some beautiful things are bought, and many more altered or repaired. All three entered, the lively widow talking vociferously about her Burmese ruby pendant and the mint of money she expected she'd have to pay just for having the clasp fixed! Betty's chair continued with the rest of the line, but she, too, stopped once or twice, to buy a magazine, a few carnations, some salt-water taffy for which, to her filial but indulgent horror, Mrs. Mullen had developed a passion. Even Alibi liked the stuff, though it stuck in his teeth and made him appear far from dignified.

They turned soon, because the upper part of the walk is mostly sea and sky and sand and summer cottages, and, as such, unworthy of much consideration. But after they had passed the other chair, Charlie still in tow, and Betty had waved a blithe greeting, she developed a grouch as to the sun in her eyes. Her mother took her cue and opined the wind from the inlet made her cold worse. That settled it; they turned, once more joined the other line and, in time, found themselves again next to the widow's conveyance. This was partly due to Betty's good luck, for the woman in the very next chair stopped at a rug auction, and as her chair, according to Atlantic City law, passed out of line to wait at the rail opposite, Betty's own equipage slid smoothly into its place. The widow, as she had noted, was on the left side, next Charlie. It was an open chair with broad wicker arms. The lady's plump, black-gloved hand rested in evidence, also a bulging, shiny black leather bag. Elizabeth began quietly to unwrap some bits of taffy which she had been able to withhold from the munching Mrs. Mullen. Alibi sat now at their feet, in the floor of the chair, concealed by what may be called the dashboard. He looked hopefully at the candy, but his mistress shook her head, and he sighed. He would be wanted for business shortly, he thought.

He was. Betty's eyes were glued to the black glove and the black bag. So near and yet so—— if something would only happen. Something was beginning to happen right then. The smooth, black suede fingers left the bag in an airy gesticulation. It lay there unprotected a moment; the fingers touched it again, only to again relinquish it. Now it was balanced on the very edge of the chair arm, and there was a humpy board in the walk coming. Betty knew at just which shops the bad boards lay; such details might come in handy. Now by all the laws of gravitation, to say nothing of Elizabeth's own luck, that bag ought to——

Suddenly she fairly pushed Alibi out of the chair on her side—the right, farthest from the sea, the widow and Charlie Lester. If she whispered a word of mystic command no one heard it but Ali. Aloud she called brightly:

“Mr. Lester!”

Pretty Charlie Lester stood stock-still and turned queer colors. He had a sneaking admiration for the good-looking girl with the eyes, not the less since Jane had told him about her. But Jane was looking on with cold and jealous glances. Nevertheless, he did raise his beautiful green hat and bow and say: “Er—how do you do?”

Betty actually giggled—which was most unlike her. “Give my love to Jane!” she said. “Did you ever see my little dog, Mr. Lester?”

Alibi was back at her feet, munching salt-water taffy, and Betty had kicked a corner of the rug over the shiny black bag he had just brought. As the chair passed him, Charlie looked hard at the dog.

“Jane's mentioned him, perhaps?” suggested Betty.

“Ye-es,” said Charlie. “Jane has.”

In times gone by, Jane had lost quite a bit of money through Alibi. The fox terrier looked at the man and blinked without enthusiasm. He was fastidious as to his friends. Betty laughed outright into the young man's vacuous face. Her dark eyes twinkled like those of a joyous imp. No, he hadn't seen—he hadn't seen a thing! What a creature! Oh, well, he was plenty good enough for Baby Jane of the Barbary Coast.

Just then a voice, shrill and perturbed, called sharply, and Charlie walked briskly on to join his two friends, and Betty got busy. She poked her head around the side of the chair and spoke quickly to the man who pushed it.

“Straight down this street here,” she said curtly, “fast as you can. Law Building, Atlantic Avenue. I have to make a train.”

The man and the chair made all possible haste, Betty opened the bag, and after some investigation threw it nonchalantly into the gutter. Nobody picked it up, that she could see. She shook her head pityingly.

At the Law Building she dismissed the chair, located a stenographer, dictated and signed a letter which made that innocent business woman stare with astonishment, and left it, a small package and some money for a messenger boy to take letter and parcel to a certain hotel.

Then she and her mother hailed a taxi, went to the railroad station, and took the two-thirty to New York. They did not go back to their own hotel. Their valuables they carried with them always, and their bill could be settled by mail. Betty meant to settle it, too. She was no piker. But she didn't like Atlantic City any longer, funnily enough. Moreover, Mrs. Mullen was homesick.

Just half an hour later, as the two-thirty was well on its way to town, an opéra-bouffe scene took place in an expensive red velvet private upstairs sitting room in one of the beach hotels.

Daniel Lonsdell, the large, gruff plain-clothes man from New York, who was quietly sojourning in Atlantic City, was hastily summoned from his own room, and made a timely entrance at a moment when Baby Jane, her widow friend, and Charlie Lester as well seemed at the point of hysterics. Daniel locked the door and sat down.

“What's the row?” he demanded, and turning to the now agitated “widow,” added: “Did you nail 'em with the goods, Miss McGorkle?”

At this strange name Jane came out of her hysterics to stare appalled. “Aren't you Mrs. Benjamin—Emerson—Jones, of Ohio?” she demanded. “The—the oil king's widow?”

“Nix on the widow!” said the lady in black, appearing far from well herself. “No men in mine! I'm Emma McGorkle, detective, and Mr. Lonsdell told me to get you two cheap crooks! You've been too lively and troublesome lately.”

“Cut it out, if you don't mind,” said Mr. Lonsdell. “I take it you didn't. What was the trouble? Didn't you plant the fake pendant? Didn't they fall for it? Where did the game get off the track?”

Emma McGorkle flung out her plump hands angrily. “Sure I planted it!” she said with asperity. “And sure I all but dropped it into this fool's hands, and—and now they haven't got it! I've searched her, and the bag's too big to hide in clothes that fit like his does.”

Danny went through the paralyzed male crook. No; he had nothing on him. Of course they could both be taken to the police station and be given a more complete overhauling, but something told him that the job had failed.

“It was those two d-devils!” sobbed Baby Jane, prostrating herself on a lounge. “We'd oughter have given up as soon's we saw 'em. Boston Betty an' that blamed dawg sure ain't lucky for——”

“Hold on!” said Daniel Lonsdell sternly, but with a prickle of apprehension going down his spine. “Is Boston Betty in Atlantic City?”

“Sure!” Jane told him. “She's got a new g-graft. She——”

There was a knock on the door, Mr. Lonsdell unlocked and opened it and received from the messenger who waited a flat package and a letter with a typewritten address to Mrs. Charles Lester.

“The fake ruby, I suppose,” said Lonsdell, who was too old a hand not to believe in coincidences and to know that it is the impossible which always happens. He tossed the packet on to a table, and tore open the letter.

“It's addressed to you, Jane,” he remarked, “but I think we're all interested in hearing what it is. Yes,” he said, in an expressionless tone, glancing at the firm, brief, familiar signature. “It's from Boston Betty, of course.”

Then he read the communication slowly aloud:

Dearest Baby Jane: You really must forgive Alibi and me for beating you to your nice, rich, careless come-on. But, if it had been anything like on the level, the game would have been too big for a pair like you and Pretty Charlie Lester. As you see, it wasn't. That 'Burmese ruby pendant' is worth, I should say, all of three dollars, and I'm sending it along, with my love, as you may like it for a souvenir, and Ali and I travel light and have no use for junk. Just a tip: the dame you picked may be all right, but she looks too wise for you to handle——”

Danny paused to look reproachfully at Emma McGorkle who threw up her hands in despair.

“Why didn't I cultivate an innocent giggle and a baby stare?” she lamented.

The note continued:

“However, she overlooked one bet. There were three twenty-dollar bills in the bag. I left that on Virginia Avenue and a——

Miss McGorkle wept, and Jane and Charlie stared at each other. They weren't going to be arrested just then, anyway. That was always something.

The letter concluded:

“Tell our dear Mr. Lonsdell, with my love, that I tried my best to get him at headquarters here. Good luck, everybody!

“Betty.”

In a daze Danny rang up the police. It was of course too late; he knew Betty's expeditious methods, but he might as well find out what she had been up to there. He persisted, past various subofficial voices, till he got Captain Bill Bates himself.

“Hello, Bill! This is Lonsdell.”

“Well, well! Listen who's here! How are you? Say—were you expecting a message or anything?”

“N-no; what sort of a message?”

The captain chuckled audibly. “Sounded like she might be your best girl, Daniel. Awful nice voice—flirty, but refined!”

Daniel swallowed. The minx! “What—what did she say?” he demanded.

“She said to tell you 'Betty was looking for you!'” jeered the merry captain.

Dan Lonsdell hung up without another word and sat down in a large, hard, red velvet chair.

“Betty was looking for you,” he repeated, with a fixed look. “Yes, that's right. Betty was looking for me and, as usual—she got me!”