The Diamond Pin

Over the wire she stated her desire to employ a detective at once, and asked to have him sent to her, where she was, which was in a drug shop.

There was a maddening delay, and as Iris waited, she began to fear she had done a foolish thing. She suddenly realized that she had acted too quickly and perhaps unadvisedly. But she must stand by it now.

It was half an hour before a man arrived and met her at the door of the drug shop.

"I am Mr. Dayton," he said, "from the agency. Is this Miss Clyde?"

"Yes," said Iris, "and please hurry! I've just got on the track of a man who is a – a burglar – "

"Ma'am?" and the detective looked sharply at this young girl who had called him to her.

"Yes," and Iris grew impatient at his doubtful interest, "now, don't stop to parley, but catch him."

"Where is he?"

"He's in the restaurant, half a block away. I don't mean for you to arrest him, but trail him, shadow him, or whatever you call it, and find out who he is, and what sort of a character he bears. If he's a correct and decent citizen, all right; if he's a man who might be a burglar, I want to know it! Now, fly!"

"Wait a minute, Miss Clyde. Tell me more. How shall I know him?"

"Oh, he's at the table by the first front window, as you go from here. He's a tall man, and a strong-looking one. Come on, I'll point him out."

They went toward the restaurant, and cautiously Iris looked in at the window. But her quarry had fled. There was no one at the table at all.

"Come on in," she cried to the bewildered Dayton. "No, that won't do, he mustn't see me. You go in, and get the waiter who served him, or the proprietor or somebody, and find out who the man was who ate at that table just now. Maybe he's still in the coat room."

Iris stepped around a corner, and Dayton went in on his errand.

But the waiter had no knowledge of the patron's name. He said he had never seen him before, to his knowledge, but he was a new waiter there, and the captain might know.

However, neither the head waiter nor the cashier, nor indeed anyone about the place, knew the man. A few remembered seeing him, but the waiters at nearby tables, if they had noticed him, didn't know his name.

One waiter said he thought he had seen him before, but wasn't sure. The man was gone, and no one knew which direction he had taken from the restaurant.

Iris was disheartened at the report of her emissary.

"If you'd only got here sooner!" she reproached the detective.

"Did my best," he assured her. "Describe your man more accurately."

But Iris couldn't seem to think of any very distinguishing characteristics that fitted him.

"His name is Pollock," she said, "and he's a collector. Oh, wait, I do know something more. He's in the hardware business."

"For himself, or with a firm?"

"I don't know."

"Then, I fear, Miss Clyde, we're wasting time in looking for a person so vaguely identified. If you say so, I can go over the hardware people for a Pollock, but it will be an unsatisfactory and expensive process."

"I don't want that," and Iris looked perplexed. "Oh, I don't know what I do want! But it's maddening to see him, and then have him get away! He's also a collector."

"Ah, that helps. A collector of what?"

"Of mementoes of crimes – "

"Of what?"

"It sounds silly, I know, but he told me so. Not exactly crimes, more of prominent people. Like a pencil that belonged to President Garfield, and such things."

"Oh, a freak! I hoped you meant a prominent collector of valuable things; then we might trace him."

"No; he collects queer things, it is a sort of harmless mania, I think. Well, if we can't find him, we can't. How much do I owe you?"

This matter was adjusted, and Iris turned disconsolately back to her hotel. She had accomplished nothing on her Chicago trip, and unless the Craig people could give her information of importance, there was no use prolonging her visit.

The rest of that day, and the morning of the next, she spent in the vicinity of the restaurant, hoping Pollock would return.

But she didn't see him, and in the afternoon she went back to Craig, Marsden & Co.

Mr. Reed greeted her pleasantly, but he had no important information.

"We've many records of sales to Mrs. Pell," he related, "and, if you desire, I can give you a memorandum of them. Presumably, she had receipts in every case, but as I do not know the particular receipt you want, I can't offer you any data concerning it."

"What are the transactions?" asked Iris. "Jewels she bought?"

"Yes; and setting, and engraving. Mrs. Pell had a great deal of engraving done."

"What sort of engraving?"

"On silver or gold trinkets and ornaments."

"Oh, yes, I know. All her silver has not only initials, but names and dates, and sometimes quotations or lines of poetry."

"Yes, and she was most particular about that work. It was always done by our best engraver, and unless it just suited her we were treated to her finest sarcasm. Mrs. Pell was a wealthy and extravagant patron, but not affable or easy to please."

"I know that, but she was a remarkable woman and a strong character often has peculiar ways. I am heir to half her fortune, and that gives me a sense of obligation that will never be canceled until I have avenged my aunt's death."

Iris did not tell this man about the missing jewels, for it seemed of no use. But they discussed at length the jewels that he knew that Mrs. Pell had possessed, and Iris was amazed at the size and value of the amount.

"Really!" she exclaimed. "Do you know that my aunt had such an enormous fortune as that, in gems?"

"I know that she had at the time of her dealings with us. That was ten years ago, or so, but then we had the handling of more than a million dollars' worth, and I know she added to her store after that."

"Oh, where are they?" cried Iris forgetting her determination not to discuss this matter here.

"Do you mean to say you don't know?" exclaimed Mr. Reed, astounded.

So Iris told him about the will.