George Gibbs - The Maker of Opportunities

Burnett, fascinated, followed his skillful fingers as they moved back and forth, lining here, shading there, not as the actor does for an effect by the calcium, but carefully, delicately, with the skill of the art anatomist who knows the bone structure of the face and the pull of the aging muscles.

In twenty minutes Mortimer Crabb had aged as many years, and now bore the phiz of a shaggy rum-sot. The long coat, soft hat and rough bandanna completed the character. The fever of the adventure had mounted in Burnett’s veins. He sprang to his feet with a reckless gesture of final resolution.

“Give me my part!” he exclaimed. “I’ll play it!”

The aged intemperate smiled approval. “Good lad!” he said. “I thought you’d be game. If you hadn’t been I was going alone. It’s lucky you’re clean shaved. Come and be transfigured.”

And as he rapidly worked on Burnett’s face he completed the details of his plan. Like a good general, Crabb disposed his plans for failure as well as for success.

They would wear their disguises over their evening clothes. Then, if the worst came, vaseline and a wipe of the bandannas would quickly remove all guilty signs from their faces, they could discard their tatters, and resume the garb of convention.

Ross Burnett at last rose swarthy and darkly mustached, lacking only the rings in his ears to be old Gabri himself. He was fully awakened to the possibilities of the adventure. Whatever misgivings he had had were speedily dissipated by the blithe optimism of his companion.

Crabb reached over for the brandy decanter.

“One drink,” he said, “and we must be off.”

The night was thick. A mist which had been gathering since sunset now turned to a soft drizzle of rain. Crabb, hands in pockets and shoulders bent, walked with a rapid and shambling gait up the street.

“We can’t risk the cars or a cab in this,” muttered Crabb. “We might do it, but it’s not worth the risk. Can you walk? It’s not over three miles.”

It was after one o’clock before they reached Highland Terrace. Without stopping they examined the German embassy at long range from the distant side of Massachusetts Avenue. A gas lamp sputtered dimly under the porte-cochère . Another light gleamed far up in the slanting roof. Crabb led the way around and into the alley in the rear. It was long, badly lighted and ran the entire length of the block.

“I got the details in the city plot-book from a real-estate man this afternoon. He thinks I’m going to buy next door. I wanted to be particular about the alleys and back entrances.” Crabb chuckled.

Burnett looked along the backs of the row of N Street houses. They were all as stolid as sphinxes. Several lights at wide intervals burned dimly. The night was chill for the season, and all the windows were down. The occasion was propitious. The rear of the embassy was dark, except for a dim glow in a window on the second floor.

“That should be Arnim’s room,” said Crabb.

He tried the back gate. It was unlocked. Noiselessly they entered, closing it after them. There was a rain spout, which Crabb eyed hopefully; but they found better luck in the shape of a thirty-foot ladder along the fence.

“A positive invitation,” whispered Crabb, joyfully. “Here, Ross; in the shadow. Once on the back building the deed is done. Quiet, now. You hold it and I’ll go up.”

Burnett did not falter. But his hands were cold, and he was trembling from top to toe with excitement. He could not but admire Crabb’s composure as he went firmly up the rungs.

He saw him reach the roof and draw himself over the coping, and in a moment Burnett, less noiselessly but safely, had joined his fellow criminal by the window. There they waited a moment, listening. A cab clattered down Fifteenth Street, and the gongs on the car line clanged in reply, but that was all.

Crabb stealthily arose and peered into the lighted window. It was a study. The light came from a lamp with a green shade. Under its glow upon the desk were maps and documents in profusion. And in the corner he could make out the lines of an iron-bound chest or box. They had made no mistake. Unless in the possession of Von Schlichter it was here that the Chinese treaty would be found.

“All right,” whispered Crabb. “An old-fashioned padlock, too.”

Crabb tried the window. It was locked. He took something from one of the pockets of his coat and reached up to the middle of the sash. There was a sound like the quick shearing of linen which sent the blood back to Burnett’s heart. In the still night it seemed to come back manifold from the wings of the buildings opposite. They paused again. A slight crackling of broken glass, and Crabb’s long fingers reached through the hole and turned the catch. In a moment they were in the room.

The intangible and Quixotic had become a latter-day reality. Burnett’s spirits rose. He did not lack courage, and here was a situation which spurred him to the utmost.

Instinctively he closed the inside shutters behind him. From the alley the pair would not have presented an appearance which accorded with the quiet splendor of the room. He found himself peering around, his ears straining for the slightest sound.

A glance revealed the dispatch-box, heavy, squat and phlegmatic, like its owner. Crabb had tiptoed over to the door of the adjoining room. Burnett saw the eyes dilate and the warning finger to his lips.

From the inner apartment, slowly and regularly, came the sound of heavy breathing. There, in a broad armchair by the foot of the bed, sprawled the baron’s valet, in stertorous sleep. His mouth was wide open, his limbs relaxed. He had heard nothing.

“Quick,” whispered Crabb; “your bandanna around his legs.”

Burnett surprised himself by the rapidity and intelligence of his collaboration. A handkerchief was slipped into the man’s mouth, and before his eyes were fairly opened he was gagged and bound hand and foot by the cord from the baron’s own dressing gown.

From a pocket Crabb had produced a revolver, which he flourished significantly under the nose of the terrified man, who recoiled before the dark look which accompanied it.

Crabb seemed to have planned exactly what to do. He took a bath towel and tied it over the man’s ears and under his chin. From the bed he took the baron’s sheets and blankets, enswathing the unfortunate servant until nothing but the tip of his nose was visible. A rope of suspenders and cravats completed the job.

The Baron Arnim’s valet, to all the purposes of usefulness in life, was a bundled mummy.

“Phew!” said Crabb, when it was done. “Poor devil! But it can’t be helped. He mustn’t see or know. And now for it.”

Crabb produced a bunch of skeleton keys and an electric bull’s-eye. He tried the keys rapidly. In a moment the dispatch-box was opened and its contents exposed to view.

“Carefully now,” whispered Crabb. “What should it look like?”

“A foolscap-shaped thing in silk covers with dangling cords,” said Ross. “There, under your hand.”

In a moment they had it out and between them on the desk. There it was, in all truth, written in two columns, Chinese on the one side, French on the other.

“Are you sure?” said Crabb.

“Sure! Sure as I’m a thief in the night!”

“Then sit and write, man. Write as you never wrote before. I’ll listen and watch Rameses the Second.”

In the twenty minutes during which Burnett fearfully wrote, Crabb stood listening at the doors and windows for sounds of servants or approaching carriages. The man swaddled in the sheets made a few futile struggles and then subsided. Burnett’s eyes gleamed. Other eyes than his would gleam at what he saw and wrote. When he finished he closed the document, removed all traces of his work, replaced it in the iron box and shut the lid. He dropped the precious sheets into an inner pocket and was moving toward the window when Crabb seized him by the arm. There was a step in the hallway without, and the door opened. There, stout and grizzled, his walrus mustache bristling with surprise, in all the distinction of gold lace and orders, stood Baron Arnim.