Evening Star Newspaper, November 29, 1931, Page 92

W 2 Y SORDAY STAR, WAS THE MEDICI RUBY—_7 8% of Robbery and A Young Man Learns the Difficulty of Contra- ({1'('/1'11g a Woman—HAnd There Are Several Other Complications, Al Form- ing One of This Author’s Best Stories. ILLUSTRATED BY R. W. CHAMBERS. HE. building of the foundations of a tall tower to be erected in one of the East Fifties, between Fifth ave- nuz and Madison, had raised a storm of protest from the neighbors. Blasting is not, of course, what it was in the good old days before Government regulation; yet much innocent fun may still be had by a contractor with a sense of humor and a good deal of political pull. One Autumn afternocn about 4 o'clock it was evident to the trained eye that something momentous was about to occur. All the trucks came plunging up the steep ramp and rum- bled hurriedly away; the giant scoop that had been charging the clay bank like an angry rhinoceros ceased its labors; the steam drills all died down together, ahd two men waving red flags sprang out onto the street. One caught by tte arm a g=1 who was glu- ing her nose to the window of Le Courrier’s jewel shop; the other shooed at a great bank president who was just entering Peterloo’s an- tique shop to buy himself a Queen Anne writ- ing desk. Exactly four minutes later, the whole block seemed to lift slightly, as a carpet lifts when the wind gets under it. The sound reminded a celebrated general, hurrying to his club, of the sound of the Big Bertha in Paris. Then simultaneously, the following events occurred: A Chinese painting on glass crashed from the wall of Peterloo’s and was shattered to bits; the window of Mme. Kendal's dress- making establishment on the second floor of the house across the street fell out and knocked down the doorman at Le Courrier's: Le Courrier’'s window cracked from top to bot- tom, but didn’t fall out; a taxicab was tilted over and a lady inside screamed steadily, though quite uninjured, and the bank presi- dent rushed out of Peterloo's without buying the desk. R. PHILIBERT BARNES, the managing director of the American branch of the great Rue Royale jeweler, was sitting in his inner office—a small room of gray and gold boiserie with crystal chandeliers. He had been thinking, as people so often are thinking just before pandemonium breaks loose, that life was rather dull and that being in the jewelry busi- ness was not at all exciting. He had imagined that it would comsist entirely of secret inter- views with great financiers who wanted to buy royal emeralds for wicked little dancers; or private conferences with faithless wives, trying to sell their pearls to save worthless young Adonises. Instead, he had just spent a tire- some afternoon with a dowager in a fur cape, who wanted to have three old diamond stars reset with the minimum of expense. When the blast came, Phil thought—for in moments of danger we all think egotistically— that he, individually, was being dynamited by gunmen. He slammed the door of the safe, grabbed a revolver, and rushed into the outer office. The first thing he saw was the doorman be- g carried in. It took several minutes for Phil to assure himself that the man’s injuries were superficial. Then only did he notice that the show win- dow was cracked. “Nothing missing, is there?” he asked. “No, I don’'t think so,” said Watson, his head clerk. But as they moved together toward the win- dow they saw that Watson had been too opti- mistic. There was something missing, namely, the great Medici ruby. Its lovely, flesh-col- ored cace starcd at them—empty. An hour was spent in investigating, in ques- ticning every one, in telephoning the insur- ance company, and summoning the police. Nothing whatsoever developed. ‘There had been many people passing at the instant of the explosion, a crowd had surrounded the in- jured doorman, any one might have slipped a band into the broken window. At length Phil went back into his little gray office and gravely contemplated ruin. His ruby had been insured, yes, but mot for its full value, and the difference at this moment would #lout wipe him out. What a fool he had been! He had insured the Copeland diamond for its full value, and there it lay, sparkling to itself in the safe. But, urged by Watson, he had skimped on the ruby ... No he wouldn't put the blame on any one else. The fault was his. He thought of his sister and her young children, all dependent on his success; of brave old M. Le Courrier’s struggle to make a go of the Paris shop in these times. He sighed. As a business man he appear2d to be a fiop. He looked, oddly enough, exactly as all those handsome young men, who, in black coats and s‘riped trousers, with gleaming pearl; in their ties, advance, in any well conducted jeweler’s, and treat your request to have your watch regulated with the consideration dug¢ an order for a diamond necklace. It was odd that Phil did look like this, because he had begun life ¢8 a mining engineer. He had bern examin- ing a sapphire mine in Montana when news reached him of the death of his brother-in- law, Gaston Le Courrier. His elder sister had been doing war work in France when she met and fell in love with the son of the great jeweler. After their mar- riage they had stayed on for some years in Paris and then, when the eyes of all commer- cial Europe began to turn westward, Gaston had come to America and opened the New York shop. For a while it had done mag- nificently, but as hard times began, Gaston had died, and there seemed to be no one but Phil to carry on the business. Considering all things, he hadn’'t done so badly. He was clear-headed, hard-working and resolute. There had not been much to do, except to cut down expenses, avoid being robbed, and pay the insurance . .. Ah, if he had only done that! In the outer office the police were preparing to go home. They didn't, they admitted, see much hope. Phil opened the drawer of his desk and put away the revolver. A man didn't, of course, commit suicide in a crisis of his own making, but it was as well to have the easy means well out of sight. There was a knock on the door. “A lady to see you, sir.” He raised his head to say he couldn’'t pos- sibly see any customers that aiternoon, but he was a second too late. The lady was al- ready in the room. HE was a slim, golden-haired girl, simply and very elegantly dressed, with a big, beautiful mouth, and gray eyes that burnt and swam . . . Phil at first saw nothing but her eyes, which secmed to be charged with some tremendous message. “Are you Mr. Le Courrier?” Her voice was unusually deep. “No, my name is Barnes, but I'm the head of the firm here.” “Have you lost? . . . : He nodded quickly, and she opened her hand. In the palm of a tan-colored glove lay the great Medici ruby. His relief was so intense that, if he had been a woman, he would have burst into tears. Being a man, he had difficulty in resisting the impulse to seize the girl in his arms and wave her like a flag of victory. “Oh,” he cried, “you don't knocw what this means to me! Where in the world did you get it?” “I can't tell you that.” “I'm afraid you must,” he said. Then, see- ing by a slight stiffening of her figure that she was not accustomed to the word must, at least in the mouths of others, he added: ‘“The police are raising Cain in the outer office; the in- surance man is on his way up here. I shall have to have a story to tell them, or they will suspect me of trying to steal my own jewel and not getting away with it.” He could see she was a reasonable girl. She yielded. “Well,” she said, “I was sitting outside of this building in the car, waiting for my mother, who was having a fitting at Mme. Kendal’s L . “I'm glad,” he said, “that your august mother permits herself the best.” “It runs in the family. We all do. Sud- denly there was the explosion. Your doorman was hurt. I was getting out of the car to go to help him when a great crowd rushed be- tween us and, as I hesitated, standing on the step of the car, I noticed a girl who seemed to be pinned against the window. Then I saw her slip her hand behind her back. When she moved away, your ruby that beautiful stone ., . . was gone.” “You noticed that at once?” “Yes, because I have often looked at it. In fact, I have some hope of getting my father to buy it. I ran after her. Pushed through the crowd and laid my hand on her shoulder, a cruel thing to do, for she almost swooned with fright. Her terror was a complete confession. “I managed to get her into the car, while 1 talked to her. I hadn't much difficulty in getting her story—quite a commonplace one, a nice background, a private school, a mother who died before she grew up, a shiftless, aristo- cratic father, the sudden necessity at 18 of earning her own living. . . .” “Was she pretty?” “Yes, I think she was—not a beauty. I con- vinced her that for her to steal that stone was death and destruction, and finally she gave it to me.” “She was a trusting girl.” His visitor stared at him a second. “You mean I might have kept it?” “She might have thought so.” The girl laughed. “Well,” she said, “that shows how stupid I am, because it never oc- curred to me that she might think I was a thief, too. But I'm afraid it was the car and chauffeur and my father’'s rather well known initials on the door that made her trust me, rather than the conspicuous honesty of my personality.” And suddenly her manner changed. “But am I, after all, so honest? What did it cost me to be on your side, against her, poor little thing? Wasn't it a perfectly na- tural, human thing for her to do? What do I know about that sort of temptation? What right had I to take away the fruits of her crime and courage?” “You saved her from 15 years in prison,” said Phil. “She was absolutely certain to be caught.” “Even so,” answered the girl, “she might have had some fun first. She might have gone to Monte Carlo—or she might simply have hidden the ruby under her pillow and gloated over it. Wouldn’t that be better than going on the way she is now, a poor drab little crea- ture, matching samples, or whatever it is she does for a living? What made me snatch it all away from her?” “But hold on a bit,” said Phil. “How about me? Am I not worth your saving, too? I was facing ruin when you came in like an angel of light. How would you have felt if you had read in tomorrow’s papers thst I had blown The door opened and the girl came in. “Bettina,” said her employer, “you what I like to call my brains out over the loss of the Medici ruby?” She regarded him thoughtfully. “I don’t think you would have,” she answered. “You look very well able to take care of your- self—" His heart swelled a little, and in the pause she rose. “Well, I think that's all I have to say.” “Not quite all.” He opened a drawer in the desk and took out a lovely old diamond bracelet. He held it out to the girl. “I want you to accept this,” he said, “with the sincere thanks of Le Courrier’s.” Her face grew blank as she drew back. “I could not possibly do that.” But Phil had had a good deal of experience with women and jewels. “If you would condescend to wear it,” he said ingratiatingly, “this bracelet would mean that you had saved a man from ruin, that you had done it by being brave and good.” She shook her head. “I'm not like that.” E took her hand. It was so small that he might have slipped the bracelet over it, but he preferred a longer, slower method. He fastened the safety clasp. She looked at it, she looked at him, and then she smiled—a sad smile. “I haven't told you,” she said, “the real rea- son why I can’t take this. You and I are never going to meet again, Mr. Barnes; and if we did meet, I might find it necessary to pretend that we hadn’t. It isn't possible to accept jew- elry from some one whom——" “Whom you regard as your social inferior?” Phil asked. She shrank, horrified, at his words. “Oh, no. It isn't that. It's something I can't explain in my own situation. Suppose I were married, or about to go away. I shall never see you again 21 She placed one hand over the bracelet, as if to pull it off, but he stopped her. “All right,” he said. “if that's the way it is, I still want you to keep it. I owe it to you, but aside from that, if I am never to see you again, it would be a comfort to me to think that you were at least wearing my bracelet. And I could tell myself delightful stories—how some day at Monte Carlo, or at the opera here, or in the royal inclosure at Ascot, I would see a slender wrist and recognize . . .” “Very well,” she said. “I'll keep it.” Then, almost before he understood her in- tention, she had gone. He stood just where she had left him, shaken by emotions not at all pleasurable. Could this be love? This dreadful turmoil? Never see her again? © Then he must record every gesture, every tone, for that was all he had to live on for the rest of his life—the way her eyes slanted and darted when her interest was roused; the deep, soul-shaking vibrations of her voice . . . Then he lost it all. Trying consciously to be aware of her, he lost her. It was as if sho had never heenm racel His afternoon was busy and his night res less, but in the morning he arrived at the off with a well-defined plan. He had thought o a way of identifying her. Mme. Kendal, N tenant, could not have had so very many tomers when the blast came. He fent a note upstairs asking her if s would help him, as one business man to ar other, in an effort to identify a prospectiy client—a lady who had been having a fittin just when the explosion occurred. Mme. Ken dal sent down a list immediately. She had only four customers at that instant—M Flora Fitch, the motion picture star; Miss An Gray-Gibbons, a spinster from Boston; M Rudolph Klein, whose address was one of th great hotels, and Mrs. Ulysses Vandergriffen. Phil's heart sank a little as the convictio came over him that his angel was a Vand griffen. The Vandergriffens were one of oldest of New York families. They had m: ried nothing but English noblemen and oth Vandergriffens for generations. He strolled around to Mrs. Klein’s hotel 3 discovered that she was a bride from Chicag He wandered on up the Avenue to where, on corner near the Museum, the great white gran ite front of the Vandergriffen house scowle out upon the Park. A handsome, claret-colored motor was stand Ing before the door. Was it the same one tha yesterday had stood before his shop? He con templated asking the chauffeur, but just the a gentleman came down the steps and dro away. Phil turned and walked briskly dow the Avenue. Late that afternoon he received a seco message from Mme. Kendal. Would M| Barnes step upstairs? Would he step! His long, striped legs stroq up the stairs two steps at a time. The moth must be there ... or possibly the girl he] self . ., Mme. Kendal's own office, to which Phil w. guided, was a narrow alley of a room. walls were covered with pencil sketches which bright samples were pinned. The rod itself was filled with a flat-topped desk.- “Well, Barnes,” -Mme. Kendal looked sharply as he entered. “I hear you lost sor Jjewelry yesterday.” “Yes,” he answered, watching her like cat. “I did, but I got it back.” “Don’t lie to me, Barnes.” There was possible insult in her tone. “For I have yo lost jewel right here in my desk. And I'll gi it back to you on condition that you ask questions.” She opened a drawer and took out a @ mond bracelet. “That’s yours, isn't it? Yes, I see by yo face that it is.” Driving his mind as cruelly as he could he could imagine no possible explanation. “It was mine,” he said, “but I gave it to g lady - . > “You did, did you?” said Mme. Kenda “That's just what I wanted to know. What do you mean giving diamond bracelets worth three or four thousand dollars, if I know any- thing aboat Jewels, to my models? I won't have it, Barnes. That's fiat. My girls are all good girls, and I won’t have them cor-