“It is a saccharimeter,” explained Kennedy, also looking at it, “an instrument used to detect the amount of sugar held in solution, a form of the polariscope. We won’t go into the science of it now. It’s rather abstruse.”
He was about to turn back into the outer office when an idea seemed to occur to him. He took the cartridge from his pocket and carefully scraped off what he could of the powder that still adhered to the outer rim. It was just a bit, but he dissolved it in some liquid from a bottle on the table, filled one of the clean glass tubes, capped the open end, and placed this tube in the saccharimeter where the first one I noticed had been.
Carefully he lighted the lamp, then squinted through the eyepiece at the tube of liquid containing what he had derived from the cartridge. He made some adjustments, and as he did so his face indicated that at last he began to see something dimly. The saccharimeter had opened the first rift in the haze that surrounded the case.
“I think I know what we have here,” he said, briefly, rising and placing the tube and its contents in his pocket with the other things he had discovered. “Of course it is only a hint. This instrument won’t tell me finally. But it is worth following up.”
With a final glance about to make sure that we had overlooked nothing, Kennedy closed and locked the outside door.
“I’m going directly up to the laboratory, Walter,” decided Kennedy. “Meanwhile you can help me very much if you will look up this Teresa de Leon. I noticed that the New York letters were written on the stationery of the Pan-America Hotel. Get what you can. I leave it to you. And if you can find out anything about the others, so much the better. I’ll see you as soon as you finish.”
It was rather a large contract. If the story had reached the newspaper stage, I should have known how to go about it. For there is no detective agency in the world like the Star, and even on the slender basis that we had, with a flock of reporters deployed at every point in the city, with telephones, wires, and cables busily engaged, I might have gathered priceless information in a few hours. But, as it was, whatever was to be got must be got by me alone.
I found Teresa de Leon registered at the Pan-America, as Craig had surmised. Such inquiries as I was able to make about the hotel did not show a trace of reason for believing that Jose Barrios had been numbered among her visitors. While that proved nothing as to the relations of the two, it was at least reassuring as far as Anitra and Eulalie were concerned, and, after all, as in such cases, this was their story.
Not having been able to learn much about the lady, I decided finally to send up my card, and to my satisfaction she sent back word that she would receive me in the parlor of the hotel.
Teresa de Leon proved to be a really striking type of Latin-American beauty. She was no longer young, but there was an elusiveness about her personality that made a more fascinating study than youth. I felt that with such a woman directness might be more of a surprise than subtlety.
“I suppose you know that Senor Barrios is very seriously ill?” I ventured, in answer to her inquiring gaze that played from my card to my face.
For a fleeting instant she looked startled. Yet she betrayed nothing as to whether it was fear or surprise.
“I have called his office several times,” she replied, “but no one answered. Even Senor Sandoval was not there.”
I felt that she was countering as cleverly as I might lead. “Then you know Mr. Sandoval also?” I asked, adding, “and Mr. Page?”
“I have known Senor Barrios a long time in Cuba,” she answered, “and the others, too—here.”
There was something evasive about her answers. She was trying to say neither too much nor too little. She left one in doubt whether she was trying to shield herself or to involve another. Though we chatted several minutes, I could gain nothing that would lead me to judge how intimately she knew Barrios. Except that she knew Sandoval and Page, her conversation might have been a replica of the letters we had discovered. Even when she hinted politely, but finally, that the talk was over she left me in doubt even whether she was an adventuress. The woman was an enigma. Had revenge or jealousy brought her to New York, or was she merely a tool in the hands of another?
I was not ready to return to Kennedy merely with another unanswered question, and I determined to stop again at the hotel where Barrios and his sister lived, in the hope of picking up something there.
The clerk at the desk told me that no one had called since we had been there, adding: “Except the tall gentleman, who came back. I think Senorita Barrios came down and met him in the tea-room.”
Wondering whether it was Page or Sandoval the clerk meant, I sauntered down the corridor past the door of the tea-room. It was Page with whom Anitra was talking. There was no way in which I could hear what was said, although Page was very earnest and Anitra showed plainly that she was anxious to return to the sick-room upstairs.
As I watched, I took good care that I should not be seen. It was well that I did, for once when I looked about I saw that some one else in another doorway was watching them, too, so intently that he did not see me. It was Sandoval. Jealousy of Page was written in every line of his face.
Studying the three, while I could not escape the rivalry of the two men, I was unable to see now or recollect anything that had happened which would convey even an inkling of her feelings toward them. Yet I was convinced that that way lay a problem quite as important as relations between the other triangle of Eulalie, Teresa, and Barrios. I was not psychologist enough to deal with either triangle. There was something that distinctly called for the higher mathematics of Kennedy.
Determined not to return to him entirely empty-mouthed, I thought it would be a good opportunity to see Eulalie alone, and hurried to the elevator, which whisked me up to the Barrios apartment.
Doctor Scott had not left his patient, though he seemed to realize that Eulalie was a most efficient nurse.
“No change,” whispered the doctor, “except that he is reaching a crisis.”
Interested as I was in the patient, it had been for the purpose of seeing Eulalie that I had come, and I was glad when Doctor Scott left us a moment.
“Has Mr. Kennedy found out anything yet?” she asked, in a tremulous whisper.
“I think he is on the right track now,” I encouraged. “Has anything happened here? Remember—it is quite as important that you should tell him all as it is for him to tell you.”
She looked at me a moment, then drew from a fold of her waist a yellow paper. It was a telegram. I took it and read:
Beware of Teresa de Leon, Hotel Pan-America.
A FRIEND.
“You know her?” I asked, folding the telegram, but not returning it.
Eulalie looked at me frankly and shook her head. “I have no idea who she is.”
“Or of who sent the telegram?”
“None at all.”
“When did you receive it?”
“Only a few minutes ago.”
Here was another mystery. Who had sent the anonymous telegram to Eulalie so soon after it had been evident that Kennedy had entered the case? What was its purpose?
“I may keep this?” I asked, indicating the telegram.
“I was about to send it to Professor Kennedy,” she replied. “Oh, I hope he will find something Won’t you go to him and tell him to hurry?”
I needed no urging, not only for her sake, but also because