Chapter XXI: Ida Sees Miss Rainforth

The next morning Nick Carter listened with surprise and deep interest to the tale which his two efficient aids had to tell him.

“When we parted last night,” he said, “there hardly seemed to be an opening anywhere in this case. The only one was that which Patsy had suggested as to Lannigan. Now, after a night’s work, there seems to be so many that they are conflicting.”

“Yes,” said Chick, “it seemed very straight when Patsy suggested that we could get to the woman who had written those letters by following up Lannigan. Well, we have found the woman who wrote the letters, but have learned nothing to show that she was connected with Lannigan, while the woman who is connected with Lannigan does not seem to have had anything to do with the letters, although if the string is right, she did have to do with Ellison.”

“That’s why I say that our openings conflict,” said Nick.

“Well, boys,” continued Nick, “it is for you to follow up what you have begun. You must follow up the Lannigan end to-day. That will take you to Philadelphia, for Lannigan went over there this morning. I know that. Find out, while there, about Ellison’s associations in Philadelphia, and whom he visited in that place.”

“You have no doubt, then,” asked Chick, “that the Englishman the girl Alice talked of was Ellison?”

“I have no doubt,” said Nick, “for the reason that, while you were busy in one direction last night, I was pushing inquiries in another, and I learned that Ellison did charter a yacht last summer, and that he did spend a good deal of time in Philadelphia, off and on.”

He got up from his chair, and, pacing up and down a little while, at length said:

“I don’t quite know how to size up young Sanborn. For a man who is well acquainted with Ellison as he pretends to be, he is singularly ignorant of the man, or else he refuses to tell all that he knows. In his talk yesterday he dropped the name of a man as one of those with whom Ellison spent much of his time, and that man I am very well acquainted with.

“While this young man made no pretentions to intimate friendship with Ellison, yet he knew enough about him to know that his life was not quite as correct as Sanborn would have us believe.

“It is from him that I learned about the yacht, the Philadelphia trips, and that Ellison was involved in two or three scrapes that did not become public. I take it young Sanborn is no longer important to us.”

“The girl Alice,” said Chick, “said that he, if he is the young Englishman, was very attentive to Mrs. Ladew. She told the truth there, because Miss Rainforth admitted to me that Ellison had been in a foolish flirtation with her.”

“It’s all over,” cried Patsy. “That settles it.”

“Settles what?” asked Chick.

“Why, that the young Englishman is Ellison.”

“Quite right, Patsy,” said Nick.

Nick thought a moment or two, and then said:

“Philadelphia is the place where you must look for a day or two. Keep your eyes open for traces of Ellison’s valet, and for the man who came to see Ellison, and in whose cape coat Ellison went away. Patsy saw them both, and that is an advantage.

“I will follow up the Rainforth matter here, but that, in my judgment, is where Ida will have to do most of the work. You can’t get away any too quickly.”

“I suppose,” said Chick, “what we’ve got to work on there is how Lannigan came to get a line on the wedding presents at Sanborn’s.”

“Of course,” said Nick, “there is a connection there with Ellison, somehow. Whether with Ellison’s knowledge or not is a question, but on working in Philadelphia on the line of Ellison’s doings, and on the line of how Lannigan was steered to the wedding, you may find out much that is valuable for us to know in tracing the mystery of Ellison’s disappearance.”

The two young detectives went away to prepare for their trip to Philadelphia.

As soon as they were gone, Nick summoned Ida.

She was not long in coming, and, when she did arrive, Nick said to her:

“Ida, I have got something for you to do which, I think, is about as difficult as anything you have undertaken.”

He told her the experiences of Chick and Patsy with the young Rainforth woman, and the discovery that she was the writer of the two anonymous letters.

“That young woman puzzles me,” said Nick. “I know something about her. Her father is an old army officer, very rich, who long since retired. The young girl, with her brother, was brought up at army posts in the West, in the wild Indian fighting times, and learned many things there that are not usually a part of a fashionable young lady’s education.

“She learned how to ride vicious horses and how to use firearms. She is an expert shot with both rifle and revolver. Besides, she can wield the sword as well as a soldier.

“Where she learned the accomplishment of boxing that she made a display of with Patsy, I don’t know. Probably after she returned to the East, and as a consequence of having already certain manly attainments.

“She is good at many of that sort of thing--lawn tennis, golf and yachting.

“All these things, although they have made her much talked about, have not given her the reputation of being fast. But it a queer story that Patsy tells of her, and it is borne out in Chick’s interview with her.

“The fact which concerns us is, that she knew about the attempt or intention to rob the Sanborn house, and that she knows more about Ellison’s private life than his associates do.”

“I should think,” said Ida, “from what you say, that she was involved with Ellison herself, and that the knowledge she obtained came through that connection.”

“It may be so,” said Nick, “but I am inclined to believe that all there was of that connection was a desire on her part to capture Ellison for herself.”

Ida laughed and said:

“Our sex is a queer thing. This Miss Rainforth seems to be a very bold, energetic and courageous young woman. If you are right, and she has been scorned by Ellison, there is no knowledge to what lengths she will go.”

“Well,” said Nick, “it is for you to get into relations with her, and find out what you can. It is a difficult thing. How will you go about it?”

“That does not seem to me to be as important,” replied Ida, “as to know how to deal with her when I do get to her.”

“Getting to her is no small matter, Ida,” said Nick. “Miss Rainforth is a fashionable young lady. Usually, her movements are wholly within fashionable circles of the most exclusive kind. Her escapade of last night is not usual, and you cannot count on getting to her by finding her outside of her own circles.”

“Leave it to me,” replied Ida, “to get to her. The thing in my mind is, as I said before, how to deal with her when I do get to her.”

“Well,” asked Nick, “have you any theory?”

“From what has been told me,” replied Ida, “I don’t think that gentle methods, or wheedling, or coaxing, will accomplish anything. Unless she has no sort of regard for her private character, I think we will have to try to frighten her.”

“Well,” said Nick, “we will have to leave that to you, and you must be governed by your judgment of her when you reach her.”

After some further talk, Ida left Nick, still undetermined as to the methods she would use in getting to the singular young lady.

As she was thinking on the street, her steps were led almost involuntarily to Sixty-eighth Street. Standing for a moment on the corner of that street and Fifth Avenue, she suddenly made up her mind, and, walking rapidly down the street, went to the Rainforth house and rang the bell.

When the door was opened, Ida said to the servant:

“Is Miss Julia Rainforth in?”

“What name am I to present?” asked the servant.

“My name will mean nothing to Miss Rainforth,” said Ida. “Tell her a lady would like to see her on a matter of much importance.”

The servant ushered Ida into a small reception-room on one side of the hall, and disappeared.

He was back again in a few moments with a message that Miss Rainforth desired to know the business of the person who had called.

“Inform Miss Rainforth,” said Ida, “that the business I have come about is that which Miss Rainforth will not care to have known to her servants.”

The servant went off, and was back again in a few moments, bringing with him some paper, a pencil and an envelope.

“Miss Rainforth,” he said, “orders me to say that, if the business cannot be stated to a servant, it can be written on this paper.”

Ida was about to return the paper with the word that a personal interview alone would do, when a thought struck her.

She took the paper and pencil and hastily wrote on it:

“Ellison. Mysterious disappearance. Elsie Sanborn. Mrs. Ladew.”

As she wrote this last name, some one passed through the hall of whom Ida caught but a glimpse through the openings of the portières.

Yet that glimpse suggested to her the man who came to see Ellison on the day of his wedding, as described by Patsy.

Not that she believed that it was the man, but the fancied resemblance suggested an idea.

She added hastily to what she had already written on the paper the following:

“The mysterious stranger who called on Ellison on the day of his
wedding.”

She folded the paper, inclosing it in the envelope, sealed it, and gave it to the servant.

In a very short time the servant was back again to say that Miss Rainforth would see the caller in her own apartment.