Chapter V: Part 5

"That don't bother me none," said Philo Gubb. "If you didn't do it, I don't know who did. Just about the best thing you can do is to account for the chicken and pay my expenses of getting you, and the quicker you do it the better off you'll be."

Pale as Wixy was, he turned still paler when Philo Gubb mentioned the chicken.

"I never killed the Chicken!" he almost shouted. "I never did it!"

"I don't care whether you killed the chicken or not," said Philo Gubb calmly. "The chicken is gone, and I reckon that's the end of the chicken. But Mrs. Smith has got to be paid."

"Did she send you?" asked Wixy, trembling. "Did Mother Smith put you onto me?"

"She did so," said the Correspondence School detective. "And you can pay up or go to jail. How'd you like that?"

Wixy studied the tall detective.

"Look here," he said. "S'pose I give you fifty and we call it square." He meant fifty dollars.

"Maybe that would satisfy Mrs. Smith," said Philo Gubb, thinking of fifty cents, "but it don't satisfy me. My time's valuable and it's got to be paid for. Ten times fifty ain't a bit too much, and if it had took longer to catch you I'd have asked more. If you want to give that much, all right. And if you don't, all right too."

Wixy studied the face of Philo Gubb carefully. There was no sign of mercy in the bird-like face of the paper-hanger detective. Indeed, his face was severe. It was relentless in its sternness. Five dollars was little enough to ask for two nights of first-class Correspondence School detective work. Rather than take less he would lead the chicken thief to jail. And Wixy, with his third, and half of the Chicken's third, of the proceeds of the criminal job that had led to the death of the Chicken, knowing the relentlessness of Mother Smith, that female Fagin of Chicago, considered that he would be doing well to purchase his freedom for five hundred dollars.

"All right, pal," he said suddenly. "You're on. It's a bet. Here you are."

He slipped his hand into his pocket and drew out a great roll of money. With the muzzle of Philo Gubb's pistol hovering just out of reach before him, he counted out five crisp one hundred dollar bills. He held them out with a sickly grin. Philo Gubb took them and looked at them, puzzled.

"What's this for?" he asked, and Wixy suddenly blazed forth in anger.

"Now, don't come any of that!" he cried. "A bargain is a bargain. Don't you come a-pretendin' you didn't say you'd take five hundred, and try to get more out of me! I won't give you no more--I won't! You can jug me, if you want to. You can't prove nothin' on me, and you know it. Have you found the body of the Chicken? Well, you got to have the corpus what-you-call-it, ain't you? Huh? Ain't five hundred enough? I bet the Chicken never cost Mother Smith more than a hundred and fifty--"

"I was only thinkin'--" began Philo Gubb.

"Don't think, then," said Wixy.

"Five hundred dollars seemed too--" Philo began again.

"It's all you'll get, if I hang for it," said Wixy firmly. "You can give Mother Smith what you want, and keep what you want. That's all you'll get."

Philo Gubb could not understand it. He tried to, but he could not understand it at all. And then suddenly a great light dawned in his brain. There was something this chicken thief knew that he and Mrs. Smith did not know. The stolen chicken must have been of some rare and much-sought strain. So it was all right. The thief was paying what the chicken was worth, and not what Mrs. Smith thought it was worth in her ignorance. He slipped the money into his pocket.

"All right," he said. "I'm satisfied if you are. The chicken was a fancy bird, ain't it so?"

"The Chicken was a tough old rooster, that's what he was," said Wixy, staggering to his feet.

"I thought he was a hen," said Philo Gubb. "Mrs. Smith said he was a hen."

Wixy laughed a sickly laugh.

"That ain't much of a joke. That's why everybody called him Chicken, because his first name was Hen."

Philo Gubb's mouth fell open. He was convinced now that he had to do with an insane man. Wixy moved toward the open drying-floor.

"Well, so 'long, pard," he said to Philo Gubb. "Give my regards to Mother Smith. And say," he added, "if you see Sal, don't let her know what happened to the Chicken. Don't say anybody made away with the Chicken, see? Tell Sal the Chicken flew the coop himself, see?"

"Who is Sal?" asked Philo Gubb.

"You ask Mother Smith," said Wixy. "She'll tell you." And he went out into the dark. Philo Gubb heard him shuffle across the drying-floor, and when the sound had died away in the distance he put up his revolver.

"Five hundred dollars!" he said, and he routed Mrs. Smith out of bed. He did not tell her the amount of reward he had made the chicken thief pay. He asked her what the most expensive chicken in the world might be worth, and she reluctantly accepted ten dollars as being far too much. Then he asked her who Sal was.

"Sal?" queried Mrs. Smith.

"The chicken thief declared the statement that you would know," said Mr. Gubb. "He said to tell her--"

"Well, Mr. Gubb," said Mrs. Smith tartly, "I don't know any Sal, and if I did I wouldn't carry messages to her for a chicken thief, and it is past midnight, and the draught on my bare feet is giving me my death of cold, and if you think this is a pink tea for me to stand around and hold fool conversation at, I don't!"

And she slammed the door.

THE DRAGON'S EYE

It was with great pleasure that Mr. Gubb carried four hundred and ninety dollars to Mr. Medderbrook, and his intended father-in-law received him quite graciously.

"This is more like it, Gubb," he said. "Keep the money coming right along and you'll find I'm a good friend and a faithful one."

"I aim so to do to the best of my ability," said Mr. Gubb, delighted to find Mr. Medderbrook in a good humor. "I hope to get the eleven thousand two hundred and sixty dollars I owe you paid up--"

"Where do you get that?" asked Mr. Medderbrook. "You owe me twelve thousand dollars, Gubb."

"It was eleven thousand seven hundred and fifty," said Mr. Gubb, "and this here payment of four hundred and ninety--"

"Ah!" said Mr. Medderbrook, "but the Utterly Hopeless Gold-Mine has declared a dividend--"

"But," ventured Mr. Gubb timidly, "I thought dividends was money that came to the owner of the stock."

"Often so," said Mr. Medderbrook. "I may say, not infrequently so. But in this case it was a compound ten per cent reversible dividend, cumulative and retroactive, payable to prior owners of the stock, on account of the second mortgage debenture lien. In such a case," he explained, "unless the priority is waived by the party of the first part, you have to pay it to me."

"Oh!" said Mr. Gubb.

"Luckily," said Mr. Medderbrook, "I was able to prevail upon the registrar of the company to make the dividend only ten cumulative per cents instead of eleven retroactive geometrical per cents, or you would now owe me thirteen thousand dollars."

"Well, I'm sure I'm much obliged to you," said Mr. Gubb with sincere gratitude. "I appreciate your kindness of good-will most greatly."

He stood for a minute or two uneasily, while Mr. Medderbrook frowned like a great financier burdened with cares.

"I don't suppose," said Mr. Gubb, when he had screwed up his courage, "you have had no telegraphic communications from Miss Syrilla?"

"Why, yes, I have," said Mr. Medderbrook, taking a telegram from his pocket, "and it will only cost you one dollar to read it. I paid two dollars."

Mr. Gubb was very glad to pay the small sum and he eagerly devoured the telegram, which read:--

Oh be joyful! Have given up all meat diet. Have given up
beef, pork, lamb, mutton, veal, chicken, pigs' feet, bacon,
hash, corned beef, venison, bear steak, frogs' legs,
opossum, and fried snails. Weigh only nine hundred and forty
pounds. Affectionate thoughts to little Gubby.

"I wish," said Mr. Gubb wistfully, when he had read the message, "that Miss Syrilla could be here present this week in Riverbank whilst the Carnival is going on."

"She would draw a big crowd at twenty-five cents admission," said Mr. Medderbrook.

"I was thinking how pleasantly nice it would be for her to enjoy the festivities of the occasion," said Mr. Gubb, but this was not quite true. What he wished was that she could be present to see him in the handsome disguise he had obtained for his work as Official Detective of the Carnival, and which he was now about to don.

This, the second day of the Third Riverbank Carnival, opened with a sun hot enough to frizzle bacon, and the ladies in charge of the lemonade, ice-cream and ice-cream cone booths were pleased, while the committee from Riverbank Lodge P.& G. M., No. 788, selling broiled frankfurters (known as "hot dogs"), groaned. It was no day for hot food. But it was grand Carnival weather.

The grounds opened at one-thirty and the amateur circus began at two-thirty, but Philo Gubb, the detective, was on the grounds in full regalia by ten o'clock in the morning. Through some awful error on the part of the Chicago costumer, Philo Gubb's regalia had not arrived in time for the first day of the Carnival, so he had absented himself rather than let the crooks and thieves who were supposed to swarm the grounds have an opportunity to become acquainted with his appearance and thus be put on their guard against the famous Correspondence School detective.

When the Committee on Organization of the Third Carnival and Circus for the benefit of the Riverbank Free Hospital held its first public mass meeting in Willcox Hall, Philo Gubb had been there. Like all the rest of Riverbank, he was willing to assist the good cause in any way he could, and he had meant to donate his services as official paper-hanger, but a grander opportunity offered. Mr. Beech, the Chairman of the Committee on Peanuts and Police Protection, offered Mr. Gubb the position of Official Detective. Mr. Gubb accepted eagerly.

During the weeks of preparation for the Carnival, a thousand plans for getting the better of pickpockets and other crooks passed through Philo Gubb's mind. He finally decided to disguise himself as Ali Baba. He had a slight recollection that Ali Baba had something to do with forty thieves. It seemed an appropriate _alias_.

His disguise he ordered from the Supply Department of the Rising Sun Detective Agency, where he bought all his disguises. It consisted of a tall conical cap spangled with stars, a sort of red Mother-Hubbard gown bespattered with black crescents, a small metal tube, and a wand. With the metal tube came several hundred sheets of apparently blank paper, but, when these were rolled into cylinders and inserted in the metal tube for half a minute, characters appeared on the sheets. A child could work the magic tube, and so could Philo Gubb.

It was not until the second day that Mr. Beech thought of Mr. Gubb at all. Then Mrs. Phillipetti, daughter-in-law of General Phillipetti, who was Ambassador to Siberia in 1867, asked for Mr. Gubb. Mrs. Phillipetti was in charge of the Hot Waffles Booth, No. 13, aided by seventeen ladies of the highest society Riverbank could boast, and they served hot waffles with their own fair hands to all who chose to buy. The cooking of the waffles, being a warm task in late June, had been turned over to three colored women, hired for the occasion, and to complete the "ongsomble" and make things perfectly "apropos"--two of Mrs. Phillipetti's favorite words--the three colored women had been dressed as Turkish slaves, while Mrs. Phillipetti and her aides dressed as Beauties of the Harem.

To judge by Mrs. Phillipetti's costume, the Beauties of the Harem were expensive to clothe. She had more silk, gold lace, and tinsel strung upon her ample form than would set a theatrical costumer up in business, but the star feature of her costume was her turban. It was a gorgeous creation, and would have been a comfortable piece of headgear in midwinter, although slightly heating for a hot June day, but it came near being the talk of the Carnival, for in the center of the front, just above her forehead, Mrs. Phillipetti had pinned the celebrated brooch containing the Dragon's Eye--the priceless ruby given to old General Phillipetti by the Dugosh of Zind after the old diplomat had saved the worthless life of the old reprobate by appealing to the Vice-Regent of Siberia in his behalf.

The Dragon's Eye was about the size of a lemon and weighed nearly as much as a pound of creamery butter, so it required considerable turban to make it "apropos" and complete its "ongsomble." Pinned on her shelf-like chest, Mrs. Phillipetti wore a small mirror somewhat smaller than a tea saucer. By tipping the outer edge of the mirror upward and glancing down into it, Mrs. Phillipetti had a good view of the entire façade of her turban, reflected in the mirror, and she was thus able to keep an eye on the Dragon's Eye.

"Oh, Mr. Beech!" cried Mrs. Phillipetti, stopping him as he was bustling past her booth, "_do_ you know where Mr. Gubb is?"

"Gubb? Gubb?" said Mr. Beech. "Oh! that paper-hanger-detective fellow? No, I don't know where he is. Why?"

"It's gone! The Dragon's Eye is gone!" moaned Mrs. Phillipetti.

Mr. Beech, although greatly concerned, tried to maintain his composure. Mrs. Phillipetti explained that she had removed her turban and placed it under a chair at the back of the booth. A little later she had noticed that the turban, with the priceless Dragon's Eye, was gone.

"Now, this--now--was not wholly unexpected," Beech said. "It's a--now--unfortunate thing, but it's the sort of thing that happens. Now, Mrs. Phillipetti, just let me beg you not to say anything about it to anybody, and I'll have Detective Gubb get right on the case. The matter is in my hands. Rest easy! We will attend to it."

"I--I hate to lose the Dragon's Eye," said Mrs. Phillipetti, wiping her eyes, "but the worst is to have my turban stolen. Mr. Beech, I will give one hundred dollars to whoever returns the Dragon's Eye to me. The 'ongsomble' of my costume is ruined. I haven't anything else 'apropos' to wear on my head."

"You look fine just as you are," said Mr. Beech. "But if you want something to wear, you can get a Turkish hat at the Paper Hat Booth for twenty-five cents."

"Thank you!" said Mrs. Phillipetti scornfully. "I don't wear twenty-five-cent hats!"

Within twenty minutes the Boy Scouts, who were acting as Aides to the Executive Committee, had tacked in ten prominent places ten hastily daubed placards that read:--

Philo Gubb, please report at Executive Booth.
Beech, Chmn. Police Committee.

And the members of the Board of Managers had, singly and by roundabout routes, approached the scene of the theft and had studied it.

To the left of Mrs. Phillipetti's booth was the Ethiopian Dip. Here, some thirty feet back from a counter and shielded by a net, a negro sat on an elevated perch just over a canvas tub full of water. In front of the net was a small target, and if a patron of the game hit the target with a baseball, the negro suddenly and unexpectedly dropped into the tub of water. The price was three throws for five cents.

As Riverbank had some remarkably clever baseball throwers, the Ethiopian was dipped quite frequently. As the water was cold and such a bath an unusual luxury for the Riverbank Ethiopians, no one Ethiopian cared to be dipped very often in succession. Therefore the Committee of Seven of the Exempt Firemen's Association, which had the Dip in charge, had arranged for a quick change of Ethiopians, and while one sat on the perch to be dipped, three others lolled in bathing costumes just back of Mrs. Phillipetti's booth.

Mr. Beech questioned the colored men quietly.

"Turbine?" said one of them. "We ain't seen no turbine. We ain't seen nuffin'. We ain't done nuffin' but sit here an' play craps."

"But you were here?" said Mr. Beech.

"Yes, we was heah," said the blackest negro. "We was right heah all de time. Dey ain't been no turbine took from nowhar whilst we was heah, neither. Ain't been nobody back heah but us, an' we's been heah all de time."

"Well, perhaps you can tell how this board got pried loose, if you were here all the time," said Mr. Beech.

"It wa'n't pried loose," said the yellow negro. "Hit got kicked loose f'om de hinside. I know dat much, annerways. I seen dat oc-cur. I seen dat board bulge out an' bulge out an' bulge out twell hit bust out. An' dey hain't no turbine come out, nuther. No, sah!"

Mr. Beech went away. The detective business was not his business. He specialized in coal and not in crime. But in going he passed by Mrs. Phillipetti's booth and spoke to her.

"It will be all right," he said reassuringly. "We are on the track."

"Oh, thank you!" said Mrs. Phillipetti, who had completed the "apropriety" of her "ongsomble" by wrapping a green silk handkerchief about her head.

"I hope to return the turban and the jewel sometime to-morrow," said Mr. Beech, bluffing bravely.

But Philo Gubb did not heed the notices posted to call him to the Executive Booth. The evening passed and he did not appear, and Mr. Beech, on his way home, stopped at the police station. It was after midnight, but Chief of Police Wittaker was still on duty. He never slept during the Carnival.

Mr. Beech explained the loss of the turban and the Dragon's Eye, and early the next morning the Chief himself took up the hunt. By three o'clock in the afternoon he had discovered several things. He discovered that the yellow man who had claimed to see the board pushed out from the inside was the husband of one of the waffle cooks in Mrs. Phillipetti's booth. He learned that the yellow man had been in jail. He learned that for a few minutes the yellow negro had been alone behind the waffle booth. The Chief thereupon arrested the yellow negro.

As he led the negro from the grounds by the back way, in order to cause as little commotion as possible, he brushed by a strange creature dressed as a wizard, who was standing by the rear entrance, droning: "Tell your fortune, ten cents! Tell your fortune, ten cents!" The wizard was tall and thin and wore a long white beard, a sort of Mother-Hubbard gown, and a pointed cap. As the Chief passed with his prisoner the wizard turned his eyes on the two, and then droned on. It was Philo Gubb, the paper-hanger detective, on the job!

Philo Gubb, having received his costume, had come to the Carnival grounds the back way. He had wandered about the grounds, peeking and peering, seeking malefactors unsuccessfully. He felt the whole weight of the Carnival on his shoulders. When he suspected a youth he followed him at a safe distance, stopping when he stopped, going on when he went on. He was so intent on trailing and shadowing that he did not even notice the placards calling him to the Executive Booth. Every few minutes he had to stop and tell a fortune with the magic tube. So far he had collected two dollars and sixty cents.

The Chief, with his prisoner walking quietly by his side,--to avoid unpleasant commotion in an otherwise orderly crowd,--had just passed the wizard when he heard voices that made him look back.

"There he is!" said one voice. "Kick him off the grounds!"

"Here, you!" said another voice. "You've got to get out of here. And you've got to give up the money you've taken. Quick now. We don't allow any professionals on these grounds."

The voices were those of Henry P. Cross, Officer of the Day for this day of the Carnival, and Sam Green, Jr., Vice-Chairman of Police, and they were speaking to the wizard.

"Sh!" said the wizard, in a mysterious voice. "It's all right! Don't make a fuss. It's all right!"

"Let me kick him off the grounds!" said Mr. Cross. "All I want is a chance to kick him off the grounds. The cheap professional fakir, sneaking in to get money that ought to go to the Hospital! Let me kick--"

"Now, wait!" said Mr. Green irritably. "We want to make him disgorge first, don't we? Just keep your head on, Cross. Let me handle this."

"It's all right! Don't make a fuss," whispered the wizard. "I belong here."

"You belong nowhere!" shouted Mr. Cross. "You belong here, indeed! Why, you couldn't tell that to a baby! I guess not! Telling fortunes and putting the cash in your pocket. Don't the Ladies' Aid of the Second Baptist Church have the exclusive fortune-telling privilege? Didn't they put us onto you?"

The Chief turned back.

"What's up?" he asked.

"Professional," said Mr. Green. "Some Chicago grafter trying to make money out of our show."

"I'm all right, I tell you," said Philo Gubb earnestly. "I'm no crook. You see Beech. Ask Beech. Have Beech come here."

Mr. Cross looked at Mr. Green.

"You mean you fixed it with Beech so you could tell fortunes here?" asked Mr. Cross.

"Yes, that's what I mean," said Philo Gubb. "You get Beech."

"Get Beech," said Mr. Green. "Beech will throw him out."

"I'll watch him," said the Chief. "If he tries to move I'll club him."

Mr. Cross and Mr. Green hurried away, and the Chief dangled his club meaningly. The yellow man, who had been standing awaiting the end of the controversy, seated himself on the grass and leaned his back against a tree. Philo Gubb, as evidence that he did not mean to run, also seated himself, and leaned back against the same tree. The Chief stood a short distance away, his eyes keenly on them.

"How about it, Chicago man?" asked the yellow man in a low tone, bending down to pick a blade of grass. "Kin you he'p a feller out?"

"How?" asked Philo Gubb.

"I got in trouble," said the yellow man. "I'm gwine git hit in de neck ef some one don't he'p me mighty quick. Ef I hand you somethin' is you gwine take it?"

"Sure," said Philo Gubb.

"Grab it!" whispered the yellow man, and his hand slid the Dragon's Eye into the hand of Philo Gubb.

The Chief moved nearer.

"I guess dey let me go whin dey git me to de calaboose," said the yellow man in a louder voice. "Kaze I ain' done nuffin' nohow."

"They'll let you go when we get that ruby," said the Chief meaningly; "and if we can prove it on you, you go to the pen'."

Mr. Cross and Mr. Green returned with Mr. Beech.

"There he is," said Mr. Cross, pointing to the wizard Gubb.

"Never saw him in my life!" said Mr. Beech. "Now, then, what is this now? What's this story you--"

The paper-hanger detective arose and leaned close to Mr. Beech's ear. He whispered three words and Mr. Beech's attitude changed entirely.

"Oh!" he said. "I wondered where--now--all right! It's all right! It's all right, Cross. All right, Green. All right, Chief!" Then he turned to Gubb. "We've been wanting you, detective. Put up placards for you. Now, listen! Mrs. Phillipetti had a turban stolen from her booth, and that infernal ton and a half or so of ruby was in it. The Dragon's Eye, she calls it. Well, that turban was stolen--"

"I am quite well acquainted with that fact," said Philo Gubb.

"Well, why don't you hunt for it, then?" asked Mr. Beech crossly. "I thought you were going to be of some use. Fooling around here with your silly ten-cent fortune-telling, having the time of your life while all of us are worrying about that Dragon's Eye. Why don't you hunt for it?"

"It ain't hardly necessary to engage in deteckative exertions at the present moment on account of that ruby," said Philo Gubb slowly, "because when I want it, all I got to do is to consult the magic deteckative tube."

"You're crazy!" said Mr. Beech. "You're crazy as a loon!"

"The usual price for consulting the oracle is ten cents," said Philo Gubb, "but I'll make a special exception out of this time."

He put the end of the magic tube to his ear and listened.

"The genyi of the tube says I've got the Dragon's Eye into my pocket, and if you ask this yellow negro black-man he'll tell you where the turban is at."

"Honest!" exclaimed Mr. Beech. "Gubb, you're a wonder!"

The negro, thus trapped, told where he had hidden the turban, and in a few minutes Mr. Beech, Mr. Cross, and Mr. Green returned with Mrs. Phillipetti, on whose head again towered the turban with the Dragon's Eye gleaming in it, making her "ongsomble" thoroughly "apropos."

"Gubb," said Mr. Beech, "I want Mrs. Phillipetti to meet you. You certainly are a wizard."

"Yes, indeed!" said Mrs. Phillipetti. "The wizardry of your whole ongsomble is completely apropos to your detective ability."

THE PROGRESSIVE MURDER

When Philo Gubb paid Mr. Medderbrook the one hundred dollars he had received for retrieving the Dragon's Eye, Mr. Medderbrook was not extremely gracious.

"I'll take it on account," he said grudgingly, "but it ought to be more. It only brings what you owe me for that Utterly Hopeless Gold-Mine stock down to eleven thousand nine hundred dollars and, at this rate, you'll never get me paid up. I can't tell when there'll come along another dividend of ten cumulative per cents on that stock, that I will have to charge up against you. Unless you can do better I have half a mind not to let you see the telegram I got from my daughter Syrilla this morning."

"Was the news into it good?" asked Mr. Gubb eagerly.

"As good as gold," said Mr. Medderbrook. "As good as Utterly Hopeless Gold-Mine stock."

"What did Miss Syrilla convey the remark of?" asked the lovelorn paper-hanger detective.

"Well, now," said Mr. Medderbrook, "I went and paid two dollars and fifty cents for that telegram. For one dollar and twenty-five cents I'll give you the telegram, and you can read it from start to finish."

Mr. Gubb, his heart palpitating as only a lover's heart can palpitate, paid Mr. Medderbrook the sum he asked and eagerly read the telegram from Syrilla. It said:--

Grand news! Have given up all fish diet. Have given up
codfish, weak fish, sole, flounder, shark's fins, bass,
trout, herring (dried, kippered, smoked, and fresh), finnan
haddie, perch, pike, pickerel, lobster, halibut, and stewed
eels. Gross weight now only nine hundred and thirty pounds
averdupois. Sweet thoughts to Gubby-lubby.

"You are touched," said Mr. Medderbrook as Mr. Gubb put the dear missive to his lips, "but unless I am mistaken you will be still more deeply touched when you pay for--when you read Syrilla's next telegram."

"I so hope and trust," said Mr. Gubb, and he returned to his office in the Opera House Block with a light heart.

* * * * *

With the increase of fame that came to him as a detective Mr. Gubb's paper-hanging business had grown, and he had left Mrs. Murphy's house and taken a room on the second floor of Opera House Block, near the offices of ex-Judge Gilroy, attorney-at-law, and C. M. Dillman, loans and real estate. The door now bore the sign

PHILO GUBB
DETECKATIVE
Also Paper-hanging

On this morning Detective Gubb had hardly reached his office when Uncle Gabriel Hostetter, a shrewd smile on his face, opened Mr. Gubb's door.

Uncle Gabriel Hostetter was a round-shouldered old man with a long white beard that came to a thin point. He wore old-fashioned gold-rimmed spectacles, the rims forming irregular octagons, and on his head he wore one of the grandest old silk hats that ever saw the light of day in 1865. His principal garment was a frock coat, once black, but now grayish green. He was the wealthiest man in town, and it was said that when he once got his hands on a silver dollar he squeezed it so hard that the bird of freedom on it uttered a squawk.

He opened Philo Gubb's door hesitatingly. He expected to see an array of mahogany desks and filing cabinets for which he would have to pay every time the detective turned around. When he peered into the room he saw a tall, thin man in white overalls with a bib, sitting on an up-ended bundle of wall-paper, stirring a pail of paste with one hand while he ate a ham sandwich by means of the other.

"I guess I got in the wrong place," said Uncle Gabe. "Thought this was a detective office. All right! All right!"

"I'm him," said Philo Gubb, swallowing a hunk of sandwich with a gulp and wiping his hand on his overalls.

"You're who?" asked Uncle Gabe.

"I'm the deteckative," said Philo Gubb.

"You are, hey?" said Uncle Gabe. "All disguised up, I reckon."

"Disguised up?" said Philo questioningly. "Oh, this here paper-hanging and decorating stuff? No, this ain't no disguise. Even a deteckative has got to earn a living while his practice is building up."

"Humph!" said old Gabe. "Detecting ain't very good right now?"

"It ain't, for a fact," said Philo.

"Well, if that's so," said old Gabe, "maybe you and me could do business. If you want to do a little detective work to sort of keep your hand in, maybe we can do business."

"I ought to git paid something," said Philo doubtfully.

"Pay!" exclaimed old Gabe. "Pay for bein' allowed to sharpen up and keep bright? Why, you'd ought to pay me for lettin' you have the practice. It ain't goin' to do me no good, is it?"

"I don't know what you want me to detect yet," said Philo. "I might pay some if it was a case that would do me good to practice on. I might pay a little."

"I knew it," said old Gabe. "Now, this case of mine--What sort of a case _would_ you pay to work on?"

"Well," said Philo thoughtfully, "if I was to have a chance at a real tough murder case, for instance."

"Humph!" said old Gabe. "How much might you pay to be let work on a case like that?"

"Well, I dunno!" said Philo Gubb thoughtfully. "If it looked like a mighty hard case I might pay a dollar a day--if it was a murder case."

"This case of mine," said old Gabe, coming farther into the room, "is just that sort of a case. And I'll let you work on it for a dollar and a quatter a day."

"Well, if it's that kind of a case," said Philo slowly, "I'll give you a dollar a day, and I'll work on it hard and faithful."

"A dollar and a quatter a day," insisted old Gabe.

"No, sir, a dollar is all I can afford to pay," said Philo.

"All right, I won't be mean," said old Gabe. "Make it a dollar an' fifteen cents and we'll call it a go."

"One dollar a day," said Philo.

"A dollar, ten cents," urged old Gabe.

"One dollar," said Philo.

"Tell you what let's do," said old Gabe. "We ain't but ten cents apart. You add on a nickel and I'll knock off a nickel, and we'll make it a dollar five. What say? That's fair enough. You ain't come up any. I come all the way down."

"All right, then," said Philo. "It's a go. Now, who was murdered, and when was he murdered, and why was he murdered? Them's the things I've got to know first."

"You pay me a dollar five for the first day's work, and I'll tell you," said old Gabe.

Philo dug into his pocket and drew out some money. "There," he said. "There's two dollars and ten cents. That pays for two days. Now, go ahead."

He drew out his notebook and wet the end of a pencil and waited.

"The reason this is such a hard case," said old Gabe slowly, and choosing his words with care, "is because the murder ain't completed yet. It's being did."

"Right now?" exclaimed Philo excitedly. "Why, we oughtn't to be sitting here like this. We ought--"

"Now, don't be in such a hurry," said old Gabe. "If you mean we ought to be where the victim of the murder is, we are. He's right here now. I'm him. I'm the one that's being murdered. I'm being murdered by slow murder. I'm liable to drop down dead any minute. But I don't want to be murdered and not have the feller that murders me hang like he ought. I can't be expected to. It ain't human nature."

"No, it ain't," agreed Philo. "A man can't help feeling revengeful against the man that murders him. If anybody murdered me I'd feel the same way. How's he killing you? Slow poison?"

"Gun-shot," said old Gabe. "Shootin' me to death with a gun."

The correspondence school detective looked at old Gabe with amazement.

"Shootin' you to death with a gun!" he exclaimed. "Ain't you told the police?"

"I come to you, didn't I?" asked old Gabe. "If I was to set the police on the feller he might rouse up and shoot me to death all at once."

"How is he shootin' you to death?" asked Philo.

"By inches, b'gee," said old Gabe. "Yes, sir, by inches. Every once in a while he takes a shot at me. Sometimes through the window of my house, and sometimes when I'm walkin' on the street."

"And he ain't ever hit you yet?" asked Philo Gubb.

"Hit me?" exclaimed old Gabe. "Why, he don't ever miss me. He hits me every time. There ain't a day he don't shoot and hit me, and some days he hits me two or three times. I dare say I'm almost dead now, if I knowed it."

Philo Gubb fondled his notebook uncertainly.

"What--what does he shoot you with?" he asked.

"Well, I dunno exactly," said old Gabe. "With a pea-shooter."

Philo Gubb closed his notebook, and slipped it into his pocket.

"If all you was after was to get that two dollars and ten cents, you might have got it without wastin' so much of my time," he said reproachfully.

But old Gabe did not move.

"What's the matter?" he asked.

"Maybe I'm a fool," Gubb said bitterly, "but I ain't no such fool as to think anybody is murdering nobody with a pea-shooter."

"Was you ever shot with a cannon?" asked old Gabe calmly.

"No, nor nobody ever tried to murder me with a pea-shooter," said Philo Gubb.

"If you ever _was_ shot by a thirteen-inch cannon ball," said old Gabe, "you'd know it. When a thirteen-inch cannon ball hits you, there ain't nothin' left of you at all. But when a one-inch cannon ball hits you, you've got a chance to live a minute or two, maybe. That's the difference between a thirteen-inch cannon ball shootin' you, and a one-inch cannon ball shootin' you. And a rifle ball is different, too."

"I got a job of paper-hangin' as soon as I can get away from here," said Philo Gubb meaningly.

"You got a job of detectin' on hand now," said old Gabe. "And, as I was sayin', a rifle ball acts different. Maybe it kills you the first shot, and maybe you can hold three or four rifle bullets before you die, but if they keep on shootin' at you, you get killed sooner or later. Probably five shots is all any man could stand. I guess that's about it.

"And then you come down to one of them little twenty-two caliber revolvers. If he don't hit you in the heart, a murderer could easy enough shoot at you twenty-five times with one of them little twenty-two's before he killed you dead. But you'd be dead sooner or later. It's just a matter of what a man shoots you with that makes the difference in time.

"Of course," he continued agreeably, "you don't expect no pea-shooter to kill me as quick as a thirteen-inch gun would. If you expect that you're unreasonable. But the principle is just the same. Shootin' is shootin'. You know how that pome goes--

'The constant drip of water
Wears away the hardest stone--'

and that's just as true of murderin' a man with a pea-shooter.

"And the beauty of it is that nobody knows you're committin' a murder. If anybody catches you and asks you what you're doin' you just say, 'Oh, nothin'. Just shootin' peas.'"

"Maybe that's so," agreed Philo Gubb. "It sounds reasonable. But the thing for me to do is to wait until you're dead and then catch the feller. It ain't a murder until you're dead."

"It ain't, ain't it?" sneered old Gabe. "You'd wait until I am dead, I suppose, and then start out to catch the feller. And you'd lose all the help I can give you. It ain't often a detective can get the corpse to help him like this."

"No, it ain't," agreed Philo Gubb.

"I got a suspicion who the feller is," said Gabe.

"Who?" asked Philo Gubb.

"You'll go ahead with the case? On the terms we settled on?" asked old Gabe.

Philo Gubb considered this carefully.

"Why, yes," he said at length, "I will. Who is the feller you think is doin' it?"

"Farrin'ton Pierce, the cashier of the Farmers' and Citizens' Bank," said old Gabe, his eyes shining with malice and shrewdness, as he leaned forward and whispered the words. "My own son-in-law, he is. An' I'll tell you why he's tryin' it. For my money. So his wife'll get it, an' he can be president of the bank in my place."

"You've seen him have a pea-shooter?" asked Philo Gubb.

"No, sir!" said old Gabe. "And I never seen one of the peas. All I ever felt was the sting of it when it hit me."

"Maybe," said Philo Gubb eagerly, "maybe it ain't a pea-shooter. Maybe it's a twenty-two short pistol with a silencer onto it. Maybe it's only because he's been afraid to come nigh enough to you that he ain't killed you yet. It don't seem to me that any man would try to murder any one with a pea-shooter."

"Humph!" said old Gabe. "Maybe you are right, at that. That's something I never thought of. It sounds likely, too."

"A deteckative has to think of all them things," said Philo simply. "If I was you I'd be more careful."

"I will!" said old Gabe. "See here, if he's shootin' at me like that, it ain't no joke, is it? Tell you what I'll do. I'll let you off from payin' me that dollar five a day. Just you hustle onto this case and keep at it, and I'll leave you work on it for nothin'. All I want is that you should send me word reg'lar of what you find out."

"It is the custom of all the graduates of the Rising Sun Correspondence School deteckatives to make reg'lar reports in writing," said Philo Gubb. "I'll start right in shadowing and trailing Mister Farrington Pierce, according to Lessons Three and Four, and I'll report reg'lar every day."

"Everything you find out," said old Gabe. "Don't leave out a thing. And particularly at night. That's when he shoots me the most."

"I won't leave him a minute," said Philo Gubb. "I've got a man I hire to help me on my paper-hangin', and I'll get him to finish up this job. I'll start trailin' and shadowin' Farry Pierce right away."

Old Gabe shook hands with Philo and went out. When the door was closed behind him he chuckled, and all the way home his face was creased in a grin. He felt that he had done a good bit of business and saved himself a good sum of money. Philo Gubb, in the meantime, having put a false beard and a wig in his pocket, went out.

Across the street from the bank was Grammill's Cigar Store, where the idler men of the town loafed when they had nothing better on hand, and Philo Gubb entered and bought a cigar and took an easy loafing position near the front window. He commanded a view of the only entrance to the bank, and here he waited. At fifteen minutes after three Farry Pierce came out of the bank.

"There's a man with an easy job," said one of the loafers. "That Farry Pierce. Nothing to do till to-morrow."

"Too much time on his hands, I guess," said another, who--by the way--had more spare time than Farry Pierce. "From what I hear he'd be better off if he had to work all day _and_ all night."

"The widow?" asked the first speaker.

"That's what they say," said the second. "They tell me he's blowing all his salary and more on that widow. Must make old Gabe crazy to see any of his kin spend money that way. Or any way. He's a close one, old Gabe is."

"What you hear about Farry and the widow?" asked the first.

"Makes old Gabe crazy, they tell me. He wants his girl to get a divorce."

"Who told you that?"

"My girl. My girl is workin' for his girl. Fr'm what she tells me old Gabe is pretty well worked up about it. Said he'd get a spotter to foller Farry and get some evidence on him if it didn't cost so blame much. I bet the' won't be any divorces in that family if old Gabe has to pay out any money."

"I bet they won't. And the' ain't no detectives workin' for nothin' so far as I hear. Not this year."

"No, nor next year, neither," said the other; and as this was in the nature of a joke they both laughed.

But Philo Gubb did not join their laughter. He felt his face grow red. His lean hands folded and unfolded as he watched Farry Pierce disappear around the corner of the bank building. If any one felt like murdering old Gabe with a pea-shooter at that moment, Philo Gubb did. Shadow and trail Farry Pierce! The old skin-flint, coming with a fairy tale and getting the only fully graduated deteckative in Riverbank to shadow and trail a son-in-law and report daily! Divorce case evidence, hey? Talking murderer and working a deteckative into doing scandal sleuthing free of charge! Philo Gubb's face reddened again with new anger as he put his hand in his pocket and touched the beard and wig he had placed there. But for this chance conversation he would have been following Farry Pierce now, and making a fool of himself. But for this chance conversation he would not have lost sight of Farry Pierce by day or by night. He went back to his office, put on his overalls, and went to his work on a paper-hanging job.

At six he started for home. A block down the street he met one of the loafers he had heard speaking in Grammill's Cigar Store.

"What do you think about it?" he asked Philo Gubb.

"About what?" asked Philo in return.

"Ain't you heerd?" asked the man. "Why, it's all over town by now. Farry Pierce murdered old Gabe Hostetter not more'n twenty minutes after we seen him comin' out of the bank. Shot him. Killed him first shot. Yes, sir! Killed him instantly with a little mite of a pistol with about as much carry as a pea-shooter. Must have hit him in just the right spot."

"Did you see the pistol?" asked Philo Gubb nervously.

"No, I didn't," said his informant, "but that's what the feller told me. 'Killed him instantly with one of these here little pea-shooters,' was what he said. What you lookin' so funny about?"

"If you insist to wish to know," said Philo Gubb, "Mr. Gabe Hostetter wasn't murdered instantly at all. He was progressively murdered by inches over a long considerable period of time, like little drops of water."

For a minute the loafer stared at Mr. Gubb. Then he laughed.

"Crazy!" he scoffed. "Crazy as a loon!" and he walked away and left Mr. Gubb struggling for a suitably crushing retort.

THE MISSING MR. MASTER

That evening Mr. Gubb received a short note from Mr. Medderbrook that was in the form of a bill or statement. It read: "Due from P. Gubb to J. Medderbrook, $11,900. Please remit,"--so he put on his hat and walked to Mr. Medderbrook's elegant home.

"I want you to hurry up with what you owe me," said Mr. Medderbrook, when Mr. Gubb explained that he could pay nothing on the Utterly Hopeless Gold-Mine stock at the moment, "because I know you are soft on Syrilla, and from a telegram I got from her to-day it looks as if it would be no time at all before she reduced her weight down to seven hundred pounds and Mr. Dorgan of the side-show broke his contract with her. And if you want to read the telegram you can do so by paying half what it cost me, which was three dollars."

Mr. Gubb paid Mr. Medderbrook one dollar and a half, as any lover would, and read the telegram from Syrilla. It said:--

Love is triumphing. Have given up all cereal diet. Have
given up oatmeal, rice, farina, puffed wheat, corn flakes,
hominy, shredded wheat, force, cream of wheat, grapenuts,
boiled barley, popcorn, flour paste, and rice powder. Weigh
now only nine hundred and twenty-five pounds. Soft thoughts
to dearest Gubby.

Mr. Gubb hesitated a moment and then said:--

"Far be it from me to say aught or anything, Mr. Medderbrook, but I would wish the cost of telegrams would reduce themselves down a little. This one is marked onto its upper corner 'PAID'--"

"Yes, the telegraph boy said that was a mistake," said Mr. Medderbrook hastily.

"And very likely so," said Mr. Gubb, "but for a reduction of five pounds one dollar fifty is a highish price to pay. Thirty cents a pound is too much."

"Well," said Mr. Medderbrook, "I don't want to have any quarrel with you, so I'll do this for you: I will make you a flat price of twenty-five cents per pound."

"Which is a fair and reasonable price for glad tidings to a fond heart," said Mr. Gubb, and this matter having been amicably settled, he returned to his office.

That evening he sat on the edge of his cot bed minus his coat, vest, and trousers, with his bare feet comfortably extended. At his back a pillow made a back-rest, and a bundle of wall-paper served as a rather lofty footstool. He was deeply immersed in Lesson Eleven, his bird-like face screwed into tensity. From time to time he wiggled one toe or another as a fly alighted on it. Sometimes, when more than one fly alighted on his toes at once, he wiggled all ten toes simultaneously.

A trunk, a varnished oak washstand and a cot showed that the room was not only a decorator's shop, but a living-place; and that this was the office of Philo Gubb, detective, was shown by a row of hooks from which hung various disguises used by the celebrated detective, by a portrait of William J. Burns, cut from a magazine and pasted on the wall, and by a placard which read, "P. Gubb, Graduate and Diploma-ist of the Rising Sun Detective Agency's Correspondence School of Detecting. Detecting done by the Day or Job. Terms on Application."

On the cot at Philo Gubb's side lay a copy of that day's morning Chicago paper, with a two-column spread headline reading, "Wife Offers $5000 Reward," and it was this that had driven Philo Gubb, the paper-hanger detective, to renewed study of Lesson Eleven--"Procedure in Abduction and Missing Men Cases."

Mr. Custer Master, of Chicago, had mysteriously disappeared. One paragraph in the article had caught Mr. Gubb's particular attention:--

Mrs. Master feels that her husband is still alive, and
insists that Mr. Master will be found in one of the Iowa
towns on the Mississippi River. The police of these towns
have been notified, and detectives have gone to investigate.
The Masters stand high in South-Side society. Mr. Master, it
is understood, recently inherited $450,000 from a maternal
uncle. At the time the will was probated considerable
interest was aroused by the fact that the legacy was to go
to Mr. Master only on condition that he carried out certain
provisions contained in a sealed envelope, to be read only
by the executors and Mr. Master.

And so on. The paper pointed out that Mr. Master had been a sufferer from dyspepsia for many years, but this had not had a permanently depressing effect on his mind. His home relations were most satisfactory. His own business--he was a dealer in laundry supplies and laundry machinery--was doing well, and no trace of outside troubles could be discovered.

On the morning of his disappearance, Mr. Master had shown some signs of mental eccentricity. A neighbor, happening to be at her window, saw Mr. Master come hurriedly from the door of his house. An hour later a friend passed him as he was standing on a corner six blocks from home. Mr. Master seemed greatly distressed.

"I can't do it! It kills me; I can't do it!" he was muttering to himself. "I never could do it. I said so."

The next news of Mr. Master was gained from the keeper of a bath-house and swimming-pool known as the Imperial Natatorium. About ten o'clock, Mr. Master entered the Natatorium hurriedly, asked the price of baths, and chose to pay for a plunge in the big swimming-pool. He paid in advance, removed his garments in one of the small dressing-rooms, put on a swimming-suit and went to the edge of the big pool. Here he grasped the rail and extended one foot until his toes touched the cold water, when he uttered a cry, rushed to the dressing-room, and, as soon as he had thrown on his clothes, dashed from the building. That was the last seen of Mr. Master.

Philo Gubb, having finished reading Lesson Eleven for the third time, had picked up the Chicago paper when the silence of the Opera House Building was disturbed by the sound of feet ascending the brass-clad stairs.

The nocturnal visitors seemed unacquainted with the building, for, after two or three steps had been taken, one lighted a match. It was evident to the detective that these visitors were reading the names on the doors as they progressed along the corridor, and he was about to extinguish his lamp and prepare for the worst, when the two men stopped again, struck a match, and, after an instant's hesitation, rapped sharply upon his door.

"Come in!" called Philo Gubb, at the same time drawing his bed-sheet over his scantily clad legs. He knotted the sheet behind, like an apron, and arose to greet the comers. They were two. One of them Mr. Gubb recognized at once; he was Billy Gribble, proprietor of the Gold Star Hand Laundry, just across the way on Main Street. The other man was a stranger.

Under his arm, Billy Gribble carried a long, cylindrical parcel enclosed in heavy wrapping paper. The parcel was about six feet long and nearly as large around as Billy himself. Under his other arm, Billy carried a second parcel. This was about three feet square. The trained eye of Detective Gubb noted all this at a glance. Billy Gribble dropped the two parcels on the floor.

"Gubby, old sport!" he said in his noisy way, "this is--"

"Now, now!" said the stranger irritably. "Now, wait! I said I would talk to him, didn't I? What do you mean by--if you'll please let--you are Detective Gubb, are you not?" he asked.

Philo Gubb gazed at the man. The man was tall and thin, taller and thinner than Mr. Gubb himself. He was clean-shaven and his face showed deep lines about the mouth and nose. His hair was closely clipped, making his head seem pea-like in its smallness.

But Mr. Gubb was not gazing at these things. His bird-like eyes were fastened on the end of the suitcase the stranger still held in his hand. On the end of the case were painted in black the letters "C. M." and the word "Chicago." The stranger glanced down at the suitcase and put it on the floor with a suddenness that brought forth a thumping sound.

"Clue!" he said, and he kicked the suitcase.