CHAPTER XXVI
THE ELECTROLYSIS CLEW
As Kennedy walked through the corridor of the building, he paused andbent down, as though examining the wall. I looked, too. There was acrack in the concrete, in the side wall toward the Creighton laboratory.
"Do you suppose vibration caused it?" I asked, remembering his watchcrystal test.
Craig shook his head. "The vibrations in a building can be shown by awatch glass full of water. You saw the surface of the liquid with itsminute waves. There's vibration, all right, but that is not the cause ofsuch cracks as these."
He stood for a moment regarding the crack attentively. On the floor onwhich we were was the Consolidated Bank itself. Beneath us were theConsolidated Safety Deposit vaults.
"What did cause them, then?" I asked, mystified.
"Apparently escaping currents of electricity are causing electrolysis ofthe Bank Building," he replied, his face wrinkled in thought.
"Electrolysis?" I repeated mechanically.
"Yes. I suppose you know how stray or vagrant currents affect steel andconcrete?"
I shook my head in the negative.
"Well," he explained as we stood there, "I believe that in onegovernment test at least it was shown that when an electric current ofhigh voltage passes from steel to concrete, the latter is cracked andbroken. Often a mechanical pressure as great as four or five thousandpounds a square inch is exerted and there is rapid destruction due tothe heating effect of the current."
I expressed my surprise at what he had discovered. "The danger is easilyoverestimated," he hastened to add. "But in this case I think it isreal, though probably it is a special and extreme condition. Still it isspecial and extreme conditions which we are in the habit of encounteringin our cases, Walter. That is what we must be looking out for. In thisinstance the destruction due to electrolysis is most likely caused bythe oxidation of the iron anode. The oxides which are formed are twiceas great in volume as the iron was originally and the resulting pressureis what causes the concrete to break. I think we shall find that thiscondition will bear strict watching."
For a moment Kennedy stopped at the little office of the superintendentof the building, in the rear.
"I was just wondering whether you had noticed those cracks in the wallsdown the corridor," remarked Kennedy after a brief introduction.
The superintendent looked at him suspiciously. Evidently he feared wehad some ulterior motive, perhaps represented some rival building andmight try to scare away his tenants.
"Oh, that's nothing," he said confidently. "Just the building settling abit--easily fixed."
"The safety vault company haven't complained?" persisted Kennedy,determined to get something out of the agent.
"No indeed," he returned confidently. "I guess they've got troubles oftheir own--real ones."
"How's that?" asked Craig, falling in with the man's evident desire tochange the subject.
"Why, I believe their alarm system's out of order," he replied. "Some ofthe fine wires in it burnt out, I think. Defective wiring, I guess. Oh,they've had it patched up, changed about a little,--it's all right now,they say. But they've had a deuce of a time with the alarm ringing atall sorts of hours, and not a trace of trouble."
I looked quickly at Craig. Though the superintendent thought he had beenvery clever in changing the topic of conversation, he had unwittinglyfurnished us with another clew. I could not ask Craig before him and Iforgot to do so later, but, to me at least, it seemed as if this mightbe due to induction from the stray currents.
"No one here seems to have suspected the Creighton motor, anyhow,"commented Craig to me, as we thanked the superintendent and walkedacross to the elevators.
We rode up to Tresham's office, which was on the third floor, on theside of the building toward Creighton's laboratory. In fact one of thewindows opened almost on the roof of the brick building next door.
We found Tresham in his office and he received us affably, I thought."Miss Laidlaw told me she was going to consult you," he remarked as weintroduced ourselves. "I'm glad she did so."
Tresham was a large, well-built fellow, apparently athleticallyinclined, clean shaven with dark hair that was getting very thin. Heseemed quite at ease as he talked with us, yet I could tell that he wasweighing us all the time, as lawyers will do.
"What do you think of Creighton's motor?" opened Kennedy. "You've seenit, I suppose?"
"Oh, yes," he replied quickly and jerkily. "Since Miss Laidlaw becameinterested he's been in here to have me look over his application for apatent. You know, I used to be a patent lawyer for a number of yearsuntil I decided to branch out into general practice. Legally Creightonseems to be sound enough. Of course, you know, the patent office won'tgrant a patent on a machine such as he claims without a rigiddemonstration. He needs money, he says, for that. If his idea is sound,I don't see any reason why he shouldn't get a basic patent."
Tresham paused. I was conscious that he was furtively watching the faceof Kennedy as though he hoped to learn as much from him as Craig did onhis part.
"It's the mechanical end of it that I don't understand," continuedTresham, after a pause. "Creighton claims to have discovered a new forcewhich he calls vibrodyne. I think it is just as well that Miss Laidlawhas decided to consult a scientist about it before she puts any moremoney into the thing. I can't say I approve of her interest init--though, of course, I know next to nothing about it, except from thelegal standpoint."
"Who is that Mrs. Barry of whom Miss Laidlaw spoke?" asked Kennedy amoment later.
"I believe she is a friend of Creighton's. Somehow she got acquaintedwith Miss Laidlaw and introduced her to him."
"You know her?" queried Craig casually.
"Oh, yes," came the frank reply. "She has been in to see me, too; firstto interest me in the motor, and then to consult me about various legalpoints in connection with it."
I felt sure that Tresham was more than just a bit jealous of his prettyclient. Certainly his tone was intended to convey the impression that hewished she would leave her affairs in his hands entirely.
"You don't know anything more about her--where she came from--herconnections?" added Craig.
"Hardly more than you do," asserted Tresham. "I've only seen the woman afew times. In fact I should be glad to know more about her--and aboutCreighton, too. I hope that if you find out anything you'll let me knowso that I can protect Miss Laidlaw's interests."
"I shall do so," promised Kennedy, rising.
"I'll do the same," agreed Tresham, extending his hand. "I see no reasonwhy we shouldn't work together for--my client."
There was no mistaking the fact that Tresham would have liked to be ableto say something more intimate than "client." Perhaps he might have beennearer to it if her interest in him had not been diverted by thiswonderful motor. At any rate I fancied he had little love for Creighton.Yet, when I reflected afterward, it seemed like a wide gulf that mustseparate a comparatively impecunious lawyer from a wealthy girl likeAdele Laidlaw.
Kennedy was not through with his effort to learn something by a thoroughinvestigation of the neighborhood yet. For some time after we leftTresham's office, he stood in the doorway of the Bank Building, lookingabout as though he hated to leave without establishing some vantagepoint from which to watch what was going on in Creighton's laboratory.
"Of course I can't very well get into the safety vault under the bank,"he mused. "I wish I could."
He walked past Creighton's without seeing anything happen. The nextbuilding was a similar two-story brick affair. A sign on it read,"Studios and Offices For Rent."
An idea seemed to be suggested to him by the sign. He wheeled andentered the place. Inquiry brought out a caretaker who showed us severalrooms unoccupied, among them one vacant on the first floor.
Kennedy looked it over carefully, as though considering whether it wasjust the place he wanted, but ended, as I knew he intended, in hiringit.
"I can't move my stuff in for a couple of
days," he told the caretaker."Meanwhile, I may have the key, I suppose?"
He had paid a good deposit and the key was readily forthcoming.
The hiring of the ground floor room accomplished without excitingsuspicion, Kennedy and I made a hasty trip up to his own laboratory,where he took a small box from a cabinet and hurried back to the taxicabwhich had brought us uptown.
Back again in the bare room which he had acquired, Craig set to workimmediately installing a peculiar instrument which he took from thepackage.
It seemed to consist of two rods much like electric light carbons, fixedhorizontally in a wooden support with a spindle-shaped bit of carbonbetween the two ends of the rods. Wires were connected with bindingscrews at the free ends of the carbon rods.
First Craig made a connection with an electric light socket from whichhe removed the bulb, cutting in a rheostat. Then he attached the freewires from the carbons to a sort of telephone headgear and switched onthe current.
"What is it?" I asked curiously.
"A geophone," he replied simply.
"And what is a geophone?" I inquired.
"Literally an earth-phone," he explained. "It is really the simplestform of telephone, applied to the earth. You saw what it was. Any highschool student of physics can make one, even with two or three drybatteries in circuit."
"But what does it do?" I asked.
"It is really designed to detect earth vibrations. All that is necessaryis to set the carbon stick arrangement, which is the transmitter of thistelephone, on the floor, place myself at the other end and listen. Atrained ear can readily detect rumblings. Really it is doing in adifferent and often better way what the seismograph does. Thisinstrument is so sensitive that it will record the slamming of a cellardoor across the street. No one can go up those stairs next door withoutletting me know it, no matter how cautious he is about it."
Craig stood there some minutes holding the thing over his ears andlistening intently.
"The vibrodyne machine isn't running," he remarked finally afterrepeated adjustments of the geophone. "But someone is in that littleroom under Creighton's workshop. I suspected that something was downthere after that watch crystal test of mine. Now I know it. I wonderwhat the man is doing?"
There was no excuse yet, however, for breaking into the room on theother side of the wall and under Creighton's. Kennedy went out andwatched. Though we waited some time nobody came out. He went back to ourown room in the rear of the first floor. Though we both listened sometime, neither of us could now hear a sound through the geophone exceptthose made by passing trolleys and street vehicles.
Inquiry about the neighborhood did not develop who was the tenant orwhat was his business. In fact the results were just the reverse. No oneseemed to know even the business conducted there. The room back of thelocked door which Miss Laidlaw had passed was shrouded in mystery.
Nothing at all of any value was being recorded by the geophone whenKennedy glanced quickly at his watch. "If we are to see Miss Laidlaw andmeet that Mrs. Barry, we had better be on our way," he remarkedhurriedly.
Miss Laidlaw was living in a handsome apartment on Central Park, West.We entered and gave our cards to the man at the door of her suite, whobowed us into a little reception room. We entered and waited.
Suddenly we were aware that someone in the next room, a library, wastalking. Whether we would or not we could not help overhearing what wassaid. Apparently two women were there, and they were not taking care howloud they spoke.
"Then you object to my even knowing Mr. Creighton?" asked one of thevoices, pausing evidently for a reply which the other did not choose tomake. "I suppose if it was Mr. Tresham you'd object, too."
There was something "catty" and taunting about the voice. It was a hardvoice, the voice of a woman who had seen much, and felt fully capable oftaking care of herself in more.
"You can't make up your mind which one you care for most, then? Is thatit?" pursued the same voice. "Well, I'll be a sport. I'll leave youCreighton--if you can keep him."
"I want neither," broke in a voice which I recognized at once as AdeleLaidlaw's.
She spoke with a suppressed emotion which plainly indicated that she didwant one of them.
Just then the butler entered with our cards. We heard no more. A momentlater we were ushered into the library.
Mrs. Barry was a trim, well-groomed woman whose age was deceptive. Ifelt that no matter what one might think of Miss Laidlaw, here was awoman whose very looks seemed to warn one to be on his guard. She was awoman of the world, confident in her own ability to take care ofherself.
Adele was flushed and excited, as we entered, though she was making adesperate effort to act as though nothing had happened.
"My friend, Professor Kennedy, and Mr. Jameson," she introduced ussimply, making no pretense to conceal our identity.
Mrs. Barry was, in addition to her other accomplishments, a goodactress. "I've heard a great deal about you, Professor," she said,extending her hand, but not taking her eyes off Craig's face.
Kennedy met her gaze directly. What did she mean? Had she accepted MissLaidlaw's invitation to call in order to look us over, knowing that wehad come to do the same?
"Mr. Creighton tells me that you have been to see his new motor," sheventured, even before any of us could open the subject.
She seemed to enjoy making the remark for the specific purpose ofrousing Miss Laidlaw. It succeeded amply, also. The implication thatCreighton took her into his confidence was sufficient to cause AdeleLaidlaw to shoot an angry glance at her.
Mrs. Barry had no objection to sticking a knife in and turning itaround. "Of course I don't know as much about such things as MissLaidlaw," she purred, "but Mr. Tresham tells me that there may be sometrouble with the patent office about allowing the patent. From all Ihave heard there's a fortune in that motor for someone. Wonderful, isn'tit?"
Even the mention of Tresham's name in the studied familiarity of hertone seemed to increase the scarcely latent hostility between the twowomen. Kennedy, so far, had said nothing, content merely to observe.
"It appears to be wonderful," was all he said, guardedly.
Mrs. Barry eyed him sharply and Miss Laidlaw appeared to be ill at ease.Evidently she wanted to believe in Creighton and his motor, yet hernatural caution forbade her. The entrance of Kennedy into the caseseemed to have proved a disturbing factor between the two women, to havebrought matters to a head.
We chatted for a few minutes, Kennedy deftly refusing to commit himselfon anything, Mrs. Barry seeking to lead him into expressing someopinion, and endeavoring to conceal her exasperation as he avoided doingso.
At last Kennedy glanced at his watch, which reminded him of a mythicalappointment, sufficient to terminate the visit.
"I'm very glad to have met you," he bowed to Mrs. Barry, as she, too,rose to go, while he preserved the fiction of merely having dropped into see Miss Laidlaw. He turned to her. "I should be delighted to haveboth you and Mr. Tresham drop in at my laboratory some time, MissLaidlaw."
Miss Laidlaw caught his eye and read in it that this was his way, underthe circumstances, of asking her to keep in touch with him.
"I shall do so," she promised.
We parted from Mrs. Barry at the door of her taxicab.
"A very baffling woman," I remarked a moment later. "Do you suppose sheis as intimate with Creighton as she implies?"
Kennedy shook his head. "It isn't that that interests me most, justnow," he replied. "What I can't figure out is Adele Laidlaw's attitudetoward both Creighton and Tresham. She seems to resent Mrs. Barry'sintimacy with either."
"Yes," I agreed. "Sometimes I have thought she really cared for both--atleast, that she was unable to make up her mind which she cared for most.Offhand, I should have thought that she was the sort who wouldn't thinka man worth caring much for."
Kennedy shook his head. "Given a woman, Walter," he said thoughtfully,"whose own and ancestral training has been a course of suppression,where she has be
en taught and drilled that exhibitions of emotion andpassion are disgraceful, as I suspect Miss Laidlaw's parents havebelieved, and you have a woman whose primitive instincts have beenstored and strengthened. The instincts are there, nevertheless, far backin the subconscious mind. I don't think Adele Laidlaw knows it herself,but there is something about both those men which fascinates her and shecan't make up her mind which fascinates her most. Perhaps they have thesame qualities."
"But Mrs. Barry," I interrupted. "Surely she must know."
"I think she does," he returned. "I think she knows more than wesuspect."
I looked at him quickly, not quite making out the significance of theremark, but he said no more. For the present, at least, he left AdeleLaidlaw quite as much an enigma as ever.
"I wish that you would make inquiries about regarding Mrs. Barry," hesaid finally as we reached the subway. "I'm going down again to thelittle room we hired and watch. You'll find me at the laboratory latertonight."