"I"m glad of it. You are a trifle pale; you seem to be a little languid. . . . When do you take your vacation?"
"You suggested May, I believe," she said wistfully.
The Tracer leaned back in his chair, joining the tips of his fingers reflectively.
"Miss Southerland," he said, "you have been with us a year. I thought it might interest you to know that I am exceedingly pleased with you."
She colored charmingly.
"But," he added, "I"m terribly afraid we"re going to lose you."
"Why?" she asked, startled.
"However," he continued, ignoring her half-frightened question with a smile, "I am going to promote you--for faithful and efficient service."
"O-h!"
"With an agreeable increase of salary, and new duties which will take you into the open air. . . . You ride?"
"I--I used to before----"
"_Ex_actly; before you were obliged to earn your living. Please have yourself measured for habit and boots this afternoon. I shall arrange for horse, saddle, and groom. You will spend most of your time riding in the Park--for the present."
"But--Mr. Keen--am I to be one of your agents--a sort of detective?"
Keen regarded her absently, then crossed one leg over the other.
"Read me your notes," he said with a smile.
She read them, folded them, and he took them from her, thoughtfully regarding her.
"Did you know that your mother and I were children together?" he asked.
"No!" She stared. "Is _that_ why you sent for me that day at the school of stenography?"
"That is why . . . When I learned that my playmate--your mother--was dead, is it not reasonable to suppose that I should wish her daughter to have a chance?"
Miss Southerland looked at him steadily.
"She was like you--when she married . . . I never married . . . Do you wonder that I sent for you, child?"
Nothing but the clock ticking there in the sunny room, and an old man staring into two dimmed brown eyes, and the little breezes at the open window whispering of summers past.
"This young man, Gatewood," said the Tracer, clearing his voice of its hoa.r.s.eness--"this young man ought to be all right, if I did not misjudge his father--years ago, child, years ago. And he _is_ all right--" He half turned toward a big letter-file; "his record is clean, so far. The trouble with him is idleness. He ought to marry."
"Isn"t he trying to?" she asked.
"It looks like it. Miss Southerland, we _must_ find this woman!"
"Yes, but I don"t see how you are going to--on such slight information--"
"Information! Child, I have all I want--all I could desire." He laughed, pa.s.sing his hands over his gray hair. "We are going to find the girl he is in love with before the week ends!"
"Do you really think so?" she exclaimed.
"Yes. But you must do a great deal in this case."
"I?"
"_Ex_actly."
"And--and what am I to do?"
"Ride in the Park, child! And if you see Mr. Gatewood, don"t you dare take your eyes off him for one moment. Watch him; observe everything he does. If he should recognize you and speak to you, be as amiable to him as though it were not by my orders."
"Then--then I _am_ to be a detective!" she faltered.
The Tracer did not appear to hear her. He took up the notes, turned to the telephone, and began to send out a general alarm, reading the description of the person whom Gatewood had described. The vast, intricate and delicate machinery under his control was being set in motion all over the Union.
"Not that I expect to find her outside the borough of Manhattan," he said, smiling, as he hung up the receiver and turned to her; "but it"s as well to know how many types of that species exist in this Republic, and who they are--in case any other young man comes here raving of brown eyes and "gleams" in the hair."
Miss Southerland, to her own intense consternation, blushed.
"I think you had better order that habit at once," said the Tracer carelessly.
"Tell me, Mr. Keen," she asked tremulously, "am I to spy upon Mr.
Gatewood? And report to you? . . . For I simply cannot bear to do it--"
"Child, you need report nothing unless you desire to. And when there is something to report, it will be about the woman I am searching for.
_Don"t_ you understand? I have already located her. You will find her in the Park. And when you are _sure_ she is the right one--and if you care to report it to me--I shall be ready to listen . . . I am always ready to listen to you."
"But--I warn you, Mr. Keen, that I have perfect faith in the honor of Mr. Gatewood. I _know_ that I could have nothing unworthy to report."
"I am sure of it," said the Tracer of Lost Persons, studying her with eyes that were not quite clear. "Now, I think you had better order that habit . . . Your mother sat her saddle perfectly . . . We rode very often--my lost playmate and I."
He turned, hands clasped behind his back, absently pacing the room, backward, forward, there in the spring sunshine. Nor did he notice her lingering, nor mark her as she stole from the room, brown eyes saddened and thoughtful, wondering, too, that there should be in the world so much room for sorrow.
[Ill.u.s.tration: ""I am sure of it," said the Tracer of Lost Persons."]
CHAPTER V
Gatewood, burdened with restlessness and gnawed by curiosity, consumed a week in prowling about the edifice where Keen & Co. carried on an interesting profession.
His first visit resulted merely in a brief interview with Mr. Keen, who smilingly reported progress and suavely bowed him out. He looked about for Miss Southerland as he was leaving, but did not see her.