Читать книгу A Matter Of Millions - Anna Katharine Green - Страница 10

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Late on this same day, the inspector sat before his desk, studying the various reports of his subordinates. Those relating to the Jenny Rogers inquiry lay in one pile and those relating to other matters in another. With the former alone are we interested. Without attempting to reproduce them literally, I will transcribe for you their substance, as I take it for granted that you take enough interest in this affair to wish to know what discoveries had been made in relation to it.

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First, there are nearly three hundred families of the name of “Rogers” mentioned in the New York directory. Of these, forty have been found to contain a “Jenny” ten of whom are infants, and five of advanced years. Ten more are married, leaving only fifteen of the age and condition necessary to include them in the category of young girls. One of these died yesterday, the daughter of Abram Rogers, living in Fifty-sixth street. Her disease was scarlet fever, and her death was a legitimate one. There is, however, one fact connected with it that we have thought it well enough to record. Some three weeks before any signs of disease had developed in this girl, she came to her mother and told her that she was haunted by a strange man. We should have said shadowed, for when her mother forced her to explain, she told how a certain man whom she did not know, but who had every appearance of being a gentleman of means and culture, was continually being met by her in the street, at church and on the school steps. How he had looked at her, not disrespectfully but too intently for her to doubt that his interest was the result of some strong motive, and though he never addressed her, he always had the appearance of being on the verge of doing so. She was not afraid of him but she would rather not walk out alone, and after this confession, her parents took good measures that she should not be called upon to do so. Two weeks later, she was taken ill, and on the morning of her death, which was yesterday, a strange gentleman called at the house and asked for her. He was told the sad news and seemed much shocked, but turned immediately away. A relative who caught a glimpse of him at the door declares him to be the same person who had so diligently haunted the young girl’s steps.

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Miss Hadden’s school having been visited, certain facts have come to light in reference to the young girl who was reported this morning as missing. She is the last representative of an old Detroit family. Her fortune is considerable, and she has for a guardian a highly respectable gentleman in Detroit. She is pretty and generous, but headstrong. To her schoolmates, she is all openness and affection, but to her teachers, reserved, if not sly and willful. She, too, has been haunted by an unknown gentleman, and was so affected by what she chose to consider his honorable attentions, that she seemed to lose her judgment, and fancy he was a lover whose passion it was her duty to return. Influenced by these impressions, her manner had grown languishing, and she had been found more than once scribbling notes and verses to the handsome unknown. Her disappearance, which was not unaccompanied by tokens of premeditation, is laid by her schoolmates to the arts of this secret suitor, and they expect to hear very soon of a private marriage between this foolish girl and the gentleman above mentioned.

So much for current gossip. More private inquiries elicited further and less well-known facts. A teacher, who had watched the girl narrowly, says that she does not look for any such termination of the affair; that the gentleman, who was one of many visitors on a certain exhibition day, had seemed more interested in her name than in herself, for he had asked if there was any girl in the school by the name of Jenny Rogers; and, when told yes, had looked with deep interest at the person designated. But it was not with a lover’s interest, or so the demure teacher persisted in declaring. But, whether this be true or not, a large reward has been offered to the man who shall first discover her present whereabouts.

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The identity of the girl found dead in Blind Alley this morning has been settled. Several persons, among them her employer and the woman with whom she lived, have testified to her features as those of an orphan girl by the name of Jenny Rogers, who worked in the large shirt-factory in Wooster street, near Broome. Inquiry into her character proves her to have been both virtuous and industrious; but she was sickly, and her death, which seems to have been sudden, was, according to present appearances, solely the result of a fright given by the following anonymous letter, which was found in her room:

“New York, May 25, 1887

“Miss Jenny Rogers: Will you let a true friend warn you? Though you seem at present unconscious of the fact, you have a desperate enemy, who has sworn to be the ruin of you. He is not a common man, and will certainly accomplish whatever he desires. Whether his determination springs from too much love or too much hate, I can not tell; but he has singled you out as his victim, and, before long, you may expect to see yourself visited by a fine-looking and uncommonly pleasing gentleman, who will talk fairly to you, but who at heart means you nothing but wrong and suffering. Lest you should not know him when you see him, I will describe him in advance. He is tall, with dark hair and mustache, gray eyes, and a polite manner. At sight of such a man, flee; it is your only safety.

“With best wishes, ‘A FRIEND.’ ”

This letter, according to the landlady with whom she lived, was given her yesterday evening upon her return from the factory; and, though she did not tell anybody about it, she manifested so much uneasiness all night, that the people in the next room complained of being disturbed. But in the morning, she was so quiet that the landlady became alarmed and went into her room, when she found that the young girl had not only gone away, but had carried off most of her few effects. This was a great surprise, as Jenny had always seemed both honest and considerate. But it was followed by a still greater surprise. For, a few minutes later, before the landlady had left the room, in fact, a strange gentleman called upon this girl, with a large packet of extra work in his arms, and upon hearing she had gone out without leaving any word, expressed himself much astonished, since she had promised to be at home to see him. He did not give his name, but he was tall, good-looking, with a black mustache and gray eyes. He left the work and went away, looking much put out and disappointed.

Meanwhile, poor Jenny Rogers, who, if she had expected him as he had said, had taken most certain means of escaping him, was lying in an alley near by, dead. She had run, as several testify, for two long blocks down North Moore street, and if, as some think, she was troubled with heart disease, her death is explained. But this cannot be settled till the autopsy takes place.

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The original name of the Signorina Valdi has been found to have been this same fatal one of Jenny Rogers.

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Signed by different names, these various reports interested the inspector greatly. Pondering upon them, he decided that the evidences of a conspiracy against girls of this name were good, and that the strange gentleman who appeared in all these reports saving the last was one and the same man. A detective was, therefore, called and given such clews to this mysterious individual as could be gathered from these various reports, with an injunction to have him forthcoming in time for the inquest soon to be held over the remains of the poor girl found in the alley-way.