Stolen Away

“We can’t think of that,” he said. “When the time comes that a respectable man cannot walk out of the door of his own home merely because he is attempting to assist one of the greatest heroes of all time, well, then…then I do not care to live a day longer.”

Was he trying to cheer me up?

“Are you all right, Mrs. Condon?” I asked.

“Yes. Thank you. I didn’t get your name, young man…?”

“My name’s Nathan Heller. I’m a police officer from Chicago. I appreciate your hospitality.”

“Actually,” she said, a hand to her generous chest, “I’ve been a bit shaken up. Luckily Myra stayed over, and fixed a nice supper. Plenty for everyone.”

I turned to Myra. “You don’t live here?”

“No,” she said, and smiled at me tightly, the sort of smile that contradicts itself.

“It is typical of little Myra,” Condon said, “that though she thoroughly opposes my determination to enter this case, she made arrangements to be here with me, in the Bronx, to absorb some of my routine duties.”

“Such as?” I asked her.

“Father received several hundred letters today,” she said, “in response to that letter to the editor he wrote to the News. It’s been like that every day since it appeared.”

“You should save those letters,” I said, “and give them to the cops.”

“Colonel Schwarzkopf, you mean?” Condon asked.

“That would be better than nothing,” I said. “But this is New York. You got cops in this state, too, you know.”

There was a knock at the door; Condon’s daughter rose languidly to answer it, and moments later she was ushering Colonel Breckinridge into the living room.

I filled him in, quickly, about the telephone call Mrs. Condon had received earlier.

“It’s almost six-thirty now,” Breckinridge said. “No call yet?”

“Not yet,” I said. “Why don’t we eat?”

“Sir!” Condon said, sitting up straight. “How can you think of food, when a child’s life hangs in the balance?”

“Well, if we eat,” I said, “it won’t tip the scale, one way or the other. Or, we can all sit around jumpy as cats in a rainstorm.”

We ate. The dining room was behind the living room, and Myra—a sour hostess but a sweet cook—served up a pot roast with oven-browned potatoes, carrots and onions.

“Colonel,” Condon said, working on his second helping of everything, baby in the balance or not, “as you may recall, I mentioned that the distinctive red-and-blue-circle signature of the kidnappers reminded me of a Sicilian Mafia sign.”

“Yes,” Breckinridge said tentatively. He was picking at his food.

“Well, I replicated the symbol and began showing it around Fordham today.”

“You what?” I said.

He sipped his drink—a big wholesome glass of milk—and repeated his sentence word for word.

I just shook my head. His daughter Myra glared at me.

Proud of himself, a forkful of food poised in midair, Condon said, “Mind you, I’ve said nothing to anyone of my trip to Hopewell the other night. But I’ve been determined to learn, if possible, the meaning of that mysterious symbol.”

“Professor,” Breckinridge said, his face whiter than Condon’s cow juice, “that really may not have been wise.”

Condon didn’t seem to hear; his eyes and smile were glazed and inwardly directed. “I sketched it on a piece of paper, that symbol, and carried it with me these last two days. I’ve been showing it to everyone I meet, asking them about it.”

“Swell idea,” I said.

“Finally,” he said, raising a significant forefinger, “this afternoon I found someone who recognized it—a Sicilian friend of mine.”

Breckinridge touched a napkin to his lips and pushed his plate of mostly uneaten food away.

“As a result,” Condon said, “I’m convinced our kidnappers are of Italian origin. My Sicilian friend confirmed my suspicion, explaining that the symbol was that of a secret criminal organization in the old country—the symbol is the trilgamba, or ‘three legs.’”

“Three legs?” Breckinridge asked.

“My Sicilian friend explained that two legs were fine, but ‘when a third leg walks, beware.’”

“Let me write that down,” I said.

“Its symbolic meaning,” Condon continued, “is that if a third leg, a stranger, enters into the province of the secret society, the Mafia, that intruder can expect a stiletto through the heart.”

His daughter Myra, cutting her meat, dropped her own knife clatteringly. “Daddy,” she said. “Please don’t do this. Please withdraw from this silly dangerous escapade.”

Colonel Breckinridge looked at the young woman with mournful eyes. “Please don’t ask that, miss. Your father may be the only honest person on earth actually in contact with the kidnappers.”

“Excuse me,” Myra said stiffly, “I think I’ll pass on dessert,” and hurled her napkin to the table and got up and went out through the front parlor; her footsteps on the hall stairs, several rooms away, conveyed her annoyance.

After apple pie, Breckinridge stepped out onto the porch for a smoke—the professor allowed no tobacco of any kind in his “domicile”—leaving Mr. and Mrs. Condon to keep watch by Mr. Bell’s invention, which was on a stand in the hallway outside the living room.