WHEN GEORGE MARSH PULLED UP TO THE FRONT GATES OF THE Ellingham estate, two men in overalls holding shotguns greeted him. They waved him along, and he steered his Model B along the perilous Ellingham road for the second time in only a few hours.
Albert Ellingham and Robert Mackenzie were waiting for him on the drive. Mackenzie huddled in his coat, but Ellingham didn’t appear to feel the chill at all. He rushed to the car door and was taken aback at the sight.
“What happened? Where are they? Your face! What happened?”
He was referring to the trail of bruises along Marsh’s jaw and around to his eye, and to a gash in his left cheek. His left eye was almost swollen shut.
“They weren’t there,” Marsh said, getting out of the car.
“What do you mean they weren’t there? You didn’t see them?”
“When I made the turn toward West Bolton, I got about a mile down before they blocked the road with a car. I got out and they ambushed me. They want two hundred thousand more. There was no sign of Iris or Alice.”
Robert let out a hissing sigh.
“You were right, Robert,” Ellingham said. “They want more. So we will get them more. How long do we have?”
“Twenty-four hours,” Marsh replied. “There’ll be another phone call. They said to have someone wait by the phone box on Church Street at eleven p.m. tonight. They wanted you to deliver it, but I got them to accept me as the deliveryman.”
“Surely now we call in the police and FBI,” Robert said to Marsh. “We can have someone wake J. Edgar Hoover. We can’t go on like this.”
“They said the increase in ransom was because you involved the police,” Marsh said. “Meaning, me.”
“They don’t want the police involved,” Ellingham said. “I can give them whatever they want.”
“This will go on,” Robert replied, his voice cracking with urgency. “You are an endless source of funds. Don’t you see?”
An owl cut across the sky with a screech.
“We should talk about this inside,” Marsh said quietly. “Voices carry.”
The Great House was quiet now, but it was not still. The electricity on the mountaintop was often erratic. The lights in the main hall flickered and dimmed. The house itself seemed to pulse. Two more men in overalls waited directly inside the door, guns at the ready. They looked confused, jumpy, and seeing Marsh’s damaged face did not reassure them. Montgomery, the butler, was still awake and attending.
“Should I bring water and bandages, sir?” he asked.
“What?” Ellingham said. Then, remembering Marsh’s injuries, he waved his hand. “Yes, yes. Bring them.”
Inside the office, Ellingham walked restlessly to his drinks table and poured some whiskeys with a shaking hand, giving one to the detective and keeping one for himself.
“What have you told everyone in the house?” Marsh asked. “They must have noticed that Mrs. Ellingham and Alice have not returned.”
“We said we had a threat of the usual type,” Robert said. “Anarchists. Mrs. Ellingham was told to spend the night in Burlington with a friend until we sorted it out.”
“Do you think they believe it?” Marsh asked.
“Unlikely.”
The three descended into silence for several minutes. Marsh lowered himself into a chair. Ellingham stood at the fire, his hand gripping the mantle. Mackenzie sat and examined the letter again. Montgomery appeared with the water and bandages. Marsh wiped the blood from his face.
“We’ll get them back,” Ellingham suddenly snapped. “We’ll give them whatever they want. Iris is strong and resourceful. She will be able to handle herself and Alice.”
“With respect,” Robert said, “I must speak frankly in this circumstance—Mrs. Ellingham is resourceful. She is also strong-willed and athletic. She’s a champion swimmer and skier. Do you think she would allow herself and her daughter to be taken without a fight? She will struggle. This has already gone wrong in several ways. Every moment we delay reaching out to the police at large is a moment she’s in danger.”
“They’re already upset that someone else is involved. Look what they did to Marsh! We can do this. We can get them what they want without further attention.”
“We may have no choice in that matter,” Robert replied. “Even if we wanted to—do you think this is going to stay quiet? We have about twenty people in the house, we’ve got the school, and in a few hours, we’re going to have a hundred men more show up for work. How does this stay out of the press?”
“Have work for this week canceled and arrange for the men to be paid anyway.”
“That’s not going to stop people from talking,” Robert said. “This will be all over Burlington by dawn.”
Ellingham looked to Marsh, who was sipping his whiskey carefully through swollen lips.
“Can you get that kind of money by tomorrow?” Marsh asked.
“The Burlington bank won’t be able to handle a withdrawal of that size on no notice,” Ellingham said. “Robert, wake someone up in New York and have them at the bank the moment it opens and you have it flown here. Get our contacts together. Money, pilots. I want people awake now. I’m going to make sure the property has been secured.”
When Ellingham was gone, the policeman and the secretary regarded each other by the light of the fire.
“I understand your disapproval, Mackenzie,” Marsh said. “I don’t like this either. But I think this is how we have to play it right now.”
“That letter . . . should we use a rope or gun? Knives are sharp and gleam so pretty. Truly, Devious. The person who wrote that note is talking about murder, not kidnapping.”
“We do it this way for twenty-four hours,” Marsh said. “Whoever did this—they know this place well. Assume we have eyes on us. If this estate is flooded with FBI, they could panic and act rashly. We stay cool, we do as they say.”
Ellingham reappeared at the doorway of the office.
“Word has just come that one of the students is missing—a girl named Dolores Epstein. We need to have the grounds searched. This has to be connected. She’s a good girl. She wouldn’t run off. My God, we need to protect the students. We can’t give the game away. We’ll need to get them all out of here on some excuse.”
Robert Mackenzie wearily closed his eyes. He felt that he was watching a disaster in the making and could do nothing to stop it.