The Gray Mask Part 30

"You must tell us," she said, "how you found the Chinaman. I've no doubt he was one of them. In itself his death was a confession--a pitifully silent one."

Garth told his story of the man in the limousine, of the trailing Oriental, of what he had learned at the Bureau of Licenses. Nora offered no interpretation, but she smiled sympathetically at the inspector's rage. He saw in the affair more than Garth. To him it meant an underhanded attempt on the part of the society to trap a material witness.

"They put it up to me," he grumbled, "then they want to put it over me.

Manford gets a line of his own and keeps it to himself. Out for a little glory and advertising! What happens every time I work with these silk-stockinged, fur-coated societies that think they know more about vice than the police. And to think, Garth, you snitched him away from them, then let him croak!"

Nora arose.

"No use crying over spilt milk, father."

She prepared to leave. Garth followed her to the hallway. He urged her to let him share her plans, to give him a more p.r.o.nounced part in the risks. She shook her head.

"It's best to let me work this alone until the last minute, Jim."

His one grain of comfort was her insistence that he should be in the van of the raiding party. So he watched her leave, her grace and beauty transformed by an inspired ingenuity into the bent lines and the haggard distortion of a crone.

The day lingered interminably. Whatever Nora had told her father he guarded with an unqualified stubbornness. Aside from the fact that he was to join the inspector in an up-town precinct house at ten o'clock, Garth walked into the affair wholly ignorant of plans or probabilities.

When finally the hour struck and he kept the appointment, he found Manford, in evening clothes, leaning against the desk while he tested the inspector's temper with a smiling face and an insinuating conversation.

Garth had never before seen this amateur in social justice. His first glance furnished him a share in the inspector's resentment, for clearly Manford's illusions as to his importance were all of a happy character.

His moustache, arranged with a studied precision, his ruddy complexion, his eyes, noticeably sarcastic, testified to measureless pride in a success which, Garth knew, had arisen almost of its own power from his inheritance. It was not to be doubted that his selection as its head had given the society in his eyes a majestic and peculiar value.

The fact that the inspector failed to counter impressed Garth. Probably it would be a sufficient revenge for him to accomplish the raid and smash the gang with Manford as a witness, yet without his active a.s.sistance.

A number of detectives and some men in uniform were grouped about the two. The inspector's commands were brief and delivered with an excited antic.i.p.ation which he could not conceal. At last he announced the number of the house. It was in the centre of the block east of that in which Garth had captured the Chinaman. Some of the men were to reach the back yard. Others were to guard the roof. The remainder would form the attacking party at the front.

"When these people find they can't get through," the inspector warned, "it's a good bet they'll show fight. So look out for yourselves, and impress on them that your guns aren't watch charms."

Garth, Manford, and the inspector led the way. Garth's misgivings were far more profound than if the chief risk had been his own. Where was Nora now? What would such conscienceless men do to her if they found at the last moment she was responsible for their hopeless predicament?

They walked slowly to give the others time to reach their posts. At last the inspector glanced at his watch, snapped it shut, and quickened his pace.

"Come on, boys," he muttered. "The season's open."

The house presented an uncommunicative front. They climbed the steps. No lights showed in the hall. The windows appeared to be shuttered. The inspector pulled the old-fas.h.i.+oned bell handle. After an undisturbed wait he tried again.

"Guess we haven't got the combination, Chief," Garth whispered.

"No time for experiments," the inspector said. He put his shoulder to the door.

"Give a hand here, boys. Bring that ax."

The lock snapped under their a.s.sault. They stumbled through into the vestibule. Garth choked. He was aware of fine particles of dust in his nose and his throat. The inspector had been similarly affected.

"Filthy lot!" he sneered. "One more door."

They attacked the inner door. They burst through into a black hallway.

The dust rose in clouds. The inspector snapped his flashlight and fell back with an exclamation, disappointed and surprised.

The light shone on bare floors and walls. Its power was radically diminished by the long acc.u.mulated dust their entrance had disturbed. As far as the first floor was concerned they stood in an empty house.

Manford sneered.

"A fine plan of yours, inspector!"

The inspector glared his dislike.

"I'm beginning to think you were jealous a minute ago, young man."

"Then you've quite disarmed my unworthy emotion," Manford laughed.

Garth had read more than dislike in the inspector's manner. It had veiled, he was sure, a positive, an increasing fear; and the scorn of his voice had not thoroughly cloaked its uncertainty.

"Get up stairs," he snarled to his men. "Scour every inch of this place."

He turned back to Manford.

"I'll swear they were here this afternoon. This house was used as a dive no later than this afternoon."

Manford chuckled, indicating the dust which still whirled in the rays of the flash light.

The plain-clothes men returned almost at once. There was not a person in the house--not a piece of furniture. The grime on the walls, the thick dust testified to its long disuse.

Manford's superior wisdom appeared justified. The intolerance of a position and a success, both inherited, shone in his eyes, expressed itself in his voice. He drew his coat closer about him. He touched his hat. It a.s.sumed a jauntier air.

"Good night, inspector," he drawled. "I cut the opera to take in this example of police efficiency. I hope my society, on its own initiative, will be able to make more progress with the case. Maybe I'll find some amus.e.m.e.nt chatting with the lieutenant at the station house. At least I can learn from the police what sins to omit."

The inspector strangely, did not answer. Manford lighted a cigarette, grinning, and strolled down the steps.

Garth marvelled at the inspector's lack of belligerency. He looked at him more closely. The big man's jaw had fallen. He stared without purpose at the blank walls. The picture made Garth afraid. He grasped the inspector's arm. He drew him to one side.

"How were you so sure?" he asked under his breath. "Because Nora gave you this number?"

The inspector shook his head. His great shoulders trembled.

"No. She had no number to give me. But this afternoon I saw her enter this house. I watched the door close behind her, and, Garth--she has never come out."

Garth with frantic haste explored the place himself from roof to cellar.

There was no question. It had remained uninhabited for many months, perhaps years. Yet Nora had told her father that, while its location had been kept from her, she had arranged a certain entry to the evil house that afternoon. She had told him to follow her. He had seen the door close behind her.

Garth scarcely dared open his mind to full comprehension. If Nora had been directed to this deserted building and admitted, it was clear that her connection with the police had been discovered. It was logically certain that she had walked into an elaborately plotted ambush.

He hurried to the sidewalk where he found the inspector braced heavily against the rail.

"What can I do, Garth?" the big man asked hoa.r.s.ely.