The Black Eagle Mystery Part 29

"Not long after it happened-but that doesn't matter. They've got everything in their hands. Even if you insist that you're innocent they've got enough to arrest you on. You've been under surveillance all along-they've been shadowing you. They followed you that time you tried to go to Toronto."

"I knew that," she said in the same low voice as if she was talking to herself.

"They know how you came out of the building that night-not by the elevator as you said, but by the stairs, and how you didn't get home till nearly eight. They know about you and Barker."

She lifted her head and said quickly:

"_What_ do they know about me and Barker?"

"That he was in love with you and you with him."

"Oh, _that_!" Her tone was indifferent as if the point was a matter of no consequence.

"They know how the murder was done. How you and Barker did it."

"Barker and I--" She sank back in her chair, then suddenly leaning across the table, looked into my face and said, "Tell me how we did it.

Let me see what they know."

I took the chair opposite and told her the whole plot and how we'd worked it out. While I was doing it she never said a word, but sat with her profile toward me and her eyes in that blank, motionless stare on the fern plant.

When I had finished there was a pause, then suddenly she drew a deep breath, turned toward me and said:

"What brought you here to me tonight?"

It came so unexpectedly I had no answer ready. What I'd looked for was a scene, terror, maybe hysterics and her breaking away as fast as she could put on her hat. Seeing me stupidly dumb she rose out of her chair, and moved away for a few steps, then stopped and seemed again to fall into that trance of thinking. It was like everything else in this nightmare-different to what I'd looked for, and a sickening thought came to me that maybe she was ready to throw up the sponge and go down and confess. And then-for all I knew-Jack Reddy might persuade her to marry him and go to prison with her. How can you be sure what a man crazy with love will do? If she got a life sentence he'd probably live at the gates of Sing Sing for the rest of his days. I was desperate and went round the table after her.

"Say," I implored. "What are you going to do?"

"I'm thinking," she muttered.

"For G.o.d's sake don't _think_," I wailed. "Get up and act. If I go back on the people that employ me and come here in the middle of the night to warn you, isn't it the least you can do to take advantage of it and _go_?"

She wheeled round on me, her face all alight with a wonderful beaming look.

"_That's_ the reason," she said. "That's what made you come-humanity-pity! You've risked everything to help me. Oh, you don't know what you've done-what courage you've put into me. And you don't know what my grat.i.tude is."

Before I knew it she had seized hold of one of my hands and held it against her heart, with her head bowed over it as if she was praying.

Do you guess how _I_ felt? Ashamed?-peris.h.i.+ng with it, ready to sink down on the floor and pa.s.s away. A murderess no doubt but even if a murderess thinks you did her a good turn when you didn't it makes you feel like a snake's a high-cla.s.s animal beside you.

"Oh, come on," I begged. "Let go of me and get out."

She dropped my hand and looked at me-Oh, so soft and sweet!-and I saw tears in her eyes. _That_ pretty near finished me and I wailed out:

"Don't stop to cry. You don't know but what they might get uneasy and come tonight. Put on your things and _go_."

Hadn't I got to hurry her? If Jack made a quick trip he'd be back in town between two and three and he'd come as straight as wheels could take him to her door.

"Yes, I'll go," she said.

"Now," I urged, "as soon as you can get into your coat and hat. Don't bother about this," I pointed to the disorder round us-"They'll think you've had another message from Barker and gone to him."

A curious, slight smile came over her face.

"Yes," she said, "that's what they _will_ think, I suppose."

"Of course it is, and they'll waste time looking for him which'll give _you_ a good start. If there's no train now to the place you're going to, sit in the depot, ride round in a taxi, walk up and down Fifth Avenue, only _get out_ of this place."

"I'll be gone in half an hour," she said, and moved between the trunks and piled up clothes to the bedroom beyond. I followed her and saw into the room, all confusion like the others, every gas in the chandelier blazing.

"Can I help you?" I said. "Can I pack a suitcase or anything?"

"No-" she halted in front of the mirror, letting the kimono slide off her to the floor, her arms and neck like s.h.i.+ning marble under that blaze of light. "I'll only want a few things. There's a bag there I can throw them into. You'd better go now."

I was afraid she'd not be as quick as I wanted but I couldn't hang round urging any more after she'd told me to go. Besides I could see she was hurrying, grabbing a dress from the bed and getting into it so swiftly even I was satisfied.

"Well then I'm off," I said.

She looked up from the hooks she was snapping together and said:

"Before you go tell me who you are?"

"There's no need for that," I answered, thinking she'd probably never see me again. "I'm just someone that blew in tonight for a minute and who's going like she came."

"Someone I'll never forget," she said, "and that some day, if all goes well, I'll be able to pay back."

I was afraid she was going to get grateful again and I couldn't stand any more of that. So with a quick "good-bye" away I went, up the hall, opening the door without a sound, and stealing down the stairs as soft as a robber.

Out in the street I stopped and reconnoitered. There was no one in sight except a policeman lounging dreary on the next corner. Across from the apartment was the entrance of a little shop-tobacco and light literature-and into that I crept, squeezing back against the gla.s.s door.

I couldn't be at peace till I saw her leave and for fifteen or twenty minutes I stood there watching the lights in her windows. Then suddenly they began to go out, across the front and along down the side, till every pane was black. A few minutes later, she came down the steps carrying a bag. She stopped close to where I was, and hailed a car, and not till I saw it start with her sitting by the door, did I steal out of my hiding place and sprint up the street to Madison Avenue.

When I reached home I was s.h.i.+vering and wild-eyed, for if Babbitts was there what could I say to him? He wasn't-thank Heaven!-and cold as ice, feeling as if I'd been through a mangle, I crawled into bed.

There wasn't much sleep for me that night. About all I could say to myself was that I'd saved Jack. But the others-Oh, _the others_! I couldn't get them out of my mind. They'd come in a procession across the dark and look at me sad and reproachful. Mr. Whitney, who'd done everything in the world for me, and Mr. George, who could put on such side, but had always been so kind and cordial, and O'Mally, who'd told Babbitts the case was going to make him, and Babbitts-Oh, _Babbitts_!

I rolled over on the pillow and cried scalding, bitter tears. It wasn't only the scoop-it was that I'd have a secret from him forever-him that up to now had known every thought in my mind, had been like the other half of me. They say virtue is its own reward, and I've always believed it. But that night I had the awful thought that maybe I'd done wrong, for all the reward I got was to feel like an outcast with a stone for a heart.

CHAPTER XVII

JACK TELLS THE STORY

That night when I left Molly there was only one thought in my mind-to reach Carol and help her get away. If the figure of Barker had not stood between us I would have then and there implored her to marry me and give me the right to fight for her. But I knew that was hopeless. As things stood, all I could do was to tell her the situation and give her a chance to escape.

I suppose it's a pretty damaging confession but the office, my duty to my work and my a.s.sociates, cut no ice at all. Heretofore I'd rather patted myself on the back as a man who stood by his obligations. That night only one obligation existed for me-to protect from disgrace the woman I loved.