The Drums of Jeopardy Part 37

"He and the Conover girl left that office building together this morning, and I followed them to Park Row. This man uses the loft of the building for his home. No elevator goes up unless you have credentials.

Our man is hiding there, Boris."

Karlov dry-washed his hands. "We'll send him one of the samples if we fail in regard to the girl. You say she arrives daily at the newspaper office about nine and leaves between five and six?"

"Every day but Sunday."

"Good news. Two bolts; one or the other will go home."

About the same time in Cutty's apartment rather an amusing comedy took place. Professor Ryan, late physical instructor at one of the aviation camps, stood Hawksley in front of him and ran his hard hands over the young man's body. Miss Frances stood at one side, her arms folded, her expression skeptical.

"Nothin' the matter with you, Bo, but the crack on the conk."

"Right-o!" agreed Hawksley.

"Lemme see your hands. Humph. Soft. Now stand on that threshold. That's it. Walk t' the' end o' the hall an' back. Step lively."

"But," began Miss Frances in protest. This was cruelty.

"I'm the doctor, miss," interrupted Ryan, crisply. "If he falls down he goes t' bed, an' you stay. If he makes it, he follows my instructions."

When Hawksley returned to the starting line the walls rocked, there were two or three blinding stabs of pain; but he faced this unusual Irishman with never a hint of the torture. A wild longing to be gone from this kindly prison--to get away from the thought of the girl.

"All right," said Ryan. "Now toddle back t' bed."

"Bed?"

"Yep. Goin' t' give you a rub that'll start all your machinery workin'."

Docilely Hawksley obeyed. He wasn't going to let them know, but that bed was going to be tolerably welcome.

"Well!" said Miss Frances. "I don't see how he did it."

"I do," said the ex-pugilist. "I told him to. Either he was a false alarm, or he'd attempt the job even if he fell down. The hull thing is this: Make a guy wanta get well an' he'll get well. If he's got any pride, dig it up. Go after 'em. He hasn't lost any blood. No serious body wound. A crack on the conk. It mighta killed him. It didn't. He didn't wabble an' fall down. So my dope is right. Drop in in a few days an' I'll show yuh."

Miss Frances held out her hand. "You've handled men," she said, with reluctant admiration.

"Oh, boy!--millions of 'em, an' each guy different. Believe me! Make 'em wanta."

Cutty attended his conferences. He learned immediately that he was booked to sail the first week in May. His itinerary began at Piraeus, in Greece, and might end in Vladivostok. But they detained him in Was.h.i.+ngton overtime because he was a fount of information the departments found it necessary to draw upon constantly. The political and commercial aspects of the polyglot peoples, what they wanted, what they expected, what they needed; racial enmities. The bugaboo of the undesirable alien was no longer bothering official heads in Was.h.i.+ngton.

Stringent immigration laws were in the making. What they wanted to know was an American's point of view, based upon long and intimate a.s.sociations.

Was.h.i.+ngton reminded him of nothing so much as a big sheep dog. The hazardous day was over; the wolves had been driven off and the sheep into the fold; and now the valiant guardian was turning round and round and round preparatory to lying down to sleep. For Was.h.i.+ngton would go to sleep again, naturally.

Often it occurred to him what a remarkable piece of machinery the human brain was. He could dig up all this dry information with the precise accuracy of an economist, all the while his actual thoughts upon Kitty.

His nights were nightmares. And all this unhappiness because he had been touched with the l.u.s.t for loot. Fundamentally, this catastrophe could be laid to the drums of jeopardy.

The alluring possibility of finding those d.a.m.nable green stones--the unsuspected kink in his moral rect.i.tude--had tumbled him into this pit.

Had not Kitty p.r.o.nounced the name Stefani Gregor--in his mind always linked with the emeralds--he would have summoned an ambulance and had Hawksley carried off, despite Kitty's protests; and perhaps he would have seen her but two or three times before sailing, seen her in conventional and unemotional parts. At any rate, there would have been none of this peculiar intimacy--Kitty coming to him in tears, opening her young heart to him and discovering all its loneliness. If she loved some chap it would not be so hard, the temptation would not be so keen--to cheat her. Marry her, and then tell her. This dogged his thoughts like a murderer's deed, terrible in the watches of the night.

Marry her, and then tell her. Cheat her. Break her heart and break his own.

Fifty-two. Never before had he thought old. His splendid health and vigorous mentality were the results of thinking young. But now he heard the avalanche stirring, the whispering slither of the first pebbles. He would grow old swiftly, thunderously. Kitty's youth would sh.o.r.e up the debacle, suspend it indefinitely. Marry her, cheat her, and stay young.

Green stones, accursed.

Kitty's days were pleasant enough, but her nights were sieges. One evening someone put Elman's rendition of Schubert's "Ave Maria" on the phonograph. Long after it was over she sat motionless in her chair.

Echoes. The Tschaikowsky waltz. She got up suddenly, excused herself, and went to her room.

Six days, and her problem was still unsolved. Something in her--she could not define it, she could not reach it, it defied a.n.a.lysis--something, then, revolted at the idea of marrying Cutty, divorcing him, and living on his money. There was a touch of horror in the suggestion. It was tearing her to pieces, this hidden repellence.

And yet this occult objection was so utterly absurd. If he died and left her a legacy she would accept it gratefully enough. Cutty's plan was only a method of circ.u.mventing this indefinite wait.

Comforts, the good things of life, amus.e.m.e.nts--simply by nodding her head. Why not? It wasn't as if Cutty was asking her to be his wife; he wasn't. Just wanted to dodge convention, and give her freedom and happiness. He was only giving her a mite out of his income. Because he had loved her mother; because, but for an accident of chance, she, Kitty, might have been his daughter. Why, then, this persistent and unaccountable revulsion? Why should she hesitate? The ancient female fear of the trap? That could not be it. For a more honourable, a more lovable man did not walk the earth. Brave, strong, handsome, whimsical--why, Cutty was a catch!

Comfy. Never any of that inherent doubt of man when she was with him.

Absolute trust. An evil thought had entered her head; fate had made it honourably possible. And still this mysterious repellence.

Romance? She was not surrendering her right to that. What was a year out of her life if afterward she would be in comfortable circ.u.mstances, free to love where she willed? She wasn't cheating herself or Cutty: she was cheating convention, a flimsy thing at best.

Windows. We carry our troubles to our windows; through windows we see the stars. We cannot visualize G.o.d, but we can see His stars pinned to the immeasurable s.p.a.ces. So Kitty sought her window and added her question to the countless millions forlornly wandering about up there, and finding no answer.

But she would return to New York on the morrow. She would not summon Bernini as she had promised. She would go back by train, alone, unhampered.

And in his cellar Boris Karlov spun his web for her.

CHAPTER XXVI

Hawksley heard the lift door close, and he knew that at last he was alone. He flung out his arms, ecstatically. Free! He would see no more of that nagging beggar Ryan until tomorrow. Free to put into execution the idea that had been bubbling all day long in his head, like a fine champagne, firing his blood with reckless whimsicality.

Quietly he stole down the corridor. Through a crack in the kitchen door he saw Kuroki's back, the att.i.tude of which was satisfying. It signified that the j.a.p was pegging away at his endless studies and that only the banging of the gong would rouse him. The way was as broad and clear as a street at dawn. Not that Kuroki mattered; only so long as he did not know, so much the better.

With careful step Hawksley manoeuvred his retreat so that it brought him to Cutty's bedroom door. The door was unlocked. He entered the room.

What a lark! They would hide his own clothes; so much the worse for the old beggar's wardrobe. Street clothes. Presently he found a dark suit, commendable not so much for its style as for the fact that it was the nearest fit he could find. He had to roll up the trouser hems.

Hats. Chuckling like a boy rummaging a jam closet, he rifled the shelves and pulled down a black derby of an unknown vintage. Large; but a runner of folded paper reduced the size. As he pressed the relic firmly down on his head he winced. A stab over his eyes. He waited doubtfully; but there was no recurrence. Fit as a fiddle. Of course he could not stoop without a flash of vertigo; but on his feet he was top-hole. He was gaining every day.

Luck. He might have come out of it with the blank mind of a newborn babe; and here he was, keen to resume his adventures. Luck. They had not stopped to see if he was actually dead. Some pa.s.ser-by in the hall had probably alarmed them. That handkerchief had carried him round the brink. Perhaps Fate intended letting him get through--written on his pa.s.s an extension of his leave of absence. Or she had some new torture in reserve.

Now for a stout walking stick. He selected a blackthorn, twirled it, saluted, and posed before the mirror. Not so bally rotten. He would pa.s.s. Next, he remembered that there were some flowers in the dining room--window boxes with scarlet geraniums. He broke off a sprig and drew it through his b.u.t.tonhole.

Outside there was a cold, pale April sky, presaging wind and rain.

Unimportant. He was going down into the streets for an hour or so. The colour and action of a crowded street; the lure was irresistible. Who would dare touch him in the crowd? These rooms had suddenly become intolerable.

He leaned against the side of the window. Roofs, thousands of them, flat, domed, pinnacled; and somewhere under one of these roofs Stefani Gregor was eating his heart out. It did not matter that this queer old eagle whom everybody called Cutty had promised to bring Stefani home.

It might be too late. Stefani was old, highly strung. Who knew what infernal lies Karlov had told him? Stefani could stand up under physical torture; but to tear at his soul, to twist and rend his spirit!

The bubble in the champagne died down--as it always will if one permits it to stand. He felt the old mood seep through the dikes of his gayety.

Alone. A familiar face--he would have dropped on his knees and thanked G.o.d for the sight of a familiar face. These people, kindly as they were--what were they but strangers? Yesterday he had not known them; to-morrow he would leave them behind forever. All at once the mystery of this bubbling idea was bared: he was going to risk his life in the streets in the vague hope of seeing some face he had known in the days before the world had gone drunk on blood. One familiar face.