Part 12

For a moment our hero chatted animatedly with his friends, while taking note of the position of the table at which the fellow sat. As yet he could not see whether Sullivan had a companion, for the table was in a recess and behind a stand of artificial palms. Then he leaned across the shoulder of the man next him and caught sight of a gray silk dress and a rose-trimmed hat. Who the lady was it was impossible for him to discover, as her head was completely hidden by the paper foliage toward which her companion was bending. They were, apparently, by no means near the end of their supper, so that there was time to consider the situation and to decide upon a course of action. But the situation itself was a novel one to Ralston.

Now the mere accosting of a young lady in a public restaurant is not a very serious matter, even if she be accompanied by a male escort, so long as the matter be done decently and in order. But to suddenly burst upon a _tête-à-tête_ couple from behind a bunch of palms, and demand what has been done with a young man, especially if it be nearly three in the morning, is somewhat different. One mistaken move, and the search would have to be abandoned. How was he to introduce himself to a strange woman and compel her to divulge information which she might have no intention of disclosing, and how, moreover, could this be accomplished in the presence of a person of the type of Mr. Sullivan? He had no claim on either of them. Even assuming that the bounder did not object to his having speech with the lady, it was unlikely that she would admit any intimacy with Steadman in the presence of her companion. No, he must speak to the girl by herself--that was clear enough. But how? Obviously, he could not invite her escort to step out into the next room for a few moments. Neither was it at all likely that she would accede to any request of his (carried by a waiter) either to speak to him or to get rid of her companion. Again he was, in the vernacular, "up against it" as his cabby had suggested on a previous occasion.

Meantime the moments were slipping by, with Ralston trying hard to keep up his end of the conversation. Ten minutes more, and he had determined definitely that there was no course open but to trust to the girl herself for a solution. All he could do was to throw his hand down, face up, before her, and let her decide. In the event of his request being ignored, he must face it boldly out with both of them.

Borrowing a pencil he wrote upon his visiting card: "Miss Davenport will place the writer under the greatest possible obligation by allowing him to speak to her privately upon a matter of the utmost importance. He is in civilian dress at the next table." Underneath his name he wrote: "Second Assistant Secretary of the Navy." Summoning the head waiter he instructed the latter to carry it to the lady behind the palm in such a manner that it should be unobserved by her companion.

He felt instantly relieved--the relief the rider feels the moment he has decided to take the jump and his horse rises beneath him. He plunged anew into the banter going on about him. He saw, out of the corner of his eye, his messenger circle the room, approach the couple from the other side, address Mr. Sullivan, call his attention to something behind him, and slip the card into his companion's lap. Then the attendant moved on.

Several moments passed. He began to feel that nothing had been accomplished when there came a crash of glass, the palm rocked, and the lady in some confusion sprang to her feet, shaking her dress. Her escort arose more slowly, cursing the nearest waiters in a comprehensive manner. The hubbub in the restaurant ceased momentarily, but quickly began again as the manager and his aids hurried forward to offer their assistance.

They had hard work to appease Mr. Sullivan, however. He wanted to see the proprietor, and insisted loudly, although irrelevantly, that he was an "American gentleman." The table was righted, and the head waiter promised that a second supper should be instantly forthcoming, but Sullivan remained in a state of defiance. He insisted on seeing "Monseer Martin"--"my fren' Monseer Martin," and called loudly for a "garsoon" to take him there.

Apparently the lady herself was indignant, and was not at all averse to having her escort see his "fren' Monseer Martin." Then, with his head high in air like a red harvest moon, the rampant Sullivan made his way toward the main door of the dining room, followed by the apologetic and deprecatory head waiter.

As the two passed out Ralston arose.

"Going?" inquired Peyton.

"Not very far. I'll be right back," replied our friend.

The others watched him curiously.

In a moment he was behind the palm, and had sunk into Sullivan's vacant seat.

"How d'y do, Mr. Second Assistant Secretary of the Navy?" remarked the young woman nonchalantly. "Glad to know you. Rather a noisy introduction, eh?"

"I'm surprised you thought it worth while," answered Ralston. "Our friend has probably polished off Martin by this time, and is already on his way back. Then he'll be ready to polish off _me_!"

"I guess you're able to take care of yourself, all right," replied the girl. "What is it you want?"

"I don't know that it's wise for me to tell you on this short acquaintance."

"Short? Yes. I suppose it is. But, you see, I know _you_. And if I can help Mr. Ralston, why I _will_."

"Thank you," said Ralston. The words sounded entirely _malapropos_ and inadequate. "Tell me, then--tell me where to find John Steadman."

Instantly the girl's whole manner changed and she drew back.

"Steadman!" she exclaimed uneasily.

"Yes, Steadman! John Steadman. I must find him _to-night_!"

"You can't!" she cried in some agitation. "You can't. I've no business to tell you even that, but you _can't_."

Ralston's face settled into a grim mask.

"I _will_!" he answered steadily. "And you're going to help me."

"I can't, Mr. Ralston. I can't. I don't know where he is."

Ralston's heart fell again.

"But you can _help_ me?" he asked.

"I can't. I swear I can't," she replied almost hysterically, and Ralston could see that she was speaking the truth.

"Tell me," he said, "tell me, and I'll give you anything you ask--does _Sullivan_ know?"

As he spoke the girl's face turned pale under the electric light. She nodded her head slightly, while at the same moment a thick hand descended on Ralston's shoulder and a heavy, wine-laden voice growled in his ear:

"Whatcher doin' in my seat?"

Ralston sprang to his feet and shook off the hand.

"Whatcher doin' talkin' to this lady?" inquired the other, his eyes blazing with anger. His voice rang loudly above the roar of conversation.

"Miss Davenport is a friend of mine," replied Ralston as quietly as he could.

"Frien' nothin'!" cried Sullivan. "I'll teach you to mind your own business." He took a step backward and began to pull off his dinner jacket.

"Don't, Jim!" cried the girl. "Don't! Please! Please don't!"

"Shut up!" snarled Sullivan. "I'll attend to you later!"

There was a great uproar in the restaurant. At the same instant Sullivan led heavily at Ralston's head. Almost automatically, with every ounce of his body at the end of an arm trained into a steel rod, Ralston ducked and countered. His fist caught Sullivan squarely on the chin, and the man went down and backward like a duck shot on the wing. His head struck on a corner of the table, and he lay motionless.

The next instant Ralston was the center of an excited, jostling crowd. Peyton had his arm around him and was whispering: "Get out quick, old man. Awfully unfortunate. Get out while there's time."

"Some one ring for an ambulance!" shouted a civilian at a nearby table.

"Is there a doctor here?" inquired the head waiter mechanically, hurrying toward the door.

Ralston's head reeled. The President's latest appointee mixed up in a drunken brawl at a public hostelry! Worse than that, if possible, he had, perhaps, killed the only man who knew where Steadman could be found. It had all happened so quickly that he saw it like the scenes of a vitagraph, with little twinkles of light glinting all about. Then a girl's voice whispered in his ear:

"Get away! You mustn't be mixed up in this. Get away while you can!"

Somebody began to fling water in Sullivan's face and to rip off his collar. The crowd forced itself almost upon the prostrate man. "Get away," he heard Peyton repeating. "Don't be a fool! Think of the Administration!"

Men were climbing upon tables to see what was going on. There was a deafening hubbub from the main hall, into which the crowd from the other room was pouring. Ralston was thinking as quickly as he could. He saw his whole public career shattered by a single blow. He saw Ellen's anxious face and heard her words: "Please find Steadman." He ground his teeth. The only clew to Steadman lay like a log before him, struck down by his own hand.

Some one in the back of the room shouted: "Send for the police--a man has been shot!" and he heard the silly cry repeated in the outer corridor. Less than half a minute had passed, but to Ralston it had already seemed twenty, when he decided upon the only course Fate had left open to him.

How he managed to do it he never really knew. Afterwards it appeared absurdly impossible, but Peyton said that at the time it seemed reasonable enough. There had been a moment when, in the confusion, the crowd had blocked its own efforts to get closer, a moment when no one apparently had known what to do, a moment which Ralston, in his businesslike and rather autocratic fashion, had turned to his own advantage.

A hurried whisper to Peyton, and with the help of one of their brother officers they had raised Sullivan from the floor and, followed by the girl, had carried him to the Fifth Avenue entrance. "Keep back the crowd!" Peyton had cried to the head waiter. "We must give this man air," and in a moment more they had staggered with Sullivan's limp form to the ever-ready hansom, which had wheeled quickly to their assistance, and shoved him in.

In another moment there had appeared around the corner of the building a throng of men and women in evening dress, among whom were mingled waiters, pedestrians, and cabmen.

"To the hospital!" cried Ralston, and pushing in the girl, sprang after her himself. The cabman cut furiously at his horse, the bystanders parted, and the hansom leaped forward like a chariot in a Roman amphitheater, with Ralston, who had snatched the reins from above his head, guiding the excited animal down Fifth Avenue.

A policeman made an ineffectual attempt to stop them at Twenty-third Street, but quickly stepped aside to avoid being run down.

"Hully gee!" shouted the cabman inconsequently, "Hully gee!" while the girl, staring abstractedly at the motionless face beside her, murmured excitedly, "A clean get-away! A clean get-away!"

VII

They turned west at Eighth Street and crossed Sixth Avenue at a slow trot. Ralston had surrendered the reins to the driver and was now racking his brains for a solution of his extraordinary and sensational predicament. The girl had taken Sullivan's motionless head into her lap.

"Where to, sir?" inquired the cabby through the manhole.

"I don't know," answered Ralston. "Lose us if you can, that's all. Lose us so we won't be able to find our own way back."

They continued west, following narrow, dimly lit streets, under the shadow of high warehouses. Sullivan had given as yet no sign of life and the girl had not spoken since Twenty-third Street. The strain of the situation began to tell.

"Well, what are we going to do now?" inquired Ralston with an attempt at jocularity. The girl did not reply, and as he heard her sobbing softly a pang of remorse touched him. What business had he to force this young woman into being an accessory after the fact in what might be heralded as a crime?

"Miss Davenport," he said, "I'm awfully sorry to have dragged you into this. Indeed, I am. Let me drive you home. I'll look after Sullivan, and if necessary take him to a hospital."

"And leave you to stick this out by yourself? Not on your life!" she replied. "It's a bad mix-up, but we've got to pull it off somehow. But first we've got to do something for Jim. Look, there's a drug store over there and a night light."

"But that won't do," expostulated Ralston. "We never could explain to the officer on post. We'll have to go somewhere else. You know about these things. Where?"

"Yes, yes--I know."

"Well, quickly!"

The cabman was peering down through the manhole.

"Do you know Commerce Street?" asked the girl.

"Sure I do," said the cabby.

"Well, go to No. 589."

The cabman jerked around his horse. They were in Greenwich Village now, and not far from the old New York Central freight depot. Trim little brick houses with white portals and tiny eves lined the streets. Slender lanes led away into black distances. The night was silent save for the rush and roar of the elevated and the clack of their own horse's hoofs. Not a window was agleam. In this respectable neighborhood folks went to bed betimes, and got up early.

The cool night air soothed Ralston's nerves, but with it he felt limp and tired. The excitement at the restaurant, the wild dash down Fifth Avenue, the presence with them of a man who might perhaps be dead, the fear of pursuit, the extraordinary situation in which he, a man of so much recent prominence, found himself, the strange way in which this girl had become a partner in his fortunes, dazed and bewildered him.

"He can't be dead," muttered Ralston. "He can't be dead!"

The cab turned into a little street lined with irregularly shaped houses. A few gnarled and distorted trees, whose trunks burst out of the concrete pavement, raised their dust-laden branches, prehensile and unnatural, into the starlight. A hundred feet from where the street began it turned sharply to the left, forming a right angle, and debouched again into another thoroughfare. Had one of the ends of it been closed it would have formed a natural _cul-de-sac_--an appendix to one of the great canals of the city. And with curious impropriety the city fathers had named this "accidental" Commerce Street, leaving it to the imagination as to what sort of commerce had been intended. A rickety gas lamp leaned dangerously toward a flight of high wooden steps in the angle of the street. Strangely enough, when the street turned the house turned, too, so that half its front faced north and half east. The natural inference was that the inside of the house was shaped like a piece of pie, with its partially bitten point abutting on the corner.

Ralston took charge of Sullivan and the girl sprang down and stepped into the area. Somewhere at a great distance a bell rang once, and then, more faintly, a second time. They waited in silence. On the main thoroughfare beyond the gnarled trees a policeman slowly sauntered across the street. At the top of one of the opposite houses a window was raised cautiously and voices could be heard whispering. Again the bell jangled loosely in the distance, then came the sound of iron bars rattling and bolts being shot back. A grating creaked rustily.

"It's me--Floss. Let me in."

The girl ran back to the cab and a match flared in the grating. Ralston thought he saw a wrinkled face behind the light.

"All right. Bring him in," said the girl.

Ralston and the cabman lifted the lank form of Sullivan to the sidewalk and half carried, half dragged him into the area. At their feet lay a small flight of steps upon which played a feeble light from the inside. Down this they pulled the victim of Ralston's strange quest. A passage opened before them, in the middle of which stood a tiny, wrinkled Jewish woman, who watched them with snapping, restless eyes, like those of a blackbird.

The girl pushed by them and, taking the candle from the woman, opened a door leading to the right. The air was close and unwholesome. A bed with only a mattress covering the springs stood in the corner, and upon this Ralston and the cabman placed the still unconscious form of Mr. Sullivan.

"That'll do for the present," said the girl. "Now you" (addressing the cabman) "wait outside. If the cop asks what you are doin', you're waiting for a fare in another house, see?"

The cabman retired, and the Jewish woman lit a kerosene lamp. The girl disappeared and returned with a wet sponge and a bottle of ammonia. She now opened Sullivan's shirt and sponged his face with perfect confidence. Then she poured some ammonia upon the sponge and applied it to his nostrils. Ralston, leaning over the bed, coughed in spite of himself.

Sullivan opened his eyes a little; the girl removed the sponge and put her head close to his face.

"He's breathing--he'll come round all right," she said. "He stays 'out' an awful long time."

She gave him the ammonia again and the patient gasped audibly. Ralston heaved a great sigh of relief. Although he had known himself to be absolutely in the right he was aware that this body-snatching was, to say the least, irregular. Had the fellow died it would have made a nasty story for the papers. He sank back on a horsehair rocking chair and the room grew black with little pricking stars. The next moment he felt the sponge thrust in his face.

"You're almost out yourself, Mr. Ralston. I'll have a cup of coffee ready for you in a minute. Lie down on the sofa."

Ralston indeed felt sick and faint, the lids of his eyes seemed like lead, pulled down by invisible but powerful strings. The man was not dead! But Steadman--he'd think of Steadman in a moment, after he had rested his eyes a little----

He leaned back his head--and slept. A light touch on his forehead awakened him half an hour later, and he opened his eyes upon a strange picture. The room was stuffy and warm as ever. The lamp cast but an uncertain light on the walls, which, he noticed, were quite bare of ornament. Over the windows were heavy wooden shutters, bolted on the inside. On the bed lay Sullivan, breathing heavily. The floor was covered by a dirty rag carpet, and the only articles of furniture besides the bed itself were a horsehair-covered lounge, a small table, and two horsehair-covered chairs, and in the midst of these uncouth surroundings stood a girl in shimmering evening dress, her white shoulders shining in the lamplight, offering him a cup of hot and fragrant coffee.

"You're a brick," said Ralston feebly.

The girl smiled.

"Kind of funny, ain't it? To think of you and me and him"--she pointed over her shoulder--"being here. What a rumpus the police'll make when they can't find him at any hospital. It's a queer mix-up, now, ain't it?"

"I should say it _was_!" echoed Ralston. He gulped down the coffee. "Do you live here?" he asked, sweeping the room again with his eyes. The girl smiled.

"Not generally," she said.

"But this house--whose is it?"

The girl shrugged her shoulders.

"They've never been able to find out at the tax office," she said.

"You're a good girl," said Ralston inconsequently.

The smile on the girl's face changed. She started to speak. Then she closed her eyes and covered them with her hands.

The figure in the bed gave vent to a long-drawn-out snort and tossed heavily. The girl dabbed her eyes with her wrists and turned with an anxious look.

"He's waking up," she whispered. "He'll be crazy when he sees you here."

"But I brought him here," said Ralston, "and it was his own fault. Besides, he is going to find Steadman for me."

"Find Steadman for you?" she exclaimed.

"Why, certainly! Why not?"

The girl looked at him in amazement.

"And that's why you carried him off?"

"Yes--naturally--of course. What did you think?"

She gave a low laugh and clapped her hands softly together.

"And I thought all along it was just to get yourself out of the mess you were in--to avoid the publicity and all. I didn't see your game. I thought it was all up for you--and the best you could do was to get out of having to go to court! But they can't count you out, can they? My, you _have_ got a nerve!" she finished enthusiastically.

Ralston shrugged his shoulders.

"I assure you it wasn't as clearly thought out as all that. It was like clutching at whatever was left. Sullivan's my only clew. How can I force a statement from this fellow? What has he done? What hold can I get on him?"

The girl looked at him half frightened yet full of admiration.

"Don't try it, Mr. Ralston," she whispered. "Give it up. You can't do it. It's too late. Besides, Sullivan's a dangerous man--a man who stands in with all the politicians--a bad fellow to threaten. He's done things enough, God knows, to send him to jail a dozen times--but leave him alone! You've done enough for Steadman. If you try to monkey with Sullivan _anything_ might happen to you. You mightn't leave this house alive. Get away before it's too late. You're probably due in Washington about now. This night's work will blow over, and Steadman isn't worth the powder to blow his brains out." She clasped her hands with a gesture of entreaty.

"No," said Ralston. "I've begun, and I must finish the job. I mightn't have gone into it if I had known what it was going to cost, but it's too late to back out now. Besides, I've nothing to lose. I'm done for. This 'Martin' business would kill the Administration if I didn't resign. In fact, the public need never know that I have accepted. Fancy! The police looking for the Second Assistant Secretary of the Navy as a fugitive from justice! Why, the papers will be full of it. But that doesn't help me with Steadman. I've got to force this fellow here to give up. Tell me something to use as a lever."

The man on the bed groaned loudly and elevated one knee high in the air. The girl hesitated, evidently torn between various conflicting claims of loyalty.

"Tell him," she whispered after a moment--"tell him you know all about Shackleton and the Mercantile bonds. If that isn't enough, say you'll hand him over for the Masterson deal--that'll fetch him, but be careful and don't get him angry. He may not know where Steadman is, after all. But I heard him say that the gang had almost finished trimming Steadman and were going to finish him up to-night--at cards I think. They've gotten almost every cent he has already----"

Sullivan gave a harsh cough and arose to a sitting position.

"Shackleton--Mercantile bonds--Masterson deal," murmured Ralston to himself.

"Huh! That you, Floss?" grunted Sullivan. "What are we doin' here? Where's the old woman?"

"Sh-h! It's all right, Jim," said the girl. "We made a clean get-away. You came near running in the lot of us."

"Whatcher talking about?" mumbled Sullivan. "'Bout 'getaways'?" Then he caught sight of Ralston. "Who's this feller?"

"All right, Mr. Sullivan, I'm a friend of yours," said Ralston quietly.

Sullivan looked fixedly at him for a moment without speaking.

"I've seen you before," he muttered. "Somewheres."

"Sure," said Ralston with a laugh. "You tried to do me up at 'The Martin' not over an hour ago."

Sullivan glared at him.

"You that feller?"

"I am."

"Whatcher doin' here?"

"Same thing I was going to do at 'The Martin' if you'd given me the chance--have a talk with you."

Sullivan looked puzzled and rubbed the back of his head. He had none of the resplendency of his earlier appearance.

"Must ha' fallen an' hit my head," said he in an explanatory manner. "Say, did anyone _club_ me?"

"No," said Ralston. "But you got a pretty rough deal."

"Say," repeated Sullivan, "how'd you come to bring me to the old woman's?"

"I had to take you somewhere," said Ralston. There was a pause of several seconds, during which Sullivan endeavored to readjust himself.

"What's yer name?" he inquired.

"Sackett," said Ralston.

"Sackett," repeated Sullivan. "I don't know Sackett. What's yer business?"

"Oh, I'm a detective," answered Ralston lightly.