Chapter 10

"I won't miss him another time if I get a shot at him, whether it's with a tomato or something else!" snapped Maxon with sudden viciousness. "I'd like to pitch him into one of his own vats!"

"You don't love him much, eh?"

Charlie Maxon thereupon expressed his exact opinion of his late employer in studied terms to which Mr. Moody lent the attentive and appreciative ear of a connoisseur in language. When the recitation was ended, he nodded approval and returned to his doorstep, where he sat down and contentedly finished his cigar.

Maxon dropped on his cot, eased the cork from the bottle of rye and took one satisfying drink of the invigorating liquor. More, he dared not allow himself for the moment.

At nine o'clock Moody rose from his doorstep and came inside, carefully locking and double-locking the door and putting its key in his pocket. He did the same by the rear exit, and was preparing to retire to the privacy of his own small room when he was hailed a second time by his charge.

"Now, what?" Moody went to the barred door of the cell with more alacrity on this occasion, hopeful of further largesse. "Can't you let a man have a minute's peace?"

"Going to bed so soon?"

"Nothin' else to do."

"Remember two years ago how we used to play checkers at the Workmen's Club?"

"What of it?"

"You used to beat me then pretty regular, but I guess it'd be different now. I'd beat you four out of five."

"That's nonsense. What are you gettin' at anyway?"

"What's the matter with letting me out of here for a while? A few games of checkers wouldn't do any harm--help pass the time."

"Help pass--! Say, where do you think you are? Why don't you ask me to take you to the movies? Mebbe you'd like me to send for Drusilla so's we could have a dance? Want me to lose my job, huh?"

"Who's going to know anything about it except us? Slip out and get a board--and a couple of glasses!"

"_Glasses_? What kind of glasses?"

"Whisky glasses."

Moody started. He looked keenly at his prisoner. Slowly, a warm light stole into his eye, he moistened his lips with the tip of his tongue.

"Quit your kiddin'!"

"I'm not kidding--look here!"

Maxon knew his man. Satisfied that he had Moody quivering with anticipation, he stepped to his cot, produced the flat bottle and shook it invitingly. The rich gurgle was music to the jailer's ear. A more hard-boiled, professional warder would have followed just one course with decision and dispatch, to Moody's credit be it said, it did not once occur to him that he might safely confiscate the treasure and dedicate it to his own delight.

"I'll go after those glasses," he said promptly. "Sure it's good stuff, Charlie?"

"Wouldn't drink it myself if I wasn't, would I? Hustle up--I'm ready for a drink right now."

Tempted beyond his strength, the faithless keeper of the Hambleton lockup departed on winged feet. He was back in remarkably quick time, a checkerboard under his coat and two bar glasses in his pockets. A last feeble flicker of responsibility stayed his hand an instant as he opened the cell door.

"No tricks, Charlie!"

"'Course not. Cross my heart and hope to die."

With the doors locked and no windows through which they could be seen, they sat themselves confidently at a small table, a glass at each side, the checkerboard between them and the precious bottle on the floor within easy reach. The proceedings opened with one apiece.

"A-a-a-ah!"

"Told you it was good, didn't I? Have another."

"Thanks. This is like old times. Black moves first."

"Teach your grandmother. Chin-chin."

"If that's bootleg, it's good enough for me."

"It ain't, though. He gets it from Canada himself."

"An empty glass is a mournful sight. Thanks. Your move."

They played and drank and drank and played. Moody won most of the games, which suited both of them. An hour passed. There was lots of time, Charlie told himself. He wasn't due at Drusilla's until eleven-thirty--the rendezvous she had made in the event that all went well. On the other hand, he was beginning to feel the effect of the whisky he was drinking. It wouldn't do to get tight himself. Better speed things up a bit, then take a walk for half an hour or so before going to Drusilla's--

"Em-py glash--mournful shight."

Charlie's left hand hovered an instant over the mournful sight, his fingers crumbling something; then he picked up the glass and filled it.

"A-a-a-ah."

Five minutes later he was half-carrying, half-dragging the inert figure of his jailer to the cell which by rights he should have been occupying himself. He dropped Moody on the narrow cot, relieved him of his keys and stepped out, grinning as he locked the door behind him. It would be a long, long time before the recreant warder awakened to discovery and disgrace. No one from outside would come near the place until eight or nine in the morning; he had oceans of time in which to make good his escape before the alarm could be given.

He possessed himself of a slouch hat that he found in Moody's room and drew its brim well down over his eyes, then cautiously unlocked the back door of the jail. This gave on to a narrow, unlighted alley, which led to a quiet side-street. There was little chance of his meeting any one at that hour of the night. After a quick survey which assured him the alley was deserted, he left the building and locked the door.

The fresh night air after the stuffy atmosphere of the jail hit him hard. It sent the potent fumes of the whisky to his head, and by the time he had reached the end of the alley he was staggering perceptibly. He vaguely realized his condition and the peril it implied, and paused for an instant at the first corner to steady himself against the wall of a building while he strove to clear his brain. He jerked off his hat to give the air access to his head, too fuddled to note that a street-lamp not ten yards away was shining directly on his face.

Then a tight grip fastened on his arm and he was pushed back into the obscurity of the alley.

"Charlie Maxon, by glory! Who let _you_ out?"

"Wh-who are you?"

"Who am I? Well, that's pretty good! Mean to say you can't _see_ me? I'm Langhorn!"

_XII: Starlight on Steel_

When he had finished his examination of the broken window in the living-room, Herman Krech contrived--partly by his sheer physical bulk and partly by the exercise of a soft assertiveness that was saved by his bland geniality from being plain rudeness--to sequester Simon Varr for a word in private. To accomplish this end he was obliged to shake off his own wife, the tanner's wife, the Jason Bolts and Miss Ocky Copley, the last lady in especial revealing the pertinacity of a cockle-burr in her objection to being shaken off. Krech didn't succeed in losing her until he had shut the door of the study in her face with a courteously affected air of absent-mindedness.

"What do you want?" inquired Varr ungraciously.

"I've got a message for you--sorry if I'm intruding," replied the big man, half-amused and half-resentful at his host's tone. "I'm afraid it will annoy you--but most things do, don't they? But Creighton thought it best to give you a tip and of course I feel obliged to pass it on as received."

"All right. What is it?" said the tanner less irascibly.

"Practically a repetition of the warning I gave you this morning on my own account. I read him that note over the telephone. He said it sounded like the work of a nut, and added that a bad nut is often a dangerous proposition. He thinks you should take reasonable precautions against a personal attack at least until he gets here."

"When peace will mantle the earth, I suppose!"

"Possibly so," answered the big man imperturbably. "I know if I were a crook engaged in a campaign of crime I'd be apt to desist if a detective suddenly appeared over the horizon. Wouldn't you?"

"Not if I thought he was scared of me!"

"Oh--I see." Mr. Krech's face, normally pink, deepened to a delicate shade of rose. "Rather cheap, that, isn't it, Varr? No, Creighton is not scared of crooks so you could notice it, but he's not a darn' fool either. Anyway, there it is. Take it or leave it."

"I'll leave it, thank you. Does he think I'm going to wire the Governor to turn out the militia?"

"He'd be more likely to suggest that you wire the nearest asylum for a competent keeper; he has a rough tongue at times."

"Humph. When's he coming?"

"First train in the morning. Gets here at eleven."

"I'll drive down and meet him. Will he stop at the hotel, or will he expect me to put him up here?"

"You'd better settle that with him, Mr. Varr. He's not a roughneck, if that's what you mean." Krech contemplated the tanner reflectively; there were several things he wished to tell him but he manfully swallowed them all. "Good-day, sir!"

His doubts of the morning were reborn as he left the study, unattended. Had he any right to inflict this specimen on Creighton? He could only hope that the detective's sense of humor would prove a buffer between him and his patron's boorishness. If not--

His cogitations ended abruptly as he spied Miss Ocky awaiting him in the living-room. He had caught her with her eye so attentively fixed on the study door as to suggest that a less refined woman might have had an ear glued to the keyhole. He beamed on her, his customary good-nature again in the ascendant as he left the irritating tanner behind.

"Hello," he greeted her cheerfully. "Others all waiting for me outside?"

"Yes. Your wife has apologized for you twice, I believe. I think it was mean of you to shut yourself up like that after getting me all excited about detectives and things! What were you two talking about?"

"Secrets," chuckled Mr. Krech. He continued to move implacably toward the front door as she marched with equal determination at his elbow. "Just a girly-girly heart-to-heart talk. Delightful fellow, isn't he?"

"Humph. You might remember he wasn't the only victim of the robbery. If he lost a notebook, I lost a perfectly good dagger. Why can't I know what's going on, too?" She cooed softly. "_Please_, Mr. Krech!"

"Well, if you _must_ know! I asked him, 'Vot iss a tanner?' and he said, '_Vat_ do you mean?', and then--"

"_Oh!_" cried Miss Ocky, and flounced. Then her indignation gave way to laughter. "Mr. Krech, you're a--a _sus domesticus_!"'

"French for diplomat, I take it," he retorted amiably, and left her on the top step as he surged across the piazza and down to the waiting car. Nevertheless, he sought his more erudite spouse at the first opportunity.

"Jean, what's a _sus domesticus_?"

"Gracious!" She wrinkled her beautiful brow for a moment, but she had taught school for a while before acquiring wedded affluence and the answer presently came to her. "Why--a common pig, I suppose."

"Gosh. A _common_ pig? Not even a nice, clean, pink-and-white, prize-winning pig?"

"No. What _are_ you talking about?"

"Nothing. Nothing _a_-tall! Say--what did you think of that Copley woman?"

"Miss Copley? Very interesting. Very attractive. I liked her immensely. Didn't you?"

He thought that over an instant. Then, like Miss Ocky, he surrendered to amusement and gave one of his deep chuckles.

"Yes," he said. "I did. Sometime I'd like to pack a dictionary with me and drop in on her for a chat!"

After Krech had dropped his unwelcome warning and departed, Simon Varr turned to his desk and tried to forget some of his immediate problems by attacking a small mass of correspondence that he had brought home from the office after the innumerable interruptions of the morning. He did not succeed any too well in concentrating his thoughts on the task. They would persist in wandering to other matters, leaving him staring blankly at a letter while his wits went the weary round of his perplexities. With reflection came temper, and he rather welcomed the sound of his study door being opened with no preliminary knock. That foreboded more trouble of some sort, and he was in the humor for a fight-- He swung his chair around and started at the sight of his wife in the doorway.

"Well? Come in. What is it?"

She accepted the invitation. She came into the room slowly, but she ignored his gesture toward a chair. She stood looking down at him, her face all the whiter for a touch of vivid color that burned in each cheek, her arms hanging loosely at her sides but her hands clenched in token of restrained emotion. Her voice was calm as ever when she spoke, but passion lent it a husky quality that smote ominously on his ear.

"What have you done to--my son?"

"Done to him? Done to him? What d'you mean?" He sputtered. "I haven't _done_ anything to him!"

"You quarreled with him?"

"Call it that if you choose. He forced the issue--though he probably went cry-babying to you with some other version!"

"He doesn't lie. And he told me just what I managed to drag out of him--no more. I got the impression that he was--ashamed of you, that's all."

"Well? I'll live it down, I guess! What do you expect me to do about it?"

"The decent thing, just for once in your life. I want you to go to him, or send for him, and--and make peace."

"You can see me doing it, can't you? Ha!"

"He has left our roof."

"His own choice!"

"You drove him to it."

"That's not so! He's free, white and twenty-one; he can do as he pleases elsewhere, but he'll do as I say while he's in my house!"

"_My_ house, please!"

"We've had that argument before and you've had precious little change out of it! As for Copley--let him rustle his own living or starve until he learns to obey my wishes!"

"You won't consider mine?"

"No!" The word was like a thunderclap.

"Very well." She held herself erect to every inch of her slim height, her steadfast gaze leveled at him from beneath straight brows. "I warn you, Simon, that you are going too far. I don't know if you realize all the brutalities, the ignominies, that I've suffered from you since we were married. Much kinder if you'd beaten me. It hasn't seemed possible to me that you can have realized--! Yours is a very curious nature--I've had to make allowances--often--" Her voice faded into silence.

"_What are you going to do about it?_"

She jumped beneath the lash of that crisp question.

"I don't know--_yet_." Abruptly, she turned on her heel and left the room.

"That's that!" Simon swung back to his desk, a grim smile on his lips. "It always boils down to the same thing--they don't know what they're going to do about it. Let 'em rant all they please, in the end what I say _goes_!"

He resumed his correspondence, refreshed.

The only aftermath of this latest squall instantly apparent was the message Bates gave him as he announced dinner. Miss Lucy would not be down. She was indisposed.

"Another word for a bad disposition," Simon informed his sister-in-law, as they seated themselves at a table laid for two, indifferent to the fact that he was criticizing his wife within the hearing of a servant. "She'll have recovered by morning."

"We can't all have your sunny nature, Simon."

"Humph. You've heard about the roekus with Copley, I suppose?"

"Rumors have reached me." Miss Ocky peppered her soup composedly. "Need we discuss it now?"

"No. There's always the weather, if you prefer that."

The topic did not seem to appeal to her. They did not talk about the weather, nor anything else. A silence that would have been perfect but for the sound of a subdued champing from the head of the table was broken only once during the progress of the meal. Occupied though he was with his food, Varr gradually became conscious of a steady scrutiny that first puzzled, then irritated him. He glared at her angrily.

"What do you keep looking at me like that for?" he demanded.

"Interest, Simon. Pure, unadulterated interest."

"Well, stop it! I don't like it!"

For a wonder, she acceded to his insistence without a word. It cost her no effort to avoid looking at him for the remainder of the time at the table, after which they rose in silence and parted. Simon went inevitably to his study, Miss Ocky in sisterly fashion to Lucy's room to inquire the cause of her _malaise_.

Two hours passed before she came down again. Two somewhat trying hours, to judge from the expression on her face, which wore a look as grim as any ever sported by Medusa. Her eyes were cold and hard as she marched promptly to the closed study door and rapped upon it--a gesture of icy politeness.

"Come in! Humph. So it's you, Ocky! Dropped in to take another good look at me?"

"No--to have a rather serious talk with you, Simon." From the effortless way in which she drew a heavy armchair into the position she desired, a shrewd observer might have gleaned a hint of the muscular strength that was her heritage from many a camp and trail. "Hope you don't mind."

"Quite the contrary. By a serious talk I presume you mean a row. Well--I've gotten so I thrive on 'em!"

"Yes. I pity you just enough, Simon, to wish you weren't so fond of them." Miss Ocky dropped into her chair and lighted a cigarette with pensive deliberation. "I don't know that I can offer you a real row, my idea was to hand you a few straight-from-the-shoulder remarks and then a couple of ultimatums. As for the brutal badinage in which you delight, I'm in no mood for it this evening."

"Let's have your remarks. I guess I can stand 'em."

"First, then--I suppose you know that you have played the cat-and-banjo with Lucy's happiness for the last twenty-odd years?"

"Don't assume I know anything. Just tell me!"

"Consider yourself told that, to start with. I was literally shocked when I came back and saw the change in Lucy. She's the shadow of her old self, nothing more. It is you who are responsible for that."

"Humph!"

"Now you have started on Copley--made a good start, too, if the boy's manner is any criterion. Possibly I may be doing him an injustice. It might have been consideration for his mother rather than fear of you that has restrained him until now. Anyway, I'm glad he has summoned the courage to defy you at last."

"Indeed. May I ask you one question? How long has it been considered good form for a woman to enter a man's house and interfere with his domestic relations. Eh?"

"It was my father's house first, then Lucy's. I am more at home here this minute than you could ever be."

"Try and prove it in a law-court!"

"Perhaps I shall--some day." She paused to scrutinize her polished finger-nails, brushed a speck from one of them, raised her eyes to his and added dryly, "After all, Simon, you know you only got in here by a trick."

"A _trick_! Now--what do you mean by _that_?"

"Memory gone _phut_, Simon? Perhaps I can refresh it. While I was watching the fire last night a man came up to me and called me by name. It was--Leslie Sherwood."

"_Ah!_" The exclamation was wrung from him through stiff lips. The color drained from his face as he leaned forward tensely, one hand gripping an arm of his chair like a vise. "G-go on!"

"That shot went home, did it?" asked Miss Ocky coolly, watching the effect of her words. "I've several more in the locker! We had quite a long talk together and he told me many things I didn't know. Interesting things--very!"

"_What?_" Simon's voice was hoarse. "He didn't tell you--he didn't dare tell you--" He stopped, a deadly fear in his eyes.

"Yes. He told me why he quarreled with his father. Why he left home. Why he has come back now, freed by his father's death. Shall I go on, Simon?"

He sank back in his chair, shaken in all his being. He could not speak until he moistened his lips with his tongue.

"Have you--told Lucy?"

"No. That is Leslie's right, I should say. No doubt he will use it. As far as I can see, there is only one way by which you can make a decent exit from the mess you're in."

"If--if you're suggesting--suicide--forget it!"

"Suicide? No! Why should I waste my breath proposing an act that requires courage? What I meant was--divorce."

"Divorce!"

"It needn't cost you a penny. Make it easy for her to get--your lawyers will arrange that. You'll have the tannery--and welcome! All you need do is--go! Go from this house!"

"Divorce! Stand aside--hat in hand--bow another man into my place--!" The rage of a cornered animal swept aside his fear. "I'll see you all in--"

"Don't shout."

"So _that_ is why Sherwood has come back!" He gritted his words through set teeth. "He thinks he is going to make trouble for me, eh? Just let him try--just let him try! If he dares to say a word to Lucy--if he even dares to set foot on this property--" His clenched fist crashed on the desk beside him as he abandoned himself to a very ecstasy of fury. "If he dares try that, by Heaven, I'll kill him like a dog!"

"I wouldn't," advised Miss Ocky in her quiet, hard little voice. "Everything would have to come out in court, then, and you'd have a fearful time persuading any jury that it was justifiable." She had finished her cigarette, and since Simon's study boasted no ash-trays, she rose and went to the open window to toss the stub outside. She remained there, leaning against the casement and breathing deep of the cool night air. "Wouldn't you rather be divorced than hanged?"

"_No!_"

"Humph. Queer tastes, you have! Well--I've kept my promise. I've told you a few straight facts and issued an ultimatum. The rest is up to you. Would you like time to consider--"

"No! Not a minute--blast you!"

"I don't blast easily, Simon. I'm to assume, then, that you reject my well-intentioned--_Hello! What's that!_" Her voice dropped to an excited whisper as she bent her head and peered into the darkness.

The alteration in her manner penetrated through the fog of temper that had clouded his brain. He left his chair and was at her side in a bound, surmising her answer even before he snapped a swift question.

"What is it?"

"That monk--! I could have sworn--! Over there by the big silver birch--! I can't see him now. Can you make out anything?"

Side by side they leaned from the window, striving to accustom their eyes to the starlit night. A long minute passed.

"I must have been mistaken." Miss Ocky drew a long breath. "A shadow from a swaying bough--or imagination."

"There isn't wind enough to sway a twig!" he corrected curtly. He lingered a while longer, his angry gaze continuing to search the darkness, before he drew back into the room. "It's quite likely you saw him," he muttered. "No doubt he saw you, too, and heard you--and has slunk off with his tail between his legs!" He half made to pull down the sash, then contemptuously refrained. "I'd like to get my hands on him!" His fingers curled longingly.

After a moment's hesitation, she accepted his dismissal of the subject. She stepped back and confronted him.

"To return, then--divorce, Simon?"

"Never!" He fairly barked it.

"I know of just one thing to your credit, Simon," said Miss Ocky rather sadly, rather dully. "You do mean what you say. I must accept your decision as--final."

"You must!" The interlude had braced him. "And--what are you going to do about it?"

She shrugged her shoulders, looked at him with expressionless eyes--turned and walked quickly from the room. His sharp, sardonic laugh followed her down the hall.

"Another false alarm!"

He threw himself into his chair, mopping his brow. Some ten minutes went by before a thought occurred to him that was fortuitously anticipated by the sudden appearance of the old butler.

"That decanter of Bourbon, Bates! Then go to bed."

"Yes, sir. Thank you, sir."