John Marvel, Assistant Part 48

I hesitated what to do. I had not wholly abandoned hope of making up my trouble with Eleanor Leigh. I did not wish my name to be mixed up in a scandal which probably would get into the papers. I determined to consult John Marvel, and I said so to Langton.

"You mean the preacher? Won't do any harm. He's straight. He's helping to hunt for her, too. I saw him just after I located her, and he had already heard."

I determined to go and see him, and told Langton to keep on following up his clew. When I went to Marvel's house, however, he was not at home. He had been away all day, since early morning, the girl who opened the door told me. I went to the police station. Marvel had been there and made a complaint about a house, and they were going to send a man around to investigate.

He was a terrible crank, that preacher was, but all the same he was a good sort of a fellow, the officer said. Some people thought he was too meddlesome and mixed up too much with affairs that did not concern him, but for his part, he had seen him do things and go where it took a man to go. As the officer was going in a short while, I determined to accompany him, so waited an hour or so till he was detailed, and then set out. When we arrived the place, for all outward signs of evil, might have been a home for retired Sunday-school teachers--a more decent and respectable little hotel in a quiet street could not have been found in town. Only the large woman, with heightened complexion, Mrs. Snow, who, at length, appeared in answer to the summons of the solemn officer, seemed to be excited and almost agitated. She was divided between outraged modesty and righteous indignation. The former was exhibited rather toward me, the latter toward the officer. But this was all. She swore by all the Evangelists that she knew nothing of the girl, and with yet more vehemence that she would have justice for this outrage. She would "report the officer to the Captain and to his Honor the Mayor, and have the whole --th precinct fired." The officer was very apologetic.

All we learned was that, "A lady had been brought there by a gentleman who said he was her husband, but she had refused to let her in. She did not take in people she did not know." As there was nothing to incriminate her, we left with apologies.

The strongest ally a man can enlist in any cause is a clear-headed, warm-hearted woman. In all moral causes they form the golden guard of the forces that carry them through. John Marvel's absence when I called to consult him was due to his having got on the trace of Elsa. Another of my friends had also got on her trace, and while I was hesitating and thinking of my reputation, they were acting. As soon as he learned of Elsa's disappearance he consulted the wisest counsellor he knew. He went, with rare good sense, to Eleanor Leigh. He had a further reason for going to her than merely to secure her aid. He had heard my name connected with the affair, and old John had gone to set me straight with her. He did not know of the trouble at the Charity Fair, and Miss Leigh did not enlighten him. Miss Eleanor Leigh, having learned through Marvel that the Loewens were in great trouble, as soon as her school was out that day, went to the Loewens' house to learn what she could of the girl, with a view to rendering all the aid she could. A new force had been aroused in her by John Marvel. Precisely what she learned I never knew, but it was enough, with what she had gleaned elsewhere, to lead to action. What she had learned elsewhere pointed to a certain place in town as one where she might secure further information. It was not a very reputable place--in fact, it was a very disreputable place--part saloon, part dance-hall, part everything else that it ought not to have been. It was one of the vilest dens in this city of Confusion, and the more vile because its depths were screened beneath a ma.s.s of gilding and tinsel and glitter. It lay on one of the most populous streets and, dazzling with electric lights, furnished one of the showiest places on that street. It was known as "The Gallery," an euphemism to cover a line of glaring nude figures hung on the walls, which, by an arrangement of mirrors, were multiplied indefinitely. Its ostensible owner was the same Mr. Mick Raffity, who kept the semi-respectable saloon opening on the alley at the back of the building where I had my office. Its keeper was a friend of Mr. Raffity's, by the name of Gallagin, a thin, middle-aged person with one eye, but that an eye like a gimlet, a face impervious to every expression save that which it habitually wore: a mixture of cunning and ferocity.

The place was crowded from a reasonable hour in the evening till an unreasonable hour in the morning, and many a robbery and not a few darker crimes were said to have been planned, and some perpetrated, around its marble tables.

At the side, in a narrow street, was a private entrance and stairway leading to the upper stories, over the door of which was the sign, "Ladies' Entrance." And at the rear was what was termed by Mr. Gallagin, a "Private Hotel."

Young women thronged the lower floor at all hours of the night, but no woman had ever gone in there and not come out a shade worse, if possible, than when she entered. The Salvation Army had attempted the closing of this gilded Augean Stable, but had retired baffled. Now and then a sporadic effort had been made in the press to close or reform it, but all such attempts had failed. The place was "protected." The police never found anything amiss there, or, if they did, were promptly found to have something amiss with their own record. To outward appearance it was on occasions of inspection as decorous as a meeting-house. It was shown that the place had been offered for Sunday afternoon services, and that such services had actually been held there. In fact, a Scripture-text hung on the wall on such occasions, while close at hand hung the more secular notice that "No excuse whatever would be taken if one lady or gentleman took another lady's or gentleman's hat or wrap."

This gilded saloon on the evening of the day I called on John Marvel was, if anything, more crowded than usual, and into it just as it was beginning to grow gay and the clouds of cigarette and cigar smoke were beginning to turn the upper atmosphere to a dull gray; just as the earlier hum of voices was giving place to the shrieking laughter and high screaming of half-sodden youths of both s.e.xes, walked a young woman. She was simply dressed in a street costume, but there was that about her trim figure, erect carriage, and grave face which marked her as different from the gaudy sisterhood who frequented that resort of sin, and as she pa.s.sed up through the long room she instantly attracted attention.

The wild laughter subsided, the shrieks died down, and as if by a common impulse necks were craned to watch the newcomer, and the conversation about the tables suddenly hushed to a murmur, except where it was broken by the outbreak of some half-drunken youth.

"Who is she? What is she?" were questions asked at all tables, along with many other questions and answers, alike unprintable and incredible.

The general opinion expressed was that she was a new and important addition to the soiled sisterhood, probably from some other city or some country town, and comments were freely bandied about as to her future destination and success. Among the throng, seated at one of the tables, was a large man with two bedizened young women drinking the champagne he was freely offering and tossing off himself, and the women stopped teasing him about his diamond ring, and rallied him on his attention to the newcomer, as with head up, lips compressed, eyes straight before her, and the color mounting in her cheek, she pa.s.sed swiftly up the room between the tables and made her way to the magnificent bar behind which Mr. Gallagin presided, with his one eye ever boring into the scene before him. Walking up to the bar the stranger at once addressed Mr.

Gallagin.

"Are you the proprietor here?"

"Some folks says so. What can I do for yer?"

"I have come to ask if there is not a young woman here--?" She hesitated a moment, as the bar-keepers all had their eyes on her and a number of youths had come forward from the tables and were beginning to draw about her. Mr. Gallagin filled in the pause.

"Quite a number, but not one too many. In fact, there is just one vacancy, and I think you are the very peach to fill it." His discolored teeth gleamed for a second at the murmur of approval which came from the men who had drawn up to the bar.

"I came to ask," repeated the girl quietly, "if there is not a young woman here named Elsa Loewen."

The proprietor's one eye fixed itself on her with an imperturbable gaze.

"Well, I don't know as there is," he drawled. "You see, there is a good many young women here, and I guess they have a good many names among 'em. But may I ask you what you want with her?"

"I want to get her and take her back to her home."

Mr. Gallagin's eye never moved from her face.

"Well, you can look around and see for yourself," he said quietly.

"No, I don't think she would be here, but have you not a sort of a hotel attached to your place?"

"Oh! Yes," drawled Mr. Gallagin. "I can furnish you a room, if you have any friends--and if you haven't a friend, I might furnish you one or two of them."

"No, I do not wish a room."

"Oh!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the proprietor.

"I wish to see Elsa Loewen, and I have heard that she is here."

"Oh! you have, and who may be your informant?" demanded the bar-keeper, coldly. "I'd like to know what gentleman has sufficient interest in me to make me the subject of his conversation."

"I cannot give you my informant, but I have information that she is here, and I appeal to you to let me see her."

"To me? You appeal to me?" Mr. Gallagin put his hand on his thin chest and nodded toward himself.

"Yes, for her mother; her father. She is a good girl. She is their only daughter. They are distracted over her--disappearance. If you only knew how terrible it is for a young girl like that to be lured away from home where every one loves her, to be deceived, betrayed, dragged down while----"

The earnestness of her tone more than the words she uttered, and the strangeness of her appeal in that place, had impressed every one within reach of her voice, and quite a throng of men and women had left the tables and pressed forward listening to the conversation, and for the most part listening in silence, the expression on their faces being divided between wonder, sympathy, and expectancy, and a low murmur began to be audible among the women, hardened as they were. Mr. Gallagin felt that it was a crucial moment in his business. Suddenly from under the fur came the fierce claw and made a dig to strike deep.

"To h.e.l.l with you, you d----d ----! I know you and your d----d sort--I know what you want, and you'll get it in one minute. Out of my place, or I'll pitch you in the gutter or into a worse hole yet!" He made a gesture with one hand such as a cat makes with its claws out.

A big man with a hard gleam in his eye moved along the edge of the bar, his face stolid and his eyes on the newcomer, while the throng fell back suddenly and left the girl standing alone with a little s.p.a.ce about her, her face pale, and her mouth drawn close under the unexpected a.s.sault.

In another second she would, without doubt, have been thrown out of the place, or possibly borne off to that worse fate with which she had been threatened. But from the throng to her side stepped out a short, broad-shouldered man, with a sodden face.

"Speak her soft, Galley, ---- ---- you! You know who she is! That is the Angel of the Lost Children. Speak her soft or ---- ---- you! you'll have to throw me out, too." The sodden face took on suddenly a resolution that gave the rough a look of power, the broad shoulders were those of an athlete, and the steady eye was that of a man to be reckoned with--and such was "Red Talman" when aroused.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Speak her soft, Galley."]

The name he had given was repeated over the throng by many, doubtless, who had not heard of her, but there were others who knew, and told of the work that Eleanor Leigh had been doing in quarters where any other woman of her cla.s.s and kind had never showed her face; of help here and there; a hand lent to lift a fallen girl; of succor in some form or another when all hope appeared to be gone.

It was a strange champion who had suddenly stepped forward into the arena to protect her, but the girl felt immediately that she was safe.

She turned to her champion.

"I thank you," she said simply. "If you wish to help me, help me get hold of this poor girl whom I have come for. Ask him to let me see her, if only for one moment, and I may save her a life of misery."

The man turned to the proprietor. "Why don't you let her see the girl?"

he said.

Gallagin scowled at him or winked, it could scarcely be told which.

"What the ---- is it to you? Why can't you keep your mouth for your own business instead of interfering with other folks? You have seen trouble enough doing that before."

"Let her see the girl."

"What business is it of yours whether I do or not?"

"Just this--that when I was away and my wife was starvin', and you never givin' her nothin', and my little gal was dyin', this here lady came there and took care of 'em--and that's what makes it my business. I don't forgit one as helped me, and you know it."

"Well, I'll tell you this, there ain't no gal of that name here. I don't know what she's talkin' about."

"Oh! Come off! Let her see the gal."

"You go up there and look for yourself," said the proprietor. "Take her with you if you want to and keep her there."

"Shut your mouth, d----n you!" said Talman. He turned to Miss Leigh.