John Marvel, Assistant Part 50

a.s.serted the other.

"I'll go there myself."

"No use goin' by yourself."

"I'll get the police----"

"The police!" The other laughed derisively. "They don't go after the Big Chief's friends--not when he stands by 'em."

"The 'Big Chief'?"

"Coll McSheen."

"Mr. McSheen!"

"He's _it_!"

"It? What? I don't understand."

"Well, don't bring me into this."

"I will not."

"He's at the bottom of the whole business. He's the lawyer 't gives the dope and takes care of 'em. He owns the place--'t least, Mick Raffity and Gallagin and Smooth Ally own the places; and he owns them. He knows all about it and they don't turn a hand without him. Oh! I know him--I know 'em all!"

"You think this is the girl the lady was looking for?"

"I don't know. I only know she went there, and Gallagin showed his teeth, and then I called him down and got the gal out. I skeered him."

"Well, we'll see."

"Well, I must be goin'. I've told you. Swear you won't bring me into it.

Good-night."

"I will not."

The man gazed down the street one way, then turned and went off in the other direction. John was puzzled, but a gleam of light came to him.

Wolffert! Wolffert was the man to consult. What this man said was just what Wolffert had always insisted on: that "the White Slave traffic" was not only the most hideous crime now existing on earth, but that it was protected and promoted by men in power in the city, that it was, indeed, international in its range. He remembered to have heard him say that a law had been pa.s.sed to deal with it; but that such law needed the force of an awakened public conscience to become effective.

Thus it was, that that morning Wolffert was aroused by John Marvel coming into his room. In an instant he was wide-awake, for he, too, knew of the disappearance of Elsa, and of our fruitless hunt for her.

"But you are sure that this woman is Elsa?" he asked as he hurriedly dressed.

"No--only that it is some one."

"So much the better--maybe."

An hour later Wolffert and John Marvel were in a lawyer's office in one of the great new buildings of the city, talking to a young lawyer who had recently become a public prosecutor, not as a representative of the city, but of a larger power, that of the nation. He and Wolffert were already friends, and Wolffert had a little while before interested him in the cause to which he had for some time been devoting his powers. It promised to prove a good case, and the young attorney was keenly interested. The bigger the game, the better he loved the pursuit.

"Who's your mysterious informant, Mr. Marvel?" he asked.

"That I cannot tell you. He is not a man of good character, but I am sure he is telling me the truth."

"We must make no mistakes--we don't want these people to escape, and the net will catch bigger fish, I hope, than you suspect. Why not tell?"

"I cannot."

"Well, then I shall have to get the proof in some other way. I will act at once and let you hear from me soon. In fact, I have a man on the case now. I learned of it yesterday from my cousin, you know. She is deeply interested in trying to break up this vile business, and a part of what you say I already knew. But the clews lead to bigger doors than you dream of."

John and Wolffert came away together and decided on a plan of their own.

Wolffert was to come to see me and get Langton interested in the case, and John was to go to see Langton to send him to me. He caught Langton just as he was leaving his house to come to my office and walked a part of the way back with him, giving him the facts he had learned. He did not know that Langton was already on the case, and the close-mouthed detective never told anything.

When they parted, Langton came to my office, and together we went to the district attorney's, who, after a brief talk, decided to act at once, and accordingly had warrants issued and placed in the hands of his marshal.

"I have been trying for some time to get at these people," he said, "and I have the very man for the work--an officer whom Coll McSheen turned out for making trouble for the woman who keeps that house."

Aroused by my interest in the Loewens and by what Langton had told me of Miss Leigh's daring the night before, I secured the marshal's consent to go along with them, the district attorney having, indeed, appointed me a deputy marshal for the occasion.

The marshal's face had puzzled me at first, but I soon recognized him as the officer I had met once while I watched a little child's funeral.

"They were too many for me," he said in brief explanation. "Mrs. Collis had me turned out. She had a pull with the Big Chief. And when I went for his friend, Smooth Ally, he bounced me. But I'm all right now, Mr.

Semmes knows me, and Coll McSheen may look out. I know him."

I do not know what might have happened had we been a little later in appearing on the scene. As, after having sent a couple of men around to the back of the block, we turned into the street we saw three or four men enter the house as though in a hurry. We quickened our steps, but found the door locked, and the voices within told that something unusual was going on. The high pitched voice of a woman in a tirade and the low growls of men came to us through the door, followed by the noise of a scuffle and the smashing of furniture; a thunderous knock on the door, however, brought a sudden silence.

As there was no response either to the knock or ring, another summons even more imperative was made, and this time a window was opened above, a woman thrust her head out and in a rather frightened voice asked what was wanted. The reply given was a command to open the door instantly, and as the delay in obeying appeared somewhat unreasonable, a different method was adopted. The door was forced with an ease which gave me a high idea of the officer's skill. Within everything appeared quiet, and the only circ.u.mstance to distinguish the house from a rather tawdry small hotel of a flashy kind was a man and that man, John Marvel, with a somewhat pale face, his collar and vest torn and a reddish lump on his forehead, standing quietly in the doorway of what appeared to be a sitting-room where the furniture had been upset, and the woman whom I had formerly seen when I visited the place with a police officer, standing at the far end of the hall in a condition of fright bordering on hysterics. I think I never saw men so surprised as those in our party were to find a preacher there. It was only a moment, however, before the explanation came.

"She's here, I believe," said John, quietly, "unless they have gotten her away just now."

His speech appeared to have unchained the fury of the woman, for she swept forward suddenly like a tornado, and such a blast of rage and abuse and hate I never heard pour from a woman's lips. Amid tears and sobs and savage cries of rage, she accused John Marvel of every crime that a man could conceive of, a.s.serting all the while that she herself was an innocent and good woman and her house an absolutely proper and respectable home. She imprecated upon him every curse and revenge which she could think of. I confess that, outraged as I was by the virago's attack, I was equally surprised by John Marvel's placidness and the officer's quiet contempt. The only thing that John Marvel said was:

"There were some men here just now."

"Liar! Liar! Liar!" screamed the woman. "You know you lie. There is not a man in this house except that man, and he came here to insult me--he who comes here all the time--you know you do, ---- ---- ----!"

"Where are the men?" demanded the marshal quietly, but he got no answer except her scream of denial.

"They were after me," said John, "but when you knocked on the door they ran off."

Another outpour of denial and abuse.

"Come on, men," said the marshal.

John Marvel had been troubled by no such scruples as had appeared to me.

He was not afraid for his reputation as I had been for mine. And on his way home he had had what he felt to be, and what, far be from me to say was not, a divine guidance. A sudden impulse or "call" as he termed it, had come to him to go straight to this house, and, having been admitted, he demanded the lost girl. The woman in charge denied vehemently that such a girl had ever been there or that she knew anything of her, playing her part of outraged modesty with a great show of sincerity. But when Marvel persisted and showed some knowledge of the facts, she took another tack and began to threaten him. He was a preacher, she said, and she would ruin him. She would call in the police, and she would like to see how it would look when an account came out in the newspapers next morning of his having visited what he thought a house of ill repute. She had friends among the police, and bigger friends even than the police, and they would see her through.

John quietly seated himself. A serene and dauntless resolution shone from his eyes. "Well, you had better be very quick about it," he said, "for I have already summoned officers and they will be here directly."

Then the woman weakened and began to cringe. She told him the same story that she had told me and the policeman when we had called before. A young woman had come there with a gentleman whom she called her husband, but she would not let her stay because she suspected her, etc., etc.