One Wonderful Night Part 35

Schmidt was an artist. He knew when to use few words.

"But Mr. Curtis himself may have been deceived."

"Mr. Curtis was among those who pretended to liberate de Courtois from his bonds. Your unfortunate friend was brutally tied and gagged in his room in the hotel, and is now recovering from the effects of the maltreatment he received."

"Mr. Curtis couldn't have known of this when he was here, little more than half an hour ago."

"He knew it two hours ago. Not only he, but Mr. Steingall knew it.

Did neither of them tell you?"

In utter despair, broken-hearted now not by reason of her own plight, but rather because of a shattered faith, Hermione appealed to the Earl.

"Father, is this true?"

"Absolutely true, every syllable. I really think you ought to confirm Mr. Schmidt's statement by inquiry at the Central Hotel."

"And publish my unhappy story more widely! . . . Will you kindly leave me now? I must think, and act."

"One word, your ladyship, and I have done," said the lawyer, speaking with a slow seriousness that could not fail to be convincing. "The mischief is not irreparable--at present. But you must not remain here.

You are registered in the books of the hotel as the wife of John Delancy Curtis, and, if I may say it with respect, your own sense of what is right and proper will forbid the notion that you can abide in the hotel until to-morrow. I pledge my reputation that it will immensely facilitate the legal steps necessary to secure the annulment of the marriage if you dissever yourself from your so-called husband at the earliest moment after you have discovered his tort."

Hermione was not the type of woman who faints in an emergency, though gladly now would she have found in unconsciousness a respite from the bitter pain that was rending her innermost fiber.

"I think--I understand," she said brokenly. "Will you please go?"

"But will you not come with me, Hermione?" said her father. "I give you my word of honor there will be no recriminations."

"I must be alone--to-night," she cried, flaring into a pa.s.sionate vehemence. "Marcelle and I will return to my apartment. You know where it is. Come there in the morning, at any hour you choose, but go now, this instant, or I shall refuse to leave the hotel, no matter what the consequences."

Her voice rose almost to a scream, and Schmidt, a profound student of human nature, realized that any extra pressure would be fatal. He had succeeded. This girl would keep her promise, of that he was well a.s.sured, but if her high-strung temperament was subjected to undue force she would put her back against the wall and defy law and convention alike.

"Come," he said to the Earl, and, with a courteous bow to Hermione, he literally pulled her father from the room.

Hermione did not weep. She was done with tears, sick with vain regret, yet braced to unfaltering purpose. The instant the door was closed she picked up the telephone, and the wretched Krantz was soon in evidence to verify the lawyer's words.

Marcelle was crying as though she had lost a lover or some dear relative; when Hermione bade her prepare for their departure, she gave no heed, but wailed her sorrow aloud.

"I d-don't believe them, miladi," she sobbed. "Mr. Curtis--will wring the lawyer-man's neck--to-morrow. . . . I know he will. . . . Did Mr.

Curtis kill poor Mr. Hunter? If not, why should he tie that Frenchman? . . . And wouldn't he t-tie twenty Frenchmen if he w-wanted to m-marry you!"

Hermione stooped and fondled the girl's shoulders, for Marcelle had collapsed to her knees on the hearth-rug while her mistress was using the telephone.

"You have been my very good friend, Marcelle," she said, and the misery in her voice subjugated the maid's louder grief. "Don't fail me now, there's a dear! I want to write a letter, and there can be no question whatever that you and I must get away before Mr. Curtis returns. Don't fret, or lose faith in Providence. A great man once wrote: 'G.o.d's in Heaven, and all's well with the world.' You and I must try to believe that, and place utmost trust in its promise. . . . There, now! Hurry, and I shall join you in a few minutes. We shall send for our baggage in the morning, and so avoid attracting attention in the hotel to-night."

Brave as she was, when left alone in the room she pressed her hands to her face in sheer abandonment of agony. But the storm pa.s.sed, and she sat down to write.

CHAPTER XIV

THREE O'CLOCK IN THE MORNING

Evans, the police captain of the 23rd Precinct, had a fairly long story to hear from McCulloch. The roundsman did not spare himself in the recital. He pleaded guilty to three errors of judgment. In the first instance, he would have done well had he taken the advice given by Devar during the halt at 42nd Street, and arrested the supposed "Anatole" then and there; secondly, he might have secured corroborative evidence of the cleansing of parts of the automobile--evidence now destroyed by the waters of the Hudson; and, thirdly, he should have asked Brodie to intercept the fugitive long before it became possible to plunge the car into the river.

"All I can say is, I sized up the situation and acted accordingly," he commented ruefully. "It did look like a good plan to give him rope enough"--here he checked his utterance, and glanced at the disconsolate prisoner--"but he fairly got the better of me when I went aboard that barge. I ought to have left one of these gentlemen to watch the quay.

My excuse is that the barge seemed to offer the only probable hiding-place, and there was always the chance that he had gone into the river with the car."

"Anyhow, you got him," observed Evans sympathetically, for McCulloch was a valued and trustworthy officer.

"Well, he's here, but Mr. Brodie got him," whereupon Brodie tried not to look sheepish.

Steingall and Clancy arrived before the roundsman had made an end of his experiences, which he had to recount for their benefit. The two detectives had resumed their ordinary clothing. They looked tired, but quietly elated, and it was noticeable that Clancy's mercurial spirits seemed to have evaporated. Those who knew him would have augured from that fact that the chase was reaching its climax, but Curtis and Devar fancied that the little man was thoroughly worn out and pining for rest. Never had they been more egregiously deceived. He resembled a hound which bays its excitement when the quarry is scented but restrains all its energies for the last desperate struggle when the flying prey is in sight.

The Frenchman sat as though in a stupor, and seemingly gave no attention to the details of the hunt, but he sprang to his feet in sheer fright when Steingall walked up to him and said sternly:

"Now, Antoine Lamotte, listen to what I have to say."

"I am betrayed, then?" snarled the man viciously, though his voice went off into a curious yelp of agony as a twinge reminded him of Brodie's vigorous aim with half a brick.

"Yes, the game is up. I know your confederates, and you will be confronted with them before daybreak. . . . No, I am not bluffing.

That is not my way. Their names are Gregor Martiny and Ferdinand Rossi. Now are you satisfied?"

Lamotte sank back into his chair. His features were wrung with pain, but the momentary excitement vanished, and his manner grew sullen again.

"If you know so much I can tell you nothing," he growled.

"No. You can give me little or no information I do not possess already. But, unless you are more fool than knave, you can at least try to save your own miserable life."

"How?"

"By a full confession. Did you know that Martiny and Rossi meant to kill Mr. Hunter?"

"No, I swear it."

"Then why don't you take the hint I have given you? It will be too late when you are brought before a judge. Believe me, I shall waste no more breath in persuading you. It is now or never."

The Frenchman rose again, this time more slowly. He glanced around at the ring of faces, and, for a moment, his gaze dwelt contemplatively on Clancy. Perhaps he was vouchsafed some intuition that this man was to be feared, but Clancy remained unemotional as a Sioux Indian. When he spoke, it was with a certain dignity, and, oddly enough, his words, though uttered in English, savored of a literal translation from the French mint which coined them.

"Monsieur," he said, "I am a man who regards loyalty to his friends before all."

"An excellent quality, even in a criminal, if your friends are loyal to you," replied Steingall with equal seriousness of manner.

"But the woman who betrayed us--may she be eaten up with cancer!--is not my friend. Those others are."

"I have met with no woman. I have good reason to think that you have no real notion of the influences which led your Hungarian friends, as you call them, to commit a murder. But I rather respect your sentiment, so, to give you one final chance, I tell you now just how you were brought into this thing. You are a thief, and the a.s.sociate of thieves, but you have never, so far as our records go, been convicted. Your real name is not Lamotte, though you have pa.s.sed under it long enough in New York to establish some sort of claim to it, and you were sentenced to two years' imprisonment at Toulon eight years ago for a breach of military discipline. On your release you consorted with anarchists in Paris, and, to escape arrest as a suspect after a dynamite outrage on the Grand Boulevard, you emigrated to America. You are a clever mechanic, and, had you tried to earn an honest living, you would have succeeded, but some kink in your nature drove you to crime, mixed up with a good deal of political froth. When you heard that precious pair of fanatics, Martiny and Rossi, plotting in Morris Siegelman's cafe to prevent a marriage between an English lady of great wealth and a wretched little Frenchman, so that the cause of a Hungarian party might benefit if Count Ladislas Va.s.silan secured the lady and the money, especially the money, you thought you saw a way towards striking a blow at the Austrian monarchy and also benefiting yourself. So you offered your services, and your more acute brain put them up to a dodge they would never have thought of. It was necessary for your purpose that you should figure as a respectable man, so you had cards printed in the name of Anatole Labergerie, and addressed letters to yourself under that same name at Morris Siegelman's restaurant. I do not know yet where you obtained the car, but I shall know to-morrow--the fact is immaterial now. What is of real importance is the method whereby you humbugged the janitor at Mr. Hunter's office by pretending that you had been sent there by Mr. Labergerie because the car was at liberty somewhat earlier than was expected, and the unfortunate journalist took it as a compliment, drove to his rooms, changed his clothes, and returned to the office, thus playing into your hands, because the car sent to his order by Mr. Labergerie was thereby prevented from picking him up at the appointed time. It was shrewd of you to guess that a busy man on the staff of a newspaper would be glad to utilize an automobile placed unexpectedly at his disposal, and fate played into your hands by the delay in issuing the duplicate marriage license, which he had promised de Courtois to obtain from the City Hall."

"Sir, I knew nothing of any marriage license."