Out of the Ashes Part 17

He turned quickly, intent on losing no further moments, when he was frozen into immobility by a sound, the most curiously unexpected of all sounds--a laugh, a faint treble chuckle! It seemed to come from the outer air, from nowhere, to hang suspended in the damp air of the shaft.

It was eerie, ghostly. Was the spirit of the dead man laughing at his folly? The detective stepped back on the grating, flattening himself against the outer sill of his window. Again the chuckler--now an unmistakable laugh floated to his ears. With a smothered exclamation he stepped forward again, and looked upward. There, against the violet-gray of the star-sprinkled sky, bulked a crouching shape, cuddled on the landing above.

Brencherly held his breath. It seemed that the woman must fall from her perch, so insecure it seemed. He controlled himself, thinking rapidly.

Then he laughed in return.

"That _was_ a good joke you played on me," he said. "How did you ever think of it?"

"Oh," came the answer, punctuated by smothered peals of laughter.

"That's the way I got away from the Sanatorium. I just went up instead of down, and stayed there, till they'd hunted all the place over. Then when I saw where they weren't, I just went down and walked out."

"That was clever," he exclaimed. "But you can't be comfortable up there.

Won't you come down, and I'll get something for you to eat. You must be hungry, and cold, too."

"No," came the response. "I sort of like it here. It reminds me of the way I fooled them all back there; and they thinking themselves that sharp, too. It's sort of nice, too, looking at the stars--sort of feels like a bird in a nest, don't it?"

"I hope to goodness, she don't take it into her head she can fly,"

thought Brencherly. Aloud he said: "Say, do you mind if I come up there and sit with you a while? I'm sort of lonesome here myself." He had already moved silently forward, and was slowly mounting the iron ladder--very slowly, a rung at a time, talking all the while in a cordial, friendly voice. He feared she might take fright and precipitate herself to the stones below. But her mood was otherwise.

"I don't mind," she said. "I don't seem to know just how I got here, and perhaps you can tell me. I just woke up and found myself sleepin' on somebody's bed. I thought at first that I was back in the ward, when I found my feet was tied up. Then when I got loose and had time to feel around, I saw 'twas some strange place. Then the fire escapes sort of looked nice and cool, so I came out."

By this time her visitor had climbed beside her and had seated himself on the landing in such fashion that no move of hers could dislodge either of the strange couple. He noted with relief that they were outside of a door instead of a window, as was the case on all the floors below. The drying roof of the hotel only was above them. He did not wish this extraordinary interview to be interrupted. His airy nest-mate seemed amenable to conversation.

"Well, well!" he resumed, "so _that_ was the way you worked it. Wouldn't that make the doctor mad, though--what was the old duffer's name, anyway? You did tell me, but I've got such a poor memory--now, yours is good, I'll bet a hat."

"Well," she said, "'tain't what it used to be, but I'll never forget old Malbey's name as long as I live, nor what he looks like, either. He looks like a potato with sprouts for eyes."

Brencherly laughed. He had a very clear, if unflattering, picture of the learned physician.

"But, say," she cried suddenly, "you're not trying to get me, are you?"

"Oh, _I'm_ no friend of the doctor's," he said easily. "Why, I brought you up here to hide you away safely. That was one of my rooms you woke up in. You see, I found you on a bench in the park out there, and you went to sleep so suddenly right while I was talking to you, that I thought you must be tired out."

She leaned forward, peering at him through the dusk. Her white pinched face looked skull-like in the faint light.

"Yes," she said slowly, "seems to me that I remember some woman saying she killed Victor Mahr, and me getting angry about it--and then I don't seem to know just _what_ happened. Well, young man, I'm much obliged to you, I'm sure. 'Tain't often an old woman like me gets so well taken care of."

"But why," he questioned softly, "were you so annoyed with the other lady? She had just as much right as you had, I suppose, to kill the gentleman?"

"She had not!" she shrilled. "She had not!" Then lowering her voice to a whisper, she murmured confidentially: "_My_ name ain't Welles!"

"Why, Mrs. Welles," he exclaimed, "how can you say so? If you aren't Mrs. Welles, who are you?"

"Just as if you didn't know!" she retorted scornfully.

"Well, perhaps," he admitted. "But never mind that now. Do you know that you lost your bag of clippings?"

Her hand flew to her breast. "Now, gracious me! How could I?"

"Oh, don't worry about them," he soothed. "I've got them all in my room.

You shall have them again. Don't you want to come down and get them?" He was cramped and chilled to the bone; moreover, the stars had paled, and a misty fog of floating, impalpable crystal was slowly crossing the oblong of sky left visible by the edifices on both sides of the alley.

He waited anxiously for her to reply, but she seemed lost in thought. He looked at her closely. She was asleep, her head resting against the blistered paneling of the door. He shifted his position slightly, and gazed at the coming of the dawn. Gradually the crystal white gave place to faintest violet, then flushed to rose color. The details of the coping above them became sharply distinct. Below them the canyon was full of blue shadow, but already the depths were becoming translucent.

He looked at his strange companion. Should he wake her, he wondered.

Softly he tried the door. It was locked from within. If he allowed her to slumber in peace, she might, on awakening, be terrified at the visible depths below. Now, all was vague in the blue canyon.

Very gently he pressed her hand and called her. "Mrs. Welles."

She awoke with such a violent start that for an agonized instant he felt his hold slipping. He held her firmly, however, and steadied her with voice and hand.

"Let's go indoors," he said quite casually. "You see if we sit here much longer, it's growing light, and people will see us. Then it won't be easy for me to keep you hidden. Now, if you'll just turn about and let me go first, I'll get you down quite easily and n.o.body the wiser for our outing."

She looked at him for a moment as if puzzled, then her brow cleared.

"Very well, young man," she said. "I must have had a nap. Now, how do you want me to turn?"

He showed her, and with his arms on the outside of the ladder, her body next the rungs--as he had often seen the firemen make their rescues, he slowly steadied her to the landing below and a.s.sisted her in at the window.

With a sigh of relief he closed the window behind them and drew down the blinds.

"Now! that's all right, Mrs. Mahr. You're quite safe."

She turned on him her beady eyes and laughed her shrill chuckle. "There, didn't I tell you, you knew all the time? I guess you'll own up that it's the wife who's got the right to kill a husband, won't you?"

"Sure," he said. "I'll see that n.o.body else gets the credit, believe me!"

XIV

With Dorothy clinging to his hand, Marcus Gard watched the door of Mrs.

Marteen's library with an ever-growing anxiety. Only the presence of the child, who clasped his hand in such fear and grief, kept him from giving way. The long reign of terror that had dragged his heart and mind to the very edge of martyrdom had worn thin his already exhausted nerves, and now--now that the lost was found again, it was to learn by what a slender thread of life they held her with them.

Every moment he could spare from the demands of his responsibilities was spent in close companionship with Dorothy in the house where only the sound of soft-footed nurses, the clink of a spoon in a medicine gla.s.s or the tread of the doctor mounting the stairs broke the waiting silence.

For many days she had not known them. Now came intervals of consciousness and coherence, but weakness so great that the two anxious watchers, unused to illness, were appalled by the change it wrought. Now for the twentieth time they sat longing for and yet fearing the moment when Dr. Balys, with his friendly eyes and grim mouth, would enter to them with the tale of his last visit and his hopes or fears for the next.

The lamps were lighted, the shades drawn; the fire crackled quietly on the hearth. The room was filled with the familiar perfume of violets, for Dorothy, true to her mother's custom, kept every vase filled with them.

Silently Gard patted the little cold hand in his, as the sound of approaching footsteps warned them of the doctor's coming. In silence they saw the door open, and welcomed with a throb of relief the smile on the physician's face.

"A great, a very great improvement," he said quickly, in answer to Dorothy's supplicating eyes. "Quite wonderful. She is a woman of such extraordinary character that, once conscious, we can count on her own great will to save the day for us--and to-morrow you shall both see her.

To-night, little girl, you may go in and kiss her, very quietly--not a word, you know. Just a kiss and go."

"Now?" whispered Dorothy, as if she were already in the sick room. "May I go now?"

"Yes. No tears, you know, and no huggings--just one little kiss--and then come back here."