Persons Unknown Part 55

An artist by a bourgeois Inspector of Police! An actor," cried Christina, beginning to soar, "and _such_ an actor, by a mere outsider!

Your side over mine!--Why did you try? Will to be shamed and hidden in the dark! And you to be bowed down to, to swell and strut and smirk and look dull and glossy and respectable, and be brushed by valets, and have prize cattle raised for you to eat, and carry gold umbrellas! He to die!

And you to pillow yourself upon a hundred crimes he never dreamed of!--Tybalt in triumph and Mercutio slain!--You poor, pretentious, silly, vulnerable soul!--not while he was paying for one moment's madness, and I began to guess and hope and pray that about you there was something prisons had been gaping for, year after year, if only I could find it out! Did you really think I didn't guess what was in this letter? Do you think I didn't know you sent Nicola into that post-office to steal it? Why, it was I, with my last strength, who mailed it there.

He must have found some trace of me and guessed. Nothing in heaven or earth would have brought me here, except to steal it back!"

"How did you--" he tried to say. But the machinery of his throat was stiff and could not work. He swallowed once or twice, and then, dropping his dulled eyes, he got out--"When--did you--at first--?"

"When you came so grandly to the station, a master of the trap that my poor boy was caught in, and said, 'If she would tell the jury what she told him--' Don't you remember that I answered, 'How do you know what she told him?' A strange confidant for Allegra! It wasn't accident, coincidence--for you knew the music that she made for Will's and my French song! Not five minutes later I learned what Allegra was! A queerer confidant, still, for an Inspector of Police! I said to myself, 'There is a very black spot frozen inside that block of bilious ice. If one could know, now, what it was!' Then came your necklace and your note. And I saw you were a violent, greedy creature, after all, who would go a long way to get your will; I saw you could be managed--and how. I remembered Will's saying that people like us had nothing but ourselves to fight with. Oh, it has been with myself that I have fought!

I'm sorry, I'm ashamed. But I've won!--What was my second hint? Do you remember the torn card of the Italian Bryce Herrick had to kill? How it said, 1411--nothing more? When I 'phoned you to call for your necklace your number wasn't in the book. The girl, at first, gave me a wrong direction. Then she remembered that was your old number which you had just had changed. The district was the same, of course. But the old number ran, 1--4--1--1.--Ah, wait for my third--the best of all! My good Ten Euyck, you never made quite such a mistake as when you lost one symbol of respectability--as when you forgot your umbrella!"

This time he looked up with a stare.

"You left it at Allegra's, and, like all excellent housekeepers, Mrs.

Pascoe put it in the closet under the stairs. I found it there. I was looking for something to break the window with. A little light came in then, and I saw the gold handle, like a staff of office, with your name.

I broke the rod and have the handle still." Christina paused and smiled at him. "My sister's partner in the business of blackmail; you, whose money robbed and burned a post-office of the United States; you, whose influence attempted murder in jail, on the highroads, in the Park, rather than be found out, I make you my bow! If I cannot save Will with you, if I cannot trade you for him with the law--and oh, I think I can!--at least our side shan't fall alone! If he is to be punished, at least he will never be punished by you! But you, Mr. Ten Euyck, who exulted in his trouble, who are afraid, as he is not, who will perish at the scorn of every fool, as he has not, you, who of shame are about to die, I salute you! Your career as a criminal, your career as a shining light, they are both at an end!--And why? Because you declared war against people without money, without position, without influence, whom you despised! Because you weren't strong enough to fight Christina Hope!

Remember that!"

The heart knoweth its own bitterness. For one little moment Ten Euyck stood with his eyes upon the reckless girl who was driving him to the last terrible extreme of self-defense. He had come there a happy and indulgent conqueror, and even the sweetness of a necessary revenge was black and poisoned in him. Then, in that moment, he heard what Christina, flushed with victory, did not hear at all--a little sound behind him and above his head.

His driving-coat still lay across a chair and he went slowly to it and drew the case of his revolver from its pocket; the revolver was fully loaded; he looked at the barrel a long time, as if he were thinking something out, and then he heard Christina laugh. "Take care!" she said.

"I did not come without a guard."

He did not turn upon her. He still stood with his back to her, and, from under his bent brows, his glance shot up and found the parting of the valance. Now, since the lessening of the lights, Herrick, half-mad and goaded by the continual slight weakening of the cords, had grown careless of concealment. There, in the opening, his face showed. Not much, indeed; not enough to be easily recognized; all masked, too, with blood and sweat and with the gag across the mouth. But still whiter than the Italian face Ten Euyck had most expected. Then he caught a glimpse of the brown, ruddy hair, and knew. This was Nicola's and Allegra's idea of a jest.

"A guard?" he said. And he turned then upon Christina.

"Don't come near me!" the girl cried. "And if you want to live, don't shoot! My friends are all about this house! They are in waiting down the road! They have waited the whole evening long, watching for my signal.

They started to close in on us when I waved my lamp. Let me cry out my name and you will hear, in answer, the horn of an automobile. It will blow three times--two short notes and one long. That means--Stand out of the way, Christina Hope; the men are ready!--Don't come near me!"

"Cry out your name!" Ten Euyck replied.

The girl lifted up her voice, and gave forth the words "Christina Hope"

so that they leaped out in the still darkness and went shrilling and searching through the night, the vibrations dying in the distance, and the air giving back an echo of their call. Till, after an age-long moment, their last note died away. And nothing happened. No note from the horn of an automobile broke forth in answer; there was only a profounder stillness. Christina was left face to face with nothingness and Cuyler Ten Euyck.

"You spoke too soon!" he said. "You were always foolhardy. This time you have outdone yourself. The clever Christina was not the only person, on coming here, to take precautions. If I gave so much to the guard in the Tombs, what did I give to buy off these friends of yours? The agreeable gang your sister commands--did you think it was in your pay for to-night? It is in mine! I suspected nothing, but I took no chances. I prepared for accident. No automobile can pa.s.s that lodge. No spy can creep about these grounds. One tried, my dear. They caught him. He is lying in that little gallery gagged and bound. When his body is discovered, he will have been shot by blackmailers, whom Cuyler Ten Euyck never so much as saw. I thought you wouldn't leave me!"

Christina had gathered up her train for flight and had been manoeuvering nearer and nearer to the window that gave deepest into the shelter of the dark. Only at the first word of a spy she had stood still.

"Yes," Ten Euyck went on, "I see that you guess his name. I am not a bad shot, and he can't move, poor fellow. Give me that letter!"

Christina looked along his arm, along the lifted revolver, to what was now only a dark opening in the valance. Her mouth opened, but no sound came. The life went out of her like the flame from a dying candle, and she seemed to shrink and crumple and to sway upon her feet. There was a long stillness.

"That letter, if you please!" Ten Euyck said.

"Bryce!" Christina called, quite low. "Bryce, are you there! Let me see!" she screamed out, and ran forward.

Ten Euyck held up a finger, and she stopped dead. "Do you understand that I, too, have a signal and these fellows will come at it? Do you understand what cause they have to love Herrick?--Fetch that chair!"

She brought it forward.

"No, under the balcony. Pardon my not helping you. I dare not lower my hand. Stand on the chair! Can you reach those little curtains? No? Take this candlestick--push them back! What do you see?"

Christina shuddered like a stricken birch, and gave forth a lamentable cry. The candlestick fell to the ground. She had met Herrick's eyes.

"Have I won?" said Ten Euyck.

"You are a brave girl, but you lack discretion.--Get down! Take that letter from your breast. That's right. What a pretty change in manners, my dear! Come here! Come!"

Her face looked thin and her eyes were set with fear. She came slowly on, like a person in a trance, half hanging back, half drawn with ropes. She stopped at one end of the little table, a few feet from him.

"Put out your hand and offer me that letter."

She put it out and he seized the letter and the hand in his.

"And now, my dear, understand me. In my connection with the Arm of Justice, I hold myself neither stained nor shamed. It has been an arm of _justice_; when I have struck it was--as poor Kane will tell you!--always at those who had sinned against the law, though I could not then reach them through the law. In that punishment I used an imperfect instrument, as a man who stands for decency must do, in an imperfect world. When I recognized your sister as our mysterious shadow I forced her to write this account of her disgraceful life not, as she supposed, for fear she might some day blackmail me--for there was nothing in my life to be used for blackmail--but for a net to snare you with! In that net you are caught. Never till its loss determined me to have it back at any cost did I really sin. And never legally! For when I give money to a needy woman I do not question what she does with it. If there is violence--why not? In self-defense! But if I sinned, at least I have succeeded in my sin. For here you are! While you--you have forfeited even your price. But when Denny is dead, talk over with Allegra, in her prison, the story of his death--it may divert you both! For now she, too, is lost, as well as he. And through your fault as Herrick is!"

She lifted her white face and questioned him, with the darkness of her eyes.

"Let him go! After all that he has heard? How could I? You gave your signal and now I must give mine!--It's been a hard fight, Christina! And to the victor belong the spoils!"

He dragged her slowly toward him by the clenched hand he held, his hungry smile flushed and yet cold with hate, feeding on her desperate compliance. And as he drew her past the table, Christina caught up the lamp and struck it with her whole force into his face.

There was a tremendous noise of crashing gla.s.s, and then darkness, filled with the smell of oil. Christina's slender strength had found force for such a blow that the lamp had been put out before it could explode,--and what it had been put out upon was Ten Euyck's head. He floundered back; dazed, cut, with the sense battered out of him. And at the same moment the last knot yielded to stiff fingers and Herrick staggered to his feet. He dropped over the balcony to the ground, and Christina ran toward the sound of him, in the darkness. "Oh! Oh!" she said, and clung like a child upon his breast.

But for a little crack under the door into the hall, the blackness had swallowed every shape. This was all in their favor. They stood listening, holding their breath, knowing that Ten Euyck was there before them but not able to see where; and then he fired. Herrick followed the lead of the flash and leaped upon him. Ten Euyck sank to one knee, but he had gripped Herrick as he fell; the two men struggled to their feet, and across the room and up and down they fought and clung and swayed and trampled, upsetting chairs, their feet slipping and grinding on the smooth floor; and though the shots continued to sound, they were fired downward and Christina guessed that Herrick forced Ten Euyck's hand toward the ground and was struggling for possession of the pistol. She could hear their breath pulsing and sobbing in the darkness. Suddenly their black, struggling bulk crashed down on the piano and the shots ceased. The pistol fell to the ground. Ten Euyck's voice gasped out, like rending cloth: "All six are fired! That's my signal!" Then there was an oath, a lurch, a sound of blows, the table tipped over with a smash, followed by the thud of both men falling to the floor; there was a groan, a pause, a last decisive blow, and then some one rose and came slowly toward Christina through the dark room.

In a childish terror of broken nerves, "Bryce!" Christina shrieked. Then her shrieking, outstretched fingers touched a rough, damp sleeve, and "Bryce!" she sobbed contentedly. They met with a b.u.mp, and clutched each other, laughing with joy, in this little moment before the last. Already they could hear the hurrying men; dark figures blackened on the darkness, the terraces came alive with sound, lights showed and were gone; and Herrick, holding the empty gun, sought vainly to put Christina back from him. She held to him, leaning on him, hardly breathing. "It's death, dear!" she said. "Forgive me!"

"Oh!"

She felt him bend his head, and lifting up her face, she set her mouth to his.

From the carriage sweep without there came--two short and one long--three notes from the horn of an automobile.

CHAPTER V

CARNAGE: A COMIC OPERA CLIMAX

The door from the hall opened, letting in a flood of light. At the same time a man stepped through one of the windows. He was the first of a number whom the halls and staircases instantly absorbed. Out of Herrick's very hold Christina slipped and caught this man by the arm and hung away from him as she was wont to hang upon the arm of Hermann Deutch. "Oh, heaven and our fathers!" cried she in a faint wail. "But you were a little late!"

The man, standing tense in the shadow, was examining the room with appraising eyes. Christina, blind to something rigid in him, hurried on.

"And I did so depend on a quick curtain! But all's well that ends well--I've got it! Mr. District-Attorney, your mail!"

"Who's that with you?" said the voice of Henry Kane.

As he took, from the hand that had never once resigned them, the scorched and torn sheets and b.u.t.toned them beneath his coat he glanced over his shoulder, expectantly.