The Moonlit Way Part 58

"Lehr has probably gone to see Skeel at the Hotel Astor," he concluded. "We're going to have our chance, I think."

Then, turning to Barres:

"We've decided to take a sport-chance to-night. We have most reliable information that this man Lehr, who now owns Grogan's, will carry here upon his person papers of importance to my Government--and to yours, too, Barres.

"The man from whom he shall procure these papers is an Irish gentleman named Murtagh Skeel, just arrived from Buffalo and stopping overnight at the Hotel Astor.

"Lehr, we were informed, was to go personally and get those papers....

Do you really wish to help us?"

"Certainly."

"Very well. I expect we shall have what you call a mix-up. You will please, therefore, walk into Grogan's--not by the family entrance, but by the swinging doors on Lexington Avenue. Kindly refresh yourself there with some Munich beer; also eat a sandwich at my expense, if you care to. Then you will give yourself the pains to inquire the way to the wash-room. And there you will possess your soul in amiable patience until you shall hear me speak your name in a very quiet, polite tone."

Barres, recognising the familiar mock seriousness of student days in Paris, began to smile. Renoux frowned and continued his instructions:

"When you hear me politely p.r.o.nounce your name, mon vieux, then you shall precipitate yourself valiantly to the aid of Monsieur Souchez and myself--and perhaps Monsieur Alost--and help us to hold, gag and search the somewhat violent German animal whom we corner inside the family entrance of Herr Grogan!"

Barres had difficulty in restraining his laughter. Renoux was very serious, with the delightful mock gravity of a witty and perfectly fearless Frenchman.

"Lehr?" inquired Barres, still laughing.

"That is the animal under discussion. There will be a taxicab awaiting us----" He turned to Souchez: "Dis, donc, Emile, faut employer ton coup du Pere Francois pour nous a.s.surer de cet animal la."

"B'en sure," nodded Souchez, fishing furtively in the side pocket of his coat and displaying the corner of a red silk handkerchief. He stuffed it into his pocket again; Renoux smiled carelessly at Barres.

"Mon vieux," he said, "I hope it will be like a good fight in the Quarter--what with all those Irish in there. You desire to get your head broken?"

"You bet I do, Renoux!"

"Bien! So now, if you are quite ready?" he suggested. "Merci, monsieur, et a bientot!" He bowed profoundly.

Barres, still laughing, walked to Lexington Avenue, crossed northward, and entered the swinging doors of Grogan's, perfectly enchanted to have his finger in the pie at last, and aching for an old-fashioned Latin Quarter row, the pleasures of which he had not known for several too respectable years.

XX

GROGAN'S

The material attraction of Grogan's was princ.i.p.ally German beer; the aesthetic appeal of the place was also characteristically Teutonic and consisted of peculiarly offensive decorations, including much red cherry, much imitation stained gla.s.s, many sprawling bra.s.s fixtures, and many electric lights. Only former inmates of the Fatherland could have conceived and executed the embellishments of Grogan's.

There was a palatial bar, behind which fat, white-jacketed Teutons served slopping steins of beer upon a perforated bra.s.s surface. There was a centre table, piled with those barbarous messes known to the undiscriminating Hun as "delicatessen"--raw fish, sour fish, smoked fish, flabby portions of defunct pig in various guises--all naturally nauseating to the white man's olfactories and palate, and all equally relished by the beer-swilling boche.

A bartender with Pekinese and apoplectic eyes and the s...o...b..tic facial symptoms of a Stra.s.sburg liver, took the order from Barres and set before him a frosty gla.s.s of Pilsner, incidentally drenching the bar at the same time with swipes, which he thriftily sc.r.a.ped through the perforated bra.s.s strainer into a slop-bucket underneath.

Being a stranger there, Barres was furtively scrutinised at first, but there seemed to be nothing particularly suspicious about a young man who stopped in for a gla.s.s of Pilsner on a July night, and n.o.body paid him any further attention.

Besides, two United States Secret Service men had just gone out, followed, as usual, by one Johnny Klein; and the Germans at the tables at the bar, and behind the bar were still sneeringly commenting on the episode--now a familiar one and of nightly occurrence.

So only very casual attention was paid to Barres and his Pilsner and his rye-bread and sardine sandwich, which he took over to a vacant table to desiccate and discuss at his leisure.

People came and went; conversation in Hunnish gutturals became general; soiled evening newspapers were read, raw fish seized in fat red fingers and suckingly masticated; also, skat and pinochle were resumed with unwiped hands, and there was loud slapping of cards on polished table tops, and many porcine noises.

Barres finished his Pilsner, side-stepped the sandwich, rose, asked a bartender for the wash-room, and leisurely followed the direction given.

There was n.o.body in there. He had, for company, a mouse, a soiled towel on a roller, and the remains of some unattractive soap. He lighted a cigarette, surveyed himself in the looking gla.s.s, cast a friendly glance at the mouse, and stood waiting, flexing his biceps muscles with a smile of antic.i.p.ated pleasure in renewing the use of them after such a very long period wasted in the peaceful pursuit of art.

For he was still a boy at heart. All creative minds retain something of those care-free, irresponsible years as long as the creative talent lasts. As it fails, worldly caution creeps in like a thief in the night, to steal the spontaneous pleasures of the past and leave in their places only the old galoshes of prudence and the finger-prints of dull routine.

Barres stood by the open door of the wash-room, listening. The corridor which pa.s.sed it led on into another corridor running at right angles. This was the Family Entrance.

Now, as he waited there, he heard the street door open, and instantly the deadened shock of a rush and struggle.

As he started toward the Family Entrance, straining his ears for the expected summons, a man in flight turned the corner into his corridor so abruptly that he had him by the throat even before he recognised in him the man with the thick eye-gla.s.ses who had hit him between the eyes with a pistol--the "Watcher" of Dragon Court!

With a swift sigh of grat.i.tude to Chance, Barres folded the fleeing Watcher to his bosom and began the business he had to transact with him--an account too long overdue.

The Watcher fought like a wildcat, but in silence--fought madly, using both fists, feet, baring his teeth, too, with frantic attempts to use them. But Barres gave him no opportunity to kick, bite, or to pull out any weapon; he battered the Watcher right and left, swinging on him like lightning, and his blows drummed on him like the tattoo of fists on a punching bag until one stinging crack sent the Watcher's head snapping back with a jerk, and a terrific jolt knocked him as clean and as flat as a dead carp.

There were papers in his coat, also a knuckle-duster, a big clasp-knife, and an automatic pistol. And Barres took them all, stuffed them into his own pockets, and, dragging his still dormant but twitching victim by the collar, as a cat proudly lugs a heavy rat, he started for the Family Entrance, where Donnybrook had now broken loose.

But the silence of the terrific struggle in that narrow entry, the absence of all yelling, was significant. No Irish whoops, no Teutonic din of combat shattered the stillness of that dim corridor--only the deadened sounds of blows and shuffling of frantic feet. It was very evident that n.o.body involved desired to be interrupted by the police, or call attention to the location of the battle field.

Renoux, Souchez, and a third companion were in intimate and desperate conflict with half a dozen other men--dim, furious figures fighting there under the flickering gas jet from which the dirty globe had been knocked into fragments.

Into this dusty maelstrom of waving arms and legs went Barres--first dropping his now inert prey--and began to hit out enthusiastically right and left, at the nearest hostile countenance visible.

His was a flank attack and totally unexpected by the attackees; and the diversion gave Renoux time to seize a muscular, struggling opponent, hold him squirming while Souchez pa.s.sed his handkerchief over his throat and the third man turned his pockets inside out.

Then Renoux called breathlessly to Barres:

"All right, mon vieux! Face to the rear front! March!"

For a moment they stiffened to face a battering rush from the stairs.

Suddenly a pistol spoke, and an Irish voice burst out:

"Whist, ye domm fool! G'wan wid yer fishtin' an' can th' goon-play!"

There came a splintering crash as the rickety banisters gave way and several Teutonic and Hibernian warriors fell in a furious heap, blocking the entry with an unpremeditated obstacle.

Instantly Souchez, Barres and the other man backed out into the street, followed nimbly by Renoux and his plunder.

Already a typical Third Avenue crowd was gathering, though the ominous glimmer of a policeman's b.u.t.tons had not yet caught the lamplight from the street corner.

Then the door of Grogan's burst open and an embattled Irishman appeared. But at first glance the hopelessness of the situation presented itself to him; a taxi loaded with French and American franc-tireurs was already honking triumphantly away westward; an excited and rapidly increasing throng pressed around the Family Entrance; also, the distant glitter of a policeman's shield and b.u.t.tons now extinguished all hope of pursuit.