The Walking Delegate Part 29

At another time Tom might have wondered at this note: how Pete had come to be in a hall with a crowd of men, how Pete had learned where he was.

But now the note did not raise a doubt in his fevered brain.

He folded the note, and put it into a pocket. "I've got some work to do yet to-night," he explained, and he took up his hat. It was an unusually warm evening for the first of April and he had worn no overcoat.

"You must come again soon," she said a few moments later, as he was leaving. Tom had nothing to say; he could not tell her the truth--that he expected never to see her again. And so he left her, awkwardly, without parting word of any kind. At the foot of the stairs he paused and looked up at her door, at the head of the first flight, and he looked for a long, long s.p.a.ce before he stepped forth into the night.

A little round man stood bareheaded on the stoop; Petersen was pacing slowly to and fro on the sidewalk. The little man seized Tom by the arm.

"Won't you send a policeman, please," he asked excitedly, in an inconsequential voice, such as belongs properly to the husband of a boarding-house mistress.

"What for?"

"That man there has been walking just so, back and forth, for the last two hours. From the way he keeps looking up at the house it is certain he is contemplating some nefarious act of burglary."

"I'll do better than send a cop," said Tom. "I'll take him away myself."

He went down the steps, took Petersen's arm and started off with him.

"Thank you exceedingly, sir!" called out the little man.

They took an Eighty-sixth Street cross-town car to Third Avenue, and after five minutes' riding southward Tom, keeping watch from the end of the car, spied a number near to the one for which he was searching. They got out and easily found the place designated in Pete's note. It was that great rarity, a saloon in the middle of a New York block. The windows of the second floor were dark; a soft glow came through those of the floor above.

With the rattle of the elevated trains in their ears Tom and Petersen entered the hallway which ran alongside the saloon, and mounted two flights of stairs so dark that, at the top of the second, Tom had to grope for the door. This discovered, he opened it and found himself at the rear of the hall. This was a barren, dingy room, perhaps forty feet long, with double curtains of some figured cloth at the three front windows. Four men sat at the front end of the room playing cards; there were gla.s.ses and beer bottles on the table, and the men were smoking.

All this Tom saw within the time of the snapping of an instantaneous shutter; and he recognized, with the same swiftness, that he had been trapped. But before he could shift a foot to retreat, a terrific shove from behind the door sent him staggering against the side wall. The door was slammed shut by the same force, grazing Petersen as he sprang in.

The bolt of the lock clicked into place.

"We've got youse this time!" Tom heard a harsh voice cry out, and on the other side of Petersen, who stood on guard with clenched fists, he saw Jake Henderson, a heavy stick in his right hand.

In the same instant the men at the table had sprung to their feet. "Why, if it ain't Rosie!" cried Kaffir Bill, advancing at the head of the quartette.

"Say, fellows, tie my two hands behind me, so's me an' Rosie can have an even fight," requested Arkansas Number Two.

"If youse want Rosie to fight, youse've got to tie his feet together,"

said Smoky; and this happy reference to the time Petersen ran away brought a laugh from the three others.

Tom, recovering from his momentary dizziness, drew his revolver and levelled it at the four. "The first man that moves gets the first bullet."

The men suddenly checked their steps.

For an instant the seven made a tableau. Then Petersen sprang in at Jake. A blow from the club on his left shoulder stopped him. Again he sprang in, this time breaking through Jake's guard, but only to grasp Jake's left arm with his half-numbed left hand. This gave Jake his chance. His right hand swung backward with the club, his eyes on Tom.

"Look out!" cried Petersen.

Tom, guessing danger in the warning, pulled the trigger. With a cry Hickey dropped to the floor, a bullet in his leg. In the very flash of the revolver the whizzing club sent the weapon flying from Tom's hand.

Tom made a rush after the pistol, and Jake, breaking from Petersen's grip, made a plunge on the same errand. Both outstretched hands closed upon it, and the two men went sprawling to the floor in a struggle for its possession.

Petersen faced quickly about upon the men whom Tom's revolver had made hesitant. Hickey lay groaning and swearing, a little pool of blood beginning to form on the bare floor. The other three, in their l.u.s.t for their reward now so nearly won, gave Hickey hardly a glance, but advanced upon Petersen with the confidence that comes of being three to one and of knowing that one to be a coward. Petersen slipped off his coat, threw it together with his derby hat upon the floor near the wall, and with swelling nostrils quietly awaited their onslaught.

Arkansas stepped forth from his fellows. "Where'll I hit you first, Rosie? Glad to give you your pref'rence." And he spat into the V of Petersen's vest.

That was the last conscious moment of Arkansas for an hour. Petersen took a step forward, his long arm shot out, and Arkansas went to the floor all a-huddle.

Tom's eyes, glancing an instant from his own adversary, saw the "Swedish Terror" of the photograph: left foot advanced, fists on guard, body low-crouched. "Come on!" Petersen said, with a joyous snarl, to the two men who had fallen back a step. "Come on. I vant you bod!"

Kaffir Bill looked hesitantly upon his companion. "It was only a lucky lick, Smoky; Arkansas wasn't lookin'," he explained doubtfully.

"Yes," said the other.

"Sure. It couldn't 'a' been nothin' else. Why, Kid Morgan done him up."

"Come on then!" cried Smoky.

Together they made a rush, Bill a step in advance. Petersen's right landed over Bill's heart. Bill went tottering backward and to the floor.

Smoky shot in and clinched; but after Petersen's fists, like alternating hammers, had played a terrific tattoo against his two cheeks, he loosed his hold and staggered away with his arms about his ears. Bill rose dizzily to his feet, and the pair leaned against the further wall, whispering and watching Petersen with glowering irresolution.

"Come on, bod! Come on vid you!" Petersen shouted, his fists moving back and forth in invitation, his indrawn breath snoring exultantly.

Jake let out an oath. "Get into him!" he said.

"Yah! Come on vid you!"

They conferred a moment longer, and then crept forward warily. Hickey stopped his groaning and rose to his elbows to watch the second round.

At five feet away the two paused. Then suddenly Smoky made a feint, keeping out of reach of the Swede's swinging return, and under cover of this Kaffir Bill ducked and lunged at Petersen's legs.

Petersen went floundering to the floor, and Smoky hurled himself upon his chest. The three became a whirling, tumbling tangle,--arms striking out, legs kicking,--Petersen now in under, now half free, striking and hugging with long-untasted joy, breathing fierce grunts and strange e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns. The two had thought, once off his feet, the Swede would be an easy conquest. But Petersen had been a mighty rough-and-tumble sc.r.a.pper before he had gone into the prize ring, and for a few tumultuous moments the astounded twain had all they could do to hold their own.

"Slug him, can't youse!" gasped Bill, who was looking after Petersen's lower half, to Smoky, who was looking after the upper.

Smoky likewise saw that only a blow in the right place could give them victory over this heaving force. So far it had taken his best to hold these long arms. But he now loosed his hug to get in the victorious blow. Before he could strike, Petersen's fist jammed him in the face.

"Ya-a-h!" grunted the Swede.

Smoky fell instantly to his old position. "Hit him yourself!" he growled from Petersen's shirt front.

Bill, not having seen what had happened to Smoky, released a leg so that he might put his fist into Petersen's stomach. The leg kicked his knee.

Bill, with a shriek, frantically re-embraced the leg.

The two now saw they could do no more than merely hold Petersen, and so the struggle settled to a stubborn equilibrium.

In the meantime the strife between Tom and Jake had been like that of two bulls which stand braced, with locked horns. Jake's right hand had gained possession of the revolver, having at first had the better hold on it; Tom had a fierce grip on his forearm. The whole effort of one was to put the weapon into use; the whole effort of the other was to prevent its use, and perhaps to seize it for himself. Neither dared strike lest the act give the other his chance.

When he saw nothing was coming of the struggle between Bill and Smoky and Petersen, a glimpse of the wounded man, raised on his elbows, gave Jake an idea. With a jerk of his wrist he managed to toss the revolver a couple of feet away, beyond his own and Tom's reach.

"Hickey!" he called out. "Get it!"

The wounded man moved toward them, half crawling, half dragging himself.

A vengeful look came into his eyes. Tom needed no one to tell him what would happen when the man he had shot laid hand upon his weapon. Hickey drew nearer and nearer, his b.l.o.o.d.y trouser leg leaving a moist trail on the bare floor. His head reached their feet--pa.s.sed them--his right hand stretched out for the revolver. Tom saw his only chance. With a supreme effort he turned Jake, who in watching Hickey was momentarily off his guard, upon his back; and with all the strength of his leg he drove his foot into the crawling man's stomach. The man collapsed with a groaning outrush of breath.

Tom saw that the deadlock was likely to be ended, and the victory won, by the side gaining possession of the revolver; and he saw the danger to Petersen and himself that lay in the possibility of either of the unconscious men regaining his senses. Petersen's slow mind worked rapidly enough in a fight; he, too, saw the danger Tom had seen.