Zula Part 43

"It is all guess work."

"It is very good guess work, then," she said, thoughtfully.

The old gypsy went her way. It was at least three miles away that she entered a building which stood in a row of worn tenement houses. Up two flights of stairs she went, and through a hall that received but a small amount of light from the outer world. She entered a dingy and scantily furnished room.

"There, Crisp, I have found him at last," she said, to a slovenly dressed man who lay at full length on a shabby, worn out couch.

"You have, do you say? Where?"

"Oh, about three miles away. I found out all I wanted to for the present. I told his fortune and made him believe that I knew all about it. I told him about his wife being gone and his father being dead."

"Did you find out anything about the paper?"

"No."

"Well, I can tell Miss Rene that if she don't furnish the sum she promised to that night, I'll settle her trouble in no time. I know well enough she's got the paper, for I had it in my hand ready to give to her when I got the money, and I believe she was the one who done the shooting or hired some villain to do it for her, 'cause how the devil would anybody else know that I was there?"

"Oh, I've thought for a long time that it was her, and if I ever lay hands on her she will fare hard," said Meg, clinching her fist.

"So she will," said Crisp, with an oath.

"She thinks now she's got the paper that it's all right with her. The old man works it pretty cunning, too."

"I s'pose that lawyer--that man of Rene's, would give us a pretty good sum to tell him where Rene is, and I'll hunt her up and tell him if it takes forty years to find her, if she don't come to time," said Crisp.

"Why don't you start out and look her up? We can't make nothing laying around here."

"Can't we?" said Meg. "Just you wait. I hain't got through with that rich lawyer, yet. Jest remember we can't be all over at once."

"No, but somebody's got to keep a deuced sharp lookout to find just where this business will end. You see why, don't you?" said Crisp.

"Yes, I see why; about the only hold we had is gone unless we come right out and tell all we know, and that would be putting us in a nice pickle, wouldn't it?" said Meg.

"Well, I'm bound to get even with that fiend if it takes my own neck."

"There's no use losing your neck if you work the business right," said Meg.

"She feels mighty fine since Zu is out of the way," said Crisp, "and she don't care whether she died in the asylum or not, so she's gone.

It's a devilish good piece o' luck, anyway."

"Yes, we'll never be troubled with her any more, and that's mighty lucky."

"It seems kinder queer, though, that a couple of little threshings like that should make her crazy," said Crisp.

"Well, she never had any too good sense anyhow, but it's a lucky thing for all hands that she's dead. I wonder how it was that she dared go out in such a thunderstorm, when it was so awful dark, but you know if she turned crazy first, then it wasn't any wonder, but there's no tellin' jest when she did get crazy. At any rate she's dead and I'm glad of it."

"And now the next thing is to bring that other jade to time, but, where to find her now is the question. She told me she was going away with that Brunswick, but she didn't tell me when she was going, she said she would let me know, but she's a liar, a liar, but we've got to hunt her up, and make her hand over a good bunch o' money."

"Never mind, she don't make nothin' hangin' off this way," said Meg, lighting her pipe.

She took from her pocket a small amount of change, and, giving it to Crisp, told him to go out and buy some bread and cheese for their supper.

When Scott Wilmer went to his room, he closed the door and turned the key in the lock that no one might enter. Seating himself he took from his pocket several letters.

"Let me see," he said; "it strikes me as being very peculiar, but I more than half believe I am right. I know very well that I have seen her before, and I do not believe that she comes here for nothing, but what can it be? Perhaps a sharp watch will give the desired information. Yes, this letter and the facts that have come before me arouse my suspicion. I'll give her a good price if she will tell my fortune again. Her very actions, when I went in the room, were singular, and the more I think of it, the more I think I am right. At all events I will study up the matter and see what I can make of it.

It is quite likely that she is here for no good at least."

He found June, and said to her: "June, if that gypsy woman comes here again do not let her go until she tells my fortune."

"Why, Scott, what is the matter?"

"Nothing, only that I wish to see her. You will not forget, will you?"

"No," June replied, wondering at the time why Scott had suddenly grown so foolish.

Scott was preparing to leave the house one day when June entered his room and startled him with the intelligence that there was a fortune teller below.

"Is it the one who told my fortune before?" he asked, in a voice that caused June to wonder.

"Yes," she answered.

"Send her here, please."

June left him, wondering what could have come over Scott to cause him to be so deeply interested in fortune-telling. She conducted old Meg to Scott's room, then left them alone.

"You have come to tell me more of my fortune, have you?" Scott asked, placing a chair for her.

"More," she repeated. "What do you mean?"

"I mean that you told me a part of it, and now you will tell me the rest."

"I? When?"

"Not many days ago."

Old Meg looked around the room in a sly way. Every article in the room pa.s.sed under her gaze, and she evidently saw that it was useless to try to carry out the deception, which she had undertaken, for she said:

"Oh, I do remember I was here before."

Scott had closely scrutinized every feature, not losing the slightest expression of the face, nor the light that now and then shot from her eyes when she looked quickly into his own.

"Do you know what you told me before?" Scott asked.

"Yes," she said. "I know it all, and I told you you wanted to work out a mystery."

"What is the mystery?"

"Ah!" she said, with a cunning twinkle in her snake-like eyes, "that is my secret."