# Partners Of The Night/Chapter 2

I
CLIFFORD, from his secluded corner of the big roof-restaurant high above Broadway, watched without seeming to watch the polished Joe Russell and the darkly beautiful Mary Regan, and with them the pale young stranger in the new evening clothes of over-smart Broadway design. Russell--it was at once obvious that he was host--was pouring ten-dollar champagne into the young man's glass with the manner of a fine gentleman which that virtuoso of a swindler never overacted. His own glass, still full from the first decanting, had been untouched, and was to remain untouched. Mary Regan's glass he replenished from her bottle of imported mineral water. The young man sipped the brigand-priced wine with excited eagerness; spoke to his host, then to Mary Regan. His words Clifford could not get, but the manner and mood he did. Toward the ambassadorial Russell the young man was deferential, vastly flattered. Toward the haughty, but now gracious, Mary Regan his manner showed him to be humbly, feverishly infatuated.
The young man spoke again, and he and Mary Regan rose and joined the perspiring gaiety of the dining dancers--over their heads hanging a calciumlike mid-summer moon, quite as unreal and theatrical in its seeming as the grape arbors with their great bunches of illumined grapes of purple glass, and the rest of the pretentious stage setting of this heaven-reaching café dansant. The young man danced with jerky angularity; but Mary Regan, where he had only eager muscularity, moved through the figures with rhythm and unconscious confidence which suggested that to her the strangest steps would the moment of the first trial be old acquaintances.
Clifford watched the pair, and behind all other thoughts and feelings were the suspense and questioning wonder which had haunted him since he had first met Mary Regan on the Mauretania; and his mind went over and over the information Commissioner of Police Thorne, at a secret conference five days before, had placed in his hands. There had come a courteous note of warning from the Paris police regarding Mary Regan. Its substance had been: Name, Mary Regan; American born; age, very early twenties; later education received in a religious school near Versailles; for last year suspected of playing part in the amazingly clever and successful operations of a group of American swindlers in Paris; no direct evidence against her; coming to America; look out.
That Paris group--Clifford was certain it must be a crack company in' Joe Russell's army of soldiers of fortune....
As he watched the pair, a lesser question perplexed him: Why had Commissioner Thorne given him the case of Mary Regan? Was it partly because Stanley Tarleton had surprised the secret of his interest in Mary Regan and had told the Commissioner? Was it because the Commissioner hoped through her to get at her uncle, Joe Russell, and through Joe Russell to get somehow the evidence needed to strike down that crafty, unassailable public hero and secret partner of master criminals, Chief of Detectives Bradley? Was it merely to gain fuller knowledge of this specimen of a type--if Mary Regan belonged to such a type--the clever, beautiful, educated girl who perversely gives herself to a life of crime?
Clifford himself had not yet penetrated the character of Mary Regan. As he followed her in the dance, he kept asking himself, what was she, really?--and swayed from one conclusion to another. The things that had been suggested against her, they were true. They had to be true.... No, they were not true. They could not possibly be true.
But as for the young man with whom she danced, he pendulated between no such uncertainties. Clifford had him sized up. In a general way, he knew him. The young man was patently one of those under-brained sons of Western wealth, whom a large allowance, or parental death, sets loose on Broadway every so often; another "thousand-dollar-a-day sport," another "millionaire kid." Joe Russell, and the lieutenants who had discovered this last "good thing" and deftly steered him into Russell's company, would certainly not waste their wits on any lesser game. Behind this wastrel prince, commonplace except for his infatuation, Clifford could see thousands of dim unresting figures in Kansas City stockyards, thousands of sweat-beaded fire-lit faces in the steel mills of Pittsburg. For this hobbledehoy Clifford felt a biting contempt--and a bitter sense that what fate had surely awaiting him was but an insignificant fraction of what he, and his kind, and his family's kind, justly merited.
What hurt him so about the heart was that Mary Regan should of her own free will assume the rôle of flame to this wretched moth. She smiled at the youth enchantingly, intimately. To Clifford it seemed that they were at, or near, an understanding.
The dance ended--and other dances; and toward midnight the three filed out among the tables, Mary Regan leading the way. Her course to the door led past Clifford. Their glances met. Experience with her had taught Clifford better than to give any sign of greeting. But their eyes held for a moment--hers contemptuous, and frankly speaking her satisfaction at his published disgrace. Then she had gone, the cub millionaire behind her.
But Joe Russell had paused at Clifford's side. "Why, hello, Bob!" he exclaimed in his pleasant voice, dropping a cordial hand on Clifford's shoulder. "I hadn't seen you here. Say, Bob,"--his voice lowered--"I'm sorry about it--that was a hard jolt, your being discharged from the force."
Clifford was never certain whether this astute crime-general really liked him, antagonists though they had often been, or whether his friendliness was a mask from behind which Russell could lie in wait for betraying looks and slips of speech. Clifford played safe.
"Well, Joe--I guess I got just what a grafter deserves."
"You a grafter? My dear boy," smiled the other, "those of us who were born before six P. M. to-day know that some one framed you."
"Whatever way it may have been, they got me."
"They certainly did. What are you going to do?"
"Thinking of taking up law. May go in later with an old friend."
"Well, if you do, here's wishing you luck, Bob. Good-night."
Russell passed out with his easy man-of-the- world air. Clifford followed him, hastily but without appearance of haste, and when Russell set off in a taxicab with his party, Clifford was trailing him in another. He was fairly certain that the party was bound for Russell's flat--for a week before, as he knew, Russell and his niece had moved to a furnished apartment up in One Hundredth Street; but he wanted to follow the young millionaire from the apartment house to his hotel and there learn his identity.
As the taxi sped up Broadway Clifford wondered what might be Joe Russell's plan for "trimming" this unsuspicious Western princelet. A clever plan, undoubtedly; and the spoil would run into tall figures. And Bradley--his rake-off for guaranteeing Russell against police interference would be a little fortune, too.
As he thought of Bradley, Clifford's heart jumped as though it had thrown in the high speed. Might not this affair on which he was just embarking give him, in some way as yet unseen, the chance to get the goods on the great Chief Bradley? If so, one thing was certain--he would conduct himself with greater wariness than in their first encounter.
From the window of his own taxi Clifford saw the car ahead stop at Russell's door--the apartment house stood on a corner--saw the three step out, saw Russell shake the young man's hand and then retire a few discreet paces toward the entrance, saw the young millionaire speak to Mary Regan, saw her smile into his eager foolish face. Then she and her uncle went indoors.
Clifford expected to see the young man reënter the taxi and go whizzing down to one of the huge ornate hotels that serve the febrile extravagance of the brighter stretch of Broadway. But the young man stood irresolute a moment, staring after Mary Regan; then with a gesture he refused the solicitation of the chauffeur and strode rapidly to the east. At Columbus Avenue he caught a surface car, and, first surprise for Clifford, it was a northbound car and not a car headed southward toward the region of reckless spending. At One Hundred and Sixteenth Street he got off, walked one block, then let himself into an apartment with a latch-key.
Clifford dismissed his taxi, and from the opposite side of the street gazed at the house. He was momentarily puzzled. The house, as did the block, showed its character by its front: a house where decent careful people of limited means could get four rooms for something like twenty-five dollars a month.
For an hour Clifford watched, but the young man did not reappear. Then, not allowing his changing ideas to become conclusions, Clifford went home. At six the next morning he was again before the uptown house. At eight the young man came out, the glory of his last night's evening clothes replaced by a carefully brushed, ill-fitting ready-made suit. He took an elevated train, left it at Rector Street, and walked across into the financial district; and, though the hour was not yet nine, and the general public were forbidden, he was admitted by a guard in gray uniform into fortress-like buildings with bars of heavy steel at all the windows.
Shortly after nine Clifford entered the building and glanced about the great room of marble and glinting brass. Behind a grilled window labeled "Receiving Teller," in a black alpaca coat, was the gallant of the night before.
So then, his young prince of steel or pork, with millions of inheritance to toss away, was merely a bank clerk with, perhaps, twenty-five weekly dollars to his name.
II
"Pardon me, Mrs. Jerrold,"--it was an hour later and Clifford was in the uptown house; the young man's name he had secured from the bank porter--"pardon me, but as an investigator for the bonding company which gave bond to the Empire Security Bank for your son, it is my duty to make a few inquiries. Please understand that it's a mere matter of form; nothing at all for you to be disturbed about. But, of course, you appreciate that to safeguard our interests we must keep in touch with the persons whose integrity we have guaranteed with our money."
"Of course--of course," fluttered the little gray-eyed, middle-aged Mrs. Jerrold. While he had spoken Clifford had made a swift survey of the combination dining-and-sitting-room in which they sat and of the other rooms into which open doors gave him glimpses. Scrupulously neat, and everywhere the suggestion of a penny-saving economy.
"I suppose," continued Clifford with the routine manner of his rôle--he disliked practising even this harmless deception on this obviously adoring and poignantly respectable mother--"I suppose that your son has a proper interest in his work?"
"Oh, indeed he has, sir! He applies himself very hard. Why, this last winter he took courses in--in--something about banking--at the New York University. In the night classes. Oh, Philip is very ambitious. And what's more," she added proudly, "since he was sixteen he has entirely supported both himself and me."
"Excellent!" Clifford made pretense of entering memoranda in his note-book. And then, still in his mechanical, census-taker's voice: "Just as determined as ever, I suppose, to advance through application?"
"Well--well--" The worried look which came suddenly into her thin face she vainly tried to force back into hiding.
"Not fallen a victim to the modern dance craze, has he?"
"He's the best son a mother ever had!" she evaded with quavering loyalty.
"Of course he is. But better tell me the exact truth," Clifford encouraged. "It will help the boy most."
"Lately--he has been going about more of nights than he used to."
"And naturally spending more? Particularly on clothes?"
"Ye-es," she confessed. And having confessed so much, she opened more of her troubles. "I've begged him not to be so extravagant. Why, two weeks ago he bought an evening suit--had it made to order!--heaven knows how much it must have cost him!" And then swiftly she was again maternally protective: "It's just a part of his being a young man. It will soon pass."
"Sure it will. We've all been through that." Clifford snapped his book shut. "I'd just keep my eyes on him for a while if I were you. And better not mention my call; it might disturb him unnecessarily. Thank you very much. Good-morning."
Outside, Clifford's mind summarized the situation in swift flashes. Devoted mother--model son of the old-fashioned pattern, who might become an honored member of society in a small way if untoward influences did not come into conflict with his none-too-definite will. Over this neat flat and these nice, commonplace people, Clifford infallibly sensed danger, vague but great, and menacingly close at hand. Russell's plan in regard to young Jerrold--what was it? Clifford guessed at many; but there was never any foretelling what the subtle, fertile-minded Joe Russell would do.
And Clifford tried to think out what might be the part of Mary Regan. He tried to conquer, drive out of himself, the personal element; but despite his efforts, whenever he thought of Mary Regan he was sick of heart.
For four days he shadowed Russell and Jerrold and Mary Regan--and with especial care did he watch Jerrold, for that young man he conceived to be the pivot figure of whatever scheme was preparing. And during these days he got in touch with Billy Dempsey, first-grade detective, also first-grade friend, with a belief in Clifford unshaken by his recent disgrace, who was having a vacation and who had elected to spend it economically and comfortably in New York. Clifford had no guess what twist the next hour might give events. There might be arrests to be made--big arrests--and since he had no authority to make them, he preferred Billy Dempsey above all men in the department to have this credit. To Dempsey Clifford said nothing more than he might need him and would he hold himself in readiness. For Dempsey this was quite enough.
Saturday morning Jerrold went down to the Empire Security Bank in a shirt with a soft collar, carrying a suit-case to which was strapped a tennis racket in the ordinary canvas cover. To all who glanced at him, and gave him a thought, the inference was inescapable: this young man was prepared to rush from desk to country, there to spend his Saturday half-holiday and his Sunday.
Shortly before noon Clifford entered the fortress of a building. The usual big Saturday crowd of depositors were in line, storing away, as was their custom, every bit of their cash over the cracksman-beloved Sunday. Clifford drew near, and while Jerrold's head was bent over a complex deposit of checks, drafts, money-orders and currency, he peeped into the barred cell of the receiving teller. On the floor, just below mountains of bills which had piled in during that morning's rush, lay the suit-case and racket, suggestive of a care-free weekend.
At half past one young Jerrold left the bank and hurried away, Clifford tailing him.
Thirty minutes later the young man entered the lofty arcade of the Pennsylvania Station and became a drop of the great holiday stream of store--and office-loosened workers who were making for the pleasure grounds of Long Island. Thus far all tallied with the implicit plan of suit-case and racket.
At the head of the stairway Jerrold stepped forth from the current and addressed one of the railroad's special policemen; Clifford judged that he was asking minute directions. On the lower level, at one of the ticket windows, Jerrold again asked many questions--making himself an unforgettable figure to the irritated press of people thus delayed behind him. At length he bought a round-trip ticket and swept into the crowd pushing for the gates to the Long Island trains.
But suddenly, and so deftly that the action was hardly noticeable, he had slipped out of the crowd, and the next minute he was on an upper level and was an inconspicuous part of the lesser stream that was flowing from the trains. In the great inclined driveway that pierces to the center of the station, he stepped swiftly into one of the waiting taxicabs and was off.
A moment later Clifford, in another taxicab, was trailing Jerrold's machine. After a run northward the car stopped before an apartment house on One Hundredth Street.
Clifford, from a safe distance, saw Jerrold, gripping racket and suit-case, hurry into the house. He stared across at the building, his every sense quickened to its finest edge of perception.
Somewhere above young Jerrold, with his suit-case, was this moment being received by Russell and Mary Regan.
III
Clifford's telephone call brought Dempsey almost immediately. Rapidly he gave Dempsey his instructions, chief of which was to watch, yet be unseen; and then, waiting for his opportunity, he slipped unnoticed into the house across the way. A minute later he was ringing the bell of Joe Russell's apartment.
It was Mary Regan herself who opened the door. At sight of him her dark face filled with disdain, hostility and quick suspicion, and she tried to close the door upon him. That purpose, however, was nullified by the ancient device of a swiftly inserted foot, and Clifford pressed into the hall.
"What do you want?" she demanded.
"A few words with your uncle."
"My uncle doesn't want a few words with you!"
"Perhaps he will when he knows what it's about."
During this brief interchange Clifford had thought he had heard faint, swift movements within. Now from the far end of the apartment Russell's voice called out:" Who is it, Mary?"
Mary Regan's voice was a sting of scorn: "That Mr. Clifford--who used to be a detective."
"Bob Clifford! Hello, is that you, Bob? Russell's tone was cordial. "One minute, and I'll be out."
Mary Regan, making no sign, permitted Clifford to go down the hall. An open door gave him a glimpse into a bedroom--her bedroom, he instantly surmised--and at the foot of the bed was a woven straw traveling bag and across a chair was a woman's traveling coat of pongee silk.
He had a moment alone in the sitting-room, for Mary Regan did not deign to follow him in to give him company. He gave a swift glance around, then stooped over wires that ran along the base-board, and snip! snip! he went with a pair of thin-jawed, powerful clippers. He had barely time to thrust the clippers and the piece of wire he had cut into a pocket when Russell entered.
"This is certainly a surprise, Bob," said Russell, shaking hands. "How are you?"
"First rate. Just thought I'd drop in to see you. I'm not butting in on anything or anybody, am I?"
"Not at all. Sit down. Not a soul here but myself and my niece there," turning his head toward Mary Regan, who had entered the instant after him and was regarding Clifford with scornful, wary eyes.
"I thought some one might have come to visit you," Clifford said, glancing with casual manner at Jerrold's racket and suit-case upon the floor beside him. "But perhaps it's the other way round--you were just going to leave?"
"You guessed it," Russell answered easily. "New York's so hot that Mary and I have decided to run down to Atlantic City for over Sunday."
"If we're going to catch the train we planned to take," cut in Mary sharply, "we've no time to lose."
Russell looked at his watch. "That's so. I don't mean to hurry you, Bob, but was there anything special you came to see about?"
"Yes. Something rather special." Clifford drew Jerrold's suit-case toward his knees and reached toward its lock with his sharp-jawed, powerful clippers. " I came to see what is in Mr. Jerrold's bag."
"Stop!"
The word was sharp, but low and controlled. Clifford looked up. Three feet away was the barrel of a black automatic pistol.
"What's up?" demanded Russell. His voice was quiet, and he had not stirred from his chair.
Clifford likewise did not move from his chair, and his voice was likewise quiet.
"There's a queer game on, Joe, and I'm here to learn what it is."
Those gray eyes of Joe Russell,behind which a world of craft was masked by an habitually open gaze, now gleamed piercingly into Clifford. Then he snapped out, but still low: "Mary--call Double-X!" Mary Regan moved quickly toward the telephone on the table.
"You need not bother," put in Clifford. "The wires are cut."
"You cut them?"
"Yes."
"There's some slack. Mary, twist the ends together!"
"The ends will not meet," said Clifford, shortly. "I cut out a yard. Here it is"--he drew the piece of wire from his pocket--" and here it goes--" and he tossed it through the open window.
Mary Regan moved away from the telephone. Joe Russell's eyes blazed over the automatic at Clifford.
"So," he breathed," you think you have cut us off from outside communication!"
"I think I have, Joe," and Clifford again thrust his clippers toward the suit-case.
"Touch that lock and I shoot!"
Clifford looked up." You ought to know, Russell," he said, "that I would not have come in here without having made my plans. Billy Dempsey is on guard outside. The fire-escape is at the front of the house. The servants' entrance is in front directly beneath the main entrance. Every exit is in plain view. If all of you, or any one of you, try to leave this house without me, Dempsey will instantly place you under arrest. So it would n't pay you to shoot."
"That's bunk about Dempsey!" declared Russell.
"Take a look," suggested Clifford.
"Mary, keep this gun on him."
Mary Regan held the automatic point blank at Clifford while Russell moved to the window and peered down. Her face was tense with wonderment, but the dark eyes were unflinchingly hard.
Russell returned from the window, took the pistol and resumed his seat. He did not speak.
"None of you can leave this apartment to telephone from another room, for if you try, I show a handkerchief at the window, or blow my whistle, and up Dempsey comes. And besides, Joe," Clifford continued, "you know that I know that you would not shoot anyhow. You may bluff, but you have never shot in your life--not at a man. That rough stuff is not in your line."
Russell gazed at him an instant longer. Then he relaxed, crossed his legs, and with an easy motion laid the automatic upon the table.
"You certainly are the goods, Bob," he remarked.
For the third time Clifford started at the suit-case with his clippers.
"Wait a minute. Don't spoil a good fifty-cent lock. Here you are."
From his vest pocket Russell drew forth a key, which he tossed to Clifford and which Clifford caught. The next moment the suit-case was wide open on the floor. The two halves of the bag were tightly packed with crumpled bank notes.
They gazed steadily at each other, the crumpled fortune between them. For a moment none of the three spoke.
"The deposits that Jerrold received this morning at the Empire Security Bank," Clifford at length remarked. "How much is there here?"
"Is this the third degree, Bob--or are we now chatting informally?" inquired Russell.
"Informally, till I say otherwise."
"Then informally I may mention that I haven't yet had time to count it. But I suppose there's a hundred thousand or two."
"Or more?"
"More, yes, if it was a lucky day."
"It was a clever scheme you had doped out, Joe," Clifford commented after a moment, "for yours was the brain behind it. Every one at the bank supposed that Jerrold had come prepared to rush away for an outing when he carried his tennis racket and empty suit-case into his cage. It was possible for him, after the bank had closed, to sweep the big bills quickly into the suit-case and carry the coin and a mass of small bills to the vault. No one would suspect. Not till Monday. Almost two days' start. That's the way you had it figured out--yes?"
"My dear fellow, you don't seem to need any information from me."
"It was clever, how you coached Jerrold into attracting attention to himself at the Pennsylvania Station. When the bank discovered what had happened, the first search would have been directed at Long Island. More time for you. Yes, the whole scheme was very clever."
"Thank you. Rather clever, I agree. But unfortunately a small item was overlooked--said item being one Robert Clifford, Esquire. you've got me beaten, Bob," Russell continued pleasantly, "and I'm not one of the fools who fight on after they see it's all over. I suppose we might as well be moving along to Headquarters. I'll just call Jerrold in and get my hat. Mary, you get ready, too."
Mary Regan, who had been standing near the window, passed behind Clifford toward the hall door. Russell, with as much urbanity in defeat as in victory, rose and turned toward the bedroom. There was no signal that Clifford saw, yet one there must have been. Suddenly from behind a heavy cloth descended and enveloped him--later he learned it was a tapestry couch cover--and in the same instant Joe Russell was embracing him, gripping his arms helpless to his side.
"Mary, the trunk strap!" cried Russell.
With that close-woven fabric muffling him, Clifford knew breath spent in crying out was wasted; he put it all into a fierce effort to break Russell's clasp. But bound by the cloth and his elbows pressed into his ribs, he could get no leverage for his superior strength; and though he could have struggled free had there been five minutes, the wiry arms of the older man held until a loop of broad father slipped over Clifford's shoulders. The next moment it was drawn tight about his elbows and buckled. And the next moment his ankles were securely bound.
"Sorry, Bob," panted Russell, "but we couldn't let you get away with it."
"Who is he?" interjected a high, excited voice, that Clifford knew must be Jerrold's.
"He used to be a friend, but at present he's a danger to us. It's all right now though, my boy. Mary, you and Philip make ready for our get- away."
"But Mr. Clifford's man below--that Mr. Dempsey?" put in Mary Regan.
"When we're ready to leave," said Russell, "we'll give Dempsey the signal to come up. A handkerchief held at the window; that was it, wasn't it, Clifford? When he gets in here I guess the three of us can give him the same we've given Clifford. Come, hurry!"
Clifford heard rapid movements, low, quick plannings. His chagrin flamed up to a fury of self-disgust. A minute before he had believed he had held victory in his hand--and here he was trapped by a trick so absurdly ancient that he had not dreamed any one would ever try it again. And the whole business would come out, and up and down the city he would be laughed at and contemptuously referred to by the dullest members of the force as "that poor simp!"
Suddenly, the door-bell rang. Billy Dempsey, thought Clifford--come in response to the handkerchief which Russell must have held at the window a minute before. Dempsey, entering unsuspiciously, would have a blanket flung over him from behind, and he, too, would be humiliatingly trussed hp. Poor Dempsey--he had let Dempsey in for the ignominy of this thing, too!
"Mary, answer that bell," said Russell. "But fasten the chain-bolt; see who it is before you let him in."
Clifford felt two hands press upon his mouth. " Sorry, Bob, but you understand we can't have any conversation from you just now."
Clifford heard Mary Regan go out; then he heard her reënter.
"Philip," she said, "will you please step into the other room a few minutes. There's a personal matter I want to talk to my uncle about."
The bedroom door closed behind Jerrold.
"Yes?" whispered Russell.
"It's Harrigan," she said.
Bound as he was, Clifford started. Harrigan, collector of Chief Bradley's percentage of the proceeds of great crime! And Clifford started again at hearing the imperturbable Joe Russell swear, and swear with consternation.
"What are you going to do?" whispered Mary Regan.
"Try to bluff him off," said Russell, and went out. Clifford discerned guarded voices. Then Russell returned.
"Well?" breathed Mary Regan.
"He demanded Bradley's share. I pretended I didn't know what he was talking about. But he said he knew we'd pulled a job. I kept up my front and sent him away. Come," Russell snapped out, "we've got to get Dempsey up here, fix him and beat it, before Harrigan can report to Bradley and Bradley can get here from Headquarters!"
A light had broken in on Clifford.
"One second, Joe," he exclaimed through his mummy-cloth; "you mean you tried to turn this trick without Bradley knowing it?"
"You might as well know I did. I thought I might for once save twenty-five or fifty thousand."
"I see--and Bradley suspected and had you watched!" cried Clifford, a sense of fresh mastery surging up in him: 'You're up against it, Joe! Bradley doesn't have to come from Headquarters. He is at the One Hundredth Street Station. I saw him go in as I rode up here. it's plain he's on the spot, to watch which way you jump. Sorry for you, Joe, but if you try to beat it this minute, Dempsey will grab you. And if you wait to pull that trick on Dempsey, Bradley will be right on top of you."
Neither Russell nor Mary Regan spoke. But Clifford felt the tautness of their nerves.
"If I were not here," Clifford went on, driving home the facts of the situation, "Bradley would let you off by giving you hell and then taking half or all the money. But with me here, and with my knowing what's happened, he won't dare touch the money. He'll be forced to arrest you all. Though you and Bradley have been doing business together, I'll bet you haven't one bit of evidence against him--he's too careful; so it would n't get you anything to turn against him in court. The way the cards lie there's nothing in this for Bradley except glory, and he'll go after all the glory there is and soak you, the very limit, particularly since you dared double-cross him in this deal. Yes, Joe, you people are certainly up against it!"
"Bob," Russell said abruptly, "take half, clean out and keep your trap closed. With the other half I'll square Bradley."
"Nothing doing," said Clifford.
"You fool! There'll be nothing in it for you anyway if Bradley makes the arrest."
"I know it. But listen--here's a chance for both of us. Let me loose, I'll hang around, you divide with Bradley, and Dempsey and I'll grab Bradley with the goods on. And I'll see that you all are taken care of."
"I'm no squealer!" said Russell sharply. "I'll never do it! Talk sense."
"Here's another chance, then. You're going to be arrested by Bradley or by me--get that in your head. Bradley will make out the worst possible case against you, to get revenge, to scare other crooks to keep in line, to swell his own reputation, I'll be easier with you. it's got to be one of us. So take your choice."
"How can you arrange anything?--a discharged officer."
"I'm working privately for Commissioner Thorne. I take you over Bradley's head right up to Thorne."
"What--Thorne's backing you? You're giving it to me straight?"
"Haven't I always given it to you straight?"
There was an instant's consideration. "But when Bradley shows up here, can you put it across on him?"
"I can if you'll help me." Clifford had been planning swiftly. "And if I fail, you'll be none the worse off for my trying."
"I'm with you then--if you'll agree to a truce for an hour. I want to think about bail and a lawyer before you take me away."
"All right," said Clifford.
The next moment he was free of straps and couch cover.
"What's your plan?" demanded Russell. "First thing, to get Dempsey," and, stepping quickly to the open window, Clifford held up his handkerchief.
IV
Two minutes later big, unquestioning Bill Dempsey, who knew nothing at all what this business was about, and who was satisfied to act as Clifford said, took Mary Regan's locked suit-case of woven straw from Clifford's hands.
"Follow directions exactly, Billy," said Clifford. "Walk up one flight, ring the elevator bell and ask to be shown the apartment just above this. It's empty. Take your time about examining it, and hang on there until you see that vase of roses on that window ledge there. Then come right down. Now hustle."
Dempsey was no more than safely up the stairway when there was another ring at the bell. "String him along as I said, Russell," whispered Clifford. "But remember, Joe," he added grimly, "no tricks with me. Try anything, and you'll have Bradley and me pounding you from both directions."
He slipped into the bedroom that harbored Jerrold, who had been kept ignorant of Clifford's identity lest the knowledge unnerve him for the coming scene. Mary Regan answered the ring, and ushered into the sitting-room Chief of Detectives Bradley. She herself did not enter, and Bradley closed the door. His glance went instantly to Jerrold's closed suit-case. Then the dark, square face of the great chief, with his little piercing eyes, fixed upon Russell in cold savagery.
"Whaddu mean?" he demanded, his voice a low growl. "Why didn't you come across to Harrigan?"
"What for, Chief? As I told Harrigan, there's been nothing doing."
"Don't try to stall me! So"--with a fierce, dangerous sneer--"you thought you could put something over on me, did you? I've got half an idea to send you up anyhow for--" He finished by glancing at Jerrold's bag. "Well, you arrange to come across in some safe way, or it's a long visit to a damned exclusive health resort up the river for yours."
"I don't get you, Chief."
"Yes, you do!" His voice rose in angry emphasis. "I guess I know about what happened at the Empire Security--"
" S-s-h! Not so loud, Chief. There's a man in the next room you don't want to hear you--Clifford."
"Clifford! What's he doing here?"
"He was proposing that I be a silent partner in a private detective agency he's thinking of starting."
"Get rid of him!"
"I've tried to but I can't. He just hangs on." Bradley lowered at Russell viciously.
"And you pass as a clever man! Why, you damned boob, your brain's club-footed!" Then sharply, in a bare whisper: "Why did Clifford go in there?"
"He slipped in when he heard your voice. I think he thought he might overhear you say something."
The bright little eyes became gleaming razor-edges.
"Does he think he's on?"
"On?" queried Russell in his blank voice. "I don't get you at all, Chief."
"We'll see whether he suspects." Bradley raised his voice. "Clifford!"
Clifford stepped into the room.
"So, Clifford--doing a bit of gum-shoe work?" sneered Bradley.
"Just came in for a little chat with Russell."
"Finish it some other time. I've got business. Move along."
Clifford sat down.
"Suppose you move along yourself, Chief. you're no longer my boss. I was here first, and I finish first."
There was a flash of fury in Bradley's little eyes, but instantly it was suppressed; and the two enemies gazed at each other with cool masked faces. Clifford wondered what was revolving in that swift astute brain. Had he planned subtly enough? Would Bradley do as he had foreseen? Or in this present encounter, would Bradley's wits again prove the quicker?
Abruptly the great chief rose. He opened the door of the bedroom and saw young Jerrold on the bed. Then he opened the door into the hall and summoned Mary Regan. Behind her he locked the door.
"Russell, I got the three of you," he chopped out, his dark face of a sudden vengefully and cruelly triumphant. "It's all up. Let's have a look at what you got in that young fool's suit-case."
"Chief, what are you talking about?" queried Russell.
"Cut that bunk! What's in it?"
"The young fellow stopped in here on his way from work. I believe he was going off for a holiday."
"Open it up!"
"Help yourself, Chief. I guess it's not locked." And Russell shoved forward the bag that two hours since had come out of the Empire Security Bank.
Bradley opened the suit-case. The two halves were filled with innocent outing shirts, flannel trousers, change of underwear, toilet articles--all Joe Russell's, packed hastily into the bag by Clifford. Bradley fingered quickly through the bag's contents, then fixed his hard eyes penetratingly on Russell.
"What's up?" demanded Clifford of the company, with his best simulation of surprise and suspicion.
"What is it, Bradley?" said Russell.
Bradley did not answer; still held his shrewd eyes upon his old-time partner. Russell maintained his admirable expression of bewilderment. Bradley turned his gaze on Mary Regan; her expression was equally surprised. During the pause, Clifford watched the dark face of his former superior, and tried to guess what was about to happen--tried to imagine what was flashing through that quick brain.
The silence lasted for no more than a moment.
"Russell," said Bradley, accusingly, "where are the lady's clothes and her necklace?"
So Bradley was playing it safe! Clifford knew these words were intended for his ears.
"I can only keep on saying that you've got me guessing what it's all about, Chief," said Russell.
"A lady's bag was stolen, and one just like it was brought into this building. The case was reported at the One Hundredth Street Station, where I happened to be, and I thought you might be in on the job." He rose. "Come on, all of you; we'll take a look around the flat."
Exultantly, but apprehensively, Clifford followed. Bradley's mind seemed to be working as he had calculated. The Chief half suspected the truth, yet half believed himself mistaken; and realized that to show suspicion in front of Clifford, before he was certain, would be needlessly to kill the goose that might continue to lay bank accounts and apartment houses.
There was half an hour of microscopic search for the imaginary bag. Then Bradley gave up with grim dignity.
"With your reputation you've got to expect things like this," he said severely to Russell; and as he went out he glanced at Clifford, with the least glimmer of derisive hostility in his cold, hard eyes. Russell saw him to the door.
"What does he think?" Clifford asked when Russell had returned.
"For one thing, he thinks he pulled the wool over the eyes of ex-Lieutenant Clifford."
"Does he suspect anything?"
"How could he help suspecting, with Jerrold here?"
"We can't have him watching us. You gave him the rest of the song-and-dance?"
"Oh, I went through the rest of your little play, exactly as per stage directions. Whispered that he wasn't altogether wrong in what he suspected, only he was too soon. To-day had been just a rehearsal. The boy was going to carry the suit-case to the bank a few times to quiet suspicion there, then if all went well we were going to pull the trick. If we had decided to go through with it we'd have given him due notice, and have seen that he got his share. I gave him the devil for almost balling the whole thing up by butting in here as he did."
"Good!"
Clifford stepped to the window. He saw Bradley emerge from the house, and turn a corner. Then he set the vase of roses on the window-ledge. Two minutes later he took from the reappearing Bily Dempsey Mary Regan's suit-case with its fortune of bank-notes, and sent Dempsey down again to his post.
V
For a space there was silence among the three. Russell and Mary Regan seemed to be waiting for their captor to speak or act. For his part, Cliford had begun to feel strangely at a loss. Mary Regan, who had obeyed his orders and acted well her part while Bradley had been upon the stage, had resumed toward him her attitude of disdainful reserve.
"What's next, Bob?" Russell gently prompted, again easy, suave, smiling. "I've had all the time I needed for thinking, so I suppose we might call our little truce over. Shall we be moving along to Headquarters?"
Clifford had believed until this moment that, the truce at an end, he was going to lead them straight down to be arrested by the waiting Dempsey. But something held him back from immediate action--the same formless motive that had in the first instance held him back from telling Dempsey all he knew and suspected: something which had to do with that dark, contemptuous Mary Regan--just what, he did not know.
Clifford's answer was a surprise to himself. "We'll not leave just yet," he said.
"So!" Russell raised his eyebrows the least trifle. Mary Regan showed an instant of amazement. "How long are you going to keep us here?" inquired Russell.
"That remains to be seen," said Clifford. "Thanks," Russell returned dryly.
The two men regarded each other with level eyes.
"As I was saying a while ago, Russell," began Clifford, a stern note coming again into his voice, "the way you framed this trick up, and got young Jerrold into it, was very clever. But, Russell, I think that this is about the meanest brace game you ever doped out. I'll say this for you, that most of the suckers you have trimmed have been men who haven't deserved a lot of sympathy. But to work upon an honest, ambitious boy like Jerrold with a dependent mother, until he became your willing tool--well, it was pretty rotten, Russell, pretty rotten."
"My dear boy, you are too energetically virtuous for so hot a day," Russell protested mildly. "Go easier, or your moral nature may suffer a sun-stroke. The fact is, the mother was to have been taken care of. And as for Jerrold--think of him having to handle stacks of money every day, helping to pile up the millions of profits for the big bankers--and for it all getting in the end perhaps thirty a week. that's not such a devilishly brilliant career to have saved the boy from."
Clifford did not attempt to reply to the element of twisted truth in Russell's words. He turned to Mary Regan, who was still standing stiffly upright, and who still held upon him the same hard, contemptuous gaze. She had treated him with scorn and insult, she had stung him whenever chance had offered. And now his turn was come to sting back. And he wanted to sting hard. He wanted to kill, by a brutal summary of the facts, that feeling in himself which hurt him so.
"And your part, Miss Regan, was even worse," he drove at her. "You have allowed your personal charm, your sex, to be used to lead an undeveloped boy on to his ruin. You have encouraged him to fall in love with you. Had he not been wildly infatuated, he could never have been induced to do what he has done. It is plain how you and your uncle worked it. The boy was led on to the point where he dared blurt out his love. Then he was adroitly given to understand that a man without money could have no hope of marrying you. Then by degrees, skilfully, it was suggested to him how he could get the necessary money. And he got it. To-night, you and Russell would probably have taken the express to Montreal--the money with you. You would have broken the boy's heart, and made him pay alone the penalty of your crime. You would have ruined him utterly. And you would have killed his mother. You are soulless--utterly despicable!"
She blanched at the merciless impact of his words, and gave a little gasp, and could only stare at him speechlessly. But the next moment she was at him, standing furiously above him.
"What you say isn't worth that!" her words rushed out, and she snapped her fingers.
"And it's worth all the less coming from you! Honesty! Every person is out to get his. Every person! And out to get it the easiest and safest way they can. that's what the whole world is doing, whatever else they may pretend. Honesty! There isn't any such thing. It's just a word that hypocritical thieves use to intimidate fools into leaving alone what they've stolen."
She paused to catch her breath. Clifford blinked at her, bewildered. Such an amazing cynicism--yet a cynicism indubitably as sincere as a religion. And yet, at the most she could be hardly more than twenty-two.
"And you are out for yours, too, Mr. Detective Clifford!" she blazed on with her annihilatory scorn. "We couldn't help acting with you against Mr. Bradley, but I at least didn't believe a word you said. Your trial and discharge showed you up for what you are. You detectives are the lowest crooks on earth. You make the crooks who have the brains or the courage to get out and do something, men who really take risks, you make them split with you. And when you arrest them, it's to gain promotion with higher pay, or it's to make the crooks more afraid of you so that they'll give you a larger share. And in this affair," pointing toward the suit-case, Dempsey had returned, "there's more in it for you than for us. You've done no thinking, you've taken no risks, yet you'll demand the lion's share in spite of your refusing my uncle awhile ago when you knew there was danger of your being caught by Mr. Bradley. You're safe against Bradley now. Well--how much are you asking?"
"Not a dollar bill," Clifford managed in his amazement to articulate.
"Then it's because you see more in it for you by pretending to be honorable!" she rushed on. "Oh, don't you think I see what it means to you? A far bigger thing than it can ever mean to any of us. Oh"--with a flash of inspiration--"I see now why you are not arresting us at once! Since Mr. Bradley has been fooled and put off, you think you can hold us here several days--until the bank finds out. Then the papers will be full of it. And the bank will offer a big reward, and increase it--perhaps to $50,000. Then at the dramatic moment you appear with us, arrested. You get the reward--there will be a tremendous story--later you send us to prison--you will be an international figure--your lost name will be retrieved--you may be reinstated in the police department--all honor will be yours! There, Mr. Detective Clifford, haven't I sized up exactly what this means to you?"
"It may mean most of that," Clifford admitted, "But if any of these things do come, they will come as the consequences of doing my duty."
"Your duty! U-ugh, I knew I had your measure!"
She turned her back upon him in uttermost scorn and gazed out the window.
"I would n't worry, Mary," put in the equable voice of Russell. "He can't do quite all these things. Bob, you know I asked for that truce to get a chance to think. Well, I've thought. You know you haven't got a thing on us. The money is here, of course, but you can't prove that we had anything to do with getting it here."
"I'll have plenty on you when young Jerrold in the next room there tells his story to Thorne. And he'll tell all right--why shouldn't he?--when Miss Regan tells him how she deceived him in the matter of loving him."
Mary Regan whirled about.
"I shall not tell!"
"Yes, you will. It's the only decent thing there's left that you can do for the boy. You and he are about to part, and he must not be allowed to go on thinking that you love him; he's got to be cured of that." It gave Clifford a hurting pleasure to be thus giving pain for pain. "And besides, while I'm making you no promises, there are some things I can do to make this a bit easier for you--and if you want these from me for yourself or your uncle, you've got to tell Jerrold."
"I shall not!" she repeated.
Joe Russell studied Clifford for a space between his half-closed eyes.
"Mary, my dear," he remarked, "it's a fairly good working rule, when your best is a pair of twos and you know the other man has got a straight flush, not to back your twos with everything you've got. I think we'd better tell, Mary."
"Then let Mr. Clifford tell!"
"You'd better do it, Joe," said Clifford.
Russell shrugged his shoulders. His even voice he raised the least trifle.
"Mr. Jerrold, will you kindly step in."
The door of the bedroom opened and young Jerrold entered.
"Mr. Jerrold, I believe I did not mention," continued the amiable voice of Russell, "when you first met Mr. Clifford that he is a detective."
"What!" The boy galvanically fell back. "Also," continued Russell, "he knows just who and what you are, and what we've been up to, and how you got the money in that bag."
"Then--even though we beat Bradley--it's all up?" gasped Jerrold.
"You are best qualified to answer his question, Bob."
"You are not going to get away with that money," said Clifford.
Jerrold turned toward Mary Regan, who stood at the window, her back to them.
"Mary--you hear that?" he said huskily. "What are we going to do?"
Mary Regan did not reply, nor did she turn.
"Better tell the boy now, Joe," advised Clifford. "Mr. Jerrold," said Joe Russell, "we all seem to be the victims of circumstances--and of Mr. Clifford. Mr. Clifford is of the opinion that a certain bit of information should be imparted to you. Mr. Jerrold, you, in particular, have been also the victim of a slight deception. Mr. Clifford thinks you should be told that I am not the Southern gentleman that you believed but what Mr. Clifford would call a confidence man, and that my niece is a member of the same industrial family; that I arranged affairs so that you met and fell in love with Mary; that I planned the bank robbery, and used you to commit it, with the full intention that you should get little of the proceeds; that Mary did not love, does not love, never would have loved you, and would have passed you up as soon as our plans were ready for that move. Mr. Clifford, have I been sufficiently explicit?"
Jerrold had flung himself to Mary Regan's side and was clutching her arm.
"Mary," he cried, "that isn't so!"
Mary Regan made no sign.
"Mary, for God's sake--tell me it isn't so!"
She turned. Her face was very white, and was tense with the strain at control.
"It is so," she said.
The boy stared at her with unbelief, then terror, in his eyes. And Mary Regan, with face that grew sickly in its whiteness, had to gaze at this love which she had called into being and had now given a mortal wound. Suddenly, Jerrold, without a word, dropped into a chair and huddled there, face covered, his whole body twitching, his breath coming in a tremulous hiss and going out a low broken moan.
The other three said not a word for over a minute. Then Joe Russell leaned forward and, not unkindly, stretched out a hand and put it on the boy's knee.
"Don't take it so hard, Philip. You would have got experience, and on my word it wasn't our intention to leave you flat."
Jerrold rose shakingly to his feet. Apparently he had not heard Russell, for his eyes were on Mary Regan.
"How could you make me think you loved me, when you didn't," he said, speaking thickly. "I took that money only because of you. If you didn't love me, why did you let me take it? If you didn't love me, why didn't you let me alone? Oh, my God--I've lost what I hoped to have with you-- and I've lost what I already had! "And then as a sudden new realization came--with a gasp--"Oh. ... my mother!"
Mary Regan's face became greenish in its whiteness.
"Better go back, Jerrold, and lie down," advised Clifford.
Without another word the boy turned and staggered out and closed the door. The next moment they heard him fling himself upon the bed, then heard low, muffled moans.
"You might as well go, too, Mary, if Bob doesn't object," said Russell.
Clifford nodded. Mary Regan, her face set, her eyes squarely meeting Clifford's though now they lacked their former hardness, crossed the room, striving to walk steadily. If Clifford had desired to hurt her in that unproved spot, her soul, there was reason to believe that he had succeeded.
As the door closed upon her, Clifford picked up from the writing table a framed photograph at which he had several times glanced. It was of a young man, lean of face, not unhandsome, with a marked droop to the left corner of his mouth. Clifford knew the original well: "Slant-Face" Regan, cleverest of pickpockets, whom he had several times tried to capture, and an equal number of times had failed. That picture had awakened him to a possibility that had never occurred to him before entering this room.
"Are they any relation?" he inquired.
"He's Mary's brother," said Russell.
Clifford slowly put the photograph back. The two men resumed their former chairs and gazed thoughtfully at each other.
"Well?" remarked Russell. "What is it?"
"I don't know yet, Joe," said Clifford.
There was a long silence. Russell leaned back at his ease. It had become second nature with that poiseful gentleman to exert no energy of mind and body upon things he could not control. After a few minutes, he said: "While we're waiting, Bob, what do you say to a game of poker?"
"All right," said Clifford.
VI
The hours passed, and still Clifford, bewildered at himself, continued to put off arrest, though now and again the nervous fear rose in him that Chief Bradley might come back. The others showed no surprise at this delay. What Mary Regan in her scorn had flung at him was to them an entirely sufficient explanation: the longer he held them, the greater the bank's reward.
All of Saturday afternoon, most of Saturday night, and most of Sunday, the two men played poker with matches as stakes--while beside them sat the closed suit-case crammed with uncounted treasury notes. They and the two others and that suit-case of money composed a veritable bomb of sensation, yet the two men hardly spoke except concerning the cards. Russell asked no questions at all about the future; perhaps he was fatalistic, perhaps he had a stoic pride, but he showed no concern.
The two bedrooms of the apartment were given over, without question,. one to Mary Regan, the other to young Jerrold. The latter did not show himself again until the last; but Clifford knew the boy had not a wink of sleep, for always he could hear him tossing about the bed or pacing the floor. Two or three times Mary Regan brought in food, and silently left food in the bedroom of young Jerrold. Not once did she speak; she did not flinch to meet Clifford's glance. Her face was thinner and paler and very strained. Behind that white mask one might guess a bewildered non-understanding of events and of inner forces hitherto unmet or unawakened.
During all that strange week-end, with its quiet of unexploded dynamite--during all the while that the two men played at poker, with each man's winnings of matches waxing alternately to a rich heap and waning to a mere two or three--all the time that he sat wide-eyed in the night--Clifford was thinking, thinking, thinking.
Now he was thinking of this his greatest chance, his greatest coup, which would reestablish him with an even more promising future than before. And again, in a very different mood, he was thinking of that poor beguiled, disillusioned boy in the next room, staring at the walls in still despair. Till this temptation had come upon him, a potentially honest boy,--a hard-working, ambitious boy,-- and, though perhaps in no high way, a potentially useful man in the years to come. And also Clifford thought of that thin, loyal, poignantly honorable mother farther uptown alone in her little flat.
But most of the time Clifford thought of Mary Regan. Yes, all the time, on whatever else a part of his mind might be, he was thinking of Mary Regan. That portrait of her brother "Slant-Face" had, in an instant, opened her history to him. She was the daughter of the once-famous Gentleman Jim Regan, dead these many years, compared to whose cynicism Joe Russell's most sinister mood was pastoral naivete. He reconstructed her history, her experiences, the course of her life. He now could begin to understand her. She had fine qualities; all of the Regans were streaked with fine qualities. But reared in the atmosphere that environed Jim Regan, agreeable and attractive beyond any other man she would meet--reared in this cynicism which had as its creed that no man was honest, and that every man was trying to get the better of every other man, and that all trickery was fair, and that the shrewdest man deserved the highest honor--it was no wonder that the girl should believe and practise as she did--and no wonder, since she was young and of high spirit, that her cynicism should be frankly outspoken, and contemptuously hostile to what she judged hypocrisy.
Yes, he thought he now understood her. And despite her disdain of him, her haughtiness, her magnificent independence, despite her beauty which set her apart, as he began to understand he also began to pity.
VII
At half past seven Monday morning Mary Regan served coffee. Russell drank his as he might have drunk coffee on any other morning. Clifford's cup shook a little as he raised it. The other two did not drink.
Clifford had not yet told them his purpose--chiefly because he had not definitely known it himself. Now, however, after two days of feverish thinking, he might have told them had not the forbidding hostility of Mary Regan stiffened his pride into silence--and also had it not been for the circumstance that at this moment he felt he could command no more than half a dozen words.
When the coffee was finished Clifford stood up. "We'll be going now," he said.
"I don't quite get you, Bob," said Russell. "I thought you were going to hold us here till a reward was offered. No reward can be offered yet."
"We'll be going now," Clifford repeated.
Five minutes later they were leaving the apartment, their week-end over. Russell was as spruce as ever. The youth was pasty and shaking. Mary Regan was pale with a gray pallor, and had purple-ringed eyes. Her face was almost blank of expression, save that for Clifford it had its same hard edge of hostility. He was the one who was going to profit.
Clifford carried Jerrold's suit-case, into which the bank's money had been replaced, and also Jerrold's racket. Once he mopped his face with his handkerchief--an act very unusual for him.
When they came out of the house, Dempsey sighted them and crossed the street.
"Get a taxi, Billy," said Clifford; and when the car was at the curb, he whispered his directions to the chauffeur, motioned his three prisoners into the machine and stepped in after them.
They swept through the curving drives of Central Park, down Fifth Avenue, then down Broadway. As they neared Grand Street, where they knew the car should turn off to the left to reach Police Headquarters, the three tensed expectantly. But when the car continued on down-town, they exchanged glances of surprise. And when, a few blocks further on, the cab passed Franklin Street, down which it should have gone to reach the District Attorney's office, surprise gave way to bewilderment.
"Taking us a round-about way, aren't you, Bob?" queried Russell.
Clifford nodded.
Five minutes later the car came to a halt in lower Broadway before a barred, fortress-like structure. The time was ten minutes to nine.
"The Empire Security Bank!" exclaimed Joe Russell.
Clifford did not heed him. He opened the door of the cab, himself stepped forth, and thrust into one of young Jerrold's hands the tennis racket and into the other the suit-case.
"This is where you get out, Jerrold," he said, trying to speak calmly. "Walk into the bank as though you'd really just returned from a week-end in the country, get that money back into the vault, and get busy on your job."
"Wha--wha--" the staring boy began to stammer.
"Go on with you."
Clifford gave him a gentle push in the direction of the bank. Without looking behind him, half-running, half-staggering, the boy crossed the sidewalk and passed the big uniformed guard at the doorway.
"We'll wait here a few minutes; there's something we want to see," Clifford said to the pair in the cab, and closed the door, and took his stand a few yards away, his back toward them.
When his watch showed quarter past nine, and depositors had begun to enter the bank in number, Clifford opened the door of the cab.
"Will you please come with me," he said, and led the way into the bank, and to the thin line before the receiving teller's cage. This queue they joined, and in the slow, short lock-step of the bank line they moved forward until Clifford was at the little barred window.
"A pocket check-book, please," said Clifford.
Jerrold glanced up from beneath his green celluloid eye-shade, went suddenly flour-white--then he gave Clifford a lightning swift glance of gratitude, dropped his face, and with a mechanical motion laid a check-book upon the marble ledge of his window. Clifford pocketed the book and led the way out.
"I guess it's straightened itself out all right," he remarked when they were again upon the sidewalk." The boy seems to be safe enough."
"Back where he started from," murmured Russell. Then--" What are you going to do with me, Bob?"
I haven't got anything on you, Joe," said Clifford.
"Bob--Bob--" Perhaps before this September morning no one had ever heard a tremor in Joseph Russell's voice. He let a second pass. "Bob--I--I--say, I've got your address, and I'll look you up, and if you don't want me now, I'll just say so-long."
"So-long, Joe."
Rather abruptly Joe Russell turned and went up Broadway. Clifford was left alone with Mary Regan.
"Better get into your taxi," he said briefly, and helped her in, and started to walk away.
"Mr. Clifford!"
He turned back. The so-dark eyes were staringly wide, and all her features were twitching.
"Mr. Clifford"--and in a bewildered, almost unbelieving voice she counted off the things of which two days before she had scathingly accused him--" Mr. Clifford, you did this, when by doing the other, you could have had money--and great fame--and been reinstated in the Department!"
"You see," explained Clifford, trying to keep his tone steady, "I did it this way because I got to thinking about that boy, and what it would mean to him--and because I got to thinking about his mother."
Then Clifford did something which till that instant he had not even thought of doing. He leaned nearer and said: "The chief reason I did it, Miss Regan, was because I got to thinking about you."
Their eyes held. For a moment it seemed to him that her proud nature, her premature cynicism, were on the verge of breaking. An unbidden happiness reeled poignantly up within him, he thrilled with formless expectation. But the next instant she had stiffened. She had caught pride and control as they were slipping; she had rescued her old self.
She smiled at him mockingly. "Mr. Clifford"--and her voice was colored with the mockery of her smile--" I never believed there was such a man in all the world!"
She gave him a quick ironic nod, and spoke to the chauffeur. Clifford, alone before the bank, dizzy with swift revulsion, stared after that strange creature in the disappearing car.