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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The White Moll, by Frank L. Packard
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The White Moll
+
+Author: Frank L. Packard
+
+Posting Date: November 23, 2008 [EBook #1741]
+Release Date: May, 1999
+Last Updated: March 13, 2018
+
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WHITE MOLL ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Polly Stratton
+
+
+
+
+
+THE WHITE MOLL
+
+By Frank Packard
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+   CHAPTER
+
+     I.       NIGHT IN THE UNDERWORLD
+
+     II.      SEVEN-THREE-NINE
+
+     III.     ALIAS GYPSY NAN
+
+     IV.      THE ADVENTURER
+
+     V.       A SECOND VISITOR
+
+     VI.      THE RENDEZVOUS
+
+     VII.     FELLOW THIEVES
+
+     VIII.    THE CODE MESSAGE
+
+     IX.      ROOM NUMBER ELEVEN
+
+     X.       ON THE BRINK
+
+     XI.      SOME OF THE LESSER BREED
+
+     XII.     CROOKS vs.  CROOKS
+
+     XIII.    THE DOOR ACROSS THE HALL
+
+     XIV.     THE LAME MAN
+
+     XV.      IN THE COUNCIL CHAMBER
+
+     XVI.     THE SECRET PANEL
+
+     XVII.    THE SILVER SPHINX
+
+     XVIII.   THE OLD SHED
+
+     XIX.     BREAD UPON THE WATERS
+
+     XX.      A LONE HAND
+
+     XXI.     THE RECKONING
+
+
+
+
+I. NIGHT IN THE UNDERWORLD
+
+It was like some shadowy pantomime: The dark mouth of an alleyway thrown
+into murky relief by the rays of a distant street lamp...the swift,
+forward leap of a skulking figure...a girl's form swaying and struggling
+in the man's embrace. Then, a pantomime no longer, there came a half
+threatening, half triumphant oath; and then the girl's voice, quiet,
+strangely contained, almost imperious:
+
+“Now, give me back that purse, please. Instantly!” The man, already
+retreating into the alleyway, paused to fling back a jeering laugh.
+
+“Say, youse've got yer nerve, ain't youse!”
+
+The girl turned her head so that the rays of the street lamp, faint as
+they were, fell full upon her, disclosing a sweet, oval face, out of
+which the dark eyes gazed steadily at the man.
+
+And suddenly the man leaned forward, staring for an instant, and then
+his hand went awkwardly to touch his cap.
+
+“De White Moll!” he mumbled deferentially. He pulled the peak of his
+cap down over his eyes in a sort of shame-faced way, as though to avoid
+recognition, and, stepping nearer, returned the purse.
+
+“'Scuse me, miss,” he said uneasily. “I didn't know it was youse--honest
+to Gawd, I didn't! 'Scuse me, miss. Good-night!”
+
+For a moment the girl stood there motionless, looking down the alleyway
+after the retreating figure. From somewhere in the distance came the
+rumble of an elevated train. It drowned out the pound of the man's
+speeding footsteps; it died away itself--and now there was no other
+sound. A pucker, strangely wistful, curiously perturbed, came and
+furrowed her forehead into little wrinkles, and then she turned and
+walked slowly on along the deserted street.
+
+The White Moll! She shook her head a little. The attack had not unnerved
+her. Why should it? It was simply that the man had not recognized her
+at first in the darkness. The White Moll here at night in one of the
+loneliest, as well as one of the most vicious and abandoned, quarters
+of New York, was as safe and inviolate as--as--She shook her head again.
+Her mind did not instantly suggest a comparison that seemed wholly
+adequate. The pucker deepened, but the sensitive, delicately chiseled
+lips parted now in a smile. Well, she was safer here than anywhere else
+in the world, that was all.
+
+It was the first time that anything like this had happened, and, for the
+very reason that it was unprecedented, it seemed to stir her memory now,
+and awaken a dormant train of thought. The White Moll! She remembered
+the first time she had ever been called by that name. It took her back
+almost three years, and since that time, here in this sordid realm
+of crime and misery, the name of Rhoda Gray, her own name, her actual
+identity, seemed to have become lost, obliterated in that of the
+White Moll. A “dip” had given it to her, and the underworld, quick and
+trenchant in its “monikers,” had instantly ratified it. There was not
+a crook or denizen of crimeland, probably, who did not know the White
+Moll; there was, probably, not one to-day who knew, or cared, that she
+was Rhoda Gray!
+
+She went on, traversing block after block, entering a less deserted,
+though no less unsavory, neighborhood. Here, a saloon flung a sudden
+glow of yellow light athwart the sidewalk as its swinging doors jerked
+apart; and a form lurched out into the night; there, from a dance-hall
+came the rattle of a tinny piano, the squeak of a raspy violin, a
+high-pitched, hectic burst of laughter; while, flanking the street
+on each side, like interjected inanimate blotches, rows of squalid
+tenements and cheap, tumble-down frame houses silhouetted themselves in
+broken, jagged points against the sky-line. And now and then a man spoke
+to her--his untrained fingers fumbling in clumsy homage at the brim of
+his hat.
+
+How strange a thing memory was! How strange, too, the coincidences that
+sometimes roused it into activity! It was a man, a thief, just like the
+man to-night, who had first brought her here into this shadowland of
+crime. That was just before her father had died. Her father had been
+a mining engineer, and, though an American, had been for many years
+resident in South America as the representative of a large English
+concern. He had been in ill health for a year down there, when, acting
+on his physician's advice, he had come to New York for consultation, and
+she had accompanied him. They had taken a little flat, the engineer had
+placed himself in the hands of a famous specialist, and an operation had
+been decided upon. And then, a few days prior to the date set for the
+operation and before her father, who was still able to be about, had
+entered the hospital, the flat had been broken into during the early
+morning hours. The thief, obviously not counting on the engineer's
+wakefulness, had been caught red-handed. At first defiant, the man had
+finally broken down, and had told a miserable story. It was hackneyed
+possibly, the same story told by a thousand others as a last defense in
+the hope of inducing leniency through an appeal to pity, but somehow to
+her that night the story had rung true. Pete McGee, alias the Bussard,
+the man had said his name was. He couldn't get any work; there was the
+shadow of a long abode in Sing Sing that lay upon him as a curse--a job
+here to-day, his record discovered to-morrow, and the next day out on
+the street again. It was very old, very threadbare, that story; there
+were even the sick wife, the hungry, unclothed children; but to her it
+had rung true. Her father had not placed the slightest faith in it,
+and but for her intervention the Bussard would have been incontinently
+consigned to the mercies of the police.
+
+Her face softened suddenly now as she walked along. She remembered well
+that scene, when, at the end, she had written down the address the man
+had given her.
+
+“Father is going to let you go, McGee, because I ask him to,” she had
+said. “And to-morrow morning I will go to this address, and if I find
+your story is true, as I believe it is, I will see what I can do for
+you.”
+
+“It's true, miss, so help me God!” the man had answered brokenly. “Youse
+come an' see. I'll be dere-an'-an'-God bless youse, miss!”
+
+And so they had let the man go free, and her father, with a whimsical,
+tolerant smile, had shaken his head at her. “You'll never find that
+address, Rhoda-or our friend the Bussard, either!”
+
+But she had found both the Bussard and the address, and destitution
+and a squalor unspeakable. Pathetic still, but the vernacular of the
+underworld where men called their women by no more gracious names than
+“molls” and “skirts” no longer strange to her ears, there came to her
+again now the Bussard's words in which he had paid her tribute on that
+morning long ago, and with which he had introduced her to a shrunken
+form that lay upon a dirty cot in the barefloored room:
+
+“Meet de moll I was tellin' youse about, Mag. She's white--all de way
+up. She's white, Mag; she's a white moll--take it from me.”
+
+The White Moll!
+
+The firm little chin came suddenly upward; but into the dark eyes
+unbidden came a sudden film and mist. Her father's health had been too
+far undermined, and he had been unable to withstand the shock of the
+operation, and he had died in the hospital. There weren't any relatives,
+except distant ones on her mother's side, somewhere out in California,
+whom she had never seen. She and her father had been all in all to each
+other, chums, pals, comrades, since her mother's death many years ago.
+She had gone everywhere with him save when the demands of her education
+had necessarily kept them apart; she had hunted with him in South
+America, ridden with him in sections where civilization was still in the
+making, shared the crude, rough life of mining camps with him--and it
+had seemed as though her life, too, had gone out with his.
+
+She brushed her hand hastily across her eyes. There hadn't been any
+friends either, apart from a few of her father's casual business
+acquaintances; no one else--except the Bussard. It was very strange! Her
+reward for that one friendly act had come in a manner little expected,
+and it had come very quickly. She had sought and found a genuine relief
+from her own sorrow in doing what she could to alleviate the misery in
+that squalid, one-room home. And then the sphere of her activities had
+broadened, slowly at first, not through any preconceived intention
+on her part, but naturally, and as almost an inevitable corollary
+consequent upon her relations with the Bussard and his ill-fortuned
+family.
+
+The Bussard's circle of intimates was amongst those who lay outside the
+law, those who gambled for their livelihood by staking their wits, to
+win against the toils of the police; and so, more and more, she had come
+into close and intimate contact with the criminal element of New York,
+until to-day, throughout its length and breadth, she was known, and,
+she had reason to believe, was loved and trusted by every crook in the
+underworld. It was a strange eulogy, self-pronounced! But it was none
+the less true. Then, she had been Rhoda Gray; now, even the Bussard,
+doubtless, had forgotten her name in the one with which he himself, at
+that queer baptismal font of crimeland, had christened her--the White
+Moll. It even went further than that. It embraced what might be called
+the entourage of the underworld, the police and the social workers with
+whom she inevitably came in contact. These, too, had long known her
+as the White Moll, and had come, since she had volunteered no further
+information, tacitly to accept her as such, and nothing more.
+
+Again she shook her head. It wasn't altogether a normal life. She was
+only a woman, with all the aspirations of a woman, with all the yearning
+of youth for its measure of gayety and pleasure. True, she had not made
+a recluse of herself outside her work; but, equally, on the other hand,
+she had not made any intimate friends in her own station in life. She
+had never purposed continuing indefinitely the work she was doing, nor
+did she now; but, little by little, it had forced its claims upon
+her until those claims were not easy to ignore. Even though the
+circumstances in which her father had left her were barely more than
+sufficient for a modest little flat uptown, there was still always a
+little surplus, and that surplus counted in certain quarters for very
+much indeed. But it wasn't only that. The small amount of money that she
+was able to spend in that way had little to do with it. The bonds which
+linked her to the sordid surroundings that she had come to know so well
+were stronger far than that. There wasn't any money involved in this
+visit, for instance, that she was going now to make to Gypsy Nan. Gypsy
+Nan was...
+
+Rhoda Gray had halted before the doorway of a small, hovel-like,
+two-story building that was jammed in between two tenements, which,
+relatively, in their own class, were even more disreputable than was the
+little frame house itself. A secondhand-clothes store occupied a portion
+of the ground floor, and housed the proprietor and his family as well,
+permitting the rooms on the second floor to be “rented out”; the garret
+above was the abode of Gypsy Nan.
+
+There was a separate entrance, apart from that into the
+secondhand-clothes store, and she pushed this door open and stepped
+forward into an absolutely black and musty-smelling hallway. By feeling
+with her hands along the wall she reached the stairs and began to make
+her way upward. She had found Gypsy Nan last night huddled in the lower
+doorway, and apparently in a condition that was very much the worse
+for wear. She had stopped and helped the woman upstairs to her garret,
+whereupon Gypsy Nan, in language far more fervent than elegant, had
+ordered her to begone, and had slammed the door in her face.
+
+Rhoda Gray smiled a little wearily, as, on the second floor now, she
+groped her way to the rear, and began to mount a short, ladder-like
+flight of steps to the attic. Gypsy Nan's lack of cordiality did not
+absolve her, Rhoda Gray, from coming back to-night to see how the woman
+was--to crowd one more visit on her already over-expanded list. She had
+never had any personal knowledge of Gypsy Nan before, but, in a sense,
+the woman was no stranger to her. Gypsy Nan was a character known
+far and wide in the under-world as one possessing an insatiable and
+unquenchable thirst. As to who she was, or what she was, or where she
+got her money for the gin she bought, it was not in the ethics of
+the Bad Lands to inquire. She was just Gypsy Nan. So that she did not
+obtrude herself too obviously upon their notice, the police suffered
+her; so that she gave the underworld no reason for complaint, the
+underworld accepted her at face value as one of its own!
+
+There was no hallway here at the head of the ladder-like stairs, just a
+sort of narrow platform in front of the attic door. Rhoda Gray, groping
+out with her hands again, felt for the door, and knocked softly upon it.
+There was no answer. She knocked again. Still receiving no reply, she
+tried the door, found it unlocked, and, opening it, stood for an instant
+on the threshold. A lamp, almost empty, ill-trimmed and smoking badly,
+stood on a chair beside a cheap iron bed; it threw a dull, yellow glow
+about its immediate vicinity, and threw the remainder of the garret into
+deep, impenetrable shadows; but also it disclosed the motionless form of
+a woman on the bed.
+
+Rhoda Gray's eyes darkened, as she closed the door behind her, and
+stepped quickly forward to the bedside. For a moment she stood looking
+down at the recumbent figure; at the matted tangle of gray-streaked
+brown hair that straggled across a pillow which was none too clean; at
+the heavy-lensed, old-fashioned, steel-bowed spectacles, awry now, that
+were still grotesquely perched on the woman's nose; at the sallow face,
+streaked with grime and dirt, as though it had not been washed for
+months; at a hand, as ill-cared for, which lay exposed on the torn
+blanket that did duty for a counterpane; at the dirty shawl that
+enveloped the woman's shoulders, and which was tightly fastened around
+Gypsy Nan's neck-and from the woman her eyes shifted to an empty bottle
+on the floor that protruded from under the bed.
+
+“Nan!” she called sharply; and, stooping over, shook the woman's
+shoulder. “Nan!” she repeated. There was something about the woman's
+breathing that she did not like, something in the queer, pinched
+condition of the other's face that suddenly frightened her. “Nan!” she
+called again.
+
+Gypsy Nan opened her eyes, stared for a moment dully, then, in a
+curiously quick, desperate way, jerked herself up on her elbow.
+
+“Youse get t'hell outer here!” she croaked. “Get out!”
+
+“I am going to,” said Rhoda Gray evenly. “And I'm going at once.” She
+turned abruptly and walked toward the door. “I'm going to get a doctor.
+You've gone too far this time, Nan, and--”
+
+“No, youse don't!” Gypsy Nan's voice rose in a sudden scream. She sat
+bolt upright in bed, and pulled a revolver out from under the coverings.
+“Youse don't bring no doctor here! See! Youse put a finger on dat door,
+an' it won't be de door yousel'l go out by!”
+
+Rhoda Gray did not move.
+
+“Nan, put that revolver down!” she ordered quietly. “You don't know what
+you are doing.”
+
+“Don't!” leered Gypsy Nan. The revolver held, swaying a little
+unsteadily, on Rhoda Gray. There was silence for a moment; then Gypsy
+Nan spoke again, evidently through dry lips, for she wet them again and
+again with her tongue: “Say, youse are de White Moll, ain't youse?”
+
+“Yes,” said Rhoda Gray.
+
+Gypsy Nan appeared to ponder this for an instant.
+
+“Well den, come back here an' sit down on de foot of de bed,” she
+commanded finally.
+
+Rhoda Gray obeyed without hesitation. There was nothing to do but humor
+the woman in her present state, a state that seemed one bordering on
+delirium and complete collapse.
+
+“Nan,” she said, “you--”
+
+“De White Moll!” mumbled Gypsy Nan. “I wonder if de dope dey hands out
+about youse is all on de level? My Gawd, I wonder if wot dey says is
+true?”
+
+“What do they say?” asked Rhoda Gray gently.
+
+Gypsy Nan lay back on her pillow as though her strength, over-taxed, had
+failed her; her hand, though it still clutched the revolver, seemed to
+have been dragged down by the weapon's weight, and now rested upon the
+blanket.
+
+“Dey say,” said Gypsy Nan slowly, “dat youse knows more on de inside
+here dan anybody else--t'ings youse got from de spacers' molls, an' from
+de dips demselves when youse was lendin' dem a hand; dey say dere ain't
+many youse couldn't send up de river just by liftin' yer finger, but dat
+youse're straight, an' dat youse've kept yer map closed, an' dat youse'
+re safe.”
+
+Rhoda Gray's dark eyes softened, as she leaned forward and laid a hand
+gently over the one of Gypsy Nan that held the revolver.
+
+“It couldn't be any other way, could it, Nan?” she said simply.
+
+“Wot yer after?” demanded Gypsy Nan, with sudden mockery. “De gun? Well,
+take it!” She let go her hold of the weapon. “But don't kid yerself dat
+youse're kiddin' me into givin' it to youse because youse have got a
+pretty smile an' a sweet voice! Savvy? I”--she choked suddenly, and
+caught at her throat--“I guess youse're de only chance I got-dat's all.”
+
+“That's better,” said Rhoda Gray encouragingly. “And now you'll let me
+go and get a doctor, won't you, Nan?”
+
+“Wait!” said Gypsy Nan hoarsely. “Youse're de only chance I got. Will
+youse swear youse won't t'row me down if I tells youse somet'ing? I
+ain't got no other way. Will youse swear youse'll see me through?”
+
+“Of course, Nan,” said Rhoda Gray soothingly. “Of course, I will, Nan. I
+promise.”
+
+Gypsy Nan came up on her elbow.
+
+“Dat ain't good enough!” she cried out. “A promise ain't good enough!
+For Gawd's sake, come across all de way! Swear youse'll keep mum an' see
+me through!”
+
+“Yes, Nan”--Rhoda Gray's eyes smiled reassurance--“I swear it. But you
+will be all right again in the morning.”
+
+“Will I? You think so, do you? Well, I can only say that I wish I did!”
+
+Rhoda Gray leaned sharply forward, staring in amazement at the figure
+on the bed. The woman's voice was the same, it was still hoarse, still
+heavy, and the words came with painful effort; but the English was
+suddenly perfect now.
+
+“Nan, what is it? I don't understand!” she said tensely. “What do you
+mean?”
+
+“You think you know what's the matter with me.” There was a curious
+mockery in the weak voice. “You think I've drunk myself into this state.
+You think I'm on the verge of the D.T.'s now. That empty bottle under
+the bed proves it, doesn't it? And anybody around here will tell you
+that Gypsy Nan has thrown enough empties out of the window there to
+stock a bottle factory for years, some of them on the flat roof just
+outside the window, some of them on the roof of the shed below, and some
+of them down into the yard, just depending on how drunk she was and how
+far she could throw. And that proves it, too, doesn't it? Well, maybe
+it does, that's what I did it for; but I never touched the stuff, not a
+drop of it, from the day I came here. I didn't dare touch it. I had to
+keep my wits. Last night you thought I was drunk when you found me in
+the doorway downstairs. I wasn't. I was too sick and weak to get up
+here. I almost told you then, only I was afraid, and--and I thought that
+perhaps I'd be all right to-day.”
+
+“Oh, I didn't know!” Rhoda Gray was on her knees beside the bed. There
+was no room to question the truth of the woman's words, it was in Gypsy
+Nan's eyes, in the struggling, labored voice.
+
+“Yes.” Gypsy Nan clutched at the shawl around her neck, and shivered.
+“I thought I might be all right to-day, and that I'd get better. But I
+didn't. And now I've got about a chance in a hundred. I know. It's my
+heart.”
+
+“You mean you've been alone here, sick, since last night?” There was
+anxiety, perplexity, in Rhoda Gray's face. “Why didn't you call some
+one? Why did you even hold me back a few minutes ago, when you admit
+yourself that you need immediate medical assistance so badly?”
+
+“Because,” said Gypsy Nan, “if I've got a chance at all, I'd finish it
+for keeps if a doctor came here. I--I'd rather go out this way than
+in that horrible thing they call the 'chair.' Oh, my God, don't you
+understand that! I've seen pictures of it! It's a horrible thing--a
+horrible thing--horrible!”
+
+“Nan”--Rhoda Gray steadied her voice--“you re delirious. You do not know
+what you are saying. There isn't any horrible thing to frighten you.
+Now you just lie quietly here. I'll only be a few minutes, and--” She
+stopped abruptly as her wrists were suddenly imprisoned in a frantic
+grip.
+
+“You swore it!” Gypsy Nan was whispering feverishly. “You swore it! They
+say the White Moll never snitched. That's the one chance I've got, and
+I'm going to take it. I'm not delirious--not yet. I wish to God it was
+nothing more than that! Look!”
+
+With a low, startled cry, Rhoda Gray was on her feet. Gypsy Nan was
+gone. A sweep of the woman's hand, and the spectacles were off, the
+gray-streaked hair a tangled wig upon the pillow--and Rhoda Gray found
+herself staring in a numbed sort of way at a dark-haired woman who could
+not have been more than thirty, but whose face, with its streaks of
+grime and dirt, looked grotesquely and incongruously old.
+
+
+
+
+II. SEVEN--THREE--NINE
+
+For a moment neither spoke, then Gypsy Nan broke the silence with a
+bitter laugh. She threw back the bedclothes, and, gripping at the edge
+of the bed, sat up.
+
+“The White Moll!” The words rattled in her throat. A fleck of blood
+showed on her lips. “Well, you know now! You're going to help me, aren't
+you? I--I've got to get out of here--get to a hospital.”
+
+Rhoda Gray laid her hands firmly on the other's shoulders.
+
+“Get back into bed,” she said steadily. “Do you want to make yourself
+worse? You'll kill yourself!”
+
+Gypsy Nan pushed her away.
+
+“Don't make me use up what little strength I've got left in talking,”
+ she cried out piteously, and suddenly wrung her hands together. “I'm
+wanted by the police. If I'm caught, it's--it's that 'chair.' I couldn't
+have a doctor brought here, could I? How long would it be before he saw
+that Gypsy Nan was a fake? I can't let you go and have an ambulance,
+say, come and get me, can I, even with the disguise hidden away? They'd
+say this is where Gypsy Nan lives. There's something queer here. Where
+is Gypsy Nan? I've got to get away from here--away from Gypsy Nan--don't
+you understand? It's death one way; maybe it is the other, maybe it'll
+finish me to get out of here, but it's the only thing left to do. I
+thought some one, some one that I could trust, never mind who, would
+have come to-day, but-but no one came, and--and maybe now it s too late,
+but there's just the one chance, and I've got to take it.” Gypsy Nan
+tore at the shawl around her throat as though it choked her, and
+flung it from her shoulders. Her eyes were gleaming with an unhealthy,
+feverish light. “Don't you see? We get out on the street. I collapse
+there. You find me. I tell you my name is Charlotte Green. That's all
+you know. There isn't much chance that anybody at the hospital
+would recognize me. I've got money. I take a private room. Don't you
+understand?”
+
+Rhoda Gray's face had gone a little white. There was no doubt about the
+woman's serious condition, and yet--and yet--She stood there hesitant.
+There must be some other way! It was not likely even that the woman had
+strength enough to walk down the stairs to begin with. Strange things
+had come to her in this world of shadow, but none before like this. If
+the law got the woman it would cost the woman her life; if the woman did
+not receive immediate and adequate medical assistance it would cost the
+woman her life. Over and over in her brain, like a jangling refrain,
+that thought repeated itself. It was not like her to stand hesitant
+before any emergency, no matter what that emergency might be. She had
+never done it before, but now...
+
+“For God's sake,” Gypsy Nan implored, “don't stand there looking at me!
+Can't you understand? If I'm caught, I go out. Do you think I'd have
+lived in this filthy hole if there had been any other way to save my
+life? Are you going to let me die here like a dog? Get me my clothes;
+oh, for God's sake, get them, and give me the one chance that's left!”
+
+A queer little smile came to Rhoda Gray's lips, and her shoulders
+straightened back.
+
+“Where are your clothes?” she asked.
+
+“God bless you!” The tears were suddenly streaming down the grimy face.
+“God bless the White Moll! It's true! It's true--all they said about
+her!” The woman had lost control of herself.
+
+“Nan, keep your nerve!” ordered Rhoda Gray almost brutally. It was the
+White Moll in another light now, cool, calm, collected, efficient. Her
+eyes swept Gypsy Nan. The woman, who had obviously flung herself down
+on the bed fully dressed the night before, was garbed in coarse, heavy
+boots, the cheapest of stockings which were also sadly in need of
+repair, a tattered and crumpled skirt of some rough material, and,
+previously hidden by the shawl, a soiled, greasy and spotted black
+blouse. Rhoda Gray's forehead puckered into a frown. “What about your
+hands and face-they go with the clothes, don't they?”
+
+“It'll wash off,” whispered Gypsy Nan. “It's just some stuff I keep in a
+box-over there--the ceiling-” Her voice trailed off weakly, then with
+a desperate effort strengthened again. “The door! I forgot the door!
+It isn't locked! Lock the door first! Lock the door! Then you take the
+candle over there on the washstand, and--and I'll show you. You--you get
+the things while I'm undressing. I--I can help myself that much.”
+
+Rhoda Gray crossed quickly to the door, turned the key in the lock, and
+retraced her steps to the washstand that stood in the shadows against
+the wall on the opposite side from the bed, and near the far end of the
+garret. Here she found the short stub of a candle that was stuck in
+the mouth of a gin bottle, and matches lying beside it. She lighted the
+candle, and turned inquiringly to Gypsy Nan.
+
+The woman pointed to the end of the garret where the roof sloped sharply
+down until, at the wall itself, it was scarcely four feet above the
+floor.
+
+“Go down there. Right to the wall--in the center,” instructed Gypsy Nan
+weakly. And then, as Rhoda Gray obeyed: “Now push up on that wide board
+in the ceiling.”
+
+Rhoda Gray, already in a stooped position, reached up, and pushed at
+a rough, unplaned board. It swung back without a sound, like a narrow
+trap-door, until it rested in an upright position against the outer
+frame of the house, disclosing an aperture through which, by standing
+erect, Rhoda Gray easily thrust her head and shoulders.
+
+She raised the candle then through the opening--and suddenly her dark
+eyes widened in amazement. It was a hiding place, not only ingenious,
+but exceedingly generous in expanse. As far as one could reach the
+ceiling metamorphosed itself into a most convenient shelf. And it had
+been well utilized! It held a most astounding collection of
+things. There was a cashbox, but the cashbox was apparently wholly
+inadequate--there must have been thousands of dollars in those piles of
+banknotes that were stacked beside it! There was a large tin box, the
+cover off, containing some black, pastelike substance--the “stuff,”
+ presumably, that Gypsy Nan used on her face and hands. There was a
+bunch of curiously formed keys, several boxes of revolver cartridges,
+an electric flashlight, and a great quantity of the choicest brands
+of tinned and bottled fruits and provisions--and a little to one side,
+evidently kept ready for instant use, a suit of excellent material,
+underclothing, silk stockings shoes and hat were neatly piled together.
+
+Rhoda Gray took the clothing, and went back to the bedside. Gypsy Nan
+had made little progress in disrobing. It seemed about all the woman
+could do to cling to the edge of the cot and sit upright.
+
+“What does all this mean, Nan,” she asked tensely; “all those things up
+there--that money?”
+
+Gypsy Nan forced a twisted smile.
+
+“It means I know how bad I am, or I wouldn't have let you see what you
+have,” she answered heavily. “It means that there isn't any other way.
+Hurry! Get these things off! Get me dressed!”
+
+But it took a long time. Gypsy Nan seemed with every moment to grow
+weaker. The lamp on the chair went out for want of oil. There was only
+the guttering candle in the gin bottle to give light. It threw weird,
+flickering shadows around the garret; it seemed to enhance the already
+deathlike pallor of the woman, as, using the pitcher of water and the
+basin from the washstand now, Rhoda Gray removed the grime from Gypsy
+Nan's face and hands.
+
+It was done at last--and where there had once been Gypsy Nan, haglike
+and repulsive, there was now a stylishly, even elegantly, dressed woman
+of well under middle age. The transformation seemed to have acted as
+a stimulant upon Gypsy Nan. She laughed with nervous hilarity she even
+tried valiantly to put on a pair of new black kid gloves, but, failing
+in this, pushed them unsteadily into the pocket of her coat.
+
+“I'm--I'm all right,” she asserted fiercely, as Rhoda Gray, pausing in
+the act of gathering up the discarded garments, regarded her anxiously.
+“Bring me a package of that money after you've put those things
+away--yes, and you'll find a flashlight there. We'll need it going down
+the stairs.”
+
+Rhoda Gray made no answer. There was no hesitation now in her actions,
+as, to the pile of clothing in her arms, she added the revolver that lay
+on the blanket, and, returning to the little trap-door in the ceiling,
+hid them away; but her brain was whirling again in a turmoil of doubt.
+This was madness, utter, stark, blind madness, this thing that she was
+doing! It was suicide, literally that, nothing less than suicide for
+one in Gypsy Nan's condition to attempt this thing. But the woman would
+certainly die here, too, with out medical assistance--only there was the
+police! Rhoda Gray's face, as she stood upright in the little aperture
+again, throwing the wavering candle-rays around her, seemed suddenly
+to have grown pinched and wan. The police! The police! It was her
+conscience, then, that was gnawing at her--because of the police!
+Was that it? Well, there was also, then, another side. Could she turn
+informer, traitor, become a female Judas to a dying woman, who had
+sobbed and thanked her Maker because she had found some one whom she
+believed she could trust? That was a hideous and an abominable thing to
+do! “You swore it! You swore you'd see me through!”--the words came
+and rang insistently in her ears. The sweet, piquant little face set in
+hard, determined lines. Mechanically she picked up the flashlight and a
+package of the banknotes, lowered the board in the ceiling into place,
+and returned to Gypsy Nan.
+
+“I'm ready, if there is no other way,” she said soberly, as she watched
+the other tuck the money away inside her waist. “I said I would see you
+through, and I will. But I doubt if you are strong enough, even with
+what help I can give you, to get down the stairs, and even if you can, I
+am afraid with all my soul of the consequences to you, and--”
+
+Gypsy Nan blew out the candle, and staggered to her feet.
+
+“There isn't any other way.” She leaned heavily on Rhoda Gray's arm.
+“Can't you see that? Don't you think I know? Haven't you seen enough
+here to convince you of that? I--I'm just spilling the dice for--for
+perhaps the last time--but it's the only chance--the only chance. Go
+on!” she urged tremulously. “Shoot the glim, and get me to the door.
+And--and for the love of God, don't make a sound! It's all up if we're
+seen going out!”
+
+The flashlight's ray danced in crazy gyrations as the two figures swayed
+and crept across the garret. Rhoda Gray unlocked the door, and, as they
+passed out, locked it again on the outside.
+
+“Hide the key!” whispered Gypsy Nan. “See--that crack in the floor under
+the partition! Slip it in there!”
+
+The flashlight guiding her, Rhoda Gray stooped down to where, between
+the rough attic flooring and the equally rough boarding of the garret
+partition, there was a narrow space. She pushed the key in out of sight;
+and then, with her arm around Gypsy Nan's waist, and with the flashlight
+at cautious intervals winking ahead of her through the darkness, she
+began to descend the stairs.
+
+It was slow work, desperately slow, both because they dared not make
+the slightest noise, and because, too, as far as strength was concerned,
+Gypsy Nan was close to the end of her endurance. Down one flight, and
+then the other, they went, resting at every few steps, leaning back
+against the wall, black shadows that merged with the blackness around
+them, the flashlight used only when necessity compelled it, lest its
+gleam might attract the attention of some other occupant of the house.
+And at times Gypsy Nan's head lay cheek to Rhoda Gray's, and the other's
+body grew limp and became a great weight, so heavy that it seemed she
+could no longer support it.
+
+They gained the street door, hung there tensely for a moment to make
+sure they were not observed by any chance passer-by, then stepped out on
+the sidewalk. Gypsy Nan spoke then:
+
+“I--I can't go much farther,” she faltered. “But--but it doesn't matter
+now we're out of the house--it doesn't matter where you find me--only
+let's try a few steps more.”
+
+Rhoda Gray had slipped the flashlight inside her blouse.
+
+“Yes,” she said. Her breath was coming heavily. “It's all right, Nan. I
+understand.”
+
+They walked on a little way up the block, and then Gypsy Nan's grasp
+suddenly tightened on Rhoda Gray's arm.
+
+“Play the game!” Gypsy Nan's voice was scarcely audible. “You'll play
+the game, won't you? You'll--you'll see me through. That's a good
+name--as good as any--Charlotte Green--that's all you know--but--but
+don't leave me alone with them--you--you'll come to the hospital with
+me, won't you--I--”
+
+Gypsy Nan had collapsed in a heap on the sidewalk.
+
+Rhoda Gray glanced swiftly around her. In the squalid tenement before
+which she stood there would be no help of the kind that was needed.
+There would be no telephone in there by means of which she could summon
+an ambulance. And then her glance rested on a figure far up the block
+under a street lamp--a policeman. She bent hurriedly over the prostrate
+woman, whispered a word of encouragement, and ran in the officer's
+direction.
+
+As she drew closer to the policeman, she called out to him. He turned
+and came running toward, and, as he reached her, after a sharp glance
+into her face, touched his helmet respectfully.
+
+“What's wrong with the White Moll to-night?” he asked pleasantly.
+
+“There's--there's a woman down there”--Rhoda Gray was breathless from
+her run--“on the sidewalk. She needs help at once.”
+
+“Drunk?” inquired the officer laconically.
+
+“No, I'm sure it's anything but that,” Rhoda Gray answered quickly.
+“She appears to be very sick. I think you had better summon an ambulance
+without delay.”
+
+“All right!” agreed the officer. “There's a patrol box down there in
+the direction you came from. We'll have a look at her on the way.” He
+started briskly forward with Rhoda Gray beside him. “Who is she d'ye
+know?” he asked.
+
+“She said her name was Charlotte Green,” Rhoda Gray replied. “That's all
+she could, or would, say about herself.”
+
+“Then she ain't a regular around here, or I guess you'd know her!”
+ grunted the policeman.
+
+Rhoda Gray made no answer.
+
+They reached Gypsy Nan. The officer bent over her, then picked her up
+and carried her to the tenement doorway.
+
+“I guess you're right, all right! She's bad! I'll send in a call,” he
+said, and started on the run down the street.
+
+Gypsy Nan had lost consciousness. Rhoda Gray settled herself on the
+doorstep, supporting the woman's head in her lap. Her face had set
+again in grim, hard, perplexed lines. There seemed something unnatural,
+something menacingly weird, something even uncanny about it all. Perhaps
+it was because it seemed as though she could so surely foresee the end.
+Gypsy Nan would not live through the night. Something told her that. The
+woman's masquerade, for whatever purpose it had been assumed, was over.
+“You'll play the game, won't you? You'll see me through?” There seemed
+something pitifully futile in those words now!
+
+The officer returned.
+
+“It's all right,” he said. “How's she seem?”
+
+Rhoda Gray shook her head.
+
+A passer-by stopped, asked what was the matter--and lingered curiously.
+Another, and another, did the same. A little crowd collected. The
+officer kept them back. Came then the strident clang of a gong and
+the rapid beat of horses' hoofs. A white-coated figure jumped from
+the ambulance, pushed his way forward, and bent over the form in Rhoda
+Gray's lap. A moment more, and they were carrying Gypsy Nan to the
+ambulance.
+
+Rhoda Gray spoke to the officer:
+
+“I think perhaps I had better go with her.”
+
+“Sure!” said the officer.
+
+She caught snatches of the officer's words, as he made a report to the
+doctor:
+
+“Found her here in the street...Charlotte Green...nothing else...the
+White Moll, straight as God makes 'em...she'll see the woman through.”
+ He turned to Rhoda Gray. “You can get in there with them, miss.”
+
+It took possibly ten minutes to reach the hospital, but, before that
+time, Gypsy Nan, responding in a measure to stimulants, had regained
+consciousness. She insisted on clinging to Rhoda Gray's hand as they
+carried in the stretcher.
+
+“Don't leave me!” she pleaded. And then, for the first time, Gypsy Nan's
+nerve seemed to fail her. “I--oh, my God--I--I don't want to die!” she
+cried out.
+
+But a moment later, inside the hospital, as the admitting officer began
+to ask questions of Rhoda Gray, Gypsy Nan had apparently recovered her
+grip upon herself.
+
+“Ah, let her alone!” she broke in. “She doesn't know me any more than
+you do. She found me on the street. But she was good to me, God bless
+her!”
+
+“Your name's Charlotte Green? Yes?” The man nodded. “Where do you live?”
+
+“Wherever I like!” Gypsy Nan was snarling truculently now. “What's it
+matter where I live? Don't you ever have any one come here without a
+letter from the pastor of her church!” She pulled out the package of
+banknotes. “You aren't going to get stuck. This'll see you through
+whatever happens. Give me a--a private room, and”--her voice was
+weakening rapidly--“and”--there came a bitter, facetious laugh--“the
+best you've got.” Her voice was weakening rapidly.
+
+They carried her upstairs. She still insisted on clinging to Rhoda
+Gray's hand.
+
+“Don't leave me!” she pleaded again, as they reached the door of a
+private room, and Rhoda Gray disengaged her hand gently.
+
+“I'll stay outside here,” Rhoda Gray promised. “I won't go away without
+seeing you again.”
+
+Rhoda Gray sat down on a settee in the hall. She glanced at her wrist
+watch. It was five minutes of eleven. Doctors and nurses came and went
+from the room. Then a great quiet seemed to settle down around her. A
+half hour passed. A doctor went into the room, and presently came out
+again. She intercepted him as he came along the corridor.
+
+He shook his head.
+
+She did not understand his technical explanation. There was something
+about a clot and blood stoppage. But as she resumed her seat, she
+understood very fully that the end was near. The woman was resting
+quietly now, the doctor had said, but if she, Rhoda Gray, cared to wait,
+she could see the other before leaving the hospital.
+
+And so she waited. She had promised Gypsy Nan she would.
+
+The minutes dragged along. A quarter of an hour passed. Still another.
+Midnight came. Fifteen minutes more went by, and then a nurse came out
+of the room, and, standing by the door, beckoned to Rhoda Gray.
+
+“She is asking for you,” the nurse said. “Please do not stay more than
+a few minutes. I shall be outside here, and if you notice the slightest
+change, call me instantly.”
+
+Rhoda Gray nodded.
+
+“I understand,” she said.
+
+The door closed softly behind her. She was smiling cheerily as she
+crossed the room and bent over Gypsy Nan.
+
+The woman stretched out her hand.
+
+“The White Moll!” she whispered. “He told the truth, that bull
+did--straight as they make 'em, and--”
+
+“Don't try to talk,” Rhoda Gray interrupted gently. “Wait until you are
+a little stronger.”
+
+“Stronger!” Gypsy Nan shook her head. “Don't try to kid me! I know. They
+told me. I'd have known it anyway. I'm going out.”
+
+Rhoda Gray found no answer for a moment. A great lump had risen in her
+throat. Neither would she have needed to be told; she, too, would have
+known it anyway--it was stamped in the gray pallor of the woman's face.
+She pressed Gypsy Nan's hand.
+
+And then Gypsy Nan spoke again, a queer, yearning hesitancy in her
+voice:
+
+“Do--do you believe in God?”
+
+“Yes,” said Rhoda Gray simply.
+
+Gypsy Nan closed her eyes.
+
+“Do--do you think there is a chance--even at the last--if--if, without
+throwing down one's pals, one tries to make good?”
+
+“Yes,” said Rhoda Gray again.
+
+“Is the door closed?” Gypsy Nan attempted to raise herself on her elbow,
+as though to see for herself.
+
+Rhoda Gray forced the other gently back upon the pillows.
+
+“It is closed,” she said. “You need not be afraid.”
+
+“What time is it?” demanded Gypsy Nan.
+
+Rhoda Gray looked at her watch.
+
+“Twenty-five minutes after twelve,” she answered.
+
+“There's time yet, then,” whispered Gypsy Nan. “There's time yet.”
+ She lay silent for a moment, then her hand closed tightly around Rhoda
+Gray's. “Listen!” she said. “There's more about--about why I lived like
+that than I told you. And--and I can't tell you now--I can't go out like
+a yellow cur--I'm not going to snitch on anybody else just because I'm
+through myself. But--but there's something on to-night that I'd--I'd
+like to stop. Only the police, or anybody else, aren't to know anything
+about it, because then they'd nip my friends. See? But you can do
+it--easy. You can do it alone without anybody knowing. There's time yet.
+They weren't going to pull it until halfpast one--and there won't be any
+danger for you. All you've got to do is get the money before they do,
+and then see that it goes back where it belongs to-morrow. Will you? You
+don't want to see a crime committed to-night if--if you can stop it, do
+you?”
+
+Rhoda Gray's face was grave. She hesitated for a moment.
+
+“I'll have to know more than that before I can answer you, Nan,” she
+said.
+
+“It's the only way to stop it!” Gypsy Nan whispered feverishly. “I won't
+split on my pals--I won't--I won't! But I trust you. Will you promise
+not to snitch if I tell you how to stop it, even if you don't go there
+yourself? I'm offering you a chance to stop a twenty-thousand-dollar
+haul. If you don't promise it's got to go through, because I've got
+to stand by the ones that were in it with me. I--I'd like to make
+good--just--once. But I can't do it any other way. For God's sake, you
+see that, don't you?”
+
+“Yes,” said Rhoda Gray in a low voice; “but the promise you ask for is
+the same as though I promised to try to get the money you speak of. If I
+knew what was going on, and did nothing, I would be an accomplice to the
+crime, and guilty myself.”
+
+“But I can't do anything else!” Gypsy Nan was speaking with great
+difficulty. “I won't get those that were with me in wrong--I won't! You
+can prevent a crime to-night, if you will--you--you can help me to--to
+make good.”
+
+Rhoda Gray's lips tightened, “Will you give me your word that I can do
+what you suggest--that it is feasible, possible?”
+
+“Yes,” said Gypsy Nan. “You can do it easily, and--and it's safe. It--it
+only wants a little nerve, and--and you've got that.”
+
+“I promise, then,” said Rhoda Gray.
+
+“Thank God!” Gypsy Nan pulled fiercely at Rhoda Gray's wrist. “Come
+nearer-nearer! You know Skarbolov, old Skarbolov, who keeps the antique
+store--on the street--around the corner from my place?” Rhoda Gray
+nodded.
+
+“He's rich!” whispered Gypsy Nan. “Think of it! Him--rich! But he gets
+the best of the Fifth Avenue crowd just because he keeps his joint in
+that rotten hole. They think they're getting the real thing in antiques!
+He's a queer old fool. Afraid people would know he had money if he kept
+it in the bank--afraid of a bank, too. Understand? We found out that
+every once in a while he'd change a lot of small bills for a big
+one--five-hundred-dollar bills--thousand-dollar bills. That put us
+wise. We began to watch him. It took months to find where he hid it.
+We've spent night after night searching through his shop. You can get in
+easily. There's no one there--upstairs is just a storage place for his
+extra stock. There's a big padlock on the back door, but there's a false
+link in the chain--count three links to the right from the padlock--we
+put it there, and--”
+
+Gypsy Nan's voice had become almost inaudible. She pulled at Rhoda
+Gray's wrist again, urging her closer.
+
+“Listen--quick! I--my strength!” she panted. “An antique he never
+sells--old escritoire against rear wall--secret drawer--take out wide
+middle drawer--reach in and rub your hand along the top--you'll feel
+the spring. We waited to--to get--get counterfeits--put counterfeits
+there--understand? Then he'd never know he'd been robbed--not for a
+long time anyway--discovered perhaps when he was dead--old wife--suffer
+then--I--got to make good--make good--I--” She came up suddenly on both
+her elbows, the dark eyes staring wildly. “Yes, yes!” she whispered.
+“Seven-three-nine! Look out!” Her voice rang with sudden terror, rising
+almost to a scream. “Look out! Can't you understand, you fool! I've told
+you! Seven-three-nine! Seven-three...”
+
+Rhoda Gray's arms had gone around the other's shoulders. She heard the
+door open-and then a quick, light step. There wasn't any other sound
+now. She made way mechanically for the nurse. And then, after a moment,
+she rose from her knees. The nurse answered her unspoken question.
+
+“Yes; it's over.”
+
+
+
+
+III. ALIAS GYPSY NAN
+
+Rhoda Gray went slowly from the room. In a curiously stunned sort of
+way she reached the street, and for a few blocks walked along scarcely
+conscious of the direction she was taking. Her mind was in turmoil. The
+night seemed to have been one of harrowing hallucination; it seemed as
+though it were utterly unreal, like one dreaming that one is dreaming.
+And then, suddenly, she looked at her watch, and the straight little
+shoulders squared resolutely back. The hallucination, if she chose to
+call it that, was not yet over! It was twenty minutes of one, and there
+was still Skarbolov's--and her promise.
+
+She quickened her pace. She did not like this promise that she had
+made; but, on the other hand, she had not made it either lightly or
+impulsively. She had no regrets on that score. She would make it again
+under the same conditions. How could she have done otherwise? It would
+have been to stand aside and permit a crime to be committed which she
+was assured was easily within her power to prevent. What excuse could
+she have had for that? Fear wasn't an excuse. She did not like the
+thought of entering the back door of a store in the middle of the night
+like a thief, and, like a thief, taking away that hidden money. She knew
+she was going to be afraid, horribly afraid--it frightened her now--but
+she could not let that fear make a moral coward of her.
+
+Her hands clenched at her sides. She would not allow herself to dwell
+upon that phase of it! She was going to Skarbolov's, and that was all
+there was to it. The only thing she really had to fear was that she
+should lose even a single unnecessary moment in getting there. Halfpast
+one, Gypsy Nan had said. That should give her ample time; but the
+quicker she went, the wider the margin of safety.
+
+Her thoughts reverted to Gypsy Nan. What had the woman meant by her last
+few wandering words? They had nothing to do with Skarbolov's, that was
+certain; but the words came back now insistently. “Seven-three-nine.”
+ What did “seven-three-nine” mean? She shook her head helplessly. Well,
+what did it matter? She dismissed further consideration of it. She
+repeated to herself Gypsy Nan's directions for finding the spring of the
+secret drawer. She forced herself to think of anything that would bar
+the entry of that fear which stood lurking at the threshold of her mind.
+
+From time to time she consulted her watch--and each time hurried the
+faster.
+
+It was five minutes past one when, stealing silently along a black lane,
+and counting against the skyline the same number of buildings she had
+previously counted on the street from the corner, she entered an equally
+black yard, and reached the back door of Skarbolov's little store. She
+felt out with her hands and found the padlock, and her fingers pressed
+on the link in the chain that Gypsy Nan had described. It gave readily.
+She slipped it free, and opened the door. There was faint, almost
+inaudible, protesting creak from the hinges. She caught her breath
+quickly. Had anybody heard it? It--it had seemed like a cannon shot. And
+then her lips curled in sudden self-contempt. Who was there to hear it?
+
+She stepped forward, closed the door silently behind her, and drew
+out her flashlight. The ray cut through the blackness. She was in what
+seemed like a small, outer storeroom, that was littered with an untidy
+collection of boxes, broken furniture, and odds and ends of all sorts.
+Ahead of her was an open door, and, through this, the flashlight
+disclosed the shop itself. She switched off the light now as she moved
+forward-there were the front windows, and, used too freely, the light
+might by some unlucky chance be noticed from the street.
+
+And now, in the darkness again, she reached the doorway of the shop. She
+had not made any noise. She assured herself of that. She had never known
+that she could move so silently before--and--and--Yes, she would fight
+down this panic that was seizing her! She would! It would only take a
+minute now--just another minute--if--if she would only keep her head and
+her nerve. That was what Gypsy Nan had said. She only needed to keep her
+nerve. She had never lost it in the face of many a really serious danger
+when with her father--why should she now, when there was nothing but the
+silence and the darkness to be afraid of!
+
+The flashlight went on again, its ray creeping inquisitively now along
+the rear wall of the shop. It held finally on an escritoire over in the
+far corner at her right.
+
+Once more the light went out. She moved swiftly across the floor, and
+in a moment more was bending over the escritoire. And now, with her body
+hiding the flashlight's rays from the front windows, she examined the
+desk. It was an old-fashioned, spindle-legged affair, with a nest of
+pigeonholes and multifarious little drawers. One of the drawers, wider
+than any of the others, and in the center, was obviously the one to
+which Gypsy Nan referred. She pulled out the drawer, and in the act
+of reaching inside, suddenly drew back her hand. What was that?
+Instinctively she switched off the flashlight, and stood tense and rigid
+in the darkness.
+
+A minute passed-another. Still she listened. There was no
+sound--unless--unless she could actually hear the beating of her heart.
+Fancy! Imagination! The darkness played strange tricks! It--it wasn't so
+easy to keep one' s nerve. She could have sworn that she had heard some
+sort of movement back there down the shop.
+
+Angry with herself, she thrust her hand into the opening now and felt
+hurriedly around. Yes, there it was! Her fingers touched what was
+evidently a little knob or button. She pressed upon it. There was a
+faint, answering click. She turned on the flashlight again. What
+had before appeared to be nothing but one of the wide, pearl inlaid
+partitions between two of the smaller drawers, was protruding invitingly
+outward now by the matter of an inch or so. Rhoda Gray pulled it open.
+It was very shallow, scarcely three-quarters of an inch in depth, but
+it was quite long enough, and quite wide enough for its purpose!
+Inside, there lay a little pile of banknotes, banknotes of very large
+denomination--the one on top was a thousand-dollar bill.
+
+She reached in and took out the money-and then from Rhoda Gray's lips
+there came a little cry, the flashlight dropped from her hand and
+smashed to the floor, and she was clinging desperately to the edge of
+the escritoire for support. The shop was flooded with light. Over by
+the side wall, one hand still on the electric-light switch, the other
+holding a leveled revolver, stood a man.
+
+And then the man spoke--with an oath--with curious amazement:
+
+“My God--a woman!”
+
+She did not speak, or stir. It seemed as though not fear, but horror
+now, held her powerless to move her limbs. Her first swift brain-flash
+had been that it was one of Gypsy Nan's accomplices here ahead of the
+appointed time. That would have given her cause, all too much of cause,
+for fear; but it was not one of Gypsy Nan's accomplices, and, far worse
+than the fear of any physical attack upon her, was the sense of ruin and
+disaster that the realization of a quite different and more desperate
+situation brought her now. She knew the man. She had seen those square,
+heavy, clamped jaws scores of times. Those sharp, restless black eyes
+under over-hanging, shaggy eyebrows were familiar to the whole East
+Side. It was Rorke--“Rough” Rorke, of headquarters.
+
+He came toward her, and halfway across the room another exclamation
+burst from his lips; but this time it held a jeer, and in the jeer a
+sort of cynical and savage triumph.
+
+“The White Moll!”
+
+He was close beside her now, and now he snatched from her hand the
+banknotes that, all unconsciously, she had still been clutching tightly.
+
+“So this is what all the sweet charity's been about, eh?” he snapped.
+“The White Moll, the Little Saint of the East Side, that lends a helping
+hand to the crooks to get 'em back on the straight and narrow again! The
+White Moll-hell! You crooked little devil!”
+
+Again she did not answer. Her mind was clear now, brutally clear,
+brutally keen, brutally virile. What was there for her to say? She was
+caught here at one o'clock in the morning after breaking into the place,
+caught red-handed in the very act of taking the money. What story could
+she tell that would clear her of that! That she had taken it so that
+it wouldn't be stolen, and that she was going to give it back in the
+morning? Was there anybody in the world credulous enough to believe
+anything like that! Tell Gypsy Nan's story, all that had happened
+to-night? Yes, she might have told that to-morrow, after she had
+returned the money, and been believed. But now-no! It would even make
+her appear in a still worse light. They would credit her with being a
+member of this very gang to which Gypsy Nan belonged, one in the secrets
+of an organized band of criminals, who was trying to clear her own
+skirts at the expense of her confederates. Everything, every act of
+hers to-night, pointed to that construction being placed upon her story,
+pointed to duplicity. Why had she hidden the identity of Gypsy Nan? Why
+had she not told the police that a crime was to be committed, and left
+it to the police to frustrate it? It would fit in with the story, of
+course--but the story was the result of having been caught in the act
+of stealing twenty thousand dollars in cash! What was there to say--and,
+above all, to this man, whose reputation for callous brutality in the
+handling of those who fell into his hands had earned him the sobriquet
+of “Rough” Rorke? Sick at heart, desperate, but with her hands clenched
+now, she stood there, while the man felt unceremoniously over her
+clothing for a concealed weapon.
+
+Finding none, he stooped, picked up the flashlight, tested it, and found
+it broken from its fall.
+
+“Too bad you bust this, we'll have to go out in the dark after I switch
+off the light,” he said with unpleasant facetiousness. “I didn't
+have one with me, or time to get one, when I got tipped off there was
+something doing here to-night.” He caught her ungently by the arm.
+“Well, come along, my pretty lady! This'll make a stir, this will! The
+White Moll!” He led her to the electric-light switch, turned off the
+light, and, with his grasp tight upon her, made for the front door. He
+chuckled in a sinister manner. “Say, you're a prize, you are! And pretty
+clever, too, aren't you? I wasn't looking for a woman to pull this. The
+White Moll! Some saint!”
+
+Rhoda Gray shivered. Disgrace, ruin, stared her in the face. A sea of
+faces in a courtroom, morbid faces, hideous faces, leered at her. Gray
+walls rose before her, walls that shut out sunshine and hope, pitiless,
+cold things that seemed to freeze the blood in her veins. And to-night,
+in just a few minutes more--a cell!
+
+From the street outside came the sound of some one making a cheery, but
+evidently a somewhat inebriated, attempt to whistle some ragtime air.
+It seemed to enhance her misery, to enhance by contrast in its care-free
+cheeriness the despair and misery that were eating into her soul.
+Her hands clenched and unclenched. If there were only a
+chance--somewhere--somehow! If only she were not a woman! If she could
+only fight this hulking form that gripped so brutally at her arm!
+
+Rough Rorke opened the door, and pulled her out to the street. She
+shrank back instinctively. It was quite light here from a nearby street
+lamp, and the owner of the whistle, a young man, fashionably dressed,
+decidedly unsteady on his legs, and just opposite the door as they came
+out, had stopped both his whistle and his progress along the street to
+stare at them owlishly.
+
+“'Ullo!” said the young man thickly. “What'sh all this about--eh?
+What'sh you two doing in that place this time of night--eh?”
+
+“Beat it!” ordered Rough Rorke curtly.
+
+“That'sh all right.” The young man came nearer. He balanced himself with
+difficulty, but upon him there appeared to have descended suddenly a
+vast dignity. “I'm--hic--law--'biding citizen. Gotta know. Gotta show
+me. Damn funny--coming out of there this time of night! Eh--what'sh the
+idea?”
+
+Rough Rorke, with his free hand, grabbed the young man by the shoulder
+angrily.
+
+“Mind your own business, or you'll get into trouble!” he rasped out.
+“I'm an officer, and this woman is under arrest. Beat it! D'ye hear?
+Beat it--or I'll run you in, too!”
+
+“Is that'sh so!” The young man's tones expressed a fuddled defiance. He
+rocked on his feet and stared from one to the other. “Shay, is that'sh
+so! You will--eh? Gotta show me. How do I know you're--hic--officer? Eh?
+More likely damned thief yourself! I--”
+
+The young man lurched suddenly and violently forward, breaking Rough
+Rorke's grip on Rhoda Gray--and, as his arms swept out to grasp at the
+detective in an apparently wild effort to preserve his balance, Rhoda
+Gray felt a quick, significant push upon her shoulder.
+
+For the space of time it takes a watch to tick she stood startled and
+amazed, and then, like a flash, she was speeding down the street. A roar
+of rage, a burst of unbridled profanity went up from Rough Rorke behind
+her; it was mingled with equally angry vituperation in the young man's
+voice. She looked behind her. The two men were swaying around crazily in
+each other's arms. She ran on--faster than she had ever run in her
+life. The corner was not far ahead. Her brain was working with lightning
+speed. Gypsy Nan's house was just around the corner. If she could get
+out of sight--hide--it would...
+
+She glanced behind her again, as her ears caught the pound of racing
+feet. The young man was sitting in the middle of the sidewalk, shaking
+his fist; Rough Rorke, perhaps a bare fifty yards away, was chasing her
+at top speed.
+
+Her face set hard. She could not out-run a man! There was only one hope
+for her--just one--to gain Gypsy Nan's doorway before Rorke got around
+the corner.
+
+A yard--another--still another! She swerved around the corner. And,
+as she turned, she caught a glimpse of the detective. The man was
+nearer--much nearer. But it was only a little way, just a little way, to
+Gypsy Nan's--not so far as the distance between her and Rorke--and--and
+if the man didn't gain too fast, then--then--A little cry of dismay came
+with a new and terrifying thought. Quite apart from Rorke, some one else
+might see her enter Gypsy Nan's! She strained her eyes in all directions
+as she ran. There wasn't any one--she didn't see any one--only Rorke,
+around the corner there, was bawling out at the top of his voice,
+and--and...
+
+She flung herself against Gypsy Nan's door, stumbled in, and, closing
+it, heard Rorke just swinging around the corner. Had he seen her? She
+didn't know. She was panting, gasping for her breath. It seemed as
+though her lungs would burst. She held her hand tightly to her bosom as
+she made for the stairs--she mustn't make any noise--they mustn't
+hear her breathing like that--they--they mustn't hear her going up the
+stairs.
+
+How dark it was! If she could only see--so that she would be sure not
+to stumble! She couldn't go fast now--she would make a noise if she did.
+Stair after stair she climbed stealthily. Perhaps she was safe now--it
+had taken her a long time to get up here to the second floor, and there
+wasn't any sound yet from the street below.
+
+And now she mounted the short, ladder-like steps to the attic, and,
+feeling with her hand for the crack in the flooring under the partition,
+reached in for the key. As her fingers closed upon it, she choked back
+a cry. Some one had been here! A piece of paper was wrapped around the
+key. What did it mean? What did all these strange, yes, sinister, things
+that had happened to-night mean? How had Rorke known that a robbery was
+to be committed at Skarbolov's? Who was that man who had effected her
+escape, and who, she knew now, was no more drunk than she was? Fast,
+quick, piling one upon the other, the questions raced through her mind.
+
+She fought them back. There was no time for speculation now! There was
+only one question that mattered: Was she safe?
+
+She stood up, thrust the paper for safe-keeping into her bosom, and
+unlocked the door. If--if Rorke did not know that she had entered this
+house here, she could remain hidden for a few hours; it would give her
+time to think, and...
+
+It came this time, no strength of will would hold it back, a little
+moan. The front door below had opened, a heavy footstep sounded in the
+lower hall. She couldn't see, of course. But she knew. It was Rorke! She
+heard him coming up the stairs.
+
+And then, in a flash, it seemed, her brain responded to her despairing
+cry. There was still a way--a desperate one--but still a way--if there
+was time! She darted inside the garret, locked the door, found the
+matches and candle, and, running silently to the rear wall, pushed
+up the board in the ceiling. In frantic haste she tore off her outer
+garments, her stockings and shoes, pulled on the rough stockings and
+coarse boots that Gypsy Nan had worn, slipped the other's greasy,
+threadbare skirt over her head, and pinned the shawl tight about her
+shoulders. There was a big, voluminous pocket in the skirt, and into
+this she dropped Gypsy Nan's revolver, and the paper she had found
+wrapped around the key.
+
+She could hear a commotion from below now. It was the one thing she had
+counted upon. Rough Rorke might know she had entered the house, but he
+could not know whereabouts in the house she was, and he would naturally
+search each room as he came to it on the way up. She fitted the
+gray-streaked wig of tangled, matted hair upon her head, plunged her
+hand into the box that Gypsy Nan used for her make-up and daubed some
+of the grime upon both hands and face, adjusted the spectacles upon her
+nose, hid her own clothing, closed the narrow trap-door in the ceiling,
+and ran back, carrying the candle, to the washstand.
+
+Here, there was a small and battered mirror, and more coolly, more
+leisurely now, for the commotion still continued from the floor below,
+she spread and rubbed in, as craftily as she could, the grime streaks
+on her face and hands. It was neither artistic nor perfect, but in
+the meager, flickering light now the face of Gypsy Nan seemed to stare
+reassuringly back at her. It might not deceive any one in daylight--she
+did not know, and it did not matter now--but with only this candle to
+light the garret, since the lamp was empty, she could fairly count on
+her identity not being questioned.
+
+She blew out the candle, left it on the washstand, because, if she could
+help it, she did not want to risk having it lighted near the bed or
+door, and, tiptoeing now, went to the door, unlocked it, then threw
+herself down upon the bed.
+
+Possibly a minute went by, possibly two, and then there was a quick step
+on the ladder-like stairs, the door handle was rattled violently, and
+the door was flung open and slammed shut again.
+
+Rhoda Gray sat upright on the bed. It was her wits now, her wits against
+Rough Rorke's; nothing else could save her. She could not even make out
+the man's form, it was so dark; but, as he had not moved, she was quite
+well aware that he was standing with his back to the door, evidently
+trying to place his surroundings.
+
+It was Gypsy Nan, not Rhoda Gray, who spoke.
+
+“Who's dere?” she screeched. “D'ye hear, blast youse, who's dere?”
+
+Rough Rorke laughed gratingly.
+
+“That you, Nan, my dear?”
+
+“Who d'youse t'ink it is-me gran'mother?” demanded Rhoda Gray
+caustically. “Who are youse?”
+
+“Rorke,” said Rorke shortly. “I guess you know, don't you?”
+
+“Is dat so?” snorted Rhoda Gray. “Well den, youse can beat it--hop
+it--on de jump! Wot t'hell right have youse got bustin' into me room at
+dis time of night--eh? I ain't done nothin'!”
+
+Rough Rorke, his feet scuffling to feel the way, came forward.
+
+“Cut it out!” he snarled. “I ain't the only visitor you've got! It's not
+you I want; it's the White Moll.”
+
+“Wot's dat got to do wid me?” Rhoda Gray flung back hotly. “She ain't
+here, is she?”
+
+“Yes, she's here!” Rough Rorke's voice held an ugly menace. “I lost
+her around the corner, but a woman from a window across the street, who
+heard the row, saw her run into this house. She ain't downstairs--so you
+can figure the rest out the same way I do.”
+
+“De woman was kiddin' youse!” Rhoda Gray, alias Gypsy Nan, cackled
+derisively. “Dere ain't nobody here but me.”
+
+“We'll see about that!” said Rough Rorke shortly. “Strike a light!”
+
+“Aw, strike it yerself!” retorted Rhoda Gray. “I ain't yer servant!
+Dere's a candle over dere on de washstand against de wall, if youse
+wants it.”
+
+A match crackled and spurted into flame; its light fell upon the lamp
+standing on the chair beside the bed. Rough Rorke stepped toward it.
+
+“Dere ain't any oil in dat,” croaked Rhoda Gray. “Didn't I tell youse de
+candle was over dere on de washstand, an'--”
+
+The words seemed to freeze in her throat, the chair, the lamp, the
+shadowy figure of the man in the match flame to swirl before her eyes,
+and a sick nausea to come upon her soul itself. With a short, triumphant
+oath, Rough Rorke had stopped suddenly and reached in under the chair.
+And now he was dangling a new, black kid glove in front of her. Caught!
+Yes, she was caught! She remembered Gypsy Nan's attempt to put on her
+gloves--one must have fallen to the floor unnoticed by either of them
+when Gypsy Nan had thought to put them in her pocket! The man's voice
+came to her as from some great distance:
+
+“So, she ain't here--ain't she! I'll teach you to lie to me! I'll--” The
+match was dying out. Rorke raised it higher, and with the last flicker
+located the washstand, and made toward it, obviously for the candle.
+
+Her wits against Rough Rorke's! Nothing else could save her! Failing to
+find any one here but herself, certain now that the White Moll was here,
+only a fool could have failed in his deduction--and Rough Rorke was
+not a fool. Her wits against Rough Rorke's! There was the time left her
+while the garret was still in darkness, just that, no more!
+
+With a quick spring she leaped from the bed, seized the chair, sending
+the lamp to the floor, and, dragging the chair after her to make as much
+noise and confusion as she could, she rushed for the door, screeching at
+the top of her voice:
+
+“Run, dearie, run! Run!” She was scuffling with her feet, clattering the
+chair, as she wrenched the door open. And then, in her own voice: “Nan,
+I won't! I won't let you stand for this, I--”
+
+Then as Gypsy Nan again: “Run, dearie! Don't youse mind old Nan!” She
+banged the door shut, locked it, and whipped out the key. It had taken
+scarcely a second. She was still screeching at the top of her voice to
+cover the absence of flying footers on the stairs. “Run, dearie, run!
+Run!”
+
+And then, in the darkness, the candle still unlighted, Rough Rorke was
+on her like a madman. With a sweep of his arm he sent her crashing to
+the floor, and wrenched at the door. The next instant he was on her
+again.
+
+“The key! Give me that key!” he roared.
+
+For answer she flung it from her. It fell with a tinkle on the floor at
+the far end of the garret. The man was beside himself with rage.
+
+“Damn you, if I had time, I'd wring your neck for this, you she-devil!”
+ he bawled-and raced back, evidently for the candle on the washstand.
+
+Rhoda Gray, sprawled on the floor where he had thrown her, did not
+move-except to take the revolver from the pocket of her dress. She was
+crooning queerly to herself, as she watched Rough Rorke light the candle
+and grope around on the floor:
+
+“She was good to me, de White Moll was. Jellies an' t'ings she brought
+me, she did. An' Gypsy Nan don't ferret. Gypsy Nan don't--”
+
+She sat up suddenly, snarling. Rorke had found the key, left the bottle
+with the short stub of guttering candle standing on the floor, and was
+back again.
+
+“By God!” he gritted through his teeth, as he jabbed the key with
+frantic haste into the lock. “I'll fix you for this!” He made a clutch
+at her throat, as he swung the door open.
+
+She jerked herself backward, eluding him, her revolver leveled.
+
+“Youse keep yer dirty paws off me!” she screamed. “Yah, wot can youse
+do! Wot do I care! She was good to me, she was, an--”
+
+Rough Rorke was gone-taking the stairs three and four at a time. Then
+she heard the street door slam.
+
+She rose slowly to her feet--and suddenly reached out, grasping at the
+door to steady herself. It seemed as though every muscle had gone limp,
+as though her limbs had not strength to support her. And for a moment
+she hung there, then she locked the door, staggered back, sank down
+on the edge of the bed, and, with her chin in her hands, stared at
+the guttering stub of candle. And presently, in an almost aimless,
+mechanical way, she felt in her pocket for the piece of paper that she
+had found wrapped around the key, and drew it out. There were three
+figures scrawled upon it--nothing else.
+
+                        7     3     9
+
+She dropped her chin in her hands again, and stared again at the candle.
+And after a while the candle went out.
+
+
+
+
+IV. THE ADVENTURER
+
+Twenty-Four hours had passed. Twenty four hours! Was it no more than
+that since--Rhoda Gray, in the guise of Gypsy Nan, as she sat on the
+edge of the disreputable, poverty-stricken cot, grew suddenly tense,
+holding her breath as she listened. The sound reached the attic so
+faintly that it might be but the product solely of the imagination.
+No--it came again! And it even defined itself now--a stealthy footstep
+on the lower stairs.
+
+A small, leather-bound notebook, in which she had been engrossed, was
+tucked instantly away under the soiled blanket, and she glanced sharply
+around the garret. A new candle, which she had bought in the single
+excursion she had ventured to make from the house during the day, was
+stuck in the neck of the gin bottle, and burned now on the chair beside
+her. She had not bought a new lamp--it gave too much light! The old one,
+the pieces of it, lay over there, brushed into a heap in the corner on
+the floor.
+
+The footstep became more audible. Her lips tightened a little. The
+hour was late. It must be already after eleven o'clock. Her eyes grew
+perturbed. Perhaps it was only one of the unknown tenants of the floor
+below going to his or her room; but, on the other hand, no one had come
+near the garret since last night, when that strange and, yes, sinister
+trick of fate had thrust upon her the personality of Gypsy Nan, and it
+was hoping for too much to expect such seclusion to obtain much longer.
+There were too many who must be interested, vitally interested, in Gypsy
+Nan! There was Rough Rorke, of headquarters; he had given no sign, but
+that did not mean he had lost interest in Gypsy Nan. There was the death
+of the real Gypsy Nan, which was pregnant with possibilities; and though
+the newspapers, that she, Rhoda Gray, had bought and scanned with such
+tragic eagerness, had said nothing about the death of one Charlotte
+Green in the hospital, much less had given any hint that the identity
+Gypsy Nan had risked so much to hide had been discovered, it did not
+mean that the police, with their own ends in view, might not be fully
+informed, and were but keeping their own counsel while they baited a
+trap.
+
+Also, and even more to be feared, there were those of this criminal
+organization to which Gypsy Nan had belonged, and to which she, Rhoda
+Gray, through a sort of hideous proxy, now belonged herself! Sooner or
+later, they must show their hands, and the test of her identity would
+come. And here her danger was the greater because she did not know who
+any of them were, unless the man who had stepped in between Rough Rorke
+and herself last night was one of them--which was a question that had
+harassed her all day. The man had been no more drunk than she had been,
+and he had obviously only played the part to get her out of the clutches
+of Rough Rorke; but, against this, he had seen her simply as herself
+then, the White Moll, and what could the criminal associates of Gypsy
+Nan have cared as to what became of the White Moll?
+
+A newspaper, to procure which had been the prime motive that had lured
+her out of her retreat that afternoon, caught her eye now, and she
+shivered a little as, from where it lay on the floor, the headlines
+seemed to leer up at her, and mock, and menace her. “The White
+Moll....The Saint of the East Side Exposed....Vicious Hypocrisy....Lowly
+Charity for Years Cloaks a Consummate Thief...” They had not spared her!
+
+Her lips firmed suddenly, as she listened. The stealthy footfall had not
+paused in the hall below. It was on the short, ladder-like steps now,
+leading up here to the garret--and now it had halted outside her door,
+and there came a low, insistent knocking on the panels.
+
+“Who's dere?” demanded Rhoda Gray, alias Gypsy Nan, in a grumbling tone,
+as, getting up from the bed, she moved the chair noiselessly a few feet
+farther away, so that the bed would be beyond the immediate radius of
+the candle light. Then she shuffled across the floor to the door. “Who's
+dere?” she demanded again, and her hand, deep in the voluminous pocket
+of Gypsy Nan's greasy skirt, closed tightly around the stock of Gypsy
+Nan's revolver.
+
+The voice that answered her expostulated in a plaintive whisper:
+
+“My dear lady! And after all the trouble I have taken to reach here
+without being either seen or heard!”
+
+For an instant Rhoda Gray hesitated--there seemed something familiar
+about the voice--then she unlocked the door, and retreated toward the
+bed.
+
+The door opened and closed softly. Rhoda Gray, reaching the edge of the
+bed, sat down. It was the fashionably-attired, immaculate young man,
+who had saved her from Rough Rorke last night. She stared at him in
+the faint light without a word. Her mind was racing in a mad turmoil of
+doubt, uncertainty, fear. Was he one of the gang, or not? Was she, in
+the role of Gypsy Nan, supposed to know him, or not? Did he know that
+the real Gypsy Nan, too, had but played a part, and, therefore, when she
+spoke must it be in the vernacular of the East Side--or not? And then
+sudden enlightenment, with its incident relief, came to her.
+
+“My dear lady”--the young man's soft felt hat was under his arm, and he
+was plucking daintily at the fingers of his yellow gloves as he removed
+them--“I beg you to pardon the intrusion of a perfect stranger. I offer
+you my very genuine apologies. My excuse is that I come from a--I hope I
+am not overstepping the bounds in using the term--mutual friend.” Rhoda
+Gray snorted disdainfully.
+
+“Aw, cut out de boudoir talk, an' get down to cases!” she croaked. “Who
+are youse, anyway?”
+
+The young man had gray eyes--and they lighted up now humorously.
+
+“Boudoir? Ah--yes! Of course! Awfully neat!” His eyes, from the chair
+that held the candle, strayed around the scantily furnished, murky
+garret as though in search of a seat, and finally rested inquiringly on
+Rhoda Gray.
+
+“Youse can put de candle on de floor, if youse like,” she said
+grudgingly. “Dat's de only chair dere is.”
+
+“Thank you!” he said.
+
+Rhoda Gray watched him with puckered brow, as he placed the gin bottle
+with its candle on the floor, and appropriated the chair. He might,
+from his tone, have been thanking her for some priceless boon. He wore
+a boutonniere. His clothes fitted him like gloves. He exuded a certain
+studied, almost languid fastidiousness--that was wholly out of keeping
+with the quick, daring, agile wit that he had exhibited the night
+before. She found her hand toying unconsciously with the weapon in her
+pocket. She was aware that she was fencing with unbuttoned foils. How
+much did he know--about last night?
+
+“Well, why don't youse spill it?” she invited curtly. “Who are youse?”
+
+“Who am I?” He lifted the lapel of his coat, carrying the boutonniere to
+his nose. “My dear lady, I am an adventurer.”
+
+“Youse don't say!” observed Rhoda Gray, alias Gypsy Nan. “An' wot's dat
+w' en it's at home?”
+
+“In my case, first of all a gentleman, I trust,” he said pleasantly;
+“after that, I do not quarrel with the accepted definition of the
+term--though it is not altogether complimentary.”
+
+Rhoda Gray scowled. As Rhoda Gray, she might have answered him; as Gypsy
+Nan, it was too subtle, and she was beyond her depth.
+
+“Youse look to me like a slick crook!” she said bluntly.
+
+“I will admit,” he said, “that I have at times, perhaps, taken liberties
+with the law.”
+
+“Well, den,” she snapped, “cut out de high-brow stuff, an' come across
+wid wot brought youse here. I ain't holdin' no reception. Who's de
+friend youse was talkin' about?”
+
+The Adventurer looked around him, and lowered his voice.
+
+“The White Moll,” he said.
+
+Rhoda Gray eyed the man for a long minute; then she shook her head.
+
+“I take back wot I said about youse bein' a slick crook,” she announced
+coolly. “I guess youse're a dick from headquarters. Well, youse have got
+de wrong number--see? Me fingers are crossed. Try next door!”
+
+The Adventurer's eyes were fixed on the newspaper headlines on the
+floor. He raised them now significantly to hers.
+
+“You helped her to get away from Rough Rorke last night,” he said
+gently. “Well, so did I. I am very anxious to find the White Moll, and,
+as I know of no other way except through you, I have got to make you
+believe in me, if I can. Listen, my dear lady--and don't look at me so
+suspiciously. I have already admitted that I have taken liberties with
+the law. Let me add now that last night there was a little fortune of
+quite a few thousand dollars that I had already made up my mind was
+as good as in my pocket. I was on my way to get it--the newspaper
+will already have given you the details--when I found that I had been
+forestalled by the young lady, who, the papers say, is known as the
+White Moll.” He smiled whimsically. “Even though one might be a slick
+crook as you suggest, it is no reason why he should fail in his duty to
+himself--as a gentleman. What other course was open to me? I discovered
+a very charming young lady in the grip of a hulking police brute. She
+also, apparently, took liberties with the law. There was a bond between
+us. I--er--took it upon myself to do what I could. And, besides, I was
+not insensible to the fact that I was under a certain obligation to her,
+quixotic as it may sound, in view of the fact that we were evidently
+competitors after the same game. You see, if she had not forestalled me
+and been caught herself, I should most certainly have walked into the
+trap that our friend of headquarters had prepared. I--er--as I say, did
+what I could. She got away; but somehow Rough Rorke later discovered her
+here in this room, I understand that he was not happy over the result;
+that, thanks to you, she escaped again, and has not been heard of since.”
+
+Rhoda Gray dropped her chin in her grime-smeared hand, staring
+speculatively at the other. The man sat there, apparently a
+self-confessed crook and criminal, but, also, he sat there as the man
+to whom she owed the fact that at the present moment she was not behind
+prison bars. He proclaimed himself in the same breath both a thief and
+a gentleman, as far as she could make out. They were characteristics
+which, until now, she had never associated together; but now, curiously
+enough, they did not seem so utterly at variance. Of course they were
+at variance, must of necessity be so; but in the personality of this man
+the incongruity seemed somehow lost. Perhaps it was a sense of gratitude
+toward him that modified her views. He looked a gentleman. There was
+something about him that appealed. The gray eyes seemed full of cool,
+confident, self-possession; and, quiet as his manner was, she sensed a
+latent dynamic something lurking near the surface all the time--that she
+was conscious she would much prefer to have enlisted on her behalf than
+against her. The strong, firm chin bore this out. He was not handsome,
+but--with a sort of mental jerk, she forced her mind back to the stark
+realities of her surroundings. She could not thank him for what he had
+done last night. She could not tell him that she was the White Moll.
+She could only play out the role of Gypsy Nan until--until--Her hand
+tightened with a fierce, involuntary pressure upon her chin until it
+brought a physical hurt. Until what? God alone knew what the end of this
+miserable, impossible horror, in which she found herself engulfed, would
+be!
+
+Her eyes sought his face again. The Adventurer was tactfully engaged
+in carefully smoothing out the fingers of his yellow gloves. Thief
+and gentleman, whatever he might be, whatever he might choose to call
+himself, what, exactly, was it that had brought him here to-night? The
+White Moll, he had said; but what did he want with the White Moll?
+
+He answered her unspoken question now, almost as though he had read her
+thoughts.
+
+“She is very clever,” he said quietly. “She must be exceedingly clever
+to have beaten the police the way she has for the last few years;
+and--er--I worship at the shrine of cleverness--especially if it be
+a woman's. The idea struck me last night that if she and I
+should--er--pool our resources, we should not have to complain of the
+reward.”
+
+“Oh, so youse wants to work wid her, eh?” sniffed Rhoda Gray. “So dat's
+it, is it?”
+
+“Partially,” he said. “But, quite apart from that, the reason I want to
+find her is because she is in very great danger. Clever as she is, it is
+a very different matter to-day now that the police have found her out.
+She has been forced into hiding, and, if alone and without any friend
+to help her, her situation, to put it mildly, must be desperate in
+the extreme. You befriended her last night, and I honor you for the
+unselfishness with which you laid yourself open to the future attentions
+of that animal Rorke, but that very fact has deprived her of what might
+otherwise have been a refuge and a quite secure retreat here with you. I
+do not wish to intrude, or force myself upon her, but I believe I could
+be of very material help, and so I have come to you, as I have said,
+because you are the only source through which I can hope to find
+her, and because, through your act of last night, I know you to be a
+trustworthy, and, perhaps, even an intimate, friend of hers.”
+
+“Aw, go on!” said Rhoda Gray, alias Gypsy Nan, deprecatingly. “Dat don't
+prove nothin'! I'd have done as much for a stray cat if de bulls was
+chasm' her. See? I told youse once youse had de wrong number. She didn't
+leave no address. Dat's flat, an' dat's de end of it.”
+
+“I'm sorry,” said the Adventurer gravely. “Perhaps I haven't made out a
+good enough case. Or perhaps, even believing me, you consider that
+the White Moll, and not yourself, should be the judge as to whether my
+services are acceptable or not?”
+
+“Youse can dope it out any way youse likes,” said Rhoda Gray
+indifferently. “Me t'roat's gettin' hoarse tellin' youse dere's nothin'
+doin'!”
+
+“I'm sorry,” said the Adventurer again. He smiled suddenly, and tucking
+his gloves into his pocket, leaned forward and tore off a small piece
+from the margin of the newspaper on the floor--but his head the while
+was now cocked in a curious listening attitude in the direction of the
+door. “You will pardon me, my dear lady, if I confess that, in spite of
+what you say, I still harbor the belief that you know where to reach
+the White Moll; and so--” He stopped abruptly, and she found his glance,
+sharp and critical, upon her. “You are expecting a visitor, perhaps?” he
+inquired softly.
+
+Rhoda Gray stared in genuine perplexity.
+
+“Wot's de answer?” she demanded.
+
+“There is some one on the stairs,” replied the Adventurer.
+
+Rhoda Gray listened--and her perplexity deepened. She could hear
+nothing.
+
+“Youse must have good ears!” she scoffed.
+
+“I have,” returned the Adventurer coolly. “My hearing is one of the
+resources that I wanted to pool with the White Moll.”
+
+“Well, den, mabbe it's Rough Rorke.” Her tone still held its scoffing
+note; but her words voiced the genuine enough, that had come flashing
+upon her. “An' if it is, after last night, an' he finds youse an' me
+together, dere'll be--”
+
+“My dear lady,” interposed the Adventurer calmly, “if there were the
+remotest possibility that it could be Rough Rorke, I would not be here.”
+
+“Wot do youse mean?” She had unconsciously towered her voice.
+
+The Adventurer shrugged his shoulders whimsically. He had laid the piece
+of paper on his knee, and, with a small gold pencil which he had taken
+from his pocket, was writing something upon it.
+
+“The fact that I can assure you that, whoever else it may be, the person
+outside there cannot be Rough Rorke, is simply a proof that, if I had
+the opportunity, I could be of real assistance to the White Moll,”
+ he said imperturbably. “Well”--a grim little smile flickered suddenly
+across his lips--“do you hear any one now?”
+
+Quite low, but quite unmistakably, the short, ladder-like steps just
+outside the door were voicing a creaky protest now as some one mounted
+them. Rhoda Gray did not move. It seemed as though she could hear the
+sudden thumping of her own heart. Who was it this time? How was she to
+act? What was she to say? It was so easy to make the single little slip
+of word or manner that would spell ruin and disaster.
+
+“Rubber heels and rubber soles,” murmured the Adventurer. “But, at that,
+it is extremely well done.” He held out the torn piece of paper to Rhoda
+Gray.
+
+“If”--he smiled significantly--“if, by any good fortune, you see the
+White Moll again, please give her this and let her decide for herself.
+It is a telephone number. She can always reach me there by asking
+for--the Adventurer.” He was still extending the piece of paper.
+“Quick!” he whispered, as the door knob rattled.
+
+
+
+
+V. A SECOND VISITOR
+
+Mechanically Rhoda Gray thrust the paper into the pocket of her skirt.
+The door swung open. A tall man, well dressed, as far as could be seen
+in the uncertain light, a slouch hat pulled far down over his eyes,
+stood on the threshold, surveying the interior of the garret.
+
+The Adventurer rose composedly to his feet--and moved slightly back out
+of the direct radius of the candlelight.
+
+There was silence for a moment, and then the man in the doorway laughed
+unpleasantly.
+
+“Hello!” he flung out harshly. “Who's the dude, Nan?”
+
+Rhoda Gray, on the edge of the bed, shrugged her shoulders. The
+Adventurer was standing quite at his ease, his soft hat tucked under his
+right arm, his hand thrust into the side pocket of his coat. She could
+no longer see his face distinctly.
+
+“Well?” There was a snarl in the man's voice as he advanced from the
+doorway. “You heard me, didn't you? Who is he?”
+
+“Why don't youse ask him yerself?” inquired Rhoda Gray truculently. “I
+dunno.”
+
+“You don't, eh?” The man had halted close to where the candle stood on
+the floor between himself and the Adventurer. “Well, then, I guess we'll
+find out!” He was peering in the Adventurer's direction, and now there
+came a sudden savage scowl to his face. “It seems to me I've seen those
+clothes somewhere before, and I guess now we'll take a look at your face
+so that there won't be any question about recognition the next time we
+meet.”
+
+The Adventurer laughed softly.
+
+“There will be none on my part,” he said calmly. “It's Danglar, isn't
+it? I am surely not mistaken. Parson Danglar, alias--ah! Please don't do
+that!”
+
+It seemed to Rhoda Gray that it happened in the space of time it might
+take a watch to tick: The newcomer stooping to the floor, and lifting
+the candle with the obvious intention of thrusting it into the
+Adventurer's face--a glint of metal, as the Adventurer whipped a
+revolver from the side pocket of his coat--and then, how they got there
+she could not tell, it was done so adroitly and swiftly, the thumb and
+forefinger of the Adventurer's left hand had closed on the candle wick
+and snuffed it out, and the garret was in darkness.
+
+There was a savage oath, a snarl of rage from the man whom the
+Adventurer had addressed as Danglar; then an instant s silence; and then
+the Adventurer's voice--from the doorway:
+
+“I beg of you not to vent your disappointment on the lady--Danglar. I
+assure you that she is in no way responsible for my visit here, and, as
+far as that goes, never saw me before in her life. Also, it is only fair
+to tell you, in case you should consider leaving here too hurriedly,
+that I am really not at all a bad shot--even in the dark. I bid you
+good-night, Danglar--and you my dear lady!”
+
+Danglar's voice rose again in a flood of profane rage. He stumbled and
+moved around in the dark.
+
+“Damn it!” he shouted. “Where are the matches? Where's the lamp? This
+cursed candle's put enough to the bad already! Do you hear? Where's the
+lamp?”
+
+“It's over dere on de floor, bust to pieces,” mumbled Rhoda Gray.
+“Youse'll find the matches on de washstand, an--”
+
+“What's the idea?” There was a sudden, steel-like note dominating the
+angry tones. “What are you handing me that hog-wash language for? Eh?
+It's damned queer! There's been damned queer doings around here ever
+since last night! See? What's the idea?”
+
+Rhoda Gray felt her face whiten in the darkness. It was the slip she
+had feared; the slip that she had had to take the chance of making, and
+which, if it were not retrieved, and instantly retrieved, now that it
+was made, meant discovery, and after that--She shivered a little.
+
+“You needn't lose your head, just because you've lost your temper!” she
+said tartly, in a guarded whisper. “The door into the hall is still wide
+open, isn't it?”
+
+“Oh, all right!” he said, his tones a sort of sullen admission that her
+retort was justified. “But even now your voice sounds off color.”
+
+Rhoda Gray bridled.
+
+“Does it?” she snapped at him. “I've got a cold. Maybe you'd get one
+too, and maybe your voice would be off color, if you had to live in a
+dump like this, and--”
+
+“Oh, all right, all right!” he broke in hurriedly. “For Heaven's sake
+don't start a row! Forget it! See? Forget it!” He walked over to the
+door, peered out, swore savagely to himself, shut the door, held the
+candle up to circle the garret, and scowled as its rays fell upon the
+shattered pieces of the lamp in the corner then, returning, he set the
+candle down upon the chair and began to pace restlessly, three or four
+steps each way, up and down in front of the bed.
+
+Rhoda Gray, from the edge of the bed, shifted back until her shoulders
+rested against the wall. Danglar, too, was dressed like a gentleman--but
+Danglar's face was not appealing. The little round black eyes were
+shifty, they seemed to possess no pupils whatever, and they roved
+constantly; there was a hard, unyielding thinness about the lips, and
+the face itself was thin, almost gaunt, as though the skin had had to
+accommodate itself to more than was expected of it, and was elastically
+stretched over the cheek-bones.
+
+“Well, I'm listening!” jerked out the man abruptly. “You knew our game
+at Skarbolov's was queered. You got the 'seven-three-nine,' didn't you?”
+
+“Yes, of course, I got it,” answered Rhoda Gray. “What about it?”
+
+“For two weeks now, yes, more than two weeks”--the man's voice rasped
+angrily--“things have been going wrong, and some one has been butting in
+and getting away with the goods under our noses. We know now, from last
+night, that it must have been the White Moll, for one, though it's not
+likely she worked all alone. Skeeny dropped to the fact that the police
+were wise about Skarbolov's, and that's why we called it off, and the
+'seven-three-nine' went out. They must have got wise through shadowing
+the White Moll. See? Then they pinch her, but she makes her get-away,
+and comes here, and, if the dope I've got is right, you hand Rough
+Rorke one, and help her to beat it again. It looks blamed funny--doesn't
+it?--when you come to consider that there's a leak somewhere!”
+
+“Is that so!” Rhoda Gray flashed back. “And did you know before last
+night that it was the White Moll who was queering our game?”
+
+“If I had,” the man gritted between his teeth, “I'd--”
+
+“Well, then, how did you expect me to know it?” demanded Rhoda Gray
+heatedly. “And if the White Moll happens to know Gypsy Nan, as she knows
+everybody else through her jellies and custards and fake charity, and
+happens to be near here when she gets into trouble, and beats it for
+here with the police on her heels, and asks for help, what do you expect
+Gypsy Nan's going to do if she wants to stand any chance of sticking
+around these parts--as Gypsy Nan?”
+
+The man paused in his walk, and, jerking back his hat, drew his hand
+nervously across his forehead.
+
+“You make me tired!” said Rhoda Gray wearily. “Do you think you could
+find the door without too much trouble?”
+
+Danglar resumed his pacing back and forth, but more slowly now.
+
+“Oh, I know! I know, Bertha!” he burst out heavily. “I'm talking through
+my hat. You've got the roughest job of any of us, old girl. Don't mind
+what I'm saying. Something's badly wrong, and I'm half crazy. It's
+certain now that the White Moll's the one that's been doing us, and what
+I really came down here for to-night was to tell you that your job from
+now on was to get the White Moll. You helped her last night. She doesn't
+know you are anybody but Gypsy Nan, and so you're the one person in New
+York she'll dare try to communicate with sooner or later. Understand?
+That's what I came for, not to talk like a fool--but that fellow I found
+here started me off. Who is he? What did he want?”
+
+“He wanted the White Moll, too,” said Rhoda Gray, with a short laugh.
+
+“Oh, he did, eh!” Danglar's lips twisted into a sudden, merciless smile.
+“Well, go on! Who is he?”
+
+“I don't know who he is,” Rhoda Gray answered a little impatiently. “He
+said he was an adventurer--if you can make anything out of that. He said
+he got the White Moll away from Rough Rorke last night, after Rorke had
+arrested her; and then he doped the rest out the same as you have--that
+he could find the White Moll again through Gypsy Nan. I don't know what
+he wanted her for.”
+
+“That's better!” snarled Danglar, the merciless smile still on his lips.
+“I thought she must have had a pal, and we know now who her pal is. It's
+open and shut that she's sitting so tight she hasn't been able to get
+into touch with him, and that's what's worrying Mr. Adventurer.”
+
+Rhoda Gray, save for a nod of her head, made no answer.
+
+Danglar laughed suddenly, as though in relief; then, coming closer to
+the bed, plunged his hand into his coat pocket, and tossed handful of
+jewelry carelessly into Rhoda Gray's lap.
+
+“I feel better than I did!” he said, and laughed again. “It's a cinch
+now that we'll get them both through you, and it s a cinch that the
+White Moll won't cut in to-night. Put those sparklers away with the rest
+until we get ready to 'fence' them.”
+
+Rhoda Gray did not speak. Mechanically, as though she were living
+through some hideous nightmare, she began to scoop up the gems from her
+lap and allow them to trickle back through her fingers. They flashed and
+scintillated brilliantly, even in the meager light. They seemed alive
+with some premonitory, baleful fire.
+
+“Yes, there's some pretty slick stuff there,” said Danglar, with an
+appraising chuckle; “but there'll be something to-night that'll make all
+that bunch look like chicken-feed. The boys are at work now, and we'll
+have old Hayden-Bond's necklace in another hour. Skeeny's got the
+Sparrow tied up in the old room behind Shluker's place, and once we're
+sure there's no back-fire anywhere, the Sparrow will chirp his last
+chirp.” He laughed out suddenly, and, leaning forward, clapped Rhoda
+Gray exultantly on the shoulder. “It was like taking candy from
+a kid! The Sparrow and the old man fell for the sick-mother,
+needing-her-son-all-night stuff without batting a lid; but the Sparrow
+hasn't been holding the old lady's hand at the bedside yet. We took care
+of that.”
+
+Again Rhoda Gray made no comment. She wondered, as she gripped at the
+rings and brooches in hand, so fiercely that the settings pricked into
+the flesh, if her face mirrored in any way the cold, sick misery that
+had suddenly taken possession of her soul. The Sparrow! She knew the
+Sparrow; she knew the Sparrow's sick mother. That part of it was true.
+The Sparrow did have an old mother who was sick. A fine old lady--finer
+than the son--Finch, her name was. Indirectly, she knew old Hayden-Bond,
+the millionaire, and--Almost subconsciously she was aware that Danglar
+was speaking again.
+
+“I guess luck's breaking our way again,” he grinned. “The old boy paid
+a hundred thousand cold for that necklace. You know how long we've been
+waiting to get our hooks on it, and we've never had our eyes off his
+house for two months. Well, it pays to wait, and it pays to do things
+right. It broke our way at last to-night, all right, all right! To-day's
+Saturday--and the safety deposit vaults aren't open on Sunday. Mrs.
+Hayden-Bond's been away all week visiting, but she comes back to-morrow,
+and there's some swell society fuss fixed for to-morrow night, and she
+wants her necklace to make a splurge, so she writes Mr. H-hyphen-B, and
+out it comes from the safety deposit vault, and into the library safe.
+The old man isn't long on social stunts, and he's got pretty well set
+in his habits; one of those must-have-nine-hours'-sleep bugs, and he's
+always in bed by ten--when his wife'll let him. She being away to-night,
+the boys were able to get to work early. They ought to be able to crack
+that box without making any noise about it in an hour and a half at the
+outside.” He pulled out his watch-and whistled low under his breath.
+“It's a quarter after eleven now,” he said hurriedly, and moved abruptly
+toward the door. “I can't stick around here any longer. I've got to be
+on deck where they can slip me the 'white ones,' and then there's
+Skeeny waiting for the word to bump off the Sparrow.” He jerked his hand
+suddenly toward the jewels in her lap. “Salt those away before any more
+adventurers blow in!” he said, half sharply, half jocularly. “And don't
+let the White Moll slip you--at any cost. Remember! She's bound to come
+to you again. Play her--and send out the call. You understand, don't
+you? There's never been a yip out of the police. Our methods are too
+good for that. Look at the Sparrow to-night. Where there's no chance
+taken of suspicion going anywhere except where we lead it, there's
+no chance of any trouble--for us! But this cursed she-fiend's another
+story. We're not planting plum trees for her to pick any more of the
+fruit. Understand?”
+
+She answered him mechanically.
+
+“Yes,” she said.
+
+“All right, then; that end of it is up to you,” he said significantly.
+“You're clever, clever as the devil, Bertha. Use your brains now--we
+need 'em. Good-night, old girl. See you later.”
+
+“Good-night,” said Rhoda Gray dully.
+
+The door closed. The short, ladder-like steps to the hallway below
+creaked once, and then all was still. Danglar did have on rubber-soled
+shoes. She sat upright, her hands, clenched now, pressed hard against
+her throbbing temples. It wasn't true! None of this was true--this
+hovel of a place, those jewels glinting like evil eyes in her lap; her
+existence itself wasn't true; it was only her brain now, sick like her
+soul, that conjured up these ugly phantoms with horrible, plausible
+ingenuity. And then an inner voice seemed to answer her with a calmness
+that was hideous in its finality. It was true. All of it was true.
+Those words of Danglar, and their bald meaning, were true. Men did such
+things; men made in the image of their Maker did such things. They were
+going to kill a man to-night--an innocent man whom they had made their
+pawn.
+
+She swept the jewels from her lap to the blanket, and rising, seized the
+candle, went to the door, looked out, and, holding the candle high above
+her head, peered down the stairs. Yes, he was gone. There was no one
+there.
+
+She locked the door again, returned to the bed, set the candle down upon
+the chair, and stood there, her face white and drawn, staring with wide,
+tormented eyes about her. Murder. Danglar had spoken of it with inhuman
+callousness--and had laughed at it. They were going to take a man's
+life. And there was only herself, already driven to extremity, already
+with her own back against the wall in an effort to save herself, only
+herself to carry the burden of the responsibility of doing something-to
+save a man's life.
+
+It seemed to plumb the depths of irony and mockery. She could not make
+a move as Gypsy Nan. It would only result in their turning upon her, of
+the discovery that she was not Gypsy Nan at all, of the almost certainty
+that it would cost her her own life without saving the Sparrow's. That
+way was closed to her from the start. As the White Moll, then? Outside
+there in the great city, every plain-clothes man, every policeman on
+every beat, was staring into every woman's face he met--searching for
+the White Moll.
+
+She wrung her hands in cruel desperation. Even to her own problem she
+had found no solution, though she had wrestled with it all last night,
+and all through the day; no solution save the negative one of clinging
+to this one refuge that remained to her, such as it was, temporarily.
+She had found no solution to that; what solution was there to this! She
+had thought of leaving the city as Gypsy Nan, and then somewhere far
+away, of sloughing off the character of Gypsy Nan, and of resuming her
+own personality again under an assumed name. But that would have meant
+the loss of everything she had in life, her little patrimony, the
+irredeemable stamp of shame upon the name she once had owned; and also
+the constant fear and dread that at any moment the police net, wide as
+the continent was wide, would close around her, as, sooner or later, it
+was almost inevitable that it would close around her. It had seemed that
+her only chance was to keep on striving to play the role of Gypsy Nan,
+because it was these associates of Gypsy Nan who were at the bottom of
+the crime of which she, Rhoda Gray, was held guilty, and because there
+was always the hope that in this way, through confidences to a supposed
+confederate, she could find the evidence that would convict those
+actually guilty, and so prove her own innocence. But in holding to
+the role of Gypsy Nan for the purpose of receiving those criminal
+confidences, she had not thought of this--that upon her would rest the
+moral responsibility of other crimes of which she would have knowledge,
+and, least of all, that she should be faced with what lay before her
+now, to-night, at the first contact with those who had been Gypsy Nan's
+confederates.
+
+What was she to do? Upon her, and upon her alone, depended a man's life,
+and, adding to her distraction, she knew the man--the Sparrow, who had
+already done time; that was the vile ingenuity of it all. And there
+would le corroborative evidence, of course; they would have seen to
+that. If the Sparrow disappeared and was never heard of again, even a
+child would deduce the assumption that the proceeds of the robbery had
+disappeared with him.
+
+Her brain seemed to grow panicky. She was standing here helplessly. And
+time, the one precious ally that she possessed, was slipping away from
+her. She could not go to the police as Gypsy Nan--and, much less, as
+the White Moll! She could not go to the police in any case, for the
+“corroborative” evidence, that obviously must exist, unless Danglar and
+those with him were fools, would indubitably damn the Sparrow to another
+prison term, even supposing that through the intervention of the police
+his life were saved. What was she to do?
+
+And then, for a moment, her eyes lighted in relief. The Adventurer!
+She thrust her hand into the pocket of her skirt, and drew out the torn
+piece of paper, and studied the telephone number upon it--and slowly the
+hurt and misery came back into her eyes again. Who was he? He had told
+her. An adventurer. He had given her to understand that he, if she had
+not been just a few minutes ahead of him, would have taken that money
+from Skarbolov's escritoire last night. Therefore he was a crook.
+Danglar had said that some one had been getting in ahead of them lately
+and snatching the plunder from under their noses; and Danglar now
+believed that it had been the White Moll. A wan smile came to her lips.
+Instead of the White Moll, it appeared to be quite obvious that it was
+the Adventurer. It therefore appeared to be quite as obvious that the
+man was a professional thief, and an extremely clever one, at that. She
+dared not trust him. To enlist his aid she would have to explain
+the gang's plot; and while the Adventurer might go to the Sparrow's
+assistance, he might also be very much more interested in the diamond
+necklace that was involved, and not be entirely averse to Danglar's plan
+of using the Sparrow as a pawn, who, in that case, would make a very
+convenient scapegoat for the Adventurer--instead of Danglar! She dared
+not trust the man. She could not absolve her conscience by staking
+another's life on a hazard, on the supposition that the Adventurer might
+do this or that. It was not good enough.
+
+She was quick in her movements now. Subconsciously her decision had been
+made. There was only one way--only one. She gathered up the jewels from
+the bed and thrust them, with the Adventurer's torn piece of paper, into
+her pocket. And now she reached for the little notebook that she had
+hidden under the blanket. It contained the gang's secret code, and she
+had found it in the cash box in Gypsy Nan's strange hiding place that
+evening. Half running now, carrying the candle, she started toward the
+lower end of the attic, where the roof sloped down to little more
+than shoulder high. “Seven-Three-Nine!” Danglar had almost decoded the
+message word for word in the course of his conversation. In the little
+notebook, set against the figures, were the words: “Danger. The game
+is off. Make no further move.” It was only one of many, that arbitrary
+arrangement of figures, each combination having its own special
+significance; but, besides these, there was the key to a complete
+cipher into which any message might be coded, and--But why was her brain
+swerving off at inconsequential tangents? What did a coder or code book,
+matter at the present moment?
+
+She was standing under the narrow trap-door in the low ceiling now, and
+now she pushed it up, and lifting the candle through the opening, set it
+down on the inner surface of the ceiling, which, like some vast shelf,
+Gypsy Nan had metamorphosed into that exhaustive storehouse of edibles,
+of plunder--a curious and sinister collection that was eloquent of a
+gauntlet long flung down against the law. She emptied the pocket of her
+skirt, retaining only the revolver, and substituted the articles she had
+removed with the tin box that contained the dark compound Gypsy Nan, and
+she herself, as Gypsy Nan, had used to rob her face of youthfulness, and
+give it the grimy, dissolute and haggard aspect which was so simple and
+yet so efficient a disguise.
+
+She worked rapidly now, changing her clothes. She could not go, or act,
+as Gypsy Nan; and so she must go in her own character, go as the White
+Moll--because that was the lesser danger, the one that held the only
+promise of success. There wasn't any other way. She could not very well
+refuse to risk her capture by the police, could she, when by so doing
+she might save another's life? She could not balance in cowardly
+selfishness the possibility of a prison term for herself, hideous as
+that might be, against the penalty of death that the Sparrow would pay
+if she remained inactive. But she could not leave here as the White
+Moll. Somewhere, somewhere out in the night, somewhere away from this
+garret where all connection with it was severed, she must complete the
+transformation from Gypsy Nan to the White Moll. She could only prepare
+for that now as best she could.
+
+And there was not a moment to lose. The thought made her frantic. Over
+her own clothes she put on again Gypsy Nan's greasy skirt, and drew on
+again, over her own silk ones, Gypsy Nan's coarse stockings. She put on
+Gypsy Nan's heavy and disreputable boots, and threw the old shawl again
+over her head and shoulders. And then, with her hat--for the small shape
+of which she breathed a prayer of thankfulness!--and her own shoes under
+her arm and covered by the shawl, she took the candle again, closed the
+trap-door, and stepped over to the washstand. Here, she dampened a
+rag, that did duty as a facecloth, and thrust it into her pocket; then,
+blowing out the candle, she groped her way to the door, locked it behind
+her, and without any attempt at secrecy made her way downstairs.
+
+
+
+
+VI. THE RENDEZVOUS
+
+Rhoda Gray's movements were a little unsteady as she stepped out on
+the sidewalk. Gypsy Nan's accepted inebriety was not without its
+compensation. It enabled her, as she swayed for a moment, to scrutinize
+the street in all directions. Were any of Rough Rorke's men watching the
+house? She did not know; she only knew that as far as she had been
+able to discover, she had not been followed when she had gone out that
+afternoon. Up the street, to her right, there were a few pedestrians; to
+her left, as far as the corner, the block was clear. She turned in the
+latter direction. She had noticed that afternoon that there was a lane
+between Gypsy Nan's house and the corner; she gained this and slipped
+into it unobserved.
+
+And now, in the comparative darkness, she hurried her steps. Somewhere
+here in the lane she would make the transformation from Gypsy Nan to the
+White Moll complete; it required only some place in which she could with
+safety leave the garments that she discarded, and--Yes, this would do! A
+tumble-down old shed, its battered door half open, ample proof that the
+place was in disuse, intersected the line of high board fence on her
+right.
+
+She stole inside. It was utterly dark, but she had no need for light.
+It was a matter of perhaps three minutes; and then, the revolver
+transferred to the pocket of her jacket, the stains removed from her
+face by the aid of the damp cloth, her hands neatly gloved in black
+kid, the skirt, boots, stockings, shawl, spectacles and wig of Gypsy Nan
+carefully piled together and hidden in a hole under the rotting boards
+of the floor, behind the door, she emerged as the White Moll, and went
+on again.
+
+But at the end of the lane, where it met a cross street, and the street
+lamp flung out an ominous challenge, and, dim though it was, seemed to
+glare with the brightness of daylight, she faltered for a moment and
+drew back. She knew where Shluker's place was, because she knew, as few
+knew it, every nook and cranny in the East Side, and it was a long way
+to that old junk shop, almost over to the East River, and--and there
+would be lights like this one here that barred her exit from the lane,
+thousands of them, lights all the way, and--and out there they were
+searching everywhere, pitilessly, for the White Moll.
+
+And then, with her lips tightened, the straight little shoulders thrown
+resolutely back, she slipped from the lane to the sidewalk, and, hugging
+the shadows of the buildings, started forward.
+
+She was alert now in mind and body, every faculty strained and in
+tension. It was a long way, and it would take a great while--by wide
+detours, by lanes and alleyways, for only on those streets that were
+relatively deserted and poorly lighted would she dare trust herself to
+the open. And as she went along, now skirting the side of a street, now
+through some black courtyard, now forced to take a fence, and taking it
+with the agility born of the open, athletic life she had led with her
+father in the mining camps of South America, now hiding at the mouth
+of a lane waiting her chance to cross an intersecting street when
+some receding footstep should have died away, the terror of delay
+came gripping at her heart with an icy clutch, submerging the fear of
+personal peril in the agony of dread that, with her progress so slow,
+she would, after all, be too late. And at times she almost cried out in
+her vexation and despair, as once, when crouched behind a door-stoop,
+a policeman, not two yards from her, stood and twirled his night stick
+under the street lamp while the minutes sped and raced themselves away.
+
+When she could run, she ran until it seemed her lungs must burst, but
+it was slow progress at best, and always the terror grew upon her. Had
+Danglar met the men yet who had looted the millionaire's safe? Had he
+already joined Skeeny in that old room behind Shluker's place? Had the
+Sparrow--She would not let her mind frame that question in concrete
+words. The Sparrow! His real name was Martin, Martin Finch--Marty,
+for short. Times without number she had visited the sick and widowed
+mother--while the Sparrow had served a two-years' sentence for his first
+conviction in safe-breaking. The Sparrow, from a first-class chauffeur
+mechanic, had showed signs of becoming a first-class cracksman, it was
+true; but the Sparrow was young, and she had never believed that he was
+inherently bad. Her opinion had been confirmed when, some six months
+ago, on his release, listening both to her own pleadings and to those of
+his mother, the Sparrow had sworn that he would stick to the “straight
+and narrow.” And Hayden-Bond, the millionaire, referred to by a good
+many people as eccentric, had further proved his claims to eccentricity
+in the eyes of a good many people by giving a prison bird a chance to
+make an honest living, and had engaged the Sparrow as his chauffeur. It
+was a vile and an abominable thing that they were doing, even if they
+had not planned to culminate it with murder. What chance would the
+Sparrow have had!
+
+It had taken a long time. She did not know how long, as, at last, she
+stole unnoticed into a black and narrow driveway that led in, between
+two blocks of down-at-the-heels tenements, to a courtyard in the rear.
+Shluker had his junk shop here. Her lips pursed up as though defiant of
+a tinge of perplexity that had suddenly taken possession of her. She did
+not know Shluker, or anything about Shluker's place except its locality;
+but surely “the old room behind Shluker's” was direction enough,
+and--She had just emerged from the end of the driveway now, and now,
+startled, she turned her head quickly, as she heard a brisk step turning
+in from the street behind her. But in the darkness she could see no one,
+and satisfied, therefore, that she in turn had not been seen, she moved
+swiftly to one side, and crouched down against the rear wall of one of
+the tenements. A long moment, that seemed an eternity, passed, and
+then a man's form came out from the driveway, and started across the
+courtyard.
+
+She drew in her breath sharply, a curious mingling of relief and a
+sudden panic fear upon her. It was not so dark in the courtyard as it
+had been in the driveway, and, unless she were strangely mistaken that
+form out there was Danglar's. She watched him as he headed toward a
+small building that loomed up like a black, irregular shadow across
+the courtyard, and which was Shluker's shop--watched him in a tense,
+fascinated way. She was in time, then--only--only somehow now her limbs
+seemed to have become weak and powerless. It seemed suddenly as though
+she craved with all her soul the protecting shadows of the tenement,
+and that every impulse bade her cling there, flattened against the wall,
+until she could make her escape. She was afraid now; she shrank from the
+next step. It wasn't illogical. She had set out with a purpose in
+view, and she had not been blind to the danger that she ran, but the
+prospective and mental encounter with danger did not hold the terror
+that the tangible, concrete and actual presence of that peril did--and
+that was Danglar there.
+
+She felt her face whiten, and she felt the tremor of her lips, tightly
+as they were drawn together. Yes, she was afraid, afraid in every fiber
+of her being, but there was a difference, wasn't there, between being
+afraid and being a coward? Her small, gloved hands clenched, her lips
+parted slightly. She laughed a little now, low, without mirth. Upon what
+she did or did not do, upon the margin between fear and cowardice as
+applied to herself, there hung a man's life. Danglar was disappearing
+around the side of Shluker's shop. She moved out from the wall, and
+swiftly, silently, crossed the courtyard, gained the side of the junk
+shop in turn, skirted it, and halted, listening, peering around her,
+as she reached the rear corner of the building. A door closed somewhere
+ahead of her; from above, upstairs, faint streaks of light showed
+through the interstices of a shuttered window.
+
+She crept forward now, hugging the rear wall, reached a door-the one,
+obviously, through which Danglar had disappeared, and which she
+had heard as it was closed--tried the door, found it unlocked, and,
+noiselessly, inch by inch, pushed it open; and a moment later, stepping
+over the threshold, she closed it softly behind her. A dull glow of
+light, emanating evidently from an open door above, disclosed the upper
+portion of a stairway over on her left, but apart from that the place
+was in blackness, and save that she knew, of course, she was in the rear
+of Shluker's junk shop, she could form no idea of her surroundings.
+But she could, at last, hear. Voices, one of which she recognized as
+Danglar's, though she could not distinguish the words, reached her from
+upstairs.
+
+Slowly, with infinite care, she crossed to the stairs, and on hands and
+knees now, lest she should make a sound, began to crawl upward. And a
+little way up, panic fear seized upon her again, and her heart stood
+still, and she turned a miserable face in the darkness back toward the
+door below, and fought against the impulse to retreat again.
+
+And then she heard Danglar speak, and from her new vantage point his
+words came to her distinctly this time:
+
+“Good work, Skeeny! You've got the Sparrow nicely trussed up, I see.
+Well, he'll do as he is for a while there. I told the boys to hold off a
+bit. It's safer to wait an hour or two yet, before moving him away from
+here and bumping him off.”
+
+“Two jobs instead of one!” a surly voice answered. “We might just as
+well have finished him and slipped him away for keeps when we first got
+our hooks on him.”
+
+“Got a little sick of your wood-carving, while you stuck around by your
+lonesome and watched him--eh?” Danglar's tones were jocularly facetious.
+“Don't grouch, Skeeny! We're not killing for fun--it doesn't pay.
+Supposing anything had broken wrong up the Avenue--eh? We wouldn't have
+had our friend the Sparrow there for the next time we tried it!”
+
+There was something abhorrently callous in the laugh that followed. It
+seemed to fan into flame a smoldering fire of passionate anger in Rhoda
+Gray's soul. And before it panic fled. Her hand felt upward for the next
+stair-tread, and she crept on again, as a face seemed to rise before
+her--not the Sparrow's face--a woman's face. It was a face that was
+crowned with very thin white hair, and its eyes were the saddest she had
+ever seen, and yet they were brave, steady old eyes that had not lost
+their faith; nor had the old, care-lined face itself, in spite of
+suffering, lost its gentleness and sweetness. And then suddenly it
+seemed to change, that face, and become wreathed in smiles, and happy
+tears to run coursing down the wrinkled cheeks. Yes, she remembered! It
+had brought the tears to her own eyes. It was the night that the wayward
+Sparrow, home from the penitentiary, on his knees, his head buried in
+his mother's lap, had sworn that he would go straight.
+
+Fear! It seemed as though she never had known, never could know
+fear--that only a merciless, tigerish, unbridled fury had her in its
+thrall. And she went on up, step after step, as Danglar spoke again:
+
+“There's nothing to it! The Sparrow there fell for the telephone when
+Stevie played the doctor. And old Hayden-Bond of course grants his
+prison-bird chauffeur's request to spend the night with his mother, who
+the doctor says is taken worse, because the old guy knows there is a
+mother who really is sick. Only Mr. Hayden-Bond, and the police with
+him, will maybe figure it a little differently in the morning when they
+find the safe looted, and that the Sparrow, instead of ever going near
+the poor old dame, has flown the coop and can't be found. And in case
+there's any lingering doubt in their minds, that piece of paper with the
+grease-smudges and the Sparrow's greasy finger-prints on it, that you
+remember we copped a few days ago in the garage, will set them straight.
+The Cricket slipped it in among the papers he pulled out of the safe
+and tossed around on the floor. It looks as though a tool had been wiped
+with it while the safe was being cracked, and that it got covered over
+by the stuff that was emptied out, and had been forgotten. I guess they
+won't be long in comparing the finger-prints with the ones the Sparrow
+kindly left with them when they measured him for his striped suit the
+time they sent him up the river--eh?”
+
+Rhoda Gray could see now. Her eyes were on a level with the landing, and
+diagonally across from the head of the stairs was the open doorway of a
+lighted room. She could not see all of the interior, but she could see
+quite enough. Two men sat, side face to her, one at each end of a rough,
+deal table--Danglar, and an ugly, pock-marked, unshaven man, in a peaked
+cap that was drawn down over his eyes, who whittled at a stick with a
+huge jack-knife. The latter was Skeeny, obviously; and the jack-knife
+and the stick, quite as obviously, explained Danglar's facetious
+reference to wood-carving. And then her eyes shifted, and widened as
+they rested on a huddled form that she could see by looking under and
+beyond the table, and that lay sprawled out against the far wall of the
+room.
+
+Skeeny pushed the peak of his cap back with the point of his
+knife-blade.
+
+“What's the haul size up at?” he demanded. “Anything in the safe besides
+the shiners?”
+
+“A few hundred dollars,” Danglar replied. “I don't know exactly how
+much. I told the Cricket to divide it up among the boys who did the
+rough work. That's good enough, isn't it, Skeeny? It gives you a little
+extra. You'll get yours.”
+
+Skeeny grunted compliance.
+
+“Well, let's have a look at the white ones, then,” he said.
+
+Rhoda Gray was standing upright in the little hallway now, and now,
+pressed close against the wall, she edged toward the door-jamb. And a
+queer, grim little smile came and twisted the sensitive lips, as she
+drew her revolver from her pocket. The merciless, pitiless way in which
+the newspapers had flayed the White Moll was not, after all, to be
+wholly regretted! The cool, clever resourcefulness, the years of
+reckless daring attributed to the White Moll, would stand her in good
+stead now. Everybody on the East Side knew her by sight. These men knew
+her. It was not merely a woman ambitiously attempting to beard two men
+who, perhaps, holding her sex in contempt in an adventure of this
+kind, might throw discretion to the winds and give scant respect to her
+revolver, for behind the muzzle of that revolver was the reputation of
+the White Moll. They would take her at face value--as one who not only
+knew how to use that revolver, but as one who would not hesitate an
+instant to do so.
+
+From the room she heard Skeeny whistle low under his breath, as though
+in sudden and amazed delight--and then she was standing full in the open
+doorway, and her revolver in her outflung, gloved hand covered the two
+men at the table.
+
+There was a startled cry from Skeeny, a scintillating flash of light as
+a magnificent string of diamonds fell from his hand to the table. But
+Danglar did not move or speak; only his lips twitched, and a queer
+whiteness came and spread itself over his face.
+
+“Put up your hands-both of you!” she ordered, in a low, tense voice.
+
+It was Skeeny who spoke, as both men obeyed her. “The White Moll, so
+help me!” he mumbled, and swallowed hard.
+
+Danglar's eyes never seemed to leave her face, and they narrowed now,
+full of hatred and a fury that lie made no attempt to conceal. She
+smiled at him coldly. She quite understood! He had already complained
+that evening that the White Moll for the last few weeks had been robbing
+them of the fruits of their laboriously planned schemes. And now-again!
+Well, she would not dispel his illusion! He had given the White Moll
+that role--and it was the safest role to play.
+
+She stepped forward now, and with her free hand suddenly pulled the
+table toward her out of their reach; and then, as she picked up the
+necklace, she appeared for the first time to become aware of the
+presence of the huddled form on the floor near the wall. She could see
+that the Sparrow was bound and gagged, and as he squirmed now he turned
+his face toward her.
+
+“Why, it's the Sparrow, isn't it?” she exclaimed sharply; then, evenly,
+to the two men: “I had no idea you were so hospitable! Push your chairs
+closer together--with your feet, not your hands! You are easier to watch
+if you are not too far apart.”
+
+Dangler complied sullenly. Skeeny, over the scraping of his chair legs,
+cursed in a sort of unnerved abandon, as he obeyed her.
+
+“Thank you!” said Rhoda Gray pleasantly--and calmly tucked the necklace
+into her bodice.
+
+The act seemed to rouse Danglar to the last pitch of fury. The blood
+rushed in an angry tide to his face, and, suffusing, purpled his cheeks.
+
+“This isn't the first crack you've made!” he flung out hoarsely. “You've
+been getting wise to a whole lot lately somehow, you and that dude pal
+of yours, but you'll pay for it, you female devil! Understand? By God,
+you'll pay for it! I promise you that you'll pray yet on your bended
+knees for the chance to take your own life! Do you hear?”
+
+“I hear,” said Rhoda Gray coldly.
+
+She picked up the jack-knife from the table, and keeping both men
+covered, stepped backward to the wall. Here, kneeling, she reached
+behind her with her left hand, and felt for, and cut the heavy cord that
+bound the Sparrow's arms; then, pushing the knife into the Sparrow's
+hands that he might free himself from the rest of his bonds, she stood
+up again.
+
+A moment more, and the Sparrow, rubbing the circulation back into his
+wrists, stood beside her. There was a look on the young, white face that
+was not good to see. He circled dry lips with the tip of his tongue and
+then his thumb began to feel over the blade of the big jack-knife in a
+sort of horribly supercritical appraisal of its edge. He spoke thickly
+for the gag that had been in his mouth.
+
+“You dirty skates!” he whispered. “You were going to bump me off, were
+you? You planted me cold, did you? Oh, hell!” His laugh, like the laugh
+of one insane, jangling, discordant, rang through the room. “Well,
+it's my turn now, and”--his body was coiling itself in a slow, curious,
+almost snake-like fashion--“and you'll--”
+
+Rhoda Gray laid her hand on the Sparrow's arm.
+
+“Not that way, Marty,” she said quietly. She smiled thinly at Danglar,
+who, with genuinely frightened eyes now, seemed fascinated by the
+Sparrow's movements. “I wouldn't care to have anything happen to Mr.
+Danglar--yet. He has been invaluable to me, and I am sure he will be
+again.”
+
+The Sparrow brushed his hands across his eyes, and stared at her. He
+licked his lips again. He appeared to be obsessed with the knife-blade
+in his hand--dazed in a strange way to all else.
+
+“There's enough cord there for both of them,” said Rhoda Gray crisply.
+“Tie them in their chairs, Marty.”
+
+For a moment the Sparrow hesitated; and then, with a sort of queer
+reluctancy, he dropped the knife on the table, and went and picked up
+the strands of cord from the floor.
+
+No one spoke. The Sparrow, with twitching lips as he worked, and worked
+not gently, bound first Danglar and then Skeeny to their respective
+chairs. Skeeny for the most part kept his eyes on the floor, casting
+only furtive glances at Rhoda Gray's revolver muzzle. But Danglar was
+smiling now. He had very white teeth. There was something of primal,
+insensate fury in the hard-drawn, parted lips. Somehow he seemed to
+remind Rhoda Gray of a beast, stung to madness, but impotent behind the
+bars of its cage, as it showed its fangs.
+
+“We'll go now, Marty,” she said softly, as the Sparrow finished.
+
+She motioned the Sparrow with an imperious little nod of her head to the
+door. And then, following the other, she backed to the door herself, and
+halted an instant on the threshold.
+
+“It has been a very profitable evening, Mr. Danglar,” she said coolly.
+“I have you to thank for it. When your friends come, which I think I
+heard you say would be in another hour or so, I hope you will not fail
+to convey to them my--”
+
+“You she-fiend!” Danglar had found his voice again. “You'll crawl for
+this! Do you understand? and I'll show you inside of twenty-four hours
+what you're up against, you--you--” His voice broke in its fury. The
+veins were standing out on the side of his neck like whipcords. He could
+just move his forearms a little, and his hands reached out toward her,
+curved like claws. “I'll--”
+
+But Rhoda Gray had closed the door behind her, and, with the Sparrow,
+was retreating down the stairs.
+
+
+
+
+VII. FELLOW THIEVES
+
+Reaching the courtyard, Rhoda Gray led the way without a word through
+the driveway, and finding the street clear, hurried on rapidly. Her
+mind, strangely stimulated, was working in quick, incisive flashes.
+Her work was not yet done. The Sparrow was safe, as far as his life was
+concerned; but her possession of even the necklace would not save the
+Sparrow from the law. There was the money that was gone from the safe.
+She could not recover that, but--yes, dimly, she began to see a way. She
+swerved suddenly from the sidewalk as she came to an alleyway--which had
+been her objective--and drew the Sparrow in with her out of sight of the
+street.
+
+The Sparrow gripped at her hand.
+
+“The White Moll!” he whispered brokenly. “God bless the White Moll! I
+ain't had a chance to say it before. You saved my life, and I--I--”
+
+In the semi-darkness she leaned forward and laid her fingers gently over
+the Sparrow's lips.
+
+“And there's no time to say it now, Marty,” she said quickly. “You are
+not out of this yet.”
+
+He swept his hand across his eyes.
+
+“I know it,” he said. “I got to get those shiners back up there somehow,
+and I got to get that paper they planted on me.”
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“Even that wouldn't clear you,” she said. “The safe has been looted of
+money, as well; and you can't replace that. Even with only the money
+gone, who would they first naturally suspect? You are known as a
+safe-breaker; you have served a term for it. You asked for a night off
+to stay with your mother who is sick. You left Mr. Hayden-Bond's, we'll
+say, at seven or eight o'clock. It's after midnight now. How long would
+it take them to find out that between eight and midnight you had not
+only never been near your mother, but could not prove an alibi of any
+sort? If you told the truth it would sound absurd. No one in their sober
+senses would believe you.”
+
+The Sparrow looked at her miserably.
+
+“My God!” he faltered. He wet his lips. “That's true.”
+
+“Marty,” she said quietly, “did you read in the papers that I had been
+arrested last night for theft, caught with the goods on me, but had
+escaped?”
+
+The Sparrow hesitated.
+
+“Yes, I did,” he said. And then, earnestly: “But I don't believe it!”
+
+“It was true, though, Marty--all except that I wasn't a thief,” she said
+as quietly as before. “What I want to know is, in spite of that, would
+you trust me with what is left to be done to-night, if I tell you that I
+believe I can get you out of this?”
+
+“Sure, I would!” he said simply. “I don't know how you got wise about
+all this, or how you got to know about that necklace, but any of our
+crowd would trust you to the limit. Sure, I'd trust you! You bet your
+life!”
+
+“Thank you, Marty,” she said. “Well, then, how do you get into Mr.
+Hayden-Bond's house when, for instance, you are out late at night?”
+
+“I've got a key to the garage,” he answered. “The garage is attached to
+the house, though it opens on the side street.”
+
+She held Out her hand.
+
+The Sparrow fished in his pocket, and extended the key without
+hesitation.
+
+“It's for the small door, of course,” he explained.
+
+“You haven't got a flashlight, I suppose?” she smiled.
+
+“Sure! There's plenty of 'em! Each car's got one with its tools under
+the back seat.”
+
+She nodded.
+
+“And now, the library,” she said. “What part of the house is it in? How
+is it situated?”
+
+“It's on the ground floor at the back,” he told her. “The little short
+passage from the garage opens on the kitchen, then the pantry, and then
+there's a little cross hallway, and the dining-room is on the left, and
+the library on the right. But ain't I going with you?”
+
+She shook her head again.
+
+“You're going home, Marty--after you've sent me a taxicab. If you were
+seen in that neighborhood now, let alone by any chance seen in the
+house, nothing could save you. You understand that, don't you? Now,
+listen! Find a taxi, and send it here. Tell the chauffeur to pick me up,
+and drive me to the corner of the cross street, one block in the rear of
+Mr. Hayden-Bond's residence. Don't mention Hayden-Bond's name. Give the
+chauffeur simply street directions. Be careful that he is some one who
+doesn't know you. Tell him he will be well paid--and give him this to
+begin with.” She thrust a banknote into the Sparrow's hand. “You're sure
+to find one at some all-night cabaret around here. And remember,
+when you go home afterward, not a word to your mother! And not a word
+to-morrow, or ever-to any one! You've simply done as you told your
+employer you were going to do--spent the night at home.”
+
+“But you,” he burst out, and his words choked a little. “I--I can't let
+you go, and--”
+
+“You said you would trust me, Marty,” she said. “And if you want to help
+me, as well, don't waste another moment. I shall need every second I
+have got. Quick! Hurry!”
+
+“But--”
+
+She pushed him toward the street.
+
+“Run!” she said tensely. “Hurry, Marty, hurry!”
+
+She drew back into the shadows. She was alone now. The Sparrow's racing
+footsteps died away on the pavement. Her mind reverted to the plan
+that she had dimly conceived. It became detailed, concrete now, as the
+minutes passed. And then she heard a car coming along the previously
+deserted street, and she stepped out on the sidewalk. It was the taxi.
+
+“You know where to go, don't you?” she said to the chauffeur, as the cab
+drew up at the curb, and the man leaned out and opened the door.
+
+“Yes'm,” he said.
+
+“Please drive fast, then,” she said, as she stepped in.
+
+The taxi shot out from the curb, and rattled forward at a rapid pace.
+Rhoda Gray settled back on the cushions. A half whimsical, half weary
+little smile touched her lips. It was much easier, and infinitely safer,
+this mode of travel, than that of her earlier experience that evening;
+but, earlier that evening, she had had no one to go to a cab rank
+for her, and she had not dared to appear in the open and hail one for
+herself. The smile vanished, and the lips became, pursed and grim. Her
+mind was back on that daring, and perhaps a little dangerous, plan, that
+she meant to put into execution. Block after block was traversed. It
+was a long way uptown, but the chauffeur's initial and generous tip was
+bearing fruit. The man was losing no time.
+
+Rhoda Gray calculated that they had been a little under half an hour in
+making the trip, when the taxi finally drew up and stopped at a corner,
+and the chauffeur, again leaning out, opened the door.
+
+“Wait for me,” she instructed, and handed the man another tip--and, with
+a glance about her to get her location, she hurried around the corner,
+and headed up the cross street.
+
+She had only a block now to go to reach the Hayden-Bond mansion on the
+corner of Fifth Avenue ahead--less than that to reach the garage,
+which opened on the cross street here. She had little fear of personal
+identification now. Here in this residential section and at this hour of
+night, it was like a silent and deserted city; even Fifth Avenue, just
+ahead, for all its lights, was one of the loneliest places at this hour
+in all New York. True, now and then, a car might race up or down the
+great thoroughfare, or a belated pedestrian's footsteps ring and echo
+hollow on the pavement, where but a few hours before the traffic-squad
+struggled valiantly, and sometimes vainly, with the congestion--but that
+was all.
+
+She could make out the Hayden-Bond mansion on the corner ahead of her
+now, and now she was abreast of the rather ornate and attached little
+building, that was obviously the garage. She drew the key from her
+pocket, and glanced around her. There was no one in sight. She stepped
+swiftly to the small door that flanked the big double ones where the
+cars went in and out, opened it, closed it behind her, and locked it.
+
+For a moment, her eyes unaccustomed to the darkness, she could see
+nothing; and then a car, taking the form of a grotesque, looming shadow,
+showed in front of her. She moved toward it, felt her way into
+the tonneau, lifted up the back seat, and, groping around, found a
+flashlight. She meant to hurry now. She did not mean to let that nervous
+dread, that fear, that was quickening her pulse now, have time to get
+the better of her. She located the door that led to the house, and in
+another moment, the short passage behind her, she was in the kitchen,
+the flashlight winking cautiously around her. She paused to listen here.
+There was not a sound.
+
+She went on again--through a swinging pantry door with extreme care, and
+into a small hall. “On the right,” the Sparrow had said. Yes, here
+it was; a door that opened on the rear of the library, evidently. She
+listened again. There was no sound--save the silence, that seemed to
+grow loud now, and palpitate, and make great noises. And now, in spite
+of herself, her breath was coming in quick, hard little catches, and the
+flashlight's ray, that she sent around her, wavered and was not steady.
+She bit her lips, as she switched off the light. Why should she be
+afraid of this, when in another five minutes she meant to invite
+attention!
+
+She pushed the door in front of her open, found it hung with a heavy
+portiere inside, brushed the portiere aside, stepped through into the
+room, stood still and motionless to listen once more, and then the
+flashlight circled inquisitively about her.
+
+It was the library. Her eyes widened a little. At her left, over against
+the wall, the mangled door of a safe stood wide open, and the floor for
+a radius of yards around was littered with papers and documents. The
+flashlight's ray lifted, and she followed it with her eyes as it made
+the circuit of the walls. Opposite the safe, and quite near the doorway
+in which she stood, was a window recess, portiered; diagonally across
+from her was another door that led, presumably, into the main hall
+of the house; the walls were tapestried, and hung here and there with
+clusters of ancient trophies, great metal shields, and swords, and
+curious arms, that gave a sort of barbaric splendor to the luxurious
+furnishings of the apartment.
+
+She worked quickly now. In a moment she was at the window portieres,
+and, drawing these aside, she quietly raised the window, and looked out.
+The window was on the side of the house away from the cross street, and
+she nodded her head reassuringly to herself as she noted that it gave on
+a narrow strip of grass, it could not be called lawn, that separated the
+Hayden-Bond mansion from the house next door; that the window was little
+more than shoulder-high from the ground; and that the Avenue was within
+easy and inviting reach along that little strip of grass between the two
+houses.
+
+She left the window open, and retraced her steps across the room, going
+now to the littered mass of papers on the floor near the safe. She began
+to search carefully amongst them. She smiled a little curiously as
+she came across the plush-lined jeweler's case that had contained the
+necklace, and which had evidently been contemptuously discarded by the
+Cricket and his confederates; but it took her longer to find the paper
+for which she was searching. And then she came upon it--a grease-smeared
+advertisement for some automobile appliances, a well-defined greasy
+finger-print at one edge--and thrust the paper into her pocket.
+
+And now suddenly her heartbeat began to quicken again until its thumping
+became tumultuous. She was ready now. She looked around her, using
+the flashlight, and her eyes rested appraisingly on one of the great
+clusters of shields and arms that hung low down on the wall between the
+window and the door by which she had entered. Yes, that would do. Her
+lips tightened. It would have been so easy if there had not been that
+cash to account for! She could replace the necklace, but she could not
+replace the cash--and one, as far as the Sparrow was concerned, was as
+bad as the other. But there was a way, and it was simple enough. She
+whispered to herself that it was not, after all, very dangerous, that
+the cards were all in her own hands. She had only to pull down those
+shields with a clatter to the floor, which would arouse some one of the
+household, and as that some one reached the library door and opened
+it, she would be disappearing through the window, and the necklace, as
+though it had slipped from her pocket or grasp in her wild effort to
+escape, would be lying behind her on the floor. They would see that
+it was not the Sparrow; and there would be no question as to where the
+money was gone, since the money had not been dropped. There was the
+interval, of course, that must elapse between the accident that knocked
+the shields from the wall and the time it would take any of the inmates
+to reach the library, an interval in which a thief might reasonably be
+expected to have had time enough to get away without being seen; but
+the possibility that she had not fully accomplished her ends when the
+accident occurred, and that she had stayed to make frantic and desperate
+efforts to do so right up to the last moment, would account for that.
+
+She moved now to an electric-light switch, and turned on the light.
+They must be able to see beyond any question of doubt that the person
+escaping through the window was not the Sparrow. What was she afraid of
+now, just at the last! There was an actual physical discomfort in the
+furious thumping of that cowardly little heart of hers. It was the only
+way. And it was worth it. And it was not so very dangerous. People,
+aroused out of bed, could not follow her in their night clothes; and in
+a matter of but a few minutes, before the police notified by telephone
+could become a factor in the affair, she would have run the block down
+the Avenue, and then the other block down the cross street, then back to
+the taxi, and be whirling safely downtown.
+
+Yes, she was ready! She nodded her head sharply, as though in imperative
+self-command, and running back, her footfalls soundless on the rich,
+heavy rug, she picked up the plush-lined necklace case. She dropped this
+again, open, on the floor, halfway between the safe and the window. With
+the case apparently burst open as it fell, and the necklace also on the
+floor, the stage would be set! She felt inside her bodice, drew out the
+necklace--and as she stood there holding it, and as it caught the light
+and flashed back its fire and life from a thousand facets, a numbness
+seemed to come stealing over her, and a horror, and a great fear, and a
+dismay that robbed her of power of movement until it seemed that she was
+rooted to the spot, and a low, gasping cry came from her lips. Her eyes,
+wide with their alarm, were fixed on the window. There was a man's
+face there, just above the sill--and now a man's form swung through the
+window, and dropped lightly to the floor inside the room. And she stared
+in horrified fascination, and could not move. It was the Adventurer.
+
+“It's Miss Gray, isn't it? The White Moll?” he murmured amiably. “I've
+been trying to find you all night. What corking luck! You remember me,
+don't you? Last night, you know.”
+
+She did not answer. His eyes had shifted from her face to the glittering
+river of gems in her hand.
+
+“I see,” he smiled, “that you are ahead of me again. Well, it is the
+fortune of war, Miss Gray. I do not complain.”
+
+She found her voice at last; and, quick as a flash, as he advanced a
+step, she dropped the necklace into her pocket, and her revolver was in
+her hand.
+
+“W--what are you doing here?” she whispered.
+
+He shrugged his shoulders expressively.
+
+“I take it that we are both in the same boat,” he said pleasantly.
+
+“In the same boat?” she echoed dully. She remembered his conversation
+with her a few hours ago, when he had believed he was talking to Gypsy
+Nan. And now he stood before her for the second time a self-confessed
+thief. In the same boat-fellow-thieves! A certain cold composure came to
+her. “You mean you came to steal this necklace? Well, you shall not have
+it! And, furthermore, you have no right to class me with yourself as a
+thief.”
+
+He had a whimsical and very engaging smile. His eyebrows lifted.
+
+“Miss Gray perhaps forgets last night,” he suggested.
+
+“No, I do not forget last night,” she said slowly, “And I do not forget
+that I owe you very much for what you did. And that is one reason why I
+warn you at once that, as far as the necklace is concerned, it will
+do you no good to build any hopes on the supposition that we are
+fellow-thieves, and that I am likely either to part with it, or, through
+gratitude, share it. In spite of appearances last night, I was not a
+thief.”
+
+“And to-night, Miss Gray--in spite of appearances?” he challenged.
+
+He was regarding her with eyes that, while they appraised shrewdly,
+held a lurking hint of irony in their depths. And somehow, suddenly,
+self-proclaimed crook though she held him to be, she found herself
+seized with an absurd, unreasonable, but nevertheless passionate, desire
+to make good her words.
+
+“Yes, and to-night, too!” she asserted. “I did not steal this necklace.
+I--never mind how--I--I got it. It was planned to put the theft on an
+innocent man's shoulders. I was trying to thwart that plan. Whether you
+believe me or not, I did not come here to steal the necklace; I came
+here to return it.”
+
+“Quite so! Of course!” acknowledged the Adventurer softly. “I am afraid
+I interrupted you, then, in the act of returning it. Might I suggest,
+therefore, Miss Gray, that as it's a bit dangerous to linger around here
+unnecessarily, you carry out your intentions with all possible haste,
+and get away.”
+
+“And you?” she queried evenly.
+
+“Myself, of course, as well.” He shrugged his shoulders philosophically.
+“Under the circumstances, as a gentleman--will you let me say I prefer
+that word to the one I know you are substituting for it--what else can I
+do?”
+
+She bit her lips. Was he mocking her? The gray eyes were inscrutable
+now.
+
+“Then please do not let me detain you!” she said sharply. “And in my
+turn, let me advise you to go at once. I intend to knock one of
+those shields down from the wall before I go, in order to arouse the
+household. I will, however, in part payment for last night, allow you
+three full minutes from the time you climb out of that window, so that
+you may have ample time to get away.”
+
+He stared at her in frank bewilderment.
+
+“Good Lord!” he gasped. “You--you're joking, Miss Gray.”
+
+“No, I am not,” she replied coolly. “Far from it! There was money stolen
+that I cannot replace, and the theft of the money would be put upon
+the same innocent shoulders. I see no other way than the one I have
+mentioned. If whoever runs into this room is permitted to get a glimpse
+of me, and is given the impression that the necklace, which I shall
+leave on the floor, was dropped in my haste, the supposition remains
+that, at least, I got away with the money. I am certainly not the
+innocent man who has been used as the pawn; and if I am recognized as
+the White Moll, what does it matter--after last night?”
+
+He took a step toward her impetuously--and stopped quite as impetuously.
+Her revolver had swung to a level with his head.
+
+“Pardon me!” he said.
+
+“Not at all!” she said caustically.
+
+For the first time, as she watched him warily, the Adventurer appeared
+to lose some of his self-assurance. He shifted a little uneasily on
+his feet, and the corners of his eyes puckered into a nest of perturbed
+wrinkles.
+
+“I say, Miss Gray, you can't mean this!” he protested. “You're not
+serious!”
+
+“I have told you that I am,” she answered steadily. “Those three minutes
+that I gave you are going fast.”
+
+“Then look here!” he exclaimed earnestly. “I'll tell you something. I
+said I had been trying to find you to-night. It was the truth. I went to
+Gypsy Nan's--and might have been spared my pains. I told her about last
+night, and that I knew you were in danger, and that I wanted to help
+you. I mention this so that you will understand that I am not just
+speaking on the spur of the moment, now that I have an opportunity of
+repeating that offer in person.”
+
+She looked at him impassively for a moment. He had neglected to state
+that he had also told Gypsy Nan he desired to enter into a partnership
+with her--in crime.
+
+“It is very kind of you,” she said sweetly. “I presume, then, that you
+have some suggestion to make?”
+
+“Only what any--may I say it?--gentleman would suggest under the
+circumstances. It is far too dangerous a thing for a woman to attempt;
+it would be much less dangerous for me. I realize that you are in
+earnest now, and I will agree to carry out your plan in every detail
+once I am satisfied that you are safely away.”
+
+“The idea being,” she observed monotonously, “that, being safely away,
+and the necklace being left safely on the floor, you are left safely in
+possession of--the necklace. Well, my answer is--no!”
+
+His face hardened a little.
+
+“I'm sorry, then,” he said. “For in that case, in so far as your project
+is concerned, I, too, must say--no!”
+
+It was an impasse. She studied his face, the strong jaw set a little
+now, the lips molded in sterner lines, and for all her outward show of
+composure, she knew a sick dismay. And for a moment she neither moved
+nor spoke. What he would do next, she did not know; but she knew
+quite well that he had not the slightest intention of leaving her here
+undisturbed to carry out her plan, unless--unless, somehow, she could
+outwit him. She bit her lips again. And then inspiration came. She
+turned, and with a sudden leap gained the wall, and the next instant,
+holding him back with her revolver as she reached up with her left hand,
+she caught at the great metal shield with its encircling cluster of
+small arms, and wrenched it from its fastenings. It crashed to the floor
+with a din infernal that, in the night silence, went racketing through
+the house like the reverberations of an explosion.
+
+“My God, what have you done!” he cried out hoarsely.
+
+“What I said I'd do!” she answered. She was white-faced, frightened at
+her own act, fighting to maintain her nerve. “You'll go now, I imagine!”
+ she flung at him passionately. “You haven't much time.”
+
+“No!” he said. His composure was instantly at command again. “No,”
+ he repeated steadily; “not until after you have gone. I
+refuse--positively--to let you run any such risk as that. It is far too
+dangerous.”
+
+“Yes, you will!” she burst out wildly. “You will! You must! You shall!
+I--I--” The house itself seemed suddenly to have awakened. From above
+doors opened and closed. Indistinctly there came the sound of a voice.
+She clenched her hand in anguished desperation. “Go, you--you coward!”
+ she whispered frantically.
+
+“Miss Gray, for God's sake, do as I tell you!” he said between his
+teeth. “You don't realize the danger. It's not the pursuit. They are not
+coming down here unarmed after that racket. I know that you came in by
+that door there. Go out that way. I will play the game for you. I swear
+it!”
+
+There were footsteps, plainly audible now, out in the main hall.
+
+“Quick!” he urged. “Are we both to be caught? See!” He backed suddenly
+toward the window.
+
+“See! I am too far away now to touch that necklace before they get here.
+Throw it down, and get behind the portiere of the rear door!”
+
+Mechanically she was retreating. They were almost at the other door now,
+those footsteps outside in the main hall. With a backward spring she
+reached the portiere. The door handle across the room rattled. She
+glanced at the Adventurer. He was close to the window. It was true,
+he could not get the necklace and at the same time hope to escape. She
+whipped it from her pocket, tossed it from her to the floor near the
+plush-lined case--and slipped behind the portiere.
+
+The door opposite to her was wrenched violently open. She could
+see through the corner of the portiere. There was a sharp, excited
+exclamation, as a gray-haired man, in pajamas, evidently Mr. Hayden-Bond
+himself, sprang into the room. He was followed by another man in equal
+dishabille.
+
+And the Adventurer was leaping for the window.
+
+There was a blinding flash, the roar of a report, as the millionaire
+flung up a revolver and fired; it was echoed by the splatter and tinkle
+of falling glass. The Adventurer was astride the window sill now, his
+face deliberately and unmistakably in view.
+
+“A foot too high, and a bit to the right!” said the Adventurer
+debonairly--and the window sill was empty.
+
+Rhoda Gray stole silently through the doorway behind her. She could hear
+the millionaire and his companion, the butler, probably, rush across the
+library to the window. As she gained the pantry, she heard another shot.
+Tight-lipped, using her flashlight, she ran through the kitchen. In a
+moment more, she was standing at the garage door, listening, peering
+furtively outside. The street itself was empty; there were shouts,
+though, from the direction of the Avenue. She stepped out on the side
+street, and walking composedly that she might not attract attention,
+though very impulse urged her to run with frantic haste, she reached the
+corner and the waiting taxicab. She gave the chauffeur an address that
+would bring her to the street in the rear of Gypsy Nan's and within
+reach of the lane where she had left her clothes, and, with an
+injunction to hurry, sprang into the cab.
+
+And then for a long time she sat there with her hands tightly clasped in
+her lap. Her mind, her brain, her very soul itself seemed in chaos and
+turmoil. There was the Sparrow, who was safe; and Danglar, who would
+move heaven and hell to get her now; and the Adventurer, who--Her mind
+seemed to grope around in cycles; it seemed to moil on and on and arrive
+at nothing. The Adventurer had played the game--perhaps because he had
+had to; but he had not risked that revolver shot in her stead because
+he had had to. Who was he? How had he come there? How had he found her
+there? How had he known that she had entered by that rear door behind
+the portiere? She remembered how that he had offered not a single
+explanation.
+
+Almost mechanically she dismissed the taxi when at last it stopped;
+and almost mechanically, as Gypsy Nan, some ten minutes later, she let
+herself into the garret, and lighted the candle. She was conscious, as
+she hid the White Moll's clothes away, that she was thankful she had
+regained in safety even the questionable sanctuary of this wretched
+place; but, strangely, thoughts of her own peril seemed somehow to be
+temporarily relegated to the background.
+
+She flung herself down on the bed--it was not Gypsy Nan's habit to
+undress--and blew out the light. But she could not sleep. And hour after
+hour in the darkness she tossed unrestfully. It was very strange! It
+was not as it had been last night. It was not the impotent, frantic
+rebellion against the horrors of her own situation, nor the fear and
+terror of it, that obsessed her to-night. It was the Adventurer who
+plagued her.
+
+
+
+
+VIII. THE CODE MESSAGE
+
+It was strange! Most strange! Three days had passed, and to Gypsy Nan's
+lodging no one had come. The small crack under the partition that had
+been impressed into service as a letter-box had remained empty. There
+had been no messages--nothing--only a sinister, brooding isolation.
+Since the night Rhoda Gray had left Danglar, balked, almost a madman in
+his fury, in the little room over Shluker's junk shop, Danglar had not
+been seen--nor the Adventurer--nor even Rough Rorke. Her only visitant
+since then had been an ugly premonition of impending peril, which came
+and stalked like a hideous ghost about the bare and miserable garret,
+and which woke her at night with its whispering voice--which was the
+voice of intuition.
+
+Rhoda Gray drew her shawl closer around her shoulders and shivered, as
+now, from shuffling down the block in the guise of Gypsy Nan, she halted
+before the street door of what fate, for the moment, had thrust upon her
+as a home; and shivered again, as, with abhorrence, she pushed the door
+open and stepped forward into the black, unlighted hallway. Soul, mind
+and body were in revolt to-night. Even faith, the simple faith in God
+that she had known since childhood, was wavering. There seemed nothing
+but horror around her, a mental horror, a physical horror; and the sole
+means of even momentary relief and surcease from it had been a pitiful
+prowling around the streets, where even the fresh air seemed to be
+denied to her, for it was tainted with the smells of squalor that ruled,
+rampant, in that neighborhood.
+
+And to-night, stronger than ever, intuition and premonition of
+approaching danger lay heavy upon her, and oppressed her with a sense of
+nearness. She was not a coward; but she was afraid. Danglar would leave
+no stone unturned to get the White Moll. He had said so. She remembered
+the threat he had made--it had lived in her woman's soul ever since that
+night. Better anything than to fall into Danglar's hands! She caught her
+breath a little, and shivered again as she groped her way up the dark
+stairs. But, then, she never would fall into Danglar's power. There was
+always an alternative. Yes, it was quite as bad as that--death at her
+own hands was preferable. Balked, outwitted, the plans of the criminal
+coterie, of which Danglar appeared to be the head, rendered again and
+again abortive, and believing it all due to the White Moll, all of
+Danglar's shrewd, unscrupulous cunning would be centered on the task
+of running her down; and if, added to this, he discovered that she
+was masquerading as Gypsy Nan, one of their own inner circle, it mean
+that--She closed her lips in a hard, tight line. She did not want
+to think of it. She had fought all day, and the days before, against
+thinking about it, but premonition had crept upon her stronger and
+stronger, until to-night, now, it seemed as though her mind could dwell
+on nothing else.
+
+On the landing, she paused suddenly and listened. The street door had
+opened and closed, and now a footstep sounded on the stairs behind her.
+She went on again along the hall, feeling her way; and reaching the
+short, ladder-like steps to the garret, she began to mount them. Who
+was it there behind her? One of the unknown lodgers on the lower floor,
+or--? She could not see, of course. It was pitch black. But she could
+hear. And as she knelt now on the narrow landing, and felt with her
+fingers along the floor for the aperture, where, imitating the custom
+of Gypsy Nan, she had left her key when she went out, she heard the
+footsteps coming steadily on, passing the doors below her, and making
+toward the garret ladder. And then, stifling a startled little cry, her
+hand closed on the key, and closed, as it had closed on that first night
+when she had returned here in the role of Gypsy Nan, on a piece of
+paper wrapped around the key. The days of isolation were ended with
+climacteric effect; the pendulum had swung full the other way--to-night
+there was both a visitor and a message!
+
+The paper detached from the key and thrust into her bodice, she stood up
+quickly. A form, looming up even in the darkness, showed on the garret
+stairs. “Who's dere?” she croaked.
+
+“It's all right,” a voice answered in low tones. “You were just ahead of
+me on the street. I saw you come in. It's Pierre.”
+
+Pierre! So that was his name! It was only the voice she recognized.
+Pierre--Danglar! She fumbled for the keyhole, found it, and inserted the
+key. “Well, how's Bertha to-night?”
+
+There seemed to be a strange exhilaration in the man's voice. He was
+standing beside her now, close beside her, and now his hand played with
+a curiously caressing motion on her shoulder. The touch seemed to scorch
+and burn her. Who was this Danglar, who was Pierre to her, and to whom
+she was Bertha? Her breath came quickly in spite of herself; there came,
+too, a frenzy of aversion, and impulsively she flung his hand away, and
+with the door unlocked now, stepped from him into the garret.
+
+“Feeling a bit off color, eh?” he said with a short laugh, as he
+followed her, and shut the door behind him. “Well, I don't know as I
+blame you. But, look here, old girl, have a heart! It's not my fault.
+I know what you're grouching about--it's because I haven't been around
+much lately. But you ought to know well enough that I couldn't help it.
+Our game has been crimped lately at every turn by that she-devil, the
+White Moll, and that dude pal of hers.” He laughed out again--in
+savage menace now. “I've been busy. Understand, Bertha? It was either
+ourselves, or them. We've got to go under--or they have. And we won't! I
+promise you that! Things'll break a little better before long, and I'll
+make it up to you.”
+
+She could not see him in the blackness of the garret. She breathed a
+prayer of gratitude that he could not see her. Her face, in spite of
+Gipsy Nan's disguising grime, must be white, white as death itself. It
+seemed to plumb some infamous depth from which her soul recoiled, this
+apology of his for his neglect of her. And then her hands at her
+sides curled into tight-clenched little fists as she strove to control
+herself. His words, at least, supplied her with her cue.
+
+“Of course!” she said tartly, but in perfect English--the vernacular of
+Gypsy Nan was not for Danglar, for she remembered only too well how
+once before it had nearly tripped her up. “But you didn't come here to
+apologize! What is it you want?”
+
+“Ah, I say, Bertha!” he said appeasingly. “Cut that out! I couldn't help
+being away, I tell you. Of course, I didn't come here to apologize--I
+thought you'd understand well enough without that. The gang's out of
+cash, and I came to tap the reserves. Let me have a package of the long
+green, Bertha.”
+
+It was a moment before she spoke. Her woman's instinct prompted her to
+let down the bars between them in no single degree, that her protection
+lay in playing up to the full what Danglar, jumping at conclusions, had
+assumed was a grouch at his neglect. Also, her mind worked quickly.
+Her own clothes were no longer in the secret hiding place here in
+the garret; they were out there in that old shed in the lane. It was
+perfectly safe, then, to let Danglar go to the hiding place himself,
+assuming that he knew where it was--which, almost of necessity, he must.
+
+“Oh!” she said ungraciously. “Well, you know where it is, don't you?
+Suppose you go and get it yourself!”
+
+“All right!” returned Danglar, a sullenness creeping into his voice.
+“Have it your own way, Bertha! I haven't got time to-night to coax
+you out of your tantrums. That's what you want, but I haven't got
+time--to-night.”
+
+She did not answer.
+
+A match crackled in Danglar's hand; the flames spurted up through the
+darkness. Danglar made his way over to the rickety washstand, found the
+candle that was stuck in the neck of the gin bottle, lighted it, held
+the candle above his head, and stared around the garret.
+
+“Why the devil don't you get another lamp?” he grumbled--and started
+toward the rear of the garret.
+
+Rhoda Gray watched him silently. She did not care to explain that she
+had not replaced the lamp for the very simple reason that it gave far
+too much light here in the garret to be safe--for her! She watched him,
+with her hand in the pocket of her greasy skirt clutched around another
+legacy of Gypsy Nan--her revolver. And now she became conscious that
+from the moment she had entered the garret, her fingers, hidden in that
+pocket, had sought and clung to the weapon. The man filled her with
+detestation and fear; and somehow she feared him more now in what he was
+trying to make an ingratiating mood, than she had feared him in the full
+flood of his rage and anger that other night at Shluker's place.
+
+She drew back a little toward the cot bed against the wall, drew back to
+give him free passage to the door when he should return again, her eyes
+still holding on the far end of the garret, where, with the slope of the
+roof, the ceiling was no more than shoulder high. There seemed something
+horribly weird and grotesque in the scene before her. He had pushed the
+narrow trap-door in the ceiling upward, and had thrust candle and
+head through the opening, and the faint yellow light, seeping back and
+downward in flickering, uncertain rays, suggested the impression of
+a gruesome, headless figure standing there hazily outlined in the
+surrounding murk. It chilled her; she clutched at her shawl, drew it
+more closely about her, and edged still nearer to the wall.
+
+And then Danglar closed the trap-door again, and came back with the
+candle in one hand, and one of the bulky packages of banknotes from the
+hiding place in the other. He set the candle down on the washstand, and
+began to distribute the money through his various pockets.
+
+He was smiling with curious complacency.
+
+“It was your job to play the spider to the White Moll if she ever showed
+up again here in your parlor,” he said. “Maybe somebody tipped her off
+to keep away, maybe she was too wily; but, anyway, since you have not
+sent out any word, it is evident that our little plans along that
+line didn't work, since she has failed to come back to pay a call of
+gratitude to you. I don't suppose there's anything to add to that, eh,
+Bertha? No report to make?”
+
+“No,” said Rhoda Gray shortly. “I haven't any report to make.”
+
+“Well, no matter!” said Danglar. He laughed out shortly. “There are
+other ways! She's had her fling at our expense; it's her turn to pay
+now.” He laughed again--and in the laugh now there was something
+both brutal in its menace, and sinister in its suggestion of gloating
+triumph.
+
+“What do you mean?” demanded Rhoda Gray quickly. “What are you going to
+do?”
+
+“Get her!” said Danglar. The man's passion flamed up suddenly; he spoke
+through his closed teeth. “Get her! I made her a little promise. I'm
+going to keep it! Understand?”
+
+“You've been saying that for quite a long time,” retorted Rhoda Gray
+coolly. “But the 'getting' has been all the other way so far. How are
+you going to get her?”
+
+Danglar's little black eyes narrowed, and he thrust his head forward and
+out from his shoulders savagely. In the flickering candle light, with
+contorted face and snarling lips, he looked again the beast to which she
+had once likened him.
+
+“Never mind how I'm going to get her!” he flung out, with an oath. “I
+told you I'd been busy. That's enough! You'll see--”
+
+Rhoda Gray, in the semi-darkness, shrugged her shoulders. Was the man,
+prompted by rage and fury, simply making wild threats, or had he at last
+some definite and perhaps infallible plan that he purposed putting into
+operation? She did not know; and, much as it meant to her, she did
+not dare take the risk of arousing suspicion by pressing the question.
+Failing, then, to obtain any intimation of what he meant to do, the next
+thing most to be desired was to get rid of him.
+
+“You've got the money. That's what you came for, wasn't it?” she
+suggested coldly.
+
+He stared at her for a moment, and then his face gradually lost its
+scowl.
+
+“You're a rare one, Bertha!” he exclaimed admiringly. “Yes; I've got the
+money--and I'm going. In fact, I'm in a hurry, so don't worry! You got
+the dope, like everybody else, for to-night, didn't you? It was sent out
+two hours ago.”
+
+The dope! It puzzled her for the fraction of a second--and then she
+remembered the paper she had thrust into the bodice of her dress. She
+had not read it. She lunged a little in the dark.
+
+“Yes,” she said curtly.
+
+“All right!” he said-and moved toward the door. “That explains why I'm
+in a hurry--and why I can't stop to oil that grouch out of you. But I'll
+keep my promise to you, too, old girl. I'll make up the last few days to
+you. Have a heart, eh, Bertha! 'Night!”
+
+She did not answer him. It seemed as though an unutterable dread had
+suddenly been lifted from her, as he passed out of the door and began
+to descend the steps to the hall below. Her “grouch,” he had called
+it. Well, it had served its purpose! It was just as well that he should
+think so! She followed to the door, and deliberately slammed it with a
+bang. And from below, his laugh, more an amused chuckle, echoed back and
+answered her.
+
+And then, for a long time she stood there by the door, a little weak
+with the revulsion of relief upon her, her hands pressed hard against
+her temples, staring unseeingly about the garret. He was gone. He filled
+her with terror. Every instinct she possessed, every fiber of her being
+revolted against him. He was gone. Yes, he was gone--for the time being.
+But--but what was the end of all this to be?
+
+She shook her head after a moment, shook it helplessly and wearily, as,
+finally, she walked over to the washstand, took the piece of paper from
+the bodice of her dress, and spread it out under the candle light. A
+glance showed her that it was in cipher. There was the stub of a pencil,
+she remembered, in the washstand drawer, and, armed with this, and a
+piece of wrapping paper that had once enveloped one of Gypsy Nan's gin
+bottles, she took up the candle, crossed the garret, and sat down on the
+edge of the cot, placing the candle on the chair in front of her.
+
+If the last three days had been productive of nothing else, they had at
+least furnished her with the opportunity of studying the notebook she
+had found in the secret hiding place, and of making herself conversant
+with the gang's cipher; and she now set to work upon it. It was a
+numerical cipher. Each letter of the alphabet in regular rotation was
+represented by its corresponding numeral; a zero was employed to set off
+one letter from another, and the addition of the numerals between the
+zeros indicated the number of the letter involved. Also, there being but
+twenty-six letters in the alphabet, it was obvious that the addition of
+three nines, which was twenty-seven, could not represent any letter,
+and the combination of 999 was therefore used to precede any of the
+arbitrary groups of numerals which were employed to express phrases and
+sentences, such as the 739 that she had found scrawled on the piece of
+paper around her key on the first night she had come here, and which,
+had it been embodied in a message and not preceded by the 999, would
+have meant simply the addition of seven, three and nine, that is,
+nineteen--and therefore would indicate the nineteenth letter of the
+alphabet, S.
+
+Rhoda Gray copied the first line of the message on the piece of wrapping
+paper:
+
+   321010333203202306663103330111102210444202101112052110761
+
+
+Adding the numerals between the zeros, and giving to each its
+corresponding letter, she set down the result:
+
+             6010110505022090405014030509014
+             f a  k e e  v i d e  n c e i  n
+
+It was then but a matter of grouping the letters into words; and,
+decoded, the first line read:
+
+             Fake evidence in......
+
+She worked steadily on. It was a lengthy message, and it took her a long
+time. It was an hour, perhaps more, after Danglar had gone, before she
+had completed her task; and then, after that, she sat for still a long
+time staring, not at the paper on the chair before her, but at the
+flickering shadows thrown by the candle on the opposite wall.
+
+Queer and strange were the undercurrents and the cross-sections of
+life that were to be found, amazingly contradictory, amazingly
+incomprehensible, once one scratched beneath the surface of the poverty
+and the squalor, and, yes, the crime, amongst the hiving thousands of
+New York's East Side! In the days--not so very long ago--when, as
+the White Moll, she had worked amongst these classes, she had on one
+occasion, when he was sick, even kept old Viner in food. She had not, at
+the time, failed to realize that the man was grasping, rapacious, even
+unthankful, but she had little dreamed that he was a miser worth fifty
+thousand dollars!
+
+Her mind swerved off suddenly at a tangent. The tentacles of this crime
+octopus, of which Danglar seemed to be the head, reached far and into
+most curious places to fasten and hold and feed on the progeny of human
+foibles! She could not help wondering where the lair was from which
+emanated the efficiency and system that, as witness this code message
+to-night, kept its members, perhaps widely scattered, fully informed of
+its every movement.
+
+She shook her head. That was something she had not yet learned; but it
+was something she must learn if ever she hoped to obtain the evidence
+that would clear her of the crime that circumstances had fastened upon
+her. And yet she had made no move in that direction, because--well,
+because, so far, it had seemed all she could do to protect and safeguard
+herself in her present miserable existence and surroundings, which,
+abhorrent as they were, alone stood between her and a prison cell.
+
+Her forehead gathered into little furrows; and, reverting to the code
+message, her thoughts harked back to a well-known crime, the authorship
+of which still remained a mystery, and which had stirred the East Side
+some two years ago. A man--in the vernacular of the underworld a “stage
+hand”--by the name of Kroner, credited with having a large amount of
+cash, the proceeds of some nefarious transaction, in his possession
+on the night in question, was found murdered in his room in an old and
+tumble-down tenement of unsavory reputation. The police net had gathered
+in some of the co-tenants on suspicion; Nicky Viner, referred to in the
+code message, amongst them. But nothing had come of the investigation.
+There had been no charge of collusion between the suspects; but Perlmer,
+a shyster lawyer, had acted for them all collectively, and, one and all,
+they had been discharged. In what degree Perlmer's services had been of
+actual value had never been ascertained, for the police, through lack
+of evidence, had been obliged to drop the case; but the underworld had
+whispered to itself. There was such a thing as suppressing evidence,
+and Perlmer was known to have the cunning of a fox, and a code of morals
+that never stood in the way, or restricted him in any manner.
+
+The code message threw a new light on all this. Perlmer must have known
+that old Nicky Viner had money, for, according to the code message,
+Perlmer prepared a fake set of affidavits and forged a chain of fake
+evidence with which he had blackmailed Nicky Viner ever since; and Nicky
+Viner, known as a dissolute, shady character, innocent enough of the
+crime, but afraid because his possession of money if made public would
+tell against him, and frightened because he had already been arrested
+once on suspicion for that very crime, had whimpered--and paid. And
+then, somehow, Danglar and the gang had discovered that the old, seedy,
+stoop-shouldered, bearded, down-at-the-heels Nicky Viner was not all
+that he seemed; that he was a miser, and had a hoard of fifty thousand
+dollars--and Danglar and the gang had set out to find that hoard and
+appropriate it. Only they had not succeeded. But in their search they
+had stumbled upon Perlmer's trail, and that was the key to the plan they
+had afoot to-night. If Perlmer's fake and manufactured affidavits were
+clever enough and convincing enough to wring money out of Viner for
+Perlmer, they were more than enough to enable Danglar, employed as
+Danglar would employ them, to wring from Nicky Viner the secret of where
+the old miser hid his wealth; for Viner would understand that Danglar
+was not hampered by having to safeguard himself on account of having
+been originally connected with the case in a legal capacity, or any
+capacity, and therefore in demanding all or nothing, would have no cause
+for hesitation, failing to get what he wanted, in turning the evidence
+over to the police. In other words, where Perlmer had to play his man
+cautiously and get what he could, Danglar could go the limit and get
+all. As it stood, then, Danglar and the gang had not found out the
+location of that hoard; but they had found out where Perlmer kept his
+spurious papers--stuffed in at the back of the bottom drawer of his desk
+in his office, practically forgotten, practically useless to Perlmer
+any more, for, having once shown them to Viner, there was no occasion
+to call them into service again unless Viner showed signs of getting
+a little out of hand and it became necessary to apply the screws once
+more.
+
+For the rest, it was a very simple matter. Perlmer had an office in a
+small building on lower Sixth Avenue, and it was his custom to go to
+his office in the evenings and remain there until ten o'clock or so.
+The plan then, according to the code message, was to loot Perlmer's
+desk some time after the man had gone home for the night, and then, at
+midnight, armed with the false documents, to beard old Nicky Viner in
+his miserable quarters over on the East Side, and extort from the old
+miser the neat little sum that Danglar estimated would amount to some
+fifty thousand dollars in cash.
+
+Rhoda Gray's face was troubled and serious. She found herself wishing
+for a moment that she had never decoded the message. But she shook her
+head in sharp self-protest the next instant. True, she would have evaded
+the responsibility that the criminal knowledge now in her possession had
+brought her; but she would have done so, in that case, deliberately at
+the expense of her own self-respect. It would not have excused her
+in her own soul to have sat staring at a cipher message that she was
+satisfied was some criminal plot, and have refused to decode it simply
+because she was afraid a sense of duty would involve her in an effort to
+frustrate it. To have sat idly by under those circumstances would have
+been as reprehensible--and even more cowardly--than it would be to sit
+idly by now that she knew what was to take place. And on that latter
+score to-night there was no argument with herself. She found herself
+accepting the fact that she would act, and act promptly, as the only
+natural corollary to the fact that she was in a position to do so.
+Perhaps it was that way to-night, not only because she had on a previous
+occasion already fought this principle of duty out with herself, but
+because to-night, unlike that other night, the way and the means seemed
+to present no insurmountable difficulties, and because she was now far
+better prepared, and free from all the perplexing, though enormously
+vital, little details that had on the former occasion reared themselves
+up in mountainous aspect before her. The purchase of a heavy veil, for
+instance, the day after the Hayden-Bond affair, would enable her now to
+move about the city in the clothes of the White Moll practically at will
+and without fear of detection. And, further, the facilities for making
+that change, the change from Gypsy Nan to the White Moll, were now
+already at hand--in the little old shed down the lane.
+
+And as far as any actual danger that she might incur to-night was
+concerned, it was not great. She was not interested in the fifty
+thousand dollars in an intrinsic sense; she was interested only in
+seeing that old Nicky Viner, unappealing, yes, and almost repulsive both
+in personality and habits as the man was, was not blackmailed out of
+it; that Danglar, yes, and hereafter, Perlmer too, should not prey
+like vultures on the man, and rob him of what was rightfully his.
+If, therefore, she secured those papers from Perlmer's desk, it
+automatically put an end to Danglar's scheme to-night; and if, later,
+she saw to it that those papers came into Viner's possession, that, too,
+automatically ended Perlmer's persecutions. Indeed, there seemed little
+likelihood of any danger or risk at all. It could not be quite ten o
+clock yet; and it was not likely that whoever was delegated by Danglar
+to rob Perlmer's office would go there much before eleven anyway, since
+they would naturally allow for the possibility that Perlmer might stay
+later in his office than usual, a contingency that doubtless accounted
+for midnight being set as the hour at which they proposed to lay old
+Nicky Viner by the heels. Therefore, it seemed almost a certainty
+that she would reach there, not only first, but with ample time at her
+disposal to secure the papers and get away again without interruption.
+She might even, perhaps, reach the office before Perlmer himself had
+left--it was still quite early enough for that--but in that case she
+need only remain on watch until the lawyer had locked up and gone away.
+Nor need even the fact that the office would be locked dismay her.
+In the secret hiding-place here in the garret, among those many other
+evidences of criminal activity, was the collection of skeleton keys,
+and--she was moving swiftly around the attic now, physically as active
+as her thoughts.
+
+It was not like that other night. There were few preparations to make.
+She had only to secure the keys and a flashlight, and to take with her
+the damp cloth that would remove the grime streaks from her face, and
+the box of composition that would enable her to replace them when she
+came back--and five minutes later she was on the street, making her way
+toward the lane, and, specifically, toward the deserted shed where she
+had hidden away her own clothing.
+
+
+
+
+IX. ROOM NUMBER ELEVEN
+
+Another five minutes, and in her own personality now, a slim, trim
+figure, neatly gloved, the heavy veil affording ample protection to her
+features, Rhoda Gray emerged from the shed and the lane, and started
+rapidly toward lower Sixth Avenue. And as she walked, her mind, released
+for the moment from the consideration of her immediate venture, began
+again, as it had so many times in the last three days, its striving
+and its searching after some loophole of escape from her own desperate
+situation. But only, as it ever did, confusion came--a chaos of things,
+contributory things and circumstances, and the personalities of those
+with whom this impossible existence had thrown her into contact. Little
+by little she was becoming acquainted with the personnel of the gang--in
+an impersonal way, mostly. Apart from Danglar, there was Shluker, who
+must of necessity be one of them; and Skeeny, the man who had been with
+Danglar in Shluker's room; and the Cricket, whom she had never seen; and
+besides these, there were those who were mentioned in the cipher message
+to-night, and detailed to the performance of the various acts and scenes
+that were to lead up to the final climax--which, she supposed, was the
+object and reason for the cipher message, in order that even those not
+actually employed might be thoroughly conversant with the entire plan,
+and ready to act intelligently if called upon. For there were others, of
+course, as witness herself, or, rather, Gypsy Nan, whose personality she
+had so unwillingly usurped.
+
+It was vital, necessary, that she should know them all, and more than
+in that impersonal way, if she counted upon ever freeing herself of the
+guilt attributed to her. For she could see no other way but one--that
+of exposing and proving the guilt of this vile clique who now surrounded
+her, and who had actually instigated and planned the crime of which she
+was accused. And it was not an easy task!
+
+And then there were those outside this unholy circle who kept forcing
+their existence upon her consciousness, because they, too, played an
+intimate part in the sordid drama which revolved around her, and whose
+end she could not foresee. There was, for instance--the Adventurer. She
+drew in her breath quickly. She felt the color creep slowly upward, and
+tinge her throat and cheeks--and then the little chin, strong and firm,
+was lifted in a sort of self-defiant challenge. True, the man had been a
+great deal in her thoughts, but that was only because her curiosity was
+piqued, and because on two occasions now she had had very real cause for
+gratitude to him. If it had not been for the Adventurer, she would even
+now be behind prison bars. Why shouldn't she think of him? She was
+not an ingrate! Why shouldn't she be interested? There was something
+piquantly mysterious about the man--who called himself an adventurer.
+She would even have given a good deal to know who he really was, and how
+he, too, came to be so conversant with Danglar's plans as fast as they
+were matured, and why, on those two particular occasions, he had not
+only gone out of his way to be of service to her, but had done so at
+very grave risk to himself. Of course, she was interested in him--in
+that way. How could she help it? But in any other way--the little chin
+was still tilted defiantly upward--even the suggestion was absurd. The
+man might be chivalrous, courageous, yes, outwardly, even a gentleman in
+both manner and appearance; he might be all those things, and, indeed,
+was--but he was a thief, a professional thief and crook. It seemed
+very strange, of course; but she was judging him, not alone from the
+circumstances under which they had met and been together, but from what
+he had given her to understand about himself.
+
+The defiance went suddenly from her face; and, for a moment, her
+lips quivered a little helplessly. It was all so very strange, and so
+forbidding, and--and, perhaps she hadn't the stout heart that a man
+would have--but she did not understand, and she could not see her way
+through the darkness that was like a pall wrapped about her--and it was
+hard just to grope out amidst surroundings that revolted her and made
+her soul sick. It was hard to do this and--and still keep her courage
+and her faith.
+
+She shook her head presently as she went along, shook it reprovingly at
+herself, and the little shoulders squared resolutely back. There must
+be, and there would be, a way out of it all, and meanwhile her position,
+bad as it was, was not without, at least, a certain compensation. There
+had been the Sparrow the other night whom she had been able to save,
+and to-night there was Nicky Viner. She could not be blind to that. Who
+knew! It might be for just such very purposes that her life had been
+turned into these new channels!
+
+She looked around her sharply now. She had reached the lower section
+of Sixth Avenue. Perlmer's office, according to the address given, was
+still a little farther on. She walked briskly. It was very different
+to-night, thanks to her veil! It had been horrible that other night,
+when she had ventured out as the White Moll and had been forced to keep
+to the dark alleyways and lanes, and the unfrequented streets!
+
+And now, through a jeweler's window, she noted the time, and knew a
+further sense of relief. It was even earlier than she had imagined. It
+was not quite ten o'clock; she would, at least, be close on the heels of
+Perlmer's departure from his office, if not actually ahead of time, and
+therefore she would be first on the scene, and--yes, this was the place;
+here was Perlmer's name amongst those on the name-plate at the street
+entrance of a small three-story building.
+
+She entered the hallway, and found it deserted. It was a rather dirty
+and unkempt place, and very poorly lighted--a single incandescent alone
+burned in the hall. Perlmer's room, so the name-plate indicated, was
+Number Eleven, and on the next floor.
+
+She mounted the stairs, and paused on the landing to look around her
+again. Here, too, the hallway was lighted by but a single lamp; and
+here, too, an air of desertion was in evidence. The office tenants, it
+was fairly obvious, were not habitual night workers, for not a ray of
+light came from any of the glass-paneled doors that flanked both sides
+of the passage. She nodded her head sharply in satisfaction. It was
+equally obvious that Perlmer had already gone. It would take her but a
+moment, then, unless the skeleton keys gave her trouble. She had never
+used a key of that sort, but--She moved quietly down the hallway, and,
+looking quickly about her to assure herself again that she was not
+observed, stopped before the door of Room Number Eleven.
+
+A moment she hung there, listening; then she slipped the skeleton keys
+from her pocket, and, in the act of inserting one of them tentatively
+into the keyhole, she tried the door--and with a little gasp of surprise
+returned the keys hurriedly to her pocket. The door was unlocked; it had
+even opened an inch already under her hand.
+
+Again she looked around her, a little startled now; and instinctively
+her hand in her pocket exchanged the keys for her revolver. But she
+saw nothing, heard nothing; and it was certainly dark inside there, and
+therefore only logical to conclude that the room was unoccupied.
+
+Reassured, she pushed the door cautiously and noiselessly open, and
+stepped inside, and closed the door behind her. She stood still for an
+instant, and then the round, white ray of her flashlight went dancing
+inquisitively around the office. It was a medium-sized room, far
+from ornate in its appointments, bare floored, the furniture of the
+cheapest--Perlmer's clientele did not insist on oriental rugs and
+mahogany!
+
+Her appraisal of the room, however, was but cursory. She was interested
+only in the flat-topped desk in front of her. She stepped quickly around
+it--and stopped-and a low cry of dismay came from her as she stared at
+the floor. The lower drawer had been completely removed, and now lay
+upturned beside the swivel chair, its contents strewn around in all
+directions.
+
+And for a moment she stared at the scene, nonplused, discomfited. She
+had been so sure that she would be first--and she had not been first.
+There was no need to search amongst those papers on the floor. They told
+their own story. The ones she wanted were already gone.
+
+In a numbed way, mechanically, she retreated to the door; and, with the
+flashlight playing upon it, she noticed for the first time that the
+lock had been roughly forced. It was but corroborative of the despoiled
+drawer; and, at the same time, the obvious reason why the door had not
+been relocked when whoever had come here had gone out again.
+
+Whoever had come here! She could have laughed out hysterically. Was
+there any doubt as to who it was? One of Danglar's emissaries; the
+Cricket, perhaps-or perhaps even Danglar himself! They had seen to it
+that lack of prompt action, at least, would not be the cause of marring
+their plans.
+
+A little dazed, overwrought, confused at the ground being cut from under
+her where she had been so confident of a sure footing, she made her way
+out of the building, and to the street--and for a block walked almost
+aimlessly along. And then suddenly she turned hurriedly into a cross
+street, and headed over toward the East Side. The experience had
+not been a pleasant one, and it had upset most thoroughly all her
+calculations; but it was very far, after all, from being disastrous.
+It meant simply that she must now find Nicky Viner himself and warn
+the man, and there was ample time in which to do that. The code message
+specifically stated midnight as the hour at which they proposed to favor
+old Viner with their unhallowed attentions, and as it was but a little
+after ten now, she had nearly a full two hours in which to accomplish
+what should not take her more than a few minutes.
+
+Rhoda Gray's lips tightened a little, as she hurried along. Old Nicky
+Viner still lived in the same disreputable tenement in which he had
+lived on the night of that murder two years ago, and she could not ward
+off the thought that it had been--yes, and was--an ideal place for a
+murder, from the murderer's standpoint! The neighborhood was one of the
+toughest in New York, and the tenement itself was frankly nothing more
+than a den of crooks. True, she had visited there more than once, had
+visited Nicky Viner there; but she had gone there then as the White
+Moll, to whom even the most abandoned would have touched his cap.
+To-night it was very different--she went there as a woman. And
+yet, after all--she amended her own thoughts, smiling a little
+seriously--surely she could disclose herself as the White Moll there
+again to-night if the actual necessity arose, for surely crooks,
+pokegetters, shillabers and lags though they were, and though the place
+teemed with the dregs of the underworld, no one of them, even for the
+reward that might be offered, would inform against her to the police!
+And yet--again the mental pendulum swung the other way--she was not so
+confident of that as she would like to be. In a general way there could
+be no question but that she could count on the loyalty of those who
+lived there; but there were always those upon whom one could never
+count, those who were dead to all sense of loyalty, and alive only to
+selfish gain and interest--a human trait that, all too unfortunately,
+was not confined to those alone who lived in that shadowland outside
+the law. Her face, beneath the thick veil, relaxed a little. Well, she
+certainly did not intend to make a test case of it and disclose herself
+there as the White Moll, if she could help it! She would enter the
+tenement unnoticed if she could, and make her way to Nicky Viner's two
+miserable rooms on the second floor as secretively as she could. And,
+knowing the place as she did, she was quite satisfied that, if she
+were careful enough and cautious enough, she could both enter and leave
+without being seen by any one except, of course, Nicky Viner.
+
+She walked on quickly. Five minutes, ten minutes passed; and now, in a
+narrow street, lighted mostly by the dull, yellow glow that seeped
+up from the sidewalk through basement entrances, queer and forbidding
+portals to sinister interiors, or filtered through the dirty windows
+of uninviting little shops that ran the gamut from Chinese laundries
+to oyster dens, she halted, drawn back in the shadows of a doorway, and
+studied a tenement building that was just ahead of her. That was where
+old Nicky Viner lived. A smile of grim whimsicality touched her lips.
+Not a light showed in the place from top to bottom. From its exterior it
+might have been uninhabited, even long deserted. But to one who knew, it
+was quite the normal condition, quite what one would expect. Those who
+lived there confined their activities mostly to the night; and their
+exodus to their labors began when the labors of the world at large
+ended--with the fall of darkness.
+
+For a little while she watched the place, and kept glancing up and down
+the street; and then, seizing her opportunity when for half a block or
+more the street was free of pedestrians, she stole forward and reached
+the tenement door. It was half open, and she slipped quickly inside into
+the hall.
+
+She stood here for a moment motionless; listening, striving to
+accommodate her eyes to the darkness, and instinctively her hand went to
+her pocket for the reassuring touch of her revolver. It was black back
+there in the hallway of Gypsy Nan's lodging; she had not thought that
+any greater degree of blackness could exist; but it was blacker here.
+Only the sense of touch promised to be of any avail. If one could have
+moved as noiselessly as a shadow moves, one could have passed another
+within arm's-length unseen. And so she listened, listened intently.
+And there was very little sound. Once she detected a footstep from the
+interior of some room as it moved across a bare floor; once she heard
+a door creak somewhere upstairs; and once, from some indeterminate
+direction, she thought she heard voices whispering together for a
+moment.
+
+She moved suddenly then, abruptly, almost impulsively, but careful
+not to make the slightest noise. She dared not remain another instant
+inactive. It was what she had expected, what she had counted upon as an
+ally, this darkness, but she was not one who laughed, even in daylight,
+at its psychology. It was beginning to attack her now; her imagination
+to magnify even the actual dangers that she knew to be around her. And
+she must fight it off before it got a hold upon her, and before panic
+voices out of the blackness began to shriek and clamor in her ears, as
+she knew they would do with pitifully little provocation, urging her to
+turn and flee incontinently.
+
+The staircase, she remembered, was at her right; and feeling out before
+her with her hands, she reached the stairs, and began to mount them.
+She went slowly, very slowly. They were bare, the stairs, and unless one
+were extremely careful they would creak out through the silence with a
+noise that could be heard from top to bottom of the tenement. But she
+was not making any noise; she dared not make any noise.
+
+Halfway up she halted and pressed her body close against the wall. Was
+that somebody coming? She held her breath in expectation. There wasn't
+a sound now, but she could have sworn she had heard a footstep on the
+hallway above, or on the upper stairs. She bit her lips in vexation.
+Panic noises! That's what they were! That, and the thumping of her
+heart! Why was it that alarms and exaggerated fancies came and tried to
+unnerve her? What, after all, was there really to be afraid of? She
+had almost a clear two hours before she need even anticipate any actual
+danger here, and, if Nicky Viner were in, she would be away from the
+tenement again in another fifteen minutes at the latest.
+
+Rhoda Gray went on again, and gaining the landing, halted once more.
+And here she smiled at herself with the tolerant chiding she would have
+accorded a child that was frightened without warrant. She could account
+for those whisperings and that footstep now. The door to the left, the
+one next to Nicky Viner's squalid, two-room apartment, was evidently
+partially open, and occasionally some one moved within; and the voices
+came from there too, and, low-toned to begin with, were naturally
+muffled into whispers by the time they reached her.
+
+She had only, then, to step the five or six feet across the narrow hall
+in order to reach Nicky Viner's door, and unless by some unfortunate
+chance whoever was in that room happened to come out into the hall at
+the same moment, she would--Yes, it was all right! She was trying Nicky
+Viner's door now. It was unlocked, and as she opened it for the space of
+a crack, there showed a tiny chink of light, so faint and meager that
+it seemed to shrink timorously back again as though put to rout by the
+massed blackness--but it was enough to evidence the fact that Nicky
+Viner was at home. It was all simple enough now. Old Viner would
+undoubtedly make some exclamation at her sudden and stealthy entrance,
+but once she was inside without those in the next room either having
+heard or seen her, it would not matter.
+
+Another inch she pushed the door open, another--and then another. And
+then quickly, silently, she tip-toed over the threshold and closed the
+door softly behind her. The light came from the inner room and shone
+through the connecting door, which was open, and there was movement from
+within, and a low, growling voice, petulant, whining, as though an old
+man were mumbling complainingly to himself. She smiled coldly. It was
+very like Nicky Viner--it was a habit of his to talk to himself, she
+remembered. And, also, she had never heard Nicky Viner do anything else
+but grumble and complain.
+
+But she could not see fully into the other room, only into a corner of
+it, for the two doors were located diagonally across from one another,
+and her hand, in a startled way, went suddenly to her lips, as though
+mechanically to help choke back and stifle the almost overpowering
+impulse to cry out that arose within her. Nicky Viner was not alone in
+there! A figure had come into her line of vision in that other room,
+not Nicky Viner, not any of the gang--and she stared now in incredulous
+amazement, scarcely able to believe her eyes. And then, suddenly cool
+and self-possessed again, relieved in a curious way because the element
+of personal danger was as a consequence eliminated, she began to
+understand why she had been forestalled in her efforts at Perlmer's
+office when she had been so sure that she would be first upon the scene.
+It was not Danglar, or the Cricket, or Skeeny, or any of the band who
+had forestalled her--it was the Adventurer. That was the Adventurer
+standing in there now, side face to her, in Nicky Viner's inner room!
+
+
+
+
+X. ON THE BRINK
+
+Rhoda Gray moved quietly, inch by inch, along the side of the wall to
+gain a point of vantage more nearly opposite the lighted doorway. And
+then she stopped again. She could see quite clearly now--that is, there
+was nothing now to obstruct her view; but the light was miserable and
+poor, and the single gas-jet that wheezed and flickered did little more
+than disperse the shadows from its immediate neighborhood in that inner
+room. But she could see enough--she could see the bent and ill-clad
+figure of Nicky Viner, as she remembered him, an old, gray-bearded man,
+wringing his hands in groveling misery, while the mumbling voice, now
+whining and pleading, now servile, now plucking up courage to indulge
+in abuse, kept on without even, it seemed, a pause for breath. And she
+could see the Adventurer, quite unmoved, quite debonair, a curiously
+patient smile on his face, standing there, much nearer to her, his right
+hand in the side pocket of his coat, a somewhat significant habit of
+his, his left hand holding a sheaf of folded, legal-looking documents.
+
+And then she heard the Adventurer speak.
+
+“What a flow of words!” said the Adventurer, in a bored voice. “You will
+forgive me, my dear Mr. Viner, if I appear to be facetious, which I am
+not--but money talks.”
+
+“You are a thief, a robber!” The old gray-bearded figure rocked on its
+feet and kept wringing its hands. “Get out of here! Get out! Do you
+hear? Get out! You come to steal from a poor old man, and--”
+
+“Must we go all over that again?” interrupted the Adventurer wearily.
+“I have not come to steal anything; I have simply come to sell you these
+papers, which I am quite sure, once you control yourself and give the
+matter a little calm consideration, you are really most anxious to
+buy--at any price.
+
+“It's a lie!” the other croaked hoarsely. “Those papers are a lie! I
+am innocent. And I haven't got any money. None! I haven't any. I am
+poor--an old man--and poor.”
+
+Rhoda Gray felt the blood flush hotly to her cheeks. Somehow she could
+feel no sympathy for that cringing figure in there; but she felt a hot
+resentment toward that dapper, immaculately dressed and self-possessed
+young man, who stood there, silently now, tapping the papers with
+provoking coolness against the edge of the plain deal table in front of
+him. And somehow the resentment seemed to take a most peculiar phase.
+She resented the fact that she should feel resentment, no matter what
+the man did or said. It was as though, instead of anger, impersonal
+anger, at this low, miserable act of his, she felt ashamed of him. Her
+hand clenched fiercely as she crouched there against the wall. It wasn't
+true! She felt nothing of the sort! Why should she be ashamed of him?
+What was he to her? He was frankly a thief, wasn't he? And he was at his
+pitiful calling now--down to the lowest dregs of it. What else did she
+expect? Because he had the appearance of a gentleman, was it that her
+sense of gratitude for what she owed him had made her, deep down in her
+soul, actually cherish the belief that he really was one--made her hope
+it, and nourish that hope into belief? Tighter her hand clenched. Her
+lips parted, and her breath came in short, hard inhalations. Was it
+true? Was it all only an added misery, where it had seemed there could
+be none to add to her life in these last few days? Was it true that
+there was no price she would not have paid to have found him in any role
+but this abased one that he was playing now?
+
+The Adventurer broke the silence.
+
+“Quite so, my dear Mr. Viner!” he agreed smoothly. “It would appear,
+then, from what you say that I have been mistaken--even stupidly so, I
+am afraid. And in that case, I can only apologize for my intrusion, and,
+as you so delicately put it, get out.” He slipped the papers, with a
+philosophic shrug of his shoulders, into his inside coat pocket, and
+took a backward step toward the door. “I bid you good-night, then, Mr.
+Viner. The papers, as you state, are doubtless of no value to you, so
+you can, of course, have no objection to my handing them over to the
+police, who--”
+
+“No, no! Wait! Wait!” the other whispered wildly. “Wait!”
+
+“Ah!” murmured the Adventurer.
+
+“I--I'll”--the bent old figure was clawing at his beard--“I'll--”
+
+“Buy them?” suggested the Adventurer pleasantly.
+
+“Yes, I'll--I'll buy them. I--I've got a little money, only a little,
+all I've been able to save in years, a--a hundred dollars.
+
+“How much did you say?” inquired the Adventurer coldly.
+
+“Two hundred.” The voice was a maudlin whine.
+
+The Adventurer took another backward step toward the door.
+
+“Three hundred!”
+
+Another step.
+
+“Five--a thousand!”
+
+The Adventurer laughed suddenly.
+
+“That's better!” he said. “Where you keep a thousand, you keep the rest.
+Where is the thousand, Mr. Viner?”
+
+The bent figure hesitated a moment; and then, with what sounded like a
+despairing cry, pointed to the table.
+
+“It's there,” he whimpered. “God's curses on you, for the thief you
+are.”
+
+Rhoda Gray found her eyes fixed in sudden, strained fascination on the
+table--as, she imagined, the Adventurer's were too. It was bare of any
+covering, nor were there any articles on its surface, nor, as far as she
+could see, was there any drawer. And now the Adventurer, his right hand
+still in his coat pocket, and bulging there where she knew quite well
+it grasped his revolver, stepped abruptly to the table, facing the other
+with the table between them.
+
+The bent old figure still hesitated, and then, with the despairing cry
+again, grasped at the top of the table, and jerked it toward him. The
+surface seemed to slide sideways a little way, a matter of two or three
+inches, and then stick there; but the Adventurer, in an instant, had
+thrust the fingers of his left hand into the crevice. He drew out a
+number of loose banknotes, and thrust his fingers in again for a further
+supply.
+
+“Open it wider!” he commanded curtly.
+
+“I--I'm trying to,” the other mumbled, and bent down to peer under the
+table. “It's stuck. The catch is underneath, and--”
+
+It seemed to Rhoda Gray, gazing into that dimly lighted room, as though
+she were suddenly held spellbound as in some horrible and amazing
+trance. Like a hideous jack-in-the-box the gray head popped above the
+level of the table again, and quick as a flash, a revolver was
+thrust into the Adventurer's face; and the Adventurer, caught at
+a disadvantage, since his hand in his coat pocket was below the
+intervening table top, stood there as though instantaneously transformed
+into some motionless, inanimate thing, his fingers still gripping at
+another sheaf of banknotes that he had been in the act of scooping out
+from the narrow aperture.
+
+And then again Rhoda Gray stared, and stared now as though bereft of her
+senses; and upon her crept, cold and deadly, a fear and a terror that
+seemed to engulf her very soul itself. That head that looked like a
+jack-in-the-box was gone; the gray beard seemed suddenly to be shorn
+away, and the gray hair too, and to fall and flutter to the table, and
+the bent shoulders were not bent any more, and it wasn't Nicky Viner at
+all--only a clever, a wonderfully clever, impersonation that had been
+helped out by the poor and meager light. And terror gripped at her
+again, for it wasn't Nicky Viner. Those narrowed eyes, that leering,
+gloating face, those working lips were Danglar's.
+
+And, as from some far distance, dulled because her consciousness was
+dulled, she heard Danglar speak.
+
+“Perhaps you'll take your hand out of that right-hand coat pocket of
+yours now!” sneered Danglar. “And take it out--empty!”
+
+The Adventurer's face, as nearly as Rhoda Gray could see, had not moved
+a muscle. He obeyed now, coolly, with a shrug of his shoulders.
+
+Danglar appeared to experience no further trouble with the surface of
+the table now. He suddenly jerked it almost off, displaying what Rhoda
+Gray now knew to be the remainder of the large package of banknotes he
+had taken from the garret earlier in the evening.
+
+“Help yourself to the rest!” he invited caustically. “There isn't fifty
+thousand there, but you are quite welcome to all there is--in return for
+those papers.”
+
+The Adventurer was apparently obsessed with an inspection of his finger
+nails; he began to polish those of one hand with the palm of the other.
+
+“Quite so, Danglar!” he said coolly. “I admit it--I am ashamed of
+myself. I hate to think that I could be caught by you; but I suppose I
+can find some self-extenuating circumstances. You seem to have risen to
+an amazingly higher order of intelligence. In fact, for you, Danglar,
+it is not at all bad!” He went on polishing his nails. “Would you mind
+taking that thing out of my face? Even you ought to be able to handle it
+effectively a few inches farther away.”
+
+Under the studied insult Danglar's face had grown a mottled red.
+
+“Damn you!” he snarled. “I'll take it away when I get good and ready;
+and by that time I'll have you talking out of the other side of your
+mouth! See? Do you know what you're up against, you slick dude?”
+
+“I have a fairly good imagination,” replied the Adventurer smoothly.
+
+“You have, eh?” mimicked Danglar wickedly. “Well, you don't need to
+imagine anything! I'll give you the straight goods so's there won't
+be any chance of a mistake. And never mind about the higher order of
+intelligence! It was high enough, and a little to spare, to make you
+walk into the trap! I hoped I'd get you both, you and your she-pal, the
+White Moll; that you'd come here together--but I'm not kicking. It's a
+pretty good start to get you!”
+
+“Is it necessary to make a speech?” complained the Adventurer
+monotonously. “I can't help listening, of course.”
+
+“You can make up your mind for yourself when I'm through--whether
+it's necessary or not!” retorted Danglar viciously. “I've got a little
+proposition to put up to you, and maybe it'll help you to add two and
+two together if I let you see all the cards. Understand? You've had your
+run of luck lately, quite a bit of it, haven't you, you and the White
+Moll? Well, it's my turn now! You've been queering our game to the
+limit, curse you!” Danglar thrust his working face a little farther over
+the table, and nearer to the Adventurer. “Well, what was the answer?
+Where did you get the dope you made your plays with? It was a cinch,
+wasn't it, that there was a leak somewhere in our own crowd?” He laughed
+out suddenly. “You poor fool! Did you think you could pull that sort of
+stuff forever? Did you? Well, then, how do you like the 'leak' to-night?
+You get the idea, don't you? Everybody, every last soul that is in
+with us, got the details of what they thought was a straight play
+to-night--and it leaked to you, as I knew it would; and you walked into
+the trap, as I knew you would, because the bait was good and juicy, and
+looked the easiest thing to annex that ever happened. Fifty thousand
+dollars! Fifty thousand--nothing! All you had to do was to get a few
+papers that it wouldn't bother any crook to get, even a near--crook like
+you, and then come here and screw the money out of a helpless old man,
+who was supposed to have been discovered to be a miser. Easy, wasn't it?
+Only Nicky Viner wasn't a miser! We chose Nicky because of what happened
+two years ago. It made things look pretty near right, didn't it? Looked
+straight, that part about Perlmer, too, didn't it? That was the come-on.
+Perlmer never saw those papers you've got there in your pocket. I doped
+them out, and we planted them nice and handy where you could get them
+without much trouble in the drawer of Perlmer's desk, and--”
+
+“It's a long story,” interrupted the Adventurer, with quiet insolence.
+
+“It's got a short ending,” said Danglar, with an ugly leer. “We could
+have bumped you off when you went for those papers, but if you went
+that far you'd come farther, and that wasn't the place to do it, and we
+couldn't cover ourselves there the way we could here. This is the place.
+We brought that trick table here a while ago, as soon as we had got rid
+of Nicky Viner. That was the only bit of stage setting we had to do
+to make the story ring true right up to the curtain, in case it was
+necessary. It wouldn't have been necessary if you and the White Moll
+had both come together, for then you would neither of you have got any
+further than that other room. It would have ended there. But we weren't
+taking any chances. I'll pay you the compliment of admitting that we
+weren't counting on getting you off your guard any too easily if, as
+it happened, you came alone, for, being alone, or if either of you were
+alone, there was that little proposition that had to be settled, instead
+of just knocking you on the head out there in the dark in that other
+room; and so, as I say, we weren't overlooking any bets on account of
+the little trouble it took to plant that table and the money. We
+tried to think of everything!” Danglar paused for a moment to mock the
+Adventurer with narrowed eyes. “That's the story; here's the end. I
+hoped I'd get you both together, you and the White Moll. I didn't. But
+I've got you. I didn't get you both--and that's what gives you a chance
+for your life, because she's worth more to us than you are. If you'd
+been together, you would have gone out-together. As it is, I'll see that
+you don't do any more harm anyway, but you get one chance. Where is she?
+If you answer that, you will, of course, answer a minor question and
+locate that 'leak', for me, that I was speaking about a moment ago. But
+we'll take the main thing first. And you can take your choice between a
+bullet and a straight answer. Where is the White Moll?”
+
+Rhoda Gray's hand felt Out along the wall for support. Was this a dream,
+some ghastly, soul-terrifying nightmare! Danglar! Those working lips!
+That callous viciousness, that leer in the degenerate face. It seemed
+to bring a weakness to her limbs, and seek to rob her of the strength to
+stand. She could not even hope against hope; she knew that Danglar was
+in deadly earnest. Danglar would not have the slightest compunction, let
+alone hesitation, in carrying out his threat. Terrified now, her eyes
+sought the Adventurer. Didn't the Adventurer know Danglar as she
+knew him, didn't he realize that there was deadly earnestness behind
+Danglar's words? Was the man mad, that he stood there utterly unmoved,
+as though he had no consideration on earth other than those carefully
+manicured finger nails of his!
+
+And then Danglar spoke again.
+
+“Do you notice anything special about this gun I'm holding on you?” he
+demanded, in low menace.
+
+The Adventurer did not even look up.
+
+“Oh, yes,” he said indifferently. “I fancy you got it out of a dime
+novel, didn't you? One of those silencer things.”
+
+“Yes,” said Danglar grimly; “one of those silencer things. Where is
+she?”
+
+The Adventurer made no answer.
+
+The color in Danglar's face deepened.
+
+“I'll make things even a little plainer to you,” he said with brutal
+coolness. “There are two men in our organization from whom it is
+absolutely impossible that that leak could have come. Those two men
+followed you from Perlmer's office to this place. They are in the next
+room now waiting for me to get through with you, and ready for anything
+if they are needed. But they won't be needed. That's not the way it
+works out. This gun won't make much noise, and it isn't likely to arouse
+the inmates of this dive, but even if it does, it doesn't matter very
+much--we aren't going out by the front door. The two of them, the minute
+they hear the shot, slip in here, and lock the door--you see it's got a
+good, husky bolt on it--and then we beat it by the fire escape that
+runs past that window there. Get the idea? And don't kid yourself into
+thinking that I am taking any risk with the consequences on account of
+the coroner having got busy because a man was found here dead on the
+floor. Nicky Viner stands for that. It isn't the first time he's been
+suspected of murder. See? Nicky was easy. He'd crawl on his hands and
+knees from the Battery to Harlem any time if you held a little money
+in front of his nose. He's been fooled up to the eyes with a faked-up
+message that he's to deliver secretly to some faked-up crooks out West.
+He's just about starting away on the train now. And that's where the
+police nab him--running away from the murder he's pulled in his room
+here to-night. Looks kind of bad for Nicky Viner--eh? We should worry!
+It cost a hundred dollars and his ticket. Cheap, wasn't it? I guess
+you're worth that much to us.”
+
+A dull horror seized upon Rhoda Gray. It seemed to clog and confuse
+her mind. She fought it frantically, striving to think, and to think
+clearly. Every detail seemed to have been planned with Satanic foresight
+and ingenuity, and yet--and yet--Yes, in one little thing, Danglar had
+made a mistake. That was why she was here now; that was why those men in
+that next room had not been out in the hall on guard, or even out in the
+street on watch for her. Danglar had naturally gone upon the supposition
+that the Adventurer and herself worked hand in glove; whereas they were
+as much in the dark concerning each other's movements as Danglar himself
+was. Therefore Danglar, and logically enough from his viewpoint, had
+jumped to the conclusion that, since they had not come together,
+only one of them, the Adventurer, was acting in the affair to-night,
+and--Danglar's voice was rasping in her ears.
+
+“I'm not going to stay here all night!” he snarled. “You've got one
+chance. I've told you what it is. You're lucky to have it. We'd sooner
+have you out of the way for keeps. I'd rather drop you in your tracks
+than let you live. Where is the White Moll?”
+
+The Adventurer was side face to the doorway again, and Rhoda Gray saw
+him smile contemptuously at Danglar now.
+
+“Really,” he said blandly, “I haven't the slightest idea in the world.”
+
+Danglar laughed ironically.
+
+“You lie!” he flung out hoarsely. “Do you think you can get away with
+that? Well, think again! Sooner or later, it will be all the same
+whether you talk or not. We caught you to-night in a trap; we'll catch
+her in another. Our hand doesn't show here. She'll think that Nicky
+Viner was a little too much for you, that's all. Come on, now--quick!
+Are you fool enough to misunderstand? The 'don't know' stuff won't get
+you by!”
+
+“The misunderstanding seems to be on your side.” There was a cold,
+irritating deliberation in the Adventurer's voice. “I repeat that I do
+not know where the young lady you refer to could be found; but I did not
+make that statement with any idea that you would believe it. To a cur,
+I suppose it is necessary to add that, even if I did know, I should take
+pleasure in seeing you damned before I told you.”
+
+Danglar's face was like a devil's. His revolver held a steady bead on
+the Adventurer's head.
+
+“I'll give you a last chance.” He spoke through closed teeth. “I'll fire
+when I count three. One!”
+
+A horrible fascination held Rhoda Gray. If she cried out, it was more
+likely than not to cause Danglar to fire on the instant. It would not
+save the Adventurer in any case. It would be but the signal, too, for
+those two men in the next room to rush in here.
+
+“Two!”
+
+It seemed as though, not in the hope that it would do any good, but
+because she was going mad with horror, that she would scream out until
+the place rang and rang again with her outcries. Even her soul was in
+frantic panic. Quick! Quick! She must act! She must! But how? Was there
+only one way? She was conscious that she had drawn her revolver as
+though by instinct. Danglar's life, or the Adventurer's! But she shrank
+from taking life. Her lips were breathing a prayer. They had called her
+a crack shot back there in South America, when she had hunted and ridden
+with her father. It was easy enough to hit Danglar, but that might mean
+Danglar's life; it was not so easy to hit Danglar's arm, or Danglar's
+hand, or the revolver Danglar held, and if she risked that and missed,
+she...
+
+“Thr--”
+
+There was the roar of a report that went racketing through the silence
+like a cannon shot, and the short, vicious tongue-flame from Rhoda
+Gray's revolver muzzle stabbed through the black. There was a scream of
+mingled surprise and fury, and the revolver in Danglar's hand clattered
+to the floor. She saw the Adventurer spring, quick as a panther, at the
+other, and saw him whip blow after blow with terrific force full into
+Danglar's face; she heard a rush of feet coming from the corridor behind
+her; and she flung herself forward into the inner room, and, panting,
+snatched at the door and slammed it shut, and groping for the bolt,
+found it, and shot it home in its grooves.
+
+And she stood there, weak for the moment, and drew her hand across her
+eyes--and behind her they pounded on the door, and there came a burst
+of oaths; and in front of her the Adventurer was smiling gravely as
+he covered Danglar with Danglar's own revolver; and Danglar, as though
+dazed and half stunned from the blows he had received, rocked unsteadily
+upon his feet. And then her eyes widened a little. The pounding on the
+door, the shouts, the noise, was beginning to arouse what inmates there
+were in the tenement, and there wasn't an instant to lose--but the
+Adventurer now was calmly gathering up, to the last one, and pocketing
+them, the banknotes with which Danglar had baited his trap. And as he
+crammed the money into his pockets, he spoke to her, with a curious
+softness, a great, strange gentleness in his voice:
+
+“I owe you my life, Miss Gray. That was a wonderful shot. You knocked
+the revolver from his hand without even grazing his fingers. A very
+wonderful shot, and--will you let me say it?--you are a very wonderful
+woman.”
+
+“Oh, quick!” she whispered wildly. “I am afraid this door will not
+hold.”
+
+“There is the window, and the fire escape, so our friend here was good
+enough to inform me,” said the Adventurer, as he composedly pocketed the
+last dollar. “Will you open the window, Miss Gray, if you please? I am
+afraid I hit Mr. Danglar a little ungently, and as he is still somewhat
+groggy, I fancy he will need a little assistance. I imagine”--he caught
+Danglar suddenly by the collar of his coat as Rhoda Gray ran to the
+window and flung it up, and rushed the man unceremoniously across the
+room--“I imagine it would be a mistake to leave him behind. He might
+open the door, or even be unpleasant enough to throw something down on
+us from above; also he should serve us very well as a hostage. Will you
+go first, please, Miss Gray?”
+
+She climbed quickly over the sill to the iron platform. Danglar was
+dragged through by the Adventurer, mumbling, and evidently still in a
+half-dazed condition. Windows were opening here and there. From back
+inside the room, the blows rained more heavily upon the door--and now
+there came the rip and rend of wood, as though a panel had crashed in.
+
+“Hurry, please, Miss Gray!” prompted the Adventurer.
+
+It was dark, almost too dark to see her footing. She felt her way down.
+It was only one story above the ground, and it did not take long; but it
+seemed hours since she had fired that shot, though she knew the time
+had been measured by scarcely more than a minute. And now, on the lower
+platform, waiting for that queer, double, twisting shadow of the two men
+to join her, she heard the Adventurers s voice ring out sharply:
+
+“This is your chance, Danglar! I didn't waste the time to bring you
+along because it afforded me any amusement. They've found their heads at
+last, and gone to the next window, instead of wasting time on that
+door. They can't reach the fire escape there, but if they fire a single
+shot--you go out! You'd better tell them so--and tell them quick!”
+
+And then Danglar's voice shrieked out in sudden, “for God's sake, don't
+fire!”
+
+They were all on the lower platform together now. The Adventurer was
+pressing the muzzle of his revolver into the small of Danglar's back,
+and was still supporting the man by the collar of his coat.
+
+“I think,” said the Adventurer abruptly, “that we can now dispense with
+Mr. Danglar's services, and I am sure a little cool night air out here
+on the fire escape will do him good. Miss Gray--would you mind?--there's
+a pair of handcuffs in my left-hand coat pocket.”
+
+Handcuffs! She could have laughed out idiotically. Handcuffs! They
+seemed the most incongruous things in the world for the Adventurer to
+have, and--She felt mechanically in his pocket, and handed them to him.
+
+There was a click as a cuff was snapped over Danglar's wrist, another as
+the other cuff was snapped shut around the iron hand-railing of the fire
+escape. The act seemed to arouse Danglar, both mentally and physically.
+He tore and wrenched at the steel links now, and burst suddenly, raving,
+into oaths.
+
+“Hold your tongue, Danglar!” ordered the Adventurer in cold menace;
+and as the other, cowed, obeyed, the Adventurer swung himself over the
+platform and dropped to the ground. “Come, Miss Gray. Drop! I'll catch
+you!” he called in a low voice. “One step takes us around the corner of
+the tenement into the lane, and Mr. Danglar won't let them fire at us
+before we can make that--when we could still fire at him!”
+
+She obeyed him, swinging at arm's-length. She felt his hands fold about
+her in a firm grasp as she let go her hold, and she caught her breath
+suddenly, she did not know why, and felt the hot blood sweep her
+face--and then she was standing on the ground.
+
+“Now!” he whispered. “Together!”
+
+They sped around the corner of the tenement. A yell from Danglar
+followed them. An echoing yell from above answered--and then a fusillade
+of abortive shots, and the sound as of boot heels clattering on the iron
+rungs of the fire escape; and then, more faintly, for they were putting
+distance behind them as fast as they could run, an excited outburst of
+profanity and exclamations.
+
+“They won't follow!” panted the Adventurer. “Those shots of theirs
+outdoors will have alarmed the police, and they'll try and get Danglar
+free first. It's lucky your shot inside wasn't heard by the patrolman
+on the beat. I was afraid of that. But we're safe now--from Danglar's
+crowd, at least.”
+
+But still they ran. They crossed an intersecting street, and continued
+on along the lane; then swerving into the next intersecting street,
+moderated their pace to a rapid walk--and stopped finally only as Rhoda
+Gray drew suddenly into the shadows of another alley-way, and held out
+her hand. They were both safe now, as he had said. And there were so
+many reasons why, though her resolution faltered a little, she should
+go the rest of the way alone. She was not sure that she trusted this
+strange “gentleman,” who was a thief with his pockets crammed even now
+with the money that had lured him almost to his death; but, too, she was
+not altogether sure that she distrusted him. But all that was secondary.
+She must, as soon as she could, get back to Gypsy Nan's garret. Like
+that other night, she dared not take the risk that Danglar, by any
+chance, might return there--and find her gone after what had just
+happened. The man would be beside himself with fury, suspicious of
+everything-and suspicion would be fatal in its consequences for her.
+And so she must go. And she could not become Gypsy Nan again with the
+Adventurer looking on!
+
+“We part here,” she said a little unsteadily. “Good-night!”
+
+“Oh, I say, Miss Gray!” he protested quickly. “You don't mean that! Why,
+look here, I haven't had a chance to tell you what I think, or what I
+feel, about what you've done to-night--for me.”
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“There is nothing you need say,” she answered quietly. “We are only
+quits. You have done quite as much for me.”
+
+“But, see here, Miss Gray!” he pleaded. “Can't we come to some
+understanding? We seem to have a jolly lot in common. Is it
+quite necessary, really necessary, that you should keep me off at
+arm's-length? Couldn't you let down the bars just a little? Couldn't
+you tell me, for instance, where I could find you in case of--real
+necessity?”
+
+She shook her head again.
+
+“No,” she said. “It is impossible.”
+
+He drew a little closer. A sudden earnestness deepened his voice, made
+it rasp a little, as though it were not wholly within control.
+
+“And suppose, Miss Gray, that I refuse to leave you, or to let you go,
+now that I have you here, unless you give me more of your confidence?
+What then?”
+
+“The other night,” she said slowly, “you informed me, among other
+things, that you were a gentleman. I believed the other things.”
+
+He did not answer for a moment--and then he smiled whimsically.
+
+“You score, Miss Gray,” he murmured.
+
+“Good night, then!” she said again. “I will go by the alley here; you by
+the street.”
+
+“No! Wait!” he said gravely. “If nothing will change your mind--and I
+shall not be importunate, for, as we have met three times now through
+the same peculiar chain of circumstances, I know we shall meet again--I
+have something to tell you, before you go. As you already know, I went
+to Gypsy Nan's the night after I first saw you, because I felt you
+needed help. I went there in the hope that she would know where to find
+you, and, failing in that, I left a message for you in the hope that,
+since she had tricked Rorke in your behalf, you would find means of
+communicating with her again. But all that is entirely changed now. Your
+participation in that Hayden-Bond affair the other night makes Gypsy
+Nan's place the last in all New York to which you should go.”
+
+Rhoda Gray stared through the semi-darkness, suddenly startled,
+searching the Adventurer's face.
+
+“What do you mean?” she demanded quickly.
+
+“Just this,” he answered. “That where before I hoped you would go there,
+I have spent nearly all the time since then in haunting the vicinity of
+Gypsy Nan's house to warn you away in case you should try to reach her.”
+
+“I--I don't understand,” she said a little uncertainly.
+
+“It is simple enough,” he said. “Gypsy Nan is now one of those you have
+most to fear. Gypsy Nan is merely a disguise. She is no more Gypsy Nan
+than you are.”
+
+Rhoda Gray caught her breath.
+
+“Not Gypsy Nan!” she repeated--and fought to keep her voice in control.
+“Who is she, then?”
+
+The Adventurer laughed shortly.
+
+“She is quite closely connected with that gentleman we left airing
+himself on the fire escape,” he said grimly. “Gypsy Nan is Danglar's
+wife.”
+
+It was very strange, very curious--the alleyway seemed suddenly to be
+revolving around and around, and it seemed to bring her a giddiness and
+a faintness. The Adventurer was standing there before her, but she did
+not see him any more; she could only see, as from a brink upon which she
+tottered, a gulf, abysmal in its horror, that yawned before her.
+
+“Thank you--thank you for the warning.” Was that her voice speaking
+so calmly and dispassionately? “I will remember it. But I must go now.
+Good-night again!”
+
+He said something. She did not know what. She only knew that she was
+hurrying along the alleyway now, and that he had made no effort to stop
+her, and that she was grateful to him for that, and that her composure,
+strained to the breaking point, would have given away if she had
+remained with him another instant. Danglar's wife! It was dark here in
+the alley-way, and she did not know where it led to. But did it
+matter? And she stumbled as she went along. But it was not the physical
+inability to see that made her stumble--it was a brain-blindness that
+fogged her soul itself. His wife! Gypsy Nan was Danglar's wife.
+
+
+
+
+XI. SOME OF THE LESSER BREED
+
+Danglar's wife! It had been a night of horror; a night without sleep;
+a night, after the guttering candle had gone out, when the blackness of
+the garret possessed added terrors created by an imagination which ran
+riot, and which she could not control. She could have fled from it,
+screaming in panic-stricken hysteria--but there had been no other place
+as safe as that was. Safe! The word seemed to reach the uttermost depths
+of irony. Safe! Well, it was true, wasn't it?
+
+She had not wanted to return there; her soul itself had revolted against
+it; but she had dared to do nothing else. And all through that night,
+huddled on the edge of the cot bed, her fingers clinging tenaciously to
+her revolver as though afraid for even an instant to relinquish it from
+her grasp, listening, listening, always listening for a footstep that
+might come up from that dark hall below, the footstep that would
+climax all the terrors that had surged upon her, her mind had kept on
+reiterating, always reiterating those words of the Adventurer--“Gypsy
+Nan is Danglar's wife.”
+
+And they were still with her, those words. Daylight had come again, and
+passed again, and it was evening once more; but those words remained,
+insensible to change, immutable in their foreboding. And Rhoda Gray, as
+Gypsy Nan, shuddered now as she scuffled along a shabby street deep in
+the heart of the East Side. She was Danglar's wife--by proxy. At dawn
+that morning when the gray had come creeping into the miserable attic
+through the small and dirty window panes, she had fallen on her knees
+and thanked God she had been spared that footstep. It was strange! She
+had poured out her soul in passionate thankfulness then that Danglar
+had not come--and now she was deliberately on her way to seek Danglar
+himself! But the daylight had done more than disperse the actual,
+physical darkness of the past night; it had brought, if not a measure of
+relief, at least a sense of guidance, and the final decision, perilous
+though it was, which she meant now to put into execution.
+
+There was no other way--unless she were willing to admit defeat, to give
+up everything, her own good name, her father's name, to run from it all
+and live henceforth in hiding in some obscure place far away, branded
+in the life she would have left behind her as a despicable criminal and
+thief. And she could not, would not, do this while her intuition, at
+least, inspired her with the faith to believe that there was still a
+chance of clearing herself. It was the throw of the dice, perhaps--but
+there was no other way. Danglar, and those with him, were at the bottom
+of the crime of which she was held guilty. She could not go on as she
+had been doing, merely in the hope of stumbling upon some clew that
+would serve to exonerate her. There was not time enough for that.
+Danglar's trap set for herself and the Adventurer last night in old
+Nicky Viner's room proved that. And the fact that the woman who
+had originally masqueraded as Gypsy Nan--as she, Rhoda Gray, was
+masquerading now--was Danglar's wife, proved it a thousandfold more. She
+could no longer remain passive, arguing with herself that it took all
+her wits and all her efforts to maintain herself in the role of Gypsy
+Nan, which temporarily was all that stood between her and prison bars.
+To do so meant the certainty of disaster sooner or later, and if it
+meant that, the need for immediate action of an offensive sort was
+imperative.
+
+And so her mind was made up. Her only chance was to find her way into
+the full intimacy of the criminal band of which Danglar was apparently
+the head; to search out its lair and its personnel; to reach to the
+heart of it; to know Danglar's private movements, and to discover where
+he lived so that she might watch him. It surely was not such a hopeless
+task! True, she knew by name and sight scarcely more than three of this
+crime clique, but at least she had a starting point from which to work.
+There was Shluker's junk shop where she had turned the tables on Danglar
+and Skeeny on the night they had planned to make the Sparrow their pawn.
+It was obvious, therefore, that Shluker himself, the proprietor of the
+junk shop, was one of the organization. She was going to Shluker's now.
+
+Rhoda Gray halted suddenly, and stared wonderingly a little way up the
+block ahead of her. As though by magic a crowd was collecting around
+the doorway of a poverty-stricken, tumble-down frame house that made
+the corner of an alleyway. And where but an instant before the street's
+jostling humanity had been immersed in its wrangling with the push-cart
+men who lined the curb, the carts were now deserted by every one save
+their owners, whose caution exceeded their curiosity--and the crowd grew
+momentarily larger in front of the house.
+
+She drew Gypsy Nan's black, greasy shawl a little more closely around
+her shoulders, and moved forward again. And now, on the outskirts of the
+crowd, she could see quite plainly. There were two or three low steps
+that led up to the doorway, and a man and woman were standing there. The
+woman was wretchedly dressed, but with most strange incongruity she held
+in her hand, obviously subconsciously, obviously quite oblivious of it,
+a huge basket full to overflowing with, as nearly as Rhoda Gray could
+judge, all sorts of purchases, as though out of the midst of abject
+poverty a golden shower had suddenly descended upon her. And she was
+gray, and well beyond middle age, and crying bitterly; and her free
+hand, whether to support herself or with the instinctive idea of
+supporting her companion, was clutched tightly around the man's
+shoulders. And the man rocked unsteadily upon his feet. He was tall
+and angular, and older than the woman, and cadaverous of feature, and
+miserably thin of shoulder, and blood trickled over his forehead and
+down one ashen, hollow cheek--and above the excited exclamations of the
+crowd Rhoda Gray heard him cough.
+
+Rhoda Gray glanced around her. Where scarcely a second before she had
+been on the outer fringe of the crowd, she now appeared to be in the
+very center of it. Women were pushing up behind her, women who wore
+shawls as she did, only the shawls were mostly of gaudy colors; and
+men pushed up behind her, mostly men of swarthy countenance, who wore
+circlets of gold in their ears; and, brushing her skirts, seeking
+vantage points, ragged, ill-clad children wriggled and wormed their way
+deeper into the press. It was a crowd composed almost entirely of the
+foreign element which inhabited that quarter--and the crowd chattered
+and gesticulated with ever-increasing violence. She did not understand.
+And she could not see so well now. That pitiful tableau in the doorway
+was being shut out from her by a man, directly in front of her, who had
+hoisted a half-naked tot of three or four to a reserved seat upon his
+head.
+
+And then a young man, one whom, from her years in the Bad Lands as the
+White Moll, she recognized as a hanger-on at a gambling hell in the
+Chatham Square district, came toward her, plowing his way, contemptuous
+of obstructions, out of the crowd.
+
+Rhoda Gray, as Gypsy Nan, hailed him out of the corner of her mouth.
+
+“Say, wot's de row?” she demanded.
+
+The young man grinned.
+
+“Somebody pinched a million from de old guy!” He shifted his cigarette
+with a deft movement of his tongue from one side of his mouth to the
+other, and grinned again. “Can youse beat it! Accordin' to him, he had
+enough coin to annex de whole of Noo Yoik! De moll's his wife. He went
+out to hell-an'-gone somewhere for a few years huntin' gold while de
+old girl starved. Den back he comes an' blows in to-day wid his pockets
+full, an' de old girl grabs a handful, an' goes out to buy up all de
+grub in sight 'cause she ain't had none for so long. An' w'en she comes
+back she finds de old geezer gagged an' tied in a chair, an' some guy's
+hit him a crack on de bean an' flown de coop wid de mazuma. But youse
+had better get out of here before youse gets run over! Dis ain't no
+place for an old skirt like youse. De bulls'll be down here on de hop in
+a minute, an' w'en dis mob starts sprinklin' de street wid deir fleetin'
+footsteps, youse are likely to get hurt. See?” The young man started
+to force his way through the crowd again. “Youse had better cut loose,
+mother!” he warned over his shoulder.
+
+It was good advice. Rhoda Gray took it. She had scarcely reached the
+next block when the crowd behind her was being scattered pell-mell and
+without ceremony in all directions by the police, as the young man had
+predicted. She went on. There was nothing that she could do. The man's
+face and the woman's face haunted her. They had seemed stamped with such
+abject misery and despair. But there was nothing that she could do. It
+was one of those sore and grievous cross-sections out of the lives
+of the swarming thousands down here in this quarter which she knew
+so intimately and so well. And there were so many, many of those
+cross-sections! Once, in a small, pitifully meager and restricted way,
+she had been able to help some of these hurt lives, but now--Her lips
+tightened a little. She was going to Shluker's junk shop.
+
+Her forehead gathered in little furrows as she walked along. She had
+weighed the pros and cons of this visit a hundred times already during
+the day; but even so, instinctively to reassure herself lest some
+apparently minor, but nevertheless fatally vital, point might have been
+overlooked, her mind reverted to it again. From Shluker's viewpoint,
+whether Gypsy Nan was in the habit of mingling with or visiting the
+other members of the gang or not--a matter upon which she could not even
+hazard a guess--her visit to-night must appear entirely logical. There
+was last night--and, a natural corollary, her equally natural anxiety on
+her supposed husband's account, providing, of course, that Shluker was
+aware that Gypsy Nan was Danglar's wife. But even if Shluker did not
+know that, he knew at least that Gypsy Nan was one of the gang, and, as
+such, he must equally accept it as natural that she should be anxious
+and disturbed over what had happened. She would be on safe ground either
+way. She would pretend to know only what had appeared in the papers;
+in other words, that the police, attracted to the spot by the sound of
+revolver shots, had found Danglar handcuffed to the fire escape of a
+well-known thieves' resort in an all too well-known and questionable
+locality.
+
+A smile came spontaneously. It was quite true. That was where the
+Adventurer had left Danglar--handcuffed to the fire escape! The smile
+vanished. The humor of the situation was not long-lived; it ended there.
+Danglar was as cunning as the proverbial fox; and Danglar, at that
+moment, in desperate need of explaining his predicament in some
+plausible way to the police, had, as the expression went, run true to
+form. Danglar's story, as reported by the papers, even rose above his
+own high-water mark of vicious cunning, because it played upon a chord
+that appealed instantly to the police; and it rang true, not only
+because what the police could find out about him made it likely,
+but also because it contained a modicum of truth in itself; and,
+furthermore, Danglar had scored on still another count in that his story
+must stimulate the police into renewed activities as his unsuspecting
+allies in the one thing, the one aim and object that, at that moment,
+must obsess him above all others--the discovery of herself, the White
+Moll.
+
+It was ingeniously simple, Danglar's smooth and oily lie! He had been
+walking along the street, he had stated, when he saw a woman, as she
+passed under a street lamp, who he thought resembled the White Moll.
+To make sure, he followed her--at a safe distance, as he believed. She
+entered the tenement. He hesitated. He knew the reputation of the
+place, which bore out his first impression that the woman was the one
+he thought she was; but he did not want to make a fool of himself by
+calling in the police until he was positive of her identity, so he
+finally followed her inside, and heard her go upstairs, and crept up
+after her in the dark. And then, suddenly, he was set upon and hustled
+into a room. It was the White Moll, all right; and the shots came from
+her companion, a man whom he described minutely--the description
+being that of the Adventurer, of course. They seemed to think that he,
+Danglar, was a plain-clothes man, and tried to sicken him of his job by
+frightening him. And then they forced him through the window and down
+the fire escape, and fastened him there with handcuffs to mock the
+police, and the White Moll's companion had deliberately fired some more
+shots to make sure of bringing the police to the scene, and then the two
+of them had run for it.
+
+Rhoda Gray's eyes darkened angrily. The newspapers said that Danglar had
+been temporarily held by the police, though his story was believed to be
+true, for certainly the man would make no mistake as to the identity of
+the White Moll, since his life, what the police could find out about it,
+coincided with his own statements, and he would naturally therefore have
+seen her many times in the Bad Lands when she was working there under
+cover of her despicable role of sweet and innocent charity. Danglar had
+made no pretensions to self-righteousness--he was too cute for that. He
+admitted that he had no “specific occupation,” that he hung around the
+gambling hells a good deal, that he followed the horses--that, frankly,
+he lived by his wits. He had probably given some framed-up address to
+the police, but, if so, the papers had not stated where it was. Rhoda
+Gray's face, under the grime of Gypsy Nan's disguise, grew troubled
+and perplexed. Neither had the papers, even the evening papers, stated
+whether Danglar had as yet been released--they had devoted the rest of
+their space to the vilification of the White Moll. They had demanded
+in no uncertain tones a more conclusive effort on the part of the
+authorities to bring her, and with her now the man in the case, as they
+called the Adventurer, to justice, and...
+
+The thought of the Adventurer caused her mind to swerve sharply off at
+a tangent. Where he had piqued and aroused her curiosity before, he
+now, since last night, seemed more complex a character than ever. It
+was strange, most strange, the way their lives, his and hers, had become
+interwoven! She had owed him much; but last night she had repaid him and
+squared accounts. She had told him so. She owed him nothing more. If a
+sense of gratitude had once caused her to look upon him with--with--She
+bit her lips. What was the use of that? Had it become so much a part of
+her life, so much a habit, this throwing of dust in the eyes of others,
+this constant passing of herself off for some one else, this constant
+deception, warranted though it might be, that she must now seek to
+deceive herself! Why not frankly admit to her own soul, already in the
+secret, that she cared in spite of herself--for a thief? Why not admit
+that a great hurt had come, one that no one but herself would ever know,
+a hurt that would last for always because it was a wound that could
+never be healed?
+
+A thief! She loved a thief. She had fought a bitter, stubborn battle
+with her common sense to convince herself that he was not a thief.
+She had snatched hungrily at the incident that centered around those
+handcuffs, so opportunely produced from the Adventurer's pocket. She had
+tried to argue that those handcuffs not only suggested, but proved, he
+was a police officer in disguise, working on some case in which Danglar
+and the gang had been mixed up; and, as she tried to argue in this wise,
+she tried to shut her eyes to the fact that the same pocket out of which
+the handcuffs came was at exactly the same moment the repository of as
+many stolen banknotes as it would hold. She had tried to argue that the
+fact that he was so insistently at work to defeat Danglar's plans was
+in his favor; but that argument, like all others, came quickly and
+miserably to grief. Where the “leak” was, as Danglar called it, that
+supplied the Adventurer with foreknowledge of the gang's movements, she
+had no idea, save that perhaps the Adventurer and some traitor in the
+gang were in collusion for their own ends--and that certainly did not
+lift the Adventurer to any higher plane, or wash from him the stigma of
+thief.
+
+She clenched her hands. It was all an attempt at argument without the
+basis of a single logical premise. It was silly and childish! Why hadn't
+the man been an ordinary, plain, common thief and criminal--and looked
+like one? She would never have been attracted to him then even through
+gratitude! Why should he have all the graces and ear-marks of breeding?
+Why should he have all the appearances of gentleman? It seemed a
+needlessly cruel and additional blow that fate had dealt her, when
+already she was living through days and nights of fear, of horror, of
+trepidation, so great that at times it seemed she would literally lose
+her reason. If he had not looked, yes, and at times, acted, so much like
+a thorough-bred gentleman, there would never have come to her this hurt,
+this gulf between them that could not now be spanned, and in a personal
+way she would never have cared because he was--a thief.
+
+Her mental soliloquy ended abruptly. She had reached the narrow driveway
+that led in, between the two blocks of down-at-the-heels tenements, to
+the courtyard at the rear that harbored Shluker's junk shop. And now,
+unlike that other night when she had first paid a visit to the place,
+she made no effort at concealment as she entered the driveway. She
+walked quickly, and as she emerged into the courtyard itself she saw a
+light in the window of the junk shop.
+
+Rhoda Gray nodded her head. It was still quite early, still almost
+twilight--not more than eight o'clock. Back there, on that squalid
+doorstep where the old woman and the old man had stood, it had still
+been quite light. The long summer evening had served at least to sear,
+somehow, those two faces upon her mind. It was singular that they should
+intrude themselves at this moment! She had been thinking, hadn't she,
+that at this hour she might naturally expect to find Shluker still in
+his shop? That was why she had come so early--since she had not cared to
+come in full daylight. Well, if that light meant anything, he was there.
+
+She felt her pulse quicken perceptibly as she crossed the courtyard, and
+reached the shop. The door was open, and she stepped inside. It was
+a dingy place, filthy, and littered, without the slightest attempt at
+order, with a heterogeneous collection of, it seemed, every article one
+could think of, from scraps of old iron and bundles of rags to cast-off
+furniture that was in an appalling state of dissolution. The light, that
+of a single and dim incandescent, came from the interior of what was
+apparently the “office” of the establishment, a small, glassed-in
+partition affair, at the far end of the shop.
+
+Her first impression had been that there was no one in the shop, but
+now, from the other side of the glass partition, she caught sight of
+a bald head, and became aware that a pair of black eyes were fixed
+steadily upon her, and that the occupant was beckoning to her with his
+hand to come forward.
+
+She scuffled slowly, but without hesitation, up the shop. She intended
+to employ the vernacular that was part of the disguise of Gypsy Nan.
+If Shluker, for that was certainly Shluker there, gave the slightest
+indication that he took it amiss, her explanation would come glibly and
+logically enough--she had to be careful; how was she supposed to know
+whether there was any one else about, or not!
+
+“'Ello!” she said curtly, as she reached the doorway of the little
+office, and paused on the threshold. Shifty little black eyes met hers,
+as the bald head fringed with untrimmed gray hair, was lifted from a
+battered desk, and the wizened face of an old man was disclosed under
+the rays of the tin-shaded lamp. He grinned suddenly, showing discolored
+teeth--and instinctively she drew back a little. He was an uninviting
+and exceedingly disreputable old creature.
+
+“You, eh, Nan!” he grunted. “So you've come to see old Jake Shluker,
+have you? 'Tain't often you come! And what's brought you, eh?”
+
+“I can read, can't I?” Rhoda Gray glanced furtively around her, then
+leaned toward the other. “Say, wot's de lay? I been scared stiff all
+day. Is dat straight wot de papers said about youse-know-who gettin'
+pinched?”
+
+A scowl settled over Shluker's features as he nodded.
+
+“Yes; it's straight enough,” he answered. “Damn 'em, one and all! But
+they let him out again.”
+
+“Dat's de stuff!” applauded Rhoda Gray earnestly. “Where is he, den?”
+
+Shluker shook his head.
+
+“He didn't say,” said Shluker.
+
+“He didn't say?” echoed Rhoda Gray, a little tartly. “Wot d'youse mean,
+he didn't say? Have youse seen him?”
+
+Shluker jerked his hand toward the telephone instrument on the desk.
+
+“He was talkin' to me a little while ago.”
+
+“Well, den”--Rhoda Gray risked a more peremptory tone--“where is he?”
+
+Shluker shook his head again.
+
+“I dunno,” he said. “I'm tellin' you, he didn't say.”
+
+Rhoda Gray studied the wizened and repulsive old creature, that, huddled
+in his chair in the dirty, boxed-in little office, made her think of
+some crafty old spider lurking in its web for unwary prey. Was the man
+lying to her? Was he in any degree suspicious? Why should he be? He
+had given not the slightest sign that her uncouth language was either
+unexpected or unnecessary. Perhaps to Shluker, and perhaps to all the
+rest of the gang--except Danglar!--Gypsy Nan was accepted at face
+value as just Gypsy Nan; and, if that were so, the idea of playing up
+a natural wifely anxiety on Danglar's behalf could not be used unless
+Shluker gave her a lead in that direction. But, all that apart, she was
+getting nowhere. She bit her lips in disappointment. She had counted a
+great deal on this Shluker here, and Shluker was not proving the fount
+of information, far from it, that she had hoped he would.
+
+She tried again-even more peremptorily than before.
+
+“Aw, open up!” she snapped. “Wot's de use bein' a clam! Youse heard me,
+didn't youse? Where is he?”
+
+Shluker leaned abruptly forward, and looked at her in a suddenly
+perturbed way.
+
+“Is there anything wrong?” he asked in a tense, lowered voice. “What
+makes you so anxious to know?”
+
+Rhoda Gray laughed shortly.
+
+“Nothin'!” she answered coolly. “I told youse once, didn't I? I got a
+scare readin' dem papers--an' I ain't over it yet. Dat's wot I want to
+know for, an' youse seem afraid to open up!”
+
+Shluker sank back again in his chair with an air of relief.
+
+“Oh!” he ejaculated. “Well, that's all right, then. You were beginning
+to give me a scare, too. I ain't playin' the clam, and I dunno where he
+is; but I can tell you there's nothing to worry you any more about the
+rest of it. He was after the White Moll last night, and it didn't come
+off. They pulled one on him instead, and fastened him to the fire escape
+the way the papers said. Skeeny and the Cricket, who were in on the play
+with him, didn't have time to get him loose before the bulls got there.
+So Danglar told them to beat it, and he handed the cops the story that
+was in the papers. He got away with it, all right, and they let go him
+to-day; but he phoned a little while ago that they were still stickin'
+around kind of close to him, and that I was to pass the word that the
+lid was to go down tight for the next few days, and--”
+
+Shluker stopped abruptly as the telephone rang, and reached for the
+instrument.
+
+Rhoda Gray fumbled unnecessarily with her shawl, as the other answered
+the call. Failure! A curious bitterness came to her. Her plan then, for
+to-night it least, was a failure. Shluker did not know where Danglar
+was. She was quite convinced of that. Shluker was--She glanced suddenly
+at the wizened little old man. From an ordinary tone, Shluker' s voice
+had risen sharply in protest about something. She listened now:
+
+“No, no; it does not matter what it is!
+
+“What?...No! I tell you, no! Nothing! Not to-night! Those are the
+orders....No, I don't know! Nan is here now....Eh?....You'll pay for
+it if you do!” Shluker was snarling threateningly now. “What?....Well,
+then, wait! I'll come over....No, you can bet I won't be long! You wait!
+Understand?”
+
+He banged the receiver on the hook, and got up from his chair hurriedly.
+
+“Fools!” he muttered savagely. “No, I won't be long gettin' there!” He
+grabbed Rhoda Gray's arm. “Yes, and you come, too! You will help me put
+a little sense into their heads, if it is possible--eh? The fools!”
+
+The man was violently excited. He half pulled Rhoda Gray down the length
+of the shop to the front door. Puzzled, bewildered, a little uneasy, she
+watched him lock the door, and then followed him across the courtyard,
+while he continued to mutter constantly to himself.
+
+“Wot's de matter?” she asked him twice.
+
+But it was not until they had reached the street, and Shluker was
+hurrying along as fast as he could walk, that he answered her.
+
+“It's the Pug and Pinkie Bonn!” he jerked out angrily. “They're in the
+Pug's room. Pinkie went back there after telephonin'. They've nosed
+out something they want to put through. The fools! And after last
+night nearly havin' finished everything! I told 'em--you heard me--that
+everybody's to keep under cover now. But they think they've got a soft
+thing, and they say they're goin' to it. I've got to put a crimp in it,
+and you've got to help me. Y'understand, Nan?”
+
+“Yes,” she said mechanically.
+
+Her mind was working swiftly. The night, after all, perhaps, was not to
+be so much of a failure! To get into intimate touch with all the members
+of the clique was equally one of her objects, and, failing Danglar
+himself to-night, here was an “open sesame” to the re-treat of two of
+the others. She would never have a better chance, or one in which risk
+and danger, under the chaperonage, as it were, of Shluker here, were,
+if not entirely eliminated, at least reduced to an apparently negligible
+minimum. Yes; she would go. To refuse was to turn her back on her own
+proposed line of action, and on the decision which she had made herself.
+
+
+
+
+XII. CROOKS Vs. CROOKS
+
+It was not far. Shluker, hastening along, still muttering to himself,
+turned into a cross street some two blocks away, and from there again
+into a lane; and, a moment later, led the way through a small door
+in the fence that hung, battered and half open, on sagging and broken
+hinges. Rhoda Gray's eyes traveled sharply around her in all directions.
+It was still light enough to see fairly well, and she might at some
+future time find the bearings she took now to be of inestimable worth.
+Not that there was much to remark! They crossed a diminutive and
+disgustingly dirty backyard, whose sole reason for existence seemed to
+be that of a receptacle for old tin cans, and were confronted by the
+rear of what appeared to be a four-story tenement. There was a back door
+here, and, on the right of the door, fronting the yard, a single window
+that was some four or five feet from the level of the ground.
+
+Shluker, without hesitation, opened the back door, shut it behind them,
+led the way along a black, unlighted hall, and halting before a door
+well toward the front of the building, knocked softly upon it--giving
+two raps, a single rap, and then two more in quick succession. There
+was no answer. He knocked again in precisely the same manner, and then
+a footstep sounded from within, and the door was flung open. “Fools!”
+ growled Shluker in greeting, as they stepped inside and the door was
+closed again. “A pair of brainless fools!”
+
+There were two men there. They paid Shluker scant attention. They both
+grinned at Rhoda Gray through the murky light supplied by a wheezy and
+wholly inadequate gas-jet.
+
+“Hello, Nan!” gibed the smaller of the two. “Who let you out?”
+
+“Aw, forget it!” croaked Rhoda Gray.
+
+Shluker took up the cudgels.
+
+“You close your face, Pinkie!” he snapped. “Get down to cases! Do you
+think I got nothing else to do but chase you two around like a couple
+of puppy dogs that haven't got sense enough to take care of themselves?
+Wasn't what I told you over the phone enough without me havin' to come
+here?”
+
+“Nix on that stuff!” returned the one designated as Pinkie
+imperturbably. “Say, you'll be glad you come when we lets you in on
+a little piece of easy money. We ain't askin' your advice; all we're
+askin' you to do is frame up the alibi, same as usual, for me an' the
+Pug here in case we wants it.”
+
+Shluker shook his fist.
+
+“Frame nothing!” he spluttered angrily. “Ain't I tellin' you that the
+orders are not to make a move, that everything is off for a few days?
+That's the word I got a little while ago, and the Seven-Three-Nine is
+goin' out now. Nan'll tell you the same thing.”
+
+“Sure!” corroborated Rhoda Gray, picking up the obvious cue. “Dat's de
+straight goods.”
+
+The two men were lounging beside a table that stood at the extreme end
+of the room, and now for a moment they whispered together. And, as they
+whispered, Rhoda Gray found her first opportunity to take critical stock
+both of her surroundings and of the two men themselves. Pinkie, a short,
+slight little man, she dismissed with hardly a glance; he was the common
+type, with low, vicious cunning stamped all over his face--an ordinary
+rat of the underworld. But her glance rested longer on his companion.
+The Pug was indeed entitled to his moniker! His face made her think of
+one. It seemed to be all screwed up out of shape. Perhaps the eye-patch
+over the right eye helped a little to put the finishing touch of
+repulsiveness upon a countenance already most unpleasant. The celluloid
+eye-patch, once flesh-colored, was now so dirty and smeared that its
+original color was discernible only in spots, and the once white elastic
+cord that circled his head and kept the patch in place was in equal
+disrepute. A battered slouch hat came to the level of the eye-patch in
+a forbidding sort of tilt. His left eyelid drooped until it was scarcely
+open at all, and fluttered continually. One nostril of his nose was
+entirely closed; and his mouth seemed to be twisted out of shape, so
+that, even when in repose, the lips never entirely met at one corner.
+And his ears, what she could see of them in the poor light, and on
+account of the slouch hat, seemed to bear out the low-type criminal
+impression the man gave her, in that they lay flat back against his
+head.
+
+She turned her eyes away with a little shudder of repulsion, and gave
+her attention to an inspection of the room. There was no window,
+except a small one high up in the right-hand partition wall. She quite
+understood what that meant. It was common enough, and all too unsanitary
+enough, in these old and cheap tenements; the window gave, not on the
+out-of-doors, but on a light-well. For the rest, it was a room she
+had seen a thousand times before--carpetless, unfurnished save for the
+barest necessities, dirt everywhere, unkempt.
+
+Pinkie Bonn broke in abruptly upon her inspection.
+
+“That's all right!” he announced airily. “We'll let Nan in on it, too.
+The Pug an' me figures she can give us a hand.”
+
+Shluker's wizened little face seemed suddenly to go purple.
+
+“Are you tryin' to make a fool of me?” he half screamed. “Or can't you
+understand English? D'ye want me to keep on tellin' you till I'm hoarse
+that there ain't nobody goin' in with you, because you am't goin' in
+yourself! See? Understand that? There's nothing doin' to-night for
+anybody--and that means you!”
+
+“Aw, shut up, Shluker!” It was the Pug now, a curious whispering
+sibilancy in his voice, due no doubt to the disfigurement of his lips.
+“Give Pinkie a chance to shoot his spiel before youse injure yerself
+throwin' a fit! Go on, Pinkie, spill it.”
+
+“Sure!” said Pinkie eagerly. “Listen, Shluk! It ain't any crib we're
+wantin' to crack, or nothin' like that. It's just a couple of crooks
+that won't dare open their yaps to the bulls, 'cause what we're after
+'ll be what they'll have pinched themselves. See?”
+
+Shluker's face lost some of its belligerency, and in its place a dawning
+interest came.
+
+“What's that?” he demanded cautiously. “What crooks?”
+
+“French Pete an' Marny Day,” said Pinkie--and grinned.
+
+“Oh!” Shluker's eyebrows went up. He looked at the Pug, and the Pug
+winked knowingly with his half-closed left eyelid. Shluker reached out
+for a chair, and, finding it suspiciously wobbly, straddled it warily.
+“Mabbe I've been in wrong,” he admitted. “What's the lay?”
+
+“Me,” said Pinkie, “I was down to Charlie's this afternoon havin' a
+little lay-off, an'--”
+
+“One of these days,” interrupted Shluker sharply, “you'll go out
+like”--he snapped his fingers--“that!” “Can't you leave the stuff
+alone?”
+
+“I got to have me bit of coke,” Pinkie answered, with a shrug of his
+shoulders. “An', anyway, I'm no pipe-hitter.
+
+“It's all the same whatever way you take it!” retorted Shluker. “Well,
+go on with your story. You went down to Charlie's dope parlors, and
+jabbed a needle into yourself, or took it some other old way. I get you!
+What happened then?”
+
+“It was about an hour ago,” resumed Pinkie Bonn with undisturbed
+complacency. “Just as I was beatin' it out of there by the cellar, I
+hears some whisperin' as I was passin' one of the end doors. Savvy? I
+hadn't made no noise, an' they hadn't heard me. I gets a peek in, 'cause
+the door's cracked. It was French Pete an' Marny Day. I listens. An'
+after about two seconds I was goin' shaky for fear some one would come
+along an' I wouldn't get the whole of it. Take it from me, Shluk, it was
+some goods!”
+
+Shluker grunted noncommittingly.
+
+“Well, go on!” he prompted.
+
+“I didn't get all the fine points,” grinned Pinkie; “but I got enough.
+There was a guy by the name of Dainey who used to live somewhere on the
+East Side here, an' he used to work in some sweat-shop, an' he worked
+till he got pretty old, an' then his lungs, or something, went bad on
+him, an' he went broke. An' the doctor said he had to beat it out of
+here to a more salubrious climate. Some nut filled his ear full 'bout
+gold huntin' up in Alaska, an' he fell for it. He chewed it over with
+his wife, an' she was for it too, 'cause the doctor 'd told her her old
+man would bump off if he stuck around here, an' they hadn't any money
+to get away together. She figured she could get along workin' out by the
+day till he came back a millionaire; an' old Dainey started off.
+
+“I dunno how he got there. I'm just fillin' in what I hears French Pete
+an' Marny talkin' about. I guess mostly he beat his way there ridin' the
+rods; but, anyway, he got there. See? An' then he goes down sick there
+again, an' a hospital, or some outfit, has to take care of him for a
+couple of years; an' back here the old woman got kind of feeble an' on
+her uppers, an there was hell to pay, an'--”
+
+“Wot's bitin' youse, Nan?” The Pug's lisping whisper broke sharply in
+upon Pinkie Bonn's story.
+
+Rhoda Gray started. She was conscious now that she had been leaning
+forward, staring in a startled way at Pinkie as he talked; conscious now
+that for a moment she had forgotten--that she was Gypsy Nan. But she was
+mistress of herself on the instant, and she scowled blackly at the Pug.
+
+“Mabbe it's me soft heart dat's touched!” she flung out acidly. “Youse
+close yer trap, an' let Pinkie talk!”
+
+“Yes, shut up!” said Pinkie. “What was I sayin'? Oh, yes! An' then the
+old guy makes a strike. Can you beat it! I dunno nothing about the way
+they pull them things, but he's off by his lonesome out somewhere, an'
+he finds gold, an' stakes out his claim, but he takes sick again an'
+can't work it, an' it's all he can do to get back alive to civilization.
+He keeps his mouth shut for a while, figurin' he'll get strong again,
+but it ain't no good, an' he gets a letter from the old woman tellin'
+how bad she is, an' then he shows some of the stuff he'd found. After
+that there's nothing to it! Everybody's beatin' it for the place; but,
+at that, old Dainey comes out of it all right, an' goes crazy with joy
+'cause some guy offers him twenty-five thousand bucks for his claim, an'
+throws in the expenses home for good luck. He gets the money in cash,
+twenty-five one-thousand-dollar bills, an' the chicken feed for the
+expenses, an' starts for back here an' the old woman. But this time he
+don't keep his mouth shut about it when he'd have been better off if he
+had. See? He was tellin' about it on the train. I guess he was tellin'
+about it all the way across. But, anyway, he tells about it comm' from
+Philly this afternoon, an' French Pete an' Marny Day happens to be on
+the train, an' they hears it, an' frames it up to annex the coin before
+morning, 'cause he's got in too late to get the money into any bank
+to-day.”
+
+Pinkie Bonn paused, and stuck his tongue significantly in his cheek.
+
+Shluker was rubbing his hands together now in a sort of unctuous way.
+
+“It sounds pretty good,” he murmured; “only there's Danglar--”
+
+“Youse leave Danglar to me!” broke in the Pug. “As soon as we hands one
+to dem two boobs an' gets de cash, Pinkie can beat it back here wid de
+coin an wait fer me while I finds Danglar an' squares it wid him. He
+ain't goin' to put up no holler at dat. We ain't runnin' de gang into
+nothin'. Dis is private business--see? So youse just take a sneak wid
+yerself, an' fix a nice little alibi fer us so's we won't be takin' any
+chances.”
+
+Shluker frowned.
+
+“But what's the good of that?” he demurred. “French Pete and Marny Day
+'ll see you anyway.”
+
+“Will dey!” scoffed the Pug. “Guess once more! A coupla handkerchiefs
+over our mugs is good enough fer dem, if youse holds yer end up. An' dey
+wouldn't talk fer publication, anyway, would dey?”
+
+Shluker smiled now-almost ingratiatingly.
+
+“And how much is my end worth?” he inquired softly.
+
+“One of dem thousand-dollar engravin's,” stated the Pug promptly. “An'
+Pinkie'll run around an' slip it to youse before mornin'.”
+
+“All right,” said Shluker, after a moment. “It's half past eight now.
+From nine o'clock on, you can beat any jury in New York to it that you
+were both at the same old place--as long as you keep decently under
+cover. That'll do, won't it? I'll fix it. But I don't see--”
+
+Rhoda Gray, as Gypsy Nan, for the first time projected herself into the
+discussion. She cackled suddenly in jeering mirth.
+
+“I t'ought something was wrong wid her!” whispered the Pug with mock
+anxiety. “Mabbe she ain't well! Tell us about it, Nan!”
+
+“When I do,” she said complacently, “mabbe youse'll smile out of de
+other corner of dat mouth of yers!” She turned to Shluker. “Youse
+needn't lay awake waitin' fer dat thousand, Shluker, 'cause youse'll
+never see it. De little game's all off--'cause it's already been pulled.
+See? Dere was near a riot as I passes along a street goin' to yer place,
+an' I gets piped off to wot's up, an' it's de same story dat Pinkie's
+told, an' de crib's cracked, an' de money's gone--dat's all.”
+
+Shluker's face fell.
+
+“I said you were fools when I first came in here!” he burst out
+suddenly, wheeling on Pinkie Bonn and the Pug. “I'm sure of it now. I
+was wonderin a minute ago how you were goin' to keep your lamps on Pete
+and Marny from here, or know when they were goin' to pull their stunt,
+or where to find 'em.”
+
+Pinkie Bonn, ignoring Shluker, leaned toward Rhoda Gray.
+
+“Say, Nan, is that straight?” he inquired anxiously. “You sure?”
+
+“Sure, I'm sure!” Rhoda Gray asserted tersely. The one thought in her
+head now was that her information would naturally deprive these men here
+of any further interest in the matter, and that she would get away as
+quickly as possible, and, in some way or other, see that the police were
+tipped off to the fact that it was French Pete and Marny Day who had
+taken the old couple's money. Those two old faces rose before her again
+now--blotting out most curiously the face of Pinkie Bonn just in front
+of her. She felt strangely glad--glad that she had heard all of old
+Dainey's story, because she could see now an ending to it other than
+the miserable, hopeless one of despair that she had read in the Daineys'
+faces just a little while ago. “Sure, I'm sure!” she repeated with
+finality.
+
+“How long ago was it?” prodded Pinkie.
+
+“I dunno,” she answered. “I just went to Shluker's, an' den we comes
+over here. Youse can figure it fer yerself.”
+
+And then Rhoda Gray stared at the other--with sudden misgiving. Pinkie
+Bonn's face was suddenly wreathed in smiles.
+
+“I'll answer you now, Shluk,” he grinned. “What do you think? That
+we're nuts, me an' Pug? Well, forget it! We didn't have to stick around
+watchin' Pete an' Marny; we just had to wait until they had collected
+the dough. That was the most trouble we had--wonderin' when that
+would be. Well, we don't have to wonder any more. We know now that the
+cherries are ripe. See? An' now we'll go an' pick 'em! Where? Where d'ye
+suppose? Down to Charlie's, of course! I hears 'em talkin' about that,
+too. They ain't so foolish! They're out for an alibi themselves. Get the
+idea? They was to sneak out of Charlie's without anybody seem' 'em,
+an' if everything broke right for 'em, they was to sneak back again an'
+spend the night there. No, they ain't so foolish--I guess they ain't!
+There ain't no place in New York you can get in an' out of without
+nobody knowin' it like Charlie's, if you know the way, an--”
+
+“Aw, write de rest of it down in yer memoirs!” interposed the Pug
+impatiently--and moved toward the door. “It's all right, Shluker--all
+de way. Now, everybody beat it, an' get on de job. Nan, youse sticks wid
+Pinkie an' me.”
+
+Rhoda Gray, her mind in confusion, found herself being crowded hurriedly
+through the doorway by the three men. Still in a mentally confused
+condition, she found herself, a few minutes later--Shluker having parted
+company with them--walking along the street between Pinkie Bonn and
+the Pug. She was fighting desperately to obtain a rip upon herself. The
+information she had volunteered had had an effect diametrically opposite
+to that which she had intended. She seemed terribly impotent; as though
+she were being swept from her feet and borne onward by some swift and
+remorseless current, whether she would or no.
+
+The Pug, in his curious whisper, was talking to her: “Pinkie knows de
+way in. We don't want any row in dere, on account of Charlie. We ain't
+fer puttin' his place on de rough, an' gettin' him raided by de bulls.
+Charlie's all to de good. See? Well, dat's wot 'd likely happen if
+me an' Pinkie busts in on Pete an' Marny widout sendin' in our
+visitin'-cards first, polite-like. Dey would pull deir guns, an' though
+we'd get de coin just de same, dere'd be hell to pay fer Charlie, an' de
+whole place 'd go up in fireworks right off de bat. Well, dis is where
+youse come in. Youse are de visitin'-card. Youse gets into deir bunk
+room, pretendin' youse have made a mistake, an' youse leaves de door
+open behind youse. Dey don't know youse, an', bein' a woman, dey won't
+pull no gun on youse. An' den youse breaks it gently to dem dat dere's
+a coupla gents outside, an' just about den dey looks up an' sees me an'
+Pinkie an' our guns-an' I guess dat's all. Get it?”
+
+“Sure!” mumbled Rhoda Gray.
+
+The Pug talked on. She did not hear him. It seemed as though her brain
+ached literally with an acute physical pain. What was she to do? What
+could she do? She must do something! There must be some way to save
+herself from being drawn into the very center of this vortex toward
+which she was being swept closer with every second that passed. Those
+two old faces, haggard in their despair and misery, rose before her
+again. She felt her heart sink. She had counted, only a few moments
+before, on getting their money back for them--through the police. The
+police! How could she get any word to the police now, without first
+getting away from these two men here? And suppose she did get away,
+and found some means of communicating with the authorities, it would be
+Pinkie Bonn here, and the Pug, who would fall into the meshes of the law
+quite as much as would French Pete and Marny Day; and to have Pinkie and
+the Pug apprehended now, just as they seemed to be opening the gateway
+for her into the inner secrets of the gang, meant ruin to her own hopes
+and plans. And to refuse to go on with them now, as one of them, would
+certainly excite their suspicions--and suspicion of Gypsy Nan was the
+end of everything for her.
+
+Her hands, under her shawl, clenched until the nails bit into her palms.
+Couldn't she do anything? And there was the money, too, for those two
+old people. Wasn't there any--She caught her breath. Yes, yes! Perhaps
+there was a way to save the money; yes, and at the same time to place
+herself on a firmer footing of intimacy with these two men here--if she
+went on with this. But--She shook her head. She could not afford “buts”
+ now; they must take care of themselves afterwards. She would play Gypsy
+Nan now without reservation. These two men here, like Shluker, were
+obviously ignorant that Gypsy Nan was Danglar's wife; so she was--Pinkie
+Bonn's hand was on her arm. She had stumbled.
+
+“Look out for yourself!” he cautioned under his breath. “Don't make a
+sound!”
+
+They had drawn into a very dark and narrow area way between two
+buildings, and now Pinkie kept his touch upon her as he led the way
+along. What was this “Charlie's”? She did not know, except that,
+from what had been said, it was a drug dive of some kind, patronized
+extensively by the denizens of the underworld. She did not know where
+she was now, save that she had suddenly left one of the out-of-the--way
+East Side streets.
+
+Pinkie halted suddenly, and, bending down, lifted up what was evidently
+a half section of the folding trapdoor to a cellar entrance.
+
+“There's only a few of us regulars wise to this,” whispered Pinkie.
+“Watch yourself! There's five steps. Count 'em, so's you won't trip.
+Keep hold of me all the way. An' nix on the noise, or we won't get away
+with it inside. Leave the trap open, Pug, for our getaway. We ain't
+goin' to be long. Come on!”
+
+It was horribly dark. Rhoda Gray, with her hand on Pinkie Bonn's
+shoulder, descended the five steps. She felt the Pug keeping touch
+behind by holding the corner of her shawl. They went forward softly,
+slowly, stealthily. She felt her knees shake a little, and suddenly
+panic seized her, and she wanted to scream out. What was she doing?
+Where was she going? Was she mad, that she had ventured into this trap
+of blackness? Blackness! It was hideously black. She looked behind her.
+She could not see the Pug, close as he was to her; and dark as she had
+thought it outside there at the cellar entrance, it appeared by contrast
+to have been light, for she could even distinguish now the opening
+through which they had come.
+
+They were in a cellar that was damp underfoot, and the soft earth
+deadened all sound as they walked upon it--and they seemed to be walking
+on interminably. It was too far--much too far! She felt her nerve
+failing her. She looked behind her again. That opening, still
+discernible to her straining eyes, beckoned her, lured her. Better to...
+
+Pinkie had halted again. She bumped into him. And then she felt his lips
+press against her ear.
+
+“Here we are!” he breathed. “They got the end room on the right, so's
+they could get in an' out with out bein' seen, an so's even Charlie'd
+swear they was here all the time. You're too old a bird to fall down,
+Nan. If the door's locked, knock--an' give 'em any old kind of a song
+an' dance till you gets 'em off their guard. The Pug an' me 'll see you
+through. Go it!”
+
+Before Rhoda Gray could reply, Pinkie had stepped suddenly to one
+side. A door in front of her, a sliding door it seemed to be, opened
+noiselessly, and she could see a faintly lighted, narrow, and very short
+passage ahead of her. It appeared to make a right-angled turn just a few
+yards in, and what light there was seemed to filter in from around the
+corner. And on each side of the passage, before it made the turn, there
+was a door, and from the one on the right, through a cracked panel, a
+tiny thread of light seeped out.
+
+Her lips moved silently. After all, it was not so perilous. Nobody would
+be hurt. Pinkie and the Pug would cover those two men in there--and take
+the money--and run for it--and...
+
+The Pug gave her an encouraging push from behind.
+
+She moved forward mechanically. There were many sounds now, but they
+came muffled and indeterminate from around that corner ahead--all save
+a low murmuring of voices from the door with the cracked panel on the
+right.
+
+It was only a few feet. She found herself crouched before the door--but
+she did not knock upon it. Instead, her blood seemed suddenly to run
+cold in her veins, and she beckoned frantically to her two companions.
+She could see through the crack in the panel. There were two men in
+there, French Pete and Marny Day undoubtedly, and they sat on opposite
+sides of a table, and a lamp burned on the table, and one of the men
+was counting out a sheaf of crisp yellow-back banknotes--but the other,
+while apparently engrossed in the first man's occupation, and while he
+leaned forward in apparent eagerness, was edging one hand stealthily
+toward the lamp, and his other hand, hidden from his companion's view
+by the table, was just drawing a revolver from his pocket. There was no
+mistaking the man's murderous intentions. A dull horror, that numbed her
+brain, seized upon Rhoda Gray; the low-type brutal faces under the rays
+of the lamp seemed to assume the aspect of two monstrous gargoyles, and
+to spin around and around before her vision; and then--it could only
+have been but the fraction of a second since she had begun to beckon to
+Pinkie and the Pug--she felt herself pulled unceremoniously away from
+the door, and the Pug leaned forward in her place, his eyes to the crack
+in the panel.
+
+She heard a low, quick-muttered exclamation from the Pug; and then
+suddenly, as the lamp was obviously extinguished, that crack of light
+in the panel had vanished. But in an instant, curiously like a jagged
+lightning flash, light showed through the crack again--and vanished
+again. It was the flash of a revolver shot from within, and the roar of
+the report came now like the roll of thunder on its heels.
+
+Rhoda Gray was back against the opposite wall. She saw the Pug fling
+himself against the door. It was a flimsy affair. It crashed inward. She
+heard him call to Pinkie:
+
+“Shoot yer flash on de table, an' grab de coin! I'll fix de other guy!”
+
+Were eternities passing? Her eyes were fascinated by the interior beyond
+that broken door. It was utterly dark inside there, save that the ray
+of a flashlight played now on the table, and a hand reached out and
+snatched up a scattered sheaf of banknotes; and on the outer edge of the
+ray two shadowy forms struggled and one went down. Then the flashlight
+went out She heard the Pug speak:
+
+“Beat it!”
+
+Commotion came now; cries and footsteps from around that corner in the
+passage. The Pug grasped her by the shoulders, and rushed her back into
+the cellar. She was conscious, it seemed, only in a dazed and mechanical
+way. There were men in the passage running toward them--and then the
+passage had disappeared. Pinkie Bonn had shut the connecting door.
+
+“Hop it like blazes!” whispered the Pug, as they ran for the faint
+glimmer of light that located the cellar exit. “Separate de minute we're
+outside!” he ordered. “Dere's murder in dere. Pete shot Marny. I put
+Pete to sleep wid a punch on de jaw; but de bunch knows now some one
+else was dere, an' Pete'll swear it was us, though he don't know who we
+was dat did de shootin'. I gotta make dis straight right off de bat wid
+Danglar.” His whispering voice was labored, panting; they were climbing
+up the steps now. “Youse take de money to my room, Pinkie, an' wait
+fer me. I won't be much more'n half an hour. Nan, youse beat it fer yer
+garret, an' stay dere!”
+
+They were outside. The Pug had disappeared in the darkness. Pinkie was
+closing, and evidently fastening, the trap-door.
+
+“The other way, Nan!” he flung out, as she started to run. “That takes
+you to the other street, an' they can't get around that way without
+goin' around the whole block. Me for a fence I knows about, an' we gives
+'em the merry laugh! Go on!”
+
+She ran--ran breathlessly, stumbling, half falling, her hands stretched
+out before her to serve almost in lieu of eyes, for she could make out
+scarcely anything in front of her. She emerged upon a street. It seemed
+abnormal, the quiet, the lack of commotion, the laughter, the unconcern
+in the voices of the passers-by among whom she suddenly found herself.
+She hurried from the neighborhood.
+
+
+
+
+XIII. THE DOOR ACROSS THE HALL
+
+It was many blocks away before calmness came again to Rhoda Gray,
+and before it seemed, even, that her brain would resume its normal
+functions; but with the numbed horror once gone, there came in its
+place, like some surging tide, a fierce virility that would not be
+denied. The money! The old couple on that doorstep, stripped of their
+all! Wasn't that one reason why she had gone on with Pinkie Bonn and
+the Pug? Hadn't she seen a way, or at least a chance, to get that money
+back?
+
+Rhoda Gray looked quickly about her. On the corner ahead she saw a drug
+store, and started briskly in that direction. Yes, there was a way! The
+idea had first come to her from the Pug's remark to Shluker that, after
+they had secured the money, Pinkie would return with it to the Pug's
+room, while the Pug would go and square things with Danglar. And also,
+at the same time, that same remark of the Pug's had given rise to a
+hope that she might yet trace Danglar to night through the Pug--but the
+circumstances and happenings of the last few minutes had shattered that
+hope utterly. And so there remained the money. And, as she had walked
+with Pinkie and the Pug a little while ago, knowing that Pinkie would,
+if they were successful, carry the money back to the Pug's room, just
+as was being done now precisely in accordance with the Pug's original
+intentions, she had thought of the Adventurer. It had seemed the only
+way then; it seemed the only way now--despite the fact that she would be
+hard put to it to answer the Adventurer if he thought to ask her how, or
+by what means, she was in possession of the information that enabled
+her to communicate with him. But she must risk that--put him off, if
+necessary, through the plea of haste, and on the ground that there was
+not time to-night for an unnecessary word. He had given her, believing
+her to be Gypsy Nan, his telephone number, which she, in turn, was to
+transmit to the White Moll--in other words, herself! But the White
+Moll, so he believed, had never received that message--and it must
+of necessity be as the White Moll that she must communicate with him
+to-night! It would be hard to explain--she meant to evade it. The one
+vital point was that she remembered the telephone number he had given
+her that night when he and Danglar had met in the garret. She was not
+likely to have forgotten it!
+
+Rhoda Gray, alias Gypsy Nan, scuffled along. Was she inconsistent? The
+Adventurer would be in his element in going to the Pug's room, and in
+relieving Pinkie Bonn of that money; but the Adventurer, too, was
+a thief-wasn't he? Why, then, did she propose, for her mind was now
+certainly made up as to her course of action, to trust a thief to
+recover that money for her?
+
+She smiled a little wearily as she reached the drug store, stepped into
+the telephone booth, and gave central her call. Trust a thief! No, it
+wasn't because her heart prompted her to believe in him; it was because
+her head assured her she was safe in doing so. She could trust him in an
+instance such as this because--well, because once before, for her sake
+he had foregone the opportunity of appropriating a certain diamond
+necklace worth a hundred times the sum that she would ask him--yes, if
+necessary, for her sake--to recover to-night. There was no...
+
+She was listening in a startled way now at the instrument. Central had
+given her “information”; and “information” was informing her that the
+number she had asked for had been disconnected.
+
+She hung up the receiver, and went out again to the street in a dazed
+and bewildered way. And then suddenly a smile of bitter self-derision
+crossed her lips. She had been a fool! There was no softer word--a fool!
+Why had she not stopped to think? She understood now! On the night the
+Adventurer had confided that telephone number to her as Gypsy Nan, he
+had had every reason to believe that Gypsy Nan would, as she had already
+apparently done, befriend the White Moll even to the extent of accepting
+no little personal risk in so doing. But since then things had taken a
+very different turn. The White Moll was now held by the gang, of which
+Gypsy Nan was supposed to be a member, to be the one who had of late
+profited by the gang's plans to the gang's discomfiture; and the
+Adventurer was ranked but little lower in the scale of hatred, since
+they counted him to be the White Moll's accomplice. Knowing this,
+therefore, the first thing the Adventurer would naturally do would be to
+destroy the clew, in the shape of that telephone number, that would lead
+to his whereabouts, and which he of course believed he had put into the
+gang's hands when he had confided in Gypsy Nan. Had he not told her, no
+later than last night, that Gypsy Nan was her worst enemy? He did not
+know, did he, that Gypsy Nan and the White Moll were one! And so that
+telephone had been disconnected--and to-night, now, just when she needed
+help at a crucial moment, when she had counted upon the Adventurer to
+supply it, there was no Adventurer, no means of reaching him, and no
+means any more of knowing where he was!
+
+Rhoda Gray walked on along the street, her lips tight, her face drawn
+and hard. Failing the Adventurer, there remained--the police. If she
+telephoned the police and sent them to the Pug's room, they would of a
+certainty recover the money, and with equal certainty restore it to its
+rightful owners. She had already thought of that when she had been with
+Pinkie and the Pug, and had been loath even then to take such a step
+because it seemed to spell ruin to her own personal plans; but now there
+was another reason, and one far more cogent, why she should not do
+so. There had been murder committed back there in that underground
+drug-dive, and of that murder Pinkie Bonn was innocent; but if Pinkie
+were found in possession of that money, and French Pete, to save his own
+skin from the consequences of a greater crime, admitted to its original
+theft, Pinkie would be convicted out of hand, for there were the others
+in that dive, who had come running along the passage, to testify that
+an attack had been made on the door of French Pete and Marny Day's
+room, and that the thieves and murderers had fled through the cellar and
+escaped.
+
+Her lips pressed harder together. And so there was no Adventurer upon
+whom she could call, and no police, and no one in all the millions in
+this great pulsing city to whom she could appeal; and so there remained
+only--herself.
+
+Well, she could do it, couldn't she? Not as Gypsy Nan, of course--but as
+the White Moll. It would be worth it, wouldn't it? If she were sincere,
+and not a moral hypocrite in her sympathy for those two outraged old
+people in the twilight of their lives, and if she were not a moral
+coward, there remained no question as to what her decision should be.
+
+Her mind began to mull over the details. Subconsciously, since the
+moment she had made her escape from that cellar, she found now that she
+had been walking in the direction of the garret that sheltered her as
+Gypsy Nan. In another five minutes she could reach that deserted shed in
+the lane behind Gypsy Nan's house where her own clothes were hidden,
+and it would take her but a very few minutes more to effect the
+transformation from Gypsy Nan to the White Moll. And then, in another
+ten minutes, she should be back again at the Pug's room. The Pug had
+said he would not be much more than half an hour, but, as nearly as she
+could calculate it, that would still give her from five to ten minutes
+alone with Pinkie Bonn. It was enough--more than enough. The prestige of
+the White Moll would do the rest. A revolver in the hands of the White
+Moll would insure instant and obedient respect from Pinkie Bonn, or
+any other member of the gang under similar conditions. And so--and
+so--it--would not be difficult. Only there was a queer fluttering at her
+heart now, and her breath came in hard, short little inhalations. And
+she spoke suddenly to herself:
+
+“I'm glad,” she whispered, “I'm glad I saw those two old faces on that
+doorstep, because--because, if I hadn't, I--I would be afraid.”
+
+The minutes passed. The dissolute figure of an old hag disappeared, like
+a deeper shadow in the blackness of a lane, through the broken door of
+a deserted shed; presently a slim, neat little figure, heavily veiled,
+emerged. Again the minutes passed. And now the veiled figure let herself
+in through the back door of the Pug's lodging house, and stole softly
+down the dark hall, and halted before the Pug's door. It was the White
+Moll now.
+
+From under the door, at the ill-fitting threshold, there showed a
+thin line of light. Rhoda Gray, with her ear against the door panel,
+listened. There was no sound of voices from within. Pinkie Bonn, then,
+was still alone, and still waiting for the Pug. She glanced sharply
+around her. There was only darkness. Her gloved right hand was hidden in
+the folds of her skirt; she raised her left hand and knocked softly upon
+the door-two raps, one rap, two raps. She repeated it. And as it had
+been with Shluker, so it was now with her. A footstep crossed the floor
+within, the key turned in the lock, and the door was flung open.
+
+“All right, Pug,” said Pinkie Bonn, “I--”
+
+The man's words ended in a gasp of surprised amazement. With a quick
+step forward, Rhoda Gray was in the room. Her revolver, suddenly
+outflung, covered the other; and her free hand, reaching behind her,
+closed and locked the door again.
+
+There was an almost stupid look of bewilderment on Pinkie Bonn's face.
+
+Rhoda Gray threw back her veil.
+
+“My Gawd!” mumbled Pinkie Bonn--and licked his lips. “The White Moll!”
+
+“Yes!” said Rhoda Gray tersely. “Put your hands up over your head and go
+over there and stand against the wall--with your face to it!”
+
+Pinkie Bonn, like an automaton moved purely by mechanical means, obeyed.
+
+Rhoda Gray followed him, and with the muzzle of her revolver pressed
+into the small of the man's back, felt rapidly over his clothes with her
+left hand for the bulge of his revolver. She found and possessed herself
+of the weapon, and, stepping back, ordered him to turn around again.
+
+“I haven't much time,” she said icily. “I'll trouble you now for the
+cash you took from Marny Day and French Pete.”
+
+“My Gawd!” he mumbled again. “You know about that!”
+
+“Quick!” she said imperatively. “Put it on the table there, and then go
+back again to the wall!”
+
+Pinkie Bonn fumbled in his pocket. His face was white, almost chalky
+white, and it held fear; but its dominant expression was one of helpless
+stupefaction. He placed the sheaf of banknotes on the table, and
+shuffled back again to the wall.
+
+Rhoda Gray picked up the money, and retreated to the door. Still facing
+the man, working with her left hand behind her back, she unlocked the
+door again, and this time removed the key from the lock.
+
+“You are quite safe here,” she observed evenly, “since there appears to
+be no window through which you could get out; but you might make it a
+little unpleasant for me if you gave the alarm and aroused the other
+occupants of the house before I had got well away. I dare say that was
+in your mind, but”--she opened the door slightly, and inserted the key
+on the outer side--“I am quite sure you will reconsider any such
+intentions--Pinkie. It would be a very disastrous thing for you if
+I were caught. Somebody is 'wanted' for the murder of Marny Day at
+Charlie's a little while ago, and a jury would undoubtedly decide that
+the guilty man was the one who broke in the door there and stole the
+money. And if I were caught and were obliged to confess that I got it
+from you, and French Pete swore that it was whoever broke into the room
+that shot his pal, it might go hard with you, Pinkie--don't you think
+so?” She smiled coldly at the man's staring eyes and dropped jaw.
+“Good-night, Pinkie; I know you won't make any noise,” she said
+softly--and suddenly opened the door, and in a flash stepped back into
+the hall, and closed and locked the door, and whipped out the key from
+the lock.
+
+And inside Pinkie Bonn made no sound.
+
+It was done now. Rhoda Gray drew in her breath in a great choking gasp
+of relief. She found herself trembling violently. She found her limbs
+were bearing her none too steadily, as she began to grope her way now
+along the black hall toward the back door. But it was done now, and--No,
+she was not safe away, even yet! Some one was coming in through that
+back door just ahead of her; or, at least, she heard voices out there.
+
+She was just at the end of the hall now. There was no time to go back
+and risk the front entrance. She darted across the hall to the opposite
+side from that of the Pug's room, because on that side the opening of
+the door would not necessarily expose her, and crouched down in the
+corner. It was black here, perhaps black enough to escape observation.
+She listened, her heart beating wildly. The voices outside continued.
+Why were they lingering there? Why didn't they do one thing or the
+other--either go away, or come in? There wasn't any too much time! The
+Pug might be back at any minute now. Perhaps one of those people out
+there was the Pug! Perhaps it would be better after all to run back and
+go out by the front door, risky as that would be. No, her escape in that
+direction now was cut off, too!
+
+She shrank as far back into the corner as she could. The door of the end
+room on this side of the hall had opened, and now a man stepped out and
+closed the door behind him. Would he see her? She held her breath. No!
+It--it was all right. He was walking away from her toward the front
+of the hall. And now for a moment it seemed as though she had lost her
+senses, as though her brain were playing some mad, wild trick upon her.
+Wasn't that the Pug's door before which the man had stopped? Yes, yes!
+And he seemed to have a key to it, for he did not knock, and the door
+was opening, and now for an instant, just an instant, the light fell
+upon the man as he stepped with a quick, lightning-like movement inside,
+and she saw his face. It was the Adventurer.
+
+She stifled a little cry. Her brain was in turmoil. And now the back
+door was opening. They--they might see her here! And--yes--it was
+safer--safer to act on the sudden inspiration that had come to her. The
+door of the room from which the Adventurer had emerged was almost
+within reach; and he had not locked it as he had gone out--she had
+subconsciously noted that fact. And she understood why he had not
+now--that he had safeguarded himself against the loss of even the second
+or two it would have taken him to unlock it when he ran back for cover
+again from the Pug's room. Yes-that room! It was the safest thing she
+could do. She could even get out that way, for it must be the room with
+the low window, which she remembered gave on the back yard, and--She
+darted silently forward, and, as the back door opened, slipped into the
+room the Adventurer had just vacated.
+
+It was pitch black. She must not make a sound; but, equally, she must
+not lose a second. What was taking place in the Pug's room between
+Pinkie Bonn and the Adventurer she did not know. But the Adventurer was
+obviously on one of his marauding expeditions, and he might stay
+there no more than a minute or two once he found out that he had been
+forestalled. She must hurry--hurry!
+
+She felt her way forward in what she believed to be the direction of
+the window. She ran against the bed. But this afforded her something by
+which to guide herself. She kept her touch upon it, her hand trailing
+along its edge. And then, halfway down its length, what seemed to be a
+piece of string caught in her extended, groping fingers. It seemed to
+cling, but also to yield most curiously, as she tried to shake it off;
+and then something, evidently from under the mattress, came away with a
+little jerk, and remained, suspended, in her hand.
+
+It didn't matter, did it? Nothing mattered except to reach the window.
+Yes, here it was now! And the roller shade was drawn down; that was why
+the room was so dark. She raised the shade quickly--and suddenly stood
+there as though transfixed, her face paling, as in the faint light by
+the window she gazed, fascinated, at the object that still dangled by a
+cord from her hand.
+
+And it seemed as if an inner darkness were suddenly riven as by a bolt
+of lightning--a hundred things, once obscure and incomprehensible, were
+clear now, terribly clear. She understood now how the Adventurer was
+privy to all the inner workings of the organization; she understood now
+how it was, and why, the Adventurer had a room so close to that other
+room across the hall. That dangling thing on an elastic cord was a
+smeared and dirty celluloid eye-patch that had once been flesh-colored!
+The Adventurer and the Pug were one!
+
+
+Her wits! Quick! He must not know! In a frenzy of haste she ran for the
+bed, and slipped the eye-patch in under the mattress again; and then,
+still with frenzied speed, she climbed to the window sill, drew the
+roller shade down again behind her, and dropped to the ground.
+
+Through the back yard and lane she gained the street, and sped on
+along the street--but her thoughts outpaced her hurrying footsteps.
+How minutely every detail of the night now seemed to explain itself
+and dovetail with every other one! At the time, when Shluker had been
+present, it had struck her as a little forced and unnecessary that the
+Pug should have volunteered to seek out Danglar with explanations after
+the money had been secured. But she understood now the craft and guile
+that lay behind his apparently innocent plan. The Adventurer needed both
+time and an alibi, and also he required an excuse for making Pinkie Bonn
+the custodian of the stolen money, and of getting Pinkie alone with
+that money in the Pug's room. Going to Danglar supplied all this. He had
+hurried back, changed in that room from the Pug to the Adventurer, and
+proposed in the latter character to relieve Pinkie of the money, to
+return then across the hall, become the Pug again, and then go back,
+as though he had just come from Danglar, to find his friend and ally,
+Pinkie Bonn, robbed by their mutual arch-enemy--the Adventurer!
+
+The Pug-the Adventurer! She did not quite seem to grasp its significance
+as applied to her in a personal way. It seemed to branch out into
+endless ramifications. She could not somehow think logically, coolly
+enough now, to decide what this meant in a concrete way to her, and her
+to-morrow, and the days after the to-morrow.
+
+She hurried on. To-night, as she would lay awake through the hours that
+were to come, for sleep was a thing denied, perhaps a clearer
+vision would be given her. For the moment there--there was something
+else--wasn't there? The money that belonged to the old couple.
+
+She hurried on. She came again to the street where the old couple lived.
+It was a dirty street, and from the curb she stooped and picked up a
+dirty piece of old newspaper. She wrapped the banknotes in the paper.
+
+There were not many people on the street as she neared the mean little
+frame house, but she loitered until for the moment the immediate
+vicinity was deserted; then she slipped into the alleyway, and stole
+close to the side window, through which, she had noted from the street,
+there shone a light. Yes, they were there, the two of them--she could
+see them quite distinctly even through the shutters.
+
+She went back to the front door then, and knocked. And presently the old
+woman came and opened the door.
+
+“This is yours,” Rhoda said, and thrust the package into the woman's
+hand. And as the woman looked from her to the package uncomprehendingly,
+Rhoda Gray flung a quick “good-night” over her shoulder, and ran down
+the steps again.
+
+But a few moments later she stole back, and stood for an instant once
+more by the shuttered window in the alleyway. And suddenly her eyes grew
+dim. She saw an old man, white and haggard, with bandaged head, sitting
+in a chair, the tears streaming down his face; and on the floor, her
+face hidden on the other's knees, a woman knelt--and the man's hand
+stroked and stroked the thin gray hair on the woman' s head.
+
+And Rhoda Gray turned away. And out in the street her face was lifted
+and she looked upward, and there were myriad stars. And there seemed a
+beauty in them that she had never seen before, and a great, comforting
+serenity. And they seemed to promise something--that through the window
+of that stark and evil garret to which she was going now, they would
+keep her dreaded vigil with her until morning came again.
+
+
+
+
+XIV. THE LAME MAN
+
+Another night--another day! And the night again had been without rest,
+lest Danglar's dreaded footstep come upon her unawares; and the day
+again had been one of restless, abortive activity, now prowling the
+streets as Gypsy Nan, now returning to the garret to fling herself upon
+the cot in the hope that in daylight, when she might risk it, sleep
+would come, but it had been without avail, for, in spite of physical
+weariness, it seemed to Rhoda Gray as though her tortured mind would
+never let her sleep again. Danglar's wife! That was the horror that was
+in her brain, yes, and in her soul, and that would not leave her.
+
+And now night was coming upon her once more. It had even begun to grow
+dark here on the lower stairway that led up to that wretched, haunted
+garret above where in the shadows stark terror lurked. Strange! Most
+strange! She feared the night--and yet she welcomed it. In a little
+while, when it grew a little darker, she would steal out again and take
+up her work once more. It was only during the night, under the veil of
+darkness, that she could hope to make any progress in reaching to the
+heart and core of this criminal clique which surrounded her, whose
+members accepted her as Gypsy Nan, and, therefore, as one of themselves,
+and who would accord to her, if they but even suspected her to be the
+White Mall, less mercy than would be shown to a mad dog.
+
+She climbed the stairs. Fear was upon her now, because fear was
+always there, and with it was abhorrence and loathing at the frightful
+existence fate had thrust upon her; but, somehow, to-night she was not
+so depressed, not so hopeless, as she had been the night before. There
+had been a little success; she had come a little farther along the way;
+she knew a little more than she had known before of the inner workings
+of the gang who were at the bottom of the crime of which she herself
+was accused. She knew now the Adventurer's secret, that the Pug and the
+Adventurer were one; and she knew where the Adventurer lived, now in
+one character, now in the other, in those two rooms almost opposite each
+other across that tenement hall.
+
+And so it seemed that she had the right to hope, even though there were
+still so many things she did not know, that if she allowed her mind to
+dwell upon that phase of it, it staggered her--where those code messages
+came from, and how; why Rough Rorke of headquarters had never made a
+sign since that first night; why the original Gypsy Nan, who was dead
+now, had been forced into hiding with the death penalty of the
+law hanging over her; why Danglar, though Gypsy Nan's husband, was
+comparatively free. These, and a myriad other things! But she counted
+now upon her knowledge of the Adventurer's secret to force from him
+everything he knew; and, with that to work on, a confession from some of
+the gang in corroboration that would prove the authorship of the crime
+of which she had seemingly been caught in the act of committing.
+
+Yes, she was beginning to see the way at last--through the Adventurer.
+It seemed a sure and certain way. If she presented herself before him as
+Gypsy Nan, whom he believed to be not only one of the gang, but actually
+Danglar's wife, and let him know that she was aware of the dual role
+he was playing, and that the information he thus acquired as the Pug
+he turned to his own account and to the undoing of the gang, he must of
+necessity be at her mercy. Her mercy! What exquisite irony! Her mercy!
+The man her heart loved; the thief her common sense abhorred! What
+irony! When she, too, played a double role; when in their other
+characters, that of the Adventurer and the White Moll, he and she were
+linked together by the gang as confederates, whereas, in truth, they
+were wider apart than the poles of the earth!
+
+Her mercy! How merciful would she be--to the thief she loved? He knew,
+he must know, all the inner secrets of the gang. She smiled wanly now
+as she reached the landing. Would he know that in the last analysis her
+threat would be only an idle one; that, though her future, her safety,
+her life depended on obtaining the evidence she felt he could supply,
+her threat would be empty, and that she was powerless--because she loved
+him. But he did not know she loved him--she was Gypsy Nan. If she kept
+her secret, if he did not penetrate her disguise as she had penetrated
+his, if she were Gypsy Nan and Danglar's wife to him, her threat would
+be valid enough, and--and he would be at her mercy!
+
+A flush, half shamed, half angry, dyed the grime that was part of Gypsy
+Nan's disguise upon her face. What was she saying to herself? What was
+she thinking? That he did not know she loved him! How would he? How
+could he? Had a word, an act, a single look of hers ever given him a
+hint that, when she had been with him as the White Moll, she cared!
+It was unjust, unfair, to fling such a taunt at herself. It seemed as
+though she had lost nearly everything in life, but she had not yet lost
+her womanliness and her pride.
+
+She had certainly lost her senses, though! Even if that word, that look,
+that act had passed between them, between the Adventurer and the White
+Moll, he still did not know that Gypsy Nan was the White Moll--and that
+was the one thing now that he must not know, and...
+
+Rhoda Gray halted suddenly, and stared along the hallway ahead of her,
+and up the short, ladder-like steps that led to the garret. Her ears--or
+was it fancy?--had caught what sounded like a low knocking up there upon
+her door. Yes, it came again now distinctly. It was dusk outside; in
+here, in the hall, it was almost dark. Her eyes strained through the
+murk. She was not mistaken. Something darker than the surrounding
+darkness, a form, moved up there.
+
+The knocking ceased, and now the form seemed to bend down and grope
+along the floor; and then, an instant later, it began to descend the
+ladder-like steps--and abruptly Rhoda Gray, too, moved forward. It
+wasn't Danglar. That was what had instantly taken hold of her mind, and
+she knew a sudden relief now. The man on the stairs--she could see that
+it was a man now--though he moved silently, swayed in a grotesquely
+jerky way as though he were lame. It wasn't Danglar! She would go to
+any length to track Danglar to his lair; but not here--here in the
+darkness--here in the garret. Here she was afraid of him with a deadly
+fear; here alone with him there would be a thousand chances of exposure
+incident to the slightest intimacy he might show the woman whom he
+believed to be his wife--a thousand chances here against hardly one in
+any other environment or situation. But the man on the stairs wasn't
+Danglar.
+
+She halted now and uttered a sharp exclamation, as though she had caught
+sight of the man for the first time.
+
+The other, too, had halted--at the foot of the stairs. A plaintive drawl
+reached her:
+
+“Don't screech, Bertha! It's only your devoted brother-in-law. Curse
+your infernal ladder, and my twisted back!”
+
+Danglar's brother! Bertha! She snatched instantly at the cue with an
+inward gasp of thankfulness. She would not make the mistake of using the
+vernacular behind which Gypsy Nan sheltered herself. Here was some one
+who knew that Gypsy Nan was but a role. But she had to remember that her
+voice was slightly hoarse; that her voice, at least, could not sacrifice
+its disguise to any one. Danglar had been a little suspicious of it
+until she had explained that she was suffering from a cold.
+
+“Oh!” she said calmly. “It's you, is it? And what brought you here?”
+
+“What do you suppose?” he complained irritably. “The same old thing, all
+I'm good for--to write out code messages and deliver them like an errand
+boy! It's a sweet job, isn't it? How'd you like to be a deformed little
+cripple?”
+
+She did not answer at once. The night seemed suddenly to be opening
+some strange, even premonitory, vista. The code messages! Their mode of
+delivery! Here was the answer!
+
+“Maybe I'd like it better than being Gypsy Nan!” she flung back
+significantly.
+
+He laughed out sharply.
+
+“I'd like to trade with you,” he said, a quick note of genuine envy
+in his voice. “You can pitch away your clothes; I can't pitch away
+a crooked spine. And, anyway, after to-night, you'll be living swell
+again.”
+
+She leaned toward him, staring at him in the semi-darkness. That
+premonitory vista was widening; his words seemed suddenly to set her
+brain in tumult. After to-night! She was to resume, after to-night, the
+character that was supposed to lay behind the disguise of Gypsy Nan! She
+was to resume her supposedly true character--that of Pierre Danglar's
+wife!
+
+“What do you mean?” she demanded tensely.
+
+“Aw, come on!” he said abruptly. “This isn't the place to talk. Pierre
+wants you at once. That's what the message was for. I thought you were
+out, and I left it in the usual place so you'd get it the minute you got
+back and come along over. So, come on now with me.”
+
+He was moving down the hallway, blotching like some misshapen toad in
+the shadowy light, lurching in his walk, that was, nevertheless, almost
+uncannily noiseless. Mechanically she followed him. She was trying to
+think; striving frantically to bring her wits to play on this sudden and
+unexpected denouement. It was obvious that he was taking her to Danglar.
+She had striven desperately last night to run Danglar to earth in
+his lair. And here was a self-appointed guide! And yet her emotions
+conflicted and her brain was confused. It was what she wanted, what
+through bitter travail of mind she had decided must be her course; but
+she found herself shrinking from it with dread and fear now that it
+promised to become a reality. It was not like last night when of her own
+initiative she had sought to track Danglar, for then she had started
+out with a certain freedom of action that held in reserve a freedom
+to retreat if it became necessary. To-night it was as though she were
+deprived of that freedom, and being led into what only too easily might
+develop into a trap from which she could not retreat or escape.
+
+Suppose she refused to go?
+
+They had reached the street now, and now she obtained a better view of
+the misshapen thing that lurched jerkily along beside her. The man was
+deformed, miserably deformed. He walked most curiously, half bent over;
+and one arm, the left, seemed to swing helplessly, and the left hand was
+like a withered thing. Her eyes sought the other's face. It was an old
+face, much older than Danglar's, and it was white and pinched and drawn;
+and in the dark eyes, as they suddenly darted a glance at her, she read
+a sullen, bitter brooding and discontent. She turned her head away. It
+was not a pleasant face; it struck her as being both morbid and cruel to
+a degree.
+
+Suppose she refused to go?
+
+“What did you mean by 'after to-night'?” she asked again.
+
+“You'll see,” he answered. “Pierre'll tell you. You're in luck, that's
+all. The whole thing that has kept you under cover has bust wide open
+your way, and you win. And Pierre's going through for a clean-up.
+To-morrow you can swell around in a limousine again. And maybe you'll
+come around and take me for a drive, if I dress up, and promise to hide
+in a corner of the back seat so's they won't see your handsome friend!”
+
+The creature flung a bitter smile at her, and lurched on.
+
+He had told her what she wanted to know--more than she had hoped for.
+The mystery that surrounded the character of Gypsy Nan, the evidence of
+the crime at which the woman who had originated that role had hinted
+on the night she died, and which must necessarily involve Danglar, was
+hers, Rhoda Gray's, now for the taking. As well go and give herself up
+to the police as the White Moll and have done with it all, as to refuse
+to seize the opportunity which fate, evidently in a kindlier mood toward
+her now, was offering her at this instant. It promised her the hold upon
+Danglar that she needed to force an avowal of her own innocence, the
+very hold that she had but a few minutes before been hoping she could
+obtain through the Adventurer.
+
+There was no longer any question as to whether she would go or not.
+
+Her hand groped down under the shabby black shawl into the wide,
+voluminous pocket of her greasy skirt. Yes, her revolver was there. She
+knew it was there, but the touch of her fingers upon it seemed to bring
+a sense of reassurance. She was perhaps staking her all in accompanying
+this cripple here to-night--she did not need to be told that--but there
+was a way of escape at the last if she were cornered and caught. Her
+fingers played with the weapon. If the worst came to the worst she would
+never be at Danglar's mercy while she possessed that revolver and, if
+the need came, turned it upon herself.
+
+They walked on rapidly; the lurching figure beside her covering the
+ground at an astounding rate of speed. The man made no effort to talk.
+She was glad of it. She need not be so anxiously on her guard as would
+be the case if a conversation were carried on, and she, who knew so much
+and yet so pitifully little, must weigh her every word, and feel her way
+with every sentence. And besides, too, it gave her time to think. Where
+were they going? What sort of a place was it, this headquarters of the
+gang? For it must be the headquarters, since it was from there the code
+messages would naturally emanate, and this deformed creature, from what
+he had said, was the “secretary” of the nefarious clique that was ruled
+by his brother. And was luck really with her at last? Suppose she had
+been but a few minutes later in reaching Gypsy Nan's house, and had
+found, instead of this man here, only the note instructing her to go and
+meet Danglar! What would she have done? What explanation could she have
+made for her nonappearance? Her hands would have been tied. She would
+have been helpless. She could not have answered the summons, for she
+could have had no idea where this gang-lair was; and the note certainly
+would not contain such details as street and number, which she was
+obviously supposed to know. She smiled a little grimly to herself.
+Yes, it seemed as though fortune were beginning to smile upon her
+again--fortune, at least, had supplied her with a guide.
+
+The twisted figure walked on the inside of the sidewalk, and curiously
+seemed to seek as much as possible the protecting shadows of the
+buildings, and invariably shrank back out of the way of the passers-by
+they met. She watched him narrowly as they went along. What was
+he afraid of? Recognition? It puzzled her for a time, and then
+she understood: It was not fear of recognition; the sullen, almost
+belligerent stare with which he met the eyes of those with whom he
+came into close contact belied that. The man was morbidly, abnormally
+sensitive of his deformity.
+
+They turned at last into one of the East Side cross streets, and her
+guide halted finally on a corner in front of a little shop that was
+closed and dark. She stared curiously as the man unlocked the door.
+Perhaps, after all, she had been woefully mistaken. It did not look at
+all the kind of place where crimes that ran the gamut of the decalogue
+were hatched, at all the sort of place that was the council chamber
+of perhaps the most cunning, certainly the most cold-blooded and
+unscrupulous, band of crooks that New York had ever harbored. And
+yet--why not? Wasn't there the essence of cunning in that very fact? Who
+would suspect anything of the sort from a ramshackle, two-story little
+house like this, whose front was a woe-begone little store, the proceeds
+of which might just barely keep the body and soul of its proprietor
+together?
+
+The man fumbled with the lock. There was not a single light showing from
+the place, but in the dwindling rays of a distant street lamp she could
+see the meager window display through the filthy, unwashed panes. It was
+evidently a cheap and tawdry notion store, well suited to its locality.
+There were toys of the cheapest variety, stationery of the same grade,
+cheap pipes, cigarettes, tobacco, candy--a package of needles.
+
+“Go on in!” grunted the man, as he pushed the door--which seemed to
+shriek out unduly on its hinges--wide open. “If anybody sees the door
+open, they'll be around wanting to buy a paper of pins--curse 'em!--and
+I ain't open to-night.” He snarled as he shut and locked the door.
+“Pierre says you're grouching about your garret. How about me, and this
+job? You get out of yours to-night for keeps. What about me? I can't do
+anything but act as a damned blind for the rest of you with this fool
+store, just because I was born a freak that every gutter-snipe on the
+street yells at!”
+
+Rhoda Gray did not answer.
+
+“Well, go on!” snapped the man. “What are you standing there for? One
+would think you'd never been here before!”
+
+Go on! Where? She had not the faintest idea. It was quite dark inside
+here in the shop. She could barely make out the outline of the other's
+figure.
+
+“You're in a sweet temper to-night, aren't you?” she said tartly. “Go
+on, yourself! I'm waiting for you to get through your speech.”
+
+He moved brusquely past her, with an angry grunt. Rhoda Gray followed
+him. They passed along a short, narrow space, evidently between a
+low counter and a shelved wall, and then the man opened a door, and,
+shutting it again behind them, moved forward once more. She could
+scarcely see him at all now; it was more the sound of his footsteps
+than anything else that guided her. And then suddenly another door was
+opened, and a soft, yellow light streamed out through the doorway, and
+she found that she was standing in an intervening room between the shop
+and the room ahead of her. She felt her pulse quicken, and it seemed as
+though her heart began to thump almost audibly. Danglar! She could see
+Danglar seated at a table in there. She clenched her hands under her
+shawl. She would need all her wits now. She prayed that there was not
+too much light in that room yonder.
+
+
+
+
+XV. IN THE COUNCIL CHAMBER
+
+The man with the withered hand had passed through into the other room.
+She heard them talking together, as she followed. She forced herself to
+walk with as nearly a leisurely defiant air as she could. The last time
+she had been with Danglar--as Gypsy Nan--she had, in self-protection,
+forbidding intimacy, played up what he called her “grouch” at his
+neglect of her.
+
+She paused in the doorway. Halfway across the room, at the table,
+Danglar's gaunt, swarthy face showed under the rays of a shaded oil
+lamp. Behind her spectacles, she met his small, black ferret eyes
+steadily.
+
+“Hello, Bertha!” he called out cheerily. “How's the old girl to-night?”
+ He rose from his seat to come toward her. “And how's the cold?”
+
+Rhoda Gray scowled at him.
+
+“Worse!” she said curtly-and hoarsely. “And a lot you care! I could have
+died in that hole, for all you knew!” She pushed him irritably away, as
+he came near her. “Yes, that's what I said! And you needn't start any
+cooing game now! Get down to cases!” She jerked her hand toward the
+twisted figure that had slouched into a chair beside the table. “He says
+you've got it doped out to pull something that will let me out of this
+Gypsy Nan stunt. Another bubble, I suppose!” She shrugged her
+shoulders, glanced around her, and, locating a chair--not too near the
+table--seated herself indifferently. “I'm getting sick of bubbles!” she
+announced insolently. “What's this one?”
+
+He stood there for a moment biting at his lips, hesitant between anger
+and tolerant amusement; and then, the latter evidently gaining the
+ascendency, he too shrugged his shoulders, and with a laugh returned to
+his chair.
+
+“You're a rare one, Bertha!” he said coolly. “I thought you'd be wild
+with delight. I guess you're sick, all right--because usually you're
+pretty sensible. I've tried to tell you that it wasn't my fault I
+couldn't go near you, and that I had to keep away from--”
+
+“What's the use of going over all that again?” she interrupted tartly.
+“I guess I--”
+
+“Oh, all right!” said Danglar hurriedly. “Don't start a row! After
+to-night I've an idea you'll be sweet enough to your husband, and I'm
+willing to wait. Matty maybe hasn't told you the whole of it.”
+
+Matty! So that was the deformed creature's name. She glanced at him. He
+was grinning broadly. A family squabble seemed to afford him amusement.
+Her eyes shifted and made a circuit of the room. It was poverty-stricken
+in appearance, bare-floored, with the scantiest and cheapest of
+furnishings, its one window tightly shuttered.
+
+“Maybe not,” she said carelessly.
+
+“Well, then, listen, Bertha!” Danglar's voice was lowered earnestly.
+“We've uncovered the Nabob's stuff! Do you get me? Every last one of the
+sparklers!”
+
+Rhoda Gray's eyes went back to the deformed creature at Danglar's side,
+as the man laughed out abruptly.
+
+“Yes,” grinned Matty Danglar, “and they weren't in the empty money-belt
+that you beat it with like a scared cat after croaking Deemer!”
+
+How queer and dim the light seemed to go suddenly--or was it a blur
+before her own eyes? She said nothing. Her mind seemed to be groping its
+way out of darkness toward some faint gleam of light showing in the
+far distance. She heard Danglar order his brother savagely to hold his
+tongue. That was curious, too, because she was grateful for the man's
+gibe. Gypsy Nan, in her proper person, had murdered a man named Deemer
+in an effort to secure--Danglar's voice came again:
+
+“Well, to-night we'll get that stuff, all of it--it's worth a cool
+half million; and to-night we'll get Mr. House-Detective Cloran for
+keeps--bump him off. That cleans everything up. How does that strike
+you, Bertha?”
+
+Rhoda Gray's hands under her shawl locked tightly together. Her
+premonition had not betrayed her. She was face to face to-night with the
+beginning of the end.
+
+“It sounds fine!” she said derisively.
+
+Danglar's eyes narrowed for an instant; and then he laughed.
+
+“You're a rare one, Bertha!” he ejaculated again. “You don't seem to put
+much stock in your husband lately.”
+
+“Why should I?” she inquired imperturbably. “Things have been breaking
+fine, haven't they?--only not for us!” She cleared her throat as though
+it were an effort to talk. “I'm not going crazy with joy till I've been
+shown.”
+
+Danglar leaned suddenly over the table.
+
+“Well, come and look at the cards, then,” he said impressively. “Pull
+your chair up to the table, and I'll tell you.”
+
+Rhoda Gray tilted her chair, instead, nonchalantly back against the
+wall--it was quite light enough where she was!
+
+“I can hear you from here,” she said coolly. “I'm not deaf, and I guess
+Matty's suite is safe enough so that you won't have to whisper all the
+time!”
+
+The deformed creature at the table chortled again.
+
+Danglar scowled.
+
+“Damn you, Bertha!” he flung out savagely. “I could wring that neck of
+yours sometimes, and--”
+
+“I know you could, Pierre,” she interposed sweetly. “That's what I like
+about you--you're so considerate of me! But suppose you get down to
+cases. What's the story about those sparklers? And what's the game
+that's going to let me shed this Gypsy Nan stuff for keeps?”
+
+“I'll tell her, Pierre,” grinned the deformed one. “It'll keep you two
+from spitting at one another; and neither of you have got all night
+to stick around here.” He swung his withered hand suddenly across the
+table, and as suddenly all facetiousness was gone both from his voice
+and manner. “Say, you listen hard, Bertha! What Pierre's telling you is
+straight. You and him can kiss and make up to-morrow or the next day, or
+whenever you damned please; but to-night there ain't any more time for
+scrapping. Now, listen! I handed you a rap about beating it with the
+empty money-belt the night you croaked Deemer with an overdose of
+knockout drops in the private dining-room up at the Hotel Marwitz, but
+you forget that! I ain't for starting any argument about that. None of
+us blames you. We thought the stuff was in the belt, too. And none of
+us blames you for making a mistake and going too strong with the drops,
+either; anybody might do that. And I'll say now that I take my hat off
+to you for the way you locked Cloran into the room with the dead man,
+and made your escape when Cloran had you dead to rights for the murder;
+and I'll say, too, that the way you've played Gypsy Nan and saved your
+skin, and ours too, is as slick a piece of work as has ever been pulled
+in the underworld. That puts us straight, you and me, don't it, Bertha?”
+
+Rhoda Gray blinked at the man through her spectacles; her brain was
+whirling in a mad turmoil. “I always liked you, Matty,” she whispered
+softly.
+
+Danglar was lolling back in his chair, blowing smoke rings into the air.
+She caught his eyes fixed quizzically upon her.
+
+“Go on, Matty!” he prompted. “You'll have her in a good humor, if you're
+not careful!”
+
+“We were playing more or less blind after that.” The withered hand
+traced an aimless pattern on the table with its crooked and half-closed
+fingers, and the man's face was puckered into a shrewd, reminiscent
+scowl. “The papers couldn't get a lead on the motive for the murder, and
+the police weren't talking for publication. Not a word about the Rajah's
+jewels. Washington saw to that! A young potentate's son, practically
+the guest of the country, touring about in a special for the sake of his
+education, and dashed near 'ending it in the river out West if it hadn't
+been for the rescue you know about, wouldn't look well in print; so
+there wasn't anything said about the slather of gems that was the reward
+of heroism from a grateful nabob, and we didn't get any help that way.
+All we knew was that Deemer came East with the jewels, presumably to
+cash in on them, and it looked as though Deemer were pretty clever;
+that he wore the money-belt for a stall, and that he had the sparklers
+safe somewhere else all the time. And I guess we all got to figuring
+it that way, because the fact that nothing was said about any theft was
+strictly along the lines the police were working anyway, and a was a
+toss-up that they hadn't found the stuff among his effects. Get me?”
+
+Get him! This wasn't real, was it, this room here; those two figures
+sitting there under that shaded lamp? Something cold, an icy grip,
+seemed to seize at her heart, as in a surge there swept upon her the
+full appreciation of her peril through these confidences to which she
+was listening. A word, in act, some slightest thing, might so easily
+betray her; and then--Her fingers under the shawl and inside the wide
+pocket of her greasy skirt, clutched at her revolver. Thank God for
+that! It would at least be merciful! She nodded her head mechanically.
+
+“But the police didn't find the jewels--because they weren't there to be
+found. Somebody got in ahead of us. Pinched 'em, understand, may be only
+a few hours before you got in your last play, and, from the way you say
+Deemer acted, before he was wise to the fact that he'd been robbed.”
+
+Rhoda Gray let her chair come sharply down to the floor. She must play
+her role of “Bertha” now as she never had before. Here was a question
+that she could not only ask with safety, but one that was obviously
+expected.
+
+“Who was it?” she demanded breathlessly.
+
+“She's coming to life!” murmured Danglar, through a haze of cigarette
+smoke. “I thought you'd wake up after a while, Bertha. This is the big
+night, old girl, as you'll find out before we're through.”
+
+“Who was it?” she repeated with well-simulated impatience.
+
+“I guess she'll listen to me now,” said Danglar, with a little chuckle.
+“Don't over-tax yourself any more, Matty. I'll tell you, Bertha; and it
+will perhaps make you feel better to know it took the slickest dip New
+York ever knew to beat you to the tape. It was Angel Jack, alias the
+Gimp.”
+
+“How do you know?” Rhoda Gray demanded.
+
+“Because,” said Danglar, and lighted another cigarette, “he died
+yesterday afternoon up in Sing Sing.”
+
+She could afford to show her frank bewilderment. Her brows knitted into
+furrows, as she stared at Danglar.
+
+“You--you mean he confessed?” she said.
+
+“The Angel? Never!” Danglar laughed grimly, and shook his head. “Nothing
+like that! It was a question of playing one 'fence' against another. You
+know that Witzer, who's handled all our jewelry for us, has been on the
+look-out for any stones that might have come from that collection.
+Well, this afternoon he passed the word to me that he'd been offered the
+finest unset emerald he'd ever seen, and that it had come to him through
+old Jake Luertz's runner, a very innocent-faced young man who is known
+to the trade as the Crab.”
+
+Danglar paused--and laughed again. Unconsciously Rhoda Gray drew her
+shawl a little closer about her shoulders. It seemed to bring a chill
+into the room, that laugh. Once before, on another night, Danglar had
+laughed, and, with his parted lips, she had likened him to a beast
+showing its fangs. He looked it now more than ever. For all his ease of
+voice and manner, he was in deadly earnest; and if there was merriment
+in his laugh, it but seemed to enhance the menace and the promise of
+unholy purpose that lurked in the cold glitter of his small, black eyes.
+
+“It didn't take long to get hold of the Crab”--Danglar was rubbing his
+hands together softly--“and the emerald with him. We got him where we
+could put the screws on without arousing the neighborhood.”
+
+“Another murder, I suppose!” Rhoda Gray flung out the words crossly.
+
+“Oh, no,” said Danglar pleasantly. “He squealed before it came to that.
+He's none the worse for wear, and he'll be turned loose in another hour
+or so, as soon as we're through at old Jake Luertz's. He's no more good
+to us. He came across all right--after he was properly frightened. He's
+been with old Jake as a sort of familiar for the last six years, and--”
+
+“He'd have sold his soul out, he was so scared!” The withered hand on
+the table twitched; the deformed creature's face was twisted into a
+grimace; and the man was chuckling with unhallowed mirth, as though
+unable to contain himself at, presumably, the recollection of a scene
+which he had witnessed himself. “He was down on his knees and clawing
+out with his hands for mercy, and he squealed like a rat. 'It's the
+sixth panel in the bedroom upstairs,' he says; 'it's all there. But for
+God's sake don't tell Jake I told. It's the sixth panel. Press the knot
+in the sixth panel that--'” He stopped abruptly.
+
+Danglar had pulled out his watch and with exaggerated patience was
+circling the crystal with his thumb.
+
+“Are you all through, Matty?” he inquired monotonously. “I think you
+said something a little while ago about wasting time. Bertha's looking
+bored; and, besides, she's got a little job of her own on for to-night.”
+ He jerked his watch back into his pocket, and turned to Rhoda Gray
+again. “The only one who knew all the details Angel Jack, and he'll
+never tell now because he's dead. Whether he came down from the West
+with Deemer or not, or how he got wise to the stones, I don't know. But
+he got the stones, all right. And then he tumbled to the fact that the
+police were pushing him hard for another job he was 'wanted' for, and
+he had to get those stones out of sight in a hurry. He made a package
+of them and slipped them to old Luertz, who had always done his business
+for him, to keep for him; and before he could duck, the bulls had him
+for that other job. Angel Jack went up the river. See? Old Jake didn't
+know what was in that package; but he knew better than to monkey with
+it, because he always thought something of his own skin. He knew Angel
+Jack, and he knew what would happen if he didn't have that package ready
+to hand back the day Angel Jack got out of Sing Sing. Understand? But
+yesterday Angel Jack died-without a will; and old Jake appointed himself
+sole executor-without bonds! He opened that package, figured he'd begin
+turning it into money--and that's how we get our own back again. Old
+Jake will get a fake message to-night calling him out of the house on an
+errand uptown; and about ten o'clock Pinkie Bonn and the Pug will pay a
+visit there in his absence, and--well, it looks good, don't it, Bertha,
+after two years?”
+
+Rhoda Gray was crouched down in her chair. She shrugged her shoulders
+now, and infused a sullen note into her voice.
+
+“Yes, it's fine!” she sniffed. “I'll be rolling in wealth in my
+garret--which will do me a lot of good! That doesn't separate me from
+these rags, and the hell I've lived, does it--after two years?”
+
+“I'm coming to that,” said Danglar, with his short, grating laugh.
+“We've as good as got the stones now, and we're going through to-night
+for a clean-up of all that old mess. We stake the whole thing. Get
+me, Bertha--the whole thing! I'm showing my hand for the first time.
+Cloran's the man that's making you wear those clothes; Cloran's the only
+one who could go into the witness box and swear that you were the woman
+who murdered Deemer; and Cloran's the man who has been working his head
+off for two years to find you. We've tried a dozen times to bump him
+off in a way that would make his death appear to be due purely to an
+accident, and we didn't get away with it; but we can afford to leave the
+'accident' out of it to-night, and go through for keeps--and that's what
+we're going to do. And once he's out of the way--by midnight--you can
+heave Gypsy Nan into the discard.”
+
+It seemed to Rhoda Gray that horror had suddenly taken a numbing hold
+upon her sensibilities. Danglar was talking about murdering some man,
+wasn't he, so that she could resume again the personality of a woman who
+was dead? Hysterical laughter rose to her lips. It was only by a
+frantic effort of will that she controlled herself. She seemed to speak
+involuntarily, doubtful almost that it was her own voice she heard.
+
+“I'm listening,” she said; “but I wouldn't be too sure. Cloran's a wary
+bird, and there's the White Moll.”
+
+She caught her breath. What suicidal inspiration had prompted her to say
+that! Had what she had been listening to here, the horror of it, indeed
+turned her brain and robbed her of her wits to the extent that she
+should invite exposure? Danglar's face had gone a mottled purple; the
+misshapen thing at Danglar's side was leering at her most curiously.
+
+It was a moment before Danglar spoke; and then his hand, clenched until
+the white of the knuckles showed, pounded upon the table to punctuate
+his words.
+
+“Not to-night!” he rasped out with an oath. “There's not a chance that
+she's in on this to-night--the she-devil! But she's next! With this
+cleaned up, she's next! If it takes the last dollar of to-night's haul,
+and five years to do it, I'll get her, and get--”
+
+“Sure!” mumbled Rhoda Gray hurriedly. “But you needn't get excited!
+I was only thinking of her because she's queered us till I've got my
+fingers crossed, that's all. Go on about Cloran.”
+
+Danglar's composure did not return on the instant. He gnawed at his lips
+for a moment before he spoke.
+
+“All right!” he jerked out finally. “Let it go at that! I told you the
+other night in the garret that things were beginning to break our way,
+and that you wouldn't have to stay there much longer, but I didn't tell
+you how or why--you wouldn't give me a chance. I'll tell you now; and
+it's the main reason why I've kept away from you lately. I couldn't
+take a chance of Cloran getting wise to that garret and Gypsy Nan.” He
+grinned suddenly. “I've been cultivating Cloran myself for the last two
+weeks. We're quite pals! I'm for playing the luck every time! When
+the jewels showed up to-day, I figured that to-night's the night--see?
+Cloran and I are going to supper together at the Silver Sphinx at about
+eleven o'clock--and this is where you shed the Gypsy Nan stuff, and show
+up as your own sweet self. Cloran'll be glad to meet you!”
+
+She stared at him in genuine perplexity and amazement.
+
+“Show myself to Cloran!” she ejaculated heavily. “I don't get you!”
+
+“You will in a minute,” said Danglar softly. “You're the bait--see?
+Cloran and I will be at supper and watching the fox-trotters. You blow
+in and show yourself--I don't need to tell you how, you're clever enough
+at that sort of thing yourself--and the minute he recognizes you as
+the woman he's been looking for that murdered Deemer, you pretend to
+recognize him for the first time too, and then you beat it like you had
+the scare of your life for the door. He'll follow you on the jump. I
+don't know what it's all about, and I sit tight, and that lets me out.
+And now get this! There'll be two taxicabs outside. If there's more than
+two, it's the first two I'm talking about. You jump into the one at the
+head of the line. Cloran won't need any invitation to grab the second
+one and follow you. That's all! It's the last ride he'll take. It'll be
+our boys, and not chauffeurs, who'll be driving those cars to-night,
+and they've got their orders where to go. Cloran won't come back.
+Understand, Bertha'?”
+
+There was only one answer to make, only one answer that she dared make.
+She made it mechanically, though her brain reeled. A man named
+Cloran was to be murdered; and she was to show herself as this--this
+Bertha--and...
+
+“Yes,” she said.
+
+“Good!” said Danglar. He pulled out his watch again. “All right, then!
+We've been here long enough.” He rose briskly. “It's time to make a
+move. You hop it back to the garret, and get rid of that fancy dress.
+I've got to meet Cloran uptown first. Come on, Matty, let us out.”
+
+The place stifled her. She got up and moved quickly through the
+intervening room. She heard Danglar and his crippled brother talking
+earnestly together as they followed her. And then the cripple brushed
+by her in the darkness, and opened the front door--and Danglar had drawn
+her to him in a quick embrace. She did not struggle; she dared not. Her
+heart seemed to stand still. Danglar was whispering in her ear:
+
+“I promised I'd make it up to you, Bertha, old girl. You'll see--after
+to-night. We'll have another honey-moon. You go on ahead now--I can't be
+seen with Gypsy Nan. And don't be late--the Silver Sphinx at eleven.”
+
+She ran out on the street. Her fingers mechanically clutched at her
+shawl to loosen it around her throat. It seemed as though she were
+choking, that she could not breathe. The man's touch upon her had seemed
+like contact with some foul and loathsome thing; the scene in that room
+back there like some nightmare of horror from which she could not awake.
+
+
+
+
+XVI. THE SECRET PANEL
+
+Rhoda Gray hurried onward, back toward the garret, her mind in riot and
+dismay. It was not only the beginning of the end; it was very near the
+end! What was she to do? The Silver Sphinx--at eleven! That was the
+end--after eleven--wasn't it? She could impersonate Gypsy Nan; she could
+not, if she would, impersonate the woman who was dead! And then, too,
+there were the stolen jewels at old Jake Luertz's! She could not turn
+to the police for help there, because then the Pug might fall into their
+hands, and--and the Pug was--was the Adventurer.
+
+And then a sort of fatalistic calm fell upon her. If the masquerade was
+over, if the end had come, there remained only one thing for her to
+do. There were no risks too desperate to take now. It was she who must
+strike, and strike first. Those jewels in old Luertz's bedroom became
+suddenly vital to her. They were tangible evidence. With those jewels
+in her possession she should be able to force Danglar to his knees.
+She could get them--before Pinkie Bonn and the Pug--if she hurried.
+Afterward she would know where to find Danglar--at the Silver Sphinx.
+Nothing would happen to Cloran, because, through her failure to
+cooperate, the plan would be abortive; but, veiled, as the White Moll,
+she could pick up Danglar's trail again there. Yes, it would be the
+end--one way or the other--between eleven o'clock and daylight!
+
+She quickened her steps. Old Luertz was to be inveigled away from his
+home about ten o'clock. At a guess, she made it only a little after nine
+now. She would need the skeleton keys in order to get into old Luertz's
+place, and, yes, she would need a flashlight, too. Well, she would have
+time enough to get them, and time enough, then, to run to the deserted
+shed in the lane behind the garret and change her clothes.
+
+Rhoda Gray, as Gypsy Nan, went on as speedily as she dared without
+inviting undue attention to herself, reached the garret, secured the
+articles she sought, hurried out again, and went down the lane in the
+rear to the deserted shed. She remained longer here than in the attic,
+perhaps ten minutes, working mostly in the darkness, risking the
+flashlight only when it was imperative; and then, the metamorphosis
+complete, a veiled figure, in her own person, as Rhoda Gray, the White
+Moll, she was out on the street again, and hastening back in the same
+general direction from which she had just come.
+
+She knew old Jake Luertz's place, and she knew the man himself very
+intimately by reputation. There were few such men and such places that
+she could have escaped knowing in the years of self-appointed service
+that she had given to the worst, and perhaps therefore the most needy,
+element in New York. The man ostensibly conducted a little secondhand
+store; in reality he probably “shoved” more stolen goods for his
+clientele, which at one time or another undoubtedly embraced nearly
+every crook in the underworld, than any other “fence” in New York. She
+knew him for an oily, cunning old fox who lived alone in the two rooms
+over his miserable store--unless, of late, his young henchman, the Crab,
+had taken to living with him; though, as far as that was concerned, it
+mattered little to-night, since the Crab, for the moment, thanks to the
+gang, was eliminated from consideration.
+
+She reached the secondhand store--and walked on past it. There was a
+light upstairs in the front window. Old Luertz therefore had not yet
+gone out in response to the gang's fake message. She knew old Luertz's
+reputation far too well for that; the man would never go out and leave a
+gas jet burning--which he would have to pay for!
+
+There was nothing to do but wait. Rhoda Gray sought the shelter of a
+doorway across the street. She was nervously impatient now. The
+minutes dragged along. Why didn't 'the man hurry and go out? “About ten
+o'clock,” Danglar had said--but that was very indefinite. Pinkie Bonn
+and the Pug might be as late as that; but, equally, they might be
+earlier!
+
+It seemed an interminable time. And then, her eyes strained across the
+street upon that upper window, she drew still farther back into the
+protecting shadows of the doorway. The light had gone out.
+
+A moment more passed. The street door of the house opposite to her--a
+door separate from that of the secondhand store-opened, and a bent,
+gray-bearded man, stepped out, peered around, locked the door behind
+him, and scuffled down the street.
+
+Rhoda Gray scanned the dingy and ill-lighted little street. It was
+virtually deserted. She crossed the road, and stepped into the doorway
+from which the old “fence” had just emerged. It was dark here, well out
+of the direct radius of the nearest street lamp, and, with luck, there
+was no reason why she should be observed--if she did not take too long
+in opening the door! She had never actually used a skeleton key in her
+life before, and...
+
+She inserted one of her collection of keys in the lock. It would not
+work. She tried another, and still another-with mounting anxiety and
+perplexity. Suppose that--yes! The door was open now! With a quick
+glance over her shoulder, scanning the street in both directions to make
+sure that she was not observed, she stepped inside, closed the door, and
+locked it again.
+
+Her flashlight stabbed through the darkness. Narrow stairs immediately
+in front of her led upward; at her right was a connecting door to the
+secondhand shop. Without an instant's hesitation she ran up the stairs.
+There was no need to observe caution since the place was temporarily
+untenanted; there was need only of haste. She opened the door at the
+head of the stairs, and, with a quick, eager nod of satisfaction, as the
+flashlight swept the interior, stepped over the threshold. It was the
+room she sought--old Luertz's bedroom.
+
+And now the flashlight played inquisitively about her. The bed occupied
+a position by the window; across one corner of the room was a cretonne
+hanging, that evidently did service as a wardrobe; across another corner
+was a large and dilapidated washstand; there were a few chairs, and a
+threadbare carpet; and, opposite the bed, another door, closed, which
+obviously led into the front room.
+
+Rhoda Gray stepped to this door, opened it, and peered in. She was not
+concerned that it was evidently used for kitchen, dining-room and
+the stowage of everything that overflowed from the bedroom; she was
+concerned only with the fact that it offered no avenue through which
+any added risk or danger might reach her. She closed the door as she
+had found it, and gave her attention now to the walls of old Luertz's
+bedroom.
+
+She smiled a little whimsically. The Crab had used a somewhat dignified
+term when he had referred to “panels.” True, the walls were of stained
+wood, but the wood was of the cheapest variety of matched boards, and
+the stain was of but a single coat, and a very meager one at that! The
+smile faded. There were a good many knots; and there were four corners
+to the room, and therefore eight boards, each one of which would answer
+to the description of being the “sixth panel.”
+
+She went to the corner nearest her, and dropped down on her knees. As
+well start with this one! She had not dared press Danglar, or Danglar's
+deformed brother, for more definite directions, had she? She counted the
+boards quickly from the corner to her right; and then, the flashlight
+playing steadily, she began to press first one knot after another, in
+the board before her, working from the bottom up. There were many knots;
+she went over each one with infinite care. There was no result.
+
+She turned then to the sixth board from the corner to her left. The
+result was the same. She stood up, her brows puckered, a sense of
+anxious impatience creeping upon her. She had been quite a while over
+even these two boards, and it might be any one of the remaining six!
+
+Her eyes traversed the room, following the ray of the flashlight. If she
+only knew which one, it would--Was it an inspiration? Her eyes had fixed
+on the cretonne hanging across one of the far corners from the door, and
+she moved toward it now quickly. The hanging might very well serve for
+an other purpose than that of merely a wardrobe! It seemed suddenly
+to be the most likely of the four corners because it was ingeniously
+concealed.
+
+She parted the hanging. A heterogeneous collection of clothing hung
+from pegs and nails. Eagerly, hastily now, she brushed these aside, and,
+close to the wall, dropped down on her knees again. The minutes passed.
+Twice she went over the sixth board from the corner to her right. She
+felt so sure now that it was this corner. And then, still eagerly, she
+turned to the corresponding board at her left.
+
+It was warm and close here. The clothing hanging from the pegs and nails
+enveloped her, and, with the cretonne hanging itself, shut out the air,
+what little of it there was, that circulated through the room.
+
+Over the board, from the tiniest knot to the largest, her fingers
+pressed carefully. Had she missed one anywhere? She must have missed
+one! She was sure the panel in question was here behind this hanging.
+Well, she would try again, and...
+
+What was that?
+
+In an instant the flashlight in her hand was out, and she was listening
+tensely. Yes, there was a footstep--two of them--not only on the stairs,
+but already just outside the door. It seemed as though a deadly fear,
+cold and numbing, settled upon her and robbed her of even the power of
+movement. She was caught! If it was Pinkie Bonn and the Pug, and if this
+corner hid the secret panel as she still believed it did, this was
+the first place to which they would come, and they would find her here
+amongst the clothing--which had evidently been the cause of deadening
+any sound on those stairs out there until it was too late.
+
+She held her breath, her hands tight upon her bosom. There was no time
+to reach the sanctuary of the other room--the footsteps were already
+crossing the threshold from the head of the stairs. And then a voice
+reached her--the Pug's. It was the Pug and Pinkie Bonn.
+
+“Strike a light, Pinkie! Dere's no use messin' around wid a flash. De
+old geezer'll be back on de hop de minute he finds out he's been bunked,
+an' de quicker we work de better.”
+
+A match crackled into flame. An air-choked gas jet, with a protesting
+hiss, was lighted. And then Rhoda Gray's drawn face relaxed a little,
+and a strange, mirthless smile came hovering over her lips. What was she
+afraid of? The Pug was the Adventurer, wasn't he? This was one of the
+occasions when he could not escape the entanglements of the gang, and
+must work for the gang instead of appropriating all the loot for his own
+personal and nefarious ends; but he was the Adventurer. The White Moll
+need not fear him, even though he appeared, linked with Pinkie Bonn, in
+the role of the Pug! So there was only Pinkie Bonn to fear.
+
+Rhoda Gray took her revolver from her pocket. She was well armed--and
+in more than a material sense. The Adventurer did not know that she was
+aware of the Pug's identity. Her smile, still mirthless, deepened.
+She might even turn the tables upon them, and still secure the stolen
+stones. She had turned the tables upon Pinkie Bonn last night; to-night,
+if she used her wits, she could do it again!
+
+And then, suddenly, she stifled an exclamation, as the Pug's voice
+reached her again:
+
+“Wot are youse gapin' about? Dere ain't anything else worth pinchin'
+around here except wot's in de old gent's safety vault. Get a move on!
+We ain't got all night! It's de corner behind de washstand. Give us a
+hand to move de furniture!”
+
+It wasn't here behind the cretonne hanging! Rhoda Gray bit her lips in
+a crestfallen little way. Well, her supposition had been natural enough,
+hadn't it? And she would have tried every corner before she was through
+if she had had the opportunity.
+
+She moved now slightly, without a sound, parting the clothing away from
+in front of her, and moving the cretonne hanging by the fraction of an
+inch where it touched the side wall of the room. And now she could see
+the Pug, with his dirty and discolored celluloid eye-patch, and his
+ingeniously contorted face; and she could see Pinkie Bonn's pasty-white,
+drug-stamped countenance.
+
+It was not a large room. The two men in the opposite corner along the
+wall from her were scarcely more than ten feet away. They swung the
+washstand out from the wall, and the Pug, going in behind it, began
+to work on one of the wall boards. Pinkie Bonn, an unlighted cigarette
+dangling from his lip, leaned over the washstand watching his companion.
+
+A minute passed--another. It was still in the room, except only for
+the distant sounds of the world outside--a clatter of wheels upon the
+pavement, the muffled roar of the elevated, the clang of a trolley bell.
+And then the Pug began to mutter to himself. Rhoda Gray smiled a little
+grimly. She was not the only one, it would appear, who experienced
+difficulty with old Jake Luertz's crafty hiding place!
+
+“Say, dis is de limit!” the Pug growled out suddenly. “Dere's more
+damned knots in dis board dan I ever save in any piece of wood in me
+life before, an'--” He drew back abruptly from the wall, twisting his
+head sharply around. “D'ye hear dat, Pinkie!” he whispered tensely.
+“Quick! Put out de light! Quick! Dere's some one down at de front door!”
+
+Rhoda Gray felt the blood ebb from her face. She had heard nothing save
+the rattle and bump of a wagon along the street below; but she had had
+reason to appreciate on a certain occasion before that the Pug, alias
+the Adventurer, was possessed of a sense of hearing that was abnormally
+acute. If it was some one else--who was it? What would it mean to her?
+What complication here in this room would result? What...
+
+The light was out. Pinkie Bonn had stepped silently across the room to
+the gas jet near the door. Her eyes, strained, she could just make out
+the Adventurer's form kneeling by the wall, and then--was she mad!
+Was the faint night-light of the city filtering in through the window
+mocking her? The Adventurer, hidden from his companion by the washstand,
+was working swiftly and without a sound--or else it was a phantasm of
+shadows that tricked her! A door in the wall opened; the Adventurer
+thrust in his hand, drew out a package, and, leaning around, slipped it
+quickly into the bottom of the washstand, where, with its little doors,
+there was a most convenient and very commodious apartment. He turned
+again then, seemed to take something from his pocket and place it in the
+opening in the wall, and then the panel closed.
+
+It had taken scarcely more than a second.
+
+Rhoda Gray brushed her hand across her eyes. No, it wasn't a phantasm!
+She had misjudged the Adventurer--quite misjudged him! The Adventurer,
+even with one of the gang present--to furnish an unimpeachable alibi
+for him!--was plucking the gang's fruit again for his own and undivided
+enrichment!
+
+Pinkie Bonn's voice came in a guarded whisper from the doorway.
+
+“I don't hear nothin'!” said Pinkie Bonn anxiously.
+
+The Pug tiptoed across the room, and joined his companion. She could not
+see them now, but apparently they stood together by the door listening.
+They stood there for a long time. Occasionally she heard them whisper to
+each other; and then finally the Pug spoke in a less guarded voice.
+
+“All right,” he said. “I guess me nerves are gettin' de creeps. Shoot de
+light on again, an' let's get back on de job. An' youse can take a turn
+dis time pushin' de knots, Pinkie; mabbe youse'll have better luck.”
+
+The light went on again. Both men came back across the room, and now
+Pinkie Bonn knelt at the wall while the Pug leaned over the washstand
+watching him. Pinkie Bonn was not immediately successful; the Pug's
+nerves, of which he had complained, appeared shortly to get the better
+of him.
+
+“Fer Gawd's sake, hurry up!” he urged irritably. “Or else lemme take
+another crack at it, Pinkie, an'...”
+
+A low, triumphant exclamation came from Pinkie Bonn, as the small door
+in the wall swung suddenly open.
+
+“There she is, my bucko!” he grinned. “Some nifty vault, eh? The old
+guy-” He stopped. He had thrust in his hand, and drawn it out again. His
+fingers gripped a sheet of notepaper--but he was seemingly unconscious
+of that fact. He was leaning forward, staring into the aperture. “It's
+empty!” he choked.
+
+“Wot's dat?” cried the Pug, and sprang to his companion's side.
+“Youse're crazy, Pinkie!” He thrust his head toward the opening--and then
+turned and stared for a moment helplessly at Pinkie Bonn. “So help me!”
+ he said heavily. “It's--it's empty.” He shook his fist suddenly. “De
+Crab's handed us one, dat's wot! But de Crab'll get his fer--”
+
+“It wasn't the Crab!” Pinkie Bonn was stuttering his words. He stood,
+jaws dropped, his eyes glued now on the paper in his hand.
+
+The Pug, his face working, the personification of baffled rage and
+intolerance, leered at Pinkie Bonn. “Well, who was it, den?” he snarled.
+
+Pinkie Bonn licked his lips.
+
+“The White Moll!” He licked his lips again.
+
+“De White Moll!” echoed the Pug incredulously.
+
+“Yes,” said Pinkie Bonn. “Listen to what's on this paper that I fished
+out of there I Listen! She's got all the nerve of the devil! 'With
+thanks, and my most grateful appreciation--the White Moll.'”
+
+The Pug snatched the paper from Pinkie Bonn's hand, as though to assure
+himself that it was true. Rhoda Gray smiled faintly. It was good acting,
+very excellently done--seeing that the Pug had written the note and
+placed it in the hiding place himself!
+
+“My God!” mumbled Pinkie Bonn thickly. “I ain't afraid of most things,
+but I'm gettin' scared of her. She ain't human. Last night you know what
+happened, and the night before, and--” He gulped suddenly. “Let's get
+out of here!” he said hurriedly. The Pug made no reply, except for a
+muttered growl of assent and a nod of his head.
+
+The two men crossed the room. The light went out. Their footsteps echoed
+back as they descended the stairs, then died away.
+
+And then Rhoda Gray moved for the first time. She brushed aside the
+cretonne hanging, ran to the washstand, possessed herself of the package
+she had seen the Pug place there, and then made her way, cautious now of
+the slightest sound, downstairs.
+
+She tried the door that led into the secondhand shop from the hall,
+found it unlocked, and with a little gasp of relief slipped through, and
+closed it gently behind her. She did not dare risk the front entrance.
+Pinkie Bonn and the Pug were not far enough away yet, and she did not
+dare wait until they were. Too bulky to take the risk of attempting
+to conceal it about his person while with Pinkie Bonn, the Pug, it was
+obvious, would come back alone for that package, and it was equally
+obvious that he would not be long in doing so. There was old Luertz's
+return that he would have to anticipate. It would not take wits nearly
+so sharp as those possessed by the Pug to find an excuse for separating
+promptly from Pinkie Bonn!
+
+Rhoda Gray groped her way down the shop, groped her way to a back door,
+unbolted it, working by the sense of touch, and let herself out into a
+back yard. Five minutes later she was blocks away, and hurrying rapidly
+back toward the deserted shed in the lane behind Gypsy Nan's garret.
+
+Her lips formed into a tight little curve as she went along. There was
+still work to do to-night--if this package really contained the stolen
+legacy of gems left by Angel Jack. She had first of all to reach a place
+where she could examine the package with safety; then a place to hide it
+where it would be secure; and then--Danglar!
+
+She gained the lane, stole along it, and disappeared into the shed
+through the broken door that hung, partially open, on sagging hinges.
+Here she sought a corner, and crouched down so that her body would
+smother any reflection from her flashlight. And now, eagerly,
+feverishly, she began to undo the package; and then, a moment later, she
+gazed, stupefied and amazed, at what lay before her. Precious stones,
+scores of them, nestled on a bed of cotton; they were of all colors and
+of all sizes--but each one of them seemed to pulsate and throb, and from
+some wondrous, glorious depth of its own to fling back from the white
+ray upon it a thousand rays in return, as though into it had been
+breathed a living and immortal fire.
+
+And Rhoda Gray, crouched there, stared--until suddenly she grew afraid,
+and suddenly with a shudder she wrapped the package up again. These were
+the stones for whose fabulous worth the woman whose personality she,
+Rhoda Gray, had usurped, had murdered a man; these were the stones which
+were indirectly the instrumentality--since but for them Gypsy Nan would
+never have existed--that made her, Rhoda Gray, to-night, now, at this
+very moment, a hunted thing, homeless, friendless, fighting for her very
+life against police and underworld alike!
+
+She rose abruptly to her feet. She had no longer any need of a
+flashlight. There was even light of a sort in the place--she could
+see the stars through the jagged holes in the roof, and through one of
+these, too, the moonlight streamed in. The shed was all but crumbling
+in a heap. Underfoot, what had once been flooring, was now but rotting,
+broken boards. Under one of these, beside the clothing of Gypsy Nan
+which she had discarded but a little while before, she deposited the
+package; then stepped out into the lane, and from there to the street
+again.
+
+And now she became suddenly conscious of a great and almost overpowering
+physical weariness. She did not quite understand at first, unless it
+was to be attributed to the reaction from the last few hours--and then,
+smiling wanly to herself, she remembered. For two nights she had not
+slept. It seemed very strange. That was it, of course, though she was
+not in the least sleepy now--just tired, just near the breaking point.
+
+But she must go on. To-night was the end, anyhow. To-night, failing to
+keep her appointment as “Bertha,” the crash must come; but before it
+came, as the White Moll, armed with the knowledge of the crime that had
+driven Danglar's wife into hiding, and which was Danglar's crime too,
+and with the evidence in the shape of those jewels in her possession,
+she and Danglar would meet somewhere--alone. Before the law got him,
+when he would be close-mouthed and struggling with all his cunning to
+keep the evidence of other crimes from piling up against him and damning
+whatever meager chances he might have to escape the penalty for Deemer's
+murder, she meant--yes, even if she pretended to compound a felony
+with him--to force or to inveigle from him, it mattered little which, a
+confession of the authorship and details of the scheme to rob Skarbolov
+that night when she, Rhoda Gray, in answer to a dying woman's pleading,
+had tried to forestall the plan, and had been caught, apparently, in the
+very act of committing the robbery herself! With that confession in her
+possession, with the identity of the unknown woman who had died in the
+hospital that night established, her own story would be believed.
+
+And so, if she were weary, what did it matter? It was only until
+morning. Danglar was at the Silver Sphinx now with the man he meant that
+she should help him murder, only--only that plan would fail, because
+there would be no “Bertha” to lure the man to his death, and she, Rhoda
+Gray, had only to keep track of Danglar until somewhere, where he lived
+perhaps, she should have that final scene, that final reckoning with him
+alone.
+
+It was a long way to the Silver Sphinx, which she knew, as every one in
+the underworld, and every one in New York who was addicted to slumming
+knew, was a combination dance-hall and restaurant in the Chatham Square
+district. She tried to find a taxi, but with out avail. A clock in a
+jeweler's window which she passed showed her that it was ten minutes
+after eleven. She had had no idea that it was so late. At eleven,
+Danglar had said. Danglar would be growing restive! She took the
+elevated. If she could risk the protection of her veil in the Silver
+Sphinx, she could risk it equally in an elevated train!
+
+But, in spite of the elevated, it was, she knew, well on towards half
+past eleven when she finally came down the street in front of the Silver
+Sphinx. From under her veil, she glanced, half curiously, half in a
+sort of grim irony, at the taxis lined up before the dancehall. The two
+leading cars were not taxis at all, though they bore the ear-marks, with
+their registers, of being public vehicles for hire; they were large,
+roomy, powerful, and looked, with their hoods up, like privately owned
+motors. Well, it was of little account! She shrugged her shoulders,
+as--she mounted the steps of the dance-hall. Neither “Bertha” nor Cloran
+would use those cars to-night!
+
+
+
+
+XVII. THE SILVER SPHINX
+
+A Bedlam of noise smote Rhoda Gray's ears as she entered the Silver
+Sphinx. A jazz band was in full swing; on the polished section of the
+floor in the center, a packed mass of humanity swirled and gyrated
+and wriggled in the contortions of the “latest” dance, and laughed
+and howled immoderately; and around the sides of the room, the waiters
+rushed this way and that amongst the crowded tables, mopping at their
+faces with their aprons. It seemed as though confusion itself held sway!
+
+Rhoda Gray scanned the occupants of the tables. The Silver Sphinx was
+particularly riotous to-night, wasn't it? Yes, she understood! A great
+many of the men were wearing little badges. Some society or other was
+celebrating--and was doing it with abandon. Most of the men were half
+drunk. It was certainly a free-and-easy night! Everything went!
+
+Danglar! Yes, 'there he was--quite close to her, only a few tables
+away--and beside him sat a heavy built, clean-shaven man of middle age.
+That would be Cloran, of course--the man who was to have been lured
+to his death. And Danglar was nervous and uneasy, she could see. His
+fingers were drumming a tattoo on the table; his eyes were roving
+furtively about the room; and he did not seem to be paying any but the
+most distrait attention to his companion, who was talking to him.
+
+Rhoda Gray sank quickly into a vacant chair. Three men, linked arm in
+arm, and decidedly more than a little drunk, were approaching her. She
+turned her head away to avoid attracting their attention. It was too
+free and easy here to-night, and she began to regret her temerity at
+having ventured inside; she would better, perhaps, have waited until
+Danglar came out--only there were two exits, and she might have missed
+him--and...
+
+A cold fear upon her, she shrank back in her chair. The three men had
+halted at the table, and were clustered around her. They began a jocular
+quarrel amongst themselves as to who should dance with her. Her heart
+was pounding. She stood up, and pushed them away.
+
+“Oh, no, you don't!” hiccoughed one of the three. “Gotta see
+your--hic!--pretty face, anyhow!”
+
+She put up her hands frantically and clutched at her veil--but just an
+instant too late to save it from being wrenched aside. Wildly her eyes
+flew to Danglar. His attention had been attracted by the scene. She saw
+him rise from his seat; she saw his eyes widen--and then, stumbling over
+his chair in his haste, he made toward her. Danglar had recognized the
+White Moll!
+
+She turned and ran. Fear, horror, desperation, lent her strength. It was
+not like this that she had counted on her reckoning with Danglar! She
+brushed the roisterers aside, and darted for the door. Over her shoulder
+she glimpsed Danglar following her. She reached the door, burst through
+a knot of people there, and, her torn veil clutched in her hand, dashed
+down the steps. She could only run--run, and pray that in some way she
+might escape.
+
+And then a mad exultation came upon her. She saw the man in the
+chauffeur's seat of the first car in the line lean out and swing the
+door open. And in a flash she grasped the situation. The man was waiting
+for just this--for a woman to come running for her life down the steps
+of the Silver Sphinx. She put her hand up to her face, hiding it with
+the torn veil, raced for the car, and flung herself into the tonneau.
+
+The door slammed. The car leaped from the curb. Danglar was coming down
+the steps. She heard him shout. The chauffeur, in a startled way, leaned
+out, as he evidently recognized Danglar's voice--but Rhoda Gray was
+mistress of herself now. The tonneau of the car was not separated from
+the driver's seat, and bending forward, she wrenched her revolver from
+her pocket, and pressed the muzzle of her weapon to the back of the
+man's neck.
+
+“Don't stop!” she gasped, struggling for her breath. “Go on! Quick!”
+
+The man, with a frightened oath, obeyed. The car gained speed. A glance
+through the window behind showed Danglar climbing into the other car.
+
+And then for a moment Rhoda Gray sat there fighting for her
+self-control, with the certain knowledge in her soul that upon her
+wits, and her wits alone, her life depended now. She studied the car's
+mechanism over the chauffeur's shoulder, even as she continued to hold
+her revolver pressed steadily against the back of the man's neck.
+She could drive a car--she could drive this one. The presence of this
+chauffeur, one of the gang, was an added menace; there were too many
+tricks he might play before she could forestall them, any one of which
+would deliver her into the hands of Danglar behind there--an apparently
+inadvertent stoppage due to traffic, for instance, that would bring
+the pursuing car alongside--that, or a dozen other things which would
+achieve the same end.
+
+“Open the door on your side!” she commanded abruptly. “And get
+out--without slowing the car! Do you understand?”
+
+He turned his head for a half incredulous, half frightened look at her.
+She met his eyes steadily--the torn veil, quite discarded now, was in
+her pocket. She did not know the man; but it was quite evident from the
+almost ludicrous dismay which spread over his face that he knew her.
+
+“The--the White Moll!” he stammered. “It's the White Moll!”
+
+“Jump!” she ordered imperatively--and her revolver pressed still more
+significantly against the man's flesh.
+
+He seemed in even frantic haste to obey her. He whipped the door open,
+and, before she could reach to the wheel, he had leaped to the street.
+The car swerved sharply. She flung herself over into the vacated seat,
+and snatched at the wheel barely in time to prevent the machine from
+mounting the curb.
+
+She looked around again through the window of the hood. The man had
+swung aboard Danglar's car, which was only a few yards behind.
+
+Rhoda Gray drove steadily. Here in the city streets her one aim must be
+never to let the other car come abreast of her; but she could prevent
+that easily enough by watching Danglar's movements, and cutting across
+in front of him if he attempted anything of the sort. But ultimately
+what was she to do? How was she to escape? Her hands gripped and
+clenched in a sudden, almost panic-like desperation at the wheel. Turn
+suddenly around a corner, and jump from the car herself? It was useless
+to attempt it; they would keep too close behind to give her a chance
+to get out of sight. Well, then, suppose she jumped from the car, and
+trusted herself to the protection of the people on the street. She shook
+her head grimly. Danglar, she knew only too well, would risk anything,
+go to any length, to put an end to the White Moll. He would not hesitate
+an instant to shoot her down as she jumped and he would be fairly safe
+himself in doing it. A few revolver shots from a car that speeded away
+in the darkness offered an even chance of escape. And yet, unless she
+forced an issue such as that, she knew that Danglar would not resort to
+firing at her here in the city. He would want to be sure that was the
+only chance he had of getting her, before he accepted the risk that he
+would run of being caught for it by the police.
+
+She found herself becoming strangely, almost unnaturally, cool and
+collected now. The one danger, greater than all others, that menaced her
+was a traffic block that would cause her to stop, and allow those in the
+other car behind to rush in upon her as she sat here at the wheel. And
+sooner or later, if she stayed in the city, a block such as that was
+inevitable. She must get out of the city, then. It was only to invite
+another risk, the risk that Danglar was in the faster car of the two but
+there was no other way.
+
+She drove more quickly, made her way to the Bridge, and crossed it. The
+car behind followed with immutable persistence. It made no effort to
+close the short gap between them; but, neither, on the other hand, did
+it permit that gap to widen.
+
+They passed through Brooklyn; and then, reaching the outskirts, Rhoda
+Gray, with headlights streaming into the black, with an open Long Island
+road before her, flung her throttle wide, and the car leaped like a
+thing of life into the night. It was a sudden start, it gained her a
+hundred yards but that was all.
+
+The wind tore at her and whipped her face; the car rocked and reeled as
+in some mad frenzy. There was not much traffic, but such as there was
+it cleared away from before her as if by magic, as, seeking shelter from
+the wild meteoric thing running amuck, the few vehicles, motor or horse,
+that she encountered hugged; the edge of the road, and the wind whisked
+to her ears fragments of shouts and execrations. Again and again she
+looked back two fiery balls of light blazed behind her always those same
+two fiery balls.
+
+She neither gained nor lost. Rigid, like steel, her little figure was
+crouched over the wheel. She did not know the road. She knew nothing
+save that she was racing for her life. She did not know the end; she
+could not see the end. Perhaps there would be some merciful piece of
+luck for her that would win her through a break-down to that roaring
+thing, with its eyes that were balls of fire, behind.
+
+She passed through a town with lighted streets and lighted windows  or
+was it only imagination?  It was gone again, anyhow, and there was just
+black road ahead. Over the roar of the car and the sweep of the wind,
+then, she caught, or fancied she caught, a series of faint reports. She
+looked behind her. Yes, they were firing now. Little flashes leaped out
+above and at the sides of those blazing headlights.
+
+How long was it since she had left the Silver Sphinx? Minutes or hours
+would not measure it, would they? But it could not last much longer!
+She was growing very tired; the strain upon her arms, yes, and upon her
+eyes, was becoming unbearable. She swayed a little in her seat, and the
+car swerved, and she jerked it back again into the straight. She began
+to laugh a little hysterically and then, suddenly, she straightened up,
+tense and alert once more.
+
+That swerve was the germ of an inspiration! It took root swiftly now. It
+was desperate--but she was desperate. She could not drive much more, or
+much longer like this. Mind and body were almost undone. And, besides,
+she was not outdistancing that car behind there by a foot; and sooner or
+later they would hit her with one of their shots, or, perhaps what they
+were really trying to do, puncture one of her tires.
+
+Again she glanced over her shoulder. Yes, Danglar was just far enough
+behind to make the plan possible. She began to allow the car to swerve
+noticeably at intervals, as though she were weakening and the car was
+getting beyond her control--which was, indeed, almost too literally the
+case. And now it seemed to her that each time she swerved there came an
+exultant shout from the car behind. Well, she asked for nothing better;
+that was what she was trying to do, wasn't it?--inspire them with the
+belief that she was breaking under the strain.
+
+Her eyes searched anxiously down the luminous pathway made by her
+high-powered headlights. If only she could reach a piece of road that
+combined two things--an embankment of some sort, and a curve just sharp
+enough to throw those headlights behind off at a tangent for an instant
+as they rounded it, too, in following her.
+
+A minute, two, another passed. And then Rhoda Gray, tight-lipped, her
+face drawn hard, as her own headlights suddenly edged away from the road
+and opened what looked like a deep ravine on her left, while the road
+curved to the right, flung a frenzied glance back of her. It was her
+chance--her one chance. Danglar was perhaps a little more than a hundred
+yards in the rear. Yes--now! His headlights were streaming out on her
+left as he, too, touched the curve. The right-hand side of her car, the
+right-hand side of the road were in blackness. She checked violently,
+almost to a stop, then instantly opened the throttle wide once more,
+wrenching the wheel over to head the machine for the ravine; and before
+the car picked up its momentum again, she dropped from the right-hand
+side, darted to the far edge of the road, and flung herself flat down
+upon the ground.
+
+The great, black body of her car seemed to sail out into nothingness
+like some weird aerial monster, the headlights streaming uncannily
+through space--then blackness--and a terrific crash.
+
+And now the other car had come to a stop almost opposite where she
+lay. Danglar and the two chauffeurs, shouting at each other in wild
+excitement, leaped out and rushed to the edge of the embankment. And
+then suddenly the sky grew red as a great tongue-flame shot up from
+below. It outlined the forms of the three men as they stood there,
+until, abruptly, as though with one accord, they rushed pell-mell down
+the embankment toward the burning wreckage. And as they disappeared from
+sight Rhoda Gray jumped to her feet, sprang for Danglar's car, flung
+herself into the driver's seat, and the car shot forward again along the
+road.
+
+A shout, a wild chorus of yells, the reports of a fusillade of shots
+reached her; she caught a glimpse of forms running insanely after her
+along the edge of the embankment--then silence save for the roar of the
+speeding car.
+
+She drove on and on. Somewhere, nearing a town, she saw a train in the
+distance coming in her direction. She reached the station first, and
+left the car standing there, and, with the torn veil over her face
+again, took the train.
+
+She was weak, undone, exhausted. Even her mind refused its functions
+further. It was only in a subconscious way she realized that, where she
+had thought never to go to the garret again, the garret and the role of
+Gypsy Nan were, more than ever now, her sole refuge. The plot against
+Cloran had failed, but they could not blame that on “Bertha's”
+ non-appearance; and since it had failed she would not now be expected
+to assume the dead woman's personality. True, she had not, as had been
+arranged, reached the Silver Sphinx at eleven, but there were a hundred
+excuses she could give to account for her being late in keeping the
+appointment so that she had arrived just in time, say, to see Danglar
+dash wildly in pursuit of a woman who had jumped into the car that she
+was supposed to take!
+
+The garret! The garret again--and Gypsy Nan! Her surroundings seemed
+to become a blank to her; her actions to be prompted by some purely
+mechanical sense. She was conscious only that finally, after an
+interminable time, she was in New York again; and after that, long,
+long after that, dressed as Gypsy Nan, she was stumbling up the dark,
+ladder-like steps to the attic.
+
+How her footsteps dragged! She opened the door, staggered inside, locked
+the door again, and staggered toward the cot, and dropped upon it; and
+the gray dawn came in with niggardly light through the grimy little
+window panes, as though timorously inquisitive of this shawled and
+dissolute figure prone and motionless, this figure who in other dawns
+had found neither sleep nor rest--this figure who lay there now as one
+dead.
+
+
+
+
+XVIII. THE OLD SHED
+
+Rhoda Gray opened her eyes, and, from the cot upon which she lay, stared
+with drowsy curiosity around the garret--and in another instant was
+sitting bolt upright, alert and tense, as the full flood of memory swept
+upon her.
+
+There was still a meager light creeping in through the small, grimy
+window panes, but it was the light of waning day. She must have slept,
+then, all through the morning and the afternoon, slept the dead, heavy
+sleep of exhaustion from the moment she had flung herself down here a
+few hours before daybreak.
+
+She rose impulsively to her feet. It was strange that she had not been
+disturbed, that no one had come to the garret! The recollection of the
+events of the night before were crowding themselves upon her now. In
+view of last night, in view of her failure to keep that appointment in
+the role of Danglar's wife, it was very strange indeed that she had been
+left undisturbed!
+
+Subconsciously she was aware that she was hungry, that it was long since
+she had eaten, and, almost mechanically, she prepared herself something
+now from the store the garret possessed; but, even as she ate, her mind
+was far from thoughts of food. From the first night she had come here
+and self-preservation had thrust this miserable role of Gypsy Nan upon
+her, from that first night and from the following night when, to save
+the Sparrow, she had been whirled into the vortex of the gang's criminal
+activities, her mind raced on through the sequence of events that seemed
+to have spanned some vast, immeasurable space of time until they had
+brought her to--last night.
+
+Last night! She had thought it was the end last night, but instead--The
+dark eyes grew suddenly hard and intent. Yes, she had counted upon last
+night, when, with the necessary proof in her possession with which to
+confront Danglar with the crime of murder, she could wring from the man
+all that now remained necessary to substantiate her own story and clear
+herself in the eyes of the law of that robbery at Skarbolov's antique
+store of which she was held guilty--and instead she had barely escaped
+with her life. That was the story of last night.
+
+Her eyes grew harder. Well, the way was still open, wasn't it? Last
+night had changed nothing in that respect. To-night, as the White Moll,
+she had only to find and corner Danglar as she had planned to do last
+night. She had still only to get the man alone somewhere.
+
+Rhoda Gray's hands clenched tightly. That was all that was
+necessary--just the substantiation of her own story that the plot to rob
+Skarbolov lay at the door of Danglar and his gang; or, rather, perhaps,
+that the plot was in existence before she had ever heard of Skarbolov.
+It would prove her own statement of what the dying woman had said. It
+would exonerate her from guilt; it would prove that, rather than having
+any intention of committing crime, she had taken the only means within
+her power of preventing one. The real Gypsy Nan, Danglar's wife, who
+had died that night, bad, even in eleventh-hour penitence, refused to
+implicate her criminal associates. There was a crime projected which,
+unless she, Rhoda Gray, would agree to forestall it in person and would
+give her oath not to warn the police about it and so put the actual
+criminals in jeopardy, would go on to its fulfillment!
+
+She remembered that night in the hospital. The scene came vividly before
+her now. The woman's pleading, the woman's grim loyalty even in death to
+her pals. She, Rhoda Gray, had given her oath.
+
+It became necessary only to substantiate those facts. Danglar could be
+made to do it. She had now in her possession the evidence that would
+convict him of complicity in the murder of Deemer, and for which
+murder the original Gypsy Nan had gone into hiding; she even had in her
+possession the missing jewels that had prompted that murder; she had,
+too, the evidence now to bring the entire gang to justice for their
+myriad depredations; she knew where their secret hoard of ill-gotten
+gains was hidden--here in this attic, behind that ingeniously contrived
+trap-door in the ceiling. She knew all this; and this information placed
+before the police, providing only it was backed by the proof that the
+scheme to rob Skarbolov was to be carried out by the gang, as she, Rhoda
+Gray, would say the dying woman had informed her, would be more than
+enough to clear her. She had not had this proof on that first night when
+she had snatched at the mantle of Gypsy Nan as the sole means of escape
+from Rough Rorke, of headquarters; she did not have it now--but she
+would have it, stake all and everything in life she had to have it, for
+it, in itself, literally meant everything and all--and Danglar would
+make a written confession, or else--or else--She smiled mirthlessly.
+That was all! Last night she had failed. To-night she would not fail.
+Before morning came, if it were humanly within her power, she and
+Danglar would have played out their game--to the end.
+
+And now a pucker came and gathered her forehead into little furrows, and
+anxiety and perplexity crept into her eyes. Another thought tormented
+her. In the exposure that was to come the Adventurer, alias the Pug, was
+involved. Was there any way to save the man to whom she owed so much,
+the splendidly chivalrous, high-couraged gentleman she loved, the thief
+she abhorred?
+
+She pushed the remains of her frugal meal away from her, stood up
+abruptly from the rickety washstand at which she had been seated, and
+commenced to pace nervously up and down the stark, bare garret. Where
+was the line of demarcation between right and wrong? Was it a grievous
+sin, or an infinitely human thing to do, to warn the man she loved, and
+give him a chance to escape the net she meant to furnish the police? He
+was a thief, even a member of the gang--though he used the gang as his
+puppets. Did ethics count when one who had stood again and again between
+her and peril was himself in danger now? Would it be a righteous thing,
+or an act of despicable ingratitude, to trap him with the rest?
+
+She laughed out shortly. Warn him! Of course, she would warn him! But
+then--what? She shivered a little, and her face grew drawn and tired.
+It was the old, old story of the pitcher and the well. It was almost
+inevitable that sooner or later, for some crime or another, the man she
+loved would be caught at last, and would spend the greater portion of
+his days behind prison bars. That was what the love that had come into
+her life held as its promise to her! It was terrible enough without her
+agency being the means of placing him there!
+
+She did not want to think about it. She forced her mind into other
+channels, though they were scarcely less disquieting. Why was it that
+during the day just past there had been not a sign from Danglar or any
+one of the gang, when every plan of theirs had gone awry last night, and
+she had failed to keep her appointment in the role of Danglar's wife?
+Why was it? What did it mean? Surely Danglar would never allow what had
+happened to pass unchallenged, and--was that some one now?
+
+She halted suddenly by the door to listen, her hand going instinctively
+to the wide, voluminous pocket of her greasy skirt for her revolver.
+Yes, there was a footstep in the hall below, but it was descending
+now to the ground floor, not coming up. She even heard the street door
+close, but still she hung there in a strained, tense way, and into her
+face there came creeping a gray dismay. Her pocket was empty.
+
+The revolver was gone! Its loss, pregnant with a hundred ominous
+possibilities, seemed to bring a panic fear upon her, holding her for a
+moment inert--and then she rushed frantically to the cot. Perhaps it had
+fallen out of her pocket during the hours she had lain there asleep.
+She searched the folds of the soiled and crumpled blanket, that was the
+cot's sole covering, then snatched the blanket completely off the cot
+and shook it; and then, down on her knees, she searched the floor under
+the cot. There was no sign of the revolver.
+
+Rhoda Gray stood up, and stared in a stunned way about her. Was this,
+then, the explanation of her having seemingly been left undisturbed
+here all through the day? Had some one, after all, been here, and--? She
+shook her head suddenly with a quick, emphatic gesture of dissent.
+The door was still locked, she could see the key on the inside; and,
+besides, as a theory, it wasn't logical. They wouldn't have taken her
+revolver and left her placidly asleep!
+
+The loss of the revolver was a vital matter. It was her one safeguard;
+the one means by which she could first gain and afterwards hold the
+whip-hand over Danglar in the interview she proposed to have with him;
+the one means of escape, the last resort, if she herself were cornered
+and fell into his power. It had sustained her more than once, that
+resolution to turn it against herself if she were in extremity. It meant
+everything to her, that weapon, and it was gone now; but the panic that
+had seized upon her was gone too, and she could think rationally and
+collectively again.
+
+Last night, or rather this morning, when she had made her way back to
+the shed out there in the lane behind the garret, she had been in a
+state of almost utter exhaustion. She had changed from the clothes of
+the White Moll to those of Gypsy Nan, but she must have done so almost
+mechanically for she had no concrete recollection of it. It was quite
+likely then, even more than probable, that she had left the revolver in
+the pocket of her other clothes; for she had certainly had, not only her
+revolver, but her flashlight and her skeleton keys with her when she had
+visited old Luertz's place last night, and later on too, when she had
+jumped into that automobile in front of the Silver Sphinx, she had had
+her revolver, for she had used it to force the chauffeur out of the
+car--and she had no one of those articles now.
+
+Of course! That was it! She stepped impulsively to the door, and,
+opening it, made her way quickly down the stairs to the street. The
+revolver was undoubtedly in the pocket of her other skirt, and she felt
+a surge of relief sweep upon her; but a sense of relief was far from
+enough. She would not feel safe until the weapon was again in her
+possession, and intuitively she felt that she had no time to lose in
+securing it. She had already been left too long alone not to make a
+break in that unaccountable isolation they had accorded her as something
+to be expected at any moment. She hurried now down the street to the
+lane that intervened between Gypsy Nan's house and the next corner,
+glanced quickly about her, and, seeing no one in her immediate vicinity,
+slipped into the lane. She gained the deserted shed some fifty yards
+along the lane, entered through the broken door that hung, half open, on
+sagging hinges, and, dropping on her knees, reached in under the decayed
+and rotting flooring. She pushed aside impatiently the package of
+jewels, at whose magnificence she had gazed awe-struck and bewildered
+the night before, and drew out the bundle that comprised her own
+clothing. Her hand sought the pocket eagerly. Yes, it was here--at least
+the flashlight was, and so were the skeleton keys. That was what had
+happened! She had been near utter collapse last night, and she had
+forgotten, and--Rhoda Gray, unconscious even that she still held the
+clothing in her hands, rose mechanically to her feet. There was a sudden
+weariness in her eyes as she stared unseeingly about her. Yes, the
+flashlight and the keys were here--but the revolver was not! Her brain
+harked back in lightning flashes over the events of the preceding night.
+She must have lost it somewhere, then. Where? She had had it in the
+automobile, that she knew positively; but after that she did not
+remember, unless--yes, it must have been that! When she had jumped from
+the car and flung herself down at the roadside! It must have fallen out
+of her pocket then.
+
+Her heart seemed to stand still. Suppose they had found it! They would
+certainly recognize it as belonging to Gypsy Nan! They were not fools.
+The deduction would be obvious--the identity of the White Moll would
+be solved. Was that why no one had apparently come near her? Were they
+playing at cat-and-mouse, watching her before they struck, so that she
+would lead them to those jewels under the flooring here that were worth
+a king's ransom? They certainly believed that the White Moll had them.
+The Adventurer's note, so ironically true, that he had intended as an
+alibi for himself, and which he had exchanged for the package in old
+Luertz's place, would have left no doubt in their minds but that the
+stones were in her possession. Was that it? Were they--She held her
+breath. It seemed as though suddenly her limbs were refusing to support
+her weight. In the soft earth outside she had heard no step, but she saw
+now a shadow fall athwart the half-open door-way. There was no time to
+move, even had she been capable of action. It seemed as though even
+her soul had turned to stone, and, with the White Moll's clothes in her
+hands, she stood there staring at the doorway, and something that was
+greater than fear, because it mingled horror, ugly and forbidding,
+fell upon her. It was still just light enough to see. The shadow moved
+forward and came inside. She wanted to scream, to rush madly in retreat
+to the farthest corner of the shed; but she could not move. It was
+Danglar who was standing there. He seemed to sway a little on his feet,
+and the dark, sinister face seemed blotched, and he seemed to smile as
+though possessed of some unholy and perverted sense of humor.
+
+She was helpless, at his mercy, unarmed, saved for her wits. Her wits!
+Were wits any longer of avail? She could believe nothing else now except
+that he had been watching her--before he struck.
+
+“What are you doing here, and what are those clothes you've got in your
+hands?” he rasped out.
+
+She could only fence for time in the meager hope that some loophole
+would present itself. She forced an assumed defiance into her tones and
+manner, that was in keeping with the sort of armed truce, which, from
+her first meeting with Danglar, she had inaugurated as a barrier between
+them.
+
+“You have asked me two questions,” she said tartly. “Which one do you
+want me to answer first?”
+
+“Look here,” he snapped, “you cut that out! There's one or two things
+need explaining--see? What are those clothes?”
+
+Her wits! Perhaps he did not know as much as she was afraid he did! She
+seemed to have become abnormally contained, her mind abnormally acute
+and active. It was not likely that the woman, his wife, whom he believed
+she was, had worn her own clothes in his presence since the day, some
+two years ago, when she had adopted the disguise of Gypsy Nan; and she,
+Rhoda Gray, remembered that on the night Gypsy Nan, re-assuming her true
+personality, had gone to the hospital, the woman's clothes, like these
+she held now, had been of dark material. It was not likely that a man
+would be able to differentiate between those clothes and the clothes of
+the White Moll, especially as the latter hung folded in her hands now,
+and even though he had seen them on her at the Silver Sphinx last night.
+
+“What clothes do you suppose they are but my own?--though I haven't had
+a chance to wear them much lately!” she countered crisply.
+
+He scowled at her speculatively.
+
+“What are you doing with them out here in this hole, then?” he demanded.
+
+“I had to wear them last night, hadn't I?” she retorted. “I'd have
+looked well coming out of Gypsy Nan's garret dressed as myself if
+any one had seen me!” She scowled at him in turn. She was beginning to
+believe that he had not even an inkling of her identity. Her safest play
+was to stake everything on that belief. “Say, what's the matter with
+you?” she inquired disdainfully. “I came out here and changed last
+night; and I changed into these rags I'm wearing now when I got back
+again; and I left my own clothes here because I was expecting to get
+word that I could put them on again soon for keeps--though I might have
+known from past experience that something would queer the fine promises
+you made at Matty's last night! And the reason I'm out here now is
+because I left some things in the pocket, amongst them”--she stared at
+him mockingly--“my marriage certificate.”
+
+Danglar's face blackened.
+
+“Curse you!” he burst out angrily. “When you get your tantrums on,
+you've got a tongue, haven't you! You'd have been wearing your clothes
+now, if you'd have done as you were told. You're the one that queered
+things last night.” His voice was rising; he was rocking even more
+unsteadily upon his feet. “Why in hell weren't you at the Silver
+Sphinx?”
+
+Rhoda Gray squinted at him through Gypsy Nan's spectacles. She knew
+an hysterical impulse to laugh outright in the sure consciousness of
+supremacy over him now. The man had been drinking. He was by no means
+drunk; but, on the other hand, he was by no means sober--and she was
+certain now that, though she did not know how he had found her here in
+the shed, not the slightest suspicion of her had entered his mind.
+
+“I was at the Silver Sphinx,” she announced coolly.
+
+“You lie!” he said hoarsely. “You weren't! I told you to be there at
+eleven, and you weren't. You lie! What are you lying to me for--eh? I'll
+find out, you--you--”
+
+Rhoda Gray dashed the clothes down on the floor at her feet, and faced
+the man as though suddenly overcome in turn herself with passion,
+shaking both closed fists at him.
+
+“Don't you talk to me like that, Pierre Danglar!” she shrilled. “I lie,
+do I? Well, I'll prove to you I don't! You said you were going to have
+supper with Cloran at about eleven o'clock, and perhaps I was a few
+minutes after that, but maybe you think it's easy to get all this Gypsy
+Nan stuff off me face and all, and rig up in my own clothes that I
+haven't seen for so long it's a wonder they hold together at all. I lie,
+do I? Well, just as I got to the Silver Sphinx, I saw a woman breaking
+her neck to get down the steps with you after her. She jumped into the
+automobile it was doped out I was to take, and you jumped into the other
+one, and both beat it down the street. I thought you'd gone crazy. I was
+afraid that Cloran would come out and recognize me, so I turned and ran,
+too. The safest thing I could do was to get back into the Gypsy Nan
+game again, and that's what I did. And I've been lying low ever since,
+waiting to get word from some of you, and not a soul came near me.
+You're a nice lot, you are! And now you come sneaking here and call me a
+liar! How'd you get to this shed, anyway?”
+
+Danglar pushed his hand in a heavy, confused way across his eyes.
+
+“My God!” he said heavily. “So that's it, is it?” His voice became
+suddenly conciliating in its tones. “Look here, Bertha, old girl, don't
+get sore. I didn't understand, see? And there was a whole lot that
+looked queer. We even lost the jewels at old Luertz's last night. Do you
+know who that woman was? It was the White Moll! She led us a chase all
+over Long Island, and--”
+
+“The White Moll!” ejaculated Rhoda Gray. And then her laugh, short and
+jeering, rang out. The tables were turned. She had him on the defensive
+now. “You needn't tell me I She got away again, of course! Why don't you
+hire a detective to help you? You make me weary! So, it was the White
+Moll, was it? Well, I'm listening--only I'd like to know first how you
+got here to this shed.”
+
+“There's nothing in that!” he answered impatiently. “There's something
+more important to talk about. I was coming over to the garret, and just
+as I reached the corner I saw you go into the lane. I followed you;
+that's all there is to that.”
+
+“Oh!” she sniffed. She stared at him for a moment. There was something
+in which there was the uttermost of irony now, it seemed, in this
+meeting between them. Last night she had striven to meet him alone, and
+she had meant to devote to-night to the same purpose; and she was here
+with him now, and in a place than which, in her wildest hopes, she
+could have imagined one no better suited to the reckoning she would have
+demanded and forced. And she was helpless, powerless to make use of it.
+She was unarmed. Her revolver was gone. Without that to protect her, at
+an intimation that she was the White Moll she would never leave the shed
+alive. The spot would be quite as ideal under those circumstances
+for him, as it would have been under other circumstances for her. She
+shrugged her shoulders. Danglar's continued silence evidently invited
+further comment on her part. “Oh!” she sniffed again. “And I suppose,
+then, that you have been chasing the White Moll ever since last night at
+eleven, and that's why you didn't get around sooner to allay my fears,
+even though you knew I must be half mad with anxiety at the way things
+broke last night. She'll have us down and out for keeps if you haven't
+got brains enough to beat her. How much longer is this thing going on?”
+
+Danglar's little black eyes narrowed. She caught a sudden glint of
+triumph in them. It was Danglar now who laughed.
+
+“Not much longer!” His voice was arrogant with malicious satisfaction.
+“The luck had to turn, hadn't it? Well, it's turned! I've got the White
+Moll at last!”
+
+She felt the color leave her face. It seemed as though something had
+closed with an icy clutch upon her heart. She had heard aright, hadn't
+she?--that he had said he had got the White Moll at last. And there was
+no mistaking the mans s sinister delight in making that announcement.
+Had she been premature, terribly premature, in assuring herself that her
+identity was still safe as far as he was concerned? Did it mean that,
+after all, he had been playing at cat-and-mouse with her, as she had at
+first feared?
+
+“You--you've got the White Moll?” She forced the words from her lips,
+striving to keep her voice steady and in control, and to infuse into it
+an ironical incredulity.
+
+“Sure!” he said complacently. “The showdown comes to-night. In another
+hour or so we'll have her where we want her, and--”
+
+“Oh!” She laughed almost hysterically in relief. “I thought so! You
+haven't got her yet. You're only going to get her--in another hour or
+so! You make me tired! It's always in 'another hour or so' with you--and
+it never comes off!”
+
+Danglar scowled at her under the taunt.
+
+“It'll come off this time!” he snarled in savage menace. “You hold that
+tongue of yours! Yes, it'll come off! And when it does”--a sweep of fury
+sent the red into his working face--“I'll keep the promise I made her
+once--that she'd wish she had never been born! D'ye hear, Bertha?”
+
+“I hear,” she said indifferently. “But would you mind telling me how you
+are going to do it? I might believe you then--perhaps!”
+
+“Damn you, Bertha!” he exploded. “Sometimes I'd like to wring that
+pretty neck of yours; and sometimes!”--he moved suddenly toward her--“I
+would sell my soul for you, and--”
+
+She retreated from him coolly.
+
+“Never mind about that! This isn't a love scene!” she purred
+caustically. “And as for the other, save it for the White Moll. What
+makes you think you've got her at last?”
+
+“I don't think--I know.” He stood gnawing at his lips, eying her
+uncertainly, half angrily, half hungrily. And then he shrugged his
+shoulders. “Listen!” he said. “I've got some one else, too! And I know
+now where the leak that's queered every one of our games and put the
+White Moll wise to every one of our plans beforehand has come from. I
+guess you'll believe me now, won't you? We've got that dude pal of
+hers fastened up tighter than the night he fastened me with his cursed
+handcuffs! Do you know who that same dude pal is?” He laughed in an
+ugly, immoderate way. “You don't, of course, so I'll tell you. It's the
+Pug!” Rhoda Gray did not answer. It was growing dark here in the shed
+now--perhaps that was why the man's form blended suddenly into the
+doorway and wall, and blurred before her. She tried to think, but there
+seemed to have fallen upon her a numbed and agonized stupefaction. There
+was no confusing this issue. Danglar had found out that the Adventurer
+was the Pug. And it meant--oh, what did it mean? They would kill him. Of
+course, they would kill him! The Adventurer, discovered, would be safer
+at the mercy of a pack of starved pumas, and...
+
+“I thought that would hold you!” said Danglar with brutal serenity.
+“That's why I didn't get around till now. I didn't get back from that
+chase until daylight--the she-fiend stole our car--and then I went to
+bed to get a little sleep. About three o'clock this afternoon Pinkie
+Bonn woke me up. He was half batty with excitement. He said he was over
+in the tenement in the Pug's room. The Pug wasn't in, and Pinkie was
+waiting for him, and then all of a sudden he heard a woman screaming
+like mad from somewhere. He went to the door and looked out, and saw
+a man dash out of a room across the hall, and burst in the door of the
+next room. There was a woman in there with her clothes on fire. She'd
+upset a coal-oil stove, or something. The man Pinkie had seen beats the
+fire out, and everybody in the tenement begins to collect around the
+door. And then Pinkie goes pop-eyed. The man's face was the face of the
+White Moll's dude pal--but he had on the Pug's clothes. Pinkie's a wise
+guy. He slips away to me without getting himself in the limelight or
+spilling any beans. And I didn't ask him if he'd been punching the
+needle again overtime, either. It fitted like a glove with what happened
+at old Luertz's last night. You don't know about that. Pinkie and this
+double-crossing snitch went there--and only found a note from the White
+Moll. He'd tipped her off before, of course, and the note made a nice
+little play so's he'd be safe himself with us. Well, that's about all.
+We had to get him--where we wanted him--and we got him. We waited until
+he showed up again as the Pug, and then we put over a frame-up deal on
+him that got him to go over to that old iron plant in Harlem, you know,
+behind Jake Malley's saloon, where we had it fixed to hand Cloran his
+last night--and the Pug's there now. He's nicely gagged, and tied, and
+quite safe. The plant's been shut down for the last two months, and
+there's only the watchman there, and he's 'squared.' We gave the Pug two
+hours of solitary confinement to think it over and come across. We just
+asked him for the White Moll's address, so's we could get her and the
+sparklers she swiped at Old Luertz's place last night.”
+
+Still Rhoda Gray did not speak for a moment. She seemed to be held in
+thrall by both terror and a sickening dismay. It did not seem real,
+her surroundings here, this man, and the voice that was gloatingly
+pronouncing the death sentence upon the man who had come unbidden into
+her life, and into her heart, the man she loved. Yes, she understood!
+Danglar's words had been plain enough. The Adventurer had been
+trapped--not through Danglar's cunning, or lack of cunning on the
+Adventurer's own part, but through force of circumstances that had
+caused him to fling all thought of self-consideration to the winds in
+an effort to save another's life. Her hands, hidden in the folds of her
+skirt, clenched until they hurt. And it was another self, it seemed,
+subconsciously enacting the role of Gypsy Nan, alias Danglar's wife, who
+spoke at last.
+
+“You are a fool! You are all fools!” she cried tempestuously. “What do
+you expect to gain by that? Do you imagine you can make the Pug come
+across with any information by a threat to kill him if he doesn't? You
+tried that once. You had him cold, or at least you thought you had, and
+so did he, that night in old Nicky Viner's room, and he laughed at you
+even when he expected you to fire the next second. He's not likely to
+have changed any since then, is he?”
+
+“No,” said Danglar, with a vicious chuckle; “and that's why I'm not
+trying the same game twice. That's why we've got him over in the old
+iron plant now.”
+
+There was something she did not like in Danglar's voice, something of
+ominous assurance, something that startled her.
+
+“What do you mean?” she demanded sharply.
+
+“It's a lonely place,” said Danglar complacently. “There's no one around
+but the watchman, and he's an old friend of Shluker's; and it's so roomy
+over there that no one could expect him to be everywhere at once. See?
+That let's him out. He's been well greased, and he won't know anything.
+Don't you worry, old girl! That's what I came here for--to tell you that
+everything is all right, after all. The Pug will talk. Maybe he wouldn't
+if he just had his choice between that and the quick, painless end that
+a bullet would bring; but there are some things that a man can't stand.
+Get me? We'll try a few of those on the Pug, and, believe me, before
+we're through, there won't be any secrets wrapped up in his bosom.”
+
+Rhoda Gray stood motionless. Thank God it had grown dark--dark enough to
+hide the whiteness that she knew had crept over her face, and the horror
+that had crept into her eyes. “You mean”--her voice was very low--“you
+mean you're going to torture him into talking?”
+
+“Sure!” said Danglar. “What do you think!”
+
+“And after that?”
+
+“We bump him off, of course,” said Danglar callously. “He knows all
+about us, don't he? And I guess we'll square up on what's coming to him!
+He's put the crimp into us for the last time!” Danglar's voice pitched
+suddenly hoarse in fury. “That's a hell of a question to ask! What do
+you think we'd do with a yellow cur that's double-crossed us like that?”
+
+Plead for the Adventurer's life? It was useless; it was worse than
+useless--it would only arouse suspicion toward herself. From the
+standpoint of any one of the gang, the Adventurer's life was forfeit.
+Her mind was swift, cruelly swift, in its workings now. There came the
+prompting to disclose her own identity to tell Danglar that he need not
+go to the Adventurer to discover the whereabouts of the White Moll, that
+she was here now before him; there came the prompting to offer herself
+in lieu of the man she loved. But that, too, was useless, and worse than
+useless; they would still do away with the Adventurer because he had
+been the Pug, and the only chance he now had, as represented by whatever
+she might be able to do, would be gone, since she would but have
+delivered herself into their hands.
+
+She drew back suddenly. Danglar had stepped toward her. She was unable
+to avoid him, and his arm encircled her waist. She shivered as the
+pressure of his arm tightened.
+
+“It's all right, old girl!” he said exuberantly. “You've been through
+hell, you have; but it's all right at last. You leave it to me! Your
+husband's got a kiss to make up for every drop of that grease you've had
+to put on the prettiest face in New York.”
+
+It seemed as though she must scream out. It was hideous. She could not
+force herself to endure it another instant even for safety's safe. She
+pushed him away. It was unbearable--at any risk, cost what it might.
+Mind, soul and body recoiled from the embrace.
+
+“Leave me alone!” she panted. “You've been drinking. Leave me alone!”
+
+He drew back, and laughed.
+
+“Not very much,” he said. “The celebration hasn't started yet, and
+you'll be in on that. I guess your nerves have been getting shaky
+lately, haven't they? Well, you can figure on the swellest rest-cure you
+ever heard of, Bertha. Take it from me! We're going down to keep the Pug
+company presently. You blow around to Matty's about midnight and get the
+election returns. We'll finish the job after that by getting Cloran
+out of the road some way before morning, and that will let you out for
+keeps--there won't be any one left to recognize the woman who was with
+Deemer the night he shuffled out.” He backed to the doorway. “Get me?
+Come over to Matty's and see the rajah's sparklers about midnight. We'll
+have 'em then--and the she-fiend, too. So long, Bertha!”
+
+She scarcely heard him; she answered mechanically.
+
+“Good-night,” she said.
+
+
+
+
+XIX. DREAD UPON THE WATERS
+
+For a moment after Danglar had gone, Rhoda Gray stood motionless; and
+then, the necessity for instant action upon her, she moved quickly
+toward the doorway herself. There was only one thing she could do, just
+one; but she must be sure first that Danglar was well started on his
+way. She reached the doorway, looked out--and suddenly caught her breath
+in a low, quick inhalation, In the semi-darkness she could just make out
+Danglar's form, perhaps twenty-five yards away now, heading along the
+lane toward the street; but behind Danglar, at a well-guarded distance
+in the rear, hugging the shadows of the fence, she saw the form of
+another man. Her brows knitted in a perplexed and anxious frown. The
+second man was undoubtedly following Danglar. That was evident. But why?
+Who was it? What did it mean?
+
+She retreated back into the shed, and commenced hastily to disrobe and
+dress again in her own clothes, which she had flung down upon the
+floor. In the last analysis, did it matter who it was that was following
+Danglar--even if it were one of the police? For, supposing that the man
+who was shadowing Danglar was a plain-clothes man, and suppose he even
+followed Danglar and the rest of the gang to the old iron plant, and
+suppose that with the necessary assistance he rounded them all up, and
+in that sense effected the Adventurer's rescue, it scarcely meant a
+better fate for the Adventurer! It simply meant that the Adventurer, as
+one of the gang, and against whom every one of the rest would testify as
+the sole means left to them of wreaking their vengeance upon one who had
+tricked and outwitted them again and again for his own ends, would stand
+his trial with the others, and with the others go behind prison bars for
+a long term of years.
+
+She hurried now, completing the last touches that transformed her from
+Gypsy Nan into the veiled figure of the White Moll, stepped out into
+the lane, and walking rapidly, reached the street and headed, not in the
+direction of Harlem, but deeper over into the East Side. Even as Danglar
+had been speaking she had realized that, for the Adventurer's own sake,
+and irrespective of what any premature disclosure of her own identity
+to the authorities might mean to her, she could not call upon the police
+for aid. There was only one way, just one--to go herself, to reach the
+Adventurer herself before Danglar returned there and had an opportunity
+of putting his worse than murderous intentions into effect.
+
+Well, she was going there, wasn't she? And if she lost no time she
+should be there easily ahead of them, and her chances would be excellent
+of releasing the Adventurer with very little risk. From what Danglar
+had said, the Adventurer was there alone. Once tied and gagged there had
+been no need to leave anybody to guard him, save that the watchman would
+ordinarily serve to keep any one off the premises, which was all that
+was necessary. But that he had been left at all worried her greatly. He
+had, of course, already refused to talk. What they had done to him she
+did not know, but the 'solitary confinement' Danglar had referred to
+was undoubtedly the first step in their efforts to break his spirit. Her
+lips tightened as she went along. Surely she could accomplish it! She
+had but to evade the watchman--only, first, the lost revolver, the one
+safeguard against an adverse turn of fortune, must be replaced, and that
+was where she was going now. She knew, from her associations with the
+underworld as the White Moll in the old days, where such things could be
+purchased and no questions asked, if one were known. And she was known
+in the establishment to which she was going, for evil days had once
+fallen upon its proprietor, one “Daddy” Jacques, in that he had incurred
+the enmity of certain of his own ilk in the underworld, and on a certain
+night, which he would not be likely to forget, she had stood between him
+and a manhandling that would probably have cost him his life, and--Yes,
+this was the place.
+
+She entered a dirty-windowed, small and musty pawnshop. A little old
+man, almost dwarf-like in stature, with an unkempt, tawny beard, who
+wore a greasy and ill-fitting suit, and upon whose bald head was perched
+an equally greasy skull cap, gazed at her inquiringly from behind the
+counter.
+
+“I want a gun, and a good one, please,” she said, after a glance around
+her to assure herself that they were alone.
+
+The other squinted at her through his spectacles, as he shook his head.
+
+“I haven't got any, lady,” he answered. “We're not allowed to sell them
+without--”
+
+“Oh, yes, you have, Daddy,” she contradicted quietly, as she raised her
+veil. “And quick, please; I'm in a hurry.”
+
+The little old man leaned forward, staring at her for a moment as though
+fascinated; and then his hand, in a fumbling way, removed the skull
+cap from his bead. There was a curious, almost wistful reverence in his
+voice as he spoke.
+
+“The White Moll!” he said.
+
+“Yes,” she smiled. “But the gun, Daddy. Quick! I haven't an instant to
+lose.”
+
+“Yes, yes!” he said eagerly--and shuffled away.
+
+He was back in a moment, an automatic in his hand.
+
+“It's loaded, of course?” she said, as she took the weapon. She slipped
+it into her pocket as he nodded affirmatively. “How much, Daddy?”
+
+“The White Moll!” He seemed still under the spell of amazement. “It is
+nothing. There is no charge. It is nothing, of course.”
+
+“Thank you, Daddy!” she said softly--and laid a bill upon the counter,
+and stepped back to the door. “Good-night!” she smiled.
+
+She heard him call to her; but she was already on the street again,
+and hurrying along. She felt better, somehow, in a mental way, for that
+little encounter with the shady old pawnbroker. She was not so much
+alone, perhaps, as she had thought; there were many, perhaps, even if
+they were of the underworld, who had not swerved from the loyalty they
+had once professed to the White Moll.
+
+It brought a new train of thought, and she paused suddenly in her walk.
+She might rally around her some of those underworld intimates upon whose
+allegiance she felt she could depend, and use them now, to-night, in
+behalf of the Adventurer; she would be sure then to be a match for
+Danglar, no matter what turn affairs took. And then, with an impatient
+shake of her head, she hurried on again. There was no time for that. It
+would take a great deal of time to find and pick her men; she had even
+wasted time herself, where there was no time to spare, in the momentary
+pause during which she had given the thought consideration.
+
+She reached the nearest subway station, which was her objective, and
+boarded a Harlem train, satisfied that her heavy veil would protect her
+against recognition. Unobtrusively she took a window seat. No one paid
+her any attention. Hours passed, it seemed to her impatience, while the
+black walls rushed by, punctuated by occasional scintillating signal
+lights, and, at longer intervals, by the fuller glare from the station
+platforms.
+
+In the neighborhood of 125th street she left the train, and, entering
+the first drug store she found, consulted a directory. She did not know
+this section of New York at all; she did not know either the location or
+the firm name of the iron plant to which Danglar, assuming naturally, of
+course, that she was conversant with it, had referred; and she did not
+care to ask to be directed to Jake Malley's saloon, which was the only
+clew she had to guide her. The problem, however, did not appear to be
+a very difficult one. She found the saloon's address, and, asking the
+clerk to direct her to the street indicated, left the drug store again.
+
+But, after all, it was not so easy; no easier than for one unacquainted
+with any locality to find one's way about. Several times she found
+herself at fault, and several times she was obliged to ask directions
+again. She had begun to grow panicky with fear and dread at the time she
+had lost, before, finally, she found the saloon. She was quite sure that
+it was already more than half an hour since she had left the drug store;
+and that half an hour might easily mean the difference between safety
+and disaster, not only for the Adventurer, but for herself as well.
+Danglar might have been in no particular hurry, and he would probably
+have gone first to whatever rendezvous he had appointed for those of the
+gang selected to accompany him, but even to have done so in a leisurely
+way would surely not have taken more than that half hour!
+
+Yes, that was Jake Malley's saloon now, across the road from her, but
+she could not recall the time that was already lost! They might be there
+now--ahead of her.
+
+She quickened her steps almost to a run. There should be no difficulty
+in finding the iron plant now. “Behind Jake Malley's saloon,” Danglar
+had said. She turned down the cross street, passed the side entrance to
+the saloon, and hastened along. The locality was lonely, deserted, and
+none too well lighted. The arc lamps, powerful enough in themselves,
+were so far apart that they left great areas of shadow, almost
+blackness, between them. And the street too was very narrow, and the
+buildings, such as they were, were dark and unlighted--certainly it was
+not a residential district!
+
+And now she became aware that she was close to the river, for the sound
+of a passing craft caught her attention. Of course! She understood now.
+The iron plant, for shipping facilities, was undoubtedly on the bank of
+the river itself, and--yes, this was it, wasn't it?--this picket fence
+that began to parallel the right-hand side of the street, and enclose,
+seemingly, a very large area. She halted and stared at it--and suddenly
+her heart sank with a miserable sense of impotence and dismay. Yes, this
+was the place beyond question. Through the picket fence she could make
+out the looming shadows of many buildings, and spidery iron structures
+that seemed to cobweb the darkness, and--and--Her face mirrored her
+misery. She had thought of a single building. Where, inside there,
+amongst all those rambling structures, with little time, perhaps none at
+all, to search, was she to find the Adventurer?
+
+She did not try to answer her own question--she was afraid that her
+dismay would get the better of her if she hesitated for an instant. She
+crossed the street, choosing a spot between two of the arc lamps where
+the shadows were blackest. It was a high fence, but not too high to
+climb. She reached up, preparatory to pulling herself to the top--and
+drew back with a stifled cry. She was too late, then--already too late!
+They were here ahead of her--and on guard after all! A man's form,
+appearing suddenly out of the darkness but a few feet away, was making
+quickly toward her. She wrenched her automatic from her pocket. The
+touch of the weapon in her hand restored her self-control.
+
+“Don't come any nearer!” she cried out sharply. “I will fire if you do!”
+
+And then the man spoke.
+
+“It's you, ain't it?” he called in guarded eagerness. “It's the White
+Moll, ain't it? Thank God, it's you!”
+
+Her extended hand with the automatic fell to her side. She had
+recognized his voice. It wasn't Danglar, it wasn't one of the gang, or
+the watchman who was no better than an accomplice; it was Marty Finch,
+alias the Sparrow.
+
+“Marty!” she exclaimed. “You! What are you doing here?”
+
+“I'm here to keep you from goin' in there!” he answered excitedly.
+“And--and, say, I was afraid I was too late. Don't you go in there! For
+God's sake, don't you go! They're layin' a trap for you! They're goin'
+to bump you off! I know all about it!”
+
+“You know? What do you mean?” she asked quickly. “How do you know?”
+
+“I quit my job a few days after that fellow you called Danglar tried
+to murder me that night you saved me,” said the Sparrow, with a savage
+laugh. “I knew he had it in for you, and I guess I had something comm'
+to him on my own account too, hadn't I? That's the job I've been on
+ever since--tryin' to find the dirty pup. And I found him! But it wasn't
+until to-night, though you can believe me there weren't many joints in
+the old town where I didn't look for him. My luck turned to-night. I
+spotted him comin' out of Italian Joe's bar. See? I followed him. After
+a while he slips into a lane, and from the street I saw him go into a
+shed there. I worked my way up quiet, and got as near as I dared without
+bein' heard and seen, and I listened. He was talkin' to a woman. I
+couldn't hear everything they said, and they quarreled a lot; but I
+heard him say something about framin' up a job to get somebody down to
+the old iron plant behind Jake Malley's saloon and bump 'em off, and I
+heard him say there wouldn't be any White Moll by morning, and I put two
+and two together and beat it for here.”
+
+Rhoda Gray reached out and caught the Sparrow's hand.
+
+“Thank you, Marty! You haven't got it quite right--though, thank Heaven,
+you got it the way you did, since you are here now!” she said fervently.
+“It wasn't me, it wasn't the White Moll, they expected to get here; it's
+the man who helped me that night to clear you of the Hayden-Bond robbery
+that Danglar meant to make you shoulder. He risked his life to do it,
+Marty. They've got him a prisoner somewhere in there; and they're
+coming back to--to torture him into telling them where I am, and--and
+afterwards to do away with him. That's why I'm here, Marty--to get him
+away, if I can, before they come back.”
+
+The Sparrow whistled low under his breath.
+
+“Well, then, I guess it's my hunt too,” he said coolly. “And I guess
+this is where a prison bird horns in with the goods. Ever since
+I've been looking for that Danglar guy, I've been carryin' a full
+kit--because I didn't know what might break, or what kind of a mess
+I might want to get out of. Come on! We ain't got no time. There's
+a couple of broken pickets down there. We might be seen climbin' the
+fence. Come on!”
+
+Bread upon the waters! With a sense of warm gratitude upon her, Rhoda
+Gray followed the ex-convict. They made their way through the fence.
+A long, low building, a storage shed evidently, showed a few yards in
+front of them. It seemed to be quite close to the river, for now she
+could see the reflection of lights from here and there playing on the
+black, mirror-like surface of the water. Farther on, over beyond the
+shed, the yard of the plant, dotted with other buildings and those
+spidery iron structures which she had previously noticed, stretched away
+until it was lost in the darkness. Here, however, within the radius of
+one of the street arc lamps it was quite light.
+
+Rhoda Gray had paused in almost hopeless indecision as to how or where
+to begin her search, when the Sparrow spoke again.
+
+“It looks like we got a long hunt,” whispered the Sparrow; “but a few
+minutes before you came, a guy with a lantern comes from over across the
+yard there and nosed around that shed, and acted kind of queer, and I
+could see him stick his head up against them side doors there as
+though he was listenin' for something inside. Does that wise you up to
+anything?”
+
+“Yes!” she breathed tensely. “That was the watchman. He's one of them.
+The man we want is in that shed beyond a doubt. Hurry, Marty--hurry!”
+
+They ran together now, and reached the double side-door. It was
+evidently for freight purposes only, and probably barred on the inside,
+for they found there was no way of opening it from without.
+
+“There must be an entrance,” she said feverishly--and led the way toward
+the front of the building in the direction away from the river. “Yes,
+here it is!” she exclaimed, as they rounded the end of the shed.
+
+She tried the door. It was locked. She felt in her pocket for her
+skeleton keys, for she had not been unprepared for just such an
+emergency, but the Sparrow brushed her aside.
+
+“Leave it to me!” he said quickly. “I'll pick that lock like one
+o'clock! It won't take me more'n a minute.”
+
+Rhoda Gray did not stand and watch him. Minutes were priceless things,
+and she could put the minute he asked for to better advantage than by
+idling it away. With an added injunction to hurry and that she would be
+back in an instant, she was already racing around the opposite side of
+the shed. If they were pressed, cornered, by the arrival of Danglar, it
+might well mean the difference between life and death to all of them if
+she had an intimate knowledge of the surroundings.
+
+She was running at top speed. Halfway down the length of the shed she
+tripped and fell over some object. She pushed it aside as she rose. It
+was an old iron casting, more bulky in shape than in weight, though
+she found it none too light to lift comfortably. She ran on. A wharf
+projected out, she found, from this end of the shed. At the edge, she
+peered over. It was quite light here again; away from the protecting
+shadows of the shed, the rays of the arc lamp played without hindrance
+on the wharf just as they did on the shed's side door. Below, some
+ten or twelve feet below, and at the corner of the wharf, a boat, or,
+rather, a sort of scow, for it was larger than a boat though oars lay
+along its thwarts, was moored. It was partly decked over, and she could
+see a small black opening into the forward end of it, though the opening
+itself was almost hidden by a heap of tarpaulin, or sailcloth, or
+something of the kind, that lay in the bottom of the craft. She nodded
+her head. They might all of them use that boat to advantage!
+
+Rhoda Gray turned and ran back. The Sparrow, with a grunt of
+satisfaction, was just opening the door. She stepped through the
+doorway. The Sparrow followed.
+
+“Close it!” said Rhoda Gray, under her breath. She felt her heart beat
+quicken, the blood flood her face and then recede. Her imagination had
+suddenly become too horribly vivid. Suppose they--they had already gone
+farther than...
+
+With an effort she controlled herself--and the round, white ray of her
+flashlight swept the place. A moment more, and, with a low cry, she
+was running forward to where, on the floor near the wall of the shed
+opposite the side door, she made out the motionless form of a man. She
+reached him, and dropped on her knees beside him. It was the Adventurer.
+She spoke to him. He did not answer. And then she remembered what
+Danglar had said, and she saw that he was gagged. But--but she was not
+sure that was the reason why he did not answer. The flashlight in her
+hand wavered unsteadily as it played over him. Perhaps the whiteness of
+the ray itself exaggerated it, but his face held a deathly pallor;
+his eyes were closed; and his hands and feet were twisted cruelly and
+tightly bound.
+
+“Give me your knife--quick--Sparrow!” she called. “Then go and keep
+watch just outside.”
+
+The Sparrow handed her his knife, and hurried back to the door.
+
+She worked in the darkness now. She could not use both hands and still
+hold the flashlight; and, besides, with the door partially open now
+where the Sparrow was on guard there was always the chance, if Danglar
+and those of the gang with him were already in the vicinity, of the
+light bringing them all the more quickly to the scene.
+
+Again she spoke to the Adventurer, as she removed the gag--and a fear
+that made her sick at heart seized up on her. There was still no answer.
+And now, as she worked, cutting at the cords on his hands and feet, the
+love that she knew for the man, its restraint broken by the sense of
+dread and fear at his condition, rose dominant within her, and impulse
+that she could not hold in least took possession of her, and in the
+darkness, since he would not know, and there was none to see, she bent
+her head, and, half crying, her lips pressed upon his forehead.
+
+She drew back startled, a crimson in her face that the darkness hid.
+What had she done? Did he know? Had he returned to consciousness, if he
+really had been unconscious, in time to know? She could not see; but she
+knew his eyes had opened.
+
+She worked frantically with the bonds. He was free now. She cast them
+off.
+
+He spoke then--thickly, with great difficulty.
+
+“It's you, the White Moll, isn't it?”
+
+“Yes,” she answered.
+
+He raised himself up on his elbow, only to fall back with a suppressed
+groan.
+
+“I don't know how you found me, but get away at once--for God's sake,
+get away!” he cried. “Danglar'll be here at any minute. It's you he
+wants. He thinks you know where some--some jewels are, and that I--I--”
+
+“I know all about Danglar,” she said hurriedly. “And I know all about
+the jewels, for I've got them myself.”
+
+He was up on his knees now, swaying there. She caught at his shoulder to
+support him.
+
+“You!” he cried out incredulously. “You--you've got them? Say that
+again! You--you've--”
+
+“Yes,” she said, and with an effort steadied her voice. He--he was
+a thief. Cost her what it might, with all its bitter hurt, she must
+remember that, even--even if she had forgotten once. “Yes,” she said.
+“And I mean to turn them over to the police, and expose every one of
+Danglar's gang. I--you are entitled to a chance; you once stood between
+me and the police. I can do no less by you. I couldn't turn the police
+loose on the gang without giving you warning, for, you see, I know you
+are the Pug.”
+
+“Good God!” he stammered. “You know that, too?”
+
+“Try and walk,” she said breathlessly. “There isn't any time. And once
+you are away from here, remember that when Danglar is in the hands of
+the police he will take the only chance for revenge he has left, and
+give the police all the information he can, so that they will get you
+too.”
+
+He stumbled pitifully.
+
+“I can't walk much yet.” He was striving to speak coolly. “They trussed
+me up a bit, you know--but I'll be all right in a little while when I
+get the cramps out of my joints and the circulation back. And so, Miss
+Gray, won't you please go at once? I'm free now, and I'll manage all
+right, and--”
+
+The Sparrow came running back from the door.
+
+“They're comm'!” he said excitedly. “They're comm' from a different way
+than we came in. I saw 'em sway up there across the yard for a second
+when they showed up under a patch of light from an arc lamp on the other
+street. There's three of 'em. We got about a couple of minutes, and--”
+
+“Get those side doors open! Quick! And no noise!”' ordered Rhoda Gray
+tersely. And then to the Adventurer: “Try--try and walk! I'll help you.”
+
+The Adventurer made a desperate attempt at a few steps. It was miserably
+slow. At that rate Danglar would be upon them before they could even
+cross the shed itself.
+
+“I can crawl faster,” laughed the Adventurer with bitter whimsicality.
+“Give me your revolver, Miss Gray, and you two go--and God bless you!”
+
+The Sparrow was opening the side door, but she realized now that even
+if they could carry the Adventurer they could not get away in time.
+Her mind itself seemed stunned for an instant--and then, in a lightning
+flash, inspiration came. She remembered that iron casting, and the
+wharf, and the other side of the shed in shadow. It was desperate,
+perhaps almost hopeless, but it was the only way that gave the
+Adventurer a chance for his life.
+
+She spoke rapidly. The little margin of time they had must be narrowing
+perilously.
+
+“Marty, help this gentleman! Crawl to the street, if you have to. The
+only thing is that you are not to make the slightest noise, and--”
+
+“What are you going to do?” demanded the Adventurer hoarsely.
+
+“I'm going to take the only chance there is for all of us,” she
+answered.
+
+She started toward the front door of the shed; but he reached out and
+held her back.
+
+“You are going to take the only chance there is for me!” he cried
+brokenly. “You're going out there--where they are. Oh, my God! I know!
+You love me! I--I was only half conscious, but I am sure you kissed me
+a little while ago. And but for this you would never have known that I
+knew it, because, please God, whatever else I am, I am not coward enough
+to take that advantage of you. But I love you, too! Rhoda! I have the
+right to speak, the right our love gives me. You are not to go--that
+way. Run--run through the side door there--they will not see you.”
+
+She was trembling. Repudiate her love? Tell him there could be nothing
+between them because he was a thief? She might never live to see him
+again. Her soul was in riot, the blood flaming hot in her cheeks. He was
+clinging to her arm. She tore herself forcibly away. The seconds were
+counting now. She tried to bid him good-by, but the words choked in her
+throat. She found herself running for the front door.
+
+“Sparrow--quick! Do as I told you!” she half sobbed over her
+shoulder--and opening the door, stepped out and dosed it behind her.
+
+
+
+
+XX. A LONE HAND
+
+And now Rhoda Gray was in the radius of the arc lamp, and distinctly
+visible to any one coming down the yard. How near were they? Yes, she
+saw them now--three forms-perhaps a little more than a hundred yards
+away. She moved a few steps deliberately toward them, as though quite
+unconscious of their presence; and then, as a shout from one of them
+announced that she was seen, she halted, hesitated as though surprised,
+terrified and uncertain, and, as they sprang forward, she turned and
+ran--making for the side of the shed away from the side door.
+
+A voice rang out--Danglar's:
+
+“By God, it's the White Moll!”
+
+It was the only way! She had the pack in cry now. They would pay no
+attention to the Adventurer while the White Moll was seemingly almost
+within their grasp. If she could only hold them now for a little
+while--just a little while--the Adventurer wasn't hurt--only cramped and
+numbed--he would be all right again and able to take care of himself in
+a little while--and meanwhile the Sparrow would help him to get away.
+
+She was running with all her speed. She heard them behind her--the
+pound, pound, pound of feet. She had gained the side of the shed. The
+light from the arc lamp was shut off from her now, and they would only
+be able to see her, she knew, as a dim, fleeting shadow. Where was that
+iron casting? Pray God, it was heavy enough; and pray God, it was not
+too heavy! Yes, here it was! She pretended to stumble--and caught the
+thing up in her arms. An exultant cry went up from behind her as she
+appeared to fall--oaths, a chorus of them, as she went on again.
+
+They had not gained on her before; but with the weight in her arms,
+especially as she was obliged to carry it awkwardly in order to shield
+it from their view with her body, she could not run so fast now, and
+they were beginning to close up on her. But she was on the wharf now,
+and there was not much farther to go, and--and surely she could hold all
+the lead she needed until she reached the edge.
+
+The light from the arc lamp held her in view again out here on the wharf
+where she was clear of the shed; but she knew they would not fire at her
+except as a last resort. They could not afford to sound an alarm that
+would attract notice to the spot--when they had, or believed they had,
+both the Adventurer and the White Moll within their grasp now.
+
+She was running now with short, hard, panting gasps. There were still
+five yards to go-three-one! She looked around her like a hunted animal
+at bay, as she reached the end of the wharf and stood there poised at
+the edge. Yes, thank God, they were still far enough behind to give her
+the few seconds she needed! She cried out loudly as though in despair
+and terror--and sprang from the edge of the wharf. And as she sprang she
+dropped the casting; but even as it struck the water with a loud
+splash, Rhoda Gray, in frantic haste, was crawling in through the little
+locker-like opening under the decked-over bow of the half scow, half
+boat into which she had leaped. And quick as a flash, huddled inside,
+she reached out and drew the heap of what proved to be sailcloth nearer
+to her to cover the opening-and lay still.
+
+A few seconds passed; then she heard them at the edge of the wharf, and
+heard Danglar s voice.
+
+“Watch where she comes up! She can't get away!”
+
+A queer, wan smile twisted Rhoda Gray's lips. The casting had served her
+well; the splash had been loud enough! She listened, straining her ears
+to catch every sound from above. It was miserably small this hiding
+place into which she had crawled, scarcely large enough to hold her--she
+was beginning to be painfully cramped and uncomfortable already.
+
+Another voice, that she recognized as Pinkie Bonn's now, reached her:
+
+“It's damned hard to spot anything out there; the water's blacker'n
+hell.”
+
+Came a savage and impatient oath from Danglar.
+
+“She's got to come up, ain't she--or drown!” he rasped. “Maybe she's
+swum under the wharf, or maybe she's swum under water far enough out
+so's we can't see her from here. Anyway, jump into that boat there, and
+we'll paddle around till we get her.”
+
+Rhoda Gray held her breath. The boat rocked violently as, one after
+another, the men jumped into it. Her right hand was doubled under her,
+it was hard to reach her pocket and her automatic. She moved a little;
+they were cursing, splashing with their oars, making too much noise to
+hear any slight rustle that she might make.
+
+A minute, two, went by. She had her automatic now, and she lay there,
+grim-lipped, waiting. Even if they found her now, she had her own way
+out; and by now, beyond any question, the Adventurer and the Sparrow
+would have reached the street, and, even if they had to hide out there
+somewhere until the Adventurer had recovered the use of his limbs, they
+would be safe.
+
+She could not see, of course. Once the boat bumped, and again. They were
+probably searching around under the wharf. She could not hear what they
+said, for they were keeping quiet now, talking in whispers--so as not to
+give her warning of their whereabouts undoubtedly!
+
+The time dragged on. Her cramped position was bringing her excruciating
+agony now. She could understand how the Adventurer, in far worse case
+in the brutal position in which they had bound him, had fainted. She
+was afraid she would faint herself--it was not only the pain, but it was
+terribly close in the confined space, and her head was swimming.
+
+Occasionally the oars splashed; and then, after an interminable time,
+the men, as though hopeless of success, and as though caution were no
+longer of any service, began to talk louder.
+
+The third man was Shluker. She recognized his voice, too.
+
+“It's no use!” he snarled. “If she's a good swimmer, she could get
+across the river easy. She's got away; that's sure. What the hell's
+the good of this? We're playing the fool. Beat it back! She was nosing
+around the shed. How do we know she didn't let the Pug loose before we
+saw her?”
+
+Pinkie Bonn whined:
+
+“If he's gone too, we're crimped! The whole works is bust up! The Pug
+knows everything, where our money is, an' everything. They'll have us
+cold!”
+
+“Close your face, Pinkie!” It was Danglar speaking, his voice hoarse
+with uncontrollable rage. “Go on back, then, Shluker. Quick!”
+
+Rhoda Gray heard the hurried splashing of the oars now; and presently
+she felt the bumping of the boat against the wharf, and its violent
+rocking as the men climbed out of it again. But she did not move--save
+with her hand to push the folds of sailcloth a cautious inch or two away
+from the opening. It did not ease the agony she was suffering from
+her cramped position, but it gave her fresher air, and she could hear
+better--the ring of their boot-heels on the wharf above, for instance.
+
+The footsteps died away. There was silence then for a moment; and then,
+faintly, from the direction of the shed, there came a chorus of baffled
+rage and execration. She smiled a little wearily to herself. It was all
+right. That was what she wanted to know. The Adventurer had got away.
+
+Still she lay there. She dared not leave the boat yet; but she could
+change her position now. She crawled half out from under the docking,
+and lay with her head on the sailcloth. It was exquisite relief! They
+could not come back along the wharf without her hearing them, and she
+could retreat under the decking again in an instant, if necessary.
+
+Voices reached her now occasionally from the direction of the shed.
+Finally a silence fell. The minutes passed--ten--fifteen--twenty of
+them. And then Rhoda Gray climbed warily to the wharf, made her way
+warily past the shed, and gained the road--and three-quarters of an hour
+later, in another shed, in the lane behind the garret, she was changing
+quickly into the rags of Gypsy Nan again.
+
+It was almost the end now. To-night, she would keep the appointment
+Danglar had given her--and keep it ahead of time. It was almost the end.
+Her lips set tightly. The Adventurer had been warned. There was nothing
+now to stand in the way of her going to the police, save only the
+substantiation of that one point in her own story which Danglar must
+supply.
+
+Her transformation completed, she reached in under the flooring and
+took out the package of jewels--they would help very materially when she
+faced Danglar!--and, though it was somewhat large, tucked it inside
+her blouse. It could not be noticed. The black, greasy shawl hid it
+effectively.
+
+She stepped out into the lane, and from there to the street, and began
+to make her way across town. She did not have to search for Danglar
+to-night. She was to meet him at Matty's at midnight, and it was not
+more than halfpast eleven now. Three hours and a half! Was that all
+since at eight o'clock, as nearly as she could place it, he had left
+her in the lane? It seemed as many years; but it was only twenty minutes
+after eleven, she had noticed, when she had left the subway on her
+return a few minutes ago. Her hand clenched suddenly. She was to meet
+him at Matty's--and, thereafter, if it took all night, she would not
+leave him until she had got him alone somewhere and disclosed herself.
+The man was a coward in soul. She could trust to the effect upon him of
+an automatic in the hands of the White Mall to make him talk.
+
+Rhoda Gray walked quickly. It was not very far. She turned the corner
+into the street where Danglar's deformed brother, Matty, cloaked the
+executive activities of the gang with his cheap little notion store--and
+halted abruptly. The store was just ahead of her, and Danglar himself,
+coming out, had just closed the door.
+
+He saw her, and stepping instantly to her side, grasped her arm roughly
+and wheeled her about.
+
+“Come on!” he said--and a vicious oath broke from his lips.
+
+The man was in a towering, ungovernable passion. She cast a furtive
+glance at his face. She had seen him before in anger; but now, with his
+lips drawn back and working, his whole face contorted, he seemed utterly
+beside himself.
+
+“What's the matter?” she inquired innocently. “Wouldn't the Pug talk, or
+is it a case of 'another hour or so,' and--”
+
+He swung on her furiously.
+
+“Hold your cursed tongue!” he flared. “You'll snicker on the wrong side
+of your face this time!” He gulped, stared at her threateningly, and
+quickened his step, forcing her to keep pace with him. But he spoke
+again after a minute, savagely, bitterly, but more in control of
+himself. “The Pug got away. The White Moll queered us again. But it's
+worse than that. The game's up! I told you to be here at midnight. It's
+only half past eleven yet. I figured you would still be over in the
+garret, and I was going there for you. That's where we're going now.
+There's no chance at those rajah's jewels now; there's no chance of
+fixing Cloran so's you can swell it around in the open again--the only
+chance we've got is to save what we can and beat it!”
+
+She did not need to simulate either excitement or disquiet.
+
+“What is it? What's happened?” she asked tensely.
+
+“The gang's thrown us down!” he said between his teeth. “They're scared;
+they've got cold feet--they're going to quit. Shluker and Pinkie were
+with me at the iron plant. We went back to Matty's from there. Matty's
+with them, too. They say the Pug knows every one of us, and every game
+we've pulled, and that in revenge for our trying to murder him he'll
+wise up the police--that he could do it easily enough without getting
+nipped himself, by sending them a letter, or even telephoning the names
+and addresses of the whole layout. They're scared--he curs! They say
+he knows where all our coin is too; and they're for splitting it up
+to-night, and ducking it out of New York for a while to get under
+cover.” He laughed out suddenly, raucously. “They will--eh? I'll show
+them--the yellow-streaked pups! They wouldn't listen to me--and it meant
+that you and I were thrown down for fair. If we're caught, it's the
+chair. I'll show them! When I saw it wasn't any use trying to get them
+to stick, I pretended to agree with them. See? I said they could go
+around and dig up the rest of the gang, and if the others felt the
+same way about it, they were all to come over to the garret, and I'd be
+waiting for them,--and we'd split up the swag, and everybody'd be on his
+own after that.” Again he laughed out raucously. “It'll take them half
+an hour to get together--but it won't take that long for us to grab all
+that's worth grabbing out of that trap-door, and making our getaway.
+See? I'll teach them to throw Pierre Danglar down! Come on, hurry!”
+
+“Sure!” she mumbled mechanically.
+
+Her mind was sifting, sorting, weighing what he had said. She was not
+surprised. She remembered Pinkie Bonn's outburst in the boat. She walked
+on beside Danglar. The man was muttering and cursing under his breath.
+Well, why shouldn't she appear to fall in with his plans? Under what
+choicer surroundings could she get him alone than in the garret? And
+half an hour would be ample time for her, too! Yes, yes, she began to
+see! With Danglar, when she had got what she wanted out of him herself,
+held up at the point of her automatic, she could back to the door and
+lock him in there--and notify the police--and the police would not only
+get Danglar and the ill-gotten hoard hidden in the ceiling behind that
+trap-door, but they would get all the rest of the gang as the latter
+in due course appeared on the scene. Yes, why not? She experienced an
+exhilaration creeping upon her; she even increased, unconsciously, the
+rapid pace which Danglar had set.
+
+“That's the stuff!” he grunted in savage approval. “We need every minute
+we've got.”
+
+They reached the house where once--so long ago now, it seemed!--Rhoda
+Gray had first found the original Gypsy Nan; and, Danglar leading,
+mounted the dark, narrow stairway to the hall above, and from there up
+the short, ladder-like steps to the garret. He groped in the aperture
+under the partition for the key, opened the door, and stepped inside.
+Rhoda Gray, following, removed the key, inserted it on the inside of
+the door, and, as she too entered, locked the door behind her. It was
+pitch-black here in the attic. Her face was set now, her lips firm. She
+had been waiting for this, hadn't she? It was near the end at last.
+She had Danglar--alone. But not in the darkness! He was too tricky! She
+crossed the garret to where the candle-stub, stuck in the neck of the
+gin bottle, stood on the rickety washstand.
+
+“Come over here and light the candle,” she said. “I can't find my
+matches.”
+
+Her hand was in the pocket of her skirt now, her fingers tight-closed on
+the stock of her automatic, as he shuffled his way across the attic to
+her side. A match spurted into flame; the candle wick flickered, then
+steadied, dispersing little by little, as it grew brighter, the nearer
+shadows--and there came a startled cry from Danglar--and Rhoda Gray, the
+weapon in her pocket forgotten, was staring as though stricken of her
+senses across the garret. The Adventurer was sitting on the edge of
+the cot, and a revolver in his hand held a steady bead upon Danglar and
+herself..
+
+
+
+
+XXI. THE RECKONING
+
+It was the Adventurer who spoke first.
+
+“Both of you! What charming luck!” he murmured whimsically. “You'll
+forgive the intrusion won't you? A friend of mine, the Sparrow by
+name--I think you are acquainted with him, Danglar--was good enough
+to open the door for me, and lock it again on the outside. You see, I
+didn't wish to cause you any alarm through a premature suspicion that
+you might have a guest!” His voice hardened suddenly as he rose from the
+cot, and, though he limped badly, stepped quickly toward them. “Don't
+move, Danglar--or you, Mrs. Danglar!” he ordered sharply--and with a
+lightning movement of his hand felt for, and whipped Danglar's revolver
+from the latter's pocket. “Pardon me!” he said--and his hand was in and
+out of Rhoda Gray's pocket. He tossed the two weapons coolly over onto
+the cot. “Well, Danglar,” he smiled grimly, “there's quite a change in
+the last few hours, isn't there?”
+
+Danglar made no answer. His face was ashen; his little black eyes, like
+those of a cornered rat, and as though searching for some avenue of
+escape, were darting hunted glances all around the garret.
+
+Rhoda Gray, the first shock of surprise gone, leaned back against the
+washstand with an air of composure that she did not altogether feel.
+What was the Adventurer going to do? True, she need have no fear of
+personal violence--she had only to disclose herself. But--but there were
+other considerations. She saw that reckoning of her own with Danglar at
+an end, though--yes!--perhaps the Adventurer would become her ally in
+that matter. But, then, there was something else. The Adventurer was
+a thief, and she could not let him get away with those packages of
+banknotes up there behind the trap-door in the ceiling, if she could
+help it. That was perhaps what he had come for, and--and--Her mind
+seemed to tumble into chaos. She did not know what to do. She stared at
+the Adventurer. He was still dressed as the Pug, though the eye-patch
+was gone, and there was no longer any sign of the artificial facial
+disfigurements.
+
+The Adventurer spoke again.
+
+“Won't you sit down--Mrs. Danglar?” He pushed the single chair the
+garret possessed toward her--and shrugged his shoulders as she
+remained motionless. “You'll pardon me, then, if I sit down myself.”
+ He appropriated the chair, and faced them, his revolver dangling
+with ominous carelessness in his hand. “I've had a rather upsetting
+experience this evening, and I am afraid I am still a little the worse
+for it--as perhaps you know, Danglar?”
+
+“You damned traitor!” Danglar burst out wildly. “I--I--”
+
+“Quite so!” said the Adventurer smoothly. “But we'll get to that in a
+minute. Do you mind if I inflict a little story on you? I promise you
+it won't take long. It's a little personal history which I think will
+be interesting to you both; but, in any case, as my hosts, I am sure you
+will be polite enough to listen. It concerns the murder of a man named
+Deemer; but in order that you may understand my interest in the matter,
+I must go back quite a little further. Perhaps I even ought to introduce
+myself. My name, my real name, you know, is David Holt. My father was
+in the American Consular service in India when I was about ten. He
+eventually left it and went into business there through the advice of a
+very warm friend of his, a certain very rich and very powerful rajah
+in the State of Chota Nagpur in the Province of Bengal, where we then
+lived. I became an equally intimate friend of the rajah's son, and--do I
+bore you, Danglar?”
+
+Danglar was like a crouched animal, his head drawn into his shoulders,
+his hands behind him with fingers twisting and gripping at the edge of
+the washstand.
+
+“What's your proposition?” he snarled. “Curse you, name your price, and
+have done with it! You're as big a crook as I am!”
+
+“You are impatient!” The Adventurer's shoulders went up again. “In due
+time the rajah decided that a trip through Europe and back home through
+America would round out his son's education, and broaden and fit him for
+his future duties in a way that nothing else would. It was also decided,
+I need hardly say to my intense delight, that I should accompany him.
+We come now to our journey through the United States--you see, Danglar,
+that I am omitting everything but the essential details. In a certain
+city in the Middle West--I think you will remember it well, Danglar--the
+young rajah met with an accident. He was out riding in the outskirts of
+the city. His horse took fright and dashed for the river-bank. He was an
+excellent horseman, but, pitched from his seat, his foot became tangled
+in the stirrup, and as he hung there head down, a blow from he horse's
+hoof rendered him unconscious, and he was being dragged along, when
+a man by the name of Deemer, at the risk of his own life, saved the
+rajah's son. The horse plunged over the bank and into the water with
+both of them. They were both nearly drowned. Deemer, let me say in
+passing, did one of the bravest things that any man ever did. Submerged,
+half drowned himself, he stayed with the maddened animal until he had
+succeeded in freeing the unconscious man. All this was some two years
+ago.”
+
+The Adventurer paused.
+
+Rhoda Gray, hanging on his words, was leaning tensely forward--it seemed
+as though some great, dawning wonderment was lifting her out of herself,
+making her even unconscious of her surroundings.
+
+“The rajah's son remained at the hotel there for several days to
+recuperate,” continued the Adventurer deliberately; “and during that
+time he saw a great deal of Deemer, and, naturally, so did I. And,
+incidentally, Danglar, though I thought nothing much of it then, I saw
+something of you; and something of Mrs. Danglar there, too, though--if
+she will permit me to say it--in a more becoming costume than she is now
+wearing!” Once more he shrugged his shoulders as Danglar snarled. “Yes,
+yes; I will hurry. I am almost through. While it was not made public
+throughout the country, inasmuch as the rajah's son was more or less an
+official guest of the government, the details of the accident were of
+course known locally, as also was the fact that the young rajah in token
+of his gratitude had presented Deemer with a collection of jewels of
+almost priceless worth. We resumed our journey; Deemer, who was a man in
+very moderate circumstances, and who had probably never had any means
+in his life before, went to New York, presumably to have his first real
+holiday, and, as it turned out, to dispose of the stones, or at least
+a portion of them. When we reached the coast we received two advices
+containing very ill news. The first was an urgent message to return
+instantly to India on account of the old rajah's serious illness; the
+second was to the effect that Deemer had been murdered by a woman in New
+York, and that the jewels had been stolen.”
+
+Again the Adventurer paused, and, eying Danglar, smiled--not pleasantly.
+
+“I will not attempt to explain to you,” he went on, “the young rajah's
+feelings when he heard that the gift he had given Deemer in return for
+his own life had cost Deemer his. Nor will I attempt to explain the
+racial characteristics of the people of whom the young rajah was
+one, and who do not lightly forget or forgive. But an eye for an eye,
+Danglar--you will understand that. If it cost all he had, there should
+be justice. He could not stay himself; and so I stayed-because he made
+me swear I would, and because he made me swear that I would never allow
+the chase to lag until the murderers were found.
+
+“And so I came East again. I remembered you, Danglar--that on several
+occasions when I had come upon Deemer unawares, you, sometimes
+accompanied by a woman, and sometimes not, had been lurking in the
+background. I went to Cloran, the house detective at the hotel here in
+New York where Deemer was murdered. He described the woman. She was the
+same woman that had been with you. I went to the authorities and showed
+my credentials, with which the young rajah had seen to it I was supplied
+from very high sources indeed. I did not wish to interfere with the
+authorities in their handling of the case; but, on the other hand, I had
+no wish to sit down idly and watch them, and it was necessary therefore
+that I should protect myself in anything I did. I also made myself
+known to one of New York's assistant district attorneys, who was an old
+friend of my father's. And then, Danglar, I started out after you.
+
+“I discovered you after about a month; then I wormed myself into your
+gang as the Pug. That took about a year. I was almost another year with
+you as an accepted member of the gang. You know what happened
+during that period. A little while ago I found out that the woman we
+wanted--with you, Danglar--was your wife, living in hiding in this
+garret as Gypsy Nan. But the jewels themselves were still missing.
+To-night they are not. A--a friend of mine, one very much misjudged
+publicly, I might say, has them, and has told me they would be handed to
+the police.
+
+“And so, Danglar, after coming here to-night, I sent the Sparrow out
+to gather together a few of the authorities who are interested in the
+case--my friend the assistant district attorney; Cloran, the house
+detective; Rough Rorke of headquarters, who on one occasion was very
+much interested in Gypsy Nan; and enough men to make the round of
+arrests. They should be conveniently hidden across the road now, and
+waiting for my signal. My idea, you see, was to allow Mrs. Danglar to
+enter here without having her suspicions aroused, and to see that
+she did not get away again if she arrived before those who are duly
+qualified--which I am not--to arrest her did; also, in view of what
+transpired earlier this evening, I must confess I was a little anxious
+about those several years' accumulation of stolen funds up there in the
+ceiling. As I said at the beginning, I hardly expected the luck to get
+you both at the same time; though we should have got you, Danglar, and
+every one of the rest of the gang before morning, and--”
+
+“You,” Rhoda Gray whispered, “you--are not a thief!” Brain and soul
+seemed on fire. It seemed as though she had striven to voice those
+words a dozen times since he had been speaking, but that she had been
+afraid--afraid that this was not true, this great, wonderful thing, that
+it could not be true. “You--you are not a--a thief!”
+
+The Adventurer's face lost its immobility. He half rose from his chair,
+staring at her in a startled way--but it was Danglar now who spoke.
+
+“It's a lie!” he screamed out. “It's a lie!” The man's reason appeared
+to be almost unhinged; a mad terror seemed to possess him. “It's all a
+lie! I never heard of this rajah bunk before in my life! I never heard
+of Deemer, or any jewels before. You lie! I tell you, you lie! You can't
+prove it; you can't--”
+
+“But I can,” said Rhoda Gray in a low voice. The shawl fell from her
+shoulders; from her blouse she took the package of jewels and held them
+out to the Adventurer. “Here are the stones. I got them from where you
+had put them in old Luertz's room. I was hidden there all the time last
+night.” She was removing her spectacles and her wig of tangled gray hair
+as she spoke, and now she turned her face full upon Danglar. “I heard
+you discuss Deemer's murder with your brother last night, and plan to
+get rid of Cloran, who you thought was the only existing witness you
+need fear, and--”
+
+“Great God!” The Adventurer cried out. “You--Rhoda! The White Moll! I--I
+don't understand, though I can see you are not the woman who originally
+masqueraded as Gypsy Nan, for I knew her, as I said, by sight.”
+
+He was on his feet now, his face aflame with a great light. He took a
+step toward her.
+
+“Wait!” she said hurriedly. She glanced at Danglar. The man's face was
+blanched, his body seemed to have shriveled up, and there was a light
+in his eyes as they held upon her that was near to the borderland of
+insanity. “That night at Skarbolov's!” she said, and tried to hold her
+voice in control. “Gypsy Nan, this man's wife, died that night in the
+hospital. I had found her here sick, and I had promised not to divulge
+her secret. I helped her get to the hospital. She was dying; she was
+penitent in a way; she wanted to prevent a crime that she said was to be
+perpetrated that night, but she would not inform on her accomplices. She
+begged me to forestall them, and return the money anonymously the next
+day. That was the choice I had--either to allow the crime to be carried
+out, or else swear to act alone in return for the information that would
+enable me to keep the money away from the thieves without bringing the
+police into it. I--I was caught. You--you saved me from Rough Rorke, but
+he followed me. I put on Gypsy Nan's clothes, and managed to outwit
+him. I had had no opportunity to return the money, which would have been
+proof of my innocence; the only way I could prove it, then, was to try
+and find the authors of the crime myself. I--I have lived since then as
+Gypsy Nan, fighting this hideous gang of Danglar's here to try and save
+myself, and--and to-night I thought I could see my way clear. I--I knew
+enough at last about this man to make him give me a written statement
+that it was a pre-arranged plan to rob Skarbolov. That would
+substantiate my story. And”--she looked again at Danglar; the man
+was still crouched there, eying her with that same mad light in his
+eyes--“and he must be made to--to do it now for--”
+
+“But why didn't you ask me?” cried the Adventurer. “You knew me as the
+Pug, and therefore must have believed that I, too, know all about it.”
+
+“Yes,” she said, and turned her head away to hide the color she felt was
+mounting to her cheeks. “I--I thought of that. But I thought you were a
+thief, and--and your testimony wouldn't have been much good unless, with
+it, I could have handed you, too, over to the police, as I intended to
+do with Danglar; and--and--I--I couldn't do that, and--Oh, don't you
+see?” she ended desperately.
+
+“Rhoda! Rhoda!” There was a glad, buoyant note in the Adventurer's
+voice. “Yes, I see! Well, I can prove it for you now without any of
+those fears on my behalf to worry you! I went to Skarbolov's myself,
+knowing their plans, to do exactly what you did. I did not know you
+then, and, as Rough Rorke, who was there because, as I heard later,
+his suspicions had been aroused through seeing some of the gang lurking
+around the back door in the lane the night before, had taken the actual
+money from you, I contrived to let you get away, because I was afraid
+that you were some new factor in the game, some member of the gang that
+I did not know about, and that I must watch, too! Don't you understand?
+The jewels were still missing. I had not got the general warning that
+was sent out to the gang that night to lay low, for at the last moment
+it seems that Danglar here found out that Rough Rorke had suspicions
+about Skarbolov's place.” He came close to her--and with the muzzle of
+his revolver he pushed Danglar's huddled figure back a little further
+against the washstand. “Rhoda--you are clear. The assistant district
+attorney who had your case is the one I spoke of a few minutes ago. That
+night at Hayden-Bond's, though I did not understand fully, I knew
+that you were the bravest, truest little woman into whom God had ever
+breathed the breath of life. I told him the next day there was some
+mistake, something strange behind it all. I told him what happened at
+Hayden-Bond's. He agreed with me. You have never been indicted. Your
+case has never come before the grand jury. And it never will now! Rhoda!
+Rhoda! Thank God for you! Thank God it has all come out right, and--”
+
+A peal of laughter, mad, insane, horrible in its perverted mirth, rang
+through the garret. Danglar's hands were creeping queerly up to his
+temples. And then, oblivious evidently in his frenzy of the revolver in
+the Adventurer's hand, and his eye catching the weapons that lay upon
+the cot, he made a sudden dash in that direction--and Rhoda Gray,
+divining his intention, sprang for the cot, too, at the same time. But
+Danglar never reached his objective. As Rhoda Gray caught up the weapons
+and thrust them into her pocket, she heard Danglar's furious snarl,
+and whirling around, she saw the two men locked and struggling in each
+other's embrace.
+
+The Adventurer's voice reached her, quick, imperative:
+
+“Show the candle at the window, Rhoda! The Sparrow is waiting for it in
+the yard below. Then open the door for them.”
+
+A sudden terror and fear seized her. The Adventurer was not fit, after
+what he had been through to-night to cope with Danglar. He had been
+limping badly even a few minutes ago. It seemed to her, as she rushed
+across the garret and snatched up the candle, that Danglar was getting
+the best of it even now. And the Adventurer could have shot him down,
+and been warranted in doing it! She reached the window, waved the candle
+frantically several times across the pane, then setting the candle down
+on the window ledge, she ran for the door.
+
+She looked back again, as she turned the key in the lock. With a crash,
+pitching over the chair, both men went to the floor--and the Adventurer
+was underneath. She cried out in alarm, and wrenched the door open--and
+stood for an instant there on the threshold in a startled way.
+
+They couldn't be coming already! The Sparrow hadn't had time even to
+get out of the yard. But there were footsteps in the hall below, many of
+them. She stepped out on the landing; it was too dark to see, but...
+
+A sudden yell as she showed even in the faint light of the open garret
+door, the quicker rush of feet, reached her from below.
+
+“The White Moll! That's her! The White Moll!” She flung herself flat
+down, wrenching both the automatic and the revolver from her pocket. She
+understood now! That was Pinkie Bonn's voice. It was the gang arriving
+to divide up the spoils, not the Sparrow and the police. Her mind was
+racing now with lightning speed. If they got her, they would get the
+Adventurer in there, too, before the police could intervene. She
+must hold this little landing where she lay now, hold those short,
+ladder-like steps that the oncoming footsteps from below there had
+almost reached.
+
+She fired once--twice--again; but high, over their heads, to check the
+rush.
+
+Yells answered her. A vicious tongue-flame from a revolver, another
+and another, leaped out at her from the black below; the spat, spat of
+bullets sounded from behind her as they struck the walls.
+
+Again she fired. They were at least more cautious now in their rush--no
+one seemed anxious to be first upon the stairs. She cast a wild glance
+through the open door into the garret at her side. The two forms in
+there, on their feet again, were spinning around and around with
+the strange, lurching gyrations of automatons--and then she saw the
+Adventurer whip a terrific blow to Danglar's face--and Danglar fall and
+lie still--and the Adventurer come leaping toward her.
+
+But faces were showing now above the level of the floor, and there was
+suddenly an increased uproar from further back in the rear until it
+seemed that pandemonium itself were loosed.
+
+“It's the police! The police behind us!” she heard Shluker's voice
+shriek out.
+
+She jumped to her feet. Two of the gang had reached the landing and were
+smashing at the Adventurer. There seemed to be a swirling mob in riot
+there below. The Adventurer was fighting like a madman. It was hand to
+hand now.
+
+“Quick! Quick!” she cried to the Adventurer. “Jump back through the
+door.”
+
+“Oh, no, you don't!” It was Skeeny--she could see the man's brutal face
+now. “Oh, no, you don't, you she-devil!” he shouted, and, over-reaching
+the Adventurer's guard, struck at her furiously with his clubbed
+revolver.
+
+It struck her a glancing blow on the head, and she reeled and staggered,
+but recovered herself. And now it seemed as though it were another
+battle that she fought--and one more desperate; a battle to fight back
+a horrible giddiness from overpowering her, and with which her brain was
+swimming, to fight it back for just a second, the fraction of a second
+that was needed until--until--“Jump!” she cried again, and staggered
+over the threshold, and, as the Adventurer leaped backward beside her,
+she slammed the door, and locked it--and slid limply to the floor.
+
+When she regained consciousness she was lying on the cot. It seemed very
+still, very quiet in the garret. She opened her eyes. It--it must be
+all right, for that was the Sparrow standing there watching her, and
+shifting nervously from foot to foot, wasn't it? He couldn't be there,
+otherwise. She held out her hand.
+
+“Marty,” she said, and smiled with trembling lips, “we--we owe you a
+great deal.”
+
+The Sparrow gulped.
+
+“Gee, you're all right again! They said it wasn't nothin', but you had
+me scared worse'n down at the iron plant when I had to do the rough act
+with that gent friend of yours to stop him from crawlin' after you and
+fightin' it out, and queerin' the whole works. You don't owe me nothin',
+Miss Gray; and, besides, I'm gettin' a lot more than is comm' to me,
+'cause that same gent friend of yours there says I'm goin' to horn in
+on the rewards, and I guess that's goin' some, for they got the whole
+outfit from Danglar down, and the stuff up in the ceiling there, too.”
+
+She turned her head. The Adventurer was coming toward the cot.
+
+“Better?” he called cheerily.
+
+“Yes,” she said. “Quite! Only I--I'd like to get away from here, from
+this--this horrible place at once, and back to--to my flat if they'll
+let me. Are--are they all gone?”
+
+The Adventurer's gray eyes lighted with a whimsical smile.
+
+“Nearly all!” he said softly. “And--er--Sparrow, suppose you go and find
+a taxi!”
+
+“Me? Sure! Of course! Sure!” said the Sparrow hurriedly, and retreated
+through the door.
+
+She felt the blood flood her face, and she tried to avert it.
+
+He bent his head close to hers.
+
+“Rhoda,” his voice was low, passionate, “I--”
+
+“Wait!” she said. “Your friend--the assistant district attorney--did he
+come?”
+
+“Yes,” said the Adventurer. “But I shooed them all out, as soon as
+we found you were not seriously hurt. I thought you had had enough
+excitement for one night. He wants to see you in the morning.”
+
+“To see me”--she rose up anxiously on her elbow--“in the morning?”
+
+He was smiling at her. His hands reached out and took her face between
+them, and made her look at him.
+
+“Rhoda,” he said gently, “I knew to-night in the iron plant that you
+cared. I told him so. What he wants to see you for is to tell you that
+he thinks I am the luckiest man in all the world. You are clear, dear.
+Even Rough Rorke is singing your praises; he says you are the only woman
+who ever put one over on him.”
+
+She did not answer for a moment; and then with a little sob of glad
+surrender she buried her face on his shoulder.
+
+“It--it is very wonderful,” she said brokenly, “for--for even we, you
+and I, each thought the other a--a thief.”
+
+“And so we were, thank God!” he whispered--and lifted her head until now
+his lips met hers. “We were both thieves, Rhoda, weren't we? And, please
+God, we will be all our lives--for we have stolen each other's heart.”
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The White Moll, by Frank L. Packard
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