Lord John in New York

"But," I threw out the bold suggestion, "what if there's a plot to get you into the Sisterhood—into this old house!"

"Oh, but that's impossible!" she cried. "You wouldn't dream of such a thing if you could meet the Head Sister and see what a splendid woman she is!"

There was my opportunity to tell about the mask, and I took it. But it availed me nothing. The mask, Miss Odell said, was no secret. She understood that the Head Sister, in saving a child from fire, had so injured her face that for the sake of others she kept it hidden. Another version had it that the motive for wearing the mask was some "sacred vow." In any case, Maida assured me, it was an honour to the good and charitable woman; and no arguments would break her resolution to give the next year to work with the Sisterhood. After that year—if I could solve the mystery of the stolen formula, and put an end for ever to scandal—she would come back and face the world again. But how could I, a stranger, do what Roger had failed to do?

That was the question. Yet I made up my mind that it must be answered in one way, or my life would be a failure. Not only would I solve that mystery, I told myself—though I dared not boast to the girl—but I would link together the old one with the new. The way to do this, I told myself, was to learn whether an enemy of Maida Odell's father had found her under her borrowed name, and had made the Granvilles and Adriances his conscious or unconscious tools.

This talk we had while the train stood still. We were sitting on a log together, out of earshot from the other passengers, when—with the name of the Grey Sisterhood on our lips—we looked up to see its veiled directress. She had, she said, been put to much trouble in securing an automobile to come for Madeleine, and see that she was not persuaded to break a promise. Maida, embarrassed and protesting, assured her friend that there was no thought of such disloyalty. Lord John—timidly the girl introduced us—had come only to try and help her throw off an old sorrow, as I had helped Roger and Grace. So she tried to "explain" me; and the Head Sister, having triumphed, could afford to heap coals of fire on my head by being coldly civil. Her one open revenge she took by requesting me not to follow them to their automobile. The chauffeur would fetch Miss Odell's hand luggage out of the train, and my "kindness would no longer be needed." I was dismissed by the conqueror; and left by the wayside with but one consolation: Maida had said "au revoir," not good-bye.

For a moment I stood crushed. Then a thought jumped into my mind: "What if this woman is the one I saw in the auto outside the theatre?"

I felt that I had been a fool to obey Maida, and took steps to retrieve my mistake. But the veiled lady had been too clever for me. The car was gone past recall. If it hadn't been for that viper-thought—and the thought of what had happened in my rooms last night—I might not have had the "cheek" to make my next move in the game. But things being as they were I couldn't stand still and take a rebuff.

Instead of motoring back to New York, I went to Salthaven, and breakfasted at a small inn there. Of the Sisterhood I could learn nothing, for it had but lately taken up its quarters near by. Of those quarters, however, I was able to pick up some queer stories. The place had been bought, it seemed, for a song, because of its ghostly reputation, which had frightened tenant after tenant away.

"What a good pitch to choose if any 'accident' were planned, and lay it to the ghosts!" I thought. And I knew that I couldn't go without learning more about the Sisterhood House than the landlord at Salthaven could tell me. I must see for myself if it were the sort of place where "anything could happen."

I meant to wait until late, when all the Grey Sisters and their protégées were safely asleep. Then, with a present of meat for a possible watch dog, I would try a prowl of inspection. I made a vague excuse of fancying the inn, and of wanting to rest till time to meet a friend who would motor back with me to New York. I engaged a room in order to take the alleged rest; but spent long hours in striving to piece together bits of the most intricate puzzle my wits had ever worked upon.

"In an hour more now I can start," I said at ten, and composed myself to forget the slow ticking of my watch. But suddenly it was as if Maida called. Actually I seemed to hear her voice. I sprang up, and in five minutes had paid the bill and was off in my car for Pine Cliff.

I left West sitting in the auto at a little distance from the high wall, which shut the old garden in from the rocks above the Sound. Then I struck my crutch into a patch of rain-sodden earth, and used it to help me vault over the wall. Just as I bestrode the top, a dog gave out a bell-toned note. I saw his dark shape, and threw the meat I had brought from the inn. He was greedily silent, and I descended, to pat his head as he ate. Luckily he was an English bull, and perhaps recognised me as a fellow-countryman. At all events, he gave his sanction to my presence.

The neglected garden, which I could dimly see, was mysterious in the night hush. There was no sound except the whisper of water on the shore outside. The substantial building with its rows of closed blinds looked common place and comfortable enough. Lights showed faintly in two or three windows. Not all the household had gone to bed. As I stood staring at a low balcony not far above the ground, which somehow attracted and called my eyes, the blinds of a long French window looking out upon it were opened. I saw Maida herself, and a tall woman in grey, wearing a short veil. They stood together, talking. Then with an affectionate touch on the girl's shoulder, the Head Sister—I knew it must be she—bade her newest recruit good night.

The window was left open, but dark curtains were drawn across, no doubt by Maida. Presently the long strip of golden light between these draperies vanished. No scene could be more peaceful than the quiet garden and the sleeping house. Still, something held me bound. How long I stood there, I don't know: an hour, maybe; perhaps less, perhaps more. But suddenly a white figure flashed out upon the balcony. So dim was it in the darkness, I might have taken it for one of the famous ghosts, but Maida's voice cried out: "The face—the face! God send me help!"

"He has sent help. I've come, to take you away," I called, and held up my arms.

Five minutes later she was with me in my car, rushing towards New York and her brother's house.

*****

"A gilded amateur detective," Roger Odell once called me in a joke. But I knew he would listen to theories I'd formed concerning this mystery which, like an evil spirit, had haunted his sister since childhood. All night I spent in elaborating these theories and dove-tailing them together. The girl had had a fright in the theatre. I had seen a man with strange eyes and a scar, looking at her; and through certain happenings at my hotel, I believed that a link between him and Maida's "Head Sister" might be found. That, of course, would free the girl from the promise she thought sacred.

By eight-thirty in the morning I was in touch with Pemberton's Private Detective Agency, and I had just been assured that a good man, Paul Teano, would be with me in ten minutes, when my telephone bell rang shrilly. It was the voice of Grace Odell which answered my "Hello!"

"Oh, Lord John," she called distressfully, "isn't it dreadful? Maida's going back to the Sisterhood House! The Head Sister has written her a letter. Maida's answering it. She doesn't blame the woman for anything. She thinks she herself was a coward to take fright at a bad dream. Do come and argue with her. The child wants to start this morning. That woman seems to have her hypnotised."

My answer goes without saying. I determined to put off the detective, but he arrived as I finished talking to Grace, and as his looks appealed to me I spared him a quarter of an hour. His eyes were as Italian as his name—with the shadow of tragedy in them. "Temperamental looking fellow," I said to myself.

My business with Teano had nothing to do directly with Maida. What I had to tell him was the invasion of my rooms two nights before, but out it came that I had been helping a woman, and that success in this case might mean her safety.

"I, too, work for a woman, my lord," the detective said. Though he had spent years in America, I noticed how little slang of the country he'd chosen to pick up. He spoke, perhaps in the wish to impress me, with singular correctness. "Now you have told me this, I shall be the more anxious to serve you. I turned detective to find her. I've been five years trying. But every morning I think, 'Perhaps it will be to-day.'"

There was no time then to draw him out as he would have liked to be drawn out. I showed him what there was to work upon, in my rooms as well as the two others, and then dashed off to Maida.

As my car stopped in front of Roger Odell's home, out of the house bounced a small boy—a very small boy indeed, with the eyes of an imp, and the clothes of a Sunday-school scholar. He looked at me as he flashed past, and it was as if he said, "So it's you, is it?"

I had never seen the boy before, but I thought of the collapsible box; and leaving a flabbergasted footman at the door, my crutch and I went after the small legs that twinkled around the corner. The elf was too quick, however. By the time I had got where he ought to have been, he had made himself invisible. Whether a taxi had swallowed him, or a door had opened to receive him, it was useless to wonder. All I could do was to question the footman. The child had brought a letter to Miss Odell, and had taken one away. "Meanwhile," the servant added, seeing my interest, "he has entertained below stairs, making faces and turning handsprings. Quite a acrobat, your lordship," remarked the man, who hailed from my country; "and that sharp, though dumb as a fish! We gave 'im cake and jam, but money seemed to please 'im most, an' his pockets was full of it already. 'E's got enough to go on a most glorious bust, beggin' your lordship's pardon."

I gave it—and something else as well. Then I asked him for the plate from which the child had eaten. It was to be wrapped in paper, and put into my car—for Teano. (It has never mattered that a footman should think his master, or his master's friends, insane!)

If the child messenger from the Sisterhood, and the child-thief in the collapsible box were one, the dumbness was an obstacle. Nevertheless Teano might catch him, I thought, little dreaming how my desire and his, working into one, were to be brought about.

I was shown into Roger's den, and confessed the theft of the document he had given me—luckily useless, without the plan. I told him also the history of the night. "Two and two generally make four," I said, "and though this affair is irritating, it may help eventually. The man who frightened Miss Odell had the look of an Egyptian. Now, isn't it more likely that a mummy should be wanted by an Egyptian than another? Miss Odell's treasure is a mummy, in a painted mummy-case. You know that several attempts have been made to break into the 'shrine,' as Miss Odell calls it. With what other object than to get the mummy? You've had its case protected with an ingenious system of electric wiring. Now, you are going away with your wife. You give me the secret of the mechanism. The same night somebody tries to steal it; also he rubs off my shirt-cuff the number of the Egyptian-looking fellow's car. Then, there's the directress of the Sisterhood. She fascinates Miss Odell. She revives the glory of a dying order. She takes an old ghost-ridden house by the seashore—where anything might happen. And something does happen. A dream—so vivid, that I venture to believe it wasn't a dream but a trick. The woman tries to induce a girl to bring all her possessions with her into seclusion. 'All her possessions,' mind! That would have included the mummy-case, if you hadn't put your foot down. Have I your leave to repeat these ramblings to her?"

"She has heard them, Lord John!" I turned, and sprang to my feet. Maida was at the door, with Grace.

"You were talking so fast, we didn't interrupt. And I wanted to hear. I thought you'd wish me to. You have a wonderful theory, but it's all a mistake so far as the Sisterhood is concerned. The Head Sister is the best woman I ever knew. I'm breaking my heart with shame because I deserted my post. Oh, don't think I blame you for bringing me away, Lord John. I blame only myself. You were splendid. And I'm grateful for everything. To convince you of that, I promise if you can prove anything against the Sisterhood, I'll consider myself free from my bond—even before the twelve months are up. That's a safe promise. You can't think what a beautiful letter the Head Sister has sent me this morning. I'm eager to go back and earn her forgiveness by helping in the work she'll give me to do. In justice to her I must tell you a secret. That mask you saw—which prejudiced you—is to hide burns she got in saving a slum-child from death in a great fife. The Sister wears it to spare others pain. As for the dream—I have it everywhere, and often. Don't be anxious. I'll write, and—you can write if you will. Dear Roger, is the car ready?"

"No," said Roger bluntly. "I hoped John would make you see reason."

"I do see it," the girl answered. "I didn't last night."

"How I wish you weren't over twenty-one!" her adopted brother growled.

Maida laughed, almost gaily. "As it is, I'm an old maid, and must be allowed to go my own way."

"May I motor you and Roger to Pine Cliff, if you must go?" I begged.

She gave me a long look before answering. Then she said, "Yes."

I shall never forget that run from New York to Long Island. I made the most of every moment; but my heart turned to ice whenever a voice seemed to mutter in my ear, "You're going to lose her. You've failed, John Hasle, in the big crisis of her life and yours."

But I wouldn't believe the voice. So far as my own story was concerned, I thought this chapter of it had come to a close with the closing of the gate at the Sisterhood House between me and Maida Odell. Yet after all it hadn't, quite. There was more to come.

A little veiled woman had opened the gate at the sound of the motor-horn, evidently expecting Miss Odell. And the same little woman shut us out when the new sister had gone in. I noticed her particularly, because she shrank from our eyes, though her face was covered with the conventional mist of gauze. And it seemed that she was glad to get rid of us. Not rudely, but with eagerness, she pushed the gate to; and as she did so I noticed her hand. The left hand it was—small, daintily shaped, with delicate, tapering fingers; but the third finger was missing.

Teano was not in my rooms when I arrived once more at my hotel; but opening the door of 212 I found him at the telephone. So absorbed was he that he did not hear me enter, and I stood still in order not to disturb him. I supposed that he had called up the Agency, and was talking of my business.

"If I could get out of the job, I would," he almost groaned. "But they'd put another man on, and that would be worse for Jenny. Everyone heard of 'Three-Fingered Jenny' at the time of the gang's getaway. The only thing I can do is to keep her out of the business at any cost, and go along on other lines. I'll call you up again, Nella, if I get anything on my own, about Jenny."

"Who, pray, are Nella and Jenny, Mr. Teano?" I asked, realising that he meant to play me false.

He jumped as if I had shot him, and dropped the receiver. "I—thought I'd locked the door," he stammered.

"It's a good thing you didn't," I said. "I've heard enough to guess you came on some clue you didn't expect. That's why you forgot to lock the door, before you called up 'Nella.'"

"Nella's my sister," Teano blurted out. "She's employed in the Priscilla Alden, the hotel where only ladies stay. She's the telephone girl on the thirteenth floor."

"Thanks for the explanation," I replied with more coolness than I felt. "As for 'Jenny'—well, before I ask more questions I'll tell you what I think. 'Jenny' is the woman for whose sake you took up your profession. You'd lost, and wanted to find her. Now, you have found her—or rather, her fingerprints—unmistakable, because they happen to be those of her left hand. Rather than get her into trouble, you'd sacrifice my interests."

Teano remained dumb as the impish child, when I finished and waited for him to speak; so I went on. "I don't want to hurt a woman; yet you see I know so much I can carry on this case without you. Suppose we work together? I'll begin by laying my cards on the table. I can save you the trouble of a search if I choose. I know where 'Jenny' is, and can take you to her."

"You—you're bluffing!" Teano stammered.

"I swear I'm not. Luckily you're a private detective. The police needn't get an inkling of this case, unless you fail me, and I turn to them. All I want is to find out who instigated the affair of night before last. Who carried it out isn't so important to me, though it may be to you. And by the by, has 'Jenny' any personal interest in a little boy of four or five who is dumb?"

"My God!" broke out the detective.

"Don't you think I can be as useful to you as you can to me?" I insinuated. "Why not be frank about 'Jenny'? I promise to hold every word in confidence. Hang up that receiver. You'd better sit down or you'll fall! Now, let's have this out."

The man was at my mercy; yet I knew he was no traitor. "Probably," I reflected, "I'd have done the same in his place."

We sat facing each other, across the bare little table; and Teano began the story of Jenny. There was drama in it, and tragedy, though as yet the story had no end. The sad music was broken; but I began to see, as he went on, that he and I might find a way of ending it, on a different key.

Paul Teano and his sister had come to relatives in New York when he was nineteen and she twelve. That was ten years ago. Paul was now a naturalised American citizen, but at the time of the Italian war in Tripoli he hadn't taken out his papers. There had been other things to think of—such as falling in love. In those days Paul was a budding newspaper reporter. He had gone to "get" a fire, and incidentally had saved a girl's life. Her name was Jenny Trent. It was a case of love at first sight with both. The mother took lodgers, and Teano became one. In a fortnight, Jenny and he were engaged in spite of a rival with money and "position"—that of a bank clerk.

Mrs. Trent wanted Jenny to marry Richard Mayne, and Jenny had vaguely entertained the idea before she met Teano. There was something mysterious and different from the men she had known, about Mayne, which piqued her interest. But the mystery ceased to attract her after the Italian's appearance. Teano, afraid of Mrs. Trent's weakness for Mayne—or his presents, would have married Jenny at once, and trusted to luck for a living; but the girl's mother fell ill, and while Jenny was nursing her, Italy's war broke out. Paul was called to the colours, and sailed for "home" with thousands of other reservists. It was hard luck, and harder still to be wounded and taken prisoner in his first battle. Teano's adventures with his Arab captors would make a separate story, as exciting as Slatin's though not so long, for he suffered only a year and six months' imprisonment. At the end of that time he escaped, made his way to Sicily, and thence back to America as stoker in an Italian ship. His first thought was to see Jenny; but at Mrs. Trent's he found himself taken for a ghost. The report had come that he was dead; and Mrs. Trent had "thought it best" for Jenny to accept Dick Mayne. "For Heaven's sake, keep away," pleaded her mother. "She's not happy with Dick. There was trouble at the bank, and he lost his job. Jenny's wretched. But she's got a baby boy to live for—a poor little thing, born dumb. The sight of you will make things harder."

Perhaps Teano might have had strength to remain in the background if an old fellow-lodger had not whispered what "people were saying about Dick Mayne." It was asserted that for years he had led a "double life." Nothing had been actually proved against him, except, that he was a dope fiend. But gossip had it that he was a dope-seller as well, a receiver of stolen goods, and a friend of thieves and gunmen. There was likely to be an awful "bust-up" and then—Heaven help Jenny!

Naturally Teano went to the address given him—that of a tenement house a long way east of Fifth Avenue. There, Fate stage-managed him into the midst of a scene destined to change the course of two lives and put an end to one. His knock was unanswered; but something was happening in the kitchen of the wretched flat. The door was not locked; it had been forgotten. Teano burst in, to find Jenny fighting for her life with a madman. Mayne had snatched a bread-knife from the table, and Jenny's hand dripped blood. Without a word Teano sprang to her defence; but Mayne slipped out of his grasp. Darting to an adjoining room, he rushed back with a Colt revolver. To save Teano, Jenny flung herself between the two men; but Paul caught and put her behind him, leaping on Mayne with a spring of a tiger. Then came a life and death tussle. The revolver went off as both fought to get it, and Mayne fell, shot through the heart.

"You'd have thought things couldn't have been worse with us than they were," the detective groaned. "But you'd have thought wrong. We were up against it, Jenny and me. If I stayed and gave evidence, she was afraid of a scandal. If I made a getaway, she argued, she would be all right, on a plea of self-defence; because it was known by the neighbours what her husband was. I thought the same myself; and she persuaded me for her sake to disappear. That was the mistake of my life. What happened after I went, I don't know. I can only guess. But something caused Jenny to change her mind. I got off without being seen, and lay low to watch the papers. But if you believe me, for three days there was nothing! Then came out a paragraph about Mayne's body being discovered by some friend, who pounded in vain on the door, and at last broke it in, to find the man dead. Doctors testified that he'd been a corpse for forty-eight hours. The revolver lay beside him. The verdict was suicide. He was known for his habits, you see; and just by pulling the catch down, Jenny could get out, leaving the door locked on the inside. Folks thought she'd deserted him—and that and other troubles, brought on by himself, had preyed upon his mind. She and I hadn't been cool enough to plan a stunt like that, in the minutes before she forced me out of the place. But somebody'd helped her; and things that happened later put me on to guessing who.

"Never a word or a line has Jenny sent me from that day to this. Do you know why? Because a pack of thieves got hold of her and the child. One of Mayne's secret pals must have come along and offered to save her and the boy. I don't believe she knew what she was letting herself in for, till she was in. But—well, a girl called 'Three-Fingered Jenny' travelled with a gang of international thieves last year in France, and I bounced over there like a bomb when I heard. You see, when I found her struggling with Mayne, he'd been trying to cut off her finger, because she would stick to an old ring of mine; refused to give it up. She'd just time to tell me that and show me what he'd done. I saw the poor finger would have to come off. My poor little Jenny! She'd loved her pretty hands! The European war broke out just as I was getting on her track—or thought I was—and I lost her again. I'd stake my life she never stole a red cent's worth. But they may have forced her to act as a decoy—using the child to bring her up to time. I've always felt the gang's game would be to train the boy for a dip. It was a frame-up on Jenny from the first. Why, the little chap would do star turns, and never spill. He's dumb. Made for the job. I've seen babies in the business, sharp as traps! Now you see, my lord, what a knockout I had, finding those finger-marks on the window-sill:—three, of a small left hand, the third finger missing; and traces that a child had been let out of the window by a rope. The footprints are below in the court. 'Jenny and her boy,' I said to myself. I've prayed God I might find them; but it's the devil has sent them to me at last."

"I'm not so sure of that," I said, and told Teano where and how I had seen a slender little woman with big, scared eyes and a left hand with its third finger missing.

When I had explained my rapidly developed theory, we discussed the means of proving it. We might as well batter at the gates of Paradise as those of the Grey Sisterhood. We would be turned away, as with a flaming sword. Trust the Head Sister for that! But we were not at the end of our resources.

That evening towards dusk, two ruddy-faced coastguards left a somewhat dilapidated car in charge of a local youth. They walked for a short distance, where a group of pines on a promontory had suggested the name "Pine Cliff." They rang a gate bell, although aware that tradesmen were the only males of the human species allowed to cross the threshold. When their summons remained unanswered, they tugged again with violence, until a grille opened like a shutter. "Who is there?" questioned a timid voice.

The elder of the coastguards, seeing his companion start at the sound of her voice, answered, to give his comrade breathing space. They had come, he announced, by order, to search the garden for a suspected hiding hole of smuggled opium. Not that the Sisterhood was implicated! This was an old place, and had been used by dope smugglers. The coast police had received the "tip" that this had happened again.

The veiled eyes behind the grille vanished; and a moment later another voice took up the argument. As Teano had recognised Jenny's voice, I knew the Head Sister's. The idea was absurd, said the latter. We could not be admitted. I stepped aside, not trusting my disguise, and Teano held out a folded document to which we had given an official semblance.

"I don't want to make trouble for you, ladies, but——" he hinted. The paper and a glimpse of a red seal said the rest. Bolts slid back indignantly, and the gate was flung open. I beheld the Head Sister, tall and formidable. Behind her I glimpsed a group of other forms less imposing, among them Maida, flowers in her hands, and surrounded with children. As for Teano, no doubt he saw only the shy figure retiring from the gate.

"This is preposterous!" exclaimed the Head Sister. "But search the garden if you must. You will find nothing." She moved away to join her satellites, motioning to the door-keeper that the gate might be closed. Before the gesture could be obeyed, however, Teano put himself between the tall woman and the little one.

"Beg pardon, madam. I admit we've got in on false pretences," he said sharply; "but we're detectives sent to arrest Three-Fingered Jenny, and here's our warrant."

He flourished the faked document. Before the mistress of infinite resource had time to collect her forces—we had swept Jenny outside the gate, and slammed it. We raced with her to Teano's waiting car, and—cruel to be kind—stopped to explain nothing till Pine Cliff was more than a mile away.

I took the wheel and gave Paul a place by Jenny. I heard him plead, "Don't you know me, Jen?" But not once did I turn my head until Teano spoke my name.

"She's my Jenny," he said, "and she cares, but she doesn't want to be rescued! It's a question of her boy. She won't give him up."

"Quite right," I agreed. "Why should she give him up? Has she left him in the Sisterhood House?"

"No, he's lost," Jenny answered. "I don't know where he is—since this morning. But the House has been our home for weeks. The Head Sister took us in, and promised to save Nicky from bad people and bad ways. He'll go back there, and——"

"But where is he now?" I cut in, having slowed down the car. "Can't we head him off? The child has money, I know. Where would he go and spend his earnings?"

"I—can't tell," she stammered. "He's always wanted me to take him to Coney Island—to some amusement park. But——"

"To Coney Island we'll go," I exclaimed.

*****

What followed was a wild adventure. I had never been to Coney Island. But I seemed to have been born knowing that it was a place dedicated to the people's pleasure. No doubt it was a toss-up which amusement ground to choose. By hazard, we began with Constellation Park; and almost at once came upon traces of Nicky. "A little dumb boy with black eyes, all alone, with plenty of money, and a grin when asked if he were lost?" Oh, yes, he was doing every stunt. We tracked him through peanuts and ice cream, lions' dens and upside-down houses, to the Maze of Mystery.

The name was no misnomer. Hampton Court, and the Labyrinth of Crete itself could have "nothing on it." In a bewildered procession Teano, Jenny and I wandered through streets of mirrors, complicated groves, walled concentric alley ways, with unexpected and disappointing outlets until at last a pair of elf-eyes stared at me from a distant and unreachable surface of glass. I cried out; so did Jenny and Teano, for all of us had had the same glimpse and quickly lost it.

"Nicky," gasped Jenny, just behind my back. "And, oh, Red Joe's got hold of him! It's all up—if we can't get between them. It's Red Joe I stole him back from when we went into the Sisterhood."

I looked back to console her—and she was gone. Teano, too, had suddenly separated from us, whether accidentally or for a purpose, I could not tell. But the maze would have put any rabbit warren to shame. When you thought you were in one place, you found to your astonishment that you were in another, with no visible way of getting out.

Then again, eyes looked at me from a mirror which might be far off or within ten yards. There were mirrors within mirrors, dazzling and endless vistas of mirrors. Child's eyes, mischievous as a squirrel's, met mine, peering from between crowding forms of grown-ups. The man Jenny had spoken of as "Red Joe" (I picked him out by a ferret face and rust-red hair) was trying to push past a fat father of a family, to reach the child in grey. Whether Nicky knew that he was a pawn in a game of chess, who could tell? There was but one thing certain. He was having "the time of his life."

"If I could get him for Jenny, what would Jenny do for me in return?" I asked myself. It might turn out that she could unlock the door that had shut between me and Maida Odell.

A desperate, a selfish desire to beat Red Joe, seized me; but now the mirrors told, if they did not deceive, that glassy depths of distance between us were increasing in space and mystery. Suddenly I reached a turning-point. Nicky was straight ahead. He paused, looked, made ready to dart away like a trout from the hook. But—inspiration ran with my blood.

I pulled a wad of greenbacks from my pocket and smiled. Red Joe had flattened pater familias unmercifully, and was squeezing past. A hand, a thief's hand if I ever saw one, caught at Nicky's collar. But he dipped from under, slipped between a surprised German's legs, and—I grabbed him in my arms.