CHAPTER II.
THE WAITER HAS A WIFE.
The waiter remained outside the window until he heard Atherton leave the room, then he stole back to number twenty-seven, left things exactly as he had found them, and descended to the waiters’ room, where he changed to street attire.
Ten minutes later he left the premises, and at the end of half an hour he let himself into a modest little flat in a “model” tenement house on East Seventy-seventh Street, near the river.
Here he proceeded to do other things which were out of the ordinary for a club waiter.
For instance, he changed his clothes once more, and, after he had done so, he loaded a revolver and stowed it away in one of his pockets. He put a fresh battery into an electric flash light, and slipped that into another pocket.
He next went down to a room in the basement, in which a motor cycle was stored, and he spent half an hour in pumping up the tires, tinkering with the lamp, oiling the bearings, filling the tank, and generally putting the machine in order for a run.
Finally he returned to the little sitting room, set out a frugal supper for two, consisting of cold beef and potato salad from a delicatessen store, bread and cheese, and a bottle of first-class claret—the last named being from the cellars of the Marmawell.
When all these preparations were completed, he lighted a pipe and consulted his watch.
“Half past nine,” he mused. “I needn’t start for the theater for another hour yet.”
He opened a black leather case and drew out a well-worn mandolin. Dropping into an easy-chair, he started to play the instrument in a fashion which proved that he was both a passionate lover of music and a capable performer.
Any one popping into the little room and seeing him leaning back in that easy-chair, with a far-away, dreamy look in his half-closed eyes, and a rapt expression on his face, would have found it hard to believe that he was capable of the side he had shown shortly before.
To say the least, he must have been a curious combination of the poetic and the matter of fact, of the dreamer and the doer, otherwise that revolver in his pocket, for instance, was decidedly out of place.
Such was the case, and, moreover, the man had had many ups and downs, which his pretty wife had shared.
The latter was an American girl, who had married him some five years before, and who now—because funds were low—had returned to her former calling. In other words, she was back on the stage, in the chorus of a Broadway production.
Elaine Stowe was the name by which she was professionally known.
Max was a most devoted husband, and never allowed his young wife to return from the theater alone. As a rule, he left the flat about half past ten, and was waiting at the stage door when Elaine came out.
To-night, however, he was so absorbed in his mandolin—and in other things—that he forgot all about the flight of time, and he was positively amazed when the door opened and there walked into the room a remarkably attractive and well-formed young woman, cheaply but effectively dressed, with an innocent, babyish face lighted by a pair of big blue eyes.
“Elaine!” he ejaculated, jumping up and laying his instrument aside. “Why are you home so early to-night?”
“Early!” the girl echoed with a laugh, unbuttoning her gloves. “Do you call half past eleven early?”
“Never!” he cried, dragging out his watch. “By George, so it is! What a thoughtless brute I am to let you come home alone. I fully intended to come for you as usual, but I just sat down to play for an hour, and the combination of the music and my plans for the future made me forget everything else.”
“Your plans for the future?” Elaine repeated, with just a touch of irony in her voice. “More plans of making our fortunes, I suppose?”
Her husband nodded.
“Yes,” he answered. “I know what you think, but you’re wrong this time, as it happens. These plans are the real thing, and I’m going to put them through.”
Elaine shrugged her dainty shoulders.
“I wonder how often I’ve heard that,” she said wistfully. “We’re always going to make our fortunes, but somehow or other something always turns up at the last moment and messes up our schemes.”
“I’ll tell you while we’re having supper,” Max replied. “I haven’t too much time, for I must start in three-quarters of an hour.”
“Start? Where are you going?” his wife asked curiously, as she removed her hat and coat.
“That doesn’t come until almost the end of the story,” was the answer. “Sit down and you’ll hear it all.”
The girl obeyed wonderingly, and Max began.
“Do you remember,” he said, “that very shortly after I started work at the Marmawell, I told you I had a suspicion that Alfred Knox Atherton was more or less crooked?”
“Yes,” answered Elaine, “you’ve said so often, and you made the same statement about another member of the club—Frost, I think was the name. You told me you thought he was so crooked that if he ever fell out of bed he could rock himself to sleep on the floor.”
“That’s right,” agreed the waiter, with an appreciative grin. “I couldn’t give you any reason for my suspicions, though. It was just instinct, I guess. You know the old saying, ‘set a thief to catch a thief.’ It must have been that. Being a rogue myself, I instinctively spotted a fellow rogue when I saw him. Anyhow, I was convinced that Atherton and ‘Jack Frost,’ as they call him, were playing some deep game of a crooked nature, and I determined to find out what it was.”
“And have you found out?” asked Elaine.
“I certainly have, and it is a deeper game and a more crooked one than ever I dreamed of.”
“This sounds interesting,” remarked the girl, pouring out a glass of wine for herself. “Do tell me what you have discovered.”
“Well, about half past six this evening,” her husband explained, “Frost came to the club and asked me if Atherton was there. When I told him he was not, he said he would go up to the writing room, and I was to let him know when Atherton arrived. There was nothing much in that, of course, but it showed me that Atherton and Frost had arranged to meet at the club this evening.
“Presently Atherton put in an appearance. He came into the cardroom, which was deserted at the time, and asked me if Frost was about. I told him Frost was in the writing room, and asked him if he would go up. His answer showed me that he wished to see Frost alone, for he asked me if there was anybody else in the writing room, and when I said there was, he told me to tell Frost to come down to the cardroom. It was plainer than ever that they shared some secret, so naturally I determined by hook or crook to hear what they had to say to each other.
“I delivered Atherton’s message to Frost and the latter came down to the cardroom. Before he had a chance to say anything of a personal nature to Atherton, however, a couple of other men walked in, and I saw Atherton scowl at them.
“While I was taking their orders, I kept my ears open, and heard Atherton and Frost arrange to meet in the latter’s private room upstairs.
“As soon as I got that tip, I slipped upstairs, used a skeleton key on Frost’s door, and opened his window a little from the bottom. I passed Frost on the lower flight, and a few minutes later Atherton left the cardroom and went upstairs.
“That was five minutes to seven, and at seven I was relieved. The moment I was free I sneaked upstairs once more, and made use of the room adjoining Frost’s. By picking the lock of that room, and softly opening the window, I managed to get out on the fire escape, and in that way reached Frost’s window. The crack I had left made it possible for me to hear every word they said, without the risk of being seen.”
“Very clever!” commented Elaine. “And what did you hear?”