“It’s always best to have a pal; you can frame things up
with him, you know.”
—The Advice of Big Slim.
STEELE KENYON placed his stick under his arm, and proceeded to draw on his gloves.
“Quite an interesting night,” he said, coolly. “I had no idea that there was so much gratis entertainment in New York. It is really hospitable. Here a lonely stranger arrives in town; and immediately he is taken in hand and provided with diversion of an absolutely unique character. The thing is an inspiration.”
He walked down the steps, and stood by the railing that ran along the front, gazing up at the building.
“At some future time,” he murmured, “I might have a desire to know just where to find this abode of marvels. The number is ninety-eight, and the street,” looking across the way at a corner light, “is Selden’s Square.”
He made a note of both. The arc lamps hissed and clicked in the silence; from away to the west came the throb of Broadway; the badly blended voices of some belated roisterers rose in quavering dissonance; the strip of sky that showed between the roof tops was black and starless.
“It was just about the top step, I fancy,” said Kenyon, “that the man from Butte was received so warmly.”
As he spoke a man appeared, apparently, from the shadows at his feet. With a sharp side-drive of the elbow Kenyon landed him heavily against the railing; then he stood calmly posed before him ready for the next move.
The man pulled himself together and chuckled.
“You’ve got the punch with you, all right, pal,” remarked he. “But don’t cut it loose on my account. I’m not dealing with you on those lines.”
“Then you should change your style of dawning on the scene,” observed Kenyon, dryly. “It’s the sort of thing that’s calculated to get you into several varieties of trouble; for from a short distance it has rather a rugged look. But now that you are here, what do you want?”
“I want to make my get-away in a hurry,” returned the man. “But first I’d like to say that it’s the ‘Far East’ for a guy like you. Do you get me?”
And with that he turned and made softly away, clinging to the shadows, and at last disappearing around a corner.
“The motions of a panther and the manners of a yeggman,” spoke Kenyon. “A most undesirable person to come upon, unprepared, I should say.”
He turned and made his way westward, deep in thought. He walked with bent head, and did not notice a patrolman well along in the block who looked at him searchingly and suspiciously; but he was allowed to pass without interference.
A bell from a neighboring tower solemnly boomed two as he turned into Fifth Avenue and made his way down town. The night had turned chill and damp; he turned up the collar of his overcoat with a shiver and plunged his hands into the wide pockets. As he strode along he drew deeply at the cigar which he had lighted, until the end glowed redly.
When Kenyon smoked hard it was a positive indication of mental unrest. Against the high-colored background of surprise, suspicion and possible crime with which the night had daubed his thoughts, was thrown a brilliant face and a pair of flashing, scornful eyes.
Who was she? Who were they? And what was the mysterious thing which so held and so moved them all? But more than anything else, how, in the name of all that was bizarre and astonishing, did he come to be mixed up in it? No matter what side of the matter he set himself to consider, he always came back to this particular one. It was a thing absolutely beyond his comprehension.
For a good two hours he tramped the streets smoking and thinking. If the girl had not figured in the affair it would have had but little effect upon him; he was quite well accustomed to startling occurrences, but her participation troubled him. Otherwise he could have gone comfortably to bed and forgotten it all.
“There is something decidedly wrong in Selden’s Square,” muttered he, “something that’s off color and underhand. But what is it? And how does a girl like that—but she can have nothing to do with anything that’s not correct. I am positive of that. There is something fine and high about her.”
Just how he ever came to be walking along the North River front he never knew. He was so deep in conjecture that he had given no heed to where his steps had been leading him, and about four o’clock he found himself in the neighborhood of the Twenty-third Street ferry. Even this he would not have known had he not suddenly collided with a stoutly built young man, with fiery red hair, who was just about entering a railroad cab.
“Hello,” cried this person, sharply. “Have the goodness to look where you are going, will you? It’s all right and proper, my friend, to carry as much excess as you can comfortably handle. But don’t try to shoulder any of it upon a man who has traveled much and is very tired.”
“I beg your pardon,” said Kenyon, stiffly.
The countenance of the other, in the ruddy flare of the cab lamps, suddenly expanded into a delighted grin.
“Why, dog-bust it, it’s Kenyon!” he almost shouted. “Shake!”
“Garry Webster!” Kenyon gripped the extended hand, equally delighted. “Why, old boy, this is a surprise.”
Webster shook Kenyon’s hand with the utmost vigor.
“Well, who would ever have thought to meet you here,” cried he. “It’s been all of ten years since I saw you last, Ken, and a good five since I heard from you; and here you all but knock the breath out of me before I’m in New York ten minutes. But I thought you were doing stunts in South America with a machine gun and a backing of barefooted patriots.”
“So I was, until a few weeks ago, but—”
“Hold on, tell me about it later. Pile in here,” drawing him toward the cab door; “kick those bags and things out of the way. I’m for the Waldorf, and the biggest breakfast they’ve got in the place.”
A feeling of faintness in the stomach told Kenyon that breakfast was a thing that he stood rather in need of himself. So he got into the cab with Webster and they bore down upon the hotel.
“I’m just in from Chicago,” the red-haired young man told Kenyon, “going to look into the windings of the hardware business here, and see if we can’t corral some of the trade that has been lately taken from us.”
“Still traveling for Webster & Seybold, eh?”
“Bless you, no!” laughed Garry. “The governor took me into the firm three years ago. This is my first business trip since, and I wouldn’t be making it, only it’s something special. You see, a rival concern has been cutting into our eastern trade like sixty, and something had to be done about it. And as I am the only one in the shop that is sufficiently acquainted with this market, why, it was me to get busy with my trunks. Back there somewhere, in a freight shed, I’ve got about a dozen sample cases filled with the finest steel implements and sundries ever seen east of Pittsburg. They are the limit, and no mistake. Webster & Seybold are out after the business of this section; and, as I block things out, when I’ve covered the ground, the entire harvest will be reaped and bound. I don’t intend to leave those other fellows opening enough to put in a pound of wire nails.”
Webster so laughed and choked and shook over this ideal if exaggerated prospect, that Kenyon, also laughing, was forced to pound him upon the back.
“You haven’t changed much, Garry,” remarked Kenyon. “You still like to slap your own choice of color on the future.”
“Well, there is no use in letting them put up some other shade for me, you know. They’d only turn out a job that wouldn’t suit. Paint the future in a good, cheerful hue, Ken, and she’ll never come to you in mourning. I made that discovery years ago, and have always stuck to the bright shades. No browns or grays for me.”
“But sometimes they get on of themselves.”
“Go ’long! It couldn’t happen, no matter how you take it. A man is always master of his future.”
“Not always. Sometimes things happen over which he has no control—for example the things which happened to me last night.”
“I can see a story in your eye. You have had an adventure.” Webster laughed and cocked up his feet. “Let’s have it, Ken, for your stories are always sure to have lots of go in them. But, hold on. Wait till we get to the hotel and start in on the breakfast. I’ll enjoy it better.”
At the Waldorf-Astoria, Garry engaged a magnificent suite.
“Webster & Seybold are going to do the thing right,” remarked he, as he walked about and approvingly surveyed the very evident elegance of the apartments. “Hardware men like to eat costly food and absorb colored drinks. Here is where they can do both; they can dine and sup and luncheon and breakfast to slow music and rapid propositions. And always will your humble servant be directly in the focus of the spot-light, reaching them the talk. Right off the dining-room is the sample-room. Do you get the effect? When they are feeling pleasant and comfortable and ‘old chappy,’ I’ll pilot them in there and they will buy as they never bought before. A man in good humor cannot possibly resist the line I will show him. And it will be instant delivery and ninety days’ time.”
“You have no thought of failure in your campaign, Garry,” remarked Kenyon, rather soberly.
“Failure! No! No man with the goods ever fails. It’s only the poor devils who try to win out with high prices, hard terms, and empty hands. Proper equipment is the thing that gains commercial battles as well as military ones.”
“I suppose that’s true. And other sorts as well, don’t you think?”
“Without a doubt.” Garry gazed at his friend curiously for a moment; then he said: “Somehow, Ken, you give me the impression of being in deep water. Has it anything to do with the night’s adventure?”
“It has all to do with it.”
“Oh! The experiences of these modern Babylons! I have had my own share of them; but as a rule I sort of slough them off before many hours have passed. It’s quite the best way. But here’s the breakfast.”
They ate in a small room, overlooking Fifth Avenue; and during the progress of the meal, Kenyon related his experiences of the preceding night. Webster listened with the utmost attention and many exclamations. When Kenyon had finished he lay back in his chair and fairly rocked with delight.
“Adventures to the adventurous!” cried he. “Why, old chap, it’s like a night of our ancient friend, Haroun Al Raschid.” He bent forward and continued with great interest, “And so the dark-eyed girl was beautiful, was she?”
“Charming! Superb! I never saw anything just like her before.”
“And the indications are,” said Webster, carefully inspecting his friend, “that you never will again. It’s the sort of thing that only hits one once in a lifetime.”
“Oh, pshaw!”
“By all means. But that’s not going to alter anything. And you say she was cold, scornful, imperious, and all that?”
“Yes, but only to me. To everyone else she spoke gently; and it was at such moments that I got a glimpse of her true charm. Why, even this fellow Forrester came in for a share of it.”
“Why not? According to your account of him, he must be rather an attractive kind of a chap, just the sort that is apt to be strong with women.”
Garry witnessed with unholy joy the resentment that flushed Kenyon’s face.
“But don’t I tell you that he’s in love with this other girl, and she with him. And then he’s not at all the sort of fellow that such a girl would admire.”
Webster shrugged his shoulders.
“You never can tell,” said he. He lit a cigarette and lay back in his chair, smoking thoughtfully. At last he said: “But, aside from her, this is a peculiar experience. It’s a great deal like a dream. There is something so absolutely lawless about it.”
“I can make neither head nor tail of it,” said Kenyon. “However, to tell the candid truth, I have examined but one side of the matter.”
“I understand,” said Webster, with a nod. “You’re confiding in an old pal, Ken, so don’t be backward. It’s the girl.” Kenyon was silent, so the young man from Chicago proceeded. “Of course it is. You have been kept so busy trying to free her of any possible blame that you have been unable to see anything else.”
“I think you are right,” replied the other, quietly. “She impressed me as being strangely out of place in such an atmosphere. There was courage and goodness and high purpose in her every look and movement.”
“Exactly.” Webster instantly dropped his bantering manner at Kenyon’s quiet, unembarrassed tone. His experience with the other told him that anything which his friend took seriously was not to be treated lightly. Throwing away his cigarette end, he lighted a fresh one. “I can’t think properly unless I’m continually firing up,” explained he.
He drew quickly and deeply, and the thick blue smoke formed a veil between him and Kenyon. Then, waving it away with his hand, he proceeded:
“Now let us take this little affair from the very start. I suppose you have been doing that ever since it happened; but if we are to get at anything tangible in the way of a solution we must do it once more. Let me play the grand inquisitor; I probably see the entire adventure from a different angle than you, and will, perhaps, set your mind to working upon points that all but escaped you.”
“All right,” said Kenyon, lighting a cigarette also. “Go ahead, Garry; and I hope you make a better fist of it than I have.”
“Now, to start with: Did you get no whisper, in any way, of the name of the old man that died last night in Selden’s Square?”
“Not the faintest. Nor that of the girl I have specially spoken of. The other’s name was Anna. Then, of course, there was Forrester and Hong Yo.”
“But the old man knew Nunez, your old commander in Uruguay. There is a possible clue. Did you never hear Nunez speak of any friends who lived here in the North?”
“Never.”
“Humph!” Webster pursed up his lips and blew a long, thin stream of smoke toward the ceiling. “That seems conclusive enough. We’ll never get at anything from that direction, that’s sure. But let us come to yourself now. You’ll know more about that subject.”
Kenyon smiled.
“I’ll be sure to,” said he.
“Who were your intimates while in Montevideo?”
“I knew no one intimately save Nunez and his secretary, Balmacenso.”
“And Nunez was killed at the taking of the town by the forces of the dictator.”
“He was.”
“And Balmacenso? What sort of a fellow was he?”
“Not a bad sort of a chap. I think he was a Spaniard. He saved my life after the fight, packed me on a mule, I being unable to walk because of a wrenched leg. If you fancy he had anything to do with this thing you are on the wrong scent. These people expected me on the Blenheim. Balmacenso died weeks before the Blenheim entered port and at a time when I had no notion of coming North in her. I’ve gone over all that, but there is no explanation of the mystery in it.”
Webster looked baffled.
“Now, look here,” complained he, “don’t throw cold water upon my investigation like this. It’s discouraging. Here I’m sweating like a sheep, trying to get to the bottom of this thing, and you take a sort of delight in stumping me. It’s not friendly and it’s not right.”
“I beg your pardon,” laughed Kenyon. “I’m only tickled to see how similar your own point of view is to my own, that’s all.”
“They don’t seem as widely separated as I expected them to be, that’s a fact,” admitted Garry. “It proves to me that it is possible for a man, newly impressed by a most beautiful woman, to see as clearly as the most cold-blooded of his friends. And that is a thing worth knowing.”
He smiled genially across the table at Kenyon and smoked his cigarette contentedly.
“There remains only one other thing which I can think of,” said he. “And that is the possibility of there being persons who knew you in New York.”
“There is no one,” said Kenyon, positively. “I never knew but a few people here, and them only slightly—so slightly as not even to recall their names. And no one in the North knew of my movements in recent years—not even you. And that I was coming to New York was not known to myself more than two hours before I started.”
“It is deeply and blackly mysterious,” conceded Webster. “It would require an acute intellect of the highest type to do anything with it. One thing I can see very plainly, and that is that hardware is my line, and not conundrums.”
“I fancied that you would give it up,” said Kenyon, smilingly.
“Only temporarily. I’ll grapple with it again.”
“Apart from the oddness of the matter where I am personally concerned,” said Kenyon, seriously, “is the matter where it concerns others. What are these people, and what object have they in view?”
“Hong Yo, now, did not impress you?”
“He was like a bloodless snake. I chilled at the very sight of him.”
“But the other—the hammer-throwing chap—sort of puzzled you?”
“Candidly, yes. He was boyish frankness personified, but still—”
“You have your doubts. Exactly. We are all more or less strong believers in the adage that birds of a feather flock together. But the old man? What of him?”
“I cannot make up my mind. He spoke of a mysterious purpose of which I was supposed to be acquainted, as I told you, and of a mysterious person who was to be safeguarded. And he was intensely and passionately in earnest. Whatever it is, it was of tremendous moment to him.”
“Then there is Forrester’s whispered injunction to you at the end; also the garrotting of the stranger from Butte outside the door. I tell you, Ken, you have had a night of it, and no mistake.”
For a moment both were silent. They smoked thoughtfully and the corners of their eyes were gathered in tight little lines. Suddenly the cigarette dropped from Kenyon’s hand, and he uttered a cry.
“What is it?” asked Webster, in surprise.
“Only the check,” answered the other, ironically. “What confounded stupidity! I never thought to look whose signature was attached to it.”
“Holy Smoke!” ejaculated Webster. And he sat regarding his friend with bulging eyes.
Kenyon drew the check from his pocket and opened it; he gave it a single glance, and then sank back in his chair, disappointment in every line of his face.
“It is signed by Hong Yo,” he said.