 Chapter 1 of Find the Woman This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Find the Woman by Gillette Burgess. Chapter 1, Prologue, in which is explained how an architectural draftsman came to possess three sets of names before he was twenty-one, and how a portrait disturbed him. Who was Bel Charmian? If you really care to know, as John Fenton did, you must go with him on his quest, hither and yawn over New York, into strange houses and through side streets at midnight, a shuttle in the secret loom of fate, weaving in and out through many colored threads until the pattern of the mystery is made clear. For the warp of his strange adventurous career, love and beauty and diamonds, for the wolf some few cross currents of crime and misery, there in brief is the web of his drama. So if you ask for such diversion, the narrative must perforce begin with a prelude that you may make acquaintance with the hero and see what manner of youth and temperament sped him on his way. To explain why an engineer's draftsman, of no special talent, should at twenty-one, have already had three sets of names, the review of his history should be divided into five epics. The first prehistoric era, that of his babyhood, was in his memory a mere blur of confused faded pictures amongst which stood out one vivid sharp recollection, a scene on a ferry boat, swept by keen brisk winds, cool under a watery spring sun. He was playing on deck with a little yellow-haired girl under the careless supervision of two indefinite elders. With a small boy's insistence, he was teasing his companion, clutching at a gold heart-shaped locket with a white star, which hung about her neck. She pulled away from him, the chain broke, and she ran crying to her guardian, leaving the locket in his hands. The second epoch, that of his childhood between the ages of four and eight, was somewhat more clear in his mind, although there were many gaps he could never account for. He was living in South Boston, and now his name was Michael O'Shea. His scarlet hair had gained for him amongst the children of his street the easy super-K of Reddy, and at first he had not consented to the name without many savage protests. Living with an uncle and an aunt, the O'Shea's, hard by the blind asylum, his life was a street urchin's career of conflict and roving, with intermittent and forced sessions at the primary school. He roamed from the point to the Dover Street bridge. He knew the docks to the last pile, from the land and from the water. He felt too, often, a missile of an opponent gang, a snowball enclosing a rock. Of his lineage he heard only that his mother had been a millhand in Fitchburg, and that his father had died at sea. This information, embroidered by diverse details which little by little he perceived as lies, was always told him with winks and smiles, as if concealed within their falsehoods was some consummate joke. He grew tired of questioning, finally, and brooded sullenly over the puzzle of his birth. When he was eight years old, the O'Shea's, with a shiny black felice and a paper-covered trunk, moved to New York. They took two rooms in a tenement on the east side, a place of multitudinous fire escapes, waving blankets, screaming children, and dented ash barrels. But in that place, Reddy O'Shea was not to stay long. The day after moving in, while Mrs. O'Shea was unpacking the trunk, and Mangus O'Shea was shaving at a broken triangle of mirror stuck in the window, the boy's eyes caught a shiny something in an open cardboard box. In wonder, with a queer, sickish feeling of recognition, he stooped down and took it, a little golden heart with a star of white stones on the cover. Strange memories, as if of a long-forgotten dream, stirred him uneasily as he handled it. The next moment he was knocked down by a violent cuff on the ear, and Mangus O'Shea stood over him, his small, reddish eyes blazing, ugly with anger, his snarling lips parted, revealing a broken row of little black teeth, horribly distinct in the middle of his lathered face. Look at what you've done now, he exclaimed to his wife, after four years have hide and pullen the wall over his eyes. It'll be your fault now if he begins to prick up his ears. Why didn't she lock it up from him? He turned to the boy and shook a great scarred hairy fist. If I catch you snooping round after things again, I'll break every rib in your body, and mind ye that. He struck ready again viciously to enforce the warning and return to his shaving. No sooner had he turned his back than the boy slipped out, ran down the narrow dirty stairs of the tenement, and was out on the street. He hurried downtown as fast as his legs would carry him. There followed two days of wandering, starvation, cold. He crossed the Brooklyn Bridge and lost himself in a wilderness of narrow streets, with rows of dreary-looking houses. When Dr. Hop Bottom found him, he was only half conscious. The third epoch, that of his adolescence, was the wretchedest of all, a household drudge enslaved by Mrs. Hop Bottom for domestic assistance, washing dishes, sweeping, cooking, a hundred other degradingly feminine tasks which went even to sowing and darning the doctor's woollen socks. Joe Hop Bottom, as he was now called, almost forgot that he was a boy. He lived in squalor, gnawing scraps in the kitchen, scolded by Mrs. Hop Bottom continually, and continually preached at by the doctor, a horny old hypocrite, whose face Joe loathed. The doctor's favorite occupation was to lecture the boy on the simple life. Plain living and high thinking, Joe, he would say, his cheeks bulging with mince pie or suet pudding. Don't make your belly your god, as he shoveled in loaded knife-folds of hot pork. The doctor's face was greasy, with exuding fat. His hands were pudgy. Manners make the man, Joe, not clothes. He often said to his miserable, ragged ward, as he strung a heavy gold watch-chain across his embroidered waistcoat. I think that suit of yours will do another year, with a little brushing, and so it went. The doctor did not drink or swear. He had all the virtues of the Pharisees, including a goat's beard, but for every worldly vice he had an efficient substitute. Instead of alcohol he used coffee with an equally stimulating effect, injecting it under his skin till he was as yellow as a moor. In the place of profanity, he made use of highly original, but perfectly adequate diction composed of scientific terms. To poor, terrified Joe, this jargon seemed worse than any oaths sanctified by custom. You talk so leucocyte, he would exclaim to the boy. What do you want to make a fennel-tribrompropionic hypotenuse of yourself for? To such mysterious apostrophe's joke would make no answer. Only once did he see mangas-ochet. That was when he went to New York with a doctor to attend the meeting of a committee investigating the white slave traffic. They were walking up the bowery, the doctor, absorbed in the theatrical posters, when the Irishman passed them. He stopped and stared. Joe, turning around fearfully to see if he had been observed, caught Ochet's eager red eyes upon him. He clung to the doctor's hands and urged him forward. Dr. Hopbottom reluctantly resumed his journey, at the next stand bearing the picture of Polkratud's Pechorino burlesquers. The boy turned round and saw that Ochet had followed. At Canal Street he was lost in the crowd. Joe dreamed of him for seven nights running, but then a new interest diverged his thoughts. Rummaging in the dusty attic one day, while Mrs. Hopbottom was at her sewing circle, Joe discovered some old numbers of the studio, left by a lodger. And between his washings and his darnings he poured over wonderful photographs of paintings and sculpture, hiding the book under the eaves. When he went back to work, at night when he had a few moments to himself, he copied the pictures with pencil, patiently, lovingly, abominably. The Hopbottoms did at least permit him an education, and he had almost finished his course at the high school before the crash came. The studio, and a boy in his own class, brought on the crisis. His friend was a member of a private life class which rented a studio on Tuesday and Thursday evenings, hired an inexpressibly ugly model, and drew there from in charcoal. The class was composed mainly of architects' ambitious draftsmen, and with his friend's influence Joe was permitted to join. Finding money for paper and charcoal and board seemed at first impossible, but the sale of old rags and bottles filched from the Hopbottoms' cellar at last sufficed for the purchase of his material, and the men allowed him to attend for a while, gratis. The boy was already a personable, good-natured youth, and soon became popular. His explanation of his absence was that he was attending a Bible class at the YMCA. His industry was great, if not his talent. By the time he was sixteen years old, a fat role of terrible studies from the nude was hidden away in the attic. Joe had become so enthusiastic in the pursuit of art that he had almost forgotten the chaste point of view of the Philistines. Dr. Hopbottom still preached asceticism for others, gesticulating with his pie, and still his fat increased. Still he preached the simple life, renunciation of the flesh, the temptation of the senses. One night Joe and his friend left a vaudeville theater in shock discussed at the row of vulgar, half-clad females who were performing a suggestive burlesque. As he went out, he saw Dr. Hopbottom's unctuous, grinning face in the audience, his eyes devouring the charms of the actresses. It was the next morning the explosion came. Mrs. Hopbottom, climbing upstairs for a spring cleaning, discovered Joe's charcoal studies from the nude. There was a hysterical tumult, lightnings of her flashing eye, thunder of her expostulation, a storm of tattered charcoal drawings. Joe put his head through the doorway to find the cause of her temper, with his ear in one hand and the sole survivor of his sketches as a sample of sin in her other. The lady stocked into the doctor's study. His wrath was sublime. Moral precepts, sermonettes, warnings, prayers, reproaches, quotations from the Bible. Timothy 412, Leviticus 26, 27, to 29. He invoked pictures of future torment and made a closer inspection of the drawing. He put it away carefully in his desk, waving his wife's itching fingers aside, and invoked heaven, raising his eyebrows. Joe could stand it no longer, told pithily of the previous evening's vaudeville horrors. It was prayer-meeting night. Then left the doctor and his blazing spouse to fight it out together. He packed a few clothes with deliberation, and walked calmly, happily, back across the Brooklyn Bridge. He was free, a great peace was in his soul. Halfway across, he wafted a gorgeous resolution. Fourth upon the breeze, the loathly name of hop-bottom sailed from his body, never to return. Stealing a new one from the first theatrical billboard he passed, he entered New York as John Fenton. So began his youth. We may pass lightly over the next five years of his life. He had been trained to take hard knocks. He had industry and a saver of humor. He made his way. Some of his draftsmen friends busied themselves for him, and he soon found a position as an office-boy for a firm of architects. Between his petty duties he practised lettering, copied the orders, made blueprints and tracings, what he lacked in genius he made up in determination, and at the age of twenty-one he earned eighteen dollars a week, and by frugality and a cheap Harlem lodging-house saved the half of it. The red of his hair had toned to a deep auburn, gymnasium work, long walks and simple living had improved his looks till many a girl's eyes gave him a second glance as he passed. He had, even in his obscurity, the habits of a gentleman, and a way of wearing his ready-made clothes that took off the curse of cheapness. His landlady was want to gossip over his charms and his aristocratic manners. She let many a room on the strength of them. Once, five or six years after he had escaped from Brooklyn, he came upon Dr. Hop Bottom in a penny arcade. The doctor was looking into a moving picture machine bearing the legend, the story of an artist's model. He was turning the crank slowly, very slowly. Something arrested his attention. He looked up with a guilty face. Good morning, said John Affably, wondering why he had ever feared the senile old fool. You correlated dimorphic appendix, you. What are you doing? Some blastodermic, corollarius mischief, I suppose. The doctor tried to look dignified. Oh, I'm going in for architecture. I see you're at your old game, though, said John, and giving him a withering smile passed on. And so at last we come to the picture, which inaugurated John Fenton's fifth epoch. Lucky for men that all have not the same tastes, lucky for men that each chooses his own type of beauty, lucky that no one woman can please all men, else every woman might be a Helen of Troy and war would rage amongst men over her everlastingly. Unlucky for Melton's magazine, however, that there were not more John Fenton's to mob the newsstands and buy up a certain edition of that periodical. Comparatively few men, perhaps, would call the girl's face pretty. Most, at least, would turn the page with small regret. But to John Fenton the sight of that face was the starting of many emotions. In that glance he achieved maturity. His youth ended on page 212, Manhood Began, at page 213. He came across the magazine in a friend's studio, and not daring to confess how much the picture affected him, he sought a chance, cut out the page, and concealed it under his coat. It showed the face of a girl of perhaps 20 years, with soft, parted hair rolling away from her forehead, eyes wide apart under level brows, and a smiling mouth at once demure and whimsical. So much for the outward aspect. Beauty, however, is subjective. In John Fenton's mind, something responded, as to a message, the secret call of a subconscious desire potent as a magic charm. To win that girl he would have plowed across arctic snows, fought his way through tropical jungles, chanced peril, war, or pestilence. So much he resolved at first glance. When he got the page safely home he smoothed out its wrinkles and studied it, perturbed and trembling. By a sorry trick of chance, someone, cutting a paragraph from the opposite side of the page, had deleted the name of the girl. Not till he had had the portrait on his wall for a week, not till a new element had begun to creep into its attraction for him, did he realize that he had been a fool not to look at the magazine and see its name and date, that he might procure an undisfigured copy. It was now impossible to trace it, and the girl must remain unnamed. As he studied it day by day, its charm grew more potent. Something more than the girl's mere physical attraction moved him. The romance and mystery of the face became more and more magnetic. At first vague and troublesome, it at last absorbed him. It seemed to promise some hidden meaning for him alone. The talk of a theosophical fellow-worker at his office began to simmer in his brain. Had he perchance known this girl in some previous life, were their destinies linked? Had they made karma together? In such wise he mused. At times the strain on his imagination grew so tense that he would put the picture away and busy himself with prosaic projects, some competition for courthouse, or pergola. But the lady did not long hide her face. Back she came to his wall again, now as expensively framed. As a dry point, a love etching. And again John Fenton's thoughts roved on the wings of romance. The House of the Fortune Teller How John Fenton went downtown without an object, and became involved in a picturesque adventure with a certain strange lady. John Fenton returned from the office one April evening, and as usual gazed long at the picture. He went out with the spell still upon him. It charmed him, even in the heated, sordid, commonplace atmosphere of the cheap restaurant where he habitually dined. A four times he had held interrupted Jaco's intercourse with Millie, his favorite waitress. But of late Millie's charms had faded. He had begun to notice that her hands and ears were large. After his small squat cup of adulterated boiled coffee, he took a subway express to Times Square, and, as was his want, wandered down Broadway into the splendor of modern Babylon. New York was waking up to its perforated nightlife, the electric signs blazed convulsively, throwing spasms of red and white and green against the darkling sky. The taxicabs grew nervous, hurried, searching here and there like roaches in a dirty kitchen. The women of the shadow began to emerge into the glare, overtly stalking their prey. John Fenton, still wrapped in his dream, walked on unregarding like a machine. At the opera house he waked up enough to take his accustomed place in a shy corner to watch the influx of wealth and fashion. He had a new measure for their grace and beauty now, and as they entered one by one they failed. Once he had a sudden clutching gasp of surprise as a girl passed him cool and imperious in her long cloak of chinchilla. He stared. At first he wildly thought his time had come and she was the girl of the picture, but she turned full upon him, and he saw her mouth was selfish, cruel, false. He turned and walked downtown trembling, and after a while passed, still dreaming into a side street to escape the crowd. He had not gone far when his idly roving eyes encountered a sign on a door reading Madame Oswald, palmist and medium. He stopped and stared at it curiously. Why not for once seek that vulgar shrine? Consult the oracle and illumine his fate. Life of late, while seeming duller of fact, had to his fancy become suddenly stimulated. That fancy must be fed. A mere portrait could no longer satisfy him. He was in a mood for romance, and here was one of romance's immemorial priestesses. He slowly ascended the steps, rang the bell, waited. A negro servant opened to him, and led him into a front parlor lighted by a single lamp on a table. He sat down, already embarrassed, upon an uncomfortable, red-plush sofa, and gazed fascinated at a huge, painted panel on the opposite wall, whereon some audacious amateur had copied some wearied professional's conception of Francesca de Rimini and her lover. The black eyes of the heroine held him, till Madame Oswald appeared, massive blonde, swathed in a purple gown. There were the usual preliminaries, Madame's quick, close scrutiny appraising him at a glance, an attempt to secure a full life reading at double the ordinary price, the production of a velvet pad upon which his hand should rest, and the drone of prophecy began. She prodded his palm with a little ivory pointer, noted extraordinary lines, stars, and mounts, and brought forth her three inevitable themes. The gentleman was of a strangely sensitive nature, and was much misunderstood. He was worried over something, and didn't know quite what to do. He had intuition, psychic power, mediumship, but it was undeveloped. A course of developing seances, now at five dollars a week, would bring out unexpected powers. No? Well then, let him ask a question. She leaned back and closed her eyes. Fenton watched her bulky satin chest heave heavily as she breathed. Her large placid face, with its one hairy mole, fascinated him. Then the picture came into his mind, and he asked in a whisper, Who is she? Who is she? she repeated, as if to some spirit guide. Her voluminous bust expanded in a gasp. She quivered, rolled her head, and finally answered, I see the letters B, C. She opened her eyes suddenly and shot at him. Ain't that right? Darned if I know, he replied. At that she plucked up courage, and went on without hesitation. B, C. She repeated. It's Bell, or Blanche, or Bessie. I ain't sure which. But she's in your life, current. And she's attracting you, her way. Yes, yes. You're going to marry her. And marry with money, too. I ain't sure if it's hers or yours. But look out for one thing. And that's a man with a split ear. Don't you trust him. Is there anything else you wanted to know? Fifty cents, please. Fenton never paid the fee, for no sooner had she spoken, than with a terrified expression she jumped up and ran to the window. She turned back to him, a large, white-anguished face. My God, the police! They're a-going-to-pomey. She began to pluck at her breast and moan. Fenton rose, beginning to be frightened himself. What the devil's the matter? He grabbed up his hat and his coat. Oh, I knew they was a-rounding up the mediums and palmists this week, she cried. But I come across with my tax to the captain all right, only last Tuesday. And he swore they'd never touch me. This means a hundred dollars out for me. And I ain't got ten. Say, kid, you get out quick, or they'll hold you for a witness. I don't want no more evidence than I can help. Hurry, for God's sake. Get out through the back parlor, there. Even as she spoke, the front doorbell rang, and the handle was rattled, to enforce the summons. Fenton did not stay to see the issue, but ran in between the folding doors to a room cluttered by feminine garments in scandalous disorder. He opened a door into the hall, but on the instant heard the officers entering, he could not escape that way. If he could not find some other exit he would be caught like a rat in a trap. He darted to the window and saw a fire escape landing. Out he climbed. The backyard showed no feasible route of egress. He ran up the iron ladder, peered into a window, tried it, and found it locked, then hurried up to the next floor. Here the window was opened, and the room lighted. He glanced in and gave a suppressed cry of surprise. Stooping down to the floor, a woman, dressed in Russian sables, was gathering into a traveling bag, by hand-folds, a profusion of gems, that, scattered upon the carpet, made the place a miracle. By the vivid flashes of red, blue, yellow, and green that dazzled his eyes, there must have been in all some two hundred precious stones, set and unset, rings, bracelets, necklaces, pins, and pendants, where there was not the prismatic fire of precious stones there was the dull sheen of gold. For the most part the jewels lay in a puddle of gorgeous color, but spattered from this, all over the floor, single sparks of radiant light twinkled, as if a rainbow had exploded in the room and lay in splendid fragments. As he stood there, transfixed, the woman turned, caught sight of his white face and screamed. With a sudden movement she threw herself full-length upon the floor like a hen trying to protect her chicks at the approach of a hawk. Fenton was too astonished to think of his own peril, too astonished even to speak. It was the woman who broke the silence. Who are you for God's sake? she moaned. Still Fenton stared, aghast, inarticulate. Are you a burglar? His tongue loosened at last. The house is raided. The police are downstairs. They've got Madame Oswald. What in Heaven's name does all this mean? She paled. She faltered. Then with a shocked face arose and stood with her hand to her head as it panic-stricken. Fenton got a good look at her now and saw that she was beautiful, with a pecan-eager face, exquisite scarlet lips, and deep brown eyes suffused with tears. Her skin had an olive cast and her hair was dark. Altogether she was unlike any woman he had ever seen. An exotic type with a sensuous prettiness made delicate, refined by great intelligence. Was she oriental? There was at least something tropical about her beauty. It was too vivid, too moving for an Anglo-Saxon. She had stood staring at him, thinking intently. Now she darted to the window and laid a grassile hand upon his arm. As she looked sharply into his face, she spoke under her breath. You look honest and brave. Will you help me? I have not a moment to lose if the police are in the house. Quick! Without waiting an answer she dragged him over the window sill into the room. Before he had collected his wits, she was scrabbling the jewels from the floor and loading them into his pockets. I swear I am innocent of any crime, she exclaimed passionately, as she gathered a handful of diamonds, rubies, and emeralds from the floor and dropped them into his overcoat pocket. You've got to help me out. There is no one else to save me and the honour of a great family. She ran to the door, listened, and returned with compressed lips to stoop for more jewels. They dripped from her fingers as she rose great drops of iridescent colour, the hues of blood and poison, to be gathered again in her little hands. All I want is that these things should be restored to their rightful owner. Why, if the police find them here, it will be awful. I can never explain. A terrible scandal will come out. Again she scraped up her hands full, chains of fire-opels, brooches of carved emeralds, topazes and sapphires, a tiny enameled watch, a half dozen rings, dazzling with rubies. Already his inside pockets were full. The stones pressed hard against his sides. She opened the flaps of his outside pockets and thrust in more gems. Don't ask any questions. There's no time. I hope to God you can get away safe. You must do your best. I am being followed, but they won't suspect you. Now, then, be quick. By this time the last jewel was concealed, and Fenton, his coat bulging with the treasure, stood before her, pale and trembling with excitement. Just then there came a noise from the stairway, a bang upon the hall door. Out the window she hissed, get away somehow for heaven's sake, and meet me at Sheffel Hall, and wait till I come. In another instant she had hustled him out onto the fire escape, shut the window behind him and turned off the gas. As he climbed the next flight of iron steps out of sight, he heard the pounding on the door grow louder. Someone was shouting for her to open. End of Chapter 2 Chapter 3 of Find the Woman This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Find the Woman, by Gillette Burgess. Chapter 3 Sheffel Hall. How our hero in the pursuit of his adventure met at his rendezvous a friend of his youth, and heard a tale of jewels and horror. So up Fenton went with his heart pumping, obstructed by his overcoat, gained the next landing and looked about for a means of escape. Three or four feet away from him the roof of an L stood, its flat roof level with his landing. With no definite plan of escape he jumped across the opening, landed upon the gravel roof and hurried along, dodging under telephone wires to where another roof rose, a few feet higher. Up this he scrambled and looked about. There was a trapped door a few yards away. He made his way to it, tried it, and found it unlocked. Lifting it he gazed down into a black hole. At first he could see nothing, but as his eyes grew accustomed to the darkness he made out a ladder leading down. With terror in his soul he cautiously groped his way to the foot, bumped his head, felt about for a door, opened one, and found himself to his immense relief in the upper hallway of an apartment house. Here he paused for a moment to regain his breath and his courage. There was nothing for it but to descend boldly and trust his luck not to be observed. He got down the first flight in safety, meeting no one, but at the next landing was suddenly confronted by a young girl coming up. She started in surprise, eyed him keenly but said nothing. He felt her eyes upon him as he went down. In the lowest hall a negro lad was dozing at a telephone desk. He did not move. Fenton opened the front door. The boy waked, caught sight of him, and shouted something. Fenton hurried out, not daring to run. Got down the front steps with his pulse quickened to fever speed and turned toward Broadway. One glance over his shoulder showed the patrol wagon, still standing at the door of Madame Oswald's, a few houses away, and by the opposite curb was a shabby coupé with its driver on the box, watching the excitement. Men were running up to the scene of the raid. One large pompous looking man jostled Fenton and nearly knocked him down. But at last he was free of the crowd, and walked south, his hands in his pockets, his fingers burrowing in the diamonds. Judging the lights of Broadway safer than dark side streets, he kept down to the flat iron building, and then looking suspiciously to right and left, crossing the street whenever he saw a pedestrian approaching. He zigzagged to 4th Avenue, and gained 18th Street. Once a bedisoned woman accosted him with a weedling voice. Once a shabby loafer hailed him requesting money for a cup of coffee. Up against it, sir, can't get work, nothing to eat for two days. Fenton did not reply. The burden of his treasure was a horror and a menace. It seemed as if he would never reach the restaurant. But at last he entered the swinging doors and sat down at a table with a sigh of relief. Here was respite for a while, till the woman should arrive, if she ever did arrive. What if she did not? He ordered beer and pretzels, and took up a copy of the fleagand of Bletter to distract his thoughts. The German letters danced on the page. The pictures had no meaning. Then seeing a ragged copy of meltons on the table, he took it up. It was a tired looking old magazine. Half the pages torn, spotted with eggs and gravy, having evidently been left in the restaurant by some patron, and read to death by subsequent guests. He turned the pages listlessly, his mind on other things than storyettes or descriptive articles. But when he came to the pages of fair women, he stopped suddenly at a half-page. It was the desecrated portrait of the girl, his wonderful girl with the whimsical smile and the level eyebrows. His heart stopped, then he glanced at the caption under the half-tone. Half of it was gone. What remained read as follows. Miss Bell C.H., one of the season's most. Bell C.H. it was maddening. Then in a flash he recalled the fortune teller's prediction. What was it Madame Oswald had said? B.C., Bell, or Blanche, or Bessie. She's in your life current. You're going to marry her, and marry with money. Strange how the girl pursued him. Would fate indeed bring them together? He cut out the half-page and put it in his pocket. There was no time to muse upon this fancy. His present situation was too compelling. He resumed his look out for the mysterious woman who had promised to meet him. He had been there a scant half-hour when he saw her enter the door and give a quick glance about the room. Seeing Fenton she walked smiling toward his table. Thank God you got here all right, she said as she sat down. I had a narrow escape myself. The police came in, but found no evidence to hold me. I told them I was rooming in the house and knew nothing. All the same I had been followed. And I daren't take the gems. You will have to help me further. See here, said Fenton. I've had enough of this. It's a little too suspicious for me, and I don't care to get into trouble with the police. It's not the police you have to fear most, she exclaimed. Who is it then, he demanded nervously. Won't you help me? She shot a languishing look at him. Surely she was beautiful, but her beauty had a savage note in it. It was the beauty of a tigress. There was strange electric force in her glance, in her mysterious smile. I won't help you till you tell me what it all means, was his answer. She kept her gaze on him steadily, and spoke as if to herself. I hardly know how to tell you. It's such a great responsibility. A family's good name is in your power, but I must have help. Still she stared at him. Fenton turned away his head embarrassed. He was upon the point of refusing her outright, handing over the jewels and making his escape back into the peace of commonplace things. There was something sinister about it all. It was too dangerous. As he looked abstractedly toward the door, it opened and a man entered. Fenton felt his blood run cold. Who was the man? At first he did not know, and yet there was something familiar about him. In his furtive walk, rather than his face, which stirred vague memories, the man passed, gave a blank stare at Fenton, and Fenton recognized him. It was Mangus O'Shay, with whom he had lived in South Boston. Whom he had always been told was his own uncle. The man had grown old, but by the small reddish eyes and the broken black teeth Fenton knew him indubitably. As the Irishman passed it was as if a chill wind had swept after him, making Fenton shiver with apprehension. At this look at O'Shay, the first for so many years, Fenton saw him as a cruel and an evil thing, a man to shun and dread. It was as if his own subconscious mind had been for years pondering a problem and needed but this encounter to fan hidden coals of thought into a fierce flaming idea. He was sure now that O'Shay was not his uncle, sure that the Irishman knew the secret of his birth, had done him some fearful wrong perhaps. His look was criminal. Fenton, with his pockets sagging with precious stones, held his peril increase every minute. If the woman opposite him had noticed the episode, she did not show it. Her eyes were still on him, but her thoughts seemed far away. Now she appeared to awake and cast some horrid apprehension from her. She leaned forward and touched his hand. Listen, she said, I'm going to tell you why and how much I need you. If you have any chivalry in your nature, you cannot refuse me. With this preamble she began her story. The dead fair. I am going to make you my confidant in two secrets. One, my lovers, I hope never to divulge. The other is my own, I hoped to keep that. Forever also, but it doesn't matter now. I have negro blood in my veins. I am an octarune. Will that kill your sympathy? I hope not. But I have to tell you. It will explain everything. Perhaps you have noticed it already. Have you suspected me under my powder, under my wig, this horrible thing that I've worn so long? Well, my lover never suspected it. I know. Perhaps he wouldn't have cared if he had. I like to think so. For he loved me. Gordon Brewster rescued me from hell. Do you know what it means to have negro blood in your veins mixed with white? To have sensibility, refinement? Surely I have that. And to be forever outside the pale? I can mingle freely with neither my own people nor yours. One sort is too low, the other too high for me. I have a college education. I studied for four years at Tuskegee Institute. After that I tried to teach. Then for three years I was alone, in New York, seeing almost no one. I write special stories for the papers, never going near the offices, and supporting myself fairly well. I have a little apartment on East 33rd Street with a colored maid. I am afraid of any other. It doesn't matter how I met Gordon Brewster. There is no need if you're knowing. That part of my life is sacred. But in spite of everything we fell in love. Can you imagine what that meant to me? A man like him? A gentleman? It was a dream come true. It was a fairy tale. Can you see how I hid my secret, my shame? I think that my soul is as white as—well, never mind. I couldn't tell Gordon. How could I risk it? I was so happy. I was sure of his love. But I was afraid of something stronger than himself. Some instinct, some inevitable revulsion of race feeling. I didn't know how it would end. I didn't care. Only that I resolved never to marry him, unless—I wonder if I could have told him. Well, it's too late now. All I have now is his honor to protect and cherish. The happiness of knowing him was all I ever had. We walked all that three years on the edge of a precipice that he never saw. I saw it always. He had plenty of money, at first. It was all I could do to prevent his spending it all on me. No one ever knew. No one ever talked about us. No one, at least, except an intimate friend of his, Harry Haye. Mr. Brewster had a string of race-horses. No other business. The family is old and rich. He put all his money into his stable and lost steadily. If I had known of it in time, I might have saved him. But it was not to be. Last evening, at about half-past seven o'clock, when I was dressing for the evening, the doorbell rang, and Eliza, my maid, came in to tell me that Mr. Brewster had come. It was so early I had not expected him for some time yet. I told Eliza to show him into my little parlour while I completed my toilet. As she helped me with my dressing, I heard him tramping up and down the room and wondered at it. Before I had finished, he knocked on my door and called out to me to hurry. His voice was so harsh and excited that it alarmed me. I threw my things on hurriedly and ran in. He was terribly excited. He told me to get rid of Eliza he wanted to talk to me alone. So I sent her away, and he walked nervously up and down till she had left. Then he came up to me and took both my hands in his. Get your things packed up at once, he said. Enough to travel with, at least. I am going to marry you right away. We're going to take the train to New Orleans to-night, and then buy a fruit steamer for Central America. I'm dished. No, I didn't cry. It was too critical a situation. I thought, then, that the time had come when I would have to tell him my secret. Oh, he had asked me to marry him scores of times. I had always been able to put him off with an indefinite answer. I couldn't bear to lose him, but I was determined not to be his wife until I had confessed what I was. But now I saw he was as determined as I. I said, what has happened, Gordon? Then he told me, told me what I dread to tell you. Only, of course, you see. Then I didn't understand how awful it was. He was ruined. His favorite filly had cost him every cent he had in the world, and he owed money everywhere. He had even—I don't think I need to tell you all of it. Perhaps that can be covered up, too. At any rate, he was desperate. Nothing would do but for us to be married that night and get away before he was arrested. Think of it. The temptation to be alone with him, his wife, sure of one friend forever. But the cost. I couldn't do it. How could I think of his losing his honor, his good name? I don't know what I said, but I refused. I told him that he couldn't marry me, but he must stay and face his trouble, stay and make a fight for it. Then when he was square with the world, if he chose, I would be his wife. Wasn't I right? I loved him too much. I never had time to finish. You see, he had brought two pieces of luggage with him. One was a suitcase, the other a smallish travelling bag. Before I had ended my talk, he was fumbling in the bag. I didn't realize what he was doing till he had pulled out a revolver. His look was horrible. He could hardly speak through his passion, but he cried out, Well, if I can't have you, I'll end it all now. Then he pulled the trigger, shot himself in the temple. I fainted on the floor beside him. The next thing I knew, the bell was ringing. I don't know how long it had been ringing. It was some time before I could get up, and it kept ringing persistently, horribly. It wouldn't stop ringing. I shut my ears to it, hoping whoever was there would go away. But the bell kept on ringing. Can you hear it? Gordon, dead on my parlor floor, and the bell ringing. God, I can hear it yet. Ringing. I managed to open the door part way, a crack, and saw Harry Hey, Gordon's best friend, the only one who knew of our friendship. For God's sake, he said, Is Gordon here? He pushed past me. I couldn't answer. He got into the parlor and saw. I sat down on the sofa and began to cry then. It was such a relief to have somebody there. I couldn't look. Gordon was dead, sure enough. There was no doubt about it. He felt of Gordon's heart, and closed his eyes. Then he told me, Gordon had been to see him yesterday, to borrow money. Harry Hey didn't have it, and not knowing how serious it was, had refused. Then afterward, hearing a few things about Gordon's affairs, he had raised a few thousands in a hurry, and had come to offer it to him. Knowing Gordon would be at my place. Think of it. Ten minutes too late. Wasn't it ironic? Harry was a good friend, God knows. Harry Hey was wonderful. What I would have done alone, I don't know. Of course, the suicide itself was awful enough. But for Gordon to be found in my room, in the room of an octaroon, think of the scandal. It would be terrific. Then there were Gordon's debts, his dishonesty. It couldn't be. I pled with Harry to find some way out. Then we discovered the jewels, and we understood how far poor Gordon had fallen. They were in the traveling-bag, but she had opened to take the pistol from. It was half full. The Brewster jewels. Thousands of dollars' worth of them. Gordon had taken them from the family safe. He had the combination, and his parents were away from home, in Europe, or rather, they were expected back any day. Well, we talked it over. What could we do? I took a dose of strictnia, and it braced me up. Finally Harry thought of a plan. There's a hack-stand round the corner. He said, I'll go round there and see if I can jolly the driver into renting his carriage. If I can, perhaps we can make it. If not, the thing will have to come out. It's our only chance, anyway. So he left to try it. I locked the door behind him, and went into my room and lay on my bed thinking. You can imagine how my mind worked. I could see Gordon lying on the floor as plainly as if I were in that room with him. Hours seemed to go by before Harry Hey rang the bell. When I opened the door, I didn't know him at first. I was terrified. He had on a cab driver's smelly coat and old high hat borrowed. I don't know how. I believe he told the cabbie it was a practical joke. He told me to get on my hat and coat and wait for him in my room. He went into the parlor. Once he came to my door and asked for warm water and towels. Then he returned for cotton wool. Oh, God! I didn't dare ask him what for. The third time he knocked, he told me that everything was ready. I gulped down a drink of brandy, clenched my teeth, and went in. I wish I could ever forget what I saw. Gordon was huddled on the sofa. His hat and gloves were on. He seemed to be asleep. His head was turned away. The hole in his temple was filled with cotton. I felt myself fainting again. I went to the bathroom and dashed my face with water, then returned. Harry had the hall door open. Well, we got the body downstairs somehow, one supporting each arm. I held Gordon while Harry looked out to see if there was anyone who might see. Then we carried him into the cab. We got the body on to the seat. And I followed and sat down and held it up. Then Harry ran upstairs for the suitcase and bag, threw them into the floor of the cab, got on the box, and we drove off. Was there ever such a drive, I wonder? Past the Waldorf Astoria, past Sherries and Delmonicoes, in and out through a stream of automobiles and carriages, the body lurched and swayed. Once it fell on the floor, I had to lift him up. Past the cathedral, the great hotels at the plaza, and then we plunged into the park. It was cool and dark. My last ride with Gordon Brewster. The last time I would touch his hand. It was the last service I would ever do for him, I thought. But there is still another. You must help me. Can you have the heart to refuse after this? Gordon had lived alone in the Brewster house on 72nd Street, with nobody but an old caretaker. Flint, his name is. I didn't quite trust him, but he was our only hope. Would Flint consent to help us? That was the question. If he would, we could manage it. We stopped at the house and Harry Haye left me alone and went in to break the news to the old man. He was gone some time. He must have paid Flint money, big money. Had that body been anyone's but Gordon's, I would have died or lost my senses right then. The suspense, you know. But how can you abhor the body of one you love? Our last ride together was over. Harry Haye came out at last with Flint, who was shivering with terror, expostulating. Harry Haye took one arm of the body, Flint the other, touched it, that is, and then ran back into the house, sobbing, terrified. Aren't men cowards? I had to help. The body was stiffened with the cold. We had to fairly drag it into the house. The boots scraped on the sidewalk. At the basement entrance, Flint was white as ashes holding the door, then into the shooting gallery, where Gordon had his bowling alley, his foils and gloves and rifles. We laid him on the floor. Harry Haye took a target pistol from a case and asked the way to the coal cellar. He went with Flint through a little low door, then I heard a shot. My God, it made me shriek, my nerves were so on edge. It was only Harry shooting into the coal to empty the cartridge. He came back and laid the pistol down beside the body. Then I turned away, sick. He was removing the cotton. We were afraid the wound wouldn't bleed. Oh God, it bled fast enough. Flint was told to wait fifteen minutes, then telephoned to the nearest police station. He was to say he had heard a shot, that Gordon had let himself in alone, while Flint was upstairs, that he probably was practicing as he often did. You see, he was a noted shot. We hoped the death might perhaps pass as accidental. That was the plan. I think it worked all right. But the police suspect something, I think. Did you read the papers? There was a notice. There is to be an inquest. The house is guarded. We came out at last. Harry Haye got up on the box and drove off. I felt relieved. So far as we knew, nobody had seen us come. I thought it was all over, the strain of it, the horror, and my strength began to go. I collapsed. It had been too much. I was roused out of a sort of stupor by finding myself slipping to the floor, as we slew round a corner. When I tried to get up, my feet struck something. The suitcase and bag. Do you see, we had been so worked up over the thing. So excited, so nervous, we had forgotten to leave Gordon's luggage at the house. Both of us had forgotten. God knows we had enough else to think about. It isn't strange, we forgot. Well I thought it wouldn't matter much about the things. Only clothes. I was too upset to remember what was in the small bag. Then as we passed an electric light, I happened to look down at my feet. The small bag had become unfastened in some way, and the whole floor of the cab was covered with jewels. You've seen them, too, on the floor. You know how I must have felt. Thousands of dollars worth of jewels. I gathered them up and stuffed them into the bag. At the next street-lamp I looked and found more in the corners, and still more. It seemed as if I'd never find them all. First I thought I'd stop, hurry, hey, and tell him. But I waited till we got to my house. Then I told him. What were we to do? We couldn't take them back. It was too late then, for the police had undoubtedly been notified. There would be officers there, and the coroner's men. Harry Haye was getting nervous about the cab driver and anxious to return the carriage. He told me that I would have to see about the jewels, told me to telephone Flint and see what could be done to return them safely, so that no one would know they had been taken. It was a tremendous responsibility for me, but to save Gordon's honour I consented to do it. I got Flint on the telephone after a while and told him. He was awfully excited and said he had found the safe door open and had suspected the theft. He proposed that I should carry the jewels up to his brother's house in Harlem, where as soon as he could get away he would meet me. Then he would return them to the safe and lock the combination. No one would ever know. But owing to the coroner he couldn't get away till late to-night. I promised to come. I tried to sleep today. But how could I forget? After I had concealed the suitcase my mind went over and over the horror of it all, and I thought I should go mad. The forenoon was bad enough, but the afternoon was worse. As I was trying to eat my dinner the bell rang. Eliza came back grinning to say a man wanted to speak to me. I couldn't understand why she was laughing. Then when I saw him, for a moment my heart stopped beating. I thought it was Harry Haye in the cabman's coat and top hat again. It was as if I had to go through that horrible ride again. I couldn't believe my sight. It was the cab driver himself. He had vicious cross eyes. He began with a horrible sneering grin to tell me that my friend had damaged the cab. I denied knowing anything about it. But he said he had followed Harry, and had watched at the coroner. He had seen us coming out, with Gordon. Think of it. For one moment I couldn't tell how much he knew, and I was tempted to kill him then and there. I almost wish I had. Then he spoke of my friend with the jag, and I saw he didn't know the truth. But he knew something queer had happened. He said he wanted a hundred dollars. I gave it to him, and told him to go away. Wasn't I a fool? Of course it was a fatal thing to do. The moment I had done it I was in despair. He would be sure something wrong had happened. He would come again, and again he would find out. I went wild. I didn't dare stay at home any longer then. And so, putting all the jewels loose into a velvet work bag, I hid that in a large mink moth, and went out. I didn't know where. I decided to go to some restaurant or to a theatre, anywhere to be in a crowd, safe, and wait until Flint could take the things. I had scarcely turned from 33rd Street into 4th Avenue when I saw a cab driving up slowly behind me. I was afraid it was the man, but was not sure. I walked hurriedly along. He followed, like a horrible creeping thing. Why didn't I take a car? Oh, I don't know. I was distracted. In any way, he would have followed me. I turned west at 29th Street. The cab crawled along after me, down Broadway. I couldn't shake it off. I turned into 26th, and for a few minutes I thought I had lost him. I crossed 7th Avenue, past little beg-shops, groceries, cobblers, cubby-holes, and sticky-faced children. Then halfway up the block came a cab jogging along toward me. I was terrified. I lost my head. I turned and ran. There was no doubt that it was the cross-eyed cabman. I knew him now, a quarter of a mile away. I became confused. Fearing he would stop me, discover the jewels. I looked about for some escape, saw a fortune-teller's sign, and ran up the steps. The front door was unlatched. I went in and darted upstairs. I had lost my reason now. I was acting through blind instinct, taking the first chance that occurred to me. Up two flights I came to adore a jar. I went in and locked it. Then I looked about for a place to conceal the jewelry, not a closet, nor a cupboard, nor a bed. I knelt to rip up the carpet thinking I could stuff the things underneath. When I heard a pounding downstairs, I got up and grabbed the muff. The jewels came flying out of the bag and scattered all over the floor. Then I looked up and saw your face. God, how you terrified me! Well, you know the rest. For some minutes neither spoke. The girl, as if relieved of some physical burden, sighed and rested her head on her hand, gazing at the young man. Fenton looked at her amazed at her story. He understood now something of her strange beauty, the sensuous charm of the octarune, spiritualized by love. That beauty, which had been tantalizing, troublesome, urgent, disturbed him no more. He looked through it to the woman whose character had been revealed. With a quick toss of his head he reached over and held out his hand. She took it without a word and smiled sadly. What do you want me to do? he asked. Take the jewels to Flint's rendezvous. 555 West 146th Street. You think it is dangerous? I'm sure of it. That cab man is still tracking me. But you don't lack courage, I know. I think I'll try it, said Fenton calmly. I'll do my best at any rate. Where can I find you, to let you know the result? I don't dare go home, said the octarune. I'll take a room at the King William Hotel. And you can telephone me there. Call for Miss Green. She rose, cast a look about, and added, If there is anything I can ever do for you. Oh, that's all right, said Fenton. You'd better get away now while you can. Good night. She bowed to him soberly, gave him another long, heartbroken look, and then walked away. Fenton, freed from the potent charm of her personality, looked about, almost wondering. If she had indeed been there at all, the German restaurant seemed to be the abode of the commonplace. How could robants have entered? All about were peaceful, prosaic patrons, intent upon their meal. Then he remembered O'Shea. Was he still there? He scanned the people at the tables, one by one. No. Fenton felt relieved. His eyes fell idly upon a stout, muscular-looking man, leaning against a table near him. He wore a shepherd's plaid suit. A protuberance behind his hip looked as if it might be a concealed revolver. Fenton wondered if he were a detective. But the time had come for him to act himself. And he rose to go. End of Chapter 3 Chapter 4 The Liars Club How our amateur adventurer fell a victim to his own inexperience, was relieved of his treasure, and fell in with a precious company. Fully convinced of the truth of this extraordinary woman's tale, and with all the chivalry of a romantic youth aroused, John Fenton set out to restore the jewels, with his overcoat pockets still clumsy with the treasure. He left Sheffel Hall, and went out into a chilly, misty night, intent upon his adventurous errand. What danger lay in wait? He did not know, nor care. He was no longer a poor, unknown draftsman. He was a night-errant bent upon the rescue of imperiled honor. The city had become, of a sudden, strange, mysterious. Every shadow was a suggestion of malice. So he walked hurriedly along 18th Street to the subway entrance. Once he turned round and saw two men following him, he increased his speed. The lights of the glazed entrance promised a safe haven. His haste, however, brought disaster. At the entrance a step was raised a scant inch from the bricks of the sidewalk. Upon that low projection his toe caught, and he fell, sprawling, hitting his forehead upon the iron plate. And as he fell, his overloaded pockets disgorged jewelry and precious stones all about him. For a moment he lay there stunned, only half-conscious. The next thing he knew, two men were helping him to rise. His head was buzzing, blood was dripping from his face. He would have fallen again, but for their assistance. In another moment he smelt the sickish odor of chloroform, and he lost consciousness for a moment. Before he went off, voices sounded strangely in his ears, and his half-opened eyes caught sight of Mangas O'Shay, supporting him. He was too dazed even to realize his danger. When he regained partial use of his senses, he was walking, still supported by the two men. He could scarcely support his own weight, and they held him up by sheer strength of arm. He caught a few words. There's a stable round the corner. I'll get a cab, and we'll take him to—it was Mangas O'Shay who was speaking. Then, as in a dream, he walked on, tottering. It seemed to last for hours that horrible journey. Slowly began to revive, and started to protest. HIST, he's coming round again, said another voice. Give him another whiff. A damp handkerchief was held hard to his nostrils for a few seconds. He struggled weakly, and went back into oblivion. So alternately walking and dozing off again, trying to shake himself free, as from some awful nightmare, he was dragged on and on and on. The next thing he knew, he was in a cab. This time he had blid enough not to show signs of reviving, but sat huddled between two men, listening. His pockets were being deliberately rifled. O'Shay was spilling his own but the spoil, as he talked. To Peter Stowe's loft, he was saying, Peter won't be there tonight. He'll be at the club, telling his spools stories. We can make a good getaway. Take his pants off, and he'll stay a while. We'll divvy up at the Norcross, and catch the first boat over the pond. Even an indiscreet movement of Fenton's head attracted the notice of his captors. The chloroform handkerchief was pressed firmly to his nose again, and Fenton knew no more. He awoke. He had no idea how long afterward, with chilled legs to find himself lying on his back, sick with nausea, his trousers missing. He was in some dark place and could see nothing except at one side a row of dim spots that were from time to time obliterated, one by one, and reappeared again like holes in the dark, admitting the merest trace of light. He was not out of doors, though the floor he lay on felt as if covered with gravel. There was a close, unfamiliar smell in his nostrils, and in his ears a confused noise like cooing, a low persistent guttural sound he could not at first explain. So soon as his brain cleared he made out, by the fluttering of wings back and forth, and the peep of chicks, that he was in some sort of a large dove-coat or pigeon-house. Every little while he felt a sharp peck at his bare legs and feathers brushed his face. He reached out his hand cautiously, felt a bird slip away from him, and his hand fell upon some small eggs, still warm from the mother. He lay there a while longer in wonderful discomfort, trying to puzzle out his situation. As the nausea wore off, he arose, and stumbling over pigeons and smashing eggs at every step, groped his way toward the light. The windows were too small for him to see anything outside. He started to explore the garret. Bang! he suddenly fell, just escaping, being precipitated into a hole in the floor, square like the opening for a ladder, though no ladder was there. He thanked his lucky stars that he had only barked his shins, and rubbed them till he found they were sticky, whether with blood or broken eggs. He could not in the darkness be sure. No light came from the trap in the floor. All he could see about him were vague forms that flitted to and fro. All he could hear was the monotonous brooding murmur of doves. There seemed no escape till someone came. He shouted aloud, shouted again and again, waited and listened. His overcoat was gone, and the pockets of his coat had been rifled. He found a single match. Lighting it, he gave one glance about which revealed nothing more than his imagination had pictured. Hundreds of pigeons on the floor, on the rafters, flying hither and yawn. He was trying to devise some means of escape, yelling with all his might. Meanwhile, when a light flickered in the hole below him, and a voice came up to him. Who's there? Fenton stuck his head through the trap, and discerned a spectacled old man, with scrawny beard, holding a lantern and looking up at him, mouth agape in wonder. Let me out for heaven's sake, Fenton cried. Who the devil are you, anyway, up in my pigeon-coat? Come up and I'll explain. I've been drugged and left here. By robbers. Your drunk, said the old man, holding the lantern above his head. Then, chuckling, innanely, he walked off to return with a ladder, which he lifted to the trap. Fenton protested volubly against the accusation, and with exclamatory eloquence described what had taken place after having left the restaurant. The old man still laughed as he climbed up. Fenton grew more vehement, but his tail was incredible. The old man sat down on the floor, with his feet on the ladder, and roared till he wept. I say he shouted, I know where you belong, and there you go, too. And that's the Liars Club, right away. That story will get the prize tonight, all right? Robbed, eh? Pockets full of diamonds, and rubies, and truck. Fine! Say, by the time we get down there you can touch that tail up a bit, and make it hum. Never drunken your life, then. Say you certainly must have been up against some merry jags this evening. Well, I like a practical joke as well as anyone. Provided it ain't on me. Come on down, and I'll have you initiated right away. But I've got to hurry up to Harlem, Fenton insisted. I must give notice right away that the jewels have been stolen. After coming with me to the Liars Club first, the old man repeated. What the devil is that? Fenton wondered if he had to do, with a crazy man. Oh, just a crowd of good fellows that meet every night to swap yarns, that's all. We have to tell a tale apiece, lies or truth, it don't matter, so long as the story's good. Only no one can peep about anything afterward. That's the only rule. That and no newspaper men. Because why? Some of our stories come pretty near being the truth. Not like this fairy tale of yours, and he poked Fenton in the ribs. Well, I have no time for fooling around. I don't care how much fun you have. You must get me a hat and a pair of trousers somewhere, and let me go. Not a bit of it. Don't you think of it, the old man grew surly. You come with me, or you go out half naked, whichever suits you best. But if you're a good fellow and don't make trouble, I'll see if I can't get you something to cover your legs. And so, saying, he went down the ladder. Fenton had no desire to go abroad upon the street in his present condition. A combination of blood and bird's eggs had streaked his shins with scarlet and yellow. The droppings upon the floor of the garret had left his coat a sight for mirth. Moreover, he found he had no hat, and no money. He picked his way down the ladder, therefore, in no jubilant frame of mind, but determined to make the best of his situation. Perhaps some of the members of this extraordinary club would take his tale seriously. But willy-nilly there was nothing to do but follow his chuckling guide. Peter Stowe, the pigeon fancier, led the way down a flight of stairs, and threw a door in the rickety partition abruptly into the next stable loft. A whoop of laughter greeted his entry as Fenton found himself in a large room filled with tobacco smoke, roughly fitted up with straw chairs and a long table. About a keg of beer in the corner, a group of men turned in amazement to see his ridiculous figure, and came forward to make a hilarious inspection of him. The pigeon fancier introduced him. Gents, here's the prize, live liar of the evening, captured after a hard struggle in my pigeon loft, making omelets and murdering my squabs. I say keep his story to the last, because why? It's dead sure for the prize. He turned to Fenton and exhibited him as if he were a curiosity. Gentlemen, I've been robbed, Fenton exclaimed angrily. I appeal to you to give me assistance. Don't spoil the point of the story, cry the old man. I had a fortune of precious stones in my pockets I've been captured and drugged. A heavy, horsey-looking man with a square jaw and a striped sweater stepped forward and laid a massive hand on Fenton's shoulder. See here, kiddo, you follow instructions, see? There's enough of us here to handle you all right, if you kick up a row. You'll have your chance in good time. Sit down in that chair and have a mug of beer and a pipe. Now then, boys, we'll have another story. Seeing by the cynical faces that further objections would be useless, Fenton sat down and hid his bare legs under the table. Beer was set in front of him and tobacco offered. It was evident now he had time to observe the crowd, that the meeting had been interrupted by his advent, so he decided to make the best of it and watch his chance for escape. The man addressed as the next speaker was a merry-looking, red-faced man of forty with a patch over one eye. By his fat stomach and his tinted nose he had apparently once lived well and at the expense of others. Fenton labeled him as a second-rate gambler or confidence man, now out of the running. His voice was good-natured and easy. He stuffed his hands in his pockets, stared at the president with his good eye, and proceeded to tell with winks and chuckles his story. The time of his life, my mother's cousin was in town last Sunday, seventy-two years old, never been in New York. Lives down on Cape Cod, keeps a sort of tavern for summer boarders, runs a general merchandise store, lets cat-boats and horses, the main Henry B. Manager of the town of Barnstable. He came up to have the time of his life at seventy-two. Can you beat it? I used to know Uncle Jurden when I was a boy. He was postmaster then, in the days when there was so little male that he could read off the names of all the letters, morning and evening, beginning with Hold a Hoxie and ending with Jeremiah Philpots, all done. Nowadays the whole town is full of summer folks, and the natives pick them good and plenty while the weather lasts. Uncle Jurden was a deacon in the Methodist Church, and always led the experienced meetings, with telling how big a sinner he used to be. But, Lord, everybody knew he'd never done anything worse than swear at his old blue mare when she wanted to stop at the watering-traw. Go long, the darned old slut, was his idea of profanity. You see, his folks brought him up to be a quaker, and early influence stuck. Well, those experiences he used to make up were the only outlet for as good a little streak of hellishness as any man ever had. They were the only chance he had to make good as a sport, and it kind of got on his nerves. I remember going down to Barnstable for a vacation, once, a couple of years after I'd moved to New York. Say, the old man's questions would have made you yelp. He knew no more about life than a Brooklyn baby, but he made it up in curiosity. I recall how he used to take me into a corner behind the shoe counter and ask me, Jared, did they ever go on a bust? And what I hadn't done I had to invent, the same as him. Lord, I made myself out a red-hot hellion for his benefit. I liked the old man. Well, he talked with all the drummers that came along, asked about the tenderloin and the theaters and masked balls. He took a particular fancy to masked balls, did the old man, and all the sporty eating-houses in this old burg. The drummers must have strung him good and plenty. When I saw him next, he seemed to have an idea that millionaires skated down Broadway in dominoes and red masks, and artists' models and scant attire rioted on the trolley-cars. Madison Square Garden, to him, was something like the three-ringed palace of Nebuchadnezzar, or who's this that built the Tower of Babylon in Sodom, or was it Gomorrah? He was dying to see a real gambler. Well, leading such a confounded virtuous life in Barnstable that it got on his nerves, he figured it out that he'd just got to have one good flang at real life in the metropolis to get it out of his blood, and then settle down to the cat-boats and prayer-meetings and clams and be good forever after. There's nothing for itching like scratching, and he'd never be satisfied till he'd had his time. So he started to sew his belated, wild-oat scrop with the cunning of a bank cashier contemplating a trip to Morocco. He squared his insurance and his mortgage debts, laid in a good stock of doodads for the summer trade, bought his wife a new silk dress, and filled in details all along the line, till they wasn't a duty undone nor a debt unpaid. Meanwhile, little by little, he began to salt away the coin for the trip to the great city. Boston wasn't half wicked enough for him. Lord know. He was going to do it big and fling his hard-earned money into the great white way, so he scrimped and saved for a pretty near three years, and in that time he scraped up a thousand dollars, which was what the drummers had told him a good spender would need for one week in Gotham. On top of that he had to collect enough for the trip back and forth, something like fifty dollars. Ain't that the beginning of a bumper crop of adventure? Can you see that old hypocrite singing psalms every Sunday and Thursday night and reading the police gazette behind the counter in between times? I say, when I met him at the train, I near laughed my head off. If you can imagine a healthy sixteen months' intent calling for cocktails and smoking a Carolina perfecto at the Hoffman House Bar, you'll understand how it struck me. Well, he wanted me to show him the sites, no limit, and him to pay all the expenses. If he didn't have the time of his life, I certainly was going to. Well, he blew in on a Saturday night, and feeling a little groggy myself, I induced him to turn in at the La Marquette Hotel, and said I'd call around next forenoon and not to do anything rash till he saw me. It was all I could do to hold him in. He wanted to do Chinatown right away that night, see Chuck Connors do a roof garden and see somebody shot and go on a joy ride with chorus girls. Finally I persuaded him to go in and take a long breath before he jumped into the gaiety of city life. But it'll be Sunday, says he. They ain't no such thing as Sunday in New York, I told him. They ain't had a Sunday for forty years, and I believed it. A lot I knew about it, rounder as I was. Well, you don't always know how the other half lives. Live and learn. I slept late that night and didn't get round to the hotel till about one o'clock next day. Sunday. There he was in the lobby, with a big carpet bag and a face like a drowning horse. Bunk goad. Well, yes, but you'll never guess how. This is what happened. He had got up at about 6 a.m., like all hayseeds, and went down to the newsstand in his slipper feet for a morning paper. Then who did he run into? Bang! But the Methodist minister who had preached at Barnstable four years before. A Reverend Willie it was, and Uncle Jordan simply couldn't get away. He said he was on business buying boats or something, but the Reverend insisted he'd got to go to church with him that morning. They was no visible way out of it, with Uncle Jordan's pious reputation and so, cursing inside he pulled his Sunday face and trotted along, clean over to Brooklyn. Wasn't that rubbing it in? It was a clean, red-brick church they went to, with a new minister who was crazy on foreign missions. And at the end, after the sermon, just before the contribution, the minister turned himself loose to persuade money out of stingy pockets. Just think of it, he says, one dollar will provide red calico enough to cover the nakedness of twelve of our heathen sisters. One dollar will buy toothbrushes enough for a whole savage tribe in the South Seas. One dollar will provide a Bible to convert a cannibal king, and one dollar will buy a marriage certificate for poor pagans, who had previously lived in simple polygitude. He got the house, misers who had never put in a dime before, sweetened up the plate. Uncle Jordan had to make good. It cost him a pang to spend a cent for the Lord on this trip. This was his time with his long-lost cousin the devil, but he dipped into his pocket, and thinking a dollar would make a good show, threw a bill into the plate. The deacon counted the contribution while the congregation sang, from Greenland's icy mountains to India's coral strand. There was a hush, while the audience rubbed. Then the treasurer of the church tiptoed up with them religious squeaky shoes to the pulpit, and whispered behind his hand to the minister. The minister got up, coughed, and rolled his eyes to heaven. The lovable brethren, he said, the Lord hath moved us in wondrous manner this day, and has shed his blessing upon our efforts. The sum collected at the contribution is one thousand and twenty-five dollars and thirty-one cents. The Lord be praised. Amen from the congregation, and everybody looked at everybody else to see if Carnegie or Rockefeller was there in disguise. Uncle Jordan was as puzzled as anybody, till he put his hand into his best pocket, and felt for the unbroken thousand-dollar bill he had put aside to spend on the primrose path. It wasn't there. He had put it into the plate, thinking it was the one-dollar bill he had left from his traveling expenses. Can you beat it? And the man with the patch on his eye reached into his hip pocket for a well-nod plug of tobacco, and took a plentious bite. The roars of laughter had not subsided before the big president rose with a surly face and pointed dramatically across the table to where a young man sat in the shadow of the lamp, his chair tilted back against the partition. He had a chubby face with a huge, good-natured mouth, and had been puffing incessantly during the recital, as if he wished to conceal himself behind a cloud of smoke. A couple of boxes emptied of their Havana cigarettes, and the butts of some two dozen on the floor testified to his industry. Now everyone turned to look at him. He stared back at them without embarrassment. Who is that chap, demanded the president? I never saw him here before. This is Jack Richmond, said a thin cadaverous-looking youth with a chauffeur's cap, who had been coughing behind his hand. Friend of mine, he's all right, I guess, met up with him at a moving picture show. Want to hear my yarn? He's a reporter, thundered the president. I can tell by the shape of his head. Whenever you see a chap with a long, egg-shaped cocoa that hangs over behind, you can bet he writes for the papers. Rat, said the chauffeur. Richmond's all right, I guess. But before he had finished, the massive president strode over to the suspicious character, took hold of the lapel of his coat, and threw it open. With a quick movement he snatched a card from the young man's vest. Look at that, he yelled. What did I tell you? The morning item. Reporter's card. Now get out of here, against the bylaws, to have newspaper men present. These stories don't get into print, if I know it. He shook his heavy hand in the young man's face. Will you leave easy or hard? I think, said the chubby young man, rising hastily and drawing on a soft hat. I'll say goodbye while the walking is good. I apologize for having that card. It was lent me by a friend to get inside the fire lines, while my own house and family was burning up alive last night. But, of course, being a liar's club, I have no place here, and the plain, unvarnished truth is at a discount. I'm a victim of circumstantial evidence. Good day, gents. Saint Ananias guide thee, and he made his exit. Two feet ahead of the toe of the president's broken. Say, that's a shame, said the thin young chauffeur, scratching his head. We lost a peach of a good story when he threw him out, I'll bet. I'll have to hump myself if I want to make up for it. My turn next, ain't it? If you've got anything on your chest, the president announced affably. This here's the time to cough it off. My text is the psychological rule of three, said the chauffeur. Say, this ain't no Browning club, objected the pigeon fancier. No Browning sharp could ever explain. The psychology of three consecutive coincidences, said the you. It's a case for Henry James. Is he a member? asked the ex-gambler. I never heard of him. What is he, a chauffeur, or what? He is a literary chauffeur, as you have guessed, and he always exceeds the speed limit. When he comes in next, I'm going to put it up to him straight. Why is it that no man can stand three strokes of lightning without expecting a fourth? I'll put it another way. When a man has three bad lucks running, he'll manufacture the fourth himself in trying to escape what he considers inevitable. Faster, kid, faster. Your act is flopping. Steer out of the tall word contest and harness on to your pet perverication. I'll do it, said the thin one. Take it from me, the only living gasoline eater who never eloped with a rich man's wife. I'm telling you the unenamled truth. I've got a tail with a wallop. This is a song of my brother's submerged e-flat luck. I'm reminded of the trilogy of sad events by the announcement in today's papers of the death of a young swell named Brewster, who blew his brains out yesterday on account of losing his wad backing a bandy-legged mule named Bellsharmion. Fenton looked up in amazement. Surely the name of Brewster was familiar. Then the other name rang queerly in his ears. He thought of the picture in his pocket. Bellsh could sharmion by any streak of chance be the name of his dream girl? He began to tremble. He could not take his eyes from the chauffeur's face as the thin young man, coughing between sentences, told to the circle about him, his story. The Rule of Three My brother Bill had been running a hog-grantch near Temple Arizona, despite the fact that this particular town is ten degrees hotter than the boiling lava of Vesuvius. He had prospered sufficiently to retire a year ago with a bank roll of eleven thousand dollars, with the wad and a hunger for something to eat better than canned peaches, cactus and bull-derum tobacco. He pulled up steaks for Chicago, spent a couple of days in the Annex Bar, and hit the trail for the big noise at the mouth of the Hudson. When it came time for him to quit the buffet car and hunt his mat, he moseyed back through the train until he came to a sleeper named Bellsharmion. In it he had lower birth number three, a fact which may or may not be significant. Upon awakening in the morning he tried to negotiate some eight dollars worth of ham and eggs, with a grapefruit on the side, but was attacked with a violent nausea. He retired to the observation car and remained there, shivering and shaking with egg-you until the flyer rolled into New York. Then piling into a taxicab, he told the driver to take him to the nearest hospital. The doctors analyzed him hurriedly, pronounced his trouble a sort of cross between typhoid and the bubonic plague, clapped him into bed in ward number three, and there he remained for three weeks. Three separate and distinct times he would have died, but for the thought of the pink-haired nurse and his bankroll. It's a pity he didn't take the count then and there. He would have missed a lot of trouble. On the third of May the doctors declared him graduated, and with seventy-four hundred dollar notes in his wallet he wobbled to the exit, where he collided with a weak-eyed quick whose shaky legs and shop-worn appearance stamped him as a fellow convalescent. Just getting well, says Bill? Yep, says the live dishrag. Where you bound for? says Bill again. Me for the racetrack, says the other, leaning against the elevator shaft and panting for ozone. The docks have all my coin, but I'm good for a marker, and before the last goat comes romping home to the paddock, my pants is going to be lined with yellowbacks, or it's me for a brody into the brine. Bill hungered for excitement enough to hire a benzene buggy, and together the two cripples went to the racetrack. In the first race Bill backed a haggen horse named Tatters and spilled a hundred. In the second a skate named Mellon Boy went to pieces in the stretch and stung my brother twelve hundred dollars. Bill was feeling blue, but his friend was talking pert. He was a couple of centuries ahead, and together they walked into the paddock to take a squint at the ponies and jocks that were getting ready for the third race. See that swell girl there with the black plumes, the big eyes, the parasol, and the aristocratic ankles? That's Miss Charmian, a society pet, says the little fellow, who was so weak he could hardly stand. There's a zebra in this race named after her, Belle Charmian's the filly, and young Brewster, the son of the millionaire, owns the beast. Suffer in Spanish mackerel, thinks Bill, typhus fever in birth three of a sleeping car named Belle Charmian, Miss Belle Charmian on the third of May, and a horse named Belle Charmian in the third race. What's the answer? The bell sounded, and everybody started to run toward the grandstand or betting ring. Bill waited long enough to take another look at the filly, then hustled for the ring as fast as his bum legs would carry him. Belle Charmian was favored at three to five, removing a single hundred dollar note from his roll, and sticking it in an inside pocket. Bill handed the entire remainder five thousand two hundred dollars to a greasy faced bookie, got a card showing that he played the filly across the board, and went out on the lawn to hold his breath. They got away in a bunch, and swung round the track so fast that Bill couldn't see which was ahead. Coming into the stretch, ten million people commenced to pound each other on the head, and yell, Come on, you Belle Charmian, oh you Belle Charmian, and Bill knew his nag was in the lead. A hundred yards from the finish, just as the leaders were right in front of Bill, the filly stumbled, turned a double somersault, slid into the fence, and killed her jockey. My brother crumpled up on the grass. When he came to, somebody had frisked him for the hundred, and he was flat broke in a strange land. He hunted up his hospital friend, who slipped him a wad of sympathy, a five case note, and his address. Come round and sleep in my folding bed, said he. Bill said he would. The address was 112 East 26th Street, and at six o'clock that night, Bill, after a 15 cent meal at Childs, and a ride on the Third Avenue L, finally located the place, and half dead with weakness, and a grouch made for the entrance. His mind was so fussed that he didn't notice anything, until his feet collided with a rubber doormat in the outer lobby. On it, in white letters, appeared the name of the house, Bel Charmian. Not for mine, thinks Bill. Nothing with that tag to it will ever make a hit with me. I'm on to my luck this time. If I enter this cursed shack, I'll be scun out of my clothes in a pinnacle game, or be arrested for blackmail, or fall in love with a blonde chambermaid, or pitch down the elevator well, or something as fierce. That name, Bel Charmian, is the wrong recipe for my help. I found that out. And so he turns out in a hurry, thanking his stars that he'd found sense at last. Just as he reached the sidewalk, somebody yelled, Look out, and wing! A forty foot swing stage hit him on the top of the head, for a ten weeks trip to the hospital again. What did I tell you? Moral.