Arthur Stringer

“ Kestner could see both the clear-cut profile and the reflected image of her in the mirror. He could see the ivory whiteness of the rounded throat, the shimmer of the heavy cascade of loosened hair, the soft line of one relaxed arm, almost white against the rose-colour of her gown. And more than ever before a wayward impression of her sheer physical beauty swept over him.
It was the first time he had ever seen her in a moment of impassivity, quite off her guard, with that touch of wistfulness which comes to humanity when alone with its own thoughts. ”

“ The floor of Fifth Avenue, washed as clean as a ballroom and shimmering like a mirror, undulated mistily northward. It was a canyon of silence along which the only sound was the periodic clatter of non-skid chains and the throb of an occasional motor-engine. New York stood like a city suddenly depopulated by some vast cataclysm.
The benignant looking Southerner in the black raincoat pounded sharply on the cab-front when his driver, apparently forgetful of instructions, jolted over the Fifty-ninth Street car-tracks and swerved to the right through the Park entrance beside the Sherman Statue. ”

“ Kestner sat absently contemplating his atlas. Then he stared as absently out over the roofs and gardens and hills of Rome. Then he suddenly wheeled about in his chair, his trained ear advising him that some one was opening the door of his hotel room.
The next moment his heart was in his mouth, for he saw a young woman step quickly inside and as quickly close the door behind her. For one brief second he thought it was Maura Lambert herself. But that foolish flutter of hope did not survive his quick stare of inquiry. ”

“ Once there, she surveyed the chamber with much deliberation. Then she sighed, took off the amber-coloured glasses, divested herself first of the black silk gloves and later of the faded widow's-bonnet. Then she placed her hand-bag on the bed beside them, consulted a watch, and with a second deep sigh unbuttoned the jet-spangled waist and groped about the voluminous corsage.
With a still deeper sigh the hand was withdrawn, bringing with it a cigar. A match was struck, the cigar was lighted, and the figure in dowdy black sank into a chair, resting its boot-heels high on the end of the bed. ”

“ The first thing about this man that impressed Kestner was his size. Yet an over-fastidiousness of apparel seemed to lend to the great figure a touch of the effeminate. He reminded the American of an Angle viking in a silk-lined Inverness. He made a figure that at first glance might pass unchallenged through the grand monde of Rome, yet beneath the immaculate raiment and the official-like posture of the shoulders lay some inalienable trace of the charlatan.
Kestner saw at a glance that the man was Watchel, at one time answering to the name of Wimpffen, and at still another known as Keudell. ”

“ The dark-barrelled weapon of gun-metal was slowly forced further and further upward.
Kestner knew quite well what it meant. But he was now powerless to withstand that cruel pressure. He knew that the forefinger of that muscular hand, held so firmly over his own, would contract the moment the barrel was levelled in the right direction. He felt it was all but useless to cry out. Under no condition would he cry out. Yet at the moment the revolver was in a perpendicular position, a flash of hope came to him. ”

“ But her smile was almost pitiful.
"It's crime that's fatal," cried Kestner. "You can't succeed, neither you nor your father nor Morello. You're getting protection of a kind at the present moment. But it's a poor kind, and it can't last! You're facing the wrong way. You'll only go down, and still farther down, and at every step you'll have meaner and dirtier work to do. You'll go down until you're nothing but a slum-worker leading the life of a street-cat. You'll shut yourself off from every decent influence that can come into a woman's life. ”

“ Even before he held it up and made sure of its dimensions, of its length of body and width of shoulder, he knew the coat belonged to Lambert.
He knew then that his enemy was still there; and it was fair to assume he was not asleep. That enemy, in fact, was as prepared for emergency as was his pursuer. He stood as ready for silent retreat or advance as did Kestner himself.
The man with the antennæ-like fingers stood erect, peering about the blackness that engulfed him. He seemed to sniff danger in the air, as an animal upwind sniffs pursuit. ”

“ It seemed life again, that plunge into action after such aeons of silence and waiting.
"Killed him?" he cried as he stooped forward and slapped about the inert hip of the stunned man. "I ought to have killed him," he added as he drew Carlesi's revolver from its hidden pocket.
"Is he dead?" she quavered. Her hand was groping blindly about until it rested on one of the carbine-cases.
"He's no more dead than he was when Lambert said you'd shot him. And we know how dead that was!"
Kestner had already dropped to his knees and was busily engaged in unlacing the unconscious Italian's shoes. ”

“ About that youth Kestner could find little that was worthy of attention. But he let no movement of the sallow-faced boy escape him.
Beyond the counter-top were the targets, white-painted discs of metal, a row of clay pipes illuminated by unseen electric-bulbs, and a further row of diminutive white ducks which travelled on an endless chain across a dusky and well-devised background, a ceaseless, hurrying procession ceaselessly inviting the skill of the most casual visitor. ”

“ But Kestner did not choose to wait.
"You won't come in contact with one man you can respect or trust. But crooked as they are, the time will come when you'll have to turn to them for protection. And if they give you that, they'll expect their price for it. And they'll get their price, in the end. Oh, believe me, I've seen the woman adventurer. I've followed their careers, by the hundred—not through novels, but through life. They all lead one way, and that way is down!" ”

“ Kestner said as he tied the ends of the roughly-made bandage.
"I'm not frightened—for myself," she quavered as she stared down at the inert figure on the floor.
"Then don't worry about that ox," was the other's quick cry of contempt. "Nothing but a rope will end him!"
Kestner steadied her as she rose to her feet. A sob caught in her throat as she leaned on his arm.
"Do you know what this means?" she tremulously asked. She was still staring apprehensively down at Watchel's groaning figure.
"It means the end of this sort of thing," declared Kestner. ”

“ For the second time Kestner saw the lines about Lambert's mouth harden. There was no doubt of his domination in that little circle.
"It's necessary, and that's enough. You've done your part, now, Tony and I will do ours."
"But you can't kill a man in cold blood,—you can't!" she cried, her voice shaking with a vibrata of horror.
"I've already told you," retorted Lambert, quite untouched by her outburst, "that he's going to do the thing himself!" ”

“ This figure sat in a wing-chair, at the end of a heavy oak table. Its ample paunch was covered by a cherry-coloured dressing-gown of quilted silk. It had a patriarchal polished dome, and a ruffled fringe of greyish-blonde hair. It also had round and innocent-looking amber-coloured eyes. A terrace of fleshy dewlaps took the place of a chin, and added to the blithe inanity, the cherubic other-worldliness, of the figure's general expression.
The man in the wing-chair, at first sight, seemed querulously invertebrate, a pathetic and foolish figure without guile and without purpose in life. ”

“ His next impression, as she turned to give a word of direction to her driver, was that she was a valuable woman for the work she had elected to follow, a woman of quick wit and pert manners, touched with both audacity and the love of adventure, as unconscious of any complicating moral-code as were the birds of the air, as light of heart, indeed, as a city sparrow, as ready to snatch at a chance as a terrier is to snatch at a chicken-bone. ”

“ The driver did not even wait to determine the outcome of that encounter. He ran to the front of his car, cranked his engine, and climbed into his seat. He could still feel the cab rock and jolt with the fury of the struggle going on inside. From that narrow little arena he could hear short gasps and grunts which warned him that the fight was not as one-sided as it had promised to be. And by the light of a nearby Park lamp Wilsnach could see slowly approaching them the great waterproofed figure of a policeman. ”

“ A recurring sense of desolation crept over Kestner as he unfolded his pocket-atlas of Europe and traced his course from city to city. He had journeyed half way around the world in search of a woman, and he seemed no nearer her than seven long months ago when, after the death of Lambert, he had taken up the trail.
He had first gone over New York, every nook and cranny. He had questioned and cross-questioned every person who had been in touch with Lambert and his little band. He had canvassed taxicab drivers and ticket sellers and station guards. ”

“ They were pitted in that abysmal blackness, as men pit game-cocks to fight out their fight to a finish.
Fate had indeed pitted them there, but Fate had not ordained that they should fight. For something had made Lambert suspicious. He had grown as silent as a hunted animal assured of the adequacy of its shelter. He had converted that interminable night into a duel of silences. He had suddenly lapsed into utter stillness,—and for a stillness so heroically maintained, Kestner knew, there must indeed be an ample reason. ”

“ The screen of rose and gold went down in the struggle; a chair was overturned. Instinctively Morello gave way before that shower of blows. The two had fought their way to the doorway before Kestner realised the necessity of slipping back into the darkness. Then came another blow, at the base of the skull, and Morello went down like a stockyard steer, without a sound.
The rat-browed victor dropped on one knee beside him. A second later he had possession of the revolver. With an equally quick movement or two he had taken what money there was in the unconscious man's pockets. ”

“ Kestner knew what the sound of that falling body meant. He groped his way forward in a sudden panic of apprehension. He ran back and forth in the open spaces, searching for the spot where that other man must surely have gone down.
Then he stopped short and crouched back, listening, warned by some whispering sixth sense, remembering that Lambert had long since proved himself a master of trickery. He stood there, pondering if that fall might not be the pretence of a wily enemy to gain time enough to reload a revolver, or at least drag himself silently off to more sheltered quarters. ”

“ Kestner, no longer wearing his pink cock's comb and his arm-sling, stared over the ship's rail as his liner, having slipped through Quarantine a few minutes before sunset, crept from the Upper Bay into the narrower reaches of the North River. He stared disconsolately at the city of his birth, depressed by that thin misery which so often returns to the traveller who remembers that he has become a man without a country.
"So that's New York!" sighed Wilsnach, close beside him at the ship's rail. ”

“ You're the cur who's low enough to steal a woman's keys and plant in her private desk a package of papers you thought would leave her in your power! You're the cowardly hound who tried to drag an honest woman into a life that was hateful to her, and you tried to do it by stealing Alfred Ruhl's cipher-messages to the Chief of the General Staff at Prague and hiding them in that desk and then having a couple of Italian agents as currish as yourself hound her until she was to swing in with your plans! ”

“ The violet-blue eyes were once more courageously meeting Kestner's unparticipating stare. "You remember what you told me in Palermo? How father and I could never keep on at this sort of work, how it must go from bad to worse, and always lead to one end, and only one end? Well, that is the way it is leading. I always tried to tell myself that money would be a protection. To do what we were doing seemed terrible only when it implied poverty and terror and flight from one corner to another. We always had money enough to keep up appearances. And when we worked together we always felt safe. ”

“ He began to whimper for money, protesting that the girl had plenty and that all he needed was enough to get out of the country, to where it was warm and his cough could be cured.
The listener behind the closed door could hear the girl promising him her help, protesting she would give him what she could. The tones of her voice struck Kestner as being strangely impetuous and exalted, as though the consciousness of some great deliverance had lifted her high above the things of everyday life. Yet something about the answering voice of Carlesi touched the listener with disquiet. ”

“ He had tried in vain to keep his voice from shaking as he spoke.
"You said once that the world was small," she began, in little more than a whisper. Then she stopped, hesitating. He realised, at that moment, how they were proceeding by indirection only, how vast were the reservations which dare not be forgotten, how divergent were the lives confronting each other across a narrow desk-top in that water-front cellar. But the desolation in his heart seemed more than he could endure. ”

“ Kestner, in his work, had always opposed the intrusion of the personal equation. When he had erred, as all men must, it had mostly been through the emotions. Yet here he had made the mistake, as Wilsnach had anticipated, of confounding a case by giving rein to a personal impulse.
There are times, however, when the ultimate truths of instinct and feeling are saner than facts. And Kestner, as he looked at the violet-blue eyes facing him, saw nothing to deplore and little to regret. ”

“ You had killed a man, and no one must know. It was the secret between you and your father. It was the chain that held you down. And Carlesi dead was worth even more to him than Carlesi alive!"
"Oh, don't—don't!" half sobbed the girl. "Don't go on with this!"
But Morello was not to be stopped.
"You killed Carlesi. You leaned out of the window and saw your father carry the body away. You saw it, with your own eyes. But you did not see everything. ”

“ They had already explored Fifth Avenue to the lonelier reaches of the upper city, and had swung sadly down through the wooded silences of Central Park, and had wandered by way of Seventy-second Street over to Riverside Drive, and had stopped to stare pensively up at Grant's Tomb, and had swung down Broadway again, bewildered by the changes which had crept over a city altering with every altering season. ”

“ She was on her feet by this time, staring down at him with almost frightened eyes.
"Are you ashamed of me, of what I've been?" he asked as he stood confronting her.
"I am ashamed of myself, of all my life."
"But all your life's still before you," he contended. "We've both got to begin over again."
"If I only could!" she said with a half-mournful little gasp.
Hope surged through him at the sound of those words. He stepped quickly over to where she stood between the bowl of Parma violets and an Etruscan vase filled with anemones. She did not shrink away from him. ”