XI.
"Don't you think you'd better get out of this?" I asked Obermuller, ashe came into the station a few minutes after I got there.
"No."
"I do."
"Because?"
"Because it won't do you any good to have your name mixed up with athing like this."
"But it might do you some good."
I didn't answer for a minute after that. I sat in my chair, my eyesbent on the floor. I counted the cracks between the chair and thefloor of the office where the Chief was busy with another case. Icounted them six times, back and forth, till my eyes were clear and myvoice was steady.
"You're awfully good," I said, looking up at him as he stood by me."You're the best fellow I ever knew. I didn't know men could be sogood to women... But you'd better go--please. It'll be bad enoughwhen the papers get hold of this, without having them lump you in witha bad lot like me."
He put his hand on my shoulder and gave it a quick little shake.
"Don't say that about yourself. You're not a bad lot."
"But--you saw the purse."
"Yes, I saw it. But it hasn't proved anything to me but this: you'reinnocent, Nance, or you're crazy. If it's the first, I want to standby you, little girl. If it's the second--good God! I've got to standby you harder than ever."
Can you see me sitting there, Mag, in the bright, bare little room,with its electric lights, still in my white dress and big white hat, mypretty jacket fallen on the floor beside me? I could feel the sharpblue eyes of that detective Morris feeding on my miserable face. But Icould feel, too, a warmth like wine poured into me from that bigfellow's voice.
I put my hand up to him and he took it.
"If I'm innocent and can prove it, Fred Obermuller, I'll get even withyou for--for this."
"Do you want to do something for me now?"
"Do I?"
"Well, if you want to help me, don't sit there looking like thecriminal ghost of the girl I know."
The blood rushed to my face. Nance Olden, a sniveling coward! Me,showing the white feather--me, whimpering like a whippedpuppy--me--Nance Olden!
"You know," I smiled up at him, "I never did enjoy getting caught."
"Hush! But that's better.... Tell me now--"
A buzzer sounded. The blue-eyed detective got up and came over to me.
"Chief's ready," he said. "This way."
They stopped Obermuller at the door. But he pushed past them.
"I want to say just a word to you, Chief," he said. "You remember me.I'm Obermuller, of the Vaudeville. If you'll send those fellows outand let me speak to you just a moment, I'll leave you alone with MissOlden."
The Chief nodded to the blue-eyed detective, and he and the otherfellow went out and shut the door behind them.
"I want simply to call your attention to the absurdity andunreasonableness of this thing," Obermuller said, leaning up againstthe Chief's desk, while he threw out his left hand with that big opengesture of his, "and to ask you to bear in mind, no matter whatappearances may be, that Miss Olden is the most talented girl on thestage to-day; that in a very short time she will be at the top; thatjust now she is not suffering for lack of money; that she's not ahigh-roller, but a determined, hard-working little grind, and that ifshe did feel like taking a plunge, she knows that she could get all shewants from me even--"
"Even if you can't pay salaries when they're due, Obermuller." TheChief grinned under his white mustache.
"Even though the Trust is pushing me to the wall; going to such lengthsthat they're liable criminally as well as civilly, if I could only getmy hands on proof of their rascality. It's true I can't pay salariesalways when they're due, but I can still raise a few hundred to help afriend. And Miss Olden is a friend of mine. If you can prove that shetook this money, you prove only that she's gone mad, but you don't--"
"All right, Obermuller. You're not the lawyer for the defense. That'llcome later--if it does come. I'll be glad to bear in mind all you'vesaid, and much that you haven't."
"Thank you. Good night.... I'll wait for you, Nance, outside."
"I'm going to ask you a lot of questions, Miss Olden," the old Chiefsaid, when we were alone. "Sit here, please. Morris tells me you'vegot more nerve than any woman that's ever come before me, so I needn'tbother to reassure you. You don't look like a girl that's easilyfrightened. I have heard how you danced in the lobby of the Manhattan,how you guyed him at your flat, and were getting lunch and having aregular picnic of a time when--"
"When he found that purse."
"Exactly. Now, why did you do all that?"
"Why? Because I felt like it. I felt gay and excited and--"
"Not dreaming that that purse was sure to be found?"
"Not dreaming that there was such a purse in existence except from thedetective's say--so, and never fancying for an instant that it would befound in my flat."
"Hm!" He looked at me from under his heavy, wrinkled old lids. Youdon't get nice eyes from looking on the nasty things in this world, Mag.
"Why," I cried, "what kind of a girl could cut up like that when shewas on the very edge of discovery?"
"A very smart girl--an actress; a good one; a clever thief who's usedto bluffing. Of course," he added softly, "you won't misunderstand me.I'm simply suggesting the different kinds of girl that could have donewhat you did. But, if you don't mind, I'll do the questioning. NanceOlden," he turned suddenly on me, his manner changed and threatening,"what has become of that three hundred dollars?"
"Mr. Chief, you know just as much about that as I do."
I threw up my head and looked him full in the face. It was overnow--all the shivering and trembling and fearing. Nance Olden's not acoward when she's fighting for her freedom; and fighting alone withoutany sympathizing friend to weaken her.
He returned the look with interest.
"I may know more," he said insinuatingly.
"Possibly." I shrugged my shoulders.
No, it wasn't put on. There never yet was a man who bullied me thatdidn't rouse the fighter in me. I swore to myself that this oldthief-catcher shouldn't rattle me.
"Doesn't it occur to you that under the circumstances a full confessionmight be the very best thing for you? I shouldn't wonder if thesepeople would be inclined to be lenient with you if you'd return themoney. Doesn't it occur--"
"It might occur to me if I had anything to confess--about this purse."
"How long since you've seen Mrs. Edward Ramsay?" He rushed thequestion at me.
I jumped.
"How do you know I've ever seen her?"
"I do know you have."
"I don't believe you."
"Thank you; neither do I believe you, which is more to the point.Come, answer the question: how long is it since you have seen the lady?"
I looked at him. And then I looked at my glove, and slowly pulled thefingers inside out, and then--then I giggled. Suddenly it came tome--that silly, little insane dodge of mine in the Bishop's carriagethat day; the girl who had lost her name; and the use all that affairmight be to me if ever--
"I'll tell you if you'll let me think a minute," I said sweetly."It--it must be all of fifteen months."
"Ah! You see I did know that you've met the lady. If you're wiseyou'll draw deductions as to other things I know that you don't think Ido.... And where did you see her?"
"In her own home."
"Called there," he sneered, "alone?"
"No," I said very gently. "I went there, to the best of myrecollection, with the Bishop--yes, it was the Bishop, Bishop VanWagenen."
"Indeed!"
I could see that he didn't believe a word I was saying, which made mehappily eager to tell him more.
"Yes, we drove up to the Square one afternoon in the Bishop'scarriage--the fat, plum-colored one, you know. We had tea there--atleast, I did. I was to have spent the night, but--"
"That's enough of that."
I chuckled. Yes, Mag
Monahan, I was enjoying myself. I was having arun for my money, even if it was the last run I was to have.
"So it's fifteen months since you've seen Mrs. Ramsay, eh?"
"Yes."
He turned on me with a roar.
"And yet it's only a week since you saw her at Mrs. Gates'."
"Oh, no."
"No? Take care!"
"That night at Mrs. Gates' it was dark, you know, in the front room. Ididn't see Mrs. Ramsay that night. I didn't know she was there at alltill--"
"Till?"
"Till later I was told."
"Who told you?"
"Her husband."
He threw down his pencil.
"Look here, this is no lark, young woman, and you needn't troubleyourself to weave any more fairy tales. Mr. Ramsay is in a--he's veryill. His own wife hasn't seen him since that night, so you see you'relying uselessly."
"Really!" So Edward didn't go back to Mrs. Gates' that night. Tut!tut! After his telephone message, too!
"Now, assuming your innocence of the theft, Miss Olden, what is yourtheory; how do you account for the presence of that purse in your flat?"
"Now, you've hit the part of it that really puzzles me. How do youaccount for it; what is your theory?"
He got to his feet, pushing his chair back sharply.
"My theory, if you want to know it, is that you stole the purse; thatyour friend Obermuller believes you did; that you got away with thethree hundred, or hid it away, and--"
"And what a stupid thief I must be, then, to leave the empty purseunder my lounge!"
"How do you know it was empty?" he demanded sharply.
"You said so... Well, you gave me to understand that it was, then.What difference does it make? It would be a still stupider thief who'dleave a full purse instead of an empty one under his own lounge."
"Yes; and you're not stupid, Miss Olden."
"Thank you. I'm sorry I can't say as much for you."
I couldn't help it. He was such a stupid. The idea of telling me thatFred Obermuller believed me guilty! The idea of thinking me such afool as to believe that! Such men as that make criminals. They're sofat-witted you positively ache--they so tempt you to pull the wool overtheir eyes. O Mag, if the Lord had only made men cleverer, there'd befewer Nancy Oldens.
The Chief blew a blast at his speaking-tube that made his purple cheeksseem about to burst. My shoulders shook as I watched him, he was sowrathy.
And I was still laughing when I followed the detective out into thewaiting-room, where Obermuller was pacing the floor. At the sight ofmy smiling face he came rushing to me.
"Nance!" he cried.
"Orders are, Morris," came in a bellow from the Chief at his door,"that no further communication be allowed between the prisoner and--"
Phew! All the pertness leaked out of me. Oh, Mag, I don't like thatword. It stings--it binds--it cuts.
I don't know what I looked like then; I wasn't thinking of me. I waswatching Obermuller's face. It seemed to grow old and thin and haggardbefore my eyes, as the blood drained out of it. He turned with anexclamation to the Chief and--
And just then there came a long ring at the telephone.
Why did I stand there? O Mag, when you're on your way to the place Iwas bound for, when you know that before you'll set foot in this samebright little room again, the hounds in half a dozen cities will havescratched clean every hiding-place you've had, when your every act willbe known and--and--oh, then, you wait, Mag, you wait foranything--anything in the world; even a telephone call that may only bebringing in another wretch like yourself; bound, like yourself, for theTombs.
The Chief himself went to answer it.
"Yes--what?" he growled. "Well, tell Long Distance to get busy.What's that? St. Francis--that's the jag ward, isn't it? Who is it?Who? Ramsay!"
I caught Obermuller's hand.
"I don't hear you," the Chief roared. "Oh--yes? Yes, we've got thethief, but the money--no, we haven't got the money. The deuce you say!Took it yourself? Out of your wife's purse--yes.... Yes. But we'vegot the--What? Don't remember where you--"
"Steady, Nance," whispered Obermuller, grabbing my other hand.
I tried to stand steady, but everything swayed and I couldn't hear therest of what the Chief was saying, though all my life seemed condensedinto a listening. But I did hear when he jammed the receiver on thehook and faced us.
"Well, they've got the money. Ramsay took the purse himself, thinkingit wasn't safe there under the spread where any servant might betempted who chanced to uncover it. You'll admit the thing lookedshady. The reason Mrs. Ramsay didn't know of it is because the oldman's just come to his senses in a hospital and been notified that thepurse was missing."
"I want to apologize to you, Chief," I mumbled.
"For thinking me stupid? Oh, we were both--"
"No, for thinking me not stupid. I am stupid--stupid--stupid. The oldfellow I told you about, Mr. O., and the way I telephoned him out ofthe flat that night--it was--"
"Ramsay!"
I nodded, and then crumbled to the floor.
It was then that they sent for you, Mag.
Why didn't I tell it straight at the first, you dear old Mag? Because Ididn't know the straight of it, then, myself. I was so heavy-witted Inever once thought of Edward. He must have taken the bills out of thepurse and then crammed them in his pocket while he was waiting there onthe lounge and I was pretending to telephone and--
But it's best as it is--oh, so best! Think, Mag! Two people who knewher--who knew her, mind--believed in Nancy Olden, in spite ofappearances: Obermuller, while we were in the thick of it, and; you,you dear girl, while I was telling you of it.