CHAPTER XXI
THE ANTICS OF A TRAIN
At a gesture from Slim, George cut the cords that bound Garth's ankles.The detective rose. With a nod Slim motioned George towards the oak doorwhich opened on Marlowe's cellar.
"Get to the 'phone," he whispered. "Pass the fair word, and bring thewheels here on the minute."
He swung on the detective.
"If you see anybody upstairs, just keep your back turned so they won'tnotice your pretty bracelets."
Garth shivered, aware that a new and disquieting element had entered thesituation.
Slim indicated the revolver, held ready in his coat pocket.
"After George, and in front of me. Always like that from now on."
He touched the bottle of acid which he had taken from George.
"Remember this will be behind you like my gun, but I don't want to shootto kill with either. Just a little in the face is better if you try tocut up."
"You heard my promise," Garth said.
He followed George through the doorway, resisting continually theimpulse to turn around, to assure himself of what he already knew, thatSlim was actually alert each moment to discipline his slightest effortat escape.
They crossed the damp spaces of the cellar and climbed the stairs,pausing at the head until they could be certain Marlowe's evil figurestill faced a bar-room, significantly empty.
George hurried to the telephone booth, fastening the door behind him sothat Garth could hear nothing. Marlowe wiped his hands on his apron. Asly smile twitched at the corners of his colorless lips.
"Well! Well! Who's rented the warehouse? Who are your pals, Mr. Garth?"
Garth kept his back turned. The glasses tinkled musically underMarlowe's nervous fingers.
"Maybe you'll name your pleasure, gentlemen."
"Nothing but a little quiet," Slim grunted.
Marlowe flung up his hands, indicating a profound disapproval.
"Then what you mean coming through my cellar? That might get me in badwith the cops. Or maybe you're detectives like Mr. Garth?"
Slim responded to the strain of this waiting. He turned angrily on theman.
"How often have I told you, Papa Marlowe, to keep your fat mouth shut?"
For Garth that outburst pitilessly defined the new element. Slim's angerhad let slip real evidence of the proprietor's lawless connection withthe gang; and Slim, Garth knew, was unlikely to make blunders hecouldn't retrieve. This one dovetailed into the fact that the detectivecould still identify the four confederates he had seen down stairs--thatis, if he kept his eyes. Slim, then, had no intention of holding to hisbargain with Nora. He would use Garth as far as the border, then hewould protect his own through the unspeakable punishment his twistedsoul craved. Nor could Garth see any way to save himself. Moreover, heknew Nora too well to cast lightly aside the promise she had drawn fromhim on a note of command.
George emerged from the booth. The four men stared at each other withoutwords. Once or twice Marlowe started to speak, but at a frown from Slimhe smothered the impulse in a busy attention to his bar cloth.
Faintly the whirring of a motor reached them. George sprang for thedoor. Slim motioned Garth ahead and followed him to the sidewalk wherean automobile had drawn up. It exposed, in the vague light, an air ofsmug respectability in itself protective.
The driver wore a fur coat with a voluminous cape, of a common chauffeurpattern. Its collar was turned up so that it completely hid the lowerpart of the wearer's face. Garth didn't understand at first when Slimtook a smaller coat from the car, stooped, and whispered in the driver'sear. The other stepped obediently to the sidewalk, removed his greatcoat, handed it to Slim, and slipped on the smaller one. Slim motionedGeorge and Garth into the car, followed them, and, while he jerked outhis instructions, drew down the side curtains. Garth was to sit on theback seat with George, who would keep one hand conveniently on hisautomatic. Slim would be opposite, his gun handy, and the bottle of acidready at his side.
"And that isn't all," he leered. "You're too precious to take chanceswith. Here! Lean forward."
He flung the chauffeur's great coat across Garth's shoulders, and, overhis chained wrists, buttoned it tight about him. He chuckled as the carstarted.
"The cape, George, makes it look as if our friend kept his hands out ofsight for warmth. Let's hope the train'll be a little chilly, too. Yourarms are going to sleep and get a nice rest, Garth."
He chuckled again. He took his own handkerchief and borrowed George's.With the two he improvised a gag which he fastened skillfully in theprisoner's mouth. Then he turned the great collar up so that the gag washidden.
"You've a swell chance to make trouble now, Garth. That's how I check upon a bull's promises. If anybody tries to stop us or to snitch you freeyou'll get the acid in those shining peepers without being able to move.You'd better pray everybody keeps straight."
Enough light entered from the front to draw an ashen glow from the acidwhich he held at his side perpetually ready.
Beyond the driver's back Garth could follow their route among tortuousdowntown thoroughfares into lower Broadway. They went then at a discreetpace straight through the heart of the city. He watched the lights flashby, the impatient traffic, the crowds, hurrying and voluble. Suchthings, taken with the grim man opposite and his unique threat, becamelike one of those dreams which project against a familiar backgroundincredible and grotesque details.
The car at last drew a hollow response from the pavement of the Broadwaybridge. Slim moved restlessly.
"The first toll-gate, Garth! Who pays the bill?"
And Garth struggled, and could not move his hands, for George cried out,and Slim started to raise the bottle as the horse of a mounted policemanhalted across their path. The car stopped.
Swiftly the policeman bent down, shaking his fist at the driver.
"If you want to run me down," he shouted, "why not give me a chance tomake my will? You might be a good chauffeur for a baby carriage. Goahead now, and keep to the right. I ought to run you in."
Slim grinned and lowered the bottle. George sank back. The dryness ofGarth's gagged mouth choked him. How could he continue to face suchmoments?
During the remainder of that swift ride he sat voiceless and helplesslytrussed. He smiled grimly, recalling the promise Nora had drawn fromhim not to resist. He was as little able to resist as he had been whenbound on the floor of the warehouse cellar. Nora, he tried to tellhimself, would not condemn him to the torture of that bottle opposite;nor would she, he was willing to swear, throw her father's career andreputation to the winds. She would try some trick, not realizing howmany precautions Slim had taken.
He struggled again futilely to free his hands, to loosen a little thecoat, buttoned tight about his own overcoat, across his body and hislegs. Nora, his logic told him, could have hit upon no plan dexterousenough to control these men before they could carry out their monstrousthreat. Yet what difference did it make? If she didn't intervene, Slimwould let him have it at the border anyway.
The night was disturbed only by the sound of their passing, nor at thestation was there any indication that an effort would be made to haltthem. So tightly was Garth bound Slim had to help him from theautomobile. He stood beside him while they watched through the stationwindow George as he purchased three tickets from a sleepy-eyed agent.The gag was as tight as at first. Even if it had not been for the acidGarth was helpless.
A dull rumbling made itself audible far to the south, and increaseduntil the rails commenced to hum. The headlight gleamed--hastenedcloser. The locomotive grumbled by, drawing an interminable string ofmail and express cars and Pullmans, shrouded for the night.
At the very end, far from the station lamps, were two lighted daycoaches. Slim and George led Garth there, and helped him to the platformbetween. The rear car was a smoker, comfortably filled with sleepy men.Slim turned his back on it, urging Garth into the car ahead which housedscarcely more than a dozen passengers--men and women in various
attitudes of somnolence. He nodded his satisfaction. It became clearthat for him the gravest strain was at an end. And the car was chilly.The dozing passengers wore wraps and hats. The fact that Garth retainedhis great coat would pass unnoticed.
When they were settled as before with Slim opposite Garth and George,and the acid held ready in the corner of the seat, the detectiveventured with one last hope to appraise his neighbors. A man oppositelounged on his cushion, his paper fallen to the floor, his eyes closed,his head swaying drunkenly in unison with the motion of the train.Farther back two women in deep mourning wept quietly from time to time,and a man and a woman across the aisle stared restlessly at them,speaking in low tones whose accents of pity alone reached Garth. Therest slept. The face of none was recognizable, nor did any suggest theslightest interest in the new arrivals. Garth resented their innocuouscompanionship. It was not to be believed that their ignorance shouldpermit this flight, which, at its termination, threatened him with anunbearable punishment.
The drowsiness of the car increased. Only his captors and himself seemedimmune to the contagion of sleep. The muttering of the pair behind hadceased. The women in mourning had controlled their grief. One of themhad left her seat, and, carrying a tin cup, moved along the aisletowards the water tank. Garth saw Slim glance at his watch. He took inGeorge's contented smile, evidently appreciative of the smoothness oftheir escape.
Without warning a dark and chaotic confusion descended upon anddestroyed the smooth orderliness of their journey. With a sudden jar thebrakes locked. The jolting of the wheels, as if they had left the rails,flung the passengers from their sluggish indifference. The lightsexpired, leaving a darkness almost palpable, through which onemomentarily flinched from the splintering, destructive violence of acollision.
During that first instant Garth was lashed by misgivings for the time,as compelling as those which had been constantly inspired by the threatopposite; and in the last flash of light he had seen that the steadycourage of his captors had furnished no antidote for this unchartedperil. As women screamed and men fought along the aisle towards the doorhe endeavored frantically and without success to free himself. Theturmoil might involve Slim and George, might smash that atrociousweapon, but he could do nothing.
Then he felt George's arms about him. He heard Slim's oath. The joltingof the wheels was less difficult. The train resumed its smooth haste.The lights came on, and Garth stared at the inspector and other men heknew, holding leveled revolvers. Somebody cried out:
"Take care!"
Garth turned in time to see Slim whirling the bottle from which the corkhad been drawn, and from whose neck the liquid was already spoutingtowards his face.
"Then shoot!" Slim shouted.
He heard Nora's voice, screaming:
"You won't, Slim!"
He moved his head. He saw the woman in mourning who had thrown back herveil, exposing Nora's face and Nora's eyes which reflected the unbeliefand the horror of her voice. The future seemed to crush upon him, asable weight, lowered by her as the result of a deliberate choice.
The liquid struck his forehead, filled his eyes. He wondered why thepain wasn't greater. He could not grasp the fact that he still readthrough a blur the tense unbelief of Nora's face, and saw vaguely thetwo condemned men struggling in the grasp of the detectives who fastenedupon their unwilling wrists gleaming handcuffs. Then he understood, andlaughing a little hysterically, shook the water from his eyes.
Shame of his doubt joined the relief that swept him with the urgency ofa material suffering. He glanced at Nora. She had stooped and wasraising from the floor behind Slim's seat a bottle precisely similar tothat from which the water had poured. She had not conquered her emotion.
"He ought to have it," she whispered. "I didn't believe he'd do thatwhen he saw the game was up and there was no use. The chair is tookind."
She opened the window and emptied the bottle. She flung it far to theright of way. The inspector freed Garth from the coat and the handcuffs.He grasped Garth's hand.
"I know it hurt you, Garth, to promise to go along with these crooksquietly, but Nora made me ask it. She passed me the wink at the top ofthe cellar steps."
"You mean," Garth asked, "that Nora had all this planned from the verybeginning?"
"Not then," the inspector answered, "but she promised to get us bothout, and I've had enough experience with that daughter of mine tobelieve her when she talks like that. She chased to the Grand Centralwhile we watched Marlowe's and saw you leave. Got the number of yourcar, of course, and had reports on you all the way to Tarrytown. Amounted cop on the bridge made sure you were all three inside, and theoperator at Tarrytown was a local detective. Nora smiled at them in therailroad offices and fixed the rest."
Garth beckoned Nora. She sat by a window. Her expression was nearlytranquil again. The only concession she made to the reaction was aquick tapping of her fingers on the window ledge.
"Better sit down, too, Garth," the inspector advised. "Your legs oughtto be shaky."
Garth obeyed, laughing nervously.
"I've been trying to hide it."
He turned to Nora.
"I'd like to know how you changed the bottles."
"I only arranged the most likely opportunity," she answered. "I knewsomething must happen to make Slim forget that acid for a moment. It hadto be bigger, more immediate than the fear of capture. Everybody has adread of railroad accidents. Own up, Jim. You were scared yourself whenthe brakes set."
He nodded.
"You sized us up right. For that minute I was about as afraid of thewreck as I was of the acid, and I was trussed like a fowl."
"So," she went on, "I persuaded them in New York to furnish an illusionof the beginnings of a wreck. It was simple. Slim would almost certainlytake his hands from the bottle then. He wouldn't risk having it brokenover him in the smash. But if it hadn't worked out right, Jim, you knowI'd never have let the others come in. You see they were with father inthe dark sleeping car ahead. Father watched from the vestibule. When Ichose my moment--you remember, I was going along the aisle close toyou--he gave the engineer and the brakeman the signals we had arrangedin New York."
The inspector's wink was brazen.
"That's a bright girl by you, Garth," he grunted. "Guess it's time Ienjoyed a cigar again. So long, children."
He drifted down the aisle.
Garth wanted to tell Nora of his gratitude, realizing how far beyondexpression that lay. With a smile she stopped his awkward attempts.
"I think I know what you would say, Jim. It was nothing--only what I hadto do."
All at once he looked away. He had caught in her smile a new,untrammeled quality.
"Why do you look away, Jim?" she asked softly.
He turned back. He tried to meet her eyes.
"Things can't be the same," he said hoarsely. "I know I'm a beast tospeak of it. I know you expect me to take what you did in the cellar asacting. But, Nora, lying there as I was, it made me happier than I everhave been in my life."
He looked straight at her.
"Tell me how you managed such acting."
Her lips trembled.
"I--I think nobody could act like that."
He saw the tears in her eyes. She closed them.
"While I was doing it," she went on, "it came to me that it wasn'tacting at all."
There was no one to see the quick surrender of her hands.
Thank you for reading books on BookFrom.Net Share this book with friends