Part 8 (1/2)
”Oh, I know! I know, Bertha!” he burst out heavily. ”I'm talking through my hat. You've got the roughest job of any of us, old girl. Don't mind what I'm saying. Something's badly wrong, and I'm half crazy. It's certain now that the White Moll's the one that's been doing us, and what I really came down here for to-night was to tell you that your job from now on was to get the White Moll. You helped her last night. She doesn't know you are anybody but Gypsy Nan, and so you're the one person in New York she'll dare try to communicate with sooner or later. Understand?
That's what I came for, not to talk like a fool--but that fellow I found here started me off. Who is he? What did he want?”
”He wanted the White Moll, too,” said Rhoda Gray, with a short laugh.
”Oh, he did, eh!” Danglar's lips twisted into a sudden, merciless smile.
”Well, go on! Who is he?”
”I don't know who he is,” Rhoda Gray answered a little impatiently. ”He said he was an adventurer--if you can make anything out of that. He said he got the White Moll away from Rough Rorke last night, after Rorke had arrested her; and then he doped the rest out the same as you have--that he could find the White Moll again through Gypsy Nan. I don't know what he wanted her for.”
”That's better!” snarled Danglar, the merciless smile still on his lips.
”I thought she must have had a pal, and we know now who her pal is. It's open and shut that she's sitting so tight she hasn't been able to get into touch with him, and that's what's worrying Mr. Adventurer.”
Rhoda Gray, save for a nod of her head, made no answer.
Danglar laughed suddenly, as though in relief; then, coming closer to the bed, plunged his hand into his coat pocket, and tossed handful of jewelry carelessly into Rhoda Gray's lap.
”I feel better than I did!” he said, and laughed again. ”It's a cinch now that we'll get them both through you, and it s a cinch that the White Moll won't cut in to-night. Put those sparklers away with the rest until we get ready to 'fence' them.”
Rhoda Gray did not speak. Mechanically, as though she were living through some hideous nightmare, she began to scoop up the gems from her lap and allow them to trickle back through her fingers. They flashed and scintillated brilliantly, even in the meager light. They seemed alive with some premonitory, baleful fire.
”Yes, there's some pretty slick stuff there,” said Danglar, with an appraising chuckle; ”but there'll be something to-night that'll make all that bunch look like chicken-feed. The boys are at work now, and we'll have old Hayden-Bond's necklace in another hour. Skeeny's got the Sparrow tied up in the old room behind Shluker's place, and once we're sure there's no back-fire anywhere, the Sparrow will chirp his last chirp.” He laughed out suddenly, and, leaning forward, clapped Rhoda Gray exultantly on the shoulder. ”It was like taking candy from a kid! The Sparrow and the old man fell for the sick-mother, needing-her-son-all-night stuff without batting a lid; but the Sparrow hasn't been holding the old lady's hand at the bedside yet. We took care of that.”
Again Rhoda Gray made no comment. She wondered, as she gripped at the rings and brooches in hand, so fiercely that the settings p.r.i.c.ked into the flesh, if her face mirrored in any way the cold, sick misery that had suddenly taken possession of her soul. The Sparrow! She knew the Sparrow; she knew the Sparrow's sick mother. That part of it was true.
The Sparrow did have an old mother who was sick. A fine old lady--finer than the son--Finch, her name was. Indirectly, she knew old Hayden-Bond, the millionaire, and--Almost subconsciously she was aware that Danglar was speaking again.
”I guess luck's breaking our way again,” he grinned. ”The old boy paid a hundred thousand cold for that necklace. You know how long we've been waiting to get our hooks on it, and we've never had our eyes off his house for two months. Well, it pays to wait, and it pays to do things right. It broke our way at last to-night, all right, all right! To-day's Sat.u.r.day--and the safety deposit vaults aren't open on Sunday. Mrs.
Hayden-Bond's been away all week visiting, but she comes back to-morrow, and there's some swell society fuss fixed for to-morrow night, and she wants her necklace to make a splurge, so she writes Mr. H-hyphen-B, and out it comes from the safety deposit vault, and into the library safe.
The old man isn't long on social stunts, and he's got pretty well set in his habits; one of those must-have-nine-hours'-sleep bugs, and he's always in bed by ten--when his wife'll let him. She being away to-night, the boys were able to get to work early. They ought to be able to crack that box without making any noise about it in an hour and a half at the outside.” He pulled out his watch-and whistled low under his breath.
”It's a quarter after eleven now,” he said hurriedly, and moved abruptly toward the door. ”I can't stick around here any longer. I've got to be on deck where they can slip me the 'white ones,' and then there's Skeeny waiting for the word to b.u.mp off the Sparrow.” He jerked his hand suddenly toward the jewels in her lap. ”Salt those away before any more adventurers blow in!” he said, half sharply, half jocularly. ”And don't let the White Moll slip you--at any cost. Remember! She's bound to come to you again. Play her--and send out the call. You understand, don't you? There's never been a yip out of the police. Our methods are too good for that. Look at the Sparrow to-night. Where there's no chance taken of suspicion going anywhere except where we lead it, there's no chance of any trouble--for us! But this cursed she-fiend's another story. We're not planting plum trees for her to pick any more of the fruit. Understand?”
She answered him mechanically.
”Yes,” she said.
”All right, then; that end of it is up to you,” he said significantly.
”You're clever, clever as the devil, Bertha. Use your brains now--we need 'em. Good-night, old girl. See you later.”
”Good-night,” said Rhoda Gray dully.
The door closed. The short, ladder-like steps to the hallway below creaked once, and then all was still. Danglar did have on rubber-soled shoes. She sat upright, her hands, clenched now, pressed hard against her throbbing temples. It wasn't true! None of this was true--this hovel of a place, those jewels glinting like evil eyes in her lap; her existence itself wasn't true; it was only her brain now, sick like her soul, that conjured up these ugly phantoms with horrible, plausible ingenuity. And then an inner voice seemed to answer her with a calmness that was hideous in its finality. It was true. All of it was true.
Those words of Danglar, and their bald meaning, were true. Men did such things; men made in the image of their Maker did such things. They were going to kill a man to-night--an innocent man whom they had made their p.a.w.n.
She swept the jewels from her lap to the blanket, and rising, seized the candle, went to the door, looked out, and, holding the candle high above her head, peered down the stairs. Yes, he was gone. There was no one there.
She locked the door again, returned to the bed, set the candle down upon the chair, and stood there, her face white and drawn, staring with wide, tormented eyes about her. Murder. Danglar had spoken of it with inhuman callousness--and had laughed at it. They were going to take a man's life. And there was only herself, already driven to extremity, already with her own back against the wall in an effort to save herself, only herself to carry the burden of the responsibility of doing something-to save a man's life.
It seemed to plumb the depths of irony and mockery. She could not make a move as Gypsy Nan. It would only result in their turning upon her, of the discovery that she was not Gypsy Nan at all, of the almost certainty that it would cost her her own life without saving the Sparrow's. That way was closed to her from the start. As the White Moll, then? Outside there in the great city, every plain-clothes man, every policeman on every beat, was staring into every woman's face he met--searching for the White Moll.