Part 31 (1/2)

At last Sam Miller's voice answered. ”h.e.l.lo! h.e.l.lo! What is it?”

”I've found Nellie.... Just in time. thank G.o.d...She's at my rooms....

Have Mrs. Anderson bring an entire change of clothing for her.... Yes, she's very much exhausted. I'll tell you all about it later.... Come quietly. She may be asleep when you get here.”

Jeff hung up the receiver, paid for the whiskey, and returned to his rooms. He did not know that he had left three good and competent witnesses who were ready to take oath that he had brought to his rooms at midnight a woman of the half world and that he had later bought liquor and returned with it to his apartment.

Billie Gray thumped his fist into his open palm. ”We've got him. We've got him right. He can't get away from it. By Gad, we've got him at last!”

Jeff found Nellie wrapped in his bathrobe in the big chair before the gas log. Her own wet clothes were out of sight behind a screen.

”You locked the door when you went out,” she charged.

”Some of my friends might have dropped in to see me,” he explained with his disarming smile.

But he could see in her eyes the unreasoning fear of a child that has been badly hurt. He had locked the door on the outside. She was going to be dragged home whether she wanted to go or not. Dread of that hour was heavy on her soul. Jeff knew the choice must be hers, not his. He spoke quietly.

”You're not a prisoner, of course. You may go whenever you like. I would have no right to keep you. But you will hurt me very much if you go before morning.”

”Where will you stay?” she asked.

”I'll sleep on the lounge in this room,” he answered in his most matter of fact voice.

While he busied himself preparing a toddy for her she began to tell brokenly, by s.n.a.t.c.hes, the story of her wanderings. She had gone to Portland and had found work in a department store at the notion counter.

After three weeks she had lost her place. Days of tramping the streets looking for a job brought her at last to an overall factory where she found employment. The foreman had discharged her at the end of the third day. Once she had been engaged at an agency as a servant by a man, but as soon as his wife saw her Nellie was told she would not do. Bitter humiliating experiences had befallen her. Twice she had been turned out of rooming houses. Jeff read between the lines that as her time drew near some overmastering impulse had drawn her back to Verden. Already she was harboring the thought of death, but she could not die in a strange place so far from home. Only that morning she had reached town.

After she had retired to the bedroom Jeff sat down in the chair she had vacated. He heard her moving about for a short time. Presently came silence.

It must have been an hour and a half later that Sam and Mrs. Anderson knocked gently on the door.

”Cars stopped running. Had to 'phone for a taxi,” Miller whispered.

The agitation of the mother was affecting. Her fingers twitched with nervousness. Her eyes strayed twenty times in five minutes toward the door behind which her daughter slept. Every little while she would tip-toe to it and listen breathlessly. In whispers Jeff told them the story, answering a hundred eager trembling questions.

Slowly the clock ticked out the seconds of the endless night. Gray day began to sift into the room. Mrs. Anderson's excursions to the bedroom door grew more frequent. Sometimes she opened it an inch or two. On one of these occasions she went in quickly and shut the door behind her.

”Good enough. They don't need us here, Sam. We'll go out and have some breakfast,” Jeff proposed.

On the street they met Billie Gray. He greeted the editor with a knowing grin. ”Good morning, Mr. Farnum. How's everything? Fine and dandy, eh?”

Jeff looked at him sharply. ”What the mischief is he doing here?” he asked Miller by way of comment.

All through breakfast that sinister little figure shadowed his thoughts.

Gray was like a stormy petrel. He was surely there for no good, barring the chance of its being an accident. Both of them kept their eyes open on their way back, but they met n.o.body except a policeman swinging his club as he leaned against a lamp post and whistled the Merry Widow waltz.

But Farnum was not satisfied. He cautioned both Sam and Mrs. Anderson to say nothing, above all to give no names or explanation to anybody. A whisper of the truth would bring reporters down on them in shoals.

”You had better stay here quietly to-day,” their host advised. ”I'll see you're not disturbed by the help. Sam will bring your meals in from a restaurant. I'd say stay here as long as you like, but it can't be done without arousing curiosity, the one thing we don't want.”

”No, better leave late to-night in a taxi,” Sam proposed.