Part 50 (2/2)

Now, it was natural that the treasurer, carrying such a sum, should scrutinize any stranger, but Harris disarmed suspicion: his right arm, twisted by Hogarth, was in a sling, and he threw himself aside, and seemed to sleep, between the peak of his cap and his m.u.f.fler hardly an inch of interval: so the treasurer, too, worn with travel, settled into a half-drowse.

Harris, however, like many of his type, was perfectly ambidextrous, often using the left hand by preference; and as the train pa.s.sed Bromley, he darted, plunged his knife, streaked with the Regent's blood, into the treasurer's heart, and huddled the body under the seat.

No stoppage till London Bridge, where, with the bag, Harris left the train, Frankl and O'Hara trotting after his burdened haste; and, after two changes of cabs, the three arrived at the Market Street house.

There Harris laid the bag on the floor of an empty back room, where through a broken window came a little light, and the three stood looking down upon the bag, solemnly as upon a body.

Then suddenly Harris: ”Come, gentlemen of the jury, let's have my share of the dead meat: and 'ere's off out of it for this child--only this blooming arm of mine! it's going to get me nabbed as sure as sticks.

Never mind--trot it out, Captain! and don't cheat an innocent orphan, lest the ravens of the valley pick out the yellow galls of some o' you”.

Neither of the other two, however, seemed anxious for the division; and after a minute's silence Frankl said: ”The third of 850, I _believe_, is 2, 8, 3; how are we going to carry away 283 thousand without something to put it in? I vote, Pat, that we leave the bag here, and come and divide at midnight sharp. How would that do?”

”Yes”, said Harris, ”I think I see old Pat leaving the lot with me--what O! You know 'ow I'd fondle it for you, and keep it out of the cold, cold world, till you came back, don't you, you bald-headed priest?”

”Shut your mouth, boy. We can't take it away without something, as Mr.

Frankl very justly observes. Aren't there some safes, Frankl, in Adair Street?”

”Right you are: and one, as I happen to know, empty. Who'll keep the key?”

”You, if you like, my friend. I'll keep the keys of the room-doors. And Harris will stand guard”.

”The very thing”, remarked Frankl.

So it was agreed. Harris took the bag; they descended to the cellar; then, striking matches, down three marl steps to the subterranean way made for Hogarth; and along it, forty feet, they stumbled bent, Harris gripped by each sleeve.

Then in the Adair Street Board Room they lit a candle, and in the room next it found the safes, the largest of which admitting the bag, Frankl locked its door, took the key; O'Hara then locked the room door, took the key; and at the stair-bottom locked another door, took the key; so that Frankl could not now get at the bag without him, nor he without Frankl, nor Harris without both.

Two then went away, while Harris, sprawling cynically on a solitary chair down in the parlour with straight open legs, awaited the _rendezvous_ at twelve.

He had not, however, sat very long, when the taper at his feet glared on a face of terror at a sound of ghosts in the tomb that the house was, and he started to his feet, p.r.o.ne, s.n.a.t.c.hing his knife--thinking, as always, of the Only Reality, the police. But he had not prowled three ecstatic steps when O'Hara stood before him.

”Oh, d.a.m.ned fool!” he went with infinite contempt and reproach, ”to frighten anybody like that! What's it you are after now? Frighten anybody like that....”

”_Alfie_!”--O'Hara whispered it breathfully as the hoa.r.s.e sirocco, stepping daintily like the peac.o.c.k. Tell it not in Gath! If Alfie rammed the knife into the marrow of Frankl's back at the moment when the safe was opened, then Alfie would have, not a third, but a half; and the thing was desirable for this reason: that a half is greater than a third...

Harris saw that: but he seemed reluctant, meditating upon the ground; then walking, hands in pockets.

”Why, boy, he is only an interloper”, said O'Hara: ”I meant the money to be divided fairly between you and me. Why should this Jew come in?”

”All right”, said Harris: ”I don't mind”.

”And I know a little castle in Granada, Alfie, which we'll buy--”

”All right: you go away. It's agreed”.

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