Part 35 (1/2)

”That other voice said to Gennaro, 'Sit down while I count this.'”

”s.h.!.+ he's talking again.”

”If it is a penny less than ten thousand or I find a mark on the bills I'll call to Enrico, and your daughter will be spirited away again,”

translated Luigi.

”Now, Gennaro is talking,” said Craig. ”Good--he is gaining time. He is a trump. I can distinguish that all right. He's asking the gruff voiced fellow if he will have another bottle of wine. He says he will. Good.

They must be at Prince Street now we'll give them a few minutes more, not too much, for word will be back to Albano's like wildfire, and they will get Gennaro after all. Ah, they are drinking again. What was that, Luigi? The money is all right, he says? Now, Vincenzo, out with the lights!”

A door banged open across the street, and four huge dark figures darted out in the direction of Albano's.

With his finger Kennedy pulled down the other switch and shouted: ”Gennaro, this is Kennedy! To the street! Polizia! Polizia!”

A scuffle and a cry of surprise followed. A second voice, apparently from the bar, shouted, ”Out with the lights, out with the lights!”

Bang! went a pistol, and another.

The dictograph, which had been all sound a moment before, was as mute as a cigar-box.

”What's the matter?” I asked Kennedy, as he rushed past me.

”They have shot out the lights. My receiving instrument is destroyed.

Come on, Jameson; Vincenzo, stay back, if you don't want to appear in this.”

A short figure rushed by me, faster even than I could go. It was the faithful, Luigi.

In front of Albano's an exciting fight was going on. Shots were being fired wildly in the darkness, and heads were popping out of tenement windows on all sides. As Kennedy and I flung ourselves into the crowd we caught a glimpse of Gennaro, with blood streaming from a cut on his shoulder, struggling with a policeman while Luigi vainly was trying to interpose himself between them. A man, held by another policeman, was urging the first officer on. ”That's the man,” he was crying. ”That's the kidnapper. I caught him.”

In a moment Kennedy was behind him. ”Paoli, you lie. You are the kidnapper. Seize him--he has the money on him. That other is Gennaro himself.”

The policeman released the tenor, and both of them seized Paoli. The others were beating at the door, which was being frantically barricaded inside.

Just then a taxicab came swinging up they street. Three men jumped out and added their strength to those who were battering down Albano's barricade.

Gennaro, with a cry, leaped into the taxicab. Over his shoulder I could see a tangled ma.s.s of dark brown curls, and a childish voice lisped ”Why didn't you come for me, papa? The bad man told me if I waited in the yard you would come for me. But if I cried he said he would shoot me.

And I waited, and waited--”

”There, there, Una; papa's going to take you straight home to mother.”

A crash followed as the door yielded, and the famous Paoli gang was in the hands of the law.

XI. The Artificial Paradise

It was, I recall, at that period of the late unpleasantness in the little Central American republic of Vespuccia, when things looked darkest for American investors, that I hurried home one evening to Kennedy, bursting with news.

By way of explanation, I may add that during the rubber boom Kennedy had invested in stock of a rubber company in Vespuccia, and that its value had been shrinking for some time with that elasticity which a rubber band shows when one party suddenly lets go his end. Kennedy had been in danger of being snapped rather hard by the recoil, and I knew he had put in an order with his broker to sell and take his loss when a certain figure was reached. My news was a first ray of light in an otherwise dark situation, and I wanted to advise him to cancel the selling order and stick for a rise.