AT ONE O'CLOCK A.M.
Clara rose at this and faced her adversary, speaking with intensity no
less than his:
"It discredits your boasted intelligence," she said, "to presume so
much as to suggest a compromise to me. There can be no middle course.
You do not care that I consider you an unspeakable villain, but you
must see that you are bound to do one thing or the other. Bring my
lover to me, or--it would be idle boasting to say what the alternative
would be, but you know that I should never cease to pursue you. In my
own way I should certainly circumvent you some day."
"Yes, you would, I believe that; but, Miss Hilman, I decline to accept
your first alternative," and he strode toward the door.
"Stop!" she cried, running forward and getting in his way. "I told you
this would be your last opportunity to tell me the whole truth. You
haven't told me anything yet that I want to know. I meant what I said.
I will not have you come here again."
"Nevertheless, we shall meet again, Miss Hilman."
Poubalov now appeared imperturbable. He had confessed to a certain
weakness and defeat; in the presence of excitement and insistence he
was easily the master of himself and the situation.
Clara realized quickly that she had lost a point by yielding even
momentarily to her emotions, and she strove to recover by assuming once
more what Poubalov called her logical position.
"You have said that you love me," she said as calmly as possible; "can
you ask me to believe that when you deliberately cause me the most
cruel grief? Is that consistent? With all your confessed craft, you
have a certain half-respectable consistency, for you confess to me at
least, how base you are. Will you, then, love and torture me, too?"
The spy became deathly pale for an instant, and then answered:
"We shall see. I have made my confession, and nothing now shall swerve
me from accomplishing my purpose in my own way."
"Is there such a thing as love of fair play in you?" asked Clara, her
emotions now quelled and every instinct alive once more to fencing with
her adversary.
"I suppose not, except in an argument. Even then it might not seem to
be fair play to the party who found himself overmatched."
"In your arguments with me you do not treat me with the ordinary
fairness of admitting me to a common ground with you. You withhold
facts without which I cannot argue as well as I might."
"That, Miss Hilman, is because our contest is over a real issue, not
over an abstraction."
"I don't wonder that poor Litizki regarded you as a fiend!"
"Therein you manifest yourself a woman. You long for invective, but
your refinement cannot teach you how to use epithets effectively."
"This is the end of talking," said Clara, moving away; "I will not
detain you."
Poubalov promptly bowed ceremoniously, bade her good-evening, and left
the house.
Paul slipped out after him, and tried his ability at playing "shadow."
Clara was greatly disturbed by her interview with Poubalov, although
it had added nothing to her knowledge of the circumstances with which
she was blindly battling. She felt like retiring at once, for she was
exhausted, but there was a fresh call upon her strength within a few
minutes of the spy's departure. This time it was the man whom she
knew only by his first name, "Mike," who had been sent from the livery
stable to take Ivan to the wedding. He was an uncouth, illiterate young
man, the most violent contrast imaginable to her recent visitor, but
also the most welcome, for there could be no manner of doubt as to his
simple honesty. Clara found it a relief to talk with him apart from
the fact that his message was one that stirred her with new hope and
stimulated her weary brain to new plans for Ivan's deliverance.
"I was to say to ye," said Mike, "how I'd had me eyes an' more, too,
last night, on the feller what did the trick to me wheel."
"Oh, indeed!" exclaimed Clara eagerly; "but what do you mean? Did
somebody send you to tell me?"
"Yes'm, me boss. I told me boss about it, an' he says you go to Miss
Hilman with that, an' tell her all about it, an', says he, if it's
anything that can be useful to her you can do, do it, says he."
"You must thank him for me," said Clara. "Now tell me, please, how and
where you saw this man, and what he said. I won't interrupt you."
"It's not me as would like to tell you what he said, miss. He wasn't
speakin' to a lady, an' I'm thinkin' a lady wouldn't 'a' give him the
cause to curse as I did."
Mike grinned in enjoyment of some retrospect that Clara thought she
could imagine, and she smiled and waited patiently for him to tell his
story in his own way.
"It was last evenin', miss, at the corner of Dover an' Washington
streets. I was done with me work for the day, an' was standin' in a
saloon by the bar, havin' a drop of beer by myself, when this loafer
came in. He stood alongside o' me an' called for something, I don't
mind now what, for I was onto him, an' was thinkin' to meself would I
thump him, or would I have an argyment. I was lookin' straight at him,
me hand on me beer glass, an' I suppose he noticed me for that, for
pretty soon he turns around an' with a kind of a start, 'Hello!' says
he.
"Now I don't know what would 'a' happened if he hadn't spoke, for I
would 'a' spoke to him, an' it might 'a' been all the same, but I was
that mad all of a sudden, that I let the beer fly in his face. With
that he jumped on me an' we had a fine fight, till the bartenders came
round an' chucked us both into the street. They was a policeman near
by, so we quit fightin', an' went to another bar where we had a drink
an' got friendly. He was already pretty full, miss, an' I was as sober
as I am now, an' after three or four more drinks he got to talkin'
confidential about that wheel."
Clara was on the qui vive with anxiety to know just what had occurred
between Mike and his acquaintance, while at the same time she felt
repugnance to basing any serious efforts upon the words of a drunken
man, as well as distrust as to the value of a clew from such a source;
but she felt, too, that she could stop at nothing in the emergency that
confronted her. So she asked, "What did he say, Michael?"
"First off he was for denyin' that he had anythin' to do with it; but
bymeby, seein' as I wasn't mad any more, an' enjoyin' the trick of it
himself, he told me he done it, an' I know what became of your man,'
says he. 'An' what?' says I. With that, though, he shut up. He winked
his eye, an' talked about somethin' else, an' I, not thinkin' or caring
very much at the time, didn't ask many questions. But this mornin' I
was thinkin' it over, an' wonderin' what became of th' gentleman, an'
thinkin' there must be something crooked, or they wouldn't 'a' took me
wheel off, an' so I told me boss an' he told me to tell you."
"It was very kind of you both," said Clara grateful, yet fearful that
the point of most importance had been lost.
"Was his name Billings?"
"No'm, 'twas Patterson. Him an' me was together for some time after the
fight, an' I walked along home with him."
"You know where he lives then?"
"Not exactly, miss, but I could go pretty near to it. You see, we was
goin' along Washington Street toward Roxbury, and had come a long way
from Dover, when he turns down a side street, an' then another, an' I
kep' along for I hadn't anything better to do. He'd been silent for a
while, an' suddenly he stops an' says, tryin' hard to brace up. 'You
mustn't come any further,' says he. 'Why not?' says I, half minded to
give him another lickin', only he was too full. ''Cause me boss says
he will----' but never mind what he said his boss would do. I said I
didn't care, an' turned back. He went on, an' then I was minded to see
where he went. Of course it was dark, an' I couldn't be certain, but I
think I could go straight to that building."
"Will you take me there?" asked Clara.
"Now, miss?"
Clara reflected. Other objections aside, it might be the worst possible
policy to move prematurely in the matter. It might be a false clew,
she knew nothing about the building, and meantime Paul was following
Poubalov. Much as she longed for immediate action, it seemed wiser to
postpone it until an investigation could be made.
"Would your employer spare you to help me to-morrow forenoon?" she
asked.
"I think he would, miss. He told me to do what you said, says he----"
"Tell him, please, that I would like to have you go with me to-morrow
as soon after nine o'clock as you can get here. I shall want you to
show me the building, and identify the man Patterson."
"That I will, miss, if he's served you any trick."
Poubalov walked very rapidly after he left Mr. Pembroke's. He could
have saved himself many steps by taking a street-car, but he evidently
preferred energetic action.
Paul, following, took note, as Litizki had done on a similar occasion,
of the streets through which he passed, and at last he saw him pause
and stand for several minutes at the curb, looking across the road
at what seemed to be an old-fashioned hotel. After a time he walked
slowly on, and soon thereafter was joined by a man with whom he
conversed.
Paul went near enough to see the man's face, but he did not recognize
him as anybody he had ever seen before. The conversation finished,
Poubalov continued on his way, again walking rapidly, but this time,
after coming to Washington Street, he boarded a downtown car. An open
car was directly behind it, and Paul found a place on its front seat,
thus being enabled to keep the spy in view until he alighted at Scollay
Square.
The guilty as well as the innocent must eat, and supper was the next
thing to engage Poubalov's attention. Paul improved the opportunity in
the same way, but he finished quickly, and waited a long time for the
spy to come forth. He had been watching the restaurant entrance from a
doorway across the street, and at last he ventured over to see whether
possibly his quarry had escaped him. No; there sat Poubalov, at a
table not far from the door, his head bent down as if he were thinking
profoundly. His supper lay almost untouched before him. Just as Paul
looked in, the head waiter touched the customer on the shoulder.
Poubalov looked up with a start, and the head waiter seemed to be
apologizing for his intrusion. It was clear that he had supposed the
customer to be asleep, or ill. Poubalov paid his check and left the
place.
He went to his lodging-house, and when Paul saw that he had lit the
gas, he, too, went inside.
He locked the door immediately and applied his eye to the nail hole.
Poubalov sat with folded arms in an old-fashioned rocking chair,
gazing abstractedly before him. On the little center table under the
chandelier, Paul could just distinguish Clara's photograph.
Paul remained with his eye at the hole until it seemed as if he could
stand no longer. In all that time Poubalov had not moved perceptibly.
The watcher got down and looked at his time-piece. It was half-past
ten. He then sat with his head against the door that he might hear the
slightest sound from the front room.
Just what possessed Paul to be so vigilant on this occasion, when the
spy was doing absolutely nothing but cudgel his inscrutable mind,
he could not have told in less vague terms than that he didn't want
Poubalov to get away from him. If he were to take a nocturnal, or early
morning ramble, Paul purposed to be on hand to accompany him.
Something like a half hour passed, and then Paul heard a long, heavy
sigh, and the creak of the rocker as Poubalov rose. Quickly mounting
his perch, Paul saw him pace back and forth, his hands clinched behind
him and his brow set in hard wrinkles. He seemed to be in for a night
of it, and as his movement promised to be productive of nothing
more than his quiescence, Paul again dismounted and sat down. So
monotonously did the march continue that the listener's head began to
droop, lulled by the very sound he had set himself to hear, and had it
not been for the extreme anxiety with which he had undertaken his task,
Paul would have fallen asleep. After twice catching himself nodding, he
no longer dared to sit still. So he rose and stepped lightly about the
room to start the blood in his drowsy limbs.
The sound of marching ceased. Poubalov had stopped under the
chandelier, and when Paul had him in view he was in the act of turning
Clara's photograph face down upon the table. He took out the leather
pocketbook that had checked the dagger thrust by Litizki's hand, and
examined one of the documents in it attentively. It appeared to be
of an official character, for there was a big seal upon it, and it
was bound with ribbon. Paul could see the holes made by the dagger in
passing through the several folds of the paper, or parchment.
Poubalov laid the document upon the table, sat down, and, drawing fresh
paper before him, began to write. His pen traversed the sheets with
great rapidity, and as Paul could hear the scratching plainly, he
again sought relief from his uncomfortable perch.
It was nearly one o'clock when the sound of writing ceased.
Paul saw that Poubalov had removed his coat. What he had written was
folded and placed in an envelope upon the table.
The watcher supposed that the spy was about to retire, but there was
so evidently something further upon Poubalov's mind, something that he
seemed to debate whether it were best done now, or in the morning, that
Paul kept his place and watched; and as he strained his eye to take in
every movement, instinctively shading his face although he stood in the
darkness, he saw Poubalov draw a revolver from his hip-pocket.
Placing the hammer at half-cock, he tilted the barrel forward and
pushed the cartridge cylinder about with his thumb and finger.
Every chamber seemed to be as he wished it, and he readjusted the
barrel.
Then he walked to the bureau upon which swung a half-length mirror.
His back was thus partially turned to the watcher, and Paul could see
dimly the reflection of his face looking somberly toward him. He held
the revolver in his right hand, the finger on the trigger, the barrel
pointed toward the floor.
Paul was in an agony of doubt and apprehension. What should he do?
How long would Poubalov stand there and allow him to reflect?
Would the spy, then, "get away," and by this manner of exit?
With his left hand Poubalov took his watch from his pocket. He glanced
at the face of the busy and faithful little machine, and it was only
too evident that he had set the limit of his life at some point that
the moving hands would presently reach.