A THREE-CORNERED BATTLE
While Johnny and Hanada were being led away to the patrol box a young
man came running up. He was a reporter, out scouting for news.
"Who's that?" he asked, as he caught a glimpse of Johnny's face.
"Johnny Thompson, you nut!" growled the policeman. "Didn't you never
view that map of his before?"
"Yes, but Johnny Thompson's dead."
"All right, have it your own way."
"What's the charge?"
"Conspiracy. Now beat it."
The youth started on a run for the nearest telephone. He had hit upon a
first page story. A half-hour later every newsboy in the downtown
district was shouting himself hoarse, and the words he shouted were
these:
"All about Johnny Thompson. Johnny Thompson, featherweight champion.
Alive! Arrested for conspiracy! Extry!"
The theatre crowds were thronging the streets, and the newsies reaped a
rich harvest. Among those in the throng was Mazie Mortimer, Johnny
Thompson's one-time pal. She had gone to the theatre alone. When Johnny
was in Chicago, she had gone with him, but now no one seemed to quite
take his place.
As she hastened to the elevated station the shouts of the newsboys
struck her ears. At first she heard only those two electrifying words,
"Johnny Thompson." Then she listened and heard it all.
Had she not been held up and hurried along by the throng, she would have
fallen in a faint. As it was her senses seemed to reel. "Johnny
Thompson! Alive! Arrested! Conspiracy!" It could not be true.
Breaking away from the crowd, she snatched a paper from a boy, flung him
a half-dollar, then hurried to the corner, where, beneath an arclight
she read the astounding news. Again it seemed that her senses would
desert her. With an effort she made her way to a restaurant where a cup
of black coffee revived her.
For a time she sat in a daze, utterly oblivious of the figure she cut--a
well dressed, handsome young woman in opera cloak and silk gown, seated
at the counter of a cheap restaurant.
Johnny Thompson alive, here in Chicago, arrested for conspiracy? What
did it mean? Could it mean that Johnny had been a deserter, that he had
become involved in the radical movement which, coming from Russia,
seemed about to sweep the country off its feet? She could not quite
believe that, but--
Suddenly a new thought sent her hurrying into the street. Hailing a
taxi, she ordered the chauffeur to drive around the block until she gave
him further orders. Her thoughts now were all shaped toward a definite
end: Johnny Thompson, her good pal, was not dead. He was in Chicago and
in trouble. If it were within her power, she must find him and help him.
Studying the newspaper, she noted the point at which he had been
arrested. "Wells street bridge," she read. "That means the Madison
Street police station."
Her lips were at the speaking tube in an instant. "Madison Street
police station, and hurry!" she ordered. "An extra five for speed." The
taxi whirled around a corner on two wheels; it shot by a policeman;
dodged up an alley, and out on the other side, then stopped with a jolt
that came near sending Mazie through the glass.
"Here you are." She thrust a bill in the driver's hand, then raced up
the steps and into the forbidding police station.
A sergeant looked up from the desk as she entered.
"Johnny Thompson," she said excitedly. "I want to see Johnny Thompson!"
"I'd like to myself, miss," he said smiling. "There never was a
featherweight like him. But he's dead."
"Dead?" Mazie caught at her throat.
"Sure. Didn't you read about it? Long time ago. Died in Russia."
"Oh!" Mazie sank limply into a chair. "Then you haven't heard? He isn't
arrested? He isn't here?"
"Arrested?" The sergeant's face took on an amused and puzzled look;
then he smiled again. "Oh, yes, there was something on the records
tonight saying he and a Jap was wanted for conspiracy. But take it from
me, lady, that's all pure bunk; some crook posing as Johnny Thompson,
more than likely. I tell you, there never was a more loyal chap than
this same Johnny; one of the first to enlist."
"I--I know," faltered Mazie. Now, for the first time, she noticed a man
who had entered after her. He stepped to the desk and asked a question
regarding a person she knew nothing of. Then he went silently out again.
Mazie sat quite still, then rising, she smiled faintly at the sergeant.
"I--I guess you must be right--but--but the papers are full of it."
"Oh, the papers!" The officer spread his hands out in a gesture of
contempt. "They'd print anything!"
As Mazie stepped out into the street she was approached by a man, and
with a little start, she noticed that it was the one who had entered the
police station a few minutes before. Halting, she waited for him to
speak.
"You were looking for Johnny Thompson?" He said the words almost in a
whisper.
"Yes."
"Well, he is alive. He is not dead. He was arrested, but has been
discharged. I can take you to him. Shall I?"
"Oh, will you?" Mazie's voice echoed her gratitude.
"Sure. There's a taxi now," the man replied in a foreign accent.
* * * * *
Johnny had not been released; far from it. And yet it was true, he was
at that very moment free. His freedom was only from moment to moment,
however; the kind of freedom one gets who runs away from the police.
It was not Johnny's fault that he ran away either. They had been
following the orders of the police to the letter, he and Hanada. They
had gone across the bridge with them, had meekly submitted to being
handcuffed, had been waiting for the patrol-wagon, when things happened.
Four men dashed suddenly from the darkness, and before the patrolmen
could draw guns or clubs, before Johnny could realize what was
happening, the officers were flat on the pavement, with hands and feet
tied.
Johnny's brain worked rapidly. He understood all right. These men were
Radicals. He was the prize they were after--he and the diamonds. Once
let him be taken to the police station, there to be searched, the
diamonds would be lost to them forever.
But handcuffed as he was, Johnny was not the boy to submit to being
kidnapped without a fight. As one of the Radicals leaped at him, he put
his hands up, as in a sign of surrender, then brought them, iron
bracelets and all, crashing down on the fellow's head. The man went down
without a cry.
Hanada, too, had not been idle. He slipped the handcuffs from his
slender wrists and seizing the club of one of the fallen policemen,
aimed a blow at the second man who leaped at Johnny. A moment later,
Johnny heard his shrill whisper:
"C'mon!"
They were away like a flash. Down a dark alley, over a fence, with
Johnny's handcuffs jangling, they sped. Then, after crossing a street
and leaping into a yard filled with junk and scrap iron, they paused.
"Let's see," said Hanada.
He took Johnny's wrist, and after twisting the iron bracelets and
working for a moment with a bit of rusty wire, he unlocked the handcuffs
and threw them in the scrap heap.
"Clumsy things! Belong there," he grunted.
"But," said Johnny slowly, "what's the big idea? They'll get us again,
and running away will only get us in bad. They'll think those Radicals
were in cahoots with us."
"I think not," said Hanada. "We left them one or two of the Radicals for
samples. But that doesn't much matter now. They will get me, yes. And
they will not let me go either, not even under bond. But you, you have
done nothing. They will let you go. My testimony will set you free. Then
you must carry on the hunt and the fight, which they will keep me from
continuing because they do not know what they are doing. That's why I
must have a little time to talk to you before they take me; time to
explain everything, and to tell you how very important it is that you
get that Russian, and all those that are with him."
"My room," whispered Johnny, now breathless with interest. "My room; the
police do not know about it. We might be able to hide there for hours.
We can reach it by the next bridge and by alleys and roofs. C'mon!"