“Suit yourself!” he suggested indifferently. “I ain't asking for
anything more than I have a right to.”
“Very well, my man!” said Kirschell icily. “If our dealings are to
be on this basis, I hope you will remember that the basis is of your own
choosing.” He swung around in his chair, and, rising, walked over to
the safe.
And then, for the first time, the Hawk moved. He edged silently back
along the floor until far enough away from the doorway to be fully
protected by the darkness of the room, and stood up. Kirschell was
swinging the heavy door of the safe open. The cash box was to be
produced! Lying down, the Hawk could not hope to see its contents if it
were opened on the desk; standing up, he might be able to form a very
good idea of how tempting its contents would prove to be.
Kirschell took a black-enamelled steel box from the safe, and returned
to the desk. He opened this with a key, threw back the cover—and
the Hawk stuck his tongue in his cheek. A few papers lay on the
top—otherwise it was crammed to overflowing with banknotes. Kirschell
selected one of the papers, and picked up a pen in frigid silence.
But the Hawk was no longer watching the scene. His head was cocked to
one side, in a curious, bird-like, listening attitude. He could have
sworn he had heard the outer office door being stealthily opened. And
now Calhoun was speaking—rapidly, his voice raised noticeably in a
louder tone than any he had previously employed.
“I ain't looking for trouble, Mr. Kirschell,” he stated
Hurriedly, as though relenting, “and I don't want you to think I am,
but——”
There was a sharp cry from Kirschell. The room was in darkness. Came
a quick step running in from the outer office, no longer stealthy
now—the crash of a toppling chair—a gasping moan in Kirschell's
voice—the thud of a falling body—a tense whisper: “All right,
I've got it!”—then the steps running back across the outer
office—the closing of the corridor door—and silence.
The Hawk, grim-lipped, had backed up against the wall of the room.
Calhoun's voice rose hoarsely:
“Good God, what's happened! Where's the electric-light switch?”
Kirschell answered him faintly:
“At—at the side of the door—just—outside the partition.”
The lights went on again, and the Hawk leaned intently forward. Calhoun
was standing now in the doorway between the outer and the private
office, his eyes fixed on Kirschell. The swivel chair had been
overturned; and Kirschell, a great crimson stream running down his cheek
from above his temple, was struggling to his knees, clutching at the
edge of the desk for support. The cash box was gone.
Kirschell's eyes swept the top of the desk haggardly, as though hoping
against hope. He gained his feet, lurching unsteadily. A crimson drop
splashed to the desk.
“My chair!” he cried out weakly. “Help me!”
Calhoun stepped forward mechanically, and picked up the chair. Kirschell
dropped into it.
“You're hurt!” Calhoun said huskily. “You're badly hurt!”
“Yes,” Kirschell answered; “but it—can wait. The police
first—there was—three thousand dollars—in my cash box.” With
an effort he reached out across the desk for the telephone, pulled it
toward him—and, on the point of lifting the receiver from the hook,
slowly drew back his hand. A strange look settled on his face, a sort of
dawning, though puzzled comprehension; and then, swaying in his chair,
his lips thinned. He drew his hand still further back until it hovered
over the handle of the desk's middle drawer. His eyes, on Calhoun,
were narrowing.
“You devil!” he rasped out suddenly. “This is your work! I was a
fool that I did not see it at first!”
Calhoun's face went white.
“What do you mean?” he said thickly.
“What I say!” Kirschell's voice was ominously clear now, though he
sat none too steadily in his chair.
“Then you lie!” said Calhoun fiercely. “You lie—and if you
weren't hurt, I'd——”
“No, you wouldn't!”—Kirschell had whipped the drawer open,
and, snatching out a revolver, was covering Calhoun. He laughed a
little—bitterly. “I'm not so bad that I can't take care of
myself. It was pretty clever, I'll give you credit for that. You
almost fooled me.”
“Damn you!” snarled Calhoun. “Do you mean to say I've got your
cash box?”
“Oh, no,” said Kirschell. “I can see you haven't. I don't even
know which of you two struck me. But I do know that you and the man who
has my cash box worked up this plant together.”
Calhoun stepped forward threateningly—only to retreat again before the
lifted muzzle of the revolver.
“You're a fool!” he snarled. “You've nothing on me!”
“That's for the police to decide,” returned Kirschell evenly.
“It would have been a pleasant way of disposing of that note,
wouldn't it—if you hadn't under-rated me! And your pal for his
share, I daresay, was to take his chance on whatever there might be in
the cash box! Why did you say you couldn't come until night, when I
gave you until to-day as the last day in which to settle? Why did you
insist on my indorsing the payment on the note, which necessitated my
opening the safe and taking out the cash box in which you knew the note
was kept, for you saw me put it there a week ago, when you first came
here? And just after I was knocked down I heard your accomplice whisper:
'All right, I've got it.”
“It's possible the police might form the same opinion I have as to
whom those words were addressed!” Calhoun's face had grown whiter.
“It's a lie!” he said scarcely above a whisper. “It's a lie! I
had nothing to do with it!”
“I want my three thousand dollars!” Kirschell's lips were set. He
held a red-stained handkerchief to his cheek. “If I call the police
now they'll get you—but it's your accomplice that's got my
money. And it's my money that I want! I'll give you half an hour to
go to him, and bring the money back here—and leave the police out of
it. If you're not here in that time, I put it up to the police. Half
an hour is time enough for you to find your pal; and it's not time
enough for you to attempt to leave the city—and get very far!”
Kirschell laid his watch on the desk. “You'd better go—I mean half
an hour from now.”
Calhoun hung hesitant for a moment, staring at the muzzle of
Kirschell's revolver. He made as though to say something—and
instead, abruptly, with a short, jarring laugh, turned on his heel, and
passed out of the room.
The Hawk was already edging his way along the wall toward the corridor
door.
“Three thousand dollars!”—the Hawk rolled the words like so many
dainty morsels on his tongue, as he communed with himself. “I guess
it's my play to stick to Mr. Calhoun!”
VI—SOME OF THE LITTLE SPIDERS
THE Hawk reached the door, as Calhoun stepped into the corridor from
the general office and passed by outside, evidently making for the main
entrance of the building. He opened the door cautiously the width of
a crack—and held it in that position. A man's voice, low, guarded,
from the corridor, but from the opposite direction to that taken by
Calhoun, reached him.
“Here! Calhoun! Here!”
Calhoun halted. There was silence for an instant, then Calhoun retraced
his steps and passed by the door again. There were a few hurried words
in a whisper, which the Hawk could not catch; and then the footsteps of
both men retreated along the corridor.
The Hawk opened the door wider, and peered out. The two men were well
down the corridor now; and now, as they passed the single incandescent
that lighted that end of the hall, Calhoun's companion reached up and
turned it out.
“Why, say—-thanks!” murmured the Hawk, and stepped out into the
corridor himself.
It was now quite dark at that end, and the men had disappeared. The Hawk
moved silently and swiftly along, keeping close to the wall. Presently
he caught the sound of their voices again, and nodded to himself. He
remembered that in going out this way yesterday he had noticed that the
corridor, for some architectural reason, made a sharp, right-angled jut
just before it gave on the side-street entrance. He stepped now across
to the other side of the corridor, and stole forward to a position where
he could look diagonally past the projecting angle of the jut. The two
men, standing there, showed plainly in the light from a street arc that
shone into the entranceway through the large plate-glass square over the
door. The Hawk, quite secure from observation, nestled back against the
wall—and an ominous smile settled on the Hawk's lips. The face of
Calhoun's companion was covered with a mask.
“There's nothing to be leery about here,” the man was saying.
“There's no one goes out or comes in this way at night. Well, it's
a nice mess, eh? So the old Shylock called the turn on you, did he?”
There seemed to be a helpless note in Calhoun's voice. He passed his
hand heavily across his eyes.
“What's the meaning of this?” he cried out. “What do you know
about what happened in there?”
“Nothing much,” said the other coolly. “Except that I'm the guy
that pinched the swag, and hit Kirschell that welt on the head.”
“You!” Calhoun involuntarily stepped back. “Yes, sure—me!” The
man shrugged his shoulders. “Me and a pal who was outside. He's
away now putting the cash box where it won't come to any harm—savvy?
He'll be back pretty soon.”
The Hawk's lips moved.
“Number Three and Number Seven,” whispered the Hawk gently.
“I—I don't understand,” said Calhoun dazedly. “Then why are
you telling me this. And why are you staying here? And how did you know
that Kirschell accused me of being in it?”
“That's another one that's easy,” announced the man evenly.
“Because it was part of the game to make him think so.”
Calhoun seemed to stiffen up.
“What! You mean, you——”
“You're getting it!” said the other shortly. “But you'd better
wait until you get it all before you start spitting your teeth out!
Mabbe you've heard of a little interference with the telegraph wires,
and a few small jobs pulled off around here where some innocent parties
accidentally got croaked? Ah—you have, eh! Well, that's where you
come in, Calhoun. We want you—and when we want anything, we get it!
See? We knew about that note, and we've been expecting the railroad
crowd to wake up some time, and we had you picked out to place our bets
on against them. They woke up to-day and began to nose over the line.
It ain't likely to do them much good, but there's a chance—and we
ain't taking chances. We don't want much from you, Calhoun, just a
little thing, and it'll bring you more money than you ever saw in your
life before and without you running any risk. All you've got to do
is stand for anything in the shape of a splice or tap on the line that
they're suspicious of—you can say it's a repair job of your own,
see?”
An angry flush was tinging Calhoun's cheeks.
“Is that all?” he burst out passionately. “Well, I'll see you
damned first!”
“Will you?” returned the other calmly. “All right, my bucko!
It's your funeral. Take your choice. That—or twenty years in
the penitentiary. You're in cold on this. Think it over a bit. For
instance, how did you come to make the break of wanting Kirschell to
indorse the payment on the back of the note, which made him open his
safe?”
“How do you know I did?” Calhoun flashed back sharply.
“Mabbe I'm only guessing at it,” said the man nonchalantly; “and
mabbe I was back in the outside room when you did. But, say, you don't
happen to remember, do you, a little talk you had with a stranger up the
line to-day? And how the conversation got around to loan sharks, and how
he told about a trick they had of giving receipts that were phony, and
how he beat one of them to it by making the shark indorse on the paper
itself? Kind of sunk in, and you bit—eh, Calhoun? We don't do things
by halves. We happen to need you. And what do you think I made the break
of whispering so Kirschell would hear me for?”
The color was ebbing from Calhoun's face.
“It's not proof!” The defiant ring in his voice was forced.
“I——”
“It's enough to make Kirschell believe it, and that's all we
wanted for a starter. We'll take care of the rest!” stated the man
grimly. “What did he say to you?”
Calhoun answered mechanically:
“He said if I didn't return in half an hour with the cash box,
he'd notify the police.”
“Oh, ho!” The man's lips widened in a grin under the edge of his
mask. “So he's going to wait here, eh? Well, so much the better!
It'll save us a trip to his house. Now, see here, Calhoun, let this
sink in!” He put his hand in his pocket and drew out a slip of paper.
“Here's your note. It was on the desk where Kirschell was writing on
it, and I pinched it when I pinched the cash box. We didn't figure
we were going to make the haul we did to-night—we were after you. But
there's some money in that cash box, as you saw for yourself. Here's
the idea: Kirschell's read a thing or two about what's going on
around here—enough to make him know that there ain't much our
gang'll stop at. If you say you're with us, me and my pal 'll
go in there and throw the fear of God into him. Do you get it? He'll
think himself lucky to get off by keeping his mouth shut about to-night
when he finds out who he's up against. Also you get the note back, and
a share of the cash—and more to come later on.”
“No!” Calhoun cried out. “No! I'm no thief!”
“All right!” agreed the other indifferently.
“That's one side of it. Here's the other: Kirschell certainly
believes you took it. He's a shark all right, and he thinks more of
his money than he does of anything else, or he wouldn't have given you
the chance he did. But when you don't show back there with the coin,
he'll take the only other hope he's got of getting his money and
turn on the police tap—see? What are you going to do then? Make a
break for it, or let 'em get you? Well, it doesn't matter which.
This note and a chunk of the cash gets mailed to-night—and the police
get tipped off to watch your mail in the morning. Kind of reasonable,
isn't it? Your pal, not being able to find you, and not tumbling to
the fact that the police have got you until too late, comes across with
your share like an honest little man! I think you said something about
proof, Calhoun? And I think I told you before that we didn't do things
by halves. How about that on top of Kirschell's story—do you think
it would cinch a jury, or do you think they'd believe any little fairy
story you might tell them, say, about meeting me? Does it look any more
like twenty years than it did?”
There was a sudden agony in Calhoun's face.
“My God!” he whispered. “You—you wouldn't do that?”
The man made no answer. He still held the note-in his hand—but in the
other now he carelessly dangled a revolver.
“You wouldn't! You wouldn't!” Calhoun's voice was broken now.
“I've a wife and children, and—my God, what am I to do!”
“That half-hour Kirschell gave you is slipping along,” suggested the
other uncompromisingly. “Here's the note, and there's easy money
waiting for you.”
Calhoun turned on the other like a man demented.
“Do you think I'd touch that cash! Or touch that note—I owe it! I
may not have been able to pay it—but I owe it!”
“Oh, well, suit yourself as to that, too!” said the man cynically.
“It's the other thing we want. What's the wife and the kids
you're talking about going to do if you go up for twenty years?”
Calhoun, with a miserable cry, buried his face in his hands.
There was silence—a minute dragged by.
“Well?” prompted the man curtly.
Calhoun dropped his hands, met the other's eyes for an instant—and
turned his head away.
“Ah, I thought you would!” said the man calmly. “My pal ought to
be back by now, and as soon as he comes we'll go in there and hand
Kirschell his little jolt, and——” He stopped. There was a light
rapping on the entrance door. “Here he is now! We'll——”
The Hawk was retreating back along the corridor. Again he opened the
door of what he had designated to himself as the secretary's office,
and for the second time that night stepped silently into the room,
closing the door behind him. The sound of running water came from
Kirschell's private office, but there was no other sound—the Hawk
made none as he once more gained his place of vantage behind the desk.
Kirschell was bending over the washbowl, his back turned, bathing his
temple and face, and now, straightening up, he bound a towel tightly
around his head.
The Hawk watched the proceedings impassively, his head, in that
bird-like, listening attitude, cocked on one shoulder toward the outer
door. Steps were coming along the corridor. But this time Kirschell,
too, heard them—for he turned, and, as the corridor door opened,
started toward his desk. He reached it and sat down, as Calhoun entered
the room.
“Ah, ha!” snapped Kirschell triumphantly. “So you've thought
better of it, have you? I imagined you would! Well, where's
the——” The words seemed to freeze on his lips; there was a sudden
terror in his face. “What—what does this mean?” he faltered.
Two masked men, the one who had been with Calhoun in the corridor, and a
taller, more heavily built man, had stepped in behind Calhoun, and were
advancing toward the desk.
The short man pointed a revolver at Kirschell's head.
“Calhoun says he keeps a gun in the middle drawer of the desk,” he
grunted to his companion. “Get it!”
The other, leaning over, pulled the drawer open, and, appropriating
Kirschell's revolver, stuck it in his pocket.
Kirschell's tongue circled his lips. He looked wildly from one to the
other.
“We just dropped in to make a confession, Mr. Kirschell,” said the
short man, with an ugly jeer. “We don't like to see an innocent man
suffer—understand? I'm the one that lifted your cash box, you measly
shark—me and my pal there. I heard you trying to stick it on Calhoun.
We ain't asking any favours for ourselves, and when we get through
with you, you can tell the police it was us, and that we're part
of the crowd that's been making things lively around these
parts—you've been reading the papers, ain't you?—but you open
your mouth about Calhoun, you put him in bad when he had nothing to do
with it, and inside of twenty-four hours you'll be found in a dark
alley somewhere with a bullet through you! Get me? You know who you're
up against now, and you've got fair warning!”
Kirschell was huddled in his chair. His little black eyes were no longer
restless—they were fixed in a sort of terrified fascination on the
speaker.
“Yes.” He licked his lips again. “Yes, I—I understand,” he
mumbled.
From his pocket the Hawk took a mask, which he slipped over his face;
and from his pocket he took his automatic.
“I don't think he believes you,” sneered the second masked man,
with a wicked grin. “Perhaps mabbe we'd better twist his windpipe
a little, just to show him in a friendly way that there ain't any
mistake about it—eh?”
“No, no!” Kirschel's voice was full of fear. “No, no! I
believe—I——” His words ended in a choked scream.
The man's hands had shot swiftly out, and closed on Kirschell's
throat. He was shaking, twisting, and turning Kirschell's head from
side to side. His companion laughed brutally. Came a series of guttural
moans from Kirschell—and Kirschel's body began to slip limply down
in his chair.
Calhoun had gone white to the lips.
“Stop it! My God, stop it!” he burst out frantically. “You
promised me you wouldn't do him any harm.”
“You mind your own business!” snarled the man with the revolver.
“We know how to handle his breed. Give him enough to hold him for a
while Jim! We——”
“Drop that revolver! Drop it!” The Hawk was standing in the doorway.
There was a startled oath from the leader of the two men as he whirled
around, a gasp as he faced the Hawk's automatic—and his weapon
clattered to the floor. The other, in a stunned way, still hung over
Kirschell, but his hands had relaxed their hold on Kirschel's throat.
“Thank you!” drawled the Hawk. “I must say I agree with Mr.
Calhoun. It's not a pleasant sight to watch a man being throttled.”
His voice rang suddenly cold. “You, there!” His automatic indicated
the man beside Kirschell. “Stand back at the end of the desk, and put
up your hands!”
Calhoun had not moved. He was staring numbly at the Hawk. Kirschell,
making guttural sounds, was clawing at his throat.
“Mr. Calhoun,” requested the Hawk coolly, “as I happen to know
that you have little reason to love either of these two gentlemen,
will you be good enough to pick up that revolver and hand it to me?”
Calhoun stooped mechanically, and extended it to the Hawk.
“And now our friend over there with his hands up, Mr. Calhoun,”
purred the Hawk. “You will find two in his pockets—his own, and
Mr. Kirschell's. Mr. Kirschell, I am sure, is already fairly well
convinced that you are in no way connected with the robbery of his cash
box, and I am equally sure that in no way could you better dispel any
lingering doubts he might still entertain than by helping to draw these
gentlemen's teeth.”
Calhoun laughed a little grimly now.
“I don't know who you are,” he said, his lips set, as he started
toward the man; “but I guess you're right. I'd like to see them
get what's coming to them.”
“Quite so!” said the Hawk pleasantly. He accepted the two remaining
revolvers from Calhoun; and from his pocket produced his skeleton keys.
He handed them to Calhoun, designating one of the keys on the ring.
“One more request, Mr. Calhoun,” he said. “I entered by the door
that opens on the corridor from this other office here. Will you please
lock it; and, on your way back, also lock this connecting door through
which I have just come in—the key of the latter, I noticed, is in the
lock.”
Calhoun nodded, took the keys, and stepped quickly from the room.
Kirschell, evidently not seriously hurt from the handling he had
received, though still choking a little and clearing his throat with
short coughs, was regarding the Hawk with a questioning stare. The eyes
of the other two men were on the Hawk's revolver. The shorter of the
two suddenly raised a clenched fist.
“The Hawk!” he flashed out furiously. “You cursed snitch! You'll
wish you were dead before we're through with you!”
“So the Butcher told me last night.” The Hawk smiled plaintively.
“Move a little closer together, you two—yes, like that, at the far
end of the desk beside each other. Thank you! You are much easier to
cover that way.”
Calhoun returned, locking the connecting door behind him, and handed the
door key, together with the key-ring, back to the Hawk.
The Hawk moved forward to the desk. He was alert, quick, ominous now.
The drawl, the pleasantry was gone.
“Out there in the hall,” he said coldly, “I heard Mr. Calhoun
refuse to take back his note—from a thief. You”—his revolver
muzzle jerked toward the short man—“hand it out!”
The man reached viciously into his pocket, and tossed the note on the
desk.
The Hawk pushed it toward Kirschell.
“Mr. Kirschell,” he said quietly, “you no doubt had good reasons
for it, but you have none the less falsely accused Mr. Calhoun.
Furthermore, Mr. Calhoun has been instrumental in laying these two who
have confessed by the heels. Under the circumstances, if you are the man
I think you are, you will tear that up.”
Kirschell lingered the note for an instant. He looked from Calhoun to
the Hawk, and back at Calhoun again.
“Yes,” he said abruptly—and tore it into several pieces. “I
suppose I could hardly do less. You are quite right! And, Mr. Calhoun,
I—I apologise to you.”
A flush spread over Calhoun's face. He swallowed hard, and his lips
quivered slightly.
“Mr. Kirschell,” he stammered, “I—I——”
“That's all right!” interposed the Hawk whimsically. “Don't
start any mutual admiration society. I dislike embarrassing situations;
and besides, Mr. Calhoun”—his eyes travelled from one to the other
of the two masked men—“I think you had better go now.”
“Go?” repeated Calhoun, somewhat bewilderedly.
“Yes,” supplemented the Hawk. “As far as you are concerned,
you are clear and out of this now. Stay out of it, and say
nothing—that's the best thing you can do.”
“Well, that suits me,” said Calhoun with a wry smile, “if Mr.
Kirschell——”
“Exactly! I see!” approved the Hawk. “It does you credit. But Mr.
Kirschell and I are quite capable of settling with these two; and you
can thank Mr. Kirschell further to-morrow if you like—when I'm not
here! Now—if you please!”
Calhoun turned, and walked to the door. His footsteps echoed back from
the general office. Then the corridor door closed behind him.
The Hawk addressed the two masked men.