THE PRISONER OF THE WHITE ONE
As Drexel realized that she was gone, a pang of dizzy agony shot
him through. What his uncle had said about his liking for Alice
was perfectly true; it had been but a boy-and-girl affair at its
best, never warmed by the least fervour; and it had been weakly,
sentimentally cherished by him only because no true love had ever come
to show him what thin moonshine stuff it was. But this was different--a
thousand times different! The danger he had stood in, mortal danger
perhaps, had been nothing to him in his anticipation of days of
companionship with her. That he had seen her for the first time but
three hours before, that she was an unknown personage to him, that she
was hunted by the police, that the report said she had tried to shoot
his cousin-to-be, Prince Berloff--these things counted also as nothing.
Shrewd, cool-headed, imperturbable, with such an eye for the main
chance as insured his getting it--thus was Drexel already widely known
in Chicago. His uncle had more than once remarked to him in his blunt
fashion, “Henry, you’ll never let your heart boss your brain cells!”
And yet this was exactly what his heart was doing. He was wildly,
recklessly in love!
From the first he realised she must have gone wholly of her own
accord--slipped out by the second staircase--and slipped out, to
face alone what dangers? And why had she gone? This puzzled him for
several moments, for she had seemed glad of the refuge offered by the
plan of travelling as his wife. Then suddenly he bethought him of the
instant-long change in her manner when he had told her his name, and
the truth flashed home. She was afraid of Henry Drexel, and her sending
him down to inquire about the train was but a ruse to give her a chance
to escape him.
Why she should hold him in equal fear with the police and throw away
the aid he was so eager to give, was a mystery his excited mind did not
even try to solve. It was plain she did not want to see him, yet his
sudden, overmastering love, made reckless by his loss of her, roused in
him one resistless impulse--to try to find her again. What he should do
when she was found he did not pause to consider.
Putting on his big overcoat and fur cap, and assuming his best air
of composure, he sallied forth into the hall and descended the minor
stairway that led to the side entrance. That he knows he is on a
wild-goose chase, is no check to the search of a frantic man. Every
bit of sense told Drexel he would not find her he sought, yet he
cautiously glanced into such side-street shops as were still open; he
scrutinised each woman who hurried through the bitter cold on foot and
the robe-buried occupants of the tiny whizzing sleighs; he watched each
prowling group of gendarmes to see if they held her in their midst;
he peered in at the doors of cafes--into poor ones where only tea was
drunk--into rich ones, dazzlingly bright, where jewelled gowns and
brilliant uniforms were feasting on Europe’s richest foods and wines.
But it was as his sense had foretold. No sight of her was anywhere.
Toward midnight the thought came to him that it was barely possible she
had left the hotel for but a moment, and that she had returned and was
perhaps in distress because of his desertion. He turned back toward
the Metropole. But as he drew near it, his steps slowed. He remembered
the dinner he had ordered, the police official he had sent for; both
had doubtless arrived long since and found him gone. The danger ahead
cleared his mind, and, going hesitatingly forward, he was pondering
whether he should risk himself anew on so slight a chance of giving
aid, when the matter was decided in a wholly unexpected manner.
As he was passing a street lamp, a young fellow with a few papers
under his arm stepped before him. “Buy a paper, Your Excellency,” he
snuffled, shooting a keen upward glance at Drexel.
“Don’t want any,” Drexel curtly returned, and pushed by him.
“Mr. Drexel?” the young fellow called in a cautious voice.
Startled, Drexel pivoted about. His interceptor was perhaps nineteen or
twenty, squat of build and very poorly dressed.
“See here--what do you want?”
“Don’t go back to the Metropole.”
“Why?”
“You’ll be arrested.”
This warning might be intended as a service, and again it might be a
new trap. “How do you know?” Drexel asked suspiciously.
“I, and others, have been on the watch for two hours.”
“What for?”
“To warn you. We were afraid you might not understand your danger and
might try to come back.”
Drexel stepped nearer. “What do you know about this?”
“That you went to the Hotel Metropole with a girl, as your wife--that
she ran away--that you went out to hunt her--that the disappearance of
you both has aroused the police.”
Drexel stared, and in the dim light he could see that the shivering
ragamuffin was grinning at his mystification. Was there some link
between this lad and the young woman?
“What do you want?”
“I want you to come with me.”
“Go with you!”
“Yes. A description of you has gone to all the police. Everywhere they
are looking for you. You are safe only if you come with me.”
The young fellow certainly did know a lot; but when Drexel looked over
his poor five feet four inches, and thought of him as a protector, his
suspicion was all alive. He was in one danger, no doubt--but it would
be foolishness to let himself be duped into another.
“I’m not so certain I want to go with you. Who told you to do this?”
“A woman.”
“A woman! Do--do I know her?”
“You do.”
The chance to find the young woman swept for the moment all suspicious
fear aside. “Will I see her?”
“Maybe.” The young fellow grinned and winked. “I’ll ask Mary Davis.”
“Come on!” cried Drexel.
With the young fellow leading the way they worked about in a
semi-circle, that had the hotel as its centre, till at length his guide
thrust Drexel into a dark doorway.
“Wait here, while I get my comrade; he was watching the other entrance
of the hotel,” he said, and disappeared.
Two minutes later he was back, with him a slender figure of medium
height. “This is Nicolai; my name’s Ivan,” whispered the young fellow.
He threw his newspapers into the blackness of the doorway. “Come
on--we must hurry.”
They walked rapidly through by-streets, Ivan chattering in a low voice
all the time, calling Nicolai “comrade” whenever he addressed him.
Drexel took close notice of his two conductors by the light of the
infrequent gas lamps. The one called Nicolai was pale, with regular
and refined features and a soft, thin, boyish beard; he was silent,
but there was a set to his face that made Drexel feel that though Ivan
talked the more, he did not dominate the pair. Compared to Nicolai,
Ivan was something of a grotesque. He was pock-marked, his large ears
stood flappingly out, his mouth was wide and lopsided and showed very
brown and jagged teeth; his hair was light and close-cropped, and he
had no more eyebrows than if his forehead had just been soaped and
razored. His eyes were small and had a snapping brightness, and they
flashed in all directions, watching always for policemen or squads of
man-hunting gendarmes, seeing a spy in that shifty-eyed cabman waiting
for a fare, or that little shopkeeper who at this late hour had not yet
put up his shutters.
They crossed the broad and frozen Neva and zigzagged through obscure
and narrow streets. Presently they passed through a gateway and crossed
a cobble-paved court with houses vaguely outlining its sides. At a
door at the court’s farther end Nicolai gave three low raps; the door
opened, they slipped quickly in, and it closed and locked behind them.
A lighted candle revealed a big brown-bearded man, who gave Drexel a
searching look. “All’s well, I see,” he said.
“Yes,” said Ivan.
The man silently turned over the candle to Nicolai and disappeared.
“Who is he?” Drexel asked, as they mounted a flight of stairs.
“The keeper of this boarding-house,” answered Ivan.
Nicolai unlocked a door. They entered and crossed to another door,
Drexel seeing nothing of the room save that it was almost bare.
This second door entered and locked behind them, and an oil lamp
with blackened chimney lighted, Drexel found himself in a square,
low-ceilinged room furnished with a hunchbacked couch on one side, a
bed of dubious comfort on the other, a wooden table in the centre with
a battered and tarnished brass samovar upon it, three chairs--and that
was all.
“Here we are at last,” said Ivan, rubbing his cold bare hands. “Now for
a bite to eat. I’ll fix the samovar, comrade. Mr. Drexel, sit down.”
“But,” said Drexel, “I thought you were going to bring me to--to--Mary
Davis.”
“It’s not time for her to come yet,” returned Ivan. “You’ll have to
wait.”
It occurred to Drexel that this was a strange place to meet such a
woman, but he brushed the thought aside. Afire with eagerness as he
was, he realised that there was nothing for him but to command such
patience as he could. So he took one of the rickety chairs and watched
Ivan start the charcoal going in the samovar, and Nicolai take paper
bags from the sill of the one window and from these bags take big sour
pickles, a loaf of black bread and a roll of sausage, which last two he
proceeded to slice. Presently the tea was brewed, and Drexel was asked
to draw his chair to the table.
In all his life Drexel had never tasted such uninviting fare. “I’m not
hungry, thank you,” he said.
But the sharp eyes of Ivan read him. “Hah! Bring out the caviar and the
champagne, comrade. What nine-tenths of the world eats always is too
poor for the rich American to eat once!”
“Is it!” said Drexel. He pulled his chair forward, seized a chunk of
the sausage and a slab of the black bread, and filled his mouth with a
huge bite from each.
Ivan clapped him on the shoulder. “That’s right!” said he, through his
gag of bread and meat. “Either I like a man, or I want to fight him.
Come--let’s be friends while we’re together!”
Drexel smiled amusedly at the bristling, excited little fellow, and
took the outstretched hand. “All right. Since you know who I am, you
might tell me who you are.”
“You already know we’re revolutionists,” said Ivan in his rapid,
choppy way. “We’re fighters for freedom--hey, comrade? Down with
Autocracy!--on come that glorious day when there’ll be a chance for
every man! Hey, comrade?”
Nicolai nodded.
“But,” said Drexel, “that doesn’t tell me who you are personally.”
“Ah, you want to be introduced!” Ivan sprang up, a hunk of bread in
one hand and of sausage in the other, and his little eyes gleamed with
a wild, humorous twinkle. “Allow me to present myself”--he bowed low,
the hand with the sausage to his heart--“Ivan, the son of I don’t know
who, cradled in the gutter, rocked to sleep on the toe of a policeman’s
boot, schooled with the dogs, my income the luxurious sum of 60 kopeks
a day drawn from my stock in a lace factory. Glad to meet me, hey?”
He grinned lopsidedly at Drexel. “That’s me,” he nodded. “But with
Nicolai”--his sausaged hand made a wave toward his comrade--“it’s
another story. He’s educated--he was rich--he--but tell him, comrade.”
“Do,” urged Drexel.
“Very well,” said the other with his quiet shrug; “but it’s little
more than Ivan’s story. My parents were well-to-do, yes--but very
conservative. While I was in the gymnasium preparing for the
university, all the country became excited about gaining freedom. I was
loyal enough to the Czar at that time, for I was only seventeen and had
been shielded by my parents from liberal opinions. But I was caught by
the general spirit and took part in a meeting of the students to demand
a constitution. Several of us were arrested and exiled to Siberia.”
“Been sent to Siberia! Think of that!” cried Ivan proudly, and half
envious of the distinction of his friend. Then his tone changed to
fierce hatred. “Think of exiling a schoolboy--and for that!” His brown
teeth clenched.
“But it did me good,” went on Nicolai’s quiet voice. “I wasn’t a
revolutionist before, but that made me one. After six months I managed
to escape, and came back, and----”
“And then we met each other,” broke in Ivan. “And ever since we’ve been
brothers. Hey, comrade?” And in an instant he was skipping nimbly about
the table patting Nicolai affectionately on the shoulder. But the next
instant he was talking again to Drexel. “We’re always together, we two,
both lace-makers--The Inséparables they call us. Oh, and what a lot he
knows! Me, I only know this!”
Instantly he had whipped out a big pistol and was flourishing it in the
air. “That’s the only argument that will ever win us liberty”--lovingly
patting the black chamber of the weapon. “The Duma--bah! We’ve got to
fight--to die!”
The pocked-marked little fellow began excitedly to pace the low room, a
chunk of sausage in one hand, the pistol in the other. Nicolai quietly
filled himself another glass of tea. Now that there was no speech for
a few moments the purpose of his being here came again to the fore of
Drexel’s mind. He looked at his watch.
“It’s one o’clock,” he said. “Are you sure she is coming?”
Ivan glanced at Nicolai. “You must have patience,” answered Nicolai.
Drexel’s burning curiosity could not refrain from a question concerning
this woman that he loved. “You know her?”
Both nodded.
“Do you mind telling me about her--anything, that is, you don’t object
to telling?”
“I don’t object to telling you everything we know,” said Nicolai. “We
are comrades. We have met a few times. As for her personality, you know
that as well as we do. That is all.”
“All!” exclaimed Drexel in disappointment. But he saw that Nicolai was
speaking the truth. The story he had heard the major-domo tell came
back to his mind. “Then you do not know what her mission was?”
“No. We are only privates. We obey the orders that are given us.”
“Then she is something more than a private?”
Nicolai nodded.
Time ticked on. Drexel became restless with the suspense of waiting;
then his first thought on entering the shabby room, that this was
a strange place to meet such a woman, began to grow into a vague
suspicion.
There was a little intermittent talk. More time dragged on. He grew
more restless and suspicious. At length he rose and drew on his coat.
Instinctively his hand slipped into one of the coat’s outside pockets
and gripped the pistol there.
“I think I’ll walk around a bit,” he said.
“Better not,” advised the quiet voice of Nicolai. “You know the police
are looking for you.”
“Oh, I’m not afraid.” The thought rose that, once out of here, his
wisest course would be to make a quick dash for the Hotel Europe where
were staying his aunt and cousin. Once there, the police would never
suspect the relative-to-be of Prince Berloff, and in no danger from
them he could continue his search for the young woman. “She may be here
when I get back,” he added easily to Nicolai, and turned toward the
door.
“Ivan!” snapped out the voice of Nicolai.
But Ivan was already at the door, his back against it, and pointing at
Drexel was Ivan’s big revolver.
Drexel started to jerk out his own pistol.
“Move that hand, and he’ll shoot!” said the sharp voice of Nicolai.
“Oh, I know when a man has the drop on me,” said Drexel. “What do you
want?”
“First, your pistol,” said Nicolai, and himself took it from Drexel’s
overcoat pocket.
When Ivan saw the black compact weapon, his eyes shone enviously. “A
Browning!” he cried. “What a beauty!”
“What does this mean?” demanded Drexel.
“That you are going to stay here,” said Nicolai.
“A prisoner?”
“A prisoner.”
“What for?”
“That we were not told when the order was given us,” said Nicolai.
“Then I am being held at some one’s order?” demanded Drexel.
“Yes.”
“By whose order?”
“By the order of The White One,” said Nicolai.