"I can guess."
"A'right. You got my permission. One guess ought to be enough. If you
miss I'll give you another."
"You're here--" Whitey's icy voice came slowly, his words
close-clipped--"to break up my romance."
"Your what?"
"Romance."
"With that kid?"
"Yes--with that kid."
Jim's heavy head rolled in earnest negation. "Naw, son--you're all
wrong. I ain't here to bust up no romance."
"Listen to me, Jim Hanvey--you've got a reputation for telling the
truth--"
"I'm telling it now. I ain't here to bust up no romance, Whitey. I'm
here to keep you from gettin' away with whatever graft you're planning."
"I'm not planning anything except to marry this girl."
"Well--that's a pretty good graft, ain't it? Good lookin'
kid--young--heiress to about twenty million bucks. Mmm! I'd call it a
real swell graft."
"I'm in love with her--"
A harsh note crept into the detective's voice. "That's a lie, Whitey,
and you know it. If you was you'd clear out. You know you can't bring
her nothin' but misery. Now what I want to find out is this--are you
plannin' to go through with this deal an' marry her, or have you got a
price?"
"I have no price."
"You can't be bought off?"
"No."
"Well, that makes my job harder. I thought maybe you was lookin' for a
soft spot and didn't want to queer things by bargaining with the old
man. It'd be worth a heap to him to get rid of you. Not that you ain't
a good crook, Whitey--an' in a professional way I ain't got nothin'
but respect an' admiration for you. But as a gent, Whitey, you ain't
worth a damn."
For a few moments neither spoke. It was Kirk who broke the silence.
"You must know already that you can't queer me with the kid."
"Does look like a tough assignment."
"There isn't anything you can do."
"Yes there is."
"What?"
"Well, for one thing, I can make it downright embarrassin' for you--so
durned embarrassin' that maybe you'll decide you'd better break it off
with the girl and begin to talk dollars and cents."
"Not a chance."
"No?" A pause, and then--"I'm glad you think so, Whitey. But lookin'
over that young lady kinder careful it strikes me that if she was ever
convinced you was a crook she'd give you the go-bye so fast you'd think
you was a popboy at an automobile racetrack. Yep--that gal sure never
would stand for no crooks payin' her rent--not if I've got her right."
"Perhaps not," admitted the other, "but you can't hang a thing on me.
You know I'm a crook and I know it. But nobody has ever gotten a thing
on me. Not a thing. In ten years I haven't slipped once--not a single
time."
Jim gazed at him keenly: "That's what you think," he said with peculiar
emphasis.
They returned to the house; Hanvey expressionless as ever, Kirk
struggling to conceal the worry inspired by Jim's air of confidence.
Whitey knew that he had never slipped in his decade of criminality--he
knew but he wasn't sure. Perhaps, somewhere in that period, there had
been an error of judgment, a weakness which he did not suspect. He
knew the axiom of the criminal world--a detective may make a thousand
mistakes and yet be successful; a criminal cannot err once. Warren Kirk
realized that he was only human--and therefore fallible. And if Jim
knew something and could prove it....
Later in the evening Kirk persuaded Madge to accompany him to the
veranda. Scarcely had they left the room when Jim fired a question at
her parents--
"Knowing what you do about this guy, why'd you agree to their
engagement?"
"Madge is headstrong," was the simple answer. "We thought it best to
appear to consent."
"Mmm!" Jim nodded slowly. "It sure is a pleasure to work with folks
which uses their heads for somethin' more than havin' a picture taken
of."
Meanwhile, on the veranda, Whitey Kirk was talking with low-voiced
earnestness to the girl. "It's this way, Madge--Hanvey is a detective
and a good one. He is one of the leaders of the police clique which
for years has been attempting to hang something on me. Your father has
fallen under their influence. He has hinted to you that my past is not
all it might have been. He has hired Jim Hanvey to come down here and
prove to you that I am crooked." He bent his handsome head close to
her wide-open, frightened eyes. "I believe I am a gentleman, little
girl. I want you to promise that the minute you lose your trust in me
you will let me know--and I shall leave you. But if you're willing to
stand by me...." With a little sob she seized his hand and pressed it
tightly.
"Don't talk that way, Warren. _Don't!_ I can't bear the thought that
anyone even thinks you are not all right. And don't suggest that I
won't stand by you. I love you, dear...."
He took her in his arms then and kissed her, and even as he did
so there was a coldly calculating light in his gray eyes. He was
playing this game for big stakes. It was the chance of a lifetime--an
opportunity to insure affluence with safety. And Madge was a pretty
good sort. He wasn't in love with her, of course, but on the other
hand he might do worse in the selection of a life partner. Nice, clean
kid--and sensible.... "Gee! it'd sure bust things higher than a kite if
Jim could ever prove to her...."
And so after the silence of midnight had fallen over the house, Whitey
Kirk sat staring from the window of his room. Beside him was an ash
tray filled with cigarette stumps.
Jim had him worried. Whitey knew--none better--the ability of the
ponderous detective, knew that he would not be absolutely safe until
he was actually married to the girl. It wasn't that Jim had discovered
proof of any past transgression so much as there was danger that Jim
might frame him.
Whitey knew well the romantic strain rampant in the soul of the
ponderous visitor, realized that Jim believed he must save the girl.
And he realized that, all other methods failing, there was every
likelihood that Jim would frame a robbery or a bit of crookedness in
such a manner that he would appear guilty. "He might even plant a jewel
robbery," reflected Kirk, "and plant the loot in my room. Then, if they
caught me...."
Early the following morning he went riding with Madge and forewarned
her of that possibility. Madge was horrified and indignant, but
there was in her eyes a queer, questioning light which had been
absent the previous night. Madge was seeing a great deal of smoke and
instinctively she found herself wondering whether, after all, there
might not be a bit of fire. She cast aside the idea as unworthy--but it
persisted subtly and she was downcast and constrained for the last hour
of their time together.
But she was blessed with a strain of sterling loyalty and active
fighting qualities. Immediately upon her return home, she sought an
interview with her father. It was brief, surfeited with mutual pain,
and very much to the point. Father and daughter were honest with one
another.
"Why are you opposed to my engagement, Dad?"
"The disparity in age, for one thing."
"What else?"
"I don't like Kirk."
"You believe he is not--all that he might be?"
"Yes, Dear."
"Why?"
"I have had him investigated."
"Yet you never heard of a man who was as evil as they say Warren is who
has never been caught, have you?"
"No."
"Then why persecute him? Why not play fair? Why make me unhappy?"
"Believing what I do, Madge--"
"The police are down on him--for no reason. They've been persecuting
him for years. If what they say were true, Dad--" and her voice
crescendoed bitterly--"they'd have proved something. But it's not true,
and I want you to know that I shall stand by him in spite of you and
Mother and this fat Mr. Hanvey and all the rest of the world."
Weston crossed the room and took her face between his hands. "I like
you to talk that way, Daughter. I like my little girl to be a good
sportsman. I'm not trying to persecute Warren Kirk: I'm trying to get
at the truth. You have no objections to that, have you?"
She thought it over for a moment--"And if you discover that these
allegations are untrue?"
"Then you may marry him whenever you wish."
She walked slowly from the room. She and her father had always been
pals. He was fair to a fault--and honest. She responded to the fairness
of his present attitude. She loved the Warren Kirk she thought she
knew. If he was not that man.... If, beneath the polished exterior,
there was blackness.... She went quietly to her room to ponder....
When she came downstairs shortly before the luncheon hour Jim Hanvey
was waiting for her. His huge figure overflowed a chair in the
reception hall and he lumbered to his feet at her descent. Somehow,
despite the nature of his mission, she could not find it in her heart
to dislike him. There was something infinitely pathetic and appealing
about the man--a vague, elusive quality which excited the maternal
instinct in her breast. The cheap, ready-made clothes which flapped so
grotesquely about the ill-shapen figure were not funny ... she liked
Jim Hanvey and she admitted it frankly. He bowed now with elephantine
lack of grace.
"Good mornin', Miss Madge."
"Good morning."
Jim glanced around apprehensively. "I've been sittin' here waitin' for
you. I wonder if you'd talk to me for a minute?"