IN SIGHT OF THE FANGS
At first, it was hard for James Bansemer to believe that his henchman
had not been mistaken. Droom's description of the lady certainly
did not correspond to what his memory recalled. Investigation,
however, assured him that the Cables in the mansion near the lake
were the people he had known in New York. Bansemer took no one into
his confidence, not even Droom. Once convinced that the erstwhile
fireman was now the rich and powerful magnate, he set to work upon
the machinery which was to extract personal gain from the secret
in his possession. He soon learned that the child was a young woman
of considerable standing in society, but there was no way for him
to ascertain whether Frances Cable had told the truth to her husband
in those dreary Far West days.
Bansemer was rich enough, but avarice had become a habit. The flight
from New York had deprived him of but little in worldly goods. His
ill-gotten gains came with him; and investments were just as easy
and just as safe in Chicago as in New York. Now, he saw a chance
to wring a handsome sum from the rich woman whose only possession
had been love when he first knew her. If the secret of Jane's
origin still remained locked up in her heart, the effort would be
an easy one. He learned enough of David Cable, however, to know that
if he shared the secret, the plan would be profitless and dangerous.
It was this uncertainty that kept him from calling at the Cable home;
likewise, from writing a note which might prove a most disastrous
folly. Time and circumstance could be his only friends, and he
was accustomed to the whims of both. He read of the dinners and
entertainments given by the Cables, and smiled grimly. Time had
worked wonders for them! Scandal, he knew, could undo all that
ambition and pride had wrought. He could well afford to wait.
However, he did not have long to wait, for his opportunity came
one night in Hooley's Theatre. Graydon and he occupied seats in
the orchestra, near the stage and not far from the lower right-hand
boxes. It was during the busy Christmas holidays, but the "star"
was of sufficient consequence to pack the house. The audience was
no end of a fashionable one. Time and again, some strange influence
drew his gaze to the gay party in one of the lower boxes. The face
of the woman nearest to him was not visible; but the two girls who
sat forward, turned occasionally to look over the audience; and he
saw that they were pretty, one exceptionally so. One of the men
was grey-haired and strong-featured; the others were quite too
insignificant to be of interest to him. The woman whose back he
could see did not look out over the audience. Her indifference was
so marked that it seemed deliberate.
At last, he felt that her eyes were upon him; he turned quickly.
True enough, for with lips slightly parted, her whole attitude
suggestive of intense restraint, Mrs. Cable was staring helplessly
into the eyes of the man who could destroy her with a word.
The one thing that flashed through Bansemer's brain was the
realisation that she was far more beautiful than he had expected
her to be. There was a truly aristocratic loveliness in the rather
piquant face, and she undeniably possessed "manner." Maturity had
improved her vastly, he confessed with strange exultation; age had
been kinder than youth. He forgot the play, seldom taking his eyes
from the back which again had been turned to him. Calculating, he
reached the conclusion that she was not more than forty years of
age. More than once he made some remark to his son, only to surprise
that young man glancing surreptitiously at the face of the more
beautiful of the two girls. Even in this early stage, James Bansemer
began to gloat over the beauty of this new-found, old acquaintance.
In the lobby of the theatre, as they were leaving, he deliberately
doffed his hat and extended a pleasant hand to the wife of David
Cable. She turned deathly pale and there was a startled, piteous
look in her eyes that convinced him beyond all shadow of a doubt.
There was nothing for her to do but introduce him to her husband.
Two minutes later Graydon Bansemer and Jane Cable, strangers until
then, were asking each other how they liked the play, and Fate was
at work.
A few weeks after this scene at the theatre young Mr. Bansemer
dashed across the hall from the elevator and entered his father's
office just as Elias Droom was closing up.
"Where's the governor, Mr. Droom?" he asked, deliberately brushing
past the old clerk in the outer office.
"Left some time ago," replied Droom, somewhat ungraciously, his blue
eyes staring past the young man with a steadiness that suggested
reproach because he was out of the direct line of vision. "It is
nearly six o'clock--he's never here after five."
"I know that he--I asked you if you knew of his whereabouts. Do
you--or not?" The self-confident, athletic youth did not stand in
physical awe of the clerk.
"No," was the simple and sufficient answer.
"Well then--I'm off," said Graydon a trifle less airily.
Droom's overcoat was on and buttoned up to his chin; his long feet
were encased in rubbers of enormous size and uncertain age. There
must have been no blood in the veins of this grim old man, for the
weather was far from cold and the streets were surprisingly dry
for Chicago.
"I am closing the office for the day," said Droom. For no apparent
reason a smile spread over the lower part of his face and Graydon,
bold as he was, turned his eyes away.
"I thought I'd stop in and pick up the governor for a ride home in
my motor," said he, turning to the door.
"Yours is one of the first out here, I suppose," came from the thin
lips of the old clerk.
Graydon laughed.
"Possibly. The company charges a nickel a ride--half a dime--Going
down, sir?" Graydon had rung for the elevator and was waiting in
front of the grating.
A look containing a curious compound of affectionate reproach and
a certain senile gratification at being made the object of the
boy's condescending raillery crossed Droom's countenance. Without,
however, answering his question, he slowly and carefully closed the
door, tried it vigorously, and joined Bansemer at the shaft. With
Droom, words were unnecessary when actions could speak for themselves.
"Still living over in Wells Street, Mr. Droom?" went on Graydon,
thoroughly at home with the man whom he had feared and despised by
stages from childhood up.
"It's good enough for me," said Droom shortly. "'Tisn't Michigan
Avenue, the Drive or Lincoln Park Boulevard, but it's just as swell
as I am--or ever hope to be."
"There's nothing against Wells Street but--it got ashamed of itself
when it crossed the river."
"They call it Fifth Avenue," sneered Droom, "but it isn't THE Avenue,
is it?" Bansemer was surprised to note a tone of affectionate pride
in the question.
"No indeed!"
"Oh, there's only one, Mr. Graydon," said the old clerk, quite
warmly; "our own Fifth Avenue."
"I had no idea you cared so much for swagger things, Mr. Droom,"
observed the other, genuinely surprised.
"Even Broadway is heaven to me," said Droom, some of the rasp
gone from his voice. "Good-bye; I go this way," he said when they
reached the sidewalk a little later. The young man watched his
gaunt figure as it slouched away in the semi-darkness.
"By George, the old chap is actually homesick!" muttered he. "I
didn't think it was in him."
Droom had rooms over a millinery shop in Wells Street. There was a
bedroom at the back and a "living-room" in front, overlooking the
street from the third story of the building. Of the bedchamber there
is but little to say, except that it contained a bed, a washstand,
a mirror, two straight-backed chairs and a clothes-press. Droom
went out for his bath--every Saturday night. The "living-room,"
however, was queer in more ways than one. In one corner, on a chest
of drawers, stood his oil stove, while in the opposite corner, a
big sheet-iron heater made itself conspicuous. Firewood was piled
behind the stove winter and summer, Droom lamenting that one could
not safely discriminate between the seasons in Chicago. The chest
of drawers contained his stock of provisions, his cooking and table
utensils, his medicine and a small assortment of carpenter's tools.
He had no use for an icebox.
A bookcase, old enough to warm the heart of the most ardent antiquarian,
held his small and unusual collection of books. Standing side by
side, on the same shelf, were French romances, unexpurgated, and the
Holy Bible, much bethumbed and pencilled. There were schoolbooks
alongside of sentimental love tales, Greek lexicons and quaint
old fairy stories, law books and works on criminology; books on
botany, geology, anatomy, and physics. In all, perhaps, there were
two hundred volumes. A life of Napoleon revealed signs of almost
constant usage. There were three portraits of the Corsican on the
dingy green walls.
The strange character of the man was best shown by the pictures
that adorned--or rather disfigured the walls. Vulgar photographs
and prints were to be seen on all sides. Mingled with these cheap
creations were excellent copies of famous Madonnas, quaint Scriptural
drawings, engravings of the Saviour, and an allegorical coloured
print which emphasised the joys of heaven. There was also a badly
drawn but idealised portrait of Droom, done in crayon at the age of
twenty. This portrait was one of his prized possessions. He loved
it best because it was a bust and did not expose his longitudinal
defects. If Droom ever had entertained a feminine visitor in his
apartments, there is no record of the fact. But few men had seen
the interior of his home, and they had gone away with distressed,
perplexed sensibilities.
He cooked his own meals on the oil stove, and, alone, ate them from
the little table that stood near the heater. Occasionally, he went
out to a near-by eating house for a lonely feast. His rooms usually
reeked with the odour of boiled coffee, burnt cabbage and grease,
pungent chemicals and long-suffering bed linen. Of his "front" room,
it may be said that it was kitchen, dining-room, parlour, library,
workshop, laboratory and conservatory. Four flower-pots in which
as many geraniums existed with difficulty, despite Droom's constant
and unswerving care, occupied a conspicuous place on the window-sills
overlooking the street. He watched aver them with all the tender
solicitude of a lover, surprising as it may appear when one pauses
to consider the vicious exterior of the man.
Droom was frugal. He was, in truth, a miser. If anyone had asked him
what he expected to do with the money he was putting away in the
bank, he could not have answered, calculating as he was by nature.
He had no relative to whom he would leave it and he had no inclination
to give up the habit of active employment. His salary was small,
but he managed to save more than half of it--for a "rainy day," as
he said. He did his reading and experimenting by kerosene light,
and went to bed by candle light, saving a few pennies a week in
that way. The windows in his apartment were washed not oftener than
once a year. He was seldom obliged to look through them during the
day, and their only duty at night was to provide ventilation--and
even that was characteristically meagre.
He was a man of habit--not habits. A pipe at night was his only
form of dissipation. It was not too far for him to walk home from
the office of evenings, and he invariably did so unless the weather
was extremely unpleasant. So methodical was he that he never had
walked over any other bridge than the one in Wells Street, coming
and going.
Past sixty-five years of age. Broom's hair still was black and snaky;
his teeth were as yellow and jagged as they were in the seventies,
and his eyes were as blue and ugly as ever. He had not aged with
James Bansemer. In truth, he looked but little older then when we
made his acquaintance. The outside world knew no more of Droom's
private transactions than it knew of Bansemer's. Up in the horrid
little apartment in Wells Street the queer old man could do as he
willed, unobserved and unannoyed. He could pursue his experiments
with strange chemicals, he could construct odd devices with his
kit of tools, and he could let off an endless amount of inventive
energy that no one knew he possessed.
When he left Graydon Bansemer on the sidewalk in front of the
office building, he swung off with his long strides towards the
Wells Street bridge. His brain had laid aside everything that had
occupied its attention during office hours and had given itself
over to the project that hastened his steps homeward. His supper
that night was a small one and hurriedly eaten in order that he
might get to work on his new device. Droom grinned and cackled to
himself all alone up there in the lamplight, for he was perfecting
an "invention" by which the honest citizen could successfully put
to rout the "hold-up" man that has made Chicago famous.
Elias Droom's inventive genius unfailingly led him toward devices
that could inflict pain and discomfiture. His plan to get the
better of the wretched, hard-working hold-up man was unique, if not
entirely practical. He was constructing the models for two little
bulbs, made of rubber and lined with a material that would resist
the effects of an acid, no matter how powerful. On one end of each
bulb, which was capable of holding at least an ounce of liquid,
there was a thin syringe attachment, also proof against acids. These
little bulbs were made so that they could be held in the palm of
the hand. By squeezing them suddenly a liquid could be shot from
the tube with considerable force.
The bulbs were to contain vitriol.
When the hold-up man gave the command to "hold up your hands," the
victim had only to squeeze the bulb as the hands went up, and, if
accurately aimed, the miscreant would get the stream of the deadly
vitriolic fluid in his eyes and--here endeth the first lesson.
Experience alone could do the rest.
Young Bansemer hurried to their apartments on the North Side. He
found his father dressed and ready to go out to dinner.
"Well, how was everything to-day?" asked James Bansemer from his
easy chair in the library. Graydon threw his hat and gloves on the
table.
"Terribly dull market, governor," he said. "It's been that way for
a week. How are you feeling?"
"Fit to dine with a queen," answered the older man, with a smile.
"How soon can you dress for dinner, Gray?"
"That depends on who is giving the dinner."
"Some people you like. I found the note here when I came in a little
after five. We have an hour in which to get over there. Can you be
ready?"
"Do you go security for the affair?" asked Graydon.
"Certainly. You have been there, my boy, and I've not heard you
complain."
"You mean over at---"
"Yes, that's where I mean," said the other, breaking in quietly.
"I think I can be ready in ten minutes, father."
While he was dressing, his father sat alone and stared reflectively
at the small blue gas blaze in the grate. A dark, grim smile
unconsciously came over his face, the inspiration of a triumphant
joy. Twice he read the dainty note that met him on his return from
the office.
"What changes time can make in woman!" he mused; "and what changes
a woman can make in time! For nearly a year I've waited for this
note. I knew it would come--it was bound to come. Graydon has had
everything up to this time, while I have waited patiently in the
background. Now, it is my turn."
"All right, father," called Graydon from the hall. "The cab is at
the door."
Together they went down the steps, arm in arm, strong figures.
"To Mr. David Cable's," ordered Bansemer, the father, complacently,
as he stepped into the carriage after his son.