THE CAUTIOUS GUY SLIPS UP
Over their good-night smoke Clay gave a warning. "Keep yore eyes open,
Johnnie. I was trailed to the house to-day by one of the fellows with
Durand the night I called on him. It spells trouble. I reckon the
'Paches are going to leave the reservation again."
"Do you allow that skunk is aimin' to bushwhack you?"
"He's got some such notion. It's a cinch he ain't through with me yet."
"Say, Clay, ain't you gettin' homesick for the whinin' of a rawhide?
Wha's the matter with us hittin' the dust for good old Tucson? I'd
sure like to chase cowtails again."
"You can go, Johnnie. I'm not ready yet--quite. And when I go it
won't be because of any rattlesnake in the grass."
"Whadyou mean I can go?" demanded his friend indignantly. "I don't aim
to go and leave you here alone."
"Perhaps I'll be along, too, after a little. I'm about fed up on New
York."
"Well, I'll stick around till you come. If this Jerry Durand's trying
to get you I'll be right there followin' yore dust, old scout."
"There's more than one way to skin a cat. Mebbe the fellow means to
strike at me through you or Kitty. I've a mind to put you both on a
train for the B-in-a-Box Ranch."
"You can put the li'l' girl on a train. You can't put me on none
less'n you go too," answered his shadow stoutly.
"Then see you don't get drawn into any quarrels while you and Kitty are
away from the house. Stick to the lighted streets. I think I'll speak
to her about not lettin' any strange man talk to her."
"She wouldn't talk to no strange man. She ain't that kind," snorted
Johnnie.
"Keep yore shirt on," advised Clay, smiling. "What I mean is that she
mustn't let herself believe the first story some one pulls on her. I
think she had better not go out unless one of us is with her."
"Suits me."
"I thought that might suit you. Well, stick to main-traveled roads and
don't take any chances. If you get into trouble, yell bloody murder
_poco pronto_."
"And don't you take any, old-timer. That goes double. I'm the
cautious guy in this outfit, not you."
Within twenty-four hours Clay heard some one pounding wildly on the
outer door of the apartment and the voice of the cautious guy imploring
haste.
"Lemme in, Clay. Hurry! Hurry!" he shouted.
Lindsay was at the door in four strides, but he did not need to see the
stricken woe of his friend's face to guess what had occurred. For
Johnnie and Kitty had started together to see a picture play two hours
earlier.
"They done took Kitty--in an auto," he gasped. "Right before my eyes.
Claimed a lady had fainted."
"Who took her?"
"I dunno. Some men. Turned the trick slick, me never liftin' a hand.
Ain't I a heluva man?"
"Hold yore hawsses, son. Don't get excited. Begin at the beginnin'
and tell me all about it," Clay told him quietly.
Already he was kicking off his house slippers and was reaching for his
shoes.
"We was comin' home an' I took Kitty into that Red Star drug-store for
to get her some ice cream. Well, right after that I heerd a man say
how the lady had fainted--"
"What lady?"
"The lady in the machine."
"Were you in the drug-store?"
"No. We'd jes' come out when this here automobile drew up an' a man
jumped out hollerin' the lady had fainted and would I bring a glass o'
water from the drugstore. 'Course I got a jump on me and Kitty she
moved up closeter to the car to he'p if she could. When I got back to
the walk with the water the man was hoppin' into the car. It was
already movin'. He' slammed the door shut and it went up the street
like greased lightnin'."
"Was it a closed car?"
"Uh-huh."
"Can you describe it?"
"Why, I dunno--"
"Was it black, brown, white?"
"Kinda roan-colored, looked like."
"Get the number?"
"No, I--I plumb forgot to look."
Clay realized that Johnnie's powers of observation were not to be
trusted.
"Sure the car wasn't tan-colored?" he asked to test him.
"It might 'a' been tan, come to think of it."
"You're right certain Kitty was in it?"
"I heerd her holler from inside. She called my name. I run after the
car, but I couldn't catch it."
Clay slipped a revolver under his belt. He slid into a street coat.
Then he got police headquarters on the wire and notified the office of
what had taken place. He knew that the word would be flashed in all
directions and that a cordon would be stretched across the city to
intercept any suspicious car. Over the telephone the desk man at
headquarters fired questions at him, most of which he was unable to
answer. He promised fuller particulars as soon as possible.
It had come on to rain and beneath the street lights the asphalt shone
like a river. The storm had driven most people indoors, but as the
Westerner drew near the drugstore Clay saw with relief a taxicab draw
up outside. Its driver, crouched in his seat behind the waterproof
apron as far back as possible from the rain, promptly accepted Lindsay
as a fare.
"Back in a minute," Clay told him, and passed into the drug-store.
The abduction was still being discussed. There was a disagreement as
to whether the girl had stepped voluntarily into the car or been lifted
in by the man outside. This struck the cattleman as unimportant. He
pushed home questions as to identification. One of the men in the
drug-store had caught a flash of the car number. He was sure the first
four figures were 3967. The fifth he did not remember. The car was
dark blue and it looked like a taxi. This information Clay got the
owner of the car to forward to the police.
He did not wait to give it personally, but joined Johnnie in the cab.
The address he gave to the driver with the waterproof hat pulled down
over his head was that of a certain place of amusement known as Heath's
Palace of Wonders. A young woman he wanted to consult was wont to sit
behind a window there at the receipt of customs.
"It's worth a fiver extra if you make good time," Lindsay told the
driver.
"You're on, boss," answered the man gruffly.
Johnnie, in a fever of anxiety, had trotted along beside his chief to
the drug-store in silence. Now, as they rushed across the city, he put
a timid question with a touch of bluff bravado he did not feel.
"We'll get her back sure, don't you reckon?"
"We'll do our best. Don't you worry. That won't buy us anything."
"No--no, I ain't a-worryin' none, but--Clay, I'd hate a heap for any
harm to come to that li'l' girl." His voice quavered.
"Sho! We're right on their heels, Johnnie. So are the cops. We'll
make a gather and get Kitty back all right."
Miss Annie Millikan's pert smile beamed through the window at Clay when
he stepped up.
"Hello, Mr. Flat-Worker," she sang out. "How many?"
"I'm not going in to see the show to-night. I want to talk with you if
you can get some one to take yore place here."
"Say, whatta you think I am--one o' these here Fift' Avenoo society
dames? I'm earnin' my hot dogs and coffee right at this window. . . .
Did you say two, lady?" She shoved two tickets through the window in
exchange for dimes.
Clay explained that his business was serious. "I've got to see you
alone--now," he added.
"If you gotta you gotta." The girl called an usher, who found a second
usher to take her place.
Annie walked down the street a few steps beside Clay. The little
puncher followed them dejectedly. His confidence had gone down to
chill zero.
"What's the big idea in callin' me from me job in the rush hours?"
asked Miss Millikan. "And who's this gumshoe guy from the bush league
tailin' us? Breeze on and wise Annie if this here business is so
important."
Clay told his story.
"Some of Jerry's strong-arm work," she commented.
"Must be. Can you help me?"
Annie looked straight at him, a humorous little quirk to her mouth.
"Say, what're you askin' me to do--t'row down my steady?"
Which remark carries us back a few days to one sunny afternoon after
Clay's midnight call when he had dropped round to see Miss Annie. They
had walked over to Gramercy Park and sat down on a bench as they
talked. Most men and all women trusted Clay. He had in him some
quality of unspoken sympathy that drew confidences. Before she knew it
Annie found herself telling him the story of her life.
Her father had been a riveter in a shipyard and had been killed while
she was a baby. Later her mother had married unhappily a man who
followed the night paths of the criminal underworld. Afterward he had
done time at Sing Sing. Through him Annie had been brought for years
into contact with the miserable types that make an illicit living by
preying upon the unsuspecting in big cities. Always in the little
Irish girl there had been a yearning for things clean and decent, but
it is almost impossible for the poor in a great city to escape from the
environment that presses upon them.
She was pretty, and inevitably she had lovers. One of these was "Slim"
Jim Collins, a confidential follower of Jerry Durand. He was a crook,
and she knew it. But some quality in him--his good looks, perhaps, or
his gameness--fascinated her in spite of herself. She avoided him,
even while she found herself pleased to go to Coney with an escort so
well dressed and so glibly confident. Another of her admirers was a
policeman, Tim Muldoon by name, the same one that had rescued Clay from
the savagery of Durand outside the Sea Siren. Tim she liked. But for
all his Irish ardor he was wary. He had never asked her to marry him.
She thought she knew the reason. He did not want for a wife a woman
who had been "Slim" Jim's girl. And Annie--because she was Irish too
and perverse--held her head high and went with Collins openly before
the eyes of the pained and jealous patrolman.
Clay had come to Annie Millikan now because of what she had told him
about "Slim" Jim. This man was one of Durand's stand-bys. If there
was any underground work to be done it was an odds-on chance that he
would be in charge of it.
"I'm askin' you to stand by a poor girl that's in trouble," he said in
answer to her question.
"You've soitainly got a nerve with you. I'll say you have. You want
me to throw the hooks into Jim for a goil I never set me peepers on. I
wisht I had your crust."
"You wouldn't let Durand spoil her life if you could stop it."
"Wouldn't I? Hmp! Soft-soap stuff. Well, what's my cue? Where do I
come in on this rescue-the-be-eutiful heroine act?"
"When did you see 'Slim' Jim last?"
"I might 'a' seen him this afternoon an' I might not," she said
cautiously, looking at him from under a broad hat-brim.
"When?"
"I didn't see him after I got behind that 'How Many?' sign. If I seen
him must 'a' been before two."
"Did he give you any hint of what was in the air?"
"Say, what's the lay-out? Are you framin' Jim for up the river?"
"I'm tryin' to save Kitty."
"Because she's your goil. Where do I come in at? What's there in it
for me to go rappin' me friend?" demanded Annie sharply.
"She's not my girl," explained Clay. Then, with that sure instinct
that sometimes guided him, he added, "The young lady I--I'm in love
with has just become engaged to another man."
Miss Millikan looked at him, frankly incredulous. "For the love o'
Mike, where's her eyes? Don't she know a real man when she sees one?
I'll say she don't."
"I'm standin' by Kitty because she's shy of friends. Any man would do
that, wouldn't he? I came to you for help because--oh, because I know
you're white clear through."
A flush beat into Annie's cheeks. She went off swiftly at a tangent.
"Wouldn't it give a fellow a jar? This guy Jim Collins slips it to me
confidential that he's off the crooked stuff. Nothin' doin' a-tall in
gorilla work. He kids me that he's quit goin' out on the spud and
porch-climbin' don't look good to him no more. A four-room flat, a
little wifie, an' the straight road for 'Slim' Jim. I fall for it,
though I'd orta be hep to men. An' he dates me up to-night for the
chauffeurs' ball."
"But you didn't go?"
"No; he sidesteps it this aft with a fairy tale about drivin' a rich
old dame out to Yonkers. All the time he' was figurin' on pinchin'
this goil for Jerry. He's a rotten crook."
"Why don't you break with him, Annie? You're too good for that sort of
thing. He'll spoil your life if you don't."
"Listens fine," the girl retorted bitterly. "I take Jim like some
folks do booze or dope. He's a habit."
"Tim's worth a dozen of him."
"Sure he is, but Tim's got a notion I'm not on the level. I dunno as
he needs to pull that stuff on me. I'm not strong for a harness bull
anyhow." She laughed, a little off the key.
"What color is 'Slim' Jim's car?"
"A dirty blue. Why?"
"That was the car."
Annie lifted her hands in a little gesture of despair. "I'm dead sick
of this game. What's there in it? I live straight and eat in a
beanery. No lobster palaces in mine. Look at me cheap duds. And Tim
gives me the over like I was a street cat. What sort of a chance did I
ever have, with toughs and gunmen for me friends?"
"You've got yore chance now, Annie. Tim will hop off that fence he's
on and light a-runnin' straight for you if he thinks you've ditched
'Slim' Jim."
She shook her head slowly. "No, I'll not t'row Jim down. I'm through
with him. He lied to me right while he knew this was all framed up.
But I wouldn't snitch on him, even if he'd told me anything. And he
didn't peep about what he was up to."
"Forget Jim while you're thinkin' about this. You don't owe Jerry
Durand anything, anyhow. Where would he have Kitty taken? You can
give a guess."
She had made her decision before she spoke. "Gimme paper and a pencil."
On Clay's notebook she scrawled hurriedly an address.
"Jim'd croak me if he knew I'd given this," she said, looking straight
at the cattleman.
"He'll never know--and I'll never forget it, Annie."
Clay left her and turned to the driver. From the slip of paper in his
hand he read aloud an address. "Another five if you break the speed
limit," he said.
As Clay slammed the door shut and the car moved forward he had an
impression of something gone wrong, of a cog in his plans slipped
somewhere. For Annie, standing in the rain under a sputtering misty
street light, showed a face stricken with fear.
Her dilated eyes were fixed on the driver of the taxi-cab.