The Brass Bowl/Chapter 15
XV
THE PRICE
Slowly Maitland returned to the study and replaced the lamp upon his desk; and stood briefly in silence, long fingers stroking his well-shaped chin, his face a little thin and worn-looking, a gleam of pain in his eyes. He sighed.
So she was gone!
He laughed a trace harshly. This surprise was nothing more than he might have discounted, of course; he had been a fool to expect anything else of her, he was enjoying only his just deserts both for having dared to believe that the good in human nature (and particularly in woman's nature) would respond to decent treatment, and for having acted on that asinine theory.
So she was gone, without a word, without a sign! …
He sat down at the desk, sidewise, one arm extended along its edge, fingers drumming out a dreary little tune on the hard polished wood; and thought it all over from the beginning. Nor spared himself.
Why, after all, should it be otherwise? Why should she have stayed? Why should he compliment himself by believing that there was aught about him visible through the veneer acquired in a score and odd years of purposeless existence, to attract a young and pretty woman's heart?
He enumerated his qualities specifically; and condemned them all. Imprimis, he was a conceited ass. A fascinating young criminal had but to toss her head at him to make him think that she was pleased with him, to make him forget that she was what she was and believe that, because he was willing to stoop, she was willing to climb. And he had betrayed himself so mercilessly! How she must have laughed in her sleeve all the time, while he pranced and bridled and preened himself under her eyes, blinded to his own idiocy by the flame of a sudden infatuation—how she must have laughed!
Undoubtedly she had laughed; and, measuring his depth,—or his shallowness,—had determined to use him to her ends. Why not? It had been her business, her professional duty, to make use of him in order to accomplish her plundering. And because she had not dared to ask him for the jewels when he left her in the morning, she had naturally returned in the evening to regain them, very confident, doubtless, that even if surprised a second time, she would get off scot-free. Unfortunately for her, this fellow Anisty had interfered. Maitland presumed cynically that he ought to be grateful to Anisty. … The unaccountable scoundrel! Why had he returned?
How the girl had contrived to escape was, of course, more easy to understand. Maitland recalled that sudden clatter of hoofs in the street, and he had only to make a trip to the window to verify his suspicion that the cab was gone. She had simply overheard his concluding remarks to the cabby, and taken pardonable advantage of them. Maitland had footed the bill. … She was welcome to that, however. He, Maitland, was well rid of the whole damnable business. … Yes, jewels and all!
What were the jewels to him? … Beyond their sentimental associations, he did not hold them greatly in prize. Of course, since they had been worn by his mother, he would spare no expense or effort to trace and re-collect them, for that dim sainted memory's sake. But in this case, at least, the traditional usage of the Maitland's would never be carried out. It had been faithfully observed when, after his mother's death, the stones had been removed from their settings and stored away; but now they would never be reset, even should he contrive to reassemble them, to adorn the bride of the Maitland heir. For he would never marry. Of course not. …
Maitland was young enough to believe, and to extract a melancholy satisfaction from this.
Puzzled and saddened, his mind harked back for ever to that carking question: Why had she returned? What had brought her back to the flat? If she and Anisty were confederates, as one was inclined at times to believe,—if such were the case, Anisty had the jewels, and there was nothing else of any particular value so persistently to entice such expert and accomplished burglars back to his flat. What else had they required of him? His peace of mind was nothing that they could turn into cash; and they seemed to have reaved him of nothing else.
But they had that; unquestionably they had taken that.
And still the riddle haunted him: Why had she come back that night? And, whatever her reason, had she come in Anisty's company, or alone? One minute it seemed patent beyond dispute that the girl and the great plunderer were hand-in-glove; the next minute Maitland was positively assured that their recent meeting had been altogether an accident. From what he had heard over the telephone, he had believed them to be quarreling, although at the time he had assigned to O'Hagan the masculine side to the dispute. But certainly there must have arisen some difference of opinion between Anisty and the girl, to have drawn from her that frantic negative Maitland had heard, to have been responsible for the overturning of the chair,—an accident that seemed to argue something in the nature of a physical struggle; the chair itself still lay upon its side, mute witness to a hasty and careless movement on somebody's part. …
But it was all inexplicable. Eventually Maitland shook his head, to signify that he gave it up. There was but one thing to do,—to put it out of mind. He would read a bit, compose himself, go to bed.
Preliminary to doing so, he would take steps to insure the flat against further burglarizing, for that night, at least. The draught moving through the hall stirred the portière and reminded him that the window in the trunk-room was still open, an invitation to any enterprising sneak-thief or second-story man. So Maitland went to close and make it fast.
As he shut down the window-sash and clamped the catch he trod on something soft and yielding. Wondering, he stooped and picked it up, and carried it back to the light. It proved to be the girl's hand-bag.
"Now," admitted Maitland in a tone of absolute candor, "I am damned. How the dickens did this thing get there, anyway? What was she doing in my trunk-closet?"
Was it possible that she had followed Anisty out of the flat by that route? A very much mystified young man sat himself down again in front of his desk, and turned the bag over and over in his hands, keenly scrutinizing every inch of it, and whistling softly.
That year the fashion in purses was for capacious receptacles of grained leather, nearly square in shape, and furnished with a chain handle. This which Maitland held was conspicuously of the mode,—neither too large, nor too small, constructed of fine soft leather of a gun-metal shade, with a framework and chain of gun-metal itself. It was new and seemed well-filled, weighing a trifle heavy in the hand. One face was adorned with a monogram of cut gun-metal, the initials "S" and "G" and "L" interlaced. But beyond this the bag was irritatingly non-committal.
Undoubtedly, if one were to go to the length of unsnapping the little, frail clasp, one would acquire information; by such facile means would much light be shed upon the darkness. But Maitland put a decided negative to the suggestion.
No. He would give her the benefit of the doubt. He would wait, he would school himself to patience. Perhaps she would come back for it,—and explain. Perhaps he could find her by advertising it,—and get an explanation. Pending which, he could wait a little while. It was not his wish to pry into her secrets, even if—even if. …
It was something to be smoked over. … Strange how it affected him to have in his hands something that she had owned and touched!
Opening a drawer of the desk, Maitland produced an aged pipe. A brazen jar, companion piece to the ash receiver, held his tobacco. He filled the pipe from the jar, with thoughtful deliberation. And scraped a match beneath his chair and ignited the tobacco and puffed in contemplative contentment, deriving solace from each mouthful of grateful, evanescent incense. Meanwhile he held the charred match between thumb and forefinger.
Becoming conscious of this fact, he smiled in deprecation of his absent-minded mood, looked for the ash-receiver, discovered it in place, inverted beneath the book; and frowned, remembering. Then, with an impatient gesture,—impatient of his own infirmity of mind: for he simply could not forget the girl,—he dropped the match, swept the book aside, lifted the bowl. …
After a moment of incredulous awe, the young man rose, with eyes a-light and a jubilant song in the heart of him. Now he knew, now understood, now believed, and now was justified of his faith!
After which depression came, with the consciousness that she was gone, for ever removed beyond his reach and influence, and that by her own wilful act. It was her intelligible wish that they should never meet again, for, having accomplished her errand, she had flown from the possibility of his thanks.
It was so clear, now! He perceived it all, plainly. Somehow (though it was hard to surmise how) she had found out that Anisty had stolen the jewels; somehow (and one wondered at what risk) she had contrived to take them from him and bring them back to their owner. And Anisty had followed.
Poor little woman! What had she not suffered, what perils had she not braved, to prove that there was honor even in thieves! It could have been at no inconsiderable danger,—a danger not incommensurate with that of robbing a tigress of her whelps,—that she had managed to filch his loot from that pertinacious and vindictive soul, Anisty!
But she had accomplished it; and all for him!
If only he could find her, now!
There was a clue to his hand in that bag, of course, but by this act she had for ever removed from him the right to investigate that.
If he could only find that cabby.
Perhaps if he tried at the Madison Square rank, immediately. …
Besides, it was clearly his duty not to remain in the flat alone with the jewels another night. There was but one attainable place of safety for them; and that the safe of a reputable hotel. He would return to the Bartholdi at once, merely pausing on his way to inquire of the cabmen if they could send their brother-nighthawk to him.
Maitland shook himself into his topcoat, jammed hat upon head, dropped the jewels into one pocket, the cigarette case into another, and—on impulse—Anisty's revolver, with its two unexploded cartridges, into a third; and pressed the call button for O'Hagan, not waiting, however, for that worthy to climb the stairs, but meeting him in the entry hall.
"I'm going back to the Bartholdi, O'Hagan, for the night. You may bring me my letters and any messages in the morning. I should like you to sleep in the flat to-night and answer any telephone calls."
"Yiss, Misther Maitland, sor."
"Have the police gone, O'Hagan?"
"There's a whole bottle full yet, sor."
"You've not been drinking, I trust?"
The Irishman shuffled. "Shure, sor, an' wud that be hosphitible?"
Laughing, Maitland bade him good night and left the house, turning west to gain Fifth Avenue, walking slowly because he was a little tired, and enjoying the rather unusual experience of being abroad at that hour without company. The sky seemed cleaner than ordinarily, the city quieter than ever he had known it, and in the air was a sweet smell, reminiscent of the country-side … reminding one unhappily of the previous night when one had gone whistling to one's destiny along a perfumed country road. …
"Good 'eavings, Mister Maitland, sir! It carn't be you!"
Maitland looked up, bewildered for the instant. The voice that hailed him out of the sky was not unfamiliar. …
A cab that he had waited on the corner to let pass, was reined back suddenly. The driver leaned down from the box and in a thunderstruck tone advertised his stupefaction.
"It aren't in nature, sir—if yer'll pardon my mentionin' it. But 'ere I leaves you not ten minutes ago at the St. Luke Building and finds yer 'ere, when you 'aven't 'ad time"
Maitland woke up. "What's that?" he questioned sharply. "You left me where ten minutes?"
"St. Luke Buildin', corner Broadway an'."
"I know it," excited, "but"
"'avin' took yer there with the young lady"
"Young lady!"
"that comes outer the 'ouse with yer, sir"
"The devil!" Maitland hesitated no longer: his foot was on the step as he spoke. "Drive me there at once, and drive for all you're worth!" he cried. "If there's an ounce of speed in that plug of yours and you don't get it out"
"Never fear, sir! We'll make it in five minutes!"
"It'll be worth your while."
"Right-O!"
Maitland dropped into his seat, dumbfounded. "Good Lord!" he whispered; and then savagely: "In the power of that infamous scoundrel!" And felt of the revolver in his pocket.
The cab had been headed north; the St. Luke rears its massive bulk south of Twenty-third Street. The driver expertly swung his vehicle almost on dead center. Simultaneously it careened with the impact of a heavy bulk landing upon the step and falling in a heap on the deck.
"My worrd, what's that?" came from aloft. Maitland was altogether too startled to speak.
The heap sat up, resolving itself into the semblance of a man; who spoke in decisive tones:
"If yeh're goin' there, I'm goin' with yeh, 'r yeh don't go—see?"
"The sleuth!" gasped Maitland, astounded.
"Ah, cut that, can't yeh?" Hickey got on all fours, found his cigar, stuck it in his mouth, and fell into place at Maitland's side.
"Hickey, I mean. But how"
"If yeh're Maitland, 'nd Anisty's at the St. Luke Buildin', tell that fool up there to drive!"
Maitland had no need to lift the trap; the cabby had already done that.
"All right," the young man called. "It's Detective Hickey. Drive on!"
The lash leaped out over the roof—cr-rack!—and the horse, presumably convinced that no speed other than a dead-run would ever again be demanded of it, tore frantically down the Avenue, the hansom rocking like a topsail-schooner in a heavy gale.
Maitland and the detective were battered against the side and back of the vehicle and slammed against one another with painful regularity. Under such circumstances speech was difficult; yet they managed to exchange a few sentences.
"Yeh gottuh gun?"
"Anisty's—two good cartridges."
"Jus' as well I'm along, I guess."
And again: "How'd yeh s'pose Anisty got this cab?"
"I don't know—must've been in the house—I told cabby to wait—Anisty seems to have walked out right on your heels."
"Hell!" And a moment later: "What's this about a woman in the case?"
Maitland took swift thought on her behalf.
"Too long to go into now," he parried the query. "You help me catch this scoundrel Anisty and I'll put in a good word for you with the deputy commissioner."
"Ah, yeh help me nab him," grunted the detective, "’nd I won't need no good word with nobody."
The hansom swung into Broadway, going like a whirlwind; and picked up an uniformed officer in front of the Flatiron Building, who, shouting and using his locust stridently, sprinted after them. A block further down another fell into line; and he it was who panted at the step an instant after the cab had lurched to a stop before the entrance to the St. Luke Building.
Hickey had rolled out before the policeman had a chance to bluster.
"’Lo, Bergen," he greeted the man. "Yeh know me—I'm Hickey, Central Office. Yeh're jus' in time. Anisty's in this buildin'—'r was ten minutes ago. We want all the help we c'n get."
By way of reply the officer stooped and drummed a loud alarm on the sidewalk with his night-stick.
"Say," he panted, rising, "you're a wonder, Hickey—if you get him."
"Uh-huh," grunted the detective with a sidelong glance at Maitland. "C'm 'long."
The lobby of the building was quite deserted as they entered, the night-watchman invisible, the night elevator on its way to the roof—as was discovered by consultation of the indicator dial above the gate. Hickey punched the night call bell savagely.
"Me 'nd him," he said, jerking the free thumb at Maitland, "’ll go up and hunt him out. Begin at th' top floor an' work down. That's th' way, huh? 'Nd," to the policeman, "yeh stay here an' hold up anybody 't tries tuh leave th' buildin'. There ain't no other entrance, I s'pose, what?"
"Basement door an' ash lift's round th' corner," responded the officer. "But that had ought tuh be locked, night."
"Well, 'f anybody else comes along yeh put him there, anyway, for luck. … What 'n hell's th' matter with this elevator?"
The detective settled a pudgy index-finger on the push button and elicited a far, thin, shrill peal from the annunciator above. But the indicator arrow remained as motionless as the car at the top of the shaft. Another summons gained no response, in likewise, and a third was also disregarded.
Hickey stepped back, face black as a storm-cloud, summed up his opinion of the management of the building in one soul-blistering phrase, produced his bandana and used it vigorously, uttered a libel on the ancestry of the night-watchman and the likes of him, and turned to give profane welcome to the policeman who had noticed the cab at Twenty-third Street and who now panted in, blown and perspiring. Much to his disgust he found himself assigned to stand guard over the basement exits, and waddled forth again into the street.
Meanwhile the first officer to arrive upon the scene was taking his turn at agitating the button and shaking the gates; and with no more profit of his undertaking than Hickey. After a minute or two of it he acknowledged defeat with an oath, and turned away to browbeat the straggling vanguard of belated wayfarers,—messenger-boys, slatternly drabs, hackmen, loafers, and one or two plain citizens conspicuously out of their reputable grooves,—who were drifting in at the entrance to line the lobby walls with blank, curious faces. Forerunners of that mysterious rabble which is apparently precipitated out of the very air by any extraordinary happening in city streets, if allowed to remain they would in five minutes have waxed in numbers to the proportions of an unmanageable mob; and the policeman, knowing this, set about dispersing them with perhaps greater discretion than consideration.
They wavered and fell back, grumbling discontentedly; and Maitland, his anxiety temporarily distracted by the noise they made, looked round to find his erstwhile cabby at his elbow. Of whom the sight was inspiration. Ever thoughtful, never unmindful of her whose influence held him in this coil, he laid an arresting hand on the man's sleeve.
"You've got your cab?"
"Yessir, right houtside."
"Drive round the corner, away from the crowd, and wait for me. If she—the young lady—comes without me, drive her anywhere she tells you and come to my rooms to-morrow morning for your pay."
"Thankee, sir."
Maitland turned back, to find the situation round the elevator shaft in statu quo. Nothing had happened, save that Hickey's rage and vexation had increased mightily.
"But why don't you go up after him?"
"How 'n blazes can I?" exploded the detective. "He's got th' night car. 'F I takes the stairs, he comes down by th' shaft, 'nd how'm I tuh trust this here mutt?" He indicated his associate but humbler custodian of the peace with a disgusted gesture.
"Perhaps one of the other cars will run" Maitland suggested.
"Ah, they're all dead ones," Hickey disagreed with disdain as the young man moved down the row of gates, trying one after another. "Yeh're only wastin'"
He broke off with a snort as Maitland, somewhat to his own surprise managing to move the gate of the third shaft from the night elevator, stepped into the darkened car and groped for the controller. Presently his fingers encountered it, and he moved it cautiously to one side. A vicious blue spark leaped hissing from the controller-box and the cage bounded up a dozen feet, and was only restrained from its ambition to soar skywards by an instantaneous release of the lever.
By discreet manipulation Maitland worked the car down to the street floor again, and Hickey with a grunt that might be interpreted as an apology for his incredulity, jumped in.
"Let 'er rip!" he cried exultantly. "Fan them folks out intuh th' street, Bergen, 'nd watch ow-ut!"
Maitland was pressing the lever slowly wide of its catch, and the lighted lobby dropped out of sight while the detective was still shouting admonitions to the police below. Gradually gaining in momentum the car began to shoot smoothly up into the blackness, safety chains clanking beneath the floor. Hickey fumbled for the electric light switch but, finding it, immediately shut the glare off again and left the car in darkness.
"Safer," he explained, sententious. "Anisty'll shoot, 'nd they says he shoots straight."
Floor after floor in ghostly strata slipped silently down before their eyes. Half-way to the top, approximately, Hickey's voice rang sharply in the volunteer operator's ear.
"Stop 'er! Hold 'er steady. T'other's comin' down."
Maitland obeyed, managing the car with greater ease and less jerkily as he began to understand the principle of the lever. The cage paused in the black shaft, and he looked upward.
Down the third shaft over, the other cage was dropping like a plummet, a block of golden light walled in by black filigree-work and bisected vertically by the black line of the guide-rail.
"Stop that there car!"
Hickey's stentorian command had no effect; the block of light continued to fall with unabated speed.
The detective wasted no more breath. As the other car swept past, Maitland was shocked by a report and flash beside him. Hickey was using his revolver.
The detonation was answered by a cry, a scream of pain, from the lighted cage. It paused on the instant, like a bird stricken a-wing, some four floors below, but at once resumed its downward swoop.
"Down, down! After 'em!" Hickey bellowed. "I dropped one, by God! T'other can't"
"How many in the car?" interrupted Maitland, opening the lever with a firm and careful hand.
"Only two, same's us, I hit th' feller what was runnin' it"
"Steady!" cautioned Maitland, decreasing the speed, as the car approached the lower floor.
The other had beaten them down; but its arrival at the street level was greeted by a short chorus of mad yells, a brief fusillade of shots—perhaps five in all—and the clang of the gate. Then, like a ball rebounding, the cage swung upwards again, hurtling at full speed.
Evidently Anisty had been received in force which he had not bargained for.
Maitland instinctively reversed the lever and sent his own car upward again, slowly, waiting for the other to overtake it. Peering down through the iron lattice-work he could indistinctly observe the growing cube of light, with a dark shape lying huddled in one corner of the floor. A second figure, rapidly taking shape as Anisty's, stood by the controller, braced against the side of the car, one hand on the lever, the other poising a shining thing, the flesh-colored oval of his face turned upwards in a supposititious attempt to discern the location of the dark car.
Hickey, by firing prematurely, lent him adventitious aid. The criminal replied with spirit, aiming at the flash, his bullet spattering against the back wall of the shaft. Hickey's next bullet rang with a bell-like note against the metal-work, Anisty's presumably went wide—though Maitland could have sworn he felt the cold kiss of its breath upon his cheek. And the lighted cage rocketed past and up.
Maitland needed no admonition to pursue; his blood was up, his heart singing with the lust of the man-hunt. Yet Anisty was rapidly leaving them, his car soaring at an appalling pace. Towards the top he evidently made some attempt to slow up, but either he was ignorant of the management of the lever, or else the thing had got beyond control. The cage rammed the buffers with a crash that echoed through the sounding halls like a peal of thunder-claps; it was instantaneously plunged into darkness. There followed a splintering and rending sound, and Maitland, heart in mouth, could make out dimly a dark, falling shadow in the further shaft. Yet ere it had descended a score of feet the safety-clutch acted and, with a third tremendous jar, shaking the building, the car halted.
Hickey and Maitland were then some five floors below. "Stop 'er at Nineteen," ordered the detective. There was a lilt of exultancy in his voice. "We got him now, all right, all right. He'll try to get down by There!" Overhead the crash of a gate forced open was followed by a scurry of footsteps over the tiling. "Stop 'er and we'll head him off. So now—eeeasy!"
Maitland shut off the power as the car reached the nineteenth floor. Hickey opened the gate and jumped out. "Shut that," he commanded sharply as Maitland followed him, "in case he gets past us."
He paused a moment in thought, heavy head on bull-neck drooping forward as he stared toward the rear of the building. He was fearless and resourceful, for all his many deficiencies. Maitland found time, quaintly enough, to regard him with detached curiosity, a rare animal, illustrating all that was best and worst in his order. Endowed with unexceptionable courage, his address in emergencies seemed altogether admirable.
"Yeh guard them stairs," he decided suddenly. "I'll run through this hall, 'nd see what's doing. Don't hesitate to shoot if he tries to jump yeh." And was gone, clumping briskly down the corridor to the rear.
Maitland, yielding the initiative to the other's superior generalship, stood sentinel, revolver in hand, until the detective returned, overheated and sweating, from his tour, to report "nothin' doin'," with characteristic brevity. He had the same report to make on both the twentieth and twenty-first floors, where the same procedure was observed; but as the latter was reached unexpected and very welcome reinforcements were gained by the arrival of a third car, containing three patrolmen and one roundsman. Yet numbers created delay; Hickey was seized and compelled to pant explanations, to his supreme disgust.
And, suddenly impatient beyond endurance, Maitland left them and alone sprang up the stairs.
That this was simple foolhardiness may be granted without dispute. But it must be borne in mind that he was very young and ardent, very greatly perturbed on behalf of an actor in the tragedy in whom the police, to their then knowledge, had no interest whatsoever. And if in the heat of chase he had for an instant forgotten her, now he remembered; and at once the capture of Anisty was relegated to the status of a matter of secondary importance. The real matter at stake was the safety of the girl whom Anisty, by exercise of an infernal ingenuity that passed Maitland's comprehension, had managed to spirit into this place of death and darkness and whispering halls. Where she might be, in what degree of suffering and danger,—these were the considerations that sent him in search of her without a thought of personal peril, but with a sick heart and overwhelmed with a stifling sense of anxiety.
More active than the paunch-burdened detective, he had sprinted down and back through the hallway of the twenty-second floor, without discovering anything, ere the police contingent had reached an agreement and the stairhead.
There remained two more floors, two final flights. A little hopelessly he swung up the first. And as he did so the blackness above him was riven by a tongue of fire, and a bullet, singing past his head, flattened itself with a vicious spat against the marble dado of the walls. Instinctively he pulled up, finger closing upon the trigger of his revolver; flash and report followed the motion, and a panel of ribbed glass in a door overhead was splintered and fell in clashing fragments, all but drowning the sound of feet in flight upon the upper staircase.
A clamor of caution, warning, encouragement, and advice broke out from the police below. But Maitland hardly heard. Already he was again in pursuit, taking the steps two at a leap. With a hand upon the newel-post he swung round on the twenty-third floor, and hurled himself toward the foot of the last flight. A crash like a rifle-shot rang out above, and for a second he fancied that Anisty had fired again and with a heavier weapon. But immediately he realized that the noise had been only the slamming of the door at the head of the stairs,—the door whose glazed panel loomed above him, shedding a diffused light to guide his footsteps, its opalescent surface lettered with the name of
HENRY M. BANNERMAN
Attorney & Counselor-at-Law
the door of the office whose threshold he had so often crossed to meet a friend and adviser. It was with a shock that he comprehended this, a thrill of wonder. He had all but forgotten that Bannerman owned an office in the building, in the rush, the urge of this wild adventure. Strange that Anisty should have chosen it for the scene of his last stand,—strange, and strangely fatal for the criminal! For Maitland knew that from this eyrie there was no means of escape, other than by the stairs.
Well and good! Then they had the man, and
The thought was flashing in his mind, illumining the darkness of his despair with the hope that he would be able to force a word as to the girl's whereabouts from the burglar ere the police arrived; Maitland's foot was on the upper step, when a scream of mortal terror—her voice!—broke from within. Half maddened, he threw himself bodily against the door, twisting the knob with frantic fingers that slipped upon its immovable polished surface.
The bolt had been shot, he was barred out, and, with only the width of a man's hand between them, the girl was in deathly peril and terror.
A sob that was at the same time an oath rose to his lips. Baffled, helpless, he fell back, tears of rage starting to his eyes, her accents ringing in his ears as terribly pitiful as the cry of a lost and wandering soul.
"God!" he mumbled incoherently, and in desperation sent the pistol-butt crashing against the glass. It was tough, stout, stubborn; the first blow scarcely flawed it. As he redoubled his efforts to shatter it, Hickey's hand shot over his shoulder to aid him. … And with startling abruptness the barrier seemed to dissolve before their eyes, the glass falling inward with a shrill clatter.
Quaintly, with the effect of a picture cast by a cinematograph in a darkened auditorium, there leaped upon Maitland's field of vision the picture of Anisty standing at bay, face drawn and tense, lips curled back, eyes lurid with defiance and despair. He stood, poised upon the balls of his feet, like a cat ready to spring, in the doorway between the inner and outer offices. He raised his hand with an indescribably swift and vicious gesture, and a flame seemed to blaze out from his finger-tips.
At the same instant Hickey's weapon spat by Maitland's cheek; the young man felt the hot furnace breath of it.
The burglar reeled as though from a tremendous blow. His inflamed features were suddenly whitened, and his right arm dropped limply from the shoulder, revolver falling from fingers involuntarily relaxing.
Hickey covered him. "Surrender!" he roared. And fired again. For Anisty had gone to his knees, reaching for the revolver with his uninjured arm.
The detective's second bullet winged through the doorway, over Anisty's head, and bit through the outer window. As Anisty, with a tremendous strain upon his failing powers, struggled to his feet, Maitland, catching the murderous gleam in the man's eye, pulled trigger. The burglar's answering shot expended itself as harmlessly as Maitland's. Both went wide of their marks.
And of a sudden Hickey had drawn the bolt, and the body of police behind forced Maitland pell-mell into the room. As he recovered he saw Hickey hurling himself at the criminal's throat—one second too late. True to his pledge never to be taken alive, Anisty had sent his last bullet crashing through his own skull.
A cry of horror and consternation forced itself from Maitland's throat. The police halted, each where he stood, transfixed. Anisty drew himself up, with a trace of pride in his pose; smiled horribly; put a hand mechanically to his lips. …
And died.
Hickey caught him as he fell, but Maitland, unheeding, leaped over the body that had in life resembled him so fatally, and entered Bannerman's private office.
The grey girl lay at length in a corner of the room, shielded from observation by one of the desks. Her eyes were closed, her cheeks wore the hue of death; the fair young head was pillowed on one white and rounded forearm, in an attitude of natural rest, and the burnished hair, its heavy coils slipping from their fastenings, tumbled over her head and shoulders in shimmering glory, like a splash of living flame.
With a low and bitter cry the young man dropped to his knees by her side. In the outer office the police were assembled in excited conclave, blind to all save the momentous fact of Anisty's last, supremely consistent act. For the time Maitland was utterly alone with his great and aching loneliness.
After a little while timidly he touched her hand. It lay upturned, white slender fingers like exotic petals curling in upon the rosy hollow of her palm. And it was soft and warm.
He lifted it tenderly in both his own, and so held it for a space, brooding, marveling at its perfection. And inevitably he bent and touched it with his lips, as if their ardent contact would warm it to sentience. …
The fingers tightened upon his own, slowly, surely; and in the blinding joy of that moment he was made conscious of the ineffable sweetness of opening, wondering eyes.