Children of the Whirlwind

CHAPTER XXXIV

But when Barney's latch-key slid into the door and Barney, in a smart dinner jacket, came in, Maggie was herself again. Indeed she was better than herself, for there rushed to her support that added power which she had just been despairing of, which carries some people through an hour of crisis, and which may occasionally lift an actor above himself when fortune gives him a difficult yet splendid part which is the great chance of his career.

And Maggie showed to the eye that she was better than her best, for Barney exclaimed the instant he was beside her: “Gee, Maggie, you look like the Queen of Sheba, whoever that dame was! Any guy would fall for you to-night—and fall so hard that he'd break, or go broke!”

But Barney was too eager to await any response. “What's behind the hurry-up call you sent in? Anything broken yet?”

“Something big! But sit down. There's a lot to tell. And I must tell it quick—before my”—she could not force herself to say “father”—“before Old Jimmie comes, and Dick.”

“Then Dick's coming?”

“Yes. Things have taken a twist so that everything breaks to-night. But sit down, and I'll tell you everything.”

She had noted that the door behind which Larry stood, and to which he had captured the key, was open a bare half-inch. It looked no more suspicious than any closet door that by accident had swung free of its latch, but by deft maneuvering Maggie managed so that Barney sat at the table with his back toward both closets.

“Go to it, Maggie,” he urged.

The plan which had swiftly developed from Dick Sherwood's idea required that she should tell much that was the truth and much that was not truth, and required that she should play with every faculty and every attraction she possessed upon Barney's tremendous vanity and upon his jealous admiration of her. She had to make him believe more in her as a pal than ever before; she had to make him want her more as a woman than ever before. And at this moment she felt herself thrillingly equal to this vampire role her over-stimulated sense of justice had commanded her to undertake.

“Things have gone great,” she began, speaking concisely, yet trying not in this eager brevity to lose the convincing effect that she would be the complete mistress of any enterprise to which she yielded her interest. “Dick Sherwood proposed to me again, and this time I said `yes.' I saw that he was ready for anything, so I took some things into my hands. I had to, for I saw we had to act quick even at the risk of losing a bit of the maximum figure we had counted on. You see I realized the danger to us in Larry Brainard suddenly showing up, and his knowing, as he told us he did, who the sucker is that we've been stringing along. Anything might happen, any minute, from Larry Brainard that would upset everything. So I reasoned that we had to collect quick or run the risk of never getting a nickel.”

“Some bean you've got, Maggie,” he said admiringly. “Keep your foot on the gas pedal.”

“What I did was only, the carrying-out of the plan you had decided on—of course carrying it out quicker, and with a few little changes that the urgent situation demanded. After he proposed I broke down, as per schedule, and confessed that I had deceived him to the extent that I was already married. Married to a man I didn't love, and who didn't love me, but who was a tight-wad and who wouldn't let me go unless he saw a lot of money in it for him. And I gave Dick all the rest of the story, just as we had doped it out.”

“Great work, Maggie! How did he take it?”

“Exactly as we figured he would. He was sorry for me; it didn't make any difference at all in his feelings for me. He'd buy my husband off—give him any price he wanted—and just so I wouldn't have to feel myself bound to such a man a minute longer than necessary he'd make a bargain with him at once and pay him part of the money right down. To-night, if he could get in touch with my husband. And so, Barney, since we had to act quick and there was no time to bring in another man that I could pass off as my husband, I confessed to him that I was married to you.”

“To me!” exclaimed Barney.

“And he's coming here in less than an hour, with real money in his pockets, to see if he can't fix a deal with you.”

“Me!” exclaimed the startled Barney again. His beady eyes glowed at her ardently. “Gee, you know I wish I really was married to you, Maggie! If I was, you bet money couldn't ever pry you loose from me!”

“Well, there's the whole lay-out, Barney. It's up to you to be my grasping, bargaining, unloving husband for about an hour.”

“I hadn't thought of myself in that part,” he objected. “I'd figured that we'd bring in a new man to be the husband. It's pretty dangerous for me, my stringing Dick along all this while and then suddenly to enter the act as your husband—and to take the money.”

“Dangerous!” There was sudden contempt in her voice and in her eyes. “So you're that kind of man, Barney—afraid! And afraid after my telling Dick you were my husband, and his swallowing the thing without a suspicion! Well, right this minute is when we call this deal off—and every other deal!”

“Oh, don't be so quick with that temper of yours, Maggie! I merely said it was dangerous. Of course I'll do it.”

And then Barney asked, with a cunning he tried to hide: “But why did you ask me to have Old Jimmie show up here right after me? We don't need him.”

“Just what's behind your saying that, Barney?” she demanded sharply.

He squirmed a little, then spoke the truth. “You don't love your father any too much, and he doesn't love you any too much—I know that. He needn't really know how much we take off Sherwood; if he wasn't here, he'd have to take our word for what we got and we'd tell him we got mighty little. Then the real money would be divided fifty-fifty between just you and me.”

“I may not love my father, but he's in this on the same basis as you are, or I'm out of it,” she declared. “I thought you might suggest something like this; that's one reason I asked you to have him come. Another reason—and this is something I forgot to tell you awhile ago—when I broke down and confessed everything to Dick Sherwood, I told Dick that Old Jimmie was really my guardian; and we both agreed that he should be present as a witness to any agreement, and to protect my interests. Still another reason is that since we had to work so fast, the thing to do was to split the money on the spot in three ways, and then each of us shoot off in a different direction to-night before any bad luck had a chance to break. In fact, Barney, this present minute is when you and I say our good-byes.”

He forgot his scheme to defraud Old Jimmie in the far greater concern aroused by her last words. He leaned across the table and tried to take her hand, an attempt she deftly thwarted.

“But listen, Maggie,” he asked with husky eagerness, “you and I are going to have an understanding to join up with each other soon, aren't we? You know what I mean—belong to each other. You know how I feel about: you!”

This was the principal point Maggie had been maneuvering toward. Before her was the most difficult scene of the many which she had planned, on her successful management of which the success of everything seemed to depend. Within she was palpitant with the strain and suspense of it all; but on Barney she held cool, appraising eyes. In this splendid composure, her momentary withdrawal from him, she seemed to Barney more beautiful, more desirable, more indispensable, than at any time since he had discovered back at the Duchess's that Maggie was a find.

“Of course I know exactly what you mean, Barney,” she responded with deliberation, bewitchingly alluring in her air of superiority. “I've known for a long time you and I would have to have a real talk. Are you ready for a straight talk now?”

“As straight as you can talk it!”

“I'll probably fall for some man and marry him. Every woman does. But if I marry him, it'll be because I love him. But my marrying a man doesn't mean I'm going to go into business with him. I'm not going to mix love with business—not unless the man is the right sort of man. Of course it would be better if the man I marry and the man I take on as a business partner were the same man—but I'm not going to take any risks. You understand me so far.”

“Surest thing you know. And every word you've said proves that your head isn't just something to look pretty with. Let me slip this over to you right at the start—I'm the right sort of man!”

“That's exactly what I want to find out,” she continued, with her deliberation, with the air of sitting secure upon the highest level. “I know now what I can do. I've proved it. Now I'm going right ahead putting over big things. You once told me I had it in me to be the best ever—and I now know I can be. I know I've got to tie up with a man, and the man has got to be just as good in his way as I am in mine. Right there's where I'm in doubt about you. I said I was going to talk straight—and I'm handing it to you straight. I don't know how good you are.”

“You mean you think I'm not big enough to work with you?”

“I mean exactly what I said. I said that I didn't really know how good you are, and that I wasn't going to tie up with any man except the best in the business. You've hinted now and then at a lot of big things you've put across and how strong you were in certain quarters where it paid to be strong—but I really know mighty little about you, Barney. This present job hasn't required you to do anything special, and all the really hard work I've done myself. Of course I know you are a good dancer, and clever with the ladies, and know how to pick up a sucker and string him along. But that's everything I do know. And, there are hundreds of men who are good at these things. The man I tie up with has got to be good at a lot of other things—and I've got to know he's good!”

“Good at what other things, Maggie?” he asked with suppressed eagerness.

“He's got to be good at putting over all kinds of situations. I don't care how he does it. So clever at putting things over that no one ever guesses he's the man who did it. And he's got to be able to give me protection. You know what I mean. A woman in the game I'm going in for is absolutely through, as far as doing anything big is concerned, the minute she gets a police record. I've got to have a man who's able to stand between me and the police. And I've got to know from past performances that the man can do these things. Just large words about what he can do, or hints about what he has done, don't count for a nickel with me. This is plain, hard business I'm talking, Barney, and I don't mean to hurt your feelings when I tell you that you don't measure up in any way to the man I need.”

It had been difficult for Barney to hold himself until she had finished. To start with, he had the vain man's constant itch to tell of his exploits, his dislike for the anonymity of his cleverness unjustly ascribed to some other man. And then Maggie had played upon him even more skillfully than she imagined.

“I'm exactly the man you need in every way!” he exploded.

“Those are just words,” she said evenly. “I said I had to have something more than mere words.”

“I'm ace-high with Chief Barlow!”

“You've got to be more explicit.”

Barney was now all excitement. “Don't you get what that means? I've never been locked up once, and yet I've been pulling stuff all the time! And yet look how Larry Brainard, that the bunch thought was so clever, got hooked and was sent away. I guess you know the answer!”

“Again, Barney, I've got to ask you to be more explicit.”

“Then the answer is that all the while I've been working on an understanding with Barlow. I guess that's explicit!”

“You mean,” she said in her cool voice, “that you've been a stool-pigeon for Barlow?”

“Sure!—though I don't like the word. That's the only safe way of staying steady in the game—an understanding with the police. All there is to it is now and then to tip the police off about some dub of a crook: of course you've got to be smooth enough not to let anyone guess your game.”

“That doesn't seem to me such a strong talking point in your favor,” she said thoughtfully.

“But don't you get the idea? I'm so strong with Barlow that I can get away with anything I want to. That means I can give you the protection from the police you just spoke about. See?”

“Yes I see.” Again she spoke thoughtfully. “But I told you I had to be shown. You must have done some pretty big things to have got such a standing with Barlow. For example?”

“I could write you a book!” He laughed in his excited pride. “You ask for an example. I could hardly hold myself in awhile ago when you said you'd practically swung the present deal alone, and that I'd done almost nothing. Why, Maggie, I did just one smooth little thing without which there couldn't have been any deal.”

“What?”

“You'll admit that nothing would have been safe with Larry Brainard determined to butt in on what you did?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I'm the little guy that fixed Larry Brainard so he wouldn't hurt anyone!”

“You did that?” For the first time Maggie showed what seemed to be a live interest. “How?”

“How? You'll say it was clever when you learn how. And you'll say that I'm the man you want on that count of being able to put over a situation so that no one will ever guess I'm the man who did it. You'll admit that putting Larry Brainard out of business, so he'd stay out, was certainly a stiff job—for though I don't like him, I admit that Larry is one wise bird. One thing I did was to suggest to Barlow that he force Larry to become a police stool. I knew Larry would refuse, and I figured out everything else exactly as it has happened. I ask you, wasn't that putting something clever over?”

“It certainly was clever!” admired Maggie.

“Wait! That's only half. To finish Larry off so that he wouldn't have a chance I had to finish him off not only with the cops, but also with his pals. So I tipped off Barlow to the game Red Hannigan and Jack Rosenfeldt were pulling and—”

“Then Larry Brainard really didn't do that?”

“No; I did it! Listen—there's some more to it. I spread the word, so that it seemed to be a leak from the Police Department, that it was Larry who had squealed on Red Hannigan and Jack Rosenfeldt. Did his old pals start out to get Larry? Well, now, did they! If I do say it myself, that was smooth work!”

“It was wonderful!” agreed Maggie.

“And there's still more, Maggie! You remember that charge of stick-up and attempted murder of a Chicago guy that the police are trying to land Larry on? I put that over! I'm the party that was messed up in that. I was trying to put over a neat little job all on my own; but something went wrong just as I thought I was cleaning out the sucker, and I had to be rough with that Chicago guy in order to make a get-away from him. I beat it straight to Barlow, and said that right here was the chance to fasten something on Larry. Barlow took my tip. My foot may have slipped on the original job, but my bean certainly did act quick, and you've got to admit I turned an apparent failure into something bigger than success would have been. And that's certainly traveling!”

“It certainly is!”

“And now, Maggie “—Barney pressed her eagerly—“I've shown you I'm just the sort you said a man had to be for you to tie up with him. I've shown you I can guarantee you police protection. And I've shown you I'm able to put over clever situations without any one ever guessing I'm the party who put 'em over. I fit all your specifications! How about our settling right now to join up some place—Toronto's the best bet—say three days after we make our get-away after to-night's clean-up? Let's be quick about this, Maggie—before Old Jimmie comes in. He's due any minute now!”

“Isn't that him at the door now?” breathed Maggie.

Both waited intently for a moment. But though she pretended so, Maggie's interest was not upon the outer door. Her attention was fixed, as it had been with sickening fear this last minute, upon that half-inch crack in the closet door behind Barney. Why had she, in her dismayed urgence, allowed Larry to possess himself of that closet key?—when her plan had been to keep Hannigan as well as Barlow forcibly behind the scenes until she had acted out her play? She now hoped almost against hope that Hannigan would not burst forth and ruin what was yet to come. Since that door unluckily had to be unlocked, her one chance was given her by the presence of Larry. Perhaps Larry could perceive the larger things she was striving for, and in some way restrain Hannigan.

These thoughts were but an instant in passing through her brain. Barney's eyes came back from the outer door to her face. “That's not Old Jimmie yet.”

“No,” her lips said. But her brain was saying, since the crack still remained a half-inch crack, “Larry understands—he's holding back Red Hannigan!”

Barney returned swiftly to his charge. “How about Toronto, Maggie—say exactly seventy-two hours from now—the Royal Brunswick Hotel?”

Maggie realized she could no longer put him off if she were to keep him unsuspicious for the next hour. Besides, in her desperate disillusionment concerning herself, she did not care what happened to her, or what people might think of her, if only she could keep this play going till its final moment.

“Yes,” she said—“if we each feel the same way toward each other when this evening's ended.”

“Maggie!” he cried. “Maggie!” This time, when he exultantly caught at her hand, she dared not refuse it to him. And she felt an additional loathing for Barney's caress because she knew that Larry was a witness to it.

Indeed, it was difficult for Larry, at the sight of Maggie's hand in Barney's too eager palms, to hold himself in check; and to do this in addition to holding in check the slight, quivering Red Hannigan, whose collar and whose right wrist he had been gripping these last three minutes. For Larry, as Maggie had hoped, had dimly apprehended something of Maggie's plan, and he felt himself bound by the promise she had extracted from him, to let her go through with whatever she had under way; though he had no conception of her plan's extent, and could, of course, not know of the intention of her overwrought mind to give her plan its final touch in what amounted to her own self-destruction, and in her vanishing utterly out of the knowledge of all who knew her.

Another minute passed; then Larry heard three peculiar rings of the bell of the outer door—an obvious signal. Maggie answered the summons, and Larry saw Old Jimmie enter. There followed a rapid and compact conference between the three, the substance of which was the telling of Old Jimmie of the developments against Dick Sherwood which Maggie had a little earlier recited to Barney, together with instructions to Old Jimmie concerning his new role as Maggie's guardian. It seemed to Larry that he caught signs of uneasiness in Jimmie, but to all the older man nodded his head.

Presently there was a loud ring. “That's Dick!” exclaimed Barney in a whisper. “And mighty eager, too—shows that by being ahead of the time you set! Let him in, Maggie.”

Maggie was startled by the ring, though she did not show it. She thought rapidly. She had definitely asked Dick to telephone before coming. Why hadn't he telephoned? Perhaps something had happened to prevent it, or perhaps an idea had come to him by which their plan could be bettered without a telephone message. In either case, she and Dick might have to improvise and deftly catch cues tossed to each other, as experienced actors sometimes do without the audience ever knowing that a hiatus in the play has been skillfully covered.

Maggie stood up. “You both understand what you're to do?”

Both whispered “yes.” Larry watched Maggie start across the room, his whole figure quivering with suspense as to what was going to happen when Dick entered. He was quite sure there was more here than appeared upon the surface, quite sure that Maggie did not intend that the business with Dick should work out as she had outlined. What could Maggie possibly be up to? he asked himself in feverish wonderment, and could find no answer. For of course Larry had no knowledge of that most important fact: that Maggie had actually made a confession to Dick—not the fraudulent confession she had told Barney of—but an honest and complete confession, and that in consequence she and Dick were working in cooperation.

From his crack Larry could not quite see the outer door. But after she opened the door he saw Maggie fall back with an inarticulate cry, her face suddenly blanched with astounded fright. And then Larry experienced one of the greatest surprises of his life—a surprise so unnerving that he almost loosed his hold upon Red Hannigan. For instead of Dick there walked into the room the tall, white-haired figure of Joe Ellison, and Joe's lean, prison-blanched face was aquiver with a devastating purpose. How in the name of God had Joe come to be here?—and what did that terrible look portend?

But Larry's surprise was but an unperturbing emotion compared to the effect of her father's appearance, with his terrible face, upon Maggie. Life seemed suddenly to go out of her. She realized that the clever play which she had constructed so rapidly, and upon which she had counted to clear the tangle for which she was in part responsible, and to bring her back in time as the seeming fulfillment of the dream of a happy and undisillusioned father—she realized that her poor, brilliant play had come to an instant end before it was fairly started, and that the control of events had passed into other hands.