The girl was dragged out of the room, screaming and fighting. A wisp of curses came back into the big room as she was lugged up the stairs towards the hotel.

Anson stood panting with anger. A mail carrier entered and placed a letter in his hand. He opened and read:

"Mr. Carter Anson: Take your choice. Close the Cafe Sinister, or I'll see that it is closed. Mary Randall."

The big man flushed crimson with rage. He tried to speak, but the words choked in his throat. He crumpled the letter and hurled it with a curse across the room.

"Druce," he bellowed.

Druce hurried across the room.

"Did you see that?"

"Yes, I saw you beat her up. Why don't you let 'em alone? You'll kill one of them some of these days."

"Naw, not her. I mean the letter. Mary Randall—she says she's going to close us." A waiter recovered the letter and brought it to Druce. He read it.

"Say, listen, are you turning yellow—"

"No, I ain't yellow," returned Anson, "but this thing is getting my goat. You're sure about that lease?"

"Sure?—say, I thought we'd settled that—"

"Well," pursued Anson, "I don't like this. What have you done with this other girl—the one you married? She'll be getting us into a row next."

"I married her, didn't I?"

"Yes, but—"

"Well, it's about time she started earning her bread. This Randall woman hasn't got me scared. You know why I married her. Well, I'm going through with it. I—"

The rest of his sentence died on his lips. A girl scarcely more than a child came in from the hotel entrance. She was dressed in a lacey gown, a size too large for her. The slit skirt displayed her slim ankles in pink silk stockings. The French heeled shoes were decorated with rhinestone buckles. In spite of this outrageous dress she was still pretty. It was Elsie Welcome.

"Hello, kid," said Druce, his manner changing.

"I want to see you, Martin," Elsie replied. Druce noticed that she seemed deeply agitated. There were signs of recently shed tears on her cheeks.

"I'll run along," said Anson, seeing the girl's agitation. When he was gone Druce drew the girl into a booth and demanded sharply:

"What the devil do you want and how did you get here?"

"I came in a taxicab," the girl answered.

"A taxi, eh? Well, you're learning. Who paid for it?"

"It isn't paid for, Martin. I wanted to see you and—"

"And what?"

"The man's waiting outside."

Druce flushed angrily. "Look here," he demanded. "Don't play me for a boob. Get someone else to pay your taxi bills."

"But, Martin, I thought—"

Druce did not wait for the rest of the sentence. With a muttered oath he rushed outside and paid the waiting chauffeur.

"Now, what do you want?" he demanded when he returned.

Elsie looked at him piteously. "Martin," she said, "I can't stay in that place any longer."

"Say, don't my aunt treat you all right?"

The girl burst out sobbing. "She isn't your aunt, Martin. She told me so herself. And that flat—"

"Well, what about it?"

"I—I can't tell you. I can't say it. I never knew until tonight." Elsie clutched Druce's arm pleadingly. "Martin," she said, "a man came into my room."

Druce saw that the time had come for him to lay his cards on the table. He folded his arms and looked at the girl.

"Well?" he demanded coolly.

"He had been drinking and—he took hold of me."

There was a long pause. Druce gazed at the girl satirically. She quailed with sinking heart under that look. She began sobbing again.

"Don't look at me like that, Martin," she wailed. "Don't—or I shall go mad. I left home to marry you."

"Well, I married you, didn't I?" Druce sneered.

Elsie attempted to control her voice.

"That woman you call your aunt laughed at me when I told her I was your wife. She said I was a country fool."

"Damn her," muttered Druce. "I'll settle with her."

The girl grasped Druce frantically.

"Tell me she lied," she cried, "or I'll go crazy. Tell me she lied."

"Yes, she lied," answered Druce glibly. "See here, kid, it's about time you began helping to support the family."

Elsie dried her tears. "I'm—I'm ready," she said. "I've practiced my songs—"

"O, the songs," said Druce. "That isn't all."

"What do you mean, Martin?"

"Why—don't be so stand-offish. When a man offers to buy you a bottle of wine, let him."

"Martin!"

Druce stopped her sharply. "Now don't begin that Millville Sunday school stuff," he said. "This is business."

"Is it?" Elsie spoke in a whisper.

"Sure. When a man's got a wad of bills and he's willing to buy, string him along!"

"But I'm your wife, Martin." Elsie was dead white and calm.

"Well, don't let that worry you. Go as far as you like—or as far as he likes."

The girl stood motionless, looking straight before her.

"Is—is that what you brought me here for?" she asked with forced calmness.

"Sure. Why do you suppose I dressed you up like that? Your stock in trade is your good looks. Sell it."

The girl drew herself up rigidly.

"I won't do it," she said. She started toward the door.

"You will!" grated Druce, following her.

"Never," she answered. "I'll die first. Good-by!" The door closed after her.

Anson had returned to the room and had witnessed the scene.

"Well," he sneered, "there goes the first move in your plan. You've lost that one."

"You think so?" Druce sneered in return. "Well, don't lose any sleep worrying about that one. She ain't got a dime. She'll be back."



CHAPTER XVIII

LOST IN THE LEVEE

So stupefied was Elsie Welcome by her emotions as she fled from the Cafe Sinister that it was not until her clothes were drenched that she realized it had begun to rain. Even then she did not halt and seek shelter. Her numbed brain knew only one thing—that she must get away from Druce and the place of sin to which he had brought her.

Up to the time of her last interview with her husband she had been living in a dream; now that dream had turned into a nightmare. But the nightmare, she at last realized, was reality. The veil of deception Druce had woven around her had been torn away by his own brutal words. She had come to feel a vague terror of the man. As for the Cafe Sinister, her whole nature revolted against it.

It was an hour before sunset. The sullen houses about her were beginning to show signs of life. Here and there a door opened and a man or woman stepped quickly out with rapid glances up and down the street. There was no loitering. They went their way quickly, always with a half furtive look over the shoulder.

As the girl reached a corner she found at last that she was too exhausted to go farther. Her clothes dripped. She sought an entrance way for shelter. A tall girl in a broad hat with showy plumes was just coming out of the door. She looked at Elsie's tear stained face and stopped.

"What's the matter, girlie?" There was sympathy in her voice.

"Nothing. Can you tell me where this number is?" She produced a card on which Druce's "aunt" at their last interview had written the address of a woman from whom she could get work.

The tall girl glanced at the slip of paper.

"It's just over there, two doors from that corner," she said. Elsie turned to cross the street. The tall girl stood still regarding her thoughtfully. Suddenly she seemed to reach a decision. She darted forward and stopped Elsie.

"It's none of my business, kid," she said, "but what do you want of Mother Lankee?"

Elsie looked at her in surprise. "Why," she said pitifully, "I expect to get work there."

"Do you know the kind of work Mother Lankee would ask you to do?"

"I don't know, but I'm willing to do anything."

"Anything?" repeated the tall girl.

"Why, yes. I've got to the point where I can't afford to be particular."

The tall girl laid her hand on Elsie's arm.

"What is your name?"

"Elsie Welcome."

"Where do you live?"

"On South Tenth street."

"You come from down state?"

"How did you know?"

"It's written all over you. What man brought you here?"

The question surprised Elsie and brought back memory of her sorrows. She did not answer. Her eyes filled with tears.

"Come, kid," said the tall girl, cheerfully, "get hold of yourself. Now, listen! You stay away from Mother Lankee. You're hungry, ain't you, dearie? You come with me and we'll get something to eat."

Elsie was too tired to resist and, instinctively, she trusted this tall girl with her assumption of guardianship. Together they crossed the street and entered the rear room of a saloon. Three men sat near the entrance playing cards. They looked at the two girls, inspecting Elsie narrowly and nodding carelessly at her companion. The girl took seats at a distant table.

"What do you want, Lou?" inquired one of the men, getting up from the table.

"Not you," retorted Lou curtly. "Send one of your waiters here with a plain lemonade, a glass of milk and some of that beef stew."

"Milk, eh?" said the man, "and lemonade. On the wagon again, Lou?"

"Run along now," returned the girl. "If you keep on asking questions someone is going to tell you lies."

The man went into another room, spoke to someone there and rejoined the card players. In a few moments a negro waiter appeared with the viands Lou had ordered.

Elsie began to eat famishedly. The other girl watched her approvingly.

"Go to it, girlie," she advised. "I know how you feel. I've been hungry myself."

She sipped her lemonade until Elsie had finished. Then, as though it had not been interrupted, she resumed the conversation they had begun in the street.

"The same old game," she said cynically. "You came to Chicago because you loved him. He strung you along—" Her glance fell on Elsie's wedding ring. "You fell for that 'I do take thee' thing. Then he shook you. Is that right, girlie?"

Elsie shook her head. A stupor due to the food and the reaction from her nervous and physical exhaustion came over her. She felt too languid to grapple with the problem of existence.

The tall girl arched her eyebrows in surprise.

"He didn't shake you? Then why—"

"I couldn't do what he wanted me to do," murmured Elsie. She felt her face flushing and she dropped her head. "He wanted me to—to—"

The other interrupted her sharply. "You needn't say it—I know." She gripped the table in sudden anger. "One of these dogs—eh?"

Elsie stared at her blankly. The old sense of forlornness, of being alone and uncared for, returned to her.

"I don't know what you mean," she faltered.

"What was his name?"

"Druce," gasped Elsie.

"Druce, eh?" replied the tall girl, as though the name had opened a whole vista of understanding. "Druce? Well, look out for him, girlie. He'll hound you from one end of the town to the other until he gets you. That's his business."

"He always said he was a dealer in live stock."

The tall girl laughed scornfully. "Live stock!" she jeered. "Did he get away with that? Well, that's what he is—a dealer in human live stock, a trafficker in women, one of the oldest professions in the world—and the dirtiest. Live stock! That's what he calls girls like you and me—cattle!"

For a long moment Elsie sat staring at her companion. The last prop of her faith in the man who had married her was crumbling. She could not give up this last illusion of Druce's faithfulness without a struggle. The blood flamed to her cheeks and she started to her feet.

"I don't believe it," she cried in anguish.

To her surprise, Lou made no reply. She merely regarded her pityingly. This was the last blow. Elsie burst into a flood of tears.

"I know you don't believe it," said Lou gently. "It's hard for anyone who is decent to believe that men can fall so low. Why, nobody believes it! The men who run the city government don't believe it, the law makers don't believe it, the vice commission, doesn't believe it. The only people who believe it are the people who, at their own bitter cost, know it—and this girl Mary Randall."

She paused.

"Look at me, kid," she went on. "I was sold for $175. Sold, do you get that? SOLD! And I came high. They buy and sell 'em in this district every day for fifty. Yes, I was prime stock. They brought me up here from Kentucky. Kentucky Lou, price $175—a choice article." She broke off, laughing bitterly, and summoned a waiter.

"Whisky," she said, "and be quick with it."

She waited until the waiter returned without speaking. Then she tossed off the glass of fiery liquid like a man.

"Now," she said, resuming the conversation abruptly, "let me tell you what you are up against. You can't go home, your pride won't let you. And if you wanted to go home you haven't the money. Druce has turned you loose in this district to starve and when you've starved enough you'll come back to him."

Elsie shook her head.

"Yes, you will, girlie. You don't know it now, but I know it and Druce knows it. And when you come back you'll do as Druce wants you to do, because you'll know that if you don't you'll have to starve again. It's against human nature to starve. You'll go back to him. And when you do and Druce is tired of you he'll sell you for what you are, cattle—his kind of cattle!"

"Oh no!" wailed Elsie. "Not that. Surely in this great city there are places where a friendless girl can find protection!"

Kentucky Lou laughed again but the laugh contained no mirth.

"I thought that too, kid," she said more gently. "And perhaps—perhaps—if you could find the right people and they believed you they might help you. But they didn't help me. I went to one of these institutions that advertise to help friendless girls. Yes, I went to them. I had my baby in my arms. And they began by shooting me full of questions that I'd rather die than answer. And me perishing for a kind word and a slap on the back—just something to keep me fighting to be good. They gave me tracts, and sermons and advice. And then my baby died and I didn't care what happened. I guess I went crazy after that. 'It's hell, anyway,' I says, 'so here goes.' And here I am."

While she spoke Kentucky Lou was fumbling with her dress. Her hand reappeared in a moment with a five dollar bill. She shoved the bill into Elsie's hand.

"Take that," she said, "and go. Go as far as you can. It's all I can do for you and it may save you. I think you'll come back to Druce but I'm taking a gambler's chance."

She took Elsie by the arm, half lifted the stupefied girl to her feet and led her to the door. Impelled by a terror which both blinded and choked her Elsie fled into the gathering darkness without even pausing to thank her benefactor.

Lou returned to the saloon and ordered more whisky.

"Lou," inquired one of the men, "who's you're friend?"

Lou regarded the questioner calmly.

"That?" she replied, "Oh, that's a little lost lamb turned loose in a den of you human hyenas."



CHAPTER XIX

MARY RANDALL GOES TO LIVE IN A WOLF'S DEN

Martin Druce, still pacing uneasily; about the big drinking room of the Cafe Sinister after his angry parting with Elsie Welcome, looked up suddenly and saw the street door open. He stood still staring. The new arrival was Mary Randall. She wore a smart tailored suit and a modish hat. Druce noted these details of costume, the shining bronze hair, the fresh complexion and the trim figure. He gasped with surprise.

Druce's surprise was not due to any recognition of his visitor as the reformer. To him Mary Randall was still Miss Masters, for he had heard nothing of the episode in John Boland's office when the electric king's private secretary revealed her true identity. His astonishment was predicated upon the fact that this stenographer, after having thwarted and flouted him, after having seemed to read the darkest secrets of his plotting mind, should now walk in upon him with all the easy composure of an old friend.

Then he had read the girl wrong after all! She was, as he had at first suspected, of the demi-monde. Thus her sophistication, the ease with which she had penetrated his pretensions, the cool finality with which she had catalogued and placed him, were all explainable. Her worldly wisdom, which he had found so baffling, was that of the skilled and experienced adventuress!

These reflections swept through his mind in a moment. Another thought came to him that filled him with rage. She was here now to resume her play with him. But rage gave way to desire. His mind instantly busied itself with new intrigues. Here was a woman much to be desired. She had come hunting amusement at his expense. She delivered herself into his hands; she laughed at his power. And she seemed confident of beating him. This was a game that filled him with delight. He sprang forward eagerly to greet her, bowing gallantly, and doffing his hat.

"How do you do, Mr. Druce?" inquired Miss Masters. "You seem surprised to see me here."

Druce caught something mocking in her tone. "I'm more than surprised," he returned. "I'm tickled pink. Won't you have a seat?" He prepared a place for her at one of the booths. "And can't I order you something to drink?"

Miss Masters favored Druce with one of her enigmatical smiles. "It's a little early for wine," she said, "and too late for highballs. Besides, business before pleasure. I want to talk to you."

Druce sat down, expectantly.

"I've come here, Mr. Druce," Miss Masters went on, "not merely to make a social call, as you seem to take for granted, but as John Boland's agent. He has instructed me to take up the matter of your new lease with you. I am to handle the whole transaction in his name. The only stipulation that he makes is that you are not to communicate with him again. He wants you to stay away from his office, because he has learned within the last few hours that the office is being watched by agents of this girl reformer, Mary Randall. He has instructed me to tell you not to attempt to see him or to telephone him until your negotiations with me are concluded."

Druce was disappointed.

"Why," he said, "I thought the matter of the lease was settled. Boland told me plainly when I last talked with him that if I would arrange to have Patience Welcome here on Saturday night so that Harry Boland could see her he would give me a new lease with no increase in rental."

"I understand," replied Miss Masters to whom this was news. "The idea of arranging this meeting is, I am informed, to convince Harry that the girl has been playing with him—that she is one of your employes."

"That's it," replied Druce. "I've made all the plans and the girl will be here on Saturday night. I've arranged to have her mother here, too. And to make it good I expect to bring in the other sister—the girl Elsie—at the last moment. Young Boland will believe that the whole Welcome family is working for me."

"I see," said Miss Masters. "It's a pretty smooth scheme, but Mr. Boland thinks it's rather too daring. That's why he's sent me here, to see that nothing goes wrong. You are to give me all the details of your plans and through me Mr. Boland is to be kept informed as to what is going on."

"Well, he's a deep one," said Druce. "I don't like his introducing a third party into my plans very well, but I guess I've got to take it. I've got to have that lease."

"Yes," replied Miss Masters, "that's the way John Boland has it figured out."

"Say, girlie," Druce went on, assuming a confidential air, "Old Boland sure must have a lot of confidence in you."

Again Miss Masters smiled enigmatically. "Yes," she admitted, "Mr. Boland has reason to know I can take care of myself in nearly every situation."

"I'm beginning to think you're as deep as Boland is."

"Yes?" Miss Masters tantalized him with another of her smiles. "Now," she went on, "tell me about this. You say you're going to have the other Welcome girl here. How do you expect to arrange that?"

Druce grinned triumphantly. "That's dead easy," he said. "You see I'm married to her." He had expected to startle Miss Masters with this information, but he was disappointed. She merely arched her brows slightly. "Then you marry them, do you?" "Yes, when I have to. It's the easiest way." "Then this girl—Elsie—is living in your—a—a—hotel?"

"No," replied Druce hesitatingly, "she's gone away." Then he added quickly, "but she'll be back."

"Gone away? I don't understand." "Oh, we had a family row this morning. I told her that if she wanted to get along in Chicago she'd have to discard her Millville morals and be a good fellow. She's squeamish. I let her understand that she'd have to—"

"I see," said Miss Masters. "She thought that, because she was your wife she wouldn't have to drink with the patrons in your cafe. When you told her she'd have to, she got angry and walked out. Is that it?"

"You're wise," replied Druce admiringly.

"You say she'll be back. How do you know that?"

"I know it, because she hasn't got a dime. With her it's a case of coming back or starving to death in the Levee, and I know enough about her to be sure she'll be back. She can't get away from me."

"And the other girl, Patience?"

"She thinks this is a sort of a music hall. She's coming here with her mother Saturday night. Before she discovers that this place isn't exactly what she believes it is, Harry Boland will see her up there on the stand with the rest of my talent. I'll get the girl out of the place before he can talk to her. That will put the kibosh on their love affair."

"What do you expect to do with these girls afterward?"

"Oh, we have facilities here"—Druce's smile was evil—"for breaking 'em in. Afterward—well, I don't know. It may be dangerous to keep them around Chicago. I can get a good price for them." He laughed. "You know I'm a dealer in live stock."

"Yes, yes, you expect to sell them. That's not a bad idea."

"Now look here, kid," said Druce, "you've asked me a lot of questions and got fair answers. It's a poor game that can't be played both ways. I want to know something about you."

Miss Masters curled herself up comfortably in a corner of the booth. She looked challengingly at Druce.

"Shoot," she said.

"Now, who are you?"

"You know my name. It's Masters."

"I don't mean that. What are you?"

Miss Masters replied quickly, "I—why—I'm a girl, and—you say yourself I'm wise."

"You don't have to tell me that. Where did you come from? Where did Boland get you?"

"Before I went to work for Boland I was in St. Louis."

"What did you do there?"

"Oh, I shan't answer that question—yet."

"Well, you seem to know a great deal about the kind of business I'm in. Where did you get your information?"

"Picked it up."

"In St. Louis?"

"Yes, I learned some things there."

"Have you ever been in this business?"

"What business?"

"Well, this cafe business—and the rest of it."

"You say I know a good deal about it."

"Yes, you know a lot about it. And you've got your information from the inside. And Boland knows you know a lot about it. Otherwise he wouldn't have sent you down here."

"Yes?" Miss Masters was silent for a moment. "Druce," she went on, "did you ever hear of the Broughton Club?"

"Sure, that swell joint in St. Louis?"

"Yes. Well, I'm interested in it."

"As owner?"

"Never mind about that. I'm interested in it and one of my reasons for calling on you is to get some girls for the club."

"You want to buy some girls?"

"You said it."

"From me?"

"From you, if I can get the right figures. If I can't, I'll try elsewhere. You're not the only 'dealer in live stock' in the Levee."

"I'll make the figures right."

"I'm interested in this place."

"In the Cafe Sinister?"

"Yes, I want to know something about your methods. We don't know it all in St. Louis. I think I can pick up a little information here. I'm going back to St. Louis in a month. I want to take some girls back with me, and I'd like to find out just how a first class joint like the Cafe Sinister is operated in Chicago."

"Is this a proposition?"

"Yes, it's a proposition."

"All right. Go on."

"I want to live at the Cafe Sinister during the week our deal for the lease is on. I'll take rooms in your—a—hotel, upstairs.

"And I'll be around the cafe, and making myself at home generally," added Miss Masters, reassuringly.

"Go as far as you like," answered Druce, "and if you need a body guard," he added, with a knowing wink, "why, you know me."

Miss Masters' eyes narrowed. "I told you I could look out for myself," she answered.

"You'll have to look out for yourself," retorted Druce significantly.

"Let me do the worrying about that."

Druce was silent. He had determined to accept Miss Masters' offer. He felt that she was walking into his trap and yet, so great had grown his respect for her that he did not know his next move.

"I'll have a suite prepared for you," he said.

"That's settled, then."

Miss Masters got up from her seat. As she did so Druce attempted a caress. "I'm going to collect part of the rent in advance," he said.

"Are you?" Miss Masters pushed him away sharply. He did not repeat his indiscretion. Instead he stood back respectfully to let her pass. In the palm of her hand with the muzzle pointing firmly in his direction he saw a small, steel-blue magazine pistol. The girl's finger was on the trigger.

"If you'll have one of your servants show me the suite," said Miss Masters, "I'll telephone for my maid."

Then she added, seemingly as an afterthought,

"I never pay the rent, Mr. Druce, until the end of the week."



CHAPTER XX

DRUCE SIGNS A SIGNIFICANT DOCUMENT

Mary Randall realized that she was playing a dangerous game. She had placed herself in Druce's power because taking that risk had seemed to her the best way to gather evidence against the Cafe Sinister. She had not acted without laying her plans carefully. Her whole campaign for the week that she was to be in Druce's dive had been mapped out before she set foot so unexpectedly inside his door.

The girl depended upon two things for protection. First was Druce's fear of the power of John Boland. She believed that the man would not dare to use physical violence against her if he thought she was what she had represented herself to be—John Boland's agent. Second was his desire for a renewal of the lease to the cafe. Mary was confident that Druce would plot against her but she was equally sure he would not move until after the lease had been signed. If both these protections failed, she still had her magazine pistol. And she knew how to use it.

In coming into Druce's place she had deliberately counted on the ascendancy which she knew her beauty and her air of mystery had obtained over him. She was playing the pander at his own game. It was an extremely dangerous game but she believed she could beat him. And the results would be worth the risk.

Meanwhile her greatest anxiety was to prevent Druce from communicating in any way with John Boland. If Druce should learn through Boland that he had not delegated her to negotiate the lease, that she was in fact Mary Randall, then she would be face to face with a fight for her life. But she was quite sure that Druce would not communicate with Boland. She knew the workings of Boland's office well enough to understand how difficult it was for Druce to get a word with the master of the Electric Trust and as a special precaution she had put an inhibition upon him not to call at or telephone to the office. Finally, before she had quite finished with Boland, she had arranged with his telephone operator that no calls from Druce should be put on John Boland's wire.

Mary's first move after she had been shown to her suite was to telephone to Anna, her maid, whom she had left nearby before making her visit to the cafe. Anna arrived in a short time with a porter carrying a couple of heavy suit cases.

When the two girls were at last alone in their rooms they began preparing for their week's stay by making a thorough examination of the locks on the doors. They found them secure. Then, closing the keyholes, they proceeded to unpack the suit cases. Out of them they took, besides various articles of apparel, a complete dictagraph apparatus. The transmitter was hidden under a mat on a table in the reception room that formed part of the suite. The wires were carried down the leg of the table and under the carpets to a small closet; there Anna installed a small table, a pocket electric light and her stenographer's notebook. A small camera was hidden in one of the window curtains. It was focused so as to take in the space surrounding the table in the reception room. When one of the curtains was raised the plate was automatically exposed and the raising of the curtain at the same time let enough light into the room to take an excellent picture.

With these arrangements completed, Mary began a tour of the cafe building. She found Druce eager to serve her. By him she was guided to every part of the place, meeting the people she wanted to know and learning all of the details of the infamous business in which Druce, Anson and Boland were jointly embarked. For three days she went about these tours of inspection undisturbed. In the evenings she had the women habitues of the place in her rooms, talking to them as if she were one of their own kind and learning from them the squalid stories of their downfall and the part Druce and Anson had played in it. Anna was not in sight during any of these interviews. She was seated at the little table with the dictagraph at her ear, her fountain pen in her hand and her stenographer's notebook before her. Nothing that was said escaped her.

Meanwhile Druce was having an unpleasant time with Anson. He had tried at first to keep from him the fact of Miss Masters' residence in their "hotel." "The mastiff," however, was not long deceived. When he confronted Druce with what he had learned, Druce with an assumption of frankness told him of his interview with Miss Masters and attempted to reassure him.

Anson, however, was by nature suspicious. "I don't like it," he snarled. "You've let a spy into the house."

Druce tried at first to argue with him. Then he grew angry. Finally he turned on his partner.

"You mind your own business," he advised him, white with rage. "I'll manage this thing. The girl's mine. I'm going to have her. Keep away from her. By God, if you interfere with my schemes I'll kill you."

Anson was not terrified by this threat. He knew that in any physical encounter he was more than a match for the slender Druce. But he feared to quarrel with his partner. He was too appreciative of Druce's value to him and their enterprise to want to lose him. He growled a smothered string of curses, but Druce had his way.

Druce had become so much infatuated with Miss Masters that he had thrown caution to the winds. Never before in his life had he been under the influence of any woman. Now that such an influence had seized him he was overwhelmed by it. He had arrived perilously close to the point where, if he had known the true character of the woman he was sheltering, his infatuation would have led him to risk the danger merely to have her near him. His thoughts were on her constantly, his mind busy during every waking hour on schemes for, entrapping her.

Mary had taken up her abode in the Cafe Sinister on Monday. On Thursday she sent for Druce. He came to her suite eagerly.

He found Miss Masters sitting at the table in the reception room. He sat down opposite her and facing the window at her invitation.

"Druce," said the girl, "I've sent for you because I want to close that deal for the girls I spoke to you about."

"The girls you're going to take back to St. Louis?"

"Yes, I'll want five or six."

"You've been looking over my stock?" said Druce with a leer.

"Yes," replied Miss Masters, concealing her repulsion.

"Well, I guess we can come to terms. Who do you want?"

"I only care for four of the girls I have seen," replied Miss Masters. "I want that little girl, Maida, the blonde girl you call Luella, Clara, and that young brunette, Esther."

"Gee," said Druce, "you don't want much, do you? Why those are the youngest and prettiest girls we've got in the place. That Luella has only been in the district three weeks. All the rest of them are new ones."

"I know it. That's why I want them."

"They'll cost you money."

"I expect to pay money for them."

"I want $200 apiece for those four girls." The price was high. Druce thought Miss Masters would reject it.

"Very well," returned Miss Masters. "That will be $800."

"You're willing to pay it?"

"Yes. I'm going to spend $1,000 with you."

"Four ain't enough?"

"No, I'm going to take two more, if I can get them. You say you expect to have these Welcome sisters?"

"Sure, I'll have them."

"Well, you told me you didn't want to run the risk of keeping them around Chicago. I'll take them off your hands."

"You expect to get them for $200?"

"Certainly. You don't know yet that you can deliver. Has the one you married come back?"

"Oh, I'll deliver."

"I'm not as sure of that as you are, but I'm willing to speculate on it. I'll make you this proposition. I'll write you a check for $1,000 and take my chance on you delivering the six girls I name."

"No checks go," said Druce.

"You'll have to take a check if you do business with me."

Druce considered. He wanted the $1,000. He did not want to quarrel with Miss Masters. He capitulated.

"Write the check," he said.

Miss Masters took a check-book from a drawer and drew a check, payable to Druce. She handed it to him. He looked at the paper doubtfully.

"I'll have to indorse that," he said.

Miss Masters laughed.

"Certainly," she said, "you'll have to indorse it unless you want to keep it as a souvenir." She smiled at him. "Druce," she said, "you'll never get along in this business if you're a coward."

"It's direct evidence against me."

"You don't trust me?"

"All right, girlie. I'll trust you." He folded the check and put it in his pocket.

"Now, we'll have to have a bit of writing."

"No writing for mine," retorted Druce. "This check is plenty."

"Oh, Mr. Druce," Miss Masters spoke appealingly. "You don't think that's fair, do you? You've got my check."

"I guess it's you that's not trusting me now," said Druce.

"But you admit yourself that you may not deliver."

"No I don't. I will deliver."

"But this isn't business."

"It's the way we do this kind of business in Chi."

Miss Masters got up from the table, as if exasperated.

"Look here, Mr. Druce," she said. "How can signing an agreement covering this sale hurt you? Oh, what a lot of cowards you 'live stock dealers' are! Can't you see that if you sign this agreement with me I'm incriminated as well as you are? The Mann act gets the buyer as well as the seller."

"Well, what's the agreement?"

"It says simply this: 'In consideration of $1,000 I agree to deliver two days from date the following girls'—I'll write in their names—'to Miss Masters.'"

"You're not trying to put anything over?"

"Did it ever strike you that by selling these girls to me you'd have John Boland where you wanted him?"

"Boland?"

"I'm his agent."

"All right." Druce snatched up the paper and read it. "Write in the names." Miss Masters wrote the names of six girls into the document. She handed it back to Druce and picked up a pen.

"Just a moment," she said, giving him the pen. "It's dark here. I'll raise the curtain."

She stepped quickly across the room and adjusted the curtain so that the sunlight fell full across Druce as he signed his name to the agreement. As he finished the last stroke he heard a faint "click."

"What was that?" he demanded anxiously.

"The curtain caught on the window latch," replied Miss Masters. She picked up the agreement and blotted the signature. "Thank you," she said, "now I've got something for my $1,000."

Druce laughed uneasily. The maid, Anna, entered from an adjoining apartment. Druce realized uncomfortably that the interview was over.

"Well," he said, going to the door and smiling sentimentally at Miss Masters, "so long. See you later."

"Yes," replied Miss Masters in a tone he didn't just like, "I'll see you later."



CHAPTER XXI

DRUCE PROVES A TRUE PROPHET

Saturday night begins at the Cafe Sinister at nine o'clock. At that hour the twin columns of glass at its portal are lighted and the Levee pours the first of its revelers into the spacious ground floor drinking room. The orchestra strikes up the first of its syncopated melodies; the barkeepers arrange their polished glasses in glittering rows; the waiters, soft-footed and watchful, take their places at their appointed stations.

The revelers come in an order regulated by inexorable circumstance. In the van are the women with the professional escorts, haggard creatures who have served their time in the district and who are on the brink of that oblivion which means starvation and slow death. Youth and health have flown and now no paint nor cosmetic can cloak their real character. They must come early because their need of money is bitter and a watchful eye for opportunity must take the place of the physical allurement that once made life in the tenderloin so easy. They sink into their seats and wait, contemptuous of their escorts, and yet pitifully dependent upon them. For without the escorts they cannot enter the Cafe Sinister. That is a tribute which the rulers of the tenderloin, through them, pays tribute to the majesty of the law.

A group of hardened rounders follows. These are men to whom the Cafe Sinister and the district have become a habit. They bring with them women of their own kind—women who, through years of dissipation, have still, like misers, managed to hoard some trace of bloom. They drink deeply, for the men are spenders. The wine flows free and the talk grows loud. Occasionally a man quarrels profanely with his companion and a soft-footed waiter with a thug's face whispers him to sullen silence.

An hour flies by. Now the Levee, roused from its sodden, day-long slumber, is wide awake. The way between the twin pillars at the Cafe Sinister's entrance is choked with the flood of merry-makers. These newcomers are not so easy to classify as their predecessors. They are the crowd from the street,—the thief with his girl pal, eager to spend the plunder of their last successful exploit; the big corporation's entertainer, out to show a party of country customers the sights of a great city; the visitor from afar, lonely and seeking excitement; the man about town, the respectable woman who with a trusted male confidant seeks shady and clandestine amusement; college students with unspoiled appetites off for a lark; women of the district still new enough to the life of vice to find pleasure in its excitements; periodical drinkers out for a night of it; clerks, cashiers, bookkeepers, schoolboys and roues.

And here and there, weaving in and out through this heterogeneous mob lurks the pander seeking for his prey—the ignorant young girl, trembling on the verge of her first step into the depths, the little lost sister of tomorrow.

By ten o'clock the merry making in the Cafe Sinister had attained the vociferousness of a riot. As the swift-footed waiters passed more and more liquor about, the voices of the speakers rose higher and higher. At last the orchestra itself could scarcely be heard. The singers, half maudlin themselves, and knowing they could not be heard above the universal din, abandoned harmony and resorted to shouts and suggestive gyrations. A woman fell helplessly into the arms of her escort who, gloating, winked knowingly at a male companion. Another drunkenly attempted to dance and was restrained by the waiters. An elderly reprobate, convoying two unsteady young girls, importuned Druce for one of his private dining rooms.

Druce and Anson watched over the revelers and directed the entertainers. "The Mastiff," comfortably full of his favorite liquor, whisky, glowered on the crowd with as near an aspect of good nature as he was able to muster. Druce, who knew his own success in business was due to alertness of mind and who was almost an ascetic in the matter of drink, was no less at peace with the world.

"Money in that crowd," rumbled the huge Anson.

"Yes," replied Druce, "business is mighty good."

"How about our lease?"

"The blow-off comes tonight."

"You're sure of your plans?"

"I am, if young Boland shows up."

"Well, he'll be here?"

"Yes, I wrote him an anonymous letter telling him if he wanted to see his girl, he could find her singing at the Cafe Sinister."

"That ought to fetch him. How about the old man?"

"He sent me word today that he'd be here and that he'd dropped hints to the son he'd heard some bad stuff about the girl."

"You haven't talked to him?"

"No; I got my orders. I stayed away."

"How about the Welcome kid you married?"

"She's down and out. I sent one of our cappers early in the week to look her up. Somebody'd slipped her a lone five dollar bill. She woke up yesterday morning broke. I don't know where she's eating, but I've sent word through the district to keep her hungry. She'll be in tonight."

Druce spoke with indifference, but the truth was that he was not at all sure that Elsie Welcome would return. He had begun to respect the girl's strength of character. He had scarcely finished his sentence when he gave a gasp of relief.

"Ah-h!" he muttered.

"What's that?" demanded Anson.

"Here she comes now."

As they looked down through the drinking room they saw the slender figure of a girl approaching. She came slowly, supporting her wavering steps with the backs of the revelers' chairs. Her face was pale and desperately haggard. Several of the men as she passed clutched at her skirts and shouted invitations at her. She tore herself away from them and made straight for the place where Druce and Anson were standing. For a moment, Druce almost felt sorry for her.

"You're back, kid?" he said softly.

"Yes," replied the girl, fiercely.

"You're going to be good?"

Elsie burst out sobbing. It was her last struggle.

"Come now, Elsie," Druce spoke almost tenderly. "Don't snivel."

"Martin," the girl gasped appealingly. "O, my God! Be kind to me."

"Don't worry about me, girlie. You forget that Sunday school stuff and you'll get along with me fine. You're hungry, aren't you, kid?"

"I'm starving," replied the girl.

"Come with me. I'll have the chef get you a big feed. After that I want you to come back and do what I tell you. I won't be hard on you, kid. You'll not have to work tonight. All I'll want you to do is sit up on the stand with my other entertainers."

Elsie was too broken in spirit to reply. She followed her master dumbly. He led her to one of his small private dining rooms, arranged a seat for her and turned on the lights. Then he went back to the kitchen to order the girl's meal.

After Druce had left, Elsie folded her arms on the table and cushioning her head on them, began to weep softly. Druce returned with the food, kissed her to take the sting from the feed, which both he and she knew was the price of her shame, and left her. The girl ate ravenously. Afterward she fell into an uneasy slumber against the cushions of the booth.

She was awakened by someone entering the room. Looking up, she saw the bowed figure and gray hair of an elderly woman. The intruder carried a bucket of hot water in one hand and a mop in the other. She had come into the booth thinking it unoccupied, and did not see Elsie until she was very close to her.

"I beg your pardon," she said, dropping her mop and bucket and starting back.

Elsie stared at her. Then she stood up, her face pale as death, her eyes starting like the eyes of one who has seen a vision.

"Mother!" she screamed. "Oh, God! Mother!" and flung herself into her mother's arms.



CHAPTER XXII

"THE MILLS OF THE GODS"

After Druce left Elsie he went back to his favorite station behind the musicians' stand. He had been there only a moment when he saw the elder Boland enter. Boland came in quietly through a side door and stood looking about inquiringly.

Druce silently summoned a waiter and sent him to Boland with a message. A little later the two men were in Druce's private office alone and the door was closed. They sat down at a table.

"Well," said Druce, "I see you're on time."

"Yes," replied Boland coldly. "I make it a point to keep my engagements. Your arrangements are complete, I suppose. I haven't heard a word from you all week."

There was a petulance in his tone the reason for which Druce did not comprehend.

"It's going to work out all right. One of the Welcome girls is here now. I'm expecting the other." He pushed an electric button. A waiter appeared.

"Go out and ask the professor if that new entertainer I'm expecting has arrived," he ordered.

The waiter was gone but a few seconds.

"She's come," he reported. "She's up on the stand and will go on right after the intermission."

"That's her," said Druce to Boland. The waiter vanished.

"Good," said Boland. "Druce," he went on, "I'm pleased with the way you've handled this. Here's something to prove it." He took a document from his breast pocket and passed it across the table. It was the lease.

"Thanks," said Druce, keenly pleased by an inspection of the papers, "that looks good to me."

"It's yours," returned Boland, "but of course I expect you to carry out your part of the contract."

"How about Harry?"

"No need to worry about that. He'll be here."

"Well, we're waiting on him."

There was a pause. Neither man seemed to know how to continue the conversation. Druce broke the silence.

"Boland," he asked, "what have you got against this girl?"

Boland resented the question, but was compelled to answer.

"She wants to marry my son. I don't think she's fit to marry him. If she were, she wouldn't be in a place like this."

Druce laughed unpleasantly.

"You know very well," he replied, "that she wouldn't be here if I hadn't managed it for you."

Boland made no reply for this. Druce went on.

"Tell me," he demanded, "on the square, now, is that all you've got against this girl?"

"Just what do you mean by that, Druce?" demanded Boland, eying him calmly.

"Didn't you know the Welcomes before this girl came into your son's life?"

Boland turned very pale.

"That's an idiotic question," he answered. "How would a man in my position know people like the Welcomes?"

"When I was in Millville," replied Druce evenly, "I heard a good deal about old Tom Welcome. It seems that someone stole an invention from him."

"Just why should I be interested in that story?"

"I don't know," replied Druce. "It just struck me that you might be. There was no harm in asking, was there?"

Boland ignored the question.

"Look here," he said, changing the subject, "suppose you get this lease from me, are you sure you can continue doing business as you are without police interference?"

Druce laughed and picked up the receiver of the telephone which stood on the table. There was an attachment that enabled Boland to hear at the same time. He handed the second receiver to the master of the Electric Trust.

"What's the idea?" inquired Boland.

"I'm just going to answer your question."

He called for a number.

"That's police station R," said Boland.

"I know," replied Druce, "just listen."

"Hello," he said presently, "is this you, Cap?"

Boland heard a familiar voice answer affirmatively.

"This is Druce talking," the dive-owner went on, "Druce of the Cafe Sinister. Say, we'll be open all night tonight. Don't make any trouble for us, you understand. Just let your fellows know that they're not to hear anything that goes on in this beat. I'll send McEdwards around in the morning with a special envelope for you. Get me?"

Druce cut off the two telephones.

"Well," he asked triumphantly, "what do you think of that?"

Boland laughed cynically.

"Rather good," he answered. "I know your friend, the captain. The fact is, I know him rather well. We belong to the same church." He chuckled over his own joke. "However," he went on, "I didn't come here to be entertained, nor to be initiated into the mysteries of the police department. Let's get down to business. I've got to get out of town tonight. I'm going to 'Frisco."

"To 'Frisco?"

"Yes, I'm in a mess. Mary Randall—"

"Randall! Boland, don't tell me you're scared of that woman, too."

"Man alive, haven't you heard? She got into my office in disguise and stole a lot of my papers. I don't know just yet what she's got, but I've decided to hunt seclusion for a while."

"She was disguised?"

"Yes, she came into my office as private secretary. I trusted her implicitly. You'll remember her. She gave the name of Miss Masters."

Druce stood up with an exclamation. His face had gone white and he clutched at the table for support. Boland stared at him in astonishment.

"What's hit you?" he demanded.

Druce made no reply. Through his mind was passing the panorama of how he had delivered himself bound hand and foot to the girl he thought he was entrapping. Suddenly, he turned and dashed in a frenzy out of the room. He was bound, with murder in his heart, for Miss Masters' suite.

As he came tearing out of the office he found himself suddenly seized and halted.

"Let me go," screamed Druce, "damn you, let me go."

He fought to release himself, but vainly. He looked up into the face of Harry Boland.

"What's your hurry?" inquired young Boland coolly. "Don't be in a rush. I want to ask you a few questions."

He produced a letter from his pocket. Druce recognized it at a glance as the anonymous note he had written to lure young Boland to the cafe.

"Did you write that?" demanded Boland.

Druce struggled in a frenzy.

"To hell with you and your questions," he yelled. "Let me by or I'll kill you."

He grappled with Boland and the two men wrestled out to the edge of the big drinking room.

"You wrote it," Boland hissed in his ear.

"It's a lie. I'm going to give you the beating of your life."

The elder Boland, who had followed Druce, fell upon his son. Harry turned and recognized his father.

"You here?" he demanded, facing his parent.

"Yes," replied John Boland, "I'm here. I came, because I had been informed that you were to meet a woman of the tenderloin in this place; and when I find you, I find you fighting with a dive-keeper."

Harry dropped the struggling Druce and turned on his father.

"What do you mean?" he asked, defiantly.

"I mean just that," replied John Boland. He turned toward the musicians' stand and pointed dramatically at Patience Welcome, who, her face almost as pale as her white lace gown, was advancing toward the front of the platform to sing.

Harry Boland's face went white as hers.

The words he gasped were drowned by a cry, Elsie Welcome, coming for the first time since her return to Druce into the drinking room, saw her sister standing upon the rostrum, poised to sing.

"Patience! Patience!" she screamed in a voice of despair. "Oh, my sister, what brought you to this place?"

She fell to the floor fainting. The whole cafe was in an uproar.

Carter Anson, roused to fury by the disturbance, fought his way through the crowd to the place where he had seen her fall.

Druce, escaped from Harry Boland, struggled from another angle to make his way through the mob. As if by magic half a score of policemen suddenly hemmed in the fighting mass. Druce, struggling blindly to make a pathway for himself, suddenly looked up to see Mary Randall standing on a table on the opposite side of the room directing the police. A wave of maniacal anger overwhelmed him. In a flash his hand went to his pocket and reappeared with a pistol.

There was an explosion, a man's yell of rage, followed by a choking gulp of mortal anguish. Druce was seized and flung to the floor.

At the same moment Mary Randall, leaping down from her table, ran to the center of the room. Carter Anson lay there, struggling through his last throes,—the bullet in his brain.



CHAPTER XXIII

AFTER THE TRAGEDY

Mary Randall stood beside the dead body of Carter Anson. Such tragedy had not entered into her plans, nor had she conceived what it might be to see a man die bearing the bullet intended for her own intrepid heart. A strange numbness possessed her faculties.

She heard the voice of Mrs. Welcome beside her. The mother was speaking with anguished entreaty to Elsie. The girl had risen to her feet and was gazing with a dreadful fascination at Druce, writhing in the grasp of the officers who seized him.

"Come, Miss Randall," one of her police aids said to the reformer. "This is no place for you—now."

"There must be something I can do," she spoke with a flash of her usual energy, then laid her hand on Mrs. Welcome's arm.

"Harvey Spencer is here," she said. "There he is trying to get through the crowd to us now. Perhaps he can help you to persuade your daughter to go away with you."

Elsie Welcome looked at Mary Randall, who was destined never to forget the pitiful revelation of the girl's dark eyes. Mary Randall read that despair of the lost mingled with woman's intense clinging to the man she has chosen,—her strange stubborn clinging, when, entangled, she hears an echo of happier and purer love.

"How dare you meddle in people's affairs like this and put us into such dreadful trouble?" Elsie asked of the one who would help her. Then to her mother, pulling away from her longing clasp, "You understand that at a time like this my place is with my husband."

Elsie doubled under the arms which would have detained her and ran out of the cafe.

"Go to Millville, Mrs. Welcome, back to your old home, as soon you can. Let me look after Elsie. Go to this boarding-house (handing her a card). Go there with Patience tonight, and I will send you some money tomorrow." Miss Randall spoke quickly, and before Mrs. Welcome realized it, had hurried in pursuit of Elsie.

But Elsie Welcome had disappeared.

Mary Randall found herself standing, as all who work for those who sin and suffer must often stand, baffled by evil's resistance. Saddened by somewhat of a divine sadness, Mary went across to the rendezvous where her faithful Anna awaited her and left the field.

Harvey Spencer came to her downtown office early next day. He found her surrounded by her strongest allies, already in conference as to the best means of pursuing their crusade which had aroused Chicago with the startling news of The Raid of Mary Randall on the Cafe Sinister, headlined in the morning newspapers.

Harvey Spencer had taken Mrs. Welcome to the boarding-house designated by Miss Randall where she was joined by Patience—and of Patience you shall know presently. The remainder of the night, or most of it, he spent trying to learn what had become of Elsie.

"I thought she might be still in that—hotel, as they call it," Harvey, haggard with his night's search, told Miss Randall. "I went to the jail too, but of course they would not let her inside there so late, even if she had wanted to."

"She is sure to go there today to see Druce. Try again, Mr. Spencer, when you go out from here," said Miss Randall.

"And keep you eye on Druce. Nobody will suspect you of being a detective. You can telephone here if you see any activity around him," said a clever special from headquarters.

"Good scheme," commended the journalist, another of Mary Randall's strongest aids.

Harvey Spencer made notes of the right steps to take and, thanking Miss Randall with a curious humility, went out again on his quest.

"Now we must learn what the vice-moneymakers will try to do next," said a former high official in the municipality. "Our one safe bet is that they will all get together and that John Boland, the boss of the bunch, will map out the fight against us."

"Is it a losing fight?" asked a famous banker, known among his intimates as the hard-headed enthusiast.

"Right against wrong can never be permanently a losing fight," quietly said a small muscular clergyman from the northwest side.

"It has taken two thousand years for mankind to begin this fight against buying and selling young virgins who can be coaxed or thrust into the market-place," said Mary Randall. "We must fight on, even in one seemingly losing field. It is not to be believed that the people of this nation will be content to submit very much longer to the presence of a band of prowling wolves tolerated by courts and protected by rascally lawyers whose acknowledged trade is to destroy virtue,—the latent motherhood of young women,—whose whole activity is directed to the exploitation of our little lost sisters."

"Chicago has to lead the fight, as she has been one of the leaders in the trade," said the banker. "Now, for our next step!"



CHAPTER XXIV

"THE HIGHWAY OF THE UPRIGHT"

Up to the moment when he heard the report of Druce's pistol and saw Carter Anson fall, Harry Boland's whole being had been concentrated in a consuming horror at sight of Patience Welcome in the Cafe Sinister.

The crack of the pistol restored his composure. He saw clearly the infamy of the plot against her,—and against himself. One of the conspirators was already dead on the scene of this last of many crimes. Druce was struggling with the police, taking him for murder of Anson, his partner.

John Boland, the third conspirator, faced his son in a desperate composure.

"Come, Harry, we must get out of here. It will never do to be seen here—"

"For you!" Harry shook off his father's hand upon his arm. "Go, by all means! I shall take care of myself." He walked towards the singers' platform beyond the seething crowd.

John Boland believed of himself afterwards that he would have followed Harry, but at the moment he saw a bowed and gray-haired woman before him, great fear and horror on her face, pressing her way in from scrubbing in the booths beyond. The mop and bucket with which she had been working were in either hand. At sight of his face she dropped her tools of toil and clutched his coat. It was Tom Welcome's widow.

He uttered a cry like a beast of prey as he shook her off; but he felt himself shiver, conscience making him a coward, and he hurried out, reaching by an exit the alley leading to a side street.

A police lieutenant suddenly barred his way.

"Not so fast there," said the functionary.

Boland recognized the man as an officer whom he had once placed under obligation to him.

"Good evening, Murphy."

"Mr. Boland!"

"Yes. I was passing and heard the shot. You understand, of course, that I wish to avoid being seen here. Do you know where I can find a taxi?"

The policeman turned and summoned a taxicab with a gesture. Boland got in at the open door. He leaned forward and spoke with peculiar force, although very low:

"If my son, Harry Boland, happens to pass by here, see that he gets into a taxi whose driver will bring him to my house, to my house, remember, no matter what address he gives."

"I understand, sir." Probably the young man's been misbehaving, was what he thought.

"Pay the driver—in advance—with this, or part of it," continued Mr. Boland.

"Thank you, sir; thank you. I understand."

Boland's car scuttled away into the darkness.

Harry Boland, pushing through the crowd to Patience, saw the futile effort of Mrs. Welcome to take Elsie from the place. He heard Mary Randall's brief direction and spoke reassuringly to the anguished mother as he pressed a friendly hand on her slight shoulder.

"I will see that Spencer takes you to that boarding-house, where you will be comfortable until you can get away. I will bring Patience. We may get there before you arrive."

As John Boland foresaw, it was but a few moments after his own departure before Harry Boland reached the street looking for a conveyance. He was assisting Patience Welcome. Rather, she was clinging to him, sobbing like a frightened child. The shooting that had interrupted her pathetic attempt to sing was only part of the tragedy to her.

"I—I saw my little sister in there," she sobbed. "She called me by name. And such a pathetic cry. Did you hear it?" Patience was sadly unnerved and ill.

"Hush, dear one," Harry soothed her. "Your mother, Harvey and Miss Randall are there, you know. Whatever can be done, they will do. You are my one and only care, and just now, dearest girl, you're ill. I'll take you to the place where your mother is going. Now, please stop crying; try—try—everything will be all right."

A taxicab appeared, the chauffeur seemingly having anticipated that he was wanted. Harry got in, half carrying Patience, and expecting to be stopped by an officer. But no policeman seemed to see or hear him as he gave the driver the address of the old-fashioned boarding-house selected by Mary Randall.

They rode in silence. Patience sat apart from him, breathing deeply of the fresh air at the window of the car as they rushed swiftly through the city streets. Slowly he felt the tension of the situation released. It was as if the dazed girl were freed from the physical mesh which had been thrown about her.

Then she spoke quite calmly, in her natural voice, but very slowly:

"Harry, I once dreamed that I was in terrible trouble and that you came and helped me. Are you sure I am not dreaming now?"

"Is it a happy dream, if you are, my darling?"

"I—I don't know," faltered Patience. "It is wonderful to be here with—you."

"Do you trust me, Patience? Do you trust me when I tell you that I care more for you than I ever knew I could care for anybody?"

"Yes," she whispered.

"I want to make you happy. I want to love you and work for you and have you for my wife, and make a home with you."

"Harry!" She slipped her hand into his.

"Harry, I still feel afraid. It was such a dreadful thing to see. Was that man killed? It was he who asked me to sing. They had been disappointed about getting a singer, he said, and he gave me ten dollars. All that money for a few songs—it seemed like stealing. But I took it. Mother helped put on this dress they gave me to sing in. You know I went there to help mother clean the place. And to think we saw a murder!"

"My poor darling!" Something in his voice caused her to put her hand up to his face. He felt her finger tips on his eyelids, then down his wet cheeks.

"My poor darling!" She put her arm around his neck—then their trembling lips met.

Harry was the first to speak. "All that you have gone through brings us closer together than anything else in life possibly could, Patience. I am so proud of you and so down on myself that I ever let you out of my sight—"

"You must not be down on my—"

"Say it, dear! I want to hear my sweetheart say the word."

"I was going to say 'my dearest,' but I'll say,—if you want me to,—my—my husband."

"You dear, sweet wife!" responded Harry.

After a few moments Harry observed that they were being taken farther than he had directed the man to go. The boarding-house was rather close to town. He found that they were well on the north side, nearing the quarter of his father's house. He called to stop the driver, but the man remained deaf to his efforts, except to increase the speed, and presently drew up at the Boland mansion.

"How dare you bring me here?" Harry demanded, stepping out of the car to remonstrate.

"Orders."

"Orders! I ordered you where I wanted you to go. Here, if you need two fares for one job, you swindler! Hold on—"

"Driver! Come here."

Harry heard his father's stern voice from the opened doorway. "Driver! Take that girl wherever she wants to go. Harry, come in here! It's time for a show-down."

"It certainly is time for a show-down!" Harry assisted Patience from the car. "You may wait and earn the fare I just paid you or go to jail," he said to the driver, and boldly led Patience into his father's house.

The elder Boland turned into a den at the right of the front hallway and closed the door. He looked at Patience with an appraising glance, then kindly at his son.

"I suppose you must be humored in this affair," he said in an indulgent manner, "while you haven't sense to see that the present is scarcely the time to devote yourself to any such young woman. What do you say to a trip to California? I'll foot all the bills, and later I will settle what you ask for on you." He spoke to Patience.

"Thank you." She spoke without a tremor. "You may do something substantial for my mother, because you—took—my poor father's invention. Do you know, sir, that my poor father never recovered from that loss?"

"Hell's fire!" yelled John Boland, "I—"

"You see, sir," interrupted Harry deliberately, "it really is time for a show-down. I wouldn't go away from Chicago at present, even for the wedding journey which we will pretend you were honestly offering us. I am going to stay and fight it out. You will have to stay and fight it out, too."

"Me?" blustered Boland. "What have I got to fight out?"

"You know very well why you were at Druce's cafe tonight. You were in a plot against me, leagued with that fellow, Druce, and his tribe, too, against the crusade started by Mary Randall to protect girls. You prefer to make money exploiting them. Not directly, perhaps, but conspicuously indirect."

"So you are turning traitor in—politics?" sneered his father. "Taking sides with a crazy fanatic, whose presence at the cafe caused the death of a good citizen of Chicago. Druce did not mean to shoot Anson."

"I see your line of defense. It's you who have turned traitor—to all that is right in you as a man. See, here is the anonymous letter which summoned me to the cafe tonight. I wish you could tell me that you do not know who wrote that note."

Boland read the letter scornfully. "How should I know who writes you letters? Young men who make alliances with women who frequent such places must expect such messages," he sneered.

"Stop!" Harry's eyes blazed with anger. "We have borne all that we shall of that sort from you. One more such syllable and I shall not be able to speak to you as to my father—even in outward respect."

"You seem already to have forgotten that completely."

Harry let the sneer pass. "It is up to you, sir, to decide now—this moment—whether or not I ever look upon you as my father again. I have myself decided that I shall no longer be a party to your crimes."

"Crimes! My God, this is too much!"

"You are too shrewd a man to have a fool for a son. I see plainly that you were leagued with Druce and Anson to blacken the woman I love. But right is might and love is right. The whole dastardly affair enlightens me as to the nature of your alliance with that dive. Why did you renew the lease to Druce against my protest? I never realized until tonight the horror of your extensive holdings of tenderloin property. I don't want another cent from such sources."

"Very well." The elder Boland shook with anger. "Get out of this house, you and your—fitting mate. Never let me see your face again. Tomorrow I will undertake a campaign which will brand you among your friends as a son who turned traitor to his father in his hour of stress. All my power, all my money, will be against you. I will crush you as I have every man who has dared oppose me. Get out of my house!"

Harry gazed at his father in a tumult of pity and wrath, but he did not speak.

Patience, her eyes filled with tears, her hands nervously clutching her 'kerchief, walked up to the angry man.

"I am sorry for you," she said, "just as I always used to be sorry for my poor father when he was drunk as you are now with your own anger. You know that I am a fitting mate for your son. I don't understand your enmity unless it's because we're not rich like you."

Harry caught Patience in his arms. "Remember, it makes no difference to me what my father says. I'm a man and able to choose my own wife." He looked at his father. "We are going now," he said firmly.

There was no reply.

The door closed behind his son. John Boland staggered to a couch and falling down beside it buried his face in his arms.



CHAPTER XXV

THE INTERESTS VERSUS MARY RANDALL

If John Boland was shaken by the interview with his son, there was no evidence of it in his bearing when he appeared at the offices of the Electric Trust the following morning. As he took his accustomed place at his desk he looked tired, but he wore what La Salle street knew as his fighting face.

Boland had scarcely established himself for the day when he discovered that his decision to remain in Chicago had been anticipated by those who knew him well in affairs. A dozen messages were waiting for him. The forces opposed to Mary Randall and her reforms looked to him for leadership.

As soon as the details of the raid on the Cafe Sinister had become definitely known, there had been a quick general movement on the part of the leaders of the Levee to get together. They met in secret places to deplore the taking off of Anson, to form alliances against their common enemy. From these meetings went appeals for protection to the forces higher up.

Aid was invoked of the great financial interests involved, directly and indirectly, in the traffic in souls. Political overlords of the city sent word that the protection demanded should not be wanting. Within twelve hours they had effected an organization whose ramifications extended into wholly unexpected places. Then, having formed the machine, they turned with one accord to John Boland to guide it.

His acceptance of this leadership was unavoidable, even if he had wished to avoid it. To reject it would have been treason to the forces which had fought side by side with him in many a former and desperate campaign. To give Boland credit, his courage was equal to the task he had no wish to avoid. He knew the situation was dangerous, but he was a fighter born.

Having made up his mind to give battle, Boland addressed himself to the task of outlining his campaign. He was too shrewd, too thoroughly familiar with all the elements making up Chicago, to underestimate his enemy. He knew that Mary Randall was appealing passionately to a public morality which hated the vice system with a wholehearted hatred. He knew, too, that when the light of truth fell upon his followers they would scurry to shelter. His first step was to exclude from his offices every employe of whose loyalty he could not be completely certain. He had his bitter lesson on that score, certainly, he told himself.

By telephone and by private messenger he proceeded to summon his chief allies to a conference. These men arrived within an hour. One was a United States Senator, two were bankers of impeccable reputation. One was a political boss whose authority was a by-word in one of the great parties, another a philanthropist whose spectacular gratuities to public institutions came from huge dividends made for him by underpaid employes, and with him a clergyman managed by this philanthropist and the bankers and a newspaper publisher whose little soul had been often bought and sold, so that certain of his profession were wont to say one could see thumb-marks of Mammon on him as he passed by.

Boland did not invite Grogan to this meeting. He intended at first to ask him, but his friend had shown too much sympathy of late with sentiment in life.

John Boland's council of war was in session for five hours. Every phase of the situation was taken up and discussed with thoroughness characteristic of these leaders of men, with thoroughness, too, that showed full familiarity with all the conditions of commercialized vice in Chicago. The evasions and bombast wherewith these citizens were accustomed to adorn their public addresses before vice commission inquiries were strangely lacking. They spoke among themselves plainly and without pretenses.

Towards the close of this conference John Boland offered his plan of action:

"Gentlemen," he addressed the others from the head of his directors' table in his inner office. "We all agree that what we have most to fear is publicity. In fact, if these reformers had no publicity they would be without weapons. As you are aware, the extent to which we can control the newspapers is limited. If news comes to them in the regular way they are bound to print it, so if we are to avoid disastrous publicity we must stop it at its source.

"At this moment the 'news' of the situation centers about Druce and those of his employes who are now in jail. We can't prevent his being indicted, we can't prevent his case coming to trial, if we allow him to remain in jail.

"My friends, I need not tell you that such a trial would fill the newspapers with what they call 'exposures' of vice conditions that would be calamitous. You all agree with me that vice is a terrible thing. We know—none better, as our discussions have indicated—how great this evil is in our city. But there is something more menacing than vice,—namely, an ill-controlled and hysterical anti-vice crusade, rushing on and intoxicating itself with its own sensations, and shaking the business fabric of the city.

"Think of the want that will come to the poor in Chicago if confidence in our leading business men should be seriously shaken! It is our duty as pillars—if I may say so—of Chicago's financial structure to avoid, to prevent, public trials of vice cases.

"How are we to go about suppressing the excitement of a trial of Martin Druce? Various expedients suggest themselves to us all. Is not the most feasible to have Druce released on bail?"

"Yes, to any amount!" called two voices.

"I believe the matter can be arranged," replied John Boland, graciously. "Indeed, I have taken the liberty to discuss that phase of the situation with Judge Grundell. He is of opinion that Druce can be freed. My own attorneys have given the subject some consideration also. As I understand it, Druce is booked for murder—"

"Is murder a bailable offense in Chicago?"

"Ordinarily, no. But in this case it can be shown that there were extenuating circumstances. We can make a showing of facts to demonstrate that the killing of Carter Anson was purely accidental."

"Druce was only trying to shoot Mary Randall, as I heard it," said a grim voice.

"H'm! Suppose we say instead that Druce thought some one was creating a disturbance in his place of business, became excited and fired. The bullet hit Anson. Our opponents are not expecting, probably, any move by us towards the release of Druce on bail. It is unlikely that they will resist the application. In any event, I have already taken up the matter with the judge.

"With Druce freed and resting in safe seclusion, I consider it advisable to place him in possession of facilities that will enable him to remain at liberty for an indefinite period—until this excitement has blown over, you understand."

"We can send him out to China on business," said one.

"Exactly. My attorney has a young man who will see that he is rightly started on his journey, avoiding all publicity. The cases of his employes will come on for trial; but with Druce out of the way, it will be extremely difficult for our opponents to obtain any convictions. Thus this whole sensation will fall flat and the reform crusaders will find themselves discredited before the public."

Applause welcomed John Boland's summing up of the situation and his formulation of a practical plan. Members of the conference rose smiling cheerfully, shook hands all around and made it plain that each was ready to pay, pay, pay. The door had not closed behind them before John Boland set in motion the machinery which was to set Martin Druce free.



CHAPTER XXVI

OUT ON BAIL

When Martin Druce heard the news that bail had been raised for his release and that all arrangements were being made for his flight and concealment, it was exactly half an hour before the bail bond was signed and the order sent to the prison that he should be set at liberty.

Broken by his incarceration, terrified by his murderous experience of the last night at the cafe, red-eyed and restless, the dive-keeper was pacing up and down his cell. A pickpocket whom he knew and who, through his own political pull was serving a term as a trusty, brought the information to him scrawled on a bit of cigarette paper which, with a little warning whistle, he dropped through the bars of the steel cage.

Druce picked up the note and read it furtively. He waited for the trusty to pass him again, then beckoning him, he whispered, "See if my gal isn't outside somewhere. She just left here. Tell her to wait. She can get into the automobile which they will be sure to send for me."

It was not affection, but cowardice, that led Druce to think of Elsie first. Since he had been locked up he had crumbled under his trouble. He was so much shaken in mind and body by the killing of Anson and by his arrest that he was actually afraid to go out of the jail alone.

After what seemed an eternity of waiting he heard footsteps in the corridor. A guard appeared and unlocked the iron door, beckoned to Druce, and he passed out.

In a little waiting-room an iron-faced jail attendant handed him his watch and knife and some money taken from him when he was locked up. A lawyer whom he knew signaled him to follow.

Another steel door stood open and Druce found himself outside the prison, breathing the free air of night. An automobile stood there. Druce saw that Elsie was already within.

"The driver has instructions," said the lawyer. "Later you will hear further from me."

"What to hell are they going to do for me?" growled Druce.

"No time to argue," said the lawyer. "Here!" He pressed something in his hand. "Your game is to get away while the getting is good." He slammed the door as Druce got in. The car turned the corner and went north.

"Where are we going?" Elsie asked.

Druce mumbled an unintelligible answer.

"Where?"

"Shut up your ranting at me!" He shook off her hand. "I guess you'll get your three squares a day."

Nothing more was said for several moments. Elsie lay back with her eyes closed. By the light from occasional street lamps Druce was counting a roll of bills.

"Here, kid, look at this." He spoke with just a touch of softness and bravado. "That young guy slipped it to me. My backers got to give me a nice trip to foreign lands. There'll be plenty of kale. I'm going to take you along, see." He did not add that her too great knowledge of his methods made others desirous that she, too, should be far away when the trial of the dive's employes came to pass. Elsie opened her eyes.

"I should think you would show that you feel a little bit glad that I'm out," he whined. "Think of those days in that jail."

Elsie would not have dared fail to express sympathy for him, but he was in need of a match for the cigarette he held. Hailing the chauffeur, he had the next instant forgotten his demand.

They drove in silence until they reached the house that had been prepared for their hiding-place. "Furnished rooms—Light Housekeeping" was inscribed on a card, tacked conspicuously in the doorway.

A woman near middle age, inclined to be fleshy, with large features that reflected the dim hall light, met them, her arms akimbo.

"Everything's all right for you folks. Upstairs front. There's a gas stove in the closet if you all—

"We ain't pikers—we'll get our eats sent in. Here, take this." Druce put a slip of paper and a greenback into Elsie's hand.

"Go to the drug-store there at the corner and get this prescription filled," he ordered. "It's morphine. I've got to sleep tonight."

Elsie obeyed passively. When she returned Druce was pacing the room wild with impatience. His greenbacks and a bottle of absinthe lay on the table.

He lost no time in resorting to the morphine. "Absinthe is the stuff to put life in your body; but it's the good old dope to make you forget all your troubles," he soliloquized, Very shortly he was on the bed, sound asleep.

Elsie paced softly back and forth in the room for a long time. Then she went out into the dark hallway. She opened the window and stood looking into the street. It was quiet there. The stars looked down on a deserted way.

That big bright star over there! Was it not the one she and her sister used to choose when wishing from their bedroom window at Millville! How long ago that seemed; how wide and dreadful life's abyss between!

"If I had known, if I had known!" Elsie shuddered and glanced towards the closed door. "I was bound to have my own way. My—own—way. That's it. There was something in me—" She faced her actions, she probed into her thoughts from the hour she first met Martin Druce. She marshalled her scathing shames before the judgment bar of her womanhood. In the flaming fires of tortured conscience she stood and suffered.

Then she began to wonder about the future. Where was she bound? Where would he be sent? What strange lands might she see?

How could she go with him? How could she stay behind? The street—the dreadful streets of night!

Elsie shuddered, remembering those nights in the Levee, the fear and horror, and at last the shameful, gnawing hunger that drove her to him again.

Back in the room where the dive-keeper lay in stupor Elsie spread a quilt on the floor and went wearily to her broken rest.

When she awoke Druce was trying nervously to roll a cigarette. The paper broke.

"Here, you, it's morning. It's time you woke up. Take this money. Get me some cigarettes. I can't roll them."

He was a being frightening to see by this time. The morphine and the French poison had torn his nerves to fragments. His eyes glared like coals in his pasty white face.

Elsie did not try to talk to him. She saw that he was beyond that. She took some money from the table and went out again to buy the cigarettes and food. When she returned Druce refused to eat. He took up the bottle of absinthe and drank from it, swallowing the burning liquid with animal-like gulps that made Elsie shudder.

"You'll kill yourself," said Elsie. "Take some of this milk."

"Mind your own damn business," returned Druce, hoarsely. "You stick to milk. I'll stick to absinthe."

Again he lay down and again he slept. The long day passed. Night came and with a wild wind and a beating rain.

Druce woke in a half delirium.

"More absinthe, more absinthe," he muttered. The bottle on the table was empty. "Why didn't you have another bottle here? What have you been doing, eh?"

"Do you think you better take any more?" asked Elsie.

Druce stood glaring at her. His eyes flamed as he rushed across the room like a madman. Before she could get out of his way he struck her a brutal blow that felled her to the floor, and kicked her as she struggled. He reached for the empty bottle and brandished it over her.

"Damn you, get out of here quick and get me that dope!"

Elsie got to her feet.

"I'll go," she said, faintly.



CHAPTER XXVII

HARVEY SPENCER TAKES UP THE TRAIL

Harvey had waited about the jail for days. He was certain that Elsie Welcome would return to Druce, and he was resolved to make a great effort to induce her to leave him.

In his unsubtle makeup the measure of his devotion was as great as the measure of his unspoiled manhood. The girl he wished to make his wife had been taken from him. She had removed herself far from his kindness and care, but he could not cease to offer her the care she needed more poignantly than before.

The personal interest of so conspicuous a person as Mary Randall, in Elsie's case, had undoubtedly urged Harvey on—when otherwise he might have given up. Even so, his courage and persistency, and personal sacrifices, were wonderful to behold.

On the night when Druce was at last removed from the jail Harvey was standing in an alley opposite the public entrance to the jail watching the automobile which stood awaiting the coming of someone from within.

Finally he saw the slender figure of a woman emerge from a doorway and enter the automobile. He knew that figure. He ran across the street and around the car. He noted its number with one of those keen flashes of memory, conscious at the moment that he should remember that number as long as he drew breath.

He flung open the door on the further side of the automobile.

Elsie faced him. "What are you doing here?" she asked in an icy little voice.

"I—no—Won't you come to your mother, Elsie? Won't you come away from this man? Your mother and Patience love you so much and have been trying so hard to find you and—"

"I can't, Harvey—I—perhaps—Oh! Go away. Druce is coming. He will—hurt you."

"It doesn't matter about me. It's you."

"I—I must stand by my husband."

"Husband! He isn't your husband. He fooled you with a marriage license. Anybody can get a license in Chicago, but Druce's license was never returned. He likely got some fellow to pretend to perform the marriage. Elsie, it wasn't legal, I can prove it."

For an instant Elsie's spirit flamed in her eyes and her burning cheeks paled. Then she saw Druce coming and she turned towards him wearily, a strange quivering and drooping of her eyelids alone showing that she had heard. In the presence of her master she grew meek as a little child.