They turned and walked back to the cab. Collins fell into the Bowery strut.

"Tryin' to throw a scare into me," he argued feebly.

"Me? Oh, no. You mentioned soft music and the preacher. Mebbeso. But it's liable to be for you if you monkey with the buzz-saw. I'm no gun-sharp, but no man who can't empty a revolver in a shade better than two seconds and put every bullet inside the rim of a cup at fifteen yards wants to throw lead at me. You see, I hang up my hat in Arizona. I grew up with a six-gun by my side."

"I should worry. This is little old New York, not Arizona," the gangman answered.

"That's what yore boss Durand thought. What has it brought him but trouble? Lemme give you something to chew on. New York's the biggest city of the biggest, freest country on God's green footstool. You little sewer rats pull wires and think you run it. Get wise, you poor locoed gink. You run it about as much as that fly on the wheel of yore taxi drives the engine. Durand's the whole works by his way of it, but when some one calls his bluff see where he gets off."

"He ain't through with you yet," growled "Slim" Jim sulkily.

"Mebbe not, but you—you're through with Annie." Clay caught him by the shoulder and swung him round. His eyes bored chilly into the other man. "Don't you forget to remember not to forget that. Let her alone. Don't go near her or play any tricks to hurt her. Lay off for good. If you don't—well, you'll pay heavy. I'll be on the job personal to collect."

Clay swung away and strode down the street, light-heeled and lithe, the sap of vital youth in every rippling muscle.

"Slim" Jim watched him, snarling hatred. If ever he got a good chance at him it would be curtains for the guy from Arizona, he swore savagely.



CHAPTER XXV

JOHNNIE SAYS HE IS MUCH OBLIGED

Beatrice, just back from riding with Bromfield, stood on the steps in front of the grilled door and stripped the gloves from her hands.

"I'm on fire with impatience, Bee," he told her. "I can hardly wait for that three weeks to pass. The days drag when I'm not with you."

He was standing a step or two below her, a graceful, well-groomed figure of ease, an altogether desirable catch in the matrimonial market. His dark hair, parted in the middle, was beginning to thin, and tiny crow's-feet radiated from the eyes, but he retained the light, slim figure of youth. It ought not to be hard to love Clarendon Bromfield, his fiancee reflected. Yet he disappointingly failed to stir her pulses.

She smiled with friendly derision. "Poor Clary! You don't look like a Vesuvius ready to erupt. You have such remarkable self-control."

His smile met hers. "I can't go up and down the street ringing a bell like a town crier and shouting it out to everybody I meet."

Round the corner of the house a voice was lifted in tuneless song.

"Oh, I'm goin' home Bull-whackin' for to spurn; I ain't got a nickel, And I don't give a dern. 'T is when I meet a pretty girl, You bet I will or try, I'll make her my little wife, Root hog or die."

"You see Johnnie isn't ashamed to shout out his good intentions," she said.

"Johnnie isn't engaged to the loveliest creature under heaven. He doesn't have to lie awake nights for fear the skies will fall and blot him out before his day of bliss."

Beatrice dropped a little curtsy. She held out her hand in dismissal. "Till to-morrow, Clary."

As Bromfield turned away, Johnnie came round a corner of the house dragging a garden hose. He was attacking another stanza of the song:

"There's hard times on old Bitter Creek That never can be beat. It was root hog or die Under every wagon sheet. We cleared up all the Indians, Drank . . ."

The puncher stopped abruptly at sight of his mistress.

"What did you drink that has made you so happy this morning, Johnnie?" she asked lightly.

The cowpuncher's secret burst from him. "I done got married, Miss Beatrice."

"You—what?"

"I up and got married day before yesterday," he beamed.

"And who's the happy girl?"

"Kitty Mason. We jes' walked to the church round the corner. Clay he stood up with us and give the bride away. It's me 'n' her for Arizona poco pronto."

Beatrice felt a queer joyous lift inside her as of some weight that had gone. In a single breath Johnnie had blown away the mists of misunderstanding that for weeks had clouded her vision. Her heart went out to Clay with a rush of warm emotion. The friend she had distrusted was all she had ever believed him. He was more—a man too stanch to desert under pressure any one who had even a slight claim on him.

"I want to meet her. Will you bring her to see me this afternoon, Johnnie?" she asked.

His face was one glad grin. "I sure will. Y'betcha, by jollies."

He did.

To Beatrice, busy writing a letter, came Jenkins some hours later.

"A young—person—to see you, Miss Whitford."

He said it with a manner so apologetic that it stressed his opinion of the social status of the visitor.

"What kind of a person?"

"A young woman, Miss. From the country, I tyke it."

"She didn't give you a card?"

"No, Miss. She came with the person Mr. Whitford took on to 'elp with the work houtside."

"Oh! Show them both up. And have tea sent in, Jenkins."

Kitty's shy eyes lifted apprehensively to those of this slim young patrician so beautifully and simply gowned. Instantly her fears fled. Beatrice moved swiftly to her with both hands outstretched.

"I'm so glad to meet you."

She kissed the young wife with unaccustomed tenderness. For the Colorado girl had about her a certain modesty that was disarming, an appeal of helplessness Beatrice could not resist.

Kitty, in the arms of her hostess, wept a few tears. She had been under a strain in anticipating the ordeal of meeting Johnnie's mistress, and she had discovered her to be a very sweet, warm-hearted girl.

As for Johnnie, he had a miserably happy half-hour. He had brought his hat in with him and he did not know how to dispose of it. What he did do was to keep it revolving in his hands. This had to be abandoned when Miss Whitford handed him a quite unnecessary cup of tea and a superfluous plate of toasted English muffins. He wished his hands had not been so big and red and freckled. Also he had an uncomfortable suspicion that his tow hair was tousled and uncombed in spite of his attempts at home to plaster it down.

He declined sugar and cream because for some reason it seemed easier to say "No'm" than "Yes," though he always took both with tea. And he disgraced himself by scalding his tongue and failing to suppress the pain. Finally the plate, with his muffin, carefully balanced on his knee, from some devilish caprice plunged over the precipice to the carpet and the bit of china broke.

Whereupon Kitty gently reproved him, as was her wifely duty.

"I ain't no society fellow," the distressed puncher explained to his hostess, tiny beads of perspiration on his forehead.

Beatrice had already guessed as much, but she did not admit it to Johnnie. She and Kitty smiled at each other in that common superiority which their sex gives them to any mere man upon such an occasion. For Mrs. John Green, though afternoon tea was to her too an alien custom, took to it as a duck does to water.

Miss Whitford handed Johnnie an envelope. "Would it be too much trouble for you to take a letter to Mr. Lindsay?" she asked very casually as they rose to go.

The bridegroom said he was much obliged and he would be plumb tickled to take a message to Clay.

When Clay read the note his blood glowed. It was a characteristic two-line apology:

I've been a horrid little prig, Clay [so the letter ran]. Won't you come over to-morrow and go riding with me?

BEATRICE



CHAPTER XXVI

A LOCKED GATE

Colin Whitford had been telling Clay the story of how a young cowpuncher had snatched Beatrice from under the hoofs of a charging steer. His daughter and the Arizonan listened without comment.

"I've always thought I'd like to explain to that young man I didn't mean to insult him by offering money for saving Bee. But you see he didn't give me any chance. I never did learn his name," concluded the mining man.

"And of course we'd like him to know that we appreciate what he did for me," Beatrice added. She looked at Clay, and a pulse beat in her soft throat.

"I reckon he knows that," Lindsay suggested. "You must 'a' thought him mighty rude for to break away like you say he did."

"We couldn't understand it till afterwards. Mr. Bromfield had slipped him a fifty-dollar bill and naturally he resented it." Miss Whitford's face bubbled with reminiscent mirth. She looked a question at Clay. "What do you suppose that impudent young scalawag did with the fifty?"

"Got drunk on it most likely."

"He fed it to his horse. Clary was furious."

"He would be," said the cattleman dryly, in spite of the best intentions to be generous to his successful rival. "But I reckon I know why yore grand-stand friend in chaps pulled such a play. In Arizona you can't square such things with money. So far as I can make out the puncher didn't do anything to write home about, but he didn't want pay for it anyhow."

"Of course, Bromfield doesn't understand the West," said Whitford. "I wouldn't like that young puncher half so well if he'd taken the money."

"He didn't need to spoil a perfectly good fifty-dollar bill, though," admitted Clay.

"Yes, he did," denied Beatrice. "That was his protest against Clarendon's misjudgment of him. I've always thought it perfectly splendid in its insolence. Some day I'm going to tell him so."

"It happened in your corner of Arizona, Lindsay. If you ever find out who the chap was I wish you'd let us know," Whitford said.

"I'll remember."

"If you young people are going riding—"

"—We'd better get started. Quite right, Dad. We're off. Clarendon will probably call up. Tell him I'll be in about four-thirty."

She pinched her father's ear, kissed him on one ruddy cheek, then on the other, and joined Clay at the door.

They were friends again, had been for almost half an hour, even though they had not yet been alone together, but their friendship was to hold reservations now. The shadow of Clarendon Bromfield rode between them. They were a little stiff with each other, not so casual as they had been. A consciousness of sex had obtruded into the old boyish camaraderie.

After a brisk canter they drew their horses together for a walk.

Beatrice broke the ice of their commonplaces. She looked directly at him, her cheeks flushing. "I don't know how you're going to forgive me, Clay. I've been awf'ly small and priggish. I hate to think I'm ungenerous, but that's just what I've been."

"Let's forget it," he said gently.

"No, I don't want to forget—not till I've told you how humble I feel to-day. I might have trusted you. Why didn't I? It would have been easy for me to have taken your little friend in and made things right for her. That's what I ought to have done. But, instead of that—Oh, I hate myself for the way I acted."

Her troubled smile, grave and sweet, touched him closely. It was in his horoscope that the spell of this young Diana must be upon him.

He put his hand on hers as it rested on the pommel of the saddle and gave it a slight pressure. "You're a good scout, li'l' pardner."

But it was Beatrice's way to step up to punishment and take what was coming. As a little girl, while still almost a baby, she had once walked up to her mother, eyes flashing with spirit, and pronounced judgment on herself. "I've tum to be spanked. I broke Claire's doll an' I'm glad of it, mean old fing. So there!" Now she was not going to let the subject drop until she had freed her soul.

"No, Clay, I've been a poor sportsman. When my friend needed me I failed him. It hurts me, because—oh, you know. When the test came I wasn't there. One hates to be a quitter."

Her humility distressed him, though he loved the spirit of her apology.

"It's all right, Bee. Don't you worry. All friends misunderstand each other, but the real ones clear things up."

She had not yet told him the whole truth and she meant to make clean confession.

"I've been a miserable little fool." She stopped with a little catch of the breath, flamed red, and plunged on. Her level eyes never flinched from his. "I've got to out with it, Clay. You won't misunderstand, I know. I was jealous. I wanted to keep your friendship to myself—didn't want to share it with another girl. That's how mean I am."

A warm smile lit his face. "I've sure enough found my friend again this mo'nin'."

Her smile met his. Then, lest barriers fall too fast between them, she put her horse to a gallop.

As they moved into the Park a snorting automobile leaped past them with muffler open. The horse upon which Beatrice rode was a young one. It gave instant signals of alarm, went sunfishing on its hind legs, came down to all fours, and bolted.

Beatrice kept her head. She put her weight on the reins with all the grip of her small, strong hands. But the horse had the bit in its teeth. She felt herself helpless, flying wildly down the road at incredible speed. Bushes and trees, the reeling road, a limousine, a mounted policeman, all flew by her with blurred detail.

She became aware of the rapid thud of hoofs behind, of a figure beside her riding knee to knee, of a brown hand taking hold of the rein close to the bit. The speed slackened. The horses pounded to a halt.

The girl found herself trembling. She leaned back in a haze of dizziness against an arm which circled her shoulder and waist. Memory leaped across the years to that other time when she had rested in his arms, his heart beating against hers. In that moment of deep understanding of herself, Beatrice knew the truth beyond any doubt. A new heaven and a new earth were waiting for her, but she could not enter them. For she herself had closed the gate and locked it fast.

His low voice soothed and comforted her.

"I'm all right," she told him.

Clay withdrew his arm. "I'd report that fellow if I had his number," he said. "You stick to yore saddle fine. You're one straight-up rider."

"I'll ask Mr. Bromfield to give you fifty dollars' again," she laughed nervously.

That word again stuck in his consciousness.

"You've known me all along," he charged.

"Of course I've known you—knew you when you stood on the steps after you had tied the janitor."

"I knew you, too."

"Why didn't you say so?"

"Did you expect me to make that grand-stand play on the parada a claim on yore kindness? I didn't do a thing for you that day any man wouldn't have done. I happened to be the lucky fellow that got the chance. That's all. Come to that, it was up to you to do the recognizing if any was done. I had it worked out that you didn't know me, but once or twice from things you said I almost thought you did."

"I meant to tell you sometime, but—well, I wanted to see how long you could keep from telling me. Now you've done it again."

"I'd like to ride with you the rest of yore life," he said unexpectedly.

They trembled on the edge of self-revelation. It was the girl who rescued them from the expression of their emotions.

"I'll speak to Clary about it. Maybe he'll take you on as a groom," she said with surface lightness.

As soon as they reached home Beatrice led the way into the library. Bromfield was sitting there with her father. They were talking over plans for the annual election of officers of the Bird Cage Mining Company. Whitford was the largest stockholder and Bromfield owned the next biggest block. They controlled it between them.

"Dad, Rob Roy bolted and Mr. Lindsay stopped him before I was thrown."

Whitford rose, the color ebbing from his cheeks. "I've always told you that brute was dangerous. I'll offer him for sale to-day."

"And I've discovered that we know the man who saved me from the wild steer in Arizona. It was Mr. Lindsay."

"Lindsay!" Whitford turned to him. "Is that right?"

"It's correct."

Colin Whitford, much moved, put a hand on the younger man's shoulder. "Son, you know what I'd like to tell you. I reckon I can't say it right."

"We'll consider it said, Mr. Whitford," answered Clay with his quick, boyish smile. "No use in spillin' a lot of dictionary words."

"Why didn't you tell us?"

"It was nothin' to brag about."

Bromfield came to time with a thin word of thanks. "We're all greatly in your debt, Mr. Lindsay."

As the days passed the malicious jealousy of the New York clubman deepened to a steady hatred. A fellow of ill-controlled temper, his thin-skinned vanity writhed at the condition which confronted him. He was engaged to a girl who preferred another and a better man, one against whom he had an unalterable grudge. He recognized in the Westerner an eager energy, a clean-cut resilience, and an abounding vitality he would have given a great deal to possess. His own early manhood had been frittered away in futile dissipations and he resented bitterly the contrast between himself and Lindsay that must continually be present in the mind of the girl who had promised to marry him. He had many adventitious things to offer her—such advantages as modern civilization has made desirable to hothouse women—but he could not give the clean, splendid youth she craved. It was the price he had paid for many sybaritic pleasures he had been too soft to deny himself.

With only a little more than two weeks of freedom before her, Beatrice made the most of her days. For the first time in her life she became a creature of moods. The dominant ones were rebellion, recklessness, and repentance. While Bromfield waited and fumed she rode and tramped with Clay. It was not fair to her affianced lover. She knew that. But there were times when she wanted to shriek as dressmakers and costumers fussed over her and wore out her jangled nerves with multitudinous details. The same hysteria welled up in her occasionally at the luncheons and dinners that were being given in honor of her approaching marriage.

It was not logical, of course. She was moving toward the destiny she had chosen for herself. But there was an instinct in her, savage and primitive, to hurt Bromfield because she herself was suffering. In the privacy of her room she passed hours of tearful regret for these bursts of fierce insurrection.

Ten days before the wedding Beatrice wounded his vanity flagrantly. Clarendon was giving an informal tea for her at his rooms. Half an hour before the time set, Beatrice got him on the wire and explained that her car was stalled with engine trouble two miles from Yonkers.

"I'm awf'ly sorry, Clary," she pleaded. "We ought not to have come so far. Please tell our friends I've been delayed, and—I won't do it again."

Bromfield hung up the receiver in a cold fury. He restrained himself for the moment, made the necessary explanations, and went through with the tea somehow. But as soon as his guests were gone he gave himself up to his anger. He began planning a revenge on the man who no doubt was laughing in his sleeve at him. He wanted the fellow exposed, discredited, and humiliated.

But how? Walking up and down his room like a caged panther, Bromfield remembered that Lindsay had other enemies in New York, powerful ones who would be eager to cooperate with him in bringing about the man's downfall. Was it possible for him to work with them under cover? If so, in what way?

Clarendon Bromfield was not a criminal, but a conventional member of society. It was not in his mind or in his character to plot the murder or mayhem of his rival. What he wanted was a public disgrace, one that would blare his name out to the newspapers as a law-breaker. He wanted to sicken Beatrice and her father of their strange infatuation for Lindsay.

A plan began to unfold itself to him. It was one which called for expert assistance. He looked up Jerry Durand, got him on the telephone, and made an appointment to meet him secretly.



CHAPTER XXVII

"NO VIOLENCE"

The ex-pugilist sat back in the chair, chewing an unlighted black cigar, his fishy eyes fixed on Bromfield. Scars still decorated the colorless face, souvenirs of a battle in which he had been bested by a man he hated. Durand had a capacity for silence. He waited now for this exquisite from the upper world to tell his business.

Clarendon discovered that he had an unexpected repugnance to doing this. A fastidious sense of the obligations of class served him for a soul and the thing he was about to do could not be justified even in his loose code of ethics. He examined the ferule of his Malacca cane nervously.

"I've come to you, Mr. Durand, about—about a fellow called Lindsay."

The bulbous eyes of the other narrowed. He distrusted on principle all kid gloves. Those he had met were mostly ambitious reformers. Furthermore, any stranger who mentioned the name of the Arizonan became instantly an object of suspicion.

"What about him?"

"I understand that you and he are not on friendly terms. I've gathered that from what's been told me. Am I correct?"

Durand thrust out his salient chin. "Say! Who the hell are you? What's eatin' you? Whatta you want?"

"I'd rather not tell my name."

"Nothin' doin'. No name, no business. That goes."

"Very well. My name is Bromfield. This fellow Lindsay—gets in my way. I want to—to eliminate him."

"Are you askin' me to croak him?"

"Good God, no! I don't want him hurt—physically," cried Bromfield, alarmed.

"Whatta you want, then?" The tight-lipped mouth and the harsh voice called for a showdown.

"I want him discredited—disgraced."

"Why?"

"Some friends of mine are infatuated by him. I want to unmask him in a public way so as to disgust them with him."

"I'm hep. It's a girl."

"We'll not discuss that," said the clubman with a touch of hauteur. "As to the price, if you can arrange the thing as I want it done, I'll not haggle over terms."

The ex-pugilist listened sourly to Bromfield's proposition. He watched narrowly this fashionably dressed visitor. His suspicions still stirred, but not so actively. He was inclined to believe in the sincerity of the fellow's hatred of the Westerner. Jealousy over a girl could easily account for it. Jerry did not intend to involve himself until he had made sure.

"Whatta you want me to do? Come clean."

"Could we get him into a gambling-house, arrange some disgraceful mixup with a woman, get the place raided by the police, and have the whole thing come out in the papers?"

Jerry's slitted eyes went off into space. The thing could be arranged. The trouble in getting Lindsay was to draw him into a trap he could not break through. If Bromfield could deliver his enemy into his hands, Durand thought he would be a fool not to make the most of the chance. As for this soft-fingered swell's stipulation against physical injury, that could be ignored if the opportunity offered.

"Can you bring this Lindsay to a gambling-dump? Will he come with you?" demanded the gang politician.

"I think so. I'm not sure. But if I do that, can you fix the rest?"

"It'll cost money."

"How much will you need?"

"A coupla thousand to start with. More before I've finished. I've got to salve the cops."

Bromfield had prepared for this contingency. He counted out a thousand dollars in bills of large denominations.

"I'll cut that figure in two. Understand. He's not to be hurt. I won't have any rough work."

"Leave that to me."

"And you've got to arrange it so that when the house is raided I escape without being known."

"I'll do that, too. Leave your address and I'll send a man up later to wise you as to the scheme when I get one fixed up."

On a sheet torn from his memorandum book Bromfield wrote the name of the club which he most frequented.

"Don't forget the newspapers. I want them to get the story," said the clubman, rising.

"I'll see they cover the raid."

Bromfield, massaging a glove on to his long fingers, added another word of caution. "Don't slip up on this thing. Lindsay's a long way from being a soft mark."

"Don't I know it?" snapped Durand viciously. "There'll be no slip-up this time if you do your part. We'll get him, and we'll get him right."

"Without any violence, of course."

"Oh, of course."

Was there a covert but derisive jeer concealed in that smooth assent? Bromfield did not know, but he took away with him an unease that disturbed his sleep that night.

Before the clubman was out of the hotel, Jerry was snapping instructions at one of his satellites.

"Tail that fellow. Find where he goes, who he is, what girl he's mashed on, all about him. See if he's hooked up with Lindsay. And how? Hop to it! Did you get a slant at him as he went out?"

"Sure I did. He's my meat."

The tailer vanished.

Jerry stood at the window, still sullenly chewing his unlighted cigar, and watched his late visitor and the tailer lose themselves in the hurrying crowds.

"White-livered simp. 'No violence, Mr. Durand.' Hmp! Different here."

An evil grin broke through on the thin-lipped, cruel face.



CHAPTER XXVIII

IN BAD

When Bromfield suggested to Clay with a touch of stiffness that he would be glad to show him a side of New York night life probably still unfamiliar to him, the cattleman felt a surprise he carefully concealed. He guessed that this was a belated attempt on the part of Miss Whitford's fiance to overcome the palpable dislike he had for her friend. If so, the impulse that inspired the offer was a creditable one. Lindsay had no desire to take in any of the plague spots of the city with Bromfield. Something about the society man set his back up, to use his own phrase. But because this was true he did not intend to be outdone in generosity by a successful rival. Promptly and heartily he accepted the invitation. If he had known that a note and a card from Jerry Durand lay in the vest pocket of his cynical host while he was holding out the olive branch, it is probable the Arizonan would have said, "No, thank you, kind sir."

The note mentioned no names. It said, "Wednesday, at Maddock's, 11 P.M. Show this card."

And to Maddock's, on Wednesday, at an hour something earlier than eleven, the New Yorker led his guest after a call at one or two clubs.

Even from the outside the place had a dilapidated look that surprised Lindsay. The bell was of that brand you keep pulling till you discover it is out of order. Decayed gentility marked the neighborhood, though the blank front of the houses looked impeccably respectable.

As a feeble camouflage of its real reason for being, Maddock's called itself the "Omnium Club." But when Clay found how particular the doorkeeper was as to those who entered he guessed at once it was a gambling-house.

From behind a grating the man peered at them doubtfully. Bromfield showed a card, and after some hesitation on the part of his inquisitor, passed the examination. Toward Clay the doorkeeper jerked his head inquiringly.

"He's all right," the clubman vouched.

Again there was a suspicious and lengthy scrutiny.

The door opened far enough to let them slide into a scantily furnished hall. On the first landing was another guard, a heavy, brutal-looking fellow who was no doubt the "chucker-out." He too looked them over closely, but after a glance at the card drew aside to let them pass.

Through a door near the head of the stairs they moved into a large room, evidently made from several smaller ones with the partitions torn down and the ceilings pillared at intervals.

Clay had read about the magnificence of Canfield's in the old days, and he was surprised that one so fastidious as Bromfield should patronize a place so dingy and so rough as this. At the end of one room was a marble mantelpiece above which there was a defaced, gilt-frame mirror. The chandeliers, the chairs, the wall-paper, all suggested the same note of one-time opulence worn to shabbiness.

A game of Klondike was going. There were two roulette wheels, a faro table, and one circle of poker players.

The cold eyes of a sleek, slippery man sliding cards out of a faro-box looked at the Westerner curiously. Among the suckers who came to this den of thieves to be robbed were none of Clay's stamp. Lindsay watched the white, dexterous hands of the dealer with an honest distaste. All along the border from Juarez to Calexico he had seen just such soft, skilled fingers fleecing those who toiled. He knew the bloodless, impassive face of the professional gambler as well as he knew the anxious, reckless ones of his victims. His knowledge had told him little good of this breed of parasites who preyed upon a credulous public.

The traffic of this room was crooked business by day as well as by night. A partition ran across the rear of the back parlor which showed no opening but two small holes with narrow shelves at the bottom. Back of that was the paraphernalia of the pool-room, another device to separate customers from their money by playing the "ponies."

As Clay looked around it struck him that the personnel of this gambling-den's patrons was a singularly depressing one. All told there were not a dozen respectable-looking people in the room. Most of those present were derelicts of life, the failures of a great city washed up by the tide. Some were pallid, haggard wretches clinging to the vestiges of a prosperity that had once been theirs. Others were hard-faced ruffians from the underworld. Not a few bore the marks of the drug victim. All of those playing had a manner of furtive suspicion. They knew that if they risked their money the house would rob them. Yet they played.

Bromfield bought a small stack of chips at the roulette table.

"Won't you take a whirl at the wheel?" he asked Lindsay.

"Thanks, no, I believe not," his guest answered.

The Westerner was a bit disgusted at his host's lack of discrimination. "Does he think I'm a soft mark too?" he wondered. "If this is what he calls high life I've had more than enough already."

His disgust was shared by the clubman. Bromfield had never been in such a dive before. His gambling had been done in gilded luxury. While he touched shoulders with this motley crew his nostrils twitched with fastidious disdain. He played, but his interest was not in the wheel. Durand had promised that there would be women and that one of them should be bribed to make a claim upon Clay at the proper moment. He had an unhappy feeling that the gang politician had thrown him down in this. If so, what did that mean? Had Durand some card up his sleeve? Was he using him as a catspaw to rake in his own chestnuts?

Clarendon Bromfield began to weaken. He and Clay were the only two men in the room in evening clothes. His questing eye fell on tough, scarred faces that offered his fears no reassurance. Any one or all of them might be agents of Durand.

He shoved all of his chips out, putting half of them on number eight and the rest on seventeen. His object was to lose his stack immediately and be free to go. To his annoyance the whirling ball dropped into the pocket labeled eight.

"Let's get out of this hole," he said to Lindsay in a low voice. "I don't like it."

"Suits me," agreed the other.

As Bromfield was cashing his chips Clay came rigidly to attention. Two men had just come into the room. One of them was "Slim" Jim Collins, the other Gorilla Dave. As yet they had not seen him. He did not look at them, but at his host. There was a question in his mind he wanted solved. The clubman's gaze passed over both the newcomers without the least sign of recognition.

"I didn't know what this joint was like or I'd never have brought you," apologized Clarendon. "A friend of mine told me about it. He's got a queer fancy if he likes this frazzled dive."

Clay acquitted Bromfield of conspiracy. He must have been tailed here by Durand's men. His host had nothing to do with it. What for? They could not openly attack him.

"Slim" Jim's eyes fell on him. He nudged Dave. Both of them, standing near the entrance, watched Lindsay steadily.

Some one outside the door raised the cry, "The bulls are comin'."

Instantly the room leaped to frenzied excitement. Men dived for the doors, bets forgotten and chips scattered over the floor. Chairs were smashed as they charged over them, tables overturned. The unwary were trodden underfoot.

Bromfield went into a panic. Why had he been fool enough to trust Durand? No doubt the fellow would ruin him as willingly as he would Lindsay. The raid was fifteen minutes ahead of schedule time. The ward politician had betrayed him. He felt sure of it. All the carefully prepared plans agreed upon he jettisoned promptly. His sole thought was to save himself, not to trap his rival.

Lindsay caught him by the arm. "Let's try the back room."

He followed Clay, Durand's gangmen at his heels.

The lights went out.

The Westerner tried the window. It was heavily barred outside. He turned to search for a door.

Brought up by the partition, Bromfield was whimpering with fear as he too groped for a way of escape. A pale moon shone through the window upon his evening clothes.

In the dim light Clay knew that tragedy impended. "Slim" Jim had his automatic out.

"I've got you good," the chauffeur snarled.

The gun cracked. Bromfield bleated in frenzied terror as Clay dashed forward. A chair swung round in a sweeping arc. As it descended the spitting of the gun slashed through the darkness a second time.

"Slim" Jim went down, rolled over, lay like a log.

Some one dived for Lindsay and drove him against the wall, pinning him by the waist. A second figure joined the first and caught the cattleman's wrist.

Then the lights flashed on again. Clay saw that the man who had flung him against the partition was Gorilla Dave. A plain-clothes man with a star had twisted his wrist and was clinging to it. Bromfield was nowhere to be seen, but an open door to the left showed that he had found at least a temporary escape.

A policeman came forward and stooped over the figure of the prostrate man.

"Some one's croaked a guy," he said.

Gorilla Dave spoke up quickly. "This fellow did it. With a chair. I seen him."

There was a moment before Lindsay answered quietly. "He shot twice. The gun must be lying under him where he fell."

Already men had crowded forward to the scene of the tragedy, moved by the morbid curiosity a crowd has in such sights. Two policemen pushed them back and turned the still body over. No revolver was to be seen.

"Anybody know who this is?" one of the officers asked.

"Collins—'Slim' Jim," answered big Dave.

"Well, he's got his this time," the policeman said. "Skull smashed."

Clay's heart sank. In that noise of struggling men and crashing furniture very likely the sound of the shots had been muffled. The revolver gone, false testimony against him, proof that he had threatened Collins available, Clay knew that he was in desperate straits.

"There was another guy here with him in them glad rags," volunteered one of the gamblers captured in the raid.

"Who was he?" asked the plain-clothes man of his prisoner.

Clay was silent. He was thinking rapidly. His enemies had him trapped at last with the help of circumstance, Why bring Bromfield into it? It would mean trouble and worry for Beatrice.

"Better speak up, young fellow, me lad," advised the detective. "It won't help you any to be sulky. You're up against the electric chair sure."

The Arizonan looked at him with the level, unafraid eyes of the hills.

"I reckon I'll not talk till I'm ready," he said in his slow drawl.

The handcuffs clicked on his wrists.



CHAPTER XXIX

BAD NEWS

Colin Whitford came into the room carrying a morning paper. His step was hurried, his eyes eager. When he spoke there was the lift of excitement in his voice.

"Bee, I've got bad news."

"Is the Bird Cage flooded?" asked Beatrice. "Or have the miners called a strike again?"

"Worse than that. Lindsay's been arrested. For murder."

The bottom fell out of her heart. She caught at the corner of a desk to steady herself. "Murder! It can't be! Must be some one of the same name."

"I reckon not, honey. It's Clay sure enough. Listen." He read the headlines of a front-page story.

"It can't be Clay! What would he be doing in a gambling-dive?" She reached for the paper, but when she had it the lines blurred before her eyes. "Read it, please."

Whitford read the story to the last line. Long before he had finished, his daughter knew the one arrested was Clay. She sat down heavily, all the life stricken from her young body.

"It's that man Durand. He's done this and fastened it on Clay. We'll find a way to prove Clay didn't do it."

"Maybe, in self-defense—"

Beatrice pushed back her father's hesitant suggestion, and even while she did it a wave of dread swept over her. The dead man was the same criminal "Slim" Jim Collins whom the cattleman had threatened in order to protect the Millikan girl. The facts that the man had been struck down by a chair and that her friend claimed, according to the paper, that the gunman had fired two shots, buttressed the solution offered by Whitford. But the horror of it was too strong for her. Against reason her soul protested that Clay could not have killed a man. It was too horrible, too ghastly, that through the faults of others he should be put in such a situation.

And why should her friend be in such a place unless he had been trapped by the enemies who were determined to ruin him? She knew he had a contempt for men who wasted their energies in futile dissipations. He was too clean, too much a son of the wind-swept desert, to care anything about the low pleasures of indecent and furtive vice. He was the last man she knew likely to be found enjoying a den of this sort.

"Dad, I'm going to him," she announced with crisp decision.

Her father offered no protest. His impulse, too, was to stand by the friend in need. He had no doubt Clay had killed the man, but he had a sure conviction it had been done in self-defense.

"We'll get the best lawyers in New York for him, honey," he said. "Nobody will slip anything over on Lindsay if we can help it."

"Will they let us see him? Or shall we have to get permission from some one?"

"We'll have to get an order. I know the district attorney. He'll do what he can for me, but maybe it'll take time."

Beatrice rose, strong again and resilient. Her voice was vibrant with confidence. "Then after you've called up the district attorney, we'll drive to Clay's flat in Harlem and find out from Johnnie what he can tell us. Perhaps he knows what Clay was doing in that place they raided."

It was not necessary to go to the Runt. He came to them. As Beatrice and her father stepped into the car Johnnie and Kitty appeared round the corner. Both of them had the news of a catastrophe written on their faces. A very little encouragement and they would be in tears.

"Ain't it tur'ble, Miss Beatrice? They done got Clay at last. After he made 'em all look like plugged nickels they done fixed it so he'll mebbe go to the electric chair and—"

"Stop that nonsense, Johnnie," ordered Miss Whitford sharply, a pain stabbing her heart at his words. "Don't begin whining already. We've got to see him through. Buck up and tell me what you know."

"That's right, Johnnie,"' added the mining man. "You and Kitty quit looking like the Atlantic Ocean in distress. We've got to endure the grief and get busy. We'll get Lindsay out of this hole all right."

"You're dawg-goned whistlin'. Y'betcha, by jollies!" agreed the Runt, immensely cheered by Whitford's confidence. "We been drug into this an' we'll sure hop to it."

"When did you see Clay last? How did he come to be in that gambling-house? Did he say anything to you about going there?" The girl's questions tumbled over each other in her hurry.

"Well, ma'am, it must 'a' been about nine o'clock that Clay he left last night. I recollect because—"

"It doesn't matter why. Where was he going?"

"To meet Mr. Bromfield at his club," said Kitty.

"Mr. Bromfield!" cried Beatrice, surprised. "Are you sure?"

"Tha's what Clay said," corroborated the husband. "Mr. Bromfield invited him. We both noticed it because it seemed kinda funny, him and Clay not bein'—"

"Johnnie," his wife reproved, mindful of the relationship between this young woman and the clubman.

"Did he say which club?"

"Seems to me he didn't, not as I remember. How about that, Kitty?"

"No, I'm sure he didn't. He said he wouldn't be back early. So we went to bed. We s'posed after we got up this mo'nin' he was sleepin' in his room till the paper come and I looked at it." Johnnie gave way to lament. "I told him awhile ago we had orto go back to Arizona or they'd git him. And now they've gone and done it sure enough."

Keen as a hawk on the hunt, Beatrice turned to her father quickly. "I'm going to get Clarendon on the 'phone. He'll know all about it."

"Why will he know all about it?"

"Because he was with Clay. He's the man the paper says the police are looking for—the man with Clay when it happened."

Her father's eyes lit. "That's good guessing, Bee."

It was her fiance's man who answered the girl's call. She learned that Clarendon was still in his room.

"He's quite sick this morning, Miss," the valet added.

"Tell him I want to talk with him. It's important."

"I don't think, Miss, that he's able—"

"Will you please tell him what I say?"

Presently the voice of Bromfield, thin and worried, came to her over the wire. "I'm ill, Bee. Absolutely done up. I—I can't talk."

"Tell me about Clay Lindsay. Were you with him when—when it happened?"

There was a perceptible pause before the answer came.

"With him?" She could feel his terror throbbing over the wire. Though she could not see him, she knew her question had stricken him white. "With him where?"

"At this gambling-house—Maddock's?"

"No, I—I—Bee, I tell you I'm ill."

"He went out last night to join you at your club. I know that. When did you see him last?"

"I—we didn't—he didn't come."

"Then didn't you see him at all?"

There was another pause, significant and telling, followed by a quavering "No-o."

"Clary, I want to see you—right away."

"I'm ill, I tell you—can't leave my bed." He gave a groan too genuine to doubt.

Beatrice hung up the receiver. Her eyes sparked. For all her slimness, she looked both competent and dangerous.

"What does he say?" her father asked.

"Says he didn't meet Clay at all—that he didn't show up. Dad, there's something wrong about it. Clary's in a panic about something. I'm going to see him, no matter whether he can leave his room or not."

Whitford looked dubious. "I don't see—"

"Well, I do," his daughter cut him off decisively. "We're going to his rooms—now. Why not? He says he's ill. All right. I'm engaged to be married to him and I've a right to see how ill he is."

"What's in your noodle, honey? You've got some kind of a suspicion. What is it?"

"I think Clary knows something. My notion is that he was at Maddock's and that he's in a blue funk for fear he'll be found and named as an accessory. I'm going to find out all he can tell me."

"But—"

She looked at her father directly, a deep meaning in the lovely eyes. A little tremor ran through her body. "Dad, I'm going to save Clay. That's the only thing that counts."

Her words were an appeal, a challenge. They told him that her heart belonged to the friend in prison, and they carried him back somehow to the hour when the nurse first laid her, a tiny baby, in his arms.

His heart was very tender to her. "Whatever you say, sweetheart."



CHAPTER XXX

BEE MAKES A MORNING CALL

Their chauffeur broke the speed laws getting them to the apartment house for bachelors where Bromfield lived.

His valet for once was caught off guard when he opened the door to them. Beatrice was inside before he could quite make up his mind how best to meet this frontal attack.

"We came to see Mr. Bromfield," she said.

"Sorry, Miss. He's really quite ill. The doctor says—"

"I'm Miss Whitford. We're engaged to be married. It's very important that I see him."

"Yes, Miss, I know."

The man was perfectly well aware that his master wanted of all things to avoid a meeting with her. For some reason or other, Bromfield was in a state of collapse this morning the valet could not understand. The man's business was to protect him until he had recovered. But he could not flatly turn his master's fiancee out of the apartment. His eye turned to Whitford and found no help there. He fell back on the usual device of servants.

"I don't really think he can see you, Miss. The doctor has specially told me to guard against any excitement. But I'll ask Mr. Bromfield if—if he feels up to it."

The valet passed into what was evidently a bedroom and closed the door behind him. There was a faint murmur of voices.

"I'm going in now," Beatrice announced abruptly to her father.

She moved forward quickly, before Whitford could stop her, whipped open the door, and stepped into the room. Her father followed her reluctantly.

Clarendon, in a frogged dressing-gown, lay propped up by pillows. Beside the bed was a tray, upon which was a decanter of whiskey and a siphon of soda. His figure seemed to have fallen together and his seamed face was that of an old man. But it was the eyes that held her. They were full of stark terror. The look in them took the girl's breath. They told her that he had undergone some great shock.

He shivered at sight of her.

"What is it, Clary?" she cried, moving toward him. "Tell me—tell me all about it."

"I—I'm ill." He quaked it from a burning throat.

"You were all right, yesterday. Why are you ill now?"

He groaned unhappily.

"You're going to tell me everything—everything."

His fascinated, frightened eyes clung to this straight, slim girl whose look stabbed into him and shook his soul. Why had she come to trouble him this morning while he was cowering in fear of the men who would break in to drag him away to prison?

"Nothing to tell," he got out with a gulp.

"Oh, yes, you have. Are you ill because of what happened at Maddock's?"

He tried to pull himself together, to stop the chattering of his teeth.

"N-nonsense, my dear. I'm done up completely. Delighted to see you and all that, but—Won't you go home?" His appealing eyes passed to Whitford. "Can't you take her away?"

"No, I won't go home—and he can't take me away." Her resolution was hard as steel. It seemed to crowd inexorably upon the shivering wretch in the frogged gown. "What is it you're so afraid to tell me, Clarendon?"

He quailed at her thrust. "What—what do you mean?"

She knew now, beyond any question or doubt, that he had been present when "Slim" Jim Collins had been killed. He had seen a man's life snuffed out, was still trembling for fear he might be called in as a party to the crime.

"You'd better tell me before it's too late. How did you and Clay Lindsay come to go to that den?"

"We went out to—to see the town."

"But why to that place? Are you in the habit of going there?"

He shuddered. "Never was there before. I had a card. Some one gave it to me. So we went in for a few minutes—to see what it was like. The police raided the place." He dropped his sentences reluctantly, as though they were being forced from him in pain.

"Well?"

"Everybody tried to escape. The lights went out. I found a back door and got away. Then I came home."

"What about Clay?"

Bromfield told the truth. "I didn't see him after the lights went out, except for a moment. He was running at the man with the gun."

"You saw the gun?"

He nodded, moistened his dry lips with the tip of his tongue.

"And the—the shooting? Did you see that?"

Twice the words he tried to say faded on his lips. At last he managed a "No."

"Why not?"

"I—found a door and escaped."

"You must have heard shooting."

"I heard shots as I ran down the stairs. This morning I read that—that a man was—" He swallowed down a lump and left the sentence unfinished.

"Then you know that Clay is accused of killing this man, and that the police are looking for you because you were with him."

"Yes." His answer was a dry whisper.

"Did you see this man Collins in the room?"

"No. I shouldn't know him if I saw him."

"But you heard shots. You're sure of that!" cried Beatrice.

"Y-yes."

The girl turned triumphantly to her father. "He saw the gun and he heard shots. That proves self-defense at the worst. They were shooting at Clay when he struck with the chair—if he did. Clarendon's testimony will show that."

"My testimony!" screamed Bromfield. "My God, do you think I'm going to—to—go into court? They would claim I—I was—"

She waited, but he did not finish. "Clay's life may depend upon it, and of course you'll tell the truth," she said quietly.

"Maybe I didn't hear shots," he hedged. "Maybe it was furniture falling. There was a lot of noise of people stamping and fighting."

"You—heard—shots."

The eyes of the girl were deadly weapons. They glittered like unscabbarded steel. In them was a contained fire that awed him.

He threw out his hand in a weak, impotent gesture of despair. "My God, how did I ever come to get into such a mix-up? It will ruin me."

"How did you come to go?" she asked.

"He wanted to see New York. I suppose I had some notion of taking him slumming."

Beatrice went up to him and looked straight into his eyes. "Then testify to that in court. It won't hurt you any. Go down to the police and say you have read in the paper that they want you. Tell the whole truth. And Clary—don't weaken. Stick to your story about the shots." Her voice shook a little. "Clay's life is at stake. Remember that."

"Do you think it would be safe to go to the police?" he asked doubtfully.

Whitford spoke up. "That's the only square and safe thing to do, Bromfield. They'll find out who you are, of course. If you go straight to them you draw the sting from their charge that you were an accomplice of Clay. Don't lose your nerve. You'll go through with flying colors. When a man has done nothing wrong he needn't be afraid."

"I dare say you're right," agreed Bromfield miserably.

The trouble was that Whitford was arguing from false premises. He was assuming that Clarendon was an innocent man, whereas the clubman knew just how guilty he was. Back of the killing lay a conspiracy which might come to light during the investigation. He dared not face the police. His conscience was not clean enough.

"Of course Dad's right. It's the only way to save your reputation," Beatrice cried. "I'm not going to leave you till you promise to go straight down there to headquarters. If you don't you'll be smirched for life—and you'd be doing something absolutely dishonorable."

He came to time with a heart of heavy dread. "All right, Bee. I'll go," he promised. "It's an awful mess, but I've got to go through with it, I suppose."

"Of course you have," she said with complete conviction. "You're not a quitter, and you can't hide here like a criminal."

"We'll have to be moving, Bee," her father reminded her. "You know we have an appointment to meet the district attorney."

Beatrice nodded. With a queer feeling of repulsion she patted her fiance's cheek with her soft hand and whispered a word of comfort to him.

"Buck up, old boy. It won't be half as bad as you think. Nobody is going to blame you."

They were shown out by the valet.

"You don't want to be hard on Bromfield, honey," Whitford told his daughter after they had reentered their car. "He's a parlor man. That's the way he's been brought up. Never did a hard day's work in his life. Everything made easy for him. If he'd ever ridden out a blizzard like Clay or stuck it out in a mine for a week without food after a cave-in, he wouldn't balk on the job before him. But he's soft. And he's afraid of his reputation. That's natural, I suppose."

Beatrice knew he was talking to save her feelings. "You don't need to make excuses for him, Dad," she answered gently, with a wry smile. "I've got to give up. I don't think I can go through with it."

"You mean—marry him?"

"Yes." She added, with a flare of passionate scorn of herself: "I deserve what I've got. I knew all the time I didn't love him. It was sheer selfishness in me to accept him. I wanted what he had to give me."

Her father drew a deep breath of relief. "I'm glad you see that, Bee. I don't think he's good enough for you. But I don't know anybody that is, come to that."

"That's just your partiality. I'm a mean little bounder or I never should have led him on," the girl answered in frank disgust.

Both of them felt smirched. The behavior of Bromfield had been a reflection on them. They had picked him for a thoroughbred, and he had failed them at the first test.

"Well, I haven't been proud of you in that affair," conceded Colin. "It didn't seem like my girl to—"

He broke off in characteristic fashion to berate her environment. "It's this crazy town. The spirit of it gets into a person and he accepts its standards. Let's get away from here for a while, sweetheart."

"After Clay is out of trouble, Dad, I'll go with you back to Denver or to Europe or anywhere you say."

"That's a deal," he told her promptly. "We'll stay till after the annual election of the company and then go off on a honeymoon together, Bee."



CHAPTER XXXI

INTO THE HANDS OF HIS ENEMY

Durand waited alone for word to be flashed him that the debt he owed Clay Lindsay had been settled in full. A telephone lay on the desk close at hand and beside it was a watch. The second-hand ticked its way jerkily round and round the circle. Except for that the stillness weighed on him unbearably. He paced up and down the room chewing nervously the end of an unlit cigar. For the good tidings which he was anxious to hear was news of the death of the strong young enemy who had beaten him at every turn.

Why didn't Collins get to the telephone? Was it possible that there had been a slip-up, that Lindsay had again broken through the trap set for him? Had "Slim's" nerve failed him? Or had Bromfield been unable to bring the victim to the slaughter?

His mind went over the details again. The thing had been well planned even to the unguarded door through which Collins was to escape. In the darkness "Slim" could do the job, make his getaway along with Dave, and be safe from any chance of identification. Bromfield, to save his own hide, would keep still. If he didn't, Durand was prepared to shift the murder upon his shoulders.

The minute-hand of the watch passed down from the quarter to the half and from the half to the three quarters. Still the telephone bell did not ring. The gang leader began to sweat blood. Had some one bungled after all the care with which he had laid his plans?

A door slammed below. Hurried footsteps sounded on the stair treads. Into the room burst a man.

"'Slim' 's been croaked," he blurted.

"What!" Durand's eyes dilated.

"At Maddock's."

"Who did it?"

"De guy he was to gun."

"Lindsay."

"Dat's de fellow."

"Did the bulls get Lindsay?"

"Pinched him right on de spot."

"Gun 'Slim,' did he?"

"Nope. Knocked him cold wit' a chair. Cracked his skull."

"Is he dead?"

"He'll never be deader. Dave grabbed this sucker Lindsay and yelled that he done it. The bulls pinched him like I said right there."

"Did it happen in the dark?"

"Sure as you're a foot high. My job was dousin' the glims, and I done it right."

"What about 'Slim'? Was he shooting when he got it?"

The other man shook his head. "This Lindsay man claims he was. I talked wit' a bull afterward. Dey didn't find no gun on 'Slim.' The bull says there was no gun-play."

"What became of 'Slim's' gun?"

"Search me."

Durand slammed a big fist exultantly down on the desk. "Better than the way I planned it. If the gun's gone, I'll frame Lindsay for the chair. It's Salt Creek for his."

He lost no time in getting into touch with Gorilla Dave, who was under arrest at the station house. From him he learned the story of the killing of Collins. One whispered detail of it filled him with malicious glee.

"The boob! He'll go to the death chair sure if I can frame him. We're lucky Bromfield ran back into the little room. Up in front a dozen guys might have seen the whole play even in the dark."

Durand spent the night strengthening the web he had spun to destroy his enemy. He passed to and fro among those who had been arrested in the raid and he arranged the testimony of some of them to suit his case. More than one of the men caught in the dragnet of the police was willing to see the affray from the proper angle in exchange for protection from prosecution.

After breakfast Durand went to the Tombs, where Clay had been transferred at daybreak.

"You needn't bring the fellow here," he told the warden. "I'll go right to his cage and see him. I wantta have a talk with him."



CHAPTER XXXII

MR. LINDSAY RECEIVES

Between two guards Clay climbed the iron steps to an upper tier of cages at the Tombs. He was put into a cell which held two beds, one above the other, as in the cabin of an ocean liner. By the side of the bunks was a narrow space just long enough for a man to take two steps in the same direction.

An unshaven head was lifted in the lower bunk to see why the sleep of its owner was being disturbed.

"I've brought you a cell mate, Shiny," explained one of the guards. "You want to be civil to him. He's just croaked a friend of yours."

"For de love o' Gawd. Who did he croak?"

"'Slim' Jim Collins. Cracked him one on the bean and that was a-plenty. Hope you'll enjoy each other's society, gents." The guard closed the door and departed.

"Is that right? Did youse do up 'Slim,' or was he kiddin' me?"

"I don't reckon we'll discuss that subject," said Clay blandly, but with a note of finality in his voice.

"No offense, boss. It's an honor to have so distinguished a gent for a cell pal. For that matter I ain't no cheap rat myself. Dey pinched me for shovin' de queer. I'd ought to get fifteen years," he said proudly.

This drew a grin from Lindsay, though not exactly a merry one. "If you're anxious for a long term you can have some of mine," he told the counterfeiter.

"Maybe youse'll go up Salt Creek," said Shiny hopefully.

Afraid the allusion might not be understood, he thoughtfully explained that this was the underworld term for the electric chair.

Clay made no further comment. He found the theme a gruesome one.

"Anyhow, I'm glad dey didn't put no hoister nor damper-getter wit' me. I'm partickler who I meet. De whole profesh is gettin' run down at de heel. I'm dead sick of rats who can't do nothin' but lift pokes," concluded the occupant of the lower berth with disgust.

Though Clay's nerves were of the best he did very little sleeping that night. He was in a grave situation. Even if he had a fair field his plight would be serious enough. But he guessed that during the long hours of darkness Durand was busy weaving a net of false evidence from which he could scarcely disentangle himself. Unless Bromfield came forward at once as a witness for him, his case would be hopeless—and Clay suspected that the clubman would prove only a broken reed as a support. The fellow was selfish to the core. He had not, in the telling Western phrase, the guts to go through. He would take the line of least resistance.

Beatrice was in his thoughts a great deal. What would she think of him when the news came that he was a murderer, caught by the police in a den of vice where he had no business to be? Some deep instinct of his soul told him that she would brush through the evidence to the essential truth. She had failed him once. She would never do it again. He felt sure of that.

The gray morning broke, and brought with it the steaming smell of prison cooking, the sounds of the caged underworld, the sense of life all around him dwarfed and warped to twisted moral purposes. A warden came with breakfast—a lukewarm, muddy liquid he called coffee and a stew in which potatoes and bits of fat beef bobbed like life buoys—and Clay ate heartily while his cell mate favored him, between gulps, with a monologue on ethics, politics, and the state of society, as these related especially to Shiny the Shover. Lindsay was given to understand that the whole world was "on de spud," but the big crooks had fixed the laws so that they could wear diamonds instead of stripes.

Presently a guard climbed the iron stairway with a visitor and led the way along the deck outside the tier of cells where Clay had been put.

"He's in seventy-four, Mr. Durand," the man said as he approached. "I'll have to beat it. Come back to the office when you're ready."

The ex-pugilist had come to gloat over him. Clay knew it at once. His pupils narrowed.

He was lying on the bed, his supple body stretched at graceful ease. Not by the lift of an eyelid did he recognize the presence of his enemy.

Durand stood in front of the cell, hands in pockets, the inevitable unlit black cigar in his mouth. On his face was a sneer of malevolent derision.

Shiny the Shover bustled forward, all complaisance.

"Pleased to meet youse, Mr. Durand."

The gang politician's insolent eyes went up and down him. "I didn't come to see you."

"'S all right. Glad to see youse, anyhow," the counterfeit passer went on obsequiously. "Some day, when you've got time I'd like to talk wit' youse about gettin' some fall money."

"Nothin' doin', Shiny. I'm not backin' you," said Jerry coldly. "You've got to go up the river."

"Youse promised—"

"Aw, what the hell's eatin' you?"

Shiny's low voice carried a plaintive whine. "If you'd speak to de judge—"

"Forget it." Durand brushed the plea away with a motion of his hand. "It's your cell pal I've come to take a look at—the one who's goin' to the chair."

With one lithe movement Clay swung down to the floor. He sauntered forward to the grating, his level gaze full on the ward boss.

"Shiny, this fellow's rotten," he said evenly and impersonally. "He's not only a crook, but he's a crooked crook. He'd throw down his own brother if it paid him."

Durand's cruel lips laughed. "Your pal's a little worried this mornin', Shiny. He ain't slept much. You see the bulls got him right. It's the death chair for him and no lifeboat in sight."

Clay leaned against the bars negligently. He spoke with a touch of lazy scorn. "See those scars on his face, Shiny—the one on the cheek bone and the other above the eye. Ask him where he got 'em and how."

Jerry cursed. He broke into a storm of threats, anger sweeping over him in furious gusts. He had come to make sport of his victim and Lindsay somehow took the upper hand at once. He had this fellow where he wanted him at last. Yet the man's soft voice still carried the note of easy contempt. If the Arizonan was afraid, he gave no least sign of it.

"You'll sing another tune before I'm through with you," the prize-fighter prophesied savagely.

The Westerner turned away and swung back to his upper berth. He knew, what he had before suspected, that Durand was going to "frame" him if he could. That information gained, the man no longer interested him.

Sullenly Jerry left. There was no profit in jeering at Lindsay. He was too entirely master of every situation that confronted him.

Within the hour Clay was wakened from sleep by another guard with word that he was wanted at the office of the warden. He found waiting him there Beatrice and her father. The girl bloomed in that dingy room like a cactus in the desert.

She came toward him with hands extended, in her eyes gifts of friendship and faith.

"Oh, Clay!" she cried.

"Much obliged, little pardner." Her voice went to his heart like water to the thirsty roots of prickly pears. A warm glow beat through his veins. The doubts that had weighed on him during the night were gone. Beatrice believed in him. All was well with the world.

He shook hands with Whitford. "Blamed good of you to come, sir."

"Why wouldn't we come?" demanded the mining man bluntly. "We're here to do what we can for you."

Little wells of tears brimmed over Beatrice's lids. "I've been so worried."

"Don't you. It'll be all right." Strangely enough he felt now that it would. Her coming had brought rippling sunshine into a drab world.

"I won't now. I'm going to get evidence for you. Tell us all about it."

"Why, there isn't much to tell that you haven't read in the papers probably. He came a-shootin' and was hit by a chair."

"Was it you that hit him?"

"Wouldn't I be justified?" he asked gently.

"But did you?"

For a moment he hesitated, then made up his mind swiftly. "Yes," he told her gravely.

She winced. "You couldn't help it. How did you come to be there?"

"I just dropped in."

"Alone?"

"Yes."

He had burned the bridges behind him and was lying glibly. Why bring Bromfield into it? She was going to marry him in a few days. If her fiance was man enough to come forward and tell the truth he would do so anyhow. It was up to him. Clay was not going to betray him to Beatrice.

"The paper says there was some one with you."

"Sho! Reporters sure enough have lively imaginations."

"Johnnie told me you had an engagement with Mr. Bromfield."

"Did you ever know Johnnie get anything right?"

"And Clarendon says he was with you at Maddock's."

Clay had not been prepared for this cumulative evidence. He gave a low laugh of relief. "I'm an awful poor liar. So Bromfield says he was with me, does he?"

"Yes."

He intended to wait for a lead before showing his hand. "Then you know all about it?" he asked carelessly.

Their eyes were on each other, keen and watchful. She knew he was concealing something of importance. He had meant not to tell her that Bromfield had been with him. Why? To protect the man to whom she was engaged. She jumped to the conclusion that he was still shielding him.

"Yes, you're a poor liar, Clay," she agreed. "You stayed to keep back Collins so as to give Clarendon a chance to escape."

"Did I?"

"Can you deny it? Clarendon heard the shots as he was running downstairs."

"He told you that, did he?"

"Yes."

"That ought to help a lot. If I can prove Collins was shootin' at me I can plead self-defense."

"That's what it was, of course."

"Yes. But Durand doesn't mean to let it go at that. He was here to see me this mo'nin'." Clay turned to the mining man, his voice low but incisive. His brain was working clear and fast. "Mr. Whitford, I have a hunch he's going to destroy the evidence that's in my favor. There must be two bullet holes in the partition of the rear room where Collins was killed. See if you can't find those bullet holes and the bullets in the wall behind."

"I'll do that, Lindsay."

"And hire me a good lawyer. Send him to me. I won't use a smart one whose business is to help crooks escape. If he doesn't believe in me, I don't want him. I'll have him get the names of all those pulled in the raid and visit them to see if he can't find some one who heard the shots or saw shooting. Then there's the gun. Some one's got that gun. It's up to us to learn who."

"That right."

"Tim Muldoon will do anything he can for me. There's a girl lives with his mother. Her name's Annie Millikan. She has ways of finding out things. Better talk it over with her too. We've got to get busy in a hurry."

"Yes," agreed Whitford. "We'll do that, boy."

"Oh, Clay, I'm sure it's going to be all right!" cried Beatrice, in a glow of enthusiasm. "We'll give all our time. We'll get evidence to show the truth. And we'll let you know every day what we are doing."

"How about my going bail for you?" asked her father.

Clay shook his head. "No chance, just yet. Let's make our showing at the coroner's inquest. I'll do fine and dandy here till then."

He shook hands with them both and was taken back to his cell. But hope was in his heart now. He knew his friends would do their best to get the evidence to free him. It would be a battle royal between the truth and a lie.



CHAPTER XXXIII

BROMFIELD MAKES AN OFFER

A youth with a face like a fox sidled up to Durand in the hotel lobby and whispered in his ear. Jerry nodded curtly, and the man slipped away as furtively as he had come.

Presently the ex-prize-fighter got up, sauntered to the street, and hailed a taxi. Twenty minutes later he paid the driver, turned a corner, and passed into an apartment house for bachelors. He took the elevator to the third floor and rang an electric bell at a door which carried the name "Mr. Clarendon Bromfield."

From the man who came to the door Mr. Bromfield's visitor learned that he was not well and could receive no callers.

"Just mention the Omnium Club, and say I'm here on very important business," said Jerry with a sour grin.

The reference served as a password. Jerry was admitted to meet a host quite unable to control his alarm. At sight of his visitor Bromfield jumped up angrily. As soon as his man had gone he broke out in a subdued scream.

"You rotten traitor! Get out of my room, or I'll call the police."

Durand found a comfortable chair, drew a case from his pocket, and selected a cigar. He grinned with evil mirth.

"You will, eh? Like hell you will. You're hidin' from the cops this blessed minute. I've just found out myself where you live."

"You took my money and threw me down. You hired a gunman to kill me."

"Now, what would I do that for? I hadn't a thing in the world against you, an' I haven't now."

"That damned ruffian shot at me. He was still shooting when I struck him with the chair," cried Bromfield, his voice shaking.

"He didn't know it was you—mistook you for Lindsay in the darkness."

"My God, I didn't mean to kill him. I had to do something."

"You did it all right."

"I told you there wasn't to be any violence. It was explicitly stated. You promised. And all the time you were planning murder. I'll tell all I know. By God, I will."

"Go easy, Mr. Bromfield," snarled Jerry. "If you do, where do ye think you'll get off at?"

"I'll go to the police and tell them your hired gunman was shooting at us."

"Will you now? An' I'll have plenty of good witnesses to swear he wasn't." Durand bared his teeth in a threat. "That's not all either. I'll tie you up with the rube from the West and send you up to Sing Sing as accessory. How'd you like that?"

"If I tell the truth—"

"You'll be convicted of murder in place of him and he'll go up as accessory. I don't care two straws how it is. But you'd be a damned fool. I'll say that for you."

"I'm not going to let an innocent man suffer in my place. It wouldn't be playing the game."

Durand leaned forward and tapped the table with his finger-tips. His voice rasped like a file. "You can't save him. He's goin' to get it right. But you can hurt yourself a hell of a lot. Get out of the country and stay out till it's over with. That's the best thing you can do. Go to the Hawaiian Islands, man. That's a good healthy climate an' the hotel cooking's a lot better than it is at Sing Sing."

"I can't do it," moaned the clubman. "My God, man, if it ever came out—that I'd paid you money to—to—ruin his reputation, and that I'd run away when I could have saved an innocent man—I'd be done for. I'd be kicked out of every club I'm in."

"It won't ever come out if you're not here. But if you force my hand—well, that's different." Again Jerry's grin slit his colorless face. He had this poor devil where he wanted him, and he was enjoying himself.

"What do you want me to do, then?" cried Bromfield, tiny beads of perspiration on his forehead.

"You'll do as I say—beat it outa the country till the thing's over with."

"But Lindsay will talk."

"The boob's padlocked his mouth. For some fool reason he's protectin' you. Get out, an' you're safe."

Bromfield sweated blood as he walked up and down the room looking for a way out of his dilemma. He had come to the parting of the road again. If he did this thing he would be a yellow cur. It was one thing to destroy Lindsay's influence with Beatrice by giving her a false impression. From his point of view their friendship was pernicious anyhow and ought to be wiped out. At most the cattleman would have gone back unhurt to the Arizona desert he was always talking about. Nobody there would care about what had happened to him in New York. But to leave him, an innocent man, to go to his death because he was too chivalrous to betray his partner in an adventure—this was something that even Bromfield's atrophied conscience revolted at. Clay was standing by him, according to Durand's story. The news of it lifted a weight from his soul. But it left him too under a stronger moral obligation to step out and face the music.

The clubman made the only decision he could, and that was to procrastinate, to put off making any choice for the present.

"I'll think it over. Give me a day to make up my mind," he begged.

Jerry shrugged his heavy shoulders. He knew that every hour counted in his favor, would make it more difficult for the tortured man to come forward and tell the truth. "Sure. Look it over upside and down. Don't hurry. But, man, what's there to think about? I thought you hated this guy—wanted to get rid of him."

"Not that way. God, no! Durand, I'll give you any sum in reason to let him go without bringing me into it. You can arrange it."

Jerry slammed down a fist heavily on the table. "I can, but I won't. Not if you was to go fifty-fifty with me to your last cent. I'm goin' to get this fellow. See? I'm goin' to get him good. He'll be crawlin' on his hands and knees to me before I'm through with him."

"What good will that do you? I'm offering you cold cash just to let the truth get out—that Collins was trying to kill him when he got hit."

"Nothin' doin'. I've been layin' for this boob. I've got him now. I'm goin' to turn the screws on and listen to him holler."

Bromfield's valet stepped into the room. "Mr. and Miss Whitford to see you, sir."



CHAPTER XXXIV

BEATRICE QUALIFIES AS A SHERLOCK HOLMES

Annie Millikan nodded her wise little head. "Jerry's gonna frame him if he can. He's laid the wires for it. That's a lead pipe."

"Sure," agreed Muldoon. "I'll bet he's been busy all night fixin' up his story. Some poor divvies he'll bully-rag into swearin' lies an' others he'll buy. Trust Jerry for the crooked stuff."

"We've got to get the truth," said Beatrice crisply, pulling on her gloves. "And we'll do it too. A pack of lies can't stand against four of us all looking for the truth."

Annie looked curiously at this golden-haired girl with the fine rapture of untamed youth, so delicate and yet so silken strong. By training and tradition they were miles apart, yet the girl who had lived on the edge of the underworld recognized a certain kinship. She liked the thorough way this young woman threw herself into the business of the day. The wireless telegraphy of the eyes, translated through the medium of her own emotions, told her that no matter whose ring Beatrice Whitford was wearing Clay Lindsay held her happiness in the cup of his strong brown hand.

"You're shoutin', Miss." Annie rose briskly. "I'll get busy doin' some sleuthin' myself. I liked your friend from the minute he stepped through—from the minute I set me peepers on him. He's one man, if anybody asks you. I'm soitainly for him till the clock strikes twelve. And say, listen! Jerry's liable not to get away with it. I'm hep to one thing. The gang's sore on him. He rides the boys too hard. Some of 'em will sure t'row him down hard if they think they'll be protected."

"The district attorney will stand by us," said Whitford. "He told me himself Durand was a menace and that his days as boss were numbered. Another thing, Miss Millikan. If you need to spend any money in a legitimate way, I'm here to foot the bills."

Muldoon, who was on night duty this month and therefore had his days free, guided Whitford and his daughter to Maddock's. As they reached the house an express wagon was being driven away. Automatically the license number registered itself in Tim's memory.

The policeman took a key from his pocket and unlocked the door. The three went up the stairs to the deserted gambling-hall and through it to the rear room.

"From what Lindsay says the bullet holes ought to be about as high as his arm pits," said Whitford.

"'Slim' must 'a' been standin' about here," guessed Muldoon, illustrating his theory by taking the position he meant. "The bullets would hit the partition close to the center, wouldn't they?"

Beatrice had gone straight to the plank wall. "They're not here," she told them.

"Must be. According to Lindsay's story the fellow was aiming straight at it."

"Well, they're not here. See for yourself."

She was right. There was no evidence whatever that any bullets had passed through the partition. They covered every inch of the cross wall in their search.

"Lindsay must have been mistaken," decided Whitford, hiding his keen disappointment. "This man Collins couldn't have been firing in this direction. Of course everything was confusion. No doubt they shifted round in the dark and—"

He stopped, struck by an odd expression on the face of his daughter. She had stooped and picked up a small fragment of shaving from the floor. Her eyes went from it to a plank in the partition and then back to the thin crisp of wood.

"What is it, honey?" asked Whitford.

The girl turned to Muldoon, alert in every quivering muscle. "That express wagon—the one leaving the house as we drove up—Did you notice it?"

"Number 714," answered Tim promptly.

"Can you have it stopped and the man arrested? Don't you see? They've rebuilt this partition. They were taking away in that wagon the planks with the bullet holes."

Muldoon was out of the room and going down the stairs before she had finished speaking. It was a quarter of an hour later when he returned. Beatrice and her father were not to be seen.

From back of the partition came an eager, vibrant voice. "Is that you, Mr. Muldoon? Come here quick. We've found one of the bullets in the wall."

The policeman passed out of the door through which Bromfield had made his escape and found another small door opening from the passage. It took him into the cubby-hole of a room in which were the wires and instruments used to receive news of the races.

"What about the express wagon?" asked Whitford.

"We'll get it. Word is out for those on duty to keep an eye open for it. Where's the bullet?"

Beatrice pointed it out to him. There it was, safely embedded in the plaster, about five feet from the ground.

"Durand wasn't thorough enough. He quit too soon," said the officer with a grin. "Crooks most always do slip up somewhere and leave evidence behind them. Yuh'd think Jerry would have remembered the bullet as well as the bullet hole."

They found the mark of the second bullet too. It had struck a telephone receiver and taken a chip out of it.

They measured with a tape-line the distance from the floor and the side walls to the place where each bullet struck. Tim dug out the bullet they had found.

They were back in the front room again when a huge figure appeared in the doorway and stood there blocking it.

"Whatta youse doin' here?" demanded a husky voice.

Muldoon nodded a greeting. "'Lo, Dave. Just lookin' around to see the scene of the scrap. How about yuh?"

"Beat it," ordered Gorilla Dave, his head thrust forward in a threat. "Youse got no business here."

"Friends av mine." The officer indicated the young woman and her father. "They wanted to see where 'Slim' was knocked out. So I showed 'em. No harm done."

Dave moved to one side. "Beat it," he ordered again.

In the pocket of Muldoon was a request of the district attorney for admission to the house for the party, with an O.K. by the captain of police in the precinct, but Tim did not show it. He preferred to let Dave think that he had been breaking the rules of the force for the sake of a little private graft. There was no reason whatever for warning Durand that they were aware of the clever trick he had pulled off in regard to the partition.



CHAPTER XXXV

TWO AND TWO MAKE FOUR

From Maddock's the Whitfords drove straight to the apartment house of Clarendon Bromfield. For the third time that morning the clubman's valet found himself overborne by the insistence of visitors.

"We're coming in, you know," the owner of the Bird Cage told him in answer to his explanation of why his master could not be seen. "This is important business and we've got to see Bromfield."

"Yes, sir, but he said—"

"He'll change his mind when he knows why we're here." Whitford pushed in and Beatrice followed him. From the adjoining room came the sound of voices.

"I thought you told us Mr. Bromfield had gone to sleep and the doctor said he wasn't to be wakened," said Beatrice with a broad, boyish smile at the man's discomfiture.

"The person inside wouldn't take no, Miss, for an answer."

"He was like us, wasn't he? Did he give his name?" asked the young woman.

"No, Miss. Just said he was from the Omnium Club."

Whitford and his daughter exchanged glances. "Same business we're on. Announce us and we'll go right in."

They were on his heels when he gave their names.

Bromfield started up, too late to prevent their entrance. He stood silent for a moment, uncertain what to do, disregarding his fiancee's glance of hostile inquiry lifted toward the other guest.

The mining man forced his hand. "Won't you introduce us, Clarendon?" he asked bluntly.

Reluctantly their host went through the formula. He was extremely uneasy. There was material for an explosion present in this room that would blow him sky-high if a match should be applied to it. Let Durand get to telling what he knew about Clarendon and the Whitfords would never speak to him again. They might even spread a true story that would bar every house and club in New York to him.

"We've heard of Mr. Durand," said Beatrice.

Her tone challenged the attention of the gang leader. The brave eyes flashed defiance straight at him. A pulse of anger was throbbing in the soft round throat.

Inscrutably he watched her. It was his habit to look hard at attractive women. "Most people have," he admitted.

"Mr. Lindsay is our friend," she said. "We've just come from seeing him."

The man to whom she was engaged had been put through so many flutters of fear during the last twelve hours that a new one more or less did not matter. But he was still not shock-proof. His fingers clutched a little tighter the arm of the chair.

"W-what did he tell you?"

Beatrice looked into his eyes and read in them once more stark fear. Again she had a feeling that there was something about the whole affair she had not yet fathomed—some secret that Clay and Clarendon and perhaps this captain of thugs knew.

She tried to read what he was hiding, groped in her mind for the key to his terror. What could it be that he was afraid Clay had told her? What was it they all knew except Lindsay's friends? And why, since Clarendon was trembling lest it be discovered, should the Arizonan too join the conspiracy of silence? At any rate she would not uncover her hand.

"He told us several things," she said significantly. "You've got to make open confession, Clary."

The ex-pugilist chewed his cigar and looked at her.

"What would he confess? That the man with him murdered Collins?"

"That's not true," said the girl quickly.

"So Lindsay's your friend, eh? Different here, Miss." Jerry pieced together what the clubman had told him and what he had since learned about her. He knew that this must be the girl to whom his host was engaged. "How about you, Bromfield?" he sneered.

The clubman stiffened. "I've nothing against Mr. Lindsay."

"Thought you had."

"Of course he hasn't. Why should he?" asked Beatrice, backing up Clarendon.

Durand looked at her with a bold insolence that was an insult. His eyes moved up and down the long, slim curves of her figure. "I expect he could find a handsome reason if he looked around for it, Miss."

The girl's father clenched his fist. A flush of anger swept his ruddy cheeks. He held himself, however, to the subject.

"You forget, Mr. Durand, that Lindsay was his guest last night."

Jerry's laugh was a contemptuous jeer. "That's right. I'd forgot that. He was your guest, wasn't he, Bromfield?"

"What's the good of discussing it here?" asked the tortured host.

"Not a bit," admitted Whitford. "Actions talk, not words. Have you seen the police yet, Bromfield?"

"N-not yet."

"What's he gonna see the police about?" Jerry wanted to know, his chin jutting out.

"To tell them that he saw Collins draw a gun and heard shots fired," retorted the mining man instantly.

"Not what he's been tellin' me. He'll not pull any such story—not unless he wants to put himself in a cell for life."

"Talk sense. You can't frighten Bromfield. He knows that's foolishness."

"Does he?" The crook turned derisive eyes on the victim he was torturing.

Certainly the society man did not look a picture of confidence. The shadow of a heavy fear hung over him.

The telephone rang. Bromfield's trembling fingers picked up the transmitter. He listened a moment, then turned it over to Beatrice.

"For you."

Her part of the conversation was limited. It consisted of the word "Yes" repeated at intervals and a concluding, "Oh, I'm so glad. Thank you." Her eyes were sparkling when she hung up.

"Good news, Dad," she said. "I'll tell you later."

Durand laughed brutally as he rose. "Good news, eh? Get all you can. You'll need it. Take that from me. It's straight. Your friend's in trouble up to the neck." He swaggered to the door and turned. "Don't forget, Bromfield. Keep outa this or you'll be sorry." His voice was like the crack of a trainer's whip to animals in a circus.

For once Bromfield did not jump through the hoop. "Oh, go to the devil," he said in irritation, flushing angrily.

"Better not get gay with me," advised Durand sourly.

After the door had closed on him there was a momentary pause. The younger man spoke awkwardly. "You can tell me now what it was Mr. Lindsay told you."

"We'd like to know for sure whether you're with us or with Durand," said Whitford mildly. "Of course we know the answer to that. You're with us. But we want to hear you say it, flat-foot."

"Of course I'm with you. That is, I'd like to be. But I don't want to get into trouble, Mr. Whitford. Can you blame me for that?"

"You wouldn't get into trouble," argued the mine owner impatiently. "I keep telling you that."

Beatrice, watching the younger man closely, saw as in a flash the solution of this mystery—the explanation of the tangle to which various scattered threads had been leading her.

"Are you sure of that, Dad?"

"How could he be hurt, Bee?"

The girl let Bromfield have it straight from the shoulder. "Because Clay didn't kill that man Collins. Clarendon did it."

"My God, you know!" he cried, ashen-faced. "He told you."

"No, he didn't tell us. For some reason he's protecting you. But I know it just the same. You did it."

"It was in self-defense," he pleaded.

"Then why didn't you say so? Why did you let Clay be accused instead of coming forward at once?"

"I was waiting to see if he couldn't show he was innocent without—"

"Without getting you into it. You wanted to be shielded at any cost." The scorn that intolerant youth has for moral turpitude rang in her clear voice.

"I thought maybe we could both get out of it that way," he explained weakly.

"Oh, you thought! As soon as you saw this morning's paper you ought to have hurried to the police station and given yourself up."

"I was ill, I keep telling you."

"Your man could telephone, couldn't he? He wasn't ill, too, was he?"

Whitford interfered. "Hold on, honey. Don't rub it in. Clarendon was a bit rattled. That's natural. The question is, what's he going to do now?"

Their host groaned. "Durand'll see I go to the chair—and I only struck the man to save my own life. I wasn't trying to kill the fellow. He was shooting at me, and I had to do it."

"Of course," agreed Whitford. "We've got proof of that. Lindsay is one witness. He must have seen it all. I've got in my pocket one of the bullets Collins shot. That's more evidence. Then—"

Beatrice broke in excitedly. "Dad, Mr. Muldoon just told me over the 'phone that they've got the express wagon. The plank with the bullet holes was in it. And the driver has confessed that he and a carpenter, whose name he had given, changed the partition for Durand."

Whitford gave a subdued whoop. "We win. That lets you out, Clarendon. The question now isn't whether you or Clay will go to the penitentiary, but whether Durand will. We can show he's been trying to stand in the way of justice, that he's been cooking up false evidence."

"Let's hurry! Let's get to the police right away!" the girl cried, her eyes shining with excitement. "We ought not to lose a minute. We can get Clay out in time to go home to dinner with us."

Bromfield smiled wanly. He came to time as gallantly as he could. "All right. I'm elected to take his place, I see."

"Only for a day or two, Clarendon," said the older man. "As soon as we can get together a coroner's jury we'll straighten everything out."

"Yes," agreed the clubman lifelessly.

It was running through his mind already that if he should be freed of the murder charge, he would only have escaped Scylla to go to wreck on Charybdis. For it was a twenty to one bet that Jerry would go to Whitford with the story of his attempt to hire the gang leader to smirch Lindsay's reputation.



CHAPTER XXXVI

A BOOMERANG

It must be admitted that when Bromfield made up his mind to clear Lindsay he did it thoroughly. His confession to the police was quiet and businesslike. He admitted responsibility for the presence of the Westerner at the Omnium Club. He explained that his guest had neither gambled nor taken any liquors, that he had come only as a spectator out of curiosity. The story of the killing was told by him simply and clearly. After he had struck down the gunman, he had done a bolt downstairs and got away by a back alley. His instinct had been to escape from the raid and from the consequences of what he had done, but of course he could not let anybody else suffer in his place. So he had come to give himself up.

The late afternoon papers carried the story that Clarendon Bromfield, well-known man about town, had confessed to having killed "Slim" Collins and had completely exonerated Lindsay. It was expected that the latter would be released immediately.

He was. That evening he dined at the home of the Whitfords. The mine owner had wanted to go on the bond of Bromfield, but his offer had been rejected.

"We'll hear what the coroner's jury has to say," the man behind the desk at headquarters had decided. "It'll not hurt him to rest a day or two in the cooler."

After dinner the committee of defense met in the Red Room and discussed ways and means. Johnnie and his bride were present because it would have been cruel to exclude them, but for the most part they were silent members. Tim Muldoon arrived with Annie Millikan, both of them somewhat awed by the atmosphere of the big house adjoining the Drive. Each of them brought a piece of information valuable to the cause.

The man in charge of the blotter at the station had told Tim that from a dip called Fog Coney, one of those arrested in the gambling-house raid, an automatic gun with two chambers discharged had been taken and turned in by those who searched him. It had required some maneuvering for Tim to get permission to see Fog alone, but he had used his influence on the force and managed this.

Fog was a sly dog. He wanted to make sure on which side his bread was buttered before he became communicative. At first he had been willing to tell exactly nothing. He had already been seen by Durand, and he had a very pronounced respect for that personage. It was not until he had become convinced that Jerry's star was on the wane that he had "come through" with what Muldoon wanted. Then he admitted that he had picked the automatic up from the floor where Collins had dropped it when he fell. His story still further corroborated that of the defense. He had seen "Slim" fire twice before he was struck by the chair.

Through an admirer Annie had picked up a lead that might develop into something worth while. Her friend had told her that Durand had made a flat offer to one of the dope fiends caught in the raid to look after him if he would swear that "Slim" had not drawn a gun. Though the story had not come at first hand, she believed it was true, and thought from her knowledge of him that the man would weaken under a mild third degree.

Clay summed up in a sentence the result of all the evidence they had collected. "It's not any longer a question of whether Bromfield goes to prison, but of Durand. The fellow has sure overplayed his hand."

Before twelve hours more had passed Durand discovered this himself. He had been too careless, too sure that he was outside of and beyond the law. At first he had laughed contemptuously at the advice of his henchmen to get to cover before it was too late.

"They can't touch me," he bragged. "They daren't."

But it came to him with a sickening realization that the district attorney meant business. He was going after him just as though he were an ordinary crook.

Jerry began to use his "pull." There reached him presently that same sinking at the pit of the stomach he had known when Clay had thrashed him. He learned that when a lawbreaker is going strong, friends at court who are under obligations to him are a bulwark of strength, but when one's power is shaken politicians prefer to take no risks. No news spreads more rapidly than that of the impending fall of a chieftain. The word was passing among the wise that Jerry Durand was to be thrown overboard.

The active center of the attack upon him was the group around Clay Lindsay. To it was now allied the office of the district attorney and all the malcontent subordinates of the underworld who had endured his domination so long only because they must. The campaign was gathering impetus like a snowslide. Soon it would be too late to stop it even if he could call off the friends of the Westerner.

Durand tried to make an appointment with Whitford. That gentleman declined to see him. Jerry persisted. He offered to meet him at one of his clubs. He telephoned to the house, but could not get any result more satisfactory than the cold voice of a servant saying, "Mr. Whitford does not wish to talk with you, sir." At last he telegraphed.

The message read:

I'll come to your house at eight this evening. Better see me for Missie's sake.

It was signed by Durand.

When Jerry called he was admitted.

Whitford met him with chill hostility. He held the telegram in his hand. "What does this message mean?" he asked bluntly.

"Your daughter's engaged to Bromfield, ain't she?" demanded the ex-prize-fighter, his bulbous eyes full on his host.

"That's our business, sir."

"I got a reason for asking. She is or she ain't. Which is it?"

"We'll not discuss my daughter's affairs."

"All right, since you're so damned particular. We'll discuss Bromfield's. I warned him to keep his mouth shut or he'd get into trouble."

"He was released from prison this afternoon."

"Did I say anything about prison?" Durand asked. "There's other kinds of grief beside being in stir. I've got this guy right."

"Just what do you mean, Mr. Durand?"

"I mean that he hired me to get Lindsay in bad with you and the girl. He was to be caught at the Omnium Club with a woman when the police raided the place, and it was to get into the papers."

"I don't believe it," said Whitford promptly.

"You will. I had a dictagraph in the room when Bromfield came to see me. You can hear it all in his own voice."

"But there wasn't any woman with Lindsay at Maddock's when the raid was pulled off."

"Sure there wasn't. I threw Bromfield down."

"You arranged to have Lindsay killed instead."

"Forget that stuff. The point is that if you don't call off the district attorney, I'll tell all I know about son-in-law Bromfield. He'll be ruined for life."

"To hear you tell it."

"All right. Ask him."

"I shall."

"Conspiracy is what the law calls it. Maybe he can keep outa stir. But when his swell friends hear it they'll turn their backs on Bromfield. You know it."

"I'll not know it unless Mr. Bromfield tells me so himself. I don't care anything for your dictagraph. I'm no eavesdropper."

"You tell him what he's up against and he'll come through all right. I'll see that every newspaper in New York carries the story if you don't notify me to-day that this attack on me is off. I'll learn you silk stockings you can't make Jerry Durand the goat."

"You can't implicate him without getting yourself into trouble—even if your story is true, and I still don't believe it."

"You believe it all right," jeered the crook. "And the story don't hurt me a bit. I pretended to fall in with his plans, but I didn't do it. The results show that."

"They show me that you tried to do murder instead."

"That's all bunk. The evidence won't prove it."

Whitford announced his decision sharply. "If you'll leave me your telephone number, I'll let you know later in the day what we'll do."

He had told Durand that he did not believe his story. He had tried to reject it because he did not want to accept it, but after the man had gone and he thought it over, his judgment was that it held some germ of truth. If so, he was bound to protect Bromfield as far as he could. No matter what Clarendon had done, he could not throw overboard to the sharks the man who was still engaged to his daughter. He might not like him. In point of fact he did not. But he had to stand by him till he was out of his trouble.