The Crimson Tide

"And where the h.e.l.l will you be then, Angelo?" sneered Bromberg. "By G.o.d, we won't have to ask you for our share of your money then!"

Again Sondheim leaned over him and wagged his nicotine-dyed finger:

"You get the rest of our money! Understand? And you get them women out!--or I tell you we'll blow you and your joint to Hoboken! Get that?"

"I have understood," said Puma quietly; but his heavy face was a muddy red now, and he choked a little when he spoke.

"Give us a date and stick to it," added Bromberg. "Set it yourself.

And after that we won't bother to do any more jawin'. We'll just attend to business--_your_ business, Puma!"

After a long silence, Puma said calmly: "How much you want?"

"Ten thousand," said Sondheim.

"And them women out of this," added Bromberg.

"Or ve get you," ended Kastner in his deadly voice.

Puma lifted his head and looked intently at each one of them in turn.

And seemed presently to come to some conclusion.

Kastner forestalled him: "You try it some monkey trick and you try it no more effer again."

"What's your date for the cash?" insisted Sondheim.

"February first," replied Puma quietly.

Kastner wrote it on the back of an envelope.

"Und dese vimmen?" he inquired.

"I'll get a lawyer----"

"The h.e.l.l with that stuff!" roared Bromberg. "Get 'em out! Scare 'em out! Jesus Christ! how long d'yeh think we're going to stand for being hammered by that bunch o' skirts? They got a lot o' people sore on us now. The crowd what uster come around is gettin' leery. And who are these d.a.m.ned women? One of 'em was a White Nun, when they did the business for the Romanoffs. One of 'em fired on the Bolsheviki--that big blond girl with yellow hair, I mean! Wasn't she one of those d.a.m.ned girl-soldiers? And look what she's up to now--comin' over here to talk us off the platform!--the dirty foreigner!"

"Yes," growled Bromberg, "and there's that redheaded wench of Vanya's!--some Grand Duke's s.l.u.t, they say, before she quit him for the university to start something else----"

Kastner cut in in his steely voice: "If you do not throw out these women, Puma, we fix them and your hall and you--all at one time, my friend. Also! Iss it then for February the first, our understanding?

Or iss it, a little later, the end of all your troubles, Angelo?"

Puma got up, nodded his acceptance of their ultimatum, and opened the door for them.

When they trooped out, under the brick arch, they noticed his splendid limousine waiting, and as they shuffled sullenly away westward, Bromberg, looking back, saw Puma come out and jump lightly into the car.

"Swine!" he snarled, facing the bitter wind once more and shuffling along beside his silent brethren.

Puma went east, then north to the Hotel Rajah, where, in

Pawling.

Skidder, too, came in at the same time, squinting rapidly at his partner; and together they moved toward the elevator.

The elevator waited a moment more to accommodate a willowy, red-haired girl in furs, whose jade eyes barely rested on Puma's magnificent black ones as he stepped aside to make way for her with an extravagant bow.

"Some skirt," murmured Skidder in his ear, as the car shot upward.

Marya left the car at the mezzanine floor: Puma's eyes were like coals for a moment.

"You know that dame?" inquired Skidder, his eyes fairly snapping.

"No." He did not add that he had seen her at the Combat Club and knew her to belong to another man. But his black eyes were almost blazing as he stepped from the elevator, for in Marya's insolent glance he had caught a vague glimmer of fire--merely a green spark, very faint--if, indeed, it had been there at all....

Pawling himself opened the door for them.

"Is it all right? Do we get the parcel?" were his first words.

"It's a knock-out!" cried Skidder, slapping him on the back. "We got the land, we got the plans, we got the iron, we got the contracts!--Oh, boy!--our dough is in--go look at it and smell it for yourself! So get into the jack, old scout, and ante up, because we break ground Wednesday and there'll be bills before then, you betcha!"

When the c.o.c.ktails were brought, Puma swallowed his in a hurry, saying he'd be back in a moment, and bidding Skidder enlighten Mr. Pawling during the interim.

He summoned the elevator, got out at the mezzanine, and walked lightly into the deserted and cloister-like perspective, his s.h.i.+ny hat in his hand.

And saw Marya standing by the marble ramp, looking down at the bustle below.

He stopped not far away. He had made no sound on the velvet carpet.

But presently she turned her head and the green eyes met his black ones.

Neither winced. The sheer bulk of the beast and the florid magnificence of its colour seemed to fascinate her.

She had seen him before, and scarcely noted him. She remembered. But the world was duller, then, and the outlook grey. And then, too, her still, green eyes had not yet wandered beyond far horizons, nor had her heart been cut adrift to follow her fancy when the tides stirred it from its mooring--carrying it away, away through deeps or shallows as the currents swerved.

CHAPTER XX

The pale parody on that sacred date which once had symbolised the birth of Christ had come and gone; the ghastly year was nearing its own death--the bloodiest year, for all its final triumph, that the world had ever witnessed--_l'annee horrible_!

Nor was the end yet, of all this death and dying: for the Crimson Tide, was.h.i.+ng through Russia, eastward, seethed and eddied among the wrecks of empires, lapping Poland's bones, splas.h.i.+ng over the charred threshold of the huns, creeping into the Balkans, crawling toward Greece and Italy, menacing Scandinavia, and arousing the stern watchers along the French frontier--the ultimate eastward barrier of human liberty.

And unless, despite the fools who demur, that barrier be based upon the Rhine, that barrier will fall one day.

Even in England, where the captive navies of the anti-Christ now sulked at anchor under England's consecrated guns, some talked glibly of rule by Soviet. All Ireland bristled now, baring its teeth at government; vast armies, disbanding, were becoming dully restless; and armed men, disarming, began to wonder what now might be their destiny and what the destiny of the world they fought for.

And everywhere, among all peoples, swarmed the stealthy agents of the Red Apocalypse, whispering discontent, hinting treasons, stirring the unhappy to sullen anger, inciting the simple-minded to insanity, the ignorant to revolution. For four years it had been a battle between Light and Night; and now there threatened to be joined in battle the uttermost forces of Evolution and Chaos--the spiritual Armageddon at last, where Life and Light and Order must fight a final fight with Degeneracy, Darkness and Death.

And always, everywhere, that h.e.l.l-born Crimson Tide seemed to be rising. All newspapers were full of it, sounding the universal alarm.

And Civilisation merely stared at the scarlet flood--gawked stupidly and unstirring--while the far clamour of ma.s.sacre throughout Russia grew suddenly to a cras.h.i.+ng discord in Berlin, shaking the whole world with brazen dissonance.