Chapter 28
The east dining-room was almost empty now, though the lobby and the cafe beyond still swarmed with people arriving and departing. Brandes, chafing at the telephone, had finally succeeded in getting Stull on the wire, only to learn that the news from Saratoga was not agreeable; that they had lost on every horse. Also, Stull had another disquieting item to detail; it seemed that Maxy Venem had been seen that morning in the act of departing for New York on the fast express; and with him was a woman resembling Brandes' wife.
"Who saw her?" demanded Brandes.
"Doc. He didn't get a good square look at her. You know the hats women wear."
"All right. I'm off, Ben. Good-bye."
The haunting uneasiness which had driven him to the telephone persisted when he came out of the booth. He cast a slow, almost sleepy glance around him, saw no familiar face in the thronged lobby, then he looked at his watch.
The car had been ordered for ten; it lacked half an hour of the time; he wished he had ordered the car earlier.
For now his uneasiness was verging on that species of superst.i.tious inquietude which at times obsesses all gamblers, and which is known as a "hunch." He had a hunch that he was "in wrong" somehow or other; an overpowering longing to get on board the steamer a.s.sailed him--a desire to get out of the city, get away quick.
The risk he had taken was beginning to appear to him as an unwarranted piece of recklessness; he was amazed with himself for taking such a chance--disgusted at his foolish and totally unnecessary course with this young girl. All he had had to do was to wait a few months. He could have married in safety then. And even now he didn't know whether or not the ceremony performed by Parson Smawley had been an illegally legal one; whether it made him a bigamist for the next three months or only something worse. What on earth had possessed him to take such a risk--the terrible hazard of discovery, of losing the only woman he had ever really cared for--the only one he probably could ever care for? Of course, had he been free he would have married her. When he got his freedom he would insist on another ceremony. He could persuade her to that on some excuse or other. But in the meanwhile!
He entered the deserted dining-room, came over to where Rue was waiting, and sat down, heavily, holding an unlighted cigar between his stubby fingers.
"Well, little girl," he said with forced cheerfulness, "was I away very long?"
"Not very."
"You didn't miss me?" he inquired, ponderously playful.
His heavy pleasantries usually left her just a little doubtful and confused, for he seldom smiled when he delivered himself of them.
He leaned across the cloth and laid a hot, cus.h.i.+ony hand over both of hers, where they lay primly clasped on the table edge:
"Don't you ever miss me when I'm away from you, Rue?" he asked.
"I think--it is nice to be with you," she said, hotly embarra.s.sed by the publicity of his caress.
"I don't believe you mean it." But he smiled this time. At which
"Rue, I don't believe you love me." This time there was no smile.
She found nothing to answer, being without any experience in give-and-take conversation, which left her always uncertain and uncomfortable.
For the girl was merely a creature still in the making--a soft, pliable thing to be shaped to perfection only by the light touch of some steady, patient hand that understood--or to be marred and ruined by a heavy hand which wrought at random or in brutal haste.
Brandes watched her for a moment out of sleepy, greenish eyes. Then he consulted his watch again, summoned a waiter, gave him the parcels-room checks, and bade him have a boy carry their luggage into the lobby.
As they rose from the table, a man and a woman entering the lobby caught sight of them, halted, then turned and walked back toward the street door which they had just entered.
Brandes had not noticed them where he stood by the desk, scratching off a telegram to Stull:
"All O. K. Just going aboard. Fix it with Stein."
He rejoined Rue as the boy appeared with their luggage; an under porter took the bags and preceded them toward the street.
"There's the car!" said Brandes, with a deep breath of relief. "He knows his business, that chauffeur of mine."
Their chauffeur was standing beside the car as they emerged from the hotel and started to cross the sidewalk; the porter, following, set their luggage on the curbstone; and at the same instant a young and pretty woman stepped lightly between Rue and Brandes.
"Good evening, Eddie," she said, and struck him a staggering blow in the face with her white-gloved hand.
Brandes lost his balance, stumbled sideways, recovered himself, turned swiftly and encountered the full, protruding black eyes of Maxy Venem staring close and menacingly into his.
From Brandes' cut lip blood was running down over his chin and collar; his face remained absolutely expressionless. The next moment his eyes s.h.i.+fted, met Ruhannah's stupefied gaze.
"Go into the hotel," he said calmly. "Quick----"
"Stay where you are!" interrupted Maxy Venem, and caught the speechless and bewildered girl by the elbow.
Like lightning Brandes' hand flew to his hip pocket, and at the same instant his own chauffeur seized both his heavy, short arms and held them rigid, pinned behind his back.
"Frisk him!" he panted; Venem nimbly relieved him of the dull black weapon.
"Can the fake gun-play, Eddie," he said, coolly shoving aside the porter who attempted to interfere. "You're double-crossed. We got the goods on you; come on; who's the girl?"
The woman who had struck Brandes now came up again beside Venem. She was young, very pretty, but deathly white except for the patches of cosmetic on either cheek. She pointed at Brandes. There was blood on her soiled and split glove:
"You dirty dog!" she said unsteadily. "You'll marry this girl before I've divorced you, will you? And you think you are going to get away with it! You dog! You dirty dog!"
The porter attempted to interfere again, but Venem shoved him out of the way. Brandes, still silently struggling to free his imprisoned arms, ceased twisting suddenly and swung his heavy head toward Venem.
His hat had fallen off; his face, deeply flushed with exertion, was smeared with blood and sweat.
"What's the idea, you fool!" he said in a low voice. "I'm not married to her."
But Ruhannah heard him say it.
"You claim that you haven't married this girl?" demanded Venem loudly, motioning toward Rue, who stood swaying, half dead, held fast by the gathering crowd which pushed around them from every side.
"Did you marry her or did you fake it?" repeated Venem in a louder voice. "It's jail one way; maybe both!"
"He married her in Gayfield at eleven this morning!" said the chauffeur. "Parson Smawley turned the trick."
Brandes' narrow eyes glittered; he struggled for a moment, gave it up, shot a deadly glance at Maxy Venem, at his wife, at the increasing throng crowding closely about him. Then his infuriated eyes met Rue's, and the expression of her face apparently crazed him.
Frantic, he hurled himself backward, jerking one arm free, tripped, fell heavily with the chauffeur on top, twisting, panting, struggling convulsively, while all around him surged the excited crowd, shouting, pressing closer, trampling one another in eagerness to see.
Rue, almost swooning with fear, was pushed, jostled, flung aside.
Stumbling over her own suitcase, she fell to her knees, rose, and, scarce conscious of what she was about, caught up her suitcase and reeled away into the light-shot darkness.
She had no idea of what she was doing or where she was going; the terror of the scene still remained luridly before her eyes; the shouting of the crowd was in her ears; an indescribable fear of Brandes filled her--a growing horror of this man who had denied that he had married her. And the instinct of a frightened and bewildered child drove her into blind flight, anywhere to escape this hideous, incomprehensible scene behind her.
Hurrying on, alternately confused and dazzled in the patches of darkness and flaring light, clutched at and followed by a terrible fear, she found herself halted on the curbstone of an avenue through which lighted tramcars were pa.s.sing. A man spoke to her, came closer; and she turned desperately and hurried across a street where other people were crossing.