The Carpet from Bagdad

CHAPTER XXI

A BOTTLE OF WINE

George stood irresolutely upon the steps. A new keyhole! What the deuce did the agent mean by putting a new keyhole in the door without notifying him? As the caretaker never entered that door, it was all the agent's fault. There was no area-way in front, but between George's house and the next there was a court eight feet in width, running to the dividing wall between the bank property and his own. A grille gate protected this court. George had a key. The gate opened readily enough. His intention was to enter by the basement-door. But he suddenly paused. To his amazement he saw just below the library curtain a thin measure of light. Light! Some one in the house! He did the most sensible thing possible: he stood still till the shock left him. Some one in the house, some one who had no earthly or heavenly business there! Near the window stood a tubbed bay-tree. Cautiously he mounted this, holding the ledge of the window with his fingers. That he did not instantly topple over with a great noise was due to the fact that he was temporarily paralyzed.

Here was the end of the puzzle. The riddle of the United Romance and Adventure Company was solved. At last he understood why Mrs. Chedsoye had sought him, why Ryanne had kidnapped him. But for his continuing his journey upon the German-Lloyd boat, he would have come home a week too late; he would have missed being a spectator (already an innocent contributor) to one of the most daring and ingenious bank-robberies known in the pages of metropolitan crime. There was Mrs. Chedsoye, intrusively handsome as ever; there was her rascally card-sharper brother, that ingrate who called himself Ryanne, and three unknown men. The impudence of it; the damnable insolence of it! And there they were, toasting their success in a brace of his own vintage-champagne! But the wine was, after all, inconsequential. It was what he saw upon the floor that caught him by the throat. His knees weakened, but he held on grimly to his perch.

White bags of gold, soiled bags of gold, and neat packets of green and yellow notes: riches! Twenty bags and as many packets of currency; a million, not a penny under that! George was seized with a horrible desire to yell with laughter. He felt the cachinnations bubble in his throat. He swallowed violently and gnawed his lips. They had got into his house under false pretenses and had tunneled back into the Merchant-Mechanic Bank, of which Horace's brother was president and in which he, George P. A. Jones, always carried a large private balance! It was the joke of the century.

As quietly as he possibly could, he stepped down from his uncertain perch. In the fine fury that followed his amazement, his one thought was to summon the police at once, to confront the wretches in their villainy; but once outside in the street, he cooled. Instantly he saw the trial in court. Fortune as witness against her own mother. That was horrible and not to be thought of. But what should he do? He was shaken to his soul. The stupendous audacity of such a plan! To have worked out every detail, down to the altering of the keyhole to prevent surprise! He saw the automobiles. They were leaving that night. If he acted at all, it must be within an hour; in less than that time they would be loading the cars. His mind began to rid itself of its confusion. Without the aid of the police; and presently he saw the way to do it.

He was off at a dog-trot, upon the balls of his feet, silently. Within five minutes he was mounting the steps to the Mortimer home, and in another minute was inside. The others saw directly that something serious had happened.

"What's the trouble, George? House vanished?" asked Mortimer.

"Have you got a brace of revolvers?" said George quietly.

"Two automatics. But…"

"Give them to me," less evenly in tone. "Will you call up Arthur Wadsworth, president of the Merchant-Mechanic Bank?"

"The bank?"

"Yes, the bank. You know, it is just in the rear of my house."

Here Fortune came forward. All the bright color was gone from her cheeks; the old mask of despair had re-formed. She needed no further enlightenment.

"Are you going back there?" she asked.

"Yes, dear; I must. Mr. Mortimer will go with me."

"And I?"

"No, heart o' mine; you've got to stay here."

"If you do not take me with you, you will not find me here when you return."

"My child," began Mortimer soothingly, "you must not talk like that. There will be danger."

"Then notify the police, and let the danger rest upon their shoulders," she said, her jaws set squarely.

"I can't call in the police," replied George, miserable.

"Shall I tell you why?"

"Dearest, can't you understand that it is you I am thinking of?"

"I am determined. If I do not go with you, you shall never see me again. My mother is there!"

Tragedy. Mrs. Mortimer stretched out a hand, but the girl did not see it. Her mother; her own flesh and blood! Oh, the poor child!

"Come, then," said George, in despair. "But you are hurting me, Fortune."

"Forgive me, but I must go with you. I must!"

"Get me the revolvers, Mr. Mortimer. We'll wait for Wadsworth. Will you please telephone him? I'm afraid I couldn't talk steadily enough. Explain nothing save that it concerns his bank."

George sat down. Not during those early days of the journey across the desert had he felt so pitiably weak and inefficient.

Fortune paced the room, her arms folded tightly across her breast. Strange, there was neither fear nor pain in her heart, only a wild wrath.

When Mortimer returned from the telephone, saying that Wadsworth would be right over, he asked George to explain fully what was going on. It was rather a long story. George managed to get through it with a coherency understandable, but no more. Mrs. Mortimer put her motherly arms about the girl, but she found no pliancy. There was no resistance, but there was that stiffness peculiar to felines when picked up under protest. And there was a little more than the cat in Fortune then; the tigress. She was not her mother's daughter for nothing. To confront her, to overwhelm her with reproach, to show her not the least mercy, stonily to see her led away to prison!

George inspected the revolvers carefully to see if they were loaded.

The bell rang, and Arthur Wadsworth came in. Mortimer knew him; George did not. He drew his interest as it fell due and deposited it in another bank. That was the extent of his relations with Arthur Wadsworth, president of the Merchant-Mechanic Bank of New York.

Arthur was small, thin, blond like his brother, but the hair was so light upon the top of his head that he gave one the impression that he was bald. His eyes looked out from behind half-shut lids; his cheeks were cadaverous; his pale lips met in a straight, unpleasant line. There was not the slightest resemblance between the two brothers, either in their bodies or in their souls. George recognized this fact immediately. He disliked the man instinctively, just as he could not help admiring his rogue of a brother.

"I want you to go with me to my house at once," began George.

"Please explain."

George disliked the voice even more than the man himself. "Everything will be explained there," he replied.

"This is very unusual," the banker complained.

"You will find it so. Come." George moved toward the hall, the revolvers in his coat-pocket.

"But I insist…"

"Mr. Wadsworth, everything will be fully explained to you the moment you enter my house; More I shall not tell you. You are at liberty to return home."

"It concerns the bank?" The voice had something human in it now; a note of affection.

Arthur Wadsworth loved the bank as a man loves his sweetheart, but more explicitly, as a miser loves the hoard hidden in the stocking. He loved every corner of the building. He worshiped the glass-covered marbles over which the gold passed and repassed. He adored the sight of the bent backs of the bookkeepers, the individual-account clerks, the little cages of the paying and receiving tellers, always so beautifully littered with little slips of paper, packets of bills, stacks of gold and silver; he loved the huge steel-vault, stored with bags of gold and bundles of notes, bonds, and stocks. Money was his god. Summed up, he was a miser in all that contemptible word implies: stingy, frugal, cautious, suspicious, sly, cruel, and relentless; he was in the concrete what his father had been in the abstract.

"It concerns the bank?" he repeated, torn by doubt.

George shrugged. "Let us be going."

"Will it be necessary to call in the police?"

"No."

"I suppose, then," said Wadsworth bitterly, wondering, too, over the strange animosity of this young man he did not know – "I suppose I must do just as you say?"

"Absolutely." George's teeth came together with a click.

The four of them passed out of the house, each singularly wrought with agitation. Fortune walked ahead with George. Neither spoke. They could hear the occasional protest from the banker into Mortimer's ear; but Mortimer did not open his lips. They came to the house, and then George whispered his final instructions to Wadsworth. The latter, when he understood what was taking place, became wild with rage and terror; and it was only because George threatened to warn the conspirators that he subsided.

"And," went on George, "if you do not obey, you can get out of it the best you know how. Now, silence, absolute silence."

He pressed back the grille gate, and the others tiptoed after him.

Ryanne tipped the third bottle delicately. Not a drop was wasted. How the golden beads swarmed up to the brim, to break into little essences of perfume! And this was good wine; twelve years in the bottle.

"It's like some dream; eh?"

Wallace smacked his lips loudly.

"Wallace," chided Ryanne, "you always drink like a sailor. You don't swallow champagne; you sip it, like this."

Major Callahan swayed his glass back and forth under his nose. "Smells like a vineyard after a rain.

"There's poetry for you!" laughed the butler.

Mrs. Chedsoye alone seemed absorbed in other things. She was trying to discover what it was that gave this supreme moment so flat a taste. It was always so; it was the chase, the goal was nothing. It was the excitement of going toward, not arriving at, the destination. Was she, who considered herself so perfect, a freak after all, shallow like a hill-stream and as aimless in her endeavors? Had she possessed a real enthusiasm for anything? She looked back along the twisted avenue of years. Had anything really stirred her profoundly? From the bags of gold her glance strayed up and over to Ryanne. Love? Love a man so weak that he could not let be the bottle? She had a horror of drunkenness, the inane giggles, the attending nausea; she had been through it all. Had she loved him, or was it because he loved the child? Even this she could not tell. Inwardly she was opaque to her searchings. She stirred restlessly. She wanted to be out of this house, on the way. The gold, as gold, meant nothing. She had enough for her needs. What was it, then? Was she mad? What flung her here and about, without real purpose?

"We could have taken every dollar from the vault," said Wallace cheerfully.

"But we couldn't have made our get-away with it," observed the butler, holding his empty glass toward Ryanne, who was acting as master of ceremonies.

"A clear, unidentified million," mused Ryanne. "Into the cars with it; over to Jersey City; on to Philadelphia; but there for Europe; quietly transfer the gold to the various Continental banks; and in six months, who could trace hair or hide of it?" Ryanne laughed.

"It's all right to laugh," said the Major. "But are you sure about Jones? He could have arrived this afternoon."

"Impossible! He left Alexandria for Naples on a boat that stopped but thirty hours. With Fortune on his hands he could not possibly sail before the following week, and maybe not then. Sit tight. I know what I am talking about."

"He might cable."

"So he might. But if he had we'd have heard from him before now. I'm going to tell you a secret. My name is not Ryanne."

"We all know that," said the Major.

"It's Wadsworth. Does that tickle your mind any?"

The men shook their heads. Mrs. Chedsoye did not move hers.

"Bah! Greatest joke of the hour. I'm Horace Wadsworth, and Arthur Wadsworth, president of the Merchant-Mechanic Bank, is my beloved brother!"

"Ay, damnable wretch!"

A shock ran through them all. In the doorway leading to the rear hall stood George, his revolvers leveled steadily. Peering white-faced over his shoulder was the man who had spoken, Arthur Wadsworth.

CHAPTER XXII

THE END OF THE PUZZLE

The elder brother tried to push past George, but old Mortimer caught him by the shoulders and dragged him back.

"Let me go!" he cried, his voice nasal and high. "Do you hear me? Let me go!"

"Mr. Mortimer," said George, without turning his head or letting his eye waver, "keep him back. Thanks." George stepped over the threshold. "Now, gentlemen, I shall shoot the first man who makes a movement."

And Ryanne, who knew something about George, saw that he meant just what he said. "Steady, every one," he said. "My friend George here can't shoot; but that kind of a man is deadliest with a pistol. I surrender."

The brother was struggling. "The telephone! The telephone! I demand to call the police. This is accessory to the fact! I tell you, let me go!"

"Mr. Wadsworth," replied George, "if you do not be still and let me run this affair, I'll throw the pistols to the floor, and your brother and his friends may do as they bally please. Now, step back and be quiet. Stop!" to Ryanne, whose hand was reaching out toward the table.

"Don't shoot, Percival; I want only a final glass of wine." Ryanne calmly took the slender stem of the glass between his fingers, lifted it and drank. He set it down empty. From his outside pocket he drew a handkerchief and delicately dried his lips. He alone of his confederates had life. It was because he alone understood. Prison wasn't staring them in the face just yet. "Well, Arthur, old top, how goes it? Nearly got your money-bags, didn't we? And we surely would have but for this delicious vintage."

"Damn you and your wine!" roared the Major, shaking with rage. This adventure had been no joke to him, no craving for excitement. He wanted the gold, the gold. With what would have been his share he could have gambled at Monte Carlo and Ostend till the end of his days. For the first time he saw long, thick bars of iron running up and down a window. And all for a bottle of wine!

"Damn away, old sport!" Ryanne reached for the bottle and filled his glass again. "Percival, I'm blamed sorry about that olive-tree of yours." He waved his hand toward the bags. "You can see that my intentions in regard to refunding that hundred pounds were strictly honorable. Now, what's on the ticket?"

"I suppose your luggage is outside in the automobiles?"

"Right-O!"

"Well, I need not explain my reasons; you will understand them; but I am going to give you all two hours' time. Then I shall notify the police. You will have to take your chance after that time."

The circling faces brightened perceptibly. Two hours – that would carry them far into Jersey.

"Accepted with thanks," said Ryanne.

"I refuse to permit it!" yelled the brother. "Mr. Jones, you will rue this night's work. I shall see that the law looks into your actions. This is felony. I demand to be allowed to telephone."

"Percival, for heaven's sake, let him!" cried Ryanne wearily. "Let him shout; it will soften his voice. He will hurt nobody. The wires were cut hours ago."

Mortimer felt the tense muscles in his grasp relax. Arthur Wadsworth grew limp and reeled against the jamb of the door.

"You had better start at once," George advised. "You three first," with a nod toward Wallace (his bulbous nose now lavender in hue), the butler and the first-man. "Forward march, front door. Go on!"

"What about me?" asked Ryanne.

"In a moment." George could not but admire the man, rascal though he was. There was a pang of regret in his heart as the thought came and went swiftly: what a comrade this man would have made under different circumstances! Too late! "Halt!" he cried. The trio marching toward the door came to a stop, their heads turned inquiringly. "Here, Mr. Mortimer; take one of these guns and cover the Major. He's the one I doubt." Then George followed the others into the hall and ironically bade them God-speed as he opened the door for them. They went out stupidly; the wine had dulled them. George immediately returned to the library.

Neither Fortune nor her mother had stirred in all this time. A quality of hypnotism held them in bondage. The mother could not lower her glance and the daughter would not. If there was a light of triumph in Fortune's eyes, it was unconsciously there. And no one will know the full bitterness that shone from the mother's. She could have screamed with fury; she could have rent her clothes, torn her skin, pulled her hair; and yet she sat there without physical sign of the tempest. This offers a serio-comic suggestion; but it was tragedy enough for the woman who was in the clutch of these emotional storms. It was not her predicament; it was not that she was guilty of a crime against society; it was not that she had failed. No. It was because she, in leaving this house for ever, was leaving her daughter behind, mistress of it.

On her side, Fortune knew, that, had there been a single gesture inviting pity, she must have flown to her mother's side. But there was no sign. Finally, Fortune stepped back, chilled. It was all too late.

"Fortune," said George, terribly embarrassed, "do you wish to speak to your mother, alone?"

"No." It was a little word, spoken in a little, hushed tone.

Mrs. Chedsoye rose and proceeded to put on her furs, which she had flung across the back of her chair.

"Mother!" This came in a gasp from the elder Wadsworth. An understanding of this strange proceeding began to filter through his mind. The young girl's mother!

Mrs. Chedsoye drew on her gloves slowly. She offered them to the Major to button. He flung the hands aside. He was not nice under the veneer. But Ryanne was instantly at her service. And curiously she watched his agile fingers at work over the buttons; they were perfectly steady. Then, followed by the Major and Ryanne, she walked easily toward the hall. Ryanne paused.