Blindfolded, Earle Ashley Walcott [non fiction books to read .TXT] 📗

ended in a snarl.

"If the gang knew he was here there would be more fun than you saw the other night."

"Don't worry about me, Mr. Wilton," said Corson with a grin. "I've stood her crowd off before, and I can do it again if the need comes. But I'd rather smoke a poipe in peace."

"You can smoke in peace, but it's not yourself you can thank for it," said Mother Borton sharply. "There'll be no trouble here to-night. Come along." And the old woman started for the door.

"Are you sure you're all right?" asked Corson in a low voice. "There's men gone up those stairs that came down with a sheet over them."

"It's all right--that is, unless there's any danger to you in leaving you here."

"No. Go ahead. I'll wait for ye. I'd as lief sit here as anywheres."

I hastened after Mother Borton, who was glowering at me from the doorway, and followed her footsteps in silence to the floor above. There was a dim light and a foul smell in the upper hall, both of which came from a lamp that burned with a low flame on a bracket by the forward stair. There were perhaps a dozen doors to be seen, all closed, but all giving the discomforting suggestion that they had eyes to mark my coming.

Mother Borton walked the passage cautiously and in silence, and I followed her example until she pushed open a door and was swallowed up in the blackness. Then I paused on the threshold while she lighted a candle; and as I entered, she swiftly closed and locked the door behind me.

"Sit down," she said in a harsh voice, motioning me to a chair by the stand that held the candle. Then this strange creature seated herself in front of me, and looked steadily and sternly in my face for a full minute. The gaze of the piercing, deep-sunken eyes of the old hag, the evil lines that marked the lean, sharp features, gaining a still more sinister meaning from the wavering, flickering light thrown upon her face by the candle, gave me a feeling of anything but ease in my position.

"What have you done that I should help you?" she broke forth in a harsh voice, her eyes still fixed on my face.

"I really couldn't say," I replied politely. "You have done me one or two services already. That's the best reason I know why you should do me another."

The hard lines on the face before me relaxed at the sound of my voice, and the old woman nodded approvingly.

"Ay, reason enough, I guess. Them as wants better can find it themselves. But why did you sneak out of the house the other night like a cop in plain clothes? Didn't I go bail you were safe? Do you want any better word than mine?" she had begun almost softly, but the voice grew higher and harsher as she went on.

"Why," I said, bewildered again, "the house sneaked away from me--or, at least you left me alone in it."

"How was that?" she asked grimly. And I described graphically my experience in the deserted building.

As I proceeded with my tale an amused look replaced the harsh lines of suspicion on Mother Borton's face.

"Oh, my lud!" she cried with a chuckle. "Oh, my lud! how very green you are, my boy. Oh ho! oh ho!" And then she laughed an inward, self- consuming laugh that called up anything but the feeling of sympathetic mirth.

"I'm glad it amuses you," I said with injured dignity.

"Oh, my liver! Don't you see it yet? Don't you see that you climbed into the next house back, and went through on to the other street?" And she relapsed into her state of silent merriment.

I felt foolish enough as the truth flashed over me. I had lost my sense of direction in the strange house, and had been deceived by the resemblance of the ground plan of the two buildings.

"But what about the plot?" I asked. "I got your note. It's very interesting. What about it?"

"What plot?"

"Why, I don't know. The one you wrote me about."

Mother Borton bent forward and searched my face with her keen glance.

"Oh," she said at last, "the one I wrote you about. I'd forgotten it."

This was disheartening. How could I depend on one whose memory was thus capricious?

"Yes," said I gloomily; "I supposed you might know something about it."

"Show me the note," she said sharply.

I fumbled through my pockets until I found it. Mother Borton clutched it, held it up to the candle, and studied it for two or three minutes.

"Where did you get it?"

I described the circumstances in which it had come into my possession, and repeated the essentials of Corson's story. Mother Borton's sharp, evil face was impassive during my recital. When it was done she muttered:

"Gimme a fool for luck." Then she appeared to consider for a minute or more.

"Well?" said I inquiringly.

"Well, honey, you're having a run of the cards," she said at last. "Between having the message trusted to a fool boy, and having a cop for your friend, an' maybe gitting this note before you're expected to, you're setting here genteel-like having agreeable conversation along with me, instead of being in company you mightn't like so well--or maybe floating out toward Fort Point."

"So you didn't write it?" I said coolly. "I had an idea of the kind. That's why my friend Corson is smoking his pipe down stairs."

Mother Borton gave me a pleased look and nodded. I hoped I had made her regret the cruel insinuation in her application of the proverb to me as the favorite of fortune.

"I see," I said. "I was to be waylaid on the road here and killed."

"Carried off, more likely. I don't say as it wouldn't end in killin' ye. But, you see, you'd be of mighty small use in tellin' tales if you was dead; but you might be got to talk if they had ye in a quiet place."

"Good reasoning. But Henry Wilton was killed."

"Yes," admitted Mother Borton; "they thought he carried papers, and maybe they ain't got over the idea yit. It's jest as well you're here instid of having a little passear with Tom Terrill and Darby Meeker and their pals."

"Well," said I, as cheerfully as I could under the depressing circumstances, "if they want to kill me, I don't see how I can keep them from getting a chance sooner or later."

Mother Borton looked anxious at this, and shook her head.

"You must call on your men," she said decidedly. "You must have guards."

"By the way," I said, "that reminds me. The men haven't been paid, and they're looking to me for money."

"Who's looking to you for money?"

"Dicky Nahl--and the others, I suppose."

"Dicky Nahl?"

"Why, yes. He asked me for it."

"And you gave it to him?" she asked sharply.

"No-o--that is, I gave him ten dollars, and told him he'd have to wait for the rest. I haven't got the money from the one that's doing the hiring yet, so I couldn't pay him."

Mother Borton gave an evil grin, and absorbed another inward laugh.

"I reckon the money'll come all right," said Mother Borton, recovering from her mirth. "There's one more anxious than you to have 'em paid, and if you ain't found out you'll have it right away. Now for guards, take Trent--no, he's hurt. Take Brown and Porter and Barkhouse and Fitzhugh. They're wide-awake, and don't talk much. Take 'em two and two, and never go without 'em, night or day. You stop here to-night, and I'll git 'em for you to-morrow."

I declined the proffered hospitality with thanks, and as a compromise agreed to call for my bodyguard in the early morning. Rejoining Corson, I explained Mother Borton's theory of the plot that had brought me thither.

"She's like to be right," said the policeman. "She knows the gang. Now, if you'll take my advice, you'll let the rats have your room for this night, and come along up to some foine hotel."

The advice appeared good, and fifteen minutes later Corson was drinking my health at the Lick House bar, and calling on the powers of light and darkness to watch over my safety as I slept.

Whether due to his prayers or not, my sleep was undisturbed, even by dreams of Doddridge Knapp and his charming but scornful daughter; and with the full tide of life and business flowing through the streets in the morning hours I found myself once more in Mother Borton's dingy eating-room, ordering a breakfast.

Mother Borton ignored my entrance, and, perched on a high stool behind the bar and cash-drawer, reminded me of the vulture guarding its prey. But at last she fluttered over to my table and took a seat opposite.

"Your men are here," she said shortly. And then, as I expressed my thanks, she warmed up and gave me a description by which I should know each and led me to the room where, as she said, they were "corralled."

"By the way," I said, halting outside the door, "they'll want some money, I suppose. Do you know how much?"

"They're paid," she said, and pushed open the door before I could express surprise or ask further questions. I surmised that she had paid them herself to save me from annoyance or possible danger, and my gratitude to this strange creature rose still higher.

The four men within the room saluted me gravely and with Mother Borton's directions in mind I had no hesitation in calling each by his name. I was pleased to see that they were robust, vigorous fellows, and soon made my dispositions. Brown and Barkhouse were to attend me during daylight, and Fitzhugh and Porter were to guard together at night. And, so much settled, I hastened to the office.

No sign of Doddridge Knapp disturbed the morning, and at the noon hour I returned to the room in the house of mystery that was still my only fixed abode.

All was apparently as I had left it, except that a letter lay on the table.

"I must get a new lock," was my comment, as I broke the seal. "This place is getting too public when every messenger has a key." I was certain that I had locked the door when Corson and I had come out on the evening before.

The letter was from my unknown employer, and read:

"Richmond has paid the men. Be ready for a move at any moment. Leave your address if you sleep elsewhere."

And now came three or four days of rest and quiet after the merry life I had been leading since my arrival in San Francisco.

No word did I get from Doddridge Knapp. I kept close watch of the stock market, and gossiped with speculators and brokers, for I wished to know at once if he had employed another agent. My work would lie in another direction if such should prove to be the case. But there was no movement in Omega, and I could hear no hint of another deal that might show a trace of his dexterous hand. "Quiet trading," was the report from all quarters.

"Fact is," said Wallbridge on the fourth day, trying to look doleful, "I haven't made enough