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

this week to pay for the gas--and I don't burn any."

In the interval I improved my time by getting better acquainted with the city. Emboldened by my body-guard, I slept for two nights in Henry's room, and with one to watch outside the door, one lying on a mattress just inside, and a new lock and bolt, I was free from disturbance.

Just as I had formed a wild idea of looking up Doddridge Knapp in his home, I came to the office in the morning to find the door into Room 16 wide open and the farther door ajar.

"Come in, Wilton," said the voice of the King of the Street; and I entered his room to find him busied over his papers, as though nothing had occurred since I had last met him.

"The market has had something of a vacation." I ventured, as he failed to speak.

"I have been out of town," he said shortly. "What have you done?"

"Nothing."

He gave a grunt of assent.

"You didn't expect me to be buying up the market, did you?" The yellow-gray mustache went up, and the wolf-fangs gleamed from beneath.

"I reckon it wouldn't have been a very profitable speculation," he replied.

Then he leaned back in his chair and looked meditatively at the wall.

"It was for one fellow, though," he continued, mellowing as he mused in his recollections. "It was at the time of the Honest Injun deal--I guess you don't remember that. It must have been ten years ago. Well, I had a fellow named--why, what was his name?--oh, Riggs, or Rix, I forget which,--and he was handling about a hundred thousand dollars for me. We had Honest Injun run up from one dollar till it was over twenty dollars a share. I had to go up to Nevada City, and left ten thousand shares with him with orders to sell at twenty-five."

"Yes," I said, as the King of the Street paused and seemed inclined to drop the story. "At twenty-five."

"Well," he continued at this encouragement, "when I came back, Honest Injun was down to ten cents, or somewhere around there, which was just about as I expected. Riggs comes up to me as proud as a spotted pup, and tells me that he'd sold at thirty dollars, and cleared fifty thousand more than I'd expected."

"A pretty good deal," I suggested.

"It happened that way, but it wouldn't happen so once in ten years. The stock had gone up to thirty-one or thirty-two before it broke, and he had sold just in time."

"Did he get a reward?" I asked, as my employer appeared to wait for an observation from me.

"He did," said the Wolf with a growl. "I discharged him on the spot. And hanged if I didn't tell him that the fifty thousand was his--and let him have it, too. Oh, he was playing in great luck! That combination wouldn't come twice in a thousand years. The next man who tried it went to jail," he added with a snap of the jaws.

"Quite correct," I said. "Orders must be obeyed."

"Just remember that," he said significantly. "Have you heard anything more of Decker?"

"I've heard enough to satisfy me that he's the man who got the Omega stock."

"What other deal is he in?" asked the King of the Street.

"I don't know."

The King of the Street smiled indulgently.

"Well, you've got something to learn yet. I'll give you till next week to find the answer to that question."

I was convinced from his air that he had information on both these points himself, and was merely trying my knowledge.

"I'll not be back before next Wednesday," he concluded.

"Going away again?" I asked in surprise.

"I'm off to Virginia City," he replied after considering for a little. "I'm not sure about Omega, after all--and there's another one I want to look into. You needn't mention my going. When I come back we'll have a campaign that will raise the roof of every Board in town. No orders till then unless I telegraph you. That's all."

The King of the Street seemed straightforward enough in his statement of plans, and it did not occur to me to distrust him while I was in his presence. Yet, once more in my office, with the locked door between, I began to doubt, and tried to find some hidden meaning in each word and look. What plan was he revolving in that fertile brain? I could not guess. The mystery of the great speculator was beyond my power to fathom. And we worked, each in ignorance of the other's purposes, and went the appointed road.


CHAPTER XV

I AM IN THE TOILS

"Welcome once more, Mr. Wilton," said Mrs. Doddridge Knapp, holding out her hand. "Were you going to neglect us again?"

"Not at all, madam," said I with unblushing mendacity. "I am always at your command."

Mrs. Knapp bowed with regal condescension, and replied with such intimations of good will that I was glad I had come. I had vowed I would never set foot again in the place. The hot blood of shame had burned my cheeks whenever I recalled my dismissal from the lips of the daughter of the house. But I had received a letter from Mrs. Bowser, setting forth that I was wanted at the house of Doddridge Knapp, and her prolixity was such that I was unable to determine whether she, or Mrs. Knapp, or Luella, wished to see me. But as all three appeared to be concerned in it I pocketed pride and resentment, and made my bow with some nervous quavers at the Pine Street palace.

As I was speaking I cast my eyes furtively about the room. Mrs. Knapp interpreted my glance.

"She will be in presently." There was to my ear a trace of mocking laughter in her voice as she spoke, but her face betokened only a courteous interest.

"Thanks--I hope so," I said in a little confusion. I wished I knew whether she meant Luella or Mrs. Bowser.

"You got the note?" she asked.

"It was a great pleasure."

"Mrs. Bowser wished so much to see you again. She has been singing your praises--you were such an agreeable young man."

I cursed Mrs. Bowser in my heart.

"I am most flattered," I said politely.

There was a mischievous sparkle in Mrs. Knapp's eye, but her face was serenely gracious.

"I believe there was some arrangement between you about a trip to see the sights of Chinatown. Mrs. Bowser was quite worried for fear you had forgotten it, so I gave her your address and told her to write you a note."

I had not been conscious of expecting anything from my visit, but at this bit of information I found that I had been building air-castles which had been invisible till they came tumbling about my ears. I could not look for Miss Knapp's company on such an expedition.

"Oh," said I, with an attempt to conceal my disappointment, "the matter had slipped my mind. I shall be most happy to attend Mrs. Bowser, or to see that she has a proper escort."

We had been walking about the room during this conversation, and at this point had come to an alcove where Mrs. Knapp motioned me to a seat.

"I may not get a chance to talk with you alone again this evening," she continued, dropping her half-bantering tone, "and you come so little now. What are you doing?"

"Keeping out of mischief."

"Yes, but how?" she persisted. "You used to tell me everything. Now you tell me nothing."

"Mr. Knapp's work--" I began.

"Oh, of course I don't expect you to tell me about that. I know Mr. Knapp, and you're as close-mouthed as he, even when he's away."

"I should tell you anything of my own, but, of course, another's--"

"I understand." Mrs. Knapp, sitting with hands clasped in her lap, gave me a quick look. "But there was something else. You were telling me about your adventures, you remember. You told me two or three weeks ago about the way you tricked Darby Meeker and sent him to Sierra City." And she smiled at the recollection of Darby Meeker's discomfiture.

"Oh, yes," I said, with a laugh that sounded distressingly hollow to my ears. "That was a capital joke on Meeker."

Here was a fine pack of predicaments loosed on my trail. It was with an effort that I kept my countenance, and the cold sweat started on my forehead. How much had Henry told of his business? Had he touched on it lightly, humorously, or had he given a full account of his adventures to the wife of the man with whose secrets he was concerned, and whose evil plans had brought him to his death? The questions flashed through my mind in the instant that followed Mrs. Knapp's speech.

"How did it turn out?" asked Mrs. Knapp with lively interest. "Did he get back?"

I decided promptly on a judicious amount of the truth.

"Yes, he got back, boiling with wrath, and loaded to the guards with threats--that is, I heard so from my men. I didn't see him myself, or you might have found the rest of it in the newspaper."

"What did he do? Tell me about it." Mrs. Knapp gave every evidence of absorbed interest.

"Well, he laid a trap for me at Borton's, put Terrill in as advance guard, and raised blue murder about the place." And then I went on to give a carefully amended account of my first night's row at Borton's, and with an occasional question, Mrs. Knapp had soon extorted from me a fairly full account of my doings.

"It is dreadful for you to expose yourself to such dangers."

I was privately of her opinion.

"Oh, that's nothing," said I airily. "A man may be killed any day by a brick falling from a building, or by slipping on an orange peel on the crossing."

"But it is dreadful to court death so. Yet," she mused, "if I were a man I could envy you your work. There is romance and life in it, as well as danger. You are doing in the nineteenth century and in the midst of civilization what your forefathers may have done in the days of chivalry."

"It is a fine life," I said dryly. "But it has its drawbacks."

"But while you live no one can harm the child," she said. There was inquiry in her tone, I thought.

I suppressed a start of surprise. I had avoided mention of the boy. Henry had trusted Mrs. Knapp further than I had dreamed.

"He shall never be given up by me," I replied with conviction.

"That is spoken like a true, brave man," said Mrs. Knapp with an admiring look.

"Thank you," I said modestly.

"Another life than yours depends on your skill and courage. That must give you strength," she said softly.

"It does indeed," I replied. I was thinking of Doddridge Knapp's life.

"But here come Luella and Mrs. Bowser," said Mrs. Knapp. "I see I shall lose your company."

My heart gave a great bound, and I turned to see the queenly grace of Luella Knapp as she entered the room in the train of Mrs. Bowser.

Vows of justice and vengeance, visions of danger and death, faded away as I looked once more