CHAPTER XXIIITHE BACK-FIRE
When Ben Blair left the Baker home he went back to his room at the hotel, closed and locked the door, and, throwing off coat and hat, stretched himself full-length upon the floor, gazing up at the ceiling but seeing nothing. It had been a hard fight for self-control there on the prairie the day Florence rejected him, but it was as nothing to the tumult that now raged in his brain. Then, despite his pain, hope had remained. Now hope was lost, and in its place stood a maddening might-have-been. Under the compulsion of his will, the white flood of anger had passed, but it only made more difficult the solution of the problem confronting him. Under the influence of passion the situation would have been a mere physical proposition; but with opportunity to think, another's wishes and another's rights—those of the woman he loved—challenged him at every turn.
At first it seemed that a removal of his physical presence, a going away never to return, was adequate solution of the difficulty; but he soon realized that it was not. Deeper than his own love was his desire for the happiness of the girl he had known from childhood. Had he beencertain that she would be happy with the man who had fascinated her, he could have conquered self, could have returned to his prairies, his cattle, his work, and have concealed his hurt. But it was impossible for him to believe she would be happy. Without volition on his part he had become an actor in this drama, this comedy, this tragedy,—whatever it might prove to be; and he felt that it would be an act of cowardice upon his part to leave before the play was ended. He was not in the least religious in the sense of creed and dogma. In all his life he had scarcely given a thought to religion. His knowledge of the Almighty by name had been largely confined to that of a word to conjure with in mastering an obstreperous bronco; but, in the broad sense of personal cleanliness and individual duty, he was religious to the core. He would not shirk a responsibility, and a responsibility faced him now.
Hour after hour he lay prone while his active brain suggested one course after another, all, upon consideration, proving inadequate. Gradually out of the chaos one fundamental fact became distinct in his mind. He must know more of this man Clarence Sidwell before he could leave the city, and this decision brought him to his feet. Under the circumstances, a strategist might have employed others to gather surreptitiously the information desired; but such was not the nature of Benjamin Blair. One thing he had learned in dealing with his fellows, which was that the most effective way to secure the thing one wished was to go direct to the man who had it to give. In this case Sidwell was the man. With a grim smileBen remembered the invitation and the address he had received the first night he was in town. He would avail himself of both.
Night had fallen long ere this; when Ben arose the room was in darkness, save for the reflected light which came through the heavily curtained windows from the street lamps. He turned on an electric bulb and made a hasty toilet. In doing so his eye fell upon the two big revolvers within the drawer of the dresser; and the same impulse that had caused him to bring them into this land of civilization made him thrust them into his hip pockets. It was more habit than anything else, just as a man with a dog friend feels vaguely uncomfortable unless his pet is with him. Blair had the vigorously recurring appetite of a healthy animal, and it suddenly occurred to him that he had not yet dined. Descending to the street, he sought acaféand ate a hearty meal.
A half-hour later, the elevator boy of the Metropolitan Block, where Sidwell had his quarters, was surprised, on answering the indicator, to find a young man in an abnormally broad hat and flannel shirt awaiting him. The youth was of vivid imagination, and knowing that a Wild West troupe was performing in town, one glance at Ben's hat, his suspicions became certainty.
"Eleventh floor," he announced, when the passenger had told his destination; then as the car moved upward he gathered courage and looked the rancher fair in the eye.
"Say, Mister," he ventured, "give me a pass to the show, will you?"
For an instant Ben looked blank; then he understood,and his hand sought his trousers' pocket. "Sorry," he explained, "but I don't happen to have any with me. Will this do instead?" and he produced a half-dollar.
The boy brought the car deftly to a stop within a half-inch of the level of the desired floor. "Thank you. Mr. Sidwell—straight ahead, and turn to the left down the short hall," he said obligingly.
Blair stepped out, saying, "Don't fail to be around to-morrow when I do my stunt."
With open-mouthed admiration the boy watched the frontiersman's long free stride—a movement that struck the floor with the springiness of a cat, very different from the flat-footed jar of pedestrians on paved streets.
"I won't!" he called after him. "I'd rather see't than a dozen ball-games! I'll look for you, Mister!"
At the interrupting tap upon the door, Sidwell voiced a languid "Come in," and merely shifted in his seat; but his big companion, with the hospitality of inebriation, had returned his glass unsteadily to the table and arisen. He had taken a couple of uncertain steps, as if to open the door, when, in answer to the summons, Ben Blair stepped inside. Hough halted with a suddenness which all but cost him his equilibrium. The expansive smile upon his face vanished, and he stared as though the bottomless pit had opened at his feet. For a fraction of a minute not one of the three men spoke or stirred, but in that time the steady blue eyes of the countryman took in the details of the scene—the luxurious furnishings, the condition of the two men—with the rapidity and minuteness of asensitized plate. Ironic chance had chosen an unpropitious night for his call. Intoxication surrounding a bar, under the stimulus of numbers, and preceding or following some exciting event, he could understand, could, perhaps, condone; but this solitary dissipation, drunkenness for its own sake, was something new to him. The observing eyes fastened themselves upon the host's face.
"In response to your invitation," he said evenly, "I've called."
Sidwell roused himself. His face flushed. Despite the liquor in his brain, he felt the inauspicious chance of the meeting.
"Glad you did," he said, with an attempt at ease. "Deucedly glad. I don't know of anyone in the world I'd rather see. Just speaking of you, weren't we?" he said, appealing to Hough. "By the way, Mr.—er—Blair, shake hands with Mr. Hough, Mr. Winston Hough. Mighty good fellow, Hough, but a bit melancholy. Needs cheering up a bit now and then. Needed it badly to-night—almost cried for it, in fact"; and the speaker smiled convivially.
Hough extended his hand with elaborate formality. "Delighted to meet you," he managed to articulate.
"Thank you," returned the other shortly.
Sidwell meanwhile was bringing a third chair and glass. "Come over, gentlemen," he invited, "and we'll celebrate this, the proudest moment of my life. You drink, of course, Mr. Blair?"
Ben did not stir. "Thank you, but I never drink," he said.
"What!" Sidwell smiled sceptically. "A cattle-man, and not refresh yourself with good liquor? You refute all the precedents! Come over and take something!"
Ben only looked at him steadily. "I repeat, I never drink," he said conclusively.
Sidwell sat down, and Hough followed his lead.
"All right, all right! Have a cigar, then. At least you smoke?"
"Yes," assented Blair, "I smoke—sometimes."
The host extended the box hospitably. "Help yourself. They're good ones, I'll answer for that. I import them myself."
Ben took a step forward, but his hands were still in his pockets. "Mr. Sidwell," he said, "we may as well save time and try to understand each other. In some ways I am a bit like an Indian. I never smoke except with a friend, and I am not sure you are a friend of mine. To be candid with you, I believe you are not."
Hough stirred in his chair, but Sidwell remained impassive save that the convivial smile vanished.
A quarter of a minute passed. Once the host took up his glass as if to drink, but put it down untasted. At last he indicated the vacant chair.
"Won't you be seated?" he invited.
Ben sat down.
"You say," continued Sidwell, "that I am not your friend. The statement and your actions carry the implication that of necessity, then, we must be enemies."
The speaker was sparring for time. His brain was not yet normal, but it was clearing rapidly. He saw this wasno ordinary man he had to deal with, no ordinary circumstance; and his plan of campaign was unevolved.
"I fail to see why," he continued.
"Do you?" said Ben, quietly.
Sidwell lit a cigar nonchalantly and smoked for a moment in silence.
"Yes," he reiterated. "I fail to see why. To have made you an enemy implies that I have done you an injury, and I recall no way in which I could have offended you."
Ben indicated Hough with a nod of his head. "Do you wish a third party to hear what we have to say?" he inquired.
Sidwell looked at the questioner narrowly. Deep in his heart he was thankful that they two were not alone. He did not like the look in the countryman's blue eyes.
"Mr. Hough," he said with dignity, "is a friend of mine. If either of you must leave the room, most assuredly it will not be he." His eyes returned to those of the visitor, held there with an effort. "By the bye," he challenged, "what is it we have to say, anyway? So far as I can see, there's no point where we touch."
Ben returned the gaze steadily. "Absolutely none?" he asked.
"Absolutely none." Sidwell spoke with an air of finality.
The countryman leaned a bit forward and rested his elbow upon his knee, his chin upon his hand.
"Suppose I suggest a point then: Miss Florence Baker."
Sidwell stiffened with exaggerated dignity. "I never discuss my relations with a lady, even with a friend. I should be less apt to do so in speaking with a stranger."
The lids of Ben's eyes tightened just a shade. "Then I'll have to ask you to make an exception to the rule," he said slowly.
"In that case," Sidwell responded quickly, "I'll refuse."
For a moment silence fell. Through the open window came the ceaseless drone of the shifting multitude on the street below.
"Nevertheless, I insist," said Ben, calmly.
Sidwell's face flushed, although he was quite sober now. "And I must still refuse," he said, rising. "Moreover, I must request that you leave the room. You forget that you are in my home!"
Ben arose calmly and walked to the door through which he had entered. The key was in the lock, and turning it he put it in his pocket. Still without haste he returned to his seat.
"That this is your home, and that you were its dictator before I came and will be after I leave, I do not contest," he said; "but temporarily the place has changed hands. I do not think you were quite in earnest when you refused to talk with me."
For answer, Sidwell jerked a cord beside the table. A bell rang vigorously in the rear of the apartments, and the big negro hurried into the room.
"Alec," directed the master, "call a policeman at once! At once—do you hear?"
"Yes, sah," and the servant started to obey; but the visitor's eye caught his.
"Alec," said Ben, steadily, "don't do that! I'll be the first person to leave this room!"
Instantly Sidwell was on his feet, his face convulsed with passion. "Curse you!" he cried. "You'll pay for this! I'll teach you what it means to hold up a man in his own house!" He turned to his servant with a look that made the latter recoil. "I want you to understand that when I give an order I mean it. Go!"
Blair was likewise on his feet, his long body stretched to its full height, his blue eyes fastened upon the face of the panic-stricken darky.
"Alec," he repeated evenly, "you heard what I said." Without a motion save of his head he indicated a seat in the corner of the room. "Sit down!"
Sidwell took a step forward, his clenched fists raised menacingly.
"Blair! you—you—"
"Yes."
"You—"
"Certainly, I—"
That was all. It was not a lengthy conversation, or a brilliant one, but it was adequate. Face to face, the two men stood looking in each other's eyes, each taking his opponent's measure. Hough had also risen; he expected bloodshed; but not once did Blair stir as much as an eyelid, and after that first step Sidwell also halted. Beneath his supercilious caste dominance he was a physical coward, and at the supreme test he weakened. The flood of angerpassed as swiftly as it had come, leaving him impotent. He stood for a moment, and then the clenched fist dropped to his side.
For the first time, Ben Blair moved. Unemotionally as before, his nod indicated the chair in the corner.
"Sit over there as long as I stay, Alec," he directed; and the negro responded with the alacrity of a well-trained dog.
Ben turned to the big man. "And you, too, Hough. My business has nothing to do with you, but it may be well to have a witness. Be seated, please."
Hough obeyed in silence. Sober as Sidwell now, his mind grasped the situation, and in spite of himself he felt his sympathy going out to this masterful plainsman.
Ben Blair now turned to the host, and as he did so his wiry figure underwent a transformation that lived long in the spectators' minds. With his old characteristic motion, his hands went into his trousers' pockets, his chest expanded, his great chin lifted until, looking down, his eyes were half closed.
"You, Mr. Sidwell," he said, "can stand or sit, as you please; but one thing I warn you not to do—don't lie to me. We're in the home of lies just now, but it can't help you. Your face says you are used to having your own way, right or wrong. Now you'll know the reverse. So long as you speak the truth, I won't hurt you, no matter what you say. If you don't, and believe in God, you'd best make your peace with Him. Do you doubt that?"
One glance only Sidwell raised to the towering face,and his eyes fell. Every trace of fight, of effrontery, had left him, and he dropped weakly into his chair.
"No, I don't doubt you," he said.
Ben likewise sat down, but his eyes were inexorable.
"First of all, then," he went on, "you will admit you were mistaken when you said there was no point where we touched?"
"Yes, I was mistaken."
"And you were not serious when you refused to talk with me?"
A spasm of repugnance shot over the host's dark face. He heard the labored breathing of the negro in the corner, and felt the eyes of his big friend upon him.
"Yes, I was not serious," he admitted slowly.
Ben's long legs crossed, his hands closed on the chair-arms.
"Very well, then," he said. "Tell me what there is between you and Miss Baker."
Sidwell lit a cigar, though the hand that held the match trembled.
"Everything, I hope," he said. "I intend marrying her."
The ranchman's face gave no sign at the confession.
"You have asked her, have you?"
"No. Your coming prevented. I should otherwise have done so to-day."
The long fingers on the chair-arms tightened until they grew white.
"You knew why I came to town, did you not?"
Sidwell hesitated.
"I had an intuition," he admitted reluctantly.
Again silence fell, and the subdued roar of the city came to their ears.
"You have not called at the Baker home to-day," continued Blair. "Was it consideration for me that kept you away?" The thin, weather-browned face grew, if possible, more clean-cut. "Remember to talk straight."
Sidwell took the cigar from his lips. An exultation he could not quite repress flooded him. His eyes met the other's fair.
"No," he said, "it was anything but consideration for you. I knew she was going to refuse you."
In the corner the negro's eyes widened. Even Hough held his breath; but not a muscle of Ben Blair's body stirred.
"You say you knew," he said evenly. "How did you know?"
Sidwell flicked the ash from his cigar steadily. He was regaining, if not his courage, at least some of his presence of mind. This seeming desperado from the West was a being upon whom reason was not altogether wasted.
"I knew because her mother told me—about all there was to tell, I guess—of your relations before Florence came here. I knew if she refused you then she would be more apt to do so now."
Still the figure in brown was that of a statue.
"She told you—what—you say?"
Sidwell shifted uncomfortably. He saw breakers ahead.
"The—main reason at least," he modified.
"Which was—" insistently.
Sidwell hesitated, his new-found confidence vanishing like the smoke from his cigar. But there was no escape.
"The reason, she said, was because you were—minus a pedigree."
The last words dropped like a bomb in the midst of the room. Ben Blair swiftly rose from his seat. The negro's eyes rolled around in search of some place of concealment. With a protesting movement Hough was on his feet.
"Gentlemen!" he implored. "Gentlemen!"
But the intervention was unnecessary. Ben Blair had settled back in his seat. Once more his hands were on the chair-arms.
"Do you," he insinuated gently, "consider the reason she gave an adequate one? Do you consider that it had any rightful place in the discussion?"
The question, seemingly simple, was hard to answer. An affirmative trembled on the city man's tongue. He realized it was his opportunity for a crushing rejoinder. But cold blue eyes were upon him and the meaning of their light was only too clear.
"I can understand the lady's point of view," he said evasively.
Ben Blair leaned forward, the great muscles of his jaw and temples tightening beneath the skin.
"I did not ask for the lady's point of view," he admonished, "I asked for your own."
Again Sidwell felt his opportunity, but physical cowardice intervened. No power on earth could have made him say "yes" when the other looked at him like that.
"No," he lied, "I do not see that it should make the slightest difference."
"On your honor, you swear you do not?"
Sidwell repeated the statement, and sealed it with his honor.
Ben Blair relaxed, and Hough mopped his brow with a sigh of relief. Even Sidwell felt the respite, but it was short-lived.
"I think," Ben resumed, "that what you've just said and sworn to gives the lie to your original statement that you have given me no cause for enmity. According to your own showing you are the one existing obstacle between Florence Baker and myself. Is it not so?"
Like a condemned criminal, Sidwell felt the noose tightening.
"I can't deny it," he admitted.
For some seconds Ben Blair looked at him with an expression almost menacing. When he again spoke the first trace of passion was in his voice.
"Such being the case, Clarence Sidwell," he went on, "caring for Florence Baker as I do, and knowing you as I do, why in God's name should I leave you, coward, in possession of the dearest thing to me in the world?" For an instant the voice paused, the protruding lower jaw advanced until it became a positive disfigurement. "Tell me why I should sacrifice my own happiness for yours. I have had enough of this word-play. Speak!"
In every human life there is at some time a supreme moment, a tragic climax of events; and Sidwell realized that for him this moment had arrived. Moreover, ithad found him helpless and unprepared. Artificial to the bone, he was fundamentally disqualified to meet such an emergency; for artifice or subterfuge would not serve him now. One hasty glance into that relentless face caused him to turn his own away. Long ago, in the West, he had once seen a rustler hung by a posse of ranchers. The inexorable expression he remembered on the surrounding faces was mirrored in Ben Blair's. His brain whirled; he could not think. His hand passed aimlessly over his face; he started to speak, but his voice failed him.
Ben Blair shifted forward in his seat. The long sinewy fingers gripped the chair like a panther ready to spring.
"I am listening," he admonished.
Sidwell felt the air of the room grow stifling. A big clock was ticking on the wall, and it seemed to him the second-beats were minutes apart. His downcast eyes just caught the shape of the hands opposite him, and in fancy he felt them already tightening upon his throat. Like a drowning man, scenes in his past life swarmed through his brain. He saw his mother, his sisters, at home in the old family mansion; his friends at the club, chatting, laughing, drinking, smoking. In an impersonal sort of way he wondered how they would feel, what they would say, when they heard. On the vision swept. It was Florence Baker he saw now—Florence, all in fleecy white; the girl and himself were on the broad veranda of the Baker home. They were not alone. Another figure—yes, this same menacing figure now so near—was on the walk below them, his broad-brimmed hat in his hand, butleaving. Florence was speaking; a smile was upon her lips.
Like a flash of lightning the images of fancy passed, the present returned. At last came the solution once before suggested,—the back-fire! Sidwell straightened, every nerve in his body tense. He spoke—and scarcely recognized his own voice.
"There is a reason," he said, "a very adequate reason, one which concerns another more than it does us." With a supreme effort of will the man met the blue eyes of his opponent squarely. "It is because Florence Baker loves me and doesn't love you. Because she would never forgive you, never, if you did—what you think of doing now."
For an instant the listening figure remained tense, and it seemed to Sidwell that his own pulse ceased beating; then the long sinewy body collapsed as under a physical blow.
"God!" said a low voice. "I forgot!"
Not one of the three spectators stirred or spoke. Like sheep, they awaited the lead of their master.
And it came full soon. Stiffly, clumsily, still in silence, Ben Blair arose. His face was drawn and old, his step was slow and halting. Like one walking in his sleep, he made his way to the door, took the key from his pocket, and turned the lock. Not once did he speak or glance back. The door closed softly, and he was gone.
Behind him for a second there was silence, inactive incredulity as at a miracle performed; then, in a blaze of long repressed fury, Sidwell stood beside the table. Notpausing for a glass, he raised the red decanter to his lips and drank, drank, as though the liquor were water.
"Curse him! I'll marry that girl now if for no other reason than to get even with him. If it's the last act of my life, I swear I'll marry her!"
CHAPTER XXIVTHE UPPER AND THE NETHER MILLSTONES
Out on the street once more, Ben Blair looked about him as one awakening from a dream. From the darkened arch of a convenient doorway he watched the endless passing throng with a dull sort of wonder. He was surprised that the city should be awake at that late hour; and stepping out into the light he held up his watch. The hands indicated a few minutes past ten, and in surprise he carried the timepiece to his ear. Yes, it was running, and must be correct. He had seemed to be up there on the eleventh floor for hours; but as a matter of fact it had been only minutes. Practically, the whole night was yet before him.
Slowly, in a listless way, he started to walk back to his hotel. Instead of the night becoming cooler it had grown sultrier, and in places the walk was fairly packed with human beings. More than once he had to turn out of his way to pass the chattering groups. In so doing he was often conscious that the flow of small talk suddenly ceased, and that, nudging each other, the chatterers pointed his way. At first he looked about to see what had attracted them, but he very soon realized that he himself was the object of attention. Even here, cosmopolitan as were thesurroundings, he was a marked man, was recognized as a person from a wholly different life; and his feeling of isolation deepened. He moved on more swiftly.
The sidewalk in front of his hotel was fringed with a row of chairs, in which sat guests in various stages of negligee costume. Nearly every man was smoking, and the effect in the semi-darkness was like that of footlights turned low. Steps and lobby were likewise crowded; but Ben made his way straight to his room. One idea now possessed him. His business was finished, and he wanted to be away. Turning on a light, he found a railroad guide and ran down the columns of figures. There was no late night train going West; he must wait until morning. Extinguishing the light, he drew a chair to the open window and lit a cigar.
With physical inactivity, consciousness of his surroundings forced themselves on his attention. Subdued, pulsating, penetrating, the murmur of the great hotel came to his ears; the drone of indistinguishable voices, the pattering footsteps of bell-boys andhabitués, the purr of the elevator as it moved from floor to floor, the click of the gate as it stopped at his own level, the renewed monotone as it passed by.
Continuous, untiring, the sounds suggested the unthinking vitality of a steam-engine or of a dynamo in a powerhouse. A mechanic by nature, as a school-boy Ben had often induced Scotty to take him to the electric light station, where he had watched the great machines with a fascination bordering on awe, until fairly dragged away by the prosaic Englishman. This feeling of his childhood recurredto him now with irresistible force. The throb of the motor of human life was pulsating in his ears; but added to it was something more, something elusive, intangible, but all-powerful. The moment he had arrived within the city limits he had felt the first trace of its presence. As he approached the centre of congestion it had deepened, had become more and more a guiding influence. Since then, by day or by night, wherever he went, augmenting or diminishing, it was constantly with him. And it was not with him alone. Every human being with whom he came in contact was likewise consciously or unconsciously under the spell. The crowds he had passed on the streets were unthinkingly answering its guidance. The trolley cars echoed its voice. It was the spirit of unrest—a thing ubiquitous and all-penetrating as the air that filled their lungs—a subtle stimulant that they took in with every breath.
Ben Blair arose and put on his hat. He had been sitting only a few minutes, but he felt that he could not longer bear the inactivity. To do so meant to think; and thought was the thing that to-night he was attempting to avoid. Moreover, for one of the few times in his life he could remember he was desperately lonely. It seemed to him that nowhere within a thousand miles was another of his own kind. Instinctively he craved relief, and that alleviation could come in but one way,—through physical activity. Again he sought the street.
To some persons a great relief from loneliness is found in mingling with a crowd, even though it be of strangers; but Ben was not like these. His desire was to be awayas far as possible from the maddening drone. Boarding a street car, he rode out into the residence section, clear to the end of the loop; then, alighting, he started to walk back. A full moon had arisen, and outside the shadow-blots of trees and buildings the earth was all alight. The asphalt of the pavements and the cement of the walks glistened white under its rays. Loth to sacrifice the comparative out-of-door coolness for the heat within, practically every house had its group on the doorsteps, or scattered upon the narrow lawns. Accustomed to magnificent distances, to boundless miles of surrounding country, to privacy absolute, Ben watched this scene with a return of the old wonder,—the old feeling of isolation, of separateness. Side by side, young men and women, obviously lovers, kept their places, indifferent to his observation. Other couples, still more careless, sat with circling arms and faces close together, returning his gaze impassively. Nothing, apparently, in the complex gamut of human nature was sacred to these folk. To the solitary spectator, the revelation was more depressing than even the down-town unrest; and he hurried on.
Further ahead he came to the homes of the wealthy,—great piles of stone and brick, that seemed more like hotels than residences. The forbidding darkness of many of the houses testified that their owners were out of town, at the seaside or among the mountains; but others were brilliantly lighted from basement to roof. Before one a long line of carriages was drawn up. Stiffly liveried footmen, impassive as automatons, waited the erratic pleasureof their masters. A little group of spectators was already gathered, and Ben likewise paused, observing the spectacle curiously.
A social event of some sort was in progress. From some concealed place came the music of a string orchestra. Every window of the great pile was open for ventilation, and Ben could hear and see almost as plainly as the guests themselves. For a time, deep, insistent, throbbing in measured beat, came the drone of the 'cello, the wail of the clarionet, and, faintly audible beneath, the rustle of moving feet. Then the music ceased; and a few seconds later a throng of heated dancers swarmed through the open doorway to the surrounding veranda, and simultaneously a chatter broke forth. Fans, like gigantic butterfly wings, vibrated to and fro. Skilful waiters, in black and white, glanced in and out. Laughter, thoughtless and care-free, mingled in the general scene.
The music still, Ben Blair was about to move on, when suddenly a man and a girl in the shadow of a window on the second floor caught and held his attention. As far as he could see, they were alone. Evidently one or the other of them knew the house intimately, and had deliberately sought the place. From the veranda beneath, the flow of talk continued uninterruptedly; but they gave it no attention. The spectator could distinctly see the man as he leaned back in the light and spoke earnestly. At times he gesticulated with rapid passionate motions, such as one unconsciously uses when deeply absorbed. Now and again, with the bodily motions that we have learned to connectwith the French, his shoulders were shrugged expressively. He was obviously talking against time; for his every motion showed intense concentration. No spectator could have mistaken the nature of his speech. Passion supreme, abandon absolute, were here personified. As he spoke, he gradually leaned farther forward toward the woman who listened. His face was no longer in the light. Suddenly, at first low, as though coming from a distance, increasing gradually until it throbbed into the steady beat of a waltz, the music recommenced. It was the signal for action and for throwing off restraint. The man leaned forward; his arm stretched out and closed about the figure of the woman. His face pressed forward to meet hers, again and again.
Not Ben alone, but a half-dozen other spectators had watched the scene. An overdressed girl among the number tittered at the sight.
But Ben scarcely noticed. With the strength of insulted womanhood, the girl had broken free, and now stood up full in the light. One look she gave to the man, a look which should have withered him with its scorn; then, gathering her skirts, she almost ran from the room.
Only a few seconds had the girl's face been clear of the shadow; yet it had been long enough to permit recognition, and instantly liquid fire flowed in the veins of Benjamin Blair. His breath came quick and short as that of a runner passing under the wire, and his great jaw set. The woman he had seen was Florence Baker.
With one motion he was upon the terrace leadingtoward the house. Another second, and he would have been well upon his way, when a hand grasped him from behind and drew him back. With a half-articulated imprecation Ben turned—and stood fronting Scotty Baker. The Englishman's face was very white. Behind the compound lenses his eyes glowed in a way Ben had not thought possible; but his voice was steady when he spoke.
"I saw too, Ben," he said, "and I understand. I know what you want to do, and God knows I want to do the same thing myself; but it would do no good; it would only make the matter worse." He looked at the younger man fixedly, almost imploringly. His voice sank. "As you care for Florence, Ben, go away. Don't make a scene that will do only harm. Leave her with me. I came to take her home, and I'll do so at once." The speaker paused, and his hand reached out and grasped the other's with a grip unmistakable. "I appreciate your motive, my boy, and I honor it. I know how you feel; and whatever I may have been in the past, from this time on I am your friend. I am your friend now, when I ask you to go," and he fairly forced his companion away.
Once outside the crowd, Ben halted. He gave the Englishman one long look; his lips opened as if to speak; then, without a word, he moved away.
There was no listlessness about him now. He was throbbing with repressed energy, like a great engine with steam up. His feet tapped with the regularity of clock-ticks over mile after mile of the city walks. He longed for physical weariness, for sleep; but the day, with its manifold mental exaltations and depressions, prevented.It seemed to him that he could never sleep again, could never again be weary. He could only walk on and on.
Down town again, he found the crowds smaller and the border of chairs in front of his hotel largely empty. A few cigars still burned in the half-light, but they were the last flicker of a conflagration now all but extinguished. The restless throb of the human dynamo was lower and more subdued. The street cars were practically empty. Instead of a constant stream of vehicles, an occasional cab clattered past. The city was preparing for its brief hours of fitful rest.
Straight on Ben walked, between the towering office buildings, beside the now darkened department-store hives, past the giant wholesale establishments and warehouses; until, quite unintentionally on his part, and almost before he realized it, he found himself in another world, another city, as distinct as though it were no part of the cosmopolitan whole. Again he came upon throbbing life; but of quite another type. Once more he met people in abundance, noisy, chattering human beings; but more frequently than his own he now heard foreign tongues that he did not understand, and did not even recognize. No longer were the pedestrians well dressed or apparently prosperous. Instead, poverty and squalor and filth were rampant. More loth even than the well-to-do of the suburbs to go within doors, the swarming mass of humanity covered the steps of the houses, and overflowed upon the sidewalk, even upon the street itself. There were men, women, children; the lame, the halt, the blind. The elders stared at the visitor,while the youngsters, secure in numbers, guyed him to their hearts' content.
It was all as foreign to any previous experience of this countryman as though he had come from a different planet. He had read of the city slums as of Stanley's Central African negro tribes with unpronounceable names; and he had thought of them in much the same way. To him they had been something known to exist, but with which it was but remotely probable he would ever come in contact. Now, without preparation or premeditation, thrown face to face with the reality, it brought upon him a sickening feeling, a sort of mental nausea. Ben was not a philanthropist or a social reformer; the inspiring thought of the inexhaustible field for usefulness therein presented had never occurred to him. He wished chiefly to get away from the stench and ugliness; and, turning down a cross street, he started to return.
The locality he now entered was more modern and better lighted than the one he left behind. The decorated building fronts, with their dazzling electric signs, partook of the characteristics of the inhabitants, who seemed overdressed and vulgarly ostentatious. The gaudily trapped saloons,cafés, and music halls, spoke a similar message. This was the recreation spot of the people of the quarter; their land of lethe. So near were the saloons and drinking gardens that from their open doorways there came a pungent odor of beer. Every place had instrumental music of some kind. Mandolins and guitars, in the hands of gentlemen of color, were the favorites. Pianos of execrable tone, played by youths with defective complexions, or by machinery, were a close second. Before one place, a crowd blocked the sidewalk; and there Ben stopped. A vaudeville performance was going on within—an invisible dialect comedian doing a German stunt to the accompaniment of wooden clogs and disarranged verbs. A barker in front, coatless, his collar loosened, a black string tie dangling over an unclean shirt front, was temporarily taking a much-needed rest. An electric sign overhead dyed his cheeks with shifting colors—first red, then green, then white. Despite its veneer of brazen effrontery, the face, with its great mouth and two days' growth of beard, was haggard and weary looking. Ben mentally pictured, with a feeling of compassion, other human beings doing their idiotic "stunts" inside, sweltering in the foul air; and he wondered how, if an atom of self-respect remained in their make-up, they could fail to despise themselves.
But the comedian had subsided in a roar of applause, and again the barker's hands were gesticulating wildly.
"Now's your time, ladies and gentlemen," he harangued. "It's continuous, you know, and Madame—"
But Ben did not wait for more. Elbow first, he pushed into the crowd, and as it instantly closed about him the odor of unclean bodies made him fairly hold his breath.
Straight ahead, looking neither to right nor to left, went the countryman; he turned the corner of the block, a corner without a light. Suddenly, with an instinctive tightening of his breath, he drew back. He had nearly stepped upon a man, dead drunk, stretched half in a darkened doorway, half on the walk. The wretch's headwas bent back over one of the iron steps until it seemed as if he must choke, and he was snoring heavily.
Not a policeman was in sight, and Ben, in great physical disgust, carried the helpless hulk to one side, out of the way of pedestrians, took off the tattered coat and rolled it into a pillow for the head, and then moved on with the sound of the stertorous drunken breathing still in his ears.
Still other experiences were in store for him. He made a half block without further interruption; then he suddenly heard at his back a frightened scream, and a young woman came running toward him, followed at a distance by a roughly dressed man, the latter apparently the worse for liquor. Blair stopped, and the girl coming up, caught him by the arm imploringly.
"Help me, Mister, please!" she pleaded breathlessly. "He—Tom, back there—insulted me. I—" A burst of hysterical tears interrupted the confession.
Meanwhile, seeing the turn events had taken, the pursuer had likewise stopped, and now he hesitated.
"All right," replied Ben. "Go ahead! I'll see that the fellow doesn't trouble you again." And he started back.
But the girl's hand was again upon his arm. "No," she protested, "not that way, please. He's my steady, Tom is, only to-night he's drank too much, and—and—he doesn't realize what he's doing." The grip on his arm tightened as she looked imploringly into his face. "Take me home, please!" A catch was in her voice. "I'm afraid."
Ben hesitated. Even in the half-light the petitioner's face hinted brazenly of cosmetics.
"Where do you live?" he asked shortly.
"Only a little way, less than a block, and it's the direction you're going. Please take me!"
"Very well," said Blair, and they moved on, the girl still clinging to him and sobbing at intervals. Before a dark three-story and basement building, with a decidedly sinister aspect, she stopped and indicated a stairway.
"This is the place."
"All right," responded Ben. "I guess you're safe now. Good-night!"
But she clung to him the tighter. "Come up with me," she insisted. "We're only on the second floor, and I haven't thanked you yet. Really, I'm so grateful! You don't know what it means to be a girl, and—and—" Her feelings got the better of her again, and she paused to wipe her eyes on her sleeve. "My mother will be so thankful too. She'd never forgive me if I didn't bring you up. Please come!" and she led the way up the darkened stair.
Again Ben hesitated. He did not in the least like the situation in which circumstances had placed him. The prospect of the girl's mother, like herself, scattering grateful tears upon him was not alluring; but it seemed the part of a cad to refuse, and at last he followed.
His guide led him up a short flight of stairs and turned to the right, down a dimly lighted hall. The ground-floor of the building was used for store purposes. This second floor was evidently a series of apartments. Lightsfrom within the rooms crept over the curtained transoms. Voices sounded; glasses clinked. A piano banged out ragtime like mad.
At the fourth door the girl stopped. "Thank you so much for coming," she said. "Walk right in," and throwing open the door she fairly shoved the visitor inside.
From out the semi-darkness, Ben now found himself in a well-lighted room, and the change made him blink about him. Instead of the motherly old lady in a frilled cap, whom he had expected to see, he found himself in the company of a half-dozen coatless young men and under-dressed women, lounging in questionable attitudes on chairs and sofas. At his advent they all looked up. A sallow youth who had been operating the piano turned in his seat and the music stopped. Not yet realizing the trick that had been played upon him, Ben turned to look for his guide; but she was nowhere in sight, and the door was closed. His eyes shifted back and met a circle of amused faces, while a burst of mocking laughter broke upon his ears.
Then for the first time he understood, and his face went white with anger. Without a word he started to leave the room. But one of the women was already at his side, her detaining hand upon his sleeve. "No, no, honey!" she said, insinuatingly. "We're all good fellows! Stay awhile!"
Ben shook her off roughly. Her very touch was contaminating. But one of the men had had time to get between him and the door; a sarcastic smile was upon his face as he blocked the way.
"I guess it's on you, old man!" he bantered. "About a half-dozen quarts will do for a starter!" He nodded to a pudgy old woman who was watching interestedly from the background. "You heard the gent's order, mother! Beer, and in a hurry! He looks dry and hot."
Again a gale of laughter broke forth; but Ben took no notice. He made one step forward, until he was within arm's reach of the humorist.
"Step out of my way, please," he said evenly.
Had the man been alone he would have complied, and quickly. No human being with eyes and intelligence could have misread the warning on Ben Blair's countenance. He started to move, when the girl who had first come forward turned the tide.
"Aw, Charley!" she goaded. "Is that all the nerve you've got!" and she laughed ironically.
Instantly the man's face reddened, and he fell back into his first position.
"Sorry I can't oblige you, pal," he said, "but you see it's agin de house. Us blokes has got—"
The sentence was never completed. Ben's fist shot out and caught the speaker fair on the point of his jaw, and he collapsed in his tracks. For a second no one in the room stirred; then before Ben could open the door, the other men were upon him. The women fled screaming to the farthest corner of the room, where they huddled together like sheep. Returning with the tray, the old woman realized an only too familiar condition.
"Gentlemen!" she pleaded. "Gentlemen!"
But no one paid the slightest attention to her. Forcedby sheer odds of mass toward a corner, Ben's long arms were working like flails. Another man fell, and was up again. The first one also was upon his feet now, his face white, and a tiny stream of blood trickling from his bruised jaw. A heavy beer-bottle flung by one of the women crashed on the wall over the countryman's head, the contents spattering over him like rain. One of the men had seized a chair and swung it high, to strike, with murder in his eye. Attracted by the confusion, the other occupants of the floor had rushed into the hall. The door was flung open and instantly blocked with a mass of sinister menacing faces.
Until then, Ben had been silent as death, silent as one who realizes that he is fighting for life against overwhelming odds. Now of a sudden he leaped backward like a great cat, clear of all the others. From his throat there issued a sound, the like of which not one of those who listened had ever heard before, and which fairly lifted their hair—the Indian war-whoop that the man had learned as a boy. With the old instinctive motion, comparable in swiftness to nothing save the passage of light, the cowboy's hands went to his hips, and as swiftly returned with the muzzles of two great revolvers protruding like elongated index fingers. With equal swiftness, his face had undergone a transformation. His jaw was set and his blue eyes flashed like live coals.
"Stand back, little folks!" he ordered, while the twin weapons revolved in circles of reflected flame about his trigger fingers. "You seem to want a show, and you shall have it!" The whirling circles vanished. A deepreport fell upon the silence, and a gaudy vase on the mantle flew into a thousand pieces. "Stand back, people, or you might get hurt!"
Awed into dumb helplessness, the spectators stared with widening eyes; but the spectacle had only begun. Like the reports of giant fire-crackers, only seconds apart, the great revolvers spoke. A nudely suggestive cast in the corner followed the vase. A quaintly carved clock paused in its measure of time, its hands chronicling the minute of interruption. A decanter of whiskey burst spattering over a table. Two bacchanalian pictures on the wall suddenly had yawning wounds in their centre. The portrait of a queen of the footlights leaped into the air. One of the beer-bottles, which the madame had placed on a convenient table, popped as though it were champagne. Fragments of glass and porcelain fell about like hail. The place was lighted by a tuft of three big incandescent globes; and, last of all, one by one, they crashed into atoms, and the room was in total darkness. Then silence fell, startling in contrast to the late confusion, while the pungent odor of burnt gunpowder intruded upon the nostrils.
For a moment there was inaction; then the assembly broke into motion. No thought was there now of retaliation or revenge; only, as at a sudden conflagration or a wreck, of individual safety and escape. The hallway was cleared as if by magic. Within the room the men and women jostled each other in the darkness, or jammed imprecating in the narrow doorway. In a few seconds Ben was alone. Calmly he thrust the empty revolvers backinto his pockets and followed leisurely into the hall. There the dim light revealed an empty space; but here and there a lock turned gratingly, and from more than one room as he passed came the sound of furniture being hastily drawn forward as a barricade.
No human being ever knew what occurred behind the locked door of Ben Blair's room at the hotel that night. Those hours were buried as deep as what took place in his mind during the months intervening between the coming of Florence Baker to the city and his own decision to follow her. By nature a solitary, he fought his battles alone and in silence. That he never once touched his bed, the hotel maids could have testified the next morning. As to the decision that followed those sleepless hours, his own action gave a clue. He had left a call for an early train West, and at daylight a tap sounded on his door, while a voice announced the time.
"Yes," answered the guest; but he did not stir.
In a few minutes the tap was repeated more insistently. "You've only time to make your train if you hurry," warned the voice.
For a moment Blair did not answer. Then he said: "I have decided not to go."