Children of the Whirlwind
silence, then it followed that the truth would never be known from any
one. But having so decided, and decided definitely and finally, the
Duchess had proceeded to wonder if she had decided wisely.
Day and night this had been the main subject of her thought. Could she
be wrong in her estimate of Maggie's character, and what she might turn
out to be? Could she be wrong in her belief that, given enough time,
Larry would outgrow his infatuation for Maggie? And since she was in
such doubt about these two points, had she any right, and was it for the
best, to suppress a fact that might so gravely influence both matters?
She did not know. What she wanted was whatever was best for Larry--and
so in her doubt she had determined to talk again to Larry, hoping that
the interview might in some way replace her uncertainty with stability
of purpose.
Presently she returned to the inner room, and in her direct way
and using the fewest possible words, which had created for her her
reputation of a woman who never spoke and who was packed with strange
secrets, she asked Larry what he had done concerning Maggie. He told
her of the plan he had evolved, of Maggie's visit to Cedar Crest, of
his ignorance of Maggie's reactions. To all this his grandmother made
response neither by word nor by change of expression. He then went on to
tell her of what he had just learned from Casey of Barney's maneuvering
his misfortunes.
The old head nodded. “Yes, Barney's just that sort,” she said in her
flat monotone.
And then she came to the purpose of her sending for him. “How do you
feel about Maggie now?”
“The same as before.”
“You love her?”
“Yes--and always will,” he said firmly.
She was silent once more. Then, “What are you going to do next?”
“Break things up between her and Barney and her father. Get her away
from them.”
She asked no further questions. Larry was as settled as a man could
be. But was Maggie worth while?--that was the great question still
unanswered.
“Just what did you want me for, grandmother?” he asked her finally.
“Something which I thought might have developed, but which hasn't.”
And so she let him go away without telling him. And wishing to shape
things for the best for him, she was troubled by the same doubts as
before.
His visit with his grandmother had had no meaning to Larry, since he
had no guess of the struggle going on within that ancient, inscrutable
figure. The visit had for him merely served to fill in a nervous,
useless hour. His rage against Barney had all the while possessed him
too thoroughly for him to give more than the mere surface of his mind
to what had passed between his grandmother and himself. And when he had
left her, his rage at Barney's treachery and his impetuous desire to
snatch Maggie away from her present influences, so stormed within him
that his usually cautious judgment was blown away and recklessness swept
like a gale into control of him.
When he called up the Grantham a second time, at nine o'clock, Maggie's
voice came to him:
“Hello. Who this, please?”
“Mr. Brandon.”
He heard a stilted “Oh!” at the other end of the line “I'm coming right
up to see you,” he said.
“I--I don't think you--”
“I'll be there in then minutes,” Larry interrupted the startled voice
and hung up.
He counted that Maggie, after his sparing her at Cedar Crest, would
receive him and treat him at least no worse than an enemy with whom
there was a half hour's truce. Sure enough, when he rang the bell of her
suite, Maggie herself admitted him to her sitting-room. She was taut and
pale, her look neither friendly nor unfriendly.
“Don't you know the risk you're running,” she whispered when the door
was closed--“coming here like this, in the open?”
“The time has come for risks, Maggie,” he announced.
“But you were safe enough where you were. Why take such risks?”
“For your sake.”
“My sake?”
“To take you away from these people you're tied up with. Take you away
now.”
At an earlier time this would have been a fuse to a detonation of
defiance from her. But now she said nothing at all, and that was
something.
“Since I've come out into the open, everything's going to be in the
open. Listen, Maggie!” The impulse had suddenly come upon him, since
his plan to awaken Maggie by her psychological reactions had apparently
failed, to tell her everything. “Listen, Maggie! I'm going to lay all
my cards on the table, and show you every card I've played. You were
invited to come out to Cedar Crest because I schemed to have you come.
And the reason I schemed to have you invited was, I reasoned that being
received in such a frank, generous, unsuspecting way, by a woman like
Miss Sherwood, would make you sick of what you were doing and you would
drop it of your own accord. But it seems I reasoned wrong.”
“So--you were behind that!” she breathed.
“I was. Though I couldn't have done it if Dick Sherwood hadn't been
honestly infatuated with you. But now I'm through with working under
cover, through with indirect methods. From now on every play's in the
open, and it's straight to the point with everything. So get ready. I'm
going to take you away from Barney and Old Jimmie.”
The mention of these two names had a swift and magical effect upon her.
But instead of arousing belligerency, they aroused an almost frantic
agitation.
“You must leave at once, Larry. Barney and my father were here before
dinner, and they've just telephoned they were coming back!”
“Coming back! That's the best argument you could make for my staying!”
“But, Larry--they both have keys, and Barney always carries a gun!”
“I stay here, unless you leave with me. Listen to some more, Maggie. I
laid all the cards on the table. Do you know the kind of people you're
tied up with? I'll not say anything about your father, for I guess you
know all there is to know. But Barney Palmer! He's the lowest kind of
crook that breathes. There's been a lot of talk about squealers and
police stools. Well, the big squealer, the big stool, is Barney Palmer!”
“I don't believe it!” she cried involuntarily.
“It's true! I've got it straight. Barney wanted to smash me, because I'd
made up my mind to quit the old game and because he wanted to get me
out of his way with you. So he framed it up so that I appeared to be a
squealer, and started the gangmen after me. And he put Barlow up to the
idea of forcing me to be a stool, and then framing me when I refused.
It was Barney who fixed things so I had to go to jail, or be shot up,
or run away. It was Barney Palmer who squealed on Red Hannigan and Jack
Rosenfeldt, and who's been squealing on his other pals. And that's the
sort you're stringing along with!”
She gazed at him in appalled half conviction. He remained silent to let
his truth sink in.
They were standing so, face to face, when a key grated in the outer door
of the little hallway as on the occasion of Larry's first visit here.
And as on that occasion, Maggie sprang swiftly forward and shot home the
bolt of the inner door. Then she turned and caught Larry's arm.
“It's Barney--I told you he was coming!” she whispered. “Oh, why didn't
you go before? Come on!”
She tried to drag him toward her bedroom door, through which she had
once helped him escape. But this time he was not to be moved.
“I stay right here,” he said to her.
There was the sound of a futile effort to turn the lock of the inner
door; then Barney's voice called out: “What's the matter, Maggie? Open
the door.”
Maggie, still clutching Larry's resisting arm, stood gasping in
wide-eyed consternation.
“Open the door for them, Maggie,” Larry whispered.
“I'll not do it!” she whispered back.
“Open it, or I will,” he ordered.
Their gazes held a moment longer while Barney rattled at the lock. Then
slowly, falteringly, her amazed eyes over her shoulder upon him, Maggie
crossed and unlocked the door. Barney entered, Old Jimmie just bend him.
“I say, Maggie, what was the big idea in keeping us--” he was beginning
in a grumbling tone, when he saw Larry just beyond her. His complaint
broke off in mid-breath; he stopped short and his dark face twitched
with his surprise.
“Larry Brainard!” he finally exclaimed. Old Jimmie, suddenly tense,
blinked and said nothing.
“Hello, Barney; hello, Jimmie,” Larry greeted his former allies, putting
on an air of geniality. “Been a long time since we three met. Don't
stand there in the door. Come right in.”
Barney was keen enough to see, though Larry's attitude was careless and
his tone light, that his eyes were bright and hard. Barney moved forward
a couple of paces, alert for anything, and Old Jimmie followed.
Maggie looked on at the three men, her girlish figure taut and hardly
breathing.
“Didn't know you were in New York,” said Barney.
“Well, here I am all right,” returned Larry with his menacing
cheerfulness.
By now Barney had recovered from his first surprise. He felt it time to
assert his supremacy.
“How do you come to be here with Maggie?” he demanded abruptly.
“Happened to catch sight of her on the street to-day. Trailed her here
to the Grantham, and to-night I just dropped in.”
Barney's tone grew more authoritative, more ugly. “We told you long ago
we were through with you. So why did you come here?”
“That's easy answered, Barney. The last time we were all together, you'd
come to take Maggie away. This is that same scene reproduced--only this
time I've come to take Maggie away.”
“What's that?” snapped Barney.
Larry's voice threw off its assumed geniality, and became drivingly
hard. “And to get Maggie to come, I've been telling her the kind of a
bird you are, Barney Palmer! Oh, I've got the straight dope on you! I've
been telling her how you framed me, and were able to frame me because
you are Chief Barlow's stool.”
Barney went as near white as it was possible for him to become, and his
mouth sagged. “What--what--” he stammered.
“I've been telling her that you are the one who really squealed on Red
Hannigan and Jack Rosenfeldt.”
“You're a damned liar!” Barney burst out, and instantly from beneath
his left arm he whipped an automatic which he thrust against Larry's
stomach. “Take that back, damn you, or I'll blow you straight to hell!”
“Barney!--Larry!” interjected Maggie in sickened fright.
“This is nothing to worry over, Maggie,” Larry said. He looked back at
Barney. “Oh, I knew you would flash a gun on me at some stage of the
game. But you're not going to shoot.”
“You'll see, if you don't take that back!”
Larry realized that his hot blood had driven him into an enterprise of
daring, in which only bluff and the playing of his highest cards could
help him through.
“You don't think I was such a fool as to walk into this place without
taking precautions,” he said contemptuously. “You won't shoot, Barney,
because since I knew I might meet you and you'd pull a gun, I had myself
searched by two friends just before I came up here. They'll testify I
was not armed. They know you, and know you so well that they'll be able
to identify the thing in your hand as your gun. So no matter what Maggie
and Jimmie may testify, the verdict will be cold-blooded murder and
the electric chair will be your finish. And that's why I know you won't
shoot. So you might as well put the gun away.”
Barney neither spoke nor moved.
“I've called your bluff, Barney,” Larry said sharply. “Put that gun
away, or I'll take it from you!”
Barney's glare wavered. The pistol sank from its position. With a
lightning-swift motion Larry wrenched it from Barney's hand.
“Guess I'd better have it, after all,” he said, slipping it into a
pocket. “Keep you out of temptation.”
And then in a subdued voice that was steely with menace: “I'm too busy