One Wonderful Night: A Romance of New York
and the two ran to the door. Now, the weather had been mild during the
afternoon, and the revolving shutters of the doorway were folded back
to allow of the overheated hall being cooled. A porter stood there,
and it was ascertained afterwards that, noticing a certain air of
flurry and confusion about the foreigners, he asked if they wanted a
taxi. They gave no heed, but continued to gaze up and down the street,
as though they awaited someone. Equally did they seem to expect, or
dread, an apparition from the hotel. It would have been hard to pick
out, at that instant, two persons more singularly ill at ease in all
New York.
Curtis saw that the clerk, now at his desk, was engaged with a lady, so
he strolled to the door, being rather interested in the excited antics
of the pair on the sidewalk. He had just passed through the door when
an automobile dashed up, and he fancied, though he could not be quite
sure in the half-light, that the chauffeur nodded to the waiting men.
The porter opened the door of the automobile, and a young man in
evening dress, and carrying an overcoat, leaped out. Obviously, he was
in a desperate hurry, and Curtis heard him say in French:
"Don't stop the engine, Anatole. I shall be but one moment."
At that instant the two foreigners sprang at him. One, swinging the
porter off his feet, seized the newcomer's right arm, and, helped by
his comrade, endeavored to force him back into the vehicle. The effort
failed, however, so the second desperado drew a knife and plunged it
deliberately into the unfortunate man's neck. It was a fearsome
stroke, intended both to silence and to kill, and, with a gurgling cry,
its victim collapsed in the grip of his assailants.
Curtis, though almost stupefied by the suddenness of the crime, did not
hesitate a second when he caught the venomous gleam of the knife.
Throwing aside his coat, he rushed forward, but he had to cross the
whole width of the pavement, and the murderers, realizing that the
capture of one or both was imminent, thrust the inert body in his way.
The chauffeur, who must have seen all that happened, had already
started the car, the two men scrambled into it, and all that Curtis
could do was to run after it and shout frantically to the driver of a
taxi coming in the opposite direction to turn his vehicle and block the
roadway.
The man understood, but was naturally slow to risk a sharp collision
merely at the order of an excited gentleman in evening dress. He
stopped quickly enough, but, by the time his help was available,
pursuit was hopeless; the one thing Curtis could do he had done--while
running up the street he had deciphered the number of the car, X24-305.
Before Curtis rejoined the dazed hall-porter a small crowd had
gathered, and it was difficult to get near the body lying on the curb.
A man picked up an overcoat, and Curtis, cool and clear-headed now,
took it, and appealed to him, if he knew where the nearest doctor
lived, to run thither at top speed. The man obeyed him instantly.
"Meanwhile, let me see to the poor fellow," he said. "I am not a
doctor, but I know enough about wounds to say whether those scoundrels
have killed him or not."
The throng yielded to an authoritative voice, and some of the more
sensible bystanders formed a ring, thus securing a semblance of light
and air around the prostrate man. Curtis struck a match, and it needed
no second glance to learn that the stranger's lung had been pierced by
an almost vertical thrust; indeed, he was already dying. The poor
lips, from which blood and froth were bubbling, strove vainly to
articulate words which, in the prevalent hubbub of alarm and
excitement, it was impossible to distinguish. A policeman came, and,
as a traffic station for the precinct happened to lie within a couple
of doors, the moribund form was carried in, and placed on a stretcher
kept there for use in emergency.
A doctor was soon on the spot, but he arrived just in time to record
the last flicker of life in the tortured eyes. Then, as one in a
dream, Curtis gave the policeman the details of the crime, the name of
the chauffeur, and the number of the car, his testimony being borne out
to some extent by the hall-porter, and, so far as the car was
concerned, by the sharp-eyed driver of the taxi. His own name and
address were taken, and a police captain and a couple of detectives,
called to the scene by telephone, thanked him for his alertness in
securing valuable clews, not only in regard to the car and chauffeur
but also in describing the features, figure, and dress of one of the
criminals.
Finally, he was warned to hold himself in readiness to attend the
opening of an inquest on the following morning, and the police
intimated that they did not desire the presence of witnesses while the
dead man's clothing was being scrutinized.
So Curtis went out into the street, and, with no other purpose than to
avoid the publicity and questioning of the crowd gathered in and around
the hotel, sauntered into Broadway. At the corner he halted for a
moment to put on the overcoat. He had gone some few yards up the
brilliantly illuminated thoroughfare when he fancied that his nervous
system needed the tonic of a cigar, and he searched in the pockets of
the overcoat for a box of matches he had placed there before leaving
his bedroom. The box had gone, but in the right-hand pocket his
fingers closed on a long, narrow envelope, made of stiff linen paper,
which somehow seemed unfamiliar. He drew it out, and examined it,
standing in front of a well-lighted shop window.
Then he whistled with sheer amazement, as well he might. The envelope
held a marriage license for two people named Jean de Courtois and
Hermione Beauregard Grandison. . . . In a word, he was wearing the
dead man's overcoat, and the fearsome conviction leaped to his brain
that the dead man must be Jean de Courtois.
CHAPTER II
EIGHT O'CLOCK
From one aspect, Curtis's sense of dread and horror was merely
altruistic, the natural welling forth of the springs of human
sentiment. If the man now lying stark and lifeless in that dreary
official bureau had in truth been hurrying on his way to a marriage
feast, then, indeed, tragedy had assumed its grimmest aspect that night
in New York. But, beyond an enforced personal contact with a ghastly
crime, Curtis had no vital interest in its victim, and it should have
occurred to him, as a law-abiding citizen, that his instant duty was to
communicate this new discovery to the authorities. Nay more, such
definite information would help the police materially in their pursuit
of the murderers. It might lay bare a motive, put the bloodhounds of
the law on a well-marked trail, and render impossible the escape of the
guilty ones.
That was the sane, level-headed, man-of-the-world view, and, to one
inured to deeds of violence in a land where the Foreign Devil oft-time
holds his life as scarce worth an hour's purchase, no other solution of
the problem should have presented itself. But, for all his strength of
character, Curtis had been breathing an intoxicating atmosphere ever
since he set foot on American soil. His home-coming had begun by
producing in his soul a subtle exaltation which had survived a
conspiracy of repression. Devar's careless acceptance of the city's
grandeur had jarred; the exuberance of the joyous throng on the jetty
had touched dormant chords of sad memories; even at the very portals of
the hotel the building's newness had struck a bizarre note; and now, as
though to emphasize the vile crime of which he had been an involuntary
witness, came the stifling knowledge that somewhere in New York an
expectant bride was chafing at delay--a delay caused by an assassin's
dagger, while there was not lacking even the tormenting suspicion that
somehow, had he been more wide-awake, he could have prevented that
malignant thrust.
Yet, his head remained in the clouds. In common with most men whose
lot is cast in climes far removed from civilization, Curtis worshiped
an ideal of womanhood which was rather that of a poet than of the
blase, cynical town-dweller. He had seen death too often to be shocked
by its harsh visage, and, perhaps in protest against the idle belief
that the crime was preventable, his sympathies were absorbed now by the
vision of some fair girl waiting vainly for the bridegroom who would
never come. His analytical mind fastened instantly on the theory that
murder had been done to prevent a marriage. He took it for granted
that the Jean de Courtois of the marriage certificate was dead, and his
heart grieved for the hapless young woman whose aristocratic name was
blazoned on that same document. So, instead of retracing his steps,
and warning the officers of the law, he bent his brows over the
certificate, and, in acting thus, unconsciously committed himself to as
fantastic a course as ever was followed by mortal man.
It is only fair to urge that had he known the truth, had the veil been
lifted ever so slightly on other happenings in the Central Hotel that
night, he would not have hesitated a moment about returning to the
conclave of policemen and detectives. He acted impulsively, absurdly,
almost insanely, it may be held, but he did honestly act in good faith,
and that is the best and the worst that can be said of him, or for him.
And now to peer over his shoulder at the printed form and its written
interlineations, which he was perusing with anxious, thoughtful eyes.
It was headed "State of New York, County of New York, City of New
York," and bade all men know that any person authorized by law to
perform marriage ceremonies within the State was thereby "authorized
and empowered to solemnize the rites of matrimony between Jean de
Courtois, a citizen of the French Republic, now residing in the Central
Hotel, West 27th Street, New York, and Hermione Beauregard Grandison, a
citizen of Great Britain, now residing at 1000 West 59th Street, New
York."
It had been issued that very day, November 8th. Annexed to the license
was the actual marriage certificate, with blanks for names and dates,
to be filled in by the person performing the ceremony. A set of
printed rules, reciting various duties, legal obligations, and
penalties for infringing the same, was also inclosed; but Curtis was in
no mood to master the provisions of "An Act to Amend the Domestic
Relations Law, by providing for Marriage Licenses," for they must
perforce be silent on the one topic wherein he needed guidance--the
course to be pursued in the circumstances now facing him.
His thoughts were focussed on the name and address of the girl who had
been so cruelly, so wantonly, bereft of her lover, and it seemed to him
both fitting and charitable that someone other than a police sergeant
or detective should interpose between the grim tragedy of 27th Street
and the even more poignant horror which was fated to descend on some
house in 59th Street. Apparently, fate had decreed that he should be
the messenger charged with this sad errand, and, with a singular
disregard of consequences, he accepted the mandate.
He did not act blindly. When all was said and done, the certificate
had come into his possession by unavoidable chance. At the hapless
bride's residence he would surely be able to meet someone who could
accompany him to the police office, and give the details needed for a
successful chase. Indeed, he argued that he was saving valuable time
by his prompt action, and, reviewing the whole of the facts while being
carried swiftly up Broadway in a taxi, he found, at first, no flaw in
his judgment.
Though busy in mind with the extraordinary events of the past quarter
of an hour, his alert eyes missed few features of the abounding life of