The sinister mark
to me like that.... But it was long ago--long ago, I think." She looked
at the upturned face steadily, trying to thread her way back through
the darkness of her mind. "Who was it? There have been so many--so
many faces.... They come and go--in dreams--but they have no names....
They're like scenes in a play. The curtain comes down ... and it's all
dark--all dark----" The beautiful voice trailed off into silence, and
again she dropped her cheek on her hand.
"But, Mary, Mary----" Donald strove, in agony, to regain her attention
by the reiteration of her name.
She roused herself a little, and looked at him again.
"Why do you call me that?" she asked, confusedly. "My name is Rosamond,
Rosamond Curwood."
"I know, dear," he replied, gently. "But you were called Mary on the
stage. Try to remember. Mary Blake. That was the name you used. Can't
you----"
She shook her head, slowly, wearily.
"Don't--don't confuse me," she said. "I can remember that my name is
Rosamond Curwood. It's all I can remember. Don't take that away from
me."
But Donald could not give up. Again and again he tried to call back to
her remembrance something out of the past. But she only shook her head,
blankly, becoming more and more troubled and uncertain, until at last
he dared not go on. With a hopeless gesture he rose to his feet, and
before he had reached the door, she had relapsed into the old position,
her eyes staring absently before her.
In passing, Donald made a sign to Mrs. Shultze, and together they left
the room, softly closing the door upon the sad and apparently hopeless
figure.
Without a word, O'Malley put his kind old hand under Morris's arm, and
realizing the young man's need of physical as well as moral support, he
led him quickly down the stairs, Mrs. Shultze following close behind.
As soon as they reached the ground floor O'Malley said:
"There's just one thing to be done, Mr. Morris, and the quicker,
the better. What we want is a doctor--an alienist"--he felt Donald
wince--"I know it's hard, but it's got to be faced. And you know
there's always hope in a case of this kind. Most of 'em recover sooner
or later, I think. But we want a specialist, the best in town, and I
would suggest----"
"Stevens," Donald interrupted, with eagerness. "I'd rather have John
Stevens than any one else."
"The very man I was thinking of," agreed O'Malley. "There's nobody like
him in the country."
"And he's a personal friend of mine, too," said Donald. "There's hardly
anything we wouldn't do for each other, and----"
"Got a telephone here?" O'Malley turned sharply to Mrs. Shultze, who
had been silently listening.
"Oh, yes, sir. Just at the back of the hall." She pointed, and O'Malley
started toward the instrument which could be dimly seen in the shadow
of the stair.
Donald checked him. "It would be better for me. It's late, but he'll
come for me," he said, and went quickly to the telephone.
While he was talking, Mrs. Shultze came up close to O'Malley, and spoke
in a soft, wheedling voice.
"You won't let Mr. Morris forget that it was me that found Miss Blake
for him, will you?" she said. "A gentleman like him would be sure to be
grateful, I should think. And there's the matter of a week's rent, too.
Of course, there's no hurry about it, now I know who her friends are,
but you'll see he doesn't forget, like an old dear, won't you? I'd hate
to be speaking to him myself, when the poor young man's in such trouble
and all."
"You needn't worry, Mrs. Shultze," said O'Malley, gruffly. "You'll be
paid and paid well, if you're good to the poor young thing upstairs."
"Oh, you can be sure of that, sir," she said, beaming at him. "I'll
treat her's if she was my own dau--sister, I mean. Yes, sir. Anything
that Trudie Shultze can do for her is the same as done. I'll----"
"Stevens is coming right down. He'll be here in a few minutes," said
Donald, advancing quickly from the other end of the hall.
"Won't you gentlemen come into my parlour and wait there?" said Mrs.
Shultze, hospitably. "It's right here handy, on the ground floor."
Donald shook his head and O'Malley declined politely.
"We'll be all right here," he said, motioning to a plush-covered settle
which stood against the wall. "And we won't keep you any longer, Mrs.
Shultze."
He said this pointedly, and the woman, realizing that she had no
further excuse for lingering, only said sweetly, "If you need me, I'll
be right on the job"; and went down the hall, disappearing through a
door at the back.
They were forced to recall her, however, when the doctor came.
"Better have some woman, Don. I hadn't time to get hold of a nurse," he
said. "Better have the woman of the house, especially since the patient
is used to seeing her."
So it was that Mrs. Shultze, as well as Donald and O'Malley,
accompanied the doctor to the top floor. The woman knocked softly and
went in alone. Presently she came back to the door, and beckoned to
Doctor Stevens. Morris and O'Malley remained in the hall. The door was
partly open, and they could hear the doctor's quiet, assured voice
and an occasional low reply. In a little while they heard him speak
quickly to Mrs. Shultze, and both of them came into the hall. The
doctor was frowning, angrily.
"When did she have something to eat?" he asked, sharply, jerking his
head in the direction of the room they had just left. "Speak up, woman.
When did she eat last?"
"I--I don't know." Mrs. Shultze faltered under the doctor's steady
glare. "She isn't boarding here any longer. She just has the room, and
she owes me for that for more'n a week. I never thought----"
"I guess that's the truth, anyway," said Doctor Stevens, angrily. "I
don't believe you ever did before, but for God's sake, think now and
think quick. Have you any bouillon--any milk in the house? The child's
starving. I don't believe she's had a mouthful for days. We'll have to
see about the other trouble later. She must have food now, and quickly.
Don't stand there, woman. Get down to your kitchen as fast as the
Lord'll let you, and bring me milk, some raw eggs, a little sherry or
brandy----"
"My God!" groaned Trudie Shultze. "There ain't been a drop of sherry or
brandy in the house for two months--I got some gin----"
"Get the other things quick," said O'Malley.
"Gin won't do as well as----" With a funny little look he slipped his
hand into a rear pocket. "It's the best, Doctor." The hand came out,
holding a small flask. "I can vouch for it. The best French brandy in
New York."
"Good!" said the doctor, with a little gleam in the eye he turned on
O'Malley. "Now, Don, you go to the nearest restaurant and get----" He
reeled off a list of light and delicate but nourishing edibles. "You
won't need to hurry. She'll do with the egg-nog for an hour at least.
So get 'em good, and take your time."
"All right," said Donald, grateful for the opportunity for action.
"I'll be back as quickly as I can make it. But, John----"
"Yes?"
"Can't we take her out of this beastly hole? Now, at once! I can't bear
to think of her with that hyena of a woman--who left her to starve--to
starve! God! When I think of it----"
"The woman will treat her well if she's paid," said O'Malley. "I can
vouch for that, at least."
"Then pay her! For God's sake, pay her!" cried Donald, pulling a roll
of bills from his pocket and thrusting them into O'Malley's hands.
"Better leave her here, in any case, for to-night, Don," advised Doctor
Stevens, quietly. "I can get her into my sanitarium to-morrow, if you'd
like that." Donald nodded, eagerly. "And I'll get a nurse for her here,
right away, but I think you'd better sweeten up this woman----"
"This'll do it," said O'Malley, peeling off a bill of large
denomination, and handing the rest of the money back to Donald. "This
will do for a starter, with the hope of benefits to follow."
"So go ahead, Don, and don't worry about anything here," said the
doctor, comfortingly. "I'm not going to leave till I see things are
right."
Donald, after a grateful look at John Stevens and O'Malley, and an
anxious, longing glance at the closed door, ran rapidly down the stairs.
* * * * *
When O'Malley reached his comfortable, old-fashioned bachelor quarters,
late that night, there was an almost unacknowledged feeling of
half-amused satisfaction in his mind. The situation was painful enough,
to be sure, and he was full of sympathy for young Morris, but, in spite
of all, there was a certain compensation in the fact that he had put
one over on Pete. While he had not been exactly instrumental in finding
Mary Blake, he had been on the job when she was found--and that was
incontestably comforting to his sporty old heart. He was, therefore,
in a somewhat mixed frame of mind as he undressed, but above all other
considerations one thought was uppermost:
"I'll have news for you, Pete, my lad, when you get back from your
wild-goose chase," he said to himself, as he stooped, ponderously, to
untie his shoes.
And just then the telephone, which was installed in the corner of his
bedroom, rang out loudly in the midnight stillness.
He muttered an impatient word as he kicked off a shoe. "If it's the
wrong number again, I'll give that operator the devil," he thought,
hastily crossing to the telephone.
"Is this Captain James O'Malley?" asked the voice in the instrument,
and at his gruff response it continued, "Telegram for you."
"All right," said O'Malley. "Shoot."
"Got the goods----"
"What!" cried O'Malley. "Repeat that, please."
"'Got--the--goods'----" the voice reiterated, with bored distinctness.
"'Meet us, Penn. Station, Saturday, eleven-forty-five from Chicago. Say
nothing yet to D. M.' Signed 'Pete.' Got that?"
"Penn. Station, eleven-forty-five from Chicago, Saturday," repeated
O'Malley, slowly. "Yes. I've got it. Thanks."
He hung up the receiver. "Saturday--that's the day after to-morrow," he
considered, and sat down heavily on a chair.
"Us, meet _us_----"
"Now, what in hell has Pete turned up?" he went on, wonderingly, half
aloud. "What--in--hell----"
CHAPTER XXVIII
DONALD MORRIS UNDERSTANDS
It chanced that O'Malley had little difficulty in following Peter's
instructions in regard to Donald Morris, for they had but a few
minutes' private conversation together during the next day, and
O'Malley cleverly filled the time by reporting Peter's discovery of the
Italian, Angelo Russo, in Miss Blake's apartment, and the subsequent
confession, which practically explained the condition in which the
apartment was found.
Donald listened to the recital with little of the interest he would
have felt two days before. His whole mind was occupied with the
discovery they had made on the previous night, and his heart was wrung
by the fact that, though Doctor Stevens had reported his patient to be
physically much improved, she still insisted that she knew no other
name than Rosamond Curwood, had no memory whatever of the past, and
showed not the slightest sign of recognition when Donald approached her.
As early in the morning as possible she was removed to Doctor Stevens's
private sanitarium. She accepted, quietly and unquestioningly, all the
arrangements which were made for her comfort, and appeared grateful
for the consideration shown her, to a certain extent, but it was all
evidently like a dream to her, and her manner remained absent and
listless.
All that day and the morning of the next Donald spent in the
sanitarium, or at his home in Gramercy Park, within reach of the
telephone, hoping, longing for news, but none came.
At two o'clock on Saturday, as he was rising from an untasted luncheon,