CHAPTER XXIII.
AT ONE O'CLOCK A.M
Clara rose at this and faced her adversary, speaking with intensity no less than his:
"It discredits your boasted intelligence," she said, "to presume so much as to suggest a compromise to me. There can be no middle course. You do not care that I consider you an unspeakable villain, but you must see that you are bound to do one thing or the other. Bring my lover to me, or – it would be idle boasting to say what the alternative would be, but you know that I should never cease to pursue you. In my own way I should certainly circumvent you some day."
"Yes, you would, I believe that; but, Miss Hilman, I decline to accept your first alternative," and he strode toward the door.
"Stop!" she cried, running forward and getting in his way. "I told you this would be your last opportunity to tell me the whole truth. You haven't told me anything yet that I want to know. I meant what I said. I will not have you come here again."
"Nevertheless, we shall meet again, Miss Hilman."
Poubalov now appeared imperturbable. He had confessed to a certain weakness and defeat; in the presence of excitement and insistence he was easily the master of himself and the situation.
Clara realized quickly that she had lost a point by yielding even momentarily to her emotions, and she strove to recover by assuming once more what Poubalov called her logical position.
"You have said that you love me," she said as calmly as possible; "can you ask me to believe that when you deliberately cause me the most cruel grief? Is that consistent? With all your confessed craft, you have a certain half-respectable consistency, for you confess to me at least, how base you are. Will you, then, love and torture me, too?"
The spy became deathly pale for an instant, and then answered:
"We shall see. I have made my confession, and nothing now shall swerve me from accomplishing my purpose in my own way."
"Is there such a thing as love of fair play in you?" asked Clara, her emotions now quelled and every instinct alive once more to fencing with her adversary.
"I suppose not, except in an argument. Even then it might not seem to be fair play to the party who found himself overmatched."
"In your arguments with me you do not treat me with the ordinary fairness of admitting me to a common ground with you. You withhold facts without which I cannot argue as well as I might."
"That, Miss Hilman, is because our contest is over a real issue, not over an abstraction."
"I don't wonder that poor Litizki regarded you as a fiend!"
"Therein you manifest yourself a woman. You long for invective, but your refinement cannot teach you how to use epithets effectively."
"This is the end of talking," said Clara, moving away; "I will not detain you."
Poubalov promptly bowed ceremoniously, bade her good-evening, and left the house.
Paul slipped out after him, and tried his ability at playing "shadow."
Clara was greatly disturbed by her interview with Poubalov, although it had added nothing to her knowledge of the circumstances with which she was blindly battling. She felt like retiring at once, for she was exhausted, but there was a fresh call upon her strength within a few minutes of the spy's departure. This time it was the man whom she knew only by his first name, "Mike," who had been sent from the livery stable to take Ivan to the wedding. He was an uncouth, illiterate young man, the most violent contrast imaginable to her recent visitor, but also the most welcome, for there could be no manner of doubt as to his simple honesty. Clara found it a relief to talk with him apart from the fact that his message was one that stirred her with new hope and stimulated her weary brain to new plans for Ivan's deliverance.
"I was to say to ye," said Mike, "how I'd had me eyes an' more, too, last night, on the feller what did the trick to me wheel."
"Oh, indeed!" exclaimed Clara eagerly; "but what do you mean? Did somebody send you to tell me?"
"Yes'm, me boss. I told me boss about it, an' he says you go to Miss Hilman with that, an' tell her all about it, an', says he, if it's anything that can be useful to her you can do, do it, says he."
"You must thank him for me," said Clara. "Now tell me, please, how and where you saw this man, and what he said. I won't interrupt you."
"It's not me as would like to tell you what he said, miss. He wasn't speakin' to a lady, an' I'm thinkin' a lady wouldn't 'a' give him the cause to curse as I did."
Mike grinned in enjoyment of some retrospect that Clara thought she could imagine, and she smiled and waited patiently for him to tell his story in his own way.
"It was last evenin', miss, at the corner of Dover an' Washington streets. I was done with me work for the day, an' was standin' in a saloon by the bar, havin' a drop of beer by myself, when this loafer came in. He stood alongside o' me an' called for something, I don't mind now what, for I was onto him, an' was thinkin' to meself would I thump him, or would I have an argyment. I was lookin' straight at him, me hand on me beer glass, an' I suppose he noticed me for that, for pretty soon he turns around an' with a kind of a start, 'Hello!' says he.
"Now I don't know what would 'a' happened if he hadn't spoke, for I would 'a' spoke to him, an' it might 'a' been all the same, but I was that mad all of a sudden, that I let the beer fly in his face. With that he jumped on me an' we had a fine fight, till the bartenders came round an' chucked us both into the street. They was a policeman near by, so we quit fightin', an' went to another bar where we had a drink an' got friendly. He was already pretty full, miss, an' I was as sober as I am now, an' after three or four more drinks he got to talkin' confidential about that wheel."
Clara was on the qui vive with anxiety to know just what had occurred between Mike and his acquaintance, while at the same time she felt repugnance to basing any serious efforts upon the words of a drunken man, as well as distrust as to the value of a clew from such a source; but she felt, too, that she could stop at nothing in the emergency that confronted her. So she asked, "What did he say, Michael?"
"First off he was for denyin' that he had anythin' to do with it; but bymeby, seein' as I wasn't mad any more, an' enjoyin' the trick of it himself, he told me he done it, an' I know what became of your man,' says he. 'An' what?' says I. With that, though, he shut up. He winked his eye, an' talked about somethin' else, an' I, not thinkin' or caring very much at the time, didn't ask many questions. But this mornin' I was thinkin' it over, an' wonderin' what became of th' gentleman, an' thinkin' there must be something crooked, or they wouldn't 'a' took me wheel off, an' so I told me boss an' he told me to tell you."
"It was very kind of you both," said Clara grateful, yet fearful that the point of most importance had been lost.
"Was his name Billings?"
"No'm, 'twas Patterson. Him an' me was together for some time after the fight, an' I walked along home with him."
"You know where he lives then?"
"Not exactly, miss, but I could go pretty near to it. You see, we was goin' along Washington Street toward Roxbury, and had come a long way from Dover, when he turns down a side street, an' then another, an' I kep' along for I hadn't anything better to do. He'd been silent for a while, an' suddenly he stops an' says, tryin' hard to brace up. 'You mustn't come any further,' says he. 'Why not?' says I, half minded to give him another lickin', only he was too full. ''Cause me boss says he will – ' but never mind what he said his boss would do. I said I didn't care, an' turned back. He went on, an' then I was minded to see where he went. Of course it was dark, an' I couldn't be certain, but I think I could go straight to that building."
"Will you take me there?" asked Clara.
"Now, miss?"
Clara reflected. Other objections aside, it might be the worst possible policy to move prematurely in the matter. It might be a false clew, she knew nothing about the building, and meantime Paul was following Poubalov. Much as she longed for immediate action, it seemed wiser to postpone it until an investigation could be made.
"Would your employer spare you to help me to-morrow forenoon?" she asked.
"I think he would, miss. He told me to do what you said, says he – "
"Tell him, please, that I would like to have you go with me to-morrow as soon after nine o'clock as you can get here. I shall want you to show me the building, and identify the man Patterson."
"That I will, miss, if he's served you any trick."
Poubalov walked very rapidly after he left Mr. Pembroke's. He could have saved himself many steps by taking a street-car, but he evidently preferred energetic action.
Paul, following, took note, as Litizki had done on a similar occasion, of the streets through which he passed, and at last he saw him pause and stand for several minutes at the curb, looking across the road at what seemed to be an old-fashioned hotel. After a time he walked slowly on, and soon thereafter was joined by a man with whom he conversed.
Paul went near enough to see the man's face, but he did not recognize him as anybody he had ever seen before. The conversation finished, Poubalov continued on his way, again walking rapidly, but this time, after coming to Washington Street, he boarded a downtown car. An open car was directly behind it, and Paul found a place on its front seat, thus being enabled to keep the spy in view until he alighted at Scollay Square.
The guilty as well as the innocent must eat, and supper was the next thing to engage Poubalov's attention. Paul improved the opportunity in the same way, but he finished quickly, and waited a long time for the spy to come forth. He had been watching the restaurant entrance from a doorway across the street, and at last he ventured over to see whether possibly his quarry had escaped him. No; there sat Poubalov, at a table not far from the door, his head bent down as if he were thinking profoundly. His supper lay almost untouched before him. Just as Paul looked in, the head waiter touched the customer on the shoulder.
Poubalov looked up with a start, and the head waiter seemed to be apologizing for his intrusion. It was clear that he had supposed the customer to be asleep, or ill. Poubalov paid his check and left the place.
He went to his lodging-house, and when Paul saw that he had lit the gas, he, too, went inside.
He locked the door immediately and applied his eye to the nail hole.
Poubalov sat with folded arms in an old-fashioned rocking chair, gazing abstractedly before him. On the little center table under the chandelier, Paul could just distinguish Clara's photograph.
Paul remained with his eye at the hole until it seemed as if he could stand no longer. In all that time Poubalov had not moved perceptibly.
The watcher got down and looked at his time-piece. It was half-past ten. He then sat with his head against the door that he might hear the slightest sound from the front room.
Just what possessed Paul to be so vigilant on this occasion, when the spy was doing absolutely nothing but cudgel his inscrutable mind, he could not have told in less vague terms than that he didn't want Poubalov to get away from him. If he were to take a nocturnal, or early morning ramble, Paul purposed to be on hand to accompany him.
Something like a half hour passed, and then Paul heard a long, heavy sigh, and the creak of the rocker as Poubalov rose. Quickly mounting his perch, Paul saw him pace back and forth, his hands clinched behind him and his brow set in hard wrinkles. He seemed to be in for a night of it, and as his movement promised to be productive of nothing more than his quiescence, Paul again dismounted and sat down. So monotonously did the march continue that the listener's head began to droop, lulled by the very sound he had set himself to hear, and had it not been for the extreme anxiety with which he had undertaken his task, Paul would have fallen asleep. After twice catching himself nodding, he no longer dared to sit still. So he rose and stepped lightly about the room to start the blood in his drowsy limbs.
The sound of marching ceased. Poubalov had stopped under the chandelier, and when Paul had him in view he was in the act of turning Clara's photograph face down upon the table. He took out the leather pocketbook that had checked the dagger thrust by Litizki's hand, and examined one of the documents in it attentively. It appeared to be of an official character, for there was a big seal upon it, and it was bound with ribbon. Paul could see the holes made by the dagger in passing through the several folds of the paper, or parchment.
Poubalov laid the document upon the table, sat down, and, drawing fresh paper before him, began to write. His pen traversed the sheets with great rapidity, and as Paul could hear the scratching plainly, he again sought relief from his uncomfortable perch.
It was nearly one o'clock when the sound of writing ceased.
Paul saw that Poubalov had removed his coat. What he had written was folded and placed in an envelope upon the table.
The watcher supposed that the spy was about to retire, but there was so evidently something further upon Poubalov's mind, something that he seemed to debate whether it were best done now, or in the morning, that Paul kept his place and watched; and as he strained his eye to take in every movement, instinctively shading his face although he stood in the darkness, he saw Poubalov draw a revolver from his hip-pocket.
Placing the hammer at half-cock, he tilted the barrel forward and pushed the cartridge cylinder about with his thumb and finger.
Every chamber seemed to be as he wished it, and he readjusted the barrel.
Then he walked to the bureau upon which swung a half-length mirror. His back was thus partially turned to the watcher, and Paul could see dimly the reflection of his face looking somberly toward him. He held the revolver in his right hand, the finger on the trigger, the barrel pointed toward the floor.
Paul was in an agony of doubt and apprehension. What should he do?
How long would Poubalov stand there and allow him to reflect?
Would the spy, then, "get away," and by this manner of exit?
With his left hand Poubalov took his watch from his pocket. He glanced at the face of the busy and faithful little machine, and it was only too evident that he had set the limit of his life at some point that the moving hands would presently reach.
CHAPTER XXIV.
THE NEW CLEW
Frantic with anxiety and dread, Paul followed a sudden impulse and jumped to the floor, ran to the door that opened into the hall, unlocked and opened it and rushed out.
He had a wild idea of bursting in the door of Poubalov's room and wrestling with him if need be to take away the revolver and prevent suicide.
He stopped, startled, just outside his door, for Poubalov stood before him, the light from the chandelier streaming out upon him and showing him erect, alert, his revolver pointed directly at the watcher.
"What is the matter?" asked Poubalov, coolly.
Paul caught his breath and leaned upon the banister.
"I was going out in a hurry and stumbled against a chair," he stammered.
"Strange time of night to do things in a hurry," remarked Poubalov, still aiming his weapon at the young man; "do you belong here?"
"Yes; I moved in yesterday."
Poubalov stood a little aside to let the light fall more fully upon Paul's face.
"Humph!" he said, lowering the revolver; then added, in Russian, "you are Paul Palovna, intimate friend of Ivan Strobel."
"Yes," admitted Paul, in the same language, "I am, and you are his deadly enemy.'
"Bah!" exclaimed Poubalov in profound disgust, "you ought to know better. Come in here – but no! you are in a hurry. Go, then; I will talk to you another time."
"Better now, Poubalov," returned Paul, significantly, "one of us might be missing before another opportunity occurred. I am not so much in a hurry that I cannot listen to you."
"No!" said the spy, decidedly, "go your way, and take this comfort with you, Palovna, that you have done your friend Strobel a service."
He shrugged his shoulders and withdrew into his room and closed the door.
Paul went slowly down the stairs and opened the front door just as the landlady poked her head from her room on the ground floor and inquired in an agitated whisper, "Whatever was the trouble?"
"It is nothing," said Paul, "I stumbled, and the gentleman in the front room mistook me for a burglar, I guess. Sorry I disturbed you."
"It's all right," whispered the landlady, "but I guess he must have scared you some. Your face is as wet as if you'd been out in a rain."
Paul realized then to what a tense degree his nerves had been strained.
Perspiration seemed to be oozing from every pore. His knees felt weak and his head dizzy, but he kept in mind the part he was playing and left the house. However certain it was that Poubalov would infer that Strobel's intimate friend lodged there for the purpose of watching him, it would never do to openly admit the fact by returning immediately to his room.
He went to the corner of Bowdoin Street, and back on the other side to a point directly opposite Poubalov's windows.
As he walked, one deep-toned stroke rang out from a neighboring church tower.
If that was the hour Poubalov had set for putting a bullet into his heart, he had let it pass without taking action.
Paul kept his eyes upon the curtained windows behind which the chandelier light still glowed, and longed to be back at his peephole, watching the spy. Yet there was nothing that he could do if he were there. He had seen the one great incident in Poubalov's career come to its climax upon the awful verge of tragedy; and he felt that as the spy's life trembled in the balance, the weight had been thrown into the scale for prolonging it by his impulsive jump from the chair on which he had been viewing the scene.
Not that Poubalov was hesitating; his was the nerve to pull the trigger with the precision and steadiness of a marksman when the appointed time came; but the shock of irrelevant circumstances had been just what was needed to release the morbid pressure of gloomy contemplation from the brain, and restore it to its normal activity.
Thus Paul reflected, with his eyes upon the lighted windows. A party of roysterers swung into the place, singing discordantly. One of them fell at the corner of Bowdoin Street, and his companions helped him up with drunken jeers and laughter. Paul had turned his head to watch them, and when he looked again at the lodging-house across the way, all the windows were dark. Poubalov had gone to bed.
As faithful as the unfortunate Litizki to his task, Paul sat up all that night. When drowsiness overcame him, he bathed his face and head with water, or walked gently about the room. He smoked all the cigarettes in his possession, for the sake of having something to do, and when his stock was exhausted, he went to a neighboring "all-night" restaurant and bought a handful of cigars. He listened through the hours for any suggestive sound from the front room, but, beyond an occasional deep breath, he heard nothing.
Poubalov slept well.
It was not until the day, reckoning by the light, was well advanced, that the spy rose and dressed. While he was still busy with his toilet, a messenger called and left a note for Paul with word to the scrub-woman who was already at work, that it was to be delivered at once. It was from Clara.
"A new clew," she wrote, "and the most promising one thus far, has been brought to me this evening. I need help in following it to the end. Owing to my uncle's indisposition, I do not feel like even telling him about it, much less asking him to give me his time. Can you come? I know you are doing much, and quite likely taking time that you ought to devote to work, but I ask some further assistance, nevertheless, knowing that it is not necessary for me to plead. This is so important that I believe you can leave Poubalov for a while, no matter what he is doing. Please come by nine o'clock if you possibly can."
Paul had great faith in Clara, although he had not known with sufficient detail of her recent work to give her judgment all the credit that it deserved, and so he found himself in an annoying quandary. To him it seemed essential to follow Poubalov now that he was well in view.
He felt, too, some disappointment at being called away without being able to feel that his night had been spent sleeplessly to some purpose.
It could not be that Clara had discovered anything of great importance compared to the developments that would probably follow a patient tracking of Poubalov's footsteps during the day.
Why hadn't she mentioned what her clew was? No, she depended upon him to obey her implicitly, as if he had no more discretion than Litizki.
If Paul was a bit unreasonable and restive, let it be charged against his fatigue. Few men can keep an even temper when the nerves are unstrung and the whole body cries for rest. Poubalov saved him from the error, if so it was, of disregarding Clara's wishes. It came about in this way:
Paul climbed to his observation perch, to see how matters stood in the next room. Poubalov had opened the envelope containing the papers he had been at work upon during the midnight hour, and was now destroying them, burning them one sheet at a time over the wash-bowl that he had set upon the center table.
He was fully dressed, even to the hat on his head, and Paul carefully replaced the nail which protected his peephole.
He stood by the chair with Clara's letter in his hand, still undecided what course to take, when there was a knock at his door.
He opened, and Poubalov stood there.
"You can spare the time now, I suppose?" he said inquiringly with a grim glance at the valentine hanging from the improvised hook.
Paul saw that his ruse was discovered, but he followed the spy into the front room, his heart beating high with expectation.
"There is never an effect without a cause, young man," remarked Poubalov, motioning Paul to a chair; "the effect was sufficient for me last night, and so far as your act deserves it, you have my thanks. This morning I sought the cause, and of course, I found it. Do not be disturbed. I have no reproaches to make. You imagined yourself at war with me, and you took your own methods to win. There is nothing to complain of in that; but you, as a Russian of intelligence, should have known that I could not be as hostile as you think to an American citizen. Bah! it's not worth discussing! You've all lost your heads.
"What I have to say is this: I am on duty for the czar, and having recovered from my dangerous temptation to be derelict, I shall do what duty demands, without let or hindrance from anybody. I will tolerate no interference, no matter whose fair lips give the command. When that little wretch, Litizki, was in that chair where you are now sitting, I sought to influence him by threats against himself. I don't take that method with you, Paul Palovna. If you choose to do so, you can dog my footsteps from now on, for I presume your American laws will not protect me in my desire to work undisturbed; but bear in mind that I have no more love for Ivan Strobel now than I ever had, and if I see fit to release him, it must be I, Alexander Poubalov, who chooses to do so of his own free will. Do you understand me?"
"Sufficiently to see that you would frighten me from my course by threats against the man whom you have in your power, and whom I am trying to rescue."
"You do well," continued Poubalov; "and if you are in any doubt as to whether I am in earnest, I advise you to report what I have said, and what you saw in this room last night, to Miss Hilman. She will tell you whether I am likely to be gratuitously merciful. Spy upon me, therefore, if you like. I shall know that you defy me, and you will have to bear the consequences. Shall we breakfast together, Paul Palovna?"
Paul ignored the ironical invitation, which was Poubalov's way of saying that he has said his say, and remarked:
"I also have a suggestion to make."
Poubalov raised his brows in contemptuous surprise that anything could be added to his statement of the situation.
"You have spoken of American law," said Paul, "and I simply suggest that the friends of Strobel may to-day resort to law to obtain his freedom. I don't know how much you may have said to Litizki and Miss Hilman, but you have made some damaging admissions to me."
"Really! is that all you can think of? It's hardly worth a reply, but I will suggest in return that what you call my admissions are your own inferences, nothing more. Ask the nearest police captain, or, better, go to the public prosecutor with your imaginings. I will tell you that there isn't a scrap of evidence on which to base my arrest, for that, of course, is what you aim at. You are more of a child than I thought you were, with all your petty contrivances for peeping upon a Russian official. Au revoir, Palovna."
Paul went downstairs in a rage, impressed, as all were whoever came in contact with this remarkable man, with Poubalov's faculty for gaining and keeping a masterful control over the situation. The worst of it was, the spy was probably entirely in the right so far as law was concerned.
As well arrest himself, Palovna, as this foreigner who had shown his interest in the Strobel case in eccentric ways, perhaps, but who could not be charged with criminality, unless possibly by Litizki, and the tailor had himself made it impossible that he should be of any further service.
There seemed to be no course open to him but to respect Clara's wishes, and, accordingly, out to Roxbury he went.
He arrived at Mr. Pembroke's house just before nine o'clock, and found Clara waiting for him, dressed to go out.
They exchanged information while waiting for Mike to come, Clara telling about the discovery of Patterson, and Paul giving a guarded account of Poubalov's contemplated suicide.
He tried to spare Clara the horrors of the scene, but he felt that she ought to know how deeply in earnest Poubalov was, that she might the more correctly judge him and estimate the value of his threats.
"It must have been a dreadful moment," she said when he had finished, "and I am glad that another tragedy has been averted. It is hard to believe that he will go to extreme measures – but what am I saying? What has he not done that is cruel, barbarous and wicked? How can I expect anything but unmixed evil from such a man? I believe it is well that for a time we can appear to withdraw our observations of him."
Mike was late, but when he did come he came with a coupé.
"Me boss said, miss," he explained, "that if there was to be any travelin', you was to ride as far an' as long as you liked, with his compliments."
"Your employer is very kind," said Clara. "This gentleman, Mr. Palovna, will go with me, and if he asks you to do anything, you needn't wait for my consent. We will go straight to the place where you left Patterson. Stop there, and point out the house you think he went into, but don't drive up to it."
When they were in the coupé, Clara continued to Paul:
"I have no definite plan as to Patterson. That must develop when we find him. If he can be cajoled, bribed or frightened into telling us the truth, it must be done. I don't see that we are called upon to make nice discriminations in our methods."
"Any way is fair in dealing with a criminal," returned Paul. "Humph!"
"What is it?" asked Clara, observing that he began to take a lively interest in the street through which they were passing.
"It may be only a coincidence," said Paul, "but it just occurred to me that thus far Mike has taken us over exactly the same course that Poubalov pursued when I followed him last evening."
"I presume it's not a coincidence," responded Clara, and she thought of Litizki's passionate words: "If ever anything is discovered, you discover Poubalov's hand in it."
Step by step the coupé followed Poubalov's line of march, and when it drew up at last, it was at the very corner where Paul had seen the spy talking with the stranger.
Mike got down and opened the door, and as he spoke, Clara looked out in the direction in which he pointed.
"This was where Patterson shook me, miss," he said, "an' I seen him go along down the street an' cross over just below there an' go into a house – that one, I think, with the balcony along the front, the one a gentleman is just comin' out of."
Clara drew back into the coupé hastily. The gentleman coming from the house in question was Poubalov, and he was walking toward them.