第4章 CHAPTER II(1)

When the day clerk arrived the night clerk sleepily informed him that the guest in Room 214 was without baggage and had not paid in advance.

"Lave a call?"

"No. I thought I'd put you wise. I didn't notice that the man had no grip until he was in the elevator."

"All right. I'll send the bell-hop captain up with a fake call to see if the man's still there."

When the captain - late of the A.E.F. in France - returned to the office he was mildly excited.

"Gee, there's been a whale of a scrap in Room 212. The chambermaid let me in."

"Murder?" whispered the clerks in unison.

"Murder your granny! Naw! Just a fight between 212 and 214, because both of 'em have flown the roost. But take a peek at what I found on the table."

It was a case of blue velours. The boy threw back the lid dramatically.

"War medals?"

"If they are I never piped 'em before. They ain't French or British." The captain of the bell-boys scratched his head ruminatively. "Gee, I got it! Orders, that's what they all 'em.

Kings pay 'em out Saturdays when the pay roll is nix. Will you pipe the diamonds and rubies? There's your room rents, monseer."

The day clerk, who considered himself a judge, was of the opinion that there were two or three thousand dollars tied up in the stones. It was a police affair. Some ambassador had been robbed, and the Britisher and the Greek or Bulgarian were mixed up in it.

Loot.

"I thought the war was over," said the night clerk.

"The shootin' is over, that's all," said the captain of the bellboys, sagely.

What had happened in Room 212? A duel of wits rather than of physical contact. Hawksley realized instantly that here was the crucial moment. Caught and overpowered, he was lost. If he shouted for help and it came, he was lost. Once the police took a hand in the affair, the newspaper publicity that would follow would result in the total ruin of all his hopes. There was only one chance - to finish this affair outside the hotel, in some fog-dimmed street.

There leaped into his mind, obliquely and queerly, a picture in one of Victor Hugo's tales - Quasimodo. And there he stood, in every particular save the crooked back. And on the top of this came the recollection that he had seen the man before.... The torches! The red torches and the hobnailed boots!

There began an odd game, a dancing match, which the young man led adroitly, always with his thought upon the open window. There would be no shooting; Quasimodo would not want the police either.

Half a dozen times his fingers touched futilely the dancing master's coat. Bank and forth across the room, over the bed, round the stand and chairs. Persistently, as if he understood the young man's manoeuvres, the squat individual kept to the window side of the room.

An inspiration brought the affair to an end. Hawksley snatched up the bedclothes and threw them as the ancient retiarius threw his net.

He managed to win to the lower platform of the fire escape before Quasimodo emerged.

There was a fourteen-foot drop to the street, and the man with the golden stubble on his chin and cheeks swung for a moment to gauge his landing. Quasimodo came after with the agility of an ape.

The race down the street began with about a hundred yards in between.

Down the hill they went, like phantoms. The distance did not widen.