Hannan made his bet five dollars again. The pot fell to myself. When I raked it in and joined it to the pile already lying between us, it suddenly struck me that indeed, even if the stakes had been even, we could not have helped cleaning Howard out since we were playing together. Only the most extraordinary run of luck could have given
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Howard any winnings at all. As it was, he was bound to be bankrupt within half an hour. I could not understand that Howard did not see through the trick, especially since we left the money lying open on the table and did not disguise the fact that we threw our winnings together. Mostly, it is true, for the next ten or fifteen minutes, Howard was the winner. But his winnings in each pot amounted to two, ten, or at most twenty dollars; whereas what he lost, was never less than a hundred, and often it was a thousand dollars a throw.
The alertness and alacrity with which he had begun the game had left him now. Repeatedly he had his glass refilled. Repeatedly he sank into something like stupor. At last Hannan had to touch him on the shoulder when it came his turn to bet. He started up as from a dream.
"Sure," he said, "sure;" and he reached for his roll on the table. It had by this time dwindled down to a few meagre bills. He grumbled. Then, as if awaking, he opened and closed his eyes rapidly two or three times, and a heavy scowl settled between his brows. He shot a glance at our joint pile. I expected some kind of trouble. But he merely hissed a scarcely audible remark, reached into his hip-pocket, apparently with great exertion, pulled another roll out, counted off ten bills, slowly and carefully, and threw them down. To my bewilderment they were ten thousand-dollar bills, I took the remainder of my money out of my pocket. It amounted to just sixty dollars.
Hannan saw my predicament and, with the slightest motion of his hand, pushed the pile of money which lay between us towards me. I took four tens and matched the bet. I thought I saw Howard shoot a glance at the hand which picked out the four bills from our common winnings. I was not quite sure of it, but the mere suspicion sent misgivings of some impending disaster through my spine.
When the coins fell, Howard bent forward and watched his chance more eagerly than he had done so far.
The pot went to Hannan.
Howard laughed. "Gol-darn it," he said; and suddenly
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he did not seem the least bit drunk. "You've done it, boys. You've cleaned me out. All but the fare back home. Well, 'scuse me a moment." With a heavy motion he got up and left the room.
As soon as he was gone, Hannan turned to me. "Well," he said quickly, "we'll put that wad in the safe of the Prince George; all but what is your own, of course. There must be twenty thousand here. Some crop! How much is yours?"
All misgivings were dispelled by these words.
"Two hundred and fifty-five," I said, and Hannan began to count.
That very moment I pricked my ears, for I heard distinctly that out in the bar-room a monotonous voice had begun to call my name. The voice came nearer. I could now hear and understand it beyond the possibility of a doubt. "Phone-call-for-Mr.-Branden! . . . Phone-call-for-Mr.-Branden-from-the-Prince-George!"
I jumped up; yet I hesitated. Who should call me? Who knew me? How could the people at the hotel have guessed where I might be?
"Phone for you?" asked Hannan.
"Seems so," I said, "but I cannot imagine."
"Better answer it," said Hannan; "but take your money."
He held out a number of notes among which I recognized two hundred-dollar bills. I grabbed them, crammed them into my pocket, and rushed out. A uniformed boy was just beginning to sing out again. At sight of myself he broke off.
"You Mr. Branden?" he asked.
"Yes."
"This way, sir." And he led the way through the crowd to one of the telephone-booths.
He held the door open and closed it when I had entered; I picked the dangling receiver up.
"Hello," I said.
Pause. Then, "Hello."
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"This is Mr. Branden; who is speaking?"
"Central."
"Hello," I said. "The Prince George was calling me, I hear. You've cut us off, it seems."
"Prince George? You want the Prince George?"
"If you please."
A moment later the connection was made. No call had come from the hotel.
A vague uneasiness took hold of me. But it did not matter. Once more I felt for my money. The money was there. I left the booth and tried to find the room in which we had been sitting. All the rooms seemed empty. I did not know exactly where to look for ours. Then I suddenly caught sight of my hat on the hat-tree of the very room into which I was looking. There was the table, too, with the glasses and the half-empty bottle. But neither Hannan nor Howard were there. I felt uneasy again but could see no cause for alarm. Probably they had simply left the room for a moment and would presently return. I had my money. I entered and sat down.
The waiter opened the door. When he saw me, he stepped back with a muttered apology. But before he could close the door, I sang out, "If you please, waiter."
"Yassir," he said and reentered.
"These gentlemen gone?" I enquired with a motion of my hand towards the empty chairs.
"Yassir," he repeated obsequiously; not a motion in his coffee-coloured face betrayed the slightest interest.
"Oh," I said, surprised and exceedingly puzzled. Then I rallied. I pulled out my money.
"Young gentleman paid the check," said the waiter. "Him as you called Mr. Hannan, sir."
I was still more puzzled. What was the game? Something was wrong; but what?
"Any message?" I asked.
"Nossir."
"Look here, waiter," I said in a confidential tone, handing him a dollar-bill which he took with a "Thank-
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you, sir," but without a smile, his face the picture of unfathomable sorrow.
"Look here," I repeated, "do you know either one of the men?"
"Nossir," he said very promptly and, so it seemed to me, a little too promptly, "never saw either one before."
This I knew to be a lie; the way in which he had led us to the prIvate room had too clearly betrayed that he knew Howard at least. I thought of the fact that Hannan, like myself, was stopping at the Prince George. I shrugged my shoulders.
"Very well," I said.
"Anything else, sir?" he asked.
"No, thanks." And I rose to go.
At the office of the hotel I asked for the number of Mr. Hannan's room. No Mr. Hannan was registered there.
I went upstairs, profoundly puzzled. I believe I walked the floor for the greater part of the night; and when at last I went to bed, I could not sleep.
There must have been some trick; but I simply could not find in what it consisted. All those points on which suspicion was based came back to me: the unmistakable fact that Howard was known to the coloured waiter at Stanley's, who yet denied all knowledge of him; the incomprehensible stupidity of Howard's in submitting to a silly mulcting trick like ours; his undoubted soberness at the beginning of the game; the sharp look from the corner
of his eye when I began to draw my betting money from the common fund; the fact that the game had automatically stopped exactly when my money was gone; the fabricated telephone-call at exactly the right moment; the disappearance of the two accomplices (for, that they were accomplices in some scheme, I had now no doubt) in the deceit practised by Hannan with regard to his stopping-place -- all these things convinced me that I had been the victim of an elaborately laid plan. There were too many suspicious things, there was too astonishing a concurrence of trifles to admit of their being taken for mere coincidence.
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What was the scheme? What was its purpose? I had my money. I took it out and counted it over, only to find the amount correct. Even the drinks had been paid for. Where did I come in? If I had somehow been cheated, well and good; I could have taken my loss and gone to bed and to sleep and accepted the thing as a lesson. As it was, the very mystery of it was tantalizing.
Suddenly a thought struck me, and the whole matter presented itself in a new aspect. I had been sitting in a crooked game! My intentions had been honest. But does the end justify the means? The fact remained that I had taken part in a conspiracy to take a man's money from him. I felt defiled. The rest of the night I spent in violent self-reproaches. I vowed never to make up with a stranger again. I wished to bury myself, to find a prIvate room and to accept any kind of work -- that of a waiter, if necessary -- immediately. I began to wish that I had been cheated, that I had lost my money. I preferred being the victim to having placed myself in a position where I might possibly have been the victimizer. And suddenly a still more disquieting thought arose, still more disquieting, because it seemed to carry conviction. It seemed to explain to my heated imagination all the puzzling features of the evening; and those that it did not explain I had no longer any eye for.
What if Howard had really been bled? What, if Hannan alone was the crook? The fact that the telephone call had come when Howard had left the room, seemed to speak against it. But, might not Hannan have "planted" that boy who had been paging me? Might not Hannan have grabbed the money and made off before Howard returned? Might not Howard, thinking that I had fled with him, have started in hot pursuit of the robbers, sobered as he no doubt had been by that time? If that was the right explanation, no matter how guileless my intention had been, I was Hannan's accomplice or at least an accessory to the fact. Who would believe me innocent?
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From that moment on I expected the police. It would have been a relief to see them enter and to be arrested. But no one came. I believe that was the most terrible night I have lived through in all my years.
Dawn broke. I got ready to leave the hotel, locked my baggage, and went to roam the streets in search of a room.
It was much too early, of course. The houses were still closed. But I walked about, went down to the ferries on the North River, back to the East-River, down to Battery Park and back again to Madison Square.
Then I started to scan the houses for "rooms-to-let" signs. I inspected only two rooms; one was eight, the other five dollars a week. Both seemed too high in price, but in order to get settled I engaged the latter, paid a week's rent in advance, and returned to the hotel to have my breakfast.
When I had made arrangements about my baggage, I crossed over to the cashier's desk, threw down a hundred-dollar bill, and asked for my account. There was some delay. It seemed to take an unconscionable time to settle my bill. The cashier, with my money in his hand, stepped back and used the telephone before attending to my change. Two other men sauntered over and stood beside me, apparently also waiting for the clerk's leisure.
"Just a moment," said the cashier to me; and he looked at the other two men with what seemed to be a questioning glance.
One of them nodded.
The cashier left his cage through a door in the rear.
I became impatient. Ten minutes went by.
Then the cashier stepped briskly back into his cage.
A fourth man had joined the group in front of the wicket.
The cashier, whose serious, yes, severe manner struck me, handed my bill, which he still held between his fingers, through the wicket to this fourth man who was pushing forward and looked at me without a word.
The same moment I felt a hand closing over my wrist,
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and a quiet voice spoke into my ear. "You are arrested. Don't try any monkey business. Just walk alongside of me, and nobody will be the wiser. If you resist, I'll have to put the billies on you. These two are the house detectives."
I smiled. "I'll follow you, sir," I said quietly, although my knees shook and my heart pounded as if it were going to burst. "I expected you. I am glad you came."
"All right, come along."
We went through the lobby of the hotel as if we were two guests lounging about. At the curb stood a waiting cab.
"Mulberry," said my captor to the driver.
We got in, and the cab rolled off.
For a while the detective sat in silence. I looked at him. His face was intelligent, Frank, kindly. He was thirty-five years old; his hair, brown; his eyes, grey.
I smiled. "I'm glad this came at last," I repeated.
He looked at me with a frown. "Better not say too much," he warned without a responsive smile. "Whatever you say, may be used against you. Your words imply a confession. Wait till you've got a lawyer."
I laughed. "I don't want a lawyer," I replied. "The case is clear enough. All I want to do is tell the truth and take what is coming to me for my foolishness."
I could see that his sternness relaxed. "Well," he said, "you may not feel like that after a while. Ever been up before?"
"What do you mean?" I asked, somewhat alarmed.
"Ever been in jail before?"
"No."
"Ever done anything like this before?"
"No."
"Did you know?" he asked with sudden sharpness.
"Know what?"
"That this is phony?" He raised the hundred-dollar bill.
The scales fell from my eyes. So that had been the
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game! I felt immensely relieved. It was not half so bad as I had feared. I laughed with relief till tears choked my laughter.
"No," I said at last, "but thank the Lord if it is, I thought it was much worse. I've got more of that stuff here," and I took the remaining bills and handed them to the detective. "The worst of it is that I have already paid out one bill which probably also is counterfeit, to pay a week's rent for a room."
"Well," the detective said, "if you didn't know and can prove it, they can't do anything to you. But your story has got to be straight."
"My story," I replied, "is straight enough. I want to make a confession. It's lucky that I was the victim and not the crook. I was afraid that I was the crook, or at least one of them. That's why I was glad when you came."
"We'll be at the station in a minute or two," he said. "All this sounds queer. But tell a straight story, and you'll be all right."
We reached the Central Police Station; I was searched, my papers were taken from me; and I was locked up in a cell behind iron-bars.
There was an occupant in the cell already; and as soon as the keeper disappeared, this man, a rather flamboyant youth with a red necktie and shifty eyes, began a nervous conversation, questioning me as to the charge on which I had been arrested, and telling me that he was wanted for forgery and embezzlement; he was "in for it"; they "had the goods on him."
About half an hour later I became aware of a stir and commotion running through the huge establishment.
"The cap's arrived," my companion volunteered. "Now we'll be up one after another. But they won't fetch you before the afternoon."
I did not reply and resigned myself to waiting.
But it was not more than ten minutes later before the keeper appeared again. He unlocked the barred doors, nodded to me, and said "Chief wants you."
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My companion emitted a whistle of surprise; I stepped out.
A detective in uniform took charge of me; I followed him through a long corridor of cells from behind the barred doors of which many human eyes looked after us like those of so many caged animals. We went down a flight of stone-steps and through a second corridor similar to the one upstairs.
We stopped at a door where another policeman stood on guard. Words were whispered; the guard disappeared through the door. A minute or so later the door opened again, and I felt myself pushed forward into the room beyond.
This room resembled any ordinary office in a large and prosperous business house. Over against the window to the left stood a large, flat-topped desk at which a portly, middle-aged, clean-shaven, and distinguished-looking man was apparently reading a paper. But he shot a sharp, enquiring look at me from behind his gold-rimmed spectacles. At the window stood, looking out, the detective who had arrested me. In front of the right-hand window sat a young lady, pencil in hand, holding a pad of paper on a small table. At her elbow stood a typewriter. Between desk and door I noticed an unoccupied chair.
The captain raised his head and looked at me. After the slightest hesitation he nodded dismissal to my escort and waved his hand towards the unoccupied chair.
"Sit down," he said. "Mr. Mulligan here tells me you have a story to tell. What is your name? . . . Age? . . . Date of birth? . . . Place of birth? . . . Ah, you are a recent immigrant? . . . Well, let us have your story, please."
I told the story as clearly and as truthfully as I could. Repeatedly the captain nodded and smiled in the course of my recital. Mr. Mulligan, though ostensibly looking out of the window, lent a sharp ear. The young lady wrote rapidly in shorthand.
When I had finished telling about my worries during
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the night and about the relief I had felt on finding that, as far as I could see, I was the only one victimized, the captain swung around in his chair and said with a smile to Mr. Mulligan, "Han the Hook, of course, and Big Heinie."
"Of course," Mr. Mulligan agreed.
"Better give the word," the captain went on, "at the roll-call, that they are in town again."
"I'm sorry," I said, "and to tell the truth, I'm mad that my foolishness has got me into this trouble."
"Oh," the captain laughed, "they've got those who should know better than you can be expected to. As for trouble, you are in America. A little inconvenience, of course; we must ask you to give us the chance to verify some of your statements. When you are dismissed, we must require you to keep us posted as to your address. We might need you to identify the pair, that is all. Too bad you lost your money."
"Oh," I replied, infinitely relieved, "that part of it is nothing. So long as I don't need to reproach myself . . ."
The captain exchanged a look with Mr. Mulligan. "Well, no, Mr. Branden," he said with a smile, rising, "you don't need to do that. It may even turn out that you have been of service to us. I don't think we'll detain you at all. As I said, keep us posted with regard to your address. Mr. Mulligan will attend to you. You are discharged."
He shook hands with me before I left the office in charge of the plain-clothes man who had apprehended me.