Part 6

Miss O'Reilly! The man of that name was perplexed. The only Miss O'Reilly who, as far as he knew, could possibly call on him, was the last woman he would have expected to do so. He had come to New York largely in the hope of seeing her. She had refused to see him.

"Tell her I'll be down in three minutes," he replied.

"She particularly doesn't want you to come down. She says she has some private news for you, and asks if you'll see her in your own sitting-room."

"All right," he tried to answer calmly. "Have the lady shown up."

He rushed back into his bedroom to wrestle once more with the tie. He must be ready to receive Miss O'Reilly at the door, and his waistcoat and coat were yet to put on. But it could be managed. The suite was on the fifteenth floor, and a full minute's walk from the lift for an old person like Miss O'Reilly. Bungling everything in his haste, he tried to think what it might mean. It looked as if she must have changed her mind, and be ready to sell him her house, the dear old house on which he had set his heart. Perhaps she would demand a higher price than he had offered. Well, he must pay it somehow. Heron would lend him the money--but no, there were reasons why O'Reilly didn't wish to accept favours from Heron, often as they had been pressed upon him. As he slipped into his coat, he heard the expected rap at his sitting-room door, and hurried to open it. A page-boy, acting as guide, had run ahead of the lady, to knock.

"Miss O'Reilly to see Mr. O'Reilly," he announced, with Irish relish of the Irish name. Then he erased himself. O'Reilly stood on the threshold, waiting for the right lady to appear, and meanwhile dodged back from the wrong one, a small, slim flapper in white, who for some reason had paused before his door. She stood quite still, and stared up at him unwinkingly, as a child stares.

"I beg your pardon," O'Reilly said, wanting to laugh. "May I pass? I must look for a lady who----"

"I'm the lady," the creature in white intervened. "That is, I am if you are Mr. O'Reilly."

"O'Reilly's my name," he admitted. "But I was expecting--or--perhaps my cousin sent you?"

"Perhaps I am your cousin," suggested the girl who (Justin saw, now that he looked her deliberately in the face) had the biggest, blackest eyes, and the whitest skin he had ever seen. She had, also, red hair under a fetching hat. Although the child was no beauty, she had an amusing, elfin air.

"Delighted, I'm sure," he felt obliged to answer. "I thought I had only one cousin in the world, Theresa O'Reilly, of Gramercy Park. But----"

"It sounds like the chorus of a song; 'Theresa O'Reilly, of Gramercy Park,'" Clo was unable to resist remarking, with her strongest brogue. "Will you please ask me in?" she said. "My errand's very pressing."

Mechanically the man stepped aside and let her walk into the room. He began to suspect that he had been "spoofed." He did not invite the young person to be seated, but looked at her expectantly. Her first move was to shut the door. She did not speak.

"May I know your name?" he inquired, as they faced each other.

"The same as yours, but for a letter or two," said Clo, marking time. "That's why I may be a cousin; one never knows. I didn't come to talk about the family tree, though, Mr. O'Reilly. I came to beg--not for money, so don't be frightened."

"I'm not conscious of fear," laughed O'Reilly. He couldn't help laughing. He didn't believe the girl's name was the "same as his." "If I'm not afraid, I am curious," he confessed. "What are you going to beg for, if not money? Is this a message from my cousin----?"

Clo ceased suddenly to be impish. She had got into the enemy's fastness by her impishness, but she could go no further on that line. This man, being the exact opposite of the type expected, upset her plan. A big danger was that she might like this O'Reilly instead of hating him, he was so pleasant and gallant-looking, more a protector than a persecutor of women. She might hesitate to cheat or trick him in whatever way came handy, and thus fail the Angel on top of all her boasts. In her hot little heart Clo prayed for the wisdom of the serpent, and as her elfin face took on anxious lines, she became more interesting to O'Reilly. Her white face looked pinched and desperate. "If I were Marat, and she Charlotte Corday," was the thought that jumped into his head, "she would stab me."

"It's a good thing for me you have a cousin, or maybe you wouldn't have let me in. I know now why God gave me the name of Riley. I guess he'll forgive me for borrowing the 'O.' I was obliged to get to you somehow. That was the one way I could think of."

"It was a pretty smart way," O'Reilly flattered her. "But you haven't told me----"

"I will. Only--I think I'll have to sit down. I feel rather--queer----"

"Good lord! You can't faint here!"

"I won't, unless you make me, I'll promise that!" She had her cue now.

"Sit down, for heaven's sake!" said O'Reilly, pulling up the biggest chair in the room. Clo sank into it. Closing her eyes, she drew in a gasping breath which made her girlish bosom heave.

The man stood by, feeling absurdly helpless.

"Shall I ring for brandy?" he suggested.

"No--please!" She opened her great eyes again. "Only listen. I've come from Mrs. Roger Sands--to beg you for those papers of hers."

"Mrs. Roger Sands! Her papers? I know nothing of any papers belonging to Mrs. Roger Sands," O'Reilly exclaimed. "What papers are you talking about?"

"The ones you hired a man to steal when the train got to Chicago."

O'Reilly started. "Whose accusation is that?" he asked sharply.

"Not hers; it's mine."

"Yours! Once again, who are you? What are you in this?"

"I'm nobody! I'm only--a lion's mouse."

O'Reilly did not ask what it meant to be a lion's mouse. He understood. His mind was not less quick than hers.

"And I'm the net you hope to gnaw! Miss Mouse, your little teeth will find me tough. I may say I'm a patent, ungnawable net. The best thing for you is to go home as fast as you can and tell those who sent you----"

"I sent myself," Clo explained, with tired obstinacy. "I told you I had to see you somehow. Oh, Mr. O'Reilly, you don't look the sort of cruel pig I thought you would be. If you dreamed what Mrs. Sands is going through you'd give her back the papers. Don't pretend not to know what I mean."

"I won't pretend anything," O'Reilly said. "I do know what you mean, and I got the documents (which were not the property of Mrs. Sands) more or less as you think I got them. But no mouse, no mastodon could induce me to hand them over to your friend."

Clo's eyes travelled over his person. He looked slim and soldierly in his well-made evening clothes. There could be nothing thicker than a watch, and that a thin one, in his pockets.

"If you would see Mrs. Sands, maybe you'd change your mind," she pleaded, in her creamiest Irish voice. "Take me back to her, and take the papers along. Then, if you----"

"I can't do either," was O'Reilly's ultimatum. "I'll take you downstairs and put you in your car if you've got one, or a taxi if you haven't. But----"

"You'll have to take me home," said Clo. "I won't try to start without you. I've gone through enough. I'll just let myself collapse. I promised not to faint unless you made me. Now you are making me."

"You deserve to be thrown out of the window!"

"I have been, once," the pale girl announced. "It was four storeys up, and all my ribs were smashed. This is my first day out of bed. I thought I could manage it, if you were kind. I'd gladly die for Mrs. Sands. And if I do----"

"Brace up!" O'Reilly cried. "I'll take you home. I know where the house is. I passed it this afternoon. There was a man who----But no matter. Have you got a car below?"

Clo was almost past answering; almost, not quite. But weakness was her "cue," as well as the line of least resistance. Having now an incentive to let herself go rather than "brace up" as O'Reilly urged, she enjoyed collapsing. Yet something within was on guard, and knew that O'Reilly had to be watched.

He dashed to the telephone and ordered a taxi. Then he returned to the girl in the chair. Her eyes were half shut, a rim of white showing between the lashes. The man could not help believing the queer story she had gasped out, about the fall, and the broken ribs, and this being the first day she had left her bed. That would account for her thinness and paleness. He touched her hand, which hung over the arm of the chair. There was no glove on it, and the pathetically small thing was icy cold.

"She's fainted, fast enough," he growled. Clo heard the words dimly, as though she had cotton wool in her ears. Her duty was to trick the man, but she didn't like doing that duty.

O'Reilly gently laid down the tiny paw he had taken in his. It was limp as the hand of a dead girl. Clo would have felt less compunction if he had dropped it roughly. He took a few brisk steps, as though he had come to some decision. She forced herself back from the brink of unconsciousness to realize that he was going toward the door--not the outer door, through which she had entered, but another. He opened this, and Clo saw that beyond was a bedroom. Quickly he went to a table where stood a tall glass jug filled with crushed ice and water. His back was turned to the girl as he began pouring the jug's contents into a tumbler, but suddenly, as if on a strong impulse, he turned. Clo did not even quiver. Something told her that the thing she had prayed for was about to happen.

XI

O'REILLY'S WAISTCOAT POCKET

O'Reilly's first look into the sitting room was not for the girl. Involuntarily, it seemed, he sent a lightning glance to the left, to that side of the room farthest from the big chair where she sat. Clo's desperate need to know what was in his head inspired her with clairvoyance. Consciousness lit her brain once more. She was sure that she had read his thoughts. He feared that after all she was fooling him. He was saying in his mind: "What if she meant me to go and fetch this water while she looks for what she wants to find?"

Now Clo was certain at last, not only of his having the papers, but that they were in the room, somewhere on that left side, where his glance had flashed. It was hard to keep still, without the flicker of an eyelash; but she believed, as O'Reilly came back to her, that she had stood the test of his stare.

He moistened his handkerchief, and gingerly dabbed the girl's forehead. It was a relief to "come to," to be able to start, and draw a long breath.

"There! You're better, aren't you?" he asked.

"Yes," she breathed. "I should like to go home, but I'm afraid----"

"Don't be. I'm going with you," he said. "By this time a taxi's waiting for us. Do you think you can walk if I give you my arm?"

"I'll try," Clo answered, gratefully.

No pretence of weakness was needed. She felt like a rag. O'Reilly took her by the hand, and with an arm round the slim waist raised the girl to her feet. Once up, she swayed as if she might fall, but he held her firmly. "Lean against me," he said, in a kind voice.

She had never before been so near to a man in her life. "You're very good to me," she whispered. "I should like you, please, to remember that I thank you."

"I'm sorry I said you deserved to be thrown out of the window," O'Reilly absolved himself. "Whatever else you may be, you're a good plucked one. Now, here we are at the door. Are you sure you can walk to the elevator? Hang on to my arm."

She hung on to it.

They reached the lift, which came to them in a few seconds, unoccupied save for the youth who ran it. Clodagh kept up bravely until she was seated in the taxi, and could have kept up until the end without too great an effort, for her collapse had made her feel rested. It was not, however, the girl's métier to "keep up." The task was but half accomplished. The hardest part was to come.

She knew--or thought she knew--that O'Reilly had the papers, that they were in New York; not only in New York, but in his private sitting room at the Dietz Hotel. They were in some hiding-place there; and for an instant he had feared her knowledge of its existence. He had expected her to try, while his back was turned, to steal its contents. Clo's nimble brain, deducing all this from what had happened, deduced something else as well. The man would have had no fear if the secret were impossible for an outsider to learn. It could not be impossible. It couldn't even be difficult, if she might have solved the puzzle while his back was turned. For her, O'Reilly's uneasiness was a hopeful sign. Somewhere on the window side of his private parlour at the Dietz the papers which Angel needed were hidden. Each second during the girl's slow progress to the lift, her descent, and her short walk to the taxi, was spent in sorting out these deductions.

Those big black eyes of Clodagh Riley's had not been given her in vain. One swift glance during the cold-water treatment had shown her many details useful to remember. On one side of the window was a desk. In the desk was a drawer, and the key thereof was in the keyhole. It seemed improbable that secret papers should be kept in such a place, but circumstances might have forced O'Reilly to leave them there.

On the other side of the window was a kind of buffet, with glass doors and shelves and a closed cupboard, but Clo had less hope of this than of the desk. There might be a less obvious hiding hole than either, perhaps a sliding panel in the wall. There must in any case be a key, and that key must be on the person of O'Reilly.

She would have to use all her wits to get it while they were together in the taxi! And there was the key of the suite to get also; but that would be easier. She had seen O'Reilly take the big key from a table, as they went by, slipping it into the pocket of his dinner jacket. Forced to support his half-fainting guest, he had not put on an outer coat, so the key was within reach of clever and determined fingers. Clodagh's were determined, and--she hoped--clever.

With this design burning in her head and tingling in her hands, she decided to faint again as they started for home, and keep O'Reilly occupied every inch of the way.

"I'm afraid--I'm not so strong--after all----" she sighed, as the taxi door shut, and proceeded to "flop" like a large rag doll. Her head fell on the man's breast, and rolled across to his left arm, her hat askew.

"I'm very ill," she moaned. "Something hurts so! My hat-pin----" And her voice trailed into silence.

"Poor child!" the man exclaimed, completely taken in at last. The hat-pin was sticking in very deep! Not that she minded a little pain. But the great thing was to keep O'Reilly's hands busy.

Clumsily, obstinately, he fumbled among the meshes of ostrich plume wound around her hat. The head of the pin eluding him there, he tried beneath the brim, his fingers tangling in thick waves of hair. They were soft waves, softer and silkier than the ostrich plume. No man with blood in his veins could have touched them without a thrill. The girl on his breast, her face on his arm, one hand holding her up, another caught in her hair, O'Reilly was conscious of electric shocks.

His hands and attention thus engaged, Clo got the chance she'd waited for. Delicately, stealthily, like the "mouse" she called herself, she extracted the door key from O'Reilly's pocket. So far, so good. But the next deed would try her mettle. Lightly as a flitting shadow the small fingers moved over the man's waistcoat, from the belt line to the breast. She could feel his heart thump, and almost started, but controlled herself.

Clo had noticed that men often wore a short chain or ribbon, attached to a watch, and hanging from the waistcoat pocket with a seal, a society badge or a lucky souvenir. O'Reilly wore no ornament of that sort; but there was a watch, a thin watch which she could feel through the cloth, and some flat object with it. If she could slip a finger into that pocket without his knowing!

But now they were in Park Avenue, not far from the imposing apartment house at the corner, where Mr. and Mrs. Sands lived. Clo availed herself of a slight bump, and showed signs of sliding off the seat. O'Reilly, who had just extracted the hat-pin and stuck it into his coat, steadied her with an effort. Fortunately there was no need to look out and stop the chauffeur. That afternoon O'Reilly had passed the building, informed by Count Lovoresco who lived there, and had looked up with a certain curiosity. He remembered the number, and in leaving the Dietz had been able to give the address.

The taxi stopped, and O'Reilly prepared to carry the fainting girl into the house. She would be a light load. As he got out of the taxi with Clo in his arms a man came forward.

"Won't you let me help you, sir?" he civilly inquired.

"You may run ahead," said O'Reilly. "I can manage the young lady myself."

The man who had offered his services disappeared into the house, and found the porter, a substantial person in livery. Clo conveniently revived when placed on the seat of the lift. O'Reilly sat by her side, supporting the limp body, her hat in his hand, while the porter shot the elevator up to the Sands' floor.

"Lord a'mighty!" the old fellow exclaimed, "if this ain't the poor child that's been an invalid all these weeks! Mrs. Sands will be in a way! Must be near eight weeks since this little gal was brought in on a stretcher, lookin' like dead. She ought to be in bed."

"Somebody should have looked after her," said O'Reilly.

"That's it, sir. Her nurse is out, gaddin'."

"Brute!" Clo heard O'Reilly mutter. And leaning comfortably against his shoulder she felt wicked, treacherous, because she had more than once applied the same epithet to him. Whatever happened, never would she do that again!

The elevator stopped. The porter touched the electric bell at the Sands' door, and almost instantly a manservant appeared. His cry of surprise brought Mrs. Sands herself out from a room at the end of the hall. The porter tried to explain everything; failed; broke off to question O'Reilly; O'Reilly answered; Beverley exclaimed; and among them, all was confusion. Clo, looking through half-shut eyes over her bearer's shoulder, saw a shadow flit between the portières. Had some one come in? If so, who could it be? Or was it only the shadow of a blowing curtain she had seen? The question did not strike her as important just then, for if any one had passed it was doubtless a servant or, at worst, Sister Lake. Besides, Clo had much to think of; how to come back to consciousness quickly without rousing suspicion, and, when officially alive again, how to escape for the next errand.

The rush of air and babble of excited voices gave her an excuse to gasp, and stammer out a conventional "Where am I?"

"We'll get you to your room, dear," said Beverley; and Clo wondered if her acting had deceived Angel. "The butler can----"

"No, thanks, I'll manage her by myself," O'Reilly broke in and carried the white bundle along the hall.

"This is her room," Mrs. Sands explained to him. "If you will put her on the bed...."

"No--please! Take me on into the next room, Sister Lake's room. I must be there. I'll tell you why presently," the girl pleaded.

Beverley threw open the door between the two rooms, hurried ahead, and turned on a light.

"Now, lay me on this bed," Clo commanded.

Having obeyed, O'Reilly stood as if awaiting further orders. Clo glanced from him imploringly to Mrs. Sands. "I've gone through such a lot!" she moaned. "I've suffered so! I felt I could never get home alive. Please, Mr. O'Reilly--you've been kind--don't let it all be for nothing!"

"What do you want of me?" he stiffly inquired.

"Only for you to talk to Mrs. Sands. In that next room--my room. Nobody will disturb you. If the nurse comes back, she'll come into her own room first. That's why I asked you to bring me to it. I couldn't persuade you to give me the papers. Perhaps even Mrs. Sands can't persuade you. But I beg, I pray you, to give her the chance. Listen to what she has to say."

"Very well," he answered, grudgingly. "I'll do what you ask. But I'll do it for your sake."

Beverley had remained on the threshold of the next room. Now she retreated into it. O'Reilly followed; but at the door he turned. "Good-bye," he said to Clo.

"Good-bye," she echoed. "And thank you again--for everything."

She had more to thank him for than he knew--the contents of her tightly clutched hand.

XII

THE HORIZONTAL PANEL

Following Mrs. Sands, O'Reilly left the door between the two rooms open; but Beverley stepped quickly back and closed it.

"She's grand, the darling!" thought Clo. "Trust her to forget nothing. Her shutting that door proves how she counts on me."

The girl was deadly tired, and her head ached, yet she struggled up as the door clicked. O'Reilly had brought in her hat and dropped it on a table. There was no hat-pin, but Clo crushed the soft toque down over her masses of red hair, and hoped she was not untidy enough to be conspicuous. Unsteadily she tottered to another door--the door that led into the corridor. This faced a narrower passage to the kitchen and domestic offices of the flat. Clo would have to take that way because, if she ventured into the lift and showed herself in the hall below, the porter might take alarm. He might fear that Mrs. Sands' protégée was trying to escape for some sly purpose of her own, and refuse to let her go till he had telephoned upstairs.