Читать книгу Ambition's Slave - Fred M. White - Страница 15

Table of Contents

DENTON could do no more than stand there waiting for Alice to speak again. That some new and overwhelming trouble had come upon her he could see from the expression on her face. He had never seen the poor girl hopeless before. But now the white drawn despair of those features touched him to the heart. The broad gleaming band from the electric standard close by shone into Alice's eyes as if they were deep pools. The dumb, patient misery of them moved Denton to something like anger.

"You ought not to be here at all," he said in low, tense tones. "What is a beautiful refined creature like you doing in this vile atmosphere? Alice, I can't work properly for thinking of you. Even you cannot touch pitch without being defiled. It must be horrible."

Alice shuddered. How horrible she only knew. A drunken ruffian staggered by with foul words upon his lips. A mad impulse to spring upon the brute and strike him to the ground was checked by Denton. After all, that would only make matters worse. Alice had forgotten her husband just for a minute. She was pure in mind and thought, but she loved this man, and he loved her, and both of them knew it.

"A little place in the country," Denton urged. "A cottage where at least you could breathe fresh air and enjoy God's blessed sunshine. I could get you plenty of work to do. And here you are in some fresh and terrible trouble that—"

The words recalled Alice to herself. She started forward.

"I cannot listen," she said. "I dare not. There is another trouble; yes. And I have to do something from which my soul recoils. If I dared ask you!"

Alice's pale face flamed. Denton would have done anything for her.

"What is it?" he asked eagerly. "Only tell me. Anything in the world for you!"

Alice stammered out an explanation. She wanted brandy and cigars. The latter she could get without any great inconvenience, but the former could only come from one of the great glittering palaces that seemed to breed and flourish like noxious blossoms in the foul miasma of a low neighbourhood. She had never entered one of these places as yet.

"You are ill!" Denton cried. "It is for yourself?"

"It is not!" Alice cried. "Oh, please do not ask me, indeed you must not. Get me a quantity, a large bottleful, so that I may be spared the humility again—and again. See, here is a sovereign. I am ashamed to ask you, but—"

The girl could say no more. Just for a moment Denton stared at the glittering coin in Alice's little pink palm. Whence had that sovereign come? Such a sum was wealth to the girl. And why did she want so large a quantity of spirit? But the pleading misery in the poor girl's eyes robbed Denton of his suspicions.

"Wait here," he said. "I shall not be long."

There was a place close by, where he had been many times before in search of copy. He asked for a bottle of brandy, which was handed to him with a wink.

"Four and nine to you, sir," the landlord said in a fat whisper. "Got something on, eh? See anybody here you recognize? Down the counter, drinking champagne!"

Denton looked in the indicated direction. A man in evening dress stood with a small crowd about him drinking champagne.

"So he's out again!" Denton said thoughtfully.

"And as large as ever," the landlord replied in the same oily whisper. "Better not let him see you, sir. He's got a dangerous gang with him, and he's had too much to drink."

Denton nodded and withdrew, deeming discretion to be the better part of valour. There were a good many reasons why he did not want to encounter the man in evening dress at present, and Alice was waiting for him.

"How can I thank you?" Alice said. "I could not have gone there myself."

"But why should you go at all?" Denton urged. "If this is an errand of charity, if you are providing for some poor fellow out of your own slender means—"

"But I am not. The money is not my own. Oh, I wish I could tell you. There is—"

Alice paused. A wild, red flush spread over her face. Denton thought that he understood.

"You are in the meshes," he said. "That man has dragged you down, and you cannot escape. If it is some vile confederate of his who is hiding—"

"Oh, no, no! I would not permit that. Harvey, it is the man himself!"

Alice glanced round fearfully, as if afraid that the walls might hear her. She felt a strange sense of relief now that she had told the truth.

"Impossible!" Denton said. "Why he is—he is—"

"He was. Now he is up in my room. It is all like some evil dream. There was a footstep and a sound. Then I looked up and there he was."

"My poor girl!" Denton groaned. "As if your punishment was not enough already! You will have to bear it now, to put up with it for a time. One comfort you have, it cannot be for long. He will try something desperate and get caught, the police will discover where he is. Alice—"

But the girl had gone. She felt that she could stay there no longer without bursting into tears. One good and true friend remained to her, but she had not even thanked him. Hardly knowing what to do next, Denton stood irresolute on the edge of the pavement. He was a man who hated to be beaten, but he had to confess that he was baffled and beaten now.

"I won't go away yet," he told himself. "Something tells me that she will want me again. Did ever a poor girl pay so terrible a price for mistaking a scoundrel for an honest man before? I ought to tell the police where the fellow has got to."

A quarter of an hour passed, and Denton was still standing there, heedless of the flight of time. A loud burst of laughter smote on his ears, a little way down the road some man was parting with a little knot of companions. Then he separated from them and came swaggering towards Denton. His light overcoat was open, displaying his evening dress beneath. Denton crossed the road as he recognized the newcomer for the man he had seen in the Bay Horse.

The man passed him now, and, paused before the block of buildings where Alice had her small abode. He merely looked at the number over the porch and strode in. A sudden inspiration came upon Denton, and he followed. There were many people passing up and down the corridor leading into Alice's room. Before it the swaggering stranger knocked, and then, without hesitation, walked in. Denton had more than he wanted to know for the present.