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Page 23
"Just a fool hunch," he assured himself.
"Why the deuce should I let a confounded Chinaman and a pretty girl get
on my nerves at this stage of the game? If it wasn't for McDowell--"
And there he stopped. He had fought too long at the raw edge of things
to allow himself to be persuaded by delusions, and he confessed that it
was John Keith who was holding him, that in some inexplicable way John
Keith, though officially dead and buried, was mixed up in a mysterious
affair in which Miriam Kirkstone and Shan Tung were the moving factors.
And inasmuch as he was now Derwent Conniston and no longer John Keith,
he took the logical point of arguing that the affair was none of his
business, and that he could go on to the mountains if he pleased. Only
in that direction could he see ice of a sane and perfect thickness, to
carry out the metaphor in his head. He could report indifferently to
McDowell, forget Miss Kirkstone, and disappear from the menace of Shan
Tung's eyes. John Keith, he repeated, would be officially dead, and
being dead, the law would have no further interest in him.
He prodded himself on with this thought as he fumbled his way through
darkness down into town. Miriam Kirkstone in her golden way was
alluring; the mystery that shadowed the big house on the hill was
fascinating to his hunting instincts; he had the desire, growing fast,
to come at grips with Shan Tung. But he had not foreseen these things,
and neither had Conniston foreseen them. They had planned only for the
salvation of John Keith's precious neck, and tonight he had almost
forgotten the existence of that unpleasant reality, the hangman. Truth
settled upon him with depressing effect, and an infinite loneliness
turned his mind again to the mountains of his dreams.
The town was empty of life. Lights glowed here and there through the
mist; now and then a door opened; down near the river a dog howled
forlornly. Everything was shut against him. There were no longer homes
where he might call and be greeted with a cheery "Good evening, Keith.
Glad to see you. Come in out of the wet." He could not even go to
Duggan, his old river friend. He realized now that his old friends were
the very ones he must avoid most carefully to escape self-betrayal.
Friendship no longer existed for him; the town was a desert without an
oasis where he might reclaim some of the things he had lost. Memories
he had treasured gave place to bitter ones. His own townfolk, of all
people, were his readiest enemies, and his loneliness clutched him
tighter, until the air itself seemed thick and difficult to breathe.
For the time Derwent Conniston was utterly submerged in the
overwhelming yearnings of John Keith.
He dropped into a dimly lighted shop to purchase a box of cigars. It
was deserted except for the proprietor. His elbow bumped into a
telephone. He would call up Wallie and tell him to have a good fire
waiting for him, and in the company of that fire he would do a lot of
thinking before getting into communication with McDowell.
It was not Wallie who answered him, and he was about to apologize for
getting the wrong number when the voice at the other end asked,
"Is that you, Conniston?"
It was McDowell. The discovery gave him a distinct shock. What could
the Inspector be doing up at the Shack in his absence? Besides, there
was an imperative demand in the question that shot at him over the
wire. McDowell had half shouted it.
"Yes, it's I," he said rather feebly.
"I'm down-town, stocking up on some cigars. What's the excitement?"
"Don't ask questions but hustle up here," McDowell fired back. "I've
got the surprise of your life waiting for you!"
Keith heard the receiver at the other end go up with a bang. Something
had happened at the Shack, and McDowell was excited. He went out
puzzled. For some reason he was in no great hurry to reach the top of
the hill. He was beginning to expect things to happen--too many
things--and in the stress of the moment he felt the incongruity of the
friendly box of cigars tucked under his arm. The hardest luck he had
ever run up against had never quite killed his sense of humor, and he
chuckled. His fortunes were indeed at a low ebb when he found a bit of
comfort in hugging a box of cigars still closer.
He could see that every room in the Shack was lighted, when he came to
the crest of the slope, but the shades were drawn. He wondered if
Wallie had pulled down the curtains, or if it was a caution on
McDowell's part against possible espionage. Suspicion made him transfer
the box of cigars to his left arm so that his right was free. Somewhere
in the darkness Conniston's voice was urging him, as it had urged him
up in the cabin on the Barren: "Don't walk into a noose. If it comes to
a fight, FIGHT!"
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