Children of the Whirlwind

by Leroy Scott

  CHAPTER XX

  Larry's new problem was the most difficult and delicate dilemma of hislife--this divided loyalty: to balk Maggie and the two men behindher without revealing the truth about Maggie to Dick, to protect Dickwithout betraying Maggie. It certainly was a trying, baffling situation.

  He had no such foolish idea that he could change Maggie by exposingher. At best he would merely render her incapable of continuing thisparticular course; he would increase her bitterness and hostility tohim. Anyhow, according to the remnants of his old code, that wouldn't beplaying fair--particularly after her aiding his escape when he had beentrapped.

  Upon only one point was he clear, and on this he became more settledwith every hour: whatever he did he must do with the idea of afundamental awakening in Maggie. Merely to foil her in this one schemewould be to solve the lesser part of his problem; Maggie would be leftunchanged, or if changed at all the change would be toward a greaterhardness, and his major problem would be made more difficult ofsolution.

  He considered many ways. He thought of seeing Maggie again, and oncemore appealing to her. That he vetoed, not because of the danger tohimself, but because he knew Maggie would not see him; and if he againdid break in upon her unexpectedly, in her obstinate pride she wouldheed nothing he said. He thought of seeing Barney and Old Jimmie andsomehow so throwing the fear of God into that pair that they wouldwithdraw Maggie from the present enterprise; but even if he succeededin so hazardous an undertaking, again Maggie would be left unchanged.He thought of showing Miss Sherwood the hidden portrait of Maggie, oftelling her all and asking her aid; but this he also vetoed, for itseemed a betrayal of Maggie.

  He kept going back to one plan: not a plan exactly, but the idea uponwhich the right plan might be based. If only he could adroitly, with hishand remaining unseen, place Maggie in a situation where circumstanceswould appeal conqueringly to her best self, to her latent sense ofhonor--that was the idea! But cudgel his brain as he would, Larry couldnot just then develop a working plan whose foundation was that idea.

  But even if Larry had had a brilliant plan it would hardly have beenpossible for him to have devoted himself to its execution, for two daysafter his visit to Maggie at the Grantham, the Sherwoods moved out totheir summer place some forty miles from the city on the North Shore ofLong Island; and Larry was so occupied with routine duties pertainingto this migration that at the moment he had time for little else. CedarCrest was individual yet typical of the better class of Long Islandsummer residences. It was a long white building of many piazzas and manywings, set on a bluff looking over the Sound, with a broad stretch ofsilken lawn, and about it gardens in their June glory, and behind thehouse a couple of hundred acres of scrub pine.

  On the following day, according to a plan that had been worked outbetween Larry and Miss Sherwood, Joe Ellison appeared at Cedar Crestand was given the assistant gardener's cottage which stood apart onthe bluff some three hundred yards east of the house. He was a tall,slightly bent, white-haired man, apparently once a man of physicalstrength and dominance of character and with the outer markings of agentleman, but now seemingly a mere shadow of the forceful man of hisprime. As a matter of fact, Joe Ellison had barely escaped that greatestof prison scourges, tuberculosis.

  The roses were given over to his care. For a few brief years during theheight of his prosperity he had owned a small place in New Jersey andduring that period had seemingly been the country gentleman. Flowers hadbeen his hobby; so that now he could have had no work which would havemore suited him than this guardianship of the roses. For himself hedesired no better thing than to spend what remained of his life in thissunlit privacy and communion with growing things.

  He gripped Larry's hand when they were first alone in the littlecottage. "Thanks, Larry; I'll not forget this," he said. He said littleelse. He did not refer to his prison life, or what had gone before it.He had never asked Larry, even while in prison together, about Larry'sprevious activities and associates; and he asked no questions now.Apparently it was the desire of this silent man to have the bones of hisown past remain buried, and to leave undisturbed the graves of others'mistakes.

  A retiring, unobtrusive figure, he settled quickly to his work. Heseemed content, even happy; and at times there was a far-away, exultantlook in his gray eyes. Miss Sherwood caught this on several occasions;it puzzled her, and she spoke of it to Larry. Larry understood what laybehind Joe's bearing, and since the thing had never been told to him asa secret he retold that portion of Joe's history he had recited to theDuchess: of a child who had been brought up among honorable people,protected from the knowledge that her father was a convict--a child Joenever expected to see and did not even know how to find.

  Joe Ellison became a figure that moved Miss Sherwood deeply: content tobusy himself in his earthly obscurity, ever dreaming and gloating overhis one great sustaining thought--that he had given his child the bestchance which circumstances permitted; that he had removed himself fromhis child's life; that some unknown where out in the world his childwas growing to maturity among clean, wholesome people; that he neverexpected to make himself known to his child. The situation also movedLarry profoundly whenever he looked at his old friend, merging into akindly fellowship with the earth.

  But while busy with new affairs at Cedar Crest, Larry was all the whilethinking of Maggie, and particularly of his own dilemma regarding Maggieand Dick. But the right plan still refused to take form in his brain.However, one important detail occurred to him which required immediateattention. If his procedure in regard to Hunt's pictures succeeded indrawing the painter from his hermitage, nothing was more likely thanthat Hunt unexpectedly would happen upon Maggie in the company of DickSherwood. That might be a catastrophe to Larry's unformed plan; it hadto be forestalled if possible. Such a matter could not be handled in aletter, with the police opening all mail coming to the Duchess's house.So once more he decided upon a secret visit to the Duchess's house. Hefigured that such a visit would be comparatively without risk, since thepolice and Barney Palmer and the gangsters Barney had put upon his trailall still believed him somewhere in the West.

  Accordingly, a few nights after they had settled at Cedar Crest, hemotored into New York in a roadster Miss Sherwood had placed at hisdisposal, and after the necessary precautions he entered Hunt's studio.The room was dismantled, and Hunt sat among his packed belongingssmoking his pipe.

  "Well, young fellow," growled Hunt after they had shaken hands, "you seeyou've driven me from my happy home."

  "Then Mr. Graham has been to see you?"

  "Yes. And he put up to me your suggestion about a private exhibition.And I fell for it. And I've got to go back among the people I usedto know. And wear good clothes and put on a set of standardized goodmanners. Hell!"

  "You don't like it?"

  "I suppose, if the exhibition is a go, I'll like grinning at the bunchthat thought I couldn't paint. You bet I'll like that! You, youngfellow--I suppose you're here to gloat over me and to try to collectyour five thousand."

  "I never gloat over doing such an easy job as that was. And I'm not hereto collect my bet. As far as money is concerned, I'm here to give yousome." And he handed Hunt the check made out to "cash" which Mr. Grahamhad sent him for the Italian mother.

  "Better keep that on account of what I owe you," advised Hunt.

  "I'd rather you'd hold it for me. And better still, I'd rather call thebet off in favor of a new bargain."

  "What's the new proposition for swindling me?"

  "You need a business nursemaid. What commission do you pay dealers?"

  "Been paying those burglars forty per cent."

  "That's too much for doing nothing. Here's my proposition. Give me tenper cent to act as your personal agent, and I'll guarantee that yourtotal percentage for commissions will be less than at present, and thatyour prices will be doubled. Of course I can't do much while the policeand others are so darned interested in me, so if you accept we'll justdate the agreement from the time I'm cleared."


  "You're on, son--and we'll just date the agreement from the presentmoment, A.D." Again Hunt gripped Larry's hand. "You're all to the good,Larry--and I'm not giving you half enough."

  That provided Larry with the opening he had desired. "You can make it upto me."

  "How?"

  "By helping me out with a proposition of my own. To come straight to thepoint, it's Maggie."

  "Maggie?"

  "I guess you know how I feel there. She's got a wrong set of ideas, andshe's fixed in them--and you know how high-spirited she is. She's out inthe world now, trying to put something crooked over which she thinks isbig. I know what it is. I want to stop her, and change her. That's mybig aim--to change her. The only way I can at this moment stop whatshe is now doing is by exposing her. And mighty few people with a wrongtwist are ever set right by merely being exposed."

  "I guess you're right there, Larry."

  "What I want is a chance to try another method on Maggie. If she'shandled right I think she may turn out a very different person from whatshe seems to be--something that may surprise both of us."

  Hunt nodded. "That was why I painted her picture. Since I first saw herI've been interested in how she was going to come out. She might becomeanything. But where do I fit in?"

  "She's flying in high company. It occurred to me that, when you got backto your own world, you might meet her, and in your surprise you mightspeak to her in a manner which would be equivalent in its effect to anintentional exposure. I wanted to put you on your guard and to ask youto treat her as a stranger."

  "That's promised. I won't know her."

  "Don't promise till you know the rest."

  "What else is there to know?"

  "Who the sucker is they're trying to trim." Larry regarded the othersteadily. "You know him. He's Dick Sherwood."

  "Dick Sherwood!" exploded Hunt. "Are you sure about that?"

  "I was with Maggie the other night when Dick came to have supper withher; he didn't see me. Besides, Dick has told me about her."

  "How did they ever get hold of Dick?"

  "Dick's the easiest kind of fish for two such smooth men as Barney andOld Jimmie when they've got a clever, good-looking girl as bait, andwhen they know how to use her. He's generous, easily impressed, thinkshe is a wise man of the world and is really very gullible."

  "Have they got him hooked?"

  "Hard and fast. It won't be his fault if they don't land him."

  The painter gazed at Larry with a hard look. Then he demanded abruptly:

  "Show Miss Sherwood that picture of Maggie I painted?"

  "No. I had my reasons."

  "What you going to do with it?"

  "Keep it, and pay you your top price for it when I've got the money."

  "H'm! Told Miss Sherwood what's doing about Dick?"

  "No."

  "Why not?"

  "I thought of doing it, then I decided against it. For the same reasonI just gave you--that it might lead to exposure, and that exposure woulddefeat my plans."

  "You seem to be forgetting that your plan leaves Dick in danger. Dickdeserves some consideration."

  "And I'm giving it to him," argued Larry. "I'm thinking of him as muchas of Maggie. Or almost as much. His sister and friends have pulled himout of a lot of scrapes. He's not a bit wiser or better for that kindof help. And it's not going to do him any good whatever to have some onestep in and take care of him again. He's been a good friend to me, buthe's a dear fool. I want to handle this so he'll get a jolt that willwaken him up--make him take his responsibilities more seriously--makehim able to take care of himself."

  "Huh!" grunted Hunt. "You've certainly picked out a few man-sized jobsfor yourself: to make a success of the straight life for yourself--tocome out ahead of the police and your old pals--to make Maggie love theTen Commandments--to put me across--to make Dick into a level-headedcitizen. Any other little item you'd like to take on?"

  Larry ignored the irony of the question. "Some of those things I'm goingto do," he said confidently. "And any I see I'm going to fail in, I'llget warning to the people involved. But to come back to your promise:are you willing to give your promise now that you know all the facts?"

  Hunt pulled for a long moment at his pipe. Then he said almost gruffly:

  "I guess you've guessed that Isabel Sherwood is about the most importantperson in the world to me?"

  That was the nearest Hunt had ever come to telling that he loved MissSherwood. Larry nodded.

  "I'm in bad there already. Suppose your foot slips and everything aboutDick goes wrong. What'll be my situation when she learns I've known allalong and have just stood by quietly and let things happen? See whatI'll be letting myself in for?"

  "I do," said Larry, his spirits sinking. "And of course I can understandyour decision not to give your promise."

  "Who said I wouldn't give my promise?" demanded Hunt. "Of course Igive my promise! All I said was that the weather bureau of my bad toepredicts that there's likely to be a storm because of this--and I wantyou to use your brain, son, I want you to use your brain!"

  He upreared his big, shag-haired figure and gripped Larry's hand."You're all right, Larry--and here's wishing you luck! Now get to hellout of here before Gavegan and Casey drop in for a cup of tea, or yourold friends begin target practice with their hip artillery. I want alittle quiet in which to finish my packing.

  "And say, son," he added, as he pushed Larry through the door, "don'tfall dead at the sight of me when you see me next, for I'm likely to bewalking around inside all the finery and vanity of Fifth Avenue."