The Destroying Angel

by Louis Joseph Vance

  IX

  ENTR'ACTE

  Dawn of Sunday found Whitaker still awake. Alone in his uncheerful hotelbedchamber, his chair tilted back against the wall, he sat smoking andthinking, reviewing again and again every consideration growing out ofhis matrimonial entanglement.

  He turned in at length to the dreamless slumbers of mental exhaustion.

  The morning introduced him to a world of newspapers gone mad andgarrulous with accounts of the sensation of the preceding night. Whatthey told him only confirmed the history of his wife's career asdetailed by the gratuitous Mr. Ember. There was, however, no suggestionin any report that Drummond had not in fact committed suicide--this,despite the total disappearance of the hypothetical corpse. No doubtsseemed to have arisen from the circumstance that there had been,apparently, but a single witness of the _felo de se_. A man, breathlesswith excitement, had run up to the nearest policeman with word of whathe claimed to have seen. In the subsequent confusion he had vanished.And so thoroughly, it seemed, had the mind of New York been prepared forsome fatal accident to this latest lover of Sara Law that no one dreamedof questioning the authenticity of the report.

  Several sensational sheets ran exhaustive resumes, elaboratelyillustrated, of the public life of "The Destroying Angel."

  Some remarked the fact that little or nothing was known of the historyof Sara Law prior to her appearance, under the management of Jules Max,as _Joan Thursday_.

  Whitaker learned that she had refused herself to the reporters whobesieged her residence.

  It seemed to be an unanimous assumption that the news of Drummond'ssuicide had in some manner been conveyed to the woman while on thestage.

  No paper mentioned the name of Whitaker....

  In the course of the forenoon a note for Whitaker was delivered at thehotel.

  The heavy sheet of white paper, stamped with the address inFifty-seventh Street, bore this message in a strong but nervous hand:

  "I rely upon the generosity you promise me. This marriage of ours, that is no marriage, must be dissolved. Please let my attorneys--Landers, Grimshaw & Clark, 149 Broadway--know when and where you will accept service. Forgive me if I seem ungrateful and unfeeling. I am hardly myself. And please do not try to see me now. Some day I hope to see and thank you; to-day--it's impossible. I am going away to forget, if I can.

  "MARY LADISLAS WHITAKER."

  Before nightfall Whitaker had satisfied himself that his wife had, intruth, left her town house. The servants there informed all who inquiredthat they had been told to report and to forward all letters to Messrs.Landers, Grimshaw & Clark.

  Whitaker promptly notified those attorneys that he was ready to beserved at their convenience. He further desired them to inform theirclient that her suit would be uncontested. But beyond their brief andbusiness-like acknowledgment, he heard nothing more of the action fordivorce.

  He sought Max several times without success. When at length run toground in the roulette room of a Forty-fourth Street gambling-house, themanager was grimly reticent. He professed complete ignorance of hisstar's welfare and whereabouts. He advised Whitaker to consult thenewspapers, if his interest was so insatiable.

  Warned by the manager's truculent and suspicious tone that his secretwas, after all, buried no more than skin-deep, Whitaker dissembledartfully his anxiety, and abandoned Max to his pet vices.

  The newspapers reported Sara Law as being in retirement in severalwidely separated sections of the country. She was also said to have goneabroad, sailing incognito by a second-class steamship from Philadelphia.

  The nine-days' wonder disintegrated naturally. The sobriquet of "TheDestroying Angel" disappeared from the newspaper scare-heads. So alsothe name of Drummond. Hugh Morten Whitaker, the dead man come to life,occupied public interest for a brief half-day. By the time that theexecutors of Carter Drummond and the attorneys representing his clientsbegan to make sense of his estate and interests, their discoveriesfailed to command newspaper space.

  This phenomenon was chiefly due to the fact that Whitaker didn't care toraise an outcry about his loss. Ember, it seemed, had guessed shrewdly:Drummond had appropriated to his own uses every dollar of the smallfortune left in his care by his erstwhile partner. No other client ofhis had suffered, however. His peculations had been confined wholly tothe one quarter whence he had had every reason to anticipate neitherprotest nor exposure. In Whitaker's too-magnanimous opinion, the man hadnot been so much a thief as one who yielded to the temptation to convertto his own needs and uses a property against which, it appeared, noother living being cared to enter a claim.

  Whether or not he had ever learned or guessed that Sara Law was the wifeof Whitaker, remained problematic. Whitaker inclined to believe thatDrummond had known--that he had learned the truth from the lips of hisbetrothed wife. But this could not be determined save through her. Andshe kept close hidden.

  The monetary loss was an inconsiderable thing to a man with an interestin mines in the Owen Stanley country. He said nothing. Drummond's nameremained untarnished, save in the knowledge of a few.

  Of these, Martin Ember was one. Whitaker made a point of hunting him up.The retired detective received confirmation of his surmise without anyamazement.

  "You still believe that he's alive?"

  "Implicitly," Ember asserted with conviction.

  "Could you find him, if necessary?"

  "Within a day, I think. Do you wish me to?"

  "I don't know..."

  Ember permitted Whitaker to consider the matter in silence for somemoments. Then, "Do you want advice?" he inquired.

  "Well?"

  "Hunt him down and put him behind the bars," said Ember instantly.

  "What's the good of that?"

  "Your personal safety."

  "How?"

  "Don't you suppose he misses all he's been accustomed to?--living as hedoes in constant terror of being discovered, the life of a hunted thing,one of the under-world, an enemy of society! Don't you suppose he'd beglad to regain all he's lost--business, social position, the esteem ofhis friends, the love of a woman who will soon be free to marry him?"

  "Well?"

  "With you out of the way, he could come back without fear."

  "Oh--preposterous!"

  "_Is_ it?"

  "Drummond's not that sort. He's weak, perhaps, but no criminal."

  "A criminal is the creature of a warped judgment. There'd be nocriminals if every one were able to attain his desires within the law.Misfortunes breed weird maggots in a man's brain. Drummond's draggingout a wretched existence in a world of false perspectives; he's not tobe blamed if he presently begins to see things as they are not."

  Ember permitted another pause to lengthen, unbroken by Whitaker.

  "Shall I try to find him for you?" he asked quietly, in the end.

  "No," Whitaker decided. "No. Let him alone--poor devil!"

  Ember disclaimed further responsibility with a movement of hisshoulders.

  "But my wife? Could you find her as readily?"

  "Possibly," the detective admitted cautiously. "But I don't mean to."

  "Why not?"

  "Because you don't want me to. Do you?"

  "No..."

  "But principally because she doesn't want me to. Otherwise she'd let youknow where to look for her."

  "True."

  These fragments of dialogue are from a conversation that took place inthe month of June, nearly seven weeks after the farewell performance atthe Theatre Max. Interim, Whitaker had quietly resumed his place in thelife of the town, regaining old friendships, renewing old associations.Save for the fact that he pursued no gainful occupation, all with himwas much as it had been: as if the intervening six years of exile hadbeen blotted out, or had never been. The mild excitement occasioned byhis reappearance had already subsided; he was again an accepted andsubstantial factor in the society of his kind.

  He had abandoned all thought of returning to New Guinea, entertained,i
ndeed, no inclination whatever to do so. The life he now led was moreor less normal to him. Yet he was sensible of a growing restlessness. Hehad nothing to busy himself with: this was the unguessed secret of hisunsettled temper. And the approach of hot weather was narrowing thecircle of his acquaintances. People were leaving town daily, for Europe,for the seashore, for the mountains.

  He began to receive invitations for week-ends and longer visits out oftown. A few of the former he accepted--always, however, returning to NewYork with a sense of necessity strong upon his spirit. Something heldhim there, some influence elusive of analysis. He was discontented, butfelt that he could not find content elsewhere.

  Gradually he began to know more hours of loneliness than suited histastes. His rooms--the old rooms overlooking Bryant Park, regained andrefurnished much as they had been six years before--knew his solitarypresence through many a long evening. July came with blistering breath,and he took to the Adirondacks, meaning to be gone a month. Within tendays he was home again, drawn back irresistibly by that strangeinsatiable craving of unformulated desire. Town bored him, yet he couldnot seem to rest away from it.

  He wandered in and out, up and down, an unquiet, irresolute soul,tremendously perplexed....

  There came one dark and sultry night, heavy beneath skies overcast, inAugust. Whitaker left a roof-garden in the middle of a stupidperformance, and walked the streets till long after midnight, courtingthe fatigue that alone could bestow untroubled sleep. On his return, asleepy hall-boy with a wilted collar ran the elevator up to histenth-floor landing and, leaving him fumbling at the lock of his door,dropped clankingly out of sight. Whitaker entered and shut himself inwith the pitch-blackness of his private hall.

  He groped along the wall for the electric switch, and found only theshank of it--the hard-rubber button having disappeared. And then, whilestill he was trying to think how this could have happened, he sustaineda murderous assault.

  A miscalculation on the part of the marauder alone saved him. Theblack-jack (or whatever the weapon was) missing his head by thenarrowest shave, descended upon his left shoulder with numbing force.Notwithstanding his pain and surprise, Whitaker rallied and grappled,thus escaping a second and possibly more deadly blow.

  But his shoulder was almost useless, and the pain of it began to sickenhim, while the man in his grip fought like a devil unchained. He foundhimself wedged back into a corner, brutal fingers digging deep into theflesh round his windpipe. He fought desperately to escape strangulation.Eventually he struggled out of the corner and gave ground through thedoorway into his sitting-room.

  For some minutes the night in that quiet room, high above the city, wasrendered wild and violent with the crashes of overthrown furniture andthe thud and thump of struggling bodies. Then by some accident littleshort of miraculous, Whitaker broke free and plunged across the room inwhat he imagined to be the direction of a dresser in which he kept arevolver. His foot slipped on the hardwood floor, the ankle twisted, andhe fell awkwardly, striking his head against a table-leg with such forcethat he lay half-stunned. An instant later his assailant emptied fivechambers of a revolver into the darkness about him, and then, alarmed bya racket of pounding on the hall door, fled successfully by way of thefire-escape to adjoining roofs and neighbouring back-yards.

  By the time Whitaker was able to pull himself together and hobble to thedoor, a brace of intelligent policemen who had been summoned by thehall-boy were threatening to break it down. Admitted, they took hissafety into their care and, simultaneously, the revolver which heincautiously admitted possessing. Later they departed, obviouslydisgruntled by the unprofessional conduct of the "crook" who had left no"clues," with a warning to the house-holder that he might expect to besummoned to court, as soon as he was able to move, to answer for thecrime of keeping a weapon of defence.

  Whitaker took to his bed in company with a black temper and the aroma ofarnica.

  He entertained, the next day, several persons: reporters; a physician; afutile, superfluous, unornamental creature misleadingly designated aplain-clothes man; finally his friend (by now their acquaintance hadwarmed to real friendship) Ember.

  The retired investigator found Whitaker getting into his clothes: aceremony distinguished by some profanity and numerous grunts.

  "Afternoon," he said, taking a chair and surveying the sufferer withslightly masked amusement. "Having a good time?"

  "You go to thunder!" said Whitaker in disgust.

  "Glad to see you're not hurt much," pursued the other, unabashed.

  Whitaker withered him with a glare. "I suppose it's nothing to have ashoulder and arm black-and-blue to the elbow! a bump on the side of myhead as big as a hard-boiled egg! a bruised throat and an ankle nextdoor to sprained! Oh, no--I'm not much hurt!"

  "You're lucky to be alive," observed Ember, exasperatingly philosophic.

  "A lot you know about it!"

  "I'm a canny little guesser," Ember admitted modestly.

  "Where'd you get your information, then?"

  Ember waved a non-committal hand. "I hear things...."

  "Oh, yes--you know a lot. I suppose you could lay this thug by the heelsin a brace of shakes?"

  "Just about," Ember admitted placidly. "I wouldn't mind trying."

  "Then why don't you?" Whitaker demanded heatedly.

  "I had a notion you wouldn't want me to."

  Whitaker stared aggressively. "You mean ... Drummond?"

  The answer was a nod.

  "I don't believe it."

  "You'll at all events do me the credit to recall that I warned you twomonths ago."

  "All the same, I don't believe it was Drummond."

  "You haven't missed any property, I believe?"

  "No."

  "So presumably the fellow had some motive other than a desire to thieve.Besides, if he'd been on the loot he might much more easily have triedone of the lower floors--and more sensibly."

  "It would seem so," Whitaker admitted sulkily.

  "And that missing switch-button--"

  "What do _you_ know about that?"

  "My sources of information.... It strikes me that a man who took thatmuch trouble to prevent your turning on the light must have been ratheranxious to avoid recognition. I shed the inference for its intrinsicworth, merely."

  "Well...." Whitaker temporized.

  "And I'd like to know what you mean to do."

  "About what?"

  "With the understanding that you're content to leave the case ofburglary and assault to the mercies of the police: what do you mean todo with yourself?"

  "I don't know--hadn't thought."

  "Unless you're hell-bent on sticking around here to get your head bashedin--I venture respectfully to suggest that you consign yourself to mycompetent care."

  "Meaning--?"

  "I've got a bungalow down on Long Island--a one-horse sort of a bacheloraffair--and I'm going to run down there this evening and stay awhile.There's quiet, no society and good swimming. Will you come along and bemy guest until you grow tired of it?"

  Whitaker looked his prospective host over with a calculating, suspiciouseye.

  "I ought to be able to take care of myself," he grumbled childishly.

  "Granted."

  "But I've a great mind to take you up."

  "Sensibly spoken. Can you be ready by three? I'll call with the carthen, if you can."

  "Done with you!" declared Whitaker with a strong sense of relief.

  As a matter of fact, he was far less incredulous of Ember's theory thanhe chose to admit.