Part 7

"Dere, Marse Warren. I went widout po'k chops an' chicken all de way to Noo York jest to lay in supplies while I was waitin' betwixt trains at Lueyville! I 'lowed you all 'd be too wrapped up in yoh troubles ter bother about dis, an' I recomembered dis here Noo York Sullivan Law w'ich makes it a crime fer a decent citerzen ter carry a gun, so dat the burglars kin work in peace. Take it, Marse Warren, an' plant every seed in de right place!"

The tears came into the eyes of the Kentuckian.

"Rusty, you're a jewel!"

"Yassir, in a ebony settin'! But, now, please git back to dat club place, an' wait fer Jim Marcum. Dat man's mind was on his bizness when I seen him in de smokin' cyar, an' he ain't thinkin' of nothin' else!"

They strolled down toward the club again. Warren gave a few parting directions and handed Rusty a roll of bills for emergency.

"Remember, Rusty, when you hear from me by any message at all, you're to come at once,--I'll just mention my first name. I'm registered at the Belmont as John Kelly of New Orleans--I couldn't hide my Southern accent. Tell them you're my valet, and show the key--I can trust you to get up to the room. If I call for you, pay the bill from that change, and don't let the grass grow under those number twelves!"

Rusty smirked happily.

"Hallelujah, Marse Warren, you'se jokin' agin--de fightin' blood of de Jarvises is bilin'--I knows de signs. Why, Marse Warren, I recollects yoh father when...."

But his master's face changed.

"Not now, Rusty. I'm thinking too much about my father. No more talk for either of us. Just action."

He turned into the side street toward the Export Club. Rusty--fresh from Kentucky psychology--doffed his cap and disappeared as Warren entered the Grecian portal.

Inside the clubhouse he found a letter awaiting him. It was scrawled in the bold, ungrammared style which might have been expected. He read it standing tensely by the doorway, as dozens of men walked in and out, little dreaming of the tragedy attached to that casual fragment of white note-paper. It was written on the stationery of the Hotel Manhattan--diagonally across the street from the hostelry where Warren had inadvertently registered for his brief stay in the city.

He read the words again and again.

"DEAR JARVIS; export Club, new York.

am visiting in New York and would like to see you and call off our kwarrel youre fathers death was misunderstandin and were last of our families will be at Above hotel all evenin and tomorrow come Around when you get chance and shake hands i Will prove I aint meant no harm.

Friend JIM MARCUM."

The Kentuckian crumpled the note in his hand, and then walked toward the fireplace of the grill. It had been weeks since any logs had been burned there, but the flakes of soot still clung to the stone casement. Warren struck a match, and a curious smile illumined his face as he ignited the paper, holding its flaming fabric between his fingers until the last half-inch had burned. He dropped the tiny fragment after lighting his cigar with its flame.

One of his friends, a Brazilian coffee merchant, addressed him in the native tongue, which Warren spoke as fluently as English.

"Ah, señor, you care not for your letter?"

"Oh, it's just a little invitation to a party to-night," laughed Jarvis of Kentucky. "If anyone found it on my person, he might think I kept late hours and associated with bad company. Let us have a drink to our friendship in the club, for I may take a long journey to-night, and never see you again!"

III

IN THE ROYAL SUITE

A beautiful young woman stirred uneasily in the early slumber of the evening. Eleven floors below her, in the foyer of the Hotel Manhattan, the after-theater crowd of visitors thronged and buzzed happily. But the girl, after an unusual day of anxiety in a strange land, was ill at ease, with fitful dreams.

The Paris clock of her Highness delicately struck two musical notes upon the chimes, to indicate the half-hour; at the same instant, as though by echo and vehement confirmation, two revolver shots resounded in the corridor.

The girl shuddered as she opened her large dark eyes, sitting bolt upright in bed. She heard a slamming of doors, a growing hubbub in the usually decorous hallway outside, and her feminine curiosity almost conquered the aristocratic reserve, to impel her to rise and discover the origin of the hubbub.

She was spared the trouble, for suddenly the door of her boudoir received a vigorous thump. The lock crashed and it swung open, admitting the rays of a red electric lamp in the corridor outside. The portal swung shut with even greater promptitude, as a dark body leaped over the threshold.

"Madre de Dios!" she screamed. Then, after a gasp, "Who's there!"

The intruder backed against the door, working with the top bolt, which was still intact. She could see the vague outline by the dim glow of the moonlight which streamed into her room.