When he won out to the open air of the street his brow was wet and his hands were trembling. There had been a fierce battle in the upper room, and he had come out of it a victor, though only in the strength of a glimpse into the heart of a woman—a glimpse vouchsafed to him in the thick of the struggle. With every wile and weapon she possessed she had fought to make him stay; and but for the saving glimpse which had shown him what her real object was, he might have yielded.
“Poor little lost soul!” he muttered, as he turned his steps toward the better-lighted cross street. “Reddick didn’t strain the truth when he said she had heroine stuff in her. She knew if she could make me stay, there would be no more talk of marriage; and it was for me that she wanted to kill that chance—not for herself. What a hell of a world this is, anyway!”
XXV
It was in the forenoon following the Englishman’s staging of an imitative attempt to “shoot up the town” that Reddick spent an earnest hour trying to find Bromley, and finally ran across him as he was coming out of the Colorado National Bank.
“Been hunting high and low for you,” said the redheaded one. “There is the devil to pay and no pitch hot. Have you seen Phil this morning?”
“No,” said the play-boy.
“Well, I have. One of our county officials is sending his family east, and I went up to the court house this morning to take him the tickets. While I was there, Phil came in and went through some sort of business at the counter. He didn’t see me; and after he was gone, I was curious enough to go and pry. He is taking the big jump, Harry—the one that will smother him for life! His business at the court house was to take out a marriage license for himself and ‘Little Irish’ Connaghey!”
“And who is the Connaghey?”
“She is a girl in Madam Blanche’s. Phil was asking me about her the other day. I told him the truth; that she was one of the straightest of the lot—for whatever that was worth. I thought he might be wanting to help her in some way, but I hadn’t the remotest idea he was thinking of making a complete fool of himself.”
“Where did Phil go after he left the court house?”