From Now On

by Frank L. Packard

It was silent in the house—only the silence began to pound and throb, and become a world of riot and dismay, and make confused noises of its own. Crouched against the wall, Dave Henderson raised his hand to his forehead—and drew his hand away damp with beads of moisture. There was an overmastering rage, a tigerish ferocity upon him; but his brain, most curiously, was deadly cold in its composure, and was working now swift as lightning flashes, keen, alert, shrewd, active. The words he had just heard meant—murder. His murder! The very callousness of the words but lent a hideous sincerity to them. Also he knew Baldy Vickers—if any further proof was needed. Baldy Vickers was a gangster to whom murder was a trade; and Baldy Vickers with stakes in the thousands, when he would have committed any crime in the decalogue with greedy haste for a hundred-dollar bill, meant—murder.

He was stooping now, silently, with the utmost caution, slipping on his shoes. And now from the rear there came a faint sound, a low creaking, like the stealthy rending of wood. He knew what it meant: They were forcing the shed door—to follow him in here—to cut off his escape, and to assist if necessary in the work those two were waiting to perform in his room, which he was expected to enter.

His face was set, drawn in lines as hard as chiselled marble. And yet he could have laughed—laughed out in the bitterest mockeries. The game was up—even if he saved his life. He would be “wanted” for the theft of one hundred thousand dollars. He could not cover that up now. If he escaped Baldy Vickers and his pack, he would still be a fugitive from the law. And, worse still, he would be a fugitive empty-handed, chased like a mangy dog who had risked his all for a bone—and had dropped the bone in his flight! God, if he could only get back there and get that money! But there were footsteps coming now—his straining ears could hear them—they were coming nearer and nearer to the door that opened from the shed into the rear of the house. Fury surged upon him again. Skarvan! Bookie Skarvan! It was Skarvan, not Baldy Vickers, not that miserable, red-headed rat of a tout in there, that he would have sold his soul at that instant to settle with. It was Skarvan, the dirty Judas, not the others, who, smug and safe, had planned his, Dave Henderson's, murder in deliberate, coldblooded hellishness! Well, if he, Dave Henderson, lived, Bookie Skarvan would pay... an eye for an eye... that was God's law, wasn't it?... well, as certainly as God lived, Bookie Skarvan would pay... it was another incentive for him, Dave Henderson, to live now....

The brain works with incredible speed. Those footsteps had not yet quite reached the door leading into the hall. His shoes were on now; and now his eyes fell upon the empty black hand-bag which, to facilitate his movements in putting on his shoes, he had set down on the floor beside him, and there came, flickering suddenly over the tight-pressed lips, a curious smile. He might not get through; there was only one way to get through—his car out there in front—a dash for it, though it was certain that there would be others of Baldy Vickers' crowd lurking out there, too; he might not get through, but if he did, there was a way, too, to save that hundred thousand dollars, or, at least, to keep it from Bookie Skarvan's claws!

Into the dark, narrowed eyes there came a glint of humor—but it was grim, deadly humor. They believed, of course, that he had the money in the bag, since he would be credited with no object for having already disposed of it, the natural presumption being that, with the money once in his possession, he would make a run for it—and they must continue to believe that—be given no reason to believe otherwise. It was dangerous, an added risk, but if he pretended to fall unwarily into their trap, pretended to be unconscious that there was, for instance, a blackjack waiting for him in his room, their suspicions would never be aroused—and neither they nor any one else would ever suspect for an instant that the money was not still in the bag as he dashed from the house.

He was creeping forward again silently toward the door of his room. That was logical. They would expect that. They would expect him to creep in silently and stealthily, on account of Tooler upstairs—or, if they did not exactly expect it, it would explain itself in that very logical way to them afterwards.

Behind him now the door leading into the hall was being opened cautiously, so cautiously that he would not have heard it if he had not been listening for it, expecting it. But he was just at the edge of the jamb of his own door now. He straightened up, his hand reached out for the door handle, and, still retaining his grasp upon the knob and standing in full view upon the threshold, he pushed the door open to the extent of his outstretched arm.

The slickest crook in the United States, they had said he would make! He would try and not disappoint them!

His eyes swept the interior in a flash. A burly figure was crouched low down against the wall within striking distance of the door, an ugly looking, leather-covered baton in his hand—Runty Mott was not in sight. It was for the fraction of a second that he stood there—no more—not long enough for that crouching figure to recover from its surprise.

“My God!” gasped Dave Henderson, in well-simulated dismay; and, leaping backward, pulled shut the door, and dashed for the door to the street.