From Now On

by Frank L. Packard

“Ah! New York!” Nicolo Capriano nodded. “But New York is a world in itself. He did not give you his address, and then rob you, I suppose!”

Dave Henderson did not answer for a moment. What Nicolo Capriano said was very true! But the rendezvous that Millman had given was, on the face of it, a fake anyhow. That had been his own opinion from the start; but during the two years Millman and he had been together in prison there had been many little inadvertent remarks in conversation that had, beyond question of doubt, stamped Millman as a New Yorker. Perhaps Millman had remembered that when he had given the rendezvous in New York—to give color to its genuineness—because it was the only natural place he could propose if he was to carry out logically the stories he had told for two long years.

“You do not answer?” suggested Nicolo Capriano patiently.

It was on Dave Henderson's tongue to lay the whole story bare to the date, day and hour of that hotel rendezvous, but instead he shook his head. He was conscious of no distrust of the other. Why should he be distrustful! It was not that. It seemed more an innate caution, that was an absurd caution now because the rendezvous meant nothing anyhow, that had sprung up spontaneously within him. He felt that he was suddenly illogical. Fie found himself answering in a savage, dogged sort of way.

“That's all right!” he said. “I haven't got his address—but New York is good enough. He spilled too much in prison for me not to know that's where he hangs out. I'll get him—if I can only shake the police.”

Nicolo Capriano's blue-tipped fingers went straggling through the long white beard.

“The police!” He was whispering—seemingly to himself. “It is always the police—a lifetime of the cursed police—and I have my daughter to think of—but I do not forget Tony Lomazzi—Teresa would not have me forget.” He spoke abruptly to Dave Henderson. “Tell me about to-night. My daughter says you came here like a hunted thing, and it is very evident that you have been in a fight. I suppose it was with the police, or with this gang you speak of; but, in that case, you have ruined any chance of help from me if you have led them here—if, for instance, they are waiting now for you to come out again.”

“I do not think they are waiting!” said Dave Henderson, with a twisted smile. “And I think that the police end of to-night, and maybe some of the rest of it as well, is in the hospital by now! It's not much of a story—but unless that light in your back porch, which was on for about two seconds, could be seen up the lane, there's no one could know that I am here.”

The old Italian smiled curiously.

“I do not put lights where they act as beacons,” he said whimsically. “It does not show from the lane; it is for the benefit of those inside the house. Tell me your story.”