Midway of the cross hall which he had entered and which opened into the main lobby he slowed his gait long enough to undo the overcoat and slip out of it. The top button caught fast in its buttonhole, the coat being new and its buttonholes being stiff. He gave a sharp tug at the rebellious cloth, and the button, which probably had been insecurely sewed on in the first place, came away from its thread fastenings and lodged in the fingers of his right hand. Mechanically he dropped it into a side pocket of the overcoat and a moment later, with the garment turned inside out so that only its silk lining showed, and held under his arm, he had come out of the sideway and was in the lobby proper.
He was prepared mentally to find signs of an alarm here—to encounter persons hurrying toward the Thirty-ninth Street side of the building. But nothing of the sort was afoot. A darky orchestra was playing a jazz tune very loudly in the café at the left of the Broadway entrance, so it was not only possible but very likely that the sounds of the shots had not been heard inside the hotel at all. Certainly his eye, sweeping the place, discovered no evidences of any unusual stir. Perhaps half a dozen individuals were traversing the tiled floor, but none of them in any seeming hurry.
With no suggestion of agitation about him anywhere and with nothing furtive or stealthy in his movements, Trencher boldly passed the corner of the desk, crossed the lobby, went along the front of the news stand, where a young woman stood among her wares, and through another set of revolving doors came out upon Broadway. It was that one hour of the night—a quarter of eleven o'clock, while the last acts are still going on and before the theatres give up their audiences—when Broadway's sidewalks are not absolutely overflowing with jostling, pouring currents of people. Numbers were abroad, for numbers always are abroad in this part of the town, be the time of day or of night what it may, but there was no congestion. This was as it should be; it suited this man's purposes exactly.
He issued forth, and a few rods north of the corner saw the person for whom he was seeking; at least he saw a most likely candidate—a ragged darky, in a district where ragged darkies unless they be beggars are not often seen, who with his hands in his pockets and his coat collar turned up was staring into the window of a small clothing shop two doors above the narrow-fronted hotel. Trencher made for him. Remember, all this—from the moment of the shooting until now—had taken much less time than has been required for me to describe it in sequence or for you to read about it.
He tapped the darky on the arm.
"Boy," he said sharply, "want to pick up some easy money quick?"
"Yas, suh, I does!" The negro's eyes shone.
"Listen then: I've got to catch a train—sooner than I expected. My bag's packed and waiting for me up here at my boarding house in West Forty-fifth Street—Number 374 is the address—just west of Broadway—tall brownstone house with a high stoop. Get me? The bag's downstairs in the hall. The hall boy—a coloured fellow named Fred—is watching it for me. If I go in a cab I may not get to the station in time. If you go after it for me at a run I may catch my train. See? Here's a dollar down in advance. Tell Fred Mr. Thompson sent you—that's me, Thompson. He'll give it to you—I told him I'd send for it. I'll be waiting right here. If you get back with it in seven minutes I'll give you another dollar—and if you get back inside of seven minutes I'll make it two dollars more. Got the number in your mind?"
"Yas, suh—three seventy-fo' Wes' Forty-fift', you said."
"Correct. Now run like the very devil up Broadway to Forty-fifth and turn west!"