“It’s no great distance from here,” he said, “and we might as well walk.”
“That suits me,” returned Kenyon, promptly.
And so they struck eastward along Canal and turned down an ill-lit street which was strange to the ex-lieutenant of Nunez. A maze of alleys and narrow ways were traversed, Forrester leading the way. And as they hurried on, Kenyon gradually became obsessed with the notion that a dark figure was lurking in their track. Several times he was upon the point of mentioning the matter to Forrester; but each time he thought better of it.
“It might be a little private arrangement of his own,” reasoned Kenyon, silently. “This would be a most excellent neighborhood for an artistic piece of assassination, and I shouldn’t wonder if that was his friend the Stalker back there. But,” and he gave a quick, puzzled look over his shoulder, “somehow I can’t get quite rid of the impression that it’s a woman.”
At any rate he quietly drew off his right-hand glove; and there was much comfort in the feel of the long, heavy Colt buried so deeply in his overcoat pocket.
IX
KENYON GOES BLINDLY ON
“Mott Street is as safe as Fifth Avenue—but you must keep your eyes open.”
—The Lieutenant in Chinatown.
Through the dim, chasm-like streets Kenyon followed Forrester; and always there clung to him the feeling that there was lurking along, in the thicker shadows behind them, a soft-footed someone whose intentions were as unknown as him- or her-self.
The section was strange to Kenyon. Overhead the mist seemed to cling stickily to a wilderness of fire-escapes, and by degrees the air became impregnated with a peculiar odor.