“And what toime should I meet you?”
“Make it ten o’clock sharp, Tom.”
“All right. I’ll be there. Good-by,” and he rang off.
I ordered lunch in my room, and after the landlady had explained with some heat that there would be an extra charge for having it served that way, I got it. When luncheon was over I settled down and tried to read a magazine. But it was hopeless. My thoughts would not keep themselves on the story but kept chasing each other round and round, until I gave it up as a bad job. Finally, I decided that a good rest would be in order, in view of the possibility that I would be up most of the night, and the certainty that I would need my wits about me. So I lay down, and after half an hour or so fell asleep.
It was well after eight o’clock when I woke up, ravenously hungry. I had a latch-key, so I left the house quietly without seeing any one. I slouched into a little quick-lunch restaurant on Sixth Avenue and, sitting with my cap on, put away a large-sized meal. I borrowed a paper from the waiter and sat reading it and smoking, with my back to the street, until about ten minutes to ten. Then I set out to meet Larry. My head was still rather painful, but the autumn air was fresh and invigorating, and the thought of action was an unfailing stimulus. In any kind of affair that requires patient watching I am a hopeless failure. For the thought of Natalie’s fate drove me nearly wild to do something, although my plan promised a slim enough chance of learning any news of her.
Larry was sitting in the little back parlor of the saloon, immersed in a much-thumbed copy of the Police Gazette. I slouched up to his table and sat down, banging on the top of it for the waiter. I had a two-days’ beard by now and my hands were as dirty as they could get in the time allowed them. So I had little fear of being picked up and arrested for the burglary.
“Lo, Mike,” said Larry, looking up. “Phwat’s new wid ye?”
“Hell—nothin’!” I answered, and then to the waiter: “Gimme a beer.”
The waiter looked me over curiously until I caught his eye. Then he shuffled hastily away. Larry leaned over the table. “Drink yer beer and let’s git out av ut, sor, I don’t like the waiter. He moight be a stool-pidgeon.” He winked. “This is a bit of a hang-out fer the gangsters around here, d’ye disremember, sor?”
Larry and I had witnessed a bloodthirsty and noisy gun fight there some weeks before, but I had forgotten the details, except that the aim had been poor and the battle comparatively bloodless.