Adventure, February 1917 — page 189: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

= | “Bh Sneed Trail Suddenly he lifted his head with a start, while a frown settled between his eyebrows. “What is it?” I asked. “Took behind you,” he said. I followed the direction of his glance. A party of women had left the third table from the one at which we were sitting, disclosing — a small table in the corner which had been cut off by their hats. Over it Brock was bending in earnest conversation with a wo- man whose beauty was evident even at the distance which separated us. Her face, which was turned up to his, wore, unless my eyes were deceiving me, a look of terror. Presently she rose and with a quick nod slipped quietly from the room. As he turned, I caught his eye and beckoned to him. He came over and sat down at our table. His face was grave and his manner vaguely abstracted as he greeted us. “Haven’t you finished with that woman yet?” exploded Ragan. ‘‘Can’t you realize, man, that your country is at war? Haven’t you already let her do enough damage?”’ Brock glanced queasy at the excited cap- tain “She will do no more damage [ think. The Japs believe she double-crossed them. They are after her. You know what that means.” “Double-crossed them?” echoed Ragan. And then as the meaning of Brock’s words - came to him, he leaned forward eagerly. ““You mean she didn’t get the papers after all? The squadron is safe?” Brock took from his pocket a yellow slip of paper and handed it to Ragan. It was a cablegram, dated from Manila, announc- ing that the Asiatic Squadron had anchored _ safely behind the guns of Corregidor. “T found it when I arrived on the Em- press of Asia this morning,” he said. “Why didn’t you cross with them? Why did you come up here?”’ I asked. Brock dropped his glance and lighted a cigaret before replying. Then, as a blue spiral of smoke curled up above his head, he said with a slight show of defiance in his manner: “T wanted to warn Mrs. Carew. I felt. that I was somewhat in her debt.” _ Ragan pushed back his chair, as he passed his hand slowly across his forehead. “Either you are crazy or I am,” he said. “Do you mean that you and Mrs. Carew were working together?” With a fork Brock began to draw circles on the table-cloth. “No, she wasn’t. I'll explain. I owe it to you anyway, Ragan, because I have caused you a good deal of anguish of spirit. Unfortunately it could not be helped. “Do you remember Poe’s story “The Pur- loined Letter,’ the point of which is that the minister kept the letter he had stolen out of the hands of the police by not hiding it at all, but leaving it in plain view in a card-rack as if he attached no importance to it? Well, when I started on my mission, I determined to adopt Poe’s ruse. The mes- sages to the admiral were in that old en-’ velope which you may remember I showed you the first night I talked with you, and on the back of which, as if it were of no value, I had made some sketches for Mrs. Carew. “The package she stole was one I had put in the life-preserver for the very purpose of having her steal—a dummy, carefully pre- pared in advance, to throw any possible spies off the track. “You saw how well the ruse succeeded. And your angér at me allayed any possible suspicions that she or Schwartz might have had. That was the reason I could not take you into my confidence. They might think I was stupid enough to believe her story, but they would have suspected you, if you had not been as upset as you were. I want- ed them to be certain they had succeeded.” Ragan stared at Brock for a full minute, while his mind evidently went over what had happened, interpreting it in the light of this new disclosure. Then, in a voice into which a note of respect had crept, he said: “But tell me one thing. I don’t yet un- derstand how she has placed you in her debt.’ 187 Brock dropped the fork, slowly folded the telegram and replaced it in his pocket. “Well,” he said, with a dry smile, “I thought that if they stole the papers to get information, we might as well give them the - information we wanted them to have. So in those she got the admiral was instructed - In no circumstances to leave Shanghai, while the ones I delivered told him to run for it. » The Japs, thinking that our squadron would ~ remain bottled up in Shanghai, drew off, and Admiral Willing was half-way to Manila before they even learned that he had come out,” Comichbook co