"I"m not going on to guess about what you all are. All I know is what I"m here trying to do. I"m not working for myself. I"m working for a partner."
She started. "That"s the second man, the one who stopped her on the street today?"
"You"re pretty well posted," replied Ronicky. "Yes, that"s the one. He started after Caroline Smith, not even knowing her name--with just a picture of her. We found out that she lived in sight of the East River, and pretty soon we located her here."
"And what are you hoping to do?"
"To find her and talk to her straight from the shoulder and tell her what a pile Bill has done to get to her--and a lot of other things."
"Can"t he find her and tell her those things for himself?"
"He can"t talk," said Ronicky. "Not that I"m a pile better, but I could talk better for a friend than he could talk for himself, I figure. If things don"t go right then I"ll know that the trouble is with the gent with the smile."
"And then?" asked the girl, very excited and grave.
"I"ll find him," said Ronicky Doone.
"And--"
"Lady," he replied obliquely, "because I couldn"t use a gun on a girl ain"t no sign that I can"t use it on a gent!"
"I"ve one thing to tell you," she said, breaking in swiftly on him.
"Do what you want--take all the chances you care to--but, if you value your life and the life of your friend, keep away from the man who smiles."
"I"ll have a fighting chance, I guess," said Ronicky quietly."
"You"ll have no chance at all. The moment he knows your hand is against him, I don"t care how brave or how clever you are, you"re doomed!"
She spoke with such a pa.s.sion of conviction that she flushed, and a moment later she was shivering. It might have been the draft from the window which made her gather the hazy-green mantle closer about her and glance over her shoulder; but a grim feeling came to Ronicky Doone that the reason why the girl trembled and her eyes grew wide, was that the mention of "the man who smiles" had brought the thought of him into the room like a breath of cold wind.
"Don"t you see," she went on gently, "that I like you? It"s the first and the last time that I"m going to see you, so I can talk. I know you"re honest, and I know you"re brave. Why, I can see your whole character in the way you"ve stayed by your friend; and, if there"s a possible way of helping you, I"ll do it. But you must promise me first that you"ll never cross the man with the sneer, as you call him."
"There"s a sort of a fate in it," said Ronicky slowly. "I don"t think I could promise. There"s a chill in my bones that tells me I"m going to meet up with him one of these days."
She gasped at that, and, stepping back from him, she appeared to be searching her mind to discover something which would finally and completely convince him. At length she found it.
"Do I look to you like a coward?" she said. "Do I seem to be weak-kneed?"
He shook his head.
"And what will a woman fight hardest for?"
"For the youngsters she"s got," said Ronicky after a moment"s thought.
"And, outside of that, I suppose a girl will fight the hardest to marry the gent she loves."
"And to keep from marrying a man she doesn"t love, as she"d try to keep from death?"
"Sure," said Ronicky. "But these days a girl don"t have to marry that way."
"I am going to marry the man with the sneer," she said simply enough, and with dull, patient eyes she watched the face of Ronicky wrinkle and grow pale, as if a heavy fist had struck him.
"You?" he asked. "You marry him?"
"Yes," she whispered.
"And you hate the thought of him!"
"I--I don"t know. He"s kind--"
"You hate him," insisted Ronicky. "And he"s to have you, that cold-eyed snake, that devil of a man?" He moved a little, and she turned toward him, smiling faintly and allowing the light to come more clearly and fully on her face. "You"re meant for a king o" men, lady; you got the queen in you--it"s in the lift of your head. When you find the gent you can love, why, lady, he"ll be pretty near the richest man in the world!"
The ghost of a flush bloomed in her cheeks, but her faint smile did not alter, and she seemed to be hearing him from far away. "The man with the sneer," she said at length, "will never talk to me like that, and still--I shall marry him."
"Tell me your name," said Ronicky Doone bluntly.
"My name is Ruth Tolliver."
"Listen to me, Ruth Tolliver: If you was to live a thousand years, and the gent with the smile was to keep going for two thousand, it"d never come about that he could ever marry you."
She shook her head, still watching him as from a distance.
"If I"ve crossed the country and followed a hard trail and come here tonight and stuck my head in a trap, as you might say, for the sake of a gent like Bill Gregg--fine fellow though he is--what d"you think I would do to keep a girl like you from life-long misery?"
And he dwelt on the last word until the girl shivered.
"It"s what it means," said Ronicky Doone, "life-long misery for you.
And it won"t happen--it can"t happen."
"Are you mad--are you quite mad?" asked the girl. "What on earth have I and my affairs got to do with you? Who are you?"
"I dunno," said Ronicky Doone. "I suppose you might say I"m a champion of lost causes, lady. Why have I got something to do with you? I"ll tell you why: Because, when a girl gets past being just pretty and starts in being plumb beautiful, she lays off being the business of any one gent--her father or her brother--she starts being the business of the whole world. You see? They come like that about one in ten million, and I figure you"re that one, lady."
The far away smile went out. She was looking at him now with a sort of sad wonder. "Do you know what I am?" she said gravely.
"I dunno," said Ronicky, "and I don"t care. What you do don"t count.
It"s the inside that matters, and the inside of you is all right.
Lady, so long as I can sling a gun, and so long as my name is Ronicky Doone, you ain"t going to marry the gent with the smile."
If he expected an outbreak of protest from her he was mistaken. For what she said was: "Ronicky Doone! Is that the name? Ronicky Doone!"
Then she smiled up at him. "I"m within one ace of being foolish and saying--But I won"t."
She made a gesture of brushing a mist away from her and then stepped back a little. "I"m going down to see the man with the smile, and I"m going to tell him that Harry Morgan is not in his room, that he didn"t answer my knock, and then that I looked around through the house and didn"t find him. After that I"m coming back here, Ronicky Doone, and I"m going to try to get an opportunity for you to talk to Caroline Smith."
"I knew you"d change your mind," said Ronicky Doone.
"I"ll even tell you why," she said. "It isn"t for your friend who"s asleep, but it"s to give you a chance to finish this business and come to the end of this trail and go back to your own country. Because, if you stay around here long, there"ll be trouble, a lot of trouble, Ronicky Doone. Now stay here and wait for me. If anyone taps at the door, you"d better slip into that closet in the corner. Will you wait?"
"Yes."