XX — Past One at Rooney’s (2)

    The guests crowded in confusion to the rear. Rooney’s lieutenant swung open a panel in the wall, overlooking the back yard, revealing a ladder already placed for the escape.
    “Down and out, everybody!” he commanded. “Ladies first! Less talking, please! Don’t crowd! There’s no danger.”
    Among the last, Cork and Ruby waited their turn at the open panel. Suddenly she swept him aside and clung to his arm fiercely.
    “Before we go out,” she whispered in his ear—“before anything happens, tell me again, Eddie, do you l—do you really like me?”
    “On the dead level,” said Cork, holding her close with one arm, “when it comes to you, I’m all in.”
    When they turned they found they were lost and in darkness. The last of the fleeing customers had descended. Half way across the yard they bore the ladder, stumbling, giggling, hurrying to place it against an adjoining low building over the roof of which their only route to safety.
    “We may as well sit down,” said Cork grimly. “Maybe Rooney will stand the cops off, anyhow.”
    They sat at a table; and their hands came together again.
    A number of men then entered the dark room, feeling their way about. One of them, Rooney himself, found the switch and turned on the electric light. The other man was a cop of the old régime—a big cop, a thick cop, a fuming, abrupt cop—not a pretty cop. He went up to the pair at the table and sneered familiarly at the girl.
    “What are youse doin’ in here?” he asked.
    “Dropped in for a smoke,” said Cork mildly.
    “Had any drinks?”
    “Not later than one o’clock.”
    “Get out—quick!” ordered the cop. Then, “Sit down!” he countermanded.
    He took off Cork’s hat roughly and scrutinized him shrewdly. “Your name’s McManus.”
    “Bad guess,” said Cork. “It’s Peterson.”
    “Cork McManus, or something like that,” said the cop. “You put a knife into a man in Dutch Mike’s saloon a week ago.”
    “Aw, forget it!” said Cork, who perceived a shade of doubt in the officer’s tones. “You’ve got my mug mixed with somebody else’s.”
    “Have I? Well, you’ll come to the station with me, anyhow, and be looked over. The description fits you all right.” The cop twisted his fingers under Cork’s collar. “Come on!” he ordered roughly.
    Cork glanced at Ruby. She was pale, and her thin nostrils quivered. Her quick eye danced from one man’s face to the other as they spoke or moved. What hard luck! Cork was thinking—Corrigan on the briny; and Ruby met and lost almost within an hour! Somebody at the police station would recognize him, without a doubt. Hard luck!
    But suddenly the girl sprang up and hurled herself with both arms extended against the cop. His hold on Cork’s collar was loosened and he stumbled back two or three paces.
    “Don’t go so fast, Maguire!” she cried in shrill fury. “Keep your hands off my man! You know me, and you know I’m givin’ you good advice. Don’t you touch him again! He’s not the guy you are lookin’ for—I’ll stand for that.”
    “See here, Fanny,” said the Cop, red and angry, “I’ll take you, too, if you don’t look out! How do you know this ain’t the man I want? What are you doing in here with him?”
    “How do I know?” said the girl, flaming red and white by turns. “Because I’ve known him a year. He’s mine. Oughtn’t I to know? And what am I doin’ here with him? That’s easy.”
    She stooped low and reached down somewhere into a swirl of flirted draperies, heliotrope and black. An elastic snapped, she threw on the table toward Cork a folded wad of bills. The money slowly straightened itself with little leisurely jerks.
    “Take that, Jimmy, and let’s go,” said the girl. “I’m declarin’ the usual dividends, Maguire,” she said to the officer. “You had your usual five-dollar graft at the usual corner at ten.”
    “A lie!” said the cop, turning purple. “You go on my beat again and I’ll arrest you every time I see you.”
    “No, you won’t,” said the girl. “And I’ll tell you why. Witnesses saw me give you the money to-night, and last week, too. I’ve been getting fixed for you.”
    Cork put the wad of money carefully into his pocket, and said: “Come on, Fanny; let’s have some chop suey before we go home.”
    “Clear out, quick, both of you, or I’ll—”
    The cop’s bluster trailed away into inconsequentiality.
    At the corner of the street the two halted. Cork handed back the money without a word. The girl took it and slipped it slowly into her hand-bag. Her expression was the same she had worn when she entered Rooney’s that night—she looked upon the world with defiance, suspicion and sullen wonder.
    “I guess I might as well say good-bye here,” she said dully. “You won’t want to see me again, of course. Will you—shake hands—Mr. McManus.”
    “I mightn’t have got wise if you hadn’t give the snap away,” said Cork. “Why did you do it?”
    “You’d have been pinched if I hadn’t. That’s why. Ain’t that reason enough?” Then she began to cry. “Honest, Eddie, I was goin’ to be the best girl in the world. I hated to be what I am; I hated men; I was ready almost to die when I saw you. And you seemed different from everybody else. And when I found you liked me, too, why, I thought I’d make you believe I was good, and I was goin’ to be good. When you asked to come to my house and see me, why, I’d have died rather than do anything wrong after that. But what’s the use of talking about it? I’ll say good-by, if you will, Mr. McManus.”
    Cork was pulling at his ear. “I knifed Malone,” said he. “I was the one the cop wanted.”
    “Oh, that’s all right,” said the girl listlessly. “It didn’t make any difference about that.”
    “That was all hot air about Wall Street. I don’t do nothin’ but hang out with a tough gang on the East Side.”
    “That was all right, too,” repeated the girl. “It didn’t make any difference.”
    Cork straightened himself, and pulled his hat down low. “I could get a job at O’Brien’s,” he said aloud, but to himself.
    “Good-by,” said the girl.
    “Come on,” said Cork, taking her arm. “I know a place.”
    Two blocks away he turned with her up the steps of a red brick house facing a little park.
    “What house is this?” she asked, drawing back. “Why are you going in there?”
    A street lamp shone brightly in front. There was a brass nameplate at one side of the closed front doors. Cork drew her firmly up the steps. “Read that,” said he.
    She looked at the name on the plate, and gave a cry between a moan and a scream. “No, no, no, Eddie! Oh, my God, no! I won’t let you do that—not now! Let me go! You shan’t do that! You can’t—you mus’n’t! Not after you know! No, no! Come away quick! Oh, my God! Please, Eddie, come!”
    Half fainting, she reeled, and was caught in the bend of his arm. Cork’s right hand felt for the electric button and pressed it long.
    Another cop—how quickly they scent trouble when trouble is on the wing!—came along, saw them, and ran up the steps. “Here! What are you doing with that girl?” he called gruffly.
    “She’ll be all right in a minute,” said Cork. “It’s a straight deal.”
    “Reverend Jeremiah Jones,” read the cop from the door-plate with true detective cunning.
    “Correct,” said Cork. “On the dead level, we’re goin’ to get married.”