Deuces Wild/Chapter 2

ORBES lived the way of most bachelor painters: a kitchen, two bedrooms and the studio, which was nothing less than a huge living-room. Upon a time it had been occupied by a fashionable photographer; so Forbes worked in the best of lights. In the hands of his Japanese valet he dressed well, dined well, adding to-night a pint of Chambertin; went out into the studio again, smoked and dreamed of the wonderful things which he very well knew he would never attempt, let alone accomplish.

He was much in demand socially. He was witty, clever, good-looking, with real talent back of his popularity. The young married people and their juniors never omitted him from their frolics; he had a perfect right to play with them. His family history was very good, so good in fact, that his capability of taking care of himself, of standing on his own legs, made him rather interesting, you know. It was ripping fun for a chap to make his own pocket-money and not have to run to papa when some balky filly came in fifth in a field of five. The amazing thing to me was neither the one nor the other of these side-lights, family history and earning capacity: it lay in the fact that Forbes always returned optimistically to his work, unscotched by the prevailing cynicism of the day.

He danced well, never went beyond moderation in tippling, paid his losses and took his gains at cards with an equanimity of heart and countenance truly oriental. The old men liked him for his manliness and independence; and the dowagers eagerly courted his favors, for like all artists he was an exceedingly well-informed gossip. He had the faculty of leading them to the very lip of the precipice and then swerving them back before they had time to look over. The most amiable kind of a gossip, always promising to disclose something and never doing it; and having a good deal of quiet fun out of it without harming any one.

At a quarter to eight he strapped on Herr Fritz's muzzle, and the puppy crept dejectedly into his basket, snuffling. He bore down upon the insulting thing with his strong broad forefeet, without avail. It was a hard world.

“Nothing doing, old top. There won't be any rose-madder in your tummy to-night. See you later. And think well of your chicken; it may be dog-biscuit to-morrow. You never can tell what these poker games are going to do to a fellow. By-by!”

Every man who does one thing well has a craving to do another man's work badly. Forbes was always hungering for detective work. He longed to pick up the tangled skein, unravel it, rescue the heroine, march the villain to jail and all that. Heaven is witness of the plots for detective stories he has offered me! He has, I believe, the best library of detective fiction in town. Well, his longings went unsatisfied. The only thing like detective work he ever did successfully was to recover the new paint-tubes before the dachel poisoned himself.

He walked up-town, wondering who the mysterious burglar could be. He searched carefully among his large acquaintance, principally among the men he disliked; but even then there was nothing tangible. Lots of duffers gambled and didn't pay their debts and never went to jail for it. If only he had a clue of some sort to start with! He knew that he had the ability; and it was a shame he could find no outlet. I'll give him credit for possessing the chiefest attribute of all great detectives—hope.

“Hang about the police-courts,” I once advised him; “study the lesser criminal. Make a friend of the policeman on your beat and go the rounds with him some night. A thousand petty crimes are happening every day, right next door to you. But I know. You're waiting for some one to stage a Gaboriau for you. Rich banker—daughter in love with the cashier—safe robbed—cashier goes to jail—shoe-string is found—behold the criminal in the banker's private secretary!”

He laughed and told me to go to Tophet. But he knew that I had his hide on the wall. He hated the sordid, and I do not blame him; for petty crimes and police-courts are sordid; but in this he lost the true direction of his gifts. Out of poverty and sordidness the great inspirations rise, never out of pleasure and pastime, things to which he devoted his labor and leisure.

He continued on, whistling an air from one of the popular operas. His thoughts, ever volatile, shifted from plots of criminals to the purblindness of the general run of art-editors, and their more or less slovenly minions, the three-color process printers; to the pretty girl he had met at Cannes last winter; to the campaign to-night at poker. For once he was going to play 'em close; he would keep out of every pot that dealt him no two-spot, and when he got a real hand, he would play it hard. With deuces wild even an open player like himself had a chance once in a while. He turned a corner, still whistling. The girl with the copper-beech hair: supposing she never went by again? Could he possibly do her from memory?

Forward with swinging stride, twirling his cane and sometimes striking the ferrule against the flagging, pleased with the spangle of answering sparks; on toward the big drama. For he was only an implement of fate, chosen haphazard to accomplish a destiny not his own.

The Dryden was a new apartment house, built especially for persons who had plenty of money and too small a family for the up-keep of a large house. They were given all the comforts of home, valets, maids, cooks, waiters and bell boys, more like a private hotel. Then were ten apartments, five on each side of the ornate marble entrance. Forbes ran eagerly up the steps; the door-boy swung open the door.

“Mr. Jillson's apartment, please.”

“Third floor, left, sir.”

“Ah!”

Forbes made for the stairs. The elevator (called lift here) was up, and he was too impatient to wait Besides, he wanted to surprise the boys, melodramatically. He scarcely paused at the first landing. He would rather play poker than eat. And in his exuberance he failed to hear the warning call from the door-boy, who had come on that day and was not yet accurately versed in the topography and occupancy of the apartments. Forbes continued his rapid ascent two steps at a time. He wanted to be at the door at precisely eight, like that old chap what's-his-name in Round the World in Eighty Days.

He tiptoed into the private hall, the outer door being unlocked. There was a light over the transom. He could see them in his mind's eye: Jillson, Wheedon, Jones, Carlyle, Miller and Crawford, peering into their hands, their faces like Buddha gods. He listened. Not a sound. In the middle of a play, no doubt. Stealthily he put his hand on the knob, turned and pushed it, with the cry “Police!” on his lips. The word died there, dryly. He saw no poker game in action. Instead, a man in evening dress, full masked, knelt with his back to an open safe. As for the artist, he gazed panic-stricken into the round black sinister hole of a Colt's automatic.