"Do I look like the foolish waters?" enquired P. Sybarite with mild resentment. "Back me up a sh.e.l.l of lather."

Grinning amiably at this happy metaphorical description of the gla.s.s of lager regularly served at Dutch House, the waiter shouldered through the swinging doors to the bar....

Then fell a brief lull in the melange of music and tongues, during which a boyish voice lifted up in clear remonstrance at a table some three removed from that at which P. Sybarite sat:

"But I don't _want_ anything more to drink!"

P. Sybarite looked that way. The owner of the voice (now again drowned) was apparently a youngster of twenty years--not more--clean of limb and feature, with a hot flush discolouring his good-looking face, a hectic glitter in his eyes, and a stubborn smile on his lips.

Lounging low in a straight-backed chair, with his hands in his pockets and his head wagging obstinately, he was plainly intoxicated, but as yet at a stage sufficiently mild to admit of his recognising the self-evident truth that he needed not another drop.

Yet his companions would have him drink more deeply.

Of these, one was a woman of no uncertain caste, a woman handsome in a daring and costly gown, and as yet not old, but in whose eyes flickered a curious febrile glare ("as though," commented P. Sybarite, moralist, "reflected back from the mouth of h.e.l.l").

The other was a man singularly handsome in a foreign way--Italian, at an indifferent guess--slight and graceful of person in well-tailored if somewhat flashy clothing; boasting too much jewellery; his teeth gleaming a vivid white against his dark colouring as he smiled good-humouredly in his attempts to press more drink upon the other.

The music stopped altogether for a time, and again the boy's voice rang out clearly:

"Tell you--'ve had enough."

The Italian said something urgent, in an undertone. The woman added inaudible persuasion to his argument. The boy looked from one to another with a semi-stupid smile; but wagged an obdurate head.

"I will _not_. No--and I don't want--lie down jus' for few minutes.

I'm goin' sit here till these--ah--foolish legs 'mine straighten 'emselves out--then 'm going home." ...

"Here's your beer, bo'," P. Sybarite's waiter announced.

"Keep the change," said the guest, tendering a quarter.

"T'anks"--with a look of surprise. Then familiarly knuckling the top of the table, the waiter stroked a rusty chin and surveyed the room.

"There's Red, now," he observed.

"Where?"

"Over there with the skirt and the kid souse. Yuh kin see for yourself he's busy. D' yuh want I sh'u'd stir him up now?"

"Oh, yes," said P. Sybarite, in the tone of one recognising an oversight. "What's doing over there--anything?" he proceeded casually.

The waiter favoured him with a hard stare. "Red November's business ain't none'r mine," he growled; "an' less you know him a heluva sight better'n I do, you'd better take a straight tip from me and--_leave--it--lay_!"

"Oh!" said the little man hastily--"I was only wondering.... But I wish you would slip Red the high sign: all I want is one word with him."

"All right, bo'--you're on."

Slouching off, obviously reluctant to interrupt the diversions of Mr.

November, the man at length mustered up courage to touch that gentleman's elbow. The gangster turned sharply, a frown replacing the smile which had illuminated his attempts to overcome the boy's recently developed aversion to drink. The waiter murmured in his private ear.

Promptly P. Sybarite received a sharp look from eyes as black and hard as shoe b.u.t.tons; and with equanimity endured it--even went to the length of a nod accompanied by his quaint, ingratiating smile. A courtesy ignored completely: the dark eyes veered back to the waiter's face and the white teeth flashed as he was curtly dismissed.

He shuffled back, scowling, reported sulkily: "Says yuh gotta wait"; and turned away in answer to a summons from another table.

Unruffled, P. Sybarite sipped his beer--sipped it sparingly and not without misgivings, but sedulously to keep in character as a familiar of the dive.

Presently there came yet another lull in the clatter of tongues; and again the accents of the boy sounded distinctly from the gangster's table:

"I won't--that's flat! I refuse positively--go up stairs--sleep it off. I'm a' right--give you m' word--in the _head_. All my trouble's--these mutinous dogs of legs. But I'll make 'em mind, yet.

Trust me--"

And again the babel blotted out his utterance.

But P. Sybarite had experienced a sudden rush of intelligence to the head--was in the throes of that mental process which it is our habit wittily to distinguish by the expressive term, "putting two and two together."

Could this, by any chance, be "that boy" who, Mr. Brian Shaynon had been a.s.sured, wouldn't know where he'd been when he waked? Was an attempt to ensure that desired consummation through the agency of a drug, being made in the open restaurant?

If not, why was Red November neglecting all other affairs to press drink upon a man who knew when he had enough?

If so, what might be the nature of the link connecting the boy with the "job," to be on which at half-past two November had just now covenanted with Brian Shaynon?

What incriminating knowledge could this boy possess, to render old Shaynon, willing that his memory should be expurgated by such a mind- and nerve-shattering agent as the knock-out drop of White Light commerce?

Now Shaynon was capable of almost any degree of infamy, if not, perhaps, the absolute peer of Red November.

This strange development of that night of Destiny began to a.s.sume in P. Sybarite's esteem a complexion of baleful promise.

But the more keenly interested he grew, the more indifferent he made himself appear, slouching low and lower in his chair, his eyes listless and half closed--his look one of the most p.r.o.nounced apathy: the while he conned the circ.u.mstances, physical as well as psychical, with the narrowest attention. Certainly, it would seem, a man who had enough instinctive decency to wish to escape the degradation of deeper drunkenness, should be humoured rather than opposed....

The table on which his attention was focussed stood against the wall, the young man sitting in the corner between November and the woman. Of two tables between it and P. Sybarite's, one was vacant, the other occupied by a brace of hatchet-faced male intimates of the dive and creatures of November's--or their looks libelled them shamefully.

It seemed unlikely that the boy could get away against the wishes of the gang leader, however steadfastly he might stand upon his determination to drink no more. For nothing was to be hoped for from the sots, prost.i.tutes, and parasites who made up the balance of that company: one and all, either too indifferent or too sophisticated, if not in active sympathy with the practices of the establishment, to lift a hand to interfere....

Testimony in support of this inference P. Sybarite received within the next few minutes, when the boy's temper abruptly veered from good-natured obduracy to open irritation.

"d.a.m.n it, no!" he cried in a high voice and with an impatient movement struck the gla.s.s from November's hand.

Though it went to the floor with a splintering crash, the incident attracted little more than casual glances from those at neighbouring tables....

November's countenance, however, turned grey with anger beneath its olive shade.

Momentarily his glance clashed with the woman's; and of a sudden the paint upon her cheeks and lips stood out as starkly artificial as carmine splashed upon a whitewashed wall. At the same time he flashed a like warning to his two followers at the next table; and the legs of their chairs grated on the tiled flooring as they shifted position, making ready for the signal to "mix in."

At this, P. Sybarite rose and nonchalantly moved over to November; his approach remarked by the latter with an evil leer; by the woman with a start of consternation; by the boy with sudden suspicion. Indubitably this last was beginning to question a hospitality that would not permit him to do as to him seemed best. With relief P. Sybarite noted symptoms of this dawning distrust. It made the problem simpler, to have the boy alive to his peril.

Pausing, P. Sybarite met November's glare with eyes informed with an expression amazingly remote and dispa.s.sionate, and in a level and toneless voice addressed him.

"I've a message for you--a hurry call--won't keep--"

"Well?" snapped the gangster. "What's it about? Spit it out!"