It was trembling on Barton’s lips to pour out the whole strange story of the Twelve Golden Coins of Confucius, the dead Sam Toy, and the laundry ticket with the cryptic hieroglyphics, but something seemed to halt him. He didn’t feel in the mood now for incurring the anger of a man who was in full control of the Dispatch on account of the owner’s absence. Indeed, a change of heart had come about in him since learning that Fawcett had walked the streets without landing a job. So it might not be good policy to antagonise the one individual who governed his present berth.
But the thought of Fawcett, sitting jobless in his dim room in the Star Hotel on the north side, gave Barton a sudden daring idea. If he should play a trick on Frangenac and then proceed to land the startling story that seemed trembling already above his head, he knew full well that he could appease the city editor. He thought harder than ever he had in his life. Fawcett, when sober, was a crack newspaper man. There was none better in the Middle West.
“I’ll go,” he snapped out. He jerked out his old leather bill-fold and seized the credential paper, noting first that it was stamped correctly with the Dispatch seal and that his name had been filled in on the line left blank for that purpose. He jabbed it viciously in the bill-fold, and buttoned the latter article in his breast pocket. He leaned over and made a quick count of the money lying on Frangenac’s desk, and scribbled his name to the receipt that appeared to be all in readiness. “I’ve got to make speedy time if I’m to throw my things together and catch the three o’clock train,” he said quietly. “What am I to do when I get there?”
“I’ll send full telegraphic instructions to Carstairs tonight,” returned Frangenac, drawing in a long breath between his thin lips. “He’ll inform you on everything and start you out. He’ll go ahead with the leak inquiry, and you’ll handle the Speaker Farley trial. Give us all that looks good.” He glanced toward the big wooden clock. Its hands pointed to 1.45. “Now go, man. Trial starts at ten to-morrow — and you must reach the Capitol at nine.”
A moment later Barton stood on the steps of the Dispatch.
Frantically he hailed a yellow taxicab that was rolling aimlessly down Market Street, its metal flag reading “Vacant.” The machine stopped at the curb. “Star Hotel, 550, Wells Street,” he instructed the driver. “And make time, please. Got to catch a train.”
The machine, with a whining and shrieking of the brakes, drew up sharply in front of the same dilapidated building which Barton had entered once before that day. He sprang out, and ordering the driver to wait, dived up the dark inside stairs three steps at a time. At the rear room on the third floor he didn’t pause to knock, but flung open the door.
Fawcett stood in front of the mirror putting on a collar and tie. Barton’s quick glance about the room showed that not a sign of a bottle or glass was visible. He noted also, as the man at the mirror turned in surprise, that the latter was shaved and clean; that his eye possessed a light of keenness and force, quite different from the sodden drunkard’s eye that had characterised him during later years.
“What the — Barton!” Fawcett ejaculated staring.
Barton, closing the door behind him, jumped quickly to his proposition. “Charlie, do you still want a newspaperman’s job? Speak quick, man — a temporary job in Washington?”
The other nodded dazedly, not comprehending.
“Then you’re going to the Capitol with an A No. 1 credential paper and a fat wad of railroad fare and expenses under the name of Jason H. Barton. You’re going to send back a daily write-up of the Speaker Farley trial. And yours truly is going to be scooting sub rosa about town here, unearthing the biggest little story ever sprung in the State of Illinois!”
CHAPTER XXXV
VOICES ON THE WIRE
WITH the ends of the loose tie trailing over his shoulders, Fawcett gazed blankly at his visitor. “Not — not kidding me, are you, Jason? Do you mean to say — ”
“Exactly,” retorted the younger man. “Tie up that tie and listen to me. First: do you know Reedy, Carstairs, McClintock, Hempfield or Van Slyke — the Washington correspondents for the Chicago papers?”
Fawcett shook his head vehemently. “No, Jason. Don’t know any of ‘em.”
“Good,” commented Barton hurriedly. “Neither do I.” Hastily he related the brief facts of his interview with Frangenac, not wasting any time by going into details as to what his “story” was about. And he finished: “So you see, Charlie, that Fate sent you along just in time. You lope down to Washington with my credential paper, tell Carstairs that you’re Jason H. Barton, write up whatever Carstairs tells you to take care of, and shoot the stuff back each day. When the Speaker Farley trial is over, back you come. If my story works out to anything like I hope it may, I’ll go to Frangenac long before and confess my share of the deception; but if by some chance it should fizzle, I’ll lie low till you come back to town. Then I’ll march into Frangenac’s office — fresh from Washington! Sound good, old man?”
“But listen to me, boy,” put in the older man uneasily. “You’re a fool to chuck this chance for any story. It means an opportunity to meet some of the biggest senators in the Capitol. Don’t know what you’ve got up your sleeve, but drop it. Never mind about me. God knows I’d like the chance — and under any conditions I’d turn back to you half the salary money they send on. But — ”
“But me no buts,” returned Barton firmly. “And you’ll send back no money — except perhaps the ten I loaned you. That’s final.” He stooped down and dragged from beneath the bed the other’s leather suit-case; then an empty travelling bag with gaping mouth. “Do we pack in a hurry — or don’t we? he asked with his hand on it.
“We pack,” said Fawcett quietly. “I won’t let you back out now, Jason, even if you want to. That Washington job is mine — and I pay nothing for the use of your name? Nothing — remember that!”
While Fawcett finished his toilet, Barton packed the other’s few belongings hurriedly into the two leather containers. His watch showed the time to be twenty minutes after two; so he gave his instructions while he packed. In ten minutes the room was bare and the suit-case and travelling bag stood in the middle of the floor.
Down in the office Fawcett handed in his key to the greasy-looking man in the shirt-sleeves, and together he and Barton entered the taxicab, still waiting at the kerb. The drive to the Grand Central station took a full fifteen minutes on account of a traffic jam at Adams Street; so Barton himself carried the suit-case over to the baggage counter while Fawcett secured the ticket and Pullman berth. The Washington Flyer was drawn up on track six, the engine coupled to it, the smoke-stack smoking in the train-shed.
Rejoined by Fawcett, and the suit-case checked through, Barton passed through the iron gates with the older man and saw him on the smoker. Then he stood outside on the platform, talking up to the other in the window of the coach. It was eight minutes to three when Fawcett, evidently recollecting something he had forgotten to say, leaned out of the window still further and beckoned the young man close to the coach.
“I’ve got your business cards, Jason, but I mighty near forgot the credential paper,” he said in a low voice. “Slip it to me. Also, you haven’t told me what hotel to find Carstairs at. I’ll have a devil of a time locating him around the big Capitol building between the time the train gets in and the trial starts.”
Barton scratched his head, struck by the fact of his own forgetfulness. “Charlie,” he replied quickly, glancing again at his watch. “I didn’t forget the matter of the credential paper. I slipped it in the suit-case — in the pocket back of the shirt straps. But I did forget about Carstairs’ hotel, though.” He wrinkled his brows, stepping aside as a baggage truck bearing Fawcett’s suit-case bore down upon him and rolled up to the open door of the baggage car. He looked up. “Strange thing, too, that that matter didn’t occur to Frangenac.” Watch in hand, he thought quickly for a moment. “Old man, we’ve got seven minutes till the train pulls out. I’ll beat it back to the waiting
-room, call up Frangenac, tell him I’m just ready to board the Flyer, and ask him about that matter. And it’ll help to lend a bona-fide appearance to this stunt of mine.” He spun quickly on his heel. “If I fail to get back in time, you’ll have to connect with Carstairs around the Capitol building some way. But I’ll do my best to be back here before the train pulls out. So long, old man.”
With a final nod to the gloomy Fawcett, now lolling back in his seat with an unlighted cigar in his mouth, Barton hurried back along the platform and into the big waiting-room. There he found all six telephone booths filled with people, and he fumed angrily up and down for a minute, until the occupant of one came out. Whereupon he hurried into it, and closing the door on the heavy, foul air, he dropped a nickel in the slot and asked for Central 4444.
A clicking ensured. The voice that answered he recognised at once as that of the girl switchboard operator in the Dispatch office.
“Mr. Frangenac, please.”
“Sorry,” she said, “but Mr. Frangenac’s line is busy. Will you call again, or shall I hold the wire? Anyone else?”
“Listen, Nelly,” put in Barton eagerly, “this is Jason Barton of the editorial rooms. I’m at the depot supposed to leave for Washington in seven minutes, and Frangenac’s forgotten to give me all my instructions. I’ve got to talk to him. Please break him off, Nelly — quick.”
The girl seemed in some indecision. “I’ll tell you what I’ll do,” she returned quickly. “I can’t cut him off — but I’ll cut you into his conversation and you can get what you want and make your train. I’ll — ” She cut herself off as she made some change on the switchboard that threw Barton squarely into another connection.
He had just opened his mouth to shout: “Listen, Frangenac, it’s me, Barton,” when he stifled his words even as they trembled on his tongue. Frangenac was taking, but the startling thing about that fact was that he was talking of no one else but Barton himself.
“I fixed Barton, Ling,” he was saying. “I got him off to Washington with a raise and a commission, and it will be several days before he will know that the interview is killed. Then it will be what we term old stuff. Also, I’ve got his notebook, all his copy and the Princess’s signature. I shall be glad to give these all to you if you will come here — or shall I send a boy over to the Rydenour with them?”
Barton gasped when he heard the voice of Li Hwei Tsung in the receiver.
“That is very good, Savegeau. Li Hwei Tsung compliments you on your clever workmanship.” The voice ceased for an instant. “But what will you tell him when he does learn the truth?”
Savegeau! Barton wondered dazedly if he had heard aright.
“I’ll simply have to humour him — even if it means still more salary for a while. I intend, though, to tell him that international complications arose after you saw the Chinese consul, and that the thing had to be suppressed. Don’t fear, Ling. I have hushed it up for good. It hurt me to do it — it was a remarkable interview — but I’ve done everything you asked. You — you are satisfied?”
“Quite satisfied,” came back the voice of the Oriental in the phone. “As to the three articles you mentioned, I shall leave it to you to destroy them all. I think you understand the situation correctly. You have done very well. We leave the city day after to-morrow, and while I shall get the Chicago papers in San Francisco, I believe this is the end of it. Good-bye — Savegeau.”
As the clicking sounded forth, Barton, too, hung us his receiver and strode from the booth, hot and perspiring. Far down the track the engine bell on number six was ringing, white-capped porters were pulling in their stools, brass-buttoned brakemen were shouting “All aboard!” But Barton was oblivious to it all.
“The sly devil of — of — of a Frangenac!” he choked in suppressed rage. “The sly devil! Shooting me off to Washington — and killing the whole interview.” He stared dumbfoundedly into space. “Savegeau — Frangenac, Tsung — Ling!” The train on track six, with a screaming of axles, pulled out and rolled away over the sunlight-covered railroad yards. “But it’s Fawcett that’s on his way to Washington,” Barton said grimly to himself, “and not little innocent Jason Barton. The latter’s on his way to the offices of the Chicago Sun — and he’s thinking that that interview, signature and all, will be on the new stands to-morrow morning.”
He jostled his way through the waiting-room of the depot, and, taking a taxi-cab out in front, drove straight to the offices of the Sun.
CHAPTER XXXVI
PROFESSOR CHAN FU SPEAKS
ARRIVING at the Sun offices, Barton went straight upstairs to the city room, and sent in his card to the city editor by an ink-smudged copy boy. The city editor, however, proved to be busy with a visitor. Nothing daunted, Barton left the city room, and, proceeding along the outer corridor, turned the handle of a ground-glass door which bore the words, “L. Britton, Proprietor and Editor-in-Chief.” The room that he entered was filled with waiting people, held in submission by an office boy with a baleful glare in his eye. This time, however, Barton did not send in his plain card to the inner office, but wrote carefully on the back of it: “The man who interviewed the Princess O Lyra Seng.” Then he dropped into the nearest chair and waited.
The office boy appeared a moment later and beckoned him in. “Mr. Britton says ‘e’ll see yer,” was the precious information which he vouchsafed, to the consternation of the other waiting occupants.
Barton walked in. The office boy closed the door behind him. At a desk near the window sat an elderly man with white hair; on his nose were a pair of gold-rimmed eyeglasses from which peered two of the keenest of grey eyes. Through a pair of great folding doors at the side of the room Barton could hear the muffled click of the typewriters coming from the city room on the other side. Britton was holding the slip of white paste-board, and he scrutinised his visitor carefully.
“Do I understand, Mr. Barton,” he said quietly, “that you have secured an interview with the Princess O Lyra Seng? I see by your card that you are with the Dispatch.”
“Not any longer,” explained Barton laconically. Whereupon, with a half-smile, he drew up a chair close to the other’s desk, and proceeded to relate the whole happenings of the day, from the moment that Frangenac of the Dispatch had told him to give up his job if he could not achieve the unachievable, to the moment that he had heard the latter talking over the ‘phone to the Chinese Minister. This time however, he did not omit to tell the whole bizarre story of the Twelve Golden Coins of Confucius, the dead Chinese laundryman, and the mysterious red ticket with the hieroglyphics — half of which was out at Chicago University.
Minute after minute rolled along, Britton leaning forward on his elbows, rapt. Outside in the ante-room people fidgeted and fidgeted and continued to send in cards. To every one Britton sent out word by the office boy that he could see no one. The clock ticked steadily, inexorably, on the wall. Its hands had pointed to three when Barton entered the inner office. It was 3-25 when the older man finally stood up and put his hand on Barton’s shoulder. The envelope containing the carbon copy of the Princess’s interview stood torn open on Britton’s desk. the leaves strewn about where the Sun owner had run his trained eye over them. The duplicate of the Princess’s signature which she had given Barton for his own personal possession was pinned under a glass paperweight near by.
“Of course, you’re part of the Sun machine after this,” Britton was saying. “We need men like you, Barton. Your time starts from eight o’clock this morning. We’ll simply waive our hide-bound rule about employing only men who have been ten years in the newspaper game. After all, what the owner says goes, I believe.” He smiled. “Sixty a week at once — and probably more if you can uncover this story you are on.” Britton paused. “Now boy, this is big stuff. Get out on this ‘golden coin’ end of it and bring in another such story. Don’t delay. The cashier will be putting you on the books while you’re gone.”
When Barton left Britton’s office he was treading on air. Out
side, he entered his taxicab once more and had himself driven straight to the Illinois Central suburban station at the foot of Van Buren Street, and inside of five minutes had boarded a train for Fifty-seventh Street, wondering what sort of results he was going to secure through the aid of Professor Chan Fu, now that the latter had returned to the University.
He left the train and started across the greasy campus toward the faculty building. Even before he reached it he saw a closed carriage draw up in front of it and a figure disnount. It was a tall figure, dressed in a most gorgeous heavy gown that, flashing in the afternoon sun, gave forth the rich colours of green and red and gold. On his head was a quaint black cap, and on his eyes great hornshell glasses that even at the distance made him appear like some coloured tropical owl. From his upper lip two branches of a jet-black, silky moustache hung clear below his chin, like trellised moss.
Barton quickened his pace, for he recognised that tall figure immediately. It was Chan Fu himself, the eccentric and learned exchange professor from Peking University, Chicago.
It took him another minute to reach the faculty building. Fu had already ascended the steps and disappeared. After inquiring from a student clerk the whereabouts of Chan Fu’s suite, Barton took the elevator to the third floor and knocked on the old-fashioned door. The Chinese professor himself answered it. Barton, peering through the opening into the cosy study, could see the latter had just finished reading his letter, for the envelope stood torn open on the table and the half of Sam Toy’s red laundry ticket was grasped in the Professor’s fingers.
Sing Sing Nights Page 18
