by Otto Penzler
“Well,” he asked, sarcastically, “who spilled it?”
None answered.
Mort’s expression grew hard and ominous, as he went on:
“One slip-up can happen. Two might happen, but three times means—” He looked intently into the faces of the moll and the two other rods. “Three slips—and each one almost spelling curtains for me—mean a rat!”
The moll’s eyes flashed dangerously.
“Don’t insinuate that I’m a rat, Mort,” she said evenly, but the tiny muscles at the corners of her mouth tightened and her small hands clenched. “I’m no rat and you know it. I’d go to hell for you, and the boys would, too. Maybe you’ve talked too much in your off moments. Remember, you’re mingling in society now!” Her voice was bitter and jealousy showed in the tone of that word “society.”
“Never mind what I’m doing,” retorted Mort, angrily, “I’m not monkey enough to talk where there’s going to be a comeback at me.”
He turned to face the girl squarely.
“Let’s start from the beginning,” he said grimly, “and maybe we can find the leak. You got the tip-off from the Hag, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“The night ‘Carmen’ was sung at the Metropolitan,” answered the moll. “She was doing her usual stuff, whining around the automobiles near the entrance, with that tooth sticking down on her lower lip and that mole on her cheek sticking out over her coat collar. She slipped me the signal and I watched my chance to step up to her and drop four-bits into her tin-cup.
“ ‘The Vanderpools on Wednesday night, girlie,’ she said in that whine of hers. ‘It’s a pipe. I heard ‘em talkin’ as they dropped me a dime from the carriage window. All of ‘em will be away Wednesday night, except the old dame, herself, and she’ll be home taking a backgammon lesson from a girl sharp. And the old woman wears her diamonds for dinner every night, even in her home. It’s a pipe, girlie. Tell Mort—an’ I want my cut.’ “
“Anybody see you getting the info from her?” asked Mort.
“What if they did see me talking to her?” retorted the moll. “Who’d think she was tipping us to a job? I was just an opera-goer to the crowd on the pavement. Everybody talks to her—she’s the Hag of the Opera to everybody. Never misses the carriage door on opera nights. All the society folk know her whining story; she was Dolores, the dancer, she tells them as she begs. Dolores the famous ballet dancer. How she gets away with it with that fang sticking out over her lower lip from her upper jaw and that mole, I don’t know. Figure her as a dancer! But they listen to her and slip her change—and she’s the best lookout and tipster this mob ever had, until now!”
“Yes,” agreed Mort, reluctantly, “but she gave us the bum steer on the Stickney job, too, didn’t she? And she sent us out on Hark Island for that bust in the Longmans’ home that pretty near put me back of the walls.”
“She’s tipped us to plenty. She doesn’t get her cut unless we click.”
“Yes,” responded Mort grimly, “but maybe she’s changed her racket. Anyway …” He paused and looked into the anxious faces before him. “Anyway, either the Hag—or somebody here in this room—tipped off the Vanderpools tonight and we came damned near to dissolving this mob when that roomful of private dicks stepped on our feet. Now, suppose some one of you tries to answer that!”
“She’s playin’ with the Orange mob, maybe,” suggested Barry, “ ‘Blackie’ Rango and his gorillas been knockin’ off some sweet jack without no trouble while we’re sticking our throats out for the knife.”
“Yes,” added Carlotta vengefully, “and Blackie Rango is a hog so greedy that he’d send us to hell in a minute, if he could. It gives him violent cramps if he hears any other mob’s grabbed a few dollars. He wants it all himself.”
“Yes,” responded Mort, grimly. “Some day Blackie and I are going to argue that little matter out—especially if I find he’s back of this business of steering us into jams!”
Mort Mitchell straightened himself in his chair. He turned to the moll, who now was watching him admiringly.
“Baby,” he said, “this looks like your job. The Hag has been playing with us—and getting plenty for it. But, maybe she’s getting more to double-cross us now. You find out—and maybe when you do find out it’ll have some bearing on your private grudge.”
As he spoke the moll’s hand went involuntarily to her right shoulder and a spasm of hatred crossed her face.
“If it does,” she answered grimly, “I’ll want no more of any mob’s takings. I’ll be happy.”
“Watch the Hag,” warned Mort earnestly. “When’s the next opera?”
“Friday night. It’s ‘Lucia’ with Stephanie and Bendi in the cast. All the box-holders will be there.”
“You go, as usual with that music hound from the Village—and watch the Hag for her signal. And watch her close, before and after you talk to her. Maybe she’s spilling her chatter for Blackie and his rats, and if she is, she’s trying to put the finger on us!”
Mort pushed back his chair and rang for Dapper Ben again.
“Mort,” interrupted the moll anxiously, “are you coming over to my place with me?”
“No!” His tone was abrupt and he avoided looking the moll in the eyes.
“Society man again!” The girl snapped the words. “I guess—”
“Never mind about my business, baby,” Mort replied menacingly. “I’ll go with who I please. Your job is to watch the Hag, and bring the dope to me. I’m running this mob yet!”
The moll stifled her anger. She threw down another generous drink and stepped to the door. Her voice was cold now, despite the glitter in her eyes.
“I’ll see the Hag Friday night,” she said, “and if she’s got any stuff I’ll get it and bring it here to the Big Society Man—if he’s not too busy drinking tea and eating lady-fingers to accept it!”
She stepped through the door and slammed it behind her before Mort could reply. Barry and Sam grinned, for they knew the reason for her anger. Deeply in love with the handsome Mort, Carlotta knew that a mysterious woman, a strikingly beautiful woman with flaming hair and starlike eyes who haunted the better supper clubs and mingled freely with Park Avenue pleasure-lovers, was claiming every spare moment that the handsome Mort could give her. Their grins, however, were wiped from their faces by the grave words of Mitchell.
“Lay low for a few days,” he cautioned them. “That moll is smart and she may be able to smell out the rat who’s trying to put the finger on us. And, if she doesn’t, well— Then, it looks to me as though this mob is through. Blackie Rango is trying to hog every racket in the city, and he’ll do it, too, unless the jane spoils his plans before they work any further.”
Mort Mitchell left them abruptly. He hurried to his rooms to dress, for he was going to step out that night to one of the city’s snootiest supper clubs where he knew he would meet and have at least a few words with the woman whose flaming beauty had fascinated him, the red-haired, glorious Vi Carroll, mystery woman of the night clubs and associate of those who moved in the faster set of Society with the capital S.
Perhaps Mort Mitchell would not have been so eager for the smiles of the flashing Vi had he known of the scene which was being enacted at the time he was dressing for his night’s pleasure. For the dazzling Vivian, her face unsmiling now and her musical voice harsh in emphasis, was talking angrily and excitedly, not with one of her society friends, but with Blackie Rango himself, the greedy mob leader, who seemed perfectly at home amid the luxuries of Vi’s apartment.
And Blackie Rango was no sheik. He puffed from the exertion of crossing one fat leg over the other and his language seemed very much out of place in the tasteful surroundings. His beady eyes peered from beneath thick, bushy brows in a beetling forehead that wrinkled as he talked. Vi’s anger he passed unnoticed.
“You messed it up again, didn’t you, broad?” he asked, interrupting her. “Everything set to give the works to
Mort Mitchell, his frail with him an’ all his mob an’ instead o’ him getting’ his’n he’s still around, getting’ in my hair.”
“Yes! He’s still around because you and your gorillas didn’t have the guts to take him when I put him right in your hands!”
“Maybe,” answered Blackie, evenly, “an’ then again, maybe not. Now, see here, broad.” His gimlet eyes glowed as he thrust his ugly face closer to hers. “It’s got to be me or Mort Mitchell. They ain’t room in this town for his mob an’ mine, an’ mine ain’t goin’ to be the one to go out.”
He reached over and grabbed the red-haired moll by the wrist.
“Get this,” he said, and there was murder in his tone. “I’m puttin’ up for you. There ain’t no limit. You can play this society gag an’ you sock away plenty of jack. Yes, I know you’re doin’ it, but I don’t care, so long as you’re on the level with me. Your job is to frame Mort Mitchell—
he’s got to go. An’ don’t think I don’t know how friendly you are with him, too!”
The moll started as Blackie’s eyes bored into hers. She started to speak, but he went on:
“An’ when Mort goes, you’d better see to it that his frail goes, too. Maybe you don’t know her. An’ maybe you do. Anyhow, she’s with him on all his jobs an’ she’s a fightin’ fool. Carlotta Wynn, that’s what they call her. But that ain’t her name. She ain’t no ordinary moll. Nobody knows where she come from, but she’s a moll for a reason—and nobody but her knows why.”
“What do I care about his moll?” asked Vi angrily.
“Maybe you don’t, but you’re monkeyin’ with her man, an’ she looks like poison to me. Anyway, get this through your skull. Three times now you’ve slipped info to the Hag to send Mort Mitchell and his mob into a jam. An’ three times you’ve made a fine mess of it. Now, dame—”
Blackie’s manner was menacing and he twisted the moll’s wrist to emphasize his words.
“Get that guy! Tell the Hag to slip him a certain one, a tip he won’t pass up—an’ leave the rest to me. I’ll see they’s a load o’ hot lead waitin’ for him when he steps into it. An’, broad, don’t miss this time! Make it right, so Mort and his whole mob will go, includin’ the moll, for if you don’t—”
“Well, if I don’t?” challenged the girl defiantly.
“Here’s your answer,” replied Blackie ominously, “that moll Carlotta, in swimmin’ suit or evenin’ clothes, never was known to bare her right shoulder! Does that mean anythin’ to you?”
Vi Carroll cried out hoarsely. There was terror in her eyes.
“What’s her name?” she screamed. “Tell me, you big ape—what’s her name?”
“You guess it,” replied Blackie brutally, with a half-smile. “She come from Chi, too.”
Horror was written on the white face of Vivian Carroll. Her hands shook and the words she tried to speak would not come. Blackie laughed loudly.
“Maybe you’ll follow orders now, eh, kid?” he asked. He wheezed from the deep chair and balanced his fat body on his feet. “Better forget your yen for that pretty boy, Morton,” he added, “an’ play along with the guy who’s been right with you. Get me, frail?”
The girl nodded. Finally she regained her composure.
“I’ll frame him, Blackie,” she said with visible effort. “I’ll frame him if you promise me you’ll get that moll, too. My life isn’t worth a nickel if that girl ever recognized me. Don’t worry. I’ll play a hundred per cent with you now!”
“Atta baby, Vi,” answered Blackie, and he pulled on his coat with the help of the girl and waddled from the room. His soul was at peace as he waited for the elevator which took him to the street, and, as he rode away in his armored car with his gat bodyguard, Blackie Rango saw himself seated soon on the throne of gangdom. With the menacing Mort Mitchell and his mob out of the way, none in the underworld would dare dispute his leadership.
“An’ that there Vi,” Blackie said, half audibly, as he mused, “I’ll keep her around. She’s pretty easy on the eyes—an’ besides, I got the deadwood on her. She oughta pay dividends!”
Despite her valiant efforts to appear natural Vi Carroll plainly was suffering from some repressed emotion that night. Her companions in the gay party which went to the ultra-fashionable Club Meta to see the new floor show and hear the reigning tenor noticed it. They joked with her; in mock solicitude they inquired gravely whether her dampened spirits were due to Wall Street, to a love affair, to the loss of a dear friend, or what else?
Then the floor show engaged their attention and she had a moment’s peace from their banter. She fingered the thin-stemmed glass before her and looked through the crowd anxiously. She was looking for the handsome Mort Mitchell, the striking-looking, mysterious Mort, who held such a subtle attraction for her and the man she was pledged to frame. Her usual complacency was gone when she saw his tall figure appear.
She was agitated when he bowed to her and exchanged a greeting.
“Let’s dance,” she said as the orchestra struck up a number. “I’m blue tonight, I’m depressed.”
They danced silently for a round of the small floor and then the girl said abruptly:
“Morton, I want to talk to you. Let’s walk out on the balcony, so we can be alone. Try to cheer me up. I feel morbid, almost afraid.”
The mob chieftain laughed. What in the world, he thought, could this glorious girl, with wealth, social position, and beauty, have to worry about? They leaned over the balcony rail together, looking out on the lights of the city. When Vivian spoke, she tried to conceal the eagerness in her voice.
“I’ve been hearing things about you, Morton,” she said.
“What were they, Vi?”
“You’re the man of mystery to all my friends,” she went on. “They like you, but they do not know your antecedents—and, as a matter of fact, neither do I.”
“Just a fellow lucky to have a little bit of money,” Mort said, “and a business which takes care of itself. I’m a consulting engineer, if you must know, but my duties are not confining.”
Vi turned to him with an air of frankness.
“I’m not questioning you, Mort,” she said, “and I don’t care what the crowd thinks of you. But—” She hesitated, and then went on with a burst of apparent frankness. “Mort, who is the beautiful girl, the beautiful black-eyed girl I’ve heard is in your company pretty often? Frankly, I’m a bit jealous of her.”
Mort laughed heartily.
“You jealous?” she scoffed. “I just wish you cared enough about me to be jealous. The other girl? Just an employee, Vi, a girl who has worked in my office, an efficient stenographer, that’s all. We have no social contact. She’s been in my car, of course, but only in the line of her duties.”
“Who is she, Morton?”
“Just a girl who came here from Chicago a year ago. I really don’t know her first name. Miss Wynn, that’s all the name I know.”
Vi’s voice was strained as she persisted in her questioning.
“This girl, Morton. Has she particularly large, black eyes?”
“Yes, she has.”
“Did she—” Vi hesitated, then she went on, speaking almost desperately. “Morton, did this girl ever have an accident? Was she ever hurt badly, was—?”
Mort looked at the agitated Vivian curiously.
“Why all this interest in an office working girl, Vi?” he asked. “I don’t know anything more about her. How would I know whether she ever suffered injury?”
“Forgive me, Morton,” said Vi. “I’ve heard this girl described, and—and the description fitted a girl I once knew in the West. I thought, maybe—” She broke off with a laugh, a relieved laugh. “Let’s forget about the girl and rejoin the party,” and she led the way back to the dining-room with the attentive, but slightly puzzled, Mort behind her.
From that moment Vi Carroll’s manner changed. Her spirits rose, she laughed gayly, she seemed determined to still any disquieting thoughts with an excess o
f gaiety. “It can’t be the same girl,” she said to herself as she tripped through a dance with Mort. “Only a chance in a million it’s the same, and my luck is good.”
Mort left the party comparatively early, for he had troublesome things on his mind. That matter, that vital matter of Blackie Rango, wouldn’t be brushed from his recollection by the bright lights and gaiety. He left before the party broke up, managing a few whispered words again with Vi before leaving.
“Shall I see you tomorrow night, Vi?” he asked anxiously.
“Tomorrow,” replied the flushed girl— ”let’s see, tomorrow’s Friday. No, Morton, but I’ll see you Saturday. Tomorrow night’s the opera, you know, and I’m going with the Elberts, and then out to the island for the night.”
She smiled fondly at Mort’s disappointment and squeezed his hand tightly as he said adieu. A qualm came to her heart as she watched his tall figure moving toward the door. God, but he was a fine-looking fellow to be marked for Death! Why did he have to be the one?
Friday night and the opera, with favorites singing the principal roles and the diamond horseshoe ablaze with celebrities and color. Outside the forbidding opera house the stream of automobiles, the crowds of curious, fascinated by the jewels and scintillating frocks of society. And along the line of crawling automobiles, slowly approaching the entrance to disgorge their cargoes of dressed-up and bejeweled folks, croaked the Hag of the Opera, the bunchy figure of that wreck of a woman who whined for her alms at the automobile windows. Her slovenly body was swathed in the ground-length, dingy coat which came high on her neck, to her chin. Over her head the inevitable dirty shawl. Beneath the shawl peered the beady eyes, the gnarled sallow skin of the Hag, whining and showing the long discolored tooth, more like a fang, which reached from the front of her upper jaw down over her lower lip as she pleaded with the richly-gowned opera patrons for alms. Adding to her hideousness was a blemish—a huge, hairy mole—on her right cheek, which moved up and down as she whined.
Dirty, hideous, repulsive was the Hag of the Opera, yet she had her clientele. Women in shining automobiles shrank from her dirty extended paws, yet they besought their escorts to help her.
