“Tell him it's Mezzo moving some furniture about,” ordered Jimmie Dale swiftly.
He took his hand from the transmitter.
“It's de old dago shovin' some of his junk around,” said Mother Margot into the phone.
Again Jimmie Dale's hand closed over the transmitter.
“All right!” snapped the voice. “Can you hear now?”
“Tell him you can hear now,” breathed Jimmie Dale.
“Sure,” obeyed Mother Margot. “Sure—I gets youse now.”
“Go to the Crescent as I told you, then,” said the voice, “and give Curley this message: The black box, Sadie Foy's at eleven o'clock. Understand?”
Jimmie Dale nudged Mother Margot significantly as he nodded his head affirmatively, and again removed his hand from the phone.
“Sure!” said Mother Margot.
“Hurry!” said the voice, curtly.
The receiver at the other end of the wire was hung up.
“Let's get out of here,” said Jimmie Dale, coolly.
Mother Margot stumbled out of the booth. She was twisting her hands together, casting frightened, hurried glances toward the closed door that led into the second-hand shop in front, glancing furtively, too, at Jimmie Dale from under her hooded shawl.
“My Gawd!” she mumbled thickly. “My Gawd!”
Outside in the lane, the side door closed, Jimmie Dale drew the old woman against the wall of the building, and for a moment stood staring at her speculatively in the darkness.
Suddenly she reached out, and clawed at his sleeve.
“Wot youse goin' to do?” she whispered wildly. “My Gawd! De Gray Seal! Wot youse goin' to do?”
Jimmie Dale ignored her question. He spoke sharply.
“So Curley down at the Crescent Saloon is one of the gang too, is he?” he demanded.
“No; he ain't!” She shook her head vehemently. “Not de way youse means, he ain't.”
“I suppose that is why a message is sent to him, then,” observed Jimmie Dale caustically.
“He gets lot of 'em,” she said quickly; “but he don't know wot any of 'em means, an' he don't know where any of 'em goes to. I watched him once. Some one calls him up on de phone, an' he just says de message over, dat's all.”
“Quite so!” said Jimmie Dale softly. “But in that case, did it ever strike you that the Voice, as you call him, would save quite a little time, to say nothing of making you trudge around town, by phoning Curley direct?”
Mother Margot was twisting her hands again.
“Youse don't believe me!” she cried out hoarsely. “Youse t'ink I'm stringin' youse. I ain't! Honest to Gawd, I ain't! I'm handin' youse de straight goods. Dat's why no one gets next to de Voice unless he wants 'em to. De trail's gummed up. See? He don't trust no one. He was gettin' leery of me. Dat's why he sent me away. See? Dere's been a lot of leaks. He sent me away for three days on a fake lay. An' w'en I was away one of his games gets a hole all bust in it again, an' I guess it was youse did it. So he's sure it ain't me dat's spillin' any of de beans. Youse see, don't youse? Say, for God's sake, youse see, don't youse, dat I ain't stringin' youse?”
The old hag's voice was full of nervous anxiety. She kept wringing her hands together. Jimmie Dale nodded. She was undoubtedly telling the truth. He could quite understand now why she had been away—and could understand, perhaps better than she could, the Phantom's dire need of looking to his fences.
“But the phone?” he suggested.
“Well, dat's de answer, ain't it?” she said. “It ain't so much of a trick to trace a telephone call, is it? Not if de dicks want to do it. Dat's why he don't telephone dat sort of stuff nowhere except here, an' not to nobody except me. An'—an' if he was wise to wot happened in dere just now he'd—he'd—my Gawd, youse know wot he'd do! Say, youse ain't goin' to stop me, are youse? Youse're goin' to tell me wot dat message is, ain't youse, an' let me put it acrost?” She was clawing pitifully, frantically at Jimmie Dale's sleeve again. “If youse don't, an' I don't give Curley dat message, dey'll kill me. Mabbe youse got away wid it bein' de dago bumpin' furniture dat made de row in de booth, but if de message don't go, dat don't go neither, an'—an' dey'll slit me troat. Aw, for Gawd's sake! Youse knows dat! Dat's wot dey'll do!”
It was literally true. The failure of Mother Margot to deliver the message was exactly equivalent to her death sentence. Jimmie Dale's lips were a straight line. There was no quibbling on that point. The Phantom's trade was murder. He would strike without an instant's hesitation at the slightest indication that the old hag had played him false. On the other hand if he, Jimmie Dale, allowed Mother Margot to deliver the message he delivered himself without reservation into her hands—either that, or go back home to bed and leave Sadie Foy's alone. But again, if the message were delivered it promised almost to a certainty that at Sadie Foy's he would pick up the trail he had come out to-night to find. The Crescent Saloon and Curley did not interest him. That was only a relaying station. The rendezvous was at Sadie Foy's. Suppose he refused to give Mother Margot the message? Would it stop the projected devilry that was obviously afoot? And on that basis alone ought he to refuse? If he did, it would cost the woman her life. There was no supposition about that. That was fact. He couldn't do that, could he? And yet, since he must then assume the moral responsibility, and if for no other reason than that play a hand at Sadie Foy's, his own life very probably hung on whether Mother Margot would keep faith with him or not.
“Dey'll kill me!” Mother Margot whispered hoarsely. She pulled at his sleeve, clung to it; she was rocking queerly on her feet.
“Yes,” said Jimmie Dale calmly, “they'd kill you; and they would equally kill me if, once out of my sight, you added to the message the information that I was in this game again to-night. And so you see it's a case of you being killed to a certainty, or the chance, depending on you, of the same thing happening to me.” He smiled suddenly, whimsically. “I haven't very much choice, have I? I can't send you to your death. The message? Oh, yes! It's this: The black box. Sadie Foy's at eleven o'clock. That's all.”
She drew in her breath suddenly.
“My Gawd, youse're white!” she said in a low, catchy way. “I gets youse. Youse're goin' to be at Sadie Foy's, an' youse're takin' de chance of me splittin' on youse. Well, youse needn't worry, an' I'll tell youse why. I ain't forgot de night at Pedler Joe's. Youse made me go dere, I knows; but youse risked yer life to get me out of it, an' I ain't forgot.”
“I've wondered about that,” said Jimmie Dale, half to himself; then, briskly: “Do you know anything about this black box or what the message means?”
She shook her head.
“Do you know where Bunty Myers is?”
Again she shook her head.
“I ain't heard anythin' for three days until in dere to-night,” she said earnestly. “I only just got back.”
“All right,” said Jimmie Dale quietly. “You'd better go now. And hurry—in case there's a check on the time when you should be at Curley's.”
She hesitated an instant. Then she brushed a hand quickly across her eyes.
“My Gawd, youse're white,” she said again, huskily—and turned, and shuffled hurriedly down the alleyway toward the street.
Jimmie Dale watched her until she had disappeared.
“Perhaps!” said Jimmie Dale grimly. “And perhaps I am—a fool!”
XXIII.