I stopped the blood from the dog’s wound as best I could, telephoned for a veterinary, and paced the floor, the blood pounding in my temples, my anger too great to enable me to think clearly. Had the girl deliberately held me with the wiles of a vampire in order to enable her confederate to sneak to the door of my apartment and shoot the dog? Had there been some plan underway by which the conspirators had sought to deprive me of my dog? Or had they tried to search the apartment and had Bobo attacked so vigorously and silently that they had been forced to shoot him?
I could not answer my own questions. I could not even hazard a guess at the answers. For once there was a blind rage in my mind which prevented clearness of thought. I only knew that someone would pay.
The veterinary arrived, made an examination, shook his head, and conveyed Bobo away in an ambulance. I rode with the dog, sat up with him during the long night, watched with him the next day until at last the veterinary nodded at me and told me the dog would pull through.
Then and not until then did I leave Bobo, but the mission on which I left was in his behalf. I was seeking revenge, and the rage which had mastered me, still held me in its grip. There remained an inability to think clearly. Whenever I turned my mind to the problem before me, all I could see was the pathetic look in the dog’s eyes as he wagged his tail in greeting, welcoming the arrival of his master with the expenditure of his last, feeble strength, apologizing that the blood he had shed in defense of my possessions, had weakened him so that he could not come to me.
That day was Thursday. That night would be the dance at the home of John Staunton Lambert, and I determined that I would go to that dance. Fate had dealt the cards, and Ed Jenkins proposed to sit in the game.
I laid down and tried to sleep but could not. My eyes stared at the ceiling, wide awake.
I got up, took a shower, and made an examination of the apartment. It had been thoroughly and skillfully ransacked. Whether the search had been made after the shooting of the dog or before I had no way of telling. In one corner, though, I found a scrap of cloth, a cloth of a peculiar check, a check which was familiar, which brought up vague recollections.
I stood studying it for several minutes, puzzling my mind in an effort to recall when I had seen it before and where. My mind would not remain on the problem, but wandered off into a recollection of the events of the night before. “Hot Spit!” seemed to ring in my ears, and then I remembered.
The cloth was bloodstained, tom irregularly, jagged, as though wrenched by the teeth of a dog from a jacket or skirt. It was a part of the suit Lois Lambert had worn the night I first met her.
For a long moment I stood, looking at that fragment of cloth, and then I went to the wardrobe trunk in which I carried my clothes and took out my evening suit. I had decided. I would go to the dance.
Promptly at eight-thirty I drove up to the Lambert house, and I was a desperate man that night. There was a cold rage which had taken possession of me. I did not have sufficient facts at my disposal to strike, but I determined that I would get what facts I needed, and when I did get them I would act. As a criminal, the courts of justice are closed to me, have always been closed. I would be laughed out of court if I ever sought to protect my rights by judicial process. As a result I was my own judge, my own jury, and, at times, my own executioner.
The dance was a simple affair. Not over ten couples were in the private ballroom. Mrs. Lambert was a woman with red hair and keen, blue eyes that seemed to see more than they disclosed. She sized me up carefully and thoughtfully when I was presented. Somehow I had an idea that she read the papers and knew who I was. And yet she did not seem to resent my presence.
Sly was there, and I was formally presented to him. Ogden Sly, his name was, and neither of us made any offer to shake hands. He barely bowed his great head upon his soft, flabby neck, his arms moving about from the shoulders like the great tentacles of an octopus. His reddish eyes gleamed into my own, and I saw his narrow mouth move beneath the beak of his nose. He was mouthing an acknowledgment of the introduction, but I did not hear the words.
Lois was radiant in one of those gowns that women wear to display their charms. There was an appeal about her which was emphasized by the sheer, shimmering silk of the garment, the clinging lines and the vital body beneath.
“Ed, you simply must quit looking at my legs,” she said. “I don’t want folks to think that you are hopelessly old-fashioned, or getting to be an old man. You’re passé, out of date. Take a tumble to yourself, lower the eyebrows, elevate the eyes, and don’t think knees are such a treat.”
I did not respond to her banter. Always I was thinking of the faithful dog lying at the point of death. I was in this game solely to get cards, and I intended to get cards solely to win.
John Lambert gave a glimpse of his real character. Kindly and worried is the best way I can describe him. There was always the kindly care and consideration for his guests, that preoccupation which is the prerogative of men who have developed the power to think deeply, and, under all, was a haunting worry.
Sly seemed literally to force himself upon the girl. He danced with her, and, while he danced, his long, restless arms flitted over her figure, his hairy hands rubbed the bare flesh of her arms and shoulders, while his heavy body and expressionless face seemed merely a jellified mass of flesh. Only was there the reddish gleam of the eyes and the parrot-like appearance of his nose and narrow mouth.
It has been a long time since I have been in a ballroom. I am afraid I did not appear to great advantage, and I didn’t give a damn.
At that, I was better than one of the young sheiks. Walter Carter was the name by which he was introduced, and he was acting as escort for a vivacious little blonde who was bubbling forth good nature and an incessant line of small talk. She ran more words to the inch than any girl I have ever seen, and she said less to the word. That girl could have written a complete set of fifty volumes on the weather and it would all have strung together in perfect continuity and then when a fellow had read everything that was in the fifty volumes he’d still have to stick his head out of the window to see whether it was raining. That’s the sort of a baby she was, and Walter Carter had the facial expression of a man who has just eaten a soft-boiled rotten egg and can’t get the taste out of his mouth.
All in all it was one hell of a party.
I was probably supposed to hang around the females and watch and listen. I looked ’em over all right — these party gowns have to show more than the street styles — but I didn’t do very much dancing. In my opinion there’s better ways of spending life than by walking around on tiptoe to music, carrying some saucy little baggage around with you. However that’s just my opinion.
Along about ten o’clock I drifted around the house, taking advantage of my privileges as a guest to satisfy my curiosity as a crook.
John Lambert had a little study and library fixed up in one corner of the house, and I fancied he didn’t care very much for the social life. He had a place that looked mighty cozy, all lined with leather bound books, containing a safe and easy-chair, a typewriter and long table. I’ve noticed that nearly all of the better class of professional men have sort of a home library and study, but whether it’s because they like to work there or because they get so they prefer books to women is more than I know. Maybe it’s a little of both.
I took a ramble out on the porch, into the little patio in the back, looked over the flowers in the moonlight, and then started back. There were voices in the study. A polite guest would have coughed. A gentleman would have backed out. Being a crook and proud of it, I tiptoed within and listened.