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Officer 666

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<h2>CHAPTER XXXII.</h2> <h3>IN WHICH BLUFF IS TRUMPS.</h3> Having disposed of the girl for the moment, Travers Gladwin decided it was time to call Michael Phelan to his assistance. There was no telling what this amazing crook might do now. He was too much for him. That a thief and impostor could possess such superhuman nerve had never occurred to his untutored mind. He was a perfect dub to have let the situation reach such a stage of complexity, though the one thought uppermost in his mind was to save Helen from public ridicule and contempt. He had reasoned it out that just the uniform of Officer 666 would serve him almost as a magician’s wand. He had almost counted on the thief taking one craven look at his constabulary disguise and then leaping through the window––fleeing like a wolf in the night––he, Travers Gladwin, remaining a veritable hero of romance to sooth and console Helen and gently break the news to her that she had been the dupe of an unscrupulous criminal. Instead of which––he ground his teeth, went to the little panel door and shouted Phelan’s name. <div></div> Mrs. Phelan’s son came a-running. He had been on his way. The vast girthed individual in the pink striped pajamas and tasselled nightcap had accomplished his awful purpose, but the climax had been anti-climax and Phelan had ground his teeth in rage. He had been on the point of bursting through the window and somehow scrambling aloft to the rescue of that helpless being who was being ground and wrenched and pounded by that porcine monster, when the monster suddenly rose to view again with a dumb-bell in each hand. The jaw of Officer 666 slowly dropped as he watched the manipulation of the dumb-bells. There was no passion in the stodgy movements of the great paddy arms. Even so far away as he was Phelan could see that the man puffed and blew and that his vigor was slowly waning. Then suddenly the huge man stooped and held up in plain view a dangling wrestling dummy. The lone watcher swallowed a savage oath. “Sure ’twas exercisin’ an’ not murther he was doin’,” Phelan hissed through his teeth. His anger was white hot. Again he had been the victim of delusion and had wasted heroic emotions on a stuffed dummy that served merely as an inanimate instrument in a course of anti-fat calisthenics. Every nerve in Phelan’s body was fairly a-bristle as he made his way upstairs and burst into the great drawing-room and picture gallery. “Fer the love o’ hivin,” he cried, “give me me uniform and let me out o’ here.” “Here’s your uniform; I’ve had enough of it,” replied Gladwin, throwing him the coat and cap, “and get into it quick. There’s work for you right in this house.” “There is not, nor play neither,” snapped Phelan. “I’ve got to go out and chase up a drunk or throw a faint or git run over or somethin’ desperate to square mesilf with the captain. I’m an hour overdue at the station.” “You’ll square yourself with the captain all right if you just do what I tell you,” said Gladwin eagerly, helping him on with his coat and pushing him toward the window recess. “You go right in there behind those curtains and wait till I call you.” Phelan took one look at the young man’s face and muttered as he obeyed. “This must be a hell of a joke.” And just then the thief breezed in again, jerking back on his heels as he caught sight of Gladwin sans uniform, sans moustache and sans eyebrows. But a glance at that young man meant volumes and there was no limit to his spontaneous resources. He summoned a laugh and jerked out: “Oh, so you’ve resigned from the force?” “Yes,” retorted Gladwin, “and let me tell you that this little excursion of yours has gone far enough. I’ll give you one chance––get away from here as quickly as you can.” The big fellow curled one corner of his lip in a contemptuous smile, then glanced about him quickly and asked: “Where’s the young lady?” “Never mind the young lady,” Gladwin flung back at him. “It was only on her account that I let you go as far as this. Now get out and keep away from that young lady––and drop my name.” The sneering smile returned and balancing himself easily as he looked down on Gladwin, he said: “Easy, son––easy. I don’t like to have little boys talk to me like that,” and turning to the doorway behind him he beckoned. The obedient Watkins sidled in and stopped with head averted from Gladwin, who started with surprise at seeing him. Stepping forward and making sure there could be no mistake, Gladwin turned to the thief and exclaimed: “Oh, now I understand how you knew all about my house. This is what I get for not sending this man to jail where he belonged.” “Don’t bother with him, Watkins,” snarled the big fellow, as he noted his companion’s complexion run through three shades of yellow. “There’s no time to bother with him,” he went on, and reaching out he caught Travers Gladwin by the shoulder and whirled him half way across the room. The young man spun half a dozen times as he reeled across the carpet and he had to use both hands to stop himself against a big onyx table. As he pulled himself up standing he saw that Watkins had lifted the trunk on his shoulders and was headed for the hallway. “Phelan!” he gasped out. “Here, quick!” Officer 666 came out with the snort and rush of a bull. “Stop that man,” cried the thief, pointing to Watkins, “he’s trying to get out of here with a trunkful of pictures.” The man’s hair-trigger mind had thought this out before Phelan was half way round the table. One lightning glance at the thickness of the patrolman’s neck and the general contour of his rubicund countenance had translated to him the sort of man he had to deal with. “Here––here––put down that trunk,” spluttered Phelan, brandishing his club at Watkins. Watkins dropped the trunk and at a signal from his companion was gone. Swiftly and silently as he vanished, he could not have been half way to the door before the thief urged Phelan: “Quick––go after that man––he’s a thief!” “Stop Phelan!” cried Gladwin, who had begun to see through the pantomime. “They’re both thieves!” Phelan tried to run four ways at once. <div></div> “W-w-what?” he gurgled. “It’s a trick to get you out of the house,” said Gladwin with his eyes on the big man, who was calmly smiling and who had fully made up his mind on a magnificent game of bluff. “What the blazes kind of a joke is this?” blurted Phelan, looking from one to the other in utter bewilderment. “You’ll find it’s no joke, officer,” said the bogus Gladwin sharply––“not if he gets away.” “You’ll find it’s not so funny yourself,” cut in the real Gladwin. Then to Phelan, “Arrest this man, Phelan.” “Do you mean it?” asked the astonished Phelan, sizing up the thief as the highest example of aristocratic elegance he had ever seen in the flesh. “Of course I mean it,” Gladwin shot back. “Look out for him––there he goes for the window.” The thief had started in that direction, but his purpose was not escape. The idea had flashed upon him that Helen might be concealed there. Phelan headed him off, whereupon the thief said severely, in a tone that was far more convincing that Gladwin’s most passionate sincerity: “Now be careful, officer, or you’ll get yourself into a lot of trouble.” “Don’t let him bluff you, Phelan,” cautioned Gladwin. “You bet your life I won’t,” Phelan answered, though he was already bluffed. “I’ll stick close to yez,” he faltered, inching uncertainly toward the thief. He had come close enough for that astute individual to make out that he wore the same uniform young Gladwin had been masquerading in and he made capital of this on the instant. “How do you think it is going to look,” he said, impressively, “if I prove that you’ve tried to help a band of thieves rob this house?” “A band of thieves?” Phelan’s jaw dropped wide open. “He’s lying to you,” cried Gladwin. “I said a band of thieves,” insisted the thief. “Why he’s got his pals hidden all over the house.” “I tell you he’s lying to you,” Gladwin cut in frantically, seeing that Phelan was falling under the spell of the big man’s superb bluff, and at the same time remembering Helen and pressing the button in the wall to warn her that the time had come for her to flee. “We’re the only ones in this house,” Gladwin pursued, as Phelan gave him the benefit of his pop-eyes before he yielded them again to the stronger will. “Then they’ve all escaped,” said the thief, easily, thrusting his hands in his pockets to help out his appearance of imperturbability. “You let one go out, Phelan, and there were two others beside this one.” <div></div> The buttons on Phelan’s coat were fairly undulating with the emotions that stirred within him. In his seething gray matter there stirred the remembrance that Bateato had told him that women were robbing the house. “You mean the women,” he said, ignoring Gladwin and addressing the thief. “I remember––when the little Japanaze called me oft me beat, he said there was women crooks here, too.” “He’s lying to you, Phelan,” persisted Gladwin, though with less vehemence, a great feeling of relief having visited him in the belief that Helen had made her escape. “You can have the whole place searched just as soon as you’ve got this man where he can’t get away. There are no women here.” This last declaration had scarcely passed his lips when a woman’s voice raised in hysterical protest was audible in the hallway. <hr class="toprule" /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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