Children of the whirlwind

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

. OP CALIF. LIBRARY J0S ANGELES

CHILDREN OF THE
WHIRLWIND

BY

LEROY SCOTT

AUTHOR OF "A DAUGHTER OF TWO WORLDS,"
'MARY REGAN," " NO. 13 WASHINGTON SQUARE," ETC.

BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON MlFFLIN COMPANY

(Cbe fiitoetf ibe pres* CambriD0e
1921

COPYRIGHT, 1921, BY LEROY SCOTT
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

21326B2

CHILDREN OF THE
WHIRLWIND

• •
•

CHAPTER I

IT was an uninspiring bit of street: narrow, paved with
cobble; hot and noisy in summer, reeking with un-
wholesome mud during the drizzling and snow-slimed
months of winter. It looked anything this May after-
noon except a starting-place for drama. But, then, the
great dramas of life often avoid the splendid estates and
trappings with which conventional romance would equip
them, and have their beginnings in unlikeliest environ-
ment ; and thence sweep on to a noble, consuming tragedy,
or to a glorious unfolding of souls. Life is a composite of
contradictions — a puzzle to the wisest of us : the lily
lifting its graceful purity aloft may have its roots in a
dunghill. Samson's dead lion putrefying by a roadside
is ever and again being found to be a storehouse of wild
honey. We are too accustomed to the ordinary and the
obvious to consider that beauty or worth may, after
bitter travail, grow out of that which is ugly and un-
promising.

Thus no one who looked on Maggie Carlisle and
Larry Brainard at their beginnings, had even a guess
what manner of persons were to develop from them or
what their stories were to be.

The houses on the bit of street were all three-storied
and all of a uniform, dingy, scaling redness. The house
of the Duchess, on the left side as you came down the

4 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

street toward the little Square which squatted beside
the East River, differed from the others only in that
three balls of tarnished gilt swung before it and un-
redeemed pledges emanated a weakly lure from behind
its dirt-streaked windows, and also in that the person-
ality of the Duchess gave the house something of a
character of its own.

The street did business with her when pressed for
funds; but it knew little definite about the Duchess ex-
cept that she was shriveled and bent and almost word-
less and was seemingly without emotions. But of course
there were rumors. She was so old, and had been so long
in the drab little street, that she was as much a legend
as a real person. No one knew exactly how she had come
by the name of ''Duchess.0 There were misty, unsup-
ported stories that long, long ago she had been a favorite
in burlesque, and that this shriveled being had been a
shapely and royal figure in colored fleshings, and that
her title had been given her in those her ruling days.
Also there was a vague story that she had come by the
name through an old liking for the romances of that
writer who put forth her, or his, or their, prolific ex-
travagances under the exalted pseudonym of "The
Duchess." Also there was a rumor that the title came
from a former alleged habit of the Duchess of carrying
beneath her shapeless dress a hoard of jewels worthy to
be a duchy's heirlooms. But all these were just stories —
no more. Down in this quarter of New York nicknames
come easily, and once applied they adhere to the end.

Some believed that she was now the mere ashes of a
woman, in whom lived only the last flickering spark.
And some believed that beneath that drab and spent
appearance there smouldered a great fire, which might
blaze forth upon some occasion. But no one knew. As
she was now, so she had always been even in the memory
of people considered old in the neighborhood.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 5

Beside the fact that she ran a pawnshop, which was
reputed to be also a fence, there were only two or three
other facts that were known to her neighbors. One was
that in the far past there had been a daughter, and that
while still a very young girl this daughter had disap-
peared. It was rumored that the Duchess had placed the
daughter in a convent and that later the girl had married ;
but the daughter had never appeared again in the quar-
ter. Another fact was that there was a grandson, a
handsome young devil, who had come down occasionally
to visit his grandmother, until he began his involuntary
sojourn at Sing Sing. Another fact — this one the best
known of all — was that two or three years before an
impudent, willful young girl named Maggie Carlisle had
come to live with her.

It was rather a meager history. People wondered and
talked of mystery. But perhaps the only mystery arose
from the fact that the Duchess was the kind of woman
who never volunteered information about her affairs, and
the kind even the boldly curious hesitate to question. . . .

And down here it was, in this unlovely street, in the
Duchess's unlovely house, that the drama of Maggie
Carlisle and Larry Brainard began its unpromising and
stormy career: for, though they had thought of it little,
their forebears had been sowers of the wind, they them-
selves had sown some of that careless seed and were to
sow yet more — and there was to be the reaping of that
seed's wild crop.

CHAPTER II

WHEN Maggie entered the studio on the Duchess's third
floor, the big, red-haired, unkempt painter roared his re-
bukes at her. She stiffened, and in the resentment of her
proud youth did not even offer an explanation. Nodding

6 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

to her father and Barney Palmer, she silently crossed to
the window and stood sullenly gazing over the single
mongrel tree before the house and down the narrow
street and across the little Square, at the swirling black
tide which raced through East River. That painter was a
beast ! Yes, and a fool !

But quickly the painter was forgotten, and once more
her mind reverted to Larry — at last Larry was coming
back! — only to have the painter, after a minute, in-
terrupt her excited imagination with :

"What's the matter with your tongue, Maggie? Gen-
erally you stab back with it quick enough."

She turned, still sulky and silent, and gazed with cynical
superiority at the easel. "Nuts" — it was Barney Pal-
mer who had thus lightly rechristened the painter when
he had set up his studio in the attic above the pawnshop
six months before — Nuts was transferring the seamy,
cunning face of her father, "Old Jimmie" Carlisle, to the
canvas with swift, unhesitating strokes.

"For the lova Christ and the twelve apostles, in-
cluding that piker Judas," woefully intoned Old Jimmie
from the model's chair, "lemme get down off this plat-
form!"

" Move and I '11 wipe my palette off on that Mardi Gras
vest of yours!" grunted the big painter autocratically
through his mouthful of brushes.

"O God — and I got a cramp in my back, and my
neck's gone to sleep!" groaned Old Jimmie, leaning for-
ward on his cane. "Daughter, dear" — plaintively to
Maggie — "what is the crazy gentleman doing to me?"

" It fs an awful smear, father." Maggie spoke slightingly,
but with a tone of doubt. It was not the sort of picture
that eighteen has been taught to like — yet the picture
did possess an intangible something that provoked doubt
as to its quality. "You sure do look one old burglar!"

"Not a cheap burglar?" — hopefully.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 7

"Naw!" exploded the man at the easel in his big
voice, first taking the brushes from his mouth. "You're
a swell-looking old pirate! — ready to loot the sub-
treasury and then scuttle the old craft with all hands on
board! A breathing, speaking, robbing likeness!"

"Maggie's right, and Nuts's right," put in Barney
Palmer. "It's sure a rotten picture, and then again it
sure looks like you, Jimmie."

The smartly dressed Barney — Barney could not
keep away from Broadway tailors and haberdashers with
their extravagant designs and color schemes — dismissed
the insignificant matter of the portrait, and resumed the
really important matter which had brought him to her.

"Are you certain, Maggie, that the Duchess hasn't
heard from Larry?"

"If she has, she has n't mentioned it. But why don't
you ask her yourself?"

"I did, but she would n't say a thing. You can't get a
word out of the Duchess with a jimmy, unless she wants
to talk — and she never wants to talk." He turned his
sharp, narrowly set eyes upon the lean old man. "It's
got me guessing, Jimmie. Larry was due out of Sing Sing
yesterday, and we haven't had a peep from him, and
though she won't talk I 'm sure he has n't been here to see
his grandmother."

"Sure is funny," agreed Old Jimmie. "But mebbe
Larry has broke straight into a fresh game and is playing
a lone hand. He's a quick worker, Larry is — and he's
got nerve."

"Well, whatever 's keeping him we're tied up till
Larry comes." Barney turned back to Maggie. "I say,
sister, how about robing yourself in your raiment of joy
and coming with yours truly to a palace of jazz, there to
dine and show the populace what real dancing is?"

"Can't, Barney. Mr. Hunt" — the name given the
painter at his original christening — "asked the Duchess

8 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

and me to have dinner up here. He's to cook it him-
self."

"For your sake I hope he cooks better than he paints."
And sliding down in his chair until he rested upon a
more comfortable vertebra, the elegant Barney lit a
monogrammed cigarette, and with idle patience swung
his bamboo stick.

"You 're half an hour late, Maggie," Hunt began at her
again in his rumbling voice. "Can't stand for such a
waste of my time!"

"How about my time?" retorted Maggie, who indeed
had a grievance. "I was supposed to have the day off,
but instead I had to carry that tray of cigarettes around
till the last person in the Ritzmore had finished lunch.
Anyhow," she added, " I don't see that your time's worth
so much when you spend it on such painty messes as
these."

"It's not up to you to tell me what my time's worth!"
retorted Hunt. " I pay you — that 's enough for you ! . . .
Because you weren't on time, I stuck Old Jimmie out
there to finish off this picture. I '11 be through with the
old cut- throat in ten minutes. Be ready to take his place."

"All right," said Maggie sulkily.

For all his roaring she was not much afraid of the
painter. While his brushes flicked at, and streaked across,
the canvas she stood idly watching him. He was in paint-
smeared, baggy trousers and a soft shirt whose open
collar gave a glimpse of a deep chest matted with hair
and whose rolled-up sleeves revealed forearms that
seemed absurdly large to be fiddling with those slender
sticks. A crowbar would have seemed more in harmony.
He was unromantically old — all of thirty-five Maggie
guessed; and with his square, rough-hewn face and
tousled, reddish hair he was decidedly ugly. But for the
fact that he really did work — though of course his
work was foolish — and the fact that he paid his way —

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 9

he bought little, but no one could beat him by so much as
a penny in a bargain, not even the Duchess — Maggie
might have considered him as one of the many bums who
floated purposelessly through that drab region.

Also, had there not been so many queer people coming
and going in this neighborhood — Eads Howe, the hobo
millionaire, settlement workers, people who had grown
rich and old in their business and preferred to live near it
— Maggie might have regarded Hunt with more curiosity,
and even with suspicion; but down here one accepted
queer people as a matter of course, the only fear being
that secretly they might be police or government agents,
which Maggie and the others knew very well Hunt was
not. When Hunt had rented this attic as a studio they
had accepted his explanation that he had taken it be-
cause it was cheap and he could afford to pay no more,
Likewise they had accepted his explanation that he was a
mechanic by trade who had roughed it all over the world
and was possessed with an itch for painting, that lately he
had worked in various garages, that it was his habit to
hoard his money till he got a bit ahead and then go off on
a painting spree. All these admissions were indubitably
plausible, for his paintings seemed the unmistakable
handiwork of an irresponsible, hard-fisted motor mechanic.

Maggie shifted to her other foot and glanced casually
at the canvases which leaned against the walls of the
shabby studio. There was the Duchess: incredibly old,
the face a web of wrinkles, the lips indrawn over toothless
and shrunken gums, the nose a thin, curved beak, the eyes
deep-set, gleaming, inscrutable, watching; and drawn
tight over the hair — even Maggie did not know whether
that hair was a wig or the Duchess's — the faded Oriental
shawl which was fastened beneath her chin and which
fell over her thin, bent chest. There was OTlaherty,
the good-natured policeman on the beat. There was the
old watchmaker next door. There was Black Hurley, the

io CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

notorious gang leader, who sometimes swaggered into the
district like a dirty and evil feudal lord. There was
a Jewish pushcart peddler, white-bearded and skull-
capped. There was an Italian mother sitting on the curb,
her feet in the gutter, smiling down at the baby that was
hungrily suckling at her milk-heavy breast. And so on,
and so on. Just the ordinary, uninteresting things Maggie
saw around the block. There was not a single pretty
picture in the lot.

Hunt swung the canvas from his easel and stood it
against the wall. "That'll be all for you, Jimmie. Beat it
and make room for Maggie. Maggie, take your same
pose."

Old Jimmie ambled forward and gazed at his portrait
as Hunt was settling an unfinished picture on his easel.
It had rather amused Jimmie and filled in his idle time to
sit for the crazy painter; and, incidentally, another pic-
ture of him would do him no particular harm since the
police already .had all the pictures they needed of him
over at Headquarters. As he gazed at Hunt's work Old
Jimmie snickered.

"I say, Nuts, what you goin' to do with this mess of
paint?"

"Going to sell it to the Metropolitan Museum, you old
sinner!" snapped Hunt.

Old Jimmie cackled at the joke. He knew pictures;
that is, good pictures. He had had an invisible hand in
more than one clever transaction in which handsome
pictures alleged to have been smuggled in, Gainsboroughs
and Romneys and such (there had been most profit for
him in handling the forgeries of these particular masters) ,
had been put, with an air of great secrecy, into the hands
of divers newly rich gentlemen who believed they were
getting masterpieces at bargain prices through this eva-
sion of customs laws.

"Nuts," chuckled Old Jimmie, "this junk wouldn't

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 11

be so funny if you did n't seem to believe you were really
painting."

"Junk! Funny!" Hunt swung around, one big hand
closed about Jimmie's lean neck and the other seized his
lean shoulder. "You grandfather of the devil and all
his male progeny, you talk like that and I '11 chuck you
through the window!"

Old Jimmie grinned. The grip of the big hands of the
painter, though powerful, was light. They all knew that the
loud ravings of the painter never presaged violence. They
had grown to like him, to accept him as almost one of them-
selves; though of course they looked down upon him with
amused pity for his imbecility regarding his paintings.

"Get out of here," continued Hunt, "or cut out all this
noise that comes from your having a brain that rattles.
I've got to work."

Hunt turned again to his easel, and Old Jimmie, still
grinning, lowered himself into a chair, lit a cigar, and
winked at Barney. Hunt, with brush poised, regarded
Maggie a moment.

"You there, Maggie," he ordered, "chin up a bit more,
some flash in your eyes, more pep in your bearing — as
though you were asking all the dames of the Winter Gar-
den, and the Charity Ball, and the Horse Show, and that
gang of tea-swilling women at the Ritzmore you sell
cigarettes to — as though you were asking them all who
the dickens they think they are ... O God, can't you do
anything!"

"I'm doing the best I can, and I look more like those
dames than you look like a painter!"

"Shut up ! I 'm paying you a dollar an hour to pose, not
to talk back to me. And you 'd have more respect for my
money if you knew how hard I had to work to earn it:
carrying a motor car around in each hand. Wash off that
scowl and try to look as I said . . . There, that's better.
Hold it."

12 - CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

He began to paint rapidly, with quick glances back and
forth between the canvas and Maggie. Maggie's dress
was just the ordinary shirt-waist and skirt that the shop-
girl and her sisters wear; Hunt had ordered it so. She
was above the medium height, with thick black hair
tinted with shadowy blue, long dark lashes, dark scimi-
tars of eyebrows, a full, firm mouth, a nose with just
the right tilt to it — all effective points for Hunt in what
he wished to do. But what had attracted him most and
given him his idea was her look; hardly pertness, or impu-
dence— rather a cynical, mature, defiant certainty in
herself.

Erect in her cheap shirt-waist, she gazed off into space
with a smiling, confident challenge to all the world.
Hunt was trying to make his picture a true portrait — and
also make it a symbol of many things which still were only
taking shape in his own mind : of beauty rising from the
gutter to overcome beauty of more favored birth, and to
reign above it; also of a lower stratum surging up and
breaking through the upper stratum, becoming a part of
it, or assimilating it, or conquering it. Leading families
replaced by other families, classes replaced by other
classes, nations replaced by other nations — such was the
inevitable social process — so read the records of the fifty
or sixty centuries since history began to be written. Oh,
he was trying to say a lot in this portrait of a girl of or-
dinary birth — even less than ordinary — in her cheap
shirt-waist and skirt !

And it pleased the sardonic element in Hunt's unmoral
nature that this Maggie, through whom he was trying to
symbolize so much, he knew to be a petty larcenist : shop-
lifting and matters of similar consequence. She had been
cynically frank about this to him; casual, almost boast-
ful. Her possessing a bent toward such activities was
hardly to be wondered at, with her having Old Jimmie
as her father, and the Duchess as a landlady, and having

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 13

for acquaintances such gentlemen as Barney Palmer and
this returning prison-bird, Larry Brainard.

But petty crime, thought Hunt, would not be Maggie's
forte if she developed her possibilities. With her looks,
her boldness, her cleverness, she had the makings of a
magnificent adventuress. As he painted, he wondered
what she was going to do, and become; and he watched
her not only with a painter's eye intent upon the present,
but with keen speculation upon the future.

CHAPTER III

PRESENTLY Hunt's mind shifted to Larry Brainard, whom
Barney Palmer and Old Jimmie Carlisle had come here
to see. Hunt had a mind curious about every thing and
every one; and blustering, bullying creature though he
was, he had the gift, possessed by but few, of audaciously
thrusting himself into other people's affairs without arous-
ing their resentment. He was keen to learn Maggie's at-
titude toward Larry; and he spoke not so much to gain
knowledge of Larry as to draw her out.

"This Larry — what sort of chap is he, Maggie?" As
with most artists, talking did not interfere with Hunt's
painting.

Warm color slowly tinted Maggie's cheeks. "He's
clever," she said positively. "You already know that.
But I was only a girl when he was sent away."

Hunt smiled at her idea of her present maturity, implied
by her last sentence. "But you lived with the Duchess
for a year before he was sent away. You must have seen
a lot of him, and got to know him well."

"Oh, he used to come down now and then to see his
grandmother — I was only fifteen or sixteen then — just
a girl, and he did n't pay much attention to me. Father
can tell you better just how smart he is."

I4 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Old Jimmie spoke up promptly. He knew Hunt was
not a police stool, and he liked the painter as much as it
was in him to like any man ; so he felt none of the reserve
or caution that might have controlled him in other com-
pany.

" You bet Larry 's smart ! Got the quickest brain of any
con man in the business — and him only about twenty-
seven now. Some think I'm a smooth proposition myself,
but Larry puts it all over me. That 's why I 'm willing to
let him be my boss. He 's a wonder at thinking up new
stunts, and then at working out safe new ways of putting
them across."

"But the police landed him at last," commented Hunt.

"Yes, but that was only because another man muffed
his end of the job."

The handsome Barney Palmer had been restless during
Old Jimmie's eulogy. " Oh, Larry 's all to the good — but
he's not the only party that's got real ideas."

"Huh!" grunted Old Jimmie. "But you'll remember
that we haven't put over any big ones since Larry's
been in stir."

"That's been because you would n't listen to any of
my ideas!" retorted Barney. "And I handed out some
peaches."

Even during the period of Larry's active reign it had
irked Barney to accept another man as leader, and it had
irked him even more during the interregnum while Larry
was guest of the State. For Barney believed in his own
Napoleonic strain.

" Don't let yourself get sore, Barney," Old Jimmie said
appeasingly. "You'll have plenty of chances to try out
your ideas as the main guy before you cash in. You know
the outfit wanted to lay low for a while, anyhow. But
we '11 be putting over a lot of the big stuff when Larry gets
out."

Hunt had noted a quick light come into Maggie's dark

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 15

eyes while her father praised the absent leader. He him-
self suddenly perceived a new possibility.

"Maggie, ever think about teaming up with Larry?"
he demanded, with his audacious keenness.

She flushed, and hesitated. He did not wait for her
slow-coming reply, but turned to her father.

"Jimmie, did Larry ever use women in his stunts?"

"Never. Whenever we suggested using a skirt, Larry
absolutely said there was nothing doing. That 's one point
where he was all wrong. Nothing helps so much, when
the sucker is at all sentimental, as a clever, good-looking
woman. And Larry '11 come around to it all right. He'll
see the sense of it, now that he's older and has had two
years to think things over."

Old Jimmie nodded, showing his yellow teeth in a sly
grin. "You said something a second ago: Maggie and
Larry! They'll make a wonder of a team! I mean that
she '11 work under him with the rest of us. I Ve been think-
ing about it a long while. Mebbe you have n't guessed
it, but we've been coaching her for the part, and she's
just about ripe. She 's got the looks, and we can dress her
right for whatever job's on hand. Oh, Larry '11 put over
some great things with Maggie!"

If Hunt felt that there was anything cynically un-
paternal in this father planning for his daughter a career
of crime, he gave no sign of it. His attention was just then
all on Maggie. He saw her eyes grow yet more bright at
these last sentences of her father: bright with the vision of
approaching adventure.

"The idea suits you, Maggie?" he asked.

"Sure. It'll be great — for Larry is a wonder!"

Barney Palmer suddenly rose, his face twisted with
anger. "I'm all fed up on this Larry, Larry, Larry!
Come on, Jimmie. Let's get uptown."

Wise Old Jimmie saw that Barney was near an out-
burst. "All right, Barney, all right," he said promptly.

16 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"Not much use waiting any longer, anyhow. If Larry
comes, we'll fix it with the Duchess to meet him to-
morrow."

"Then so-long, Maggie," Barney flung at her, and that
swagger ex-jockey, gambler, and clever manipulator of
the confidence of people with money, slashed aside the
shabby burlap curtains with his wisp of a bamboo walk-
ing-stick, and strode out of the room.

"Good-night, daughter," and Old Jimmie crossed and
kissed her. She kissed him back — a perfunctory kiss.
Maggie had never paused to think the matter out, but
for some reason she felt little real affection for her
father, though of course she admired his astuteness.
Perhaps her unconscious lack of love was due in part to
the fact that she had never lived with him. Ever since she
remembered he had boarded her out, here and there, as
he was now boarding her at the Duchess's — and had
only come to visit her at intervals, sometimes intervals
that stretched into months.

"Barney is rather sweet on you," remarked Hunt after
the two were gone.

"I know he is," conceded Maggie in a matter-of-fact
way.

"And he seems jealous of Larry — both regarding you,
and regarding the bunch."

"He thinks he can run the bunch just as well as
Larry. Barney 's clever all right, and has plenty of nerve
— but he's not in Larry's class. Not by a million
miles!"

Hunt perceived that this daring, world-defying, embry-
onically beautiful model of his had idealized the home-
coming nephew of the Duchess into her especial hero.
Hunt said no more, but painted rapidly. Night had fallen
outside, and long since he had switched on the electric
lights. He seemed not at all finicky in this matter of
light; he had no supposedly indispensable north light, and

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 17

midday or midnight were almost equally apt to find him
slashing with brush or scratching with crayon.

Presently the Duchess entered. No word was spoken.
The Duchess, noteworthy for her mastery of silence, sank
into a chair, a bent and shrunken image, nothing seem-
ingly alive about her but her faintly gleaming, deep-set
eyes. Several minutes passed, then Hunt lifted the can-
vas from the easel and stood it against the wall.

"That's all for to-day, Maggie," he announced, push-
ing the easel to one side. "Duchess, you and this wild
young thing spread the banquet- table while I wash up."

He disappeared into a corner shut off by burlap curtains.
From within there issued the sound of splashing water
and the sputtering roar of snatches of the Toreador's song
in a very big and very bad baritone.

Maggie put out a hand, and kept the Duchess from
rising. "Sit still — I'll fix the table."

Silently the Duchess acquiesced. Maggie had never
felt any tenderness toward this strange, silent woman
with whom she had lived for three years, but it was
perhaps an indication of qualities within Maggie, whose
existence she herself never even guessed, that she in-
stinctively pushed the old woman aside from tasks which
involved any physical effort. Maggie now swung the back
of a laundry bench up to form a table-top, and upon it
proceeded to spread a cloth and arrange a medley of
chipped dishes. As she moved swiftly and deftly about,
the Duchess watching her with immobile features, these
two made a strangely contrasting pair: one seemingly
spent and at life's grayest end, the other electric with
vitality and giving off the essence of life's unknown ad-
ventures.

Hunt stepped out between the curtains, pulling on his
coat. "You'll find that chow in my fireless cooker will
beat the Ritz," he boasted. "The tenderest, fattest kind
of a fatted calf for the returned prodigal."

18 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Maggie started. "The prodigal! You mean — Larry is
coming?"

"Sure," grinned Hunt. "That's why we celebrate."

Maggie wheeled upon the Duchess. "Is Larry really
coming?"

"Yes," said the old woman.

"But — but why the uncertainty about when he was
coming back ? Father and Barney thought he was due
to get out yesterday."

"Just a mistake we all made about his release. His
time was up this afternoon."

"But you told Barney and my father you hadn't
heard from him."

"I had heard," said the Duchess in her flat tone. "If
they want to see him they can see him to-morrow."

"When — when will he be here?"

"Any minute," said the Duchess.

Without a word Maggie whirled about and the next
moment she was in her room on the floor below. She did
not know what prompted her, but she had a frantic de-
sire to get out of this plain shirt-waist and skirt and into
something that would be striking. She considered her
scanty wardrobe; her father had recently spoken of hand-
some gowns and furnishings, but as yet these existed only
in his words, and the pseudo-evening gowns which she
had worn to restaurant dances with Barney she knew to
be cheap and uneffective.

Suddenly she remembered the things Hunt had given
her, or had loaned her, the evening four months earlier
when he had taken her to an artists' masquerade ball —
though to her it had been a bitter disappointment when
Hunt had carried her away before the unmasking at
twelve o'clock. She tore off the offending waist and skirt,
pulled from beneath the bed the pasteboard box con-
taining her costume; and in five minutes of flying hands
the transformation was completed. Her thick hair of bur-

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 19

nished black was piled on top of her head in gracious dis-
order, and from it swayed a scarlet paper flower. About
her lithe body, over a black satin skirt, swathing her
in its graceful folds, clung a Spanish shawl of saffron-
colored background with long brown silken fringe, and
flowered all over with brown and red and peacock blue,
and held in place by three huge barbaric pins jeweled with
colored glass, one at either hip and upon her right shoulder,
leaving her smooth shoulders bare and free. With no
more than a glance to get the hasty effect, she hurried
up to the studio.

Hunt whistled at sight of her, but made no remark.
Flushed, she looked back at him defiantly. The Duchess
gave no sign whatever of being aware of the trans-
formation.

Maggie with excited touches tried to improve her set-
ting of the table, aquiverwith expectancy and suspense
at the nearness of the meeting — every nerve of audition
strained to catch the first footfall upon the stairs. Hunt,
watching her, could but wonder, in case Larry was the
clever, dashing person that had been described, what
would be the outcome when these two natures met and
perhaps joined forces.

CHAPTER IV

WHILE the preparations for dinner were going on in the
studio, down below Larry turned a corner and swung up
the narrow street toward the pawnshop. He halted and
peered in before entering ; in doing this he was obeying the
caution that was his by instinct and training.

Leaning over the counter within and chatting with
his grandmother's assistant was Casey, one of the two
plain-clothesmen who had arrested him. Larry drew
back. He was not afraid of Casey, or of Ga vegan, Casey's

20 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

partner, or of the whole police force, or of the State of
New York; they had nothing on him, he had settled ac-
counts by having done his bit. All the same, he preferred
not to meet Casey just then. So he went down the street,
crossed the cobbled plaza along the water-front, and
slipped through the darkness among the trucks out to
the end of the pier. Under his feet the East River splashed
sluggishly against the piles, but out near the river's
center he could see the tide swirling out to sea at six
miles an hour, toward the great shadowy Manhattan
Bridge crested with its splendid tiara of lights.

He stretched himself and breathed deeply of the warm
free spring. It tasted good after two long years of the
prison's sealed air. He would have liked to shed his cloth-
ing and dive down for a brisk fight with the tingling water.
Larry had always taken pleasure in keeping his body fit.
He had not cared for the gymnasiums of the ward clubs
where he would have been welcome; in them there had
been too much rough horseplay and foulness of mouth,
and such had always been offensive to him. And though
he had ever looked the gentleman, he had known that
the New York Athletic Club and other similar clubs were
not for him; they pried a bit too much into a candidate's
social and professional standing. So he had turned to a
club where really searching inquiries were rarely made;
for years he had belonged to a branch of the Y.M.C.A.
located just off Broadway, and had played handball and
boxed with chunky, slow-footed city detectives who were
struggling to retain some physical activity, and with fat
playwrights, and with Jewish theatrical managers, and
with the few authentic Christians who occasionally
strayed into the place and seemed ill at ease therein. He
had liked this club for another reason; his sense of humor
had often been highly excited by the thought of his being
a member of the Y.M.C.A.

Having this instinct for physical fitness, he had not

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 21

greatly minded being a coal-passer during the greater part
of his stay at Sing Sing; better that than working in the
knitting mills; so that now, though underfed and under
weight, he was active and hard-muscled.

Larry Brainard could not have told why, and just
when, he had turned to devious ways. He had never put
that part of his life under the microscope. But the simple
facts were that he had become an orphan at fifteen and a
broker's clerk at nineteen after a course in a business col-
lege ; and that experiences with wash-sales and such de-
vious and dubious practices of brokers, his high spirits, his
instinct for pleasure, his desire for big winnings — these
had swept him into a wild crowd before he had been old
enough to take himself seriously, and had started him
upon a brilliant career of adventures and unlawful money-
making in whose excitement there had been no let-up
until his arrest. He had never thought about such tech-
nical and highly academic subjects as right and wrong
up to the day when Casey and Gavegan had slipped the
handcuffs upon him. To laugh, to dance, to plan and di-
rect clever coups, to spend the proceeds gayly and lavishly
— to challenge the police with another daring coup: that
had been life to him, a game that was all excitement.

And now, after two years in which there had been
plenty of time for thinking, his conscience still did not
trouble him on the score of his offenses. He believed, and
was largely right in this belief, that the suckers he had
trimmed had all been out to secure unlawful gain and to
take cunning advantage of his supposedly foolish self
and of other dupes. He had been too clever for them,
that was all ; in desire and intent they had been as great
cheats as himself. So he felt no remorse over his victims ;
and as for anything he may have done against that im-
personal entity, the criminal statutes, why, the period
in prison had squared all such matters. So he now faced
life pleasantly and with care-free soul.

22 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Larry had turned away from the dark river and had
started to retrace his way, when he saw a man approach-
ing through the darkness. Larry paused. The man drew
near and halted exactly in front of Larry. By the swing
of his body Larry had recognized the man, and his own
figure instinctively grew tense.

"What you doin' out here, Brainard?" The voice was
peremptory and rough.

"Throwing kisses over at Brooklyn," Larry replied
coolly. "And what are you doing out here, Gavegan?"

" Following you. I wanted a quiet word with you. I 've
been right behind you ever since you hit New York."

"I knew you would be. You and Casey. But you
have n't got anything on me."

"I got plenty on you before! — with Casey helping,"
retorted Gavegan. "And I '11 get plenty on you again! —
now that I know you are the main guy of a clever outfit.
You '11 be starting some smooth game — but I 'm going to
be right after you every minute. And I '11 get you. That's
the news I wanted to slip you."

"So!" commented Larry drawlingly. "Casey's a
fairly decent guy, considering his line — but, Gavegan,
I don't see how Casey stands you as a partner. And,
Gavegan, I don't see why the Board of Health lets you
stay around the streets — when putrefying matter
causes so much disease."

"None of your lip, young feller!" growled Gavegan.
He stepped closer, bulking over Larry. "You think you
are such a damned smart talker and such a damned
clever schemer — but I'll bet I'll have you locked up
in six months."

Anger boiled up within Larry. Against all the persons
connected with his arrest, trial, and imprisonment, he
had no particular resentment, except against this one
man. He never could forget the time he and Gavegan,
he handcuffed, had been locked in a sound-proof cell, and

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 23

Gavegan had given him the third degree — in this case
a length of heavy rubber hose, applied with a powerful
arm upon head and shoulders — in an effort to make
him squeal upon his confederates. And that third degree
was merely a sample of the material of which Gavegan
was made.

Larry held his desire in leash. "So you bet you'll get
me. I '11 take that bet — any figure you like. I Ve al-
ready got a new game cooked up, Gavegan. Cleverer
than anything I've ever tried before."

"Oh, I'll get you!" Gavegan growled again.

"Oh, no, you won't!" And then Larry's old anger
against Gavegan got into his tongue and made it wag
tauntingly. "You did n't get me the last time; that
was a slip and police stools got me. All by yourself,
Gavegan, you couldn't get anything. Your brain's got
flat tires, and its motor does n't fire, and its clutch is
broken. The only thing about it that still works is the
horn. You've got a hell of a horn, Gavegan, and it never
stops blowing."

A tug was nearing the dock, and by its light Larry
saw the terrific swing that the enraged detective started.
Larry swayed slightly aside, and as Gavegan lunged by,
Larry's right fist drove into Gavegan's chin — drove
with all the power of his dislike and all the strength of
five years in a Y.M.C.A. gymnasium and a year in a
prison boiler-room.

Gavegan went down and out.

Larry gazed a moment at the dim, sprawling figure,
then turned and made his way off the pier and again to
the door of the pawnshop. Casey was gone; he could
see no one within but Old Isaac, the assistant.

Larry opened the door and entered. "Hello, Isaac.
Where's grandmother?"

It is not a desirable trait in one connected with a
pawnshop, that is also reputed to be a fence, to show

24 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

surprise or curiosity. So Isaac's reply was confined to a
few facts and brief direction.

Wondering, Larry mounted the stairway which opened
from the confidential business room behind the pawn-
shop. It was common enough for his grandmother to
rent out the third floor; but to a painter, and a crazy
painter — that seemed strange. And yet more strange
was it for her to be having dinner with the painter.

Larry knocked at the door. A big male voice within
gave order:

"Be parlor-maid, Maggie, and see who's there."

The door opened and Larry half entered. Then he
stopped, and in surprise gazed at the flushed, gleaming
Maggie, slender and supple in the folds of the Spanish
shawl.

"Why, Maggie!" he exclaimed, holding out his hand.

"Larry!"

She was thrillingly confused by his surprised ad-
miration. For a moment they stood gazing at each
other, holding hands. The clothes given him on leaving
prison were of course atrocious, but in all else he measured
up to her dreams: lithe, well-built, handsome, a laugh
ready on his lips, and the very devil of daring in his
smiling, gray-blue eyes.

"How you have grown up, Maggie!" he said, still
amazed.

"That's all I've had to do for two years," she re-
turned.

"Come on in, Larry," said the Duchess.

Larry shut the door, bowed with light grace as he had
to pass in front of Maggie, and crossed to the Duchess.

"Hello, grandmother," he said as though he had last
seen her the day before. He held out his hand, the left
one, and she took it in a mummified claw. In all his
life he had never kissed his grandmother, nor did he re-
member ever having been kissed by her.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 25

"Glad you're back, Larry." She dropped his hand.
"The man's name is Hunt."

Larry turned to the painter. His laughing eyes could
be sharp; they were penetratingly sharp now. And so
were Hunt's eyes.

Larry held out his hand, again the left. "And so
you're the painter?"

"They call me a painter," responded Hunt, "but
none of them believe I 'm a painter."

Larry turned again to Maggie. "And so you 're actually
Maggie! Meaning no offense" — and there was a smiling
audacity in his face that it would have been hard to have
taken offense at — "I don't see how Old Jimmie Car-
lisle's daughter got such looks without stealing them."

"Well, then," retorted Maggie, "I don't see how you
got your looks unless — "

She broke off and bit her tongue. She had been about
to retort with the contrast between Larry's face and
his shriveled, hook-nosed grandmother's. They all per-
ceived her intention, however.

Larry came instantly to her rescue with almost im-
perceptible ease.

"Dinner!" he exclaimed, gazing at the miscellany of
dishes on the table. "Am I invited?"

"Invited?" said Hunt. "You're the guest of honor."

"Then might the guest of honor beg the privilege of
cleaning up a bit?" Larry drew his right hand from his
coat pocket, where it had been all this while, and started
to unwind the handkerchief which he had wound about
his knuckles as he had crossed from the pier.

" Is your hand hurt much? " Maggie inquired eagerly.

"Just skinned my knuckles."

"How?"

"They happened to connect with a flatfoot's jaw
while he was trying to make hypnotic passes at me. He's
coming to about now. Officer Gavegan."

26 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"Gavegan!" exclaimed Hunt. "You picked a tough
bird. Young man, you 're off to a grand start — a charge
of assault on an officer the very day they turn you out
of jail."

Larry smiled. "Gavegan is a dirty one, but he'll
make no charge of assault. He claims to be heavy-
weight champion boxer of the Police Department. Put
a fine crimp in his reputation, would n't it, if he ad-
mitted in public that he'd been knocked out by a fellow,
bare-handed, supposed to be weak from prison life,
forty pounds lighter. He 'd get the grand razoo all along
the line. Oh, Gavegan will never let out a peep."

" He'll square things in some other way," said Hunt. i

"I suppose he'll try," Larry responded carelessly.
"Where's the first-aid room?"

Hunt showed him through the curtains. When he
came out, Hunt, Maggie, and the Duchess were all en-
gaged in getting the dinner upon the table. Additional
help would only be interference, so Larry's eyes wan-
dered casually to the canvases standing in the shadows
against the walls.

"Mr. Hunt," he remarked, "you seem to have earned
a very real reputation of its sort in the neighborhood.
Old Isaac downstairs told me you were crazy — said
they called you ' Nuts ' — said you were the worst
painter that ever happened."

"Yeh, that's what they say," agreed Hunt.

"They certainly are awful, Larry," put in Maggie,
coming to his side. "Father thinks they are jokes, and
father certainly knows pictures. Just look at a few of
them."

"Yeh, look at 'em and have a good laugh," invited
Hunt.

Larry carried the portrait of the Duchess to beneath
the swinging electric bulb and examined it closely.
Maggie, at his shoulder, waited for his mirth; and Hunt

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 27

regarded him with a sidelong gaze. But Larry did not
laugh. He silently returned the picture, and then ex-
amined the portrait of Old Jimmie — then of Maggie —
then of the Italian madonna, throned on her curbstone.
He replaced this last and crossed swiftly to Hunt.
Maggie watched this move in amazement.

Larry faced the big painter. His figure was tense, his
features hard with suspicion. That moment one could
understand why he was sometimes called "Terrible
Larry"; just then he looked a devastating explosion that
was still unexploded.

"What's your game down here, Hunt?" he demanded
harshly.

"My game?" repeated the big painter. "I don't get
you."

"Yes, you do! You're down here posing as a boob who
smears up canvases!"

"What's wrong with that?"

"Only this: those are not crazy daubs. They're real
pictures!"

"Eh!" exclaimed Hunt. Maggie stared in bewilder-
ment at the two men.

Hunt spoke again. "What the dickens do you know
about pictures? Old Jimmie, who's said to be a shark,
thinks all these things are just comics."

"Jimmie only thinks a picture's good after a thousand
press-agents have said it's good," Larry returned. "I
studied at the Academy of Design for two years, till I
learned I could never paint. But I know pictures."

"And you think mine are good?"

"Not in the popular manner — they're too original.
But they're great. And you're a great painter. And I
want to know — "

"Hurray!" shouted Hunt, and flung an enthusiastic
arm about Larry, and began to pound his back. "Oh,
boy! Oh, boy!"

28 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Larry wrenched himself free. " Cut that out. Then you
admit you're a great painter?"

"Of course I'm a great painter !" shouted Hunt. "Who
should know it better than I do? "

"Then what 's a great painter doing down here? What 's
the game you're trying to put over, posing as — "

"Listen, son," Hunt grinned. "You've called me and
I Ve got to show my cards. Only you must n't ever tell —
nor must Maggie; the Duchess doesn't talk, anyway.
No need bothering you just now with a lot of details about
myself. It's enough to say that people would n't pay me
except when I did the usual pretty rot; no one believed in
the other stuff I wanted to do. I wanted to get away from
that bunch; I wanted to do real studies of human people,
with their real nature showing through. So I beat it.
Understand so far?"

"But why pose as a dub down here?"

" I never started the yarn that I was a dub. The people
who looked at my work, and laughed, started that talk.
I did n't shout out that I was a great artist for the mighty
good reason that if I had, and had been believed, the
people who posed for me either would n't have done it or
would have been so self-conscious that they would have
tried to look like some one else, and would never have
shown me themselves at all. Thinking me a joke, they just
acted natural. Which, young man, is about all you need to
know."

Maggie looked on breathlessly at the two men, be-
wildered by this new light in which Hunt was presented,
and fascinated by the tense alertness of her hero, Larry.

Slowly Larry's tensity dissipated. " I don't know about
the rest of your make-up," he said slowly, "but as a
painter you're a whale."

"The rest of him's all right, too," put in the dry, un-
emotional voice of the Duchess. " Dinner 's ready. Come
on."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 29

As they moved to the table Hunt clapped a big hand on
Larry's shoulder. "And to think," he chuckled, "it took
a crook fresh from Sing Sing to discover me as a great
artist! You're clever, Larry — clever! Maggie, get the
corkscrew into action and fill the glasses with the choicest
vintage of H2O. A toast. Here's to Larry!"

CHAPTER V

THE dinner was simple: beef stewed with potatoes and
carrots and onions, and pie, and real coffee. But it
measured up to Hunt's boast: the chef of the Ritz, limited
to so simple a menu, could indeed have done no better.
And Larry, after his prison fare, was dining as dine the
gods.

The irrepressible Hunt, trying to read this new speci-
men that had come under his observation, sought to
draw Larry out. "Barney Palmer and Old Jimmie were
here this afternoon, wanting to see you. They've got
something big waiting for you. I suppose you 're all ready
to jump in and put it over with a wallop."

" I'm going to put something over with a wallop — but
I guess business will have to wait until Barney, Jimmie,
and I have a talk. Can you spare me a little more of that
stew?"

His manner of speaking was a quiet announcement to
Hunt that his plans were for the present a closed subject.
Hunt felt balked, for this lean, alert, much-talked-of ad-
venturer piqued him greatly; but he switched to other
subjects, and during the rest of the meal did most of the
talking. The Duchess was silent, and seemingly was
concerned only with her food. Larry got in a fair portion
of speech, but for the most part his attention, except for
that required for eating, was fixed upon Maggie.

How she had sprung up since he had last seen her! Al-

30 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

most a woman now — and destined to be a beauty ! And
more than just a beauty: she was colorful, vital, high-
strung. Before he had gone away he had regarded her with
something akin to the negligent affection of an older
brother. But this thing which was already beginning
to surge up in him was altogether different, and he knew
it.

As for Maggie, when she looked at him, she flushed and
her eyes grew bright. Larry was back! — the brilliant,
daring Larry. She was aware that she had been successful
in startling and gripping his attention. Yes, they would
do great things together !

When the dinner was finished and the dishes washed,
Larry gave voice to this new urge that had so quickly
grown up within him.

"What do you say, Maggie, to a little walk?"

"All right," she replied eagerly.

They went down the narrow stairway together. On
the landing of the second floor, which contained only
Maggie's bedroom and the Duchess's and a tiny kitchen,
Maggie started to leave him to change into street clothes ;
but he caught her arm and said, "Come on." They de-
scended the next flight and came into the back room be-
hind the pawnshop, which the Duchess used as a combina-
tion of sitting-room, office, and storeroom. About this
musty museum hung or stood unredeemed seamen's
jackets, men and women's evening wear, banjos, guitars,
violins, umbrellas, and one huge green stuffed parrot
sitting on top of the Duchess's safe.

"I wanted to talk, not walk," he said. "Let's stay
here."

He took her hands and looked down on her steadily.
Under the yellow gaslight her face gleamed excitedly up
into his, her breath came quickly.

"Well, sir, what do you think of me?" she demanded.
"Have I changed much?"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 31

"Changed? Why, it's magic, Maggie! I left you a
schoolgirl; you're a woman now. And a wonder!"

"You think so?" She flushed with pride and pleasure,
and a wildness of spirit possessed her and demanded ex-
pression in action. She freed her left hand and slipped it
over Larry's shoulder. "Come on — let's two-step."

"But, Maggie, I've forgotten."

"Come on!"

Instantly she was dragging him over the scanty floor
space. But after a moment he halted, protesting.

"These prison brogans were not intended by their
builders for such work. If you Ve got to dance, you '11 have
to work it out of your system alone."

"All right!"

At once, in the midst of the dingy room, humming the
music, she was doing Carmen's dance — wild, provoca-
tive, alluring. It was not a remarkable performance in
any professionally technical sense; but it had vivid per-
sonality; she was light, lithe, graceful, flashing with
color and spirits.

"Maggie!" he exclaimed, when she had finished and
stood before him glowing and panting. "Good! Where
did you learn that?"

"In the chorus of a cabaret revue."

" Is that what you 're doing now, working in a chorus?"

"No. Barney and father said a chorus was no place
for me." She drew nearer. " Oh, Larry, I Ve such a lot to
tell you."

"Goon."

"Well" — she cocked her head impishly — "I've
been going to school."

' ' Going to school ! Where ? ' '

"Lots of places. Just now I'm going to school at the
Ritzmore Hotel."

1 ' At the Ritzmore Hotel ! " He stared at her bewildered.
"What are you learning there?"

32 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"To be a lady." She laughed at his increasing be-
wilderment. "A real lady, Larry," she went on excitedly.
"Oh, it 's such a wonderful idea ! Father had never seemed
to think much of me till the night I went to a masquerade
ball with Mr. Hunt, and he and Barney saw me in these
clothes. They had never seen me really dressed up before ;
Barney said it was an eye-opener. They saw how I could
be of big use to you all. But to be that, I Ve got to be a
lady — a real lady, who knows how to behave and wear
real clothes. That's what they're doing now: making me
a lady."

"Making you a lady!" exclaimed Larry. "How?"

"By putting me where I can watch real ladies, and
study them. Barney cut short my being in a chorus;
Barney said a chorus girl never learned to pass for a
lady. So I 've been working in places where the swellest
women come. First in a milliner shop ; then as dresser to a
model in the shop of a swell modiste ; always watching how
the ladies behave. Now I 'm at the Ritzmore, and I carry a
tray of cigarettes around the tables at lunch and at tea-
time and during dinner and during the after-theater
supper. I 'm supposed to be there to sell cigarettes, but I 'm
really there to watch how the ladies handle their knives
and forks and behave toward the men. Is n't it all awfully
clever?"

"Why, Maggie!" he exclaimed.

"And pretty soon, when I've learned more," she con-
tinued rapidly, "I'm going to have swell clothes of my
own — and be a lady — and get away from this dingy,
stuffy, dead old place! I can't stand for being buried
down here much longer. And, oh, Larry, I'm going to
begin to work with you!"

"What?" he blinked, not yet quite understanding.

"You think I'm not clever enough? But I am!" she
protested. "I tell you I've learned a lot. And Barney
and father have let me help in a lot of things — nothing

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 33

really big yet, of course. They think I 'm going to be a
wonder. Just to-day father was saying that you and I,
teamed up — Why, what's the matter, Larry?"

"You and I — teamed up," he repeated slowly.

"Yes. Don't you like the idea?"

His hands suddenly gripped her bare shoulders.

"There 's nothing to it !" he exclaimed almost savagely.

"What's that?" she cried, startled.

"I tell you there's nothing to it!"

"You — you think I can't put it over?"

"You can't! And I'm not going to have it!"
."Why — why— "

Staring, she drew slowly away from him. His face,
which a few moments before had been smiling, was now
harsh and dominant with decision. She had heard him
spoken of as "Laughing Larry"; and also as "Terrible
Larry" whose aroused will none could brook. He looked
this latter person now, and she could not understand.

But though she could not understand, her own defiant
spirit stormed up to fight this unexpected opposition.
He did n't believe in her — that was it! He did n't think
she was equal to working with him! Her young figure
stiffened in angered pride, and her mind was gathering
hot phrases to fling at him when the door from the pawn-
shop began to creak open. Instantly Larry turned toward
it, relaxed and yet alert for anything. Old Jimmie and
Barney Palmer entered.

"Hello, Larry!" cried the old man, crossing. "Wel-
come to our city!"

"Hello, Jimmie. Hello, Barney." And Larry shook
hands with his partners of other days.

"Gee, Larry, it's good to see you!" exclaimed the
cunning-eyed old man. " Did n't know you were back till
I bumped into Gavegan on Broadway. He told me, and
so Barney and I beat it over here to see you. Believe me,
Larry, that flatfoot is certainly sore at you!"

34 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Larry ignored the last sentence. " Think it exactly wise
for you two to come here?"

"Why, Larry?"

"Gavegan, Casey, the police, may follow, thinking
you 've come to see me for some purpose. That outfit may
act upon suspicion."

Jimmie grinned cunningly. "A man can come to visit
his own daughter as often as he likes. Father love,
Larry."

" I see ; that '11 be your explanation." Larry's eyes grew
keen at the new understanding. " I had n't thought of
that before, Jimmie. So that's why you've always
boarded Maggie around in shady joints: so's you could
meet your pals and yet always have the excuse that you
had come to meet your daughter?"

"Partly that," smiled Old Jimmie blandly — per-
haps too blandly. "Suppose we sit down."

They did so, Maggie sitting a little apart from the
men and regarding Larry with indignant, questioning
eyes. She still could not understand his queer behavior
when she had announced her intention of working with
him. Could it be, as her father had said, because he would
never work with women — not trusting them? She'd
show him!

She was so occupied with this wonderment that she
gave no heed to the talk about Larry's experience in Sing
Sing and Old Jimmie's recital of what had happened
among Larry's friends during his absence. During this
gossip the Duchess entered from the stairway, and with-
out word to any one shuffled across to her desk in a cor-
ner and bent silently over her accounts: just one more
grotesque and unredeemed pledge in this museum of
antiquities and forgotten pawns.

Presently Barney Palmer, who had been impatient
during all this, broke out with:

"Aw, let's cut out this chatter about what used to be

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 35

and get down to cases. Jimmie, will you spill the business
to Larry, or want me to?"

" I '11 tell him. Listen, Larry." Maggie pricked up her
ears; the talk was now excitingly important. "We've
got our very greatest game all planned out. Stock-selling
game ; going to unload the whole thing on one sucker, and
we 've got the sucker picked out. Besides you and Barney
and me, there's Red Hannigan and Jack Rosenfeldt in it
— a classy bunch all right. And we think that for the
woman end we'll take in Mae Gorham. She's clever and
innocent-eyed — "

"But I thought you were going to take me in!" pro-
tested Maggie.

"Maggie '11 be just as good as Mae Gorham," put in
Barney.

"We'll let that pass," said Old Jimmie. "The main
thing, Larry, is that everything is ready. It 's a whale of a
business proposition. We 've been waiting for you ; you 're
all that 's lacking — the brainy guy to sit behind the
scenes and manage the thing. You Ve handled the bunch
for a long time, and they want you to handle this. For
you're sure a wonder at business, Larry! None keener.
Well, we've held this off waiting for you for a month.
How about jumping right in?"

All three eyed Larry. His lean face was expressionless.
He lit a cigarette, rose and leaned against the Duchess's
safe on which stood the green parrot, and, gaze on the
floor, slowly exhaled smoke through his nostrils.

"Well?" demanded Barney.

Larry looked at the two men with quiet, even eyes.
"Thanks to both of you. It's a great compliment. But
I've had time to do a little planning myself up in Sing
Sing, and I've worked out a game that's got this one
beat a mile."

"Hell!" ejaculated Barney in wrathful disgust. "Jim-
mie, I told you we were wasting time waiting for him!"

36 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"Hold on a second, Barney. If Larry's worked out a
better game, he'll take us into it. But, Larry, how can
your game beat this one?"

"Because there's more money in it. And because it's
safer."

"Safe! Aw, hell!" The smouldering jealousy and
hatred glared out of Barney's greenish eyes. "I always
knew you had a yellow streak! Something safe! Aw,
hell!"

"Don't blow up, Barney. What is the new game,
Larry?" queried the old man.

Larry regarded the two men steadfastly. He seemed
reluctant to speak.

"Well?" prompted Old Jimmie. " Is it something you
don't want to let us in on?"

"Of course I'll let you in on it, and be glad to, if you
want to come in," Larry replied in his level tone. "As I
said, I've thought it all out and it's a great proposition.
Here's the game: I'm going to run straight."

For a moment all three sat astounded by this quiet
statement from their leader. Nothing he might have said
could have been more unexpected, more stupefying. The
Duchess alone moved; she turned her head and held her
sunken eyes upon her grandson.

Simultaneously the two men and Maggie stood up.

"The hell you say!" grated Barney Palmer.

"Larry, you gone crazy?" cried Old Jimmie.

Maggie moved a pace nearer him. "Going to go
straight?" she asked incredulously.

"Listen, all of you," Larry said quietly. "No, Jimmie,
I 've not gone crazy. I 'm merely going a little sane. You
just said I was a wonder at business, Jimmie. I think I
am myself. I thought it all over as a business proposi-
tion. Suppose we clean up fifty or a hundred thousand
on a big deal. We've got to split it several ways, perhaps
pay a big piece to the police for protection, perhaps pay

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 37

a lot of lawyers, and then perhaps get sent away for a
year or several years, during which we don't take in a
nickel. I figured that over a term of years my average
income was mighty small. As a business man it seemed to
me that I was in a poor business, with no future. So I de-
cided to get into a new business that had a future. That 's
the size of it."

"You're turning yellow — that's the real size of it!"
snarled Barney Palmer, half starting toward him.

"Better be a little careful, Barney," Larry warned with
tightening jaw.

"You really mean, Larry," demanded Old Jimmie,
"that you're going to drop us after us counting on you
and waiting for you so long?"

"I'm sorry about having kept you waiting, Jimmie.
But we've parted definitely." Then Larry added: "Un-
less you want to travel my road."

"Your road! Never!" snapped Barney.

"And you, Jimmie?" Larry inquired, his eyes on Bar-
ney's inflamed face.

" I don't see your proposition. And I 'm too old a bird
to start something new. No, thanks. I '11 stick to what I
know."

His next words, showing his long yellow teeth, were
spoken slowly, but they were hard, and had a cutting
edge. "You've got a sweet idea of what's straight,
Larry: dropping us without a leader, just when we need a
leader most."

Larry's composed yet watchful gaze was still on Bar-
ney. "You're not really left in such a bad way. Barney
here is ready to take charge."

"You bet I am!" Barney flamed at him, his hands
clenching. "And the bunch won't lose by the change, you
bet ! The bunch always thought you were an ace — and
I always knew you were a two-spot. And now they '11 see I
was right — that you were always yellow!"

38 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Larry still leaned against the safe in the same posture
of seeming ease, but he expected Barney to strike at any
moment, and held himself in readiness for a flashing fist.
Barney had been hard to hold in leash in the old days;
now that all ties of partnership were broken, he saw in
those small gleaming eyes a defiance and a hatred that
henceforth had no reason for restraint. And he knew that
Barney was shrewd, grimly tenacious, and limitless in
self-confidence and ambition.

"And listen to this, too, Larry Brainard," Barney's
temper carried him on. "Don't you mix in and try any
preaching on Maggie." He half turned his head jealously.
"Maggie, don't you listen to any of this boob's Salvation
Army talk!"

Maggie did not at once respond, but stood gazing at the
two confronting figures. To her they were an oddly dis-
similar pair : Barney in the smartest clothes that an over-
smart Broadway tailor could create, and Larry in the
shapeless garments that were the State's gift to him on
leaving prison.

"Maggie," he repeated, "don't you listen to this
boob's talk!"

" I '11 do just as I please, Barney."

"But you're going to come our way?" he demanded.

"Of course."

He turned back to Larry. "You hear that? You leave
Maggie alone!"

Larry did not answer, though his temper was rising.
He looked over Barney's head at Maggie's father.

"Jimmie," he remarked in his same even voice, "any-
thing more you'd like to say?"

"I'm through."

"Then," said Larry, " better lead your new commander-
in-chief out of here, or I'll carry him out and spank
him."

"What's that?" snarled Barney.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 39

"Get out!" Larry ordered, in a voice suddenly like
steel.

Barney's fist swung viciously at Larry's head. It did
not land, because Larry's head was elsewhere. Larry
did not take advantage of the opening to strike back, but
as the fist flashed by he seized the wrist, and in the same
instant he seized the other wrist. The next moment he
held Barney helpless in a twisting, torturing grip that he
had learned from one of his non-Christian friends at the
Y.M.C.A.

"Barney — are you going to walk out, or shall I kick
you out?"

Barney's answer came after a moment through gritted
teeth: "I'll walk out — but I'll get you for this!"

"I know you'll try, Barney. And I know you'll try to
get me behind my back." Larry loosed his grip. "Good-
night."

Barney backed glowering to the door; and Old Jimmie,
his gray face an expressionless mask, silently followed
him out.

All this while the Duchess had looked on, motionless in
her corner, a dingy, forgotten part of the dingy background
— no more noticeable than one of her own dusty, bizarre
pledges.

CHAPTER VI

FOR a moment after the door had closed upon Barney and
Old Jimmie, Larry stood gazing at it. Then he turned to
Maggie.

She was standing slenderly upright. Her head was im-
periously high, her black eyes defiant. Neither spoke at
once. More than before was he impressed by her present
and her potential beauty. Till this night he had thought
of her only casually, as merely a young girl ; he was not
now consciously in love with her — her young woman-

40 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

hood had burst upon him too suddenly for such a con-
sciousness — but a warm tingling went through him as
he gazed at her imperious, self-confident youth. Part of
his mind was thinking much the same thought that Hunt
had considered a few hours earlier: here were the makings
of a magnificent adventuress.

"Maggie," he mused, "you did n't get your looks from
your father. You must have had a fine-looking mother."

"I don't know — I never saw her," she returned
shortly.

"Poor kid," Larry mused on — "and with only Old
Jimmie for a father." She did not know what to say. For
a long time she had dreamed of this man as her hero ; she
had dreamed of splendid adventures with him in which
she should win his praise. And now — and now —

He switched to another subject.

"So you have decided to string along with your father
and Barney?"

"I have."

"Don't you do it, Maggie."

"Don't you preach, Larry."

" I 'm not preaching. I 'm just talking business to you.
The same as I talked business to myself. The crooked
game is a poor business for a woman who can do something
else — and you can do something else. I 've known a lot
of women in the crooked game. They've all had a rotten
finish, or are headed for one. So forget it, Maggie. There 's
more in the straight game."

She had swiftly come to feel herself stronger and wiser
than her ex-hero. In her tremendous pride and confidence
of eighteen, she regarded him almost with pitying con-
descension.

"Something's softened your brain, Larry. I know
better. The people who pretend to go straight are just
fakes; they're playing a different kind of a smooth game,
that's all. Everybody is out to get his, and get it the eas-

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 41

iest and quickest way he can. You know that's so. And
that's just what I am going to do."

Larry had once talked much the same way, but it
seemed puzzlingly strange just now to hear such talk
from a young girl. Then he understood.

"You could n't help having such ideas, Maggie, living
among crooks ever since you were a kid. Why, Old Jim-
mie could not have used better methods, or got better
results, if he had set out consciously to make you a crook."
Then a sudden possibility came to him. " D' you suppose
he could always have had that plan — to make you into
a crook?" he asked.

"What difference does that make?" she demanded
shortly.

"A funny thing for a father to do with his own child,"
Larry returned. "But whether Jimmie intended it or
not, that's just what he's done."

"What I am, I am," she retorted with her imperious
defiance. Just then she felt that she hated him; she quiv-
ered with a desire to hurt him : he had so utterly destroyed
her romantic hero and her romantic dreams. Her hands
clenched.

"You talk about going straight — it's all rot!" she
flamed at him. "A lot of men say they're going straight,
but no one ever does! And you won't either!"

"You think I won't?"

"I know you won't! You don't know how to do any
regular work. And, besides, no one will give a crook a
chance."

She had unerringly placed her finger upon his two great
problems, and Larry knew it; he had considered them
often enough.

"All the same, I'm going to make good!" he declared.

"Oh, no, you're not!"

Perhaps he was stirred chiefly by the sting of her
taunting tongue, by the blaze of her dark, disdainful eyes ;

42 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

and perhaps by the changed feeling toward this creature
whom he had left a half-grown girl and returned to find
a woman. At any rate, he crossed and seized her wrists
and gazed fiercely down upon her.

"I tell you, I'm going to go straight, and I'm going
to make a success of it ! You '11 see ! " And then he added
dominantly: "What's more, I'm going to make you go
straight, too!"

She made no attempt to free herself, but blazed up at
him defiantly. " You '11 make me do nothing. I'm going
to be just what I said, and I 'm going to make a success
of it. Just wait — I '11 prove to you what I can do !
And you — you '11 be a failure, and will come slinking
back and beg us to take you in!"

They glared at each other silently, angrily, their
aroused wills defying each other. For a moment they
stood so. Then something — a mixture of his desire to
dominate this defiant young thing and of that growing
change in him toward her — surged madly into Larry's
head. He caught Maggie in his arms and kissed her.

All the rigidity went suddenly from her figure and she
hung loose in his embrace. Their gazes held for a moment.
She went pale, and quivering all through she looked up
at him in startled, wide-eyed silence. As for Larry, a
dizzying, throbbing emotion permeated his whole as-
tonished being.

Suddenly she pushed herself free from his relaxing
arms, and backed away from him.

"What did you do that for?" she whispered huskily.

But she did not wait for his answer. She turned and
hurried for the stairway. Three steps up she turned again
and gazed down upon him. Her cheeks were once more
flushed and her dark eyes blazing.

"It's going to be just as I said!" she flung at him.
"I'm going to succeed — you're going to fail! You just
wait and see!"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 43

She turned and ran swiftly up the stairway and out
of sight. Neither of them had been aware that the Duch-
ess, a drab figure merged into a drab background, had
regarded them fixedly during all this scene. And Larry
was still unconscious that the old eyes were now watch-
ing him with their deep-set, expressionless fixity.

Motionless, Larry stood gazing at where Maggie had
been. Within him was tumult; he did not yet understand
the significance of that impulsive kiss . . . He began to
walk the floor, his mind and will now more in control.
Yes, he was going to go straight; he was going to make
good, and make good in a big way! And he was going to
make Maggie go straight, too. He 'd show her! It was n't
going to be easy, but he had his big plan made, and he
had determination, and he knew he'd win in the end.
Yes, he'd show her! . . .

Up before the mirror Maggie sat looking intently at
herself. Part of her consciousness was wondering about
that kiss, and part kept fiercely repeating that she 'd show
him — she 'd show him — she 'd show him ! . . .

Looking thus into their futures they were both very cer-
tain of themselves and of the roads which they were to
travel.

CHAPTER VII

LARRY was still gazing at where Maggie had stood, flash-
ing her defiance at him, when Hunt came thumping down
the stairway.

"Hello, young fellow ; what you been doing to Maggie? "
demanded the painter.

"Why?"

"Her door was open when I came by and I called to
her. She did n't answer, but, oh, what a look! What 'sin
the air?"

And then Hunt noted the Duchess apart in her corner.

44 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

" I say, Duchess — what were Larry and Maggie rowing
about?"

"Grandmother!" Larry exclaimed with a start. "I'd
forgotten you were here ! You must have heard it all —
go ahead and tell him."

"Tell him yourself," returned the Duchess.

Larry and Hunt took chairs, and Larry gave the gist of
what he had said about his decision to Barney and Old
Jimmie and Maggie. The Duchess, still motionless at
her desk as she had been all during Larry's scene with
Old Jimmie and Barney, and then his scene with Maggie,
regarded her grandson with that emotionless, mummified
face in which only the red-margined eyes showed life or
interest.

"So you're going to go straight, eh?" queried Hunt.
The big painter sat with his long legs sprawling in front
of him, a black pipe in his mouth, and looked at Larry
skeptically. "You certainly did hand a jolt to your friends
who'd been counting on you. And yet you're sore be-
cause they were sore at you and did n't believe in you."

"Did I say that I was sore?" queried Larry.

"No, but you're acting it. And you're sore at Maggie
because she did n't believe that you could make good or
that you'd stick it out. Well, I don't believe you will
either."

"You're a great painter, Hunt, and a great cook —
but I don't give a damn what you believe."

"Keep your shirt on, young fellow," Hunt responded,
puffing imperturbably. "I say I believe you won't win
out — but that's not saying I don't want you to win out.
If that's what you want to do, go to it, and may luck be
with you, and may the devil stay in hell. The morals of
other people are out of my line — none of my business.
I 'm a painter, and it 's my business to paint people as I
find them. But Maggie certainly did put her finger on
the tough spot in your proposition : for a crook to find a

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 45

job and win the confidence of people. It's up grade all
the way, and it takes ten men's nerve to stick it out to the
top. Yep, Maggie was sure right!"

And then the Duchess broke her accustomed silence
with her thin croak:

"Never you mind Maggie! She thinks she knows
everything, but she does n't know anything."

Larry looked in surprise at his grandmother. There was
a flash in her old eyes; but the next moment the spark
was gone.

"Sure you're up against it — but I'll be rooting for
you." Hunt was grinning. " But say, young fellow, what
made you decide to vote the other ticket?"

Larry was trained at reading faces; and in the rough-
hewn, grinning features of Hunt he read good-fellowship.
Larry swiftly responded in kind, for from the moment he
had pulled the mask of being a fool from the painter and
shown him to be a real artist, he had felt drawn toward
this impecunious swashbuckler of the arts. So he now re-
peated the business motives which he had presented to
Barney and Old Jimmie. As Larry talked he became more
spontaneous, and after a time he was telling of the effect
upon him of seeing various shrewd men locked up and
unexercised in prison. And presently his reminiscence
settled upon one prison acquaintance : a man past middle
age, clever in his generation, who had already done some
fifteen years of a long sentence. He was, said Larry, grim
and he rarely spoke; but a close, wordless friendship had
developed between them. Only once, in an unusually re-
laxed mood, had the old convict spoken of himself, but
what he had then said had had a greater part in rousing
Larry to his new decision than the words of any other
man.

"It was a queer story Joe let out," continued Larry.
"Before he was sent away he had a kid, just a baby
whose mother was dead. He told me he wanted to have

46 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

his kid brought up without ever knowing anything about
the kind of people he knew and the kind of life he'd
lived. He wanted it to grow up among decent people. He
had money put away and he had an old friend, a pal,
that he'd trust with anything. So he turned over his
money and his baby to his friend, and gave orders that the
kid was to be brought up decent, sent to school, and that
the kid was never to know anything about Joe. Of course
the baby was too young then ever to remember him ; and
when he gets out he 's going to keep absolutely clear of the
kid's life — he wants his kid to have the best possible
chance."

"What is his whole name, and what was he sent up
for?" queried the Duchess, that flickering fire of interest
once more in her old eyes.

"Joe Ellison. He was an old-time confidence man.
He got caught in a jam — there had been drinking —
there was some shooting — and he had attempted man-
slaughter tacked on to the charge of swindling. But Joe
said everybody had been drinking and that the shooting
was accidental."

"Joe Ellison — I knew him," said the Duchess. "He
was about the cleverest man of his day. But I never
knew he had a child. Who was this best friend of his?"

"Joe Ellison didn't mention his name," answered
Larry. "You see Joe spoke of his story only once. But
he then said that he'd had letters once a month telling
how fine the kid was getting on — till three or four years
ago when he got word that his friend had died. The way
things stand now, Joe won't know how to find the kid
when he gets out even if he should want to find it — and
he would n't know it even if he saw it. Up in Sing Sing
when I had nothing else to do," concluded Larry, " I
tell you I thought a lot about that situation — for it
certainly is some situation: Joe Ellison for fifteen years
in prison with just one big idea in his life, the idea being

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 47

the one thing he felt he was really doing or ever could
do, his very life built on that one idea: that outside,
somewhere, was his kid growing up into a fine young
person — never guessing it had such a father — and Joe
never intending to see it again and not being able to
know it if he ever should see it. I tell you, after learning
Joe's story, it made me feel that I 'd had enough of the
old life."

Again the Duchess spoke. " Did Joe ever mention its
name?"

" No, he just spoke of it as 4 his kid.' "

Larry was quiet a moment. "You see," he added, "I
want to get settled before Joe comes out — his time's
up in a few months — so that I can give him some sort
of place near me. He's all right, Joe is; but he's too
old to have any show at a fresh start if he tries to make
it all on his own."

"Larry, you haven't got such a tough piece of old
brass for a heart yourself," commented Hunt. "What
are your own plans?"

" I know I 've got the makings of a real business man —
I've already told you that," said Larry confidently. He
had thought this out carefully during his days as a coal-
passer and his long nights upon the eighteen-inch bunk
in his cell. "I've got a lot of the finishing touches; I
know the high spots. What I need are the rudiments —
the fundamentals — connecting links. You see, I had
part of a business college training a long time before I
went to work in a broker's office, stenography and type-
writing; I've been a secretary in the warden's office the
last few months and I've brushed up on the old stuff
and I'm pretty good. That ought to land me a job.
Then I 'm going to study nights. Of course, I 'd get on
faster if I could have private lessons with one of the head
men of one of these real business schools. I'd mop up
this stuff about organization and management mighty

48 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

quick, for that business stuff comes natural to me. A
bit of that sort of going to school would connect up and
give a working unity to what I already know. But then
I '11 find a job and work the thing out some way. I 'm in
this to win out, and win out big!"

Once more the rarely heard voice of the Duchess
sounded, and though thin it had a positive quality:

"You're not going to take any job at first. First
thing, you 're going to give all your time to those private
lessons."

Larry gazed at the Duchess, surprised by the tone in
which she spoke. " But, grandmother, these lessons cost
money. And I did n't have a thin dime left when my
lawyers finished with me."

"I've got plenty of money — and it's yours. And the
money you get from me will be honest money, too; the
interest on loans made in my pawnshop is honest all
right. It'll be better, anyhow, for you to be out in the
world a few days, getting used to it, before you take a
job."

"Why, grandmother!"

The explanation seemed bald and inadequate, but
Larry did not know what else to say, he was so taken
aback. The Duchess, as far as he had been able to see,
had never shown much interest in him. And now, unless
he was mistaken, there was something very much like
emotion quavering in her thin voice and shining in her
old eyes.

"I don't interfere with what people want to do," she
continued — "but, Larry, I'm glad you've decided to
go straight."

And then the Duchess went on to make the longest
speech that any living person had ever heard issue from
her lips, and to reveal more than had yet been heard
of that unmysterious mystery which lived within her
shriveled, misshapen figure:

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 49

"That's what made me interested in Joe Ellison's
story — his wanting to get his child clear of the life he
was living; though I did n't know he had any such ideas
till you told me. Larry, I could n't get out of this life
myself; I was part of it, I belonged to it. But I felt the
same as Joe Ellison, and over forty years ago I got your
mother out of it, and your mother never came back to
it. I did that much. After she died it made me sick
when you, all I've got left, began to go crooked. But I
had no control over you ; I could n't do anything. So I 'm
glad that at last you 're going to go straight. I 'm glad,
Larry!"

The emotion that had given her voice a strange and
increasing vibrance, was suddenly brought under control
or snuffed out ; and she added in her usual thin, mechan-
ical tone: "The money will be ready for you in the
morning."

Startled and embarrassed by this outbreak of things
long hidden beneath the dust in the secret chambers of
her being, and wishing to avoid the further embarrass-
ment of thanks, the Duchess turned quickly and awk-
wardly back to her desk, and her bent old body became
fixed above her figures. In a moment the ever-alert Hunt
had out the little block of drawing-paper he always
carried in a pocket, and with swift, eager strokes he was
sketching the outline of that bent, shrunken shape that
had subsided so swiftly from emotion to the common-
place.

Larry gazed at the Duchess in silent bewilderment. He
had thought he had known his grandmother. He was
now realizing that perhaps he did not know his grand-
mother at all.

50 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

CHAPTER VIII

THAT night Larry slept on a cot set up in Hunt's studio.
Hunt had made the proposition that Larry consider the
studio his headquarters for the present, and Larry had
accepted. Of course the cot and the rough-and-ready
furnishings of the studio were grotesquely short of the
luxury of those sunny days when Larry had had plenty
of easy money and had been free to gratify his taste for
the best of everything; but the quarters were infinitely
more luxurious and comfortable than his more recent
three-by-seven room at Sing Sing with its damp and
chilly stone walls.

There were many reasons why Larry was appealed to
by the idea of making his home for the present in this
old house in this dingy, unexciting, unromantic street.
He was drawn toward this bluff, outspoken, autocratic
painter, and was curious about him. And then the way
his grandmother had spoken, the gleam in her old eyes,
had stirred an affection for her that he had never before
felt. And then there was Maggie, with her startlingly
new dusky beauty, her admiration of him that had so
swiftly altered to defiance, her challenge to a duel of
purposes.

Yes, for the present, this dingy old house in this dingy
old street was just the place he preferred to be.

It was not the part of wisdom to start forth on the
beginning of his new career in his shapeless prison shoddy ;
so the next day Larry pottered about the studio, acting
as maid-of-all-work, while the clothes in his trunk which
had been stored with the Duchess were being sponged
and pressed by the little tailor down the street, and while
a laundress, driven by the Duchess, was preparing the
rest of his outfit for his d6but. In his capacity of maid,
with a basket on his arm, he went out into the little

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 51

street, where in his shabby clothes he was recognized by
none and leaned for a time against the mongrel, under-
fed tree that was hesitatingly greeting the spring with a
few half-hearted leaves. He bathed himself in the warm
sun which seemed over-glorious for so mean a street; he
filled his lungs with the tangy May air ; yes, it was won-
derful to be free again !

Then he strolled about the street on his business of
marketing. It amused him to be buying three pounds of
potatoes and a pound of chopped meat and a package of
macaroni, and to be counting Hunt's pennies — remem-
bering those days when he had been a personage to head
waiters, and had had his table reserved, and with a care-
less Midas's gesture had left a dollar, or five, or twenty,
for the waiter's tip.

When he climbed back into the studio he watched
Hunt slashing about with his paint. Hunt growled and
roared at him, and kidded him; and Larry came back at
him with the same kind of verbal horseplay, after the
fashion of men. Presently a relaxation, if not actual
friendship, began to develop in their attitude toward
each other.

"Tell you what," Larry remarked, standing with legs
wide apart gazing at the picture of the Italian mother
throned on the curb nursing her child, "if I were dolled
up all proper, I bet I could take some of this stuff out
and sell it for real dough."

"Huh, nobody wants that stuff!" snorted Hunt.
"It's too good. Sell it! You're off your bean, young
fellow!"

"I can sell anything, my bucko," Larry returned
evenly. "All I need is a man who has plenty of money
and a moderate willingness to listen. I've sold pictures
of an oil derrick on a stock certificate, exact value nothing
at all, for a masterpiece's price — so I guess I could sell
a real picture."

52 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"Aw, you shut up!"

"The real trouble with you," commented Larry, "is
that, though you can paint, as a business man, as a pro-
moter of your own stock, the suckling infant in that
picture is a J. Pierpont Morgan of multiplied capacity
compared to — "

"Stop making that noise like a damned fool!"

This amiable pastime of throwing stones at each other
was just then interrupted by the entrance of Maggie for
an appointed sitting, before going to her business of
carrying a tray of cigarettes about the Ritzmore. She
gave Hunt a pleasant "good-morning," the pleasantness
purposely stressed in order to make more emphatic her
curt nod to Larry and the cold hostility of her eye. Dur-
ing the hour she posed, Larry, moving leisurely about
his kitchen duties, addressed her several times, but no
remark got a word from her in response. He took his
rebuffs smilingly, which irritated her all the more.

"Maggie, I'll get my real clothes late this afternoon;
how about my dropping in at the Ritzmore for a cup of
tea, and letting me buy some cigarettes and talk to you
when you're not busy?" he inquired when Hunt had
finished with her.

"You may buy cigarettes, but you'll get no talk!"
she snapped, and head high and dark eyes flashing con-
tempt, she swept past him.

Hunt watched her out. As the door slammed behind
her, he remarked dryly, his eyes searching Larry keenly:

"Our young queen doesn't seem wildly enthusiastic
about you or your programme."

"She certainly is not."

"Don't let that worry you, young fellow. That's a
common trait of her whole tribe; women simply cannot
believe in a man!"

There was an emphasis and a cynicism in this last re-
mark which caused Larry to regard the painter search-

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 53

ingly. "You seem to know what it is. Don't mean to
butt in, Hunt, if there are any trespassing signs up — but
there's a woman in your case?"

"Of course there is — there's always a woman; that's
another reason I 'm here," Hunt answered. "She did n't
believe in me — did n't believe I could paint — did n't be-
lieve in the things I wanted to do — so I just picked up
my playthings and walked out of her existence."

"Wife?" queried Larry.

"Thank God, no!" exclaimed Hunt emphatically.
"No — 'I thank whatever gods there be, I am the cap-
tain of my soul!' Oh, she's all right — altogether too
good for me," he added. "Here, try this tobacco."

Larry picked up the pouch flung him and accepted with-
out remark this being abruptly shunted off the track.
But he surmised that this woman in the background of
Hunt's life meant a great deal more to the painter than
Hunt tried to indicate by his attempt to dismiss her
casually — and Larry wondered what kind of woman she
was, and what the story had been.

The following day, clean-shaven and in his freshened
clothes — they were smart and well-tailored, though sober
indeed compared with Barney's, and two years behind the
style of which Barney's were the extreme expression —
Larry passed Maggie on the stairway with a smile, who
gave him no smile in return, and started forth upon his
quest. He was well-dressed, he had money in his pockets,
he had a plan, and the air of freedom of a new life was
sweet in his nostrils. He was going to succeed!

It was easy enough, with his mind alert for what he
wanted, and with the Duchess's liberal allowance to pay
for what he wanted, for Larry to find in this city of ten
thousand institutes teaching business methods, the par-
ticular article which suited his especial needs. He found
this article in an institute whose black-faced headline
in its advertisements was, "We Make You a #50,000

54 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Executive"; and the article which he found, by payment
of a special fee, was an old man who had been the man-
ager of a big brokerage concern until his growing addiction
to drink and later to drugs had rendered him undepend-
able. But old Bronson certainly did know the funda-
mentals and intricacies of the kind of big business which
is straight, and it was a delight to him to pour out his
knowledge to a keen intelligence.

Larry, in his own words, simply "mopped it up."
His experience had been so wide and varied that he now
had only to be shown a bone of fact and almost instantly
he visioned in their completeness unextinct ichthyosauri
of business. By day he fairly consumed old Bronson; he
read dry books far into the night. Thus he rapidly filled
the holes in the walls of his knowledge, and strengthened
its rather sketchy foundation. Of course he realized that
what he was learning was in a sense academic; it had to
be tested and developed and made flexible by experience;
but then much of it became instantly a living enlarge-
ment of the things of which he was already a master.

Old Bronson was delighted ; he had never had so apt a
pupil. " In less than no time you '11 be the real head of that
house you're with!" he proudly declared. Larry had not
seen it as needful to tell the truth about himself ; his casual
story was that he was there putting to use a month's
holiday granted him by a mythical firm in Chicago.

The Duchess's statement that it would be best for him
not to seek work at once was founded on wisdom. Larry
was busy and interested, but he did not yet have to face
the constant suspicion and hostility which are usually
the disheartening lot of the ex-convict who asks for a
position. In this period his confidence and his purpose
expanded with new vitality.

As the busy days passed down in the little street, the
bantering fellowship between Larry and Hunt took deeper
root. The Duchess did not again show any of the emo-

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 55

tion which had gleamed in her briefly when Larry had an-
nounced his new plan; but bent and silent went like an
oddly revivified mummy about her affairs. And during
these days he did not again see Barney or Old Jimmie; he
had learned that on the day following his conference with
them they had gone to Chicago on a very private matter
of business.

He saw Maggie daily, but she maintained the same
attitude toward him. He was now conscious that he was
in love. He saw splendid qualities in her, most of them
latent. Maggie had determination, high spirits, clever-
ness, courage, and capacity for sympathy and affection;
she had head, heart, and beauty, the makings of an un-
usual woman, if only she could be swung into a different
attitude of mind. But he realized that there was small
chance indeed of his working any alteration in her, much
less winning her admitted regard, until he was definitely a
success, until he had definitely proven himself right. So
he took her rebuffs with a smile, and waited his time.

He understood her point of view, and sympathized with
her; for her point of view had once been his own. With a
growing understanding he saw her as the natural product
of such a fathership as Old Jimmie's, and of the cynical
environment which Old Jimmie had given her in which
crime was a matter of course. In this connection one
matter that had previously interested him began to en-
gage his speculation more and more. All her life, until re-
cently, Old Jimmie had apparently shown little more con-
cern over Maggie than one shows over a piece of baggage
which is stored in this and that warehouse — and so
valueless a piece of baggage in Old Jimmie's case that it
had always been stored in the worst warehouses. What
was behind Old Jimmie's new interest in his daughter?

Old Jimmie had in late months awakened to the value
to him of Maggie as a business proposition — that was
Larry's answer to his own question.

56 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

As for Maggie, during these days, the mere fact that
Larry smiled at her and refused to get angry angered her
all the more. Her anger at him, the manner in which he
had refused her offered and long-dreamed-of partnership,
would not permit her pride and self-confidence to consider
any justification for him to enter her mind and argue in
his behalf. The great dream she had nourished had been
destroyed. And, moreover, he had proclaimed himself a
fool.

Yes, despite him and all he could do, she was going to go
the brilliant, exciting way she had planned!

In fairness to Maggie it must be remembered that de-
spite her assumed maturity and self-confident wisdom,
she really was only eighteen, and perhaps did not yet
fully know herself, and had all the world yet to learn.
And it must be remembered that she believed herself
entirely in the right. This was a world where strength and
cunning were the qualities that counted, and every one
was trying to outwit his neighbor; and all who acted
otherwise were either weak-witted fools or else pretenders
who saw in their hypocrisy the keenest game of all.
Living under the influence of Old Jimmie, and later of
Barney, and of the environment in which she had been
bred, these beliefs had come to be her religion. She was
thoroughly orthodox, and had the defensive and aggres-
sive fervor which is the temper of militant orthodoxy.

And so more keenly than ever, because she was more
determined than ever, Maggie studied the groups of well-
dressed men and women who ate and danced at the Ritz-
more, among whom she circulated in her short, smart
skirt with her cigarette tray swung from her neck by a
broad purple ribbon. Particularly she liked the after-
theater crowd, for then only evening wear was permitted
in the supper-room and the people were at their liveliest.
She liked to watch the famous professional couple do their
specialties on the glistening central space with the agile

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 57

spot-lights always bathing them; and then watch the
smartly dressed guests take the floor with the less prac-
ticed and more humble steps. Sometime soon she was
going to have clothes as smart as any of these. Soon she
would be one of these brilliant people, and have a life more
exciting than any. Very soon — for her apprenticeship
was almost over !

Barney Palmer had these last few months, since he had
discovered in Maggie a star who only needed coaching
and then an opportunity, made it a practice to come for
Maggie occasionally when one o'clock, New York's curfew
hour, dispersed the pleasure-seekers and ended Maggie's
day of work, or rather her day of intensive schooling for
her greater life. On the night of his return from Chicago,
which was a week after his break with Larry, Barney re-
ported to take Maggie home. He was in swagger evening
clothes and he asked the starter for a taxi; with an al-
most lordly air and for the service of a white-gloved
gesture to a chauffeur, he carelessly handed the starter
(who, by the way, was a richer man than Barney) a crisp
dollar bill. Barney was trying to make his best impression.

"Seen much of that stiff, Larry Brainard?" he asked
when the cab was headed southward.

His tone, which he tried to make merely contemptuous,
conveyed the deep wrath which he still felt whenever his
mind reverted to Larry. Maggie reserved to herself the
privilege of thinking of Larry just as she pleased; but
being the kind of girl she was, she could not help being
also a bit of a coquette.

"I did n't think he was such a stiff, Barney," she said
in an irritatingly pleasant voice. "His prison clothes
were bad, but now that he's dressed right I think he looks
awfully nice. You and father have always said he looked
the perfect swell."

"See here — has he been talking to you?" Barney de-
manded savagely.

58 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"A little. Yes, several times. In fact he said quite a lot
that night after you'd gone."

"What did he say?"

"He said he was not only going to go straight, but" —
in her provocative, teasing voice — "he was going to
make me go straight."

"What's that? Tell me just what he said!" demanded
Barney, his wrath suddenly flaring into furious jealousy.

Maggie told him in detail; in fact told him the scene
in greater detail and with a greater length than had been
the actuality. Also she censored the scene by omitting
her own opposition to Larry's determination. She en-
joyed playing with Barney, the exercise of the power she
had over Barney's passions.

"And you stood for all that!" cried Barney. By this
time they were far down town. ' ' You listen to me, Maggie :
What I said to Larry's face that night at the Duchess's
still stands. I think he's yellow and has turned against
his old pals. I tell you what, I 'm going to watch that guy ! "

"You won't find it hard to watch him, Barney. Larry
never hides himself."

"Oh, I'll watch him all right! And you, Maggie —
why, you talk as though you liked that line of talk he gave
you!"

"Larry talks well — and I did like it, rather."

"See here! You're not falling for him? You're not
going to let him make you go straight?"

Maggie certainly had no intention of letting any such
thing come to pass; but she could not check her innocent-
toned baiting.

"How do I know what he'll make me do? He's clever
and handsome, you know."

Barney gripped her shoulder fiercely. "Maggie — are
you falling in love with him?"

"How do I know, when — "

"Maggie!" He gripped her more tightly, and his

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 59

phrases tumbled out fiercely, rapidly. "You 're not going
to do anything of the sort ! If he goes straight — if you go
straight — how can he ever help you? He can't! And
it will be your finish — the finish of all the big things
we've talked about. Listen: since Larry threw us down,
I Ve taken hold of things and will soon be ready to spring
something big. Just a few days now and you '11 be out of
that dirty street, and you'll be in swell clothes doing
swell work — and it will mean the best restaurants,
theaters, swell times!"

The car had turned into the narrow, cobbled street and
had paused before the Duchess's. Suddenly Barney caught
her into his arms.

"And, Maggie, you're going to be mine! We'll have a
nifty little place, all right! You know I'm dippy about
you. . . . And, Maggie, I don't even want you to go back
in there where Larry Brainard is. Let's drive back up-
town and start in together now! To-night!"

It was not the fact that he had not suggested marriage
which stirred Maggie: men and women in Barney's class
lived together, and sometimes they were married and
sometimes they were not. It was something else, some-
thing of which she was not definitely conscious: but she
felt no such momentary thrill, no momentary, dazing sur-
render, as she had felt the night when Larry had similarly
held her.

"Stop that, Barney!" she gasped. "Let me go!" She
struggled fiercely, and then tore herself free.

"What's wrong with you?" panted Barney. "You're
mine, ain't you?"

"You leave me alone! I'm going to get out!"

She had the door open, and was stepping out when he
caught her sleeve. But she pulled so determinedly that
to have held her would have meant nothing better than
ripping the sleeve out of her coat. So he freed her and
followed her across the sidewalk to the Duchess's door.

60 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"What's the idea?" he demanded, choking with fierce
jealousy. " It 's not Larry, after all? You 're not going to
let him make you go straight?"

She had recovered her poise, and she replied banter-
ingly:

"As I said, how can I tell what he's going to make me
do?"

She heard him draw a deep, quivering breath between
clenched teeth ; but she could not see how his figure tensed
and how his face twisted into a glower.

"Get this, Maggie: Larry Brainard is never going to
be able to make you do anything. You get that?"

"Yes, I get it, Barney; good-night," she said lightly.

And Maggie slipped through the door and left Barney
trembling in the little street.

CHAPTER IX

MAGGIE, as she mounted to her room, was hardly con-
scious of the ring of menace in Barney's voice; but once
she was in bed, his tone and his words came back to her
and stirred a strange uneasiness in her mind. Barney was
angry; Barney was cunning; Barney would stop at noth-
ing to gain his ends. What might be behind his threaten-
ing words?

The next morning as she was coming in with milk for
her breakfast coffee, she met Larry in the Duchess's room
behind the pawnshop. He smilingly planted himself
squarely in her way.

"See here, Maggie — are n't you ever going to speak to
a fellow?"

Something within her surged up impelling her to tell
him of Barney's savage yet unformulated threat. The
warning got as far as her tongue, and there halted, strug-
gling.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 61

Her strange, fixed look startled Larry. "Why, what's
the matter, Maggie?" he exclaimed.

But her pride, her settled determination to unbend to
him in no way and to have no dealings with him, were
stronger than her impulse; and the struggling warning re-
mained unuttered.

"Nothing's the matter," she said, and brushed past
him and hurried up the stairway.

At times during the day, while tutoring with Mr. Bron-
son, Larry thought of Maggie's strange look. And his
mind was upon it late in the afternoon when he entered
the little street. But as he neared his grandmother's
house all such thought was banished by Detective Gave-
gan of the Central Office stepping from the pawnshop and
blocking the door with his big figure. There was grim,
triumphant purpose on the hard features of Ga vegan,
conceited by nature and trained to harsh dominance by
long rule as a petty autocrat.

"Hello, Gavegan," Larry greeted him pleasantly.
"Gee, but you look tickled! Did the Duchess give you a
bigger loan than you expected on the Carnegie medal you
just hocked?"

"You '11 soon be cuttin' out your line of comedy." Gave-
gan slipped his left arm through Larry's right. "You're
comin' along with me, and you 'd better come quiet."

Larry stiffened . ' ' Come where ? ' '

4 4 Headquarters. ' '

"I have n't done a thing, Gavegan, and you know it!
What do you want me for?"

"Me and the Chief had a little talk about you," leered
Gavegan. "And now the Chief wants to have a little
personal talk with you. He asked me to round you up and
bring you in."

" I 've done nothing, and I '11 not go ! " Larry cried hotly.

" Oh, yes, you will ! " Gavegan withdrew his right hand
from his coat pocket where it had been resting in readiness.

62 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

In the hand, its thong about his wrist, was a short leather-
covered object filled with lead. "I Ve got my orders, and
you'll come peaceably, or — But I'd just as soon you'd
resist, for I owe you something for the punch you slipped
over on me the other night."

Larry, taut with the desire to strike, gazed for a mo-
ment into the glowering face of the detective. Gavegan,
gripping his right arm, with that bone-crushing slug-shot
itching for instant use, was apparently master in the pres-
ent circumstances. But before Larry's quick mind had
decided upon a course, the door of the pawnshop opened
and closed, and a voice said sharply:

"Nothing doing on that rough stuff, Gavegan!" The
speaker was now on Larry's left side, a heavy-faced man
in a black derby. "Larry, better be a nice boy and come
with us."

"Oh, it's you, Casey!" said Larry. "If you say I've
got to go, I'll go — for you're one white copper, even if
you do have Gavegan for a partner. Come on. What 're
we standing here for?"

The trio made their way out of the narrow street, and
after some fifteen minutes of walking through the twisting
byways of that part of the city, they passed through the
granite doorway at Headquarters and entered the office
of Deputy Commissioner Barlow, Chief of the Detective
Bureau. Barlow was talking over the telephone in a
growling staccato, and the three men sat down. After
a moment Barlow banged the receiver upon its hook, and
turned upon them. He had a clenched, driving face, with
small, commanding eyes. It was his boast that he got re-
sults, that it was his policy to make people do what you
told 'em. He had no other code.

"Well, Brainard," he snapped, "here you are again.
What you up to now?"

"Going to try the straight game, Chief," returned
Larry.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND . 63

"Don't try to put that old bunk over on me!"

"It's not bunk, Chief. It's the real stuff."

"Cut it out, I say! Don't you suppose I had a clever
bird like you picked up the minute you landed in the city,
and have had you covered ever since? And if you are go-
ing straight, what about the session you had with Barney
Palmer and Old Jimmie Carlisle the very night you blew
in? And I 'm on to this bluff of your going to that business
institute. So come across, Brainard ! I Ve got your every
move covered!"

" I've already come across, Chief," replied Larry, trying
to keep his temper in the face of the other's bullying
manner. "I told Barney and Old Jimmie that I was
through with the old game, and through with them as pals
at the old game — that 's all there was to that meeting.
I 'm going to that business institute for the same reason
that every other person goes there — to learn. That's
all there is to the whole business, Chief: I'm going to
go straight."

Chief Barlow, hunched forward, his undershot jaw
clenched on a cigar stub, regarded Larry steadily with his
beady, autocratic eyes. Barlow was trained to penetrate
to the inside of men's minds, and he recognized that Larry
was in earnest.

"You mean you think you are going to go straight,"
Barlow remarked slowly and meaningly.

"I know I am going to go straight," Larry returned
evenly, meeting squarely the gaze of the Chief of Detec-
tives.

" Do you realize, young man," Barlow continued in the
same measured, significant tone, "that whether you go
straight, and how you go straight, depends pretty much
on me?"

"Mind making that a little clearer, Chief?"

" I '11 show you part of my hand — just remember that
I'm holding back my high cards. I don't believe you're

64 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

going to go straight, so we'll start with the proposition
that you're not going to run straight and work on from
there. You 're clever, Brainard — I hand you that ; and
all the classy crooks trust you. That's why I had picked
you out for what I wanted long before you left stir.
Brainard, you're wise enough to know that some of our
best pinches come from tips handed us from the inside.
Brainard" — the slow voice had now become incisive,
mandatory — "you're not going to go straight. You're
going to string along with Barney and Old Jimmie and
the rest of the bunch — we '11 protect you — and you 're
going to slip us tips when something big is about to be
pulled off."

Larry, experienced with police methods though he
was, could hardly believe this thing which was being
proposed to him, Larry Brainard. But he controlled him-
self.

"If I get you, Chief, you are suggesting that I become
a police stool?"

"Exactly. We'll never tip your hand. And any little
thing you pull off on your own we '11 not bother you about.
And, besides, we'll slip you a little dough regular on the
quiet."

"And all you want me to do in exchange," Larry asked
quietly, "is to hand up my pals?"

"That 'sail."

Larry found it required his all of strength to control
himself; but he did.

"There are only three small objections to your propo-
sition, Chief."

"Yes?"

"The first is, I shall not be a stool."

"What's that?"

"And the second is, I would n't squeal on a pal to you
even if I were a crook. And the third is what I said in the
beginning: I'm not going to be a crook."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 65

Barlow's squat, powerful figure arose menacingly.
Casey also stood up.

" I tell you you are going to be a crook!" Barlow's big
fist crashed down on his desk in a tremendous exclama-
tion point. "And you 're going to work for me exactly as I
tell you!"

"I have already given you my final word," said Larry.

"You — you — " Barlow almost choked at this quiet
defiance. His face turned red, his breath came in a flutter-
ing snarl, his powerful shoulders hunched up as if he were
about to strike. But he held back his physical blows.

"That's your ultimatum?"

" If you care to call it so — yes."

"Then here's mine! I told you I was holding back my
high cards. Either you do as I say, and work with Ga vegan
and Casey, or you '11 not be able to hold a job in New York 1
My men will see to that. And here 's another high card.
You do as I 've said, or I '11 hang some charge on you, one
that'll stick, and back up the river you'll go for another
stretch! There's an ultimatum for you to think about!"

It certainly was. Larry gazed into the harsh, glaring
face, set in fierce determination. He knew that Barlow,
as part of his policy, loved to break down the spirit of
criminals; and he knew that nothing so roused Barlow as
opposition from a man he considered in his power. Close
beside the Chief he saw the gloating, malignant face of
Gavegan; Casey, who had been restless since the be-
ginning of the scene, had moved to the window and was
gazing down into Center Street.

For a moment Larry did not reply. Barlow mistook
Larry's silence for wavering, or the beginning of an in-
clination to yield.

"You turn that over in your noodle," Barlow drove on.
"You're going to go crooked, anyhow, so you might as
well go crooked in the only way that's safe for you. I 'm
going to have Gavegan and Casey watch you, and if in the

66 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

next few days you don't begin to string along with Barney
and Old Jimmie and that bunch, and if you don't get me
word that your answer to my proposition is 'yes,' hell's
going to fall on you! Now get out of here!"

Larry got out. He was liquid lava of rage inside ; but he
had had enough to do with police power to know that it
would help him not at all to permit an eruption against a
police official while he was in the very heart of the police
stronghold.

He walked back toward his own street in a fury, beneath
which was subconsciously an element of uneasiness: an
uneasiness which would have been instantly roused to
caution had he known that Barney Palmer had this hour
and more been following him in a taxicab, and that
across the street from the car's window Barney's sharp
face had watched him enter Police Headquarters and had
watched him emerge.

Home reached, Larry briefly recounted his experience
at Headquarters to Hunt and the Duchess. The painter
whistled; the Duchess blinked and said nothing at all.

"Maggie was more right than she knew when she first
said you were facing a tough proposition!" exclaimed
Hunt. "Believe me, young fellow, you're certainly up
against it!"

"Can you beat it for irony!" said Larry, pacing the
floor. "A man wants to go straight. His pals ask him to
be a crook, and are sore because he won't be a crook. The
police ask him to be a crook, and threaten him because he
does n't want to be a crook. Some situation!"

"Some situation!" repeated Hunt. "What 're you go-
ing to do?"

"Do?" Larry halted, his face set with defiant deter-
mination. " I 'm going to keep on doing exactly what I 've
been doing! And they can all go to hell!"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 67

CHAPTER X

FOR several days nothing seemed to be happening, though
Larry had a sense that unknown forces were gathering on
distant isothermal lines and bad weather was bearing
down upon him. During these days, trying to ignore that
formless trouble, he gave himself with a most rigid de-
termination to his new routine — the routine which he
counted on to help him into the way of great things.

Every day he saw Maggie; sometimes he was in her
company for an hour or more. He had the natural hunger
of a young man to talk to a young woman ; and, moreover,
it is a severe strain for a man to be living under the same
roof with the girl he loves and not to be on terms of friend-
ship with her. But Maggie maintained her aloofness.
She spoke only when she was pressed into it, and her
speech was usually no more than a "yes" or a "no," or a
flashing phrase of disdain.

At times Larry had the feeling that, for all her repres-
sion, Maggie would have been glad to be more free with
him. And he knew enough of human nature not to be too
disheartened by her attitude. Had he been a nonentity
to her, she would have ignored him. Her very insults
were proof that he was a positive personality with real
significance in her life. And so he counseled himself to
have patience and await a thawing or an awaking. Be-
sides, he kept repeating to himself, there would be small
chance of effecting a conversion in this militant young
orthodoxist of cynicism until he had proved the soundness
of contrary views by his own established success.

And thus the days drifted by. But on the fifth day
after his interview with Barlow things began to happen.
First of all, he noticed in a morning paper that Red
Hannigan and Jack Rosenfeldt, members of his old out-
fit and suggested by Old Jimmie as participants in his

68 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

proposed new enterprise, had just been arrested by Gave-
gan and Casey on the charge of alleged connection with
the sale of fraudulent mining stock.

Second, on his return at the end of the afternoon, he
saw standing before the house a taxicab with a trunk be-
side the chauffeur. In the musty museum of a room be-
hind the pawnshop he found Hunt and the Duchess and
Old Jimmie and Barney; and also Maggie, coming down
the stairway, hat and coat on and carrying a suitcase. A
sharp pain throbbed through him as he recognized the
significance of Maggie's hat and coat and baggage.

"Maggie — you're going away?" he exclaimed.

"Yes."

She had paused at the foot of the stairway, and at
eight of him had gone a little pale and wide-eyed. But
in an instant she had recovered her accustomed flair;
there came a proud lift to her head, a flash of scorn into
her dark eyes.

"At last I'm leaving this street for good," she said.
" I told you that some day I was going out into the world
and do big things. The time's come — I 'm graduated —
I 'm going to begin real work. And I 'm going to succeed —
you see!"

"Maggie!" he breathed. Then impulsively he started
toward her authoritatively. "Maggie, I'm not going to
let you do anything of the sort!"

But swiftly Barney had stepped in between them, Old
Jimmie just behind him.

"Keep out of this!" Barney snapped at Larry, a red-
dish blaze in his eyes. "Maggie's going away and you
can't stop her. D'you think her father is going to let her
stay down here any longer, where you can spout your
preaching at her! — aiid you all the time a stool and a
squealer!"

"What's that?" cried Larry.

"I called you a stool!" repeated the malignantly

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 69

exultant Barney, alert for any move on the part of the
suddenly tensed Larry. "And you are a stool! Didn't
I see you myself go into Headquarters with Casey and
Ga vegan where you sold yourself to Chief Barlow!"

"Why, you damned — "

Even before he spoke Larry launched a furious swing
straight from the hip at Barney's twisted face. But
Barney had been expecting exactly that, and was even
the quicker. He caught Larry's wrist before it was fairly
started, and thrust a dull-hued automatic into Larry's
stomach.

"Behave, damn you," gritted Barney, "or I'll blow
your damned guts out! No — go ahead and try to hit
me. I'd like nothing better than to kill you, you rat,
and have a good plea of self-defense!"

Larry let his hands unclench and fall to his sides.
"You've got the drop on me, Barney — but you're a
liar."

"You bet I got the drop on you! And not only with
my gun. I 've got it on you about being a stool. Every-
body knows you are a stool. And what's more, they
know you are a squealer!"

"A squealer!" Larry stiffened again.

"A stool and a squealer!" Barney fairly hurled at
Larry these two most despised epithets of his world.
"You've done your job swell as a stool, and squealed on
Red Hannigan and Jack Rosenfeldt and turned them up
for the police!"

"You believe I had anything to do with their arrest?"
exclaimed Larry.

Barney laughed in his derision.

"Of course we believe it," put in Old Jimmie, his
seamed, cunning face now ruthlessly hard. "And what's
more, we know it!"

"And what's still more," Barney taunted, "Maggie
believes it, too!"

70 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Larry turned to Maggie. Her face was now drawn,
with staring eyes.

"Maggie — do you believe it?" he demanded.

For a moment she neither spoke nor moved. Then
slowly she nodded.

"But, Maggie," he protested, "I did n't do it! Barlow
did ask me to be a stool, but I turned him down! Aside
from that, I know no more of this than you do!"

"Of course you'd deny it — we were waiting for that,"
sneered Barney. "Jimmie, we've wasted enough time
here. Take Maggie's bag and let's be moving on."

Old Jimmie picked up Maggie's suitcase, and slipping
a hand through her arm led her across the room. She did
not even say good-bye to Hunt or the Duchess, or even
glance at them; but went out silently, her drawn, staring
look on Larry alone.

Barney backed after them, his automatic still held in
readiness. " I 'm letting you down damned easy, Brain-
ard," he said, hate glittering in his eyes. "But there's
some who won't be so nice!"

With that he closed the door. Until that moment both
Hunt and the Duchess had said nothing. Now the
Duchess spoke up:

"I'm glad they've taken Maggie away, Larry. I've
seen the way you 've come to feel about her, and she 's
not the right sort for you."

But Larry was still too dazed by the way in which
Maggie had walked out of his life to make any response.

" But there 's a lot in what Barney said about there
being some who would n't be easy on you," con-
tinued the Duchess. " That word had been brought me
before Barney showed up. So I had this ready for
you."

From a slit pocket in her baggy skirt the Duchess
drew out a pistol and handed it to Larry.

"What's this for?" Larry asked.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 71

"I was told that word had gone out to the Ginger
Buck Gang to get you," answered the Duchess. "Barney
has some secret connection with the Ginger Bucks. His
saying that you were a stool and a squealer is not the
only thing he's got against you; he's jealous of you on
account of everything — especially Maggie. So you '11
need that gun."

"What's this I've fallen into the middle of?" ex-
claimed Hunt. "A Kentucky feud?"

"It's very easy to understand when you know the
code," Larry explained grimly. "Down here when an
outfit thinks one of its members has squealed on
them, it's their duty to be always on the watch for their
chance to finish him off. I 'm to be finished off — that's
all."

"Say, young fellow, the life of a straight crook does n't
seem to be getting much simpler! Why, man, you
hardly dare to stir from the house! What are you going
to do?"

"Going to go around my business, always with the
pleasant anticipation of a bullet in my back when some
fellow thinks it safe for him to shoot."

The three of them discussed this latest development
over their dinner, which they had together up in Hunt's
studio. But despite all their talk of his danger, a very
real and near danger, Larry's mind was more upon
Maggie who had thus suddenly been wrenched out of
his life. He remembered her excited, boastful talk of
their first evening. Her period of schooling was indeed
now over; she was now committed to her rosily imagined
adventure, in which she saw herself as a splendid lady.
And with Barney Palmer as her guiding influence! . . .

Dinner had been finished and Hunt was trying to
give Larry such cheer as "Buck up, young fellow — you
know the worst — there's nothing else that can happen,"
when the lie direct was given to his phrases by heavy

73 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

steps running up the stairway and the opening and clos-
ing of the door. There stood Officer Casey, heaving for
breath.

Instinctively Larry drew his pistol. "Casey! What 're
you here for?"

"Get rid of that gat — don't be found with a gun on,"
ordered Casey. "And beat it. You've got less than
five minutes to make your get-away."

"My get-away! What's up?"

"You haven't come across as the Chief ordered you
to, and he's out to give you just what he said he would,"
Casey said rapidly, his speech broken by panting.
"There's been a stick-up, with assault that may be
changed to attempted manslaughter, and the Chief has
three men who swear you're the guilty party. It's a
sure-fire case against you, Larry — and it'll mean five
to ten years if you're caught. Gavegan and I got the
order to arrest you. I've beat Gavegan to it so's to tip
you off, but he's only a few minutes behind. Hurry,
Larry ! Only — only — "

Casey paused, gasping for his wind.

"Only what, Casey?"

"Only alibi me, Larry, by slipping over a haymaker on
me like you did on Gavegan. So's I can say I tried to
get you, but you were too quick and knocked me cold.
Quick! Only not too hard — I know how to play pos-
sum."

Larry handed the pistol to Hunt. "Casey, you're a
real scout! Thanks!" He grasped Casey's hand, then
swiftly relaxed his grip. "Ready?"

"Fire," said Casey.

Larry held his open left hand close to Casey's jaw, and
drove his right fist into his palm with a thudding smack.
Casey went sprawling to the floor, and lay there loosely,
with mouth agape, in perfect simulation of a man who
has been knocked out.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 73

Larry turned quickly. "You two will testify that I
beat Casey up and then made my escape?"

"Sure, I'll testify to anything for the sake of a good
old goat like Casey!" cried Hunt. "But hurry, boy —
beat it!"

The Duchess held out Larry's hat to him, and thrust
into his coat pocket a roll of bills which had come from
her capacious skirt. "Hurry, Larry — and be careful —
for you're all I've got."

Impulsively Larry stooped and kissed the thin, shriv-
eled lips of his grandmother — the first kiss he had ever
given her. Then he turned and ran down the stairway,
Hunt just behind him. He turned out the light in the
back room, and called to Old Isaac to darken the pawn-
shop proper. He was going forth with two forces in arms
against him, the police and his pals, and he had no desire
to be a shining mark for either or both by stepping
through a lighted doorway.

"Larry, my son, you're all right!" said Hunt, gripping
his hand in the darkness. "Listen, boy: if ever you're
trapped and can get to a telephone, call Plaza nine-
double-o-one and say 'Benvenuto Cellini.'"

"All right."

"Remember, you're to say 'Benvenuto Cellini,' and
the telephone is Plaza nine-double-o-one. Luck to you!"
Again they gripped hands. Then Larry slipped through
the darkened doorway into whatever might lie beyond.

CHAPTER XI

A MISTING rain was being swirled about by a temperish
wind as Larry came out into the little street. Down to-
ward the river the one gaslight glowed faintly like an
expiring nebula; all the little shops were closed; home
lights gleamed behind the curtained windows which the

74 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

storm had closed; so that the street was now a little
canyon of uncertain shadows.

Larry had not needed to think to know that Gavegan
would be making his vindictive approach from the
westerly regions where lay Headquarters. So, keeping in
the deeper shadows close to the building, Larry took the
eastern course of the street, remembering in a flash a skiff
he had seen tethered to a scow moored to the pier which
stretched like a pointer finger from the little Square. As
yet he had no plan beyond the necessity of the present
moment, which was flight. Could he but make that skiff
unseen and cast off, he would have time, in the brief sanc-
tuary which the black river would afford him, to formulate
the wisest procedure his predicament permitted him.

As he came near that smothered glow-worm of a street-
lamp it assumed for him the betraying glare of a huge
spot-light. But it had to be passed to gain the skiff; and
with collar turned up and hat-brim pulled down and head
hunched low, he entered the dim sphere of betrayal,
walked under its penny 's-worth of flame, and glided
toward the shadows beyond, his eyes straining with the
preternatural keenness of the hunted at every stoop
and doorway before him.

He was just passing out of the sphere of mist-light —
the lamp being now at his back helped him — when he
saw three vague figures lurking half a dozen paces ahead
of him. His brain registered these vague figures with the
instantaneity of a snapshot camera at full noon. They
were mere shadows; but the farther of the three seemed
to be Barney Palmer — he was not sure ; but of the iden-
tity of the other two there was no doubt: "Little Mick"
and " Lefty Ed," both members high in the councils of
the Ginger Bucks, and either of whose services as a killer
could be purchased for a hundred dollars or a paper of
cocaine, depending upon which at the moment there was
felt the greater need.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 75

In the very instant that he saw, Larry doubled about
and ran at full speed back up the street. Two shots rang
out; Larry could not tell whether they were fired by
Little Mick or Lefty Ed or Barney Palmer — that is, if
the third man really were Barney. Again two shots were
fired, then came the sound of pursuing feet. Luckily not
one of the bullets had touched Larry; for the New York
professional gunman is the premier bad shot of all the
world, and cannot count upon his marksmanship, unless
he can get his weapon solidly anchored against his man,
or can sneak around to the rear and pot his unsuspecting
victim in the back.

As Larry neared the pawnshop, with the intention of
making his escape through the western stretch of the
street, he saw that Old Isaac had switched on the lights;
and he also saw Officer Gavegan bearing down in his
direction. They sighted each other in the same instant,
and Gavegan let out a roar and started for him.

Caught between two opposing forces, Larry again had
no time to plan. Rather, there was nothing he could
plan, for only one way was open to him. He dashed into
the pawnshop and into the back room. At the Duchess's
desk Hunt was scribbling at furious speed.

"I'm caught, Hunt — Gavegan's coming," he gasped,
and ran up the stairs, Hunt following and stuffing his
scribblings into a pocket. As Larry passed the open
studio door he saw Casey sitting up. "Down on the floor
with you, Casey ! Hunt, work over him to bring him to —
and stall Gavegan for a while if you can."

With that Larry sprang to a ladder at the end of the
little hall, ran up it, unhooked and pushed up the trap,
scrambled through upon the roof, and pushed the trap
back into place.

Fortune, or rather the well-wishing wits of friends
below, gave Larry a few precious moments more than he
had counted on. He was barely out on the rain-greased

76 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

tin roof, with the trap down, when Gavegan came thump-
ing up the stairs and into the studio. At sight of the re-
cumbent Casey, head limply on Hunt's knees, and his
loose face being laved by a wet towel in Hunt's hands,
Gavegan let out another roar:

"Hell's bells! What the hell's this mean?"

"I tried to nab Brainard," Casey mumbled feebly,
"and he knocked me out cold — the same as he did you,
Gavegan."

"Hell!" snorted Gavegan, his wrath increased by this
reference. "You there" — to Hunt and the Duchess —
" where 'd Brainard go? He's in this house some place!"

"I don't know," said Hunt.

"Yes, you do! Leave that boob side-kick of mine
sleep it off, and help me find Brainard or you '11 feel my
boot!"

The big painter stood up facing the big detective and
his left hand gripped the latter's wrist and his right
closed upon the detective's throat just as it had closed
upon the lean throat of Old Jimmie on the day of Larry's
return — only now there was nothing playful in the
noose of that big hand. He shook Gavegan as he might
have shaken a pillow, with a thumb thrusting painfully
in beneath Gavegan's ear.

"I've done nothing, and that bully stuff doesn't go
with me!" he fairly spat into Gavegan's face. "You talk
to me like a gentleman and apologize, or I '11 throw you
out of the window and let your head bounce off one of its
brother cobblestones below!"

Gavegan choked out an apology, whereat Hunt flung
him from him. The detective, glowering at the other,
pulled aside curtains, peered into corners; then made
furious and fruitless search of the rooms below, bringing
up at last at Maggie's door, which the Duchess had
slipped ahead of him and locked. When he demanded
the key, the Duchess told him of Maggie's departure and

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 77

her carrying the key with her. It was a solid door, with
strong lock and hinges; and two minutes of Gavegan's
battering shoulders were required to make it yield en-
trance. Not till he found the room empty did Gavegan
think of the trap and the roof.

Larry made good use of these few extra minutes
granted him. Whatever he was to do he realized he must
do it quickly. Not for long would the forces arrayed
against him be small in number; Gavegan, though beaten
at the outset, would send out an alarm that would arouse
the police of the city — and in their own degree the
gangsters would do the same. During his weeks of free-
dom Larry had unconsciously studied the layout of the
neighborhood, his old instincts at work. The subcon-
scious knowledge thus gained was of instant value. He
hurried along the slippery roofs, taking care not to trip
over the dividing walls, and came to the rear edge of a
roof where he had marked a fire-escape with an unusually
broad upper landing. He could discern the faint outlines
of this ; and hanging to the gutter he dropped to the fire-
escape, and a moment later he was down in the back
yard ; and yet two moments later he was over two fences
and going through a rabbit's burrow of a passageway that
went beneath a house into the street behind his own.

He did not pause to reconnoiter. Time was of the
essence of his safety, risks had to be taken. He plunged
out of his hole — around the first corner — around the
next — and thus wove in and out, working westward,
till at last, on turning a corner into a lighted street, he
saw possible relief in two stray taxicabs before a little
East Side restaurant, one of which was just leaving.

"Taxi!" he called breathlessly.

The chauffeur of the moving car swung back beside
the curb and opened the door. But even as he started to
enter he saw Little Mick and Lefty Ed turn into the
street behind him. However, the brightness of this street

78 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

ill-accorded with the anonymity with which their art is
most safely and profitably practiced, so Larry got in
without a bullet flicking at him.

"Forty-Second Street and Broadway," he called to the
chauffeur as he closed the door.

The car started off. Looking back through the little
window he saw Lefty Ed enter the other taxicab, and
saw Little Mick standing on the curb. He understood.
Little Mick was to send out the alarm, while Lefty was
to follow the trail.

Let Lefty follow. At least Larry now had a few min-
utes to consider some plan which should look beyond the
safety of the immediate moment. He was well-dressed,
albeit somewhat wet and soiled; he had money in his
pockets. What should he do?

Yes, what should he do? The more he considered it
the more ineluctable did his situation become. By now
Gavegan had sent out his alarm; within a few moments
every policeman on duty would have instructions to
watch for him. He might escape for the time, at least,
these allies of his one-time pals by going to a hotel and
taking a room there; but to walk into a hotel would be
to walk into arrest. On the other hand, he might evade
the police if he sought refuge in one of his old haunts, or
perhaps with old Bronson; but then his angered pals
knew of these haunts, and to enter one of them would be
to offer himself freely to their vengeance.

There were other cities — but then how was he to get
to them? He saw Manhattan for what it was to a man
who was a fugitive from justice and injustice: an island,
a trap, with only a few outlets and inlets for its millions:
two railway stations — a few ferries — a few bridges —
a few tunnels: and at every one of them policemen
watching for him. He could not leave New York. And
yet how in God's name was he to stay here?

He thought of Maggie. So she wanted the life of

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 79

dazzling excitement, of brilliant adventure, did she? He
wondered how she would like a little of the real thing —
such as this?

As he neared Forty-Second Street he still was without
definite plan which would guarantee him safety, and
there was Lefty hanging on doggedly. An idea came
which would at least extend his respite and give him
more time for thought. He opened the door of his cab
and thrust a ten-dollar note into the instinctively ready
hand of his driver.

"Keep the change — and give me a swing once around
Central Park, slowing down on those hilly turns on the
west side."

"I gotcha."

The car entered the park at the Plaza and sped up the
shining, almost empty drive. Larry kept watch, now on
the trailing Lefty, now on the best chance for execution
of his idea — all the way up the east side and around the
turn at the north end. As the car, now south-bound,
swung up the hill near One Hundred and Fifth Street, at
whose crest there is a sharp curve with thick-growing,
overhanging trees, Larry opened the right door and said:

"Show me a little speed, driver, as soon as you pass
this curve!"

"I gotcha," replied the chauffeur.

The slowing car hugged the inside of the sharp turn,
Larry holding the door open and waiting his moment.
The instant the taxi made the curve Lefty's car was cut
from view; and that instant Larry sprang from the run-
ning-board, slamming the door behind him, landed on
soft earth and scuttled in among the trees. Crouching in
the shadows he saw his car speed away as per his orders,
and the moment after he saw Lefty's car, evidently taken
by surprise by this obvious attempt at escape, leap for-
ward in hot pursuit.

Larry slipped farther in among the trees and sat down,

80 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

his back against a tree. This was better. For the time he
was safe.

He drew a long breath. Then for a moment what he
had just been through this last hour came back to him in
an almost amusing light: as something grotesquely im-
possible — much like those helter-skelter, utterly unreal
chases which, with slight variations of personalities and
costumes, were the chief plots for the motion-picture
drama in its crude childhood. But though there seemed
a likeness, there was a tremendous difference. For this
was real ! Every one was in earnest !

Again he thought of Maggie. What would she think,
what would be her attitude, if she knew the truth about
him? — the truth about those she had gone with and the
life she had gone into? Would she be inclined toward
him, would she help him? . . .

Again he thought of what he should do. Now that he
commanded a composure which had not been his during
the stress of his flight, he examined every aspect with
greater care. But the conclusions of composure were the
same as those of excitement. He could not gain entrance
to one of the great hotels and remain in his room, un-
identified among its thousands of strangers; he could not
find asylum in one of his old haunts; he dared not try to
leave Manhattan. He was a prisoner, whose only privi-
lege was a larger but most uncertain liberty.

And that liberty was becoming penetratingly uncom-
fortable. An hour had passed, the ground on which he
sat was wet and cold, and the misty air was assuming a
distressing kinship with departed winter and was making
shivering assaults upon his bones. At the best, he real-
ized, he could not hope to remain secure in this culti-
vated wilderness beyond daylight. With the coming of
morning he would certainly be the prey of either his pals
or the police. And if they did not beat him from his
hiding, plain mortal hunger would drive him out into the

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 81

open streets. If he was to do anything at all, he must do
it while he still had the moderate protection of the night.

And then for the first time there came to him remem-
brance of Hunt's rapid injunction, given him in the hurly-
burly of escape when no thoughts could impress the upper
surface of his mind save those of the immediate moment.
"If you're trapped, call Plaza nine-double-o-one and say
'Benvenuto Cellini.'"

Larry had no idea what that swift instruction might
be about. And the chance seemed a slender, fantastical
one, even if he could safely get to a public telephone.
But it seemed his only chance.

He arose, and, keeping as much as he could to the
wilder regions of the park, and making the utmost use of
shadows when he had to cross a path or a drive, he stole
southward. He remembered a drug-store at Eighty-
Fourth Street and Columbus Avenue, peculiarly suited
to his purpose, for it had a side entrance on Eighty-
Fourth Street and was in a neighborhood where police-
men were infrequent.

Fortune favored him. At length he reached Eighty-
Fourth Street and peered over the wall. Central Park
West was practically empty of automobiles, for the thea-
ters had not yet discharged their crowds and no policeman
was in sight. He vaulted the wall; a minute later he was
in a booth in the drug-store, had dropped his nickel in the
slot, and was asking for Plaza nine-double-o-one.

"Hello, sir!" responded the very correct voice of a
man.

"Benvenuto Cellini," said Larry.

"Hold the wire, sir," said the voice.

Larry held the wire, wondering. After a moment the
same correct voice asked where Larry was speaking from.
Larry gave the exact information.

"Stay right in the booth, and keep on talking; say
anything you like; the wire here will be kept open," con-

82 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

tinued the voice. "We'll not keep you waiting long,
sir."

The voice ceased. Larry began to chat about topics of
the day, about invented friends and engagements, well
knowing that his stream of talk was not being heard unless
Central was "listening in"; and knowing also that, to
any one looking into the glass door of his booth, he was
giving a most unsuspicious appearance of a busy man.
And while he talked, his wonder grew. What was about
to happen? What was this Benvenuto Cellini business all
about?

He had been talking for fifteen minutes or more when
the glass door of the booth was opened from without and
a man's voice remarked:

"When you are through, sir, we will be going."

The voice was the same he had heard over the wire.
Larry hung up and followed the man out the side door,
noting only that he had a lean, respectful face. At the
curb stood a limousine, the door of which was opened by
the man for Larry. Larry stepped in.

"Are you followed, sir?" inquired the man.

"I don't know."

"We 'd better make certain. If you are, we '11 lose them,
sir. We '11 stop somewhere and change our license plates
again."

Instead of getting into the unlighted body with him,
as Larry had expected, the man closed the door, mounted
to the seat beside the chauffeur, and the car shot west and
turned up Riverside Drive.

One may break the speed laws in New York if one has
the speed, and if one has the ability to get away with it.
This car had both. Never before had Larry driven so
rapidly within New York City limits; he knew this, that
any trailing taxicab would be lost behind. At Two-
Hundred-and-Forty-Fifth Street the car swung into Van
Cortlandt Park, and switched off all lights. Two minutes

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 83

later they halted in a dark stretch of one of the by-roads of
the Park.

"We'll be stopping only a minute, sir, to put on our
right number plates," the man opened the door to explain.

Within the minute they were away again, now pro-
ceeding more leisurely, in the easy manner of a private car
going about its private business — though the interior of
the car was discreetly dark and Larry huddled discreetly
into a corner. Thus they drove over the Grand Boule-
vards and recrossed the Harlem River and presently drew
up in front of a great apartment house in Park Avenue.

The man opened trie door. "Walk right in, sir, as
though you belong here. The doorman and the elevator-
man are prepared."

They might be prepared, but Larry certainly was not;
and he shot up the elevator to the top floor with mounting
bewilderment. The man unlocked the door of an apart-
ment, ushered Larry in, took his wet hat, then ushered
the dazed Larry through the corner of a dim-lit drawing-
room and through another door.

"You are to wait here, sir," said the man, and quietly
withdrew.

Larry looked about him. He took in but a few details,
but he knew enough about the better fittings of life to
realize that he was in the presence of both money and the
best of taste. He noted the log fire in the broad fireplace,
comfortable chairs, the imported rugs on the gleaming
floor, the shelves of books which climbed to the ceiling, a
quaint writing-desk in one corner which seemed to belong
to another country and another century, but which was
perfectly at home in this room.

On the desk he saw standing a leather-framed photo-
graph which seemed familiar. He crossed and picked it
up. Indeed it was familiar ! It was a photograph of Hunt :
of Hunt, not in the shabby, shapeless garments he wore
down at the Duchess's, but Hunt accoutered as might be a

84 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

man accustomed to such a room as this — though in this
picture there was the same strong chin, the same belliger-
ent good-natured eyes.

Now how and where did that impecunious, rough-neck
painter fit into —

But the dazed question Larry was asking was inter-
rupted by a voice from the door — the thick voice of a
man:

"Who the hell V you?"

Larry whirled about. In the doorway stood a tall,
bellicose young gentleman of perhaps twenty-four or five,
in evening dress, flushed of face, holding unsteadily to the
door- jamb.

"I beg your pardon," said Larry.

"'N' what the hell you doin' here?" continued the
belligerent young gentleman.

11 I'd be obliged to you if you could tell me," said Larry.

"Tryin* to stall, 'r' you," declared the young gentle-
man with a scowling profundity. "No go. Got to come
out your corner V fight. 'N' I'm goin' lick you."

The young man crossed unsteadily to Larry and took a
fighting pose.

"Put 'em up!" he ordered.

This was certainlya night of strange adventure, thought
Larry. His wild escape — his coming to this unknown
place — and now this befuddled young fellow intent upon
battle with him.

"Let's fight to-morrow," Larry suggested soothingly.

" Put 'em up ! " ordered the other. "If you don't know
what you 're doin' here, I '11 show you what you 're doin'
here!"

But he was not to show Larry, for while he was uttering
his last words, trying to steady himself in a crouch for the
delivery of a blow, a voice sounded sharply from the
doorway — a woman's voice:

"Dick!"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 85

The young man slowly turned. But Larry had seen her
first. He had no chance to take her in, that first moment,
beyond noting that she was slender and young and ex-
quisitely gowned, for she swept straight across to them.

"Dick, you're drunk again!" she exclaimed.

"Wrong, sis," he corrected in an injured tone. "It's
same drunk."

"Dick, you go to bed!"

"Now, sis — "

"You go to bed!"

The young man wavered before her commanding gaze.
"Jus's you say — jus's you say," he mumbled, and went
unsteadily toward the door.

The young woman watched him out, and then turned
her troubled face back to Larry. "I'm sorry Dick be-
haved to you as he did."

And then before Larry could make answer, her clouded
look was gone. "So you're here at last, Mr. Brainard."
She held her hand out, smiling a smile that by some magic
seemed to envelop him within an immediate friendship.

"I'm Miss Sherwood." He noted that the slender,
tapering hand had almost a man's strength of grip. " You
need n't tell me anything about yourself," she added,
"for I already know a lot — all I need to know: about
you — and about Maggie Carlisle. You see an hour ago
a messenger brought me a long letter he 'd written
about you." And she nodded to the photograph Larry
was still holding.

"You — you know him?" Larry stammered.

She answered with a whimsical smile: "Yes. Is n't he a
grand, foolish old dear? He's such a roistering, bragging
personage that I've named him Benvenuto Cellini —
though he 's neither liar nor thief. He must have told you
what I called him."

So that explained this password of "Benvenuto Cellini " !
"No, he did n't explain anything. There was no time."

86 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"I don't know where he is," she continued; "please
don't tell me. I don't want to know until he wants me to
know."

Larry had been making a swift appraisal of her. She
was perhaps thirty, fair, with golden-brown hair held in
place by a large comb of wrought gold, with violet-blue
eyes, wearing a low-cut gown of violet chiffon velvet and
dull gold shoes. Larry's instinct told him that here was a
patrician, a thoroughbred: with poise, with a knowledge
of the world, with whimsical humor, with a kindly under-
standing of people, with steel in her, and with a smiling
readiness for almost any situation.

" I think no one will find you — at least for the present,"
her pleasantly modulated voice continued. "There are so
many things I want to talk over with you. Perhaps I can
help about Maggie. I hope you don't mind my talking
about her." Larry could not imagine any one taking
offense at anything this brilliant apparition might possi-
bly say. "But we '11 put off our talk until to-morrow. It 's
late, and you're wet and cold, and besides, my aunt is
having one of her bad spells and thinks she needs me.
Judkins will see to you. Good-night."

"Good-night," said Larry.

She moved gracefully out — almost floated, Larry
would have said. The next moment the man was with
him who had been his escort here, and led Larry into a
spacious bedroom with bath attached. Ten minutes
later Judkins made his exit, carrying Larry's outer
clothes; and another ten minutes later, after a hot bath,
and garbed in silk pajamas which Judkins had produced,
Larry was in the softest and freshest bed that had ever
held him.

But sleep did not come to Larry for a long time. He
lay wondering about this golden-haired, poiseful Miss
Sherwood. She was undoubtedly the woman in the back
of Hunt's life. And he wondered about Hunt — who he

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 87

really was — what had really driven him into this strange
exile. And he wondered about Maggie — what she might
be doing — what from this strange new vantage-point
he might do for her and with her. And he wondered how
his own complex situation was going to work itself out.
And still wondering, Larry at length fell asleep.

CHAPTER XII

WHEN Larry awoke the next morning, he blinked for
several bewildered moments about his bedroom, so un-
like his cell at Sing Sing and so unlike Hunt's helter-
skelter studio down at the Duchess's which he had shared,
before he realized that this big, airy chamber and this
miracle of a bed on which he lay were realities and not
a mere continuation of a dream of fantastic and body-
flattering wealth.

Then his mind turned back a page in the book of his
life and he lay considering the events of the previous
evening: the scene with Barney and Old Jimmie and
Maggie, their all denouncing him as a police stool-pigeon
and a squealer, and Maggie's defiant departure to begin
her long-dreamed-of career as a leading-woman and per-
haps star in what she saw as great and thrilling adven-
tures; his own enforced and frenzied flight; his strange
method of reaching this splendid apartment ; his meeting
with the handsome, drink-befuddled young man in eve-
ning clothes; his meeting with the exquisitely gowned
patrician Miss Sherwood, who had received him with the
poise and frank friendliness of a democratic queen, and
had immediately ordered him off to bed.

Strange, all of these things! But they were all realities.
And in this new set of circumstances which had come into
being in a night, what was he to do?

He recalled that Miss Sherwood had said that she and

88 , CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

he would have their talk that morning. He pulled his
watch from under his pillow. It was past nine o'clock.
He looked about him for clothes, but saw only a bath-
robe. Then he remembered Judkins carrying off his rain-
soaked garments, with "Ring for me when you wake up,
sir."

Larry found an electric bell button dangling over the
top of his bed by a silken cord. He pushed the button
and waited. Within two minutes the door opened, and
Judkins entered, laden with fresh garments.

"Good-morning, sir," said Judkins. "Your own clothes,
and some shirts and other things I 've borrowed from
Mr. Dick. How will you have your bath, sir — hot or
cold?"

"Cold," said the bewildered Larry.

Judkins disappeared into the great white-tiled bath-
room, there was the rush of splashing water for a few
moments, then silence, and Judkins reappeared.

"Your bath is ready, sir. I've laid out some of Mr.
Dick's razors. How soon shall I bring you in your break-
fast?"

"In about twenty minutes," said Larry.

Exactly twenty minutes later Judkins carried in a
tray, and set it on a table beside a window looking down
into Park Avenue. " Miss Sherwood asked me to tell you
she would see you in the library at ten o'clock, sir —
where she saw you last night," said Judkins, and noise-
lessly was gone.

Freshly shaven, tingling from his bath, with a sense of
being garbed flawlessly, though in garments partly alien,
Larry addressed himself to the breakfast of grapefruit,
omelette, toast and coffee, served on Sevres china with
covers of old silver. In his more prosperous eras Larry
had enjoyed the best private service that the best hotels
in New York had to sell; but their best had been coarse
and slovenly compared to this. He would eat for a minute

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 89

or two — then get up and look at his carefully dressed
self in the full-length mirror — then gaze from his high,
exclusive window down into Park Avenue with its stream
of cars comfortably carrying their occupants toward
ten o'clock jobs in Wall or Broad Streets — and then he
would return to his breakfast. This was amazing — be-
wildering !

He was toward the end of his omelette when a knock
sounded at his door. Thinking Judkins had returned, he
called, "Come in"; but instead of Judkins the opening
door admitted the belligerent young man in rumpled eve-
ning clothes of the previous night. Now he wore a silk
dressing-gown of a flamboyant peacock blue, his feet
showed bare in toe slippers, his wavy, yellowish hair had
the tousled effect of a very recent separation from a
pillow. A cigarette depended from the corner of his
mouth.

Larry started to rise. But the young man arrested the
motion with a gesture of mock imperativeness.

"Keep your seat, fair sir; I would fain have speech
with thee." He crossed and sat on a corner of Larry's
table, one slippered foot dangling, and looked Larry over
with an appraising eye. "Permit me to remark, sir," he
continued in his grand manner, "that you look as though
you might be some one."

" Is that what you wanted to tell me, Mr. Sherwood?"
queried Larry.

The other's grand manner vanished and he grinned.
"Forget the 'Mr. Sherwood,' or you'll make me feel not
at home in my own house," he begged with humor-
ous mournfulness. "Call me Dick. Everybody else does.
That's settled. Now to the reason for this visitation at
such an ungodly hour. Sis has just been in picking on
me. Says I was rude to you last night. I suppose I was.
I 'd had several from my private stock early in the eve-
ning; and several more around in jovial Manhattan

90 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

joints where prohibition has n't checked the flow of hap-
piness if you know the countersign. The cumulative ef-
fect you saw, and were the victim of. I apologize, sir."

"That's all right, Mr. — "

"Dick is what I said," interrupted the other.

"Dick, then. It's all right. I understand."

"Thanks. I'll call you Old Captain Nemo for short.
Sis did n't tell me your name or anything about you, and
she said I was n't to ask you questions. But whatever
Isabel does is usually one hundred per cent right. She said
I 'd probably be seeing a lot of you, so I '11 introduce my-
self. You'd learn all about me from some one else, any-
how, so you might as well learn about me from me and get
antimpartial and unbiased statement. Clever of me, ain't
it, to beat 'em to it?"

Larry found himself smiling back into the ingratiating,
irresponsible, boyish face. "I suppose so."

"I'll shoot you the whole works at once. Name,
Richard Livingston Sherwood. Years, twenty-four, but
alleged not yet to have reached the age of discretion.
One of our young flying heroes who helped save France
and make the world safe for something or other by flap-
ping his wings over the endless alkali of Texas. Occupa-
tion, gentleman farmer."

"You a farmer!" exclaimed Larry.

"A gentleman farmer," corrected Dick. "The differ-
ence between a farmer and a gentleman farmer, Captain
Nemo, is that a gentleman farmer makes no profit on his
crops. Now my friends say I'm losing an awful lot of
money and am sowing an awfully big crop. And according
to them, instead of practicing sensible crop rotation, I 'm
a foolish one-crop farmer — and my one crop is wild oats."

"I see," said Larry.

"Of course I do do a little something else on the side.
Avocation. I 'm in the brokerage business. But my chief
business is looking after the Sherwood interests. You see,

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 91

my mother — father died ten years before she did — my
mother, being dotty about the innate superiority of the
male, left me in control of practically everything, and I do
as well by it as the more important occupation of farming
will permit. Which completes the racy history of myself."

"I'm sorry I can't reciprocate."

"That's all right, Captain Nemo. There's plenty of
time — and it doesn't make any difference, anyhow."
For all his light manner and careless chatter, Larry had a
sense that Dick had been sizing him up all this while ; that,
in fact, to do this was the real purpose of the present call.
Dick slipped to his feet. " If you 're just now a bit shy on
duds, as I understand you are, why, we're about the same
size. Tell Judkins what you want, and make him give you
plenty. What time you got?"

"Just ten o'clock."

"By heck — time a farmer was pulling on his overalls
and going forth to his dew-gemmed toil!"

"And time for me to be seeing your sister," said Larry,
rising.

"Come on. I'm a good seneschal, or major domo, or
what you like — and I '11 usher you into her highness's
presence."

A moment later Larry was pushed through the library
door and Dick announced in solemn tone:

"Senorita — Mademoiselle — our serene, revered, and
most high sister Isabel, permit us to present our newest
and most charming friend, Captain Nemo."

" Dick," exclaimed Miss Sherwood, "get out of here
and get yourself into some clothes!"

" Listen to that ! " complained Dick. " She still talks to
me as though I were her small brother. Next thing she '11
be ordering me to wash behind my ears!"

"Get out, and shut the door after you!"

The reply was Dick's stately exit and the sharp closing
of the door.

92 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"Has Dick been talking to you about himself?" asked
Miss Sherwood.

"Yes."

"What did he say?"

Larry gave the substance of the autobiography which
Dick had volunteered.

" Part of that is more than the truth, part less than the
truth," Miss Sherwood remarked. "But this morning
we were to have a real talk about your affairs, and let 's
get to the subject."

She had motioned him to a chair beside the quaint
old desk, and they were now sitting face to face. Isabel
Sherwood looked as much the finished patrician as on the
evening before, and with that easy, whimsical humor and
the direct manner of the person who is sure of herself;
and in the sober, disillusioning daylight she had no less of
beauty than had seemed hers in the softer lighting of their
first meeting. The clear, fresh face with its violet-blue
eyes was gazing at him intently. Larry realized that she
was looking into the very soul of him, and he sat silent
during this estimate which he recognized she had the
right to make.

"Mr. Hunt has written me the main facts about you,
certainly the worst," she said finally. "You need tell me
nothing further, if you prefer not to do so; but it might be
helpful if I knew more of the details."

Larry felt that there was no information he was not
willing to give this clear-eyed, charming woman; and so
he told her all that had happened since his return from
Sing Sing, including his falling in love with Maggie, the
nature of their conflict, her departure into the ways of
her ambition.

"You are certainly facing a lot of difficult propositions."
Miss Sherwood checked them off on her fingers. "The
police are after you — your old friends are after you —
you do not dare be caught. You want to clear yourself — •

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 93

you want to make a business success — you want to
eradicate Maggie's present ambitions and remove her
from her present influences."

"That is the correct total," said Larry.

" Certainly a large total ! Of them all, which is the most
important item?"

Larry considered. "Maggie," he confessed. "But
Maggie really includes all the others. To have any in-
fluence with her, I must get out of the power of the police,
I must overcome her belief that I am a stool and a squealer,
and I must prove to her that I can make a success by
going straight."

"Just so. And all these things you must do while a
fugitive in hiding."

"Exactly. Or else not do them."

" H'm ! . . . The most pressing thing, I judge, is to have a
safe and permanent place to hide, and to have work which
may lead to an opportunity to prove yourself a success."

"Yes."

"Mr. Hunt's O.K. on you would be sufficient, in any
event, and he has given that O.K.," Miss Sherwood said
in her even voice. "Besides, my own judgment prompts
me to believe in your truth and your sincerity. I have
been thinking the matter over since I saw you last night.
I therefore ask you to remain here, never leaving the
apartment — "

"Miss Sherwood!" he ejaculated.

"And a little later, when we go out to our place on
Long Island, you'll have more freedom. For the present
you will be, to the servants and any other persons who
may chance to come in, Mr. Brandon, a second cousin
staying with us; and your explanation for never ventur-
ing forth can be that you are convalescing after an opera-
tion. Perhaps you can think of a plan whereby later on
you might occasionally leave the house without too great
risk to yourself."

94 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"Yes. The risk comes from the police, and from some
of my old friends and the gangsters they have enlisted.
So long as they believe me in New York, they'll all be
on the lookout for me every moment. If they believed
me out of New York, they would all discontinue their
vigilance. If — if — But perhaps you would not care to
do so much."

"Goon."

"Would you be willing to write a letter to some friend
in Chicago, requesting the friend to post an enclosed
letter written by me?"

"Certainly."

"My handwriting would be disguised — but a person
who really knows my writing would penetrate the at-
tempted disguise and recognize it as mine. My letter
would be addressed to my grandmother requesting her
to express my recent purchase of forfeited pledges to me
in Chicago. A clever person reading the letter would
be certain I was asking her to send me my clothes."

"What's the point to that?"

"One detail of the police's search for me will be to open
secretly, with the aid of the postal authorities, all mail
addressed to my grandmother. They will steam open
this letter about my clothes, then seal it and let it be de-
livered. But they will have learned that I have escaped
them and am in Chicago. They will drop the hunt here
and telegraph the Chicago police. And of course the news
will leak through to my old friends, and they'll also stop
looking for me in New York."

"I see."

"And enclosed in another letter written by you, I'll
send an order, also to be posted in Chicago, to a good
friend of mine asking him to call at the express office, get
my clothes, and hold them until I call or send for them.
When he goes and asks for the clothes, the Chicago police
will get him and find the order on him. They '11 have no

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 95

charge at all against him, but they'll have further proof
that I'm in Chicago or some place in the Middle West.
The effect will be definitely to transfer the search from
New York."

" Yes, I see," repeated Miss Sherwood. " Go ahead and
do it; I '11 help you. But for the present you 've got to re-
main right here in the apartment, as I said. And later,
when you think the letters have had their effect, you must
use the utmost caution."

"Certainly," agreed Larry.

"Now as to your making a start in business. I suspect
that my affairs are in a very bad shape. Things were
left to my brother, as he told you. I have a lot of papers,
all kinds of accounts, which he has brought to me and
he 's bringing me a great many more. I can't make head
or tail of them, and I think my brother is about as much
befuddled as I am. I believe only an expert can under-
stand them. Mr. Hunt says you have a very keen mind
for such matters. I wish you'd take charge of these
papers, and try to straighten them out."

"Miss Sherwood," Larry said slowly, "you know my
record and yet you risk trusting me with your affairs?"

"Not that I wouldn't take the risk — but whatever
there is to steal, some one else has already stolen it, or
will steal it. Your work will be to discover thefts or mis-
takes, and to prevent thefts or mistakes if you can. You
see I am not placing any actual control over stealable
property in you — not yet. . . . Well, what do you say?"

" I can only say, Miss Sherwood, that you are more
than good, and that I am more than grateful, and that I
shall do my best!"

Miss Sherwood regarded him thoughtfully for a long
space. Then she said: "I am going to place something
further in your hands, for if you are as clever as I think
you are, and if life has taught you as much as I think it
has, I believe you can help me a lot. My brother Dick is

96 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

wild and reckless. I wish you 'd look out for him and try
to hold him in check where you can. That is, if this is n't
placing too great a duty on you."

"That's not a duty — it's a compliment!"

"Then that will be all for the present. I '11 see you again
in an hour or two, when I shall have some things ready to
turn over to you."

Back in his bedroom Larry walked exultantly to and
fro. He had security ! And at last he had a chance — per-
haps the chance he had been yearning for through which
he was ultimately to prove himself a success ! . . .

He wondered yet more about Miss Sherwood. And
again about her and Hunt. Miss Sherwood was clever,
gracious, everything a man could want in a woman ; and
he guessed that behind her humorous references to Hunt
there was a deep feeling for the big painter who was living
almost like a tramp in the attic of the Duchess's little
house. And Larry knew Miss Sherwood was the only
woman in Hunt's life; Hunt had said as much. They
were everything to each other; they trusted each other.
Yet there was some wide breach between the two; evi-
dently his own crisis had forced the only communication
which had passed between the two for months. He won-
dered what that breach could be, and what had been its
cause.

And then an idea began to open its possibilities. What
a splendid return, if, somehow, he could do something
that would help bring together these two persons who
had befriended him! . . .

But most of the time, while he waited for Miss Sher-
wood to summon him again, he wondered about Maggie.
Yes, as he had told Miss Sherwood, Maggie was the most
important problem of his life: all his many other prob-
lems were important only in the degree that they aided
or hindered the solution of Maggie. Where was she? —
what was she doing? — how was he, in this pleasant prison

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 97

which he dared not leave, ever to overcome her scorn of
him, and ever to divert her from that dangerous career
in which her proud and excited young vision saw only the
brilliant and profitable adventure of high romance?

CHAPTER XIII

WHEN Maggie rode away forever from the house of the
Duchess with Barney Palmer and her father, after the
denunciation of Larry by the three of them as a stool and
a squealer, she was the thrilled container of about as many
diversified emotions as often bubble and swirl in a young
girl at one and the same time. There was anger and con-
tempt toward Larry : Larry who had weakly thrown aside
a career in which he was a master, and who had added
to that bad the worse of being a traitor. There was the
lifting sense that at last she had graduated; that at last
she was set free from the drab and petty things of life;
that at last she was riding forth into the great brilliant
world in which everything happened — forth into the fas-
cinating, bewildering Unknown.

Barney and Old Jimmie talked to each other as the
taxicab bumped through the cobbled streets, their talk
being for the most part maledictions against Larry
Brainard. But their words were meaningless sounds to
the silent Maggie, all of whose throbbing faculties were
just then merged into an excited endeavor to perceive the
glorious outlines of the destiny toward which she rode.
However, as the cab turned into Lafayette Place and
rolled northward, her curiosity about the unknown be-
came conscious and articulate.

"Where am I going?" she asked.

" First of all to a nice, quiet hotel." It was Barney who
answered; somehow Barney had naturally moved into the
position of leader, and as naturally her father had receded

98 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

to second place. "We've got everything fixed, Maggie.
Rooms reserved, and a companion waiting there for you."

"A companion!" exclaimed Maggie. "What for?"

"To teach you the fine points of manners, and to help
you buy clothes. She 's a classy bird all right. I advertised
and picked her out of a dozen who applied."

"Barney!" breathed Maggie. She was silent a dazed
moment, then asked: "Just — just what am I going to
do?"

"Listen, Maggie: I'll spill you the whole idea. I'd
have told you before, but it's developed rather sudden,
and I've not had a real chance, and, besides, I knew
you 'd be all for it. Jimmie and I have canned that stock-
selling scheme for good — unless an easy chance for it
develops later. Our big idea now is to put you across!"
Barney believed that there might still remain in Maggie
some lurking admiration for Larry, some influence of
Larry over her, and to eradicate these completely by the
brilliance of what he offered was the chief purpose of his
further quick-spoken words. "To put you across in the
biggest kind of a way, Maggie ! A beautiful, clever woman
who knows how to use her brains, and who has brainy
handling, can bring in more money, and in a safer way,
than any dozen men! And I tell you, Maggie, I'll make
you a star!"

"Barney! . . . But you have n't told me just what I 'm
to do."

"The first thing will be just a try-out; it'll help finish
your education. I've got it doped out, but I'll not tell
you till later. The main idea is not to use you in just one
game, Maggie, but to finish you off so you'll fit into
dozens of games — be good year after year. A big actress
who can step right into any big part that comes her way.
That's what pays! I tell you, Maggie, there's no other
such good, steady proposition on earth as the right kind of
woman. And that's what you're going to be!"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 99

Maggie had heard much this same talk often before.
Then it had been vague, and had dealt with an indefinite
future. Now she was too dazzled by this picture of near
events which the eager Barney was drawing to be able to
make any comment.

"I'll be right behind you in everything, and so will
Jimmie," Barney continued in his exciting manner —
"but you'll be the party out in front who really puts the
proposition over. And we'll keep to things where the
police can't touch us. Get a man with coin and position
tangled up right in a deal with a woman, and he'll never
let out a peep and he '11 come across with oodles of money.
Hundreds of ways of working that. A strong point about
you, Maggie, is you have no police record. Neither have
I, though the police suspect me — but, as I said, I'll
keep off the stage as much as I can. I tell you, Maggie,
we're going to put over some great stuff! Great, I tell
you!"

Maggie felt no repugnance to what had been said and
implied by Barney. How could she, when since her
memory began she had lived among people who talked
just these same things? To Maggie they seemed the
natural order. At that moment she was more concerned
by a fascinating necessity which Barney's flamboyant
enterprise entailed.

"But to do anything like that, won't I need clothes?"

"You'll need 'em, and you'll have 'em! You're going
to have one of the swellest outfits that ever happened.
You'll make Paris ashamed of itself!"

"No use blowing the whole roll on Maggie's clothes,"
put in Old Jimmie, speaking for the first time.

Barney turned on him caustically, almost savagely.
"You're a hell of a father, you are — counting the pen-
nies on his own daughter ! I told you this was no piker's
game, and you agreed to it — so cut out the idea you 're
in any nickel-in-the-slot business!"

ioo CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Old Jimmie felt physical pain at the thought of parting
from money on such a scale. His earlier plans concern-
ing Maggie had never contemplated any such extrava-
gance. But he was silenced by the dominant force behind
Barney's sarcasm.

"Miss Grierson — she's your companion — knows
what 's what about clothes," continued Barney to Maggie.
"Here's the dope as I've handed it to her. You're an
orphan from the West, with some dough, who's come to
New York as my ward and Jimmie's and we want you to
learn a few things. To her and to any new people we
meet I 'm your cousin and Jimmie is your uncle. You 've
got that all straight?"

"Yes," said Maggie.

"You're to use another name. I've picked out Mar-
garet Cameron for you. We can call you Maggie and it
won't be a slip-up — see? If any of the coppers who
know you should tumble on to you, just tell 'em you
dropped your own name so 's to get clear of your old life.
They can't do anything to you. And tell 'em you in-
herited a little coin; that's why you're living so swell.
They can't do anything about that either. . . . Here's
where we get out. Got a sitting-room, two bedrooms and
a bath hired for you here. But we'll soon move you into
a classier hotel."

The taxi had stopped in front of one of the unpre-
tentious, respectable hotels in the Thirties, just off
Fifth Avenue, and Maggie followed the two men in.
This hotel did, indeed, in its people, its furnishings, its
atmosphere, seem sober and commonplace after the Ritz-
more; but at the Ritzmore she had been merely a cigar-
ette-girl, a paid onlooker at the gayety of others. Here
she was a real guest — here her great life was beginning !
Maggie's heart beat wildly.

Up in her sitting-room Barney introduced her to
Miss Grierson, then departed with a significant look at

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 101

Old Jimmie, saying he would return presently and
leaving Old Jimmie behind. Old Jimmie withdrew into
a corner, turned to the racing part of the Evening Tele-
gram, which, with the corresponding section of the
Morning Telegraph, was his sole reading, and left Maggie
to the society of Miss Grierson.

Maggie studied this strange new being, her hired
"companion," with furtive keenness; and after a few
minutes, though she was shyly obedient in the manner
of an untutored orphan from the West, she had no fear
of the other. Miss Grierson v/as a large, flat-backed
woman who was on the descending slope of middle age.
She was really a "gentlewoman," in the self-pitying and
self-praising sense in which those who advertise them-
selves as such use that word. She was all the social
forms, all the proprieties. She was deferentially auto-
cratic; her voice was monotonously dignified and cul-
tured; and she was tired, which she had a right to be, for
she had been in this business of being a gentlewomanly
hired aunt to raw young girls for over a quarter of a
century.

To the tired but practical eye of Miss Grierson, here
was certainly a young woman who needed a lot of work-
ing over to make into a lady. And though weary and
unthrillable as an old horse, Miss Grierson was con-
scientious, and she was going to do her best.

Maggie made a swift survey of her new home. The
rooms were just ordinary hotel rooms, furnished with
the dingy, wholesale pretentiousness of hotels of the
second rate. But they were the essence of luxury com-
pared to her one room at the Duchess's with its view of
dreary back yards. These rooms thrilled her. They
were her first material evidence that she was now ac-
tually launched upon her great adventure.

Maggie had dinner in her sitting-room with Old
Jimmie and Miss Grierson — and of that dinner, medi-

102 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

ocre and sloppy, and chilled by its transit of twelve
stories from the kitchen, Miss Grierson, by way of an
introductory lesson, made an august function, almost
diagrammatic in its educational details. After the din-
ner, with Miss Grierson's slow and formal aid, which
consisted mainly in passages impressively declaimed
from her private book of decorum, Maggie spent two
hours in unpacking her suitcase and trunk, and repacking
her scanty wardrobe in drawers of the chiffonier and
dressing-table; a task which Maggie, left to herself,
could have completed in ten minutes.

Maggie was still at this task in her bedroom when she
heard Barney enter her sitting-room. "He got away,"
she heard him say in a low voice to Old Jimmie.

She slipped quickly out of her bedroom and closed
the door behind her. An undefined something had sud-
denly begun to throb within her.

"Who got away, Barney?" she demanded in a hushed
tone.

Her look made Barney think rapidly. He was good
at quick thinking, was Barney. He decided to tell the
truth — or part of it.

"Larry Brainard."

"Got away from what?" she pursued.

"The police. They were after him on some charge.
And some of his pals were after him, too. They were out
to get him because he had squealed on Red Hannigan
and Jack Rosenfeldt. Both parties were closing in on
him at about the same time. But Larry got a tip some-
how, and made his get-away."

"When did it happen?"

"Must have happened a little time after we all left
the Duchess's."

"But — but, Barney — how did you learn it so
soon?"

"Just ran into Officer Ga vegan over on Broadway

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 103

and he told me," lied Barney. He preferred not to tell
her that he had been upon the scene with Little Mick
and Lefty Ed; for the third figure which Larry had de-
scried through the misty shadows had indeed been Bar-
ney Palmer. Also Barney preferred not to tell what fur-
ther subtle share he had had in the causes for Larry's
flight.

"Do you think he — he made a safe get-away?"

"Safe for a few hours. Ga vegan told me they'd have
him rounded up by noon to-morrow." Barney was more
conscious of Maggie's interest than was Maggie herself,
and again was desirous of destroying it or diverting it.
"Generally I'm for the other fellow against the police.
But this time I 'm all for the coppers. I hope they land
Larry — he 's got it coming to him. Remember that he 's
a stool and a squealer."

And swiftly Barney switched the subject. "Let's be
moving along, Jimmie."

He drew Maggie out into the hall, to make more cer-
tain that Miss Grierson would not overhear. "Well,
Maggie," he exulted, "haven't I made good so far in
my bargain to put you over?"

"Yes."

"Of course we're going slow at first. That's how
you've got to handle big deals — careful. But you'll
sure be a knock-out when that she-undertaker in there
gets you rigged out in classy clothes. Then the curtain
will go up on the real show — and it 's going to be a big
show — and you'll be the hit of the piece!"

With that incitement to Maggie's imagination Barney
left her; and Old Jimmie followed, furtively giving
Maggie a brief, uncertain look.

104 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

CHAPTER XIV

A BLOCK away from the hotel Barney parted from Old
Jimmie. For a space Barney thought of his partner.
Barney had quick eyes which were quite capable of taking
in two things at once; and while he had seen the excited
glow his final speech had brought back into Maggie's
face, he had also caught that swift look of uncertainty
in the lean, cunning face of Old Jimmie: a look of one
who is eager to go on, yet sees himself frustrated by his
own eagerness. To Barney it was a puzzling, suspicious
look.

As Barney made his way toward a harbor of refresh-
ment he wondered about Old Jimmie — not in the man-
ner Larry had wondered about a father bringing his
daughter up into crooked ways — but he wondered what
kind of a man beneath his shrewd, yielding, placating
manner Old Jimmie really was, how far he was to be
trusted, whether he was in this game on the level or
whether he was playing some very secret hand of his
own. Though he had known and worked with Old Jimmie
for years, Barney had never been admitted to the inner
chambers of the older man's character. He sensed that
there were hidden rooms and twisting passages; and of
this much he was certain, that Old Jimmie was sly and
saturnine.

Well, he would be on guard that Old Jimmie did n't
put anything over on your obliging servant, Barney
Palmer!

This was the era of legal prohibition, but thus far
Barney had not been severely discommoded by the
action of the representatives of America's free institu-
tions in Washington, for Barney knew his New York. In
an ex-saloon on Sixth Avenue, which nominally sold only
the soft drinks permitted by the wise men of the Capital,

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 105

Barney leaned at his ease upon the bar and remarked:
"Give me some of the real stuff, Tim, and forget that
eye-dropper the boss bought you last week." Barney had
a drink of the real stuff, and then another drink, in the
measuring of neither of which had an eye-dropper been
involved.

After that, much heartened, he put two dollars upon
the bar and went his way. His course took the dapper
Barney into three of the gayest restaurants in the Times
Square section ; and in these Barney paused long enough
to speak to a few after-theater supper-parties. For this
was the hour when Barney paid his social calls; he was
very strict with himself upon this point. Barney was
really by way of being a rising figure in this particular
circle of New York society composed of people who had
or believed they had an interest in the theater, of ex-
pensively gowned women the foreground of whose lives
was most attractive, but whose background was perhaps
wisely kept out of the picture, and of moneyed young
men who gloried in the idea that they were living the
life. These social calls from gay table to gay table, at all
of which Barney was welcome — for here Barney showed
only his most attractive surfaces, his most brilliant facets
— were in truth a very important part of Barney's busi-

A little later, alone at a corner table in a quieter
restaurant, Barney was eating his supper and making an
inventory of his prospects. He was in a very exultant
mood. The whiskey he had drunk had given broad
wings to his self-satisfaction; and what he was now sip-
ping from his tea-cup — it was not tea, for Barney was
on the proper terms with his waiter here — this draught
from his tea-cup tipped these broad wings at a yet more
soaring angle.

Yes, he had certainly put it over so far. And Maggie
would certainly prove a winner. Those fair women he

106 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

had chatted with as he had moved from table to table,
why, they'd be less than dirt compared to Maggie when
Maggie was rigged out and readied up and the stage was
set. And it had been he, Barney Palmer, who had been
the first to discover Maggie's latent possibilities !

He had an eye beyond mere surfaces, had Barney. He
had used women in the past in putting over many of his
more private transactions (and had done so partly for the
reason that using women so was eminently "safe" — this
despite his violent outburst of sneering disdain at Larry
when the latter had spoken of safety) : some of them pro-
fessional sharpers, some unscrupulous actresses of the
lower flight — such women as he had just chatted with
in the restaurants where he had made his brief visits.
But such, he now recognized, were rather blasees, rather
too obvious. They were the blown rose. But Maggie was
fresh, and once she was properly broken in, she would be
his perfect instrument. Yes, perfect!

Barney's plans soared on. Some day, when it fitted in
just right with his plans, he was going to marry Maggie.
It was only recently that he had seen her full charms, and
still more recently that he had determined upon marriage.
That decision had materially altered certain details of
the career Barney had blue-printed for himself. Barney
had long regarded marriage as an asset for himself; a
valuable resource which he must hold in reserve and not
liquidate, or capitalize, until his own market was at its
peak. He knew that he was good-looking, an excellent
dancer, that he had the metropolitan finish. He had
calculated that sometime some rich girl, perhaps from
the West, who did not know the world too well, would
fall under the spell of his charms; and he would marry
her promptly while she was still infatuated, before she
could learn too much about him. Such had been Barney's
idea of marriage for himself; which is very similar to
ideas held by thousands of gentlemen, young and other-

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 107

wise, in this broad land of ours, who consider themselves
neither law-breakers nor adventurers.

But that was all changed now. Now it was Maggie,
though Maggie in pursuit of their joint advantage might
possibly first have to go through the marriage ceremony
with some other man. Of course, a very, very rich man!
Barney already had this man marked. He hoped, though,
they would not have to go so far as marriage. However,
he was willing to wait his proper turn. As he had told
Maggie, you could not put over a big thing in a hurry.

As for Larry, he'd certainly handled that business in
a swell fashion! He "d certainly put a crimp in what had
been developing between Larry and Maggie. And he'd
get Larry in time, too. The drag-net was too large and
close of mesh for Larry to hope to escape it. The word
he'd slipped that boob Gavegan had sure done the
business! And the indirect way he had tipped off the
police about Red Hannigan and Jack Rosenfeldt and
had then made his pals think Larry had squealed — that
was sure playing the game, too! Jack and Red would
get off easy — there was nothing on them; but little old
Barney Palmer had certainly used his bean in the way
he had set the machinery of the police and the under-
world in motion against Larry!

While other occupants of the caf6, particularly the
women, stole looks at the handsome, flawlessly dressed,
interesting-looking Barney, Barney had yet another of
those concoctions which the discreet waiter served in a
tea-cup. He'd done a great little job, you bet! Not an-
other man in New York could have done better. He was
sure going to put Maggie across! And in doing so, he
was going to do what was right by yours truly.

All seemed perfect in Barney's world. . . .

And while Barney sat exulting over triumphs already
achieved and those inevitably to be achieved, Maggie
lay in her new bed dreaming exultant dreams of her own :

io8 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

heedless of the regular snoring which resounded in the
adjoining room — for the excellent Miss Grierson, while
able to keep her every act in perfect form while in the
conscious state, unfortunately when unconscious had no
more control of the goings-on of her mortal functions
than the lowliest washwoman. Maggie's flights of fancy
circled round and round Larry. She stifled any excuses
or insurgent yearnings for him. He 'd deserved what he
had got. Already, contrary to his predictions, she had
made a tremendous advance into her brilliant future.
She would show him! Yes, she would show him! Oh,
but she was going to do things !

But while she dreamed thus, shaping a magnificent
destiny — an independent, self-engineered young woman,
so very, very confident of the great future she was going
to achieve through the supremacy of her own will and
her own abilities — no slightest surmise came into her
mind that Barney Palmer was making plans by which
her will was to count as naught and by which he was to
be the master of her fate, and that the furtive, yielding
Old Jimmie was also dreaming a patient dream in which
she was to be a mere chess-piece which was to capture a
long-cherished game.

And yet, after all, Maggie's dreams, aside from the
peculiar twist life had given them, were fundamentally
just the ordinary dreams of youth : of willful confident
youth, to whom but a small part of the world has yet
been opened, who in fact does not yet half know its own
nature.

CHAPTER XV

No prison could have been more agreeable — that is,
no prison from which Maggie was omitted — than this
in which Larry was now confined. He had the run of the

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 109

apartment; Dick Sherwood outfitted him liberally with
clothing from his superabundance of the best; Judkins
and the other servants treated him as the member of the
family which they had been informed he was; the lively
Dick, with his puppy-like friendliness, asked never an
uncomfortable question, and placed Larry almost on the
footing of a chum; and the whimsically smiling Miss
Sherwood treated Larry exactly as she might have
treated any well-bred gentleman and in every detail
made good on her promise to give him a chance. In fact,
in all his life Larry had never lived so well.

As for Miss Sherwood's aunt, a sister of Miss Sher-
wood's mother and a figure of pale, absent-minded
dignity, she kept very much to her own sitting-room.
She was a recent convert to the younger English novel-
ists, and was forced to her seclusion by the amazing
fecundity with which they kept repopulating her reading-
table. Larry she accepted with a hazy, preoccupied
politeness, eager always to get back to the more sub-
stantial characters of her latest fiction.

Of course Miss Sherwood did not make of Larry a
complete confidant. For all her smiling, easy frankness,
he knew that there were many doors of her being which
she never unlocked for him. What he saw was so inter-
esting that he could not help being interested about the
rest. Of course many details were open to him. She was
an excellent sportswoman; a rare dancer; there were
many men interested in her; she dined out almost every
other evening at some social affair blooming belatedly in
May (most of her friends were already settled in their
country homes, and she was still in town only because
her place on Long Island was in disorder due to a two
months' delay in the completion of alterations caused by
labor difficulties); she had made a study of beetles; she
had a tiny vivarium in the apartment and here she
would sit studying her pets with an interest and patience

I io CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

not unlike that of old Fabre upon his stony farm. Also,
as Larry learned from her accounts, there was a day
nursery on the East Side whose lack of a deficit was due
to her.

All in all she was a healthy, normal, intelligent, un-
self-sacrificing woman who belonged distinctly to her
own day; who gave a great deal to life, and who took a
great deal from life.

Often Larry wished she would speak of Hunt. He was
curious about Hunt, of whom he thought daily ; and such
talk might yield him information about the blustering,
big-hearted painter who was gypsying it down at the
Duchess's. But as the days passed she never mentioned
Hunt again; not even to ask where he was or what he
was doing. She was adhering very strictly to the remark
she had made the night Larry came here: "I don't want
to know until he wants me to know." And so Hunt re-
mained the same incomplete picture to Larry ; the painter
was indubitably at home in such surroundings as these,
and he was at home as a roistering, hard-working vaga-
bond at the Duchess's — but all the vast spaces between
were utterly blank, except for the sketchy remarks Hunt
had made concerning himself.

Larry had guessed that hurt pride was the reason for
Hunt's vanishment from the world which had known
him. But he knew hurt pride was not Miss Sherwood's
motive for making no inquiries. Anger? No. Jealousy?
No. Some insult offered her? No. Larry went through
the category of ordinary motives, of possible happenings;
but he could find none which would reconcile her very
keen and kindly feeling for Hunt with her abstinence
from all inquiries.

From his first day in his sanctuary Larry spent long
hours every day over the accounts and documents Miss
Sherwood had put in his hands. They were indeed a
tangle. Originally the Sherwood estate had consisted of

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND in

solid real-estate holdings., But now that Larry had be-
fore him the records of holdings and of various dealings
he learned that the character of the Sherwood fortune
had altered greatly. Miss Sherwood's father had neg-
lected the care of this sober business in favor of specu-
lative investment and even outright gambling in stocks;
and Dick, possessing this strain of his father, and lacking
his father's experience, had and was speculating even more
wildly.

Larry had followed the market since he had been in a
broker's office almost ten years earlier, so he knew what
stock values had been and had some idea of what they
were now. The records, and some of the stock Larry
found in the safe, recalled the reputation of the elder
Sherwood. He had been known as a spirited, daring man
who would buy anything or sell anything; he had been
several times victimized by sharp traders, some of these
out-and-out confidence men. Studying these old records
Larry remembered that the elder Sherwood a dozen years
before had lost a hundred thousand in a mining deal
which Old Jimmie Carlisle had helped manipulate.

Larry found hundreds and hundreds of thousands of
stock in the safe that were just so much waste paper, and
he found records of other hundreds of thousands in safety
deposit vaults that had no greater value. The real estate,
the more solid and to the male Sherwoods the less inter-
esting part of the fortune, had long been in the care of
agents; and since Larry was prohibited from going out
and studying the condition and true value of these hold-
ings, he had to depend upon the book valuations and the
agents' reports and letters. Upon the basis of these valu-
ations he estimated that some holdings were returning a
loss, some a bare one and a half per cent, and some run-
ning as high as fifteen per cent. Larry found many com-
plaints from tenants; some threatening letters from the
Building Department for failure to make ordered alter-

ii2 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

ations to comply with new building laws; and some
rather perfunctory letters of advice and recommendation
from the agents themselves.

From Miss Sherwood Larry learned that the agents
were old men, friends of her father since youth ; that they
had both made comfortable fortunes which they had no
incentive to increase. Larry judged that there was no
dishonesty on the part of the agents, only laxity, and an
easy adherence to the methods of their earlier years when
there had not been so much competition nor so many
building laws. All the same Larry judged that the real-
estate holdings were in a bad way.

Larry liked the days and days of this work, although
the farther he went the worse did the tangle seem. It
was the kind of work for which his faculties fitted him,
and this was his first chance to use his faculties upon
large affairs in an honest way. Thus far his work was all
diagnostic; cure, construction, would not come until
later — and perhaps Miss Sherwood would not trust him
with such affairs. This investigation, this checking up,
involved no risk on her part as she had frankly told him.
The other would : it would mean at least partial control
of property, the handling of funds.

Miss Sherwood had many sessions with him; she
was interested, but she confessed herself helpless in this
compilation and diagnosis of so many facts and figures.
Dick was prompt enough to report his stock transactions,
and he was eager enough to discuss the probable fluctua-
tion of this or that stock ; but when asked to go over what
Larry had done, he refused flatly and good-humoredly to
"sit in any such slow, dead game."

"If my Solomon-headed sister is satisfied with what
you're doing, Captain Nemo, that's good enough for
me," he would say. "So forget that stuff till I'm out of
sight. Open up, Captain — what do you think copper is
going to do?"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 113

"I wish you could be put on an operating-table and
have your speculative streak knifed out of you, Dick.
That oil stock you bought the other day — why, a blind
man could have seen it was wild-cat. And you were
wiped out."

"Oh, the best of 'em get aboard a bad deal now and
then."

"I know. But I've been tabulating all your deals to
date, and on the total you 're away behind. Better leave
the market absolutely alone, Dick, and quit taking those
big chances."

" You Ve got to take some big chances, Captain Nemo "
— Dick had clung to the title he had lightly conferred on
Larry the morning he had come in to apologize — "or
else you '11 never make any big winnings. Besides, I want
a run for my money. Just getting money is n't enough.
I want a little pep in mine."

Larry saw that these talks on the unwisdom of specula-
tion he was giving Dick were not in themselves enough to
effect a change in Dick. Mere words were colorless and
negative; something positive would be required.

Larry hesitated before he ventured upon another mat-
ter he had long considered. "Excuse my saying it, Dick.
But a man who 's trying to do as much in a business way
as you are, particularly since it's plain speculation, can't
afford to go to after-theater shows three times a week and
to late suppers the other four nights. Two and three
o'clock is no bedtime hour for a business man. And that
boot-legged booze you drink when you 're out does n't
help you any. I know you think I 'm talking like a fossil-
ized grand-aunt — but all the same, it 's the straight stuff
I 'm handing you."

"Of course it's straight stuff — and you're perfectly
all right, Captain Nemo." With a good-natured smile
Dick clapped him on the shoulder. "But I'm all right,
too, and nothing and nobody is going to hurt me. Got to

H4 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

have a little fun, have n't I? As for the booze, I 'm merely
making hay while the sun shines. Soon there'll be no sun
— I mean no booze."

Larry dropped the subject. In his old unprincipled
days his practice had been much what he had suggested
to Dick; as little drink as possible, and as few late nights
as possible. He had needed all his wits all the time. In
this matter of hilarious late hours, as in the matter of
speculation, Larry recognized words alone, however good,
would have little effect upon the pleasure-loving, friendly,
likable Dick. An event, some big experience, would be
required to check him short and bring him to his senses.

While Larry was keeping at this grind something was
happening to Larry of which he was not then conscious :
something which was part of the big development in him
that was in time to lead him far. A confidence man is
essentially a "sure-thing" gambler. It had been Larry's
practice, before the law had tripped him up, to study
every detail of an enterprise he was planning to under-
take, to know the psychology of the individuals with
whom he was dealing, to eliminate every perceivable
uncertainty: that was what had made almost all of hig
deals "sure things." Strip a clever knave of all intent
or inclination for knavery, and leave all his other qualities
and practices intact and eager, and you have the makings
of a "sure-thing" business man: — a man who does not
cheat others, and who takes precious care that his every
move is sound and forward-looking. Aside from the
moral element involved, the difference between the two
is largely a difference in percentage : say the difference be-
tween a thousand per cent profit and six per cent profit.
The element of trying to play a "safe thing" still remains.

This transformation of character, under the stimulus
of hard, steady work upon a tangled thing which con-
tained the germ of great constructive possibilities for some
one, was what was happening unconsciously to Larry.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 115

CHAPTER XVI

ALL this while Maggie, and what he was to do about her,
and how do it, was in Larry's mind. Even this work he
was doing for Miss Sherwood, he was doing also for Mag-
gie, in the hope that in some unseen way it might lead
him to her and help lead her to herself. There were diffi-
culties enough between them, God knew; but of them all
two were forever presenting themselves as foremost : first,
he did not dare go openly to see her; and, second, even
if he so dared he did not know where she was.

When he had been with the Sherwoods some three
weeks Larry determined upon a preliminary measure.
By this time he knew that the letters mailed from Chi-
cago, according to the plan he had arranged with Miss
Sherwood, had had their contemplated effect. He knew
that he was supposed by his enemies to be in Chicago or
some other Western point, and that New York was off its
guard as far as he was concerned.

His preliminary measure was to discover, if possible,
Maggie's whereabouts. The Duchess seemed to him the
most likely source of information. He dared not write
asking her for this, for he was certain her mail was still
being scrutinized. The safest method would be to call at
the pawnshop in person ; the police, and his old friends,
and the Ginger Bucks would expect anything else before
they would expect him to return to his grandmother's.
Of course he must use all precautions.

Incidentally he was prompted to this method by his
desire to see his grandmother and Hunt. He had an idea
or two which he had been mulling over that concerned
the artist.

He chose a night when a steady, blowing rain had driven
all but limousined and most necessitous traffic from the
streets. The rain was excuse for a long raincoat with

n6 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

high collar which buttoned under his nose, and a cap
which pulled down to his eyes, and an umbrella which
masked him from every direct glance. Thus abetted and
equipped he came, after a taxi ride and a walk, into his
grandmother's street. It was as seemingly deserted as on
that tumultuous night when he had left it; and on this
occasion no figures sprang out of the cover of shadows,
shooting and cursing. He had calculated correctly; and
unmolested he gained the pawnshop door, passed the
solemn-eyed, incurious Isaac, and entered the room be-
hind.

His grandmother sat over her accounts at her desk
in a corner among her curios. Hunt, smoking a black
pipe, was using his tireless right hand in a rapid sketch of
her: another of those swift, few-stroked, vivid character
notes which were about his studio by the hundreds. The
Duchess saw Larry first; and she greeted him in the same
unsurprised, emotionless manner as on the night he had
come back from Sing Sing.

"Good-evening, Larry," said she.

"Good-evening, grandmother," he returned.

Hunt came to his feet, knocking over a chair in so
doing, and gripped Larry's hand. "Hello — here's our
wandering boy to-night! How are you, son?"

"First-rate, you old paint-slinger. And you?"

"Hitting all twelve cylinders and taking everything on
high! But say, listen, youngster: how about your copper
friends and those gun-toting schoolmates of yours?"

"Missed them so far."

"Better keep on missing 'em." Hunt regarded him in-
tently for a moment, then asked abruptly: "Never heard
one way or another — but did you use that telephone
number I gave you?"

"Yes."

"Miss Sherwood take care of you?"

"Yes."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 117

"Still there?"

"Yes."

Again Hunt was silent for a moment. Larry expected
questions about Miss Sherwood, for he knew the quality
of the painter's interest. But Hunt seemed quite as de-
termined to avoid any personal question relating to Miss
Sherwood as she had been about personal questions re-
lating to him; for his next remark was:

"Young fellow, still keeping all those commandments
you wrote for yourself?"

"So far, my bucko."

" Keep on keeping 'em, and write yourself a few more,
and you '11 have a brand-new decalogue. And we '11 have a
little Moses of our own. But in the meantime, son, what 's
the great idea of coming down here?"

"For one thing, I came to ask for a couple of your
paintings."

" My paintings ! " Hunt regarded the other suspiciously.
"What the hell you want my paintings for?"

"They might make good towels if I can scrape the
paint off."

"Aw, cut out the vaudeville stuff! I asked you what
you wanted my paintings for? Give me a straight answer!"

"All right — here's your straight answer: I want your
paintings to sell them."

"Sell my paintings! Say, are you trying to say some-
thing still funnier?"

" I want them to sell them. Remember I once told you
that I could sell them — that I could sell anything. Let
me have them, and then just see."

"You'd sure have to be able to sell anything to
sell them!" A challenging glint had come into Hunt's
eyes. "Young fellow, you're so damned fresh that if
you had any dough I 'd bet you five thousand, any odds
you like, that you could n't even give one of the things
away!"

Ii8 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"Loan me five thousand," Larry returned evenly,
"and I'll cover the bet with even money — it being
understood that I 'm to sell the picture at a price not less
than the highest price you ever received for one of your
'pretty pictures' which you delight to curse and which
made your fortune. Now bring down your pictures — or
shut up!"

Hunt's jaw set. "Young fellow, I take that bet! And
I '11 not let you off, either — you '11 have to pay it ! Which
pictures do you want?"

"That young Italian woman sitting on the curb nurs-
ing her baby — and any other picture you want to put
with it."

Hunt went clumping up the stairway. When he was
out of earshot, the Duchess remarked quietly:

"What did you really come for, Larry?"

Larry was somewhat taken aback by his grandmother's
penetration, but he did not try to evade the question nor
the steady gaze of the old eyes.

"I thought you might know where Maggie is, and I
came to ask."

"That's what I thought."

"Do you know where she is?"

"Yes."

"Where is she?"

The old eyes were still steady upon him. "I don't
know that I should tell you. I want you to get on — and
the less you have to do with Maggie, the better for you."

" I 'd like to know, grandmother."

The Duchess considered for a long space. "After all,
you're of age — and you've got to decide what's best for
yourself. I'll tell you. Maggie was here the other day
— dressed simple — to get some letters she'd forgotten
to take and which I could n't find. We had a talk. Maggie
is living at the Grantham under the name of Margaret
Cameron. She has a suite there."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 119

"A suite at the Grantham!" exclaimed Larry, as-
tounded. "Why, the Grantham is in the same class with
the Ritzmore, where she used to work — or the Plaza !
A suite at the Grantham!"

And then Larry gave a twitching start. "At the Gran-
tham— alone?"

"Not alone — no. But it's not what just came into
your mind. It's a woman that's with her; a hired com-
panion. And they're doing everything on a swell scale."

"What's Maggie up to?"

"She did n't tell me, except to say that the plan was a
big one. She was all excited over it. If you want to know
just what it is, ask Barney Palmer and Old Jimmie."

"Barney and Old Jimmie!" ejaculated Larry. And
then: "Barney and Old Jimmie — and a suite at the
Grantham!"

At that moment Hunt came back down the stairway,
carrying a roll wrapped in brown paper.

"Here you are, young fellow," he announced. "De-
mounted 'em so the junk would be easier to handle. The
Dago mother you asked for — the second painting may
be one you'd like to have for your own private gallery.
I 'm not going to let you get away with your bluff — and
don't you forget it! ... Duchess, don't you think he'd
better beat it before Gavegan and his loving friends take
a tumble to his presence and mess up the neighborhood?"

"Yes," said the Duchess. "Good-night, Larry."

"Good-night," said he.

Mechanically he took the roll of paintings and slipped
it under his raincoat; mechanically he shook hands;
mechanically he got out of the pawnshop; mechanically
he took all precautions in getting out of the little rain-
driven street and in getting into a taxicab which he
captured over near Cooper Institute. All his mind was
upon what the Duchess had told him and upon a new
idea which was throbbingly growing into a purpose.

120 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Maggie and Barney and Old Jimmie! Maggie in a suite
at the Grantham!

What Larry now did, as he got into the taxi, he would
have called footless and foolhardy an hour before, and
at any other hour his judgment might have restrained
him. But just now he seemed controlled by a force
greater than smooth -running judgment — a composite of
many forces: by sudden jealousy, by a sudden desire to
shield Maggie, by a sudden desire to see her. So as he
stepped into the taxi, he said:

"The Grantham — quick!"

CHAPTER XVII

THE taxi went rocking up Fourth Avenue. But now that
decision was made and he was headed toward Maggie,
a little of judgment reasserted itself. It would not be
safe for him to walk openly into the Grantham with a
mouthful of questions. He did not know the number of
Maggie's suite. And Maggie might not be in. So he re-
vised his plan slightly. He called to his driver:

"Go to the Claridge first."

Five minutes later the taxi was in Forty-Fourth
Street and Larry was stepping out. Fortune favored him
in one fact — or perhaps his subconscious mind had based
his plan upon this fact: the time was half-past ten, the
theaters still held their crowds, the streets were empty,
the restaurants were practically unoccupied. He was in-
curring the minimum of risk.

"Wait for me," he ordered the driver. "I'll be out in
five minutes."

In less than the half of the first of these minutes Larry
had attained his first objective: the secluded telephone-
room down behind the grill. It was unoccupied except
for the telephone girl who was gazing raptly at the sorrow-

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 121

ful, romantic, and very soiled pages of "St. Elmo." The
next moment she was gazing at something else — a five-
dollar bill which Larry had slipped into the open book.

"That's to pay for a telephone call; just keep the
change," he said rapidly. "You're to do all the talking,
and say just what I tell you."

" I got you, general," said the girl, emerging with alac-
rity from romance to reality. "Shoot."

"Call up the Hotel Grantham — say you're a florist
with an order to deliver some flowers direct to Miss
Margaret Cameron — and ask for the number of her
suite — and keep the wire open."

The girl obeyed promptly. In less than a minute she
was reporting to Larry :

"They say 1141-1142-1143."

"Ask if she 's in. If she is, get her on the 'phone, tell her
long distance is calling, but does n't want to speak to her
unless she is alone. You get it?"

"Sure, brother. This ain't the first time I helped a
party out."

There was more jabbing with the switch-board plug,
evident switching at the other end, several questions,
and then the girl asked : " Is this Miss Margaret Cameron?
Miss Cameron — " and so on as per Larry's instructions.

The operator turned to Larry : "She says she 's alone."

"Tell her to hold the wire till you get better connections
— the storm has messed up connections terribly — and
keep your own wire open and make her hold her end."

As Larry went out he heard his instructions being exe-
cuted while an adept hand safely banked the bill inside her
shirt-waist. Within two minutes his taxi set him down at
the Grantham; and knowing that whatever risks he ran
would be lessened by his acting swiftly and without any
suspicious hesitation, he walked straight in and to the
elevators, in the manner of one having business there, his
collar again pulled up, his cap pulled down, and his face

122 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

just then covered with a handkerchief which was caring
for a sniffling nose in a highly natural manner.

With his heart pounding he got without mishap to the
doors numbered 1141, 1142, and 1143. Instinctively he
knew in a general way what the apartment was like: a
set of rooms of various character which the hotel could
rent singly or throw together and rent en suite. But which
of the three was the main entrance? He dared not hesitate,
for the slightest queer action might get the attention of the
floor clerk down the corridor. So Larry chose the happy
medium and pressed the mother-of-pearl button of 1 142.

The door opened, and before Larry stood a large,
elderly, imposing woman in a rigidly formal evening
gown — a gown which, by the way, had been part of
Miss Grierson's equipment for many a year for helping
raw young things master the art of being ladies. Larry
surmised at once that this was the "hired companion"
his grandmother had spoken of. In other days Larry
had had experience with this type and before Miss Grier-
son could bar him out or ask a question, Larry was in the
room and the door closed behind him — and he had en-
tered with the easiest, niost natural, most polite manner
imaginable.

"You were expecting me?" inquired Larry with his
disarming and wholly engaging smile.

Neither Miss Grierson's mind nor body was geared for
rapid action. She was taken aback, and yet not offended.
So being at a loss, she resorted to the chief item in her
stock in trade, her ever dependable dignity.

"I cannot say that I was. In fact, sir, I do not know
who you are."

"Miss Cameron knows — and she is expecting me,"
Larry returned pleasantly. His quick eyes had noted that
this was a sitting-room : an ornate, patterned affair which
the great hotels seem to order in hundred lots. "Where
is Miss Cameron?"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 123

"In the next room," nodding at the connecting door.
"She is engaged. Telephoning. A long-distance call.
I'm quite sure she is not expecting you," Miss Grierson
went on to explain ponderously and elaborately, but with
politeness, for this young man was handsome and pleas-
ant and well-bred and might prove to be some one of
real importance. "We were to have had a theater party
with supper afterwards; but owing to Miss Cameron's
indisposition we did not go to the theater. But she in-
sisted on keeping the engagement for the supper, but
changing it to here. Besides herself and myself, there are
to be only her uncle, her cousin, and just one guest. That
is why I am so certain, sir, she is not expecting you."

"But you see," smiled Larry, "I am that one guest."

Miss Grierson shook her carefully coiffured transforma-
tion. " I've met the guest who is coming, and I certainly
have not met you."

"Then she must have asked two of us. Anyhow, I'll
just speak to her, and if I'm mistaken and de trap, I'll
withdraw." And ere Miss Grierson could even stir up an
intention to intervene further, this well-mannered young
man had smiled his disarming smile and bowed to her
and had passed through the door, closing it behind him.

He halted, the knob in his hand. Maggie was standing
sidewise to him, holding a telephone in her hand, its re-
ceiver at her ear. She must have supposed that it was
Miss Grierson who had so quietly entered, for she did not
look around.

"Yes, I'm still waiting," she was saying impatiently.
"Can't you ever get that connection?"

Larry had seen Maggie only in the plain dark suit
which she had worn to her daily business of selling cigar-
ettes at the Ritzmore; and once, on the night of his re-
turn from Sing Sing, in that stage gypsy costume, which
though effective was cheap and impromptu and did not
at all lift her out of the environment of the Duchess's

124 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

ancient and grimy house. But Larry was so startled by
this changed Maggie that for the moment he could not
have moved from the door even had he so desired. She
was accoutered in the smartest of filmy evening gowns,
with the short skirt which was then the mode, with high-
heeled silver slippers, her rounded arms and shoulders
and bosom bare, her abundant black hair piled high in
careful carelessness. The gown was cerise in color, and
from her forearm hung a great fan of green plumes. In all
the hotels and theaters of New York one could hardly
have come upon a figure that night more striking in its
finished and fresh young womanhood. Larry trembled
all over; his heart tried to throb madly up out of his
throat.

At length he spoke. And all he was able to say was:

"Maggie."

She whirled about, and telephone and receiver almost
fell from her hands. She went pale, and stared at him,
her mouth agape, her dark eyes wide.

"La- Larry!" she whispered.

"Maggie!" he said again.

"La-Larry! I thought you were in Chicago."

" I 'm here now, Maggie — especially to see you." He
did not know it, but his voice was husky. He noted that
she was still holding the telephone and receiver. " It was
I who put in that long-distance call. But 1 came instead.
So you might as well hang up."

She obeyed, and set the instrument upon its little
table.

"Larry — where have you been all this while?"

He was now conscious enough to note that there was
tense concern in her manner. He exulted at it, and crossed
and took her hand.

"Right here in New York, Maggie."

"In hiding?"

"In mighty good hiding."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 125

"But, Larry — don't you know it's dangerous for you
to come out? And to come here of all places?"

"I couldn't help myself. I simply had to see you,
Maggie."

He was still holding her hand, and there was an in-
stinctive grip of her fingers about his. For a moment —
the moment during which her outer or more conscious
self was startled into forgetfulness — they gazed at each
other silently and steadily, eye into eye.

And then the things the Duchess had said crept back
into his mind, and he said:

"Maggie, I've come to take you out of all this. Get
ready — let's leave at once."

That broke the spell. She jerked away from him, and
instantly she was the old Maggie: the Maggie who had
jeered at him and defied him the night of his return from
prison when he had announced his new plan — the Maggie
who had flaunted him as "stool" and "squealer" the
evening she had left the Duchess's to enter upon this new
career.

"No, you're not going to take me out of this!" she
flung at him. "I told you once before that I wasn't
going your way ! I told you that I was going my own way !
That held for then, and it holds for now, and it will hold
for always!"

The softer mood which had come upon him by sur-
prise at sight of her and filled him, now gave way to grim
determination. "Yes, you are coming my way — some-
time, if not now! And now if I can make you!"

Their embattled gazes gripped each other. But now
Larry was seeing more than just Maggie. He was also
taking in the room. It was close kin to the room in which
he had left Miss Grierson: ornate, undistinguished, and
very expensive. He noted one slight difference: a tiny
hallway giving on the corridor, its inner door now opened.

But the greatest difference was what he saw over

126 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Maggie's smooth white shoulders: a table all set with
china and glass and silver, and arranged for five.

1 ' Maggie, what 's this game you 're up to ?" he demanded.

"It's none of your business!" she said fiercely, but in
a low tone — for both were instinctively remembering
Miss Grierson in the adjoining room. And then she
added proudly: "But it's big! Bigger than anything you
ever dreamed of! And you can see I am putting it across
so far — and I '11 be putting it across at the finish ! Com-
pare it to the cheap line you talked about. Bah!"

"Listen, Maggie!" In his intensity he gripped her
bare forearm. "This is bad business, and if you had any
sense you'd know it! Don't you think I get the layout?
Barney is your cousin, Old Jimmie is your uncle, that
dame in the next room and this suite and your swell
clothes to help put up a front! And your sickness that
would n't let you go to the theater is just a fake, so that,
not wanting to disappoint them entirely, you 'd have an
excuse for having supper here — and thus adroitly draw
some person into the trap of a more intimate relation-
ship. It's a clever and classy layout. Maggie, exactly
what's your game?"

Til not tell you!"

'Who's that man that's coming here?"

'I'll not tell you!"

'Is he the sucker you're out to trim?"

'I'll not tell you!"

'You will tell me!" he cried dominantly. "And you're
going to get out of all this! You hear me? It may look
good to you now. But I tell you it has only one finish !
And that's a rotten finish!"

She tore free from his punishing grip, and pantingly
glared at him — her former defiance now an egoistic
fury.

" I won't have you interfering with my life! — you fake
preacher! — you stool, you squealer!" she flung at him

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 127

madly. "Stool — squealer!" she repeated. "I tell you
I'm going my own way — and it's a big way — and I
tell you again nothing you can say or do can stop me ! If
I could have my best wish, all I 'd wish for would be some-
thing to keep you from always interfering — something
to get you out of my way!"

Panting, she paused. Her tense figure, with hands
closing and unclosing, expressed the very acme of furious
defiance — of desire to annihilate — of ultimate hatred.
Larry was astounded by the very extent, the profundity,
of her passion. And so they stood, silent except for their
quick breathing, eyes fixed upon eyes, for several mo-
ments.

And then a key sounded in the outer door of the
little hallway. Instantly there was an almost unbelievable
transformation in Maggie. From an imperious, uncon-
trollable fury, she changed to a white, quivering thing.
"Barney!" she whispered; and sprang to the inner door
of the little hallway, closed and locked it.

She turned on Larry a face that was ghastly in its
pallor.

"Barney always carries a pistol," she whispered.

They had heard the outer door close with a click of its
automatic lock. They now heard the knob of the inner
door turn and tugged at; and then heard Barney call:

"What's the matter, Maggie? Let us in."

Maggie made a supreme effort to reply in a controlled
voice :

"Just a minute. I'm not quite ready."

Then a second voice sounded from the other side of the
door:

"Don't keep us too long, Maggie. Please!"

There was a distantly familiar quality to Larry in that
second voice. But he did not try to place it then : he was
too poignantly concerned in his own situation, and in the
bewildering change in Maggie.

128 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

She slipped a hand through his arm. "Oh, La-Larry,
why did you ever take such a risk!" she breathed. Her
whisper was piteous, aquiver with fright. "Come this
way!" and she quickly pulled him into the room where
he had met Miss Grierson and to the door by which he
had entered.

Maggie opened this door. "They 're all in the little hall-
way — I don't think they'll see you," her rapid, agitated
whisper went on. " Don't take the elevators in this corri-
dor, they 're in plain sight. There are elevators just around
the corner. Take them; they're safer. Good-bye, Larry
— and, oh, Larry, don't ever take such a risk again!"

With that she pushed him out and closed the door.

Larry followed her instructions about the elevator; he
used the same precautions in leaving that he had used in
coming, and twenty minutes later he was back in his room
in the Sherwood apartment. For an hour or more he sat
motionless — thinking — thinking: asking himself ques-
tions, but in his tumultuous state of mind and emotions
not able to keep to a question long enough to reason out
its possible answer.

Just what was that game in which Maggie was in-
volved? — a game which required that Grantham setting,
that eminently respectable companion, and Maggie's
accouterment as a young lady of obvious wealth.

Whose was that vaguely familiar second voice? — that
voice which he still could not place.

But what he thought about most of all was something
very different. What had caused that swift change in
Maggie? — from a fury that was both fire and granite, to
that pallid, quivering, whispering girl who had so rapidly
led him safely out of his danger.

To and fro, back and forth, shuttled these questions.
Toward two o'clock he stood up, mind still absorbed,
and mechanically started to undress. He then observed
the roll of paintings Hunt had given him. Better for them

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 129

if they were flattened out. Mechanically he removed
string and paper. There on top was the Italian mother
he had asked for. A great painting — a truly great paint-
ing. Mechanically he lifted this aside to see what was
the second painting Hunt had included. Larry gave a
great start and the Italian mother went flapping to the
floor.

The second painting was of Maggie ; the one on which
Hunt had been working the day Larry had come back:
Maggie in her plain working clothes, looking out at the
world confidently, conqueringly ; the painting in which
Hunt, his brain teeming with ideas, had tried to express
the Maggie that was, the many Maggies that were in her,
and the Maggie that was yet to be.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE next morning Larry tried to force his mind to attend
strictly to Miss Sherwood's affairs. But in this effort he
was less than fifty per cent effective. His experience of
the night before had been too exciting, too provocative
of speculation, too involved with what he frankly recog-
nized to be the major interest of his life, to allow him to
apply himself with perfect and unperturbed concentra-
tion to the day's routine. Constantly he was seeing the
transformed Maggie in the cerise evening gown with the
fan of green plumes — seeing her elaborate setting in her
suite at the Grantham — hearing that vaguely familiar
but unplaceable voice outside her door — recalling the
frenzied effort with which Maggie had so swiftly effected
his escape.

This last matter puzzled him greatly. If she were so
angered at him as she had declared, if she so distrusted
him, why had she not given him up when she had had him
at her mercy? Could it be that, despite her words, she had

130 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

an unacknowledged liking for him? He did not dare let
himself believe this.

Again and again he thought of this adventure in whose
very middle Maggie now was, and of whose successful
issue she had proudly boasted to him. It was indeed
something big, as she had said; that establishment at the
Grantham was proof of this. Larry could now perceive
the adventure's general outlines. There was nothing
original in what he perceived; and the plan, so far as he
could see it, would not have interested him in the least
as a novel creation of the brain were not Maggie its cen-
tral figure, and were not Barney and Old Jimmie her
directing agents. A pretty woman was being used as a
lure to some rich man, and his infatuation for her was to
cause him to part with a great deal of money : some varia-
tion of this ancient idea, which has a thousand varia-
tions — that was the plan.

Obviously the enterprise was not directed at some
gross victim whose palate might permit his swallowing
anything. If any one item essentially proved this, it was
the item of the overwhelmingly respectable chaperon.
Maggie was being presented as an innocent, respectable,
young girl; and the victim, whoever he was, was the type
of man for whom only such a type of girl would have a
compelling appeal.

And this man — who was he? Ever and again he tried
to place the man's voice, with its faintly familiar quality,
but it kept dodging away like a dream one cannot quite
recall.

The whole business made Larry rage within himself.
Maggie to be used in such a way! He did not blame
Maggie, for he understood her. Also he loved her. She
was young, proud, willful, had been trained to regard
such adventures as colorful and legitimate; and had not
lived long enough for experience to teach her otherwise.
No, Maggie was not to blame. But Old Jimmie! He

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 131

would like to twist Old Jimmie's neck! But then Old Jim-
mie was Maggie's father ; and the mere fact of Old Jimmie
being Maggie's father would, he knew, safeguard the old
man from his wrath even were he at liberty to go forth
and act.

He cursed his enforced seclusion. If only he were free
to go out and do his best in the open ! But then, even if he
were, his best endeavors would have little influence upon
Maggie — with her despising and distrusting him as she
did, and with her so determined to go ahead in her own
way.

Once during the morning, he slipped from the library
into his room and gazed at the portrait of Maggie that
Hunt had given him the night before: Maggie, self-
confident, willful, a beautiful nobody who was staring the
world out of countenance; a Maggie that was a thousand
possible Maggies. And as he gazed he thought of the wager
he had made with Hunt, and of his own rather scatter-
brained plannings concerning it. He removed Maggie's
portrait from the fellowship of the picture of the Italian
mother, and hid it in his chiffonier. Whatever he might do
in his endeavor to make good his boast to Hunt, for the
present he would regard Maggie's portrait as his private
property. To use the painting as he had vaguely planned,
before he had been surprised to find it Maggie's portrait,
would be to pass it on into other possession where it might
become public — where, through some chance, the Mag-
gie of the working-girJ's cheap shirt-waist might be iden-
tified with the rich Miss Cameron of the Grantham, to
Maggie's great discomfiture, and possibly to her en-
tanglement with the police.

When Miss Sherwood came into the library a little
later, Larry tried to put Maggie and all matters pertain-
ing to his previous night's adventure out of his mind.
He had enough other affairs which he was trying adroitly
to handle — for instance, Miss Sherwood and Hunt;

132 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

and when his business talk with her was ended, he re-
marked :

"I saw Mr. Hunt last evening."

He watched her closely, but he could detect no flash
of interest at Hunt's name.

"You went down to your grandmother's?"

"Yes."

"That was a very great risk for you to take," she re-
proved him. " I 'm glad you got back safely."

Despite the disturbance Maggie had been to his
thoughts, part of his brain had been trying to make plans
to forward this other aim; so he now told Miss Sherwood
of his wager with Hunt and his bringing away a picture —
he said "one picture." He wanted to awaken the sup-
pressed interest each had in the other; to help bridge or
close the chasm which he sensed had opened between
them. So he brought the picture of the Italian mother
from his room. She regarded it critically, but with no
sign of approval or disapproval.

"What do you think of it?" she asked.

"It's a most remarkable piece of work!" he said em-
phatically— wishing he could bring in that picture of
Maggie as additional evidence supporting his opinion.

She made no further comment, and it was up to
Larry to keep the conversation alive. "What is the most
Mr. Hunt ever was paid for a painting? I mean one of
what he swears at as his 'pretty pictures'?"

"I believe about two thousand dollars."

That was part of the information necessary to Larry's
plan.

"Miss Sherwood, I'm going to ask another favor of
you. In connection with a bet I made with Mr. Hunt.
I want to talk with a picture dealer — the best one there
is. I can't very well go to him. Can you manage to have
him come here?"

"Easily. I know the man best for your purpose. I'll

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 133

telephone, and if he 's in New York he '11 come to see you
this afternoon."

"Thank you."

She started out, then turned. "Better finish your
business with him to-day if you can. We go to the coun-
try to-morrow or the day after. I 've just had word that
the workmen are finally out of the house; though the
grounds, of course, are in bad shape, and will probably
remain so. With this labor situation, it's practically
impossible to get men."

Larry remembered something else. "Miss Sherwood,
you recall my once speaking about a man I got to be
friends with in prison — Joe Ellison?"

"Yes."

"I've written him, under an assumed name, of course,
and have had an answer. He '11 be out in a very few days
now. He 's through with his old ways. I know he 'd like
nothing better than a quiet place to work, off to himself
somewhere. I'm sure you can trust him."

"We'll arrange to have him come out to Cedar Crest.
Oh, don't think I'm being generous or sentimental," she
interrupted smilingly as he started to thank her. "I'd
be glad to put two or three more ex-convicts to work on
our place if I could get them. And so would my friends;
they can't get workmen of any kind."

That afternoon the picture dealer came. Miss Sher-
wood introduced Larry to him as Mr. Brandon, her
cousin, and then left the two men together. Larry ap-
praised Mr. Graham as a shrewd man who knew his
business and who would like to score a triumph in his own
particular field. He decided that the dealer had to be
handled with a great deal of frankness, and with some
stiff bluffing which must appear equally frank. The
secret of Larry's earlier success had been to establish
confidence and even enthusiasm in something which had
little or no value. In selling an honest thing at an honest

134 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

price, the first and fundamental procedure was the same,
to establish confidence and, if possible, enthusiasm.

From the moment of introduction Larry quietly as-
sumed the manner of an art collector who was very sure
of himself; which manner was abetted by the setting of
the Sherwood library. He felt something of the old zest
when wits had been matched against wits, even though
this was to be a strictly honorable enterprise.

"You know the work of Mr. Jerome Hunt?" he asked.

"I have handled practically all his work since he began
to sell," replied Mr. Graham.

"I was referring to work in his recent manner."

"He has not been doing any work recently," corrected
Mr. Graham.

"No?" Larry picked up the Italian mother which for
this occasion he had mounted with thumb-tacks upon a
drawing-board, and stood it upon a chair in the most
advantageous light. "There is a little thing in Mr.
Hunt's recent manner which I lately purchased."

Mr. Graham regarded the painting long and critically.
Finally he remarked:

"At least it is different."

"Different and better," said Larry with his quiet
positiveness. "So much better that I paid him three
thousand dollars for it."

"Three thousand!" The dealer regarded Larry
sharply. "Three thousand for that?"

"Yes. And I consider that I got a bargain."

Mr. Graham was silent for several moments. Then
he said:

'For what reason have I been asked here?"

'I want you to undertake to sell this picture."

'For how much?"

'Five thousand dollars."

'Five thousand dollars!"

'It is easily worth five thousand," Larry said quietly.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 135

" If you value it so highly, why do you want to sell?"

"I am pressed by the present money shortage. Also I
secured a second picture when I got this one. That
second picture I shall not sell. You should have no
difficulty in selling this," Larry continued, "if you
handle the matter right. Think of how people have
started again to talk about Gaugin : about his starting to
paint in a new manner down there in the Marquesas
Islands, of his trading a picture for a stick of furniture or
selling it for a few hundred francs — which same paint-
ings are now each worth a small fortune. Capitalize this
Gaugin talk; also the talk about poor mad Blakeslie.
You've got a new sensation. One all your own."

"You can't start a sensation with one painting,"
Mr. Graham remarked dryly.

This had been the very remark Larry had adroitly
been trying to draw from the dealer.

"Why, that's so!" he exclaimed. And then as if the
thought had only that moment come to him: "Why not
have an exhibition of paintings done in his new manner?
He's got a studio full of things just as characteristic as
this one."

Larry caught the gleam which came into the dealer's
eyes. It was instantly masked.

" Too late in the spring for a picture show. Could n't
put on an exhibition before next season."

"But why not have a private pre-exhibition showing?"
Larry argued — "with special invitations sent to a small,
carefully chosen list, putting it over strong to them that
you were offering them the chance of a first and ex-
clusive view of something very remarkable. Most of
them will feel flattered and will come. And that will
start talk and stir up interest in your public exhibition
in the fall. That 's the idea !"

Again there was the gleam, quickly masked, in the
dealer's eyes. But Larry got it.

I36 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"How do I know this picture here is n't just an acci-
dent?— the only one of the sort Mr. Hunt has ever
painted, or ever will paint?" cautiously inquired Mr.
Graham. "You said you had a second picture. May I
see it?"

Larry hesitated. But he believed he had the dealer
almost "sold"; a little more and Mr. Graham would be
convinced. So he brought in Maggie's portrait. The
dealer looked it over with a face which he tried to keep
expressionless.

"How much is this one?" he asked at length.

"It is not for sale."

"It will bring more money than the other. It's a
more interesting subject."

"That's why I'm keeping it," said Larry. "I think
you'll admit, Mr. Graham, that this proves that Mr.
Hunt is not now painting accidents."

"You're right." The mask suddenly dropped from
Mr. Graham's face; he was no longer merely an art
merchant; he was also an art enthusiast. "Hunt has
struck something bold and fresh, and I think I can put
him over. I '11 try that scheme you mentioned. Tell me
where I can find him and I '11 see him at once."

"That picture has got to be sold before I give you his
address. No use seeing him until then; he'd laugh at
you, and not listen to anything. He's sore at the world;
thinks it does n't understand him. An actual sale would
be the only argument that would have weight with him."

"All right — I'll buy the picture myself. Hunt and I
have had a falling out, and I 'd like him to have proof
that I believe in him." Again Mr. Graham was the art
merchant. "Though, of course, I can't pay the five
thousand you ask. Hunt's new manner may catch on,
and it may not. It 's a big gamble."

"What will you pay?"

"What you paid for it — three thousand."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 137

"That's an awful drop from what I expected. When
can you pay it?"

"I'll send you my check by an assistant as soon as I
get back to my place."

"I told you I was squeezed financially — so the pic-
ture is yours. I'll send you Mr. Hunt's present address
when I receive your check. Make it payable to 'cash.'"

When Mr. Graham had gone with the Italian mother —
it was then the very end of the afternoon — Larry won-
dered if his plan to draw Hunt out of his hermitage was
going to succeed; and wondered what would be the result,
if any, upon the relationship between Hunt and Miss
Sherwood if Hunt should come openly back into his
world an acclaimed success, and come with the changed
attitude toward every one and every thing that recog-
nition bestows.

But something was to make Larry wonder even more
a few minutes later. Dick, that habitual late riser, had
had to hurry away that morning without speaking to
him. Now, when he came home toward six o'clock, Dick
shouted cheerily from the hallway:

"Ahoy! Where you anchored, Captain Nemo?"

Larry did not answer. He sat over his papers as one
frozen. He knew now whose had been the elusively
familiar voice he had heard outside Maggie's door. It
was Dick Sherwood's.

Dick paused without to take some messages from
Judkins, and Larry's mind raced feverishly. Dick Sher-
wood was the victim Maggie and Barney and Old Jimmie
were so cautiously and elaborately trying to trim! It
seemed an impossible coincidence. But no, not impos-
sible, after all. Their net had been spread for just such
game: a young man, impressionable, pleasure-loving,
with plenty of money, and with no strings tied to his
spending of it. That Barney should have made his
acquaintance was easily explained; to establish acquaint-

138 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

ances with such persons as Dick was Barney's specialty.
What more natural than that the high-spirited, irre-
sponsible Dick should fall into this trap? — or indeed
that he should have been picked out in advance as the
ideal victim and have been drawn into it?

"Hello, there!" grumbled Dick, entering. "Why did
n't you answer a shipmate's hail?"

"I heard you; but just then I was adding a column of
figures, and I knew you 'd look in."

At that moment Larry noted the portrait of Maggie,
looking up from the chair beside him. With a swiftness
which he tried to disguise into a mechanical action, he
seized the painting and rolled it up, face inside.

"What's that you've got?" demanded Dick.

"Just a little daub of my own."

"So you paint, too. What else can you do? Let's
have a look."

"It's too rotten. I'd rather let you see something
else — though all my stuff is bad."

"You wouldn't do any little thing, would you, to
brighten this tiredest hour in the day of a tired business
man," complained Dick. "I've really been a business
man to-day, Captain. Worked like the devil — or an
angel — whichever works the harder."

He lit a cigarette and settled with a sigh on the corner
of Larry's desk. Larry regarded him with a stranger and
more contradicting mixture of feelings than he had ever
thought to contain: solicitude for Dick — jealousy of
him — and the instinct to protect Maggie. This last
seemed to Larry grotesquely absurd the instant it
seethed up in him, but there the instinct was: was Dick
treating Maggie right?

"How was the show last night, Dick?"

"Punk!"

"I thought you said you were to see 'The Jest.' I've
heard it's one of the best things for years."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND ' 139

"Oh, I guess the show's all right. But the company
was poor. My company, I mean. The person I wanted
to see could n't come."

"Hope you had a supper party that made up for the
disappointment," pursued Larry, adroitly trying to lead
him on.

"I sure had that, Captain!"

Dick slid to a chair beside Larry, dropped a hand on
Larry's knee, and said in a lowered tone:

"Captain, I 've recently met a new girl — and believe
me, she's a knock-out!"

"Better keep clear of those show girls, Dick."

"Never again! The last one cured me for life. Miss
Cameron — Maggie Cameron, how's that for a name? —
is no Broadway girl, Captain. She's not even a New
York girl."

"No?"

"She's from some place out West. Father owned
several big ranches. She says that explains her crudeness.
Her crude? I should say not! They don't grow better
manners right here in New York. And she 's pretty, and
clever, and utterly naive about everything in New York.
Though I must say," Dick added, " that I 'm not so keen
about her cousin and her uncle. I'd met the cousin a
few times the last year or two around town; he belongs
here. The two are the sort of poor stock that crops out in
every good family. They Ve got one merit, though : they
don't try to impose on her too much."

"What is your Miss Cameron doing in New York?"

"Having her first look at the town before going to
some resort for the summer; perhaps taking a cottage
somewhere. I say, Captain" — leaning closer — "I wish
you did n't feel you had to stick around this apartment
so tight. I 'd like to take you out and introduce you to her."

Larry could imagine the resulting scene if ever this
innocently proposed introduction were given.

140 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

" I guess that for the present I '11 have to depend upon
your reports, Dick."

"Well, you can take it from me that she's just about
all right!"

It was Larry's strange instinct to protect Maggie that
prompted his next remark:

"You're not just out joy-riding, are you, Dick?"

Dick flushed. "Nothing of that sort. She's not that
kind of girl. Besides — I think it's the real thing,
Captain."

The honest look in Dick's eyes, even more than his
words, quieted Larry's fear for Maggie. Presently Dick
walked out leaving Larry yet another problem added
to his life. He could not let anything happen to Maggie.
He could not let anything happen to Dick. He had to
protect each; he had to do something. Yet what could
he do?

Yes, this certainly was a problem! He paced the room,
another victim of the ancient predicament of divided and
antagonistic duty.

CHAPTER XIX

THE night of Larry's unexpected call upon her at the
Grantham, Maggie had pulled herself together and
aided by the imposing Miss Grierson had done her best
as ingenue hostess to her pseudo-cousin, Barney, and her
pseudo-uncle, Old Jimmie, and to their quarry, Dick
Sherwood, whom they were so cautiously stalking. But
when Dick had gone, and when Miss Grierson had with-
drawn to permit her charge a little visit with her rela-
tives, Barney had been prompt with his dissatisfaction.

"What was the matter with you to-night, Maggie?"
he demanded. "You didn't play up to your usual
form,"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 141

"If you don't like the way I did it, you may get some
one else," Maggie snapped back.

"Aw, don't get sore. If I 'm stage-managing this show,
I guess it 's my business to tell you how to act the part,
and to tell you when you 're endangering the success of
the piece by giving a poor performance."

"Maybe you'd better get some one else to take my
part right now."

Maggie's tone and look were implacable. Barney
moved uneasily. That was the worst about Maggie: she
wouldn't take advice from any one unless the advice
were a coincidence with or an enlargement of her own
wishes, and she was particularly temperish to-night. He
hastened to appease her.

" I guess the best of us have our off days. It's all right
unless" — Barney hesitated, business fear and jealousy
suddenly seizing him — "unless the way you acted to-
night means you don't intend to go through with it."

"Why should n't I go through with it?"

"No reason. Unless you acted as you did to-night
because" — again Barney hesitated; again jealousy
prompted him on — "because you've heard in some way
from Larry Brainard. Have you heard from Larry?"

Maggie met his gaze without flinching. She would
take the necessary measures in the morning with Miss
Grierson to keep that lady from indiscreet talking.

" I have not heard from Larry, and if I had, it would n't
be any of your business, Barney Palmer!"

He chose to ignore the verbal slap in his face of her last
phrase. "No, I guess you haven't heard from Larry.
And I guess none of us will hear from him — not for a
long time. He's certainly fixed himself for fair!"

"He sure has," agreed Old Jimmie.

Maggie said nothing.

"Seems to me we 've got this young Sherwood hooked,"
said Old Jimmie, who had been impatient during this

I42 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

unprofitable bickering. "Seems to me it's time to settle
just how we're going to get his dough. How about it,
Barney?"

"Plenty of time for that, Jimmie. This is a big fish,
and we've got to be absolutely sure we've got him
hooked so he can't get off. We Ve got to play safe here ;
it's worth waiting for, believe me. Besides, all the while
Maggie's getting practice."

"Seems to me we ought to make our clean-up quick.
So that — so that — "

"See here — you think you got some other swell game
you want to use Maggie in?"

Old Jimmie's shifty gaze wavered before Barney's
glare.

"No. But she's my daughter, ain't she?"

"Yes. But who's running this?" Barney demanded.
Thank Heavens, Old Jimmie was one person he did not
have to treat like a prima donna!

"You are."

"Then shut up, and let me run it!"

"You might at least tell if you've decided how you're
going to run it," persisted Old Jimmie.

"Will you shut up!" snapped Barney.

Old Jimmie said no more. And having asserted his
supremacy over at least one of the two, Barney relented
and condescended to talk, lounging back in his chair with
that self-conscious grace which had helped make him a
figure of increasing note in the gayer restaurants of
New York.

It did not enter into Barney's calculations, present or
for the future, to make Maggie the mistress of any man.
Not that Barney was restrained by moral considerations.
The thing was just bad business. Such a woman makes
but comparatively little; and what is worse, if she
chooses, she makes it all for herself. And Barney, in his
cynical wisdom of his poor world, further knew that the

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 143

average man enticed into this poor trap, after the woman
has said yes, and after the first brief freshness has lost its
bloom, becomes a tight- wad and there is little real money
to be got from him for any one.

"It's like this: once we've got this Sherwood bird
safely hooked," expanded Barney with the air of an
authority, flicking off his cigarette ash with his best
restaurant manner, "we can play the game a hundred
ways. But the marriage proposition is the best bet, and
there are two best ways of working that."

"Which d' you think we ought to use, Barney?" in-
quired Old Jimmie.

But Barney went on as if the older man had not asked
a question. "Both ways depend upon Sherwood being
crazy in love, and upon his coming across with a pro-
posal and sticking to it. The first way, after being pro-
posed to, Maggie must break down and confess she's
married to a man she does n't love and who does n't love
her. This husband would probably give her a divorce,
but he's a cagy guy and is out for the coin, and if he
smelled that she wanted to remarry some one with
money he would demand a large price for her freedom.
Maggie must further confess that she really has no
money, and is therefore helpless. Then Sherwood offers
to meet the terms of this brute of a husband. If Sher-
wood falls for this we shove in a dummy husband
who takes Sherwood's dough — and a big bank roll it
will be! — and that'll be the last Sherwood '11 ever see
of Maggie."

Old Jimmie nodded. "When it's worked right, that
always brings home the kale."

"The only question is," continued Barney, "can
Maggie put that stuff over? How about it, Maggie?
Think you're good enough to handle a proposition like
that?"
„ Looking the handsome Barney straight in the eyes,

144 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Maggie for the moment thought only of his desire to
manage her and of the challenge in his tone. Larry and
the appeal he had made to her were forgotten, as was
also Dick Sherwood.

"Anything you're good enough to think up, Barney
Palmer, I guess I 'm good enough to put over," she
answered coolly.

And then: "What's the other way?" she asked.

"Old stuff. Have to be a sure-enough marriage.
Sherwoods are big-time people, you know ; a sister who 's
a regular somebody. After marriage, family permitted to
learn truth — perhaps something much worse than truth.
Family horrified. They pay Maggie a big wad for a
separation — same as so many horrified families get rid
of daughters-in-law they don't like. Which of the ways
suits you best, Maggie?"

Maggie shrugged her shoulders with indifference. It
suited her present mood to maintain her attitude of being
equal to any enterprise.

"Which do you like best, Barney?" Old Jimmie asked.

"The second is safer. But then it's slower; and there
would be lawyers' fees which would eat into our profits;
and then because of the publicity we might have to wait
some time before it would be safe to use Maggie again.
The first plan is n't so complicated, it's quick, and at once
we've got Maggie free to use in other operations. The
first looks the best bet to me — but, as I said, we don't
have to decide yet. We can let developments help make
the actual decision for us."

Barney did not add that a further reason for his ob-
jecting to the second plan was that he did n't want
Maggie actually tied in marriage to any man. That was
a relationship his hopes were reserving for himself.

Barney's inborn desire for acknowledged chieftainship
again craved assertion and pressed him on to say:

"You see, Maggie, how much depends on you. You 've

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 145

got a whale of a chance for a beginner. I hope you take a
big brace over to-night and play up to the possibilities of
your part."

"You take care of your end, and I'll take care of
mine!" was her sharp retort.

Barney was flustered for a moment by his second
failure to dominate Maggie. "Oh, well, we'll not row,"
he tried to say easily. "We understand each other, and
we 're each trying to help the other fellow's game —
that's the main point."

The two men left, Jimmie without kissing his daughter
good-night. This caused Maggie no surprise. A kiss, not
the lack of it, would have been the thing that would have
excited wonder in Maggie.

Barney went away well satisfied on the whole with the
manner in which the affair was progressing, and with his
management of it and of Maggie. Maggie was obstinate,
to be sure; but he'd soon work that out of her. He was
now fully convinced of the soundness of his explanation
of Maggie's poor performance of that night: she had just
had an off day.

As for Maggie, after they had gone she sat up long,
thinking — and her thoughts reverted irresistibly to
Larry. His visit had been most distracting. But she was
not going to let it affect her purpose. If anything, she was
more determined than ever to be what she had told him
she was going to be, to prove to him that he could not
influence her.

She tried to keep her mind off Larry, but she could not.
He was for her so many questions. How had he escaped?
— thrown off both police and old friends? Where was he
now? What was he doing? And when and how was he
going to reappear and interfere? — for Maggie had no
doubt, now that she knew him to be in New York, that he
would come again, and again try to check her.

And there was a matter which she no more understood

146 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

than Larry, and this was another of her questions: Why
had she gone into a panic and aided his escape?

Of course, she now and then thought of Dick Sherwood.
She rather liked Dick. But thus far she regarded him
exactly as her scheme of life had presented him to her:
as a pleasant dupe who, in an exciting play in which she
had the thrilling lead, was to be parted from his money.
She was rather sorry for him; but this was business, and
her sorrow was not going to interfere with what she was
going to do.

Maggie Cameron, at this period of her life, was not
deeply introspective. She did not realize what, according
to other standards, this thing was which she was doing.
She was merely functioning as she had been taught to
function. And if any change was beginning in her, she
was thus far wholly unconscious of it.

CHAPTER XX

LARRY'S new problem was the most difficult and delicate
dilemma of his life — this divided loyalty : to balk Maggie
and the two men behind her without revealing the truth
about Maggie to Dick, to protect Dick without betray-
ing Maggie. It certainly was a trying, baffling situation.

He had no such foolish idea that he could change Maggie
by exposing her. At best he would merely render her
incapable of continuing this particular course; he would
increase her bitterness and hostility to him. Anyhow, ac-
cording to the remnants of his old code, that would n't
be playing fair — particularly after her aiding his escape
when he had been trapped.

Upon only one point was he clear, and on this he be-
came more settled with every hour: whatever he did he
must do with the idea of a fundamental awakening in
Maggie. Merely to foil her in this one scheme would be to

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 147

solve the lesser part of his problem; Maggie would be left
unchanged, or if changed at all the change would be to-
ward a greater hardness, and his major problem would be
made more difficult of solution.

He considered many ways. He thought of seeing Mag-
gie again, and once more appealing to her. That he
vetoed, not because of the danger to himself, but because
he knew Maggie would not see him; and if he again did
break in upon her unexpectedly, in her obstinate pride she
would heed nothing he said. He thought of seeing Barney
and Old Jimmie and somehow so throwing the fear of
God into that pair that they would withdraw Maggie
from the present enterprise; but even if he succeeded
in so hazardous an undertaking, again Maggie would be
left unchanged. He thought of showing Miss Sherwood
the hidden portrait of Maggie, of telling her all and
asking her aid; but this he also vetoed, for it seemed a
betrayal of Maggie.

He kept going back to one plan : not a plan exactly, but
the idea upon which the right plan might be based. If
only he could adroitly, with his hand remaining unseen,
place Maggie in a situation where circumstances would
appeal conqueringly to her best self, to her latent sense
of honor — that was the idea ! But cudgel his brain as he
would, Larry could not just then develop a working plan
whose foundation was that idea.

But even if Larry had had a brilliant plan it would
hardly have been possible for him to have devoted himself
to its execution, for two days after his visit to Maggie at
the Grantham, the Sherwoods moved out to their summer
place some forty miles from the city on the North Shore
of Long Island ; and Larry was so occupied with routine
duties pertaining to this migration that at the moment
he had time for little else. Cedar Crest was individual
yet typical of the better class of Long Island summer
residences. It was a long white building of many

148 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

piazzas and many wings, set on a bluff looking over the
Sound, with a broad stretch of silken lawn, and about it
gardens in their June glory, and behind the house a couple
of hundred acres of scrub pine.

On the following day, according to a plan that had
been worked out between Larry and Miss Sherwood,
Joe Ellison appeared at Cedar Crest and was given the as-
sistant gardener's cottage which stood apart on the bluff
some three hundred yards east of the house. He was
a tall, slightly bent, white-haired man, apparently once a
man of physical strength and dominance of character and
with the outer markings of a gentleman, but now seem-
ingly a mere shadow of the forceful man of his prime. As
a matter of fact, Joe Ellison had barely escaped that
greatest of prison scourges, tuberculosis.

The roses were given over to his care. For a few brief
years during the height of his prosperity he had owned a
small place in New Jersey and during that period had
seemingly been the country gentleman. Flowers had
been his hobby; so that now he could have had no work
which would have more suited him than this guardianship
of the roses. For himself he desired no better thing than
to spend what remained of his life in this sunlit privacy
and communion with growing things.

He gripped Larry's hand when they were first alone
in the little cottage. "Thanks, Larry; I '11 not forget this,"
he said. He said little else. He did not refer to his prison
life, or what had gone before it. He had never asked Larry,
even while in prison together, about Larry's previous
activities and associates ; and he asked no questions now.
Apparently it was the desire of this silent man to have the
bones of his own past remain buried, and to leave undis-
turbed the graves of others' mistakes.

A retiring, unobtrusive figure, he settled quickly to his
work. He seemed content, even happy; and at times
there was a far-away, exultant look in his gray eyes.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 149

Miss Sherwood caught this on several occasions; it
puzzled her, and she spoke of it to Larry. Larry under-
stood what lay behind Joe's bearing, and since the thing
had never been told to him as a secret he retold that por-
tion of Joe's history he had recited to the Duchess: of a
child who had been brought up among honorable people,
protected from the knowledge that her father was a con-
vict — a child Joe never expected to see and did not even
know how to find.

Joe Ellison became a figure that moved Miss Sherwood
deeply: content to busy himself in his earthly obscurity,
ever dreaming and gloating over his one great sustaining
thought — that he had given his child the best chance
which circumstances permitted; that he had removed him-
self from his child's life; that some unknown where out
in the world his child was growing to maturity among
clean, wholesome people; that he never expected to make
himself known to his child. The situation also moved
Larry profoundly whenever he looked at his old friend,
merging into a kindly fellowship with the earth.

But while busy with new affairs at Cedar Crest, Larry
was all the while thinking of Maggie, and particularly
of his own dilemma regarding Maggie and Dick. But the
right plan still refused to take form in his brain. How-
ever, one important detail occurred to him which required
immediate attention. If his procedure in regard to Hunt's
pictures succeeded in drawing the painter from his hermit-
age, nothing was more likely than that Hunt unexpectedly
would happen upon Maggie in the company of Dick
Sherwood. That might be a catastrophe to Larry's un-
formed plan; it had to be forestalled if possible. Such a
matter could not be handled in a letter, with the police
opening all mail coming to the Duchess's house. So once
more he decided upon a secret visit to the Duchess's
house. He figured that such a visit would be compara-
tively without risk, since the police and Barney Palmer

150 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

and the gangsters Barney had put upon his trail all still
believed him somewhere in the West.

Accordingly, a few nights after they had settled at
Cedar Crest, he motored into New York in a roadster
Miss Sherwood had placed at his disposal, and after the
necessary precautions he entered Hunt's studio. The
room was dismantled, and Hunt sat among his packed
belongings smoking his pipe.

"Well, young fellow," growled Hunt after they had
shaken hands, "you see you 've driven me from my happy
home."

"Then Mr. Graham has been to see you?"

"Yes. And he put up to me your suggestion about a
private exhibition. And I fell for it. And I 've got to go
back among the people I used to know. And wear good
clothes and put on a set of standardized good manners.
Hell!"

"You don't like it?"

"I suppose, if the exhibition is a go, I'll like grinning
at the bunch that thought I couldn't paint. You bet
I'll like that! You, young fellow — I suppose you're
here to gloat over me and to try to collect your five
thousand."

" I never gloat over doing such an easy job as that was.
And I 'm not here to collect my bet. As far as money is
concerned, I'm here to give you some." And he handed
Hunt the check made out to "cash" which Mr. Graham
had sent him for the Italian mother.

"Better keep that on account of what I owe you,"
advised Hunt.

" I 'd rather you 'd hold it for me. And better still, I 'd
rather call the bet off in favor of a new bargain."

"What's the new proposition for swindling me?"

"You need a business nursemaid. What commission
do you pay dealers?"

"Been paying those burglars forty per cent."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 151

"That's too much for doing nothing. Here's my
proposition. Give me ten per cent to act as your personal
agent, and I '11 guarantee that your total percentage for
commissions will be less than at present, and that your
prices will be doubled. Of course I can't do much while
the police and others are so darned interested in me, so if
you accept we'll just date the agreement from the time
I'm cleared."

"You're on, son — and we'll just date the agreement
from the present moment, A.D." Again Hunt gripped
Larry's hand. " You 're all to the good, Larry -^ and I 'm
not giving you half enough."

That provided Larry with the opening he had desired.
"You can make it up to me."

"How?"

" By helping me out with a proposition of my own. To
come straight to the point, it's Maggie."

"Maggie?"

"I guess you know how I feel there. She's got a wrong
set of ideas, and she 's fixed in them — and you know how
high-spirited she is. She's out in the world now, trying
to put something crooked over which she thinks is big.
I know what it is. I want to stop her, and change her.
That's my big aim — to change her. The only way I can
at this moment stop what she is now doing is by exposing
her. And mighty few people with a wrong twist are ever
set right by merely being exposed."

"I guess you're right there, Larry."

"What I want is a chance to try another method on
Maggie. If she's handled right I think she may turn
out a very different person from what she seems to be — •
something that may surprise both of us."

Hunt nodded. "That was why I painted her picture.
Since I first saw her I Ve been interested in how she was
going to come out. She might become anything. But
where do I fit in?"

152 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"She's flying in high company. It occurred to me that,
when you got back to your own world, you might meet
her, and in your surprise you might speak to her in a
manner which would be equivalent in its effect to an in-
tentional exposure. I wanted to put you on your guard
and to ask you to treat her as a stranger."

"That's promised. I won't know her."
• "Don't promise till you know the rest."

"What else is there to know?"

"Who the sucker is they're trying to trim." Larry
regarded the other steadily. "You know him. He's Dick
Sherwood."

"Dick Sherwood!" exploded Hunt. "Are you sure
about that?"

" I was with Maggie the other night when Dick came to
have supper with her; he did n't see me. Besides, Dick
has told me about her."

"How did they ever get hold of Dick?"

"Dick's the easiest kind of fish for two such smooth
men as Barney and Old Jimmie when they've got a
clever, good-looking girl as bait, and when they know
how to use her. He's generous, easily impressed, thinks
he is a wise man of the world and is really very gullible."

"Have they got him hooked?"

"Hard and fast. It won't be his fault if they don't land
him."

The painter gazed at Larry with a hard look. Then he
demanded abruptly:

"Show Miss Sherwood that picture of Maggie I
painted?"

"No. I had my reasons."

"What you going to do with it?"

"Keep it, and pay you your top price for it when I've
got the money."

"H'm! Told Miss Sherwood what's doing about
Dick?"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 153

"No."

"Why not?"

"I thought of doing it, then I decided against it. For
the same reason I just gave you — that it might lead to
exposure, and that exposure would defeat my plans."

"You seem to be forgetting that your plan leaves Dick
in danger. Dick deserves some consideration."

"And I'm giving it to him," argued Larry. "I'm
thinking of him as much as of Maggie. Or almost as
much. His sister and friends have pulled him out of a lot
of scrapes. He 's not a bit wiser or better for that kind of
help. And it's not going to do him any good whatever to
have some one step in and take care of him again. He 's
been a good friend to me, but he's a dear fool. I want to
handle this so he'll get a jolt that will waken him up —
make him take his responsibilities more seriously —
make him able to take care of himself."

"Huh!" grunted Hunt. "You've certainly picked out
a few man-sized jobs for yourself: to make a success of the
straight life for yourself — to come out ahead of the police
and your old pals — to make Maggie love the Ten Com-
mandments — to put me across — to make Dick into a
level-headed citizen. Any other little item you'd like to
take on?"

Larry ignored the irony of the question. "Some of those
things I'm going to do," he said confidently. "And any
I see I'm going to fail in, I'll get warning to the people
involved. But to come back to your promise: are you
willing to give your promise now that you know all the
facts?"

Hunt pulled for a long moment at his pipe. Then he
said almost gruffly:

"I guess you've guessed that Isabel Sherwood is about
the most important person in the world to me?"

That was the nearest Hunt had ever come to telling
that he loved Miss Sherwood. Larry nodded.

154 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"I'm in bad there already. Suppose your foot slips
and everything about Dick goes wrong. What '11 be my
situation when she learns I 've known all along and have
just stood by quietly and let things happen? See what
I '11 be letting myself in for?"

"I do," said Larry, his spirits sinking. "And of course
I can understand your decision not to give your prom-
ise."

"Who said I wouldn't give my promise?" demanded
Hunt. "Of course I give my promise! All I said was that
the weather bureau of my bad toe predicts that there's
likely to be a storm because of this — and I want you to
use your brain, son, I want you to use your brain!"

He upreared his big, shag-haired figure and gripped
Larry's hand. "You're all right, Larry — and here's
wishing you luck! Now get to hell out of here before
Ga vegan and Casey drop in for a cup of tea, or your old
friends begin target practice with their hip artillery. I
want a little quiet in which to finish my packing.

"And say, son," he added, as he pushed Larry through
the door, "don't fall dead at the sight of me when you
see me next, for I 'm likely to be walking around inside
all the finery and vanity of Fifth Avenue."

CHAPTER XXI

LARRY came down the stairway from Hunt's studio in a
mood of high elation. Through Hunt's promise of coopera-
tion he had at least made a start in his unformed plan re-
garding Maggie. Somehow, he 'd work out and put across
the rest of it.

Then Hunt's prediction of the trouble that might
rise through his silence recurred to Larry. Indeed, that
was a delicate situation ! — containing all kinds of possible
disasters for himself as well as for Hunt. He would have

' CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 155

to be most watchful, most careful, or he would find himself
entangled in worse circumstances than at present.

As he came down into the little back room, his grand-
mother was sitting over her interminable accounts, each
of which represented a little profit to herself, some a little
relief to many, some a tragedy to a few; and many of
which were in code, for these represented transactions
of a character which no pawnshop, particularly one re-
puted to be a fence, wishes ever to have understood by
those presumptive busy-bodies, the police. When Larry
had first entered, she had merely given him an unsur-
prised "good-evening" and permitted him to pass on.
But now, as he told her good-night and turned to leave,
she said in her thin, monotonous voice :

"Sit down for a minute, Larry. I want to talk to you."

Larry obeyed. "Yes, grandmother."

But the Duchess did not at once speak. She held her
red-rimmed, unblinking eyes on him steadily. Larry
waited patiently. Though she was so composed, so self-
contained, Larry knew her well enough to know that what
was passing in her mind was something of deep impor-
tance, at least to her.

At length she spoke. "You saw Maggie that night you
hurried away from here?"

"Yes, grandmother. Have you heard from her since
then? — or from Barney or Old Jimmie?"

The Duchess shook her head. "Do you mind telling
me what happened that night — and what Maggie's
doing?"

Larry told her of the scene in Maggie's suite at the
Grantham, told of the plan in which Maggie was in-
volved and of his own added predicament. This last
the Duchess seemingly ignored.

"Just about what I supposed she was doing," she said.
"And you tried again to get her to give it up?"

"Yes."

156 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"And she refused?"

"Yes." And he added: "Refused more emphatically
than before."

The Duchess studied him a long moment. Then:
" You 're not trying to make her give that up just because
you think she 's worth saving. You like her a lot, Larry?"

"I love her," Larry admitted.

" I 'm sorry about that, Larry." There was real emo-
tion in the old voice now. " I've told you that you 're all
I Ve got left. And now that you 've at last started right,
I want everything to go right with you. Everything!
And Maggie will never help things go right with you.
Your love for her can only mean misery and misfortune.
You can't change her."

Larry came out with the questions he had asked him-
self so frequently these last days. "But why did her man-
ner change so when she heard Barney and the others?
Why did she help me escape?"

"That was because, deep down, she really loves you.
That's the worst part of it: you both love each other."
The Duchess slowly nodded her head. "You both love
each other. If it was n't for that I would n't care what you
tried to do. But I tell you again you can't change her.
She's too sure of herself. She'll always try to make you
go her way — and if you don't, you '11 never get a smile
from her. And because you love each other, I 'm afraid
you'll give in and go her way. That's what I 'm afraid of.
Won't you just cut her out of your life, Larry?"

It had been a prodigiously long speech for the Duchess.
And Larry realized that the emotion behind it was a
thousand times what showed in the thin voice of the bent,
gestureless figure.

"For your sake I 'm sorry, grandmother. But I can't."

"Then it's only fair to tell you, Larry," she said in a
more composed tone which expressed a finality of deci-
sion, "that if there's ever any tiling I can do to stop

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 157

this, I '11 do it. For she 's bad for you — what with her
stiff spirit — and the ideas Old Jimmie has put into her —
and the way Old Jimmie has brought her up. I '11 stop
things if I can."

Larry made no reply. The Duchess continued looking
at him steadily for a long space. He knew she was think-
ing ; and he was wondering what was passing through that
shrewd old brain, when she remarked:

"By the way, Larry, I just remembered what you
told me of that old Sing Sing friend — Joe Ellison.
Have you heard from him recently?"

"He's out, and he's working where I am."

"Yes? What 'she doing?"

"He's working there as a gardener."

Again she was silent a space, her sunken eyes steady
with thought. Then she said:

" From the time he was twenty till he was thirty I knew
Joe Ellison well — better than I 've ever told you. He
knew your mother when she was a girl, Larry. I wish
you 'd ask him to come in to see me. As soon as he can
manage it."

Larry promised. His grandmother said no more about
Maggie, and presently Larry bade her good-night and
made his cautious way, ever on the lookout for danger,
to where he had left his roadster, and thence safely out to
Cedar Crest. But the Duchess sat for hours exactly as he
had left her, her accounts unheeded, thinking, thinking,
thinking over an utterly impossible possibility that had
first presented itself faintly to her several days before. She
did not see how the thing could be; and yet somehow it
might be, for many a strange thing did happen in this
border world where for so long she had lived. When
finally she went to bed she slept little; her busy conjec-
tures would not permit sleep. And though the next day
she went about her shop seemingly as usual, she was still
thinking.

158 ' CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

That night Joe Ellison came. They met as though
they had last seen each other but yesterday.

4 ' Good-evening, Joe . ' '

"Glad to see you, Duchess."

She held out to him a box of the best cigars, which she
had bought against his coming, for she had remembered
Joe Ellison's once fastidious taste regarding tobacco. He
lit one, and they fell into the easy silence of old friends,
taking up their friendship exactly where it had been broken
off. As a matter of fact, Joe Ellison might have been her
son-in-law but for her own firm attitude. He had known
her daughter very much better than her words to Larry
the previous evening had indicated. Not only had Joe
known her while a girl down here, but much later he had
learned in what convent she was going to school and
there had been surreptitious love-making despite convent
rules and boundaries — till the Duchess had learned what
was going on. She had had a square out-and-out talk
with Joe; the romance had suddenly ended; and later
Larry's mother had married elsewhere. But the snuffed-
out romance had made no difference in the friendship
between the Duchess and Joe; each had recognized the
other as square, as that word was understood in their
border world.

To Joe Ellison the Duchess was changed but little since
twenty-odd years ago. She had seemed old even then;
though as a youth he had known old men who had talked
of her beauty when a young woman and of how she had
queened it among the reckless spirits of that far time. But
to the Duchess the change in Joe Ellison was astound-
ing. She had last seen him in his middle thirties: black-
haired, handsome, careful of dress, powerful of physique,
dominant, fiery-tempered, fearless of any living thing,
but with these hot qualities checked into a surface ap-
pearance of unruffled equanimity by his self-control and
his habitual reticence. And now to see him thin, white-

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 159

haired, bent, his old fire seemingly burned to gray ashes —
the Duchess, who had seen much in her generations, was
almost appalled at the transformation.

At first the Duchess skillfully guided the talk among
commonplaces.

"Larry tells me you're out with him."

"Yes," said Joe. "Larry's been a mighty good pal."

"What 're you going to do when you get back your
strength?"

"The same as I'm doing now — if they'll let me."
And after a pause: "Perhaps later, if I had the necessary
capital, I'd like to start a little nursery. Or else grow
flowers for the market."

"Not going back to the old thing, then?"

Joe shook his white head. "I'm all through there.
Flowers are a more interesting proposition."

"Whenever you get ready to start, Joe, you can have
all the capital you want from me. And it will cost you
nothing. Or if you 'd rather pay, it '11 cost you the same
as at a bank — six per cent."

"Thanks. I'll remember." Joe Ellison could not have
spoken his gratitude more strongly.

The Duchess now carefully guided the talk in the direc-
tion of the thing of which she had thought so constantly.

"By the way, Joe, Larry told me something about you
I 'd never heard before — that you had been married,
and had a child."

"Yes. You did n't hear because I was n't telling any-
body about it when it happened, and it never came out."

"Mind telling me about it, Joe?"

He pulled at his perfecto while assembling his facts;
and then he made one of the longest speeches Joe Ellison
— "Silent Joe" some of his friends had called him in the
old days — was ever known to utter. But there was
reason for its length ; it was an epitome of the most im-
portant period of his life.

i6o CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"I had a nice little country place over in Jersey for
three or four years. It all happened there. No one knew
me for what I was; they took me for what I pretended to
be, a small capitalist whose interests required his taking
occasional trips. Nice neighbors. That's where I met
my wife. She was fine every way. That's why I kept all
that part of my life from my pals ; I was afraid they might
leak and the truth would spoil everything. My wife was
an orphan, niece of the widow of a broker who lived out
there. She never knew the truth about me. She died
when the baby was born. When the baby was a year and
a half my big smash came, and I went up the river. But
I was never connected up with the man who lived over in
Jersey and who suddenly cancelled his lease and moved
away."

The Duchess drew nearer to the heart of her thoughts.

"Was the baby a boy or girl, Joe?"

"Girl."

The Duchess did not so much as blink. "How old would
she be by this time?"

"Eighteen."

"What was her name?"

"Mary — after her mother. But of course I ordered
it to be changed. I don't know what her name is now."

The Duchess pressed closer.

"What became of her, Joe?"

A glow began to come into the somber eyes of Joe
Ellison. "I told you her mother was a fine woman, and
she never knew anything bad about me. I wanted my
girl to grow up like her mother. I wanted her to have as
good a chance as any of those nice girls over in Jersey —
I wanted her never to know any of the lot I Ve known —
I wanted her never to have the stain of knowing her
father was a crook — I wanted her never to know even
who her father was."

"How did you manage it?"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 161

"Her mother had left a little fortune, about twenty-
five thousand — twelve or fifteen hundred a year. I
turned the money and the girl over to my best pal —
and the squarest pal a man ever had — the only one I 'd
let know about my Jersey life. I told him what to do. She
was an awfully bright little thing; at a year and a half,
when I saw her last, she was already talking. She was to
be brought up among nice, simple people — go to a good
school — grow up to be a nice, simple girl. And especially
never to know anything about me. She was to believe her-
self an orphan. And my pal did just as I ordered. He
wrote me how she was getting on till about four years
ago, then I had news that he was dead and that the trust
fund had been transferred to a firm of lawyers, though I
wasn't given the name of the lawyers. That doesn't
make any difference since she 's getting the money just the
same."

"What was your pal's name, Joe?"

"Jimmie Carlisle."

The Duchess had been certain what this name would
be, but nevertheless she could not repress a start.

"What's the matter?" Joe asked sharply. "Did you
know him?"

"Not in those days," said the Duchess, recovering her
even tone. "Though I got to know him later. By the
way," she added casually, "did Jimmie Carlisle have any
children of his own?"

"Not before I went away. He was n't even married."

There was now no slightest doubt left in the Duchess's
mind. Maggie was really Joe Ellison's daughter.

Joe Ellison went on, the glow of his sunken eyes be-
coming yet more exalted. He was almost voicing his
thoughts to himself alone, for his friendship with the
Duchess was so old that her presence was no inhibition.
His low words were almost identical in substance with
what Larry had told — a summary of what had come to

162 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

be his one great hope and dream, the nearest thing he had
to a religion.

"Somewhere, in a nice place, my girl is now growing up
like her mother. Clean of everything I was and I knew.
She must be practically a woman now. I don't know where
she is — there 's now no way for me to learn. And I don't
want to know. And I don't want her ever to know about
me. I don't ever want to be the cause of making her
feel disgraced, or of dragging her down from among the
people where she belongs."

The Duchess gave no visible sign of emotion, but her
ancient heart-strings were set vibrating by that tense,
low-pitched voice. She had a momentary impulse to tell
him the truth. But just then the Duchess was a confusion
of many conflicting impulses, and the balance of their
strength was for the moment against telling. So she said
nothing.

Their talk drifted back to commonplaces, and presently
Joe Ellison went away. The Duchess sat motionless
at her desk, again thinking — thinking — thinking; and
when Joe Ellison was back in his gardener's cottage at
Cedar Crest and was happily asleep, she still sat where
he had left her. During her generations of looking upon
life from the inside, she had seen the truth of many
strange situations of which the world had learned only
the wildest rumors or the most respectable versions; but
during the long night hours, perhaps because the affair
touched her so closely, this seemed to her the strangest
situation she had ever known. A father believing with
the firm belief of established certainty that his daughter
had been brought up free from all taint of his own life,
carefully bred among the best of people. In reality the
girl brought up in a criminal atmosphere, with criminal
ideas implanted in her as normal ideas, and carefully
trained in criminal ways and ambitions. And neither
father nor daughter having a guess of the truth.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 163

Indeed it was a strange situation ! A situation charged
with all kinds of unforeseeable results.

The Duchess now understood the unfatherly disregard
Old Jimmie had shown for the ordinary welfare of
Maggie. Not being her father, he had not cared. Super-
ficially, at least, Jimmie Carlisle must have been a much
more plausible individual twenty years earlier, to have
won the implicit trust of Joe Ellison and to have become
his foremost friend. She understood one reason why Old
Jimmie had always boarded Maggie in the cheapest and
lowest places; his hidden cupidity had thereby been
pocketing about a thousand dollars a year of trust money
for over sixteen years.

But there was one queer problem here to which the
Duchess could not at this time see the answer. If Jimmie
Carlisle had wished to gratify his cupidity and double-
cross his friend, why had he not at the very start placed
Maggie in an orphanage where she would have been
neither charge nor cost to him, and thus have had the use
of every penny of the trust fund? Why had he chosen to
keep her by him, and train her carefully to be exactly
what her father had most wished her not to be? There
must have been some motive in the furtive, tortuous
mind of Old Jimmie, that now would perhaps forever
remain a mystery.

Of course she saw, or thought she saw, the reason for
the report of Old Jimmie's death to Joe Ellison. That
report had been sent to escape an accounting.

As she sat through the night hours the Duchess for the
first time felt warmth creep over her for Maggie. She
saw Maggie in the light of a victim. If Maggie had been
brought up as her father had planned, she might now be
much the girl her father dreamed her. But Old Jimmie
had entered the scheme of things. Yes, the audacious,
willful, confident Maggie, bent on conquering the world
in the way Old Jimmie and later Barney Palmer had

164 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

taught her, was really just a poor misguided victim who
should have had a far different fate.

And now the Duchess came to one of the greatest
problems of her life. What should she do? Considering
the facts that Joe Ellison wished the life of a recluse and
desired to avoid all talk of the old days, the chances were
that he would never happen upon the real state of af-
fairs. Only she and Old Jimmie knew the essentials of the
situation — and very likely Jimmie did not yet know
that the friend who had once trusted him was now a free
man. She felt as though she held in her hands the strings
of destiny. Should she tell the truth?

She pondered long. All her considerations were given
weight according to what she saw as their possible effect
upon Larry; for Larry was the one person left whom she
loved, and on him were fixed the aspirations of these her
final years. Therefore her thoughts and arguments were
myopic, almost necessarily specious. She wanted to see
justice done, of course. But most of all she wanted what
was best for Larry. If she told the truth, it might result
in some kind of temporary breakdown in Maggie's atti-
tude which would bring her and Larry together. That
would be disastrous. If not disastrous at once, certainly
in the end. Maggie was a victim, and undoubtedly de-
served sympathy. But others should not be sacrificed
merely because Maggie had suffered an injury. She had
been too long under the tutelage of Old Jimmie, and his
teachings were now too thoroughly the fiber of her very
being, for her to alter permanently. She might change
temporarily under the urge of an emotional revelation;
but she would surely revert to her present self. There was
no doubt of that.

And the Duchess gave weight to other considerations —
all human, yet all in some measure specious. Joe Ellison
was happy in his dream, and would be happy in it all
the rest of his life. Why tell the truth and destroy his

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 165

precious illusion? — especially when there was no chance
to change Maggie?

And further, she recalled the terrific temper that had
lived within the composed demeanor of Joe Ellison. The
fires of that temper could not yet be all burned out. If
she told the truth, told that Jimmie Carlisle was still
alive, that might be just touching the trigger of a dev-
astating tragedy — might be disaster for all. What would
be the use when no one would have been benefited?

And so, in the wisdom of her old head and the en-
tanglements of her old heart, the Duchess decided she
would never tell. And that loving, human decision she
was to cling to through the stress of times to come.

But even while she was thus deciding upon a measure
to checkmate them both, Larry was pacing his room at
Cedar Crest, at last excitedly evolving the elusive plan
which was to bring Maggie to her senses and also to him ;
and Maggie, all unconscious of this new element which
had entered as a potential factor in her existence, all
unconscious of how far she had been guided from the
course which had been charted for her, was lying awake
at the Grantham after a late party at which Dick Sher-
wood had been her escort, and was exulting pridefully
over the seemingly near consummation of the plan that
was to show Larry Brainard how wrong he was and that
was to establish her as the cleverest woman in her line —
better even than Barney or Old Jimmie believed her.

And thus separate wills each strove to direct their own
lives and other lives according to their own separate
plans; little thinking to what extent they were all en-
tangled in a common destiny; and thinking not at all of
the further seed that was being sown for the harvest-time
of the whirlwind.

166 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

CHAPTER XXII

AFTER Larry's many days and nights of futile searching
of his brain for a plan that would accord with his funda-
mental idea for awakening the unguessed other self of
Maggie, the plan, which finally came to him complete in
all its details in a single moment, was so simple and ob-
vious that he marveled it could have been plainly before
his eyes all this while without his ever seeing it. Of
course the plan was dangerous and of doubtful issue. It
had to be so, because it involved the reactions of strong-
tempered persons as yet unacquainted who would have no
foreknowledge of the design behind their new relation-
ship; and because its success or failure, which might also
mean his own complete failure, the complete loss of all
he had thus far gained, depended largely upon the twist
of events which he could not foresee and therefore could
not guide.

Briefly, his plan was so to manage as to have Maggie
received in the Sherwood household as a guest, to have
her receive the frank, unquestioning hospitality (and
perhaps friendship) of such a gracious, highly placed, un-
pretentious woman as Miss Sherwood, so distinctly a
native of, and not an immigrant to, the great world. To
be received as a friend by those against whom she plotted,
to have the generous, unsuspecting friendship of Miss
Sherwood — if anything just then had a chance to open
the blinded Maggie's eyes to the evil and error of what
she was engaged upon, if anything had a chance to appeal
to the finer things he believed to exist unrecognized or
suppressed in Maggie, this was that thing.

And best part of this plan, its effect would be only
within Maggie's self. No one need know that anything
had happened. There would be no exposure, no humili-
ation.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 167

Of course there was the great question of how to get
Miss Sherwood to invite Maggie; and whether indeed
Miss Sherwood would invite her at all. And there was the
further question, the invitation being sent, of whether
Maggie would accept.

Larry decided to manipulate his design through Dick
Sherwood. Late that afternoon, when Dick, just re-
turned from the city, dropped into, as was his before-
dinner custom, the office-study which had been set aside
for Larry's use, Larry, after an adroit approach to his
subject, continued:

"And since I've been wished on you as a sort of
step-uncle, there 's something I 'd like to suggest — if
I don't seem to be fairly jimmying my way into your
affairs."

" Door's unlocked and wide open, Captain," said Dick.
"Walk right in and take the best chair."

"Thanks. Remember telling me about a young woman
you recently met? A Miss Maggie — Maggie — "

"Miss Cameron," Dick prompted. "Of course I re-
member."

"And remember your telling me that this time it's the
real thing?"

"And it is the real thing!"

"You haven't — excuse me — asked her to marry
you yet?"

"No. I've been trying to get up my nerve."

"Here's where you've got to excuse me once more,
Dick — it 's not my business to tell you what should be
your relations with your family — but have you told
your sister?"

"No." Dick hesitated. "I suppose I should. But I
hadn't thought of it — yet. You see — " Again Dick
hesitated.

"Yes?" prompted Larry.

"There are her relatives — that cousin and uncle. I

168 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

guess it must have been my thinking of them that pre-
vented my thinking of what you suggest."

"But you told me they hadn't interfered much, and
never would interfere." Larry gently pressed his point:
"And look at it from Miss Cameron's angle of view. If
it 's the real thing, and you 're behaving that way toward
her, has n't she good grounds for thinking it strange that
you have n't introduced her to your family?"

"By George, you're right, Captain! I'll see to that at
once."

"Of course, Dick," Larry went on, carefully feeling
his way, "you know much better than I the proper way
to do such things — but don't you think it would be
rather nice, when you tell your sister, that you suggest to
her that she invite Miss Cameron out here for a little
visit? If they are to meet, I know Miss Cameron, or any
girl, would take it as more of a tribute to be received in
your own home than merely to meet in a big common-
place hotel."

" Right again, Captain ! I 'd tell Isabel to-night, and ask
her to send the invitation — only I 'm booked to scoot
right back to the city for a little party as soon as I get
some things together, and I '11 stay overnight in the apart-
ment. But I '11 attend to the thing to-morrow night, sure."

"May I ask just one favor in the meantime?"

"One favor? A dozen, Captain!"

"I'll take the other eleven later. Just now I only ask,
since you haven't proposed, that you won't — er —
commit yourself any further, in any way, with Miss
Cameron until after you've told your sister and until
after Miss Cameron has been out here."

"Oh, I say now!" protested Dick.

"I am merely suggesting that affairs remain in statu
quo until after Miss Cameron's visit with your sister.
That's not asking much of you, Dick — nor asking it for
a very long time."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 169

"Oh, of course I'll do it, Captain," grumbled Dick
affectionately. "You've got me where I'll do almost
anything you want me to do."

But Dick did not speak to his sister the following
evening. The next morning news came to Miss Sherwood
of a friend's illness, and she and her novel-reading aunt
hurried off at once on what was to prove to be a week's
absence. But this delay in his plan did not worry Larry
as greatly as it otherwise would have done, for Dick re-
peated his promise to hold a stiff rein upon himself until
after he should have spoken to his sister. And Larry be-
lieved he could rely upon Dick's pledged word.

During this week of waiting and necessary inactivity
Larry concentrated upon another phase of his many-
sided plan — to make of himself a business success. As
has been said, he saw his chance of this in the handling
of Miss Sherwood's affairs; and saw it particularly in an
idea that had begun to grow upon him since he became
aware, through statements and letters from the agents
turned over to him, of the extent of the Sherwood real-
estate holdings and since he had got some glimmering of
their condition. His previous venturings about the city
had engendered in him a sense of moderate security; so
he now began to make flying trips into New York in the
smart roadster Miss Sherwood had placed at his dis-
posal.

On each trip Larry made swift visits to several of the
properties, until finally he had covered the entire list
Miss Sherwood had furnished him through the agents.
His survey corroborated his surmise. The property,
mostly neglected apartment and tenement houses, was
in an almost equally bad way whether one regarded
it from the standpoint of sanitation, comfort, or cold
financial returns. The fault for this was due to the fact
that the Sherwoods had left the property entirely in the
care of the agents, and the agents, being old, old-fashioned,

170 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

and weary of business to the point of being almost ready
to retire, had left the property to itself.

Prompted by these bad conditions, and to some degree
by the then critical housing famine, with its records of
some thousands of families having no place at all to go
and some thousands of families being compelled for the
sake of mere shelter to pay two and three times what
they could afford for a few poor rooms, and with its
records of profiteering landlords, Larry began to make
notes for a plan which he intended later to elaborate —
a plan which he tentatively entitled: "Suggestions for
the Development of Sherwood Real-Estate Holdings."
Larry, knowing from the stubs of Miss Sherwood's
checkbook what would be likely to please her, gave as
much consideration to Service as to Profit. The basis of
his growing plan was good apartments at fair rentals.
That he saw as the greatest of public services in the
present crisis. But the return upon the investment had
to be a reasonable one. Larry did not believe in Charity,
except for extreme cases. He believed, and his belief had
grown out of a wide experience with many kinds of peo-
ple, that Charity, of course to a smaller extent, was as
definitely a source of social evil as the then much-talked-
of Profiteering.

In the meantime he was seeing his old friend, Joe
Ellison, every day; perhaps smoking with Ellison in his
cottage after he had finished his day's work among the
roses, perhaps walking along the bluff which hung above
the Sound, whose cool, clear waters splashed with vaca-
tion laziness upon the shingle. The two men rarely spoke,
and never of the past. Larry was well acquainted with,
and understood, the older man's deep-rooted wish to
avoid all talk bearing upon deeds and associates of other
days; that was a part of his life and a phase of existence
that Joe Ellison was trying to forget, and Larry by his
silence deferred to his friend's desire.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 171

On the day after Joe Ellison's visit to the Duchess,
Larry had received a note from his grandmother, ad-
dressed, of course, to "Mr. Brandon." There was no
danger in her writing Larry if she took adequate pre-
cautions : mail addressed to Cedar Crest was not bothered
by postal and police officials ; it was only mail which came
to the house of the Duchess which received the attention
of these gentlemen.

The note was one which the Duchess, after that night
of thought which had so shaken her old heart, had de-
cided to be a necessity if her plan of never telling of her
discovery of Maggie's real paternity were to be a success.
The major portion of her note dwelt upon a generality
with which Larry already was acquainted: Joe's desire
to keep clear of all talk touching upon the deeds and the
people of his past. And then in a careless-seeming last
sentence the Duchess packed the carefully calculated
substance of her entire note:

"It may not be very important — but particularly
avoid ever mentioning the mere name of Jimmie Carlisle.
They used to know each other, and their acquaintance is
about the bitterest thing Joe Ellison has to remember."

Of course he'd never mention Old Jimmie Carlisle,
Larry said to himself as he destroyed the note — never
guessing, in making this natural response to what seemed
a most natural request, that he had become an uncon-
scious partner in the plan of the warm-hearted, scheming
Duchess.

There was one detail of Joe Ellison's behavior which
aroused Larry's mild curiosity. Directly beneath one of
Joe's gardens, hardly a hundred yards away, was a bit
of beach and a pavilion which were used in common by
the families from the surrounding estates. The girls and
younger women were just home from schools and colleges,
and at high tide were always on the beach. At this pe-
riod, whenever he was at Cedar Crest, Larry saw Joe, his

172 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

work apparently forgotten, gazing fixedly down upon the
young figures splashing about the water in their bright
bathing-suits or lounging about the pavilion in their
smart summer frocks.

This interest made Larry wonder, though to be sure
not very seriously. For he had never a guess of how deep
Joe's interest was. He did not know, could not know,
that that tall, fixed figure, with its one absorbing idea,
was thinking of his daughter. He could not know that
Joe Ellison, emotionally elated and with a hungry, self-
denying affection that reached out toward them all, was
seeing his daughter as just such a girl as one of these —
simple, wholesome, well-brought-up. He could not know
that Joe, in a way, perceived his daughter in every nice
young woman he saw.

Toward evening of the seventh day of her visit, Miss
Sherwood returned. Larry was on the piazza when the
car bearing her swept into the white-graveled curve of
the drive. The car was a handsome, powerful roadster.
Larry had started out to be of such assistance as he could,
when the figure at the wheel, a man, sprang from the car
and helped Miss Sherwood alight. Larry saw that the
man was Hunt — such a different Hunt ! — and he had
begun a quick retreat when Hunt's voice called after him :

"You there — wait a minute! I want a little chin-
chin with you."

Larry halted. He could not help overhearing the few
words that passed between Hunt and Miss Sherwood.

"Thank you ever so much," she said in her even
voice. "Then you're coming?"

"I promised, did n't I?"

"Then good-bye."

"Good-bye."

They shook hands friendly enough, but rather formally,
and Miss Sherwood turned to the house. Hunt called to
Larry:

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 173

"Come here, son."

Larry crossed to the big painter who was standing be-
side the power-bulged hood of his low-swung car.

" Happened to drop in where she was — brought her
home — aunt following in that hearse with its five-foot
cushions she always rides in," Hunt explained. And then :
"Well, I suppose you've got to give me the once-over.
Hurry up, and get it done with."

Larry obeyed. Hunt's wild hair had been smartly
barbered, he had on a swagger dust-coat, and beneath it
flannels of the smartest cut. Further, he bore himself as
if smart clothes and smart cars had always been items of
his equipment.

"Well, young fellow, spill it," he commanded. "What
do I look like?"

"Like Solomon in all his glory. No, more like the he-
dressmaker of the Queen of Sheba."

"I'm going to run you up every telephone post we
come to for that insult! Hop in, son, and we'll take a
little voyage around the earth in eighty seconds."

Larry got in. Once out of the drive the car leaped
away as though intent upon keeping to Hunt's time-table.
But after a mile or two Hunt quieted the roaring monster
to a conversational pace.

"Get one of the invitations to my show?" he asked.

"Yes. Several days ago. That dealer certainly got it
up in great shape."

" You must have hypnotized Graham. That old paint
pirate is giving the engine all the gas she '11 stand — and
believe me, he's sure getting up a lot of speed." Hunt
grinned. "That private pre-exhibition show you sug-
gested is proving the best publicity idea Graham ever
had in his musty old shop. Everywhere I go, people are
talking about the darned thing. Every man, woman and
child, also unmarried females of both sexes, who got in-
vitations are coming — and those who didn't get 'em

174 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

are trying to bribe the traffic cop at Forty-Second Street
to let 'em in."

Hunt paused for a chuckle. "And I'm having the
time of my young life with the people who always thought
I could n't paint, and who are now trying to sidle up to
me on the suspicion that possibly after all I can paint.
What 's got that bunch buffaloed is the fact that Graham
has let it leak out that I 'm likely to make bales of money
from my painting. The idea of any one making money
out of painting, that's too much for their heads. Oh,
this is the life, Larry!"

Larry started to congratulate him, but was instantly
interrupted with :

" I admit I'm a painter, and always will admit it. But
this present thing is all your doing. We '11 try to square
things sometime. But I did n't ask you to come along
to hear verbostical acrobatics about myself. I asked you
to learn if you'd worked out your plan yet regarding
Maggie?"

"Yes." And Larry proceeded to give the details of his
design.

"Regular psychological stuff!" exclaimed Hunt. And
then: "Say, you're some stage-manager! Or rather
some playwright! Playwrights that know tell me it's one
of their most difficult tricks — to get all their leading
characters on the stage at the same time. And here
you've got it all fixed to bring on Miss Sherwood, Dick,
Maggie, yourself, and the all-important me — for don't
forget I shall be slipping out to Cedar Crest occasion-
ally."

"As for myself," remarked Larry, "I shall remain very
much behind the scenes. Maggie '11 never see me."

"Well, here's hoping you're good enough playwright
to manage your characters so they won't run away from
you and mix up an ending you never dreamed of!"

The car paused again in the drive and Larry got out.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 175

"I say, Larry," Hunt whispered eagerly, "who's that
tall, white-haired man working over there among the
roses?"

"Joe Ellison. He's that man I told you about my
getting to know in Sing Sing. Remember?"

"Oh, yes ! The crook who was having his baby brought
up to be a real person. Say, he 's a sure-enough character !
Lordy, but I 'd love to paint that face ! . . . So-long, son."

The car swung around the drive and roared away.
Larry mounted to the piazza. Dick was waiting for him,
and excitedly drew him down to one corner that crimson
ramblers had woven into a nook for confidences.

"Captain, old scout," he said in a low, happy voice,
"I've just told sis. Put the whole proposition up to her,
just as you told me. She took it like a regular fellow.
Your whole idea was one hundred per cent right. Sis is
inside now getting off that invitation to Miss Cameron,
asking her to come out day after to-morrow."

Larry involuntarily caught the veranda railing. "I
hope it works out — for the best," he said.

"Oh, it will — no doubt of it!" cried the exultant Dick.
"And, Captain, if it does, it'll be all your doing!"

CHAPTER XXIII

WHEN Miss Sherwood's invitation reached Maggie, Bar-
ney and Old Jimmie were with her. The pair had growled
a lot, though not directly at Maggie, at the seeming lack
of progress Maggie had made during the past week. Bar-
ney was a firm enough believer in his rogue's creed of first
getting your fish securely hooked; but, on the other hand,
there was the danger, if the hooked fish be allowed to
remain too long in the water, that it would disastrously
shake itself free of the barb and swim away. That was
what Barney was afraid had been happening with Dick

176 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Sherwood. Therefore he was thinking of returning to his
abandoned scheme of selling stock to Dick. He might get
Dick's money in that way, though of course not so much
money, and of course not so safely.

And another item which for some time had not been
pleasing Barney was that Larry Brainard had not yet
been finally taken care of, either by the police or by that
unofficial force to which he had given orders. So he had
good reason for permitting himself the relaxation of
scowling when he was not on public exhibition.

But when Maggie, after reading the invitation, tossed
it, together with a note from Dick, across to Barney with-
out comment, the color of his entire world changed for
that favorite son of Broadway. The surly gloom of the
end of a profitless enterprise became magically an aurora
borealis of superior hopes: — no, something infinitely
more substantial than any heaven-painting flare of iri-
descent colors.

"Maggie, it's the real thing! At last!" he cried.
[ "What is it?" asked Old Jimmie.

Barney gave him the letter. Jimmie read it through,
then handed it back, slowly shaking his head.

"I don't see nothing to get excited about," said the
ever-doubtful, ever-hesitant Jimmie. "It's only an in-
vitation."

"Aw, hell!" ejaculated the exasperated Barney in dis-
gust. "If some one handed you a government bond all
you could see would be a cigar coupon ! That invitation,
together with this note from Dick Sherwood saying he '11
call and take Maggie out, means that the fish is all ready
to be landed. Try to come back to life, Jimmie. If you
knew anything at all about big-league society, you'd
know that sending invitations to meet the family — that 's
the way these swells do things when they're all set to
do business. We're all ready for the killing — the big
clean-up!"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 177

He turned to Maggie. "Great stuff, Maggie. I knew
you could put it over. Of course you're going?"

"Of course," replied Maggie with a composure which
was wholly of her manner.

A sudden doubt came out of this glory to becloud
Barney's master mind. "I don't know," he said slowly.
"It's one proposition to make one of these men swells
believe that a woman is the real thing. And it 's another
proposition to put it over on one of these women swells.
They've got eyes for every little detail, and they know
the difference between the genuine article and an imita-
tion. I've heard a lot about this Miss Sherwood; they
say she 's one of the cleverest of the swells. Think you can
walk into her house and put it over on her, Maggie?"

"Of course — why not?" answered Maggie, again
with that composure which was prompted by her pride's
desire to make Barney, and every one else, believe her
equal to any situation.

Barney's animation returned. "All right. If you think
you can swing it, you can swing it, and the job 's the same
as finished and we're made!"

Left to herself, and the imposing propriety and mag-
nificent stupidity of Miss Grierson, Maggie made no at-
tempt to keep up her appearance of confidence. All her
thoughts were upon this opportunity which insisted upon
looking to her like a menace. She tried to whip her self-
confidence, of which she was so proud, into a condition
of constant regnancy. But the plain fact was that Mag-
gie, the misguided child of a stolen birthright, whose soar-
ing spirit was striving so hard to live up to the traditions
and conventions of cynicism, whose young ambition it
was to outshine and surpass all possible competitors in
this world in which she had been placed, who in her pride
believed she knew so much of life — the plain fact was
that Maggie was in a state bordering on funk.

This invitation from Miss Sherwood was an ordeal she

178 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

had never counted on. She had watched the fine ladies
at the millinery shop and while selling cigarettes at the
Ritzmore, when she had been modeling her manners,
and had believed herself just as fine a lady as they. But
that had been in the abstract. Now she was face to face
with a situation that was painfully concrete — a real
test: she had to place herself into close contrast with,
and under the close observation of, a real lady, and in that
lady's own home. And in all her life she had not once
been in a fine home ! In fine hotels, yes — but fine hotels
were the common refuge of butcher, baker, floor-walker,
thief, swell, and each had approximately the same atten-
tion; and all she now felt she had really learned were a few
such matters as the use of table silver and finger bowls.

It came to her that Barney, in his moment of doubt,
had spoken more soundly than he had imagined when he
had said that it was easier to fool a man about a woman
than it was to fool a woman. How tragically true that
was! While trying to learn to be a lady by working in
smart shops, she had learned that the occasional man
who had ventured in after woman's gear was hopelessly
ignorant and bought whatever was skillfully thrust upon
him, but that it was impossible to slip an inferior or un-
suitable or out-dated article over on the woman who really
knew.

And Miss Sherwood was the kind of woman who really
knew ! Who knew everything. Could she possibly, pos-
sibly pass herself off on Miss Sherwood as the genuine
article? . . .

Could Larry have foreseen the very real misery — for
any doubt of her own qualities, any fear of her ability to
carry herself well in any situation, are among the most
acute of a proud woman's miseries — which for some
twenty-four hours was brought upon Maggie by the well-
meant intrigue of which he was pulling the hidden strings,
he might, because of his love for Maggie, have discarded

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 179

his design even while he was creating it, and have sought
a measure pregnant with less distress. But perhaps it was
just as well that Larry did not know. Perhaps, even, it
was just as well that he did not know what his grand-
mother knew.

Maggie's pride would not let her evade the risk; and her
instinct for self-preservation dictated that she should re-
duce the risk to its minimum. So she wrote her accept-
ance— Miss Grierson attended to the phrasing of her
note — but expressed her regret that she would be able
to come only for the tea-hour. Drinking tea must be
much the same, reasoned Maggie, whether it be drunk in
a smart hotel or in a smart country home.

Maggie's native shrewdness suggested her simplest
summer gown as likely to have committed the fewest
errors, and the invaluable stupidity of Miss Grierson
aided her toward correctness if not originality. When
Dick came he was delighted with her appearance. On
the way out he was ebulliently excited in his talk. Maggie
averaged a fair degree of sensibility in her responses,
though only her ears heard him. She was far more excited
than he, and every moment her excitement mounted, for
every moment she was speeding nearer the greatest ordeal
of her life.

When at length they curved through the lawns of satin
smoothness and Dick slowed down the car before the long
white house, splendid in its simplicity, Maggie's excite-
ment had added unto it a palpitant, chilling awe. And
unto this was added consternation when, as they mounted
the steps, Miss Sherwood smilingly crossed the piazza
and welcomed her without waiting for an introduction.
Maggie mumbled some reply ; she later could not remem-
ber what it was. Indeed she never had met such a woman :
so finished, so gracious, so unaffected, with a sparkle of
humor in her brown eyes ; and the rich plainness of her
white linen frock made Maggie conscious that her own

I8o CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

supposed simplicity was cheap and ostentatious. If Miss
Sherwood had received her with hostility, doubt, or even
chilled civility, the situation would have been easier;
the aroused Maggie would then have made use of her own
great endowment of hauteur and self-esteem. But to be
received with this frank cordiality, on a basis of equality
with this finished woman — that left Maggie for the
moment without arms. She had, in her high moments,
believed herself an adventuress whose poise and plans
nothing could unbalance. Now she found herself sud-
denly just a young girl of eighteen who did n't know what
to do.

Had Maggie but known it that sudden unconscious
confusion, which seemed to betray her, was really more
effective for her purpose than would have been the best
of conscious acting. It established her at once as an un-
stagey ingSnue — simple, unspoiled, unacquainted with
the formulas and formalities of the world.

Miss Sherwood, in her easy possession of the situation,
banished Dick with "Run away for a while, Dick, and
give us two women a chance to get acquainted." She
had caught Maggie's embarrassment, and led her to a
corner of the veranda which looked down upon the gar-
dens and the glistering Sound. She spoke of the impersonal
beauties spread before their vision, until she judged that
Maggie's first flutter had abated ; then she led the way to
wicker chairs beside a table where obviously tea was to
be spread.

Miss Sherwood accepted Maggie for exactly what she
seemed to be ; and presently she was saying in a low voice,
with her smiling, unoffending directness:

"Excuse the liberty of an older woman, Miss Cameron
— but I don't wonder that Dick likes you. You see, he 's
told me."

If Maggie had been at loss for her cue before, she had it
now. It was unpretentiousness.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 181

"But, Miss Sherwood — I'm so crude," she faltered,
acting her best. "Out West I never had any chances to
learn. Not any chances like your Eastern girls."

"That's no difference, my dear. You are a nice, simple
girl — that's what counts!"

"Thank you," said Maggie.

"So few of our rich girls of the East know what it is to
be simple," continued Miss Sherwood. "Too many are
all affectation, and pose, and forwardness. At twenty
they know all there is to be known, they are blas6es —
cynical — ready for divorce before they are ready for
marriage. By contrast you are so wholesome, so refresh-
ing."

"Thank you," Maggie again murmured.

And as the two women sat there, sprung from the
extremes of life, but for the moment on the level of equals,
and as the older talked on, there grew up in Maggie two
violently contradictory emotions. One was triumph.
She had won out here, just as she had said she would win
out; and won out with what Barney had declared to be
the most difficult person to get the better of, a finished
woman of the world. Indeed, that was triumph!

The other emotion she did not understand so well.
And just then she could not analyze it. It was an un-
expected dismay — a vague but permeating sickness —
a dazed sense that she was being carried by unfamiliar
forces toward she knew not what.

She held fast to her sense of triumph. That was the
more apprehendable and positive ; triumph was what she
had set forth to win. This sense of triumph was at its
highest, and she was resting in its elating security, when
a car stopped before the house and a large man got out
and started up the steps. From the first moment there
was something familiar to Maggie in his carriage, but not
till Miss Sherwood, who had risen and crossed toward
him, greeted him as "Mr. Hunt," did Maggie recognize

182 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

the well-dressed visitor as the shabby, boisterous painter
whom she had last seen down at the Duchess's.

Panic seized upon her. Miss Sherwood was leading
him toward where she sat and his first clear sight of her
would mean the end. There was no possible escape; she
could only await her fate. And when she was denounced
as a fraud, and her glittering victory was gone, she could
only take herself away with as much of the defiance of ad-
mitted defeat as she could assume — and that would n't
be much.

She gazed up at Hunt, whitely, awaiting extermination.
Miss Sherwood's voice came to her from an infinite dis-
tance, introducing them. Hunt bowed, with a formally
polite smile, and said formally, "I'm very glad to meet
you, Miss Cameron."

Not till he and Miss Sherwood were seated and chat-
ting did Maggie realize the fullness of the astounding
fact that he had not recognized her. This was far more
upsetting to her than would have been recognition and
exposure; she had been all braced for that, but not for
what had actually happened. She was certain he must
have known her; nothing had really changed about her
except her dress, and only a few weeks had passed since
he had been seeing her daily down at the Duchess's, and
since she had been his model, and he had studied every
line and expression of her face with those sharp painter's
eyes of his.

And so as the two chatted, she putting in a stumbling
phrase when they turned to her, Maggie Carlisle, Maggie
Cameron, Maggie Ellison, that gallant and all-confident
adventuress who till the present had never admitted her-
self seriously disturbed by a problem, sat limply in her
chair, a very young girl, indeed, and wondered how this
thing could possibly be.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 183

CHAPTER XXIV

PRESENTLY Miss Sherwood said something about tea,
excused herself, and disappeared within the house.
Maggie saw that Hunt watched Miss Sherwood till she
was safely within doors ; then she was aware that he was
gazing steadily at her; then she saw him execute a slow,
solemn wink.

Maggie almost sprang from her chair.

"Shall we take a little stroll, Miss Cameron?" Hunt
asked. "I think it will be some time before Miss Sher-
wood will want us for tea."

"Yes — thank you," Maggie stammered.

Hunt led her down a walk of white gravel to where a
circle of Hiawatha roses were trained into a graceful
mosque, now daintily glorious with its solid covering of
yellow-hearted red blooms. Within this retreat was a
rustic bench, and on this Hunt seated her and took a place
beside her. He looked her over with the cool, direct,
studious eyes which reminded her of his gaze when he had
been painting her.

"Well, Maggie," he finally commented, "you certainly
look the part you picked out for yourself, and you seem
to be putting it over. Always had an idea you could
handle something big if you went after it. How d'you
like the life, being a swell lady crook?"

She had hardly heard his banter. She needed to ask
him no questions about his presence here; his ease of
bearing had conveyed to her unconsciously from the first
instant that her previous half-contemptuous estimate of
him had been altogether wrong and that he was now in his
natural element. Her first question went straight to the
cause of her amazement.

" Did n't you recognize me when you first saw me with
Miss Sherwood?"

184 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"Yes."

"Were n't you surprised?"

"Nope," he answered with deliberate monosyllabic-
ness.

"Why not?"

"I'd been wised up that I'd be likely to meet you —
and here."

"Here! By whom?"

"By advice of counsel I must decline to answer."

"Why did n't you tell Miss Sherwood who I am and
show me up?"

"Because I'd been requested not to tell."

"Requested by whom?"

"Maggie," he drawled, "you seem to be making a go
of this lady crook business — but I think you might have
been even more of a shining light as a criminal cross-
examiner. However, I refuse to be cross-examined fur-
ther. By the way," he drawled on, "how goes it with
those dear souls, Barney and Old Jimmie?"

She ignored his question.

"Please! Who asked you not to tell?"

There was a sudden glint of good-humored malice in
his eyes. "Mind if I smoke?"

"No."

He drew out a silver cigarette case and opened it.
"Empty!" he exclaimed. "Excuse me while I get some-
thing from the house to smoke. I'll be right back."

Without waiting for her permission he stepped out of
the arbor and she heard his footsteps crunching up the
gravel path. Maggie waited his return in pulsing sus-
pense. Her situation had been developing beyond any-
thing she had ever dreamed of; she was aquiver as to what
might happen next. So absorbed was she in her chaos of
feeling and thoughts that she did not even hear the humble
symphony of the hundreds of bees drawing their treasure
from the golden hearts of the roses; and did not see, across

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 185

the path a score of yards away, the tall figure of Joe Elli-
son among the rosebushes, pruning-shears in hand, with
which he had been cutting out dead blossoms, gazing
at her with that hungry, admiring, speculative look with
which he had regarded the young women upon the
beach.

Presently she heard Hunt's footsteps coming down the
path. Then she detected a second pair. Dick accompany-
ing him, she thought. And then Hunt appeared before
her, and was saying in his big voice: "Miss Cameron,
permit me to present my friend, Mr. Brandon." And
then he added in a lowered voice, grinning with the imp-
ish delight of an overgrown boy who is playing a trick:
"Thought I 'd better go through the motions of introduc-
ing you people, so it would look as if you'd just met for
the first time." And with that he was gone.

Maggie had risen galvanically. For the moment she
could only stare. Then she got out his name.

4 ' Larry ! " she whispered . ' ' You here ? ' '

"Yes."

Astounded as she was, she had caught instantly the
total lack of amazement on Larry's part.

"You're — you're not surprised to see me?"

"No," he said evenly. "I knew you were here. And
before that I knew you were coming."

That was almost too much for Maggie. Hunt had
known and Larry had known ; both were people belonging
to her old life, both the last people she expected to meet
in such circumstances. She could only stare at him —
entirely taken aback by this meeting.

And indeed it was a strangely different meeting from
the last time she had seen him, at the Grantham ; strangely
different from those earlier meetings down at the Duchess's
when both had been grubs as yet unmetamorphosized.
Now standing in the arbor they looked a pair of week-
end guests, in keeping with the place. For, as Maggie

186 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

had noted, Larry in his well-cut flannels was as greatly
transformed as Hunt.

It was Larry who ended the silence. "Shall we sit
down?"

She mechanically sank to the bench, still staring at him.

"What are you doing here?" she managed to breathe.

"I belong here."

"Belong here?"

"I work here," he explained. "I'm called 'Mr. Bran-
don/ but Miss Sherwood knows exactly who I am and
what I've been."

"How long have you been here?"

"Since that night when Barney and Old Jimmie took
you away to begin your new career — the same night
that I ran away from those gunmen who thought I was a
squealer, and from Casey and Gavegan."

"And all the while that Barney and my father and the
police have thought you hiding some place in the West,
you've been with the Sherwoods?"

"Yes. And I've got to remain in hiding until some-
thing happens that will clear me. If the police or Barney
and his friends learn where I am — you can guess what
will happen."

She nodded.

"Hunt got me here," he went on to explain. "I 'm as-
sisting in trying to get the Sherwood business affairs in
better shape. I might as well tell you, Maggie," he added
quietly, "that Dick Sherwood is my very good friend."

"Dick Sherwood!" she breathed.

"And I might as well tell you," he went on, "that
since that night at the Grantham when I heard his voice,
I 've known that Dick is the sucker you and Barney and
Old Jimmie are trying to trim."

She half rose, and her voice sounded sharply: "Then
you Ve got me caught in a trap! You've told them about
me?"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 187

"No."

"Why not?"

"Not so loud, or we may attract attention," he warned
her. "I haven't told because you had your chance to
give me away to Barney that night at the Grantham.
And you did n't give me away."

She sank slowly back to the bench. "Is that your only
reason?"

"No," he answered truthfully. "Exposing you would
merely mean that you 'd feel harder toward me — and
harder toward every one else. I don't want that."

She pondered this a moment. "Then — you're not
going to tell?'

He shook his head. " I don't expect to. I want you to
be free to decide what you 're going to do — though I
hope you'll decide not to go through with this thing
you're doing."

She made no response. Larry had spoken with control
until now, but his next words burst from him.

" Don't you see what a situation it's put me in, Maggie
— trying to play square with my friends, the Sherwoods,
and trying to. play square with you?"

Again she did not answer.

"Maggie, you're too good for what you're doing —
it's all a terrible mistake!" he cried passionately. Then
he remembered himself, and spoke with more composure.
"Oh, I know there's not much use in talking to you
now — while you feel as you do about yourself — and
while you feel as you do about me. But you know I love
you, and want to marry you — when — " He halted.

"When?" she prompted, almost involuntarily.

"When you see things differently — and when I can
go around the world a free man, not a fugitive from
Barney and his gunmen and the police."

Again Maggie was silent for a moment. It was as if
she were trying to press out of her mind what he had said

188 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

about loving her. Truly this was, indeed, different from
their previous meetings. Before, there had almost in-
variably been a defiant attitude, a dispute, a quarrel.
Now she had no desire to quarrel.

Finally she said with an effort to be that self-controlled
person which she had established as her model:

"You seem to have your chance here to put over
what you boasted to me about. You remember making
good in a straight way."

"Yes. And I shall make good — if only they will let
me alone." He paused an instant. "But I have no
illusions about the present," he went on quietly. "I'm
in quiet water for a time; I've got a period of safety;
and I'm using this chance to put in some hard work.
But presently the police and Barney and the others will
learn where I am. Then I'll have all that fight over
again — only the next time it'll be harder."

She was startled into a show of interest. "You think
that's really going to happen?"

"It's bound to. There's no escaping it. If for no
other reason, I myself won't be able to stand being
penned up indefinitely. Something will happen, I don't
know what, which will pull me out into the open world —
and then for me the deluge!"

He made this prediction grimly. He was not a fatalist,
but it had been borne in upon him recently that this
thing was inescapable. As for him, when that time came,
he was going to put up the best fight that was in him.

He caught the strained look which had come into
Maggie's face, and it prompted him suddenly to lean
toward her and say:

"Maggie, do you still think I'm a stool and a
squealer?"

«I_"

She broke off. She had a surging impulse to go on and
say something to Larry. A great deal. She was not

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 189

conscious of what that great deal was. She was conscious
only of the impulse. There was too great a turmoil
within her, begotten by the strain of her visit on Miss
Sherwood and these unexpected meetings, for any mo-
tive, impulse, or decision to emerge to even a brief su-
premacy. And so, during this period when her brain
would not operate, she let herself be swept on by the
momentum of the forces which had previously deter-
mined her direction — her pride, her self-confidence, her
ambition, the alliance of fortune between her and Barney
and Old Jimmie.

They were sitting in this silence when footsteps again
sounded on the gravel, and a shadow blotted the arbor floor.

" Excuse me, Larry," said a man's voice.

"Sure. What is it, Joe?"

Before her Maggie saw the tall, thin man in overalls,
his removed broad-brimmed hat revealing his white
hair, whom she had noticed a little earlier working
among the flowers. He held a bunch of the choicest
pickings from the abundant rose gardens, their stems
bound in maple leaves as temporary protection against
their thorns. He was gazing at Maggie, respectful,
hungry admiration in his somber eyes.

"I thought perhaps the young lady might care for
these." He held out the roses to her. And then quickly,
to forestall refusal: "I cut out more than we can use for
the house. And I 'd like to have you have them."

"Thank you," and Maggie took the flowers.

For an instant their eyes held. In every outward cir-
cumstance the event was a commonplace — this meeting
of father arid daughter, not knowing each other. It was
hardly more than a commonplace to Maggie: just a tall,
white-haired gardener respectfully offering her roses.
And it was hardly more to Joe Ellison: just a tribute
evoked by his hungry interest in every well-seeming girl
of the approximate age of his daughter.

190 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

At the moment's end Joe Ellison had bowed and
started back for his flower beds. "Who is that man?"
asked Maggie, gazing after him. " I never saw such eyes."

"We used to be pals in Sing Sing," Larry replied. He
went on to give briefly some of the details of Joe Ellison's
story, never dreaming how he and Maggie were entangled
in that story, nor how they were to be involved in its
untanglement. Perhaps they were fortunate in this
ignorance. Within the boundaries of what they did
know life already held enough of problems and com-
plications.

Larry had just finished his condensed history when
Dick Sherwood appeared and ordered them to the
veranda for tea. There were just the five of them,
Miss Sherwood, Maggie, Hunt, Dick, and Larry. Miss
Sherwood was as gracious as before, and she seemingly
took Maggie's strained manner and occasional confusions
as further proof of her genuineness. Dick beamed at
the impression she was making upon his sister.

As for Maggie, she was living through the climax of
that afternoon's strain. And she dared not show it. She
forced herself to do her best acting, sipping her tea with
a steady hand. And what made her situation harder was
that two of the party, Larry and Hunt, were treating
her with the charmed deference they might accord a
charming stranger, when a word from either of them
might destroy the fragile edifice of her deception.

At last it was over, and all was ready for her to start
back to town with Dick. When Miss Sherwood kissed
her and warmly begged her to come again soon, the very
last of her control seemed to be slipping from her — but
she held on. Larry and Hunt she managed to say good-
bye to in the manner of her new acquaintanceship.

"Isn't she simply splendid!" exclaimed Miss Sher-
wood when Dick had stepped into the car and the two
had started away.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 191

Larry pretended not to have heard. He felt pre-
cariously guilty toward this woman who had befriended
him. The next instant he had forgotten Miss Sherwood
and his pulsing thoughts were all on Maggie in that
speeding car. She had been profoundly shaken by that
afternoon's experience, this much he knew. But what
was going to be the real effect upon her of his carefully
thought-out design? Was it going to be such as to save
her and Dick? — and eventually win her for himself?

In the presence of Miss Sherwood Larry tried to be-
have as if nothing had happened more than the pleasant
interruption of an informal tea: but beneath that calm
all his senses were waiting breathless, so to speak, for
news of what had happened within Maggie, and what
might be happening to her.

CHAPTER XXV

WHEN Maggie sped away from Cedar Crest in the low
seat of the roadster beside the happy Dick, she felt her-
self more of a criminal than at any time in her life, and
a criminal that miraculously was making her escape out
of an inescapable set of circumstances.

Beyond her relief at this escape she did not know
these first few minutes what she thought or felt. Too
much had happened, and what had happened had all
turned out so differently from what she had expected,
for her to set in orderly array this chaos of reactions
within herself and read the meaning of that afternoon's
visit. She managed, with a great effort, to keep under
control the outer extremities of her senses, and thus
respond with the correct "yes" or "no" or "indeed"
when some response from her was required by Dick's
happy conversation.

Near Roslyn they swung off the turnpike into an un-

192 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

frequented, shady road. Dick steered to one side be-
neath a locust-tree and silenced the motor.

"Why are you stopping?" she asked in sudden
alarm.

"So we can talk without a piece of impertinent ma-
chinery roaring interruptions at us," replied Dick with
forced lightness. And then in a voice he could not make
light: "I want to talk to you about — about my sister.
Isn't she splendid?"

"She is!" There was no wavering of her thoughts as
Maggie emphatically said this.

"I'm mighty glad you like her. She certainly liked
you. She's all the family I've got, and since you two
hit it off so well together I hope — I hope, Maggie — "

And then Dick plunged into it, stammeringly, but
earnestly. He told her how much he loved her, in old
phrases that his boyish ardor made vibrantly new. He
loved her! And if she would marry him, her influence
would make him take the brace all his friends had urged
upon him. She'd make him a man! And she could see
how pleased it would make his sister. And he would do
his best to make Maggie happy — his very best!

The young super-adventuress — she herself had men-
tally used the word "adventuress" in thinking of herself,
as being more genteel and mentally aristocratic than the
cruder words by which Barney and Old Jimmie and their
kind designated a woman accomplice — this young
super-adventuress, who had schemed all this so adroitly,
and worked toward it with the best of her brain and her
conscious charm, was seized with new panic as she lis-
tened to the eager torrent of his imploring words, as she
gazed into the quivering earnestness of his frank, blue-
eyed face. She wished she could get out of the machine
and run away or sink through the floor-boards of the car.
For she really liked Dick.

" I'm — I'm not so good as you think," she whispered.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 193

And then some unsuspected force within her impelled
her to say: "Dick, if you knew the truth — "

He caught her shoulders. "I know all the truth about
you I want to know! You're wonderful, and I love you!
Will you marry me? Answer that. That's all I want to
know!"

He had checked the confession that impulsively had
surged toward her lips. Silent, her eyes wide, her breath
coming sharply, she sat gazing at him. . . . And then
from out the portion of her brain where were stored her
purposes, and the momentum of her pride and determi-
nation, there flashed the realization that she had won!
The thing that Barney and Old Jimmie had prepared
and she had so skillfully worked toward, was at last
achieved! She had only to say "yes," and either of those
two plans which Barney had outlined could at once be
put in operation — and there could be no doubt of the
swift success of either. Dick's eager, trusting face was
guarantee that there would come no obstruction from
him.

She felt that in some strange way she had been caught
in a trap. Yes, what they had worked for, they had won !
And yet, in this moment of winning, as elements of her
vast dizziness, Maggie felt sick and ashamed — felt a
frenzied desire to run away from the whole affair. For
Maggie, cynical, all-confident, and eighteen, was proving
really a very poor adventuress.

"Please, Maggie" — his imploring voice broke in
upon her — "won't you answer me? You like me, don't
you? — you'll marry me, won't you? "

"I like you, Dick," she choked out — and it was some
slight comfort to her to be telling this much of the truth —
"but — but I can't marry you."

"Maggie!" It was a cry of surprised pain, and the
pain in his voice shot acutely into her. "From the way
you acted toward me — I thought — I hoped — " He

194 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

sharply halted the accusation which had risen to his
lips. "I'm not going to take that answer as final, Mag-
gie," he said doggedly. "I'm going to give you more
time to think it over — more time for me to try. Then
I '11 ask you again."

That which prompted Maggie's response was a mixture
of impulses: the desire, and this offered opportunity, to
escape; and a faint reassertion of the momentum of her
purpose. For with one such as Maggie, the set purposes
may be seemingly overwhelmed, but death comes hard.

"All right," she breathed rapidly. "Only please get
me back as quickly as you can. I 'm to have dinner with
my — my cousin, and I '11 be very late."

Dick drove her into the city in almost unbroken
silence and left her at the great doors of the Grantham,
abustle with a dozen lackeys in purple livery. She stood
a moment and watched him drive away. He really was a
nice boy — Dick.

As she shot up the elevator, she thought of a hitherto
forgotten element of that afternoon's bewildering situ-
ation. Barney Palmer! And Barney was, she knew, now
up in her sitting-room, impatiently waiting for her report
of what he had good reason to believe would prove a
successful experience. If she told the truth — that Dick
had proposed, just as they had planned for him to do —
and she had refused him — why, Barney — !

She seemed caught on every side!

Maggie got into her suite by way of her bedroom. She
wanted time to gather her wits for meeting Barney.
When Miss Grierson told her that her cousin was still
waiting to take her to dinner, she requested her com-
panion to inform Barney that she would be in as soon as
she had dressed. She wasted all the time she legitimately
could in changing into a dinner-gown, and when at
length she stepped into her sitting-room she was to
Barney's eye the same cool Maggie as always.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 195

Barney rose as she entered. He was in smart dinner
jacket; these days Barney was wearing the smartest of
everything that money could secure. There was a shadow
of impatience on his face, but it was instantly dissipated
by Maggie's self -composed, direct-eyed beauty.

"How'd you come out with Miss Sherwood?" he
whispered eagerly.

"Well enough for her to kiss me good-bye, and beg
me to come again."

"I've got to hand it to you, Maggie! You're sure
some swell actress — you've sure got class!" His dark
eyes gleamed on her with half a dozen pleasures: admi-
ration of what she was in herself — admiration of what
she had just achieved — anticipation of results, many
results — anticipation of what she was later to mean to
him in a personal way. "If you can put it over on a
swell like Miss Sherwood, you can put it over on any
one!" He exulted. "As soon as we clean up this job in
hand, we'll move on to one big thing after another!"

And then out came the question Maggie had been
bracing herself for: "How about Dick Sherwood? Did he
finally come across with that proposal?"

"No," Maggie answered steadily.

"No? Why not?" exclaimed Barney sharply. "I
thought that was all that was holding him back — wait-
ing for his sister to look you over and give you her
O.K.?"

Maggie had decided that her air of cool, indifferent
certainty was the best manner to use in this situation
with Barney. So she shrugged her white shoulders.

"How can I tell what makes a man do something, and
what makes him not do it?"

"But did he seem any less interested in you than
before?" Barney pursued.

"No," replied Maggie.

"Then maybe he's just waiting to get up his nerve.

196 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

He'll ask you, all right; nothing there for us to worry
about. Come on, let's have dinner. I'm starved."

On the roof of the Grantham they were excellently
served; for Barney knew how to order a dinner, and he
knew the art, which is an alchemistic mixture of suave
diplomacy and the insinuated power and purpose of
murder, of handling head-waiters and their sub-auto-
crats. Having no other business in hand, Barney de-
voted himself to that business which ran like a core
through all his businesses — paying court to Maggie.
And when Barney wished to be a courtier, there were
few of his class who could give a better superficial inter-
pretation of the r61e; and in this particular instance he
was at the advantage of being in earnest. He forced the
most expensive tidbits announced by the dinner card
upon Maggie; he gallantly and very gracefully put on
and removed, as required by circumstances, the green
cobweb of a scarf Maggie had brought to the roof as pro-
tection against the elements; and when he took the danc-
ing-floor with her, he swung her about and hopped up
and down and stepped in and out with all the skill of a
master of the modern perversion of dancing. Barney was
really good enough to have been a professional dancer
had his desires not led him toward what seemed to him
a more exciting and more profitable career.

Maggie, not to rouse Barney's suspicions, played her
r61e as well as he did his own. And most of the other
diners, a fraction of the changing two or three hundred
thousand people from the South and West who choose
New York as the best of all summer resorts, gazed upon
this handsome couple with their intricate steps which
were timed with such effortless and enviable accuracy,
and excitedly believed that they were beholding two dis-
tinguished specimens of what their home papers persisted
in calling New York's Four Hundred.

Maggie got back to her room with the feeling that she

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 197

had staved off Barney and her numerous other dilemmas
for the immediate present. Her chief thought in the
many events of the day had been only to escape her
dangers and difficulties for the moment; all the time she
had known that her real thinking, her real decisions, were
for a later time when she was not so driven by the press
of unexpected circumstances. That less stressful time
was now beginning.

What was she to do next? What were to be her final
decisions? And what, in all this strange ferment, was
likely to germinate as possible forces against her?

She mulled these things over for several days, during
which Dick came to see her twice, and twice proposed,
and was twice put off. She had quiet now, and was most
of the time alone, but that clarity which she had ex-
pected, that quickness and surety of purpose which she
had always believed to be unfailingly hers, refused to
come.

She tried to have it otherwise, but the outstanding
figure in her meditations was Larry. Larry, who had not
exposed her at the Sherwoods', and whose influence had
caused Hunt also not to expose her — Larry, who with-
out deception was on a familiar footing at the Sherwoods'
where she had been received only through trickery —
Larry, a fugitive in danger from so many enemies, per-
haps after all undeserved enemies — Larry, who looked
to be making good on his boast to achieve success through
honesty — Larry, who had again told her that he loved
her. She liked Dick Sherwood — she really did. But
Larry — that was something different.

And thus she thought on, drawn this way and that, and
unable to reach a decision. But with most people, when
in a state of acute mental turmoil, that which has been
most definite in the past, instinct, habit of mind, purpose,
tradition, becomes at least temporarily the dominant
factor through the mere circumstance that it has existed

198 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

powerfully before, through its comparative stability,
through its semi-permanence. And so with Maggie. She
had for that one afternoon almost been won over against
herself by the workings of Larry's secret diplomacy.
Then had come the natural reaction. And now in her
turmoil, in so far as she had any decision, it was in-
stinctively to go right ahead in the direction in which she
had been going.

But on the sixth day of her uncertainty, just after
Dick had called on her and she had provisionally ac-
cepted an invitation to Cedar Crest for the following
afternoon, a danger which she had half seen from the
start burst upon her without a moment's warning. It
came into her sitting-room, just before her dinner hour,
in the dual form of Barney and Old Jimmie. The faces
of both were lowering.

"Get rid of that boob chaperon of yours!" gritted
Barney. "We're going to have some real talk!"

Maggie stepped to the connecting door, sent Miss
Grierson on an inconsequential errand, and returned.

"You're looking as pleasant as if you were sitting for
a new photograph, Barney. What gives you that sweet
expression?"

"You'll cut out your comic-supplement stuff in just
one second," Barney warned her. "We both saw young
Sherwood awhile ago as he was leaving the Grantham,
and he told us everything/1'

Persiflage did indeed fail Maggie. "Everything?" she
exclaimed. "What's everything?"

"He told us about proposing to you almost a week
ago, and about your refusing him. And you lied to us —
kept us sitting round, wasting our time — and all the
while you've been double-crossing us!"

Those visitors from South and West, especially the
women, who a few nights before on the roof had regarded
Barney as the perfect courtier, would not have so es-

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 199

teemed him if they had seen him at the present moment.
He seized Maggie's wrists, and all the evil of his violent
nature glared from his small bright eyes.

"Damn you!" he cried. "Jimmie, she's yours, and a
father's got a right to do anything he likes to his own
daughter. Give it to her proper if she don't come across
with the truth!"

Jimmie stepped closer to her and bared his yellow
teeth. "I haven't given you a basting since you were
fifteen — but I '11 paste you one right in the mouth if you
don't talk straight talk!"

"You hear that!" Barney gritted at her. He believed
there was justice in his wrath — as indeed there was, of
a sort. "Think what Jimmie and I've put into this, in
time and hard coin ! We Ve given you your chance, we Ve
made you! And then, after hard work and waiting and
our spending so much, and everything comes out exactly
as we figured, you go and throw us down — not just your-
self, but us and our rights! Now you talk straight stuff!
Tell us, why did you refuse Sherwood when he proposed?
And why did you tell me that lie about his not proposing? "

Maggie realized she was in a desperate plight, with
these two inflamed gazes upon her. Never had she felt so
little of a daughter's liking for Old Jimmie as now when
she looked into his lean, harsh, yellow-fanged face. And
she had no illusions about Barney. He might love her,
as she knew he did ; but that would not be a check upon
his ruthlessness if he thought himself balked or betrayed.

Just then her telephone began to ring. She started to
move toward it, but Barney's grip checked her short.

"You're going to answer me — not any damned tele-
phone! Let it ring!"

The bell rang for a minute or two before it stilled its
shrill clamor. Its ringing was in a way a brief respite to
Maggie, for it gave her additional time to consider what
should be her course. She realized that she dared not let

200 ' CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND j

Barney believe at this moment that she had turned
against him. Again she fell back upon her cool, self-
confident manner.

' ' You want to know why? The answer is simple enough.
I thought I might try out an improvement of our plan —
something that might suit me better."

"What's that?" Barney harshly demanded.

"Since Miss Sherwood fell for me so easy, it struck me
that she'd be pretty sure to fall for me if I told her the
whole truth about myself. That is, everything except
our scheme to play Dick for a sucker."

"What 're you driving at?"

"Don't you see? If she forgave me being what I am,
and I rather think she would, and with Dick liking me as
he does — why, it struck me as the best thing for yours
truly to marry Dick for keeps."

"What?" Though Barney's voice was low, it had the
effect of a startled and savage roar. "And chuck us over-
board?"

"Not at all. If I married Dick for keeps, I intended to
pay you a lump sum, or else a regular amount each year."

"No, you don't!" Barney cried in the same muffled
roar.

"Perhaps not — I haven't decided," Maggie said
evenly. "I've merely been telling you, as you requested
me, why I did as I did. I refused Dick, and lied to you,
so that I might have more time to think over what I
really wanted to do."

Instinctively she had counted on rousing Barney's
jealousy in order to throw him off the track of her real
thoughts. She succeeded.

"I can tell you what you're going to do!" Barney
flung at her with fierce mastery. "You 're not going to put
over a sure-enough marriage with any Dick Sherwood!
When there 's that kind of a marriage, I 'm going to be the
man ! And you 're going to go right straight ahead with

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 201

our old plan! Dick '11 propose again if you give him half a
chance. And when he does, you say 'yes'l Understand?
That's what you're going to do!"

There was no safety in openly defying Barney. And as
a matter of fact what he had ordered was what, in the
shifting currents of her thoughts, the steady momentum
of her old ambitions and purposes had been pushing her
toward. So she said, in her even voice:

"You waste such a lot of your good energy, Barney,
by exploding when there 's nothing to blow up. That 's
exactly what I 'd decided to do. Miss Sherwood has asked
me out to Cedar Crest to-morrow afternoon, and I'm
going."

Barney let go the hold he had kept upon her wrists,
and the dark look slowly lifted from his face. "Why
did n't you tell a fellow this at first?" he half grumbled.
Then with a grim enthusiasm: "And when you come
back, you're going to tell us it's all settled!"

" Of course — if he asks me. And now suppose you two
go away. You've given me a headache, and I want to
rest."

"We'll go," said Barney. "But there may be some
more points about this that we may want to talk over a
little later to-night. So better get all the rest you can."

But when they had gone and left her to the silence of
her pretentious and characterless suite, Maggie did not
rest. She had made up her mind ; she was going to do as
she had said. But there was still that same turmoil within
her.

Again she thought of Larry. But she would not admit
to herself that her real motive for suddenly deciding to go
to Cedar Crest on the morrow was the chance of seeing
him.

202 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

CHAPTER XXVI

DURING all these days Larry waited for news of the result
of the experiment in psychology which meant so much
to his life. He had not expected to hear directly from
Maggie; but he had counted upon learning at once from
Dick, if not by words, then either from eloquent dejection
which would proclaim Dick's refusal (and Larry's success)
or from an ebullient joy which would proclaim that
Maggie had accepted him. But Dick's sober but not un-
happy behavior announced neither of these two to Larry;
and the matter was too personal, altogether too delicate,
to permit Larry to ask Dick the result, however subtly he
might ask it.

So Larry could only wait — and wonder. The truth
did not occur to Larry; he did not see that there might be
another alternative to the two possible reactions he had
calculated upon. He did not bear in mind that Maggie's
youthful obstinacy, her belief in herself and her ways,
were too solid a structure to yield at once to one moral
shock, however wisely planned and however strong. He
did not at this time hold in mind that any real change in
so decided a character as Maggie, if change there was to
be, would be preceded and accompanied by a turbulent
period in which she would hardly know who she was, or
where she was, or what she was going to do — and that
at the end of such a period there might be no change at
all.

Inasmuch as just then Maggie was his major interest,
it seemed to Larry in his safe seclusion that he was merely
marking time, and marking time with feet that were
frantically impatient. He felt he could not stand much
longer his own inactivity and his ignorance of what
Maggie was doing and what was happening to her. He
could not remain in this sanctuary pulling strings, and

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 203

very long and fragile strings, and strings which might be
the mistaken ones, for any much greater period. He felt
that he simply had to walk out of this splendid safety,
back into the dangers from which he had fled, where he
might at least have the possible advantage of being in the
very midst of Maggie's affairs and fight for her more openly
and have a more direct influence upon her.

He knew that, sooner or later, he was going to throw
caution aside and appear suddenly among his enemies,
unless something of a definite character developed. But
for these slow, irritating days he held himself in check
with difficulty, hoping that things might come to him,
that he would not have to go forth to them.

He had brought Hunt's portrait of Maggie to Cedar
Crest in the bottom of his trunk, and kept it locked in
his chiffonier. During these days, more frequently than
before, he would take out the portrait and in the security
of his locked room would gaze long at that keen-visioned
portrayal of her many characters. No doubt of it : there
was a possible splendid woman there ! And no doubt of it :
he loved that woman utterly!

During these days of his ignorance, while Maggie was
struggling in the darkness of her unexplored being, Larry
drove himself grimly at the business to which under hap-
pier circumstances he would have gone under the ir-
resistible suasion of pure joy. One afternoon he presented
to Miss Sherwood an outline for his growing plan for the
development of the Sherwood properties on the basis of
good homes at fair rentals. He discovered that, in spite of
her generous giving, she had much the same attitude to-
ward Charity as his own: that the only sound Charity,
except for those temporarily or permanently handicapped
or disabled, was the giving of honest values for honest
returns — and that was not Charity at all.

The project of reforming the shiftless character of the
Sherwood properties, and of relieving even in a small

204 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

degree New York's housing congestion, appealed at
once to her imagination and her sensible idealism.

"A splendid plan!" she exclaimed, regarding Larry
with those wise, humorous eyes of hers, which were now
very serious and penetrating. "You have been working
much harder than I had thought. And if you will pardon
my saying it, you have more of the soundly humane
vision which big business enterprise should have than I
had thought."

"Thank you!" said Larry.

"That's a splendid dream," she continued; "but it will
take hard work to translate that dream into a reality.
We shall need architects, builders, a heavy initial expense,
time — and a more modern and alert management."

"Yes, Miss Sherwood."

She did not speak for a moment. Her penetrating eyes,
which had been fixed on him in close thought, were yet
more penetrating. Finally she said :

"That's a big thing, a useful thing. The present agents
wish to be relieved of our affairs as soon as I can make
arrangements — and I'd like nothing better than for
Dick to drop what he's doing and get into something
constructive and useful like this. But Dick cannot do it
alone; he's too unsettled, and too inexperienced to cope
with some of the sharper business practices."

She paused again, still regarding him with those keen
eyes, which seemed to be weighing him. Finally she said,
almost abruptly:

"Will you take charge of this with Dick? He likes you
and respects your judgment; I'm sure you'd help steady
him down. Of course you lack practical experience, but
you can take in a practical man who will supply this ele-
ment. Practical experience is one of the commonest
articles on the market; vision and initiative are among
the rarest — and you have them. What do you say?"

Larry could not say anything at once. The suddenness

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 205

of her offer, the largeness of his opportunity, bewildered
him for the moment. And his bewilderment was added
to by his swift realization of quite another element in-
volved in her frank proposition. He was now engaged in
the enterprise of foisting a bogus article, Maggie, upon
this woman who was offering him her complete confidence
— an enterprise of most questionable ethics and very du-
bious issue. If he accepted her offer, and the result of this
enterprise were disaster, what would Miss Sherwood then
think of him?

He took refuge in evasion. "I'm not going to try to
tell you how much I appreciate your proposition, Miss
Sherwood. But do you mind if I hold back my answer
for the present and think it over? Anyhow, to do all that
is required I must be able to work in the open — and I
can't do that until I get free of my entanglements with the
police and my old acquaintances."

Thus it was agreed upon. Miss Sherwood turned to
another subject. The pre-public show of Hunt's pictures
had opened the previous day.

"When you were in the city yesterday, did you get in
to see Mr. Hunt's exhibition?"

"No," he answered. "Although I wanted to. But you
know I've already seen all of Mr. Hunt's pictures that
Mr. Graham has in his gallery. How was the opening?"

"Crowded with guests. And since they had been told
that the pictures were unusual and good, of course the
people were enthusiastic."

"What kind of prices was Mr. Graham quoting?"

"He was n't quoting any. He told me he was n't going
to sell a picture, or even mention a price, until the public
exhibition. He's very enthusiastic. He thinks Mr. Hunt
is already made — and in a big way."

And then she added, her level gaze very steady on Larry :

"Of course Mr. Hunt is really a great painter. But he
needed a jolt to make him go out and really paint his own

206 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

kind of stuff. And he needed some one like you to put
him across in a business way."

When she left, she left Larry thinking: thinking of her
saying that Hunt "needed a jolt to make him go out and
really paint his own kind of stuff." Hidden behind that
remark somewhere could there be the explanation for
the break between these two? Larry began to see a glim-
mer of Jight. It was entirely possible that Miss Sherwood,
in so finished and adroit a manner that Hunt had not dis-
cerned her purpose, had herself given him this jolt or at
least contributed to its force. It might all have been
diplomacy on her part, applied shrewdly to the man she
understood and loved. Yes, that might be the explana-
tion. Yes, perhaps she had been doing in a less trying way
just what he was seeking to do under more stressful cir-
cumstances with Maggie : to arouse him to his best by in-
directly working at definite psychological reactions.

That afternoon Hunt appeared at Cedar Crest, and
while there dropped in on Larry. The big painter, in his
full-blooded, boyish fashion, fairly gasconaded over the
success of his exhibit. Larry smiled at the other's exuber-
ant enthusiasm. Hunt was one man who could boast with-
out ever being offensively egotistical, for Hunt, added to
his other gifts, had the divine gift of being able to laugh at
himself.

Larry saw here an opportunity to forward that other
ambition of his: the bringing of Hunt and Miss Sher-
wood together. And at this instant it flashed upon him
that Miss Sherwood's seemingly casual remarks about
Hunt had not been casual at all. Perhaps they had been
carefully thought out and spoken with a definite purpose.
Perhaps Miss Sherwood had been very subtly appointing
him her ambassador. She was clever enough for that.

"Stop declaiming those self- written press notices of
your unapproachable superiority," Larry interrupted.
"If you use your breath up like that you'll drown on dry

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 207

land. Besides, I just heard something better than this
mere articulated air of yours. Better because from a
person in her senses."

"Heard it from whom?"

"Miss Sherwood."

"Miss Sherwood! What did she say?"

"That you were a really great painter."

"Huh !" snorted Hunt. "Why should n't she say that?
I've proved it!"

"Hunt," said Larry evenly, "you are the greatest
painter I ever met, but you also have the distinction of
being the greatest of all damned fools."

"What's that, young fellow?"

"You love Miss Sherwood, don't you? At least you Ve
the same as told me that in words, and you've told
me that in loud-voiced actions every time you 've seen
her."

"Well — what if I do?"

"If you had the clearness of vision that is in the
glassy eye of a cold boiled lobster you would see that she
feels the same way about you."

"See here, Larry" — all the boisterous quality had
gone from Hunt's voice, and it was low-pitched and a bit
unsteady — "I don't mind your joshing me about myself
or my painting, but don't fool with me about anything
that's really important."

"I'm not fooling you. I'm sure Miss Sherwood feels
that way."

"How do you know?"

"I've got a pair of eyes that don't belong to a cold
boiled lobster. And when I see a thing, I know I see it."

"You're all wrong, Larry. If you'd heard what she
said to me less than a year ago — "

"You make me tired!" interrupted Larry. "You two
were made for each other. She's waiting for you to step
up and talk man's talk to her — and instead you sulk in

208 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

your tent and mumble about something you think she
might have thought or said a year ago! You 're too sensi-
tive; you're too proud; you've got too few brains. It's
a million dollars to one that in your handsome, well-bred
way you 've fallen out with her over something that prob-
ably never existed and certainly does n't exist now. For-
get it all, and walk right up and ask her!"

"Larry, if I thought there was a chance that you are
right — "

"A single question will prove whether I'm right!"

Hunt did not speak for a moment. " I guess I 've never
seen my part of it all in the way you put it, Larry." He
stood up, his whole being subdued yet tense. " I 'm going
to slide back into town and think it all over."

Larry followed him an hour later, bent on routine
business of the Sherwood estate. Toward seven o'clock
he was studying the present decrepitude and future possi-
bilities of a row of Sherwood apartment houses on the
West Side, when, as he came out of one building and
started into another, a firm hand fell upon his shoulder
and a voice remarked:

"So, Larry, you're in New York?"

Larry whirled about. For the moment he felt all the life
go out of him. Beside him stood Detective Casey, whom
he had last seen on the night of his wild flight when Casey
had feigned a knockout in order to aid Larry's escape from
Ga vegan. Any other man affiliated with his enemies Larry
would have struck down and tried to break away from.
But not Casey.

"Hello, Casey. Well, I suppose you're going to invite
me to go along with you?"

"Where were you going?"

"Into this house."

"Then I '11 invite myself to go along with you."

He quickly pushed Larry before him into the hallway,
which was empty since all the tenants were at their din-

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 209

ner. Larry remembered the scene down in Deputy Police
Commissioner Barlow's office, when the Chief of Detec-
tives had demanded that he become a stool-pigeon work-
ing under Gavegan and Casey, and the grilling and the
threats, more than fulfilled, which had followed.

"Going to give me a little private quiz first, Casey,"
he asked, "and then call in Gavegan and lead me down to
Barlow?"

"Not unless Gavegan or some one else saw and recog-
nized you, which I know they did n't since I was watch-
ing for that very thing. And not unless you yourself feel
hungry for a visit to Headquarters."

"If I feel hungry, it's an appetite I'm willing to make
wait."

"You know I don't want to pinch you. My part in
this has been a dirty job that was just pushed my way.
You know that I know you Ve been framed and double-
crossed, and that I won't run you in unless I can't get out
of it.'

"Thanks, Casey. You're too white to have to run
with people like Barlow and Gavegan. But if it was n't
to pinch me, why did you stop me out there in the street? "

"Been hoping I might some day run into you on
the quiet. There are some things I Ve learned — never
mind how — that I wanted to slip you for your own
good."

"Go to it, Casey."

" First, I Ve got a hunch that it was Barney Palmer who
tipped off the police about Red Hannigan and Jack
Rosenfeldt, and then spread it among all the crooks that
you were the stool and squealer."

"Yes, I'd guessed that much."

"Second, I've got a hunch that it really was from
Barney Palmer that Barlow got his idea of making you
become a stool-pigeon. Barney is a smooth one all right,
and he figured what would happen. He knew you would

2io ' CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

refuse, and he knew Barlow would uncork hell beneath
you. Barney certainly called every turn."

"What — what — " stammered Larry. "Why, then
Barney must be — " He paused, utterly astounded by
the newness of the possibility that had just risen in his
mind.

"You've got it, Larry," Casey went on. "Barney is a
police stool. Has been one for years. Works directly for
Barlow. We 're not supposed to know anything about it.
He's turned up a lot of big ones. That's why it's safe for
Barney to pull off anything he likes."

"Barney a police stool!" Larry repeated in the stupor
of his amazement.

"Guess that's all the news I wanted to hand you,
Larry, so I'll be on my way. Here's wishing you luck — •
and for God's sake, don't let yourself be pinched by us.
So-long." And with that Casey slipped out of the hall-
way.

For a moment Larry stood moveless where Casey had
left him. Then fierce purpose, and a cautious reckless-
ness, surged up and took mastery of him. It had required
what Casey had told him to end his irksome waiting and
wavering. No longer could he remain in his hiding-place,
safe himself, trying to save Maggie by slow, indirect en-
deavor. The time had now come for very different
methods. The time had come to step forth into the open,
taking, of course, no unnecessary risk, and to have it out
face to face with his enemies, who were also Maggie's
real enemies, though she counted them her friends — to
save Maggie against her own will, if he could save her in
no other way.

And having so decided, Larry walked quickly out of
the hallway into the street.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 211

CHAPTER XXVII

ON the sidewalk Larry glanced swiftly around him. Half a
block down the street on the front of a drug-store was a
blue telephone flag. A minute later he was inside a tele-
phone booth in the drug-store, asking first for the Hotel
Grantham, and then asking the Grantham operator to be
connected with Miss Maggie Cameron.

There was a long wait. While he listened for Maggie's
voice he blazed with terrible fury against Barney Pal-
mer. For Maggie to be connected with a straight crook,
that idea had been bad enough. But for her to be under
the influence of the worst crook of all, a stool, a cunning
traitor to his own friends — that was more than could
possibly be stood! In his rage in Maggie's behalf he for-
got for the moment the many evils Barney had done to
himself. He thought of wild, incoherent, vaguely tre-
mendous plans. First he would get Maggie away from
Barney and Old Jimmie — somehow. Then he would
square accounts with those two — again by an undefined
somehow.

Presently the tired, impersonal voice of the Grantham
operator remarked against his ear-drum: "Miss Cameron
don't answer."

"Have her paged, please," he requested.

Larry, of course, could not know that his telephone
call was the very one which had rung hi Maggie's room
while Barney and Old Jimmie were with her, and which
Barney had harshly forbidden her to answer. Therefore
he could not know that any attempt to get Maggie by
telephone just then was futile.

When he came out of the booth, the impersonal voice
having informed him that Miss Cameron was not in, it
was with the intention of calling Maggie up between
eight and nine when she probably would have returned

212 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

from dinner where he judged her now to be. He knew that
Dick Sherwood had no engagement with her, for Dick
was to be out at Cedar Crest that evening, so he judged
it almost certain Maggie would be at home and alone
later on.

Having nothing else to do for an hour and a half, he
thought of a note he had received from the Duchess in
that morning's mail asking him to come down to see her
when he was next in town. Thirty minutes later he was
in the familiar room behind the pawnshop. The Duchess
asked him if he had eaten, and on his reply that he had
not and did not care to, instead of proceeding to the
business of her letter she mumbled something and went
into the pawnshop.

She left Larry for the very simple reason that now that
she had him here she was uncertain what she should say,
and how far she should go. Unknown to either, one
thread of the drama of Larry and Maggie was being spun
in the brain and heart of the Duchess; and being spun
with pain to her, and in very great doubt. True, she had
definitely decided, for Larry's welfare, that the facts
about Maggie's parentage should never be known from
her — and since the only other person who could tell the
truth was Jimmie Carlisle, and his interests were all ap-
parently in favor of silence, then it followed that the
truth would never be known from any one. But having so
decided, and decided definitely and finally, the Duchess
had proceeded to wonder if she had decided wisely.

Day and night this had been the main subject of her
thought. Could she be wrong in her estimate of Maggie's
character, and what she might turn out to be? Could she
be wrong in her belief that, given enough time, Larry
would outgrow his infatuation for Maggie? And since
she was in such doubt about these two points, had she any
right, and was it for the best, to suppress a fact that might
so gravely influence both matters? She did not know.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 213

What she wanted was whatever was best for Larry — and
so in her doubt she had determined to talk again to Larry,
hoping that the interview might in some way replace her
uncertainty with stability of purpose.

Presently she returned to the inner room, and in her
direct way and using the fewest possible words, which
had created for her her reputation of a woman who never
spoke and who was packed with strange secrets, she asked
Larry what he had done concerning Maggie. He told her
of the plan he had evolved, of Maggie's visit to Cedar
Crest, of his ignorance of Maggie's reactions. To all this
his grandmother made response neither by word nor by
change of expression. He then went on to tell her of what
he had just learned from Casey of Barney's maneuvering
his misfortunes.

The old head nodded. " Yes,. Barney 's just that sort,"
she said in her flat monotone.

And then she came to the purpose of her sending for
him. "How do you feel about Maggie now?"

"The same as before."

41 You love her?"

"Yes — and always will," he said firmly.

She was silent once more. Then, "What are you going
to do next?"

"Break things up between her and Barney and her
father. Get her away from them."

She asked no further questions. Larry was as settled
as a man could be. But was Maggie worth while? —
that was the great question still unanswered.

"Just what did you want me for, grandmother?" he
asked her finally.

"Something which I thought might have developed,
but which has n't."

And so she let him go away without telling him. And
wishing to shape things for the best for him, she was
troubled by the same doubts as before.

2I4 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

His visit with his grandmother had had no meaning to
Larry, since he had no guess of the struggle going on with-
in that ancient, inscrutable figure. The visit had for him
merely served to fill in a nervous, useless hour. His rage
against Barney had all the while possessed him too thor-
oughly for him to give more than the mere surface of
his mind to what had passed between his grandmother
and himself. And when he had left her, his rage at
Barney's treachery and his impetuous desire to snatch
Maggie away from her present influences, so stormed
within him that his usually cautious judgment was blown
away and recklessness swept like a gale into control of
him.

When he called up the Grantham a second time, at
nine o'clock, Maggie's voice came to him:

"Hello. Who is this, please?"

"Mr. Brandon."

He heard a stifled "Oh!" at the other end of the line.
"I'm coming right up to see you," he said.

"I — I don't think you — "

"I'll be there hi ten minutes," Larry interrupted the
startled voice, and hung up.

He counted that Maggie, after his sparing her at Cedar
Crest, would receive him and treat him at least no worse
than an enemy with whom there was a half-hour's truce.
Sure enough, when he rang the bell of her suite, Maggie
herself admitted him to her sitting-room. She was taut
and pale, her look neither friendly nor unfriendly.

"Don't you know the risk you're running," she whis-
pered when the door was closed — "coming here like this,
in the open?"

"The time has come for risks, Maggie," he announced.

"But you were safe enough where you were. Why take
such risks?"

"For your sake."

"My sake?"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 215

"To take you away from these people you're tied up
with. Take you away now."

At an earlier time this would have been a fuse to a de-
tonation of defiance from her. But now she said nothing
at all, and that was something.

"Since I Ve come out into the open, everything 's going
to be in the open. Listen, Maggie!" The impulse had
suddenly come upon him, since his plan to awaken Maggie
by her psychological reactions had apparently failed, to
tell her everything. "Listen, Maggie! I 'm going to lay
all my cards on the table, and show you every card I Ve
played. You were invited to come out to Cedar Crest be-
cause I schemed to have you come. And the reason I
schemed to have you invited was, I reasoned that being
received in such a frank, generous, unsuspecting way, by
a woman like Miss Sherwood, would make you sick of
what you were doing and you would drop it of your own
accord. But it seems I reasoned wrong."

"So — you were behind that!" she breathed.

"I was. Though I could n't have done it if Dick Sher-
wood had n't been honestly infatuated with you. But now
I 'm through with working under cover, through with in-
direct methods. From now on every play 's in the open,
and it's straight to the point with everything. So get
ready. I 'm going to take you away from Barney and Old
Jimmie."

The mention of these two names had a swift and magical
effect upon her. But instead of arousing belligerency,
they aroused an almost frantic agitation.

"You must leave at once, Larry. Barney and my
father were here before dinner, and they've just tele-
phoned they were coming back!"

"Coming back! That's the best argument you could
make for my staying!"

"But, Larry — they both have keys, and Barney al-
ways carries a gun!"

216 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

11 1 stay here, unless you leave with me. Listen to some
more, Maggie. I laid all the cards on the table. Do you
know the kind of people you 're tied up with? I '11 not say
anything about your father, for I guess you know all there
is to know. But Barney Palmer! He 's the lowest kind of
crook that breathes. There's been a lot of talk about
squealers and police stools. Well, the big squealer, the big
stool, is Barney Palmer!"

"I don't believe it!" she cried involuntarily.

"It's true! I've got it straight. Barney wanted to
smash me, because I 'd made up my mind to quit the old
game and because he wanted to get me out of his way with
you. So he framed it up so that I appeared to be a
squealer, and started the gangmen after me. And he put
Barlow up to the idea of forcing me to be a stool, and then
framing me when I refused. It was Barney who fixed
things so I had to go to jail, or be shot up, or run away.
It was Barney Palmer who squealed on Red Hannigan and
Jack Rosenfeldt, and who's been squealing on his other
pals. And that 's the sort you 're stringing along with ! "

She gazed at him in appalled half conviction. He re-
mained silent to let his truth sink in.

They were standing so, face to face, when a key grated
in the outer door of the little hallway as on the occasion of
Larry's first visit here. And as on that occasion, Maggie
sprang swiftly forward and shot home the bolt of the
inner door. Then she turned and caught Larry's arm.

"It's Barney — I told you he was coming!" she
whispered. "Oh, why didn't you go before? Come
on!"

She tried to drag him toward her bedroom door,
through which she had once helped him escape. But this
time he was not to be moved.

"I stay right here," he said to her.

There was the sound of a futile effort to turn the lock
of the inner door; then Barney's voice called out:

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 217

"What's the matter, Maggie? Open the door."

Maggie, still clutching Larry's resisting arm, stood
gasping in wide-eyed consternation.

"Open the door for them, Maggie," Larry whispered.

"I'll not do it!" she whispered back.

"Open it, or I will," he ordered.

Their gazes held a moment longer while Barney
rattled at the lock. Then slowly, falteringly, her amazed
eyes over her shoulder upon him, Maggie crossed and un-
locked the door. Barney entered, Old Jimmie just be-
hind him.

" I say, Maggie, what was the big idea in keeping us — "
he was beginning in a grumbling tone, when he saw
Larry just beyond her. His complaint broke off in mid-
breath ; he stopped short and his dark face twitched with
his surprise.

"Larry Brainard!" he finally exclaimed. Old Jimmie,
suddenly tense, blinked and said nothing.

"Hello, Barney; hello, Jimmie," Larry greeted his
former allies, putting on an air of geniality. "Been a
long time since we three met. Don't stand there in the
door. Come right in."

Barney was keen enough to see, though Larry's atti-
tude was careless and his tone light, that his eyes were
bright and hard. Barney moved forward a couple of
paces, alert for anything, and Old Jimmie followed.
Maggie looked on at the three men, her girlish figure taut
and hardly breathing.

"Did n't know you were in New York," said Barney.

"Well, here I am all right," returned Larry with his
menacing cheerfulness.

By now Barney had recovered from his first surprise.
He felt it time to assert his supremacy.

"How do you come to be here with Maggie?" he de-
manded abruptly.

"Happened to catch sight of her on the street to-day.

218 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Trailed her here to the Grantham, and to-night I just
dropped in."

Barney's tone grew more authoritative, more ugly.
"We told you long ago we were through with you. So
why did you come here?"

"That's easy answered, Barney. The last time we
were all together, you 'd come to take Maggie away. This
is that same scene reproduced — only this time / 've
come to take Maggie away."

"What's that?" snapped Barney.

Larry's voice threw off its assumed geniality, and be-
came drivingly hard. "And to get Maggie to come, I 've
been telling her the kind of a bird you are, Barney
Palmer! Oh, I've got the straight dope on you! I've
been telling her how you framed me, and were able to
frame me because you are Chief Barlow's stool."

Barney went as near white as it was possible for him
to become, and his mouth sagged. "What — what — "
he stammered.

"I've been telling her that you are the one who really
squealed on Red Hannigan and Jack Rosenfeldt."

"You're a damned liar!" Barney burst out, and in-
stantly from beneath his left arm he whipped an auto-
matic which he thrust against Larry's stomach. "Take
that back, damn you, or I'll blow you straight to hell!"

"Barney! — Larry!" interjected Maggie in sickened
fright.

"This is nothing to worry over, Maggie," Larry said.
He looked back at Barney. "Oh, I knew you would
flash a gun on me at some stage of the game. But you 're
not going to shoot."

"You'll see, if you don't take that back!"

Larry realized that his hot blood had driven him into
an enterprise of daring, in which only bluff and the play-
ing of his highest cards could help him through.

"You don't think I was such a fool as to walk into this

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 219

place without taking precautions," he said contemptu-
ously. "You won't shoot, Barney, because since I knew
I might meet you and you'd pull a gun, I had myself
searched by two friends just before I came up here.
They'll testify I was not armed. They know you, and
know you so well that they'll be able to identify the
thing in your hand as your gun. So no matter what
Maggie and Jimmie may testify, the verdict will be cold-
blooded murder and the electric chair will be your
finish. And that's why I know you won't shoot. So
you might as well put the gun away."

Barney neither spoke nor moved.

"I've called your bluff, Barney," Larry said sharply.
"Put that gun away, or I'll take it from you!"

Barney's glare wavered. The pistol sank from its
position. With a lightning-swift motion Larry wrenched
it from Barney's hand.

"Guess I'd better have it, after all," he said, slipping
it into a pocket. "Keep you out of temptation."

And then in a subdued voice that was steely with
menace: " I'm too busy to attend to you now, Barney —
but, by God, I 'm going to square things with you for the
dirt you Ve done me, and I 'm going to show you up for a
stool and a squealer ! " He wheeled on Old Jimmie. "And
the only reason I'll be easy with you, Jimmie Carlisle, is
because you are Maggie's father — though you're the
rottenest thing as a father God ever let breathe!"

Old Jimmie shrank slightly before Larry's glower, and
his little eyes gleamed with the fear of a rat that is
cornered. But he said nothing.

Larry turned his back upon the two men. "We're
through with this bunch, Maggie. Put on a hat and a
wrap, and let's go. We can send for your things."

"No you don't, Maggie," snarled Barney, before
Maggie could speak.

Old Jimmie made his first positive motion since enter-

220 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

ing the room. He shifted quickly to Maggie's side and
seized her arm.

"You're my daughter, and you stay with me!" he
ordered. "I brought you up, and you do exactly what I
tell you to ! You 're not going with Larry — he 's lying
about Barney. You stay with me!"

"Come on, let's go, Maggie," repeated Larry.

"You stay with me!" repeated Jimmie.

Thus ordered and appealed to, Maggie was areel with
contradicting thoughts and impulses while the three men
awaited her action. In fact she had no clear thought at
all. She never knew later what determined her course at
this bewildered moment: perhaps it was partly a con-
tinuance of her doubt of Larry, perhaps partly once more
sheer momentum, perhaps her instinctive feeling that
her place was with the man she believed to be her father.

"Yes, I'll stay with you," she said to Old Jimmie.

"That's the signal for you to be on your way, Larry
Brainard!" Barney snapped at him triumphantly.

Larry realized, all of a sudden, that his coming here
was no more than a splendid gesture to which his anger
had excited him. Indeed there was nothing for him but
to be on his way.

"I've told you the truth, Maggie; and you'll be sorry
that you have not left — if not sorry soon, then sorry a
little later."

He turned to Barney with a last shot; he could not
leave the gloating Barney Palmer his unalloyed triumph.
"I told you I had the straight dope on you, Barney.
Here 's some more of it. I know exactly what your game
is, and I know exactly who your sucker is. We'll see if
you put it over — you squealer! Good-night, all."

With that Larry walked out. Old Jimmie regarded his
partner with suspicion.

"How about that, Barney — you being a stool and a
squealer?" he demanded.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 221

"I tell you it's all a lie — a damned lie!" cried Barney
with feverish emphasis.

"I hope it is!" breathed Old Jimmie.

This was a subject Barney wanted to get away from.
"Maggie," he demanded, "is what Larry Brainard said
about how he came here the truth? — his seeing you on
the street and then following you here?"

"How do I know where he first saw me?"

"But is to-night the first time you've seen him?"

"It is."

"Sure you haven't been seeing him?" demanded
Barney's quick jealousy.

"I have not."

"Did he tell you where he came from? — where he
hangs out?"

"No."

Old Jimmie interrupted this cross-examination.

"You're wasting good time asking these questions.
Barney, do you realize the cold fact that it's not a good
thing for you, nor for us, for Larry Brainard to be back
in New York, floating around as he pleases?"

" I should say not ! " Barney saw he was facing a sudden
crisis, and in the need for quick action he spoke without
thought of Maggie. "We've got to look after him at
once!"

"Tell the bunch he's back, and let them take care of
him?" suggested Old Jimmie.

Barney considered rapidly. If Larry knew of his ar-
rangement with the police, then perhaps his secret was
beginning to leak through to others. He decided that
for the present it would be wiser to keep from these old
friends and allies.

"Not the bunch — the police!" he said inspiredly.
"They're after him, anyhow, and are sore. All we've
got to do is slip them word — they'll do the rest!" And
then with the sharper emphasis of an immediate plan:

222 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"We don't want to lose a minute. I know where Gavegan
hangs out at this time of night. Come on!"

With a bare "Good-night" to Maggie the two men
hurried forth on their pressing mission. Left to herself,
Maggie sank into a chair and wildly considered the
many elements of this new situation. Presently two
thoughts emerged to dominance: Whether Larry was
right or wrong, he had risked coming out of his safety for
her sake — perhaps had risked all he had won for her
sake. And now the police were to be set after him, with
that Gavegan heading the pack.

Perhaps the further thinking Maggie did did not re-
sult in cool, mature wisdom — for her thoughts were the
operations of a panicky mind. Somehow she had to get
warning to Larry of this imminent police hunt ! Without
doubt Larry would return to Cedar Crest sometime that
night. Word should be sent to him there. A letter was
too uncertain in such a crisis. Of course she had an
invitation to go to Cedar Crest the following afternoon,
and she might warn him then — but that might be too
late. She dared not telephone or telegraph — for that
might somehow direct dangerous attention to the exact
spot where Larry was hidden. Also she had an instinct,
operating unconsciously long before she had any thought
of what she was eventually to do, not to let Barney or
Old Jimmie find out, or even guess, that she had warned
Larry — not yet.

There seemed nothing that she herself could do. Then
she thought of the Duchess. That was the way out! The
Duchess would know some way in which to get Larry
word.

Five minutes later, in her plainest suit and hat, Maggie
in a taxicab was rolling down toward the Duchess's —
from where, only a few months back, she had started
forth upon her great career.

CHILDREN, OF THE WHIRLWIND 223

CHAPTER XXVIII

OLD JIMMIE did not like meeting the police any oftener
than a meeting was forced upon him, and so he slipped
away and allowed Barney Palmer to undertake alone
the business of settling Larry. Barney found Gavegan
exactly where he had counted: lingering over his late
dinner in the cafe of a famous Broadway restaurant — a
favorite with some of the detectives and higher officials of
the Police Department — in which cafe, in happier days
now deeply mourned, Gavegan had had all the exhila-
ration he wanted to drink at the standing invitation of the
proprietor, and where even yet on occasion a bit of the
old exhilaration was brought to Gavegan's table in a cup
or served him in a room above to which he had had
whispered instructions to retire. The proprietor had in
the old days liked to stand well with the police; and
though his bar was now devoted to legal drinks — or at
least obliging Federal officers reported it to be — he still
liked to stand well with the police.

Gavegan was at a table with a minor producer of
musical shows, to whom Barney had been of occasional
service in securing the predominant essential of such
music — namely, shapely young women. Barney nodded
to Gavegan, chatted for a few minutes with his musical-
comedy friend, during which he gave Gavegan a signal,
then crossed to the once-crowded bar, now sunk to iso-
lation and the lowly estate of soft drinks, and ordered a
ginger ale. Not until then did he notice Barlow, chief
of the Detective Bureau, at a corner table. Barney gave
no sign of recognition, and Barlow, after a casual glance
at him, returned to his food.

Barney, in solitude at one end of the bar, slowly sipped
with a sort of indignation against his kickless purchase.
Presently Gavegan was beside him, having most con-

224 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

vincing ill-luck in his attempts to light his cigar from a
box of splintering safety matches which stood at that
end of the bar.

"Well, what is it?" Gavegan whispered out of that
corner of his mouth which was not occupied by his cigar.
He did not look at Barney.

"Any clue to Larry Brainard yet?" Barney whispered
also out of a corner of his mouth, glass at his lips. Like-
wise he seemed not to notice the man beside him.

"Naw! Still out West somewhere. Them Chicago
bums could n't catch a crook if he walked along State
Street with a sign-board on him!"

"Saw Larry Brainard to-night."

Gavegan had difficulty in maintaining his attitude of
non-awareness of his bar-mate.

"Where?"

"Right here in New York."

"What! Where 'd you see him?"

"Coming out of the Grantham."

"When?"

"Fifteen minutes ago."

"Know where he went to? — where he hangs out? —
know anything else?"

"That 's everything. Thought I 'd better slip it to you
as quick as I could."

"This time that bird '11 not get away!" growled
Gavegan, still in a whisper. "Twenty-four hours and
he '11 be in the cooler!"

Finally Gavegan managed to get a flame from one of
those irritatingly splintery Swedish matches made in
Japan. Cigar alight he walked over to Barlow's table.
He conversed with his Chief a moment or two, then went
out. After a minute Barney saw Chief Barlow crossing
toward the bar. Barney seemed not to notice this move-
ment. Barlow likewise paused beside him to light a
cigar; and from the side of the Chief's mouth there issued:

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 225

"Room 613."

Barlow passed on. Presently Barney finished the dreary
drudgery of drink and sauntered out. Five minutes later,
having exercised the proper caution, he was in Room 613,
and the door was locked.

"What's this dope you just handed Gavegan about
Larry Brainard?" demanded Barlow.

Barney gave his information again, but this time
more fully. Of course he omitted all mention of Maggie
and the enterprise which Larry had sought to interrupt;
it was part of the tacit understanding between these two
that Barlow should have no knowledge of Barney's pro-
fessional doings, unless such knowledge should be forced
upon him by events or people too strong to be ignored.

"Did Brainard drop any clue that might give us a
lead as to where he's hiding out?"

Barney remembered something Larry had said half an
hour before, which he had considered mere boasting. " He
said he knew I had some game on, and he said he knew
who the sucker was I was planning to trim."

"Did he say who the sucker was?"

"No."

"If Larry Brainard really did know, then who would
he be having in mind?"

Barney hesitated; but he perceived that this was a
question which had to be answered. "Young Dick
Sherwood, of the swell Sherwood family — you know."

Barlow did not pursue the subject. According to his
arrangement with Barney, the latter's private activities
were none of his business.

"I'll get busy with the drag-net; we'll land Brainard
this time," said Barlow. And then with a grim look at
Barney: "But Larry Brainard 's not what I got you up
here to talk about, Palmer. I wanted to talk about two
words to you — and say 'em to you right between your
eyes."

226 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"Go ahead, Chief."

"First, you ain't been worth a damn to me for several
months. You Ve given me no value received for me keep-
ing my men off of you. You have n't turned up a single
thing."

"Come, now, Chief — you're forgetting about Red
Hannigan and Jack Rosenfeldt."

"Chicken feed! They're out on bail, and when their
cases come up, they'll beat them! Besides, you didn't
give me that tip to help me; you gave it to me so that
you could fix things to put Larry Brainard in bad with
all his old friends. You did that to help yourself. Shut
up! Don't try to deny it. I know!"

Barney did not attempt denial. Barlow went on:

"And the second thing I want to tell you, and tell you
hard, is this: You gotta turn in some business! The easy
way you Ve been going makes it look like you Ve forgot
I Ve got hold of you where the hair's long. Young man,
you'd better remember that I've got you cold for that
Gregory stock business — you and Old Jimmie Carlisle.
Got all the papers in a safety-deposit vault, and got three
witnesses doing stretches in Sing Sing. Keep on telling
yourself all that ! and keep on telling yourself that, if you
don't come across, some day soon I '11 suddenly discover
that you 're the guilty party in that Gregory affair, and
I '11 bring down those witnesses I Ve got cached in Sing
Sing."

Barney moved uneasily in his chair. He knew the
bargain he had made, and did not like to dwell upon the
conditions under which he was a licensed adventurer.

"No need to rag me like this, Chief," he protested.
"Sure I remember all you've said. And you're not going
to have cause to be sore much longer. There '11 be plenty
doing."

"See that there is! And see that you don't pull any
raw work. And see that you don't let your foot slip. For

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 227

if you do, you know what '11 happen to you. Now get
out!"

Barney got out, again protesting that he would not be
found failing. He was not greatly disturbed by what
Barlow had said. Every so often there had to be just
such sessions, and every so often Barlow had to let off
just such steam.

Barney's errand was done. The police of the city were
on Larry's trail and his share in the matter was and would
remain unknown. Thus far all was well. He had no
doubt of Larry's early capture, now that he was back in
New York, and now that the whole police force had been
promptly warned and were hotly after him, and now that
all avenues of exit would instantly be, in fact by this
time were, under surveillance and closed against him —
and now that every refuge of the criminal world was
only a trap for him. No, there was n't a doubt of Larry's
early capture. There could n't be. And once Larry was
locked up, things would be much better. Barlow would
see that Larry did n't talk undesirable things, or at least
that such talk was not heard. It was n't exactly pleasant
or safe having Larry at large, free to blurt out to the
wrong persons those things about Barney's being a stool
and a squealer.

Greatly comforted, though eager for news of the chase,
Barney started on his evening's routine of visiting the
gayer restaurants. Business is business, and a man suf-
fers when he neglects it. True, this Was a neat proposition
which he had in hand ; but that would soon be cleaned
up, and Businessman Barney desired to be all ready to
move forward into further enterprises.

In the meanwhile there had been a session between
Maggie and the Duchess. At about the time Barney had
whispered his unlipped news to Gavegan, Maggie, breath-
less with her frantic haste though she had made the

228 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

journey in a taxicab, entered the familiar room behind
the pawnshop.

"Good-evening, Maggie." The voice was casual, in-
different, though at that moment, there was no person
that the Duchess, pondering her problems, more wished
to see. "Sit down. What's the matter?"

"The police know Larry is in New York and are after
him!"

"How do you know?"

Rapidly Maggie told of the happenings in her sitting-
room, and of Barney and Old Jimmie starting out to warn
Ga vegan. The Duchess heard every word, but most of
her faculties were concentrated upon a reexamination of
Maggie and upon those questions which had been trou-
bling her all evening and for these many days. Was there
good in Maggie? Was she justified in longer suppressing
the truth of Maggie's parentage?

"Why are you telling me all this?" the Duchess asked,
when Maggie had finished her rapid recital.

"Why! Is n't it plain? I want you to get warning to
Larry that the police are after him!"

"Why not do it yourself?"

"I'm going out where he is to-morrow, but that may
be too late."

Maggie gave her other reasons, such as they were. The
old woman's eyes never left Maggie's flushed face, and
yet never showed any interest.

"I thought you were tied up with Barney and Old
Jimmie," the Duchess commented. "Why are you going
against them in this, and trying to help Larry?"

"What's the difference why I'm doing it," Maggie
cried with feverish impatience, "so long as I 'm trying to
help him out of this!"

"Don't you realize," continued the calm old voice,
"that Larry must already know, as a matter of course,
that the police and all the old crowd are after him?"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 229

"Perhaps he does, and perhaps he doesn't. All the
same, he should know for certain ! The big point is, will
you get Larry word?"

A moment passed and the Duchess did not speak. In
fact this time she had not heard Maggie, so intent was
she in trying to look through Maggie's dark, eager eyes
to the very core of Maggie's being.

"Will you get Larry word?" Maggie repeated impa-
tiently.

The Duchess came out of her study. There was a
sudden thrill within her, but it did not show in her voice.

"Yes."

"At once?"

" As soon as telling him will do any good. And now you
better hurry back to your hotel, if you don't want Barney
and Old Jimmie to suspect what you've been up to.
Though why you still want to hang on to that pair, know-
ing what they are, is more than I can guess."

She stood up. "Wait a minute," she said as Maggie
started for the door. Maggie turned back, and for an-
other moment the Duchess silently peered deep into Mag-
gie's eyes. Then she said shortly, almost sharply: "At
your age I was twice as pretty as you are — and twice as
clever — and I played much the same game. Look what
I got out of life! . . . Good-night." And abruptly the
Duchess wheeled about and mounted the stairway.

Twenty minutes later Maggie was back at the Gran-
tham, her absence unobserved. Though palpitant over
Larry's fate, she had the satisfaction of having achieved
with Larry's grandmother what she had set forth to
achieve. She did not know, could not know, that what
she had accepted as her achievement was inconsequen-
tial compared to what had actually been achieved by her
spontaneous appearance before the troubled Duchess.

23o CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

CHAPTER XXIX

As the Duchess had gazed into Maggie's excited, im-
ploring eyes, it had been borne in upon her carefully judg-
ing and painfully hesitant mind that there was better
than a fifty per cent chance that Larry was right in his
estimate of Maggie; that Maggie's inclination toward
criminal adventure, her supreme self-confidence, all her
bravado, were but the superficial though strong tenden-
cies developed by her unfortunate environment; that
within that cynical, worldly shell there were the vital and
plastic makings of a real woman.

And so the long-troubled Duchess, who to her acquaint-
ances had always seemed as unemotional as the dust-
coated, moth-eaten parrot which stood in mummified
aloofness upon her safe, had made a momentous decision
that had sent through her old veins the thrilling sap of a
great crisis, a great suspense. She had tried to guide des-
tiny. She was now through with such endeavor. She
had no right, because of her love for Larry, to withhold
longer the facts of Maggie's parentage. She was now
going to tell the truth, and let events work out as they
would.

But the events — what were they going to be?

For a moment the Duchess had been impelled to tell
the truth straight out to Maggie. But she had caught
herself in time. This whole affair was Larry's affair, and
the truth belonged to him to be used as he saw fit. So
when she had told Maggie that she would get word to
Larry, it was this truth which she had had in mind, and
only in a very minor way the news which Maggie had
brought.

This was, of course, such a truth as could be safely com-
municated only by word of mouth. The Duchess realized
that Larry no longer dared come to her, and that there-

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 231
*

fore she must manage somehow to get to him. And get
to him without betraying his whereabouts.

There was little chance that the police would search her
place or greatly bother her. To the police mind, now that
Larry was aware he was known to be in New York, the
pawnshop would obviously be the last place in which he
would seek refuge or through which he would have deal-
ings. Nevertheless, the Duchess deemed it wise to lose
no moment and to neglect no possible caution. Therefore,
while Barney was still with Chief Barlow and before the
general order regarding Larry had more than reached the
various police stations, the Duchess, in cape, hat, and
veil, was out of her house. A block up the street lived the
owner of two or three taxicabs, concerning whom the
Duchess, who was almost omniscient in her own world,
knew much that the said owner ardently desired should be
known no further. A few sentences with this gentleman,
and fifteen minutes later, huddled back in the darkened
corner of a taxicab, she rolled over the Queensboro Bridge
out upon Long Island on her mission of releasing a fact
whose effect she could not foresee.

An hour and a half after that Larry was leading her to
a bench in the scented darkness of the Sherwoods' lawn.
She had telephoned "Mr. Brandon" from a drug-store
booth in Flushing, and Larry had been waiting for her
near the entrance to Cedar Crest.

"What brought you out here like this, grandmother?"
Larry whispered in amazement as he sat down beside her.

"To tell you that the police are after you," she whis-
pered back.

' I knew that already."

'Yes, I knew that you would."

'But how did you find out?"

'Maggie told me."

'Maggie!"

'She came down to see me, told me what had just

232 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

happened at her place, told me about Barney hurrying
away to slip the news to that Gavegan, and begged me to
warn you at once. She was terribly nervous and wrought
up."

"Maggie did that!" he breathed. His heart leaped at
her unexpected concern for him. "Maggie did that!"
And then: "There wasn't any need; she should have
known that I would know."

" It was rather foolish in a way — but Maggie was too
excited to use cool reason."

His grandmother did not speak for a moment. "Her
losing her head and coming shows that she cares for you,
Larry."

He could make no response. This was indeed the
clearest evidence Maggie had yet given that possibly she
might care.

"Maggie may have lost her head in her excitement,"
he managed to say; "but, grandmother, there was no
reason for you to lose your head so far as to come away
out here to tell me about the police."

"I didn't come away out here to tell you about the
police," she replied. "1 came to tell you something else."

"Yes?"

"You're sure you really care for Maggie?"

"I told you that when I was down to see you this
evening."

Though the Duchess had decided, the desire to pro-
tect Larry remained tenaciously in her and made it hard
for her jealous love to take a risk. "You 're sure she might
turn out all right — that is, under better influences?"

" I 'm sure, grandmother." He recalled how a few hours
earlier at the Grantham the demand of Old Jimmie that
she remain with him had seemed the force that had con-
trolled her decision. "There would be no doubt of it if it
were not for Old Jimmie, and the people he's kept her
among, and the ideas he 's been feeding her since she was

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 233

a baby. I don't think she has any love for her father; but
they say blood is mighty thick, and I guess with her
it's just the usual instinct of a child to stand with her
father and do what he says. Yes, if she were not held
back and held down by having Old Jimmie for a father,
I 'm sure she'd be all right."

The Duchess felt that the moment had now arrived for
her to unloose her secret. But despite her fixed purpose to
tell, her words had to be forced out, and were halting,
bald.

'Jimmie Carlisle — is not her father."

'What's that?" exclaimed Larry.

'Not so loud. I said Jimmie Carlisle is not her father."

'Grandmother!"

'Her father is Joe Ellison."

'Grandmother!" He caught her hands. "Why —
why — " But for a moment his utter dumbfoundment
paralyzed his speech. "You're — you're sure of that?"
he finally got out.

"Yes." She went on and told of how her suspicion
had been aroused, of her interview with Joe Ellison which
had transmuted suspicion into certainty, of her theory of
the motives which had actuated Jimmie Carlisle in so
perverting the directions of the man who had held Jimmie
as his most trusted friend.

Larry was fairly stunned by this recital of what had
been done. And he was further stunned as he realized
the fullness of what now seemed to be the circumstances.
"God, think of it!" he breathed. "Maggie trying to
be a great adventuress because she was brought up that
way, because she thinks her father wants her to be that
— and having never a guess of the truth ! And Joe Ellison
believing that his daughter is a nice, simple girl, happily
ignorant of the life he tried to shield her from — and
having never a guess of the truth ! What a situation ! And
if they should ever find out — "

234 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

He broke off, appalled by the power and magnitude of
what he vaguely saw. Presently he said in a numbed,
awed voice:

"They should know the truth. But how are they to
find out?"

"I'm leaving all that to you, Larry. Maggie and Joe
Ellison are your affair. It's up to you to decide what you
think best to do."

Larry was silent for several moments. "You've known
this for some time, grandmother?"

"For several weeks."

"Why did n't you tell me before?"

"I was afraid it might somehow bring you closer to
Maggie, and I did n't want that," she answered honestly.
"Now I think a little better of Maggie. And you've
proved to me I can trust a great deal more to your judg-
ment. Yes, I guess that's the chief reason I 've come out
here to tell you this: you've proved to me I've got to
respect your judgment. And so whatever you may do —
about Maggie or anything else — will be all right with me."

She did not wait for a response, but stood up. Her
voice which had been shot through with emotion these
last few minutes was now that flat, mechanical monotone
to which the habitants of her little street were accus-
tomed.

"I must be getting back to the city. Good-night."

He started to accompany her to her car, but she for-
bade him, saying that it would not help matters to have
him seen and possibly recognized by the taxi cab driver;
and so she went out of the grounds alone. Within another
hour and a half she was set down unobserved in a dim
side street in Brooklyn. Thence she made her way on foot
to the Subway and rode home. If the police had noticed
her absence and should question her, she could refuse to
answer, or say that she had been visiting late with a
friend in Brooklyn.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 235

Larry sat long out in the night after his grandmother
had left him. What should he do with this amazing
information placed at his disposal? Tell Joe Ellison? Or
tell Maggie? Or tell both? Or himself try to meet Jimmie
Carlisle and pay that traitor to Joe Ellison and that mal-
former of Maggie the coin he had earned?

But for hours the situation itself was still too bewilder-
ing in its many phases for Larry to give concentrated
thought to what should be its attempted solution. Not
until dawn was beginning to awaken dully, as with a pro-
tracted yawn, out of the shadowy Sound, was he able
really to hold his mind with clearness upon the problem of
what use he should make of these facts of which he had
been appointed guardian. He decided against telling Joe
Ellison — at least he would not tell him yet. He recalled
the rumors of Joe Ellison's repressed volcano of a tem-
per; if Joe Ellison should learn how he had been de-
frauded, all the man's vital forces would be instantly
transformed into destructive, vengeful rage that would
spare no one and count no cost. The result would doubt-
less be tragedy, with no one greatly served, and with Joe
very likely back hi prison. If he himself should go out to
give Old Jimmie his deserts, his action would be just
good powder wasted — it likewise would serve no con-
structive purpose. Larry realized that it is only human
nature for a wronged man to wish for and attempt revenge ;
but that in the economy of life revenge has no value, serves
no purpose; that it usually only makes a bad situation
worse.

A tremendous wrong had been done here, a wrong which
showed a malignant, cunning, patient mind. But as
Larry finally saw the matter, the point for first considera-
tion was not the valueless satisfaction of making the guilty
man suffer, but was to try to restore to the victims some
part of those precious things of which they had been un-
consciously robbed.

236 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

And then Larry had what seemed to him an inspira-
tion : his inspiration being only a sane thought, and what
the Duchess, though she had not pointed the way to him,
had thought he would do. Maggie was the important
person in this situation! — Maggie whose life was just
beginning, and whose nature he still believed to be plas-
tic! Not Joe Ellison or Old Jimmie Carlisle, who had al-
most lived out their lives and whose natures were now
settled into what they would be until the end. By play-
ing upon the finer elements in Maggie's character he had
all but succeeded in rousing to dominance that best na-
ture which existed within her. He would privately tell
Maggie the truth, and tell only her and leave the using
of that knowledge to her alone. The shock of that
knowledge, the effect of its revelations upon her, to-
gether with the responsibility of what she should do with
this information, might be just the final forces necessary
to make Maggie break away from all that she had been
and swing over to all that he believed she might be.

Yes, that was the thing to do! And he would do it
within the next twelve hours; for Dick had told him that
Maggie was coming out again to Cedar Crest on the af-
ternoon of the day which was now rousing from its sleep.
That is, he would do it if the police or the allies of his one-
time friends did not locate him before Maggie came. But
of that he had no serious fear; he knew he had made a
clean get-away from the Grantham, and that the shrewd
Duchess had left no scent by which those bloodhounds of
the Police Department could trail her.

Larry did not even try to sleep ; he knew it would be of
no avail. Back in his own room he sat going over the situ-
ation, and his decision. He tingled with the sense of the
tremendous power which had been delivered into his
hands. Yes, tremendous! But what were going to be
Maggie's reactions the moment he told her? — just what
would be her course after she knew the truth?

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 237

CHAPTER XXX

LARRY undressed, had a bath, shaved, dressed again, and
started to work. But that day the most Larry did was ab-
stractedly going through the motions of work. He was
completely filled with the situation and its many questions,
and with the suspense of waiting for Maggie to come and
of how he was going to manage to see her privately.

The meeting, however, proved no difficulty; for Maggie,
who arrived at four, had come primarily on Larry's ac-
count and she herself maneuvered the encounter. While
they were on the piazza, Dick having gone into the house
for a fresh supply of cigarettes, and Miss Sherwood being
in an animated discussion with Hunt, Maggie said :

"Miss Sherwood, I've never had a real look down at
the Sound from the edge of your bluff. Do you mind if
Mr. Brandon shows me?"

"Not at all. Tea won't be served for half an hour, so
take your time. Have Mr. Brandon show you the view
from just the other side of that old rose-bench; that's the
best view."

They walked away chatting mechanically until they
were in a garden seat behind the rose-bench. The rose-
bench was a rather sorry affair, for it had been set out in
this exposed place by a former gardener who had for-
gotten that the direct winds from the Sound are malgra-
cious to roses. However, it screened the two, and was
far enough removed so that ordinary tones would not
carry to the house.

" Did your grandmother get you word about the police? "
Maggie asked with suppressed excitement as soon as they
were seated.

"Yes. She came out here about midnight."

"Then why, while you still had time, did n't you get
farther away from New York than this?"

238 ... CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"If I'm to be caught, I'm to be caught; in the mean-
time, this is as safe a place as any other for me. Besides,
I wanted to have at least one more talk with you —
after something new grandmother told me about you."

"Something new about me?" echoed Maggie, startled
by his grave tone. "What?"

"About your father," he said, watching closely for the
effect upon her of his revelations.

"What about my father? What's he been doing that
I don't know about?"

"You do not know a single thing that your father has
done."

"What!"

"Because you do not know who your father is."

"What!" she gasped.

"Listen, Maggie. What I'm going to tell you may
seem unbelievable, but you've got to believe it, because
it's the truth. I can see that you have proofs if you want
proofs. But you can accept what I tell you as absolute
facts. You are by birth a very different person from
what you believe yourself. Your father is not Jimmie
Carlisle. And your mother — "

"Larry!" She tensely gripped his arm.

"Your mother was of a good family. I imagine some-
thing like Miss Sherwood's kind — though not so rich
and not having such social standing. She died when you
were born. She never knew what your father's business
actually was; he passed for a country gentleman. He was
about the smoothest and biggest crook of his time, and
a straight crook if there is such a thing."

"Larry!" she breathed.

"He kept this gentleman-farmer side of his life and his
marriage entirely hidden from his crook acquaintances;
that is, from all except one whom he trusted as his most
loyal friend. Before you were old enough to remember, he
was tripped up and sent away on a twenty-year sentence."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 239

"And he's — he's still in prison?" whispered Maggie.

Larry did not heed the interruption. "He had de-
veloped the highest kind of ambition for you. He wanted
you to grow up a fine simple woman like your mother —
something like Miss Sherwood. He did not want you
ever to know the sort of life he had known ; and he did not
want you to be handicapped by the knowledge that you
had a crook for a father. He still had intact your mother's
fortune, a small one, but an honest one. So he put you
and the money in the hands of his trusted friend, with
the instructions that you were to be brought up as the
girls of the nicest families are brought up, and believing
yourself an orphan."

"That friend of his, Larry?" she whispered tensely.

"Jimmie Carlisle."

"O— oh!"

"I don't know what Jimmie Carlisle's motives were
for what he has done. Perhaps to get your money, per-
haps some grudge against your father, which he was
afraid to show while your father was free, for your father
was always his master. But Old Jimmie has brought you
up exactly contrary to the orders he received. If revenge
was Old Jimmie's motive, his cunning, cowardly brain
could not have conceived a more diabolical revenge, one
that would hurt your father more. Till a few years ago,
when word was sent to your father that Old Jimmie was
dead, Jimmie regularly wrote your father about the suc-
cess of his plan, about how splendidly you were developing
and getting on with the best people. And your father —
I knew him in prison — now believes you have grown up
into exactly the kind of young woman he planned."

"Larry!" she choked in a numbed voice. "Larry!"

"Your father is now as happy as it is possible for him
to be, for he has lived for years and still lives in the belief
that his great dream, the only big thing left for him to do,
has come to pass : that somewhere out in the world is his

24o CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

daughter, grown into a nice, simple, wholesome young
woman, with a clean, wholesome life before her. And
though she is the one thing in all the world to him, he
never intends to see her again for fear that his seeing her
might somehow result in an accident that would destroy her
happy ignorance. Maggie, can you conceive the tremen-
dous meaning to your father of what he believes he has
created? And can you conceive the tremendous difference
between the dream he lives upon, and the reality?"

She was white, staring, wilted. For once all the defi-
ance, self-confidence, bravado, melted out of her, and she
was just an appalled and frightened young girl.

After a moment she managed to repeat the question
Larry had ignored: "Is my real father — still in prison?"

"You'd like to see your real father?" he asked her.

"I think — I'd like to have a glimpse of him," she
breathed.

Larry, just before this, had noted Joe Ellison in his
blue overalls and wide straw hat cleaning out a bank of
young dahlias a distance up the bluff. He now took
Maggie's arm and guided her in that direction.

"See that man there working among the dahlias? —
the man who once brought you a bunch of roses? Joe
Ellison is his name. He's the man I've been talking
about — your father."

He felt her quivering under his hand for a moment,
and heard her breath come in swift, spasmodic pants.
He was wondering what was the effect upon her of this
climax of his revelation, when she whispered:

"Do you suppose — I can speak — to my father?"

"Of course. He likes all young women. And I told
you that he and I were close friends."

"Then — come on." She arose, clinging to him, and
drew him after her. Halfway to Joe she breathed: "You
please say something first. Anything."

He recognized this as the appeal of one whose faculties

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 241

were reeling. There had never been any attempt here
at Cedar Crest to conceal Joe Ellison's past, and in
Larry's case there had been only such concealment as
might help his evasion of his dangers. And so Larry
remarked as Joe Ellison took his wide hat off his white
hair and stood bareheaded before them:

"Joe, Miss Cameron knows who I really am, and about
my having been in Sing Sing; and I Ve just told her about
our having been friends there. Also I told her about your
having a daughter. It interested her and she asked me
if she could n't talk to you, so I brought her over."

Larry stood aside and tensely watched this meeting
between father and daughter. Joe bowed slightly, and
with a dignified grace that overalls and over fifteen years
of prison could not take from one who during his early
and middle manhood had been known as the perfection
of the finished gentleman. His gray eyes warmed with
appreciation of the young figure before him, just as Larry
had seen them grow bright watching the young figures
disporting in the Sound.

" It is very gracious for a young woman like you, Miss
Cameron," he said in a voice of grave courtesy, "to be
interested enough in an old man like me to want to talk
with him."

Maggie made the supreme effort of her life to keep her-
self in hand. "I wanted to talk to you because of some-
thing Mr. Brainard told me about — about your having
a daughter."

Larry felt that this was too sacred a scene for him to
intrude upon. "Would you mind excusing me," he said;
"there are some calculations I Ve got to rush out " — and
he returned to the bench on which they had been sitting
and pretended to busy himself over a pocket notebook.

While Larry had been speaking and moving away,
Maggie had swiftly been appraising her father. His gray
eyes were direct as against the furtiveness of Jimmie's;

242 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

his mouth had a firm kindliness as against the wrmkled
cunning of Jimmie's; his bearing was erect, self-possessed,
as against Jimmie's bent, shuffling carriage. Maggie felt
no swift-born daughter love for this stranger who was her
father. The turmoil of her discovery filled her too com-
pletely to admit a full-grown affection ; but she thrilled
with the sense of the vast difference between her supposed
father and this her real father.

In the meantime her father had spoken. Joe would
have been more reserved with men or with older women ;
but with this girl, so much the sort of girl he had long
dreamed about, his reserve vanished without resistance,
and in its place was a desire to talk to this beautiful
creature who came out of the world which the big white
house represented.

" I have a daughter, yes," he said. "But Larry — Mr.
Brainard perhaps I should say — has likely told you
all there is to tell."

"I'd like to hear it from you, please — if you don't
mind."

"There's really not much to tell," he said. "You know
what I was and what happened. When I went to prison
my daughter was too young to remember me — less than
two years old. I did n't want her ever to be drawn into
the sort of life that had been mine, or be the sort of
woman that a girl becomes who gets into that life. And I
did n't want her ever to have the stigma, and the handi-
cap, of her knowing and the world knowing that her
father was a convict. You can't understand it fully, Miss
Cameron, but perhaps you can understand a little how
disgraced you would feel, what a handicap it would be,
if your father were a convict. I had a good friend I could
trust. So I turned my daughter over to him, to be
brought up with no knowledge of my existence, and with
every reasonable advantage that a nice girl should have.
I guess that's all, Miss Cameron."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 243

"This friend — what was his name?"

" Carlisle — Jimmie Carlisle. But his name could never
have meant anything to you. Besides, he's dead now."

Maggie forced herself on. "Your plan — it turned out
all right? And you — you are happy?"

"Yes." In the sympathetic atmosphere which this
young girl's presence created for him, Joe's emotions
flowed into words more freely than ever before in the
company of a human being. Though he was answering
her, what he was really doing was rather just letting his
heart use its long-silent voice, speak its exultant dream
and belief.

' "Somewhere out in the world — I don't know where,
and I don't want to know — my daughter has now grown
into a wholesome, splendid young woman!" he said in a
vibrant voice. Brooding in solitude so long upon his
careful plan that he believed could not fail, had made the
keen Joe Ellison less suspicious concerning it than he
otherwise would have been — perhaps had made him a
bit daffy on this one subject. " I have saved my daughter
from all the grime she might have known, and which
might have soiled her, and even pulled her down if I
had n't thought out in good time my plan to protect her.
And of course I am happy!" he exulted. "I have done
the best thing that it was possible for me to do, the thing
which I wanted most to do ! Instead of what she might
have been, I have as a daughter just such a nice girl as
you are — just about your own age — though, of course,
she hasn't your money, your social position, and nat-
urally not quite the advantages you have had. Of course
I'm happy!"

"You're — you're sure she's all that?"

Again his words were as much a statement aloud to
himself of his constant dream as they were a direct
answer to Maggie. "Of course! There was enough
money — the plan was in the hands of a friend who knew

244 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

how to handle such a thing — she 's never known any-
thing but the very best surroundings — and until she was
fourteen I had regular reports on how wonderfully she was
progressing. You see my friend had had her legally
adopted by a splendid family, so there 's no doubt about
everything being for the best."

"And you" — Maggie drove herself on — "don't you
ever want to see her?"

"Of course I do. But at the very beginning I fixed
things so I could not; so that I would not even know
where she is. Removed temptation from myself, you see.
Don't you see the possible results if I should try to see her?
.Something might happen that would bring out the truth,
and that would ruin her happiness, her career. Don't you
see?"

His gray eyes, bright with his great dream, were fixed
intently upon Maggie; and yet she felt that they were
gazing far beyond her at some other girl ... at his girl.

"I — I — " she gulped and swayed and would have
fallen if he had not been quick to catch her arm.

"You are sick, Miss?" he asked anxiously.

"I — I have been," she stammered, trying to regain
control of her faculties. " It's — it's that — and my not
eating — and standing in this hot sun. Thank you very
much for what you Ve told me. I 'd — I 'd better be
getting back."

"I'll help you." And very gently, with a firm hand
under one arm, he escorted her to the bench where Larry
sat scribbling nothings. He then raised his hat and re-
turned to his dahlias.

"Well?" queried Larry when they were alone.

" I can't stand it to stay here and talk to these people,"
she replied in an agonized whisper. "I must get away
from here quick, so that I can think."

"May I come with you?"

"No, Larry — I must be alone. Please, Larry, please

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 245

get into the house, and manage to fake a telephone
message for me, calling me back to New York at once."

"All right." And Larry hurried away. She sat, pale,
breathing rapidly, her whole being clenched, staring fix-
edly out at the Sound. Five minutes later Larry was back.

"It's all arranged, Maggie. I've told the people;
they're sorry you've got to go. And Dick is getting his
car ready."

She turned her eyes upon him. He had never seen in
them such a look. They were feverish, with a dazed,
affrighted horror. She clutched his arm.

"You must promise never to tell my father about me!"

"I won't. Unless I have to."

"But you must not! Never!" she cried desperately.
" He thinks I 'm — Oh, don't you understand? If he were
to learn what I really am, it would kill him. He must
keep his dream. For his sake he must never find out, he
must keep on thinking of me just the same. Now, you
understand?"

Larry slowly nodded.

Her next words were dully vibrant with stricken awe.
"And it means that I can never have him for my father!
Never! And I think — I'd — I'd like him for a father!
Don't you see?"

Again Larry nodded. In this entirely new phase of her,
a white-faced, stricken, shivering girl, Larry felt a poign-
ant sympathy for her the like of which had never tingled
through him in her conquering moods. Indeed Maggie's
situation was opening out into great human problems
such as neither he nor any one else had ever foreseen !

"There comes Dick," she whispered. "I must do my
best to hold myself together. Good-bye, Larry."

A minute later, Larry just behind her, she was crossing
the lawn on Dick's arm, explaining her weakness and
pallor by the sudden dizziness which had come upon her
in consequence of not eating and of being in the hot sun.

B46 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

CHAPTER XXXI

LARRY was far more deeply moved this time when Maggie
drove away with Dick than on that former occasion when
he had tried to play with adroitness upon her psycholog-
ical reactions. Now he knew that her very world was
shaken; that her soul was stunned and reeling; that she
was fighting with all her strength for a brief outward
composure.

He had loved her for months, but he had never so loved
her as in this hour when all her artificial defenses had been
battered down and she had been just a bewildered, ago-
nized girl, with just the emotions and first thoughts that
any other normal girl would have had under the same
circumstances. His great desire had been to be with her,
to comfort her, help her; but he realized that she had
been correct in her instinct to be by herself for a while, to
try to comprehend it all, to try to think her way out.

When Maggie was out of sight he excused himself from
having tea, left Hunt and Miss Sherwood upon the
veranda, and sought his study. But though he had
neglected his work the whole day, he now gave it no
attention. He sat at his desk and thought of Maggie:
tried to think of what she was going to do. Her situation
was so complicated with big elements which she would
have to handle that he could not foretell just what her
course would be. It was a terrific situation for a young
woman, who was after all just a very young girl, to face
alone. But there was nothing for him but to wait for
news from her. And she had not said even that she would
ever let him hear.

While he considered these matters he had risen and
paced the room. Once he had paused at a French window
which opened upon a side veranda, and had seen below
him a few yards away Joe Ellison, whose interest in his

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 247

flowers had established his workday from sunrise to sun-
set. Joe Ellison had been pulling tiny weeds that were dar-
ing to attempt to get a start in a rose-garden. Larry's
mind had halted a moment upon Joe. Here at least was a
contented man: one who, no matter what happened,
would remain in ignorance of possibly great events which
would intimately concern him. Then Larry had left the
window and had returned to his thoughts of Maggie.

But Larry's thoughts were not to remain exclusively
with Maggie for long. Shortly after six Judkins entered and
announced that a man was at the door with a message.
The man had refused to come in, saying he was only a
messenger and was in a hurry; and had refused to give
Judkins the message, saying that it was verbal. Think-
ing that some word had come from his grandmother, or
possibly even from Maggie, Larry went out upon the ve-
randa. Waiting for him was a nondescript man he did not
know.

"Mr. Brandon, sir?" asked the man.

"Yes. You have a message for me?"

Before the man could reply, there came a shout from the
shrubbery beyond the drive :

"Grab him, Smith! He's the man!"

Instantly Smith's steely arms were about Larry, pin-
ning his elbows to his sides, and a man broke from the
shrubbery and hurried toward the house. Instinctively
Larry started to struggle, but he ceased as he recognized
the man coming up the steps. It was Gavegan. Larry
realized that he had been shrewdly trapped, that resist-
ance would serve no end, and the next moment handcuffs
were upon his wrists.

"Well, Brainard," gloated Gavegan, "we've landed
you at last!"

"So it seems, Gavegan."

"You thought you was damned clever, but I guess you
know now you ain't one, two, three!"

248 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"Oh, I knew how clever you are, Gavegan," Larry
responded dryly, "and that you'd get me sooner or later
if I hung around."

As a matter of fact Larry's capture, which was as un-
spectacular as his escape had been strenuous, was the
consequence of no cleverness at all. Larry had said to
Barney Palmer the night before that he knew who Bar-
ney's sucker was; and Barney had passed this information
along to Chief Barlow. "Follow every clue; luck may be
with you and one of the clues may turn up what you want " :
— this is in substance an unwritten rule of routine proce-
dure which effects those magnificent police solutions
which are presented as more mysterious than the original
mystery — for it is well for the public to believe that its
police officers are unfailingly more clever than its criminals.
Barlow had done some routine thinking: if Larry Brainard
knew Dick Sherwood was the sucker, then watching Dick
Sherwood might possibly reveal the whereabouts of Larry
Brainard. Barlow had passed this tip along to Gavegan.
Gavegan had grumbled to himself that it was only a
thousand to one shot; but luck had been with him, and his
long shot had won.

Miss Sherwood, Hunt behind her, had been drawn by
the sound of voices around to the side of the veranda
where stood the four men. "What are you doing?" she
now sharply demanded of Gavegan.

"Don't like to make any unpleasant scene, Miss Sher-
wood, but I've gotta tell you that this so-called Brandon
is a well-known crook." Gavegan enjoyed few things
more than astounding people with unpleasant facts.
" His real name is Brainard ; he 's done time, and now he 's
wanted by the New York police for a tough job he pulled."

"I knew all that long ago," said Miss Sherwood.

"Eh — what?" stammered Gavegan.

" Mr. Brainard told me all that the first time I saw him."

"Hello, Gavegan," said Hunt, stepping forward.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 249

"Well, I'll be — if you ain't that crazy — " Again the
ability to express himself coherently and with restraint
failed Ga vegan. "If you ain't that painter that lived
down at the Duchess's!"

"Right, Ga vegan — as a detective always should be.
And Larry Brainard was then, and is now, my friend."

Miss Sherwood again spoke up sharply. "Mr. Gavegan
— if that is your name — you will please take those foolish
things off Mr. Brainard's wrists."

Gavegan had been cheated out of creating a sensation.
That discomfiture perhaps made him even more dogged
than he was by nature.

"Sorry, Miss, but he's charged with having committed
a crime and is a fugitive from justice, and I can't."

"I'll be his security. Take them off."

"Sorry to refuse you again, Miss. But he 's a dangerous
man — got away once before. My orders is to take no
risks that'll give him another chance for a get-away."

Miss Sherwood turned to Larry. " I '11 go into town with
you, and so will Mr. Hunt. I '11 see that you get bail and a
good lawyer."

"Thank you, Miss Sherwood," Larry said. " Gavegan,
I guess we 're ready to start."

"Not just yet, Brainard. Sorry, Miss Sherwood, but
we've got a search warrant for your place. We just want
to have a look at the room Brainard used. No telling what
kind of crooked stuff he's been up to. And to make the
search warrant O.K. I had it issued in this county and
brought along a county officer to serve it. Show it to the
lady, Smith."

" I have no desire to see it, Mr. Gavegan. I have more
interest in watching you while you go through my things."
And giving Gavegan a look which made an unaccustomed
flush run up that officer's thick neck and redden his square
face, she led the way into Larry's study. "This is the
room where Mr. Brainard works," she said. "Through

250 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

that door is his bedroom. Everything here except his
clothing is my property. I shall hold you rigidly responsi-
ble for any disorder you may create or any damage you
may do. Now you may go ahead."

"Let's have all your keys, Brainard," Ga vegan choked
out.

Larry handed them over. With Miss Sherwood, Hunt,
and Larry looking silently on, the two men began their
examination. They began with the papers on Larry's
desk and in its drawers; and in all his life Gavegan had
not been so considerate in a search as he now was with
Miss Sherwood's blue eyes coldly upon him. They un-
locked cabinets, scrutinized their contents, shook out
books, examined the backs of pictures, took up rugs; then
passed into Larry's bedroom. Miss Sherwood made no
move to follow the officers into that more ultimate apart-
ment, and the other two watchers remained with her.

A minute passed. Then Gavegan reentered, a puzzled,
half-triumphant look on his red face, holding out a square
of paint-covered canvas.

"Found this thing in Brainard's chiffonier. What the
he — I mean what's it doing out here?"

There was not an instant's doubt as to what the thing
was. Larry started, and Hunt started, and Miss Sherwood
started. But it was Miss Sherwood who first spoke.

"Why, it's a portrait of Miss Cameron, in costume!
And painted by Mr. Hunt!" In amazement she turned
first upon Larry and upon Hunt. "When did you ever
paint her portrait, when you did not meet Miss Cameron
till you met her here? And, Mr. Brainard, how do you
come to possess Miss Cameron's portrait?"

It was Gavegan who spoke up promptly, and not either
of the two suddenly discomfited men. And Gavegan in-
stantly sensed in the situation a chance to get even for the
humiliation his self-esteem had just suffered.

"Miss Cameron nothing! Her real name is Maggie

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 251

Carlisle, and she used to live at a dump of a pawnshop
down on the East Side run by Brainard's grandmother.
Brainard knew her there, and so did Mr. Hunt."

"But — but — " gasped Miss Sherwood — "she's been
coming out here as Maggie Cameron!"

"I tell you your Maggie Cameron is Maggie Carlisle!"
said Gavegan gloatingly. "I 've known her for years. Her
father is Old Jimmie Carlisle, a notorious crook. And she 's
mixed up right now with her father and some others in a
crooked game. And Brainard here used to be sweet on
her, and probably still is, and if he 's been letting her come
here, without telling you who she is — well, I guess you
know the answer. Did n't I tell you, Miss, that give me
a chance and I'd turn up something against this guy
Brainard!"

Miss Sherwood's face was white, but set with grim
accusation that was only waiting to pronounce swift
judgment. "Mr. Hunt, is it true that Miss Cameron is
this Maggie Carlisle the officer mentions, and that you
knew it all the while?"

"Yes — " began the painter.

" Don't blame him, Miss Sherwood," Larry interrupted.
"He did n't tell you because I begged him not to as a favor
to me. Blame me for everything."

Her judgment upon Hunt was pronounced with cold
finality, her eyes straight into Hunt's: "Whatever may
have been Mr. Hunt's motives, I unalterably hold him to
blame."

She turned upon Larry. The face which he had only
seen in gracious moods was as inflexibly stern as a prose-
cuting attorney's.

"We're going to go right to the bottom of this,
Mr. Brainard. You too have known all along that this
Miss Cameron was really the Maggie Carlisle this officer
speaks of?"

"Yes."

252 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"And you have known all along that she was the daugh-
ter of this notorious criminal, Old Jimmie Carlisle?"

The impulse surged up in Larry to tell the newly learned
truth about Maggie. But he remembered Maggie's in-
junction that the truth must never be known. He checked
his revelation just in time.

"Yes."

"And is it true that Maggie Carlisle is herself what is
known as a crook? — or has had crooked inclinations or
plans?"

"It's like this, Miss Sherwood—"

"A direct answer, please!"

"Yes."

"And is it true, as this officer has suggested, that you
were in love with her yourself?"

"Yes."

"You are aware of my brother's infatuation for her?
That he has asked her to marry him?"

"Yes."

Her voice now sounded more terrible to Larry. " I took
you in to give yqu a chance. And your repayment has
been that, knowing all these things, you have kept silent
and let me and my brother be imposed upon by a swin-
dling operation. And who knows, since you admit that
you love the girl, that you have not been a partner in the
conspiracy from the first!"
• "That's exactly the idea, Miss!" put in Gavegan.

Larry had foreseen many possible wrong turns which
his plan might take, but he was appalled by the utter un-
expectedness of the actual disaster. And yet he recognized
that the evidence justified Miss Sherwood's judgment of
him. It all made him seem an ingrate and a swindler.

For the moment Larry was so overwhelmed that he
made no attempt to speak. And since for once Gavegan
was content merely to gloat over his triumph, there was
stiff silence in the room until Miss Sherwood said in the

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 253

cold voice of a judge after a jury has brought in a verdict
of guilty:

"Of course, if you think there is anything you may say
for yourself, Mr. Brainard, you now have the chance to
say it."

" I have much to say, but I can't blame you if you refuse
to believe most of it," Larry said desperately, fighting
forwhat seemed his last chance. "I loved Maggie Carlisle.
I believed she had splendid qualities. Only she was domi-
nated by the twisted ideas Old Jimmie Carlisle had planted
in her. I wanted to eradicate those twisted ideas, and
make her good qualities her ruling ones. But she did n't
believe in me. She thought me a soft-head, a police stool,
a squealer. Then I had to disappear ; you know all about
that. Not till I had been with you for several weeks did I
learn that she was being used in a swindling scheme against
Dick.

"I did think of telling you or Dick. But my greatest
interest was to awaken that better person I believed to be
in her ; and I knew that the certain result of my exposing
her to you would be for me to lose the last bit of influence
I had with her, and for her to pass right on to another
enterprise of similar character. So the idea came to me
that if I did n't expose her, but caused her to be received
with every courtesy by her intended victims, the effect
upon her would be that she would feel a revulsion for
what she was doing and she would come to her best senses.
I told this to Mr. Hunt ; that 's why he agreed not to give
her away. And another point, though frankly this was not
so important to me : it seemed to me that a good hard jolt
might be just what was needed to make Dick take life
more seriously, and I saw in this affair a chance for Dick to
get just the jolt he needed.

"That's all, Miss Sherwood. Except that I have seen
signs which make me believe that what I figured would
happen to Maggie Carlisle have begun to happen to her."

254 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"Bunk!" snorted Gavegan.

" I know that part of what he says is true," put in Hunt.

Miss Sherwood ignored Hunt and his remark. The look
of controlled wrath which she held upon Larry did not
change. Larry recognized that his statement had sounded
' most implausible. Miss Sherwood in her indignation con-
sidered only that her kindness had been betrayed, her
hospitality outraged, and that those she had accepted as
friends had sought to trick her family in the worst way
she could conceive ; and she spoke accordingly.

" If that is the best Mr. Brainard has to say for himself,
Mr. Gavegan, you may take him with you, and without
any interference from me. I ask only that you take him
out of the house at once."

With that she moved from the room, not looking again
at either Hunt or Larry. For a brief space there was
silence, .while Gavegan let his triumph feed gloatingly
upon the sight of his prisoner.

This brief silence was broken by a low, strange sound,
like a human cry quickly repressed, that seemed to come
from just outside the French windows.

"What was that?" Larry asked quickly.

"I did n't hear anything," said Gavegan whose senses
had been thoroughly concentrated upon his triumph.

"I did," said Hunt. "On the veranda."

"We'll see. Watch him — " to the county officer;
and Gavegan followed Hunt to the French windows and
looked out. " Noone on the veranda, and no one in sight,"
he reported. "You fellows must have been dreaming."

He returned and faced Larry. "I guess you'll admit.
Brainard, that I've got you for keeps this time."

"Then suppose we be starting for Headquarters." Larry
responded.

Hunt moved to Larry's side. " I '11 just trail along after
you, Larry. Anyhow, this does n't seem to be any place
for me."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 255

A few minutes afterwards Larry was in a car beside
Gavegan, speeding away from Cedar Crest toward the
city. Larry's thoughts were the gloomiest he had enter-
tained since he had come out of Sing Sing months before
with his great dream. All that he had counted on had
gone wrong. He was in the hands of the police, and he
knew how hard the police would be. He had incurred the
hostility of Miss Sherwood and had lost what had seemed
a substantial opportunity to start his career as an honest
man. The only item of his great plan in which he did not
seem to have failed completely was Maggie. And he did
not know what Maggie was going to do.

CHAPTER XXXII

WHEN Maggie drove away with Dick from Cedar Crest — •
this was an hour before Gavegan descended out of the blue
upon Larry and two hours before he rode triumphantly
away with his captive — she was the most dazed and dis-
illusioned young creature who had ever set out confidently
to conquer the world. Courage, confidence, quickness of
wit, all the qualities on which she had prided herself, were
now entirely gone, and she was just a white, limp figure
that wanted to run away : a weak figure in which swirled
thoughts almost too spasmodically powerful for so
weakened a vessel not to be shattered under their wild
strain : thoughts of her amazingly discovered real father —
of how she was the very contradiction of her father's
dream — of Larry — of the cunning Jimmie Carlisle whom
till this day she had believed her father — of Barney
Palmer.

So agitated was she with these gyrating thoughts that
she was not conscious that Dick had stopped the car on the
green roadside until he had taken her hand and had begun
to speak. The happy, garrulous, unobservant Dick had

256 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

not noticed anything out of the way with her more than
a pallor which she had explained away as being due to
nothing more than a bit of temporary dizziness. And so
for the second time Dick now poured out his love to her
and asked her to marry him.

"Don't, Dick — please!" she interrupted him. "I
can't marry you ! Never!"

"What!" cried the astounded Dick. "Maggie — why
not?"

"I can't. That 's final. And don't make me talk to you
now, Dick — please ! I cannot ! "

His face, so fresh and happy the moment before, be-
came gray and lined with pain. But he silently swung the
car back into the road.

She forgot him utterly in what was happening within
her. As they rode on, she forced herself to think of what
she should do. She saw herself as the victim of much,
and as guilty of much. And then inspiration came upon
her, or perhaps it was merely a high frenzy of desperation,
and she saw that the responsibility for the whole situa-
tion was upon her alone; she saw it as her duty, the r61e
assigned her, to try to untangle alone this tangled situa-
tion, to try to measure out justice to every one.

First of all, as she had told Larry, her father's dream of
her must remain unbroken. Whatever she did, she must
do nothing that might possibly be a sharp blow to the
conception of his daughter which were the roots and trunk
and flowering branches of his present happiness. . . . And
then came a real inspiration! She would, in time, make
herself into the girl he believed her — make his dream
the truth ! She would get rid of Old Jimmie and Barney
— would cut loose from everything pertaining to her for-
mer life — would disappear and live for a year or two in
the kind of environment in which he believed he had
placed her — and would reappear and claim him for her
father! And for his own sake, he should never know the

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 257

truth. Two years more and he should have the actuality,
where he now had only the dream !

But before she was free to enter upon this plan, before
she could vanish out of the knowledge of all who had
known her, there was a great duty to Larry Brainard
which she must discharge. He was hunted by the police,
he was hunted by his former pals. And he was in his pre-
dicament fundamentally because of her. Therefore, it
was her foremost duty to clear Larry Brainard.

Yes, she would do that first! Somehow! . . .

She was considering this problem of how she was to
clear Larry, who had tried to awaken her, who had
shielded her, who loved her, when Dick slowed his car
down in front of the Grantham and helped her out. As he
said a subdued good-bye and was stepping back into his
car, an impulse surged up into her — an impulse of this
different Maggie whose birth was being attended by such
bewildering emotions and decisions.

" Dick, won't you please come up for just a little while? "

Three minutes later they were in her sitting-room. Cap
in hand Dick awaited her words in the misery of silence.
Her look was drawn, but direct.

"Back in the road, Dick, you asked me why I could n't
marry you. I asked you up here to tell you."

"Yes?" he queried dully.

"One reason is that, though I like you, I don't like you
that way. The more important reason to you is that I am
a fraud."

"A fraud!" he exclaimed incredulously.

It had come to her, as she was leaving the car, that the
place to start her new life was to start right, or quit right,
with Dick. "A fraud," she repeated — "an impostor.
There is no Maggie Cameron. I am born of no good family
from the West. I have no money. I have always lived in
New York — most of the time down on the East Side.
I used to work in a Fifth Avenue millinery shop. Till

258 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

three months ago I sold cigarettes in one of the big
hotels."

"What of that!" cried Dick.

"That is the nicest part of what I have to tell you,"
she continued relentlessly. "My supposed relatives,
Jimmie Carlisle and Barney Palmer, are no relatives at
all, but are two clever confidence men. I have been in with
them, working on a scheme they have framed. Every-
thing I have seemed to be, everything I have done, even
this expensive apartment, have all been parts of that
scheme. The idea of that scheme was to swindle some
rich man out of a lot of money — through my playing on
his susceptibilities."

"Maggie!" he gasped.

"More concretely, the idea was to trick some rich man
into falling in love with me, to get him to propose, then to
have me confess that I was already married, but to a man
who would give me a divorce if he were paid enough. The
rich man would then drive a bargain with my supposed
husband, pay over a lot of money — after which Barney,
Old Jimmie, and I would disappear with our profits."

"Maggie!" he repeated, stupefied with his incredulous
amazement. But the unflinching gaze she held upon him
convinced him she was speaking the truth. "Then, if
that was your game, why are you telling me now? Why
did n't you say ' yes* when I proposed a week ago? I
would have fallen for the game; you would have suc-
ceeded."

Not till that moment did Maggie realize the full
truth; not till then did she realize the solid influence
Larry Brainard had been in the background of her life
all these months.

" I did n't go through with it because of Larry Brain-
ard."

"Larry Brainard ! " His astonishment increased. "You
know Larry Brainard, then?"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 259

" I've known him for several years."

"And you've been coming out, and he's been pre-
tending not to know you! Of course I knew what Larry
Brainard has been. But is he in this, too?"

"No. He's exactly what you think him. From the
start he's been trying to keep me out of this. He was
behind my coming to your house; he's told me so. His
reason for getting me there was his belief that my being
treated by you and your sister as I was would make
me ashamed of myself and make me want to quit what
I was doing. And I think — I think he was right —
partly."

"And Larry — he's the reason you're telling me
now?"

"I think so. But there are other reasons." Making a
clean breast of things though she was, she felt she dared
not trust Dick with the secret of her father. "I — I
wanted to clear things up as far as I was responsible.
That's one reason I 'm telling you. There was the chance
you might sometime find out that Larry had known me
and suspect him; I wanted you to know the truth of
what he'd really done. And I wanted to tell you the
truth about myself, so you 'd despise and forget me, in-
stead of perhaps carrying around romantic delusions
about me after I've gone. And there's another reason.
I 'd like to tell you — for you Ve been everything that 's
fine to me — if it won't offend you."

"Go on," he said huskily.

"Barney Palmer picked you out as the victim — you
did n't know you were being picked out — because he
said that you were an easy mark. That you took things
for exactly what they pretended to be, and did n't care
what you did with your money. That you never would
settle down into a responsible person. I 'm telling you all
this, Dick, because I don't want you to be what Barney
said."

260 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Dick slumped into a chair, at last beaten down by this
cumulative revelation. He buried his face in his hands
and his panting breath was convulsive with unuttered
sobs. Maggie looked down upon the young boy, with
pity, remorse, and an increasing recognition of the wide-
spread suffering she had wrought.

"To think that this has all been horrible make-be-
lieve!" he at last groaned. "That all the while I 've been
looked on as just a young fool who would always remain
a fool!"

Maggie, in her sense of guilt, was helpless to make any
reply that would soften his agony ; and for a space neither
spoke.

Presently Dick stood suddenly up. His face was still
marked by suffering, but somehow it seemed to have
grown older without losing its youth. There was a new
blaze of determination in the direct look he held on
Maggie.

"You say you have never loved me?" he demanded.

She shook her head. "But I've told you that I've
always liked you."

" Larry Brainard 's doing what he has kept on doing for
you — that means that he loves you, doesn't it?" he
pressed on.

"He has told me so."

"And you love him?"

"What difference does that make? — since I am going
away as soon as I get everything I'm wholly or partly
responsible for cleared up."

"If Larry Brainard has known you for a long while,
then how about Barney Palmer and Jimmie Carlisle?"

"They've known me as long, or longer."

"Then you must have all known each other?"

"Yes. Years ago Larry worked with Barney and
Jimmie Carlisle."

"What was the attitude of those two toward Larry,

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 261

when he was trying to balk them by making you give up
the plan?"

"They hated him. They are the cause — especially
Barney — of all of Larry's trouble with the police and
with the old crowd he 's quit. To try to clear Larry, that 's
the most important thing I 'm going to try to do."

"And that's where you've got to let me help you!"
Dick cried with sudden energy. "Larry's been a mighty
good friend to me — he 's tried to head me right — and
I owe him a lot. And I 'd like a chance to show that
Barney Palmer I 'm not going to keep on being the eternal
fool he sized me up to be!"

Maggie was startled by this swift transformation.
"Why — why, Dick!" she breathed.

"What's your plan to clear Larry?"

"I had n't got so far as to have a clear plan. I had
only just realized that there had to be a plan. But since
they have set the police on Larry, it came to me that the
idea behind any plan would be for the police to really
capture Barney and Jimmie Carlisle — get them out of
Larry's way."

"That's it!" Dick Sherwood had a mind which, given
an interesting stimulus, could work swiftly ; and it worked
swiftly now. "They were planning to trim me. Let 's use
that plan you outlined to me — use it to-night. You can
tell them some story which will make immediate action
seem necessary and we'll all get together this evening.
I'll play my part all right — don't you worry about me!
I 'II come with a roll of money that I '11 dig up somewhere,
and it'll be marked money. When it's passed — bingo!
— a couple of detectives that we'll have planted to watch
the proceedings will step right up and nab the two!"

She was taken aback by the very idea of him, the vic-
tim, after her confession, throwing his lot in with her.
"Why, Dick" — she stammered — "to think of you
offering to do such a thing!"

262 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"I owe that much to Larry Brainard," he declared.
"And — and I owe that much to your desire to help set
him straight. Well, what about my plan?"

Since he seemed eager to lend himself to it, it seemed
to her altogether wonderful, and she told him so. They
discussed details for several minutes, for there was much
to be done and it had all to be done most adroitly. It was
agreed that he should come at ten o'clock, when the stage
would all be set.

As he was leaving to attend to his part of the play, a
precautionary idea flashed upon Maggie.

"Better telephone me just before you come. Some-
thing may have happened to change our plans."

"All right — I'll telephone. Just keep your nerve."

With that he hurried out. At about the time he left,
Larry was leaving Cedar Crest in handcuffs beside the
burly and triumphant Gavegan, and believing that the
power he had sought to exercise was now effectually at
an end. He was out of it. In his despondency it was
not granted him to see that the greatest thing which he
could do was already done ; that he had set in motion
all the machinery of what had taken place and what was
about to take place; that all the figures in the action
of the further drama of that night were to act as they
were to do primarily because of promptings which came
from him.

CHAPTER XXXIII

DICK'S departure left Maggie to think alone upon an in-
tricate and possibly dangerous interplay of characters in
which she had cast herself for the chief r61e, which might
prove a sacrificial r&le for her. She quickly perceived
that Dick's plan, clever as it might be, would bring about,
in the dubious event of its success, only one of the several

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 263

happenings which had to come to pass if she were to clear
her slate before her disappearance.

Dick's plan was good ; but it would only get rid of
Barney and Old Jimmie. It would only rid Larry of such
danger as they represented; it would only be revenge
upon them for the evil they had done. And, after all,
revenge helped a man forward but very little. There
would still remain, even in the event of the success of
Dick's plan, the constant danger to Larry from the police
hunt, instigated by Chief Barlow's vindictive determina-
tion to send Larry back to prison for his refusal to be a
stool-pigeon ; and the constant danger from his one-time
friends who were hunting him down with deadly hatred
as a squealer.

Somehow, if she were to set things right for Larry, she
had to maneuver that night's happenings in such a way
as to eliminate forever Barlow's persecutions, and elim-
inate forever the danger to Larry from his friends' and
their hirelings' desire for vengeance upon a supposed
traitor.

Maggie thought rapidly, elaborating on Dick's plan.
But what Maggie did was not so much the result of
sober thought as of the inspiration of a desperate, hardly
pressed young woman; but then, after all, what we call
inspiration is only thought geared to an incredibly high
speed. First of all, she got rid of that slow-witted, awe-
some supernumerary, Miss Grierson, who might com-
pletely upset the delicate action of the stage by a dig-
nified entrance at the wrong moment and with the wrong
cue. Next she called up Chief Barlow at Police Head-
quarters. Fortunately for her Barlow was still in ; for an
acrimonious dispute, then in progress and taking much
space in the public prints, between him and the District
Attorney's office was keeping him late at his desk despite
the most autocratic and pleasant of all demands, those of
his dinner hour. To him Maggie gave a false name, and

264 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND '

told him that she had most important information to
communicate at once; to which he growled back that she
could give it if she came down at once.

Next she called up Barney, who had been waiting near
a telephone in expectation of news of the result of her
second visit to the home of Dick Sherwood. To Barney
she said that she had the greatest possible news — news
which would require immediate action — and that he
should be at her suite at nine o'clock prepared to play his
part at once in the big proposition that had just de-
veloped, and that he should get word to Old Jimmie to
follow him in a few minutes.

Within fifteen minutes a taxicab had whirled her down
to Police Headquarters and she was in the office where
three months earlier Larry had been grilled after his
refusal of the license to steal and cheat on the condition
that he become a police stool. Barlow, who was alone in
the room, looked up with a scowl from a secret report he
had secured of the activities of detectives in the District
Attorney's office. Although Maggie was pretty and styl-
ishly dressed, Barlow did not rise nor did he remove the
big cigar he had been viciously gnawing. It is the tra-
dition of the Police Department, the most thoroughly
respected article of its religion, that a woman who is seen
in Police Headquarters cannot by any possibility be a
lady.

"Well, what's on your chest?" he grunted, not even
asking her to be seated.

It was suddenly Maggie's impulse — sprung perhaps out
of unconscious memory of what Larry had suffered — to in-
flict upon herself the uttermost humiliation. So she said :

"I've come here to offer myself as a stool-pigeon."

"What's that?" Barlow exclaimed, startled. It was
not often that a swell lady — who of course could n't be
a swell (he did not know who Maggie was) — volun-
tarily walked into his office with such a proposition.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 265

"I can give you some real information about a big
game that 's being worked up. In fact, I can arrange for
you to be present when the game is pulled off, and you
can make the arrests."

"Who are the people?" he asked brusquely.

Maggie knew it would be fatal to mention Barney or
Old Jimmie, if that story about Barlow's protection con-
tained any truth. Again inspiration, or incredibly swift
thinking, came to her aid, and with sure touch she twanged
one of Barlow's rawest and most responsive nerves.

" Larry Brainard is behind it all. He 's been doing a lot
of things on the quiet these last few months. Here is
where you can get his whole crowd."

"Larry Brainard!"

Maggie did not yet know what had befallen Larry, and
Gavegan had neglected to telephone his Chief of the ar-
rest. Even had Gavegan done so, the large and vague
manner in which Maggie had stated the situation would
have stirred Barlow's curiosity.

"All right. I '11 put a couple of my good men on the case.
Where shall I send 'em?"

"A couple of your good men won't do. I want only one
of your good men — and that man is yourself."

"Me!" growled Barlow. "What kind of floor-walker
d* you think I am? I'm too busy!"

"Too busy to take personal charge, and get personal
credit, for one of the biggest cases that ever went through
this office?"

Maggie had sought only to excite his vanity. But un-
knowingly she had also appealed to something else in him :
his very deep concern in the hostile activities of the Dis-
trict Attorney's office. If this girl told the truth, then
here might be his chance to display such devotion to duty
as to turn up some such sensational case as would make
this investigation from the District Attorney's office seem
to the public an unholy persecution and make the chagrined

266 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

District Attorney, who was very sensitive to public opin-
ion, think it wiser to drop the whole matter.

"How do I know you're not trying to string me? — or
get me out of the way of something bigger? — or hand me
the double-cross?"

" I shall be there all the time, and if you don't like the
way the thing develops you can arrest me. I suppose
you 've got some kind of law, with a stiff punishment
attached, about conspiracy against an officer."

"Well — give me all the dope, and tell me where I 'm
to come," he yielded ungraciously.

" I've told you all I am going to tell. All the important
'dope' you'll get first-hand by being present when the
thing happens. The place to come is the Hotel Grantham
— room eleven-forty-two — at eight-thirty sharp."

To this Barlow grudgingly agreed. He might have
exulted inwardly, but he would have shown no outer
graciousness if a committee of citizens had handed him
a reward of a million dollars and an engrossed testimonial
to his unprecedented services. Barlow did not know how
to thank any one.

Five minutes after she left Headquarters Maggie was
in the back room of the Duchess's pawnshop, which her
rapid planning had fixed upon as the next station at which
she should stop. She did not waste a moment in coming to
the point with the Duchess.

"Red Hannigan is really the most important of Larry's
old friends who are out to get him, is n't he? " she asked.

"Yes — in a way. I mean among those who honestly
think Larry has turned stool and squealer. He trusted
Larry more than any one else — and now he hates Larry
more than any one else. Rather natural, since he was two
months in the Tombs before he could get bail — because
he thinks Larry squealed on him."

"How 's he stand with his crowd?"

" No one higher. They 'd all take his word for anything.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 267

"Can you find him at once?" Maggie pursued breath-
lessly.

That was a trifling question to ask the Duchess; since
all the news of her shadowy world came to her ears in
some swift obscure manner.
'Yes. If it is necessary."

'It's terribly necessary! If I can't get him, the whole
th ng may fail!"

'What thing?" demanded the Duchess.
'It might all sound impossibly foolish!" cried the ex-
cited, desperate Maggie. "You might tell me so — and
discourage me — and I simply must go ahead! I feel
rather like — like a juggler who 's trying for the first time
to keep a lot of new things going in the air all at once. But
I think there's a chance that I may succeed ! I '11 tell you
just one thing. It all has to do with Larry. I think I may
help Larry."

"I'll get Red Hannigan," the Duchess said briefly.
"What do you want with him?"

" Have him come to the Hotel Grantham — room eleven-
forty-two — at eight-fifteen sharp ! "

"He'll be there," said the Duchess.

There followed a swirling taxi-ride back to the Gran-
tham, and a rapid change into her most fetching evening
gown (she had not even a thought of dinner) to play her
bold part in the drama which she was excitedly writing
in her mind and for which she had just engaged her cast.
She was on fire with terrible suspense: would the other
actors play their parts as she intended they should? —
would her complicated drama have the ending she was
hoping for?

Had she been in a more composed, matter-of-fact state
of mind , this play which she was staging would have seemed
the crudest, most impossible melodrama — a thing both
too absurd and too dangerous for her to risk. But Maggie
was just then living through one of the highest periods of

268 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

her life; she cared little what happened to her. And it is
just such moods that transform and elevate what other-
wise would be absurd to the nobly serious; that changes
the impossible into the possible; just as an exalted mood or
mind is, or was, the primary difference between Hamlet, or
Macbeth, or Lear, and any of the forgotten Bowery melo-
dramas of a generation now gone.

She had been dressed for perhaps ten nervous minutes
when the bell rang. She admitted a slight, erect, well-
dressed, middle-aged man with a lean, thin-lipped face
and a cold, hard, conservative eye: a man of the type
that you see by the dozens in the better hotels of New
York, and seeing them you think, if you think of them at
all, that here is the canny president of some fair-sized bank
who will not let a client borrow a dollar beyond his estab-
lished credit, or that here is the shrewd but unobtrusive
power behind some great industry of the Middle West.

"I'm Hannigan," he announced briefly. "I know
you're Old Jimmie Carlisle's girl. The Duchess told me
you wanted me on something big. What's the idea?"

"You want to get Larry Brainard, don't you? — or
whoever it was that squealed on you?"

There was a momentary gleam in the hard, gray eyes.
"I do."

"That's why you're here. In a little over an hour, if
you stay quiet in the background, you'll have what you
want."

"You've got a swell-looking lay-out here. What's
going to be pulled off?"

" It 's not what I might tell you that's going to help you.
It's what you hear and see."

"All right," said the thin-lipped man. "I'll pass the
questions, since the Duchess told me to do as you said.
She's square, even if she does have a grandson who's a
stool. I suppose I 'm to be out of sight during whatever
happens?"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 269

"Yes."

In the room there were two spacious closets, as is not in-
frequent in the better class of modern hotels; and it had
been these two closets which had been the practical start-
ing-point of Maggie's development of Dick Sherwood's
proposition. To one of these she led Hannigan.

"You '11 be out of sight here, and you '11 get every word."

He stepped inside, and she closed the door. Also she
took the precaution of locking it. She wished Hannigan
to hear, but she wished no such contretemps as Hannigan
bursting forth and spoiling her play when it had reached
only the middle of its necessary action.

Barlow came promptly at half-past eight. He brought
news which for a few moments almost completely upset
Maggie's delicately balanced structure.

"I know who you are now," he said brusquely. "And
part of your game 's cold before you start."

"Why? — What part?"

"Just after you left Headquarters Officer Gavegan
showed up. He had this Larry Brainard in tow — had
pinched him out on Long Island."

This announcement staggered Maggie; for the moment
made all her strenuous planning seem to have lost its pur-
pose. In her normal condition she might either have given
up or betrayed her real intent. But just now, in her super-
excited state, in which she felt she was fighting desperately
for others, she was acting far above her ordinary capacity;
and she was making decisions so swift that they hardly
seemed to proceed from conscious thought. So Barlow,
vigilant watcher of faces that he was, saw nothing unusual
in her expression or manner.

"What did you do with him?" she asked.

"Left him with Gavegan — and with Casey, who had
just come in. Trailing with Brainard was a swell named
Hunt, cussing mad. He was snorting around about
being pals with most of the magistrates, and swore he'd

270 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

have Brainard out on bail inside an hour. But what he
does don't make any difference to me. Your proposition
seems to me dead cold, since I 've already got Brainard,
and got him right. I would n't have bothered to have
come here at all except for something you let drop about
the pals he might have been working with these last few
months."

"That's exactly it," she caught him up. "I never
thought that you 'd catch Larry Brainard here. How could
I, when, if you know me as you say, you also know that
he and I are in different camps — are fighting each other?
What 's going to happen here is something that will show
you the people Larry Brainard 's been mixed up with —
that will turn up for you the people you want."

"But what 's going to happen ? ' ' Barlow demanded .

To this Maggie answered in much the same strain she
had used with Hannigan a few minutes earlier. "I told
you down at Headquarters that everything that's im-
portant you'll learn by being present when the thing
actually happened. What I tell you does n't count for
much — it might not be true. It's what you see and hear
for yourself when things begin to happen. You're to wait
in here." She led him to the second large closet and opened
the door.

"See here," he demanded, "are you framing something
on me?"

"How can I, in a big hotel like this? And even if I were
to try, you 'd certainly make me pay for it later. Besides,
you 've got a gun. Please go in quick ; I 'm expecting the
people here any minute. And don't make a sound that
might arouse their suspicions and queer everything."

He entered, and she closed the door. So carefully that
he did not hear it, she locked the door; no more than in
Hannigan's case did she want Barlow to come bungling
into a scene before it had reached its climax.

All was now ready for the curtain to rise. Quivering all

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 271

through she waited for Barney Palmer, whose entrance
was to open her drama. She glanced at her wrist-watch
which she had left upon the little lacquered writing-table.
Ten minutes of nine. Ten more minutes to wait. She
felt far more of sickening suspense than ever did any
young playwright on the opening night of his first play.
For she was more than merely playwright. In her des-
perate, overwrought determination Maggie had assumed
for herself the super-mortal r61e of dea ex machina. And
in those moments of tense waiting Maggie, who so
feverishly loathed all she had been, was not at all sure
whether she was going to succeed in her part of goddess
from the machine.

At five minutes to nine there was a ring. She gave a
little jump at the sound. That was Barney. Though
generally when Barney came he used the latch-key which
his assumed dear cousinship, and the argued possibility
of their being out and thus causing him to wait around
in discomfort, Miss Grierson's sense of propriety had
unbent far enough to permit him to possess. The truth
was; of course, that Barney had desired the key so that
he might have most private conferences with Maggie, at
any time necessity demanded, without the stolidly con-
scientious Miss Grierson ever knowing what had hap-
pened and being therefore unable to give dangerous
testimony.

Maggie crossed and opened the door. But instead of
Barney Palmer, it was Larry who stepped in. He quickly
closed the door behind him.

"Larry!" she cried startled. "Why — why, I thought
the police had you!"

"They did. But Hunt was with me, and he got hold
of a magistrate who would have made Hunt a present of
the Tombs and Police Headquarters if he had owned
them."

"Then you're out on bail?"

272 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"Got out about ten minutes ago. Hunt did n't have
any property he could put up as security, so he 'phoned
my grandmother. She walked in with an armload of
deeds. Why, she must own as much property in New
York as the Astor Estate."

"Larry, I'm so glad!" And then, remembering what,
according to her plan, was due to begin to happen almost
any moment, she exclaimed in dismay: "But, Larry, oh,
why did you come here now!"

"I wanted to know — you understand — what you
had decided to do after learning about your father. And
I wanted to tell you that, after all my great boasts to
you, I seem to have failed in every boast. Item one, the
police have got me. Item two, since the police have got
me, my old pals will also most likely get me. Item three,
when I was arrested at Cedar Crest Miss Sherwood
learned that I had known you all along and believes I
was part of a conspiracy to clean out the family ; so she
chucked me — and I 've lost what I believed my big
chance to make good. So, you see, Maggie, it looks as if
you were right when you predicted that I was going to
fail in everything I said I was going to do."

"Larry — Miss Sherwood believes that!" she breathed.
And then she remembered again, and caught his arm
with sudden energy. "Larry, you must n't stay here!"

"Why not?"

Her answer was almost identical with one she had
given the previous evening. "Because Barney Palmer
may be here the next minute!"

His response was in sense also identical. "Then I'll
stay right here. There's no one I want to see as much
as Barney Palmer. And this time I'll have it out with
him!"

Maggie was in consternation at this unexpected twist
which was not in the brain-manuscript of her play at all
— which indeed threatened to take her play right out of

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 273

her hands. "Please go, Larry!" she cried desperately.
"And please give me a chance! You'll spoil it all if you
stay!"

" I'm going to stay right here," was his grim response.

She realized there was no changing him. She glimpsed
a closet door behind him, and caught at the chance of
saving at least a fragment of her drama.

"Stay, then — but, Larry, please give me a chance to
do what I want to do! Please!" By this time she had
dragged him across the room and had started to unlock
the closet. "Just wait in here — and keep quiet ! Please!"

He took the key from her fumbling hands, unlocked
the door, and slipped the key into his pocket. "All
right — I'll give you your chance," he promised.

He stepped through the door and closed it upon him-
self, entombing himself in blackness. The next moment
the glare of a pocket flash was in his face, blinding him.

"Larry Brainard!" gritted a low voice in the darkness.

Larry could see nothing, but there was no mistaking
that voice. "Red Hannigan!" he exclaimed.

"Yes — you damned squealer! And I'm going to
finish you off right here!"

The light clicked out, and a pair of lean hands almost
closed on Larry's wind-pipe. But Larry caught the
wrists of the older man in a grip the other could not
break. There was a brief struggle in the blackness of the
closet, then the slighter man stood still with his wrists
manacled by Larry's hands.

"Evidently you haven't a gun on you, Red, or you
would n't have tried this," Larry commented. "Any-
how, you could n't have got away with killing in a big
hotel, whether you had strangled me or shot me. I don't
blame you for being sore at me, Red — only you've got
me all wrong. But you and I are evidently here for the
same purpose: to get next to something that's going to
happen out in the room. What do you say, Red? — let's

274 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

suspend hostilities for the present. You Ve got me where
you can follow me, and you can get me any time."

"You bet I'll get you!" declared Hannigan. And
then after a few more words an armistice was agreed upon
between the two men in the closet and silently, tensely,
they stood in the dark awaiting whatever was to happen.

Outside Maggie, that amateur playwright who had
tried so desperately to prearrange events, that inexpe-
rienced goddess from the machine, stood in a panic of
fear and suspense the like of which she had never known.

CHAPTER XXXIV

Bur when Barney's latch-key slid into the door and
Barney, in a smart dinner jacket, came in, Maggie was
herself again. Indeed she was better than herself, for
there rushed to her support that added power which she
had just been despairing of, which carries some people
through an hour of crisis, and which may occasionally lift
an actor above himself when fortune gives him a difficult
yet splendid part which is the great chance of his career.

And Maggie showed to the eye that she was better
than her best, for Barney exclaimed the instant he was
beside her: "Gee, Maggie, you look like the Queen of
Sheba, whoever that dame was! Any guy would fall for
you to-night — and fall so hard that he 'd break, or go
broke!"

But Barney was too eager to await any response.
"What's behind the hurry-up call you sent in? Any-
thing broken yet?"

"Something big! But sit down. There's a lot to tell.
And I must tell it quick — before my" — she could not
force herself to say "father" — "before Old Jimmie
comes, and Dick."

"Then Dick's coming?"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 275

"Yes. Things have taken a twist so that everything
breaks to-night. But sit down, and I'll tell you every-
thing."

She had noted that the door behind which Larry stood,
and to which he had captured the key, was open a bare
half-inch. It looked no more suspicious than any closet
door that by accident had swung free of its latch, but by
deft maneuvering Maggie managed so that Barney sat
at the table with his back toward both closets.

"Go to it, Maggie," he urged.

The plan which had swiftly developed from Dick
Sherwood's idea required that she should tell much that
was the truth and much that was not truth, and required
that she should play with every faculty and every at-
traction she possessed upon Barney's tremendous vanity
and upon his jealous admiration of her. She had to make
him believe more in her as a pal than ever before; she
had to make him want her more as a woman than ever
before. And at this moment she felt herself thrillingly
equal to this vampire r61e her over-stimulated sense of
justice had commanded her to undertake.

"Things have gone great," she began, speaking con-
cisely, yet trying not in this eager brevity to lose the
convincing effect that she would be the complete mistress
of any enterprise to which she yielded her interest. " Dick
Sherwood proposed to me again, and this time I said
'yes.' I saw that he was ready for anything, so I took
some things into my hands. I had to, for I saw we had to
act quick even at the risk of losing a bit of the maximum
figure we had counted on. You see I realized the danger
to us in Larry Brainard suddenly showing up, and his
knowing, as he told us he did, who the sucker is that
we've been stringing along. Anything might happen, any
minute, from Larry Brainard that would upset every-
thing. So I reasoned that we had to collect quick or run
the risk of never getting a nickel."

276 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"Some bean you've got, Maggie," he said admiringly.
"Keep your foot on the gas pedal."

"What I did was only the carrying-out of the plan
you had decided on — of course carrying it out quicker,
and with a few little changes that the urgent situation
demanded. After he proposed I broke down, as per
schedule, and confessed that I had deceived him to the
extent that I was already married. Married to a man I
did n't love, and who did n't love me, but who was a
tight-wad and who would n't let me go unless he saw a
lot of money in it for him. And I gave Dick all the rest
of the story, just as we had doped it out."

"Great work, Maggie! How did he take it?"

"Exactly as we figured he would. He was sorry for
me; it didn't make any difference at all in his feelings
for me. He'd buy my husband off — give him any price
he wanted — and just so I would n't have to feel myself
bound to such a man a minute longer than necessary he 'd
make a bargain with him at once and pay him part of the
money right down. To-night, if he could get in touch with
my husband. And so, Barney, since we had to act quick
and there was no time to bring in another man that I
could pass off as my husband, I confessed to him that I
was married to you."

"To me!" exclaimed Barney.

"And he's coming here in less than an hour, with real
money in his pockets, to see if he can't fix a deal with
you."

"Me!" exclaimed the startled Barney again. His
beady eyes glowed at her ardently. "Gee, you know I
wish I really was married to you, Maggie! If I was, you
bet money could n't ever pry you loose from me!"

"Well, there's the whole lay-out, Barney. It's up to
you to be my grasping, bargaining, unloving husband for
about an hour."

" I had n't thought of myself in that part," he objected.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 277

''I'd figured that we'd bring in a new man to be the
husband. It's pretty dangerous for me, my stringing
Dick along all this while and then suddenly to enter the
act as your husband — and to take the money."

"Dangerous!" There was sudden contempt in her
voice and in her eyes. "So you're that kind of man,
Barney — afraid ! And afraid after my telling Dick you
were my husband, and his swallowing the thing without
a suspicion! Well, right this minute is when we call this
deal off — and every other deal !"

"Oh, don't be so quick with that temper of yours,
Maggie ! I merely said it was dangerous. Of course I '11
do it."

And then Barney asked, with a cunning he tried to
hide: "But why did you ask me to have Old Jimmie show
up here right after me? We don't need him."

"Just what's behind your saying that, Barney?" she
demanded sharply.

He squirmed a little, then spoke the truth. "You
don't love your father any too much, and he does n't
love you any too much — I know that. He need n't
really know how much we take off Sherwood ; if he was n't
here, he'd have to take our word for what we got and
we 'd tell him we got mighty little. Then the real money
would be divided fifty-fifty between just you and me."

" I may not love my father, but he 's in this on the same
basis as you are, or I'm out of it," she declared. "I
thought you might suggest something like this; that's
one reason I asked you to have him come. Another reason
— and this is something I forgot to tell you awhile ago —
when I broke down and confessed everything to Dick
Sherwood, I told Dick that Old Jimmie was really my
guardian; and we both agreed that he should be present
as a witness to any agreement, and to protect my in-
terests. Still another reason is that since we had to work
so fast, the thing to do was to split the money on the spot

278 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

in three ways, and then each of us shoot off in a different
direction to-night before any bad luck had a chance to
break. In fact, Barney, this present minute is when you
and I say our good-byes."

He forgot his scheme to defraud Old Jimmie in the far
greater concern aroused by her last words. He leaned
across the table and tried to take her hand, an attempt
she deftly thwarted.

"But listen, Maggie," he asked with husky eagerness,
"you and I are going to have an understanding to join
up with each other soon, are n't we? You know what I
mean — belong to each other. You know how I feel about
you!"

This was the principal point Maggie had been ma-
neuvering toward. Before her was the most difficult scene
of the many which she had planned, on her successful
management of which the success of everything seemed to
depend. Within she was palpitant with the strain and sus-
pense of it all; but on Barney she held cool, appraising
eyes. In this splendid composure, her momentary with-
drawal from him, she seemed to Barney more beautiful,
more desirable, more indispensable, than at any time since
he had discovered back at the Duchess's that Maggie was
a find.

"Of course I know exactly what you mean, Barney,"
she responded with deliberation, bewitchingly alluring
in her air of superiority. " I 've known for a long time you
and I would have to have a real talk. Are you ready for
a straight talk now?"

"As straight as you can talk it!"

" I '11 probably fall for some man and marry him. Every
woman does. But if I marry him, it'll be because I love
him. But my marrying a man does n't mean I 'm going
to go into business with him. I fm not going to mix love
with business — not unless the man is the right sort of
man. Of course it would be better if the man I marry and

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 279

the man I take on as a business partner were the same
man — but I 'm not going to take any risks. You under-
stand me so far?"

"Surest thing you know. And every word you've said
proves that your head is n't just something to look pretty
with. Let me slip this over to you right at the start —
I 'm the right sort of man ! "

"That's exactly what I want to find out," she con-
tinued, with her deliberation, with the air of sitting secure
upon the highest level. " I know now what I can do. I 've
proved it. Now I 'm going right ahead putting over big
things. You once told me I had it in me to be the best
ever — and I now know I can be. I know I 've got to tie
up with a man, and the man has got to be just as good in
his way as I am in mine. Right there 's where I 'm in doubt
about you. I said I was going to talk straight — and I 'm
handing it to you straight. I don't know how good you
are."

"You mean you think I 'm not big enough to work with
you?"

" I mean exactly what I said. I said that I did n't really
know how good you are, and that I was n't going to tie up
with any man except the best in the business. You've
hinted now and then at a lot of big things you've put
across and how strong you were in certain quarters where
it paid to be strong — but I really know mighty little
about you, Barney. This present job has n't required you
to do anything special, and all the really hard work I've
done myself. Of course I know you are a good dancer, and
clever with the ladies, and know how to pick up a sucker
and string him along. But that 's everything I do know.
And there are hundreds of men who are good at these
things. The man I tie up with has got to be good at a lot
of other things — and I've got to know he's good!"

" Good at what other things, Maggie?" he asked with
suppressed eagerness.

28o CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"He's got to be good at putting over all kinds of situa-
tions. I don't care how he does it. So clever at putting
things over that no one ever guesses he 's the man who did
it. And he's got to be able to give me protection. You
know what I mean. A woman in the game I 'm going in for
is absolutely through, as far as doing anything big is con-
cerned, the minute she gets a police record. I've got to
have a man who's able to stand between me and the
police. And I Ve got to know from past performances that
the man can do these things. Just large words about what
he can do, or hints about what he has done, don't count for
a nickel with me. This is plain, hard business I 'm talking,
Barney, and I don't mean to hurt your feelings when I tell
you that you don't measure up in any way to the man I
need."

It had been difficult for Barney to hold himself until
she had finished. To start with, he had the vain man's
constant itch to tell of his exploits, his dislike for the ano-
nymity of his cleverness unjustly ascribed to some other
man. And then Maggie had played upon him even more
skillfully than she imagined.

"I'm exactly the man you need in every way!" he
exploded.

"Those are just words," she said evenly. "I said I had
to have something more than mere words."

"I'm ace-high with Chief Barlow!"

"You've got to be more explicit."

Barney was now all excitement. "Don't you get what
that means? I 've never been locked up once, and yet I 've
been pulling stuff all the time! And yet look how Larry
Brainard, that the bunch thought was so clever, got
hooked and was sent away. I guess you know the answer ! "

"Again, Barney, I Ve got to ask you to be more explicit."

"Then the answer is that all the while I Ve been work-
ing on an understanding with Barlow. I guess that's
explicit!"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 281

"You mean," she said in her cool voice, "that you've
been a stool-pigeon for Barlow?"

"Sure! — though I don't like the word. That's the
only safe way of staying steady in the game — an under-
standing with the police. All there is to it is now and
then to tip the police off about some dub of a crook: of
course you 've got to be smooth enough not to let any one
guess your game."

"That does n't seem to me such a strong talking point
in your favor," she said thoughtfully.

"But don't you get the idea? I 'm so strong with Barlow
that I can get away with anything I want to. That means
I can give you the protection from the police you just
spoke about. See?"

"Yes, I see." Again she spoke thoughtfully. "But I
told you I had to be shown. You must have done some
pretty big things to have got such a standing with
Barlow. For example?"

"I could write you a book!" He laugned in his excited
pride. " You ask for an example. I could hardly hold my-
self in awhile ago when you said you 'd practically swung
the present deal alone, and that I 'd done almost nothing.
Why, Maggie, I did just one smooth little thing without
which there could n't have been any deal."

"What?"

"You'll admit that nothing would have been safe with
Larry Brainard determined to butt in on what you did?"

"Yes."

"Well, I'm the little guy that fixed Larry Brainard so
he would n't hurt any one!"

"You did that?" For the first time Maggie showed
what seemed to be a live interest. "How?"

"How? You'll say it was clever when you learn how.
And you '11 say that I 'm the man you want on that count
of being able to put over a situation so that no one will
ever guess I'm the man who did it. You'll admit that

282 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

putting Larry Brainard out of business, so he'd stay out,
was certainly a stiff job — for though I don't like him, I
admit that Larry is one wise bird. One thing I did was to
suggest to Barlow that he force Larry to become a police
stool. I knew Larry would refuse, and I figured out every-
thing else exactly as it has happened. I ask you, was n't
that putting something clever over?"

"It certainly was clever!" admired Maggie.

"Wait! That's only half. To finish Larry off so that
he would n't have a chance I had to finish him off not
only with the cops, but also with his pals. So I tipped off
Barlow to the game Red Hannigan and Jack Rosenfeldt
were pulling and — "

"Then Larry Brainard really did n't do that?"

"No; I did it! Listen — there's some more to it. I
spread the word, so that it seemed to be a leak from the
Police Department, that it was Larry who had squealed
on Red Hannigan and Jack Rosenfeldt. Did his old pals
start out to get Larry? Well, now, did they! If I do say
it myself, that was smooth work!"

"It was wonderful!" agreed Maggie.

"And there's still more, Maggie! You remember that
charge of stick-up and attempted murder of a Chicago
guy that the police are trying to land Larry on? I put that
over! I'm the party that was messed up in that. I was
trying to put over a neat little job all on my own; but
something went wrong just as I thought I was cleaning
out the sucker, and I had to be rough with that Chicago
guy in order to make a get-away from him. I beat it
straight to Barlow, and said that right here was the chance
to fasten something on Larry. Barlow took my tip. My
foot may have slipped on the original job, but my bean
certainly did act quick, and you Ve got to admit I turned
an apparent failure into something bigger than success
would have been. And that's certainly traveling!"

44 It certainly is!"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 283

"And now, Maggie" — Barney pressed her eagerly —
" I 've shown you I 'm just the sort you said a man had to
be for you to tie up with him. I've shown you I can
guarantee you police protection. And I Ve shown you I 'm
able to put over clever situations without any one ever
guessing I 'm the party who put 'em over. I fit all your
specifications! How about our settling right now to join
up some place — Toronto 's the best bet — say three days
after we make our get-away after to-night's clean-up?
Let 's be quick about this, Maggie — before Old Jimmie
comes in. He 's due any minute now !"

"Is n't that him at the door now?" breathed Maggie.

Both waited intently for a moment. But though she
pretended so, Maggie's interest was not upon the outer
door. Her attention was fixed, as it had been with sicken-
ing fear this last minute, upon that half-inch crack in the
closet door behind Barney. Why had she, in her dismayed
urgence, allowed Larry to possess himself of that closet
key? — when her plan had been to keep Hannigan as well
as Barlow forcibly behind the scenes until she had acted
out her play? She now hoped almost against hope that
Hannigan would not burst forth and ruin what was yet
to come. Since that door unluckily had to be unlocked,
her one chance was given her by the presence of Larry.
Perhaps Larry could perceive the larger things she was
striving for, and in some way restrain Hannigan.

These thoughts were but an instant in passing through
her brain. Barney's eyes came back from the outer door
to her face. "That's not Old Jimmie yet."

"No," her lips said. But her brain was saying, since
the crack still remained a half-inch crack, "Larry under-
stands — he's holding back Red Hannigan!"

Barney returned swiftly to his charge. "How about
Toronto, Maggie — say exactly seventy- two hours from
now — the Royal Brunswick Hotel?"

Maggie realized she could no longer put him off if she

284 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

were to keep him unsuspicious for the next hour. Besides,
in her desperate disillusionment concerning herself, she
did not care what happened to her, or what people might
think of her, if only she could keep this play going till its
final moment.

"Yes," she said — "if we each feel the same way to-
ward each other when this evening's ended."

"Maggie!" he cried. "Maggie!" This time, when he
exultantly caught at her hand, she dared not refuse it to
him. And she felt an additional loathing for Barney's
caress because she knew that Larry was a witness to it.

Indeed, it was difficult for Larry, at the sight of Mag-
gie's hand in Barney's too eager palms, to hold himself in
check; and to do this in addition to holding in check the
slight, quivering Red Hannigan, whose collar and whose
right wrist he had been gripping these last three minutes.
For Larry, as Maggie had hoped, had dimly apprehended
something of Maggie's plan, and he felt himself bound by
the promise she had extracted from him, to let her go
through with whatever she had under way; though he had
no conception of her plan's extent, and could, of course,
not know of the intention of her overwrought mind to
give her plan its final touch in what amounted to her own
self-destruction, and in her vanishing utterly out of the
knowledge of all who knew her.

Another minute passed ; then Larry heard three peculiar
rings of the bell of the outer door — an obvious signal.
Maggie answered the summons, and Larry saw Old Jim-
mie enter. There followed a rapid and compact conference
between the three, the substance of which was the telling
of Old Jimmie of the developments against Dick Sher-
wood which Maggie had a little earlier recited to Barney,
together with instructions to Old Jimmie concerning his
new r61e as Maggie's guardian. It seemed to Larry that
he caught signs of uneasiness in Jimmie, but to all the
older man nodded his head.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 285

Presently there was a loud ring. "That's Dick!" ex-
claimed Barney in a whisper. "And mighty eager, too —
shows that by being ahead of the time you set! Let him
in, Maggie."

Maggie was startled by the ring, though she did not
show it. She thought rapidly. She had definitely asked
Dick to telephone before coming. Why had n't he tele-
phoned? Perhaps something had happened to prevent it,
or perhaps an idea had come to him by which their plan
could be bettered without a telephone message. In either
case, she and Dick might have to improvise and deftly
catch cues tossed to each other, as experienced actors
sometimes do without the audience ever knowing that a
hiatus in the play has been skillfully covered.

Maggie stood up. "You both understand what you're
to do?"

Both whispered "yes." Larry watched Maggie start
across the room, his whole figure quivering with suspense
as to what was going to happen when Dick entered. He
was quite sure there was more here than appeared upon
the surface, quite sure that Maggie did not intend that
the business with Dick should work out as she had out-
lined. What could Maggie possibly be up to? he asked
himself in feverish wonderment, and could find no answer.
For of course Larry had no knowledge of that most im-
portant fact: that Maggie had actually made a confession
to Dick — not the fraudulent confession she had told Bar-
ney of — but an honest and complete confession, and that
in consequence she and Dick were working in cooperation.

From his crack Larry could not quite see the outer door.
But after she opened the door he saw Maggie fall back
with an inarticulate cry, her face suddenly blanched with
astounded fright. And then Larry experienced one of
the greatest surprises of his life — a surprise so unnerving
that he almost loosed his hold upon Red Hannigan. For
instead of Dick there walked into the room the tall,

286 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

white-haired figure of Joe Ellison, and Joe's lean, prison-
blanched face was aquiver with a devastating purpose.
How in the name of God had Joe come to be here? — and
what did that terrible look portend?

But Larry's surprise was but an unperturbing emotion
compared to the effect of her father's appearance, with
his terrible face, upon Maggie. Life seemed suddenly to
go out of her. She realized that the clever play which she
had constructed so rapidly, and upon which she had
counted to clear the tangle for which she was in part re-
sponsible, and to bring her back in time as the seeming
fulfillment of the dream of a happy and undisillusioned
father — she realized that her poor, brilliant play had
come to an instant end before it was fairly started, and
that the control of events had passed into other hands.

CHAPTER XXXV

AT the entrance of Joe Ellison instead of the expected
Dick, Barney and Old Jimmie had sprung up from the
table in amazement. Joe strode past Maggie, hardly
heeding his daughter, and faced the two men.

"I guess you know me, Jimmie Carlisle!" said Joe with
a terrifying restraint of tone. "The pal I trusted — the
pal I turned everything over to — the pal who double-
crossed me in every way!"

"Joe Ellison!" gasped Jimmie, suddenly as ghastly as
a dead man. "I — I did n't know you were out."

"I'm out, all right. But I'll probably go in again for
what I fm going to do to you! And you there" — turning
on Barney — "you're got up enough like a professional
dancer to be the Barney Palmer I've heard of!"

"What business is it of yours who I am?" Barney
tried to bluster. "Perhaps you won't mind introducing
yourself."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 287

"I'm the man who's going to settle with you and Old
Jimmie Carlisle! Is that introduction enough? If not,
then I'm Joe Ellison, the father of this girl here you call
Maggie Carlisle and Maggie Cameron, that you two have
made into a crook."

"Your daughter!" exclaimed Barney in stupefaction.
"Why, she's Jimmie Carlisle's — "

"He's always passed her off as such; that much I've
learned. Speak up, Jimmie Carlisle! Whose daughter is
this girl you've turned into a crook?"

"Your daughter, Joe," stammered Old Jimmie. "But
about my making her into a crook — you 're — you 're all
wrong there."

"So she's not a crook, and you did n't make her one?"
demanded Joe with the calm of unexploded dynamite
whose fuse is sputtering. "I left you about twelve or
fifteen hundred a year to bring her up on — as a decent,
respectable girl. That's twenty-five or thirty a week.
If she's not a crook, how can she on twenty-five a week
have all the swell clothes I 've seen her in, and be living in
a suite like this that costs from twenty-five to fifty a day?
And if she is n't a crook, why is she mixed up with two
such crooks as you? And if she is n't a crook, why is she
in a game to trim young Dick Sherwood?"

The two men started and wilted at these driving
questions. "But — but, Joe," stammered Old Jimmie,
"you've gone out of your head. She's not in any such
game. She never even heard of any Dick Sherwood."

"Cut out your lies, Jimmie Carlisle!" Joe ordered
harshly. "We've got something more to do here, the four
of us, than to waste any time on lies. And just to prove to
you that your lies will be wasted, I '11 lay all my cards face
up on the table. Since I got out I Ve been working for the
Sherwoods. Larry Brainard was working there before me,
and got me my job. I Ve seen this girl here — my daugh-
ter that you've made into a crook — out there twice.

288 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

Dick Sherwood was supposed to be in love with her. At
the end of this afternoon some officers came to the Sher-
woods' and arrested Larry Brainard. I was working out-
side, overheard what was happening, and crept up on the
porch. Officer Gavegan, who was in charge, found a
painting among Larry Brainard's things. Miss Sherwood
said that it was a picture of Miss Maggie Cameron who
had been visiting there, and I could see that it was. Officer
Gavegan said it was a picture of Maggie Carlisle, daugh-
ter of Jimmie Carlisle, and that she was a crook. Larry
Brainard, cornered, had to admit that Gavegan was right.
I guessed at once who Maggie Carlisle was, since she was
just the age my girl would have been and since you never
had any children. And that's how, Jimmie Carlisle,
standing there outside the window/'concluded the terrible
voice of Joe Ellison, "I learned for the first time that the
baby I'd trusted with you to be brought up straight, and
that I believed was now happy somewhere as a nice, decent
girl, you had really brought up as your own daughter and
trained to be a crook!"

Old Jimmie shrank back from Joe's blazing eyes; his
mouth opened spasmodically, but no words came there-
from. There was stupendous silence in the room. Within
the closet, Larry now understood that low, strange sound
he had heard on the Sherwoods' porch and which Gavegan
and Hunt had investigated. It had been the suppressed
cry of Joe Ellison when he had learned the truth —
the difference between his dreams and the reality. He
could not imagine what that moment had been to Joe :
the swift, unbelievable knowledge that had seemed to be
tearing his very being apart.

Larry had an impulse to step out to Joe's side. But just
as a little earlier he had felt the scene had belonged to
Maggie, he now felt that this situation, the greatest in
Joe's life, belonged definitely to Joe, was almost sacredly
Joe's own property. Also he felt that he was about to

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 289

learn many things which had puzzled him. Therefore
he held himself back, at the same time keeping his hold
upon Red Hannigan.

During this moment of silence, while Larry was wonder-
ing what was going to happen, his eyes also took in the
figure of Maggie, all her powers of action and expression
still paralyzed by appalling consternation. He understood,
at least to a degree, what she was going through. He knew
this much of her plan : that she had intended to cut loose
in some way from Barney and Old Jimmie, and that she
had intended that her father should continue to cherish
the dream that had been his happiness for so long. And
now her father had come upon her in the company of
Barney and Old Jimmie and in a situation whose every
superficial circumstance was such as to make him believe
the worst of her!

Joe turned on the smartly dressed Barney. " I '11 takp
you first, you imitation swell, because I 'm saving Jimmie
Carlisle to the last ! " went on Joe's crunching voice. " I'm
going to twist your damned neck for what you Ve helped
do to my girl, but if you want to say anything first, say
it."

Barney's response was a swift movement of his right
hand toward his left armpit. But Barney Palmer, like
almost all his kind, was a very indifferent gunman; and
he had no knowledge of the reputation for masterful
quickness that had been Joe Ellison's twenty years
earlier. Before his compact automatic was fairly out of its
holster beneath his armpit, it was in Joe Ellison's hands.

"I sized you up for that kind of rat and was watching
you," continued Joe in his same awful grimness. "I'm
not going to shoot you, unless you make me. I'm going
to twist that pretty neck of yours. But first, out with
anything you've got to say for yourself!"

"I haven't had anything to do with this business,"
said Barney, trying to affect a bold manner.

290 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"You lie! I know that in this game against Dick Sher-
wood, in which you used my girl, you were the real
leader!"

"Well — even if I did use your girl, I only used her the
way I found her."

"You lie again! I know how your kind work: cleverly
putting crooked ideas into girls' minds, and exciting their
imagination, so they'll work with you. Your case is
closed." He turned to his one-time friend. "What have
you got to say for yourself, Jimmie Carlisle?"

Old Jimmie believed that his last hour was come. He
showed something of the defiant, almost maniacal cour-
age of a coward who realizes he can retreat no farther.

"What I got to say, Joe Ellison," he snarled in a sud-
den rage which bared his yellow teeth, "is that I 'm even
with you at last !"

"Even with me? What for? "

"For the way you double-crossed me in nineteen -one
in that Gordon business. You never gave me a dime —
said the thing had fallen down — yet I know there was a
big haul!"

"I told you the truth. That Gordon thing was a
fizzle."

"There's where you 're lying! It was a clean-up ! And I
knew you 'd been cheating me out of my share in other
deals!"

"You 're absolutely wrong, Jimmie Carlisle. But if you
thought that, why did n't you have it out with me at the
time?"

"Because I knew you would lie! You were a better
talker than I was, and since our outfit always sided with
you, I knew I wouldn't have a chance then. But I
reasoned that if I kept quiet and kept on being your
friend, I'd get my chance to get even if I waited awhile.
I waited — and I certainly got my chance!"

"Go on, Jimmie Carlisle!"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 291

And Old Jimmie went on — a startlingly different Old
Jimmie, his pent-up evil now loosed into quivering, malig-
nant triumph; went on with the feverish exultation of a
twisted, perverted mind that has brooded long over an
imagined injustice, that has brooded greedily and long in
private over his revenge, and at last has his chance to
gloat in the open.

"When you were sent away, Joe Ellison, and turned
over your daughter to me with those orders about seeing
that she was brought up as a decent girl, I began to see
the big chance I 'd been waiting for. I asked myself, What
is the dearest thing in the world to Joe Ellison? The
answer was, this idea he'd got about his girl. I asked my-
self, What is the biggest way I can get even with Joe
Ellison? The answer was, to make Joe Ellison believe
all the time he 's in stir that his girl is growing up the way
he wants her to be and yet to bring her up the exact thing
he didn't want her to be. And that's exactly what I
did!"

"You — did — such a thing?" breathed Joe Ellison,
almost incredulous.

"That's exactly what I did!" Old Jimmie went on,
gloatingly. " It was easy. No one knew you had a daugh-
ter, so I passed her off as my own baby by a marriage I 'd
not told any one about. I saw that she always lived among
crooks, looked at things the way crooks do, and grew up
with no other thought than to be a crook. I never had an
idea of using her myself, till she began to look like such a
good performer this last year; and then my idea, no mat-
ter what Barney Palmer may have planned, was to use
her only in a couple of stunts. My main idea always was,
when you came out with your grand idea of what your
girl had grown up to be, for you suddenly to see your girl,
and know her as your girl, and know her to be a crook.
That smash to you was the big thing to me — what I 'd
planned for, and waited for. I did n't expect the blow-off

292 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

to come like this; I did n't expect to be caught in it when
it did happen. But since it has happened, well — There's
your daughter, Joe Ellison! Look at her! Look at what
I 've made her! I guess I'm even all right!"

"My God!" breathed Joe Ellison, staring at the lean
face twisting with triumphant malignancy. "I didn't
think there could be such a man!"

He slowly turned upon Maggie. This was the first
direct recognition he had taken of her since his en-
trance.

"I don't suppose you can guess what your being what
you are has meant to me," he began in a numbed tone
which grew accusingly harsh as he continued. "But I'd
think that a daughter of mine, with such a mother, would
have had more instinctive sense than to have gone into
such a game with such a pair of crooks! "

"It's true — I have been what you think me — I did
go into this thing against Dick Sherwood," Maggie re-
sponded in a voice that at first was faltering, then that
stumbled rapidly on in her eagerness to pour out all the
facts. " But — but Larry Brainard had kept after me —
and finally he made me see how wrong I was headed.
And then, this afternoon, before I spoke to you, Larry
told me that you were my real father. When I learned
the truth — how I had been cheated out of being some-
thing else — how I was the exact opposite of what you
had wanted me to be and believed me to be — I felt about
it almost exactly as you feel about it. I — I made up my
mind to clear up at once all the wrong I was responsible
for — and then disappear in such a way that you 'd never
have your dream of me spoiled. And so — and so this
afternoon, after I left Cedar Crest, I confessed the whole
truth to Dick Sherwood — about our plan to cheat him.
And like the really splendid fellow he is, Dick Sherwood
offered to help me set straight the things I wanted to set
straight. Particularly to clear Larry Brainard. And so

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 293

my being here as you find me is part of a plan between
Dick Sherwood and myself. It's really a frame-up. A
frame-up to catch Barney Palmer and Jimmie Carlisle."

"A frame-up!" ejaculated these two in startled uni-
son.

" How a frame-up? " demanded her father, no bit of the
accusing harshness gone out of his voice.

"Our plan against Dick Sherwood was to have him
propose to me, then for me to confess that I was really
married to a mean sort of man I did n't love — the idea
being that Dick would be infatuated enough to pay a big
sum to a dummy husband, and the three of us would dis-
appear as soon as we got Dick's money. Dick offered
to go through with the plan as Barney Palmer and Jimmie
Carlisle had shaped it up — go through with it to-night
— and then after money had passed, we'd have a criminal
case against them. By reminding him that Larry Brainard
knew just what we were up to, and might spoil every-
thing if we did n't act at once, I got Barney Palmer worked
up to the point where he was going to pose as my husband
and take the money. Dick Sherwood was to come a little
later, after he'd first telephoned me, with a big roll of
marked money."

There were stuttered exclamations from Barney and
Old Jimmie, which were cut off by the dominant incisive-
ness of Joe Ellison's words to his daughter:

"I think you're lying to me! Besides, even if you're
telling the truth, it's a pretty way you've taken to clear
things up ! Don't you see that by letting Dick Sherwood
come here and play such a part, you 'd be dead sure to in-
volve him and his family in a dirty police story that the
papers of the whole country would play up as a sensation?
It's plain to any one that that's no way a person who
wanted to square things would use Dick Sherwood. And
that's why I think you're lying!"

" I had thought of that — you're right," said Maggie.

294 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"And so I wasn't going to do it. Hewas going to telephone
me — just about this time — and when he called up I was
going to fake his message. I was going to tell Barney
Palmer and Old Jimmie that Dick had just telephoned he
was n't coming, because one of the two had just sold him
a tip for ten thousand dollars that this was a crooked game.
I thought this would have started a quarrel between the
two; they are suspicious of each other, anyhow. Each
would have accused the other, and in their quarrel they
would have been likely to have let out a lot of truth that
would have completely given each other away."

"Not a bad plan at all," commented Joe Ellison. He
tried to peer deep into his daughter for a moment, his in-
flamed face relaxing neither in its harshness nor its doubt
of her. "But since you are the clever crook I actually
know you to be from your work on Dick Sherwood, and
since Jimmie Carlisle says he has trained you to be a
crook, I believe that everything you've told me is just
something you've cleverly invented on the spur of the
moment — just so many lies."

"But — but— "

She broke off before the harsh, accusing doubt of his
pale face. For a fraction of a moment no one spoke. Then
the telephone bell began to ring.

"Dick!" breathed Maggie, and started for the tele-
phone.

"Stay right where you are!" her father ordered. "I'll
answer that telephone myself, and see whether you're
lying to me about Dick Sherwood! . . . No, we'll do this
together. I '11 hold the receiver and hear what he says.
You '11 do the talking and you '11 answer just what I tell you
to, and^you'll keep your hand tight over the mouthpiece
while I 'm giving you your orders. You two " — to Barney
and Old Jimmie, with a significant movement of Barney's
automatic — "you'd better behave while this telephone
business is going on."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 295

The next moment Larry was hearing, or rather witness-
ing, the strangest telephone conversation of his experience.
Maggie was holding the transmitter, and Joe had the re-
ceiver at his ears, grimly covering the two men with the
automatic. Maggie obediently kept her palm tight over
the mouthpiece during Joe's brief whispered directions,
and no one in the room except Joe, not even Maggie, had
the slightest idea of what was really passing over the
wires.

What Larry heard was no more than a dozen most com-
monplace words in the world, transformed into the most
absorbing words in the language. Joe ordered Maggie to
answer with "hello" in her usual tone, which she did, and
Joe, after a startled expression at the first words that
came over the wire, listened with immobile face for four or
five seconds. Then he nodded imperatively to Maggie
and she put her hand over the mouthpiece.

"Ask him how much, and when he wanted it to be
paid," he ordered.

"How much, and when does he want it to be paid?"
repeated Maggie.

Again Joe listened for several moments; and then or-
dered as before: "Say 'Yes.'"

"Yes," said Maggie.

Another period of waiting, and Joe ordered : "Say, ' I Ve
got a much better plan that supersedes the old.' "
| "I've got a much better plan that supersedes the
old."

There was yet another period of waiting, then Joe com-
manded: "Tell him he really must n't and say good-bye
quick."

" You really must n't ! Good-bye ! "

The instant her "Good-bye" was out of her mouth
Joe clicked the receiver upon its hook, and stood re-
garding the breathless Maggie. His pale, stern face was
not quite so severe as before. Presently he spoke :

296 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"I know now that you really were sick of what you'd
been trying to do — that you 'd really broken away from
these two — that you'd really confessed to Dick, and
are now all square with him."

The word "Father!" struggled chokingly toward her
lips. But she only said:

" I 'm glad — you know."

"And you were shrewd in that guess you made of
what one of these two would do." Joe crossed back to
Barney and Old Jimmie. "You two must have been
almighty afraid, because of Larry Brainard, that your
game was suddenly collapsing, and each must have been
trying to grab a piece for himself before he ran away."

"What you talking about?" gruffly demanded Barney.

"Perhaps I'm talking about you. But more par-
ticularly about Jimmie Carlisle. For just now Dick
Sherwood said when he telephoned, that an hour or two
ago Jimmie Carlisle had hunted him up, had hinted that
he was going to lose a lot of money unless he was properly
advised, and offered to give him certain valuable in-
formation for five thousand cash."

Barney turned upon his partner. "You damned thief ! "
he snarled, tensed as if about to spring upon the other.

Old Jimmie, turned greenishly pale, shrank away from
Barney, his every expression proclaiming his guilt. Then
Maggie again found her voice:

"And at about the same time Barney was trying to
double-cross Jimmie Carlisle, Barney proposed to me
that, after we'd got Dick Sherwood's money, we'd tell
Jimmie Carlisle we'd got very little, and divide the real
money fifty-fifty between just us two."

"You damned thief!" snarled Old Jimmie back at his
partner.

Thenextmoment Barney and Old Jimmie were upon each
other, striking wildly, clawing. But the moment after Joe
Ellison, his repressed rage now unloosed, and with the

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 297

super-strength of his supreme fury, had torn the two
apart.

"You don't do that to each other — that job belongs
to me!" he cried. His right arm flung Barney backward
so that Barney went staggering over himself and sprawled
upon the floor. Joe gripped Old Jimmie's collar, and his
right hand painfully twisted Jimmie's arm. "And I
finish you off first, Jimmie Carlisle, for what you 've done
to me and my girl! But for Larry Brainard you, Jimmie
Carlisle, would have succeeded in your scheme to make
my girl a crook ! I 'd like to give you a thousand years of
agony, you damned rat — but that's beyond me!" His
right hand shifted swiftly from Old Jimmie's arm to his
throat. "But I'm going to choke your rat's life out of
you! — your lying, sneaking devil's life out of you!"

Old Jimmie squirmed and twisted with those long
fingers clamped mercilessly around his throat, his eyes
rolling, and his mouth gaping with voiceless cries. He
was indeed being shaken as a rat might be shaken.

"Don't! — Don't!" cried the frantic Maggie, and
started to seize her father to pull him away. But she was
halted by her arm being caught by Barney.

"Let Jimmie have it!" he said fiercely to her, and
flung her to the farthest corner of the room. And grimly
exultant over what seemed to be Old Jimmie's doom, he
started for the door to make his own escape.

Up to the moment of Joe Ellison's eruption Larry
had felt bound to remain a mere spectator where he was:
long as the time had seemed to him, it had in fact been
less than half an hour. He had felt bound at first by his
promise to Maggie to let her work out her plan; and
bound later by his sense that this situation belonged to
Joe Ellison. But now this swift crisis dissolved all such
obligations. He sprang from his closet to take his part
in the drama that was so swiftly unfolding.

298 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

CHAPTER XXXVI

LARRY caught and whirled around Barney Palmer just
as the hand of the escaping Barney was on the knob of
the outer door.

"No, you don't, Barney Palmer!" he cried. "You
stay right here!"

Startled as Barney was by this appearance of his dear-
est enemy, he wasted no precious time on mere words.
He swung a vicious blow at Larry, intended to remove
this barrier to his freedom. But the experienced Larry
let it glance off his forearm, and with the need of an
instantaneous conclusion he sent a terrific right to
Barney's chin. Barney staggered back, fell in a crumpled
heap, and lay motionless.

Sparing only the fraction of a second to see that
Barney was momentarily out of it, Larry sprang upon
Joe Ellison and tried to break the deadly grips Joe held
upon Old Jimmie.

"Stop, Joe — stop!" he cried peremptorily. "Your
killing Jimmie Carlisle is n't going to help things!"

Without relaxing his holds, Joe turned upon this inter-
ferer.

"Larry Brainard! How'd you come in here?"

"I've been here all the time. But, Joe — don't kill
Jimmie Carlisle!"

"You keep out — this is my business!" Joe fiercely
replied. "If you've been here all the time, then you
know what he's done to me, and what he's done to my
girl! You know he deserves to have his neck twisted
off — and I'm going to twist it off!"

Larry perceived that Joe's sense of tremendous injury
had made him for the moment a madman in his rage.
Only the most powerful appeal had a chance to bring him
back to sanity.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 299

"Listen, Joe — listen!" he cried desperately, straining
to hold back the other's furious strength from its de-
structive purpose. "After what's happened, every one
is bound to know that Maggie is your daughter! Under-
stand that, Joe? — every one will know that Maggie is
your daughter! It's not going to help you to be charged
with murder. And think of this, Joe — what's it going
to do to your daughter to have her father a murderer?"

"What's that?" Joe Ellison asked dazedly.

Larry saw that his point had penetrated to the other's
reason. So he drove on, repeating what he had said.

"Understand this, Joe? — every one will now know
that Maggie is your daughter! You simply can't prevent
their knowing that now ! Remember how for over fifteen
years you've been trying to do the best you could for
her! Do you now want to do the worst thing you can do?
The worst thing you can do for Maggie is to make her
father a murderer!"

" I guess that's right Larry, "he said huskily. "Thanks."

He pushed the half-strangled Jimmie Carlisle away
from him. "You'll get yours in some other way!" he
said grimly.

Old Jimmie, staggering, caught the back of a chair for
support. He tenderly felt his throat and blinked at
Larry and Joe and Maggie. He did not try to say any-
thing. In the meantime Barney had recovered con-
sciousness, had struggled up, and was standing near
Old Jimmie. Their recognition that they were sharers of
defeat had served to restore something of the sense of
alliance between the two.

"Well, anyhow, Larry Brainard," snarled Barney,
"you haven't had anything to do with putting this
across!"

It was Joe Ellison who replied. "Larry Brainard has
had everything to do with putting this across. He's
been beating you all the time from the very beginning,

3oo CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

though you may not have known it. And though he's
seemed to be out of things for the last few hours, he's
been the actual power behind everything that's happened
up to this minute. So don't fool yourself — Larry Brain-
ard has beaten you out at every point!"

A sense of triumph glowed within Larry at this. There
had been a time when he had wanted the animal satis-
faction which would have come from his giving violent
physical punishment to these two — particularly to
Barney. But he had no desire now for such empty
vengeance.

"Well, I guess you've got nothing on me," Barney
growled at them, "so I'll be moving along. Better come,
too, Jimmie."

While he spoke a figure had moved from Larry's closet
with the silence of a swift shadow. It's thin hand gripped
Barney's shoulder.

"I guess I've got something on you!" it said.

Barney whirled. "Red Hannigan!" he gasped.

"Yes, Red Hannigan! — you stool — you squealer!"
said Red Hannigan. "I heard you brag about being
Barlow's stool, and I heard everything else you bragged
about to Joe Ellison's girl. I'd bump you off right now
if I had my gat with me and if I had any chance at a
get-away. But I'll be looking after you, and the gang
will be looking after you, till you die — the same as
you set us after Larry Brainard! No matter what else
happens to you, you'll always have that as something
extra waiting for you! And when the time comes, we'll
get you!"

As silently as he had appeared from the closet, as
silently he let himself out of the room. The glowering
features of Barney had faded to a pasty white while
Hannigan had spoken, and now the hand which tried to
bring a handkerchief to his lips shook so that he could
hardly find his face. For none knew so well as Barney

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 301

Palmer how inescapable was this thing which would be
hanging over him until the end of his days.

Before any one in the room could speak there came a
loud pounding from within the door of the closet Larry
and Red Hannigan had not occupied. "Oh, I'd com-
pletely forgotten!" exclaimed Maggie — and indeed she
had forgotten all that was not immediately connected
with the situation created by her father's unexpected
entrance. She crossed and unlocked the door, and Barlow
stepped out.

"Chief Barlow!" exclaimed the astonished Larry, and
all the other men gazed at the Chief of Detectives with
an equal surprise.

"He is part of my frame-up," Maggie explained at
large. "I wanted both the police and Larry's old friends
to know the truth at first hand — and clear him before
I went away."

"Wasn't that Red Hannigan who just spoke?" were
Barlow's first words.

"Yes," said Larry.

Barney, and Old Jimmie as well, had perked up at the
appearance of Barlow, as though at aid which had come
just in time. But Barlow turned upon Barney a cold
police eye.

"I heard you brag that you were my stool. That's a
lie."

"Why — why — Chief — " Barney stammered. He
had counted upon help here, where there had existed
mutually advantageous relations for so long.

"I heard you say you had my protection. That's an-
other lie. You've squealed on a few people, but I've
never given you a thing."

Barney gasped at this. He knew, as every one in the
room also knew, that Barlow was lying. But Barlow
held all the cards. Rough and ruthless police politician
that he was, he made it his business always to hold the

302 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

highest cards. As sick of soul as a man can be, Barney
realized that Barlow was doing exactly what Barlow al-
ways did — was swinging to the side that had the most
evidence and that would prove most advantageous to
him. And Barney realized that he was suffering the ap-
pointed fate of all stool-pigeons who are found out by
their fellow criminals to be stool-pigeons. Such informers
are of no further use, and according to the police code
they must be given punishment so severe as to dissipate
any unhealthy belief on the public's part that there could
ever have been any alliance between the two.

"I've used this young lady who seems to have been
Jimmie Carlisle's daughter and now seems to be the
daughter of this old-timer Joe Ellison, for a little private
sleuthing on my own hook," Barlow went on — for it
was the instinct of the man to claim the conception and
leadership of any idea in whose development he had a
part. He spoke in a brusque tone — as why should he
not, since he was addressing an audience he lumped to-
gether as just so many crooks? "Through this little
stunt I pulled to-night, I've got on to your curves,
Barney Palmer. And yours, too, Jimmie Carlisle. And
I 'm going to run the pair of you in."

This was too much for Barney Palmer. Even though
he knew that his position as a stool, who was known to
be a stool, was without hope whatever, he went utterly
to pieces.

"For God's sake, Chief," he burst out frantically,
"you're not going to treat me like that! You could get
me out of this easy! Think of all I 've done for you! For
God's sake, Chief — for God's sake — "

"Shut up!" ordered Barlow, doubling a big fist.

Chokingly Barney obeyed. Old Jimmie, coward though
he was, and lacking entirely Barney's quality of a bravo,
had accepted the situation with the twitching calm of one
to whom the worst has often happened. "Shut up,"

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND ' 303

repeated Barlow, "and get it fixed in your beans that I 'm
going to run you two in."

"Run them in because of this Sherwood affair?" asked
Larry.

"Surest thing you know. I've got all the evidence I
need."

"But — " Larry was beginning protestingly, when the
doorbell rang again. Maggie opened the door, and there
entered Miss Sherwood, with Hunt just behind her, and
Dick just behind him, and Casey and Gavegan following
these three. All in the room were surprised at this in-
vasion with the sole exception of Joe Ellison.

"When Mr. Dick spoke over the 'phone about your
coming," he said to Miss Sherwood, "I asked you not to
do it."

Barlow was prompt to speak, and the sudden change in
his voice would have been amazing to those who do not
know how the little great men of the Police Department,
and other little great men, can alter their tones. He had
recognized Miss Sherwood at once, as would any one else
at all acquainted with influential New York.

"Miss Sherwood, I believe," he said, essaying a slight
bow.

"Yes. Though I fear I have not the pleasure of know-
ing you."

"Deputy Barlow, head of the Detective Bureau of the
Police Department," he informed her. "Entirely at your
service."

"Just what is going on here?" she queried. "I know a
part of what has happened" — she was addressing her-
self particularly to Maggie and Larry — "for Dick tele-
phoned me about seven, and I came right into town. He
told me everything he knew — which threw a different
light on a lot of events — and Dick telephoned at about
nine that I was coming over. But something more seems
to have happened."

304 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

"Miss Sherwood, it's like — " began Barlow.

"Just a second, Chief," Larry interrupted. Larry
knew what a sensational story this would be as it had de-
veloped — and he knew in advance just how it would be
seized upon and played up by the newspapers. And Larry
did not want unpleasant publicity for his friends (three in
that room were trying to make a fresh start in life), nor
for those who had been his friends. "Chief, do you want
to make an arrest on a charge which will involve every
person in this room in a sensational story? Of course I
know most of us here don't weigh anything with you. But
why drag Miss Sherwood, who is innocent in every way,
into a criminal story that will serve to cheapen her and
every decent person involved? Besides, it can only be a
conspiracy charge, and there's more than a probability
that you can't prove your case. So why make an arrest
that will drag in Miss Sherwood?".

Barlow had a mind which functioned with amazing
rapidity on matters pertaining to his own interest. He
realized on the instant how it might count for him in the
future if he were in a position to ask a favor of a person of
Miss Sherwood's standing; and he spoke without hesita-
tion:

" I don't know anything about this Sherwood matter.
If any one ever asks me, they'll not get a word."

There was swift relief on the faces of Barney and Old
Jimmie; to be instantly dispelled by Chief Barlow's next
statement which followed his last with only a pause for
breath :

"The main thing we want is to stick these two crooks
away." He turned on Barney and Old Jimmie. "I've
just learned you two fellows are the birds I want for that
Gregory stock business. I 've got you for fair on that. It '11
hold you a hundred times tighter than any conspiracy
charge. Casey, Gavegan — hustle these two crooks out
of here."

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 305

The next moment Casey and Gavegan had handcuffs on
the prisoners and were leading them out.

"Good for you, Larry," Casey whispered warmly as he
went by with Barney. "I knew you were going to win
out, though it might be an extra-inning game!"

At the door Barlow paused. "I hope I've done every-
thing all right, Miss Sherwood?"

"Yes — as far as I know, Mr. Barlow."

Again Barlow started out, and again turned. "And
you, Brainard," he said, rather grudgingly, "I guess you
need n't worry any about that charge against you. It'll
be dropped."

And with that Barlow followed his men and his prisoners
out of the room.

Then for a moment there was silence. As Larry saw and
felt that moment, it was a moment so large that words
would only make a faltering failure in trying to express it.
He himself was suddenly free of all clouds and all dangers.
He had succeeded in what he had been trying to do with
Maggie. A father and a daughter were meeting, with
each knowing their relationship, for the first time. There
was so much to be said, among all of them, that could
only be said as souls relaxed and got acquainted with each
other.

It was so strained, so stupendous a moment that it
would quickly have become awkward and anti-climac-
teric but for the tact of Miss Sherwood.

"Mr. Brainard," she began, in her smiling, direct
manner, with a touch of brisk commonplace in it which
helped relieve the tension, "I want to apologize to you
for the way I treated you late this afternoon. As I said,
I've just had a talk with Dick and he's told me every-
thing — except some things we may all have to tell each
other later. I was entirely in the wrong, and you were
entirely in the right. And the way you 've handled things
seems to have given Dick just that shock which you said

306 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

he needed to awaken him to be the man it 's in him to be.
I'm sure we all congratulate you."

She gave Larry no chance to respond. She knew the
danger, in such an emotional crisis as this, of any let-up.
So she went right on in her brisk tone of ingratiating
authority.

"I guess we've all been through too much to talk.
You are all coming right home with me. Mr. Brainard
and Mr. Ellison live there, I'm their boss, and they've
got to come. And you've got to come, Miss Ellison, if
you don't want to offend me. I won't take 'no.' Besides,
your place is near your father. Wear what you have on ;
in a half a minute you can put enough in a bag to last until
to-morrow. To-morrow we '11 send in for the rest of your
things — whatever you want — and send a note to your
Miss Grierson, paying her off. You and your father will
have my car," she concluded, "Mr. Brainard and Dick
will ride in Dick's car, and Mr. Hunt will take me."

And as she ordered, so was it.

For fifteen minutes — perhaps half an hour — after it
rolled away from the Grantham Hotel there was absolute
stillness in Miss Sherwood's limousine, which she had
assigned to Maggie and her father. Maggie was near
emotional collapse from what she had been through ; and
now she was sitting tight in one corner, away from the
dark shadow in the other corner that was her newly
discovered father who had cared for her so much that he
had sought to erase from her mind all knowledge of his
existence. She wanted to say something — do something;
she was torn with a poignant hunger. But she was so
filled with pulsing desires and fears that she was im-
potent to express any of the million things within her.

And so they rode on, dark shadows, almost half the
width of the deeply cushioned seat between them. Thus
they had ridden along Jackson Avenue, almost into
Flushing, when the silence was broken by the first words

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 307

of the journey. They were husky words, yearning and
afraid of their own sound, and were spoken by Maggie's
father.

"I — I don't know what to call you. Will — will
Maggie do?"

"Yes," she whispered.

"I'm — I'm not much," the husky voice ventured
on; "but what you said about going away — for my
sake — do you think you need to do it?"

" I 've made — such a mess of myself," she choked out.

'"'Other people were to blame," he said. "And out of
it all, I think you 're going to be what — what I dreamed
you were. And — and — "

There was another stifling silence. "Yes?" she
prompted.

"I wanted to keep out of your life — for your sake,"
he went on in his strained, suppressed voice. "But —
but if you're not ashamed of me now that you know all"
— in the darkness his groping hand closed upon hers —
"I wish you would n't — go away from me, Maggie."

And then the surging, incoherent thing in her that
had been struggling to say itself this last half-hour,
suddenly found its voice in a single word :

" Father ! " she cried, and flung her arms around his neck.

"Maggie!" he sobbed, crushing her to him.

All the way to Cedar Crest they said not another word ;
just clung to each other in the darkness, sobbing — the
first miraculous embrace of a father and daughter who had
each found that which they had never expected to have.

CHAPTER XXXVII

IT was ten the next morning at Cedar Crest, and Larry
Brainard sat in his study mechanically going over his
figures and plans for the Sherwood housing project.

3o8 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

For Larry the storms of the past few weeks, and the
whirlwind of last night, had cleared away. There was
quiet in the house, and through the open windows he
could glimpse the broad lawn almost singing in its sun-
gladdened greenness, and farther on he could glimpse
the Sound gleaming placidly. Once for perhaps ten
minutes he had seen the overalled and straw-hatted
figure of Joe Ellison busy as usual among the flowers.
He had strained his eyes for a glimpse of Maggie, but he
had looked in vain.

Despite all that had come to pass at the Grantham the
previous evening, Larry was just now feeling restless
and rather forlorn. His breakfast had been brought to
him in his room, and he had not seen a single member of
last night's party at the Grantham since they had all
divided up according to Miss Sherwood's orders and
driven away; that is he had really seen no one except
Dick.

Dick had gripped his hand when he had slipped in
beside Dick in the low seat of the roadster. "You're all
right, Captain Nemo! — only I'm going to be so brash
as to call you Larry after this," Dick had said. " If you '11
let me, you and I are going to be buddies."

He was all right, Dick was. Dick Sherwood was a
thoroughbred.

And there was another matter which had pleased him.
The Duchess had called him up that morning, had con-
gratulated him in terms so brief that they sounded per-
functory, but which Larry realized had all his grand-
mother's heart in them, and had said she wanted him to
take over the care of all her houses — those she had
put up as bail for him. When could he come in to see
her about this? . . . He understood this dusty -seeming,
stooped, inarticulate grandmother of his as he had not
before. Considering what her life had been, she also was
a brick.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 309

But notwithstanding all this, Larry was lonely —
hungrily lonely — and was very much in doubt. Miss
Sherwood had spoken to him fair enough the night be-
fore — yet he really did not know just how he stood with
her. And then — Maggie. That was what meant most
to him just now. True, Maggie had emerged safe through
perils without and within; and to get her through to
some such safety as now was hers had been his chief con-
cern these many months. He wanted to see her, to speak
to her. But he did not know what her attitude toward
him would now be. He did not know how to go about
finding her. He was not even certain where she had spent
the night. He wanted to see her, yet was apulse with
fear of seeing her. She would not be hostile, he knew that
much; but she might not love him; and at the best a
meeting would be awkward, with so wide a gap in their
lives to be bridged. . . .

He was brooding thus when there was a loud knocking
at his door. Without waiting for his invitation to enter,
the door was flung open, and Hunt strode in leaving the
door wide behind him. His face was just one great, ex-
cited grin. He gave Larry a thump upon the back which
almost knocked Larry over, and then pulled him back to
equilibrium by seizing a hand in both of his, and then al-
most shook it off.

"Larry, my son," exploded the big painter, "I've
just done it! And I did it just as you ordered me to!
Forgot that Miss Sherwood and I had had a falling out,
and as per your orders I walked straight up to her and
asked her. And Larry, you son-of-a-gun, you were
righ t ! She said ' yes ' ! "

"You're lucky, old man!" exclaimed Larry, warmly
returning the painter's grip.

"And, Larry, that's not all. You told me I had the
clearness of vision of a cold boiled lobster — said I was
the greatest fool that^ ever had brains enough not to

3io CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

paint with the wrong end of an umbrella. Paid me some
little compliment like that."

"Something like that," Larry agreed.

"Well, Larry, old son, you were right again! I've
been a worse fool than all you said. Been blinder than
one of those varnished skulls some tough-stomached
people use for paper-weights. After she'd said 'yes'
she gave me the inside story of why we had fallen out.
And guess why it was?"

"You don't want me to guess. You want to tell me.
So go to it."

"Larry, we men will never know how clever women
really are!" Hunt shook his head with impressive
emphasis. "Nor how they understand our natures — the
clever women — nor how well they know how to handle
us. She confessed that our quarrel was, on her part, care-
fully planned from the beginning with a definite result
in view. She told me she'd always believed me a great
painter, if I 'd only break loose from the pretty things
people wanted and paid me so much for. The trouble, as
she saw it, was to get me to cut loose from so much easy
money and devote myself entirely to real stuff. The
only way she could see was for her to tell me I could n't
paint anything worth while, and tell it so straight-out
as to make me believe that she believed it — and thus
make me so mad that I 'd chuck everything and go off to
prove to her that I damned well could paint! I certainly
got sore — I ducked out of sight, swearing I 'd show her
— and, oh, well, you know the rest! Tell me now, can you
think of anything cleverer than the way she handled me? "

"It's just about what I would expect of Miss Sher-
wood," Larry commented.

"Excuse me," said a voice behind them. "I found the
door open; may I come in?"

Both men turned quickly. Entering was Miss Sher-
wood.

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 311

"Isabel!" exclaimed the happy painter. "I was just
telling Larry here — you know!"

Miss Sherwood's tone tried to be severe, and she tried
not to smile — and she succeeded in being just herself.

"I came to talk business with Mr. Brainard. And I'm
going to stay to talk business with Mr. Brainard. But
I '11 give him five seconds for congratulations — provided
at the end of the five seconds Mr. Hunt gets out of
the room."

Larry congratulated the two; congratulated them as
warmly as he felt his as yet dubious position in this
company warranted. At the end of the five seconds
Hunt was closing the door upon his back.

"I've always loved him — and I want to thank you,
Mr. Brainard," she said with her simple directness. And
before Larry could make response of any kind, she shifted
the subject.

"I really came in to see you on business, Mr. Brainard.
I hope I made my attitude toward you clear enough last
night. If I did not, let me say now that I think you have
made good in every particular — and that I trust you in
every particular. What I wished especially to say now,"
she went on briskly, giving Larry no chance to stammer
out his appreciation, "is that I wish to go ahead with-
out any delay with your proposition for developing the
Sherwood properties in New York City which we dis-
cussed some time ago. A former objection you raised is
now removed: you are cleared, and are free to work in
the open. I want you to take charge of affairs, with Dick
working beside you. I think it will be Dick's big chance.
I Ve talked it over with him this morning, and he 's eager
for the arrangement. I hope you are not going to refuse
the offer this time."

"I can't — not such an offer as that," Larry said
huskily. "But, Miss Sherwood, I did n't expect — "

"Then it's settled," she interrupted with her brisk

3i2 CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

tone. " There'll be a lot of details, but we'll have plenty
of time to talk them over later." She stood up. "There
are some changes here at Cedar Crest which I want
begun at once and which I want you to supervise. If you
don't mind we'll look things over now."

He followed beside her along the curving, graveled
walks. She headed toward the cliff, but he had no idea
where she was leading until a sharp turn brought them
almost upon the low cottage which these last few weeks
had been Joe Ellison's home.

"Here is where we start our changes," said the busi-
ness-like Miss Sherwood. "The door 's open, so we might
as well go right in."

They stepped into a tiny entry, and from thence into
a little sitting-room. The room was filled with cut
flowers, but Larry did not even see them. For as they
entered, Maggie sprang up, startled, from a chair, and,
whiter than she had been before in all her life, gazed at
him as if she wanted to run away. She stood trembling
and slender in a linen frock of most simple and graceful
lines. It was Miss Sherwood's frock, though Larry did
not know this; already it had been decided that all those
showy Grantham gowns were never to be worn again.

Once more Miss Sherwood came to the rescue of a
stupendous situation, just as her tact had rescued a
situation too great for words the night before.

"Of course you two people now perceive that I'm a
fraud — that I 've got you together by base trickery. So
much being admitted, let's proceed." She turned on
Larry. " Maggie — we 've agreed that I am to call her
that — Maggie stayed with me last night. There are two
beds in my room. But we did n't sleep much. Mostly we
talked. If there's anything Maggie did n't tell me about
herself, I can't guess what there's left to tell. According
to herself, she's terrible. But that's for us to judge; per-
sonally I don't believe her. She confessed that she really

CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND 313

loved you, but that after the way she'd treated you, of
course she was n't fit for you. Which, of course, is just a
girl's nonsense. I suppose you, Mr. Brainard, are think-
ing something of the sort regarding your own self. It is
equally nonsense. You both love each other — you 've
both been through a lot — nothing of importance now
stands between you — so don't waste any of your too
short lives in coming together."

She took a deep breath and went on. "You might as
well know, Mr. Brainard, that Maggie is going to live
with me for the present — that, of course, she is going
to be a very great burden to me — and it will be a great
favor to me if you '11 marry her soon and take her off my
hands." And then the voice that had tried to keep itself
brisk and even, quavered with a sudden sob. "For
Heaven's sake, dear children — don't be fools!"

And with that she was gone.

For an instant Larry continued to gaze at Maggie's
slender, trembling figure. But something approaching a
miracle — a very human miracle — had just happened.
All those doubts, fears, indecisions, unexpressed desires,
agonies of self-abasement, which might have delayed
their understanding and happiness for weeks and months,
had been swept into nothingness by the incisive kindli-
ness of Miss Sherwood. In one minute she had said all
they might have said in months; there was nothing more
to say. There was nothing left of the past to discuss.
Before them was only the fact of that immediate moment,
and the future.

Tremblingly, silently, Larry crossed to that trembling,
silent figure in white. She did not retreat. Tremblingly
he took her hands and looked down into her dark eyes.
They were now flowing tears, but they met his squarely,
holding back nothing. The look in her eyes answered all
he desired to know just then, for he gathered her tight
into his arms. Wordlessly, but with a sharp, convulsive

3H CHILDREN OF THE WHIRLWIND

sob, she threw her arms about his neck — and thus em-
bracing, shaken with sharp sobs, they stood while the
minutes passed, not a single word having been spoken.
And so it was that these two, both children of the storm,
at last came together. . . .

Presently Joe Ellison chanced to step unsuspectingly
into the room. Seeing what he did, he silently tiptoed
out. There was a garden chair just outside his door. Into
this he sank and let his thin face fall into his hands. His
figure shook and hot tears burned through his fingers.
For his heart told him that his great dream was at last
come true.

THE END

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