Part 50 (1/2)
a.s.serted the other.
”I'll go there myself.”
”No use goin' by yourself.”
”I'll get the police----”
”The police!” The other laughed derisively. ”They don't go after the Big Chief's friends--not when he stands by 'em.”
”The 'Big Chief'?”
”Coll McSheen.”
”Mr. McSheen!”
”He's _it_!”
”It? What? I don't understand.”
”Well, don't bring me into this.”
”I will not.”
”He's at the bottom of the whole business. He's the lawyer 't gives the dope and takes care of 'em. He owns the place--'t least, Mick Raffity and Gallagin and Smooth Ally own the places; and he owns them. He knows all about it and they don't turn a hand without him. Oh! I know him--I know 'em all!”
”You think this is the girl the lady was looking for?”
”I don't know. I only know she went there, and Gallagin showed his teeth, and then I called him down and got the gal out. I skeered him.”
”Well, we'll see.”
”Well, I must be goin'. I've told you. Swear you won't bring me into it.
Good-night.”
”I will not.”
The man gazed down the street one way, then turned and went off in the other direction. John was puzzled, but a gleam of light came to him.
Wolffert! Wolffert was the man to consult. What this man said was just what Wolffert had always insisted on: that ”the White Slave traffic” was not only the most hideous crime now existing on earth, but that it was protected and promoted by men in power in the city, that it was, indeed, international in its range. He remembered to have heard him say that a law had been pa.s.sed to deal with it; but that such law needed the force of an awakened public conscience to become effective.
Thus it was, that that morning Wolffert was aroused by John Marvel coming into his room. In an instant he was wide-awake, for he, too, knew of the disappearance of Elsa, and of our fruitless hunt for her.
”But you are sure that this woman is Elsa?” he asked as he hurriedly dressed.
”No--only that it is some one.”
”So much the better--maybe.”
An hour later Wolffert and John Marvel were in a lawyer's office in one of the great new buildings of the city, talking to a young lawyer who had recently become a public prosecutor, not as a representative of the city, but of a larger power, that of the nation. He and Wolffert were already friends, and Wolffert had a little while before interested him in the cause to which he had for some time been devoting his powers. It promised to prove a good case, and the young attorney was keenly interested. The bigger the game, the better he loved the pursuit.
”Who's your mysterious informant, Mr. Marvel?” he asked.