The Mission of Poubalov

"I am afraid," said Clara, "that my trouble is making me harsh toward everybody, but that old man seems to me the most disagreeable and repulsive being I ever saw. Who is he?"

"I only know that his name is Dexter," replied Louise; "he has some business with papa, I believe."

Clara inquired for the detective who had been assigned to the Strobel case, and after such delays as are naturally incident to strangers making their first call at the offices of the department, she was confronted by Mr. William Bowker, a commonplace-looking individual, who said:

"Well, ladies, what can I do for you?"

"I am Miss Hilman," replied Clara.

"Ah!" and Bowker raised his brows regretfully, "I informed your uncle this forenoon, Miss Hilman, of what I have done and found in the matter."

"He told me about it, but I couldn't be satisfied with a report at second hand. Won't you tell me just what you told him?"

"It will be very unpleasant for you, Miss Hilman, and if Mr. Pembroke has told you the result of my investigation, that is really all there is to be said."

"I won't trouble you to repeat that a gentleman answering the description of Mr. Strobel alighted from a closed carriage at the Park Square Station, shortly after the accident on Park Street and bought a ticket for New York, or that Miss White took the same train. I am willing to take it for granted that you have traced Miss White's movements correctly. I want to know what makes you so certain that the gentleman who took the train was Mr. Strobel?"

Detective Bowker stared at the young lady a moment; it was his delicate way of expressing surprise.

"The description of the man and the time tallied with Strobel and his accident," he answered, "to say nothing of the reasons for his running away."

"Is that all, Mr. Bowker?"

"No, it ain't; that was what we found at first. Don't it look reasonable – " and he proceeded to theorize on the matter until Clara checked him.

"I could have heard all that from half the people in Boston," she said, "if I had paid any attention to the rumor. I supposed professional detectives would base their reports on something better than conjecture."

Bowker shrugged his shoulders.

"What would you say," he asked with a little temper, "if an acquaintance of Strobel's was to tell you that he saw the gentleman buy his ticket and go to the train?"

"Have you such evidence as that? If so, who is it?"

"I can't answer the question, Miss Hilman. I have no right to make public the workings of the department. I expect to get further evidence this afternoon to prove that Strobel eloped. It's by no wish of mine, you understand, that I tell you these disagreeable things."

"You needn't apologize, Mr. Bowker. I came for information. I understand, then, that you do not regard your investigation as finished."

"Well, not exactly. Of course we want to clinch it."

"Have you seen the driver of the closed carriage?"

"No. We have no means of identifying him except recognition by the man who drove the coupé. If a man should walk in here and say that he drove the closed carriage, we'd examine him, of course, but we've been unable yet to find that man. The thing being in the papers, it may happen – in fact, it's quite likely – that the missing driver will turn up to-day. Cabmen are usually anxious to please the department. I suppose the evidence of the cabman would be satisfactory, wouldn't it?"

"Quite, if I was satisfied that it was the man, and that he told the truth."

"I guess you're hard to satisfy, Miss Hilman."

"Mr. Bowker," and Clara beamed on him with a smile so sweet and radiant that he started with astonishment, "I think you are working hard and as faithfully as you know how to prove a theory which you formed early in your investigations, even before you had Lizzie White's flight to base it on. I shouldn't think you'd do that, you know. Honestly, wouldn't you rather find out the truth, even if it did upset your first theory?"

Bowker stared in undisguised discomfort.

"If you've got any facts," he said, "you'd ought to let us have them. Of course we want to find out the truth. What is it you know, or think of?"

"No, thank you, Mr. Bowker," responded Clara, rising, and still bewildering him with her lovely smiles; "you work along in your way and I'll work in mine. When I learn that you've found anything worth considering, I may take you into my confidence; I might even co-operate with you. Good-afternoon."

No one was more amazed at Clara's coolness than her Cousin Louise.

"I don't see how you can do it, Clara," she said when they were again in Pemberton Square.

"Do you realize," returned Clara, "what might happen if I didn't do something of this kind? Somebody must stir everybody else up, or else the public will not only come to believe that Ivan was false, but we shall never find him. I may be making mistakes, but I don't believe that detective will be content to stop where he is. He'll look further, and the further he looks the more certainly will he find that he has been working at a wrong theory. Let's go somewhere and find a business directory."

They went to the parlor of a neighboring hotel, where for an hour Clara busied herself making a list of all the livery and hack stables in the city. Then she hired a cab, and for hours the young ladies went from one to another stable, Clara always with the same inquiry, seeking for some trace of him whom for convenience she came to call the "second driver."

There is no need to go into the details of her tedious search. It was not concluded when evening came, and she had to desist from sheer fatigue. She had found no clew that promised the discovery of the one witness who could certainly be of use to her.

From Mrs. White's Litizki went to his shop and toiled patiently and methodically for two or three hours. He hardly opened his lips during the whole time, but his brain was busy with projects. That Poubalov was responsible for the fate of Ivan Strobel did not admit of a shadow of doubt; that he had concealed the young man in his lodgings was not so certain, but Litizki deemed it altogether probable. The spy would have plenty of money, he could have put up at a hotel; why had he not done so? Because, according to Litizki's reasoning, he had uses for a lodging to which the public conveniences of a hotel could not safely be bent. Distrustful of all men, the spy would keep his prisoner under his own charge, and in a lodging-house it would not be difficult to purchase the discreet silence of a not too scrupulous landlady concerning a mysterious co-tenant.

The more he thought about it the more firmly the idea took possession of the tailor that Strobel was confined in the Bulfinch Place lodging-house which Poubalov had entered by means of a latch-key. If any one had suggested to him the spy's arguments to the effect that as the agent of a friendly government he could not venture, if he would, to violate American law, Litizki would have laughed, and that would have been very significant of his immeasurable contempt for the argument, for it was not in the memory of his associates that the tailor had ever smiled. His nearest approach to it, in fact, was when he manifested pleasure at the idea of being countenanced in an investigation of Poubalov's doings in his own way. Respect American law, indeed! Then would Poubalov be other than he was, and the leopard might be expected to change his spots.

Litizki hated Poubalov with all the concentrated venom of his small nature, a nature that had known little of good in the world save in Ivan Strobel's kindness, that had felt the blows of tyranny and the stabs of treachery at the hands of this same spy. A desire for vengeance had smoldered long in his heart, and he had never expected that any breeze of fortune would fan it into living flame; and now, suddenly, it had burst forth a raging fire, and the possibility of opportunity rose before his dull eyes as the one glad hope of his wretched life. Poubalov in America! Poubalov at his treacherous work against the one man who had inspired Litizki with confidence and stirred his affections! and he, Litizki, knew Poubalov's secret, knew where he could lay hands upon him! Fate must have placed him there in order that Litizki's vengeance might be the more complete.

The tailor laid down his tools and bent his head upon his hands. Poubalov must be checkmated, Strobel rescued; and if in accomplishing this end, the spy should be – Well, what then?

Litizki put on a long coat with a high collar that he turned up about his ears, and a soft hat that he pulled down over his eyes. At the foot of the stairs that led to his shop he met Paul Palovna.

"Hello, Litizki," exclaimed the young man, "where in the world are you going rigged out as if it were winter?"

The grotesque little figure looked sourly up at the inquirer and replied:

"I am going to begin my work."

"See here, Litizki," said Paul, seriously, "you mustn't do anything rash. I was just coming to see you to give you warning. Poubalov is dangerous and very clever. Don't get yourself into trouble, and don't spoil all chance of trapping him, if he has really got hold of Strobel, by any premature act."

The little tailor reflected.

"For myself," he answered presently, "nothing matters. I will be careful, Paul Palovna, as careful as man can be not to compromise any chances. I shall act for myself alone. Nobody sends me, nobody influences me. If I succeed, we shall all rejoice; if I fail" – he shrugged his shoulders significantly – "I will be the only loser. I promise you not to be rash, Paul Palovna, for the sake of noble Ivan Strobel and his beautiful lady."

Then he moved away, and Palovna knew hardly whether to smile at his ludicrous make-up, or shudder at the purpose that unquestionably lurked in his thoughts.

"I hope good may come of it!" sighed Palovna.

Litizki went to Bulfinch Place, and shrinking as far as possible into his long coat, walked along on the sidewalk opposite Poubalov's house. Yes, there the villain was, calmly reading a newspaper! One flight from the ground, front room. At the side of the room was a smaller one over the hall. Litizki knew the arrangement of the houses in that vicinity, and the blinds of that room were closed. Perhaps, though, the prison chamber would be in some more remote part of the house. Time and the night would tell.

The tailor went to the corner of Bowdoin Street, and stood there, unmindful of the curious glances of passers until he saw Poubalov leave the lodging-house. It was just possible that the spy had his prisoner concealed elsewhere, and was now going to him. Litizki followed. It occurred to him that now might be the time to get into the house on some pretext and make a search, but he dismissed the thought as ruinous. If Strobel were there, the landlady would be paid to be watchful during Poubalov's absence. No; the night was the time when nobody would be watching, and when every corner in the house could be searched from cellar to garret.

Poubalov went to State Street, and entered the bank where Strobel had been employed. He brushed past Litizki when he emerged, but apparently did not see him. The tailor followed him from one place to another, waited under a hotel window for an hour while the spy was dining, saw him into a theatre and eventually back to his lodgings, where he arrived at about eleven o'clock. It was evident that he went directly to bed, for the light in his room was extinguished very shortly after he went in.

Litizki then went to a cheap restaurant, where he appeased his appetite and drank several cups of bad tea. It was after midnight before he left the place, and his one wish was that he had a dark lantern. To make up for his lack, he was plentifully supplied with matches.

A printer, whom Litizki knew by sight, lived in the house adjoining the one where Poubalov lodged. The tailor knew that he ordinarily arrived home at one o'clock. He was on time this night, and as he turned into the tiny yard before the building, Litizki stepped down from the doorway.

"I'm glad you've come," he said, "I left my key in the room and I can't rouse anybody by ringing."

"No," responded the printer with a laugh, "they don't get up for anybody. How long you been living here?"

"Only a few days."

The door was opened, and both men went upstairs. The printer, with a cheery "good-night," entered a room on the second landing. Litizki continued to the top floor, and thence through a skylight to the roof. Fortune was, indeed, favoring him. He had supposed the skylight would be raised for the sake of ventilation. There had been doubt whether the steps leading to it would be in place.

He cared little whether the skylight on the adjoining roof would be found open and the steps in place, or not; he would get in in any event. Both were in just the condition most favorable to his project, and a moment later Litizki had struck a match and was peering about in an empty room on the top floor of Poubalov's lodging house.

The little tailor exulted more and more as he crept down the stairs after examining every room. Not a sleeper had been awakened, not a door had been found locked. He would search the whole house before trying the door to the hall room adjoining Poubalov's. That would be found locked. He had no doubt he should pick the lock, for he had skeleton keys in his pocket, and if not – a vigorous shove and he would burst it open. What cared he for details at the very end of his search?

He had come to the floor above the spy's room. Here, as before, every door was unlocked, most of the rooms empty. He had just extinguished a match preparatory to descending further, when from somewhere out of the darkness heavy hands were laid upon him and he was borne to the floor. Another instant and a hand was pressed upon his mouth and there was a dazzling flash of light from a dark lantern held over him.

Litizki saw the cruel eyes of Alexander Poubalov glaring down, and then the slide of the lantern was closed again.

CHAPTER IX.

LITIZKI'S LESSON

There had been no scuffle and almost no noise as the tailor fell to the floor, but one of the chamber doors opened, nevertheless, and a startled voice asked: "What's that?"

"Sorry you've been disturbed," said Poubalov; "a friend of mine, with a little more of a load than he could manage, has stumbled. That's all. I will look out for him."

The inquirer went back to bed grumbling, and as soon as the door closed Poubalov whispered in Russian: "Will you keep quiet, or shall I have to quiet you?" and he removed his hand from Litizki's mouth.

"It's all one to me, Alexander Poubalov," muttered the tailor, and, feeling the pressure removed, he rose to his feet. Still speaking Russian, the spy remarked:

"You are so good at finding your way in the dark that I will not pull the slide of my lantern. I should dislike, for your sake, to have you recognized. Go down and enter my room."

Litizki felt for the banister, and, guided by it, walked down the flight and opened the door, as directed, into his captor's room. When Poubalov came in he closed and bolted the door, then opened the lantern and let its rays fall on Litizki from head to feet, and head again, as if he were curiously studying the make-up. He laughed softly at last and said:

"There's a chair just back of you. Sit down."

The tailor sank into it, and Poubalov lit the gas. In the general light Litizki saw that the spy was fully dressed save for his coat, and that the folding bed which was a feature of the furniture had not been let down. Poubalov noticed Litizki's glance and understood:

"No, my friend," he said suavely, "I did not go to bed. I expected you, and sat up to receive you."

Litizki groaned. Until then he had hoped desperately that even as a prisoner he would be able to accomplish something; now, convinced that the spy had prepared for his coming, he realized that his effort had been in vain. The awful sense of the unshakable power this man represented and wielded came over him as it did in those gloomy days in Russia when he had to choose between voluntary exile and certain banishment.

Poubalov drew a chair to a little table in the middle of the room, and sat down opposite the tailor.

"Nicholas Litizki," he said, "you have surprised and grieved me! I would not have supposed that even a residence of several years in America could have made you forget that Alexander Poubalov never takes a step until he is thoroughly prepared for it. I, who hardly know what the word emotion means, am almost hurt. Surely it must be that contact with republican institutions deadens a man's sensibilities and affects his memory."

Litizki's small eyes had been fixed upon those of his adversary from the beginning. They had relapsed to their customary dull expression, but they glowed faintly with new life, for, the first edge of his disappointment dulled, he recalled the two great purposes for which he had invaded the house: vengeance and the rescue of Ivan Strobel. Neither purpose might be lost, and if he must forego or postpone vengeance, he would not prejudice what means others might have at command for saving his benefactor.

"Poubalov," said the tailor, "I am an American citizen."

"I bow to your discretion," responded the spy, "but I knew it. You think to hide behind the generous skirts of your adopted country's goddess. Good! I admit the efficacy of the refuge, for the accredited agent of the czar – whom God preserve, Nicholas Litizki – will do nothing in a friendly country in violation of that country's laws. But see, my friend, what a tower of strength a proper respect for the law becomes: I not only knew you were coming, but I knew what you were coming for, and I need not say that I knew what way you would take. I have kept within the law, and yet I found out all about you and your associates before I had been in Boston – no matter how long. Poor fellow! did you really think that Poubalov's eyes did not penetrate your flimsy disguise? I am sorry, Litizki; your patience and devotion would fit you for service in the holy cause of the czar, and it is not at all adapted to pursuing the steps of honest men."

"You do not frighten me," interposed Litizki; "I know your superlative cunning and your crooked ways. Your speech nauseates me. 'Honest men!' Bah!"

"We won't dispute over trifles, then. I simply call to your attention the fact that you unlawfully invade a dwelling-house, prowling about like a common thief and thus place yourself unreservedly in my power. Of course, Nicholas Litizki did not enter here to commit theft. He came to find his friend, Ivan Strobel."

"It is a lie, Alexander Poubalov! I sought him not."

"You know whether it is a lie, or not. So do I. Therefore we will not argue the matter. Well, what are you going to do now that you are here?"

Litizki boiled with futile rage. He was trapped not only literally as Poubalov's prisoner, but he felt how weak he was in any contest of words with this shrewd master of deceit. He had spoken truly in telling Paul Palovna that it mattered not what became of him, and although those words were uttered under the influence of a desire for vengeance that constant dwelling upon had turned to conviction that he would succeed, he now felt them to be as true, for he despaired, as he had been despairing for years, of accomplishing anything that would be worth the doing. Why had he presumed to undertake the hopeless task of outwitting Poubalov? He saw how wildly foolish had been his course, but his conviction remained unshaken.

"Have it so, then," he hissed; "respect for law is not in your character. You have unlawfully taken possession of Ivan Strobel."

"Yes?" responded Poubalov quietly; "you are very sure of that?"

"I know it, yes; I did come here to find him, to liberate, ay, to kill you if need be!"

"Indeed! the same, familiar antagonism to the authority of Russia, I suppose. The Russian agent is to you like the red flag to the bull. Yes, very interesting. Well, Litizki?"

"Alexander Poubalov!" exclaimed the tailor, rising and speaking with all his long-treasured bitterness, "you have Ivan Strobel, an American citizen, in your power; you restrain him illegally of his liberty, with what purpose it matters not. I, as an American citizen, demand that you release him."

Poubalov looked with mock admiration at the fierce but grotesque figure before him, and said:

"Good! very good! I am not certain but that demand is good law. I shall have to think of it. When, Nicholas Litizki?"

"I cannot tolerate your smart language," returned Litizki; "give him up now. It will be worse for you if you fool with me. You threw me down in the dark because I was taken unawares. In the light I can make my own fight, Alexander Poubalov! Come! Ivan Strobel is in that room, behind that door, and if you have not stopped his ears as you have gagged his mouth and bound his limbs, he hears my voice now and knows it. I should be less than man should I not take even a desperate step to rescue him, my friend, my benefactor!"

Even to the cynical spy the grotesqueness of the little tailor's figure and make-up disappeared in the exaltation up to which his emotions bore him. He took one determined stride toward the door to the little hall room.

"Nicholas Litizki," said Poubalov, softly.

The tailor turned, such was the compelling power of that deep voice, and for the instant his progress was checked. Poubalov had extended one arm upon the table and his hand was toying with a revolver.

"I believe you, my friend," remarked the spy, hardly looking toward the tailor at first, but later concentrating his gleaming eyes upon him, "I believe you when you say by actions if not by words that you would die for your friend, and that you do not care what becomes of you. But you have some degree of cleverness, Litizki. We learned that years ago. Listen, then, just a moment before you lay hand upon that door. It is locked, Litizki. Before you could open it I could put a bullet through your heart. Would I not dare? What should a peaceable lodger not do to a man who stealthily enters his house by night? Who would disbelieve me if I should calmly report to the police that you came as a burglar, and that I shot at you in protection of property and life? Suppose, however, that I prefer to avoid a disturbance. Before you could more than wrench the knob of that door once, I could pierce your heart silently."

Poubalov rose and stood towering over Litizki, a knife glistening in his right hand.

"You know something of my resources," he continued, "and whether I would be likely to find difficulty in disposing of your lifeless body. Why! you have come so secretly that you and I alone know of your whereabout. We would then have another disappearance to add to the Strobel mystery, but one that would not be half as interesting, Litizki, not half."

"You have killed Ivan Strobel!" whispered Litizki, shrinking away.

"In that inference," said Poubalov, contemptuously, as he laid his weapons on the table and resumed his seat, "your madness reaches its climax and you will speedily recover. You will not go to that door now. You see how useless it would be. Live, and you may yet see your friend, may yet assist in liberating him. Understand me, Nicholas Litizki: I have not come to this country for nothing. I have a mission to perform, and nothing shall prevent me from performing it, and in my own way."

"You will then keep Strobel a prisoner," muttered Litizki, "until you have wrung from him by cruelty what you have come for?"

"I shall perform my mission. Now it would be perfectly easy for me to remove you, for you are making yourself an obstacle, a slight one, to my plans. It pleases me better, however, that you should live, and you may yet be an assistance to me. I will show you to the street door whenever you feel ready to depart."

Litizki shot a glance full of evil at his captor, but Poubalov ignored it, and calmly lighted the inevitable cigarette.

"Very well, Alexander Poubalov," said Litizki after a moment, "you may let me go, but expect no gratitude from me. I know only too well that you think to serve your foul purposes by my liberty, but, weak as I am, I shall not rest until Strobel is restored to us or his fate made known, and even after that I shall pursue you! You teach me a lesson, Poubalov, a hard one, but I shall learn it."