The White Moll. Frank L. Packard

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СКАЧАТЬ Nan had lost consciousness. Rhoda Gray settled herself on the doorstep, supporting the woman's head in her lap. Her face had set again in grim, hard, perplexed lines. There seemed something unnatural, something menacingly weird, something even uncanny about it all. Perhaps it was because it seemed as though she could so surely foresee the end. Gypsy Nan would not live through the night. Something told her that. The woman's masquerade, for whatever purpose it had been assumed, was over. "You'll play the game, won't you? You'll see me through?" There seemed something pitifully futile in those words now!

      The officer returned.

      "It's all right," he said. "How's she seem?"

      Rhoda Gray shook her head.

      A passer-by stopped, asked what was the matter—and lingered curiously. Another, and another, did the same. A little crowd collected. The officer kept them back. Came then the strident clang of a gong and the rapid beat of horses' hoofs. A white-coated figure jumped from the ambulance, pushed his way forward, and bent over the form in Rhoda Gray's lap. A moment more, and they were carrying Gypsy Nan to the ambulance.

      Rhoda Gray spoke to the officer:

      "I think perhaps I had better go with her."

      "Sure!" said the officer.

      She caught snatches of the officer's words, as he made a report to the doctor:

      "Found her here in the street...Charlotte Green...nothing else...the White Moll, straight as God makes 'em...she'll see the woman through." He turned to Rhoda Gray. "You can get in there with them, miss."

      It took possibly ten minutes to reach the hospital, but, before that time, Gypsy Nan, responding in a measure to stimulants, had regained consciousness. She insisted on clinging to Rhoda Gray's hand as they carried in the stretcher.

      "Don't leave me!" she pleaded. And then, for the first time, Gypsy Nan's nerve seemed to fail her. "I—oh, my God—I—I don't want to die!" she cried out.

      But a moment later, inside the hospital, as the admitting officer began to ask questions of Rhoda Gray, Gypsy Nan had apparently recovered her grip upon herself.

      "Ah, let her alone!" she broke in. "She doesn't know me any more than you do. She found me on the street. But she was good to me, God bless her!"

      "Your name's Charlotte Green? Yes?" The man nodded. "Where do you live?"

      "Wherever I like!" Gypsy Nan was snarling truculently now. "What's it matter where I live? Don't you ever have any one come here without a letter from the pastor of her church!" She pulled out the package of banknotes. "You aren't going to get stuck. This'll see you through whatever happens. Give me a—a private room, and"—her voice was weakening rapidly—"and"—there came a bitter, facetious laugh—"the best you've got." Her voice was weakening rapidly.

      They carried her upstairs. She still insisted on clinging to Rhoda Gray's hand.

      "Don't leave me!" she pleaded again, as they reached the door of a private room, and Rhoda Gray disengaged her hand gently.

      "I'll stay outside here," Rhoda Gray promised. "I won't go away without seeing you again."

      Rhoda Gray sat down on a settee in the hall. She glanced at her wrist watch. It was five minutes of eleven. Doctors and nurses came and went from the room. Then a great quiet seemed to settle down around her. A half hour passed. A doctor went into the room, and presently came out again. She intercepted him as he came along the corridor.

      He shook his head.

      She did not understand his technical explanation. There was something about a clot and blood stoppage. But as she resumed her seat, she understood very fully that the end was near. The woman was resting quietly now, the doctor had said, but if she, Rhoda Gray, cared to wait, she could see the other before leaving the hospital.

      And so she waited. She had promised Gypsy Nan she would.

      The minutes dragged along. A quarter of an hour passed. Still another. Midnight came. Fifteen minutes more went by, and then a nurse came out of the room, and, standing by the door, beckoned to Rhoda Gray.

      "She is asking for you," the nurse said. "Please do not stay more than a few minutes. I shall be outside here, and if you notice the slightest change, call me instantly."

      Rhoda Gray nodded.

      "I understand," she said.

      The door closed softly behind her. She was smiling cheerily as she crossed the room and bent over Gypsy Nan.

      The woman stretched out her hand.

      "The White Moll!" she whispered. "He told the truth, that bull did—straight as they make 'em, and—"

      "Don't try to talk," Rhoda Gray interrupted gently. "Wait until you are a little stronger."

      "Stronger!" Gypsy Nan shook her head. "Don't try to kid me! I know. They told me. I'd have known it anyway. I'm going out."

      Rhoda Gray found no answer for a moment. A great lump had risen in her throat. Neither would she have needed to be told; she, too, would have known it anyway—it was stamped in the gray pallor of the woman's face. She pressed Gypsy Nan's hand.

      And then Gypsy Nan spoke again, a queer, yearning hesitancy in her voice:

      "Do—do you believe in God?"

      "Yes," said Rhoda Gray simply.

      Gypsy Nan closed her eyes.

      "Do—do you think there is a chance—even at the last—if—if, without throwing down one's pals, one tries to make good?"

      "Yes," said Rhoda Gray again.

      "Is the door closed?" Gypsy Nan attempted to raise herself on her elbow, as though to see for herself.

      Rhoda Gray forced the other gently back upon the pillows.

      "It is closed," she said. "You need not be afraid."

      "What time is it?" demanded Gypsy Nan.

      Rhoda Gray looked at her watch.

      "Twenty-five minutes after twelve," she answered.

      "There's time yet, then," whispered Gypsy Nan. "There's time yet." She lay silent for a moment, then her hand closed tightly around Rhoda Gray's. "Listen!" she said. "There's more about—about why I lived like that than I told you. And—and I can't tell you now—I can't go out like a yellow cur—I'm not going to snitch on anybody else just because I'm through myself. But—but there's something on to-night that I'd—I'd like to stop. Only the police, or anybody else, aren't to know anything about it, because then they'd nip my friends. See? But you can do it—easy. You can do it alone without anybody knowing. There's time yet. They weren't going to pull it until half past one—and there won't be any danger for you. All you've got to do is get the money before they do, and then see that it goes back where it belongs to-morrow. Will you? You don't want to see a crime committed to-night if—if you can stop it, do you?"

      Rhoda Gray's face was grave. She hesitated for a moment.

      "I'll СКАЧАТЬ