“Alec, you’re going to lie down here.
If any one comes in you act drunk.
You do what I say—if you don’t I’ll probably kill you.”
There was another moment while they stared at each other.
Then Amory went briskly to the bureau and, taking his pocket-book, beckoned peremptorily to the girl.
He heard one word from Alec that sounded like “penitentiary,” then he and Jill were in the bathroom with the door bolted behind them.
“You’re here with me,” he said sternly. “You’ve been with me all evening.”
She nodded, gave a little half cry.
In a second he had the door of the other room open and three men entered.
There was an immediate flood of electric light and he stood there blinking.
“You’ve been playing a little too dangerous a game, young man!”
Amory laughed.
“Well?”
The leader of the trio nodded authoritatively at a burly man in a check suit.
“All right, Olson.”
“I got you, Mr. O’May,” said Olson, nodding.
The other two took a curious glance at their quarry and then withdrew, closing the door angrily behind them.
The burly man regarded Amory contemptuously.
“Didn’t you ever hear of the Mann Act?
Coming down here with her,” he indicated the girl with his thumb, “with a New York license on your car—to a hotel like this.” He shook his head implying that he had struggled over Amory but now gave him up.
“Well,” said Amory rather impatiently, “what do you want us to do?”
“Get dressed, quick—and tell your friend not to make such a racket.” Jill was sobbing noisily on the bed, but at these words she subsided sulkily and, gathering up her clothes, retired to the bathroom.
As Amory slipped into Alec’s B. V. D.’sao he found that his attitudetoward the situation was agreeably humorous.
The aggrieved virtue of the burly man made him want to laugh.
“Anybody else here?” demanded Olson, trying to look keen and ferret-like.
“Fellow who had the rooms,” said Amory carelessly. “He’s drunk as an owl, though.
Been in there asleep since six o’clock.”
“I’ll take a look at him presently.”
“How did you find out?” asked Amory curiously.
“Night clerk saw you go up-stairs with this woman.”
Amory nodded; Jill reappeared from the bathroom, completely if rather untidily arrayed.
“Now then,” began Olson, producing a note-book, “I want your real names—no damn John Smith or Mary Brown.”
“Wait a minute,” said Amory quietly. “Just drop that big-bully stuff.
We merely got caught, that’s all.”
Olson glared at him.
“Name?” he snapped.
Amory gave his name and New York address.
“And the lady?”
“Miss Jill____”
“Say,” cried Olson indignantly, “just ease up on the nursery rhymes.
What’s your name?
Sarah Murphy?
Minnie Jackson?”
“Oh, my God!” cried the girl cupping her tear-stained face in her hands. “I don’t want my mother to know.
I don’t want my mother to know.”
“Come on now!”
“Shut up!” cried Amory at Olson.
An instant’s pause.
“Stella Robbins,” she faltered finally “General Delivery, Rugway, New Hampshire.”
Olson snapped his note-book shut and looked at them very ponderously.