8.

       Gateway to Evil

       Table of Contents

      Pat stared curiously at the apparition but made no move to alight from the vehicle. She was conscious of no fear, only a sense of wonder and perplexity. After all, this was merely Nick, her own harmless, adoring Nick, in some sort of mysterious masquerade, and she felt full confidence in her ability to handle him under any circumstances.

      "Where's here?" she said, remaining motionless in her place.

      "A place to dance," came the toneless reply.

      Pat eyed him; a street car rumbled past, and the brief glow from its lighted windows swept over his face. Suddenly the visage was that of Nick; the crimson glare of the eyes was imperceptible, and the features were the well-known appurtenances of Nicholas Devine, but queerly tensed and strained.

      "A trick of the light," she thought, as the street car lumbered away, and again a faint gleam of crimson appeared. She gazed curiously at the youth, who stood impassively returning her survey as he held the door of the car. But the face was the face of Nick, she perceived, probably in one of his grim moods.

      She transferred her glance to the building opposite which they had stopped. The strains of the mechanical piano had ceased; blank, shaded windows faced them, around whose edges glowed a subdued light from within. A drab, battered, paintless shack, she thought, dismal and unpleasant; while she gazed, the sound of the discordant music recommenced, adding, it seemed, the last unprepossessing item.

      "It doesn't look very attractive, Nick," she observed dubiously.

      "I find it so, however."

      "Then you've been here?"

      "Yes."

      "But I thought you said you didn't know any place to go."

      "This one hadn't occurred to me—then."

      "Well," she said crisply, "I could have done as well as this with my eyes closed. It doesn't appeal to me at all, Nick."

      "Nevertheless, here's where we'll go. You're apt to find it—interesting."

      "Look here, Nicholas Devine!" Pat snapped, "What makes you think you can bully me? No one has ever succeeded yet!"

      "I said you'd find it interesting." His voice was unchanged; she stared at him in complete bafflement.

      "Oh, Nick!" she exclaimed in suddenly softer tones. "What difference does it make? Didn't I say anywhere would do, so we went together?" She smiled at him. "This will do if you wish, though really, Honey, I'd prefer not."

      "I do wish it," the other said.

      "All right, Honey," said Pat the faintest trace of reluctance in her voice as she slipped from the car. "I stick to my bargains."

      She winced at the intensity of his grip as he took her arm to assist her. His fingers were like taunt wires biting into her flesh.

      "Nick!" she cried. "You're hurting me! You're bruising my arm!"

      He released her; she rubbed the spot ruefully, then followed him to the door of the mysterious establishment. The unharmonious jangle of the piano dinned abruptly louder as he swung the door open. Pat entered and glanced around her at the room revealed.

      Dull, smoky, dismal—not the least exciting or interesting as yet, she thought. A short bar paralleled one wall, behind which lounged a little, thin, nondescript individual with a small mustache. Half a dozen tables filled the remainder of the room; four or five occupied by the clientele of the place, as unsavory a group as the girl could recall having encountered on the hither side of the motion picture screen. Two women tittered as Nick entered; then with one accord, the eyes of the entire group fixed on Pat, where she stood drawing her wrap more closely about her, standing uncomfortably behind her escort. And the piano tinkled its discords in the far corner.

      "Same place," said Nick shortly to the bartender, ignoring the glances of the others. Pat followed him across the room to a door, into a hall, thence into a smaller room furnished merely with a table and four chairs. The nondescript man stood waiting in the doorway as Nick took her wrap and seated her in one of the chairs.

      "Quart," he said laconically, and the bartender disappeared.

      Pat stared intently, studiously, into the face of her companion. Nick's face, certainly; here in full light there was no trace of the red-eyed horror she had fancied out there in the semi-darkness of the street. Or was there? Now—when he turned, when the light struck his eyes at an angle, was that a glint of crimson? Still, the features were Nick's, only a certain grim intensity foreign to him lurked about the set of his mouth, the narrowed eye-lids.

      "Well!" she said. "So this is Paris! What are you trying to do—teach me capital L—life? And where do we dance?"

      "In here."

      "And what kind of quart was that you ordered? You know how little I drink, and I'm darned particular about even that little."

      "You'll like this."

      "I doubt it."

      "I said you'll like it," he reiterated in flat tones.

      "I heard you say it." She regarded him with a puzzled frown. "Nick," she said suddenly, "I've decided I like you better in your gentle pose; this masterful attitude isn't becoming, and you can forget what I said about wishing you'd display it oftener."

      "You'll like that, too."

      "Again I doubt it. Nick, dear, don't spoil another evening like that last one!"

      "This one won't be like the last one!"

      "But Honey—" she paused at the entrance of the bartender bearing a tray, an opened bottle of ginger ale, two glasses of ice, and a flask of oily amber liquid. He deposited the assortment on the red-checked table cloth.

      "Two dollars," he said, pocketed the money and silently retired.

      "Nicholas," said the girl tartly, "there's enough