CHAPTER VI
Tony Guarino made a good soldier. They put him into a machine gun company and he loved it. Officers considered his nerveless coolness under fire remarkable. They didn't know that being under fire was an old story to him, and that he was unaccustomed to having countless thousands of men to help him repel the attack. Trenches, too, were a protection unknown in the street battles back home. All in all, he considered war a rather tame proposition and plunged into it with gusto.
Within six months he was first sergeant of his company. The men, being mostly country boys and therefore having nothing in common with him, didn't like him very well personally but he had that indefinable "it" of the born leader that would have made them unquestionably follow him anywhere. They had to, once. It was a nasty night engagement in the woods. Tony came staggering out of the dark, carrying the unconscious captain on his back, and almost blinded by his own blood, to find all their officers down and the leaderless men on the verge of panic. Tony let the captain carefully to the ground, instructed two men to do what they could for him from their first-aid kits, then dashed the blood out of his eyes and quietly took command of the situation.
Shortly after dawn the amazed colonel discovered Tony in command of three companies, with his position well consolidated and holding his section of the line comfortably. Tony himself was sitting on a little hillock, in deadly peril from snipers, with his automatic lying on his knee and with his keen glance wandering up and down the line in an effort to find some man who seemed disposed to retreat. He was somewhat of a sight with his legs bare and muddy, and his head tied up in bloody handkerchiefs and his puttees; only his eyes and mouth remained uncovered.
"Of all the dashed impudence!" exclaimed the colonel to the officers with him. "Taking command of the whole works and running it better than many a major could have done. If the Heinies had penetrated through here, they'd have wiped us out. "Say," he called to Tony from the shelter of the messy trench through which he was making his way in an effort to gather up his scattered regiment, "come down from there and go back and have your wounds dressed."
"We ain't got any officers," retorted Tony doggedly. "Most of 'em got bumped off during the night but a few only got nicked and I sent them back to get patched up. They wouldn'ta gone, of course, if they'd been conscious but they was all out like a light so I didn't have any trouble with 'em. The men fight grand when there's somebody to see to 'em," he continued, "but they're a little skittish when there ain't. So I'm seein' to 'em till some officers get here."
"Damme!" exclaimed the colonel to his staff. "Can you beat that; argues with me to stay up there and get his head blown off?" Then he raised his voice and called to Tony again: "I'm Colonel Riley. I'll leave Captain Stone here to 'see' to your men. Now you come down from there—at once, do you hear?—and go back and have your wounds dressed. I can't afford to have a man like you getting infection and dying on me."
So Tony scrambled down from his observatory but dangerous hillock, saluted the colonel, who silently shook hands with him, and reluctantly started for the rear.
Before the day was over, Colonel Riley was in possession of a complete story of the night's activities and he sent a report into G.H.Q, that would have made Tony's ears ring. They gave Tony the D.S.C and the Croix de Guerre for that night's work and he couldn't see what for; he'd merely done what the situation demanded, the same as he would in a street fight back home.
Eventually came the Armistice and Tony was sent home. He was ready to go home. Being a shrewd gambler he had taken the saps for a ride, running his small capital up to something over six thousand dollars, which he carried in cash in a belt around his waist under his tunic. And there had been many a time in France when he would have given all of it for an hour with Vyvyan.
Having perfected him in every branch of the fine art of murder and having made every effort to readjust his mental processes so that he was willing at any time to translate this knowledge and technique into action, the government, in turning him loose with its blessing in the shape of an honorable discharge, seemed to expect him to forget it all immediately and thereafter be a peaceable, law-abiding citizen. Which was a lot to ask of any man, much less Tony.
He had come home with a new face and a lot of new ideas, ideas that were going to be profitable for him but detrimental to the community in which he put them into practice. That awful night battle in the woods which had gained him the medals—he had them buttoned up in an inside pocket, not even showing the ribbons where anybody could see them—had also left him with a long livid scar down the left side of his face, a heavy scar running from the top of his ear to the point of his chin. In some manner the nerves and muscles around his mouth had become involved in the matter and now the left corner of his mouth was drawn upward permanently, not much but it had changed his appearance surprisingly. When he smiled, that corner didn't, and it gave his face an amazingly sinister look.
He hurried eagerly out of the depot, looking boyish and jaunty in his uniform and overseas cap. He had a grip and in the side pocket of his tunic a German officer's automatic that he had brought home as a souvenir.
Now that he was home, the first thing was to see Vyvyan. God! wouldn't it be grand to have her in his arms again, to feel her lithe, supple body pliant and vibrant against his? He hailed a taxi and gave the address, ordering the driver "to step on it." His hungry eyes recognized the building, even in the dark, two blocks away and his glance sought their old apartment. Yes, there was a light. She was home! That is, if she still lived there. He added that as an afterthought, as a dreadful possibility. Then he grunted and grinned. Vyv would be waiting; he remembered how she had sobbed and promised that night he left.
He gave the driver a handsome tip for his speed and, hurrying inside, eagerly scanned the names beside the letter boxes. Yes, there it was in the same place—Vyvyan Lovejoy. What a surprise his coming would be to her; he hadn't written for two months—there'd been so much else to do. He tried the hall door on the chance that it might be open. It was. He hurried softly upstairs and with his breath catching in his throat knocked at the familiar third floor door. He heard a sort of scuffling sound inside but no one came. He knocked again, loud and a little impatiently.
Then the door opened slightly. Tony's ready arms dropped to his sides and his eyes suddenly flashed fire. For holding the door was a man, a ratty-looking young fellow with a crook's face but sensual lips and a passionate nose. He was in his shirtsleeves.
With a lunge, Tony flung the door wide open, almost overturning the other man as he did so, and plunged into the room.
"Where's Vyvyan?" he demanded.
She came hurrying out of the bedroom, wrapped in a beautiful negligee that he had bought her. He could see that she had on only pajamas beneath it and that her legs were bare.
"Who are you?" she demanded furiously. "And what do you mean by breaking in here this way?"
Tony caught his breath; she didn't recognize him.
"Why, I'm Tony. I know I've changed a little," his fingers unconsciously felt that awful scar on his left cheek, "but surely you—"
"Tony!" she exclaimed in amazement and came closer to stare wonderingly up into his face. "Why they reported you killed about six weeks ago; it was in the papers."
"Well, I wasn't. I'm right here, and as good as ever." Then he suddenly remembered that strange man, who had closed the door by now and was waiting behind him. He whirled, facing, them both accusingly. "Who's that?" he demanded, and in his voice was a tone that made Vyvyan cringe.
"A—a friend of mine," she answered.
"A friend of yours, eh?" he repeated bitterly and stared contemptuously at the other.
He whirled and rushed back to the bedroom. There in the closet, all mixed up with Vyvyan's things, he found a man's shoes, half a dozen masculine suits, even a man's pajamas. His things had been there when he went to war; but they were all gone now—these things were strange, evidently the property of that rat-faced crook in the parlor. Tony rushed back there, trembling with fury.
"So you two-timed me, you little bitch!" he snarled through gritted teeth. "I s'pose you been feedin' him out o' the money I had Klondike O'Hara send you every week."
"No, Tony," gasped Vyvyan breathlessly. Her hands fluttered to her throat and she seemed to find it almost impossible to speak. "Tony, you mustn't think what you're thinkin'. I never looked at another man all the time you was gone, not until that report about you bein' killed; I swear to God I didn't."
"Well, you didn't wait long after; a woman don't go to livin' with a man the first night she meets him. You didn't take the trouble to find out if that report was true; you didn't wait for a little while to see if I might come back, like I did. No, you grabbed somep'm else right away. And I don't see any mourning among your clothes; they're all just as wild and gay as ever. A lot you cared about me, outside of a meal ticket." Suddenly he "saw red"; his mind seemed frozen with rage. Automatically his hand darted to that pistol in his pocket. "You didn't give a damn about me, you lousy little———"
The dreadful word he flung at her was drowned in the roar of the gun. She clutched at her throat and fell, a fluffy, blood-stained heap. The man had dodged and was trying to hide behind a chair. But Tony mowed him down with deadly precision. Then he secreted the empty pistol under the cushion of an overstuffed chair and hurried out of the apartment, still carrying his bag.