Summary
A steel-king’s infatuation with a chorine detonates a chain-reaction of stolen children, embezzled payrolls and nocturnal doors that open on abysses instead of Turkish steam. Fern—raised as the darling of a retired cracksman—dances under electric footlights while her foster-father, Hardy, barters what's left of his soul to a Wall-Street basilisk named Bates. One vault is blown, one watchman left for dead clutching a monogrammed card-case, and the Industrial Age’s gilt edifice cracks like slag. Guilt becomes a contagion: Hardy, cornered in a gas-lit warren beneath Bates’s Persian-rugged salon, tries to cough back the loot; Phil Borden, the smitten millionaire, blunders through the wrong portal and sees what he thinks is a man being throttled by shadows; a tiger-skin rug drinks lamplight and later serves as the damning Exhibit A. In the auction-house cacophony of lower Broadway the ivory casket that once cradled baby-Fern’s ransom jewels reappears, its lid flung open like a mouth mid-scream. Blood money changes palms so often it frays; when the inked serial numbers resurface under a blotter, destiny’s ledger slams shut. Hardy, more wraith than patriarch, claws his nemesis one final time and dies whispering restitution while police bull’s-eyes strobe across Persian drapery. The steel foundry will resume its roar at dawn, but the stage-door lovers must wrestle with a genealogy rewritten by larceny and a conscience set in motion like a tumbler that can never again find rest.
Synopsis
Phillip Borden, a young millionaire owner of a steel foundry, attends a musical comedy and sees Miss Frou Frou, who in private life is Fern Hardy. He immediately loses his heart and determines to win her. Fern Hardy is the foster-child of a reformed "crook," but these facts are entirely unknown to her. Bates, a notorious New York crook, with his accomplice, Herne, visit the Hardy flat, and after Fern retires, the men "frame up" a great haul. Hardy agrees to steal a sum of money from Borden's foundry. The crime is committed and the foundry watchman is discovered half dead. In his hand he clasps a card case, which bears Hardy's name. The following day, Fern gets a note from her father telling her that Bates will let her know where he is. Fern goes to her father, who is in hiding in a secret chamber, in Bates' apartment, and Hardy confesses that he committed the crime. Hardy begs Bates to allow him to go out. While on the street Hardy is overcome with guilt and is at the point of committing suicide, when Phil Corden happens along in his automobile and takes him to his home. Hardy ultimately confesses how in his youth he kidnapped a little child from a wealthy home, taking with him an ivory box, containing jewels. He determined to keep the baby for ransom, but his wife prevailed upon him to raise her as their own. Hardy then resolves to obtain the money from Bates and return it to the man from whom they stole it. He goes to Bates and makes his request. The result is a fierce fight. The same night Phil becomes intoxicated at his club and decides to finish off at a Turkish bath. He staggers up the steps, but instead of entering the right door, he enters Bates' apartment which is next to the Turkish bath establishment. The room is dark when Borden enters and as he strikes a match he sees in the dim light the face of Hardy, being distorted with agony and two hands clutching his throat. The match goes out and Borden is violently thrown to the floor. When he opens his eyes he looks directly into the face of a tiger skin rug. Suddenly a blow stuns him and the next thing he knows, he is being arrested. Fern goes again to visit her father and accepts a sum of money Bates gives her remarking that her father left it for her. Bates' housekeeper, seeing Fern receive the roll of bills, demands a share and is refused. Resolved to obtain money somehow, she steals some jewelry from his desk, takes the ivory box and sells the box and contents at an auction shop. While on a shopping tour, Fern is attracted by the sound of an auctioneer's voice. She enters the shop and is surprised to see the auctioneer holding up for bids her much treasured ivory box. Unable to resist, she enters the place, but not before Phil Borden sees her and follows her in, and when the bidding for the box starts he secures it. He offers it to her, but she refuses to take it without paying for it. Phil then gives her his card and tells her that whenever she wants it she may call upon him and get it. When Fern has saved enough money to pay for the box she goes to Phil, but he refuses to take the money. He forces the box into her arms and she leaves thankfully. After she has gone, Phil finds several bills on his desk where she has slipped them under the blotter. Upon examining the bills, he recognizes the number marks of his stolen money. Borden goes to Fern to find out how she obtained the money, and she gives the address of Bates. When Borden is admitted to Bates' apartment he recognizes the tiger rug on the floor. His mind reverts to the night of his adventure and he realizes that this is the house in which Hardy was being tortured. He compels the housekeeper to confess to him and she tells the complete story of the night Hardy was pleading with Bates to be allowed to return the money and Phil unexpectedly entered the room. After the housekeeper finishes her story, Borden is confronted by Bates. In an instant Borden springs upon him and they are in a struggle. The housekeeper, frightened and fearing one of them to be killed, opens the secret doorway and Hardy weakened by months of confinement totters forth. He manages to gather strength and filled with hate towards Bates, springs upon him like a dying panther and claws him from Phil. In this struggle Hardy is mortally wounded and sinks back dying as the officers, called by the housekeeper, enter the house and the raid is made. Fern comes to the house for news of her father and enters just as Bates, the housekeeper and the gang are arrested and taken away. The dying Hardy tells Phil that Fern is the little child that he stole and begs him to take her to her rightful parents.
