CHAPTER I

THE ADVENTURES OF JIMMIE DALE

by Frank L. Packard

CONTENTS

PART ONE: THE MAN IN THE CASE

I. THE GRAY SEAL

II. BY PROXY

III. THE MOTHER LODE

IV. THE COUNTERFEIT FIVE

V. THE AFFAIR OF THE PUSHCART MAN

VI. DEVIL'S WORK

VII. THE THIEF

VIII. THE MAN HIGHER UP

IX. TWO CROOKS AND A KNAVE

X. THE ALIBI

XI. THE STOOL-PIGEON

PART TWO: THE WOMAN IN THE CASE

I. BELOW THE DEAD LINE

II. THE CALL TO ARMS

III. THE CRIME CLUB

IV. THE INNOCENT BYSTANDER

V. ON GUARD

VI. THE TRAP

VII. THE “HOUR”

VIII. THE TOCSIN

IX. THE TOCSIN'S STORY

X. SILVER MAG

XI. THE MAGPIE

XII. JOHN JOHANSSON--FOUR-TWO-EIGHT

XIII. THE ONLY WAY

XIV. OUT OF THE DARKNESS

XV. RETRIBUTION

XVI. “DEATH TO THE GRAY SEAL!”

PART ONE: THE MAN IN THE CASE

CHAPTER I

THE GRAY SEAL

Among New York's fashionable and ultra-exclusive clubs, the St. James

stood an acknowledged leader--more men, perhaps, cast an envious eye at

its portals, of modest and unassuming taste, as they passed by on Fifth

Avenue, than they did at any other club upon the long list that the city

boasts. True, there were more expensive clubs upon whose membership roll

scintillated more stars of New York's social set, but the St. James was

distinctive. It guaranteed a man, so to speak--that is, it guaranteed a

man to be innately a gentleman. It required money, it is true, to keep

up one's membership, but there were many members who were not wealthy,

as wealth is measured nowadays--there were many, even, who were pressed

sometimes to meet their dues and their house accounts, but the accounts

were invariably promptly paid. No man, once in, could ever afford, or

ever had the desire, to resign from the St. James Club. Its membership

was cosmopolitan; men of every walk in life passed in and out of

its doors, professional men and business men, physicians, artists,

merchants, authors, engineers, each stamped with the “hall mark” of

the St. James, an innate gentleman. To receive a two weeks' out-of-town

visitor's card to the St. James was something to speak about, and men

from Chicago, St. Louis, or San Francisco spoke of it with a sort of

holier-than-thou air to fellow members of their own exclusive clubs, at

home again.

Is there any doubt that Jimmie Dale was a gentleman--an INNATE

gentleman? Jimmie Dale's father had been a member of the St. James

Club, and one of the largest safe manufacturers of the United States, a

prosperous, wealthy man, and at Jimmie Dale's birth he had proposed his

son's name for membership. It took some time to get into the St. James;

there was a long waiting list that neither money, influence, nor pull

could alter by so much as one iota. Men proposed their sons' names for

membership when they were born as religiously as they entered them upon

the city's birth register. At twenty-one Jimmie Dale was elected to

membership; and, incidentally, that same year, graduated from Harvard.

It was Mr. Dale's desire that his son should enter the business and

learn it from the ground up, and Jimmie Dale, for four years thereafter,

had followed his father's wishes. Then his father died. Jimmie Dale had

leanings toward more artistic pursuits than business. He was credited

with sketching a little, writing a little; and he was credited with

having received a very snug amount from the combine to which he sold out

his safe-manufacturing interests. He lived a bachelor life--his mother

had been dead many years--in the house that his father had left him on

Riverside Drive, kept a car or two and enough servants to run his

menage smoothly, and serve a dinner exquisitely when he felt hospitably

inclined.

Could there be any doubt that Jimmie Dale was innately a gentleman?

It was evening, and Jimmie Dale sat at a small table in the corner of

the St. James Club dining room. Opposite him sat Herman Carruthers,

a young man of his own age, about twenty-six, a leading figure in the

newspaper world, whose rise from reporter to managing editor of the

morning NEWS-ARGUS within the short space of a few years had been almost

meteoric.

They were at coffee and cigars, and Jimmie Dale was leaning back in his

chair, his dark eyes fixed interestedly on his guest.

Carruthers, intently engaged in trimming his cigar ash on the edge of

the Limoges china saucer of his coffee set, looked up with an abrupt

laugh.

“No; I wouldn't care to go on record as being an advocate of crime,” he

said whimsically; “that would never do. But I don't mind admitting quite

privately that it's been a positive regret to me that he has gone.”

“Made too good 'copy' to lose, I suppose?” suggested Jimmie Dale

quizzically. “Too bad, too, after working up a theatrical name like that

for him--the Gray Seal--rather unique! Who stuck that on him--you?”

Carruthers laughed--then, grown serious, leaned toward Jimmie Dale.

“You don't mean to say, Jimmie, that you don't know about that, do you?”

he asked incredulously. “Why, up to a year ago the papers were full of

him.”

“I never read your beastly agony columns,” said Jimmie Dale, with a

cheery grin.

“Well,” said Carruthers, “you must have skipped everything but the stock

reports then.”

“Granted,” said Jimmie Dale. “So go on, Carruthers, and tell me about

him--I dare say I may have heard of him, since you are so distressed

about it, but my memory isn't good enough to contradict anything you may

have to say about the estimable gentleman, so you're safe.”

Carruthers reverted to the Limoges saucer and the tip of his cigar.

“He was the most puzzling, bewildering, delightful crook in the annals

of crime,” said Carruthers reminiscently, after a moment's silence.

“Jimmie, he was the king-pin of them all. Clever isn't the word for him,

or dare-devil isn't either. I used to think sometimes his motive was

more than half for the pure deviltry of it, to laugh at the police and

pull the noses of the rest of us that were after him. I used to dream

nights about those confounded gray seals of his--that's where he got

his name; he left every job he ever did with a little gray paper affair,

fashioned diamond-shaped, stuck somewhere where it would be the first

thing your eyes would light upon when you reached the scene, and--”

“Don't go so fast,” smiled Jimmie Dale. “I don't quite get the

connection. What did you have to do with this--er--Gray Seal fellow?

Where do you come in?”

“I? I had a good deal to do with him,” said Carruthers grimly. “I was a

reporter when he first broke loose, and the ambition of my life, after

I began really to appreciate what he was, was to get him--and I nearly

did, half a dozen times, only--”

“Only you never quite did, eh?” cut in Jimmie Dale slyly. “How near did

you get, old man? Come on, now, no bluffing; did the Gray Seal ever even

recognise you as a factor in the hare-and-hound game?”

“You're flicking on the raw, Jimmie,” Carruthers answered, with a wry

grimace. “He knew me, all right, confound him! He favoured me with

several sarcastic notes--I'll show 'em to you some day--explaining

how I'd fallen down and how I could have got him if I'd done something

else.” Carruthers' fist came suddenly down on the table. “And I would

have got him, too, if he had lived.”

“Lived!” ejaculated Jimmie Dale. “He's dead, then?”

“Yes,” averted Carruthers; “he's dead.”

“H'm!” said Jimmie Dale facetiously. “I hope the size of the wreath you

sent was an adequate tribute of your appreciation.”

“I never sent any wreath,” returned Carruthers, “for the very simple

reason that I didn't know where to send it, or when he died. I said he

was dead because for over a year now he hasn't lifted a finger.”

“Rotten poor evidence, even for a newspaper,” commented Jimmie Dale.

“Why not give him credit for having, say--reformed?”

Carruthers shook his head. “You don't get it at all, Jimmie,” he said

earnestly. “The Gray Seal wasn't an ordinary crook--he was a classic.

He was an artist, and the art of the thing was in his blood. A man like

that could no more stop than he could stop breathing--and live. He's

dead; there's nothing to it but that--he's dead. I'd bet a year's salary

on it.”

“Another good man gone wrong, then,” said Jimmie Dale capriciously. “I

suppose, though, that at least you discovered the 'woman in the case'?”

Carruthers looked up quickly, a little startled; then laughed shortly.

“What's the matter?” inquired Jimmie Dale.

“Nothing,” said Carruthers. “You kind of got me for a moment, that's

all. That's the way those infernal notes from the Gray Seal used to

end up: 'Find the lady, old chap; and you'll get me.' He had a damned

patronising familiarity that would make you squirm.”

“Poor old Carruthers!” grinned Jimmie Dale. “You did take it to heart,

didn't you?”

“I'd have sold my soul to get him--and so would you, if you had been in

my boots,” said Carruthers, biting nervously at the end of his cigar.

“And been sorry for it afterward,” supplied Jimmie Dale.

“Yes, by Jove, you're right!” admitted Carruthers, “I suppose I should.

I actually got to love the fellow--it was the GAME, really, that I

wanted to beat.”

“Well, and how about this woman? Keep on the straight and narrow path,

old man,” prodded Jimmie Dale.

“The woman?” Carruthers smiled. “Nothing doing! I don't believe there

was one--he wouldn't have been likely to egg the police and reporters on

to finding her if there had been, would he? It was a blind, of course.

He worked alone, absolutely alone. That's the secret of his success,

according to my way of thinking. There was never so much as an

indication that he had had an accomplice in anything he ever did.”

Jimmie Dale's eyes travelled around the club's homelike, perfectly

appointed room. He nodded to a fellow member here and there, then his

eyes rested musingly on his guest again.

Carruthers was staring thoughtfully at his coffee cup.

“He was the prince of crooks and the father of originality,” announced

Carruthers abruptly, following the pause that had ensued. “Half the time

there wasn't any more getting at the motive for the curious things he

did, than there was getting at the Gray Seal himself.”

“Carruthers,” said Jimmy Dale, with a quick little nod of approval,

“you're positively interesting to-night. But, so far, you've been kind

of scouting around the outside edges without getting into the thick of

it. Let's have some of your experiences with the Gray Seal in detail;

they ought to make ripping fine yarns.”

“Not to-night, Jimmie,” said Carruthers; “it would take too long.” He

pulled out his watch mechanically as he spoke, glanced at it--and pushed

back his chair. “Great Scott!” he exclaimed. “It's nearly half-past

nine. I'd no idea we had lingered so long over dinner. I'll have to

hurry; we're a morning paper, you know, Jimmie.”

“What! Really! Is it as late as that.” Jimmie Dale rose from his chair

as Carruthers stood up. “Well, if you must--”

“I must,” said Carruthers, with a laugh.

“All right, O slave.” Jimmie Dale laughed back--and slipped his hand,

a trick of their old college days together, through Carruthers' arm as

they left the room.

He accompanied Carruthers downstairs to the door of the club, and saw

his guest into a taxi; then he returned inside, sauntered through the

billiard room, and from there into one of the cardrooms, where, pressed

into a game, he played several rubbers of bridge before going home.

It was, therefore, well on toward midnight when Jimmie Dale arrived at

his house on Riverside Drive, and was admitted by an elderly manservant.

“Hello, Jason,” said Jimmie Dale pleasantly. “You still up!”

“Yes, sir,” replied Jason, who had been valet to Jimmie Dale's father

before him. “I was going to bed, sir, at about ten o'clock, when a

messenger came with a letter. Begging your pardon, sir, a young lady,

and--”

“Jason”--Jimmie Dale flung out the interruption, sudden, quick,

imperative--“what did she look like?”

“Why--why, I don't exactly know as I could describe her, sir,” stammered

Jason, taken aback. “Very ladylike, sir, in her dress and appearance,

and what I would call, sir, a beautiful face.”

“Hair and eyes--what color?” demanded Jimmie Dale crisply. “Nose, lips,

chin--what shape?”

“Why, sir,” gasped Jason, staring at his master, “I--I don't rightly

know. I wouldn't call her fair or dark, something between. I didn't take

particular notice, and it wasn't overlight outside the door.”

“It's too bad you weren't a younger man, Jason,” commented Jimmie Dale,

with a curious tinge of bitterness in his voice. “I'd have given a

year's income for your opportunity to-night, Jason.”

“Yes, sir,” said Jason helplessly.

“Well, go on,” prompted Jimmie Dale. “You told her I wasn't home, and

she said she knew it, didn't she? And she left the letter that I was on

no account to miss receiving when I got back, though there was no need

of telephoning me to the club--when I returned would do, but it was

imperative that I should have it then--eh?”

“Good Lord, sir!” ejaculated Jason, his jaw dropped, “that's exactly what

she did say.”

“Jason,” said Jimmie Dale grimly, “listen to me. If ever she comes here

again, inveigle her in. If you can't inveigle her, use force; capture

her, pull her in, do anything--do anything, do you hear? Only don't let

her get away from you until I've come.”

Jason gazed at his master as though the other had lost his reason.

“Use force, sir?” he repeated weakly--and shook his head. “You--you

can't mean that, sir.”

“Can't I?” inquired Jimmie Dale, with a mirthless smile. “I mean every

word of it, Jason--and if I thought there was the slightest chance of

her giving you the opportunity, I'd be more imperative still. As it

is--where's the letter?”

“On the table in your studio, sir,” said Jason, mechanically.

Jimmie Dale started toward the stairs--then turned and came back to

where Jason, still shaking his head heavily, had been gazing anxiously

after his master. Jimmie Dale laid his hand on the old man's shoulder.

“Jason,” he said kindly, with a swift change of mood, “you've been a

long time in the family--first with father, and now with me. You'd do a

good deal for me, wouldn't you?”

“I'd do anything in the world for you, Master Jim,” said the old man

earnestly.

“Well, then, remember this,” said Jimmie Dale slowly, looking into the

other's eyes, “remember this--keep your mouth shut and your eyes open.

It's my fault. I should have warned you long ago, but I never dreamed

that she would ever come here herself. There have been times when it was

practically a matter of life and death to me to know who that woman is

that you saw to-night. That's all, Jason. Now go to bed.”

“Master Jim,” said the old man simply, “thank you, sir, thank you for

trusting me. I've dandled you on my knee when you were a baby, Master

Jim. I don't know what it's about, and it isn't for me to ask. I

thought, sir, that maybe you were having a little fun with me. But I

know now, and you can trust me, Master Jim, if she ever comes again.”

“Thank you, Jason,” said Jimmie Dale, his hand closing with an

appreciative pressure on the other's shoulder “Good-night, Jason.”

Upstairs on the first landing, Jimmie Dale opened a door, closed and

locked it behind him--and the electric switch clicked under his fingers.

A glow fell softly from a cluster of shaded ceiling lights. It was a

large room, a very large room, running the entire depth of the

house, and the effect of apparent disorder in the arrangement of its

appointments seemed to breathe a sense of charm. There were great

cozy, deep, leather-covered lounging chairs, a huge, leather-covered

davenport, and an easel or two with half-finished sketches upon them;

the walls were panelled, the panels of exquisite grain and matching; in

the centre of the room stood a flat-topped rosewood desk; upon the floor

was a dark, heavy velvet rug; and, perhaps most inviting of all, there

was a great, old-fashioned fireplace at one side of the room.

For an instant Jimmie Dale remained quietly by the door, as though

listening. Six feet he stood, muscular in every line of his body, like

a well-trained athlete with no single ounce of superfluous fat about

him--the grace and ease of power in his poise. His strong, clean-shaven

face, as the light fell upon it now, was serious--a mood that became him

well--the firm lips closed, the dark, reliant eyes a little narrowed, a

frown on the broad forehead, the square jaw clamped.

Then abruptly he walked across the room to the desk, picked up an

envelope that lay upon it, and, turning again, dropped into the nearest

lounging chair.

There had been no doubt in his mind, none to dispel. It was precisely

what he had expected from almost the first word Jason had spoken. It was

the same handwriting, the same texture of paper, and there was the same

old haunting, rare, indefinable fragrance about it. Jimmie Dale's

hands turned the envelope now this way, now that, as he looked at it.

Wonderful hands were Jimmie Dale's, with long, slim, tapering fingers

whose sensitive tips seemed now as though they were striving to decipher

the message within.

He laughed suddenly, a little harshly, and tore open the envelope.

Five closely written sheets fell into his hand. He read them slowly,

critically, read them over again; and then, his eyes on the rug at his

feet, he began to tear the paper into minute pieces between his fingers,

depositing the pieces, as he tore them, upon the arm of his chair. The

five sheets demolished, his fingers dipped into the heap of shreds on

the arm of the chair and tore them over and over again, tore them until

they were scarcely larger than bits of confetti, tore at them absently

and mechanically, his eyes never shifting from the rug at his feet.

Then with a shrug of his shoulders, as though rousing himself to present

reality, a curious smile flickering on his lips, he brushed the pieces

of paper into one hand, carried them to the empty fireplace, laid them

down in a little pile, and set them afire. Lighting a cigarette, he

watched them burn until the last glow had gone from the last charred

scrap; then he crunched and scattered them with the brass-handled fender

brush, and, retracing his steps across the room, flung back a portiere

from where it hung before a little alcove, and dropped on his knees in

front of a round, squat, barrel-shaped safe--one of his own design and

planning in the years when he had been with his father.

His slim, sensitive fingers played for an instant among the knobs and

dials that studded the door, guided, it seemed by the sense of touch

alone--and the door swung open. Within was another door, with locks and

bolts as intricate and massive as the outer one. This, too, he opened;

and then from the interior took out a short, thick, rolled-up leather

bundle tied together with thongs. He rose from his knees, closed the

safe, and drew the portiere across the alcove again. With the bundle

under his arm, he glanced sharply around the room, listened intently,

then, unlocking the door that gave on the hall, he switched off the

lights and went to his dressing room, that was on the same floor. Here,

divesting himself quickly of his dinner clothes, he selected a dark

tweed suit with loose-fitting, sack coat from his wardrobe, and began to

put it on.

Dressed, all but his coat and vest, he turned to the leather bundle that

he had placed on a table, untied the thongs, and carefully opened it

out to its full length--and again that curious, cryptic smile tinged his

lips. Rolled the opposite away from that in which it had been tied

up, the leather strip made a wide belt that went on somewhat after

the fashion of a life preserver, the thongs being used for shoulder

straps--a belt that, once on, the vest would hide completely, and,

fitting close, left no telltale bulge in the outer garments. It was not

an ordinary belt; it was full of stout-sewn, up-right little pockets

all the way around, and in the pockets grimly lay an array of fine,

blued-steel, highly tempered instruments--a compact, powerful burglar's

kit.

The slim, sensitive fingers passed with almost a caressing touch over

the vicious little implements, and from one of the pockets extracted

a thin, flat metal case. This Jimmie Dale opened, and glanced

inside--between sheets of oil paper lay little rows of GRAY, ADHESIVE,

DIAMOND-SHAPED SEALS.

Jimmie Dale snapped the case shut, returned it to its recess, and from

another took out a black silk mask. He held it up to the light for

examination.

“Pretty good shape after a year,” muttered Jimmie Dale, replacing it.

He put on the belt, then his vest and coat. From the drawer of his

dresser he took an automatic revolver and an electric flashlight,

slipped them into his pocket, and went softly downstairs. From the hat

stand he chose a black slouch hat, pulled it well over his eyes--and

left the house.

Jimmie Dale walked down a block, then hailed a bus and mounted to the

top. It was late, and he found himself the only passenger. He inserted

his dime in the conductor's little resonant-belled cash receiver, and

then settled back on the uncomfortable, bumping, cushionless seat.

On rattled the bus; it turned across town, passed the Circle, and

headed for Fifth Avenue--but Jimmie Dale, to all appearances, was quite

oblivious of its movements.

It was a year since she had written him. SHE! Jimmie Dale did not smile,

his lips were pressed hard together. Not a very intimate or personal

appellation, that--but he knew her by no other. It WAS a woman,

surely--the hand-writing was feminine, the diction eminently so--and had

SHE not come herself that night to Jason! He remembered the last letter,

apart from the one to-night, that he had received from her. It was

a year ago now--and the letter had been hardly more than a note. The

police had worked themselves into a frenzy over the Gray Seal, the

papers had grown absolutely maudlin--and she had written, in her

characteristic way:

Things are a little too warm, aren't they, Jimmie? Let's let them cool

for a year.

Since then until to-night he had heard nothing from her. It was a

strange compact that he had entered into--so strange that it could never

have known, could never know a parallel--unique, dangerous, bizarre, it

was all that and more. It had begun really through his connection with

his father's business--the business of manufacturing safes that should

defy the cleverest criminals--when his brains, turned into that channel,

had been pitted against the underworld, against the methods of a

thousand different crooks from Maine to California, the report of whose

every operation had reached him in the natural course of business,

and every one of which he had studied in minutest detail. It had begun

through that--but at the bottom of it was his own restless, adventurous

spirit.

He had meant to set the police by the ears, using his gray-seal device

both as an added barb and that no innocent bystander of the underworld,

innocent for once, might be involved--he had meant to laugh at them and

puzzle them to the verge of madness, for in the last analysis they would

find only an abortive attempt at crime--and he had succeeded. And then

he had gone too far--and he had been caught--by HER. That string of

pearls, which, to study whose effect facetiously, he had so idiotically

wrapped around his wrist, and which, so ironically, he had been unable

to loosen in time and had been forced to carry with him in his sudden,

desperate dash to escape from Marx's the big jeweler's, in Maiden Lane,

whose strong room he had toyed with one night, had been the lever which,

AT FIRST, she had held over him.

The bus was on Fifth Avenue now, and speeding rapidly down the deserted

thoroughfare. Jimmie Dale looked up at the lighted windows of the St.

James Club as they went by, smiled whimsically, and shifted in his seat,

seeking a more comfortable position.

She had caught him--how he did not know--he had never seen her--did not

know who she was, though time and again he had devoted all his energies

for months at a stretch to a solution of the mystery. The morning

following the Maiden Lane affair, indeed, before he had breakfasted,

Jason had brought him the first letter from her. It had started by

detailing his every move of the night before--and it had ended with an

ultimatum: “The cleverness, the originality of the Gray Seal as a crook

lacked but one thing,” she had naively written, “and that one thing was

that his crookedness required a leading string to guide it into channels

that were worthy of his genius.” In a word, SHE would plan the coups,

and he would act at her dictation and execute them--or else how did

twenty years in Sing Sing for that little Maiden Lane affair appeal to

him? He was to answer by the next morning, a simple “yes” or “no” in the

personal column of the morning NEWS-ARGUS.

A threat to a man like Jimmie Dale was like flaunting a red rag at a

bull, and a rage ungovernable had surged upon him. Then cold reason had

come. He was caught--there was no question about that--she had taken

pains to show him that he need make no mistake there. Innocent enough in

his own conscience, as far as actual theft went, for the pearls would in

due course be restored in some way to the possession of their owner, he

would have been unable to make even his own father, who was alive then,

believe in his innocence, let alone a jury of his peers. Dishonour,

shame, ignominy, a long prison sentence, stared him in the face,

and there was but one alternative--to link hands with this unseen,

mysterious accomplice. Well, he could at least temporise, he could

always “queer” a game in some specious manner, if he were pushed too

far. And so, in the next morning's NEWS-ARGUS, Jimmie Dale had answered

“yes.” And then had followed those years in which there had been NO

temporising, in which every plan was carried out to the last detail,

those years of curious, unaccountable, bewildering affairs that

Carruthers had spoken of, one on top of another, that had shaken the old

headquarters on Mulberry Street to its foundations, until the Gray Seal

had become a name to conjure with. And, yes, it was quite true, he

had entered into it all, gone the limit, with an eagerness that was

insatiable.

The bus had reached the lower end of Fifth Avenue, passed through

Washington Square, and stopped at the end of its run. Jimmie Dale

clambered down from the top, threw a pleasant “good-night” to the

conductor, and headed briskly down the street before him. A little

later he crossed into West Broadway, and his pace slowed to a leisurely

stroll.

Here, at the upper end of the street, was a conglomerate business

section of rather inferior class, catering doubtless to the poor,

foreign element that congregated west of Broadway proper, and to the

south of Washington Square. The street was, at first glance, deserted;

it was dark and dreary, with stores and lofts on either side. An

elevated train roared by overhead, with a thunderous, deafening clamour.

Jimmie Dale, on the right-hand side of the street, glanced interestedly

at the dark store windows as he went by. And then, a block ahead, on the

other side, his eyes rested on an approaching form. As the other reached

the corner and paused, and the light from the street lamp glinted on

brass buttons, Jimmie Dale's eyes narrowed a little under his slouch

hat. The policeman, although nonchalantly swinging a nightstick,

appeared to be watching him.

Jimmie Dale went on half a block farther, stooped to the sidewalk to

tie his shoe, glanced back over his shoulder--the policeman was not in

sight--and slipped like a shadow into the alleyway beside which he had

stopped.

It was another Jimmie Dale now--the professional Jimmie Dale. Quick as

a cat, active, lithe, he was over a six foot fence in the rear of a

building in a flash, and crouched a black shape, against the back door

of an unpretentious, unkempt, dirty, secondhand shop that fronted

on West Broadway--the last place certainly in all New York that the

managing editor of the NEWS-ARGUS, or any one else, for that matter,

would have picked out as the setting for the second debut of the Gray

Seal.

From the belt around his waist, Jimmie Dale took the black silk mask,

and slipped it on; and from the belt, too, came a little instrument

that his deft fingers manipulated in the lock. A curious snipping sound

followed. Jimmie Dale put his weight gradually against the door. The

door held fast.

“Bolted,” said Jimmie Dale to himself.

The sensitive fingers travelled slowly up and down the side of the door,

seeming to press and feel for the position of the bolt through an inch

of plank--then from the belt came a tiny saw, thin and pointed at the

end, that fitted into the little handle drawn from another receptacle in

the leather girdle beneath the unbuttoned vest.

Hardly a sound it made as it bit into the door. Half a minute

passed--there was the faint fall of a small piece of wood--into the

aperture crept the delicate, tapering fingers--came a slight rasping of

metal--then the door swung back, the dark shadow that had been Jimmie

Dale vanished and the door closed again.

A round, white beam of light glowed for an instant--and disappeared. A

miscellaneous, lumbering collection of junk and odds and ends

blocked the entry, leaving no more space than was sufficient for bare

passageway. Jimmie Dale moved cautiously--and once more the flashlight

in his hand showed the way for an instant--then darkness again.

The cluttered accumulation of secondhand stuff in the rear gave place to

a little more orderly arrangement as he advanced toward the front of the

store. Like a huge firefly, the flashlight twinkled, went out, twinkled

again, and went out. He passed a sort of crude, partitioned-off

apartment that did duty for the establishment's office, a sort of little

boxed-in place it was, about in the middle of the floor. Jimmie Dale's

light played on it for a moment, but he kept on toward the front door

without any pause.

Every movement was quick, sure, accurate, with not a wasted second. It

had been barely a minute since he had vaulted the back fence. It was

hardly a quarter of a minute more before the cumbersome lock of the

front door was unfastened, and the door itself pulled imperceptibly

ajar.

He went swiftly back to the office now--and found it even more of a

shaky, cheap affair than it had at first appeared; more like a box stall

with windows around the top than anything else, the windows doubtless to

permit the occupant to overlook the store from the vantage point of the

high stool that stood before a long, battered, wobbly desk. There was

a door to the place, too, but the door was open and the key was in

the lock. The ray of Jimmie Dale's flashlight swept once around the

interior--and rested on an antique, ponderous safe.

Under the mask Jimmie Dale's lips parted in a smile that seemed almost

apologetic, as he viewed the helpless iron monstrosity that was little

more than an insult to a trained cracksman. Then from the belt came the

thin metal case and a pair of tweezers. He opened the case, and with

the tweezers lifted out one of the gray-coloured, diamond-shaped seals.

Holding the seal with the tweezers, he moistened the gummed side with

his lips, then laid it on a handkerchief which he took from his pocket,

and clapped the handkerchief against the front of the safe, sticking

the seal conspicuously into place. Jimmie Dale's insignia bore no finger

prints. The microscopes and magnifying glasses at headquarters had many

a time regretfully assured the police of that fact.

And now his hands and fingers seemed to work like lightning. Into the

soft iron bit a drill--bit in and through--bit in and through again.

It was dark, pitch black--and silent. Not a sound, save the quick, dull

rasp of the ratchet--like the distant gnawing of a mouse! Jimmie Dale

worked fast--another hole went through the face of the old-fashioned

safe--and then suddenly he straightened up to listen, every faculty

tense, alert, and strained, his body thrown a little forward. WHAT WAS

THAT!

From the alleyway leading from the street without, through which he

himself had come, sounded the stealthy crunch of feet. Motionless in the

utter darkness, Jimmie Dale listened--there was a scraping noise in the

rear--someone was climbing the fence that he had climbed!

In an instant the tools in Jimmie Dale's hands disappeared into their

respective pockets beneath his vest--and the sensitive fingers shot to

the dial on the safe.

“Too bad,” muttered Jimmie Dale plaintively to himself. “I could have

made such an artistic job of it--I swear I could have cut Carruthers'

profile in the hole in less than no time--to open it like this is really

taking the poor old thing at a disadvantage.”

He was on his knees now, one ear close to the dial, listening as the

tumblers fell, while the delicate fingers spun the knob unerringly--the

other ear strained toward the rear of the premises.

Came a footstep--a ray of light--a stumble--nearer--the newcomer was

inside the place now, and must have found out that the back door had

been tampered with. Nearer came the steps--still nearer--and then the

safe door swung open under Jimmie Dale's hand, and Jimmie Dale, that he

might not be caught like a rat in a trap, darted from the office--but he

had delayed a little too long.

From around the cluttered piles of junk and miscellany swept the

light--full on Jimmie Dale. Hesitation for the smallest fraction of a

second would have been fatal, but hesitation was something that in all

his life Jimmie Dale had never known. Quick as a panther in its spring,

he leaped full at the light and the man behind it. The rough voice, in

surprised exclamation at the sudden discovery of the quarry, died in a

gasp.

There was a crash as the two men met--and the other reeled back before

the impact. Onto him Jimmie Dale sprang, and his hands flew for the

other's throat. It was an officer in uniform! Jimmie Dale had felt the

brass buttons as they locked. In the darkness there was a queer smile on

Jimmie Dale's tight lips. It was no doubt THE officer whom he had passed

on the other side of the street.

The other was a smaller man than Jimmie Dale, but powerful for his

build--and he fought now with all his strength. This way and that the

two men reeled, staggered, swayed, panting and gasping; and then--they

had lurched back close to the office door--with a sudden swing, every

muscle brought into play for a supreme effort, Jimmie Dale hurled the

other from him, sending the man sprawling back to the floor of the

office, and in the winking of an eye had slammed shut the door and

turned the key.

There was a bull-like roar, the shrill CHEEP-CHEEP-CHEEP of the

patrolman's whistle, and a shattering crash as the officer flung his

body against the partition--then the bark of a revolver shot, the tinkle

of breaking glass, as the man fired through the office window--and past

Jimmie Dale, speeding now for the front door, a bullet hummed viciously.

Out on the street dashed Jimmie Dale, whipping the mask from his

face--and glanced like a hawk around him. For all the racket, the

neighbourhood had not yet been aroused--no one was in sight. From just

overhead came the rattle of a downtown elevated train. In a hundred-yard

sprint, Jimmie Dale raced it a half block to the station, tore up the

steps--and a moment later dropped nonchalantly into a seat and pulled an

evening newspaper from his pocket.

Jimmie Dale got off at the second station down, crossed the street,

mounted the steps of the elevated again, and took the next train uptown.

His movements appeared to be somewhat erratic--he alighted at the

station next above the one by which he had made his escape. Looking down

the street it was too dark to see much of anything, but a confused noise

as of a gathering crowd reached him from what was about the location of

the secondhand store. He listened appreciatively for a moment.

“Isn't it a perfectly lovely night?” said Jimmie Dale amiably to

himself. “And to think of that cop running away with the idea that I

didn't see him when he hid in a doorway after I passed the corner! Well,

well, strange--isn't it?”

With another glance down the street, a whimsical lift of his shoulders,

he headed west into the dilapidated tenement quarter that huddled for

a handful of blocks near by, just south of Washington Square. It was

a little after one o'clock in the morning now and the pedestrians were

casual. Jimmie Dale read the street signs on the corners as he went

along, turned abruptly into an intersecting street, counted the

tenements from the corner as he passed, and--for the eye of any one who

might be watching--opened the street door of one of them quite as though

he were accustomed and had a perfect right to do so, and went inside.

It was murky and dark within; hot, unhealthy, with lingering smells of

garlic and stale cooking. He groped for the stairs and started up.

He climbed one flight, then another--and one more to the top. Here,

treading softly, he made an examination of the landing with a view,

evidently, to obtaining an idea of the location and the number of doors

that opened off from it.

His selection fell on the third door from the head of the stairs--there

were four all told, two apartments of two rooms each. He paused for an

instant to adjust the black silk mask, tried the door quietly, found it

unlocked, opened it with a sudden, quick, brisk movement--and, stepping

in side, leaned with his back against it.

“Good-morning,” said Jimmie Dale pleasantly.

It was a squalid place, a miserable hole, in which a single flickering,

yellow gas jet gave light. It was almost bare of furniture; there was

nothing but a couple of cheap chairs, a rickety table--unpawnable. A

boy, he was hardly more than that, perhaps twenty-two, from a posture

in which he was huddled across the table with head buried in out-flung

arms, sprang with a startled cry to his feet.

“Good-morning,” said Jimmie Dale again. “Your name's Hagan, Bert

Hagan--isn't it? And you work for Isaac Brolsky in the secondhand shop

over on West Broadway--don't you?”

The boy's lips quivered, and the gaunt, hollow, half-starved face,

white, ashen-white now, was pitiful.

“I--I guess you got me,” he faltered “I--I suppose you're a

plain-clothes man, though I never knew dicks wore masks.”

“They don't generally,” said Jimmie Dale coolly. “It's a fad of

mine--Bert Hagan.”

The lad, hanging to the table, turned his head away for a moment--and

there was silence.

Presently Hagan spoke again. “I'll go,” he said numbly. “I won't make any

trouble. Would--would you mind not speaking loud? I--I wouldn't like her

to know.”

“Her?” said Jimmie Dale softly.

The boy tiptoed across the room, opened a connecting door a little,

peered inside, opened it a little wider--and looked over his shoulder at

Jimmie Dale.

Jimmie Dale crossed to the boy, looked inside the other room--and his

lip twitched queerly, as the sight sent a quick, hurt throb through his

heart. A young woman, younger than the boy, lay on a tumble-down bed, a

rag of clothing over her--her face with a deathlike pallor upon it, as

she lay in what appeared to be a stupor. She was ill, critically ill;

it needed no trained eye to discern a fact all too apparent to the most

casual observer. The squalor, the glaring poverty here, was even more

pitifully in evidence than in the other room--only here upon a chair

beside the bed was a cluster of medicine bottles and a little heap of

fruit.

Jimmie Dale drew back silently as the boy closed the door.

Hagan walked to the table and picked up his hat.

“I'm--I'm ready,” he said brokenly. “Let's go.”

“Just a minute,” said Jimmie Dale. “Tell us about it.”

“Twon't take long,” said Hagan, trying to smile. “She's my wife. The

sickness took all we had. I--I kinder got behind in the rent and things.

They were going to fire us out of here--to-morrow. And there wasn't any

money for the medicine, and--and the things she had to have. Maybe you

wouldn't have done it--but I did. I couldn't see her dying there for the

want of something a little money'd buy--and--and I couldn't”--he caught

his voice in a little sob--“I couldn't see her thrown out on the street

like that.”

“And so,” said Jimmie Dale, “instead of putting old Isaac's cash in

the safe this evening when you locked up, you put it in your pocket

instead--eh? Didn't you know you'd get caught?”

“What did it matter?” said the boy. He was twirling his misshappen hat

between his fingers. “I knew they'd know it was me in the morning when

old Isaac found it gone, because there wasn't anybody else to do it.

But I paid the rent for four months ahead to-night, and I fixed it so's

she'd have medicine and things to eat. I was going to beat it before

daylight myself--I”--he brushed his hand hurriedly across his cheek--“I

didn't want to go--to leave her till I had to.”

“Well, say”--there was wonderment in Jimmie Dale's tones, and his

English lapsed into ungrammatical, reassuring vernacular--“ain't that

queer! Say, I'm no detective. Gee, kid, did you think I was? Say, listen

to this! I cracked old Isaac's safe half an hour ago--and I guess there

won't be any idea going around that you got the money and I pulled a

lemon. Say, I ain't superstitious, but it looks like luck meant you to

have another chance, don't it?”

The hat dropped from Hagan's hands to the floor, and he swayed a little.

“You--you ain't a dick!” he stammered. “Then how'd you know about me and

my name when you found the safe empty? Who told you?”

A wry grimace spread suddenly over Jimmie Dale's face beneath the mask,

and he swallowed hard. Jimmie Dale would have given a good deal to have

been able to answer that question himself.

“Oh, that!” said Jimmie Dale. “That's easy--I knew you worked there.

Say, it's the limit, ain't it? Talk about your luck being in, why all

you've got to do is to sit tight and keep your mouth shut, and you're

safe as a church. Only say, what are you going to do about the money,

now you've got a four months' start and are kind of landed on your feet?

“Do?” said the boy. “I'll pay it back, little by little. I meant to. I

ain't no--” He stopped abruptly.

“Crook,” supplied Jimmie Dale pleasantly. “Spit it right out, kid; you

won't hurt my feelings none. Well, I'll tell you--you're talking the way

I like to hear you--you pay that back, slide it in without his knowing

it, a bit at a time, whenever you can, and you'll never hear a yip out

of me; but if you don't, why it kind of looks as though I have a right

to come down your street and get my share or know the reason why--eh?”

“Then you never get any share,” said Hagan, with a catch in his voice.

“I pay it back as fast as I can.”

“Sure,” said Jimmie Dale. “That's right--that's what I said. Well, so

long--Hagan.” And Jimmie Dale had opened the door and slipped outside.

An hour later, in his dressing room in his house on Riverside Drive,

Jimmie Dale was removing his coat as the telephone, a hand instrument on

the table, rang. Jimmie Dale glanced at it--and leisurely proceeded

to remove his vest. Again the telephone rang. Jimmie Dale took off his

curious, pocketed leather belt--as the telephone repeated its summons.

He picked out the little drill he had used a short while before, and

inspected it critically--feeling its point with his thumb, as one might

feel a razor's blade. Again the telephone rang insistently. He reached

languidly for the receiver, took it off its hook, and held it to his

ear.

“Hello!” said Jimmie Dale, with a sleepy yawn. “Hello! Hello! Why the

deuce don't you yank a man out of bed at two o'clock in the morning and

have done with it, and--eh? Oh, that you, Carruthers?”

“Yes,” came Carruthers' voice excitedly. “Jimmie, listen--listen! The

Gray Seal's come to life! He's just pulled a break on West Broadway!”

“Good Lord!” gasped Jimmie Dale. “You don't say!”

CHAPTER II

BY PROXY

“The most puzzling bewildering, delightful crook in the annals of crime,”

Herman Carruthers, the editor of the MORNING NEWS-ARGUS, had called the

Gray Seal; and Jimmie Dale smiled a little grimly now as he recalled

the occasion of a week ago at the St. James Club over their after-dinner

coffee. That was before his second debut, with Isaac Brolsky's

poverty-stricken premises over on West Broadway as a setting for the

break.

SHE had written: “Things are a little too warm, aren't they, Jimmie?

Let's let them cool for a year.” Well, they had cooled for a year, and

Carruthers as a result had been complacently satisfied in his own mind

that the Gray Seal was dead--until that break at Isaac Brolsky's over on

West Broadway!

Jimmie Dale's smile was tinged with whimsicality now. The only effect

of the year's inaction had been to usher in his renewed activity with

a furor compared to which all that had gone before was insignificant.

Where the newspapers had been maudlin, they now raved--raved in

editorials and raved in headlines. It was an impossible, untenable,

unbelievable condition of affairs that this Gray Seal, for all his

incomparable cleverness, should flaunt his crimes in the faces of the

citizens of New York. One could actually see the editors writhing in

their swivel chairs as their fiery denunciations dripped from their

pens! What was the matter with the police? Were the police children;

or, worse still, imbeciles--or, still worse again, was there some one

“higher up” who was profiting by this rogue's work? New York would not

stand for it--New York would most decidedly not--and the sooner the

police realised that fact the better! If the police were helpless, or

tools, the citizens of New York were not, and it was time the citizens

were thoroughly aroused.

There was a way, too, to arouse the citizens, that was both good

business from the newspaper standpoint, and efficacious as a method.

Carruthers, of the MORNING NEWS-ARGUS, had initiated it. The MORNING

NEWS-ARGUS offered twenty-five thousand dollars' reward for the capture

of the Gray Seal! Other papers immediately followed suit in varying

amounts. The authorities, State and municipal, goaded to desperation,

did likewise, and the five million men, women, and children of New York

were automatically metamorphosed into embryonic sleuths. New York was

aroused.

Jimmie Dale, alias the Gray Seal, member of the ultra-exclusive St.

James Club, the latter fact sufficient in itself to guarantee his

social standing, graduate of Harvard, inheritor of his deceased father's

immense wealth amassed in the manufacture of burglar-proof safes, some

of the most ingenious patents on which were due to Jimmie Dale himself,

figured with a pencil on the margin of the newspaper he had been

reading, using the arm of the big, luxurious, leather-upholstered

lounging chair as a support for the paper. The result of his

calculations was eighty-five thousand dollars.

He brushed the paper onto the Turkish rug, dove into the pocket of his

dinner jacket for his cigarettes, and began to smoke as his eyes strayed

around the room, his own particular den in his fashionable Riverside

Drive residence.

Eighty-five thousand dollars' reward! Jimmie Dale blew meditative rings

of cigarette smoke at the fireplace. What would she say to that? Would

she decide it was “too hot” again, and call it off? It added quite a

little hazard to the game--QUITE a little! If he only knew who “she”

was! It was a strange partnership--the strangest partnership that had

ever existed between two human beings.

He turned a little in his chair as a step sounded in the hallway

without--that is, Jimmie Dale caught the sound, muffled though it was by

the heavy carpet. Came then a knock upon the door.

“Come in,” invited Jimmie Dale.

It was old Jason, the butler. The old man was visibly excited, as he

extended a silver tray on which lay a letter.

Jimmie Dale's hand reached quickly out, the long, slim tapering fingers

closed upon the envelope--but his eyes were on Jason significantly,

questioningly.

“Yes, Master Jim,” said the old man, “I recognised it on the instant,

sir. After what you said, sir, last week, honouring me, I might say, to

a certain extent with your confidence, though I'm sure I don't know what

it all means, I--”

“Who brought it this time, Jason?” inquired Jimmie Dale quietly.

“Not the young person, begging your pardon, not the young lady, sir. A

shuffer in a big automobile. 'Your master at once,' he says, and shoves

the letter into my hand, and was off.”

“Very good, Jason,” said Jimmie Dale. “You may go.”

The door closed. Yes, it was from HER--it was the same texture of paper,

there was the same rare, haunting fragrance clinging to it.

He tore the envelope open, and extracted a folded sheet of paper. What

was it this time? To call the partnership off again until the present

furor should have subsided once more--or the skilfully sketched outline

of a new adventure? Which? He glanced at the few lines written on the

sheet, and lunged forward from his chair to his feet. It was neither one

nor the other. It was--

Jimmie Dale's face was set, and an angry red surge swept his cheeks. His

lips moved, muttering audibly fragments of the letter, as he stared at

it.

“--incredible that you--a heinous thing--act instantly--this is ruin--”

For an instant--a rare occurrence in Jimmie Dale's life--he stood like a

man stricken, still staring at the sheet in his hand. Then mechanically

his fingers tore the paper into little pieces, and the little pieces

into tiny shreds. Anger fled, and a sickening sense of impotent dismay

took its place; the red left his cheeks, and in its stead a grayness

came.

“Act instantly!” The words seemed to leap at him, drum at his ears with

constant repetition. Act instantly! But how? How? Then his brain--that

keen, clear, master brain--sprang from stunned inaction into virility

again. Of course--Carruthers! It was in Carruthers' line.

He stepped to the desk--and paused with his hand extended to pick up the

telephone. How explain to Carruthers that he, Jimmie Dale, already knew

what Carruthers might not yet have heard of, even though Carruthers

would naturally be among the first to be in touch with such affairs! No;

that would never do. Better get there himself at once and trust to--

The telephone rang.

Jimmie Dale waited until it rang again, then he lifted the receiver from

the hook.

“Hello?” he said.

“Hello! Hello! Jimmie!” came a voice. “This is Carruthers. That you,

Jimmie?”

“Yes,” said Jimmie Dale and sat down limply in the desk chair.

“It's the Gray Seal again. I promised you I'd let you in on the ground

floor next time anything happened, so come on down here quick if you

want to see some of his work at firsthand.”

Jimmie Dale flirted a bead of sweat from his forehead.

“Carruthers,” said Jimmie languidly, “you newspaper chaps make me tired

with your Gray Seal. I'm just going to bed.”

“Bed nothing!” spluttered Carruthers, from the other end of the wire.

“Come down, I tell you. It's worth your while--half the population of

New York would give the toes off their feet for the chance. Come down,

you blast idiot! The Gray Seal has gone the limit this time--it's

MURDER.”

Jimmie Dale's face was haggard.

“Oh!” he said peevishly. “Sounds interesting. Where are you? I guess

maybe I'll jog along.”

“I should think you would!” snapped Carruthers. “You know the Palace on

the Bowery? Yes? Well, meet me on the corner there as soon as you can.

Hustle! Good--”

“Oh, I say, Carruthers!” interposed Jimmie Dale.

“Yes?” demanded Carruthers.

“Thanks awfully for letting me know, old man.”

“Don't mention it!” returned Carruthers sarcastically. “You always were

a grateful beast, Jimmie. Hurry up!”

Jimmie Dale hung up the receiver of the city 'phone, and took down the

receiver of another, a private-house installation, and rang twice for

the garage.

“The light car at once, Benson,” he ordered curtly. “At once!”

Jimmie Dale worked quickly then. In his dressing room, he changed from

dinner clothes to tweeds; spent a second or so over the contents of a

locked drawer in the dresser, from which he selected a very small but

serviceable automatic, and a very small but highly powerful magnifying

glass whose combination of little round lenses worked on a pivot, and,

closed over one another, were of about the compass of a quarter of a

dollar.

In three minutes he was outside the house and stepping into the car,

just as it drew up at the curb.

“Benson,” he said tersely to his chauffeur, “drop me one block this

side of the Palace on the Bowery--and forget there was ever a speed law

enacted. Understand?”

“Very good, sir,” said Benson, touching his cap. “I'll do my best, sir.”

Jimmie Dale, in the tonneau, stretched out his legs under the front

seat, and dug his hands into his pockets--and inside the pockets his

hands were clenched and knotted fists.

Murder! At times it had occurred to him that there was a possibility

that some crook of the underworld would attempt to cover his tracks and

take refuge from pursuit by foisting himself on the authorities as the

Gray Seal. That was a possibility, a risk always to be run. But that

MURDER should be laid to the Gray Seal's door! Anger, merciless and

unrestrained, surged over Jimmie Dale.

There was peril here, live and imminent. Suppose that some day he should

be caught in some little affair, recognised and identified as the Gray

Seal, there would be the charge of murder hanging over him--and the

electric chair to face!

But the peril was not the only thing. Even worse to Jimmie Dale's

artistic and sensitive temperament was the vilification, the holding up

to loathing, contumely, and abhorrence of the name, the stainless name,

of the Gray Seal. It WAS stainless! He had guarded it jealously--as a

man guards the woman's name he loves.

Affairs that had mystified and driven the police distracted with

impotence there had been, many of them; and on the face of them--crimes.

But no act ever committed had been in reality a crime--none without

the highest of motives, the righting of some outrageous wrong, the

protection of some poor stumbling fellow human.

That had been his partnership with her. How, by what amazing means, by

what power that smacked almost of the miraculous she came in touch with

all these things and supplied him with the data on which to work he

did not know--only that, thanks to her, there were happier hearts and

happier homes since the Gray Seal had begun to work. “Dear Philanthropic

Crook,” she often called him in her letters. And now--it was MURDER!

Take Carruthers, for instance. For years, as a reporter before he had

risen to the editorial desk, he had been one of the keenest on the scent

of the Gray Seal, but always for the sake of the game--always filled

with admiration, as he said himself, for the daring, the originality of

the most puzzling, bewildering, delightful crook in the annals of crime.

Carruthers was but an example. Carruthers now would hunt the Gray Seal

like a mad dog. The Gray Seal, to Carruthers and every one else, would

be the vilest name in the land--a synonym for murder.

On the car flew--and upon Jimmie Dale's face, as though chiselled in

marble, was a look that was not good to see. And a mirthless smile set,

frozen, on his lips.

“I'll get the man that did this,” gritted Jimmie Dale between his teeth.

“I'll GET him! And, when I get him, I'll wring a confession from him if

I have to swing for it!”

The car swept from Broadway into Astor Place, on down the Bowery, and

presently stopped.

Jimmie Dale stepped out. “I shall not want you any more, Benson,” he

said. “You may return home.”

Jimmie Dale started down the block--a nonchalant Jimmie Dale now, if

anything, bored a little. Near the corner, a figure, back turned, was

lounging at the edge of the sidewalk. Jimmie Dale touched the man on the

arm.

“Hello, Carruthers!” he drawled.

“Ah, Jimmie!” Carruthers turned with an excited smile. “That's the boy!

You've made mighty quick time.”

“Well, you told me to hurry,” grumbled Jimmie Dale. “I'm doing my best

to please you to-night. Came down in my car, and got summoned for three

fines to-morrow.”

Carruthers laughed. “Come on,” he said; and, linking his arm in Jimmie

Dale's, turned the corner, and headed west along the cross street. “This

is going to make a noise,” he continued, a grim note creeping into his

voice. “The biggest noise the city has ever heard. I take back all I

said about the Gray Seal. I'd always pictured his cleverness as being

inseparable with at least a decent sort of man, even if he was a rogue

and a criminal, but I'm through with that. He's a rotter and a hound

of the rankest sort! I didn't think there was anything more vulgar or

brutal than murder, but he's shown me that there is. A guttersnipe's got

more decency! To murder a man and then boastfully label the corpse is--”

“Say, Carruthers,” said Jimmie Dale plaintively, suddenly hanging back,

“I say, you know, it's--it's all right for you to mess up in this sort

of thing, it's your beastly business, and I'm awfully damned thankful to

you for giving me a look-in, but isn't it--er--rather INFRA DIG for me?

A bit morbid, you know, and all that sort of thing. I'd never hear the

end of it at the club--you know what the St. James is. Couldn't I be

Merideth Stanley Annstruther, or something like that, one of your new

reporters, or something like that, you know?”

Carruthers chuckled. “Sure, Jimmie,” he said. “You're the latest

addition to the staff of the NEWS-ARGUS. Don't worry; the incomparable

Jimmie Dale won't figure publicly in this.”

“It's awfully good of you,” said Jimmie gratefully. “I have to have a

notebook or something, don't I?”

Carruthers, from his pocket, handed him one. “Thanks,” said Jimmie Dale.

A little way ahead, a crowd had collected on the sidewalk before a

doorway, and Carruthers pointed with a jerk of his hand.

“It's in Moriarty's place--a gambling hell,” he explained. “I haven't

got the story myself yet, though I've been inside, and had a look

around. Inspector Clayton discovered the crime, and reported it at

headquarters. I was at my desk in the office when the news came, and, as

you know the interest I've taken in the Gray Seal, I decided to 'cover'

it myself. When I got here, Clayton hadn't returned from headquarters,

so, as you seemed so keenly interested last week, I telephoned you. If

Clayton's back now we'll get the details. Clayton's a good fellow with

the 'press,' and he won't hold anything out on us. Now, here we are.

Keep close to me, and I'll pass you in.”

They shouldered through the crowd and up to an officer at the door.

The officer nodded, stepped aside, and Carruthers, with Jimmie Dale

following, entered the house.

They climbed one flight, and then another. The card-rooms, the faro,

stud, and roulette layouts were deserted, save for policemen here and

there on guard. Carruthers led the way to a room at the back of the

hall, whose door was open and from which issued a hubbub of voices--one

voice rose above the others, heavy and gratingly complacent.

“Clayton's back,” observed Carruthers.

They stepped over the threshold, and the heavy voice greeted them.

“Ah, here's Carruthers now! H'are you, Carruthers? They told me you'd

been here, and were coming back, so I've been keeping the boys waiting

before handing out the dope. You've had a look at that--eh?” He flung

out a fat hand toward the bed.

The voices rose again, all directed at Carruthers now.

“Bubble's burst, eh, Carruthers? What about the 'Prince of Crooks'?

Artistry in crime, wasn't it, you said?” They were quoting from his

editorials of bygone days, a half dozen reporters of rival papers,

grinning and joshing him good-naturedly, seemingly quite unaffected by

what lay within arm's reach of them upon the bed.

Carruthers smiled a little wryly, shrugged his shoulders--and presented

Jimmie Dale to Inspector Clayton.

“Mr. Matthewson, a new man of ours--inspector.”

“Glad to know you, Mr. Matthewson,” said the inspector.

Jimmie Dale found his hand grasped by another that was flabby and

unpleasantly moist; and found himself looking into a face that was red,

with heavy rolls of unhealthy fat terminating in a double chin and a

thick, apoplectic neck--a huge, round face, with rat's eyes.

Clayton dropped Jimmie Dale's hand, and waved his own in the air. Jimmie

Dale remained modestly on the outside of the circle as the reporters

gathered around the police inspector.

“Now, then,” said Clayton coarsely, “the guy that's croaked there is

Metzer, Jake Metzer. Get that?”

Jimmie Dale, scribbling hurriedly in his notebook like all the rest,

turned a little toward the bed, and his lower jaw crept out the fraction

of an inch. Both gas jets in the room were turned on full, giving ample

light. A man fully dressed, a man of perhaps forty, lay upon his back on

the bed, one arm outflung across the bedspread, the other dangling,

with fingers just touching the floor, the head at an angle and off the

pillow. It was as though he had been carried to the bed and flung upon

it after the deed had been committed. Jimmie Dale's eyes shifted and

swept the room. Yes, everything was in disorder, as though there had

been a struggle--a chair upturned, a table canted against the wall,

broken pieces of crockery from the washstand on the carpet, and--

“Metzer was a stool pigeon, see?” went on Clayton, “and he lived here.

Moriarty wasn't on to him. Metzer stood in thick with a wider circle of

crooks than any other snitch in New York.”

Jimmie Dale, still scribbling as Clayton talked, stepped to the bed and

leaned over the murdered man. The murder had been done with a blackjack

evidently--a couple of blows. The left side of the temple was crushed

in. Right in the middle of the forehead, pasted there, a gray-colored,

diamond shaped paper seal flaunted itself--the device of the Gray Seal.

In Jimmie Dale' hand, hidden as he turned his back, the tiny combination

of powerful lenses was focused on the seal.

Clayton guffawed. “That's right!” he called out. “Take a good look.

That's a bright young man you've got, Carruthers.”

Jimmie Dale looked up a little sheepishly--and got a grin from the

assembled reporters, and a scowl from Carruthers.

“Now, then,” continued Clayton, “here's the facts--as much of 'em as I

can let you boys print at present. You know I'm stretching a point

to let you in here--don't forget that when you come to write up the

case--honour where's honour's due, you know. Well, me and Metzer there

was getting ready to close down on a big piece of game, and I was over

here in this room talking to him about it early this afternoon. We had

it framed to get our man to-night--see? I left Metzer, say, about three

o'clock, and he was to show up over at headquarters with another little

bit of evidence we wanted at eight o'clock to-night.”

Jimmie Dale was listening--to every word. But he stooped now again over

the murdered man's head deliberately, though he felt the inspector's

rat's eyes upon him--stooped, and, with his finger nail, lifted back the

right-hand point of the diamond-shaped seal where it bordered a faint

thread of blood on the man's forehead.

There was a bull-like roar from the inspector, and he burst through the

ring of reporters, and grabbed Jimmie Dale by the shoulder.

“Here you, what in hell are you doing!” he spluttered angrily.

Embarrassed and confused, Jimmie Dale drew back, glanced around, and

smiled again a little sheepishly as his eyes rested on the red-flushed

jowl of the inspector.

“I--I wanted to see how it was stuck on,” he explained inanely.

“Stuck on!” bellowed Clayton. “I'll show you how it's STUCK on, if you

monkey around here! Don't you know any better than that! Where were you

dragged up anyway? The coroner hasn't been here yet. You're a hot cub

of a reporter, you are!” He turned to Carruthers. “Y'ought to get out

printed instructions for 'em before you turn 'em loose!” he snapped.

Carruthers' face was red with mortification. There was a grin, expanded,

on the faces of the others.

“Stand away from that bed!” roared Clayton at Jimmie Dale. “And if you

go near it again, I'll throw you out of here bodily!”

Jimmie Dale edged away, and, eyes lowered, fumbled nervously with the

leaves of his notebook.

Clayton grunted, glared at Jimmie Dale for an instant viciously--and

resumed his story.

“I was saying,” he said, “that Metzer was to come to headquarters at

eight o'clock this evening. Well, he didn't show up. That looked queer.

It was mighty important business. We was after one of the biggest hauls

we'd ever pulled off. I waited till nine o'clock, an hour ago, and I

was getting nervous. Then I started over here to find out what was the

matter. When I got here I asked Moriarty if he'd seen Metzer. Moriarty

said he hadn't since I was here before. He was a little suspicious that

I had something on Metzer--see? Well, by pumping Moriarty, he admitted

that Metzer had had a visitor about an hour after I left.”

“Who was it? Know what his name is, inspector?” asked one of the

reporters quickly.

Inspector Clayton winked heavily. “Don't be greedy boys,” he grinned.

“You mean you've got him?” burst out another one of the men excitedly.

“Sure! Sure, I've got him.” Inspector Clayton waved his fat hand airily.

“Or I will have before morning--but I ain't saying anything more till

it's over.” He smiled significantly. “Well, that's about all. You've

got the details right around you. I left Moriarty downstairs and came up

here, and found just what you see--Metzer laying on the bed there, and

the gray seal stuck on his forehead--and”--he ended abruptly--“I'll have

the Gray Seal himself behind the bars by morning.”

A chorus of ejaculations rose from the reporters, while their pencils

worked furiously.

Then Jimmie Dale appeared to have an inspiration. Jimmie Dale turned a

leaf in his notebook and began to sketch rapidly, cocking his head now

on one side now on the other. With a few deft strokes he had outlined

the figure of Inspector Clayton. The reporter beside Jimmie Dale leaned

over to inspect the work, and another did likewise. Jimmie Dale drew

in Clayton's face most excellently, if somewhat flatteringly; and then,

with a little flourish of pride, wrote under the drawing: “The Man Who

Captured the Gray Seal.”

“That's a cracking good sketch!” pronounced the reporter at his side.

“Let the inspector see it.”

“What is it?” demanded Clayton, scowling.

Jimmie Dale handed him the notebook modestly.

Inspector Clayton took it, looked at it, looked at Jimmie Dale; then his

scowl relaxed into a self-sufficient and pleased smile, and he grunted

approvingly.

“That's the stuff to put over,” he said. “Mabbe you're not much of

a reporter, but you can draw. Y're all right, sport--y're all right.

Forget what I said to you a while ago.”

Jimmie Dale smiled too--deprecatingly. And put the notebook in his

pocket.

An officer entered the room hurriedly, and, drawing Clayton aside, spoke

in an undertone. A triumphant and malicious grin settled on Clayton's

features, and he started with a rush for the door.

“Come around to headquarters in two hours, boys,” he called as he went

out, “and I'll have something more for you.”

The room cleared, the reporters tumbling downstairs to make for the

nearest telephones to get their “copy” into their respective offices.

On the street, a few doors up from the house where they were free from

the crowd, Carruthers halted Jimmie Dale.

“Jimmie,” he said reproachfully, “you certainly made a mark of us both.

There wasn't any need to play the 'cub' so egregiously. However, I'll

forgive you for the sake of the sketch--hand it over, Jimmie; I'm going

to reproduce it in the first edition.”

“It wasn't drawn for reproduction, Carruthers--at least not yet,” said

Jimmie Dale quietly.

Carruthers stared at him. “Eh?” he asked blankly.

“I've taken a dislike to Clayton,” said Jimmie Dale whimsically. “He's

too patently after free advertising, and I'm not going to help along his

boost. You can't have it, old man, so let's think about something

else. What'll they do with that bit of paper that's on the poor devil's

forehead up there, for instance.”

“Say,” said Carruthers, “does it strike you that you're acting queer?

You haven't been drinking, have you, Jimmie?”

“What'll they do with it?” persisted Jimmie Dale.

“Well,” said Carruthers, smiling a little tolerantly, “they'll

photograph it and enlarge the photograph, and label it 'Exhibit A' or

'Exhibit B' or something like that--and file it away in the archives

with the fifty or more just like it that are already in their

collection.”

“That's what I thought,” observed Jimmie Dale. He took Carruthers by the

lapel of the coat. “I'd like a photograph of that. I'd like it so much

that I've got to have it. Know the chap that does that work for the

police?”

“Yes,” admitted Carruthers.

“Very good!” said Jimmie Dale crisply, “Get an extra print of the

enlargement from him then--for a consideration--whatever he asks--I'll

pay for it.”

“But what for?” demanded Carruthers. “I don't understand.”

“Because,” said Jimmie Dale very seriously, “put it down to imagination

or whatever you like, I think I smell something fishy here.”

“You WHAT!” exclaimed Carruthers in amazement. “You're not joking, are

you, Jimmie?”

Jimmie Dale laughed shortly. “It's so far from a joke,” he said, in

a low tone, “that I want your word you'll get that photograph into my

hands by to-morrow afternoon, no matter what transpires in the meantime.

And look here, Carruthers, don't think I'm playing the silly thickhead,

and trying to mystify you. I'm no detective or anything like that. I've

just got an idea that apparently hasn't occurred to any one else--and,

of course, I may be all wrong. If I am, I'm not going to say a word even

to you, because it wouldn't be playing fair with some one else; if I'm

right the MORNING NEWS-ARGUS gets the biggest scoop of the century. Will

you go in on that basis?”

Carruthers put out his hand impulsively. “If you're in earnest,

Jimmie--you bet!”

“Good!” returned Jimmie Dale. “The photograph by to-morrow afternoon

then. And now--”

“And now,” said Caruthers, “I've got to hurry over to the office and get

a write-up man at work. Will you come along, or meet me at headquarters

later? Clayton said in two hours he'd--”

“Neither,” said Jimmie Dale. “I'm not interested in headquarters. I'm

going home.”

“Well, all right then,” Carruthers returned. “You can bank on me for

to-morrow. Good-night, Jimmie.”

“Good-night, old man,” said Jimmie Dale, and, turning, walked briskly

toward the Bowery.

But Jimmie Dale did not go home. He walked down the Bowery for three

blocks, crossed to the east side, and turned down a cross street. Two

blocks more he walked in this direction, and halfway down the next.

Here he paused an instant--the street was dimly lighted, almost dark,

deserted. Jimmie Dale edged close to the houses until his shadow blended

with the shadows of the walls--and slipped suddenly into a pitch-black

areaway.

He opened a door, stepped into an unlighted hallway where the air was

close and evil smelling, mounted a stairway, and halted before another

door on the first landing. There was the low clicking of a lock, three

times repeated, and he entered a room, closing and fastening the door

behind him.

Jimmie Dale called it his “Sanctuary.” In one of the worst

neighbourhoods of New York, where no questions were asked as long as the

rent was paid, it had the further advantage of three separate exits--one

by the areaway where he had entered; one from the street itself; and

another through a back yard with an entry into a saloon that fronted on

the next street. It was not often that Jimmie Dale used his Sanctuary,

but there had been times when it was no more nor less than exactly what

he called it--a sanctuary!

He stepped to the window, assured himself that the shade was down--and

lighted the gas, blinking a little as the yellow flame illuminated the

room.

It was a rough place, dirty, uninviting; a bedroom, furnished in the

most scanty fashion. Neither, apparently, was there anything suspicious

about it to reward one curious enough to break in during the owner's

absence--some rather disreputable clothes hanging on the wall, and flung

untidily across the bed--that was all.

Alone now, Jimmie Dale's face was strained and anxious and,

occasionally, as he undressed himself, his hands clenched until his

knuckles grew white. The gray seal on the murdered man's forehead was

a GENUINE GRAY SEAL--one of Jimmie Dale's own. There was no doubt of

that--he had satisfied himself on that point.

Where had it come from? How had it been obtained? Jimmie Dale carefully

placed the clothes he had taken off under the mattress, pulled a

disreputable collarless flannel shirt over his head, and pulled on a

disreputable pair of boots. There were only two sources of supply. His

own--and the collection that the police had made, which Carruthers had

referred to.

Jimmie Dale lifted a corner of the oilcloth in a corner of the room,

lifted a piece of the flooring, lifted out a little box which he placed

upon the rickety table, and sat down before a cracked mirror. Who was

it that would have access to the gray seals in the possession of the

police, since, obviously, it was one of those that was on the dead man's

forehead? The answer came quick enough--came with the sudden out-thrust

of Jimmie Dale's lower jaw. ONE OF THE POLICE THEMSELVES--no one else.

Clayton's heavy, cunning face, Clayton's shifty eyes, Clayton's sudden

rush when he had touched the dead man's forehead, pictured themselves

in a red flash of fury before Jimmie Dale. There was no mask now, no

facetiousness, no acted part--only a merciless rage, and the muscles of

Jimmie Dale's face quivered and twitched. MURDER, foisted, shifted upon

another, upon the Gray Seal--making of that name a calumny--ruining

forever the work that she and he might do!

And then Jimmie Dale smiled mirthlessly, with thinning lips. The box

before him was open. His fingers worked quickly--a little wax behind the

ears, in the nostrils, under the upper lip, deftly placed-hands, wrists,

neck, throat, and face received their quota of stain, applied with an

artist's touch--and then the spruce, muscular Jimmie Dale, transformed

into a slouching, vicious-featured denizen of the underworld, replaced

the box under the flooring, pulled a slouch hat over his eyes,

extinguished the gas, and went out.

Jimmie Dale's range of acquaintanceship was wide--from the upper strata

of the St. James Club to the elite of New York's gangland. And, adored

by the one, he was trusted implicitly by the other--not understood,

perhaps, by the latter, for he had never allied himself with any of

their nefarious schemes, but trusted implicitly through long years of

personal contact. It had stood Jimmie Dale in good stead before, this

association, where, in a sort of strange, carefully guarded exchange,

the news of the underworld was common property to those without the law.

To New York in its millions, the murder of Metzer, the stool pigeon,

would be unknown until the city rose in the morning to read the

sensational details over the breakfast table; here, it would already be

the topic of whispered conversations, here it had probably been known

long before the police had discovered the crime. Especially would it be

expected to be known to Pete Lazanis, commonly called the Runt, who

was a power below the dead line and, more pertinent still, one in whose

confidence Jimmie Dale had rejoiced for years.

Jimmie Dale, as Larry the Bat--a euphonious “monaker” bestowed possibly

because this particular world knew him only by night--began a search for

the Runt. From one resort to another he hurried, talking in the accepted

style through one corner of his mouth to hard-visaged individuals behind

dirty, reeking bars that were reared on equally dirty and foul-smelling

sawdust-strewn floors; visiting dance halls, secretive back rooms, and

certain Chinese pipe joints.

But the Runt was decidedly elusive. There had been no news of him, no

one had seen him--and this after fully an hour had passed since Jimmie

Dale had left Carruthers in front of Moriarty's. The possibilities

however were still legion--numbered only by the numberless dives and

dens sheltered by that quarter of the city.

Jimmie Dale turned into Chatham Square, heading for the Pagoda Dance

Hall. A man loitering at the curb shot a swift, searching glance at him

as he slouched by. Jimmie Dale paused in the doorway of the Pagoda and

looked up and down the street. The man he had passed had drawn a little

closer; another man in an apparently aimless fashion lounged a few yards

away.

“Something up,” muttered Jimmie Dale to himself. “Lansing, of

headquarters, and the other looks like Milrae.”

Jimmie Dale pushed in through the door of the Pagoda. A bedlam of noise

surged out at him--a tin-pan piano and a mandolin were going furiously

from a little raised platform at the rear; in the centre of the room a

dozen couples were in the throes of the tango and the bunny-hug; around

the sides, at little tables, men and women laughed and applauded and

thumped time on the tabletops with their beer mugs; while waiters, with

beer-stained aprons and unshaven faces, juggled marvelous handfuls of

glasses and mugs from the bar beside the platform to the patrons at the

tables.

Jimmie Dale's eyes swept the room in a swift, comprehensive glance,

fixed on a little fellow, loudly dressed, who shared a table halfway

down the room with a woman in a picture hat, and a smile of relief

touched his lips. The Runt at last!

He walked down the room, caught the Runt's eyes significantly as he

passed the table, kept on to a door between the platform and the bar,

opened it, and went out into a lighted hallway, at one end of which a

door opened onto the street, and at the other a stairway led above.

The Runt joined him. “Wot's de row, Larry?” inquired the Runt.

“Nuthin' much,” said Jimmie Dale. “Only I t'ought I'd let youse know.

I was passin' Moriarty's an' got de tip. Say, some guy's croaked Jake

Metzer dere.”

“Aw, ferget it!” observed the Runt airily. “Dat's stale. Was wise to dat

hours ago.”

Jimmie Dale's face fell. “But I just come from dere,” he insisted; “an'

de harness bulls only just found it out.”

“Mabbe,” grunted the Runt. “But Metzer got his early in de

afternoon--see?”

Jimmie Dale looked quickly around him--and then leaned toward the Runt.

“Wot's de lay, Runt?” he whispered.

The Runt pulled down one eyelid, and, with his knowing grin, the

cigarette, clinging to his upper lip, sagged down in the opposite corner

of his mouth.

Jimmie Dale grinned, too--in a flash inspiration had come to Jimmie

Dale.

“Say, Runt”--he jerked his head toward the street door--“wot's de fly

cops doin' out dere?”

The grin vanished from the Runt's lips. He stared for a second wildly at

Jimmie Dale, and then clutched at Jimmie Dale's arm.

“De WOT?” he said hoarsely.

“De fly cops,” Jimmie Dale repeated in well-simulated surprise. “Dey was

dere when I come in--Lansing an' Milrae, an--”

The Runt shot a hurried glance at the stairway, and licked his lips as

though they had gone suddenly dry.

“My Gawd, I--” He gasped, and shrank hastily back against the wall

beside Jimmie Dale.

The door from the street had opened noiselessly, instantly. Black forms

bulked there--then a rush of feet--and at the head of half a dozen men,

the face of Inspector Clayton loomed up before Jimmie Dale. There was

a second's pause in the rush; and, in the pause, Clayton's voice, in a

vicious undertone:

“You two ginks open your traps, and I'll run you both in!”

And then the rush passed, and swept on up the stairs.

Jimmie Dale looked at the Runt. The cigarette dangled limply; the Runt's

eyes were like a hunted beast's.

“Dey got him!” he mumbled. “It's Stace--Stace Morse. He come to me after

croakin' Metzer, an' he's been hidin' up dere all afternoon.”

Stace Morse--known in gangland as a man with every crime in the calendar

to his credit, and prominent because of it! Something seemed to go

suddenly queer inside of Jimmie Dale. Stace Morse! Was he wrong, after

all? Jimmie Dale drew closer to the Runt.

“Yer givin' me a steer, ain't youse?” He spoke again from the corner

of his mouth, almost inaudibly. “Are youse sure it was Stace croaked

Metzer? Wot fer? How'd yer know?”

The Runt was listening, his eyes strained toward the stairs. The hall

door to the street was closed, but both were quite well aware that there

was an officer on guard outside.

“He told me,” whispered the Runt. “Metzer was fixin' ter snitch on him

ter-night. Dey've got de goods on Stace, too. He made a bum job of it.”

“Why didn't he get out of de country den when he had de chanst, instead

of hangin' around here all afternoon?” demanded Jimmie Dale.

“He was broke,” the Runt answered. “We was gettin' de coin fer him ter

fade away wid ter-night, an'--”

A revolver shot from above cut short his words. Came then the sound of a

struggle, oaths, the shuffling tread of feet--but in the dance hall the

piano still rattled on, the mandolin twanged, voices sang and applauded,

and beer mugs thumped time.

They were on the stairs now, the officers, half carrying, half dragging

some one between them--and the man they dragged cursed them with utter

abandon. As they reached the bottom of the stairs, Jimmie Dale

caught sight of the prisoner's face--not a prepossessing

one--villainous,--low-browed, contorted with a mixture of fear and rage.

“It's a lie! A lie! A lie!” the man shrieked. “I never seen him in me

life--blast you!--curse you!--d'ye hear!”

Inspector Clayton caught Jimmie Dale and the Runt by the collars.

“There's nothing to interest you around here!” he snapped maliciously.

“Go on, now--beat it!” And he pushed them toward the door.

They had heard the disturbance in the dance hall now and the occupants

were swarming to the sidewalk. A patrol wagon came around the corner. In

the crowd Jimmie Dale slipped away from the Runt.

Was he wrong, after all? A fierce passion seized him. It was Stace Morse

who had murdered Metzer, the Runt had said. In Jimmie Dale's brain the

words began to reiterate themselves in a singsong fashion: “It was Stace

Morse. It was Stace Morse.” Then his lips drew tight together. WAS it

Stace Morse? He would have given a good deal for a chance to talk to the

man--even for a minute. But there was no possibility of that now. Later,

to-morrow perhaps, if he was wrong, after all!

Jimmie Dale returned to the Sanctuary, removed from his person all

evidences of Larry the Bat--and from the Sanctuary went home to

Riverside Drive.

In his den there, in the morning after breakfast, Jason, the butler,

brought him the papers. Three-inch headlines in red ink screamed,

exulted, and shrieked out the news that the Gray Seal, in the person of

Stace Morse, fence, yeggman and murderer, had been captured. The public,

if it had held any private admiration for the one-time mysterious crook

could now once and forever disillusion itself. The Gray Seal was Stace

Morse--and Stace Morse was of the dregs of the city's scum, a pariah,

an outcast, with no single redeeming trait to lift him from the ruck

of mire and slime that had strewn his life from infancy. The face of

Inspector Clayton, blandly self-complacent, leaped out from the paper

to meet Jimmie Dale's eyes--and with it a column and a half of perfervid

eulogy.

Something at first like dismay, the dismay of impotency, filled Jimmie

Dale--and then, cold, leaving him unnaturally calm, the old merciless

rage took its place. There was nothing to do now but wait--wait until

Carruthers should send that photograph. Then if, after all, he were

wrong--then he must find some other way. But was he wrong! The notebook

that Carruthers had given him, open at the sketch he had made of

Clayton, lay upon the desk. Jimmie Dale picked it up--he had already

spent quite a little time over it before breakfast--and examined it

again minutely, even resorting to his magnifying glass. He put it down

as a knock sounded at the door, and Jason entered with a silver card

tray. From Carruthers already! Jimmie Dale stepped quickly forward--and

then Jimmie Dale met the old man's eyes. It wasn't from Carruthers--it

was from HER!

“The same shuffer brought it, Master Jim,” said Jason.

Jimmie Dale snatched the envelope from the tray, and waved the other

from the room. As the door closed, he tore open the letter. There was

just a single line:

Jimmie--Jimmie, you haven't failed, have you?

Jimmie Dale stared at it. Failed! Failed--HER! The haggard look was in

his face again. It was the bond between them that was at stake--the Gray

Seal--the bond that had come, he knew for all time in that instant, to

mean his life.

“God knows!” he muttered hoarsely, and flung himself into a lounging

chair, still staring at the note.

The hours dragged by. Luncheon time arrived and passed--and then by

special messenger the little package from Carruthers came.

Jimmie Dale started to undo the string, then laid the package down,

and held out his hands before him for inspection. They were trembling

visibly. It was a strange condition for Jimmie Dale either to witness or

experience, unlike him, foreign to him.

“This won't do, Jimmie,” he said grimly, shaking his head.

He picked up the package again, opened it, and from between two pieces

of cardboard took out a large photographic print. A moment, two, Jimmie

Dale examined it, used the magnifying glass again; and then a strange

gleam came into the dark eyes, and his lips moved.

“I've won,” said Jimmie Dale, with ominous softness. “I've WON!”

He was standing beside the rosewood desk, and he reached for the phone.

Carruthers would be at home now--he called Carruthers there. After a

moment or two he got the connection.

“This is Jimmie, Carruthers,” he said. “Yes, I got it. Thanks. . . .

Yes. . . . Listen. I want you to get Inspector Clayton, and bring him up

here at once. . . . What? No, no--no! . . . How? . . . Why--er--tell him

you're going to run a full page of him in the Sunday edition, and you

want him to sit for a sketch. He'd go anywhere for that. . . . Yes. . . .

Half an hour. . . . YES. . . . Good-bye.”

Jimmie Dale hung up the receiver; and, hastily now, began to write upon

a pad that lay before him on the desk. The minutes passed. As he wrote,

he scored out words and lines here and there, substituting others. At

the end he had covered three large pages with, to any one but himself,

an indecipherable scrawl. These he shoved aside now, and, very

carefully, very legibly, made a copy on fresh sheets. As he finished, he

heard a car draw up in front of the house. Jimmie Dale folded the copied

sheets neatly, tucked them in his pocket, lighted a cigarette, and was

lolling lazily in his chair as Jason announced: “Mr. Carruthers, sir,

and another gentleman to see you.”

“Show them up, Jason,” instructed Jimmie Dale.

Jimmie Dale rose from his chair as they came in. Jason, well-trained

servant, closed the door behind them.

“Hello, Carruthers; hello, inspector,” said Jimmie Dale pleasantly, and

waved them to seats. “Take this chair, Carruthers.” He motioned to one

at his elbow. “Glad to see you, inspector--try that one in front of the

desk, you'll find it comfortable.”

Carruthers, trying to catch Jimmie Dale's eye for some sort of a cue,

and, failing, sat down. Inspector Clayton stared at Jimmie Dale.

“Oh, it's YOU, eh?” His eyes roved around the room, fastened for an

instant on some of Jimmie Dale's work on an easel, came back finally

to Jimmie Dale--and he plumped himself down in the chair indicated.

“Thought you was more'n a cub reporter,” he remarked, with a grin.

“You were too slick with your pencil. Pretty fine studio you got here.

Carruthers says you're going to draw me.”

Jimmie Dale smiled--not pleasantly--and leaned suddenly over the desk.

“Yes,” he said slowly, a grim intonation in his voice, “going to draw

you--TRUE TO LIFE.”

With an exclamation, Clayton slued around in his chair, half rose, and

his shifty eyes, small and cunning, bored into Jimmie Dale's face.

“What d'ye mean by that?” he snapped out

“Just exactly what I say,” replied Jimmie Dale curtly. “No more,

no less. But first, not to be too abrupt, I want to join with the

newspapers in congratulating you on the remarkable--shall I call it

celerity, or acumen?--with which you solved the mystery of Metzer's

death, and placed the murderer behind the bars. It is really remarkable,

inspector, so remarkable, in fact, that it's almost--SUSPICIOUS. Don't

you think so? No? Well, that's what Mr. Carruthers was good enough to

bring you up here to talk over--in an intimate and confidential way, you

know.”

Inspector Clayton surged up from his chair to his feet, his fists

clenched, the red sweeping over his face--and then he shook one fist at

Carruthers.

“So that's your game, is it!” he stormed. “Trying to crawl out of that

twenty-five thousand reward, eh? And as for you”--he turned on Jimmie

Dale--“you've rigged up a nice little plant between you, eh? Well, it

won't work--and I'll make you squirm for this, both of you, damn you,

before I'm through!” He glared from one to the other for a moment--then

swung on his heel. “Good-afternoon, gentlemen,” he sneered, as he

started for the door.

He was halfway across the room before Jimmie Dale spoke.

“Clayton!”

Clayton turned. Jimmie Dale was still leaning over the desk, but now one

elbow was propped upon it, and in the most casual way a revolver covered

Inspector Clayton.

“If you attempt to leave this room,” said Jimmie Dale, without raising

his voice, “I assure you that I shall fire with as little compunction as

though I were aiming at a mad dog--and I apologise to all mad dogs for

coupling your name with them.” His voice rang suddenly cold. “Come back

here, and sit down in that chair!”

The colour ebbed slowly from Clayton's face. He hesitated--then sullenly

retraced his steps; hesitated again as he reached the chair, and finally

sat down.

“What--what d'ye mean by this?” he stammered, trying to bluster.

“Just this,” said Jimmie Dale. “That I accuse you of the murder of Jake

Metzer--IT WAS YOU WHO MURDERED METZER.”

“Good God!” burst suddenly from Carruthers.

“You lie!” yelled Clayton--and again he surged up from his chair.

“That is what Stace Morse said,” said Jimmie Dale coolly. “Sit down!”

Then Clayton tried to laugh. “You're--you're having a joke, ain't you?

It was Stace--I can prove it. Come down to headquarters, and I can prove

it. I got the goods on him all the way. I tell you”--his voice rose

shrilly--“it was Stace Morse.”

“You are a despicable hound,” said Jimmie Dale, through set lips.

“Here”--he handed the revolver over to Carruthers--“keep him covered,

Carruthers. You're going to the CHAIR for this, Clayton,” he said, in

a fierce monotone. “The chair! You can't send another there in your

place--this time. Shall I draw you now--true to life? You've been

grafting for years on every disreputable den in your district. Metzer

was going to show you up; and so, Metzer being in the road, you removed

him. And you seized on the fact of Stace Morse having paid a visit to

him this afternoon to fix the crime on--Stace Morse. Proofs? Oh, yes, I

know you've manufactured proofs enough to convict him--if there weren't

stronger proofs to convict YOU.”

“Convict ME!” Clayton's lower jaw hung loosely; but still he made

an effort at bluster. “You haven't a thing on me--not a thing--not a

thing.”

Jimmie Dale smiled again--unpleasantly.

“You are quite wrong, Clayton. See--here.” He took a sheet of paper from

the drawer of his desk.

Clayton reached for it quickly. “What is it?” he demanded.

Jimmie Dale drew it back out of reach.

“Just a minute,” he said softly. “You remember, don't you, that in the

presence of Carruthers here, of myself, and of half a dozen reporters,

you stated that you had been alone with Metzer in his room at three

o'clock yesterday, and that it was you--alone--who found the body later

on at nine o'clock? Yes? I mention this simply to show that from your

own lips the evidence is complete that you had an OPPORTUNITY to commit

the crime. Now you may look at this, Clayton.” He handed over the sheet

of paper.

Clayton took it, stared at it, turning it over from first one side to

the other. Then a sort of relief seemed to come to him and he gulped.

“Nothing but a damned piece of blank paper!” he mumbled.

Jimmie Dale reached over and took back the sheet.

“You're wrong again, Clayton,” he said calmly. “It WAS quite blank

before I handed it to you--but not now. I noticed yesterday that your

hands were generally moist. I am sure they are more so now--excitement,

you know. Carruthers, see that he doesn't interrupt.”

From a drawer, Jimmie Dale took out a little black bottle, the notebook

he had used the day before, and the photograph Carruthers had sent him.

On the sheet of paper Clayton had just handled, Jimmie Dale sprinkled a

little powder from the bottle.

“Lampblack,” explained Jimmie Dale. He shook the paper carefully,

allowing the loose powder to fall on the desk blotter--and held out the

sheet toward Clayton. “Rather neat, isn't it? A very good impression,

too. Your thumb print, Clayton. Now don't move. You may look--not

touch.” He laid the paper down on the desk in front of Clayton. Beside

it he placed the notebook, open at the sketch--a black thumb print now

upon it. “You recall handling this yesterday, I'm sure, Clayton. I tried

the same experiment with the lampblack on it this morning, you see. And

this”--beside the notebook he placed the police photograph; that,

too, in its enlargement, showed, sharply defined, a thumb print on

a diamond-shaped background. “You will no doubt recognise it as an

official photograph, enlarged, taken of the gray seal on Metzer's

forehead--AND THE THUMB PRINT OF METZER'S MURDERER. You have only to

glance at the little scar at the edge of the centre loop to satisfy

yourself that the three are identical. Of course, there are a dozen

other points of similarity equally indisputable, but--”

Jimmie Dale stopped. Clayton was on his feet--rocking on his feet. His

face was deathlike in its pallor. Moisture was oozing from his forehead.

“I didn't do it! I didn't do it!” he cried out wildly. “My God, I tell

you, I DIDN'T do it--and--and--that would send me to the chair.”

“Yes,” said Jimmie Dale coldly, “and that's precisely where you're

going--to the chair.”

The man was beside himself now--racked to the soul by a paroxysm of

fear.

“I'm innocent--innocent!” he screamed out. “Oh, for God's sake, don't

send an innocent man to his death. It WAS Stace Morse. Listen! Listen!

I'll tell the truth.” He was clawing with his hands, piteously, over the

desk at Jimmie Dale. “When the big rewards came out last week I stole

one of the gray seals from the bunch at headquarters to--to use it the

first time any crime was committed when I was sure I could lay my hands

on the man who did it. Don't you see? Of course he'd deny he was the

Gray Seal, just as he'd deny that he was guilty--but I'd have the

proof both ways and--and I'd collect the rewards, and--and--” The man

collapsed into the chair.

Carruthers was up from his seat, his hands gripping tight on the edge of

the desk as he leaned over it.

“Jimmie--Jimmie--what does this mean?” he gasped out.

Jimmie Dale smiled--pleasantly now.

“That he has told the truth,” said Jimmie Dale quietly. “It is quite

true that Stace Morse committed the murder. Shows up the value of

circumstantial evidence though, doesn't it? This would certainly have

got him off, and convicted Clayton here before any jury in the land. But

the point is, Carruthers, that Stace Morse ISN'T the Gray Seal--and that

the Gray Seal is NOT a murderer.”

Clayton looked up. “You--you believe me?” he stammered eagerly.

Jimmie Dale whirled on him in a sudden sweep of passion.

“NO, you cur!” he flashed. “It's not you I believe. I simply wanted your

confession before witnesses.” He whipped the three written sheets from

his pocket. “Here, substantially, is that confession written out.” He

passed it to Carruthers. “Read it to him, Carruthers.”

Carruthers read it aloud.

“Now,” said Jimmie Dale grimly, “this spells ruin for you, Clayton. You

don't deserve a chance to escape prison bars, but I'm going to give you

one, for you're going to get it pretty stiff, anyhow. If you refuse to

sign this, I'll hand you over to the district attorney in half an hour,

and Carruthers and I will swear to your confession; on the other hand,

if you sign it, Carruthers will not be able to print it until to-morrow

morning, and that gives you something like fourteen hours to put

distance between yourself and New York. Here is a pen--if you are quick

enough to take us by surprise once you have signed, you might succeed in

making a dash for that door and effecting your escape--without forcing

us to compound a felony--understand?”

Clayton's hand trembled violently as he seized the pen. He scrawled

his name--looked from one to the other--wet his lips--and then, taking

Jimmie Dale at his word, rushed for the door--and the door slammed

behind him.

Carruthers' face was hard. “What did you let him go for, Jimmie?” he

said uncompromisingly.

“Selfishness. Pure selfishness,” said Jimmie Dale softly. “They'd guy me

unmercifully if they ever heard of it at the St. James Club. The

honour is all yours, Carruthers. I don't appear on the stage. That's

understood? Yes? Well, then”--he handed over the signed confession--“is

the 'scoop' big enough?”

Carruthers fingered the sheets, but his eyes in a bewildered way

searched Jimmie Dale's face.

“Big enough!” he echoed, as though invoking the universe. “It's the

biggest thing the newspaper game has ever known. But how did you come to

do it? What started you? Where did you get your lead?”

“Why, from you, I guess, Carruthers,” Jimmie Dale answered thoughtfully,

with artfully puckered brow. “I remembered that you had said last week

that the Gray Seal never left finger marks on his work--and I saw one on

the seal on Metzer's forehead. Then, you know, I lifted one corner where

the seal overlapped a thread of blood, and, underneath, the thread of

blood wasn't in the slightest disturbed; so, of course, I knew the seal

had been put on quite a long time after the man was dead--not until the

blood had dried thoroughly, to a crust, you know, so that even the damp

surface of the sticky side of the seal hadn't affected it. And then,

I took a dislike to Clayton somehow--and put two and two together,

and took a flyer in getting him to handle the notebook. I guess that's

all--no other reason on earth. Jolly lucky, don't you think?”

Carruthers didn't say anything for a moment. When he spoke, it was

irrelevantly.

“You saved me twenty-five thousand dollars on that reward, Jimmie.”

“That's the only thing I regret,” said Jimmie Dale brightly. “It wasn't

nice of you, Carruthers, to turn on the Gray Seal that way. And

it strikes me you owe the chap, whoever he is, a pretty emphatic

exoneration after what you said in this morning's edition.”

“Jimmie,” said Carruthers earnestly. “You know what I thought of him

before. It's like a new lease of life to get back one's faith in him.

You leave it to me. I'll put the Gray Seal on a pedestal to-morrow that

will be worthy of the immortals--you leave it to me.”

And Carruthers kept his word. Also, before the paper had been an hour

off the press, Carruthers received a letter. It thanked Carruthers

quite genuinely, even if couched in somewhat facetious terms, for his

“sweeping vindication,” twitted him gently for his “backsliding,”

begged to remain “his gratefully,” and in lieu of signature there was a

gray-coloured piece of paper shaped like this:

[Picture]

Only there were no fingerprints on it.

CHAPTER III

THE MOTHER LODE

It was the following evening, and they had dined together again at the

St. James Club--Jimmie Dale, and Carruthers of the MORNING NEWS-ARGUS.

From Clayton and a discussion of the Metzer murder, the conversation had

turned, not illogically, upon the physiognomy of criminals in general.

Jimmie Dale, lazily ensconced now in a lounging chair in one of the

club's private library rooms, flicked a minute speck of cigar ash from

the sleeve of his dinner jacket, and smiled whimsically across the table

at his friend.

“Oh, I dare say there's a lot in physiognomy, Carruthers,” he drawled.

“Never studied the thing, you know--that is, from the standpoint

of crime. Personally, I've only got one prejudice: I distrust, on

principle, the man who wears a perennial and pompous smirk--which isn't,

of course, strictly speaking, physiognomy at all. You see, a man can't

help his eyes being beady or his nose pronounced, but pomposity and a

smirk, now--” Jimmie Dale shrugged his shoulders.

Carruthers laughed--and then glanced ludicrously at Jimmie Dale, as the

door, ajar, was pushed open, and a man entered.

“Speaking of angels,” murmured Jimmie Dale--and sat up in his chair.

“Hello, Markel!” he observed casually, “You've met Carruthers, of the

NEWS-ARGUS, haven't you?”

Markel was fat and important; he had beady black eyes, fastidiously

trimmed whiskers--and a pronounced smirk.

Markel blew his nose vigorously, coughed asthmatically, and held out his

hand.

“Of course, certainly,” said he effusively. “I've met Carruthers several

times--used his sheet more than once to advertise a new bond flotation.”

The dominant note in Markel's voice was an ingratiating and unpleasant

whine, and Carruthers nodded, not very cordially--and shook hands.

Markel went back to the door, closed it carefully, and returned to the

table.

“Fact is,” he smiled confidentially, “I saw you two come in here a few

minutes ago, and I've got something that I thought Carruthers might be

glad to have for his society column--say, in the Sunday edition.”

He dove into the inside pocket of his coat, produced a large morocco

leather jeweller's case, and, holding it out over the table between

Carruthers and Jimmie Dale, suddenly snapped the cover open--and then,

with a complacent little chuckle that terminated in another fit of

coughing, spilled the contents on the table under the electric reading

lamp.

Like a thing of living, pulsing fire it rolled before their eyes--a

magnificent diamond necklace, of wondrous beauty, gleaming and

scintillating as the light rays shot back from a thousand facets.

For a moment, both men gazed at it without a word.

“Little surprise for my wife,” volunteered Markel, with a debonair wave

of his pudgy hand, and trying to make his voice sound careless.

The case lay open--patently displaying the name of the most famous

jewelry house in America. Jimmie Dale's eyes fixed on Markel's whiskers

where they were brushed outward in an ornate and fastidious gray-black

sweep.

“By Jove!” he commented. “You don't do things by halves, do you,

Markel?”

“Two hundred and ten thousand dollars I paid for that little bunch of

gewgaws,” said Markel, waving his hand again. Then he clapped Carruthers

heartily on the shoulder. “What do you think of it, Carruthers--eh?

Say, a photograph of it, and one of Mrs. Markel--eh? Please her, you

know--she's crazy on this society stunt--all flubdub to me of course.

How's it strike you, Carruthers?”

Carruthers, very evidently, liked neither the man nor his manners, but

Carruthers, above everything else, was a gentleman.

“To be perfectly frank with you, Mr. Markel,” he said a little frigidly,

“I don't believe in this sort of thing. It's all right from a newspaper

standpoint, and we do it; but it's just in this way that owners of

valuable jewelry lay themselves open to theft. It simply amounts to

advising every crook in the country that you have a quarter of a million

at his disposal, which he can carry away in his vest pocket, once he can

get his hands on it--and you invite him to try.”

Jimmie Dale laughed. “What Carruthers means, Markel, is that you'll have

the Gray Seal down your street. Carruthers talks of crooks generally,

but he thinks in terms of only one. He can't help it. He's been

trying so long to catch the chap that it's become an obsession. Eh,

Carruthers?”

Carruthers smiled seriously. “Perhaps,” he admitted. “I hope, though,

for Mr. Markel's sake, that the Gray Seal won't take a fancy to it--if

he does, Mr. Markel can say good-bye to his necklace.”

“Pouf!” coughed Markel arrogantly. “Overrated! His cleverness is all

in the newspaper columns. If he knows what's good for him, he'll know

enough to leave this alone.”

Jimmie Dale was leaning over the table poking gingerly with the tip of

his forefinger at the centre stone in the setting, revolving it gently

to and fro in the light--a very large stone, whose weight would hardly

be less than fifteen carats. Jimmie Dale lowered his head for a closer

examination--and to hide a curious, mocking little gleam that crept into

his dark eyes.

“Yes, I should say you're right, Markel,” he agreed judicially. “He

ought to know better than to touch this. It--it would be too hard to

dispose of.”

“I'm not worrying,” declared Markel importantly.

“No,” said Jimmie Dale. “Two hundred and ten thousand, you said.

Any special--er--significance to the occasion, if the question's not

impertinent? Birthday, wedding anniversary--or something like that?”

“No, nothing like that!” Markel grinned, winked secretively, and rubbed

his hands together. “I'm feeling good, that's all--I'm going to make the

killing of my life to-morrow.”

“Oh!” said Jimmie Dale.

Markel turned to Carruthers. “I'll let you in on that, too, Carruthers,

in a day or two, if you'll send a reporter around--financial man, you

know. It'll be worth your while. And now, how about this? What do you

say to a little article and the photos next Sunday?”

There was a slight hint of rising colour in Carruthers' face.

“If you'll send them to the society editor, I've no doubt he'll be able

to use them,” he said brusquely.

“Right!” said Markel, and coughed, and patted Carruthers' shoulder

patronisingly again. “I'll just do that little thing.” He picked up the

necklace, dangled it till it flashed and flashed again under the light,

then restored it very ostentatiously to its case, and the case to his

pocket. “Thanks awfully, Carruthers,” he said, as he rose from his

chair. “See you again, Dale. Good-night!”

Carruthers glared at the door as it closed behind the man.

“Say it!” prodded Jimmie Dale sweetly. “Don't feel restrained because

you are a guest--I absolve you in advance.”

“Rotter!” said Carruthers.

“Well,” said Jimmie Dale softly. “You see--Carruthers?”

Carruthers' match crackled savagely as he lighted a cigar.

“Yes, I see,” he growled. “But I don't see--you'll pardon my saying

so--how vulgarity like that ever acquired membership in the St. James

Club.”

“Carruthers,” said Jimmie Dale plaintively, “you ought to know better

than that. You know, to begin with, since it seems he has advertised

with you, that he runs some sort of brokerage business in Boston. He's

taken a summer home up here on Long Island, and some misguided chap put

him on the club's visitor's list. His card will NOT be renewed. Sleek

customer, isn't he? Trifle familiar--I was only introduced to him last

night.”

Carruthers grunted, broke his burned match into pieces, and began to

toss the pieces into an ash tray.

Jimmie Dale became absorbed in an inspection of his hands--those

wonderful hands with long, slim, tapering fingers, whose clean, pink

flesh masked a strength and power that was like to a steel vise.

Jimmie Dale looked up. “Going to print a nice little story for him about

the 'costliest and most beautiful necklace in America'?” he inquired

innocently.

Carruthers scowled. “No,” he said bluntly. “I am not. He'll read the

NEWS-ARGUS a long time before he reads anything about that, Jimmie.”

But therein Carruthers was wrong--the NEWS-ARGUS carried the “story” of

Markel's diamond necklace in three-inch “caps” in red ink on the front

page in the next morning's edition--and Carruthers gloated over it

because the morning NEWS-ARGUS was the ONLY paper in New York that did.

Carruthers was to hear more of Markel and Markel's necklace than he

thought, though for the time being the subject dropped between the two

men.

It was still early, barely ten o'clock, when Carruthers left the club,

and, preferring to walk to the newspaper offices, refused Jimmie Dale's

offer of his limousine. It was but five minutes later when Jimmie Dale,

after chatting for a moment or two with those about in the lobby, in

turn sought the coat room, where Markel was being assisted into his

coat.

“Getting home early, aren't you, Markel?” remarked Jimmie Dale

pleasantly.

“Yes,” said Markel, and ran his fingers fussily, comb fashion, through

his whiskers. “Quite a little run out to my place, you know--and with,

you know what, I don't care to be out too late.”

“No, of course,” concurred Jimmie Dale, getting into his own coat.

They walked out of the club together, and Markel climbed importantly

into the tonneau of a big gray touring car.

“Ah--home, Peters,” he sniffed at his chauffeur; and then, with a

grandiloquent wave of his hand to Jimmie Dale: “'Night, Dale.”

Jimmie Dale smiled with his eyes--which were hidden by the brim of his

hat.

“Good-night, Markel,” he replied, and the smile crept curiously to

the corners of his mouth as he watched the gray car disappear down the

street.

A limousine drew up, and Benson, Jimmie Dale's chauffeur, opened the

door.

“Home, Mr. Dale?” he asked cheerily, touching his cap. “Yes,

Benson--home,” said Jimmie Dale absently, and stepped into the car.

It was a luxurious car, as everything that belonged to Jimmie Dale was

luxurious--and he leaned back luxuriously on the cushions, extended

his legs luxuriously to their full length, plunged his hands into his

overcoat pockets--and then a change stole strangely, slowly over Jimmie

Dale.

The sensitive fingers of his right hand in the pocket had touched, and

now played delicately over a sealed envelope that they had found there,

played over it as though indeed by the sense of touch alone they could

read the contents--and he drew his body gradually erect.

It was another of those mysterious missives from--HER. The texture of

the paper was invariably the same--like this one. How had it come there?

Collusion with the coat boy at the club? That was hardly probable.

Perhaps it had been there before he had entered the club for dinner--he

remembered, now, that there had been several people passing, and that he

had been jostled slightly in crossing the sidewalk. What, however, did

it matter? It was there mysteriously, as scores of others had come to

him mysteriously, with never a clew to her identity, to the identity of

his--he smiled a little grimly--accomplice in crime.

He took the envelope from his pocket and stared at it. His fingers had

not been at fault--it was one of hers. The faint, elusive, exquisite

fragrance of some rare perfume came to him as he held it.

“I'd give,” said Jimmie Dale wistfully to himself--“I'd give everything

I own to know who you are--and some day, please God, I will know.”

Jimmie Dale tore the envelope very gently, as though the tearing almost

were an act of desecration--and extracted the letter from within. He

began to read aloud hurriedly and in snatches:

“DEAR PHILANTHROPIC CROOK: Charleton Park Manor--Markel's house is the

second one from the gates on the right-hand side--library leads off

reception hall on left, door opposite staircase--telephone in reception

hall near vestibule entrance, left-hand side--safe is one of your

father's make, No. 14,321--clothes closet behind the desk--probably will

be kept in cash box--five servants; two men, three maids--quarters on

top story--Markel and wife occupy room over library--French windows to

dining room on opposite side of the house--opening on the lawn--get

it TO-NIGHT, Jimmie--TO-MORROW WOULD BE TOO LATE--dispose of it--see

fit--Henry Wilbur, Marshall Building, Broadway--fifth story--”

Through the glass-panelled front of the car, Jimmie Dale could see his

chauffeur's back, and the hand that held the letter dropped now to his

side, and Jimmie Dale stared--at his chauffeur's back. Then, presently,

he read the letter again, as though committing it to memory now; and

then, tearing the paper into tiny shreds, as he did with every one of

her communications, he reached out of the window and allowed the little

pieces to filter gradually from his hand.

The Gray Seal! He smiled in his whimsical way. If it were ever known!

He, Jimmie Dale, with his social standing, his wealth, his position--the

Gray Seal! Not a police official, not a secret-service bureau probably

in the civilised world, but knew the name--not a man, woman, or child

certainly in this great city around him but to whom it was as

familiar as their own! Danger? Yes. A battle of wits? Yes. His against

everybody's--even against Carruthers', his old college chum! For, even

as a reporter, before he had risen to the editorial desk, and even now

that he had, Carruthers had been one of the keenest on the scent of the

Gray Seal.

Danger? Yes. But it was worth it! Worth it a thousand times for the very

lure of the danger itself; but worth it most of all for his association

with her who, by some amazing means, verging indeed on the miraculous,

came into touch with all these things, and supplied him with the data on

which to work--that always some wrong might be righted, or gladness

come where there had been gloom before, or hope where there had been

despair--that into some fellow human's heart should come a gleam

of sunshine. Yes, in spite of the howls of the police, the virulent

diatribes of the press, an angry public screaming for his arrest,

conviction, and punishment, there were those perhaps who even on their

bended knees at night asked God's blessing on--the Gray Seal!

Was it strange, then, after all, that the police, seeking a clew through

motive, should have been driven to frenzy on every occasion in finding

themselves forever confronted with what, from every angle they were able

to view it, was quite a purposeless crime! On one point only they

were right, the old dogma, the old, old cry, old as the institution of

police, older than that, old since time immemorial--CHERCHEZ LA FEMME!

Quite right--but also quite purposeless! Jimmie Dale's eyes grew

wistful. He had been “hunting for the woman in the case” himself,

now, for months and years indefatigably, using every resource at his

command--quite purposelessly.

Jimmie Dale shrugged his shoulders. Why go over all this to-night--there

were other things to do. She had come to him again--and this time with

a matter that entailed more than ordinary difficulty, more than usual

danger, that would tax his wits and his skill to the utmost, not only

to succeed, but to get out of it himself with a whole skin. Markel--eh?

Jimmie Dale leaned back in his seat, clasped his hands behind his

head--and his eyes, half closed now, were studying Benson's back again

through the plate-glass front.

He was still sitting in that position as the car approached his

residence on Riverside Drive--but, as it came to a stop, and Benson

opened the door, it was a very alert Jimmie Dale that stepped to the

sidewalk.

“Benson,” he said crisply, “I am going downtown again later on, but I

shall drive myself. Bring the touring car around and leave it in front

of the house. I'll run it into the garage when I get back--you need not

wait up.”

“Very good, sir,” said Benson.

In the hallway, Jason, the butler, who had been butler to Jimmie Dale's

father before him, took Jimmie Dale's hat and coat.

“It's a fine evening, Master Jim,” said the privileged old man

affectionately.

Jimmie Dale took out his silver cigarette case, selected a cigarette,

tapped it daintily on the cover of the case--and accepted the match the

old man hastily produced.

“Yes, Jason.” said Jimmie Dale, pleasantly facetious, “it a fine night,

a glorious night, moon and stars and a balmy breeze--quite too fine,

indeed, to remain indoors. In fact, you might lay out my gray ulster; I

think I will go for a spin presently, when I have changed.”

“Yes, sir,” said Jason. “Anything else, Master Jim?”

“No; that's all, Jason. Don't sit up for me--you may go to bed now.”

“Thank you, sir,” said the old man.

Jimmie Dale went upstairs, opened the door of his own particular den on

the right of the landing, stepped inside, closed the door, switched on

the light--and Jimmie Dale's debonair nonchalance dropped from him as a

mask instantly--and it was another Jimmie Dale--the professional Jimmie

Dale.

Quick now in every action, he swung aside the portiere that curtained

off the squat, barrel-shaped safe in the little alcove, opened the safe,

took out that curious leather girdle with its kit of burglar's tools,

added to it a flashlight and an automatic revolver, closed the safe--and

passed into his dressing room. Here, he proceeded to divest himself

rapidly of his evening clothes, selecting in their stead a suit of dark

tweed. He heard Jason come up the stairs, pass along the hall, and mount

the second flight to his own quarters; and presently came the sound of

an automobile without. The dressing room fronted on the Drive--Jimmie

Dale looked out. Benson was just getting out of the touring car.

Slipping the leather girdle, then, around his waist, Jimmie Dale put on

his vest, then his coat--and walked briskly downstairs.

Jason had laid out a gray ulster on the hall stand. Jimmie Dale put it

on, selected a leather cap with motor-goggle attachment that pulled down

almost to the tip of his nose, tucked a slouch hat into the pocket of

the ulster, and, leaving the house, climbed into his car.

He glanced at his watch as he started--it was a quarter of eleven.

Jimmie Dale's lips pursed a little.

“I guess it'll make a night of it, and a tight squeeze, at that, to get

back under cover before daylight,” he muttered. “I'll have to do some

tall speeding.”

But at first, across the city and through Brooklyn, for all his

impatience, it was necessarily slow--after that, Jimmie Dale took

chances, and, once on the country roads of Long Island, the big,

powerful car tore through the night like a greyhound whose leash is

slipped.

A half hour passed--Jimmie Dale's eyes shifting occasionally from the

gray thread of road ahead of him under the glare of the dancing lamps,

to the road map spread out at his feet, upon which, from time to time,

he focused his pocket flashlight. And then, finally, he slowed the car

to a snail's pace--he should be very near his destination--that very

ultra-exclusive subdivision of Charleton Park Manor.

On either side of the road now was quite a thickly set stretch of wooded

land, rising slightly on the right--and this Jimmie Dale scrutinised

sharply. In fact, he stopped for an instant as he came opposite to a

wagon track--it seemed to be little more than that--that led in through

the trees.

“If it's not too far from the seat of war,” commented Jimmie Dale to

himself, as he went on again, “it will do admirably.”

And then, a hundred yards farther on, Jimmie Dale nodded his head in

satisfaction--he was passing the rather ornate stone pillars that marked

the entrance to Charleton Park Manor, and on which the initial promoters

of the subdivision, the real-estate people, had evidently deemed it good

advertising policy to expend a small fortune.

Another hundred yards farther on, Jimmie Dale turned his car around

and returned past the gates to the wagon track again. The road was

deserted--not a car nor a vehicle of any description was in sight.

Jimmie Dale made sure of that--and in another instant Jimmie Dale's own

car, every light extinguished, had vanished--he had backed it up the

wagon track, just far enough in for the trees to screen it thoroughly

from the main road.

Nor did Jimmie Dale himself appear again on the main road--until just as

he emerged close to the gates of Charleton Park Manor from a short cut

through the woods. Also, he was without his ulster now, and the slouch

hat had replaced the motor cap.

Jimmie Dale, in the moonlight, took stock of his surroundings, as he

passed in at a businesslike walk through the gates. It was a large park,

if that name could properly be applied to it at all, and the houses--he

caught sight of one set back from the driveway on the right--were quite

far apart, each in its own rather spacious grounds among the trees.

“The second house on the right,” her letter had said. Jimmie Dale had

already passed the first one--the next would be Markel's then--and it

loomed ahead of him now, black and shadowy and unlighted.

Jimmie Dale shot a glance around him--there was stillness, quiet

everywhere--no sign of life--no sound.

Jimmie Dale's face became tense, his lips tight--and he stepped suddenly

from the sidewalk in among the trees. They were not thick here, of

course, the trees, and the turf beneath his feet was well kept--and,

therefore, soundless. He moved quickly now, but cautiously, from tree to

tree, for the moonlight, flooding the lawn and house, threw all objects

into bold relief.

A minute, two, three went by--and a shadow flitted here and there across

the light-green sward, like the moving of the trees swaying in the

breeze--and then Jimmie Dale was standing close up against one side of

the house, hidden by the protecting black shadows of the walls.

But here, for a moment, Jimmie Dale seemed little occupied with the

house itself--he was staring down past its length to where the woods

made a heavy, dark background at the rear. Then he turned his head,

to face directly to the main road, then back again slowly, as though

measuring an angle. Jimmie Dale had no intention of making his escape by

the roundabout way in which he had been forced to come in order to make

certain of locating the right house, the second one from the gates--and

he was getting the bearings of his car and the wagon track now.

“I guess that'll be about right,” Jimmie Dale muttered finally. “And now

for--”

He slipped along the side of the house and halted where, almost on a

level with the ground, the French windows of the dining room opened on

the lawn. Jimmie Dale tried them gently. They were locked.

An indulgent smile crept to Jimmie Dale's lips--and his hand crept in

under his vest. It came out again--not empty--and Jimmie Dale leaned

close against the window. There was a faint, almost inaudible,

scratching sound, then a slight, brittle crack--and Jimmie Dale laid a

neat little four-inch square of glass on the ground at his feet. Through

the aperture he reached in his hand, turned the key that was in the

lock, turned the bolt-rod handle, pushed the doors silently open--wide

open--left them open--and stepped into the room.

He could see quite well within, thanks to the moonlight. Jimmie Dale

produced a black silk mask from one of the little leather pockets,

adjusted it carefully over his face, and crossed the room to the hall

door. He opened this--wide open--left it open--and entered the hall.

Here it was dark--a pitch blackness. He stood for a moment,

listening--utter silence. And then--alert, strained, tense in an

instant, Jimmie Dale crouched against the wall--and then he smiled a

little grimly. It was only some one coughing upstairs--Markel--in his

sleep, perhaps, or, perhaps--in wakefulness.

“I'm a fool!” confided Jimmie Dale to himself, as he recognised the

cough that he had heard at the club. “And yet--I don't know. One's

nerves get sort of taut. Pretty stiff business. If I'm ever caught, the

penitentiary sentence I get will be the smallest part of what's to pay.”

A round button of light played along the wall from the flashlight in

his hand--just for an instant--and all was blackness again. But in that

instant Jimmie Dale was across the hall, and his fingers were tracing

the telephone connection from the instrument to where the wires

disappeared in the baseboard of the floor. Another instant, and he had

severed the wires with a pair of nippers.

Again the quick, firefly gleam of light to locate the stair case and the

library door opposite to it--and, moving without the slightest noise,

Jimmie Dale's hand was on the door itself. Again he paused to listen.

All was silence now.

The door swung under his hand, and, left open behind him, he was in

the room. The flashlight winked once--suspiciously. Then he snapped its

little switch, keeping the current on, and the ray dodged impudently

here and there all over the apartment.

The safe was set in a sort of clothes closet behind the desk, she had

said. Yes, there it was--the door, at least. Jimmie Dale moved toward

it--and paused as his light swept the top of the intervening desk. A

mass of papers, books, and correspondence littered it untidily. The

yellow sheet of a telegram caught Jimmie Dale's eye.

He picked it up and glanced at it. It read:

“Vein uncovered to-day. Undoubtedly mother lode. Enormously rich. Put

the screws on at once. THURL.”

Under the mask, Jimmie Dale's lips twitched.

“I think, Markel, you miserable hound,” said he softly, “that God will

forgive me for depriving you of a share of the profits. Two hundred and

ten thousand, I think it was, you said the sparklers cost.” A curious

little sound came from Jimmie Dale's lips--like a chuckle.

Jimmie Dale tossed the telegram back on the desk, moved on behind the

desk, opened the door of the closet that had been metamorphosed into

a vault--and the white light travelled slowly, searchingly, critically

over the shining black-enamelled steel, the nickelled knobs, and dials

of a safe that confronted him.

Jimmie Dale nodded at it--familiarly, grimly.

“It's number one-four-three-two-one, all right,” he murmured. “And one

of the best we ever made. Pretty tough. But I've done it before. Say,

half an hour of gentle persuasion. It would be too bad to crack it with

'soup'--besides, that's crude--Carruthers would never forgive the Gray

Seal for that!”

The light went out--blackness fell. Jimmie Dale's slim, sensitive

fingers closed on the dial's knob, his head touched the steel front of

the safe as he pressed his ear against it for the tumblers' fall.

And then silence. It seemed to grow heavier, that silence, with

each second--to palpitate through the quiet house--to grow pregnant,

premonitory of dread, of fear--it seemed to throb in long undulations,

and the stillness grew LOUD. A moonbeam filtered in between the edge

of the drawn shade and the edge of the window. It struggled across the

floor in a wavering path, strayed over the desk, and died away, shadowy

and formless, against the blackness of the opened recess door, against

the blackness of the great steel safe, the blackness of a huddled

form crouched against it. Only now and then, in a strange, projected,

wraithlike effect, the moon ray glinted timidly on the tip of a nickel

dial, and, ghostlike, disclosed a human hand.

Upstairs, Markel coughed again. Then from the safe a whisper,

heavy-breathed as from great exertion:

“MISSED IT!”

The dial whirled with faint, musical, little metallic clicks; then

began to move slowly again, very, very slowly. The moonbeam, as though

petulant at its own abortive attempt to satisfy its curiosity, retreated

back across the floor, and faded away.

Blackness!

Time passed. Then from the safe again, but now in a low gasp, a pant of

relief:

“Ah!”

The ear might barely catch the sound--it was as of metal sliding in

well-oiled grooves, of metal meeting metal in a padded thud. The massive

door swung outward. Jimmie Dale stood up, easing his cramped muscles,

and flirted the sweat beads from his forehead.

After a moment, he knelt again. There was still the inner door--but that

was a minor matter to Jimmie Dale compared with what had gone before.

Stillness once more--a long period of it. And then again that cough from

above--a prolonged paroxysm of it this time that went racketing through

the house.

Jimmie Dale, in the act of swinging back the inner door of the safe,

paused to listen, and little furrows under his mask gathered on his

forehead. The coughing stopped. Jimmie Dale waited a moment, still

listening--then his flashlight bored into the interior of the safe.

“The cash box, probably,” quoted Jimmie Dale, beneath his breath--and

picked it up from where it lay in the bottom compartment of the safe.

The lock snipped under the insistent probe of a delicate little

blued-steel instrument, and Jimmie Dale lifted the cover. There was

a package of papers and documents on top, held together with elastic

bands. Jimmie Dale spent a moment or two examining these, then

his fingers dived down underneath, and the next minute, under the

flashlight, the morocco leather case open, the diamond necklace was

sparkling and flashing on its white satin bed.

“A tempting little thing, isn't it?” said Jimmie Dale gently. “It was

really thoughtful of you, Markel, to buy that this afternoon!”

Jimmie Dale replaced the necklace in the cash box, set the cash box on

the floor, closed the inner door of the safe, and swung the outer door

a little inward--but left it flauntingly ajar. Then from a pocket of the

leather girdle beneath his vest he produced his small, thin, flat, metal

case. From this, from between sheets of oil paper, with the aid of a

pair of tweezers, he lifted out a gray, diamond-shaped seal. Jimmie

Dale was apparently fastidious. He held the seal with the tweezers as

he moistened the adhesive side with his tongue, laid the seal on his

handkerchief, and pressed the handkerchief firmly against the safe--as

usual, Jimmie Dale's insignia bore no finger prints as it lay neatly

capping the knob of the dial.

He reached down, picked up the cash box--and then, for the second time

that night, held suddenly tense, alert, listening, his every muscle

taut. A door opened upstairs. There came a murmur of voices. Then a

momentary lull.

Jimmie Dale listened. Like a statue he stood there in the black,

absolutely motionless--his head a little forward and to one side.

Nothing--not a sound. Then a very low, curious, swishing noise, and a

faint creak. SOMEBODY WAS COMING DOWN THE STAIRS!

Jimmie Dale moved stealthily from the recess, and noiselessly to the

desk. Very faintly, but distinctly now, came a pad of either slippered

or bare feet on the stairway carpet. Like a cat, soundless in his

movements, Jimmie Dale crept toward the door of the room. Down the

stairs came that pad of feet; occasionally came that swishing sound.

Nearer the door crept Jimmie Dale, and his lips were thinned now, his

jaws clamped. How near were they together, he and this night prowler? At

times he could not hear the other at all, and, besides, the heavy carpet

made the judgment of distance an impossibility. If he could gain the

hall, and, in the darkness, elude the other, the way of escape through

the dining room was open. And then, within a few feet of the door,

Jimmie Dale halted abruptly, as a woman's voice rose querulously from

the hallway above:

“You are making a perfect fool of yourself, Theodore Markel! Come back

here to bed!”

Jimmie Dale's face hardened like stone--the answer came almost from the

very threshold in front of him:

“I can't sleep, I tell you”--it was Markel's voice, in a disgruntled

snarl. “I was a fool to bring the confounded thing home. I'm going to

take the library couch for the rest of the night.”

It happened quick, then--quick as the winking of an eye. Two sharp,

almost simultaneous, clicks of the electric-light buttons pressed by

Markel, and the hall and library were a flood of light--and Jimmie Dale

leaped forward to where, in dressing gown and pajamas, blankets and

bedding over one arm, a revolver dangling in the other hand, Markel

stood full before the door in the hallway without.

There was a wild yell of terror and surprise from Markel, then a

deafening roar and a spit of flame from his revolver--a bitter,

smothered exclamation from Jimmie Dale as the cash box crashed to the

floor from his left hand, and he was upon the other like a tiger.

With the impact, both men went to the floor, grappled, and rolled over

and over. Half mad with fear, shock, and surprise, Markel fought like a

maniac, and his voice, in gasping shouts, rang through the house.

A minute, two passed--and the men rolled about the hall floor. Markel,

over middle age and unheathily fat, against Jimmie Dale's six feet of

muscle--only Jimmie Dale's left hand, dripping a red stream now, was

almost useless.

From above came wild confusion--women's voices in little shrieks; men's

voices shouting in excitement; doors opening, running feet. And then

Jimmie Dale had snatched the revolver from the floor where Markel

had dropped it in the scuffle, and was pressing it against Markel's

forehead--and Markel, terror-stricken, had collapsed in a flabby, pliant

heap.

Jimmie Dale, still covering Markel with the weapon, stood up. The

frightened faces of women protruded over the banisters above. The two

men-servants, at best none too enthusiastically on the way down, stopped

as though stunned as Jimmie Dale swung the revolver upon them.

Then Jimmie Dale spoke--to Markel--pointing the weapon at Markel again.

“I don't like you, Markel,” he said, with cold impudence. “The only

decent thing you'll ever do will be to die--and if those men of yours

on the stairs move another step it will be your death warrant. Do you

understand? I would suggest that you request them to stay where they

are.”

Cold sweat was on Markel's face as he stared into the muzzle of the

revolver, and his teeth chattered.

“Go back!” he screamed hysterically at the servants. “Go back! Sit down!

Don't move! Do what he tells you!”

“Thank you!” said Jimmie Dale grimly. “Now, get up yourself!”

Markel got up.

Jimmie Dale backed to the library door, picked up the cash box, tucked

it under his left armpit, and faced those on the stairs.

“Mr. Markel and I are going out for a little walk,” he announced coolly.

“If one of you make a move or raise an alarm before your master comes

back, I shall be obliged, in self-defence, to shoot--Mr. Markel. Mr.

Markel quite understands that--I am sure. Do you not, Mr. Markel?”

“Helen,” screamed Markel to his wife, “don't let 'em move! For God's

sake, do as he says!”

Jimmie Dale's lips, just showing beneath the edge of his mask, broadened

in a pleasant little smile.

“Will you lead the way, Mr. Markel?” he requested, with ironic

deference. “Through the dining room, please. Yes, that's right!”

Markel walked weakly into the dining room, and Jimmie Dale followed. A

prod in the back from the revolver muzzle, and Markel stepped through

the French windows and out on the lawn. Jimmie Dale faced the other

toward the woods at the rear of the house.

“Go on!” Jimmie Dale's voice was curt now, uncompromising. “And step

lively!”

They passed on along the side of the house and in among the trees. Fifty

yards or so more, and Jimmie Dale halted. He backed Markel up against a

large tree--not over gently.

“I--I say”--Markel's teeth were going like castanets. “I--”

“You'll oblige me by keeping your mouth shut,” observed Jimmie Dale

politely--and he whipped the cord of Markel's dressing gown loose

and began to tie the man to the tree. “You have many unpleasant

characteristics, Markel--your voice is one of them. Shall I repeat that

I do not like you?” He stepped to the back of the tree. “Pardon me if I

draw this uncomfortably tight. I don't think you can reach around to the

knot. No? The trunk is too large? Quite so!” He stepped around to face

Markel again--the man was thoroughly frightened, his face was livid, his

jaw sagged weakly, and his eyes followed every movement of the revolver

in Jimmie Dale's hand in a sort of miserable fascination. Jimmie Dale

smiled unhappily. “I am going to do something, Markel, that I should

advise no other man to do--I am going to put you on your honour! For the

next fifteen minutes you are not to utter a sound. Do you understand?”

“Y-yes,” said Markel hoarsely.

“No,” said Jimmie Dale sadly, “I don' think you do. Let me be painfully

explicit. If you break your vow of silence by so much as a second, then

to-morrow, or the next day, or the day after, at my convenience, Markel,

you and I will meet again--for the LAST time. There can be no possible

misapprehension on your part now--Markel?”

“N-no,”--Markel could scarcely chatter out the word.

“Quite so,” said Jimmie Dale, in velvet tones. He stood for an

instant looking at the other with cool insolence; then: “Good-night,

Markel”--and five minutes later a great touring car was tearing New

Yorkward over the Long Island roads at express speed.

It was one o'clock in the morning as Jimmie Dale swung the car into a

cross street off lower Broadway, and drew up at the curb beside a large

office building. He got out, snuggled the cash box under his ulster,

went around to the Broadway entrance, glanced up to note that a light

burned in a fifth-story window, and entered the building.

The hallway was practically in darkness, one or two incandescents only

threw a dim light about. Jimmie Dale stopped for a moment at the foot

of the stairs, beside the elevator well, to listen--if the watchman was

making rounds, it was in another part of the building Jimmie Dale began

to climb.

He reached the fifth floor, turned down the corridor, and halted in

front of a door, through the ground-glass panel of which a light glowed

faintly--as though coming from an inner office beyond. Jimmie Dale drew

the black silk mask from his pocket, adjusted it, tried the door, found

it unlocked, opened it noiselessly, and stepped inside. Across the

room, through another door, half open, the light streamed into the outer

office, where Jimmie Dale stood.

Jimmie Dale stole across the room, crouched by the door to look into the

inner office--and his face went suddenly rigid.

“Good God!” he whispered. “As bad as that!”--but it was a nonchalant

Jimmie Dale to all outward appearances that, on the instant, stepped

unconcernedly over the threshold.

An elderly man, white-haired, kindly-faced, kindly-eyed, save now that

the face was drawn and haggard, the eyes full of weariness, was standing

behind a flat-topped desk, his fingers twitching nervously on a revolver

in his hand. He whirled, with a startled cry, at Jimmie Dale's entrance,

and the revolver clattered from his fingers to the floor.

“I am afraid,” said Jimmie Dale, smiling pleasantly, “that you were

going to shoot yourself. Your name is Wilbur, Henry Wilbur, isn't it?”

Unmanned, trembling, the other stood--and nodded mechanically.

“It's really not a nice thing to do,” said Jimmie Dale confidentially.

“Makes a mess, you see, too”--he was pulling off his motor gauntlet,

his ulster, his jacket, and, having set the cash box on the desk, was

rolling back his sleeve as he spoke. “Had a little experience myself

this evening.” He held out his hand that, with the forearm, was covered

with blood. “A little above the wrist--fortunately only a flesh wound--a

little memento from a chap named Markel, and--”

“MARKEL!” The word burst, quivering, from the other's lips.

“Yes,” said Jimmie Dale imperturbably. “Do you mind if I wash a bit--and

could you oblige me with a towel, or something that would do for a

bandage?”

The man seemed dazed. In a subconscious way, he walked from the desk to

a little cupboard, and took out two towels.

Jimmie Dale stooped, while the other's back was turned, picked up the

revolver from the floor, and slipped it into his trousers pocket.

“Markel?” said Wilbur again, the same trembling anxiety in his voice, as

he handed Jimmie Dale the towels and motioned toward a washstand in the

corner of the room. “Did you say Markel--Theodore Markel?”

“Yes,” said Jimmie Dale, examining his wound critically.

“You had trouble--a fight with him? Is he--he--dead?”

“No,” said Jimmie Dale, smiling a little grimly. “He's pretty badly

hurt, though, I imagine--but not in a physical way.”

“Strange!” whispered Wilbur, in a numbed tone to himself; and he went

back and sank down in his desk chair. “Strange that you should speak of

Markel--strange that you should have come here to-night!”

Jimmie Dale did not answer. He glanced now and then at the other, as he

deftly dressed his wrist--the man seemed on the verge of collapse, on

the verge of a nervous breakdown. Jimmie Dale swore softly to himself.

Wilbur was too old a man to be called upon to stand against the trouble

and anxiety that was mirrored in the misery in his face, that had

brought him to the point of taking his own life.

Jimmie Dale put on his coat again, walked over to the desk, and picked

up the 'phone.

“If I may?” he inquired courteously--and confided a number to the

mouthpiece of the instrument.

There was a moment's wait, during which Wilbur, in a desperate sort of

way, seemed to be trying to rally himself, to piece together a puzzle,

as it were; and for the first time he appeared to take a personal

interest in the masked figure that leaned against his desk. He kept

passing his hands across his eyes, staring at Jimmie Dale.

Then Jimmie Dale spoke--into the 'phone.

“MORNING NEWS-ARGUS office? Mr. Carruthers, please. Thank you.”

Another wait--then Jimmie Dale's voice changed its pitch and register to

a pleasant and natural, though quite unrecognisable bass.

“Mr. Carruthers? Yes. I thought it might interest you to know that

Mr. Theodore Markel purchased a very valuable diamond necklace this

afternoon. . . . Oh, you knew that, did you? Well, so much the better;

you'll be all the more keenly interested to know that it is no longer in

his possession. . . . I beg pardon? Oh, yes, I quite forgot--this is the

Gray Seal speaking. . . . Yes. . . . The Gray Seal. . . . I have just

come from Mr. Markel's country house, and if you hurry a man out there

you ought to be able to give the public an exclusive bit of news,

a scoop, I believe you call it--you see, Mr. Carruthers, I am not

ungrateful for, I might say, the eulogistic manner in which the MORNING

NEWS-ARGUS treated me in that last affair, and I trust I shall be able

to do you many more favours--I am deeply in your debt. And, oh, yes,

tell your reporter not to overlook the detail of Mr. Markel in his

pajamas and dressing gown tied to a tree in his park--Mr. Markel might

be inclined to be reticent on that point, and it would be a pity to

deprive the public of any--er--'atmosphere' in the story, you know. . . .

What? . . . No; I am afraid Mr. Markel's 'phone is--er--out of order.

. . . Yes. . . . And, by the way, speaking of 'phones, Mr. Carruthers,

between gentlemen, I know you will make no effort under the

circumstances to discover the number I am calling from. Good-night, Mr.

Carruthers.” Jimmie Dale hung the receiver abruptly on the hook.

“You see,” said Jimmie Dale, turning to Wilbur--and then he stopped. The

man was on his feet, swaying there, his face positively gray.

“My God!” Wilbur burst out. “What have you done? A thousand times better

if I had shot myself, as I would have done in another moment if you had

not come in. I was only ruined then--I am disgraced now. You have robbed

Markel's safe--I am the one man in the world who would have a reason

above all others for doing that--and Markel knows it. He will accuse

me of it. He can prove I had a motive. I have not been home to-night.

Nobody knows I am here. I cannot prove an alibi. What have you done!”

“Really,” said Jimmie Dale, almost plaintively, swinging himself up on

the corner of the desk and taking the cash box on his knee, “really, you

are alarming yourself unnecessarily. I--”

But Wilbur stopped him. “You don't know what you are talking about!”

Wilbur cried out, in a choked way; then, his voice steadying, he rushed

on: “Listen! I am a ruined man, absolutely ruined. And Markel has ruined

me--I did not see through his trick until too late. Listen! For years,

as a mining engineer, I made a good salary--and I saved it. Two years

ago I had nearly seventy thousand dollars--it represented my life work.

I bought an abandoned mine in Alaska for next to nothing--I was certain

it was rich. A man by the name of Thurl, Jason T. Thurl, another mining

engineer, a steamer acquaintance, was out there at the time--he was a

partner of Markel's, though I didn't know it then. I started to work the

mine. It didn't pan out. I dropped nearly every cent. Then I struck

a small vein that temporarily recouped me, and supplied the necessary

funds with which to go ahead for a while. Thurl, who had tried to buy

the mine out from under my option in the first place, repeatedly then

tried to buy it from me at a ridiculous figure. I refused. He persisted.

I refused--I was confident, I KNEW I had one of the richest properties

in Alaska.”

Wilbur paused. A little row of glistening drops had gathered on his

forehead. Jimmie Dale, balancing Markel's cash box on one knee, drummed

softly with his finger tips on the cover.

“The vein petered out,” Wilbur went on. “But I was still confident.

I sank all the proceeds of the first strike--and sank them fast, for

unaccountable accidents that crippled me both financially and in the

progress of the work began to happen.” Wilbur flung out his hands

impotently. “Oh, it's a long story--too long to tell. Thurl was at the

bottom of those accidents. He knew as well as I did that the mine was

rich--better than I did, for that matter, for we discovered before we

ran him out of Alaska that he had made secret borings on the property.

But what I did not know until a few hours ago was that he had actually

uncovered what we uncovered only yesterday--the mother lode. He was

driving me as fast as he could into the last ditch--for Markel. I

didn't know until yesterday that Markel had any thing to do with it. I

struggled on out there, hoping every day to open a new vein. I raised

money on everything I had, except my insurance and the mine--and sank

it in the mine. No one out there would advance me anything on a property

that looked like a failure, that had once already been abandoned. I

have always kept an office here, and I came back East with the idea of

raising something on my insurance. Markel, quite by haphazard as I then

thought, was introduced to me just before we left San Francisco on

our way to New York. On the run across the continent we became very

friendly. Naturally, I told him my story. He played sympathetic good

fellow, and offered to lend me fifty thousand dollars on a demand note.

I did not want to be involved for a cent more than was necessary, and,

as I said, I hoped from day to day to make another strike. I refused

to take more than ten thousand. I remember now that he seemed strangely

disappointed.”

Again Wilbur stopped. He swept the moisture from his forehead--and his

fist, clenched, came down upon the desk.

“You see the game!”--there was bitter anger in his voice now. “You see

the game! He wanted to get me in deep enough so that I couldn't wriggle

out, deeper than ten thousand that I could get at any time on my

insurance, he wanted me where I couldn't get away--and he got me. The

first ten thousand wasn't enough. I went to him for a second, a third, a

fourth, a fifth--hoping always that each would be the last. Each time a

new note, a demand note for the total amount, was made, cancelling the

former one. I didn't know his game, didn't suspect it--I blessed God for

giving me such a friend--until this, or, rather, yesterday afternoon,

when I received a telegram from my manager at the mine saying that

he had struck what looked like a very rich vein--the mother lode.

And”--Wilbur's fist curled until the knuckles were like ivory in their

whiteness--“he added in the telegram that Thurl had wired the news of

the strike to a man in New York by the name of Markel. Do you see? I

hadn't had the telegram five minutes, when a messenger brought me a

letter from Markel curtly informing me that I would have to meet my note

to-morrow morning. I can't meet it. He knew I couldn't. With wealth in

sight--I'm wiped out. A DEMAND note, a call loan, do you understand--and

with a few months in which to develop the new vein I could pay it

readily. As it is--I default the note--Markel attaches all I have left,

which is the mine. The mine is sold to satisfy my indebtedness. Markel

buys it in legally, upheld by the law--and acquires, ROBS me of it,

and--”

“And so,” said Jimmie Dale musingly, “you were going to shoot yourself?”

Wilbur straightened up, and there was something akin to pathetic

grandeur in the set of the old shoulders as they squared back.

“Yes!” he said, in a low voice. “And shall I tell you why? Even if,

which is not likely, there was something reverting to me over the

purchase price, it would be a paltry thing compared with the mine. I

have a wife and children. If I have worked for them all my life, could I

stand back now at the last and see them robbed of their inheritance by a

black-hearted scoundrel when I could still lift a hand to prevent it!

I had one way left. What is my life? I am too old a man to cling to it

where they are concerned. I have referred to my insurance several times.

I have always carried heavy insurance”--he smiled a little curious,

mirthless smile--“THAT HAS NO SUICIDE CLAUSE.” He swept his hand over

the desk, indicating the papers scattered there. “I have worked late

to-night getting my affairs in order. My total insurance is fifty-two

thousand dollars, though I couldn't BORROW anywhere near the full amount

on it--but at my death, paid in full, it would satisfy the note. My

executors, by instruction would pay the note--and no dollar from the

mine, no single grain of gold, not an ounce of quartz, would Markel ever

get his hands on, and my wife and children would be saved. That is--”

His words ended abruptly--with a little gasp. Jimmie Dale had opened

the cash box and was dangling the necklace under the light--a stream of

fiery, flashing, sparkling gems.

Then Wilbur spoke again, a hard, bitter note in his voice, pointing his

hand at the necklace.

“But now, on top of everything, you have brought me disgrace--because

you broke into his safe to-night for THAT? He would and will accuse me.

I have heard of you--the Gray Seal--you have done a pitiful night's work

in your greed for that thing there.”

“For this?” Jimmie Dale smiled ironically, holding the necklace up.

Then he shook his head. “I didn't break into Markel's safe for this--it

wouldn't have been worth while. It's only paste.”

“PASTE!” exclaimed Wilbur, in a slow way.

“Paste,” said Jimmie Dale placidly, dropping the necklace back into its

case. “Quite in keeping with Markel, isn't it--to make a sensation on

the cheap?”

“But that doesn't change matters!” Wilbur cried out sharply, after a

numbed instant's pause. “You still broke into the safe, even if you

didn't know then that the necklace was paste.”

“Ah, but, you see--I did know then,” said Jimmie Dale softly. “I am

really--you must take my word for it--a very good judge of stones, and I

had--er--seen these before.”

Wilbur stared--bewildered, confused.

“Then why--what was it that--”

“A paper,” said Jimmie Dale, with a little chuckle--and produced it from

the cash box. “It reads like this: 'On demand, I promise to pay--'”

“My note!” It came in a great, surging cry from Wilbur; and he strained

forward to read it.

“Of course,” said Jimmie Dale. “Of course--your note. Did you think that

I had just happened to drop in on you? Now, then, see here, you just

buck up, and--er--smile. There isn't even a possibility of you being

accused of the theft. In the first place, Markel saw quite enough of me

to know that it wasn't you. Secondly, neither Markel nor any one else

would ever dream that the break was made for anything else but the

necklace, with which you have no connection--the papers were in the cash

box and were just taken along with it. Don't you see? And, besides, the

police, with my very good friend, Carruthers at their elbows, will see

very thoroughly to it that the Gray Seal gets full and ample credit for

the crime. But”--Jimmie Dale pulled out his watch, and yawned under his

mask--“it's getting to be an unconscionable hour--and you've still a

letter to write.”

“A letter?” Wilbur's voice was broken, his lips quivering.

“To Markel,” said Jimmie Dale pleasantly. “Write him in reply to his

letter of the afternoon, and post it before you leave here--just as

though you had written it at once, promptly, on receipt of his. He will

still get it on the morning delivery. State that you will take up the

note immediately on presentation at whatever bank he chooses to name.

That's all. Seeing that he hasn't got it, he can't very well present

it--can he? Eventually, having--er--no use for fake diamonds, I

shall return the necklace, together with the papers in his cash box

here--including your note.”

“Eventually?” Uncomprehendingly, stumblingly, Wilbur repeated the word.

“In a month or two or three, as the case may be,” explained Jimmie

Dale brightly. “Whenever you insert a personal in the NEWS-ARGUS to

the effect that the mother lode has given you the cash to meet it.” He

replaced the note in the cash box, slipped down to his feet from the

desk--and then he choked a little. Wilbur, the tears streaming down

his face, unable to speak, was holding out his hands to Jimmie Dale.

“I--er--good-night!” said Jimmie Dale hurriedly--and stepped quickly

from the room.

Halfway down the first flight of stairs he paused. Steps, running after

him, sounded along the corridor above; and then Wilbur's voice.

“Don't go--not yet,” cried the old man. “I don't understand. How did you

know--who told you about the note?”

Jimmie Dale did not answer--he went on noiselessly down the stairs. His

mask was off now, and his lips curved into a strange little smile.

“I wish I knew,” said Jimmie Dale wistfully to himself.

CHAPTER IV

THE COUNTERFEIT FIVE

It was still early in the evening, but a little after nine o'clock.

The Fifth Avenue bus wended its way, jouncing its patrons, particularly

those on the top seats, across town, and turned into Riverside Drive. A

short distance behind the bus, a limousine rolled down the cross street

leisurely, silently.

As the lights of passing craft on the Hudson and a myriad scintillating,

luminous points dotting the west shore came into view, Jimmie Dale rose

impulsively from his seat on the top of the bus, descended the little

circular iron ladder at the rear, and dropped off into the street. It

was only a few blocks farther to his residence on the Drive, and

the night was well worth the walk; besides, restless, disturbed, and

perplexed in mind, the walk appealed to him.

He stepped across to the sidewalk and proceeded slowly along. A month

had gone by and he had not heard a word from--HER. The break on West

Broadway, the murder of Metzer in Moriarty's gambling hell, the theft

of Markel's diamond necklace had followed each other in quick

succession--and then this month of utter silence, with no sign of her,

as though indeed she had never existed.

But it was not this temporary silence on her part that troubled Jimmie

Dale now. In the years that he had worked with this unknown, mysterious

accomplice of his whom he had never seen, there had been longer

intervals than a bare month in which he had heard nothing from her--it

was not that. It was the failure, total, absolute, and complete,

that was the only result for the month of ceaseless, unremitting,

doggedly-expended effort, even as it had been the result many times

before, in an attempt to solve the enigma that was so intimate and vital

a factor in his own life.

If he might lay any claims to cleverness, his resourcefulness, at

least, he was forced to admit, was no match for hers. She came, she went

without being seen--and behind her remained, instead of clews to her

identity, only an amazing, intangible mystery, that left him at times

appalled and dismayed. How did she know about those conditions in West

Broadway, how did she know about Metzer's murder, how did she know about

Markel and Wilbur--how did she know about a hundred other affairs of the

same sort that had happened since that night, years ago now, when out of

pure adventure he had tampered with Marx's, the jeweller's strong

room in Maiden Lane, and she had, mysteriously then, too, solved HIS

identity, discovered him to be the Gray Seal?

Jimmie Dale, wrapped up in his own thoughts, entirely oblivious to his

surroundings, traversed another block. There had never been since the

world began, and there would never be again, so singular and bizarre a

partnership as this--of hers and his. He, Jimmie Dale, with his strange

double life, one of New York's young bachelor millionaires, one whose

social status was unquestioned; and she, who--who WHAT? That was just

it! Who what? What was she? What was her name? What one personal,

intimate thing did he know about her? And what was to be the end?

Not that he would have severed his association with her--not for

worlds!--though every time, that, by some new and curious method, one of

her letters found its way into his hands, outlining some fresh coup

for him to execute, his peril and danger of discovery was increased in

staggering ratio. To-day, the police hunted the Gray Seal as they hunted

a mad dog; the papers stormed and raved against him: in every detective

bureau of two continents he was catalogued as the most notorious

criminal of the age--and yet, strange paradox, no single crime had ever

been committed!

Jimmie Dale's strong, fine-featured face lighted up. Crime! Thanks to

her, there were those who blessed the name of the Gray Seal, those

into whose lives had come joy, relief from misery, escape from death

even--and their blessings were worth a thousandfold the risk and peril

of disaster that threatened him at every minute of the day.

“Thank God for her!” murmured Jimmie Dale softly. “But--but if I could

only find her, see her, know who she is, talk to her, and hear her

voice!” Then he smiled a little wanly. “It's been a pretty tough

month--and nothing to show for it!”

It had! It had been one of the hardest months through which Jimmie Dale

had ever lived. The St. James, that most exclusive club, his favourite

haunt, had seen nothing of him; the easel in his den, that was his

hobby, had been untouched; there had been days even when he had not

crossed the threshold of his home. Every resource at his command he

had called into play in an effort to solve the mystery. For nearly the

entire month, following first this lead and then that, he had lived in

the one disguise that he felt confident she knew nothing of--that was,

or, rather, had become, almost a dual personality with him. From the

Sanctuary, that miserable and disreputable room in a tenement on the

East Side, a tenement that had three separate means of entrance and

exit, he had emerged day after day as Larry the Bat, a character as well

known and as well liked in the exclusive circles of the underworld as

was Jimmie Dale in the most exclusive strata of New York's society

and fashion. And it had been useless--all useless. Through his own

endeavours, through the help of his friends of the underworld, the

lives of half a dozen men, Bert Hagan's on West Broadway, for instance,

Markel's, and others', had been laid bare to the last shred, but nowhere

could be found the one vital point that linked their lives with hers,

that would account for her intimate knowledge of them, and so furnish

him with the clew that would then with certainty lead him to a solution

of her identity.

It was baffling, puzzling, unbelievable, bordering, indeed, on the

miraculous--herself, everything about her, her acts, her methods, her

cleverness, intangible in one sense, were terrifically real in another.

Jimmie Dale shook his head. The miraculous and this practical, everyday

life were wide and far apart. There was nothing miraculous about it--it

was only that the key to it was, so far, beyond his reach.

And then suddenly Jimmie Dale shrugged his shoulders in consonance with

a whimsical change in both mood and thought.

“Larry the Bat, is a hard taskmaster!” he muttered facetiously. “I'm

afraid I'm not very presentable this evening--no bath this morning,

and no shave, and, after nearly a month of make-up, that beastly grease

paint gets into the skin creases in a most intimate way.” He chuckled

as the thought of old Jason, his butler, came to him. “I saw Jason,

torn between two conflicting emotions, shaking his head over the black

circles under my eyes last night--he didn't know whether to worry over

the first signs of a galloping decline, or break his heart at witnessing

the young master he had dandled on his knees going to the damnation

bowwows and turning into a confirmed roue! I guess I'll have to mind

myself, though. Even Carruthers detached his mind far enough from his

editorial desk and the hope of exclusively publishing the news of the

Gray Seal's capture in the MORNING NEWS-ARGUS, to tell me I was looking

seedy. It's wonderful the way a little paint will metamorphose a man!

Well, anyway, here's for a good hot tub to-night, and a fresh start!”

He quickened his pace. There were still three blocks to go, and here was

no hurrying, jostling crowd to impede his progress; indeed, as far as he

could see up the Drive, there was not a pedestrian in sight. And then,

as he walked, involuntarily, insistently, his mind harked back into the

old groove again.

“I've tried to picture her,” said Jimmie Dale softly to himself. “I've

tried to picture her a hundred, yes, a thousand times, and--”

A bus, rumbling cityward, went by him, squeaking, creaking, and rattling

in its uneasy joints--and out of the noise, almost at his elbow it

seemed, a voice spoke his name--and in that instant intuitively he KNEW,

and it thrilled him, stopped the beat of his heart, as, dulcet, soft,

clear as the note of a silver bell it fell--and only one word:

“Jimmie!”

He whirled around. A limousine, wheels just grazing the curb, was

gliding slowly and silently past him, and from the window a woman's

arm, white-gloved and dainty, was extended, and from the fingers to the

pavement fluttered an envelope--and the car leaped forward.

For the fraction of a second, Jimmie Dale stood dazed, immovable, a

gamut of emotions, surprise, fierce exultation, amazement, a strange

joy, a mighty uplift, swirling upon him--and then, snatching up the

envelope from the ground, he sprang out into the road after the car. It

was the one chance he had ever had, the one chance she had ever given

him, and he had seen--a white-gloved arm! He could not reach the car,

it was speeding away from him like an arrow now, but there was something

else that would do just as well, something that with all her cleverness

she had overlooked--the car's number dangling on the rear axle, the

rays of the little lamp playing on the enamelled surface of the plate!

Gasping, panting, he held his own for a yard or more, and there floated

back to him a little silvery laugh from the body of the limousine, and

then Jimmie Dale laughed, too, and stopped--it was No. 15,836!

He stood and watched the car disappear up the Drive. What delicious

irony! A month of gruelling, ceaseless toil that had been vain, futile,

useless--and the key, when he was not looking for it, unexpectedly,

through no effort of his, was thrust into his hand--No. 15,836!

Jimmie Dale, the gently ironic smile still on his lips, those slim,

supersensitive fingers of his subconsciously noting that the texture of

the envelope was the same as she always used, retraced his steps to the

sidewalk.

“Number fifteen thousand eight hundred and thirty-six,” said Jimmie Dale

aloud--and halted at the curb as though rooted to the spot. It sounded

strangely familiar, that number! He repeated it over again slowly:

“One-five-eight-three-six.” And the smile left his lips, and upon his

face came the look of a chastened child. She had used a duplicate plate!

Fifteen thousand eight hundred and thirty-six was the number of one of

his own cars--his own particular runabout!

For a moment longer he stood there, undecided whether to laugh or swear,

and then his eyes fastened mechanically on the envelope he was twirling

in his fingers. Here, at least, was something that was not elusive;

that, on the contrary, as a hundred others in the past had done,

outlined probably a grim night's work ahead for the Gray Seal! And, if

it were as those others had been, every minute from the moment of its

receipt was precious time. He stepped under the nearest street light,

and tore the envelope open.

“Dear Philanthropic Crook,” it began--and then followed two closely

written pages. Jimmie Dale read them, his lips growing gradually

tighter, a smouldering light creeping into his dark eyes, and once he

emitted a short, low whistle of consternation--that was at the end, as

he read the post-script that was heavily underscored: “Work quickly.

They will raid to-night. Be careful. Look out for Kline, he is the

sharpest man in the United States secret service.”

For a brief instant longer, Jimmie Dale stood under the street lamp,

his mind in a lightning-quick way cataloguing every point in her letter,

viewing every point from a myriad angles, constructing, devising,

mapping out a plan to dove-tail into them--and then Jimmie Dale swung on

a downtown bus. There was neither time nor occasion to go home now--that

marvellous little kit of burglar's tools that peeped from their tiny

pockets in that curious leather undervest, and that reposed now in

the safe in his den, would be useless to him to-night; besides, in the

breast pocket of his coat, neatly folded, was a black silk mask, and,

relics of his role of Larry the Bat, an automatic revolver, an

electric flashlight, a steel jimmy, and a bunch of skeleton keys, were

distributed among the other pockets of his smart tweed suit.

Jimmie Dale changed from the bus to the subway, leaving behind him,

strewn over many blocks, the tiny and minute fragments into which he had

torn her letter; at Astor Place he left the subway, walked to Broadway,

turned uptown for a block to Eighth Street, then along Eighth Street

almost to Sixth Avenue--and stopped.

A rather shabby shop, a pitiful sort of a place, displaying in its

window a heterogeneous conglomeration of cheap odds and ends, ink

bottles, candy, pencils, cigarettes, pens, toys, writing pads, marbles,

and a multitude of other small wares, confronted him. Within, a little,

old, sweet-faced, gray-haired woman stood behind the counter, pottering

over the rearrangement of some articles on the shelves.

“My word!” said Jimmie Dale softly to himself. “You wouldn't believe it,

would you! And I've always wondered how these little stores managed to

make both ends meet. Think of that old soul making fifteen or twenty

thousand dollars from a layout like this--even if it has taken her a

lifetime!”

Jimmie Dale had halted nonchalantly and unconcernedly by the curb,

not too near the window, busied apparently in an effort to light a

refractory cigarette; and then, about to enter the store, he gazed

aimlessly across the street for a moment instead. A man came briskly

around the corner from Sixth Avenue, opened the store door, and went in.

Jimmie Dale drew back a little, and turned his head again as the door

closed--and a sudden, quick, alert, and startled look spread over his

face.

The man who had entered bent over the counter and spoke to the old lady.

She seemed to listen with a dawning terror creeping over her features,

and then her hands went piteously to the thin hair behind her ears. The

man motioned toward a door at the rear of the store. She hesitated,

then came out from behind the counter, and swayed a little as though her

limbs would not support her weight.

Jimmie Dale's lips thinned.

“I'm afraid,” he muttered slowly, “I'm afraid that I'm too late even

now.” And then, as she came to the door and turned the key on the

inside: “Pray Heaven she doesn't turn the light out--or somebody might

think I was trying to break in!”

But in that respect Jimmie Dale's fears were groundless. She did not

turn out either of the gas jets that lighted the little shop; instead,

in a faltering, reluctant sort of manner, she led the way directly

through the door in the rear, and the man followed her.

The shop was empty--and Jimmie Dale was standing against the door on the

outside. His position was perfectly natural--a hundred passers-by would

have noted nothing but a most commonplace occurrence--a man in the act

of entering a store. And, if he appeared to fumble and have trouble with

the latch, what of it! Jimmie Dale, however, was not fumbling--hidden by

his back that was turned to the street, those wonderful fingers of his,

in whose tips seemed embodied and concentrated every one of the human

senses, were working quickly, surely, accurately, without so much as the

wasted movement of a single muscle.

A faint tinkle--and the key within fell from the lock to the floor. A

faint click--and the bolt of the lock slipped back. Jimmie Dale restored

the skeleton keys and a little steel instrument that accompanied them

to his pocket--and quietly opened the door. He stepped inside, picked up

the key from the floor, inserted it in the lock, closed the door behind

him, and locked it again.

“To guard against interruption,” observed Jimmie Dale, a little

quizzically.

He was, perhaps, thirty seconds behind the others. He crossed the shop

noiselessly, cautiously, and passed through the door at the rear. It

opened into a short passage that, after a few feet, gave on a sort of

corridor at right angles--and down this latter, facing him, at the end,

the door of a lighted room was open, and he could see the figure of the

man who had entered the shop, back turned, standing on the threshold.

Voices, indistinct, came to him.

The corridor itself was dark; and Jimmie Dale, satisfied that he was

fairly safe from observation, stole softly forward. He passed two

doors on his left--and the curious arrangement of the building that had

puzzled him for a moment became clear. The store made the front of an

old tenement building, with apartments above, and the rear of the store

was a sort of apartment, too--the old lady's living quarters.

Step by step, testing each one against a possible creaking of the floor,

Jimmie Dale moved forward, keeping close up against one wall. The man

passed on into the room--and now Jimmie Dale could distinguish every

word that was being spoken; and, crouched up, in the dark corridor, in

the angle of the wall and the door jamb itself, could see plainly enough

into the room beyond. Jimmie Dale's jaw crept out a little.

A young man, gaunt, pale, wrapped in blankets, half sat, half reclined

in an invalid's chair; the old lady, on her knees, the tears streaming

down her face, had her arms around the sick man's neck; while the other

man, apparently upset at the scene, tugged vigorously at long, gray

mustaches.

“Sammy! Sammy!” sobbed the woman piteously. “Say you didn't do it,

Sammy--say you didn't do it!”

“Look here, Mrs. Matthews,” said the man with the gray mustaches gently,

“now don't you go to making things any harder. I've got to do my duty

just the same, and take your son.”

The young man, a hectic flush beginning to burn on his cheeks, gazed

wildly from one to the other.

“What--what is it?” he cried out.

The man threw back his coat and displayed a badge on his vest.

“I'm Kline of the secret service,” he said gravely. “I'm sorry, Sammy,

but I want you for that little job in Washington at the bureau--before

you left on sick leave!”

Sammy Matthews struggled away from his mother's arms, pulled himself

forward in his chair--and his tongue licked dry lips.

“What--what job?” he whispered thickly.

“You know, don't you?” the other answered steadily. He took a large,

flat pocketbook from his pocket, opened it, and took out a five-dollar

bill. He held this before the sick man's eyes, but just out of reach,

one finger silently indicating the lower left-hand corner.

Matthews stared at it for a moment, and the hectic flush faded to a

grayish pallor, and a queer, impotent sound gurgled in his throat.

“I see you recognise it,” said the other quietly. “It's open and shut,

Sammy. That little imperfection in the plate's got you, my boy.”

“Sammy! Sammy!” sobbed the woman again. “Sammy, say you didn't do it!”

“It's a lie!” said Matthews hoarsely. “It's a lie! That plate was

condemned in the bureau for that imperfection--condemned and destroyed.”

“Condemned TO BE destroyed,” corrected the other, without raising his

voice. “There's a little difference there, Sammy--about twenty years'

difference--in the Federal pen. But it wasn't destroyed; this note was

printed from it by one of the slickest gangs of counterfeiters in the

United States--but I don't need to tell you that, I guess you know who

they are. I've been after them a long time, and I've got them now, just

as tight as I've got you. Instead of destroying that plate, you stole

it, and disposed of it to the gang. How much did they give you?”

Matthews' face seemed to hold a dumb horror, and his fingers picked at

the arms of the chair. His mother had moved from beside him now, and

both her hands were patting at the man's sleeve in a pitiful way, while

again and again she tried to speak, but no words would come.

“It's a lie!” said Matthews again, in a colourless, mechanical way.

The man glanced at Mrs. Matthews as he put the five-dollar note back

into his pocket, seemed to choke a little, shook his head, and all trace

of the official sternness that had crept into his voice disappeared.

“It's no good,” he said in a low tone. “Don't do that, Mrs. Matthews,

I've got to do my duty.” He leaned a little toward the chair. “It's dead

to rights, Sammy. You might as well make a clean breast of it. It was

up to you and Al Gregor to see that the plate was destroyed. It WASN'T

destroyed; instead, it shows up in the hands of a gang of counterfeiters

that I've been watching for months. Furthermore, I've got the plate

itself. And finally, though I haven't placed him under arrest yet for

fear you might hear of it before I wanted you to and make a get-away,

I've got Al Gregor where I can put my hands on him, and I've got his

confession that you and he worked the game between you to get that plate

out of the bureau and dispose of it to the gang.”

“Oh, my God!”--it came in a wild cry from the sick man, and in a

desperate, lurching way he struggled up to his feet. “Al Gregor said

that? Then--then I'm done!” He clutched at his temples. “But it's not

true--it's not true! If the plate was stolen, and it must have been

stolen, or that note wouldn't have been found, it was Al Gregor who

stole it--I didn't, I tell you! I knew nothing of it, except that he and

I were responsible for it and--and I left it to him--that's the only way

I'm to blame. He's caught, and he's trying to get out of it with a light

sentence by pretending to turn State's evidence, but--but I'll fight

him--he can't prove it--it's only his word against mine, and--”

The other shook his head again.

“It's no good, Sammy,” he said, a touch of sternness back in his tones

again. “I told you it was open and shut. It's not only Al Gregor. One

of the gang got weak knees when I got him where I wanted him the other

night, and he swears that you are the one who DELIVERED the plate to

them. Between him and Gregor and what I know myself, I've got evidence

enough for any jury against every one of the rest of you.”

Horror, fear, helplessness seemed to mingle in the sick man's staring

eyes, and he swayed unsteadily upon his feet.

“I'm innocent!” he screamed out. “But I'm caught, I'm caught in a net,

and I can't get out--they lied to you--but no one will believe it any

more than you do and--and it means twenty years for me--oh, God!--twenty

years, and--” His hands went wriggling to his temples again, and he

toppled back in a faint into the chair.

“You've killed him! You've killed my boy!” the old lady shrieked out

piteously, and flung herself toward the senseless figure.

The man jumped for the table across the room, on which was a row of

bottles, snatched one up, drew the cork, smelled it, and ran back with

the bottle. He poured a little of the contents into his cupped hand,

held it under young Matthews' nostrils, and pushed the bottle into Mrs.

Matthews' hands.

“Bathe his forehead with this, Mrs. Matthews,” he directed reassuringly.

“He'll be all right again in a moment. There, see--he's coming around

now.”

There was a long, fluttering sigh, and Matthews opened his eyes; then

a moment's silence; and then he spoke, with an effort, with long pauses

between the words:

“Am--I--to--go--now?”

The words seemed to ring absolute terror in the old lady's ears. She

turned, and dropped to her knees on the floor.

“Mr. Kline, Mr. Kline,” she sobbed out, “oh, for God's love, don't take

him! Let him off, let him go! He's my boy--all I've got! You've got

a mother, haven't you? You know--” The tears were streaming down the

sweet, old face again. “Oh, won't you, for God's dear name, won't you

let him go? Won't--”

“Stop!” the man cried huskily. He was mopping at his face with his

handkerchief. “I thought I was case-hardened, I ought to be--but I guess

I'm not. But I've got to do my duty. You're only making it worse for

Sammy there, as well as me.”

Her arms were around his knees now, clinging there.

“Why can't you let him off!” she pleaded hysterically. “Why can't

you! Why can't you! Nobody would know, and I'd do anything--I'd pay

anything--anything--I'll give you ten--fifteen thousand dollars!”

“My poor woman,” he said kindly, placing his hand on her head, “you are

talking wildly. Apart altogether from the question of duty, even if

I succeeded in hushing the matter up, I would probably at least be

suspected and certainly discharged, and I have a family to support--and

if I were caught I'd get ten years in the Federal prison for it. I'm

sorry for this; I believe it's your boy's first offence, and if I could

let him off I would.”

“But you can--you can!” she burst out, rocking on her knees, clinging

tighter still to him, as though in a paroxysm of fear that he might

somehow elude her. “It will kill him--it will kill my boy. And you can

save him! And even if they discharged you, what would that mean against

my boy's life! You wouldn't suffer, your family wouldn't suffer,

I'll--I'll take care of that--perhaps I could raise a little more than

fifteen thousand--but, oh, have pity, have mercy--don't take him away!”

The man stared at her a moment, stared at the white face on the

reclining chair--and passed his hand heavily across his eyes.

“You will! You will!” It came in a great surging cry of joy from the old

lady. “You will--oh, thank God, thank God!--I can see it in your face!”

“I--I guess I'm soft,” he said huskily, and stooped and raised Mrs.

Matthews to her feet. “Don't cry any more. It'll be all right--it'll be

all right. I'll--I'll fix it up somehow. I haven't made any arrests yet,

and--well, I'll take my chances. I'll get the plate and turn it over to

you to-morrow, only--only it's got to be destroyed in my presence.”

“Yes, yes!” she cried, trying to smile through her tears--and then

she flung her arms around her son's neck again. “And when you come

to-morrow, I'll be ready with the money to do my share, too, and--”

But Sammy Matthews shook his head.

“You're wrong, both of you,” he said weakly. “You're a white man,

Kline. But destroying that plate won't save me. The minute a single note

printed from it shows up, they'll know back there in Washington that the

plate was stolen, and--”

“No; you're safe enough there,” the other interposed heavily. “Knowing

what was up, you don't think I'd give the gang a chance to get them

into circulation, do you? I got them all when I got the plate. And”--he

smiled a little anxiously--“I'll bring them here to be destroyed with

the plate. It would finish me now, as well as you, if one of them ever

showed up. Say,” he said suddenly, with a catch in his breath, “I--I

don't think I know what I'm doing.”

Mrs. Matthews reached out her hands to him.

“What can I say to you!” she said brokenly, “What--”

Jimmie Dale drew back along the wall. A little way from the door he

quickened his pace, still moving, however, with extreme caution. They

were still talking behind him as he turned from the corridor into the

passageway leading to the store, and from there into the store itself.

And then suddenly, in spite of caution, his foot slipped on the bare

floor. It was not much--just enough to cause his other foot, poised

tentatively in air, to come heavily down, and a loud and complaining

creak echoed from the floor.

Jimmie Dale's jaws snapped like a steel trap. From down the corridor

came a sudden, excited exclamation in the little old lady's voice, and

then her steps sounded running toward the store. In the fraction of a

second Jimmie Dale was at the front door.

“Clumsy, blundering fool!” he whispered fiercely to himself as he turned

the key, opened the door noiselessly until it was just ajar, and turned

the key in the lock again, leaving the bolt protruding out. One step

backward, and he was rapping on the counter with his knuckles. “Isn't

anybody here?” he called out loudly. “Isn't any--oh!”--as Mrs. Matthews

appeared in the back doorway. “A package of cigarettes, please.”

She stared at him, a little frightened, her eyes red and swollen with

recent crying.

“How--how did you get in here?” she asked tremendously.

“I beg your pardon?” inquired Jimmie Dale, in polite surprise.

“I--I locked the door--I'm sure I did,” she said, more to herself than

to Jimmie Dale, and hurried across the floor to the door as she spoke.

Jimmie Dale, still politely curious, turned to watch her. For a moment

bewilderment and a puzzled look were in her face--and then a sort of

surprised relief.

“I must have turned the key in the lock without shutting the door

tight,” she explained, “for I knew I turned the key.”

Jimmie Dale bent forward to examine the lock--and nodded.

“Yes,” he agreed, with a smile. “I should say so.” Then, gravely

courteous: “I'm sorry to have intruded.”

“It is nothing,” she answered; and, evidently anxious to be rid of him,

moved quickly around behind the counter. “What kind of cigarettes do you

want?”

“Egyptians--any kind,” said Jimmie Dale, laying a bill on the counter.

He pocketed the cigarettes and his change, and turned to the door.

“Good-evening,” he said pleasantly--and went out.

Jimmie Dale smiled a little curiously, a little tolerantly. As he

started along the street, he heard the door of the little shop close

with a sort of supercareful bang, the key turned, and the latch rattle

to try the door--the little old lady was bent on making no mistake a

second time!

And then the smile left Jimmie Dale's lips, his face grew strained and

serious, and he broke into a run down the block to Sixth Avenue. Here he

paused for an instant--there was the elevated, the surface cars--which

would be the quicker? He looked up the avenue. There was no train

coming; the nearest surface car was blocks away. He bit his lips in

vexation--and then with a jump he was across the street and hailing a

passing taxicab that his eyes had just lighted on.

“Got a fare?” called Jimmie Dale.

“No, sir,” answered the chauffeur, bumping his car to an abrupt halt.

“Good!” Jimmie Dale ran alongside, and yanked the door open. “Do you

know where the Palace Saloon on the Bowery is?”

“Yes, sir,” replied the man.

Jimmie Dale held a ten-dollar bank note up before the chauffeur's eyes.

“Earn that in four minutes, then,” he snapped--and sprang into the cab.

The taxicab swerved around on little better than two wheels, started on

a mad dash down the Avenue--and Jimmie Dale braced himself grimly in

his seat. The cab swerved again, tore across Waverly Place, circuited

Washington Square, crossed Broadway, and whirled finally into the upper

end of the Bowery.

Jimmie Dale spoke once--to himself--plaintively.

“It's too bad I can't let old Carruthers in on this for a scoop with his

precious MORNING NEWS-ARGUS--but if I get out of it alive myself, I'll

do well! Wonder if the day'll ever come when he finds out that his very

dear friend and old college pal, Jimmie Dale, is the Gray Seal that he's

turned himself inside out for about four years now to catch, and that

he'd trade his soul with the devil any time to lay hands on! Good old

Carruthers! 'The most puzzling, bewildering, delightful crook in the

annals of crime'--am I?”

The cab drew up at the curb. Jimmie Dale sprang out, shoved the bill

into the chauffeur's hand, stepped quickly across the sidewalk, and

pushed his way through the swinging doors of the Palace Saloon. Inside

leisurely and nonchalantly, he walked down past the length of the bar to

a door at the rear. This opened into a passageway that led to the side

entrance of the saloon on the cross street. Jimmie Dale emerged from

the side entrance, crossed the street, retraced his steps to the Bowery,

crossed over, and walked rapidly down that thoroughfare for two blocks.

Here he turned east into the cross street; and here, once more, his pace

became leisurely and unhurried.

“It's a strange coincidence, though possibly a very happy one,” said

Jimmie Dale, as he walked along, “that it should be on the same street

as the Sanctuary--ah, this ought to be the place!”

An alleyway, corresponding to the one that flanked the tenement where,

as Larry the Bat, he had paid room rent as a tenant for several years,

in fact, the alleyway next above it, and but a short block away,

intersected the street, narrow, black, and uninviting. Jimmie Dale, as

he passed, peered down its length.

“No light--that's good!” commented Jimmie Dale to himself. Then: “Window

opens on alleyway ten feet from ground--shoe store, Russian Jew, in

basement--go in front door--straight hallway--room at end--Russian

Jew probably accomplice--be careful that he does not hear you moving

overhead”--Jimmie Dale's mind, with that curious faculty of his, was

subconsciously repeating snatches from her letter word for word, even

as he noted the dimly lighted, untidy, and disorderly interior of what,

from strings of leather slippers that decorated the cellarlike entrance,

was evidently a cheap and shoddy shoe store in the basement of the

building.

The building itself was rickety and tumble-down, three stories high, and

given over undoubtedly to gregarious foreigners of the poorer class, a

rabbit burrow, as it were, having a multitude of roomers and lodgers.

There was nothing ominous or even secretive about it--up the short

flight of steps to the entrance, even the door hung carelessly half

open.

Jimmie Dale's slouch hat was pulled a little farther down over his eyes

as he mounted the steps and entered the hallway. He listened a moment.

A sort of subdued, querulous hubbub seemed to hum through the place, as

voices, men's, women's, and children's, echoing out from their various

rooms above, mingled together, and floated down the stairways in a

discordant medley. Jimmie Dale stepped lightly down the length of

the hall--and listened again; this time intently, with his ear to the

keyhole of the door that made the end of the passage. There was not a

sound from within. He tried the door, smiled a little as he reached for

his keys, worked over the lock--and straightened up suddenly as his

ear caught a descending step on the stairs. It was two flights up,

however--and the door was unlocked now. Jimmie Dale opened it, and, like

a shadow, slipped inside; and, as he locked the door behind him, smiled

once more--the door lock was but a paltry makeshift at best, but INSIDE

his fingers had touched a massive steel bolt that, when shot home, would

yield when the door itself yielded--and not before. Without moving the

bolt, he turned--and his flashlight for a moment swept the room.

“Not much like the way they describe this sort of place in storybooks!”

murmured Jimmie Dale capriciously. “But I get the idea. Mr. Russian Jew

downstairs makes a bluff at using it for a storeroom.”

Again the flashlight made a circuit. Here, there, and everywhere,

seemingly without any attempt at order, were piles of wooden shipping

cases. Only the centre of the room was clear and empty; that, and a

vacant space against the wall by the window.

Jimmie Dale, moving without sound, went to the window. There was a shade

on it, and it was pulled down. He reached up underneath it, felt for

the window fastening, and unlocked it; then cautiously tested the window

itself by lifting it an inch or two--it slid easily in its grooves.

He stood then for a moment, hardfaced, a frown gathering his forehead

into heavy furrows, as the flashlight's ray again and again darted

hither and thither. There was nothing, absolutely nothing in the room

but wooden packing cases. He lifted the cover of the one nearest to him

and looked inside. It was quite empty, except for some pieces of heavy

cord, and a few cardboard shoe boxes that, in turn, were empty, too.

“It's here, of course,” said Jimmie Dale thoughtfully to himself.

“Clever work, too! But I can't move half a hundred packing cases without

that chap below hearing me; and I can't do it in ten minutes, either,

which, I imagine is the outside limit of time. Fortunately, though,

these cases are not without their compensation--a dozen men could hide

here.”

He began to move about the room. And now he stooped before one pile of

boxes and then another, curiously attempting to lift up the entire pile

from the bottom. Some he could not move; others, by exerting all his

strength, gave a little; and then, finally, over in one corner, he found

a pile that appeared to answer his purpose.

“These are certainly empty,” he muttered.

There was just room to squeeze through between them and the next stack

of cases alongside; but, once through, by the simple expedient of moving

the cases out a little to take advantage of the angle made by the

corner of the room, he obtained ample space to stand comfortably upright

against the wall. But Jimmie Dale was not satisfied yet. Could he see

out into the room? He experimented with his flashlight--and carefully

shifted the screen of cases before him a little to one side. And yet

still he was not satisfied. With a sort of ironical droop at the

corners of his lips, as though suddenly there had flashed upon him the

inspiration that fathered one of those whimsical ideas and fancies that

were so essentially a characteristic of Jimmie Dale, he came out from

behind the cases, went across the room to the case he had opened when he

first entered, took out the cord and the cover of one of the cardboard

shoe boxes, and with these returned to his hiding place once more.

The sounds from the upper stories of the tenement now reached him hardly

at all; but from below, directly under his feet almost, he could hear

some one, the proprietor of the shoe store probably, walking about.

Tense, every faculty now on the alert, his head turned in a strained,

attentive attitude, Jimmie Dale threw on the flashlight's tiny switch,

took that intimate and thin metal case from his pocket, extracted a

diamond-shaped, gray paper seal with the little tweezers, moistened the

adhesive side, and stuck it in the centre of the white cardboard-box

cover, then tore the edges of the cardboard down until the whole was

just small enough to slip into his pocket. Through the cardboard he

looped a piece of cord, placard fashion, and with his pencil printed the

four words--“with the compliments of “--above the gray seal. He

surveyed the result with a grim, mirthless chuckle--and put the piece of

cardboard in his pocket.

“I'm taking the longest chances I ever took in my life,” said Jimmie

Dale very seriously to himself, as his fingers twisted, and doubled,

and tied the remaining pieces of cord together, and finally fashioned a

running noose in one end. “I don't--” The cord and the flashlight went

into his pocket, the room was in darkness, the black mask was whipped

from his breast pocket and adjusted to his face, and his automatic was

in his hand.

Came the creak of a footstep, as though on a ladder exactly below him,

another, and another, receding curiously in its direction, yet at the

same time growing louder in sound as if nearer the floor--then a crack

of light showed in the floor in the centre of the room. This held for

an instant, then expanded suddenly into a great luminous square--and

through a trapdoor, opened wide now, a man's head appeared.

Jimmie Dale's eyes, fixed through the space between the piles of cases,

narrowed--there was, indeed, little doubt but that the shoe-store

proprietor below was an accomplice! The store served a most convenient

purpose in every respect--as a secret means of entry into the room, as

a sort of guarantee of innocence for the room itself. Why not! To the

superficial observer, to the man who might by some chance blunder into

the room--it was but an adjunct of the store itself!

The man in the trap-doorway paused with his shoulders above the floor,

looked around, listened, then drew himself up, walked across the floor,

and shot the heavy bolt on the door that led into the hallway of the

house. He returned then to the trapdoor, bent over it, and whistled

softly. Two more men, in answer to the summons, came up into the room.

“The Cap'll be along in a minute,” one of them said. “Turn on the

light.”

A switch clicked, flooding the room with sudden brilliancy from half a

dozen electric bulbs.

“Too many!” grunted the same voice again. “We ain't working

to-night--turn out half of 'em.”

The sudden transition from the darkness for a moment dazzled Jimmie

Dale's eyes--but the next moment he was searching the faces of the three

men. There were few crooks, few denizens of the crime world below the

now obsolete but still famous dead line that, as Larry the Bat, he did

not know at least by sight.

“Moulton, Whitie Burns, and Marty Dean,” confided Jimmie Dale softly

to himself. “And I don't know of any worse, except--the Cap. And gun

fighters, every one of them, too--nice odds, to say nothing of--”

“Here's the Cap now!” announced one of the three. “Hello, Cap, where'd

you raise the mustache?”

Jimmie Dale's eyes shifted to the trapdoor, and into them crept a

contemptuous and sardonic smile--the man who was coming up now and

hoisting himself to the floor was the man who, half an hour before, had

threatened young Sammy Matthews with arrest.

The Cap, alias Bert Malone, alias a score of other names, closed the

trapdoor after him, pulled off his mustache and gray wig, tucked them in

his pocket, and faced his companions brusquely.

“Never mind about the mustache,” he said curtly. “Get busy, the lot of

you. Stir around and get the works out!”

“What for?” inquired Whitie Burns, a sharp, ferret-faced little man. “We

got enough of the old stuff on hand now, and that bum break Gregor made

when he pinched the cracked plate put the finish on that. Say, Cap--”

“Close your face, Whitie, and get the works out!” Malone cut in shortly.

“We've only got the whole night ahead of us--but we'll need it all.

We're going to run the queer off that cracked plate.”

One of the others, Marty Dean this time, a certain brutal aggressiveness

in both features and physique, edged forward.

“Say, what's the lay?” he demanded. “A joke? We printed one fiver off

that plate--and then we knew enough to quit. With that crack along

the corner, you couldn't pass 'em on a blind man! And Gregor saying he

thought we could patch the plate up enough to get by with gives me a

pain--he's got jingles in his dome factory! Run them fivers eh--say, are

you cracked, too?”

“Aw, forget it!” observed Malone caustically. “Who's running this gang?”

Then, with a malicious grin: “I got a customer for those fivers--fifteen

thousand dollars for all we can turn out to-night. See?”

The others stared at him for a moment, incredulity and greed mingling in

a curious half-hesitant, half-expectant look on their faces.

Then Whitie Burns spoke, circling his lips with the tip of his tongue:

“D'ye mean it, Cap--honest? What's the lay? How'd you work it?”

Malone, unbending with the sensation he had created, grinned again.

“Easy enough,” he said offhandedly. “It was like falling off a log.

Gregor said, didn't he, that the only way he had been able to get

his claws on that plate was on account of young Matthews going away

sick--eh? Well, the old Matthews woman, his mother, has got money--about

fifteen thousand. I guess she ain't got any more than that, or I'd have

raised the ante. Aw, it was easy. She threw it at me. I framed one up on

them, that's all. I'm Kline, of the secret service--see? I don't suppose

they'd ever seen him, though they'd know his name fast enough, but I

made up something like him. I showed them where I had a case against

Sammy for pinching the plate that was strong enough to put a hundred

innocent men behind the bars. Of course, he knew well enough he was

innocent, but he could see the twenty years I showed him with both eyes.

Say, he mussed all over the place, and went and fainted like a girl. And

then the old woman came across with an offer of fifteen thousand for the

plate, and corrupted me.” Malone's cunning, vicious face, now that

the softening effects of the gray hair and mustache were gone, seemed

accentuated diabolically by the grin broadening into a laugh, as he

guffawed.

Marty Dean's hand swung with a bang to Malone's shoulder.

“Say, Cap--say, you're all right!” he exclaimed excitedly. “You're

the boy! But what's the good of running anything off the plate before

turning it over to 'em--the stuff's no good to us.”

“You got a wooden nut, with sawdust for brains,” said Malone

sarcastically. “If he'd thought the gang of counterfeiters that was

supposed to have bought the plate from him had run off only one fiver

and then stopped because they say it wouldn't get by, and weren't going

to run any more, and just destroy the plate like it was supposed to have

been destroyed to begin with, and it all end up with no one the wiser,

where d'ye think we'd have banked that fifteen thousand! I told him I

had the whole run confiscated, and that the queer went with the plate,

so we'll just make that little run to-night--that's why I sent word

around to you this morning.”

“By the jumping!” ejaculated Whitie Burns, heavy with admiration. “You

got a head on you, Cap!”

“It's a good thing for some of you that I have,” returned Malone

complacently. “But don't stand jawing all night. Go on, now--get busy!”

There was no surprise in Jimmie Dale's face--he had chosen his position

behind a pile of cases that he had been extremely careful, as a man

is careful when his life hangs in the balance, to assure himself were

empty. None of the four came near or touched the pile behind which he

stood; but, here and there about the room, they pulled this one and that

one out from various stacks. In scarcely more than a moment, the room

was completely transformed. It was no longer a storeroom for surplus

stock, for the storage of bulky and empty packing cases! From the cases

the men had picked out, like a touch of magic, appeared a veritable

printing plant, an elaborate engraver's outfit--a highly efficient

foot-power press, rapidly being assembled by Whitie Burns; an electric

dryer, inks, a pile of white, silk-threaded bank-note paper, a cutter,

and a score of other appurtenances.

“Yes,” said Jimmie Dale very gently to himself. “Yes, quite so--but the

plate? Ah!” Malone was taking it out from the middle of a bundle of old

newspapers, loosely tied together, that he had lifted from one of the

cases.

Jimmie Dale's eyes fastened on it--and from that instant never left it.

A minute passed, two, three of them--the four men were silently busy

about the room--Malone was carefully cleaning the plate.

“They will raid to-night. Look out for Kline, he is the sharpest man in

the United State secret service”--the warning in her letter was running

through Jimmie Dale's mind. Kline--the real Kline--was going to raid

the place to-night. When? At what time? It must be nearly eleven o'clock

already, and--

It came sudden, quick as the crack of doom--a terrific crash against the

bolted door--but the door, undoubtedly to the surprise of those without,

held fast, thanks to the bolt. The four men, white-faced, seemed for an

instant turned to statues. Came another crash against the door--and a

sharp, imperative order to those within to open it and surrender.

“We're pinched! Beat it!” whispered Whitie Burns wildly--and dashed for

the trapdoor.

Like a rat for its hole, Marty Dean followed. Malone, farther away,

dropped the plate on the floor, and rushed, with Moulton beside him,

after the others--but he never reached the trapdoor.

Over the crashing blows, raining now in quick succession on the door of

the room, over a startled commotion as lodgers, roomers, and tenants on

the floor above awoke into frightened activity with shouts and cries,

came the louder crash of a pile of packing boxes hurled to the floor.

And over them, vaulting those scattered in his way, Jimmie Dale sprang

at Malone. The man reeled back, with a cry. Moulton dashed through

the trapdoor and disappeared. The short, ugly barrel of Jimmie Dale's

automatic was between Malone's eyes.

“You make a move,” said Jimmie Dale, in a low sibilant way, “and

I'll drop you where you stand! Put your hands behind your back--palms

together!”

Malone, dazed, cowed, obeyed. A panel of the door split and rent down

its length--the hinges were sagging. Jimmie Dale worked like lightning.

The cord with the slip noose from his pocket went around Malone's

wrists, jerked tight, and knotted; the placard, his lips grim, with no

sign of humour, Jimmie Dale dangled around the man's neck.

“An introduction for you to Mr. Kline out there--that you seem so fond

of!” gritted Jimmie Dale. Then, working as he talked: “I've got no time

to tell you what I think of you, you pitiful hound”--he snatched up the

plate from the floor and put it in his pocket--“Twenty years, I think

you said, didn't you?”--his hand shot into Malone's pocket-book, and

extracted the five-dollar note--“If you can open this with your toes

maybe you can get a way”--he wrenched the trapdoor over and slammed it

shut--“good-night, Malone”--and he leaped for the window.

The door tottered inward from the top, ripping, tearing, smashing

hinges, panels, and jamb. Jimmie Dale got a blurred vision of brass

buttons, blue coats, and helmets, and, in the forefront, of a stocky,

gray-mustached, gray-haired man in plain clothes.

Jimmie Dale threw up the window, swung out, as with a rush the officers

burst through into the room and a revolver bullet hummed viciously past

his ear, and dropped to the ground--into encircling arms!

“Ah, no, you don't, my bucko!” snapped a hoarse voice in his ear. “Keep

quiet now, or I'll crack your bean--understand!”

But the officer, too heavy to be muscular, was no match for Jimmie

Dale, who, even as he had dropped from the sill, had caught sight of

the lurking form below; and now, with a quick, sudden, lithe movement he

wriggled loose, his fist from a short-arm jab smashed upon the point of

the other's jaw, sending the man staggering backward--and Jimmie Dale

ran.

A crowd was already collecting at the mouth of the alleyway, mostly

occupants of the house itself, and into these, scattering them in all

directions, eluding dexterously another officer who made a grab for him,

Jimmie Dale charged at top speed, burst through, and headed down the

street, running like a deer.

Yells went up, a revolver spat venomously behind him, came the shrill

CHEEP-CHEEP! of the police whistle, and heavy boots pounding the

pavement in pursuit.

Down the block Jimmie Dale raced. The yells augmented in his rear.

Another shot--and this time he heard the bullet buzz. And then he

swerved--into the next alleyway--that flanked the Sanctuary.

He had perhaps a ten yards' lead, just a little more than the distance

from the street to the side door of the Sanctuary that opened on

the alleyway. And, as he ran now, his fingers tore at his clothing,

loosening his tie, unbuttoning coat, vest, collar, shirt, and

undershirt. He leaped at the door, swung it open, flung himself

inside--and then sacrificing speed to silence, went up the stairs like a

cat, cramming his mask now into his pocket.

His room was on the first landing. In an instant he had unlocked the

door, entered, and locked it again behind him. From outside, an excited

street urchin's voice shrilled up to him:

“He went in that door! I seen him!”

The police whistle chirped again; and then an authoritative voice:

“Get around and watch the saloon back of this, Heeney--there's a way out

through there from this joint.”

Jimmie Dale, divested of every stitch of clothing that he had worn,

pulled a disreputable collarless flannel shirt over his head, pulled on

a dirty and patched pair of trousers, and slipped into a threadbare and

filthy coat. Jimmie Dale was working against seconds. They were at the

lower door now. He lifted the oilcloth in the corner of the room,

lifted up the loose piece of the flooring, shoved his discarded garments

inside, and from a little box that was there smeared the hollow of

his hand with some black substance, possessed himself of two little

articles, replaced the flooring, replaced the oilcloth, and, in bare

feet, stole across the room to the door. Against the door, without a

sound, Jimmie Dale placed a chair, and on the chair seat he laid the two

little articles he had been carrying in his hand. It was intensely black

in the room, but Jimmie Dale needed no light here. From under the bed he

pulled out a pair of woolen socks and a pair of congress boots, both as

disreputable as the rest of his attire, put them on--and very quietly,

softly, cautiously, stretched himself out on the bed.

The officers were at the top of the stairs. A voice barked out:

“Stand guard on this landing, Peters. Higgins, you take the one above.

We'll start from the top of the house and work down. Allow no one to

pass you.”

“Yes, sir! Very good, Mr. Kline,” was the response.

Kline!--the sharpest man in the United States secret service, she had

said. Jimmie Dale's lips set.

“I'm glad I had no shave this morning,” said Jimmie Dale grimly to

himself.

His fingers were working with the black substance in the hollow of his

hand--and the long, slim, tapering fingers, the shapely, well-cared-for

hands grew unkempt and grimy, black beneath the finger nails--and a

little, too, played its part on the day's growth of beard, a little

around the throat and at the nape of the neck, a little across the

forehead to meet the locks of straggling and disordered hair. Jimmie

Dale wiped the residue from the hollow of his hand on the knee of his

trousers--and lay still.

An officer paced outside. Upstairs doors opened and closed. Gruff, harsh

tones in commands echoed through the house. The search party descended

to the second floor--and again the same sounds were repeated. And then,

thumping down the creaking stairs, they stopped before Jimmie Dale's

room. Some one tried the door, and, finding it locked, rattled it

violently.

“Open the door!” It was Kline's voice.

Jimmie Dale's eyes were closed, and he was breathing regularly, though

just a little slower than in natural respiration.

“Break it down!” ordered Kline tersely.

There was a rush at it--and it gave. It surged inward, knocked against

the chair, upset the latter, something tinkled to the floor--and four

officers, with Kline at their head, jumped into the room.

Jimmie Dale never moved. A flashlight played around the room and focused

upon him--and then he was shaken roughly--only to fall inertly back on

the bed again.

“I guess this is all right, Mr. Kline,” said one of the officers. “It's

Larry the Bat, and he's doped to the eyes. There's the stuff on the

floor we knocked off the chair.”

“Light the gas!” directed Kline curtly; and, being obeyed, stooped to

the floor and picked up a hypodermic syringe and a small bottle. He held

the bottle to the light, and read the label: LIQUOR MORPHINAE. “Shake

him again!” he commanded.

None too gently, a policeman caught Jimmie Dale by the shoulder and

shook him vigorously--again Jimmie Dale, once the other let go his hold,

fell back limply on the bed, breathing in that same, slightly slowed

way.

“Larry the Bat, eh?” grunted Kline; then, to the officer who had

volunteered the information: “Who's Larry the Bat? What is he? And how

long have you known him?”

“I don't know who he is any more than what you can see there for

yourself,” replied the officer. “He's a dope fiend, and I guess a pretty

tough case, though we've never had him up for anything. He's lived here

ever since I've been on the beat, and that's three years or--”

“All right!” interrupted Kline crisply. “He's no good to us! You say

there's an exit from this house into that saloon at the back?”

“Yes, sir but the fellow, whoever he is, couldn't get away from there.

Heeney's been over on guard from the start.”

“Then he's still inside there,” said Kline, clipping off his words.

“We'll search the saloon. Nice night's work this is! One out of the

whole gang--and that one with the compliments of the Gray Seal!”

The men went out and began to descend the stairs.

“One,” said Jimmie Dale to himself, still motionless, still breathing in

that slow way so characteristic of the drug. “Two. Three. Four.”

The minutes went by--a quarter of an hour--a half hour. Still Jimmie

Dale lay there--still motionless--still breathing with slow regularity.

His muscles began to cramp, to give him exquisite torture. Around

him all was silence--only distant sounds from the street reached

him, muffled, and at intervals. Another quarter of an hour passed--an

eternity of torment. It seemed to Jimmie Dale, for all his will power,

that he could not hold himself in check, that he must move, scream out

even in the torture that was passing all endurance. It was silent now,

utterly silent--and then out of the silence, just outside his door, a

footstep creaked--and a man walked to the stairs and went down.

“Five,” said Jimmie Dale to himself. “The sharpest man in the United

States secret service.”

And then for the first time Jimmie Dale moved--to wipe away the beads of

sweat that had sprung out upon his forehead.

CHAPTER V

THE AFFAIR OF THE PUSHCART MAN

Larry the Bat shambled out of the side door of the tenement into the

back alleyway; shambled along the black alleyway to the street--and

smiled a little grimly as a shadow across the roadway suddenly shifted

its position. The game was growing acute, critical, desperate even--and

it was his move.

Larry the Bat, disreputable denizen of the underworld, alias Jimmie

Dale, millionaires' clubman, alias the Gray Seal, whom Carruthers of the

MORNING NEWS-ARGUS called the master criminal of the age, shuffled along

in the direction of the Bowery, his hands plunged deep in the pockets

of his frayed and tattered trousers, where his fingers, in a curious,

wistful way, fondled the keys of his own magnificent residence on

Riverside Drive. It was his move--and it was an impasse, ironical,

sardonic, and it was worse--it was full of peril.

True, he had outwitted Kline of the secret service two nights before,

when Kline had raided the counterfeiters' den; true, he had no reason to

believe that Kline suspected HIM specifically, but the man Kline wanted

HAD entered the tenement that night, and since then the house had been

shadowed day and night. The result was both simple and disastrous--to

Jimmie Dale. Larry the Bat, a known inmate of the house, might come

and go as he pleased--but to emerge from the Sanctuary in the person of

Jimmie Dale would be fatal. Kline had been outwitted, but Kline had not

acknowledged final defeat. The tenement had been searched from top to

bottom--unostentatiously. His own room on the first landing had been

searched the previous afternoon, when he was out, but they had failed to

find the cunningly contrived opening in the floor under the oilcloth in

the corner, an impromptu wardrobe, that would proclaim Larry the Bat and

Jimmie Dale to be one and the same person--that would inevitably lead

further to the establishment of his identity as the Gray Seal. In time,

of course, the surveillance would cease--but he could not wait. That was

the monumental irony of it--the factor that, all unknown to Kline, was

forcing the issue hard now. It was his move.

Since, years ago now, as the Gray Seal, he had begun to work with HER,

that unknown, mysterious accomplice of his, and the police, stung to

madness both by the virulent and constant attacks of the press and by

the humiliating prod of their own failures, sought daily, high and low,

with every resource at their command, for the Gray Seal, he had never

been in quite so strange and perilous a plight as he found himself at

that moment. To preserve inviolate the identity of Larry the Bat was

absolutely vital to his safety. It was the one secret that even she, who

so strangely appeared to know all else about him, he was sure, had not

discovered--and it was just that, in a way, that had brought the present

impossible situation to pass.

In the month previous, in a lull between those letters of hers, he had

set himself doggedly and determinedly to the renewed task of what had

become so dominantly now a part of his very existence--the solving of

HER identity. And for that month, as the best means to the end--means,

however, that only resulted as futilely as the attempts that had gone

before--he had lived mostly as Larry the Bat, returning to his home in

his proper person only when occasion and necessity demanded it. He had

been going home that evening, two nights before, walking along Riverside

Drive, when from the window of the limousine she had dropped the letter

at his feet that had plunged him into the affair of the Counterfeit

Five--and he had not gone home! Eventually, to save himself, he had, in

the Sanctuary, performing the transformation in desperate haste, again

been forced to assume the role of Larry the Bat.

That was really the gist of it. And yesterday morning he had remembered,

to his dismay, that he had had little or no money left the night before.

He had intended, of course, to replenish his supply--when he got home.

Only he hadn't gone home! And now he needed money--needed it badly,

desperately. With thousands in the bank, with abundance even in

his safe, in his own den at home, a supply kept there always for an

emergency, he was facing actual want--he rattled two dimes, a nickel,

and a few odd pennies thoughtfully against the keys in his pocket.

To a certain extent, old Jason, his butler, could be trusted. Jason even

knew that mysterious letters of tremendous secretive importance came

to the house, and the old man always meant well--but he dared not trust

even Jason with the secret of his dual personality. What was he to do?

He needed money imperatively--at once. Thanks to Kline, for the time

being, at least, he could not rid himself of the personality of Larry

the Bat by the simple expedient or slipping into the clothes of Jimmie

Dale--he must live, act, and remain Larry the Bat until the secret

service officer gave up the hunt. How bridge the gulf between Jimmie

Dale and Larry the Bat in old Jason's eyes!

Nor was that all. There was still another matter, and one that, in order

to counteract it, demanded at once a serious inroad--to the extent of

a telephone call--upon his slender capital. A too prolonged and

unaccounted-for absence from home, and old Jason, in his anxious,

blundering solicitude, would have the fat in the fire at that end--and

the city, and the social firmament thereof, would be humming with the

startling news of the disappearance of a well-known millionaire. The

complications that would then ensue, with himself powerless to lift a

finger, Jimmie Dale did not care to think about--such a contretemps must

at all hazards be prevented.

Jimmie Dale reached the corner of the street, where it intersected

the Bowery, and paused languidly by the curb. No one appeared to be

following. He had not expected that there would be--but it was as well

to be sure. He walked then a few steps along the Bowery--and slipped

suddenly into a doorway, from where he could command a view of the

street corner that he had just left. At the end of ten minutes,

satisfied that no one had any concern in his immediate movements, he

shambled on again down the Bowery.

There was a saloon two blocks away that boasted a private telephone

booth. Jimmie Dale made that his destination.

Larry the Bat was a very well-known character in that resort, and the

bullet-headed dispenser of drinks behind the bar nodded unctuously to

him over the heads of those clustered at the rail as he entered; Larry

the Bat, as befitted one of the elite of the underworld, was graciously

pleased to acknowledge the proletariat salutation with a curt nod. He

walked down to the end of the room, entered the telephone booth--and was

carelessly careful to close the door tightly behind him.

He gave the number of his residence on Riverside Drive, and waited for

the connection. After some delay, Jason's voice answered him.

“Jason,” said Jimmie Dale, in matter-of-fact tones, “I shall be out

of the city for another three or four days, possibly a week, and--” he

stopped abruptly, as a sort of gasp came to him over the wire.

“Thank God that's you, sir!” exclaimed the old butler wildly. “I've been

near mad, sir, all day!”

“Don't get excited, Jason!” said Jimmie Dale a little sharply. “The mere

matter of my absence for the last two days is nothing to cause you any

concern. And while I am on the subject, Jason, let me say now that I

shall be glad if you will bear that fact in mind in future.”

“Yes, sir,” stammered Jason. “But, sir, it ain't that--good Lord, Master

Jim, it ain't that, sir! It's--it's one of them letters.”

Something like a galvanic shock seemed to jerk the disreputable,

loose-jointed frame of Larry the Bat suddenly erect--and a strained

whiteness crept over the dirty, unwashed face.

“Go on, Jason,” said Jimmie Dale, without a quiver in his voice.

“It came this morning, sir--that shuffer with his automobile left it.

I had just time to say you weren't at home, sir, and he was gone. And

then, sir, there ain't been an hour gone by all through the day that a

woman, sir--a lady, begging your pardon, Master Jim--hasn't rung up

on the telephone, asking if you were back, and if I could get you, and

where you were, and half frantic, sir, half sobbing, sometimes, sir, and

saying there was a life hanging on it, Master Jim.”

Larry the Bat, staring into the mouthpiece of the instrument,

subconsciously passed his hand across his forehead, and subconsciously

noted that his fingers, as he drew them away, were damp.

“Where is the letter now, Jason?” inquired Jimmie Dale coolly.

“Here on your desk, Master Jim. Shall I bring it to you?”

Bring it to him! How? When? Where? Bring it to him! The ghastly irony

of it! Jimmie Dale tried to think--prodding, spurring desperately that

keen, lightning brain of his that had never failed him yet. How bridge

the gulf between Larry the Bat and Jimmie Dale in Jason's eyes--not just

for the replenishing of funds now, but with a life at stake!

“No--I think not, Jason,” said Jimmie Dale calmly. “Just leave it where

it is. And if she telephones again, say that you have told me--that will

be sufficient to satisfy any further inquiries. And Jason--”

“Yes, sir?”

“If she telephones again, try and find out where the call comes from.”

“I haven't forgotten what you said once, Master Jim, sir,” said the old

man eagerly. “And I've been trying that sir, all day. They've all come

from different pay stations, sir.”

A mirthless little smile tinged Jimmie Dale's lips. Of course! He might

have known! It was always that way, always the same. He was as near to

the solution of her identity at that moment as he had been years ago,

when she, in some mysterious way, alone of all the world, had identified

him as the Gray Seal!

“Very good, Jason,” he said quietly. “Don't bother about it any more.

It will be all right. You can expect me when you see me. Good-night.” He

hung the receiver on the hook, walked out of the booth, and mechanically

reached the street.

All right! It was far from “all right”--very far from it. It was no

trivial thing, that letter; they never had been trivial things, those

letters of hers, that involved so often a matter of life and death--as

this one now, perhaps, as her actions would seem to indicate, involved

life and death more urgently than any that had gone before. It was far

from all right--at a moment when his own position, his own safety, was

at best but a desperate chance; when his every energy, brain, wit, and

cunning were taxed to the utmost to save himself! And yet, somehow, some

way, at any cost, he must get that letter--and at any cost he must act

upon it! To fail her was to fail utterly in everything that failure in

its most miserable, its widest sense, implied--failure in that which

rose paramount to every other consideration in life!

Fail her! Jimmie Dale's lips thinned into a hard, drawn line--and then

parted slowly in a curiously whimsical smile. It would be a strange

burglary that he had decided upon, in order that he might not fail

her--stranger than any the Gray Seal had ever committed, and, in some

respects, even more perilous!

He started along the Bowery, walking briskly now, toward the nearest

subway station, at Astor Place, his mind for the moment electing to face

the situation in a humour as whimsical as his smile. Supposing that,

as Larry the Bat, he were caught and arrested during the next hour, in

Jimmie's Dale's residence on Riverside Drive! With his arrest as Larry

the Bat, Jimmie's Dale would automatically disappear. Would follow then

the suspicion that Jimmie Dale, the millionaire, had met with foul play,

and as time went on, and Jimmie Dale, being then in prison as Larry

the Bat, did not reappear, the assurance of it; then the certainty

that suspicion would focus on Larry the Bat as being connected with

the millionaire's death, since Larry the Bat had been caught in Jimmie

Dale's home--and he would be accused of his own murder! It was quite

humourous, of course, quite grotesquely bizarre--but it was equally

an exceedingly grim possibility! There were drawbacks to a dual

personality!

“In a word,” confided Jimmie Dale softly to himself, and a serious light

crept into the dark, steady eyes, “I'm in a bit of a nasty mess!”

At Astor Place he entered the subway; at Fourteenth Street he changed

to an express, and at Ninety-sixth Street he got out. It was but a short

walk west to Riverside Drive, and from there his house was only a few

blocks farther on.

Jimmie Dale did not slouch now. And for all his disreputable attire,

incongruous as it was in that neighbourhood, few people that he

passed paid any attention to him, none gave him more than a casual

glance--Jimmie Dale swung along, upright, with no attempt to make

himself inconspicuous, hurrying a little, as one intent upon a definite

errand. As he neared his house he slowed his pace a little until a

couple, who were passing in front of it, had gone on; then he went up

the steps, but noiselessly as a shadow now, to the front door, opened

it softly, closed it softly behind him, and crouched for a moment in the

vestibule.

Through the monogrammed lace on the plate glass of the inner doors he

could see, a little indistinctly, into the reception hall beyond. The

hall was empty. Jason, for that matter, would be the only one likely to

be about; the other servants would have no business there in any case,

and whether in their quarters above or below, they had their own stairs

at the rear.

Jimmie Dale inserted the key in the spring lock, and opened the door

a cautious fraction of an inch--to listen. There was no sound--yes,

a subdued murmured--the servants were downstairs in the basement. He

slipped inside, slipped, in a flash, across the hall, and, treading like

a cat, went up the stairs. He scarcely seemed to breathe until, with a

little sigh of relief, he stood inside his den on the first floor, with

the door shut behind him.

“I must speak to Jason about being a little more watchful,” muttered

Jimmie Dale facetiously. “Here's all my property at the mercy of--Larry

the Bat!”

An instant he stood by the door, looking about him--in the bright

moonlight streaming in through the side windows the room's appointments

stood out in soft shadows, the huge davenport, the great, luxurious

easy-chairs, an easel with a half-finished canvas, as he had left it;

the big, flat-topped, rosewood desk, the open fireplace--and then, his

steps silent on the thick velvet rug under foot, he walked quickly to

the desk.

Yes, there it was--the letter. He placed it hurriedly in his pocket--the

moonlight was not strong enough to read by, and he dared not turn on the

lights.

And now money--funds. In the alcove behind the portiere, Jimmie Dale

dropped on his knees before the squat, barrel-shaped safe, and opened

it. He reached inside, took out a package of banknotes, placed the bills

in his pocket--and hesitated a moment. What else would he require? What

act did that letter call upon the Gray Seal to perform in the next few

hours? Jimmie Dale stared thoughtfully into the interior of the safe.

Whatever it was, it must be performed in the role of Larry the Bat, for

though he could get into his dressing room now, and become Jimmie Dale

again, there were still those watchers outside the Sanctuary--THEY must

not become suspicious--and if Larry the Bat disappeared mysteriously,

Larry the Bat would be the man that Kline and the secret service of the

United States would never cease hunting for, and that would mean that

he could never reassume a character that was as necessary for his

protection as breath was to life, so long as the Gray Seal worked. True,

he could change now to Jimmie Dale, but he would have to change back

again and return to the Sanctuary before morning, as Larry the Bat--and

remain there until Kline, beaten, called off his human bloodhounds. No,

a change was not to be thought of.

What, then, would he require--that compact little kit of burglar tools,

rolled in its leather jacket, that, unrolled slipped about his body like

a close-fitting undervest? As well to take it anyway. He removed his

coat and vest, took out the leather bundle from the safe, untied the

thongs that bound it together, unrolled it, passed it around his body,

life belt fashion, secured the thongs over his shoulders, and put on

his coat and vest again. A revolver, a flashlight? He had both--at

the Sanctuary, under the flooring--but there were duplicates here! He

slipped them into his pockets. Anything else--to forestall and provide

for any possible contingency? He hesitated again for a moment, thinking,

then slowly closed the inner door of the safe, locked it, swung the

outer door shut--and, in the act of twirling the knobs, sprang suddenly

to his feet. Sharp, shrill in the stillness of the room, the telephone

bell on the desk rang out clamourously.

Jimmie Dale's face set hard, as he leaped out from behind the

curtain--had Jason heard it! It rang again before he could reach the

desk--was ringing as he snatched the receiver from the hook.

“Yes, yes!” he called, in a low, guarded, hasty way, into the

mouthpiece. “Hello! What is it?” And then one hand, resting on the desk,

closed around the edge, and tightened until the skin over the knuckles

grew ivory white. It was--SHE! She! It was HER voice--he had only heard

it once in all his life--that night, two nights before, in a silvery

laugh from the limousine as it had sped away from him down the road--but

he knew! It thrilled him now with a mad rhapsody, robbing him for the

moment of every thought save that she was living, real, existent--that

it was HER voice. “It's you--YOU!” he said hoarsely.

“Oh, Jimmie--you at last!”--it came in a little gasping cry of relief.

“The letter--”

“Yes, I've got it--it's all right--it's all right”--the words would

not seem to come fast enough in his desperate haste. “But it's you now.

Listen! Listen!” he pleaded. “Tell me who you are! My God! how I've

tried to find you, and--”

That rippling, silvery laugh again, but now, too, it seemed to his eager

ear, with just the faintest note of wistfulness in it.

“Some day, Jimmie. That letter now. It--”

Jimmie Dale straightened up suddenly--Jason's steps, running, sounded

outside the room along the corridor--there was not an instant to lose.

“Hang up! Good-bye! Danger! Don't ring again!” he whispered hurriedly,

and, with a miserable smile, replacing the receiver bitterly on the

hook, he jumped for the curtain.

He reached it none too soon. The door opened, an electric-light switch

clicked, and the room was flooded with light. Jason, still running,

headed for the desk.

“It'll be her again!” Jimmie Dale heard the old man mutter, as from the

edge of the portiere he watched the other's actions.

Jason picked up the telephone.

“Hello! Hello!” he called--then began to click impatiently with the

receiver hook. “Hello! . . . Who? . . . Central? . . . I don't want

any number--somebody was calling here. . . . What? . . . Nobody on the

wire!”

He set the telephone back on the desk with a bewildered air.

“That's queer!” he exclaimed. “I could have sworn I heard it ring twice,

and--” He stopped abruptly, and, leaning across the desk, hung there,

wide-eyed, staring, while a sickly pallor began to steal into his face.

“The letter!” he mumbled wildly. “The letter--Master Jim's letter--the

letter--it's GONE!”

Trembling, excited, the old man began to search the desk, then down on

his knees on the floor under it; and then, growing more frantic with

every instant, rose and began to hunt around the room in an agitated,

aimless fashion.

Jason's distress was very real--he was almost beside himself now with

fear and anxiety. A whimsical, affectionate smile played over Jimmie

Dale's lips at the old man's antics--and changed suddenly into one of

consternation. Jason was making directly now for the curtain behind

which he stood! Perhaps, though, he would pass it by, and--Jason's hand

reached out and grasped the portiere.

“Jason!” said Jimmie Dale sharply.

The old man staggered back as though he had been struck, tried to speak,

choked, and gazed at the curtain with distended eyes.

“Is--is that you, sir--Master Jim--behind the curtain there?” he finally

blurted out. “I--sir--you gave me a start--and the letter, Master Jim--”

“Don't lose your head, Jason,” said Jimmie Dale coolly. “I've got the

letter. Now do as I bid you.”

“Yes--Master Jim,” faltered the old man.

“Pull down the window shades and draw the portiere together,” directed

Jimmie Dale.

Jason, still overwrought and excited, obeyed a little awkwardly.

“Now the lights, Jason,” instructed Jimmie Dale. “Turn them off, and go

and sit down in that chair at the desk.”

Again Jason obeyed, stumbling in the darkness as he returned from the

electric-light switch at the farther end of the room. He sat down in the

chair.

Larry the Bat stepped out from behind the curtain. “I came for that

letter, Jason,” he explained quietly. “I am going out again now. I may

be back to-morrow; I may not be back for a week. You will say nothing,

not a word, of my having been here to-night. Do you understand, Jason?”

“Yes, sir,” said Jason; then hesitantly: “Would you mind saying, sir,

when you came in?”

“It's of no consequence, Jason--is it?”

“No, sir,” said Jason.

Jimmie Dale smiled in the darkness.

“Jason!”

“Yes, sir.”

“I wish you to remain where you are, without leaving that chair, for the

next ten minutes.” He moved across the room to the door. “Good-night,

Jason,” he said.

“Good-night, Master Jim--good-night, sir--oh, Lord!”

Jimmie Dale did not require that ten minutes; it was a very wide margin

of safety to obviate the possibility of Jason, from a window, detecting

the exit of a disreputable character from the house--in three minutes

he was turning the corner of the first cross street and walking rapidly

away from Riverside Drive.

In the subway station Jimmie Dale read the letter--read it twice over,

as he always read those strange epistles of hers that opened the door to

new peril, new danger to the Gray Seal, but too, that seemed somehow to

draw tighter, in a glad, big way, the unseen bond between them; read it,

as he always read those letters, almost subconsciously committing the

very words to memory with that keen faculty of brain of his. But now

as he began to tear the sheet and envelope into minute particles, a

strained, hard look was on his face and in his eyes, and his lips, half

parted, moved a little.

“It's a death warrant,” muttered Jimmie Dale. “I--I guess to-night will

see the end of the Gray Seal. She says I needn't do it, but I guess it's

worth the risk--a human life!”

A downtown express roared into the station.

“What time is it?” Jimmie Dale asked the guard, as he stepped aboard.

“'Bout midnight,” the man answered tersely.

The forward car was almost empty, and Jimmie Dale chose a seat by

himself. How did she know? How did she know not only this, but the

hundred other affairs that she had outlined in those letters of hers? By

what means, superhuman, indeed, it seemed, did she--Jimmie Dale jerked

himself erect suddenly. What good did it do to speculate on that now,

when every minute was priceless? What was HE to do, how was he to act,

what plan could he formulate and carry out, and WIN against odds that,

at the outset, were desperate enough even to forecast almost certain

failure--and death!

Who would ever have suspected old Tom Ludgate, known for years

throughout the squalour of the East Side as old Luddy, the pushcart man,

of having a bag of unset diamonds under his pillow--or under the sack,

rather, that he probably used for a pillow! What a queer thing to do!

But then, old Luddy was a character--apparently always in the most

poverty-stricken condition, apparently hardly more than keeping body

and soul together, trusting no one, and obsessed by the dread that by

depositing in a bank some one would discover that he had money, and

attempt to force it from him, he had put his savings, year after

year, for twenty years, twenty-five years, perhaps, into unset

stone--diamonds. How had she found that out?

Jimmie Dale sank into a deeper reverie. He could steal them all right,

and they would be well worth the stealing--old Luddy had done well, and

lived and existed on next to nothing--the stones, she said, were worth

about fifteen thousand dollars. Not so bad, even for twenty-five years

of vegetable selling from a pushcart! He could steal them all right; it

would tax the Gray Seal's ingenuity little to do so simple a thing as

that, but that was not all, nor, indeed, hardly a factor in it--it was

vital that if he were to succeed at all he must steal them PUBLICLY, as

it were.

And after that--WHAT? His own chances were pretty slim at best. Jimmie

Dale, staring at the grayness of the subway wall through the window,

shook his head slowly--then, with a queer little philosophical shrug of

his shoulders, he smiled gravely, seriously. It was all a part of the

game, all a part of the life--of the Gray Seal!

It was half-past twelve, or a little later, as nearly as he could judge,

for Larry the Bat carried no such ornate thing in evidence as a watch,

as he halted at the corner of a dark, squalid street in the lower

East Side. It was a miserable locality--in daylight humming with a

cosmopolitan hive of pitiful humans dragging out as best they could

an intolerable existence, a locality peopled with every nationality on

earth, their community of interest the struggle to maintain life at the

lowest possible expenditure, where necessity even was pared and

shaved down to a minimum; but now, at night time, or rather in the

early-morning hours, the darkness, in very mercy, it seemed, covered it

with a veil, as it were, and in the quiet that hung over it now hid the

bald, the hideous, aye, and the piteous, too, from view.

It was a narrow street, and the row of tenement houses, each house

almost identical with its neighbour, that flanked the pavement on either

side, seemed, from where Jimmie Dale stood looking down its length, from

the corner, to converge together at a point a little way beyond,

giving it an unreal, ominous, cavernlike effect. And, too, there seemed

something ominous even in its quiet. It was as though one sensed acutely

the crouching of some Thing in its lair--waiting silently, viciously,

with sullen patience.

A footstep sounded--another. Jimmie Dale drew quickly back around the

corner into an areaway. Two men passed--in helmets--swinging their

nightsticks--that beat was always policed in pairs!

They passed on, turned the corner, and went down the narrow cross street

that Jimmie Dale had just been inspecting. He started to follow--and

drew back again abruptly. A form flitted suddenly across the road and

disappeared in the darkness in the officers' wake--ten yards behind

the first another followed--at the same interval of distance still

another--and yet still one more--four in all.

The darkness hid all six, the two policemen, the four men behind

them--the only sounds were the OFFICERS' footsteps dying away in the

distance.

Jimmie Dale's fingers were mechanically testing the mechanism of the

automatic in his pocket.

“The Skeeter's gang!” he muttered to himself. “Red Mose, the Midget,

Harve Thoms--and the Skeeter! The Worst apaches in the city of New York;

death contractors--the lowest bidders! Professional assassins, and a

man's life any time for twenty-five dollars! I wonder--I've never

done it yet--but I wonder if it would be a crime in God's sight if one

shot--to KILL!”

Jimmie Dale was at the corner again--again the street before him was

black, deserted, empty. He chose the right hand side, and, well in the

shadow of the houses, as an extra precaution, stole along silently. He

stopped finally before one where, in the doorway, hung a little sign.

Jimmie Dale mounted the porch, and with his eyes close to the sign could

just make out the larger words in the big printed type:

ROOM TO RENT

TOP FLOOR

Jimmie Dale nodded. That was right. The first house on the right-hand

side, with the room-to-rent sign, her letter had said. His fingers were

testing the doorknob. The door was not locked.

“Naturally, it wouldn't be locked,” Jimmie Dale told himself grimly--and

stepped inside.

He stood for an instant without movement, every faculty on the alert.

Far up above him a step, guarded though his trained ear made it out

to be, creaked faintly upon the stairs--there was no other sound. The

creaking, almost inaudible at its loudest, receded farther up--and

silence fell.

In the darkness, noiselessly, Jimmie Dale groped for the stairway, found

it, and began to ascend. The minutes passed--it seemed a minute even

from step to step, and there were three flights to the top! There must

be no creaking this time--the slightest sound, he knew well enough,

would be not only fatal to the work he had to do, but probably fatal to

himself as well. He had been near death many times--the consciousness

that he was nearer to it now, possibly, than he had ever been before,

seemed to stimulate his senses into acute and abnormal energy. And, too,

the physical effort, as, step by step, the flexed muscles relaxing so

slowly, little by little, gradually, each time as he found foothold

on the step higher up, was a terrific strain. At the top his face was

bathed in perspiration, and he wiped it off with his coat sleeve.

It was still dark here, intensely dark, and his eyes, though grown

accustomed to it, could make out nothing but the deeper shadow of the

walls. But thanks to her, always a mistress of accurate and minute

detail, he possessed a mental plan of his surroundings. The head of the

stairs gave on the middle of the hallway--the hallway ran to his right

and left. To his right, on the opposite side of the hall, was the door

of old Luddy's squalid two-room apartment.

For a moment Jimmie Dale stood hesitant--a sudden perplexity and anxiety

growing upon him. It was strange! What did it mean? He had nerved

himself to a quick, desperate attempt, trusting to surprise and his own

wit and agility for victory--there had seemed no other way than that,

since he had seen those four men at the corner--since they were AHEAD

of him. True, they were not much ahead of him, not enough to have

accomplished their purpose--and, furthermore, they were not in that

room. He knew that absolutely, beyond question of doubt. He had listened

for just that all the nerve-racking way up the stairs. But where

were they? There was no sound--not a sound--just blackness, dark,

impenetrable, utter, that began to palpitate now.

It came in a whisper, wavering, sibilant--from his left. A sort of

relief, fierce in the breaking of the tense expectancy, premonitory in

the possibilities that it held, swept Jimmie Dale. He crept along the

hall. The whisper had come from that room, presumably empty--that was

for rent!

By the door he crouched--his sensitive fingers, eyes to Jimmie Dale so

often--feeling over jamb and panels with a delicate, soundless touch.

The door was just ajar. The fingers crept inside and touched the knob

and lock--there was no key within.

The whispering still went on--but it seemed like a screaming of vultures

now in Jimmie Dale's ears, as the words came to him.

“Aw, say, Skeeter, dis high-brow stunt gives me de pip! Me fer goin' in

dere an' croakin' de geezer reg'lar, widout de frills. Who's to know?

Say, just about two minutes, an' we're beatin' it wid de sparklers.”

An inch, a half inch at a time, the knob slowly, very, very slowly

turning, the door was being closed by the crouched form on the

threshold.

“Close yer trap, Mose!” came a fierce response. “We ain't fixed the

lay all day for nothin'. There ain't a soul on earth knows he's got any

sparklers, 'cept us. If there was, it would be different--then they'd

know that was what whoever did it was after, see?”

The door was closed--the knob slowly, very, very slowly being released

again. From one of the leather pockets under Jimmie Dale's vest came a

tiny steel instrument that he inserted in the key-hole.

The same voice spoke on:

“That's what we're croaking him for, 'cause nobody knows about them

diamonds, and so's he can't TELL anybody afterward that any were

pinched. An' that's why it's got to look like he just got tired of

living and did it himself. I guess that'll hold the police when they

find the poor old duck hanging from the ceiling, with a bit of cord

around his neck, and a chair kicked out from under his feet on the

floor. Ain't you got the brains of a louse to see that?”

“Sure”--the whisper came dully, in grudging intonation through the

panels--the door was locked. “Sure, but it's de hangin' 'round waitin'

to get busy that's gettin' me goat, an'--”

Jimmie Dale straightened up and began to retreat along the corridor.

A merciless rage was upon him now, every fiber of his being seemed to

tingle and quiver with it--the damnable, hellish ingenuity of it all

seemed to choke and suffocate him.

“Luck!” muttered Jimmie Dale between his clenched teeth. “Oh, the

blessed luck to get that door locked! I've got time now to set the stage

for my own get-away before the showdown!”

He stole on along the corridor. Excerpts from her letter were running

through his brain: “It would do no good to warn him, Jimmie--the Skeeter

and his gang would never let up on him until they got the stones. . . .

It would do no good for you to steal them first, for they would only

take that as a ruse of old Luddy's, and murder the man first and hunt

afterward. . . . In some way you must let the Skeeter SEE you steal

them, make them think, make them certain that it is a bona-fide theft,

so that they will no longer have any interest or any desire to do old

Luddy harm. . . . And for it to appear real to them, it must appear real

to old Luddy himself--do not take any chances there.”

Jimmie Dale's eyes narrowed. Yes, it was simple enough now with that

pack of hell's wolves guarded for the moment by a locked door, forced to

give him warning by breaking the door before they could get out. It was

simple enough now to enter old Luddy's room, steal the stones at the

revolver point, then make enough disturbance--when he was ready--to set

the gang in motion, and, as they rushed in open him, to make his escape

with the stones to the roof through Luddy's room. That was simple

enough--there was an opening to the roof in Luddy's room, she had said,

and there was a ladder kept there in place. On hot nights, it seemed,

the old man used to go up there and sleep on the roof--not now, of

course. It was too late in the year for that--but the opening in the

roof was there, and the ladder remained there, too.

Yes, it was simple enough now. And the next morning the papers would

rave with execrations against the Gray Seal--for the robbery of the

life savings of a poor, defenseless old man, for committing as vile and

pitiful a crime as had ever stirred New York! Even Carruthers, of

the MORNING NEWS-ARGUS, would be moved to bitter attack. Good old

Carruthers--who little thought that the Gray Seal was his old college

pal, his present most intimate friend, Jimmie Dale! And afterward--after

the next morning? Well, that, at least, had never been in doubt. Old

Luddy could be made to leave New York, and, once away, with the Skeeter

and his gang robbed of incentive to pay any further attention to him,

the stones could be secretly returned to the old man. And it would

to the public, to the police, be just another of the Gray Seal's

crimes--that was all!

Jimmie Dale had reached old Luddy's door. The Gray Seal? Oh, yes, they

would know it was the Gray Seal--the insignia was familiar enough;

familiar to the crooks of the underworld, who held it in awe; familiar

to the police, to whom it was an added barb of ridicule. He was placing

it now, that insignia, a diamond-shaped, gray paper seal, on the panel

of the door; and now, a black silk mask adjusted over his face, Jimmie

Dale bent to insert the little steel instrument in the lock--a pitiful,

paltry thing, a cheap lock, to fingers that could play so intimately

with twirling knobs and dials, masters of the intricate mechanism of

vaults and safes!

And then, about to open the door, a sort of sudden dismay fell upon him.

He had not thought of that--somehow, it had not occurred to him! WHAT

WAS IT THEY WERE WAITING FOR? Why had they not struck at once, as, when

he had first entered the house, he had supposed they would do? What was

it? Why was it? Was old Luddy out? Were they waiting for his return--or

what?

The door, without sound, moved gradually under his hand. A faint odor

assailed his nostrils! It was dark, very dark. Across the room, in a

direct line, was the doorway of the inner room--she had explained that

in her letter. It was slow progress to cross that room without sound,

in silence--it was a snail's movement--for fear that even a muscle might

crack.

And now he stood in the inner doorway. It was dark here, to--and yet,

how bizarre, a star seemed to twinkle through the very roof of the room

itself! The odour was pungent now. There was a long-drawn sigh--then a

low, indescribable sound of movement. SOMEBODY, APART FROM OLD LUDDY,

WAS IN THE ROOM!

It swept, the full consciousness of it, upon Jimmie Dale in an

instantaneous flash. Chloroform; the open scuttle in the roof; the

waiting of those others--all fused into a compact logical whole. They

had loosened the scuttle during the day, probably when old Luddy was

away--one of them had crept down there now to chloroform the old man

into insensibility--the others would complete the ghastly work presently

by stringing their victim up to the ceiling--and it would be suicide,

for, long before morning came, long before the old man would be

discovered, the fumes of the chloroform would be gone.

It seemed like a cold hand, deathlike, clutching at his heart. Was he

too late, after all! Chloroform alone could--kill! To the right, just a

little to the right--he must make no mistake--his ear placed the sound!

He whipped his hands from the side pockets of his coat--the ray of his

flashlight cut across the room and fell upon an aged face upon a bed,

upon a hand clutching a wad of cloth, the cloth pressed horribly against

the nose and mouth of the upturned face--and then, roaring in the

stillness, spitting a vicious lane of fire that paralleled the

flashlight's ray, came the tongue flame of his automatic.

There was a yell, a scream, that echoed out, reverberated, and went

racketing through the house, and Jimmie Dale leaped forward--over a

table, sending it crashing to the floor. The man had reeled back against

the wall, clutching at a shattered wrist, staring into the flashlight's

eye, white-faced, jaw dropped, lips working in mingled pain and fear.

“Harve Thoms--you, eh?” gritted Jimmie Dale.

A cunning look swept the distorted face. Here, apparently, was only one

man--there were pals, three of them, only a few yards away.

“You ain't got nothing on me!” he snarled, sparring for time. “You

police are too damned fresh with your guns!”

“I'll take yours!” snapped Jimmie Dale, and snatched it deftly from the

other's pocket. “This ain't any police job, my bucko, and you make

a move and I'll drop you for keeps, if what you've got already ain't

enough to teach you to keep your hands off jobs that belong to your

betters!”

He was working with mad haste as he spoke. One minute at the outside

was, perhaps, all he could count upon. Already he had caught the rattle

of the locked door down the hall. He lit a match and turned on the gas

over the bed--it was the most dangerous thing he could do--he knew that

well enough, none knew it better--it was offering himself as a fair

mark when the others rushed in, as they would in a moment now--but the

Skeeter and his gang and this man here must have no misconception of his

purpose, his reason for being there, the same as their own, the theft of

the stones--and no misconception as to his SUCCESS.

“Y'ain't the police!”--it came in a choked gasp from the other, as he

blinked in the sudden light “Say then--”

“Shut up!” ordered Jimmie Dale curtly. “And mind what I told you about

moving!” He leaned over the bed. Old Luddy, though under the influence

of the chloroform, was moving restlessly. Thoms had evidently only begun

to apply the chloroform--old Luddy was safe! Jimmie Dale ran his hand

in under the pillow. “If you ain't swiped them already they ought to be

here!” he growled; “and if you have I'll--ah!” A little chamois bag was

in his hand. He laughed sneeringly at Thoms, opened the bag, allowed

a few stones to trickle into his hand--and then, without stopping to

replace them, dashed stones and bag into his pocket. The door along the

corridor crashed open.

“What's that?” he gasped out, in well-simulated fright--and sprang for

the ladder that led up to the roof.

It had all taken, perhaps, the minute that he had counted on--no more.

Noises came from the floors below now, a confusion of them--the shot,

the scream had been heard by others, save those who had been in the

locked room. And the latter were outside now in the corridor, running to

their accomplice's aid.

There was a pause at the outer door--then an oath--and coupled with the

oath an exclamation:

“The Gray Seal!”

They had swept a flashlight over the door panel--Jimmie Dale, halfway up

the ladder, smiled grimly.

The door opened--there was a rush of feet. The man with the shattered

wrist yelled, cursing wildly:

“Here he is--on the ladder! Let him have it! Fill him full of holes!”

Jimmie Dale was in the light--they were in the dark of the outer room.

He fired at the threshold, checking their rush--as a hail of bullets

chipped and tore at the ladder and spat wickedly against the wall. He

swung through to the roof, trying, as he did so, to kick the ladder

loose behind him. It was fastened!

The three gunmen jumped into the room--from the roof Jimmie Dale got a

glimpse of them below, as he flung himself clear of the opening. Bullets

whistled through the aperture--a voice roared up as he gained his feet:

“Come on! After him! The whole place is alive, but this lets us out.

We can frame up how we came to be here easy enough. Never mind the old

geezer there any more! Get the Gray Seal--the reward that's out for him

is worth twice the sparklers, and--”

Jimmie Dale hurled the cover over the scuttle. He could have stood them

off from above and kept the ladder clear with his revolver, but the

alarm seemed general now--windows were opening, voices were calling to

one another--from the windows across the street he must stand out in

sharp outline against the sky. Yes--he was seen now.

A woman's voice, from a top-story window across the street, screamed

out, high-pitched in excitement:

“There he is! There he is! On the roof there!”

Jimmie Dale started on the run along the roof. The houses, built wall to

wall, flat-roofed, seemed to offer an open course ahead of him--until

a lane or an intersecting street should bar his way! But they were not

quite all on the same level, though--the wall of the next house rose

suddenly breast high in front of him. He flung himself up, regained his

feet--and ducked instantly behind a chimney.

The crack of a revolver echoed through the night--a bullet drummed

through the air--the Skeeter and his gang were on the roof now, dashing

forward, firing as they ran. Two shots from Jimmie Dale's automatic, in

quick succession cooled the ardour of their rush--and they broke, black,

flitting forms, for the shelter of chimneys, too.

And now the whole neighbourhood seemed awakened. A dull-toned roar,

as from some great gulf below, rolled up from the street, a medley of

slamming windows, the rush of feet as people poured from the houses,

cries, shouts, and yells--and high over all the shrill call of the

police-patrol whistle--and the CRACK, CRACK, CRACK of the Skeeter's

revolver shots--the Skeeter and his hellhounds for once self-appointed

allies of the law!

Twice again Jimmie Dale fired--then crouching, running low, he zigzagged

his way across the next roof. The bullets followed him--once more his

pursuers dashed forward. And again Jimmie Dale, his face set like stone

now, his breath coming in hard gasps, dodged behind a chimney, and with

his gun checked their rush for the third time.

He glanced about him--and with a growing sense of disaster saw that two

houses farther on the stretch of roof appeared to end. There would be

a lane or a street there! And in another minute or two, if it were not

already the case, others would be following the gunmen to the roof,

and then he would be--he caught his breath suddenly in a queer little

strangled cry of relief. Just back of him, a few yards away, his eyes

made out what, in the darkness, seemed to be a glass skylight.

A dark form sped like a deeper shadow across the black in front of

him, making for a chimney nearer by, closing in the range. Jimmie Dale

fired--wide. Tight as was the corner he was in, little as was the

mercy deserved at his hands, he could not, after all, bring himself to

shoot--to kill.

A voice, the Skeeter's, bawled out raucously:

“Rush him all together--from different sides at once!”

A backward leap! Jimmie Dale's boot was crashing glass and frame,

stamping at it desperately, making a hole for his body through the

skylight. A yell, a chorus of them, answered this--then the crunch of

racing feet on the gravel roof. He emptied his revolver, sweeping the

darkness with a semicircle of vicious flashes.

It seemed an hour--it was barely the fraction of a second, as he hung

by his hands from the side of the skylight frame, his body swinging

back and forth in the unknown blackness below. The skylight might

be, probably was, directly over the stair well, and open clear to the

basement of the house--but it was his only chance. He swung his body

well out, let go--and dropped. With the impetus he smashed against a

wall, was flung back from it in a sort of rebound, and his hands closed,

gripping fiercely, on banisters. It had been the stair well beyond any

question of doubt, but his swing had sent him clear of it.

Above, they had not yet reached the skylight. Jimmie Dale snatched a

precious moment to listen, as he rose, and found himself, apart from

bruises, perhaps unhurt. There was commotion, too, in this house below,

the alarm had extended and spread along the block--but the commotion was

all in the FRONT of the house--the street was the lure.

Jimmie Dale started down the stairs, and in an instant he had gained the

landing. In another he had slipped to the rear of the hall--somewhere

there, from the hall itself, from one of the rear rooms, there must be

an exit to the fire escape. To attempt to leave by the front way was

certain capture.

They were yelling, shouting down now through the sky-light above, as

Jimmie Dale softly raised the window sash at the rear of the hall. The

fire escape was there. Shouts from along the corridor, from the tenement

dwellers who had been crowding their neighbours' rooms, craning their

necks probably from the front windows, answered the shouts now from the

roof and the skylight; doors opened; forms rushed out--but it was dark

in the corridor, only a murky yellow at the upper end from the opened

doors.

Jimmie Dale slipped through the window to the fire escape, and, working

cautiously, silently, but with the speed of a trained athlete, made his

way down. At the bottom he dropped from the iron platform into the back

yard, ran for the fence and climbed over into a lane on the other side.

And then, as he ran, Jimmie Dale snatched the mask from his face and

put it in his pocket. He was safe now. He swept the sweat drops from his

forehead with the back of his hand--noticing them for the first time.

It had been close--almost as close for him as it had been for old Luddy.

And to-morrow the papers would execrate the Gray Seal! He smiled a

little wanly. His breath was still coming hard. Presently they would

scour the lane--when they found that their quarry was not in the house.

What a racket they were making! The whole district seemed roused like a

swarm of angry bees.

He kept on along the lane--and dodged suddenly into a cross street where

the two intersected. The clang of a bell dinned discordantly in

his ears--a patrol wagon swept by him, racing for the scene of the

disturbance--the riot call was out!

Again Jimmie Dale smiled wearily, passing his hand across his eyes.

“I guess,” said Jimmie Dale, “I'm pretty near all in. And I guess it's

time that Larry the Bat went--home.”

And a little later a figure turned from the Bowery and shambled down

the cross street, a disreputable figure, with hands plunged deep in his

pockets--and a shadow across the roadway suddenly shifted its position

as the shambling figure slouched into the black alleyway and entered the

tenement's side door.

And Larry the Bat smiled softly to himself--Kline's men were still on

guard!

CHAPTER VI

DEVIL'S WORK

A white-gloved arm, a voice, and a silvery laugh! Just that--no more!

Jimmie Dale, in his favourite seat, an aisle seat some seven or eight

rows back from the orchestra, stared at the stage, to all outward

appearances absorbed in the last act of the play; inwardly, quite

oblivious to the fact that even a play was going on.

A white-gloved arm, a voice, and a silvery laugh! The words had formed

themselves into a sort of singsong refrain that, for the last few days,

had been running through his head. A strange enough guiding star to

mould and dictate every action in his life! And that was all he had ever

seen of her, all that he had ever heard of her--except those letters,

of course, each of which had outlined the details of some affair for the

Gray Seal to execute.

Indeed, it seemed a great length of time now since he had heard from her

even in that way, though it was not so many days ago, after all. Perhaps

it was the calm, as it were, that, by contrast, had given place to the

strenuous months and weeks just past. The storm raised by the newspapers

at the theft of Old Luddy's diamonds had subsided into sporadic

diatribes aimed at the police; Kline, of the secret service, had finally

admitted defeat, and a shadow no longer skulked day and night at

the entrance to the Sanctuary--and Larry the Bat bore the government

indorsement, so to speak, of being no more suspicious a character than

that of a disreputable, but harmless, dope fiend of the underworld.

Larry the Bat! The Gray Seal! Jimmie Dale the millionaire! What if it

were ever known that that strange three were one! What if--Jimmie Dale

smiled whimsically. A burst of applause echoed through the house, the

orchestra was playing, the lights were on, seats banged, there was the

bustle of the rising audience, the play was at an end--and for the life

of him he could not have remembered a single line of the last act!

The aisle at his elbow was already crowded with people on their way out.

Jimmie Dale stooped down mechanically to reach for his hat beneath his

seat--and the next instant he was standing up, staring wildly into the

faces around him.

It had fallen at his feet--a white envelope. Hers! It was in his hand

now, those slim, tapering, wonderfully sensitive fingers of Jimmie

Dale, that were an “open sesame” to locks and safes, subconsciously

telegraphing to his mind the fact that the texture of the paper--was

hers. Hers! And she must be one of those around him--one of those

crowding either the row of seats in front or behind, or one of those

just passing in the aisle. It had fallen at his feet as he had stooped

over for his hat--but from just exactly what direction he could not

tell. His eyes, eagerly, hungrily, critically, swept face after face.

Which one was hers? What irony! She, whom he would have given his

life to know, for whom indeed he risked his life every hour of the

twenty-four, was close to him now, within reach--and as far removed as

though a thousand miles separated them. She was there--but he could not

recognise a face that he had never seen!

With an effort, he choked back the bitter, impotent laugh that rose to

his lips. They were talking, laughing around him. Her VOICE--yes, he

had once heard that, and that he would recognise again. He strained to

catch, to individualise the tone sounds that floated in a medley about

him. It was useless--of course--every effort that he had ever made

to find her had been useless. She was too clever, far too clever for

that--she, too, would know that he could and would recognise her voice

where he could recognise nothing else.

And then, suddenly, he realised that he was attracting attention. Level

stares from the women returned his gaze, and they edged away a little

from his vicinity as they passed, their escorts crowding somewhat

belligerently into their places. Others, in the same row of seats as his

own, were impatiently waiting to get by him. With a muttered apology,

Jimmie Dale raised the seat of his chair, allowing these latter to pass

him--and then, slipping the letter into his pocketbook, he snatched up

his hat from the seat rack.

There was still a chance. Knowing he was there, she would be on her

guard; but in the lobby, among the crowd and unaware of his presence,

there was the possibility that, if he could reach the entrance ahead of

her, she, too, might be talking and laughing as she left the theatre.

Just a single word, just a tone--that was all he asked.

The row of seats at whose end he stood was empty now, and, instead of

stepping into the thronged aisle, he made his way across to the opposite

side of the theatre. Here, the far aisle was less crowded, and in a

minute he had gained the foyer, confident that he was now in advance of

her. The next moment he was lost in a jam of people in the lobby.

He moved slowly now, very slowly--allowing those behind to press by

him on the way to the entrance. A babel of voices rose about him,

as, tight-packed, the mass of people jostled, elbowed, and pushed

good-naturedly. It was a voice now, her voice, that he was listening

for; but, though it seemed that every faculty was strained and intent

upon that one effort, his eyes, too, had in no degree relaxed their

vigilance--and once, half grimly, half sardonically, he smiled to

himself. There would be an unexpected aftermath to this exodus

of expensively gowned and bejewelled women with their prosperous,

well-groomed escorts! There was the Wowzer over there--sleek, dapper,

squirming in and out of the throng with the agility and stealth of a

cat. As Larry the Bat he had met the Wowzer many times, as indeed he

had met and was acquainted with most of the elite of the underworld.

The Wowzer, beyond a shadow of doubt, in his own profession stood upon

a plane entirely by himself--among those qualified to speak, no one yet

had ever questioned the Wowzer's claim to the distinction of being the

most dexterous and finished “poke getter” in the United States!

The crowd thinned in the lobby, thinned down to the last few belated

stragglers, who passed him as he still loitered in the entrance; and

then Jimmie Dale, with a shrug of his shoulders that was a great

deal more philosophical than the maddening sense of chagrin and

disappointment that burned within him, stepped out to the pavement and

headed down Broadway. After all, he had known it in his heart of hearts

all the time--it had always been the same--it was only one more occasion

added to the innumerable ones that had gone before in which she had

eluded him!

And now--there was the letter! Automatically he quickened his steps a

little. It was useless, futile, profitless, for the moment, at least, to

disturb himself over his failure--there was the letter! His lips parted

in a strange, half-serious, half-speculative smile. The letter--that

was paramount now. What new venture did the night hold in store for

him? What sudden emergency was the Gray Seal called upon to face this

time--what role, unrehearsed, without warning, must he play? What story

of grim, desperate rascality would the papers credit him with

when daylight came? Or would they carry in screaming headlines the

announcement that the Gray Seal was caged and caught at last, and in

three-inch type tell the world that the Gray Seal was--Jimmie Dale!

A block down, he turned from Broadway out of the theatre crowds that

streamed in both directions past him. The letter! Almost feverishly

now he was seeking an opportunity to open and read it unobserved; an

eagerness upon him that mingled exhilaration at the lure of danger

with a sense of premonition that, irritably, inevitably was with him

at moments such as these. It seemed, it always seemed, that, with an

unopened letter of hers in his possession, it was as though he were

about to open a page in the Book of Fate and read, as it were, a

pronouncement upon himself that might mean life or death.

He hurried on. People still passed by him--too many. And then a cafe,

just ahead, making a corner, gave him the opportunity that he sought.

Away from the entrance, on the side street, the brilliant lights from

the windows shone out on a comparatively deserted pavement. There was

ample light to read by, even as far away from the window as the curb,

and Jimmie Dale, with an approving nod, turned the corner and walked

along a few steps until opposite the farthest window--but, as he halted

here at the edge of the street, he glanced quickly behind him at a man

whom he had just passed. The other had paused at the corner and was

staring down the street. Jimmie Dale instantly and nonchalantly produced

his cigarette case, selected a cigarette, and fastidiously tapped its

end on his thumb nail.

“Inspector Burton in plain clothes,” he observed musingly to himself. “I

wonder if it's just a fluke--or something else? We'll see.”

Jimmie Dale took a box of matches from his pocket. The first would not

light. The second broke, and, with an exclamation of annoyance, he flung

it away. The third was making a fitful effort at life, as another man

emerged hastily from the cafe's side door, hurried to the corner, joined

the man who was still loitering there, and both together disappeared at

a rapid pace down the street.

Jimmie Dale whistled softly to himself. The second man was even better

known than the first; there was not a crook in New York but would

side-step Lannigan of headquarters, and do it with amazing celerity--if

he could!

“Something up! But it's not my hunt!” muttered Jimmie Dale; then, with

a shrug of his shoulders: “Queer the way those headquarters chaps

fascinate and give me a thrill every time I see them, even if I haven't

a ghost of a reason for imagining that--”

The sentence was never finished. Jimmie Dale's face was gray. The street

seemed to rock about him--and he stared, like a man stricken, white to

the lips, ahead of him. THE LETTER WAS GONE! His hand, wriggling from

his empty pocket, swept away the sweat beads that were bursting from his

forehead. It had come at last--the pitcher had gone once too often to

the well!

Numbed for an instant, his brain cleared now, working with lightning

speed, leaping from premise to conclusion. The crush in the theatre

lobby--the pushing, the jostling, the close contact--the Wowzer, the

slickest, cleverest pickpocket in the United States! For a moment he

could have laughed aloud in a sort of ghastly, defiant mockery--he

himself had predicted an unexpected aftermath, had he not!

Aftermath! It was--the END! An hour, two hours, and New York would be

metamorphosed into a seething caldron of humanity bubbling with the

news. It seemed that he could hear the screams of the newsboys now

shouting their extras; it seemed that he could see the people, roused to

frenzy, swarming in excited crowds, snatching at the papers; he seemed

to hear the mob's shouts swell in execration, in exultation--it seemed

as though all around him had gone mad. The mystery of the Gray Seal was

solved! It was Jimmie Dale, Jimmie Dale, Jimmie, Dale, the millionaire,

the lion of society--and there was ignominy for an honoured name, and

shame and disaster and convict stripes and sullen penitentiary walls--or

death! A felon's death--the chair!

He was running now, his hands clenched at his sides; his mind, working

subconsciously, urging him onward in a blind, as yet unrealised,

objectless way. And then gradually impulse gave way to calmer reason,

and he slowed his pace to a quick, less noticeable walk. The Wowzer!

That was it! There was yet a chance--the Wowzer! A merciless rage,

cold, deadly, settled upon him. It was the Wowzer who had stolen his

pocketbook, and with it the letter. There could be no doubt of that.

Well, there would be a reckoning at least before the end!

He was in a downtown subway train now--the roar in his ears in

consonance, it seemed, with the turmoil in his brain. But now, too, he

was Jimmie Dale again; and, apart from the slightly outthrust jaw, the

tight-closed lips, impassive, debonair, composed.

There was yet a chance. As Larry the Bat he knew every den and lair

below the dead line, and he knew, too, the Wowzer's favourite haunts.

There was yet a chance, only one in a thousand, it was true, almost too

pitiful to be depended upon--but yet a chance. The Wowzer had probably

not worked alone, and he and his pal, or pals, would certainly not

remain uptown either to examine or divide their spoils--they would wait

until they were safe somewhere in one of their hell holes on the East

Side. If he could find the Wowzer, reach the man BEFORE THE LETTER WAS

OPENED--Jimmie Dale's lips grew tighter. THAT was the chance! It he

failed in that--Jimmie Dale's lips drooped downward in grim curves at

the corners. A chance! Already the Wowzer had at least a half hour's

lead, and, worse still, there was no telling which one of a dozen places

the man might have chosen to retreat to with his loot.

Time passed. His mind obsessed, Jimmie Dale's physical acts were

almost wholly mechanical. It was perhaps fifteen minutes since he had

discovered the loss of the letter, and he was walking now through the

heart of the Bowery. Exactly how he had got there he could not have

told; he had only a vague realisation that, following an intuitive

sense of direction, he had lost not a second of time in making his way

downtown.

And now he found himself hesitating at the corner of a cross street. Two

blocks east was that dark, narrow alleyway, that side door that made the

entrance to the Sanctuary. It would be safer, a hundred times safer, to

go there, change his clothes and his personality, and emerge again as

Larry the Bat--infinitely safer in that role to explore the dens of the

underworld, many of them indeed unknown and undreamed of by the police

themselves, than to trust himself there in well-cut, fashionable

tweeds--but that would take time. Time! When, with every second, the

one chance he had, desperate as that already was, was slipping away from

him. No; what was apparently the greater risk at least held out the only

hope.

He went on again--his brain incessantly at work. At the worst, there

was one mitigating factor in it all. He had no need to think of her.

Whatever the ruin and disaster that faced him in the next few hours, she

in any case was safe. There was no clew to HER identity in the letter;

and where he, for months on end, with even more to work upon, had failed

at every turn to trace her, there was little fear that any one else

would have any better success. She was safe. As for himself--that was

different. The Gray Seal would be referred to in the letter, there would

be the outline, the data for the “crime” she had planned for that night;

and the letter, though unaddressed, being found in his pocketbook,

where cards and notes and a dozen different things among its contents

proclaimed him Jimmie Dale, needed no further evidence as to its

ownership nor the identity of the Gray Seal.

Jimmie Dale's fingers crept inside his vest and fumbled there for a

moment--and a diamond stud, extracted from his shirt front, glistened

sportively in the necktie that was now tucked jauntily in at one side of

his shirt bosom. He had reached the Blue Dragon, one of Wowzer's usual

hang outs, and, swerving from the sidewalk, entered the place. There was

wild tumult within--a constant storm of applause, derision, and hilarity

that was hurled from the tables around the room at the turkey-trotting,

tango-writhing couples on the somewhat restricted space of polished

hardwood flooring in the centre. Jimmie Dale swaggered down the room,

a cigar tilted up at an angle between his teeth, his soft felt hat a

little rakishly on one side of his head and well over his nose.

At the end of the room, at the bar, Jimmie Dale leaned toward the

barkeeper and talked out of the corner of his mouth. There were private

rooms upstairs, and he jerked his head surreptitiously ceilingward.

“Say, is de Wowzer up dere?” he inquired in a cautious whisper.

The man behind the bar, well known to Jimmie Dale as one of the Wowzer's

particular pals, favoured him with a blank stare.

“Never heard of de guy!” he announced brusquely. “Wot's yours?”

“Gimme a mug of suds,” said Jimmie Dale, reaching for a match. He puffed

at his cigar, blew out the match, and, after a moment, flung the charred

end away--but on his hand, as, palm outward, he raised it to take his

glass, the match had traced a small black cross.

The barkeeper put down the beer he had just drawn, wiped his hand

hurriedly, and with sudden enthusiasm thrust it across the bar.

“Glad to know youse, cull!” he exclaimed. “Wot's de lay?”

Jimmie Dale smiled.

“Nix!” said Jimmie Dale. “I just blew in from Chicago. Used to know de

Wowzer dere. He said dis place was on de level, an' I could always find

him here, dat's all.”

“Sure, youse can!” returned the barkeeper heartily. “Only he ain't here

now. He beat it about fifteen minutes ago, him an' Dago Jim. I guess

youse'll find him at Chang's, I heard him an' Dago say dey was goin'

dere. Know de place?”

Jimmie Dale shook his head.

“I ain't much wise to New York,” he explained.

“Aw, dat's easy,” whispered the barkeeper. “Go down to Chatham Square,

an' den any guy'll show youse Chang Foo's.” He winked confidentially. “I

guess youse won't bump yer head none gettin' around inside.”

Jimmie Dale nodded, grinned back, emptied his glass, and dug for a coin.

“Forget it!” observed the barkeeper cordially. “Dis is on me. Any friend

of de Wowzer's gets de glad hand here any time.”

“T'anks!” said Jimmie Dale gratefully, as he turned away. “So long,

then--see youse later.”

Chang Foo's! Jimmie Dale's face set even a little harder than it

had before, as he swung on again down the Bowery. Yes; he knew Chang

Foo's--too well. Underground Chinatown--where a man's life was worth the

price of an opium pill--or less! Mechanically his hand slipped into his

pocket and closed over the automatic that nestled there. Once in--where

he had to go--and the chances were even, just even, that was all, that

he would ever get out. Again he was tempted to return to the Sanctuary

and make the attempt as Larry the Bat. Larry the Bat was well enough

known to enter Chang Foo's unquestioned, and--but again he shook his

head and went on. There was not time. The Wowzer and his pal--it was

Dago Jim it seemed--had evidently been drinking and loitering their way

downtown from the theatre, and he had gained that much on them; but

by now they would be smugly tucked away somewhere in that maze of dens

below the ground, and at that moment probably were gloating over the

biggest night's haul they had ever made in their lives!

And if they were! What then? Once they knew the contents of that

letter--what then? Buy them off for a larger amount than the many

thousands offered for the capture of the Gray Seal? Jimmie Dale gritted

his teeth. That meant blackmail from them all his life, an intolerable

existence, impossible, a hell on earth--the slave, at the beck and call

of two of the worst criminals in New York! The moisture oozed again to

Jimmie Dale's forehead. God, if he could get that letter before it was

opened--before they KNEW! If he could only get the chance to fight for

it--against ANY odds! Life! Life was a pitiful consideration against the

alternative that faced him now!

From the Blue Dragon to Chang Foo's was not far; and Jimmie Dale covered

the distance in well under five minutes. Chang Foo's was just a tea

merchant's shop, innocuous and innocent enough in its appearance,

blandly so indeed, and that was all--outwardly; but Jimmie Dale, as he

reached his destination, experienced the first sensation of uplift he

had known that night, and this from what, apparently, did not in the

least seem like a contributing cause.

“Luck! The blessed luck of it!” he muttered grimly, as he surveyed

the sight-seeing car drawn up at the curb, and watched the passengers

crowding out of it to the ground. “It wouldn't have been as easy to fool

old Chang as it was that fellow back at the Dragon--and, besides, if I

can work it, there's a better chance this way of getting out alive.”

The guide was marshalling his “gapers”--some two dozen in all, men and

women. Jimmie Dale unostentatiously fell in at the rear; and, the guide

leading, the little crowd passed into the tea merchant's shop. Chang

Foo, a wizened, wrinkled-faced little Celestial, oily, suave, greeted

them with profuse bows, chattering the while volubly in Chinese.

The guide made the introduction with an all-embracing sweep of his hand.

“Chang Foo--ladies and gentlemen,” he announced; then held up his hand

for silence. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he said impressively, “this is one

of the most notorious, if not THE most notorious dive in Chinatown, and

it is only through special arrangement with the authorities and at great

expense that the company is able exclusively to gain an entree here for

its patrons. You will see here the real life of the Chinese, and in half

an hour you will get what few would get in a lifetime spent in China

itself. You will see the Chinese children dance and perform; the Chinese

women at their household tasks; the joss, the shrine of his hallowed

ancestors, at which Chang Foo here worships; and you will enter the most

famous opium den in the United States. Now, if you will all keep close

together, we will make a start.”

In spite of his desperate situation, Jimmie Dale smiled a little

whimsically. Yes; they would see it all--UPSTAIRS! The same old bunk

dished out night after night at so much a head--and the nervous little

schoolma'am of uncertain age, who fidgeted now beside him, would go

back somewhere down in Maine and shiver while she related her “wider

experiences” in tremulous whispers into the shocked ears of envious

other maiden ladies of equally uncertain age. The same old bunk--and a

profitable one for Chang Foo for more reasons than one. It was dust in

the eyes of the police. The police smiled knowingly at mention of Chang

Foo. Who should know, if they didn't, that it was all harmless fake, all

bunk! And so it was--UPSTAIRS!

They were passing out of the shop now, bowed out through a side door by

the obsequious and oily Chang Foo. And now they massed again in a sort

of little hallway--and Chang Foo, closing the door upon Jimmie Dale, who

was the last in the line, shuffled back behind the counter in his shop

to resume his guard duty over customers of quite another ilk. With the

door closed, it was dark, pitch dark. And this, too, like everything

else connected with Chang Foo's establishment, for more reasons than

one--for effect--and for security. Nervous little twitters began to

emanate from the women--the guide's voice rose reassuringly:

“Keep close together, ladies and gentlemen. We are going upstairs now

to--”

Jimmie Dale hugged back against the wall, sidled along it, and like a

shadow slipped down to the end of the hall. The scuffling of two dozen

pairs of feet mounting the creaky staircase drowned the slight sound as

he cautiously opened a door; the darkness lay black, impenetrable, along

the hall. And then, as cautiously as he had opened it, he closed the

door behind him, and stood for an instant listening at the head of a

ladder-like stairway, his automatic in his hand now. It was familiar

ground to Larry the Bat. The steps led down to a cellar; and diagonally

across from the foot of the steps was an opening, ingeniously hidden by

a heterogeneous collection of odds and ends, boxes, cases, and rubbish

from the pseudo tea shop above; a low opening in the wall to a passage

that led on through the cellars of perhaps half a dozen adjoining

houses, each of which latter was leased, in one name or another--by

Chang Foo.

Jimmie Dale crept down the steps, and in another moment had gained the

farther side of the cellar; then, skirting around the ruck of cases, he

stooped suddenly and passed in through the opening in the wall. And

now he halted once more. He was straining his eyes down a long, narrow

passage, whose blackness was accentuated rather than relieved by curious

wavering, gossamer threads of yellow light that showed here and there

from under makeshift thresholds, from doors slightly ajar. Faint noises

came to him, a muffled, intermittent clink of coin, a low, continuous,

droning hum of voices; the sickly sweet smell of opium pricked at his

nostrils.

Jimmie Dale's face set rigidly. It was the resort, not only of the most

depraved Chinese element, but of the worst “white” thugs that made New

York their headquarters--here, in the succession of cellars, roughly

partitioned off to make a dozen rooms on either side of the passage,

dope fiends sucked at the drug, and Chinese gamblers spent the greater

part of their lives; here, murder was hatched and played too often to

its hellish end; here, the scum of the underworld sought refuge from the

police to the profit of Chang Foo; and here, somewhere, in one of these

rooms, was--the Wowzer.

The Wowzer! Jimmie Dale stole forward silently, without a sound,

swiftly--pausing only to listen for a second's space at the doors as he

passed. From this one came that clink of coin; from another that jabber

of Chinese; from still another that overpowering stench of opium--and

once, iron-nerved as he was, a cold thrill passed over him. Let this

lair of hell's wolves, so intent now on their own affairs, be once

roused, as they certainly must be roused before he could hope to finish

the Wowzer, and his chances of escape were--

He straightened suddenly, alert, tense, strained. Voices, raised in a

furious quarrel, came from a door just beyond him on the other side

of the passage, where a film of light streamed out through a cracked

panel--it was the Wowzer and Dago Jim! And drunk, both of them--and both

in a blind fury!

It happened quick then, almost instantaneously it seemed to Jimmie Dale.

He was crouched now close against the door, his eye to the crack in the

panel. There was only one figure in sight--Dago Jim--standing beside

a table on which burned a lamp, the table top littered with watches,

purses, and small chatelaine bags. The man was lurching unsteadily on

his feet, a vicious sneer of triumph on his face, waving tauntingly

an open letter and Jimmie Dale's pocket-book in his hands--waving them

presumably in the face of the Wowzer, whom, from the restrictions of the

crack, Jimmie Dale could not see. He was conscious of a sickening sense

of disaster. His hope against hope had been in vain--the letter had been

opened and read--THE IDENTITY OF THE GRAY SEAL WAS SOLVED.

Dago Jim's voice roared out, hoarse, blasphemous, in drunken rage:

“De Gray Seal--see! Youse betcher life I knows! I been waitin' fer

somet'ing like dis, damn youse! Youse been stallin' on me fer a year

every time it came to a divvy. Youse've got a pocketful now youse

snitched to-night dat youse are tryin' to do me out of. Well, keep

'em”--he shoved his face forward. “I keeps dis--see! Keep 'em Wowzer,

youse cross-eyed--”

“Everyt'ing I pinched to-night's on de table dere wid wot youse pinched

yerself,” cut in the Wowzer, in a sullen, threatening growl.

“Youse lie, an' youse knows it!” retorted Dago Jim. “Youse have given me

de short end every time we've pulled a deal!”

“Dat letter's mine, youse--” bawled the Wowzer furiously.

“Why didn't youse open it an' read it, den, instead of lettin' me do it

to keep me busy while youse short-changed me?” sneered Dago Jim. “Youse

t'ought it was some sweet billy-doo, eh? Well, t'anks, Wowzer--dat's wot

it is! Say,” he mocked, “dere's a guy'll cash a t'ousand century notes

fer dis, an' if he don't--say, dere's SOME reward out fer the Gray

Seal! Wouldn't youse like to know who it is? Well, when I'm ridin' in

me private buzz wagon, Wowzer, youse stick around an' mabbe I'll tell

youse--an' mabbe I won't!”

“By God”--the Wowzer's voice rose in a scream--“youse hand over dat

letter!”

“Youse go to--”

Red, lurid red, a stream of flame seemed to cut across Jimmie Dale's

line of vision, came the roar of a revolver shot--and like a madman

Jimmie Dale flung his body at the door. Rickety at best, it crashed

inward, half wrenched from its hinges, precipitating him inside. He

recovered himself and leaped forward. The room was swirling with blue

eddies of smoke; Dago Jim, hands flung up, still grasping letter and

pocketbook, pawed at the air--and plunged with a sagging lurch face

downward to the floor. There was a yell and an oath from the Wowzer--the

crack of another revolver shot, the hum of the bullet past Jimmie Dale's

ear, the scorch of the tongue flame in his face, and he was upon the

other.

Screeching profanity, the Wowzer grappled; and, for an instant, the two

men rocked, reeled, and swayed in each other's embrace; then, both

men losing their balance, they shot suddenly backward, the Wowzer,

undermost, striking his head against the table's edge--and men, table,

and lamp crashed downward in a heap to the floor.

It had been no more, at most, than a matter of seconds since Jimmie Dale

had hurled himself into the room; and now, with a gurgling sigh,

the Wowzer's arms, that had been wound around Jimmie Dale's back and

shoulders, relaxed, and, from the blow on his head the man, lay

back inert and stunned. And then it seemed to Jimmie Dale as though

pandemonium, unreality, and chaos at the touch of some devil's hand

reigned around him. It was dark--no, not dark--a spurt of flame was

leaping along the line of trickling oil from the broken lamp on the

floor. It threw into ghastly relief the sprawled form of Dago

Jim. Outside, from along the passageway, came a confused jangle of

commotion--whispering voices, shuffling feet, the swish of Chinese

garments. And the room itself began to spring into weird, flickering

shadows, that mounted and crept up the walls with the spreading fire.

There was not a second to lose before the room would be swarming with

that rush from the passageway--and there was still the letter, the

pocketbook! The table had fallen half over Dago Jim--Jimmie Dale pushed

it aside, tore the crushed letter and the pocketbook from the man's

hands--and felt, with a grim, horrible sort of anxiety, for the other's

heartbeat, for the verdict that meant life or death to himself. There

was no sign of life--the man was dead.

Jimmie Dale was on his feet now. A face, another, and another showed

in the doorway--the Wowzer was regaining his senses, stumbling to his

knees. There was one chance--just one--to take those crowding figures by

surprise. And with a yell of “Fire!” Jimmie Dale sprang for the doorway.

They gave way before his rush, tumbling back in their surprise against

the opposite wall; and, turning, Jimmie Dale raced down the passageway.

Doors were opening everywhere now, forms were pushing out into the

semi-darkness--only to duck hastily back again, as Jimmie Dale's

automatic barked and spat a running fire of warning ahead of him. And

then, behind, the Wowzer's voice shrieked out:

“Soak him! Kill de guy! He's croaked Dago Jim! Put a hole in him, de--”

Yells, a chorus of them, took up the refrain--then the rush of following

feet--and the passageway seemed to racket as though a Gatling gun were

in play with the fusillade of revolver shots. But Jimmie Dale was at

the opening now--and, like a base runner plunging for the bag, he flung

himself in a low dive through and into the open cellar beyond. He was

on his feet, over the boxes, and dashing up the stairs in a second. The

door above opened as he reached the top--Jimmie Dale's right hand shot

out with clubbed revolver--and with a grunt Chang Foo went down before

the blow and the headlong rush. The next instant Jimmie Dale had sprung

through the tea shop and was out on the street.

A minute, two minutes more, and Chinatown would be in an uproar--Chang

Foo would see to that--and the Wowzer would prod him on. The danger was

far from over yet. And then, as he ran, Jimmie Dale gave a little gasp

of relief. Just ahead, drawn up at the curb, stood a taxicab--waiting,

probably, for a private slumming party. Jimmie Dale put on a spurt,

reached it, and wrenched the door open.

“Quick!” he flung at the startled chauffeur. “The nearest subway

station--there's a ten-spot in it for you! Quick man--QUICK! Here they

come!”

A crowd of Chinese, pouring like angry hornets from Chang Foo's shop,

came yelling down the street--and the taxi took the corner on two

wheels--and Jimmie Dale, panting, choking for his breath like a man

spent, sank back against the cushions.

But five minutes later it was quite another Jimmie Dale, composed,

nonchalant, imperturbable, who entered an up-town subway train, and,

choosing a seat alone near the centre of the car, which at that hour

of night in the downtown district was almost deserted, took the crushed

letter from his pocket. For a moment he made no attempt to read it,

his dark eyes, now that he was free from observation, full of troubled

retrospect, fixed on the window at his side. It was not a pleasant

thought that it had cost a man his life, nor yet that that life was also

the price of his own freedom. True, if there were two men in the city of

New York whose crimes merited neither sympathy nor mercy, those two men

were the Wowzer and Dago Jim--but yet, after all, it was a human life,

and, even if his own had been in the balance, thank God it had been

through no act of his that Dago Jim had gone out! The Wowzer, cute and

cunning, had been quick enough to say so to clear himself, but--Jimmie

Dale smiled a little now--neither the Wowzer, nor Chang Foo, nor

Chinatown would ever be in a position to recognise their uninvited

guest!

Jimmie Dale's eyes shifted to the letter speculatively, gravely. It

seemed as though the night had already held a year of happenings, and

the night was not over yet--there was the letter! It had already cost

one life; was it to cost another--or what?

It began as it always did. He read it through once, in amazement; a

second time, with a flush of bitter anger creeping to his cheeks; and

a third time, curiously memorising, as it were, snatches of it here and

there.

“DEAR PHILANTHROPIC CROOK: Robbery of Hudson-Mercantile National

Bank--trusted employee is ex-convict, bad police record, served term in

Sing Sing three years ago--known to police as Bookkeeper Bob, real name

is Robert Moyne, lives at ---- Street, Harlem--Inspector Burton

and Lannigan of headquarters trailing him now--robbery not yet made

public--”

There was a great deal more--four sheets of closely written data. With

an exclamation almost of dismay, Jimmie Dale pulled out his watch. So

that was what Burton and Lannigan were up to! And he had actually run

into them! Lord, the irony of it! The--And then Jimmie Dale stared at

the dial of his watch incredulously. It was still but barely midnight!

It seemed impossible that since leaving the theatre at a few minutes

before eleven, he had lived through but a single hour!

Jimmie Dale's fingers began to pluck at the letter, tearing it into

pieces, tearing the pieces over and over again into tiny shreds. The

train stopped at station after station, people got on and off--Jimmie

Dale's hat was over his eyes, and his eyes were glued again to the

window. Had Bookkeeper Bob returned to his flat in Harlem with the

detectives at his heels--or were Burton and Lannigan still trailing the

man downtown somewhere around the cafe's? If the former, the theft

of the letter and its incident loss of time had been an irreparable

disaster; if the latter--well, who knew! The risk was the Gray Seal's!

At One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Street Jimmie Dale left the train; and,

at the end of a sharp four minutes' walk, during which he had dodged in

and out from street to street, stopped on a corner to survey the block

ahead of him. It was a block devoted exclusively to flats and apartment

houses, and, apart from a few belated pedestrians, was deserted. Jimmie

Dale strolled leisurely down one side, crossed the street at the end of

the block, and strolled leisurely back on the other side--there was no

sign of either Burton or Lannigan. It was a fairly safe presumption then

that Bookkeeper Bob had not returned yet, or one of the detectives at

least would have been shadowing the house.

Jimmie Dale, smiling a little grimly, retraced his steps again, and

turned deliberately into a doorway--whose number he had noted as he had

passed a moment or so before. So, after all, there was time yet!

This was the house. “Number eighteen,” she had said in her letter. “A

flat--three stories--Moyne lives on ground floor.”

Jimmie Dale leaned against the vestibule door--there was a faint

click--a little steel instrument was withdrawn from the lock--and Jimmie

Dale stepped into the hall, where a gas jet, turned down, burned dimly.

The door of the ground-floor apartment was at his right, Jimmie Dale

reached up and turned off the light. Again those slim, tapering,

wonderfully sensitive fingers worked with the little steel instrument,

this time in the lock of the apartment door--again there was that almost

inaudible click--and then cautiously, inch by inch, the door opened

under his hand. He peered inside--down a hallway lighted, if it could be

called lighted at all, by a subdued glow from two open doors that gave

upon it--peered intently, listening intently, as he drew a black silk

mask from his pocket and slipped it over his face. And then, silent as

a shadow in his movements, the door left just ajar behind him, he stole

down the carpeted hallway.

Opposite the first of the open doorways Jimmie Dale paused--a curiously

hard expression creeping over his face, his lips beginning to droop

ominously downward at the corners. It was a little sitting room, cheaply

but tastefully furnished, and a young woman, Bookkeeper Bob's wife

evidently, and evidently sitting up for her husband, had fallen sound

asleep in a chair, her head pillowed on her arms that were outstretched

across the table. For a moment Jimmie Dale held there, his eyes on the

scene--and the next moment, his hand curved into a clenched fist, he had

passed on and entered the adjoining room.

It was a child's bedroom. A night lamp burned on a table beside the bed,

and the soft rays seemed to play and linger in caress on the tousled

golden hair of a little girl of perhaps two years of age--and something

seemed to choke suddenly in Jimmie Dale's throat--the sweet, innocent

little face, upturned to his, was smiling at him as she slept.

Jimmie Dale turned away his head--his eyelashes wet under his mask.

“BENEATH THE MATTRESS OF THE CHILD'S BED,” the letter had said. His face

like stone, his lips a thin line now, Jimmie Dale's hand reached

deftly in without disturbing the child and took out a package--and then

another. He straightened up, a bundle of crisp new hundred-dollar notes

in each hand--and on the top of one, slipped under the elastic band that

held the bills together, an unsealed envelope. He drew out the latter,

and opened it--it was a second-class steamship passage to Vera Cruz,

made out in a fictitious name, of course, to John Davies, the booking

for next day's sailing. From the ticket, from the stolen money, Jimmie

Dale's eyes lifted to rest again on the little golden head, the smiling

lips--and then, dropping the packages into his pockets, his own lips

moving queerly, he turned abruptly to the door.

“My God, the shame of it!” he whispered to himself.

He crept down the corridor, past the open door of the room where the

young woman still sat fast asleep, and, his mask in his pocket again,

stepped softly into the vestibule, and from there to the street.

Jimmie Dale hurried now, spurred on it seemed by a hot, insensate fury

that raged within him--there was still one other call to make that

night--still those remaining and minute details in the latter part of

her letter, grim and ugly in their portent!

It was close upon one o'clock in the morning when Jimmie Dale stopped

again--this time before a fashionable dwelling just off Central Park.

And here, for perhaps the space of a minute, he surveyed the house from

the sidewalk--watching, with a sort of speculative satisfaction, a man's

shadow that passed constantly to and fro across the drawn blinds of one

of the lower windows. The rest of the house was in darkness.

“Yes,” said Jimmie Dale, nodding his head, “I rather thought so. The

servants will have retired hours ago. It's safe enough.”

He ran quickly up the steps and rang the bell. A door opened almost

instantly, sending a faint glow into the hall from the lighted room; a

hurried step crossed the hall--and the outer door was thrown back.

“Well, what is it?” demanded a voice brusquely.

It was quite dark, too dark for either to distinguish the other's

features--and Jimmie Dale's hat was drawn far down over his eyes.

“I want to see Mr. Thomas H. Carling, cashier of the Hudson-Mercantile

National Bank--it's very important,” said Jimmie Dale earnestly.

“I am Mr. Carling,” replied the other. “What is it?”

Jimmie Dale leaned forward.

“From headquarters--with a report,” he said, in a low tone.

“Ah!” exclaimed the bank official sharply. “Well, it's about time! I've

been waiting up for it--though I expected you would telephone rather

than this. Come in!”

“Thank you,” said Jimmie Dale courteously--and stepped into the hall.

The other closed the front door. “The servants are in bed, of course,”

he explained, as he led the way toward the lighted room. “This way,

please.”

Behind the other, across the hall, Jimmie Dale followed and close at

Carling's heels entered the room, which was fitted up, quite evidently

regardless of cost, as a combination library and study. Carling, in

a somewhat pompous fashion, walked straight ahead toward the

carved-mahogany flat-topped desk, and, as he reached it, waved his hand.

“Take a chair,” he said, over his shoulder--and then, turning in the act

of dropping into his own chair, grasped suddenly at the edge of the desk

instead, and, with a low, startled cry, stared across the room.

Jimmie Dale was leaning back against the door that was closed now behind

him--and on Jimmie Dale's face was a black silk mask.

For an instant neither man spoke nor moved; then Carling, spare-built,

dapper in evening clothes, edged back from the desk and laughed a little

uncertainly.

“Quite neat! I compliment you! From headquarters with a report, I think

you said?”

“Which I neglected to add,” said Jimmie Dale, “was to be made in

private.”

Carling, as though to put as much distance between them as possible,

continued to edge back across the room--but his small black eyes, black

now to the pupils themselves, never left Jimmie Dale's face.

“In private, eh?”--he seemed to be sparring for time, as he smiled. “In

private! You've a strange method of securing privacy, haven't you? A bit

melodramatic, isn't it? Perhaps you'll be good enough to tell me who you

are?”

Jimmie Dale smiled indulgently.

“My mask is only for effect,” he said. “My name is--Smith.”

“Yes,” said Carling. “I am very stupid. Thank you. I--” he had reached

the other side of the room now--and with a quick, sudden movement jerked

his hand to the dial of the safe that stood against the wall.

But Jimmie Dale was quicker--without shifting his position, his

automatic, whipped from his pocket, held a disconcerting bead on

Carling's forehead.

“Please don't do that,” said Jimmie Dale softly. “It's rather a good

make, that safe. I dare say it would take me half an hour to open it. I

was rather curious to know whether it was locked or not.”

Carling's hand dropped to his side.

“So!” he sneered. “That's it, is it! The ordinary variety of sneak

thief!” His voice was rising gradually. “Well, sir, let me tell you

that--”

“Mr. Carling,” said Jimmie Dale, in a low, even tone, “unless you

moderate your voice some one in the house might hear you--I am quite

well aware of that. But if that happens, if any one enters this room,

if you make a move to touch a button, or in any other way attempt to

attract attention, I'll drop you where you stand!” His hand, behind his

back, extracted the key from the door lock, held it up for the other to

see, then dropped it into his pocket--and his voice, cold before, rang

peremptorily now. “Come back to the desk and sit down in that chair!” he

ordered.

For a moment Carling hesitated; then, with a half-muttered oath, obeyed.

Jimmie Dale moved over, and stood in front of Carling on the other side

of the desk--and stared silently at the immaculate, fashionably groomed

figure before him.

Under the prolonged gaze, Carling's composure, in a measure at least,

seemed to forsake him. He began to drum nervously with his fingers on

the desk, and shift uneasily in his chair.

And then, from first one pocket and then the other, Jimmie Dale took

the two packages of banknotes, and, still with out a word, pushed them

across the desk until they lay under the other's eyes.

Carling's fingers stopped their drumming, slid to the desk edge,

tightened there, and a whiteness crept into his face. Then, with an

effort, he jerked himself erect in his chair.

“What's this?” he demanded hoarsely.

“About ten thousand dollars, I should say,” said Jimmie Dale slowly. “I

haven't counted it. Your bank was robbed this evening at closing time, I

understand?”

“Yes!” Carling's voice was excited now, the colour back in his face.

“But you--how--do you mean that you are returning the money to the

bank?”

“Exactly,” said Jimmie Dale.

Carling was once more the pompous bank official. He leaned back and

surveyed Jimmie Dale critically with his little black eyes.

“Ah, quite so!” he observed. “That accounts for the mask. But I am still

a little in the dark. Under the circumstances, it is quite impossible

that you should have stolen the money yourself, and--”

“I didn't,” said Jimmie Dale. “I found it hidden in the home of one of

your employees.”

“You found it--WHERE?”

“In Moyne's home--up in Harlem.”

“Moyne, eh?” Carling was alert, quick now, jerking out his words. “How

did you come to get into this, then? His pal? Double-crossing him, eh? I

suppose you want a reward--we'll attend to that, of course. You're

wiser than you know, my man. That's what we suspected. We've had the

detectives trailing Moyne all evening.” He reached forward over the desk

for the telephone. “I'll telephone headquarters to make the arrest at

once.”

“Just a minute,” interposed Jimmie Dale gravely. “I want you to listen

to a little story first.”

“A story! What has a story got to do with this?” snapped Carling.

“The man has got a home,” said Jimmie Dale softly. “A home, and a

wife--and a little baby girl.”

“Oh, that's the game then, eh? You want to plead for him?” Carling flung

out gruffly. “Well, he should have thought of all that before! It's

quite useless for you to bring it up. The man has had his chance

already--a better chance than any one with his record ever had before.

We took him into the bank knowing that he was an ex-convict, but

believing that we could make an honest man of him--and this is the

result.”

“And yet--”

“NO!” said Carling icily.

“You refuse--absolutely?” Jimmie Dale's voice had a lingering, wistful

note in it.

“I refuse!” said Carling bluntly. “I won't have anything to do with it.”

There was just an instant's silence; and then, with a strange, slow,

creeping motion, as a panther creeps when about to spring, Jimmie Dale

projected his body across the desk--far across it toward the other. And

the muscles of his jaw were quivering, his words rasping, choked with

the sweep of fury that, held back so long, broke now in a passionate

surge.

“And shall I tell you why you won't? Your bank was robbed to-night of

one hundred thousand dollars. There are ten thousand here. THE OTHER

NINETY THOUSAND ARE IN YOUR SAFE!”

“You lie!” Ashen to the lips, Carling had risen in his chair. “You lie!”

he cried. “Do you hear! You lie! I tell you, you lie!”

Jimmie Dale's lips parted ominously.

“Sit down!” he gritted between his teeth.

The white in Carling's face had turned to gray, his lips were

working--mechanically he sank down again in his chair.

Jimmie Dale still leaned over the desk, resting his weight on his right

elbow, the automatic in his right hand covering Carling.

“You cur!” whispered Jimmie Dale. “There's just one reason, only one,

that keeps me from putting a bullet through you while you sit there.

We'll get to that in a moment. There is that little story first--shall

I tell it to you now? For the past four years, and God knows how many

before that, you've gone the pace. The lavishness of this bachelor

establishment of yours is common talk in New York--far in excess of a

bank cashier's salary. But you were supposed to be a wealthy man in your

own right; and so, in reality you were--once. But you went through

your fortune two years ago. Counted a model citizen, an upright man, an

honour to the community--what were you, Carling? What ARE you? Shall I

tell you? Roue, gambler, leading a double life of the fastest kind. You

did it cleverly, Carling; hid it well--but your game is up. To-night,

for instance, you are at the end of your tether, swamped with debts,

exposure threatening you at any moment. Why don't you tell me again that

I lie--Carling?”

But now the man made no answer. He had sunk a little deeper in his

chair--a dawning look of terror in the eyes that held, fascinated, on

Jimmie Dale.

“You cur!” said Jimmie Dale again. “You cur, with your devil's work! A

year ago you saw this night coming--when you must have money, or face

ruin and exposure. You saw it then, a year ago, the day that Moyne,

concealing nothing of his prison record, applied through friends for a

position in the bank. Your co-officials were opposed to his appointment,

but you, do you remember how you pleaded to give the man his chance--and

in your hellish ingenuity saw your way then out of the trap! An

ex-convict from Sing Sing! It was enough, wasn't it? What chance had

he!” Jimmie Dale paused, his left hand clenched until the skin formed

whitish knobs over the knuckles.

Carling's tongue sought his lips, made a circuit of them--and he tried

to speak, but his voice was an incoherent muttering.

“I'll not waste words,” said Jimmie Dale, in his grim monotone. “I'm not

sure enough myself--that I could keep my hands off you much longer. The

actual details of how you stole the money to-day do not matter--NOW. A

little later perhaps in court--but not now. You were the last to leave

the bank, but before leaving you pretended to discover the theft of a

hundred thousand dollars--that, done up in a paper parcel, was even then

reposing in your desk. You brought the parcel home, put it in that safe

there--and notified the president of the bank by telephone from here of

the robbery, suggesting that police headquarters be advised at once. He

told you to go ahead and act as you saw best. You notified the police,

speciously directing suspicion to--the ex-convict in the bank's employ.

You knew Moyne was dining out to-night, you knew where--and at a hint

from you the police took up the trail. A little later in the evening,

you took these two packages of banknotes from the rest, and with this

steamship ticket--which you obtained yesterday while out at lunch by

sending a district messenger boy with the money and instructions in a

sealed envelope to purchase for you--you went up to the Moynes' flat in

Harlem for the purpose of secreting them somewhere there. You pretended

to be much disappointed at finding Moyne out--you had just come for a

little social visit, to get better acquainted with the home life of your

employees! Mrs. Moyne was genuinely pleased and grateful. She took you

in to see their little girl, who was already asleep in bed. She left

you there for a moment to answer the door--and you--you”--Jimmie Dale's

voice choked again--“you blot on God's earth, you slipped the money and

ticket under the child's mattress!”

Carling came forward with a lurch in his chair--and his hands went out,

pawing in a wild, pleading fashion over Jimmie Dale's arm.

Jimmie Dale flung him away.

“You were safe enough,” he rasped on. “The police could only construe

your visit to Moyne's flat as zeal on behalf of the bank. And it

was safer, much more circumspect on your part, not to order the flat

searched at once, but only as a last resort, as it were, after you

had led the police to trail him all evening and still remain without

a clew--and besides, of course, not until you had planted the evidence

that was to damn him and wreck his life and home! You were even generous

in the amount you deprived yourself of out of the hundred thousand

dollars--for less would have been enough. Caught with ten thousand

dollars of the bank's money and a steamship ticket made out in a

fictitious name, it was prima-facie evidence that he had done the job

and had the balance somewhere. What would his denials, his protestations

of innocence count for? He was an ex-convict, a hardened criminal caught

red-handed with a portion of the proceeds of robbery--he had succeeded

in hiding the remainder of it too cleverly, that was all.”

Carling's face was ghastly. His hands went out again--again his tongue

moistened his dry lips. He whispered:

“Isn't--isn't there some--some way we can fix this?”

And then Jimmie Dale laughed--not pleasantly.

“Yes, there's a way, Carling,” he said grimly. “That's why I'm here.” He

picked up a sheet of writing paper and pushed it across the desk--then a

pen, which he dipped into the inkstand, and extended to the other. “The

way you'll fix it will be to write out a confession exonerating Moyne.”

Carling shrank back into his chair, his head huddling into his

shoulders.

“NO!” he cried. “I won't--I can't--my God!--I--I--WON'T!”

The automatic in Jimmie Dale's hand edged forward the fraction of an

inch.

“I have not used this--yet. You understand now why--don't you?” he said

under his breath.

“No, no!” Carling pushed away the pen. “I'm ruined--ruined as it is. But

this would mean the penitentiary, too--”

“Where you tried to send an innocent man in your place, you hound; where

you--”

“Some other way--some other way!” Carling was babbling. “Let me out of

this--for God's sake, let me out of this!”

“Carling,” said Jimmie Dale hoarsely, “I stood beside a little bed

to-night and looked at a baby girl--a little baby girl with golden hair,

who smiled as she slept.”

Carling shivered, and passed a shaking hand across his face.

“Take this pen,” said Jimmie Dale monotonously; “or--THIS!” The

automatic lifted until the muzzle was on a line with Carling's eyes.

Carling's hand reached out, still shaking, and took the pen; and his

body, dragged limply forward, hung over the desk. The pen spluttered on

the paper--a bead of sweat spurting from the man's forehead dropped to

the sheet.

There was silence in the room. A minute passed--another. Carling's pen

travelled haltingly across the paper then, with a queer, low cry as

he signed his name, he dropped the pen from his fingers, and, rising

unsteadily from his chair, stumbled away from the desk toward a couch

across the room.

An instant Jimmie Dale watched the other, then he picked up the sheet of

paper. It was a miserable document, miserably scrawled:

“I guess it's all up. I guess I knew it would be some day. Moyne hadn't

anything to do with it. I stole the money myself from the bank to-night.

I guess it's all up.

“THOMAS H. CARLING.”

From the paper, Jimmie Dale's eyes shifted to the figure by the

couch--and the paper fluttered suddenly from his fingers to the desk.

Carling was reeling, clutching at his throat--a small glass vial rolled

upon the carpet. And then, even as Jimmie Dale sprang forward, the other

pitched head long over the couch--and in a moment it was over.

Presently Jimmie Dale picked up the vial--and dropped it back on the

floor again. There was no label on it, but it needed none--the strong,

penetrating odor of bitter almonds was telltale evidence enough. It was

prussic, or hydrocyanic acid, probably the most deadly poison and the

swiftest in its action that was known to science--Carling had provided

against that “some day” in his confession!

For a little space, motionless, Jimmie Dale stood looking down at the

silent, outstretched form--then he walked slowly back to the desk, and

slowly, deliberately picked up the signed confession and the steamship

ticket. He held them an instant, staring at them, then methodically

began to tear them into little pieces, a strange, tired smile hovering

on his lips. The man was dead now--there would be disgrace enough for

some one to bear, a mother perhaps--who knew! And there was another way

now--since the man was dead.

Jimmie Dale put the pieces in his pocket, went to the safe, opened it,

and took out a parcel, locked the safe carefully, and carried the parcel

to the desk. He opened it there. Inside were nearly two dozen little

packages of hundred-dollar bills. The other two packages that he had

brought with him he added to the rest. From his pocket he took out the

thin metal insignia case, and with the tiny tweezers lifted up one of

the gray-coloured, diamond-shaped paper seals. He moistened the

adhesive side, and, still holding it by the tweezers, dropped it on

his handkerchief and pressed the seal down on the face of the topmost

package of banknotes. He tied the parcel up then, and, picking up the

pen, addressed it in printed characters:

HUDSON-MERCANTILE NATIONAL BANK,

NEW YORK CITY.

“District messenger--some way--in the morning,” he murmured.

Jimmie Dale slipped his mask into his pocket, and, with the parcel under

his arm, stepped to the door and unlocked it. He paused for an instant

on the threshold for a single, quick, comprehensive glance around the

room--then passed on out into the street.

At the corner he stopped to light a cigarette--and the flame of the

match spurting up disclosed a face that was worn and haggard. He threw

the match away, smiled a little wearily--and went on.

The Gray Seal had committed another “crime.”

CHAPTER VII

THE THIEF

Choosing between the snowy napery, the sparkling glass and silver, the

cozy, shaded table-lamps, the famous French chef of the ultra-exclusive

St. James Club, his own home on Riverside Drive where a dinner fit for

an epicure and served by Jason, that most perfect of butlers, awaited

him, and Marlianne's, Jimmie Dale, driving in alone in his touring car

from an afternoon's golf, had chosen--Marlianne's.

Marlianne's, if such a thing as Bohemianism, or, rather, a concrete

expression of it exists, was Bohemian. A two-piece string orchestra

played valiantly to the accompaniment of a hoarse-throated piano; and

between courses the diners took up the refrain--and, as it was always

between courses with some one, the place was a bedlam of noisy riot.

Nevertheless, it was Marlianne's--and Jimmie Dale liked Marlianne's. He

had dined there many times before, as he had just dined in the person of

Jimmie Dale, the millionaire, his high-priced imported car at the curb

of the shabby street outside--and he had dined there, disreputable in

attire, seedy in appearance, with the police yelping at his heels, as

Larry the Bat. In either character Marlianne's had welcomed him with

equal courtesy to its spotted linen and most excellent table-d'hote with

VIN ORDINAIRE--for fifty cents.

And now, in the act of reaching into his pocket for the change to pay

his bill, Jimmie Dale seemed suddenly to experience some difficulty in

finding what he sought, and his fingers went fumbling from one pocket

to another. Two men at the table in front of him were talking--their

voices, over a momentary lull in violin squeaks, talk, laughter,

singing, and the clatter of dishes, reached him:

“Carling commit suicide! Not on your life! No; of course he didn't! It

was that cursed Gray Seal croaked him, just as sure as you sit in that

chair!”

The other grunted. “Yes; but what'd the Gray Seal want to pinch a

hundred thousand out of the bank for, and then give it back again the

next morning?”

“What's he done a hundred other things for to cover up the real object

of what he's after?” retorted the first speaker, with a short, vicious

laugh; then, with a thump of his fist on the table: “The man's a devil,

a fiend, and anywhere else but New York he'd have been caught and sent

to the chair where he belongs long ago, and--”

A burst of ragtime drowned out the man's words. Jimmie Dale placed a

fifty-cent piece and a tip beside it on his dinner check, pushed

back his chair, and rose from the table. There was a half-tolerantly

satirical, half-angry glint in his dark, steady eyes. It was not only

the police who yelped at his heels, but every man, woman, and child in

the city. The man had not voiced his own sentiments--he had voiced the

sentiments of New York! And it was quite on the cards that if he, Jimmie

Dale, were ever caught his destination would not even be the death cell

and the chair at Sing Sing--his fellow citizens had reached a pitch

where they would be quite capable of literally tearing him to pieces if

they ever got their hands on him!

And yet there were a few, a very few, a handful out of five millions,

who sometimes remembered perhaps to thank God that the Gray Seal

lived--that was his reward. That--and SHE, whose mysterious letters

prompted and impelled his, the Gray Seal's, acts! She--nameless,

fascinating in her brilliant resourcefulness, amazing in her power, a

woman whose life was bound up with his and yet held apart from him in

the most inexplicable, absorbing way; a woman he had never seen, save

for her gloved arm in the limousine that night, who at one unexpected

moment projected a dazzling, impersonal existence across his path, and

the next, leaving him battling for his life where greed and passion and

crime swirled about him, was gone!

Jimmie Dale threaded the small, crowded rooms--the interior of

Marlianne's had never been altered from the days when the place had been

a family residence of some pretension--and, reaching the hall, received

his hat from the frowsy-looking boy in attendance. He passed outside,

and, at the top of the steps, paused as he took his cigarette case

from his pocket. It was nearly a week since Carling, the cashier of

the Hudson-Mercantile National Bank, had been found dead in his home,

a bottle that had contained hydrocyanic acid on the floor beside him;

nearly a week since Bookkeeper Bob, unaware that he had ever been under

temporary suspicion for the robbery of the bank, had, equally unknown

to himself, been cleared of any complicity in that affair--and yet, as

witness the conversation of a moment ago, it was still the topic of New

York, still the vital issue that filled the maw of the newspapers

with ravings, threats, and execrations against the Gray Seal, snarling

virulently the while at the police for the latter's ineptitude,

inefficiency, and impotence!

Jimmie Dale closed his cigarette case with a snap that was almost human

in its irony, dropped it back into his pocket, and lighted a match--but

the flame was arrested halfway to the tip of his cigarette, as his eyes

fixed suddenly and curiously on a woman's form hurrying down the street.

She had turned the corner before he took his eyes from her, and the

match between his fingers had gone out. Not that there was anything very

strange in a woman walking, or even half running, along the street; nor

that there was anything particularly attractive or unusual about

her, and if there had been the street was too dark for him to have

distinguished it. It was not that--it was the fact that she had neither

passed by the house on whose steps he stood, nor come out of any of the

adjoining houses. It was as though she had suddenly and miraculously

appeared out of thin air, and taken form on a sidewalk a little way down

from Marlianne's.

“That's queer!” commented Jimmie Dale to himself. “However--” He took

out another match, lighted his cigarette, jerked the match stub away

from him, and, with a lift of his shoulders, went down the steps.

He crossed the pavement, walked around the front of his machine, since

the steering wheel was on the side next to the curb, and, with his hand

out to open the car door--stopped. Some one had been tampering with

it--it was not quite closed. There was no mistake. Jimmie Dale made

no mistakes of that kind, a man whose life hung a dozen times a day on

little things could not afford to make them. He had closed it firmly,

even with a bang, when he had got out.

Instantly suspicious, he wrenched the door wide open, switched on

the light under the hood, and, with a sharp exclamation, bent quickly

forward. A glove, a woman's glove, a white glove lay on the floor of the

car. Jimmie Dale's pulse leaped suddenly into fierce, pounding beats. It

was HERS! He KNEW that intuitively--knew it as he knew that he breathed.

And that woman he had so leisurely watched as she had disappeared from

sight was, must have been--she!

He sprang from the car with a jump, his first impulse to dash after

her--and checked himself, laughing a little bitterly. It was too late

for that now--he had already let his chance slip through his fingers.

Around the corner was Sixth Avenue, surface cars, the elevated,

taxicabs, a multitude of people, any one of a hundred ways in which

she could, and would, already have discounted pursuit from him--and,

besides, he would not even have been able to recognise her if he saw

her!

Jimmie Dale's smile was mirthless as he turned back to the car, and

picked up the glove. Why had she dropped it there? It could not have

been intentional. Why had--he began to tear suddenly at the glove's

little finger, and in another second, kneeling on the car's step, his

shoulders inside, he was holding a ring close under the little electric

bulb.

It was a gold seal ring, a small, dainty thing that bore a crest:

a bell, surmounted by a bishop's mitre--the bell, quaint in design,

harking the imagination back to some old-time belfry tower. And

underneath, in the scroll--a motto. It was a full minute before Jimmie

Dale could decipher it, for the lettering was minute and the words, of

course, reversed. It was in French: SONNEZ LE TOCSIN.

He straightened up, the glove and ring in his hand, a puzzled expression

on his face. It was strange! Had she, after all, dropped the glove

there intentionally; had she at last let down the barriers just a little

between them, and given him this little intimate sign that she--

And then Jimmie Dale laughed abruptly, self-mockingly. He was only

trying to deceive himself, to argue himself into believing what, with

heart and soul, he wanted to believe. It was not like her--and neither

was it so! His eyes had fixed on the seat beside the wheel. He had not

used the lap rug all that day, he couldn't use a rug and drive, he had

left it folded and hanging on the rack in the tonneau--it was now neatly

folded and reposing on the front seat!

“Yes,” said Jimmie Dale, a sort of self-pity in his tones, “I might have

known.”

He lifted the rug. Beneath it on the leather seat lay a white envelope.

Her letter! The letter that never came save with the plan of some grim,

desperate work outlined ahead--the call to arms for the Gray Seal.

SONNEZ LE TOCSIN! Ring the Tocsin! Sound the alarm! The Tocsin!

The words were running through his brain. A strange motto on that

crest--that seemed so strangely apt! The Tocsin! Never once in all the

times that he had heard from her, never once in the years that had gone

since that initial letter of hers had struck its first warning note,

had any communication from her been but to sound again a new alarm--the

Toscin! The Tocsin--the word seemed to visualise her, to give her a

concrete form and being, to breathe her very personality.

“The Tocsin!”--Jimmie Dale whispered the word softly, a little

wistfully. “Yes; I shall call you that--the Tocsin!”

He folded the glove very carefully, placed it with the ring in his

pocketbook, picked up the letter--and, with a sharp exclamation, turned

it quickly over in his fingers, then bent hurriedly with it to the

light.

Strange things were happening that night! For the first time, the letter

was not even SEALED! That was not like her, either! What did it mean?

Quick, alert now, anxious even, he pulled the double, folded sheets

from the envelope, glanced rapidly through them--and, after a moment, a

smile, whimsical, came slowly to his lips.

It was quite plain now--all of it. The glove, the ring, and the unsealed

letter--and the postscript held the secret; or, rather, what had been

intended for a postscript did, for it comprised only a few words, ending

abruptly, unfinished: “Look in the cupboard at the rear of the room. The

man with the red wig is--” That was all, and the words, written in ink,

were badly blurred, as though the paper had been hastily folded before

the ink was dry.

It was quite plain; and, in view of the real explanation of it all,

eminently characteristic of her. With the letter already written, she

had come there, meaning to place it on the seat and cover it with the

rug, as, indeed, she had done; then, deciding to add the postscript, and

because she would attract less attention that way than in any other, she

had climbed into the car as though it belonged to her, and had seated

herself there to write it. She would have been hurried in her movements,

of course, and in pulling off her glove to use the fountain pen the ring

had come with it. The rest was obvious. She had but just begun to write

when he had appeared on the steps. She had slipped instantly down to

the floor of the car, probably dropping the glove from her lap, hastily

inclosed the letter in the envelope which she had no time to seal,

thrust the envelope under the rug, and, forgetting her glove and fearful

of risking his attention by attempting to close the door firmly,

had stolen along the body of the car, only to be noticed by him too

late--when she was well down the street!

And at that latter thought, once more chagrin seized Jimmie Dale--then

he turned impulsively to the letter. All this was extraneous, apart--for

another time, when every moment was not a priceless asset as it very

probably was now.

“Dear Philanthropic Crook”--it always began that way, never any other

way. He read on more and more intently, crouched there close to the

light on the floor of his car, lips thinning as he proceeded--read it to

the end, absorbing, memorising it--and then the abortive postscript:

“Look in the cupboard at the rear of the room. The man with the red wig

is--”

For an instant, as mechanically he tore the letter into little shreds,

he held there hesitant--and the next, slamming the door tight, he flung

himself into the seat behind the wheel, and the big, sixty-horse-power,

self-starting machine was roaring down the street.

The Tocsin! There was a grim smile on Jimmie Dale's lips now. The alarm!

Yes, it was always an alarm, quick, sudden, an emergency to face on the

instant--plans, decisions to be made with no time to ponder them, with

only that one fact to consider, staggering enough in itself, that a

mistake meant disaster and ruin to some one else, and to himself, if

the courts were merciful where he had little hope for mercy, the

penitentiary for life!

And now to-night again, as it almost always was when these mysterious

letters came, every moment of inaction was piling up the odds against

him. And, too, the same problem confronted him. How, in what way, in

what role, must he play the night's game to its end? As Larry the Bat?

The car was speeding forward. He was heading down Broadway now, lower

Broadway, that stretched before him, deserted like some dark, narrow

canyon where, far below, like towering walls, the buildings closed

together and seemed to converge into some black, impassable barrier. The

street lights flashed by him; a patrolman stopped the swinging of his

night-stick, and turned to gaze at the car that rushed by at a rate

perilously near to contempt of speed laws; street cars passed at

indifferent intervals; pedestrians were few and far between--it was the

lower Broadway of night.

Larry the Bat? Jimmie Dale shook his head impatiently over the steering

wheel. No; that would not do. It would be well enough for this young

Burton, perhaps, but not for old Isaac, the East Side fence--for Isaac

knew him in the character of Larry the Bat. His quick, keen brain,

weaving, eliminating, devising, scheming, discarded that idea. The final

coup of the night, as yet but sensed in an indefinite, unshaped way, if

enacted in the person of Larry the Bat would therefore stamp Larry the

Bat and the Gray Seal as one--a contretemps but little less fatal, in

view of old Issac, than to bracket the Gray Seal and Jimmie Dale! Larry

the Bat was not a character to be assumed with impunity, nor one to

jeopardize--it was a bulwark of safety, at it were, to which more than

once he owed escape from capture and discovery.

He lifted his shoulders with a sudden jerk of decision as the car

swerved to the left and headed for the East Side. There was only

one alternative then--the black silk mask that folded into such tiny

compass, and that, together with an automatic and the curious, thin

metal case that looked so like a cigarette case, was always in his

pocket for an emergency!

The car turned again, and, approaching its destination, Jimmie Dale

slowed down the speed perceptibly. It was a strange case, not a pleasant

one--and the raw edges where they showed were ugly in their nakedness.

Old Isaac Pelina, young Burton, and Maddon--K. Wilmington Maddon, the

wall-paper magnate! Curious, that of the three he should already know

two--old Isaac and Maddon! Everybody in the East Side, every denizen

of the underworld, and many who posed on a far higher plane knew old

Isaac--fence to the most select clientele of thieves in New York,

unscrupulous, hand in glove with any rascality or crime that promised

profit, a money lender, a Shylock without even a Shylock's humanity as

a saving grace! Yes; as Larry the Bat he knew old Isaac, and he knew him

not only personally but by firsthand reputation--he had heard the man

cursed in blasphemous, whole-souled abandon by more than one crook who

was in the old fence's toils. They dealt with him, the crooks, while

they swore to “get” him because he was “safe,” but--Jimmie Dale's lips

parted in a mirthless smile--some day old Isaac would be found in that

spiders' den of his back of the dingy loan office with a knife in his

heart or a bullet through his head! And K. Wilmington Maddon--Jimmie

Dale's smile grew whimsical--he had known Maddon quite intimately for

years, had even dined with him at the St. James Club only a few nights

before. Maddon was a man in his own “set”--and Maddon, interfered with,

was likely to prove none too tractable a customer to handle. And young

Burton, the letter had said, was Maddon's private and confidential

secretary. Jimmie Dale's lips thinned again. Well, Burton's acquaintance

was still to be made! It was a curious trio--and it was dirty work, more

raw than cunning, more devilish than ingenious; blackmail in its most

hellish form; the stake, at the least calculation, a cool half million.

A heavy price for a single slip in a man's life!

He brought the car abruptly to a halt at the edge of the curb, and

sprang out to the ground. He was in front of “The Budapest” restaurant,

a garish establishment, most popular of all resorts for the moment on

the East Side, where Fifth Avenue, in the fond belief that it was seeing

the real thing in “seamy” life, engaged its table a week in advance.

Jimmie Dale pushed a bill into the door attendant's hand, accompanied by

an injunction to keep an eye on the machine, and entered the cafe.

But for a sort of tinselled ostentation the place might well have been

the Marlianne's that he had just left--it was crowded and riot was

at its height; a stringed orchestra in Hungarian costume played what

purported to be Hungarian airs; shouts, laughter, clatter of dishes,

and thump of steins added to the din. He made his way between the

close-packed tables to the stairs, and descended to the lower floor.

Here, if anything, the confusion was greater than above; but here,

too, was an exit through to the rear street--and a moment later he was

sauntering past the front of an unkempt little pawnshop, closed for

the night, over whose door, in the murk of a distant street lamp, three

balls hung in sagging disarray, tawny with age, and across whose dirty,

unwashed windows, letters missing, ran the legend:

IS AC PELINA Pawn brok r

The pawnshop made the corner of a very dark and narrow lane--and, with a

quick glance around him to assure himself that he was unobserved, Jimmie

Dale stepped into the alleyway, and, lost instantly in the blacker

shadows, stole along by the wall of the pawnshop. Old Isaac's business

was not all done through the front door.

And then suddenly Jimmie Dale shrank still closer against the wall. Was

it intuition, premonition--or reality? There seemed an uncanny feeling

of PRESENCE around him, as though perhaps he were watched, as though

others beside himself were in the lane. Yes; ahead of him a shadow

moved--he could just barely distinguish it now that his eyes had grown

accustomed to the darkness. It, like himself, was close against the

wall, and now it slunk noiselessly down the length of the lane until he

lost sight of it. AND WHAT WAS THAT? He strained his ears to listen. It

seemed like a window being opened or closed, cautiously, stealthily, the

fraction of an inch at a time. And then he located the sound--it came

from the other side of the lane and very nearly opposite to where, on

the second floor, a dull, yellow glow shone out from old Isaac's private

den in the rear of the pawnshop's office.

Jimmie Dale's brows were gathered in sharp furrows. There was evidently

something afoot to-night of which the Tocsin had NOT sounded the alarm.

And then the frown relaxed, and he smiled a little. Miraculous as was

the means through which she obtained the knowledge that was the basis of

their strange partnership, it was no more miraculous than her unerring

accuracy in the minutest details. The Tocsin had never failed him yet.

It was possible that something was afoot around him, quite probable,

indeed, since he was in the most vicious part of the city, in the heart

of gangland; but whatever it might be, it was certainly extraneous to

his mission or she would have mentioned it.

The lane was empty now, he was quite sure of that--and there was

no further sound from the window opposite. He started forward once

more--only to halt again for the second time as abruptly as before,

squeezing if possible even more closely against the wall. Some one had

turned into the lane from the sidewalk, and, walking hurriedly, choosing

with evident precaution the exact centre of the alleyway, came toward

him.

The man passed, his hurried stride a half run; and, a few feet beyond,

halted at old Isaac's side door. From somewhere inside the old building

Jimmie Dale's ears caught the faint ringing of an electric bell; a

long ring, followed in quick succession by three short ones--then the

repeated clicking of a latch, as though pulled by a cord from above, and

the man passed in through the door, closing it behind him.

Jimmie Dale nodded to himself in the darkness. It was a spring lock; the

signal was one long ring and three short ones--the Tocsin had not missed

even those small details. Also, Burton was late for his appointment, for

that must have been Burton--business such as old Isaac had in hand

that night would have permitted the entrance of no other visitor but K.

Wilmington Maddon's private secretary.

He moved down the lane to the door, and tried it softly. It was locked,

of course. The slim, tapering, sensitive fingers, whose tips were eyes

and ears to Jimmie Dale, felt over the lock--and a slender little steel

instrument slipped into the keyhole. A moment more and the catch was

released, and the door, under his hand, began to open. With it ajar,

he paused, his eyes searching intently up and down the lane. There was

nothing, no sign of any one, no moving shadows now. His gaze shifted to

the window opposite. Directly facing it now, with the dull reflection

upon it from the lighted window of old Isaac's den above his head, he

could make out that it was open--but that was all.

Once more he smiled--a little tolerantly at himself this time. Some one

had been in the lane; some one had opened the window of his or her

room in that tenement house across from him--surely there was nothing

surprising, unnatural, or even out of the commonplace in that. He had

been a little bit on edge himself, perhaps, and the sudden movement of

that shadow, unexpected, had startled him for the moment, as, in all

probability, the opening of the window had startled the skulking figure

itself into action.

The door was open now. He stepped noiselessly inside, and closed it

noiselessly behind him. He was in a narrow hall, where a few yards away,

a light shone down a stairway at right angles to the hall itself.

“Rear door of pawnshop opens into hall, and exactly opposite very short

flight of stairs leading directly to doorway of Isaac's den above.

Ramshackle old place, low ceilings. Isaac, when sitting in his den, can

look down, and, by means of a transom over the rear door of the shop,

see the customers as they enter from the street, while he also keeps an

eye on his assistant. Latter always locks up and leaves promptly at six

o'clock--” Jimmie Dale was subconsciously repeating to himself snatches

from the Tocsin's letter, which, as subconsciously in reading, he had

memorised almost word for word.

And now voices reached him--one, excited, nervous, as though the

speaker were labouring under mental strain that bordered closely on

the hysterical; the other, curiously mingling a querulousness with an

attempt to pacify, but dominantly contemptuous, sneering, cold.

Jimmie Dale moved along the hall--very slowly--without a sound--testing

each step before he threw his body weight from one leg to the other. He

reached the foot of the stairs. The Tocsin had been right; it was a very

short flight. He counted the steps--there were eight. Above, facing him,

a door was open. The voices were louder now. It was a sordid-looking

room, what he could see of it, poverty-stricken in its appearance,

intentionally so probably for effect, with no attempt whatever at

furnishing. He could see through the doorway to the window that opened

on the alleyway, or, rather, just glimpse the top of the window at an

angle across the room--that and a bare stretch of floor. The two men

were not in the line of vision.

Burton's voice--it was unquestionably Burton speaking--came to Jimmie

Dale now distinctly.

“No, I didn't! I tell you, I didn't! I--I hadn't the nerve.”

Jimmie Dale slipped his black silk mask over his face; and with extreme

caution, on hands and knees, began to climb the stairs.

“So!” It was old Isaac now, in a half purr, half sneer. “And I was so

sure, my young friend, that you had. I was so sure that you were not

such a fool. Yes; I could even have sworn that they were in your pocket

now--what? It is too bad--too bad! It is not a pleasant thing to think

of, that little chair up the river in its horrible little room where--”

“For God's sake, Isaac--not that! Do you hear--not that! My God, I

didn't mean to--I didn't know what I was doing!”

Jimmie Dale crept up another step, another, and another. There was

silence for a moment in the room; then Burton again, hoarse-voiced:

“Isaac, I'll make good to you some other way. I swear I will--I swear

it! If I'm caught at this I'll--I'll get fifteen years for it.”

“And which would you rather have?” Jimmie Dale could picture the oily

smirk, the shrug of his shoulders, the outthrust hands, palms upward,

elbows in at the hips, the fingers curved and wide apart--“fifteen

years, or what you get--for murder? Eh, my friend, you have thought of

that--eh? It is a very little price I ask--yes?”

“Damn you!” Burton's voice was shrill, then dropped to a half sob. “No,

no, Isaac, I didn't mean that. Only, for God's sake be merciful! It is

not only the risk of the penitentiary; it's more than that. I--I tried

to play white all my life, and until that cursed night there's no man

living could say I haven't. You know that--you know that, Isaac. I tell

you I couldn't do it this afternoon--I tell you I couldn't. I tried to

and--and I couldn't.”

Jimmie Dale was lying flat on the little landing now, peering into the

room. Back a short distance from the doorway, a repulsive-looking

little man in unkempt clothes and soiled linen, with yellowish-skinned,

parchment face, out of which small black eyes shone cunningly and

shrewdly, sat at a bare deal table in a rickety chair; facing him across

the table stood a young man of not more than twenty-five, clean cut,

well dressed, but whose face was unnaturally white now, and whose hand,

as he extended it in a pleading gesture toward the other, trembled

visibly. Jimmie Dale's hand made its way quietly to his side pocket and

extracted his automatic.

Old Isaac humped his shoulders, and leered at his visitor.

“We talk a great deal, my young friend. What is the use? A bargain is

a bargain. A few rubies in exchange for your life. A few rubies and my

mouth is shut. Otherwise”--he humped his shoulders again. “Well?”

Burton drew back, swept his hand in a dazed way across his eyes--and

laughed out suddenly in bitter mirth.

“A few rubies!” he cried. “The most magnificent stones on this side of

the water--a FEW rubies! It's been Maddon's life hobby. Every child in

New York knows that! A few--yes, there's only a few--but those few are

worth a fortune. He trusts me, the man has been like a father to me,

and--”

“So you are the very last to be suspected,” observed old Isaac suavely.

“Have I not told you that? There is nothing to fear. Did we not arrange

everything so nicely--eh, my young friend? See, it was to-night that

Maddon gives a little reception to his friends, and did you not say that

the rubies would be taken from the safe-deposit vault this afternoon

since his friends always clamoured to see them as a very fitting

conclusion to an evening's entertainment? And did you not say that you

very naturally had access to the safe in the library where you worked,

and that he would not notice they were gone until he came to look

for them some time this evening? I think you said all that. And what

suspicion let alone proof, would attach itself to you? You were out of

the room once when he, too, was absent for perhaps half an hour. It

is very simple. In that half hour, some one, somehow, abstracted them.

Certainly it was not you. You see how little I ask--and I pay well, do I

not? And so I gave you until to-night. Three days have gone, and I have

said nothing, and the body has not been found--eh? But to-night--eh--it

was understood! The rubies--or the chair.”

Burton's lips moved, but it was a moment before he could speak.

“You wouldn't dare!” he whispered thickly. “You wouldn't dare! I'd tell

the story of--of what you tried to make me do, and they'd send you up

for it.”

Old Isaac shrugged with pitying contempt.

“Is it, after all, a fool I am dealing with!” he sneered. “And I--what

should I say? That you had stolen the stones from your employer and

offered them as a bribe to silence me, and that I had refused. The very

act of handing you over to the police would prove the truth of what I

said and rob you of even a chance of leniency--FOR THAT OTHER THING. Is

it not so--eh? And why did I not hand you over at once three nights ago?

Believe me, my young friend, I should have a very good reason ready, a

dozen, if necessary, if it came to that. But we are borrowing trouble,

are we not? We shall not come to that--eh?”

For a moment it seemed to Jimmie Dale, as he watched, that Burton would

hurl himself upon the other. White to the lips, the muscles of his face

twitching, Burton clenched his fists and leaned over the table--and

then, with sudden revulsion of emotion, he drew back once more, and once

more came that choked sob:

“You'll pay for this, Isaac--your turn will come for this!

“I have been threatened very often,” snapped the other contemptuously.

“Bah, what are threats! I laugh at them--as I always will.” Then, with

a quick change of front, his voice a sudden snarl: “Well, we have

talked enough. You have your choice. The stones or--eh? And it is

to-night--NOW!”

The old pawnbroker sprawled back in his chair, a cunning leer on his

vicious face, a gleam of triumph, greed, in the beady, ratlike eyes that

never wavered from the other. Burton, moisture oozing from his forehead,

stood there, hesitant, staring back at old Isaac, half in a fascinated

gaze, half as though trying to read some sign of weakness in the bestial

countenance that confronted him. And then, very slowly, in an automatic,

machine-like way, his hand groped into the inside pocket of his

vest--and old Isaac cackled out in derision.

“So! You thought you could bluff me, eh--you thought you could fool old

Isaac! Bah! I read you like a book! Did I not tell you a while back that

you had them in your pocket? I know your kind, my young friend; I know

your kind very well indeed--it is my business. You would not have

dared to come here to-night without the price. So! You took them this

afternoon as we agreed. Yes, yes; you did well. You will not regret it.

And now let me see them”--his voice rose eagerly--“let me see them now,

my young friend.”

“Yes, I took them.” Burton spoke listlessly. “God help me!”

Old Isaac, quivering, excited, like a different creature now, sprang

from his chair, and, as Burton drew a long, flat, leather case from

his pocket, snatched it from the other's hand. His fingers in their

rapacious haste could not at first manipulate the catch, and then

finally, with the case open, he bent over the table feverishly. The

light reflected back as from some living mass of crimson fire, now

shading darkly, now glowing into wondrous, colourful transparency as he

moved the case to and fro with jerky motions of his hands--and he was

babbling, crooning to himself like one possessed.

“Ah, the little beauties! Ah, the pretty little things! Yes, yes; these

are the ones! This is the great Aracon--see, see, the six-sided prism

terminated by the six-sided pyramid. But it must be cut--it must be cut

to sell it, eh? Ah, it is too bad--too bad! And this, this one here, I

know them all, this is--”

But his sentence was never finished--it was Jimmie Dale, on his feet

now, leaning against the jamb of the door, his automatic covering the

two men at the table, who spoke.

“Quite so, Isaac,” he said coolly; “you know them all! Quite so,

Isaac--but be good enough to DROP them!”

The case fell from Isaac's hand, the flush on his cheeks died to a

sickly pallor, and, his mouth half open, he stood like a man turned to

stone, his hands with curved fingers still outstretched over the table,

over the crimson gems that, spilled from the case, lay scattered now

on the tabletop. Burton neither spoke nor moved--a little whiter, the

misery in his face almost apathetic, he moistened his lips with the tip

of his tongue.

Jimmie Dale walked across the room, halted at the end of the table,

and surveyed the two men grimly. And then, while one hand with revolver

extended rested easily on the table, the other gathered up the stones,

placed them in the case, and, the case in his pocket, Jimmie Dale's lips

parted in an uninviting smile.

“I guess I'm in luck to-night, eh, Isaac?” he drawled. “Between you and

your young friend, as I believe you call him, it would appear as though

I had fallen on my feet. That Aracon's worth--what would you say?--a

hundred, two hundred thousand alone, eh? A very famous stone, that--had

your eye on it for quite a time, Isaac, you miserable blood leech, eh?”

Isaac did not answer; but, while he still held back from the table, he

seemed to be regaining a little of his composure--burglars of whatever

sort were no novelty to him--and was staring fixedly at Jimmie Dale.

“Can't place me--though there's not many in the profession you don't

know? Is that it?” inquired Jimmie Dale softly. “Well, don't try, Isaac;

it's hardly worth your while. I'VE got the stones now, and--”

“Wait! Wait! Listen!” It was Burton, speaking for the first time, his

words coming in a quick, nervous rush. “Listen! You don't--”

“Hold your tongue!” cried old Isaac, with sudden fierceness. “You are a

fool!” He leaned toward Jimmie Dale, a crafty smile on his face, quite

in control of himself once more. “Don't listen to him--listen to me.

You're right. I can't place you, and it doesn't make any difference”--he

took a step forward--“but--”

“Not too close, Isaac!” snapped Jimmie Dale sharply. “I know YOU!”

“So!” ejaculated old Isaac, rubbing his hands together. “So! That is

good! That is what I want. Listen, we will make a bargain. We are birds

of a feather, eh? All thieves, eh? You've got the drop on us who did all

the work, but you'll give us our share--eh? Listen! You couldn't get rid

of those stones alone. You know that; you're not so green at the game,

eh? You'd have to go to some one. You know me; you know old Isaac, you

say. Well, then, you know there isn't another man in New York could

dispose of those rubies and play SAFE doing it except me. I'll make a

good bargain with you.”

“Isaac,” said Jimmie Dale pensively, “you've made a good many 'good'

bargains. I wonder when you'll make your last! There's more than one

looking for 'interest' on those bargains in a pretty grim sort of way.”

“Bah!” ejaculated old Isaac. “It is an old story. They are all alike. I

am afraid of none of them. I hold them all like--THAT!” His hand opened

and closed like a taloned claw.

“And you'd add me to the lot, eh?” said Jimmie Dale. He lifted the

revolver, its muzzle on old Isaac, examined the mechanism thoughtfully,

and lowered it again. “Very well, I'll make a bargain with

you--providing it is agreeable to your young friend here.”

“Ah!” exclaimed old Isaac shrilly. “So! That is good! It is done then.”

He chuckled hoarsely. “Any bargain I make he will agree to. Is it not

so?” He fixed his eyes on Burton. “Well, is it not so? Speak up! Say--”

He stopped--the words cut short off on his lips. It came without

warning--a crash, a pound on the door below--another.

Burton shrank back against the wall.

“My God! The police!” he gasped. “Maddon's found out! We're--we're

caught!”

Jimmie Dale's eyes, on old Isaac, narrowed. The pounding in the alleyway

grew louder, more insistent. And then his first suspicion passed--it

was no “game” of Isaac's. Crafty though the old fox was, the other's

surprise and agitation was too genuine to be questioned.

Still the pounding continued--some one was kicking viciously at the

door, and banging a tattoo on the panels with his fists.

Old Isaac's clawlike hands doubled suddenly.

“It is some drunken sot,” he snarled out, “that knows no better than to

come here and rouse the whole neighbourhood! It is true, in a moment we

will have the police running in from the street. But wait--wait--I'll

teach the fool a lesson!” He dashed around the table, ran for the

window, wrenched the catch up, flung the window open, and, snarling

again, leaned out--and instantly the knocking ceased.

And instantly then, with a sharp cry, as the whole ghastly meaning of it

swept upon him, Jimmie sprang after the other--too late! Came the

roar of a revolver shot, a stream of flame cutting the darkness of the

alleyway from the window in the house opposite--and, without a sound,

old Isaac crumpled up, hung limply for a moment over the sill, and slid

in a heap to the floor.

On his hands and knees, protected from the possibility of another bullet

by the height of the sill, Jimmie Dale, quick in every movement now,

dragged the inert form toward the table away from the window, and bent

hurriedly over the other. A minute perhaps he stayed there--and then

rose slowly.

Burton, horror-stricken, unmanned, beside himself, was hanging,

clutching with both hands at the table edge.

“He's dead,” said Jimmie Dale laconically.

Burton flung out his hands.

“Dead!” he whispered hoarsely. “I--I think I'm going mad. Three days of

hell--and now this. We'd--we'd better get out of here quick--they'll get

us if--”

Jimmie Dale's hand fell with a tight grip on Burton's shoulder.

“There won't be any more shots fired--pull yourself together!”

Burton stared at him in a demented way.

“What's--what's it mean?” he stammered.

“It means that I didn't put two and two together,” said Jimmie Dale a

little bitterly. “It means that there's a dozen crooks been dancing

old Isaac's tune for a long time--and that some of them have got him at

last.”

Burton reached out suddenly and clutched Jimmie Dale's arm.

“Then I'm safe!” He mumbled the words, but there was dawning hope,

relief in his white face. “Safe! I'm safe--if you'll only give me back

those stones. Give them back to me, for God's sake give them back to me!

You don't know--you don't understand. I stole them because--because he

made me--because I--it was the only chance I had. Oh, my God, you don't

know what the last three days have been! Give them back to me, won't

you--won't you? You--you don't know!”

“Don't lose your nerve!” said Jimmie Dale sharply. “Sit down!” He pushed

the other into the chair. “There's no one will disturb us here for some

time at least. What is it that I don't know? That three nights ago

you were in a gambling hell, Sagosto's, to be exact, one of the most

disreputable in New York--and you went there on the invitation of a

stray acquaintance, a man named Perley--shall I describe him for you? A

short, slim-built man, black eyes, red hair, beard, and--”

“YOU know that!” The misery, the hopelessness was back in Burton's face

again--and suddenly he bent over the table and buried his head in his

outflung arms.

There was silence for a moment. Tight-lipped, Jimmie Dale's eyes

travelled from Burton's shaking shoulders to the motionless form on the

floor. Then he spoke again:

“You're a bit of a rounder, Burton, but I think you've had a lesson that

will last you all your life. You were half-drunk when you and Perley

began to hobnob over a downtown bar. He said he'd show you some real

life, and you went with him to Sagosto's. He gave you a revolver before

you went in, and told you the place wasn't safe for an unarmed man. He

introduced you to Sagosto, the proprietor, and you were shown to a

back room. You drank quite a little there. You and Perley were alone,

throwing dice. You got into a quarrel. Perley tried to draw his

revolver. You were quicker. You drew the one he had given you--and

fired. He fell to the floor--you saw the blood gush from his breast just

above the heart--he was dead. In a panic you rushed from the place and

out into the street. I don't think you went home that night.”

Burton raised his head, showing his haggard face.

“I guess it's no use,” he said dully. “If you know, others must. I

thought only Isaac and Sagosto knew. Why haven't I been arrested? I wish

to God I had--I wouldn't have had to-day to answer for.”

“I am not through yet,” said Jimmie Dale gravely. “The next day old

Isaac here sent for you. He said Sagosto had told him of the murder, and

had offered to dispose of the corpse and keep his mouth shut for fifty

thousand dollars--that no one in his place knew of it except himself.

Isaac, for his share, wanted considerably more. You told him you had no

such sums, that you had no money. He told you how you could get it--you

had access to Maddon's safe, you were Maddon's confidential

secretary, fully in your employer's trust, the last man on earth to be

suspected--and there were Maddon's famous, priceless rubies.”

Jimmie Dale paused. Burton made no answer.

“And so,” said Jimmie Dale presently, “to save yourself from the death

penalty you took them.”

“Yes,” said Burton, scarcely above his breath. “Are you an officer? If

you are, take me, have done with it! Only for Heaven's sake end it! If

you're not--”

Jimmie Dale was not listening. “The cupboard at the rear of the room,”

she had said. He walked across to it now, opened it, and, after a little

search, found a small bundle. He returned with it in his hand, and,

kneeling beside the dead man on the floor, his back to Burton, untied

it, took out a red wig and beard, and slipped them on to old Isaac's

head and face.

“I wonder,” he said grimly, as he stood up, “if you ever saw this man

before?”

“My God--PERLEY!” With a wild cry, Burton was on his feet, straining

forward like a man crazed.

“Yes,” said Jimmie Dale, “Perley! Sort of an ironic justice in his end

as far as you are concerned, isn't there? I think we'll leave him like

that--as Perley. It will provide the police with an interesting little

problem--which they will never solve, and--STEADY!”

Burton was rocking on his feet, the tears were streaming down his face.

He lurched heavily--and Jimmie Dale caught him, and pushed him back into

the chair again.

“I thought--I thought there was blood on my hands,” said Burton brokenly;

“that--that I had taken a man's life. It was horrible, horrible! I've

lived through three days that I thought would drive me mad, while I--I

tried to do my work, and--and talk to people, just as if nothing had

happened. And every one that spoke to me seemed so carefree and happy,

and I would have sold my soul to have changed places with them.” He

stared at the form on the floor, and shivered suddenly. “It--it was like

that I saw him last!” he whispered. “But--but I do not understand.”

Jimmie Dale smiled a little wearily.

“It was simple enough,” he said. “Old Isaac had had his eyes on those

rubies for a long time. The easiest way of getting them was through you.

The revolver he gave you before you entered Sagosto's was loaded with

blank cartridges, the blood you saw was the old, old trick--a punctured

bladder of red pigment concealed under the vest.”

“Let us get out of here!” Burton shuddered again. “Let us get out of

here--at once--now. If we're found here, we'll be accused of--THAT!”

“There is no hurry,” Jimmie Dale answered quietly. “I have told you that

no one is liable to come here to-night--and whoever did this certainly

will not raise an alarm. And besides, there is still the matter of the

rubies--Burton.”

“Yes,” said Burton, with a quick intake of his breath.

“Yes--the rubies--what are you going to do with them? I--I had forgotten

them. You'll--” He stopped, stared at Jimmie Dale, and burst into a

miserable laugh. “I'm a fool, a blind fool!” he moaned. “It does not

matter what you do with them. I forgot Sagosto. When they find Isaac

here, Sagosto will either tell his story, which will be enough to

convict me of this night's work, the REAL murder, even though I'm

innocent; or else he'll blackmail me just as Isaac did.”

Jimmie Dale shook his head.

“You are doing Isaac's cunning an injustice,” he said grimly. “Sagosto

was only a tool, one of many that old Isaac had in his power--and, for

that matter, as likely as any one else to have had a hand in Isaac's

murder to-night. Sagosto saw you once when Isaac brought you into his

place--not because Isaac wanted Sagosto to see you, but because he

wanted YOU to see Sagosto. Do you understand? It would make the story

that Sagosto came to him with the tale of the murder the next day ring

true. Sagosto, however, did not go to old Isaac the next day to tell

about any fake murder--naturally. Sagosto would not know you again

from Adam--neither does he know anything about the rubies, nor what old

Isaac's ulterior motives were. He was paid for his share in the game in

old Isaac's usual manner of payment probably--by a threat of exposure

for some old-time offence, that Isaac held over him, if he didn't keep

his mouth shut.”

Burton's hand brushed his eyes.

“Yes,” he muttered. “Yes--I see it now.”

Jimmie Dale stooped down, picked up the paper from the floor in which

the wig and beard had been wrapped, walked back with it, and replaced

it in the cupboard. And then, with his back to Burton again, he took

the case of gems from his pocket, opened it, and laid it on the cupboard

shelf. Also from his pocket came that thin metal case, and from the

case, with a pair of tweezers that obviated the possibility of telltale

finger prints, a gray, diamond-shaped piece of paper, adhesive on

one side that, cursed by the distracted authorities in every police

headquarters on both sides of the Atlantic, and raved at by a virulent

press whose printed reproductions had made it familiar in every

household in the land--was the insignia of the Gray Seal. He moistened

the adhesive side, dropped it from the tweezers to his handkerchief, and

pressed it down firmly on the inside of the cover of the jewel case. He

put both cases back in his pockets, and returned to Burton.

“Burton,” he said a little sharply, “while I was outside that doorway

there, I heard you beg old Isaac to let you keep the rubies, and three

times already you have asked the same of me. What would you do with them

if I gave them back to you?”

Burton did not reply for a moment--he was gazing at the masked face in a

half-eager, half-doubtful way.

“You--you mean you will give them back!” he burst out finally.

“Answer my question,” prompted Jimmie Dale.

“Do with them?” Burton repeated slowly. “Why, I've told you. They'd go

back to Mr. Maddon--I'd take them back.”

“Would you?” Jimmie Dale's voice was quizzical.

A puzzled expression came to Burton's face.

“I don't know what you mean by that,” he said. “Of course, I would!”

“How?” asked Jimmie Dale. “Do you know the combination of Mr. Maddon's

safe?”

“No,” said Burton

“And the safe would be locked, wouldn't it?”

“Yes.”

“Quite so,” said Jimmie Dale musingly. “Then, granted that Mr. Maddon

has not already discovered the theft, how would you replace the stones

before he does discover it? And if he already knows that they are gone,

how would you get them back into his hands?”

“Yes, I know,” Burton answered a little listlessly. “I've thought of

that. There's only one way--to take them back to him myself, and make a

clean breast of it, and--” He hesitated.

“And tell him you stole them,” supplied Jimmie Dale.

Burton nodded his head. “Yes,” he said.

“And then?” prodded Jimmie Dale. “What will Maddon do? From what I've

heard of him, he's not a man to trifle with, nor a man to take an overly

complacent view of things--not the man whose philosophy is 'all's well

that ends well.'”

“What does it matter?” Burton's voice was low. “It isn't that so much.

I'm ready for that. It's the fact that he trusted me implicitly, and

I--well, I played the fool, or I'd never have got into a mess like

this.”

For an instant Jimmie Dale looked at the other searchingly, and then,

smiling strangely, he shook his head.

“There's a better way than that, Burton,” he said quietly.

“I think, as I said before, you've had a lesson to-night that will last

you all your life. I'm going to give you another chance--with Maddon.

Here are the stones.” He reached into his pocket and laid the case on

the table.

But now Burton made no effort to take the case--his eyes, in that

puzzled way again, were on Jimmie Dale.

“A better way?” he repeated tensely. “What do you mean? What way?”

“Well, say at the expense of another man's reputation--of mine,”

suggested Jimmie Dale, with his whimsical smile. “You need only say that

a man came to you this evening, told you that he stole these rubies from

Mr. Maddon during the afternoon, and asked you, as Mr. Maddon's private

secretary, to restore them with his compliments to their owner.”

A slow flush of disappointment, deepening to one of anger dyed Burton's

cheeks.

“Are you trying to make a fool of me?” he cried out. “Go to Maddon with

a childish tale like that! There's no man living would believe such a

cock-and-bull story!”

“No?” inquired Jimmie Dale softly. “And yet I am inclined to think there

are a good many--that even Maddon would, hard-headed as he is. You

might say that when the man handed you the case you thought it was some

practical joke being foisted on you, until you opened the case”--Jimmie

Dale pushed it a little farther across the table, and Burton,

mechanically, his eyes still on Jimme Dale, loosened the catch with his

thumb nail--“until you opened the case, saw the rubies, and--”

“The Gray Seal!” Burton had snatched the case toward him, and was

straining his eyes at the inside cover. “You--the Gray Seal!”

“Well?” said Jimmie Dale whimsically.

Motionless, the case held open in his hands, Burton stood there.

“The Gray Seal!” he whispered. Then, with a catch in his voice: “You

mean this? You mean to let me have these back--you mean--you mean all

you've said? For God's sake, don't play with me--the Gray Seal, the most

notorious criminal in the country, to give back a fortune like this!

You--you--”

“Dog with a bad name,” said Jimmie Dale, with a wry smile; then, a

little gruffly: “Put it in your pocket!”

Slowly, almost as though he expected the case to be snatched back from

him the next instant, Burton obeyed.

“I don't understand--I CAN'T understand!” he murmured. “They say that

you--and yet I believe you now--you've saved me from a ruined life

to-night. The Gray Seal! If--if every one knew what you had done,

they--”

“But every one won't,” Jimmie Dale broke in bluntly, “Who is to tell

them? You? You couldn't very well, when you come to think of it--could

you? Well, who knows, perhaps there have been others like you!”

“You mean,” said Burton excitedly, “you mean that all these crimes of

yours that have seemed without motive, that have been so inexplicable,

have really been like to-night to--”

“I don't mean anything at all,” interposed Jimmie Dale a little

hurriedly. “Nothing, Burton--except that there is still one little thing

more to do to bolster up that 'childish' story of mine--and then get

out of here.” He glanced sharply, critically around the room, his eyes

resting for a moment at the last on the form on the floor. Then tersely:

“I am going to turn out the light--we will have to pass the window to

get to the door, and we will invite no chances. Are you ready?”

“No; not yet,” said Burton eagerly. “I haven't said what I'd like to say

to you, what I--”

“Walk straight to the door,” said Jimmie Dale curtly. There was the

click of an electric-light switch, and the room was in darkness. “Now,

no noise!” he instructed.

And Burton, perforce, made his way across the room--and at the door

Jimmie Dale joined him and led him down the short flight of stairs. At

the bottom, he opened the door leading into the rear of the pawnshop

itself, and, bidding Burton follow, entered.

“We can't risk even a match; it could be seen from the street,” he said

brusquely, as he fumbled around for a moment in the darkness. “Ah--here

it is!” He lifted a telephone receiver from its hook, and gave a number.

Burton caught him quickly by the arm.

“Good Lord, man, what are you doing?” he protested anxiously. “That's

Mr. Maddon's house!”

“So I believe,” said Jimmie Dale complacently. “Hello! Is Mr. Maddon

there? . . . I beg pardon? . . . Personally, yes, if you please.”

There was a moment's wait. Burton's hand was still nervously clutching

at Jimmie Dale's sleeve. Then:

“Mr. Maddon?” asked Jimmie Dale pleasantly. “Yes? . . . I am very sorry

to trouble you, but I called you up to inquire if you were aware that

your rubies, and among them your Aracon, had been stolen? . . . I beg

pardon! . . . Rubies--yes. . . . You weren't. . . . Oh, no, I am quite

in my right mind; if you will take the trouble to open your safe you

will find they are gone--shall I hold the line while you investigate?

. . . What? . . . Don't shout, please--and stand a little farther away

from the mouthpiece.” Jimmie Dale's tone was one of insolent composure

now. “There is really no use in getting excited. . . . I beg pardon? . . .

Certainly, this is the Gray Seal speaking. . . . What?” Jimmie Dale's

voice grew plaintive, “I really can't make out a word when you yell like

that. . . . Yes. . . . I had occasion to use them this afternoon, and I

took the liberty of borrowing them temporarily--are you still there, Mr.

Maddon? . . . Oh, quite so! Yes, I hear you NOW. . . . No, that is

all, only I am returning them through your private secretary, a very

estimable young man, though I fear somewhat excitable and shaky, who is

on his way to you with them now. . . . WHAT'S THAT YOU SAY? You repeat

that,” snapped Jimmie Dale suddenly, icily, “and I'll take them

from under your nose again before morning! . . . Ah! That is better!

Good-night--Mr. Maddon.”

Jimmie Dale hung up the receiver and shoved Burton toward the door.

“Now then, Burton, we'll get out of her--and the sooner you reach Fifth

Avenue and Mr. Maddon's house the better. No; not that way!” They had

reached the hall, and Burton had turned toward the side door that opened

on the alleyway. “Whoever they were who settled their last account with

Isaac may still be watching. They've nothing against any one else,

but they know some one was in here at the time, and, if the police

are clever enough ever to get on their track, they might find it

very convenient to be able to say WHO was in the room when Isaac was

murdered--there's nothing to show, since Isaac so obligingly opened the

window for them, that the shot was fired THROUGH the window and not from

the inside of the room. And even if they have already taken to their

heels”--Jimmie Dale was leading Burton up the stairs again as he

talked--“it might prove exceedingly inconvenient for us if some

passer-by should happen to recollect that he saw two men of our general

appearance leaving the premises. Now keep close--and follow me.”

They passed the door of Isaac's den, turned down a narrow corridor that

led to the rear of the house--Jimmie Dale guiding unerringly, working

from the mental map of the house that the Tocsin had drawn for

him--descended another short flight of stairs that gave on the kitchen,

crossed the kitchen, and Jimmie Dale opened a back door. He paused here

for a moment to listen; then, cautioning Burton to be silent, moved on

again across a small back yard and through a gate into a lane that

ran at right angles to the alleyway by which both had entered the

house--and, a minute later, they were crouched against a building, a

half block away, where the lane intersected the cross street.

Here Jimmie Dale peered out cautiously. There was no one in sight. He

touched Burton's shoulder, and pointed down the street.

“That's your way, Burton--mine's the other. Hurry while you've got the

chance. Good-night.”

Burton's hand reached out, caught Jimmie Dale's, and wrung it.

“God bless you!” he said huskily. “I--”

And Jimmie Dale pushed him out on to the street.

Burton's steps receded down the sidewalk. Jimmie Dale still crouched

against the wall. The steps grew fainter in the distance and died

finally away. Jimmie Dale straightened up, slipped the mask from his

face to his pocket, stepped out on the street--and five minutes later

was passing through the noisy bedlam of the Hungarian restaurant on his

way to the front door and his car.

“SONNEZ LE TOCSIN,” Jimmie Dale was saying softly to himself. “I wonder

what she'll do when she finds I've got the ring?”

CHAPTER VIII

THE MAN HIGHER UP

The Tocsin! By neither act, sign, nor word had she evidenced the

slightest interest in that ring--and yet she must know, she certainly

must know that it was now in his possession. Jimmie Dale was

disappointed. Somehow, he had counted more than he had cared to admit on

developments from that ring.

He pulled a little viciously at his cigarette, as he stared out of the

St. James Club window. That was how long ago? Ten days? Yes; this would

be the eleventh. Eleven days now and no word from her--eleven days since

that night at old Isaac's, since she had last called him, the Gray Seal,

to arms. It was a long while--so long a while even that what had come

to be his prerogative in the newspapers, the front page with three-inch

type recounting some new exploit of that mysterious criminal the Gray

Seal, was being usurped. The papers were howling now about what they,

for the lack of a better term, were pleased to call a wave of crime that

had inundated New York, and of which, for once, the Gray Seal was not

the storm centre, but rather, for the moment, forgotten.

He drew back from the window, and, settling himself again in the big

leather lounging chair, resumed the perusal of the evening paper. His

eye fell on what was common to every edition now, a crime editorial--and

the paper crackled suddenly under the long, slim, tapering fingers,

so carefully nurtured, whose sensitive tips a hundred times had made

mockery of the human ingenuity squandered on the intricate mechanism

of safes and vaults. No; he was wrong--the Gray Seal had not been

forgotten.

“We should not be surprised,” wrote the editor virulently, “to discover

at the bottom of these abominable atrocities that the guiding spirit,

in fact, was the Gray Seal--they are quite worthy even of his diabolical

disregard for the laws of God and man.”

Jimmie Dale's lips straightened ominously, and an angry glint crept into

his dark, steady eyes. There was nothing then, nothing too vile that,

in the public's eyes, could not logically be associated with the Gray

Seal--even this! A series of the most cold-blooded, callous murders

and robberies, the work, on the face of it, of a well-organized band

of thugs, brutal, insensate, little better than fiends, though clever

enough so far to have evaded capture, clever enough, indeed, to have

kept the police still staggering and gasping after a clew for one

murder--while another was in the very act of being committed! The Gray

Seal! What exquisite irony! And yet, after all, the papers were not

wholly to blame for what they said; he had invited much of it. Seeming

crimes of the Gray Seal had apparently been genuine beyond any question

of doubt, as he had intended them to appear, as in the very essence of

their purpose they had to be.

Yes; he had invited much--he and she together--the Tocsin and himself.

He, Jimmie Dale, millionaire, clubman, whose name for generations in

New York had been the family pride, was “wanted” as the Gray Seal for so

many “crimes” that he had lost track of them himself--but from any one

of which, let the identity of the Gray Seal be once solved, there was

and could be no escape! What exquisite irony--yet full, too, of the most

deadly consequences!

Once more Jimmie Dale's eyes sought the paper, and this time scanned the

headlines of the first page:

BRUTAL MURDER OF MILL PAYMASTER.

THE CRIME WAVE STILL AT ITS HEIGHT.

HERMAN ROESSLE FOUND DEAD NEAR HIS CAR.

ASSASSINS ESCAPE WITH $20,000.

Jimmie Dale read on--and as he read there came again that angry set to

his lips. The details were not pleasant. Herman Roessle, the paymaster

of the Martindale-Kensington Mills, whose plant was on the Hudson, had

gone that morning in his runabout to the nearest town, three miles away,

for the monthly pay roll; had secured the money from the bank, a sum of

twenty-odd thousand dollars; and had started back with it for the

mill. At first, it being broad daylight and a well-frequented road, his

nonappearance caused no apprehension; but as early afternoon came and

there was still no sign of Roessle the mill management took alarm.

Discovering that he had left the bank for the return journey at a few

minutes before eleven, and that nothing had been seen of him at his

home, the police were notified. Followed then several hours of fruitless

search, until finally, with the whole countryside aroused and the

efforts of the police augumented by private search parties, the car was

found in a thicket at the edge of a crossroad some four miles back from

the river, and, a little way from the car, the body of Roessle, dead,

the man's head crushed in where it had been fiendishly battered by some

blunt, heavy object. There was no clew--no one could be found who had

seen the car on the crossroad--the murderer, or murderers, and the

twenty-odd thousand dollars in cash had disappeared leaving no trace

behind.

There were several columns of this, which Jimmie Dale skimmed through

quickly; but at the end he stared for a long time at the last paragraph.

Somehow, strange, to relate, the paper had neglected to turn its “sob”

artist loose, and the few words, added almost as though they were

an afterthought, for once rang true and full of pathos in their very

simplicity--at the Roessle home, where Mrs. Roessle was prostrated,

two little tots of five and seven, too young to understand, had gravely

received the reporter and told him that some bad man had hurt their

daddy.

“Mr. Dale, sir!”

Jimmie Dale lowered his paper. A club attendant was standing before him,

respectfully extending a silver card tray. From the man, Jimmie Dale's

eyes fixed on a white envelope on the tray. One glance was enough--it

was HERS, that letter. The Tocsin again! His brain seemed suddenly to be

afire, and he could feel his pulse quicken, the blood begin to pound

in fierce throbs at his heart. Life and death lay in that white,

innocent-looking, unaddressed envelope, danger, peril--it was always

life and death, for those were the stakes for which the Tocsin played.

But, master of many things, Jimmie Dale was most of all master of

himself. Not a muscle of his face moved. He reached nonchalantly for the

letter.

“Thank you,” said Jimmie Dale.

The man bowed and started away. Jimmie Dale laid the envelope on the

arm of the lounging chair. The man had reached the door when Jimmie Dale

stopped him.

“Oh, by the way,” said Jimmie Dale languidly, “where did this come

from?”

“Your chauffeur, sir,” replied the other. “Your chauffeur gave it to the

hall porter a moment ago, sir.”

“Thank you,” said Jimmie Dale again.

The door closed.

Jimmie Dale glanced around the room. It was the caution of habit, that

glance; the habit of years in which his life had hung on little things.

He was alone in one of the club's private library rooms. He picked up

the envelope, tore it open, took out the folded sheets inside, and began

to read. At the first words he leaned forward, suddenly tense in his

chair. He read on, turning the pages hurriedly, incredulity, amazement,

and, finally, a strange menace mirroring itself in turn upon his face.

He stood up--the letter in his hand.

“My God!” whispered Jimmie Dale.

It was a call to arms such as the Gray Seal had never received

before--such as the Tocsin had never made before. And if it were true

it--True! He laughed aloud a little gratingly. True! Had the Tocsin,

astounding, unbelievable, mystifying as were the means by which she

acquired her knowledge not only of this, but of countless other affairs,

ever by so much as the smallest detail been astray. If it were true!

He pulled out his watch. It was half-past nine. Benson, his chauffeur,

had sent the letter into the club. Benson had been waiting outside

there ever since dinner. Jimmie Dale, for the first time since the

first communication that he had ever received from the Tocsin, did not

immediately destroy her letter now. He slipped it into his pocket--and

stepped quickly from the room.

In the cloakroom downstairs he secured his hat and overcoat, and,

though it was a warm evening, put on the latter since he was in evening

clothes, then walked leisurely out of the club.

At the curb, Benson, the chauffeur, sprang from his seat, and, touching

his cap, opened the door of a luxurious limousine.

Jimmie Dale shook his head.

“I shall not keep you waiting any longer, Benson,” he said. “You may

take the car home, and put it up. I shall probably be late to-night.”

“Very good, sir,” replied the chauffeur.

“You sent in a letter a moment or so ago, Benson?” observed Jimmie Dale

casually, opening his cigarette case.

“Yes, sir,” said Benson. “I hope I didn't do wrong, sir. He said it was

important, and that you were to have it at once.”

“He?” Jimmie Dale was lighting his cigarette now.

“A boy, sir,” Benson amplified. “I couldn't get anything out of him. He

just said he'd been told to give it to me, and tell me to see that you

got it at once. I hope, sir, I haven't--”

“Not at all, Benson,” said Jimmie Dale pleasantly. “It's quite all

right. Good-night, Benson.”

“Good-night, sir,” Benson answered, climbing back to his seat.

There was a queer little smile on Jimmie Dale's lips, as he watched the

great car swing around in the street and glide noiselessly away--a queer

little smile that still held there even after he himself had started

briskly along the avenue in a downtown direction. It was invariably the

same, always the same--the letters came unexpectedly, when least

looked for, now by this means, now by that, but always in a manner that

precluded the slightest possibility of tracing them to their source. Was

there anything, in his intimate surroundings, in his intimate life,

that she did not know about him--who knew absolutely nothing about her!

Benson, for instance--that the man was absolutely trustworthy--or else

she would never for an instant have risked the letter in his possession.

Was there anything that she did not--yes, one thing--she did not know

him in the role he was going to play to-night. That at least was one

thing that surely she did not know about him; the role in which, many

times, for weeks on end, he had devoted himself body and soul in an

attempt to solve the mystery with which she surrounded herself; the

role, too, that often enough had been a bulwark of safety to him when

hard pressed by the police; the role out of which he had so carefully,

so painstakingly created a now recognised and well-known character of

the underworld--the role of Larry the Bat.

Jimmie Dale turned from Fifth Avenue into Broadway, continued on down

Broadway, across to the Bowery, kept along the Bowery for several more

blocks--and finally headed east into the dimly lighted cross street on

which the Sanctuary was located.

And now Jimmie Dale became cautious in his movements. As he approached

the black alleyway that flanked the miserable tenement, he glanced

sharply behind and about him; and, at the alleyway itself, without

pause, but with a curious lightning-like side step, no longer Jimmie

Dale now, but the Gray Seal, he disappeared from the street, and was

lost in the deep shadows of the building.

In a moment he was at the side door, listening for any sound from

within--none had ever seen or met the lodger or the first floor either

ascending or descending, except in the familiar character of Larry

the Bat. He opened the door, closed it behind him, and in the utter

blackness went noiselessly up the stairs--stairs so rickety that it

seemed a mouse's tread alone would have set them creaking. There seemed

an art in the play of Jimmie Dale's every muscle; in the movements,

lithe, balanced, quick, absolutely silent. On the first landing he

stopped before another door, there was the faint click of a key turning

in the lock; and then this door, too, closed behind him. Sounded the

faint click of the key as it turned again, and Jimmie Dale drew a long

breath, stepped across the room to assure himself that the window blind

was down, and lighted the gas jet.

A yellow, murky flame spurted up, pitifully weak, almost as though it

were ashamed of its disreputable surroundings. Dirt, disorder, squalour,

the evidence of low living testified eloquently enough to any one,

the police, for instance, in times past inquisitive until they were

fatuously content with the belief that they knew the occupant for what

he was, that the place was quite in keeping with its tenant, a mute

prototype, as it were, of Larry the Bat, the dope fiend.

For a little space, Jimmie Dale, immaculate in his evening clothes,

stood in the centre of the miserable room, his dark eyes, keen, alert,

critical, sweeping comprehensively over every object about him--the

position of a chair, of a cracked drinking glass on the broken-legged

table, of an old coat thrown with apparent carelessness on the floor at

the foot of the bed, of a broken bottle that had innocently strewn some

sort of white powder close to the threshold, inviting unwary foot tracks

across the floor. And then, taking out the Tocsin's letter, he laid it

upon the table, placed what money he had in his pockets beside it, and

began rapidly to remove his clothes. The Sanctuary had not been invaded

since his last visit there.

He turned back the oilcloth in the far corner of the room, took up the

piece of loose flooring, which, however, strangely enough, fitted

so closely as to give no sign of its existence even should it

inadvertently, by some curious visitor again be trod upon; and from the

aperture beneath lifted out a bundle of clothes and a small box.

Undressed now, he carefully folded the clothes he had taken off, laid

them under the flooring, and began to dress again, his wardrobe supplied

by the bundle he had taken out in exchange--an old pair of shoes, the

laces broken; mismated socks; patched trousers, frayed at the bottoms; a

soiled shirt, collarless, open at the neck. Attired to his satisfaction,

he placed the box upon the table, propped up a cracked mirror, sat down

in front of it, and, with a deft, artist's touch, began to apply stain

to his hands, wrists, neck, throat, and face--but the hardness, the grim

menace that now grew into the dominant characteristic of his features

was not due to the stain alone.

“Dear Philanthropic Crook”--his eyes were on the Tocsin's letter that

lay before him. He read on--for once, even to Jimmie Dale's keen, facile

mind, a first reading had failed to convey the full significance of what

she had written. It was too amazing, almost beyond belief--the series of

crimes, rampant for the past few weeks, at which the community had

stood aghast, the brutal murder of Roessle but a few hours old, lay bare

before his eyes. It was all there, all of it, the details, the hellish

cleverness, the personnel even of the thugs, all, everything--except the

proof.

“Get him, Jimmie--the man higher up. Get him, Jimmie--before another

pays forfeit with his life”--the words seemed to leap out at him from

the white page in red, dancing lines--“Get him--Jimmie--the man higher

up.”

Jimmie Dale finished the second reading of the letter, read it again

for the third time, then tore it into tiny fragments. His fingers delved

into the box again, and the transformation of Jimmie Dale, member of New

York's most exclusive social set, into a low, vicious-featured denizen

of the underworld went on--a little wax applied skilfully behind the

ears, in the nostrils and under the upper lip.

It was all there--all except the proof. And the proof--he laughed aloud

suddenly, unpleasantly. There seemed something sardonic in it; ay, more

than that, all that was grim in irony. The proof, in Stangeist's own

writing, sworn to before witnesses in the presence of a notary, the

text of the document, of course, unknown to both witnesses and notary,

evidence, absolute and final, that would be admitted in any court, for

Stangeist was a lawyer, and would see to that, was in Stangeist's own

safe, for Stangeist's own protection--Stangeist, who was himself the

head and brains of this murder gang--Stangeist, who was the man higher

up!

It was amazing, without parallel in the history of crime--and yet

ingenious, clever, full of the craft and cunning that had built up the

shyster lawyer's reputation below the dead line.

Jimmie Dale's lips were curiously thin now. So it was Stangeist! A

Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde with a vengeance! He knew Stangeist--not

personally; not by the reputation Stangeist held, low even as that was,

among his brother members of the profession; but as the man was known

for what he really was among the crooks and criminals of the underworld,

where, in that strange underground exchange, whispered confidences

passed between those whose common enemy was the law, where Larry the Bat

himself was trusted in the innermost circles.

Stangeist was a power in the Bad Lands. There were few among that unholy

community that Stangeist, at one time or another, in one way or another,

had not rescued from the clutches of the law, resorting to any trick or

cunning, but with perjury, that he could handle like the master of

it that he was, employed as the most common weapon of defence for his

clients--provided he were paid well enough for it. The man had become

more than the attorney for the crime world--he had become part of

it. Cunning, shrewd, crafty, conscienceless, cold-blooded--that was

Stangeist.

The form and features of the man pictured themselves in Jimmie Dale's

mind--the six-foot muscular frame, that was invariably clothed in attire

of the most fashionable cut; the thin lips with their oily, plausible

smile, the straight black hair that straggled into pin point, little

black eyes, the dark face with its high cheek bones, which, with the

pronounced aquiline nose and the persistent rumour that he was a

quarter caste, had led the underworld, prejudiced always in favour of a

“monaker,” to dub the man the “Indian Chief.”

Jimmie Dale laughed again--still unpleasantly. So Stangeist had taken

the plunge at last and branched out into a wider field, had he? Well,

there was nothing surprising in that--except that he had not done it

before! The irony of it lay in the fact that at last he had been TOO

clever, overstepped himself in his own cleverness, that was all. It was

Australian Ike, The Mope, and Clarie Deane that Stangeist had gathered

around him, the Tocsin had said--and there were none worse in Larry the

Bat's wide range of acquaintanceship than those three. Stangeist had

made himself master of Australian Ike, The Mope, and Clarie Deane--and

he had driven them a little too hard on the division of the spoils--and

laughed at them, and cracked the whip much after the fashion that the

trainer in the cage handles the growling beasts around him.

A dozen of the crimes that had appalled and staggered New York they had

committed under his leadership; and then, it seemed, they had quarrelled

furiously, the three pitted against Stangeist, threatening him,

demanding a more equitable share of the proceeds. None was better aware

than Stangeist that threats from men of their calibre were likely to

result in a grim aftermath--and Stangeist, yesterday, the Tocsin said,

had answered them as no other man than Stangeist would either have

thought of or have dared to do. One by one, at separate times, covering

the other with a revolver, Stangeist had permitted them to read

a document that was addressed to the district attorney. It was a

confession, complete in every detail, of every crime the four together

had committed, implicating Stangeist as fully and unreservedly as it

did the other three. It required no commentary! If anything happened

to Stangeist, a stab in the dark, for instance, a bullet from some dark

alleyway, a blackjack deftly wielded, as only Australian Ike, The Mope

or Clarie Deane knew how to wield it--the document automatically became

a DEATH SENTENCE for Australian Ike, The Mope, and Clarie Deane!

It was very simple--and, evidently, it had been effective, as witness

the renewal of their operations in the murder of Roessle that afternoon.

Fear and avarice had both probably played their part; fear of the man

who would with such consummate nerve fling his life into the balance

to turn the tables upon them, while he jeered at them; avarice that

prompted them to get what they could out of Stangeist's brains and

leadership, and to be satisfied with what they COULD get--since they

could get no more!

Satisfied? Jimmie Dale shook his head. No; that was hardly the

word--cowed, perhaps, for the moment, would be better. But afterward,

with a document like that in existence, when they would never be safe

for an instant--well, beasts in the cages had been known to get the

better of the man with the whip, and beasts were gentle things compared

with Australian Ike, The Mope, and Clarie Deane! Some day they would

reverse the tables on the Indian Chief--if they could. And if they

couldn't it would not be for the lack of trying.

There would be another act in that drama of the House Divided before the

curtain fell! And there would be a sort of grim, poetic justice in it, a

temptation almost to let the play work itself out to its own inevitable

conclusion, only--Jimmie Dale, the final touches given to his features,

stood up, and his hands clenched suddenly, fiercely--it was not just the

man higher up alone, there were the other three as well, the whole

four of them, all of them, crimes without number at their door, brutal,

fiendish acts, damnable outrages, murder to answer for, with which the

public now was beginning to connect the name of the Gray Seal! The Gray

Seal!

Jimmie Dale's hands, whose delicate fingers were artfully grimed and

blackened now beneath the nails, clenched still tighter--and then, with

a quick shrug of his shoulders, a thinning of the firmly compressed

lips, he picked up the coat from where it lay upon the floor, put it on,

put the money that was on the table in his pocket, and replaced the box

under the flooring.

In quick succession, from the same hiding place, an automatic, a black

silk mask, an electric flashlight, that thin metal box like a cigarette

case, and a half dozen vicious-looking little blued-steel burglar's

tools were stowed away in his pockets, the flooring carefully replaced,

the oilcloth spread back again; and then, pulling a slouch hat well down

over his eyes, he reached up to turn off the gas.

For an instant his hand held there, while his eyes, sweeping around the

apartment, took in every single detail about him in that same alert,

comprehensive way as when he had entered--then the room was in darkness,

and the Gray Seal, as Larry the Bat, a shuffling, unkempt creature

of the underworld, alias Jimmie Dale, the lionised of clubs, the

matrimonial target of exclusive drawing-rooms, closed the door of the

Sanctuary behind him, shuffled down the stairs, shuffled out into the

lane, and shuffled along the street toward the Bowery.

A policeman on the corner accosted him familiarly.

“Hello, Larry!” grinned the officer.

“'Ello!” returned Jimmie Dale affably through the side of his mouth.

“Fine night, ain't it?”--and shuffled on along the street.

And now Jimmie Dale began to hurry--still with that shuffling tread, but

covering the ground nevertheless with amazing celerity. He had lost

no time since receiving the Tocsin's letter, it was true, but, for all

that, it was now after ten o'clock. Stangeist's house was “dark” that

evening, she had said, meaning that the occupants, Stangeist as well

as whatever servants there might be, for Stangeist had no family, were

out--the servants in town for a theatre or picture show probably--and

Stangeist himself as yet not back, presumably from that Roessle affair.

The stub of an old cigar, unlighted, shifted with a sudden, savage twist

of the lips from one side of Jimmie Dale's mouth to the other. There was

need for haste. There was no telling when Stangeist might get back--as

for the servants, that did not matter so much; servants in suburban

homes had a marked affinity for “last trains!”

Jimmie Dale boarded a cross-town car, effected a transfer, and in

a quarter of an hour after leaving the Sanctuary was huddled, an

inoffensive heap, like a tired-out workingman, in a corner seat of a

Long Island train. From here, there was only a short run ahead of him,

and, twenty minutes later, descending from the train at Forest Hills, he

had passed through the more thickly settled portion of the little place,

and was walking briskly out along the country road.

Stangeist's house lay, approximately, a mile and a half from the

station, quite by itself, and set well back from the road. Jimmie Dale

could have found it with his eyes blindfolded--the Tocsin's directions

had lacked none of their usual explicit minuteness. The road was quite

deserted. Jimmie Dale met no one. Even in the houses that he passed the

lights were in nearly every instance already out.

Something, merciless in its rage, swept suddenly over Jimmie Dale, as,

unbidden, of its own volition, the last paragraph he had read in that

evening's paper began to repeat itself over and over again in his mind.

The two little kiddies--it seemed as though he could see them standing

there--and from Jimmie Dale's lips, not given to profanity, there came

a bitter oath. It might possibly be that, even if he were successful in

what was before him to-night, the authors of the Roessle murder would

never be known. That confession of Stangeist's was written prior to what

had happened that afternoon, and there would be no mention, naturally,

of Roessle. And, for a moment, that seemed to Jimmie Dale the one thing

paramount to all others, the one thing that was vital; then he shook

his head, and laughed out shortly. After all, it did not matter--whether

Stangeist and the blood wolves he had gathered around him paid the

penalty specifically for one particular crime or for another could make

little difference--they would PAY, just as surely, just as certainly,

once that paper was in his possession!

Jimmie Dale was counting the houses as he passed--they were more

infrequent now, farther apart. Stangeist was no fool--not the fool that

he would appear to be for keeping a document like that, once he had had

the temerity to execute it, in his own safe; for, in a day or two, the

Tocsin had hinted at this, after holding it over the heads of Australian

Ike, The Mope, and Clarie Deane again to drive the force of it a little

deeper home, he would undoubtedly destroy it--and the SUPPOSITION that

it was still in existence would have equally the same effect on the

minds of the other three! Stangeist was certainly alive to the peril

that he ran with such a thing in his possession, only the peril had not

appealed to him as imminent either from the three thugs with whom he had

allied himself, or, much less, from any one else, that was all.

Jimmie Dale halted by a low, ornamental stone fence, some three feet

high, and stood there for a moment, glancing about him. This was

Stangeist's house--he could just make out the building as it loomed up a

shadowy, irregular shape, perhaps two hundred yards back from the fence.

The house was quite dark, not a light showed in any window. Jimmie Dale

sat down casually on the fence, looked carefully again up and down

the road--then, swinging his legs over, quick now in every action, he

dropped to the other side, and stole silently across the grass to the

rear of the house.

Here he stopped again, reached up to a window that was about on a level

with his shoulders, and tested its fastenings. The window--it was the

window of Stangeist's private sanctum, according to the plan in

her letter--was securely locked. Jimmie Dale's hands went into his

pocket--and the black silk mask was slipped over his face. He listened

intently--then a little steel instrument began to gnaw like a rat.

A minute passed--two of them. Again Jimmie Dale listened. There was not

a sound save the night sounds--the light breeze whispering through

the branches of the trees; the far-off rumble of a train; the whir of

insects; the hoarse croaking of a frog from some near-by creek or pond.

The window sash was raised an inch, another, and gradually to the top.

Like a shadow, Jimmie Dale pulled himself up to the sill, and, poised

there, his hand parted the heavy portieres that hung within. It was too

dark to distinguish even a single object in the room. He lowered himself

to the floor, and slipped cautiously between the portieres.

From somewhere in the house, a clock began to strike. Jimmie Dale

counted the strokes. Eleven o'clock. It was getting late--TOO late!

Stangeist was likely to be back at any moment. The flashlight, in Jimmie

Dale's hand now, circled the room with its little round white ray,

lingering an instant in a queer, inquisitive sort of way here and there

on this object and that--and went out. Jimmie Dale nodded--the flat desk

in the centre of the floor, the safe in the corner by the rear wall, the

position of everything in the room, even to the chairs, was photographed

on his mind.

He stepped from the portieres to the safe, and the flashlight played

again--this time reflecting back from the glistening nickelled knobs.

Jimmie Dale's lips tightened. It was a small safe, almost ludicrously

small; but to such height as the art of safe design had been carried,

that design was embodied in the one before him.

“Type K-four-two-eight-Colby,” muttered Jimmie Dale. “A nasty little

beggar--and it's eleven o'clock now! I'd use 'soup' for once, if it

weren't that it would put Stangeist wise, and give him a chance to make

his get-away before the district attorney got the nippers on the four of

them.”

The light went out. Jimmie Dale dropped to his knees; and, while his

left hand passed swiftly, tentatively over dials and handle, he rubbed

the fingers of his right hand rapidly to and fro over the carpet.

Wonderful finger tips were those of Jimmie Dale, sensitive to an

abnormal degree; and now, tingling with the friction, the nerves

throbbing at the skin surface, they closed in a light, delicate touch

upon the knob of the dial--and Jimmie Dale's ear pressed close against

the face of the safe.

Time passed. The silence grew heavy--seemed to palpitate through the

room. Then a deep breath, half like a sigh, half like a fluttering sob

as of a strong man taxed to the uttermost of his endurance, came from

Jimmie Dale, and his left hand swept away the sweat beads that had

spurted to his forehead.

“Eight--thirteen--twenty-two,” whispered Jimmie Dale.

There was a click, a low metallic thud as the bolts slid back, and the

door swung open.

And now the flashlight again, searching the mechanism of the inner

door--then darkness once more.

Five minutes, ten minutes went by. The clock struck again--and the

single stroke seemed to boom out through the house in a weird, raucous,

threatening note, and seemed to linger, throbbing in the air.

The inner door was open--the flashlight's ray was flooding a nest

of pigeonholes and little drawers. The pigeonholes were crammed with

papers, as, presumably, too, were the drawers. Jimmie Dale sucked in his

breath. He had already been there well over half an hour--every minute

now, every second was counting against him, and to search that mass of

papers before Stangeist returned was--

“Ah!”--it came in a fierce little ejaculation from Jimmie Dale. From

the centre pigeonhole, almost the first paper he had touched, he drew

a long, sealed envelope and at a single swift glance had read the

inscription upon it, written in longhand:

TO THE DISTRICT ATTORNEY, NEW YORK CITY.

IMPORTANT. URGENT.

The words in the corners were underscored three times.

Swiftly, deftly, Jimmie Dale's hands rolled the rounded end of one of

his collection of the legal instruments under the flap of the envelope,

turned the sheets over and drew out the folded document inside. There

were eight sheets of legal foolscap, neatly fastened together at the top

left-hand corner with green tape. He opened them out, read a few words

here and there, and turned the pages hurriedly over to scrutinise

the last one--and nodded grimly. Three witnesses had testified to the

signature of Stangeist, and a notary's seal, accompanied by the usual

legal formula, was duly affixed.

Jimmie Dale slipped the document into his pocket, and, with the envelope

in his hand, moved to the desk. He opened first one drawer and then

another, and finally discovering a pile of blank foolscap, took out four

sheets, folded them, and placed them in the envelope, sealing the

flap of the latter again. That it did not seal very well now brought a

quizzical twitch to Jimmie Dale's lips. Sealed or unsealed, perhaps, it

made little difference; but, for all that, he was not through with it

yet. Apart from bringing the four to justice, there was, after all, a

chance to vindicate the Gray Seal in this matter at least, and repudiate

the newspaper theory which the public, to whom the Gray Seal was already

a monster of iniquity, would seize upon with avidity.

There was no further need of light now. Jimmie Dale replaced the

flashlight in his pocket, took out the thin, metal case, opened it, and

with the tiny pair of tweezers that likewise nestled there, lifted out

one of the gray, diamond-shaped paper seals. There was no question but

that, once under arrest, Stangeist's effects would be immediately

and thoroughly searched by the authorities! Jimmie Dale's smile from

quizzical became ironic. It would afford the police another little,

bewildering reminder of the Gray Seal, and give Carruthers, good old

Carruthers of the MORNING NEWS-ARGUS, so innocently ignorant that the

Gray Seal was his old college pal, yet the one editor of them all who

was not forever barking and yelping at the Gray Seal's heels, a chance

to vindicate himself a little, too! Jimmie Dale moistened the adhesive

side of the gray seal, and, still mindful of tell-tale finger prints,

laid it with the tweezers on the flap of the envelope, and pressed it

firmly into place with his elbow.

And then, suddenly, every faculty instantly on the alert, he snatched up

the envelope from the desk, and listened. Was it imagination, a trick

of nerves, or--no, there it was again!--a footfall on the gravel walk at

the front of the house. The sound became louder, clearer--two footfalls

instead of one. It was Stangeist, and somebody was with him.

In an instant Jimmie Dale was across the room and kneeling again before

the safe. His fingers were flying now. The envelope shot back into the

pigeonhole from which he had taken it--the inner door of the safe closed

silently and swiftly.

A dry chuckle came from Jimmie Dale's lips. It was just like fiction,

just precisely time enough to have accomplished what he had come for

before he was interrupted, not a second more or less, the villain foiled

at the psychological moment! The key was rattling in the front door

now--they were in the hall--he could hear Stangeist's voice--there came

a dull glow from the hallway, following the click of an electric-light

switch. The outer door of the safe swung shut, the bolts slid into

place, the dial whirled under Jimmie Dale's fingers. It was only a

step to the portieres, the open window--and escape. He straightened up,

stepped back, the portieres closed behind him--and the chuckle died on

Jimmie Dale's lips.

He was trapped--caught without so much as a corner in which to turn!

Stangeist was even then coming into the room--and OUTSIDE, darkly

outlined, two forms stood just beneath the window. Instinctively, quick

as a flash, Jimmie Dale crouched below the sill. Who were they? What did

it mean? Questions swept in swift sequence through his brain. Had they

seen him? It would be very dark against the background of the portieres,

but yet if they were watching--he drew a breath of relief. He had not

been seen. Their voices reached him in low, guarded whispers.

“Say, youse, Ike, pipe it! Dere's a window open in the snitch's room.

Come on, we'll get in dere. It'll make the hair stand up on the back of

his neck fer a starter.”

“Aw, ferget it!” replied another voice. “Can the tee-ayter stunt!

Clarie leaves the front door unfastened, don't he? An' dey'll be in dere

in a minute now. Wotcher want ter do? Crab the game? He might hear us

an' fix Clarie before we had a chanst, the skinny old fox! An' dere's

the light now--see! Beat it on yer toes fer the front of the house!”

The room was flooded with light. Through the portieres, that Jimmie Dale

parted by the barest fraction of an inch, he could see Stangeist and

another man, a thick-set, ugly-faced-looking customer--Clarie Deane,

according to that brief, whispered colloquy that he had heard outside.

He looked again through the window. The two dark forms had disappeared

now, but they had disappeared just a few seconds too late--with the two

other men now in the room, and one of them so close that Jimmie Dale

could almost have reached out and touched him, it was impossible to

get through the window without being detected, when the slightest sound

would attract instant attention and equally instant suspicion. It was a

chance to be taken only as a last resort.

Jimmie Dale's face grew hard, as his fingers closed around his automatic

and drew the weapon from his pocket. It was all plain enough. That last

act in the drama which he had speculatively anticipated was being staged

with little loss of time--and in a grim sort of way the thought flashed

across his mind that, perilous as his own position was, Stangeist at

that moment was in even greater peril than himself. Australian Ike, The

Mope, and Clarie Deane, given the chance, and they seemed to have made

that chance now, were not likely to deal in half measures--Clarie Deane

had dropped into a chair beside the desk; and The Mope and Australian

Ike were creeping around to the front door!

The parting in the portieres widened a little more, a very little more,

slowly, imperceptibly, until Jimmie Dale, by the simple expedient of

moving his head, could obtain an unobstructed view of the entire room.

Stangeist tossed a bag he had been carrying on the desk, pulled up a

chair opposite to Clarie Deane, and sat down. Both men were side face to

Jimmie Dale.

“You tell the boys,” said Stangeist abruptly, “to fade away after this

for a while. Things are getting too hot. And you tell The Mope I dock

him five hundred for that extra crunch on Roessle's skull. That sort

of thing isn't necessary. That's the kind of stunt that gets the public

sore--the man was dead enough as it was. See?”

“Sure!” Clarie Deane's ejaculation was a grunt.

Stangeist opened the bag, and dumped the contents on the desk--pile

after pile of banknotes, the pay roll of the Martindale-Kensington

Mills.

“Some haul!” observed Clarie Deane, with a hoarse chuckle. “The papers

said over twenty thousand.”

“You can't always believe what the papers say,” returned Stangeist

curtly; and, taking a scribbling pad from the desk, began to check up

the packages.

Clarie Deane's cigar had gone out. He rolled the short stub in his

mouth, and leaned forward.

The bills were evidently just as they had been delivered to the murdered

paymaster at the bank, done up with little narrow paper bands in

packages of one hundred notes each, save for a small bundle of loose

bills which latter, with the rolls of silver, Stangeist swept to one

side of the desk.

Package by package, Stangeist went on jotting the amounts down on the

pad.

“Nix!” growled Clarie Deane suddenly. “Cut that out! Them's fivers in

that wad. Make that five hundred instead of one--I'm onter yer!”

“Mistake,” said Stangeist suavely, changing the figures with his pencil.

“You're pretty wide awake for this time of night, aren't you, Clarie?”

“Oh, I dunno!” responded Clarie Deane gruffly. “Not so very!”

Stangeist, finished with the packages, picked up the loose bills, and,

with a short laugh, tossed them into the bag and followed them with the

rolls of silver. He pushed the bag toward Clarie Deane.

“That's a little extra for you,” he said. “The trouble with you fellows

is that you don't know when you're well off--but the sooner you find it

out the better, unless you want another lesson like yesterday.” He made

the addition on the pad. “Fifteen thousand, eight hundred dollars,” he

announced softly. “That's seven thousand, nine hundred for the three of

you to divide, less five hundred from The Mope.”

Clarie Deane's eyes narrowed. His hands were on his knees, hidden by the

desk.

“There's more'n twenty there,” he said sullenly--and drew a match across

the under edge of the desk with a long, crackling noise.

Stangeist's face lost its suavity, a snarl curled his lips; but, about

to reply, he sprang suddenly to his feet instead, his head turned

sharply toward the door.

“What's that!” he said hoarsely. “It's not the servants, they wouldn't

dare to--”

Stangeist's words ended in a gulp. He was staring into the muzzle of a

heavy-calibered revolver that Clarie Deane had jerked up from under the

desk.

“You sit down, or I'll blow your block off!” said Clarie Deane, with a

sudden leer.

It happened then almost before Jimmie Dale could grasp the details;

before even Clarie Deane himself could interfere. The door burst open,

two men rushed in--and one, with a bound, flung himself at Stangeist.

The man's hand, grasping a clubbed revolver, rose in the air, descended

on Stangeist's head--and Stangeist went down in a limp heap, crashed

into the chair, and slid from the chair with a thud to the floor.

There was an oath from Clarie Deane. He jumped from his seat, and with a

violent shove sent the man reeling half across the room.

“Blast you, Mope!” he snarled. “You're too blamed fly! D'ye wanter queer

the whole biz?”

“Aw, wot's the matter wid youse!” The Mope, purple-faced with rage,

little black eyes glittering, mouth working under a flattened nose that

some previous encounter had broken and bent over the side of his face,

advanced belligerently.

Australian Ike, who had entered the room with him, pulled him back.

“Ferget it!” he flung out. “Clarie's dealin' the deck. Ferget it!”

The Mope glared from one to the other; then shook his fist at Stangeist

on the floor.

“Youse two make me sick!” he sneered. “Wot's the use of waitin' all

night? We was to bump him off, anyway, wasn't we? Dat's wot youse said

yerselves, 'cause wot was ter stop him writin' out another paper if we

didn't fix him fer keeps?”

“That's all right,” rejoined Clarie Deane; “but that's the second act,

you bonehead, see! We ain't got the paper yet, have we? Say, take a look

at that safe! It's easier ter scare him inter openin' it than ter crack

it, ain't it?”

Jimmie Dale, from his crouched position, began to rise to his feet

slowly, making but the slightest movement at a time, cautious of the

least sound. His lips were like a thin line, his fingers tightly pressed

over the automatic in his hand. There was not room for him between the

portieres and the window; and, do what he could, the hangings bulged a

little. Let one of the three notice that, or inadvertently brush against

the portieres, and his life would not be worth an instant's purchase.

They were lifting Stangeist up now, propping him up in the chair.

Stangeist moaned, opened his eyes, stared in a dazed way at the three

faces that leered into his, then dawning intelligence came, and his

face, that had been white before, took on a pasty, grayish pallor.

“You--the three of you!” he mumbled. “What's this mean?”

And then Clarie Deane laughed in a low, brutal way.

“Wot d'ye think it means? We want that paper, an' we want it damn

quick--see! D'ye think we was goin' ter stand fer havin' a trip ter Sing

Sing an' the wire chair danglin' over our heads!”

Stangeist closed his eyes. When he opened them again, something of the

old-time craftiness was in his face.

“Well, what are you going to do about it?” he inquired, almost sharply.

“You know what will happen to you, if anything happens to me.”

“Don't youse kid yerself!” retorted Clarie Deane. “D'ye think we're

fools? This ain't like it was yesterday--see! We GETS the paper this

time--so there won't nothin' happen to us. You come across with it

blasted quick now, or The Mope'll give you another on the bean that'll

put you to sleep fer keeps!”

The blood was running down Stangeist's face. He wiped it away from his

eyes.

“It's not here,” he said innocently. “It's in my box in the

safety-deposit vaults.”

“Aw,” blurted out Australian Ike, pushing suddenly forward, “youse can't

work dat crawl on--”

“Cut it out, Ike!” snapped Clarie Dane. “I'm runnin' this! So it's in

the vaults, eh?” He shoved his face toward Stangeist's.

“Yes,” said Stangeist easily. “You see--I was looking for something like

this.”

Clarie Deane's fist clenched.

“You lie!” he choked. “The Mope, here, was the last of us you showed

the paper to yesterday afternoon, an' the vaults was closed then--an' you

ain't been there to-day, 'cause you've been watched. That's why we fixed

it fer to-night after the divvy that you've just tried ter do us on

again, 'cause we knew you had it here.”

“I tell you, it's not here,” said Stangeist evenly.

“You lie!” said Clarie Deane again. “It's in that safe. The Mope heard

you tell the girl in yer office that if anything happened to you she was

ter wise up the district attorney that there was a paper in your safe

at home fer him that was important. Now then, you beat it over ter that

safe, an' open it up--we'll give you a minute ter do it in.”

“The paper's not there, I tell you,” said Stangeist once more.

“That's all right,” submitted Clarle Deane grimly. “There's a quarter of

that minute gone.”

“I won't!” Stangeist flashed out violently.

“That's all right,” repeated Clarie Deane. “There's half of that minute

gone.”

Jimmie Dale's eyes, in a fascinated sort of way, were on Stangeist. The

man's face was twitching now, moisture began to ooze from his forehead,

as the callous brutality of the scowling faces seemed to get him--and

then he lurched suddenly forward in his chair.

“My God!” he cried out, a ring of terror in his voice “What do you mean

to do? You'll pay for it! They'll get you! The servants will be back in

a minute.”

“Two skirts!” jeered Clarie Deane. “We ain't goin' ter run away from

them. If they comes before we goes, we'll fix 'em. That minute's up!”

Stangeist licked his lips with his tongue.

“Suppose--suppose I refuse?” he said hoarsely.

“You can suit yerself,” said Clarie Deane, with a vicious grin. “We know

the paper's there, an' we gets it before we leaves here--see? You can

take yer choice. Either you goes over ter the safe an' opens it yerself,

or else”--he paused and produced a small bottle from his pocket--“this

is nitro-glycerin', an' we opens it fer you with this. Only if we does

the job we does it proper. We ties you up and sets you against the door

of the safe before we touches off the 'soup,' an' mabbe if yer a good

guesser you can guess the rest.”

There was a short, raucous guffaw from The Mope.

Stangeist turned a drawn face toward the man, stared at him, and

stared in a miserable way at the other two in turn. He licked his lips

again--none was in a better position than himself to know that there

would be neither scruples nor hesitancy to interfere with carrying out

the threat.

“Suppose,” he said, trying to keep his voice steady, “suppose I open the

safe--what then--afterward?”

“We ain't got the safe open yet,” countered Clarie Deane

uncompromisingly. “An' we ain't got no more time ter fool over it,

either. You get a move on before I counts five, or The Mope an' Ike ties

you up! One--”

Stangeist staggered to his feet, wiped the blood out of his eyes for the

second time, and, with lips working, went unsteadily across the room to

the safe.

He knelt before it, and began to manipulate the dial; while the others

crowded around behind him. The Mope was fingering his revolver again

club fashion. Australian Ike's elbow just grazed the portieres, and

Jimmie Dale flattened himself against the window, holding his breath--a

smile on his lips that was mirthless, deadly, cold. The end was not far

off now; and then--WHAT?

Stangeist had the outer door of the safe open now--and now the inner

door swung back. He reached in his hand to the pigeonhole, drew out the

envelope--and with a sudden, wild cry, reeled to his feet.

“My God!” he screamed out. “What's--what's this!”

Clarie Deane snatched the envelope from him.

“THE GRAY SEAL!”--the words came with a jerk from his lips. He ripped

the envelope open frantically--and like a man stunned gazed at the four

blank sheets, while the colour left his face. “IT'S GONE!” he cried out

hoarsely.

“Gone!” There was a burst of oaths from Australian Ike. “Gone! Den we're

nipped--de lot of us!”

The Mope's face was like a maniac's as he whirled on Stangeist.

“Sure!” he croaked. “But youse gets yers first, youse--”

With a cry, Stangeist, to elude the blow, ducked blindly backward--into

the portieres--and with a rip and tear the hangings were wrenched apart.

It came instantaneously--a yell of mingled surprise and fury from the

three--the crash and spit of Jimmie Dale's revolver as he fired one shot

at the floor to stop their rush--then he flung himself at the window,

through it, and dropped sprawling to the ground.

A stream of flame cut the darkness above him, a bullet whistled by his

head--another--and another. He was on his feet, quick as a cat, and

running close alongside of the wall of the house. He heard a thud behind

him, still another, and yet a third--they were dropping through the

window after him. Came another shot, an angry hum of the bullet closer

than before--then the pound of racing feet.

Jimmie Dale swung around the corner of the house, running at top speed.

Something that was like a hot iron suddenly burned and seared along the

side of his head just above the ear. He reeled, staggered, recovered

himself, and dashed on. It nauseated him, that stinging in his head,

and all at once seemed to be draining his strength away. The shouts, the

shots, the running feet became like a curious buzzing in his ears. It

seemed strange that they should have hit him, that he should be wounded!

If he could only reach the low stone wall by the road, he could at least

make a fight for his life on the other side!

Red streaks swam before Jimmie Dale's eyes. The wall was such a long way

off--a yard or two was a very long way more to go--the weakness

seemed to be creeping up now even to numb his brain. No, here was the

wall--they hadn't hit him again--he laughed in a demented way--and

rolled his body over, and fell to the other side.

“JIMMIE!”

The cry seemed to reach some inner consciousness, revive him, send the

blood whipping through his veins. That voice! It was her--HERS! The

Tocsin! There was an automobile, engine racing, standing there in the

road. He won to his feet--dark, rushing forms were almost at the wall.

He fired--once--twice--fired again--and turned, staggering for the car.

“Jimmie! Jimmie--QUICK!”

Panting, gasping, he half fell into the tonneau. The car leaped forward,

yells filled the air--but only one thing was dominant in Jimmie Dale's

reeling brain now. He pulled himself up to his feet, and leaned over the

back of the seat, reaching for the slim figure that was bent over the

wheel.

“It's you--you at last!” he cried. “Your face--let me lee your face!”

A bullet split the back panel of the car--little spurting flames were

dancing out from the roadway behind.

“Are you mad!” she shouted back at him. “Let me steer--do you want them

to hit me!”

“No-o,” said Jimmie Dale, in a queer singsong sort of way, and his

head seemed to spin dizzily around. “No--I guess--” He choked. “The

paper--it's in--my pocket”--and he went down unconscious on the floor of

the car.

When he recovered his senses he was lying on a couch in a plainly

furnished room, and a man, a stranger, red, jovial-faced, farmerish

looking, was bending over him.

“Where am I?” he demanded finally, propping himself up on his elbow.

“You're all right,” replied the man. “She said you'd come around in a

little while.”

“Who said so?” inquired Jimmie Dale.

“She did. The woman who brought you here about five minutes ago. She

said she ran you down with her car.”

“Oh!” said Jimmie Dale. He felt his head--it was bandaged, and it was

bandaged, he was quite sure, with a piece of torn underskirt. He looked

at the man again. “You haven't told me yet where I am.”

“Long Island,” the other answered. “My name's Hanson. I keep a bit of a

truck garden here.”

“Oh,” said Jimmie Dale again.

The man crossed the room, picked up an envelope from the table, and came

back to Jimmie Dale.

“She said to give you this as soon as you got your senses, and asked us

to put you up for a while, as long as you wanted to stay, and paid

us for it, too. She's all right, she is. You don't want to hold the

accident up against her, she was mighty sorry about it. And now I'll go

and see if the old lady's got your room ready while you're readin' your

letter.”

The man left the room.

Jimmie Dale sat up on the couch, and tore the envelope open. The note,

scrawled in pencil, began abruptly:

“You were quite a problem. I couldn't take you HOME--could I? I couldn't

take you to what you call the Sanctuary could I? I couldn't take you to

a hospital, nor call in a doctor--the stain you use wouldn't stand it.

But, thank God! I know it's only a flesh wound, and you are all right

where you are for the day or two that you must keep quiet and take care

of yourself. By the time you read this the paper will be on the way to

the proper hands, and by morning the four where they should be. There

were a few articles in your clothes I thought it better to take charge

of in case--well, in case of ACCIDENT.”

Jimmie Dale tore the note up, and smiled wryly at the door. He felt

in his pockets. Mask, revolver, burglar's tools, and the thin metal

insignia case were gone.

“And I had the sublime optimism,” murmured Jimmie Dale, “to spend months

trying to find her as Larry the Bat!”

CHAPTER IX

TWO CROOKS AND A KNAVE

The bullet wound along the side of his head and just above his ear would

have been a very awkward thing indeed, in more ways than one, for Jimmie

Dale, the millionaire, to have explained at his club, in his social set,

or even to his servants, and of these latter to Jason the Solicitous

in particular; but for Jimmie Dale as Larry the Bat it was a matter of

little moment. There was none to question Larry the Bat, save in a most

casual and indifferent way; and a bandage of any description, primarily

and above all one that he could arrange himself, with only himself to

take note of the incongruous hues of skin where the stain, the grease

paint, and the make-up was washed off, would excite little attention

in that world where daily affrays were common-place happenings, and a

wound, for whatever reason, had long since lost the tang of novelty. Why

then should it arouse even a passing interest if Larry the Bat, credited

as the most confirmed of dope fiends, should have fallen down the

dark, rickety stairs of the tenement in one of his orgies, and, in the

expressive language of the Bad Lands, cracked his bean!

And so Jimmie Dale had been forced to maintain the role of Larry the Bat

for a far longer period than he had anticipated when, ten days before,

he had assumed it for the night's work that had so nearly resulted

fatally for himself, though it had placed Roessle's murderers behind

the bars. For, the next day, unwilling to court the risk of remaining

in that neighbourhood, he had left Hanson's, the farmer's, house on

Long Island where the Tocsin had carried him in an unconscious state,

telephoned Jason that he had been unexpectedly called out of town for

a few days, and returned to the Sanctuary in New York. And here, to his

grim dismay, he had found the underworld in a state of furious, angry

unrest, like a nest of hornets, stirred up, seeking to wreak vengeance

on an unseen assailant.

For years, as the Gray Seal, Jimmie Dale had lived with the slogan of

the police, “The Gray Seal dead or alive--but the Gray Seal!” sounding

in his ears; with the newspapers screaming their diatribes, arousing

the people against him, nagging the authorities into sleepless, frenzied

efforts to trap him; with a price upon his head that was large enough to

make a man, not too pretentious, rich for life--but in the underworld,

until then, the name of the Gray Seal had been one to conjure with, for

the underworld had sworn by the unknown master criminal, and had

spoken his name with a reverence that was none the less genuine even if

pungently tainted with unholiness. But now it was different. Up and down

through the Bad Lands, in gambling hells, in vicious resorts, in the

hiding places where thugs and crooks burrowed themselves away from

the daylight, through the heart and the outskirts of the underworld

travelled the fiat, whispered out of mouths crooked to one side--DEATH

TO THE GRAY SEAL!

Gangland differences were forgotten in the larger issue of the common

weal. The gang spirit became the spirit of a united whole, and the crime

fraternity buzzed and hummed poisonously, spurred on by hatred, thirst

for revenge, fear, and, perhaps most potent of all, a hideous suspicion

now of each other.

The underworld had received a shock at which it stood aghast, and which,

with its terrifying possibilities, struck consternation into the soul

of every individual of that brotherhood whose bond was crime, who was

already “wanted” for some offence or other, whether it ranged from

murder in the first degree to some petty piece of sneak thievery.

Stangeist, the Indian chief, the lawyer whose cunning brain had stood as

a rampart between the underworld and a prison cell, was himself now in

the Tombs with the certainty of the electric chair before him; and with

him, the same fate equally assured, were Australian Ike, The Mope, and

Clarie Deane! Aristocrats of the Bad Lands, peers of that inglorious

realm were those four--and the blow had fallen with stunning force,

a blow that in itself would have been enough to have stirred the

underworld to its depths. But that was not all--from the cells in the

Tombs, from the four came the word, and passed from mouth to mouth in

that strange underground exchange until all had heard it, that the Gray

Seal had “SQUEALED.” The Gray Seal who, though unknown, they had counted

the most eminent among themselves, had squealed! Who was the Gray Seal?

It he had held the secrets of Stangeist and his band, what else might

he not know? Who else might not fall next? The Gray Seal had become

a snitch, a menace, a source of danger that stalked among them like a

ghastly spectre. Who was the Gray Seal? None knew.

“Death to the Gray Seal! Run him to earth!” went the whisper from lip

to lip; and with the whisper men stared uncertainly into each other's

faces, fearful that the one to whom they spoke might even be--the Gray

Seal!

Jimmie Dale's lips twisted queerly as he looked around him at the

squalid appointments of the Sanctuary. The police were bad enough, the

papers were worse; but this was a still graver peril. With every denizen

of the underworld below the dead line suspicious of each other, their

lives, the penitentiary, or a prison sentence the stakes against which

each one played, the role of Larry the Bat, clever as was the make-up

and disguise, was fraught now more than ever before with danger and

peril. It seemed as though slowly the net was beginning at last to

tighten around him.

The murky, yellow flame of the gas jet flickered suddenly, as though

in acquiescence with the quick, impulsive shrug of Jimmie Dale's

shoulders--and Jimmie Dale, bending to peer into the cracked mirror that

was propped up on the broken-legged table, knotted his dress tie almost

fastidiously. The hair, if just a trifle too long, covered the scar on

his head now, the wound no longer required a bandage, and Larry the Bat,

for the time being at least, had disappeared. Across the foot of the

bed, neatly folded, lay his dress coat and overcoat, but little creased

for all that they had lain in that hiding-place under the flooring since

the night when, hurrying from the club, he had placed them there to

assume instead the tatters of Larry the Bat. It was Jimmie Dale in his

own person again who stood there now in Larry the Bat's disreputable

den, an incongruous figure enough against the background of his

miserable surroundings, in perfect-fitting shoes and trousers, the

broad expanse of spotless white shirt bosom glistening even in the

poverty-stricken flare from the single, sputtering gas jet.

Jimmie Dale took the watch from his pocket that had not been wound for

many days, wound it mechanically, set it by guesswork--it was not far

from eight o'clock--and replaced it in his pocket. Carefully then, one

at a time, he examined his fingers, long, slim, sensitive, tapering

fingers, magical masters of safes and locks and vaults of the most

intricate and modern mechanism--no single trace of grime remained,

they were metamorphosed hands from the filthy paws of Larry the Bat. He

nodded in satisfaction; and picked up the mirror for a final inspection

of himself, that, this time, did not miss a single line in his face or

neck. Again Jimmie Dale nodded. As though he had vanished into thin

air, as though he had never existed, not a trace of Larry the Bat

remained--except the heap of rags upon the floor, the battered slouch

hat, the frayed trousers, the patched boots with their broken laces, the

mismated socks, the grimy flannel shirt, and the old coat that he had

just discarded.

The mirror was replaced on the table; and, pushing the heap of clothes

before him with his foot, Jimmie Dale knelt down in the corner of the

room where the oilcloth had been turned up and the loose planking of the

floor removed, and began to pack the articles away in the hole. Jimmie

Dale rolled the trousers of Larry the Bat into a compact little bundle,

and stuffed them under the flooring. The gas jet seemed to blink again

in a sort of confidential approval, as though the secret lay inviolate

between itself and Jimmie Dale. Through the closed window, shade tightly

drawn, came, low and muffled, the sound of distant life from the Bowery,

a few blocks away. The gas jet, suffering from air somewhere within the

pipes, hissed angrily, the yellow flame died to a little blue, forked

spurt--and Jimmie Dale was on his feet, his face suddenly hard and white

as marble.

SOME ONE WAS KNOCKING AT THE DOOR!

For the fraction of a second Jimmie Dale stood motionless. Found as

Jimmie Dale in the den of Larry the Bat, and the consequences required

no effort of the imagination to picture them; police or denizen of the

underworld who was knocking there, it was all the same, the method of

death would be a little different, that was all--one legalised, the

other not. Jimmie Dale, Larry the Bat, the Gray Seal, once uncovered,

could expect as much quarter as would be given to a cornered rat. His

eyes swept the room with a swift, critical glance--evidences of Larry

the Bat, the clothes, were still about, even if he in the person of

Jimmie Dale, alone damning enough, were not standing there himself.

And he was even weaponless--the Tocsin had taken the revolver from

his pocket, together with those other telltale articles, the mask, the

flashlight, the little blued-steel tools, before she had intrusted him

that night, wounded and unconscious, to Hanson's care.

Jimmie Dale slipped his feet out of his low evening pumps, snatched up

the old coat and hat from the pile, put them on, and, without a

sound, reached the gas jet and turned it off. A second had gone by--no

more--the knocking still sounded insistently on the door. It was dark

now, perfectly black. He started across the room, his tread absolutely

silent as the trained muscles, relaxing, threw the body weight gradually

upon one foot before the next step was taken. It was like a shadow,

a little blacker in outline than the surrounding blackness, stealing

across the floor.

Halfway to the door he paused. The knocking had ceased. He listened

intently. It was not repeated. Instead, his ear caught a guarded step

retreating outside in the hall. Jimmie Dale drew a breath of relief.

He went on again to the door, still listening. Was it a trap--that step

outside?

At the door now, tense, alert, he lowered his ear to the keyhole. There

came the faintest creak from the stairs. Jimmie Dale's brows gathered.

It was strange! The knocking had not lasted long. Whoever it was was

going away--but it required the utmost caution to descend those stairs,

rickety and tumble-down as they were, with no more sound than that!

Why such caution? Why not a more determined and prolonged effort at his

door--the visitor had been easily satisfied that Larry the Bat was not

within. TOO easily satisfied! Jimmie Dale turned the key noiselessly in

the lock. He opened the door cautiously--half inch--an inch, there was

no sound of footsteps now. Occasionally a lodger moved about on the

floor above; occasionally from somewhere in the tenement came the murmur

of voices as from behind closed door--that was all. All else was silence

and darkness now.

The door, on its well-oiled hinges, swung wide open. Jimmie Dale thrust

out his head into the hall--and something fell upon the threshold with

a little thud--but for a moment Jimmie Dale did not move. Listening,

trying to pierce the darkness, he was as still as the silence around

him; then he stooped and groped along the threshold. His hand closed

upon what seemed like a small box wrapped in paper. He picked it up,

closed and locked the door again, and retreated back across the room. It

was strange--unpleasantly strange--a box propped stealthily against the

door so that it would fall to the threshold when the door was opened!

And why the stealth? What did it mean? Had the underworld with its

thousand eyes and ears already succeeded in a few days where the police

had failed signally for years--had they sent him this, whatever it was,

as some grim token that they had run Larry the Bat to earth? He shook

his head. No; gangland struck more swiftly, with less finesse than

that--the “cat-and-mouse” act was never one it favoured, for the mouse

had been known to get away.

Jimmie Dale lighted the gas again, and turned the package over in his

hands. It was, as he had surmised, a small cardboard box; and it was

wrapped in plain paper and tied with a string. He untied the string,

and still suspicious, as a man is suspicious in the knowledge that he is

stalked by peril at every turn, removed the wrapper a little gingerly.

It was still without sign or marking upon it, just an ordinary cardboard

box. He lifted off the cover, and, with a short, sudden laugh, stared, a

little out of countenance, at the contents.

On the top lay a white, unaddressed envelope. HERS! Beneath--he emptied

the box on the table--his black silk mask, his automatic revolver, the

kit of fine, small blued-steel burglar's tools, his pocket flashlight,

and the thin metal insignia case. The Tocsin! Impulsively Jimmie Dale

turned toward the door--and stopped. His shoulders lifted in a shrug

that, meant to be philosophical, was far from philosophical. He could

not, dared not venture far through the tenement dressed as he was; and

even if he could there were three exits to the Sanctuary, a fact that

now for the first time was not wholly a source of unmixed satisfaction

to him; and besides--she was gone!

Jimmie Dale opened the letter, a grim smile playing on his lips. He had

forgotten for the moment that the illusion he had cherished for years

in the belief that she did not know Larry the Bat as an alias of

Jimmie Dale was no more than--an illusion. Well, it had been a piece of

consummate egotism on his part, that was all. But, after all, what did

it matter? He had had his innings, tried in the role of Larry the Bat

to solve her identity, devoted weeks on end to the attempt--and failed.

Some day, perhaps, his turn would come; some day, perhaps, she would no

longer be able to elude him, unless--the letter crackled suddenly in

his fingers--unless the house that they had built on such strange

and perilous foundations crashed at some moment, without an instant's

warning, in disaster and ruin to the ground. Who knew but that this

letter now, another call to the Gray Seal to act, another peril invited,

would be the LAST? There must be an end some day; luck and nerve had

their limitations--it had almost ended last week!

“Dear Philanthropic Crook”--it was the same inevitable beginning. “You

are well enough again, aren't you, Jimmie?--I am sending these little

things back to you, for you will need them to-night.”--Jimmie Dale read

on, muttering snatches of the letter aloud: “Michael Breen prospecting

in Alaska--map of location of rich mining claim--Hamvert, his former

partner, had previously fleeced him of fifteen thousand dollars--his

share of a deal together--Breen was always a very poor man--Breen later

struck a claim alone; but, taking sick, came back home--died on

arrival in New York after giving map to his wife--wife in very

needy circumstances--lives with little daughter of seven in New

Rochelle--works out by the day at Henry Mittel's house on the

Sound near-by--wife intrusted map for safe-keeping and advice to

Mittel--Hamvert after map--telephone wires cut--room one hundred

and forty-eight, corner, right, first floor, Palais-Metropole

Hotel, unoccupied--connecting doors--quarter past nine to-night--the

Weasel--Mittel's house later--the police--look out for both the Weasel

and the police, Jimmie--”

There was more, several pages of it, explanations, specific details down

to a minute description of the locality and plan of the house on the

Sound. Jimmie Dale, too intent now to mutter, read on silently. At the

end he shuffled the sheets a little abstractedly, as his face hardened.

Then his fingers began to tear the letter into little shreds, tearing it

over and over again, tearing the shreds into tiny particles. He had not

been far wrong. From what the night promised now, this might well be the

last letter. Who knew? There would be need of all the wit and luck and

nerve to-night that the Gray Seal had ever had before.

With a jerk, Jimmie Dale roused himself from the momentary reverie into

which he had fallen; and, all action now, stuffed the torn pieces of the

letter into his trousers pocket to be disposed of later in the street;

took off the old coat and slouch hat again, and resumed the disposal of

Larry the Bat's effects under the flooring.

This accomplished, he replaced the planking and oilcloth, stood up, put

on his dress coat and light overcoat, and, from the table, stowed the

black silk mask, the automatic, the little kit of tools, the flashlight,

and the thin metal case away in his pockets.

Jimmie Dale raised his hand to the gas fixture, circled the room with a

glance that missed no single detail--then the light went out, the door

closed behind him, locked, a dark shadow crept silently down the stairs,

out through the side door into the alleyway, along the alleyway close to

the wall of the tenement where it was blackest, and, satisfied that

for the moment there were no passers-by, emerged on the street, walking

leisurely toward the Bowery.

Once well away from the Sanctuary, however, Jimmie Dale quickened his

steps; and twenty minutes later, having stopped but once to telephone to

his home on Riverside Drive for his touring car, he was briskly mounting

the steps of the St. James Club on Fifth Avenue. Another twenty minutes

after that, and he had dismissed Benson, his chauffeur, and, at

the wheel of his big, powerful machine, was speeding uptown for the

Palais-Metropole Hotel.

It was twelve minutes after nine when he drew up at the curb in front of

the side entrance of the hotel--his watch, set by guesswork, had been a

little slow, and he had corrected it at the club. He was replacing the

watch in his pocket as he sauntered around the corner, and passed in

through the main entrance to the big lobby.

Jimmie Dale avoided the elevators--it was only one flight up, and

elevator boys on occasions had been known to be observant. At the top

of the first landing, a long, wide, heavily carpeted corridor was before

him. “Number one hundred and forty-eight, the corner room on the right,”

the Tocsin had said. Jimmie Dale walked nonchalantly along--past No.

148. At the lower end of the hall a group of people were gathered around

the elevator doors; halfway down the corridor a bell boy came out of a

room and went ahead of Jimmie Dale.

And then Jimmie Dale stopped suddenly, and began to retrace his steps.

The group had entered the elevator, the bell boy had disappeared around

the farther end of the hall into the wing of the hotel--the corridor

was empty. In a moment he was standing before the door of No. 148;

in another, under the persuasion of a little steel instrument, deftly

manipulated by Jimmie Dale's slim, tapering fingers, the lock clicked

back, the door opened, and he stepped inside, closing and locking the

door again behind him.

It was already a quarter past nine, but no one was as yet in the

connecting room--the fanlight next door had been dark as he passed. His

flashlight swept about him, located the connecting door--and went out.

He moved to the door, tried it, and found it locked. Again the little

steel instrument came into play, released the lock, and Jimmie Dale

opened the door. Again the flashlight winked. The door opened into a

bathroom that, obviously, at will, was either common to the two rooms or

could, by the simple expedient of locking one door or the other, be used

by one of the rooms alone. In the present instance, the occupant of the

adjoining apartment had taken “a room with a bath.”

Jimmie Dale passed through the bathroom to the opposite door. This was

already three-quarters open, and swung outward into the bedroom, near

the lower end of the room by the window. Through the crack of the door

by the hinges, Jimmie Dale flashed his light, testing the radius of

vision, pushed the door a few inches wider open, tested it again with

the flashlight--and retreated back into No. 148, closing the door on his

side until it was just ajar.

He stood there then silently waiting. It was Hamvert's room next door,

and Hamvert and the Weasel were already late. A step sounded outside in

the corridor. Jimmie Dale straightened intently. The step passed on

down the hallway and died away. A false alarm! Jimmie Dale smiled

whimsically. It was a strange adventure this that confronted him, quite

the strangest in a way that the Tocsin had ever planned--and the night

lay before him full of peril in its extraordinary complications. To win

the hand he must block Hamvert and the Weasel without allowing them an

inkling that his interference was anything more than, say, the luck of

a hotel sneak thief at most. The Weasel was a dangerous man, one of the

slickest second-story workers in the country, with safe cracking as one

of his favourite pursuits, a man most earnestly desired by the police,

provided the latter could catch him “with the goods.” As for Hamvert,

he did not know Hamvert, who was a stranger in New York, except that

Hamvert had fleeced a man named Michael Breen out of his share in a

claim they had had together when Breen had first gone to Alaska to try

his luck, and now, having discovered that Breen, when prospecting alone

somewhere in the interior a month or so ago, had found a rich vein and

had made a map or diagram of its location, he, Hamvert, had followed

the other to New York for the purpose of getting it by hook or crook.

Breen's “find” had been too late; taken sick, he had never worked his

claim, had barely got back home before he died, and only in time to hand

his wife the strange legacy of a roughly scrawled little piece of paper,

and--Jimmie Dale straightened up alertly once more. Steps again--and

this time coming from the direction of the elevator; then voices; then

the opening of the door of the next room; then a voice, distinctly

audible:

“Pull up a chair, and we'll get down to business. You're late, as it is.

We haven't any time to waste, if we're going to wash pay-dirt to-night.”

“Aw, dat's all right!” responded another voice--quite evidently the

Weasel's. “Don't youse worry--de game's cinched to a fadeaway.”

There was the sound of chairs being moved across the floor. Jimmie Dale

slipped the black silk mask over his face, opened the door on his side

of the bathroom cautiously, and, without a sound, stepped into the

bathroom that was lighted now, of course, by the light streaming in

through the partially opened door of Hamvert's room. The two were

talking earnestly now in lower tones. Jimmie Dale only caught a word

here and there--his faculties for the moment were concentrated on

traversing the bathroom silently. He reached the farther door, crouched

there, peered through the crack--and the old whimsical smile flickered

across his lips again.

The Palais-Metropole was high class and exclusive, and the Weasel for

once looked quite the gentleman, and, for all his sharp, ferret face,

not entirely out of keeping with his surroundings--else he would never

have got farther than the lobby. The other was a short, thickset,

heavy-jowled man, with a great shock of sandy hair, and small black eyes

that looked furtively out from overhanging, bushy eyebrows.

“Well,” Hamvert was saying, “the details are your concern. What I

want is results. We won't waste time. You're to be back here by

daylight--only see that there's no come-back.”

“Leave it to me!” returned the Weasel, with assurance. “How's dere

goin' ter be any come-back? Mittel keeps it in his safe, don't he? Well,

gentlemen's houses has been robbed before--an' dis job'll be a good one.

De geographfy stunt youse wants gets pinched wid de rest, dat's all. It

disappears--see? Who's ter know youse gets yer claws on it? It's just

lost in de shuffle.”

“Right!” agreed Hamvert briskly--and from his inside pocket produced

a package of crisp new bills, yellow-backs, and evidently of large

denominations. “Half down and half on delivery--that's our deal.”

“Dat's wot!” assented the Weasel curtly.

Hamvert began to count the bills.

Jimmie Dale's hand stole into his pocket, and came out with his

handkerchief and the thin metal insignia case. From the latter, with its

little pair of tweezers, he took out one of the adhesive gray seals.

His eyes warily on the two men, he dropped the seal on his handkerchief,

restored the thin metal case to his pocket--and in its stead the

blue-black ugly muzzle of his automatic peeped from between his fingers.

“Five thousand down,” said Hamvert, pushing a pile of notes across the

table, and tucking the remainder back into his pocket; “and the other

five's here for you when you get back with the map. Ordinarily, I

wouldn't pay a penny in advance, but since you want it that way and

the map's no good to you while the rest of the long green is, I--” He

swallowed his words with a startled gulp, clutched hastily at the money

on the table, and began to struggle up from his chair to his feet.

With a swift, noiseless side-step through the open door, Jimmie Dale was

standing in the room.

Jimmie Dale's tones were conversational. “Don't get up,” said Jimmie

Dale coolly. “And take your hand off that money!”

The Weasel, whose back had been to the door, squirmed around in his

chair--and in his turn stared into the muzzle of Jimmie Dale's revolver,

while his jaw dropped and sagged.

“Good-evening, Weasel,” observed Jimmie Dale casually. “I seem to be in

luck to-night. I got into that room next door, but an empty room is slim

picking. And then it seemed to me I heard some one in here mention five

thousand dollars twice, which makes ten thousand, and which happens to

be just exactly the sum I need at the present moment--if I can't get any

more! I haven't the honour of your wealthy friend's acquaintance, but

I am really charmed to meet him. You--er--understand, both of you, that

the slightest sound might prove extremely embarrassing.”

Hamvert's face was white, and he stirred uneasily in his chair; but

into the Weasel's face, the first shock of surprised dismay past, came

a dull, angry red, and into the eyes a vicious gleam--and suddenly he

laughed shortly.

“Why, youse damned fool,” jeered the Weasel, “d'youse t'ink youse can

get away wid dat! Say, take it from me, youse are a piker! Say, youse

make me tired. Wot d'youse t'ink youse are? D'youse t'ink dis is a

tee-ayter, an' dat youse are a cheap-skate actor strollin' acrost de

stage? Aw, beat it, youse make me sick! Why, say, youse pinch dat money,

an' youse have got de same chanst of gettin' outer dis hotel as a guy

has of breakin' outer Sing Sing! By de time youse gets five feet from de

door of dis room we has de whole works on yer neck.”

“Do you think so, Weasel?” inquired Jimmie Dale politely. He carried his

handkerchief to his mouth to cloak a cough--and his tongue touched

the adhesive side of the little diamond-shaped gray seal. Hand and

handkerchief came back to the table, and Jimmie Dale leaned his weight

carelessly upon it, while the automatic in his right hand still covered

the two men. “Do you think so, Weasel?” he repeated softly. “Well,

perhaps you are right; and yet; somehow, I am inclined to disagree with

you. Let me see, Weasel--it was Tuesday night, two nights ago; wasn't

it, that a trifling break in Maiden Lane at Thorold and Sons disturbed

the police? It was a three-year job for even a first offender, ten

for one already on nodding terms with the police and fifteen to twenty

for--well, say, for a man like you, Weasel--IF HE WERE CAUGHT! Am I

making myself quite plain?”

The colour in the Weasel's cheeks faded a little--his eyes were holding

in sudden fascination upon Jimmie Dale.

“I see that I am,” observed Jimmie Dale pleasantly. “I said, 'if he were

caught,' you will remember. I am going to leave this room in a moment,

Weasel, and leave it entirely to your discretion as to whether you will

think it wise or not to stir from that chair for ten minutes after

I shut the door. And now”--Jimmie Dale nonchalantly replaced his

handkerchief in his pocket, nonchalantly followed it with the banknotes

which he picked up from the table--and smiled.

With a gasp, both men had strained forward, and were staring, wild-eyed,

at the gray seal stuck between them on the tabletop.

“The Gray Seal!” whispered the Weasel, and his tongue circled his lips.

Jimmie Dale shrugged his shoulders.

“That WAS a bit theatrical, Weasel,” he said apologetically; “and yet

not wholly unnecessary. You will recall Stangeist, The Mope, Australian

Ike, and Clarie Deane, and can draw your own inference as to what might

happen in the Thorold affair if you should be so ill-advised as to force

my hand. Permit me”--the slim, deft fingers, like a streak of lightning,

were inside Hamvert's coat pocket and out again with the remainder of

the banknotes--and Jimmie Dale was backing for the door--not the door

of the bathroom by which he had entered, but the door of the room itself

that opened on the corridor. There he stopped, and his hand swept around

behind his back and turned the key in the locked door. He nodded at the

two men, whose faces were working with incongruously mingled expressions

of impotent rage, bewilderment, fear, and fury--and opened the door a

little. “Ten minutes, Weasel,” he said gently. “I trust you will not

have to use heroic measures to restrain your friend for that length of

time, though if it is necessary I should advise you for your own sake to

resort almost--to murder. I wish you good evening, gentlemen.”

The door opened farther; Jimmie Dale, still facing inward, slipped

between it and the jamb, whipped the mask from his face, closed the door

softly, stepped briskly but without any appearance of haste along the

corridor to the stairs, descended the stairs, mingled with a crowd in

the lobby for an instant, walked, seemingly a part of it, with a group

of ladies and gentlemen down the hall to the side entrance, passed

out--and a moment later, after drawing on a linen dust coat which he

took from under the seat, and exchanging his hat for a tweed cap, the

car glided from the curb and was lost in a press of traffic around the

corner.

Jimmie Dale laughed a little harshly to himself. So far, so good--but

the game was not ended yet for all the crackle of the crisp notes in

his pocket. There was still the map, still the robbery at Mittel's

house--the ten-thousand-dollar “theft” would not in any way change that,

and it was a question of time now to forestall any move the Weasel might

make.

Through the city Jimmie Dale alternately dodged, spurted, and dragged

his way, fuming with impatience; but once out on the country roads and

headed toward New Rochelle, the big machine, speed limits thrown to the

winds, roared through the night--a gray streak of road jumping under the

powerful lamps; a village, a town, a cluster of lights flashing by him,

the steady purr of his sixty-horse-power engines; the gray thread of

open road again.

It was just eleven o'clock when Jimmie Dale, the road to himself for the

moment at a spot a little beyond New Rochelle, extinguished his lights,

and very carefully ran his car off the road, backing it in behind a

small clump of trees. He tossed the linen dust coat back into the car,

and set off toward where, a little distance away, the slap of waves from

the stiff breeze that was blowing indicated the shore line of the Sound.

There was no moon, and, while it was not particularly dark, objects and

surroundings at best were blurred and indistinct; but that, after all,

was a matter of little concern to Jimmie Dale--the first house beyond

was Mittel's. He reached the water's edge and kept along the shore.

There should be a little wharf, she had said. Yes; there it was--and

there, too, was a gleam of light from the house itself.

Jimmie Dale began to make an accurate mental note of his surroundings.

From the little wharf on which he now stood, a path led straight to the

house, bisecting what appeared to be a lawn, trees to the right, the

house to the left. At the wharf, beside him, two motor boats were

moored, one on each side. Jimmie Dale glanced at them, and, suddenly

attracted by the familiar appearance of one, inspected it a little more

closely. His momentarily awakened interest passed as he nodded his head.

It had caught his attention, that was all--it was the same type and

design, quite a popular make, of which there were hundreds around New

York, as the one he had bought that year as a tender for his yacht.

He moved forward now toward the house, the rear of which faced him--the

light that flooded the lawn came from a side window. Jimmie Dale was

figuring the time and distance from New York as he crept cautiously

along. How quickly could the Weasel make the journey? The Weasel would

undoubtedly come, and if there was a convenient train it might prove a

close race--but in his own favour was the fact that it would probably

take the Weasel quite some little time to recover his equilibrium from

his encounter with the Gray Seal in the Palais-Metropole, also the

further fact that, from the Weasel's viewpoint, there was no desperate

need of haste. Jimmie Dale crossed the lawn, and edged along in the

shadows of the house to where the light streamed out from what now

proved to be open French windows. It was a fair presumption that he

would have an hour to the good on the Weasel.

The sill was little more than a couple of feet from the ground, and,

from a crouched position on his knees below the window, Jimmie Dale

raised himself slowly and peered guardedly inside. The room was empty.

He listened a moment--the black silk mask was on his face again--and

with a quick, agile, silent spring he was in the room.

And then, in the centre of the room, Jimmie Dale stood motionless,

staring around him, an expression, ironical, sardonic, creeping into his

face. THE ROBBERY HAD ALREADY BEEN COMMITTED! At the lower end of the

room everything was in confusion; the door of a safe swung wide, the

drawers of a desk had been wrenched out, even a liqueur stand, on which

were well-filled decanters, had been broken open, and the contents of

safe and desk, the thief's discards as it were, littered the floor in

all directions.

For an instant Jimmie Dale, his eyes narrowed ominously, surveyed the

scene; then, with a sort of professional instinct aroused, he stepped

forward to examine the safe--and suddenly darted behind the desk

instead. Steps sounded in the hall. The door opened--a voice reached

him:

“The master said I was to shut the windows, and I haven't dast to go in.

And he'll be back with the police in a minute now. Come on in with me,

Minnie.”

“Lord!” exclaimed another voice. “Ain't it a good thing the missus is

away. She'd have highsteericks!”

Steps came somewhat hesitantly across the floor--from behind the desk,

Jimmie Dale could see that it was a maid, accompanied by a big, rawboned

woman, sleeves rolled to the elbows over brawny arms, presumably the

Mittels' cook.

The maid closed the French windows, there were no others in the room,

and bolted them; and, having gained a little confidence, gazed about

her.

“My, but wasn't he cute!” she ejaculated. “Cut the telephone wires, he

did. And ain't he made an awful mess! But the master said we wasn't to

touch nothing till the police saw it.”

“And to think of it happening in OUR house!” observed the cook heavily,

her hands on her hips, her arms akimbo. “It'll all be in the papers, and

mabbe they'll put our pictures in, too.”

“I won't get over it as long as I live!” declared the maid. “The yell

Mr. Mittel gave when he came downstairs and put his head in here,

and then him shouting and using the most terrible language into

the telephone, and then finding the wires cut. And me following him

downstairs half dead with fright. And he shouts at me. 'Bella,' he

shouts, 'shut those windows, but don't you touch a thing in that room.

I'm going for the police.' And then he rushes out of the house.”

“I was going to bed,” said the cook, picking up her cue for what was

probably the twentieth rehearsal of the scene, “when I heard Mr. Mittel

yell, and--Lord, Bella, there he is now!”

Jimmie Dale's hands clenched. He, too, had caught the scuffle of

footsteps, those of three or four men at least, on the front porch.

There was one way, only one, of escape--through the French windows!

It was a matter of seconds only before Mittel, with the police at his

heels, would be in the room--and Jimmie Dale sprang to his feet. There

was a wild scream of terror from the maid, echoed by another from the

cook--and, still screaming, both women fled for the door.

“Mr. Mittel! Mr. Mittel!” shrieked the maid--she had flung herself out

into the hall. “He's--he's back again!”

Jimmie Dale was at the French windows, tearing at the bolts. They

stuck. Shouts came from the front entryway. He wrenched viciously at the

fastenings. They gave now. The windows flew open. He glanced over his

shoulder. A man, Mittel presumably, since he was the only one not in

uniform, was springing into the room. There was a blur of forms and

brass buttons behind Mittel--and Jimmie Dale leaped to the lawn,

speeding across it like a deer.

But quick as he ran, Jimmie Dale's brain was quicker, pointing the

single chance that seemed open to him. The motor boat! It seemed like a

God-given piece of luck that he had noticed it was like his own; there

would be no blind, and that meant fatal, blunders in the dark over its

mechanism, and he could start it up in a moment--just the time to cast

her off, that was all he needed.

The shouts swelled behind him. Jimmie Dale was running for his life. He

flung a glance backward. One form--Mittel, he was certain--was perhaps a

hundred yards in the rear. The others were just emerging from the

French windows--grotesque, leaping things they looked, in the light that

streamed out behind them from the room.

Jimmie Dale's feet pounded the planking of the wharf. He stooped and

snatched at the mooring line. Mittel was almost at the wharf. It seemed

an age, a year to Jimmie Dale before the line was clear. Shouts rang

still louder across the lawn--the police, racing in a pack, were more

than halfway from the house. He flung the line into the boat, sprang in

after it--and Mittel, looming over him, grasped at the boat's gunwhale.

Both men were panting from their exertions.

“Let go!” snarled Jimmie Dale between clenched teeth.

Mittel's answer was a hoarse, gasping shout to the police to hurry--and

then Mittel reeled back, measuring his length upon the wharf from a blow

with a boat hook full across the face, driven with a sudden, untamed

savagery that seemed for the moment to have mastered Jimmie Dale.

There was no time--not a second--not the fraction of a second.

Desperately, frantically he shoved the boat clear of the wharf.

Once--twice--three times he turned the engine over without success--and

then the boat leaped forward. Jimmie Dale snatched the mask from his

face, and jumped for the steering wheel. The police were rushing out

along the wharf. He could just faintly discern Mittel now--the man was

staggering about, his hands clapped to his face. A peremptory order to

halt, coupled with a threat to fire, rang out sharply--and Jimmie Dale

flung himself flat in the bottom of the boat. The wharf edge seemed to

open in little, crackling jets of flame, came the roar of reports like a

miniature battery in action, then the FLOP, FLOP, FLOP, as the lead tore

up the water around him, the duller thud as a bullet buried its nose in

the boat's side, and the curious rip and squeak as a splinter flew. Then

Mittel's voice, high-pitched, as though in pain:

“Can't any of you run a motor boat? He's got me bad, I'm afraid. That

other one there is twice as fast.”

“Sure!” another voice responded promptly. “And if that's right, he's run

his head into a trap. Cast loose, there, MacVeay, and pile in, all of

you! You go back to the house, Mr. Mittel, and fix yourself up. We'll

get him!”

Jimmie Dale's lips thinned. It was true! If the other boat had any speed

at all, it was only a question of time before he would be overtaken.

The only point at issue was how much time. It was dark--that was in his

favour--but it was not so dark but that a boat could be distinguished on

the water for quite a distance, for a longer distance than he could hope

to put between them. There was no chance of eluding the police that

way! The keen, facile brain that had saved the Gray Seal a hundred times

before was weaving, planning, discarding, eliminating, scheming a way

out--with death, ruin, disaster the price of failure. His eyes swept

the dim, irregular outline of the shore. To his right, in the opposite

direction from where he had left his car, and perhaps a mile ahead, as

well as he could judge, the land seemed to run out into a point. Jimmie

Dale headed for it instantly. If he could reach it with a little lead to

the good, there was a chance! It would take, say, six minutes, granting

the boat a speed of ten miles an hour--and she could do that. The others

could hardly overtake him in that time--they hadn't got started yet. He

could hear them still shouting and talking at the wharf. And Mittel's

“twice as fast” was undoubtedly an exaggeration, anyhow.

A minute more passed, another--and then, astern, Jimmie Dale caught the

racket from the exhaust of a high-powered engine, and a white streak

seemed to shoot out upon the surface of the water from where, obscured

now, he placed the wharf. A quarter-mile lead, roughly four hundred

yards; yes, he had as much as that--but that, too, was very little.

He bent over his engine, coaxing it, nursing it to its highest

efficiency; his eyes strained now upon the point ahead, now upon his

pursuers behind. He was running with the wind, thank Heaven! or the

small boat would have had a further handicap--it was rolling up quite a

sea.

The steering gear, he found, was corded along the side of the boat,

permitting its manipulation from almost any position, and, abruptly now,

Jimmie Dale left the engine to rummage through the little locker in the

stern of the boat. But as he rummaged, his eyes held speculatively on

the boat astern. She was gaining unquestionably, steadily, but not as

fast as he had feared. He would still have a hundred yards' lead, at

least, abreast the point--and, he was smiling grimly now, a hundred

yards there meant life to the Gray Seal! The locker was full of a

heterogeneous collection of odds and ends--a suit of oilskins, tools,

tins, and cans of various sizes and descriptions. Jimmie Dale emptied

the contents, some sort of powder, of a small, round tin box overboard,

and from his pocket took out the banknotes, crammed them into the box,

crammed his watch in on top of them, and screwed the cover on tightly.

His fingers were flying now. A long strip torn from the trousers' leg of

the oilskins was wrapped again and again around the box--and the box was

stuffed into his pocket.

The flash of a revolver shot cut the blackness behind him, then another,

and another. They were firing in a continuous stream again. It was

fairly long range, but there was always the chance of a stray bullet

finding its mark. Jimmie Dale, crouching low, made his way to the bow of

the boat again.

The point was looming almost abreast now. He edged in nearer, to hug

it as closely as he dared risk the depth of the water. Behind,

remorselessly, the other boat was steadily closing the gap; and the

shots were not all wild--one struck, with a curious singing sound, on

some piece of metal a foot from his elbow. Closer to the shore, running

now parallel with the head of the point, Jimmie Dale again edged in the

boat, his jaws, clamped, working in little twitches.

And then suddenly, with a swift, appraising glance behind him, he

swerved the boat from her course and headed for the shore--not directly,

but diagonally across the little bay that, on the farther side of the

point, had now opened out before him. He was close in with the edge of

the point, ten yards from it, sweeping past it--the point itself came

between the two boats, hiding them from each other--and Jimmie Dale,

with a long spring, dove from the boat's side to the water.

The momentum from the boat as he sank robbed him for an instant of all

control over himself, and he twisted, doubled up, and rolled over and

over beneath the water--but the next moment his head was above the

surface again, and he was striking out swiftly for the shore. It was

only a few yards--but in a few SECONDS the pursuing boat, too, would

have rounded the point. His feet touched bottom. It was haste now,

nothing else, that counted. The drum of the racing engines, the

crackling roar of the exhaust from the oncoming boat was in his ears. He

flung himself upon the shore and down behind a rock. Around the point,

past him, tore the police boat, dark forms standing clustered in the

bow--and then a sudden shout:

“There she is! See her? She's heading into the bay for the shore!”

Jimmie Dale's lips relaxed. There was no doubt that they had sighted

their quarry again--a perfect fusillade of revolver shots directed at

the now empty boat was quite sufficient proof of that! With something

that was almost a chuckle, Jimmie Dale straightened up from behind the

rock and began to run back along the shore. The little motor boat would

have grounded long before they overtook her, and, thinking naturally

enough, that he had leaped ashore from her, they would go thrashing

through the woods and fields searching for him!

It was a longer way back by the shore, a good deal longer; now over

rough, rocky stretches where he stumbled in the darkness, now through

marshy, sodden ground where he sank as in a quagmire time and again over

his ankles. It was even longer than he had counted on, and time, with

the Weasel on one hand and the return of the police on the other, was

a factor to be reckoned with again, as, a half hour later, Jimmie Dale

stole across the lawn of Mittel's house for the second time that night,

and for the second time crouched beneath the open French windows.

Masked again, the water still dripping from what were once immaculate

evening clothes but which now sagged limply about him, his collar a

pasty string around his neck, the mud and dirt splashed to his knees,

Jimmie Dale was a disreputable and incongruous-looking object as he

crouched there, shivering uncomfortably from his immersion in spite of

his exertions. Inside the room, Mittel passed the windows, pacing the

floor, one side of his face badly cut and bruised from the blow with the

boat hook--and as he passed, his back turned for an instant, Jimmie Dale

stepped into the room.

Mittel whirled at the sound, and, with a suppressed cry, instinctively

drew back--Jimmie Dale's automatic was dangling carelessly in his right

hand.

“I am afraid I am a trifle melodramatic,” observed Jimmie Dale

apologetically, surveying his own bedraggled person; “but I assure you

it is neither intentional nor for effect. As it is, I was afraid I would

be late. Pardon me if I take the liberty of helping myself; one gets a

chill in wet clothes so easily”--he passed to the liqueur stand, poured

out a generous portion from one of the decanters, and tossed it off.

Mittel neither spoke nor moved. Stupefaction, surprise, and a very

obvious regard for Jimmie Dale's revolver mingled themselves in a

helpless expression on his face.

Jimmie Dale set down his glass and pointed to a chair in front of the

desk.

“Sit down, Mr. Mittel,” he invited pleasantly. “It will be quite

apparent to you that I have not time to prolong our interview

unnecessarily, in view of the possible return of the police at any

moment, but you might as well be comfortable. You will pardon me again

if I take another liberty”--he crossed the room, turned the key in the

lock of the door leading into the hall, and returned to the desk. “Sit

down, Mr. Mittel!” he repeated, a sudden rasp in his voice.

Mittel, none too graciously, now seated himself.

“Look here, my fine fellow,” he burst out, “you're carrying things with

a pretty high hand, aren't you? You seem to have eluded the police for

the moment, somehow, but let me tell you I--”

“No,” interrupted Jimmie Dale softly, “let ME tell you--all there is

to be told.” He leaned over the desk and stared rudely at the bruise on

Mittel's face. “Rather a nasty crack, that,” he remarked.

Mittel's fists clenched, and an angry flush swept his cheeks.

“I'd have made it a good deal harder,” said Jimmie Dale, with sudden

insolence, “if I hadn't been afraid of putting you out of business and

so precluding the possibility of this little meeting. Now then”--the

revolver swung upward and held steadily on a line with Mittel's eyes--

“I'll trouble you for the diagram of that Alaskan claim that belongs to

Mrs. Michael Breen!”

Mittel, staring fascinated into the little, round, black muzzle of the

automatic, edged back in his chair.

“So--so that's what you're after, is it?” he jerked out. “Well”--he

laughed unnaturally and waved his hand at the disarray of the

room--“it's been stolen already.”

“I know that,” said Jimmie Dale grimly. “By--YOU!”

“Me!” Mittel started up in his chair, a whiteness creeping into his

face. “Me! I--I--”

“Sit down!” Jimmie Dale's voice rang out ominously cold. “I haven't any

time to spare. You can appreciate that. But even if the police return

before that map is in my possession, they will still be TOO LATE as

far as you are concerned. Do you understand? Furthermore, if I am

caught--you are ruined. Let me make it quite plain that I know

the details of your little game. You are a curb broker, Mr.

Mittel--ostensibly. In reality, you run what is nothing better than an

exceedingly profitable bucket shop. The Weasel has been a customer

and also a stool for you for years. How Hamvert met the Weasel is

unimportant--he came East with the intention of getting in touch with a

slick crook to help him--the Weasel is the coincidence, that is all. I

quite understand that you have never met Hamvert, nor Hamvert you, nor

that Hamvert was aware that you and the Weasel had anything to do

with one another and were playing in together--but that equally is

unimportant. When Hamvert engaged the Weasel for ten thousand dollars

to get the map from you for him, the Weasel chose the line of least

resistance. He KNEW you, and approached you with an offer to split the

money in return for the map. It was not a question of your accepting his

offer--it was simply a matter of how you could do it and still protect

yourself. The Weasel was well qualified to point the way--a fake robbery

of your house would answer the purpose admirably--you could not be held

either legally or morally responsible for a document that was placed,

unsolicited by you, in your possession, if it were stolen from you.”

Mittel's face was ashen, colourless. His hands were opening and shutting

with nervous twitches on the top of the desk.

Jimmie Dale's lips curled.

“But”--Jimmie Dale was clipping off his words now viciously--“neither

you nor the Weasel were willing to trust the other implicitly--perhaps

you know each other too well. You were unwilling to turn over the map

until you had received your share of the money, and you were equally

unwilling to turn it over until you were SAFE; that is, until you had

engineered your fake robbery even to the point of notifying the police

that it had been committed; the Weasel, on the other hand, had some

scruples about parting with any of the money without getting the map in

one hand before he let go of the banknotes with the other. It was very

simply arranged, however, and to your mutual satisfaction. While you

robbed your own house this evening, he was to get half the money in

advance from Hamvert, giving Hamvert to understand that HE had planned

to commit the robbery himself to-night. He was to come out here then,

receive the map from you in exchange for your share of the money, return

to Hamvert with the map, and receive in turn his own share. I might

say that Hamvert actually paid down the advance--and it was perhaps

unfortunate for you that you paid such scrupulous attention to details

as to cut your own telephone wires! I had not, of course, an exact

knowledge of the hour or minute in which you proposed to stage your

little play here. The object of my first visit a little while ago was

to forestall your turning the diagram over to the Weasel. Circumstances

favoured you for the moment. I am back again, however, for the same

purpose--the map!”

Mittel, in a cowed way, was huddled back in his chair. He smiled

miserably at Jimmie Dale.

“QUICK!” Jimmie Dale flung out the word in a sharp, peremptory bark. “Do

you need to be told that the CARTRIDGES are dry?”

Mittel's hand, trembling, went into his pocket and produced an envelope.

“Open it!” commanded Jimmie Dale. “And lay it on the desk, so that I can

read it--I am too wet to touch it.”

Mittel obeyed--like a dog that has been whipped.

A glance at the paper, and Jimmie Dale's eyes lifted again--to sweep the

floor of the room. He pointed to a pile of books and documents in one

corner that had been thrown out of the safe.

“Go over there and pick up that check book!” he ordered tersely.

“What for?” Mittel made feeble protest.

“Never mind what for!” snapped Jimmie Dale. “Go and get it--and HURRY!”

Once more Mittel obeyed--and dropped the book hesitantly on the desk.

Jimmie Dale stared silently, insolently, contemptuously at the other.

Mittel stirred uneasily, sat down, shifted his feet, and his fingers

fumbled aimlessly over the top of the desk.

“Compared with you,” said Jimmie Dale, in a low voice, “the Weasel, ay,

and Hamvert, too, crooks though they are, are gentlemen! Michael Breen,

as he died, told his wife to take that paper to some one she could

trust, who would help her and tell her what to do; and, knowing no one

to go to, but because she scrubbed your floors and therefore thought

you were a fine gentleman, she came timidly to you, and trusted you--you

cur!”

Jimmie Dale laughed suddenly--not pleasantly. Mittel shivered.

“Hamvert and Breen were partners out there in Alaska when Breen first

went out,” said Jimmie Dale slowly, pulling the tin can wrapped in

oilskin from his pocket. “Hamvert swindled Breen out of the one strike

he made, and Mrs. Breen and her little girl back here were reduced to

poverty. The amount of that swindle was, I understand, fifteen thousand

dollars. I have ten of it here, contributed by the Weasel and Hamvert;

and you will, I think, recognise therein a certain element of poetic

justice--but I am still short five thousand dollars.”

Jimmie Dale removed the cover from the tin can. Mittel gazed at the

contents numbly.

“You perhaps did not hear me?” prompted Jimmie Dale coldly. “I am still

short five thousand dollars.”

Mittel circled his lips with the tip of his tongue.

“What do you want?” he whispered hoarsely.

“The balance of the amount.” There was an ominous quiet in Jimmie

Dale's voice. “A check payable to Mrs. Michael Breen for five thousand

dollars.”

“I--I haven't got that much in the bank,” Mittel fenced, stammering.

“No? Then I should advise you to see that you have by ten o'clock

to-morrow morning!” returned Jimmie Dale curtly. “Make out that check!”

Mittel hesitated. The revolver edged insistently a little farther across

the desk--and Mittel, picking up a pen, wrote feverishly. He tore the

check from its stub, and, with a snarl, pushed it toward Jimmie Dale.

“Fold it!” instructed Jimmie Dale, in the same curt tones. “And fold

that diagram with it. Put them both in this box. Thank you!” He wrapped

the oilskin around the box again, and returned the box to his pocket.

And again with that insolent, contemptuous stare, he surveyed the man at

the desk--then he backed to the French windows. “It might be as well to

remind you, Mittel,” he cautioned sternly, “that if for any reason this

check is not honoured, whether through lack of funds or an attempt by

you to stop payment, you'll be in a cell in the Tombs to-morrow for this

night's work--that is quite understood, isn't it?”

Mittel was on his feet--sweat glistened on his forehead.

“My God!” he cried out shrilly. “Who are you?”

And Jimmie Dale smiled and stepped out on the lawn.

“Ask the Weasel,” said Jimmie Dale--and the next instant, lost in the

shadows of the house, was running for his car.

CHAPTER X

THE ALIBI

DEATH TO THE GRAY SEAL!”--through the underworld, in dens and dives that

sheltered from the law the vultures that preyed upon society, prompted

by self-fear, by secret dread, by reason of their very inability

to carry out their purpose, the whispered sentence grew daily more

venomous, more insistent. THE GRAY SEAL, DEAD OR ALIVE--BUT THE GRAY

SEAL!” It was the “standing orders” of the police. Railed at by a

populace who angrily demanded at its hands this criminal of criminals,

mocked at and threatened by a virulent press, stung to madness by the

knowledge of its own impotence, flaunted impudently to its face by this

mysterious Gray Seal to whose door the law laid a hundred crimes, for

whom the bars of a death cell in Sing Sing was the certain goal could

he but be caught, the police, to a man, was like an uncaged beast that,

flicked to the raw by some unseen assailant and murderous in its fury,

was crouched to strike. Grim paradox--a common bond that linked the

hands of the law with those that outraged it!

Death to the Gray Seal! Was it, at last, the beginning of the end?

Jimmie Dale, as Larry the Bat, unkempt, disreputable in appearance,

supposed dope fiend, a figure familiar to every denizen below the dead

line, skulked along the narrow, ill-lighted street of the East Side

that, on the corner ahead, boasted the notorious resort to which Bristol

Bob had paid the doubtful, if appropriate, compliment of giving his

name. From under the rim of his battered hat, Jimmie Dale's eyes, veiled

by half-closed, well-simulated drug-laden lids, missed no detail either

of his surroundings or pertaining to the passers-by. Though already late

in the evening, half-naked children played in the gutters; hawkers of

multitudinous commodities cried their wares under gasoline banjo torches

affixed to their pushcarts; shawled women of half a dozen races, and men

equally cosmopolitan, loitered at the curb, or blocked the pavement,

or brushed by him. Now a man passed him, flinging a greeting from

the corner of his mouth; now another, always without movement of the

lips--and Jimmie Dale answered them--from the corner of his mouth.

But while his eyes were alert, his mind was only subconsciously attune

to his surroundings. Was it indeed the beginning of the end? Some day,

he had told himself often enough, the end must come. Was it coming

now, surely, with a sort of grim implacability--when it was too late to

escape! Slowly, but inexorably, even his personal freedom of action

was narrowing, being limited, and, ironically enough, through the very

conditions he had himself created as an avenue of escape.

It was not only the police now; it was, far more to be feared, the

underworld as well. In the old days, the role of Larry the Bat had been

assumed at intervals, at his own discretion, when, in a corner, he had

no other way of escape; now it was forced upon him almost daily. The

character of Larry the Bat could no longer be discarded at will. He had

flung down the gauntlet to the underworld when, as the Gray Seal, he had

closed the prison doors behind Stangeist, The Mope, Australian Ike, and

Clarie Deane, and the underworld had picked the gauntlet up. Betrayed,

as they believed, by the one who, though unknown to them; they had

counted the greatest among themselves, and each one fearful that his own

betrayal might come next, every crook, every thug in the Bad Lands

now eyed his oldest pal with suspicion and distrust, and each was a

self-constituted sleuth, with the prod of self-preservation behind him,

sworn to the accomplishment of that unhallowed slogan--death to the Gray

Seal. Almost daily now he must show himself as Larry the Bat in some

gathering of the underworld--a prolonged absence from his haunts was not

merely to invite certain suspicion, where all were suspicious of each

other, it was to invite certain disaster. He had now either to carry

the role like a little old man of the sea upon his back, or renounce it

forever. And the latter course he dared not even consider--the Sanctuary

was still the Sanctuary, and the role of Larry the Bat was still a

refuge, the trump card in the lone hand he played.

He reached the corner, pushed open the door of Bristol Bob's, and

shuffled in. The place was a glare of light, a hideous riot of noise. On

a polished section of the floor in the centre, a turkey trot was in

full swing; laughter and shouting vied raucously with an impossible

orchestra.

Jimmie Dale slowly made the circuit of the room past the tables, that,

ranged around the sides, were packed with occupants who thumped their

glasses in tempo with the music and clamoured at the rushing waiters

for replenishment. A dozen, two dozen, men and women greeted him. Jimmie

Dale indifferently returned their salutes. What a galaxy of crooks--the

cream of the underworld! His eyes, under half-closed lids, swept the

faces--lags, dips, gatmen, yeggs, mob stormers, murderers, petty sneak

thieves, stalls, hangers-on--they were all there. He knew them all; he

was known to all.

He shuffled on to the far end of the room, his leer a little arrogant,

a certain arrogance, too, in the tilt of his battered hat. He also

was quite a celebrity in that gathering--Larry the Bat was of the

aristocracy and the elite of gangland. Well, the show was over; he had

stalked across the stage, performed for his audience--and in another

hour now, free until he must repeat the same performance the next day in

some other equally notorious dive, he would be sitting in for a rubber

of bridge at that most exclusive of all clubs, the St. James, where none

might enter save only those whose names were vouched for in the highest

and most select circles, and where for partners he would possibly have

a justice of the supreme court, or mayhap an eminent divine! He looked

suddenly around him, as though startled. It always startled him, that

comparison. There was something too stupendous to be simply ironical in

the incongruity of it. If--if he were ever run to earth!

His eyes met those of a heavy-built, coarse-featured man, the chewed end

of a cigar in his mouth, who stepped from behind the bar, carrying a tin

tray with two full glasses upon it. It was Bristol Bob, ex-pugilist, the

proprietor.

“How're you, Larry?” grunted the man, with what he meant to be a smile.

Jimmie Dale was standing in the doorway of a passage that prefaced a

rear exit to the lane. He moved aside to allow the other to pass.

“'Ello, Bristol,” he returned dispassionately.

Bristol Bob went on along down the passage, and Jimmie Dale shuffled

slowly after him. He had intended to leave the place by the rear

door--it obviated the possibility of an undesirable acquaintance joining

company with him if he went out by the main entrance. But now his

eyes were fixed on the proprietor's back with a sort of speculative

curiosity. There was a private room off the passage, with a window on

the lane; but they must be favoured customers indeed that Bristol Bob

would condescend to serve personally--any one who knew Bristol Bob knew

that.

Jimmie Dale slowed his shuffling gait, then quickened it again. Bristol

Bob opened the door and passed into the private room--the door was just

closing as Jimmie Dale shuffled by. He had had only a glance inside--but

it was enough. They were favoured customers indeed! It was no wonder

that Bristol Bob himself was on the job! Two men were in the room:

Lannigan of headquarters, rated the smartest plain-clothes man in the

country--and, across the table from Lannigan, Whitey Mack, as clever,

finished and daring a crook as was to be found in the Bad Lands, whose

particular “line” was diamonds, or, in the vernacular of his ilk, “white

stones,” that had earned him the sobriquet of “Whitey.” Lannigan of

headquarters, Whitey Mack of the underworld, sworn enemies those two--in

secret session! Bristol Bob might well play the part of outer guard. If

a choice few of those outside in the dance hall could get a glimpse into

that private room it would be “good-night” to Whitey Mack.

Jimmie Dale's eyes were narrowed a little as he shuffled on down the

passage. Lannigan and Whitey Mack with their heads together! What was

the game? There was nothing in common between the two men. Lannigan, it

was well known, could not be “reached.” Whitey Mack, with his ingenious

cleverness, coupled with a cold-blooded fearlessness that had made him

an object of unholy awe and respect in the eyes of the underworld, was a

thorn that was sore beyond measure in the side of the police.

Certainly, it was no ordinary thing that had brought these two together;

especially, since, with the unrest and suspicion that was bubbling

and seething below the dead line, and with which there was none more

intimate than Whitey Mack, Whitey Mack was inviting a risk in “making

up” with the police that could only be accounted for by some urgent and

vital incentive.

Jimmie Dale pushed open the door that gave on the lane. Behind him,

Bristol Bob closed the door of the private room and retreated back along

the passage. Jimmie Dale stepped out into the lane--and instinctively

his eyes sought the window of the private room. The shade was drawn,

only a yellow murk filtered out into the black, unlighted lane, but

suddenly he started noiselessly toward it. The window was open a bare

inch or so at the bottom!

The sill was just shoulder high, and, placing his ear to the opening,

he flattened himself against the wall. He could not see inside, for the

shade was drawn well to the bottom; but he could hear as distinctly as

though he were at the table beside the two men--and at the first words,

the loose, disjointed frame of Larry the Bat seemed to tauten curiously

and strain forward lithe and tense.

“This Gray Seal dope listens good, Whitey; but, coming from you, I'm

leery. You've got to show me.”

“Don't you want him?” There was a nasty laugh from Whitey Mack.

“You BET I want him!” returned the headquarters man with a suppressed

savagery that left no doubt as to his earnestness. “I want him fast

enough, but--”

“Then, blast him, so do I!” Whitey Mack rapped out with a vicious snarl.

“So does every guy in the fleet down here. We got it in for him. You

get that, don't you? He's got Stangeist and his gang steered for the

electric chair now; he put a crimp in the Weasel the other night--get

that? He's like a blasted wizard with what he knows. And who'll he deal

the icy mitt to next? Me--damn him--me, for all I know!”

“That's all right,” observed Lannigan coolly. “I'm not questioning your

sincerity for a minute; I know all about that; but that doesn't land the

Gray Seal. I'll work with you if you've anything to offer, but we've had

enough 'tips' and 'information' handed us at headquarters in the last

few years to make us a trifle skeptical. Show me what you've got,

Whitey?”

“Show you!” echoed Whitey Mack passionately. “Sure, I'll show you!

That's what I'm going to do--show you. I'll show you the Gray Seal! I

ain't handing you any tips. I'VE FOUND OUT WHO THE GRAY SEAL IS!”

There was a tense silence. It seemed to Jimmie Dale as though cold

fingers were clutching at his heart, stifling its beat--then the blood

came bursting to his forehead. He could not see into the room, but

that silence was eloquent. It seemed as though he could picture the two

men--Lannigan leaning suddenly forward--Lannigan and Whitey Mack staring

tensely into each other's eyes.

“You--WHAT!” It came low and grim from Lannigan.

“That's what!” asserted Whitey Mack bluntly. “You heard me! That's what

I said! I know who the Gray Seal is--and I'm the only guy that's wise to

him. Am I letting you in right?”

“You're sure?” demanded Lannigan hoarsely. “You're sure? Who is he,

then?”

There was a half laugh, half snarl from Whitey Mack.

“Oh, no, you don't!” he growled. “Nix on that! What do you take me

for--a fool? You beat it out of here and round him up--eh--while I suck

my thumbs? Say, forget it! Do you think I'm doing this because I love

you? Why, blame you, you've been aching for a year to put the bracelets

on me yourself! Say, wake up! I'm in on this myself.”

Again that silence. Then Lannigan spoke slowly, in a puzzled way.

“I don't get you, Whitey,” he said. “What do you mean?” Then, a little

sharply: “You're quite right; you've got some reputation yourself, and

you're badly 'wanted' if we could get the 'goods' on you. If you're

trying to plant something, look out for yourself, or--”

“Can that!” snapped Whitey Mack threateningly. “Can that sort of spiel

right now--or quit! I ain't telling you his name--yet. BUT I'LL TAKE

YOU TO HIM TO-NIGHT--and you and me nabs him together. Is that straight

enough goods for you?”

“Don't get sore,” said Lannigan, more pacifically. “Yes, if you'll do

that it's good enough for any man. But lay your cards on the table face

up, Whitey--I want to see what you opened the pot on.”

“You've seen 'em,” Whitey Mack answered ungraciously. “I've told you

already. The Gray Seal goes out for keeps--curse him for a snitch! If

I bumped him off, or wised up any of the guys to it, and we was caught,

we'd get the juice for it even if it was the Gray Seal, wouldn't we?

Well, what's the use! If one of you dicks get him, he gets bumped off

just the same, only regular, up in the wire parlour at Sing Sing. I

ain't looking for that kind of trouble when I can duck it. See?”

“Sure,” said Lannigan.

“Besides, and moreover,” continued Whitey Mack, “there's SOME reward

hung out for him that I'm figuring to born in on. I'd swipe it all

myself, don't you make any mistake about that, and you'd never get a

look-in, only, sore as the mob is on the Gray Seal, it ain't healthy for

any guy around these parts to get the reputation of being a snitch, no

matter who he snitches on. Bump him off--sure! Snitching--well, you get

the idea, eh? I'm ducking that too. Get me?”

“I get you,” said Lannigan, with a short, pleased laugh.

“Well, then,” announced Whitey Mack, “here's my proposition, and it's my

turn to hand out the 'look-out-for-your-self' dope. I'm busting the game

wide open for you to play, but you throw me down, and”--his voice sank

into a sullen snarl again--“you can take it from me, I'll get you for

it!”

“All right,” responded Lannigan soberly. “Let's hear it. If I agree to

it, I'll stick to it.”

“I believe you,” said Whitey Mack curtly. “That's why I picked you out

for the medal they'll pin on you for this. And here's getting down to

tacks! I'll lead you to the Gray Seal to-night and help you nab him and

stay with you to the finish, but there's to be nobody but you and me on

the job. When it's done I fade away, and nobody's to know I snitched,

and no questions asked as to how I found out about the Gray Seal.

I ain't looking for any of the glory--you can fix that up to suit

yourself. The cash is different--you come across with half the reward

the day they pay it.”

“You'll get it!” There was savage elation in Lannigan's voice, the

emphatic smash of a fist on the table. “You're on, Whitey. And if we get

the Gray Seal to-night, I'll do better by you than that.”

“We'll get him!” said Whitey Mack, with a vicious oath. “And--”

Jimmie Dale crouched suddenly low down, close against the wall. The

crunch of a footstep sounded from the end of the lane. Some one had

turned in from the cross street, some fifty yards away, and was heading

evidently for the back entrance to Bristol Bob's. Jimmie Dale edged

noiselessly, cautiously back past the doorway, kept on, pressed close

against the wall, and finally paused. He had not been seen. The back

door of Bristol Bob's opened and closed. The man had gone in.

For a moment Jimmie Dale stood hesitant. There was a wild surging in his

brain, something like a myriad batteries of trip hammers seemed to be

pounding at his temples. Then, almost blindly, he kept on down the lane

in the same direction in which he had started to retreat--as well one

cross street as another.

He turned into the cross street, went along it--and presently emerged

into the full tide of the Bowery. It was garishly lighted; people

swarmed about him. Subconsciously, there were crowded sidewalks;

subconsciously, he was on the Bowery--that was all.

Ruin, disaster, peril faced him--faced him, and staggered him with the

suddenness of the shock. Was it true? No; it could not be true! It was

a bluff--Whitey Mack was bluffing. Jimmie Dale's lips grew thin in a

mirthless smile as he shook his head. Neither Whitey Mack nor any other

man would dare to bluff like that. It was too straight, too open-handed,

Whitey Mack had laid his cards too plainly on the table. Whitey Mack's

words rang in his ears: “I'll LEAD you to the Gray Seal to-night and

help you nab him and stay with you to the finish.” The man meant what he

said, meant what he said, too, about the “finish” of the Gray Seal; not

a man in the Bad Lands but meant--death to the Gray Seal! But how, by

what means, when, where had Whitey Mack got his information? “I'm the

only one that's wise,” Whitey Mack had said. It seemed impossible. It

WAS impossible! Whitey Mack was sincere enough probably in what he had

said, but the man simply could not know. Whitey Mack could only have

spotted some one that, for some reason or other, he IMAGINED was the

Gray Seal. That was it--must be it! Whitey Mack had made a mistake. What

clew could he have obtained to--

Over the unwashed face of Larry the Bat a gray pallor spread slowly. His

fingers were plucking at the frayed edge of his inside vest pocket.

The dark eyes seemed to turn coal-black. A laugh, like the laugh of one

damned, rose to his lips, and was choked back. It was gone! GONE! That

thin metal case, like a cigarette case, that, between the little sheets

of oil paper, held those diamond-shaped, gray-coloured, adhesive seals,

the insignia of the Gray Seal--was gone! Clew! It seemed as though there

were an overpowering nausea upon him. CLEW! That little case was not a

clew--it was a death warrant!

His hands clenched fiercely. If he could only think for a moment! The

lining of his pocket had given away. The case had dropped out. But there

was nothing about the case to identify any one as the Gray Seal unless

it were found in one's actual possession. Therefore Whitey Mack, to have

solved his identity, must have seen him drop the case. There could be no

question about that. It was equally obvious then that Whitey Mack would

know the Gray Seal as Larry the Bat. Did he also know him as Jimmie

Dale? Yes, or no? It was a vital question. His life hung on it.

That keen, facile brain, numbed for the moment, was beginning to work

with lightning speed. It was four o'clock that afternoon when he had

assumed the character of Larry the Bat--some time between four o'clock

and the present, it was now well after eleven, the case had dropped from

his pocket. There had been ample time then for Whitey Mack to have

made that appointment with Lannigan--and ample time to have made a

surreptitious visit to the Sanctuary. Had Whitey Mack gone there? Had

Whitey Mack found that hiding place in the flooring under the oilcloth?

Had Whitey Mack discovered that the Gray Seal was not only Larry the

Bat--but Jimmie Dale?

Jimmie Dale swept his hand across his forehead. It was damp from

little clinging beads of moisture. Should he go to the Sanctuary and

change--become Jimmie Dale again? Was it the safest thing to do--or the

most dangerous? Even if Whitey Mack had been there and discovered the

dual personality of Larry the Bat, how would he, Jimmie Dale, know it?

The man would have been crafty enough to have left no sign behind him.

Was it to the Sanctuary that Whitey Mack meant to lead Lannigan that

evening--or did Whitey Mack know him as Jimmie Dale, and to make it

the more sensational, plan to carry out the coup, say, at the St. James

Club? Whitey Mack and Lannigan were still at Bristol Bob's; he had

probably time, if he so elected, to reach the Sanctuary, change, and get

away again. But every minute was priceless now. What should he do? Run

from the city as he was for cover--or take the gambler's chance? Whitey

Mack knew him as Larry the Bat--it was not certain that Whitey Mack knew

him as Jimmie Dale.

He had halted, absorbed, in front of a moving-picture theatre. Great

placards, at first but a blur of colour, suddenly forced themselves in

concrete form upon his consciousness. Letters a foot high leaped out at

him: “THE DOUBLE LIFE.” There was the picture of a banker in his private

office hastily secreting a forged paper as the hero in the guise of a