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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Guy Garrick, by Arthur B. Reeve
+(#10 in our series by Arthur B. Reeve)
+
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+Title: Guy Garrick
+
+Author: Arthur B. Reeve
+
+Release Date: February, 2004  [EBook #5163]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on May 24, 2002]
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+Edition: 10
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+Language: English
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+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, GUY GARRICK ***
+
+
+
+
+Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
+
+
+
+THE CRAIG KENNEDY SERIES
+
+GUY GARRICK
+
+ARTHUR B. REEVE
+
+
+WITH FRONTISPIECE
+
+
+
+ CONTENTS
+
+  I. The Stolen Motor
+
+  II. The Murder Car
+
+ III. The Mystery of the Thicket
+
+  IV. The Liquid Bullet
+
+   V. The Blackmailer
+
+  VI. The Gambling Den
+
+ VII. The Motor Bandit
+
+ VIII. The Explanation
+
+  IX. The Raid
+
+  X. The Gambling Debt
+
+  XI. The Gangster's Garage
+
+ XII. The Detectaphone
+
+ XIII. The Incendiary
+
+ XIV. The Escape
+
+  XV. The Plot
+
+  XVI. The Poisoned Needle
+
+  XVII. The Newspaper Fake
+
+XVIII. The Vocaphone
+
+ XIX. The Eavesdropper Again
+
+  XX. The Speaking Arc
+
+ XXI. The Siege of the Bandits
+
+ XXII. The Man Hunt
+
+XXIII. The Police Dog
+
+ XXIV. The Frame-Up
+
+ XXV. The Scientific Gunman
+
+
+
+
+An Adventure in the New Crime Science
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+THE STOLEN MOTOR
+
+
+"You are aware, I suppose, Marshall, that there have been
+considerably over a million dollars' worth of automobiles stolen
+in this city during the past few months?" asked Guy Garrick one
+night when I had dropped into his office.
+
+"I wasn't aware of the exact extent of the thefts, though of
+course I knew of their existence," I replied. "What's the matter?"
+
+"If you can wait a few moments," he went on, "I think I can
+promise you a most interesting case--the first big case I've had
+to test my new knowledge of crime science since I returned from
+abroad. Have you time for it?"
+
+"Time for it?" I echoed. "Garrick, I'd make time for it, if
+necessary."
+
+We sat for several moments, in silence, waiting.
+
+I picked up an evening paper. I had already read it, but I looked
+through it again, to kill time, even reading the society notes.
+
+"By Jove, Garrick," I exclaimed as my eye travelled over the page,
+"newspaper pictures don't usually flatter people, but just look at
+those eyes! You can fairly see them dance even in the halftone."
+
+The picture which had attracted my attention was of Miss Violet
+Winslow, an heiress to a moderate fortune, a debutante well known
+in New York and at Tuxedo that season.
+
+As Garrick looked over my shoulder his mere tone set me wondering.
+
+"She IS stunning," he agreed simply. "Half the younger set are
+crazy over her."
+
+The buzzer on his door recalled us to the case in hand.
+
+One of our visitors was a sandy-haired, red-mustached, stocky man,
+with everything but the name detective written on him from his
+face to his mannerisms.
+
+He was accompanied by an athletically inclined, fresh-faced young
+fellow, whose clothes proclaimed him to be practically the last
+word in imported goods from London.
+
+I was not surprised at reading the name of James McBirney on the
+detective's card, underneath which was the title of the Automobile
+Underwriters' Association. But I was more than surprised when the
+younger of the visitors handed us a card with the simple name,
+Mortimer Warrington.
+
+For, Mortimer Warrington, I may say, was at that time one of the
+celebrities of the city, at least as far as the newspapers were
+concerned. He was one of the richest young men in the country, and
+good for a "story" almost every day.
+
+Warrington was not exactly a wild youth, in spite of the fact that
+his name appeared so frequently in the headlines. As a matter of
+fact, the worst that could be said of him with any degree of truth
+was that he was gifted with a large inheritance of good, red,
+restless blood, as well as considerable holdings of real estate in
+various active sections of the metropolis.
+
+More than that, it was scarcely his fault if the society columns
+had been busy in a concerted effort to marry him off--no doubt
+with a cynical eye on possible black-type headlines of future
+domestic discord. Among those mentioned by the enterprising
+society reporters of the papers had been the same Miss Violet
+Winslow whose picture I had admired. Evidently Garrick had
+recognized the coincidence.
+
+Miss Winslow, by the way, was rather closely guarded by a duenna-
+like aunt, Mrs. Beekman de Lancey, who at that time had achieved a
+certain amount of notoriety by a crusade which she had organized
+against gambling in society. She had reached that age when some
+women naturally turn toward righting the wrongs of humanity, and,
+in this instance, as in many others, humanity did not exactly
+appreciate it.
+
+"How are you, McBirney?" greeted Garrick, as he met his old
+friend, then, turning to young Warrington, added: "Have you had a
+car stolen?"
+
+"Have I?" chimed in the youth eagerly, and with just a trace of
+nervousness. "Worse than that. I can stand losing a big nine-
+thousand-dollar Mercedes, but--but--you tell it, McBirney. You
+have the facts at your tongue's end."
+
+Garrick looked questioningly at the detective.
+
+"I'm very much afraid," responded McBirney slowly, "that this
+theft about caps the climax of motor-car stealing in this city. Of
+course, you realize that the automobile as a means of committing
+crime and of escape has rendered detection much more difficult to-
+day than it ever was before." He paused. "There's been a murder
+done in or with or by that car of Mr. Warrington's, or I'm ready
+to resign from the profession!"
+
+McBirney had risen in the excitement of his revelation, and had
+handed Garrick what looked like a discharged shell of a cartridge.
+
+Garrick took it without a word, and turned it over and over
+critically, examining every side of it, and waiting for McBirney
+to resume. McBirney, however, said nothing.
+
+"Where did you find the car?" asked Garrick at length, still
+examining the cartridge. "We haven't found it," replied the
+detective with a discouraged sigh.
+
+"Haven't found it?" repeated Garrick. "Then how did you get this
+cartridge--or, at least why do you connect it with the
+disappearance of the car?"
+
+"Well," explained McBirney, getting down to the story, "you
+understand Mr. Warrington's car was insured against theft in a
+company which is a member of our association. When it was stolen
+we immediately put in motion the usual machinery for tracing
+stolen cars."
+
+"How about the police?" I queried.
+
+McBirney looked at me a moment--I thought pityingly. "With all
+deference to the police," he answered indulgently, "it is the
+insurance companies and not the police who get cars back--usually.
+I suppose it's natural. The man who loses a car notifies us first,
+and, as we are likely to lose money by it, we don't waste any time
+getting after the thief."
+
+"You have some clew, then?" persisted Garrick.
+
+McBirney nodded.
+
+"Late this afternoon word came to me that a man, all alone in a
+car, which, in some respects tallied with the description of
+Warrington's, although, of course, the license number and color
+had been altered, had stopped early this morning at a little
+garage over in the northern part of New Jersey."
+
+Warrington, excited, leaned forward and interrupted.
+
+"And, Garrick," he exclaimed, horrified, "the car was all stained
+with blood!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+THE MURDER CAR
+
+
+Garrick looked from one to the other of his visitors intently.
+Here was an entirely unexpected development in the case which
+stamped it as set apart from the ordinary.
+
+"How did the driver manage to explain it and get away?" he asked
+quickly.
+
+McBirney shook his head in evident disgust at the affair.
+
+"He must be a clever one," he pursued thoughtfully. "When he came
+into the garage they say he was in a rather jovial mood. He said
+that he had run into a cow a few miles back on the road, and then
+began to cuss the farmer, who had stung him a hundred dollars for
+the animal."
+
+"And they believed it?" prompted Garrick.
+
+"Yes, the garage keeper's assistant swallowed the story and
+cleaned the car. There was some blood on the radiator and hood,
+but the strange part was that it was spattered even over the rear
+seat--in fact, was mostly in the rear."
+
+"How did he explain that?"
+
+"Said that he guessed the farmer who stung him wouldn't get much
+for the carcass, for it had been pretty well cut up and a part of
+it flung right back into the tonneau."
+
+"And the man believed that, too?"
+
+"Yes; but afterward the garage keeper himself was told. He met the
+farmer in town later, and the farmer denied that he had lost a
+cow. That set the garage keeper thinking. And then, while they
+were cleaning up the garage later in the day, they found that
+cartridge where the car had been washed down and swept out. We had
+already advertised a reward for information about the stolen car,
+and, when he heard of the reward, for there are plenty of people
+about looking for money in that way, he telephoned in, thinking
+the story might interest us. It did, for I am convinced that his
+description of the machine tallies closely with that of Mr.
+Warrington's."
+
+"How about the man who drove it?" cut in Garrick.
+
+"That's the unfortunate part of it," replied McBirney, chagrined.
+"These amateur detectives about the country rarely seem to have
+any foresight. Of course they could describe how the fellow was
+dressed, even the make of goggles he wore. But, when it came to
+telling one feature of his face accurately, they took refuge
+behind the fact that he kept his cap pulled down over his eyes,
+and talked like a 'city fellow.'"
+
+"All of which is highly important," agreed Garrick. "I suppose
+they'd consider a fingerprint, or the portrait parle the height of
+idiocy beside that."
+
+"Disgusting," ejaculated McBirney, who, whatever his own
+limitations might be, had a wholesome respect for Garrick's new
+methods.
+
+"Where did you leave the car?" asked Garrick of Warrington. "How
+did you lose it?"
+
+The young man seemed to hesitate.
+
+"I suppose," he said at length, with a sort of resigned smile,
+"I'll have to make a clean breast of it."
+
+"You can hardly expect us to do much, otherwise," encouraged
+Garrick dryly. "Besides, you can depend on us to keep anything you
+say confidential."
+
+"Why," he began, "the fact is that I had started out for a mild
+little sort of celebration, apropos of nothing at all in
+particular, beginning with dinner at the Mephistopheles
+Restaurant, with a friend of mine. You know the place, perhaps--
+just on the edge of the automobile district and the white lights."
+
+"Yes," encouraged Garrick, "near what ought to be named 'Crime
+Square.' Whom were you with?"
+
+"Well, Angus Forbes and I were going to dine together, and then
+later we were to meet several fellows who used to belong to the
+same upperclass club with us at Princeton. We were going to do a
+little slumming. No ladies, you understand," he added hastily.
+
+Garrick smiled.
+
+"It may not have been pure sociology," pursued Warrington, good-
+humouredly noticing the smile, "but it wasn't as bad as some of
+the newspapers might make it out if they got hold of it, anyhow. I
+may as well admit, I suppose, that Angus has been going the pace
+pretty lively since we graduated. I don't object to a little flyer
+now and then, myself, but I guess I'm not up to his class yet. But
+that doesn't make any difference. The slumming party never came
+off."
+
+"How?" prompted Garrick again.
+
+"Angus and I had a very good dinner at the Mephistopheles--they
+have a great cabaret there--and by and by the fellows began to
+drop in to join us. When I went out to look for the car, which I
+was going to drive myself, it was gone."
+
+"Where did you leave it?" asked McBirney, as if bringing out the
+evidence.
+
+"In the parking space half a block below the restaurant. A
+chauffeur standing near the curb told me that a man in a cap and
+goggles--"
+
+"Another amateur detective," cut in McBirney parenthetically.
+
+"--had come out of the restaurant, or seemed to do so, had spun
+the engine, climbed in, and rode off--just like that!"
+
+"What did you do then?" asked Garrick. "Did you fellows go
+anywhere?"
+
+"Oh, Forbes wanted to play the wheel, and went around to a place
+on Forty-eighth Street. I was all upset about the loss of the car,
+got in touch with the insurance company, who turned me over to
+McBirney here, and the rest of the fellows went down to the Club."
+
+"There was no trace of the car in the city?" asked Garrick, of the
+detective.
+
+"I was coming to that," replied McBirney. "There was at least a
+rumour. You see, I happen to know several of the police on fixed
+posts up there, and one of them has told me that he noticed a car,
+which might or might not have been Mr. Warrington's, pull up,
+about the time his car must have disappeared, at a place in Forty-
+seventh Street which is reputed to be a sort of poolroom for
+women."
+
+Garrick raised his eyebrows the fraction of an inch.
+
+"At any rate," pursued McBirney, "someone must have been having a
+wild time there, for they carried a girl out to the car. She
+seemed to be pretty far gone and even the air didn't revive her--
+that is, assuming that she had been celebrating not wisely but too
+well. Of course, the whole thing is pure speculation yet, as far
+as Warrington's car is concerned. Maybe it wasn't his car, after
+all. But I am repeating it only for what it may be worth."
+
+"Do you know the place?" asked Garrick, watching Warrington
+narrowly.
+
+"I've heard of it," he admitted, I thought a little evasively.
+
+Then it flashed over me that Mrs. de Lancey was leading the
+crusade against society gambling and that that perhaps accounted
+for Warrington's fears and evident desire for concealment.
+
+"I know that some of the faster ones in the smart set go there
+once in a while for a little poker, bridge, and even to play the
+races," went on Warrington carefully. "I've never been there
+myself, but I wouldn't be surprised if Angus could tell you all
+about it. He goes in for all that sort of thing."
+
+"After all," interrupted McBirney, "that's only rumour. Here's the
+point of the whole thing. For a long time my Association has been
+thinking that merely in working for the recovery of the cars we
+have been making a mistake. It hasn't put a stop to the stealing,
+and the stealing has gone quite far enough. We have got to do
+something about it. It struck me that here was a case on which to
+begin and that you, Garrick, are the one to begin it for us, while
+I carry on the regular work I am doing. The gang is growing bolder
+and more clever every day. And then, here's a murder, too, in all
+likelihood. If we don't round them up, there is no limit to what
+they may do in terrorizing the city."
+
+"How does this gang, as you call it, operate?" asked Garrick.
+
+"Most of the cars that are stolen," explained McBirney, "are taken
+from the automobile district, which embraces also not a small
+portion of the new Tenderloin and the theatre district. Actually,
+Garrick, more than nine out of ten cars have disappeared between
+Forty-second and Seventy-second Streets."
+
+Garrick was listening, without comment.
+
+"Some of the thefts, like this one of Warrington's car," continued
+McBirney, warming up to the subject, "have been so bold that you
+would be astonished. And it is those stolen cars, I believe, that
+are used in the wave of taxicab and motor car robberies, hold-ups,
+and other crimes that is sweeping over the city. The cars are
+taken to some obscure garage, without doubt, and their identity is
+destroyed by men who are expert in the practice."
+
+"And you have no confidence in the police?" I inquired cautiously,
+mindful of his former manner.
+
+"We have frequently had occasion to call on the police for
+assistance," he answered, "but somehow or other it has seldom
+worked. They don't seem to be able to help us much. If anything is
+done, we must do it. If you will take the case, Garrick, I can
+promise you that the Association will pay you well for it."
+
+"I will add whatever is necessary, too," put in Warrington,
+eagerly. "I can stand the loss of the car--in fact, I don't care
+whether I ever get it back. I have others. But I can't stand the
+thought that my car is going about the country as the property of
+a gunman, perhaps--an engine of murder and destruction."
+
+Garrick had been thoughtfully balancing the exploded shell between
+his fingers during most of the interview. As Warrington concluded,
+he looked up.
+
+"I'll take the case," he said simply. "I think you'll find that
+there is more to it than even you suspect. Before we get through,
+I shall get a conviction on that empty shell, too. If there is a
+gunman back of it all, he is no ordinary fellow, but a scientific
+gunman, far ahead of anything of which you dream. No, don't thank
+me for taking the case. My thanks are to you for putting it in my
+way."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE MYSTERY OF THE THICKET
+
+
+"You know my ideas on modern detective work," Garrick remarked to
+me, reflectively, when they had gone.
+
+I nodded assent, for we had often discussed the subject.
+
+"There must be something new in order to catch criminals,
+nowadays," he pursued. "The old methods are all right--as far as
+they go. But while we have been using them, criminals have kept
+pace with modern science."
+
+I had met Garrick several months before on the return trip from
+abroad, and had found in him a companion spirit.
+
+For some years I had been editing a paper which I called "The
+Scientific World," and it had taxed my health to the point where
+my physician had told me that I must rest, or at least combine
+pleasure with business. Thus I had taken the voyage across the
+ocean to attend the International Electrical Congress in London,
+and had unexpectedly been thrown in with Guy Garrick, who later
+seemed destined to play such an important part in my life.
+
+Garrick was a detective, young, university bred, of good family,
+alert, and an interesting personality to me. He had travelled
+much, especially in London, Paris, Berlin, and Vienna, where he
+had studied the amazing growth abroad of the new criminal science.
+
+Already I knew something, by hearsay, of the men he had seen,
+Gross, Lacassagne, Reiss, and the now immortal Bertillon. Our
+acquaintance, therefore, had rapidly ripened into friendship, and
+on our return, I had formed a habit of dropping in frequently on
+him of an evening, as I had this night, to smoke a pipe or two and
+talk over matters of common interest in his profession.
+
+He had paused a moment in what he was saying, but now resumed,
+less reflectively, "Fortunately, Marshall, the crime-hunters have
+gone ahead faster than the criminals. Now, it's my job to catch
+criminals. Yours, it seems to me, is to show people how they can
+never hope to beat the modern scientific detective. Let's strike a
+bargain."
+
+I was flattered by his confidence. More than that, the idea
+appealed to me, in fact was exactly in line with some plans I had
+already made for the "World," since our first acquaintance.
+
+And so it came about that the case brought to him by McBirney and
+young Warrington was responsible for clearing our ideas as to our
+mutual relationship and thus forming this strange partnership that
+has existed ever since.
+
+"Tom," he remarked, as we left the office quite late, after he had
+arranged affairs as if he expected to have no time to devote to
+his other work for several days, "come along and stay with me at
+my apartment to-night. It's too late to do anything now until to-
+morrow."
+
+I accepted his invitation without demur, for I knew that he meant
+it, but I doubt whether he slept much during the night. Certainly
+he was up and about early enough the following morning.
+
+"That's curious," I heard him remark, as he ran his eye hastily
+over the first page of the morning paper, "but I rather expected
+something of the sort. Read that in the first column, Tom."
+
+The story that he indicated had all the marks of having been
+dropped into place at the last moment as the city edition went to
+press in the small hours of the night.
+
+It was headed:
+
+GIRL'S BODY FOUND IN THICKET
+
+The despatch was from a little town in New Jersey, and, when I saw
+the date line, it at once suggested to me, as it had to Guy, that
+this was in the vicinity that must have been traversed in order to
+reach the point from which had come the report of the bloody car
+that had seemed to tally with the description of that which
+Warrington had lost. It read:
+
+"Hidden in the underbrush, not ten feet from one of the most
+travelled automobile roads in this section of the state, the body
+of a murdered girl was discovered late yesterday afternoon by a
+gang of Italian labourers employed on an estate nearby.
+
+"Suspicion was at first directed by the local authorities at the
+labourers, but the manner of the finding of the body renders it
+improbable. Most of them are housed in some rough shacks up the
+road toward Tuxedo and were able to prove themselves of good
+character. Indeed, the trampled condition of the thicket plainly
+indicates, according to the local coroner, that the girl was
+brought there, probably already dead, in an automobile which drew
+up off the road as far as possible. The body then must have been
+thrown where it would be screened from sight by the thick growth
+of trees and shrubbery.
+
+"There was only one wound, in the chest. It is, however, a most
+peculiar wound, and shows that a terrific force must have been
+exerted in order to make it. A blow could hardly have accomplished
+it, so jagged were its edges, and if the girl had been struck by a
+passing high-speed car, as was at first suggested, there is no way
+to account for the entire lack of other wounds which must
+naturally have been inflicted by such an accident.
+
+"Neither is the wound exactly like a pistol or gunshot wound, for,
+curiously enough, there was no mark showing the exit of a bullet,
+nor was any bullet found in the body after the most careful
+examination. The local authorities are completely mystified at the
+possible problems that may arise out of the case, especially as to
+the manner in which the unfortunate girl met her death.
+
+"Until a late hour the body, which is of a girl perhaps twenty-
+three or four, of medium height, fair, good looking, and stylishly
+dressed, was still unidentified. She was unknown in this part of
+the country."
+
+Almost before I had finished reading, Garrick had his hat and coat
+on and had shoved into his pocket a little detective camera.
+
+"Strange about the bullet," I ruminated. "I wonder who she can
+be?"
+
+"Very strange," agreed Garrick, urging me on. "I think we ought to
+investigate the case."
+
+As we hurried along to a restaurant for a bite of breakfast, he
+remarked, "The circumstances of the thing, coming so closely after
+the report about Warrington's car, are very suspicious--very. I
+feel sure that we shall find some connection between the two
+affairs."
+
+Accordingly, we caught an early train and at the nearest railroad
+station to the town mentioned in the despatch engaged a hackman
+who knew the coroner, a local doctor.
+
+The coroner was glad to assist us, though we were careful not to
+tell him too much of our own connection with the case. On the way
+over to the village undertaker's where the body had been moved, he
+volunteered the information that the New York police, whom he had
+notified immediately, had already sent a man up there, who had
+taken a description of the girl and finger prints, but had not, so
+far at least, succeeded in identifying the girl, at any rate on
+any of the lists of those reported missing.
+
+"You see," remarked Garrick to me, "that is where the police have
+us at a disadvantage. They have organization on their side. A good
+many detectives make the mistake of antagonizing the police. But
+if you want results, that's fatal."
+
+"Yes," I agreed, "it's impossible, just as it is to antagonize the
+newspapers."
+
+"Exactly," returned Garrick. "My idea of the thing, Marshall, is
+that I should work with, not against, the regular detectives. They
+are all right, in fact indispensable. Half the secret of success
+nowadays is efficiency and organization. What I do believe is that
+organization plus science is what is necessary."
+
+The local undertaking establishment was rather poorly equipped to
+take the place of a morgue and the authorities were making
+preparations to move the body to the nearest large city pending
+the disposal of the case. Local detectives had set to work, but so
+far had turned up nothing, not even the report which we had
+already received from McBirney regarding the blood-stained car
+that resembled Warrington's.
+
+We arrived with the coroner fortunately just before the removal of
+the body to the city and by his courtesy were able to see it
+without any trouble.
+
+Death, and especially violent death, are at best grewsome
+subjects, but when to that are added the sordid surroundings of a
+country undertaker's and the fact that the victim is a woman, it
+all becomes doubly tragic.
+
+She was a rather flashily dressed girl, but remarkably good
+looking, in spite of the rouge and powder which had long since
+spoiled what might otherwise have been a clear and fine
+complexion. The roots of her hair showed plainly that it had been
+bleached.
+
+Garrick examined the body closely, and more especially the jagged
+wound in the breast. I bent over also. It seemed utterly
+inexplicable. There was, he soon discovered, a sort of greasy,
+oleaginous deposit in the clotted blood of the huge cavity in the
+flesh. It interested him, and he studied it carefully for a long
+time, without saying a word.
+
+"Some have said she was wounded by some kind of blunt instrument,"
+put in the coroner. "Others that she was struck by a car. But it's
+my opinion that she was killed by a rifle bullet of some kind,
+although what could have become of the bullet is beyond me. I've
+probed for it, but it isn't there."
+
+Garrick finished his minute examination of the wound without
+passing any comment on it of his own.
+
+"Now, if you will be kind enough to take us around to the place
+where the body was discovered," he concluded, "I think we shall
+not trespass on your time further."
+
+In his own car, the coroner drove us up the road in the direction
+of the New York state boundary to the spot where the body had been
+found. It was a fine, well-oiled road and I noticed the number and
+high quality of the cars which passed us.
+
+When we arrived at the spot where the body of the unfortunate girl
+had been discovered, Garrick began a minute search. I do not think
+for a moment that he expected to find any weapon, or even the
+trace of one. It seemed hopeless also to attempt to pick out any
+of the footprints. The earth was soft and even muddy, but so many
+feet had trodden it down since the first alarm had been given that
+it would have been impossible to extricate one set of footprints
+from another, much less to tell whether any of them had been made
+by the perpetrators of the crime.
+
+Still, there seemed to be something in the mud, just off the side
+of the road, that did interest Garrick. Very carefully, so as not
+to destroy anything himself which more careless searchers might
+have left, he began a minute study of the ground.
+
+Apparently he was rewarded, for, although he said nothing, he took
+a hasty glance at the direction of the sun, up-ended the camera he
+had brought, and began to photograph the ground itself, or rather
+some curious marks on it which I could barely distinguish.
+
+The coroner and I looked on without saying a word. He, at least, I
+am sure, thought that Garrick had suddenly taken leave of his
+senses.
+
+That concluded Garrick's investigation, and, after thanking the
+coroner, who had gone out of his way to accommodate us, we started
+back to town.
+
+"Well," I remarked, as we settled ourselves for the tedious ride
+into the city in the suburban train, "we don't seem to have added
+much to the sum of human knowledge by this trip."
+
+"Oh, yes, we have," he returned, almost cheerfully, patting the
+black camera which he had folded and slipped into his pocket.
+"We'll just preserve the records which I have here. Did you notice
+what it was that I photographed?"
+
+"I saw something," I replied, "but I couldn't tell you what it
+was."
+
+"Well," he explained slowly as I opened my eyes wide in amazement
+at the minuteness of his researches, "those were the marks of the
+tire of an automobile that had been run up into the bushes from
+the road. You know every automobile tire leaves its own
+distinctive mark, its thumb print, as it were. When I have
+developed my films, you will see that the marks that have been
+left there are precisely like those left by the make of tires used
+on Warrington's car, according to the advertisement sent out by
+McBirney. Of course, that mere fact alone doesn't prove anything.
+Many cars may use that make of tires. Still, it is an interesting
+coincidence, and if the make had been different I should not feel
+half so encouraged about going ahead with this clew. We can't say
+anything definite, however, until I can compare the actual marks
+made by the tires on the stolen car with these marks which I have
+photographed and preserved."
+
+If any one other than Garrick had conceived such a notion as the
+"thumb print" of an automobile tire, I might possibly have
+ventured to doubt it. As it was it gave food enough for thought to
+last the remainder of the journey back to town.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE LIQUID BULLET
+
+
+On our return to the city, I was not surprised after our
+conversation over in New Jersey to find that Garrick had decided
+on visiting police headquarters. It was, of course, Commissioner
+Dillon, one of the deputies, whom he wanted to see. I had met
+Dillon myself some time before in connection with my study of the
+finger print system, and consequently needed no second
+introduction.
+
+In his office on the second floor, the Commissioner greeted us
+cordially in his bluff and honest voice which both of us came to
+know and like so well later. Garrick had met him often and the
+cordiality of their relations was well testified to by Dillon's
+greeting.
+
+"I thought you'd be here before long," he beamed on Garrick, as he
+led us into an inner sanctum. "Did you read in the papers this
+morning about that murder of a girl whose body was found up in New
+Jersey in the underbrush?"
+
+"Not only that, but I've picked up a few things that your man
+overlooked," confided Garrick.
+
+Dillon looked at him sharply for a moment. "Say," he said frankly,
+"that's one of the things I like about you, Garrick. You're on the
+job. Also, you're on the square. You don't go gumshoeing it around
+behind a fellow's back, and talking the same way. You play fair.
+Now, look here. Haven't I always played fair with you, Garrick?"
+
+"Yes, Dillon," agreed Garrick, "you have always played fair. But
+what's the idea?"
+
+"You came up here for information, didn't you?" persisted the
+commissioner.
+
+Garrick nodded.
+
+"Well do you know who that girl was who was murdered?" he asked
+leaning forward.
+
+"No," admitted Garrick.
+
+"Of course not," asserted Dillon triumphantly. "We haven't given
+it out yet--and I don't know as we shall."
+
+"No," pursued Garrick, "I don't know and I'll admit that I'd like
+to know. My position is, as it always has been, that we shouldn't
+work at cross purposes. I have drawn my own conclusions on the
+case and, to put it bluntly, it seemed to me clear that she was of
+the demi-monde."
+
+"She was--in a sense," vouchsafed the commissioner. "Now," he
+added, leaning forward impressively, "I'm going to tell you
+something. That girl--was one of the best stool pigeons we have
+ever had."
+
+Both Garrick and I were listening intently at, the surprising
+revelation of the commissioner. He was pacing up and down, now,
+evidently much excited.
+
+"As for me," he continued, "I hate the stool pigeon method as much
+as anyone can. I don't like it. I don't relish the idea of being
+in partnership with crooks in any degree. I hate an informer who
+worms himself or herself into a person's friendship for the
+purpose of betraying it. But the system is here. I didn't start it
+and I can't change it. As long as it's here I must accept it and
+do business under it. And, that being the case, I can't afford to
+let matters like this killing pass without getting revenge, swift
+and sure. You understand? Someone's going to suffer for the
+killing of that girl, not only because it was a brutal murder, but
+because the department has got to make an example or no one whom
+we employ is safe."
+
+Dillon was shouldering his burly form up and down the office in
+his excitement. He paused in front of us, to proceed.
+
+"I've got one of my best men on the case now--Inspector Herman.
+I'll introduce you to him, if he happens to be around. Herman's
+all right. But here you come in, Garrick, and tell me you picked
+up something that my man missed up there in Jersey. I know it's
+the truth, too. I've worked with you and seen enough of you to
+know that you wouldn't say a thing like that as a bluff to me."
+
+Dillon was evidently debating something in his mind.
+
+"Herman'll have to stand it," he went on, half to himself. "I
+don't care whether he gets jealous or not."
+
+He paused and looked Garrick squarely in the eye, as he led up to
+his proposal. "Garrick," he said slowly, "I'd like to have you
+take up the case for us, too. I've heard already that you are
+working on the automobile cases. You see, I have ways of getting
+information myself. We're not so helpless as your friend McBirney,
+maybe, thinks."
+
+He faced us and it was almost as if he read our minds.
+
+"For instance," he proceeded, "it may interest you to know that we
+have just planned a new method to recover stolen automobiles and
+apprehend the thieves. A census of all cars in the questionable
+garages of the city has been taken, and each day every policeman
+is furnished with descriptions of cars stolen in the past twenty-
+four hours. The policeman then is supposed to inspect the garages
+in his district and if he finds a machine that shouldn't be there,
+according to the census, he sees to it that it isn't removed from
+the place until it is identified. The description of this
+Warrington car has gone out with extra special orders, and if it's
+in New York I think we'll find it."
+
+"I think you'll find," remarked Garrick quietly, "that this
+machine of Warrington's isn't in the city, at all."
+
+"I hardly think it is, myself," agreed Dillon. "Whoever it was who
+took it is probably posted about our new scheme. That's not the
+point I was driving at. You see, Garrick, our trails cross in
+these cases in a number of ways. Now, I have a little secret fund
+at my disposal. In so far as the affair involved the murder of
+that girl--and I'm convinced that it does--will you consider that
+you are working for the city, too? The whole thing dovetails. You
+don't have to neglect one client to serve another. I'll do
+anything I can to help you with the auto cases. In fact, you'll do
+better by both clients by joining the cases."
+
+"Dillon," answered Garrick quickly, "you've always been on the
+level with me. I can trust you. Consider that it is a bargain.
+We'll work together. Now, who was the girl?"
+
+"Her name was Rena Taylor," replied Dillon, apparently much
+gratified at the success of his proposal. "I had her at work
+getting evidence against a ladies' poolroom in Forty-seventh
+Street--an elusive place that we've never been able to 'get
+right.'"
+
+Garrick shot a quick glance at me. Evidently we were on the right
+trail, anyhow.
+
+"I don't know yet just what happened," continued Dillon, "but I do
+know that she had the goods on it. As nearly as I can find out, a
+stranger came to the place well introduced, a man, accompanied by
+a woman. They got into some of the games. The man seems to have
+excused himself. Apparently he found Rena Taylor alone in a room
+in some part of the house. No one heard a pistol shot, but then I
+think they would lie about that, all right."
+
+Dillon paused. "The strange thing is, however," he resumed, "that
+we haven't been able to find in the house a particle of evidence
+that a murder or violence of any kind has been done. One fact is
+established, though, incontrovertibly. Rena Taylor disappeared
+from that gambling house the same night and about the same time
+that Warrington's car disappeared. Then we find her dead over in
+New Jersey."
+
+"And I find reports and traces that the car has been in the
+vicinity," added Garrick.
+
+"You see," beamed Dillon, "that's how we work together. Say you
+MUST meet Herman."
+
+He rang a bell and a blue-coated man opened the door. "Call
+Herman, Jim," he said, then, as the man disappeared, he went on to
+us, "I have given Herman carte-blanche instructions to conduct a
+thorough investigation. He has been getting the goods on another
+swell joint on the next street, in Forty-eighth, a joint that is
+just feeding on young millionaires in this town, and is or will be
+the cause of more crime and broken hearts if I don't land it and
+break it up than any such place has been for years." The door
+opened, and Dillon said, "Herman, shake hands with Mr. Garrick and
+Mr. Marshall."
+
+The detective was a quiet, gentlemanly sort of fellow who looked
+rugged and strong, a fighter to be respected. In fact I would much
+rather have had a man like him with us than against us. I knew
+Garrick's aversion to the regular detective and was not surprised
+that he did not overwhelm Mr. Herman by the cordiality of his
+greeting. Garrick always played a lone hand, preferred it and had
+taken Dillon into his confidence only because of his official
+position and authority.
+
+"These gentlemen are going to work independently on that Rena
+Taylor case," explained Dillon. "I want you to give Mr. Garrick
+every assistance, Herman."
+
+Garrick nodded with a show of cordiality and Herman replied in
+about the same spirit. I could not fancy our getting very much
+assistance from the regular detective force, with the exception of
+Dillon. And I noticed, also, that Garrick was not volunteering any
+information except what was necessary in good faith. Already I
+began to wonder how this peculiar bargain would turn out.
+
+"Just who and what was Rena Taylor?" asked Garrick finally.
+
+Inspector Herman shot a covert glance at Dillon before replying
+and the commissioner hastened to reassure him, "I have told Mr.
+Garrick that she was one of our best stool pigeons and had been
+working on the gambling cases."
+
+Like all detectives on a case, Herman was averse to parting with
+any information, and I felt that it was natural, for if he
+succeeded in working it out human nature was not such as to
+willingly share the glory.
+
+"Oh," he replied airily, "she was a girl who had knocked about
+considerably in the Tenderloin. I don't know just what her story
+was, but I suppose there was some fellow who got her to come to
+New York and then left her in the lurch. She wasn't a New Yorker.
+She seems to have drifted from one thing to another--until finally
+in order to get money she came down and offered her services to
+the police, in this gambling war."
+
+Herman had answered the question, but when I examined the answer I
+found it contained precious little. Perhaps it was indeed all he
+knew, for, although Garrick put several other questions to him and
+he answered quite readily and with apparent openness, there was
+very little more that we learned.
+
+"Yes," concluded Herman, "someone cooked her, all right. They
+don't take long to square things with anyone who raps to the
+'bulls.'"
+
+"That's right," agreed Garrick. "And the underworld isn't alone in
+that feeling. No one likes a 'snitch.'"
+
+"Bet your life," emphasized Herman heartily, then edging toward
+the door, he said, "Well, gentlemen, I'm glad to meet you and I'll
+work with you. I wish you success, all right. It's a hard case.
+Why, there wasn't any trace of a murder or violence in that place
+in which Rena Taylor must have been murdered. I suppose you have
+heard that there wasn't any bullet found in the body, either?"
+
+"Yes," answered Garrick, "so far it does look inexplicable."
+
+Inspector Herman withdrew. One could see that he had little faith
+in these "amateur" detectives.
+
+A telephone message for Dillon about another departmental matter
+terminated our interview and we went our several ways.
+
+"Much help I've ever got from a regular detective like Herman,"
+remarked Garrick, phrasing my own idea of the matter, as we paid
+the fare of our cab a few minutes later and entered his office.
+
+"Yes," I agreed. "Why, he's even stumped at the start by the
+mystery of there being no bullet. I'm glad you said nothing about
+the cartridge, although I can't see for the life of me what good
+it is to us."
+
+I had ventured the remark, hoping to entice Garrick into talking.
+It worked, at least as far as Garrick wanted to talk yet.
+
+"You'll see about the cartridge soon enough, Tom," he rejoined.
+"As for there being no bullet, there was a bullet--only it was of
+a kind you never dreamed of before."
+
+He regarded me contemplatively for a moment, then leaned over and
+in a voice full of meaning, concluded, "That bullet was composed
+of something soft or liquid, probably confined in some kind of
+thin capsule. It mushroomed out like a dumdum bullet. It was
+deadly. But the chief advantage was that the heat that remained in
+Rena Taylor's body melted all evidence of the bullet. That was
+what caused that greasy, oleaginous appearance of the wound. The
+murderer thought he left no trail in the bullet in the corpse. In
+other words, it was practically a liquid bullet."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE BLACKMAILER
+
+
+It was late in the afternoon, while Garrick was still busy with a
+high-powered microscope, making innumerable micro-photographs,
+when the door of the office opened softly and a young lady
+entered.
+
+As she advanced timidly to us, we could see that she was tall and
+gave promise of developing with years into a stately woman--a
+pronounced brunette, with sparkling black eyes. I had not met her
+before, yet somehow I could not escape the feeling that she was
+familiar to me.
+
+It was not until she spoke that I realized that it was the eyes,
+not the face, which I recognized.
+
+"You are Mr. Garrick?" she asked of Guy in a soft, purring voice
+which, I felt, masked a woman who would fight to the end for
+anyone or anything she really loved.
+
+Then, before Guy could answer, she explained, "I am Miss Violet
+Winslow. A friend of mine, Mr. Warrington, has told me that you
+are investigating a peculiar case for him--the strange loss of his
+car."
+
+Garrick hastened to place a chair for her in the least cluttered
+and dusty part of the room. There she sat, looking up at him
+earnestly, a dainty contrast to the den in which Garrick was
+working out the capture of criminals, violent and vicious.
+
+"I have the honor to be able to say, 'Yes' to all that you have
+asked, Miss Winslow," he replied. "Is there any way in which I can
+be of service to you?"
+
+I thought a smile played over his face at the thought that perhaps
+she might have come to ask him to work for three clients instead
+of two.
+
+At any rate, the girl was very much excited and very much in
+earnest, as she opened her handbag and drew from it a letter which
+she handed to Garrick.
+
+"I received that letter," she explained, speaking rapidly, "in the
+noon mail to-day. I don't know what to make of it. It worries me
+to get such a thing. What do you suppose it was sent to me for?
+Who could have sent it?"
+
+She was leaning forward artlessly on her crossed knee looking
+expectantly up into Garrick's face, oblivious to everything else,
+even her own enticing beauty. There was something so simple and
+sincere about Violet Winslow that one felt instinctively that
+nothing was too great a price to shield her from the sordid and
+the evil in the world. Yet something had happened that had brought
+her already into the office of a detective.
+
+Garrick had glanced quickly at the outside of the slit envelope.
+The postmark showed that it had been mailed early that morning at
+the general post office and that there was slight chance of
+tracing anything in that direction.
+
+Then he opened it and read. The writing was in a bold scrawl and
+hastily executed:
+
+You have heard, no doubt, of the alleged loss of an automobile by
+Mr. Mortimer Warrington. I have seen your name mentioned in the
+society columns of the newspapers in connection with him several
+times lately. Let a disinterested person whom you do not know warn
+you in time. There is more back of it than he will care to tell. I
+can say nothing of the nefarious uses to which that car has been
+put, but you will learn more shortly. Meanwhile, let me inform you
+that he and some of the wilder of his set had that night planned a
+visit to a gambling house on Forty-eighth Street. I myself saw the
+car standing before another gambling den on Forty-seventh Street
+about the same time. This place, I may as well inform you, bears
+an unsavory reputation as a gambling joint to which young ladies
+of the fastest character are admitted. If you will ask someone in
+whom you have confidence and whom you can ask to work secretly for
+you to look up the records, you will find that much of the
+property on these two blocks, and these two places in particular,
+belongs to the Warrington estate. Need I say more?
+
+The letter was without superscription or date and was signed
+merely with the words, "A Well-Wisher." The innuendo of the thing
+was apparent.
+
+"Of course," she remarked, as Garrick finished reading, and before
+he could speak, "I know there is something back of it. Some person
+is trying to injure Mortimer. Still---"
+
+She did not finish the sentence. It was evident that the "well-
+wisher" need not have said more in order to sow the seeds of
+doubt.
+
+As I watched her narrowly, I fancied also that from her tone the
+newspapers had not been wholly wrong in mentioning their names
+together recently.
+
+"I hadn't intended to say anything more than to explain how I got
+the letter," she went on wistfully. "I thought that perhaps you
+might be interested in it."
+
+She paused and studied the toe of her dainty boot. "And, of
+course," she murmured, "I know that Mr. Warrington isn't dependent
+for his income on the rent that comes in from such places. But--
+but I wish just the same that it wasn't true. I tried to call him
+up about the letter, but he wasn't at the office of the Warrington
+estate, and no one seemed to know just where he was."
+
+She kept her eyes downcast as though afraid to betray just what
+she felt.
+
+"You will leave this with me?" asked Garrick, still scrutinizing
+the letter.
+
+"Certainly," she replied. "That is what I brought it for. I
+thought it was only fair that he should know about it."
+
+Garrick regarded her keenly for a moment. "I am sure, Miss
+Winslow," he said, "that Mr. Warrington will thank you for your
+frankness. More than that, I feel sure that you need have no cause
+to worry about the insinuations of this letter. Don't judge
+harshly until you have heard his side. There's a good deal of
+graft and vice talk flying around loose these days. Miss Winslow,
+you may depend on me to dig the truth out and not deceive you."
+
+"Thank you so much," she said, as she rose to go; then, in a burst
+of confidence, added, "Of course, after all, I don't care so much
+about it myself--but, you know, my aunt--is so dreadfully prim and
+proper that she couldn't forgive a thing like this. She'd never
+let Mr. Warrington call on me again."
+
+Violet stopped and bit her lip. She had evidently not intended to
+say as much as that. But having once said it, she did not seem to
+wish to recall the words, either.
+
+"There, now," she smiled, "don't you even hint to him that that
+was one of the reasons I called."
+
+Garrick had risen and was standing beside her, looking down
+earnestly into her upturned face.
+
+"I think I understand, Miss Winslow," he said in a low voice,
+rapidly. "I cannot tell you all--yet. But I can promise you that
+even if all were told--the truth, I mean--your faith in Warrington
+would be justified." He leaned over. "Trust me," he said simply.
+
+As she placed her small hand in Garrick's, she looked up into his
+face, and with suppressed emotion, answered, "Thank you--I--I
+will."
+
+Then, with a quick gathering of her skirts, she turned and almost
+fled from the room.
+
+She had scarcely closed the door before Garrick was telephoning
+anxiously all over the city in order to get in touch with
+Warrington himself.
+
+"I'm not going to tell him too much about her visit," he remarked,
+with a pleased smile at the outcome of the interview, though his
+face clouded as his eye fell again on the blackmailing letter,
+lying before him. "It might make him think too highly of himself.
+Besides, I want to see, too, whether he has told us the whole
+truth about the affair that night."
+
+Somehow or other it seemed impossible to find Warrington in any of
+his usual haunts, either at his office or at his club.
+
+Garrick had given it up, almost, as a bad job, when, half an hour
+later, Warrington himself burst in on us, apparently expecting
+more news about his car.
+
+Instead, Garrick handed him the letter.
+
+"Say," he demanded as he ran through it with puckered face, then
+slapped it down on the table before Guy, in a high state of
+excitement, "what do you make of that?"
+
+He looked from one to the other of us blankly.
+
+"Isn't it bad enough to lose a car without being slandered about
+it into the bargain?" he asked heatedly, then adding in disgust,
+"And to do it in such an underhand way, writing to a girl like
+Violet, and never giving me a chance to square myself. If I could
+get my hands on that fellow," he added viciously, "I'd qualify him
+for the coroner!"
+
+Warrington had flown into a towering and quite justifiable rage.
+Garrick, however, ignored his anger as natural under the
+circumstances, and was about to ask him a question.
+
+"Just a moment, Garrick," forestalled Warrington. "I know just
+what you are going to say. You are going to ask me about those
+gambling places. Now, Garrick, I give you my word of honor that I
+did not know until to-day that the property in that neighborhood
+was owned by our estate. I have been in that joint on Forty-eighth
+Street--I'll admit that. But, you know, I'm no gambler. I've gone
+simply to see the life, and--well, it has no attraction for me.
+Racing cars and motorboats don't go with poker chips and the red
+and black--not with me. As for the other place, I don't know any
+more about it than--than you do," he concluded vehemently.
+
+Warrington faced Garrick, his steel-blue eye unwavering. "You see,
+it's like this," he resumed passionately, "since this vice
+investigation began, I have read a lot about landlords. Then,
+too," he interjected with a mock wry face, "I knew that Violet's
+Aunt Emma had been a crusader or something of the sort. You see,
+virtue is NOT its own reward. I don't get credit even for what I
+intended to do--quite the contrary."
+
+"How's that?" asked Garrick, respecting the young man's temper.
+
+"Why, it just occurred to me lately to go scouting around the
+city, looking at the Warrington holdings, making some personal
+inquiries as to the conditions of the leases, the character of the
+tenants, and the uses to which they put the properties. The police
+have compiled a list of all the questionable places in the city
+and I have compared it with the list of our properties. I hadn't
+come to this one yet. But I shall call up our agent, make him
+admit it, and cancel that lease. I'll close 'em up. I'll fight
+until every---"
+
+"No," interrupted Garrick, quickly, "no--not yet. Don't make any
+move yet. I want to find out what the game is. It may be that it
+is someone who has tried and failed to get your tenant to come
+across with graft money. If we act without finding out first, we
+might be playing into the hands of this blackmailer."
+
+Garrick had been holding the letter in his hand, examining it
+critically. While he was speaking, he had taken a toothpick and
+was running it hastily over the words, carefully studying them.
+His face was wrinkled, as if he were in deep thought.
+
+Without saying anything more, Garrick walked over to the windows
+and pulled down the dark shades. Then he unrolled a huge white
+sheet at one end of the office.
+
+From a corner he drew out what looked like a flat-topped stand,
+about the height of his waist, with a curious box-like arrangement
+on it, in which was a powerful light. For several minutes, he
+occupied himself with the adjustment of this machine, switching
+the light off and on and focussing the lenses.
+
+Then he took the letter to Miss Winslow, laid it flat on the
+machine, switched on the light and immediately on the sheet
+appeared a very enlarged copy of the writing.
+
+"This is what has been called a rayograph by a detective of my
+acquaintance," explained Garrick. "In some ways it is much
+superior to using a microscope."
+
+He was tracing over the words with a pointer, much as he had
+already done with the toothpick.
+
+"Now, you must know," he continued, "or you may not know, but it
+is a well-proved fact, that those who suffer from various
+affections of the nerves or heart often betray the fact in their
+handwriting. Of course, in cases where the disease has progressed
+very far it may be evident to the naked eye even in the ordinary
+handwriting. But, it is there, to the eye of the expert, even in
+incipient cases.
+
+"In short," he continued, engrossed in his subject, "what really
+happens is that the pen acts as a sort of sphygmograph,
+registering the pulsations. I think you can readily see that when
+the writing is thrown on a screen, enlarged by the rayograph, the
+tremors of the pen are quite apparent."
+
+I studied the writing, following his pointer as it went over the
+lines and I began to understand vaguely what he was driving at.
+
+"The writer of that blackmailing letter," continued Garrick, "as I
+have discovered both by hastily running over it with a tooth-pick
+and, more accurately, by enlarging and studying it with the
+rayograph, is suffering from a peculiar conjunction of nervous
+trouble and disease of the heart which is latent and has not yet
+manifested itself, even to him."
+
+Garrick studied the writing, then added, thoughtfully, "if I knew
+him, I might warn him in time."
+
+"A fellow like that needs only the warning of a club or of a good
+pair of fists," growled Warrington, impatiently. "How are you
+going to work to find him?"
+
+"Well," reasoned Garrick, rolling up the sheet and restoring the
+room to its usual condition, "for one thing, the letter makes it
+pretty evident that he knows something about the gambling joint,
+perhaps is one of the regular habitues of the place. That was why
+I didn't want you to take any steps to close up the place
+immediately. I want to go there and look it over while it is in
+operation. Now, you admit that you have been in the place, don't
+you?"
+
+"Oh, yes," he replied, "I've been there with Forbes and the other
+fellows, but as I told you, I don't go in for that sort of thing."
+
+"Well," persisted Garrick, "you are sufficiently known, any way,
+to get in again."
+
+"Certainly. I can get in again. The man at the door will let me
+in--and a couple of friends, too, if that's what you mean."
+
+"That is exactly what I mean," returned Garrick. "It's no use to
+go early. I want to see the place in full blast, just as the
+after-theatre crowd is coming in. Suppose you meet us, Warrington,
+about half past ten or so. We can get in. They don't know anything
+yet about your intention to cancel the lease and close up the
+place, although apparently someone suspects it, or he wouldn't
+have been so anxious to get that letter off to Miss Winslow."
+
+"Very well," agreed Warrington, "I will meet you at the north end
+of 'Crime Square,' as you call it, at that time. Good luck until
+then."
+
+"Not a bad fellow, at all," commented Garrick when Warrington had
+disappeared down the hall from the office. "I believe he means to
+do the square thing by every one. It's a shame he has been dragged
+into a mess like this, that may affect him in ways that he doesn't
+suspect. Oh, well, there is nothing we can do for the present.
+I'll just add this clew of the handwriting to the clew of the
+automobile tires against the day when we get--pshaw!--he has taken
+the letter with him. I suppose it is safe enough in his
+possession, though. He can't wait until he has proved to Violet
+that he is honest. I don't blame him much. I told you, you know,
+that the younger set are just crazy over Violet Winslow."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+THE GAMBLING DEN
+
+
+In spite of the agitation that was going on at the time in the
+city against gambling, we had no trouble in being admitted to the
+place in Forty-eighth Street. They seemed to recognise Warrington,
+for no sooner had the lookout at the door peered through a little
+grating and seen him than the light woodwork affair was opened.
+
+To me, with even my slender knowledge of such matters, it had
+seemed rather remarkable that only such a door should guard a
+place that was so notorious. Once inside, however, the reason was
+apparent. It didn't. On the outside there was merely such a door
+as not to distinguish the house, a three-story and basement
+dwelling, of old brownstone, from the others in the street.
+
+As the outside door shut quickly, we found ourselves in a sort of
+vestibule confronted by another door. Between the two the lookout
+had his station.
+
+The second door was of the "ice-box" variety, as it was popularly
+called at the time, of heavy oak, studded with ax-defying bolts,
+swung on delicately balanced and oiled hinges, carefully
+concealed, about as impregnable as a door of steel might be.
+
+There were, as we found later, some steel doors inside, leading to
+the roof and cellar, though not so thick. The windows were
+carefully guarded inside by immense steel bars. The approaches
+from the back were covered with a steel network and every
+staircase was guarded by a collapsible door. There seemed to be no
+point of attack that had been left unguarded.
+
+Yet, unless one had been like ourselves looking for these
+fortifications, they would not have appeared much in evidence in
+the face of the wealth of artistic furnishings that was lavished
+on every hand. Inside the great entrance door was a sort of marble
+reception hall, richly furnished, and giving anything but the
+impression of a gambling house. As a matter of fact, the first
+floor was pretty much of a blind. The gambling was all upstairs.
+
+We turned to a beautiful staircase of carved wood, and ascended.
+Everywhere were thick rugs into which the feet sank almost ankle
+deep. On the walls were pictures that must have cost a small
+fortune. The furniture was of the costliest; there were splendid
+bronzes and objects of art on every hand.
+
+Gambling was going on in several rooms that we passed, but the
+main room was on the second floor, a large room reconstructed in
+the old house, with a lofty ceiling and exquisitely carved trim.
+Concealed in huge vases were the lights, a new system, then, which
+shed its rays in every direction without seeming to cast a shadow
+anywhere. The room was apparently windowless, and yet, though
+everyone was smoking furiously, the ventilation must have been
+perfect.
+
+There was, apparently, a full-fledged poolroom in one part of the
+house, closed now, of course, as the races for the day were run.
+But I could imagine it doing a fine business in the afternoon.
+There were many other games now in progress, games of every
+description, from poker to faro, keno, klondike, and roulette.
+There was nothing of either high or low degree with which the
+venturesome might not be accommodated.
+
+As Warrington conducted us from one room to another, Garrick noted
+each carefully. Along the middle of the large room stretched a
+roulette table. We stopped to watch it.
+
+"Crooked as it can be," was Garrick's comment after watching it
+for five minutes or so.
+
+He had not said it aloud, naturally, for even the crowd in evening
+clothes about it, who had lost or would lose, would have resented
+such an imputation.
+
+For the most part there was a solemn quiet about the board, broken
+only by the rattle of the ball and the click of chips. There was
+an absence of the clink of gold pieces that one hears as the
+croupier rakes them in at the casinos on the continent. Nor did
+there seem to be the tense faces that one might expect. Often
+there was the glint of an eye, or a quick and muffled curse, but
+for the most part everyone, no matter how great a loser, seemed
+respectable and prosperous. The tragedies, as we came to know,
+were elsewhere.
+
+We sauntered into another room where they were playing keno. Keno
+was, we soon found, a development or an outgrowth of lotto, in
+which cards were sold to the players, bearing numbers which were
+covered with buttons, as in lotto. The game was won when a row was
+full after drawing forth the numbers on little balls from a
+"goose."
+
+"Like the roulette wheel," said Garrick grimly, "the 'goose' is
+crooked, and if I had time I could show you how it is done."
+
+We passed by the hazard boards as too complicated for the limited
+time at our disposal.
+
+It was, however, the roulette table which seemed to interest
+Garrick most, partly for the reason that most of the players
+flocked about it.
+
+The crowd around the table on the second floor was several deep,
+now. Among those who were playing I noticed a new face. It was of
+a tall, young man much the worse, apparently, for the supposed
+good time he had had already. The game seemed to have sobered him
+up a bit, for he was keen as to mind, now, although a trifle shaky
+as to legs.
+
+He glanced up momentarily from his close following of the play as
+we approached.
+
+"Hello, W.," he remarked, as he caught sight of our young
+companion.
+
+A moment later he had gone back to the game as keen as ever.
+
+"Hello, F.," greeted Warrington. Then, aside to us, he added, "You
+know they don't use names now in gambling places if they can help
+it. Initials do just as well. That is Forbes, of whom I told you.
+He's a young fellow of good family--but I am afraid he is going
+pretty much to the bad, or will go, if he doesn't quit soon. I
+wish I could stop him. He's a nice chap. I knew him well at
+college and we have chummed about a great deal. He's here too much
+of the time for his own good."
+
+The thing was fascinating, I must admit, no matter what the morals
+of it were. I became so engrossed that I did not notice a man
+standing opposite us. I was surprised when he edged over towards
+us slowly, then whispered to Garrick, "Meet me downstairs in the
+grill in five minutes, and have a bite to eat. I have something
+important to say. Only, be careful and don't get me 'in Dutch'
+here."
+
+The man had a sort of familiar look and his slang certainly
+reminded me of someone we had met.
+
+"Who was it?" I inquired under my breath, as he disappeared among
+the players.
+
+"Didn't you recognize him?" queried Garrick. "Why, that was
+Herman, Dillon's man,--the fellow, you know, who is investigating
+this place."
+
+I had not recognized the detective in evening clothes. Indeed, I
+felt that unless he were known here already his disguise was
+perfect.
+
+Garrick managed to leave Warrington for a time under the pretext
+that he wanted him to keep an eye on Forbes while we explored the
+place further. We walked leisurely down the handsome staircase
+into the grill and luncheon room downstairs.
+
+"Well, have you found out anything?" asked a voice behind us.
+
+We turned. It was Herman who had joined us. Without pausing for an
+answer he added, "I suppose you are aware of the character of this
+place? It looks fine, but the games are all crooked, and I guess
+there are some pretty desperate characters here, from all
+accounts. I shouldn't like to fall afoul of any of them, if I were
+you."
+
+"Oh, no," replied Garrick, "it wouldn't be pleasant. But we came
+in well introduced, and I don't believe anyone suspects."
+
+Several others, talking and laughing loudly to cover their chagrin
+over losses, perhaps, entered the buffet.
+
+With the gratuitous promise to stand by us in trouble of any kind,
+Herman excused himself, and returned to watch the play about the
+roulette table.
+
+Garrick and I leisurely finished the little bite of salad we had
+ordered, then strolled upstairs again.
+
+The play was becoming more and more furious. Forbes was losing
+again, but was sticking to it with a grim determination that was
+worthy of a better cause. Warrington had already made one attempt
+to get him away but had not succeeded.
+
+"Well," remarked Garrick, as we three made our way slowly to the
+coatroom downstairs, "I think we have seen enough of this for to-
+night. It isn't so very late, after all. I wonder if it would be
+possible to get into that ladies' poolroom on the next street? I
+should like to see that place."
+
+"Angus could get us in, if anyone could," replied Warrington
+thoughtfully. "Wait here a minute. I'll see if I can get him away
+from the wheel long enough."
+
+Five minutes later he came back, with Forbes in tow. He shook
+hands with us cordially, in fact a little effusively. Perhaps I
+might have liked the young fellow if I could have taken him in
+hand for a month or two, and knocked some of the silly ideas he
+had out of his head.
+
+Forbes called a taxicab, a taxicab apparently being the open
+sesame. One might have gone afoot and have looked ever so much
+like a "good thing" and he would not have been admitted. But such
+is the simplicity of the sophistication of the keepers of such
+places that a motor car opens all locks and bolts.
+
+It seemed to be a peculiar place and as nearly as I could make out
+was in a house almost in the rear of the one we had just come
+from.
+
+We were politely admitted by a negro maid, who offered to take our
+coats.
+
+"No," answered Forbes, apparently with an eye to getting out as
+quickly as possible, "we won't stay long tonight. I just came
+around to introduce my friends to Miss Lottie. I must get back
+right away."
+
+For some reason or other he seemed very anxious to leave us. I
+surmised that the gambling fever was running high and that he had
+hopes of a change of luck. At any rate, he was gone, and we had
+obtained admittance to the ladies' pool room.
+
+We strolled into one of the rooms in which the play was on. The
+game was at its height, with huge stacks of chips upon the tables
+and the players chatting gayly. There was no large crowd there,
+however. Indeed, as we found afterward, it was really in the
+afternoon that it was most crowded, for it was rather a poolroom
+than a gambling joint, although we gathered from the gossip that
+some stiff games of bridge were played there. Both men and women
+were seated at the poker game that was in progress before the
+little green table. The women were richly attired and looked as if
+they had come from good families.
+
+We were introduced to several, but as it was evident that they
+were passing under assumed names, whatever the proprietor of the
+place might know of them, I made little effort to remember the
+names, although I did study the faces carefully.
+
+It was not many minutes before we met Miss Lottie, as everyone
+called the woman who presided over this feminine realm of chance.
+Miss Lottie was a finely gowned woman, past middle age, but
+remarkably well preserved, and with a figure that must have
+occasioned much thought to fashion along the lines of the present
+slim styles. There seemed to be a man who assisted in the conduct
+of the place, a heavy-set fellow with a closely curling mustache.
+But as he kept discreetly in the offing, we did not see much of
+him.
+
+Miss Lottie was frankly glad to see us, coming so well introduced,
+and outspokenly disappointed that we would not take a seat in the
+game that was in progress. However, Garrick passed that over by
+promising to come around soon. Excise laws were apparently held in
+puny respect in this luxurious atmosphere, and while the
+hospitable Miss Lottie went to summon a servant to bring
+refreshments--at our expense--we had ample opportunity to glance
+about at the large room in which we were seated.
+
+Garrick gazed long and curiously at an arc-light enclosed in a
+soft glass globe in the center of the ceiling, as though it had
+suggested an idea of some sort to him.
+
+Miss Lottie, who had left us for a few moments, returned
+unexpectedly to find him still gazing at it.
+
+"We keep that light burning all the time," she remarked, noticing
+his gaze. "You see, in the daytime we never use the windows. It is
+always just like it is now, night or day. It makes no difference
+with us. You know, if we ever should be disturbed by the police,"
+she rattled on, "this is my house and I am giving a little private
+party to a number of my friends."
+
+I had heard of such places but had never seen one before. I knew
+that well-dressed women, once having been caught in the toils of
+gambling, and perhaps afraid to admit their losses to their
+husbands, or, often having been introduced through gambling to far
+worse evils, were sent out from these poker rendezvous to the
+Broadway cafes, there to flirt with men, and rope them into the
+game.
+
+I could not help feeling that perhaps some of the richly gowned
+women in the house were in reality "cappers" for the game. As I
+studied the faces, I wondered what tragedies lay back of these
+rouged and painted faces. I saw broken homes, ruined lives, even
+lost honor written on them. Surely, I felt, this was a case worth
+taking up if by any chance we could put a stop or even set a
+limitation to this nefarious traffic.
+
+"Have you ever had any trouble?" Garrick asked as we sipped at the
+refreshments.
+
+"Very little," replied Miss Lottie, then as if the very manner of
+our introduction had stamped us all as "good fellows" to whom she
+could afford to be a little confidential in capturing our
+patronage, she added nonchalantly, "We had a sort of wild time a
+couple of nights ago."
+
+"How was that?" asked Garrick in a voice of studied politeness
+that carefully concealed the aching curiosity he had for her to
+talk.
+
+"Well," she answered slowly, "several ladies and gentlemen were
+here, playing a little high. They--well, they had a little too
+much to drink, I guess. There was one girl, who was the worst of
+all. She was pretty far gone. Why, we had to put her out--carry
+her out to the car that she had come in with her friend. You know
+we can't stand for any rough stuff like that--no sir. This house
+is perfectly respectable and proper and our patrons understand
+it."
+
+The story, or rather, the version of it, seemed to interest
+Garrick, as I knew it would.
+
+"Who was the girl?" he asked casually. "Did you know her? Was she
+one of your regular patrons?"
+
+"Knew her only by sight," returned Miss Lottie hastily, now a
+little vexed, I imagined, at Guy's persistence, "like lots of
+people who are introduced here--and come again several times."
+
+The woman was evidently sorry that she had mentioned the incident,
+and was trying to turn the conversation to the advantages of her
+establishment, not the least of which were her facilities for
+private games in little rooms in various parts of the house. It
+seemed all very risque to me, although I tried to appear to think
+it quite the usual thing, though I was careful to say that hers
+was the finest of such places I had ever seen. Still, the memory
+of Garrick's questioning seemed to linger. She had not expected, I
+knew, that we would take any further interest in her story than to
+accept it as proof of how careful she was of her clientele.
+
+Garrick was quick to take the cue. He did not arouse any further
+suspicion by pursuing the subject. Apparently he was convinced
+that it had been Rena Taylor of whom Miss Lottie spoke. What
+really happened we knew no more now than before. Perhaps Miss
+Lottie herself knew--or she might not know. Garrick quite
+evidently was willing to let future developments in the case show
+what had really happened. There was nothing to be gained by
+forcing things at this stage of the game, either in the gambling
+den around the corner or here.
+
+We chatted along for several minutes longer on inconsequential
+subjects, treating as important those trivialities which Bohemia
+considers important and scoffing at the really good and true
+things of life that the demi-monde despises. It was all banality
+now, for we had touched upon the real question in our minds and
+had bounded as lightly off it as a toy balloon bounds off an
+opposing surface.
+
+Warrington had kept silent during the visit, I noticed, and seemed
+relieved when it was over. I could not imagine that he was known
+here inasmuch as they treated him quite as they treated us.
+
+Apparently, though, he had no relish for a possible report of the
+excursion to get to Miss Winslow's ears. He was the first to
+leave, as Garrick, after paying for our refreshments and making a
+neat remark or two about the tasteful way in which the gambling
+room was furnished, rescued our hats and coats from the negro
+servant, and said good-night with a promise to drop in again.
+
+"What would Mrs. de Lancey think of THAT?" Garrick could not help
+saying, as we reached the street.
+
+Warrington gave a nervous little forced laugh, not at all such as
+he might have given had Mrs. de Lancey not been the aunt of the
+girl who had entered his life.
+
+Then he caught himself and said hastily, "I don't care what she
+thinks. It's none of her---"
+
+He cut the words short, as if fearing to be misinterpreted either
+way.
+
+For several squares he plodded along silently, then, as we had
+accomplished the object of the evening, excused himself, with the
+request that we keep him fully informed of every incident in the
+case.
+
+"Warrington doesn't wear his heart on his sleeve," commented
+Garrick as we bent our steps to our own, or rather his, apartment,
+"but it is evident enough that he is thinking all the time of
+Violet Winslow."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE MOTOR BANDIT
+
+
+Early the next morning, the telephone bell began to ring
+violently. The message must have been short, for I could not
+gather from Garrick's reply what it was about, although I could
+tell by the startled look on his face that something unexpected
+had happened.
+
+"Hurry and finish dressing, Tom," he called, as he hung up the
+receiver.
+
+"What's the matter?" I asked, from my room, still struggling with
+my tie.
+
+"Warrington was severely injured in a motor-car accident late last
+night, or rather early this morning, near Tuxedo."
+
+"Near Tuxedo?" I repeated incredulously. "How could he have got up
+there? It was midnight when we left him in New York."
+
+"I know it. Apparently he must have wanted to see Miss Winslow.
+She is up there, you know. I suppose that in order to be there
+this morning, early, he decided to start after he left us. I
+thought he seemed anxious to get away. Besides, you remember he
+took that letter yesterday afternoon, and I totally forgot to ask
+him for it last night. I'll wager it was on account of that
+slanderous letter that he wanted to go, that he wanted to explain
+it to her as soon as he could."
+
+There had been no details in the hasty message over the wire,
+except that Warrington was now at the home of a Doctor Mead, a
+local physician in a little town across the border of New York and
+New Jersey. The more I thought about it, the more I felt that it
+was extremely unlikely that it could have been an accident, after
+all. Might it not have been the result of an attack or a trap laid
+by some strong-arm man who had set out to get him and had almost
+succeeded in accomplishing his purpose of "getting him right," to
+use the vernacular of the class?
+
+We made the trip by railroad, passing the town where the report
+had come to us before of the finding of the body of Rena Taylor.
+There was, of course, no one at the station to meet us, and, after
+wasting some time in learning the direction, we at last walked to
+Dr. Mead's cottage, a quaint home, facing the state road that led
+from Suffern up to the Park, and northward.
+
+Dr. Mead, who had telephoned, admitted us himself. We found
+Warrington swathed in bandages, and only half conscious. He had
+been under the influence of some drug, but, before that, the
+doctor told us, he had been unconscious and had only one or two
+intervals in which he was sufficiently lucid to talk.
+
+"How did it happen?" asked Garrick, almost as soon as we had
+entered the doctor's little office.
+
+"I had had a bad case up the road," replied the doctor slowly,
+"and it had kept me out late. I was driving my car along at a
+cautious pace homeward, some time near two o'clock, when I came to
+a point in the road where there are hills on one side and the
+river on the other. As I neared the curve, a rather sharp curve,
+too, I remember the lights on my own car were shining on the white
+fence that edged the river side of the road. I was keeping
+carefully on my own side, which was toward the hill.
+
+"As I was about to turn, I heard the loud purring of an engine
+coming in my direction, and a moment later I saw a car with
+glaring headlights, driven at a furious pace, coming right at me.
+It slowed up a little, and I hugged the hill as close as I could,
+for I know some of these reckless young drivers up that way, and
+this curve was in the direction where the temptation is for one
+going north to get on the wrong side of the road--that is, my
+side--in order to take advantage of the natural slope of the
+macadam in turning the curve at high speed. Still, this fellow
+didn't prove so bad, after all. He gave me a wide berth.
+
+"Just then there came a blinding flash right out of the darkness.
+Back of his car a huge, dark object had loomed up almost like a
+ghost. It was another car, back of the first one, without a single
+light, travelling apparently by the light shed by the forward car.
+It had overtaken the first and had cut in between us with not half
+a foot to spare on either side. It was the veriest piece of sheer
+luck I ever saw that we did not all go down together.
+
+"With the flash I heard what sounded like a bullet zip out of the
+darkness. The driver of the forward car stiffened out for a
+moment. Then he pitched forward, helpless, over the steering
+wheel. His car dashed ahead, straight into the fence instead of
+taking the curve, and threw the unconscious driver. Then the car
+wrecked itself."
+
+"And the car in the rear?" inquired Garrick eagerly.
+
+"Dashed ahead between us safely around the curve--and was gone. I
+caught just one glimpse of its driver--a man all huddled up, his
+collar up over his neck and chin, his cap pulled forward over his
+eyes, goggles covering the rest of his face, and shrouded in what
+seemed to be a black coat, absolutely as unrecognizable as if he
+had been a phantom bandit, or death itself. He was steering with
+one hand, and in the other he held what must have been a
+revolver."
+
+"And then?" prompted Garrick.
+
+"I had stopped with my heart in my mouth at the narrowness of my
+own escape from the rushing black death. Pursuit was impossible.
+My car was capable of no such burst of speed as his. And then,
+too, there was a groaning man down in the ravine below. I got out,
+clambered over the fence, and down in the shrubbery into the pitch
+darkness.
+
+"Fortunately, the man had been catapulted out before his car
+turned over. I found him, and with all the strength I could muster
+and as gently as I was able carried him up to the road. When I
+held him under the light of my lamps, I saw at once that there was
+not a moment to lose. I fixed him in the rear of my car as
+comfortably as I could and then began a race to get him home here
+where I have almost a private hospital of my own, as quickly as
+possible."
+
+Cards in his pocket had identified Warrington and Dr. Mead
+remembered having heard the name. The prompt attention of the
+doctor had undoubtedly saved the young man's life.
+
+Over and over again, Dr. Mead said, in his delirium Warrington had
+repeated the name, "Violet--Violet!" It was as Garrick had
+surmised, his desire to stand well in her eyes that had prompted
+the midnight journey. Yet who the assailant might be, neither Dr.
+Mead nor the broken raving of Warrington seemed to afford even the
+slightest clew. That he was a desperate character, without doubt
+in desperate straits over something, required no great acumen to
+deduce.
+
+Toward morning in a fleeting moment of lucidity, Warrington had
+mentioned Garrick's name in such a way that Dr. Mead had looked it
+up in the telephone directory and then at the earliest moment had
+called up.
+
+"Exactly the right thing," reassured Garrick. "Can't you think of
+anything else that would identify the driver of that other car?"
+
+"Only that he was a wonderful driver, that fellow," pursued the
+doctor, admiration getting the better of his horror now that the
+thing was over. "I couldn't describe the car, except that it was a
+big one and seemed to be of a foreign make. He was crowding
+Warrington as much as he dared with safety to himself--and not a
+light on his own car, too, remember."
+
+Garrick's face was puckered in thought.
+
+"And the most remarkable thing of all about it," added the doctor,
+rising and going over to a white enameled cabinet in the corner of
+his office, "was that wound from the pistol."
+
+The doctor paused to emphasize the point he was about to make.
+"Apparently it put Warrington out," he resumed. "And yet, after
+all, I find that it is only a very superficial flesh wound of the
+shoulder. Warrington's condition is really due to the contusions
+he received owing to his being thrown from the car. His car wasn't
+going very fast at the time, for it had slowed down for me. In one
+way that was fortunate--although one might say it was the cause of
+everything, since his slowing down gave the car behind a chance to
+creep up on him the few feet necessary.
+
+"Really I am sure that even the shock of such a wound wasn't
+enough to make an experienced driver like Warrington lose control
+of the machine. It is a fairly wide curve, after all, and--well,
+my contention is proved by the fact that I examined the wreck of
+the car this morning and found that he had had time to shut off
+the gas and cut out the engine. He had time to think of and do
+that before he lost absolute control of the car."
+
+Dr. Mead had been standing by the cabinet as he talked. Now he
+opened it and took from it the bullet which he had probed out of
+the wound. He looked at it a minute himself, then handed it to
+Garrick. I bent over also and examined it as it lay in Guy's hand.
+
+At first I thought it was an ordinary bullet. But the more I
+examined it the more I was convinced that there was something
+peculiar about it. In the nose, which was steel-jacketed, were
+several little round depressions, just the least fraction of an
+inch in depth.
+
+"It is no wonder Warrington was put out, even by that superficial
+wound," remarked Garrick at last. "His assailant's aim may have
+been bad, as it must necessarily have been from one rapidly
+approaching car at a person in another rapidly moving car, also.
+But the motor bandit, whoever he is, provided against that. That
+bullet is what is known as an anesthetic bullet."
+
+"An anesthetic bullet?" repeated both Dr. Mead and myself. "What
+is that?"
+
+"A narcotic bullet," Garrick explained, "a sleep-producing bullet,
+if you please, a sedative bullet that lulls its victim into almost
+instant slumber. It was invented quite recently by a Pittsburgh
+scientist. The anesthetic bullet provides the poor marksman with
+all the advantages of the expert gunman of unerring aim."
+
+I marvelled at the ingenuity of the man who could figure out how
+to overcome the seeming impossibility of accurate shooting from a
+car racing at high speed. Surely, he must be a desperate fellow.
+
+While we were talking, the doctor's wife who had been attending
+Warrington until a nurse arrived, came to inform him that the
+effect of the sedative, which he had administered while Warrington
+was restless and groaning, was wearing off. We waited a little
+while, and then Dr. Mead himself informed us that we might see our
+friend for a minute.
+
+Even in his half-drowsy state of pain Warrington appeared to
+recognise Garrick and assume that he had come in response to his
+own summons. Garrick bent down, and I could just distinguish what
+Warrington was trying to say to him.
+
+"Wh--where's Violet?" he whispered huskily, "Does she know? Don't
+let her get--frightened--I'll be--all right."
+
+Garrick laid his hand on Warrington's unbandaged shoulder, but
+said nothing.
+
+"The--the letter," he murmured ramblingly. "I have it--in my
+apartment--in the little safe. I was going to Tuxedo--to see
+Violet--explain slander--tell her closing place--didn't know it
+was mine before. Good thing to close it--Forbes is a heavy loser.
+She doesn't know that."
+
+Warrington lapsed back on his pillow and Dr. Mead beckoned to us
+to withdraw without exciting him any further.
+
+"What difference does it make whether she knows about Forbes or
+not?" I queried as we tiptoed down the hall.
+
+Garrick shook his head doubtfully. "Can't say," he replied
+succinctly. "It may be that Forbes, too, has aspirations."
+
+The idea sent me off into a maze of speculations, but it did not
+enlighten me much. At any rate, I felt, Warrington had said enough
+to explain his presence in that part of the country. On one thing,
+as I have said, Garrick had guessed right. The blackmailing letter
+and what we had seen the night before at the crooked gambling
+joint had been too much for him. He had not been able to rest as
+long as he was under a cloud with Miss Winslow until he had had a
+chance to set himself right in her eyes.
+
+There seemed to be nothing that we could do for him just then. He
+was in excellent hands, and now that the doctor knew who he was, a
+trained nurse had even been sent for from the city and arrived on
+the train following our own, thus relieving Mrs. Mead of her
+faithful care of him.
+
+Garrick gave the nurse strict instructions to make exact notes of
+anything that Warrington might say, and then requested the doctor
+to take us to the scene of the tragedy. We were about to start,
+when Garrick excused himself and hurried back into the house,
+reappearing in a few minutes.
+
+"I thought perhaps, after all, it would be best to let Miss
+Winslow know of the accident, as long as it isn't likely to turn
+out seriously in the end for Warrington," he explained, joining us
+again in Dr. Mead's car which was waiting in front of the house.
+"So I called up her aunt's at Tuxedo and when Miss Winslow
+answered the telephone I broke the news to her as gently as I
+could. Warrington need have no fear about that girl," he added.
+
+The wrecked car, we found, had not yet been moved, nor had the
+broken fence been repaired. It was, in fact, an accident worth
+studying topographically. That part of the road itself near the
+fence seemed to interest Garrick greatly. Two or three cars passed
+while we waited and he noted how carefully each of them seemed to
+avoid that side toward the broken fence, as though it were
+haunted.
+
+"I hope they've all done that," Garrick remarked, as he continued
+to examine the road, which was a trifle damp under the high trees
+that shaded it.
+
+As he worked, I could not believe that it was wholly fancy that
+caused me to think of him as searching with dilated nostrils, like
+a scientific human bloodhound. For, it was not long before I began
+to realize what he was looking for in the marks of cars left on
+the oiled roadway.
+
+During perhaps half an hour he continued studying the road, above
+and below the exact point of the accident. At length a low
+exclamation from him brought me to his side. He had dropped down
+in the grease, regardless of his knees and was peering at some
+rather deep imprints in the surface dressing. There, for a few
+feet, were plainly the marks of the outside tires of a car, still
+unobliterated.
+
+Garrick had pulled out copies of the photographs he had made of
+the tire marks that had been left at the scene of the finding of
+the unfortunate Rena Taylor's body, and was busy comparing them
+with the marks that were before him.
+
+"Of course," Garrick muttered to me, "if the anti-skid marks of
+the tires were different, it would have proved nothing, just as in
+the other case where we looked for the tire prints. But here, too,
+a glance shows that at least it is the same make of tires."
+
+He continued his comparison. It did not take me long to surmise
+what he was doing. He was taking the two sets of marks and, inch
+by inch, going over them, checking up the little round metal
+insertions that were placed in this style of tire to give it a
+firmer grip.
+
+"Here's one missing, there's another," he cried excitedly. "By
+Jove, it can't be mere coincidence. There's one that is worn--
+another broken. They correspond. Yes, that MUST be the same car,
+in each case. And if it was the stolen car, then it was
+Warrington's own car that was used in pursuing him and in almost
+making away with him!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE EXPLANATION
+
+
+We had not noticed a car which had stopped just past us and
+Garrick was surprised at hearing his own name called.
+
+We looked up from contemplating the discovery he had made in the
+road, to see Miss Winslow waving to us. She had motored down from
+Tuxedo immediately after receiving the message over the telephone,
+and with her keen eye had picked out both the place of the
+accident and ourselves studying it.
+
+As we approached, I could see that she was much more pale than
+usual. Evidently her anxiety for Warrington was thoroughly
+genuine. The slanderous letter had not shaken her faith in him,
+yet.
+
+She had left her car and was walking back along the road with us
+toward the broken fence. Garrick had been talking to her earnestly
+and now, having introduced her to Dr. Mead, the doctor and he
+decided to climb down to inspect the wrecked car itself in the
+ravine below.
+
+Miss Winslow cast a quick look from the broken fence down at the
+torn and twisted wreckage of the car and gave a suppressed little
+cry and shudder.
+
+"How is Mortimer?" she asked of me eagerly, for I had agreed to
+stay with her while the others went down the slope. "I mean how is
+he really? Is he likely to be better soon, as Mr. Garrick said
+over the telephone?" she appealed.
+
+"Surely--absolutely," I assured her, knowing that if Garrick had
+said that he had meant it. "Miss Winslow, believe me, neither Mr.
+Garrick nor Dr. Mead is concealing anything. It is pretty bad, of
+course. Such things are always bad. But it might be far worse. And
+besides, the worst now has passed."
+
+Garrick had already promised to accompany her over to Dr. Mead's
+after he had made his examination of the wrecked car to confirm
+what the doctor had already observed. It took several minutes for
+them to satisfy themselves and meanwhile Violet Winslow, already
+highly unstrung by the news from Garrick, waited more and more
+nervously.
+
+In spite of his careful examination of the wrecked car, Garrick
+found practically nothing more than Dr. Mead had already told him.
+It was with considerable relief that Miss Winslow saw the two
+again climbing up the slope in the direction of the road.
+
+A few minutes later we were on our way back, Dr. Mead and Garrick
+leading the way in the doctor's car, while I accompanied Miss
+Winslow in her own car.
+
+She said little, and it was plain to see that she was consumed by
+anxiety. Now and then she would ask a question about the accident,
+and although I tried in every way to divert her mind to other
+subjects she unfailingly came back to that.
+
+Tempering the details as much as I could I repeated for her just
+what had happened to the best of our knowledge.
+
+"And you have no idea who it could have been?" she asked turning
+those liquid eyes of hers on my face.
+
+If there were any secret about it, it was perhaps fortunate that I
+did not know. I don't think I am more than ordinarily susceptible
+and I know I did not delude myself that Miss Winslow ever could be
+anything except a friend to either Garrick or myself. But I felt I
+could not resist the appeal in those eyes. I wondered if even
+they, by some magic intuition, might not pierce the very soul of
+man and uncover a lying heart. I felt that Warrington could not
+have been other than he said he was and still have been hastening
+to meet those eyes.
+
+"Miss Winslow," I answered, "I have no more idea than you have who
+it could be."
+
+I was telling the truth and I felt that I could meet her gaze.
+
+There must have been something about how I had phrased my answer
+that caused her to look at me more searchingly than before.
+Suddenly she turned her face away and gazed at the passing
+landscape from the car.
+
+She said nothing, but as I continued to watch her finely moulded
+features, I saw that she was making an effort to control herself.
+It flashed over me, somehow, that perhaps, after all, she herself
+suspected someone. It was not that she said anything. It was
+merely an indefinable impression I received.
+
+Had Warrington any enemies, not in the underworld, but among those
+of his own set, rivals, perhaps, who might even stoop to secure
+the aid of those of the underworld who could be bought to commit
+any crime in the calendar for a price? I did not pause to examine
+the plausibility or the impossibility of such a theory. What
+interested me was whether in her mind there was such a thought.
+Had she, perhaps, really more of an idea than I who it could be?
+She betrayed nothing of what her intuition told her, but I felt
+sure that, even though she knew nothing, there was at least
+something she feared.
+
+At last we arrived at Dr. Mead's and I handed her out of the car
+and into the tastefully furnished little house. There was an air
+of quietness about it that often indefinably pervades a house in
+which there is illness or a tragedy.
+
+"May I--see him?" pleaded Miss Winslow, as Dr. Mead placed a chair
+for her.
+
+I wondered what he would have done if there had been some good
+reason why he should resist the pleading of her deep eyes.
+
+"Why--er--for a minute--yes," he answered. "Later, soon, he may
+see visitors longer, but just now I think for a few hours the less
+he is disturbed the better."
+
+The doctor excused himself for a moment to look at his patient and
+prepare him for the visit. Meanwhile Miss Winslow waited in the
+reception room downstairs, still very pale and nervous.
+
+Warrington was in much less pain now than he had been when we left
+and Dr. Mead decided that, since the nurse had made him so much
+more comfortable, no further drug was necessary. In fact as his
+natural vitality due to his athletic habits and clean living
+asserted itself, it seemed as if his injuries which at first had
+looked so serious were not likely to prove as bad as the doctor
+had anticipated.
+
+Still, he was badly enough as it was. The new nurse smoothed out
+his pillows and deftly tried to conceal as much as she could that
+would suggest how badly he was injured and at last Violet Winslow
+was allowed to enter the room where the poor boy lay.
+
+Miss Winslow never for a moment let her wonderful self-control
+fail her. Quickly and noiselessly, like a ministering angel, she
+seemed to float rather than walk over the space from the door to
+the bed.
+
+As she bent over him and whispered, "Mortimer!" the simple tone
+seemed to have an almost magic effect on him.
+
+He opened his eyes which before had been languidly closed and
+gazed up at her face as if he saw a vision. Slowly the expression
+on his face changed as he realized that it was indeed Violet
+herself. In spite of the pain of his hurts which must have been
+intense a smile played over his features, as if he realized that
+it would never do to let her know how serious had been his
+condition.
+
+As she bent over her hand had rested on the white covers of the
+bed. Feebly, in spite of the bandages that swathed the arm nearest
+her, he put out his own brawny hand and rested it on hers. She did
+not withdraw it, but passed the other hand gently over his
+throbbing forehead. Never have I seen a greater transformation in
+an invalid than was evident in Mortimer Warrington. No tonic in
+all the pharmacopoeia of Dr. Mead could have worked a more
+wonderful change.
+
+Not a word was said by either Warrington or Violet for several
+seconds. They seemed content just to gaze into each other's faces,
+oblivious to us.
+
+Warrington was the first to break the silence, in answer to what
+he knew must be her unspoken question.
+
+"Your aunt--gambling," he murmured feebly, trying hard to connect
+his words so as to appear not so badly off as he had when he had
+spoken before. "I didn't know--till they told me--that the estate
+owned it--was coming to tell you--going to cancel the lease--close
+it up--no one ever lose money there again--"
+
+The words, jerky though they were, cost him a great physical
+effort to say. She seemed to realize it, but there was a look of
+triumph on her face as she understood.
+
+She had not been mistaken. Warrington was all that she had thought
+him to be.
+
+He was looking eagerly into her face and as he looked he read in
+it the answer to the questionings that had sent him off in the
+early hours of the morning on his fateful ride to Tuxedo.
+
+Dr. Mead cleared his throat. Miss Winslow recognised it as a
+signal that the time was growing short for the interview.
+
+Reluctantly, she withdrew her hand from his, their eyes met
+another instant, and with a hasty word of sympathy and
+encouragement she left the room, conscious now that other eyes
+were watching.
+
+"Oh, to think it was to tell me that that he got into it all," she
+cried, as she sank into a deep chair in the reception room,
+endeavouring not to give way to her feelings, now that the strain
+was off and she had no longer to keep a brave face. "I--I feel
+guilty!"
+
+"I wouldn't say that," soothed Garrick. "Who knows? Perhaps if he
+had stayed in the city--they might have succeeded,--whoever it was
+back of this thing."
+
+She looked up at Garrick, startled, I thought, with the same
+expression I had seen when she turned her face away in the car and
+I got the impression that she felt more than she knew of the case.
+
+"I may--see--Mr. Warrington again soon?" she asked, now again
+mistress of her feelings after Garrick's interruption that had
+served to take her mind off a morbid aspect of the affair.
+
+"Surely," agreed Dr. Mead. "I expect his progress to be rapid
+after this."
+
+"Thank you," she murmured, as she slowly rose and prepared to make
+the return trip to her aunt's home.
+
+"Oh, Mr. Garrick," she confided, as he helped her on with the
+wraps she had thrown carelessly on a chair when she entered, "I
+can't help it--I do feel guilty. Perhaps he thinks I am--like Aunt
+Emma---"
+
+"Perhaps it was quite as much to convince your aunt as you that he
+took the trip," suggested Garrick.
+
+Miss Winslow understood. "Why is it," she murmured, "that
+sometimes people with the best intentions manage to bring about
+things that are--more terrible?"
+
+Garrick smiled. Quite evidently she and her aunt were not exactly
+in tune. He said nothing.
+
+As for Dr. Mead he seemed really pleased, for the patient had
+brightened up considerably after even the momentary glimpse he had
+had of Violet. Altogether I felt that although they had seen each
+other only for a moment, it had done both good. Miss Winslow's
+fears had been quieted and Warrington had been encouraged by the
+realisation that, in spite of its disastrous ending, his journey
+had accomplished its purpose anyway.
+
+There was, as Dr. Mead assured us, every prospect now that
+Warrington would pull through after the murderous assault that had
+been made on him.
+
+We saw Miss Winslow safely off on her return trip, much relieved
+by the promise of the doctor that she might call once a day to see
+how the patient was getting along.
+
+Warrington was now resting more easily than he had since the
+accident and Garrick, having exhausted the possibilities of
+investigation at the scene of the accident, announced that he
+would return to the city.
+
+At the railroad terminus he called up both the apartment and the
+office in order to find out whether we had had any visitors during
+our absence. No one had called at the apartment, but the office
+boy downtown said that there was a man who had called and was
+coming back again.
+
+A half hour or so later when we arrived at the office we found
+McBirney seated there, patiently determined to find Garrick.
+
+Evidently the news of the assault on Warrington had travelled
+fast, for the first thing McBirney wanted to know was how it
+happened and how his client was. In a few words Garrick told him
+as much about it as was necessary. McBirney listened attentively,
+but we could see that he was bursting with his own budget of news.
+
+"And, McBirney," concluded Garrick, without going into the
+question of the marks of the tires, "most remarkable of all, I am
+convinced that the car in which his assailant rode was no other
+than the Mercedes that was stolen from Warrington in the first
+place."
+
+"Say," exclaimed McBirney in surprise, "that car must be all over
+at once!"
+
+"Why--what do you mean?"
+
+"You know I have my own underground sources of information,"
+explained the detective with pardonable pride at adding even a
+rumour to the budget of news. "Of course you can't be certain of
+such things, but one of my men, who is scouting around the
+Tenderloin looking for what he can find, tells me that he saw a
+car near that gambling joint on Forty-eighth Street and that it
+may have been the repainted and renumbered Warrington car--at
+least it tallies with the description that we got from the garage
+keeper in north Jersey.
+
+"Did he see who drove it?" asked Garrick eagerly.
+
+"Not very well. It was a short, undersized man, as nearly as he
+could make out. Someone whom he did not recognize jumped in it
+from the gambling house and they disappeared. Even though my man,
+his suspicions aroused, tried to follow them in a taxicab they
+managed to leave him behind."
+
+"In what direction did they go?" asked Garrick.
+
+"Toward the West Side--where those fly-by-night garages are all
+located."
+
+"Or, perhaps, the Jersey ferries," suggested Garrick.
+
+"Well, I thought you might like to know about this undersized
+driver," said McBirney a little sulkily because Garrick had not
+displayed as much enthusiasm as he expected.
+
+"I do," hastened Garrick. "Of course I do. And it may prove to be
+a very important clew. But I was just running ahead of your story.
+The undersized man couldn't have figured in the case afterward,
+assuming that it was the car. He must have left it, probably in
+the city. Have you any idea who it could be?"
+
+"Not unless he might be an employee or a keeper of one of those
+night-hawk garages," persisted McBirney. "That is possible."
+
+"Quite," agreed Garrick.
+
+McBirney had delivered his own news and in turn had received ours,
+or at least such of it as Garrick chose to tell at present. He was
+apparently satisfied and rose to go.
+
+"Keep after that undersized fellow, will you?" asked Garrick. "If
+you could find out who he is and he should happen to be connected
+with one of those garages we might get on the right trail at
+last."
+
+"I will," promised McBirney. "He's evidently an expert driver of
+motor cars himself; my man could see that."
+
+McBirney had gone. Garrick sat for several minutes gazing squarely
+at me. Then he leaned back in his chair, with his hands behind his
+head.
+
+"Mark my words, Marshall," he observed slowly, "someone connected
+with that gambling joint in some way has got wind of the fact that
+Warrington is going to revoke the lease and close it up. We've got
+to beat them to it--that's all."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE RAID
+
+
+Garrick was evidently turning over and over in his mind some plan
+of action.
+
+"This thing has gone just about far enough," he remarked
+meditatively, looking at his watch. It was now well along in the
+afternoon.
+
+"But what do you intend doing?" I asked, regarding the whole
+affair so far as a hopeless mystery from which I could not see
+that we had extracted so much as a promising clew.
+
+"Doing?" he echoed. "Why, there is only one thing to do, and that
+is to take the bull by the horns, to play the game without any
+further attempt at finessing. I shall see Dillon, get a warrant,
+and raid that gambling place--that's all."
+
+I had no counter suggestion to offer. In fact the plan rather
+appealed to me. If any blow were to be struck it must be just a
+little bit ahead of any that the gamblers anticipated, and this
+was a blow they would not expect if they already had wind of
+Warrington's intention to cancel the lease.
+
+Garrick called up Dillon and made an appointment to meet him early
+in the evening, without telling him what was afoot.
+
+"Meet me down at police headquarters, Tom," was all that Garrick
+said to me. "I want to work here at the office for a little while,
+first, testing a new contrivance, or, rather, an old one that I
+think may be put to a new use."
+
+Meanwhile I decided to employ my time by visiting some newspaper
+friends that I had known a long time on the Star, one of the most
+enterprising papers in the city. Fortunately I found my friend,
+Davenport, the managing editor, at his desk and ready to talk in
+the infrequent lulls that came in his work.
+
+"What's on your mind, Marshall?" he asked as I sat down and began
+to wonder how he ever conducted his work in the choatic clutter of
+stuff on the top of his desk.
+
+"I can't tell you--yet, Davenport," I explained carefully, "but
+it's a big story and when it breaks I'll promise that the Star has
+the first chance at it. I'm on the inside--working with that young
+detective, Garrick, you know."
+
+"Garrick--Garrick," he repeated. "Oh, yes, that fellow who came
+back from abroad with a lot of queer ideas. I remember. We had an
+interview with him when he left the steamer. Good stuff, too,--but
+what do you think of him? Is he--on the level?"
+
+"On the level and making good," I answered confidently. "I'm not
+at liberty to tell much about it now, but--well, the reason I came
+in was to find out what you could tell me about a Miss Winslow,--
+Violet Winslow and her aunt, Mrs. Beekman de Lancey."
+
+"The Miss Winslow who is reported engaged to young Warrington?" he
+repeated. "The gossip is that he has cut out Angus Forbes,
+entirely."
+
+I had hesitated to mention all the names at once, but I need not
+have done so, for on such things, particularly the fortunes in
+finance and love of such a person as Warrington, the eyes of the
+press were all-seeing.
+
+"Yes," I answered carefully, "that's the Miss Winslow. What do you
+know of her?"
+
+"Well," he replied, fumbling among the papers on his desk, "all I
+know is that in the social set to which she belongs our society
+reporters say that of all the young fellows who have set out to
+capture her--and she's a deuced pretty girl, even in the pictures
+we have published--it seems to have come down to Mortimer
+Warrington and Angus Forbes. Of course, as far as we newspapermen
+are concerned, the big story for us would be in the engagement of
+young Warrington. The eyes of people are fixed on him just now--
+the richest young man in the country, and all that sort of thing,
+you know. Seems to be a pretty decent sort of fellow, too, I
+believe--democratic and keen on other things besides tango and
+tennis. Oh, there's the thing I was hunting for. Mrs. de Lancey's
+a nut on gambling, I believe. Read that. It's a letter that came
+to us from her this morning."
+
+It was written in the stilted handwriting of a generation ago and
+read:
+
+"To the Editor of the Star, Dear Sir:--I believe that your paper
+prides itself on standing for reform and against the grafters. If
+that is so, why do you not join in the crusade to suppress
+gambling in New York? For the love that you must still bear
+towards your own mother, listen to the stories of other mothers
+torn by anxiety for their sons and daughters, and if there is any
+justice or righteousness in this great city close up those
+gambling hells that are sending to ruin scores of our finest young
+men--and women. You have taken up other fights against gambling
+and vice. Take up this one that appeals to women of wealth and
+social position. I know them and they are as human as mothers in
+any other station in life. Oh, if there is any way, close up these
+gilded society resorts that are dissipating the fortunes of many
+parents, ruining young men and women, and, in one case I know of,
+slowly bringing to the grave a grey-haired widow as worthy of
+protection as any mother of the poor whose plea has closed up a
+little poolroom or policy shop. One place I have in mind is at----
+West Forty-eighth Street. Investigate it, but keep this
+confidential.
+
+"Sincerely,
+
+"(MRS.) EMMA DE LANCEY."
+
+"Do you know anything about it?" I asked casually handing the
+letter back.
+
+"Only by hearsay. I understand it is the crookedest gambling joint
+in the city, at least judging by the stories they tell of the
+losses there. And so beastly aristocratic, too. They tell me young
+Forbes has lost a small fortune there--but I don't know how true
+it is. We get hundreds of these daintily perfumed and monogramed
+little missives in the course of a year."
+
+"You mean Angus Forbes?" I asked.
+
+"Yes," replied the managing editor, "the fellow that they say has
+been trying to capture your friend Miss Winslow."
+
+I did not reply for the moment. Forbes, I had already learned, was
+deeply in debt. Was it part of his plan to get control of the
+little fortune of Violet to recoup his losses?
+
+"Do you know Mrs. de Lancey?" pursued the editor.
+
+"No--not yet," I answered. "I was just wondering what sort of
+person she is."
+
+"Oh I suppose she's all right," he answered, "but they say she's
+pretty straight-laced--that cards and all sorts of dissipation are
+an obsession with her."
+
+"Well," I argued, "there might be worse things than that."
+
+"That's right," he agreed. "But I don't believe that such a
+puritanical atmosphere is--er--just the place to bring up a young
+woman like Violet Winslow."
+
+I said nothing. It did not seem to me that Mrs. de Lancey had
+succeeded in killing the natural human impulses in Violet, though
+perhaps the girl was not as well versed in some of the ways of the
+world as others of her set. Still, I felt that her own natural
+common sense would protect her, even though she had been kept from
+a knowledge of much that in others of her set was part of their
+"education."
+
+My friend's telephone had been tinkling constantly during the
+conversation and I saw that as the time advanced he was getting
+more and more busy. I thanked Davenport and excused myself.
+
+At least I had learned something about those who were concerned in
+the case. As I rode uptown I could not help thinking of Violet
+Winslow and her apparently intuitive fear concerning Warrington. I
+wondered how much she really knew about Angus Forbes. Undoubtedly
+he had not hesitated to express his own feelings toward her. Had
+she penetrated beneath the honeyed words he must have spoken to
+her? Was it that she feared that all things are fair in war and
+love and that the favour she must have bestowed on Warrington
+might have roused the jealousy of some of his rivals for her
+affections?
+
+I found no answer to my speculations, but a glance at my watch
+told me that it was nearing the time of my appointment with Guy.
+
+A few minutes later I jumped off the car at Headquarters and met
+Garrick, waiting for me in the lower hall. As we ascended the
+broad staircase to the second floor, where Dillon's office was, I
+told him briefly of what I had discovered.
+
+"The old lady will have her wish," he replied grimly as I related
+the incident of the letter to the editor. "I wonder just how much
+she really does know of that place. I hope it isn't enough to set
+her against Warrington. You know people like that are often likely
+to conceive violent prejudices--and then refuse to believe
+something that's all but proved about someone else."
+
+There was no time to pursue the subject further for we had reached
+Dillon's office and were admitted immediately.
+
+"What's the news?" asked Dillon greeting us cordially.
+
+"Plenty of it," returned Garrick, hastily sketching over what had
+transpired since we had seen him last.
+
+Garrick had scarcely begun to outline what he intended to do when
+I could see from the commissioner's face that he was very
+sceptical of success.
+
+"Herman tells me," he objected, "that the place is mighty well
+barricaded. We haven't tried raiding it yet, because you know the
+new plan is not only to raid those places, but first to watch
+them, trace out some of the regular habitues, and then to be able
+to rope them in in case we need them as evidence. Herman has been
+getting that all in shape so that when the case comes to trial,
+there'll be no slip-up."
+
+"If that's all you want, I can put my finger on some of the
+wildest scions of wealth that you will ever need for witnesses,"
+Garrick replied confidently.
+
+"Well," pursued Dillon diffidently, "how are you going to pull it
+off, down through the sky-light, or up through the cellar?"
+
+"Oh, Dillon," returned Garrick reproachfully, "that's unworthy of
+you."
+
+"But, Garrick," persisted Dillon, "don't you know that it is a
+veritable National City Bank for protection. It isn't one of those
+common gambling joints. It's proof against all the old methods.
+Axes and sledgehammers would make no impression there. Why, that
+place has been proved bomb-proof--bomb-proof, sir. You remember
+recently the so-call 'gamblers' war' in which some rivals exploded
+a bomb on the steps because the proprietor of this place resented
+their intrusion uptown from the lower East Side, with their gunmen
+and lobbygows? It did more damage to the house next door than to
+the gambling joint."
+
+Dillon paused a moment to enumerate the difficulties. "You can get
+past the outside door all right. But inside is the famous ice-box
+door. It's no use to try it at all unless you can pass that door
+with reasonable quickness. All the evidence you will get will be
+of an innocent social club room downstairs. And you can't get on
+the other side of that door by strategy, either. It is strategy-
+proof. The system of lookouts is perfect. Herman---"
+
+"Can't help it," interrupted Garrick, "we've got to go over
+Herman's head this time. I'll guarantee you all the evidence
+you'll ever need."
+
+Dillon and Garrick faced each other for a moment.
+
+It was a supreme test of Dillon's sincerity.
+
+Finally he spoke slowly. "All right," he said, as if at last the
+die were cast and Garrick had carried his point, "but how are you
+going to do it? Won't you need some men with axes and crowbars?"
+
+"No, indeed, almost shouted Garrick as Dillon made a motion as if
+to find out who were available. "I've been preparing a little
+surprise in my office this afternoon for just such a case. It's a
+rather cumbersome arrangement and I've brought it along stowed
+away in a taxicab outside. I don't want anyone else to know about
+the raid until the last moment. Just before we begin the rough
+stuff, you can call up and have the reserves started around. That
+is all I shall want."
+
+"Very well," agreed Dillon, after a moment.
+
+He did not seem to relish the scheme, but he had promised at the
+outset to play fair and he had no disposition to go back on his
+word now in favor even of his judgment.
+
+"First of all," he planned, "we'll have to drop in on a judge and
+get a warrant to protect us."
+
+Garrick hastily gave me instructions what to do and I started
+uptown immediately, while they went to secure the secret warrant.
+
+I had been stationed on the corner which was not far from the
+Forty-eighth Street gambling joint that we were to raid. I had a
+keen sense of wickedness as I stood there with other loiterers
+watching the passing throng under the yellow flare of the flaming
+arc light.
+
+It was not difficult now to loiter about unnoticed because the
+streets were full of people, all bent on their own pleasure and
+not likely to notice one person more or less who stopped to watch
+the passing throng.
+
+From time to time I cast a quick glance at the house down the
+street, in order to note who was going in.
+
+It must have been over an hour that I waited. It was after ten,
+and it became more difficult to watch who was going into the
+gambling joint. In fact, several times the street was so blocked
+that I could not see very well. But I did happen to catch a
+glimpse of one familiar figure across the street from me.
+
+It was Angus Forbes. Where he kept himself in the daytime I did
+not know, but he seemed to emerge at night, like a rat, seeking
+what to him was now food and drink. I watched him narrowly as he
+turned the corner, but there was no use in being too inquisitive.
+He was bound as certainly for the gambling joint as a moth would
+have headed toward one of the arc lights. Evidently Forbes was
+making a vocation of gambling.
+
+Just then a taxicab pulled up hurriedly at the curb near where I
+was standing and a hand beckoned me, on the side away from the
+gambling house.
+
+I sauntered over and looked in through the open window. It was
+Garrick with Dillon sunk back into the dark corner of the cab, so
+as not to be seen.
+
+"Jump in!" whispered Garrick, opening the door. "We have the
+warrant all right. Has anything happened? No suspicion yet?"
+
+I did so and reassured Garrick while the cab started on a blind
+cruise around the block.
+
+On the floor was a curiously heavy instrument, on which I had
+stubbed my toe as I entered. I surmised that it must have been the
+thing which Garrick had brought from his office, but in the
+darkness I could not see what it was, nor was there a chance to
+ask a question.
+
+"Stop here," ordered Garrick, as we passed a drug store with a
+telephone booth.
+
+Dillon jumped out and disappeared into the booth.
+
+"He is calling the reserves from the nearest station," fretted
+Garrick. "Of course, we have to do that to cover the place, but
+we'll have to work quickly now, for I don't know how fast a tip
+may travel in this subterranean region. Here, I'll pay the taxi
+charges now and save some time."
+
+A moment later Dillon rejoined us, his face perspiring from the
+closeness of the air in the booth.
+
+"Now to that place on Forty-eighth Street, and we're square,"
+ordered Garrick to the driver, mentioning the address. "Quick!"
+
+There had been, we could see, no chance for a tip to be given that
+a raid was about to be pulled off. We could see that, as Garrick
+and I jumped out of the cab and mounted the steps.
+
+The door was closed to us, however. Only someone like Warrington
+who was known there could have got us in peacefully, until we had
+become known in the place. Yet though there had been no tip, the
+lookout on the other side of the door, with his keen nose, had
+seemed to scent trouble.
+
+He had retreated and, we knew, had shut the inside, heavy door--
+perhaps even had had time already to give the alarm inside.
+
+The sharp rap of a small axe which Garrick had brought sounded on
+the flimsy outside door, in quick staccato. There was a noise and
+scurry of feet inside and we could hear the locks and bolts being
+drawn.
+
+Banging, ripping, tearing, the thin outer door was easily forced.
+Disregarding the melee I leaped through the wreckage with Garrick.
+The "ice-box" door barred all further progress. How was Garrick to
+surmount this last and most formidable barrier?
+
+"A raid! A raid!" cried a passer-by.
+
+Another instant, and the cry, taken up by others, brought a crowd
+swarming around from Broadway, as if it were noon instead of
+midnight.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+THE GAMBLING DEBT
+
+
+There was no time to be lost now. Down the steps again dashed
+Garrick, after our expected failure both to get in peaceably and
+to pass the ice-box door by force. This time Dillon emerged from
+the cab with him. Together they were carrying the heavy apparatus
+up the steps.
+
+They set it down close to the door and I scrutinized it carefully.
+It looked, at first sight, like a short stubby piece of iron,
+about eighteen inches high. It must have weighed fifty or sixty
+pounds. Along one side was a handle, and on the opposite side an
+adjustable hook with a sharp, wide prong.
+
+Garrick bent down and managed to wedge the hook into the little
+space between the sill and the bottom of the ice-box door. Then he
+began pumping on the handle, up and down, up and down, as hard as
+he could.
+
+Meanwhile the crowd that had begun to collect was getting larger.
+Dillon went through the form of calling on them for aid, but the
+call was met with laughter. A Tenderloin crowd has no use for
+raids, except as a spectacle. Between us we held them back, while
+Garrick worked. The crowd jeered.
+
+It was the work of only a few seconds, however, before Garrick
+changed the jeers to a hearty round of exclamations of surprise.
+The door seemed to be lifted up, literally, until some of its
+bolts and hinges actually bulged and cracked. It was being
+crushed, like the flimsy outside door, before the unwonted attack.
+
+Upwards, by fractions of an inch, by millimeters, the door was
+being forced. There was such straining and stress of materials
+that I really began to wonder whether the building itself would
+stand it.
+
+"Scientific jimmying," gasped Garrick, as the door bulged more and
+more and seemed almost to threaten to topple in at any moment.
+
+I looked at the stubby little cylinder with its short stump of a
+lever. Garrick had taken it out now and had wedged it horizontally
+between the ice-box door and the outer stonework of the building
+itself. Then he jammed some pieces of wood in to wedge it tighter
+and again began to pump at the handle vigorously.
+
+"What is it?" I asked, almost in awe at the titanic power of the
+apparently insignificant little thing.
+
+"My scientific sledgehammer," he panted, still working the lever
+more vigorously than ever backward and forward. "In other words, a
+hydraulic ram. There is no swinging of axes or wielding of crow-
+bars necessary any more, Dillon, in breaking down a door like
+this. Such things are obsolete. This little jimmy, if you want to
+call it that, has a power of ten tons. I think that's about
+enough."
+
+It seemed as if the door were buckling and being literally
+wrenched off its hinges by the irresistible ten-ton punch of the
+hydraulic ram.
+
+Garrick sprang back, grasping me by the arm and pulling me too.
+But there was no need of caution. What was left of the door swung
+back on its loosened hinges, seemed to tremble a moment, and then,
+with a dull thud crashed down on the beautiful green marble of the
+reception hall, reverberating.
+
+We peered beyond. Inside all was darkness. At the very first sign
+of trouble the lights had been switched out downstairs. It was
+deserted. There was no answer to our shouts. It was as silent as a
+tomb.
+
+The clang of bells woke the rapid echoes. The crowd parted. It was
+the patrol wagons, come just in time, full of reserves, at
+Dillon's order. They swarmed up the steps, for there was nothing
+to do now, in the limelight of the public eye, except their duty.
+Besides Dillon was there, too.
+
+"Here," he ordered huskily, "four of you fellows jump into each of
+the next door houses and run up to the roof. Four more men go
+through to the rear of this house. The rest stay here and await
+orders," he directed, detailing them off quickly, as he
+endeavoured to grasp the strange situation.
+
+On both sides of the street heads were out of windows. On other
+houses the steps were full of spectators. Thousands of people must
+have swarmed in the street. It was pandemonium.
+
+Yet inside the house into which we had just broken it was all
+darkness and silence.
+
+The door had yielded to the scientific sledge-hammering where it
+would have shattered, otherwise, all the axes in the department.
+What was next?
+
+Garrick jumped briskly over the wreckage into the building.
+Instead of the lights and gayety which we had seen on the previous
+night, all was black mystery. The robbers' cave yawned before us.
+I think we were all prepared for some sort of gunplay, for we knew
+the crooks to be desperate characters. As we followed Garrick
+closely we were surprised to encounter not even physical force.
+
+Someone struck a light. Garrick, groping about in the shadows,
+found the switch, and one after another the lights in the various
+rooms winked up.
+
+I have seldom seen such confusion as greeted us as, with Dillon
+waiving his "John Doe" warrant over his head, we hurried upstairs
+to the main hall on the second floor, where the greater part of
+the gambling was done. Furniture was overturned and broken, and
+there had been no time to remove the heavier gambling apparatus.
+Playing cards, however, chips, racing sheets from the afternoon,
+dice, everything portable and tangible and small enough to be
+carried had disappeared.
+
+But the greatest surprise of all was in store. Though we had seen
+no one leave by any of the doors, nor by the doors of any of the
+houses on the block, nor by the roofs, or even by the back yard,
+according to the report of the police who had been sent in that
+direction, there was not a living soul in the house from roof to
+cellar. Search as we did, we could find not one of the scores of
+people whom I had seen enter in the course of the evening while I
+was watching on the corner.
+
+Dillon, ever mindful of some of the absurd rules of evidence in
+such cases laid down by the courts, had had an official
+photographer summoned and he was proceeding from room to room,
+snapping pictures of apparatus that was left in place and
+preserving a film record of the condition of things generally.
+
+Garrick was standing ruefully beside the roulette wheel at which
+so many fortunes had been dissipated.
+
+"Get me an axe," he asked of one of Dillon's men who was passing.
+
+With a well-directed blow he smashed the wheel.
+
+"Look," he exclaimed, "this is what they were up against."
+
+His forefinger indicated an ingenious but now twisted and tangled
+series of minute wires and electro-magnets in the delicate
+mechanism now broken open before us. Delicate brushes led the
+current into the wheel.
+
+With another blow of the axe, Garrick disclosed wires running down
+through the leg of the table to the floor and under the carpet to
+buttons operated by the man who ran the game.
+
+"What does it mean?" I asked blankly.
+
+"It means," he returned, "that they had little enough chance to
+win at a straight game of roulette. But this wheel wasn't even
+straight with all the odds in favor of the bank, as they are
+naturally. This game was electrically controlled. Others are
+mechanically controlled by what are called the 'mule's ear,' and
+other devices. You CAN'T win. These wires and magnets can be made
+to attract the little ball into any pocket the operator desires.
+Each one of the pockets contains an electro-magnet. One set of
+electro-magnets in the red pockets is connected with one button
+under the carpet and a set of batteries. The other series of
+little magnets in the black pockets is connected with another
+button and the batteries."
+
+He had picked up the little ball. "This ball," he said as he
+examined it, "is not really of ivory, but of a composition that
+looks like ivory, coating a hollow, soft-iron ball inside. Soft
+iron is attracted by an electro-magnet. Whichever set of magnets
+is energized attracts the ball and by this simple method it is in
+the power of the operator to let the ball go to red or black as he
+may wish. Other similar arrangements control the odd or even, and
+other combinations, also from push buttons. There isn't an honest
+gambling machine in the whole place. The whole thing is crooked
+from start to finish,--the men, the machines,----"
+
+"Then a fellow never had a chance?" repeated Dillon.
+
+"Not a chance," emphasized Garrick.
+
+We gathered about and gazed at magnets and wires, the buttons and
+switches. He did not need to say anything more to expose the
+character of the place.
+
+Amazing as we found everything about us in the palace of crooks,
+nothing made so deep an impression on me as the fact that it was
+deserted. It seemed as if the gamblers had disappeared as though
+in a fairy tale. Search room after room as Dillon's men did they
+were unable to find a living thing.
+
+One of the men had discovered, back of the gambling rooms on the
+second floor, a little office evidently used by those who ran the
+joint. It was scantily furnished, as though its purpose might have
+been merely a place where they could divide up the profits in
+private. A desk, a cabinet and a safe, besides a couple of chairs,
+were all that the room contained.
+
+Someone, however, had done some quick work in the little office
+during those minutes while Garrick was opening the great ice-box
+door with his hydraulic ram, for on every side were scattered
+papers, the desk had been rifled, and even from the safe
+practically everything of any value had been removed. It was all
+part of the general scheme of things in the gambling joint.
+Practically nothing that was evidential that could be readily
+removed had been left. Whoever had planned the place must have
+been a genius as far as laying out precautions against a raid were
+concerned.
+
+Garrick, Dillon and I ran hastily through some scattered
+correspondence and other documents that spilled out from some
+letter files on the floor, but as far as I could make out there
+was nothing of any great importance that had been overlooked.
+
+Dillon ordered the whole mass to be bundled up and taken off when
+the other paraphernalia was removed so that it could be gone
+through at our leisure, and the search continued.
+
+From the "office" a staircase led down by a back way and we
+followed it, looking carefully to see where it led.
+
+A low exclamation from Garrick arrested our attention. In a curve
+between landings he had kicked something and had bent down to pick
+it up. An electric pocket flashlight which one of the men had
+picked up disclosed under its rays a package of papers evidently
+dropped by someone who was carrying away in haste an armful of
+stuff.
+
+"Markers with the house," exclaimed Garrick as he ran over the
+contents of the package hurriedly. "I. O. U.'s for various amounts
+and all initialed--for several hundred thousands. Hello, here's a
+bunch with an 'F.' That must mean Forbes--thousands of dollars
+worth."
+
+The markers were fastened together with a slip in order to
+separate them from the others, evidently.
+
+Garrick was hastily totalling them up and they seemed to amount to
+a tidy sum.
+
+"How can he ever pay?" I asked, amazed as the sum crept on upward
+in the direction of six figures.
+
+"Don't you see that they're cancelled?" interjected Garrick, still
+adding.
+
+I had not examined them closely, but as I now bent over to do so I
+saw that each bore the words, "Paid by W."
+
+Warrington himself had settled the gambling debts of his friend!
+
+In still greater amazement I continued to look and found that they
+all bore dates from several weeks before, down to within a few
+days. The tale they told was eloquent. Forbes, his own fortune
+gone, had gambled until rescued by his friend. Even that had not
+been sufficient to curb his mania. He had kept right on, hoping
+insanely to recoup. And the gamblers had been willing to take a
+chance with him, knowing that they already had so much of his
+money that they could not possibly lose.
+
+A horrid thought flashed over me. What if he had really planned to
+pay his losses by marrying a girl with a fortune? Forbes was the
+sort who would have gambled on even that slender prospect.
+
+As we stood on the landing while Garrick went over the markers, I
+found myself wondering, even, where Forbes had been that night
+after he hurried away from us at the ladies' poolroom and
+Warrington had taken the journey that had ended so disastrously
+for him. The more I learned of what had been taking place, the
+more I saw that Warrington stood out as a gentleman. Undoubtedly
+Violet Winslow had heard, had been informed by some kind unknown
+of the slight lapses of Warrington. I felt sure that the gross
+delinquencies of Forbes were concealed from her and from her aunt,
+at least as far as Warrington had it in his power to shield the
+man who was his friend--and rival.
+
+The voice of Dillon recalled me from a train of pure speculation
+to the more practical work in hand before us.
+
+"Well, at any rate, we've got evidence enough to protect ourselves
+and close the place, even if we didn't make any captures,"
+congratulated Dillon, as he rejoined us, after a momentary
+excursion from which he returned still blinking from the effects
+of the flashlight powders which his photographer had been using
+freely. "After we get all the pictures of the place, I'll have the
+stuff here removed to headquarters--and it won't be handed back on
+any order of the courts, either, if I can help it!"
+
+Garrick had shoved the markers into his pocket and now was leading
+the way downstairs.
+
+"Still, Dillon," he remarked, as we followed, "that doesn't shed
+any light on the one remaining problem. How did they all manage to
+get out so quickly?"
+
+We had reached the basement which contained the kitchens for the
+buffet and quarters for the servants. A hasty excursion into the
+littered back yard under the guidance of Dillon's men who had been
+sent around that way netted us nothing in the way of information.
+They had not made their escape over the back fences. Such a number
+of people would certainly have left some trail, and there was
+none.
+
+We looked at Garrick, perplexed, and he remarked, with sudden
+energy, "Let's take a look at the cellar."
+
+As we groped down the final stairway into the cellar, it was only
+too evident that at last he had guessed right. Down in the
+subterranean depths we quickly discovered, at the rear, a sheet-
+iron door. Battering it down was the work of but a moment for the
+little ram. Beyond it, where we expected to see a yawning tunnel,
+we found nothing but a pile of bricks and earth and timbers that
+had been used for shoring.
+
+There had been a tunnel, but the last man who had gone through had
+evidently exploded a small dynamite cartridge, and the walls had
+been caved in. It was impossible to follow it until its course
+could be carefully excavated with proper tools in the daylight.
+
+We had captured the stronghold of gambling in New York, but the
+gamblers had managed to slip out of our grasp, at least for the
+present.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+THE GANGSTER'S GARAGE
+
+
+"I have it," exclaimed Garrick, as we were retracing our steps
+upstairs from the dank darkness of the cellar. "I would be willing
+to wager that that tunnel runs back from this house to that pool-
+room for women which we visited on Forty-seventh Street, Marshall.
+That must be the secret exit. Don't you see, it could be used in
+either direction."
+
+We climbed the stairs and stood again in the wreck of things,
+taking a hasty inventory of what was left, in hope of uncovering
+some new clew, even by chance.
+
+Garrick shook his head mournfully.
+
+"They had just time enough," he remarked, "to destroy about
+everything they wanted to and carry off the rest."
+
+"All except the markers," I corrected.
+
+"That was just a lucky chance," he returned. "Still, it throws an
+interesting sidelight on the case."
+
+"It doesn't add much in my estimation to the character of Forbes,"
+I ventured, voicing my own suspicions.
+
+The telephone bell rang before Garrick had a chance to reply.
+Evidently in their haste they had not had time to cut the wires or
+to spread the news, yet, of the raid. Someone who knew nothing of
+what had happened was calling up.
+
+Garrick quickly unhooked the receiver, with a hasty motion to us
+to remain silent.
+
+"Hello," we heard him answer. "Yes, this is it. Who is this?"
+
+He had disguised his voice. We waited anxiously and watched his
+face to gather what response he received.
+
+"The deuce!" he exclaimed, with his hand over the transmitter so
+that his voice would not be heard at the other end.
+
+"What's the matter?" I asked eagerly.
+
+"Whoever he was," replied Garrick, "he was too keen for me. He
+caught on. There must have been some password or form that they
+used which we don't know, for he hung up the receiver almost as
+soon as he heard me."
+
+Garrick waited a minute or two. Then he whistled into, the
+transmitter. It was done apparently to see whether there was
+anyone listening. But there was no answer. The man was gone.
+
+"Operator, operator!" Guy was calling, insistently moving the hook
+up and down rapidly. "Yes--I want Central. Central, can you tell
+me what number that was which just called up?"
+
+We all waited anxiously to learn whether the girl could find out
+or not.
+
+"Bleecker seven--one--eight--o? Thank you very much. Give me
+information, please."
+
+Again we waited as Garrick tried to trace the call out.
+
+"Hello! What is the street address of Bleecker seven--one--eight--
+o? Three hundred West Sixth. Thank you. A garage? Good-bye."
+
+"A garage?" echoed Dillon, his ears almost going up as he realized
+the importance of the news.
+
+"Yes," cried Garrick, himself excited. "Tom, call a cab. Let us
+hustle down there as quickly as we can."
+
+"One of those garages on the lower West Side," I heard Dillon say
+as I left. "Perhaps they did work for the gambling joint--sent
+drunks home, got rid of tough customers and all that. You know
+already that there are some pretty tough places down there. This
+is bully. I shouldn't be surprised if it gave us a line on the
+stealing of Warrington's car at last."
+
+I found a cab and Dillon and Garrick joined me in it.
+
+"I tried to get McBirney," said Garrick as we prepared to start on
+our new quest, "but he was out, and the night operator at his
+place didn't seem to know where he was. But if they can locate
+him, I imagine he'll be around at least shortly after we get
+there. I left the address."
+
+Dillon had issued his final orders to his raiders about guarding
+the raided gambling joint and stationing a man at the door. A
+moment later we were off, threading our way through the crowd
+which in spite of the late hour still lingered to gape at the
+place.
+
+On the way down we speculated much on the possibility that we
+might be going on a wild goose chase. But the very circumstances
+of the call and the promptness with which the man who had called
+had seemed to sense when something was wrong and to ring off
+seemed to point to the fact that we had uncovered a good lead of
+some kind.
+
+After a quick run downtown through the deserted avenues, we
+entered a series of narrow and sinuous streets that wound through
+some pretty tough looking neighborhoods. On the street corners
+were saloons that deserved no better name than common groggeries.
+They were all vicious looking joints and uniformly seemed to
+violate the law about closing. The fact was that they impressed
+one as though it would be as much as one's life was worth even to
+enter them with respectable looking clothes on.
+
+The further we proceeded into the tortuous twists of streets that
+stamp the old Greenwich village with a character all its own, the
+worse it seemed to get. Decrepit relics of every style of
+architecture from almost the earliest times in the city stood out
+in the darkness, like so many ghosts.
+
+"Anyone who would run a garage down here," remarked Garrick,
+"deserves to be arrested on sight."
+
+"Except possibly for commercial vehicles," I ventured, looking at
+the warehouses here and there.
+
+"There are no commercial vehicles out at this hour," added Garrick
+dryly.
+
+At last our cab turned down a street that was particularly dark.
+
+"This is it," announced Garrick, tapping on the glass for the
+driver to stop at the corner. "We had better get out and walk the
+rest of the way."
+
+The garage which we sought proved to be nothing but an old brick
+stable. It was of such a character that even charity could not
+have said that it had seen much better days for generations. It
+was dark, evil looking. Except for a slinking figure here and
+there in the distance the street about us was deserted. Even our
+footfalls echoed and Garrick warned us to tread softly. I longed
+for the big stick, that went with the other half of the phrase.
+
+He paused a moment to observe the place. It was near the corner
+and a dim-lighted Raines law saloon on the next cross street ran
+back almost squarely to the stable walls, leaving a narrow yard.
+Apparently the garage itself had been closed for the night, if,
+indeed, it was ever regularly open. Anyone who wanted to use it
+must have carried a key, I surmised.
+
+We crossed over stealthily. Garrick put his ear to an ordinary
+sized door which had been cut out of the big double swinging doors
+of the stable, and listened.
+
+Not a sound.
+
+Dillon, with the instinct of the roundsman in him still, tried the
+handle of the door gently. To our surprise it moved. I could not
+believe that anyone could have gone away and left it open,
+trusting that the place would not be looted by the neighbours
+before he returned. I felt instinctively that there must be
+somebody there, in spite of the darkness.
+
+The commissioner pushed in, however, followed closely by both of
+us, prepared for an on-rush or a hand-to-hand struggle with
+anything, man or beast.
+
+A quick succession of shots greeted us. I do not recall feeling
+the slightest sensation of pain, but with a sickening dizziness in
+the head I can just vaguely remember that I sank down on the oil
+and grease of the floor. I did not fall. It seemed as if I had
+time to catch myself and save, perhaps, a fractured skull. But
+then it was all blank.
+
+It seemed an age, though it could not have been more than ten
+minutes later when I came to. I felt an awful, choking sensation
+in my throat which was dry and parched. My lungs seemed to rasp my
+very ribs, as I struggled for breath. Garrick was bending
+anxiously over me, himself pale and gasping yet. The air was
+reeking with a smell that I did not understand.
+
+"Thank heaven, you're all right," he exclaimed, with much relief,
+as he helped me struggle up on my feet. My head was still in a
+whirl as he assisted me over to a cushioned seat in one of the
+automobiles standing there. "Now I'll go back to Dillon," he
+added, out of breath from the superhuman efforts he was putting
+forth both for us and to keep himself together. "Wh--what's the
+matter? What happened?" I gasped, gripping the back of the cushion
+to steady myself. "Am I wounded? Where was I hit? I--I don't feel
+anything--but, oh, my head and throat!"
+
+I glanced over at Dillon. He was pale and white as a ghost, but I
+could see that he was breathing, though with difficulty. In the
+glare of the headlight of a car which Garrick had turned on him,
+he looked ghastly. I looked again to discover traces of blood. But
+there was none anywhere.
+
+"We were all put out of business," muttered Garrick, as he worked
+over Dillon. Dillon opened his eyes blankly at last, then
+struggled up to his feet. "You got it worst, commissioner,"
+remarked Garrick to him. "You were closest."
+
+"Got what?" he sputtered, "Was closest to what?"
+
+We were all still choking over the peculiar odor in the fetid air
+about us.
+
+"The bulletless gun," replied Garrick.
+
+Dillon looked at him a moment incredulously, in spite even of his
+trying physical condition.
+
+"It is a German invention," Garrick went on to explain, clearing
+his throat, "and shoots, instead of bullets, a stupefying gas
+which temporarily blinds and chokes its victims. The fellow who
+was in here didn't shoot bullets at us. He evidently didn't care
+about adding any more crimes to his list just now. Perhaps he
+thought that if he killed any of us there would be too much of a
+row. I'm glad it was as it was, anyway. He got us all, this way,
+before we knew it. Perhaps that was the reason he used the gun,
+for if he had shot one of us with a pistol I had my own automatic
+ready myself to blaze away. This way he got me, too.
+
+"A stupefying gun!" repeated Dillon. "I should say so. I don't
+know what happened--yet," he added, blinking.
+
+"I came to first," went on Garrick, now busily looking about, as
+we were all recovered. "I found that none of us was wounded, and
+so I guessed what had happened. However, while we were unconscious
+the villain, whoever he was, succeeded in running his car out of
+the garage and getting away. He locked the door after him, but I
+have managed to work it open again."
+
+Garrick was now examining the floor of the garage, turning the
+headlight of the machine as much as he could on successive parts
+of the floor.
+
+"By George, Tom," he exclaimed to me suddenly, "see those marks in
+the grease? Do you recognize them by this time? It is the same
+tire-mark again--Warrington's car--without a doubt!"
+
+Dillon had taken the photographs which Garrick had made several
+days before from the prints left by the side of the road in New
+Jersey, and was comparing them himself with the marks on the floor
+of the garage, while Garrick explained them to him hurriedly, as
+he had already done to me.
+
+"We are getting closer to him, every time,'" remarked Garrick.
+"Even if he did get away, we are on the trail and know that it is
+the right one. He could not have been at the gambling joint, or he
+would never have called up. Yet he must have known all about it.
+This has turned out better than I expected. I suppose you don't
+feel so, but you must think so."
+
+It was difficult not to catch the contagion of Garrick's
+enthusiasm. Dillon grunted assent.
+
+"This garage," he put in, looking it over critically, "must act as
+a fence for stolen cars and parts of cars. See, there over in the
+corner is the stuff for painting new license numbers. Here's
+enough material to rebuild a half dozen cars. Yes, this is one of
+the places that ought to interest you and McBirney, Garrick. I'll
+bet the fellow who owns this place is one of those who'd engage to
+sell you a second-hand car of any make you wanted to name. Then
+he'd go out on the street and hunt around until he got one. Of
+course, we'll find out his name, but I'll wager that when we get
+the nominal owner we won't be able to extract a thing from him in
+the way of actual facts."
+
+Garrick had continued his examination of the floor. In a corner,
+near the back, he had picked up an empty shell of a cartridge. He
+held it down in the light of the car, and examined it long and
+carefully. As he turned it over and over he seemed to be carefully
+considering it. Finally, he dropped it carefully into his inside
+vest pocket, as though it were a rare treasure.
+
+"As I said at the start," quoted Garrick, turning to me, "we might
+get a conviction merely on these cartridges. Anyhow, our man has
+escaped from here. You can be sure that he won't come back--
+perhaps never--certainly not at least for a long time, until he
+figures that this thing has completely blown over."
+
+"I'm going to keep my eye on the place, just the same," stoutly
+insisted Dillon.
+
+"Of course, by all means," reiterated Garrick. "The fact is, I
+expect our next important clew will come from this place. The only
+thing I want you to be careful of, Dillon, is not to be hasty and
+make an arrest."
+
+"Not make an arrest?" queried Dillon, who still felt the fumes in
+his throat, and evidently longed to make someone pay the price--at
+least by giving him the satisfaction of conducting a "third
+degree" down at headquarters.
+
+"No. You won't get the right man, and you may lose one who points
+straight at him. Take my advice. Watch the place. There's more to
+be gained by going at it cautiously. These people understand the
+old hammer-and-tongs game."
+
+Just then the smaller outside door grated on its rusty hinges. We
+sprang to our feet, startled. Dillon leaped forward. Stupefying
+guns had no taming effect on his nationality.
+
+"Well, commish, is that the way you greet an old friend?" laughed
+McBirney, as a threatened strangle-hold was narrowly averted and
+turned into a handshake. "How are you fellows? I got your message,
+Garrick, and thought I'd drop around. What's the matter? You all
+look as if you'd been drawn through a wringer."
+
+Briefly, to the accompaniment of many expressions of astonishment
+from the insurance detective, Garrick related what had happened,
+from the raid to the gas-gun.
+
+"Well," gasped McBirney, sniffing the remains of the gas in the
+air, "this is some place, isn't it? Neat, cozy, well-located--for
+a murder--hello!--that's that ninety horsepower Despard that was
+stolen from Murdock the other day, or I'll eat my hat."
+
+He had raised the hood and was straining his eyes to catch a
+glimpse of the maker's number on the engine, which had been all
+but obliterated by a few judicious blows of a hammer.
+
+Garrick was busy telling McBirney also about the marks of the tire
+on the floor, as the detective looked over one car after another,
+as if he had unearthed a veritable treasure-trove.
+
+"No, your man could not have been at either of the gambling
+joints," agreed McBirney, as Garrick finished, "or he wouldn't
+have called up. But he must have known them intimately. Perhaps he
+was in the pay of someone there."
+
+McBirney was much interested in what had been discovered, and was
+trying to piece it together with what we had known before. "I
+wonder whether he's the short fellow who drove the car when it was
+seen up there, or the big fellow who was in the car when
+Warrington was shot, up-state?"
+
+The question was, as yet, unanswerable. None of us had been able
+to catch a glimpse of his figure, muffled, in the darkness when he
+shot us.
+
+All we knew was that even this man was unidentified and at large.
+The murderer, desperate as he was, was still free and unknown,
+too. Were they one and the same? What might not either one do
+next?
+
+We sat down in one of the stolen cars and held a midnight council
+of war. There were four of us, and that meant four different
+plans. Dillon was for immediate and wholesale arrests. McBirney
+was certain of one thing. He would claim the cars he could
+identify. The garage people could not help knowing now that we had
+been there, and we conceded the point to him with little argument,
+though it took great tact on Garrick's part to swing over Dillon.
+
+"I'm for arresting the garage-keeper, whoever he proves to be,"
+persisted Dillon, however.
+
+"It won't do any good," objected Garrick.
+
+"Don't you see that it will be better to accept his story, or
+rather seem to, and then watch him?"
+
+"Watch him?" I asked, eager to propose my own plan of waiting
+there and seizing each person who presented himself. "How can you
+watch one of these fellows? They are as slippery as eels,--and as
+silent as a muffler," I added, taking good-humouredly the general
+laugh that greeted my mixed metaphor.
+
+"You've suggested the precise idea, Marshall, by your very
+objection," broke in Garrick, who up to this time had been silent
+as to his own plan.
+
+"I've a brand-new system of espionage. Trust it to me, and you can
+all have your way."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+THE DETECTAPHONE
+
+
+I found it difficult to share Garrick's optimism, however. It
+seemed to me that again the best laid plans of one that I had come
+to consider among the cleverest of men had been defeated, and it
+is not pleasant to be defeated, even temporarily. But Garrick was
+certainly not discouraged.
+
+As he had said at the start, it was no ordinary criminal with whom
+we had to deal. That was clear. There had been gunmen and gangmen
+in New York for years, we knew, but this fellow seemed to be the
+last word, with his liquid bullets, his anesthetic shells and his
+stupefying gun.
+
+We had agreed that the garage keeper would, of course, shed little
+light on the mystery. He was a crook. But he would find no
+difficulty, doubtless, in showing that there was nothing on which
+to hold him.
+
+Still, Garrick had evidently figured out a way to go ahead while
+we had all been floundering around, helpless. His silence had
+merely masked his consideration of a plan.
+
+"You three stay here," he ordered. "If anyone should come in, hold
+him. Don't let anyone get away. But I don't think there will be
+anyone. I'll be back within an hour or so."
+
+It was far past midnight already, as we sat uncomfortably in the
+reeking atmosphere of the garage. The hours seemed to drag
+interminably. Almost I wished that something would happen to break
+the monotony and the suspense. Our lonely vigil went unrewarded,
+however. No one came; there was not even a ring at the telephone.
+
+As nearly as I could figure it out, McBirney was the only one who
+seemed to have gained much so far. He had looked over the cars
+most carefully. There were half a dozen of them, in all.
+
+"I don't doubt," he concluded, "that all of them have been stolen.
+But there are only two here that I can identify. They certainly
+are clever at fixing them up. Look at all the parts they keep
+ready for use. They could build a car, here."
+
+"Yes," agreed Dillon, looking at the expensive "junk" that was
+lying about. "There is quite enough to warrant closing the place,
+only I suppose Garrick is right. That would defeat our own
+purpose."
+
+At last Garrick returned from his hurried trip down to the office.
+I don't know what it was we expected him to bring, but I think we
+were more or less disappointed when it proved to be merely a
+simple oblong oak box with a handle.
+
+He opened it and we could see that it contained in reality nothing
+but a couple of ordinary dry cells, and some other paraphernalia.
+There were two black discs, attached to a metal headpiece, discs
+about two and a half inches in diameter, with a circular hole in
+the centre of each, perhaps an inch across, showing inside what
+looked like a piece of iron or steel.
+
+Garrick carefully tested the batteries with a little ammeter which
+he carried in a case.
+
+"Sixteen amperes," he remarked to himself, "I don't attempt to use
+the batteries when they fall below five. These are all right."
+
+From a case he took a little round black disc, about the same size
+as the other two. In its face it had a dozen or so small holes
+perforated and arranged in the shape of a six-pointed star.
+
+"I wonder where I can stow this away so that it won't attract
+attention?" he asked.
+
+Garrick looked about for the least used part of the garage and
+decided that it was the back. Near the barred window lay a pile of
+worn tires which looked as if it had been seldom disturbed except
+to be added to. When one got tires as cheaply as the users of this
+garage did, it was folly to bother much about the repair of old
+ones.
+
+Back of this pile, then, he threw the little black disc
+carelessly, only making sure that it was concealed. That was not
+difficult, for it was not much larger than a watch in size.
+
+To it, I noticed, he had attached two plugs that were "fool-
+proof"--that is, one small and the other large, so that they could
+not be inserted into the wrong holes. A long flexible green silk
+covered wire, or rather two wires together, led from the disc. By
+carefully moving the tires so as to preserve the rough appearance
+they had of being thrown down hastily into the discard, he was
+able to conceal this wire, also, in such a way as to bring it
+secretly to the barred window and through it.
+
+Next he turned his attention to the telephone itself. Another
+instrument which he had brought with him was inserted in place of
+the ordinary transmitter. It looked like it and had evidently been
+prepared with that in view. I assumed that it must act like the
+ordinary transmitter also, although it must have other uses as
+well. It was more of a job to trace out the course of the
+telephone wires and run in a sort of tap line at a point where it
+would not be likely to be noted. This was done by Garrick, still
+working in silence, and the wires from it led behind various
+things until they, too, reached another window and so went to the
+outside.
+
+As Garrick finished his mysterious tinkering and rose from his
+dusty job to brush off his clothes, he remarked, "There, now you
+may have your heart's desire, Dillon, if all you want to do is to
+watch these fellows."
+
+"What is it?" I hastened to ask, looking curiously at the oak box
+which contained still everything except the tiny black disc and
+the wires leading out of the window from it and from the new
+telephone transmitter.
+
+"This little instrument," he answered slowly, "is much more
+sensitive, I think, than any mechanical or electrical eavesdropper
+that has ever been employed before. It is the detectaphone--a new
+unseen listener."
+
+"The detectaphone?" repeated Dillon. "How does it work?"
+
+"Well, for instance," explained Garrick, "that attachment which I
+placed on the telephone is much more than a sensitive transmitter
+such as you are accustomed to use. It is a form of that black disc
+which you saw me hide behind the pile of tires. There are, in
+both, innumerable of the minutest globules of carbon which are
+floating around, as it were, making it alive at all times to every
+sound vibration and extremely sensitive even to the slightest
+sound waves. In the case of the detectaphone transmitter, it only
+replaces the regular telephone transmitter and its presence will
+never be suspected. It operates just as well when the receiver is
+hung up as when it is off the hook, as far as the purpose I have
+in mind is concerned, as you shall see soon. I have put both forms
+in so that even if they find the one back of the tires, even the
+most suspicious person would not think that anything was contained
+in the telephone itself. We are dealing with clever people and two
+anchors to windward are better than one."
+
+Dillon nodded approval, but by the look on his face it was evident
+that he did not understand the whole thing yet.
+
+"That other disc, back of the tires," went on Garrick, "is the
+ordinary detective form. All that we need now is to find a place
+to install this receiving box--all this stuff that is left over--
+the two batteries, the earpieces. You see the whole thing is very
+compact. I can get it down to six inches square and four inches
+thick, or I can have it arranged with earpieces so that at least
+six people can 'listen in' at once--forms that can be used in
+detective work to meet all sorts of conditions. Then there is
+another form of the thing, in a box about four inches square and,
+perhaps, nine or ten inches long which I may bring up later for
+another purpose when we find out what we are going to do with the
+ends of those wires that are now dangling on the outside of the
+window. We must pick up the connection in some safe and
+inconspicuous place outside the garage."
+
+The window through which the wires passed seemed to open, as I had
+already noticed, on a little yard not much larger than a court.
+Garrick opened the window and stuck his head out as far as the
+iron bars would permit. He sniffed. The odor was anything but
+pleasant. It was a combination of "gas" from the garage and stale
+beer from the saloon.
+
+"No doubt about it, that is a saloon," remarked Garrick, "and they
+must pile empty kegs out there in the yard. Let's take a walk
+around the corner and see what the front of the place looks like."
+
+It was a two and a half story building, with a sloping tin roof,
+of an archaic architecture, in a state of terrible decay and
+dilapidation, and quite in keeping with the neighbourhood.
+Nevertheless a bright gilt sign over a side door read, "Hotel
+Entrance."
+
+"I think we can get in there to-morrow on some pretext," decided
+Garrick after our inspection of the "Old Tavern," as the crazy
+letters, all askew, on one of the windows denoted the place. "The
+Old Tavern looks as if it might let lodgings to respectable
+gentlemen--if they were roughly enough dressed. We can get
+ourselves up as a couple of teamsters and when we get in that will
+give us a chance to pick up the ends of those wires to-morrow.
+That will be time enough, I'm sure, and it is the best we can do,
+anyhow."
+
+We returned from our walk around the block to the garage where
+Dillon and McBirney were waiting for us.
+
+"I leave you free to do what you please, Dillon," answered Garrick
+to the commissioner's inquiry, "as long as you don't pinch this
+place which promises to be a veritable gold-mine. McBirney, I
+know, will reduce the number of cars here tomorrow by at least
+two. But don't, for heaven's sake, let out any suspicion about
+those things I have just hidden here. And now, as for me, I'm
+going uptown and get a few hours' sleep."
+
+Dillon and McBirney followed, leaving us, shortly, to get a couple
+of men from the nearest police station to see that none of the
+cars were taken out before morning.
+
+We rode up to our apartment, where a message was awaiting us,
+telling that Warrington had passed a very good day and was making
+much more rapid progress than even Dr. Mead had dared hope. I
+could not help wondering how much was due to the mere tonic
+presence daily of Violet Winslow.
+
+I had a sound sleep, although it was a short one. Garrick had me
+up early, and, by digging back in his closet, unearthed the oldest
+clothes he had. We improved them by sundry smears of dirt in such
+a way that when we did start forth, no one would have accused us
+of being other than we were prepared to represent ourselves--
+workmen who had been laid off from a job on account of bad
+business conditions. We decided to say that we were seeking
+another position.
+
+"How do I look?" I asked seriously, for this was serious business
+to me.
+
+"I don't know whether to give you a meal ticket, or to call a cop
+when I look at you, Marshall," laughed Garrick.
+
+"Well, I feel a good deal safer in this rig than I did last night,
+in this part of the city," I replied as we hopped off a surface
+car not far from our destination. "I almost begin to feel my part.
+Did you see the old gink with the gold watch on the car? If he was
+here I believe I'd hold him up, just to see what it is like. I
+suppose we are going to apply for lodgings at the famous hostelry,
+the Old Tavern?"
+
+"I had that intention," replied Garrick who could see no humour in
+the situation, now that we were on the scene of action. "The place
+looks even more sordid in daylight than at night. Besides, it
+smells worse."
+
+We entered the tavern, and were greeted with a general air of
+rough curiosity, which was quickly dispelled by our spending ten
+cents, and getting change for a bill. At least we were good for
+anything reasonable, and doubts on that score settled by the man
+behind the bar, he consented to enter into conversation, which
+ultimately resulted in our hiring a large back room upstairs in
+the secluded caravansary which supplied "Furnished Rooms for
+Gentlemen Only."
+
+Garrick said that we would bring our things later, and we went
+upstairs. We were no sooner settled than he was at work. He had
+brought a rope ladder, and, after fastening it securely to the
+window ledge, he let himself down carefully into the narrow court
+below.
+
+That was the only part of the operation that seemed to be attended
+with any risk of discovery and it was accomplished safely. For one
+thing the dirt on the windows both of the garage and the tavern
+was so thick that I doubt whether so much caution was really
+necessary. Nevertheless, it was a relief when he secured the ends
+of the wires from the detectaphone and brought them up, pulling in
+the rope ladder after him.
+
+It was now the work of but a minute to attach one of the wires
+that led from the watchcase disc back of the pile of tires to the
+oak box with its two storage batteries. Garrick held the ear-
+pieces, one to each ear, then shoved them over his head, in place.
+
+"It works--it works," he cried, with as much delight as if he had
+not been positive all along that it would.
+
+"Here, try it yourself," he added, taking the headgear off and
+handing the receivers to me.
+
+I put the black discs at my ears, with the little round holes over
+the ear openings. It was marvellous. I could hear the men washing
+down one of the cars, the swash of water, and, best of all, the
+low-toned, gruff gossip.
+
+"Just a couple of the men there, now," explained Garrick. "I
+gather that they are talking about what happened last night. I
+heard one of them say that someone they call 'the Chief' was there
+last night and that another man, 'the Boss,' gave him orders to
+tell no one outside about it. I suppose the Chief is our friend
+with the stupefying gun. The Boss must be the fellow who runs the
+garage. What are they saying now? They were grumbling about their
+work when I handed the thing over to you."
+
+I listened, fascinated by the marvel of the thing. I could hear
+perfectly, although the men must have been in the front of the
+garage.
+
+"Well, there's two of them yer won't haveter wash no more," one
+man was saying. "A feller from the perlice come an' copped off
+two--that sixty tin can and the ninety Despard."
+
+"Huh--so the bulls are after him?"
+
+"Yeh. One was here all night after the fight."
+
+"Did they follow the Chief?"
+
+"Follow the Chief? Say, when anyone follows the Chief he's gotter
+be better than any bull that ever pounded a beat."
+
+"What did the Boss say when he heard it?"
+
+"Mad as---. We gotter lay low now."
+
+"The Chief's gone up-state, I guess."
+
+"We can guess all we want. The Boss knows. I don't."
+
+"Why didn't they make a pinch? Ain't there nobody watchin' now?"
+
+"Naw. They ain't got nothin' on us. Say, the Chief can put them
+fellers just where he wants 'em. See the paper this morning? That
+was some raid up at the joint--eh?"
+
+"You bet. That Garrick's a pretty smooth chap. But the Chief can
+put it all over him."
+
+"Yep," agreed the other speaker.
+
+I handed the receivers back to Garrick with a smile.
+
+"You are not without some admirers," I remarked, repeating the
+conversation substantially to him. "They'd shoot up the
+neighbourhood, I imagine, if they knew the truth."
+
+Hour after hour we took turns listening at the detectaphone. We
+gathered a choice collection of slang and epithets, but very
+little real news. However, it was evident that they had a
+wholesome respect for both the Chief and the Boss. It seemed that
+the real head of the gang, if it was a gang, had disappeared, as
+one of the men had already hinted "up-state."
+
+Garrick had meanwhile brought out the other detectaphone box,
+which was longer and larger than the oak box.
+
+"This isn't a regular detactaphone," he explained, "but it may
+vary the monotony of listening in and sometime I may find occasion
+to use it in another way, too."
+
+In one of the long faces were two square holes, from the edges of
+which the inside walls focussed back on two smaller, circular
+diaphragms. That made the two openings act somewhat like megaphone
+horns to still further magnify the sound which was emitted
+directly from this receiver without using any earpieces, and could
+be listened to anywhere in the room, if we chose. This was
+attached to the secret arrangement that had been connected with
+the telephone by replacing the regular by the prepared
+transmitter.
+
+One of us was in the room listening all the time. I remember once,
+while Guy had gone uptown for a short time, that I heard the
+telephone bell ring in the device at my ear. Out of the larger box
+issued a voice talking to one of the men.
+
+It was the man whom they referred to as the Chief. He had nothing
+to say when he learned that the Boss had not showed up since early
+morning after he had been quizzed by the police. But he left word
+that he would call up again.
+
+"At least I know that our gunman friend, the Chief, is going to
+call up to-night," I reported to Garrick on his return.
+
+"I think he'll be here, all right," commented Garrick. "I called
+up Dillon while I was out and he was convinced that the best way
+was, as I said, to seem to let up on them. They didn't get a word
+out of the fellow they call the Boss. He lives down here a couple
+of streets, I believe, in a pretty tough place, even worse than
+the Old Tavern. I let Dillon get a man in there, but I haven't
+much hope. He's only a tool of the other whom they call Chief. By
+the way, Forbes has disappeared. I can't find a trace of him since
+the raid on the gambling joint."
+
+"Any word from Warrington?" I asked.
+
+"Yes, he's getting along finely," answered Guy mechanically, as if
+his thoughts were far away from Warrington. "Queer about Forbes,"
+he murmured, then cut himself short. "And, oh," he added, "I
+forgot to tell you that speaking about Forbes reminds me that
+Herman has been running out a clew on the Rena Taylor case. He has
+been all over the country up there, he reports to Dillon, and he
+says he thinks the car was seen making for Pennsylvania.
+
+"They have a peculiar license law there, you know--at least he
+says so--that enables one to conceal a car pretty well. Much good
+that does us."
+
+"Yes," I agreed, "you can always depend on a man like Herman to
+come along with something like that---"
+
+Just then the "master station" detectaphone connected with the
+telephone in the garage began to talk and I cut myself short. We
+seemed now at last about to learn something really important. It
+was a new voice that said, "Hello!"
+
+"Evidently the Boss has come in without making any noise,"
+remarked Guy. "I certainly heard no one through the other
+instrument. I fancy he was waiting for it to get dark before
+coming around. Listen."
+
+It was a long distance call from the man they called Chief. Where
+he was we had no means of finding out, but we soon found out where
+he was going.
+
+"Hello, Boss," we heard come out of the detectaphone box.
+
+"Hello, Chief. You surely got us nearly pinched last night. What
+was the trouble?"
+
+"Oh, nothing much. Somehow or other they must have got on to us. I
+guess it was when I called up the joint on Forty-eighth Street.
+Three men surprised me, but fortunately I was ready. If they
+hadn't stopped at the door before they opened it, they might have
+got me. I put 'em all out with that gun, though. Say, I want you
+to help me on a little job that I am planning.
+
+"Yes? Is it a safe one? Don't you think we'd better keep quiet for
+a little while?"
+
+"But this won't keep quiet. Listen. You know I told you about
+writing that letter regarding Warrington to Miss Winslow, when I
+was so sore over the report that he was going to close up the
+Forty-eighth Street joint, right on top of finding that Rena
+Taylor had the 'goods' on the Forty-seventh Street place? Well, I
+was a fool. You said so, and I was,"
+
+"You were--that's right."
+
+"I know it, but I was mad. I hadn't got all I wanted out of those
+places. Well, anyhow, I want that letter back--that's all. It's
+bad to have evidence like that lying around. Why, if they ever get
+a real handwriting expert they might get wise to something from
+that handwriting, I'm afraid. I must have been crazy to do it that
+way."
+
+"What became of the letter?"
+
+"She took it to that fellow Garrick and I happen to know that
+Warrington that night, after leaving Garrick, went to his
+apartment and put something into the safe he has there. Oh,
+Warrington has it, all right. What I want to do is to get that
+letter back while he is laid up near Tuxedo. It isn't much of a
+safe, I understand. I think a can opener would do the job. We can
+make the thing look like a regular robbery by a couple of yeggs.
+Are you on?"
+
+"No, I don't get you, Chief."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"It's too risky."
+
+"Too risky?"
+
+"Yes. That fellow Garrick is just as likely as not to be nosing
+around up there. I'd go but for that."
+
+"I know. But suppose we find that he isn't there, that he isn't in
+the house--has been there and left it. That would be safe enough.
+You're right. Nothing doing if he's there. We must can him in some
+way. But, say,--I know how to get in all right without being seen.
+I'll tell you later. Come on, be a sport. We won't try it if
+anybody's there. Besides, if we succeed it will help to throw a
+scare into Warrington."
+
+The man on our end of the telephone appeared to hesitate.
+
+"I'll tell you what I'll do, Chief," he said at length. "I'll meet
+you at the same place as we met the other day--you know where I
+mean--some time after twelve. We'll talk it over. You're sure
+about the letter?"
+
+"As sure as if I'd seen it."
+
+"All right. Now, be there. I won't promise about this Warrington
+business. We'll talk that over. But I have other things I want to
+tell you--about this situation here at the garage. I want to know
+how to act."
+
+"All right. I'll be there. Good-bye."
+
+"So long, Chief."
+
+The conversation stopped. I looked anxiously at Garrick to see how
+he had taken it.
+
+"And so," he remarked simply, as after a moment's waiting we made
+sure that the machine had stopped talking, "it appears that our
+friends, the enemy, are watching us as closely as we are watching
+them--with the advantage that they know us and we don't know them,
+except this garage fellow."
+
+Garrick lapsed into silence. I was rapidly turning over in my mind
+what we had just overheard and trying to plan some way of
+checkmating their next move.
+
+"Here's a plot hatching to rob Warrington's safe," I exclaimed
+helplessly.
+
+"Yes," repeated Garrick slowly, "and if we are going to do
+anything about it, it must be done immediately, before we arouse
+suspicion and scare them off. Did you hear those footsteps over
+the detectaphone? That was the Boss going out of the garage. So,
+they expect me around there, nosing about Warrington's apartment.
+Well, if I do go there, and then ostentatiously go away again,
+that will lure them on."
+
+He reached his decision quickly. Grabbing his hat, he led the way
+out of the Old Tavern and up the street until we came to a drug
+store with a telephone.
+
+I heard him first talking with Warrington, getting from him the
+combination of the safe, over long distance. Then he called up his
+office and asked the boy to meet him at the Grand Central subway
+station with a package, the location of which he described
+minutely.
+
+"We'll beat them to it," he remarked joyously, as we started
+leisurely uptown to meet the boy.
+
+
+
+
+Chapter XIII
+
+THE INCENDIARY
+
+
+"The Warrington estate owns another large apartment house, besides
+the one where Warrington has his quarters, on the next street,"
+remarked Garrick, half an hour later, after we had met the boy
+from his office. "I have arranged that we can get in there and use
+one of the empty suites."
+
+Garrick had secured two rather good-sized boxes from the boy, and
+was carrying them rather carefully, as if they contained some very
+delicate mechanism.
+
+Warrington, we found, occupied a suite in a large apartment on
+Seventy-second Street, and, as we entered, Garrick stopped and
+whispered a few words to the hall-boy.
+
+The boy seemed to be more than usually intelligent and had
+evidently been told over the telephone by Warrington that we were
+coming. At least we had no trouble, so far.
+
+Warrington's suite was very tastefully furnished for bachelor
+quarters. In the apartment, Garrick unwrapped one of the packages,
+and laid it open on the table, while he busied himself opening the
+safe, using the combination that Warrington had given him.
+
+I waited nervously, for we could not be sure that no one had got
+ahead of us, already. There was no need for anxiety, however.
+
+"Here's the letter, just as Warrington left it," reported Garrick
+in a few minutes, with some satisfaction, as he banged the safe
+door shut and restored things so that it would not look as though
+the little strong box had been touched.
+
+Meanwhile, I had been looking curiously at the box on the table.
+It did not seem to be like anything we had ever used before. One
+end was open, and the lid lifted up on a pair of hinges. I lifted
+it and looked in. About half way down the box from the open end
+was a partition which looked almost as if some one had taken the
+end of the box and had just shoved it in, until it reached the
+middle.
+
+The open half was empty, but in the other half I saw a sort of
+plate of some substance covering the outside of the shoved-in end.
+There was also a dry cell and several arrangements for adjustments
+which I did not understand. Back of the whole thing was a piece of
+mechanism, a clockwork interrupter, as I learned later. Wires led
+out from the closed end of the box.
+
+Garrick shoved the precious letter into his pocket and then placed
+the box in a corner, where it was hidden by a pile of books, with
+the open end facing the room in the direction of the antiquated
+safe. The wires from the box were quickly disposed of and dropped
+out of the window to the yard, several stories below, where we
+could pick them up later as we had done with the detectaphone.
+
+"What's that?" I asked curiously, when at last he had finished and
+I felt at liberty to question him.
+
+"Well, you see," he explained, "there is no way of knowing yet
+just how the apartment will be entered. They apparently have some
+way, though, which they wouldn't discuss over the telephone. But
+it is certain that as long as they know that there is anyone up
+here, they will put off the attempt. They said that."
+
+He was busily engaged restoring everything in the room as far as
+possible to its former position.
+
+"My scheme," he went on, "is for us now to leave the apartment
+ostentatiously. I think that is calculated to insure the burglary,
+for they must have someone watching by this time. Then we can get
+back to that empty apartment in the house on the next street, and
+before they can get around to start anything, we shall be prepared
+for them."
+
+Garrick stopped to speak to the hall-boy again as we left,
+carrying the other box. What he said I did not hear but the boy
+nodded intelligently.
+
+After a turn down the street, a ride in a surface car for a few
+blocks and back again, he was satisfied that no one was following
+us and we made our way into the vacant apartment on Seventy-third
+Street, without being observed.
+
+Picking up the wires from the back yard of Warrington's and
+running them across the back fence where he attached them to other
+wires dropped down from the vacant apartment was accomplished
+easily, but it all took time, and time was precious, just now.
+
+In the darkness of the vacant room he uncovered and adjusted the
+other box, connected one set of wires to those we had led in and
+another set to an apparatus which looked precisely like the
+receiver of a wireless telegraph, fitting over the head with an
+earpiece. He placed the earpiece in position and began regulating
+the mechanism of the queer looking box.
+
+"I didn't want to use the detectaphone again," he explained as he
+worked, "because we haven't any assurance that they'll talk, or,
+if they do, that it will be worth while to listen. Besides, there
+may be only one of them."
+
+"Then what is this?" I asked.
+
+"Well," he argued, "they certainly can't work without light of
+some kind, can they?"
+
+I acquiesced.
+
+"This is an instrument which literally makes light audible," he
+pursued.
+
+"Hear light?" I repeated, in amazement.
+
+"Exactly," he reiterated. "You've said it. It was invented to
+assist the blind, but I think I'll be able to show that it can be
+used to assist justice--which is blind sometimes, they say. It is
+the optophone."
+
+He paused to adjust the thing more accurately and I looked at it
+with an added respect.
+
+"It was invented," he resumed, "by Professor Fournier d'Albe, a
+lecturer on physics at the University of Birmingham, England, and
+has been shown before many learned societies over there."
+
+"You mean it enables the blind to see by hearing?" I asked.
+
+"That's it," he nodded. "It actually enables the blind to locate
+many things, purely by the light reflected by them. Its action is
+based on the peculiar property of selenium, which, you probably
+know, changes its electrical conductivity under the influence of
+light. Selenium in the dark is a poor conductor of electricity; in
+the light it, strange to say, becomes a good conductor. Variations
+of light can thus be transmuted into variations of sound. That
+pushed-in end of the box which we hid over in Warrington's had, as
+you might have noticed, a selenium plate on the inside partition,
+facing the open end of the box."
+
+"I understand," I agreed, vaguely.
+
+"Now," he went on, "this property of selenium is used for
+producing or rather allowing to be transmitted an electric current
+which is interrupted by a special clockwork interrupter, and so is
+made audible in this wireless telephone receiver which I have here
+connected with this second box. The eye is replaced by the ear as
+the detector of light--that is all."
+
+It might have been all, but it was quite wonderful to me, even if
+he spoke of it so simply. He continued to adjust the thing as he
+talked.
+
+"The clockwork has been wound up by means of a small handle, and I
+have moved that rod along a slit until I heard a purring sound.
+Then I moved it until the purring sound became as faint as
+possible. The instrument is at the present moment in its most
+sensitive state."
+
+"What does it sound like?" I asked.
+
+"Well, the passage of a hand or other object across the aperture
+is indicated by a sort of murmuring sound," he replied, "the
+loudest sound indicating the passage of the edges where the
+contrast is greatest. In a fairly bright light, even the swiftest
+shadow is discoverable. Prolonged exposure, however, blinds the
+optophone, just as it blinds the eye."
+
+"Do you hear anything now?" I asked watching his face curiously.
+
+"No. When I turned the current on at first I heard a ticking or
+rasping sound. I silenced that. But any change in the amount of
+light in that dark room over there would restore the sound, and
+its intensity would indicate the power of the light."
+
+He continued to listen.
+
+"When I first tried this, I found that a glimpse out of the window
+in daylight sounded like a cinematograph reeling off a film. The
+ticking sank almost into silence as the receiving apparatus was
+held in the shadow of the office table, and leaped into a lively
+rattle again when I brought it near an electric-light bulb. I
+blindfolded myself and moved a piece of blotting paper between the
+receiver and the light. I could actually hear the grating of the
+shadow, yes, I heard the shadow pass. At night, too, I have found
+that it is even affected by the light of the stars."
+
+He glanced out of the window in the direction of Warrington's,
+which we could not see, however, since it was around an angle of
+the building.
+
+"See," he went on, "the moon is rising, and in a few minutes, I
+calculate, it will shine right into that room over there on
+Seventy-second Street. By using this optophone, I could tell you
+the moment it does. Try the thing, yourself, Tom."
+
+I did so. Though my ear was untrained to distinguish between
+sounds I could hear just the faintest noise.
+
+Suddenly there came a weird racket. Hastily I looked up at Garrick
+in surprise.
+
+"What is that?" I asked endeavouring to describe it. "Are they
+there now?"
+
+"No," he laughed. "That was the moon shining in. I wanted you to
+hear what a difference it makes. When a ray of the sun, for
+instance, strikes that 'feeler' over there, a harmonious and
+majestic sound like the echo of a huge orchestra is heard. The
+light of the moon, on the other hand, produces a different sound--
+lamenting, almost like the groans of the wounded on a
+battlefield."
+
+"So you can distinguish between various kinds of light?"
+
+"Yes. Electric light, you would find if anyone came in and
+switched it on over there, produces a most unpleasant sound,
+sometimes like two pieces of glass rubbed against each other,
+sometimes like the tittering laugh of ghosts, and I have heard it
+like the piercing cry of an animal. Gaslight is sobbing and
+whispering, grating and ticking, according to its intensity. By
+far the most melodious and pleasing sound is produced by an
+ordinary wax candle. It sounds just like an aeolian harp on which
+the chords of a solemn tune are struck. I have even tried a glow-
+worm and it sounded like a bee buzzing. The light from a red-hot
+piece of iron gives the shrillest and most ear-splitting cry
+imaginable."
+
+He took the receiver back from me and adjusted it to his own ear.
+
+"Yes," he confirmed, "that was the moon, as I thought. It's a
+peculiar sound. Once you have heard it you're not likely to forget
+it. I must silence the machine to that."
+
+We had waited patiently for a long time, and still there was no
+evidence that anyone had entered the room.
+
+"I'm afraid they decided not to attempt it after all," I said,
+finally.
+
+"I don't think so," replied Garrick. "I took particular pains to
+make it seem that the road was clear. You remember, I spoke to the
+hall-boy twice, and we lingered about long enough when we left. It
+isn't much after midnight. I wonder how it was that they expected
+to get in. Ah--there goes the moon. I can hear it getting fainter
+all the time."
+
+Suddenly Garrick's face was all animation. "What is it?" I asked
+breathlessly.
+
+"Someone has entered the room. There is a light which sounds just
+like an electric flashlight which is being moved about. They
+haven't switched on the electric light. Now, if I were
+sufficiently expert I think I could tell by the varying sounds at
+just what that fellow is flashing the light. There, something
+passed directly between the light and the box. Yes, there must be
+two of them--that was the shadow of a human being, all right. They
+are over in the corner by the safe, now. The fellow with the
+flashlight is bending down. I can tell, because the other fellow
+walked between the light and the box and the light must be held
+very low, for I heard the shadows of both of his legs."
+
+Garrick was apparently waiting only until the intruders, whoever
+they were, were busily engaged in their search before he gave the
+alarm and hurried over in an attempt to head off their escape by
+their secret means of entrance.
+
+"Tom," he cried, as he listened attentively, "call up the
+apartment over there and get that hall-boy. Tell him he must not
+run that elevator up until we get there. No one must leave or
+enter the building. Tell him to lock the front door and conceal
+himself in the door that leads down to the cellar. I will ring the
+night bell five times to let him know when to let us in."
+
+I was telephoning excitedly Garrick's instructions and as he
+waited for me to finish he was taking a last turn at the optophone
+before we made our dash on Warrington's.
+
+A suppressed exclamation escaped him. I turned toward him quickly
+from the telephone and hung up the receiver.
+
+"What's the matter?" I asked anxiously.
+
+For a moment he did not reply, but seemed to be listening with an
+intensity that I knew betokened something unexpected.
+
+"Tom," he cried abruptly, stripping the receiver from his head
+with a jerk and clapping it over my own ears, "quick!--tell me
+what you hear. What does it sound like to you? What is it? I can't
+be mistaken."
+
+I listened feverishly. Not having had a former acquaintance with
+the machine, I did not know just what to make of it. But from the
+receiver of the little optophone there seemed to issue the most
+peculiar noise I had ever heard a mechanical instrument make.
+
+It was like a hoarse rumbling cry, now soft and almost plaintive,
+again louder and like a shriek of a damned soul in the fires of
+the nether world. Then it died down, only to spring up again,
+worse than before.
+
+If I had been listening to real sounds instead of to light I
+should have been convinced that the thing was recording a murder.
+
+I described it as best I could. The fact was that the thing almost
+frightened me by its weird novelty.
+
+"Yes--yes," agreed Garrick, as the sensations I experienced seemed
+to coincide with his own. "Exactly what I heard myself. I felt
+sure that I could not be mistaken. Quick, Tom,--get central on
+that wire!"
+
+A moment later he seized the telephone from me. I had expected him
+to summon the police to assist us in capturing two crooks who had,
+perhaps, devised some odd and scientific method of blowing up a
+safe.
+
+"Hello, hello!" he shouted frantically over the wire. "The fire
+department! This is eight hundred Seventy-second--on the corner;
+yes, yes--northeast. I want to turn in an alarm. Yes--quick! There
+is a fire--a bad one--incendiary--top floor. No, no--I'm not
+there. I can see it. Hurry!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+THE ESCAPE
+
+
+He had dropped the telephone receiver without waiting to replace
+it on the hook and was now dashing madly out of the empty
+apartment and down the street.
+
+The hall-boy at Warrington's had done exactly as I had ordered
+him. There was the elevator waiting as Garrick gave the five short
+rings at the nightbell and the outside door was unlocked. No one
+had yet discovered the fire which we knew was now raging on the
+top floor of the apartment.
+
+We were whirled up there swiftly, just as we heard echoing through
+the hall and the elevator shaft from someone who had an apartment
+on the same floor the shrill cry of, "Fire, fire!"
+
+Tenants all the way up were now beginning to throw open their
+doors and run breathlessly about in various states of undress. The
+elevator bell was jangling insistently.
+
+In the face of the crisis the elevator boy looked at Garrick
+appealingly.
+
+"Run your car up and down until all are out who want to go,"
+ordered Garrick. "Only tell them all that an alarm has already
+been turned in and that there is no danger except to the suite
+that is on fire. You may leave us here."
+
+We had reached the top floor and stepped out. I realised fully now
+what had happened. Either the robbers had found out only too
+quickly that they had been duped or else they had reasoned that
+the letter they sought had been hidden in a place in the apartment
+for which they had no time to hunt.
+
+It had probably been the latter idea which they had had and,
+instead of hunting further, they had taken a quicker and more
+unscrupulous method than Garrick had imagined and had set the room
+on fire. Fortunately that had been promptly and faithfully
+reported to us over the optophone in time to localize the damage.
+
+"At least we were able to turn in an alarm only a few seconds
+after they started the fire," panted Garrick, as he strained to
+burst in the door.
+
+Together we managed to push it in, and rushed into the stifle of
+Warrington's suite. The whole thing was in flames and it was
+impossible for us to remain there longer than to take in the
+situation.
+
+Accordingly we retreated slowly before the fierce blaze. One of
+the other tenants came running with a fire extinguisher in either
+hand from wall rack down the hall on this floor. As well try to
+drown a blast furnace. They made no impression whatever.
+
+Personally I had expected nothing like this. I had been prepared
+up to the time the optophone reported the fire to dash over and
+fight it out at close quarters with two as desperate and
+resourceful men as underworld conditions in New York at that time
+had created. Instead we saw no one at all.
+
+The robbers had evidently worked in seconds instead of minutes,
+realizing that they must take no risks in a showdown with Garrick.
+Rooms that might perhaps have given some clew of their presence,
+perhaps finger-prints which might have settled their identity at
+once, were now being destroyed. We had defeated them. We had the
+precious letter. But they had again slipped away.
+
+Firemen were now arriving. A hose had been run up, and a solid
+stream of water was now hissing on the fire. Smoke and steam were
+everywhere as the men hacked and cut their way at the very heart
+of the hungry red monster.
+
+"We are only in the way here, Tom," remarked Garrick, retreating
+finally. "Our friends must have entered and escaped by the roof.
+There is no other way."
+
+He had dashed up ahead of the firemen. I followed. Sure enough,
+the door out on the roof had been broken into. A rope tied around
+a chimney showed how they had pulled themselves up and later let
+themselves down to the roof of the next apartment some fifteen
+feet lower. We could see an open door leading to the roof there,
+which must also have been broken open. That had evidently been the
+secret method of which the Chief had spoken to the Boss, whoever
+they might be, who bore these epithets.
+
+Pursuit was useless, now. All was excitement. From the street we
+could hear the clang of engines and trucks arriving and taking
+their positions, almost as if the fire department had laid out the
+campaign beforehand for this very fire.
+
+Anyone who had waited a moment or so in the other apartment down
+the street might have gone downstairs without attracting any
+attention. Then he might have disappeared in or mingled with the
+very crowd on the street which he had caused to gather. Late as it
+was, the crowd seemed to spring from nowhere, and to grow
+momentarily as it had done during the raid on the gambling joint.
+It was one of the many interesting night phenomena of New York.
+
+What had been intended to be one of the worst fires and to injure
+a valuable property of the Warrington estate had, thanks to the
+prompt action of Garrick, been quickly turned into only a minor
+affair, at the worst. The fire had eaten its way into two other
+rooms of Warrington's own suite, but there it had been stopped.
+The building itself was nearly fireproof, and each suite was a
+unit so that, to all intents and purposes, it might burn out
+without injury to others.
+
+Still, it was interesting to watch the skill and intuition of the
+smoke-eaters as they took in the situation and almost instantly
+seemed to be able to cope with it.
+
+Sudden and well-planned though the incendiary assault had been, it
+was not many minutes before it was completely under control. Men
+in rubber coats and boots were soon tramping through the water-
+soaked rooms of Warrington. Windows were cracked open and the air
+in the rooms was clearing.
+
+We followed in cautiously after one of the firemen. Everywhere was
+the penetrating smell of burnt wood and cloth. In the corner was
+the safe, still hot and steaming. It had stood the strain. But it
+showed marks of having been tampered with.
+
+"Somebody used a 'can-opener' on it," commented Garrick, looking
+at it critically and then ruefully at the charred wreck of his
+optophone that had tumbled in the ashes of the pile of books under
+which it had been hidden, "Yes, that was the scheme they must have
+evolved after their midnight conference,--a robbery masked by a
+fire to cover the trail, and perhaps destroy it altogether."
+
+"If we had only known that," I agreed, "we might have saved what
+little there was in that safe for Warrington. But I guess he
+didn't keep much there."
+
+"No," answered Garrick, "I don't think he did. All I saw was some
+personal letters and a few things he apparently liked to have
+around here. I suppose all the really valuable stuff he has was in
+a safety-deposit vault somewhere. There was a packet of--it's
+gone! What do you think of that?" he exclaimed looking up from the
+safe to me in surprise.
+
+"Packet of what?" I asked. "What is gone?"
+
+"Why," replied Garrick, "I couldn't help noticing it when I opened
+the safe before, but Warrington had evidently saved every line and
+scrap of writing that Violet Winslow had ever given him and it was
+all in one of the compartments of the safe. The compartment is
+empty!"
+
+Neither of us could say a word. What reason might there be why
+anyone should want Warrington's love letters? Was it to learn
+something that might be used to embarrass him? Might it be for the
+purpose of holding him up for money? Did the robber want them for
+himself or was he employed by another? These and a score of other
+questions flashed, unanswered, through my mind.
+
+"I wonder who this fellow is that they call the Chief?" I ventured
+at last.
+
+"I can't say--yet," admitted Garrick. "But he's the cleverest I
+have ever met. His pace is rapid, but I think we are getting up
+with it, at last. There's no use sticking around here any longer,
+though. The place for us, I think, is downtown, getting an earful
+at the other end of that detectaphone."
+
+The engines and other apparatus were rolling away from the fire
+when we regained the street and things were settling themselves
+down to normal again.
+
+We rode downtown on the subway, and I was surprised when Garrick,
+instead of going all the way down to the crosstown line that would
+take us to the Old Tavern, got off at Forty-second Street.
+
+"What's the idea of this?" I asked.
+
+"Do you think I'm going to travel around the city with that letter
+in my pocket?" he asked. "Not much, since they seem to set such a
+value on getting it back. Of course, they don't know that I have
+it. But they might suspect it. At any rate I'm not going to run
+any chances of losing it."
+
+He had stopped at a well-known hotel where he knew the night
+clerk. There he made the letter into a little package, sealed it,
+and deposited it in the safe.
+
+"Why do you leave it here?" I asked.
+
+"If I go near the office, they might think I left it there, and I
+certainly won't leave it in my own apartment. They may or may not
+suspect that I have it. At any rate, I'd hate to risk meeting them
+down in their own region. But here we are not followed. I can
+leave it safely and to-morrow I'll get it and deposit it in a
+really safe place. Now, just to cover up my tracks, I'm going to
+call up Dillon, but I'm going up Broadway a bit before I do so, so
+that even he will not know I've been in this hotel. I think he
+ought to know what has happened to-day."
+
+"What did he say?" I asked as Garrick rejoined me from the
+telephone booth, his face wearing a scowl of perplexity.
+
+"Why, he knew about it already," replied Garrick. "I got him at
+his home. Herman, it seems, got back from some wild-goose chase
+over in New Jersey and saw the report in the records filed at
+police headquarters and telephoned him."
+
+"Herman is one of the brightest detectives I ever met," I
+commented in disgust. "He always manages to get in just after
+everybody else. Has he any more news?"
+
+"About the car?" asked Garrick absently. "Nothing except that he
+ran down the Pennsylvania report and found there was nothing in
+it. Now he says that he thinks the car may have returned to New
+York, perhaps by way of Staten Island, for he doubts whether it
+could have slipped in by New Jersey."
+
+"Clever," I ejaculated. "I suppose that occurred to him as soon as
+he read about the fire. I have to hand it to him for being a
+deducer."
+
+Garrick smiled.
+
+"There's one thing, though, he does know," he added, "and that is
+the gossip of the underworld right here in New York."
+
+"I should hope so," I replied. "That was his business to know.
+Why, has he found out anything really new?"
+
+"Why--er--yes. Dillon tells me that it now appears that Forbes had
+been intimate with that Rena Taylor."
+
+"Yes?" I repeated, not surprised.
+
+"At least that's what Herman has told him."
+
+"Well," I exclaimed in disgust, "Forbes is a fine one to run
+around with stool-pigeons and women of the Tenderloin, in addition
+to his other accomplishments, and then expect to associate with a
+girl like Violet Winslow."
+
+"It is scandalous," he agreed. "Why, according to Dillon and
+Herman, she must have been getting a good deal of evidence through
+her intimacy with Forbes. They probably gambled together, drank
+together, and---"
+
+"Do you suppose Forbes ever found out that she was really using
+him?"
+
+Garrick shook his head. "I can't say," he replied. "There isn't
+much value in this deductive, long distance detective work. You
+reason a thing out to your satisfaction and then one little fact
+knocks all your clever reasoning sky-high. The trouble here is
+that on this aspect of the case the truth seems to have been known
+by only two persons--and one of them is dead, while the other has
+disappeared."
+
+"Strange what has become of Forbes," I ruminated.
+
+"It is indeed," agreed Garrick. "But then he was such a night-hawk
+that anything might easily have happened and no one be the wiser.
+Since you saw him enter the gambling joint the night of the raid,
+I've been unable to get a line on him. He must have gone through
+the tunnel to the ladies' poolroom, but after he left that,
+presumably, I can't find a trace of him. Where he went no one
+seems to know. This bit of gossip that Herman has unearthed is the
+first thing I've heard of him, definitely, for two days."
+
+"If Rena Taylor were alive," I speculated, "I don't think you'd
+have to look further for Forbes than to find her."
+
+"But she isn't alive," concluded Garrick, "and there is nothing to
+show that there was anyone else at the poolroom for women who
+interested him--and--well, this isn't getting back to business."
+
+He turned toward the street.
+
+"Let's go down on a surface car," he said. "I think we ought to
+learn something down there at the Old Tavern, now. If these people
+have done nothing more, they'll think they have at least given an
+example of their resourcefulness and succeeded in throwing another
+scare into Warrington. But there's one thing I'd like to be able
+to tell Mr. Chief, however. He can't throw any scare into me, if
+that's his game."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+THE PLOT
+
+
+We had been able to secure a key to the hotel entrance of the Old
+Tavern, so that we felt free to come and go at any hour of the day
+or night. We let ourselves in and mounted the stairs cautiously to
+our room.
+
+"At least they haven't discovered anything, yet," Garrick
+congratulated himself, looking about, as I struck a light, and
+finding everything as we had left it.
+
+Late as it was, he picked up the detective receiver of the
+mechanical eavesdropper and held it to his ears, listening
+intently several moments.
+
+"There's someone in the garage, all right," he exclaimed. "I can
+hear sounds as if he were moving about among the cars. It must be
+the garage keeper himself--the one they call the Boss. I don't
+think our clever Chief would have the temerity to show up here
+yet, even at this hour."
+
+We waited some time, but not the sound of a voice came from the
+instrument.
+
+"It would be just like them to discover one of these
+detectaphones," remarked Garrick at length. "This is a good
+opportunity. I believe I'll just let myself down there in the yard
+again and separate those two wires, further. There's no use in
+risking all the eggs in one basket."
+
+While I listened in, Garrick cautiously got out the rope ladder
+and descended. Through the detectaphone I could hear the noise of
+the man walking about the garage and was ready at the window to
+give Garrick the first alarm of danger if he approached the back
+of the shop, but nothing happened and he succeeded in
+accomplishing his purpose of further hiding the two wires and
+returning safely. Then we resumed listening in relays.
+
+It was early in the morning when there came a telephone call to
+the garage and the garage keeper answered it.
+
+"Where did you go afterward?" he asked of the man who was calling
+him.
+
+Garrick had quickly shifted to the instrument by which we could
+overhear what was said over the telephone.
+
+A voice which I recognised instantly as that of the man they
+called the Chief replied, "Oh, I had a little business to attend
+to--you understand. Say, they got that fire out pretty quickly,
+didn't they? How do you suppose the alarm could have been turned
+in so soon?"
+
+"I don't know. But they tell me that Garrick and that other fellow
+with him showed up, double quick. He must have been wise to
+something."
+
+"Yes. Do you know, I've been thinking about that ever since. Ever
+hear of a little thing called a detectaphone? No? Well, it's a
+little arrangement that can be concealed almost anywhere. I've
+been wondering whether there might not be one hidden about your
+garage. He might have put one in that night, you know. I'm sure he
+knows more about us than he has any right to know. Hunt around
+there, will you, and see if you can find anything?"
+
+"Hold the wire."
+
+We could hear the Boss poking around in corners, back of the piles
+of accessories, back of the gasoline tank, lifting things up and
+looking under them, apparently flashing his light everywhere so
+that nothing could escape him.
+
+A hasty exclamation was recorded faithfully over our detectaphone,
+close to the transmitter, evidently.
+
+"What the deuce is this?" growled a voice.
+
+Then over the telephone we could hear the Boss talking.
+
+"There's a round black thing back of a pile of tires, with a wire
+connected to it. One side of it is full of little round holes. Is
+that one of those things?"
+
+"Yes," came back the voice, "that's it." Then excitedly, "Smash
+it! Cut the wires--no, wait--look and see where they run. I
+thought you'd find something. Curse me for a fool for not thinking
+of that before."
+
+Garrick had quickly himself detached the wire from the receiving
+instrument in our room and, sticking his head cautiously out of
+the window, he swung the cut ends as far as he could in the
+direction of a big iron-shuttered warehouse down the street in the
+opposite direction from us.
+
+Then he closed the window softly and pulled down the switch on the
+other detectaphone connected with the fake telephone receiver.
+
+He smiled quietly at me. The thing worked still. We had one
+connection left with the garage, anyway.
+
+There was a noise of something being shattered to bits. It was the
+black disc back of the pile of tires. We could hear the Boss
+muttering to himself.
+
+"Say," he reported back over the telephone, "I've smashed the
+thing, all right, and cut the wires, too. They ran out of the back
+window to that mercantile warehouse, down the street, I think.
+I'll look after that in the morning. It's so dark over there now I
+can't see a thing."
+
+"Good!" exclaimed the other voice with satisfaction. "Now we can
+talk. That fellow Garrick isn't such a wise guy, after all. I tell
+you, Boss, I'm going to throw a good scare into them this time--
+one that will stick."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"Well, I got Warrington, didn't I?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"You know I can't always be following that fellow, Garrick. He's
+too clever at dodging shadows. Besides, unless we give him
+something else to think about he may get a line on one of us,--on
+me. Don't you understand? Warrington's out of it for the present.
+I saw to that. Now, the thing is to fix up something to call them
+off, altogether, something that we can use to hold them up."
+
+"Yes--go on--what?"
+
+"Why--how about Violet Winslow?"
+
+My heart actually skipped beating for a second or two as I
+realised the boldness and desperation of the plan.
+
+"What do you mean--a robbery up there in Tuxedo?"
+
+"No, no, no. What good would a robbery do? I mean to get her--
+kidnap her. I guess Warrington would call the whole thing off to
+release her--eh?"
+
+"Say, Chief, that's going it pretty strong. I'd rather break in up
+there and leave a threat of some kind, something that would
+frighten them. But, this,--I'm afraid--"
+
+"Afraid--nothing. I tell you, we've got to do it. They're getting
+too close to us. We've either got to get Garrick or do something
+that'll call him off for good. Why, man, the whole game is up if
+he keeps on the way he has been going--let alone the risk we have
+of getting caught."
+
+The Boss seemed to be considering.
+
+"How will you get a chance to do it?" he asked at length.
+
+"Oh, I'll get a chance, all right. I'll make a chance," came back
+the self-confident reply.
+
+It sent a shiver through me merely to contemplate what might
+happen if Violet Winslow fell into such hands. Mentally I blessed
+Garrick for his forethought in having the phony 'phone in the
+garage against possible discovery of the detective instrument.
+
+"You know this poisoned needle stuff that's been in the papers?"
+pursued the Chief.
+
+"Bunk--all bunk," came back the Boss promptly.
+
+"Is that so?" returned the Chief. "Well, you're right about it as
+far as what has been in the papers is concerned. I don't know but
+I doubt about ninety-nine and ninety-nine hundredths per cent of
+it, too. But, I'll tell you,--it can be done. Take it from me--it
+can be done. I've got one of the best little sleepmakers you ever
+saw--right from Paris, too. There, what do you know about that?"
+
+I glanced hastily, in alarm, at Garrick. His face was set in hard
+lines, as he listened.
+
+"Sleepmaker--Paris," I heard him mutter under his breath, and just
+a flicker of a smile crossed the set lines of his fine face.
+
+"Yes, sir," pursued the voice of the Chief, "I can pull one of
+those poisoned needle cases off and I'm going to do it, if I get
+half a chance."
+
+"When would you do it?" asked the Boss, weakening.
+
+"As soon as I can. I've a scheme. I'm not going to tell you over
+the wire, though. Leave it to me. I'm going up to our place, where
+I left the car. I'll study the situation out, up there. Maybe I'll
+run over and look over the ground, see how she spends her time and
+all that sort of thing. I've got to reckon in with that aunt, too.
+She's a Tartar. I'll let you know. In the meantime, I want you to
+watch that place on Forty-seventh Street. Tell me if they make any
+move against it. Don't waste any time, either. I can't be out of
+touch with things the way I was the last time I went away. You
+see, they almost put one across on us--in fact they did put one
+across with that detectaphone thing. Now, we can't let that happen
+again. Just keep me posted, see?"
+
+They had finished talking and that was apparently all we were to
+get that night, or rather that morning, by way of warning of their
+plot for the worst move yet.
+
+It was enough. If they would murder and burn, what would they stop
+at in order to strike at us through the innocent figure of Violet
+Winslow? What might not happen to such a delicate slip of a girl
+in the power of such men?
+
+"At least," rapped out Garrick, himself smothering his alarm,
+"they can't do anything immediately. It gives us time to prepare
+and warn. Besides, before that we may have them rounded up. The
+time has come for something desperate. I won't be trifled with any
+longer. This last proposal goes just over the limit."
+
+As for me, I was speechless. The events of the past two days, the
+almost sleepless nights had sapped my energy. Even Garrick, though
+he was a perfect glutton for work, felt the strain.
+
+It was very late, or rather very early, and we determined to
+snatch a few moments of sleep at the Old Tavern before the rest of
+the world awoke to the new day. It was only a couple of hours that
+we could spare, but it was absolutely necessary.
+
+In spite of our fatigue, we were up again early and after another
+try at the phony 'phone which told us that only the men were
+working in the garage, we were on our way up to Garrick's
+apartment.
+
+We had scarcely entered when the telephone boy called up to say
+that there was a Mr. Warrington on long distance trying to get us.
+Garrick eagerly asked to have him put on our wire.
+
+Warrington, it seemed, had been informed of the fire by one of his
+agents and was inquiring anxiously for details, especially about
+the letter. Garrick quickly apologised for not calling up himself,
+and relieved his anxiety by assuring him that the letter was safe.
+
+"And how are you?" he asked of Warrington.
+
+"Convalescing rapidly," laughed back the patient, to whom the loss
+of anything was a mere bagatelle beside the letter. Garrick had
+not told him yet of the stealing of the other letters. "Getting
+along fine,--thanks to a new tonic which Dr. Mead has prescribed
+for me."
+
+"I can guess what it is."
+
+Warrington laughed again. "Yes--I've been allowed to take short
+motor trips with Violet," he explained.
+
+The natural manner in which "Violet" replaced "Miss Winslow"
+indicated that the trips had not been without result.
+
+"Say, Warrington," burst out Garrick, seeing an opportunity of
+introducing the latest news, "I hate to butt in, but if you'll
+take my advice, you'll just cut out those trips a few days. I
+don't want to alarm you unnecessarily, but after to-day I want
+Miss Winslow never to be out of sight of friends--friends, I said;
+not one, but several."
+
+"Why--what's the matter?" demanded Warrington in alarm.
+
+"I can't explain it all over the telephone," replied Garrick,
+sketching out hastily something of what we had overheard. "I'll
+try to see you before long--perhaps to-day. Don't forget. I want
+you to warn Miss Winslow yourself. You can't put it too strongly.
+Use your judgment about Mrs. de Lancey. I don't want to get you in
+wrong with her. But, remember, it's a matter of life or death--or
+perhaps worse. Try to do it without unnecessarily alarming Miss
+Winslow, if you can. Just fix it up as quietly as possible. But be
+positive about it. No, I can't explain more over the wire now.
+But--no more outings for either of you, and particularly Miss
+Winslow, until I raise the ban."
+
+Warrington had been inclined to argue the matter at first, but
+Garrick of course quickly prevailed, the more so because
+Warrington realised that in his condition he was anything but an
+adequate body-guard for her if something unexpected should happen.
+
+"Oh--I had a call the other day," reported Warrington as an
+afterthought before hanging up the receiver. "It was from
+McBirney. He says one of his unofficial scouts has told him of
+seeing a car that might have been mine up this way lately."
+
+Garrick acquiesced to the information which, to us, was not new.
+"Yes," he said, "there have been several such reports. And, by the
+way, that reminds me of something. You will have to put at our
+disposal one of your cars down here."
+
+"Go as far as you like. What do you want--a racer?"
+
+"Why--yes, if it's in perfect condition. You see, we may have to
+do some unexpected sleuthing in it."
+
+"Go as far as you like," repeated Warrington, now thoroughly
+aroused by the latest development of the case. "Spare nothing,
+Garrick--nothing. Curse my luck for being laid up! Every dollar I
+have is at your disposal, Garrick, to protect her from those
+scoundrels--damn them!"
+
+"Trust me, Warrington," called back Garrick. "I give you my word
+that it's my fight now."
+
+"Garrick--you're a brick," came back Warrington as the
+conversation closed.
+
+"Good heavens, Guy," I exclaimed when he hung up the receiver
+after calling up Warrington's garage and finding out what cars
+were available, "Are we going to have to extend operations over
+the whole State, after all?"
+
+"We may have to do almost anything," he replied, "if our
+scientific murderer tries some of his smooth kidnapping tricks.
+It's possible that McBirney may be right about that car being up
+there. Certainly we know that it has been up there, whether it is
+now or not."
+
+"And Herman wrong about its being in the city?" I suggested.
+"Well, one guess is as good as another in a case like this, I
+suppose."
+
+It had been a great relief to get back to our rooms and live even
+for a few minutes like civilised beings. I suggested that we might
+have a real breakfast once more.
+
+I could tell, however, that Garrick's mind was far away from the
+thought of eating, and that he realised that a keen, perhaps the
+keenest, test of his ability lay ahead of him, if he was to come
+out successfully and protect Violet Winslow in the final battle
+with the scientific gunman. I did not interrupt him.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+THE POISONED NEEDLE
+
+
+Over a still untasted grapefruit Garrick was considering what his
+next move should be. As for me, even this temporary return to a
+normal life caused me to view things in a different light.
+
+There had been, as the Chief and the Boss had hinted at in their
+conversation, a wave of hysteria which had swept over the city
+only a short time before regarding what had come to be called the
+"poisoned needle" cases. Personally I had doubted them and I had
+known many doctors and scientists as well as vice and graft
+investigators who had scouted them, too.
+
+"Garrick," I said at length, "do you really think that we have to
+deal with anything in this case but just plain attempted
+kidnapping of the old style?"
+
+He shook his head doubtfully. I knew him to be anything but an
+alarmist and waited impatiently for him to speak.
+
+"I wouldn't think so," he said at length slowly, "except for one
+thing."
+
+"What's that?" I asked eagerly.
+
+"His mention of the 'sleepmakers' and Paris," he replied briefly.
+
+Garrick had risen and walked over to a cabinet in the corner of
+his room. When he returned it was with something gleaming in the
+morning sunshine as he rolled it back and forth on a piece of
+paper, just a shining particle. He picked it up carefully.
+
+I bent over to look at it more closely and there, in Garrick's
+hand, was a tiny bit of steel, scarcely three-eighths of an inch
+long, a mere speck. It was like nothing of which I had ever heard
+or read. Yet Garrick himself seemed to regard the minute thing
+with a sort of awe. As for me, I knew not what to make of it. I
+wondered whether it might not be some new peril.
+
+"What is it?" I asked at length, seeing that Garrick might be
+disposed to talk, if I prompted him.
+
+"Well," he answered laconically, holding it up to the light so
+that I could see that it was in reality a very minute, pointed
+hollow tube, "what would you say if I told you it was the point of
+a new--er--poisoned needle?"
+
+He said it in such a simple tone that I reacted from it toward my
+own preconceived notions of the hysterical newspaper stories.
+
+"I've heard about all the poisoned needle stories," I returned.
+"I've investigated some of them and written about them for my
+paper, Guy. And I must say still that I doubt them. Now in the
+first place, the mere insertion of a hypodermic needle--of course,
+you've had it done, Guy--is something so painful that anyone in
+his senses would cry aloud. Then to administer a drug that way
+requires a great deal of skill and knowledge of anatomy, if it is
+to be done with full and quick effect."
+
+Garrick said nothing, but continued to regard the hollow point
+which he had obtained somewhere, perhaps on a previous case.
+
+"Why, such an injection," I continued, recalling the result of my
+former careful investigations on the subject, "couldn't act
+instantaneously anyhow, as it must if they are to get away with
+it. After the needle is inserted, the plunger has to be pushed
+down, and the whole thing would take at least thirty seconds. And
+then, the action of the drug. That would take time, too. It seems
+to me that in no case could it be done without the person's being
+instantly aware of it and, before lapsing into unconsciousness,
+calling for help or--"
+
+"On the contrary," interrupted Garrick quietly, "it is absurdly
+easy. Waiving the question whether they might not be able to get
+Violet Winslow in such a situation where even the old hypodermic
+method which you know would serve as well as any other, why,
+Marshall, just the hint that fellow dropped tells me that he could
+walk up to her on the street or anywhere else, and--"
+
+He did not finish the sentence, but left it to my imagination. It
+was my turn, now, to remain silent.
+
+"You are right, though, Tom, in one respect," he resumed a moment
+later. "It is not easy by the old methods that everyone now knows.
+For instance, take the use of chloral-knock-out drops, you know.
+That is crude, too. Hypodermics and knock-out drops may answer
+well enough, perhaps, for the criminals whose victims are found in
+cafes and dives of a low order. But for the operations of an
+aristocratic criminal of to-day--and our friend the Chief seems to
+belong to the aristocracy of the underworld--far more subtle
+methods are required. Let me show you something."
+
+Carefully, from the back of a drawer in the cabinet, where it was
+concealed in a false partition, he pulled out a little case. He
+opened it, and in it displayed a number of tiny globes and tubes
+of thin glass, each with a liquid in it, some lozenges, some
+bonbons, and several cigars and cigarettes.
+
+"I'm doing this," he remarked, "to show you, Tom, that I'm not
+unduly magnifying the danger that surrounds Violet Winslow, after
+hearing what I did over that detectaphone. Perhaps it didn't
+impress you, but I think I know something of what we're up
+against."
+
+From another part of the case he drew a peculiar looking affair
+and handed to me without a word. It consisted of a glass syringe
+about two inches long, fitted with a glass plunger and an asbestos
+washer. On the other end of the tube was a hollow point, about
+three-eighths of an inch long--just a shiny little bit of steel
+such as he had already showed me.
+
+I looked at it curiously and, in spite of my former assurance,
+began to wonder whether, after all, the possibility of a girl
+being struck down suddenly, without warning, in a public place and
+robbed--or worse--might not take on the guise of ghastly reality.
+
+"What do you make of it?" asked Garrick, evidently now enjoying
+the puzzled look on my face.
+
+I could merely shrug my shoulders.
+
+"Well," he drawled, "that is a weapon they hinted at last night.
+The possibilities of it are terrifying. Why, it could easily be
+plunged through a fur coat, without breaking."
+
+He took the needle and made an imaginary lunge at me.
+
+"When people tell you that the hypodermic needle cannot be
+employed in a case like this that they are planning," he
+continued, "they are thinking of ordinary hypodermics. Those
+things wouldn't be very successful usually, anyhow, under such
+circumstances. But this is different. The very form of this needle
+makes it particularly effective for anyone who wishes to use it
+for crime. For instance--take it on a railroad or steamship or in
+a hotel. Draw back the plunger--so--one quick jab--then drop it on
+the floor and grind it under your heel. The glass is splintered
+into a thousand bits. All evidence of guilt is destroyed, unless
+someone is looking for it practically with a microscope."
+
+"Yes," I persisted, "that is all right--but the pain and the
+moments before the drug begins to work?"
+
+With one hand Garrick reached into the case, selecting a little
+thin glass tube, and with the other he pulled out his
+handkerchief.
+
+"Smell that!" he exclaimed, bending over me so that I could see
+every move and be prepared for it.
+
+Yet it was done so quickly that I could not protect myself.
+
+"Ugh!" I ejaculated in surprise, as Garrick manipulated the thing
+with a legerdemain swiftness that quite baffled me, even though he
+had given me warning to expect something.
+
+Everyone has seen freak moving picture films where the actor
+suddenly bobs up in another place, without visibly crossing the
+intervening space. The next thing I knew, Garrick was standing
+across the room, in just that way. The handkerchief was folded up
+and in his pocket.
+
+It couldn't have been done possibly in less than a minute. What
+had happened? Where had that minute or so gone? I felt a sickening
+sensation.
+
+"Smell it again?" Garrick laughed, taking a step toward me.
+
+I put up my hand and shook my head negatively, slowly
+comprehending.
+
+"You mean to tell me," I gasped, "that I was--out?"
+
+"I could have jabbed a dozen needles into you and you would never
+have known it," asserted Garrick with a quiet smile playing over
+his face.
+
+"What is the stuff?" I asked, quite taken aback.
+
+"Kelene--ethyl chloride. Whiff!--and you are off almost in a
+second. It is an anaesthetic of nearly unbelievable volatility. It
+comes in little hermetically sealed tubes, with a tiny capillary
+orifice, to prevent its too rapid vaporising, even when opened for
+use. Such a tube may be held in the palm of the hand and the end
+crushed off. The warmth of the hand alone is sufficient to start a
+veritable spray. It acts violently on the senses, too. But kelene
+anaesthesia lasts only a minute or so. The fraction of time is
+long enough. Then comes the jab with the real needle--perhaps
+another whiff of kelene to give the injection a chance. In two or
+three minutes the injection itself is working and the victim is
+unconscious, without a murmur--perhaps, as in your case, without
+any clear idea of how it all happened--even without recollection
+of a handkerchief, unable to recall any sharp pain of a needle or
+anything else."
+
+He was holding up a little bottle in which was a thick, colorless
+syrup.
+
+"And what is that?" I asked, properly tamed and no longer disposed
+to be disputatious.
+
+"Hyoscine."
+
+"Is it powerful?"
+
+"One one-hundredth of a grain of this strength, perhaps less, will
+render a person unconscious," replied Garrick. "The first symptom
+is faintness; the pupils of the eyes dilate; speech is lost;
+vitality seems to be floating away, and the victim lapses into
+unconsciousness. It is derived from henbane, among ether things,
+and is a rapid, energetic alkaloid, more rapid than chloral and
+morphine. And, preceded by a whiff of kelene, not even the
+sensations I have described are remembered."
+
+I could only stare at the outfit before me, speechless.
+
+"In Paris, where I got this," continued Garrick, "they call these
+people who use it, 'endormeurs'--sleepmakers. That must have been
+what the Chief meant when he used that word. I knew it."
+
+"Sleepmakers," I repeated in horror at the very idea of such a
+thing being attempted on a young girl like Violet Winslow.
+
+"Yes. The standard equipment of such a criminal consists of these
+little thin glass globes, a tiny glass hypodermic syringe with a
+sharp steel point, doped cigars and cigarettes. They use various
+derivatives of opium, like morphine and heroin, also codeine,
+dionin, narcein, ethyl chloride and bromide, nitrite of amyl,
+amylin,--and the skill that they have acquired in the manipulation
+of these powerful drugs stamps them as the most dangerous coterie
+of criminals in existence. Now," he concluded, "doubt it or not,
+we have to deal with a man who is a proficient student of these
+sleepmakers. Who is he, where is he, and when will he strike?"
+
+Garrick was now pacing excitedly up and down the room.
+
+"You see," he added, "the police of Europe by their new scientific
+methods are driving such criminals out of the various countries.
+Thank heaven, I am now prepared to meet them if they come to
+America."
+
+"Then you think this is a foreigner?" I asked meekly.
+
+"I didn't say so," Garrick replied. "No. I think this is a
+criminal exceptionally wide awake, one who studies and adopts what
+he sees whenever he wants it. If you recall, I warned you to have
+a wholesome respect for this man at the very start, when we were
+looking at that empty cartridge."
+
+I could restrain my admiration of him no longer. "Guy," I
+exclaimed, heartily, astounded by what I had seen, "you--you are a
+wonder!"
+
+"No," he laughed, "not wonderful, Tom,--only very ordinary. I've
+had a chance to learn some things abroad, fortunately. I've taken
+the time to show you all this because I want you to appreciate
+what it is we are up against in this case of Violet Winslow. You
+can understand now why I was so particular about instructing
+Warrington not to let her go anywhere unattended by friends.
+There's nothing inherently impossible in these poisoned needle
+stories--given the right conjunction of circumstances. What we
+have to guard against principally is letting her get into any
+situation where the circumstances make such a thing possible. I've
+almost a notion to let the New York end of this case go altogether
+for a while and take a run up to Tuxedo to warn her and Mrs. de
+Lancey personally. Still, I think I put it strongly enough with
+Warrington so that--"
+
+Our telephone tinkled insistently.
+
+"Hello," answered Garrick. "Yes, this is Garrick. Who is this?
+Warrington? In Tuxedo? Why, my dear boy, you needn't have gone
+personally. Are you sure you're strong enough for such exertion?
+What--what's that? Warrington--it--it isn't--not to New York?"
+
+Garrick's face was actually pale as he fairly started back from
+the telephone and caught my eye.
+
+"Tom," he exclaimed huskily to me, "Violet Winslow left for New
+York on the early train this morning!"
+
+I felt my heart skip a beat, then pound away like a sledge-hammer
+at my ribs as the terrible possibilities of the situation were
+seared into my brain.
+
+"Yes, Warrington--a letter to her? Read it--quick," I heard
+Garrick's tense voice repeating. "I see. Her maid Lucille was
+taken very ill a few days ago and she allowed her to go to her
+brother who lives on Ninth Street. I understand. Now--the letter."
+
+I could not hear what was said over the telephone, but later
+Garrick repeated it to me and I afterwards saw the letter itself
+which I may as well reproduce here. It said:
+
+"Since I left you, mademoiselle, I am very ill here at the home of
+my brother. I have a nice room in the back of the house on the
+first floor and now that I am getting better I can sit up and look
+out of the window.
+
+"I am very ill yet, but the worst is past and some time when you
+are in New York I wish I could see you. You have always been so
+good to me, mademoiselle, that I hope I may soon be back again, if
+you have not a maid better than your poor Lucille.
+
+"Your faithful servant,
+
+"LUCILLE DE VEAU."
+
+"And she's already in the city?" asked Garrick of Warrington as he
+finished reading the letter. "Mrs. de Lancey has gone with her--to
+do some shopping. I see. That will take all day, she said? She is
+going to call on Lucille--to-night--that's what she told her new
+maid there? To-night? That's all right, my boy. I just wanted to
+be sure. Don't worry. We'll look out for her here, all right. Now,
+Warrington, you just keep perfectly quiet. No relapses, you know,
+old fellow. We can take care of everything. I'm glad you told me.
+Good-bye."
+
+Garrick had finished up his conversation with Warrington in a
+confident and reassuring tone, quite the opposite to that with
+which he had started and even more in contrast with the expression
+on his face as he talked.
+
+"I didn't want to alarm the boy unnecessarily," he explained to
+me, as he hung up the receiver. "I could tell that he was very
+weak yet and that the trip up to Tuxedo had almost done him up. It
+seems that she thought a good deal of Lucille--there's the
+address--99 Ninth. You can never tell about these maids, though.
+Lucille may be all right--or the other maid may be all bad, or
+vice versa. There's no telling. The worst of it is that she and
+her aunt are somewhere in the city, perhaps shopping. It only
+needs that they become separated for something, anything, to
+happen. There's been no time to warn her, either, and she's just
+as likely to visit that Lucille to-night alone as not. Gad--I'm
+glad I didn't fly off up there to Tuxedo, after all. She'll need
+someone here to protect her."
+
+Garrick was considering hastily what was to be done. Quickly he
+mapped out his course of action.
+
+"Come, Tom," he said hurriedly to me, as he wrapped up a little
+cedar box which he took from the cabinet where he kept the
+endormeur outfit. "Come--let's investigate that Ninth Street
+address while we have time."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+THE NEWSPAPER FAKE
+
+
+Within a few minutes we were sauntering with enforced leisure
+along Ninth Street, in a rather sordid part, inhabited largely, I
+made out, by a slightly better class of foreigners than some other
+sections of the West Side.
+
+As we walked along, I felt Garrick tugging at my arm.
+
+"Slow up a bit," he whispered under his breath. "There's the house
+which was mentioned in the maid's note."
+
+It was an old three-story brownstone building with an entrance two
+or three steps up from the sidewalk level. Once, no doubt, it had
+housed people of some means, but the change in the character of
+the neighbourhood with shifting population had evidently brought
+it to the low estate where it now sheltered one family on each
+floor, if not more. At least that was the general impression one
+got from a glance at the cheapened air of the block.
+
+Garrick passed the house so as not to attract any attention, and a
+little further on paused before an apartment house, not of the
+modern elevator construction, but still of quiet and decent
+appearance. At least there were no children spilling out from its
+steps into the street, in imminent danger of their young lives
+from every passing automobile, as there were in the tenements of
+the block below.
+
+He entered the front door which happened to be unlatched and we
+had no trouble in mounting the stairs to the roof.
+
+What he intended doing I had no idea yet, but he went ahead with
+assurance and I followed, equally confident, for he must have had
+adventures something like this before. On the roof, a clothesline,
+which he commandeered and tied about a chimney, served to let him
+down the few feet from the higher apartment roof to that of the
+dwelling house next to it, one of the row in which number 99 was
+situated.
+
+Quickly he tiptoed over to the chimney of the brownstone house a
+few doors down and, as he did so, I saw him take from his pocket
+the cedar box. A string tied to a weight told him which of the
+flues reached down to the room on the first floor, back.
+
+That determined, he let the little cedar box fastened to an
+entwined pair of wires down the flue. He then ran the wires back
+across the roof to the apartment, up, and into a little storm shed
+at the top of the last flight of stairs which led from the upper
+hall to the roof.
+
+"There is nothing more that we can do here just yet," he remarked
+after he had hauled himself back to me on the higher roof. "We are
+lucky not to have been disturbed, but if we stay here we are
+likely to be observed."
+
+Cautiously we retraced our steps and were again on the street
+without having alarmed any of the tenants of the flat through
+which we had gained access to the roofs.
+
+It was now the forenoon and, although Garrick instituted a search
+in every place that he could think of where Mrs. de Laacey and
+Violet Winslow might go, including the homes of those of their
+friends whose names we could learn, it was without result. I don't
+think there can be many searches more hopeless than to try to find
+someone in New York when one has no idea where to look. Only
+chance could possibly have thrown them in our way and chance did
+not favour us.
+
+There was nothing to do but wait for the time when Miss Winslow
+might, of her own accord, turn up to visit her former maid for
+whom she apparently had a high regard.
+
+Inquiries as to the antecedents of Lucille De Veau were decidedly
+unsatisfactory, not that they gave her a bad character, but
+because there simply seemed to be nothing that we could find out.
+The maid seemed to be absolutely unknown. Her brother was a
+waiter, though where he worked we could not find out, for he
+seemed to be one of those who are constantly shifting their
+positions.
+
+Garrick had notified Dillon of what he had discovered, in a
+general way, and had asked him to detail some men to conduct the
+search secretly for Miss Winslow and her aunt, but without any
+better results than we had obtained. Apparently the department
+stores had swallowed them up for the time being and we could only
+wait impatiently, trusting that all would turn out right in the
+end. Still, I could not help having some forebodings in the
+matter.
+
+It was in the middle of the afternoon that we had gone downtown to
+Garrick's office, after stopping to secure the letter from the
+safe in the uptown hotel where it had been deposited for security
+during the night and placing it in a safety deposit vault where
+Garrick kept some of his own valuables. Garrick had selected his
+office as a vantage point to which any news of Miss Winslow and
+her aunt might be sent by those whom we had out searching. No word
+came, however, and the hours of suspense seemed to drag
+interminably.
+
+"You're pretty well acquainted on the STAR?" Garrick asked me at
+last, after we had been sitting in a sort of mournful silence
+wondering whether those on the other side might not be stealing a
+march on us.
+
+"Why, yes, I know several people there," I replied. "Why do you
+ask?"
+
+"I was just thinking of a possible plan of campaign that might be
+mapped out to bring these people from under cover," he remarked
+thoughtfully. "Do you think you could carry part of it through?"
+
+I said I would try and Garrick proceeded to unfold a scheme which
+he had been revolving all day. It consisted of as ingenious a
+"plant" as I could well imagine.
+
+"You see," he outlined, "if you could go over to the Star office
+and get them to run off a few copies of the paper, after they are
+through with the regular editions, I believe we can get the Chief
+started and then all we should have to do would be to follow him
+up--or someone who would lead us to him."
+
+The "plant," in short, consisted in writing a long and
+circumstantial story of the discovery of new evidence against the
+ladies' poolroom, which so far had been scarcely mentioned in the
+case. As Garrick laid it out, the story was to tell of a young
+gambler who was said to be in touch with the district attorney, in
+preference to saying the police.
+
+In fact, his idea was to write up the whole gambling situation as
+we knew it on lines that he suggested. Then a "fake" edition of
+the paper was to be run off, bearing our story on the front page.
+Only a few copies were to be printed, and they were to be
+delivered to us. The thing had been done before by detectives, I
+knew, and in this case Warrington was to foot the bill, which
+might prove to be considerable.
+
+At least it offered me some outlet for my energies during the rest
+of the afternoon when the failure to receive any reports about the
+two women whom we were seeking began to wear on my nerves.
+
+It took some time to arrange the thing with those in authority on
+the Star, but at last that was done and I hastened back to Garrick
+at his office to tell him that all that remained to do was the
+actual writing of the story.
+
+Garrick had just finished testing an arrangement in a large case,
+almost the size of a suitcase, and had stood it in a corner, ready
+to be picked up and carried off the instant there was any need for
+it. There was still no word of Miss Winslow and Mrs. de Lancey and
+it began to look as if we should not hear from them until Violet
+Winslow turned up on her visit to her former maid.
+
+Together we plunged into the preparation of the story, the writing
+of which fell to me while Garrick now and then threw in a
+suggestion or a word of criticism to make it sound stronger for
+his purpose. Thus the rest of the afternoon passed in getting the
+thing down "pat."
+
+I flatter myself that it was not such a bad piece of work when we
+got through with it. By dint of using such expressions as "It is
+said," "It is rumoured," "The report about the Criminal Courts
+Building is," "An informant high in the police department," and
+crediting much to a mythical "gambler who is operating quietly
+uptown," we managed to tell some amazing facts.
+
+The fake story began:
+
+"Since the raid by the police on the luxurious gambling house in
+Forty-eighth Street, a remarkable new phase of sporting life has
+been unfolded to the District Attorney, who is quietly gathering
+evidence against another place situated in the same district.
+
+"A former gambler who frequented the raided place has put many
+incriminating facts about the second place in the hands of the
+authorities who are contemplating an exposure that will stir even
+New York, accustomed as it is to such startling revelations. It
+involves one of the cleverest and most astute criminals who ever
+operated in this city.
+
+"This place, which is under observation, is one which has brought
+tragedy to many. Young women attracted by the treacherous lure of
+the spinning roulette wheel or the fascination of the shuffle of
+cards have squandered away their own and their husband's money
+with often tragic results, and many of them have gone even further
+into the moral quagmire in the hope of earning enough money to pay
+their losses and keep from their families the knowledge of their
+gambling.
+
+"This situation, one of the high lights in the city of lights and
+shadows, has been evolved, according to the official informant,
+through the countless number of gambling resorts that have gained
+existence in the most fashionable parts of the city.
+
+"The record of crime of the clever and astute individual already
+mentioned is being minutely investigated, and, it is said, shows
+some of the most astounding facts. It runs even to murder, which
+was accomplished in getting rid of an informer recently in the pay
+of the police.
+
+"Against those conducting the crusade every engine of the
+underworld has been used. The fight has been carried on bitterly,
+and within less than twenty-four hours arrests are promised as a
+result of confessions already in the hands of the authorities and
+being secretly and widely investigated by them before the final
+blow is delivered simultaneously, both in the city and in a town
+up-state where the criminal believes himself unknown and secure."
+
+There was more of the stuff, which I do not quote, describing the
+situation in detail and in general terms which could all have only
+one meaning to a person acquainted with the particular case with
+which we were dealing. It threw a scare, in type, as hard as could
+be done. I fancied that when it was read by the proper person he
+would be amazed that so much had, apparently, become known to the
+newspapers, and would begin to wonder how much more was known that
+was not printed.
+
+"That ought to make someone sit up and take notice," remarked
+Garrick with some satisfaction, as he corrected the typewritten
+copy late in the afternoon. "The printing of that will take some
+time and I don't suppose we shall get copies until pretty late.
+You can take it over to the Star, Tom, and complete the
+arrangements. I have a little more work to do before we go up
+there on Ninth Street. Suppose you meet me at eight in Washington
+Square, near the Arch?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+THE VOCAPHONE
+
+
+Promptly to the dot I met Garrick at the appointed place. Not a
+word so far had been heard, either from Violet Winslow or Mrs. de
+Lancey. There was one thing encouraging about it, however. If they
+had become separated while shopping, as sometimes happens, we
+should have been likely to hear of it, at least from her aunt.
+
+Garrick was tugging the heavy suitcase which I had seen standing
+ready down in his office during the afternoon, as well as a small
+package wrapped up in paper.
+
+"Let me carry that suitcase," I volunteered.
+
+We trudged along across the park, my load getting heavier at every
+step.
+
+"I'm not surprised at your being winded," I panted, soon finding
+myself in the same condition. "What's in this--lead?"
+
+"Something that we may need or may not," Garrick answered
+enigmatically, as we stopped in the shadow to rest.
+
+He carefully took an automatic revolver from an inside pocket and
+stowed it where it would be handy, in his coat.
+
+We resumed our walk and at last had come nearly up to the house on
+the first floor of which the maid Lucille was. The suitcase was
+engaging all my attention, as I shifted it from one hand to the
+other. Not so Garrick, however. He was looking keenly about us.
+
+"Gad, I must be seeing things to-night!" he exclaimed, his eyes
+fixed on a figure slouching along, his hat pulled down over his
+eyes, passing just about opposite us on the other side of the
+street. I looked also in the gathering dusk. The figure had
+something indefinably familiar about it, but a moment later it was
+gone, having turned the corner.
+
+Garrick shook his head. "No," he said half to himself, "it
+couldn't have been. Don't stop, Tom. We mustn't do anything to
+rouse suspicion, now."
+
+We came a moment later to the flat-house through the hall of which
+we had reached the roof that morning and in the excitement of the
+adventure I forgot, for the time, the mysterious figure across the
+street, which had attracted Garrick's attention.
+
+Again, we managed to elude the tenants, though it was harder in
+the early evening than it had been in the daytime. However, we
+reached the roof apparently unobserved. There at least, now that
+it was dark, we felt comparatively safe. No one was likely to
+disturb us there, provided we made no noise.
+
+Unwrapping the smaller, paper-covered package, Garrick quickly
+attached the wires, as he had left them, to another cedar box,
+like that which he had already let down the chimney up the street.
+
+I now had a chance to examine it more closely under the light of
+Garrick's little electric bull's-eye. I was surprised to find that
+it resembled one of the instruments we had used down in the room
+in the Old Tavern.
+
+It was oblong, with a sort of black disc fixed to the top. In the
+face of the box, just as in the other we had used, were two little
+square holes, with sides also of cedar, converging inward, making
+a pair of little quadrangular pyramidal holes which seemed to end
+in a small round black circle in the interior, small end.
+
+I said nothing, but I could see that it was a new form, to all
+intents and purposes, of the detectaphone which we had already
+used.
+
+The minutes that followed seemed like hours, as we waited, not
+daring to talk lest we should attract attention.
+
+I wondered whether Miss Winslow would come after all, or, if she
+did, whether she would come alone.
+
+"You're early," said a voice, softly, near us, of a sudden.
+
+I leaped to my feet, prepared to meet anything, man or devil.
+Garrick seized me and pulled me down, a strong hint to be quiet.
+Too surprised to remonstrate, since nothing happened, I waited,
+breathless.
+
+"Yes, but that is better than to be too late. Besides, we've got
+to watch that Garrick," said another voice. "He might be around."
+
+Garrick chuckled.
+
+I had noticed a peculiar metallic ring in the voices.
+
+"Where are they?" I whispered, "On the landing below?"
+
+Garrick laughed outright, not boisterously, but still in a way
+which to me was amazing in its bravado, if the tenants were really
+so near.
+
+"What's this?" I asked.
+
+"Don't you recognize it?" he answered.
+
+"Yes," I said doubtfully. "I suppose it's like that thing we used
+down at the Old Tavern."
+
+"Only more so," nodded Garrick, aloud, yet careful not to raise
+his voice, as before, so as not to disturb the flat dwellers below
+us. "A vocaphone."
+
+"A vocaphone?" I repeated.
+
+"Yes, the little box that hears and talks," he explained. "It does
+more than the detectaphone. It talks right out, you know, and it
+works both ways."
+
+I began to understand his scheme.
+
+"Those square holes in the face of it are just like the other
+instrument we used," Garrick went on. "They act like little
+megaphones to that receiver inside, you know,--magnify the sound
+and throw it out so that we can listen up here just as well,
+perhaps better than if we were down there in the room with them."
+
+They were down there in the back room, Lucille and a man.
+
+"Have you heard from her?" asked the man's voice, one that I did
+not recognise.
+
+"Non,--but she will come. Voila, but she thought the world of her
+Lucille, she did. She will come."
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"Because--I know."
+
+"Oh, you women!"
+
+"Oh, you men!"
+
+It was evident that the two had a certain regard for each other, a
+sort of wild, animal affection, above, below, beyond, without the
+law. They seemed at least to understand each other.
+
+Who the man was I could not guess. It was a voice that sounded
+familiar, yet I could not place it.
+
+"She will come to see her Lucille," repeated the woman. "But you
+must not be seen."
+
+"No--by no means."
+
+The voice of the man was not that of a foreigner.
+
+"Here, Lucille, take this. Only get her interested--I will do the
+rest--and the money is yours. See--you crush it in the
+handkerchief--so. Be careful--you WILL crush it before you want to
+use it. There. Under her nose, you know. I shall be there in a
+moment and finish the work. That is all you need do--with the
+handkerchief."
+
+Garrick made a motion, as if to turn a switch in the little
+vocaphone, and rested his finger on it.
+
+"I could make those two jump out of the window with fright and
+surprise," he said to me, still fingering the switch impatiently.
+"You see, it works the other way, too, as I told you, if I choose
+to throw this switch. Suppose I should shout out, and they should
+hear, apparently coming from the fireplace, 'You are discovered.
+Thank you for telling me all your plans, but I am prepared for
+them already.' What do you suppose they would--"
+
+Garrick stopped short.
+
+From the vocaphone had come a sound like the ringing of a bell.
+
+"Sh!" whispered Lucille hoarsely. "Here she comes now. Didn't I
+tell you? Into the next room!"
+
+A moment later came a knock at a door and Lucille's silken rustle
+as she hurried to open it.
+
+"How do you do, Lucille?" we heard a sweetly tremulous voice
+repeated by the faithful little vocaphone.
+
+"Comment vous portez-vous, Mademoiselle?"
+
+"Tres bien."
+
+"Mademoiselle honours her poor Lucille beyond her dreams. Will you
+not be seated here in this easy chair?"
+
+"My God!" exclaimed Garrick, starting back from the vocaphone.
+"She is there alone. Mrs. de Lancey is not with her. Oh, if we
+could only have prevented this!"
+
+I had recognized, too, even in the mechanical reproduction, the
+voice of Violet Winslow. It came as a shock. Even though I had
+been expecting some such thing for hours, still the reality meant
+just as much, perhaps more.
+
+Independent, self-reliant, Violet Winslow had gone alone on an act
+of mercy and charity, and it had taken her into a situation full
+of danger with her faithless maid.
+
+At once I was alive to the situation. All the stories of
+kidnappings and white slavery that I had ever read rioted through
+my head. I felt like calling out a warning. Garrick had his finger
+on the switch.
+
+"Since I have been ill, Mademoiselle, I have been doing some
+embroidery--handkerchiefs--are they not pretty?"
+
+It was coming. There was not time for an instant's delay now.
+
+Garrick quickly depressed the switch.
+
+Clear as a bell his voice rang out.
+
+"Miss Winslow--this is Garrick. Don't let her get that
+handkerchief under your nose. Out of the door--quick. Run! Call
+for help! I shall be with you in a minute!"
+
+A little cry came out of the machine.
+
+There was a moment of startled surprise in the room below. Then
+followed a mocking laugh.
+
+"Ha! Ha! I thought you'd pull something like that, Garrick. I
+don't know where you are, but it makes no difference. There are
+many ways of getting out of this place and at one of them I hare a
+high-powered car. Violet--will go--quietly--" there were sounds of
+a struggle--"after the needle--"
+
+A scream had followed immediately after a sound of shivering glass
+through the vocaphone. It was not Violet Winslow's scream, either.
+
+"Like hell, she'll go," shouted a wildly familiar voice.
+
+There was a gruff oath.
+
+We stayed to hear no more. Garrick had already picked up the heavy
+suitcase and was running down the steps two at a time, with myself
+hard after him.
+
+Without waiting to ring the bell at 99, he dashed the suitcase
+through the plate glass of the front door, reached in and turned
+the lock. We hurried into the back room.
+
+Violet was lying across a divan and bending over her was
+Warrington.
+
+"She--she's unconscious," he gasped, weak with the exertion of his
+forcible entrance into the place and carrying from the floor to
+the divan the lovely burden which he had found in the room. "They-
+-they fled--two of them--the maid, Lucille--and a man I could not
+see."
+
+Down the street we heard a car dashing away to the sound of its
+changing gears.
+
+"She's--not--dying--is she, Garrick?" he panted bending closer
+over her.
+
+Garrick bent over, too, felt the fluttering pulse, looked into her
+dilated eyes.
+
+I saw him drop quickly on his knees beside the unconscious girl.
+He tore open the heavy suitcase and a moment later he had taken
+from it a sort of cap, at the end of a rubber tube, and had
+fastened it carefully over her beautiful, but now pale, face.
+
+"Pump!" Garrick muttered to me, quickly showing me what to do.
+
+I did, furiously.
+
+"Where did you come from?" he asked of Warrington. "I thought I
+saw someone across the street who looked like you as we came
+along, but you didn't recognise us and in a moment you were gone.
+Keep on with that pulmotor, Tom. Thank heaven I came prepared with
+it!"
+
+Eagerly I continued to supply oxygen to the girl on the divan
+before us.
+
+Garrick had stooped down and picked up both the handkerchief with
+its crushed bits of the kelene tube and near it a shattered glass
+hypodermic.
+
+"Oh, I got thinking about things, up there at Mead's," blurted out
+Warrington, "and I couldn't stand it. I should have gone crazy.
+While the doctor was out I managed to slip away and take a train
+to the city. I knew this address from the letter. I determined to
+stay around all night, if necessary. She got in before I could get
+to her, but I rang the bell and managed to get my foot in the door
+a minute later. I heard the struggle. Where were you? I heard your
+voice in here but you came through the front door."
+
+Garrick did not take time to explain. He was too busy over Violet
+Winslow.
+
+A feeble moan and a flutter of the eyelids told that she was
+coming out from the effects of the anaesthetic and the drug.
+
+"Mortimer--Mortimer!" she moaned, half conscious. "Don't let them
+take me. Oh where is--"
+
+Warrington leaned over, as Garrick removed the cap of the
+pulmotor, and gently raised her head on his arm.
+
+"It's all right--Violet," he whispered, his face close to hers as
+his warm breath fanned her now flushed and fevered cheek.
+
+She opened her eyes and vaguely understood as the mist cleared
+from her brain.
+
+Instinctively she clung to him as he pressed his lips lightly on
+her forehead, in a long passionate caress.
+
+"Get a cab, Tom," said Garrick turning his back suddenly on them
+and placing his hand on my shoulder as he edged me toward the
+hall. "It's too late to pursue that fellow, now. He's slipped
+through our fingers again--confound him!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+THE EAVESDROPPER AGAIN
+
+
+It took our combined efforts now to take care not only of Violet
+Winslow but Warrington himself, who was on the verge of collapse
+after his heroic rescue of her.
+
+I found the cab and in perhaps half an hour Miss Winslow was so
+far recovered that she could be taken to the hotel where she and
+her aunt had engaged rooms for the night.
+
+We drew up at an unfrequented side carriage entrance of the hotel
+in order to avoid the eyes of the curious and Warrington jumped
+out to assist Violet. The strain had told on him and in spite of
+his desire to take care of her, he was glad to let Garrick guide
+him to the elevator, while I took Miss Winslow's arm to assist
+her.
+
+Our first object had been to get our two invalids where they could
+have quiet and so regain their strength and we rode up in the
+elevator, unannounced, to the suite of Violet and her aunt.
+
+"For heaven's sake--Violet--what's all this?" exclaimed Mrs. de
+Lancey as we four entered the room.
+
+It was the first time we had seen the redoubtable Aunt Emma. She
+was a large woman, well past middle age, and must have been
+handsome, rather than pretty, when she was younger. Everything
+about Mrs. de Lancey was correct, absolutely correct. Her dress
+looked like a form into which she had been poured, every line and
+curve being just as it should be, having "set" as if she had been
+made of reinforced concrete. In short, she was a woman of "force."
+
+An incursion such as we made seemed to pain her correct soul
+acutely. And yet, I fancied that underneath the marble exterior
+there was a heart and that secretly she was both proud and jealous
+of her dainty niece.
+
+Violet sank into a chair and Garrick deposited Warrington,
+thoroughly exhausted, on a couch.
+
+Mrs. de Lancey looked sternly at Warrington, as though in some way
+he might be responsible. I could not help feeling that she had a
+peculiar sense of conscientiousness about him, that she was just a
+bit more strict in gauging him than she would have been if he had
+not been the wealthy young Mr. Warrington whom scores and hundreds
+of mothers and guardians in society would have welcomed for the
+sake of marriageable daughters no matter how black and glaring his
+faults. I was glad to see the way Warrington took it. He seemed to
+want to rest not on the merits of the Warrington blood nor the
+Warrington gold, but on plain Mortimer Warrington himself.
+
+"What HAS happened, Violet?" repeated Mrs. de Lancey.
+
+Violet had, woman-like, in spite of her condition caught the stern
+look that her aunt had shot at Warrington.
+
+"Nothing, now," she replied with a note of defiance. "Lucille--
+seems to have been a--a bad woman--friendly with bad men. Mr.
+Garrick overheard a plot to carry me off and telephoned Mortimer.
+Fortunately when Mortimer went up home to warn us, he found the
+letter and knew where I was going to-night. Ill as he was, he came
+all the way to the city, followed me into that house, saved me--
+even before Mr. Garrick could get there."
+
+Violet's duenna was considerably mollified, though she tried hard
+not to admit it. Garrick seized the opportunity and poured forth a
+brief but connected story of what had happened.
+
+"Well," exclaimed Mrs. de Lancey as he finished, "you children
+ought to be very thankful it isn't worse. Violet, I think I'll
+call up the house physician. You certainly need a doctor. And as
+for you, Mortimer,--you can't go to your apartment. Violet tells
+me it is all burned out. There's an empty suite across the hall.
+I'll telephone the room clerk and engage it for you. And you need
+a doctor, too. Now--there's going to be no more foolishness.
+You're both going to stay right here in this hotel until you're
+all right. Your mother and I were great friends, Mortimer, when we
+were girls. I--you must let me PLAY mother--for her sake."
+
+I had been right about Mrs. de Lancey. Her voice softened and I
+saw a catch in Warrington's throat, too, at the mention of the
+mother he remembered only hazily as a small boy.
+
+Violet and Warrington exchanged glances. I fancied the wireless
+said, "We've won the old lady over, at last," for Warrington
+continued to look at her, while she blushed a bit, then dropped
+her eyes to hide a happy tear.
+
+Mrs. de Lancey was bustling about and I felt sure that in another
+minute every available bellhop in the hotel would be at work. As
+Warrington might have said in his slang, "Action is her middle
+name."
+
+Garrick rose and bade our two patients a hasty good-night,
+tactfully forgetting to be offended by their lack of interest now
+in anything except each other.
+
+"I doubt if they get much chance to be alone--not with that woman
+mothering them," he smiled to me, drawing me toward the door.
+"Don't let's spoil this chance."
+
+Mrs. de Lancey was busy in the next room, as we stopped to say
+good-bye to her.
+
+"I--I can't talk to you--now, Mr. Garrick," she cried, with a
+sudden, unwonted show of emotion, taking both his hands in hers.
+"You--you've saved my girl--there--there's nothing in this world
+you could have done for me--greater."
+
+"Mrs. de Lancey," replied Garrick, deftly changing the subject,
+"there's just one thing. I'm afraid you are--have been, I mean,--a
+little hard on Mr. Warrington. He isn't what you think--"
+
+"Mr. Garrick," she returned, in a sudden burst of confidence, "I'm
+afraid you, too, misunderstand me. I am not hard on the boy. But,
+remember. I knew his mother and father--intimately. Think of it,
+sir--the responsibilities that rest on that young man. Do you
+wonder that I--I want him better than others? Don't you see--that
+is why I want to hold him up to the highest standard. If Violet--
+marries him," she seemed to choke over the word,--"they must meet
+tests that ordinary people never know. Don't you understand? I've
+seen other young men and other young women in our circle--they
+were our babies once--I've seen them--go down. But I--I am proud.
+The Winslows, yes, and the Warringtons, they,--they SHAN'T go
+down--not while I have an ounce of strength or a grain of sanity.
+Nothing--nothing but the best that is in us--counts."
+
+I think Mrs. de Lancey and Garrick understood each other perfectly
+after that. He said nothing, in fact did not need to say anything,
+for he looked it.
+
+"I feel that I can safely resign my job as guardian," was all he
+remarked, finally. "Neither of them could be in better hands.
+Only, keep that boy quiet a few days. You can do it better than I
+can--you and Miss Winslow. Trust me to do the rest."
+
+A moment later we were passing out through the hotel lobby, as
+Garrick glanced at his watch.
+
+"A wonderful woman, after all," he mused, in the manner of one who
+revises an estimate formed hastily on someone else's hearsay.
+"Well, it's too late to do anything more to-night. I suppose those
+papers are printed down at the Star. We'll stop and get them in
+the morning. Did you recognise the voice over the vocaphone?"
+
+"I can't say I did," I confessed.
+
+"Perhaps you aren't used to it and things sound too metallic to
+you. But I did. It was the Chief."
+
+"I suspected as much," I replied. "Where do you suppose he went?"
+
+Garrick shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"I doubt whether we could find him in New York to-night," he
+answered, slowly. "I think he must feel by this time that the town
+is getting too hot for him."
+
+There was nothing that I could say, and I played the part
+admirably.
+
+"Come," he decided, as he turned from the hotel in the direction,
+now, of our apartment. "Let's snatch a little rest. We'll need it
+to-morrow for the final spurt."
+
+Tired and exhausted though I was I cannot say that I slept. At
+least, it may have been physical rest that I got. Certainly my
+mind never stopped in its dream play, as the kaleidoscopic stream
+of events passed before me, now in their true form, now in the
+fantastic shapes that constitute one of the most interesting
+studies of the modern psychology.
+
+I was glad when I heard Garrick stirring in his room in the early
+daylight and heard him call out, "Are you awake, Tom? There are
+some things I want to attend to, while you drop into the Star for
+those papers. I'm afraid you'll have to breakfast alone. Meet me
+at my office as soon as you can."
+
+He was off a few minutes later, as fresh as though he had been on
+a vacation instead of plunged into the fight of his life. I
+followed him, more leisurely, and then rode down in the infernal
+jam in the subway to execute his commission.
+
+Then for an hour or two I fidgeted impatiently in his office
+waiting for him, until finally he came downtown in the racing car
+which Warrington had placed at his disposal.
+
+He said nothing, but it was all the same to me. I had reached that
+nervous state where I craved something doing, as a drug-fiend
+craves the dope that sets his brain on fire again.
+
+I did not ask where he was going, for I knew it intuitively, and
+it was not long before we were again in the part of the city where
+the gangster's garage was located.
+
+We stopped and Garrick beckoned to an urchin, a couple of blocks
+below the garage.
+
+"Do you want to make a dollar, kid?" he asked, jingling four
+quarters enticingly.
+
+The boy's eyes never left the fist that held the tempting bait.
+"Betcherlife," he answered.
+
+"Well, then," instructed Garrick, "take these newspapers. I don't
+want you to sell any of them on the street. But when you come to
+that garage over there--see it?--I want you to yell, 'Extra--
+special extra! All about the great gambling exposure. Warrants
+out!' Just go in there. They'll buy, all right. And if you say a
+word about anyone giving you these papers to sell--I'll chase you
+and get back this dollar to the last cent. You'll go to the Gerry
+Society--get me?"
+
+The boy did. The bait was as alluring as the threat terrible.
+After Garrick had given him final instructions not to start with
+the papers for at least five minutes, we slipped quietly around
+the next street and came out near the Old Tavern, but not in front
+of it.
+
+Garrick left the car--I had been riding almost on the mud guard--
+in charge of Warrington's man, who was to appear to be tinkering
+with the engine as an excuse for waiting there, and to keep an eye
+on anything that happened down the street.
+
+We made our way into our room at the Tavern with more than
+ordinary caution, for fear that something might have been
+discovered. Apparently, however, the discovery of one detectaphone
+had been enough to disarm further suspicion, and the garage keeper
+had not thought it necessary to examine the telephone wires to see
+whether they had been tampered with in any way. The wire which he
+had thought led to the warehouse had seemed quite sufficient to
+explain everything.
+
+In the room which we had used so much, we found the other
+detectaphone working splendidly. Garrick picked it up.
+
+By the sound, evidently, someone in the garage was overhauling a
+car. It may have been that they were fixing one up so that its
+rightful owner would never recognize it, or they may have been
+getting ready to take one out. There was no way of determining.
+
+We could hear one of the workmen helping about the car, a man whom
+we had listened to when the instrument first introduced us to the
+place. The second machine, connected with the telephone, did not
+transmit quite as clearly as the broken detective device had done,
+but it served and, besides, we could both hear through this and
+could confirm anything that might be indistinct to either of us
+alone.
+
+"The Chief has gone up-state," remarked Garrick, piecing together
+the conversation where we had broken into it.
+
+"We had to hustle to make that boat," remarked a voice which I
+recognised as that of one of the men.
+
+"But she got off all right, didn't she?"
+
+"Sure--he had the tickets and everything, and her baggage had
+already gone aboard."
+
+"That's Lucille, I suppose," supplied Garrick. "No doubt part of
+her bribe for getting Miss Winslow into their power was free
+passage back to France. We can't stop to take up her case, yet."
+
+"My--but the Chief was mad," continued the voice of the man who
+must have been not only a machinist but a chauffeur when occasion
+demanded. "He had a package of letters. I don't know what they
+were--looked as if they might be from some woman."
+
+"What did he do with them?" asked the Boss in a tone that showed
+that he knew something, at least, about them already.
+
+"Why, he was so mad after that fellow Garrick and the other fellow
+beat him out, that when we went down along West Street to the boat
+with that other woman, he tore them up and threw them in the
+river."
+
+"Did he say anything?"
+
+"Why, I tell you he was mad. He tore 'em up and threw them in the
+river. I think he said there wasn't a damn thing in 'em except a
+lot of mush, anyhow."
+
+An amused smile crossed Garrick's face as he added,
+parenthetically, "Good-bye to Warrington's love letters that they
+took from his safe."
+
+"At least there has been nothing they managed to get that night of
+the fire that they have been able to use against Warrington," I
+remarked, with satisfaction.
+
+"Listen," cautioned Garrick. "What's that they are saying? Someone
+has told the Boss--he's talking--that they can go over Dillon's
+head and get back all the gambling paraphernalia? Well, I've been
+there, at the raided place, to-day, and it doesn't look so. The
+stuff has all been taken down to headquarters. Ah, so that is the
+game that is in the wind, is it? Get it all back by a court order
+and open somewhere else. Here's our boy."
+
+The improvised newsboy had apparently stuck his head in the door
+as he had been instructed, for we could hear them greet him with a
+growl, until he yelled lustily, "Extry, special extry! All about
+the big gambling exposure! Warrants out! Extry!"
+
+"Hey, you kid," came a voice from the detectaphone, "let's see
+that paper. What is it--the Star? Well, I'll be--! Read that.
+Someone's snitched to the district attorney, I'll bet. That'll
+make the Chief sore, all right--and he's 'way up in the country,
+too. I don't dare wire it to him. No, someone'll have to take a
+copy of this paper up there to him and tip him off. He'll be
+redheaded if he doesn't know about it. He was the last time
+anything happened. Hurry up. Finish with this car. I'll take it
+myself."
+
+Garrick laughed, almost gleefully.
+
+"The plant has begun to work," he cried. "We'll wait here until
+just before he's ready to start. Three of us around our car on the
+street are too many. He must be getting ready for a long run."
+
+"How much gas is there in this tank?" the gruff voice of the Boss
+demanded. "You dummy--not two gallons! No, you finish what you're
+doing. I'll fill it myself. There isn't any time for fooling now."
+
+There was the steady trickle of the stream of gasoline as he drew
+it.
+
+"Any extra tires? What! Not a new shoe in the place? Give me a
+couple of the best of those old ones. Never mind. Here are two
+over by the telephone. Say, what the devil is this wire back here-
+-cut in on the telephone wire? Well,--rip it out! That's some more
+of that fellow Garrick's work. We got rid of one thing the other
+night. Well, thank heaven, I didn't have any telephone calls to-
+day. While I'm gone, you go over this place thoroughly. God knows
+how many other things he may have put in here."
+
+"Confound it!" muttered Garrick, as a pair of pliers made our
+second detectaphone die with an expiring gasp in the middle of a
+sentence of profanity.
+
+"Come on, Tom," he shouted.
+
+There was no use now in remaining any longer in the room.
+Gathering up the receiving apparatus, Garrick quickly carried it
+down and tossed it into the waiting car around the corner. Then he
+sent Warrington's man to hang around, up the street, and watch
+what was going on at the garage.
+
+Garrick was to drive the car himself, and we were going to leave
+Warrington's man behind. We could tell by the actions of the man
+as he stood down the street that something was taking place at the
+garage.
+
+We could hear a horn blow, and I knew that the doors had opened
+and a big car had been backed out, slowly. Our own engine was
+running perfectly in spite of the seeming trouble with which we
+had covered up our delay. Garrick jumped in at the wheel, and I
+followed. The man on the corner was signalling that the car was
+going in the opposite direction. We leaped ahead.
+
+As the big car ahead slipped along eastward, we followed at such a
+distance as not to attract attention. It was easy enough to do
+that, but not so easy to avoid getting tied up among the trucks
+laden with foodstuffs of every description which blocked the
+streets over in this part of town.
+
+Where the car ahead was bound, we did not know, but I could see
+that the driver was a stocky fellow, who slouched down into his
+seat, and handled his car almost as if it had been a mere toy. It
+was, I felt positive, the man whom McBirney had reported one night
+about the neighbourhood of Longacre Square in the car which had
+once been Warrington's. This, at least, was a different car, I
+knew. Now I realised the wisdom of allowing this man, whom they
+called the Boss, to go free. Under the influence of Garrick's
+"plant," he was to lead us to the right trail to the Chief.
+
+It was easier now to follow the car since it had worked its way
+into lower Fifth Avenue. On uptown it went. We hung on doggedly in
+the mass of traffic going north at this congested hour.
+
+At last it turned into Forty-seventh Street. It was stopping at
+the ladies' gambling joint, apparently to confirm the news. I had
+thought that the place was closed, until the present trouble blew
+over, but it seemed that there must be someone there. The Boss was
+evidently well known, for he was immediately admitted.
+
+Garrick did not stop. He kept on around the corner to the raided
+poolroom on the next street. Dillon's man, who had been stationed
+there to watch the place, bowed and admitted him.
+
+"I'm going to throw it into him good, this time," remarked
+Garrick, as he entered. "I've been planning this stunt for an
+emergency--and it's here. Now for the big scare!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+THE SPEAKING ARC
+
+
+"Looks pretty deserted here," remarked Garrick to Dillon's man,
+who had accompanied us from the door into the now deserted
+gambling den.
+
+"Yes," he grinned, "there's not much use in keeping me here since
+they took all the stuff to headquarters. Now and then one of the
+old rounders who has been out of town and hasn't heard of the raid
+comes in. You should see their faces change when they catch sight
+of my uniform. They never stop to ask questions," he chuckled.
+"They just beat it."
+
+I was wondering how the police regarded Garrick's part in the
+matter, and while Garrick was busy I asked, "Have you seen
+Inspector Herman lately?"
+
+The man laughed.
+
+"What's the matter?" I asked, "Is he sore at having the raid
+pulled off over his head?"
+
+"Sore?" the roundsman repeated, "Oh, not a bit, not a bit. He
+enjoyed it. It gave him so much credit," the man added
+sarcastically, "especially after he fell down in getting the
+evidence against that other place around the corner."
+
+"Was that his case, too?" I asked.
+
+"Sure," replied the policeman. "Didn't you know that? That Rena
+Taylor was working under his orders when she was killed. They tell
+me at headquarters he's working overtime on the case and other
+things connected with it. He hasn't said much, but there's someone
+he is after--I know. Mark my words. Herman is always most
+dangerous when he's quiet. The other day he was in here, said
+there was a man who used to be seen here a good deal in the palmy
+days, who had disappeared. I don't know who he was, but Herman
+asked me to keep a particular lookout to see if he came back for
+any purpose. There's someone he suspects, all right."
+
+I wondered why the man told me. He must have seen, by the look on
+my face, that I was thinking that.
+
+"I wouldn't tell it to everybody," he added confidentially, "only,
+most of us don't like Herman any too well. He's always trying to
+hog it all--gets all the credit if we pick up a clew, and,--well,
+most of us wouldn't be exactly disappointed to see Mr. Garrick
+succeed--that's all."
+
+Garrick was calling from the back room to me, and I excused
+myself, while the man went back to his post at the front door.
+Garrick carefully closed the door into the room.
+
+While I had been busy getting the copies of the faked edition of
+the Star, which had so alarmed the owner of the garage and had set
+things moving rapidly, Garrick had also been busy, in another
+direction. He had explored not only the raided gambling den, but
+the little back yard which ran all the way to an extension on the
+rear of the house in the next street, in which was situated the
+woman's poolroom.
+
+He had explored, also, the caved-in tunnel enough to make
+absolutely certain that his suspicions had been correct in the
+first place, and that it ran to this other joint, from which the
+gamblers had made their escape. That had satisfied him, however,
+and he had not unearthed the remains of the tunnel or taken any
+action in the matter yet. Something else appeared to interest him
+much more at the present moment.
+
+"I found," he said when he was sure that we were alone, "that the
+feed wire of the arc light that burns all the time in that main
+room over there in the place on Forty-seventh Street--you recall
+it?--runs in through the back of the house."
+
+He was examining two wires which, from his manner, I inferred were
+attached to this feed wire, leading to it from the room in which
+we now were. What the purpose of the connection was I had no idea.
+Perhaps, I thought, it was designed to get new evidence against
+the place, though I could not guess how it was to be done. So far,
+except for what we had seen on our one visit, there had appeared
+to be no real evidence against the place, except, possibly, that
+which had died with the unfortunate Rena Taylor.
+
+"What's that?" I asked, as Garrick produced a package from a
+closet where he had left it, earlier in the day.
+
+I saw, after he had unwrapped it, that it was a very powerful
+microphone and a couple of storage cells. He attached it to the
+wire leading out to the electric light feed wire.
+
+"I had provided it to be used in an emergency," he replied. "I
+think the time has come sooner than I anticipated."
+
+I watched him curiously, wondering what it would be that would
+come next.
+
+There followed a most amazing series of groanings and mutterings
+from Garrick. I could not imagine what he was up to. The whole
+proceeding seemed so insane that, for the moment, it left me
+nonplussed and speechless.
+
+Garrick caught the puzzled look on my face.
+
+"What's the matter?" he laughed heartily, cutting out the
+microphone momentarily and seeming to enjoy the joke to the
+utmost.
+
+"Would you prefer to be sent to a State or a private institution?"
+I rasped, testily. "What insanity is all this? It sounds like the
+fee-faw-fum and mummery of a voodoo man."
+
+"Come, now, Tom," he rejoined, argumentatively. "You know as well
+as I do what sort of people those gamblers are--superstitious as
+the deuce. I did this once before to-day. This is a good time to
+do it again, before they persuade themselves that there is nothing
+in that story which we printed in the Star. That fellow is in
+there now, probably in that room where we were, and it is possible
+that they may reassure him and settle his fears. Now, just suppose
+a murder had been committed in a room, and you knew it, and heard
+groanings and mutterings--from nowhere, just in the air, about
+you, overhead--what would you do, if you were inclined to be
+superstitious?"
+
+Before I could answer, he had resumed the antics which before I
+had found so inexplicable.
+
+"Cut out and run, I suppose," I replied. "But what has that to do
+with the case? The groanings are here--not there. You haven't been
+able to get in over there to attach anything, have you? What do
+you mean?"
+
+"No," he admitted, "but did you ever hear what you could do with a
+microphone, a rheostat, and a small transformer coil if you
+attached them properly to a direct-current electric lighting
+circuit? No? Well, an amateur with a little knowledge of
+electricity could do it. The thing is easily constructed, and the
+result is a most complicated matter."
+
+"Well?" I queried, endeavouring to follow him.
+
+"The electric arc," he continued, "isn't always just a silent
+electric light. You know that. You've heard them make noises.
+Under the right conditions such a light can be made to talk--the
+'speaking arc,' as Professor Duddell calls it. In other words, an
+arc light can be made to act as a telephone receiver."
+
+I could hardly believe the thing possible, but Garrick went on
+explaining.
+
+"You might call it the arcophone, I suppose. The scientific fact
+of the matter is that the arc is sensitive to very small
+variations of the current. These variations may run over a wide
+range of frequency. That suggested to Duddell that a direct-
+current arc might be used as a telephone receiver. All that you
+need is to add a microphone current to the main arc current. The
+arc reproduces sounds and speech distinctly, loud enough, even, to
+be heard several feet away from the light."
+
+He had cut out the microphone again while he was talking to me. He
+switched it in again with the words, "Now, get ready, Tom. Just
+one more; then we must hurry around in that car of ours and watch
+the fun."
+
+This time he was talking into the microphone. In a most solemn,
+sepulchral voice he repeated, "Let the slayer of Rena Taylor
+beware. She will be avenged! Beware! It will be a life for a
+life!"
+
+Three times he repeated it, to make sure that it would carry.
+Then, grabbing up his hat and coat, he dashed out of the room,
+past the surprised policeman at the door, and took the steps in
+front of the house almost at a bound.
+
+We hardly had time to enter our own car and reach the corner of
+Forty-seventh Street, when the big black automobile which we had
+followed uptown shot by almost before the traffic man at the
+crossing could signal a clear road.
+
+"We must hang onto him!" cried Garrick, turning to follow. "Did
+you catch a glimpse of his face? It's our man, the go-between, the
+keeper of the garage whom they call the Boss. He was as pale as if
+he had seen a ghost. I guess he did think he heard one. Between
+the news-paper fake and the speaking arc, I think we've got him
+going. There he is."
+
+It was an exciting ride, for the man ahead was almost reckless,
+though he seemed to know instinctively still just when to put on
+bursts of speed and when to slow down to escape being arrested for
+speeding. We hung on, managing to keep something less than a
+couple of blocks behind him. It was evident that he was making for
+the ferry uptown across the river to New Jersey, and, taking
+advantage of this knowledge, Garrick was able to drop back a
+little, and approach the ferry by going down a different street so
+that there was no hint yet that we were following him.
+
+By judicious jockeying we succeeded in getting on the boat on the
+opposite side from the car we were following, and in such a way
+that we could get off as soon as he could. We managed to cross the
+ferry, and, in the general scramble that attends the landing, to
+negotiate the hill on the other side of the river without
+attracting the attention of the man in the other car. His one idea
+seemed to be speed, and he had no suspicion, apparently, that in
+his flight he was being followed.
+
+As we bowled along, forced by circumstances to take the fellow's
+dust, Garrick would quietly chuckle now and then to himself.
+
+"Fancy what he must have thought," he chortled. "First the
+newspaper that sent him scurrying up to the gambling place for
+more news, or to spread the alarm, and then, while they were
+sitting about, perhaps while someone was talking about the strange
+voices they had already heard this morning, suddenly the voice
+from nowhere. Can you blame them if they thought it was a warning
+from the grave?"
+
+Whatever actually had happened in the gambling house, the
+practical effect was all that even Garrick could have desired.
+Hour after hour, we hung to that car ahead, leaving behind the
+cities, and passing along the regular road through town after
+town.
+
+Sometimes the road was well oiled, and we would have to drop back
+a bit to escape too close observation. Then we would strike a
+stretch where it was dry. The clouds of dust served to hide us. On
+we went until it was apparent that the man was now headed at least
+in the direction of Tuxedo.
+
+We now passed the boundary between New York state and New Jersey
+and soon after that came to the house of Dr. Mead where Warrington
+had been convalescing until Garrick's warning had brought him,
+still half ill, down to the city to protect Violet Winslow. In
+fact, the road seemed replete with interesting reminiscences of
+the case, for a few miles back was the spot where Rena Taylor's
+body had been found, as well as the garage whence had come the
+rumour of the blood-stained car. There was no chance to stop and
+tell the surprised Dr. Mead just what had become of his patient
+and we had to trust that Warrington would explain his sudden
+disappearance himself. In fact, Garrick scarcely looked to either
+the right or left, so intent was he on not missing for an instant
+the car that was leading us in this long chase.
+
+On we sped, around the bend where Warrington had been held up. It
+was a nasty curve, even in the daytime.
+
+"I think this fellow ahead noticed the place," gritted Garrick,
+leaning forward. "He seemed to slow up a bit as he turned. I hope
+he didn't notice us as he turned his head back slightly."
+
+It made no difference, if he did, for, the curve passed, he was
+evidently feeding the gas faster than ever. We turned the curve
+also, the forward car something more than a quarter of a mile
+ahead of us.
+
+"We must take a chance and close up on him," said Garrick, as he,
+too, accelerated his speed, not a difficult thing to do with the
+almost perfect racer of Warrington's. "He may turn off at a
+crossroad at any time, now."
+
+Still our man kept on, bowling northward along the fine state road
+that led to one of the richest parts of the country.
+
+He came to the attractive entrance to Tuxedo Park. Almost, I had
+expected him to turn in. At least I should not have been surprised
+if he had done so.
+
+However, he kept on northward, past the entrance to the Park. We
+hung doggedly on.
+
+Where was he going? I wondered whether Garrick might have been
+wrong, after all. Half a mile lengthened into a mile. Still he was
+speeding on.
+
+But Garrick had guessed right. Sure enough, at a cross road, the
+other car slowed down, then quickly swung around, off the main
+road.
+
+"What are you going to do?" I asked Garrick quickly. "If we turn
+also, that will be too raw. Surely he'll notice that."
+
+"Going to stop," cried Garrick, taking in the situation instantly.
+"Come on, Tom, jump out. We'll fake a little tire trouble, in case
+he should look around and see us stopping here. I'll keep the
+engine running."
+
+We went back and stood ostentatiously by the rear wheel. Garrick
+bent over it, keeping his eye fixed on the other car, now perhaps
+half a mile along on the narrow crossroad.
+
+It neared the top of a hill on the other side of the valley across
+which the road wound like a thin brown line, then dipped down over
+the crest and was lost on the other side.
+
+Garrick leaped back into our car and I followed. He turned the
+bend almost on two wheels, and let her out as we swept down a
+short hill and then took the gentle incline on high speed, eating
+up the distance as though it had been inches instead of nearly a
+mile.
+
+A short distance from the top of the hill, Garrick applied the
+brake, just in time so that the top of our car would not be
+visible to one who had passed on down the next incline into the
+valley beyond.
+
+"Let us walk up the rest of the way," he said quickly, "and see
+what is on the other side of this hill."
+
+We did so cautiously. Far down below us we could see the car which
+we had been trailing all the way up from the city, threading its
+way along the country road. We watched it, and as we did so, it
+slowed up and turned out, running up a sort of lane that led to
+what looked like a trim little country estate.
+
+The car had stopped at an unpretentious house at the end of the
+lane. The driver got out and walked up to the back door, which
+seemed to be stealthily opened to admit him.
+
+"Good!" exclaimed Garrick. "At last we are on a hot trail!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+THE SIEGE OF THE BANDITS
+
+
+As we watched from the top of the hill, I wondered what Garrick's
+next move was to be. Surely he would not attempt to investigate
+the place yet. In fact, there seemed to be nothing that could be
+done now, as long as it was day-light, for any movement in this
+half-open country would have been viewed with suspicion by the
+occupants of the little house in the valley, whoever they might
+be.
+
+We could not help viewing the place with a sort of awe. What
+secrets did the cottage hide, nestled down there in the valley
+among these green hills? Often I had heard that the gunmen of New
+York, when hard pressed, sought refuge in the country districts
+and mountains within a few miles of the city. There was something
+incongruous about it. Nature seemed so perfectly peaceful here
+that it was the very antithesis of those sections of the city in
+which he had found the gunman, whoever he was, indulging in
+practically every crime and vice of decadent civilization.
+
+"So--the one they call the Boss has led up to the refuge of the
+Chief, the scientific gunman, at last," Garrick exclaimed, with
+marked satisfaction, as we turned and walked slowly back again to
+our car.
+
+"Yes," I assented, "and now that we have found them--what are we
+to do with them?"
+
+"It is still early in the day," Garrick remarked, looking at his
+watch. "They suspect no trouble up here. Here they evidently feel
+safe. No doubt they think we are still hunting for them
+fruitlessly in New York. I think we can afford to leave them here
+for a few hours. At any rate, I feel that I must return to the
+city. I must see Dillon, and then drop into my office, if we are
+to accomplish anything against them."
+
+He had turned the car around and we made our way back to the main
+road, and then southward again, taking up in earnest the long
+return trip to the city and covering the distance in Warrington's
+racer in a much shorter time, now that we had not to follow
+another car and keep under cover. It was late in the afternoon,
+however, when we arrived and Garrick went directly to police
+headquarters where he held a hasty conference with Dillon.
+
+Dillon was even more excited than we were when he learned how far
+we had gone in tracing out the scant clews that we had uncovered.
+As Garrick unfolded his plan, the commissioner immediately began
+to make arrangements to accompany us out into the country that
+night.
+
+I did not hear all that was said, as Garrick and Dillon laid out
+their plans, but I could see that they were in perfect accord.
+
+"Very well," I overheard Garrick, as we parted. "I shall go out in
+the car again. You will be up on the train?"
+
+"Yes--on the seven-fifty," returned Dillon. "You needn't worry
+about my end of it. I'll be there with the goods--just the thing
+that you want. I have it."
+
+"Fine," exclaimed Garrick, "I have to make a call at the office.
+I'll start as soon as I can, and try to beat you out."
+
+They parted in good humour, for Dillon's passion for adventure was
+now thoroughly aroused and I doubt if we could have driven him off
+with a club, figuratively speaking.
+
+At the office Garrick tarried only long enough to load the car
+with some paraphernalia which he had there, much of which, I knew,
+he had brought back with him after his study of police methods
+abroad. There were three coats of a peculiar texture, which he
+took from a wardrobe, a huge arrangement which looked like a
+reflector, a little thing that looked merely like the mouthpiece
+of a telephone transmitter, and a large heavy package which might
+have been anything from a field gun to a battering ram.
+
+It was twilight when we arrived at the nearest railroad station to
+the little cottage in the valley, after another run up into the
+country in the car. Dillon who had come up by train to meet us,
+according to the arrangement with Garrick, was already waiting,
+and with him was one of the most trustworthy and experienced of
+the police department chauffeurs. Garrick looked about at the few
+loungers curiously, but there did not seem to be any of them who
+took any suspicious interest in new arrivals.
+
+We four managed to crowd into a car built only for two, and
+Garrick started off. A few minutes later we arrived at the top of
+the hill from which we had already viewed the mysterious house
+earlier in the day. It was now quite dark. We had met no one since
+turning off into the crossroad, and could hear no sound except the
+continuous music of the night insects.
+
+Just before crossing the brow of the last hill, we halted and
+Garrick turned out all the lights on the car. He was risking
+nothing that might lead to discovery yet. With the engine muffled
+down, we coasted slowly down the other side of the hill into the
+shadowy valley. There was no moon yet and we had to move
+cautiously, for there was only the faint light of the sky and
+stars to guide us.
+
+What was the secret of that unpretentious little house below us?
+We peered out in the gathering blackness eagerly in the direction
+where we knew it must be, nestled among the trees. Whoever it
+sheltered was still there, and we could locate the place by a
+single gleam that came from an upper window. Whether there were
+lights below, we could not tell. If there were they must have been
+effectively concealed by blinds and shades.
+
+"We'll stop here," announced Garrick at last when we had reached a
+point on the road a few hundred yards from the house.
+
+He ran the car carefully off the road and into a little clearing
+in a clump of dark trees. We got out and pushed stealthily forward
+through the underbrush to the edge of the woods. There, on the
+slope, just a little way below us, stood the house of mystery.
+
+Garrick and Dillon were busily conferring in an undertone, as I
+helped them bring the packages one after another from the car to
+the edge of the woods. Garrick had slipped the little telephone
+mouthpiece into his pocket, and was carrying the huge reflector
+carefully, so that it might not be injured in the darkness. I had
+the heavy coats of the peculiar texture over my arm, while Dillon
+and his man struggled along over the uncertain pathway, carrying
+between them the heavy, long, cylindrical package, which must have
+weighed some sixty pounds or so.
+
+Garrick had selected as the site of our operations a corner of the
+grove where a very large tree raised itself as a landmark,
+silhouetted in black against a dark sky. We deposited the stuff
+there as he directed.
+
+"Now, Jim," ordered Dillon, walking back to the car with his man,
+"I want you to take the car and go back along this road until you
+reach the top of the hill."
+
+I could not hear the rest of the order, but it seemed that he was
+to meet someone who had preceded us on foot from the railway
+station and who must be about due to arrive. I did not know who or
+what it might be, but even the thought of someone else made me
+feel safer, for in so ticklish a piece of business as this, in
+dealing with at least a pair of desperate men such as we knew them
+to be in the ominously quiet little house, a second and even a
+third line of re-enforcements was not, I felt, amiss.
+
+Garrick in the meantime had set to work putting into position the
+huge reflector. At first I thought it might be some method of
+throwing a powerful light on the house. But on closer examination
+I saw that it could not be a light. The reflector seemed to have
+been constructed so that in the focus was a peculiar coil of
+something, and to the ends of this coil, Garrick attached two
+wires which he fastened to an instrument, cylindrical, with a
+broadened end, like a telephone receiver.
+
+Dillon, who had returned by this time, after sending his chauffeur
+back on his errand, appeared very much interested in what Garrick
+was doing.
+
+"Now, Tom," said Garrick, "while I am fixing this thing, I wish
+you would help me by undoing that large package carefully."
+
+While I was thus engaged, he continued talking with Dillon in a
+low voice, evidently explaining to him the use to which he wished
+the large reflector put.
+
+I was working quickly to undo the large package, and as the
+wrappings finally came off, I could see that it was some bulky
+instrument that looked like a huge gun, or almost a mortar. It had
+a sort of barrel that might have been, say, forty inches in
+length, and where the breechlock should have been on an ordinary
+gun was a great hemispherical cavity. There was also a peculiar
+arrangement of springs and wheels in the butt.
+
+"The coats?" he asked, as he took from the wrappings of the
+package several rather fragile looking tubes.
+
+I had laid them down near us and handed them over to him. They
+were quite heavy, and had a rough feel.
+
+"So-called bullet-proof cloth," explained Garrick. "At close
+range, quite powerful lunges of a dagger or knife recoil from it,
+and at a distance ordinary bullets rebound from it, flattened.
+We'll try it, anyway. It will do no harm, and it may do good. Now
+we are ready, Dillon."
+
+"Wait just a minute," cautioned Dillon. "Let me see first whether
+that chauffeur has returned. He can run that engine so quietly
+that I myself can't hear it."
+
+He had disappeared into the darkness toward the road, where he had
+despatched the car a few minutes before. Evidently the chauffeur
+had been successful in his mission, for Dillon was back directly
+with a hasty, "Yes, all right. He's backing the car around so that
+he can run it out on the road instantly in either direction. He'll
+be here in a moment."
+
+Garrick had in the meantime been roughly sketching on the back of
+an old envelope taken from his pocket. Evidently he had been
+estimating the distance of the house from the tree back of which
+he stood, and worked with the light of a shaded pocket flashlight.
+
+"Ready, then," he cried, jumping up and advancing to the peculiar
+instrument which I had unwrapped. He was in his element now. After
+all the weary hours of watching and preparation, here was action
+at last, and Garrick went to it like a starved man at food.
+
+First he elevated the clumsy looking instrument pointed in the
+general direction of the house. He had fixed the angle at
+approximately that which he had hastily figured out on the
+envelope. Then he took a cylinder about twelve inches long, and
+almost half as much in diameter, a huge thing, constructed, it
+seemed, of a substance that was almost as brittle as an eggshell.
+Into the large hemispherical cavity in the breech of the gun he
+shoved it. He took another quick look at the light gleaming from
+the house in the darkness ahead of us.
+
+"What is it?" I asked, indicating the "gun."
+
+"This is what is known as the Mathiot gun," he explained as he
+brought it into action, "invented by a French scientist for the
+purpose, expressly, of giving the police a weapon to use against
+the automobile bandits who entrench themselves, when cornered, in
+houses and garages, as they have done in the outskirts of Paris,
+and as some anarchists did once in a house in London."
+
+"What does it do?" asked Dillon, who had taken a great interest in
+the thing.
+
+"It throws a bomb which emits suffocating gases without risking
+the lives of the police," answered Garrick. "In spite of the
+fragility of the bombs that I have here, it has been found that
+they will penetrate a wooden door or even a thin brick partition
+before the fuse explodes them. One bomb will render a room three
+hundred feet off uninhabitable in thirty seconds. Now--watch!"
+
+He had exploded the gun by hand, striking the flat head of a
+hammer against the fulminating cap. The gun gave a bark. A low,
+whistling noise and a crash followed.
+
+"Too short," muttered Garrick, elevating the angle of the gun a
+trifle.
+
+Quite evidently someone was moving in the house. There was a
+shadow, as of someone passing between the light in the upper story
+and the window on our side of the house.
+
+Again the gun barked, and another bomb went hurtling through the
+air. This time it hit the house squarely. Another followed in
+rapid succession, and the crash of glass told that it had struck a
+window. Garrick was sending them now as fast as he could. They had
+taken effect, too, for the light was out, whether extinguished by
+gases or by the hand of someone who realized that it afforded an
+excellent mark to shoot at. Still, it made no difference, now, for
+we had the range.
+
+"The house must be full of the stifling gases," panted Garrick, as
+he stopped to wipe the perspiration from his face, after his rapid
+work, clad in the heavy coat. "No man could stand up against that.
+I wonder how our friend of the garage likes it, Tom? It is some of
+his own medicine--the Chief, I mean. He tried it on us on a small
+scale very successfully that night with his stupefying gun."
+
+"I hope one of them hit him," ground out Dillon, who had no relish
+even for the recollection of that night. "What next? Do you have
+to wait until the gases clear away before we can make a break and
+go in there?"
+
+Garrick had anticipated the question. Already he was buttoning up
+his long coat. We did the same, mechanically.
+
+"No, Dillon. You and Jim stay here," ordered Garrick. "You will
+get the signal from us what to do next. Tom, come on."
+
+He had already dashed ahead into the darkness, and I followed
+blindly, stumbling over a ploughed field, then a fence over which
+we climbed quickly, and found ourselves in the enclosure where was
+the house. I had no idea what we were running up against, but a
+dog which had been chained in the rear broke away from his
+fastening at sight of us, and ran at us with a lusty and savage
+growl. Garrick planted a shot squarely in his head.
+
+Without wasting time on any formalities, such as ringing the bell,
+we kicked and battered in the back door. We paused a moment, not
+from fear but because the odor inside was terrific. No one could
+have stayed in that house and retained his senses. One by one,
+Garrick flung open the windows, and we were forced to stick our
+heads out every few minutes in order to keep our own breath.
+
+From one room to another we proceeded, without finding anyone.
+Then we mounted to the second floor. The odour was worse there,
+but still we found no one.
+
+The light on the third floor had been extinguished, as I have
+said. We made our way toward the corner where it had been. Room
+after room we entered, but still found no one. At last we came to
+a door that was locked. Together we wrenched it open.
+
+There was surely nothing for us to fear in this room, for a bomb
+had penetrated it, and had filled it completely. As we rushed in,
+Garrick saw a figure sprawled on the floor, near the bed, in the
+corner.
+
+"Quick, Tom!" he shouted, "Open that other window. I'll attend to
+this man. He's groggy, anyhow."
+
+Garrick had dropped down on his knees and had deftly slipped a
+pair of handcuffs on the unresisting wrists of the man. Then he
+staggered to my side at the open window, for air.
+
+"Heavens--this is awful!" he gasped and sputtered. "I wonder where
+they all went?"
+
+"Who is this fellow?" I asked.
+
+"I don't know yet. I couldn't see."
+
+A moment later, together, we had dragged the unconscious man to
+the window with us, while I fanned him with my hat and Garrick was
+wetting his face with water from a pitcher of ice on the table.
+
+"Good Lord!" Garrick exclaimed suddenly, as in the fitful light he
+bent over the figure. "Do you see who it is?"
+
+I bent down too and peered more closely.
+
+It was Angus Forbes.
+
+Strange to say, here was the young gambler whom we had seen at the
+gambling joint before it was raided, the long-lost and long-sought
+Forbes who had disappeared after the raid, and from whom no one
+had yet heard a word.
+
+I did not know his story, but I knew enough to be sure that he had
+been in love with Violet himself, and, although Warrington had
+once come to his rescue and settled thousands of dollars of his
+gambling debts, was sore at Warrington for closing the gambling
+joint where he hoped ultimately to recoup his losses. More than
+that, he was probably equally sore at Warrington for winning the
+favour of the girl whose fortune might have settled his own debts,
+if he had had a free field to court her.
+
+Why was Forbes here, I asked myself. The fumes of the bombs from
+the Mathiot gun may have got into my head but, at least as far as
+I could see, they had not made my mind any the less active. I felt
+that his presence here, apparently as one of the gang, explained
+many things.
+
+Who, I reasoned, would have been more eager to "get" Warrington at
+any cost than he? I never had any love for the fellow, who had
+allowed his faults and his temptations so far to get the upper
+hand of him. I had felt a sort of pity at first, but the incident
+of the cancelled markers in the gambling joint and now the
+discovery of him here had changed that original feeling into one
+that was purely of disgust.
+
+These thoughts were coursing through my fevered brain while
+Garrick was working hard to bring him around.
+
+Suddenly a mocking voice came from the hall.
+
+"Yes, it's Forbes, all right, and much good may it do you to have
+him!"
+
+The door to the room, which opened outward, banged shut. The lock
+had been broken by us in forcing an entrance. There must have been
+two of them out in the hall, for we heard the noise and scraping
+of feet, as they piled up heavy furniture against the door,
+dragging it from the next room before we could do anything. Piece
+after piece was wedged in between our door and the opposite wall.
+
+We could hear them taunt us as they worked, and I thought I
+recognised at once the voice of the stocky keeper of the garage,
+the Boss, whom I had heard so often before over our detectaphone.
+The other voice, which seemed to me to be disguised, I found
+somewhat familiar, yet I could not place it. It must have been, I
+thought, that of the man whom we had come to know and fear under
+the appellation of the Chief.
+
+We could hear them laugh, now, as they cursed us and wished us
+luck with our capture. It was galling.
+
+Evidently, too, they had not much use for Forbes, and, indeed, at
+such a crisis I do not think he would have been much more than an
+additional piece of animated impedimenta. Dissipation had not
+added anything to the physical prowess of Forbes.
+
+With a parting volley of profanity, they stamped down the narrow
+stairs to the ground floor, and a few seconds afterward we could
+hear them back of the house, working over the machine which we had
+followed up from New York earlier in the day. Evidently there were
+several machines in the barn which served them as garage, but this
+was the handiest.
+
+They had cranked it up, and were debating which way they should
+go.
+
+"The shots came from the direction of the main road," the Boss
+said. "We had better go in the opposite direction. There may be
+more of them coming. Hurry up!"
+
+At least, it seemed, there had been only three of them in this
+refuge which they had sought up in the hills and valleys of the
+Ramapos. Of that we could now be reasonably certain. One of them
+we had captured--and had ourselves been captured into the bargain.
+
+I stuck my head out of the window to look at the other two down
+below, only to feel myself dragged unceremoniously back by
+Garrick.
+
+"What's the use of taking that risk, Tom?" he expostulated. "One
+shot from them and you would be a dead one."
+
+Fortunately they had not seen me, so intent were they on getting
+away. They had now seated themselves in the car and, as Garrick
+had suspected, could not resist delivering a parting shot at us,
+emptying the contents of an automatic blindly up at our window.
+Garrick and I were, as it. happened, busy on the opposite side of
+the room.
+
+All thought of Forbes was dropped for the present. Garrick said
+not a word but continued at work in the corner of the room by the
+other broken window.
+
+"Either they must have succeeded in getting out after the first
+shot and so escaped the fumes," muttered Garrick finally, "and hid
+in the stable, or, perhaps, they were out there at work anyhow.
+Still that makes little difference now. They must have seen us go
+in, have followed us quietly, and then caught us here."
+
+With a hasty final imprecation, the car below started forward with
+a jerk and was swallowed up in the darkness.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+THE MAN HUNT
+
+
+Here we were, locked in a little room on the top floor of the
+mysterious house. I looked out of both windows. There was no way
+to climb down and it was too far to jump, especially in the
+uncertain darkness. I threw myself at the door. It had been
+effectually braced by our captors.
+
+Garrick, in the meantime, had lighted the light again, and placed
+it by the window.
+
+Forbes, now partly recovered, was rambling along, and Garrick,
+with one eye on him and the other on something which he was
+working over in the light, was too busy to pay much attention to
+my futile efforts to find a means of escape.
+
+At first we could not make out what it was that Forbes was trying
+to tell us, but soon, as the fresh air in the room revived him,
+his voice became stronger. Apparently he recognised us and was
+trying to offer an explanation of his presence here.
+
+"He kidnapped me--brought me here," Forbes was muttering. "Three
+days--I've been shut up in this room."
+
+"Who brought you here?" I demanded sharply.
+
+"I don't know his name--man at the gambling place--after the raid-
+-said he'd take me in his car somewhere--from the other place back
+of it--last I remember--must have drugged me--woke up here--all I
+know."
+
+"You've been a prisoner, then?" I queried.
+
+"Yes," he murmured.
+
+"A likely story," I remarked, looking questioningly at Garrick who
+had been listening but had not ceased his own work, whatever it
+was. "What are you going to do, Guy? We can't stay here and waste
+time over such talk as this while they are escaping. They must be
+almost to the road now, and turning down in the opposite direction
+from Dillon and his man."
+
+Garrick said nothing. Either he was too busy solving our present
+troubles or he was, like myself, not impressed by Forbes'
+incoherent story. He continued to adjust the little instrument
+which I had seen him draw from his pocket and now recognised as
+the thing which looked like a telephone transmitter. Only, the
+back of it seemed to gleam with a curious brightness under the
+rays of the light, as he handled it.
+
+"They have somehow contrived to escape the effect of the bombs,"
+he was saying, "and have surprised us in the room on the top floor
+where the light is. We are up here with a young fellow named
+Forbes, whom we have captured. He's the young man that I saw
+several times at the gambling joint and was at dinner with
+Warrington the night when the car was stolen. He was pretty badly
+overcome by the fumes, but I've brought him around. He either
+doesn't know much or won't tell what he knows. That doesn't make
+any difference now, though. They have escaped in a car. They are
+leaving by the road. Wait. I'll see whether they have reached it
+yet. No, it's too dark to see and they have no light on the car.
+But they must have turned. They said they were going in the
+direction opposite from you."
+
+"Well?" I asked, mystified. "What of it? I know all that,
+already."
+
+"But Dillon doesn't," replied Garrick, in great excitement now. "I
+knew that we should have to have some way of communicating with
+him instantly if this fellow proved to be as resourceful as I
+believed him to be. So I thought of the radiophone or photophone
+of Dr. Alexander Graham Bell. I have really been telephoning on a
+beam of light."
+
+"Telephoning on a beam of light?" I repeated incredulously.
+
+"Yes," he explained, feeling now at liberty to talk since he had
+delivered his call for help. "You see, I talk into this
+transmitter. The simplest transmitter for this purpose is a plane
+mirror of flexible material, silvered mica or microscope glass.
+Against the back of this mirror my voice is directed. In the
+carbon transmitter of the telephone a variable electrical
+resistance is produced by the pressure on the diaphragm, based on
+the fact that carbon is not as good a conductor of electricity
+under pressure as when not. Here, the mouthpiece is just a shell
+supporting a thin metal diaphragm to which the mirror on the back
+is attached, an apparatus for transforming the air vibrations
+produced by the voice into light vibrations of the projected beam,
+which is reflected from this light here in the room. The light
+reflected is thus thrown into vibrations corresponding to those in
+the diaphragm."
+
+"And then?" I asked impatiently.
+
+"That varying beam of light shoots out of this room, and is caught
+by the huge reflector which you saw me set up at the foot of that
+tall tree which you can just see against the dark sky over there.
+That parabolic mirror gathers in the scattered rays, focusses them
+on the selenium cell which you saw in the middle of the reflector,
+and that causes the cell to vary the amount of electric current
+passing through it from a battery of storage cells. It is
+connected with a very good telephone receiver. Every change in the
+beam of light due to the vibrations of my voice is caught by that
+receiving mirror, and the result is that the diaphragm in the
+receiver over there which Dillon is holding to his ear responds.
+The thing is good over several hundred yards, perhaps miles,
+sometimes. Only, I wish it would work both ways. I would like to
+feel sure that Dillon gets me."
+
+I looked at the simple little instrument with a sort of reverence,
+for on it depended the momentous question of whether we should be
+released in time to pursue the two who were escaping in the
+automobile.
+
+"You'll have to hurry," continued Garrick, speaking into his
+transmitter. "Give the signal. Get the car ready. Anything, so
+long as it is action. Use your own judgment."
+
+There he was, flashing a message out of our prison by an invisible
+ray that shot across the Cimmerian darkness to the point where we
+knew that our friends were waiting anxiously. I could scarcely
+believe it. But Garrick had the utmost faith in the ability of the
+radiophone to make good.
+
+"They MUST have started by this time," he cried, craning his neck
+out of the window and looking in every direction.
+
+Forbes was still rambling along, but Garrick was not paying any
+attention to him. Instead, he began rummaging the room for
+possible evidence, more for something to do than because he hoped
+to find anything, while we were waiting anxiously for something to
+happen.
+
+An exclamation from Garrick, however, brought me to his side.
+Tucked away in a bureau drawer under some soiled linen that
+plainly belonged to Forbes, he drew out what looked like a single
+blue-steel tube about three inches long. At its base was a hard-
+rubber cap, which fitted snugly into the palm of the hand as he
+held it. His first and middle fingers encircled the barrel, over a
+steel ring. A pull downward and the thing gave a click.
+
+"Good that it wasn't loaded," Garrick remarked. "I knew what the
+thing was, all right, but I didn't think the spring was as
+delicate as all that. It is a new and terrible weapon of
+destruction of human life, one that can be carried by the thug or
+the burglar and no one be the wiser, unless he has occasion to use
+it. It is a gun that can be concealed in the palm of the hand. A
+pull downward on that spring discharges a thirty-two calibre,
+centre fire cartridge. The most dangerous feature of it is that
+the gun can be carried in an upper vest pocket as a fountain pen,
+or in a trousers pocket as a penknife."
+
+I looked with added suspicion now, if not a sort of respect, on
+the young man who was tossing, half conscious, on the bed. Was he,
+after all, not the simple, gullible Forbes, but a real secret
+master of crime?
+
+Garrick, keen though he had been over the discovery, was in
+reality much more interested just now in the result of his
+radiophone message. What would be the outcome?
+
+I had been startled to see that almost instantly after his second
+call over the radiophone there seemed to rise on all sides of us
+lights and the low baying of dogs.
+
+"What's all that?" I asked Garrick.
+
+"Dillon had a dozen or so police dogs shipped up here quietly,"
+answered Garrick, now straining his eyes and ears eagerly. "He
+started them out each in charge of an officer as soon as they
+arrived. I hope they had time to get around in that other
+direction and close in. That was what he sent the chauffeur back
+to see about, to make sure that they were placed by the man who is
+the trainer of the pack."
+
+"What kind of dogs are they?"
+
+"Some Airedales, but mostly Belgian sheep dogs. There is one in
+the pack, Cherry, who has a wonderful reputation. A great deal
+depends, now, on our dog-detectives."
+
+"But," I objected, "what good will they be? Our men are in an
+automobile."
+
+"We thought of that," replied Garrick confidently. "Here they are,
+at last," he cried, as a car swung up the lane from the road and
+stopped with a rush under our window. He leaned out and shouted,
+"Dillon--up here--quick!"
+
+It was Dillon and his chauffeur, Jim. A moment later there was a
+tremendous shifting and pulling of heavy pieces of furniture in
+the hall, and, as the door swung open, the honest face of the
+commissioner appeared, inquiring anxiously if we were all right.
+
+"Yes, all right," assured Garrick. "Come on, now. There isn't a
+minute to lose. Send Jim up here to take charge of Forbes. I'll
+drive the car myself."
+
+Garrick accomplished in seconds what it takes minutes to tell. The
+chauffeur had already turned the car around and it was ready to
+start. We jumped in, leaving him to go upstairs and keep the
+manacled Forbes safely.
+
+We gained the road and sped along, our lights now lighted and
+showing us plainly what was ahead. The dust-laden air told us that
+we were right as we turned into the narrow crossroad. I wondered
+how we were ever going to overtake them after they had such a
+start, at night, too, over roads which were presumably familiar to
+them.
+
+"Drive carefully," shouted Dillon soon, "it must be along here,
+somewhere, Garrick."
+
+A moment before we had been almost literally eating the dust the
+car ahead had raised. Garrick slowed down as we approached a bend
+in the road.
+
+There, almost directly in our path, stood a car, turned half
+across the road and jammed up into a fence. I could scarcely
+believe it. It was the bandit's car--deserted!
+
+"Good!" exclaimed Dillon as Garrick brought our own car to a stop
+with a jerk only a few feet away.
+
+I looked about in amazement, first at the empty car and then into
+the darkness on either side of the road. For the moment I could
+not explain it. Why had they abandoned the car, especially when
+they had every prospect of eluding us in it?
+
+They had not been forced to turn out for anybody, for no other
+vehicle had passed us. Was it tire trouble or engine trouble? I
+turned to the others for an explanation.
+
+"I thought it must be about here," cried Dillon. "We had one of my
+men place an obstruction in the road. They didn't run into it,
+which shows clever driving, but they had to turn so sharply that
+they ran into the fence. I guess they realised that there was no
+use in turning and trying to go back."
+
+"They have taken to the open country," shouted Garrick, leaping up
+on the seat of our car and looking about in a vain endeavour to
+catch some sign of them.
+
+All was still, save here and there the sharp, distant bark of a
+dog.
+
+"I wonder which way they went?" he asked, looking down at us.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+THE POLICE DOG
+
+
+Dillon pulled a whistle from his pocket and blew a short blast
+sharply. Far down the road, we could hear faintly an answering
+bark. It came nearer.
+
+"They're taught to obey a police whistle and nothing else,"
+remarked Dillon, with satisfaction. "I wonder which one of the
+dogs that was. By the way, just keep out of sight as much as you
+can--get back up in our car. They are trained to worry anyone who
+hasn't a uniform. I'll take this dog in charge. I hope it's
+Cherry. She ought to be around here, if the men obeyed my orders.
+The others aren't keen on a scent even when it is fresh, but
+Cherry is a dandy and I had the man bring her up purposely."
+
+We got back into our car and waited impatiently. Across the hills
+now and then we could catch the sounds of dogs scouting around
+here and there. It seemed as if every dog in the valley had been
+aroused. On the other slope of the hill from the main road we
+could see lights in the scattered houses.
+
+"I doubt whether they have gone that way," commented Garrick
+following my gaze. "It looks less settled over here to the right
+of the road, in the direction of New York."
+
+The low baying of the dog which had answered Dillon's call was
+growing nearer every moment. At last we could hear it quite close,
+at the deserted car ahead.
+
+Cherry seemed to have many of the characteristics of the wild,
+prehistoric animal, among them the full, upright ears of the wild
+dog, which are such a great help to it. She was a fine, alert, up-
+standing dog, hardy, fierce, and literally untiring, of a tawny
+light brown like a lioness, about the same size and somewhat of
+the type of the smooth-coated collie, broad of chest and with a
+full brush of tail.
+
+Untamed though she seemed, she was perfectly under Dillon's
+control, and rendered him absolute and unreasoning obedience.
+
+"Now, Cherry, nice dog," we heard Dillon encouraging, "Here, up
+here. And here."
+
+He was giving the dog the scent from the deserted car. His voice
+rang out sharply in the night air, "Come on Garrick and Marshall.
+She's got it. I've got her on leash. Follow along, now, just a few
+feet behind."
+
+Cherry was on the trail and it was a hot one. We could just see
+her magnificent head, narrow and dome-like, between the keen ears.
+She was working like a regular sleuthhound, now, too, slowly,
+picking up the trail and following it, baying as she went.
+
+She was now going without a halt or falter. Nose to the ground,
+she had leaped from the bandit's car and made straight across a
+field in the direction that Garrick had suspected they would take,
+only a little to the west.
+
+"This is a regular, old-fashioned man hunt," called back Dillon,
+as we followed the dog and himself, as best we could.
+
+It was pitch dark, but we plunged ahead over fields and through
+little clumps of trees, around hedges, and over fences.
+
+There was no stopping, no cessation of the deep baying of the dog.
+Cherry was one of the best and most versatile that the police had
+ever acquired and trained.
+
+We came to the next crossroad, and the dog started up in the
+direction of the main road, questing carefully.
+
+We had gone not a hundred feet when a dark object darted out of
+the bushes at the side of the road, and I felt myself
+unceremoniously tumbled off my feet.
+
+Garrick leaped aside, with a laugh.
+
+"Dillon," he shouted ahead at the top of his voice, "one of the
+Airedales has discovered Marshall. Come back here. Lie still, Tom.
+The dog is trained to run between the legs and trip up anyone
+without a police uniform. By Jupiter--here's another one--after
+me. Dillon--I say--Dillon!"
+
+The commissioner came back, laughing at our plight, and called off
+the dogs, who were now barking furiously. We let him get a little
+ahead, calling the Airedales to follow him. They were not much
+good on the scent, but keen and intelligent along the lines of
+their training, and perfectly willing to follow Dillon, who was
+trusting to the keen sense of Cherry.
+
+A little further down, the fugitives had evidently left the road
+after getting their bearings.
+
+"They must have heard the dogs," commented Garrick. "They are
+doubling on their tracks, now, and making for the Ramapo River in
+the hope of throwing the dogs off the scent. That's the game. It's
+an old trick."
+
+We came, sure enough, in a few minutes to the river. That had
+indeed been their objective point. Cherry was baffled. We stuck
+close to Dillon, after our previous experience, as we stopped to
+talk over hastily what to do.
+
+Had they gone up or down, or had they crossed? There was not much
+time that we could afford to lose here in speculation if we were
+going to catch them.
+
+Cherry was casting backward in an instinctive endeavour to pick up
+the trail. Dillon had taken her across and she had not succeeded
+in finding the scent on the opposite bank for several hundred
+yards on either side.
+
+"They started off toward the southwest," reasoned Garrick quickly.
+"Then they turned in this direction. The railroads are over there.
+Yes, that is what they would make for. Dillon," he called, "let us
+follow the right bank of the river down this way, and see if we
+can't pick them up again."
+
+The river was shallow at this point, but full of rocks, which made
+it extremely hard, if not dangerous, to walk even close to the
+bank in the darkness. "I don't think they'd stand for much of this
+sort of going," remarked Garrick. "A little of it would satisfy
+them, and they'd strike out again."
+
+He was right. Perhaps five minutes later, after wading in the cold
+water, clinging as close to the bank as we could, we came to a
+sort of rapids. Cherry, who had been urged on by Dillon, gave a
+jerk at her leash, as she sniffed along the bank.
+
+"She has it," cried Garrick, springing up the bank after Dillon.
+
+I followed and we three men and three dogs struck out again in
+earnest across country.
+
+We had come upon a long stretch of woods, and the brambles and
+thick growth made the going exceedingly difficult. Still, if it
+was hard for us now, it must have been equally hard for them as
+they broke through in the first place.
+
+At last we came to the end of the woods. The trail was now fresher
+than ever, and Dillon had difficulty in holding Cherry back so
+that the rest of us could follow. As we emerged from the shadow of
+the trees into the open field, it seemed as if guns were blazing
+on all sides of us.
+
+We were almost up with them. They had separated and were not half
+a mile away, firing at random in our direction, as they heard the
+dogs. Dillon drew up, Cherry tugging ahead. He turned to the
+Airedales. They had already taken in the situation, and were now
+darting ahead at what they could see, if not scent.
+
+I felt a "ping!" on my chest. I scarcely realized what it was
+until I heard something drop the next instant in the stubble at my
+feet, and felt a smarting sensation as if a sharp blow had struck
+me. I bent down and from the stubble picked up a distorted bullet.
+
+"These bullet-proof coats are some good, anyhow, at a distance,"
+remarked Garrick, close beside me, as he took the bullet from my
+fingers. "Duck! Back among the trees--until we get our bearings!"
+
+Another bullet had whizzed just past his arm as he spoke.
+
+We dodged back among the trees, and slowly skirted the edge of the
+wood, where it bent around a little on the flank of the position
+from which the continuous firing was coming.
+
+At the edge we stopped again. We could go no further without
+coming out into the open, and the moon, just rising, above the
+trees, made us an excellent mark under such conditions. Garrick
+peered out to determine from just where they were firing.
+
+"Lucky for us that we had these coats," he muttered, "or they
+would have croaked us, before we knew it. These are our old
+friends, the anaesthetic bullets, too. Even a little scratch from
+one of them and we should be hors de combat for an hour or two."
+
+"Shall we take a chance?" urged Dillon.
+
+"Just a minute," cautioned Garrick, listening.
+
+The barking of the Airedales had ceased suddenly. Cherry was
+straining at her leash to go.
+
+"They have winged the two dogs," exclaimed Garrick. "Yes--we must
+try it now--at any cost."
+
+We broke from the cover, taking a chance, separating as much as we
+could, and pushing ahead rapidly, Dillon under his breath keeping
+Cherry from baying as much as possible.
+
+I had expected a sharp fusillade to greet us as we advanced and
+wondered whether the coats would stand it at closer range.
+Instead, the firing seemed to have ceased altogether.
+
+A quick dash and we had crossed the stretch of open field that
+separated us from a dark object which now loomed up, and from
+behind which it seemed had come the firing. As we approached, I
+saw it was a shed beside the railroad, which was depressed at this
+point some twelve or fifteen feet.
+
+"They kept us off just long enough," exclaimed Garrick, glancing
+up at the lights of the block signals down the road. "They must be
+desperate, all right. Why, they must have jumped a freight as it
+slowed down for the curve, or perhaps one of them flagged it and
+held it up. See? The red signal shows that a train has just gone
+through toward New York. There is no chance to wire ahead, either,
+from this Ducktown siding. Here's where they stood--look!"
+
+Garrick had picked up a handful of exploded cartridge shells,
+while he was speaking. They told a mute story of the last
+desperate stand of the gunmen.
+
+"I'll keep these," he said, shoving them into his pocket. "They
+may be of some use later on in connecting to-night's doings with
+what has gone before."
+
+We looked at each other blankly. There was nothing more to do that
+night but to return to the now deserted house in the valley where
+we had left Forbes in charge of Dillon's man.
+
+Toilsomely and disgusted, we trudged back in silence.
+
+Garrick, however, refused to be discouraged. Late as it was, he
+insisted on making a thorough search of the captured house. It
+proved to be a veritable arsenal. Here it seemed that all the new
+and deadly weapons of the scientific gunman had been made. The
+barn, turned into half garage and half workshop, was a mine of
+interest.
+
+We found it unlocked and entered, Garrick flashing a light about.
+
+"There's a sight that would do McBirney's eyes good," he exclaimed
+as he bent the rays of the light before us.
+
+Before us, in the back of the barn, stood Warrington's stolen car-
+-at last.
+
+"They won't plot anything more--at least not up here," remarked
+Garrick, bending over it.
+
+In the house, we found Jim still with Forbes, who was now
+completely recovered. In the possession of his senses, Forbes'
+tongue which the anaesthetic gases seemed to have loosened, now
+became suddenly silent again. But he stuck doggedly to his story
+of kidnapping, although he would not or could not add anything to
+it. Who the kidnapper was he swore he did not know, except that he
+had known his face well, by sight, at the gambling joint.
+
+I could make nothing of Forbes. But of one thing I was sure. Even
+if we had not captured the scientific gunman, we had dealt him a
+severe and crushing blow. Like Garrick, I had begun to look upon
+the escape philosophically.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+THE FRAME-UP
+
+
+Although I felt discouraged on our return to the city, the morning
+following our exciting adventure at the mysterious house in the
+Ramapo valley, Garrick, who never let anything ruffle him long,
+seemed quite cheerful.
+
+"Cheer up, Tom," he encouraged. "We are on the home stretch now."
+
+"Perhaps--if they don't beat us to the tape," I answered
+disconsolately. "What are you going to do next?"
+
+"While you were snatching a little sleep, I was rummaging around
+and found a number of letters in a table drawer, up there. One was
+a note, evidently to the garage keeper, and signed merely,
+'Chief.' I'll wager that the handwriting is the same as that in
+the blackmailing letter to Miss Winslow."
+
+"What of it?" I asked, refusing to be comforted. "We haven't got
+him and the prospects--"
+
+"No, we haven't got him," interrupted Garrick, "but the note was
+just a line to tell the Boss, who seemed to have been up there in
+the country at the time, to meet the Chief at 'the Joint,' on
+Second Avenue."
+
+I nodded, but before I could speak, he added, "It didn't say any
+more, but I think I know the place. It is the old International
+Cafe, a regular hang-out for crooks, where they come to gamble
+away the proceeds of their crimes in stuss, the great game of the
+East Side, now. Anyhow, we'll just drop into the place. We may not
+find them, but we'll have an interesting time. Then, there is the
+possibility of getting a strangle hold on someone, anyhow."
+
+Garrick was evidently figuring on having driven our gunman back
+into the haunts of the underworld.
+
+There seemed to be no other course that presented itself and
+therefore, rather than remain inactive until something new turned
+up, I consented to accompany him in his excursion.
+
+Forbes, still uncommunicatively protesting that he would say
+nothing until he had an opportunity to consult a lawyer, had been
+taken down to New York by Dillon during the morning and was lodged
+in a West Side prison under a technical charge which was
+sufficient to hold him until Garrick could investigate his case
+and fix his real status.
+
+We had taken a cross-town car, with the intention of looking over
+the dive where Garrick believed the crooks might drop in. The ride
+itself was uninteresting, but not so by any means the objective
+point of our journey.
+
+Over on the East Side, we found the International Cafe, and
+slouched into the back room. It was not the room devoted to stuss,
+but the entrance to it, which Garrick informed me was through a
+heavy door concealed in a little hallway, so that its very
+existence would not be suspected except by the initiate.
+
+We made no immediate attempt to get into the hang-out proper,
+which was a room perhaps thirty feet wide and seventy feet deep.
+Instead, we sat down at one of the dirty, round tables, and
+ordered something from the waiter, a fat and oily Muscowitz in a
+greasy and worn dinner coat.
+
+It seemed that in the room where we were had gathered nearly every
+variety of the populous underworld. I studied the men and women at
+the tables curiously, without seeming to do so. But there could be
+no concealment here. Whatever we might be, they seemed to know
+that we were not of them, and they greeted us with black looks and
+now and then a furtive scowl.
+
+It was not long, however, before it became evident that in some
+way word had been passed that we were not mere sightseers. Perhaps
+it was by a sort of wireless electric tension that seemed to
+pervade the air. At any rate, it was noticeable.
+
+"There's no use staying here," remarked Garrick to me under his
+breath, affecting not to notice the scowls, "unless we do
+something. Are you game for trying to get into the stuss joint?"
+
+He said it with such determination to go himself that I did not
+refuse. I had made up my mind that the only thing to do was to
+follow him, wherever he went.
+
+Garrick rose, stretched himself, yawned as though bored, and
+together we lounged out into the public hall, just as someone from
+the outside clamoured for admission to the stuss joint through the
+strong door.
+
+The door had already been opened, when Garrick deftly inserted his
+shoulder. Through the crack in the door, I could see the startled
+roomful of players of all degrees in crookdom, in the thick,
+curling tobacco smoke.
+
+The man at the door called out to Garrick to get out, and raised
+his arm to strike. Garrick caught his fist, and slowly with his
+powerful grip bent it back until the man actually writhed. As his
+wrist went back by fractions of an inch, his fingers were forced
+to relax. I knew the trick. It was the scientific way to open a
+clenched fist. As the tendons refused to stretch any farther, his
+fingers straightened, and a murderous looking blackjack clattered
+to the floor.
+
+All was confusion. Money which was on the various tables
+disappeared as if by magic. Cards were whisked away as if a ghost
+had taken them. In a moment there was no more evidence of gambling
+than is afforded by any roomful of men, so easy was it to hide the
+paraphernalia, or, rather, lack of paraphernalia of stuss.
+
+It was the custom, I knew, for criminals, after they had made a
+haul to retire into such places as these stuss parlors, not only
+to spend the proceeds of their robberies, but for protection. Even
+though they were unmercifully fleeced by the gamblers, they might
+depend on them to warn of the approach of the "bulls" and if
+possible count on being hidden or spirited off to safety.
+
+Apparently we had come just at a time when there were some
+criminals in hiding among the players. It was the only explanation
+I could offer of the strange action that greeted our simple
+attempt to gain admission to the stuss room. Whether they were
+criminals who had really made a haul or mere fugitives from
+justice, I could not guess. But that a warning had been given the
+man at the door to be on his guard, seemed evident from the manner
+in which we had been met.
+
+There was a rush of feet in the room. I expected that we would be
+overwhelmed. Instead, as together we pushed on the now half-open
+door, the room emptied like a sieve. Whoever it might be who had
+taken refuge there had probably disappeared, among the first, by
+tacit understanding of the rest, for the whole thing had the air
+of being run off according to instructions.
+
+"It's a collar!" had sounded through the room, the moment we had
+appeared at the door, and it was now empty.
+
+I wondered whether the letter which Garrick had found might not,
+after all, have brought us straight to the last resort of those
+whom we sought.
+
+"Where have they gone?" I panted, as the door opened at last, and
+we found only one man in the place.
+
+There he stood apparently ready to be arrested, in fact courting
+it if we could show the proper authority, since he knew that it
+would be only a question of hours when he would be out again and
+the game would be resumed, in full blast.
+
+The man shook his head blankly in answer to my question.
+
+"There must be a trap door somewhere," cried Garrick. "It is no
+use to find it. They are all on the street by this time. Quick--
+before anyone catches us in the rear."
+
+We had been not a moment too soon in gaining the street. Though we
+had done nothing but attempt to get into the stuss room,
+ostensibly as players, the crowd in the cafe was pressing forward.
+
+On the street, we saw men filing quickly from a cellar, a few
+doors down the block. We mingled with the excited crowd in order
+to cover ourselves.
+
+"That must have been where the trap door and passage led,"
+whispered Garrick.
+
+A familiar figure ducked out of the cellar, surrounded by others,
+and the crowd made for two taxicabs standing on the opposite side
+of the street near a restaurant which was really not a tough joint
+but made a play at catering to people from uptown who wanted a
+taste of near-crime and did not know when they were being buncoed.
+
+Another cab swung up to the stand, just as the first two pulled
+away. Its sign was up: "Vacant."
+
+Quick as a flash, Garrick was in it, dragging me after him. The
+driver must have thought that we, too, were escaping, for he
+needed only one order from Garrick to leap ahead in the wake of
+the cabs which had already started.
+
+A moment later, Garrick's head was out of the window. He had drawn
+his revolver and was pegging away at the tires of the cabs ahead.
+An answering shot came back to us. Meanwhile, a policeman at a
+corner leaped on a passing trolley and urged the motorman to put
+on the full power in a vain effort to pursue us as we swept by up
+the broad avenue.
+
+Even the East Side, accustomed to frequent running fights on the
+streets between rival gunmen and gangs, was roused by such an
+outburst. The crack of revolver shots, the honking of horns, the
+clang of the trolley bell, and the shouts of men along the street
+brought hundreds to the windows, as the cars lurched and swayed up
+the avenue.
+
+The cars ahead swerved to dodge a knot of pedestrians, but their
+pace never slackened. Then the rearmost of the two began to buck
+and almost leap off the roadway. There came a rattle and roar from
+the rear wheels which told that the tires had been punctured and
+that the heavy wheels were riding on their rims, cutting the
+deflated tubes. At a cross street the first car turned, just in
+time to avoid a truck, and dodged down a maze of side streets, but
+the second ran squarely into the truck.
+
+As the first car disappeared we caught a glimpse of a man leaning
+out of it. He seemed to be swinging something around and around at
+arm's length. Suddenly he let it go and it shot high up in the air
+on the roof of a tenement house.
+
+"The automobile is the most dangerous weapon ever used by
+criminals," muttered Garrick, as the first car shot down through a
+mass of trucking which had backed up and shifted, making pursuit
+momentarily more impossible for us. "These people know how to use
+the automobile, too. But we've got someone here, anyhow," he
+cried, leaping out and pushing aside the crowd that had collected
+about the wrecked car.
+
+In the bottom of it we found a man, stunned and crumpled into a
+heap. Blood flowed from his arm where one of the bullets had
+struck him. Several bullets had struck the back of the cab and
+both tires were cut by them.
+
+As I came up and looked over Garrick's shoulder at the prostrate
+and unconscious figure in the car, I could not restrain an
+exclamation of surprise.
+
+It was the garage keeper, the Boss--at last!
+
+Policemen had come up in the meantime, and several minutes were
+consumed while Garrick proved to them his identity.
+
+"What was that thing the fellow in the forward car whirled over
+his head?" I whispered.
+
+"A revolver, I think," returned Garrick. "That's a favourite trick
+of the gunmen. With a stout cord tied to a gun you can catapult it
+far enough to destroy the evidence that will hold you under the
+Sullivan law, at least. I mean to get that gun as soon as we are
+through with this fellow here."
+
+Someone had turned in a call for an ambulance which came jangling
+up soon after, and we stood in a group close to the young surgeon
+as he worked to bring around the captured gangster.
+
+"Where's the Chief?" he mumbled, dazed.
+
+Garrick motioned to us to be quiet.
+
+The man rambled on with a few inconsequential remarks, then opened
+his eyes, caught sight of the white coated surgeon working over
+him, of us standing behind, and of the crowd about him.
+
+Memory of what had happened flitted back to him. With an effort he
+was himself again, close-mouthed, after the manner of the
+gangsters.
+
+The surgeon had done all in his power and the man was sufficiently
+recovered to be taken to the hospital, now, under arrest. As far
+as we were concerned, our work was done. The Boss could be found
+now, at any time that we needed him, but that he would speak all
+the traditions of gangland made impossible.
+
+I wondered what Garrick would do. As for myself, I had no idea
+what move to make.
+
+It surprised me, therefore, to see him with a smile of
+satisfaction on his face.
+
+"I'll see you this afternoon, Tom," he said merely, as the
+ambulance bore the wounded Boss away. "Meanwhile, I wish you'd
+take the time to go over to headquarters and give Dillon our
+version of this affair. Tell him to hold to-night open, too. I
+have a little work to do this afternoon, and I'll call him up
+later."
+
+Dillon, I found, was overjoyed when I reported to him the capture
+of at least one man whom we had failed to get the night before.
+
+"Things seem to be clearing up, after all," he remarked. "Tell
+Garrick I shall hold open to-night for him. Meanwhile, good luck,
+and let me know the moment you get any word about the Chief. He
+must have been in. that first cab, all right."
+
+As I left Dillon's office, I ran into Herman in the hall, coming
+in. I bowed to him and he nodded surlily. Evidently, I thought, he
+had heard of the result of our activities. I did not ask him what
+progress he had made in the case, for I had had experience with
+professional jealousy before, and thought that the less said on
+the subject the better.
+
+Recalling what Garrick had said, I curbed my impatience as best I
+could, in order to give him ample time to complete the work that
+he had to do. It was not until the middle of the afternoon that I
+rejoined him in his office.
+
+I found him at work at a table, still, with a microscope and an
+arrangement which I recognised as the apparatus for making
+microphotographs. Several cartridges, carefully labelled, were
+lying before him, as well as the peculiar pistol we had found when
+we had captured Forbes in the little room. There were also the
+guns we had captured in the garage and one found in the cab which
+we had chased and wrecked.
+
+On the end of the table was a large number of photographs of a
+most peculiar nature. I picked up one. It looked like an enlarged
+photograph of an orange, or like some of the pictures which the
+astronomers make of the nearer planets.
+
+"What are these?" I asked curiously, as he leaned back from his
+work, with a smile of quiet satisfaction.
+
+"That is a collection of microphotographs which I have gathered,"
+he answered, adding, "as well as some that I have just made. I
+hope to use them in a little stereopticon entertainment I am
+arranging to-night for those who have been interested in the
+case."
+
+Garrick smiled. "Have you ever heard?" he asked, "that the rounded
+end of the firing pin of every rifle when it is examined under a
+microscope bears certain irregularities of marking different from
+those of every other firing pin and that the primer of every shell
+fired in a rifle is impressed with the particular markings of that
+firing pin?"
+
+I had not, but Garrick went on, "I know that it is true. Such
+markings are distinctive for each rifle and can be made by no
+other. I have taken rifles bearing numbers preceding and following
+that of a particular one, as well as a large number of other
+firing pins. I have tried the rifles and the firing pins, one by
+one, and after I made microphotographs of the firing pins with
+special reference to the rounded ends and also photographs of the
+corresponding rounded depressions in the primers fired by them, it
+was forced upon me that cartridges fired by each individual firing
+pin could be positively identified."
+
+I had been studying the photographs. It was a new idea, and it
+appealed to me strongly. "How about revolvers?" I asked quickly.
+
+"Well, Dr. Balthazard, the French criminologist, has made
+experiments on the identification of revolver bullets and has a
+system that might be compared to that of Bertillon for identifying
+human beings. He has showed by greatly enlarged photographs that
+every gun barrel leaves marks on a bullet and that the marks are
+always the same for the same barrel but never identical for two
+different barrels. He has shown that the hammer of a revolver, say
+a centre fire, strikes the cartridge at a point which is never the
+exact centre of the cartridge, but is always the same for the same
+weapon. He has made negatives of bullets nearly a foot wide. Every
+detail appears very distinctly and it can be decided with absolute
+certainty whether a certain bullet or cartridge was fired by a
+certain revolver."
+
+He had picked up one of the microphotographs and was looking at it
+attentively through a small glass.
+
+"You will see," he explained, "on the edge of this photograph a
+rough sketch calling attention to a mark like an L which is the
+chief characteristic of this hammer, although there are other
+detailed markings which show well under the microscope but not in
+a photograph. You will note that the marks on a hammer are
+reversed on the primer in the same way that a metal type and the
+character printed by it are reversed as regards one another.
+Moreover, depressions on the end of a hammer become raised on the
+primer and raised markings on the hammer become depressions on the
+primer.
+
+"Now, here is another. You can see that it is radically different
+from the first, which was from the cartridge used in killing poor
+Rena Taylor. This second one is from that gun which I found on the
+tenement roof this morning. It lacks the L mark as well as the
+concentric circles. Here is another. Its chief characteristics are
+a series of pits and elevations which, examined under the
+microscope and measured, will be found to afford a set of
+characters utterly different from those of any other hammer.
+
+"In short," he concluded with an air of triumph, "the ends of
+firing pins are turned and finished in a lathe by the use of tools
+designed for that purpose. The metal tears and works unevenly so
+that microscopical examination shows many pits, lines, circles,
+and irregularities. The laws of chance are as much against two of
+these firing pins or hammers having the same appearance under the
+microscope as they are against the thumb prints of two human
+subjects being identical."
+
+I picked up the curious little arrangement which we had found in
+the drawer in Forbes' room and examined it closely.
+
+"I have been practicing with that pistol, if you may call it
+that," he remarked, "on cartridges of my own and examining the
+marks made by the peculiar hammer. I have studied marks of the gun
+which we found on the roof. I have compared them with the marks on
+cartridges which we have picked up at the finding of Rena Taylor's
+body, at the garage that night of the stupefying bullet, with
+bullets such as were aimed at Warrington, with others, both
+cartridges and bullets, at various times, and the conclusion is
+unescapable."
+
+Who, I asked myself, was the scientific gunman? I knew it was
+useless to try to hurry Garrick. First, by a sort of intuition he
+had picked him out, then by the evidence of hammer and bullet he
+had made it practically certain. But I knew that to his scientific
+mind nothing but absolute certainty would suffice.
+
+While I was waiting for him to proceed, he had already begun to
+work on some apparatus behind a screen at the end of his office.
+Close to the wall at the left was a stereopticon which, as nearly
+as I could make out, shot a beam of light through a tube to a
+galvanometer about three feet distant. In front of this beam
+whirled a five-spindled wheel governed by a chronometer which was
+so accurate, he said, that it erred only a second a day.
+
+Between the poles of the galvanometer was stretched a slender
+thread of fused quartz plated with silver. It was the finest
+thread I could imagine, only a thousandth of a millimeter in
+diameter, far too tenuous to be seen. Three feet further away was
+a camera with a moving plate holder which carried a sensitized
+photographic plate. Its movement was regulated by a big fly-wheel
+at the extreme right.
+
+"You see," remarked Garrick, now engrossed on the apparatus and
+forgetting the hammer evidence for the time, "the beam of light
+focussed on that fine thread in the galvanometer passes to this
+photographic plate. It is intercepted by the five spindles of the
+wheel, which turns once a second, thus marking the picture off in
+exact fifths of a second. The vibrations of the thread are
+enormously magnified on the plate by a lens and produce a series
+of wavy or zigzag lines. I have shielded the sensitized plate by a
+wooden hood which permits no light to strike it except the slender
+ray that is doing the work. The plate moves across the field
+slowly, its speed regulated by the fly-wheel. Don't you think it
+is neat and delicate? All these movements are produced by one of
+the finest little electric motors I ever saw."
+
+I could not get the idea of the revolvers out of my head so
+quickly. I agreed with him, but all I could find to say was, "Do
+you think there was more than this one whom they call the Chief
+engaged in the shootings?"
+
+"I can't say absolutely anything more than I have told you, yet,"
+he answered in a tone that seemed to discourage further
+questioning along that line.
+
+He continued to work on the delicate apparatus with its thread
+stretched between the stationary magnets of the galvanometer, a
+thread so delicate that it might have been spun by a microscopic
+spider, so light that no scales made by human hands could weigh
+it, so slender that the mind could hardly grasp it. It was about
+one-third the diameter of a red corpuscle of blood and its weight
+had been estimated as about .00685 milligrams, truly a fairy
+thread. It was finer than the most delicate cobweb and could be
+seen with the naked eye only when a strong light was thrown on it
+so as to catch the reflection.
+
+"All I can say is," he admitted, "that the bullets which committed
+this horrible series of crimes have been proven all to be shot
+from the same gun, presumably, I think I shall show, by the same
+hand, and that hand is the same that wrote the blackmailing
+letter."
+
+"Whose gun was it?" I asked. "Was there a way to connect it and
+the bullets and the cartridges with the owner--four things, all
+separated--and then that owner with the curious and tragic
+succession of events that had marked the case since the theft of
+Warrington's car?"
+
+Garrick had apparently completed his present work of adjusting the
+delicate apparatus. He was now engaged on another piece which also
+had a powerful light in it and an attachment which bore a strong
+resemblance to a horn.
+
+He paused a moment, regarding me quizzically. "I think you'll find
+it sufficiently novel to warrant your coming, Tom," he added. "I
+have already invited Dillon and his man, Herman, over the
+telephone just before you came in. McBirney will be there, and
+Forbes, of course. He'll have to come, if I want him. By the way,
+I wish you'd get in touch with Warrington and see how he is. If it
+is all right, tell him that I'd like to have him escort Miss
+Winslow and her aunt here, to-night. Meanwhile I shall find out
+how our friend the Boss is getting on. He ought to be here, at any
+cost, and I've put it off until to-night to make sure that he'll
+be in fit condition to come. To-night at nine--here in this
+office--remember," he concluded gayly. "In the meantime, not a
+word to anybody about what you have seen here this afternoon."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+THE SCIENTIFIC GUNMAN
+
+
+Our little audience arrived one by one, and, as master of
+ceremonies, it fell to me to greet them and place them as much at
+ease as the natural tension of the occasion would permit. Garrick
+spoke a word or two to each, but was still busy putting the
+finishing touches on the preparations for the "entertainment," as
+he called it facetiously, which he had arranged.
+
+"Before I put to the test a rather novel combination which I have
+arranged," began Garrick, when they had all been seated, "I want
+to say a few words about some of the discoveries I have already
+made in this remarkable case."
+
+He paused a moment to make sure that he had our attention, but it
+was unnecessary. We were all hanging eagerly on his words.
+
+"There is, I believe," he resumed slowly, "no crime that is ever
+without a clew. The slightest trace, even a drop of blood no
+larger than a pin-head, may suffice to convict a murderer. So may
+a single hair found on the clothing of a suspect. In this case,"
+he added quickly, "it is the impression made by the hammer of a
+pistol on the shell of a cartridge which leads unescapably to one
+conclusion."
+
+The idea was so startling that we followed Garrick's every word as
+if weighted with tremendous importance, as indeed it was in the
+clearing up of this mysterious affair.
+
+"I have made a collection from time to time," he pursued, "of the
+various exploded cartridges, the bullets, and the weapons left
+behind by the perpetrator of the dastardly series of crimes, from
+the shooting of the stool pigeon of the police, Rena Taylor, and
+the stealing of Mr. Warrington's car, down to the peculiar events
+of last night up in the Ramapos and the running fight through the
+streets of New York in taxicabs this morning.
+
+"I have studied this evidence with the microscope and the
+microphotographic apparatus. I have secured excellent
+microphotographs of the marks made by various weapons on the
+cartridges and bullets. Taking those used in the commission of the
+greater crimes in this series, I find that the marks are the same,
+apparently, whether the gun shot off a bullet of wax or tallow
+which became liquid in the body, whether it discharged a
+stupefying gas, or whether the deadly anaesthetic bullet was
+fired. I have obtained a gun"--he threw it on the table with a
+clang--"the marks from the hammer of which correspond with the
+marks made on all the cartridges I have mentioned. One person
+owned that gun and used it. That is proved. It remains only to
+connect that gun positively and definitely, as a last link, with
+that person."
+
+I noticed with a start that the revolver still had a stout cord
+tied to it.
+
+As he concluded, Garrick had begun fitting a curious little device
+to each of our forearms. It looked to me like an electrode
+consisting of large plates of German silver, covered with felt and
+saturated with salt solution. From each electrode wires ran across
+the floor to some hidden apparatus.
+
+"Back of this screen," he went on, indicating it in the corner of
+the room, "I have placed what is known as the string galvanometer,
+invented, or, perhaps better, perfected by Dr. Einthoven, of
+Leyden. It was designed primarily for the study of the beating of
+the heart in cases of disease, but it also may be used to record
+and study emotions as well,--love and hate, fear, joy, anger,
+remorse, all are revealed by this uncanny, cold, ruthlessly
+scientific instrument.
+
+"The machine is connected by wires to each of you, and will make
+what are called electrocardiographs, in which every emotion, every
+sentiment, every passion is recorded inevitably, inexorably. For,
+the electric current that passes from each of you to the machine
+over these wires carrying the record of the secrets of your hearts
+is one of the feeblest currents known to science. Yet it can be
+caught and measured. The dynamo which generates this current is
+not a huge affair of steel castings and endless windings of copper
+wire. It is merely the heart of the sitter.
+
+"The heart makes only one three-thousandth of a volt of
+electricity at each beat. It would take thousands of hearts to
+light one electric light, hundreds of thousands to run one trolley
+car. Yet just that slight little current from the heart is enough
+to sway a gossamer strand of quartz fibre in what I may call my
+'heart station' here. This current, as I have told you, passes
+from each of you over a wire and vibrates a fine quartz fibre in
+unison with it, one of the most delicate bits of mechanism ever
+made, recording the result on a photographic film by means of a
+beam of light reflected from a delicate mirror."
+
+We sat spellbound as Garrick unfolded the dreadful, awe-inspiring
+possibilities of the machine behind the screen. He walked slowly
+to the back of the room.
+
+"Now, here I have one of the latest of the inventions of the
+Wizard of West Orange--Edison," he resumed. "It is, as you perhaps
+have already guessed, the latest product of this genius of sound
+and sight, the kinetophone, the machine that combines moving
+pictures with the talking machine."
+
+A stranger stepped in from an outer office. He was the skilled
+operator of the kinetophone, whom Garrick had hired. In a few
+terse sentences he explained that back of a curtain which he
+pulled down before us was a phonograph with a megaphone, that from
+his booth behind us he operated the picture films, and that the
+two were absolutely synchronized.
+
+A moment later a picture began to move on the screen. Sounds and
+voices seemed to emerge as if from the very screen itself. There,
+before us, we saw a gambling joint operating in full blast. It was
+not the Forty-eighth Street resort. But it was strongly
+reminiscent of it. From the talking machine proceeded all the
+noises familiar to such a scene.
+
+Garrick had moved behind the screen that cut off our view of the
+galvanometer. One after another, he was studying the emotions of
+each of his audience.
+
+Suddenly the scene changed. A door was burst in, cards and
+gambling paraphernalia were scattered about and hidden, men rushed
+to escape, and the sounds were much like those on the night of the
+raid. Garrick was still engrossed in the study of what the
+galvanometer was showing.
+
+The film stopped. Without warning, the operator started another.
+It was a group of men and women playing cards. A man entered, and
+engaged in conversation with one of the women who was playing.
+They left the room.
+
+The next scene was in an entirely different room. But the
+connection which was implied with the last scene was obvious.
+Different actors entered the room, a man and a woman. There was a
+dispute--there was a crack of a revolver--and the woman fell.
+People rushed in. Everything was done to hide the crime. The girl
+was carried out into a waiting automobile, propped in as if
+overcome by alcohol and whisked away. I found myself almost
+looking to see if the car was of the make of Warrington's, so
+great was the impression the scene made on me. Of course it was
+not, but it all seemed so real that one might be pardoned for
+expecting the impossible, especially when her body was thrown,
+with many a muttered imprecation, by the roadside, and in the last
+picture the man was cleaning the exploded gun. One single still
+picture followed. It was a huge, enlarged cartridge.
+
+I followed the thing with eager eyes and ears. From a long list of
+canned and reeled plays, Garrick had selected here and there such
+scenes and acts as, interspersed with a few single, original
+pictures of his own, like the cartridge, would serve best to
+recapitulate the very case which we had been investigating. It
+carried me along step by step, wonderfully.
+
+Another moving and talking picture was under way. This time it
+seemed to be a race between two automobiles. They were tearing
+along, and the sound of the rapidly working cylinders was most
+real. The rearmost was rapidly overhauling that in front. Imagine
+our surprise as it crept up on the other to see the driver rise,
+whip out a pistol, and fire point blank at the other as he dashed
+ahead, and the picture stopped.
+
+A suppressed scream escaped Violet Winslow. It was too much like
+what had happened to Mortimer Warrington for her to repress the
+shudder that swept over her, and an involuntary movement toward
+him to make sure that it was not real.
+
+Still Garrick did not move from his post at the galvanometer. He
+was taking no chances. He had us thrilled, tense, and he meant to
+take advantage to the full in reading the truth in the dramatic
+situation he had so skilfully created.
+
+Another picture started almost on the heels of the last. It was of
+the robbery of a safe. Then came another, a firebug at work in
+starting a conflagration. We could hear the crackling of flames,
+the shouts of the people, the clang of bells, and the hasty tread
+of the firemen as they advanced and put out the blaze. The film
+play was one of those which never fail to attract, where the
+makers had gone to the utmost extent of realism and had actually
+set fire to a house to get the true effect.
+
+The next was a scene from a detective play, pure and simple, in
+which that marvellous little instrument which had served us in
+such good stead in this case was played up strongly, the
+detectaphone. Then followed a scene from another play in which a
+young girl was kidnapped and rescued by her lover just in the nick
+of time. Nothing could have been selected to arouse the feelings
+of the little audience to a higher pitch.
+
+The last of the series, which I knew was to be a climax, was not
+an American picture. It was quite evidently made in Paris and was
+from actual life. I myself had been startled when the title was
+announced by the voice and on the screen simultaneously, "The
+Siege of the Motor Bandits by the Paris Police."
+
+It was terrific. It began with the shouts of the crowd urging on
+the police, the crack of revolvers and guns from a little house or
+garage in the suburbs, the advance and retreat of the gendarmes on
+the stronghold. Back and forth the battle waged. One could hear
+the sharp orders of the police, the shrill taunts of the bandits,
+the sounds of battle.
+
+Then at a point where the bandits seemed to have beaten off the
+attack successfully, there came an automobile. From it I could see
+the police take an object which I now knew must be a Mathiot gun.
+The huge thing was set up and carefully aimed. Then with a dull
+roar it was fired.
+
+We could see the bomb hurtling through the air, see it strike the
+little house with a cloud of smoke and dust, hear the report of
+the explosion, the shouts of dismay of the bandits--then silence.
+A cry went up from the crowd as the police now pressed forward in
+a mass and rushed into the house, disclosing the last scene--in
+which the bandits were suffocated.
+
+The film suddenly stopped. Garrick's office, which had been
+ringing with firearms and shouts from the kinetophone, was again
+silent. It was an impressive silence, too. No one of us but had
+felt and lived the whole case over again in the brief time that
+the talking movies had been shown.
+
+The lights flashed up, and before we realised that the thing was
+over, Garrick was standing before us, holding in his hand a long
+sheet of paper. The look on his face told plainly that his novel
+experiment had succeeded.
+
+"I may say," he began, still studying the paper in his hand,
+although I knew he must have arrived at his conclusion already or
+he would never have quitted his "heart station," so soon, "I may
+say that some time ago a letter was sent to Miss Winslow
+purporting to reveal some of Mr. Warrington's alleged connections
+and escapades. It is needless to say that as far as the
+accusations were concerned he was able to meet them all adequately
+and, as for the innuendoes, they were pure baseless fabrications.
+The sender was urged on to do it by someone else who also had an
+interest of another kind in placing Mr. Warrington in a bad light
+with Miss Winslow. But the sender soon realised his mistake. The
+fact that he was willing to go to the length of a dangerous
+robbery accompanied by arson in order to get back or destroy the
+letter showed how afraid he was to have a sample of his
+handwriting fall into my hands. He blundered, but even then he did
+not realise how badly.
+
+"For, in certain cases the handwriting shows a great deal more
+than would be recognised even by the ordinary handwriting expert.
+This letter showed that the writer was, as I have already
+explained to Mr. Marshall, the victim of a peculiar kind of
+paralysis which begins to show itself in nerve tremours for days
+before the attack and exhibits itself even in the handwriting.
+
+"Now, my string galvanometer shows not only the effects of these
+moving and talking pictures on the emotions, but also, as it was
+really designed to do, the state of the heart with reference to
+normality. It shows to me plainly the effect of disease on the
+heart, even if it is latent in the subject. While I have been
+using the psychological law of suggestion, and have been
+recapitulating as well as I was able under the circumstances the
+whole story of the crime briefly in moving and talking pictures, I
+have found, in addition, that the same heart which shows the
+emotions I expected also shows the disease which I discovered in
+the blackmailing letter.
+
+"There was surprise at the sight of the gambling den, rage at the
+raid, fear at the murder of the girl in the other den and the
+disposal of her body, excitement over the racing motor cars,
+passion over the kidnapping of the girl, anger over the little
+detectaphone, and panic at the siege of the bandits, as I showed
+by the selection of the films that I was getting closer and closer
+to the truth. And there was the same abnormality of the heart
+exhibited throughout."
+
+Garrick paused. I scarcely breathed, nor did I move my eyes, which
+were riveted on his face. What was he going to reveal next? Was he
+going to accuse someone in the room?
+
+"Mr. Marshall," he resumed with a smile toward me, "I am glad to
+say is quite normal and innocent of all wrongdoing--in this
+instance," he added with a momentary flash of humour.
+"Commissioner Dillon also passes muster. Mr. Warrington--I shall
+come back to, later."
+
+I thought Violet Winslow gave a little, startled gasp. She turned
+toward him, anyhow, and I saw that not even science now could
+shake her faith in him.
+
+"Mr. Forbes," he continued, speaking rapidly as I bent forward to
+catch every word, "incriminated himself quite sufficiently in
+connection with the gambling joint, the raid and the slanderous
+letter, so that I should advise him when this case comes to trial
+to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth about his
+helping a gunman in order to further what proved a hopeless love
+affair on his own part. Here, too, is a little vest-pocket gun
+that was found under such circumstances as would be likely to
+connect Forbes in the popular mind with the shootings."
+
+"My lawyer has my statement about that. I'll read--"
+
+"No, Forbes," interrupted Garrick. "You needn't read. Your lawyer
+may be interested to add this to the statement, however. A pistol
+that has been shot off has potassium sulphide from the powder in
+the barrel. Later, it oxidizes and iron oxide is found. This
+weapon has neither the sulphide nor the oxide, as far as I can
+determine. It has never even been discharged. No, it was not the
+pistol found on Forbes that figured in this case.
+
+"As far as that new-fangled gun goes, Forbes, it was a frame-up.
+You were kidnapped by a man whom you thought was your friend, and
+it was done for a purpose. He knew the situation you were in, your
+jealousy--I won't dwell on that here. He held you at the house up
+in the valley. You told the truth about that. He did it, the man
+who wrote the letter, because he hoped ultimately to shift all the
+guilt on you and himself go scot-free."
+
+Forbes stared dumbly. I knew he had known what was coming but had
+held back for fear of what he knew had always happened to
+informers in the circle to which he had sunk.
+
+"McBirney," continued Garrick, "your emotions, mostly
+astonishment, show that you have much to learn in this new
+business of modern detection, besides the recovery of stolen
+cars."
+
+Garrick had paused for effect again.
+
+"And now we come to the keeper of a nighthawk garage on the West
+Side, a man whom they seem to call the Boss. That is getting
+higher up. I find that he points, according to this scientific
+third degree, to one whom I have for a long time suspected--"
+
+A dull thud startled us.
+
+I turned. A man was lying, face down, on the floor.
+
+Before any of us could reach him, Garrick concluded, "This is the
+man who framed up the case against Forbes, who stole Warrington's
+car to use to get rid of the body of the informer, Rena Taylor,
+because she by her success interfered with his gambling graft, who
+wrote the letter to Miss Winslow to injure Warrington because he,
+too, was interfering with his graft collection from the gambling
+house by threatening to close it up. He committed the arson to
+cover up his identity by getting back the letter; he planned and
+nearly executed the kidnapping of Miss Winslow in order to hold up
+Warrington, and then hid in the country where we ferreted him out,
+not far from the very scene of a murderous attack on Warrington
+for his brave stand in suppressing gambling--from which this man
+was weekly shaking down a huge profit as the price of police
+protection of the vice."
+
+Garrick was kneeling by the prostrate form now, not so much the
+accuser as the scientist, studying a new phase of crime.
+
+The threatened paralysis had struck Inspector Herman sooner than
+even Garrick had expected.
+
+When we had made Herman as comfortable as we could, Garrick added
+to Dillon, who stood over us, speechless, "You had under you one
+of the strong links in the secret system of police protection of
+vice and crime, and you never knew it--the greatest grafter and
+scientific gunman that I ever knew. It has been a long, hard
+fight. But I have the goods on him at last."
+
+The exposure was startling in the extreme. Herman had gained for
+himself the reputation of being one of the shrewdest and most
+efficient men in the department. But he had felt the lure of
+graft. With the aid of the gamblers and unscrupulous politicians
+he had built up a huge, secret machine for collection of the
+profits from the sale of police protection against the enforcement
+of the law he was sworn to uphold.
+
+He had begun to mix with doubtful characters. But he was a genius
+and had become, by degrees, the worst of the gangmen and gunmen
+who ever operated in the metropolis. Detailed to catch the
+gamblers and gangsters, with official power to do almost as he
+pleased, he had enjoyed a fine holiday and employed his leisure
+both for new crimes and in covering up so successfully his tracks
+in the old ones, even with Garrick on his trail, that he had been
+able to completely hoodwink his superior, Dillon, by his long,
+detailed reports which sounded very convincing but which really
+meant nothing.
+
+As the strange truth of the case was established by Garrick,
+Dillon was the most amazed of us all. He had trusted Herman, and
+the revulsion of feeling was overwhelming.
+
+"And to think," he exclaimed, in disgust, "that I actually placed
+his own case in his own hands, with carte blanche instructions to
+go ahead. No wonder he never produced a clew that amounted to
+anything. Well, I'll be--"
+
+Words failed him, as he looked down and glared savagely at the man
+in silence.
+
+All were now crowding around Garrick eager to thank him for what
+he had done. As Warrington, now almost his former hearty wholesome
+self again, grasped Garrick's hand in the heartiness of his
+thanks, Garrick, with the electrocardiogram paper still in his
+other hand, smiled.
+
+He released himself and turned to touch the dainty little hand of
+Violet Winslow, whose eyes were so full of happy tears that she
+could scarcely speak.
+
+"Miss Winslow," he beamed, gazing earnestly and admiringly into
+her sweet face, "I promised to attend to the case of that man
+later,--" he added, with a nod at Warrington. "It may interest you
+to know scientifically what you already know by something that is
+greater than science, a woman's intuition."
+
+She blushed as he added, "Mr. Warrington has a good, strong,
+healthy heart. He wouldn't be alive to-day if he hadn't. But, more
+than that, I have observed throughout the evening that he has
+hardly taken his eyes off you. Even the 'talkies' and the 'movies'
+failed to stir him until the kidnapping scene overwhelmed him.
+Here on this strip of paper I have a billet-doux. His heart
+registers the current that only that consummate electrician,
+little Dan Cupid, can explain."
+
+
+
+
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