Jimmie Dale flirted a bead of sweat from his forehead.

"Carruthers," said Jimmie languidly, "you newspaper chaps make me tired with your Gray Seal. I'm just going to bed."

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

"Come down, I tell you. It's worth your while--half the population of New York would give the toes off their feet for the chance. Come down, you blast idiot! The Gray Seal has gone the limit this time--it's MURDER."

Jimmie Dale's face was haggard.

"Oh!" he said peevishly. "Sounds interesting. Where are you? I guess maybe I'll jog along."

"I should think you would!" snapped Carruthers. "You know the Palace on the Bowery? Yes? Well, meet me on the corner there as soon as you can.

Hustle! Good--"

"Oh, I say, Carruthers!" interposed Jimmie Dale.

"Yes?" demanded Carruthers.

"Thanks awfully for letting me know, old man."

"Don't mention it!" returned Carruthers sarcastically. "You always were a grateful beast, Jimmie. Hurry up!"

Jimmie Dale hung up the receiver of the city 'phone, and took down the receiver of another, a private-house installation, and rang twice for the garage.

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

Jimmie Dale worked quickly then. In his dressing room, he changed from dinner clothes to tweeds; spent a second or so over the contents of a locked drawer in the dresser, from which he selected a very small but serviceable automatic, and a very small but highly powerful magnifying gla.s.s whose combination of little round lenses worked on a pivot, and, closed over one another, were of about the compa.s.s of a quarter of a dollar.

In three minutes he was outside the house and stepping into the car, just as it drew up at the curb.

"Benson," he said tersely to his chauffeur, "drop me one block this side of the Palace on the Bowery--and forget there was ever a speed law enacted. Understand?"

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

Jimmie Dale, in the tonneau, stretched out his legs under the front seat, and dug his hands into his pockets--and inside the pockets his hands were clenched and knotted fists.

Murder! At times it had occurred to him that there was a possibility that some crook of the underworld would attempt to cover his tracks and take refuge from pursuit by foisting himself on the authorities as the Gray Seal. That was a possibility, a risk always to be run. But that MURDER should be laid to the Gray Seal's door! Anger, merciless and unrestrained, surged over Jimmie Dale.

There was peril here, live and imminent. Suppose that some day he should be caught in some little affair, recognised and identified as the Gray Seal, there would be the charge of murder hanging over him--and the electric chair to face!

But the peril was not the only thing. Even worse to Jimmie Dale's artistic and sensitive temperament was the vilification, the holding up to loathing, contumely, and abhorrence of the name, the stainless name, of the Gray Seal. It WAS stainless! He had guarded it jealously--as a man guards the woman's name he loves.

Affairs that had mystified and driven the police distracted with impotence there had been, many of them; and on the face of them--crimes.

But no act ever committed had been in reality a crime--none without the highest of motives, the righting of some outrageous wrong, the protection of some poor stumbling fellow human.

That had been his partnership with her. How, by what amazing means, by what power that smacked almost of the miraculous she came in touch with all these things and supplied him with the data on which to work he did not know--only that, thanks to her, there were happier hearts and happier homes since the Gray Seal had begun to work. "Dear Philanthropic Crook," she often called him in her letters. And now--it was MURDER!

Take Carruthers, for instance. For years, as a reporter before he had risen to the editorial desk, he had been one of the keenest on the scent of the Gray Seal, but always for the sake of the game--always filled with admiration, as he said himself, for the daring, the originality of the most puzzling, bewildering, delightful crook in the annals of crime.

Carruthers was but an example. Carruthers now would hunt the Gray Seal like a mad dog. The Gray Seal, to Carruthers and every one else, would be the vilest name in the land--a synonym for murder.

On the car flew--and upon Jimmie Dale's face, as though chiselled in marble, was a look that was not good to see. And a mirthless smile set, frozen, on his lips.

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

"I'll GET him! And, when I get him, I'll wring a confession from him if I have to swing for it!"

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

Jimmie Dale stepped out. "I shall not want you any more, Benson," he said. "You may return home."

Jimmie Dale started down the block--a nonchalant Jimmie Dale now, if anything, bored a little. Near the corner, a figure, back turned, was lounging at the edge of the sidewalk. Jimmie Dale touched the man on the arm.

"h.e.l.lo, Carruthers!" he drawled.

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

You've made mighty quick time."

"Well, you told me to hurry," grumbled Jimmie Dale. "I'm doing my best to please you to-night. Came down in my car, and got summoned for three fines to-morrow."

Carruthers laughed. "Come on," he said; and, linking his arm in Jimmie Dale's, turned the corner, and headed west along the cross street. "This is going to make a noise," he continued, a grim note creeping into his voice. "The biggest noise the city has ever heard. I take back all I said about the Gray Seal. I'd always pictured his cleverness as being inseparable with at least a decent sort of man, even if he was a rogue and a criminal, but I'm through with that. He's a rotter and a hound of the rankest sort! I didn't think there was anything more vulgar or brutal than murder, but he's shown me that there is. A guttersnipe's got more decency! To murder a man and then boastfully label the corpse is--"

"Say, Carruthers," said Jimmie Dale plaintively, suddenly hanging back, "I say, you know, it's--it's all right for you to mess up in this sort of thing, it's your beastly business, and I'm awfully d.a.m.ned thankful to you for giving me a look-in, but isn't it--er--rather INFRA DIG for me?

A bit morbid, you know, and all that sort of thing. I'd never hear the end of it at the club--you know what the St. James is. Couldn't I be Merideth Stanley Annstruther, or something like that, one of your new reporters, or something like that, you know?"

Carruthers chuckled. "Sure, Jimmie," he said. "You're the latest addition to the staff of the NEWS-ARGUS. Don't worry; the incomparable Jimmie Dale won't figure publicly in this."

"It's awfully good of you," said Jimmie gratefully. "I have to have a notebook or something, don't I?"

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

A little way ahead, a crowd had collected on the sidewalk before a doorway, and Carruthers pointed with a jerk of his hand.

"It's in Moriarty's place--a gambling h.e.l.l," he explained. "I haven't got the story myself yet, though I've been inside, and had a look around. Inspector Clayton discovered the crime, and reported it at headquarters. I was at my desk in the office when the news came, and, as you know the interest I've taken in the Gray Seal, I decided to 'cover'

it myself. When I got here, Clayton hadn't returned from headquarters, so, as you seemed so keenly interested last week, I telephoned you. If Clayton's back now we'll get the details. Clayton's a good fellow with the 'press,' and he won't hold anything out on us. Now, here we are.

Keep close to me, and I'll pa.s.s you in."

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

The officer nodded, stepped aside, and Carruthers, with Jimmie Dale following, entered the house.

They climbed one flight, and then another. The card-rooms, the faro, stud, and roulette layouts were deserted, save for policemen here and there on guard. Carruthers led the way to a room at the back of the hall, whose door was open and from which issued a hubbub of voices--one voice rose above the others, heavy and gratingly complacent.

"Clayton's back," observed Carruthers.

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

"Ah, here's Carruthers now! H'are you, Carruthers? They told me you'd been here, and were coming back, so I've been keeping the boys waiting before handing out the dope. You've had a look at that--eh?" He flung out a fat hand toward the bed.

The voices rose again, all directed at Carruthers now.

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