He was halfway across the room before Jimmie Dale spoke.

"Clayton!"

Clayton turned. Jimmie Dale was still leaning over the desk, but now one elbow was propped upon it, and in the most casual way a revolver covered Inspector Clayton.

"If you attempt to leave this room," said Jimmie Dale, without raising his voice, "I a.s.sure you that I shall fire with as little compunction as though I were aiming at a mad dog--and I apologise to all mad dogs for coupling your name with them." His voice rang suddenly cold. "Come back here, and sit down in that chair!"

The colour ebbed slowly from Clayton's face. He hesitated--then sullenly retraced his steps; hesitated again as he reached the chair, and finally sat down.

"What--what d'ye mean by this?" he stammered, trying to bl.u.s.ter.

"Just this," said Jimmie Dale. "That I accuse you of the murder of Jake Metzer--IT WAS YOU WHO MURDERED METZER."

"Good G.o.d!" burst suddenly from Carruthers.

"You lie!" yelled Clayton--and again he surged up from his chair.

"That is what Stace Morse said," said Jimmie Dale coolly. "Sit down!"

Then Clayton tried to laugh. "You're--you're having a joke, ain't you?

It was Stace--I can prove it. Come down to headquarters, and I can prove it. I got the goods on him all the way. I tell you"--his voice rose shrilly--"it was Stace Morse."

"You are a despicable hound," said Jimmie Dale, through set lips.

"Here"--he handed the revolver over to Carruthers--"keep him covered, Carruthers. You're going to the CHAIR for this, Clayton," he said, in a fierce monotone. "The chair! You can't send another there in your place--this time. Shall I draw you now--true to life? You've been grafting for years on every disreputable den in your district. Metzer was going to show you up; and so, Metzer being in the road, you removed him. And you seized on the fact of Stace Morse having paid a visit to him this afternoon to fix the crime on--Stace Morse. Proofs? Oh, yes, I know you've manufactured proofs enough to convict him--if there weren't stronger proofs to convict YOU."

"Convict ME!" Clayton's lower jaw hung loosely; but still he made an effort at bl.u.s.ter. "You haven't a thing on me--not a thing--not a thing."

Jimmie Dale smiled again--unpleasantly.

"You are quite wrong, Clayton. See--here." He took a sheet of paper from the drawer of his desk.

Clayton reached for it quickly. "What is it?" he demanded.

Jimmie Dale drew it back out of reach.

"Just a minute," he said softly. "You remember, don't you, that in the presence of Carruthers here, of myself, and of half a dozen reporters, you stated that you had been alone with Metzer in his room at three o'clock yesterday, and that it was you--alone--who found the body later on at nine o'clock? Yes? I mention this simply to show that from your own lips the evidence is complete that you had an OPPORTUNITY to commit the crime. Now you may look at this, Clayton." He handed over the sheet of paper.

Clayton took it, stared at it, turning it over from first one side to the other. Then a sort of relief seemed to come to him and he gulped.

"Nothing but a d.a.m.ned piece of blank paper!" he mumbled.

Jimmie Dale reached over and took back the sheet.

"You're wrong again, Clayton," he said calmly. "It WAS quite blank before I handed it to you--but not now. I noticed yesterday that your hands were generally moist. I am sure they are more so now--excitement, you know. Carruthers, see that he doesn't interrupt."

From a drawer, Jimmie Dale took out a little black bottle, the notebook he had used the day before, and the photograph Carruthers had sent him.

On the sheet of paper Clayton had just handled, Jimmie Dale sprinkled a little powder from the bottle.

"Lampblack," explained Jimmie Dale. He shook the paper carefully, allowing the loose powder to fall on the desk blotter--and held out the sheet toward Clayton. "Rather neat, isn't it? A very good impression, too. Your thumb print, Clayton. Now don't move. You may look--not touch." He laid the paper down on the desk in front of Clayton. Beside it he placed the notebook, open at the sketch--a black thumb print now upon it. "You recall handling this yesterday, I'm sure, Clayton. I tried the same experiment with the lampblack on it this morning, you see. And this"--beside the notebook he placed the police photograph; that, too, in its enlargement, showed, sharply defined, a thumb print on a diamond-shaped background. "You will no doubt recognise it as an official photograph, enlarged, taken of the gray seal on Metzer's forehead--AND THE THUMB PRINT OF METZER'S MURDERER. You have only to glance at the little scar at the edge of the centre loop to satisfy yourself that the three are identical. Of course, there are a dozen other points of similarity equally indisputable, but--"

Jimmie Dale stopped. Clayton was on his feet--rocking on his feet. His face was deathlike in its pallor. Moisture was oozing from his forehead.

"I didn't do it! I didn't do it!" he cried out wildly. "My G.o.d, I tell you, I DIDN'T do it--and--and--that would send me to the chair."

"Yes," said Jimmie Dale coldly, "and that's precisely where you're going--to the chair."

The man was beside himself now--racked to the soul by a paroxysm of fear.

"I'm innocent--innocent!" he screamed out. "Oh, for G.o.d's sake, don't send an innocent man to his death. It WAS Stace Morse. Listen! Listen!

I'll tell the truth." He was clawing with his hands, piteously, over the desk at Jimmie Dale. "When the big rewards came out last week I stole one of the gray seals from the bunch at headquarters to--to use it the first time any crime was committed when I was sure I could lay my hands on the man who did it. Don't you see? Of course he'd deny he was the Gray Seal, just as he'd deny that he was guilty--but I'd have the proof both ways and--and I'd collect the rewards, and--and--" The man collapsed into the chair.

Carruthers was up from his seat, his hands gripping tight on the edge of the desk as he leaned over it.

"Jimmie--Jimmie--what does this mean?" he gasped out.

Jimmie Dale smiled--pleasantly now.

"That he has told the truth," said Jimmie Dale quietly. "It is quite true that Stace Morse committed the murder. Shows up the value of circ.u.mstantial evidence though, doesn't it? This would certainly have got him off, and convicted Clayton here before any jury in the land. But the point is, Carruthers, that Stace Morse ISN'T the Gray Seal--and that the Gray Seal is NOT a murderer."

Clayton looked up. "You--you believe me?" he stammered eagerly.

Jimmie Dale whirled on him in a sudden sweep of pa.s.sion.

"NO, you cur!" he flashed. "It's not you I believe. I simply wanted your confession before witnesses." He whipped the three written sheets from his pocket. "Here, substantially, is that confession written out." He pa.s.sed it to Carruthers. "Read it to him, Carruthers."

Carruthers read it aloud.

"Now," said Jimmie Dale grimly, "this spells ruin for you, Clayton. You don't deserve a chance to escape prison bars, but I'm going to give you one, for you're going to get it pretty stiff, anyhow. If you refuse to sign this, I'll hand you over to the district attorney in half an hour, and Carruthers and I will swear to your confession; on the other hand, if you sign it, Carruthers will not be able to print it until to-morrow morning, and that gives you something like fourteen hours to put distance between yourself and New York. Here is a pen--if you are quick enough to take us by surprise once you have signed, you might succeed in making a dash for that door and effecting your escape--without forcing us to compound a felony--understand?"

Clayton's hand trembled violently as he seized the pen. He scrawled his name--looked from one to the other--wet his lips--and then, taking Jimmie Dale at his word, rushed for the door--and the door slammed behind him.

Carruthers' face was hard. "What did you let him go for, Jimmie?" he said uncompromisingly.

"Selfishness. Pure selfishness," said Jimmie Dale softly. "They'd guy me unmercifully if they ever heard of it at the St. James Club. The honour is all yours, Carruthers. I don't appear on the stage. That's understood? Yes? Well, then"--he handed over the signed confession--"is the 'scoop' big enough?"

Carruthers fingered the sheets, but his eyes in a bewildered way searched Jimmie Dale's face.

"Big enough!" he echoed, as though invoking the universe. "It's the biggest thing the newspaper game has ever known. But how did you come to do it? What started you? Where did you get your lead?"

"Why, from you, I guess, Carruthers," Jimmie Dale answered thoughtfully, with artfully puckered brow. "I remembered that you had said last week that the Gray Seal never left finger marks on his work--and I saw one on the seal on Metzer's forehead. Then, you know, I lifted one corner where the seal overlapped a thread of blood, and, underneath, the thread of blood wasn't in the slightest disturbed; so, of course, I knew the seal had been put on quite a long time after the man was dead--not until the blood had dried thoroughly, to a crust, you know, so that even the damp surface of the sticky side of the seal hadn't affected it. And then, I took a dislike to Clayton somehow--and put two and two together, and took a flyer in getting him to handle the notebook. I guess that's all--no other reason on earth. Jolly lucky, don't you think?"

Carruthers didn't say anything for a moment. When he spoke, it was irrelevantly.

"You saved me twenty-five thousand dollars on that reward, Jimmie."

"That's the only thing I regret," said Jimmie Dale brightly. "It wasn't nice of you, Carruthers, to turn on the Gray Seal that way. And it strikes me you owe the chap, whoever he is, a pretty emphatic exoneration after what you said in this morning's edition."

"Jimmie," said Carruthers earnestly. "You know what I thought of him before. It's like a new lease of life to get back one's faith in him.

You leave it to me. I'll put the Gray Seal on a pedestal to-morrow that will be worthy of the immortals--you leave it to me."