"Oh, what are we to do?" exclaimed Mary in despair.

"Well, we can go to all the theatrical offices, and make inquiries. I have my badge under my coat, and they will answer, all right."

They went to every big office in the whole theatrical district. But there, too, the search was vain. Mary was too nervous and wretched to enjoy the possibility of a dinner, and so Burke took her home. Her father asked for Lorna, to which Mary made some weak excuse which temporarily quieted the old gentleman.

Promising to keep up his search in restaurants and offices, Burke hurried on downtown again. It was useless. Throughout the night he sought, but no trace of the girl had been found. When he finally went up to the Barton home to learn if the young girl had returned, he found the old man frantic with fear and worriment.

"Burke, some ill has befallen the child," he exclaimed. "Mary has finally told me the truth, and my heart is breaking."

"There, sir, you must be patient. We will try our best. I can start an investigation through police channels that will help along."

"But father became so worried that we called up your station. The officer at the other end of the telephone took the name, and said he would send out a notice to all the stations to start a search."

"Great Scott! That means publicity, Miss Mary. The papers will have the story sure, now. There have been so many cases of girls disappearing lately that they are just eager for another to write up."

Mary wrung her hands, and the old man chattered on excitedly.

"Then if it is publicity I don't care. I want my daughter, and I will do everything in the world to get her."

Burke calmed them as much as he could, but if ever two people were frantic with grief it was that unhappy pair.



Bobbie hurried on downtown again, promising to keep them advised about the situation.

After he left Mary went to her own room, and by the side of the bed which she and the absent one had shared so long, she knelt to ask for stronger aid than any human being could give.

If ever prayer came from the depths of a broken heart, it was that forlorn plea for the lost sister!

All through the night they waited in vain.

* * * * *

The first page of every New York paper carried the sensational story of the disappearance of Lorna Barton. Not that such a happening was unusual, but in view of the white slavery arrests and the gang fight in which Bobbie Burke had figured so prominently; his partial connection with the case, and those details which the fertile-minded reporters could fill in, it was full of human interest, and "yellow" as the heart of any editor could desire.

Pale and heart-sick Mary went down to Monnarde's next morning. The girls crowded about her in the wardrobe room, some to express real sympathy, others to show their condescension to one whom they inwardly felt was far superior in manners, appearance and ability.

Mary thanked them, and dry-eyed went to her place behind the counter. For reasons best known to himself, the manager was late in arriving that morning. The minutes seemed century-long to Mary as she hoped against hope.

A surprisingly early customer was Mrs. Trubus, who came hurrying in from her big automobile. She went to Mary's counter and observed the girl's demeanor.

"Dear, was it your sister that I read about in the paper this morning?" she inquired.

"Yes," very meekly. Mary tried to hold back the tears which seemed so near the surface.

"I am so sorry. I remembered that you once spoke of your sister when you were waiting on me. The paper said that she worked here at Monnarde's, and I remembered my promise of yesterday that I would do anything for you that I could. Mr. Trubus is greatly interested in philanthropic work, and of course what I could do would be very small in comparison to his influence. But if there is a single thing...."

"There's not, I'm afraid. Oh, I'm so miserable—and my poor dear old daddy!"

Even as she spoke the manager came bustling into the store. He had evidently passed an uncomfortable night himself, although from an entirely different cause. In his hand he bore the morning paper, which he just bought outside the door from one of several newsboys who stood there shouting about the "candy store mystery," as one paper had headlined it.

"See, here!" cried he, turning to Mary at once. "What do you mean by bringing this disgrace down upon the most fashionable candy shop in New York. You will ruin our business."

"Oh, Mr. Fleming," began Mary brokenly, "I don't understand what you mean. I have done nothing, sir!"

"Nothing! Nothing! You and this miserable sister of yours! Complaining to the police, are you, about men flirting with the girls in my store? Do you think society women want to come to a shop where the girls flirt with customers? No! I'm done right now. Get your hat and get out of here!"

"Why, what do you mean?" gasped the girl, her fingers contracting and twitching nervously.

"You're fired—bounced—ousted!" he cried. "That's what I mean." He turned toward the other girls and in a strident voice, unmindful of the two or three customers in the place, continued. "Let this be a lesson. I will discharge every girl in the place if I see her flirting. The idea!"

And he pompously walked back to his office as important as a toad in a lonely puddle.

Mary turned to the counter, which she caught for support. One of the girls ran to her, but Mrs. Trubus, standing close by, placed a motherly arm about her waist.

"There, you poor dear. Don't you despair. This is a large world, and there are more places for an honest, clever girl to work in than a candy store run by a popinjay! You get your hat and get right into my car, and I will take you down to my husband's office, and see what we can do there. Come right along, now, with me."

"Oh, I must go home!" murmured Mary brokenly.

But at the elderly woman's insistence she walked back, unsteadily, to the wardrobe room for her hat and coat.

"How dare you walk out the front way," raved the manager, as she was leaving with Mrs. Trubus.

Mary did not hear him. The tears, a blessed relief, were coursing down her flower-white cheeks as the kindly woman steadied her arm.

"Well! That suits me well enough," muttered Mr. Fleming philosophically, as he retired to his private office. "I lost a lot at poker last night—and here are two salaries for almost a full week that won't go into anyone's pockets but my own. First, last and always, a business man, say I."



CHAPTER XIV

CHARITY AND THE MULTITUDE OF SINS

In the outer office of William Trubus an amiable little scene was being enacted, far different from the harrowing ones which had made up the last twelve hours for poor Mary.

Miss Emerson, the telephone girl, was engaged in animated repartee with that financial genius of the "Mercantile Agency," with whose workings the reader may have a slight familiarity, located on the floor below of the same Fifth Avenue building.

"Yes, dearie, during business hours I'm as hard as nails, but when I shut up my desk I'm just as good a fellow as the next one. All work and no play gathers no moss," remarked Mr. John Clemm.

"You're a comical fellow, Mr. Clemm. I'd just love to go out to-night, as you suggest. And if you've got a gent acquaintance who is like you, I have the swellest little lady friend you ever seen. Her name is Clarice, and she is a manicure girl at the Astor. We might have a foursome, you know."

"That's right, girlie," responded Clemm, as he ingratiatingly placed an arm about her wasp-like waist. "But two's company, and four's too much of a corporation for me."

"Oh, Mr. Clemm—nix on this in here—Mr. Trubus is in his office, and he'll get wise...."

As she spoke, not Mr. Trubus, but his estimable wife interrupted the progress of the courtship. She walked into the doorway, from the elevator corridor, holding Mary's arm.

As she saw the lover-like attitude of the plump Mr. Clemm, she gasped, and then burst out in righteous indignation.

"Why, you shameless girl, what do you mean by such actions in the office of the Purity League? I shall tell my husband at once!"

Miss Emerson sprang away from the amorous entanglement with Mr. Clemm and tried to say something. She could think of nothing which befitted the occasion; all her glib eloquence was temporarily asphyxiated. Mr. Clemm stammered and looked about for some hole in which to conceal himself. He, too, seemed far different from the pugnacious, self-confident dictator who reigned supreme on the floor below.

"William! William Trubus!" called the philanthropist's wife angrily. Her husband heard from within, and he opened the door with a thoroughly startled look.

"My dear wife!" he began, purring and somewhat uncertain as to the cause of the trouble. Mary, nervous as she was, observed a curious interchange of glances between the two men.

"William, I find this brazen creature standing here hugging this man, as though your office, the Purity League's headquarters, were some Lover's Lane! It is disgusting."

"Well, well, my dear," stammered Trubus. "Don't be too harsh."

"I am not harsh, but I have too much respect for you and the high ideals for which I know you battle every hour of the day to endure such a thing. Suppose the Bishop had come in instead of myself? Would he consider such actions creditable to the great purpose for which the church takes up collections twice each year throughout his diocese?"

Trubus tilted back and forth on his toes and tapped the ends of his plump fingers together. He was sparring for time. The girl looked at him saucily, and the offending visitor shrugged his shoulders as he quietly started for the door.

"Tut, tut, my dear! I shall reprimand the girl."

"You shall discharge her at once!" insisted Mrs. Trubus, her eyes flashing. "She will disgrace the office and the great cause."

Trubus was in a quandary. He looked about him. Miss Emerson, with a confident smile, walked toward the general office on the left.

"I should worry about this job. I'm sick of this charity stuff anyway. I'm going to get a cinch job with a swell broker I know. He runs a lot of bunco games, too—but he admits. Don't let the old lady worry about me, Mr. Trubus, but don't forget that I've got two weeks' salary coming to me. And you just raised my weekly insult to twenty-five dollars last Saturday, you know, Mr. Trubus."

With this Parthian shot, she slammed the door of the general stenographers' room, and left Mr. Trubus to face his irate wife.

"You pay that girl twenty-five dollars for attending to a telephone, William? Why, that's more money than you earned when we had been married ten years. Twenty-five dollars a week for a telephone girl!"

"There, my dear, it is quite natural. She is especially tactful and worth it," said Trubus, in embarrassment. "You are not exactly tactful yourself, my dear, to nag me in front of an employee. As the Scriptures say, a gentle wife...."

Mrs. Trubus gave the philanthropist one deep look which seemed to cause aphasia on the remainder of the Scriptural quotation.

For the first time Trubus noticed Mary Barton, standing in embarrassed silence by the door, wishing that she could escape from the scene.

"Who is this young person, my dear?"

"This is a young girl who is in deep trouble, and without a position through no fault of her own. I brought her down to your office to have you help her, William."

"But, alas, our finances are so low that we have no room for any additional office force," began Trubus.

"There, that will do. If you pay twenty-five dollars a week to the telephone operator no wonder the finances are low. You have just discharged her, and I insist on your giving this young lady an opportunity."

Trubus reddened, and tried to object.

But his good wife overruled him.

"Have you ever used a switchboard, miss?" he began.

"Yes, sir. In my last position I began on the switchboard, and worked that way for nearly two months. I am sure I can do it."

Trubus did not seem so optimistic. But, at his wife's silent argument—looks more eloquent than a half hour of oratory, he nodded grudgingly.

"Well, you can start in. Just hang your hat over on the wall hook. Come into my office, my dear wife."

They entered, and Mary sat down, still in a daze. She had been so suddenly discharged and then employed again that it seemed a dream. Even the terrible hours of the night seemed some hideous nightmare rather than reality.

Miss Emerson came from the side room, attired in a street garb which would have brought envy to many a chorus girl.

"Oh, my dear, and so you are to follow my job. Well, I wish you joy, sweetie. Tell Papa Trubus that I'll be back after lunch time for my check. And keep your lamps rolling on the old gink and he'll raise your salary once a month. He's not such a dead one if he is strong on this charity game. Life with Trubus is just one telephone girl after another ... ta, ta, dearie. I'm off stage."

And she departed, leaving simple Mary decidedly mystified by her diatribe.

A few minutes brought another diversion. This time it was Sylvia Trubus and Ralph Gresham, her fiance, come for a call.

"Is my father in?" she asked, absorbed in the well groomed, selfish young man. Mary rang the private bell and announced Miss Trubus. Her father hurried to the door, and when he saw his prospective son-in-law his face wreathed in smiles.

"Ah, Mr. Gresham, Ralph, I might say, I am delighted! Come right in!"

Mary was startled as she heard the name of the young girl's sweetheart.

"I'm afraid that she will not be as happy as she thinks, if daddy has told me right about Ralph Gresham. But, oh, if I could hear something from Bobbie about Lorna. I believe I will call him up."

She was just summoning the courage for a private call when the private office door opened, and Gresham, Sylvia, her mother and Trubus emerged.

"I will return in ten minutes, Miss," said Trubus. "If there are any calls just take a record of them. Allow no one to go into my private office."

"Yes, sir."

Mary waited patiently for a few moments, when suddenly a telephone bell began to jangle inside the private office.

"That's curious," she murmured, looking at her own key-board. "There's no connection." Again she heard it, insistent, yet muffled.

She walked to the door and opened it. As she did so the wind blew in from the open casement, making a strong draught. Half a dozen papers blew from Trubus' desk to the floor. Frightened lest her inquisitiveness should cause trouble, Mary hurriedly stooped and picked up the papers, carrying them back to the desk. As she leaned over it she noticed a curious little metal box, glass-covered. Under this glass an automatic pencil was writing by electrical connection.

"What on earth can that be?" she wondered. The bell tinkled, in its muffled way, once more.

The moving pencil went on. She watched it, fascinated, even at the risk of being caught, hardly realizing that she was doing what might be termed a dishonorable act.

"Paid Sawyer $250. Girl safe, but still unconscious."

Mary's heart beat suddenly. The thought of her own sister was so burdensome upon her own mind that the mention by this mysterious communication of a girl, "safe but still unconscious," strung her nerves as though with an electric shock. She leaned over the little recording instrument, which was built on a hinged shelf that could be cunningly swung into the desk body, and covered with a false front. As she did so she saw a curious little instrument, shaped somewhat like the receiver of a telephone receiver. Mary's experience with her father's work told her what that instrument was.

"A dictagraph!" she exclaimed.

Instinctively she picked it up, and heard a conversation which was so startling in its import to herself that her heart seemed to congeal for an instant.

"I tell you, Jack, the girl is still absolutely out of it. We can risk shipping her anywhere the way she is now. I chloroformed her in the auto as soon as we got away from the candy store. But that Burke nearly had us, for I saw him coming."

"You will have to dispose of her to-day, Shepard. Give her some strong coffee—a good stiff needleful of cocaine will bring her around. Do something, that's all, or you don't get a red cent of the remaining three hundred. Now, I'm a busy man. You'll have to talk louder, too, my hearing isn't what it used to be."

"Say, Clemm, quit this kidding about your ears. I've tried you out and you can hear better than I can. There's some game you're working on me and if there is, I'll...."

"Can the tragedy, Shepard. Save it for that famous whipping stunt of yours. Beat this girl up a bit, and tell me where she is."

"I'll do that in an hour, and not a minute sooner, and I've got to have the other three hundred."

Mary dropped the receiver. She wanted to know where that conversation could come from. Down the side of the desk she traced a delicate wire. Under the rug it went, and across to the window. She looked out. A fire escape passed the window. It was open. She saw the little wire cross through the woodwork to the outside brick construction and down the wall. Softly she clambered down the fire-escape until she could peer through the window on the floor below.

There at a desk, in the private office of the "Mercantile" association, sat the man who had been hugging her predecessor at Trubus' switchboard, the man who had exchanged the curious looks with the philanthropist. Talking to him was the man who had taken her sister away from the candy store the day before!

Hurriedly she climbed back up the fire escape into the window, out through the door of the private office, closing it behind her.

She telephoned Bobbie at the station house. Fortunately he was there. She gave him her address, and before he could express his surprise begged him to hurry to the doorway of the building and wait for her.

He promised.

Mary kept her nerves as quiet as she could, praying that the man Sawyer would not leave before she could follow him with Bobbie. In a few minutes one of the girls from the stenography room came out. Seeing that she was the new girl the young woman spoke: "Do you want me to relieve you while you go to lunch. I'm not going out to-day. I'm so glad to see anyone here but that fresh Miss Emerson that it will be a pleasure."

"Thank you. I do want to go now," said Mary nervously. She hurriedly donned her hat and rushed down to the street. Bobbie was waiting for her, as he had lost not a minute.

They waited behind the big door column for several minutes. Suddenly a man came swinging through the portal. It was Sawyer.

Bobbie remembered him instantly, while Mary gripped his arm until she pinched it.

"We'll follow him," said Burke, for the girl had already told of the dictagraph conversation.

Follow him they did. Up one street and down another. At last the man led them over into Burke's own precinct. He ascended the iron steps of an old-fashioned house which had once been a splendid mansion in generations gone by.

"Ah, that's where Lorna is hidden, as sure as you're standing here, Mary. From what he said no harm has come to her yet. Hurry with me to the station house, and we'll have the reserves go through that house in a jiffy."

It took not more than ten minutes for the police to surround the house. But disappointment was their only reward. Somehow or other the rascals had received a tip of premonition of trouble; perhaps Shepard was suspicious of his principals, and wished to move the girl out of their reach.

The house was empty, except for a few pieces of furniture.

"Look!" cried Mary, as she went through the rooms with Bob. "There is a handkerchief. She snatched it up. It was one of her own, with the initials "M. B." in a monogram.

"Lorna has been here," she exclaimed. "I remember handing her that very handkerchief when we were in the store yesterday."

"What's to be done now?" thought Bobbie. "We had better go up to your father and tell him what we know—it is not as bad as it might have been."

"Precious little comfort," sighed Mary, exhausted beyond tears.

They reached the desolate home, and Bob broke the news to the old man. As Mary poured forth her story of the discovery in Trubus' office, her father's face lighted with renewed hope.

To their surprise he laughed, softly, and then spoke:

"Mary, my child, my long hours of study and labor on my own invention have not been in vain. My dictagraph-recorder—this very model here, which I have just completed shall be put to its first great test to save my own daughter. Heaven could reward me in no more wonderful manner than to let it help in the rescue of little Lorna—why did I not think of it sooner?"

"What shall we do, father?" breathlessly cried Mary.

"Can I help, Mr. Barton?"

"Describe the arrangement of the offices."

Mary rapidly limned the plan of the headquarters of the Purity League. Her father nodded and his lips moved as he repeated her words in a whisper.

"I have it now. You must put the instrument under the telephone switchboard table," he directed. "Pile up a waste-basket, or something that is handy to keep it out of view. I have already adjusted enough fresh cylinders to record at least one hour of conversation. This machine is run by an automatic spring, which you must wind like a clock. Here I will wind it myself to have all in readiness."

He rolled his chair swiftly to his work table, and turned the little crank, continuing his plan of attack.

"Now, take the long wire, and run it through the door of the private office up close to the desk. Attach this disc to the dictagraph receiver. It is so small, and the wiring so fine that it will not be noticed if it is done correctly. Here, Burke. I will do it now to this loose dictagraph receiver. Watch me."

The old man worked swiftly.

Burke scrutinized each move, and nodded in understanding.

"Be careful to cover the wire along the floor with a rug—he must never be allowed to see that, you know. After you have all this prepared, Mary, you must start the mechanism going, and then get the reproduction of the conversation as it comes on the dictagraph."

"All right, father—but how shall we get it there without Mr. Trubus knowing about it? He is very watchful of that room."

Barton patted Bobbie's broad shoulder, with a confident smile.

"I think Officer 4434 can devise a way for that. He has had harder tasks and won out. Now, hurry down with the machine. It is a bit heavy. You had better take it in a taxicab. You will spend all your money on taxicabs, my boy, I am afraid."

"Well, sir, a little money now isn't important enough to worry about if it means happiness for the future—for us all."

Mary's face reddened, and she dropped her eyes. There was an understanding between the three which needed no words for explanation. So it is that the sweetest love creeps into its final nestling place.

"God bless you, my boy. I'm an old man and none too good, but I shall pray for your success."

"Good bye," said Bobbie, as he and Mary left with the mechanism.

Bobbie stopped the taxicab which carried them half a block east of the office building which was their goal.

"Mary, I will take this machine up on the floor above Trubus' office, and hide it in the hall. Then you go to your place in the office and I will manage a way to draw Mr. Trubus out in a hurry. We will work together after that, and spread the electric trap for him."

Mary went direct to the office, where she found Trubus storming about angrily.

"What do you mean by staying nearly two hours out at luncheon time?" he cried. "I am very busy and I want you to be here on duty regularly, even if my wife did foolishly intercede in your behalf, young woman."

"I am sorry—I became ill, and was delayed. I will not be late with you again, sir."

The president of the Purity League retired to his sanctum, slightly mollified. Mary had not been at her post long when a messenger came in with a telegram.

"Mr. Trubus!" he said, shoving the envelope at her.

She signed his book, and knocked at the door. There was a little delay, and the worthy man opened it impatiently. "I do not want to be interrupted, I am going over my accounts."

She handed him the telegram, and he tore it open hastily.

"What's this?" he muttered in excitement. Then he went back for his silk hat, and left, slamming the door of his private office and carefully locking it.

"I wonder what took him out so quickly?" thought Mary. But even as she mused Bobbie Burke came into the outer office, with the precious machine wrapped in yellow paper.

"What took Trubus out, Bobbie?" she asked, as she helped him arrange the machine behind the wastebasket, near the telephone switchboard.

"Just a telegram, signed 'Friend,' advising him to watch the men who came in the front door, downstairs, for ten minutes, but not to visit Clemm's office. That will keep him away, and he can't possibly guess who did it."

"But, look, Bob, he has locked his door with a peculiar key. If you force it he will be able to tell."

"I thought he might do as much, Mary. I wouldn't risk tampering with the lock. Instead, I found an empty room on the floor above. I have a rope, and I will take the receiver of your father's machine with the disc, and part of the wiring which I had already cut. There is no fire escape from the floor above for some reason. He will suspect all the less, then, for he would not think of anyone coming through the headquarters on the floor below. I will go down hand over hand, you shove the wire under the door to me, and I'll attach it. Then I'll go up the ladder, and we'll let the dictagraph do its work."

Thus it was accomplished. Mary covered the machine and its wiring in the outer office, although several times she had to quit at inopportune times to answer the telephone, or make a connection.

Burke, from the room above, climbed down hurriedly, adjusted the instrument as he had been told to do by John Barton. Then he was out, barely drawing himself and the rope away from the window view before Trubus entered.

Mary thought that it was all discovered, but breathed a sigh of relief when the president opened the door and entered without a remark.

It was lucky for Burke that the day was so warm, for the president had left the window open when he left, otherwise Burke could not possibly have carried out his plan so opportunely.

The telephone bell rang. Mary answered and was greeted by Bob's voice.

"Is it you, Mary?" he exclaimed hurriedly.

"Yes."

"Then start your machine, for I saw this man Shepard go upstairs to the floor beneath you."

"All right, Bob," said Mary softly.

"When the records are run out, unless I telephone you sooner, call one of the girls to take your place, tell her you are sick, and smuggle out the records—don't bother about the machine, we'll get that later. I will be downstairs waiting for you."

"Yes. I understand."

The time dragged horribly, but at last the hour had passed, and Mary wrapped up the precious wax cylinders and hurried downstairs.

Bob was pacing up and down anxiously.

"Shepard has eluded me. I was afraid to leave you, and he took an auto, and disappeared over toward the East Side. I have telephoned Captain Sawyer to have a phonograph ready for us. Come, we'll get over to the station at once. I hope your records give us the clue. If they don't, I'm afraid the trail is lost."

They hurried to the station house. In the private office of the Captain they found that officer waiting with eagerness.

"What's it all about, Bob?" he cried. "Why this phonograph?"

"It will explain itself, Captain," answered 4434. "Let's fix these records in the regular way, and then we will run them in order."

They did so in absolute silence. The Captain listened, first in bewilderment, then in great excitement.

"Great snakes! Where did you get those? That is a conversation between a bunch of traffickers. Listen, they are buying and selling, making reports and laying out their work for the night."

"Sssh!" cautioned Bob. "There's something important we want to get."

Suddenly Mary gripped his hand.

"That's Shepard's voice. I'd never forget it."

They listened. The man told of the condition of Lorna, mentioning her by name now. She had returned to consciousness, and was detained in the room of a house not five blocks from the police station.

"I'll break her spirit now. None of this stage talk any more, Clemm," droned the voice in the phonograph. "When I get my whip going she'll be glad enough to put on the silk dresses. She screamed and cried a while ago, but I'm used to that sort of guff."

"Don't mark her up with the whip, Shepard. That's a weakness of yours, and makes us lose money. Go over now and get her ready for to-night. They want a girl like her for a party up-town to-night. Get her scared, and then slip a little cocaine,—that eases 'em up. Then some champagne, and it will be easy."

Mary began to sob. Burke held her hand in his firm manner.

"Don't cry, little girl, we'll attend to her. Captain Sawyer, this is a record of a conversation we took on a new machine in the offices of the Purity League. It connects with the 'Mercantile' office downstairs, which is a headquarters for the white slave business. Now we know the address of the house where this young girl is kept. Can I have the reserves to help me raid it?"

"Ah, can you? Why, you will lead it my boy. Run out and order four machines from that garage next door. We'll be there in two minutes."

The reserves were summoned from their lounging room with such speed that Mary was bewildered.

"Oh, may I go along?" she begged. "I want to be the first to greet my little sister."

"Yes!" cried Sawyer. "All out now, boys. We'll work this on time. I know the house. It has a big back yard, and a fire-escape in the rear. Half you fellows follow the sergeant, and go to the front—but stay down by the corner until exactly four-thirty. Then break into the front door with axes. The other half—you men in that second file" (they were lined up with military precision in the big room of the station house)—"go with Bob Burke. I want you to go up over the roof. Use your night sticks if there is any gun play, shoot—but not to kill, for we want to send these men to prison."

They started off. Mary's heart fluttered with excitement, with hope. There was something so reassuring about the husky manhood of these blue-coats and the nonchalance and even delight with which they faced the dangers before them.

"Can I go in with them?" she cried eagerly.

"No, young lady, you stay with the sergeant, and sit in the automobile when the men leave it. You're apt to get shot, and we want you to take care of your sister."

They were off on the race to save Lorna!

Now the machines sped down the street. They separated at one thoroughfare, and the men with Burke went down another street to approach the house from the rear. This they did, quietly but rapidly, through the basement of an old house whose frightened tenants feared that they were to be arrested and lynched on the spot, to judge from their terror.

"Keep quiet," said Burke, "and don't look out of the windows, or we will arrest you."

Burke and his men peered at the building which was the object of their attack. The fire escape came only down to the second story.

"Well, you fellows will have to give me a boost, and I'll jump for the lower rungs. Then toss up one more man and I'll catch his hand. We can go up together. You watch the doors."

At exactly four thirty they dashed across the yard, scrambled over the fence, and like Zouaves in an exhibition drill, tossed Burke up to the lowest iron bar of the fire escape. He failed the first time. He tumbled back upon them. The second time was successful. Patrolman White was given a lift and Burke helped to pull him upon the fire-escape.

"Up, now, White! We will be behind the other fellows in the front!"

They lost not a second. It was an ape-like climb, but the two trained athletes made it in surprising time.

As they reached the top of the building a man scrambled out of the trap which led from the skylight.

"Grab him," yelled Burke.

White did so. This was prisoner number one.

Down the ladder, through the opening Burke went and found himself in a dingy garret, at the top of a rickety stair-case. He heard screams. He descended the steps half a floor and peering from the angle, through the transom of a room which led from the hall, he saw a fat old woman standing with her hands on her hips, laughing merrily, while Shepard was swinging a whip upon the shoulders of a screaming girl. Her clothes were half torn from her back, and the whip left a red welt each time it struck.

Downstairs Burke heard the crashing of breaking doors. The raid was progressing rapidly. Burke dashed down to the floor level and flung himself upon the locked door. The first lunge cracked the lock. The second swung the door back on its hinges.

He half fell into the room.

As he did so Lorna Barton saw him and in a flash of recognition, screamed: "Oh, save me, Mr. Burke!"

She staggered forward, and Shepard missed his aim, striking the fat woman who squealed with pain.

"I've got you now!" cried Burke, rushing for the ruffian with his stick.

"No, you haven't!" hissed Shepard, a fighting animal to the last. He had whipped out a magazine gun from his coat pocket, and began firing point-blank. Burke threw his stick at the man, but it went wild.

His own revolver was out now, and he sent a bullet into the fellow's shoulder.

Shepard's left arm dropped limply. He dashed toward the door and forced his way past, firing wildly at such close range that it almost burst the gallant policeman's ear drums.

Up the ladder he scurried like a wild animal, firing as he climbed.

Burke was right behind him.

Shepard ran for the fire-escape. Burke was after him. Each man was wasting bullets. But as Shepard reached the edge of the roof Burke took the most deliberate aim of his life, and sent a bullet into the villain's breast.

Shepard gasped, his hands went up, and he toppled over the cornice to the back yard below.

He died as he had lived, with a curse on his lip, murder in his heart, and battling like a beast!



CHAPTER XV

THE FINISH

Burke rushed down the dilapidated steps once more to the room where Lorna had undergone her bitter punishment. Already three bluecoats had entered in time to capture the frantic old woman, while they worked to bring the miserable girl back to consciousness.

"She's coming around all right, Burke," said the sergeant. "Help me carry her downstairs."

"I'll do that myself," quoth Bobbie, feeling that the privilege of restoring her to Mary had been rightfully earned. He picked her up and tenderly lifted her from the couch where she had been placed by the sergeant. Down the stairs they went with their prisoner, while Patrolman White descended from the roof with his captive, whose hands had been shackled behind his back.

The house had the appearance of a cheap lodging place, and the dirty carpet of the hall showed hard usage. As they reached the lower floor Bobbie noticed Captain Sawyer rummaging through an imitation mahogany desk in the converted parlor, a room furnished much after the fashion of the bedroom of Madame Blanche in the house uptown.

"What sort of place is it? A headquarters for the gang?" asked Bobbie, as he hesitated with Lorna in his arms.

"No, just the same kind of joint we've raided so many times, and we've got hundreds more to raid," answered Sawyer. "I've found the receipts for the rent here, and they've been paying about five times what it is worth. The man who owns this house is your friend Trubus. This links him up once more. There's a lot of information in this desk. But hurry with the girl, Bobbie, for her sister is nearly wild."

As Burke marched down the steps, carrying the rescued one, a big crowd of jostling spectators raised a howl of "bravos" for the gallant bluecoat. The nature of this evil establishment was well enough known in the neighborhood, but people of that part of town knew well enough to keep their information from the police, for the integrity of their own skins.

Mary had been kept inside the automobile with difficulty; now she screamed with joy and sprang from the step to the street. Up the stone stairs she rushed, throwing her arms about Lorna, who greeted her with a wan smile; she had strength for no more evidence of recognition.

"Here, chief," said the chauffeur of the hired car to Burke, "I always have this handy in my machine. Give the lady a drink—it'll help her."

He had drawn forth a brandy flask, and Burke quickly unscrewed the cup-cap, to pour out a libation.

"Oh, no!" moaned Lorna, objecting weakly, but Burke forced it between her teeth. The burning liquid roused her energies and, with Mary's assistance, she was able to sit up in the rear of the auto.

"Take another, lady," volunteered the chauffeur. "It'll do you good."

"Never. I've tasted the last liquor that shall ever pass my lips," said Lorna. "Oh, Mary, what a horrible lesson I've learned!"

Her sister comforted her, and turned toward Burke pleadingly.

"Can I take her home, Bob? You know how anxious father is?"

Captain Sawyer had come to the side of the automobile. He nodded.

"Yes, Miss Barton, the chauffeur will take her right up to your house. Give her some medical attention at once, and be ready to come back with her to the station house as soon as I send for you. I'm going to get the ringleader of this gang in my net before the day is through. So your sister should be here if she is strong enough to press the first complaint. I'll attend to the others, with the Federal Government and those phonograph records back of me! Hurry up, now."

He turned to his sergeant.

"Put these prisoners in the other automobile and call out the men to clear this mob away from the streets. Keep the house watched by one man outside and one in the rear. We don't know what might be done to destroy some of this evidence."

The automobile containing the two girls started on the glad homeward journey at the Captain's signal. Bobbie waved his hat and the happy tears coursed down his face.

"Well, Captain, I've got to face a serious investigation now," he said to his superior as they went up the steps once more.

"What is it?" exclaimed Sawyer in surprise, "You'll be a medal of honor man, my boy."

"I've killed a man."

"You have! Well, tell me about your end of the raid. All this has happened so quickly that we must get the report ready right here on the spot, in order to have it exact."

"This man Shepard, who seems to be the professional whipper of this gang, as well as a procurer, fought me with a magazine revolver. I ran him up to the roof, and I had to shoot him or be killed myself. That means a trial, I know. You'll find his body back of the house, for he fell off the roof at the end."

"Self-defense and carrying out the law will cover you, my boy. Don't worry about that. This city has been kept terror-stricken by these gangsters long enough, because honest citizens have been compelled by a ward politician's law to go without weapons of defense. A man is not allowed to have a revolver in his own home without paying ten dollars a year as a license fee. But a crook can carry an arsenal; I've always had a sneaking opinion that there were two sides to the reasons for that law. Then the city officials have given the public the idea that the police were brutes, and have reprimanded us for using force with these murderers and robbers. Force is the only thing that will tame these beasts of the jungle. You can't do it with kisses and boxes of candy!"

Burke was rubbing his left forearm.

"By Jingo! I believe I hurt myself."

He rolled up his sleeve, and saw a furrow of red in his muscular forearm. It was bleeding, but as he wiped it with his handkerchief he was relieved to find that it was a mere flesh wound.

"If Shepard had hit the right instead of the left—I would have been left in the discard," he said, with grim humor. "Can you help me tie it up for now. This means another scolding from Doctor MacFarland, I suppose."

"It means that you've more evidence of the need for putting a tiger out of danger!"

The coroner was called, and the statements of the policemen were made. The Captain, with Burke and several men, deployed through the back yard to the other house, leaving the grewsome duty of removing the body to the coroner. The two waiting automobiles on the rear street were crowded with policemen, as Sawyer ordered the chauffeur to drive speedily to the headquarters of the Purity League.

"We must clean out that hole, as we did this one!" muttered Sawyer. "You go for Trubus, Burke, with one of the men, while I will take the rest and close in on their 'Mercantile' office downstairs. We'll put that slave market out of business in three minutes."

They were soon on Fifth Avenue. The elevators carried the policemen up to the third floor, and they sprang into the offices of the "Mercantile Association" with little ado.

The small, wan man who sat at the desk was just in the act of sniffing a cheering potion of cocaine as the head of Captain Sawyer appeared through the door. With a quick movement the lookout pressed two buttons. One of them resulted in a metallic click in the door of the strong iron grating. The other rang a warning bell inside the private office of John Clemm.

Sawyer pushed and shoved at the grilled barrier, but it was safely locked with a strong, secret bolt.

"Open this, or I'll shoot!" exclaimed the irate Captain.

"You can't get in there. We're a lawful business concern," replied the little man, squirming toward the door which led to the big waiting room. "Where's your search warrant. I know the law, and you police can't fool me."

"This is my search warrant!" exclaimed Sawyer, as he sent a bullet crashing into the wall, purposely aiming a foot above the lookout's head. "Quick, open this door. The next shot won't miss!"

There was a sound of overturned chairs and cries of alarm inside the door. The little man felt that he had sounded his warning and lived up to his duty. Had he completed that sniffing of the "koke," he would doubtless have been stimulated to enough pseudo-courage to face the entire Police Department single-handed—as long as the thrill of the drug lasted. A majority of the desperate deeds performed by the criminals in New York, so medical examinations have proved, are carried on under the stimulus of this fearful poison, which can be obtained with comparative ease throughout the city.

But the lookout was deprived of his drug. He even endeavored to take a sniff as the captain and his men shoved and shook the iron work of the grating.

"Drop it!" cried Sawyer, pulling the trigger again and burying another bullet in the plaster.

"Oh, oh! Don't shoot!" cried the lookout weakly. He trembled as he advanced to the grating and removed the emergency bolt.

"Grab him!" cried Sawyer to one of his men. "Come with me, fellows." He rushed into the waiting room. There consternation reigned. Fully a dozen pensioners of the "system" of traffic in souls were struggling to escape through the barred windows in the rear. These bars had been placed as they were to resist the invaders from the outside. John Clemm's system of defense was extremely ingenious. In time of trouble he had not deemed the inmates of the middle room worth protecting—his purpose was to exclude with the iron grating and the barred windows the possible entry of raiders.

Three revolvers were on the floor. Their owners had wisely discarded them to avoid the penalty of the concealed weapon law, for they had realized that they were trapped.

"Open that door!" cried Sawyer, who had learned the arrangement of the rooms from Burke's description.

Two men pushed at the door, which was securely locked. They finally caught up the nearest church pew, and, using it as a battering ram, they succeeded in smashing the heavy oaken panels. The door had been barricaded with a cross bar. As they cautiously peered in through the forced opening they saw the room empty and the window open.

"He's escaped!" exclaimed Sawyer.

Just then a call from the outer vestibule reached his ears.

"I've caught the go-between, Captain. Here's Mr. John Clemm, the executive genius of this establishment," sung out Burke, who was standing inside the door with the rueful fat man wearing the handcuffs.

"Where did you get him, Burke?"

"He tried to make a quiet getaway through the rescue department of the Purity League," answered Officer 4434. "I nabbed him as he came up the fire-escape from this floor."

"Where is Trubus?"

"He has gone home, so one of the stenographers tells me."

"Then we will get him, too. Hurry now. White, I leave you in charge of this place. Send for the wagon and take these men over to our station house. Get every bit of paper and the records. We had better look around in that private office first before we go after Trubus."

They finished the demolition of the door and entered.

"What's this arrangement?" queried Sawyer, puzzled, as he looked at the automatic pencil box.

"That is an arrangement by which this fellow Clemm has been making duplicates of all his transactions in his own writing," explained Burke. "You see this Trubus has trusted no one. He has a definite record of every deal spread out before him by the other pencil on the machine upstairs, just as this go-between writes it out. Then here is the dictagraph, under the desk."

Burke pointed out the small transmitting disc to the surprised captain.

"Well, this man learned a lot from the detectives and applied it to his trade very scientifically, didn't he?"

"Yes, the records we have on the phonograph show that every word which passed in this room was received upstairs by Trubus. No one but Clemm knew of his connection or ownership of the establishment. Yet Trubus, all the time that he was posing as the guardian angel of virtue, has been familiar with the work of every procurer and every purchaser; it's a wonderful system. If he had spent as much energy on doing the charitable work that he pretended to do, think of how much misery and sickness he could have cured."

"Well, Burke, it's the same game that a lot of politicians on the East Side do. They own big interests and the gambling privileges in the saloons, and they get their graft from the gangsters. Then about twice a year they give a picnic for the mothers and babies of the drunkards who patronize their saloons. They send a ticket for a bucket of coal or a pair of shoes to the parents of young girls who work for the gangsters and bring the profits of shame back tenfold on the investment to these same politicians. They will spend a hundred dollars on charity and the newspapers will run columns about it. But the poor devils who cheer them and vote for them don't realize that every dollar of graft comes, not out of the pockets of property owners and employers, but from reduced wages, increased rents, and expensive, rotten food. Trubus would have been a great Alderman or State Senator: he wasted his talents on religion."

Burke turned to the door.

"Shall I go up to his house, Captain? I'd like to be in at the finish of this whole fight."

"You bet you can," said Sawyer. "It's now nearly six o'clock, and we will jump into the machine and get up there before he can get out to supper. The men will take care of these prisoners."

After a few skillful orders, Sawyer led the way downstairs. They were soon speeding up to the Riverside Drive residence of the philanthropist, Sawyer and Burke enjoying the machine to themselves.

"This is a joy ride that will not be so joyful for one man on the return trip, Burke!" exclaimed Sawyer, as he took off his cap to mop the perspiration from his brow. He had been through a strenuous afternoon and was beginning to feel the strain.

"How shall we approach his house?" asked Burke.

"You get out of the machine and go to the door. There's no need of alarming his family. Just tell the servant who answers the door that you want to speak to the boss—say that there's been a robbery down at his office, and you want to speak to him privately. Tell the servant not to let the other members of the family know about it, as it would worry them."

"That's a good idea, Captain. I understand that his wife and daughter are very fine women. It will save a terrible scene. What a shame to make them suffer like this!"

"Yes, Burke. If these scoundrels only realized that their work always made some good woman suffer—sometimes a hundred. Think of the women that this villain has made to suffer, body and soul. Think of the mothers' hearts he has broken while posing with his charity and his Bible! All that wickedness is to be punished on his own wife and his own daughter. I tell you, there's something in life which brings back the sins of the fathers, all right, upon their children. The Good Book certainly tells it right."

The auto was stopped before the handsome residence of the Purity League's leader. It seemed a bitter tangle of Fate that in these beautiful surroundings, with the broad blue Hudson River a few hundred yards away, the green of the park trees, the happy throng of pedestrians strolling and chatting along the promenade of the Drive, it should be Burke's duty to drag to punishment as foul a scoundrel as ever drew the breath of the beautiful spring air. The sun was setting in the heights of Jersey, across the Hudson, and the golden light tinted the carved stone doorway of Trubus's home, making Burke feel as though he were acting in some stage drama, rather than real life. The spotlight of Old Sol was on him as he rang the bell by the entry.

"Is Mr. Trubus home?" asked Burke of the portly butler who answered the summons.

"Hi don't know, sir," responded the servant, in a conventional monotone. "What nyme, sir?"

"Just tell him that it is a policeman. His office has been robbed, and we want to get some particulars about it."

"Well, sir, he's dressing for dinner, sir. You'll 'ave to wyte, sir. Hi wouldn't dare disturb 'im now, sir."

"You had better dare. This is very important to him. But don't mention it to anyone else, for it would worry his wife and daughter."

As Burke was speaking, a big fashionable car drew up behind the one in which Captain Sawyer sat, awaiting developments. A young man, wearing a light overcoat, whose open fold displayed a dinner coat, descended and approached the door.

"What's the trouble here?" he curtly inquired.

"None of your business," snapped Burke, who recognized the fiance, Ralph Gresham.

"Don't you sauce me—I'll find out myself."

The butler bowed as Gresham approached.

"Come in, sir. Miss Trubus is hexpecting you, sir. This person is wyting to see Mr. Trubus, sir."

Gresham, with an angry look at the calm policeman, went inside.

The door shut. Burke for a minute regretted that he had not insisted on admission. It might have been possible for Trubus to have received some sort of warning. The "best-laid plans of mice and men" had one bad habit, as Burke recollected, just at the moment when success was apparently within grasp.

But the door opened again. The smug countenance, the neatly brushed "mutton-chops," the immaculate dinner coat of William Trubus appeared, and Bobbie looked up into the angry glint of the gentleman's black eyes.

"What do you mean by annoying me here? Why didn't you telephone me?" began the owner of the mansion. "I am just going out to dinner."

He looked sharply at Burke, vaguely remembering the face of the young officer. Bobbie quietly stepped to his side and caught the knob of the big door, shutting it softly behind Trubus.

"Why, you...."

Before he could finish Burke had deftly clipped one handcuff on the right wrist of the man and with an unexpected movement pinioned the other, snapping the manacle as he did so.

"Outrageous!" exclaimed the astounded Trubus. But Burke was dragging him rapidly into the car.

"If you don't want your wife to know about this, get in quickly," commanded Sawyer sharply.

Trubus began to expostulate, but his thick lips quivered with emotion.

"Down to the station house, quick!" ordered the captain to the chauffeur. "No speed limit."

"I'll have you discharged from the force for this, you scoundrel!" Trubus finally found words to say. "Where is your warrant for my arrest? What is your charge?"

Sawyer did not answer.

As they reached a subway station he called out to the driver:

"Stop a minute. Now, Burke, you had better go uptown and get the witness; hurry right down, for I want to end this matter to-night."

Bobbie dismounted, while Trubus stormed in vain. As the car sped onward he saw the president of the Purity League indulging in language quite alien to the Scriptural quotations which were his usual stock in discourse. Captain Sawyer was puffing a cigar and watching the throng on the sidewalks as though he were stone deaf.

Burke hurried to the Barton home. There he found a scene of joy which beggared description. Lorna had recovered and was strong enough to run to greet him.

"Oh, Mr. Burke, can you ever forgive me for my silliness and ugly words?" she began, as Mary caught the officer's hand with a welcome clasp.

"There, there, Miss Lorna, I've nothing to forgive. I'm so happy that you have come out safe and sound from the dangers of these men," answered Burke. "We have trapped the gang, even up to Trubus, and, if you are strong enough to go down to the station, we will have him sent with the rest of his crew to the Tombs to await trial."

Old Barton reached for Burke's hand.

"My boy, you have been more than a friend to me on this terrible yet wonderful day. You could have done no more if you had been my own son."

The excitement and his own tense nerves drove Bobbie to a speech which he had been pondering and hesitating to make for several weeks. He blurted it out now, intensely surprised at his own temerity.

"Your own son, Mr. Barton.... Oh, how I wish I were.... And I hope that I may be some day, if you and some one else are willing ... some day when I have saved enough to provide the right sort of a home."

He hesitated, and Lorna stepped back. Mary held out her hands, and her eyes glowed with that glorious dilation which only comes once in a life-time to one woman's glance for only one man's answering look.

She held out her hands as she approached him.

"Oh, Bob ... as though you had to ask!" was all she said, as the strong arms caught her in their first embrace. Her face was wet with tears as Bob drew back from their first kiss.

John Barton was wiping his eyes as Burke looked at him in happy bewilderment at this curious turn to his fortune.

"My boy, Bob," began the old man softly, "would you take the responsibility of a wife, earning no more money than a policeman can?"

Bob nodded. "I'd do it and give up everything in the world to make her happy if it were enough to satisfy her," he asserted.

Barton lifted up a letter which had been lying on the table beside him. He smiled as he read from it:

"DEAR MR. BARTON:

"The patents have gone through in great shape and they are so basic that no one can fight you on them. The Gresham Company has offered me, as your attorney, fifty thousand dollars as an advance royalty, and a contract for your salary as superintendent for their manufacture. We can get even more. It may interest you to know that your friend on the police force won't have to worry about a raise in salary. I have been working on his case with a lawyer in Decatur, Illinois. His uncle is willing to make a payment of twenty-four thousand dollars to prevent being prosecuted for misappropriation of funds on that estate. I will see you...."

Barton dropped the letter to his lap.

"Now, how does that news strike you?"

"I can't believe it real," gasped Burke, rubbing his forehead. "But I am more glad for you than for myself. You will have an immense fortune, won't you?"

Smiling into the faces of the two radiant girls, Old Barton drew Lorna to his side and, reaching forward, tugged at the hand of Mary.

"In my two dear girls, safe and happy, I have a greater wealth for my old age than the National City Bank could pay me, Burke. Lorna has told me of her experience and her escape when all escape seemed hopeless. She has learned that the sensual pleasures of one side of New York's glittering life are dross and death. In the books and silly plays she has read and seen it was pictured as being all song and jollity. Now she knows how sordid and bitter is the draught which can only end, like all poison, in one thing. God bless you, my boy, and you, my girls!"

Bobbie shook the old man's hand, and then remembered the unpleasant duty still before him.

"We must get down town as soon as possible," syd he. "Come, won't you go with us, Mary?"

The two girls put on their hats and together they traveled to the distant police station as rapidly as possible. It was a bitter ordeal for Lorna, whose strength was nearly exhausted. The welts on her shoulders from Shepard's whip brought the tears to her eyes. As they reached the station house the girl became faint. The matron and Mary had to chafe her hands and apply other homely remedies to keep her up for the task of identifying the woman who had been captured.

"Now, Burke," began Sawyer, "I have been saving Trubus for a surprise. He has been locked up in my private office, and still doesn't know exactly how we have caught him. I've broken the letter of the rules by forbidding him to telephone anyone until you came. I guess it is important enough, in view of our discovery, for me to have done this—he can call up his lawyer as soon as we have confronted him with Clemm and this young girl. Bring me the phonograph records."

They went into his private office, where White was guarding Trubus.

"How much longer am I to be subject to these Russian police methods?" demanded Trubus, with an oath.

"Quiet, now, Mr. Purity League," said Sawyer, "we are going to have ladies present. You will soon be allowed to talk all you want. But I warn you in advance that everything you say will be used as evidence against you."

"Against me—me, the leading charity worker of our city!" snorted Trubus, but he watched the door uneasily.

"Bring in the young ladies, Burke," directed Captain Sawyer.

Bobbie returned with Mary and Lorna. Trubus started perceptibly as he observed the new telephone girl whom his wife had induced him to employ that day.

Sawyer nodded again to Burke.

"Now the go-between." He turned to Mary. "Do you know this man, Miss Barton?"

The name had a strangely familiar sound to Trubus. He wondered uneasily.

"He is William Trubus, president of the Purity League. I worked for him to-day."

"Do you recognize this man?" was queried, as Clemm shuffled forward, with the assistance of Burke's sturdy push.

"This is the one who was embracing the other telephone girl. But he did not stay there long. I never saw him before that, to my recollection."

"What do you know about this man, Officer 4434?" asked the captain. Clemm fumbled with his handcuffs, looking down in a sheepish way to avoid the malevolent looks of Trubus.

"He is known as John Clemm, although we have found a police record of him under a dozen different aliases. He formerly ran a gambling house, and at different times has been involved in bunco game and wire-tapping tricks. He is one of the cleverest crooks in New York. In the present case he has been the go-between for this man Trubus, who, posing as a reformer to cover his activities, has kept in touch with the work of the Vice Trust, managed by Clemm. They had a dictagraph and a mechanical pencil register which connected Trubus's office with Clemm's."

"It's a lie!" shouted Trubus, furiously. "Some of these degraded criminals are drawing my famous and honored name into this case to protect themselves. It is a police scheme for notoriety."

"You'll get the notoriety," retorted Sawyer. "There is a young man who is taking notes for the biggest paper in New York. He has verified every detail. They'll have extras on the streets in fifteen minutes, for this is the biggest story in years. You are cornered at last, Trubus. Send in the rest of those people arrested in that house owned by Trubus." The woman was brought in with the others of the gang who had been apprehended in the old house.



"Now, Mr. Trubus, this woman rented from you and paid a very high rental. The man Shepard was killed in resisting arrest. We have rounded up Baxter, Craig, Madame Blanche and a dozen others of your employees. Have you anything to say?"

Trubus whirled around and would have struck Clemm had not White intervened.

"You squealer! You've betrayed me!"

"No, I didn't!" cried Clemm, shrinking back. "I swear I didn't!"

Sawyer reached for the phonograph records and held them up with a laconic smile.

"There's no use in accusing anyone else, Trubus. You're your own worst enemy, for these records, with your own dictagraph as the chief assistant prosecutor, have trapped you."

Trubus raised his hands in terror and his iron nerve gave way completely.

"Oh, my God!" he cried. "What will my wife and daughter think?"

"You should have figured that out when you started all this," retorted Sawyer. "Take them into the cells, and we'll have them arraigned at Night Court. Make out the full reports now, men."

The prisoners were led out.

Trubus turned and begged with Sawyer for a little time.

"Let me tell my wife," he pleaded. "I don't want any one else to do it."

"You stay just where you are, until I am through with you. You're getting war methods now, Trubus—after waging war from ambush for all this time. Burke, you had better have the young ladies taken home. Go up with them. Use the automobile outside. You can have the evening off as soon as we get through the arraignment at court."

It took an hour before the first charges could be brought to the Magistrate, through whose hands all cases must first be carried. The sisters decided to stay and end their first ordeal with what testimony was desired. This was sufficient for the starting of the wheels of justice. Trubus had called up his lawyer, who was on hand with the usual objections and instructions. But he was held over until the day court, without bail.

"Only let me go home, and break the news to my wife and daughter," begged the subdued man. "Oh, I beg that one privilege."

The judge looked at Captain Sawyer, who nodded.

"I will send a couple of men up with him, your honor. I understand his wife is a very estimable lady. It will be a bitter blow to her."

"All right. You will have to go in the custody of the police. But I will not release you on bail."

Bobbie and the girls had already sped on their way to the happy Barton home. Trubus, under the watchful eyes of two policemen and with his lawyer, lost no time in returning to his mansion.

As he rang the bell the butler hurried to the door in a frightened manner.

"It can't be true, sir, wot the pypers say, can it?" he gasped. But Trubus forced his way past, followed by the attorney and his two guards.

In the beautiful drawing-room he saw two maids leaning over the Oriental couch. They were trying to quiet his daughter.

"Why, Sylvia, my child," he cried.

"Oh, oh!" exclaimed the girl, forcing herself free from the restraining hands of the servants. She laughed shrilly as she staggered toward her father. Her eyes were wide and staring with the light of madness. "Here's father! Dear father!"

Trubus paled, but caught her in his arms.

"My poor dear," he began.

"Oh, look, father, what it says in the papers. We missed you—ha, ha!—and the newsboys sold us this on the street. Look, father, there's your picture. He, he! And Ralph bought it and brought it to me."

She staggered and sank half-drooping in his arms. Her head rolled back and her eyes stared wildly at the ceiling. Her mad laughter rang out shrilly, piercing the ears of her miserable father. The two policemen and the lawyer watched the uncanny scene.

"Ha, ha! Ralph read it, and he's gone. He wouldn't marry me now, he said,—ha, ha! Father! Who cares? Oh, it's so funny!" She broke from her father's hold and ran into the big dining room, pursued by the sobbing maids.

"She's gone crazy as a loon," whispered one of the policemen to the other.

"Where is my wife?" timidly asked Trubus, as he supported himself with one hand on a table near the door. The frightened butler, with choleric red face, pointed upward.

Trubus drew himself up and started for the broad stairway.

Just then a revolver shot smote the ears of the excited men. It came from above.

"Great God!" uttered Trubus, clasping his hand to his heart. He ran for the stairs, followed by the two patrolmen, while the lawyer sank weakly into a chair and buried his face in his hands. He guessed only too well what had happened.

The policemen were slower than the panic-stricken Trubus.

They found him in his magnificent boudoir, kneeling and sobbing by the side of his dead wife; a revolver had fallen to the floor from her limp hand. It was still smoking. The exquisite lace coverlet was even now drinking up the red stains, and the bluecoats stopped at the doorway, dropping their heads as they instinctively doffed their caps.

Gruff Roundsman Murphy crossed himself, while White wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. He remembered a verse from the old days when he went to Sunday-school in the Jersey town where he was born.

"'Vengeance is mine,' saith the Lord."

* * * * *

The blossoms of late May were tinting the greensward beneath the trees of Central Park as Bobbie Burke and Mary strolled along one of the winding paths. They had just walked up the Avenue from their last shopping expedition.

"I hated to bid the boys at the station house good-bye this afternoon, Mary. Yet after to-night we'll be away from New York for a wonderful month in the country. And then no more police duty, is there?"

"No, Bob. You and father will be the busiest partners in New York and you will have to report for duty at our new little apartment every evening before six. I'm so glad that you can leave all those dangers, and gladder still because of my own selfish gratifications. After to-night."

"Well, I'm scared of to-night more than I was of that police parade on May Day, with all that fuss about the medal. Here I've got to face a minister, and you know that's not as easy as it seems."

They reached the new home which the advance royalties for old Barton's days of realization had made possible. It was a handsome apartment on Central Park West, and the weeks of preparation had turned it into a wonderful bower for this night of nights.

"Look, Mary," cried Lorna, as they came in. "Here are two more presents. One must weigh a ton and the other is in this funny old bandbox."

They opened the big bundle first; it was a silver service of elaborate, ornate design. It had cost hundreds of dollars.

On a long paper Bobbie saw the names of a hundred men, all familiar and memory-stirring. The list was headed with the simple dedication in the full, round hand which Burke recognized as that of Captain Sawyer:

"To the Prince of all the Rookies and his Princess, from his brother cops. God bless you, Bobbie Burke, and Mrs. Bobbie."

Ex-officer 4434 Burke blinked and hugged his happy fiancee delightedly.

"What's in that old bandbox, Bob?" asked Lorna. "It's marked 'Glass—Handle with care.' I wonder how it ever held together. Some country fellow left it at the door this afternoon, but wouldn't come in."

They opened it, and Mary gasped.

"Why, look at the flowers!"

The box seemed full of old-fashioned country blossoms, as Mary dipped her hand into it. Then she deftly reached to the bottom of the big bandbox and lifted its contents. Wrapped in a sheathing of oiled tissue paper was a monstrous cake, layer on layer, like a Chinese pagoda. It was covered with that rustic triumph of multi-colored icing which only grandmothers seem able to compound in these degenerate days of machine-made pastry of the city bakeries.

A wedding ring of yellow icing was molded in the center, while on either side were red candy hearts, joined by whirly sugar streamers of pink and blue.

A card pinned in the center said:

"From Henrietta and Joe."

"That's all we needed," said Mary with a sob in her happy voice, "to make our wedding supper end right. Wasn't it, Officer 4434?"



THE END