In the streaked and broken mirror Jimmie Dale surveyed himself critically, methodically, and, with a nod of satisfaction, hastily donned the fashionably cut suit of tweeds upon the bed.He rummaged then through the ragged garments he had just discarded, transferred to his pockets a roll of bills and his automatic, and paused hesitantly, staring at the thin metal case, like a cigarette case, that he held in the palm of his hand.He shrugged his shoulders a little whimsically; it seemed strange indeed that he was through with that! He snapped it open.Within, between sheets of oil paper, lay the scores of little diamond-shaped, gray-coloured, adhesive paper seals--the insignia of the Gray Seal.Yes, it seemed strange that he was never to use another! He closed the case, gathered up the clothes of Larry the Bat, tucked the case in among them, and shoved the bundle into the hole under the flooring.All these things would have to be destroyed, but there was not time to-night; to-morrow, or the next day, would do for that.What would it be like to live a normal life again, without the menace of danger lurking on every hand, without that grim slogan of the underworld, "Death to the Gray Seal!" or that savage fiat of the police, "The Gray Seal, dead or alive--but the Gray Seal!" forever ringing in his ears? What would it be like, this new life--with her?
The thought was thrilling him again, bringing again that eager, exultant uplift.In an hour, ONE hour, and the barriers of years would be swept away, and she would be in his arms!
"It's for my sake to-night!" His face grew suddenly tense, as the words came back to him.That "hour" wasn't over yet! It was no hysterical exaggeration that had prompted her to call her enemies the most powerful and pitiless organisation of criminals that the world had ever known.It was not the Tocsin's way to exaggerate.
The words would be literally true.The very life she had led for the three years that had gone stood out now as a grim proof of her assertion.
Jimmie Dale replaced the flooring, carefully brushed the dust back into the cracks, spread the oilcloth into place, and stood up.Who and what was this organisation? What was between it and the Tocsin?
What was this immense fortune that was at stake? And what was this priceless packet that was so crucial, that meant victory now, ay, and her life, too, she had said?
The questions swept upon him in a sort of breathless succession.
Why had she not let him play a part in this? True, she had told him why--that she dared not expose him to the risk.Risk! Was there any risk that the Gray Seal had not taken, and at her instance! He did not understand, he smiled a little uncertainly, as he reached up to turn out the gas.There were a good many things that he did not understand about the Tocsin!
The room was in darkness, and with the darkness Jimmie Dale's mind centred on the work immediately before him.To enter the tenement where he was known and had an acknowledged right as Larry the Bat was one thing; for Jimmie Dale to be discovered there was quite another.
He crossed the room, opened the door silently, stood for a moment listening, then stepped out into the black, musty, ill-smelling hallway, closing the door behind him.He stooped and locked it.
The querulous cry of a child reached him from somewhere above--a murmur of voices, muffled by closed doors, from everywhere.How many families were housed beneath that sordid roof he had never known, only that there was miserable poverty there as well as vice and crime, only that Larry the Bat, who possessed a room all to himself, was as some lordly and super-being to these fellow tenants who shared theirs with so many that there was not air enough for all to breathe.
He had no doors to pass--his was next to the staircase.He began to descend.They could scream and shriek, those stairs, like aged humans, twisted and rheumatic, at the least ungentle touch.But there was no sound from them now.There seemed something almost uncanny in the silent tread.Stair after stair he descended, his entire weight thrown gradually upon one foot before the other was lifted.The strain upon the muscles, trained and hardened as they were, told.As he moved from the bottom step, he wiped little beads of perspiration from his forehead.
The door, now, that gave on the alleyway! He opened it, slipped outside, darted across the narrow lane, stole along where the shadows of the fence were blackest, paused, listening, as he reached the end of the alleyway, to assure himself that there was no near-by pedestrian--and stepped out into the street.
He kept on along the block, turned into the Bowery, and, under the first lamp, consulted his watch.It was a quarter past ten.He could make it easily in a leisurely walk.He continued on up the Bowery, finally crossed to Broadway, and shortly afterward turned into Waverly Place.At the corner of Fifth Avenue he consulted his watch again--and now he lighted a cigarette.Sixth Avenue was only a block away.At precisely half-past ten, to the second, he halted on the designated corner, smoking nonchalantly.
A taxicab, coincidentally coming from an uptown direction, swung in to the curb.
"Taxi, sir? Yes, sir?" Then, with an admirable mingling of eagerness to secure the fare and a fear that his confession might cause him the loss of it: "I've another fare in half an hour, sir, but I can get you most anywhere in that time."Jimmie Dale's cigarette was tossed carelessly into the street.
"St.James Club!" he said curtly, and stepped into the cab.