Scuttle’s hand that held the receiver grew white where the tension of the skin over the knuckles betrayed his emotion, but his voice was steady as he replied.

  “Yes, sir,” and hung up the telephone.

  II

  The desk sergeant regarded Lester Leith’s immaculate figure with narrow-eyed suspicion. “Bail for Miss Dixie Stagud has been fixed in the sum of ten thousand dollars. She’s held on suspicion of grand theft. You can’t see her unless you’re her lawyer.”

  With a bored gesture Lester Leith flipped his hand to his pocket. “If one puts up bail for a prisoner he has the opportunity of getting a return or his bail by delivering the prisoner back into custody.”

  “Yes, that’s right. Why?”

  “Because I desire to bail Miss Stagud out of jail.”

  “You’d have to get your bond approved by—”

  Lester Leith’s withdrawn hand interrupted the speech. Two packages of treasury certificates thudded on the desk. “United States currency, sergeant. You’ll find it correct in amount. I trust it will not be necessary to approve that, because I have an important appointment in thirty minutes.”

  The sergeant gasped, sputtered, then started in motion the necessary machinery that unwound the red tape and released Miss Dixie Stagud to the custody of Lester Leith.

  “We’ll have to hurry to keep my appointment,” announced Lester Leith, making a deep bow to the startled eyed young blonde who appeared on the arm of a matron.

  “But I don’t understand—” began the girl, eying him with puzzled approval. “They tell me you’ve put up bail— Oh, but I don’t know you!”

  Lester Leith extended his card. “Permit me, my dear young lady, Lester Leith, at your service. And only too pleased to be of some temporary aid to you in your unfortunate predicament. I read of your case in the newspaper, realized at once you were innocent. If you’ll accompany me I think I can demonstrate to all concerned that you had no connection with the crime.”

  The girl sighed, took his arm, and flashed him a tired smile. “It’s a pleasure to meet a real gentleman—after enjoying the society of my employers.”

  “Thank you. My roadster’s this way.”

  The sergeant took down his telephone as the couple left the jail. In short, rapid sentences he conveyed to higher-ups an exact account of what had transpired.

  Thereafter, several machines purred through the night in the direction of the Follingsby residence. One of them was the red roadster of Lester Leith. Three of the others were police cars, filled with detectives and uniformed officers. Another car, a light runabout, contained Lieutenant Silvey, the head of the gem squad. His lips were tight with determination, and he personally saw to the distribution of his forces.

  Within ten minutes after Leith had been received at the Follingsby residence, Lieutenant Silvey had completed his plans. He rang the Follingsby doorbell.

  Hearing the sounds of loud conversation from the drawingroom, the officer brushed past the servant who opened the door, and entered.

  Lester Leith, himself, arose with a smile of welcome. “This is, indeed, a pleasure, lieutenant. Perhaps you may be of some assistance. I have dropped in to explain to Mr. Follingsby the grievous error he has made in accusing this young lady of grand theft. He adopts the position that I have brought a thief to his house, and refuses to listen.”

  Lieutenant Silvey swept his eyes over the occupants of the room, opened his mouth to speak, but closed it as Follingsby bellowed forth a torrent of words.

  “Damned outrage! The police can’t make me stand for it. This damned social dude can’t make me stand for it. I won’t stand for it. Bring a brazen-faced hussy back into my house like this! Preposterous! My wife signed a complaint that was to put her in jail. Why isn’t she there now? I’ll prosecute her to the limit. If the officers of the law can’t do it, I’ll hire officers of my own! The idea—”

  He was a short, stout man, his eyes glassy, his face florid. His head was held far back to minimize the double chin and make him appear taller. His chest stuck out like a drum major’s. What might otherwise have been an erect figure was somewhat impaired by a most excessive waistline.

  Lieutenant Silvey managed to catch his eye.

  “A word with you,” he said, clamped a thumb and forefinger about the man’s forearm and firmly escorted him to the far corner of the room.

  “That man’s suspected of being one of the cleverest thieves in the state.” he whispered. “He makes a practice of studying crimes and beating the police to it. He’s uncanny when it comes to running down clews, making keen deductions, and getting the boodle. We’re laying a trap for him on this case. Just keep quiet and follow his lead. The place is surrounded.”

  Follingsby snorted. “Well, I’m not supposed to act as decoy for any incompetent police—”

  Of a sudden cold lightning played from the officer’s eyes. “We’ve been trying to get this bird for two years. Either you play ball with us or you’ll wish you had. Get that?”

  The thunder died away to rumblings.

  “All right, all right. I was just going to mention that I didn’t see what right the police had to call upon me, but I’m willing to do anything to get those diamonds back. I’m a heavy taxpayer—”

  “Forget it and come on. Play into his hand and follow my lead.”

  The two men moved back to the center of the room and encountered Lester Leith’s amused, supercilious smile.

  “He may have the cooperation of the police department, I’d like to make a few demonstrations concerning the theft of the necklace and the innocence of this young lady,” drawled Leith. “To do so, however, I must have all of the occupants of the house assemble at the scene of the crime. When I say all, I mean all.”

  Lieutenant Silvey flashed a warning glance at Follingsby, dropped his left eyelid slowly and emphatically. ‘“Certainly,” blustered Follingsby. “I’ll attend to that. But, understand this, I don’t give a damn about a lot of theorizing. I want those diamonds.”

  There followed the hasty shuffle of assembling steps, whispers rustled through the corridors, preceded white-faced servants as they trooped up the stairs. Within a matter of minutes a motley assemblage was grouped in Mrs. Follingsby’s room.

  “Aw, who are these vulgah persons, George? Ah, yes, the police! Such a bothah, y’know. I presume we have to put up with it? Yes? Real-l-ly!”

  A decade before she had been a cashier in a motion picture palace. The meteoric rise to wealth of her husband had been accompanied by a veneer of synthetic culture on the part of his wife.

  “Howevah, one must put up with certain inconveniences when one associates with the common herd.”

  Lieutenant Silvey could not forego his revenge. “Mr. Lester Leith is the Mr. Lester Leith,” he said. “Perhaps you’ve heard of him. Clubman, sportsman, social leader. You’ve probably read of him in the papers.”

  The glassy eyes of the woman goggled to her husband. “Why my dear sir! Why didn’t you say so. Do come in, my dear Mr. Leith. I’ve barely missed meeting you a numbah of times. It’s so strange that we should move in the same circles so long without having met. Do be seated. It’s a pleasuah!”

  Suave as ever, Lester Leith bowed.

  “I thank you, madame. And I trust it will not be impertinent for me to remark that I hope it will be a mutual pleasure in the near future. I have just agreed to finance Miss Stagud in her action for defamation of character. We are to split the damage recovery. I think it will be high.

  “But that is a mere matter which does not need intrude upon the present discussion. Probably you will wish to settle the case out of court, anyhow. What I wished to point out tonight was the facts establishing the innocence of my—ah—client.

  “I’ve been talking a bit with some of the servants while the little group was gathering. What I’ve heard confirms the suspicion that formed as soon as I read of the crime in the paper.

  “Had you found the diamond in the pocket of this young lady’s coat, or had you found her handbag left near the paste necklace, you might have suspected her. But the finding of both was too much to expect. And why should she have sneaked from her room, gone downstairs, taken the trouble to clip one of the diamonds from the necklace, and left it in a separate place from the others?”

  Mrs. Follingsby sputtered her wrath, dropped her acquired accent.

  “How should I know all of the moves of a crook. The little hussy imposed on me. Swiped my rocks as soon as my back was turned. I know she did it. The doors were locked, from the inside. There couldn’t have been any one come in through the doors or windows—”

  Lester Leith intruded upon her angry discourse. “Your pardon, Mrs. Follingsby. But if you’ll arrange the room just as it was the night of the crime I believe I can demonstrate how the crime was committed.”

  Lieutenant Silvey glanced meaningly at Follingsby. That individual placed his flushed face next to the fat neck of his wife and whispered rumblingly. The woman arose with sneering lips.

  “Perhaps you know more of the habits of crooks than I do,” she sneered.

  Leith smiled affably. “Crime is divided into many branches, my dear Mrs. Follingsby. It is no slight upon the ability of your husband that he has not been able to perfect himself in all of them. It happens I’ve made a study of certain forms of direct crime.”

  With which the smiling, debonair Leith withdrew.

  III

  The police officer took occasion to rumble a swift warning. “Lead him on. He’s up to something. Play into his hand. The place is watched. Remember, this may discover your jewels!”

  Her face mottled with indignation. Mrs. Follingsby went about the room arranging furniture, placing the paste imitation upon her dressing table.

  “Ready!” she snapped.

  Leith opened the door, smiled. “Ah, yes, and your handbag, Miss Stagud? Where was it the last time you remember having it?”

  “In the adjoining room,” she said, her eyes hopeful but puzzled.

  “Be so good as to place it there, please.” The girl hastened to obey.

  “Now, if you’ll lock the doors and windows,” suggested Lester Leith, and stepped into the hall.

  Lieutenant Silvey, his features wearing an air of puzzled abstraction, took charge of locking the rooms. “Ready,” he called.

  Instantly, noiselessly, Lester Leith’s face appeared at a crack in the half open transom above the door. His startled observers saw that in his hand he held the handbag which, but a moment before, had been left on the dressing table in the adjoining room.

  Then they laughed, a laugh of sheer tension and relief. For the manner in which Lester Leith had obtained possession of that handbag became immediately apparent. A jointed fishing pole was in his hand. The bag dangled from a half straightened, barb-less hook.

  But Lester Leith’s face was grave.

  Noiselessly, he thrust the stiff pole through the crack above the transom, held it dangling over the dressing table on which reposed the paste imitation.

  Then the oiled reel silently unwound the silken line. The purse dropped noiselessly into position. The hook shifted to the paste imitation, caught it. The reel spun the fine line and the paste imitation disappeared through the transom.

  Lieutenant Silvey was at the door, shooting the lock. It seemed that he did not trust Leith even with the paste replica of the necklace.

  “Simple,” smiled Leith.

  “Too damn simple!” growled Silvey.

  Leith indicated a member of the group. White-faced, lips trembling, eyes watering, a liveried servant strove to keep his eyes from the floor—and failed.

  “You see, it was a very amateurish crime all round. And that means some professional criminal bribed a trusted servant, a servant who wasn’t very expert. I found the things in your room, Roberts. While you were arranging things in here I slipped down to Roberts’s room. I heard he was on duty on the night of the crime. The jointed fishing pole was under his mattress.

  “After all, Lieutenant Silvey and I know that you didn’t think this thing up. Somewhere in the city some fence desired those stones. He was the one who made up the paste replica. He was the one who got you in debt to him, finally sprung his idea—”

  But there was no need of going farther. The guilt of the man was apparent. His face switching, tears streaming from his eyes blurted his story.

  “I’d have confessed anyway. I’d never have stolen for an innocent girl being convicted of crime. He’s a pawnbroker. He got people coming to him for money. I was playing the races, and he encouraged me, took my notes, got me in deeper and deeper. Finally I stole a little money to make a payment, just a little. That I stole a small article or two, finally he became ugly, threatened to expose me. An’ what was I to do? He blocked out the plan, told me how to work it.

  “I was the one that suggested to Mrs. Follingsby should better have someone sleep in the adjoining room. I’d been watching my chance for six months.”

  Lieutenant Silvey stared at Leith. “And you deduced this from a newspaper account?’

  Leith smiled. “In part. But, you see, I’d heard, in a roundabout way, a very roundabout way, my dear lieutenant, that a certain fence had made a bid for the Follingsby diamonds. I couldn’t get his name.

  “Now one clew might be all right, but two such made-to-order clews, two such perfectly ridiculous slips were too much. And why should the girl have left the bedroom, and gone downstairs to put a single incriminating gem in her coat pocket, then come back to await discovery of the substitution?

  “And while the papers played up the shrewdness of Mrs. Follingsby in noticing the substitution, you’ll see that the replica wasn’t made to really fool her. It’s almost nothing but glass and tin. Anyone would notice it. No, manifestly, the idea was to have her notice it almost at once.

  “The newspaper photographs and diagrams showed that there were transoms over each door. And I noticed that the dressing tables had been placed directly opposite each transom. It was all very clear.”

  Lieutenant Silvey turned fiercely upon the sobbing servant.

  “Who was the man? Where are the gems?”

  “Silverstein—Moe Silverstein, he calls himself—on the corner.”

  But Silvey had exploded into action.

  “There’s only one man in the city we’d rather get than Moe Silverstein. The dirty fence! We’ve been laying for him for more than a year!”

  He flung up a window, blew three short, sharp blasts on his police whistle.

  Almost instantly scurring shadows flitted across the dim street. Heavy steps sounded upon the porches. Doors were thrown open. Grim faced men came trooping into the house.

  Lester Leith smiled suavely at the officer. “You seem to have your reception committee well trained, lieutenant.”

  But Silvey did not reply. He was busy, and he was mad. There was a certain irritating superciliousness about Lester Leith that caused the dark blood to mantle the officer’s temples.

  “Handcuff this man. He’s confessed to the theft of the necklace. Two of you men stay here and search the house. He may be lying. The rest of you come with me. Allow no one to leave the house or get to a telephone.

  “Leith, I think I’ll ask you to come with me. You’re too damnably clever to be left here. I want you where I can watch you.”

  “You flatter me,” drawled Leith. “I like to drive my own car. Perhaps you’d allow the young lady and myself to drive immediately ahead of your car?”

  The request was made in drawling insolence, and was vetoed in hot wrath.

  “You’ll ride beside me in a police car, and the young lady will remain here, under guard!”

  Leith bowed. The tilt of his head concealed a flash of swift triumph that twisted the corners of his mouth. “As you wish, my dear lieutenant.”

  IV

  The cars roared through the night with speed that made the tires screech a protest on the turns. For the first few blocks they used the sirens to clear the traffic. After that they trusted entirely to driving skill. They dared not alarm their quarry.

  Lieutenant Silvey directed the disposition of his forces. Men dropped from slowing cars, took up stations at doorways, alleys, corners. Silvey’s car and one other drew up directly before the office of Moe Silverstein.

  It was a little cubbyhole, cobwebby, squalid. The door bore no legend. A pale-yellow light showed through dust encrusted glass. Moe Silverstein did business with a very few, very select clients. And the nature of his business was such that he kept open until the first streaks of dawn came to pale his dim lamp.

  Silvey gave a cautious knock at the door, then banged his nightstick. “Open in the name of the law!”

  There was the sound of shooting bolts. The door swung back on silent hinges. A stooped little buzzard of a man stood in the doorway.

  His nose hooked downward. His chin hooked upward. Somewhere between was a thin, cruel mouth, much like the beak of a bird, hard, powerful.

  The eyes were great pools of lambent fire, masked from time to time, at other times reflecting emotion with strange fidelity.

  Just now the eyes depicted injured innocence, hurt incredulity. The dark skin, glistening with a coat of natural oil, had the appearance of cobwebbed dirt. The thin, claw-like fingers twisted and twined, one over the other, perpetually rubbing the harsh, rustling skin.

  “What’s the trouble? What’s the trouble? A great time it is to come disturbing an honest man in the keeping of his books. But don’t stand there gawking, come in.

  “Come in and wreck the business of an honest man. Day and night I labor, trying to make a living for my family. I build up the reputation of being an honest man and then come the police! Not in twos or threes do they come. I might explain such a coming. But, no! They come in carloads and droves. The neighbors crane necks from windows, see Moe Silverstein getting raked over the coals. They whisper and whisper.