“Looks harmless, Mugs,” said Paul Pry.

  Mugs Magoo nodded casually. “Yeah,” he said, “he don’t do anything except smuggle letters. That’s his racket. He won’t touch anything else. He won’t even take hop in to the prisoners.”

  “All right,” persisted Paul Pry, “why do you think that Tom Meek, the letter smuggler, knows anything about the Legget diamond?”

  “He don’t,” Mugs Magoo agreed readily enough. “But you see that heavy-set fellow over there at the table, with the jaw that’s the blue-black, in spite of the fact he’s been shaved not over two hours ago, the guy with the black hair and the big chest?”

  “Yes,” said Paul Pry, “he looks like a lawyer.”

  “He is a lawyer. That’s Frank Bostwick, the criminal lawyer, and he’s attorney for George Tompkins, and Tompkins is the man that’s in jail for pulling the robbery that netted the Legget diamond.”

  “All right,” said Paul Pry, “go on, Mugs.”

  Mugs swung his head in the other direction. “And the tall dignified coot over there with the starched collar and the glasses is Edgar Patten, and Patten’s the confidential representative of the insurance company that had the Legget diamond insured.”

  Paul Pry watched Mugs Magoo thoughtfully, his eyes glittering with interest despite their preoccupation.

  “Well, Mugs,” he said, “give me the lowdown on it and perhaps I can turn the information to some advantage.”

  Paul Pry lived by his wits alone. He would have indignantly denied that he was a detective in any sense of the word; on the other hand, he could have demonstrated that he was not a crook. Had he been called upon to give his business, he might have described himself as a professional opportunist.

  Mugs Magoo, on the other hand, had a definite status. He was confidential adviser to Paul Pry.

  Mugs never forgot a name, a face, or a connection. At one time he had been “camera-eye” man on the metropolitan police force. A political shake-up had thrown him out of employment. An accident had taken off his right arm at the shoulder. Booze had done the rest. When Paul Pry found the man he was a human derelict, seated on the sidewalk by the corner of a bank building, holding a derby hat in his left hand. The hat was half filled with pencils, with a few small coins at the bottom.

  Paul Pry had dropped in half a dollar, taken out one pencil and then been interested in something he had seen in the rugged weather-beaten face, in the flash of gratitude which had filled the unwinking glassy eyes. He had engaged him in conversation and had learned that the man was a veritable encyclopedia of underworld knowledge.

  That had been the last day Mugs Magoo had known want. It marked the formation of a strange association by which Mugs furnished Paul Pry with information and the chain-lightning mind of Paul Pry translated that information to pecuniary advantage.

  Mugs Magoo rolled his glassy eyes in another survey of the room and then turned once more to Paul Pry.

  “Here’s probably what’s happening,” he said. “Frank Bostwick, the lawyer is making a deal with Edgar Patten, the adjustor for the insurance company, to get Tompkins out with a light sentence or maybe get him turned loose without even a trial. The price he’s going to pay is the return of the Legget diamond.

  “The cops have got a dead open-and-shut case on Tompkins but they haven’t been able to find the diamond. Tompkins is an old hand at the game and he’s sitting tight.”

  “Then,” said Paul Pry, “you think that Bostwick knows where the diamond is?”

  Mugs Magoo stared at the table where Tom Meek was dining in solitude. “I wouldn’t doubt,” he said, “but what Bostwick has worked up a deal with Patten and smuggled a letter in to Tompkins by Meek. Then Tompkins has sent a reply back and Meek has got it to deliver.”

  “Why doesn’t Meek deliver it then?” Pry wanted to know.

  “That’s not the way Meek works,” said Mugs Magoo. “He’s one of those cagey individuals that never comes out with anything in the open. He’ll sit around there and eat his dinner. Then he’ll get up and leave the place. The letter will be planted under his plate or under his napkin somewhere, and Bostwick will go over and get it. Then Bostwick will get in touch with Patten and they’ll fix up the deal between them.”

  Paul Pry surveyed the dining room of the speakeasy with wary eyes that missed nothing.

  “I could,” said Mugs Magoo plaintively, “stand another bottle of that wine.”

  Paul Pry summoned the waiter. “Another pint,” he said.

  Mugs Magoo made a grimace. “A pint,” he said, “is a half-bottle.”

  “A quart, waiter,” Paul Pry remarked.

  Mugs Magoo nodded his satisfaction. “Gonna telephone,” he said. “Be back by the time the wine gets here.”

  He scraped back his chair and started in the general direction of the telephones.

  It was at that moment that Tom Meek summoned the waiter, paid his check, and arose from the table. He was halfway to the door when the light dimmed to a pale blue effect of imitation moonlight and the orchestra struck up a seductive waltz.

  In the confusion of the milling couples on the floor and other couples rising spontaneously from tables and twining into each other’s arms, Frank Bostwick, the lawyer, got to his feet and unobtrusively started toward the table which Meek had vacated.

  Paul Pry took instant advantage of the opportunity and the confusion. As swiftly and noiselessly as a trout, gliding through the black depths of a mountain pool, he slipped over to the table where Meek had been sitting. His hands made a questioning exploration of the table. The tips of the searching fingers encountered some flat object beneath the table-cloth and within a very few moments the flat object had been transferred to Paul Pry’s hand.

  It was a letter folded and sealed, and Paul Pry made no attempt to read it but folded it once again and thrust it into his shoe. Then he swung slightly to one side and paused before a table where a woman was seated.

  The woman was one of a trio who had entered the speakeasy, either the mother or the older sister of the young woman who accompanied her, and who was at the moment sliding into the first steps of the waltz with the young man of the party. She was amazed and flattered at Paul Pry’s attention and, after a moment, when startled surprise gave way to simpering acquiescence in her expression, she permitted herself to be guided out to the center of the room which was reserved for the dance floor.

  Paul Pry moved gracefully in the steps of the waltz. He had an opportunity to peer over the woman’s shoulder and see that Frank Bostwick, the lawyer, was seated at the table that had been vacated by Tom Meek, the letter smuggler.

  And Paul Pry’s smile became a chuckle as he realized that the attorney had not observed the surreptitious theft of the missive that Tom Meek had left beneath the tablecloth.

  Paul Pry was a handsome individual. Moreover, he had a ready poise and a magnetic manner. His companion was grateful and pleased. And, as Paul Pry returned her to her table at the termination of the waltz, he gave to the older woman the triumph of waiting a few moments until the younger couple had returned to the table. Nor did the sharp eyes of Paul Pry miss the sudden look of incredulous surprise on the face of the younger woman, or the expression of triumphant elation upon the face of the woman with whom he had been dancing.

  Then Paul Pry bowed from the waist, muttered his pleasure, and returned once more to his own table.

  The chair in which Mugs Magoo had been sitting was now occupied by a woman some twenty-seven years of age. She had a willowy figure, a daring backless gown, and blue eyes that stared at Paul Pry with frank invitation.

  Paul Pry paused. “I beg your pardon,” he said.

  The woman’s eyes rested upon his face with a directness of gaze that was frankly seductive. The sensuous red lips parted in a smile.

  “You should,” she said.

  Paul Pry raised his eyebrows.

  “Not,” said the young woman still smiling, “that I object so much to your appearance, as to the stereotyped manner in which you have tried to pick me up. I presume you will pretend that this was your table and—” She broke off abruptly with an expression of dismay suffusing her features. “Good heavens!” she said. “It is your table!”

  Paul Pry remained standing and smiling.

  “Oh!” she said. “I’m so sorry. I had left the room and the lights went down. You see, my escort was called away on a business matter and I returned to my table alone. I just became confused, I guess.”

  She made a motion as if to rise, but her wide blue eyes remained fastened steadily upon Paul Pry’s face.

  “Well,” he said, “since you’re here, and since, apparently, your escort has left, why not finish the evening with me?”

  “Oh, no!” she said. “I couldn’t. Please don’t misunderstand. I assure you it was just an accident.”

  “Of course it was an accident,” Paul Pry said and pulled out the other chair, sat down and smiled across at her. “The sort of an accident,” he went on, “that fate sometimes throws in the way of a lone man who appreciates wide blue eyes and coppery hair.”

  “Flatterer!” she exclaimed.

  Paul Pry, glancing up at that moment, saw Mugs Magoo walking toward the table. And Mugs Magoo abruptly became conscious of the woman who was seated opposite Paul Pry.

  The camera-eye man stopped dead in his tracks while his glassy eyes flickered over the features of the woman. Then Mugs Magoo raised his left hand to his ear lobe and tugged at it once, sharply. Then he turned and walked away.

  In the course of the association which had grown up between the two adventurers, it had been necessary to arrange an elaborate code of signals, so that, in times of emergency, Mugs Magoo might convey complete ideas to Paul Pry by a single sign. And in their code, the gestures Mugs had just completed meant: “The party who is talking to you knows me and is dangerous. I’m getting under cover so I won’t be recognized. You must extricate yourself from a dangerous position at once.”

  2

  As a Highwayman

  It was as Mugs Magoo turned away, that the cooing voice of the young woman reached Paul Pry’s ears.

  “Well,” she said, “since you’re so attractive and so nice about it, perhaps I will make an exception just this once. Won’t it be a lark going through the evening pretending that we’re old acquaintances, and each of us not really knowing who the other is. You may call me Stella. And your name?” “Wonderful!” exclaimed Paul Pry with enthusiasm. “You may call me Paul.” “And we’re old friends, Paul, meeting for the first time after an absence of years?” “Yes,” he said, “but don’t make the absence too long. It doesn’t sound plausible. Having once known you, a man would never permit too great an interval of separation.” She laughed lightly. “And so you believe in fate?” she asked.

  Paul Pry nodded, his lips smiling but his eyes watchful.

  “Perhaps,” she said, “it was, after all,

  fate.” She sighed, and for the first time since she had sat at his table, lowered her eyes.

  “What is fate?” asked Paul Pry.

  “The fact that I should meet you just when I needed someone …” Her voice trailed off into silence and she shook her head vehemently.

  “No,” she said decisively, “I mustn’t go into that.”

  The orchestra struck up a rollicking one-step. The blue eyes once more impacted full upon his face.

  “And do we dance, Paul?” she asked.

  He nodded and rose, taking the back of her chair in his hand, moving it away from the table as she swung up, in front of him, her arms open, her lips smiling invitingly.

  They moved out onto the floor, a couple well calculated to catch the eye of any connoisseur of the dance. Paul Pry, moving as gracefully and lightly as though his feet had been floating on air just above the floor, the girl well curved but willowy, straight-limbed and radiating a consciousness of her sex.

  “Do you know,” she said, “that I was contemplating suicide earlier in the evening?”

  Paul Pry tightened his arms in a gesture of protection. “You’re joking,” he exclaimed.

  “No,” she said. “It’s a fact.”

  “Would you care to tell me about it?” he asked.

  “I think,” she said slowly, “I would.” They danced for a few moments in silence and in some subtle way she managed to convey the impression that she had thrown herself entirely upon his masculine strength as a bulwark of protection. “But,” she added after the interval of silence, “I couldn’t tell you here.”

  “Where?” he asked.

  “I have an apartment,” she said, “if you care to come there.”

  “Splendid,” Paul Pry said enthusiastically.

  “Let’s go then,” she told him. “I was here only for the excitement. Only to get my mind away from myself. Now you’ve given me just the stimulus that I need to restore my perspective.”

  The music stopped.

  She gave just the faintest hint of pressing her body close to his and then managed to forestall the intimacy of the moment and become, once more, respectably distant, standing with her hand on his arm, her frank blue eyes smiling into his.

  “A wonderful dance,” he said applauding.

  “You dance divinely,” she breathed.

  There was no encore. She gently exerted pressure on his arm.

  “Would you care to leave now?” she asked.

  “Yes, indeed,” he told her.

  Paul Pry lived by his wits and he was an opportunist. Moreover, he was, as Mugs Magoo so frequently pointed out, entirely without prudence. Paul Pry would walk into any danger which offered a reasonable amount of excitement, and do it with the utmost sangfroid, trusting to his ingenuity to extricate himself from any untoward complications.

  Paul Pry, upon this occasion, took only a reasonable amount of precaution to ascertain that he was not being shadowed as he left the cabaret. Having satisfied himself that no one was on his trail, he handed the young woman into a taxicab, followed her, and was lighting a cigarette as the cab driver slammed the door and nodded his comprehension of the address the young woman had given him.

  It was but a short ride to the apartment and Paul Pry followed docilely into the elevator, out of the car again, and down a corridor. A close observer would have noticed that his right hand hovered near the left lapel of his coat as the young woman opened the door of the apartment and switched on the lights. But a moment later his hand was back at his side, for the apartment was, quite apparently, empty, unless someone were concealed behind a closed door. And Paul Pry always claimed that he could get a gun from its holster long before a person could twist the knob of a door, open it and draw a bead.

  “My God, Paul,” she said, “I’m glad that I met you!”

  Paul Pry watched the outer door of the apartment move slowly shut until the spring lock automatically clicked into position and then smiled at her. “It was,” he said, “a real pleasure to me, Stella.”

  “And,” she said, smiling at him with half-parted lips and steady eyes, “we’re old friends. Wasn’t that the understanding, Paul?”

  “Yes, Stella.”

  “Very well then,” she said, “I’m going to get out of these clothes and get into something comfortable. Wait here and make yourself at home.”

  Paul Pry’s hand once more hovered about the lapel of his coat as she opened the door of the connecting bedroom, but the door closed without event and Paul Pry moved to a chair which gave him a commanding position, sat down, crossed his knees and lit a cigarette.

  Five minutes later the bedroom door opened and Stella came out, a vision of filmy loveliness. And it may or may not have been accident that she had placed a very bright light directly behind her, that she stood for a long moment in the doorway of the bedroom before switching out the light, and that the brilliant illumination transformed her silken coverings into a mere filmy aura which served to frame, without concealing, her every curve.

  She switched out the light and came to him.

  She perched on the arm of his chair; her fingers smoothed his hair; one leg swinging free in a pendulum-like arc, swung clear of the filmy silken covering.

  “Paul,” she said, “really and truly I feel as though I’ve known you all my life.”

  “Go ahead then,” he said, “and confide in me.”

  She sighed and her hands dropped from his hair, brushed lightly along his cheek and then came to rest on his shoulders.

  “Paul,” she said, “don’t look at me while I tell you. I can’t bear that. Sit just as you are and listen.”

  “Listening,” he told her.

  “Did you ever hear of a man called ‘Silver’ Dawson?”

  “No,” said Paul Pry. “Who is Silver Dawson?”

  “The worst fiend unhung,” she said with vehemence.

  “That still leaves a lot to my imagination,” Paul Pry reminded.

  “He’s got the letters,” she told him.

  “What letters?”

  “The letters that I wrote to a man who betrayed my confidence.”

  “Indeed?” said Paul Pry.

  “Yes,” she said. “And you see I was married at the time.”

  “Ah,” said Paul Pry in a tone of quickening interest, “and you’re married now?”

  “No, my husband is dead.”

  “I see,” he said, in a tone of one who waits for further revelations.

  “But he left this peculiar will,” she said, “in which my inheritance was predicated upon my fidelity. The will contained a proviso that if it should appear I had been unfaithful to him during our married life, the inheritance was to go to a charitable institution.”

  “I see,” said Paul Pry, “and the letters threaten to complicate things?”

  “The letters,” she said, “would ruin me.

  “You shouldn’t have written them,” he told her.

  She slid her palm under his chin, tilted his head so that her eyes could stare down into his. “Tell me,” she said, “did you ever do anything that you shouldn’t have done?” “Lots of times,” he said.