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And then, suddenly, halfway up the room, he dropped down behind what was evidently a jeweller's workbench. A whisper, obviously Laroque's this time, came once more from the inner room. "Shoot the flash again!" And then, savagely: "Curse it, not on the ceiling! Can't you hold it steady! What the devil is the matter with you!" There was no answer.
A curious, muffled, metallic thump, mingled with a quick, low-breathed, triumphant oath, came suddenly from the inner room and then Laroque's voice, eager, the words clipped off as though in feverish elation: "There she is! One nice little job eh? Well, come on shoot your light into her, and let's take a look at the Christmas tree!" The flashlight's ray flooded the interior of the open safe.
I have heard it said that Gentleman Laroque, with his gangsters behind him, would stop at nothing where Gentleman Laroque's own skin was concerned. I have heard it said that where Gentleman Laroque was known he was feared. Very well, Laroque, it is your turn to choose. You can choose between yourself and this 'Private Club Ring' who have purchased your services in this game to-night.
Neither of the men spoke only their faces worked in a queer, convulsive sort of way, as they gazed in startled fascination at Jimmie Dale. "Thank you!" said Jimmie Dale politely. He stepped briskly into the room, shoved Sonnino unceremoniously to one side, shoved his revolver muzzle none too gently into Laroque's ribs, and went through the latter's clothes.
What would you say, Laroque, would be the sentence handed out for that little affair to a man with, say, your past record?" Laroque's lips were twitching; his face had gone gray. "Fourteen years would be a light sentence, wouldn't it?" resumed Jimmie Dale, an even colder menace in his voice.
The boy's hands, clenched, were raised above his head, and then shaken almost maniacally in Gentleman Laroque's face. "It's a lie! I I don't understand, but but you two, you devils, are together in this!" "Sure!" retorted Laroque, as insolently as before and flung the other's hands away. "Sure, we are!" "It's a lie!" said the boy again. "I was in a hole. I needed money.
"Yes," he said, "I thought quite possibly you might have one." He pocketed Laroque's revolver, and also Sonnino's from the table. "And now that letter thank you!" He whipped the letter from Laroque's inside coat pocket and transferred it to his own, then stepped back, and smiled but the smile was not inviting. "I've only about five minutes to spare," murmured Jimmie Dale. "I'm in a hurry, Niccolo.
If murder would either further or safeguard Laroque's personal interests, Laroque was the sort of man who would stop only to consider, not whether the murder should be committed, but the method that might best be employed in order to implicate as little as possible one Laroque!
A young man who speculates, who uses an assumed name, and runs a private letter box on Sixth Avenue, and has forty-eight hours in which to square up his debts or face exposure, has a hell of a chance with a jury not!" The boy circled his lips with the tip of his tongue. "But why why?" he whispered. "I I never did anything to you." "Sure, you didn't!" Laroque's tones were brutally amiable now.
One thing, however, one thing that might have had some bearing on Laroque's choice, one thing for which he, Jimmie Dale, was grateful to Laroque for making such a choice, was that Sonnino's place lent itself admirably to attack from the standpoint of the attacker! A black courtyard, screened completely from the street; a house that
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