Jimmie Dale read on—­and as he read there came again that angry set to his lips.  The details were not pleasant.  Herman Roessle, the paymaster of the Martindale-Kensington Mills, whose plant was on the Hudson, had gone that morning in his runabout to the nearest town, three miles away, for the monthly pay roll; had secured the money from the bank, a sum of twenty-odd thousand dollars; and had started back with it for the mill.  At first, it being broad daylight and a well-frequented road, his nonappearance caused no apprehension; but as early afternoon came and there was still no sign of Roessle the mill management took alarm.  Discovering that he had left the bank for the return journey at a few minutes before eleven, and that nothing had been seen of him at his home, the police were notified.  Followed then several hours of fruitless search, until finally, with the whole countryside aroused and the efforts of the police augumented by private search parties, the car was found in a thicket at the edge of a crossroad some four miles back from the river, and, a little way from the car, the body of Roessle, dead, the man’s head crushed in where it had been fiendishly battered by some blunt, heavy object.  There was no clew—­no one could be found who had seen the car on the crossroad—­the murderer, or murderers, and the twenty-odd thousand dollars in cash had disappeared leaving no trace behind.

There were several columns of this, which Jimmie Dale skimmed through quickly; but at the end he stared for a long time at the last paragraph.  Somehow, strange, to relate, the paper had neglected to turn its “sob” artist loose, and the few words, added almost as though they were an afterthought, for once rang true and full of pathos in their very simplicity—­at the Roessle home, where Mrs. Roessle was prostrated, two little tots of five and seven, too young to understand, had gravely received the reporter and told him that some bad man had hurt their daddy.

“Mr. Dale, sir!”

Jimmie Dale lowered his paper.  A club attendant was standing before him, respectfully extending a silver card tray.  From the man, Jimmie Dale’s eyes fixed on a white envelope on the tray.  One glance was enough—­it was hers, that letter.  The Tocsin again!  His brain seemed suddenly to be afire, and he could feel his pulse quicken, the blood begin to pound in fierce throbs at his heart.  Life and death lay in that white, innocent-looking, unaddressed envelope, danger, peril—­it was always life and death, for those were the stakes for which the Tocsin played.  But, master of many things, Jimmie Dale was most of all master of himself.  Not a muscle of his face moved.  He reached nonchalantly for the letter.

“Thank you,” said Jimmie Dale.

The man bowed and started away.  Jimmie Dale laid the envelope on the arm of the lounging chair.  The man had reached the door when Jimmie Dale stopped him.

“Oh, by the way,” said Jimmie Dale languidly, “where did this come from?”