For a little space, Jimmie Dale, immaculate in his evening clothes, stood in the centre of the miserable room, his dark eyes, keen, alert, critical, sweeping comprehensively over every object about him—­the position of a chair, of a cracked drinking glass on the broken-legged table, of an old coat thrown with apparent carelessness on the floor at the foot of the bed, of a broken bottle that had innocently strewn some sort of white powder close to the threshold, inviting unwary foot tracks across the floor.  And then, taking out the Tocsin’s letter, he laid it upon the table, placed what money he had in his pockets beside it, and began rapidly to remove his clothes.  The Sanctuary had not been invaded since his last visit there.

He turned back the oilcloth in the far corner of the room, took up the piece of loose flooring, which, however, strangely enough, fitted so closely as to give no sign of its existence even should it inadvertently, by some curious visitor again be trod upon; and from the aperture beneath lifted out a bundle of clothes and a small box.

Undressed now, he carefully folded the clothes he had taken off, laid them under the flooring, and began to dress again, his wardrobe supplied by the bundle he had taken out in exchange—­an old pair of shoes, the laces broken; mismated socks; patched trousers, frayed at the bottoms; a soiled shirt, collarless, open at the neck.  Attired to his satisfaction, he placed the box upon the table, propped up a cracked mirror, sat down in front of it, and, with a deft, artist’s touch, began to apply stain to his hands, wrists, neck, throat, and face—­but the hardness, the grim menace that now grew into the dominant characteristic of his features was not due to the stain alone.

“Dear Philanthropic Crook”—­his eyes were on the Tocsin’s letter that lay before him.  He read on—­for once, even to Jimmie Dale’s keen, facile mind, a first reading had failed to convey the full significance of what she had written.  It was too amazing, almost beyond belief—­the series of crimes, rampant for the past few weeks, at which the community had stood aghast, the brutal murder of Roessle but a few hours old, lay bare before his eyes.  It was all there, all of it, the details, the hellish cleverness, the personnel even of the thugs, all, everything—­except the proof.

“Get him, Jimmie—­the man higher up.  Get him, Jimmie—­before another pays forfeit with his life”—­the words seemed to leap out at him from the white page in red, dancing lines—­“Get him—­Jimmie—­the man higher up.”

Jimmie Dale finished the second reading of the letter, read it again for the third time, then tore it into tiny fragments.  His fingers delved into the box again, and the transformation of Jimmie Dale, member of New York’s most exclusive social set, into a low, vicious-featured denizen of the underworld went on—­a little wax applied skilfully behind the ears, in the nostrils and under the upper lip.