Slowly, very slowly, Jimmie Dale’s hand crept into his pocket—­and crept out again with his automatic.  He lay motionless once more.  Time in any concrete sense ceased to exist.  Fancied shapes began to assume form in the darkness.  By the door, Lannigan stirred uneasily, shifting his position slightly.

Was it hours—­was it only minutes?  It seemed to ring through the nerve-racking stillness like the shriek of a hurtling shell—­and it was only a whisper.

“Watch yourself, Lannigan,” whispered Whitey Mack.  “He’s coming now through the yard!  Don’t move till I start something.  Let him get his paws on the sparklers.”

Silence again.  And then a low rasping at the window, like the gnawing of a rat; then, inch by inch, the sash was lifted.  There was the sound as of a body forcing its way over the sill cautiously, then a step upon the floor inside, another, and still another.  The figure of a man loomed up suddenly against the glow of a flashlight as he threw the round, white ray inquisitively here and there over the rear wall.  And now he appeared to be counting the boards.  One, two, three—­ten.  His hand ran up and down the tenth board.  Again and again he repeated the operation, and something like the snarl of a baited beast echoed through the room.  He half turned to snatch at something in his pocket, and the light for a moment showed a black-bearded, lowering face, partially hidden by a peaked cap that was pulled far down over his eyes.

There was the rip and tear of rending wood, as a steel jimmy, in lieu of the spring the man evidently could not find, bit in between the boards, a muttered oath of satisfaction, and a portion of the wall slid back, disclosing what looked like a metal-lined cupboard.  He reached in, seized one of a dozen little boxes, and wrenched off the cover.  A blue, scintillating gleam seemed to leap out to meet the white ray of the flashlight.  The man chuckled hoarsely, and began to cram the rest of the boxes into his pockets.

Jimmie Dale stirred.  On hands and knees he was creeping now from beneath the workbench.  Something caught and tore behind him—­the canvas curtain.  And at the sound, with a sharp cry, the man at the wall whirled, the light went out, and he sprang toward the window.  Jimmie Dale gained his feet and leaped forward.  A revolver shot cut a lane of fire through the blackness; and, above the roar of the report, Whitey Mack’s voice in a fierce yell: 

“It’s all right, Lannigan!  I got him!  No—­hell!” There was a terrific crash of breaking glass.  “He’s got away!”

“Not yet, he hasn’t!” gritted Jimmie Dale between his teeth, and his clubbed revolver swung crashing to the head of a dark form in front of him.

There was a half sigh, half moan.  The form slid limply to the floor.  Lannigan was floundering down the shop, leaping obstacles in a mad rush, his flashlight picking out the way.