From the space beneath he removed a neatly folded pile of clothes, laid these on the bed, and began to undress.  He was working rapidly now.  Tiny pieces of wax were removed from his nostrils, from under his lips, from behind his ears; water from a cracked pitcher poured into a battered tin basin, and mixed with a few drops of some liquid from a bottle which he procured from its hiding place under the flooring, banished the make-up stain from his face, his neck, his wrists, and hands as if by magic.  It was a strange metamorphosis that had taken place—­the coarse, brutal-featured, blear-eyed, leering countenance of Larry the Bat was gone, and in its place, clean-cut, square-jawed, clear-eyed, was the face of Jimmie Dale.  And where before had slouched a slope-shouldered, misshapen, flabby creature, a broad-shouldered form well over six feet in height now stood erect, and under the clean white skin the muscles of an athlete, like knobs of steel played back and forth with every movement of his body.

In the streaked and broken mirror Jimmie Dale surveyed himself critically, methodically, and, with a nod of satisfaction, hastily donned the fashionably cut suit of tweeds upon the bed.  He rummaged then through the ragged garments he had just discarded, transferred to his pockets a roll of bills and his automatic, and paused hesitantly, staring at the thin metal case, like a cigarette case, that he held in the palm of his hand.  He shrugged his shoulders a little whimsically; it seemed strange indeed that he was through with that!  He snapped it open.  Within, between sheets of oil paper, lay the scores of little diamond-shaped, gray-coloured, adhesive paper seals—­the insignia of the Gray Seal.  Yes, it seemed strange that he was never to use another!  He closed the case, gathered up the clothes of Larry the Bat, tucked the case in among them, and shoved the bundle into the hole under the flooring.  All these things would have to be destroyed, but there was not time to-night; to-morrow, or the next day, would do for that.  What would it be like to live a normal life again, without the menace of danger lurking on every hand, without that grim slogan of the underworld, “Death to the Gray Seal!” or that savage fiat of the police, “The Gray Seal, dead or alive—­but the Gray Seal!” forever ringing in his ears?  What would it be like, this new life—­with her?

The thought was thrilling him again, bringing again that eager, exultant uplift.  In an hour, one hour, and the barriers of years would be swept away, and she would be in his arms!

“It’s for my sake to-night!” His face grew suddenly tense, as the words came back to him.  That “hour” wasn’t over yet!  It was no hysterical exaggeration that had prompted her to call her enemies the most powerful and pitiless organisation of criminals that the world had ever known.  It was not the Tocsin’s way to exaggerate.  The words would be literally true.  The very life she had led for the three years that had gone stood out now as a grim proof of her assertion.