“Exactly.  There nearly always is a woman in the case, somehow or other.  This woman is closely connected with the firebug.  As for the firebug, whoever it may be, he performs his crimes with cold premeditation and, as De Quincey said, in a spirit of pure artistry.  The lust of fire propels him, and he uses his art to secure wealth.  The man may be a tool in the hands of others, however.  It’s unsafe to generalise on the meagre facts we now have.  Oh, well, there is nothing we can do just yet.  Let’s take a walk, get an early dinner, and be back here before the automobile arrives.”

Not a word more did Kennedy say about the case during our stroll or even on the way downtown to fire headquarters.

We found McCormick anxiously waiting for us.  High up in the sandstone tower at headquarters, we sat with him in the maze of delicate machinery with which the fire game is played in New York.  In great glass cases were glistening brass and nickel machines with discs and levers and bells, tickers, sheets of paper, and annunciators without number.  This was the fire-alarm telegraph, the “roulettewheel of the fire demon,” as some one has aptly called it.

“All the alarms for fire from all the boroughs, both from the regular alarm-boxes and the auxiliary systems, come here first over the network of three thousand miles or more of wire nerves that stretch out through the city,” McCormick was explaining to us.

A buzzer hissed.

“Here’s an alarm now,” he exclaimed, all attention.

“Three,” “six,” “seven,” the numbers appeared on the annunciator.  The clerks in the office moved as if they were part of the mechanism.  Twice the alarm was repeated, being sent out all over the city.  McCormick relapsed from his air of attention.

“That alarm was not in the shopping district,” he explained, much relieved.  “Now the fire-houses in the particular district where that fire is have received the alarm instantly.  Four engines, two hook-and-ladders, a water-tower, the battalion chief, and a deputy are hurrying to that fire.  Hello, here comes another.”

Again the buzzer sounded.  “One,” “four,” “five” showed in the annunciator.

Even before the clerks could respond, McCormick had dragged us to the door.  In another instant we were wildly speeding uptown, the bell on the front of the automobile clanging like a fire-engine, the siren horn going continuously, the engine of the machine throbbing with energy until the water boiled in the radiator.

“Let her out, Frank,” called McCormick to his chauffeur, as we rounded into a broad and now almost deserted thoroughfare.

Like a red streak in the night we flew up that avenue, turned into Fourteenth Street on two wheels, and at last were on Sixth Avenue.  With a jerk and a skid we stopped.  There were the engines, the hose-carts, the hook-and-ladders, the salvage corps, the police establishing fire lines—­everything.  But where was the fire?