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Mr. Shelton nodded.

"Yes, I've just come back from South America. I've been there twenty-five years. The Argentine Bank is somewhere along here, isn't it?"

The policeman pointed, but Mr. Shelton made no attempt to continue his walk.

"It is very difficult to believe that in this street are stored millions and millions of gold."

The policeman smiled sardonically.

"I've never seen any of it," he said, "but there's no doubt—"

He stopped and his hand went halfway up to a salute. A taxicab had drawn in behind the car, a young man had jumped out. He flashed a reproachful grin at the policeman, took in Mr. Shelton with one comprehensive glance. and disappeared into the bank.

"Who was that— a police officer?" For Shelton had detected the interrupted salute.

"No, sir, he's a City gentleman I know," replied the officer, and strolled off to give instructions to the taxi-driver.

Betcher Long passed into the bank, was attracted for a second by a pretty face at one of the tellers' desks, and disappeared into the holy of the general manager's office. A stout little man, completely bald, rose and shook hands vigorously.

"I'll only keep you a minute, Long," he said. "I've got a customer to see."

He darted out of the room and was gone a few minutes and returned rubbing his hands, a smile on his rubicund face.

"There's a woman of character," he said, shaking his head ecstatically. "Did you notice her?"

"I thought she was rather pretty," replied Betcher, and Mr. Monkford was good-naturedly impatient.

"That was the secretary. The elderly woman I'm talking about— Miss Revelstoke. She's been one of my customers for nearly thirty years. You ought to meet her; she's a character. The young man with her is her lawyer. He's a bit of a dude, but he's one of the rising men in the law."

There was in the manager's office a foot square of unclouded glass, which commanded a view of the long counter at which the three people were standing. The elderly lady was counting with great deliberation a bundle of notes that had been passed across to her by the teller, and the girl, a little bored, he thought, was gazing up at the beautifully carved ceiling of the bank. It was an unusual face: that was his first impression. Certain types of prettiness are commonplace, but there was a distinction in her face, a vitality that was arresting. He hardly noticed the smiling young man at Miss Revelstoke's elbow. And then, suddenly, her eyes met his, and for a second they looked at each other with an absorbed interest. As quickly, she turned, and he became conscious that the banker was speaking.

"...I don't suppose you'll ever catch him; I don't suppose anybody will catch him. He's like an eel, that fellow! My theory is that he's a member of a very clever gang

"I wish to Heaven he was," smiled Betcher. "You can drop that idea, Mr. Monkford. There is no honour amongst thieves— only amongst good thieves. The man is working single-handed, and that is his biggest asset."

The banker had taken from a drawer of his desk a large portfolio, which he laid on the table.

"Here are all the facts, not only relating to the City & Southern, but to every bank that has been victimized by this man," he said. "All his original signatures are here, but I don't think they will teach you much. The 'm's' are similar—"

"All 'm's' are similar," interrupted Arnold Long. "It is the one letter of the alphabet that has no character."

He spent half an hour examining the dossier and found no profit in his inspection.

"I notice that these documents have been tested for finger prints?"

Mr. Monkford nodded.

"That is one of the features of every forgery. The left hand, which kept the document steady, was invariably gloved."

When Betcher came out of the bank, he looked left and right, undetermined as to which way he should go, and at last decided to go toward Gracechurch Street and make a call at a shipping office in Fenchurch Street. At the corner of Gracechurch and Lombard streets he saw a slim, elderly man standing, apparently absorbed in the streaming traffic. He was looking sideways at the stranger as he passed, and Betcher read the message of that scrutiny. It was only for a fraction of a second, but as plainly as words could speak, those gray, watchful eyes said: "I know you: you are a detective!"

Betcher experienced a little shock, but could neither analyze its genesis nor find a reason. He crossed the road to Fenchurch Street and turned to buy a newspaper. The man was still there, a well-dressed, debonair colonel of infantry he might have been, with his white felt hat and his well-fitting tweed suit. Betcher purposely gave the boy a shilling in order to have an excuse for waiting for the change, and in that time he took stock of the stranger. A City swindler of some kind; one of the little army of men who thrive on questionable enterprises. He had caught in that one glimpse of the man's mind a hint of resentment as well as knowledge. For a second he had a mind to return and find an excuse for speaking to the man. But he was a Scotland Yard man in the City of London. The City has its own detective force and is jealous of encroachment.

As he stood, the figure in gray hailed a passing taxicab, which turned up Lombard Street and disappeared. It was hardly out of sight when, acting on an impulse, Betcher Long called a cab.

"Lombard Street," he said quickly, "and keep well behind the yellow taxi. You'll catch him up in the block before the Mansion House."

Presently the taxi came in sight, and, holding the outspread newspaper which hid his face, he saw his prey look back through the peephole.

That night, when Colonel Macfarlane was leaving his office, a jubilant young man intercepted him.

"Call me lucky!" he chortled. "I've found Clay Shelton."

"You never have!" gasped the Commissioner.

"Betcher!" said Mr. Long promptly.

Chapter 3

A WEEK later, as Mr. Clay Shelton was passing through the dingy little town of Chelmsford, he had an inspiration— a sudden unaccountable fear that depressed him so much that for a second he could not breathe naturally. He threw his gear into neutral, pressed his foot slowly on the brake and came to a halt by the side of the road. On his right was a high wall of dingy red, and, standing back from the roadway, a grim, black gate.

Mr. Shelton stroked the white moustache he had so carefully cultivated for the past six months.

Chelmsford Jail. He must have seen the place without realizing that he had seen it, and the depression lay at the end of a chain of subconscious reasoning.

A little wicket door set in the black gate opened and a warder came out, and then four men and another warder. The four men wore ordinary civilian clothing, but they were chained together. Convicts on their way to Dartmoor, Mr. Shelton mused. They would be in London in time to catch the one o'clock train for Plymouth. The wicket gate remained open. The jailer at the door and the warder in charge discussed something. What it was Mr. Shelton guessed when a taxicab came furiously from the town end of the Colchester Road and pulled up at the prison gate. The prisoners were bundled in, one of the warders with them; the other took his seat by the driver's side and the cab went away.

"Humph!" said Shelton thoughtfully, and stroked his moustache again.

Stepping on the starter, he turned his machine and went back to Chelmsford and, stopping his car at the Saracen's Head, got out. There was a booksellers' and stationers' shop which had a notice in its window:

ADVERTISEMENTS RECEIVED HERE

FOR ALL THE LONDON NEWSPAPERS

He went into the shop, asked for a blank, and filled it up. There was some delay here, for the only person in the shop at this early hour was a youthful assistant who had begun his employment that day and was strange to the routine. Eventually the necessary forms were discovered.

"That is to go in the personal column of the Times," he said, and paid the fee.

The youth took the blank and read it carefully, though there was little need for care, for every word was printed. Mr. Shelton went on his way with a lighter heart, and the young man who had accepted the advertisement put it for safety between the pages of a book he had been reading, and which he was still reading, to the neglect of his duties, when his new employer came upon the scene and in a fit of choler discharged him.

When he jerked back to its shelf Mr. Anthony Trollope's fascinating study of clerical life, he filed away unconsciously the advertisement. Mr. Shelton's lightness of heart was, in the circumstances, premature.

Outside of Colchester, Shelton drove his machine into a side lane, took from a locker beneath the seat a compact suitcase in which were the change of clothing, the scissors, cream, and razor that would in the shortest possible time change him into a rather seedy-looking person, and, having examined every article with care, he walked jauntily to the place where the tramcars start, boarded one, and was jerked uncomfortably to the centre of the town— Colchester being notably unhappy in its street transportation.

Ten o'clock was striking as he entered the premises of the Eastern Counties Bank.

He laid down a paper and a book, and the spectacled clerk examined both carefully before he disappeared into the office of his manager. When he came back it was with the respectful and apologetic smile of one who found that his worst fears were without foundation.

"Seven thousand six hundred," he said cheerfully. "How will you have this, Colonel Weatherby?"

"In hundreds," said Mr. Shelton.

Pads of notes came into view, the cashier's finger moved with extraordinary rapidity; he scribbled the numbers in his book.

"Thank you," he said.

Mr. Shelton turned, putting the notes into his breast pocket. There were two men in the room, and one passing through the swing doors. The first of these was a weary-looking gentleman who supported himself at the counter. At him Shelton did not look; but the man with his back to the door, showing his white teeth in a smile. "'Morning, Shelton."

Betcher Long— of all people in the world! Shelton stopped, his face outthrust, at bay.

"Do you want to talk to me? My name is not Shelton."

Arnold Long nodded; he took off his hat and ran his fingers through his black hair.

"Thought I would," he said.

And then Shelton leapt at him.

In a second three men were struggling on the floor. Up to his feet came Shelton; the second policeman fumbled and bungled all the time in Betcher's way. And then the weary man at the counter took a hand, and thrust into the tangle of whirling arms and straining bodies.

"Here, I say! Confound it!"

There was a deafening explosion, the second policeman went down on the tessellated floor, bleeding hideously. "Put that pistol down or I'll shoot!"

Shelton turned his head. The bespectacled clerk covered him with a heavy army revolver, and his hand was wonderfully steady. There had recently been a war, in which bespectacled bank clerks had learnt to kill people with the greatest nonchalance.

Betcher Long snapped cold irons on the wrist of the white-faced man. Two uniformed policemen came into the office whilst the clerk was 'phoning the hospital.

"I want you for forgery," said Arnold; looked down at the limp heap and the widening circle of blood, and then:

"Thought you never carried a gun?"

Shelton said nothing, and the detective turned to the languid stranger who had intervened.

"Thank you, sir. I'm obliged to you." And then, recognizing the helper:

"You're Mr. Crayley, aren't you?"

The face of this man of fashion who had intervened in the fight was the colour of chalk; his yellow moustache drooped pathetically.

"Might have been killed, by gad!" he croaked. "Did my best for you. Let me know if I can do anything more. Is he dead?"

"I guess so." Betcher stared gloomily at the still figure. "Wish you hadn't done that, Shelton. But it will be easier to prove than the other murders. We'll take him to the station house before the crowd get him. Show me the back way out of here."

The manager led the party through his private office to a courtyard at the back of the bank. A small gate led to a narrow street, where a car and two policemen were waiting. Betcher had planned this exit.

He pushed his prisoner into the machine and followed. Where had Shelton seen manacled men thrust into a cab? At Chelmsford— a thousand years ago!

Chapter 4

ON THE 14th of June, Inspector Arnold Long left London at five o'clock on a perfect morning, when the sun was shining and every cottager's garden he passed was ablaze with blue and gold. The roads were empty save for the farmers' lorries, and he came into Chelmsford before a shop was open, and only the labourers on their way to the fields to speculate upon his haste.

He had passed through a little village and was speeding down a straight road that ran between green fields when he passed a man sitting on the top of a field gate. In that instant he recognized the idler, and, jamming on his brakes, went at reverse and ran back to where he had seen the man. He was still sitting on the top rail, a cigarette drooping limply from his lips, and met the astonished gaze of the detective without embarrassment.

"Good-morning, Lancer. Have you taken to the agricultural life?"

The Lancer took out his cigarette, looked at it thoughtfully, and threw it away.

"Doin' any harm to anybody?" he demanded truculently.

"Are you on the road?" Betcher asked politely, using the term which most euphemistically described a tramp.

"I've got a job, if you want to know— a good job!" There was a queer expression on the Lancer's face. "Where you off to— blood'ound?"

Arnold Long smiled— he hadn't dreamt that he would smile that morning.

"Thief-catching, Lancer." He looked round the deserted fields. The only building in sight was a big black barn. "You haven't slept out, I'll swear! And you haven't walked far— there is no dust on your boots. Lancer, what is the game?"

But the Lancer did not reply. With a gesture he waved his hand toward distant Chelmsford, and, chuckling to himself, Arnold Long went on his way.