And if they
couldn't it would not be for the lack of trying.
There would be another act in that drama of the House Divided before the
curtain fell! And there would be a sort of grim, poetic justice in it, a
temptation almost to let the play work itself out to its own inevitable
conclusion, only--Jimmie Dale, the final touches given to his features,
stood up, and his hands clenched suddenly, fiercely--it was not just the
man higher up alone, there were the other three as well, the whole
four of them, all of them, crimes without number at their door, brutal,
fiendish acts, damnable outrages, murder to answer for, with which the
public now was beginning to connect the name of the Gray Seal! The Gray
Seal!
Jimmie Dale's hands, whose delicate fingers were artfully grimed and
blackened now beneath the nails, clenched still tighter--and then, with
a quick shrug of his shoulders, a thinning of the firmly compressed
lips, he picked up the coat from where it lay upon the floor, put it on,
put the money that was on the table in his pocket, and replaced the box
under the flooring.
In quick succession, from the same hiding place, an automatic, a black
silk mask, an electric flashlight, that thin metal box like a cigarette
case, and a half dozen vicious-looking little blued-steel burglar's
tools were stowed away in his pockets, the flooring carefully replaced,
the oilcloth spread back again; and then, pulling a slouch hat well down
over his eyes, he reached up to turn off the gas.
Pages:
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286
287
288