He smiled again, but it was a twisted smile on the mechanically
misshapen lips of Larry the Bat. NEARLY over! Who knew? That "nearly"
might be too late! Even tonight he had been shadowed, was skulking even
now in this place as a refuge. Who knew? Another hour, and the newsboys
might be shrieking their "Uxtra! Uxtra! De Gray Seal caught! De
millionaire Jimmie Dale de Jekyll an' Hyde of real life!"
Jimmie Dale straightened up suddenly in his seat. There was a shout,
an oath bawled out high above the riot of noise, a chorus of feminine
shrieks from across the room. What was the matter with the
underworld to-night? He seemed fated to find nothing but centres of
disturbance--first a raid at Chang Foo's, and now this. What was the
matter here? They were stampeding toward him from the other side of
the room. There was the roar of a revolver shot--another. Black Ike! He
caught an instant's glimpse of the gunman's distorted face through the
crowd. That was it probably--a row over some moll.
And then, as Jimmie Dale lunged up from his chair to his feet to escape
the rush, pandemonium itself seemed to break loose. Yells, shots,
screams, and oaths filled the air. The crowd surged this way and that.
Tables were overturned and sent crashing to the floor. And then came
sudden darkness, as some one of the attendants in misguided excitability
switched off the lights.
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