The mysterious one emerged from Mike's stairway as silently as he had entered it. He tossed a claw-like hand palm outward, toward the waiting, watching Hip Sing Tongs, and then went slippering towards the Bowery. Had that brisk Central Office intelligence been there to see, it might have reflected, recalling a time table, that by taking the Cortlandt Street ferry, the mysterious one would be in time for the 12.30 train to Philadelphia over the Pennsylvania.
Before the mysterious one had reached the Bowery, those scores of waiting, watching Hip Sing Tongs had vanished, and Pell Street was as empty as the promise of a politician.
“Now,” whispered Ching Lee to Sam Kum, who kept the chop suey shop, as they turned to go—“now he meet Ling Tchen, mebby so!”
One o'clock.
Tony began to think about locking his front door. This, out of respect for the law. Not that beer and revelry were to cease in Number Twelve, but because such was Tony's understanding with the precinct skipper. Some reformer might come snooping else, and lodge complaint against that skipper with the Commissioner of Police.
Just as Tony, on bidding “Good-bye!” to Mrs. Vee and her purple fluttering flock, had been impressed by the crowded condition of Pell Street, so now, when he made ready to lock up, was he impressed by that causeway's profound emptiness.
“Say,” he cried to his guests in the rear, “you stews come here! This is funny; there ain't a chink in sight!”
“D'youse think th' bulls are gettin' ready for a raid?” asked Sop Henry. Sop, with the Nailer and the Wop, had joined Tony in the door. “Perhaps there's somethin' doin' over at th' Elizabeth Street station, an' the wardman's passed th' monks th' tip.”
“Nothin' in that,” responded Tony, confidently. “Wouldn't I be put wise, too?”
Marvelling much, Tony fastened his door, and joined old Jimmy, Pretty Agnes and the others in the rear room. When he got there, he found old Jimmy sniffing with suspicious nose, and swearing he smelled gas.