"If only I could get in there," he said to himself. "I wonder—"
He stopped, struck by a sudden idea.
"By Jove! I believe it can be done," he said.
He continued to pace up and down, apparently deep in thought. Occasionally he stopped to look in the direction from which he had followed his prey to the rendezvous.
After nearly an hour the lad, after a glance down the street, slipped quietly into a doorway. Apparently the thing for which he had been waiting was about to come to pass.
Footsteps sounded on the street, coming closer. Save for the one lone pedestrian, the street was deserted. The footsteps approached closer, and Chester gathered himself for a spring. As the man came abreast of the doorway in which the lad was hiding, Chester hurled himself upon him. With one hand the lad clutched his victim about the throat, and with the other he struck out heavily. There was a stifled groan, and the man fell limp in the boy's arms.
Glancing hurriedly about to see that there was no one in sight—no witness to his deed—Chester dragged the man into the doorway. Here he quickly discarded his own clothes, stripped the stranger of his outer garments and donned them himself.
Then tearing his own clothes into strips, he bound his victim and gagged him, after which, now attired in his victim's clothes, he stood up and made a search of the pockets.
"If my surmise is correct," he said to himself, "I shall be all right."
The hand which was exploring the inside breast pocket came forth with a little piece of cloth.