He was not working for an “exclusive” now; he was working to free a mite of a cripple girl and her stunned and misused brother from the inner tier of cells at the city prison.
He said no more. At Market Street he flung open a taxicab door and we jumped in. He called an address to the driver. It was Chief Leslie’s home. We were there within fifteen minutes. Lanagan held his finger on the button until the door swung open and the Chief himself appeared, wrapped in a lounging robe, his hair tousled, his beard rumpled, but his grey eyes wide and alert. Lanagan brushed in and I after him. He sat the Chief down on a settee and for ten minutes he hammered away. At last Leslie’s fist banged the settee arm.
“By the Lord Harry, you’re right! And I want to flash that bird again! It all comes back to me now; I couldn’t make out the other day where I had seen him before. Little stouter, but same man or I’ll cut my throat!”
He took the stairs to the next floor three at a time. Within five minutes he was back, fully dressed.
“Got your machine out here yet?”
“Yes,” said Lanagan. “But don’t forget the Wards.”
Leslie stepped to the telephone stand and to his private line to headquarters.
“Prison,” he said, shortly. “Prison? Give me the matron. Mrs. Conness? Take that Ward girl into your room and give her the best you have until I get down. Give me Andrews. Sergeant Andrews? Take that Ward boy to the matron’s room and give him the best you have until I get down there.” He hung up the receiver. “Come on. We’ll pick up Brady. He lives just around the corner. We better get Maloney, too; he’s not far away. If this is the bird I think it is, we’ll take no chances. Known as the ‘Swallow.’ Two timer, Moyomemsing prison. Porch climber. Came out here about fifteen years ago and reported on, saying he wanted a chance to make good. We kept track of him for a couple of years. He was clerking and doing the right thing. Then we lost him.”
“I didn’t identify him that closely,” said Lanagan. “But he’s the man who did this trick and the other nine.”
Within twenty-five minutes Brady and Maloney were crowded into the machine with us. Lanagan gave a direction. At Pacific Avenue and Octavia Street we stopped, in the heart of the fashionable western addition. With Lanagan and Leslie in the lead, Brady and I next and Maloney bringing up the rear, we straggled along for several blocks.