“This—to begin with!” he said—and, crossing the room, felt through the other’s pockets, and possessed himself of the man’s revolver. “Now go over there, and sit down at that table!”
Hunchback Joe laughed contemptuously again, as he obeyed; but there was a hint of deadly menace in his voice as he spoke.
“Go to it—while you can!” he snarled. “You’ve got the drop on me. Well, what do you want?”
Jimmie Dale followed, and faced the other across the table. Hunchback Joe’s eyes, with that curious, unpleasant trick of which the man seemed possessed, were blinking ceaselessly.
“I want to give this back to you,” said Jimmie Dale quietly—and flung the roll of bills that he had taken from Klanner’s trunk down upon the table.
Hunchback Joe’s eyes ceased to blink.
“Why, thanks!” grinned Hunchback Joe. “You’re a queer sort of a night marauder, you are! Sure this is for me, and that you aren’t making a mistake?”
“Quite sure,” said Jimmie Dale, still quietly. “It’s yours. It’s the money you planted in Klanner’s trunk a couple of hours ago.”
“I never heard of Klanner,” said Hunchback Joe.
“It’s simply the evidence that that isn’t all I found in the trunk,” said Jimmie Dale. “There was a packet of papers, and the blood-stained blackjack with which Jathan Lane was murdered in the bank this afternoon.”