With a cry, that to Jimmie Dale seemed one of more poignant anguish than he had ever heard before, the old gentleman caught her in his arms and supported her to a chair; then running quickly to the hall, called loudly for the maid below.
There was a merciless smile on Jimmie Dale’s lips. He was retreating now further back into the room toward the door that gave on the hall.
“I wonder,” said Jimmie Dale to himself through set teeth, “I wonder if a man wouldn’t be justified in putting an end for keeps to that devil Thorold for this!”
He heard the maid come rushing up the stairs. He could no longer see into the other room now, but a confused mingling of voices reached him:
“... The police ... next door and telephone ... the light ... while we were at dinner....”
Jimmie Dale opened the door, slipped across the hall, made his way silently and swiftly down the stairs, and with the single precaution of pulling his slouch hat far down over his eyes, stepped boldly out of the front door, walked quietly down the steps, walked briskly, but without apparent haste, along the street—and turned the first corner.
CHAPTER V. “DEATH TO THE GRAY SEAL!”
Jimmie Dale hurried now, making his way to the nearest subway station, and took a downtown train. “There should be no danger,” the Tocsin had written. His eyes darkened with a flash of passion. Danger! Danger was a small, pitiful factor now! He had been too late through no fault either of his or the Tocsin’s—but he still knew where the pendant was, or would be! Time was counting again; he was afraid now only that he might be too late a second time. Old Attic would not let any grass grow under his feet in disposing of the diamonds through one of the many channels at his command, and once they had passed out of that scoundrel’s hands they were as good as hopelessly lost. Also there was Thorold to reckon with. Thorold would naturally get the pendant first, then turn it over to Jake Kisnieff. Had Thorold already done so? It depended, of course, on when the theft had been committed. That snatch of conversation—“the light ... when we were at dinner”—came back to him. His brows gathered. He crouched a little in his seat, staring abstractedly at the black tunnel walls without. Station after station was passed. Jimmie Dale’s hand, resting on the window sill, was so tightly clenched that it seemed the skin must crack across the knuckles.