"You can be sure of it, Bailey," returned Allingham. "I'll accept at once. Tell me more of what you are finding out. That is, if you think she won't mind."
"She won't mind your knowing some of it anyhow, because you'll be expected to help us look into certain matters," said Bailey.
They talked together for an hour or so, and when John Allingham finally departed he felt a deeper interest in city reform than ever, and believed the time had come when he could be of real use to his community.
"By the way, Jack," said Armstrong, as he was leaving, "have you found out anything more about the originators of your strange ride the night before election?"
"I have detectives working on it now—or pretending to," replied Jack, "but they don't seem to get anywhere. Whoever was behind the scheme covered his tracks well."
"Yes, we, too, have had a detective working," said Bailey, "though Miss Van Deusen has called him off now. No use, she says, and thinks perhaps any further work in that direction may hinder what she wants to do in another."
"Perhaps she's right," responded Allingham. "All we have been able to discover is that two electric cabs, both provided with outside means of locking the doors and windows, took the opposing candidates and went off twenty miles or so into the country, on the night before election, breaking up an important debate that might have turned the current of affairs in another direction—"
"—Um, perhaps," interrupted Bailey. "Perhaps not. Anyway, all this we knew before midnight, the evening it happened."
"Yes. And while there are no electric cabs in Roma, there are plenty of them within a radius of twenty-five miles of us. And the Burke gang could easily have brought any of them here. I've been having a hunt made for cabs with outside locks; but so far, none have been discovered. Between you and me, I doubt if we can ever find out."
"Between you and me, I shall not be surprised if we run up against further deviltry of that sort," said Bailey, "before we get through with—"