But Jimmy had run the gamut of his short, but varied career.
Nothing had been too swift for him to overtake it, to distance it, and finally to wear out its usefulness, and finally his own, too.
Once, according to Nick Carter’s records, the man had really tried to reform; “had made a stab at it,” as he expressed it; but the old temptations had been too strong for him; the “call of the contest” had proved too alluring. The desire to pit his own wit against the representatives of law and order had overcome the better self that reposed somewhere within the strange complexity of this man, and he had gone again, deliberately, into the life of the underworld.
The woman who was seated upon the chair opposite, and to whom his conversation was addressed, had proved herself to be the only person of whom Jimmy had ever stood in the least in awe.
The name by which Jimmy addressed her, was one that he had bestowed upon her himself.
She had never been known by that name to any other person than this man who had just determined to steal a birthright, although there were half a dozen aliases by which she had been known to the authorities of Paris, Vienna, Berlin, St. Petersburg, and London; and under each one of those half dozen aliases she had earned reputations which filled pages of private but official records of the secret police of five different nations.
Her dossier had been written down in five languages—and more; and now, as Juno, she had started out to carve a new career for herself, with the aid of Jimmy, whom she respected for his wit, his daring, for his past achievements and the promise he gave of attempting new and greater ones.
These two represented the masculine and the feminine of all that is masterful in the life of rogues; they were the perfection of the imperfect, if the expression may be used.
Jimmy was a handsome man, and one who would be noticeable in any company. He was distinguished in appearance, Chesterfieldian in his manners, graceful in his motions—a somebody in everything that he did, educated, refined by instinct and by early training; he was a graduated crook in every part and branch of the “profession.”
And Juno? Draw her picture for yourself. It cannot be too strongly, too perfectly outlined.