Larry told the driver to take us around the Park a couple of times and, as we picked up speed again, Moore gripped my arm.
“Gad, it’s good to see you again, Clayton,” he cried, “but I have not time to tell how good, old man. For I’m hoping big things of to-night. I believe this is our chance to round up the lot of them. And we’ve a lot to talk over first.”
I nodded. “Go ahead then,” I told him.
“All right. First, about to-night then. Vining is coming for me at seven. I thought at first of letting Captain Peters in on the whole thing. But he’d want to have a lot of plain-clothes men around here, easily recognized as detectives. And Vining is nobody’s fool. Of course he may suspect me. His turning up like that and catching you in his house looks like it. But that might be a coincidence, or he might have one of his faithful henchmen watching his house—it’s quite on the cards when a man plays the sort of a game he seems to be playing—and the watcher may have seen you and Larry go in and sent for Vining. At any rate, there’s nothing but coincidence to connect me with you or your search of his house. And his suspicion is a chance we’ve got to take.”
“Pretty desperate position for you if he does suspect you,” I pointed out.
Moore laughed. “No worse than lots of others we’ll have to take in this business. It’s all part of the game. But here’s my idea. The thing we want to accomplish to-night is to discover the location of this hang-out, where they give these parties. If we do that, we can round up the gang at our leisure afterwards. I’ll be blindfolded and probably won’t have the faintest idea where they’re taking me. So I want to know whether you’ll follow and find out where they do take me. Of course it’s a bit risky——”
“Sure,” I answered, in Larry’s best colloquial style, “I’m running a helluva lot of risk following you, after you’ve poked your head into the lion’s mouth like that.”
“Well, then,” Moore went on, “Vining’s coming at seven, and I think you ought to be hanging around in the neighborhood by six-thirty at the latest, in case he comes a little early. You ought to have a high-powered car—rent one if necessary—and have it well out of sight. I’ll try to keep Vining for a moment or two—give him a drink or something—and that’ll give you time to get ready after you see him. Better get a good driver or drive yourself.”
“That’s easily fixed. Larry can see to the car this afternoon.”
“Good. Now here’s another thing. I’ll tell you frankly that I’m afraid of Vining. He’s a gifted criminal, and I’m not at all sure that he’s not playing with us. Anyhow, I thought it best to tell him about my diggings near you. I told him that they were usually occupied by a little lady friend, now on tour, and suggested that he call for me there, as I would be in that neighborhood. I did that for this reason. I thought that if anything went wrong at the last minute, I could get Larry here on the telephone, and he could get in touch with you at once, as you’ll be just around the corner waiting with your car. Then you could come in and we could capture Vining anyhow, if it came to that. We might be able to get some information out of him. I know enough about him to hold him all right.”