"Precisely," grinned the chief. "Oh, I know it doesn't look like much of a job and I grant you that the thrill element will probably be lacking. But you can't draw a snap every time. All that's asked is that you get something on Cheney—something which will withstand the assaults of the lawyers he will undoubtedly hire the minute we lay hands on him. Therefore you've got to be mighty careful to have the right dope. If you're satisfied that he's doing nothing out of the way, don't hesitate to say so. But I don't expect that your report will clear him, for, from what we already know of the gentleman, he's more likely to be implicated in some plan aimed directly at a violation of neutrality, and it's essential that we find out what that is before we take any radical step."
"What do you know about Cheney?" was Randall's next question, followed by an explanation from the chief that the "count" had been suspected in a number of cases and had barely been able to escape in time.
"But," added the head of the Secret Service, "he did escape. And that's what we have to prevent this time. He's a fast worker and a clever one—which means that you've got to keep continually after him. Call in all the help you need, but if you take my advice you'll handle the case alone. You're apt to get a lot further that way."
Agreeing that this was the best method to pursue, Randall caught the midnight train for New York and went at once to police headquarters, where he requested a full description of Cheney's previous activities.
"You're asking for something what ain't," he was informed, ungrammatically, but truthfully. "We've never been able to get a thing on the count, though we're dead certain that he had a finger in several crooked plays. The Latimer letters were never directly traced to him, but it's a cinch that he had something to do with their preparation, just as he had with the blackmailing of old man Branchfield and the smuggling of the van Husen emeralds. You remember that case, don't you? The one where the stones were concealed in a life preserver and they staged a 'man overboard' stunt just as the ship came into the harbor. Nobody ever got the stones or proved that they were actually smuggled—but the count happened to be on the ship at the time, just as he 'happened' to be in Paris when they were sold. We didn't even dare arrest him, which accounts for the fact that his photograph doesn't ornament the Rogues' Gallery."
"Well, what's the idea of trailing him, then?"
"Just to find out what he is doing. What d'ye call those birds that fly around at sea just before a gale breaks—stormy petrels? That's the count! He's a stormy petrel of crookedness. Something goes wrong every time he hits a town—or, rather, just after he leaves, for he's too clever to stick around too long. The question now is, What's this particular storm and when is it goin' to break?"
"Fine job to turn me loose on," grumbled Randall.
"It is that," laughed the captain who was dispensing information. "But you can never tell what you'll run into, me boy. Why I remember once—"
Randall, however, was out of the office before the official had gotten well started on his reminiscences. He figured that he had already had too much of a grouch to listen patiently to some long-winded story dug out of the musty archives of police history and he made his way at once to the hotel where Carl Cheney was registered, flaunting his own name in front of the police whom he must have known were watching him.