Never-Fail Blake

ed, late that night, by a woman. She was dressed in black, and heavily

house steps she looked first eastward and then westward, as thoug

n fact, seemed to be expected, for without hesitation she wa

t it was not a room of his own fashioning. He stood in the midst of its warm hangings, in fact, as cold and neutral as the marble Di

ds and began to remove the widow's cap from her head. She sighed again as she tossed the black crepe on the dark-wooded table beside her. As she sank into the chair the light from the elec

her consciousness of power. It was plain that she neither liked him nor disliked

in?" he half asked

she an

hy

afrai

you we 'd take c

e that before. They wer

made you that promise

r eyes rest on h

I know Jim Blake. We 'd better not come tog

down on the table. "There 's just one thing I want to know, and kno

together at the mere calmness with whi

y," he

is it?" s

ing with her. His tone was almos

ness," he answered her. "And we 're anxio

ard note and had it work out to fit a street in Montreal. You 've got a wooden decoy up there in Canada, and when Blake gets there he 'll be told his man slipped away the day befor

give it

ut you knew he was going to do t

nds for several seconds. Then she

e, if Blake comes back? How are

back in his chair and

he announced. She slewed s

a plant!" sh

re will be changes in the Department, I imagine; changes for the better which even

little hand gestu

he gives up Binhart? Supposing he suspects some

the unmoved and dry-lipped official. He met

re not going to shoot him up. You

man across the table from her. "Admin

out of the way, off on this Binhart trail

worked out of this Departmen

looking at Copeland. Then she sighed, with mock plaintive

me one might find it worth while to

was his pointed and e

he fulcrum of light, an

r idea of me

ng alert and yet unparticipating in their steady gaze. They held no trace of abashment. They

intelligent woman," Co

way. Don't smile! I 'm not going to turn mawkish. I 'm not good. I don't know whether I want

e First Deputy, as

e wants. We know what you want. And I want something more than I 'm getting, just as you want something

prompted the

e, mind! It's not what other women like me think it is. But I can't go on. It do

had just struck home with him. For the first

ave gone through what I have, because I feel I was n't made for it. I 'm too big a coward to face what it leads to. I can look ahead and see through things. I can understand too

this he could believe. But she d

tion Bureau, the picture and the Bertillon measurements

ot rest with me,

do for the service if I 'm on their side. He could let me begin with the Ellis Island spotting. I could stop that

ony breast, looked up to smile i

n," he said. "And what is m

and her steady gaze succeeded in taking the

tion equal to her own, "will prove of gre

actual mockery in his. But each was keenly conscious of the wheels that revolved within wheels, of the intricacies through whi

rose from his chair. "I 'll attend to the pict

luded. And as they shook hands her gray-irised e

s men awaiting him at Bonaventure Station. There had been a hitch or a leak somew

t a ticket for Winnipeg, that he was not in Montreal, and

as authentic, consulted a timetable, and made a dash for Windsor Station. There he caught the Winnipeg express, took possession of a stateroom and indited carefully worded telegrams to Trimble in Vancouver, that all out-going Pacific steamers should b

n he had visited certain offices and interviewed certain officials, when he had sought out two or three women acquaintances in the city's

Teal Agency operative wired him from Calgary, stating that a man answering Binhart's description had just left the Alberta Hotel for Banff. To this latter point Blake promptly w

f rain. There was something wrong. Of that he felt certain. He could not place it or define it. To continue westward would be to depend too much on an uncertainty; it would involve the risk of wandering too far from the center of things. He suddenly decided to double on his tracks and swing down to Chicago. Just why he fe

him the bewildering extent of the resources which he might command. So intricate and so wide-reaching were the secret wires of his information that he knew he could wait, like a spider at the center of its web, until the betraying vibration awakened some far-reaching thread of that web. In every corner of the country lurked a non-professional ally, a secluded tipster, ready to report to Blake when the call for a report came. The world, that great detective

y proved that. For months past every police chief in the country had held his description of Binhart. That was a fact which Binhart himself very wel

ro-room and casually interviewing the "stools" of Custom House Place and South dark Street, and then dropping in at the Café Acropolis, in Halsted Street, and lodging houses in even less savory quarters. He duly canvassed every likely dive, every "melina," every gambling house and yegg hang out. He engaged in leisurely games of pool with stone-g

His word still carried its weight of official authority. There was still an army of obsequious underlings compelled to respect his wishes. It was merely a matter of time an

herwin, who reported that he had met Binhart, two weeks before, in the café of the Brown Palace in Den

eet-cars and "lifting leathers." Before the stampede at the news of his approach, he picked up Biff Edwards and Lefty Stivers, put on the screws, and learned nothing. He went next to Glory McSha

gisters, a canvassing of ticket agencies and cab stands and transfer companies. It was anything but story-book sleuthing. It was a dispiriting tread-mill round, but he

n apparently care free and leisurely game of pool with one Loony Ryan, an old-time "box man" who was allowed to roam with a clipped wing in the for

" asked Blake,

" said

to the top cushion, wo

, as he turned to chalk his cue. But his eye, with one

second or two. Wolf was a "dip

out at 'Frisco, workin' the

hies of the underworld. The players went on with

days?" asked Blake, as he r

?" demanded Loony, wit

ak named Blanchard or Binhart," e

n made hi

tin' it for N' Orleans. But he was n't t

glanced down at his watch. His eyes were on th

the rack. He spoke slowly and calmly. But Loony's quick gaze circled

e demanded. "W

s game o' yours blamed near made

. He knew that he was getting within striking distance of Binhart, at last. The zest of the chase took possession of him. The

he closeted himself with two dependable "elbows," started his detectives on a round of the hotels, and himself repaired to the Levee district, where he held off-handed and ponderously facetious conversations with c

Monsieur Jules could dish up such startling uncloistral dishes, his eyes fell on Abe Sheiner, a drum snuffer with whom he had had previous and somewhat painful encounters. Sheiner, it was plain to see, was in c

the "moccasin telegraph," a wanderer and a carrier of stray tidings as to the movements of others along the undergrooves of the world. So while Blake breakfasted on shrimp and crab meat and French artichokes stuffed with caviar and

ced the calmly mendacious detective. He continu

sted the other, losing his taste fo

Headquarters and talk that o

when I 'm on the square again?

d out. That's what Connie Binhart sai

into Binhart

talk, thre

town as though he had a regiment o

or with a broken cable. But he gave no

fore the Hamburg-American boat hits the p

," contended the puzzled Sheiner. "Shot t

t, but he went s

sloop. There 's nothing sai

ot to do with our troub

ked for a day coach and said he was traveling for h

the man he was "buzzing." The trick had been turned. The word had been given. He knew that Binhart was headed westward again. He also kne

s type. He was suave and artful; he was active bodied and experienced in the ways of the world. What counted still more, he was well heeled with money. Just how much he had planted away after the Newcomb coup no one knew. But no one denied that it was a for

ould see to that. And he would "get" his man; whether it was in a week's time or a month's time, he would "get" his man and take him back in triumph to New York. He

him, by suddenly accepting those protestations and agreeing to let everything drop. It was necessary, of course, to warn Sheiner, to exact a promise of better living. But Blake's interest in the man had already departed. He dropped him from

emained untouched. He neither fretted nor fumed at the time this travel was taking. In spite of the electric fans at each end of his Pullman, it is true, he suffered greatly from the heat, especially during the ride across the Arizona Desert. He accepted it without complaint, stolidly thanking his lucky stars that men were n't still

iously as a fisherman in forbidden waters. He did not overlook the shipping offices and railway stations, neither did he neglect the hotels and ferries. Then he quietly lunche

nd an adroit decoying of the talk along the channels which most interested his portly host, casually announced that an Eastern crook named Blanchard had got away, the day before, on the Paci

he diffident-eyed Blake, who confessed that he was rounding up a

tening on to Seattle and catching a Great Northern steamer from that port. When a hot-box held his train up for over half an hour, Blake stood with his timepiece in his hand, watching the train crew in their e

y missed. He had a hunch that Hong Kong was the port he wanted. Just why, he could not explain. But he felt sure that Binhart would not drop off at Manila. Once on the run

ing out to sea. Blake hired a tug and overtook her. He reached the steamer's deck by means of a

s that threaded between islands which could not even be counted. He was fleeing towards dark rivers which led off through barbaric and mysterious silence, into the heart of darkness. He was drawing nearer and n

chfulness the impact would be recorded and the alarm would be given. A man of Binhart's type, with the money Binhart had, would never divorce himself completely from civilization. He would always crave a white man's world; he would always hunger for what that world stood for and represented. He would always creep back to it. He might hide in his heathen burrow, for a time; but there would be a limit to