New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1920-07-18

pockets for silver. "These are tips
you've received. A dollar OH ac-
count of salary. He may ask you
for change Now, don't be
overanxious. If this doesn't work
we'll find some other way. If he
gets suspicious and telephones to the
desk-or anything of that sort
just get in here as quickly as you
can, and we'll protect you"
Barney had a sensation of pecu-
liar heaviness in the knees as he
walked stiffly to the door. Outside
he paused to close the door with UNI
necessary gentleness and make sure
that the corridor was empty. Where
was 818? He saw $40 across the
hall to his left. He cleared his
throat of nervousness. He walked
boldly to 818, raised his small
knuckles to panel and knocked.
There was no answer. He had
put up his hand to knock again
when the door opened and a tall man
in slippers and bathrobe asked,
"Wen?"
"A telegram for Mr. Cooper"
Barney said steadily. ''They tol'
me to see that he got it this time.
It's repeat"
Cooper stood back. Come in.s
His voice was pitched. low What
did you say?"
Barney came across the threshold
and Cooper closed the door on him.
Its repeat" Barney said, can
they told me to see that you got it
this time" He held out the tele-
gram.
Cooper took it nervously. There
was little patch of lather drying
on one cheekbone, and Barney un-
derstood that he had been shaving.
He wiped his hand on his bathrobe
before he took the telegram, and he
fun1bled over it. Barney found HIM
self suddenly cool and confident.
"Why!" Cooper said. II got this
last night"
Maybe you didn' answer it," Bar
ney suggested. 'It's a repeat"
He puzzled over it. "Well," he
said, "I"-- His voice faded out
in a tone of abstraction. He
turned and shuffied across the room
to his writing desk, his eyes on the
telegram. Unconscious of Barney's
craning watch illness, he took a
small clothbound volume from an
upper drawer of the little escritoire
and turned the printed pages, COM
pairing the words in the message
with words in the book. The code
book!
eff you want to send an answer"
Barney said boldly, moving down to-
ward him, II could take it,"
He did not reply. He sat down to
the desk and took pencil and wrote
and consulted the book carefully
with his pencil point on the page
and came back again to the message
and returned to find another page
in the book. "No, that's all right, y
he said, finally. He tore the tele-
gram and retore it into tiny pieces.
There's no answer" He made as
If to throw the torn paper into the
wastebasket, and then he checked
himself. "Wait a minute" he said,
rising; and Barney understood that
he was to have tip.
Cooper shuff1ed off to the bath
room in his slippers.
Barney, as pale as thief, darted
to the secretary and crammed the
little code book into his pocket.
When Cooper returned to the
room, the bellboy was standing near
the door looking up at a framed
engraving. He took the dime that
Cooper gave him. and said stifiy,
Thanks" but without raising his
guilty eyes. AS he went out, he
glanced back and saw that Cooper
was returning to the bathroom.
Gee.
He was so obviously-so breath
lessly-excited when he burst in
upon the detectives that Corcoran
came to his feet at sight of him.
"What's the matter?''
II go--got it," Barney stammered,
Juggling at the book that stuck in
his pocket.
"Got what?"
"His-his book"
"What?" Corcoran grabbed him
roughly by the shoulder and snatched
the volume from his hand He
glanced at it's brown cloth cover.
WHAT" he cried. And that second
WHAT" expressed the extreme of
incredulous disgust.
Babbing looked at it. 1t was a
pocket Webster" a cheap abridged
edition, on cheap paper where
did you get this?' he asked: and