New Britain herald., 1924-07-01

could, he evidently did not choose to do so. "I guess that will hold you," sneered Daragon. "If l didn't hate scandal, I'd call the police"
 He turned on his heel, gave me a grudging nod of thanks, and walked out of the restaurant. I stood mo- ment smiling at the crook.
 You certainly do need me-" I 1 laughed. Then, though having recog- nized mo, he would have detained me, I walked over to my table. What did ]. who was about to die, have in common with such a person? The thanks of himself, or of his pretty feminine companion, would not do me any good.
 I paid my waiter and walked to the | cheCk-room. l will confess that l was slightly embarrassed at my in- i ability to tip the coat-boy. But I need not have been; for Daragon, just ! donning his overcoat. saw me and seemed to regret his lack of courtesy. He handed the coat boy an extra coin. 1 Let me do that much" he said, "-cven though you did me a shabby turn"
 I stared at him. What do you mean?" l asked.
 | We were at the cloak-room en- trance now. Daragon jerked a fat thumb toward the dining-room. Don't you think had that crooks number? It was the girl l wanted. I guessed their game, and played the come-on simply to get her where l wanted her."
 And where was that?" asked. | He grinned. She 'sstuck on him. But l figured that if l caught them with the goods, she'd forget how stuck she was on him if didn't prosecute. Get me-" 'T do," said l codly. 'I suppose she dropped it, and you saw it fall. If you hadn't stepped in, I'd have had them dead to rights. Oh, well, a man cant get everything he thinks he wants" A sense of the monstrous injustice of life came to me. That injustice could be remedcd by money. For instance. that jewel in Daragons
 
 sands of dollars. Even I. a gentle man, had heard, in recent months of poverty, of "fenses," those men who buy the loot of thieves I even knew where one or two of them resided. The skirts of poverty brush the feet of criminality.
 l was about to die, because I had neither productive nor constructive brains. But perhaps had the third kind, a destructive brain. If my fur colared friend could make success of crime, despite the pallcty of imagination which his clumsy scheme for robbing Daragon had disclosed. what tremendous success l could achieve.
 Honor? Adherence to it led me to the gutter vas about to lead me to the river!
 Daragon stepped aside to let me prccede him through the restaurant door. l exercised the only talent that l had, sleight- -of-hand. I sub- stitutcd the second box, which the girl had given me. for the one that lay in Daragon's pocket.
 I nodded farewell to him-to more  than him: to all the past that lay behind me. And I kissed my hand to the future. ! was nothing within the law; l would be the greatest liv- ing figure outside the law. I would make the super-crimnal something more than the flgment of police mans Imagination. I would bring to my new profession the brain of a gentleman, certainly fitted to cope with the intellect of detective. Il would bring to my new art the cul- ture of an aristocrat. I would raise it from the sordid level to which such people as my fur-collared friend re- pressed it. I smiled cheerfully as I set out to dispose of the diamond ring gained by my legerdemain.