George heard
Sweetwater's whisper at his ear:

"It's the police. The chief has got ahead of me. Was that the man we're
after--the one who shouted down?"

"No. Neither was he the speaker. The voices are very different."

"We want the speaker. If the boys get him, we're all right; but if they
don't--wait, I must make the matter sure."

And with a bound he vaulted through the window, whistling in a peculiar
way. George, thus left quite alone, had the pleasure of seeing his sole
protector mix with the boys, as he called them, and ultimately crowd
in with them through the door which had finally been opened for their
admittance. Then came a wait, and then the quiet re-appearance of the
detective alone and in no very, amiable mood.

"Well?" inquired George, somewhat breathlessly. "Do you want me? They
don't seem to be coming out."

"No; they've gone the other way. It was a red hot anarchist meeting,
and no mistake. They have arrested one of the speakers, but the other
escaped. How, we have not yet found out; but I think there's a way out
somewhere by which he got the start of us. He was the man I wanted you
to see. Bad luck, Mr. Anderson, but I'm not at the end of my resources.
If you'll have patience with me and accompany me a little further, I
promise you that I'll only risk one more failure. Will you be so good,
sir?"

IX. THE INCIDENT OF THE PARTLY LIFTED SHADE

The fellow had a way with him, hard to resist. Cold as George was
and exhausted by an excitement of a kind to which he was wholly
unaccustomed, he found himself acceding to the detective's request; and
after a quick lunch and a huge cup of coffee in a restaurant which I
wish I had time to describe, the two took a car which eventually brought
them into one of the oldest quarters of the Borough of Brooklyn. The
sleet which had stung their faces in the streets of New York had been
left behind them somewhere on the bridge, but the chill was not gone
from the air, and George felt greatly relieved when Sweetwater paused
in the middle of a long block before a lofty tenement house of mean
appearance, and signified that here they were to stop, and that from now
on, mum was to be their watchword.

George was relieved I say, but he was also more astonished than ever.
What kind of haunts were these for the cultured gentleman who spent
his evenings at the Clermont? It was easy enough in these days of
extravagant sympathies, to understand such a man addressing t