However, I can
get past the outer door, I think, even if it is strong. But inside--you
must have heard of it--is the famous steel door, three inches thick,
made of armourplate. It's no use to try it at all unless we can pass
that door with reasonable quickness. All the evidence we shall get will
be of an innocent social club-room downstairs. The gambling is all on
the second floor, beyond this door, in a room without a window in it.
Surely you've heard of that famous gambling-room, with its perfect
system of artificial ventilation and electric lighting that makes it
rival noonday at midnight. And don't tell me I've got to get on the
other side of the door by strategy, either. It is strategy-proof. The
system of lookouts is perfect. No, force is necessary, but it must not
be destructive of life or property--or, by heaven, I'd drive up there
and riddle the place with a fourteen-inch gun," exclaimed O'Connor.

"H'm!" mused Kennedy as he flicked the ashes off his cigar and
meditatively watched a passing freight-train on the railroad below us.
"There goes a car loaded with tons and tons of scrap iron. You want me
to scrap that three-inch steel door, do you?"

"Kennedy, I'll buy that particular scrap from you at almost its weight
in gold. The fact is, I have a secret fund at my disposal such as former
commissioners have asked for in vain. I can afford to pay you well,
as well as any private client, and I hear you have had some good fees
lately. Only deliver the goods."

"No," answered Kennedy, rather piqued, "it isn't money that I am after.
I merely wanted to be sure that you are in earnest. I can get you past
that door as if it were made of green baize."

It was O'Connor's turn to look incredulous, but as Kennedy apparently
meant exactly what he said, he simply asked, "And will you?"

"I will do it to-night if you say so," replied Kennedy quietly. "Are you
ready?"

For answer O'Connor simply grasped Craig's hand, as if to seal the
compact.

"All right, then," continued Kennedy. "Send a furniture-van, one of
those closed vans that the storage warehouses use, up to my laboratory
any time before seven o'clock. How many men will you need in the raid?
Twelve? Will a van hold that many comfortably? I'll want to put some
apparatus in it, but that won't take much room."

"Why, yes, I think so," answered O'Connor. "I'll get a well-padded van
so that they won't be badly jolted by the ride down-town. By George!
Kennedy, I se