R III.

A LICENSED PIRATE.

We had latterly somewhat neglected business--our real business being at
night, when we made the pursuit of pleasure hard work. Soon the finances
of our firm not only ran low, but were on three several occasions
exhausted, so that we not only had recourse to borrowing, but were
barely saved from bankruptcy by liberal donations from Ed's parents. His
father was a fine, jolly old gentleman, and took it quite a matter of
course that it was his duty to help us off the rocks when we ran on
them. My partner took everything easy, but I, having no indulgent parent
behind me ever ready to draw a check, began to be uneasy over the
financial situation. Strangely enough, however, it never occurred to me
to cut down my personal expenses, and I continued living at the same
extravagant rate as when money was plenty--dining and wining and being
dined and wined. Just here an important character, one destined to have
an influence for evil on my future life, came upon the scene, and I will
halt for a moment in my narrative to give some account of him.

This man was James Irving, popularly known as Jimmy Irving, chief of the
New York Detective Force, and a bad-hearted, worthless scamp he was. I
was with several friends in the Fifth Avenue Hotel one cold January
night when he came in, and one of our party, knowing him, introduced us.
He was a man of medium height, rather heavy set, blond mustache,
pleasant eyes, but with a weak mouth and chin, and a flushed face,
telling a tale of dissipation. It was when Boss Tweed ruled supreme in
New York and the whole administration was honeycombed with corruption.
Except under similar political conditions could such a man attain to so
responsible an office in a great city as that of chief of the detective
force--a position which at that time invested him with all but
autocratic power. An old rounder and barroom loafer, without one
attribute of true manliness and not possessed of any quality which would
point him out as a fit man for the place. Nevertheless, when the
position became vacant his political pull caused his selection. From
being a mere detective on the staff he became chief. And truly this
meant something in those days. The great civil war had but lately ended,
and the country was still reeling from the mighty conflict. The flush
times, resultant from the enormous money issue of the Government, kept
everything booming. The foundations of society were shaken and