to one wire and
then to another. Each time that the little Bunnell sounder was
galvanized into articulate life he bent his ear and listened to the
busy cluttering of the dots and dashes, as the reports of races, as the
weights and names of jockeys, and lists of entries and statements of
odds and conditions went speeding into the busy keys of the big
poolroom below, where men and women waited with white and straining
faces, and sorrowed and rejoiced as the ever-fluctuant goddess of
chance brought them ill luck or success.

But Durkin paid little attention to these flying messages winging
cityward from race-tracks so many miles away. What he was in search of
was the private wire leading from Penfield's own office, whereon
instructions and information were secretly hurried about the city to
his dozen and one fellow-operators. It was from this wire that Durkin
hoped, without "bleeding" the circuit, to catch some thread of fact
which might make the task before him more lucid and direct.

He worked for an hour, connecting and disconnecting, testing and
listening and testing still again, before the right wire fell under his
thumb. Then he listened intently, with a little start, for he knew he
was reading an operator whose bluff, heavy, staccato "send" was as
familiar to his long-practiced ear as a well-known face would be to his
watching eyes.

It was MacNutt himself who was "sending." His first intercepted
message was an order, to some confederate unknown, to have a carriage
call for him at eight. That, Durkin told himself, was worth knowing.
His second despatch was a warning to a certain "Al" Mackenzie not to
fail to meet Penfield in Albany, Sunday, at midnight. The third
message was brief, and seemed to be an answer to a question which had
escaped the interloper.

"Yes, got her here, and here she stays. Things will happen tonight."

"Ah!" ejaculated Durkin, as he wiped his moist forehead, while the
running dots and dashes resolved themselves into the two intelligible
sentences.

Then he looked about him, at the leaden sky, at the roofs and walls and
windows of the crowded and careless city, as a _sabreur_ about to enter
the arena might look about him on life for perhaps the last time.

"Yes," he said, with a meditative stare at the transom before him,
"things _will_ happen tonight."

CHAPTER XXIII

THE WAKING CIRCUIT

It was a thick and heavy night, with a drizzle of fine rain blanketing
the cit