at he could do it easily enough without getting
nipped himself, by sending them a letter, or even telephoning the names
and addresses of the whole layout. They're scared--he curs! They say
he knows where all our coin is too; and they're for splitting it up
to-night, and ducking it out of New York for a while to get under
cover." He laughed out suddenly, raucously. "They will--eh? I'll show
them--the yellow-streaked pups! They wouldn't listen to me--and it meant
that you and I were thrown down for fair. If we're caught, it's the
chair. I'll show them! When I saw it wasn't any use trying to get them
to stick, I pretended to agree with them. See? I said they could go
around and dig up the rest of the gang, and if the others felt the
same way about it, they were all to come over to the garret, and I'd be
waiting for them,--and we'd split up the swag, and everybody'd be on his
own after that." Again he laughed out raucously. "It'll take them half
an hour to get together--but it won't take that long for us to grab all
that's worth grabbing out of that trap-door, and making our getaway.
See? I'll teach them to throw Pierre Danglar down! Come on, hurry!"

"Sure!" she mumbled mechanically.

Her mind was sifting, sorting, weighing what he had said. She was not
surprised. She remembered Pinkie Bonn's outburst in the boat. She walked
on beside Danglar. The man was muttering and cursing under his breath.
Well, why shouldn't she appear to fall in with his plans? Under what
choicer surroundings could she get him alone than in the garret? And
half an hour would be ample time for her, too! Yes, yes, she began to
see! With Danglar, when she had got what she wanted out of him herself,
held up at the point of her automatic, she could back to the door and
lock him in there--and notify the police--and the police would not only
get Danglar and the ill-gotten hoard hidden in the ceiling behind that
trap-door, but they would get all the rest of the gang as the latter
in due course appeared on the scene. Yes, why not? She experienced an
exhilaration creeping upon her; she even increased, unconsciously, the
rapid pace which Danglar had set.

"That's the stuff!" he grunted in savage approval. "We need every minute
we've got."

They reached the house where once--so long ago now, it seemed!--Rhoda
Gray had first found the original Gypsy Nan; and, Danglar leading,
mounted the dark, narrow stairway to the hall above, and from there up
the short, l