im his claws before I take
any chances with him. Delaney," he added, "get my overcoat and bring me
those plaster-casts. This case grows interesting. I wonder who the
fellow is? 'Albert Jones' doesn't convey much. He is a friend and tool
of Morphy. Poor Morphy! I wonder what he'll say when the governor gets
this evidence? He's buried now for twenty long years of penal service.
He picked a good tool, though. A smart man!"

The prisoner did not brighten to any extent under the professional
flattery. His eyes closed. The cuffed wrists dropped down upon his
chest. He breathed slowly as Drew took the overcoat Delaney brought,
and found the photos of the finger prints which Fosdick and the expert
at headquarters had both declared were not on record.

"A little ink," Drew said to the operative. "We'll smear this fellow's
thumb and see if his print answers to the print I found in the booth at
Grand Central. I'll venture that it does."

Nichols extended a fountain pen which the detective opened, sponged on
the corner of a handkerchief, and returned with a chuckle of
satisfaction.

"Ah," he said, gripping the prisoner's hand and smearing a thumb with a
rolling motion across the back of the print. "Ah, Delaney, see here.
The same whorls and loops. The same tiny V-shaped scar. One, two,
three--center right. This is the man. We have him deeper in toward the
place with the little, green door. He knows what I mean!"

The prisoner's lips closed to a thin, hard line. A tiny spot of hectic
fire burned in the center of each cheek as Drew completed the searching
and rose.

"Footprints, now!" he said with a snappy order. "Compare those plaster
casts you took at the junction-box back of this house. Are they the
same? There's a series of four screw holes in his rubber-heels,
Delaney. Do they compare with the casts. Measure them!"

"Sure and they do," said the big operative, rising and pointing to the
small projections. "This lad, Chief, was the only one around that
junction-box till after the snow froze and drifted over. That's my
idea, Chief. It caught him, didn't it, Chief?"

"Every little helps to forge the chain," Drew said. "He's in bad now.
His only chance is to tell us what he knows about Morphy? What was said
over the telephone wire? What did Frick say?"

"It was this way, Chief," Delaney said. "I'm waiting talking with the
drug-clerk when there's a ring on the slot-booth 'phone. It's Jack Nefe
at Gramercy Hill. He says to m