“I was a cop myself, for a while, but I got broke for letting a prisoner get away from me. It wasn’t my fault and I had only been on the force a month. But they broke me all the same, and I hadn’t pull enough to fix it up.” “But what made you ask us if we were fly-cops?” asked Patsy. “Oh, it was only because you asked about that house. There’s hardly been a time since that house was built that the fly-cops haven’t been hanging about it. That was fifteen years ago.” “Tough place?” asked Patsy. “Well,” replied the man, doubtfully, “it’s always been under sort of suspicions. It was built, and is owned now, by a man they call Stumpy Herrick. He’s got a sort of a club foot. That’s why they call him Stumpy. “They say he used to be a maker of the queer and that he built this house out of a big rake off in shoving a lot of it.” “Does he keep that saloon?” asked Chick. “Oh, no,” replied the man. “He doesn’t do anything now but take care of his property and collect his rents. He owns not a little around here. No, the first man that kept the place was Fillingham. He rented it from Stumpy, and the next thing they knew the Secret Service men made a raid on the place and found a whole plant for printing notes in that rear building. “Fillingham was sent up, you know. Then the house was kept by another man by the name of Locke. Everything was quiet for a year or two and then the fly-cops made a raid on the place and they found that it was a fence, and Locke doing more business in taking in swag in that rear building than in the saloon. “They sent him up, and the saloon changed hands again. “Things was quiet for two or three years and then there was another raid of the place. A man was taken out of that rear house that was in hiding there for having killed somebody downtown. I forget now who. Then it was shown that it was a great loafing place for crooks. And the business ran down and that man had to give up the place. “By this time the place got a bad reputation and it was empty for several years. “Now this man has taken it and, for anything that anybody knows, it’s all right. But I don’t like the crowd that hangs around here.” “What’s the man’s name that keeps it now,” asked Chick. “His name is Dempsey,” said the man. “My brother was telling me yesterday that, some years ago, he used to keep a game downtown which was a crooked one. But I don’t know about that.” “The house has had a curious history,” said Chick. “I’m going in to look at it. Will you go over and have a drink?” “I don’t care if I do,” said the man. The three crossed and entered the saloon. It was an ordinary drinking place, not well kept, and the floor was covered with sawdust. In the rear of the room were several tables, one of which was near a door. At this table were seated the four men Chick and Patsy had followed, and another, who, from the fact that he was in his shirt sleeves, seemed to be the proprietor of the place.