“Now, we have, if you will forgive my professorial method,” continued Average Jones, “a chair sent to a gentleman of prominence from an anonymous source. In this chair is a charge of high explosive and above it a glass bulb containing sulphuric acid. The bulb, we will assume, is so safe-guarded as to resist any ordinary shock of moving. But when this gentleman, sitting at ease in his chair, is noticed by a trombonist, placed for that purpose In the street, below—” “The Dutch horn-player!” cried the politician. “Then it was him; and I’ll—” “Only an innocent tool,” interrupted Average Jones, in his turn. “He had no comprehension of what he was doing. He didn’t understand that the vibration from his trombone on one particular note by the slide up the scale—as in the chorus of _Egypt_—would shiver that glass and set off the charge. All that he knew was to play the B-flat trombone and take his pay.” “His pay?” The question leaped to the politician’s lips. “Who paid him?” “A man—named—er—Arbuthnot,” drawled Average Jones. Linder’s eyes did not drop, but a film seemed to be drawn over them. “You once knew—er—a Mrs. Arbuthnot?” The thick shoulders quivered a little. “Her husband—her widower—is in Brooklyn. Shall I push the argument any further to convince you that you’d better drop out of the mayoralty race?” Linder recovered himself a little. “What kind of a game are you ringing in on me?” he demanded. “Don’t you think,” suggested Average Jones sweetly, “that considered as news, this—” Linder caught the word out of his mouth. “News!” he roared. “A fake story ten years old, news? That ain’t news! It’s spite work. Even your dirty paper, Waldemar, wouldn’t rake that kind of muck up after ten years. It’d be a boomerang. You’ll have to put up a stronger line of blackmail and bluff than that.” “Blackmail is perhaps the correct word technically,” admitted the newspaper owner, “but bluff—there you go wrong. You’ve forgotten one thing; that Arbuthnot’s arrest and confession would make the whole story news. We stand ready to arrest Arbuthnot, and he stands ready to confess.” There was a long, tense minute of silence. Then— “What do you want?” The straight-to-the-point question was an admission of defeat. “Your announcement of withdrawal. I’d rather print that than the Arbuthnot story.” There was a long silence. Finally the Honorable Linder dropped his hand on the table. “You win,” he declared curtly. “But you’ll give me the benefit, in the announcement, of bad health caused by the shock of the explosion, to explain my quitting, Waldemar?” “It will certainly make it more plausible,” assented the newspaper owner with a smile. Linder turned on Average Jones. “Did you dope this out, young fellow?” he demanded. “Yes.” “Well, you’ve put me in the Down-and-Out-Club, all right. And I’m just curious enough to want to know how you did it.”