"Now, if Cutts paid them--and Cutts is crooked, if he is a detective; I've known that this long while--the question is who was to pay Cutts? My answer would be this man Callister, whose direct interest it is to have you convicted of crime." "Mr. Hook," exclaimed the boy, lost in astonishment, "I am completely bewildered. What would you advise me to do?" "To place yourself in my hands, if you will," answered the detective, decidedly. "I will take up your case if you wish me to do so, for it is just the sort of an affair I like. "I now fully believe your story, my boy, and shall not place you under arrest. In working for your interests I shall also be doing my duty in unearthing the robbers of the Webster Bank." "Of course I shall be only too glad of your help," said Frank, eagerly. "I have been foolish--I see it now. Whatever you say I'll do." "Then, inasmuch as you have mysteriously disappeared, remain so. I've reported your disappearance to the police; let it be your care not to reappear until I say the word. "Disguise yourself, watch Callister, see your bootblacks and newsboys, and procure from them the tin box and all it contains. I will do for your unfortunate mother all that can be done. When you want money come to me. We will work together, Frank, and as I don't work for nothing, you can repay me when you come into your own." "I can never repay you, sir!" cried the boy, with tears in his eyes, grasping the detective's outstretched hand. "Yes, you can, and I'm sure you will. Here are a few dollars now. When you need it you shall have more. Now go, and don't be seen in the streets so dressed that any one will recognize you again. You can meet me--let me see--I've got to go out of town this afternoon on important business, and won't return until late to-night. Meet me where I saw you first--on the corner of Rector street and Broadway--to-night, as the clock of old Trinity strikes twelve." CHAPTER XII. WHAT WAS SEEN BY THE CHURCH-YARD WALL. The Sabbath has passed, and night has fallen upon the city once more. The busy streets are growing deserted, and the great business thoroughfares about lower Broadway, silent at all hours on this the day of rest, have, as the night wears on, become almost entirely abandoned by pedestrians, and have sunk into obscurity and gloom. As the midnight hour approached, the figure of a young man, roughly dressed in garments of the commonest sort, his face concealed beneath a low slouch hat, his mouth by a heavy black mustache, might have been observed to briskly ascend the Rector street hill, which rises along the church-yard wall, and to take his station at the corner of Broadway, close by the side of the iron fence which divides the old burial ground from the street. He was evidently waiting for some one, for as he paced up and down beneath the cold light of the glittering stars his eye was from time to time turned upon the clock in the church tower, now about to strike the hour of twelve.