"Well, never mind," said the detective, indifferently. "I don't want to pry into your secrets, boys. All I want is to bring these bank robbers to justice, and remove suspicion from our young friend here. That's my business here to-night, and I've nothing to do with any other matters at all. I suppose you are all friends of his, or he wouldn't be among you. By the way, that was a mighty sharp trick, getting him away from the officer who had him in charge last night." "Oh, we're fly every time, boss," replied Barney, with an air of conscious pride. "You can just bet your life on that." Caleb Hook laughed pleasantly, and took an extra puff at his cigar. "Frank, here's one witness to prove that you didn't rob the bank," he said, pointing carelessly to Jerry Buck. "An' here's anoder," put in Barney. "I seen the fellers too." "I'm sure both of them will testify to what they know, Mr. Hook," said Frank, somewhat puzzled to discern the detective's aim. "Of course we will," exclaimed Barney. "Me an' Jerry has undertook to set you right, and we're de kind as goes de whole hog or none." The reply came heartily, nor was the assent of Jerry Buck any less strong. It seemed strange that these wild street Arabs had taken up his cause in the manner they had. Strange to Caleb Hook as he sat scanning the faces of the "bats" about him. Doubly strange to Frank himself the more he turned it over in his mind. But his situation was such that there was nothing for it but to drift helplessly with the tide, with Detective Hook for his rudder, to steer him to whatever haven of safety he might choose. And the boy did well to place his reliance where he did. Had he searched New York from end to end, he could not have found a shrewder ally or a better man. "Good!" exclaimed the detective. "The testimony of two is better than that of one. Would either of you know the three men again?" "Every one on 'em," said Jerry, decidedly. "Good again. You saw the man over whom I tumbled in Catherine street this morning, when I tried to catch hold of your coat. Was he one of them?" "Yes, he was, boss, an' a minute after another--the big feller wot dropped the box--went up the street." "He did?" "Sure's yer born. I know'd him the minute I saw him." "I saw him, too, Mr. Hook," said Frank, eagerly, "and with him----" "One moment," said the detective, throwing a warning look toward Frank. "I'm listening to Jerry now. You can tell your story by and by. Where did the man go, Jerry? Do you know?" "No," replied the newsboy, shaking his head. "I went down to the house where the woman was murdered. You seen me there, you know." This, of course, was true. And yet the reader knows, as well as did Jerry Buck himself, that it was far, very far, from being the whole truth. Of his subsequent adventures in Cagney's sanctum, of the conversation he had overheard while crouched behind the whisky barrels outside the half door, he said nothing at all.