“Hello.... This is Lieutenant Jimmie Kelly, of the Tenderloin Squad,--you know, friend of Mr. Clifford. Mr. Clifford has just found Mr. Morton--Jack Morton, I mean. Jack is sick of what he’s been doing the last few days--half crazy with remorse, you understand. Mr. Clifford can’t leave Jack, and he asked me to telephone you to come for him. We’re all at”--here Loveman gave the address--“it’s one of those old private houses made into an exclusive restaurant. Just ring and I’ll let you in.... All right, then, we’ll expect you in half an hour.” He called a second number, which he got instantly, and he spoke in his natural voice, though his words to any other ears save those at the end of the wire, might have been enigmatic:-- “I wish to report a full crop,” he said. “Immediate delivery is requested.” With that he hung up and stepped out of the closet, wiping away the moisture begotten by the stifling air of the cubicle. The full-bodied little man, that Fifth Avenue and Broadway knew best as an amiable, unflurried smile, was now set and grim of face, excited with suspense and calculations. All had thus far gone well with his plan. Immediately before him was the next vital development, swiftly approaching its culmination. If all went there, too, as planned--why, he would be safe--no man could touch him--and once emerged from the desperate methods into which his present danger had forced him, he would be more careful in the future. Resuming his amiable smile, Peter Loveman rejoined his companions in the dining-room. CHAPTER XXIX CLIFFORD WAITS ON GUARD For a minute or more, after he had seen Loveman go up the high stoop of Le Bain’s dark-windowed house, Clifford had stood with Uncle George in the shadow across the deserted street and had thought rapidly. He knew the character of that silent, respectable-fronted residence; he had heard rumors, vague, to be sure, of certain happenings that had taken place within; and he had heard rumors--again only rumors--of happenings in which unwitnessed and unrestrained pleasure was not the dominant purpose of the organizer of the party. He was certain that some vital phase of Loveman’s shrewd scheming was being, or was to be, enacted within: Le Bain’s reticent and expensive house was not taken for ordinary pleasures or commonplace enterprises.