"Young man, I'm from the Central Office, and need your help. About a block from here a feller will come runnin' after you and say they've given you the wrong bundle--see? He'll hand you another, and tell you to give him the one you've got. He's a crook--'Paddy the Sneak'--old game! see?" The boy was all attention, his jaws motionless. "Yep!" he replied, his eyes glistening delightedly. "Well, I'll be right behind you; and when he throws the game into you, just pretend you fall to it an' hand him your box. Then I'll make the collar. Are you on?" "Say, that's easy!" grinned the boy. "Show us what you're good for, then, and I'll have the Inspector send you some passes for the theayter." The boy started on in business-like fashion. As his interlocutor had predicted, a hatless "feller" overtook him, breathless, and entered into voluble explanation. The messenger exchanged bundles, and then, eyes front, continued up the street until the detective should pounce upon his victim. For some strange reason no such event took place. At the end of the block he cast a furtive glance behind him. Both Paddy and the Central Office man had vanished, to dispose in a Bowery pawnshop of the fruits of their short hour of toil, dividing between them one hundred and sixty dollars as the equivalent of the diamond stud which the box had contained. Half an hour later, drawn by a fascination which he found irresistible, the hero of this legal memoir took a car to the Criminal Courts Building, and made his way to the General Sessions. "Forgot my subpœna, Cap'n. I'm a witness. Just let me in, please!" he said, with a smile of easy good-nature. Old Flaherty, the superannuated door-keeper, known as The Eagle, eyed the young man suspiciously for a moment, and then, grumbling, allowed him to enter the court-room. The thief who had so easily secured admittance, fought his way persistently through the throng, elbowed by the gruff officer at the inner gate, and selecting the best seat on the front bench, compelled its earlier occupants to make room for him with a calm assurance and matter-of-course superiority which they had not the courage to oppose. Supple Jim listened with interest to the call of the calendar. A few lawyers, with their witnesses, whose cases had gone over until the morrow, struggled out through the crush at the door, with no perceptible diminution in the throng within. The clerk prepared to call the roll of the jury. "Trial jurors in the case of 'The People against Richard Monohan,' please answer to your names."