He turned to the left and ran along until he came to a stairway several houses further along. The door of this was open, and he went down. He had fairly distanced his pursuers, for none of them were yet on the roof. "I'll get to the street and leave 'em behind," the boy reasoned. "Everyone will be in the house looking for me, and the street will be deserted." In this Ned was almost right, for when, after hurrying down several flights of stairs, he reached the thoroughfare, the only person in sight in the immediate neighborhood was a colored man putting in coal. He seemed to be so busily engaged that he had no time to waste in pursuit, so, after a hasty glance from the front door of the tenement, Ned went out. But in this he reckoned without his host. The colored man, looking up from his shoveling, saw Ned. The lad's wild and disheveled appearance raised the man's suspicions. Besides he had heard of the chase after the thief. "I'll cotch you!" he cried, leaping from his wagon. "I'll get you!" Ned, who was, by this time, running past where the coal wagon was backed up to the curb, turned out to avoid the negro, who, with outstretched arms was advancing toward him. In his anxiety to avoid the coal man, Ned did not notice an open hole down which the black diamonds were being shoveled. Before he could save himself he had plunged into it. Lucky for the boy the cellar underneath was almost full, the coal coming to within a few feet of the sidewalk, so when Ned toppled in he only went down a little ways. There he was, his head and shoulders sticking up above the pavement, while his feet and legs were buried in the pile of coal underneath. "Now I've got you!" yelled the colored man, as he ran up to Ned, and hauled him from the hole. "I've got you! What'd you steal?" "I didn't steal anything," Ned answered. "It's all a mistake. Please let me go!" "Hold him!" cried Cassidy, appearing at that moment from the front entrance of the house, up the stairs of which Ned had dashed a few minutes before. "Don't let him get away!" "He'll not get away," replied the negro. Cassidy came up and took charge of Ned. Quite a crowd gathered, but the lodging house keeper answered none of the many questions asked him. "Guess he's a detective," was the general whisper that went around, and Cassidy did not correct it. "You come with me!" he said to Ned. "Don't try any of your tricks again, or it'll be the worse for you." And he marched Ned off. CHAPTER XXVII BAFFLED AGAIN William, coming across the street to take up a position, where he could watch the lad he suspected was Ned, puzzled his head over the scene he had just witnessed. "I wonder what he went off with that man for?" he said to himself. "Didn't act as though he wanted to, either. I'll ask the fruit man."