In a moment all was plain. That something soft which had so told upon the Wop was a rubber tube. There was a gas jet in the hall. One end of the rubber tube had been fastened over the gas jet, and the other stuffed into the keyhole of Mike's door. Trap arranged, the gas had been set flowing full blast. “Well, what do youse think of that?” exclaimed Tony, who understood at a glance. With one swift move, Tony turned off the gas and tore away the rubber tube. There was no talk of keys. He placed his powerful shoulder against the door, and sent it crashing. The out-rush of gas drove them, choking and gasping, into the open air. “Take it from me,” said the Dropper, as soon as he could get his breath, “they've croaked Mike.” “But the window,” urged the Nailer; “mebbe Mike has the window open!” “Not a chance!” retorted the Dropper. “No one has his window up while he hits th' pipe. They don't jibe, fresh air an' dope.” The Dropper was right. Big Mike, stark and still and yellow, lay dead in his bed--the last place his friends would have anticipated--poisoned by gas. “Better notify th' cops,” advised Jimmy, the practical. “Who did it?” sobbed Pretty Agnes. “Mike never handed it to himself.”. “Who did it?” repeated the Dropper, bitterly. “Th' chinks did it. It's for Low Foo's laundry.” “You're down wrong, Dropper,” said old Jimmy. “It's that Ling Tchen trick. I knew them Hip Sings would get Mike.” XII.--THE GOING OF BIFF ELLISON The jury returned a verdict of guilty. Thereupon the judge, fixing Ellison with hard and thoughtful eye, gave him “from eight to twenty years.” When a man gets “from eight to twenty years” he is worth writing about. He would be worth writing about, even though it had been for such crimes of the commonplace as poke-getting at a ferry or sticking up a drunken sailor. And Ellison was found guilty of manslaughter. Razor Riley would have been sentenced along with Ellison, only he had conveniently died. When the Gophers gather themselves together, they give various versions of Razor Riley's taking off. Some say he perished of pneumonia. Others lay it to a bullet in his careless mouth. In any case, he was dead, and therefore couldn't, in the nature of things, accompany Ellison to Sing Sing. Razor was a little one-hundred-and-ten-pound man, with weak muscles and a heart of fire. He had, razorwise, cut and slashed his way into much favorable mention, when that pneumonia or bullet--whichever it was--stopped short his career. While the width of the city apart, he and Ellison were ever friends. They drank together, fought together, and held their foes as they held their money, in common.