To be sure there are exceptions. Such as Chick Tricker, Ike the Blood, Big Mike Abrams, Jack Sirocco, the Dropper, and the redoubtable Jimmy Kelly never fly and always fight. No one ever saw their backs. You are inclined to doubt the bloody character of those gang battles. Why doesn't one hear of them?--you ask. Because the police conceal as much as may be all word and all sign of them. For the public to know might get the police criticized, and they are granted enough of that without inviting it through any foolish frankness. The hospitals, however, will tell you of a weekly average of fifty patients, suffering from knife or gun-shot wounds, not to name fractures born of bottles, bricks and blackjacks. A bottle judiciously wielded, or a beer stein prudently broken in advance to assure a jagged edge, is no mean weapon where warriors are many and the fields of battle close. While Roxie rattled on, and the others gave interested ear, Jackeen was commenting in discouraged whispers to Johnny Rice on those twin setbacks of the Division Street stick-up and the Savoy safe. “It looks like nobody's got any dough,” replied Rice, in a spirit of sympathy. “Take me own self. I ain't made a touch youse could call a touch, for a mont' of Sundays. Me rag, Josie, an' I was chin-nin' about it on'y last night, an' Josie herself says she never sees th' town so dead.” “It's somethin' fierce!” returned Jackeen, moodily. More beer, and a moment of silence. “W'at's you' goil May doin'?” asked Rice. “She's graftin' a little,” responded Jackeen; “but w'at wit' th' stores full of private dicks a booster can't do much.” “Well, you can bet May ought to know!” returned Rice. “As a derrick, she' got the Darby Kid an' the best of 'em beat four ways from th' jack. She could bring home th' bacon, if any of them hoisters could.” Then appeared Lulu the houseless--Lulu, the forlorn and outcast Eve of that Catherine Street Eden! Lulu stood a polite moment behind the chair of Jackeen. At a lull in the talk, she whispered a word in his ear. He looked up, nodded, and then followed her out into Doyers Street. “It's this way,” said Lulu. “May's copped th' Doc from me, see! An' she's givin' you the cross, Jackeen. You ought to hand her out a good heatin'. She's over hittin' the pipe wit' th' Doc right now.” “G'wan!” came jealously from Jackeen. “Honest! You come wit' me to number Nineteen, an' I'll show youse.” Jackeen paused as though weighing the pros and cons. “Let me go get Ricey,” he said at last. “He's got a good nut, an' I'll put th' play up to him.” “All right,” responded Lulu, impatient in her desolation; “but get a move on! I've wised you; an' now, if you're any good at all, you'll take May out of number Nineteen be th' mop. W'at license has she, or any other skirt for that matter, got to do me out of me Doc?” The last ended in a howl.