We sat smoking for some little time before Duds made further observations. I waited patiently, realizing the value of his advice in such a matter. After a while he spoke up in the manner of having arrived at conclusions. “On the first shot I don’t see where he could get you,” he said. “Blackmail’s out of it. Robbery’s out of it. Playing this game to get a hook in you for another is out of it. Of course he didn’t come into that restaurant by any chance or accident.” “No?” “Not on the cat’s pajamas—or whatever it is they say. Wouldn’t be surprised if he followed you over from New York.” “Why not talk to me there?” “Can’t say, but he had his reasons. Nothing accidental goes with him.... All the same, what of it? If there’s anything criminal about his stuff, you can quit.... If he’s cribbed it somewhere, that doesn’t touch you. Another thing: if you do it I’m going to sit in with you. If Barnes objects, he’s crooked and that ends it. Lot of things I don’t like about the man, from his one-sided smile to something damned peculiar back in his eyes. And I don’t take much stock in his book, or whatever it is. Most likely a blind to cover a job he’s got on hand. Rather interesting to know what it’s all about, eh?——If he talks all right to-morrow, suppose we go ahead and see what he’s got!” Mr. Barnes certainly did talk all right the next day, and not only raised no objections to the presence of Dudley while the dictating was going on, but seemed quite enormously pleased at the proposal, explaining that with two of us he’d be able to get his mind off the dictation business—which, to tell the truth, had rather alarmed him—and run it off on the idea of simply giving us an account of the affair. I phoned the office, and my managing editor gave me a week or ten days, which Mr. Barnes said would do. The working time was arranged to suit Dudley, as his affairs couldn’t be shifted. Always we had the evenings, and frequently the afternoons as well. The place was the living room of Dudley’s apartment. Mr. Barnes made it a part of the agreement that I should write out a brief statement of the episode of my trailing of Jamie Dreek, and our chance meeting with him (Barnes) in the restaurant,—this to serve as an explanation of his dictating the account of the affair to me. He suggested also that in this statement I make mention of the fact that because of the incidents he proposed to relate being actual happenings with actual people involved in them, he felt it necessary in some cases to use fictitious names and addresses. This and the preceding pages constitute my effort to comply with Mr. Barnes’s wishes. PART II