“To the wine room,” was the reply. “Those are private rooms,” said the attendant. “You can’t go up there to-night.” The muscular fellows who had been watching at the door now advanced to the foot of the stairs. As they did so, four roughly dressed men entered and stepped back to the inner end of the bar. “There seems to be a little row on between the remaining members of the syndicate,” thought Nick. “Well, when thieves fall out honest men get their dues.” “Why can’t we go up?” demanded one of the men. “We have been there before.” “Not to-night,” said the attendant. “Take seats down here.” The men hesitated. Then they saw that the people in the place were gathering about them with threatening looks, and took chairs at a table, the eight close together. The crook who was sitting with Nick arose and moved up to the bar, where he stood whispering to the man in charge. As he did so, Chick walked up to Nick as if to take an order. “When the row begins,” he said, “go to the back end of the room. I’ll be there. We’ll go up by the private staircase. I know where to take you.” Nick nodded, and Chick brought two glasses of wine and placed them on the table. Before the crook returned to his chair, however, the rush was made. Nick saw the gang springing for the stairs, drawing their revolvers as they went, and made for the back of the room, where Chick awaited him. There came a shot, and in an instant the lights were out. Then followed more shots on the stairs, and a police call sounded. The detective heard the men breaking in the door at the head of the stairs, and then came more shooting in the hall above. All was confusion in the room below. CHAPTER XXIV. WHAT NICK OVERHEARD. As the detectives started up the stairs, which were not lighted, a woman’s voice came from above. “Who is there?” she asked. Chick crowded past his chief before he replied: “Waiter.” “What is going on down there?” was the next question. “There’s a gang of toughs making for the wine rooms.” There was a short silence, during which the detectives crept noiselessly up the stairs. In a moment Nick could feel the woman’s skirt by reaching over Chick’s shoulders. The gang was not yet in the hall connecting with the private stairs. “Send Jim up to my room,” said the woman presently. “All right.” The woman was heard moving away, and the detectives followed her. She passed down a narrow hall running toward an annex in the rear of the building. Presently she opened a door, and the passage was flooded with light. The electrics in the annex had not been switched off. The woman uttered a cry of alarm when she saw two men were following her, one in the uniform of a waiter and the other a stranger. “What are you doing here?” she demanded. “Go back and send Jim up. Who is that with you?” “Friend,” replied Chick. “Business man, and I brought him up so he wouldn’t get pinched. Put him away somewhere.”