Buttoning his coat, he started briskly down Longacre Square, swinging his stick with the air of a man who was just beginning a constitutional. In front of the Astor he paused a second, as if half minded to enter the brilliant hostelry. Then, without warning, he turned abruptly, stepped into the street, and headed for the Times Building. As he did so he caught a glimpse, out of the corner of his eye, of his pursuer, half a block in the rear. With a chuckle of amusement, Barry passed the outdoor subway entrance, and walked swiftly into the lower floor of the building. The instant he was inside, he hastened his steps, hurried past the stairs leading down into the underground road, pushed his way through the throng which crowded the big drug store that occupied the ground floor, and emerged on Forty-second Street. A crosstown car was just getting up speed as he dashed across the street; and with some difficulty he raced forward and swung himself aboard. A backward glance showed that his bearded friend was nowhere in sight, and Lawrence smiled again. Nevertheless, he did not relax his vigilance. Making his way through to the front of the car, he sat down on one of the little seats just behind the motorman, and made no attempt to alight until Madison Avenue had been reached. Here he slipped off, dodged around the front of the car, slid across the slippery pavement, and was engulfed in the comparative shadow of the Manhattan in an instant. The three blocks to Forty-fifth were passed in as many minutes. Around the corner of the cross street, however, he sought a secluded doorway, and waited patiently for as much as five minutes, with the pleasant, ever-growing conviction that his man had been eluded. "Not quite clever enough, my friend," he murmured, as he crossed the dark and rather silent street, heading for the bright entrance of the St. Albans near Fifth Avenue. Part way down the block stood a pair of old-fashioned brownstone houses, and, as he passed the shadowy bulk of the first high stoop, Barry chuckled again. "Not quite clever enough," he repeated amusedly. "You’ll have to get up a trifle early to——" Crash! From behind, something struck his head with a crushing force that sent him to his knees, stick flying one way, top hat the other. With a hoarse cry of anger, he strove dazedly to turn and grapple with the unknown assailant. Before he could do so the heavy weapon descended for the second time. There was a shower of stars, a sickening sense of faintness, and, with a groan, Lawrence toppled forward on his face, to lie still and silent on the icy pavement. *CHAPTER XII.* *PUZZLED.* How long Barry Lawrence lay there unconscious he did not know. Afterward he realized that it could have been no more than a minute or two, but at the moment he was too occupied with what was occurring near him to waste time on that score.