"I did take a good look," answered Peter. "It was as thorough as I could make it at the time, and with Morris champing at the bit. But I'm not entirely satisfied--haven't been all along. There's a queer feel about the place, O'Malley. You may think I'm getting fanciful in my old age, and I can't explain to you just what it is that seems----The place is shut in--airy enough, and all that, you know, but cut off from the rest of the world.... You have the sort of feeling that almost anything might happen there--and no one the wiser.... The windows are all covered with curtains that are thin enough to let in the light and air but thick enough so you couldn't see a thing from the outside. They're not the usual sash curtains, but run from the top to the bottom of the windows, and there's a rod through them at the bottom so they can't blow--and there are thick, dark shades.... Of course it might be that way in any apartment where the outlook wasn't very attractive--and it may be just that.... You may think I'm a nut, O'Malley, but I've got it into my old bean that there was something more--a purpose--I don't know what.... But I'm going to find out. The thing's got me going. I'm going to find out, O'Malley, if it takes a leg!" CHAPTER XV THE DUPLICATE KEY It was a dark night, hot and close, with a feel of thunder in the air. The big arc lights near the arch in Washington Square made spots of copperas green on the close-trimmed grass and flecks of emerald on the full summer foliage of the trees. Above, the sky was velvet black, thick and solid, like a pall, except for the faint, pulsating glow of heat lightning over in the west. In the short length of Waverly Place the shadows lay deep, like those at the bottom of a cañon. At the far end shone the lights of Broadway, dim here in comparison with its upper reaches of flashing electricity. An occasional car banged and rumbled on its way north or south, serving to accentuate the silence of the short cross street. It was nearing midnight when Peter Clancy alighted from the stage at Fifth Avenue and made his way eastward. When he reached the corner of University Place, he whistled softly, five notes in a minor key. That simple little call was as familiar to every man on his staff as the notes of a robin to a country-bred boy. Immediately a shadow, among the shadows on the south side of the street, moved toward him. Peter advanced quietly. "That you, Mr. Clancy?" A voice from the moving shadow, and as it came closer, Peter could just distinguish Rawlins's face. "Anything stirring, Rawlins?" "Not a damn thing," the man replied, disgustedly. "This is a hell of a job to put a live man on, Mr. Clancy. Been hangin' around here for weeks, and not a soul to speak to but Sullivan and the dago over there----" "Angelo swallowed the story of your being a plain-clothes watchman for the bank here all right, didn't he? He hasn't any suspicion----"