As they talked voices were heard in the bar-room outside, and presently a huge man stood in the door-way. He was fully six feet in height, and blond. His face was red, and he was dressed in dark gray clothes, a blue polka-dotted cravat giving his attire its one touch of color. He reminded Archie of some one, and he tried to think who that person was. "Oh, Dan," the man in the doorway said, "come here a minute." Gibbs went into the bar-room. "Who’s that?" asked Mandell. "He’s a swell, all right," said Keenan. The three, Mandell, Keenan and Jackson, looked at Mason as if he could tell. But Archie suddenly remembered. "He looks like an army officer," he said, speaking his thought aloud. "What do you know about army officers, young fellow?" demanded Jackson. The others turned, and Archie blushed. But he did not propose to have Jackson put him down. "Well," he said with spirit, "I know something--I was in the regular army three years." "What regiment?" Jackson fixed Archie with his blue eyes, and there seemed to be just a trace of concern in their keen, searching glance. "The twelfth cavalry," said Archie. "I served in the Philippines." "Oh!" said Jackson, as if relieved, and he released Archie from his look. Archie felt relieved, too, and went on: "He looks just like a colonel in the English army I saw at Malta. Our transport stopped there." "It’s Lon McDougall," said Mason when Archie had finished. "He’s a big-mitt man." The others turned away with an effect of lost interest and something like a sneer. "I suppose there’s a lot o’ those guns out there," said Keenan. "A mob come in this afternoon," said Mason; "they’re working eastward out of Chicago with the rag." "Well, let’s make a get-away," said Keenan, unable to conceal a yegg man’s natural contempt of the guns. They all got up, Archie with them, and went out. In the bar-room five men were standing; they were all men of slight figure, dressed well and becomingly, and with a certain alert, sharp manner. They cast quick, shifty glances at the men who came out of the back room, but there was no recognition between them. These men, as Mason had said, were all pickpockets; they had come to town that afternoon, and naturally repaired at once to Gibbs’s. They had come in advance of a circus that was to be in the city two days later, and were happy in the hope of being able to work under protection. They knew Cleary as a chief of police with whom an arrangement could be made, and McDougall, who had come in to work on circus day himself, had kindly agreed to secure them this protection. At that moment, indeed, McDougall was whispering with Gibbs at the end of the bar; they were discussing the "fixing" of Cleary.