“He’s a crook, all right, or he wouldn’t have wanted to get away from me. But now I want to ask you whether there is a George Vernon in the employ of the company.” “What department does he say he is employed in?” asked the official. “In the inspector’s department.” “Come with me,” said the official. Patsy was led to a room where a man, busily engaged, was seated at a desk. He arose immediately on the approach of the high official, answering promptly the question whether there was a George Vernon in his employ. “Yes; there is such a person, and he is in the next room at this moment.” “Call him,” said the official. A tall, thin, intelligent-looking young man, the very opposite in appearance of the one whom Patsy had followed, reported. What was apparent was that the man followed had known of this George Vernon, and had seized on his name to throw Patsy off. When the real George Vernon was told of the occurrence and of the man who had taken his name, he said that on the day previous he had fallen in with a man of the description given in an uptown hotel, who had expressed a wish to take out a policy on his life. The real Vernon had talked with him on that line and given him his name and department. “Well,” said Patsy, to the high official, “my man got away, but one thing is settled, he’s a crook, and the other thing is that I have him so well sized up that I’ll know him, I don’t care how he is disguised.” Patsy left the offices of the company, and as he did so, he said to himself: “My man carries his shoulders as not one man in a thousand does. He has a short step and a knock-kneed gait; he has no beard and a small mole under his chin, on the left side.” He stopped in the corridor suddenly, slapped his thigh with his hand, stood still a moment, thinking earnestly. Finally he exclaimed aloud: “Holy smoke! I’ll bet that’s the way of it.” Seeking a retired spot, in a corner, he made a rapid change in his appearance. He had entered the building a smartly dressed young fellow. He left it looking like a broken-down man of sixty, limping in gait and with bowed shoulders, racked with a cough. But he did not leave it until he had stood some time in the entrance holding out his hands and asking for money of every one that entered nor until he had been fairly driven from it by the officer in charge. Then he stood on the sidewalk, still begging, and continued to do so until the officer drove him away by threatening him with arrest. All the while he was thus engaged his eyes had been busy, and he saw a man standing on the opposite side of the street, occupying a position that commanded a view of the main entrance. When driven from the sidewalk in front of the building he crossed the street and took up a position near this man.