Part 75

"Hold on, sister; hold on!" said the man, with a laugh, for Trotter was still rattling the door. The owner stepped across his shop and turned the key in the lock.

"Hard to hear when I'm in doin' my lathe work," he explained, as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. All the while, as he swung back the door, his eyes were closely studying the eyes of the other man. Trotter noticed the row of matches stuck in the soiled hatband, and the cotton bag of "Durham" that swung from his sweat-stained belt.

"What can I do for you, sister?" was his companionable greeting. Trotter unwrapped his electric bell.

"Can you give me a clapper for this?" he asked.

The other man took the bell in his hand. Trotter could see powdered lime under his nails.

"I guess I can fix you out," said the shop owner. "Wait a minute."

He turned to the door in the partition, and disappeared from sight, closing the door after him.

Trotter's first decision had been to take the key from the outer door lock. But some sixth sense made him hesitate, prompted him to turn and look at the inner door.

His stare was rewarded by the discovery of a hole in this door, about five feet from the floor. It was a lookout; he felt sure he was being watched. So he thrust his hands into his pockets, gazed carelessly about the shop, and waited.

The man reappeared, shaking his head.

"Nothing doing," he said. He was not able to fit a clapper to the bell.

"But I thought you kept electric supplies here," objected Trotter.

The other man smiled. His good nature was impregnable.

"Oh, I can get it, if you've got to have it. Come back about ten to-morrow."

"All right," was Trotter's indifferent answer, as he turned languidly away. He went up the steps with equal languor, humming as he went.

Trotter kept guarded watch on "J. Heeney's" plumbing establishment. He watched it like a hungry cat watching a rat hole. And it was three hours later that he had the satisfaction of seeing the plumber ascend to the street and walk hurriedly westward. Trotter could see that he carried a kit of tools under his arm. But to follow him in open daylight was too great a risk. Instead of that, he went down the narrow steps, and through the dusty glass examined the doorlock.

Fifteen minutes later he went down another flight of basement steps, this time to the cellar of a Sixth Avenue locksmith.

"I've got a closet door locked shut on me," he explained. "And I want a key to get it open."

The locksmith looked him up and dow.n He seemed respectable enough, this mild-eyed youth with the locked closet.

But the locksmith knew the tricks of his trade.

"Then I'll take a bunch of `blanks' over with me and open her up for you."

"I'd rather get her open by myself."

"It will cost you a dollar," was the locksmith's ultimatum.

"It's worth a dollar," agreed Trotter. "But how'll we do it?"

"I'll dip a skeleton blank in hot wax and lampblack. Then you put the key in the lock and turn it as far as you can. That'll show the ward marks, where they bite the wax. Then bring me the key and I'll cut it. Maybe it'll take two cuttings. That'll be two dollars!"

Trotter paid a quarter deposit and took the key, made a circuitous way to the plumber's cellar, descended the steps, knocked, got no answer, and quietly inserted the key in the lock, turning it as far as it would go.

Instead of going back to the locksmith, he bought a ten-cent file, and with his own hand cut away the blank according to the ward marks. Once more he made his way to the door of the empty shop and fitted his key. It turned part way round in the lock, but did not throw back the bar. He recoated the key flange with the black wax by holding it to a lighted match and letting it cool again.

He at once saw where his cutting had been imperfect. A few strokes of his file remedied this. He once more fitted the key to the lock, and found that he was free to pass in and out of the door.