He
heard them crackle under the man's fingers, and it was like crisp
laughter in his ears. The bills were evidently new and unused.
But, side by side with the excitement caused by the shock of such an
event, Blake's caution, acquired by a year of vivid New York experience,
was meanwhile beginning to assert itself. It all seemed just a little
too much out of the likely order of things to be quite right. The police
courts had taught him the amazing ingenuity of the criminal mind, as
well as something of the plots and devices by which the unwary are
beguiled into the dark places where blackmail may be levied with
impunity. New York, as a matter of fact, just at that time was literally
undermined with the secret ways of the blackmailers, the green-goods
men, and other police-protected abominations; and the only weak point
in the supposition that this was part of some such proceeding was the
selection of himself--a poor newspaper reporter--as a victim. It did
seem absurd, but then the whole thing was so out of the ordinary, and
the thought once having entered his mind, was not so easily got rid of.
Pages:
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239