stunned. But she did not let the
telegraphone pause. Skipping some unimportant calls, she began again.

This was a call from Bella to Watson.

"Ross, that fellow Drummond called up to-day."

"Yes?"

"He is going to pull it off to-night. His client will make good--five
thousand if they catch Halsey with the goods. How about it?"

"Pretty soft--eh, Bella?" came back from Watson.

"My God! it's a plant!" exclaimed Halsey, staggering and dropping
heavily into a chair. "I'm ruined. There is no way out!"

"Wait," interrupted Constance. "Here's another call. It may serve to
explain why luck was with me to-night. I came prepared."

"Yes, Mrs. LeMar," came another strange voice from the machine. "We'd
do anything for Mr. Watson. What is it--a pack of strippers?"

"Yes. The aces stripped from the ends, the kings from the sides."

The group looked eagerly at Constance.

"From the maker of fake gambling apparatus, I find," she explained,
shutting off the machine. "They were ordering from him cards cut or
trimmed so that certain ones could be readily drawn from the deck, or
'stripped.' Small wedge-shaped strips are trimmed off the edges of all
the other cards, leaving the aces, say, projecting just the most minute
fraction of an inch beyond the others. Everything is done carefully.
The rounded edges at the corners are recut to look right. When the
cards are shuffled the aces protrude a trifle over the edges of the
other cards. It is a simple matter for the dealer to draw or strip out
as many aces as he wants, stack them on the bottom of the pack as he
shuffles the cards, and draw them from the bottom whenever he wants
them. Strippers are one of the newest things in swindling. Marked cards
are out of date. But some decks have the aces stripped from the ends,
the kings from the sides. With this pack, as you can see, a sucker can
be dealt out the kings, while the house player gets the aces."

Drummond brazened it out. With a muttered oath he turned to Watson
again. "What rot is this? The stock, Watson," he repeated. "Where is
that stock I heard them talking about?"

Mrs. Noble, forgetting all now but Halsey, paled. Bella LeMar was
fumbling at her gold mesh bag. She gave a sudden, suppressed little
scream.

"Look!" she cried. "They are blank--those stock certificates he gave
me."

Drummond seized them roughly from her hands.

Where the signatures should have been there was nothing at all!

Across the face of the sto