fact, personal or impersonal. But more and more Blake
was given the talking parts, the role of spokesman to the press. He
was more and more posted in the background, like artillery, to
intimidate with his remote thunder and cover the advance of more agile
columns. He was encouraged to tell the public what he knew, but he was
not allowed to know too much. And, ironically enough, he bitterly
resented this role of "mouthpiece" for the Department.

"You call yourself a gun!" a patrolman who had been shaken down for
insubordination broke out at him. "A gun! why, you 're only a _park_
gun! That's all you are, a broken-down bluff, an ornamental has-been,
a park gun for kids to play 'round!"

Blake raged at that, impotently, pathetically, like an old lion with
its teeth drawn. He prowled moodily around, looking for an enemy on
whom to vent his anger. But he could find no tangible force that
opposed him. He could see nothing on which to centralize his activity.
Yet something or somebody was working against him. To fight that
opposition was like fighting a fog. It was as bad as trying to
shoulder back a shadow.

He had his own "spots" and "finders" on the force. When he had been
tipped off that the powers above were about to send him out on the
Binhart case, he passed the word along to his underlings, without loss
of time, for he felt that he was about to be put on trial, that they
were making the Binhart capture a test case. And he had rejoiced
mightily when his dragnet had brought up the unexpected tip that Elsie
Verriner had been in recent communication with Binhart, and with
pressure from the right quarter could be made to talk.

This tip had been a secret one. Blake, on his part, kept it well
muffled, for he intended that his capture of Binhart should be not only
a personal triumph for the Second Deputy, but a vindication of that
Second Deputy's methods.

So when the Commissioner called him and Copeland into conference, the
day after his talk with Elsie Verriner, Blake prided himself on being
secretly prepared for any advances that might be made.

It was the Commissioner who did the talking. Copeland, as usual,
lapsed into the background, cracking his dry knuckles and blinking his
pale-blue eyes about the room as the voices of the two larger men
boomed back and forth.

"We 've been going over this Binhart case," began the Commissioner.
"It's seven months now--and nothing done!"

Blake looked sideway