re--you, that'll teach you"--He kicked the prostrate player.

"Cut that out," ordered the quiet man, quickly. "You needn't murder
him; he's fixed."

CHAPTER XXIV

_Baiting a Trap_

Events that preceded and led up to the desperate encounter between
McCarthy and the two strangers in the dark interior of a racing taxicab
seemed to have been dictated by fate. At the end of the doubleheader
between the Jackrabbits and Bears, Easy Ed Edwards had hurriedly laid
new plans to save himself. The gambler had watched both contests,
believing all the time that the result of the games ended his final
hope of winning the bets, and, facing ruin, he had welcomed his new
lease upon hope with the determination of resorting to desperate
measures to achieve his end. He realized that unless he acted at once
all his plotting had failed. After the defeat of the Bears in the
second game he left the grounds, hastened downtown in a taxi and at
once telephoned to both Adonis Williams and Barney Baldwin to meet him
at his rooms. Baldwin responded at once to the gambler's summons and
entered the rooms blustering.

"You've a frightful nerve, Edwards," snarled the angry politician.
"Understand, I do not take orders from cheap gamblers."

"You needn't try storming at me," said the gambler quietly. "I'm onto
you. You may ring over such a bluff as that in politics, but not with
me. You don't seem to understand."

"I don't think you can deliver any votes anyhow," said Baldwin
sullenly. "I've nothing but your word for it."

"That's all the security I ever needed," said the gambler
superciliously. "But never mind about the votes--you're going to help
me."

"I've done all I can"----

"No, you haven't. I want you to go to-morrow morning and join the
Bears and I want you to see to it that Williams pitches one of those
games against the Blues. He'll lose it this time. I've thrown a scare
into him and he'll do it, even if he gives himself away."

"I tell you I can't," snarled Baldwin. "President Bannard is the only
one who knows I own the club"----

"Take your stock with you. That proves you own it."

"And Bannard is out of town. Clancy wouldn't pay any attention to
me"----

"You own this club," said Edwards. "You can do what you please with
it, and you're going to do it."

"You talk as if you owned me!" Baldwin was purple with anger.

"I do," said the gambler coldly. "It would look good in print to have
the people