r of police and that you have
been ordered to suppress gambling in New York. For the love that you
must still bear toward your own mother, listen to the story of a mother
worn with anxiety for her only son, and if there is any justice or
righteousness in this great city close up a gambling hell that is
sending to ruin scores of our finest young men. No doubt you know
or have heard of my family--the DeLongs are not unknown in New York.
Perhaps you have also heard of the losses of my son Percival at the
Vesper Club. They are fast becoming the common talk of our set. I am not
rich, Mr. Commissioner, in spite of our social position, but I am human,
as human as a mother in any station of life, and oh, if there is any
way, close up that gilded society resort that is dissipating our
small fortune, ruining an only son, and slowly bringing to the grave
a gray-haired widow, as worthy of protection as any mother of the poor
whose plea has closed up a little poolroom or low policy shop."

Sincerely,

(Mrs.) Julia M. DeLong.

P.S.--Please keep this confidential--at least from my son Percival.

J. M. DeL.

"Well," said Kennedy, as he handed back the letter, "O'Connor, if you do
it, I'll take back all the hard things I've ever said about the police
system. Young DeLong was in one of my classes at the university, until
he was expelled for that last mad prank of his. There's more to that boy
than most people think, but he's the wildest scion of wealth I have ever
come in contact with. How are you going to pull off your raid--is it to
be down through the skylight or up from the cellar?"

"Kennedy," replied O'Connor in the same reproachful tone with which he
had addressed me, "talk sense. I'm in earnest. You know the Vesper Club
is barred and barricaded like the National City Bank. It isn't one of
those common gambling joints which depend for protection on what we
call 'ice-box doors.' It's proof against all the old methods. Axes and
sledge-hammers would make no impression there."

"Your predecessor had some success at opening doors with a hydraulic
jack, I believe, in some very difficult raids," put in Kennedy.

"A hydraulic jack wouldn't do for the Vesper Club, I'm afraid,"
remarked O'Connor wearily. "Why, sir, that place has been proved
bomb-proof--bomb-proof, sir. You remember recently the so-called
'gamblers' war' in which some rivals exploded a bomb on the steps? It
did more damage to the house next door than to the club.