.

A week after the release of Valentine, 9762, there was a neat job of
safe-burglary done in Richmond, Indiana, with no clue to the author.
A scant eight hundred dollars was all that was secured. Two weeks
after that a patented, improved, burglar-proof safe in Logansport
was opened like a cheese to the tune of fifteen hundred dollars,
currency; securities and silver untouched. That began to interest
the rogue-catchers. Then an old-fashioned bank-safe in Jefferson
City became active and threw out of its crater an eruption of
bank-notes amounting to five thousand dollars. The losses were now
high enough to bring the matter up into Ben Price's class of work.
By comparing notes, a remarkable similarity in the methods of the
burglaries was noticed. Ben Price investigated the scenes of the
robberies, and was heard to remark:

"That's Dandy Jim Valentine's autograph. He's resumed business. Look
at that combination knob--jerked out as easy as pulling up a radish
in wet weather. He's got the only clamps that can do it. And look
how clean those tumblers were punched out! Jimmy never has to drill
but one hole. Yes, I guess I want Mr. Valentine. He'll do his bit
next time without any short-time or clemency foolishness."

Ben Price knew Jimmy's habits. He had learned them while working up
the Springfield case. Long jumps, quick get-aways, no confederates,
and a taste for good society--these ways had helped Mr. Valentine to
become noted as a successful dodger of retribution. It was given out
that Ben Price had taken up the trail of the elusive cracksman, and
other people with burglar-proof safes felt more at ease.

One afternoon Jimmy Valentine and his suit-case climbed out of the
mail-hack in Elmore, a little town five miles off the railroad
down in the black-jack country of Arkansas. Jimmy, looking like an
athletic young senior just home from college, went down the board
side-walk toward the hotel.

A young lady crossed the street, passed him at the corner and
entered a door over which was the sign, "The Elmore Bank." Jimmy
Valentine looked into her eyes, forgot what he was, and became
another man. She lowered her eyes and coloured slightly. Young men
of Jimmy's style and looks were scarce in Elmore.

Jimmy collared a boy that was loafing on the steps of the bank as
if he were one of the stockholders, and began to ask him questions
about the town, feeding him dimes at intervals. By and by the young
lady came out, looking r