to the Subway, boarded an uptown
express that was jammed to the guards with struggling humanity, all
deserting the small end of Gotham at once; and here, with Wicks crowded
flat up against him, and hanging, first to a strap and then to his
shoulder. Garrison related the few facts that he had already briefly
summarized.

"Well--nothing to say to you but go ahead," said Wicks, as they neared
the Grand Central Station, where he meant to take a train. "Stick to
the case till you clean it up. That's all."

Garrison, presently alone on the crowded street, with no particular
objective point in view, felt thoroughly depressed and lonely.

He wished he had never discovered the poisoned cigar at Branchville.

Mechanically, his hand sought his pocket, where the second charged weed
had been placed.

Then he started and searched his waistcoat wildly.

The deadly cigar was gone!

CHAPTER XIII

A TRYST IN THE PARK

Unable for a moment to credit his senses, Garrison moved over against
the wall of the building he was passing, and stood there, slowly,
almost mechanically, searching his pockets once again, while his mind
revolved about the lost cigar, in an effort to understand its
disappearance.

He was wholly at a loss for a tenable theory till he thought of the
frequency with which men are robbed of scarf-pins or similar
trifles--and then a sickening possibility possessed him.

One of the commonest devices that a woman employs in such a petty theft
is to faint on the breast of her victim. In such a pose she may
readily extract some coveted article from either his tie or his pocket,
with almost absolute certainty of avoiding detection.

It did not seem possible--and yet the fact remained that Dorothy had
fainted thus against him, and the poisoned cigar was gone. She had
known of his visit to Branchville; his line of questions might have
roused her suspicions; the cigar had been plainly in sight. He had
seen her enact her role so perfectly, in the presence of her relatives,
that he could not doubt her ability in any required direction.

For a moment a powerful revulsion of feeling toward the girl, who was
undeniably involved in some exceptionally deep-laid plan, crept
throughout his being. Not only does a man detest being used as a tool
and played upon like any common dunce, but he also feels an utter
chagrin at being baffled in his labors. Apparently he had played the
fool, and also he had lost the vital e