"Rum!" answered the woman. "Rum has been sinking him lower and lower, and it's easy to see the end."

 

"What will be the end?"

 

"The prison—perhaps the gallows¹."

 

"You are taking too dark a view of your husband," said Dan, soothingly². "He won't go as far as that."

 

The woman shook her head.

 

"I know him only too well," she said. "This very evening he has been planning a burglary."

 

Dan started, and a sudden suspicion entered his mind.

 

"Did you hear him doing it?" he asked.

 

"Yes."

 

"Do you know where it is?" he asked, eagerly.

 

"Yes; it is a store on Pearl street."

 

Dan felt that he was on the track of a discovery.[Pg 151] He was likely to be repaid at last for the hours he had spent in detective service.

 

"Who put him up to it?" he asked, fixing his eyes intently on the woman.

 

"I don't know his name; he is a well-dressed man. I think he is in the store."

 

"Was it a man who came to your rooms this evening?"

 

"Yes."

 

"Is this the way he looked?" Here Dan gave a rapid description of Talbot.

 

"That is the man. Do you know him?"

 

"Yes, I know him. He is the book-keeper of the firm."

 

"He is a bad man. He is to pay a thousand dollars for the job. Bill is to have half of it."

 

"Bill, I suppose, is your husband?"

 

"Yes."

 

Dan looked thoughtful. Here was a most important discovery. He must consider what to do.

 

By this time they had reached a small public-house, of humble³ exterior⁴, but likely to afford his companion better accommodations than she had at home.

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