AMSEY looked at his watch, and reassured as to the hour, offered his cigarette-case to the man sitting opposite him at the restaurant table.
“Only eight o'clock,” he said,—“twenty minutes before we need start for the theater. We can drink our coffee comfortably, and not gulp it.”
He motioned to the waiter. “Give me the check.”
Picking up the slip, he glanced over it and laid down a twenty-dollar bill.
Hatton, with whom he was dining, reached over quickly and took the money before the waiter could do so. Holding it under the light of the silk-shaded electric lamp on the table, he scrutinized it carefully.
“That's all right.” He handed it to the astonished waiter; and then to the equally astonished Ramsey he addressed a word of caution.
“Better look sharp, if you have occasion to take any of those in change,” he advised. “New York is being flooded just now with a wonderfully clever counterfeit of the twenty-dollar Federal Reserve note, Series 1920.”
“Really?” Ramsey did not question the correctness of the information; for Hatton was, he knew, an important official in the Secret Service Bureau of the Treasury Department at Washington.
“Yes.” A worried frown creased his companion's forehead. “We have been working on the case for the past three weeks, and I may add confidentially”—with a chagrined smile—“we haven't been able to dig up even the ghost of a clue.”
From his pocketbook he took out a specimen of the counterfeit and spread it on the table between them.
“It is a wonderfully accurate piece of engraving, you see,” he pointed out. “The only noticeable discrepancy is a slight blurring of the lines in the portrait of Cleveland here on the face of the bill. Any of us would swear it is the work of old Jimmy Swope; all the earmarks of the old master are on that plate.”
“And why not he?” asked Ramsey.
Hatton shrugged his shoulders. “Swope has been dead and in is grave for over six months.”
“Perhaps some disciple, then, some Elisha who has inherited his mantle?”
“No.” Hatton shook his head. “Swope's old gang is pretty well broken up, and all of them accounted for. Acting on the theory you mention, we did pick up a fellow the other day—never really one of the crowd, but a sort of hanger-on or go-between—in the hope of sweating something out of him. But it hasn't worked.
“About the only suspicious circumstance we have been able to fasten on him is that, although he has no money and apparently no friends, he has retained Heywood Achison as his counsel.”
Ramsey leaned quickly forward. “Achison does not often indulge in philanthropic whims,” he said.
“Hardly.” Hatton laughed significantly. “Still, in a way, there's a plausible explanation for it in this case. He says that White, this little rat we've got, years ago gave him some valuable information in regard to the Conover murder, You don't remember that, maybe, but it was the sensation of its day, and the acquittal of young Dave Conover practically made Achison. So it's not unreasonable that he should now come to White's assistance.”
The Secret Service operative paused to pour himself a second cup of coffee.
“There's another angle, too,” he resumed, “where Achison comes into this affair. In fact, when we first started in, we were very hopeful that he might be able to give us our lead. You see, he defended Swope on his last trial, making it so plain the old man was too ill to conduct any operations or even direct them, that he got him off. We thought at the time it was pure camouflage, but I guess there was something to it after all; anyway it wasn't more than a month later that the old fellow died.
“He made Achison his executor; he had considerable property that he left to be distributed among various charitable institutions; so naturally we thought, when this thing came up, that Achison, having been in his confidence, might be able to throw some light on the situation.”
“A reasonable enough conclusion,” Ramsey said. “But nothing came of it?”
Hatton gave a little gesture of defeat. “Nothing. Achison told us all he knew; but it didn't amount to anything—mostly old stuff. He said that when he took charge of Swope's affairs, he had a very thorough search made for any plates or counterfeiting outfits that might have been in the old man's possession; but not a trace of anything of the kind could be found, and he was satisfied that Swope must either have destroyed or disposed of them.”
“Achison himself is an interesting study, don't you think?” Ramsey observed casually.
