“Yes; whether you were there or not!” said Billy Kane dryly. “That’s not good enough! If anything breaks wrong to-night you’ve got to have something better than an alibi in a dive like that to stack up against what will look like open-and-shut evidence against you. You’ve got to get on a higher plane than that.”
“I ain’t been a very regular church attendant,” he said, with a sickly grin, “and——” He stopped short, and suddenly leaned toward Billy Kane. “Say, would a minister do?”
“It would be an improvement,” admitted Billy Kane, with a smile.
“Well, I got it, then!” announced the Wop. His hesitancy had vanished. He seemed eager, almost anxious now. The iron of five years of prison was evidently far too poignant a memory to risk it being turned into reality again. “I got it! There’s a guy named Mister Claflin that ran one of them mission joints down around where I uster hang out before I went up. He’s all right! He’s the only soul on God’s earth came near me when I was doing my spaces. Twice he came up to Sing Sing to see me. He didn’t hold no prayer meeting with me neither, but he’s got a grip in his hand that makes a fellow feel he ain’t all dirt. He’s white, he is!”
“Do you know where he lives?” inquired Billy Kane crisply.
“No,” said the Wop, and was suddenly downcast. “And he ain’t at the mission any more, ’cause he told me he’d got a regular layout uptown somewhere.”
“No matter!” said Billy Kane cheerfully. “Any drug store has a directory. You can find the address there. Got any money?”
The Wop felt through his pockets, and the red flared into his face again.
“Spend this on the first taxi you can grab,” he said. “You’ve got to get there as soon as you can, and you’ve got to keep under cover getting there. If Mr. Claflin is not at home, wait in his house for him. Don’t let them sidetrack you. And make it a point of establishing the hour you get there, either with the minister himself, or whoever happens to be at home. And stay there until midnight anyhow. Understand?”
“Well, then,” said Billy Kane, “beat it!”
“Say, ain’t I going to know who you are?” he blurted out. “Say, I ain’t anything but a crook, just a damned crook with a prison record, but—but I’d like to pay what I owe. Ain’t you going to give me the chance?”