I don’t know how to explain it, but it’s almost always so.
Dave Doyle told me next morning that he was just as certain that Sam Kean would try to get his man out by the back way as he ever was of anything.
Now that is something I can’t tell you--I can only say that the same thing has often happened to me.
You see I was inclined to suspect Opdyke, because I had taken the trouble to inquire into his habits, but I had no idea that Sam would get anything more than a clew that night.
Yet to make sure I had Doyle put on the door as butler, Mrs. Welton was perfectly informed of the whole plot.
As soon as Opdyke and his friend Dalledouze left the house, Dave, who had been alive to what was going on, followed them.
He shadowed Sam all the way to Big Mike’s, and never gave himself away once.
Why by keeping at a considerable distance and always in the shadow.
Of course one runs a risk of losing the game by doing this, but Dave took the chances and won.
If Sam’s shadowing work was good, then Dave’s was better, but if I had told either that the other one was working on the case I doubt if the result would have been so good.
You can’t act out your true nature if you know some one is watching you all the time.
Sam had not the faintest idea that Dave Doyle was on the case until he sprang through Big Mike’s back gate just in time to save his life, while Dave, who had been in the house all the afternoon, never knew that Sam was coming until he suddenly appeared at the door.
Before this Dave had selected Mr. Opdyke as the thief--I mean before the night of the party, because he had shadowed him to Big Mike’s the day previous, and there saw him exhibit a set of diamond jewelry--pin, ear-rings, etc.--of great value, which Dave at once recognized as stolen goods.
That is why I hoped Sam would trap him, and that it would be valuable practice for him, I knew, so--but there I’ve said enough and need only add that after a long and weary trial Opdyke was convicted and sent to Sing Sing on a fifteen year sentence, which was all it amounted to, for he had powerful friends possessed of that mysterious influence “political pull.”
Would you believe it? In less than six months I met Opdyke walking down Broadway with all the assurance you please.