"Hello, Welch! How goes it? Let's see, how long is it since you were here?"
Somehow this quiet, gentlemanly fellow with his confident method of address, telling you just who you were, irritated McAllister to the explosive point.
"Ha-ha!" laughed Mr. Sheridan. "Pray who are you?"
"You'll find out soon enough!" answered McAllister sullenly.
"Look here," remarked the other, "don't imagine you can bluff us. If you think you are not Welch, perhaps I can persuade you to change your mind."
He turned to an officer who stood in the doorway of a large vault.
The officer pulled out a drawer, removed a long linen envelope, and spread out its contents upon the desk. These were fifteen or twenty newspaper clippings, at least one of which was embellished with an evil-looking wood-cut.
"Let's see," continued Mr. Sheridan. "You began with a year up the river. Took a pearl pin from a man named McAllister. Then you turned several tricks in Chicago, St. Louis, Buffalo and Philadelphia, and got away with it every time. Have we got you right?"
"Look at yourself," continued the other. "There's your face. You can't deny it. I wonder the Inspector didn't have you measured and photographed the first time you were settled. Still, the picture's enough."
He handed the clubman a newspaper clipping containing a visage which undeniably resembled the features which the latter saw daily in his mirror. McAllister wearily shook his head.
"Well," said the expert, "of course you don't have to tell us anything unless you want to. We've got you right--that's enough."
He pushed the clippings back into the envelope, handed it to the officer, and turned away.
Once more McAllister and his mentor availed themselves of the only free transportation offered by the city government, that of the patrol wagon, and were soon deposited at the side entrance of the Jefferson Market police court. A group of curious idlers watched their descent and disappearance into what must have at all times seemed to them a concrete and ever-present temporal Avernus. The why and wherefore of these erratic trips were, of course, unknown to McAllister. Presumably he must be some _rara avis_ of crime whose feet had been caught inadvertently in the limed twig set by the official fowler for more homely poultry. Fatty Welch, whoever he might be, apparently enjoyed the respect incident to success in any line of human endeavor. It seemed likewise that his presence was much desired in the sister city of Philadelphia, in which direction the clubman had a vague fear of being unwillingly transported. He did not, of course, realize that he was held primarily as a violator of the law of his own State, and hence must answer to the charge in the magistrate's court nearest the locus of his supposed offence.