CHAPTER II.
DYBALL'S CLUB.
Dyball's Club-room was not the most high-toned of the New York clubs,nor is it frequented by what are, as a rule, termed the highest ofhigh-toned men.
Situated on the second floor of a building on the Bowery, not farfrom the corner of Canal street, its nightly patrons were those of adecidedly low-toned sort.
Small clerks in wholesale stores, small sporting men, not yet arrivedat the dignity of the more fashionable clubs, and small--oh, verysmall--card-flippers and poker playing cheats, who considered theability to store aces and kings, _ad libitum_, in the sleeves of theirsmall-tailed coats, the very highest touch of art, and who used theirskill, as may be readily believed, to fleece such of the small clerkswho were bold enough to challenge them to a friendly game.
For card-playing--and that means plain poker and nothing else--was allthey did at Dyball's Club-room, except to consume the vile liquor andsmoke _Regalia de Avenue B_ cigars served over the bar; but, althoughlimited in variety, the entertainment furnished made up in quantitywhat it otherwise lacked; nor did the votaries at the Dyball shrineoften separate until morning had well-nigh dawned.
Upon the evening referred to in the last chapter, at a fewminutes after eleven o'clock, just as the sidewalks along thebrilliantly-lighted Bowery were beginning to whiten with what promisedto be a heavy fall of snow, there entered Dyball's club room no lesscelebrated a person than Mr. Detective Cutts, a young but alreadypopular special on the force of the New York police.
He was in citizen's dress, of course--in fact, the same in which wehave already met him on this night once before--and as he pushed hisway among the card tables, a long cigar stuck in one corner of hismouth, his cane under his left arm, and his Derby hat set rakishlyupon the side of his head, several of the small clerks rejoicing in aspeaking acquaintance with so prominent an official, greeted him withan air of great respect, their less fortunate companions regarding themwith feelings of envy not unmingled with awe.
But the young detective paid little attention to any of the players atthe card tables.
Pushing his way among them through the stifling atmosphere, fairly bluewith tobacco smoke, and reeking with the stale odors of whisky andbeer, he approached a small table in a remote corner of the room, wheresat four young men who, if the chips upon its green baize top and theanxious faces of the players themselves could be taken as a guide, wereindulging in a pretty stiff sort of game.
"Frank, I want to see you," he said, quietly, placing his hand lightlyupon the shoulder of the youngest man of the four.
"All right, Billy, I'll be with you when I finish this hand."
"I'll wait for you in the wine-room."
"Very good. Two jacks and two queens--I'll take that pot, boys. I'll bewith you in a second, Billy--just one hand more."
It is Frank Mansfield, and no one else, we are sorry to say, whoagain deals the cards around, and with flushed face, being evidentlyconsiderably the worse for drink, a moment later joins Detective Cuttsin the private wine-room, to the left of Mr. Dyball's bar.
What brings the boy to a place like this?
Disappointment and a fatal love of exciting pleasures, yielded to toooften--far too often--in the past.
Firm in his resolution to reform his ways, Frank, who loved thedaughter of Elijah Callister, and was devotedly loved by her in return,had, at her own suggestion, asked of the stock operator the hand of hisdaughter in marriage with the ill success already told.
Now, instead of meeting that refusal like a man--instead of returningto the object of his affections at the house of a mutual friend, wholoved them both, and where they had been in the habit of meeting atintervals in the past--Frank had sought to drown his sorrows by thatfatal method--recourse to the whisky bottle and glass.
One drink had been followed by another, the second by a third, until,reckless of the consequences, the boy had yielded to a temptation whichhe had for days been struggling to resist, and which---- But thatbrings us back to Detective Cutts again!
"Well, young fellow, what shall it be?" asked that individual, touchingthe little call bell upon the table by which he had seated himself themoment Frank appeared.
"Oh! I don't care--whisky, I suppose. What do you want of me? The sameold scheme?"
"Of course. What else should it be?" answered the detective, callingfor the drinks, which were speedily produced and consumed. "You can'tdo better than to join me in that, and I suppose you have made up yourmind to do so, since you are here by the appointment we made."
"I don't know about that. I want to make money as well as any one, andI'm more than ever in the mood for it to-night; but I'm afraid of yourscheme, Billy, and I don't deny it. I'm afraid it'll get me in a hole."
"No, it won't--nothing of the sort. I don't want to get you in no hole,nor to land in one myself. I'm just as honest as any one else, but I'mbound to look out for No. 1 every time, and you owe it to yourself todo the same."
"But this letting a man into the bank at night is something that has avery nasty look."
"Well, I ain't a-goin' to steal nothin', am I? All I want is to lookat a name in a book. Upon my word, young feller, you're a deal toosqueamish. I can't see where's the possibility of harm comin' to youfrom a move like that."
"But it's against all rules. If it were known that I had shown thesignatures of our depositors to an outsider, I'd lose my place before Iknew where I was."
"Perhaps you would. But whose a-goin' to give you away? To show youthat I mean to be perfectly square with you, I've asked Jim Morrow andEd Wilson to meet us down by the bank and go and see the thing done."
"You have?"
"Yes. They are both good friends of yours, and in case anything wasbrought up against you, you could prove that you did nothing wrong.Come, now, what do you say? It's getting late, and if it's to be doneat all it must be done to-night. All I want is to copy the signature ofold Thomas Hendrickson. If you will help me to do it I'll give you fivehundred dollars as soon as we leave the bank."
"But I don't understand what your man wants it for. Why can't he get itby some other means?"
"Because he can't, that's all I know, and I don't want to know anymore. Hendrickson never leaves his room, and will see no one and answerno letters; my man has got them deeds I told you about, and wants to besure that the old miser's signature is all O. K.; why, he don't tellme, and I'm sure I don't care to know, so long as he is willing to payfor the job he wants done."
Now this was not the first time Frank Mansfield had had thisproposition made to him by Detective Cutts, nor the second nor thethird.
He had been introduced to this individual about a month before, by twoof his fast companions, the Jim Morrow and Ed Wilson the detective hadjust named, and in their presence this strange request had been firstmade, to be renewed upon several occasions since.
At first the proposal had been rejected outright.
Frank had positively refused to have anything to do with it at all.
But, upon its repetition, the boy had been more inclined to lend awilling ear.
He was more inclined than ever to do so upon this night.
To be sure, he did not more than half believe the detective's statementas to the reason of his singular request; but, after all, he was amember of the police force, an officer of the law, although littleolder than Frank himself.
Detectives were obliged, as he knew well enough, to attain their endsby all sorts of singular means. Surely, in these days of defaultingcashiers and pilfering tellers, there could be no serious harm inletting a police detective copy a signature from the bank's books.
Nor was the promised reward without its full weight in the mind of theboy.
"Come to me with proof that you are possessed of at least ten thousanddollars, and I will listen to you, and not before," the father of thegirl he so devotedly loved had said.
Money makes money.
With five hundred dollars he would at least obtain a start.
 
; Visions of successful speculations in the institutions known as "bucketshops," which cluster around the Stock Exchange, floated through hisbrain.
If he had luck, as many of his acquaintances had had before him, hisfive hundred might be doubled in no time at all, and the thousand thusincreased to ten in a comparative short space of time.
And then----
"Well, Cutts, I'll do it!" he exclaimed at last; "but, mind, if you goback on me, I can make it as hot for you at police headquarters as youcan for me at the bank. I'll show you the signature-book of the WebsterBank, and let you trace old Hendrickson's autograph from it--but don'texpect me to do anything else."
"I shan't, my boy, for that's all I want," replied the detective, withan air of triumph. "Now let's have another drink."
There were two doors connecting with the private wine room of Dyball'sclub.
One opened into the main or card room, and the other out into thehallway, from which descended the stairs leading to the street.
Had Detective Cutts been a little older in the business, and a littlemore observing withal, he might have noticed that during all hisconversation with Frank Mansfield this hall door stood open on thecrack.
No sooner had the young men left Dyball's by the regular entrance, andgaining the stairs, descended to the street, than from the floor of thehall close to the wine room there arose the form of a woman.
She was of somewhat above the ordinary stature, but of witheredfeatures and attenuated form, while her long gray hair, hanging ina tangled mass down her neck and shoulders, and a pair of wild,restless eyes ever moving in their shrunken sockets, lent to her wholeappearance an air of hopeless misery painful to behold.
Her dress neat, but shabby and worn; a faded shawl and a cheap woolenhood being the only outer wraps she wore.
And this strange creature crept after the two young men in the darknessand storm, dogging their steps as they moved down the Bowery towardsChatham Square never taking her restless eyes from their moving figuresfor so much as a moment of time.