XII The door across the hall. It was many blocks away before a calmness came again to road a gray, and before it seemed even that her brain would resume its normal functions, but with the numbed horror, once gone, there came in its place, like some surging tide, a fierce virility that would not be denied. The money. The old couple on that doorstep, stripped of their all. Wasn't that one reason why she had gone on with Pinky Bond and the pug? Didn't she seen away, or at least a chance, to get the money back? Rhoda Gray looked quickly about her. On the corner ahead she saw a drugstore, and started briskly in that direction. Yes, there was a way. The idea had first come to her from the pug's remark to Schlucker that, after they had secured the money, Pinky would return with it to the pug's room, while the pug would go and square things with Dangler. And also, at the same time, that same remark of the pug's had given rise to a hope that she might yet trace Dangler to-night through the pug, but the circumstances and the happenings of the last few minutes had shattered that hope utterly. And so there remained the money. And as she had walked with Pinky and the pug a little while ago, knowing that Pinky would, if they were successful, carry the money back to the pug's room, just as was being done now precisely in accordance with the pug's original intentions, she had thought of the adventurer. It had seemed the only way then. It seemed the only way now, despite the fact that she would be hard put to it to answer the adventurer if he thought to ask her how, or by what means she was in possession of the information that enabled her to communicate with him. But she must risk that, put him off if necessary, through a plea of haste and on the ground that there was not time to-night for an unnecessary word. He had given her, believing her to be Gypsy Nann, his telephone number, which she, in turn, was to transmit to the White Mall, in other words, herself. But the White Mall, so he believed, had never received that message, and it must of necessity be as the White Mall that she must communicate with him to-night. It would be hard to explain she meant to evade it. The one vital point was that she remembered the telephone number he had given her that night when he and Dangler had met in the garret. She was not likely to have forgotten it. But a gray, alias Gypsy Nann shuffled along. Was she inconsistent? The adventurer would be in his element in going to the Pug's room and in relieving Pinky Bond of that money, but the adventurer, too, was a thief, wasn't he? Why then did she propose, for her mind was now certainly made up, as to her course of action, to trust a thief to recover that money for her? She smiled a little wearily as she reached the drug-store, stepped into the telephone booth, and gave central her call. Trust a thief? No, it wasn't because her heart prompted her to believe in him. It was because her head assured her she was safe in doing so. She could trust him in an instance such as this, because—well, because once before, for her sake, he had foregone the opportunity of appropriating a certain diamond necklace worth a hundred times the sum that she would ask him—yes, if necessary, for her sake—to recover to-night. There was no—she was listening in a startled way at the instrument. Central had given her information, and information was informing her that the number she had asked for had been disconnected. She hung up the receiver and went out again to the street in a dazed and bewildered way, and then suddenly a smile of bittered self-derision crossed her lips.   Why had she not stopped to think? She understood now. On the night the adventure had confided that number to her, as Gypsy Nann, he had had every reason to believe that Gypsy Nann would, as she had already apparently done, befriend the White Mall even to the extent of accepting no little personal risk in doing so. But since then things had taken a very different turn. The White Mall was now held by the gang, of which Gypsy Nann was supposed to be a member, to be the one who had of late profited by the gang's plans to the gang's discomforture, and the adventurer was ranked but little lower in the scale of hatred since they counted him to be the White Mall's accomplice. Knowing this, therefore, the first thing the adventurer would naturally do would be to destroy the clue in the shape of that telephone number that would lead to his whereabouts and which he of course believed he had put into the gang's hands when he had confided into Gypsy Nann. Had he not told her, no later than last night, that Gypsy Nann was her worst enemy? He did not know, did he, that Gypsy Nann and the White Mall were one. And so that telephone had been disconnected, and tonight, now, just when she needed help at a crucial moment, when she had counted upon the adventurer to supply it, there was no adventurer, no means of reaching him, and no means any more of knowing where he was. Rhoda Gray walked along the street, her lips tight, her face drawn and hard. Failing the adventurer there remained the police. When she telephoned the police, and sent them to the Pug's room, they would of a certainty recover the money, and with equal certainty restore it to its rightful owners. She had already thought of that when she had been with Pinky and the Pug, and had been loath even then to take such a step, because it seemed to spell ruin to her own personal plans. But now there was another reason, and one far more cogent, why she should not do so. There had been a murder committed back there in that underground drug dive, and of that murder Pinky Bond was innocent, but if Pinky Bond were found in possession of that money and French Pete to save his own skin from the consequences of a greater crime admitted to its original theft, Pinky would be convicted out of hand, for there were others in that dive who had come running along the passage to testify that an attack had been made on the door of French Pete and Marnie Day's room, and that the thieves and murderers had fled through the cellar and escaped. Her lips pressed harder together. And so there was no adventurer upon whom she could call, and no police, and no one in all the millions in this great pulsing city to whom she could appeal, and so there remained only herself. Well, she could do it, couldn't she? Not as Gypsy Nan, of course, but as the White Mall. It would be worth it, wouldn't it? If she was sincere, and not a moral hypocrite in her sympathy for those two outraged old people in the twilight of their lives, and if she were not a moral coward, there remained no question as to what her decision should be. Her mind began to mull over the details. Subconsciously, since the moment she had made her escape from the cellar, she had found now that she had been walking in the direction of the garret that sheltered her as Gypsy Nan. In another five minutes she could reach that deserted shed in the lane behind Gypsy Nan's house where her own clothes were hidden, and it would take her but a few minutes more to affect the transformation from Gypsy Nan to the White Mall. And then in another ten minutes she could be back again at the Pug's room. The Pug had said he would not be much more than a half an hour, but as nearly as she could calculate it that would still give her more than five or ten minutes alone with Pinky Bond. It was enough, more than enough. The prestige of the White Mall would do the rest. A revolver in the hands of the White Mall would ensure instant and obedient respect from Pinky Bond, or any other member of the gang in similar conditions. And so, and so, it would not be difficult.  And she spoke suddenly to herself. I'm glad, she whispered. I'm glad I saw those two old faces on that doorstep, because if I hadn't I, I would be afraid. The minutes passed. The desolate figure of an old hag disappeared, like a deeper shadow in the blackness of a lane, through the broken door of the deserted shed. Presently a slim, neat little figure, heavily veiled, emerged. Again the minutes passed. And now the veiled figure let herself in through the back door of the Pug's lodging-house, and stalled softly down the dark hall, and halted before the Pug's door. It was the White Mall now. From under the door, at the ill-fitting threshold, there showed a thin line of light. Wrote a gray, with her ear against the door-panel, listened. There was no sound of voices within. Pinky Bond, then, was still alone, and still waiting for the Pug. She glanced sharply around her. There was only darkness. Her gloved right hand was hidden in the folds of her skirt. She raised her left hand and knocked softly on the door. Two wraps. One wrap. Two wraps. She repeated it. And as it had been with Schlucker, so it was now with her. A footstep crossed the floor within. The key turned in the lock, and the door was flung open. All right, Pug, said Pinky Bond, I—the man's words ended in a gasp of surprised amazement. With a quick step forward wrote a gray, was in the room. Her revolver suddenly outflung covered the other, and her free hand, reaching behind her, closed and locked the door again.  Wrote a gray through back her veil. My God! mumbled Pinky Bond, and licked his lips, the white maul. Yes, said Wrote a gray, tersely.  Pinky Bond, like an automaton, moved purely by mechanical means, obeyed. Wrote a gray followed him, with the muzzle of her revolver pressed into the small of the man's back, felt rapidly over his clothes with her left hand for the bulge of his revolver. She found and possessed herself of the weapon, and stepping back ordered him to turn around again. I haven't much time, she said, icily. I'll trouble you now for the cash you took from Marnie Day and French Pete. My God! he mumbled again. You know about that? Quick! she said imperatively, put it on the table there, and then go back again to the wall. Pinky Bond fumbled in his pocket. His face was white, almost chalky-white, and it held fear, but its dominant expression was one of helpless stupification. He placed the sheaf of bank notes on the table, and shuffled back again to the wall. Wrote a gray picked up the money and retreated to the door. Still facing the man, working her left hand behind her back, she unlocked the door again, and this time removed the key from the lock. You were quite safe here, she observed evenly, since there appears to be no window through which you could get out, but you might make it a little unpleasant for me if you gave the alarm and arouse the other occupants of the house before I got well away. I dare say that was in your mind, but she opened the door slightly, and inserted the key on the other side. I am quite sure that you will reconsider any such intentions, Pinky. It would be very disastrous for you if I were caught. Somebody is wanted for the murder of Marnie Day at Charlie's a little while ago, and a jury would undoubtedly decide that the guilty man was the one who broke in the door there and stole the money. And if I were caught, and were obliged to confess that I got it from you, and French Pete swore that it was whoever broke into his room that shot his pal, it might go hard with you, Pinky. Don't you think so?  Good night, Pinky. I know you won't make any noise. She said softly and suddenly opened the door and in a flash stepped back into the hall and closed and locked the door and whipped out the key from the lock. And inside Pinky Bond made no sound. It was done. Rota Gray drew in her breath in a great choking gasp of relief. She found herself trembling violently. She found her limbs were bearing her none too steadily as she began to grope her way along the black hall toward the back door. But it was done now, and, no, she was not safe away even yet. Someone was coming through the back door just ahead of her, or, at least, she heard voices out there. She was just at the end of the hall now. There was no time to go back and risk the front entrance. She darted across the hall to the opposite side from the pug's room, because on that side the opening of the door would not necessarily expose her and crouch down in the corner.  She listened, her heart beating wildly. The voices outside continued. Why were they lingering there? Why didn't they do one thing or the other, either go away or come in? There wasn't any too much time. The pug might be back at any minute now. Perhaps one of those people out there was the pug. Perhaps it would be better, after all, to run back and go out the front door, risky as that would be. No, her escape in that direction was cut off now, too. She shrank as far back into the corner as she could. The door of the end room on this side of the hall had opened, and now a man stepped out and closed the door behind him. Would he see her? She held her breath. No. It—it was all right. He was walking away from her toward the front of the hall. And now, for a moment, it seemed as though she had lost her senses as though her brain were playing some mad wild trick upon her. Wasn't that the pug's door before which the man had stopped? Yes. Yes. And he seemed to have a key to it, for he did not knock, and the door was opening. And now for an instant, just for an instant, the light fell upon the man as he stepped with a quick, lightning-like movement inside, and she saw his face. It was the adventurer. She stifled a little cry. Her brain was in turmoil. And now the back door was opening. They—they must have seen her. And yes, it was safer—safer to act on the sudden inspiration that had come to her. The door of the room from which the adventurer had emerged was almost within reach, and he had not locked it as he had gone out. She had subconsciously noted that fact. And she understood why he had not, now, that he had safeguarded himself against the loss of even a second or two it would have taken him to unlock it when he ran back for cover again from the pug's room. Yes, that room. It was the safest thing she could do.  It was pitch-black. She must not make a sound, but equally she must not lose a second. What was taking place in the pug's room between Pinky Bond and the adventurer she did not know. But the adventurer was obviously on one of his marauding expeditions, and he might stay there no more than a minute or two once he found out that he had been firstalled. She must hurry, hurry. She felt her way forward in what she believed to be the direction of the window. She ran against the bed. But this afforded her something by which to guide herself. She kept her touch upon it, her hand trailing along its edge. And then, half-way down its length, what seemed to be a piece of string caught her extended, groping fingers. It seemed to cling, but also yield most curiously as she tried to shake it off, and then something evidently from under the mattress came away with a little jerk and remained suspended in her hand. It didn't matter, did it? Nothing mattered except to reach the window. Yes, here it was now. And the roller shade was drawn down, that was why the room was so dark. She raised the shade quickly, and suddenly stood there transfixed, her face paling, as in the faint light by the window she gazed, fascinated at the object that still dangled by the cord in her hand. And it seemed as if an inner darkness were suddenly riven as by a bolt of lightning, a hundred things, once obscure and incomprehensible, or clear now, terribly clear. She understood now how the adventurer was privy to all the inner workings of the organization. She understood now how it was and why the adventurer had a room so close to that of the other room across the hall. That dangling thing on the elastic cord was a smeared and dirty celluloid eye-patch that had once been flesh-colored. The adventurer and the pug were one. Her wits! Quick! He must not know. In a frenzy of haste she ran for the bed and slipped the eye-patch under the mattress again, and then, still with frenzied speed, she climbed to the windowsill, drew the roller shade down again behind her and dropped to the ground. Through the back-yard and the lane she gained the street, and sped on along the street, but her thoughts outpaced her hurrying footsteps. How minutely every detail of the night now seemed to explain itself and dovetail with every other one. At the time, when Schlucker had been present, he had struck her as a little forced and unnecessary that the pug should have volunteered to seek out dangler with explanations after the money had been secured. But she understood now the craft and guile that lay behind the apparently innocent plan. The adventurer needed both time and an alibi, and also he required an excuse for making Pinky Bond the custodian of the stolen money, and of getting Pinky alone with that money in the pug's room. Going to dangler supplied all this. He had hurried back, changed in that room from the pug to the adventurer, and proposed in the latter character to relieve Pinky of the money, to return then across the hall, become the pug again, and then go back, as though he had just come from dangler, to find his friend and ally, Pinky Bond, robbed by their mutual arch-enemy, the adventurer. The pug, the adventurer. She did not seem to grasp its significance as applied to her in a personal way. It seemed to branch out into endless ramifications. She could not somehow think logically, coolly enough now, to decide what this meant in a concrete way to her, and her to-morrow, and the days after to-morrow. She hurried on. Tonight, as she would lay awake through the hours that were to come, for sleep was a thing denied, perhaps a clearer vision would be given her. For the moment there, there was something else, wasn't there? The money that belonged to the old couple? She hurried on. She came again to the street where the old couple lived.  She wrapped the bank-notes in the paper. There were not many people on the street as she neared the mean little frame-house, but she loitered until for a moment the immediate vicinity was deserted. Then she slipped into the alleyway and stolled close to the side window, through which she had noted from the street their shone alight. Yes, they were there, the two of them. She could see them quite distinctly, even through the shutters. She went back to the front door then and knocked. And presently the old woman came and opened the door. "'This is yours,' said Rhoda Gray, and thrust the package into the woman's hand. As the woman looked from her to the package, comprehensively, Rhoda Gray flung a quick good night over her shoulder and ran down the steps again. But a few minutes later she stolled back and stood for an instant once more by the shuttered window in the alleyway.   And Rhoda Gray turned away. And out in the street her face was lifted and she looked upward and there were a myriad of stars. And there seemed a beauty in them that she had never seen before and a great comforting serenity. And they seemed to promise something, that through the window of that stark and evil garret to which she was going now they would keep her dreaded vigil with her until morning came again. CHAPTER XIV. The lame man. Another night. Another day. And the night again had been without rest, lest dangler's dreaded footstep come upon her unawares. And the day again had been one of restless, abortive activity, now prowling the streets as Gypsy Nan, now returning to the garret to fling herself upon the cot in the hope that in daylight, when she might risk it, sleep would come. But it had been without avail. For in spite of physical weariness, it seemed to rode aggray as though her tortured mind would never let her sleep again. DANGLER'S WIFE. That was the horror that was in her brain, yes, and in her soul, and that would not leave her. And now the night was coming upon her once more. It had even begun to grow dark in the lower stairway that led up to that wretched, haunted garret above where in the shadows stark terror lurked, strange, most strange. She feared the night, and yet she welcomed it. In a little while, when it grew a little darker, she would steal out again and take up her work once more. It was only during the night, under the veil of darkness, that she could hope to make any progress in reaching the heart and core of this criminal clique which surrounded her, whose members accepted her as Gypsy Nan, and, therefore, as one of themselves, and who would accord her, if they even suspected her to be the White Mall, less mercy than would be shown to a mad dog. She climbed the stairs. Fear was upon her, because fear was always there, and with it was abhorrence and loathing at the frightful existence fate had thrust upon her. But somehow, to-night, she was not so depressed, not so hopeless, as she had been the night before. There had been a little success. She had come a little further along the way. She knew a little more than she had known before of the inner workings of the gang, who were at the bottom of the crime for which she herself was accused. She knew now the adventurer's secret, that the pug and the adventurer were one, and she knew that the adventurer lived, now in one character, now in another, in those two rooms almost opposite each other across the tenement hall. And so it seemed that she had the right to hope, even though there were still so many things that she did not know, that if she allowed her mind to dwell on that phase of it, it staggered her. Where those code messages came from, and how, why rough roark of headquarters had never made a sign since that first night? Why the original Gypsy Nan, who was now dead, had been forced into hiding with the death penalty of the law hanging over her? Why dangler, though Gypsy Nan's husband, was comparatively free? These and a myriad other things. But she counted now upon her knowledge of the adventurer's secret to force from him everything he knew, and with that to work on, a confession from some of the gang in corroboration that would prove the authorship of the crime of which she had seemingly been caught in the act of committing. Yes, she was beginning to see the way at last, through the adventurer. It seemed a sure and certain way. If she presented herself before him as Gypsy Nan, whom he believed to be not only one of the gang, but actually dangler's wife, and let him know that she was aware of the dual role he was playing, and that the information he thus acquired as the pug he turned to his own account, and to the undoing of the gang, he must of necessity be at her mercy. HER MERCY What exquisite irony. HER MERCY The man her heart loved, the thief her common sense abhorred. What irony. When she, too, played a double role, when in their other characters that of the adventurer and the white maul, he and she were linked together by the gang as Confederates, whereas in truth they were wider apart than the poles of the earth. HER MERCY How merciful would she be to the thief she loved? He knew, he must know, all the inner secrets of the gang. She smiled wandily now as she reached the landing. Would he know that in the last analysis her threat would be only an idle one, that though her future, her safety, her life depended on obtaining the evidence she felt he could supply, her threat would be empty, and that she was powerless, because she loved him? But he did not know she loved him, she was Gypsy Nann. If she kept her secret, if he did not penetrate her disguise as she had penetrated his, if she were Gypsy Nann and Dangler's wife to him, her threat would be valid enough, and he would be at her mercy.  What was she saying to herself? What was she thinking? That he did not know she loved him? How would he? How could he? Had a word, an act, a single look of hers ever given him a hint that when she had been with him as the white maul, she cared? It was unjust, unfair, to fling such a taunt at herself. It seemed as though she had lost nearly everything in life, but she had not yet lost her womanliness and her pride. She had certainly lost her senses, though. Even if that word, that look, that act had passed between them, between the adventurer and the white maul, he still did not know that Gypsy Nann was the white maul, and that was the one thing now that he must not know, and wrote a gray halted suddenly, and stared along the hallway ahead of her, and up the short, ladder-like steps that led to the garret.  Yes, it came again now distinctly. It was dusk outside, in here, in the hall, it was almost dark. Her eyes strained through the murk. She was not mistaken. Something darker than the surrounding darkness a form moved up there. The knocking ceased, and now the form seemed to bend down and grope along the floor, and then an instant later it began to descend the ladder-like steps, and abruptly wrote a gray two moved forward. It wasn't Dangler. That was what had instantly taken hold of her mind, and she knew a sudden relief now. The man on the stairs, she could see that it was a man now, though he moved silently, swayed in a grotesquely jerky way as though he were lame. It wasn't Dangler. She would go to any length to track Dangler to his lair, but not here, not in the darkness, here in the garret. Here she was afraid of him with a deadly fear. Here alone with him there would be a thousand chances of exposure incident to the slightest intimacy he might show to the woman whom he believed to be his wife. A thousand chances here against hardly one in any other environment or situation. But the man on the stairs wasn't Dangler. She halted now and uttered a sharp exclamation as though she had caught sight of the man for the first time. The other, too, had halted at the foot of the stairs. A plaintive drawl reached her. Don't screech, Bertha. It's only a devoted brother-in-law. Curse your infernal ladder and my twisted back. Dangler's brother? Bertha? She snatched instantly at the cue with an inward gasp of thankfulness. She would not make the mistake of using the vernacular behind which Gypsy Nan sheltered herself. Here was someone who knew that Gypsy Nan was but a roll. But she had to remember that her voice was slightly hoarse, that her voice, at least, could not sacrifice its disguise to any one. Dangler had been a little suspicious of it until she had explained that she was suffering from a cold. Oh! she said calmly. It's you, is it? And what has brought you here? What do you suppose, he complained irritably? The same old thing, all I'm good for, to write out code messages and deliver them like an errand boy. It's a sweet job, isn't it? How'd you like to be a deformed little cripple? She did not answer at once. The night seemed suddenly to be opening with some strange, even pramptery vista. The code messages. Their mode of delivery. Here was the answer. Maybe I'd like it better than being Gypsy Nan, she flung back significantly. He laughed out, sharply. I'd like to trade with you, he said, a quick note of genuine envy in his voice. You can pitch away your clothes. I can't pitch away a crooked spine. And anyway, after tonight you'll be living swell again. She leaned toward him, staring at him in the semi-darkness. That pre-emptory vista was widening. His words seemed suddenly to set her brain in tumult. After tonight? She was to resume, after tonight, the character that was supposed to lay behind the disguise of Gypsy Nan. She was to resume her supposedly true character, that of Pierre Dangler's wife. What do you mean, she demanded, tensely? Ah, come on, he said abruptly. This isn't the place to talk. Pierre wants you at once. That's what the message was for. I thought you were out, and I left it in the usual place.  So come on now with me. He was moving down the hallway, blotching like some misshapen toad in the shadowy light, lurching in his walk that was, nevertheless, almost uncannily, noiseless. Mechanically she followed him. She was trying to think, striving frantically to bring her wits to play on this sudden and unexpected denouement. It was obvious that he was taking her to Dangler. She had striven desperately last night to run Dangler to Earth in his lair, and here was a self-appointed guide. And yet her emotions conflicted and her brain was confused. It was what she wanted, what through bitter travail of her mind she had decided must be her course, but she found herself shrinking from it with dread and fear now that it promised to become a reality. It was not like last night when of her own initiative she sought to track Dangler, for then she had started out with a certain freedom of action that held in reserve a freedom to retreat if it became necessary. At night it was as though she were deprived of that freedom and being led to what only too easily might develop into a trap from which she could not retreat or escape. Suppose she refused to go. They had reached the street, and now she obtained a better view of the misshapen thing that lurched jerkily along beside her. The man was deformed, miserably deformed. He walked most curiously, half bent over, and one arm, the left, seemed to swing helplessly, and the left hand was like a withered thing. Her eyes sought the other's face. It was an old face, much older than Dangler's, and it was white and pinched and drawn, and in the dark eyes, as they suddenly darted a glance at her, she read a sullen, bitter brooding and discontentment.  It was not a pleasant face. It struck her as being both morbid and cruel to a degree. Suppose she refused to go. What did you mean, after to-night, she asked again? You'll see, he answered. Pierre'll tell you. You're in luck, that's all. The whole thing that has kept you under cover has bust wide open your way, and you win. And Pierre's going through for a clean-up. Tomorrow you can swell around in a limousine again. And maybe you'll come around and take me for a drive if I dress up and promise to hide in the corner of the back seat so as they won't see your handsome friend. The creature flung a bitter smile at her and lurched on. He had told her what she wanted to know, more than she had hoped for. The mystery that surrounded the character of Gypsy Nan, the evidence of the crime at which the woman who had originated that role had hinted on the night she died, and which must necessarily involve Dangler, was hers, wrote a graze, now for the taking. As well go and give herself up to the police as the white maul, and have done with it all, as to refuse to seize the opportunity which fate, evidently in a kindlier mood toward her now, was offering her at this instant. It promised her the hold upon Dangler that she needed to force an avowal of her own innocence, the very hold that she had but a few minutes before been hoping she could obtain through the adventurer. There was no longer any question as to whether she would go or not. Her hand groped under the shabby black shawl into the wide, voluminous pocket of her greasy skirt. Yes, the revolver was there. She knew it was there, but the touch of her fingers upon it seemed to bring a sense of reassurance. She was perhaps taking all in accompanying this cripple here tonight. She did not need to be told that, but there was a way of escape at the last if she were cornered and caught. Her fingers played with the weapon. If the worst came to the worst she would never be at Dangler's mercy while she possessed that revolver and, if the need came, turned it upon herself. They walked on rapidly, the lurching figure beside her covering the ground at an astounding rate of speed. The mad made no effort to talk. She was glad of it. She need not be so anxiously on her guard as would be the case if a conversation were carried on, and she, who knew so much and yet so pitifully little, must weigh her every word and feel her way with every sentence. And besides, too, it gave her time to think. Where were they going? What sort of place was it, this headquarters of the gang? For it must be the headquarters, since it was from there that the code messages would naturally emanate and this deformed creature from what he had said was the secretary of the nefarious clique that was ruled by his brother. And was Luck really with her at last? Suppose she had been but a few minutes later in reaching Gypsy Nann's house, and had found, instead of this man here, only the note instructing her to go and meet Dangler. What would she have done? What explanation could she have made for her non-appearance? Her hands would have been tied. She would have been helpless. She could not have answered the summons, for she could have had no idea where this gangler was, and the note certainly would not contain such details as a street and number, which she was obviously supposed to know. She smiled a little grimly to herself. Yes, it seemed as though Fortune were beginning to smile upon her again. Fortune, at least, had supplied her with a guide. The twisted figure walked on the inside of the sidewalk, and curiously seemed to seek, as much as possible, the protecting shadows of the buildings, and invariably shrank back out of the way of passers-by they met. She watched him narrowly as they went along. What was he afraid of? Recognition? It puzzled her for a time, and then she understood. It was not fear of recognition. The sullen, almost belligerent stare with which he met the eyes of those with whom he came into close contact, belied that. The man was morbidly, abnormally sensitive of his deformity.  She stared curiously as the man unlocked the door. Perhaps after all, she had been woefully mistaken. It did not look at all like the kind of place where crimes that ran the gamut of the decalogue were hatched, at all the sort of place that was the council chamber of perhaps the most cunning, certainly the most cold-blooded and unscrupulous band of crooks that New York had ever harbored. And yet, why not? Wasn't there the essence of cunning in that very fact? Who would suspect anything of the sort, from a ram shackled two-story little house like this, whose front was a woe-begone little store, the proceeds of which might just barely keep the body and soul of its proprietor together? The man fumbled with a lock. There was not a single light showing from the place, but in the dwindling rays of a distant street lamp she could see the meager window display through the filthy, unwashed panes. It was evidently a cheap and tawd renotion store, well suited to its locality. There were toys of the cheapest variety, stationary of the same grade, cheap pipes, cigarettes, tobacco, candy, packages of needles. Go on in, grunted the man, as he pushed the door, which seemed to shriek out unduly on its hinges, wide open. If any one sees the door open, they'll be around wanting to buy a paper of pens, cursome, and I ain't open to-night. He snarled as he shut and locked the door. Pierre says you're grouching about your garret. How about me and this job?  What about me?  What a gray did not answer. Well, go on, snapped the man. What are you standing there for? One would think you'd never been here before. Go on. Where? She had not the faintest idea. It was quite dark inside here in the shop. She could barely make out the outline of the other figure. You're in sweet temper tonight, aren't you? She said tartly.  I'm waiting for you to get through your speech. He moved breastfully past her with an angry grunt. Rota Gray followed him. They passed along a short, narrow space evidently between a low counter and a shelved wall, and then the man opened a door and shutting it again behind them, moved forward once more. She could scarcely see him at all now. It was more the sound of his footsteps than anything else that guided her. And then suddenly another door was opened and a soft, yellow light streamed out through the doorway, and she found herself standing in an intervening room between the shop and the room ahead of her. She felt her pulse quicken, and it seemed as though her heart began to thump almost audibly. Dangler. She could see Dangler seated at a table in there. She clenched her hands under her shawl. She would need all her wits now. She prayed that there was not too much light in that room yonder. CHAPTER XV IN THE COUNCIL CHAMBER The man with the withered hand had passed through into the other room. She heard them talking together as she followed. She forced herself to walk with as nearly a leisurely defiant air as she could. The last time she had been with Dangler, as Gypsy Nan, she had in self-protection, forbidding intimacy, played up what he called her grouch at his neglect of her. She paused in the doorway. Halfway across the room, at the table, Dangler's gaunt, swarthy face showed under the rays of a shaded oil lamp. Behind her spectacles she met his small, black, ferret eyes steadily. Hello, Bertha! He called out cheerily. How's the old girl to-night? He rose from his seat and came toward her. And how's the cold? Wrote a gray scowl to him. Worse, she said, curtly and hoarsely. And a lot you care.  She pushed him irritably away as he came near her. Yes, that's what I said. You needn't start any cooing game now. Get down to cases. She jerked her hand toward the twisted figure that had slouched into a chair beside the table. He says you've got it doped out to pull something that will let me out of this Gypsy Nan stunt. Another bubble, I suppose. She shrugged her shoulders, glanced around her, and locating a chair not too near the table, seated herself indifferently.  What's this one? He stood there for a moment, biting at his lips, hesitant between anger and tolerant amusement. And then, the latter evidently gaining ascendancy, he too shrugged his shoulders and laughed and returned to his chair.  I thought you'd be wild with delight.  I've tried to tell you that it wasn't my fault I couldn't go near you, and that I had to keep away from— What's the use of going over all that again, she interrupted tartly? I guess I— Oh, all right, said dangler hurriedly. Don't start a row. After tonight I have an idea you'll be sweet enough to your husband, and I'm willing to wait. Maddie maybe hasn't told you the whole of it. Maddie. So that was the deformed creature's name. She glanced at him. He was grinning broadly. A family squabble seemed to afford him amusement. Her eyes shifted and made a circuit of the room. It was poverty-stricken in appearance, bare floored, with the scantiest and cheapest of furnishings, its only window tightly shuttered. Maybe not, she said carelessly. Well, then, listen, Bertha, dangler's voice was lowered earnestly. We've uncovered the Nabob's stuff. Do you get me? Every last one of the sparklers.   How queer and dim the light seemed to go suddenly, or was it a blur before her own eyes? She said nothing. Her mind seemed to be groping its way out of the darkness toward some faint gleam of light showing in the far distance. She heard dangler order his brother savagely to hold his tongue. That was curious, too, because she was grateful for the man's jib. Gypsy Nan, in her proper person, had murdered a man named Deemer in an effort to secure her voice. Dangler's voice came again. Well, tonight we'll get that stuff. All of it. It's worth a cool half-million, and tonight we'll get Mr. House Detective Clorin for keeps.  That cleans everything up. How does that strike you, Bertha? Put a grey's hands under her shawl locked tightly together. Her premonition had not betrayed her. She was face to face to-night with the beginning of the end. It sounds fine, she said derisively. Dangler's eyes narrowed for an instant, and then he laughed. You're a rare one, Bertha, he ejaculated again. You don't seem to put much stock in your husband lately. Why should I, she inquired imperturbably. Things have been breaking fine, haven't they? Really not for us. She cleared her throat, as though it were an effort to talk. I'm not going crazy with joy till I've been shone. Dangler leaned suddenly over the table. Well, come and look at the cards, then, he said impressively. Pull your chair up to the table, and I'll tell you.  It was quite light enough where she was. I can hear you from here, she said coolly.  The deformed creature at the table shortled again. Dangler scowled.  I could ring that neck of yours sometimes, and— I know you could, Pierre, she interposed, sweetly. That's what I like about you. You're so considerate of me. But suppose you get down to cases. What's the story about those sparklers? And what's the game that's going to let me shed this gypsy-nan stuff for keeps? I'll tell her, Pierre, Grinda-deformed one. It'll keep you two from spitting at one another, and neither of you have got all night to stick around here. He swung his withered hand suddenly across the table, and as suddenly all facetiousness was gone from his voice and manner.   But tonight there ain't any more time for scrapping. Now listen. I handed you a wrap about beating it with the empty money-belt the night you croaked demer with an overdose of knockout-drops in the private room up at the Hotel Marwits. But you forget that. I ain't starting any argument about that. None of us blames you. We thought the stuff was in the belt, too. And none of us blames you for making a mistake and going too strong with the drops, either. Anybody might do that. And I'll say now that I take my hat off to you for the way you locked Clorin into the room with the dead man, and made your escape when Clorin had you dead to rights for the murder. And I'll say, too, that the way you've played Gypsy Nan and saved your skin, and ours, too, is as slick a piece of work as has ever been pulled in the underworld. That puts you straight, you and me, don't it, Bertha? Rhoda Gray blinked at the man through her spectacles.  I always liked you, Maddie, she whispered softly. Dangler was lolling back in his chair, blowing smoke-rings into the air. She caught his eyes fixed quizzically upon her. Go on, Maddie, he prompted. You'll have her in a good humour if you're not careful. We were playing more or less blind after that. The withered hand traced an aimless pattern on the table with its crooked and half-closed fingers, and the man's face was puckered into a shrewd, reminiscent scowl. The papers couldn't get a lead on the motive for the murder, and the police weren't talking for publication. Not a word about the Rajah's jewels. Washington saw to that. A young potentate son, practically a guest of the country, touring about in a special for the sake of his education, and dashed near ending it in the river out west if it hadn't been for the rescue you know about, wouldn't look well in print. So there wasn't anything said about the slather of gyms that was a reward of heroism from a grateful nabob, and we didn't get any help that way. All we knew was that Deemer came east with the jewels, presumably to cash in on them, and it looked as though Deemer were pretty clever, that he wore the money-belt for a stall, and that he had the sparklers safe somewhere else all the time. And I guess we all got to figuring it that way, because the fact that nothing was said about the theft was strictly along the lines the police were working anyway, and was a toss-up that they hadn't found the stuff among his effects. Get me? Get him? This wasn't real, was it, this room here? Those two figures sitting there under the shaded lamp? Something cold and icy grip seemed to seize at her heart, as in a surge there swept upon her the full appreciation of her peril through these confidences to which she was listening. A word, an act, some slightest thing, might so easily betray her, and then her fingers under the shawl and inside the wide pocket of her greasy skirt clutched at her revolver. Thank God for that. It would at least be merciful.  But the police didn't find the jewels, because they weren't there to be found. Somebody else got in ahead of us. Pinched him, understand? Maybe only a few hours before you got in your last play, and from the way you say Deemer acted before he was wise to the fact he'd been robbed. Not a gray letter chair comes sharply down to the floor. She must play her role of Bertha now, as she never had before. Here was a question that she could not only ask with safety, but one that was obviously expected. Who was it, she demanded breathlessly? She's coming to life, murmured dangler, through a haze of cigarette smoke. I thought she'd wake up after a while, Bertha. This is the big night, old girl, as she'll find out before we're through. Who was it, she repeated, with well-simulated impatience? I guess she'll listen to me now, said dangler, with a little chuckle. Don't over-tact yourself any more, Maddie. I'll tell you, Bertha, and it will, perhaps, make you feel better to know that it took the slickest dip New York ever knew to beat you to the tape. It was Angel Jack, alias the Gimp. How do you know, wrote a gray demanded. Because, said dangler, and lighted another cigarette, he died yesterday afternoon in Sing Sing. She could afford to show her frank bewilderment. Her brows knitted into furrows as she stared at dangler. You, you mean he confessed, she said? The Angel? Never! Dangler laughed grimly and shook his head. Nothing like that. It was a question of playing one fence against another. You know that Whitzer, who's handled all our jewelry for us, has been on the lookout for any stones that might have come from that collection. Well, this afternoon he passed the word to me that he had been offered the finest unset emerald he'd ever seen, and that it came to him through old Jake Lertz's runner, a very innocent young man who's known to the trade as the crab. Dangler paused, and laughed again. Unconsciously wrote a gray drew her jaw a little closer about her shoulders. It seemed to bring a chill into the room, that laugh. Once before, on another night, Dangler had laughed, and with his parted lips she had likened him to a beast showing its fangs. He looked at now more than ever. For all his ease of voice and manner he was in deadly earnest, and if there was merriment in his laugh it but seemed to enhance the menace and the promise of unholy purpose that lurked in the cold glitter of his small black eyes. It didn't take long to get hold of the crab. Dangler was rubbing his hands together softly, and the emerald with him. We got him where we could put the screws on him without arousing the neighborhood. Another murder, I suppose, wrote a gray, flung out the words crossly. Oh, no, Dangler said pleasantly. He squealed before it came to that. He's none the worse for wear, and he'll be turned loose in another hour or so as soon as we get through old Jake Lertz's. He's no more good to us. He came across all right after he was properly frightened. He's been with old Jake as a sort of familiar for the last six years, and— He'd have sold his soul he was so scared. The withered hand on the table twitched, the deformed creature's face twisted into a grimace, and the man was chuckling with unhollowed mirth, as though unable to contain himself at, presumably, the recollection of the scene which he had witnessed himself. He was down on his knees and clawing out with his hands for mercy, and he squealed like a rat. It's the sixth panel in the bedroom upstairs, he says. It's all there. But for God's sake, don't tell Jake I told. It's the sixth panel. Press the knot in the sixth panel that—he stopped abruptly. Dangler had pulled out his watch, and with exaggerated patience was circling the crystal with his thumb. Are you all through, Maddie? He inquired monotonously. I think you said something a little while ago about wasting time. Bertha's looking bored, and besides, she's got a little job of her own on for tonight. He jerked his watch back into his pocket, and turned to wrote a gray again. The only one who knew all the details, Angel Jack, and he'll never tell now because he's dead. Whether he came down from the west with demer or not, or how he got wise to the stones I don't know. But he got the stones all right, and then he tumbled to the fact that the police were pushing him hard for another job he was wanted for, and he had to get those stones out of sight in a hurry. He made a package of them, and slipped them to old Lertz, who had always done his business for him, to keep for him, and before he could duck the bulls had him for that other job. Angel Jack went up the river. See? Old Jake didn't know what was in that package, but he knew better than to monkey with it because he always thought something of his own skin. He knew Angel Jack, and he knew what would happen if he didn't have that package ready to hand back the day Angel Jack got out of Singsing. Understand? And yesterday Angel Jack died, without a will, and Old Jake appointed himself sole executor, without bonds. He opened that package, figured he'd begin turning it into money, and that's how we get our own back again. Old Jake will get a fake message tonight calling him out of the house on an errand uptown, and about ten o'clock Pinky Bond and the pug will pay a visit there in his absence, and, well, it looks good, don't it, Bertha? After two years? Rhoda Gray was crouched down in her chair. She shrugged her shoulders now, and infused a sullen note into her voice. Yes, it's fine, she sniffed. I'll be rolling in wealth in my garret, which will do me a lot of good. That doesn't separate me from these rags, and the hell I've lived, does it? After two years? I'm coming to that, said Dangler, with a short, grating laugh. We've as good as got the stones now, and we're going through to-night for a clean-up of all that old mess. We staked the whole thing. Get me Bertha, the whole thing. I'm showing my hand for the first time. Cloran's the man that's making you wear those clothes. Cloran's the only one who could go into the witness-box and swear that you were the woman who murdered Deemer. And Cloran's the man who has been working his head off for two years to find you. We've tried a dozen times to bump him off in a way that would make his death appear to be purely an accident, and we didn't get away with it. But we can afford to leave the accident out of it to-night and go through for keeps. And that's what we're going to do, and once he's out of the way, by midnight you can heave Gypsy Nan into the discard. It seemed to Rota Gray that whore had suddenly taken a numbing hold on her sensibilities. Dangler was talking about murdering some man, wasn't he, so that she could resume again the personality of a woman who was dead. Hysterical laughter rose to her lips. It was only by a frantic effort of will that she controlled herself. She seemed to speak involuntarily, doubtful almost that it was her own voice she heard. I'm listening, she said, but I wouldn't be too sure.  She caught her breath. What suicidal inspiration had prompted her to say that? Had what she been listening to hear, the horror of it, indeed turned her brain, and robbed her of her wits to the extent that she should invite exposure? Dangler's face had gone a-modeled purple, the misshapen thing at Dangler's side was leering at her most curiously. It was a moment before Dangler spoke, and then his hand, clenched until the white of the knuckles showed, pounded upon the table to punctuate his words. Not to-night, he wrasped out with an oath. There's not a chance that she's in on this to-night, the she-devil. But she's next. With this cleaned up, she's next. If it takes the last dollar of to-night's haul, and five years to do it, I'll get her, and get— Sure! Mumbled Rota Gray hurriedly, but you needn't get excited. I was only thinking of her because she's queered us till I've got my fingers crossed, that's all.  Dangler's composure did not return on the instant. He gnawed at his lips for a moment before he spoke. All right! He jerked out, finally. Let it go at that. I told you the other night in the garret that things were beginning to break our way, and that you wouldn't have to stay there much longer, but I didn't tell you why or how. You wouldn't give me a chance. I'll tell you now, and it's the main reason why I've kept away from you lately. I couldn't take a chance of Chlorin getting wise to that garret in Gypsy Nan. He grinned suddenly. I've been cultivating Chlorin myself for the last two weeks. We're quite pals. I'm playing for luck every time. When the jewels showed up to-day, I figured that tonight's the night. See? Chlorin and I are going to supper together at the Silver Sphinx at about eleven o'clock, and this is where you show up and shed the Gypsy Nan stuff, and show up as your sweet self. Chlorin'll be glad to meet you." She stared at him in genuine perplexity and amazement. "'Show myself to Chlorin?' she ejaculated heavily. "'I don't get you.' "'You will in a minute,' said Dangler softly. "'You're the bait, see?' Chlorin and I will be at supper and watching the foxtrotters. You blow in and show yourself. I don't need to tell you how.   He'll follow you on the jump. I don't know what it's all about, and I sit tight, and that lets me out. And now get this. There'll be two taxicabs outside. If there's more than two, it's the first two I'm talking about. You jump in the one at the head of the line. Chlorin won't need an invitation to grab the second one and follow you. That's all. It's the last ride he'll take. It'll be our boys, and not chauffeurs who'll be driving those cars tonight, and they've got their orders where to go. Chlorin won't come back. Understand, Bertha?' There was only one answer to make—only one answer that she dared make. She made it mechanically, though her brain reeled. A man named Chlorin was to be murdered, and she was to show herself as this—this Bertha, and—'Yes,' she said. "'Good,' said Dangler. He pulled out his watch again. All right, then. We've been here long enough. He rose briskly. It's time to make a move. You hop back to the garret, and get rid of that fancy dress. I've got to meet Chlorin uptown first.  The place stifled her. She got up, and moved quickly through the intervening room. She heard Dangler and his crippled brother talking earnestly together as they followed her. And then the crippled brushed past her in the darkness, and opened the front door, and Dangler had drawn her to him in a quick embrace. She did not struggle. She dared not. Her heart seemed to stand still. Dangler was whispering in her ear. "'I promised I'd make it up to you, Bertha old girl. You'll see, after to-night. We'll have another honeymoon. You go on ahead now. I can't be seen with Gypsy Nan.'  The silver sphinx at eleven.' She ran out on the street. Her fingers mechanically clutched at her shawl to loosen it around her throat. It seemed as though she were choking, that she could not breathe. The man's touch upon her had seemed like a contact with some foul and loathsome thing. The scene in that back room there like some nightmare of horror from which she could not awake. End of Chapter 15 THE WHITE MALL. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Coming by Rowdy Delaney, Idaho, USA. THE WHITE MALL. By Frank L. Packard. CHAPTER XVI. THE SECRET PANEL. Rhoda Gray hurried onward, back toward the garret, her mind in riot and dismay. It was not only the beginning of the end, it was very near the end. What was she to do? The silver sphinx at eleven. That was the end. After eleven, wasn't it? She could impersonate Gypsy Nan. She could not, if she would, impersonate the woman who was dead. And then, too, there were the stolen jewels at Old Jake Lertz's. She could not turn to the police for help there, because then the pug might fall into their hands and—and the pug—was the adventurer. And then a sort of fatalistic calm fell upon her. If the masquerade was over, if the end had come, there remained only one thing for her to do. There were no risks too desperate to take now. It was she who must strike, and strike first. Those jewels in Old Lertz's bedroom became suddenly vital to her. They were tangible evidence. With those jewels in her possession, she should be able to force dangler to his knees. She could get them, before Pinky Bond and the pug, if she hurried. Afterward, she would know where to find dangler, at the silver sphinx. Nothing would happen to Cloran, because, through her failure to cooperate, the plan would be abortive. But veiled as the white maul, she could pick up dangler's trail again there. Yes, it would be the end, one way or the other, between eleven o'clock and daylight. She quickened her steps. Old Lertz would be invagaled away from his home about ten o'clock. At a guess, she made it only a little after nine now. She would need the skeleton keys in order to get into Old Lertz's place, and yes, she would need a flashlight, too. Well she would have time enough to get them, time enough, then, to run to the deserted shed in the lane behind the garret and change her clothes. Rota Gray, as Gypsy Nan, went on as speedily as she dared without inviting undue attention to herself, reached the garret, secured the article she sought, hurried out again, and went down the lane in the rear to the deserted shed. She remained longer here than in the attic, perhaps ten minutes, working mostly in darkness, risking the flashlight only when it was imperative, and then, the metamorphosis complete, a veiled figure in her own person as Rota Gray, the white maul, she was out in the street again, and hastening back in the same general direction from which she had just come. She knew Old J. Lertz's place, and she knew the man himself very intimately by reputation. There were few such men, and such places that she could have escaped knowing in the years of self-appointed service that she had given to the worst, and perhaps therefore the most needy element of New York. The man ostensibly conducted a little second-hand store, in reality he probably shoved more stolen goods for his clientele, which at one time or another undoubtedly embraced every criminal in the underworld than any other fence in New York. She knew him for an oily, cunning old fox who lived alone in the two rooms over his miserable store, unless of late his young henchman the Crab had taken to living with him. Though as far as that was concerned, it mattered little to-night, since the Crab, for the moment, thanks to the game, was eliminated from consideration. She reached the second-hand store and walked on past it. There was a light upstairs in the front window. Old Lertz, therefore, had not yet gone out in response to the gang's fake message. She knew Old Lertz's reputation far too well for that, the man would never go out and leave a gas-jet burning, which he would have to pay for. There was nothing to do but wait. Rota Gray sought the shelter of a doorway across the street. She was nervously impatient now. The minutes dragged along. Why didn't the man hurry and go out? About ten o'clock, Dangler had said, but that was very indefinite. Pinkie Bond and the pug might be as late as that, but equally they might be earlier. It seemed an interminable time. And then her eye strained across the street upon the upper window. She drew still further back into the protecting shadows of the doorway. The light had gone out. A moment more passed. The street door of the house opposite to her, a door separate from that of the second-hand store, opened, and a bent, gray-bearded man stepped out, peered around, locked the door behind him, and shuffled down the street. Rota Gray scanned the dingy and ill-lighted little street. It was virtually deserted. She crossed the road and stepped into the doorway from which the old fence had just emerged. It was dark here, well out of the direct radius of the nearest street-lamp, and with luck there was no reason why she should be observed if she did not take too long in opening the door. She had never actually used a skeleton key in her life before, and she inserted one of her collection of keys in the lock. It would not work. She tried another, and still another, with mounting anxiety and perplexity. Was that, yes, the door was open now? With a quick glance over her shoulder, scanning the street in both directions to make sure that she was not observed, she stepped inside, closed the door, and locked it again. Her flashlight stabbed through the darkness. Narrow stairs immediately in front of her led upward, at her right was a connecting door to the second-hand shop. Without an instant hesitation she ran up the stairs. There was no need to observe caution since the place was temporarily untenanted. There was need only of haste. She opened the door at the head of the stairs, and, with a quick eager nod of satisfaction as the flashlight swept the interior, stepped over the threshold. It was the room she sought, old Lurtz's bedroom. And now the flashlight played inquisitively about her. The bed occupied a position by the window. Across one corner of the room was a cretine hanging that evidently did service as a wardrobe. Across another corner was a large and dilapidated washstand. There were a few chairs and a threadbare carpet, and opposite the bed another door, closed, which obviously led into the front room. Rhoda Gray stepped to this door, opened it, and peered in. She was not concerned that it was evidently used for a kitchen, dining-room, and the storage of everything that overflowed from the bedroom. She was concerned only with the fact that it offered no avenue through which any added risk or danger might reach her. She closed the door as she had found it, and gave her attention now to the walls of old Lurtz's bedroom. She smiled a little whimsically. The crab had used a somewhat dignified term when he had referred to panels. True, the walls were of stained wood, but the wood was of the cheapest variety of matched boards, and the stain was of but a single coat and a very meagre one at that. The smile faded. There were a good many knots, and there were four corners in the room, and therefore eight boards, each one of which answered the description of being the sixth panel. She went to the corner nearest her, and dropped down to her knees. As well start with this one. She had not dared press dangler, or danglers deformed a brother, for more definite directions, had she? She counted the boards quickly from the corner to her right, and then, with the flashlight playing steadily, she began to press first one knot after another, in the board before her, working from the bottom up. There were many knots. She went over each one with infinite care. There was no result. She turned then to the sixth board from the corner to her left. The result was the same. She stood up, her brows puckered, a sense of anxious impatience creeping upon her. She had been quite a while over these two boards, and it might be any one of the remaining six. Her eyes travest the room, following the ray of the flashlight. If she only knew which one it would, was it an inspiration? Her eyes fixed on the cretane hanging across one of the far corners from the door, and she moved toward it quickly. The hanging might very well serve another purpose than that of merely a wardrobe. It seemed suddenly to be the most likely of the four corners, because it was ingeniously concealed. She parted the hanging. A heterogeneous collection of clothing hung from pegs and nails. Eagerly, hastily now, she brushed these aside, and, close to the wall, dropped to her knees again. The minutes passed. Twice she went over the sixth board from the corner to her right. She felt so sure now that it was this corner. And then, still eagerly, she turned to the corresponding board at her left. It was warm and close in here. The clothing hanging from the pegs and nails enveloped her, and with the cretane hanging itself shut out the air, what little of it there was, that circulated through the room. Over the board, from the tiniest knot to the largest, her fingers pressed carefully. Had she missed one anywhere? She must have missed one. She was sure the panel in question was here behind this hanging. Well, she would try again, and—what was that? In an instant the flashlight in her hand was out, and she was listening tensely. Yes, there was a footstep, two of them, not only on the stairs, but already just outside the door. It seemed as though a deadly fear, cold and numbing, settled upon her, and robbed her of even the power of movement. She was caught. If it was Pinky Bond in the pug, and if this corner hid the secret panel as she still believed it did, this was the first place to which they would come, and they would find her amongst the clothing, which had evidently been the cause of deadening any sound on those stairs out there until it was too late. She held her breath, her hands tight upon her bosom. There was no time to reach the sanctuary of the other room. The footsteps were already crossing the threshold from the head of the stairs. And then a voice reached out, the pugs. It was the pug, and Pinky Bond. Strike a light, Pinky! There's no messing around with a flash. Old geezer'll be back in a hop, the minute he finds out he's been bunked, and a quicker we worked a better. A match crackled into flame. An air-choked gas jet with a protesting hiss was lighted.  What was she afraid of? The pug was the adventurer, wasn't he? This was one of the occasions when he could not escape the entanglements of the gang, and he must work for the gang instead of appropriating all the loot for his own personal and nefarious ends. But he was the adventurer. The white maul need not fear him, even though he appeared, linked with Pinky Bond, in the role of the pug. So there was only Pinky Bond to fear. Wrote a grey took her revolver from her pocket. She was well armed, and in a more than material sense. The adventurer did not know that she was aware of the pug's identity. Her smile, still mirthless, deepened. She might even turn the tables upon them, and still secure the stolen stones. She had turned the tables upon Pinky Bond last night, to-night, if she used her wits, she could do it again. And then, suddenly, she stifled an exclamation, as the pug's voice reached her again. What a used gaping about! Anything else worth pinching around here except what's in the old gents' safety vault? Get a move on. We ain't got all night. It's the corner behind a wash-stand. Give us a hand to move to furniture. It wasn't behind the cretane hanging. Wrote a grey bit her lips in a crestfallen little way. Well, her supposition had been natural enough, hadn't it? She would have tried every corner before she was through, if she had had the opportunity. She moved slightly now, without a sound, parting the clothing away from in front of her, and moving the cretane hanging by a fraction of an inch, where it touched the side wall of the room. And now she could see the pug, with his dirty and discoloured celluloid eye-patch, and his ingeniously contorted face, and she could see Pinky Bond's pasty white drug-stamped countenance. It was not a large room. The two men in the opposite corner along the wall from her were scarcely more than ten feet away. They swung the wash-stand out from the wall, and the pug, going in behind it, began to work on the wall-boards. Pinky Bond, an unlighted cigarette dangling from his lips, leaned over the wash-stand, watching his companion. A minute passed—another. It was still in the room, except only for the distant sounds of the world outside—a clatter of wheels upon the pavement, the muffled roar of the elevated, the clang of a trolley-bell. And then the pug began to mutter to himself. Rhoda Gray smiled a little grimly. She was not the only one, it would appear, who experienced difficulty with old Jake Lertz's crafty hiding-place. Say, this is the limit, the pug growled out suddenly.  Do you hear that, Pinky? He whispered tensely. Quick! Put out the light. Quick! There's someone down at the front door. Rhoda Gray felt the blood ebb from her face. She had heard nothing save the rattle and bump of a wagon along the street below, but she had had reason to appreciate, on a certain occasion before, that the pug, alias the adventurer, was possessed with a sense of hearing that was abnormally acute. If it was someone else, who was it? What would it mean to her? What complication here in this room would result? What—the light went out. Pinky Bond stepped silently across the room to the gas-jet near the door. Her eyes strained. She could just make out the adventurer's form kneeling by the wall. And then, was she mad? Was the faint night-lighting of the city filtering in through the window mocking her? The adventurer, hidden from his companion by the wash-stand, was working swiftly without a sound, or else it was a phantasm of shadows that tricked her. The adventurer, thrust in his hand, drew out a package, and leaning around, slipped it quickly into the bottom of the wash-stand, where with its little doors there was a most convenient and very comodious apartment. He turned again, then, seemed to take something from his pocket and placed it in the opening in the wall, and then closed the panel. It had scarcely taken more than a second.  No, it wasn't a phantasm. She had misjudged the adventurer—quite misjudged him. The adventurer, even with one of the gang present, to furnish an unimpeachable alibi for him, was plucking the gang's fruit again for his own and undivided enrichment. Pinky Bond's voice came in a guarded whisper from the doorway. I don't hear nothing, said Pinky Bond, anxiously. The pug tiptoed across the room and joined his companion. She could not see them now, but apparently they stood together by the door listening. They stood there for a long time. Occasionally she heard them whisper to each other, and then finally the pug spoke in a less guarded voice. All right, he said, I guess me nerves was getting to creeps. Shoot the light on again, and let's get back on to job. And you take a turn this time, push into knots, Pinky. Maybe you'll have better luck. The light went on again. Both men came back across the room, and now Pinky knelt at the wall while the pug leaned over the wash-stand, watching him. Pinky Bond was not immediately successful. The pug's nerves, of which he had complained, appeared shortly to get the better of him. For God's sake, hurry up, he urged irritably. Or else let me take a crack at it, Pinky, and a low, triumphant exclamation came from Pinky Bond, as the small door in the wall swung suddenly open. There she is, my bucko, he grinned, some nifty vault, eh? The old guy—he stopped. He had thrust his hand in, and drawn it out again. His fingers gripped a sheet of note-paper, but he was seemingly unconscious of that fact. He was leaning forward, staring into the aperture. It's empty, he choked. What's that? Cried the pug, and sprang to his companion's side. User-crazy Pinky! He thrust his head toward the opening, and then turned and stared for a moment helplessly at Pinky Bond. So help me, he said heavily. It's—it's empty! He shook his fist suddenly. The crabs handed us one. That's what, but to Crabble get his fur. It wasn't the crab. Pinky Bond was stuttering his words. He stood, jaws dropped, his eyes glued on the paper in his hand. The pug, his face working, the personification of baffled rage and intolerance, leered at Pinky Bond. Well, what is it, then? He snarled. Pinky Bond licked his lips. The white maul. He licked his lips again. The white maul echoed the pug incredulously. Yes, said Pinky Bond. Listen to what's on this paper I've fished out of there, I listen. She's got all the nerve of the devil. With thanks, and most grateful appreciation, the white maul. The pug snatched the paper from Pinky Bond's hand, as though to assure himself that it was true. Rhoda Gray smiled faintly. It was good acting, very excellently done, seeing the pug had written the note and placed it in the hiding-place himself. My God! mumbled Pinky Bond thickly. I ain't afraid of most things, but I'm getting scared of her. She ain't human. Last night you know what happened, and the night before, and— He gulped suddenly. Let's get out of here, he said hurriedly. The pug made no reply, except for a muttered growl of assent and a nod of his head. The two men crossed the room. The light went out. Their footsteps echoed as they descended the stairs, then died away. And then Rhoda Gray moved for the first time. She brushed aside the Cretan hanging, ran to the wash-stand, possessed herself of the package she had seen the pug place there, and made her way, cautious now of the slightest sound, downstairs. She tried the door that led into the second hand-shop from the hall, found it unlocked, and with a little gasp of relief slipped through, and closed the door gently behind her. She did not dare risk the front entrance. Pinky-Bon and the pug were not far enough away yet, and she did not dare wait until they were. Too bulky to take the risk of attempting to conceal it about his person, while with Pinky-Bon, the pug, it was obvious, would come back alone for that package, and it was equally obvious that he would not be longed in doing so. There was old Lurtz's return that he would have to anticipate. It would not take widths nearly so sharp as those possessed by the pug to find an excuse for separating promptly from Pinky-Bon. Rhoda Gray groped her way down the shop, groped her way to the back door, unbolted it, working by the sense of touch, and let herself out into the backyard. Five minutes later she was blocks away, and hurrying rapidly back toward the deserted shed in the lane behind Gypsy-Nan's garret. Her lips formed into a tight little curve as she went along. There was still work to do to-night, if this package really contained the stolen legacy of gems left by Angel Jack. She had, first of all, to reach the place where she could examine the package with safety, then a place to hide it where it would be secure, and then, dangler. She gained the lane, stole along it, and disappeared into the shed through the broken door that hung partially open on sagging hinges. Later she sawed a corner, and crouched down so that her body would smother any reflection from her flashlight. And now, eagerly, feverishly, she began to undo the package. And then, a moment later, she gazed, stupefied, and amazed at what lay before her. Precious stones, scores of them, nestled on a bed of cotton. They were of all colors, and of all sizes, but each one of them seemed to pulsate and throb, and from some wondrous, glorious depth of its own seemed to fling back the white ray upon a thousand rays in return, as though into it had been breathed a living and immortal fire. And Rhoda Gray, crouched there, stared, until suddenly she grew afraid, and suddenly, with a shudder, she wrapped the package up again. These were the stones for whose fabulous worth the woman whose personality she, Rhoda Gray had usurped, had murdered a man. These were the stones which were indirectly the instrumentality, but for them Gypsy Nand would never have existed that made her, Rhoda Gray, to-night, now, at this very moment, a hunted thing, homeless, friendless, fighting for her life against police and underworld alike. She rose abruptly to her feet. She had no longer any need of the flashlight. There was even light of a sort in the place. She could see the stars through the jagged holes in the roof, and through one of these, too, the moonlight streamed in. The shed was all but crumbling in a heap. Underfoot, what had once been flooring, was now but rotting, broken boards. Under one of these, beside the clothing of Gypsy Nand which she had discarded a little while before, she deposited the package, and then she stepped out into the lane, and from there to the street again. And now she became suddenly conscious of a great and almost overpowering physical weariness. She did not quite understand at first, unless it was to be attributed to the reaction from the last few hours, and then smiling wanly at herself she remembered. For two nights she had not slept. It seemed very strange. That was it, of course. Though she was not, in the least, sleepy now, just tired, just near the breaking point. But she must go on. Tonight was the end anyhow. Tonight, failing to keep her appointment as Bertha, the crash must come. But before it came as the white maul, armed with the knowledge of the crime that had driven Dangler's wife into hiding, and which was Dangler's crime, too, and with the evidence and the shape of those jewels in her possession, she and Dangler would meet somewhere—alone. Before the law got him, when he would be closed mouth and struggling with all his cunning to keep the evidence of other crimes from piling up against him, and damning whatever meager chances he might have to escape the penalty for Dangler's murder, she meant, yes, even if she pretended to compound a felony with him, to force, or to envigle from him, it mattered little which, a confession of the authorship and details of the scheme to rob Skarbov that night when she, wrote a gray, in answer to a dying woman's pleading, had tried to forestall the plan, and had been caught, apparently, in the act of committing the robbery herself. With that confession in her possession, with the identity of the unknown woman who had died in the hospital that night established, her own story would be believed. And so, if she were weary, what did it matter? It was only until morning. Dangler was at the silver sphinx now, with the man he meant that she should help him murder, only that would fail, because there would be no birther to lure the man to his death, and she, wrote a gray, had only to keep track of Dangler until somewhere, where he lived perhaps, she should have that final scene, that final reckoning with him alone. It was a long way to the silver sphinx, which she knew, as everyone in the underworld, and everyone in New York who was addicted to slumming knew, was a combination dance-hall and restaurant in the Chatham Square District. She tried to find a taxi, but without a veil. A clock in a jeweler's window which she passed showed her the time was ten minutes after eleven. She had had no idea that it was so late. At eleven, Dangler had said, Dangler would be growing restive. She took the elevated. If she could risk the protection of her veil in the silver sphinx, she could risk it equally in an elevated train. But in spite of the elevated it was, she knew, well on towards half past eleven, when she finally came down the street in front of the silver sphinx. From under the veil she glanced half curiously, half in a sort of grim irony, at the taxis lined up before the dance-hall. The two leading cars were not taxis at all, though they bore the ear-marks, with their registers, of being public vehicles for hire. They were large, roomy, powerful, and looked with their hoods up like privately owned motors. Well, it was of little account. She shrugged her shoulders as she mounted the steps to the dance-hall. Neither Bertha nor Cloran would use those cars to-night. End of CHAPTER XVI THE WHITE MALL This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Reading by Rowdy Delaney Idaho, USA THE WHITE MALL By Frank L. Packard CHAPTER XVII THE SILVER SPHINX A bedlam of noise smote Rhoda Gray's ears as she entered the silver sphinx. The jazz band was in full swing, on the polished section of the floor in the center, a packed mass of humanity swirled and gyrated and wriggled in the contortions of the latest dance, men laughed and howled immoderately, and around the sides of the room the waiters rushed this way and that amongst the crowded tables, mopping their faces with their aprons. It seemed as though confusion itself held sway. Rhoda Gray scanned the occupants of the tables. The silver sphinx was particularly riotous to-night, wasn't it? Yes, she understood. A great many of the men were wearing little badges. Some society or other was celebrating, and was doing it with abandon. Most of the men were half drunk. It was certainly a free and easy night. Everything went. Dangler. Yes, there he was, quite close to her, only a few tables away, and beside him sat a heavy-built, clean-shaven man of middle age. That would be Cloran, of course, the man who was to have been lured to his death. When Dangler was nervous and uneasy she could see. His fingers were drumming a tattoo on the table, his eyes were roaming fruitively about the room, and he did not seem to be paying any but the most distraight attention to his companion who was talking to him. Rhoda Gray sank quickly into a vacant chair. Three men, linked arm in arm, and decidedly more than a little drunk, were approaching her.  It was to be free and easy here to-night, and she began to regret her temerity at having ventured inside. She would better, perhaps, have waited until Dangler came out. Only there were two exits, and she might have missed him, and— A cold fear upon her she shrank back in her chair. The three men halted at the table, and were clustered around her. They began a jocular quarrel amongst themselves as to who should dance with her. Her heart was pounding. She stood and pushed them away. Oh, no you don't, hick oft one of the three. Gotta see your pretty face, anyhow. She put up her hands frantically and clutched at her veil, but just an instant too late to save it from being wrenched aside. Wildly her eyes flew to Dangler. His attention had been caught by the scene. She saw him rise from his seat. She saw his eyes widen, and then, stumbling over his chair and haste, he made toward her. Dangler had recognized the white maul. She turned and ran. Fear, horror, desperation lint her strength. It was not like this that she had counted on her reckoning with Dangler. She brushed the roisterers aside and darted for the door. Over her shoulder she glimpsed Dangler following her. She reached the door, burst through a knot of people there, and her torn veil clutched in her hand, dashed down the steps. She could only run, run, and pray that in some way she might escape. And then a mad exultation came upon her. She saw the man in the chauffeur's seat of the first car in the line lean out and swing the door open. And in a flash she grasped the situation. The man was waiting for just this—for a woman to come running for her life down the steps of the silver sphinx. She put her hand up to her face, hiding it with her torn veil, missed for the car and flung herself into the tonneau. The door slammed. The car leapt from the curb. Dangler was coming down the steps. She heard him shout. The chauffeur, in a startled way, leaned out as he evidently recognized Dangler's voice, but wrote a gray was mistress of herself now. The tonneau of the car was not separated from the driver's seat, and bending forward she wrenched her revolver from her pocket and pressed the muzzle of the weapon to the back of the man's neck. Don't stop, she gasped, struggling for breath.  The man, with a frightened oath, obeyed. The car gained speed. A glance through the window behind showed Dangler climbing into the other car. And then, for a moment, wrote a gray sat there fighting herself control, with the certain knowledge in her soul that upon her wits, and her wits alone, her life depended now. She studied the car's mechanism over the chauffeur's shoulder, even as she continued to hold the revolver pressed steadily against the back of the man's neck. She could drive a car. She could drive this one. The presence of this chauffeur, one of the gang, was an added menace. There were too many tricks he might play before she could install them, any one of which would deliver her into the hands of Dangler behind there, and apparently inadvertent stoppage due to traffic, for instance, that would bring the pursuing car alongside, that or a dozen other things would achieve the same end.  He turned his head for a half-incredulous, half-frightened look at her. She met his eyes steadily. The torn veil quite discarded now was in her pocket. She did not know the man, but it was quite evident from the almost ludicrous dismay which spread over his face that he knew her.  Jump! She ordered imperatively, and the revolver pressed more significantly against the man's flesh. He seemed even in frantic haste to obey her. He whipped the door open, and before she could reach to the wheel he had leapt to the street. The car swerved sharply. She flung herself over into the vacated seat, and snatched at the wheel barely in time to prevent the machine from mounting the curb. She looked around again through the window of the hood. The man had swung aboard Dangler's car, which was only a few yards behind. Road aggray drove steadily. Here in the city streets her one aim must be never to let the other car come abreast of her, but she could prevent that easily enough by watching Dangler's movements, and cutting a cross in front of him if he attempted anything of the sort. But ultimately what was she to do? How was she to escape? Her hands gripped and clenched in a sudden, almost panic-like desperation at the wheel. Turned suddenly around a corner and jumped from the car herself? It was useless to attempt it. They would keep too close behind her to give her a chance to get out of sight. Well, then, suppose she jumped from the car and trusted herself to the protection of the people on the street.  Dangler, she knew only too well, would risk anything, go to any length to put an end to the white mall. He would not hesitate an instant to shoot her down as she jumped, and he would be fairly safe himself in doing it. A few revolver shots from a car that speeded away in the darkness offered an even chance of escape. And yet, unless she forced an issue such as that, she knew that Dangler would not resort to firing at her here in the city. He would want to be sure that that was the only chance of getting her before he accepted the risk that he would run of being caught for it by the police. She found herself becoming strangely, almost unnaturally cool and collected now. The one danger, greater than all the others, that minister was a traffic block that would cause her to stop and allow those in the other car behind her to rush in upon her as she sat here at the wheel. And sooner or later, if she stayed in the city, a block such as that was inevitable. She must get out of the city then. It was only to invite risk, the risk that Dangler was in the faster car of the two, but there was no other way. She drove more quickly, made her way to the bridge, and crossed it. The car behind followed with a mutable persistence. It made no effort to close the short gap between them, but neither, on the other hand, did it permit the gap to widen. They passed through Brooklyn, and then, reaching the outskirts, rode a gray, with headlights streaming into the black, with an open long island road before her, flung her throttle wide, and the car leaped like a thing of life into the night. And it was a sudden start. It gained her a hundred yards, but that was all. The wind tore at her and whipped her face. The car rocked and reeled as in some mad frenzy. There was not much traffic, but such as it was cleared away from before her as if by magic, as seeking shelter from the wild meteoric thing running amuck, the few vehicles, motor or horse, that she encountered hugged the edge of the road, and the wind whisked to her ears fragments of shouts and excrations. Again and again she looked back. Two fiery balls of light blazed behind her, always those same two fiery balls. She neither gained nor lost. Like steel, her little figure was crouched over the wheel. She did not know the road. She knew nothing save that she was racing for her life. She did not know the end. She could not see the end. Perhaps there would be some merciful piece of luck for her that would win her through, a breakdown to that roaring thing with its eyes that were balls of fire behind her. She passed through a town with lighted streets and lighted windows, or was it only imagination? It was gone again anyhow, and there was just the black road ahead. Over the roar of the car, and the sweep of the wind then, she caught, or fancied she caught, a series of faint reports. She looked behind her. Yes, they were firing now. Little flashes leaped out above and at the sides of those blazing headlights. How long was it since she had left the silver sphinx? Minutes or hours would not measure it, would they? But it could not last much longer. She was growing very tired. The strain upon her arms, yes, and the strain upon her eyes, was becoming unbearable. She swayed a little in her seat, and the car swerved, and she jerked it back again into the straight. She began to laugh a little hysterically, and then, suddenly, she straightened up, tense, and alert once more. That swerve was the germ of inspiration. It took root swiftly now. It was desperate, but she was desperate. She could not drive much more, or much longer like this. Her body and mind were almost undone. And besides, she was not out distancing that car behind her there by a foot, and sooner or later they would hit her with one of their shots, or perhaps what they were really trying to do was puncture one of her tires. Again she glanced over her shoulder. Yes, Dangler was just far enough behind her to make the plan possible. She began to allow the car to swerve noticeably at intervals, as though she were weakening, and the car was getting beyond her control, which was, indeed, almost too literally the case. And now it seemed to her that each time she swerved there came an exultant shout from the car behind. Well, she asked for nothing better. That was what she was trying to do, wasn't it? Inspire them with the belief that she was breaking under the strain? Her eyes searched anxiously down the luminous pathway made by her high-powered headlights. If only she could reach a piece of road that combined two things, an embankment of some sort, and a curve just sharp enough to throw those headlights behind her off at a tangent for an instant as they rounded it, too, in following her. A minute, two, another passed. And then, rode a gray, tight-lipped, her face drawn hard as her headlights suddenly edged away from the road, and opened what looked like a ravine to her left, while the road curved to the right, flung a frenzied glance back of her. It was her chance, her one chance. Dangler was perhaps a little more than a hundred yards to the rear. Yes, now. His headlights were streaming out on her left as he, too, touched the curve. The right-hand side of her car, the right-hand side of the road were in blackness. She checked violently, almost to a stop, then almost instantly opened the throttle wide once more, wrenching the wheel over to head the machine for the ravine, and before the car picked up its momentum again, she dropped from the right side, darted for the edge of the road, and flung herself flat down upon the ground. The great, black body of her car seemed to sail into nothingness, like some weird aerial monster, the headlights streaming uncannily through space, then blackness, and a terrific crash. And now the other car came to a stop almost opposite where she lay. The two driver and the two chauffeurs, shouting at each other in wild excitement, leaped out and rushed to the edge of the embankment. And then suddenly the sky grew red as a great tongue flame shot up from below. It outlined the forms of the three men as they stood there, until abruptly, as though with one accord, they rushed palmel down the embankment toward the burning wreckage. And as they disappeared from sight, rode a gray jump to her feet, sprang for Dangler's car, flung herself into the driver's seat, and the car shot forward again along the road. A shout, a wild chorus of yells, the reports of a fuselad of shots reached her. She caught a glimpse of the forms running insanely after her along the edge of the embankment, then silence, save for the roar of the speeding car.  Somewhere, nearing a town, she saw a train in the distance coming in her direction. She reached the station first, and left the car standing there, and with the torn veil over her face again took the train. She was weak, undone, exhausted. Even her mind refused its functions further. It was only in a subconscious way she realized that where she had thought never to go to the Garrett again, the Garrett and the role of Gypsy Nan were, more than ever now, her sole refuge. The plot against Chlorin had failed, but they could not blame that on Bertha's non-appearance, and since it had failed, she would not now be expected to assume the dead woman's personality. True, she had not, as had been arranged, reached the Silver Sphinx at eleven, but there were a hundred excuses she could give to account for her being late in keeping the appointment so that she had arrived just in time, say, to see Dangler dash wildly in pursuit of a woman who had jumped into the car that she was supposed to take. The Garrett. The Garrett again, and Gypsy Nan. Her surroundings seemed to become blank to her, her actions to be prompted by some purely mechanical sense. She was conscious only that finally, after an interminable time, she was in New York again, and after that, long, long after that, dressed as Gypsy Nan, she stumbled up the dark, ladder-like steps to the attic. How her footsteps dragged! She opened the door, staggered inside, locked the door again and staggered toward the cot, and dropped upon it, and the gray dawn came in with niggardly light through the grimy little window-panes, as though timorously inquisitive of this shod and desolate figure, prone and motionless. This figure who would in other dawns had found neither sleep nor rest. This figure who lay there now, as one dead.


Adults need a kick-action now. We are powerful. We are awesome. And we can change the world. Together. Small but mighty, kids change the world! Get what you were fighting for to continue trying because if you just give up, the world is going to just become pollution and there won't be a future for kids that are younger than you. So even if you fail on something that you're working on, keep doing it and keep trying. The Green New Deal. Sign the fossil fuel, free pledge, teach environmental action in all public schools. Create state-wide bans on styrofoam and single-use plastic, including plastic bags, straws and bottles. Create industrial composting, recycling and renewable energy systems in every school, town and state building. Protect our water, air and soil from pollution and charge for all forms of carbon pollution.


ASEAN and Australia have opened a new chapter in our relations with the decision to establish a comprehensive strategic partnership. For Australia, a CSP is a strong signal of our commitment to ASEAN and its central role in the Indo-Pacific. It provides a framework for deepening our cooperation and positions our partnership for the future. It's about delivering substance and will be underpinned by a new package of Australia for ASEAN initiatives that focus on ASEAN priorities. The Australia for ASEAN Futures Initiative will advance projects jointly agreed by ASEAN and Australia that address complex challenges including climate change, health security, transnational crime, healthy oceans, the circular economy and energy transition. Australia for ASEAN Scholarships will support 100 emerging ASEAN leaders to study in Australia in fields that advance the four key areas of the ASEAN outlook on the Indo-Pacific. And the Australia for ASEAN Digital Transformation and Future Skills Initiative will support 350 vocational education and training scholarships, technical assistance partnerships and a new skills policy dialogue. This represents the largest ever increase in Australia's Development Cooperation Program with ASEAN and builds on our strong history of cooperation since Australia became ASEAN's first dialogue partner in 1974 and our enhanced support during the pandemic. Australia is now firmly focused on implementing our CSP to deliver real benefit for ASEAN, Australia and the region. As we take forward our comprehensive strategic partnership together, our Southeast Asian natives can continue to count on Australia. Australia will be with ASEAN every step of the way.