The Mystery Megapack

another was in the toils of the law for theft. And there was a chance—
    Thubway Tham remembered the forty dollars his day of honest toil had cost him. He wanted that forty, and he needed it. As Detective Craddock started for the nearest subway entrance with his prisoner and the victim, Thubway Tham followed, shadowing the trio as well as ever detective shadowed a suspect.
    They got into a crowded car, and Tham kept Craddock from seeing him. And then he began working his way forward, in such a manner as not to attract undue attention to himself. Finally he was two feet behind Detective Craddock in the midst of the crowd.
    The proper station was reached, the doors were opened. Detective Craddock started to leave the car with his two men. Thubway Tham stepped up close behind him for an instant—and in that instant his hand dived into Craddock’s pocket and took out the countryman’s wallet. Chuckling, Tham crept back into the crowd—and the train glided on.
    Craddock would find himself in trouble when the station was reached, Tham knew. His evidence against the evil-looking youth would be gone, and by the same token the countryman would demand to be reimbursed for his wallet. Craddock’s only explanation would be that he had had his own pocket picked. He might even remember that Thubway Tham had been near at hand, and suspect him—but suspicion would get him nothing. Craddock would have to get Tham “with the goods on” in order to conquer.
    Tham left the train at the next station, walked rapidly down the street, then turned into an alley. When he thought it was safe, he investigated the wallet.
    There were some newspaper clippings in it, some receipts, but no money.
    “Thtung again!” Tham told himself. “Thith ith a rotten day!”
    He threw the wallet away from him and went through the alley to the next street. He made his way to a certain saloon, sat at a table in the rear, and brooded over his wrongs. It was getting hard for a prominent pickpocket to make a living, he decided. And it didn’t pay to be honest when it cost a man forty dollars a day and his wages were but fifteen a week.
    Tham moped for an hour and then went out upon the streets again. He stood on a corner and contemplated a crowd, wondering whether to risk fortune by picking a pocket there. It was against his principles to work anywhere but in the subway, but he told himself that this was all a part of his insane moment.
    Somebody slapped him on the shoulder.
    “Hey, young fellow!” said a voice in his ear. “Ain’t you the cigar clerk?”
    Thubway Tham whirled around to face the countryman.
    “Hello!” he growled.
    “I want to buy you a good cigar. What you told me was right. But I knew it all along. They don’t fool me, you betcha. I had a wallet in my hip pocket, all right, but there waren’t nothin’ except newspaper clippings in it. And a feller picked my pocket and a detective arrested him. And when we got to the police station, the detective had lost the wallet.”
    “Huh!” Tham said, this not being news to him.
    “I reckon these New York slickers don’t get gay with me! You know what I did, young feller? I raised Cain, I did! I said as how there was a hundred dollars in that wallet, and I demanded that the detective pay me back. He argued some about it and then took me to another room, and we argued some more. Finally he give me fifty, and I called it square. I reckon these New York slickers don’t get the best of me!”
    “You made him pay you fifty?” Tham queried with a gasp.
    “I certainly did—and there wasn’t nothin’ in that there wallet except clippings. He had to let that pickpocket go, too. I’m wise, you betcha. I been carryin’ my real money in my vest pocket all the time, bills folded up.”
    “You’re withe, all right,” Tham said. “Carryin’ it in your vetht pocket all the time, eh?”
    “Sure! And I’ve got that detective’s fifty there with it. If this keeps up, young feller, I’ll have all my expenses paid and go home with a profit.”
    Thubway Tham chuckled until the tears started from his eyes. He’d have to tell Craddock about this some time, he promised himself. It certainly would be rubbing it in so far as Craddock was concerned.
    “You don’t owe me any cigar,” he told the countryman. “That ith a good joke, and I’ll buy you a drink. Come along.”
    He led the way to the nearest resort that had plenty of bright lights. He ordered drinks and paid for them, and