woman, old, faded and gray, who, with upturned features and hands clasped above her head now met his astonished gaze.

It was the singular creature who had followed him from the gambling hall.

Not for one moment had the boy been lost from her view.

"Pause, my son!" she exclaimed, raising her clasped hands aloft with a supplicating air, as she knelt before him in the pure white snow. "Remember your dead father—I ask you not to remember me—pause before it is too late."

"Hello!" cried Cutts, placing his hand on Frank's shoulder as he spoke, "who the mischief have we here?"

As though stung by an adder, the boy shrank back from that aged form.

"Mother!" he cried, in husky tones, "for God's sake, what brings you here? Have they let you escape again?"

"Escape!" said the woman, in feeble tones. "Can doors hold a mother when danger besets her son? No, no, bolts and bars cannot keep me in. Locks amount to nothing for me. I roam the streets by night and by day, and I watch over you, my son."

"She is mad, Cutts!" cried the boy angrily; "mad for years, and has escaped from those by whom she was confined. Follow me, and let's be done with this thing at once. With her on my hands I need the money more than ever now."

He leaped the fence railing as he spoke with the lightness of a cat, landing by the woman's side.

Cutts instantly followed him, as did the two young men, who had during this strange scene come to a halt a little in the rear of the spot where Frank and the detective had stood.

"No, no, you shall not go! You shall not rob the bank!" shrieked the woman, seizing Frank by the skirts of his coat. "Don't listen to these wicked men, my son; they only seek your harm!"

"Confound the old hag!" muttered the detective, angrily. "What are we going to do? If we don't stop her mouth she will ruin all."

"Hold her where she is and stop her mouth; but gently, boys," said Frank, in a hoarse voice. "Cutts, you follow me and the thing is done. I've gone too far to back out now. I want your pay, and as I am wronging no one, have it I must and will."

He sprang across the street as he spoke, followed by the young detective, while the woman, feebly struggling in the arms of the two young fellows, still knelt moaning beneath the church yard wall.

"I'll have to take care of her, Cutts," said Frank, producing a key and fitting it into the lock of the door of the bank. "She's hopelessly crazy, poor thing, and God only knows by what strange chance she came to be here to-night."

He turned the key in the lock as he spoke and threw open the door leading into a dark hallway in the great building on the corner of Rector street and Broadway, in the rear of the offices occupied by the Webster National Bank.

"Follow me," he added, entering the passage as he spoke, "and shut the door behind you—it won't take a moment, and the thing is done."

He moved through the passage and opened an inner door, supposing the detective to be close behind.

Great heavens! What sight was this?

There, before his astonished gaze in the dim light of the gas, kept burning through the entire night in this, as in other banks, lay the great doors of the money vault blown out of all shape, disclosing the vault within.

A burglar's jimmy, a crowbar, and a powder-can lay mingled with a pile of books and papers—the contents of the rifled vault—upon the floor.

"Cutts, Cutts! For Heaven's sake look here!"

Frank Mansfield sprang out into the dark hall, calling the detective's name.

There was no reply.

The outer door stood open, the dark outlines of Trinity Church appeared beyond, but Detective Cutts was nowhere to be seen.

With one bound Frank Mansfield leaped toward that open door.

"Stop!" cried a stern voice. "Young man, what are you doing here?"

And the form of a large and powerful man was interposed before him, who seized the boy by the arm.

"This way, men!" he cried, as three policemen came running down Rector street from Broadway. "Here's one of the rascals now. We are here just in the nick of time!"

CHAPTER IV.

THE STRANGE DISAPPEARANCE BENEATH THE CHURCH-YARD WALL.

"Come, speak up! Are you dumb? What are you doing at the door of the Webster Bank at this hour of the night?"

It was Mr. Caleb Hook, the famous New York detective, who spoke, as he seized Frank Mansfield by the coat-collar and jerked him violently into the dark hallway which formed the rear entrance to the bank.

At the same instant the forms of the three policemen were to be seen filling the open door.

Even as he spoke the detective threw the full glare of a dark lantern upon the pale and frightened countenance of the boy who stood trembling in his grasp.

"I—I—work in the bank," he stammered, brokenly. "I wanted—— I am the assistant cashier. I came here with my friend, Detective Cutts, to try the door and see that all was right."

It was a bold stroke, but a useless one.

Detective Hook laughed in his face.

"Well, and where is Cutts?" he asked, sneeringly.

"He was here a moment ago, just outside the door. I went into the bank and found that the vault had been blown open, and turned to call him in as you seized me on the steps."

"I don't see him anywhere around," said the detective, coolly, at the same time pulling Frank toward the door, and looking quickly up and down Rector street.

It was deserted.

Cutts, the strange woman, and the two young fellows who held her down had alike disappeared.

There was nothing to be seen save the dark outlines of Trinity Church, the old burial ground about it, and the white flakes of the ever falling snow.

And the heart of Frank Mansfield sank within him as the full meaning of his perilous position burst upon his bewildered brain.

The bank robbed—Cutts and his companions gone.

Who would believe his story, now that he had been caught almost in front of the rifled vault?

"Now look here, young fellow," said the detective, "you might just as well own up and tell the truth. Where are your pals? Who are you? What's your name?"

"My name is Frank Mansfield. I'm assistant cashier of the bank."

There was nothing to be gained by attempting to conceal his identity; Frank saw that at a glance.

"I thought as much," replied the detective grimly, "and I'm a little behind time, I see. But you don't answer my other question. Where are your pals?"

"I don't know what you mean."

"Spread yourself, you Jones and Brady," exclaimed the detective, turning suddenly upon the officers. "Examine every doorway, one of you, the other make for the church-yard wall. Schneider, you come with me. We'll soon see what's been going on in here. This comes from the folly of the chief in keeping me so long engaged. I might have been here an hour ago at the very least."

He turned quickly upon the boy as he spoke, and without a word of warning snapped a pair of handcuffs about his wrists.

"Move on ahead there," he exclaimed, pushing Frank before him into the hall. "You say this bank has been robbed. I believe you. Show me what you have done."

The vault door, wrenched out of all shape and hanging by one hinge, the burglar's tools, the books and papers scattered upon the floor around, were quite answer enough without a word from the wretched Frank, who stood trembling by his side.

The detective surveyed the scene grimly.

"I was born a day too late, it seems," was all he said.

Then, turning toward his youthful prisoner, he gazed intently upon his face.

"You and your friends have made a clean job of it here, young man," he said, at length.

Frank stared at him dumbly.

Could he hope to win the hand of Edna Callister after such a fatal slip as this?

What was he to do?

What should he say?

Ah, if he had but heeded the