old job as watchman and checker. But the agency, after giving him a
three-week try out at picket work, submitted him to the further test of
a "shadowing" case. That first assignment of "tailing" kept him
thirty-six hours without sleep, but he stuck to his trail, stuck to it
with the blind pertinacity of a bloodhound, and at the end transcended
mere animalism by buying a tip from a friendly bartender. Then, when
the moment was ripe, he walked into the designated hop-joint and picked
his man out of an underground bunk as impassively as a grocer takes an
egg crate from a cellar shelf.

After his initial baptism of fire in the Wisconsin Central railway
yards, however, Blake yearned for something more exciting, for
something more sensational. His hopes rose, when, a month later, he
was put on "track" work. He was at heart fond of both a good horse and
a good heat. He liked the open air and the stir and movement and color
of the grand-stand crowds. He liked the "ponies" with the sunlight on
their satin flanks, the music of the band, the gaily appareled women.
He liked, too, the off-hand deference of the men about him, from
turnstile to betting shed, once his calling was known. They were all
ready to curry favor with him, touts and rail-birds, dockers and
owners, jockeys and gamblers and bookmakers, placating him with an
occasional "sure-thing" tip from the stables, plying him with cigars
and advice as to how he should place his money. There was a tacit
understanding, of course, that in return for these courtesies his
vision was not to be too keen nor his manner too aggressive. When he
was approached by an expert "dip" with the offer of a fat reward for
immunity in working the track crowds, Blake carefully weighed the
matter, pro and con, equivocated, and decided he would gain most by a
"fall." So he planted a barber's assistant with whom he was friendly,
descended on the pickpocket in the very act of going through that