"No," he said. "I guess I'll take my medicine. I don't know who you are.
I might just as well have opened it for Slimmy as for you. It looks as
though you were after the same thing he was."
Jimmie Dale smiled.
"Stand a little away from the safe, Birdie--there," he instructed. And,
as the other obeyed wonderingly, Jimmie Dale knelt to the dial. "You
see, I trust you not to move," he said. The dial was whirling under the
sensitive fingers, and, like Birdie before him, his ear was pressed
against the face of the safe.
The moments went by. Birdie Lee was watching in an eager, fascinated,
startled way. Came at last a sharp, metallic click, as Jimmie Dale flung
the handle over--and the door swung wide. He shut it again
instantly--and locked it.
"It's your turn, Birdie," he said calmly. "You see that, as far as I
or my intentions are concerned, it doesn't matter whether you open
it or not."
"Who are you?" There was awed admiration in Birdie's voice.
"You're slicker than ever I was, even in the old days. For God's
sake, who are you?"
"Never mind," said Jimmie Dale. "Open the safe, if you can."
"I can open it all right," said Birdie, moving slowly forward; "and
quicker than you did, because I got the combination when I was workin'
on it with Slimmy watchin'.
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