His mother (aged eighty-two years) put the chain on the door and politely declined to open it.

All the evidence against the forger was inside the apartment and he was actively engaged in burning it up in the kitchen stove.

In half an hour to arrest him would have been useless! The detectives stormed and threatened, but the old crone merely grinned at them.

She hated a "bull" as much as did her son.

Fearing to take the law into their own hands, they summoned a detective sergeant from head-quarters, but, although he sympathized with them, he had read Mayor Gaynor's decision and declined to take any chances.