192 Layte Street all unobserved; but, for reasons of his own, he had made one or two private alterations in the two buildings which enabled him to enter the different floors by his own judiciously veiled private entrances.
The cellar of No.

192 Layte Street had been piped for cold-storage of the wines and beer of the "Valkyrie" under Fritz Braun's own supervision when he gave up the basement of the "Valkyrie" to the kitchens of the restaurant, which drew the attractive women of the quarter into the safest possible association with their victims crowding the "Valkyrie" saloon.
A vigilant business man, August Meyer came each evening to settle the days' affairs and personally watch the money mill next door, which ran noiselessly on golden wheels from nine o'clock till midnight.
No one had Meyer's confidence; he left no tell-tale papers to connect him with the gruff pharmacist of Sixth Avenue, and at midnight he always vanished to his own private home, a diligently guarded terra incognita to all men.
A sphinx-like "Oberkellner" received the orders of the proprietor each evening; a steward of equal taciturnity "ran" the restaurant, and August Meyer himself, with autocratic power, directed the villainous operations of No.

192 Layte Street.
Popular with the police, exact in his monthly settlements with the ground landlords and the despotic brewery king, Fritz Braun avoided both the failings which had wrecked the golden fortunes of the dead Sohmer.
But, alas! no man is equally strong against all temptations.

Deaf to woman's wail; brutal and heartless; too fearful of his past record to give himself up to the bowl, Fritz Braun, blase and tired of every side of human life, had drifted easily into the desperate craze of the insatiate gambler.
It was months after he had found No.

192 Layte Street to be a never-failing mint, when Braun became fascinated with the whirr of the roulette ball, the varying chances of the faro box, and, at last, the fine peculiarities of "unlimited poker" swept away his once callous prudence.
Night after night, in the grim quartette of a ruinously high game, August Meyer "held his hand" recklessly, while a street railroad magnate, a millionaire importer, and a reigning politician swept away the revenues of the "Valkyrie." He was rolling the stone of Sysiphus up hill now.