Edgar Wallace

“ Patience is everything. Burns sent a man into the mining camps with the scrap of a photograph showing only a murderer's right eye, and it was three years before this fellow of Burns' nailed his man. Lecomte, of the Surete, waited five years before he caught Madame Serpilot, and I myself as a young man trailed the 'Cully' Smith gang for three years, eight months and twelve days before I put Cully where I wanted him—and it will probably take you as long to pull down Cæsar Valentine.”
“When do I start?” asked his companion.
“At once,” replied Hallett. ”

“ If you watch every card and keep your mind concentrated on the game and you have luck, it comes out. If you start wool-gathering in the earlier stages you'll just miss putting up the right card, and you'll be stuck with the deuce of hearts that should have gone up, lying snug and useless at the bottom of the pack. ”

“ Now get out and pull Valentine. This man may be. the biggest thing of his kind—and the most dangerous man in the world. On the other hand all the stories that come to police headquarters may be lies. It's a weird job you've taken on. You can't jail a man for living expensively or for running away with men's wives. ”