Historically, The Gray Seal is a fascinating character. He predates most of the familiar inner-city crimefighters of the twentieth century. Before the fantastic pulp characters of the twenties such as The Shadow and The Green Hornet lurked the underworld to take vengeance on gangland, The Gray Seal fought for justice. Packard's book was published around the middle of the 1910s, and continues to be a well-written and exciting adventure story.
The Gray Seal is Jimmie Dale, 'wealthy young man about town' to borrow a familiar phrase. Jimmie's father owned a company that built safes. Wearing a domino mask, Jimmie uses his familiarity with safes to crack the very same built by his father's company. Despite his apparent crimes, all his robberies serve a just purpose. Directed by a mysterious woman known only as the Tocsin, (French for 'warning bell'), he ferrets out criminals. Jimmie adopts yet another disguise, Larry the Bat, to infilterate the underworld. Larry is an uncouth character with a feigned addiction to opium that moves easily through gangland. Hunted by criminals and the law alike, The Gray Seal performs fantastic feats in his quest to stamp out injustice. Jimmie leaves a gray, diamond-shaped piece of paper or sticker at his endeavors to ensure the police and public who commited the crime; The Gray Seal!