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Show been drugged. But I will come to that In a moment. Having secured thlg Information, which of course eliminated him as the active burglar, I went to him and tol4 him uphill and down that he was making a blank fool of himself. When he learned that I had uncovered his whereabouts on the night In question he made a clean breast of It. While he had been plunged in despair by the crash, yet he had taken but two drinks that day, one being a cocktail with you In a cafe. oon after the last drink he had become stupefied', which fact he attributed to the reaction from his highly nervous state, but I came to a totally different conclusion, although I said nothing to him about It at the time. With your assistance he entered en-tered a cab, and remembered mumbling mumb-ling a direction to the driver to take him to his rooms; yet when he awoke in the morning he found himself at a place where he had no desire to be. Fear of Miss Winton's displeasure had made him resolve to remain silent rather than hurt her by the confession that he had got drunk, s he imagined he had, and gone to such a plnce. I could not understand why the cabman had taken It upon himself to convey him to this resort against Bruce's di-1 rectious. so I came back at the driver hard. By the dint of more questions, aided by a few judicious threats, I drew out the information that the change in address had been given by a certain party whom the driver knew to- be a friend of his passenger from the fact of having seen them together, and who had stopped him and given new instructions as to where to convey con-vey the sleeping one inside. That explained ex-plained the driver's peculiar actions, and things were becoming decidedly interesting. Although practically satisfied sat-isfied now that Bruce had had nothing "ven indirectly to do with the matter, I neverthless went a little further in my investigations. I was very much interested to find out where he had secured the money which had enabled him to resume his operations on 'change. When I had convinced him that I would keep the information absolutely ab-solutely secret, he told me that it was furnished him by a woman client who did not care to have her name mentioned men-tioned in connection with speculative matters. I traced the story to its foundation and learned that it was absolutely ab-solutely true. That left only one matter mat-ter to be explained so far as Bruce was concerned." "I suppose you mean his possession of the key and his denial that he had it, coupled with the possibility that some one else had somehow come into possession of It," I said, breaking the moment's lull. LeDuc nodded. "Exactly. I was almost certain from the time that Miss Winton announced the loss of her key that it had somehow some-how got into the possession of her sweetheart; for its disappearance from her keeping convinced me that you had not been mistaken when you said Bruce had exhibited it or its duplicate. I had several talks with enou; : I '.d not missed It. So we got, the coat he had worn on that occasion and went through It. We found a small rip in the bottom of the outside pocket, and going further discovered dis-covered the key in the bottom lining. That solved the mystery. As for his having pounded on the table with it and afterwards denied it, that was easily accounted for by the fact that in his worriment 1 e had unconsciously drawn It from his pocket and used It as you described and then replaced It mechanically without noticing what he had held or remembering the Incident. In-cident. I accepted this as the correct solution of the key incident, and then and there dismissed Bruce from all connection with the matter For had he entered into collusion with , anyone any-one else and loaned him the key for the night, the other person most certainly cer-tainly would have been a professional who owned his own tools and knew how to use them, and that idea as you know, I had already abandoned. Do you get me?" "I think so. And having eliminated Bruce, whom I all along told you was innocent, you turned your attention to Richard Mackay as the next possibility." pos-sibility." My companion smiled faintly, faint-ly, thrusting his hands into his pockets pock-ets and leaning forward In his chair. "Yes, for about ten minutes. At the end of that time I had reasoned him out of the case. The man who strangled your uncle was described by him as a large, strong man who coughed peculiarly. That description fitted Mackay to a dot, and furthermore further-more there was a possibility of his having been informed, through his more or less familiar connection with Mrs. Dace's establishment, of the money being in the safe at this particular partic-ular time. Then, too. the incident Of your having left your keys there l'w some days furnished a possible way by which he could have secured o duplicate through a conspiracy with one of the household. But that he did it personally was absurd. He is far and away above it. He is not a burglar; he is a boodlcr. He has a million dollars of his own, and would no more risk himself in an act like this than you would for a handful of silver. And having previously stricken strick-en out the professional cracksmen because be-cause of the cruderiess of the job, I was now compelled to eliminate Mackay and his friends because of the same reasoning that I had applied in Bruce's case. Had he turned the job over to some needy friend of his from the underworld, that person certainly would not have been a bungler. bun-gler. You see what that brought me to." I arose in my chair with a mingled sensation of heat and cold climbing my spine and stiffening my hair. "Do you mean to say as the last remaining possibility you fastened your suspicions suspi-cions upon me?" I gasped. One of his hands fastened upon my wrist with the snapping grip of a steel trap; his fingers biting like teeth into my flesh. As in our school days I felt i "I Am Not Through With You Even Yet, Puppy." xfe LASH of wfffff y Harry Irving Greene m MW Author yYosonde of the Wilderness" - I the ertn of !h hary oaken chair. Frenzied with rage I made an awkward awk-ward cU7e behind my back with my left hand for my right-hand hip pocket ns he Ic.'ked his arms around me. With the quIcknesB of thought he had twisted n revolver from my. fingers, and springing back laid It on the dresser beyond my reach, as shackled to the heavy piece of furniture I could only stand quivering in helpless passion. pas-sion. Realizing my physical impotence impo-tence I rat down sullenly. "So you feared I would murder you." I sneered. He negatived. "Xo, I did not think you would do that. But I feared that you might minder yourself. Do you wish me to proceed quietly, or shall 1 summon your uncle to hear what I have to say?" For a moment I hesitated as I calmed myself by a mighty effort. There could be no good n getting him excited. "If you have anything more to say to me you may continue or not, as you choose. I can scarcely help hearing you, but you will regret this outrage when I am set free." He did not seem to become either alarmed or angry at the threat; on the contrary con-trary his voice was even smoother than before as he resumed his seat. "Tom," lie continued, "1 have always al-ways been your friend and I wish to always remain so. When I have done telling you what I know about this crime we will talk about other matters, mat-ters, if you desire. But what 1 wish to tell you additionally Is this. I had been compelled to eliminate everybody every-body but you, and was therefore compelled, com-pelled, most regretfully, to start along your trail. As my first step I went to the hotel where you told me you staid on the night of the crime; looked at the register and ascertained the room that you had occupied. I engaged en-gaged It, and went to it for the purpose pur-pose of a thorough inspection. It was a back room overlooking an alley and the fire escape ran close by one of its windows. It at once occurred to me. therefore, that it would have been the simplest thing in the world for you, after having called up your uncle and after hav.. left a request at the office for a morning summons in order to impress it upon the minds of others that you were in your room at midnight, and thus establish an alibi In case of suspicion, to have passed down the escape in the darkness, dark-ness, gone to any place yon wished and returned before daybreak. I therefore went down the ladder, as I assumed you had done, and at its bottom bot-tom chanced upon what I consider to have been the only piece of pure good luck that came my way in the whole case. For, mind you, I insist that the rest of my discoveries were the result of experience in such matters, mat-ters, aided by close reasoning. -Be that as it may, at the foot of the ladder lad-der I found your lost card case. I could only account for its presence there in one way; namely, that it had dropped from your pocket while you were either descending or ascyviding the ladder whh your arms working above your head. That will perhaps remind you of the other night when you and I burglarized that office downtown. You will remember upon that occasion I handed you your match safe after we had come down, and told you that I had picked it up at the foot of the ladder we had just left; mentioning the fact that climbing climb-ing up and down under such conditions condi-tions was apt to work a smooth article ar-ticle out of one's vest pocket. There is nothing truer than that statement, and I have no doubt but that is exactly ex-actly what happened in the original case of your lost card receptacle. Now as a matter of fact, I extracted that match safe from your pocket In the darkness when you were occupied in pressing the putty against the window in order that I might- try an interesting interest-ing experiment. The experiment succeeded. suc-ceeded. My calling your attention to the likelihood of losing such articles ar-ticles under conditions similar to those you had just experienced, started a train of thought in your mind. 1 knew you were worried by the loss of your card case and were very desirous of regaining It. My stratagem of the restored re-stored match box made it occur to you that it was possible that you had lost your card case In going out of the window on the night of the crime, and that there was a bare possibility that it had not be ri picked up and that you would find it among the rubbish rub-bish back of the hotel. Having as I hoped sowed this thought in your mind, I made an excuse and left you. You will recall that the pretext I made for departing was that I wished to make another experiment alone. I immediately made it, the experiment consisting of my going rapidly to the head of the alley parsing the Pacific hotel and wailing there for you. True to my reasoning you went straight to the place whore I had found the card case, and lighting a cigar made n brief search of the premises by the light of the match, of course unsuccessfully. Then as you came hurrying Into the street you popped into my arms where I had stood to watch If you would fall Into the trap. 1 remember your expression of surprise and displeasure dis-pleasure at unexpectedly seeing me there. As an excuse I told you that the criminal was downtown then and moving around considerably himself. I Imagine that remark rather got you to guessing." (TO BE CON TI N U K D.) plasalnc a naw campaign, and beg of her a few days' Indulgence until I could go over matter. Bh had told me that ahe was to be at home that evening, and it had been understood between us that I waii to he with her; therefore, at eight o'clock I arose and called for her number. The vole1 of Janet answered me, telling me that her mistress was not at home. With an overwhelming presentment of more misery to come, I vainly Implored Im-plored Bome Information as to where she had gone and at what hour she was expected to return. The answer that I received was a click that told me of the hanging up of the earpiece and my further volcings brought only the ringing silence of an unanswering wire. I sank Into my chair again. In the midst of my stupor I heard the ringing of the door bell and a moment mo-ment later the sound of light footsteps ascending the stairs. There was a tap at my door, and at my listless response re-sponse LeDuc quietly entered. I saw him run his eyes quickly over me as he tossed his hat upon the bed and dreiv a chair close besldo mine. He said nothing, did not even smile as was his habit, and in my misery I did not offer him any greeting. For perhaps a minute he sat without speaking and then addressed me with unwonted gravity: "Tom, I have tba proofs." I started slightly and raised my eyes to his. I fancied they were full of regret, even sorrow, but his mouth was firmly set. My head was hot and my throat dry, and I cleared the latter lat-ter before I spoke. Then I asked him hoarsely where they were. He laid them on the table before me. They consisted of a silver card case, a bookmaker's ticket, a bit of steel, a soiled piece of paper and a small lump of some grayish substance. Stupidly I stared at them. CHAPTER XVI. In the silence that followed the slow ticking of the tall clock sounded like the tolling of a bell. I shut my eyes. "Go on," . I commanded as he sat facing me with no signs of any inclination incli-nation to proceed. "What does this junk signify to you?" He got up and crossing the room silently bolted the door that led to my uncle's apartments; apart-ments; then resumed his seat and addressed ad-dressed me in the low tones of one who adds caution to precaution. "When I began this investigation, Tom, as I then told you I was about to do, I commenced to shift the chaff from the wheat in order to decrease the number of objects which I would in the last analysis be compelled to examine with great minuteness. My inquiries made upon the morning I first came, together with my inspection inspec-tion of the house upon that occasion, satisfied me of several things, among which were that Mrs. Tebbets had possessed no knowledge of the money being in the safe, and because of that and divers other reasons she should be eliminated; that your uncle had in no wise spread the information of his having the currency to anyone except ex-cept yourself and Bruce, and therefore there-fore that he, as a distributor of the news to outside parties, was to be eliminated; that the house must have been entered by the front door, and therefore that the idea that all parties par-ties were telling me without reserva-Cbn reserva-Cbn all they knew about the matter was to be eliminated; and last, that on account of the unusual drilling of the safe and the quantity and quality of the explosive used, that all thought of its being the work of a professional profession-al cracksman must be eliminated. You see that brought me down to a pretty narrow field." He ceased speaking, and with my eyes still closed and my head resting heavily against tb back of the chair I nodded slightly. "I understand. Having eliminated the possibility of its having been done by a professional, you have brought it down to Bruce, who possessed a key, or to Richard Mackay or one of his friends who might have obtained a duplicate from the key I left at Mrs. Dace's. However, go ahead." "You seem to be following me to a certain extent. Having decided that tt was the work of an amateur, I was obliged to start out with those thoughts in my mind as I attempted to still further construct the circle. Your key was in the possession of your uncle at the time of the crime, and I did not believe that you had ever had another. Mrs. Tebbets and your uncle had theirs; Miss Winton's was missing and you had assured me that Bruce had been in the possession of one which he failed to account fox; that he had made rash statements about getting money; had become angry at your uncle; had been in a generally unnatural and desperate frame of mind the day before, and therefore I started in to investigate him. This seemed to me the most logical way of going at it, for looming loom-ing as big as he did among the surroundings, sur-roundings, I must either concentrate upon him as the probable thief, or greatly simplify matters by getting rid of him altogether. You had told me of his entering a cab the evening before the crime, and so I went to a friend of mine who is an official in the cab drivers' union. They are practically prac-tically all union men in this city, and he sent out a circular to every member mem-ber of his association calling upon the driver who had conveyed the person described to come forward and receive reward. Within two days I was talking talk-ing to the man who had driven Bruce, and In that way found out where he spent the night. The cabman drove him to a resort ten miles from this place and Bruce spent the night of the robbery there asleep." I unclosed my eyelids with an expression of surprise. sur-prise. "I did not know that Bruce vent to such places," I muttered. LeDuc went on. "Nor does e voluntarily. He had r f Tfj SYNOPSIS. I Abner Halliday, a miserly millionaire. Is found gagged, bound and insensible in his room, his safe rifled and $40,000 missing. miss-ing. The thread of the story Is taken up by his nephew Tom. Living in the same house are other relatives; reckless Bruce Halliday and pretty Clare Wtnton. Bruce, who Is a bond broker, has been trying to raise $10,000 to put through a deal and save himself from financial ruin. He has applied to Ills miserly uncle and to others for the loan but has been refused. Tom sends for William LeDuc, an old-time friend connected with a detective agency. In relating the story Tom reverts to his acquaintance witli a Mrs. Dace, a wealthy widow, whose business agent Is Richard Mackay, a boodler and political boss. Tom is Jealous of Mackay and is deeply in love with Mrs. Dace. Bruce Halliday warns him to shun her as an adventuress. Tom sees Mrs. Dace and Mackay together. togeth-er. He afterwards meets the woman at a horse race, and. happening to mention that Bruce had a tip on the winner, ahe gives him $500 to place on the race. The tip goes wrong and she loses her money.' Later Tom invests in stocks. He makes some money, and returns the lost $500 to Mrs. Dace. It is at this Juncture that the theft of the $40,000 from old Abner Halli-tlay Halli-tlay occurs. Le Due meets Clare and Bruce. He learns that the key which Clara had to the house is missing. Mac-kay's Mac-kay's dealings with Mrs. Dace make Tom more Jealous. The detective Intimates a suspicion against Bruce Halliday as the thief. This Clare Winton Indignantly repudiates. re-pudiates. Mrs. Dace accepts Tom as her fiance, and encourages him to invest In a certain stock. Tom has a row with Mackay and the latter threatens revenge. The detective announces that he has discovered dis-covered Important clews as to the thief. It looks as if Mackay had got hold of ' Tom's key to the Halliday home and might have been the burglar. CHAPTER XV. (Continued.) At the firt. corner a shrieking newsboy news-boy nearly ran between my legs, and above the uproar of the street I heard him shout a sentence that caused me to gasp and clutch at a lamp post for support. Snatching a paper from him I threw him a coin and began to read, the paper shaking in my hands like a wind-thrummed reed. Two paragraphs told me the hideous truth. Upon information that had been given him by Richard Mackay, who had been frozen out of the combination by his co-conspirators, the state's attorney had filed a quo warranto proceeding in which he attacked the very life of the franchise fran-chise of the underground system. Should that official be able to substantiate sub-stantiate the attack and prove that the grant had been obtained by fraud and trickery, as Mackay stated, the courts might deprive the corporation of all Its rights and privileges, take away its power to act and render it hopelessly impotent. Under such a frightful condition of affairs the stock w-ould become absolutely worthless, and beneath this stab at its heart it had already fallen with a crash that had carried half of those who had ridden rid-den upon it to ruin. My meager margins mar-gins had been wiped out as quickly as a guilty schoolboy scours his slate, and I had been made a bankrupt in the time which it takes to tell it. I dropped the paper and staggered into ft doorway, my hands pressing my temples. The world swam drunkenly before me in a hideous gray mist, through which men with faces lined and hard-fned hard-fned by hopes long deferred, passed ghostlike as they plodded silently along with strained eyes in search of the sordid necessities which bind the soul and the body together. The roar of the street came to my deadened earB like the sullen grumble of thunder. thun-der. From out of the gloom weary ihop girls and ragged newsboys stared ruriously up at my drawn face, none Poorer than I. none half so wretched. f S . For they had abided in the depths and had not seen the star of hope shining close above them, whereas I had been hurled from the battlements of heaven heav-en in the twinkling of an eye. Deadened Dead-ened of senses and seeing but vaguely, vague-ly, I went stumbling towards my broker's office, my only hope being that I would awake and find that I had dreamed a nightmare. His d,oors were locked. Already a rabble stood before them vainly clamoring clam-oring for admittance, and realizing the uselessness of remaining here, I rushed down the stairs and towards the floor of the exchange. The shrieking shriek-ing uproar of the pit was unintelligible to me, but in the midst of it wilh his collar torn from his neck and his coat split down the back was my agent, still dancing about insanely with wild thrusts of his fingers into the air. The frenzy upon his face left me no vestige of hope, and I turned away wilh my brain spinning. Four steps further and I almost ran into the arms of Richard Mackay. His teeth showed beneath his heavy mustaches; his eyes burned and his face was stamped with the vin-dictiveness vin-dictiveness that had brought this inferno in-ferno about. He saw me at once and a brutal laugh of satisfaction burst from between the half-sealed lips which my fist had split. "I dirt it partly for your benefit, if that is any satisfaction to you. But I am not through with you even yet, puppy," he said in my ears, as he passed. Too broken of spirit to resent the insult other than by a look I passed him in silence. How I got through that terrible afternoon af-ternoon I am still uncertain, except in a vague way. I dared not keep my luncheon engagement with Mrs. Dace and tell her all; but Instead kept mumbling to myself that I would call her up that evening when I had a chance to think over what I should say. There is always a chance, though it be only one in a million, that something some-thing will be saved out of a wreck: and come what might matters could not possibly be more hopeless at nightfall than they were now. And perhaps by then I could think of'some-thlng of'some-thlng to retrieve myself temporarily; something which would eventually start me once more along the primrose prim-rose way. Scarcely conscious of what I was doing I wandered to Bruce's office. of-fice. He was not there, but his clerk told me that my cousin for some reason rea-son bad closed out all his holdings the day before at a handsome profit and had announced himself as through with speculation. The bitterness of the contrast between him and myself brought the tears to my eyes. Should he carry out this resolve and stick to his commissions, as I had little doubt that he would under Clare's persuasions persua-sions and the weight of his promise, his happiness was in his own keeping. He had undoubtedly again gained a modest competence, had a good business busi-ness and the love of a sweetly beautiful beauti-ful and contented woman. Verily the richest gifts of the gods reposed in the hollow of his hand. I vent home and threw myself heavily heav-ily upon the bed. At the summons to the evening meal I failed to respond; re-spond; burying my face in the pillow Instead, as for the hundredth time I rehearsed what I was to say to Mrs. Dace. I could only tell her that I had received a 6evsr tback but was "Tom Halliday, You Stole Your Uncle's Money." him and her on the subject, and they still insisted with a positiveness that I could not ignore that their original statements were absolutely correct; namely, she denied that she had ever loaned him the key, and he asserted that he had no knowledge of ever having it in his possession. I made them rehearse all their actions when together for some days previous to the robbery, and finally a thought came to her. She remembered that a short time previous while she and Si nce had been strolling together that she had slipped her pocketbook containing con-taining the key into his side coat pocket for a few moments while she was putting on tier gloves. And that In turn suggested an idea to me. Had the pocketbook been partially unclasped, un-clasped, the key might easily enough have fallen from it Into his pocket, and not having any occasion to use ii Isx U next few days she naturally , the piano wire strength of his tendons and clinched my teeth between the fierceness of the clasp. "Tom Halliday," he returned sternly, stern-ly, "you stole your uncle's money," daring at him, quivering under an Impulse Im-pulse to tear myself from him and strike him down, I first swelled my muscles for the effort, then letting them subside sank back with an exclamation ex-clamation of supreme disgust. "So that was your ultimate analysis!" analy-sis!" I said, with bitterest scorn. "Of all the absurd, asinine Idiots it was ever my misfortune to come in contact con-tact with, you are the most complete you, an alleged detective. But you might as well finish your dream. I will compel myself to listen." I turned my head from him contemptuously; became aware that something cold and metallic was snapped around .the wrist which he held and leaped to'roy feet only to find myself handcuffed to |