serene!"

"Right-oh!" said Carver. "I'm on. Well, and what am I to do, first?"

"Two things," responded Triffitt. "One of 'em's easy, and can be done
at once. Get me--diplomatically--this man Burchill's, or Bentham's,
present address. You know some _Magnet_ chaps--get it out of them. Tell
'em you want to ask Burchill's advice about some dramatic stuff--say
you've written a play and you're so impressed by his criticisms that
you'd like to take his counsel."

"I can do that," replied Carver. "As a matter of fact, I've got a real
good farce in my desk. And the next?"

"The next is--try to find out if there's any taxi-cab driver around the
Portman Square district who took a fare resembling old Herapath from
anywhere about there to Kensington on the night of the murder," said
Triffitt. "There must be some chap who drove that man, and if we've got
any brains about us we can find him. If we find him, and can get him to
talk--well, we shall know something."

"It'll mean money," observed Carver.

"Never mind," said Triffitt, confident as ever. "If it comes off all
right with our boss, you needn't bother about money, my son! Now let's
be going Fleet Street way, and I'll meet you tonight at the usual--say
six o'clock."

Arrived at the _Argus_ office and duly seated at his own particular
table, Triffitt, instead of proceeding to write out his report of the
funeral ceremony of the late Jacob Herapath, M.P., wrote a note to his
proprietor, which note he carefully sealed and marked "Private." He
carried this off to the great man's confidential secretary, who stared
at it and him.

"I suppose this really is of a private nature?" he asked suspiciously.
"You know as well as I do that Mr. Markledew'll make me suffer if it
isn't."

"Soul and honour, it's of the most private!" affirmed Triffitt, laying a
hand on his heart. "And of the highest importance, too, and I'll be
eternally grateful if you'll put it before him as soon as you can."

The confidential secretary took another look at Triffitt, and allowed
himself to be reluctantly convinced of his earnestness.

"All right!" he said. "I'll shove it under his nose when he comes in at
four o'clock."

Triffitt went back to his work, excited, yet elated. It was no easy job to
get speech of Markledew. Markledew, as everybody in Fleet Street knew, was
a man in ten thousand. He was not only sole proprietor of his paper, but
its editor and manager, and he ruled his office and his em