g-practiced in the art of turning out promptly for these midnight
emergencies, and he was pulling on his trousers almost before the
door-bell had ceased to ring, but to the anguished gaze of the
detective he resembled nothing more than a languid snail with white
whiskers. It seemed as if they would never get back to the house.

They finally did, and Joliffe took competent charge of the situation.
Creighton, banished peremptorily, went into his room, extinguished the
lamp, and sat down on the edge of his bed in the dark to await a
verdict from the doctor. At each side of him his fingers gripped the
corner of the mattress tensely.

He had not waited thus above fifteen minutes when he heard a familiar,
heavy tread in the hall outside. His door was unceremoniously flung
open and the space filled by a huge form.

"Creighton--you in here?"

"Hello, Krech. What are you doing here at this hour?"

"Haven't been sleeping well lately. Got up to smoke a cigar, looked
out my bedroom window and saw this house lighted up. What's doing?"

"Miss Copley is seriously ill--perhaps--dying."

"The deuce!" ejaculated Krech, startled. He fumbled in his pocket,
produced a match and struck it. "Mind if I light the lamp?" But the
flickering flame of the match showed him a face so white and drawn that
he caught his breath in sudden realization of the truth. He abandoned
his idea of lighting the lamp and fumbled his way to a chair near the
foot of the bed. "So--you _know_!" he said quietly.

"Yes," admitted the detective wearily. "But how did _you_?"

"I tumbled to it the night you went to New York," answered Krech, his
voice anything but happy. "I didn't go home after I left you at the
station. Came back here. You hinted something might happen if you
went away and gave it a chance, and I didn't see why it shouldn't
happen right away. I hoped the monk would turn up again; had a notion
that my head would feel better if I could once get my hands on that
wire-stretching humorist.

"I kept carefully out of sight in the woods and settled down at a point
where I could watch both the kitchen garden and the spot where we'd
last seen the monk. I waited three hours. If patience and
perseverance make a good detective I was the best in the world that
night.

"The reason I waited so long was that I was interested in a lighted
window--Miss Ocky's. She was keeping pretty late hours, talking to
Janet Mackay, I recognized her tall, t