upon it, and, turning again, dropped into the nearest
lounging chair.

There had been no doubt in his mind, none to dispel. It was precisely
what he had expected from almost the first word Jason had spoken. It was
the same handwriting, the same texture of paper, and there was the same
old haunting, rare, indefinable fragrance about it. Jimmie Dale's
hands turned the envelope now this way, now that, as he looked at it.
Wonderful hands were Jimmie Dale's, with long, slim, tapering fingers
whose sensitive tips seemed now as though they were striving to decipher
the message within.

He laughed suddenly, a little harshly, and tore open the envelope.
Five closely written sheets fell into his hand. He read them slowly,
critically, read them over again; and then, his eyes on the rug at his
feet, he began to tear the paper into minute pieces between his fingers,
depositing the pieces, as he tore them, upon the arm of his chair. The
five sheets demolished, his fingers dipped into the heap of shreds on
the arm of the chair and tore them over and over again, tore them until
they were scarcely larger than bits of confetti, tore at them absently
and mechanically, his eyes never shifting from the rug at his feet.

Then with a shrug of his shoulders, as though rousing himself to present
reality, a curious smile flickering on his lips, he brushed the pieces
of paper into one hand, carried them to the empty fireplace, laid them
down in a little pile, and set them afire. Lighting a cigarette, he
watched them burn until the last glow had gone from the last charred
scrap; then he crunched and scattered them with the brass-handled fender
brush, and, retracing his steps across the room, flung back a portiere
from where it hung before a little alcove, and dropped on his knees in
front of a round, squat, barrel-shaped safe--one of his own design and
planning in the years when he had been with his father.

His slim, sensitive fingers played for an instant among the knobs and
dials that studded the door, guided, it seemed by the sense of touch
alone--and the door swung open. Within was another door, with locks and
bolts as intricate and massive as the outer one. This, too, he opened;
and then from the interior took out a short, thick, rolled-up leather
bundle tied together with thongs. He rose from his knees, closed the
safe, and drew the portiere across the alcove again. With the bundle
under his arm, he glanced sharply around the room, liste