him she soon saw that his attention
seemed to be riveted on some one sitting at the other side of the room.
Wonderingly she let her eyes follow his, and once more it was with
difficulty that she suppressed an excited gasp.

There, across the room, calmly sipping some coffee, was the handsome
young man from the next apartment--the man whom she had felt sure, or at
least almost sure, was a murderer, about whom she had been wondering all
day long, picturing him as a hunted criminal fleeing from the law.
Chatting interestedly with him was another man, a young man in the
uniform of a lieutenant in the navy.

What did it all mean? Why was the black-mustached man watching them so
intently? Her eyes turned back to him. He was still sitting there,
leaning forward a little, his brows in a pucker of concentration, his
eyes still fixed on the pair opposite. It looked almost as if he was
trying to read their lips and tell what they were talking about.

Jane thrilled with excitement. The black-mustached man, she decided,
must be a detective. She recalled that he had said to her it was because
she lived at the address she did that she was available for the mission
for which he wanted her. Did he, she wondered, know about the mysterious
death in the street outside their apartment house? Was that the reason
he was spying on her neighbor? But what could be his motive in seeking
to involve her in the matter?

Unable to find satisfactory answers to her questions she gave herself up
interestedly to studying the faces of the two young men across the room.
Neither of them, she decided, could be much more than thirty. The face
that only a few hours before she had seen utterly convulsed with bitter
hate, now placid and smiling, was really an attractive one, not in the
least like a murderer's. Frank, alert blue eyes looked out from under an
intellectual forehead. A small military mustache lent emphasis to a
clean-shaven, forceful jaw. His flaxen hair was neatly trimmed. His
linen and clothing were immaculate, and the hand that curved around his
cup had long, tapering, well-manicured fingers. The cut of his clothing,
his manners, everything about him seemed American, yet there was an
indefinable something in his appearance that suggested foreign birth or
parentage, probably either Swedish or German. The man with him was
smaller and slighter. Despite the air of importance his uniform gave
him, it was palpable that he was the less forceful of th