airy fist.
"Everything goes wrong. That blond devil interferes, and now this letter
speaks but of blankets and loaves!"

The bell rang, and, taking care to thrust the letter out of sight,
the concierge disappeared. Then ensued, in the hall, a short colloquy,
followed by a thumping on the staircase. The concierge returned.

"Old Adelbert, from the Opera," he said. "He has lost his position, and
would have spent the night airing his grievance. But I sent him off!"

Herman turned his pale eyes toward the giant. "So!" he said. And after a
pause, "He has some influence among the veterans."

"And is Royalist to his marrow," sneered the concierge. He took the
letter out again and, bringing a lamp, went over it carefully. It was
signed merely "Olga." "Blankets and loaves!" he fumed.

Now, as between the two, Black Humbert furnished evil and strength, but
it was the pallid clerk who furnished the cunning. And now he made a
suggestion.

"It is possible," he said, "that he--upstairs--could help."

"Adelbert? Are you mad?"

"The other. He knows codes. It was by means of one we caught him. I have
heard that all these things have one basis, and a simple one."

The concierge considered. Then he rose. "It is worth trying," he
observed.

He thrust the letter into his pocket, and the two conspirators went out
into the gloomy hall. There, on a ledge, lay the white tapers, and one
he lighted, shielding it from the draft in the hollow of his great hand.
Then he led the way to the top of the house.

Here were three rooms. One, the best, was Herman Spier's, a poor thing
at that. Next to it was old Adelbert's. As they passed the door they
could hear him within, muttering to himself. At the extreme end of
the narrow corridor, in a passage almost blocked by old furniture, was
another room, a sort of attic, with a slanting roof.

Making sure that old Adelbert did not hear them, they went back to this
door, which the concierge unlocked. Inside the room was dark. The taper
showed little. As their eyes became accustomed to the darkness, the
outlines of the attic stood revealed, a junk-room, piled high with old
trunks, and in one corner a bed.

Black Humbert, taper in hand, approached the bed. Herman remained near
the door. Now, with the candle near, the bed revealed a man lying on it,
and tied with knotted ropes; a young man, with sunken cheeks and weary,
desperate eyes. Beside him, on a chair, were the fragments of a meal, a
bit of