the girl,
blushing rosy red, and looking shyly at Louis.

I felt sorry to disclose the poor girl's little romance, for it was
easy enough to see that she was in love with the fickle Frenchman,
who evidently did not reciprocate her interest. He looked at her
disdainfully, and she presented a pathetic picture of embarrassment.

But the situation was too serious for me to consider Elsa's sentiments,
and I said, rather sternly: "You do know where it is. You preserved that
rose as a souvenir. Go at once and fetch it."

It was a chance shot, for I was not at all certain that she had kept
the withered flower, but dominated by my superior will she went away at
once. She returned in a moment with the flower.

Although withered, it was still in fairly good condition; quite enough
so for me to see at a glance that no petals had been detached from it.
The green calyx leaves clung around the bud in such a manner as to prove
positively that the unfolding flower had lost no petal. This settled the
twelfth rose. Wherever those tell-tale petals had come from, they were
not from Louis's rose. I gave the flower back to Elsa, and I said, "take
your flower, my girl, and go away now. I don't want to question you any
more for the present."

A little bewildered at her sudden dismissal, Elsa went away, and I
turned my attention to the Frenchman.

"Louis," I began, "this must be settled here and now between us. Either
you must tell me what I want to know, or you must be taken before the
district attorney, and be made to tell him. I have proved to my own
satisfaction that the rose petals in the office were not from the flower
you wore. Therefore I conclude that you did not go into the office that
night, but as you passed the window you did see someone in there with
Mr. Crawford. The hour was later than Mr. Porter's visit, for he had
already gone home, and Lambert had locked the front door and gone to
bed. You came in later, and what you saw, or whom you saw through the
office window so surprised you, or interested you, that you paused to
look in, and there you dropped your transfer."

Though Louis didn't speak, I could see at once that I was on the right
track at last. The man was shielding somebody. He was unwilling to tell
what he had seen, lest it inculpate someone. Could it be Gregory Hall?
If Hall had come out on a late train, and Louis had seen him there, he
might, perhaps under Hall's coercion, be keeping the fact secret. Again,
i