that he had lived in the
deserted house for several days, since there were remnants of food
scattered here and there.

"The mystery is getting deeper and deeper," thought Larry. He said
nothing to the policeman about the man being a person who had come
ashore from the _Olivia_. "I'm going to ask Mr. Emberg to let me
work on this case," he resolved, while he followed Higgins from room
to room. "I believe it will be a great story if I can get all the
details."

How much of a story it was destined to be Larry had no idea of at
that moment, though his newspaper instinct, that led him to suspect
there was a strange mystery connected with Mah Retto, was perfectly
correct, as he learned later.

"Well, I don't see that we can learn anything more here," remarked
Higgins when he had been in a number of chambers on the third floor.
"He evidently only used a few of these handsome apartments," and he
laughed as he looked around on the dilapidated rooms, with the
plaster peeling from the walls, the windows half broken, and the
doors falling from their hinges.

"Hark!" exclaimed Larry. "Some one is coming!"

Footsteps sounded in the lower hall.

"That's Storg, coming back!" cried Higgins. "I hope he got his man."

He leaned over the balustrade and called down:

"Any luck, Storg?"

"No, he got away," was the reply. "He's a good runner. I couldn't
keep up to him."

"Never mind," consoled Higgins. "Maybe it's just as well. We'd have
trouble proving anything illegal against him, though I could have
had him held on a charge of vagrancy until I investigated a bit."

The officers, followed by Larry, left the ramshackle structure, with
the wind whistling mournfully through the broken windows, and the
shutters banging, while the doors creaked on the rusty and broken
hinges.

"I wouldn't want to stay there all alone at night," thought the
young reporter, as he started toward home. "A man must have a strong
motive to cause him to hide in there. I'd like to find out what it
is. Perhaps I shall, some time."

Larry spoke of the matter to Mr. Emberg the next day. He said he
thought it might be a good idea to devote some hours to working up
the story, in an endeavor to learn who the queer man was.

"Still puzzling over your East Indian, eh?" asked the city editor.
"Well, there may be something in it, but just now I have something
else for you to do."

"Another flying-machine story?"

"Not exactly. I'm going to give you a speci