een found on
his enemy; they had not been found in the Gregor apartment; the two
men assigned to the task of securing them would not have risked certain
death by trying to do a little bargaining on their own initiative.
In the first instance they had come forth empty-handed. In the
second instance--that of intimidating the girl to disclose his
whereabouts--neither Vladimir nor Stemmler had returned. Sinister. The
man in the dress suit again?

Conceivably, then, the drums were in the possession of this girl; and
she was holding them against the day when the fugitive would reclaim
them. The advertisement was a snare. Very good. Two could play that game
as well as one.

The girl. Was it not always so? That breed! God's curse on them all! A
crooked finger, and the women followed, hypnotized. The girl was away
from the apartment the major part of the day; so it was in order to
search her rooms. A pretty little fool.

But where were they hiding him? Gall and wormwood! That he should slip
through Boris Karlov's fingers, after all these tortuous windings across
the world! Patience. Sooner or later the girl would lead the way. Still,
patience was a galling hobble when he had so little time, when even now
they might be hunting him. Boris Karlov had left New York rather well
known.

He expanded under this thought. For the spiritual breath of life to
the anarch is flattery, attention. Had the newspapers ignored Trotzky's
advent into Russia, had they omitted the daily chronicle of his
activities, the Russian problem would not be so large as it is this day.
Trotzky would have died of chagrin.

He would answer this advertisement. Trap? He would set one himself. The
man who eventually came to negotiate would be made a prisoner and forced
to disclose the identity of the man who had interfered with the great
projects of Boris Karlov, plenipotentiary extraordinary for the red
government of Russia.

Midtown, Cutty tapped his breakfast egg dubiously. Not that he
speculated upon the freshness of the egg. What troubled him was that
advertisement. Last night, keyed high by his remarkable discovery of the
identity of his guest and his cupidity relative to the emeralds, he
had laid himself open. If he knew anything at all about the craft, that
reporter would be digging in. Fortunately he had resources unsuspected
by the reporter. Legitimately he could send a secret-service operative
to collect the mail--if Karlov decided to negotiate. St