Czenki.

"That settles it, gentlemen," declared the chief with an air of
finality. "Czenki, I charge you with the murder of Mr. Kellner here.
Anything you may say will be used against you. Come along, now;
don't make any trouble."

CHAPTER XVI

MR. CZENKI EXPLAINS

Fairly drunk with excitement, his lean face, usually expressionless,
now flushed and working strangely, and his beady black eyes aglitter,
Mr. Czenki reeled into the study where Mr. Latham and Mr. Schultze
sat awaiting Mr. Birnes. He raised one hand, enjoining silence,
closed the door, locked it and placed the key in his pocket, after
which he turned upon Mr. Latham.

"He _makes_ them, man! He _makes them!_" he burst out between
gritting teeth. "Don't you understand? _He makes them!_"

Mr. Latham, astonished and a little startled, came to his feet; the
phlegmatic German sat still, staring at the expert without
comprehension. Mr. Czenki's thin fist was clenched under his
employer's nose, and the jeweler drew back a little, vaguely alarmed.

"I don't understand what--" he began.

"The diamonds!" Mr. Czenki interrupted, and the long pent-up
excitement within him burst into a flame of impatience. "The
diamonds! He makes them! Don't you see? Diamonds! He
_manufactures_ them!"

"_Gott in Himmel!_" exclaimed Mr. Schultze, and it was anything but
an irreverent ejaculation. He arose. "Der miracle has come to pass!
Ve might haf known! Ve might haf known!"

"Millions and millions of dollars' worth of them, even _billions_,
for all we know," the expert rushed on in incoherent violence. "A
sum greater than all the combined wealth of the world in the hands
of one man! Think of it!" Mr. Latham only gazed at him blankly,
and he turned instinctively to the one who understood--Mr. Schultze.
"Think of the mind that achieved it, man!"

He collapsed into a chair and sat looking at the floor, his fingers
writhing within one another, muttering to himself. Mr. Latham was a
cold, sane, unimaginative man of business. As yet the full import of
it all hadn't reached him. He stared dumbly, first at Mr. Czenki,
then at Mr. Schultze. There was not even incredulity in the look,
only faint amazement that two such well-balanced men should have gone
mad at once. At last the German importer turned upon him flatly.

"Why don'd you ged egzited aboud id, Laadham?" he demanded. "He iss
all righd, nod crazy," he added with whimsical assurance. "He iss
de