pting noises. The delicate nature of some of the machines he
used would not tolerate so much as the footsteps of a man within a
hundred yards, and a passing car would have disrupted them entirely.

* * * * *

Lambert was terribly nervous; he trembled under the gaze of the stern
detective, come with several colleagues from a neighboring town at the
call of Madge Crawford's frightened family. The girl, whose picture
stood on a working table nearby, looked at them from the photograph as
a beautiful young woman of twenty-five, light of hair, with large eyes
and a lovely face.

Detective Phillips pointed dramatically to the likeness of the missing
girl. "Can you," he said, "look at her there, and deny you loved her?
And if she did not love you in return, then we have a motive for what
you have done--jealousy. Come, tell us what you have done with her.
Our men will find her, anyway; they are searching the cellar for her
now. You can't hope to keep her, alive, and if she is dead--"

Lambert uttered a cry of despair, and put his face in his long
fingers. "She--she--don't say she's dead!"

"Then you did love her!" exclaimed Phillips triumphantly, and
exchanged glances with his companions.

"Of course I love her. And she returned my love. We were secretly
engaged, and were to be married when we had finished these extremely
important experiments. It is infamous though, to accuse me of having
killed her; if I have done so, then it was no fault of mine."

"Then you did kill her?"

"No, no. I cannot believe she is really gone."

"Why did you evade her parents' inquiries?"

"Because ... I have been trying to bring her ... to re-materialize
her."

"You mean to bring her back to life?"

"Yes."

"Couldn't a doctor do that better than you, if she is hidden somewhere
about here?" asked Phillips gravely.

"No, no. You do not understand. She cannot be seen, she has
dematerialized. Oh, go away. I'm the only man, save, possibly, my
friend Doctor Morgan, who can help her now. And Morgan--I've thought
of calling him, but I've been working every instant to get the right
combination. Go away, for God's sake!"

"We can't go away until we have found out Miss Crawford's fate," said
Phillips patiently.

* * * * *

Another sleuth entered the immense laboratory. He made his way through
the myriad strange machines, a weird collection of xylophones, gongs,
stone slabs cut