ose you
think yourself the cleverest in the world, do you? Don't you admit any
superior? If so, get him; if not, then prove your own worth. I repeat, I
want no undue favor shown to McClellan Thorpe, but if he is not the
guilty man, then I want you to move heaven and earth to find the real
criminal. Can't you conceive, Weston, of a murderer so clever as to have
committed the crime, planted the vial as evidence against Thorpe and
made his escape leaving no clew?"

"I can conceive of such a thing, sir, as I can conceive of a ghost,--but
there is no evidence for either conception."

"Evidence enough for ghosts, Weston! Haven't you read my book?"

"Oh, I clean forgot that book you wrote, Mr. Crane. No, I haven't read
it, but my folks have, and I dare say you do believe in spooks. But,
come, now, you don't believe a spook killed Mr. Blair, do you, sir?"

"No,--and yet, it is within the bounds of possibility----"

"Not as the police count possibility! There's small chance of any human
agency other than Mr. Thorpe, but far less chance of a supernatural
agent! I'll be getting along, Mr. Crane, if you're going off on that
track."

"Hold on, Weston, I'm in earnest about this special detective. Suppose I
engage a private one. Can you and he work in harmony?"

"Oh, yes, I'm not pig-headed. So long as he don't interfere too much, or
get me into any scrapes with his highfalutin tricks,--which they all
have, go ahead and get him. I'll do my own duty, as I see it and as it's
dictated to me by Headquarters; but if you want to engage a dozen
private detectives, there's no law against it. And, sir, I'm free to
confess I feel mighty sorry for that pretty daughter of yours, and if
anybody else can save her man for her, when I can't--why, let him at
it!"

"Good for you, Weston, I hoped you'd be above petty jealousy. Go on,
now, and see if you can't connect up that empty vial with somebody whose
name isn't Thorpe,--and, I say, you're not going to arrest him yet, are
you?"

"Not just yet,--but,--well, I'll let you know--soon, where we stand."

His visitor gone, Benjamin Crane put on his hat and went at once to see
Madame Parlato. He had acquired the habit of an interview with her when
anything bothered him, and his faith in her powers was unshaken.

His request for a _seance_ was granted, for since the book of Benjamin
Crane's had made such a success, the medium was besieged with patrons,
yet she always gave Crane the preference ov