a peephole at one corner of a panel. The director
promised to wait there until the interview with Latisan was over. The
chief said he would make it short.

Latisan walked in exactly on the stroke of three; after he came up in
the elevator he had waited in the corridor, humbly obedient to Mern's
directions as to the hour.

"Nothing doing in that matter to-day, Latisan," stated the chief,
affecting to be busily engaged with papers on his desk. "Try me
to-morrow, same time."

"Very well, sir," agreed the young man, somberly. In prospect, another
twenty-four hours filled with lagging minutes! He had grown to know the
hideous torture of such hours in the case of a man who before-time had
found the days too short for his needs.

"By the way," said Mern, still hanging grimly to the desire to find out
more about what the matter was with the office's internal affairs, "did
anybody tell you that Miss Jones had returned to New York?"

"I wired to Brophy a few days ago. He said she had come back here,
according to what he knew of her movements."

"You fell in love with her, didn't you?" The chief's tone was crisp with
the vigor of third-degree abruptness.

"Yes," admitted Latisan, showing no resentment; he had promulgated that
fact widely enough in the north.

"Just why did she urge you so strongly to go back to the drive?" The
young man's meekness had drawn the overeager chief along to an
incautious question.

"You ought to know better than I, sir. I take it that she was obeying
your orders about how to work the trick on me, though it isn't clear in
my mind as yet; but I'm not a detective."

"Did she promise to marry you as soon as the Flagg drive was down?"
Still Mern was boldly taking advantage of the young man's docility.

"That's true. I must admit it because it was said in public."

Mern scratched his ear. The thing was clearing somewhat in Crowley's
direction; the blunderer had not lied on one point at least--the point
that Mern found most blindly puzzling. What in the mischief had happened
to the nature of Lida Kennard, as Mern knew that nature, so he thought!

"You remember Operative Crowley, do you?"

"Naturally."

"Are you holding an especial grudge against him?"

"I don't know why I should, sir. It's a dirty business he's in, but he
gave me that letter which I turned over to you yesterday, and for some
reason he exposed the trick that was being put upon me by the girl. If I
can get at the bottom of