e officer.

The Central Office man who had taken O'Toole's place had little to
report. O'Toole had vanished toward the south. When last seen he was
close on the heels of the man in olive-drab.

"Come on, Delaney," said Drew at this information. "We'll walk over to
Fifth Avenue and then downtown. The driver can pick up our men in the
alley. I want to clear my head of this muddle. A walk will do it!"

Delaney fell in behind his chief. They turned the corner. They struck
through a side street and westward. They saw ahead of them the white
expanse of untrodden snow, and beyond this the faint blue barricade of
the Palisades.

The hour was after three. The crisp underfooting brought wine to their
cheeks. The grip of winter air cleared both men's heads like a draught
of ether. They stepped out. Their shoulders went back. Their thoughts
passed from the case at the mansion to other things. The night had been
filled with a thousand disappointments. Greatest of these was the
stabbing memory that they both had been picked by the multimillionaire
to protect him and save him from his enemies. They had failed in this
trust. Their patron lay dead, and somewhere a whispering voice chuckled
over a victory.

"Fifth Avenue!" announced Drew as they reached the corner. "Now,
downtown, Delaney," he added cheerily. "Old Kris Kringle has nothing on
us to-night. I believe we're the only ones out."

The operative caught his chief's humor, and glanced into his face with
a smile. "Whew!" he breathed. "Whew!" he repeated from the depths of
his lungs. "I'm glad, Triggy, to get from that damn house and that damn
magpie and that----"

"So am I!" said Drew, thrusting out his hand and linking his elbow into
the cove of Delaney's arm. "So am I. Fine night for the poor firm of
Drew and Company."

Delaney glanced around and over his left shoulder. He blinked with
frosty lids as he saw the towering facades of Stockbridge's mansion;
its turrets and towers spiraled in the winter sky. He drew in his lips
and compressed them. He puffed them out as he turned.

"I'm deducting," he said, "that there's more at the bottom of this
thing than we think. Put it down for me that the Germans are mixed up
in it."

Drew walked on for a block before he answered. He gripped the
operative's arm by closing his own as he said:

"Quit deducting! It's fatal! Get your facts! Get all of them. The
answer will come then, without an effort. It will be the right answer
or