ch attention.

"I--I can't blame you, Professor Kennedy," she cried, choking down a sob
in her voice, "but I have just discovered--he has told me that it is
even worse than I had anticipated."

We were both following her closely, the incident of the latch-key still
fresh in mind.

"Some time ago," she hurried on, "I missed my latch-key. I thought
nothing of it at the time--thought perhaps I had mislaid it. But today
he told me--just after the dance, even while I was making him think I
would pay him the money, because--because I liked him--he told me he had
it. The brute! He must have picked my handbag!"

Her eyes were blazing now with indignation. Yet as she looked at us
both, evidently the recollection of what had just happened came
flooding over her mind, and she dropped her head in her hands in
helpless dismay at the new development.

Craig pulled out his watch hastily. "It is about six, Mrs. Seabury," he
reassured. "Can you be here at, say, eight?"

"I will be here," she murmured pliantly, realizing her own helplessness.

She had scarcely closed the door when Craig seized the telephone, and
hurriedly tried to locate Seabury himself.

"Apparently no trace of him yet," he fumed, as he hung up the receiver.
"The first problem is how to get that key."

Instantly I thought of Dunn's secret service girl. Kennedy shook his
head doubtfully. "I'm afraid there is no time for that," he answered.
"But will you attend to that end of the affair for me, Walter? I have
just a little more work here at the laboratory before I am ready. I
don't care how you do it, but I want you to convey to Sherburne the
welcome news that Mrs. Seabury is prepared to give in, in any way he may
see fit, if he will call her up here at eight o'clock."

Kennedy had already plunged back among his beakers and test tubes, and
with these slender instructions I sallied forth in my quest of
Sherburne. I had little difficulty in locating him and delivering my
message, which he received with a satisfaction that invited assault and
battery and mayhem. However, I managed to restrain myself and rejoin
Craig in the laboratory, shortly after seven o'clock.

I had scarcely had time to assure Kennedy of the success of my mission,
when we were surprised to see the door open and Seabury himself appear.

His face was actually haggard. Whether or not he had believed the
hastily concocted story of Kennedy at the Vanderveer, his mind had not
ceased to work on th