er you may create or any
damage you may do. Now you may go ahead."

"Let's have all your keys, Brainard," Gavegan choked out.

Larry handed them over. With Miss Sherwood, Hunt, and Larry looking
silently on, the two men began their examination. They began with the
papers on Larry's desk and in its drawers; and in all his life Gavegan
had not been so considerate in a search as he now was with Miss
Sherwood's blue eyes coldly upon him. They unlocked cabinets,
scrutinized their contents, shook out books, examined the backs of
pictures, took up rugs; then passed into Larry's bedroom. Miss Sherwood
made no move to follow the officers into that more intimate apartment,
and the other two watchers remained with her.

A minute passed. Then Gavegan reentered, a puzzled, half-triumphant look
on his red face, holding out a square of paint-covered canvas.

"Found this thing in Brainard's chiffonier. What the he--I mean what's
it doing out here?"

There was not an instant's doubt as to what the thing was. Larry
started, and Hunt started, and Miss Sherwood started. But it was Miss
Sherwood who first spoke.

"Why, it's a portrait of Miss Cameron, in costume! And painted by Mr.
Hunt!" In amazement she turned first upon Larry and upon Hunt. "When did
you ever paint her portrait, when you did not meet Miss Cameron till
you met her here? And, Mr. Brainard, how do you come to possess Miss
Cameron's portrait?"

It was Gavegan who spoke up promptly, and not either of the two suddenly
discomfited men. And Gavegan instantly sensed in the situation a chance
to get even for the humiliation his self-esteem had just suffered.

"Miss Cameron nothing! Her real name is Maggie Carlisle, and she used
to live at a dump of a pawnshop down on the East Side run by Brainard's
grandmother. Brainard knew her there, and so did Mr. Hunt."

"But--but--" gasped Miss Sherwood--"she's been coming out here as Maggie
Cameron!"

"I tell you your Maggie Cameron is Maggie Carlisle!" said Gavegan
gloatingly. "I've known her for years. Her father is Old Jimmie
Carlisle, a notorious crook. And she's mixed up right now with her
father and some others in a crooked game. And Brainard here used to be
sweet on her, and probably still is, and if he's been letting her come
here, without telling you who she is--well, I guess you know the answer.
Didn't I tell you, Miss, that give me a chance and I'd turn up something
against this guy Brainard!"

Miss Sherwood's face w