splashed with
mud. Friday was a rainy day, you will remember. By the merest chance my
Harkville representative also learned yesterday that Kull had purchased
some saws for cutting steel before leaving town on Tuesday. He had
bought a ticket for Batavia, but that was no certain sign that he would
not stop off in Griffin.

"To see through the man's entire plan now is, of course, like reading it
in print. All that we do not know is just how Coster happened to lose
the Torpedo, then pick up the car of our friends here, which certainly
he did. That we will learn later. The point I would bring to your notice
now is that Kull, whatever his first plan may have been, changed
somewhat his course of action as he found circumstances favoring him. He
had learned of Coster reaching Griffin in an intoxicated condition and
being locked up. He enabled him to escape by passing saws in to him by
means of a long stick put between the bars of the rear corridor window,
which was open. This he did last night, Mr. Fobes believes, and he
probably is correct.

"It is an interesting fact, but not a strange one, for usually it is the
small thing that trips the criminal up,--an interesting fact, observe,
that the dog Kull had been at such pains to be rid of in Harkville, lest
it innocently betray the spot where his car had been concealed, had
appeared here in Griffin to trouble him. To regain possession of the
Torpedo (after having failed to get it placed in a barn where he could
more easily get at it) Kull found it necessary to kill the Scotch
collie. This he did on Sunday night. It was also desirable that Mr.
Creek be placed beyond power to hinder. An anonymous telephone call from
Port Greeley, summoning him there, did the work nicely.

"Now we come to the circumstance that Kull believed so especially
favored him--Coster breaking jail, the Torpedo disappearing, poor old
Mr. Peek assaulted and killed--all this in one night. Where would
suspicion naturally point? To Coster, certainly."

Mr. Rack smiled and paused.

"Wonderful!" exclaimed Mr. Wagg.

"Not at all. The boys deserve more credit than I. And we found so much
additional information the moment we reached Griffin to-night, that the
veriest novice could hardly go wrong. Billy had Coster's measure from
boots up. Fobes knew nothing except that he was able to tell me that
Creek telephoned to him from Port Greeley, stating that there was
deception in his being summoned to that town, and as