ving extradition," he went on. "It
will save time."

"I'll come, of course," I agreed. "The sooner the better. But I want you
to give me an hour here, gentlemen. I think we can interest you. Have a
cigar?"

The lean man took a cigar; the rotund man took three, putting two in his
pocket.

"How about the catch of that door?" he inquired jovially. "Any danger
of it going off again?" Really, considering the circumstances, they were
remarkably cheerful. Hotchkiss, however, was not. He paced the floor
uneasily, his hands under his coat-tails. The arrival of McKnight
created a diversion; he carried a long package and a corkscrew, and
shook hands with the police and opened the bottle with a single gesture.

"I always want something to cheer on these occasions," he said. "Where's
the water, Blakeley? Everybody ready?" Then in French he toasted the two
detectives.

"To your eternal discomfiture," he said, bowing ceremoniously. "May you
go home and never come back! If you take Monsieur Blakeley with you, I
hope you choke."

The lean man nodded gravely. "Prosit," he said. But the fat one leaned
back and laughed consumedly.

Hotchkiss finished a mental synopsis of his position, and put down his
glass. "Gentlemen," he said pompously, "within five minutes the man you
want will be here, a murderer caught in a net of evidence so fine that a
mosquito could not get through."

The detectives glanced at each other solemnly. Had they not in their
possession a sealskin bag containing a wallet and a bit of gold chain,
which, by putting the crime on me, would leave a gap big enough for
Sullivan himself to crawl through?

"Why don't you say your little speech before Johnson brings the other
man, Lawrence?" McKnight inquired. "They won't believe you, but it will
help them to understand what is coming."

"You understand, of course," the lean man put in gravely, "that what you
say may be used against you."

"I'll take the risk," I answered impatiently.

It took some time to tell the story of my worse than useless trip to
Pittsburg, and its sequel. They listened gravely, without interruption.

"Mr. Hotchkiss here," I finished, "believes that the man Sullivan,
whom we are momentarily expecting, committed the crime. Mr. McKnight is
inclined to implicate Mrs. Conway, who stabbed Bronson and then herself
last night. As for myself, I am open to conviction."

"I hope not," said the stout detective quizzically. And then Alison
was announ