gh access to the upper floors was to be had only
by ladders, down which Mary and her uncle, Barton Keith, had been
carried.

"Here are my offices," said Mr. Keith, who accompanied Tom, Ned, Mr.
Damon and Mr. Baxter, as he ushered them into his suite of rooms.

"Bless my fountain pen! nothing is burned here," cried the eccentric
man.

"No, the flames just shot upward," explained the fire chief, who was
leading the party. "But I think those chemicals of yours would have
been just as effective, Mr. Swift, if the fire had mushroomed out more."

"It was hot enough as it was," answered Tom, with a grim laugh.

"Bless my thermometer, too hot--too hot by far!" exclaimed Tom Swift's
eccentric friend, and to this Ned nodded an amused agreement.

An exclamation from Mr. Baxter attracted the attention of all in Mr.
Keith's office. The chemist picked up from the floor a bundle of papers.

"Here is a bundle of documents that some one has dropped, Mr. Keith,"
he said. "I guess you forgot to put it in your safe. Why--why--no--they
aren't yours! They're mine. Here are my missing dye formulae! The secret
papers I've been searching for so long! The ones I thought Field and
Melling had!" cried Mr. Baxter. "How--how did they get here?" and,
wonderingly, he looked at the bundle of papers he had discovered in such
a strange manner.

CHAPTER XXV

THE LIGHT OF DAY

"What's that? Your dye formulae here in my office?" cried Mr. Keith,
for he had heard something of the chemist's loss, though he did not
directly associate Field and Melling with it.

"That's what this is! The very papers, containing all the rare secrets,
for which I have been so at a loss!" cried the delighted old man. "Now
I can give to the world the dyes for which it has long been waiting!
Oh, Tom Swift, you did more than you knew when you put out this fire!"
and he hugged the bundle of smoke-smelling papers to his breast.

"But how did they get here?" asked the young inventor. "I know that
Field and Melling had offices in this building. They were starting a
new dye concern, and, though Mr. Baxter and I suspected them of having
stolen his secret, we couldn't prove it."

"But we can now!" cried Mr. Baxter. "Though I don't know that I'll
bother even to accuse them, as long as I have back my previous papers.
I see how it happened. They had the formulae in their office. They
rushed out with the documents, and, when they found they couldn't get
past this floor,