floor tenants were joining in the march,
and that as they came the janitress was explaining to all and sundry how
the weird miscreant had sought to inveigle her into admitting him to Mr.
Slack's rooms, and how she had refused, and how with maniacal craft--or
words to that effect--he had, nevertheless, managed to secure admittance
to the house, and how he must still be in the house. And through all her
discourse there were questions from this one or that, crossing its flow
but in no-wise interrupting it; and through it all percolated hootingly
the terrorised outcries of Mr. Braydon's maiden aunt-in-law, issuing
through the keyhole of the door behind which she cowered. Only now she
was interjecting a new harassment into the already complicated mystery
by pleading that someone repair straightway to her and render
assistance, as she felt herself to be on the verge of fainting dead
away.

With searches into closets and close scrutiny of all dark corners passed
en route, the procession advanced to the top floor, mainly guided in its
oncoming by the clew deduced from the circumstances of the mad intruder
having betrayed a desire to secure access to Mr. Slack's apartment,
with the intention, as the caretaker more than once suggested on her way
up, of murdering Mr. Slack in his bed. Before the ascent had been
completed she was quite certain this was the correct deduction, and so
continued to state with all the emphasis of which she was capable.

"He couldn't possibly have got downstairs again," somebody hazarded; "so
he must be upstairs here still--must be right round here somewhere."

"Didn't I tell you he was lookin' for Mr. Slack to lay in wait for him
and destroy the poor man in his bed?" shrilled the caretaker.

"Watch carefully now, everybody. He might rush out of some corner at
us."

"Say, my transom's halfway open!" Mr. Bob Slack exclaimed. "And, by
Jove, there's a light shining through it yonder from the bedroom. He's
inside--we've got him cornered, whoever he is."

Boldly Mr. Slack stepped forward and rapped hard on the door.

"Better step on out peaceably," he called, "because there's an officer
here with us and we've got you trapped."

"It's me, Bob, it's me," came in a wheezy, plaintive wail from somewhere
well back in the apartment.

"Who's me?" demanded Mr. Slack, likewise forgetting his grammar in the
thrill of this culminating moment.

"Algy--Algernon Leary."

"Not with that voice, it isn't. But I'l