he came out of it with them at young Drake's call, and
joined the party in the armoury.

"Doctor," said Cleek, looking up as he came in, "we've got to the
puzzle's unpicking, and I thought you'd be interested to hear the
result. I was right about the substance employed, for I've found
the stuff and I've nailed the guilty party. It was woorali, and
the reason why there was no trace of a weapon was because the
blessed thing melted. It was an icicle, my friend, an icicle with
its point steeped in woorali, and if you want to know how it did
its work--why, it was shot in there from the cross-bow hanging
on the wall immediately behind me, and the person who shot it in
was so short that a chair was necessary to get up to the bowman's
slit when----No, you don't, my beauty! There's a gentleman with a
noose waiting to pay his respects to all such beasts as you!"

Speaking, he sprang with a sharp, flashing movement that was like
to nothing so much as the leap of a pouncing cat, and immediately
there was a yap and a screech, a yell and a struggle, a click of
clamping handcuffs, and a scuffle of writhing limbs, and a moment
later they that were watching saw him rise with a laugh, and stand,
with his hands on his hips, looking down at Ojeebi lying crumpled
up in a heap, with gyves on his wrists and panic in his eyes, at
the foot of the guarded door.

"Well, my pleasant-faced, agreeable little demon, it'll be many a
long day before the spirits of your ancestors welcome you back to
Nippon!" Cleek said as the panic-stricken Jap, realizing what was
before him, began to shriek and shriek until his brain and nerves
sank into a collapse and he fainted where he lay. "I've got you and
I've got the woorali. I went through your trunk and found it--as I
knew I should from the moment I clapped eyes upon you. If the laws
of the country are so lax that they make it possible for you to do
what you have done, they also are stringent enough to make you pay
the price of it with your yellow little neck!"

"In the name of heaven, Mr. Cleek," spoke up young Drake, breaking
silence suddenly, "what can the boy have done? You speak as if it
were he that murdered my father; but, man, why should he? What had
he to gain? What motive could a harmless little chap like this have
for killing the man he served?"

"The strongest in the world, my friend--the greed of gain!" said
Cleek. "What he could not do in your father's land it is possible
for him to do in