to a little matter; it will occupy us but a
moment," making a step nearer the desk and away from the others, yet
still holding them in her eye.

"What is it you wish, madame?" the Secretary inquired a trifle huskily;
his throat was becoming somewhat parched by the anxiety of the
situation.

"I see you have on your desk a small blue candle; employed, I assume,
for melting wax for your private seal," she went on. "May I trouble your
Excellency to light the aforesaid candle?"

The Secretary promptly struck a match, and managed with a most unsteady
hand to touch it to the wick.

As the flame flared up, she drew a narrow envelope from her bag and
tossed it on the desk before him.

"Now," said she, "will you be kind enough to look at the enclosure."

The Secretary took up the envelope and drew out the sheet. It was a
single sheet of the thinnest texture used for foreign correspondence. He
looked first at one side, then at the other.

"What do you see, sir?" she asked.

"The sheet is blank," he replied.

"Try the envelope," she recommended.

He turned it over. "It also is blank," he said.

"Sympathetic ink!" Carpenter laughed.

"Just what we are about to see, wise one!" she mocked. "Now, your
Excellency, will you place the envelope in the candle's flame?"

The Secretary took the envelope by the tip of one corner and held it in
the blaze until it was burned to his fingers--no writing was disclosed.

"Now the letter, please?" she directed. And when Carpenter would have
protested, she cut him short with a peremptory gesture. "Don't
interrupt, sir!" she exclaimed.

And Carpenter laughed softly and did nothing more--being, with
Harleston, in enjoyment of their chief's discomfiture.

"The letter--see--your Excellency," she repeated with a bewildering
smile.

And as the flame crept down the thin sheet, just ahead of it, apparent
to them all, crept also the writing, brought out by the heat. In a
moment it was over; the last bit of the corner burning in a brass tray
where the Secretary had dropped it.

"Now, Mr. Harleston," said Madeline Spencer, lowering her revolver as
the final flicker of the flame expired, "I am ready to submit to a
search."

Harleston glanced inquiringly at the Secretary.

"The lady is with you," the Secretary remarked with a sigh of relief.

"Very well, sir," said Harleston. "Ranleigh has a skilled woman in the
waiting-room, she will officiate in the matter. We're not likely to find
an