, my friend. Bless your tender heart for the kind thought, but in this
case it's up to me to tread warily. And the least suspicious glance cast
at a guilty party, the least flutter of eyelid or brow in expression of
one's knowledge--and the cat would be out of the bag, and all our
trouble taken for nothing. I'm going to play 'possum to-day and lay low.
And you've just got to forgive me beforehand and put up with it. I've no
doubt your own theories coincide with mine but---- Here's P. C. Mackay.
Good morning, Constable. Mr. Narkom and I just wanted to have a few
words with you, with reference to what arrangements you made for me last
night. You followed out my instructions?"

P. C. Mackay, who was a slight, wiry, light-rooted chap, and so chosen
by Cleek for the very work he had been given to do, nodded his head, and
his hand came to the salute.

"I did that, sir."

"Good. No names mentioned, Constable ... but you found some clues there,
I take it?"

"Yessir. _This._" He looked from side to side of the room, as though
uncertain how to produce the clue in case of discovery. But the door was
shut, and only they four were within the confines of the small place.
Then he put his hand into his breast-pocket and drew forth a little bit
of crimson-covered flexible electric wire.

Cleek's face fell a little.

"That all?"

"Yessir--except for a photograph of a young wummun. It was hidden in a
carved wood box on the dressin' table. I brought it along in case you
might find some use for it. Here it is."

Speaking, he drew the bit of pasteboard from his pocket and handed it
across to Cleek, who bent his eyes upon it, gave a little start at
something which was written across it in bold capitals and underscored
three times, gazed a moment at the pictured face, and then promptly
opened his pocketbook and placed it within.

"Very good, Constable. Mr. Narkom, you will do me a personal favour if
you arrange for P. C. Mackay's promotion. He did good work last night,
and it must not be forgotten. You may go, Constable."

"Thank you, sir."

The man saluted smartly, grinned all over his ruddy Scotch face at the
word "promotion," and went back to his position outside the library
door, his head in the clouds and his heart longing for the time when he
could impart this wonderful knowledge to his Maggie, and see her blue
eyes brighten.

Meanwhile Cleek, the door shut once more, dived down into his pocket and
produced the little bit