he bracelets unless I have to," says I. "I expect
he'll toddle along meek enough when he sees the two of us."

I hadn't overstated the case much at that. Course, Jake Zosco has
developed more or less of a grouch durin' his 36 hours of solitary
confinement, but when Ellery orders him to march out with his hands up
he comes right along.

"What foolishness now, you young rough necker?" he demands.

"You'll soon find out how foolish it is," says Ellery. "You're in the
hands of the law."

"Wha-a-at!" gasps Jake. "For such a little thing as that? It--it can't
be. Who says it of me?"

"Isn't this your hat?" says I, handin' him the hail-proof kelly. "It
is, eh? Then you're the one. Come on, now. Right up to the house."

"It's a foolishness," he protests. "In Saginaw it couldn't be done."

All the way up the hill he mutters and grumbles but he keeps on going.
Not until he gets near enough to get a glimpse of all the people in the
drawin'-room does he balk.

"Matilda and all!" says he. "Why couldn't we go in by the back?"

"Nothing doin'," says Ellery, flourishing his knife. "You're goin' to
face the music, you are."

"That's the way to talk to him, Ellery," says I. "But if you don't mind
I think I'd better take charge of him from now on."

"Sure thing," says Ellery. "He's your prisoner."

"Then in you go, Jake," says I. "And don't forget about keepin' the
hands up. Now!"

Say, you should have seen that bunch when our high tragedy trio marches
in; Ellery with his butcher knife on one side; me on the other; and
leadin' in the center Mr. Jake Zosco, his arms above his head, his
dinner coat all dusty and wrinkled, and a two days' stubble of whiskers
decoratin' his face.

It was Mrs. Jake who got her breath first and swooped down on her little
man with wild cries of "Oh, Jake! My own Jakey at last!" And in another
second his head is all tangled up with the pearl ropes.

Next Andres Zosco comes to. "What is it, a holdup act?" he asks.
"Ellery, what you doing with that knife? What's it all about, somebody?"

That seems to be my cue, so I steps to the front. "Sorry, Mr. Zosco,"
says I, "but Ellery has discovered a deep laid plot."

"Eh?" says Zosco, gawpin'.

"To do away with you and your wife," I goes on. "He says your brother
Jake is in it, and Mrs. Jake, and the butler, and maybe a lot of others.
Isn't that right, Ellery?"

"Yep," says Ellery. "They're all crooks."

"What confounded tommyrot!" says Zosco. "Wh