ard Gilder's house, last night! I knew the trick was going to be
pulled off, and so I planted Cassidy and a couple of other men just
outside the room where the haul was to be made. Then, I went away,
and after something like half an hour I came back to make the arrests
myself." A look of intense disgust spread itself over the Inspector's
massive face. "Well," he concluded sheepishly, "when I broke into the
room I found young Gilder along with that Turner woman he married, and
they were just talking together."

"No trace of the others?" Demarest questioned crisply.

At the inquiry, Burke's face crimsoned angrily, then again set in grim
lines.

"I found Griggs lying on the floor--dead!" Once again the disgust showed
in his expression. "The Turner woman says young Gilder shot Griggs
because he broke into the house. Ain't that the limit?"

"What does the boy say?" the District Attorney demanded.

Burke shook his head dispiritedly.

"Nothing," he answered. "She told him not to talk, and so, of course, he
won't, he's such a fool over her."

"And what does she say?" Demarest asked. He found himself rather amused
by the exceeding chagrin of the Inspector over this affair.

Burke's voice grew savage as he snapped a reply.

"Refuses to talk till she sees a lawyer." But a touch of cheerfulness
appeared in his tones as he proceeded. "We've got Chicago Red and Dacey,
and we'll have Garson before the day's over. And, oh, yes, they've
picked up a young girl at the Turner woman's place. And we've got one
real clue--for once!" The speaker's expression was suddenly triumphant.
He opened a drawer of the desk, and took out Garson's pistol, to which
the silencer was still attached.

"You never saw a gun like that before, eh?" he exclaimed.

Demarest admitted the fact after a curious examination.

"I'll bet you never did!" Burke cried, with satisfaction. "That thing
on the end is a Maxim silencer. There are thousands of them in use on
rifles, but they've never been able to use them on revolvers before.
This is a specially made gun," he went on admiringly, as he took it
back and slipped it into a pocket of his coat. "That thing is absolutely
noiseless. I've tried it. Well, you see, it'll be an easy thing--easiest
thing in the world!--to trace that silencer attachment. Cassidy's
working on that end of the thing now."

For a few minutes longer, the two men discussed the details of the
crime, theorizing over the baffling event. Th