the thing is to find that man. You've no
doubt whatever, Mr. Fullaway, that this dead man upstairs is the man you
knew as Ebers, a valet at your hotel?"

"None!" answered Fullaway emphatically. "None whatever. Lots of people
will be able to identify him."

"That's good, at any rate," remarked the chief. "It's a long step
towards--something. Well, I must go."

Allerdyke was in more than half a mind to draw the chief aside and tell
him about Chettle's discoveries as regards the handwriting, but while he
hesitated Fullaway tugged earnestly at his sleeve.

"Come away!" whispered Fullaway. "Come! We're going to cut in at this
ourselves!"

CHAPTER XXVI

PARTICIPANTS IN THE SECRET

Allerdyke was scarcely prepared for the feverish energy with which
Fullaway dragged him out of the hotel, forced him into the first taxi-cab
they met, and bade the driver make haste to the Waldorf. He knew by that
time that the American was a nervous, excitable individual who now and
then took on tremendous fits of work in which he hustled and bustled
everybody around him, but he had never seen him quite so excited and
eager as now. The discovery at that shabby hotel which they had just
quitted seemed to have acted on him like the smell of powder on an old
war-horse; he appeared to be positively panting for action.

"Allerdyke!" he almost shouted as the cab moved away, and he himself
smote one clenched fist upon the other. "Allerdyke--this thing has got to
go through! I resign all claim to that reward. Allerdyke!--this affair is
too serious for any hole-and-corner work. I shall tell Van Koon that what
we know, or fancy, must be thrown into the common stock of knowledge! The
thing is to get at the people who've been behind this poor chap Ebers, or
Federman, or Herman, or whatever his name is. Allerdyke!--we must go
right into things."

Allerdyke laughed sardonically. When Fullaway developed excitement, he
developed coolness, and his voice became as dry and hard as the other's
was fervid and eloquent.

"Aye!" he said in his most phlegmatic tones. "Aye, just so! And where
d'ye intend to cut in, now, like? Is it a sort of Gordian knot affair
that you're thinking of? Going to solve this difficulty at one blow?"

"Don't be sarcastic," retorted Fullaway. "I'm going to take things clean
up from this Federman or Ebers affair. I'm going deep--deep! You'll see
in a few minutes."

"Willing to see--and to hear--aught," remarked Allerdyke l