e brow,
and gazes steady at floral exhibit No. 4, turnin' it round slow between
his fat fingers and almost goin' into a trance over it.

"Hadn't you better take a look around the offices," suggests Old
Hickory, "examine the doors, and so on?"

"No, no!" says Bingstetter, wavin' away the interruption. "No bypaths.
The trained mind rejects everything contributory, subordinate. It
refuses to be led off into a maze of unsupported conjecture. It seeks
only the vital, primogenitive fact, the hidden truth at the heart of
things. And that is all here--here!"

Piddie leans forward for another look at the flowers, and wags his head
solemn, I edges around for a closer view myself, and Old Hickory stares
puzzled.

"You don't mean to say," says he, "that just by gazing at a few flowers
you can----"

"S-s-s-sh!" breaks in the Doc, holdin' up a warnin' hand. "It is
coming. I am working outward from the primal fact toward the
objective. It is evolving, taking on definite proportions, assuming
shape."

"Well, what's the result?" demands the boss, hitchin' restless in his
chair.

"Patience, my dear Sir, patience," says the Doc soothin'. "The
introdeductive method cannot be hurried. It is an exact process,
requiring utmost concentration, until in the fullness of the moment----
Ah, I have it!"

"Eh?" says Old Hickory.

"One moment," says the Doc. "A trifling detail is still missing,--the
day of the week. To-day is Wednesday, is it not? Now, on what day of
last week did you receive a--er--similar token?"

Old Hickory finally reckons up that it must have been last Wednesday.

"And the week before?" goes on the Doc. "The bunch of flowers appeared
then on Wednesday, did it not?"

Yes, he was pretty sure it did.

"Ah!" says Bingstetter, settlin' back in his chair like it was all
over, "then the cumulative character is established. And such exact
recurrence cannot be due to chance. No, it has all been nicely
calculated, carried out with relentless precision. Four Wednesdays,
four floral threats!"

"Threats?" says Mr. Ellins, sittin' up prompt.

"You failed to read them," says the Doc. "That is what comes of
neglecting minor details. But fortunately I came in time to decipher
this one. Observe the fateful number,--thirteen. Note the colors
here,--brown, golden, pink. The pink of the mallow means youth, the
goldenrod stands for hoarded wealth, the brown for age. And all are
bound together by wire grass,