hose who meant well by him. It was noticeable, too, as his
senses returned and the panic glare left his eyes, that his expression
changed from one of abject fear to a lowering look of suspicious
uncertainty. He peered at Steingall and the hotel clerk many times,
but gave Curtis and Devar only a perfunctory glance. Oddly enough, the
fact that the two latter were in evening dress seemed to reassure him,
and it became evident later that the presence of the clerk led him to
regard these strangers as guests in the hotel who had been attracted to
his room by the mere accident of propinquity.

His first intelligible words, uttered in broken English, were:

"Vat time ees eet?"

"Ten-thirty," said Steingall.

"_Ah, cre nom d'un nom_! I haf to go, queek!"

"Where to?"

"No mattaire. I tank you all to-morrow. I explain eferyting den.
Now, I go."

"You had better stay where you are, Monsieur de Courtois," said
Steingall in French. "Milord Valletort and Count Vassilan have
arrived. I have seen them, and nothing more can be done with respect
to their affair tonight. I am the chief of the New York Detective
Bureau, and I want you to tell me how you came to be in the state in
which you were found."

But de Courtois was regaining his wits rapidly, and the clarifying of
his senses rendered him obviously unwilling to give any information as
to the cause of his own plight. Nor would he speak French. For some
reason, probably because of a permissible vagueness in statements
couched in a foreign tongue, he insisted on using English.

"Eef you haf seen my frien's you tell me vare I fin' dem. I come your
office to-morrow, an' make ze complete explanation," he said.

"I must trouble you to-night, please," insisted Steingall quietly.
"You don't understand what has occurred while you were fastened up
here. You know Mr. Henry R. Hunter?"

"Yes, yes. I know heem."

"Well, he was stabbed while alighting from an automobile outside this
hotel shortly before eight o'clock, and I imagine he was coming to see
you."

"Stabbed! Did zey keel heem?"

"Yes. Now, tell me who 'they' were."

Monsieur Jean de Courtois was taken instantly and violently ill. He
dropped back on the bed, from which he had risen valiantly in his
eagerness to be stirring, and faintly proclaimed his inability to grasp
what the detective was saying.

"Ah, _Grand Dieu_!" he murmured. "I am eel; fetch a doctaire. My
brain, eet ees, vat you say, _eto