away, after dragging down his confederates. He had sworn at the
time of conviction that he would get Stockbridge if it took to the
longest day of his life. Drew remembered this oath and promise as he
waited for Harrigan to appear from the booth.

He turned to the magpie and the cage. He studied both with keen eyes
which had been trained in the school of hard facts piled upon each
other until they pointed a way. Stockbridge had owned the pet for many
years. It was the one domestic trait in his make-up, save Loris. It
would be a strange thing, Drew concluded, swinging toward the window,
if Morphy and Morphy's confederates were to fall through a remembered
couplet dropped by the magpie. It was in the order of events, however.
It was the bright, particular finger which pointed toward the prisoner
at Sing Sing. Nothing would be more logical than for the bird to
remember the millionaire's last words--or dying words. They would be
shrieked aloud and unforgetable.

"More snow," said Drew to himself. "This is a white day if ever there
was one. I wonder if Delaney got to the house in time?"

He turned as a "Buurrrr! Burrrr!" sounded at the ringing-box below the
desk.

"Hello!" he said sharply into the transmitter. "Hello! Who's this?"

He waited as some out-of-town connection was made. A thin voice broke
in from the silence. The voice rose in timber. "Oh, Hello!" exclaimed
the detective, recognizing Flynn, one of his operatives. "Hello,
Flynn," he said. "What's the weather like out at Morristown? Yes! ...
Yes! ... Oh, is that so.... What? ... Too bad! ... Well, you better
come in.... Take the first train and jump on the job.... He's in
Florida, eh? ... Well, that lets him out.... Good-by, Flynn!"

Drew reached for a pencil and scratched a name off his list before he
hung up the receiver. "That leaves six," he said, running his eyes down
the names of the suspects. "Six to go. We'll round them up--or out. It
looks bad for one or two of them!"

He dropped the pencil to the desk with a flip of his fingers. He
replaced the telephone receiver on the hook. He twirled the chair and
leaned forward with his hands on his knees.

"Nice bird, you," he said, addressing the magpie. "We're alone, you and
I. Why don't you tell me what you know--what you heard in that library,
when the millionaire talked over the phone and then received the
cupronickel bullet in the base of his brain? He said, 'Ah, Sing!' eh?
He said it, or we are jumping