West studied the face seriously.

“Yes, I believe it is, Mac,” he said at length.  “He looks much older now, but those are his features all right.  What was his game?”

“‘Con’ mostly, according to the record; only one conviction though, two years in Detroit for using the mails to defraud.  Oh, yes, here is something different, ’assault with intent to kill’—­indeterminate sentence to Joliet for that.  Nothing heard of him since.  So he is back, and at the old game again.  Do you want him brought in, Captain?”

“No, not yet.  I haven’t anything against the man now but a suspicion.  I wanted to learn his record, that’s all.  This inquiry was only incidental.  What I’m really interested in just at present is something I picked up in the alley back of Mike’s Place three or four hours ago.  It’s a note in a woman’s hand-writing, and when I found it, it was hidden in a small silver pen-knife, such as a lady might carry.  I thought it might have some connection with the case I’m trying to catch this fellow Hobart in.”

“There is a woman in it, then?”

“Yes; but I haven’t got things hitched up sufficiently to talk about it.  The note itself is blind.”

“In what respect?”

“Well, here it is.  Can you make it out?  I’ll read it for you—­’Please notify police to search Seminole quick.’”

“No signature?”

“None.”

“But that is plain enough, isn’t it?”

“Yes, if you know what she means by Seminole; what is it? a street? an apartment house? a saloon?  Do you know of anything under that name?”

McAdams stood motionless thinking.

“No, by thunder, I don’t,” he admitted reluctantly.  “There is no street of that name in the city.  There used to be a shady hotel over on Ontario Street called ‘The Seminole,’ but that was torn down ten years ago.  I never heard of any other—­did you, Dave?”

“No,” answered the lieutenant slowly, sucking away at a cigar.  “I just been looking over the directory, and I don’t find nothing.  Maybe it’s the name of a boat—­seems to me I’ve heard some such name before, but I don’t just recollect where.”

“A boat!  Well, that’s a straw anyway, and worth looking up.”  Mac picked up the telephone.  “Who is on at the Harbour Master’s office this time of night?”

“Winchell, usually, and he’ll have a record there.”

The detective jiggled the receiver impatiently.

“Yes, this is police headquarters calling.  Give me the Harbour Master’s office, please—­I said the Harbour office.  Oh, is this you, Dan?  Bob McAdams speaking.  Do you know of any boat on the lakes called the Seminole?  What’s that?  A lumber schooner at Escanaba?  Never makes this port, you say?  And you don’t know of any other by that name?  Sure, I’ll hold the wire; look it up.”

“Not a very promising lead,” he said over his shoulder, “but Dan will have the dope for us in a minute.”