Doctor Q, wildly excited, started to beat out the flames, and in so doing allowed several unseared letters to flutter to the floor.  One in particular arrested Zita’s attention.  It was a drawing, a plan of some sort, and was marked, “Plan of Den.”

Zita placed her foot on it, and, while Doctor Q was engaged with the small blaze, she reached down and, hastily folding it, thrust it into one of the low shoes she was wearing.  Then she went to Doctor Q’s assistance and in a jiffy the fire was out.  The doctor was furiously angry at her, and, feeling that she had accomplished all that she might expect, she expressed her regrets for the accident and went out before his anger became any worse.

Thus it was that Zita arrived at Brent Rock only a few moments after Locke, whom she found in the library with Eva, turning over the pages of the record he had secured at Balcom’s.

The record purported to be a record of marriages of Wallace County, New York, and Locke finally found an entry that read, “Peter Brent and Rita Dane.”

For a moment Zita was stunned.  It was her mother’s name.

Locke smiled.  “Yes, Zita,” he said, quietly, “for a moment Eva and I were surprised, too.  But it’s a palpable forgery.  Balcom has tried to prove that you and Eva are half-sisters, but look.”

He handed her a powerful magnifying-glass and through it the clumsy forgery stood out in all its crudeness, showing plainly where other names had been erased and these inserted.

Zita was greatly disappointed, for she had thought that at last she would establish her identity.  Then she remembered the paper she had hidden in her shoe.  She slipped the paper out and handed it to Locke, who was greatly excited over its importance.

They were still studying it when Locke heard a strange noise, as of shuffling feet, in the hallway.  He jumped to the door, and there, in the dim light of the stairway leading down to the Graveyard of Genius, he saw a knot of men carrying another man, who was evidently helpless.  Locke started forward, but they were gone.

Eva hurried up-stairs to her father’s room, fearing something was wrong.

“Father’s gone!” she cried, despairingly.

Locke threw himself full against the door at the head of the cellar stairs which the men had slammed shut.  He tried to batter it down, but it was too strongly built.  Then he drew his revolver and with the barrel started to push out the pins from the hinges.  He worked feverishly and succeeded in driving the top pin out.  Then, using it as a lever, he was able to pull the door from its frame.

He dashed down the stairs, but was late by only the fraction of a second, as a metal hand was just closing the huge door to the Graveyard of Genius.  He fumbled at the secret combination, and as he was doing so Eva and Zita joined him.

The door swung open and they rushed through.  But the place was deserted.