“Have you told any one else what you have told me?”

“Only Josette.  She’s my fiancee.  Miss La Baum is her last name.”

“You told her nothing further that did not come out at the inquest?”

Valois hesitated.

“Maybe I did, miss,” he admitted nervously.  “She questioned me about losing my job, and her questions brought things into my mind that I might never have thought of otherwise.  And at last I came to believe that it wasn’t Mr. Frederick who was dead at all.”

The valet’s last remark was crashing in its effect.

Miss Donovan’s eyes dilated with eagerness and amazement.

“Not Frederick Cavendish!  Mr. Valois, tell me—­why?”

The other’s voice fell to a whisper.

“Frederick Cavendish, miss,” he said hollowly, “had a scar on his chest—­from football, he once told me—­and the man we laid out, well, of course his body was a bit burned, but he appeared to have no scar at all!”

“You know that?” demanded the girl, frightened by the import of the revelation.

“Yes, miss.  The assistant in the undertaking rooms said so, too.  Doubting my own mind, I asked him.  The man we laid out had no scar on his chest.”

Miss Donovan sprang suddenly to her feet.

“Mr. Valois,” she said breathlessly, “you come and tell that story to my city editor, and he’ll see that you get a job—­and a real one.  You and I have started something, Mr. Valois.”

And, tossing money to cover the bill on the table, she took Valois’s arm, and with him in tow hurried through the restaurant to the city streets on one of which was the Star office, where Farriss, the city editor, daily damned the doings of the world.

That night when Farriss had heard the evidence his metallic eyes snapped with an unusual light.  Farriss, for once, was enthusiastic.

“A great lead!  By God, it is!  Now to prove it, Stella”—­Farriss always resorted to first names—­“you drop everything else and go to this, learn what you can, spend money if you have to.  I’ll drag Willis off police, and you work with him.  And damn me, if you two spend money, you’ve got to get results!  I’ll give you a week—­when you’ve got something, come back!”

CHAPTER V:  ON THE TRACK OF A CRIME

In the city room of the Star, Farriss, the city editor, sat back in his swivel chair smoking a farewell pipe preparatory to going home.  The final edition had been put to bed, the wires were quiet, and as he sat there Farriss was thinking of plunging “muskies” in Maine streams.  His thoughts were suddenly interrupted by a clatter of footsteps, and, slapping his feet to the floor, he turned to confront Willis and Miss Donovan.

“Great God!” he started, at their appearance at so late an hour.

Miss Donovan smiled at him.  “No; great luck!”