One of the gentlemen immediately said some kind words to me, and another smiled in a very encouraging way.  But their attention was soon diverted, and so was mine by the entrance of a man in semi-uniform, who was immediately addressed as Clausen.

I knew his face.  He was one of the doorkeepers; the oldest employee about the hotel, and the one best liked.  I had often exchanged words with him myself.

Mr. Slater at once put his question: 

“Has Mr. Brotherson passed your door at any time to-night?”

“Mr. Brotherson!  I don’t remember, really I don’t,” was the unexpected reply.  “It’s not often I forget.  But so many people came rushing in during those few minutes, and all so excited—­”

“Before the excitement, Clausen.  A little while before, possibly just before.”

“Oh, now I recall him!  Yes, Mr. Brotherson went out of my door not many minutes before the cry upstairs.  I forgot because I had stepped back from the door to hand a lady the muff she had dropped, and it was at that minute he went out.  I just got a glimpse of his back as he passed into the street.”

“But you are sure of that back?”

“I don’t know another like it, when he wears that big coat of his.  But Jim can tell you, sir.  He was in the cafe up to that minute, and that’s where Mr. Brotherson usually goes first.”

“Very well; send up Jim.  Tell him I have some orders to give him.”

The old man bowed and went out.

Meanwhile, Mr. Slater had exchanged some words with the two officials, and now approached me with an expression of extreme consideration.  They were about to excuse me from further participation in this informal inquiry.  This I saw before he spoke.  Of course they were right.  But I should greatly have preferred to stay where I was till George came back.

However, I met him for an instant in the hall before I took the elevator, and later I heard in a round-about way what Jim and some others about the house had to say of Mr. Brotherson.

He was an habitue of the hotel, to the extent of dining once or twice a week in the cafe, and smoking, afterwards, in the public lobby.  When he was in the mood for talk, he would draw an ever-enlarging group about him, but at other times he would be seen sitting quite alone and morosely indifferent to all who approached him.  There was no mystery about his business.  He was an inventor, with one or two valuable patents already on the market.  But this was not his only interest.  He was an all round sort of man, moody but brilliant in many ways—­a character which at once attracted and repelled, odd in that he seemed to set little store by his good looks, yet was most careful to dress himself in a way to show them off to advantage.  If he had means beyond the ordinary no one knew it, nor could any man say that he had not.  On all personal matters he was very close-mouthed, though he would talk about other men’s riches in a way to show that he cherished some very extreme views.