“Very little,” replied Craig.  “There hasn’t been much to read.”

“Of course not, of course not,” said Mr. Andrews with some show of gratification.  “I flatter myself that we have pulled the wires so as to keep the thing out of the papers as much as possible.  We don’t want to frighten the quarry till the net is spread.  The point is, though, to find out who is the quarry.  It’s most baffling.”

“I am at your service,” interposed Craig quietly, “but you will have to enlighten me as to the facts in the case.  As to that, I know no more than the newspapers.”

“Oh, certainly, certainly.  That is to say, you know nothing at all and can approach it without bias.”  He paused and then, seeming to notice something in Craig’s manner, added hastily:  “I’ll be perfectly frank with you.  The policy in question is for one hundred thousand dollars, and is incontestable.  His wife is the beneficiary.  The company is perfectly willing to pay, but we want to be sure that it is all straight first.  There are certain suspicious circumstances that in justice to ourselves we think should be cleared up.  That is all—­believe me.  We are not seeking to avoid an honest liability.”

“What are these suspicious circumstances?” asked Craig, apparently satisfied with the explanation.

“This is in strict confidence, gentlemen,” began Mr. Andrews.  “Mr. Morowitch, according to the story as it comes to us, returned home late one night last week, apparently from his office, in a very weakened, a semiconscious, condition.  His family physician, Doctor Thornton, was summoned, not at once, but shortly.  He pronounced Mr. Morowitch to be suffering from a congestion of the lungs that was very like a sudden attack of pneumonia.

“Mr. Morowitch had at once gone to bed, or at least was in bed, when the doctor arrived, but his condition grew worse so rapidly that the doctor hastily resorted to oxygen, under which treatment he seemed to revive.  The doctor had just stepped out to see another patient when a hurry call was sent to him that Mr. Morowitch was rapidly sinking.  He died before the doctor could return.  No statement whatever concerning the cause of his sudden illness was made by Mr. Morowitch, and the death-certificate, a copy of which I have, gives pneumonia as the cause of death.  One of our men has seen Doctor Thornton, but has been able to get nothing out of him.  Mrs. Morowitch was the only person with her, husband at the time.”

There was something in his tone that made me take particular note of this last fact, especially as he paused for an instant.

“Now, perhaps there would be nothing surprising about it all, so far at least, were it not for the fact that the following morning, when his junior partner, Mr. Kahan, opened the place of business, or rather went to it, for it was to remain closed, of course, he found that during the night someone had visited it.  The lock on the great safe, which contained thousands of dollars’ worth of diamonds, was intact; but in the top of the safe a huge hole was found—­an irregular, round hole, big enough to put your foot through.  Imagine it, Professor Kennedy, a great hole in a safe that is made of chrome steel, a safe that, short of a safety-deposit vault, ought to be about the strongest thing on earth.