“Why, what has he done?” asked Kennedy.

“Nothing in particular.  But he came out to see us once.  You can’t blame him for being a bit sore at us fellows hanging about.  But he didn’t show it.  Instead he almost begged us to be careful of how we asked questions of the girl.  Of course, all of us could see how completely broken up she is.  We haven’t bothered her.  In fact, we’d do anything we could for her.  But Lockwood talks straight from the shoulder.  You can see he’s used to handling all kinds of situations.”

“But did he say anything, has he done anything?” persisted Kennedy.

“N-no,” admitted the reporter.  “I can’t say he has.”

Craig frowned a bit.  “I thought not,” he remarked.  “These people aren’t giving away any hints, if they can help it.”

“It’s my idea,” ventured another of the men, “that when this case breaks, it will break all of a sudden.  I shouldn’t wonder if we are in for one of the sensations of the year, when it comes.”

Kennedy looked at him inquiringly.  “Why?” he asked simply.

“No particular reason,” confessed the man.  “Only the regular detectives act so chesty.  They haven’t got a thing, and they know it, only they won’t admit it to us.  O’Connor was here.”

“What did he say?”

“Nothing.  He went through all the motions—­’Now, pens lifted, boys,’ and all that—­talked a lot—­and after it was all over he might have been sure no one would publish a line of his confidences.  There wasn’t a stick of copy in the whole thing.”

Kennedy laughed.  “O’Connor’s all right,” he replied.  “We may need him sorely before we get through.  After all, nothing can take the place of the organization the police have built up.  You say de Moche is in there yet?”

“Yes.  He seemed very anxious to see her.  We never get a word out of him.  I’ve been thinking what would happen if we tried to get him mad.  Maybe he’d talk.”

“More likely he’d pull a gun,” cautioned another.  “Excuse me.”

Kennedy said nothing, evidently content to let the newspaper men go their own sweet way.

He nodded to them, and pressed the buzzer at the Mendoza door.

“Tell Senorita Mendoza that it is Professor Kennedy,” he said to Juanita, who opened the door, keeping it on the chain, to be sure it was no unwelcome intruder.

Evidently she had had orders to admit us, for a second later we found ourselves again in the little reception room.

We sat down, and I saw that Craig’s attention had at once been fixed on something.  I listened intently, too.  On the other side of the heavy portieres that cut us off from the living room I could distinguish low voices.  It was de Moche and Inez.

Whatever the ethics of it, we could not help listening.  Besides there was more at stake than ethics.

Evidently the young man was urging her to do something that she did not agree with.