Page:Bedford-Jones--The Mardi Gras Mystery.djvu/76

 that one of the cars in the street had been testing its engine about midnight. I found that the car belonged to Mr. X.

"How simple, Lucie, and how very clever! The chauffeur worked a powerful motor with a muffler cutout at about the time Mr. X., inside the house, was making his appearance. It scarcely sounded like an airplane motor, yet frightened and startled, people would imagine that it did. Thus arose the legend that the Midnight Masquer came and departed by means of airplane—a theory aided ingeniously by his costume. Well, that is all I know or suspect, my dear Lucie! And now"

"Now, I suppose," said the girl, thoughtfully, "you'll put that awful Creole of yours on the track of Mr. X.? Ben Chacherre is a good chauffeur, and he's amusing enough—but he's a bloodhound! I don't wonder that he used to be a criminal. Even if you have rescued him from a life of crime, you haven't improved his looks."

"Exactly—Ben is at work," assented Jachin Fell. "The gentleman under suspicion is very prominent. To accuse him without proof would be utter folly. To catch him