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 out! I tell you he’s as bright as they come—if he is an artist.”

“Well, what next? He’ll not come here again.”

“How do you know? Did he get what he was after?”

“What was he after?”

“I don’t know. What did he get?”

“I don’t know that he got anything. But I haven’t looked around at all. I was so sore—mentally, not physically—that I just went back to bed—and I’m only just through my breakfast now.”

“Let’s give the place the once over. I don’t think there was anything of value for him to take—but he was after something and we may get a line on it.”

“Why, of course, he was after his lucky piece—as Charley calls it.”

“Yes—if it was Locke.”

“If it was Locke? Who else in thunder could it be?”

“Might be lots of people. Hello, what’s this?”

The two had wandered through the studio, looking for any bit of evidence and finding none, and now they were in the Den. On the floor in a corner lay a strange looking object.

Hutchins picked it up and held it out at arm’s length.

“Well, I’m blowed!” he ejaculated, though he rarely gave way to such elaborate expletive.

But the occasion seemed to justify it, for the thing he held up to Glenn’s view was a wig of rather long, black hair.

Glenn’s eyes grew big and round as he gazed.

“That’s it!” he cried; “I grabbed him by the hair once, and it seemed to slide! Gave me the creeps! I’d forgotten that. My heavens, Hutchins, what does it mean?”

“It means,” the detective said, slowly, “well, it might mean something else, but I’ll say it means that your friend