Page:The Master of Mysteries (1912).djvu/136

 He sat down and looked at her seriously. "The only way is to use your imagination and your memory. Put yourself in her place. You can't trust servants or mails. You are watched everywhere except in your own room. Think it out; concentrate your mind on the problem."

Valeska dropped her head on her hand thoughtfully, and spoke as if to herself. "Let's see. I am in my room alone. I read my Bible and pick out appropriate messages. But how do I get them to him?" She looked up, puzzled.

"Never mind that now. How does he communicate with you?"

"There's a box of candy there, and a newspaper—" She paused and then, gazing at him through narrowed eyes, went on. "It must be through the paper; I can't see any other way possible. No one would suspect that, if the message were concealed. It might be in the 'Personal' column."

"That's too easy, and it might be noticed. Besides, The Star has no 'Personals'."

"Then— It couldn't be in a news item; for he wouldn't be sure of its being inserted, even if he were a reporter. It must be in an advertisement."

He went into the waiting-room, and returned with a copy of The Star.

"Correct," he said. "That's the only possible solution. Now the thing to do is to look through this file of The Star and see if we can discover any advertisement that seems suspicious. First, what date shall we lookup?"

Valeska returned to the paper on which the numbers were written. "Well," she said, "if it were I, I