of taking passage upon a French steamer sailing the next day, decided to sell or pawn the tiara, which she still retained in her possession. But when the Bowery dealer to whom she applied questioned her a bit sharply, she grew convinced that the story Sonnenthal had told her of police suspicion was the truth, and fled in a panic from the shop.

"She secured a room in a hotel near by, and lurked there in hiding without food all day yesterday, shuddering each moment lest the next might bring the police in search of her, and brooding constantly over the wrongs she had suffered from the knave in whom she had put her trust.

"Half crazed by this ordeal, desperate and despairing, she came to Sonnenthal's room tonight with the definite purpose of killing both him and herself.

"We found the tiara wrapped in a newspaper beside her cloak and hat in Sonnenthal's apartment."

A silence fell upon us for a moment as Baggerly finished his recital; then more as a relief to my surcharged emotions than for any desire to learn his opinion, I asked him where he supposed the remainder of the sapphires were?

"And where are Miss Yeats's rubies?" supplemented the Captain.

"We do not know," Baggerly passed his hand perplexedly over his brow; "but we believe that both are in the hands of Harry Glenn. Bender is out now hard upon his trail, and we shall probably hear something before very long. The little jockey and I each tried to get the better of the other in this case," he added; "but," with a shrug of the shoulders, “we have had to join hands at the finish, whether we liked to or not.— "Ah, that must be he now!" as a sharp ring sounded upon my telephone.

He sprang quickly to the receiver and held a brief colloquy over the wire. "Ha,” excitedly, as he turned away. "We will get him after all. Bender says he has indubitable proof that the man has been in this house to-night, and we know that he could not have passed our line of pickets. We will turn the place upside down from cellar to garret, but what we find him now!” He waited for no more; but dashed from the As the door closed behind him Captain McCracken turned to me, and I saw a hundred questions trembling on his lips.

room.

CHAPTER VIII

WON BY STRATEGY

"Not yet, Duncan. Not yet, if you love me," I protested, as I turned the key upon the departing Baggerly, and sped toward the other room to release the half-stifled prisoner in my closet. "We have no time to waste in an inquisition now. We have much to do." This last I threw over my shoulder while I was struggling with the closet door.

I seized the hand of the blinking outlaw and drew him out into the light. "This," I explained to the dumbfounded Captain with a nervous laugh, "is Harry Glenn; and we've got to get him out of here before those men return."

"Gwendolen, are you mad?" exploded the Captain. He had grown pale to the lips and his usually placid eyes were ablaze.

Fortunately, however, Glenn afforded him a target for his righteous indignation, and he turned furiously upon the luckless cracksman. "So you have counted on a woman's compassion

to save your worthless hide, have you?" he demanded hotly. "Well, let me tell you, sir, that you have a man to deal with now; and one who has small regard for rogues of your stripe. I shall take the greatest pleasure in turning you over to the authorities without delay."

Glenn was wise enough to keep silent and leave the management of the affair to me; but I will admit that for a moment I was frightened. For all I could tell, I might be running up against the solid granite of British obstinacy.

“Oh, Duncan,” I pleaded, “do you not see how that would complicate matters? Can't you understand you would thus bring upon us the very publicity and notoriety we have been striving so hard to avoid? Beside," as a final argument, "you promised to give me free rein, Duncan. You agreed to do as I said without question or demur."

"Well, I didn't know then that you intended to inveigle me into assisting an escaping criminal," he grumbled. "But if I do help," he declared firmly, "this fellow will have to give up those stolen jewels. I do not stir a hand until he accedes to that.'

99

I breathed a sigh of relief. His assistance was

assured. Glenn laughed amusedly. "What you ask would be a fair exchange and no robbery, Captain," he said, "if I still had them; but, unfortunately, Miss Bramblestone has proved herself a smarter burglar than I."

"Yes," I corroborated in answer to Duncan's questioning glance, "I recovered Mrs. Van Suyden's necklace to-day. It is in the hotel safe at this moment. "But," impatiently stemming his tide of eager inquiries, "you can learn all about that later. The important thing now is to get rid of this man's presence."

While I was speaking I had hurried to the closet once more, and was now feverishly tearing down garments from the hooks and tossing them out upon the floor.

All the time that Baggerly had been relating his story my mind had been busily maturing a plan to dispose of my inconvenient guest; and I was now preparing to put it into action.

"Here," I cried to Glenn, indicating the heap of apparel. "You are not much taller than I, and fully as slender. Put these on."

His wits sharpened by danger caught at my suggestion almost before I had made it, and he was already picking up various articles, meas