“Curse the luck!” exclaimed Carrington, who appeared to be engineering the conspiracy. “We’re euchred after all! What has he done with them?” Miss Miller, who had been watching the abortive efforts of Guy Dudley with a slight curl on her pretty lips, now spoke. “Evidently the boy is smarter than you have given him credit for,” she said with a tantalizing laugh. “I suspected it almost from the start. Why, he didn’t give a single thing away the whole time I was doing my best to pump him. You’ll have to try something else, Sid, if you expect to reach results.” Just then the waiter appeared at the door with the bill. “What’s the number of your cab, Dudley?” asked Carrington as he handed the attendant a bill. “No. 206.” “Call up 206 and 93, waiter, and then you’ll have to help us get our friend here to the walk. Your coffee has been too much for him.” CHAPTER VI. ELEVATORVILLE. Vance woke up next morning with a severe headache. He was in bed in his room at the hotel. His thinking powers were somewhat mixed, and he wondered what had occurred to him. “I don’t recollect coming to bed,” he muttered in a perplexed tone. “Where was I last night?” He did not even remember that he had been to the theater. After lying motionless in bed a good fifteen minutes staring at the ceiling he gave the problem up for a bad job. “What time is it, anyway?” “Gee! Nearly ten o’clock! I’ll have to hustle if I am going to get any breakfast in this house to-day. Something is wrong with me, that’s sure. I never felt this way before.” He began to dress, and then gave his face and head a good sousing, which made him feel better. “I look as if I had been out with the boys all night,” he said, observing his bloodshot eyes and pallid expression. “I’d give something to know what has knocked me out.” He did not feel hungry, but he believed a cup of coffee would do him good. On his way from the elevator to the dining-room he stopped at the office and asked the clerk if he had any idea when he came in last evening. “You’ll have to see the night man about that,” replied the spruce young man with a quizzical smile. “Been having a good time, I suppose. Better get a bromo-seltzer before you eat. Step into the drug store, right through the corridor, and he’ll fix you up all right.” Vance thought the clerk’s advice was good and he followed it, after which he went into breakfast. It was not long before the events of the preceding evening began to fashion themselves in his brain, and the situation dawned upon him. “But I didn’t drink anything at that place,” he persisted to himself, “that is, nothing but a cup of coffee. Perhaps strong coffee at midnight doesn’t agree with me, as I’m not used to it. All the same, it’s funny I don’t remember a thing about how the affair wound up, or how I got back and into my bed upstairs.” The reflection annoyed him a good bit.