The whole maneuver had not occupied three seconds. And, by the time Standish had the door closed and had started back toward the couch, the watch and money were safe-hidden. At that, there had been little enough time to spare. It had been a matter of touch-and-go. Nothing but the odd look he had read in Milo's face as Standish had glanced at him over his shoulder, would have led Brice to take such a chance. But, all at once, it had seemed a matter of stark necessity. The narrow escape from detection set his strained nerves to twitching. He muttered to himself: "Come along then, you man-mountain! You wanted to get your sister out of the way, so you could go through my clothes and see if I was lying about being flat broke and if I had any incriminating papers on me. Come along, and search! If I hadn't brains enough to fool a chucklehead, like you, I'd go out of the business and take in back-stairs to clean!" Milo was approaching the couch, moving with a stealthy lightness, unusual in so large a man. Leaning over the supposedly unconscious Gavin, he ran his fingers deftly through Brice's several pockets. In only two was he lucky to find anything. From a trousers pocket he exhumed seventy-eight cents. From the inner pocket of the coat he extracted a card, postmarked "New York City," and addressed to "Gavin Brice, General Delivery, Miami, Florida." The postcard was inscribed, in a scrawling hand: "Good time and good luck and good health to you, from us all. Jack O'G." Gavin knew well the contents of the card, having written it and mailed it to himself on the eve of his departure from the North. It was as mild and noncommittal a form of identification as he could well have chosen. Standish read the banal message on the soiled card, then restored cash and postal to their respective pockets. After which he stood frowning down in puzzled conjecture on the moveless Gavin. "Well, old chap!" soliloquized Brice. "If that evidence doesn't back up all I said about myself, nothing will. But, for the Lord's sake, don't help yourself to a pipeful of tobacco, till I have time to plant the loot deeper in the jar!" He heard the light footfalls of women, upstairs, where Claire, in person, seemed to be superintending the arrangement of his room. At the sound, a twinge of compunction swept Brice. But, at memory of her brother's stealthy ransacking of an unconscious guest's clothes, the feeling passed, leaving only a warm battlethrill. Drowsily, he opened his eyes, and stared with blank wonder up at Milo. Then, shamefacedly, he mumbled: "I--I hope I wasn't baby enough to--to keel over, Mr. Standish?"