"Pipe off that guy?" asked the boy in a friendly whisper, with a nod at the stout man. Ned understood the question to mean "Do you know who that man is?" and he answered that he did not. "One of the detectives from the Central Office. The sleuths come here same as at other hotels, every once in a while, to see if anybody they want might happen to be on hand. Guess he won't land anybody this time, though, about a week ago--" But Ned did not stop to listen. The stairway was in front of him, and he could get to his room without the clerk or the detective seeing him. As he started up the stairs, intending to go to his apartment and hide, for he had left the key in the lock, the boy-porter called after him: "Why don't you take the cage?" "The elevator's too slow," Ned answered, trying to keep his voice from trembling. He was afraid the men might hear him. But they did not, and, walking swiftly he was soon in his room. "What shall I do?" poor Ned asked himself. He seemed hounded on every side. "I must get away from here," he thought. "The clerk suspects me! Perhaps that detective has a description of me! I must sneak out, and yet--I can't go. I haven't paid for my room!" Then he caught sight of the rope fire escape. An idea came to him. "I'll slide down the rope to the ground," he murmured. "That's the way. I can get off without any one seeing me, and I'll go to another hotel." He loosened the rope, which was looped upon a hook, and looked down into the yard. All was dark and quiet there. He tied his valise to the end of the rope and lowered it. The little thud of the satchel as it landed and slipped from the noose of the rope told him it was in the yard. Then, having left a dollar bill pinned to one of the pillows of the bed, Ned put on his hat and overcoat, and, taking a firm hold of the rope stepped out of the window and went down, hand over hand. It was a trick he had often performed, though it was hard to descend the five stories. At last his feet touched the ground, and he breathed a sigh of relief. "Now to take my valise and skip," he said in a whisper. "That was pretty well done." He stooped over to loosen his satchel from the rope. His fingers encountered nothing but the hempen strands. "My valise is gone!" he exclaimed. CHAPTER XX IN THE LODGING HOUSE Ned felt around on the ground. He thought the valise might have slipped from the rope and rolled away into some corner of the yard. He got down on his knees and crawled about, looking among boxes and barrels, as well as he could in the darkness. But the valise was gone. "Where in the world could it have disappeared to?" Ned asked himself. "I came down within three minutes after I lowered it to the ground." There was a gate, opening from the yard to the street, and Ned decided some one had either seen or heard the valise drop and had slipped in and stolen it.