“That is, providing we can get an adjoining, or an opposite room,” Nick added. “We then can watch his apartments and overhear anything said there. There is no time like the present, moreover, for he left here only an hour ago, presumably to return to the hotel, and he very likely will be at dinner when we arrive there.” “We could, in that case, turn the trick in a very few minutes.” “We’ll attempt it,” said Nick, taking the instrument and a coil of fine, pliable wire from a drawer in his desk. “We’ll go up there in disguise. Have a gun on your hip, also, for there’s no telling what may come off.” “I’ll wear two, Nick, to make a dead-sure thing of it,” Chick said dryly. It was seven o’clock when the two detectives arrived at the New Oriental, where they lost no time in getting in their work. Nick confided in the chief clerk, from whom he learned that Chadwick had arrived that afternoon, that he was traveling alone, and had just gone in to dinner, also that he had a small suite on the third floor. One directly opposite to it happened to be unoccupied, and no less than ten minutes after their arrival at the hotel both detectives were established in the vacant suite. “Now, Chick, we’ll work lively,” Nick remarked, throwing off his coat and hat. “You keep an eye on the corridor. I’ll do the painting.” “I’ve got you,” Chick nodded. “Lie low, if you hear me whistle.” Nick stole out with the dictograph and wire, as well as the tools he required. He opened the opposite door with a picklock and entered the suite, which consisted of only a sitting room, bedroom, and bath. The Englishman had left the lights on, and his outside garments and luggage were in the bedroom. A table stood in the middle of the sitting room. Near one of the walls, that adjoining the hall, was a desk supplied with writing materials. It was prevented from standing flush against the wall by a projection of the baseboard, and Nick quickly attached the dictograph to the back of the desk, well out of sight. He then ran the fine wire downward to the floor, tucking it between the carpet and the baseboard, and conducting it to the door. Then he ran it over the threshold, close to the jamb on the hinge side, and then under the hall carpet and into the opposite room. No warning whistle from Chick had delayed him, and the entire work had occupied less than fifteen minutes. “We now will wait developments,” said Nick, when all was ready. “Out with the lights and set this door ajar. If this man has no visitor to-night, Chick, I shall be much mistaken.” Chick adjusted the door, leaving a crack, through which they could see that of the opposite suite, and both then sat down to wait in the darkness. The steps of others could occasionally be heard in the corridor, but half an hour had passed when the Englishman returned to his apartments. Both detectives saw him enter his lighted rooms, consulting his watch when he closed the door.