Instead, however, a stately woman in black swept into the room, a remarkably handsome woman in the fifties, but whose hair was prematurely gray, and the gravity of whose refined, almost classical face denoted that her life had not been one of all sunshine. She was fashionably clad and in street attire. Clayton sprang up to meet her, crying impulsively: “My mother! I did not dream it was you.” The woman stopped short, gazing at him with wide eyes and an expression of dread on her white face. “What is this I hear, Chester?” she cried, as if oblivious to the presence of others. “Tell me quickly. Tell me quickly, my son! You suspected of crime, of----” “No, no; nothing of the kind,” Clayton hurriedly cried, both hands uplifted. “A crime has been committed, but I know nothing about it. The criminal was a man so like me that----” Clayton caught his breath and stopped short. The woman had reeled as if struck a blow, and every vestige of color had left her face. “Like you!” she echoed, gasping. “So like you that--that----” Doctor Guelpa started toward her. “Careful, madame!” he cried, with hands outstretched. “Be calm, or you will----” His warning came too late. The woman’s eyes suddenly rolled upward. Her arms dropped lax at each side. Before any observer could reach her, she fell unconscious upon the floor, as ghastly as if the hand of death had suddenly claimed her. CHAPTER IV. HOW NICK SIZED IT UP. Nick Carter entered his Madison Avenue residence at four o’clock that afternoon and hurried into his library, in which Chick Carter and Patsy Garvan were awaiting him. Their investigations in the Hotel Westgate had ended abruptly temporarily some time before. They had been productive of no more than has appeared. No additional clews were discovered. No trace of the stolen jewel cases had been found, nor any evidence or testimony obtained pointing to the identity of the thief, aside from that involving Chester Clayton, the one most important man in the house, and the only one, in fact, or a perfect counterfeit of him, could so have obtained the jewel cases from the hotel vault. Numerous persons had been found who had seen him in the hotel office and corridor, nevertheless, or positively testified thereto; but none who had seen the stranger he described, and on whom alone he could depend to corroborate his statements and establish his innocence. As a result of all this, both Mademoiselle Falloni and Madame Escobar had insisted that Clayton must be arrested, which was reluctantly done by Detective Webber, despite the objections of Nick Carter and his refusal to comply with the insistent demands of the famous vocalists. The mission from which Nick was returning at four o’clock, however, appeared in his first remark. “Well, I got him out,” he said, while removing his coat and hat. “On bail?” Chick tersely questioned.