“Honest as the _day_!” scoffed Miss Gregg. “You’re like every one else. You get your similes from books written by people who don’t know any more than you do. ‘Honest as the day?’ Do you know that only four days, out of three hundred and sixty-five, are honest? On the four solstices the time of day agrees absolutely with the sun. And on not one other day of them all. Then a day promises to be lovely and fair, and it lures one out into it in clothes that will run and with no umbrella. Up comes a rain, as soon as one is far enough from home to get nicely caught in it. ‘Honest as the day!’ The average day is an unmitigated swindler! Why--” The return of Vail and Chase from their task of getting Clive to bed interrupted the homily. “He seems all right now,” reported Willis. “He’s terribly broken up, though, at having fainted. And he’s as ashamed as if he’d been caught stealing pennies from a blind beggar.” “He needn’t be,” snapped Miss Gregg. “If I’d had to be Oz Creede’s twin brother as long a time as Clive has, I’d be too inured to feel shame for anything short of burning an orphanage. Just the same, he’s a dear boy, Clive is. I like the way he came to the front, this evening, when--” “We’ve been clear through the house, from cellar to garret,” announced the chief, from the doorway. “And we’ve been all around it from the outside with flashlights. Not a clue.” “Behold an honest cop!” approved Chase. “One who’ll admit he hasn’t a dozen mysterious clues up his sleeve! It’s a record!” “I’m going back to the station now,” resumed Quimby, ignoring him, “to write my report. There’s nothing more I can do to-night. I’ll be around, of course, the first thing in the morning. I’ve thrown the fear of the Lord into the whole staff of servants. They won’t dare budge till I get back. No danger of one of them confusing things by leaving on the sly.” Vail followed the two officers to the front door and watched them climb into their rattling car and make off down the drive. As they disappeared, he wished he had asked the chief to leave his man on guard outside the house for the night. The mystery of the thefts and the evening’s later complications had gotten on Vail’s nerves. If the supposedly secure rooms could be plundered by a mysterious robber when a score of people were awake, in and around the building, could not the same robber return to complete his work when all the house should be sleeping and unguarded? Thaxton’s worries found themselves centering about Doris Lane. If the intruder should alarm her at dead of night--! “Mac,” he said under his breath to the collie standing at his side on the veranda. “You’re going to do real guard duty to-night. I’m going to post you at the foot of the stairs, and there I want you to stay. No comfy snoring on the front door mat this time. You’ll lie at the foot of the stairs where you can catch every sound and where you can block any one who may try to go up or down. Understand that, old boy?”