Elk tried to yell, but his voice failed him, and then he snatched up the paper from the desk and turned the leaves with trembling hands. It was the lost treaty! Elk held the precious document in his hand, and his mind went back quickly over the night’s adventures. When had he taken off his top-coat? When had he last put his hand in his pocket? He had taken off the coat at Heron’s Club, and he could not remember having used the pockets since. It was a light coat that he either carried or wore, summer or winter. He had brought it to the office that morning on his arm. At the club! Probably when he had parted with the garment to the cloak-room attendant. Then the Frog must have been there. One of the waiters probably—an admirable disguise for the chief of the gang. Elk sat down to think. To question anybody in the building would be futile. Nobody had touched the coat but himself. “Dear me!” said Elk, as he hung up the coat again. At the touch of his bell, Balder came. “Balder, do you remember seeing me pass your room?” “Yes, sir.” “I had my coat on my arm, didn’t I?” “I never looked,” said Balder with satisfaction. He invariably gave Elk the impression that he derived a great deal of satisfaction out of not being able to help. “It’s queer,” said Elk. “Anything wrong, sir?” “No, not exactly. You understand what has to be done with Mills? He is to see nobody. Immediately he arrives he is to be put into the waiting-room—alone. There is to be no conversation of any kind, and, if he speaks, he is not to be answered.” In the privacy of his office he inspected his find again. Everything was there—the treaty and Lord Farmley’s notes. Elk called up his lordship and told the good news. Later came a small deputation from the Foreign Office to collect the precious document, and to offer, in the name of the Ministry, their thanks for his services in recovering the lost papers. All of which Elk accepted graciously. He would have been cursed with as great heartiness if he had failed, and would have been equally innocent of responsibility. He had arranged for Mills to be brought to Headquarters at noon. There remained an hour to be filled, and he spent that hour unprofitably in a rough interrogation of Hagn, who, stripped of his beard, occupied a special cell segregated from the ordinary places of confinement in Cannon Row Station—which is virtually Scotland Yard itself. Hagn refused to make any statement—even when formally charged with the murder of Inspector Genter. He did, however, make a comment on the charge when Elk saw him this morning. “You have no proof, Elk,” he said, “and you know that I am innocent.” “You were the last man seen in Genter’s company,” said Elk sternly. “It is established that you brought his body back to town. In addition to which, Mills has spilt everything.” “I’m aware what Mills has said,” remarked the other.