Dash me, if _I_ did! The only thing I saw was that it must have been Jenkins that had telephoned and the message had been twisted. What he _had said_, of course, was that Billings had _almost_ been arrested. But the police finding the pajamas in his bag--I did not like that. Could it be that, after all, Billings _had_ found his sister's pajamas in the guest-room and had quietly confiscated them? It looked devilishly, ominously like it! Or perhaps he, himself, had recovered them from Foxy Grandpa, and with more delicacy than I thought him capable of, had kept the whole matter to himself. One thing only was certain: the sleuth hounds of the law, stimulated by the extravagant reward I had offered over the telephone, _had_ run down and recovered _her pajamas_. It was a relief that they were out of his hands, anyhow--_I_ could get them again, but _he_ couldn't. By Jove! Alone in my room, I stood before the mirror, hands in pockets and rocking on my toes--kind of smiling, you know--and thinking what a daredevil, reckless thing it had been--clever, too, dash it--in getting them away from old Jack, and right under his nose. By Jove, I felt a bit proud about it--sort of exultation, don't you know--and I had just got off a wink at myself, when Wilkes appeared again. "Pardon, sir, for disturbing you, but Mr. Billings is acting so queer, we are afraid to cross him; and he just insisted I take his message to you at once." "Message?" I repeated, sobering. "Yes, sir--something about some pajamas--" "Pajamas?" I faltered, and I dropped into a chair. "Oh!" Wilkes looked grave. "Pajamas seem to be the thing with him this time, sir--it's the queerest go! That's a _new_ one, _that_ is!" He shifted contemplatively. "The last time it was lizards and the time before blue dachshunds, but his main stand-by, so to speak, is piebald rattlesnakes--them we're _used_ to; but this new turn, pajamas, gets me!" He shook his head dubiously. "And he won't take his off--you can't get him to; he just gets kinder peevish and goes off on the queerest streak of freak talk you ever heard. Perkins tried to coax him to take a bath, but he said he never had taken a bath in his life--and he called Perkins something awful--some name about a yard long. It squelched Perkins so that he--" "But the _message_?" I suggested nervously. "I was just a-coming to that, sir. He asks me if I knew whether you were still on the place; and when I said you were, he says to me kinder excited and impressive like: 'Well, you go to him at once--_at once_--and tell him I'm on the trail of the mystery of those pajamas, and I'll soon know as much about 'em as _he_ does. Just tell him that--_he'll_ know what I mean.'" "Oh!" I gasped shortly. "Yes, sir," Wilkes nodded, "but that ain't quite all. He says: 'Tell Mr. Lightnut that when I first saw those pajamas in his rooms--'" Wilkes paused inquiringly. "Did you say something, sir?" I had not--I had only groaned!