“The thief? Why, Mr. Keating, the Count, of course,” laughed Nita gleefully; “and he was caught all through Sheila’s crying out about the funny ’phone man. When she spoke of the man in the booth placing the receiver on his head when telephoning, it gave Mr. Grenoble a big clew. It seems that the detective-bureau had been on the lookout for some time for a gentleman burglar who had the peculiar eccentricity of holding the receiver on the top of his head, as Sheila stated. He was born without any folds to his ears,—no, that isn’t the word; I guess it was ganglion cells. No, _that_ isn’t right—Well, anyway he had something the matter with his auditory nerve, so that his hearing was defective. By placing the receiver on the top of his head, as he had very good bone-conduction,—yes, that’s right,—he could hear better. “As soon as the detective heard what Sheila said he began to shadow our friend, the Count. He saw him do the same thing that Sheila told about, and _that_, with certain other clews, led to his arrest. He was not _the Mr._ Keating from Chicago that he claimed to be, whom the manager asserted had spent a summer at the hotel two years ago. That gentleman died this spring, and this ‘count’ fellow impersonated him, so as to gain a social standing in the hotel. “The manager now admits that at times he had been puzzled by certain changes in Mr. Keating’s appearance, but he attributed it to the fact that he was older, and was now clean-shaven, when two years ago he wore a mustache. The detective thinks that the Count burned the cabin up in the woods so as to deepen the suspicion already fostered in regard to Philip.” “But he got away with the jewelry,” exclaimed that young gentleman, who, with Janet, had just stepped up to the edge of the veranda, while Nita had been talking. “But he did not get far,” rejoined Nita, “for when he walked into the New York station a few days ago,—that was just a ruse, talking about being called to Chicago,—he simply walked into the net that the detectives had spread for him, and he is now in jail.” “I saw that the detective doubted my story,” remarked Nathalie, “and it made me feel unpleasant. But, oh, I am so glad the thief has been caught—and—” “That Philip is cleared,” interrupted that young man. “Yes, Miss Nathalie, you have added to the store of kind things that you have done for me. But wait,” Philip’s eyes glowed, “some day,—well, perhaps I can repay every one. And little Blue Robin,” he continued, laughingly, “I knew that I was the suspected one, although you were all so careful not to let anything slip out that would tell me, so as to save my sensitiveness, but as I was innocent I knew that things would clear up somehow.”