There was a frightened hush when Counsellor Stillwell solemnly said: "Are we sure that we are on the right road? It appears that we have lost all roads. Groping! Only feeling our way in the dark! Police and journals powerless, our rewards unanswered! It remains for us to drop the matter of theft, and--look for a murderer. "I now move that we double the reward and seek for the murderer or murderers of Randall Clayton! Remember, not a bill or cheque, not an object, the bank book, nothing has been found to indicate either theft or flight. "I always had implicit confidence in Clayton's honor; he was trusted by our heaviest stockholder, named by him, backed by him; and Mr. Worthington, even at his lamented death, proposed making him general manager in the West. There's not a shadow on the name of the missing man." While the audience eyed each other, the three police officials present cried in accord: "Good; double the reward. NOW YOU'RE ON THE RIGHT TRACK." "I second the motion," quietly said the pale-faced Witherspoon. "I do also," slowly said Ferris, "and I offer the amendment that this action takes effect when Mr. Worthington's executors arrive and authorize this important step." In sheer impotency to quarrel, the puzzled meeting adjourned, and Arthur Ferris, now conspicuously alone, was left to chatter with Policeman Dennis McNerney on the lonely street corner below. "Well!" said Ferris impatiently, as a fifty-dollar bill changed hands. "All I can tell you," whispered the policeman, "is that Lawyer Witherspoon is at the Buckingham. He received no visitors but his friend, a young doctor. "Physician's name, William Atwater, M.D. Mail and telegrams he gets at down-town office, your company's lawyers. And he spends all his time running around at nights with Atwater or locked up with old Stillwell in his den down town. "It's a poor harvest, Dennis," gruffly said Ferris. "That's all there's in it," stolidly said the man. "Shall I keep up the watch?" "Yes, as usual," sadly replied Ferris, as he sped up Broadway to the Fifth Avenue. The policeman snorted his contempt, when Ferris had turned the corner. "A beggarly fifty! By God! I'll hold the boy down. Somewhere in that funny little joint of a drug-store the secret lies. In a couple of weeks I can begin work on Timmins; but the office boy, Einstein, waited personally on Clayton! When his fear wears off, I'll trap him. He is spending money too freely. Where does that come from?" As McNerney wandered on, he was as ignorant of Einstein's continued milking of Ferris' purse, as Ferris was of Jack Witherspoon's treasured clues and as all the knowing ones were of Arthur Ferris' crafty course in robbing Randall Clayton's desk of the tell-tale dispatches.