"'A lie that is half the truth,'" quoted T. B. solemnly. "But it is true--there is some connection between the murders and the slump, and, I say, do your people know anything about the mysterious disappearance of that dancing girl from the Philharmonic?" "Oh, child of sin!" T. B. shook his head reprovingly. "Oh, collector of romance!" "One last question," said the reporter. "Do you know a man named Escoltier?" "Not," said T. B. flippantly, "from a crow--why? is he suspected of abducting your dancing lady?" "No," said the reporter, "he's suspected of pulling our editor's leg." T. B. was all this time walking away from the court, and the reporter kept step with him. "And what is the nature of his hoax?" demanded T. B. He was not anxious for information, but he was very desirous of talking about nothing--it had been a trying day for him. "Oh, the usual thing; wants to tell us the greatest crime that ever happened--a great London crime that the police have not discovered." "Dear me!" said T. B. politely, "wants payment in advance?" "No; that's the curious thing about it," said the reporter. "All he wants is protection." T. B. stopped dead and faced the young man. He dropped the air of boredom right away. "Protection?" he said quickly, "from whom?" "That is just what he doesn't say--in fact, he's rather vague on that point--why don't you go up and see Delawn, the editor?" T. B. thought a moment. "Yes," he nodded. "That is an idea. I will go at once." In the holy of holies, the inner room within the inner room, wherein the editor of the London Morning Journal saw those visitors who were privileged to pass the outer portal, T. B. Smith sat, a sorely puzzled man, a scrap of disfigured paper in his hands. He read it again and looked up at the editor. "This might of course be a fake," he said. "It doesn't read like a fake," said the other. "Admitting your authority on the subject of fakes, Tom," said T. B.,--they were members of the same club, which fact in itself is a license for rudeness,--"I am still in the dark. Why does this--what is his name?" "Escoltier." "Why does this man Escoltier write to a newspaper, instead of coming straight to the police?" "Because he is a Frenchman, I should imagine," said the editor. "The French have the newspaper instinct more highly developed than the English." T. B. looked at his watch. "Will he come, do you think?" "I have wired to him," said the editor. T. B. read the paper again. It was written in execrable English, but its purport was clear. The writer could solve the mystery of Hyatt's death, and for the matter of that of the Moss murder. T. B. read it and shook his head. "This sort of thing is fairly common," he said; "there never was a bad murder yet, but what the Yard received solutions by the score." A little bell tinkled on the editor's desk, and he took up the receiver of the telephone. "Yes?" he said, and listened. Then, "Send him up." "Is it----"