“You seem possessed of a phobia on the subject of hidden papers, Cronin,” remarked Ellery mildly. “One would think we are living in the days of Charles the First. There’s no such thing as hidden papers. You merely have to know where to look.” Cronin grinned impertinently. “That’s very good of you, Mr. Queen. Suppose you suggest the place Mr. Monte Field selected to hide _his_ papers.” Ellery lit a cigarette. “All right. I accept the challenge to combat.... You say—and I don’t doubt your word in the least—that the documents you suppose to be in existence are not in Field’s office.... By the way, what makes you so sure that Field kept papers which would incriminate him in this vast clique of gangsters you told us about?” “He must have,” retorted Cronin. “Queer logic, but it works.... My information absolutely establishes the fact that Field had correspondence and written plans connecting him with men higher up in gangdom whom we’re constantly trying to ‘get’ and whom we haven’t been able to touch so far. You’ll have to take my word for it; it’s too complicated a story to go into here. But you mark my words, Mr. Queen—Field had papers that he couldn’t afford to destroy. Those are the papers I’m looking for.” “Granted,” said Ellery in a rhetorical tone. “I merely wished to make certain of the facts. Let me repeat, then, these papers are not in his office. We must therefore look for them farther afield. For example, they might be secreted in a safety-deposit vault.” “But, El,” objected the Inspector, who had listened to the interplay between Cronin and Ellery in amusement, “didn’t I tell you this morning that Thomas had run that lead to earth? Field did not have a box in a safety-deposit vault. That is established. He had no general delivery or private post-office box either—under his real name or any other name. “Thomas has also investigated Field’s club affiliations and discovered that the lawyer had no residence, permanent or temporary, besides the flat on 75th Street. Furthermore, in all Thomas’s scouting around, he found not the slightest indication of a possible hiding-place. He thought that Field might have left the papers in a parcel or bag in the keeping of a shopkeeper, or something of the sort. But there wasn’t a trace.... Velie’s a good man in these matters, Ellery. You can bet your bottom dollar that hypothesis of yours is false.”