"Were you calling me?" he asked. Then he caught sight of Larry, and a smile came on his face. "Well, you've found me, I see," was his greeting. "Only for that team I'd been far away." "I suppose so. But now you're here, for which I'm sorry; I hope you will answer me a few questions." "What are they?" asked the man, and a spasm of pain replaced his smile. "I believe you know the secret of Mr. Potter's disappearance," said Larry, speaking in a low tone so none of the other patients would hear him. "I want you to tell me where he is." At the mention of Mr. Potter's name Retto raised himself in bed. His face that had been pale became flushed. "He--he--is----" then he stopped. He seemed unable to speak. "Yes--yes!" exclaimed Larry, eagerly. "Where is he?" "He--is----" Then Retto fell back on the bed. "He has fainted!" cried the nurse, running to the cot. "The strain has been too much for him," and she pressed an electric button which summoned the doctor. CHAPTER XXVI A NEW CLUE Larry moved to one side. The unexpected outcome of his interview had startled him. He did not quite know what to do. The doctor came up on the run and made a hasty examination of the patient. Then he sent for another surgeon. Larry heard them talking. "What is it?" he asked of his friend the nurse. "His skull is fractured," she said in a low voice. "They did not think so at first, but now the symptoms show it. They are going to operate at once. It is the only chance of saving his life." "There goes my story," thought Larry, regretfully. It was not that he was hard-hearted or indifferent to Retto's sufferings. Simply that his newspaper instinct got ahead of everything else, as it does in all true reporters, who, if they have a "nose for news," will make "copy" out of even their closest friend, though they may dislike the operation very much. "You had better go," the nurse advised Larry. "You will not be able to see him again for some time--no one will be allowed to talk to him until he is on the road to recovery--if we can save him. He has a bad fracture." Much disappointed, Larry left the hospital. It was hard to be almost on the verge of getting the story and then to see his chance slip away. "I'm sure he was just going to tell me where Mr. Potter is," thought the reporter. "Now it means a long wait, if I ever find out at all from him." He told Mr. Emberg what had happened. The city editor decided to follow out his first plan, of not connecting the accident at the pier with the Potter mystery. "If he has to be operated on for a fractured skull," Mr. Emberg remarked to Larry over the wire, "he will be in no condition to tell his name, or give any information for some time. The story is safe with him. Now you'd better get busy on some other line of the case. The _Scorcher_ is out, but they only have a scare yarn, without any foundation, to the effect that Mr. Potter is still in Italy, and that his family knows where he is."