We bent over and assisted him to his feet. As I took hold of his hand, I felt a peculiar pressure from him. He had placed something in my hand. My mind worked quickly. I checked my first impulse to speak and, more from curiosity than anything else, kept the thing he had passed to me surreptitiously.
"Thank you, gentlemen," he puffed, straightening himself out. "One of the infirmities of age. Thank you, thank you."
In a moment he had bustled off quite comically.
Again Del Mar said good-bye and I did not urge him to stay. He had scarcely gone when I looked at the thing the old man had placed in my hand. It was a little folded piece of paper. I opened it slowly. Inside was printed in pencil, disguised:
"BE CAREFUL. WATCH HIM."
I read it in amazement. What did it mean?
. . . . . . .
At the La Coste, Del Mar was met by two of his men in the lobby and they rode up to his room.
Imagine their surprise when they opened the door and found the valet lying bound on the floor.
"Who the deuce did this?" demanded Del Mar as they loosened him.