"You opened the door the first time."
"I do not deny it. The policeman interrupted me and I shut the box up.
When I came back the combination had gotten away from me."
There was a pause.
"Where are you stopping, Mr. Watkins, in case I wish to communicate with you again?"
"At Hager's Hotel, in Sidham. But I am on the jump nearly all the time," and the secret service man laughed again. "Anything else?"
"No."
"Then I'll be going. I've got to send a long secret message before I go to bed and it takes time to follow the code, you know that. Good-night," and in a moment more John Watkins was on his horse and riding away at a good rate of speed.
Adam Adams watched his departure with a variety of thoughts chasing each other through his mind. The man must be what he claimed, he had shown his badge on the inside of his coat, and been perfectly willing to prove his words.
"If he is honest, he must be on the trail of those counterfeits, and perhaps it was my duty to tell him of my discovery," mused the detective. "It is curious how these two cases have wound around each other, or is it all one case?"
Concluding that there was nothing more to be done that night, Adam Adams took himself to the Beechwood Hotel, secured a room, and was soon in the land of dreams. He arose early, obtained his breakfast, and without waiting to meet Raymond Case, started off to interview Doctor Bird, one of the two persons Margaret Langmore had seen go past the mansion about the time the tragedy was occurring.