“They say,” suggested John, “that women brew marvelous tea. The tea kettle is hot.”
Mary responded to his invitation. So, in the small hours of the night they drank a toast to the future in a steaming cup.
After that Jimmie saw Mary to her train, then crept sleepily back to his own cozy bed.
“Life,” he thought, “is not so bad, but all this excitement cuts into a fellow’s sleeping program.”
Tired as he was he was not able to at once quiet his active brain. That picture? Had it been a success? What would it reveal? Who were those men? Had he at last taken a picture showing a real front view or profile? Would Tom Howe say the instant he saw them, “Yes, this is so and so. Boy! We’ll take them now!” Or would his face go blank at sight of them?
As his mind quieted down he thought of matters farther afield. “Clues,” he thought dreamily. “How very little it takes to put a finger on the guilty man. He drops matches, lights a candle, blows it out and forgets it. He leaves through a window, his knee leaves a pattern in the dust. These little things get him. Why does he care to go on with it?” To this question he could find no answer.
He was almost asleep when a sub-conscious thought working its way to the surface brought him up with a jerk wide awake once more.
“Bubbles!” he whispered excitedly. “It might be that! Who knows? I’ll work that out. If only the Terror would strike again! And yet, what a wish?”
At that he settled back on his pillow. Two minutes later nature’s demand for repose took him to dreamland.