He was not sure. He knocked at the door that bore that number. A man opened it.
"Were you expecting a package, sir?" inquired the bell boy.
"Yes," growled the man. "Is that it? Let me have it."
He slammed the door, and the bell boy went away. The man opened the package in a hurry. It was time it had arrived.
Half an hour before, he had called the desk and ordered a safety razor and a tube of shaving cream. He had been waiting for the articles ever since.
The hotel guest emitted an angry growl when he saw the contents of the box. He drew out a bunch of violets!
What was the idea of these? He threw the flowers on the writing desk and went to the telephone. He tried to get the operator, but failed.
The bell boy had returned to the lobby. He saw no sign of the man who had given him the package. The hotel attendant was sure that he had delivered it where it was intended.
Ten minutes later, Joe Cardona left Room 414 and went downstairs. Out on the street, he walked through the Loop, and mounted the steps to an elevated station. He was bound for the suburban home where Madame Plunket was conducting her seance to-night.
Joe Cardona was satisfied that he was getting somewhere. He had spent some seemingly useless days in Cincinnati. He had looked through some back files of the newspapers, and had discovered that a girl named Stella Dykeman had been killed in a serious automobile accident during the month of March. The brakes of her car had given way on a steep hill leading to her father's estate, and she had crashed into a stone gateway at the bottom of the incline.