"What do you mean to do?" demanded the visitor.
"Wait a few minutes and see," was Garrison's reply. "Meantime, here is a photograph of the man who threatened Hardy's life. And, by the way," he added, holding the picture with its face toward himself, in attitude of carelessness, "I forgot to say before that a man was seen entering Hardy's room, in Hickwood, the night of the murder. He extracted two cigars from the box presented to Hardy by his niece, and in their place he deposited others, precisely like them, purchased at the same little store in Amsterdam Avenue where she obtained hers, and bought, moreover, within a very few minutes of her visit to the shop. All of which bears upon the case."
Wicks was eying him now with a menacing, furtive glance that shifted with extraordinary rapidity. He had paled a trifle about the mouth.
"Mr. Garrison," he said, "you are trifling with this matter. What do you mean?"
"Just what I said," answered Garrison. "The witness who saw the murderer leave his deadly cigars in that box should have arrived by now to identify the criminal. This photograph, as I said before, is a picture of the man I think guilty."
He advanced a step, with no intention of abandoning the door, and delivered the picture into his visitor's hand.
Wicks glanced down at it furtively. His face turned livid.
"So!" he cried. "You think you—— Get away from that door!"
He made a swift movement forward, but Garrison blocked his way.
"Not till your friends the policemen arrive!" he said. "It was your own suggestion, and good."