“She wants me to go down there with her ir the morning and sleuth it for clews. I told her to take you, and that you are a much better sleuth than I,” said Tom laughingly.
“Thomas, you never spoke a truer word in your life. Leave it to the brilliant brains of Grace Harlowe Gray and Theophilus Wingate to solve this dark mystery. By the way, how much did the thieves get?”
Tom said he did not know. Later on, Tom, Grace and Hippy arranged that she and Lieutenant Wingate were to go down to the hotel early in the morning, reaching there by daylight for their own private inquiry into the robbery.
“As I have said before, it’s a crazy idea, and is none of our business,” declared Tom.
“Ordinarily I should agree with that, but I have an idea in the back of my head that this affair may prove to be our business,” answered Grace reflectively.
“Go to it,” was Tom’s smiling reply.
Daybreak of the following morning found Lieutenant Wingate and Grace strolling down towards the hotel. At that early hour there were no signs of activity about the place until both got a sudden scare when a garbage barrel in the rear of the hotel tipped over with a bang and a black bear ambled away. The bear, however, was more frightened than were the two Overlanders.
“That is what a guilty conscience does,” laughed Grace, referring to the start the bear had given them and to bruin’s hurried departure.
Both stepped back and surveyed the rear veranda roof and the window through which entrance might be gained to the small hallway. They saw that it would be easy for a person to gain the veranda roof, and that no obstacle would then intervene for entrance into the building. Hippy and Grace now examined the ground all along the rear of the house, working towards each other from opposite ends.
“Come here!” called Hippy just loudly enough to reach the ears of his companion.