“By George, it’s a world-beater! What put you on the right track?”
“The last one. I realized then that they were afraid the kidnaped man, Ramon Hamilton, who had been grievously wounded, would die on their hands, and that rather than face the results of such a contingency they would attempt to obtain some obscure but experienced medical aid, and in a way which would give the physician no inkling of his patient’s identity or whereabouts. I therefore sent out that circular letter to every doctor in Illington, warning each one to come to me in the event of his having received a mysterious summons. It worked, as you know, and Doctor Alwyn responded.”
“Well, if you hadn’t been able to read the cryptogram, sir, the Lord knows what would have happened!”
“And if you hadn’t trodden on the cat’s tail––” Blaine suggested dryly.
Guy glanced at him in sudden, swift comprehension.
“Why, look here, sir, I believe you knew that Emily and her father were the two mysterious boarders at Mrs. Quinlan’s, all the time! You said it was significant that you hadn’t been able to trace the number of the taxicab in which they had run away from the neighborhood! There never was a taxicab in all Illington which couldn’t be traced by its number! You knew, of course, that that story of Mrs. Quinlan’s was a fake, and then when I told you of the two concealed people there, you had it all doped out! Oh, why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I didn’t want you to precipitate matters just then, Guy,” the detective responded, kindly. “The house was watched––they couldn’t get away.”