“Why do you say that?” asked Jane quickly. “What did you find out when you searched the apartment yesterday?”
She felt certain from the manner in which he spoke that he must now have some damning evidence of Frederic Hoff’s guilt. He was not in the habit of making decisions without proof.
“We found,” said Fleck, his keen eyes fixed on her face as if trying to read her innermost thoughts, “a British officer’s uniform hanging in Frederic Hoff’s closet, proof positive that he is a dangerous spy.”
“And,” said Carter, pointing to the two clippings lying on Fleck’s desk, “in the old man’s waste-paper basket we found those.”
Jane picked up the clippings and examined them curiously.
“What are they?” she asked, looking from one to the other; “cipher messages of some sort?”
“We think so,” said Carter. “We don’t know yet.”
“I’ve noticed these peculiar advertisements often,” said Jane, studying the clippings, “but I never thought of connecting them with the Hoffs. I wonder—” Fleck and Carter had their heads together and were talking in low tones.
“I wonder,” said the chief, “what young Hoff is up to. He must have known the girl was there to spy on him. I can’t understand his not quizzing her.”
“He’s a cagey bird,” Carter replied. “They are both of them expert at throwing off shadowers. Both of them know, I think, they are being watched.”