"No more than there is a bold lion in the middle of this floor, sir."

"Well, what did you do after you got up there to-night?"

"I hunted around for the man who had been lying there listening to the talk in this room, but I didn't find him, sir."

"Did you ascertain where all the servants were at the time the listening must have been going on?" asked Jack, after a short pause.

"All but one," was the reply.

"And that one? Where is he now? That is, tell, if you know where he is?"

"I don't know, sir. He has left the house, I reckon--bag and baggage."

"Who was it?" demanded Jack, moving toward the door.

"Chang Chu, the c.h.i.n.k, may the Evil One get into his bed!"

"And then you came here and notified Jack?" asked Ned. "As soon as you learned that Chang Chu was not in the house?"

"Indeed I did--within a minute and a half."

"Where is this girl, Mary Murphy?" asked Ned, turning to Jack. "We must get hold of her right away. I want to hear her story of what she saw in the attic."

Jack went out of the room, but was back in a minute with the girl, a pretty, modest maid of about eighteen. She looked frightened at finding herself the center of interest, but was soon in the midst of her story.

"I went up to the attic to get a piece of cloth for a bandage, Sally having cut her hand with the bread knife. When I got to the door of that room I heard some one inside of it. I listened at the crack there is between the panel and the stile and heard footsteps, slow and soft like. I thought it was one of the maids, and opened the door quick, so as to give her a scare."

The girl paused and wiped her face with a white ap.r.o.n bordered with pink.

"Go on," Ned requested. "Tell us what you saw in the attic."

"It wasn't much, sir," was the agitated answer. "I saw just a flash of dark blue, coming at me like the lightning express, and then I was keeled over--just as if I had been a bag of meal, sir!"

"He bunted into you, did he?" asked Jack. "Who was it?"

"Indeed I don't know, sir," was the reply. "It was dim in the room, there being only the light from the hall as I opened the door. Then he came at me with such a bunt that it took the breath out of me body!"

"And what followed?" asked Ned.

"She wint down f'r the count!" chuckled the servant who had been first questioned.

"I did not!" was the indignant retort. "When I got up the man was still on the stairs leading to this floor, and I picked up the great shears which had tumbled out of me hand and heaved thim at him. I had brought the shears up to cut a bandage, sir."

"Did you hit him?" asked Jack with a smile. "Where are the shears?"

"I never went back after them!" answered the girl. "I'll go this minute."

"Wait," Ned said, "and I'll get them. Now, you say you saw a blue streak coming at you, head-on! Who wears blue clothes around the house?"

"Chang Chu, the c.h.i.n.k, sir."

"You saw him dressed in blue to-day?" asked Ned.

"All in blue he was!" the male servant interrupted, "with his shirt on the outside of his trousers, like the b.l.o.o.d.y heathen he is."

"And so you looked for him and failed to find him on the premises?"

asked Jack.

"He's gone, bag and baggage," answered Terance, the coachman. "Bad luck to him!"

"Still, you don't really know that it was the Chinaman?" asked Ned.

"He was dressed like the c.h.i.n.k," was the reply. "He smelled like a saloon!"

"Does the Chinaman drink?" asked Ned, facing Terance. "Does he get drunk?"

"He does not," was the reply. "He doesn't know the taste of good liquor!"

"That's all," Ned concluded. "Now you two keep on looking for the Chinaman. He may be hiding in the house, or he may be at some of the dens such people frequent. You, Mary, look for him in the house, and you, Terance, see if you can learn where he usually went when he left the house."

"Pell street!" cried Jimmie. "Look in Pell street!"

"Or Doyers!" Jack exclaimed. "Look in the dumps in Doyers street."

The two went away, forgetting all about the shears which Mary had hurled at the mysterious man she had caught in the attic. Asking the boys to remain where they were, Ned went out to the staircase and secured the article. Taking it carefully by the handle, he returned to the room and held up one blade.

Jack looked at the blade casually at first, then cried out that there was blood on it, and that Mary had speared the sneak.

"Yes," Ned explained, "there is blood on it. Mary hit the fellow on the head with this blade. What else do you see on the steel?" he asked with a smile.

Jimmie looked and backed away in disgust. His freckled face was thrust out of the door for an instant, and they heard him calling to Mary, who, being in the kitchen, beyond sound of his voice, did not respond.

"What do you want of Mary?" demanded Jack. "Shall I call her?"

"She said it was the c.h.i.n.k, didn't she?" the boy asked. "Or, she said it was a man dressed like the c.h.i.n.k? Well, it wasn't the c.h.i.n.k."

Ned laughed and looked at the boy admiringly.

"How do you know that?" he asked. "Why are you so sure it was not the c.h.i.n.k?"

Jimmie looked up into Ned's face with a provoking grin.

"You know just as well as I do that it wasn't the c.h.i.n.k," he said.

"Just you look on that blade again! Ever see a c.h.i.n.k with light brown hair?"

"Now, what do you think of that?" roared Jack. "Sometimes this boy, Jimmie, seems to me to be possessed of almost human intelligence!"

The lads gathered closer around the shears, one blade of which Ned was still holding out for inspection. There was the blood, and there was the long, blonde hair!