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“Hello,” he called. “Do you want to speak to me, or do you want to speak to me?”

“I’ve gotta letter for the district attorney,” said the voice. “I’m to give it to nobody but him. It’s about Banf. He must get it quick, or it’ll be too late.”

“Who are you?” demanded Rumson. “Where are you speaking from?”

The man at the other end of the wire ignored the questions.

“Where’ll Wharton be for the next twenty minutes? “

“If I tell you, “parried Rumson, “will you bring the letter at once?” The voice exclaimed indignantly:

“Bring nothing! I’ll send it by district messenger. You’re wasting time trying to reach me. It’s the LETTER you want. It tells—-” the voice broke with an oath and instantly began again: “I can’t talk over a phone. I tell you, it’s life or death. If you lose out, it’s your own fault. Where can I find Wharton?”

“At Delmonico’s,” answered Rumson. “He’ll be there until two o’clock.” “Delmonico’s! That’s Forty-fort Street?” “Right,” said Rumson. “Tell the messenger—-” He heard the receiver slam upon the hook. With the light of the hunter in his eyes, he turned to the girl.

“They can laugh,” he cried, “but I believe we’ve hooked something. I’m going after it.” In the waiting-room he found the detectives. “Hewitt, ” he ordered, “take the subway and whip up to Delmonico’s. Talk to the taxi-starter till a messenger-boy brings a letter for the D. A. Let the boy deliver the note, and then trail him till he reports to the man he got it from. Bring the man here. If it’s a district messenger and he doesn’t report, but goes straight back to the office, find out who gave him the note; get his description. Then meet me at Delmonico’s.”

Rumson called up that restaurant and had Wharton come to the phone. He asked his chief to wait until a letter he believed to be of great importance was delivered to him. He explained, but, of necessity, somewhat sketchily. “It sounds to me,” commented his chief, “like a plot of yours to get a lunch up- town.”

“Invitation!” cried Rumson. “I’ll be with you in ten minutes.”

After Rumson had joined Wharton and Bissell the note arrived. It was brought to the restaurant by a messenger-boy, who said that in answer to a call from a saloon on Sixth Avenue he had received it from a young man in ready-to-wear clothes and a green hat. When Hewitt, the detective, asked what the young man looked like, the boy said he looked like a young man in ready-to-wear clothes and a green hat. But when the note was read the identity of the man who delivered it ceased to be of importance. The paper on which it was written was without stamped address or monogram, and carried with it the mixed odors of the drug-store at which it had been purchased. The handwriting was that of a woman, and what she had written was: “If the district attorney will come at once, and alone, to Kessler’s Cafe, on the Boston Post Road, near the city line, he will be told who killed Hermann Banf. If he don’t come in an hour, it will be too late. If he brings anybody with him, he won’t be told anything. Leave your car in the road and walk up the drive. Ida Earle.”

Hewitt, who had sent away the messenger-boy and had been called in to give expert advice, was enthusiastic.

“Mr. District Attorney,” he cried, “that’s no crank letter. This Earle woman is wise. You got to take her as a serious proposition. She wouldn’t make that play if she couldn’t get away with it.”

“Who is she?” asked Wharton.

To the police, the detective assured them, Ida Earle had been known for years. When she was young she had been under the protection of a man high in the ranks of Tammany, and, in consequence, with her different ventures the Police had never interfered. She now was proprietress of the road-house in the note described as Kessler’s Cafe. It was a place for joy- riders. There was a cabaret, a hall for public dancing, and rooms for very private suppers.