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“She’s in this thing, too,” exclaimed Adele Laidlaw. “Can you go down with me now and meet Mr. Tresham? I promised I would.”

Though she repressed her feelings, as usual, I could see that Adele Laidlaw was furious. Was it because Creighton had gone off with her money, or was it pique because Mrs. Barry had, perhaps, won him? At any rate, someone was going to feel the fury of her scorn.

We motored down quickly in Miss Laidlaw’s car and met Tresham, who was standing in front of the Bank Building waiting for us.

“It just happened that I came down early this morning,” he explained, “or I shouldn’t have noticed anything out of the way. The junk wagon was just driving away as I came up. It seemed to be in such a hurry that it attracted my attention.”

It was the first time we had seen Tresham and Miss Laidlaw together and I was interested to see how they would act. There was no mistaking his attitude toward her and Adele was much more cordial to him than I had expected.

“While I was waiting I got a key from the agent,” he explained. “But I didn’t want to go in until you came.”

Tresham opened the door and led the way upstairs, Miss Laidlaw following closely. As we entered Creighton’s shop, everything seemed to be in the greatest disorder. Prints and books were scattered about, the tools were lying about wherever they happened to have been left, all the models were smashed or missing and a heap of papers in the fireplace showed where many plans, letters and other documents had been burned.

We hurried into the big room. Sure enough, the demon motor itself was gone! Creighton had unbolted it from the floor and some holes in the boards had been plugged up. The room below was still locked and the windows were covered with opaque paper on the inside.

“What do you suppose he has done with the motor?” asked Adele.

“The only clew is a junk dealer whom we don’t know,” I replied, as Kennedy said nothing.

We looked about the place thoroughly, but could find nothing else. Creighton seemed to have made a clean getaway in the early hours.

“I wish I could stay and help you,” remarked Tresham at length. “But I must be in court at ten. If there’s anything I can do, though, call on me.”

“I’m going to find that engine if I have to visit every junk dealer in New York,” declared Miss Laidlaw soon after Tresham left.

“That’s about all we can do, yet, I guess,” remarked Kennedy, evidently not much worried about the disappearance of the inventor.

Together we three closed up the workshop and started out with a list from a trade publication giving all those who dealt in scrap iron and old metal. In fact we spent most of the day going from one to another of the junk shops. I never knew that there were so many dealers in waste. They seemed to be all over the city and in nearly every section. It was a tremendous job, but we mapped it out so that we worked our way from one section to another.

We had got as far as the Harlem River when we entered one place and looked about while we waited for someone in charge to appear.

I heard a low exclamation from Kennedy, and turned to look in the direction he indicated. There, in a wagon from which the horse had been unhitched, was the heavy base of the engine into which so many dollars had been turned–sold as so much scrap!

Kennedy examined it quickly, while I questioned a man who appeared from behind a shed in the rear. It was useless. He could give no clew that we already could not guess. He had just bought it from a man who seemed anxious to get rid of it. His description of the man tallied with Creighton. But that was all. It gave us no chance to trace him.