Beyond the threshold he halted and pressed the button of his flash-lamp.
For just an instant its faint rays illumined the interior of the room,
and then darkness blotted out the scene. But whatever it was that the
little flash-lamp had revealed was evidently in the nature of a
surprise, and perhaps something of a shock, to the Lizard, for he drew
back with a muttered oath, backed quietly out of the room, closed the
door after him, and, moving much more swiftly than he had entered,
retraced his steps to the fifth window on the alley, and was gone from
the scene with whatever job he had contemplated unexecuted.

A half-hour later detective headquarters at the Central Station received
an anonymous tip: "Send some one to the office of the International
Machine Company, on the second floor of West Superior Street."

It was ten thirty when Jimmy reached the plant. He entered the front
door with his own latchkey, pressed the button which lighted the
stairway and the landing above, and, ascending, went straight to Mr.
Compton's office, turned the knob, and opened the door, to find that the
interior was dark.

"Strange," he thought, "that after sending for me the fellow didn't
wait." As these thoughts passed through his mind he fumbled on the wall
for the switch, and, finding it, flooded the office with light.

As he turned again toward the room he voiced a sudden exclamation of
horror, for on the floor beside his desk lay the body of Mason Compton!
As Jimmy stepped quickly toward Compton's body and kneeled beside it a
man tiptoed quietly up the front stairway, while another, having
ascended from the rear, was crossing the outer office with equal
stealth.