"Not much of a wizard. In the first place, I know the fight you're
making. Also, I know that you wouldn't go to the police in the
present state of armed truce between your office and Headquarters.
You want someone outside. Well, I'm more than willing to be that
person. The whole thing, in its larger aspects, interests me.
Betty Blackwell in particular, arouses my sympathies. That's all."

"Exactly, Kennedy. This fight I'm in is going to be the fight of
my life. Just now, in addition to everything else, people are
looking to me to find Betty Blackwell. Her mother was in to see me
today; there isn't much that she could add to what has already
been said. Betty was a most attractive girl. The family is an
excellent one, but in reduced circumstances. She had been used to
a great deal as a child, but now, since the death of her father,
she has had to go to work--and you know what that means to a girl
like that."

Carton laid down a new photograph which the newspapers had not
printed yet. Betty Blackwell was slender, petite, chic. Her dark
hair was carefully groomed, and there was an air with which she
wore her clothes and carried herself, even in a portrait, which
showed that she was no ordinary girl.

Her soft brown eyes had that magnetic look which is dangerous to
their owner if she does not know how to control it, eyes that
arrested one's gaze, invited notice. Even the lens must have felt
the spell. It had caught, also, the soft richness of the skin of
her oval face and full throat and neck. Indeed one could not help
remarking that she was really the girl to grace a fortune. Only a