to No. 16, this office, and receive
heartfelt thanks.

"Well," said Doctor Hoff, after reading it over twice, "that don't
tell me nothing."

"No? Yet it's pretty plain. The two crooks 'planted' the letter
and map on your son. Probably slipped them into a pocket of his
coat while he was drunk. Then they inserted their little ad, waited
until he had time to find the letter, and casually called the
advertisement to his attention. The rest would be easy. But I'll
have something to say to my clerk, who failed to clip that ad."

"You're workin' for me, now," half blustered, half whined the old
quack. "Whatche goin' to do next?"

"Pack for the night train."

"Where to?"

"Yuma or Calexico. Don't know which till I get a reply to two
telegrams. I'll need five hundred dollars expense money."

"Say, you don't want much, do ye?" snarled the quack, his avaricious
soul in revolt at the prospect of immediate outlay. "When I hire a
man I expect him to pay his own expenses and send me the bill."

"Quite so," agreed the other blandly. "But, you see, you aren't
hiring me. I'm doing this on spec. And I don't propose to invest
anything in a dubious proposition, myself. It isn't too late to