Redmond.

"When does the next steamer depart for Melbourne, or for that part of the globe?" anxiously inquired the American detective.

"One leaves to-day," was the reply. "I happen to know, because one of my friends is going out in her and he gave me good-by this morning."

"Why not see if our friend, the murderer, is to be a passenger?"

Tom Owens looked a little astonished by this suggestion.

"It's all right. He will be in London after the Intrepid has sailed," said he. "He is installed in the little red house yonder, and we can lay hands on him whenever we care to."

But Old Broadbrim persisted until the Scotland Yarder yielded.

"I'm afraid it's too late to see the Intrepid," said Tom, glancing at his watch. "Her time is up, and ere this she is off."

"But we can see the books of the company."

It did not take them long to find the office of the Australian Steamship Company, and Old Broadbrim ran over the list of passengers, with Owens looking over his shoulder.

Suddenly Old Broadbrim uttered a cry.

His finger had stopped at a certain name on the list.

Tom Owens looked again and echoed the exclamation.

"Too late!" he said. "Well, it stumps me!"

Old Broadbrim did not reply, but merely smiled as he turned away.

The Intrepid was gone.

Once more the prey had slipped through his fingers by a few hours, and the long trail stretched before him.

Silently the detective walked from the steamer office.

Owens was chagrined.

For some minutes he did not speak, and his silence showed his deep disappointment.

"To think that the rascal should take Tom Owens in so cleverly!" suddenly cried the Scotland Yarder. "It makes me feel sick. I tracked him from Liverpool so nicely, and had everything snug for you, Mr. Broadbrim; but here he slips through my fingers like a Thames eel; it's too bad. I'll go with you and help you find him in Australia."

"No," said the Quaker, laying his hand on the other's arm. "This is my trail from now on, and this scoundrel will be hunted to his doom if I have to track him all over the world!"

"You can't get another steamer out of London port for Melbourne inside of a week," said Owens.

"Will I have to lie here in agony that long?" was the reply.

"It seems so, but you'll find plenty here to interest you, and we'll see that time doesn't hang heavily on your hands. Redmond has got clean off, and neatly, too, but we'll find out if he left anything behind."

The two detectives crossed the street to the little red house and Owens knocked.

The woman who came to the door held it open for them to enter and in they went.

"We are looking for an empty front room," said the Scotland Yarder.

"I've just had one vacated," was the reply. "It's on the second floor, and the young man who held it went off to-day and will not be back."

"Might we look at the room, madam?"

The woman led the way to the stairs and said to Owens:

"First room front up there. You can find it easily. I have to look after the kitchen just now, but will be up in a little while."

This was just the opportunity the detectives wanted, and in a few seconds they stood in the room overhead.

It was a plainly furnished apartment with a few chairs, and several coarse prints on the walls.

"Not a very fine nest for our bird," smiled the American detective. "He was not very choice, for he knew he would not keep the room very long, but that he would soon be the occupant of a ship's cabin."

"Exactly. He made a fire in the grate and left some ashes of paper, I see."

Old Broadbrim stepped across the room and bent over the ashes on the little hearth.

Scooping up a handful of fragments, he came back to the table and sat down.

Tom Owens bent over his shoulder and saw Old Broadbrim separate the bits of charred paper with fingers as delicate as a woman's.

All at once the detective stopped and pointed at two pieces which lay side by side.

"What is it?" eagerly asked Owens.

"A letter in the same handwriting that we found in the house on Fifth Avenue."

"That settles the matter. You are surely on the right trail."

The face of the New York detective seemed to light up with a gleam of triumph, and then he swept the papers together and put them into his inner pocket.

"The right trail?" he cried. "Of course, Tom. It remains only to find this man. I'll attend to the rest. We'll fix the crime upon him and there'll be a broken neck under the sheriff's noose."

"But you'll find him cool and desperate."

"I know that."

"If he turns on you your life won't be worth the flare of a candle."

"I've counted every cost, as I always do, Tom," was the answer. "I know the trail and the quarry. I am ready for the game."

By this time the landlady appeared at the door of the room and the two men turned to interview her.

She did not know much about her late roomer.

All she did know was in his favor, for he paid promptly and ahead for a week.

He was "a nice gentleman," and the detectives did not tell her that he was a suspected murderer.

Once more on the street below the Scotland Yarder proposed to escort Old Broadbrim to a lounging place for the English detectives when not officially engaged, but the Quaker did not want his presence known in London and declined.

By this time the shades of twilight had deepened over the city.

The night came on suddenly, as it does in London, and Old Broadbrim separated from Owens for the purpose of calling on a friend whom he had not seen for some years.

Promising to meet Owens the next day, Old Broadbrim walked off and turned the nearest corner.

He was in the act of taking a hansom, when his arm was touched by a hand, and he turned to look into the face of a young woman whose eyes were deeply sunken and staring.

"You're watched, sir," said she, with a hurried glance to the right. "Be careful."

"Thanks. Here's a guinea," said the detective, and springing into the hansom he was driven off.

Watched? he thought. By whom?

If Rufus Redmond was on the sea, who would play spy for him now?

CHAPTER V.

IN THE WAKE OF A MYSTERY.

Old Broadbrim did not let the woman's warning deprive him of the society of his friend, and some hours later he emerged from the house with the thousand-and-one lights of London before him.

Drawing his collar up, for the night was cool and a brisk wind was coming in over the waters of the Thames, he started back, intending to walk to a cab station in the immediate neighborhood and from there take a cab.

London was well filled, from what the detective could see, and some of its inhabitants were in the same condition.

Every now and then he was jostled by a drunken man or woman, and in some instances almost crowded off the narrow sidewalk.

Presently he was clutched by a hand and forced into the mouth of an alley.

"Don't talk, for it's all right," said a voice which he thought he recognized. "I followed you and I hope I've done no wrong, sir. The man is still watching you, sir. I hung onto the back of the cab, sir, and got a good jolting over the stones. But I'm here, sir, to tell you that you're still in peril."

It was the same warning woman, and her face was the very picture of starvation.

"Where is he?" asked Old Broadbrim.

"You can't see him from here, sir; but he's across the way near the Star and Garter over there. If you look very sharp you may see a man in the shadow of the place. That's him."

"What is he like?"

"He's a tall, slim fellow with the keenest eyes you ever saw in a human head; but those eyes mean mischief and death."

"And you?"

"Oh, sir, I'm Mag of the Dusthole. I'm out for wictims;