“L 22?  Here you are.”

He had the letter in his hand.  He had glanced at it and had thrust it deep in his pocket, when he felt a hand on his shoulder.  He wheeled and faced Bassett.

“I thought I recognized that back,” said the reporter, cheerfully.  “Come over here, old man.  I want to talk to you.”

But he held to Gregory’s shoulder.  In a corner Bassett dropped the friendliness he had assumed for the clerk’s benefit, and faced him with cold anger.

“I’ll have that letter now, Gregory,” he said.  “And I’ve got a damned good notion to lodge an information against you.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Forget it.  I was behind you when you asked for that letter.  Give it here.  I want to show you something.”

Suddenly, with the letter in his hand, Bassett laughed and then tore it open.  There was only a sheet of blank paper inside.

“I wasn’t sure you’d see it, and I didn’t think you’d fall for it if you did,” he observed.  “But I was pretty sure you didn’t want me to see Melis.  Now I know it.”

“Well, I didn’t,” Gregory said sullenly.

“Just the same, I expect to see him.  The day’s early yet, and that’s not a common name.  But I’ll take darned good care you don’t get any more letters from here.”

“What do you think Melis can tell you, that you don’t know?”

“I’ll explain that to you some day,” Bassett said cheerfully.  “Some day when you are in a more receptive mood than you are now.  The point at this moment seems to me to be, what does Melis know that you don’t want me to know?  I suppose you don’t intend to tell me.”

“Not here.  You may believe it or not, Bassett, but I was going to your town to-night to see you.”

“Well,” Bassett said sceptically, “I’ve got your word for it.  And I’ve got nothing to do all day but to listen to you.”

To his proposition that they go to his hotel Gregory assented sullenly, and they moved out to find a taxicab.  On the pavement, however, he held back.

“I’ve got a right to know something,” he said, “considering what he’s done to me and mine.  Clark’s alive, I suppose?”

“He’s alive all right.”

“Then I’ll trade you, Bassett.  I’ll come over with what I know, if you’ll tell me one thing.  What sent him into hiding for ten years, and makes him turn up now, yelling for help?”

Bassett reflected.  The offer of a statement from Gregory was valuable, but, on the other hand, he was anxious not to influence his narrative.  And Gregory saw his uncertainty.  He planted himself firmly on the pavement.

“How about it?” he demanded.

“I’ll tell you this much, Gregory.  He never meant to bring the thing up again.  In a way, it’s me you’re up against.  Not Clark.  And you can be pretty sure I know what I’m doing.  I’ve got Clark, and I’ve got the report of the coroner’s inquest, and I’ll get Melis.  I’m going to get to the bottom of this if I have to dig a hole that buries me.”