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became clear at once that the exercise of his peculiar gifts, at least as far as Ellen Nash was concerned, was her charge for his lodging.
    â€œI’m not going to dignify for one moment the absurd conclusion that one of us murdered father,” Ellen said. “He was done in by some maniac, or tramp, or something—”
    â€œThe snow,” her brother said damply.
    â€œTo hell with the snow! What I’m interested in is that father left a million dollars’ worth of pendant in his wall safe, and I want that safe opened.”
    â€œPendant?” said Ellery. “What pendant?”
    So Christopher told him all about the New Year’s Eve party, and what Godfrey Mumford had told them, and how he had exhibited the Imperial Pendant to them and then returned it to the safe.
    â€œAnd he also told us,” Christopher concluded, “that he was the only one who knew the safe combination. He said he was going to make a note of the combination for us. But we haven’t looked for it yet.”
    â€œI have,” said Ellen, “and I can’t find it. So that your stay here won’t be a complete waste of time, Mr. Queen, why not show us how Superman detects? A little thing like finding a safe combination should barely test your reputation.”
    â€œDo we have to worry about the pendant now? ” asked Jo.
    â€œIt shouldn’t take too long, Miss Caswell,” said Ellery. To himself he was saying: Maybe a million dollars’ worth of jewelry has something to do with where Godfrey’s boyhood knife had finally rested.
    Searches were Ellery’s forte, but this one defeated him. Trailed by relatives of the deceased, he squandered the rest of the morning looking in obvious places. But unlike Poe’s purloined letter, the combination of the safe was nowhere to be found.
    They took time out for lunch and an inventory of the unlikelier places, and the afternoon passed in exhausting this inventory. Then time out again, and over dinner a round-table discussion of other possibilities, however remote. Mr. Queen’s fame as a sleuth clearly underwent reappraisal by at least one conferee present. And Mr. Queen himself grew audibly more quiet.
    After dinner Ellen returned to the search of the files she had already ransacked once. Ellery, reminding himself bravely in the face of his failure that there was, after all, more than one way to flay a kitty, took Christopher aside.
    â€œI’m prompted,” Ellery announced, “to go directly to the source of the problem—namely, to the safe itself. Can you show me where the blamed thing is?”
    â€œWhat do you have in mind?” asked Christopher. “Nitro?”
    â€œNothing so common. A bit of fiddling with the dial, à la Jimmy Valentine.”
    â€œWho’s he?”
    Ellery said sadly, “Never mind.”
    Christopher led him to the drawing room and, turning on the lights, went to the chrysanthemum painting on the wall and pushed it aside. Ellery began to flex his fingers like a violin virtuoso before a recital.
    He studied the thing. The safe door was about ten inches square and in the middle was a rotating dial about six inches in diameter. Etched into the circumference of the dial were twenty-six evenly spaced notches numbered in sequence 1 to 26. Around the dial Ellery saw a narrow immovable ring or collar in the top of which was set a single unnumbered notch—the notch used for aligning the numbers of the combination when opening the safe.
    In the center of the dial was a bulky knob, about half the diameter of the dial itself, and on the knob was etched the manufacturer’s trademark—an outline of the god of metal-working, Vulcan; around the rim of the knob appeared the manufacturer’s name and address: VULCAN SAFE & LOCK COMPANY , INC ., NEW HAVEN , CONN .
    The safe door was locked. Ellery duly fiddled with the dial, ear cocked à la Jimmy Valentine. Nothing happened—at