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there was even heavier than the other. It had even more locks on it. An army couldn’t have gotten in from outside. But from the inside, where all the catches were, a slip of a girl could get out very easily.
    And had!
    While they were wasting seconds in the store, the girl had calmly walked out the back door and was now safely away from there.
    “The play-actin’, worthless little Jezebel!” raged Mac. “The— Anythin’ gone, Smitty? The little baggage went through all that act to line us out of here, then get back herself and take somethin’. But what?”
    “The orchid,” came in a girl’s voice.
    They fell over themselves to look around, thinking for an instant that the girl was not gone, but that she was hiding and had spoken.
    Then Smitty realized that this was Nellie’s voice and that it came from the television screen. He hurried there.
    Nellie’s blue eyes, sparkling with glee, stared at him.
    “You big dope. She took you in nicely, didn’t she? Will you ever learn not to fall for a pretty face?”
    “Why . . . er . . . I only wanted to help,” mumbled Smitty, red to the roots of his hair.
    “Mac left the current on, so we saw most of what she did,” Nellie said. “She took the orchid and ran. I think that’s all she took.”
    They checked. That did seem to be all. It was more than enough! They’d been taken in like a couple of children.
    “You’d better come over here while you’re still clothed,” said Nellie. “First, you let somebody steal your car; then you let somebody walk out with a subject of laboratory experiment. Better come here before some little boy steals your undershirt.”
    “You—” Smitty began hotly. But he couldn’t think of a suitable retort. He tried so hard that it wasn’t till later that the real puzzle of the thing loomed in his mind.
    Who was the girl? How had she known they had the black orchid in the back room? Why had she gone to such lengths to get it, when there was nothing incriminating about it? Or didn’t she know it was not incriminating?
    Smitty wished he could get hold of her again.

CHAPTER V

That Girl Again
    “She must have been hanging around Bleek Street, drawn by the report of Gailord’s death and the confusion,” Nellie said, back at Bleek Street. “She must have seen Smitty pick up the orchid, then followed him to Mac’s store. There,” she added to the giant, “she realized she didn’t have to do much to lull your suspicions, so she simply took the orchid away with her.”
    “Lay off, will you?” pleaded Smitty. “We pulled a boner. All right. It could have happened to anybody. The question is, now what?”
    The Avenger supplied this. As usual, he paid no attention to the interplay of diminutive blonde Nellie and gigantic Smitty. He spoke out of a study of papers on his desk.
    “We have a report on Schuyler Marcy. What he told us is true as far as it goes: He is a son of wealth which has disappeared, leaving him practically penniless. He has been at Gailord’s Hoboken plant quite a few times, and that may have been on the quest of a job, as he said. Also, he has been around the Bristal Airplane Co.’s plant, North Philadelphia, many times. He didn’t touch on that. And the report makes no effort to explain.”
    “Gailord is working on airplane parts, now, isn’t he—wasn’t he?” said Smitty.
    “Yes,” said The Avenger.
    “Then it looks like Marcy is singularly interested in bombers. The Bristal plant turns out bombers, doesn’t it?”
    “It does. In fact, it is the plant that subcontracted stabilizers from Gailord’s smaller factory.”
    “That seems to tie something up in the same bundle,” frowned Nellie. “But I don’t know what.”
    The Avenger went on “We have a report on John Jay Hannon, too. Or, rather, we have a lack of report that is almost as significant as a full report would be.
    “For nearly eight weeks, no single person, as far as is known, has set eyes on him. He has vanished.
    “John Jay