The Thirteenth Clue—(Continued from page 27 ).

“Nojpgy the police stations!” cried one.

“Telegraph Mr. Semple!” advised another.

A Rotarian garage proprietor sighed.

“I wish I had the agency for those blinking Disapontiacs. They accelerate like hell.”

Up in the tea room a group bent over a prostrate form. It was Furnace Skurry, lying in a faint, his eyeglass still in position. Gillespie opened a bottle of pink mineral water, and, saying to himself that the stuff had never been put to so good a purpose, dashed some of it over Skurry's face. Skurry got up slowly with apologies.

“Sorry to make such an exhibition of myself, but O my God, that cliché!”

“What cliché?” asked Gillespie.

“The last infirmity of ignoble detective story minds,” replied Skurry. “Use of pepper. The oldest and commonest trick in the box of crime and frustration.”

The president of Rotary looked puzzled.

“What does he mean? What's a cleeshay?”

“C-l-i-c-h-é,” Gillespie spelt.

“O, you mean clitsh,” said the president.

Skurry fainted again.

(To be continued.)