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“I follow you to join in that interview, but first I make stop at public library.”

“Oh, yes, of course. Come as soon as you can, I— I think we’re getting somewhere now.”

“Where?” inquired Chan blandly.

“Lord knows—I don’t,” replied the Chief, and hurried to his own car. He got away first, and Charlie followed him through the big gates to Kalakaua Avenue.

It was nearly five o’clock, the bathing hour at Waikiki was on, and along the sidewalk passed a perpetual parade of pretty girls in gay beach robes and stalwart tanned men in vivid dressing-gowns. Other people had time to enjoy life, Charlie reflected, but not he. The further discoveries of the afternoon baffled him completely, and he had need of all his Oriental calm to keep him firmly on the pathway of his investigation. Tarneverro, who had sworn that his dearest wish was to assist in finding the murderer of Shelah Fane, had been impeding the search from the start. The fortune-teller’s dark face, with its deep mysterious eyes, haunted Chan’s thoughts as he flivvered on to town.

Stopping at the public library, he again appeared at the desk.

“Would you kindly tell me if the young woman in charge of reading-room is now on scene?” he asked.

The girl appeared, upset and indignant over the morning’s events. She would never again leave a newspaper file idle on a table, but the Japanese boy whose work it was to return such items to the shelves was taking the day off. She remembered Van Horn, of course; she had seen him in the films.