"No, mon ami, not a bit of it," declared the art student, earnestly. "A long article concerning the Morancourt case appeared in a Paris newspaper."

"Morancourt? Why, that's the old place right near us here—up toward the front!"

"That's the very place, my son."

"Hah! The plot thickens. What is the 'case' you spoke of?"

"The Count de Morancourt had in his gallery some of the most valuable of all old masters—a Correggio, a Titian and a Botticelli, besides several examples of the Dutch school, such as Rembrandt and Franz Hals, for instance."

"Well, suppose he had—what of it?" demanded "Peewee," a trifle impatiently. "He isn't the first old gent that's been a bug on collecting pictures. Where does your story begin to become a story?"

"The French government made many efforts to acquire some of Count de Morancourt's treasures for the Louvre," answered Dunstan, "but he always refused to dispose of them."

"No story yet," growled "Peewee."

"Wait."

"That's what we're doing."

"Not long after the beginning of the war the count left the Château de Morancourt and also the land of his birth and set sail for America. Now comes the curious part of the story. With the government and the most famous art dealers of Europe on the qui vive to get hold of his old masters it would have been practically impossible for the count to sell them without the fact becoming immediately known."

"Quite true," assented Wendell.

"It has been proven, too, beyond all doubt, that no part of his collection accompanied the grand seigneur to America."

"What is all this leading to?" inquired Watts.

"Only this: that all the valuable paintings and bric-à-brac, without exception, have disappeared—vanished—gone!"

"Vanished!" echoed Don, his face lighting with interest. "A jolly nice mystery, I call it. There's where the story becomes a story, eh, 'Peewee'?"

"It sounds like one of those 'to-be-continued' yarns," grumbled "Peewee." He winked impressively at Bodkins. "Anyhow, what's the use of ado and chatter about a few old 

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