When Inspector French felt really up against it in the conduct of a case, it was his invariable habit to recount the circumstances in the fullest detail to his wife. She, poor woman, haled from the mysterious household employments in which her soul delighted, would resignedly fetch her sewing and sit placidly in the corner of the Chesterfield while her lord and master strode up and down the room stating his premises, arguing therefrom with ruthless logic and not a few gestures, sifting his facts, grouping them, restating them. . . . Sometimes she interjected a remark, sometimes she didn’t; usually she warned him to be careful not to knock over the small table beside the piano, and invariably she wished he would walk on the less worn parts of the carpet. But she listened to what he said, and occasionally expressed an opinion, or, as he called it, “took a notion.” And more than once it had happened that these notions had thrown quite a new light on the point at issue, a light which in at least two cases had indicated the line of research which had eventually cleared up the mystery.

On the second evening after his return from Spain, the Inspector was regaling her with a by no means brief résumé of the Hatton Garden crime. She had listened more carefully than usual, and presently he found she had taken a notion.

“I don’t believe that poor old man was out to do anything wrong,” she declared. “It’s a shame for you to try to take away his character now he’s dead.”

French, stopping his pacing of the room, faced round.

“But I’m not trying to take away his character, Emily dear,” he protested, nettled by this unexpected attack in the rear. “I’m only saying that he’s the only person we know of who could have got an impression of the key. If so, it surely follows he was out to rob the safe.”

“Well, I believe you’re wrong,” the lady affirmed, continuing with a logic as relentless as his own, “because if he was out to rob the safe, he wasn’t the sort of man that you described, and if he was the sort of man that you described, why, then, he wasn’t out to rob the safe. That’s what I think about it.”

French was a trifle staggered. The difficulty he had recognised from the beginning, but he had not considered it serious. Now, put to him in the downright, uncompromising language in which his wife usually clothed her thoughts, it suddenly seemed to him overwhelming. What she said was true. There was here a discrepancy. If Gething really bore the character he was given by all who had known him, he was not a thief.

He ceased his restless movement, and sitting down at the table, he opened his notebook and began to look up what he had actually learned about the dead man. And the more he did so, the more he came to believe that his wife was right. Unless all this cloud of witnesses were surprisingly mistaken, Gething was innocent.

His mind reverted to the other horn of the dilemma. If Gething were innocent, who took the impression of the key? It was not obtained from that in the bank, therefore it was copied from that in Mr. Duke’s possession. Who had done it?

No one at the office, at least not unless Mr. Duke was greatly mistaken. And he did not believe the principal could be mistaken on such a point. The breaking through of his regular custom in a matter of such importance would almost certainly be noted and remembered. No, French felt that he might rely on Mr. Duke’s statement so far.

But with regard to his assertion that no one in his house could have tampered with the key, the Inspector saw that he was on more shaky ground. In the nature of the case, the diamond merchant would be less alert in dealing with the members of his own household than with his business acquaintances. Believing he was surrounded by friends, he would subconsciously be more ready to assume his precautions adequate. Was Mr. Duke’s belief that no one would touch the key not the real basis of his statement that no one had done so?

It seemed to French that here was a possibility that he had overlooked, and it was in the nature of the man that the moment he reached such a conclusion he began to consider a way of retrieving his error.

At first he thought of taking Mr. Duke into his confidence and asking him to assist him in some subterfuge by which he could enter the house. But presently he saw that it would be better if the old gentleman knew nothing of his plan, lest he might inadvertently warn a possible criminal.

For the same reason—that Mr. Duke might get to know of it—he decided he would be wiser not to undertake the business in person. But he knew the man for the job—a certain detective-sergeant named Patrick Nolan. This man was something of a Don Juan in his way, and had a positive genius for extracting confidences from the fair sex. If he could scrape acquaintance with the maids of the establishment, it would not be long before he knew all they had to tell.

Accordingly next morning he sent for Sergeant Nolan and explained his idea, and Nolan, who, where his superiors were concerned, was a man of few words, said, “Yes, sir,” and withdrew.

The following day he returned with his first report. It seemed that, changing into the garb of a better-class mechanic and taking a small kit of tools with him, he had called at Mr. Duke’s in the character of an electrician who had been sent to overhaul the light fittings.

Miss Duke happened to be out, and the rather pretty housemaid who opened the door, charmed with the newcomer’s manner, admitted him without hesitation. He had gone all over the house, paying particular attention to Mr. Duke’s bedroom. In the middle of the day he had asked and been granted leave to heat his can of soup at the kitchen fire, and to such purpose had he used the opportunities thus gained that before he left he had prevailed on the pretty housemaid to go with him to supper and the pictures on her next evening out. “Once I get a drop of spirits into her I’ll get all she knows,” he concluded, “though I doubt if it’ll be much.”

“That’s all right so far as it goes,” French admitted, “but what have you actually found out?”

“Well, there’s first of all the family. It’s a small one; there’s only the father and the daughter, Miss Sylvia. The mother’s alive, but she has been in a lunatic asylum for years, quite incurable, they said. Miss Sylvia is a nice-looking young lady and well liked, by what Rachael says—that’s the housemaid. Then there’s the servants; this Rachael, and another girl, Annie, and Sarah, the cook, and there’s a shover they call Manley. I didn’t see him, but the girls seem all right—not the kind that would be after the keys of jewel safes anyway.”

“What’s the house like?”

“It’s a middling big house, and the furniture’ll have been good when it was bought, though it’s getting a trifle shabby now. Mr. Duke’s bedroom is at the end of the left wing, and Miss Duke’s is in the front of the house, so anybody could go through Mr. Duke’s room without being seen. Anybody could get a mould of that key if he left it in his room, say, while he was having his bath.”

“Did you find out any possibilities; any tradesmen in, like yourself, or any one staying in the house?”

The Sergeant shook his head.

“I did not, sir,” he admitted. “I thought I had maybe done enough for one day. I didn’t want to be after starting them wondering about me. But I’ll get that out of Rachael to-morrow night.”

“Better see that Manley, the chauffeur—or no, I shall see him myself. You stick to what you’re at. Anything else?”

“No, sir, I think not. What the girls talked most about was Miss Sylvia’s engagement. It seems she was engaged to some friend in the City and they were to have been married at the end of the month, and now they’ve had some bust up and the whole thing’s postponed, if not off altogether.”

“That so? They didn’t tell you the reason?”

“They did not, sir. But I can likely find out from Rachael if you want to know.”

“I don’t suppose I do,” French returned, “but you might as well find out what you can—on spec. You know who the young man is?”

“No, sir. They didn’t say.”

French looked up his notebook.

“I seem to know a deal more about it than you do,” he grumbled. “He is a clerk in Mr. Duke’s office, name of Harrington—Stanley Harrington. I interviewed him with the others in the office on the day after the murder, and he told me about the engagement. It seemed to be going strong then. When did they postpone it?”

“They didn’t say that either, sir.”

“Well, find that out, too. That’ll do for the present.”

That evening French, in the guise of an out-of-work mechanic, took up his stand near Mr. Duke’s house, and presently saw the old gentleman arrive back from business in his car. An hour later he followed the chauffeur from the garage to a house in a small street off Esther Road. There French hung about for perhaps another hour, when he had the satisfaction of seeing the quarry emerge again, pass down the street, and disappear into the Rose and Thistle bar. This was just what the Inspector had hoped for, and after a few minutes he followed him in.

To scrape acquaintance was easy enough. French, as a motor mechanic out of work, was provided with a ready introduction to any chauffeur, and over a couple of glasses of beer he learned first of the chances of jobs in the district, and secondly, by skilful pumping, many details of his new companion’s work and of the Duke menage. But he heard nothing that seemed in the slightest degree suspicious or interesting. The man himself, moreover, seemed of an honest, harmless type, and much too stupid to be concerned personally in enterprises with keys of safes.

For a day the inquiry hung fire, and then Sergeant Nolan brought in a report which turned the Inspector’s thoughts into still another channel. Nolan had, it appeared, taken the pretty housemaid, Rachael, first to the pictures and then to supper at a popular restaurant. The girl had what the Sergeant called “the gift of the gab,” and it had only been necessary for him judiciously to supply an occasional topic, to have a continuous stream of more or less relevant information poured into his receptive ears.

First he had tried to ascertain whether any one had recently had access to Mr. Duke’s dressing-room during the night or early morning, and he soon learned that, prior to his own visit, no tradesmen had been in the house for many months. Moreover, the only visitor who had stayed overnight for a considerable time was Mr. Stanley Harrington, Miss Duke’s fiancée. The two young people had been feverishly engaged in rehearsals for a play given by a local amateur dramatic society, and for the four nights previous to the entertainment Miss Duke had refused to allow her swain to waste time in going to and from his rooms, and had insisted on his putting up with them. This occurred about a month before the murder, and Harrington had slept in a room just opposite to Mr. Duke’s. It was obvious, therefore, that had the key been left in the dressing-room at any time, Harrington could easily have taken the necessary impression.

Nolan then went on to tell what he had found out as to the postponed wedding, and in this French felt he had food for thought. It appeared that the trouble, whatever it was, had come suddenly, and it had taken place on the day after the murder. On the evening of the crime, so Rachael had said, Mr. Duke was not at home for dinner, but Mr. Harrington had turned up. He and Miss Duke had dined together, and then everything was couleur de rose. They had gone out together after dinner. About ten, Miss Duke had returned and had gone straight to bed. Almost certainly, therefore, she had not known that night of Mr. Duke’s call to the office. Next morning she had breakfasted with her father, and had presumably then learned of the tragedy. But not five minutes after breakfast began she had slipped out of the room and had made a telephone call, and directly Mr. Duke had left the house she had put on her things and followed him. She had been absent for about twenty minutes, and had then gone direct to her bedroom, where, on the plea of a headache, she had spent the day. When Rachael had had occasion to enter, she found her lying down, but the girl had heard her hour after hour pacing the room, and in her opinion, her mistress’s indisposition was more mental than physical. About four o’clock that afternoon Mr. Harrington had called. Miss Duke saw him in her own sitting-room, and during the interview some terrible quarrel must have taken place. Mr. Harrington left in about half an hour, and Rachael, who had opened the door to let him out, said that he looked as if he had received his death warrant. His face wore an expression of the most acute consternation and misery, and he seemed like a man in a dream, stupefied by some terrible calamity. He usually spoke pleasantly to the girl when leaving, but on this occasion he did not appear to notice her presence, but stumbled blindly out of the house and crept off like a broken man. Later the same evening she had seen Miss Duke, and she noticed that her eyes were red and swollen from crying. Since then, the young lady had changed out of all knowing. She had become silent, melancholy, and depressed. She had grown thin and old looking, and was eating nothing, and, Rachael had opined, if something were not done, they would soon see her in a decline.

Inspector French was not a little intrigued by all this information. That there was a connection between the murder of Charles Gething and the postponed wedding he could scarcely believe, and yet some of the facts seemed almost to point in that direction.

If Miss Duke had first learned of the tragedy from her father at breakfast, was this knowledge the cause of her telephone call? To whom was the call made? What had she done during her twenty-minute absence from the house? What had taken place at the interview between Miss Duke and Harrington, and, most important of all, why had the wedding been postponed? French felt that he could not rest until he had obtained answers to all these questions, and it seemed to him that the only way he could do so would be to trace the girl’s movements in detail during the whole period in question.

For a long time he continued sitting at his desk as he considered ways and means. At last he telephoned once more for Sergeant Nolan.

“Look here,” he began, when the man presented himself, “I want you to get something more out of that girl. When can you see her again?”

“Sunday, sir,” said the charmer. “I left an opening for meeting her for fear it would maybe be wanted.”

“And this is Friday. Well, I suppose I shall have to wait. Better see her on Sunday and find out these things in this order. First, in what vehicle Miss Duke drove to her friend’s girls’ club on the night of the crime; secondly, what vehicle she came back in, and thirdly, whether she received any note or message between the time she returned that night and Mr. Harrington’s call next day, other than what she might have learned during her telephone call and absence from the house after breakfast. Got that?”

Nolan, signifying that he had, left the room, and French turned his attention to his routine work, which had got sadly behind.

On the following Monday morning, Sergeant Nolan made his report. He had taken his fair quarry up the river on Sunday afternoon, and there he had got his information.

Miss Duke and Mr. Harrington had left in Mr. Duke’s car shortly before eight. Manley, the chauffeur, had mentioned to Rachael that his young mistress had told him he need not wait for her, as she expected that Mr. Duke would want him later in the evening to take him home from his club. She had returned about ten in a taxi, and had come in quickly and gone to her room. So far as Rachael knew, she had received no caller, note or other message from then until Mr. Harrington arrived next day, other than those excepted in the question.

French was anxious to keep secret the fact that he was looking into Miss Duke’s doings, and he was therefore unwilling to question Manley on the matter. He had learned from Harrington the address of the girls’ club, and he thought inquiries there might give him his information. Accordingly an hour later saw him standing before a somewhat dilapidated church school-house in a narrow street of drab and depressing houses in the Shadwell district. The school was closed, but inquiries next door produced the information that the caretaker lived in No. 47.

He betook himself to No. 47, and there found a pale, tired-looking young woman with a baby in her arms, who, when he asked for a few moments’ conversation, invited him into an untidy and not overclean kitchen. She told him, in reply to his questions, that the club was run by a number of ladies, headed by a Miss Amy Lestrange. It was open each evening, but she, the speaker, was not present, her duty being only to keep the rooms clean. But her husband, the caretaker, was there off and on every evening. He might have been there when the young lady in question arrived, she did not know. But he worked in the factory near by, and would be in for his dinner in half an hour, if the gentleman liked to wait.

French said he would call back presently, and strolled out through the depressing neighbourhood. In forty-five minutes he was back at No. 47, where the caretaker had just arrived. French told him to go on with his dinner, and sat beside him as he ate. The man, evidently hoping the affair would have its financial side, was anxious to tell everything he knew.

It seemed that he had been present at the club on the evening in question, and when French had described his young couple, he remembered their arrival. It was not usual for so fine a motor to penetrate the fastnesses of that dismal region, and its appearance had fixed the matter in his memory. The gentleman had got out first and asked him if this was the Curtis Street Club, and had then assisted his companion to alight. The lady had called to the chauffeur that he need not either wait or return for her. She had then gone into the club, leaving the gentleman standing on the pavement. About half-past nine a taxi had driven up, and the same gentleman had got out and sent him, the caretaker, in to say that Mr. Harrington was waiting for Miss Duke. The young lady had presently come down with Miss Lestrange, the head of the club. The three had talked for a few minutes, and then the strangers had got into the taxi and driven off.

“She’s a fine girl, Miss Duke,” French observed, as he offered the caretaker a fill from his pouch. “I never have seen her anything but smiling and pleasant all the years I’ve known her.”

“That’s right,” the man returned, gloatingly loading his pipe. “She’s a peach and no mistake.”

French nodded in a satisfied way.

“I should have laid a quid on it,” he declared, “that she would have been as smiling and pleasant going away as when she came. She always is.”

“Well, you’d ha’ pulled it off. But, lor, guv’nor, it’s easy for lydies as wot ’as lots o’ money to be pleasant. W’y shouldn’t they be?”

French rose.

“Ah, well, I expect they’ve their troubles like the rest of us,” he said, slipping half a crown into the man’s eager hand.

If the caretaker was correct and Miss Duke was in good spirits on leaving the club, it followed that the upset, whatever it had been, had not up to then taken place. The next step, therefore, was obviously to find the taxi in which the two young people had driven to Hampstead, so as to learn whether anything unusual had occurred during the journey.

He returned to the Yard, and sending for some members of his staff, explained the point at issue. But, as he would have been the first to admit, it was more by luck than good guidance that on the very first day of the inquiry he gained his information. Taximan James Tomkins had driven the young couple on the evening in question, and by five o’clock he was at the Yard awaiting French’s pleasure.

Taximan Tomkins was a wizened-looking man with a surly manner and the air of having a constant grievance, but he was evidently overawed by the situation in which he found himself, and seemed anxious to do his best to answer the Inspector’s questions clearly.

He remembered the evening in question. He had been hailed by a gentleman near Liverpool Street, and told to drive to the Curtis Street Girls’ Club. There, after some delay, they had picked up a young lady.

“What address did you get?” French asked.

“I don’t just remember,” the man said slowly scratching his head. “Somewhere in Hampstead it was, but I’m blest if I could tell you where.”

“The Cedars, Hampstead, perhaps?”

“That’s right guv’nor. That was it.”

“And the two started off together?”

“Yes, the other young lydie just saw them off.”

“Now tell me, did they meet any one else on the way home?”

“Not while they were in the keb, they didn’t.”

“Or buy a paper, or stop for any purpose whatever?”

“They stopped and got out for a ’arf a mo’, but I can’t say if it was to buy a paper.”

“Oh, they stopped, did they? Where was that?”

“In Holborn, just past the end of Hatton Garden.”

“What?” cried French, surprised out of his usual calm superiority. “Tell me about that.”

The driver was stupid and suspicious, but in time the details came out. The most direct route led along Holborn, and he had taken it, but when he reached the point in question the young man had hailed him through the speaking tube. “Hold on a minute, driver,” he had called. “Look sharp, please.” He had pulled over to the kerb, but almost before he had come to a stand the young man had jumped out and had hurried across the street. The lady had then alighted, had told Tomkins to wait, and had followed him. Tomkins had at first feared he was going to lose his money, but after a couple of minutes they had both returned and the girl had got in. She had bidden good-night to her friend, and he, Tomkins, had driven her off, leaving the man standing on the pavement. On arrival at Hampstead, the lady had paid him and entered the house. As far as the driver had noticed neither of the young people was excited or upset.

This information gave French cause for thought. On obtaining Harrington’s statement on the morning after the murder, he had imagined the young man was keeping something back. And now he found that he had been right. The young fellow had not mentioned the fact that he had been within a few yards of the scene of the crime at the time at which it had taken place. He had stated that he had seen Sylvia home, and now it appeared he had not done so, but had accompanied her only half-way. French reminded himself with satisfaction that his instinct on such a point was seldom far astray.

Furthermore, this news confirmed his growing suspicion that Miss Duke also knew something about the affair. It seemed too far-fetched a coincidence that this unexpected stop near the scene of the crime, the mental upset of both herself and Harrington, and the postponing of the wedding, were unconnected with the tragedy. What the connection might be he could not imagine but he could not but believe it existed.

Determined to put the matter to the test without further delay, he drove to the Hatton Garden office and asked for Harrington. The young fellow received him politely, though French thought he could sense an air of strain in his manner. After the briefest greeting he came directly to the point.

“Mr. Harrington,” he began, “I want to ask you one question. In our conversation on the morning after the crime you told me you had seen Miss Duke home on the previous night. Why did you state this when you had only seen her as far as Hatton Garden?”

The young man paled somewhat. He did not seem taken aback, rather he gave French the impression of feeling that he was now face to face with a crisis he had long expected. He answered without hesitation and with an evident attempt at dignity.

“I quite admit that I left Miss Duke near the end of Hatton Garden, but I don’t admit that that was in any way inconsistent with what I told you. Certainly I had no intention of deceiving you.”

“I don’t appreciate your point, Mr. Harrington,” French said sternly. “There is a very considerable difference between seeing Miss Duke home and not doing so.”

The young man flushed.

“I got a cab, drove to the club to meet Miss Duke, picked her up, and accompanied her a considerable part of the way home. I consider I was perfectly justified in saying I saw her home.”

“Then our ideas of the meanings of words are strangely different. I shall be glad if you will now tell me why you both alighted from your taxi near this street, and why you then allowed Miss Duke to proceed alone.”

This time Harrington seemed taken aback, but in a moment he pulled himself together, and he answered coherently enough:

“Certainly, there is no secret or mystery about it. As we were driving along, Miss Duke suddenly pointed to a tall girl in one of those glossy blue waterproofs, and told me to stop the cab, as she wished to speak to her. I shouted to the driver, and when he drew in to the kerb I jumped out and ran after the girl. Unfortunately she had disappeared, and though I searched round I could not find her. When I came back I found that Miss Duke had also alighted. I explained that I had missed her friend, but she only said, ‘Never mind, it can’t be helped.’ She got into the cab again, and I was about to follow, but she said No, that there was no use in taking me farther out of my way, and that she would go home alone.”

“Did you know the girl?”

“No, Miss Duke did not tell me who she was.”

“You might describe her.”

“I really could not, except that she was tall and wearing the blue waterproof and carrying an umbrella. You see, it was dark, and I only got a glimpse of her by the street lamps. She was swinging along quickly towards Oxford Street.”

“What did you do after Miss Duke drove off?”

“I went home, as I have already told you.”

And that was all Inspector French could get out of him. In spite of all his questions, the young man stuck absolutely to his story.

It was obvious to French that he must next get Miss Duke’s statement, and with this in view he drove out to The Cedars. He asked Harrington to accompany him, so as to prevent his telephoning to the young lady to put her on her guard, and on reaching the house he bade him good-day with a somewhat sardonic smile.

Miss Duke was at home, and presently joined him in the breakfast-room to which he had been shown.

She was a comely maiden, slightly given to plumpness, perhaps, but pretty and kindly and wholesome looking, a sight indeed to warm a man’s heart. But she looked pale and worried, and French felt that her experience, whatever it was, had hit her hard.

“I am sorry to trouble you, Miss Duke, but I am inquiring into the recent crime at your father’s office, and I find I require to ask you a few questions.”

As he spoke he watched her sharply, and he was intrigued to notice a flash of apprehension leap into her clear eyes.

“Won’t you sit down?” she invited, with a somewhat strained smile.

He seated himself deliberately, continuing:

“My questions, I am afraid, are personal and impertinent, but I have no option but to ask them. I will go on to them at once, without further preamble. The first is, What was it that upset you so greatly on the day after the crime?”

She looked at him in evident surprise, and, he imagined, in some relief also.

“Why, how can you ask?” she exclaimed. “Don’t you think news like that was enough to upset any one? You see, I had known poor Mr. Gething all my life, and he had always been kind to me. I sincerely liked and respected him, and to learn suddenly that he had been murdered in that cold-blooded way, why, it was awful—awful. It certainly upset me, and I don’t see how it could have done anything else.”

French nodded.

“Quite so, Miss Duke, I fully appreciate that. But I venture to suggest that there was something more in your mind than the tragic death of your old acquaintance; something of more pressing and more personal interest. Come now, Miss Duke, tell me what it was.”

The flash of apprehension returned to her eyes, and then once again the look of relief.

“You mean the loss of the diamonds,” she answered calmly. “I deplored that, of course, particularly on my father’s account. But it was Mr. Gething’s death that really, as you call it, upset me. The diamonds we could do without, but we could not give the poor old man back his life.”

“I did not mean the loss of the diamonds, Miss Duke. I meant something more personal than that. I’m afraid you must tell me about it.”

There was now no mistaking the girl’s uneasiness, and French grew more and more hopeful that he was on the track of something vital. But she was not giving anything away.

“You must be mistaken,” she said in a lower tone. “It was the news of the murder, and that alone, which upset me.”

French shook his head.

“I would rather not take that answer from you. Please reconsider it. Can you tell me nothing else?”

“Nothing. That is all I have to say.”

“Very well. I trust it may not be necessary to reopen the matter. Now I want you to tell me why you postponed your wedding with Mr. Harrington.”

Miss Duke flushed deeply.

“I will tell you nothing of the sort, Mr. Inspector!” she declared with some show of anger. “What right have you to ask me such a question? That is a matter between Mr. Harrington and myself alone.”

“I hope you are right, Miss Duke, but I fear there is a chance that you may be mistaken. Do you absolutely decline to answer me?”

“Of course I do! No girl would answer such a question. It is an impertinence to ask it.”

“In that case,” French said grimly, “I shall not press the matter—for the present. Let me turn to another subject. I want you next to tell me why you stopped at Hatton Garden on your way home from the Curtis Street Girls’ Club on the night of the crime.”

For a moment the girl seemed too much surprised to reply, then she answered with a show of indignation: “Really, Mr. French, this is too much! May I ask if you suspect me of the crime?”

“Not of committing it,” French returned gravely, “but,” he leaned forward and gazed keenly into her eyes, “I do suspect you of knowing something about it. Could you not, Miss Duke, if you chose, put me on the track of the criminal?”

“Oh, no, no, no!” the girl cried piteously, motioning with her hands as if to banish so terrible a thought from her purview. “How can you suggest such a thing? It is shameful and horrible!”

“Of course, Miss Duke, I can’t make you answer me if you don’t want to. But I put it to you that it is worth your while thinking twice before you attempt to keep back information. Remember that if I am not satisfied, you may be asked these same questions in court, and then you will have to answer them whether you like it or not. Now I ask you once again, Why did you leave your taxi at Hatton Garden?”

“I think it is perfectly horrible of you to make all these insinuations against me without any grounds whatever,” she answered a little tremulously. “There is no secret about why I stopped the taxi, and I have never made any mystery about it. Why it should have any importance I can’t imagine.” She paused, then with a little gesture as if throwing discretion to the winds, continued: “The fact is that as we were driving home I suddenly saw a girl in the street whom I particularly wished to meet. I stopped the cab and sent Mr. Harrington after her, but he missed her.”

“Who was she?”

“I don’t know; that is why I was so anxious to see her. I suppose you want the whole story?” She tossed her head and went on without waiting for him to reply. “Last summer I was coming up to town from Tonbridge, where I had been staying, and this girl and I had a carriage to ourselves. We began to talk, and became quite friendly. When they came to collect the tickets found I had lost mine. The man wanted to take my name, but the girl insisted on lending me the money to pay my fare. I wrote down her name and address on a scrap of paper so that I could return the money to her, but when I reached home I found I had lost the paper, and I stupidly had not committed the address to memory. I could not send her the money, and I don’t know what she must have thought of me. You can understand, therefore, my anxiety to meet her when I saw her from the cab.”

“But why did you pay your fare a second time? You must have known that all you had to do was to give your name and address to the ticket collector.”

“I suppose I did,” she admitted, “but I preferred to pay rather than have the trouble of explanations and probably letters to the head office.”

Inspector French was chagrined. Instinctively he doubted the story, but Miss Duke had answered his question in a reasonable way, and if she stuck to the tale, he did not see how he could break her down. After this lapse of time it would be quite impossible to obtain confirmation or otherwise of the details, especially as Miss Duke’s hypothetical fellow-traveller could not be produced. He pointedly made no comment on the statement as he resumed his investigation.

“To whom did you telephone after breakfast on the morning after the murder?”

That Miss Duke was amazed at the extent of the Inspector’s knowledge was evident, but she answered immediately.

“To Mr. Harrington.”

“To say what?”

“If I must repeat my private conversations to my future husband, it was to ask him to meet me at once as I had something to say to him.”

“What was the nature of the communication?”

Miss Duke flushed again.

“Really,” she exclaimed, “I protest against this. What possible connection can our private affairs have with your business?”

“It is your own fault, Miss Duke. You are not telling me the whole truth, and I am therefore suspicious. I want to find out what you are keeping back, and I may tell you that I am going to do so. What did you want to see Mr. Harrington about so urgently?”

The girl seemed terribly distressed.

“If you will have it, it was about the postponement of the wedding,” she said in a low voice. “You understand, we had been discussing the matter on the night before, when no conclusion had been come to. But on sleeping on it I had made up my mind in favour of the postponement, and I wanted to tell Mr. Harrington at once.”

“But why was it so urgent? Could you not have waited until later in the day?”

“I felt I couldn’t wait. It was so important to us both.”

“And you refuse to give the reason of the postponement?”

“I do. You have no right to ask it.”

“You did meet Mr. Harrington that morning?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“At the entrance to the Finchley Road tube station.”

“Why did you not tell him to call on you instead of yourself going out?”

“In order as far as possible to prevent him from being late at the office.”

French suddenly remembered that Harrington had entered the office during his visit there on the morning after the crime, and had apologised to Mr. Duke for his late arrival. It had not struck French at the time, but now he recalled that when Mr. Duke had spoken to him of the tragedy he had stated he had heard of it already. Where? French now wondered. Was it merely from the morning paper, or was it from Miss Duke? Or, still more pressing question, had they both known of it on the previous night?

Suddenly a possible theory flashed into his mind, and he sat for a few moments in silence, considering it. Suppose that on the stop near Hatton Garden, Harrington had mentioned that he wanted for some purpose to call at the office, or suppose Miss Duke had asked him to do so, and that he had left her for that purpose. Next morning at breakfast she hears from her father of the murder, and is at once panic stricken about Harrington. She sees that if he admits his visit he may be suspected of the crime, and she sends for him before he reaches the office in order to warn him. Or could it be that, knowing of this hypothetical visit, Miss Duke had herself suspected Harrington, and had sent for him at the earliest possible moment to hear his explanation? French was not satisfied with these suggestions, but he felt more than ever certain these two young people had conspired to hide vital information.

He left the house profoundly dissatisfied, and returning to Hatton Garden, had another interview with Harrington. He pressed the young man as hard as he could, taxing him directly with having been present in the office on the fatal night. This Harrington strenuously denied, and French could get nothing further out of him. He went again into the man’s movements on the night of the crime, but without getting any further light thrown thereon. Harrington said he had walked to his rooms after parting from Miss Duke, but no direct evidence was forthcoming as to the truth or falsehood of his statement.

Suddenly another theory leaped into the detective’s mind, but after careful thought he felt he must reject it. If Vanderkemp were guilty, the whole of these mysterious happenings would be cleared up. Harrington was under a deep debt of gratitude to his uncle, and appeared attached to him. Whether Miss Duke shared, or was endeavouring to share, his feelings, French did not know, but it was certainly possible. Suppose he and Miss Duke, driving home from the East End, had seen Vanderkemp at the end of Hatton Garden. Suppose, moreover, something in the man’s appearance had attracted their attention, something furtive or evil, something unlike his usual expression. This, coupled with the fact that the traveller was supposed to be in Amsterdam, might easily have impelled Harrington to stop the cab to have a word with his uncle. But by the time he had reached the pavement, Vanderkemp had disappeared. The incident would have been dismissed by both as trivial, until next morning at breakfast, when Miss Duke learned of the murder, its significance would become apparent. She might not believe the traveller guilty, but she would recognise that the circumstances required some explanation. Immediately the paramount importance of communicating with Harrington would appear, lest he might incautiously mention that he had seen his uncle virtually on the scene of the murder. She would instantly telephone in the hope of catching her lover before he left his rooms. She could not give her message over the telephone, so she would arrange the meeting. She would instruct Harrington to return to her as soon as possible, so as to hear what had taken place at the office. He would therefore call in the afternoon, and at the interview they would decide that in the uncertainty of the situation, the wedding should be postponed. The supposed flight of Vanderkemp would confirm their suspicions, and would account for the perturbed state of mind which both exhibited.

The theory was so fascinating that next day French once more interviewed Harrington and Miss Duke and put the question directly to them, Had they seen Vanderkemp? But both denied having done so, and baffled and irritated, he wrathfully watched another promising clue petering out before him. He had the two young people shadowed, and spent a considerable time in investigating their past life, but without result.

So the days began to draw out into weeks, and the solution of the mystery seemed as far off as ever.

One morning about six weeks after the murder in Hatton Garden, Inspector French was summoned to the presence of his chief.

“Look here, French,” he was greeted, “you’ve been at that Gething case long enough. I can’t have any more time wasted on it. What are you doing now?”

French, his usual cheery confidence sadly deflated, hesitatingly admitted that at the moment he was not doing very much, embellishing this in the course of a somewhat painful conversation with the further information that he was doing nothing whatever, and that he was severally up against it and down and out.

“I thought so,” the chief declared. “In that case you’ll have time to go and see Williams & Davies, of Cockspur Street, the money-lenders. I have just had a ’phone from them, and they say that some diamonds recently came into their possession which they are told resemble those stolen from Duke & Peabody. You might look into the matter.”

It was a rejuvenated French that fifteen minutes later ascended the stairs of Straker House, Cockspur Street, to the office of Messrs. Williams & Davies. Gone was the lassitude and the dejection and the weary brooding look, and instead there was once again the old cheery optimism, the smiling self-confidence, the springy step. He pushed open a swing door, and with an air of fatherly benevolence demanded of a diminutive office boy if Mr. Williams was in.

The senior partner was disengaged, and two minutes later French was ushered into a small, rather dark office, in which sat a tall, well-groomed man with graying hair, and a precise, somewhat pedantic manner.

“They ’phoned me from the Yard that you were coming across, Inspector,” he announced, when French had introduced himself. “I can only say I hope I have not brought you on a wild goose chase. But the affair should certainly be looked into.”

“I have not heard the circumstances yet, sir,” French reminded him. “I shall naturally be glad if you can give me some helpful information.”

“I did not care to give details over the ’phone,” Mr. Williams explained. “You can never tell who overhears you. I once heard a girl declining what was evidently a proposal of marriage. The circumstances in this case are very simple. About six weeks ago a lady, giving her name as Mrs. Chauncey S. Root, and evidently an American, called and asked if she could see one of the principals of my firm. She was shown in to me, and she explained that she was the wife of a Mr. Chauncey S. Root, a rich steel manufacturer of Pittsburg. She had just crossed by the Olympic for a holiday in Europe, reaching London on the previous evening. She said a series of misfortunes had brought her into a somewhat awkward predicament, and she wondered if I could do anything to assist her. In the first place she had been foolish enough to get into a gambling set on the way over, and had lost, as she expressed it, ‘the hell of a lot of money.’ She spoke in a very racy and American way, but she gave me the impression of being thoroughly competent and efficient. Her losses ran into several hundred pounds—she did not tell me the exact amount—but all her ready money was gone and in addition she had given several I.O.U.’s. This, however, she would not have thought twice about, as she had letters of credit for many times the amount, had it not been that a further calamity befell her in Southampton. There, in the crush on the quays, the small despatch case in which she kept her ready money and papers had been snatched from her, and she was left practically penniless, as well as without her letters of credit and her passport or other means of identification. She had, of course, reported the matter to the police authorities, but they had rather shaken their heads over it, though promising to do everything possible. She had had, indeed, to borrow a twenty-pound note from one of her travelling acquaintances to get her to London, and now she was practically without money at all. She wished, therefore, to borrow £3000, which would enable her to pay her gambling debts and to carry on in London until fresh letters of credit could be sent. Fortunately, she had with her a collection of unmounted diamonds, which she intended to have set by London jewellers, of whose skill she had heard great accounts. These diamonds she proposed to deposit as security, and she would agree to pay whatever rate of interest was customary. She asked me if my firm would be prepared to lend the money on these terms.”

“Why did she not cable to her husband?”

“I asked her that, and she explained that she did not wish to tell Mr. Root, as he had an inveterate dislike to gambling, and they had had several disagreements about her betting proclivities. In fact, relations had been seriously strained until she had promised amendment, and a confession might easily lead to a serious breach. She could not, either, attribute the loss to the theft, as it ran to so great a figure that she could not possibly be carrying the amount in her despatch case. She said she would prefer to borrow the money until she could write to her man of business to realise some of her own stocks.

“I said that her proposition, as such, was acceptable, as we frequently took stones and jewellery as security for loans, but that as she was a stranger to us, before we could do business we should obviously require some evidence of her bona fides. She replied that that was all right, that she quite recognised that owing to the loss of her papers and particularly of her passport something of the kind would be necessary. She said we could make what inquiries we liked, provided only we were quick about them, for she wanted the money as soon as possible. She asked how long we should take, and when I said twenty-four hours, she admitted that was reasonable. She suggested that if we did business we should take the stones to be valued to one of the best-known London jewellers. I agreed to this, and rang up Mr. Stronge, of Hurst & Stronge, of Bond Street, to ask him if he would undertake the valuation. He is, as you probably know, one of the most famous experts in the world. He consented, and I settled with him the amount of his fee. Finally it was arranged that, provided our inquiries were satisfactory, I should meet Mrs. Root at Hurst & Stronge’s at half-past ten on the following morning, she with the stones and I with my cheque book. I was to pay her five-sixths of the value of the diamonds. She said she expected to pay back the loan in about four weeks, and suitable terms of interest were arranged.”

Mr. Williams paused and glanced at his companion, as though to assure himself that his story was receiving the attention he evidently felt it deserved. But French’s air of thrilled interest left him no room for doubt, and he continued:

“I made my inquiries, and all appeared satisfactory. I called up Mrs. Root at the Savoy, told her I was prepared to deal, and at the hour named met her at Hurst & Stronge’s. Mr. Stronge took us to his private room, and there Mrs. Root produced a bag of stones, mostly diamonds, though there were a few emeralds and a large ruby, all unmounted. There were sixteen stones ranging in value from £40 to £400, but averaging about £200 or £220. Mr. Stronge valued them very carefully, and after a long wait we got his opinion. The whole were worth about £3300, and in accordance with our bargain I proposed to hand Mrs. Root a cheque for £2750. She admitted the correctness of this, but said she wanted the £3000, and after some conversation I agreed to meet her wishes and filled the cheque for the latter sum. She then objected that no bank would pay her without inquiring as to her identity, which would mean another delay, and asked me if I would go with her to the bank to certify that she was the person for whom I intended the money. I agreed to this, and we went to the Piccadilly branch of the London and Counties Bank. There we saw the manager, and there I left her. I returned here and lodged the stones in my safe.”

“The manager took your identification, I suppose?”

“Oh, yes. I know him personally and there was no difficulty. That ended the matter as far as I was concerned, and for four weeks I thought no more of it. But as the fifth and sixth week passed and the lady made no sign, I began to wonder. I telephoned to the Savoy, but it appeared she had left on the day of our deal. I assumed, however, that she was on the Continent, and no suspicion that all was not right occurred to me.”

“Then what roused your suspicion?”

“I am coming to that,” Mr. Williams answered in a slightly frigid tone. “This morning I happened to show the stones—without saying how they came into my possession, of course—to a personal friend of my own, a diamond merchant named Sproule, who had called with me on other business. When he saw them he grew very much excited, and asked me where I had got them from. I pressed him for an explanation, and he said they fitted the description circulated of those stolen from Messrs. Duke & Peabody. He was emphatic that I should inform the firm, but I thought it better to ring you up instead.”

“Very wise, sir,” French approved. “That was certainly your proper course. Now, I take it the first thing we have to do is to see if your friend, Mr. Sproule, is correct in his supposition. I have a list of the missing stones in my pocket, but I don’t know that I’m expert enough to identify them. I think we’ll have Mr. Duke over. May I use your ’phone?”

Mr. Duke was naturally eager to learn details of the new development, and in less than half an hour he joined the others in Mr. Williams’s office. French explained the situation, ending up, “Now we want you, Mr. Duke, to tell us if these were among the stones you lost.”

The diamond merchant, obviously much excited, began at once to make his examination. He inspected the stones minutely through a lens, weighed them on a delicate balance he had brought, and put them to other tests which greatly interested his companions. As he put each down he gave his judgment. One after another were identified. All were among those stolen from him. They were the sixteen smallest and least valuable stones of the collection.

The fact was learned by the three men with very different emotions. Mr. Duke’s gain was Mr. Williams’s loss, and resulting satisfaction and consternation showed on their respective faces, while French’s countenance wore an expression of the liveliest delight, not unmixed with mystification.

“Good heavens!” Mr. Williams cried, his voice trembling with agitation and excitement. “Then I’ve been swindled! Swindled out of three thousand pounds!” He glared at the Inspector as if he were at fault. “I suppose,” he continued, “that if this gentleman establishes his claim, the loss will fall on me? God knows, I can ill afford it.”

“We shall hope not, sir,” French said sympathetically. “We shall hope that with luck you’ll recover your money. But we must not waste any more time. I shall start by going to the bank to see if all the money has been withdrawn. I’d be obliged, Mr. Williams, if you would come also. I’ll keep you advised, Mr. Duke, how things go on, and of course you’ll get back your stones after the usual formalities have been carried out.”

Mr. Williams had recovered his composure, and, the gems having been locked in his safe, the three men left the office and descended to the street. There French said good-day to Mr. Duke, who somewhat reluctantly took his leave, the other two continuing to the bank. After a few moments’ wait they were shown into the manager’s room.

“I am afraid, Mr. Scarlett, I have had a serious misfortune,” Mr. Williams began, almost before they were seated. “I have just learned that I have been swindled out of £3000. This is Inspector French of Scotland Yard, and we both want your help in the matter.”

Mr. Scarlett, a well-groomed, middle-aged gentleman of fashionable appearance and suave manners, looked suitably concerned. He shook hands with French, and expressed his commiseration with his client’s loss in a few easy words, declaring also his desire to be of service.

“Do you remember,” Mr. Williams went on eagerly, “my coming to see you one morning about six weeks ago with a lady whom I introduced as Mrs. Root, of Pittsburg, U. S. A.? She held my cheque for £3000, and I came to introduce her to you.”

The manager recalled the incident.

“That money was a loan, for which she deposited with me a number of diamonds. The diamonds were valued by Mr. Stronge of Hurst & Stronge’s, and I gave her less than their value. I thought I had taken all reasonable precautions, but now,” Mr. Williams made a faint gesture of despair, “now it seems that they were stolen.”

“Stolen?” Mr. Scarlett repeated in a shocked voice. “My dear sir! Allow me to say how extremely sorry I am to have to tell you that I fear your discovery has come too late. Your cheque had been paid practically in full.”

Mr. Williams gave a little groan, though he had evidently been expecting the bad news. He would have spoken, but French broke in with, “Is that so, sir? That is really what we came to ask. Now I want you please to give me as detailed an account of the whole business as you can.”

“I will do so, of course,” Mr. Scarlett returned, “but I fear my story will not help you much.” He raised his desk telephone. “Ask Mr. Plenteous to come here,” he directed, and when a young, fair-haired man had entered he resumed, “This is Mr. Plenteous who carried out the details of the transaction. As Mr. Williams has said, he and the lady called on me,” he turned over the leaves of a diary, “about midday on Thursday, 26th November. He introduced the lady as a Mrs. Chauncey S. Root, of Pittsburg, and stated he had called to certify that she was the person referred to in a cheque he had made out. She produced a cheque for £3000, and Mr. Williams identified it as his. She thanked him and he withdrew. She then said that she wished to open a temporary account, and that she would like cash for £1500, and to lodge the remainder. I sent for Mr. Plenteous, and asked him to arrange the matter, and he showed the lady out to his counter. Next day the balance was withdrawn except for a few shillings, which I believe we still hold. Is not that correct, Plenteous?”

“Yes, sir,” the fair-haired young man answered, “quite correct. I can turn you up the exact balance in a moment.”

“Presently, thank you, Mr. Plenteous,” French interposed. “In the meantime perhaps you would tell us what took place between you and the lady after you left this office.”

After a glance at his chief, the clerk answered:

“Mrs. Root handed me the cheque for £3000, and said she wished to lodge half. I filled the customary forms, took her signature, and gave her a passbook, all in the usual way. Then she told me she would like the other £1500 cashed in notes of small value. She said she was a stranger to London, but that already she had discovered the difficulty of changing Bank of England notes. Being short of ready money, she had proffered a twenty-pound note in a shop. It was refused, and on asking for change in a bank which happened to be next door, the cashier politely informed her he was not permitted to change notes for strangers. She had, indeed, to go back to her hotel before she could get it done. She said she therefore wanted nothing larger than ten pounds, and at her further request I counted her out a hundred tens and a hundred fives. She stowed them away in a despatch case she was carrying. I pointed out that that was not a very safe way to carry so large a sum, but she laughed and said she guessed it was all right, that no one would know she had money in it. She said good-day and went out, and that was the last I saw of her.”

“You noticed nothing in any way suspicious about her manner or actions?”

“Nothing whatever.”

“You say the lodgment was subsequently withdrawn? You might tell me about that.”

“It was withdrawn in the sense that cheques were issued for almost the whole amount. The lady did not herself call again, nor was the account closed. There is still a small balance.”

French nodded.

“Yes, I understood you to say so. Could you let me see the ledger, and also the cheques that were issued?”

In a few seconds the clerk returned with a ponderous tome, which he opened at the name of Mrs. Helen Sadie Root. The account possessed but few items. On the debit side there was but the single entry of £1500, but on the other side there were six entries, varying from £210 10s. to £295, and totalling £1495 7s. 9d. Six cancelled cheques corresponded with the entries. As French examined these, he was interested to see that all were made out on fashionable London jewellers.

“Can you lend me these?” he asked, pointing to the cheques.

The clerk hesitated, but Mr. Scarlett intervened.

“Certainly,” he answered readily, “but you will have to give us a receipt for our auditors.”

This was soon arranged, and after French had asked a few more questions, he and Mr. Williams left the bank.

“Now,” he said briskly, before his companion could frame a remark, “I am going round to these six jewellers, but first I want some further information from you. Shall we go back to your office?”

Mr. Williams assented eagerly. He had lost his air of detached precision, and, like a somewhat spoiled child, plied the other with questions as to his probable chances of success. French answered in his usual cheery, optimistic way, and it was not until they were once more seated in Mr. Williams’s sanctum that he dropped his air of fatherly benevolence and became once more the shrewd and competent officer of Scotland Yard.

“In the first place,” he began, as he took out his notebook, “I want your description of the lady. I gather she was a good-looking woman, attractive both in appearance and manner. Did you find her so?”

Mr. Williams hesitated.

“Well, yes, I did,” he admitted, somewhat apologetically, as French thought. “She certainly had a way with her—something different from my usual clients. From her manner I never should have suspected she was other than all right.”

“Most women crooks are attractive looking,” French declared smoothly. “It’s part of their stock in trade. Just let me have as detailed a description of her as you can.”

It seemed she was of middle height, and dark, very dark as to hair and eyelashes, but less so as to eyes. They were rather a golden shade of brown. She had a somewhat retroussé nose, and a tiny mouth set in an oval face, with a complexion of extreme, but healthy, pallor. She wore her hair low over her ears, and her smile revealed an unexpected dimple. Mr. Williams had remarked these details so thoroughly that French smiled inwardly, as he solemnly noted them in his book. The money-lender had not particularly observed what she was wearing, but this did not matter as Mr. Scarlett had, and a detailed description of her dress was already entered up.

“Tell me next, please, Mr. Williams, what identification the lady gave of herself, and what inquiries you made to test her statement. She had lost her passport?”

“Yes, I told you how, or rather I told you what she said about it. She gave me her card, and showed me the envelopes of several letters addressed to her at Pittsburg. She also showed me some photographs of groups in which she appeared which had been taken on board the Olympic, as well as a dinner menu dated for the third day out. She explained that her return ticket had been stolen with the passport, so that she could not let me see it.”

“Not very conclusive, I’m afraid,” French commented. “All that evidence might have been faked.”

“I quite see that, and saw it at the time,” declared the money-lender. “But I did not rest there. I applied to Dashford’s, you know, the private inquiry people. I asked them to cable their agents in Pittsburg for a description of Mrs. Root, and to know if she had left for England on the Olympic. There is the reply.”

He took a paper from a file and handed it across. It was headed, “J. T. Dashford & Co., Private Inquiry Agents,” and read: