please. Berner, you are to stay here until the gentleman goes out
again."

Muller followed her through several rooms into a large bed-chamber where
he found an elderly man, very evidently ill, lying in bed.

"Who are you?" asked the sick man, raising his head from the pillow. The
woman had gone out and closed the door behind her.

"My name is Muller, police detective. Here are my credentials."

Fellner glanced hastily at the paper. "Why does the police send to me?"

"It concerns your ward."

Fellner sat upright in bed now. He leaned over towards his visitor as he
said, pointing to a letter on the table beside his bed, "Asta's overseer
writes me from her estate that she left home on the 18th of November to
visit me. She should have reached here on the evening of the 18th, and
she has not arrived yet. I did not receive this letter until to-day."

"Did you expect the young lady?"

"I knew only that she would arrive sometime before the third of
December. That date is her twenty-fourth birthday and she was to
celebrate it here."

"Did she not usually announce her coming to you?"

"No, she liked to surprise me. Three days ago I sent her a telegram
asking her to bring certain necessary papers with her. This brought the
answer from the overseer of her estate, an answer which has caused me
great anxiety. Your coming makes it worse, for I fear--" The sick man
broke off and turned his eyes on Muller; eyes so full of fear and grief
that the detective's heart grew soft. He felt Fellner's icy hand on his
as the sick man murmured: "Tell me the truth! Is Asta dead?"

The detective shrugged his shoulders. "We do not know yet. She was alive
and able to send a message at half past eight this evening."

"A message? To whom?"

"To the nearest police station." Muller told the story as it had come to
him.

The old man listened with an expression of such utter dazed terror that
the detective dropped all suspicion of him at once.

"What a terrible riddle," stammered the sick man as the other finished
the story.

"Would you answer me several questions?" asked Muller. The old gentleman
answered quickly, "Any one, every one."

"Miss Langen is rich?"

"She has a fortune of over three hundred thousand guldens, and
considerable land."

"Has she any relatives?"

"No," replied Fellner harshly. But a thought must have flashed through
his brain for he started suddenly and murmured, "Yes, she has one
relative, a step-brother."