man, and had perhaps already received from him a promise to
visit the studio.

She had not seen the stranger again. He had not been at the Cafe Royal
on the night when she had dined there alone. But Garstin must have seen
him again, unless, indeed, Garstin was being absolutely disgusting, was
condescending to a cheap and vulgar hoax.

That was just possible. But somehow she believed in Garstin this
time. She felt almost sure that he had done what she wished, and that
to-morrow afternoon in Glebe Place she would meet the man to whom she
had offered the shilling.

That would be distinctly amusing. She felt on the edge of a rather
uncommon adventure.

On the following day, very soon after three, she pushed the bell outside
Garstin's studio door in Glebe Place. It was not answered immediately,
and, feeling impatient, she rang again without waiting long. Garstin
opened the door, and smiled rather maliciously on seeing her.

"What a hurry you're in!" he said. "Come along in, my girl."

As he shut the heavy door behind her she turned in the lobby and said:

"Well, Dick?"

"I'm working in the upstairs studio," he returned blandly.

"What are you at work on?"

"Go up and you'll see for yourself."

She hastened through the studio on the ground floor, which was hung with
small landscapes, and sketches in charcoal, and audacious caricatures
of various well-known people. At the end of it was a short and wide
staircase. She mounted it swiftly, and came into another large studio
built out at the back of the building. Here Garstin worked on his
portraits, and here she expected to come face to face with the living
bronze. As she drew near to the entrance of the studio she felt positive
that he was waiting for her. But when she reached it and looked quickly
and expectantly round she saw at once that the great room was empty.
Only the few portraits on easels and on the pale walls looked at her
with the vivid eyes which Garstin knew how to endow with an almost
abnormal life.

Evidently Garstin had stopped below for a moment in the ground floor
studio, but she now heard his heavy tramp on the stairs behind her and
turned almost angrily.

"Dick, is this intended for a joke?"

"What do you mean by 'this'?"

"You know! Have you brought me here under false pretences? You know
quite well why I came."

"Why don't you take off your hat?"

But for once Miss Van Tuyn's vanity was not on the alert; for once she
did not care wh