ell trilled, the limelights
shut off, with a jerk that made the eyes ache, a back-cloth
soared aloft and another glided down into its place, the comedian
took two, three, four calls, then vanished into a horde of dim
figures scuttling about in the gloom.

An electric bell trilled again and deep silence fell once more,
broken only by the hissing of the lights.

"You ought to stop behind after your turn and see her, Mac," the
stage manager's voice went on evenly. "All right, Jackson! On you
go, Mac!"

Barbara felt her heart jump. Now for it, daddy!

The great curtain mounted majestically and Arthur Mackwayte,
deputy turn, stumped serenely on to the stage.

CHAPTER II. CAPTAIN STRANGWISE ENTERTAINS A GUEST

It was the slack hour at the Nineveh Hotel. The last groups about
the tea-tables in the Palm Court had broken up, the Tzigane
orchestra had stacked its instruments together on its little
platform and gone home, and a gentle calm rested over the great
hotel as the forerunner of the coming dinner storm.

The pre-dinner hour is the uncomfortable hour of the modern hotel
de luxe. The rooms seem uncomfortably hot, the evening paper
palls, it is too early to dress for dinner, so one sits yawning
over the fire, longing for a fireside of one's own. At least that
is how it strikes one from the bachelor standpoint, and that is
how it appeared to affect a man who was sitting hunched up in a
big arm-chair in the vestibule of the Nineveh Hotel on this
winter afternoon.

His posture spoke of utter boredom. He sprawled full length in his
chair, his long legs stretched out in front of him, his, eyes
half-closed, various editions of evening papers strewn about the
ground at his feet. He was a tall, well-groomed man, and his
lithe, athletic figure looked very well in its neat uniform.

A pretty little woman who sat at one of the writing desks in the
vestibule glanced at him more than once. He was the sort of man that
women look at with interest. He had a long, shrewd, narrow head,
the hair dark and close-cropped, a big, bold, aquiline nose, and
a firm masterful chin, dominated by a determined line of mouth
emphasised by a thin line of moustache. He would have been very
handsome but for his eyes, which, the woman decided as she
glanced at him, were set rather too close together. She thought
she would prefer him as he was now, with his eyes glittering in
the fire-light through their long lashes.

But what was most appare