nity. Good friends and all that, but somehow the things he always
wanted, Dacre Wynne had invariably come by just beforehand. There was
much more than friendly rivalry in their acquaintanceship. And once, as
mere youngsters of seventeen and eighteen, there had been a girl, _his_
girl, until Dacre came and took her with that masterful way of his. There
was something brutally over-powering about Dacre, hard as granite,
forceful, magnetic. To Nigel's young, clean, wholesome mind, little given
to morbid imaginings as it was, it had almost seemed as if their two
spirits were in some stifling stranglehold together, wrapt about and
intertwined by a hand operating by means of some unknown medium. And now
to find him here in his hour of happiness. Was this close, uncomfortable
companionship of the spirit to be forced on him again? If Wynne were
present he felt he would be powerless to avoid it.

"Do you know Dacre Wynne?" he asked, his voice betraying an emotion that
was almost fear.

'Toinette Brellier glanced at her uncle, hesitated, and then murmured:
"Yes--I--do. I didn't know you did, Nigel. He never spoke of you.
I--he--you see he wants me, too, Nigel, and I am almost afraid to tell
him--about us. But I--I have to see him. Shall I tell him?"

"Of course. Poor chap, I am sorry for him. Yes, I know him, 'Toinette.
But I cannot say we are friends. You see, I--Oh, well, it doesn't
matter."

But how much Dacre Wynne was to matter to him, and to 'Toinette, and to
the public, and to far away Scotland Yard, and to the man of mystery,
Hamilton Cleek, not they--nor any one else--could possibly tell.

They went into the long, cool drawing room together, and came upon Dacre
Wynne, clad in riding things, and looking, just as Nigel remembered he
always looked, very bronzed and big and handsome in a heavy way. His back
was toward them and his eyes were upon a photo of 'Toinette that stood on
a carved secretaire. He wheeled at the sound of their footsteps and came
forward, his face lighting with pleasure, his hand outstretched. Then he
saw Merriton behind 'Toinette's tiny figure, and for a moment some of the
pleasure went out of his eyes.

"Hello," he said. "However did you get to this part of the world? You
always turn up like a bad penny.... What a time you've been 'Toinette!"

Merriton greeted him pleasantly, and 'Toinette's radiant eyes smiled up
into his bronzed face.

"Have I?" she said, with a little embarrassed laugh. "Wel