cret House was a mere blind to throw suspicion upon
Farrington and to put the police off the real track. The car would have
returned to London, and under the influence of a drug he had intended to
smuggle Frank into the small house at West Ham, where he was to be
detained until the period which Farrington had stipulated had expired.

But the transfer of money in the house was a different matter. The place
could be surrounded by police. No, it must be an open space; such a
space as would enable Poltavo to command a clear view on every side.

Why not Great Bradley, he thought, after a while? Again he would be
serving two purposes. He would be leading the police to the Secret
House, and he would have the mansion of mystery and all its resources as
a refuge in case anything went wrong at the last moment. He could, in
the worst extremity, explain that he was collecting the money on behalf
of Farrington.

Yes, Great Bradley and the wild stretch of down on the south of the town
was the place. He made his arrangements accordingly.

CHAPTER XVIII

It was three days after the exchange of letters that Count Poltavo, in
the rough tweeds of a country gentleman--a garb which hardly suited his
figure or presence--strolled carelessly across the downs, making his way
to their highest point, a great rolling slope, from the crest of which a
man could see half a dozen miles in every direction.

The sky was overcast and a chill wind blew; it was such a day upon which
he might be certain no pleasure-seekers would be abroad. To his left,
half hidden in the furthermost shelter of the downs, veiled as it was
for ever under a haze of blue grey smoke, lay Great Bradley, with its
chimneys and its busy industrial life. To his right he caught a glimpse
of the square ugly facade of the Secret House, half hidden by the
encircling trees. To its right was a chimney stack from which a lazy
feather of smoke was drifting. Behind him the old engine house of the
deserted mines, and to the right of that the pretty little cottage from
which a week before Lady Constance Dex had so mysteriously disappeared,
and which in consequence had been an object of pilgrimage for the whole
countryside.

But Lady Constance Dex's disappearance had become a nine days' wonder.
There were many explanations offered for her unexpected absence. The
police of the country were hunting systematically and leisurely, and
only T. B. and those in his immediate confidence we