an Secretary it was for
Lady Hilda Trelawney Hope that Sherlock Holmes inquired. We were shown
into the morning-room.

"Mr. Holmes!" said the lady, and her face was pink with her indignation,
"this is surely most unfair and ungenerous upon your part. I desired,
as I have explained, to keep my visit to you a secret, lest my husband
should think that I was intruding into his affairs. And yet you
compromise me by coming here and so showing that there are business
relations between us."

"Unfortunately, madam, I had no possible alternative. I have been
commissioned to recover this immensely important paper. I must therefore
ask you, madam, to be kind enough to place it in my hands."

The lady sprang to her feet, with the colour all dashed in an instant
from her beautiful face. Her eyes glazed--she tottered--I thought that
she would faint. Then with a grand effort she rallied from the shock,
and a supreme astonishment and indignation chased every other expression
from her features.

"You--you insult me, Mr. Holmes."

"Come, come, madam, it is useless. Give up the letter."

She darted to the bell.

"The butler shall show you out."

"Do not ring, Lady Hilda. If you do, then all my earnest efforts to
avoid a scandal will be frustrated. Give up the letter and all will be
set right. If you will work with me I can arrange everything. If you
work against me I must expose you."

She stood grandly defiant, a queenly figure, her eyes fixed upon his as
if she would read his very soul. Her hand was on the bell, but she had
forborne to ring it.

"You are trying to frighten me. It is not a very manly thing, Mr.
Holmes, to come here and browbeat a woman. You say that you know
something. What is it that you know?"

"Pray sit down, madam. You will hurt yourself there if you fall. I will
not speak until you sit down. Thank you."

"I give you five minutes, Mr. Holmes."

"One is enough, Lady Hilda. I know of your visit to Eduardo Lucas, of
your giving him this document, of your ingenious return to the room
last night, and of the manner in which you took the letter from the
hiding-place under the carpet."

She stared at him with an ashen face and gulped twice before she could
speak.

"You are mad, Mr. Holmes--you are mad!" she cried, at last.

He drew a small piece of cardboard from his pocket. It was the face of a
woman cut out of a portrait.

"I have carried this because I thought it might be useful," said he.
"The poli