Fountain,' so I sent a message to both."

"I was at the 'George,' and left an hour after receipt of your wire."

"Well, tell me what has happened. How are things up at Glencardine?"

"Goslin is with the old fellow. He has taken the girl's place as his
confidential secretary," was the shabby man's reply, speaking with a
foreign accent. "Walter Murie was at home for Christmas, but went to
Cairo."

"And how are matters in Paris?"

"They are working hard, but it's an uphill pull. The old man is a crafty
old bird. Those papers you got from the safe had been cunningly prepared
for anybody who sought to obtain information. The consequence is that
we've shown our hand, and heavily handicapped ourselves thereby."

"You told me all that when you were down here a month ago," Flockart
said impatiently.

"You didn't believe me then. You do now, I suppose?"

"I've never denied it," Flockart declared, offering the stranger a
Russian cigarette from his gold case. "I was completely misled, and by
the girl also."

"The girl's influence with her father is happily quite at an end,"
remarked the shabby man. "I saw her last week in Woodnewton. The change
from Glencardine to an eight-roomed cottage in a village street must be
rather severe."

"Only what she deserves," snapped Flockart. "She defied us."

"Granted. But I cannot help thinking that we haven't played a very fair
game," said the man. "Remember, she's only a girl."

"But dangerous to us and to our plans, my dear Krail. She knows a lot."

"Because--well, forgive me for saying so, my dear Flockart--because
you've been a fool, and have allowed her to know."

"It wasn't I; it was the woman."

"Lady Heyburn! Why, I always believed her to be the soul of discretion."

"She's been too defiant of consequences. A dozen times I've warned her;
but she will not heed."

"Then she'll land herself in a deep hole if she isn't careful," replied
the foreigner, speaking very fair English. "Does she know I'm here?"

"Of course not. If we're to play the game she must know nothing. She's
already inclined to throw prudence to the winds, and to confess all to
her husband."

"Confess!" gasped the stranger, paling beneath his rather sallow skin.
"_Per Bacco!_ she's not going to be such an idiot, surely?"

"We were run so close, and so narrowly escaped discovery after I got at
those papers at Glencardine, that she seems to have lost heart,"
Flockart remarked.

"But if she acted the fo