truth and give me away," remarked Hugh dubiously.

"She won't. Recollect, Hugh, that I was your father's friend, and am
yours. What advice I give you is for your own good. You can't stay
here--it's impossible."

The name of The Sparrow was upon Hugh's lips, and he was about to
tell Benton of that mysterious person's efforts on his behalf, but,
on reflection, he saw that he had no right to expose The Sparrow's
existence to others. The very house in which they were was one of the
bolt-holes of the wonderfully organized gang of crooks which Il Passero
controlled.

"How did you know that I was here?" asked Hugh suddenly in curiosity.

"That I'm not at liberty to say. It was not a friend of yours, but
rather an enemy who told me--hence I tell you that you run the gravest
risk in remaining here a moment longer. As soon as I heard you were
here, I telephoned to Mrs. Bond, and she has very generously asked us
both to stay with her," Benton went on. "If you agree, I'll get a car
now, without delay, and we'll run down into Surrey together," he added.

Hugh glanced at the tall, well-dressed man of whom his father had
thought so highly. Charles Benton, in spite of his hair tuning grey, was
a handsome man, and moved in a very good circle of society. Nobody knew
his source of income, and nobody cared. In these days clothes make the
gentleman, and a knighthood a lady.

Like many others, old Mr. Henfrey had been sadly deceived by Charles
Benton, and had taken him into his family as a friend. Other men had
done the same. His geniality, his handsome, open face, and his plausible
manner, proved the open sesame to many doors of the wealthy, and the
latter were robbed in various ways, yet never dreaming that Benton was
the instigator of it all. He never committed a theft himself. He gave
the information--and others did the dirty work.

"You recollect Mrs. Bond," said Benton. "But I believe Maxwell, her
first husband, was alive then, wasn't he?"

"I have a faint recollection of meeting a Mrs. Maxwell in Paris--at
lunch at the Pre Catalan--was it not?"

"Yes, of course. About six years ago. That's quite right!" laughed
Benton. "Well, Maxwell died and she married again--a Colonel Bond. He
was killed in Mesopotamia, and now she's living up on the Hog's Back,
beyond Guildford, on the road to Farnham."

Hugh again reflected. He had come to Abingdon Road at the suggestion of
the mysterious White Cavalier. Ought he to leave the place wi