irst
came."

The colonel was taken aback. A theory which he had formed was destroyed
by that recollection.

"So she was. That's right, she was there! I remember he insulted her.
But I'm certain she's seen him since; I am certain she's been working
hand-in-glove with him since. Who was the Jack who went to Yorkshire?"

It was Crewe's turn to be nonplussed.

"Jack o' Judgment must be working with a pal," the colonel went on
triumphantly, "and I suggest that that pal is Lollie Marsh."

"That's a lie!"

The colonel looked up quickly.

"Who said that?" he demanded harshly.

Crewe shook his head.

"It was not me," he said.

"Was it you, Selby?"

"Me?" said the astonished Selby. "No, I thought it was you who said it.
It came from your end of the table, colonel."

The colonel got up.

"There's something wrong here," he said.

"I've got it!" It was Pinto who spoke. "Did you notice anything peculiar
about the voice, colonel?" he asked eagerly. "I did, the first time I
heard it, and I've been wondering how I'd heard it before, and just now
it has struck me. It was a gramophone voice!"

"A gramophone voice?"

"It sounded like a voice on a speaking machine."

The colonel nodded slowly.

"Now you come to mention it, I think you're right," he said; "it sounded
familiar to me. Of course, it was a gramophone voice."

They made a careful search of the apartment, taking down every book
from the big shelf in one of the alcoves, and turning the leaves to
discover the hidden machine. With this idea to guide them the search was
more complete than it had been before. Every drawer in the desk was
taken out, every scrap of furniture was minutely examined, even the
massive legs of the colonel's writing table were tapped.

Crewe took no part in the search, but watched it with a slight smile of
amusement, and the colonel turning, detected this.

"What the devil are you grinning about?" he said. "Why aren't you
helping, Crewe? You've got an interest in this business."

"Not such an interest that I'm going to fool around looking for a
gramophone voice that goes off at appropriate intervals," said Crewe.
"Doesn't it strike you that it would have to be a pretty smart
gramophone to chip in at the right moment?"

The colonel pondered this a minute and then went back to his place at
the table, mopping his forehead.

"Pinto's right," he said; "the fellow has smuggled some fool machine
into the flat, and we shall discover it