the fact that he was an agent
for Van Vreck & Co. until he had had to complain of the theft) excused
this seeming carelessness by the statement that he had hoped his identity
might pass unsuspected. His theory was that safety lay in insignificance.

He had engaged a small, cheap cabin for himself alone, taking an assumed
name; had pretended to be a schoolmaster on holiday, and had worn the
pearls and other things always on his person in a money belt. Even at
night he had kept the belt on his body, a revolver under his pillow, and
the door of his cabin locked, with an extra patent adjustable lock of his
own, invented by a member of the firm he served. It had not seemed
probable that he would be recognized, or possible that he could be
robbed.

Yet one morning he had waked late, with a dull headache and sensation of
sickness, to find that his door, though closed, was unfastened, and that
all his most valuable possessions were missing from the belt.

Some were left, as though the thief had fastidiously made his selection,
scorning to trouble himself with anything but the best. The mystery of
the affair was increased by the fact that, though the man (Annesley
vaguely recalled some odd name, like Jekyll or Jedkill) felt certain he
had fastened the door, there was no sign that it had been forced open.
His patent detachable lock, however, had disappeared, like the jewels.

And despite the sensation of sickness, and pain in the head, there were
no symptoms of drugging by chloroform, or any odour of chloroform or
other anaesthetic in the room.

It struck Annesley as strange, almost terrifying, that these details of
the _Monarchic_ "sensation" should come back to her now; but she could
not doubt that she had actually read them, and the rest of the story
continued to reprint itself on her brain, as the unrolling of a film
might bring back to one of the actors poses of his own which he had let
slip into oblivion.

She remembered how some of the more important passengers had suggested
that everybody on board should be searched, even to the ship's officers,
sailors, and employes of all sorts; that the search had been made and
nothing found, but that a lady supposed to possess clairvoyant powers had
offered Mr. Jekyll or Jedkill to _consult her crystal_ for his benefit.

She had done so, and had seen wireless messages passing between someone
on the _Monarchic_ and someone on another ship, with whom the former
person appeared to