fic."

The man continued to smile.

"Alas, my Lady," he replied, "we are coupled together. Scotland Yard
would hardly separate us.... you could scarcely manage to drown me and,
keep afloat yourself. Dismiss the notion; it is from the pit."

There was no virtue in her threat as the woman knew. Already her mind
was on the way that Hecklemeir had ironically suggested--an elderly
relative, with no children, from whom one might borrow,--she valued
the ramifications of her family, running out to the remote, withered
branches of that noble tree. She appraised the individuals and rejected
them.

Finally her searching paused.

There was her father's brother who had gone in for science--deciding
against the army and the church--Professor Bramwell Winton, the
biologist. He lived somewhere toward Covent Garden.

She had not thought of him for years. Occasionally his name appeared in
some note issued by the museum, or a college at Oxford.

For almost four years she had been relieved of this thought about one's
family. The one "over the water" for whom Hecklemeir had stolen the
Scottish toast to designate, had paid lavishly for what she could find
out.

She had been richly, for these four years, in funds.

The habit was established of dipping her hand into the dish. And now
to find the dish empty appalled her. She could not believe that it was
empty. She had come again, and again to this apartment above the shops
in Regent Street, selected for its safety of ingress; a modiste and a
hairdresser on either side of a narrow flight of steps.

A carriage could stop here; one could be seen here.

Even on the right, above, at the landing of the flight of steps Nance
Coleen altered evening gowns with the skill of one altering the plumage
of the angels. It must have cost the one "over the water" a pretty penny
to keep this whole establishment running through four years of war.

She spoke finally.

"Have you a directory of London, Hecklemeir?"

The man had been watching her closely.

"If it is Scotland Yard, my Lady," he said, "you will not require a
direction. I can give you the address. It is on the Embankment,
near..."

"Don't be a fool, Hecklemeir," she interrupted, and taking the book from
his hands, she whipped through the pages, got the address she sought,
and went out onto the narrow landing and down the steps into Regent
Street:

She took a hansom.

With some concern she examined the contents of her purse. There