a quiet street," said the wily writer, and named the one in
which it stood. "Have you nothing there?"

"I have one," said the agent with reserve, "and it's only seventy."

"The less the better," cried Langholm, light-heartedly. "I should like
to see that one."

The house-agent hesitated, finally looking Langholm in the face.

"You may as well know first as last," said he, "for we have had enough
trouble about that house. It was let last year for ninety; we're asking
seventy because it is the house in which Mr. Minchin was shot dead.
Still want to see it?" inquired the house-agent, with a wry smile.

It was all Langholm could do to conceal his eagerness, but in the end he
escaped with several orders to view, and the keys of the house of houses
in his pocket. No caretaker could be got to live in it; the agent seemed
half-surprised at Langholm's readiness to see over it all alone.

About an hour later the novelist stood at a door whose name and number
were not inscribed upon any of the orders obtained by fraud from the
King's Road agent. It was a door that needed painting, and there was a
conspicuous card in the ground-floor window. Langholm tugged twice in
his impatience at the old-fashioned bell. If his face had been alight
before, it was now on fire, for by deliberate steps he had arrived at
the very conclusion to which he had been inclined to jump. At last came
a slut of the imperishable lodging-house type.

"Is your mistress in?"

"No."

"When do you expect her?"

"Not before night."

"Any idea what time of night?"

The untidy child had none, but at length admitted that she had orders to
keep the fire in for the landlady's supper. Langholm drew his own
deduction. It would be little use in returning before nine o'clock. Five
hours to wait! He made one more cast before he went.

"Have you been here long, my girl?"

"Going on three months."

"But your mistress has been here some years?"

"I believe so."

"Are you her only servant?"

"Yes."

And five hours to wait for more!

It seemed an infinity to Langholm as he turned away. But at all events
the house had not changed hands. The woman he would eventually see was
the woman who had given invaluable evidence at the Old Bailey.

CHAPTER XXI

WORSE SPEED

Langholm returned to his hotel and wrote a few lines to Rachel. It had
been arranged that he was to report progress direct to her, and as often
as possible; but it was a very open arra