odgings were to be let there. It was pretty
late still, but a light in the basement testified to the fact that the
housekeeper, or landlady, or whoever she was, had not yet gone to bed.

"It's late, but I'll try it," Field said to himself. "So here goes."

The inspector walked up the steps and rang the bell. After a little time
a tall slatternly woman came to the door and looked sleepily out. She
seemed by no means pleased to be disturbed, and the way she wiped her
mouth with the back of her hand suggested the fact that she had been
taking some of a pleasing and not altogether unintoxicating fluid with
her supper.

"And what may you want at this time of night?" she asked suspiciously.

"Lodgings," Field said promptly. "I've just come to London, and I find
the hotels so expensive. I'm prepared to pay an advance--a matter of
five and twenty shillings a week or a little more, as it's only for so
short a time. You see I am at the hospital."

"Well, if you are at the hospital you'd better stay there," the woman
said with a laugh. "We don't let lodgings at this time of night, and
besides, I settled with a party to-day. I'm not going to stand gossiping
here all night. Be off with you."

The door closed, but not before Field had got a glimpse of the inside.
The house was most beautifully furnished, as he could see. There was an
atmosphere of hothouse flowers and fruit, and the like; a suggestion of
exquisite cigars. A man in evening dress, with a diamond flashing in his
shirt, crossed the hall; somebody was laughing in a well-bred voice. All
of this Field did not omit to note as the door closed on him.

"That card about lodgings is a blind," he said. "That place must be
watched. I'll get to bed, for I'm dead tired. In the morning I'll go and
see my actress friend. Probably she can tell me all about Miss Adela
Vane."

It was a little after eleven the next day before Field found time to
visit the little actress. He had stupidly forgotten to ask her name, but
he seemed to be expected. He waited for some time in a small prettily
furnished room till the lady of the last night's adventure came down.
She arrived presently, bright and pretty and smiling, her hand
outstretched--words of gratitude on her lips.

"But I shall never be able to thank you properly," she said. "The public
came very near last night to losing their dear, dear Adela Vane."

"You are Adela Vane?" Field gasped. "Really you are Adela Vane?"

For Adela Va