arrived in London two weeks ago on the
MAURETANIA. But my name was not on the passenger-list, because I did not
want the Navy Department to know I was taking my leave abroad. I have
been stopping at my own address in Jermyn Street, and my references are
yourself, the Embassy, and my landlord. You will telephone him at once
that, if any one asks after Henry Grant, he is to say what you tell him
to say. And if any one sends for Henry Grant's clothes, he is to send MY
clothes."

"But you don't expect to be in there as long as that?" exclaimed
Cuthbert.

"I do not," said Ford. "But, if he takes me in, I must make a bluff of
sending for my things. No; either I will be turned out in five minutes,
or if he accepts me as a patient I will be there until midnight. If I
cannot get the girl out of the house by midnight, it will mean that
I can't get out myself, and you had better bring the police and the
coroner."

"Do you mean it?" asked Cuthbert.

"I most certainly do!" exclaimed Ford.

"Until twelve I want a chance to get this story exclusively for our
paper. If she is not free by then it means I have fallen down on it, and
you and the police are to begin to batter in the doors."

The two young men left the cab, and at some distance from each other
walked to Sowell Street. At the house of Dr. Prothero, Ford stopped and
rang the bell. From across the street Cuthbert saw the door open and
the figure of a man of almost gigantic stature block the doorway. For a
moment he stood there, and then Cuthbert saw him step to one side, saw
Ford enter the house and the door close upon him. Cuthbert at once ran
to a telephone, and, having instructed Ford's landlord as to the part
he was to play, returned to Sowell Street. There, in a state nearly
approaching a genuine nervous breakdown, he continued his vigil.

Even without his criminal record to cast a glamour over him, Ford would
have found Dr. Prothero, a disturbing person. His size was enormous, his
eyes piercing, sinister, unblinking, and the hands that could strangle a
bull, and with which as though to control himself, he continually pulled
at his black beard, were gigantic, of a deadly white, with fingers long
and prehensile. In his manner he had all the suave insolence of the
Oriental and the suspicious alertness of one constantly on guard, but
also, as Ford at once noted, of one wholly without fear. He had not
been over a moment in his presence before the reporter felt that t