rce
of personality which underlay her outward lightness of manner.

"I both trust you and respect your intelligence," he answered, quietly.
"If I withhold anything from you, I am prompted by a very different
motive from the one you suggest."

"Then you are keeping something from me," she said, softly. "I knew you
were."

"Miss Abingdon," replied Harley, "when the worst trials of this affair
are over, I want to have a long talk with you. Until then, won't you
believe that I am acting for the best?"

But Phil Abingdon's glance was unrelenting.

"In your opinion it may be so, but you won't do me the honour of
consulting mine."

Harley had half anticipated this attitude, but had hoped that she
would not adopt it. She possessed in a high degree the feminine art of
provoking a quarrel. But he found much consolation in the fact that she
had thus shifted the discussion from the abstract to the personal. He
smiled slightly, and Phil Abingdon's expression relaxed in response and
she lowered her eyes quickly. "Why do you persistently treat me like a
child?" she said.

"I don't know," replied Harley, delighted but bewildered by her sudden
change of mood. "Perhaps because I want to."

She did not answer him, but stared abstractedly out of the cab window;
and Harley did not break this silence, much as he would have liked to do
so. He was mentally reviewing his labours of the preceding day when, in
the character of a Colonial visitor with much time on his hands, he had
haunted the Savoy for hours in the hope of obtaining a glimpse of Ormuz
Khan. His vigil had been fruitless, and on returning by a roundabout
route to his office he had bitterly charged himself with wasting
valuable time upon a side issue. Yet when, later, he had sat in his
study endeavouring to arrange his ideas in order, he had discovered many
points in his own defence.

If his ineffective surveillance of Ormuz Khan had been dictated by
interest in Phil Abingdon rather than by strictly professional motives,
it was, nevertheless, an ordinary part of the conduct of such a case.
But while he had personally undertaken the matter of his excellency
he had left the work of studying the activities of Nicol Brinn to an
assistant. He could not succeed in convincing himself that, on the
evidence available, the movements of the Oriental gentleman were more
important than those of the American.

"Here we are," said Phil Abingdon.

She alighted, and Harley dismissed t