that
thing I can't tell you. In twenty-four hours I might be able to tell
you. Whatever happens, even if poor Harley is found dead, don't hamper
my movements between now and this time tomorrow."

Wessex, who had been watching the speaker intently, suddenly held out
his hand. "It's a bet!" he said. "It's my case, and I'll conduct it in
my own way."

"Mr. Wessex," replied Nicol Brinn, taking the extended hand, "I think
you are a clever man. There are questions you would like to ask me, and
there are questions I would like to ask you. But we both realize the
facts of the situation, and we are both silent. One thing I'll say: You
are in the deadliest peril you have ever known. Be careful. Believe me I
mean it. Be very careful."

CHAPTER XIV. WESSEX GETS BUSY

Innes rose from the chair usually occupied by Paul Harley as Detective
Inspector Wessex, with a very blank face, walked into the office. Innes
looked haggard and exhibited unmistakable signs of anxiety. Since he
had received that dramatic telephone message from his chief he had not
spared himself for a moment. The official machinery of Scotland Yard was
at work endeavouring to trace the missing man, but since it had proved
impossible to find out from where the message had been sent, the
investigation was handicapped at the very outset. Close inquiries at the
Savoy Hotel had shown that Harley had not been there. Wessex, who was a
thorough artist within his limitations, had satisfied himself that none
of the callers who had asked for Ormuz Khan, and no one who had loitered
about the lobbies, could possibly have been even a disguised Paul
Harley.

To Inspector Wessex the lines along which Paul Harley was operating
remained a matter of profound amazement and mystification. His interview
with Mr. Nicol Brinn had only served to baffle him more hopelessly than
ever. The nature of Paul Harley's inquiries--inquiries which, presumably
from the death of Sir Charles Abingdon, had led him to investigate the
movements of two persons of international repute, neither apparently
having even the most remote connection with anything crooked--was a
conundrum for the answer to which the detective inspector sought in
vain.

"I can see you have no news," said Innes, dully.

"To be perfectly honest," replied Wessex, "I feel like a man who is
walking in his sleep. Except for the extraordinary words uttered by
the late Sir Charles Abingdon, I fail to see that there is any possible