d through the opening,
found himself gazing into that selfsame ugly sitting room where
Desmond had talked with Nur-el-Din.

A couple of vigorous heaves burst the fastening of the door. The
sitting-room was in the wildest confusion. The doors of the
sideboard stood wide with its contents scattered
higgledy-piggledy on the carpet. A chest of drawers in the corner
had been ransacked, some of the drawers having been taken bodily
out and emptied on the floor.

The door leading to the inner room stood open and showed that a
similar search had been conducted there as well. The inner room
proved to be a bare white-washed place, very plainly furnished as
a bedroom. On the floor stood a small attache case, and beside it
a little heap of miscellaneous articles such as a woman would
take away with her for a weekend, a crepe-de-chine nightdress, a
dainty pair of bedroom slippers and some silver-mounted toilet
fittings. From these things Matthews judged that this had been
Nur-el-Din's bedroom.

The two men spent a long time going through the litter with which
the floor in the bedroom and sitting room was strewed. But their
labors were vain, and they turned their attention to the
remaining rooms, of which there were three.

The first room they visited, adjoining Nur-el-Din's bedroom, was
scarcely better than an attic. It contained in the way of
furniture little else than a truckle-bed, a washstand, a table
and a chair. Women's clothes were hanging on hooks behind the
door. The place looked like a servant's bedroom.

They pursued their search. Across the corridor two rooms stood
side by side. One proved to be Rass's. His clothes lay about the
room, and on a table in the corner, where writing materials
stood, were various letters and bills made out in his name.

The other room had also been occupied; for the bed was made and
turned back for the night and there were clean towels on the
washstand. But there was no clue as to its occupant save for a
double-barreled gun which stood in the corner. It had evidently
been recently used; for fresh earth was adhering to the stock and
the barrel, though otherwise clean, showed traces of
freshly-burnt powder.

There being nothing further to glean upstairs, the two men went
down to the tap-room again. As Matthews came through the door
leading from the staircase his eye caught a dark object which lay
on the floor under the long table. He fished it out with his
stick.

It was a small bla