in war-time and
Bellward was gone fully twenty minutes. Strangwise fidgeted
continually, drawing out his watch repeatedly and casting many
anxious glances this way and that.

His nervous demeanor began to affect Mrs. Malplaquet, who had
linked her arm affectionately in Barbara's. The girl remained
absolutely apathetic. Indeed, she seemed almost as one in a
trance.

"Aren't we going to Bath?" at length demanded Mrs. Malplaquet of
Strangwise.

"Don't ask questions!" snapped the latter.

"But the car?" asked the lady.

"Hold your tongue!" commanded the officer; and Mrs. Malplaquet
obeyed.

Then Mr. Bellward returned with the news that he had at last got
a taxi. Strangwise turned to Bellward.

"Can Minna and the girl go to Campden Hill alone?" he asked. "Or
will the girl try and break away, do you think?"

Bellward held up his hand to enjoin silence.

"You will go along with Mrs. Malplaquet," he said to Barbara in
his low purring voice, "you will stay with her until I come. You
understand?"

"I will go with Mrs. Malplaquet!" the girl replied in the same
dull tone as before.

"Upon my word," exclaimed Mrs. Malplaquet, "you might have told me
that we were going to my own place..."

But Strangwise shut her up.

"Bellward and I will come on by tube... it is safer," he said,
"hurry, hurry! We must all be under cover by eight o'clock... we
have no time to lose!"

CHAPTER XXVI. THE MAN IN THE SUMMER-HOUSE

The hour of the theatre rush was long since over and its passing
had transformed the taxi-drivers from haughty autocrats to humble
suppliants. One taxi after another crawled slowly past the street
corner where Desmond had stood for over an hour in deep converse
with Gunner Barling, but neither flaunting flag nor appealingly
uplifted finger attracted the slightest attention from the
athletic-looking man who was so earnestly engaged in talk with a
tramp. But at last the conversation was over; the two men
separated and the next taxi passing thereafter picked up a fare.

At nine o'clock the next morning Desmond appeared for breakfast
in his sitting-room at Santona Road; for such was the name of the
street in which his new rooms were situated. When he had finished
his meal, he summoned Gladys and informed her that he would be
glad to speak to Mrs. Viljohn-Smythe. That lady having duly
answered the summons, Desmond asked whether, in consideration of
terms to be mutually agreed upon, she could accommodate h