p. I told you that story, didn't I?"

Yes, he had done so. She informed him of the fact with an immovable
face. It might have been a subject of total indifference to her.

"You know Nick Ratcliffe, don't you?" he pursued, evidently following
his own train of thought.

She flushed at the direct question. She had not expected it. "It is
a very long time since I last saw him," she said, with a deliberate
effort to banish all interest from her voice.

He was not looking at her. He could not have been aware of the flush.
Yet he elected to push the matter further.

"A queer fish," he said. "A very queer fish. He has lost his left arm,
poor beggar. Did you know?"

Yes, she knew; but she could hardly summon the strength to tell him
so. Her fan concealed her quivering lips, but the hand that held it
shook uncontrollably.

But he, still casual, continued his desultory harangue. "Always
reminds one of a jack-in-the-box--that fellow. Has a knack of popping
up when you least expect him. You never know what he will do next. You
can only judge him by the things he doesn't do. For instance, there's
been a rumour floating about lately that he has just gone into a
Tibetan monastery. Heaven knows who started it and why. But it is
absolutely untrue. It is the sort of thing that couldn't be true of a
man of his temperament. Don't you agree with me? Or perhaps you didn't
know him very well, and don't feel qualified to judge."

At this point he pulled out his programme and studied it frowningly.
He was plainly not paying much attention to her reply. He seemed to be
contemplating something that worried him.

It made it all the easier for her to answer. "No," she said slowly. "I
didn't know him very well. But--that rumour was told to me as absolute
fact. I--of course--I believed it."

She knew that her face was burning as she ended. She could feel the
blood surging through every vein.

"If you want to know what I think," said Bobby Fraser deliberately,
"it is that that rumour was a malicious invention of some one's."

"Oh, do you?" she said. "But--but why?"

He turned and looked at her. His usually merry face was stern.
"Because," he said, "it served some one's end to make some one else
believe that Nick had dropped out for good."

Her eyes fell under his direct look. "I don't understand," she
murmured desperately.

"Nor do I," he rejoined, "for certain. I can only surmise. It doesn't
do to believe things too readily. One get