e long twilight
of that first day of November.

CHAPTER XXVI.

OFF THE TRACK.

It was eight o'clock in the morning of a dark and cloudy day, when the
duke was finally aroused by the noise and confusion attending the arrival
of the Great Northern Express train at King's Cross Station, London.

He shook himself wide awake, adjusted his wrap, and sprang out of his
coupe, while yet his servant was but just bestirring himself.

The first man he met in the station was Detective Setter.

"_How_ is she?" eagerly inquired the traveller, hastening to meet
the officer.

"She is perfectly well, and expresses herself as not only willing, but
anxious to see your grace," replied the detective.

"_Not only willing!_ that is a strange phrase, too! But I presume I
shall understand it all when I see her. _Where_ is she?" demanded
the duke.

"At the house on Westminster Road. The address _was_ Westminster,
and not Blackfriars Road."

"At the house on Westminster Road! Did you find her there?"

"I did your grace."

"But why, in the name of propriety, and good sense, does she not return
home?"

"Your grace, she is at home," said the perplexed detective.

"Just now you told me that she was at the house on Westminster Road!"
said the bewildered duke.

"Beg pardon, your grace, but the house on Westminster Road _is_ her
home. She has no other that I know of."

The duke stared at the detective a moment, and then hastily demanded:

"Who _are_ you talking of?"

"Beg pardon again, your grace, but I am afraid there is some
misunderstanding."

"_Who_ are you talking about?"

"I am talking of the woman who came to the duchess just before she
disappeared," answered the detective.

"Good Heaven!" exclaimed the duke, with such a look of deep
disappointment that the detective hastened to deprecate his displeasure
by saying:

"I am very sorry, your grace, that there should have been any
misapprehension."

"You idiot!" were the words that arose spontaneously to the duke's lips;
but they were not uttered. The "princely Hereward" habitually governed
himself.

"Why did you not tell me in your telegram _who_ was found?" he
demanded.

"I certainly thought that your grace would have understood. In the
telegram dispatched at nine o'clock yesterday morning, I told your grace
that I had a clew to the woman who had called at Elmthorpe House on
Tuesday. In the telegram sent at three in the afternoon, I said--'She is
found.'