many a time,
but I don't know his name. He's a friend of Mr. Castlemayne's, and he's
the entry, d'ye see--walks in as he likes."

"Ah, just so--and who may Mr. Castlemayne be, now?" asked Easleby
confidentially.

"Mr. Castlemayne?" repeated the door-keeper. "Why, he's the lessee, of
course!--the boss!"

"Ah, the boss, is he?" said Easleby. "Much obliged to you, sir. Well,
now, then, just take these two cards to Mr. Castlemayne, will you, and
ask him if he'll be good enough to see their owners for a few minutes on
very important private business?"

The door-keeper departed up a dark passage, and Easleby pointed
Starmidge to a playbill which hung, framed on the wall, behind them.

"There you are!" he said, indicating a line near the big capitals at the
top. "'Lessee and Manager--Mr. Leopold Castlemayne.' That's our man.
Fancy name, of course--real name Tom Smith, or Jim Johnson, you know.
But, Lord bless you, what's in a name? Haven't we got a case in point?"

"There's a good deal in what's in a name in our case, old man!" retorted
Starmidge. "You're off it there!"

Easleby was about to combat this reply when a boy appeared, and
intimated that Mr. Castlemayne would see the gentlemen at once. And the
two detectives followed up one passage and down another, and round
corners and across saloons and foyers, until they were shown into a snug
room, half office, half parlour, very comfortably furnished and
ornamented, wherein, at a desk, and alone, sat a gentleman in evening
dress, whose countenance, well-fed though it was, seemed to be just then
clouded with suspicion and something that looked very like anxiety. He
glanced up from the cards which lay before him to the two men who had
sent them in, and silently pointed them to chairs near his own.

"Good-evening, sir," said Easleby, with a polite bow. "Sorry to
interrupt you, Mr. Castlemayne, but you see our business from our cards,
and we've called, sir, to ask if you can give us a bit of much-wanted
information. I don't know, sir," continued Easleby, laying the
blue-pencilled newspaper on the lessee's desk, "if you've read in the
papers any account of the affair which is here called the Scarnham
Mystery!"

Mr. Leopold Castlemayne glanced at the columns to which Easleby pointed,
rubbed his chin, and nodded.

"Yes--yes!" he said. "I have just seen the papers. Case of a strange
disappearance--bank manager--isn't it?"

"It's more than that, sir," replied Easleby. "It