"Yes--this is Polke, superintendent, Scarnham--I
rang you up twenty minutes since. I want you to send me, at once, the
smartest man you have available. Case is disappearance, under mysterious
circumstances, of a bank manager. Securities to a large amount are
missing; valuables also. No expense will be spared here--money no
object. You understand--a first-class man? Tonight? Yes. Good train from
town five-twenty--gets here nine-fifteen. He will catch that? Good. Tell
him report here on arrival. All right. Good-bye."

Polke rang off and went back to his desk.

"What New Scotland Yard calls a first-class is very often what I should
call a third-class," he muttered as he picked up his pen. "However,
we'll live in hope that something out of the usual will arrive. Now what
are those two Chestermarkes after? Why didn't one of them come here?
What are they doing? And what's the mystery? James Polke, my boy, here's
a handful for you!"

If Polke had been able to look into Chestermarke's Bank just then, he
would have failed to notice any particular evidences of mystery. It was
nearly the usual hour for closing when Wallington Neale went back, and
Gabriel Chestermarke immediately told him to follow out the ordinary
routine. The clerks were to finish their work and go their ways, as if
nothing had happened, and, as far as they could, they were to keep their
tongues quiet. As for the partners, food was being sent over for them
from the hotel: they would be obliged to remain at the bank for some
time yet. But there was no need for Neale to stay; he could go when the
day's balancing was done.

"You heard what instructions this Miss Fosdyke had given the police, I
suppose?" asked Gabriel, as Neale was leaving the parlour. "Raising the
whole town, no doubt?"

Neale briefly narrated all he knew; the partners listened with the
expression characteristic of each, and made no comment. And in half an
hour Neale handed over the keys to Joseph Chestermarke and went out into
the hall, his labours over. That had been the most exciting day he had
ever known in his life--was what was left of it going to yield anything
still more exciting?

He stood in the outer hall trying to make up his mind about something.
He wanted to speak to Betty Fosdyke--to talk to her. She had evidently
not recognized him when she came so suddenly into the dining-room of the
bank-house. But why should she, he asked himself?--they had only met
once, when both were chi