oke a cigar and talk--I am beginning to
see chinks of daylight."

He led Allerdyke down to the office, completed the necessary
arrangements, and went on to the smoking-room, in a quiet corner of which
he pulled out his cigar-case.

"Well?" he said. "What do you think now?"

"I think you're a smart chap," answered Allerdyke bluntly. "You did all
that very well. I said naught, but I kept an eye and an ear open.
You'll do."

"Very complimentary!--but I wasn't asking you what you thought about me,"
said Fullaway, with a laugh. "I'm asking you what you think of the
situation, as illuminated by this last episode?"

"Well, I'm still reflecting on what you said to that manager
chap," answered Allerdyke. "You really think this young woman has
lost her jewels?"

"Oh, no doubt, no doubt at all," replied Fullaway. "Mademoiselle is
impetuous, impulsive, demonstrative, much given to insisting on her own
way, but she's absolutely honest and truthful, and I've no doubt
whatever--none!--that she's been robbed. But--not here. She never brought
those jewels here. They were not in that box when she came here.
Mademoiselle, my dear sir, was relieved of those jewels either on the
steamer, as she crossed from, Christiania to Hull, or during the few
hours she spent at the Hull hotel. The whole thing--the robbery from your
cousin, the robbery from Mademoiselle de Longarde--is all the work of a
particularly clever and brilliant gang of international thieves; and, by
the holy smoke, sir, we've got our hands full! For there isn't a clue to
the identity of the operators, so far, unless the lady with whom we are
going to sup can help us to one."

Allerdyke ruminated over this for a moment or two. Then, after lighting
the cigar which Fullaway had offered him, he shook his head--in grim
affirmation.

"I shouldn't wonder," he said. "Certainly, it seems a big thing. You're
figuring on its having been a carefully concocted scheme? No mere chance
affair, eh?"

"This sort of thing's never done by chance," responded the American.
"This is the work of very clever and accomplished thieves who somehow
became aware of two facts. One, that your cousin was bringing with him to
England the jewels of the Princess Nastirsevitch. The other, that
Mademoiselle Zelie de Longarde carried her pearls and diamonds in an
innocent-looking rosewood box. My dear sir! you observed that I examined
that box with seeming carelessness--in reality, I was looking at it wit