rom her Arab friends that he was a young man of
good family, the son of an Agha or desert chief, whose douar lay far
south, in the neighbourhood of El-Aghouat. He was respected by the
French authorities and esteemed by the Governor of Algiers. Known to be
ambitious, he was anxious to stand well with the ruling power, and among
the dissipated, sensuous young Arabs of his class and generation, he was
looked upon as an example and a shining light. The only fault found in
him by his own people was that he inclined to be too modern, too French
in his political opinions; and his French friends found no fault with
him at all.

It seemed impossible that a person so highly placed would dare risk his
future by kidnapping a European girl, and Jeanne Soubise advised Stephen
to turn his suspicions in another direction. Still he would not be
satisfied, until he had found and engaged a private detective, said to
be clever, who had lately seceded from a Paris agency and set up for
himself in Algiers. Through him, Stephen hoped to learn how Sidi
Maieddine ben el Hadj Messaoud had occupied himself after landing from
the _Charles Quex_; but all he did learn was that the Arab, accompanied
by his servant and no one else, had, after calling on the Governor, left
Algiers immediately for El-Aghouat. At least, he had taken train for
Bogharie, and was known to have affairs of importance to settle between
his father the Agha, and the French authorities. Secret inquiries at the
Hotel de la Kasbah elicited answers, unvaryingly the same. Sidi
Maieddine ben el Hadj Messaoud was not a patron of the house, and had
never been seen there. No one answering at all to his description had
stopped in, or even called at, the hotel.

Of course, the value of such assurances was negatived by the fact that
Arabs hold together against foreigners, and that if Si Maieddine wished
to be incognito among his own people, his wish would probably be
respected, in spite of bribery. Besides, he was rich enough to offer
bribes on his own part. Circumstantial evidence, however, being against
the supposition that the man had followed Victoria after landing,
Stephen abandoned it for the time, and urged the detective, Adolphe
Roslin, to trace the cabman who had driven Miss Ray away from her hotel.
Roslin was told nothing about Victoria's private interests, but she was
accurately described to him, and he was instructed to begin his search
by finding the squint-eyed cab-driver who