have us think--or, perhaps,
herself believes?"

"Not quite that," he replied doubtfully. "But I am wondering whether
there is such a factor that must be considered."

Before I could answer Kennedy touched my arm. Instinctively I followed
the direction of his eye and saw Mrs. Seabury step out on the floor
across from us. Without a word from Craig, I realized that the man with
her must be Sherburne, our "tango thief."

Fashionably dressed, affable, seemingly superficially, at least, well
educated, tall, graceful, with easy manners, I could not help seeing at
a glance that he was one of the most erotic dancers on the little floor.

As they passed near us, Mrs. Seabury caught Kennedy's eye in momentary
recognition. Her face, flushed with the dance, colored perhaps a shade
deeper, but not noticeably to her partner, who was devoting himself
wholly and skillfully to leading her in a manner that one could see
called forth frequent comment from others, less favored.

As they sat down after this dance and the encore, Craig motioned to the
waiter at our table and whispered to him.

A few moments later, a man whom I had seen around the hotel on my
infrequent visits, but did not know, slipped quietly into a seat beside
Kennedy, even deeper in the shadow of the recess in which we were
sitting.

"Walter, I'd like to have you meet Mr. Dunn, the house detective,"
whispered Kennedy under his breath.

The usual interchange of remarks followed, during which Dunn was
evidently waiting for Kennedy to reveal the real purpose of our visit.

"By the way, Dunn," remarked Craig at length, "who is that fellow--over
there with the woman in blue--the fellow with the heavy braided coat?"

Dunn craned his neck cautiously, then shrugged his shoulders. "I've seen
him here with her before," he remarked. "I don't know him, though. Why?"

Briefly Kennedy sketched such facts of a supposedly hypothetical case as
would be likely to secure an opinion from the house man. Dunn narrowed
his eyes thoughtfully.

"That's rather a ticklish situation, Kennedy," Dunn remarked when Craig
had stated the case, omitting all reference to Seabury's name as well as
his suspicions. "Of course," he went on, "I know we've got to protect
the name of the hotel. And I know we can't have men meeting our women
patrons, doing a gavotte or two--and then fox-trotting them into
blackmail."

Dunn stroked his chin thoughtfully. "You see, we can do a great deal to
suppress