No discovery rewarded him, however, and he returned upstairs to his office deep in thought.  “I am in to nobody,” he said as he passed the desk at which Innes was at work.

“Very good, Mr. Harley.”

Paul Harley walked through to the private office and, seating himself at the big, orderly table, reached over to a cupboard beside him and took out a tin of smoking mixture.  He began very slowly to load his pipe, gazing abstractedly across the room at the tall Burmese cabinet.

He realized that, excepting the extraordinary behaviour and the veiled but significant statements of Nicol Brinn, his theory that Sir Charles Abingdon had not died from natural causes rested upon data of the most flimsy description.  From Phil Abingdon he had learned nothing whatever.  Her evidence merely tended to confuse the case more hopelessly.

It was sheer nonsense to suppose that Ormuz Khan, who was evidently interested in the girl, could be in any way concerned in the death of her father.  Nevertheless, as an ordinary matter of routine, Paul Harley, having lighted his pipe, made a note on a little block: 

Cover activities of Ormuz Khan.

He smoked reflectively for a while and then added another note: 

Watch Nicol Brinn.

For ten minutes or more he sat smoking and thinking, his unseeing gaze set upon the gleaming lacquer of the cabinet; and presently, as he smoked, he became aware of an abrupt and momentary chill.  His sixth sense was awake again.  Taking up a pencil, he added a third note: 

Watch yourself.  You are in danger.

CHAPTER VIII.  A WREATH OF HYACINTHS

Deep in reflection and oblivious of the busy London life around him, Paul Harley walked slowly along the Strand.  Outwardly he was still the keen-eyed investigator who could pry more deeply into a mystery than any other in England; but to-day his mood was introspective.  He was in a brown study.

The one figure which had power to recall him to the actual world suddenly intruded itself upon his field of vision.  From dreams which he recognized in the moment of awakening to have been of Phil Abingdon, he was suddenly aroused to the fact that Phil Abingdon herself was present.  Perhaps, half subconsciously, he had been looking for her.

Veiled and dressed in black, he saw her slim figure moving through the throng.  He conceived the idea that there was something furtive in her movements.  She seemed to be hurrying along as if desirous of avoiding recognition.  Every now and again she glanced back, evidently in search of a cab, and a dormant suspicion which had lain in Harley’s mind now became animate.  Phil Abingdon was coming from the direction of the Savoy Hotel.  Was it possible that she had been to visit Ormuz Khan?

Harley crossed the Strand and paused just in front of the hurrying, black-clad figure.  “Miss Abingdon,” he said, “a sort of instinct told me that I should meet you to-day.”