There was a dead silence; then:  “Keep him there until I come!  Chloroform him if he attempts to escape!”

And the great specialist rang off excitedly.

So Rosalind Hollis went back to the lamp-lit office where, in a luxurious armchair, Carden was sitting, contentedly poring over the ninth volume of Lamour’s great treatise and smoking his second cigar.

“Dr. Atwood is coming here,” she said in a discouraged voice, as he rose with alacrity to place her chair.

“Oh!  What for?”

“T-to see you, Mr. Carden.”

“Who?  Me?  Great Scott!  I don’t want to be slapped and pinched and polled by a man!  I didn’t expect that, you know.  I’m willing enough to have you observe me in the interest of humanity—­”

“But, Mr. Carden, he is only called in for consultation.  I—­I have a dreadful sort of desperate hope that perhaps I may have made a mistake; that possibly I am in error.”

“No doubt you are,” he said cheerfully.  “Let me read a few more pages, Dr. Hollis, and then I think I shall be all ready to dispute my symptoms, one by one, and convince you what really is the trouble with me.  And, by the way, did Dr. Atwood seem a trifle astonished when you told him about me?”

“A trifle—­yes,” she said uncertainly.  “He is a very, very old man; he forgets.  But he is coming.”

“Oh!  And didn’t he appear to recollect seeing me in the Park?”

“N-not clearly.  He is very old, you know.  But he is coming here.”

“Exactly—­as a friend of mine puts it,” smiled Carden.  “May I be permitted to use your telephone a moment?”

“By all means, Mr. Carden.  You will find it there in my bedroom.”

So he entered her pretty bedroom and, closing the door tightly, called up the Tracer of Lost Persons.

“Is that you, Mr. Keen?  This is Mr. Carden.  I’m head over heels in love.  I simply must win her, and I’m going to try.  If I don’t—­if she will not listen to me—­I’ll certainly go to smash.  And what I want you to do is to prevent Atwood from butting in.  Do you understand? . . .  Yes, Dr. Austin Atwood.  Keep him away somehow. . . .  Yes, I’m here, at Dr. Hollis’s apartments, under anxious observation. . . .  She is the only woman in the world!  I’m mad about her—­and getting madder every moment!  She is the most perfectly splendid specimen of womanhood—­what?  Oh, yes; I rang you up to ask you whether it was you in the Park to-day?—­that old gentleman—­What! Yes, in Central Park.  Yes, this afternoon!  No, he didn’t resemble you; and Dr. Hollis took him for Dr. Atwood. . . .  What are you laughing about? . . .  I can hear you laughing. . . . Was it you? . . .  What do I think?  Why, I don’t know exactly what to think, but I suppose it must have been you.  Was it? . . .  Oh, I see.  You don’t wish me to know.  Certainly, you are quite right.  Your clients have no business behind the scenes.  I only asked out of curiosity. . . .  All right.  Good-by.”