“Austen,” he said, “I am not at all sure that I have not brought you up on rather a fool’s errand, but you seemed rather mystified yourself about these Deloras.  Here’s the cable from Dicky.  What do you make of it?  Must have cost him something, extravagant young beggar!”

He passed it across to me.  I read it out aloud.

    DELORA HERE PUZZLED NOT HEARING FROM BROTHER
    SHOULD BE IN LONDON IMPORTANT BUSINESS FEARS
    SOMETHING WRONG ALL CODED CABLES REMAIN UNANSWERED
    INQUIRE MILAN HOTEL IF POSSIBLE FIND
    DELORA BEG HIM CABLE AT ONCE IN CHALDEAN CODE.

I read the cable through three times.

“May I take this, Ralph?” I said.  “I will go round to the Milan at once.”

“Certainly,” Ralph answered.  “I will leave the matter entirely in your hands.  It seems as though there were something queer about it.”

“There is something queer going on, Ralph,” I assured him.  “I have found out as much as that myself.  Exactly what it means I can’t fathom.  To tell you the truth, it has been taking a lot of my time lately, and I know very little more than when I started.”

“It’s the young lady, I suppose,” Ralph remarked thoughtfully.

I nodded.

“I am not over keen about interfering in other people’s concerns, Ralph,” I said.  “You know that.  It’s the girl, of course, and I am afraid, I am very much afraid, that there is something wrong.”

“Anyhow,” Ralph said, “it doesn’t follow that the girl’s in it.”

“I am jolly certain she isn’t!” I said.  “What bothers me, of course, is that I hate to think of her being mixed up with anything shady.  The Deloras may be great people in their own country, but I’ll swear that our friend here is a wrong ’un.”

“I suppose you are sure,” Ralph said thoughtfully, “that he is Delora—­that he is not an impostor, I mean?”

“I thought of that,” I answered, “but you see there’s the girl.  She’d know her own uncle, wouldn’t she?  And she told me that she had seen him on and off for years.  No, he is Delora right enough!  One can’t tell,” I continued.  “Perhaps the whole thing’s crooked.  Perhaps the Deloras who seem to Dicky such charming people in their own country are a different sort of people on this side.  At any rate, I’m off, Ralph, with that cable.  I’ll look you up as soon as I have found out anything.”

Ralph smiled.

“I don’t believe,” he said, “you are sorry to have an excuse for having another turn at this affair.”

“Perhaps not,” I answered.

“Take the car,” Ralph called out after me.  “You may find it useful.”

I drove first to the small hotel where I had last seen Delora.  Here, however, I was confronted with a certain difficulty.  The name of Delora was quite unknown to the people.  I described him carefully, however, to the landlady, and she appeared to recognize him.

“The gentleman you mean was, I think, a Mr. Henriquois.  He left us the day before yesterday.”