“When Doctor Sparrow told me you could help me I got out these,” she said.

Ford jotted down a mental note to the effect that she “got them out.”  That is, she did not keep them where she could always look at them.  That she was not used to look at them was evident by the fact that they were bound together.

The first photograph showed three men standing in an open place and leaning on a railing.  One of them was smiling toward the photographer.  He was a good-looking young man of about thirty years of age, well fed, well dressed, and apparently well satisfied with the world and himself.  Ford’s own smile had disappeared.  His eyes were alert and interested.

“The one with the Panama hat pulled down over his eyes is your husband?” he asked.

“Yes,” assented the widow.  Her tone showed slight surprise.

“This was taken about a year ago?” inquired Ford.  “Must have been,” he answered himself; “they haven’t raced at the Bay since then.  This was taken in front of the club stand—­probably for the Telegraph?” He lifted his eyes inquiringly.

Rising on her elbow the young wife bent forward toward the photograph.  “Does it say that there,” she asked doubtfully.  “How did you guess that?”

In his role as chorus the ship’s doctor exclaimed with enthusiasm:  “Didn’t I tell you?  He’s wonderful.”

Ford cut him off impatiently.  “You never saw a rail as high as that except around a race-track,” he muttered.  “And the badge in his buttonhole and the angle of the stand all show—­”

He interrupted himself to address the widow.  “This is an owner’s badge.  What was the name of his stable?”

“I don’t know,” she answered.  She regarded the young man with sudden uneasiness.  “They only owned one horse, but I believe that gave them the privilege of—­”

“I see,” exclaimed Ford.  “Your husband is a bookmaker.  But in London he is a promoter of companies.”

“So my friend tells me,” said Mrs. Ashton.  “She’s just got back from London.  Her husband told her that Harry, my husband, was always at the American bar in the Cecil or at the Salisbury or the Savoy.”  The girl shook her head.  “But a woman can’t go looking for a man there,” she protested.  “That’s, why I thought you—­”

“That’ll be all right,” Ford assured her hurriedly.  “It’s a coincidence, but it happens that my own work takes me to these hotels, and if your husband is there I will find him.”  He returned the photographs.

“Hadn’t you better keep one?” she asked.

“I won’t forget him,” said the reporter.  “Besides”—­he turned his eyes toward the doctor and, as though thinking aloud, said—­“he may have grown a beard.”

There was a pause.

The eyes of the woman grew troubled.  Her lips pressed together as though in a sudden access of pain.

“And he may,” Ford continued, “have changed his name.”

As though fearful, if she spoke, the tears would fall, the girl nodded her head stiffly.