‘Mr. Logan knows nothing?’

‘Absolutely nothing.  I alone, and now you, know anything.’

The girl walked up and down in agony.

‘Nobody will ever know if I do not tell you how to find him,’ she said.

’Unhappily that is not the case.  I only ask you, so that it may not be necessary to take other steps, tardy, but certain, and highly undesirable.’

‘You will not go to him armed?’

‘I give you my word of honour,’ said Merton.  ’I have risked myself unarmed already.’

The girl paused with fixed eyes that saw nothing.  Merton watched her.  Then she took her resolve.

’I do not know where he is living.  I know that on Wednesdays, that is, the day after to-morrow, he is to be found at Dr. Fogarty’s, a private asylum, a house with a garden, in Water Lane, Hammersmith.’

It was the lane in which stood the Home for Destitute and Decayed Cats, whither Logan had once abducted Rangoon, the Siamese puss.

‘Thank you,’ said Merton simply.  ‘And I am to ask for?’

’Ask first for Dr. Fogarty.  You will tell him that you wish to see the Ertwa Oknurcha.’

‘Ah, Australian for “The Big Man,"’ said Merton.

‘I don’t know what it means,’ said Miss Markham.  ’Dr. Fogarty will then ask, “Have you the churinga?"’

The girl drew out a slim gold chain which hung round her neck and under her dress.  At the end of it was a dark piece of wood, shaped much like a large cigar, and decorated with incised concentric circles, stained red.

‘Take that and show it to Dr. Fogarty,’ said Miss Markham, detaching the object from the chain.

Merton returned it to her.  ‘I know where to get a similar churinga,’ he said.  ’Keep your own.  Its absence, if asked for, might lead to awkward questions.’

‘Thank you, I can trust you,’ said Miss Markham, adding, ’You will address my father as Dr. Melville.’

‘Again thanks, and good-bye,’ said Merton.  He bowed and withdrew.

‘She is a good deal upset, poor girl,’ Merton remarked to Madame Claudine, who, on going to comfort Miss Markham with tea, found her weeping.  Merton took another cab, and drove to Trevor’s house.

After dinner (at which there were no guests), and in the smoking-room, Trevor asked whether he had made any progress.

‘Everything succeeded to a wish,’ said Merton.  ’You remember Water Lane?’

‘Where Logan carried the Siamese cat in my cab,’ said Trevor, grinning at the reminiscence.  ‘Rather!  I reconnoitred the place with Logan.’

‘Well, on the day after to-morrow I have business there.’

‘Not at the Cats’ Home?’

’No, but perhaps you might reconnoitre again.  Do you remember a house with high walls and spikes on them?’

‘I do,’ said Trevor; ’but how do you know?  You never were there.  You disapproved of Logan’s method in the case of the cat.’