There was a sort of hall, with a clock and a table, and a shaded electric lamp, and beyond that the door was open into a sitting room.

There was a small light burning there, and the remains of a wood fire in the fireplace.  There was no Cabinet however.

Everything was perfectly quiet, and I went over to the fire and warmed my hands.  My nails were quite blue, but I was strangly calm.  I took off mother’s veil, and my mackintosh, so I would be free to work, and I then looked around the room.  There were a number of photographs of rather smart looking girls, and I curled my lip scornfully.  He might have fooled them but he could not decieve me.  And it added to my bitterness to think that at that moment the villain was dancing—­and flirting probably—­while I was driven to actual theft to secure the Letter that placed me in his power.

When I had stopped shivering I went to his desk.  There were a lot of letters on the top, all addressed to him as Grosvenor.  It struck me suddenly as strange that if he was only visiting, under an assumed name, in order to see me, that so many people should be writing to him as Mr. Grosvenor.  And it did not look like the room of a man who was visiting, unless he took a freight car with him on his travels.

There was A mystery.  All at once I knew it.

My letter was not on the desk, so I opened the top drawer.  It seemed to be full of bills, and so was the one below it.  I had just started on the third drawer, when a terrable thing happened.

“Hello!” said some one behind me.

I turned my head slowly, and my heart stopped.

The PORTERES into the passage had opened, and A gentleman in his evening clothes was standing there.

“Just sit still, please,” he said, in a perfectly cold voice.  And he turned and locked the door into the hall.  I was absolutely unable to speak.  I tried once, but my tongue hit the roof of my mouth like the clapper of a bell.

“Now,” he said, when he had turned around.  “I wish you would tell me some good reason why I should not hand you over to the Police.”

“Oh, please don’t!” I said.

“That’s eloquent.  But not a reason.  I’ll sit down and give you a little time.  I take it, you did not expect to find me here.”

“I’m in the wrong apartment.  That’s all,” I said.  “Maybe you’ll think that’s an excuse and not a reason.  I can’t help it if you do.”

“Well,” he said, “that explains some things.  It’s pretty well known, I fancy, that I have little worth stealing, except my good name.”

“I was not stealing,” I replied in a sulky manner.

“I beg your pardon,” he said.  “It is an ugly word.  We will strike it from the record.  Would you mind telling me whose apartment you intended to—­er—­investigate?  If this is the wrong one, you know.”