For a whole fortnight Pollyooly had played her part with such skill that only the duke's nephew and heir, Lord Ronald Ricksborough, had discovered that she was not Lady Marion. A most discreet boy of fourteen, and already Pollyooly's warm friend, he was the last person to spoil the sport; and at the end of the fortnight she had slipped away and returned by motor car to her post of housekeeper to the Honourable John Ruffin and Mr. Gedge-Tomkins in the King's Bench Walk. Ignorant of the fact that Lady Marion Ricksborough had fled a fortnight previously, the detectives, both official and private, had taken up the search for her from the moment of Pollyooly's disappearance from the Court. It is hardly a matter for wonder that they did not go far along a trail which had been cold for a fortnight. As he said, the Honourable John Ruffin had believed the duchess to be hiding out of England; and he showed himself unfeignedly pleased to see her. He put her in his most comfortable chair, made her take off her hat, and said: "Now, I'll make you some tea." The Honourable John Ruffin went to the kitchen; the duchess rose restlessly and followed him. As he made the tea he lectured her on the importance of making it not only with boiling water, but with water which had not been boiling for more than a quarter of a minute, and that poured on to a fine China tea in a warmed pot without taking the kettle right off the stove. The rebellious duchess, impatient to tell him the object of her visit, made several faces at him; and twice she said contemptuously: "You and your old tea!" But when she came to drink it, she admitted handsomely that it was better than she could have made it herself. She drank it; grew suddenly serious, and said: "John, I'm in a mess, and I've come to you for help." "It is yours to the half of my fortune--at present about fourteen shillings," said the Honourable John Ruffin warmly. "Well, I didn't take Marion abroad," said the duchess. "They always look abroad for people who bolt. I borrowed Pinky Wallerton's car and drove her down, myself, to a cottage I bought in Devonshire--in the pinewoods above Budleigh Salterton." "That sounds all right." "It was--quite--till this morning. Then, without a word of warning, at eleven o'clock, one of Osterley's lawyers turned up with a detective." "And got her?" "No. Fortunately she was out in the wood with her nurse. I gave Eglantine, my maid, twenty pounds and told her to get quietly to Marion while I kept the brutes in play, rush her down to the station, and catch the London train. They'd just time if they ran most of the way." "But the lawyer would only have to wire to Osterley to meet the train at Waterloo," said the Honourable John Ruffin. "I thought of that," said the duchess quickly. "I told her to leave the express at Salisbury, go on to Woking by a slow train, take a taxi from there to my old nurse's, Mrs. Simpson's, in Camden Town, and leave Marion with her."