At first sight it seemed to French as if he had hit on the solution of the mystery, but as he continued turning it over in his mind he became less and less certain. Several important points were not covered by the theory. First of all, it did not, in his opinion, square with Vanderkemp’s personality. The Inspector had a very exalted opinion of his own powers as a reader of character—with considerable justification, it must be admitted—and the more he thought of Vanderkemp’s bearing during their momentous interview at Barcelona, the more satisfied he felt of the traveller’s innocence. He found it hard to believe, further, that a man who had just benefited to the extent of over £30,000 would be able to deny himself at least a very slight betterment in his standard of living. But the real difficulty was to connect Vanderkemp with Miss Winter’s escapade with the sixteen diamonds. How did she receive them? She was in the Savoy building all the time between the theft at Hatton Garden and the traveller’s departure from London, and it was therefore impossible that they could have met. Nor did French think it likely that so dangerous a package would have been entrusted to other hands or to the post. Here were undoubted objections to the theory, nevertheless French felt a pleasurable glow of excitement as he wondered if they could not be met and if he really had not reached the last lap of his long investigation. He determined that his first action on reaching the Yard would be to put the matter to the test. Having arrived at this decision, he turned again to Miss Scott. “I should like cook’s address, please.” Miss Scott did not know cook’s address. She believed the woman lived somewhere down near Reading, but more than that she could not say, except that her name was Jane Hudson, and that she was small and stout and lively. French felt that if he wanted the woman he could find her from this information. He scarcely hoped that she would be able to tell him more than the parlourmaid, but thought that it might be worth while to have her looked up on chance, and he decided to give the necessary instructions, to one of his men on his return to the Yard. By this time it was evident that Miss Scott had exhausted her stock of information, and he presently took leave of her, having asked her to ring him up if she heard or saw anything either of cook or of her former employers. Returning to the Yard he rang up the Hatton Garden office, and having obtained Vanderkemp’s last known address, sent a cable to the United States police, asking that inquiries should be made as to the man’s whereabouts.