At the desk in the St. Boniface he heard that Mr. and Mrs. Janney had just gone out, and waited while Mrs. Price’s room was called up. There was no response; Mrs. Price must be out too. The information made him uneasy; she had told him she went nowhere except to Larkin’s. More than ever anxious to see her, he engaged a room and left the message that he would be there and to be called up when she came in. The door shut on him, his uneasiness increased; wondering what had taken her out, wondering if she had done anything foolish, cursing the fate that had placed so much in her feeble hands, perturbed and restless as a lion in a cage. Suzanne had gone to Larkin’s, called there by a telephone message. It had come almost on the heels of her parents’ departure and was brief—a request to come to him as soon as she could. She had scrambled into her street clothes, and, shaking in every limb, slipped out of the hotel’s side door and sped across town in a taxi to hear how Bébita was to be found. She was hardly inside the door, her veil lifted from a face as pale as Cæsar’s ghost, when Larkin answered her look of agonized question: "Yes, the letter’s come—what we expect, very clear and explicit. It was sent to me this time—came on the two o’clock delivery." He turned to the desk and took up a folded paper. Before he could offer it to her, she had leaned forward and snatched it out of his hand. Instantly her eyes were riveted on the lines: "Mr. Horace Larkin, "_Dear Sir_: "In answer to the ad. in the _Daily Record_, we are dealing through you as the agent named by Mrs. Price. We do this as we realize that a lady of Mrs. Price’s type and experience would be unable to handle alone so important a matter. Before we enter into details we must again repeat our warnings—not only the return of the child but her life is dependent on the actions of her mother and yourself. If you are wise to this and follow our instructions Bébita will be restored to her family on Saturday night.