"And if you should meet anyone and they should be impertinent enough to ask you where you are going, don't tell them. Give them your card and tell them to go to the devil. If they are very pressing indeed, you must tell a lie. Say that you've been to dine with Sir Sedgwick Bromley at Hatherly Hall. Don't forget the name." "Very well. Are you coming back to the Metropole to-night?" I asked. "I think so. But if you don't mind I should be glad if you would have the box taken up into your room and keep it for me. I shouldn't like anything to happen to it." I promised, but without much alacrity. We shook hands and the carriage drove off. CHAPTER XLVI. A BRUSH WITH THE POLICE. We could scarcely have accomplished more than a mile of our homeward journey when, with a sudden jerk which almost threw me forward, the carriage was brought to a standstill. On the opposite side of the road were two carriages, or, rather, flys, from one of which a tall, slim man was in the act of descending. Several other men on horseback were just riding up from behind. They were all in plain clothes, but something about their _physique_ and general appearance had an unmistakable suggestion of police. The man who had been descending from the nearer of the two carriages crossed the road and approached me. "Sorry to detain you, sir," he said, saluting in military fashion, "but I must ask you your name and address and where you have been this evening." "I don't know whether it has occurred to you that your behaviour is rather strange," I remarked, looking at him steadily, "not to say impertinent! What the mischief do you mean by stopping my carriage in this way on the high road and asking me questions like that? Who are you?" He hesitated, and then answered with a little more respect in his manner. "I am deputy chief sergeant at Scotland Yard, sir, and these are my men. We have a little business at a house not far from here, and our orders are to detain and procure the names and addresses of all persons whom we might encounter of whom we had reasonable suspicion that they had recently left the house in question. You will not object to give me your name, sir?" "Certainly not. My name is Philip Morton, and my general address is Ravenor Castle, Leicestershire. At present I am staying at the Metropole Hotel. Are you satisfied?" "Perfectly, sir," he answered, after one more rapid glance around the carriage. "I see that you are not concerned in this affair. I wish you good-night!" We drove rapidly off, and I began to feel not a little dissatisfied with myself. The Count had no right to have mixed me up in this affair.