“I don’t like him,” said Michael bluntly. “In fact, my first impressions are distinctly unfavourable, though I am probably doing the poor gentleman a very great injustice.” Jack Knebworth sighed. Foss was one of his biggest troubles, sometimes bulking larger than the temperamental Mendoza. “He certainly is a queer chap,” he said, “though he’s diabolically clever. I never knew a man who could take a plot and twist it as Lawley Foss can—but he’s—difficult.” “I should imagine so,” said Michael dryly. They passed out into the studio, and Michael sought the troubled girl to explain his crudeness. There were tears of vexation in her eyes when he approached her, for his startling disappearance with a page of the script had put all thoughts of the play from her mind. “I am sorry,” he said penitently. “I almost wish I hadn’t come.” “And I quite wish it,” she said, smiling in spite of herself. “What was the matter with that page you took—you _are_ a detective, aren’t you?” “I admit it,” said Michael recklessly. “Did you speak the truth when you said that my uncle——” she stopped, at a loss for words. “No, I did not,” replied Michael quietly. “You uncle is dead, Miss Leamington.” “Dead!” she gasped. He nodded. “He was murdered, in extraordinary circumstances.” Suddenly her face went white. “He wasn’t the man whose head was found at Esher?” “How did you know?” he asked sharply. “It was in this morning’s newspaper,” she said, and inwardly he cursed the sleuth-hound of a reporter who had got on to the track of this latest tragedy. She had to know sooner or later: he satisfied himself with that thought. The return of Foss relieved him of further explanations. The man spoke for a while with Jack Knebworth in a low voice, and then the director beckoned Michael across. “Foss can’t trace this manuscript,” he said, handing back the sheet. “It may have been a sample page sent in by a contributor, or it may have been a legacy from our predecessors. I took over a whole lot of manuscript with the studio from a bankrupt production company.” He looked impatiently at his watch. “Now, Mr. Brixan, if it’s possible I should be glad if you would excuse me. I’ve got some scenes to shoot ten miles away, with a leading lady from whose little head you’ve scared every idea that will be of the slightest value to me.” Michael acted upon an impulse. “Would you mind my coming out with you to shoot—that means to photograph, doesn’t it? I promise you I won’t be in the way.” Old Jack nodded curtly, and ten minutes later Michael Brixan was sitting side by side with the girl in a char-à-banc which was carrying them to the location. That he should be riding with the artistes at all was a tribute to his nerve rather than to his modesty. CHAPTER VI THE MASTER OF GRIFF