At length the connection was made. Staff's agitated voice seemed drawn thin by an immense distance. By a supreme effort she managed to spur her flagging faculties and began to falter her incredible story, but had barely swung into the second sentence when her voice died in her throat and her tongue clave to the roof of her mouth. The telephone instrument was fixed to the wall near the clothes-closet, the door of which framed a long mirror. This door, standing slightly ajar, reflected to her vision the hall door. She had detected a movement in the mirror. The hall door was opening--slowly, gently, noiselessly, inch by inch. Fascinated, dumb with terror, she watched. She saw the hand that held the knob--a small hand, thin and fragile; then the wrist, then part of the arm.... A head appeared in the opening, curiously suggesting the head of a bird, thinly thatched with hair of a faded yellow; out of its face, small eyes watched her, steadfastly inquisitive. Almost mechanically she replaced the receiver on the hook and turned away from the wall, stretching forth her hands in a gesture of pitiful supplication.... XI THE COLD GREY DAWN "Well?" snapped Iff irritably. "What're you staring at?" "You," Staff replied calmly. "I was thinking--" "About me? What?" "Merely that you are apparently as much cut up as if the necklace were yours--as if you were in danger of being robbed, instead of Miss Landis--by way of Miss Searle." "And I am!" asserted Iff vigorously. "I am, damn it! I'm in no danger of losing any necklace; but if he gets away with the goods, that infernal scoundrel will manage some way to implicate me and rob me of my good name and my liberty as well. Hell!" he exploded--"seems to me I'm entitled to be excited!" Staff's unspoken comment was that this explanation of the little man's agitation was something strained and inconclusive: unsatisfactory at best. It was not apparent how (even assuming the historical Mr. Ismay to be at that moment stealing the Cadogan collar from Miss Searle) the crime could be fastened on Mr. Iff, in the face of the positive alibi Staff could furnish him. On the other hand, it was indubitable that Iff believed himself endangered in some mysterious way, or had some other and still more secret cause for disquiet. For his uneasiness was so manifest, in such sharp contrast with his habitual, semi-cynical repose, that even he hadn't attempted to deny it. With a shrug Staff turned back to the telephone and asked for the manager of the exchange, explained his predicament and was promised that, if the call could be traced back to the original station, he should have the number. He was, however, counselled to be patient. Such a search would take time, quite possibly and very probably. He explained this to Iff, whose disgust was ill-disguised.