He had been at Hot Springs no longer than forty-eight hours when a long letter came from his mother. She urged him to return to New York as soon as possible. It was imperative that he should be present at a very important dinner she was giving on Friday night. One of the most influential politicians in New York was to be there,--a man whose name was a household word,--and she was sure something splendid would come of it. "You must not fail me, dear boy," she wrote. "I would not have him miss seeing you for anything in the world. Don't ask me any questions. I can't tell you anything now, but I will say that a great surprise is in store for my darling boy." Meanwhile the nosy individual from Scotland Yard had not been idle. The fleeting, all too brief glimpse he had had of the good-looking chauffeur in front of Spangler's spurred him to sudden energy in pursuit of what had long since shaped itself as a rather forlorn hope. He got out the photograph of the youngster in the smart uniform of the Guard, and studied it with renewed intensity. Mentally he removed the cocky little moustache so prevalent in the Army, and with equal arrogance tried to put one on the smooth-faced chauffeur. He allowed for elapsed time, and the wear and tear of three years knocking about the world, and altered circumstances, and still the resemblance persisted. For a matter of ten months he had been seeking the young gentleman who bore such a startling resemblance to the smiling chauffeur. He had traced him to Turkey, into Egypt, down the East Coast of Africa, over to Australia, up to Siam and China and Japan, across the Pacific to British Columbia, thence to the United States, where the trail was completely lost. His quarry had a good year and a half to two years the start of him. Still, a chap he knew quite well in the Yard, after chasing a man twice around the world, had nabbed him at the end of six years. So much for British perseverance. Inquiry had failed to produce the slightest enlightenment from the doorman or the starter at Spangler's. He always remembered them as the stupidest asses he had ever encountered. They didn't recognize the chauffeur, nor the car, nor the ladies; not only were they unable to tell him the number of the car, but they couldn't, for the life of them, approximate the number of ladies. All they seemed to know was that some one had been knocked down by a "swell" who was "hot-footing it" up the street. His sallow-faced friend, however, had provided him with an encouraging lead. That worthy knew the ladies, but somewhat peevishly explained that it was hardly to be expected that he should know all of the taxi-cab drivers in New York,--and as he had seen them arrive in a taxi-cab it was reasonable to assume that they had departed in one. "But it wasn't a taxi-cab," the Scotland Yard man protested. "It was a blinking limousine."