"Miss Lawton." Mr. Elaine bowed over her hand. When they were seated she said, shyly: "I understand from Ramon--Mr. Hamilton--that you were at one time of great service to my father. I trust that you will be able to help me now, for I feel that I am in the meshes of a conspiracy. You know that my father died suddenly, almost a week ago." "Yes, of course. His death was a great loss to the whole country, Miss Lawton." "Something occurred a few hours before his death, of which even the coroner is unaware, Mr. Blaine. I told Mr. Hamilton what I knew, but he advised me to say nothing of it, unless further developments ensued." "And they have ensued?" the detective asked quietly. "Yes." Anita then detailed to Mr. Blaine the incident of her father's nocturnal visitor. As she told him the conversation she had overheard, it seemed to her that the eyes of the detective narrowed slightly, but no other change of expression betrayed the fact that the incident might have held a significance in his mind. "The voice was entirely strange to you?" he asked. "Yes; I have never heard it before, but it made such an impression upon me that I think I would recognize it instantly whenever or wherever I might happen to hear it." "You caught no glimpse of the man through the half-opened door?" "No, I was not far enough downstairs to see into the room." "And when you fled, after hearing your father groan, you returned immediately to your room?" "Yes. I closed my door and buried my face deeply in the pillows on my bed. I did not want to hear or know any more. I was frightened; I did not know what to think. After a time I must have drifted off into an uneasy sort of sleep, for I knew nothing more until my maid came to tell me that Wilkes, the butler, wished to speak to me. My father had been found dead in his chair. No one in the household seemed to know of my father's late visitor, for they made no mention of his coming. I would have told no one, except Ramon, but for the fact that this afternoon my minister informed me that my father, instead of being the multi-millionaire we had all supposed him, had in reality died a bankrupt." The detective received this information with inscrutable calm. Only by a thoughtful pursing of his lips did he give indication that the news had any visible effect upon him. Anita continued, giving him all the details of the minister's visit, and the magnanimous promise of her father's three associates to stand in _loco parentis_ toward her. It was only when she told of summoning her lover, and the accident which befell him on his way to her, that that peculiar gleam returned again to the eyes of Mr. Blaine, and they glanced narrowly at the young man opposite him.