"She's very beautiful!" I declared, taking up the photograph and discovering that it bore the name of the same well-known photographer in New Bond Street as that I had found on the carpet of the _Lola_ in the Mediterranean. "Yes. She's really prettier than her photograph. It hardly does her justice." "And where is she now?" "Why are you so very inquisitive, Mr. Gregg?" laughed the handsome girl. "Have you actually fallen in love with her from her picture?" "I'm hardly given to that kind of thing, Miss Leithcourt," I answered with mock severity. "I don't think even my worst enemy could call me a flirt, could she?" "No. I will give you your due," she declared. "You never do flirt. That is why I like you." "Thanks for your candor, Miss Leithcourt," I said. "Only," she added, "you seem smitten with Elma's charms." "I think she's extremely pretty," I remarked, with the photograph still in my hand. "Do you ever see her now?" "Never," she replied. "Since the day I left school we have never met. She was several years younger than myself, and I heard that a week after I left Chichester her people came and took her away. Where she is now I have no idea. Her people lived somewhere in Durham. Her father was a doctor." Her reply disappointed me. Yet I had, at least, retained knowledge of the name of the original of the picture, and from the photographer I might perhaps discover her address, for to me it seemed that she was somehow intimately connected with those mysterious yachtsmen. What Muriel told me concerning her, I did not doubt for a single instant. Yet it was certainly more than a coincidence that a copy of the picture which had created such a deep impression upon me should be preserved in her own little boudoir as a souvenir of a devoted school-friend. "Then you have heard absolutely nothing as to her present position or whereabouts--whether she is married, for instance?" "Ah!" she cried mischievously. "You betray yourself by your own words. You have fallen in love with her, I really believe, Mr. Gregg. If she knew, she'd be most gratified--or at least, she ought to be." At which I smiled, preferring that she should adopt that theory in preference to any other. She spoke frankly, as a pure honest girl would speak. She was not jealous, but she nevertheless resented--as women do resent such things--that I should fall in love with a friend's photograph. There was a mystery surrounding that torn picture; of that I was absolutely certain. The remembrance of that memorable evening when I had dined on board the _Lola_ arose vividly before me. Why had the girl's portrait been so ruthlessly destroyed and the frame turned with its face to the wall? There was some reason--some distinct and serious motive in it. Had Muriel told me the truth, I wondered, or was she merely seeking to shield the suspected man who was her lover?