He had called up Lyne's Store that morning on the telephone to discover whether there had been any inquiries for him and had heard from his chief assistant that a number of articles of clothing had been ordered to be sent to this address for Miss Rider's use. He had wondered what had caused her collapse, and concluded that it was the result of the strain to which the girl had been subjected in that remarkable interview which she and he had had with Tarling at Hertford on the night before. "Suppose you met Miss Rider?" he said. "What could you do?" Sam Stay showed his teeth in a grin. "Well, anyway, you're not likely to meet her for some time. She is in a nursing home," said Milburgh, "and the nursing home," he went on deliberately, "is at 304, Cavendish Place." "304, Cavendish Place," repeated Sam. "That's near Regent Street, isn't it?" "I don't know where it is," said Mr. Milburgh. "She is at 304, Cavendish Place, so that it is very unlikely that you will meet her for some time." He rose to his feet, and he saw the man was shaking from head to foot like a man in the grip of ague. "304, Cavendish Place," he repeated, and without another word turned his back on Mr. Milburgh and slunk away. That worthy gentleman looked after him and shook his head, and then rising, turned and walked in the other direction. It was just as easy to take a ticket for the Continent at Waterloo station as it was at Charing Cross. In many ways it was safer. CHAPTER XXXII THE DIARY OF THORNTON LYNE Tarling should have been sleeping. Every bone and sinew in him ached for rest. His head was sunk over a table in his flat. Lyne's diaries stood in two piles on the table, the bigger pile that which he had read, the lesser being those which Tarling had yet to examine. The diaries had been blank books containing no printed date lines. In some cases one book would cover a period of two or three years, in other cases three or four books would be taken up by the record of a few months. The pile on the left grew, and the pile on the right became smaller, until there was only one book--a diary newer than the others which had been fastened by two brass locks, but had been opened by the Scotland Yard experts. Tarling took up this volume and turned the leaves. As he had expected, it was the current diary--that on which Thornton Lyne had been engaged at the time of his murder. Tarling opened the book in a spirit of disappointment. The earlier books had yielded nothing save a revelation of the writer's egotism. He had read Lyne's account of the happenings in Shanghai, but after all that was nothing fresh, and added little to the sum of the detective's knowledge.