"Yes—though I didn't write it. Mrs. Stapleton wrote it. She gave it to her chauffeur, who was in the hall at the Rook Hotel, and when she was gone he asked me if I would mind handing it in, as I had intentionally told him I was going to the post office. I was a chauffeur, too, at the time, chauffeur to 'Baron Poppenheimer,' whom I drove down this morning in his car ostensibly to see the beautiful widow. 'Baron Poppenheimer' was, of course, Mr. Osborne. The widow was not at 'The Book' when we arrived—we knew she wouldn't be, and, of course, you know where she was, she was at the house in Hampstead where you found Miss Challoner when you called there this morning; she arrived home about two o'clock, however, and while 'Baron Poppenheimer' was making himself agreeable to her—your friend Mr. Osborne is a most splendid actor, and ought to have been in the detective force—I was making headway with her chauffeur out in the garage. Yes, Mr. Berrington, you can set your mind at rest—Miss Challoner is perfectly well. I wonder if by chance you telephoned to Holt this afternoon." "I tried to." "And you couldn't get through? The line was out of order?" "Yes." "Good!" Preston exclaimed, his small, intelligent eyes twinkling oddly. "That is as I thought. One of Gastrell's accomplices set the line out of order between three and five this afternoon. When the line comes to be examined the electrician will, unless I am greatly mistaken, find the flaw at some point between Holt Stacey and Holt Manor—if you should happen to hear, you might tell me the exact point where they find that the trouble exists. My theories and my chain of circumstances are working out splendidly—I haven't as yet made a single false conjecture. And now come along to my house, and I'll tell you more on the way." Osborne sat in Preston's sitting-room, smoking a long cigar. He no longer wore the disguise of "Baron Poppenheimer," or any disguise, and upon our entry he uttered an exclamation. "By Jove, Mike," he said, "you are the very man we've been wanting all day. Where did you disappear to last night?" And turning to Preston he added, "Were you right? Did he follow the widow and Miss Challoner home last night?" "Yes," I answered for him, "I did. Did you see Dulcie at Gastrell's last night?" "I should say so—and we saw you gazing at her. You nearly gave yourself away, Mike; you did, indeed. You ought to be more careful. When we saw you follow them out of the room, we knew, just as though you had told us, that you meant to follow them home. And what about the boy?" he said, addressing Preston. "Did he turn up? And was he met?" "Yes, just as I expected; but he wasn't met by Sir Roland's butler, of course. He was met by Doris Lorrimer—you have probably noticed her, that dark, demure, quietly dressed girl who was at Connie Stapleton's dinner party at 'The Rook,' and at Gastrell's last night."