He rose, opened the door by which Miska had entered the room and went down into the cellars. She watched him silently, half fearfully, yet her eyes were filled with compassionate tears. Then, readjusting the hideous grey wig, she went up the steps and passed through the doorway into the den of the opium smokers. CHAPTER VI THE MAN WITH THE SCAR Stuart read through a paper, consisting of six closely written pages, then he pinned the sheets together, folded them and placed them in one of those long envelopes associated in his memory with the opening phase of "The Scorpion" mystery. Smiling grimly, he descended to his dispensary and returned with the Chinese coin attached to the cork. With this he sealed the envelope. He had volunteered that night for onerous service, and his offer had been accepted. Gaston Max's knowledge of Eastern languages was slight, whilst Stuart's was sound and extensive, and the Frenchman had cordially welcomed the doctor's proposal that he should accompany him to the house of Ah-Fang-Fu. Reviewing the facts gleaned from Miska during the earlier part of the evening, Stuart perceived that, apart from the additional light which they shed upon her own relations with the group, they could be of slight assistance to the immediate success of the inquiry--unless the raid failed. Therefore he had determined upon the course which now he was adopting. As he completed the sealing of the envelope and laid it down upon the table, he heard a cab drawn up in front of the house, and presently Mrs. M'Gregor knocked and entered the study. "Inspector Dunbar to see you, Mr. Keppel," she said--"and he has with him an awful-looking body, all cuts and bandages. A patient, no doubt." Stuart stood up, wondering what this could mean. "Will you please show them up, Mrs. M'Gregor," he replied. A few moments later Dunbar entered, accompanied by a bearded man whose head was bandaged so as to partly cover one eye and who had an evil-looking scar running from his cheekbone, apparently--or at any rate from the edge of the bandage--to the corner of his mouth, so that the lip was drawn up in a fierce and permanent snarl. At this person Stuart stared blankly, until Dunbar began to laugh. "It's a wonderful make-up, isn't it?" he said. "I used to say that disguises were out of date, but M. Max has taught me I was wrong." "Max!" cried Stuart. "At your service," replied the apparition, "but for this evening only I am 'Le Belafre.' Yes, _pardieu!_ I am a real dead man!" The airy indifference which he proclaimed himself to represent one whose awful body had but that day been removed from a mortuary, and one whom in his own words he had "had the misfortune to strangle," was rather ghastly and at the same time admirable. For "Le Balafre" had deliberately tried to murder him, and false sentiment should form no part of the complement of a criminal investigator.