Gloria he was convinced knew nothing and suspected nothing. He loved the girl with his whole heart and soul, with every pulse of his being, but even his great love would not have blinded him if he had observed anything suspicious or evasive about her. In all their intercourse together, she had been so perfectly frank, even with regard to the uncle whose kindness she so greatly appreciated. When she told him that Stormont was a financier, it was evident she was telling what she believed to be the truth. And about her early life with her parents in China she had been as open as a book. Whatever mystery there might be about Stormont himself, there was none about the brother who held a high position in one of the biggest banks in that far-off country. She had shown him more than one letter from her parents, who kept up a constant correspondence with her, and he could see from what he read there was nothing suspicious about them. In the last one he read, there was an intimation that at any moment they might make up their minds to come to England for a brief holiday. Yes, there was no doubt everything was open and above-board with Jasper Stormont, her father. The young man found himself wishing that visit would be paid soon. He could question a man more closely than he could a woman. He was at Grewgus’ office at the appointed hour next morning. As before, there was nobody there but the detective himself. The staff did not put in an appearance till nine. In a very few minutes the disguise was effected, with a few additional touches which made it more complete. When he had finished, Grewgus drew back and surveyed his handiwork with an air of pardonable pride. “If Miss Mayhew meets you face to face, she will never suspect you are the young man she met at Effington Hall. There was no recognition in Whitehouse’s glance last night, although I have no doubt he was suspicious of what we were doing there. I bet you he will have asked the porter a question or two by now. But that chap is no fool; he will know how to put him off.” When Leonard looked in the glass which Grewgus handed him, he was bound to confess that a complete metamorphosis had been effected. There was no resemblance between this heavy-bearded creature and the good-looking lover of Gloria Stormont. “Now I think we will be off,” observed Grewgus. “I have written a letter to my head clerk telling him I’m off to Paris, and giving him the address of the hotel we shall stay at. Of course it will not be the _Terminus_, that would hamper us too much. I shall only take you there for the purpose of identifying her; I shall watch her from elsewhere. To stay there would be fatal to our plans. If she is the person you believe her to be, she is naturally as sharp as a needle, and she would soon tumble to the fact that we were taking a suspicious interest in her.”