The House of the Missing by Sinclair Gluck published by A. L. Burt Company, New York by arrangement with Dodd, Mead & Company Copyright, 1922, by The Inter-continental Publishing Corporation of New York Contents I I Acquire a Friend II “The Shadow of the Web” III “That’s All We Know” IV Roving Commissions V Our First Clew VI The Girl in Gray VII The Famous Tea VIII Amateur Burglary IX The First Skirmish X Mrs. Fawcette is Indiscreet XI Black Friday XII Disaster! XIII Our Second Burglary XIV What We Found XV The Darkest Hour XVI The Final Attempt XVII Walk into My Parlor XVIII When in Rome—— XIX Fast in the Web XX The Room of the Voices XXI Beating Back XXII Through the Outposts XXIII Within the Web XXIV The Web Is Torn XXV The Emperor XXVI The Final Surprise to My Sister whose help and encouragement brought it to a happy ending this book is affectionately dedicated Chapter I I Acquire a Friend High on the roof of the apartment house, in the darkness, the insatiable, ceaseless murmur of the city came hushed and muted to my ears. I leaned against the parapet, staring out over the glow of clashing lights below and letting the breeze touch my face with its gentle fingers. It had a soothing influence of which I was badly in need that night. For I had come to the end of two months of ceaseless search—and consistent, unvarying failure. I had not dared to lose faith that somewhere down there, in that brimming human river, still existed the sweetest little sister a fellow ever had. It was possible even that one of the little dots now passing in the street far below knew where she was and what her fate had been. But I, who would have given the aching heart out of my body to find her, could not tell. I could only remember her sweetness; her little wide-eyed glances; her happy, bubbling laughter and her adorable innocence. Perhaps fate had been envious of our happiness together, for it had played us the cruellest of tricks, wresting my little sister away to God knew what horrors and leaving me with a ceaseless, gnawing grief. My imagination is none too vivid, perhaps, at ordinary times, but during those two months I had had to school it rigidly. A mind that is balked of a great desire, turns on itself like a scorpion. But it did not help my search to picture scenes in which she might be the victim, scenes going on even at that moment and just around the corner perhaps. And madness lay that way, as I had long since had cause to realize.