As it happened, Towton, late in dressing for dinner, had not yet left his rooms for the Athenian Club. Vernon arrived at a quarter to eight, just as the Colonel opened the door. The two came face to face with mutual joy at meeting. "My dear Vernon, I am glad to see you. I am simply dying to have a talk, as I can do nothing but think of the entanglement in which we find ourselves." "You can't be more pleased than I am at having found you, Colonel. I have had an adventure with Diabella." "The deuce. Have you learned who she is?" "Who _he_ is, you mean. Yes. That mask concealed Constantine Maunders." Towton sat down on one of the hall chairs and stared. "Do you mean to say that the young scamp has been masquerading as a woman?" Vernon nodded and sat down wearily, for his bones ached. "I presume he thought that there would be less danger of discovery if he changed his sex. I expect he wore those long Egyptian robes over his ordinary clothes. When discarding them he would reappear as Maunders, and could easily escape without being noticed in the crowd. He's clever, is Constantine, and yet not clever enough." "I don't know what you're talking about," said Towton gruffly and rising to his feet. "Suppose you come with me to the Athenian and tell me all about the matter." "I'm not in evening kit." "Oh, the deuce take that," said the Colonel cheerfully. "And I'm rather knocked up with my fight." "Fight? Did Maunders show fight?" "No. Your Hindoo did. He assaulted me as he did you and left his job unfinished in the same way. It's a long story and I want your assistance. Go and have your dinner, Colonel, and I'll lie down on the sofa in your sitting-room until you return." "Pooh! pooh! I can't eat with such news as this exciting me." Towton threw off his coat and hung his silk hat on a peg. "Come into the sitting-room and I'll send my man to the nearest restaurant for a meal. Meanwhile you'd better have a peg, for you look as white as a winter's day." "No, thank you, Colonel. I had a brandy and soda just after leaving The Georgian Hall," said Vernon as they entered the sitting-room. "Have you been there--at the bazaar?" "Yes. Diabella had set up her tent there and was telling fortunes. I heard of this at Lady Corsoon's the other day, and so ventured to beard the lioness in her den." "And the lioness turned out to be a lion," chuckled Towton throwing himself into a chair after making the sofa comfortable with cushions for his guest. "Well, we'll have the whole story after a makeshift dinner, for, hang it, your disclosure has taken away a very excellent appetite. Bendham!" The Colonel turned to the retired soldier who acted as his valet and who had just entered the room, "go round to the nearest restaurant and tell them to send in the best small dinner they have, for two. Look sharp, now. You can lay the cloth in the smoking-room; we'll make shift there."