And there he reflected until the pink dawn spread, and upon the horizon he saw the early morning steamer crossing from Havre. He was broke! Perhaps Ted Patten had treated him just as he had treated Adolphe. That letter might, after all, be only a blind. "He may have got money, and then written to frighten me," he muttered to himself. "Strange that he didn't give an address. But I know where I shall find him sooner or later. Harry's in Paris is his favourite place, or the American Bar at the Grand at Brussels. Oh, yes, I shall find him. First let me turn myself round." Then, rising, he walked back to Trouville in the brilliant morning, and going up to his room, went to bed. Whenever he found himself in an hotel with no money to pay the bill, he always feigned illness, and so awakened the sympathies of the management. In some cases he had lain ill for weeks, living on luxuries, and promising to settle for it all when he was able to get about. He had done the trick at the Adlon, in Berlin, till found out, and again at the Waldorf-Astoria, in New York. This time he intended to "work the wheeze" on the Palace at Trouville, though he knew that he could not live there long, for the short season was nearly at an end, and in about three weeks the hotel would be closed. But for a fortnight he remained in bed--or, at least, he was in bed whenever anyone came in. The doctor who was called prescribed for acute rheumatism, and the way in which the patient shammed pain was pathetic. This enforced retirement was in one way irksome. Wrapped in his dressing-gown, he, after a week in bed, was sufficiently well to sit at the window and look down upon the gay crowd on the _plage_ below, and sometimes he even found himself so well that he could appreciate a cigar. The manager, of course, sympathised with his wealthy visitor, and often came up for an hour's chat, now that the busiest week of his season was over. All the time Ansell's inventive brain was busy. He was devising a new scheme for money-making, and concocting an alluring prospectus of a venture into which he hoped one "mug," or even two, might put money, and thus form "the original syndicate," which in turn would supply him with funds. He knew Constantinople, the city where the foreign "crook" and concession-hunter abounds. Among his unscrupulous friends was an under-official at the Yildiz Kiosk, with whom he had had previous dealings. Indeed, he had paid this official to fabricate and provide bogus concessions purporting to be given under the seal of the Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire. For one of these concessions--for mining in Asia Minor--he had paid one thousand pounds two years ago, and had sold it to a syndicate in St. Petersburg for ten thousand. When the purchasers came to claim their rights they found the document to be a forgery.