"But why should Miss Lethmere be attacked by a woman?" I queried in dismay. "Why should she have disappeared from home at all, Mr Munro?" asked Barton. "Yes. I quite agree with you, sir, the more we probe this mystery, the more and more complicated it becomes." "Well, Mr Barton?" I exclaimed. "Now, tell me frankly, what's your theory. Why has Miss Lethmere disappeared?" The inspector, one of the best and shrewdest officials attached to the Criminal Investigation Department, paused for a few moments and, looking me full in the face, replied: "To tell you the truth, Mr Munro, I'm still absolutely puzzled. The whole affair seems to grow more involved, and more astounding." CHAPTER TWELVE. REVEALS AN ASTOUNDING FACT. Weeks passed, but alas! the problem remained unsolved. I became plunged in the darkest depths of despair. The hue-and-cry had been raised all over the kingdom. Sir Herbert Lethmere had offered a reward for any information concerning his daughter, but nobody came forward with any really tangible declaration. The hard indisputable fact was that she had gone down those front-door steps in Cadogan Gardens and disappeared as completely as though the earth had opened and swallowed her. For me, those weeks were weeks of keen, hourly anxiety, weeks of grief and breathless forebodings. The woman I loved so dearly had been snatched from me, and now I felt that I had no further object in life. Indeed, I had no heart to make any further experiments to perfect my Zeppelin-destroyer, and though Teddy, in his old cheery way, tried to console me and endeavoured to get me down to Gunnersbury, I always firmly refused to go. The place was now hateful to me. My keenness had vanished. Now and then I went out to Hendon and looked at Roseye's machine still there. Her mechanic, whom Sir Herbert still kept on--he being unfit for military service-- hung about the aerodrome and smoked "yellow perils" awaiting his mistress's return. Once or twice, on bright days, I made a short flight just to keep fit. Otherwise I generally remained at home in my rooms pondering, or else out trying to follow some imaginary clue to which my theory led me. Lionel Eastwell always expressed himself full of sympathy. Many times we met at the club and elsewhere, and he always expressed his belief that Roseye was somewhere with friends. Indeed, he seemed full of optimism. "My firm opinion is that Miss Lethmere has met with an accident, and is in some hospital or other--some cottage hospital perhaps. Maybe she has lost her memory as result of her unfortunate mishap," he suggested one day. "There are lots of such cases recorded in the papers."