I slipped back into the room to wait for them. Murray Olivant strode in first, and looked at me with a scowl; looked past me at Jervis Fanshawe, who had risen from the bed. "Well--plotters and schemers--what's the move now?" he demanded. "Is there any one here at all I can believe or trust?" He looked round on the three of us fiercely enough. "Dawkins here has her, and then he has not; you, Fanshawe, can do great things, but you don't do them; Tinman threatens and boasts, and does nothing. I suppose you think you can play with me just as you please, eh? Will no one speak?" "I tell you again, Olivant, that I have not got the girl," said Dawkins. "I only came here in the hope to find her; I've been tricked, just as I tried to trick you. If I knew where she was, shouldn't I try to bluff the thing a bit, and get some money out of you?" "I believe you would," retorted Olivant slowly. Then he swung round to me. "Well, Tinman, and what do you know?" "Nothing," I replied. "I have not seen the lady at all." "Why should she come here?" asked Fanshawe, in a quiet voice. I confess I had been expecting a totally different answer from him, and I began to wonder if, after all, I had misjudged the man. His face was a mask, behind which even the deadly fear that he had shown was hidden. "Well, I trust _you_, at any rate, Fanshawe," said Olivant, "because I believe you know who's your friend, and who's likely to help you most in this world. This seems to rest with you, Dawkins," he went on, turning to his friend, "and I shan't forget to pay you for it, though not quite in the coin you expected. I'm going home; God help any one of you that plots against me again. You, Tinman, can walk with me; I believe you have some fears as to my safety," he added, with a grin. The man Dawkins came down the stairs and into the street with us, still protesting his innocence in the matter; Murray Olivant waved him aside impatiently enough, and set off in the direction of his lodging. I think he had meant to take me with him; but within a hundred yards of the house he hailed a passing cab, and turned to dismiss me. "You can go back," he said. "I shan't want you. You needn't be afraid; I shall go in the back way." He climbed into the cab, and was rapidly driven away. I walked slowly back to the house, and rang the bell again. After I had climbed the stairs to Fanshawe's room I suddenly made up my mind that I would go on further, and see Barbara; altered my mind again, and determined to see Fanshawe, and at least to thank him for the attitude he had adopted to Murray Olivant. I opened the door and went in, but the man was not there. Inwardly perturbed, I came out on to the landing again, and began slowly to climb the stairs; I did not like this sudden absence of Fanshawe in the least. On the landing above I came face to face with Moggs, standing outside a door, and looking at me with a scared white face. "She's gorn!" she whispered.