"I tell you I----" He made a sudden leap to pass the constable, and to reach the door of that inner room; but the man was too quick for him: he caught him by the arm, and deftly turned him towards the door; hustled him out of the room into the little hall. I was close at hand, and I heard what the man said. "Now, sir, you're behaving very foolish. Go away, and go home and think about it; then see if you don't thank me in the morning. Come on now." I put in my plea also, and presently the boy went away in a moody silence. The constable walked quietly after him, and as I ran down too I saw the man standing at the outer door leading into the street, looking after the boy as he strode away. "A bit hot-headed, your friend," he said. "Lor' bless you, I've seen 'em like that a few times, and then ready to laugh about it next morning." I went back to the rooms; there I found the startled manservant peering out at the door of the flat. He drew me inside, and carefully closed the door: seemed disposed, indeed, to question me. "I give you my word I don't understand it," said the man. "Because, you see, there's never been any lady 'ere at all; an' nobody couldn't have got in without passing me. Now, what I argue is----" I thrust him aside, and walked into the room. There I found Murray Olivant lying back in a chair, shaking with laughter, while Dawkins and Jervis Fanshawe stared at him wonderingly. Seeing me, he sat up, and shook his head at me whimsically, and went off into another shout of laughter. "It's beautiful!" he cried--"it's wonderful! It only came to me on the spur of the moment to say that she was here; I wanted to see if that young fool would rise to the bait. And now he's gone off--and he's a marked man; that constable's not likely to let him come near me again in a hurry. Gone out like a whipped cur, with his tail between his legs. It was beautiful!" "And he's left you with the girl," said Dawkins, with his smile. Murray Olivant sat up, and stared at him. "What--haven't you tumbled to it yet?" he demanded. "There's no girl here--and there never has been. She'll come here sooner or later, no doubt; but she's not here now." "Oh, come, my dear Olivant, you can't bluff me, you know," exclaimed Dawkins, beginning to show a little temper over the business. "The girl's here right enough." "Open the door and look for yourself," said Olivant composedly. "Personally, I wish I could say that she had been here; but she hasn't." Dawkins, after a glance at him, strode across the room, and flung open the door; turned up the light, and went poking and prying about. Fanshawe stood at the door of that inner room, and peered in also. Dawkins came out, and closed the door again. "There are no other rooms," said Olivant, still laughing--"except my servant's room across the hall. You can go and look in there, if you like."