At half-past two Archie rang up.

“Hello, Ernestine!”

“Really, Archie, you’re the limit!”

“My dear girl, why so peeved? If you’re not careful, you’ll be gettin’ wrinkles in the voice. What price voice massage?”

“I must say I think you might have let me know you were going to carry the girl off like that. I might have imagined something had happened to her.”

“I say-what’s all this?”

“I think you might just have told me.”

“Told you what?”

“Of course George takes your part. He would-men always do.”

“What have I done?”

“If you were going to take her out to lunch-and I suppose you arranged it last night-why on earth couldn’t she have said so instead of leaving me stranded at Harridge’s?”

“Ernestine, what are you talkin’ about? Where’s Greta?”

“I’m sure I don’t know. Hasn’t she been lunching with you?”

“No, she hasn’t. I say, suppose you tell me what’s been happenin’?”

“You didn’t fetch her from Harridge’s?”

“No, of course I didn’t.”

“Then who did?”

“Look here, tell me what happened.”

“I went upstairs to telephone to Renee Latouche, because I’d promised her Jim Maxwell’s address, and George was so exasperating that I forgot all about it till Greta and I were passing Harridge’s.”

“Well?”

“It took me ages to get Renee-it always does. And when I’d finished, I couldn’t find Greta anywhere. I went into every department. D’you know, they’ve got departments for things I’ve never even heard of. I went everywhere, and she simply wasn’t there. And then I asked the commissionaires. And one of them had seen us go in, and he said he’d seen Greta come out only about ten minutes afterwards. He said she got into a Daimler that was waiting and went off. And of course I thought it was you.”

“A Daimler!”

“With a chauffeur. The commissionaire said there was a man inside. Wasn’t it you?”

“No, it wasn’t. I haven’t seen her since last night.”

Ernestine hardly knew Archie’s voice.

“Then who was it?”

“What time did all this happen?”

“Well, it was about twelve when I remembered about telephoning to Renee, and the commissionaire said Greta came out about ten minutes after we went in, so-”

“Ernestine! I told you not to let her go about alone!”

Ernestine became sharply offended.

“Well, if you call that letting her go about alone!”

Archie rang off.

CHAPTER XXXVIII

Charles spent the afternoon going through a stack of papers at Thornhill Square. It was about five o’clock when he finished with them and went out by the garden way. It was dusk but not yet dark. The alley-way was much darker than the garden.

When he had shut and locked the door in the wall, he stood for a moment, and then turned to the right instead of to the left. The impulse which made him do this was so slight and undefined that it took no definite shape in his mind. He turned to the right instead of to the left and walked slowly along the alley-way.

On his right were the other gardens of Thornhill Square, on his left the smaller, narrower gardens of George Street. On both sides, brick walls broken at intervals by wooden doors. The slope of the ground hid all but the top stories of the houses on the right; but the George Street houses showed back windows lighted and curtained,

Charles had walked a dozen yards or so before it occurred to him that it was a sentimental desire to look at the Pelhams’ house which had brought him out of his way. That he might have looked at it any day since his return was true; and it was equally true that he had never felt impelled to do so. He discovered the reason now. It was the empty house that drew him, because, empty, it held a thousand memories.

He walked past the bend in the alley and stood where he had often stood waiting for Margaret to slip through the garden door. The house was larger than the others in the street-larger, and older by a hundred years; a square Georgian house with modern additions. The study was an addition, and a hideous one. It jutted out, breaking the square lines, and from it a frightful iron stair descended to the garden. From the alley you could see the French window and the looped spirals of the stair.

Charles had stood a hundred times where he was standing now and watched for the window to open. He watched now with a definite feeling of what a fool he was to stare at an empty house and people it with memories. The dusk was darkening into night; the house was just a black square. He could no longer discern either window or stair, when suddenly the window sprang into view, a brilliant oblong crossed with black lines. It showed for a moment, and then a man pulled down the blind.

The man was Freddy Pelham; and the sight of Freddy sent all those romantic memories back into the past to which they belonged; their place was taken by the practical consideration that here was a most excellent opportunity of tackling Freddy about the whole stupid Grey Mask imbroglio.

Charles tried the garden door, found it open, and walked briskly up the garden path. The iron stair was wet and slippery under foot, the hand-rail coldly insecure-a beastly contraption like seaside lodgings. He rapped on the window, and could have laughed at Freddy Pelham’s scared face when he raised the blind and peered into the darkness- “Probably thinks it’s one of Grey Mask’s little lot.”

Freddy’s relief at recognizing Charles Moray was touching.

“I’m all alone in the house, you see. And I shouldn’t be much use if it came to a rough-and-tumble with a burglar- what? Now there was Hugo Byrne-you remember Hugo- no, he was before your time-his mother was Edith Peace, and his sister married one of the Dunlop-Murrays-no relation of yours of course. Let me see, what was I going to tell you? Oh yes-burglars. Well, poor old Hugo got up in the middle of the night and thought he heard a burglar and-let me see, did I tell you?-he’d got his wife’s uncle down from Scotland staying with them-he married Josephine Campbell, you know. No, no, not Josephine-she was the dark one-Elizabeth Campbell. Yes, I’m sure it was Elizabeth, because she had red hair, and we used to call her Red Liz-behind her back, you know, behind her back. And- where was I? Oh yes-poor old Hugo and the burglar. Of course it turned out to be old Robert Campbell. And he never left them a penny. Rather too bad-what?”

The study was in its usual condition of disorder. How Freddy ever found anything in it was a mystery. He appeared to have been making some slight attempt to clear things up.

“Frightful mess-what? Sit down-sit down. Here, put those photograph albums on the floor. No-perhaps better leave those. This chair now-we can shift these papers. Nothing of importance there-what? Only bills-nothing to break one’s heart over, if some of them did get lost-what?”

He tilted a confused mass of papers on to the floor.

“Thanks, I won’t sit,” said Charles. “I’m afraid I’m interrupting you. Fact is I wanted to ask you about something, and when I saw the light I thought I’d come up and get it over.”

“Well, what can I do for you? I don’t suppose I shall do much more here anyway. I thought I’d try and clear up some of this mess; but I’m off tomorrow, and there’s too much of it-I can’t tackle it. Margaret’s coming up to say good-bye. I telephoned to her place to let her know I’d be here, and she’ll come along as soon as she gets off. That’s why the garden door’s open-she’ll come along that way. Well, well, I shall be glad when I’m off. I don’t like saying good-bye-that’s a fact. Stupid of me, isn’t it?”

He was fidgeting with the litter on the table. There was something pathetic about the aimless movements and the deprecating glances which accompanied them.

Charles felt very sorry for him. He said,