"There was a lady here last night, who, according to your night-porter,
changed her mind about staying, and set off in a motor-car about
midnight," observed Allerdyke. "Which is she, now, in this lot?"

The clerk instantly pointed to an entry, made in a big, dashing,
artistic-looking handwriting.

"That," he answered. "Miss Celia Lennard--Number 265."

Two numbers away from James Allerdyke's room--Number 263! The inquirer
pricked his ears.

"It was she who went off in the middle of the night," continued the
clerk. "She pestered me with a lot of questions as to how she could get
North--to Edinburgh. That would be about eleven o'clock. I told her she
couldn't get a train until morning. I saw her going upstairs just before
I went off duty--soon after eleven. It seems, according to the
night-porter--"

"I know--he told me," said Allerdyke, interrupting him. "He got her a
car, she wanted to be driven to some station on the Great Northern main
line--I met her on the road at two-thirty. I suppose the driver of that
car can be found?--he'll have returned by this, I should think."

"Oh, you can find him all right," answered the clerk. "The car was got
from a garage close by."

Allerdyke jotted down the name of the garage in his pocket-book, and
proceeded to make further inquiries about his cousin's movements on the