She's a wrong 'un, that's what she is. Swell clothes, but no
class. Cook knows something about her--but she won't
tell--scared to death of her. And suspicious! She's on to you in
a minute if you as much as speak to a fellow. I can tell you----"

But what more Annie could tell, Tuppence was never destined to
learn, for at that moment a clear voice with a peculiarly steely
ring to it called:

"Annie!"

The smart young woman jumped as if she had been shot.

"Yes, ma'am."

"Who are you talking to?"

"It's a young woman about the situation, ma'am."

"Show her in then. At once."

"Yes, ma'am."

Tuppence was ushered into a room on the right of the long
passage. A woman was standing by the fireplace. She was no
longer in her first youth, and the beauty she undeniably
possessed was hardened and coarsened. In her youth she must have
been dazzling. Her pale gold hair, owing a slight assistance to
art, was coiled low on her neck, her eyes, of a piercing electric
blue, seemed to possess a faculty of boring into the very soul of