that's what I feel--and what I am. Listen!"

Leaning across the table so that the light of the shaded lamp fell
fully upon his flushed, eager face, Gray, not without embarrassment,
told his companion of the "dirty trick"--so he phrased it--which Sir
Lucien Pyne had played upon him. In conclusion:

"What would you do, Seton?" he asked.

Seton sat regarding him in silence with a cool, calculating stare
which some men had termed insolent, absently tapping his teeth with
the gold rim of a monocle which he carried but apparently never used
for any other purpose; and it was at about this time that a long low
car passed near the door of the restaurant, crossing the traffic
stream of Piccadilly to draw up at the corner of old Bond Street.

From the car Monte Irvin alighted and, telling the man to wait, set
out on foot. Ten paces along Bond Street he encountered a small,
stooping figure which became detached from the shadows of a shop door.
The light of a street lamp shone down upon the sharp, hooked nose and
into the cunning little brown eyes of Brisley, of Spinker's Detective
Agency. Monte Irvin started.

"Ah, Brisley!" he said, "I was looking for you. Are they still there?"

"Probably, sir." Brisley licked his lips. "My colleague, Gunn, reports
no one came out whilst I was away 'phoning."

"But the whole thing seems preposterous. Are there no other offices in
the block where they might be?"