"It is not," he declared promptly. "It is an impudent forgery.
Good God! You don't mean to say that you parted with my property
to - "

The cashier stopped his breathless question.

"I haven't parted with anything, sir," he said. "I was just
wondering what to do when you came in. I'd no reason to believe
that the signature was a forgery, but I didn't like the look of it,
somehow. We'd better be after him. Come along, sir."

They hurried outside. The man was nowhere in sight. The cashier
summoned the head porter.

"A gentleman has just come out," he exclaimed, - "tall and fair, very
carefully dressed, with a single eyeglass! Which way did he go?"

"He's just driven off in a big Daimler car, sir," the porter
answered. "I noticed him particularly. He spoke to the chauffeur
in Austrian."

Laverick looked out into the Strand.

"Can't we stop him?" he asked rapidly.

The porter smiled as he shook his head.

"Not the ghost of a chance, sir. He shot round the corner there as
though he were in a desperate hurry, and went the wrong side of the
island. I heard the police calling to him. I hope there's nothing