reporter's job in half an hour. And you have a head for a mystery; you have
imagination and cool judgement along with it. Think how it would feel if you
pulled it off!'

Trent had admitted that it would be rather a lark. He had smoked, frowned, and
at last convinced himself that the only thing that held him back was fear of
an unfamiliar task. To react against fear had become a fixed moral habit with
him, and he had accepted Sir James's offer.

He had pulled it off. For the second time he had given the authorities a start
and a beating, and his name was on all tongues. He withdrew and painted
pictures. He felt no leaning towards journalism, and Sir James, who knew a
good deal about art, honourably refrained--as other editors did not--from
tempting him with a good salary. But in the course of a few years he had
applied to him perhaps thirty times for his services in the unravelling of
similar problems at home and abroad. Sometimes Trent, busy with work that held
him, had refused; sometimes he had been forestalled in the discovery of the
truth. But the result of his irregular connection with the Record had been to
make his name one of the best known in England. It was characteristic of him
that his name was almost the only detail of his personality known to the
public. He had imposed absolute silence about himself upon the Molloy papers;
and the others were not going to advertise one of Sir James's men.

The Manderson case, he told himself as he walked rapidly up the sloping road
to White Gables, might turn out to be terribly simple. Cupples was a wise old
boy, but it was probably impossible for him to have an impartial opinion about
his niece. But it was true that the manager of the hotel, who had spoken of
her beauty in terms that aroused his attention, had spoken even more
emphatically of her goodness. Not an artist in words, the manager had yet
conveyed a very definite idea to Trent's mind. 'There isn't a child about here