"About four weeks since--" the clerk began.

"Say ten days before your seance," the Commissary interposed.

"A gentleman with very long hair and an aquiline nose, dark,
strange, and handsome, called in at my department and asked if I
could tell him the name of Sir Charles Vandrift's London banker.
He said he had a sum to pay in to your credit, and asked if we
would forward it for him. I told him it was irregular for us to
receive the money, as you had no account with us, but that your
London bankers were Darby, Drummond, and Rothenberg, Limited."

"Quite right," Sir Charles murmured.

"Two days later a lady, Madame Picardet, who was a customer of ours,
brought in a good cheque for three hundred pounds, signed by a
first-rate name, and asked us to pay it in on her behalf to Darby,
Drummond, and Rothenberg's, and to open a London account with them
for her. We did so, and received in reply a cheque-book."

"From which this cheque was taken, as I learn from the number,
by telegram from London," the Commissary put in. "Also, that on
the same day on which your cheque was cashed, Madame Picardet,
in London, withdrew her balance."

"But how did the fellow get me to sign the cheque?" Sir Charles
cried. "How did he manage the card trick?"

The Commissary produced a similar card from his pocket. "Was that