"And it was this girl Sir Frederic asked you about?" Miss Morrow inquired.
"It was. He showed me that clipping, and asked me if I wasn't in the same company. I said I was. He wanted to know if I thought I could identify Marie Lantelme if I met her again, and I said I was quite sure I could. 'Very good,' he said. 'I may call upon you for that service before the evening is over. Please do not leave tonight until we have had another talk.' I told him I wouldn't, but of course, at the end—well, he wasn't talking to any one any more."
They sat for a moment in silence. Then Miss Morrow spoke.
"I think that is all," she said. "Unless Captain Flannery—"
She glanced at the Captain. An expression of complete bewilderment decorated that great red face. "Me? No—no, I guess not. Nothing more from me, now," he stammered.
"Thank you very much, Miss Garland," the girl continued. "You are going to be in the city for some time?"
"Yes. I've been promised a part at the Alcazar."
"Well, don't leave town without letting me know. You may go now. So good of you to come."
Miss Garland nodded toward the desk. "May I have the pearl?"
"Oh—certainly—"
"Thanks. When an actress has been out of a show for some time, even the imitation jewels are precious. You understand?"
Miss Morrow let her out, and returned to the silent little group in the inner room. "Well?" she remarked.
"It's incredible," cried Barry Kirk. "Another lost lady. Good lord, Eve Durand and Marie Lantelme can't both be hanging out around here. Unless this is the Port of Missing Women. What do you say, Sergeant?"
Chan shrugged. "All time we get in deeper," he admitted. "Free to announce I find myself sunk in bafflement."
"I'll get to the bottom of it," Flannery cried. "You leave it to me. I'll stir things up."
Chan's eyes narrowed. "My race has old saying, Captain," he remarked gently. "'Muddy water, unwisely stirred, grows darker still. Left alone, it clears itself.'"
Flannery glared at him and without a word strode from the room, slamming the outer door behind him.
Chapter VIII. Willie Li's Good Turn
THOUGHTFULLY Charlie Chan picked up Sir Frederic's clippings from the desk and taking out a huge wallet, stowed them away inside. Barry Kirk's eyes were on the door through which Flannery had taken his unceremonious departure.
"I'm very much afraid," he said, "that the policeman's lot is not a happy one. The dear old Captain seemed a bit—what's a good word for it? Nettled? Ah yes, nettled is a very good word."
Miss Morrow smiled. "He's frightfully puzzled, and that always makes a policeman cross."
"I hope it doesn't have that effect on you."
"If it did, I'd be so cross right at this moment you'd order me out of your life for ever."
"A trifle baffled, eh?"
"Can you wonder? Was there ever a case like this?" She picked up her coat, which she had brought with her from the bungalow. "All that about Marie Lantelme—"
"Humbly making suggestion," remarked Chan, "do not think too much about Marie Lantelme. She is—what you say—an issue from the side. Remember always one big fact—Sir Frederic Bruce dead on this very floor, the velvet shoes absent from his feet. Wandering too far from that, we are lost. Think of Eve Durand, think of Hilary Galt, but think most of all regarding Sir Frederic and last night. Bestow Marie Lantelme in distant pigeonhole of mind. That way alone, we progress, we advance."
The girl sighed. "Shall we ever advance? I doubt it."
"Take cheer," advised Chan. "A wise man said, 'The dark clouds pass, the blue heavens abide.'" He bowed low and disappeared toward the stairs leading up to the bungalow.
Barry Kirk held the girl's coat. As he placed it about her shoulders the words of a familiar advertisement flashed into his mind. "Obey that impulse." But one couldn't go through life obeying every chance impulse.
"'All time we get in deeper,'" he quoted. "It begins to look like a long and very involved case."
"I'm afraid it does," Miss Morrow replied.
"What do you mean, afraid? You and I are very brainy people—thanks for including me—and we should welcome a good stiff test of our powers. Let's get together for a conference very soon."
"Do you think that's necessary?"
"I'm sure of it."
"Then it's all settled," she smiled. "Thanks for the lunch—and good-by."
When Kirk reached the bungalow, Charlie called to him from the room formerly occupied by the man from Scotland Yard. Going in, he found the detective standing thoughtfully before Sir Frederic's luggage, now piled neatly in a corner.
"You have investigated these properties of Sir Frederic?" Chan asked.
Kirk shook his head. "No, I haven't. That's hardly in my line. Flannery went through them last night, and evidently found nothing. He told me to turn them over to the British consul."
"Flannery travels with too much haste," protested Chan. "You have the keys, perhaps? If so, I experience a yearning of my own to look inside."
Kirk handed him the keys, and left him alone. For a long time Chan proceeded with his search. Finally he appeared in the living-room with a great collection of books under his arm.
"Find anything?" Kirk asked.
"Nothing at all," Chan returned, "with these somewhat heavy exceptions. Deign to come closer, if you will be kind enough."
Kirk rose and casually examined the books. His offhand manner vanished, and he cried excitedly: "Great Scott!"
"The same from me," Chan smiled. "You have noted the name of the author of these volumes." He read off the titles. "Across China and Back. Wanderings in Persia. A Year in the Gobi Desert. Tibet, the Top of the World. My Life as an Explorer." His eyes narrowed as he looked at Kirk. "All the work of our good friend, Colonel Beetham. No other books amid Sir Frederic's luggage. Does it not strike you as strange, his keen interest in one solitary author?"
"It certainly does," agreed Kirk. "I wonder—"
"I have never ceased to wonder. When I look into deep eyes of the lonely explorer last night, I ask myself, what make of man is this? No sooner is Sir Frederic low on the floor than my thoughts fly back to that mysterious face. So cold, so calm, but who knows with what hot fires beneath." He selected one enormous volume, the Life. "I feel called upon to do some browsing amid Sir Frederic's modest library. I will advance first on this, which will grant me bird's-eye look over an adventurous career."
"A good idea," Kirk nodded.
Before Chan could settle to his reading, the bell rang and Paradise admitted Mrs. Dawson Kirk. She came in as blithely as a girl.
"Hello, Barry. Mr. Chan, I rather thought I'd find you here. Didn't sail after all, did you?"
Chan sighed. "I have encountered some difficulty in bringing vacation to proper stop. History is a grand repeater."
"Well, I'm glad of it," said Mrs. Kirk. "They'll need you here. Frightful thing, this is. And to think, Barry, it happened in your building. The Kirks are not accustomed to scandal. I never slept a wink all night."
"I'm sorry to hear it," her grandson said.
"Oh, you needn't be.