I was dressed and ready for dinner before the bugle sounded, but did not go down until I thought that most of the passengers would be already seated. Hovering in the doorway, I saw that Odell was already in his place. Then I made straight for the table and sat down in the chair opposite his.

He had been gloomily eating his soup, and looked up from it with a glare.

"I think you must be making a mistake," he remarked with an effort at civility. "I asked to be alone."

"So did I," I said.

"But not at this table."

"At this very table."

"Then I'll leave it to you."

"Please don't," I said. "If one of us goes, I'll be the one, as I'm the last comer. But will you meanwhile be kind enough to answer two easy questions? First, are you Mr. Roger Odell of New York?"

"Yes, to question number one. If the next's as easy, perhaps I'll answer that too."

(He looked faintly amused. The space between his straight black eyebrows was growing visible again. I had still two minutes and a half out of the three.)

"Thank you," I said. "The next should be even easier. Why have you warned Julius Felborn that if he brings out Carr Price's play, The Key, you'll quash it?"

The man's face changed. From half-amused boredom it expressed white rage. "You are that fellow John Hasle," he said. His voice was low and in control, but his look was vitriolic. All the same, I liked him. He was a man, and I had a man's chance with him.

"Yes, I'm that fellow John Hasle. Let me introduce myself," I replied.

"You've hunted me down. You said you wanted to sit alone. That was not true."

"I said, 'I asked to sit alone.' I wanted to sit with you. It was my way of getting to do it. I took not only the table and the opportunity, but my ticket to New York with the same object. I think I have the right to inquire what's your motive for wishing to injure me and to expect that you'll answer. If you think differently, I'll get up at once and go. But I believe I shall have succeeded in spoiling your appetite."

"You're a cool hand," he said, with no softening of the eyes which gave me look for look. "Sit still. If you get up and hobble away on those crutches you'll have the whole room gaping at us." (Not for the first time were my crutches a blessing in disguise:) "Whether you've a right to question me or not, I don't mind telling you that I think Americans are better at detective literature than any Englishman, speaking generally, and a whole lot better than John Hasle, speaking particularly."

"I think," said I, "that I shall be able to prove my detective powers to you later on, speaking very particularly."

"Ah, indeed! In what way?"

"'Later on' was what I said."

"All right. I'm in no hurry."

"I am. Because several matters have got to be settled before I can progress much further. For one thing, you haven't answered my second question. Your opinion of my book or my British limitations as a detective has nothing to do with your attitude toward the play."

"If you know so much, perhaps you know more."

"Frankly, I don't. I ask you to tell me the rest as frankly."

"Very well. Perhaps the medicine will go to the spot quicker if you understand what it's for. It sounds sort of melodramatic, and maybe it is so; but my wish – my intention – to strangle your play at birth, or crush it afterwards, has revenge for its motive."

"Revenge for what?"

"For the cruel act of a member of your family to a member of mine."

"There's only one other member of my family beside myself – my brother."

"Exactly! That's the man. There's only one other member of my family beside myself. That's my adopted sister. I care more for her than anyone else in the world – except one. Through your brother, my sister's health and her hopes are both ruined. If you didn't know before, you know now what you're up against."

"I assure you I didn't know," I said. "This is the last thing that occurred to me. I admit I thought of something else – "

"Oh, is there something else? It's not needed. Still, you may as well out with it, so I can put another black mark against the name."

"I'll tell you, when I'm ready to talk of the detective test I spoke of. But about my brother injuring your adopted sister. There must be some mistake – "

"Not on your life, if you're Lord John Hasle and your brother's the Marquis of Haslemere."

"I can't deny that."

"It's a pity!"

"So he often says. He's not proud of me as an author. He'd be still less proud of me on the stage. You'll be doing him a real service if you prevent The Key from being produced, and so keep the family name out of the papers in connection with the theatre."

"Oh, will I?" Odell echoed. He looked rather blank for a moment; then gathered himself and his black eyebrows together. "You're mighty intelligent, aren't you?" he sneered.

"I've always thought so. I'm glad you agree. But there's no use our rotting on like this. We're wasting time. Will you tell me what Haslemere can possibly have done?"

"Yes! What he positively did do!" the man broke out fiercely, then controlled himself and glanced quickly round the room as if looking for someone. But not even Miss Marian Callender had come into the saloon. Both she and her niece must have been dining in their own suite. "Lord Haslemere wrote a letter to your British Lord Chamberlain, or whatever you call his High Mightiness, and caused him to have my sister's presentation at Court cancelled three days before it should have come off in May last year."

"Good heavens!" I exclaimed. "What an extraordinary thing to do!"

"What a monstrous, what a beastly thing to do! A defenceless girl. A beautiful girl. One of the best on earth. It broke her heart – the humiliation of it, and the shock. She wasn't very strong, and she'd been looking forward to making her bow to your Royalties. Lord knows why she should have cared so much. But she did. She loved England. She has English blood in her veins. She had a sort of loyal feeling to your King and Queen. That is what she got for it. She's never been the same since, and I doubt if she ever will be. All her friends knew she was going to be presented – and then she wasn't. The damned story leaked out somehow, and has been going the rounds ever since. That's why, if your play is produced in New York, I shall see it gets what it deserves – or, anyway, what your family deserves."

"How do you know Haslemere wrote that letter?" I asked.

"My sister got it from a woman who was to present her – a friend of Lord Haslemere's wife. She'd seen the letter."

"Then she must have seen some reason alleged."

"She did. That to his certain knowledge Miss Madeleine Odell wasn't a proper person to be introduced to their Majesties. Maida not a proper person! She's a saint."

"What lie about her could have been told to my brother?"

"I know what lie was told, because it has been told to others. It's blighted her life for years, go where she would on our side of the water. She hoped it wouldn't have got so far as England; and if it hadn't, she'd have settled down in that country to enjoy a little peace. But there it was, like a snake in the grass! The thing I'd give my head to find out is, who spread the lie?"

"You don't know, then?"

"No, I don't. It's a black mystery."

"Better let me use my despised detective talents to solve it."

"Oh, that's what you've been working up to, is it?"

"No. How could it be, as I hadn't heard the story when I began to work? But I'm willing to take it on as an extra by and by. My brother and I are scarcely friends. I'm not responsible for his act, and whatever the motive, I don't excuse it. Why go out of his way to hurt a woman? Yet I may be able to atone."

"Never!"

"Never's a long word. But just here the time has come to mention the two things I promised to tell you 'later on.' I thought what you had against me might be the name and the plot of my book, dramatised by Carr Price."

"What the devil is the name or plot of your play to me?"

"Ah, that was what I wanted to know. It occurred to me as possible that you resented the incident of a key being found in a dead man's pocket, and the title of the book and play which might recall a certain double tragedy to the public mind."

The blood rushed to the man's face. He understood instantly, and did not choose to pretend ignorance. "How dare you presume that I have a right to resent any such reference?" he challenged me.

"I dare, because of the second of the two things I reserved to tell you later: the wish I have to prove my detective powers for your benefit. I couldn't help seeing to-day your meeting on deck with Miss Callender. I couldn't help hearing a few words. Because I play at being a detective I keep my wits about me. Also I have a good memory for names and stories connected with them. Mr. Odell, will you separate me in your mind from my brother and give Carr Price's play a chance for its life if I tell you who killed Perry and Ned Callender-Graham, and prove to Miss Callender that there's no reason why she need be afraid to give her love to any man?"

Odell stared as if he thought I had gone mad or he was dreaming.

"Who killed Perry and Ned Graham?" he repeated. "No one killed them."

"You are wrong," I said quietly.

"That's your opinion!" he blurted out.

"That's my opinion. And if I'm right, if those two were murdered, and if the murderer or murderers can be found, won't Miss Callender feel she may safely marry a man she loves without delivering him up to danger?"

"Yes," Odell admitted. "Great Heaven, if you were right!"

"Supposing I am, and can prove it?"

"There's nothing on God's earth I wouldn't do for you."

"Well," I said, "I believe there's something in that opinion of mine. Don't dream that now I am getting at this truth I would bury it even if you did worse than crush my play. I'll go on, anyhow, but – "

"You say you are getting at the truth," he broke in. "What do you think – what do you know? But how can you, a stranger, know anything?"

"A stranger to you and those connected with the case, but not to the case itself. You may thank that despised detective instinct of mine for my keen interest in its details."

"If you thought you'd unearthed the clue to a mystery, why didn't you advertise yourself by pointing it out to the police a year and a half ago?"

"I certainly should if I'd got hold of it then, though not for the motive you suggest, Mr. Odell. My publishers were giving me all the publicity I wanted. As it happens, I picked up the clue in question only – a short time ago."

"Only a few hours ago" were the words which all but slipped out. I bit them back, however. My line with a keen business man like Roger Odell was not to give away something for nothing. It was to sell – for a price.

He tried to keep his countenance, but his eyes lit. I saw that my hint, like a spark to gun-cotton, had set him aflame with curiosity. Already, in spite of himself, he began to look on me less as an enemy than an agent; perhaps (a wonderful "perhaps" he could not help envisaging) a deliverer.

"For God's sake, speak out and say what you mean!" The appeal was forced from him. He looked half ashamed of it.

"I can't do that – yet," I returned. "I might tell you my suspicions; but that wouldn't be fair to myself, or you, or – anyone concerned. I must land first. Once off the ship, twenty-four hours are all I shall need to find – I won't say the 'missing link,' because I have reason to think it will not be missing, but the link I can't touch this side of New York. I will make a rendezvous with you at the end of that time, either to tell you I've put two and two together with the link, or else to confess that the ends of the chain can't be made to fit."

Odell stared at me hungrily.

"You want only twenty-four hours to do what the best police in the world haven't done in a year and a half," he growled at me. "You think something of yourself, don't you?"

"You see, I've known myself for a long time," I said modestly. "You've only just been introduced to me, and were prejudiced to begin with. About that rendezvous – do you consent to my appointing the place?"

"Yes," he agreed. "Your hotel?"

"No. In the manager's private office at the Felborn Theatre; the time, twenty-four hours after we get away from the dock. That will be the most convenient place for both of us in case of my success, for Julius Felborn and Carr Price can be called in to fix a date for the first rehearsal of The Key."

The man could not keep back a laugh. It was harsh and short; but it was a score for me and he knew it. "The Felborn Theatre let it be," he said grimly.

The weather was fine and we made almost a record trip in point of time. There was nothing for Odell to regret in the briefness of the voyage, for Grace Callender remained in her cabin till he sent a message by her aunt, promising not to try for a word or a look if she came on deck. After that she appeared again, as if to show appreciation, and Odell didn't abuse her confidence. He kept himself to the other side of the deck; but there was no reason why I should give up my place near the two ladies. After the first night's dinner en tête-à-tête, Odell and I had no more meals together; consequently, the Misses Callender, aunt and niece, were unaware of our acquaintanceship. They had no reason to shun their lame neighbour, and my crutches gave me their sympathy, as they have given me various other blessings. Instead of my picking up a dropped book, as a man usually contrives to do if he yearns to know a girl on shipboard, Grace Callender retrieved one for me. After that, I was permitted, even encouraged, to draw my deck-chair closer to theirs and "tell them things about the war." I noticed that the girl caught eagerly, nervously, at any subject which could hold her attention for a moment, even that of my book and Carr Price's play. I, having the secret clue, guessed that she was for ever trying to escape from a thought too engrossing. Her aunt, Miss Marian Callender, had the clue also; and often I caught her long dark eyes – eyes like those of La Gioconda – fixed with almost painful intentness on Grace. "She knows that her niece is thinking about Odell," I told myself. Evidently she approved the girl's decision to put him out of her life. If she had been Odell's friend and sympathiser, a woman of her superior age and strong personal charm (for she had a sort of hypnotic charm, like a velvet-petalled flower with a penetrating perfume) could surely have influenced an impressionable girl, especially one so devoted to her as Grace Callender was.

It was nine o'clock on an April morning when we escaped from the custom-house men and spun away from the White Star docks in a glittering grey car. When I say "we," I refer to myself and the two Misses Callender. They had befriended me to the extent of recommending me to an hotel and offering to motor me to it; and I was malicious enough to hope that Odell might see me going off with them. There was little doubt in my mind that he did so, and none at all of what feelings must have been roused by the sight. These would have been still more poignant had he known that it was Grace who impulsively invited me, Marian who merely followed with a polite echo. They lived in a large old-fashioned house in Park Avenue, where the car dropped the ladies and by their order took me on to the Hotel Belmont. There Carr Price was waiting, for when – the day before our landing – the Callenders had mentioned the Belmont I marconied him to meet me at the hotel.

"Why did you wire 'Don't come to the dock?'" he asked almost resentfully.

"Because I thought it might annoy Roger Odell if I dangled you under his nose," I explained.

"Roger Odell's nose!" Price gasped. "Where – where – "

"Was it? On the Monarchic. And I didn't pull it; neither did he pull mine. I even have hopes that the two features may come to terms. To-morrow, at exactly this hour, you're due to know why. But meanwhile I want you to promise me patience, blind faith and – unquestioning help. There's no time to waste over it, so here goes! Who's the most influential man you know in New York?"

"George Gould," he said.

"Pooh! a mere millionaire. He's no use to me. Do you know anyone in the police force – high enough up to do you a favour?"

Price pondered for an instant. "I know Sam Yelverton. Is that name familiar to you?"

"It is. Think we'll find him in now if you take me to call?"

"If this is our lucky day we shall."

"Let's put it to the test. I've noticed that New York has taxis as well as London."

"And you'll notice the difference when you've paid for one. But this is on me."

The omen of luck was good, for we found our man at the police head-quarters, and, true to his promise, Carr Price sat as still and expressionless as an owl while I did the talking. I had been introduced to the great Sam Yelverton by my own request as the author of The Key, and it really was a stroke of luck that he had read and liked it. He looked interested when I said that I'd got an idea for my book from a cause célèbre