her teeth, and in her blue eyes—though he did not see it—there showed a distinct light of suspicion.

Then she switched on the light on the stairs, loosened her furs, and ascended to the well-furnished room that was always regarded as hers.

The room in which Ella found herself was large, with a fine double wardrobe, a long cheval-glass, and a handsome mahogany dressing-table. The curtains and upholstery were in pale-blue damask, while the thick plush carpet was of a darker shade.

Instead of retiring, Ella at once lit the gas-stove, glanced at her wristlet-watch, the face of which was set round with diamonds, and then flung herself into a deep armchair to think, dozing off at last, tired out by the exertion of her dancing.

The striking of the little gilt clock upon the mantelshelf presently aroused her, and, rising, she switched off the light and, creeping upon tiptoe, slowly opened her bedroom door and listened attentively.

Somewhere she could hear the sound of men’s voices. One she recognised as her father’s.

“That’s Nystrom again! That infernal hell-fiend!” she whispered breathlessly to herself.

Then, removing her smart shoes and her jingling bangles, she crept stealthily forth along the soft carpet of the corridor, and with great care ascended the stairs to the floor above, which was occupied by that long room, the door of which was always kept locked—the room in which her father conducted his constant experiments.

From the ray of light she saw that the door was ajar. Within, the two men were talking in low deep tones in German.

She could hear a hard sound, as of metal being filed down, and more than once distinguished the clinking of glass, as though her father was engaged in some experiment with his test-tubes and other scientific paraphernalia which she had seen arranged so methodically upon the two long deal tables.

“What has Ortmann told you?” asked Theodore Drost’s midnight visitor, while his daughter stood back within the long cupboard on the landing, listening.

“He says that all is in order. We have a friend awaiting us.”

“And the payment—eh?” asked the man Nystrom, a German who had been naturalised as a Swede, and now lived in London as a neutral. As a professor of 

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