“Is there no one else, then, whom you can possibly conceive guilty of such an outrage?”

Westerham gave himself up to a few minutes of genuine hard thinking.

“No,” he said at last slowly; “I can think of no one in the world who would have any object in treating my rooms in this way.”

“Then surely,” cried the detective, “if it is a mystery to you, you would like the matter cleared up?”

“Quite so,” said Westerham, with a smile, “cleared up with the assistance of Mr. Rookley. No, thank you very much for your kind offer, but I will clear the matter up for myself. In the meantime, as I see no reason why you should detain me, I will not detain you. Allow me to wish you good-day.”

Without another word he walked into his bedroom and shut the door sharply.

When Westerham told Rookley that he had no conception of the identity of his mysterious visitor he spoke the truth; nor, cudgel his brains as he might, could he advance any theory which satisfied him. It seemed that the best thing he could do was to send for Melun. The captain, he reflected, was more acquainted with this sort of dealing than he was, and might possibly throw some light on the matter. So for Melun he sent.

The captain came with a bad grace at about eight o'clock. He had already seen in the evening papers various accounts of the ransacking of Westerham's rooms.

Westerham began by detailing to him the conversation with the detective, to every word of which the captain listened with a great attention, here and there putting in a question which quite[Pg 110] convinced Sir Paul that Melun knew nothing of the affair.

[Pg 110]

However, he was determined to see what Melun would say if he asked him point blank whether he had been playing the burglar.

Upon the question being put to him, Melun laughed quite easily and shrugged his shoulders.

“My dear fellow,” he said, “once bitten, twice shy. My attempt to burgle you on the Gigantic was not so successful as to tempt me to repeat the performance. Besides, I am a fairly good judge of my fellow-men, and I have given up all hope of discovering anything in your past or your present which would lead me to the delectable state of being able to dictate to you.”

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