“Directly after an early lunch. It must have been about two o’clock.”
Quest hurried away. So after all there was some foundation for this queer sense of depression which had been hovering about him for the last few days!
“Scotland Yard,” he told the taxi-driver.
He thrust another cigar between his teeth but forgot to light it. He was amazed at his own sensations, conscious of fears and emotions of which he would never have believed himself capable. He gave in his card, and after a few moments’ delay he was shown into the presence of one of the chiefs of the Detective Department, who greeted him warmly.
“My name is Hardaway,” the latter announced. “Glad to meet you, Mr. Quest. We’ve heard of you over here. Take a chair.”
“To tell you the truth,” Quest replied, “my business is a little urgent.”
“Glad to hear you’ve got that fellow Craig,” Mr. Hardaway continued. “Ridiculous the way he managed to slip through our fingers. I understand you’ve got him all right now, though?”
“He is safe enough,” Quest declared, “but to tell you the truth, I’m worried about another little affair.”
“Go on,” the other invited.
“My assistant, a young lady, Miss Lenora Macdougal, has disappeared! She and I and Professor Ashleigh left the steamer at Plymouth and travelled up in the boat train. It was stopped at Hamblin Road for the Professor and myself, and Miss Macdougal came on to London. She was staying at Clifford’s Hotel in Payne Street for the night, and then going on to an aunt. Well, I’ve found that aunt. She was expecting the girl but the girl never appeared. I have been to the hotel where she spent the night before last, and I find that she left there at two o’clock and left word that she would send for her luggage. She didn’t arrive at her aunt’s, and the luggage is still uncalled for.”