"Olga," went on Braine, "you must look at it as I do; that it is still in the middle of the game, and we have neither lost nor won."

"How do you know that Hargreave may not have at his beck and call an organization quite as capable if not as large as ours?" suggested the physician.

"That is not possible," Braine declared without hesitation.

"Well, it begins to look that way to me. We've never made a move yet that hasn't been blocked."

"Pure luck each time, I tell you; the devil's own luck always at the critical moment, when everything seems to be in our hands. Now, we want Florence, and we've tried a hundred ways to accomplish this fact and failed. The question is, how to get her away from her companion?"

"Simple enough," said the doctor complacently.

"Out with it, if you have an idea."

The doctor leaned forward and whispered a few words.

"Well, I'm hanged!" Braine laughed and slapped the doctor on the shoulder. "The simplest thing in the world. Mad dog wouldn't be in it. I always said that you had gray matter if you cared to exert yourself."

"Thanks," replied the doctor dryly. "I'll drop down there to-morrow, if you say so, ostensibly to see the other patient. It will make a deuce of a disturbance."