"That is a step ahead of me, Kirk, I think. Where did you get a portrait of this man Crawford?"
By way of an answer the investigator held up the photograph once more. Pendleton gave a gasp of amazement.
"Allan Morris," said he. "Allan Morris, by George!"
CHAPTER XIV
MISS VALE UNEXPECTEDLY APPEARS
Edouard, Ashton-Kirk's cook, was astonished and somewhat grieved that day to receive orders that dinner was to be served an hour earlier than usual. And Stumph, grave and immobile, was betrayed into an expression of astonishment when his master and guest sat down to the same dinner in their work-a-day attire.
And at best Edouard's delicate art that day received but scant attention. Stumph could hardly conceive of a more important thing than the proper and gentlemanly eating of one's dinner. Nevertheless other things engaged the attention of the two young men; they talked earnestly and in incomprehensible terms; mysterious allusions were sprinkled thickly through it all.
"I do not think," Stumph told the mortified Edouard in the kitchen, "that Mr. Pendleton has tasted the flavor of a single thing he has eaten. He listens to Mr. Ashton-Kirk talk; he is surprised at everything that he is told; there is a trembling in his hands, he is so eager. No, I don't know what it's about. But then, I never know what Mr. Ashton-Kirk is about. He is a very remarkable gentleman."
And no sooner was the dinner completed than Ashton-Kirk's big French car was brought to the door and both young men got into it.