"Miss Duggan, I believe?" he began, with a creditable attempt at cordiality. "Friend of Miss Lorne's?"
"That's right," she said in a hesitating voice, with just a trace of Scotch accent that told of the part of the British Isles which gave her birth. "I am a friend of Ailsa's—an old school friend—although we haven't seen each other for a matter of five years. But I wrote to her—when the trouble began—and she told me to come to you. Here is her letter, if you care to see it."
"I prefer to listen to your version of the story first, my dear young lady," returned Mr. Narkom, with a reassuring smile. She was palpably nervous. "You are in trouble, of course? No one ever visits these offices for any other reason. Now just set yourself at ease and tell me all about it. Is it a family matter, or what?"
"Yes, it is a family matter. And a very serious one at that, Mr. Narkom," returned Miss Duggan in her rapid voice. "And I am so worried I don't know which way to turn—and so, in desperation, I came down—all the way from Scotland—to consult you. You will help me, I know. It is about my father. His life is in danger, in very grave danger, and I am afraid that even now, while I am away, something may happen to him, and that woman practise her cunning successfully at last."
"In danger?" Mr. Narkom sat forward in his chair, his professional instincts awake at the word. "Who is the woman of whom you speak, Miss Duggan, and why should she have designs on your father's life? Begin at the beginning and tell me where you live, and all about it. There's plenty of time, you know. Things don't happen so rapidly as a lot of you young people imagine. You are Scotch, are you not?"
"I am. And my father is Sir Andrew Duggan, of whom you have no doubt heard. He—he has large possessions in Scotland. A big landowner, you know——"
"And a hard one," said Mr. Narkom mentally recalling certain paragraphs about the gentleman which appeared from time to time in the Scotch papers.
"Our home is at Aygon—Aygon Castle, in Argyllshire. And there are two of us by our father's first marriage—my brother Ross and me. Ross, as you know, is heir to the estates, of course, as eldest son of the line (that part of them which is entailed); but some seventeen years ago my father married again, an Italian woman whom he met upon one of his periodical journeys abroad."
"And this is the woman in question?"
"It is!" Her voice ran up a tiny scale of excitement. She shut her hands together and breathed hard, and leaning forward in her seat, let her big dark eyes dwell a moment upon his face. "That woman is a would-be murderer, a fiend incarnate, prompted to heaven knows what awful action by her ambitions for her son Cyril!"