“It is,” she said sobbing. “I—I believed all that he told me, but now I have found out that what he said was false. And—and already he has deserted me!”
“But you love him,” I said, full of sympathy for her in her obviously genuine distress. “Perhaps, after all, we are misjudging him. Something has occurred which prevents his return. I will wire at once to Half Moon Street and see whether we can get any news.”
“Yes, do,” she urged. “Mr. Belton is the man who keeps the chambers. I recollect the name.”
So we turned back to the chalet post office whence I sent a reply-paid telegram. Next evening came the answer. “Mr. Audley left for abroad about two months ago—Belton.”
That was all. We had at least one person who knew him and who might place us in possession of more facts than we had at present.
After dinner that night Dr. Feng asked me to go with him to his room.
“I have had some telegrams from China,” he said, when he had established me comfortably in an easy chair with a whiskey and soda at my hand.
“Any news about Thelma?” I asked.
“Yes,” he replied: “it’s a very curious story. Of course, I have no details and I am afraid we shall never get any. But there is enough information to show, as I expected, that the crystal claw was sent to Mrs. Audley in recognition of services rendered by her father to a powerful member of the Thu-tseng. Have you ever heard of Sung-tchun?”
I nodded. “Wasn’t he the chap who escaped from Siberia under rather extraordinary circumstances in the early years of the war—about 1916 or 1917? There was a lot about him in the papers, I remember, but I never saw any reason given for his imprisonment.”