He seemed to have passed into a world where mysterious happenings were an every-day occurrence, into a world peopled by strange men and women who always carried secrets about with them.

And, in a sense, no one was more mysterious than Fenella herself.

He asked himself as he stood there whether her vagaries were merely temperamental, the air of mystery which seemed to surround her simply accidental.

He thought of that night at her house, the curious intimacy which from the first moment she had seemed to take for granted, the confidence with which she had treated him.

He remembered those few breathless moments in her room, the man's hand upon the window-sill, with the strange colored ring, worn with almost flagrant ostentation.