He drew me aside into the small gallery which runs parallel with
the Assyrian Room.

"Dexter has booked two passages in the Oceanic. Who is his
companion?"

I wondered, I had wondered more than once, if his companion were
my beautiful violet-eyed acquaintance. A scruple--perhaps an
absurd scruple--hitherto had kept me silent respecting her, but
now I determined to take Bristol fully into my confidence. A
conviction was growing upon me that she and Earl Dexter together
represented that third party whose existence we had long suspected.
Whether they operated separately or on behalf of the Moslems (of
which arrangement I could not conceive) remained to be seen. I
was about to voice my doubts and suspicions when Bristol went on
hurriedly--

"I have thoroughly examined the Burton Room, and considering that
the windows are thirty feet from the ground, that there is no sign
of a ladder having stood upon the lawn, and that the iron bars are
quite intact, it doesn't look humanly possible for any one to have
been in the room last night prior to Mostyn's arrival!"

"One of the dwarfs--"

"Not even one of the dwarfs," said Bristol, "could have passed
between those iron bars!"

"But there was blood on the window!"