The Sleeping Sphinx

before then. But Margot really did have a lover.'

'How did you learn that?'

'In Margot's sitting room last night,' Celia shivered, 'in that Chinese Chippendale writing desk, we found the receipted bill.'

'What receipted bill?'

'For a year's rent (yes, a year's! It must have been rather a grand passion) of flat something-or-other at number 56b New Bond Street The fortune-telling place! Dr. Fell seemed awfully excited about it. The bill was dated early in last August. Dr. Fell even put through a call to the London Exchange, and found there's a phone still listed in Madame Vanya's name. I'm not sure what Dr. Fell is after . ..'

(Now the distant bellowing voice was plainer.) I'm sure what he's after,' said Holden, suddenly waking up. 'He wants to send me there, because the place is still intact And he says something devilish will happen unless I catch that train! And the time now ... Celia!'

'Yes?'

'You said once, if I remember correctly, that you'd have been glad if Margot had become somebody's mistress?'

'I did say it,' Celia's eyes blazed, 'and I do say it'

'You're wrong, my dear. It was the worst move she ever made.'

'Why?'

'Because one thing,' said Holden, 'now seems fairly certain. When we find Margot's lover, we are going to find the murderer.'

CHAPTER XVI

Margot's lover . ..

Or, after all, was lie on the wrong track?

New Bond Street, when Holden's taxi set him down at the end of Oxford Street, had a gray-and-white solidity in mid-afternoon sunshine. Once the thoroughfare of fashion, it is now at least the thoroughfare of expense. Though less narrow than Old Bond Street, and with shop numbers less designed to confuse the enemy, it seemed a backwater after the Oxford Street tumult where a terrific walking race seems always in progress by half the population of London.

Nevertheless, even here, traffic plunged. Large if sedate banners, floating from second-floor flagstaffs, waved allurements in colored letters.

Contemporary Paintings said one. Modern Masters! said another. Everything Photographic! rather sweepingly proclaimed a third. Mr. Doc, a fourth said curtly in French, Artist-Hairdresser! Brave but a little dingy, like shop fronts chary of exposing too much glass.

Plate and jewels behind wire netting. Furs. Gowns. Porcelain. Art galleries that showed dim recesses of green walls and gilt frames. Long windows displaying antique furniture, of heavy leopardlike magnificence. Holden saw it flow past beyond a dodging screen of pedestrians. 56b, now . . .

55b should be on the left-hand side of the street, unless the London County Council's usual sense of humor suddenly set the numbers running the other way.

56b, Got itl

Holden, walking rapidly on the right-hand side, dodged into a doorway to reconnoiter the address opposite. He was a little surprised to see, on the wall beside him, a brass plate—announcing that upstairs was a Marriage Bureau, personal and confidential introductions performed. At another time he would have been intrigued with wondering what happened if you just walked upstairs and went in. But he had too much on his mind now.All the way up in the train, from Chippenham to Paddington, he had wildly mulled over those last instructions of Dr. Fell.

'I have not time,' said Dr. Fell, who would have had plenty of time if only he had ceased his roundabout style of speech, 'to explain fully. But I call your attention to the problem of the black velvet gown.'

'If you want to catch that train,' said Mr. Derek Hurst- . Gore, who had generously offered to drive him there, 'you'd better hurry.'

'We agree,' thundered Dr. Fell so upset he could think of only one thing at a time, 'we agree that Mrs. Marsh herself put on the black velvet gown in which she was found dying. | She did it because of some sentimental association. Ah! But what association?'

'It is getting late,' Celia urged.

'I have questioned,' Dr. Fell pointed at Celia and Mr. Hunt-Gore, 'these two here. Early this morning I questioned Sir Danvers Locke, Lady Locke, Doris Locke, Ronald Merrick, Miss Obey, and Miss Cook. Nobody has ever seen Mrs. Marsh wearing the black velvet, though it has been i seen in her dress cupboard.'

'That’s perfectly true,' agreed Celia. 'It’s now twenty-five minutes past noon.'

'I have not,' Dr. Fell looked at Holden, 'a key to the premises at 56b New Bond Street. You (harrumph) are familiar with the technique of breaking and entering?'

'I've been known to employ it,' Holden said dryly.

'And you can make a thorough search?'

'Yes! But that’s just it! What am I supposed to be searching for?'

'Dash it all!' said Dr. Fell, drawing a hand across his fore-head. 'Didn't I explain?'

'No, you didn't. How the hell can I find any evidence against a murderer if you don't tell me what I'm looking for?'

'But, my dear sir! I don't want any evidence against the murderer!'

'You . . . ?' Holden regarded him in stupefaction.

'Not as such. No, no, no!' Dr. Fell assured him. 'Just get me proof as to who was the man in the case, the amant du coeur, and I will apply it to explain what evidence is now in my possession.

'It also seems to me,' added Dr. Fell, mopping his forehead, 'that you are being extremely dilatory, my dear sir, and wasting an unconscionable amount of time in talking, when there is the greatest need for haste. This is really serious. There may only be a theft Or there may be—' 'Well?'

'A tragedy,' said Dr. Fell.

In New Bond Street as Holden instinctively dodged into a doorway and mocked at himself for doing it a string of heavy lorries rumbled past. Odd, how old instincts stayed with youl Even the sight of a British policeman, directing traffic at the intersection of Grosvenor Street, gave him a slight jump.

He looked across at the premises of 56b.

It was a narrow stone front built perhaps fifty years ago; it had three floors above the ground floor, which was a bookshop agleam with rich bindings. On its left was an art gallery, on its right a stationer's displaying fans of blue note paper and envelopes. Just to the left of the bookshop he saw a big door wide open on a passage, presumably leading to stairs at the back.

Holden's eyes went up to the dead-looking, shadowed windows of the floors above the bookshop. Each floor showed two windows between stone pillars. The first set bore large gilt handwriting which said, Archer; Furs; that was no good. The two upper pairs of windows might have been curtained or merely shadowed, occupied or unoccupied; they remained blank.

It was one of the two upper floors, then.

Holden crossed the street.

At the left of the open door, under a brass plate of Sedwick & Co. Ltd., he was surprised to see a smaller plate reading, Madame Vanya.

This was carrying realism rather far: Had Margot, as a sort of huge secret joke, really been practicing a fortune-telling trade here and bamboozling genuine clients? Such things were not unknown. Though Doris Locke had professed to find it so very modem, it was an old trick of the seventeenth century. And fortune telling was not against the law, unless you professed to psychic powers. But Margot? Of all people, Margot?

A low-ceihnged passage, dimly lighted by a concealed electric bulb on each landing, ran to a flight of stairs at the back. The place smelled of fresh brown paint; the brass bindings on the stair treads were new.

As he went up the stairs, he had to remind himself again that he was not in a foreign country; he was in England, in peacetime, at half-past three of a drowsy July afternoon. Yet , the palms of his hands were tingling and old memories returned.