Yet in a way Labar was enjoying himself. The throwbacks, the lines of inquiry that led nowhere, were in normal sequence for this type of investigation and but stiffened his resolution to see the matter through. He had regained the interest that he had lost in his work. No one knew better than he the value of persistency. Somehow he would get his fingers on that end of the string that would unravel the entire tangle. It might be obtained by dogged perseverance; it might drop unexpectedly from the blue skies as clues have not infrequently been known to do.

He had a theory that he was wont to expand upon in moments of leisure with his colleagues. “With enough men, enough money, enough brains and a little time there is no mystery that cannot be explained.”

Something of this sort he reiterated to Moreland, his Flying Squad intimate, while they discussed the matter in the privacy of the latter’s room at Scotland Yard.