Suzanne, however, negatived these ideas very strongly. She refused to believe that Guy Pagett was the ruling spirit. The real head⁠—the Colonel⁠—was somewhere in the background and had probably been already in Africa at the time of our arrival.

I agreed that there was much to be said for her view, but I was not entirely satisfied. For in each suspicious instance Pagett had been shown as the directing genius. It was true that his personality seemed to lack the assurance and decision that one would expect from a master criminal⁠—but after all, according to Colonel Race, it was brain work only that this mysterious leader supplied, and creative genius is often allied to a weak and timorous physical constitution.

“There speaks the professor’s daughter,” interrupted Suzanne, when I had got to this point in my argument.

“It’s true, all the same. On the other hand, Pagett may be the Grand Vizier, so to speak, of the All Highest.” I was silent for a minute or two, and then went on musingly: “I wish I knew how Sir Eustace made his money!”