replied Jack. "I have been in Brindisi making every inquiry possible, but I have been able to gather no information whatever as to his whereabouts. I have come here in hopes that you may give me some idea of what his arrangements were with you, and from that I might plan a course of action."

"I think my partner had better join us," said Mr. Lane, taking up a speaking-tube. For a few moments nothing was said. The business man went on with the letter he was writing, and Jack looked about him. The office was large and splendidly fitted up. Jack knew nothing of Lane & Baumann, but it was plain on every hand that it was a large and wealthy firm. Mr. Lane himself was an elderly gentleman, irreproachably dressed, and the picture of an important man in the City.

The door opened and the other partner came in. Jack saw that Mr. Baumann was much younger, a fat, heavy German with clean-shaven face and big, round spectacles, through which little, thick-lidded eyes peered.

"Has he brought some news?" asked Baumann quickly. "What does he say?" His accent at once betrayed him, though his English was excellent.

"No," said Mr. Lane quietly, "he has brought no news. He comes to learn of us."

"To learn of us," said Baumann slowly; "and what is it you wish to learn?" he demanded of Jack.

The latter eyed the German keenly. At the first word he detected an enemy. Mr. Lane had been gravely polite and non-committal in his manner. This man showed hostility at once.

"I wish to learn anything that will aid me in discovering the reason for the mysterious disappearance of my father," replied Jack, firmly.

"Mysterious disappearance," repeated the German, with a sneering stress upon the words. "Ach Gott! it is no mystery to me when a man with such a gombanion as that disappears." He was becoming excited, and his German accent began to thicken.

"Companion," repeated Jack, "I do not understand you. My father had no companion except Buck Risley, his man, who has now returned to London with me."

"Had he not, indeed?" said Baumann. "But he had a very close gombanion, one who might easily lead him astray. Himmel, what was it not worth? I think about it night and day."

"Gently, Baumann, gently," said Mr. Lane. "You are mystifying Mr. Haydon, and I shall explain to him what you mean. He clearly does not understand you, and I do not think it is right to keep him in the dark. Mr. Haydon, do you know why your father went to Burmah for us?"

"I understood that he was going to survey some concession you had gained," replied Jack.

"My goncession," cried Baumann. "I went over there and saw the place, and I said to myself, Himmel, here is the for rubies, yes, fine rubies, and I got all rights to dig there."

Mr. Lane quieted his excited partner and turned once more to Jack.

"Exactly," he said; "your father went to survey a concession for us. My partner had been over the ground, and had returned convinced that there was a fine field for ruby-mining. We sent your father out to look carefully over the ground on our behalf, and a short time ago we received some very startling news from him. He cabled to us that in a fissure of the rock, where, as everyone knows, the finest rubies are found, he had made a most marvellous find. He had come across a ruby of priceless quality, and, as his work was done, he intended to return at once, bringing the ruby with him in order to place it himself in our hands."

"And now he has mysteriously disappeared," sneered Baumann. His meaning was very plain, and Jack leapt to his feet with pale face and shining eyes.

"Sir!" he cried. "Do you dare to hint that the ruby is the cause of my father's disappearance?"

The German smiled, and Jack's anger grew.

"It is impossible!" he cried. "My father is the soul of uprightness and honour. And do you think he would be tempted by a mere stone, whatever its value? He has handled rubies a hundred and a hundred times."

"Ay," snarled the German, "but not such a ruby as this. What did he say himself? What was in his cablegram? 'The finest ruby by far that I have ever seen or handled!' He says that. He, Haydon, the first living expert on rubies, the man who knows everything of every big specimen in existence. Himmel, Himmel, what a stone was that! And what time are we losing! I would set every police of the world on his track. And we do no nothing, nothing!"

"Gently, Baumann, gently, you know very well that I do not agree with you," said Mr. Lane.

Jack turned eagerly to the senior partner. He felt that the whining German was below both his anger and contempt.

"Sir," said Jack earnestly, "if my father had in his charge a stone so immensely precious, I fear he has met with foul play."

"Who knew of it?" said Mr. Lane. "Had he mentioned anything about it to his man?"

"No, he had not," said Jack, and narrated at once what he had heard from Buck Risley.

"Yes," said Mr. Lane, nodding, "it was the possession of the great jewel which made him uneasy."

"Who can say what it was worth?" broke in Baumann fiercely. "A big ruby of perfect colour and without flaw, remember, he said its like did not exist, is of all stones the most precious. Diamonds, poof! This ruby was worth a score of great diamonds."

"And if my father had with him so wonderful a stone," urged Jack on Mr. Lane, "is it not almost certain that someone has learned of its existence? and again I say that he has met with foul play."

"But who should know of it?" said Mr. Lane. "It is most unlikely that he should mention it to anyone; and you say, moreover, that his own companion knew nothing of it."