William Le Queux 
Sign of Silence 

INTRODUCES A GENTLEMAN. Then it’s an entire mystery? Yes, Phrida. But it’s astounding! It really seems so utterly impossible, declared my well-beloved, amazed at what I had just related. I’ve simply stated hard facts. But there’s been nothing about this affair in the papers. For certain reasons the authorities are not exactly anxious for any publicity. It is a very puzzling problem, and they do not care to own themselves baffled, I replied. Really, it’s the most extraordinary story of London life that I’ve ever heard, Phrida Shand declared, leaning forward in her chair, clasping her small white hands as, with her elbows upon the table-a-deux, she looked at me with her wondrous dark eyes across the bowl of red tulips between us.