292
THE ACHIEVEMENTS OF LUTHER TRANT
But what Egyptian, Turk or Arab could have entered my room with any other object than robbery—which was certainly not the aim of my intruder, for the valuables in the writing desk were untouched. That same afternoon, it is true, I had had an altercation amounting almost to a quarrel with a Bedouin Arab on my way back from Heliopolis; but if this were he, why should he have taken revenge on my writing desk instead of on me? And what reason on earth can any follower of the Prophet have had for examining with such particular attention my letters from you? It was so decidedly a strange thing that I have taken all this space to tell it to you—one of the strangest sort of things I've had in all my knocking about; and Lawler can make no more of it than I."
"Who is this Lawler who was with Mr. Axton then?" Trant looked up interestedly from the last page of the letter.
"I only know he was a friend Howard made in London—an interesting man who had traveled a great deal, particularly in America. Howard was lonely after his mother's death; and as Mr. Lawler was about his age, they struck up a friendship and traveled together."
"An English younger son, perhaps?"
"I don't know anything else except that he had been in the English army—in the Royal Sussex regiment—but was forced to give up his commission on account of charges that he had cheated at cards. Howard always held that the charges were false; but that was why he wanted to travel."
"You know of no other trouble which this Lawler had?"
"No, none."
"Then where is he now?"
