The Red Symbol

An urgent newspaper assignment threatens Maurice Wynn's plans to ask Anne Pendennis to marry him. Ordered to prepare for St. Petersburg, the special correspondent hopes first to speak with Anne before a dinner engagement. His preparations are interrupted when an elderly stranger tries a key in his flat's door. The visitor is seeking Wynn's neighbor Cassavetti, but collapses on the landing. A scrap of red cloth tied to the key and a portrait carried by the stranger give this encounter the makings of a mystery.

John Ironside lets Wynn recount the events himself, so the reporter's observations sit alongside his uncertainty about Anne's feelings. In a later scene, he insists that her name be kept out of discussion of a disputed portrait, then faces a crowded police court while weakened by injuries and travel. The novel combines personal attachment with the practical business of following clues, offering a mystery shaped by a correspondent's work and loyalties.