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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The End of Her Honeymoon, by Marie Belloc Lowndes
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+Title: The End of Her Honeymoon
+
+Author: Marie Belloc Lowndes
+
+Release Date: January, 2006  [EBook #9635]
+[This file was first posted on October 11, 2003]
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+Edition: 10
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+Language: English
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+Character set encoding: US-ASCII
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE END OF HER HONEYMOON ***
+
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+E-text prepared by Suzanne Shell, David Kline, and Project Gutenberg
+Distributed Proofreaders
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+
+The End of Her Honeymoon
+
+By
+
+Mrs. Belloc Lowndes
+
+Author of "The Uttermost Farthing," "The Chink in the Armour," etc., etc.
+
+1913
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+"Cocher? l'Hotel Saint Ange, Rue Saint Ange!"
+
+The voice of John Dampier, Nancy's three-weeks bridegroom, rang out
+strongly, joyously, on this the last evening of their honeymoon. And before
+the lightly hung open carriage had time to move, Dampier added something
+quickly, at which both he and the driver laughed in unison.
+
+Nancy crept nearer to her husband. It was tiresome that she knew so little
+French.
+
+"I'm telling the man we're not in any hurry, and that he can take us round
+by the Boulevards. I won't have you seeing Paris from an ugly angle the
+first time--darling!"
+
+"But Jack? It's nearly midnight! Surely there'll be nothing to see on the
+Boulevards now?"
+
+"Won't there? You wait and see--Paris never goes to sleep!"
+
+And then--Nancy remembered it long, long afterwards--something very odd and
+disconcerting happened in the big station yard of the Gare de Lyon. The
+horse stopped--stopped dead. If it hadn't been that the bridegroom's arm
+enclosed her slender, rounded waist, the bride might have been thrown out.
+
+The cabman stood up in his seat and gave his horse a vicious blow across
+the back.
+
+"Oh, Jack!" Nancy shrank and hid her face in her husband's arm. "Don't let
+him do that! I can't bear it!"
+
+Dampier shouted out something roughly, angrily, and the man jumped off the
+box, and taking hold of the rein gave it a sharp pull. He led his unwilling
+horse through the big iron gates, and then the little open carriage rolled
+on smoothly.
+
+How enchanting to be driving under the stars in the city which hails in
+every artist--Jack Dampier was an artist--a beloved son!
+
+In the clear June atmosphere, under the great arc-lamps which seemed
+suspended in the mild lambent air, the branches of the trees lining the
+Boulevards showed brightly, delicately green; and the tints of the dresses
+worn by the women walking up and down outside the cafes and still
+brilliantly lighted shops mingled luminously, as on a magic palette.
+
+Nancy withdrew herself gently from her husband's arm. It seemed to her that
+every one in that merry, slowly moving crowd on either side must see that
+he was holding her to him. She was a shy, sensitive little creature, this
+three-weeks-old bride, whose honeymoon was now about to merge into happy
+every-day life.
+
+Dampier divined something of what she was feeling. He put out his hand and
+clasped hers. "Silly sweetheart," he whispered. "All these merry,
+chattering people are far too full of themselves to be thinking of us!"
+
+As she made no answer, bewildered, a little oppressed by the brilliance,
+the strangeness of everything about them, he added a little anxiously,
+"Darling, are you tired? Would you rather go straight to the hotel?"
+
+But pressing closer to him, Nancy shook her head. "No, no, Jack! I'm not a
+bit tired. It was you who were tired to-day, not I!"
+
+"I didn't feel well in the train, 'tis true. But now that I'm in Paris I
+could stay out all night! I suppose you've never read George Moore's
+description of this very drive we're taking, little girl?"
+
+And again Nancy shook her head, and smiled in the darkness. In the world
+where she had lived her short life, in the comfortable, unimaginative world
+in which Nancy Tremain, the delightfully pretty, fairly well-dowered,
+orphan, had drifted about since she had been "grown-up," no one had ever
+heard of George Moore.
+
+Strange, even in some ways amazing, their marriage--hers and Jack
+Dampier's--had been! He, the clever, devil-may-care artist, unconventional
+in all his ways, very much a Bohemian, knowing little of his native
+country, England, for he had lived all his youth and working life in
+France--and she, in everything, save an instinctive love of beauty, which,
+oddly yet naturally enough, only betrayed itself in her dress, the
+exact opposite!
+
+A commission from an English country gentleman who had fancied a portrait
+shown by Dampier in the Salon, had brought the artist, rather reluctantly,
+across the Channel, and an accident--sometimes it made them both shiver to
+realise how slight an accident--had led to their first and
+decisive meeting.
+
+Nancy Tremain had been brought over to tea, one cold, snowy afternoon, at
+the house where Dampier was painting. She had been dressed all in grey, and
+the graceful velvet gown and furry cap-like toque had made her look, in his
+eyes, like an exquisite Eighteenth Century pastel.
+
+One glance--so Dampier had often since assured her and she never grew tired
+of hearing it--had been enough. They had scarcely spoken the one to the
+other, but he had found out her name, and, writing, cajoled her into seeing
+him again. Very soon he had captured her in the good old way, as women--or
+so men like to think--prefer to be wooed, by right of conquest.
+
+There had been no one to say them nay, no one to comment unkindly over so
+strange and sudden a betrothal. On the contrary, Nancy's considerable
+circle of acquaintances had smilingly approved.
+
+All the world loves a masterful lover, and Nancy Tremain was far too
+pretty, far too singular and charming, to become engaged in the course of
+nature to some commonplace young man. This big, ugly, clever, amusing
+artist was just the contrast which was needed for romance.
+
+And he seemed by his own account to be making a very good income, too! Yet,
+artists being such eccentric, extravagant fellows, doubtless Nancy's modest
+little fortune would come in useful--so those about them argued carelessly.
+
+Then one of her acquaintances, a thought more good-natured than the rest,
+arranged that lovely, happy Nancy should be married from a pleasant country
+house, in a dear little country church. Braving superstition, the wedding
+took place in the last week of May, and bride and bridegroom had gone to
+Italy--though, to be sure, it was rather late for Italy--for three
+happy weeks.
+
+Now they were about to settle down in Dampier's Paris studio.
+
+Unluckily it was an Exhibition Year, one of those years, that is, which,
+hateful as they may be to your true Parisian, pour steady streams of gold
+into the pockets of fortunate hotel and shop keepers, and which bring a
+great many foreigners to Paris who otherwise might never have come. Quite a
+number of such comfortable English folk were now looking forward to going
+and seeing Nancy Dampier in her new home--of which the very address was
+quaint and unusual, for Dampier's studio was situated Impasse des Nonnes.
+
+They were now speeding under and across the vast embracing shadow of the
+Opera House. And again Dampier slipped his arm round his young wife. It
+seemed to this happy man as if Paris to-night had put on her gala dress to
+welcome him, devout lover and maker of beauty, back to her bosom.
+
+"Isn't it pleasant to think," he whispered, "that Paris is the more
+beautiful because you now are in it and of it, Nancy?"
+
+And Nancy smiled, well pleased at the fantastic compliment.
+
+She pressed more closely to him.
+
+"I wish--I wish--" and then she stopped, for she was unselfish, shy of
+expressing her wishes, but that made Dampier ever the more eager to hear,
+and, if possible, to gratify them.
+
+"What is it that you wish, dear heart?" he asked.
+
+"I wish, Jack, that we were going straight home to the studio now--instead
+of to an hotel."
+
+"We'll get in very soon," he answered quickly. "Believe me, darling, you
+wouldn't like going in before everything is ready for you. Mere Bideau has
+her good points, but she could never make the place look as I want it to
+look when you first see it. I'll get up early to-morrow morning and go and
+see to it all. I wouldn't for the world you saw our home as it must look
+now--the poor little living rooms dusty and shabby, and our boxes sitting
+sadly in the middle of the studio itself!"
+
+They had sent their heavy luggage on from England, and for the honeymoon
+Nancy had contented herself with one modest little trunk, while Dampier had
+taken the large portmanteau which had been the useful wedding present of
+the new friend and patron in whose house he had first seen his wife.
+
+Swiftly they shot through the triple arch which leads from the Rue de
+Rivoli to the Carousel. How splendid and solitary was the vast dimly-lit
+space. "I like this," whispered Nancy dreamily, gazing up at the dark,
+star-powdered sky.
+
+And then Dampier turned and caught her, this time unresisting, yielding
+joyfully, to his breast. "Nancy?" he murmured thickly. "Nancy? I'm afraid!"
+
+"Afraid?" she repeated wonderingly.
+
+"Yes, horribly afraid! Pray, my pure angel, pray that the gods may indulge
+their cruel sport elsewhere. I haven't always been happy, Nancy."
+
+And she clung to him, full of vague, unsubstantial fears. "Don't talk like
+that," she murmured. "It--it isn't right to make fun of such things."
+
+"Make fun? Good God!" was all he said.
+
+And then his mood changed. They were now being shaken across the huge,
+uneven paving stones of the quays, and so on to a bridge. "I never really
+feel at home in Paris till I've crossed the Seine," he cried joyously.
+"Cheer up, darling, we shall soon be at the Hotel Saint Ange!"
+
+"Have you ever stayed in the Hotel Saint Ange?" she said, with a touch of
+curiosity in her voice.
+
+"I used to know a fellow who lived there," he said carelessly. "But what
+made me pick it out was the fact that it's such a queer, beautiful old
+house, and with a delightful garden. Also we shall meet no English there."
+
+"Don't you like English people?" she asked, a little protestingly.
+
+And Dampier laughed. "I like them everywhere but in Paris," he said: and
+then, "But you won't be quite lonely, little lady, for a good many
+Americans go to the Hotel Saint Ange. And for such a funny reason--"
+
+"What reason?"
+
+"It was there that Edgar Allan Poe stayed when he was in Paris."
+
+Their carriage was now engaged in threading narrow, shadowed thoroughfares
+which wound through what might have been a city of the dead. From midnight
+till cock-crow old-world Paris sleeps, and the windows of the high houses
+on either side of the deserted streets through which they were now driving
+were all closely shuttered.
+
+"Here we have the ceremonious, the well-bred, the tactful Paris of other
+days," exclaimed Dampier whimsically. "This Paris understands without any
+words that what we now want is to be quiet, and by ourselves, little girl!"
+
+A gas lamp, burning feebly in a corner wine shop, lit up his exultant face
+for a flashing moment.
+
+"You don't look well, Jack," Nancy said suddenly. "It was awfully hot in
+Lyons this morning--"
+
+"We stayed just a thought too long in that carpet warehouse," he said
+gaily,--"And then--and then that prayer carpet, which might have belonged
+to Ali Baba of Ispahan, has made me feel ill with envy ever since! But joy!
+Here we are at last!"
+
+After emerging into a square of which one side was formed by an old Gothic
+church, they had engaged in a dark and narrow street the further end of
+which was bastioned by one of the flying buttresses of the church they had
+just passed.
+
+The cab drew up with a jerk. "C'est ici, monsieur."
+
+The man had drawn up before a broad oak porte cochere which, sunk far back
+into a thick wall, was now inhospitably shut.
+
+"They go to bed betimes this side of the river!" exclaimed Dampier
+ruefully.
+
+Nancy felt a little troubled. The hotel people knew they were coming, for
+Jack had written from Marseilles: it was odd no one had sat up for them.
+
+But their driver gave the wrought-iron bell-handle a mighty pull, and after
+what seemed to the two travellers a very long pause the great doors swung
+slowly back on their hinges, while a hearty voice called out, "C'est vous,
+Monsieur Gerald? C'est vous, mademoiselle?"
+
+And Dampier shouted back in French, "It's Mr. and Mrs. Dampier. Surely you
+expect us? I wrote from Marseilles three days ago!"
+
+He helped his wife out of the cab, and they passed through into the broad,
+vaulted passage which connected the street with the courtyard of the hotel.
+By the dim light afforded by an old-fashioned hanging lamp Nancy Dampier
+saw that three people had answered the bell; they were a middle-aged man
+(evidently mine host), his stout better half, and a youth who rubbed his
+eyes as if sleepy, and who stared at the newcomers with a dull,
+ruminating stare.
+
+As is generally the case in a French hotel, it was Madame who took command.
+She poured forth a torrent of eager, excited words, and at last Dampier
+turned to his wife:--"They got my letter, but of course had no address to
+which they could answer, and--and it's rather a bore, darling--but they
+don't seem to have any rooms vacant."
+
+But even as he spoke the fat, cheerful-looking Frenchwoman put her hand on
+the young Englishman's arm. She had seen the smart-looking box of the
+bride, the handsome crocodile skin bag of the bridegroom, and again she
+burst forth, uttering again and again the word "arranger."
+
+Dampier turned once more, this time much relieved, to his wife: "Madame
+Poulain (that's her name, it seems) thinks she can manage to put us up all
+right to-night, if we don't mind two very small rooms--unluckily not on the
+same floor. But some people are going away to-morrow and then she'll have
+free some charming rooms overlooking the garden."
+
+He took a ten-franc piece out of his pocket as he spoke, and handed it to
+the gratified cabman:--"It doesn't seem too much for a drive through
+fairyland"--he said aside to his wife.
+
+And Nancy nodded contentedly. It pleased her that her Jack should be
+generous--the more that she had found out in the last three weeks that if
+generous, he was by no means a spendthrift. He had longed to buy a couple
+of Persian prayer carpets in that queer little warehouse where a French
+friend of his had taken them in Lyons, but he had resisted the
+temptation--nobly.
+
+Meanwhile Madame Poulain was talking, talking, talking--emphasising all she
+said with quick, eager gestures.
+
+"They are going to put you in their own daughter's room, darling. She's
+luckily away just now. So I think you will be all right. I, it seems, must
+put up with a garret!"
+
+"Oh, must you be far away from me?" she asked a little plaintively.
+
+"Only for to-night, only till to-morrow, sweetheart."
+
+And then they all began going up a winding staircase which started flush
+from the wall to the left.
+
+First came Madame Poulain, carrying a candle, then Monsieur Poulain with
+his new English clients, and, last of all, the loutish lad carrying Nancy's
+trunk. They had but a little way to go up the shallow slippery stairs, for
+when they reached the first tiny landing Madame Poulain opened a curious,
+narrow slit of a door which seemed, when shut, to be actually part of the
+finely panelled walls.
+
+"Here's my daughter's room," said the landlady proudly. "It is very
+comfortable and charming."
+
+"What an extraordinary little room!" whispered Nancy.
+
+And Dampier, looking round him with a good deal of curiosity, agreed.
+
+In the days when the Hotel Saint Ange belonged to the great soldier whose
+name it still bears, this strange little apartment had surely been, so the
+English artist told himself, a powdering closet. Even now the only outside
+light and air came from a small square window which had evidently only
+recently been cut through the thick wall. In front of this aperture
+fluttered a bright pink curtain.
+
+Covering three of the walls as well as the low ceiling, was a paper
+simulating white satin powdered with rose-buds, and the bed, draped with
+virginal muslin curtains, was a child's rather than a woman's bed.
+
+"What's that?" asked Dampier suddenly. "A cupboard?"
+
+He had noticed that wide double doors, painted in the pale brownish grey
+called grisaille, formed the further side of the tiny apartment.
+
+Madame Poulain, turning a key, revealed a large roomy space now fitted up
+as a cupboard. "It's a way through into our bedroom, monsieur," she said
+smiling. "We could not of course allow our daughter to be far from
+ourselves."
+
+And Dampier nodded. He knew the ways of French people and sympathised with
+those ways.
+
+He stepped up into the cupboard, curious to see if this too had been a
+powdering closet, and if that were so if the old panelling and
+ornamentation had remained in their original condition.
+
+Thus for a moment was Dampier concealed from those in the room. And during
+that moment there came the sound of footsteps on the staircase, followed by
+the sudden appearance on the landing outside the open door of the curious
+little apartment of two tall figures--a girl in a lace opera cloak, and a
+young man in evening dress.
+
+Nancy Dampier, gazing at them, a little surprised at the abrupt apparition,
+told herself that they must be brother and sister, so striking was their
+resemblance to one another.
+
+"We found the porte cochere open, Madame Poulain, so we just came straight
+in. Good night!"
+
+The young lady spoke excellent French, but as she swept on up the staircase
+out of sight there came a quick low interchange of English words between
+herself and the man with her.
+
+"Daisy? Did you notice that beautiful young woman? A regular stunner! She
+must be that daughter the Poulains are always talking about."
+
+And then "Daisy's" answer floated down. "Yes, I noticed her--she is
+certainly very pretty. But do be careful, Gerald, I expect she knows a
+little English--"
+
+Dampier stepped down out of the cupboard.
+
+"That American cub ought to be put in his place!" he muttered heatedly.
+
+Nancy turned her face away to hide a little smile. Jack was so funny! He
+delighted in her beauty--he was always telling her so, and yet it annoyed
+him if other people thought her pretty too. This young American had looked
+at her quite pleasantly, quite respectfully; he hadn't meant to be
+offensive--of that Nancy felt sure.
+
+"I suppose you have a good many Americans this year?" went on Dampier in
+French, turning to Monsieur Poulain.
+
+"No, monsieur, no. Our clientele is mostly French. We have only this young
+lady, her brother, and their father, monsieur. The father is a Senator in
+his own country--Senator Burton. They are very charming people, and have
+stayed with us often before. All our other guests are French. We have never
+had such a splendid season: and all because of the Exhibition!"
+
+"I'm glad you are doing well," said Dampier courteously. "But for my
+part"--he shrugged his shoulders--"I'm too much of a Parisian to like the
+Exhibition."
+
+Then he turned to Nancy: "Well, you'll be quite safe, my darling. Monsieur
+and Madame Poulain are only just through here, so you needn't feel lonely."
+
+And then there came a chorus of bonsoirs from host, from hostess, and from
+the lad who now stood waiting with the Englishman's large portmanteau
+hitched up on his shoulder.
+
+Dampier bent and kissed his wife very tenderly: then he followed Monsieur
+Poulain and the latter's nephew up the stairs, while Madame Poulain stayed
+behind and helped Mrs. Dampier to unpack the few things she required for
+the night.
+
+And Nancy, though she felt just a little bewildered to find herself alone
+in this strange house, was yet amused and cheered by the older woman's
+lively chatter, and that although she only understood one word in ten.
+
+Madame Poulain talked of her daughter, Virginie, now in the country well
+away from the holiday crowds brought by the Exhibition, and also of her
+nephew, Jules, the lad who had carried up the luggage, and who knew--so
+Madame Poulain went to some pains to make Nancy understand--a
+little English.
+
+Late though it was, the worthy woman did not seem in any hurry to go away,
+but at last came the kindly words which even Nancy, slight as was her
+knowledge of French, understood: "Bonsoir, madame. Dormez bien."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+Nancy Dampier sat up in bed.
+
+Through the curtain covering the square aperture in the wall which did duty
+for a window the strong morning light streamed in, casting a pink glow over
+the peculiar little room.
+
+She drew the pearl-circled watch, which had been one of Jack's first gifts
+to her, from under the big, square pillow.
+
+It was already half-past nine. How very tiresome and strange that she
+should have overslept herself on this, her first morning in Paris! And
+yet--and yet not so very strange after all, for her night had been
+curiously and disagreeably disturbed.
+
+At first she had slept the deep, dreamless sleep of happy youth, and then,
+in a moment, she had suddenly sat up, wide awake.
+
+The murmur of talking had roused her--of eager, low talking in the room
+which lay the other side of the deep cupboard. When the murmur had at last
+ceased she had dozed off, only to be waked again by the sound of the porte
+cochere swinging back on its huge hinges.
+
+It was evidently quite true--as Jack had said--that Paris never goes to
+sleep.
+
+Jack had declared he would get up and go over to the studio early, so there
+was nothing for it but to get up, and wait patiently till he came back.
+Nancy knew that her husband wouldn't like her to venture out into the
+streets alone. He was extraordinarily careful of her--careful and
+thoughtful for her comfort.
+
+What an angel he was--her great strong, clever Jack!
+
+A girl who goes about by herself as much as Nancy Tremain had gone about
+alone during the three years which had elapsed betwixt her leaving school
+and her marriage, obtains a considerable knowledge of men, and not of the
+nicest kind of men. But Jack was an angel--she repeated the rather absurdly
+incongruous word to herself with a very tender feeling in her heart. He
+always treated her not only as if she were something beautiful and rare,
+but something fragile, to be respected as well as adored....
+
+He had left her so little during the last three weeks that she had never
+had time to think about him as she was thinking of him now; "counting up
+her mercies," as an old-fashioned lady she had known as a child was wont to
+advise those about her to do.
+
+At last she looked round her for a bell. No, there was nothing of the sort
+in the tiny room. But Nancy Dampier had already learned to do without all
+sorts of things which she had regarded as absolute necessities of life when
+she was Nancy Tremain. In some of the humbler Italian inns in which she and
+Jack had been so happy, the people had never even heard of a bell!
+
+She jumped out of bed, put on her pretty, pale blue dressing-gown--it was a
+fancy of Jack's that she should wear a great deal of pale blue and
+white--and then she opened the door a little way.
+
+"Madame!" she called out gaily. "Madame Poulain?" and wondered whether her
+French would run to the words "hot water"--yes, she thought it would. "Eau
+chaude"--that was hot water.
+
+But there came no answering cry, and again, this time rather impatiently,
+she called out, "Madame Poulain?"
+
+And then the shuffling sounds of heavy footsteps made Nancy shoot back from
+the open door.
+
+"Yuss?" muttered a hoarse voice.
+
+This surely must be the loutish-looking youth who, so Nancy suddenly
+remembered, knew a little English.
+
+"I want some hot water," she called out through the door. "And will you
+please ask your aunt to come here for a moment?"
+
+"Yuss," he said, in that queer hoarse voice, and shuffled downstairs again.
+And there followed, floating up from below, one of those quick, gabbling
+interchanges of French words which Nancy, try as she might, could not
+understand.
+
+She got into bed again. Perhaps after all it would be better to allow them
+to bring up her "little breakfast" in the foreign fashion. She would still
+be in plenty of time for Jack. Once in the studio he would be in no hurry,
+or so she feared, to come back--especially if on his way out he had opened
+her door and seen how soundly she was sleeping.
+
+She waited some time, and then, as no one came, grew what she so seldom
+was, impatient and annoyed. What an odd hotel, and what dilatory,
+disagreeable ways! But just as she was thinking of getting up again she
+heard a hesitating knock.
+
+It was Madame Poulain, and suddenly Nancy--though unobservant as is youth,
+and especially happy youth--noticed that mine hostess looked far less well
+in the daytime than by candle-light.
+
+Madame Poulain's stout, sallow face was pale, her cheeks puffy; there were
+rings round the black eyes which had sparkled so brightly the night before.
+But then she too must have had a disturbed night.
+
+In her halting French Mrs. Dampier explained that she would like coffee and
+rolls, and then some hot water.
+
+"C'est bien, mademoiselle!"
+
+And Nancy blushed rosy-red. "Mademoiselle?" How odd to hear herself so
+addressed! But Madame Poulain did not give her time to say anything, even
+if she had wished to do so, for, before Mrs. Dampier could speak again, the
+hotel-keeper had shut the door and gone downstairs.
+
+And then, after a long, long wait, far longer than Nancy had ever been made
+to wait in any of the foreign hotels in which she and her husband had
+stayed during the last three weeks, Madame Poulain reappeared, bearing a
+tray in her large, powerful hands.
+
+She put the tray down on the bed, and she was already making her way
+quickly, silently to the door, when Nancy called out urgently, "Madame?
+Madame Poulain! Has my husband gone out!"
+
+And then she checked herself, and tried to convey the same question in her
+difficult French--"Mon mari?" she said haltingly. "Mon mari?"
+
+But Madame Poulain only shook her head, and hurried out of the room,
+leaving the young Englishwoman oddly discomfited and surprised.
+
+It was evidently true what Jack had said--that tiresome Exhibition had
+turned everything in Paris, especially the hotels, topsy-turvy. Madame
+Poulain was cross and tired, run off her feet, maybe; her manner, too,
+quite different now from what it had been the night before.
+
+Nancy Dampier got up and dressed. She put on a pale blue linen gown which
+Jack admired, and a blue straw hat trimmed with grey wings which Jack said
+made her look like Mercury.
+
+She told herself that there could be no reason why she shouldn't venture
+out of her room and go downstairs, where there must surely be some kind of
+public sitting-room.
+
+Suddenly remembering the young American's interchange of words with his
+sister, she wondered, smiling to herself, if she would ever see them again.
+How cross the young man's idle words had made Jack! Dear, jealous Jack, who
+hated it so when people stared at her as foreigners have a trick of
+staring. It made Nancy happy to know that people thought her pretty, nay
+beautiful, for it would have been dreadful for Jack, an artist, to marry an
+ugly woman....
+
+Locking her box she went out onto the shallow staircase, down the few steps
+which led straight under the big arch of the porte cochere. It was thrown
+hospitably open on to the narrow street now full of movement, colour, and
+sound. But in vivid contrast to the moving panorama presented by the busy,
+lane-like thoroughfare outside, was the spacious, stone-paved courtyard of
+the hotel, made gay with orange trees in huge green tubs. Almost opposite
+the porte cochere was another arch through which she could see a glimpse of
+the cool, shady garden Jack remembered.
+
+Yes, it was a strangely picturesque and charming old house, this Hotel
+Saint Ange; but even so Nancy felt a little lost, a little strange,
+standing there under the porte cochere. Then she saw that painted up on a
+glass door just opposite the stairs leading to her room was the word
+"Bureau": it was doubtless there that Jack had left word when he would
+be back.
+
+She went across and opened the door, but to her surprise there was no one
+in the little office; she hadn't, however, long to wait, for Madame
+Poulain's nephew suddenly appeared from the courtyard.
+
+He had on an apron; there was a broom in his hand, and as he came towards
+her, walking very, very slowly, there came over Nancy Dampier, she could
+not have told you why, a touch of repulsion from the slovenly youth.
+
+"I wish to know," she said, "whether my husband left any message for me?"
+
+But the young man shook his head. He shuffled first on one foot and then on
+the other, looking miserably awkward. It was plain that he did not know
+more than a word or two of English.
+
+"I am sure," she said, speaking slowly and very distinctly, "that my
+husband left some kind of message with your uncle or aunt. Will you please
+ask one of them to speak to me?"
+
+He nodded. "Si, mademoiselle" and walked quickly away, back into the
+courtyard.
+
+"Mademoiselle" again! What an extraordinary hotel, and what bad manners
+these people had! And yet again and again Jack had compared English and
+French hotels--always to the disadvantage of the former.
+
+Long minutes went by, and Nancy began to feel vexed and angry. Then there
+fell on her listening ears a phrase uttered very clearly in Madame
+Poulain's resonant voice: "C'est ton tour maintenant! Vas-y, mon ami!"
+
+And before she had time to try and puzzle out the sense of the words, she
+saw Monsieur Poulain's portly figure emerge from the left side of the
+courtyard, and then--when he caught sight of the slim, blue-clad figure
+standing under his porte cochere--beat a hasty retreat.
+
+Nancy's sense of discomfort and indignation grew. What did these people
+mean by treating her like this? She longed with a painful, almost a sick
+longing for her husband's return. It must be very nearly eleven o'clock.
+Why did he stay away so long?
+
+A painful, choking feeling--one she had very, very seldom experienced
+during the course of her short, prosperous life, came into her throat.
+
+Angrily she dashed away two tears from her eyes.
+
+This was a horrid hotel! The Poulains were hateful people! Jack had made a
+mistake--how could he have brought her to such a place? She would tell him
+when he came back that he must take her away now, at once, to some
+ordinary, nice hotel, where the people knew English, and where they treated
+their guests with ordinary civility.
+
+And then there shot through Nancy Dampier a feeling of quick relief, for,
+walking across the courtyard, evidently on their way out, came a
+pleasant-looking elderly gentleman, accompanied by the girl whom Nancy had
+seen for a brief moment standing on the landing close to her bedroom door
+the night before.
+
+These were English people? No, American of course! But that was quite as
+good, for they, thank heaven! spoke English. She could ask them to be her
+interpreters with those extraordinary Poulains. Jack wouldn't mind her
+doing that. Why, he might have left quite an important message for her!
+
+She took a step forward, and the strangers stopped. The old
+gentleman--Nancy called him in her own mind an old gentleman, though
+Senator Burton was by no means old in his own estimation or in that of his
+contemporaries--smiled a very pleasant, genial smile.
+
+Nancy Dampier made a charming vision as she stood under the arch of the
+porte cochere, her slender, blue-clad figure silhouetted against the dark
+background by the street outside, and the colour coming and going in
+her face.
+
+"May I speak to you a moment?" she said shyly.
+
+"Why certainly."
+
+The American took off his hat, and stood looking down at her kindly. "My
+name is Burton, Senator Burton, at your service! What can I do for you?".
+
+The simple little question brought back all Nancy's usual happy confidence.
+How silly she had been just now to feel so distressed.
+
+"I'm Mrs. Dampier, and I can't make the hotel people understand what I
+say," she explained. "I mean Monsieur and Madame Poulain--and the nephew--I
+think his name is Jules--though he is supposed to speak English, is so
+very stupid."
+
+"Yes, indeed he is!" chimed in the girl whom her brother had called
+"Daisy." "I've long ago given up trying to make that boy understand
+anything, even in French. But they do work him most awfully hard, you know;
+they have women in each day to help with the cleaning, but that poor lad
+does everything else--everything, that is, that the Poulains don't do
+themselves."
+
+"What is it that you can't make them understand?" asked Senator Burton
+indulgently. "Tell us what it is you want to ask them?"
+
+"I only wish to know at what time my husband went out, and whether he left
+any message for me," answered Nancy rather shamefacedly. "You see the hotel
+is so full that they put us on different floors, and I haven't seen him
+this morning."
+
+"I'll find that out for you at once. I expect Madame Poulain is in her
+kitchen just now."
+
+The Senator turned and went back into the courtyard, leaving his daughter
+and the young Englishwoman alone together.
+
+"The Poulains seem such odd, queer people," said Nancy hesitatingly.
+
+"D'you think so? We've always found them all right," said the girl,
+smiling. "Of course they're dreadfully busy just now because of the
+Exhibition. The hotel is full of French people, and they give Madame
+Poulain a great deal of trouble. But she doesn't grudge it, for she and her
+husband are simply coining money! They're determined that their daughter
+shall have a splendid dowry!" She waited a moment, and then repeated, "Oh,
+yes, the Poulains are very good sort of people. They're very kindly and
+good-natured."
+
+To this remark Nancy made no answer. She thought the Poulains both rude and
+disagreeable, but she had no wish to speak ill of them to this nice girl.
+How lucky it was that these kind Americans had come to her rescue! Though
+still feeling indignant and uncomfortable with regard to the way in which
+she had been treated by the hotel-keeper and his wife, she felt quite happy
+again now.
+
+Senator Burton was away for what seemed, not only to Mrs. Dampier, but also
+to his daughter, a considerable time. But at last they saw him coming
+slowly towards them. His eyes were bent on the ground; he seemed to be
+thinking, deeply.
+
+Nancy Dampier took a step forward. "Well?" she said eagerly, and then a
+little shyly she uttered his name, "Well, Mr. Burton? What do they say? Did
+my husband leave any message?"
+
+"No, he doesn't seem to have done that." And then the Senator looked down
+searchingly into the young Englishwoman's face. It was a very lovely face,
+and just now the look of appeal, of surprise, in the blue eyes added a
+touch of pathetic charm. He thought of the old expression, "Beauty in
+distress."
+
+His daughter broke in: "Why, Mrs. Dampier, do come upstairs and wait in our
+sitting-room," she said cordially. "I'll come with you, for we were only
+going out for a little stroll, weren't we, father?"
+
+Nancy Dampier hesitated. She did not notice that the American Senator
+omitted to endorse his daughter's invitation; she hesitated for a very
+different reason: "You're very kind; but if I do that I shall have to tell
+Madame Poulain, for it would give my husband a dreadful fright if he came
+in and found I had left my room and disappeared"--she blushed and smiled
+very prettily.
+
+And again Senator Burton looked searchingly down into the lovely, flushed
+little face; but the deep-blue, guileless-looking eyes met his questioning
+gaze very frankly. He said slowly, "Very well, I will go and tell Madame
+Poulain that you will be waiting up in our sitting-room,
+Mrs.--ah--Dampier."
+
+He went out across the courtyard again, and once more he seemed, at any
+rate to his daughter, to stay away longer than was needed for the delivery
+of so simple a message.
+
+Growing impatient, Miss Burton took Nancy Dampier across the sunlit
+courtyard to the wide old oak staircase, the escalier d'honneur, as it was
+still called in the hotel, down which the Marquis de Saint Ange had
+clattered when starting for Fontenoy.
+
+When they were half-way up the Senator joined them, and a few moments later
+when they had reached the second landing, he put a key in the lock of a
+finely carved door, then he stood back, courteously, to allow his
+daughter's guest to walk through into the small lobby which led to the
+delightful suite of rooms which the Burtons always occupied during their
+frequent visits to Paris.
+
+Nancy uttered an exclamation of delight as she passed through into the
+high-pitched, stately salon, whose windows overlooked one of those leafy
+gardens which are still the pride of old Paris. "This is delightful!" she
+exclaimed. "Who would ever have thought that they had such rooms as this in
+the Hotel Saint Ange!"
+
+"There are several of these suites," said Daisy Burton pleasantly. "In
+fact, a good many French provincial people come up here, year after year,
+for the winter."
+
+While Mrs. Dampier and his daughter were exchanging these few words the
+Senator remained silent. Then--"Is your brother gone out?" he
+said abruptly.
+
+"Yes, father. He went out about half an hour ago. But he said he'd be back
+in ample time to take us out to luncheon. He thought we might like to go to
+Foyot's to-day."
+
+"So we will. Daisy, my dear--?" He stopped short, and his daughter looked
+at him, surprised.
+
+"Yes, father?"
+
+"I'm afraid I must ask you to leave me with this young lady for a few
+moments. I have something to say to her which I think it would be as well
+that I should say alone."
+
+Nancy got up from the chair on which she had already seated herself, and
+fear flashed into her face. "What is it?" she cried apprehensively. "You're
+not going to tell me that anything's happened to Jack!"
+
+"No, no," said the Senator quickly, but even as he uttered the two short,
+reassuring little words he averted his eyes from Mrs. Dampier's questioning
+anxious eyes.
+
+His daughter left the room.
+
+"What is it?" said Nancy again, trying to smile. "What is it, Mr. Burton?"
+
+And then the Senator, motioning her to a chair, sat down too.
+
+"The Poulains," he said gravely--he was telling himself that he had never
+come across so accomplished an actress as this young Englishwoman was
+proving herself to be--"the Poulains," he repeated very distinctly,
+"declare that you arrived here last night alone. They say that they did not
+know, as a matter of fact, that you were married. You do not seem to have
+even given them your name."
+
+Nancy stared at him for a moment. Then, "There must be some extraordinary
+mistake," she said quietly. "The Poulains must have thought you meant
+someone else. My husband and I arrived, of course together, late last
+night. At first Madame Poulain said she couldn't take us in as the hotel
+was full. But at last she said that they could give us two small rooms.
+They knew our name was Dampier, for Jack wrote to them from Marseilles. He
+and I were only married three weeks ago: this is the end of our honeymoon.
+My husband, who is an artist, is now at his studio. We're going to move
+there in a day or two."
+
+She spoke quite simply and straightforwardly, and the Senator felt oddly
+relieved by her words.
+
+He tried to remember exactly what had happened, what exactly the Poulains
+had said, when he had gone into the big roomy kitchen which lay to the left
+of the courtyard.
+
+He had certainly been quite clear. That is, he had explained, in his very
+good French, to Madame Poulain, that he came to inquire, on behalf of a
+young English lady, whether her husband, a gentleman named Dampier, had
+left any message for her. And Madame Poulain, coming across to him in a
+rather mysterious manner, had said in a low voice that she feared the young
+lady was toquee--i. e., not quite all right in her head--as, saving
+Monsieur le Senateur's presence, English ladies so often were! At great
+length she had gone on to explain that the young lady in question had
+arrived very late the night before, and that seeing that she was so young
+and pretty, and also that she knew so very little French, they had allowed
+her, rather than turn her out, to occupy their own daughter's room, a room
+they had never, never, under any circumstances, allowed a client to sleep
+in before.
+
+Then Madame Poulain had gone out and called Monsieur Poulain; and the
+worthy man had confirmed, in every particular, what his wife had just
+said--that is, he had explained how they had been knocked up late last
+night by a loud ringing at the porte cochere; how they had gone out to the
+door, and there, seized with pity for this pretty young English lady, who
+apparently knew so very, very little French, they had allowed her to occupy
+their daughter's room....
+
+Finally, the good Poulains, separately and in unison, had begged the
+Senator to try and find out something about their curious guest, as she
+apparently knew too little French to make herself intelligible.
+
+Now that he heard Nancy's quiet assertion, the Senator felt sure there had
+been a mistake. The Poulains had evidently confused pretty Mrs. Dampier
+with some wandering British spinster.
+
+"Let me go down with you now," she said eagerly. "The truth is--I know
+you'll think me foolish--but I'm afraid of the Poulains! They've behaved so
+oddly and so rudely to me this morning. I liked them very much last night."
+
+"Yes," he said cordially. "We'll go right down now; and my girl, Daisy, can
+come too."
+
+When his daughter came into the room, "There's been some mistake," said
+Senator Burton briefly. "It's my fault, I expect. I can't have made it
+clear to Madame Poulain whom I meant. She has confused Mrs. Dampier with
+some English lady who turned up here alone late last night."
+
+"But we turned up late last night," said Nancy quickly. "Very, very late;
+long after midnight."
+
+"Still, my brother and I came in after you," said Daisy Burton suddenly.
+And then she smiled and reddened. Mrs. Dampier must certainly have
+overheard Gerald's remark.
+
+"It was an awful job getting a cab after that play, father, and it must
+have been nearly one o'clock when we got in. As we felt sure this side of
+the house was shut up we went up that queer little back staircase, and so
+past the open door of Mrs. Dampier's room," she explained.
+
+To the Senator's surprise, Mrs. Dampier also grew red; indeed, she blushed
+crimson from forehead to chin.
+
+"My brother thought you were French," went on Daisy, a little awkwardly.
+"In fact, we both thought you must be Madame Poulain's daughter. We knew
+that was Virginie's room, and we've always been hearing of that girl ever
+since we first came to stay in Paris. She used to be at a convent school,
+and she's with her grandmother in the country just now, to be out of the
+Exhibition rush. The Poulains simply worship her."
+
+The Senator looked very thoughtful as he walked downstairs behind the two
+girls. The mystery was thickening in a very disagreeable way. Both
+hotel-keepers had stated positively that the "demoiselle anglaise," as they
+called her, had slept in their daughter's room....
+
+But what was this the lady who called herself Mrs. Dampier saying?
+
+"My husband and I realised you thought I was Mademoiselle Poulain," said
+Nancy, and she also spoke with a touch of awkwardness.
+
+Senator Burton put out his right hand and laid it, rather heavily, on his
+daughter's shoulder.
+
+She stopped and turned round. "Yes, father?"
+
+"Then I suppose you also saw Mr. Dampier, Daisy?"
+
+Eagerly he hoped for confirmation of the charming stranger's story. But--
+
+"No," she said reluctantly. "We only saw Mrs. Dampier and the Poulains,
+father--they were all in the room together. You see, we were outside on the
+dark staircase, and just stopped for a minute on the landing to say
+good-night to the Poulains, and to tell them that we had come in."
+
+"I suppose, Mrs. Dampier, that by then your husband had already gone to his
+room?" But in spite of his efforts to make his voice cordial the Senator
+failed to do so.
+
+"No, he hadn't gone upstairs then." Nancy waited a moment, puzzled, then
+she exclaimed, "I remember now! Jack had just stepped up into a big
+cupboard which forms one side of the little room. He came out again just as
+Miss Burton and--and your son had gone on upstairs." Again she reddened
+uncomfortably, wondering if this nice, kind girl had heard Jack's
+unflattering epithets concerning "the young American cub." But no, Jack's
+voice, if angry, had been low.
+
+When they were at the bottom of the staircase the Senator turned to his
+daughter.
+
+"Daisy," he said quietly, "I think it will be best for this lady to see
+Madame Poulain with me alone." And as his daughter showed no sign of having
+understood, he said again, with a touch of severity in his voice: "Daisy, I
+desire you to go upstairs."
+
+"You'll bring Mrs. Dampier up again, father?"
+
+He hesitated--and then he said, "Yes, should she wish it, I will do so."
+
+And Daisy Burton turned away, up the stairs again, very reluctantly. Her
+indulgent father was not given to interfere with even the most casual of
+her friendships, and she already felt as if this attractive young
+Englishwoman was to be her friend.
+
+Madame Poulain came slowly across the courtyard, and the Senator was struck
+by her look of ill-health, of languor. Clearly the worthy woman was
+overtaxing her strength. It was foolish of the Poulains not to have more
+help in, but French people were like that!
+
+Senator Burton knew that these good folks were trying to amass as large a
+dowry as possible for their adored only child. Virginie was now of
+marriageable age, and the Poulains had already selected in their own minds
+the man they wished to see their son-in-law. He was owner of an hotel at
+Chantilly, and as he was young, healthy, and reputed kind and
+good-tempered, he had the right to expect a good dowry with his future
+wife. The fact that this was an Exhibition Year was a great stroke of luck
+for the Poulains. It almost certainly meant that their beloved Virginie
+would soon be settled close to them in charming salubrious Chantilly....
+
+The proprietress of the Hotel Saint Ange now stood close to Senator Burton
+and his companion. Her voluble tongue was stilled for once: she was
+twisting a corner of her blue check apron round and round in her strong,
+sinewy-looking fingers.
+
+"Well, Madame Poulain," the American spoke very gravely, "there has
+evidently been some strange misunderstanding. This lady asserts most
+positively that she arrived here last night accompanied by her husband,
+Mr. Dampier."
+
+A look of--was it anger or pain?--came over Madame Poulain's face. She
+shook her head decidedly. "I have already told monsieur," she said quickly,
+"that this lady arrived here last night alone. I know nothing of her
+husband: I did not even know she was married. To tell you the truth,
+monsieur, we ought to have made her fill in the usual form. But it was so
+late that we put off the formality till to-day. I now regret very much that
+we did so."
+
+The Senator looked questioningly at Nancy Dampier. She had become from red
+very white. "Do you understand what she says?" he asked slowly,
+impassively.
+
+"Yes--I understand. But she is not telling the truth."
+
+The Senator hesitated. "I have known Madame Poulain a long time," he said.
+
+"Yes--and you've only known me a few minutes."
+
+Nancy Dampier felt as though she were living through a horrible
+nightmare--horrible and at the same time absurd. But she made a great
+effort to remain calm, and to prove herself a sensible woman. So she added
+quietly: "I can't tell--I can't in the least guess--why this woman is
+telling such a strange, silly untruth. It is easy to prove the truth of
+what I say, Mr. Burton. My husband's name is John Dampier. He is an artist,
+and has a studio here in Paris."
+
+"Do you know the address of your husband's studio, Mrs. Dampier?"
+
+"Of course I do." The question stung her, this time past endurance. "I
+think I had better have a cab and drive there straight," she said stiffly.
+"Please forgive me for having given you so much trouble. I'll manage all
+right by myself now."
+
+Every vestige of colour had receded from her face. There was a frightened,
+hunted expression in her blue eyes, and the Senator felt a sudden thrill of
+concern, of pity. What did it all mean? Why should this poor girl--she
+looked even younger than his daughter--pretend that she had come here
+accompanied, if, after all, she had not done so?
+
+Madame Poulain was still looking at them fixedly, and there was no very
+pleasant expression on her face.
+
+"Well," she said at last, "that comes of being too good-natured, Monsieur
+le Senateur. I never heard of such a thing! What does mademoiselle accuse
+us of? Does she think we made away with her friend? She may have arrived
+with a man--as to that I say nothing--but I assert most positively that in
+that case he left her before she actually came into the Hotel Saint Ange."
+
+"Will you please ask her to call me a cab?" said Nancy trembling.
+
+And he transmitted the request; adding kindly in English, "Of course I am
+coming with you as far as your husband's studio. I expect we shall find
+that Mr. Dampier went there last night. The Poulains have forgotten that he
+came with you: you see they are very tired and overworked just now--"
+
+But Nancy shook her head. It was impossible that the Poulains should have
+forgotten Jack.
+
+Madame Poulain went a step nearer to Senator Burton and muttered something,
+hurriedly. He hesitated.
+
+"Mais si, Monsieur le Senateur."
+
+And very reluctantly he transmitted the woman's disagreeable message. "She
+thinks that perhaps as you are going to your husband's rooms, you had
+better take your trunk with you, Mrs. Dampier."
+
+Nancy assented, almost eagerly. "Yes, do ask her to have my trunk brought
+down! I would far rather not come back here." She was still quite collected
+and quiet in her manner. "But, Mr. Burton, hadn't I better pay? Especially
+if they persist in saying I came alone?" she smiled, a tearful little
+smile. It still seemed so--so absurd.
+
+She took out her purse. "I haven't much money, for you see Jack always pays
+everything. But I've got an English sovereign, and I can always draw a
+cheque. I have my own money."
+
+And the Senator grew more and more bewildered. It was clear that this girl
+was either speaking the truth, or else that she was a most wonderful
+actress. But, as every man who has reached the Senator's age is ruefully
+aware, very young women can act on occasion in ordinary every day life, as
+no professional actress of genius ever did or ever will do on a stage.
+
+Madame Poulain went off briskly, and when she came back a few moments
+later, there was a look of relief, almost of joy, on her face. "The cab is
+here," she exclaimed, "and Jules has brought down madame's trunk."
+
+Nancy looked at the speaker quickly. Then she was "madame" again? Well,
+that was something.
+
+"Three francs--that will quite satisfy us," said Madame Poulain, handing
+over the change for her English sovereign. It was a gold napoleon and a
+two-franc piece. For the first time directly addressing Mrs. Dampier,
+"There has evidently been a mistake," she said civilly. "No doubt monsieur
+left madame at the door, and went off to his studio last night. I expect
+madame will find monsieur there, quite safe and sound."
+
+Senator Burton, well as he believed himself to be acquainted with his
+landlady, would have been very much taken aback had he visioned what
+followed his own and Mrs. Dampier's departure from the Hotel Saint Ange.
+
+Madame Poulain remained at the door of the porte cochere till the open
+carriage turned the corner of the narrow street. Then she looked at
+her nephew.
+
+"How much did she give you?" she asked roughly. And the young man
+reluctantly opened a grimy hand and showed a two franc piece.
+
+She snatched it from him, and motioned him back imperiously towards the
+courtyard.
+
+After he had gone quite out of sight she walked quickly up the little
+street till she came to a low, leather-bound door which gave access to the
+church whose fine buttress bestowed such distinction on the otherwise
+rather sordid Rue Saint Ange. Pushing open the door she passed through into
+the dimly-lit side aisle where stood the Lady Altar.
+
+This old church held many memories for Madame Poulain. It was here that
+Virginie had been christened, here that there had taken place the funeral
+service of the baby son she never mentioned and still bitterly mourned, and
+it was there, before the High Altar, to the right of which she now stood,
+that she hoped to see her beloved daughter stand ere long a happy bride.
+
+She looked round her for a moment, bewildered by the sudden change from the
+bright sunlit street to the shadowed aisle. Then she suddenly espied what
+she had come to seek. Close to where she stood an alms-box clamped to the
+stone wall had written upon it the familiar legend, "Pour les Pauvres."
+
+Madame Poulain took a step forward, then dropped the three francs Nancy
+Dampier had just paid her, and the two francs she had extracted from
+Jules's reluctant hand, into the alms-box.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+That the cabman was evidently familiar with the odd address, "Impasse des
+Nonnes," brought a measure of relief to Senator Burton's mind, and as he
+turned and gazed into the candid eyes of the girl sitting by his side he
+was ashamed of his vague suspicions.
+
+The little carriage bowled swiftly across the great square behind which
+wound the Rue Saint Ange, up one of the steep, picturesque streets which
+lead from thence to the Luxembourg Gardens.
+
+When they had gone some considerable way round the gay and stately
+pleasance so dear to the poets and students of all nations, they suddenly
+turned into the quaintest, quietest thoroughfare imaginable, carved out of
+one of those old convent gardens which till lately were among the most
+beautiful and characteristic features of the "Quartier."
+
+An architect, who happened also to be an artist, had set up in this remote
+and peaceful oasis his household gods, adding on this, his own domain, a
+few studios with living rooms attached.
+
+A broad, sanded path ran between the low picturesque buildings, and so the
+carriage was obliged to draw up at the entrance to the Impasse.
+
+Senator Burton looked up at the cabman: "Better not take off the lady's
+trunk just yet," he said quickly in French, and though Nancy Dampier made
+no demur, she looked surprised.
+
+They began walking up the shaded path, for above the low walls on either
+side sprang flowering shrubs and trees.
+
+"What a charming place!" exclaimed the Senator, smiling down at her. "How
+fond you and your husband must be of it!"
+
+But his companion shook her head. "I've never been here," she said slowly.
+"You see this is my first visit to Paris. Though I ought not to call it a
+visit, for Paris is to be my home now," and she smiled at last, happy in
+the belief that in a few moments she would see Jack.
+
+She was a little troubled at the thought that Jack would be disappointed at
+her coming here in this way, with a stranger. But surely after she had
+explained the extraordinary occurrence of the morning he would understand?
+
+They were now opposite No. 3. It was a curious, mosque-like building, with
+the domed roof of what must be the studio, in the centre. Boldly inscribed
+on a marble slab set above the door was the name, "John Dampier."
+
+Before the bell had well stopped ringing, a sturdy apple-faced old woman,
+wearing the Breton dress Jack so much admired, stood before them.
+
+Nancy of course knew her at once for Mere Bideau.
+
+A pleasant smile lit up the gnarled face, and Nancy remembered what Jack
+had so often said as to Mere Bideau's clever way of dealing with visitors,
+especially with possible art patrons.
+
+Mrs. Dampier looked very kindly at the old woman who had been so good and
+so faithful a servant to her Jack, and who, she hoped, would also serve her
+well and faithfully.
+
+Before the Senator had time to speak, Mere Bideau, shaking her head,
+observed respectfully, "Mr. Dampier is not yet arrived. But if you,
+monsieur, and you, madame, will give yourselves the trouble of coming back
+this afternoon he will certainly be here, for I am expecting him
+any moment--"
+
+"Do you mean that Mr. Dampier has not been here at all this morning?"
+enquired the Senator.
+
+"No, monsieur, but as I have just had the honour of informing you, my
+master is to arrive to-day without fail. Everything is ready for him and
+for his lady. I had a letter from Mr. Dampier the day before yesterday."
+She waited a moment, and then added, "Won't monsieur come in and wait? Mr.
+Dampier would indeed be sorry to miss monsieur!"
+
+So far so good. Senator Burton eagerly acknowledged to himself that here
+was confirmation--as much confirmation as any reasonable man could
+expect--of Mrs. Dampier's story.
+
+This respectable old woman was evidently expecting her master and his bride
+to-day--of that there could now be no doubt.
+
+"I beg of you to enter," said Mere Bideau again. "Monsieur and madame may
+like to visit the studio? I do not say that it is very tidy--but my
+master's beautiful paintings are not affected by untidiness--" and she
+smiled ingratiatingly.
+
+This important-looking gentleman, whom her shrewd Parisian eyes and ears
+had already told her was an American, might be an important picture-buyer;
+in any case, he was evidently gravely disappointed at not finding Mr.
+Dampier at home.
+
+"My master may arrive any moment," she said again; "and though I've had to
+put all the luggage he sent on some time ago, in the studio--well, monsieur
+and madame will excuse that!"
+
+She stood aside to allow the strangers to step through into the little
+passage.
+
+The Senator turned to Nancy: "Hadn't we better go in and wait?" he asked.
+"You must remember that if Mr. Dampier has gone to the hotel they will
+certainly tell him we are here."
+
+"No," said Nancy in a low voice, "I would rather not go in--now. My husband
+doesn't want me to see the place until he has got it ready for me." Her
+lips quivered. "But oh, Mr. Burton, where can Jack be? What can he be
+doing?" She put her hands together with a helpless, childish gesture of
+distress. Then, making an effort over herself, she said in a more composed
+voice, "But I should like you to go in and just see some of Jack's
+pictures."
+
+With a smiling face Mere Bideau preceded the Senator down a sunny corridor
+into the large studio. It was circular in shape, lighted by a skylight, and
+contained a few pieces of fine old furniture, now incongruously allied to a
+number of unopened packing-cases and trunks.
+
+Mere Bideau went on talking volubly. She was evidently both fond and proud
+of her master. Suddenly she waved her lean arm towards a large, ambitious
+painting showing a typical family group of French bourgeois sitting in
+an arbour.
+
+"This is what won Mr. Dampier his first Salon medal," she explained. "But
+his work has much improved since then, as monsieur can see for himself!"
+and she uncovered an unframed easel portrait. It was a really interesting,
+distinguished presentment of a man. "Is not this excellent?" exclaimed Mere
+Bideau eagerly. "What expression, what strength in the mouth, in the eyes!"
+
+Senator Burton, had the circumstances been other, would perhaps have smiled
+at the old woman's enthusiasm, and at her intelligent criticism. But now he
+simply nodded his head gravely. "Yes, that is a very good portrait," he
+said absently. "And--and--where are the living rooms?"
+
+"This way, monsieur!" Then, with some surprise, "Would monsieur care to see
+the appartement? Then I presume monsieur is a friend of my master."
+
+But the Senator shook his head quickly. "No, no, I don't want to see the
+rooms," he said. "I was only curious to know if Mr. Dampier actually
+lived here."
+
+As there was a suite of living rooms attached to the studio, why had the
+Dampiers gone to an hotel?
+
+"Yes, monsieur, there are three beautiful bedrooms, also a bath-room, and a
+room which was not used by us, but which my master is going to turn into a
+little salon for his lady. As for their meals--" she shrugged her
+shoulders--"they will have to be served as heretofore in the studio." Then,
+"Does monsieur know the new Madame Dampier?" enquired Mere Bideau a trifle
+anxiously.
+
+"Yes," he answered uncomfortably. "Yes, I do know her."
+
+"And if monsieur will excuse the question, is she a nice lady? It will make
+a great difference to me--"
+
+"Yes, yes--she is very charming, very pretty."
+
+He could not bring himself to inform the good woman that the lady who had
+come with him, and who was now waiting outside the house, claimed to be
+Mrs. Dampier. It would be too--too unpleasant if it turned out to be--well,
+a mistake!
+
+The Senator was telling himself ruefully that though there was now ample
+evidence of the existence of John Dampier, there was not evidence at all as
+yet that the artist had ever been at the Hotel Saint Ange: still less that
+the young Englishwoman who had just now refused to accompany him into the
+studio was John Dampier's wife. However, that fact, as she had herself
+pointed out rather piteously, could very soon be put to the proof.
+
+Slowly Senator Burton left the studio and made his way into the open air,
+where Nancy was waiting for him.
+
+"Well?" he said questioningly. "Well, Mrs. Dampier, what is it that you
+would like to do now?"
+
+"I don't know what I ought to do," said Nancy helplessly. She had again
+become very pale and she looked bewildered, as well as distressed. "You see
+I felt so sure that we should find Jack here!"
+
+"The only thing I can suggest your doing," the American spoke kindly, if a
+little coldly, "is to come back with me to the Hotel Saint Ange. It is
+probable that we shall find Mr. Dampier there, waiting for you. A dozen
+things may have happened to him, none of which need give you any cause for
+anxiety." He pulled out his watch. "Hum! It's close on twelve--yes, the
+only thing to do is to go back to the hotel. It's almost certain we shall
+find him there--" it was on his lips to add, "if he really did come with
+you last night," but he checked himself in time.
+
+"But Mr. Burton? Suppose Jack is not there?"
+
+"If he doesn't return within the next two or three hours, then I will
+consult with my son, who, young though he be, has a very good head on his
+shoulders, as to what will be the best step for you to take. But don't
+let's meet trouble half-way! I have little doubt that we shall find Mr.
+Dampier waiting for you, vowing vengeance against the bold man who has
+eloped, even with the best of motives, with his wife!" he smiled, and poor
+Nancy gave a quivering smile in return.
+
+"I should so much have preferred not to go back to that hotel," she said,
+in a low voice. "I do hope Jack won't make me stay on there for the next
+two or three days."
+
+And with the remembrance of what she had considered to be the gross insult
+put upon her by Madame Poulain, Nancy Dampier reddened deeply, while her
+new friend felt more and more bewildered and puzzled.
+
+On the one hand Senator Burton had the testimony of three trustworthy
+persons that the young Englishwoman had arrived alone at the hotel the
+night before; and against this positive testimony there was nothing but her
+bare word.
+
+Very, very reluctantly, he felt compelled to believe the Poulains' version
+of what had happened. He could think of no motive--in fact there was no
+motive--which could prompt a false assertion on their part.
+
+As they were driving back, each silent, each full of painful misgivings,
+the kindly American began to wonder whether he had not met with that, if
+rare yet undoubted, condition known as entire loss of memory.
+
+If, as Madame Poulain had suggested, Mr. Dampier had left his wife just
+before their arrival at the hotel, was it not conceivable that by some kind
+of kink in Mrs. Dampier's brain--the kind of kink which brings men and
+women to entertain, when otherwise sane, certain strange delusions--she had
+imagined the story she now told with so much circumstantial detail and
+clearness?
+
+When they were nearing the hotel, Nancy put her hand nervously on her
+companion's arm.
+
+"Mr. Burton," she whispered, "I'm horribly afraid of the Poulains! I keep
+thinking of such dreadful things."
+
+"Now look here, Mrs. Dampier--" Senator Burton turned, and looking down
+into her agitated face, spoke gently and kindly--"though I quite admit to
+you these people's conduct must seem inexplicable, I feel sure you are
+wronging the Poulains. They are very worthy, respectable folk--I've known
+them long enough to vouch for that fact. This extraordinary
+misunderstanding, this mistake--for it must be either a misunderstanding or
+a mistake on some one's part--will soon be cleared up, so much is certain:
+till then I beg you not to treat them as enemies."
+
+And yet even Senator Burton felt taken aback when he saw the undisguised
+annoyance, the keen irritation with which their return to the Hotel Saint
+Ange was greeted by the woman to whom he had just given so good a
+certificate of character.
+
+Madame Poulain was standing on the street side of the open porte cochere,
+as the carriage drove down the narrow street, and the American was
+astonished to see the change which came over her face.
+
+An angry, vindictive, even a cruel expression swept over it, and instead of
+waiting to greet them as the carriage drew up at the door she turned
+abruptly away, and shuffled out of sight.
+
+"Wait a moment," he said, as the fiacre drew up, "don't get out of the
+carriage yet, Mrs. Dampier--"
+
+And meekly Nancy obeyed him.
+
+The Senator hurried through into the courtyard. Much would he have given,
+and he was a careful man, to have seen the image he had formed of Jack
+Dampier standing on the sun-flecked flagstones. But the broad space
+stretching before him was empty, deserted; during the daylight hours of
+each day the Exhibition drew every one away much as a honey cask might have
+done a hive of bees.
+
+Madame Poulain did not come out of her kitchen as was her usual hospitable
+wont when she heard footsteps echoing under the vaulted porte cochere, and
+so her American guest had to go across, and walk right into her
+special domain.
+
+"We did not find the gentleman at his studio," he said shortly, "and I
+presume, Madame Poulain, that he has not yet been here?"
+
+She shook her head sullenly, and then, with none of her usual suavity,
+exclaimed, "I do not think, Monsieur le Senateur, that you should have
+brought that demoiselle back here!"
+
+She gave him so odd--some would have said, so insolent a look, that the
+Senator realised for the first time what he was to realise yet further in
+connection with this strange business, namely, that the many who go through
+life refusing to act the part of good Samaritans have at any rate excellent
+reasons for their abstention.
+
+It was disagreeably dear that Madame Poulain thought him a foolish old man
+who had been caught by an adventuress's pretty face....
+
+To their joint relief Monsieur Poulain came strolling into his wife's
+kitchen.
+
+"I've been telling Monsieur le Senateur," exclaimed Madame Poulain, "that
+we do not wish to have anything more to do with that young person who
+asserts that she arrived here with a man last night. Monsieur le Senateur
+has too good a heart: he is being deceived."
+
+The hotel-keeper looked awkwardly, deprecatingly, at his valued American
+client. "Paris is so full of queer people just now," he muttered. "They
+keep mostly to the other side of the river, to the Opera quarter, but we
+are troubled with them here too, during an Exhibition Year!"
+
+"There is nothing at all queer about this poor young lady," said Senator
+Burton sharply--somehow the cruel insinuation roused him to chivalrous
+defence. But soon he changed his tone, "Now look here, my good friends"--he
+glanced from the husband to the wife--"surely you have both heard of people
+who have suddenly lost their memory, even to the knowledge of who they were
+and where they came from? Now I fear--I very much fear--that something of
+the kind has happened to this Mrs. Dampier! I am as sure that she is not
+consciously telling a lie as I am that you are telling me the truth. For
+one thing, I have ascertained that this lady's statement as to Mr. John
+Dampier having a studio in Paris, where he was expected this morning, is
+true. As to who she is herself that question can and will be soon set at
+rest. Meanwhile my daughter and myself"--and then he hesitated, for, well
+as he knew French, Senator Burton did not quite know how to convey his
+meaning, namely, that they, he and his daughter, meant to see her through.
+"My daughter and myself," he repeated firmly, "are going to do the best we
+can to help her."
+
+Madame Poulain opened her lips--then she shut them tight again. She longed
+to tell "Monsieur le Senateur" that in that case she and Poulain must have
+the regret of asking him to leave their hotel.
+
+But she did not dare to do this.
+
+Her husband broke in conciliatingly: "No doubt it is as Monsieur le
+Senateur says," he observed; "the demoiselle is what we said she was only
+this morning--" and then he uttered the word which in French means so much
+and so little--the word "toquee."
+
+There came another interruption. "Here come Mademoiselle Daisy and Monsieur
+Gerald!" exclaimed Madame Poulain in a relieved tone.
+
+The Senator's son and daughter had just emerged across the courtyard, from
+the vestibule where ended the escalier d'honneur. There was a look of keen,
+alert interest and curiosity on Gerald Burton's fine, intelligent face. He
+was talking eagerly to his sister, and Madame Poulain told herself that
+surely these two young people could not wish their stay in Paris to be
+complicated by this--this unfortunate business--for so the Frenchwoman in
+her own secret heart designated the mysterious affair which was causing her
+and her worthy husband so much unnecessary trouble.
+
+Some little trouble, so she admitted to herself, they had expected to have,
+but they had not thought it would take this very strange and
+tiresome shape.
+
+But the hotel-keeper was destined to be bitterly disappointed in her hope
+that Daisy and Gerald Burton would try and dissuade their father from
+having anything more to do with Mrs. Dampier.
+
+"Well, father?" the two fresh voices rang out, and the Senator smiled back
+well pleased. He was one of those fortunate fathers who are on terms of
+full confidence and friendship as well as affection with their children.
+Indeed Senator Burton was specially blessed; Daisy was devoted to her
+father, and Gerald had never given him a moment of real unease: the young
+man had done well at college, and now seemed likely to become one of the
+most distinguished and successful exponents of that branch of
+art--architecture--modern America has made specially her own.
+
+"Well?" said the Senator, "well, Daisy, I suppose you have told your
+brother about this odd affair?"
+
+As his daughter nodded, he went on:--"As for me, I have unfortunately
+nothing to tell. We found the studio, and everything was exactly as this
+poor young lady said it would be--with the one paramount exception that her
+husband was not there! And though his housekeeper seems to be expecting Mr.
+Dampier every moment, she has had no news of him since he wrote, some days
+ago, saying he would arrive this morning. It certainly is a very
+inexplicable business--" he looked helplessly from one good-looking,
+intelligent young face to the other.
+
+"But where is Mrs. Dampier now?" asked Daisy eagerly. "I do think you might
+have told me before you took her away, father. I would have loved to have
+said good-bye to her. I do like her so much!"
+
+"You won't have far to go to see her. Mrs. Dampier's at the door, sitting
+in a carriage," said her father drily. "I had to bring her back here: I
+didn't know what else to do."
+
+"Why, of course, father, you did quite right!"
+
+And Gerald Burton chimed in, "Yes, of course you were right to do that,
+father."
+
+Senator Burton smiled a little ruefully at his children's unquestioning
+approval. He himself was by no means sure that he had done "quite right."
+
+They walked, the three of them, across to the porte-cochere.
+
+Nancy Dampier was now sitting crouched up in a corner of the fiacre; a
+handkerchief was pressed to her face, and she was trying, not very
+successfully, to stifle her sobs of nervous fear and distress.
+
+With an eager, impulsive gesture the American girl leapt up the step of the
+little open carriage. "Don't cry," she whispered soothingly. "It will all
+come right soon! Why, I expect your husband just went out to see a friend
+and got kept somehow. If it wasn't for those stupid Poulains' mistake about
+last night you wouldn't feel really worried, now would you?"
+
+Nancy dabbed her eyes. She felt ashamed of being caught crying by these
+kind people. "I know I'm being silly!" she gasped. "You must forgive me!
+It's quite true I shouldn't feel as worried as I feel now if it wasn't for
+the Poulains--their saying, I mean, that they've never seen my husband.
+That's what upset me. It all seems so strange and--and horrid. My sense
+tells me it's quite probable Jack has gone in to see some friend, and was
+kept somehow."
+
+"And now," said Daisy Burton persuasively, "you must come upstairs with us,
+and we'll get Madame Poulain to send us up a nice dejeuner to our
+sitting-room."
+
+And so the Senator found part of his new problem solved for him. Daisy, so
+much was dear, had determined to befriend--and that to the uttermost--this
+unfortunate young Englishwoman.
+
+But now there arose another most disagreeable complication.
+
+Madame Poulain had strolled out, her arms akimbo, to see what was going on.
+And, as if she had guessed the purport of Miss Burton's words, she walked
+forward, and speaking this time respectfully, even suavely, to "Monsieur le
+Senateur," observed, "My husband and I regret very greatly that we cannot
+ask this lady to stay on in our hotel. We have no vacant room--no room
+at all!"
+
+And then it was that Gerald Burton, who had stood apart from the
+discussion, saying nothing, simply looking intently, sympathetically at his
+sister and Mrs. Dampier--took a hand in the now complicated little
+human game.
+
+"Father!" he exclaimed, speaking in low, sharp tones. "Of course Mrs.
+Dampier must stay on here with us till her husband comes back! If by some
+extraordinary chance he isn't back by to-night she can have my room--I
+shall easily find some place outside." And as his father looked at him a
+little doubtfully he went on:--"Will you explain to Madame Poulain what
+we've settled? I can't trust myself to speak to the woman! She's behaving
+in the most unkind, brutal way to this poor little lady."
+
+He went on between his teeth, "The Poulains have got some game on in
+connection with this thing. I wish I could guess what it is."
+
+And the Senator, much disliking his task, did speak to Madame Poulain. "I
+am arranging for Mrs. Dampier to stay with us, as our guest, till her
+husband's--hem--arrival. My son will find a room outside, so you need not
+disturb yourself about the matter. Kindly send for Jules, and have her
+trunk carried up to our apartments."
+
+And Madame Poulain, after an uncomfortably long pause, turned and silently
+obeyed the Senator's behest.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+The afternoon wore itself away, and to two out of the four people who spent
+it together in the pleasant salon of the Burtons' suite of rooms the hours,
+nay the very minutes, dragged as they had never dragged before.
+
+Looking back to that first day of distress and bewilderment, Nancy later
+sometimes asked herself what would have happened, what she would have done,
+had she lacked the protection, the kindness--and what with Daisy Burton
+almost at once became the warm affection--of this American family?
+
+Daisy and Gerald Burton not only made her feel that they understood, and,
+in a measure, shared in her distress, but they also helped her to bear her
+anguish and suspense.
+
+Although she was not aware of it very different was the mental attitude of
+their father.
+
+Senator Burton was one of those public men of whom modern America has a
+right to be proud. He was a hard worker--chairman of one Senate committee
+and a member of four others; he had never been a brilliant debater, but his
+more brilliant colleagues respected his sense of logic and force of
+character. He had always been unyielding in his convictions, absolutely
+independent in his views, a man to whom many of his fellow-countrymen would
+have turned in any kind of trouble or perplexity sure of clear and
+honest counsel.
+
+And yet now, as to this simple matter, the Senator, try as he might, could
+not make up his mind. Nothing, in his long life, had puzzled him as he was
+puzzled now. No happening, connected with another human being, had ever so
+filled him with the discomfort born of uncertainty.
+
+But the object of his--well, yes, his suspicions, was evidently quite
+unconscious of the mingled feelings with which he regarded her, and he was
+half ashamed of the ease with which he concealed his trouble both from his
+children and from their new friend.
+
+Nancy Dampier was far too ill at ease herself to give any thought as to how
+others regarded her. She had now become dreadfully anxious, dreadfully
+troubled about Jack.
+
+Much of her time was spent standing at a window of the corridor which
+formed a portion of the Burtons' "appartement." This corridor overlooked
+the square, sunny courtyard below; but during that first dreary afternoon
+of suspense and waiting the Hotel Saint Ange might have been an enchanted
+palace of sleep. Not a creature came in or out through the porte
+cochere--with one insignificant exception: two workmen, dressed in
+picturesque blue smocks, clattered across the big white stones, the one
+swinging a pail of quaking lime in his hand, and whistling gaily as
+he went.
+
+When a carriage stopped, or seemed to stop, in the street which lay beyond
+the other side of the quadrangular group of buildings, then Nancy's heart
+would leap, and she would lean out, dangerously far over the grey bar of
+the window; but the beloved, and now familiar figure of her husband never
+followed on the sound, as she hoped against hope, it would do.
+
+At last, when the long afternoon was drawing to a close, Senator Burton
+went down and had another long conversation with the Poulains.
+
+The hotel-keeper and his wife by now had changed their tone; they were
+quite respectful, even sympathetic:
+
+"Of course it is possible," observed Madame Poulain hesitatingly, "that
+this young lady, as you yourself suggested this morning, Monsieur le
+Senateur, is suffering from loss of memory, and that she has imagined her
+arrival here with this artist gentleman. But if so, what a strange thing to
+fancy about oneself! Is it not more likely--I say it with all respect,
+Monsieur le Senateur--that for some reason unknown to us she is acting
+a part?"
+
+And with a heavy heart "Monsieur le Senateur" had to admit that Madame
+Poulain's view might be the correct one. Nancy's charm of manner, even her
+fragile and delicate beauty, told against her in the kindly but shrewd
+American's mind. True, Mrs. Dampier--if indeed she were Mrs. Dampier--did
+not look like an adventuress: but then does any adventuress look like an
+adventuress till she is found to be one?
+
+The Frenchwoman suggested yet another theory. "I have been asking myself,"
+she said, smiling a little wryly, "another question. Is it not possible
+that this young lady and her husband had a quarrel? Such incidents do
+occur, even during honeymoons. If the two had a little quarrel he may have
+left her at our door--just to punish her, Monsieur le Senateur. He would
+know she was safe in our respectable hotel. Your sex, if I may say so,
+Monsieur le Senateur, is sometimes very unkind, very unfeeling, in their
+dealings with mine."
+
+Monsieur Poulain, who had said nothing, here intervened. "How you do run
+on," he said crossly. "You talk too much, my wife. We haven't to account
+for what has happened!"
+
+But Senator Burton had been struck by Madame Poulain's notion. Men, and if
+all the Senator had heard was true, especially Englishmen, do behave very
+strangely sometimes to their women-folk. It was an Englishman who conceived
+the character of Petruchio. He remembered Mrs. Dampier's flushed face, the
+shy, embarrassed manner with which she had come forward to meet him that
+morning. She had seemed rather unnecessarily distressed at not being able
+to make the hotel people understand her: she had evidently been much
+disappointed that her husband had not left a message for her.
+
+"My son thinks it possible that Mr. Dampier may have met with an accident
+on his way to the studio."
+
+A long questioning look flashed from Madame Poulain to her husband, but
+Poulain was a cautious soul, and he gave his wife no lead.
+
+"Well," she said at last, "of course that could be ascertained," and the
+Senator with satisfaction told himself that she was at last taking a proper
+part in what had become his trouble, "but I cannot help thinking, Monsieur
+le Senateur, that we might give this naughty husband a little longer--at
+any rate till to-morrow--to come back to the fold."
+
+And the Senator, perplexed and disturbed, told himself that after all this
+might be good advice.
+
+But when he again went upstairs and joined the young people, he found that
+this was not at all a plan to which any one of the three was likely to
+consent. In fact as he came into the sitting-room where Nancy Dampier was
+now restlessly walking up and down, he noticed that his son's hat and his
+son's stick were already in his son's hands.
+
+"I think I ought to go off, father, to the local Commissaire of Police.
+There's one in every Paris district," said Gerald Burton abruptly. "Mrs.
+Dampier is convinced that her husband did go out this morning, even if the
+Poulains did not see him doing so; and she and I think it possible, in
+fact, we are afraid, that he may have met with an accident on his way to
+the studio."
+
+As he saw by his father's face that this theory did not commend itself to
+the Senator, the young man went on quickly:--"At any rate my doing this can
+do no harm. I might just inform the Commissaire that a gentleman has been
+missing since this morning from the Hotel Saint Ange, and that the only
+theory we can form which can account for his absence is that he may have
+met with an accident. Mrs. Dampier has kindly provided me with a
+description of her husband, and she has told me what she thinks he might
+have been wearing."
+
+Nancy stopped her restless pacing. "If only the Poulains would allow me to
+see where Jack slept last night!" she cried, bursting into tears. "But oh,
+everything is made so much more difficult by their extraordinary assertion
+that he never came here at all! You see he had quite a large portmanteau
+with him, and I can't possibly tell which of his suits he put on
+this morning."
+
+And the Senator looking down into her flushed, tearful face, wondered
+whether she were indeed telling the truth--and most painfully he doubted,
+doubted very much.
+
+But when Gerald Burton came back at the end of two hours, after a long and
+weary struggle with French officialdom, all he could report was that to the
+best of the Commissaire's belief no Englishman had met with an accident
+that day. There had been three street accidents yesterday in which
+foreigners had been concerned, but none, most positively none, to-day. He
+admitted, however, that all his reports were not yet in.
+
+Paris, from the human point of view, swells to monstrous proportions when
+it becomes the background of a great International World's Fair. And the
+police, unlike the great majority of those in the vast hive where they keep
+order, have nothing to gain in exchange for the manifold discomforts an
+Exhibition brings in its train.
+
+At last, worn out by the mingled agitations and emotions of the day, Nancy
+went to bed.
+
+The Senator, Gerald and Daisy Burton waited up some time longer. It was a
+comfort to the father to be able to feel that at last he was alone for a
+while with his children. To them at least he could unburden his perplexed
+and now burdened mind.
+
+"I suppose it didn't occur to you, Gerald, to go to this Mr. Dampier's
+studio?"
+
+He looked enquiringly at his son.
+
+Gerald Burton was sitting at the table from which Mrs. Dampier had just
+risen. He looked, if a trifle weary, yet full of eager energy and life--a
+fine specimen of strong, confident young manhood--a son of whom any father
+might well be fond and proud.
+
+The Senator had great confidence in Gerald's sense and judgment.
+
+"Yes indeed, father, I went there first. Not only did I go to the studio,
+but from the Commissaire's office I visited many of the infirmaries and
+hospitals of the Quarter. You see, I didn't trust the Commissaire; I don't
+think he really knew whether there had been any street accidents or not. In
+fact at the end of our talk he admitted as much himself."
+
+"And at Mr. Dampier's studio?" queried the Senator. "What did you find
+there? Didn't the old housekeeper seem surprised at her master's
+prolonged absence?"
+
+"Yes, father, she did indeed. I could see that she was beginning to feel
+very much annoyed and put out about it."
+
+"Did she tell you," asked the Senator hesitatingly, "what sort of man this
+Mr. Dampier is?"
+
+"She spoke very well of him," said young Burton, with a touch of reluctance
+in his voice, "but she admitted that he was a casual sort of fellow."
+
+Gerald's sister looked up. She broke in, rather eagerly, "What sort of a
+man do you suppose Mr. Dampier to be, Gerald?"
+
+He shrugged his shoulders, rather ill-temperedly. He, too, was tired, after
+the long day of waiting and suspense. "How can I possibly tell, Daisy? I
+must say it's rather like a woman to ask such a question! From something
+Mrs. Dampier said, I gather he is a plain-looking chap."
+
+And then Daisy laughed heartily, for the first time that day. "Why, she
+adores him!" she cried, "she can't have told you that."
+
+"Indeed she did! But you weren't there when I made her describe him
+carefully to me. I had to ask her, for it was important that I should have
+some sort of notion what the fellow is like."
+
+He took out his note-book. "I'll tell you what I wrote down, practically
+from her dictation. 'A tall man--taller than the average Englishman. A
+loosely-hung fellow; (he doesn't care for any kind of sport, I gather).
+Thirty five years of age; (seems a bit old to have married a girl--she
+won't be twenty till next month). He has big, strongly-marked features, and
+a good deal of fair hair. Always wears an old fashioned repeater watch and
+bunch of seals. Was probably wearing this morning a light grey tweed suit
+and a straw hat.'" Gerald looked up and turned to his sister, "If you call
+that the description of a good-looking man, well, all I can say is that I
+don't agree with you, Daisy!"
+
+"He's a very good artist," said the Senator mildly. "Did you go into his
+studio, Gerald?"
+
+"Yes, I did. And I can't say that I agree with you, father: I didn't care
+for any of the pictures I saw there."
+
+Gerald Burton spoke rather crossly. Both his father and sister felt
+surprised at his tone. He was generally very equable and good-tempered. But
+where any sort of art was concerned he naturally claimed to speak with
+authority.
+
+"Have you any theory, Gerald"--the Senator hesitated, "to account for the
+extraordinary discrepancy between the Poulains' story and what Mrs. Dampier
+asserts to be the case?"
+
+"Yes, father, I have a quite definite theory. I believe the Poulains are
+lying."
+
+The young man leant forward across the round table. He spoke very
+earnestly, but even as he spoke he lowered his voice, as if fearing to be
+overheard.
+
+Senator Burton glanced at the door. "You can speak quite openly," he said
+rather sharply. "You forget that there is the door of our appartement as
+well as a passage between this room and the staircase."
+
+"No, father, I don't forget that. But it would be quite easy for anyone to
+creep in. The Poulains have pass keys everywhere."
+
+"My dear boy, they don't understand English!"
+
+"Jules does, father. He knows far more English than he admits. At any rate
+he understands everything one says to him."
+
+Daisy broke in with a touch of impatience. "But with what object could the
+Poulains tell such a stupid and cruel untruth, one, too, which is sure to
+be found out very soon? If this Mr. Dampier did arrive here last night,
+well then, he did--if he didn't, he didn't!"
+
+"Yes, that's true," Gerald turned to his sister. "And though I've given a
+good deal of thought to it during the last few hours--I can't form any
+theory yet as to why the Poulains are lying. I only feel quite sure that
+they are."
+
+"It's a curious thing," observed the Senator musingly, "that neither of you
+saw this Mr. Dampier last night--curious, I mean, that he should have just
+stepped up into a cupboard, as Mrs. Dampier says he did, at the exact
+moment when you were outside the door."
+
+Neither of his children made any reply. That coincidence still troubled
+Daisy Burton.
+
+At last,--"I don't see that it's at all curious," exclaimed her brother
+hastily. "It's very unfortunate, of course, for if we had happened to see
+him the Poulains couldn't have told the tale they told you this morning."
+
+The Senator sighed. He was tired--tired of the long afternoon spent in
+doing nothing, and, to tell the truth, tired of the curious, inexplicable
+problem with which he had been battling since the morning.
+
+"Well, I say it with sincere regret, but I am inclined to believe the
+Poulains."
+
+"Father!" His son was looking at him with surprise and yes, indignation.
+
+"Yes, Gerald. I am, for the present, inclined not only to believe the
+Poulains' clear and consistent story, but to share Madame Poulain's view of
+the case--"
+
+"And what is her view?" asked Daisy eagerly.
+
+"Well, my dear, her view--the view, let me remind you, of a sensible woman
+who, I fancy, has seen a good deal of life--is that Mr. Dampier did
+accompany his wife here, as far as the hotel, that is. That then, as the
+result of what our good landlady calls a 'querelle d'amoureux,' he left
+her--knowing she would be quite safe of course in so respectable a place as
+the Hotel Saint Ange."
+
+Daisy Burton only said one word--but that word was "Brute!" and her father
+saw that there was the light of battle in her eyes.
+
+"My dear," he said gently, "you forget that it was an Englishman who wrote
+'The Taming of the Shrew.'"
+
+"And yet American girls--of a sort--are quite eager to marry Englishmen!"
+
+The Senator quickly pursued his advantage. "Now is it likely that Madame
+Poulain would make such a suggestion if she were not telling the truth? Of
+course her view is that this Mr. Dampier will turn up, safe and sound, when
+he thinks he has sufficiently punished his poor little wife for her share
+in their 'lovers' quarrel.'"
+
+But at this Gerald Burton shook his head. "We know nothing of this man
+Dampier," he said, "but I would stake my life on Mrs. Dampier's
+truthfulness."
+
+The Senator rose from his chair. Gerald's attitude was generous; he would
+not have had him otherwise but still he felt irritated by his son's
+suspicion of the Poulains.
+
+"Well, it's getting late, and I suppose we ought all to go to bed now,
+especially as they begin moving about so early in this place. As for you,
+my boy, I hope you've secured a good room outside, eh?"
+
+Gerald Burton also got up. He smiled and shook his head.
+
+"No, father, I haven't found a place at all yet! The truth is I've been so
+tremendously taken up with this affair that I forgot all about having to
+find a room to-night."
+
+"Oh dear!" cried Daisy in dismay. "Won't you find it very difficult? They
+say Paris is absolutely full just now. Why, a lot of people who have never
+let before are letting out rooms just now--so Madame Poulain says."
+
+"Don't worry about me. I shall be all right," said Gerald quickly. "I
+suppose my things have been moved into your room, father?"
+
+Daisy nodded. "Yes, I saw to all that. In fact I did more--" she smiled;
+the brother and sister were very fond of one another. "I packed your bag
+for you, Ger."
+
+"Thanks," he said. And then going quickly round the table, he bent down and
+kissed her. "I'll be in early to-morrow morning," he said, nodding to
+his father.
+
+Then he went out.
+
+Daisy Burton felt surprised. Gerald was the best of brothers, but he didn't
+often kiss her good-night. There had been a strange touch of excitement, of
+emotion, in his manner to-night. It was natural that she herself should be
+moved by Nancy Dampier's distress. But Gerald? Gerald, who was generally
+speaking rather nonchalant, and very, very critical of women?
+
+"Gerald's tremendously excited about this thing," said Daisy thoughtfully.
+She was two years younger in years than her brother, but older, as young
+women are apt to be older, in all that counts in civilised life. "I've
+never seen him quite so--so keen about anything before."
+
+"I hope he will have got a comfortable room," said the Senator a little
+crossly. Then fondly he turned and took his daughter's hand. "Sleep well,
+my darling," he said. "You two have been very kind to that poor little
+soul. And I love you both for it. Whatever happens, kindness is
+never lost."
+
+"Why, what d'you mean, father?" she looked down at him troubled, rather
+disturbed by his words.
+
+"Well, Daisy, the truth is,"--he hesitated--"I can't make out whether this
+Mrs. Dampier is all she seems to be. And I want to prepare you for a
+possible disappointment, my dear. When I was a young man I once took a
+great fancy to someone who--well, who disappointed me cruelly--" he was
+speaking very gravely. "It just spoilt my ideal for a time--I mean my ideal
+of human nature. Now I don't want anything of that kind to happen to you or
+to our boy in connection with this--this young lady."
+
+"But, father? You know French people aren't as particular about telling the
+truth as are English people. I can't understand why you believe the
+Poulains' story--"
+
+"My dear, I don't know what to believe," he said thoughtfully.
+
+She was twenty-four years old, this grey-eyed, honest, straightforward girl
+of his; and yet Senator Burton, much as he loved her, knew very little as
+to her knowledge of life. Did Daisy know anything of the ugly side of human
+nature? Did she know, for instance, that there are men and women,
+especially women, who spend their lives preying on the honest, the
+chivalrous, and the kind?
+
+"The mystery is sure to be cleared up very soon," he said aloud. "If what
+our new friend says is true there must be as many people in England who
+know her to be what she says she is, as there are people in Paris who
+evidently know all about the artist, John Dampier."
+
+"Yes, that's true. But father?"
+
+"Yes, my dear."
+
+"I am quite sure Mrs. Dampier is telling the truth."
+
+Somehow the fact that Daisy was anxious to say that she disagreed with him
+stung the Senator.
+
+"Then what do you think of the Poulains?" he asked quietly--"the Poulains,
+whom you have known, my dear, ever since you were fifteen--on whose honesty
+and probity I personally would stake a good deal. What do you think
+about them?"
+
+Daisy began to look very troubled. "I don't know what to think," she
+faltered. "The truth is, father, I haven't thought very much of the
+Poulains in the matter. You see, Madame Poulain has not spoken to me about
+it at all. But you see that Gerald believes them to be lying."
+
+"Gerald," said the Senator rather sharply, "is still only a boy in many
+things, Daisy. And boys are apt, as you and I know, to take sides, to feel
+very positive about things. But you and I, my darling--well, we must try to
+be judicial--we must try to keep our heads, eh?"
+
+"Yes, father, yes--we must, indeed"; but even as she said the words she did
+not quite know what her father meant by "judicial."
+
+And Gerald Burton? For a while, perhaps for an hour, holding his heavy bag
+in his hand, he wandered about from hostelry to hostelry, only to be told
+everywhere that there was no room.
+
+Then, taking a sudden resolution, he went into a respectable little cafe
+which was still open, and where he and his father, in days gone by, had
+sometimes strolled in together when Daisy was going about with friends in
+Paris. There he asked permission to leave his bag. Even had he found a
+room, he could not have slept--so he assured himself. He was too excited,
+his brain was working too quickly.
+
+Talking busily, anxiously, argumentatively to himself as he went, he made
+his way to the river--to the broad, tree-lined quays which to your true
+lover of Paris contain the most enchanting and characteristic vistas of
+the city.
+
+Once there, his footsteps became slower. He thrust his hands into his
+pockets and walked along, with eyes bent on the ground.
+
+What manner of man could John Dampier be to leave his young wife--such a
+beautiful, trusting, confiding creature as was evidently this poor girl--in
+this cruel uncertainty? Was it conceivable that the man lived who could
+behave to this Mrs. Dampier with the unkindness Gerald's father had
+suggested--and that as the outcome of a trifling quarrel? No! Gerald
+Burton's generous nature revolted from such a notion.
+
+And yet--and yet his father thought it quite possible! To Gerald his
+father's views and his father's attitude to life meant a great deal more
+than he was wont to allow, either to that same kind indulgent father or to
+himself; and now he had to admit that the Senator did believe that what
+seemed so revolting to him, Gerald, was the most probable explanation of
+the mystery.
+
+The young man had stayed quite a while at the studio, listening to Mere
+Bideau's garrulous confidences. Now and again he had asked her a question,
+forced thereto by some obscure but none the less intense desire to know
+what Nancy Dampier's husband was like. And the old woman had acknowledged,
+in answer to a word from him, that her master was not a good-tempered man.
+
+"Monsieur" could be very cross, very disagreeable sometimes. But bah! were
+not all gentlemen like that?--so Mere Bideau had added with an easy laugh.
+
+On the whole, however--so much must be admitted--she had given Dampier a
+very good character. If quick-tempered, he was generous, considerate, and,
+above all, hard-working. But--but Mere Bideau had been very much surprised
+to hear "Monsieur" was going to be married--and to an Englishwoman, too!
+She, Mere Bideau, had always supposed he preferred Frenchwomen; in fact, he
+had told her so time and again. But bah! again; what won't a pretty face do
+with a man? So Mere Bideau had exclaimed 'twixt smile and sigh.
+
+Gerald Burton began walking more quickly, this time towards the west, along
+the quay which leads to the Chamber of Deputies.
+
+The wide thoroughfare was deserted save for an occasional straggler making
+his weary way home after a day spent in ministering to the wants and the
+pleasures of the strangers who now crowded the city....
+
+How wise he, Gerald Burton, was now showing himself to be in thus spending
+the short summer night out-of-doors, a la belle etoile, as the French so
+charmingly put it, instead of in some stuffy, perhaps not overclean,
+little room!
+
+But soon his mind swung back to the strange events of the past day!
+
+Already Nancy Dampier's personality held a strange, beckoning fascination
+for the young American. He hadn't met many English girls, for his father
+far preferred France to England, and it was to France they sped whenever
+they had time to do so. And Gerald Burton hadn't cared very much for the
+few English girls he had met. But Nancy was very, very different from the
+only two kinds of her fellow countrywomen with whom he had ever been
+acquainted--the kind, that is, who is closely chaperoned by vigilant mother
+or friend, and the kind who spends her life wandering about the world
+by herself.
+
+How brave, how gentle, how--how self-controlled Mrs. Dampier had been!
+While it was clear that she was terribly distressed, and all the more
+distressed by the Poulains' monstrous assertion that she had come alone to
+the Hotel Saint Ange, yet how well she had behaved all that long day of
+waiting and suspense! How anxious she had been to spare the
+Burtons trouble.
+
+Not for a single moment had he, Gerald Burton, felt with her as he so often
+felt with women--awkward and self-conscious. Deep in his inmost heart he
+was aware that there were women and girls who thought him very
+good-looking; and far from pleasing him, the knowledge made him feel
+sometimes shy, sometimes even angry. He already ardently wished to protect,
+to help, to shelter Mrs. Dampier.
+
+Daisy had been out of the room for a moment, probably packing his bag, when
+he had come back tired and weary from his fruitless quest, and Mrs.
+Dampier, if keenly disappointed that he had no news, had yet thanked him
+very touchingly for the trifling trouble, or so it now seemed, that he had
+taken for her.
+
+"I don't know what I should have done if it hadn't been for your kind
+father, for your sister, and--and for you, Mr. Burton."
+
+He walked across the bridge leading to the Champs Elysees, paced round the
+Arc de Triomphe, and then strolled back to the deserted quays. He had no
+wish to go on to the Boulevards. It was Paris asleep, not Paris awake, with
+which Gerald Burton felt in close communion during that short summer night.
+
+And how short is a Paris summer night! Soon after he had seen the sun rise
+over an eastern bend of the river, the long, low buildings which line the
+Seine below the quays stirred into life, and he was able to enjoy a
+delicious, a refreshing plunge in the great swimming-bath which is among
+the luxuries Paris provides for those of her sons who are
+early-morning toilers.
+
+Six o'clock found Gerald Burton at the cafe where he had left his bag,
+ready for a cup of good coffee.
+
+The woman who served him--the waiters were still asleep--told him of a room
+likely to be disengaged the next night.
+
+The next night? But if Dampier were to come back this morning--as,
+according to one theory, he was very likely to do--then he, Gerald, would
+have no need of a room.
+
+Somehow that possibility was not as agreeable to him as it ought to have
+been. In theory Gerald Burton longed for this unknown man's return--for a
+happy solution, that is, of the strange mystery which had been cast, in so
+dramatic a fashion, athwart the Burtons' placid, normal life; but, scarce
+consciously to himself, the young American felt that Dampier's reappearance
+would end, and that rather tamely, an exciting and in some ways a very
+fascinating adventure.
+
+As he came up the Rue Saint Ange, he saw their landlord, a blue apron tied
+about his portly waist, busily brushing the pavement in front of the hotel
+with a yellow broom.
+
+"Well?" he said eagerly, "well, Monsieur Poulain, any news?"
+
+Poulain looked up at him and shook his head. "No, Monsieur Gerald," he said
+sullenly, "no news at all."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+Nancy Dampier sat up in bed.
+
+Long rays of bright sunlight filtering in between deep blue curtains showed
+her a large, lofty room, with panelled walls, and furniture covered with
+blue damask silk.
+
+It was more like an elegant boudoir in an old English country house than a
+bedroom, and for a moment she wondered, bewildered, where she could be.
+
+Then suddenly she remembered--remembered everything; and her heart filled,
+brimmed over, with seething pain and a sharp, overwhelming sensation
+of fear.
+
+Jack had gone: disappeared: vanished as if the earth had swallowed him up!
+And she, Nancy, was alone in a foreign city where she did not know a single
+soul, with the paramount exception of the American strangers who had come
+to her help in so kindly and so generous a fashion.
+
+She pushed her soft hair back from her forehead, and tried to recall, step
+by step, all that had happened yesterday.
+
+Two facts started out clearly--her almost painful gratitude to the Burtons
+and her shrinking terror of the Poulains, or rather of Madame Poulain, the
+woman who had looked fixedly into her face and lied.
+
+As to what had happened to Dampier, Nancy's imagination began to whisper
+things of unutterable dread. If her Jack had been possessed of a large sum
+of money she would have suspected the hotel people of having
+murdered him....
+
+But no, she and Jack had come to the end of the ample provision of gold and
+bank-notes with which they had started for Italy. As is the way with most
+prosperous newly-married folk, they had spent a good deal more on their
+short honeymoon than they had reckoned to do. He had said so the day before
+yesterday, in the train, when within an hour of Paris. Indeed he had added
+that one of the first things they must do the next day must be to call at
+the English bank where he kept an account.
+
+She now told herself that she had to face the possibility, nay the
+probability, that her husband had met with some serious accident on his way
+to the Impasse des Nonnes. Nancy knew that this had been Gerald Burton's
+theory, and of her three new kind friends it was Gerald Burton who
+impressed her with the greatest trust and confidence. He, unlike his
+father, had at once implicitly believed her version of what had taken place
+when she and Jack arrived at the Hotel Saint Ange.
+
+The bedroom door opened, cautiously, quietly, and Daisy Burton came in
+carrying a tray in her pretty graceful hands.
+
+Poor Nancy! She felt confused, grateful, and a little awkward. She had not
+realised that her nervous dread of Madame Poulain would mean that this kind
+girl must wait on her.
+
+"I came in before, but you were sound asleep. Still, I thought I must wake
+you now, for father wants to know if you would mind him going to our
+Embassy about your husband? It's really my brother's idea. As you know,
+Gerald thinks it almost certain that Mr. Dampier met with some kind of
+accident yesterday morning, and he isn't a bit satisfied with the way the
+local Commissaire de Police answered his enquiries. Gerald thinks the only
+way to get attended to in Paris is to make people feel that you are
+important, and that they will get into trouble if they don't attend to you
+promptly!"
+
+Even as she was speaking Daisy Burton smiled rather nervously, for both she
+and Gerald had just gone through a very disagreeable half-hour with their
+generally docile and obedient father.
+
+The Senator did not wish to go to the American Embassy--at any rate not
+yet--about this strange business. He had pleaded with both his young people
+to wait, at any rate, till the afternoon: at any moment, so he pointed out,
+they might have news of the missing man: but Gerald was inexorable.
+
+"No, father, that's no use; if we do nothing we shan't get proper attention
+from the police officials till to-morrow. If you will only go and see Mr.
+Curtis about this business I promise to take all other trouble off
+your hands."
+
+And then the Senator had actually groaned--as if he minded trouble!
+
+"Mr. Curtis will do for you what he certainly wouldn't do for me, father.
+Daisy can go with you to the Embassy: I'll stay and look after Mrs.
+Dampier: she mustn't be left alone, exposed to the Poulains' insolence."
+
+And so the matter had been settled. But Senator Burton had made one
+stipulation:--
+
+"I won't go to the Embassy," he said firmly, "without hearing from Mrs.
+Dampier's own lips that such is her wish. And, Daisy? Gerald? Hearken to
+me--neither of you is to say anything to influence her in the matter, one
+way or the other."
+
+And so it was with a certain relief that Daisy Burton now heard her new
+friend say eagerly:
+
+"Why of course! I shall only be too grateful if your father will do
+anything he thinks may help me to find Jack. Oh, you don't know how
+bewildered and how frightened I feel!"
+
+And the other answered soothingly, "Yes, indeed I do know how you must
+feel. But I expect it will be all right soon. After all, Gerald
+said--"--she hesitated a moment, and then went on more firmly--"Gerald said
+that probably Mr. Dampier met with quite a slight accident, and that might
+be the reason why the tiresome Commissaire de Police knew nothing
+about it."
+
+"But if it was a slight accident," Nancy objected quickly, "Jack would have
+let me know at once! You don't know my husband: he would move heaven and
+earth to save me a minute's anxiety or trouble."
+
+"I am sure of that. But Gerald says that if Mr. Dampier did try and arrange
+for you to be sent a message at once, the message miscarried--"
+
+It was an hour later. The Senator had listened in silence while his young
+English guest had expressed in faltering, but seemingly very sincere,
+tones, her gratitude for his projected visit to the American Embassy. Nay,
+she had done more. Very earnestly Mrs. Dampier had begged Senator Burton
+and his daughter not to give themselves more trouble over her affairs than
+was absolutely necessary.
+
+And her youth, her beauty, her expression of pitiful distress had touched
+the Senator, though it had not shaken his belief in the Poulains' story. He
+did however assure her, very kindly and courteously, that he grudged no
+time spent in her service.
+
+And then, while Gerald Burton accompanied his father and his sister
+downstairs, Nancy Dampier was left alone for a few minutes with her own
+troubled and bewildered thoughts.
+
+She walked restlessly over to one of the high windows of the sitting-room,
+and looked down into the shady garden below. Then her eyes wandered over
+the picturesque grey and red roofs of the old Paris Jack Dampier loved
+so well.
+
+Somehow the cheerful, bright beauty of this June morning disturbed and even
+angered poor Nancy. She remembered with distaste, even with painful wonder,
+the sensations of pleasure, of amusement, of admiration with which she had
+first come through into this formal, harmoniously furnished salon, which
+was so unlike any hotel sitting-room she had ever seen before.
+
+But that had been yesterday morning--infinitely long ago.
+
+Now, each of the First Empire pieces of furniture seemed burnt into her
+brain: and the human faces of the dull gold sphinxes which jutted from each
+of the corners of the long, low settee seemed to grin at her maliciously.
+
+She felt unutterably forlorn and wretched. If only she could do something!
+She told herself, with a sensation of recoil and revolt, that she could
+never face another day of suspense and waiting spent as had been the whole
+of yesterday afternoon and evening.
+
+Going up to the brass-rimmed round table, she took up a book which was
+lying there. It was a guide to Paris, arranged on the alphabetical
+principle. Idly she began turning over the leaves, and then suddenly Nancy
+Dampier's cheeks, which had become so pale as to arouse Senator Burton's
+commiseration, became deeply flushed. She turned over the leaves of the
+guide-book with feverish haste, anxious to find what it was that she now
+sought there before the return of Gerald Burton.
+
+At last she came to the page marked M.
+
+Yes, there was what she at once longed and dreaded to find! And she had
+just read the last line of the paragraph when Gerald Burton came back
+into the room.
+
+Looking at him fixedly, she said quietly and in what he felt to be an
+unnaturally still voice, "Mr. Burton? There is a place in Paris called the
+Morgue. Do you not think that I ought to go there, to-day? It says in this
+guide-book that people who are killed in the streets of Paris are taken
+straight to the Morgue."
+
+The young American nodded gravely. The Commissary of Police had mentioned
+the Morgue, had in fact suggested that those who were seeking John Dampier
+would do well to go there within a day or two.
+
+Nancy went on:--"Could I go this morning? I would far rather go by myself,
+I mean without saying anything about it to either your father or to
+your sister."
+
+He answered quickly, but so gently, so kindly, that the tears sprang to her
+eyes, "Yes, I quite understand that. But of course you must allow me to go
+with you."
+
+And she answered, again in that quiet, unnaturally still voice, "Thank you.
+I shall be grateful if you will." Then after a moment, "Couldn't we start
+soon--I mean now?"
+
+"Why yes, certainly--if you wish it."
+
+Without saying anything further, she went to put on her hat.
+
+Gerald Burton's notions as to the Morgue were in a sense at once confused
+and clear. He had known of the place ever since he could read. He was aware
+that it was a building where all those who die a violent death are at once
+taken: he imagined it further to be a place where morbid curiosity drew
+daily many tourists. In fact in an old guide-book of which his father was
+fond he remembered that there ran a sentence:--
+
+    The Morgue is certainly one of the most curious and extraordinary
+    sights of Paris, but only those who are in the enjoyment of good nerves
+    are advised to visit it.
+
+As he waited for Mrs. Dampier the young man's face became very, very grave.
+Till now he had not envisaged the possibility that John Dampier, this
+unknown man across the current of whose life he, Gerald Burton, had been
+thrust in so strange and untoward a manner, might be dead.
+
+Sudden death--that dread possibility which is never far from any one of
+us--never haunts the mind of normal youth.
+
+But now there came to Gerald Burton a sudden overwhelming understanding of
+the transience not only of human life, but what means so much more to most
+sentient human beings, the transience of such measure of happiness as we
+poor mortals are allowed to enjoy.
+
+His imagination conjured up Nancy Dampier as he had first seen her standing
+in Virginie Poulain's little room. She had been a vision of lovely
+girlhood, and yes, far more than that--though he had not known it then--of
+radiant content.
+
+And now?
+
+His unspoken question was answered by Mrs. Dampier's return into the room.
+He looked at her searchingly. Yes, she was lovely--her beauty rather
+heightened than diminished, as is so often the case with a very young
+woman, by the ordeal she was going through, but all the glow and radiance
+were gone from her face.
+
+"I ought to have told you before," he said impulsively, "that--that among
+the men who were taken to the Morgue yesterday morning there was no one who
+in the least answered to the description you have given me of Mr.
+Dampier--so much the Commissary of Police was able to inform me most
+positively."
+
+And Nancy drew a long convulsive breath of relief.
+
+They went down to the courtyard, and across to the porte cochere. While
+they did so Gerald Burton was unpleasantly conscious that they were being
+watched; watched from behind the door which led into the garden, for there
+stood Jules, a broom as almost always in his hand: watched from the kitchen
+window, where Madame Poulain stood with arms akimbo: watched from behind
+the glass pane of the little office which was only occupied when Monsieur
+Poulain was engaged in the pleasant task of making out his profitable
+weekly bills.
+
+But not one of the three watchers came forward and offered to do them even
+the usual, trifling service of hailing a cab.
+
+The two passed out into the narrow street and walked till they came to the
+square where stood, at this still early hour of the morning, long rows of
+open carriages.
+
+"I think we'd better drive?" said Gerald Burton questioningly.
+
+And his companion answered quickly, "Oh yes! I should like to get there as
+quickly as possible." And then her pale face flushed a little. "Mr. Burton,
+will you kindly pay for me?"
+
+She put her purse, an absurd, delicately tinted little beaded purse which
+had been one of her wedding presents, into his hand.
+
+Gerald took it without demur. Had he been escorting an American girl, he
+would have insisted on being paymaster, but some sure instinct had already
+taught him how to treat Nancy Dampier--he realised she preferred not adding
+a material to the many immaterial obligations she now owed the
+Burton family.
+
+A quarter of an hour's quick driving brought them within sight of the low,
+menacing-looking building which is so curiously, in a sense so beautifully,
+situated on the left bank of the Seine, to the right of Notre Dame.
+
+"Mrs. Dampier? I beg you not to get out of the carriage till I come and
+fetch you," said Gerald earnestly, "there is no necessity for you to come
+into the Morgue unless--" he hesitated.
+
+"I know what you mean," she said quietly. "Unless you see someone there who
+might be Jack. Yes, Mr. Burton, I'll stay quietly in the carriage till you
+come and fetch me. It's very good of you to have thought of it."
+
+But when they drew up before the great closed door two or three of the
+incorrigible beggars who spend their days in the neighbourhood of the
+greater Paris churches, came eagerly forward.
+
+Here were a fine couple, a good-looking Englishman and his bride. True,
+they were about to be cheated out of their bit of fun, but they might be
+good for a small dole--so thought the shrewder of those idlers who seemed,
+as the carriage drew up, to spring out of the ground.
+
+One of them strolled up to Gerald. "M'sieur cannot go into the Morgue
+unless he has a permit," he said with a whine.
+
+Gerald shook the man off, and rang at the closed door. It seemed a long
+time before it was opened by a man dressed like a Paris workman, that is in
+a bright blue blouse and long baggy white trousers.
+
+"I want to view any bodies which were brought in yesterday. I fear I am a
+little early?"
+
+He slipped a five franc piece into the man's hand. But the silver key which
+unlocks so many closed doors in Paris only bought this time a civil answer.
+
+"Impossible, monsieur! I should lose my place. I could not do it for a
+thousand francs." And then in answer to the American's few words of
+surprise and discomfiture,--"Yes, it's quite true that we were open to the
+public till three years ago. But it's easier to get into the Elysee than it
+is to get into the Morgue, nowadays." He waited a moment, then he murmured
+under his breath, "Of course if monsieur cares to say that he is looking
+for someone who has disappeared, and if he will provide a description, the
+more commonplace the better, then--well, monsieur may be able to obtain a
+permit! At any rate monsieur has only to go along to the office where
+permits are issued to find that what I say is true. If only monsieur will
+bring me a permit I will gladly show monsieur everything there is to be
+seen." The man became enthusiastic. "Not only are there the bodies to see!
+We also possess relics of many great criminals; and as for our
+refrigerating machines--ah, monsieur, they are really in their way wonders!
+Well worth, as I have sometimes heard people say, coming all the way to
+Paris to see!"
+
+Sick at heart Gerald Burton turned away--not, however, before he had
+explained gravely that his wish in coming to the Morgue was not to gratify
+idle curiosity, but to seek a friend whose disappearance since the morning
+before was causing acute anxiety.
+
+The man looked at him doubtfully--somehow this young gentleman did not look
+as people generally look who come to the Morgue on serious business. The
+janitor was only too familiar with the signs--the air of excitement, of
+dejection, of suspense, the reddened eyelids.... But, "In that case I am
+sure to see monsieur again within a few minutes," he said politely.
+
+Nancy had stepped down from the carriage. "Well?" she said anxiously.
+"Well, won't he let you in?"
+
+"We shall have to get an order. The office is only just over there,
+opposite Notre Dame. Shall we dismiss the cab?"
+
+"Yes," she said. "I would far rather walk across." Still followed by a
+troop of ragged idlers, they hastened across the great space in front of
+Notre Dame and so to the office of the Morgue.
+
+At first the tired official whose not always easy duty it is to
+discriminate between the morbid sightseer and the anxious relative or
+friend, did not believe the American's story. He, too, evidently thought
+that Gerald and the latter's charming, daintily dressed companion were
+simply desirous of seeing every sight, however horrible, that Paris has to
+offer. But when he heard the name "Dampier," his manner suddenly changed.
+There came over his face a sincere look of pity and concern.
+
+"You made enquiries concerning this gentleman yesterday?" he observed, and
+Gerald Burton, rather surprised, though after all he need not have been,
+assented. Then the Commissary of Police had been to some trouble for him
+after all? He, Gerald, had done the man an injustice.
+
+"We have had five bodies already brought in this morning," said the clerk
+thoughtfully. "But I'm sure that none of them answers to the description we
+have had of madame's husband. Let me see--Monsieur Dampier is aged
+thirty-four--he is tall, dressed in a grey suit, or possibly a brown suit
+of clothes, with a shock of fair hair?"
+
+And again Gerald Burton was surprised how well the man remembered.
+
+The other went into another room and came back with a number of grey cards
+in his hand. He began to mumble over the descriptions, and suddenly Gerald
+stopped him.
+
+"That might be the person we are looking for!" he exclaimed. "I mean the
+description you've just read out--that of the Englishman?"
+
+"Oh no, monsieur! I assure you that the body here described is that of a
+quite young man." And as the American looked at him doubtfully, he added,
+"But still, if you wish to make absolutely sure I will make out a permit;
+and madame can stay here while you go across to the Morgue." Again he
+looked pityingly at Mrs. Dampier.
+
+Nancy shook her head. "Tell him I mean to go too," she said quietly.
+
+The man looked at her with an odd expression. "I should not myself care to
+take my wife or my sister to the Morgue, monsieur. Believe me her husband
+is not there. Do try and dissuade the poor lady." As he spoke he averted
+his eyes from Nancy's flushed face.
+
+Gerald Burton hesitated: it was really kind of this good fellow to feel so
+much for a stranger's distress.
+
+"Won't you stay here and let me go alone to that place? I think you can
+trust me. You see there is only one body there which in any way answers to
+the description."
+
+"Yes, I quite understand that, but I'd rather go too." Her lips quivered.
+"You see you've never seen Jack, Mr. Burton."
+
+"I'm afraid this lady is quite determined to go too," said the young
+American in a low voice; and without making any further objection, the
+Frenchman filled in a form and silently handed it to Gerald Burton.
+
+And then something happened which was perhaps more untoward and strange
+than Gerald realised.
+
+He and Mrs. Dampier were already well started across the great sunny space
+in front of Notre Dame, when suddenly he felt himself tapped on the
+shoulder by the man from whom they had just parted.
+
+"Monsieur, monsieur!" said the French official breathlessly, "I forgot a
+most important point. Visitors to the Morgue are not allowed to see all the
+bodies exposed in our mortuary. When the place was closed to the public we
+went from one extreme to the other. The man whose description you think
+approximates to that of the gentleman you are looking for is Number 4. Tell
+the guardian to show you Number 4."
+
+Then he turned on his heel, without awaiting the other's thanks; and as he
+walked away, the Frenchman said aloud, not once but many times, "Pauvre
+petite dame!" And then again and again, "Paume petite dame!"
+
+But his conscience was clear. He had done his very best to prevent that
+obstinate young American subjecting the "poor little lady" to the horrible
+ordeal she was about to go through. Once more he spoke aloud--"They have no
+imagination--none at all--these Yankees!" he muttered, shrugging his
+shoulders.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+The janitor of the Morgue, remembering Gerald Burton's five-franc piece,
+and perchance looking forward to another rond, was wreathed in smiles.
+
+Eagerly he welcomed the two strangers into the passage, and carefully he
+closed the great doors behind them.
+
+"A little minute," he said, smiling happily. "Only one little minute! The
+trifling formality of showing your permit to the gentleman in the office
+must be gone through, and then I myself will show monsieur and madame
+everything there is to be seen."
+
+"We do not wish to see everything," said Gerald Burton sharply. "We simply
+wish to see--" he hesitated--"body Number 4--" he lowered his voice, but
+Nancy understood enough French to know what it was that he said.
+
+With a blind, instinctive gesture she put out her hand, and Gerald Burton
+grasped it firmly, and for the first time a look of pity and of sympathy
+came across the janitor's face.
+
+Tiens! tiens! Then it was true after all? These young people (he now took
+them for a brother and sister) were here on business, not, as he had
+supposed, on pleasure.
+
+"Come in and wait here," he said gravely. "This is the doctors' room, but
+madame can sit here for a moment while the formalities are gone through."
+
+He flung open a door, and showed them into a curious, old-fashioned looking
+sitting-room, strangely unlike the waiting-room which would have been found
+attached, say, to an American or British mortuary.
+
+An ornate writing-table filled up one corner of the room, and, opposite the
+two windows, covering the whole of the blank wall, was a narrow glass case
+running from floor to ceiling.
+
+From this case young Burton quickly averted his eyes, for it was filled
+with wax models of heads which might have been modelled from the denizens
+of Dante's Inferno.
+
+"I'm afraid I must now leave you for a moment," he said gently; "sit over
+here, Mrs. Dampier, and look out on the river."
+
+And Nancy obeyed with dull submission. She gazed on the bright, moving
+panorama before her, aware, in a misty, indifferent way, that the view was
+beautiful, that Jack would have thought it so.
+
+This bend of the Seine is always laden with queer, picturesque craft, and
+just below the window by which she sat was moored a flat-bottomed barge
+which evidently served as dwelling place for a very happy little family.
+One end of the barge had been turned into a kind of garden, there was even
+a vine-covered arbour, under which two tiny children were now playing some
+absorbing game.
+
+And this glimpse of ordinary normal life gradually brought a feeling of
+peace, almost of comfort, to Nancy's sore heart. She wondered if she would
+ever be happy again--happy as those little children playing outside were
+happy, without a thought of care in the world: that had been the kind of
+simple, unquestioning happiness she too had thoughtlessly enjoyed till the
+last three days.
+
+When Gerald Burton came back he was glad rather than grieved to see that
+tears were running down her face.
+
+But a moment later, as they followed their guide down a humid, dark passage
+her tears stopped, and a look of pinched terror came into her eyes.
+
+Suddenly there fell on their ears loud, whirring, jarring sounds.
+
+"What's that?" cried Nancy in a loud voice. Her nerves were taut with
+suspense, quivering with fear of what she was about to see.
+
+And the janitor, as if he understood her question, turned round
+reassuringly. "Only our refrigerating machines, madame. We think them
+wonderfully quiet, considering. They whirr on night and day, they are never
+stilled. As for me--" he added jovially--"I would miss the noise very much.
+But as I lie in bed listening to the sound I know that all is well. It
+would be a very serious thing indeed for us if the machines stopped, even
+for ten minutes--" he shook his head mysteriously.
+
+Nancy breathed a little more easily. She had not understood what it was
+exactly that he had said, but his voice had sounded cheerful and kind: and
+she remained for a while ignorant of the meaning and object of the machines
+by which they passed quickly in a great room filled with moving wheels,
+and, even on this hot June day, full of icy breaths.
+
+As they came to the end of the engine-room their guide turned round and
+gave the young American a quick, warning look. "C'est ici," he said, under
+his breath. And Gerald stepped quickly in front of Mrs. Dampier.
+
+"Is what we are going to see very horrible?" he whispered hurriedly. "I
+wish this lady to be spared as far as may be from seeing anything
+especially painful."
+
+"As to horrible--well, it depends, monsieur, on what is thought horrible! A
+good many of my pensioners have been dangerous customers in their time--but
+now? Fortunately, monsieur, the dead cannot bite!" and he smiled at his own
+grim joke.
+
+Gerald Burton shuddered involuntarily, but as he and Nancy followed the man
+from the engine-room he gave a sigh of relief, for they had emerged into a
+wide, airy shed.
+
+The place looked like a workshop of sorts, for it was lined, on one side,
+with what looked like gigantic chests of drawers, painted black; while
+standing about on the stone pavement were long white deal packing cases.
+Over in a corner was a black box, of which the lid was loose.
+
+"You said Number 4, monsieur?" said the man in a business-like tone. "Well,
+I will get you out Number 4. Kindly stand just over there--not in the
+sunlight, that might prevent your seeing clearly." He added, speaking far
+more gently and kindly than he had yet done, "Madame must not be
+frightened. It will be all over in a moment."
+
+Gerald looked down at his companion. Her face seemed to have become quite
+small, like that of a child, but the pupils of her eyes had dilated: as she
+stared up at him fearfully he likened them, in his heart, to deep
+unfathomable pools.
+
+She came close up to him, and then, without stopping to think, simply
+following a natural instinct, he put his arm round her shoulder; so would
+he have done to his sister in a moment of similar distress.
+
+"Don't be too frightened," he whispered, "it will all be over very, very
+soon, Mrs. Dampier. Somehow I don't think you have anything to fear."
+
+"Please stand over in that corner," said the janitor, pointing towards the
+black box Gerald Burton had noticed when they had first come into the yard.
+"We have a poor lady in that box who was only brought in an hour ago! She
+was run over, killed by an omnibus--such a pity, for she is such a nice
+fresh-looking lady: not more than about thirty years of age. We expect her
+family any moment; they will know her by her wedding ring, and by a little
+locket with a child's hair in it."
+
+Even as he was speaking the man was opening a small, inconspicuous door,
+situated close to that which gave into the refrigerating-engine room.
+
+Gerald's arm slipped down from Nancy's shoulder. She had put out her hand
+gropingly, as a blind child might have done, and he was now holding the
+poor little hand tightly clasped in his firm grasp.
+
+There came a harsh rumbling sound, and then there was wheeled out into the
+open yard an inclined plane hitched up on huge iron wheels. To the inclined
+plane was bound a swathed, rigid figure.
+
+"Here is Number 4," said the man in a subdued tone. "I will uncover his
+face so that madame and monsieur may see if it is the gentleman for whom
+they are seeking."
+
+A strange tremor shot through Gerald Burton. He was shaken with a variety
+of sensations of which the predominant feeling was that of repulsion. Was
+he at last about to gaze at the dead face of the man who, with the one
+paramount exception of that same man's wife, had filled his mind and
+thoughts to the exclusion of all else since he had first heard the name of
+John Dampier? Was he now to make acquaintance with the stranger who had yet
+in so curious and sinister a way become his familiar?
+
+Nancy gently withdrew her hand from his: leaning slightly forward, she
+gazed at the swathed stark form which might possibly--so much she had told
+herself at once--be that of John Dampier.
+
+Very slowly the man drew off that portion of the sheet which covered the
+upper part of the body, and, as he did so, Gerald Burton heard the woman
+standing by his side utter a long, fluttering sigh of relief.
+
+Thank God it was not Jack--not her Jack!
+
+The fine, well-cut face was that of a man about Gerald Burton's own age.
+The features were stilled in the awful immobility of death: but for that
+immobility, the dead man lying there before them might have been asleep.
+
+"An Englishman," said the janitor thoughtfully, "or perchance an American?
+A finely built fellow, monsieur. A true athlete. Not a wound, not a touch!
+Just dropped dead yesterday afternoon in a public gymnasium."
+
+"How extraordinary it is," observed Gerald Burton in a low voice, "that he
+has not yet been claimed by his friends--"
+
+"Oh no, monsieur, not extraordinary at all! We in this country write to our
+children every day when we are separated from them--that is if we can
+afford the stamps. Not so English or American people. They think their
+children are sure to be all right. In about a fortnight we shall have
+enquiries for Number 4, hardly before then."
+
+"And by that time," said Gerald slowly, "I suppose the poor fellow will
+have been buried."
+
+"Oh no, monsieur--" the man laughed, as if the other's remark struck him as
+being really very funny. "Why, we keep some of them as long as fifteen
+months! Those drawers are full of them--" he pointed to the long black
+chests which lined one side of the shed. "Would monsieur like to see some
+of my pensioners? I have men, women, ay, and children too, cosily tucked
+away in there."
+
+A low exclamation of horror escaped from Nancy Dampier's lips. She turned
+ashily pale. At last she understood what it was the janitor was saying....
+
+The man looked at her with kindly concern. "Tiens!" he said, "isn't that
+strange? It happens again and again! People like madame come here--quite
+quiet, quite brave; and then, though overjoyed at not finding the person
+they came to seek--they suddenly shudder and turn pale; sometimes I have
+known them faint!"
+
+"Kindly let us out by the shortest and quickest way," said Gerald quickly.
+
+"Pardon, monsieur, the law exacts that Number 4 must remain in your
+presence for a quarter of an hour." The man shrugged his shoulders. "You
+see some people, especially ladies, are apt to think afterwards that they
+may have made a mistake: that their sight was at fault, and so on. That is
+why this tiresome regulation is now in force. I should like to oblige
+monsieur, but to do so would get me into trouble."
+
+He stopped speaking, and stood waiting, at attention.
+
+And then, as they stood there in silence, Gerald, looking beyond the still,
+swathed figure stretched out before him, allowed his eyes to rest on these
+black boxes, each containing one poor tenantless shell of humanity, from
+which the unquenchable spirit of man had been suddenly, violently expelled:
+and as he looked, he missed something that should have been there--the
+sign, the symbol, of the cross.
+
+A flood of memories came surging through his mind--memories of childish
+prayers learnt at his mother's knee, of certain revisions which time had
+brought to his first innocent, unquestioning faith. And with those memories
+came anger and a sense of humiliation. For there was nothing, absolutely
+nothing, to show that these boxes before him held what had once been the
+dwelling-place of that daily miracle, the sentient soul of man. These
+defenceless dead had been subjected to a last, continuous, intolerable
+insult; in their flesh he felt that his own humanity was degraded. Here was
+nothing to separate the human dead from the beasts of the field; these
+boxes would have looked the same had they held merely the bodies of animals
+prepared for the inquisitive, probing research of science.
+
+His young imagination, strung to the highest pitch, penetrated those
+shuttered receptacles and showed him on the face of each occupant that
+strange ironic smile with which the dead husk of man seems often to betray
+the full knowledge now possessed by the spirit which has fled. That riddle
+of existence, of which through the ages philosophers and kings had sought
+the key, was now an open book to all those who lay here in the still
+majesty of death. Yes, they could well afford to smile--to smile at the
+littleness which denied to their tenements of flesh the smallest symbol of
+belief that death was not the end of all.
+
+His companion had also marked the absence of any sign of the Christian's
+hope in this house of death, and through her mind there ran the confused
+recollection of holy words:--
+
+"It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption. It is sown in
+dishonour; it is raised in glory.
+
+"Behold, I shew you a mystery; we shall not all sleep....
+
+"O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?"
+
+Comfortable words! They seemed, merely by their flight through the tense
+ganglia of her brain, to break into the awful loneliness of these recent
+tabernacles of the spirit, and bestow on them the benison denied them in
+its pride by the human family from whose bosom they had been torn.
+
+Then swiftly her mind turned to the thought of those who were still
+watching and waiting, in that misery of suspense of which she now knew each
+pang. Every one--surely every one--of these dead who now surrounded
+her,--silent, solitary, had been loved--for love comes in some guise to all
+poor human creatures. Those mouths, cheeks, eyes, those rippling waves of
+woman's hair, had been kissed--ah, how often. The perishing flesh had been
+clasped heart to heart....
+
+There came over her soul a great rush of pity for those others, the vast
+and scattered company, mourning, mourning, and yet reaching out in wild
+hope and desire for their loved ones, whose bodies were all the while here.
+They did not know, yet hither came winging unerringly, like flights of
+homing doves, their myriad prayers, their passionate loving thoughts and
+wistful thirsty longing for one word, one kiss, one touch of the hand....
+Surely such thoughts and prayers sanctified this charnel-house.
+
+She herself was of that company--that company who were not sure. Some,
+doubtless, obstinate, refused to believe that death in any form had
+overtaken the missing; others feared to come here and look. She had not
+feared....
+
+The janitor spoke to her, and she started violently.
+
+"You are quite convinced, madame, that Number 4 is not he whom you seek?"
+
+These words, that question, evidently embodied a formula the man was bound
+to use.
+
+Mrs. Dampier bent her head.
+
+"You, monsieur, also have no doubt?"
+
+"None at all," said Gerald briefly.
+
+With a sudden movement the man put the sinister carriage in motion, but
+when he had got it close to the door of the mortuary, he stopped a
+moment:--"We have many compliments on our brancard," he said cheerfully.
+"It is very ingenious, is it not? You see the wheels are so large that a
+mere touch pushes it backwards and forwards. It is quite easy to wheel back
+into place again."
+
+Gerald Burton took out a five-franc piece. He left Nancy Dampier standing,
+an infinitely pathetic, forlorn little figure, in the sunlit portion of the
+yard, and approached the man.
+
+"We must go now," he said hurriedly. "I suppose it is quite easy to leave
+by the way we came in--through the engine-room?"
+
+"One moment, monsieur, one moment! Before showing you out I must put Number
+4 back with his other companions. There is no fear of his being lonely,
+poor man! We had five brought in this morning."
+
+They had not long to wait before the concierge joined them again.
+
+"Won't monsieur and madame stay and just see everything else there is to be
+seen?" he asked eagerly. "We have the most interesting relics of great
+criminals, notably of Troppman. Troppman was before my time, monsieur, but
+the day that his seven victims were publicly exposed there--" he pointed
+with his thumb to the inconspicuous door through which he had just wheeled
+Number 4--"ah, that was a red-letter day for the Morgue! Eighteen thousand
+people came to gaze on those seven bodies. And it was lucky, monsieur, that
+in those days we were open to the public, for it was the landlord of their
+hotel who recognised the poor creatures."
+
+He was now preceding his two visitors through the operating theatre where
+are held the post-mortems. From thence he led them into the hall where they
+had first gained admission. "Well, monsieur, if you really do not care to
+see our relics--?" He opened the great door through which so few living men
+and women ever pass.
+
+Gerald Burton and Nancy Dampier walked out into the sunlight, and the last
+thing they saw of the Morgue was the smiling face of the concierge--it was
+not often that he received ten francs for doing his simple duty.
+
+"Au plaisir de vous revoir, monsieur, madame: au plaisir de vous revoir!"
+he said gaily. And as the courteous old French mode of adieu fell upon
+their ears, Gerald Burton felt an awful sensation of horror, of oppression,
+yes and of dread, steal over him.
+
+Nancy Dampier, looking up at her companion, suddenly forgot herself. "Mr.
+Burton," she exclaimed, her voice full of concern, "I'm afraid this has
+made you feel ill? I oughtn't to have let you come here!" And it was she
+who in her clear, low voice told the cabman the address of the Hotel
+Saint Ange.
+
+Gerald Burton muttered a word of half-angry excuse. He was keenly ashamed
+of what he took to be his lack of manliness.
+
+But during the weeks, aye and the months that followed he found himself
+constantly haunted by the gentle, ironic words of farewell uttered by the
+concierge of the Morgue: "Au plaisir de vous revoir, monsieur, madame: au
+plaisir de vous revoir!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+The American abroad has a touching faith, first, in the might and power of
+his country to redress all wrongs, and secondly, in the personal prestige
+of his Ambassador.
+
+As a rule this faith is justified by works, but in the special and very
+peculiar case of John Dampier, Senator Burton was destined to meet with
+disappointment.
+
+With keen vexation he learnt that the distinguished and genial individual
+who just then represented the great sister Republic in Paris, and on whom
+he himself had absolutely counted for advice and help, for they were old
+friends and allies, had taken sick leave for three months.
+
+Paris, during an Exhibition Year, seems mysteriously to lose the wonderful
+climate which a certain British Minister for Foreign Affairs once declared
+to be the only one that suited every diplomat's constitution!
+
+The Senator and his daughter drove on from the American Embassy to the
+American Consulate, and it was with a feeling of considerable satisfaction
+that they were shown by a courteous janitor into the pleasant, airy
+waiting-room where a large engraving of Christopher Columbus, and a huge
+photograph of the Washington Monument, welcome the wandering American.
+
+Even in this waiting-room there was an air of cheerful activity, a constant
+coming and going, which showed that whatever might be the case with the
+Embassy, the Consulate, at any rate, was very much alive.
+
+"Mr. Senator Burton? Glad to see you, sir! What can we do for you?" The
+words fell with a cheering, refreshing sound on the Senator's ears, though
+the speaker went on a trifle less cordially, "We are simply overwhelmed
+with business just now! You can imagine--but no, no one could imagine, the
+length, the breadth, the scope of what people think to be our duties in an
+Exhibition Year!"
+
+The distinguished visitor and his daughter were being shown into the
+Consul's own pleasant study. Now this spacious, comfortable apartment is
+hung with fine engravings of the White House and of the Capitol, and
+Senator Burton felt a thrill of yearning as well as of pride when he gazed
+at these familiar, stately buildings which looked so homelike and dear when
+seen amid alien surroundings.
+
+And as he sat down, and prepared to state his business, there suddenly came
+over this kindly American a curious feeling of misgiving, of self-rebuke.
+Had he remained at home in Washington, content with all his familiar duties
+and pleasures, he would never have been brought into this association with
+a strange, unpleasant life-story.
+
+But he soon shook off this feeling of misgiving, and as the curious tale he
+had to tell was being listened to, kindly and patiently, he felt glad
+indeed that he had at last found a fellow-countryman in whom to confide,
+and on whose advice he could rely.
+
+But when Senator Burton had finished speaking, the American Consul shook
+his head. "I only wish we could help you!" he exclaimed. "But we can do
+nothing where a British subject is concerned. We've quite enough to do
+looking after those of our own people who disappear in Paris! Would you be
+surprised to learn, Mr. Senator, that four of our countrymen have
+completely vanished within the last two days?" And as Daisy uttered a
+little exclamation of incredulous dismay, "Don't feel so badly about it, my
+dear young lady, I quite expect all four of them to turn up again, after
+having given us and their friends a great deal of useless,
+expensive worry."
+
+"What I really want," said the Senator earnestly, "is not your official
+assistance, but a word of practical advice. What is it this unfortunate
+young lady, Mrs. Dampier, ought to do? We've tried the Commissaire de
+Police of the quarter, and he's perfectly useless: in fact my son, who's
+seen him twice, doesn't believe a word he says."
+
+The Consul gave what Senator Burton felt to be a very French shrug of the
+shoulders.
+
+"That don't surprise me! As regards the lower branch of the service the
+police here is very understaffed. The only thing for you to do is to take
+this poor lady to the British Consulate. They are driven to death there,
+just as we are here, and they'll naturally snatch at any excuse to avoid an
+extra job. But of course if this Mrs. Dampier is, as you say, a British
+subject--well, they're bound to do something for her. But you may believe
+me when I say, Mr. Senator, that there's probably nothing really mysterious
+about the case. You may find this Mr. Dampier at the hotel when you return
+there. It may interest you to learn"--he hesitated, and glanced at his
+young countrywoman--"that among our countrymen who vanish, I mean in a
+temporary way, there are more married men than bachelors."
+
+And with that enigmatic pronouncement the genial Consul courteously and
+smilingly dismissed Senator Burton and his daughter.
+
+The same afternoon saw the Senator and Mrs. Dampier on their way to the
+British Consulate.
+
+The day before Nancy had been unwilling to leave the hotel for even the
+shortest space of time, now she seemed sunk into apathetic despair--and
+yet, as they drove along together, the Senator still doubted, still
+wondered in the depths of his heart, whether the lovely young woman now
+sitting silent by his side, was not making a fool of him, as she had
+certainly done of his two children.
+
+He caught himself again and again thinking of her as "Nancy;" already his
+daughter and she were on Christian-name terms with one another; and as for
+Gerald, he had put everything else aside to devote himself entirely to
+solving the mystery of John Dampier's disappearance.
+
+At last they reached the British Consulate, and the American could not help
+feeling a thrill of pride as he mentally compared the Office where he had
+been that morning and that which represented, in this shabby side street,
+the commercial might and weight of the British Empire.
+
+The waiting-room into which they were shown was a gloomy apartment looking
+on to an inner courtyard, and Senator Burton's card did not produce the
+magic effect it had done at the American Consulate; in fact he and his
+companion had to take their turn with a crowd of other people, and the time
+they were kept waiting seemed very long.
+
+At last, however, they were ushered into the study of the courteous Briton
+whose difficult and sometimes exasperating duty it is to look after the
+rights and interests of the motley world composed of those Englishmen and
+Englishwomen who make a short or long sojourn in Paris. Once they were in
+his presence nothing could have been kinder and more considerate than the
+British Consul's reception of the American Senator and his companion.
+
+In the Consular branch of the Diplomatic Service the post of Consul in the
+greater cities of the civilised world is almost invariably given to an
+ex-member of the Diplomatic Corps--to one, that is, who is a shrewd man of
+the world rather than a trained business official, and Senator Burton felt
+it to be a comfort indeed to deal with such a one rather than with an acute
+but probably conventionally-minded man of commercial experience.
+
+The Consul was moved by Mrs. Dampier's youth, her beauty, her evident, if
+subdued bewilderment and distress. She told her story very clearly and
+simply, but to the Senator's excited and yes, it must be admitted,
+suspicious fancy, she seemed to slur over, as of no importance, the
+extraordinary discrepancy between her own and the Poulains' account of what
+had happened on the night of her own and her husband's arrival in Paris.
+
+The Consul asked but few questions, but those were pertinent and to the
+point.
+
+"I am glad, Mrs. Dampier, that you did not come to me yesterday," he said
+at last, "for, thanks, as I understand, to this gentleman, you have done
+everything which I should have had to advise you to do."
+
+He then turned more particularly to his American visitor:--"I suppose you
+have now quite convinced yourself that no kind of street accident befell
+Mr. Dampier yesterday morning?"
+
+The Senator shook his head dubiously; there was a look of hesitation, of
+unease, on his face.
+
+"Perhaps it would be as well," said the Consul suavely, "for Mrs. Dampier
+to go and wait awhile in the next room. Then you and I, Mr. Senator, might
+go into the matter more thoroughly?"
+
+Unsuspiciously Nancy Dampier fell in with the plan.
+
+And then, at last, Senator Burton was able to open out his heart, and, as
+the British Consul listened to the American's version of all that had taken
+place, when he realised how entirely the story of this young lady, who
+called herself Mrs. Dampier, was uncorroborated, his face became graver
+and graver.
+
+"From the little opportunity I have had of judging, she impresses me as
+being a truthful woman," he said musingly. "Still, what I now know puts a
+very different complexion on the story as told me just now by her."
+
+"That is exactly what I feel," said the Senator sighing. "From something
+you said just now I gather that you have heard of this Mr. John Dampier?"
+
+"Why, yes, indeed I have--I know his name as being that of a distinguished
+English artist living in Paris; but he has never troubled me individually,
+and I can answer for it that he is very little known to our colony here. He
+evidently lives only amongst the French painters and their set--which means
+that to all intents and purposes he has become a Frenchman!" The Consul
+shrugged his shoulders--racial prejudice dies hard.
+
+He looked doubtfully at his visitor:--"You see, Mr. Senator, if this lady's
+tale is true, if the poor little woman is a three weeks' bride, Mr.
+Dampier's disappearance may mean a good many things, any one of which is
+bound to cause her pain and distress. I do not think it likely that there
+has been any kind of foul play. If, as Mrs. Dampier asserts, he had neither
+money nor jewels in his possession, we may dismiss that possibility from
+our minds."
+
+"If anything of that sort has happened--I mean, if there has been foul
+play," said Senator Burton firmly, "then I would stake my life that neither
+of the Poulains are in any way associated with it."
+
+"Quite so. Still, as Mrs. Dampier has appealed to me very properly for
+help, these hotel people--if they are as worthy as you believe them to
+be--will not mind consenting to an informal interrogatory from one of my
+clerks. I have here a sharp young fellow who knows English as well as he
+does French. I'll send him back with you. He can take down the Poulains'
+story, even cross-examine them in a friendly manner. Mrs. Dampier might
+also give him her version of what took place."
+
+Senator Burton uttered a hesitating assent. He knew only too well that the
+Poulains would greatly resent the proposed interrogatory.
+
+"One word more, Mr. Senator. If there is no news of this Mr. John Dampier
+by to-morrow, you must persuade Mrs. Dampier to write, or even to telegraph
+for her friends. For one thing, it isn't at all fair that all this trouble
+should fall on an entire stranger, on one not even her own countryman! I
+cannot help seeing, too, that you do not altogether believe in Mrs. Dampier
+and her story. You can't make up your mind--is not that so?"
+
+The American Senator nodded, rather shamefacedly.
+
+"I might advise you to go to the Prefecture de Police, nay, I might
+communicate with them myself, but I feel that in the interests of this
+young lady it would be better to go slow. Mr. Dampier may return as
+suddenly, as unexpectedly, as he went. And then he would not thank us, my
+dear sir, for having done anything to turn the Paris Police searchlight on
+his private life."
+
+The Consul got up and held out his hand. "For your sake, as well as for
+that of my countrywoman, I hope most sincerely that you will find Mr.
+Dampier safe and sound when you get back to the Hotel Saint Ange. But if
+the mystery still endures to-morrow, then you really must persuade this
+poor young lady to send for one of her relatives--preferably, I need hardly
+say, a man."
+
+"At what time shall I expect your clerk?" asked Senator Burton. "I think I
+ought to prepare the Poulains."
+
+"No, there I think you're wrong! Far better let him go back with you now,
+and hear what they have to say. Let him also get a properly signed
+statement from Mrs. Dampier. Then he can come back here and type out his
+report and her statement for reference. That can do no harm, and may in the
+future be of value."
+
+He accompanied the American Senator to the door. "I wish I could help you
+more," he said cordially. "Believe me, I appreciate more than I can say
+your extraordinary kindness to my 'subject.' I shall, of course, be glad to
+know how you get on. But oh, if you knew how busy we are just now! When I
+think of how we are regarded--of how I read, only the other day, that a
+Consul is the sort of good fellow one likes to make comfortable in a nice
+little place--I wish the man who wrote that could have my 'nice little
+place' for a week, during an Exhibition Year! I think he would soon change
+his mind."
+
+Mrs. Dampier was not present at the, to Senator Burton, odious half-hour
+which followed their return to the Hotel Saint Ange.
+
+At first the French hotel-keeper and his wife refused to say anything to
+the Consular official. Then, when they were finally persuaded to answer his
+questions, they did so as curtly and disagreeably as possible. Madame
+Poulain also made a great effort to prevent her nephew, young Jules, from
+being brought into the matter. But to her wrath and bitter consternation,
+he, as well as her husband and herself, was made to submit to a regular
+examination and cross-examination as to what had followed Mrs. Dampier's
+arrival at the Hotel Saint Ange.
+
+"Why don't you send for the police?" she cried at last. "We should be only
+too glad to lay all the facts before them!"
+
+And as the young Frenchman, after his further interview with Nancy, was
+being speeded on his way by the Senator, "I'm blessed if I know what to
+believe!" he observed with a wink. "It's the queerest story I've ever come
+across; and as for the Poulains, it's the first time I've ever known French
+people to say they would like to see the police brought into their private
+affairs! One would swear that all the parties concerned were telling the
+truth, but I thought that boy, those people's nephew, did know something
+more than he said."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+The third morning brought no news of the missing man, and Senator Burton,
+noting Gerald's and Daisy's preoccupied, anxious faces, began to wonder if
+his life would ever flow in pleasant, normal channels again.
+
+The son and daughter whom he held so dear, whose habitual companionship was
+so agreeable to him, were now wholly absorbed in Mrs. Dampier and her
+affairs. They could think of nothing else, and, when they were alone with
+their father, they talked of nothing else.
+
+The Senator remembered with special soreness what had happened the
+afternoon before, just after he had dismissed the clerk of the British
+Consul. Feeling an eager wish to forget, as far as might be for a little
+while, the mysterious business in which they were all so untowardly
+concerned, he had suggested to Daisy that they might go and spend a quiet
+hour in the Art section of the Exhibition. But to his great discomfiture,
+his daughter had turned on him with a look of scorn, almost of contempt:
+
+"Father! Do you mean me to go out and leave poor little Nancy alone in her
+dreadful suspense and grief--just that I may enjoy myself?"
+
+And the Senator had felt ashamed of his selfishness. Yes, it had been most
+unfeeling of him to want to go and gaze on some of the few masterpieces
+American connoisseurs have left in Europe, while this tragedy--for he
+realised that whatever the truth might be it was a tragedy--was still
+in being.
+
+It was good to know that thanks to the British Consul's word of advice his
+way, to-day, was now clear. The time had come when he must advise Mrs.
+Dampier to send for some member of her family. Without giving his children
+an inkling of what he was about to say to their new friend, Senator Burton
+requested Nancy, in the presence of the two others, to come down into the
+garden of the Hotel Saint Ange in order that they might discuss the
+situation.
+
+As they crossed the sun-flecked cheerful courtyard Nancy pressed
+unconsciously nearer her companion, and averted her eyes from the kitchen
+window where the hotel-keeper and his wife seemed to spend so much of their
+spare time, gazing forth on their domain, watching with uneasy suspicion
+all those who came and went from the Burtons' apartments.
+
+As the young Englishwoman passed through into the peaceful garden whose
+charm and old-world sweetness had been one of the lures which had drawn
+John Dampier to what was now to her a fatal place, she felt a sensation of
+terrible desolation come over her, the more so that she was now half
+conscious that Senator Burton, great as was his kindness, kept his judgment
+in suspense.
+
+They sat down on a wooden bench, and for awhile neither spoke. "Have you
+found out anything?" she asked at last in a low voice. "I think by your
+manner that you have found out something, Mr. Burton--something you don't
+wish to say to me before the two others?"
+
+He looked at her, surprised. "No," he said sincerely, "that is not so at
+all. I have found out nothing, Mrs. Dampier--would that I had! But I feel
+it only right to tell you that the moment has come when you should
+communicate with your friends. The British Consul told me that if we were
+still without news, still in suspense, this morning, he would strongly
+advise that you send for someone to join you in Paris. Surely you have some
+near relation who would come to you?"
+
+Nancy shook her head. "No. I daresay it may seem strange to you, Senator
+Burton, but I have no near relations at all. I was the only child of a
+father and mother who, in their turn, were only children. I have some very
+distant cousins, a tribe of acquaintances, a few very kind friends--" her
+lips quivered "but no one--no one of whom I feel I could ask that sort
+of favour."
+
+Senator Burton glanced at her in dismay. She looked very wan and fragile
+sitting there; whatever the truth, he could not but feel deeply sorry
+for her.
+
+Suddenly she turned to him, and an expression of relief came over her sad
+eyes and mouth. "There is someone, Mr. Burton, someone I ought to have
+thought of before! There is a certain Mr. Stephens who was my father's
+friend as well as his solicitor; and he has always managed all my money
+matters. I'll write and ask Mr. Stephens if he can come to me. He was more
+than kind at the time of my marriage, though I'm afraid that he and Jack
+didn't get on very well together."
+
+She looked up in Senator Burton's face with a bewildered, pleading look,
+and he suddenly realised how difficult a task such a letter would be to
+her, supposing, that is, that the story she told, the story in which even
+now the Senator only half believed--were true.
+
+"I'll go up and write the letter now," she said, and together they both
+went, once more, indoors.
+
+But Gerald Burton, when he heard of the proposed letter to Mrs. Dampier's
+lawyer, made an abrupt suggestion which both the Senator and Nancy welcomed
+with eagerness.
+
+"Why shouldn't we telephone to this Mr. Stephens?" he asked. "That would
+save a day, and it would be far easier to explain to him all that has
+happened by word of mouth than in a letter--" He turned to Nancy, and his
+voice unconsciously softened: "If you will trust me, I will explain the
+situation to your friend, Mrs. Dampier."
+
+The father and son's drive to the Central Paris-London-Telephone office was
+curiously silent, though both the older and the younger man felt full of
+unwonted excitement.
+
+"Now, at last, I am on the track of the truth!" such was the Senator's
+secret thought. But he would not have been very much surprised had no such
+name as that of Davies P. Stephens, Solicitor, 58 Lincoln's Inn Fields,
+appeared in the London Telephone Directory. But yes, there the name was,
+and Gerald showed it to his father with a gleam of triumph.
+
+"You will want patience--a good deal of patience," said the attendant
+mournfully.
+
+Gerald Burton smiled. He was quite used to long-distance telephoning at
+home. "All right!" he said cheerily. "I've plenty of patience!"
+
+But though the young man claimed to have plenty of patience he felt far too
+excited, far too strung up and full of suspense, for the due exercise of
+that difficult virtue.
+
+The real reason why he had suggested this telephone message, instead of a
+letter or a telegram, was that he longed for his father's suspicions to be
+set at rest.
+
+Gerald Burton resented keenly, far more keenly than did his sister, the
+Senator's lack of belief in Nancy Dampier's story. He himself would have
+staked his life on the truthfulness of this woman whom he had only known
+three days.
+
+At last the sharp, insistent note of the telephone bell rang out, and he
+stept up into the call-box.
+
+"Mr. Stephens' office?" He spoke questioningly: and after what seemed a
+long pause the answer came, muffled but audible. "Yes, yes! This is Mr.
+Stephens' office. Who is it wants us from Paris?" The question was put in a
+Cockney voice, and the London twang seemed exaggerated by its transmission
+over those miles and miles of wire by land, under the sea, and then by
+land again.
+
+"I want to speak to Mr. Stephens himself," said Gerald Burton very
+distinctly.
+
+"Mr. Stephens? Yes, he's here all right. I'll take a message."
+
+"Make him come himself."
+
+"Yes, he's here. Give me your message--" the words were again a little
+muffled.
+
+"I can't send a message. You must fetch him." Gerald Burton's stock of
+patience was giving way. Again there was an irritating pause, but it was
+broken at last.
+
+"Who is it? I can't fetch him if you won't say who you are."
+
+"I am speaking on behalf of Mrs. Dampier," said Gerald reluctantly. Somehow
+he hated uttering Nancy's name to this tiresome unknown.
+
+And then began an absurd interchange of words at cross purposes.
+
+"Mr. Larkspur?"
+
+"No," said Gerald. "Mrs. Dampier."
+
+"Yes," said the clerk. "Yes, I quite understand. L. for London--"
+
+Gerald lost his temper--"D. for damn!" he shouted, "Dampier."
+
+And then, at last, with a shrill laugh that sounded strange and eerie, the
+clerk repeated, "Dampier--Mr. John Dampier? Yes, sir. What can we do
+for you?"
+
+"Mrs. Dampier!"
+
+"Mrs. Dampier? Yes, sir. I'll fetch Mr. Stephens." The clerk's voice had
+altered; it had become respectful, politely enquiring.
+
+And at last with intense relief, Gerald Burton heard a low clear, incisive
+voice uttering the words: "Is that Mrs. Dampier herself speaking?"
+
+Instinctively Gerald's own voice lowered. "No, I am speaking for Mrs.
+Dampier."
+
+The English lawyer's voice hardened, or so it seemed to the young American.
+It became many degrees colder. "I beg your pardon, Mr. Dampier. Yes? What
+can I do for you?"
+
+And as Gerald, taken oddly aback by the unseen man's very natural mistake,
+did not answer for a moment or two:
+
+"Nothing wrong with Nancy, I hope?"
+
+The anxious question sounded very, very clear.
+
+"There is something very wrong with Mrs. Dampier--can you hear me clearly?"
+
+"Yes, yes What is wrong with her?"
+
+"Mrs. Dampier is in great trouble. Mr. Dampier has disappeared."
+
+The strange thing which had happened was told in those four words, but
+Gerald Burton naturally went on to explain, or rather to try to explain,
+the extraordinary situation which had arisen, to Nancy's lawyer and friend.
+
+Mr. Stephens did not waste any time in exclamations of surprise or pity.
+Once he had grasped the main facts, his words were few and to the point.
+
+"Tell Mrs. Dampier," he said, speaking very distinctly, "that if she has no
+news of her husband by Friday I will come myself to Paris. I cannot do so
+before. Meanwhile, I strongly advise that she, or preferably you for her,
+communicate with the police--try and see the Prefect of Police himself. I
+myself once obtained much courteous help from the Paris Prefect of Police."
+
+Gerald stept down from the stuffy, dark telephone box. He turned to the
+attendant:--"How much do I owe you?" he asked briefly.
+
+"A hundred and twenty francs, Monsieur," said the man suavely.
+
+The Senator drew near. "That was an expensive suggestion of yours, Gerald,"
+he observed smiling, as the other put down six gold pieces. And then he
+said, "Well?"
+
+"Well, father, there's not much to tell. This Mr. Stephens will come over
+on Friday if there's still no news of Mr. Dampier by then. He wants us to
+go to the Prefecture of Police. He says we ought to try and get at the
+Prefect of Police himself."
+
+There came a long pause: the two were walking along a crowded street.
+Suddenly Gerald stopped and turned to the Senator. "Father," he said
+impulsively, "I suppose that now, at last, you do believe Mrs.
+Dampier's story?"
+
+The young man spoke with a vehemence and depth of feeling which disturbed
+his father. What a good thing it was that this English lawyer was coming to
+relieve them all from a weight and anxiety which was becoming, to the
+Senator himself, if not to the two younger people, quite intolerable.
+
+"Well," he said at last, "I am of course glad to know that everything, so
+far, goes to prove that Mrs. Dampier's account of herself is true."
+
+"That being so, don't you think the Hotel Saint Ange ought to be searched?"
+
+"Searched?" repeated Senator Burton slowly. "Searched for what?"
+
+"If I had charge of this business--I mean sole charge--the first thing I
+would do would be to have the Hotel Saint Ange searched from top to
+bottom!" said Gerald vehemently.
+
+"Is that Mrs. Dampier's suggestion?"
+
+"No, father, it's mine. I had a talk with that boy Jules last night, and
+I'm convinced he's lying. There's another thing I should like to do. I
+should like to go to the office of the 'New York Herald' and enlist the
+editor's help. I would have done it long ago if this man Dampier had been
+an American."
+
+"And you would have done a very foolish thing, my boy." The Senator spoke
+with more dry decision than was his wont. "Come, come, Gerald, you and I
+mustn't quarrel over this affair! Let us think of the immediate thing to
+do." He put his hand on his son's arm.
+
+"Yes, father?"
+
+"I suppose that the first thing to do is to take this Mr. Stephens'
+advice?"
+
+"Why, of course, father! Will you, or shall I, go to the Prefecture of
+Police?"
+
+"Well, Gerald, I have bethought myself of that courteous President of the
+French Senate who wrote me such a pleasant note when we first arrived in
+Paris this time. No doubt he would give me a personal introduction to the
+Prefect of Police."
+
+"Why, father, that's a first rate idea! Hadn't you better go right now and
+get it?"
+
+"Yes, perhaps I had; and meanwhile you can tell the poor little woman that
+her friend will be here on Friday."
+
+"Yes, I will. And father? May I tell Daisy that now you agree with me about
+Mrs. Dampier--that you no longer believe the Poulains' story?"
+
+"No," said Senator Burton a little sternly. "You are to say nothing of the
+sort, Gerald. I have only known this girl three days--I have known the
+Poulains nine years. Of course it's a great relief to me to learn that Mrs.
+Dampier's account of herself is true--so far as you've been able to
+ascertain such a fact in a few minutes' conversation with an unknown man
+over the telephone--but that does not affect my good opinion of the
+Poulains."
+
+And on this the father and son parted, for the first time in their joint
+lives, seriously at odds the one with the other.
+
+"Give you an introduction to our Prefect of Police? Why, certainly!"
+
+The white-haired President of the French Senate looked curiously at the
+American gentleman who had sought him out at the early hour of
+eleven o'clock.
+
+"You will find Monsieur Beaucourt a charming man," he went on. "I hear
+nothing but good of the way he does his very difficult work. He is a type
+to whom you are used in America, my dear Senator, but whom we perhaps too
+often lack in France among those who govern us. Monsieur Beaucourt is a
+strong man--a man who takes his own line and sticks to it. I was told only
+the other day that crime had greatly diminished in our city since he became
+Prefect. He is thoroughly trusted by his subordinates, and you can imagine
+what that means when one remembers that our beautiful Paris is the resort
+of all the international rogues of Europe. And if they tease us by their
+presence at ordinary times, you can imagine what it is like during an
+Exhibition Year!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+In all French public offices there is a strange mingling of the sordid and
+of the magnificent.
+
+The Paris Prefecture of Police is a huge, quadrangular building, containing
+an infinity of bare, and to tell the truth, shabby, airless rooms; yet when
+Senator Burton had handed in his card and the note from the President of
+the French Senate, he was taken rapidly down a long corridor, and ushered
+into a splendid apartment, of which the walls were hung with red velvet,
+and which might have been a reception room in an Italian Palace rather than
+the study of a French police official.
+
+"Monsieur le Prefet will be back from dejeuner in a few minutes," said the
+man, softly closing the door.
+
+The Senator looked round him with a feeling of keen interest and curiosity.
+After the weary, baffling hours of fruitless effort in which he had spent
+the last three days, it was more than pleasant to find himself at the
+fountainhead of reliable information.
+
+Since the far-off days when, as a boy, he had been thrilled by the
+brilliant detective stories of which French writers, with the one
+outstanding exception of Poe, then had a monopoly, there had never faded
+from Senator Burton's mind that first vivid impression of the power, the
+might, the keen intelligence, and yes, of the unscrupulousness, of the
+Paris police.
+
+But now, having penetrated into the inner shrine of this awe-inspiring
+organism, he naturally preferred to think of the secret autocratic powers,
+and of the almost uncanny insight of those to whom he was about to make
+appeal. Surely they would soon probe the mystery of John Dampier's
+disappearance.
+
+The door opened suddenly, and the Paris Prefect of Police walked into the
+room. He was holding Senator Burton's card, and the letter of introduction
+with which that card had been accompanied, in his sinewy nervous
+looking hand.
+
+Bowing, smiling, apologising with more earnestness than was necessary for
+the few moments the American Senator had had to await his presence, the
+Prefect motioned his guest to a chair.
+
+"I am very pleased," he said in courtly tones, "to put myself at the
+disposal of a member of the American Senate. Ah, sir, your country is a
+wonderful country! In a sense, the parent of France--for was not America
+the first great nation to become a Republic?"
+
+Senator Burton bowed, a little awkwardly, in response to this flowery
+sentiment.
+
+He was telling himself that Monsieur Beaucourt was quite unlike the picture
+he had mentally formed, from youth upwards, of the Paris Prefect of Police.
+
+There was nothing formidable, nothing for the matter of that in the least
+awe-inspiring, about this tired, amiable-looking man. The Prefect was also
+lacking in the alert, authoritative manner which the layman all the world
+over is apt to associate with the word "police."
+
+Monsieur Beaucourt sat down behind his ornate buhl writing-table, and
+shooting out his right hand he pressed an electric bell.
+
+With startling suddenness, a panel disappeared noiselessly into the red
+velvet draped wall, and in the aperture so formed a good-looking young man
+stood smiling.
+
+"My secretary, Monsieur le Senateur--my secretary, who is also my nephew."
+
+The Senator rose and bowed.
+
+"Andre? Please say that I am not to be disturbed till this gentleman's
+visit is concluded." The young man nodded: and then he withdrew as quickly,
+as silently, as he had appeared; and the panel slipped noiselessly back
+behind him.
+
+"And now tell me exactly what it is that you wish me to do for you," said
+the Prefect, with a weary sigh, which was, however, softened by a pleasant
+smile. "We are not as omnipotent as our enemies make us out to be, but
+still we can do a good deal, and we could do a good deal more were it not
+for the Press! Ah, Monsieur le Senateur, that is the only thing I do not
+like about your great country. Your American Press sets so bad, so very
+bad, an example to our poor old world!"
+
+A thin streak of colour came into Monsieur Beaucourt's cheek, a gleam of
+anger sparkled in his grey eyes.
+
+"Yes, greatly owing to the bad example set in America, and of late in
+England too, quite a number of misguided people nowadays go to the Press
+before they come to us for redress! All too soon," he shook a warning
+finger, "they find they have entered a mouse-trap from which escape is
+impossible. They rattle at the bars--but no, they are caught fast! Once
+they have brought those indefatigable, those indiscreet reporters on the
+scene, it is too late to draw back. They find all their most private
+affairs dragged into the light of day, and even we can do very little for
+them then!"
+
+Senator Burton nodded gravely. He wished his son were there to hear these
+words.
+
+"And now let us return to our muttons," said the Prefect leaning forward.
+"I understand from the President of the Senate that you require my help in
+a rather delicate and mysterious matter."
+
+"I do not know that the matter is particularly delicate, though it is
+certainly mysterious," and then Senator Burton explained, in as few and
+clear words as possible, the business which had brought him there--the
+disappearance, three days before, of the English artist, John Dampier, and
+of the present sad plight of Dampier's wife.
+
+Monsieur Beaucourt threw himself back in his chair. His face lit up, it
+lost its expression of apathetic fatigue; and his first quick questions
+showed him a keen and clever cross-examiner.
+
+At once he seized on the real mystery, and that though the Senator had not
+made more of it than he could help. That was the discrepancy in the account
+given by the Poulains and by Mrs. Dampier respectively as to the lady's
+arrival at the hotel.
+
+But even Monsieur Beaucourt failed to elicit the fact that Senator Burton's
+acquaintance with Mrs. Dampier was of such short standing. He assumed that
+she was a friend of the Burton family, and the Senator allowed the
+assumption to go by default.
+
+"The story you have told me," the Prefect said at last, "is a very curious
+story, Monsieur le Senateur. But here we come across stranger things every
+day. Still, certain details make the disappearance of this English
+gentleman rather stranger than usual. I gather that the vanished man's wife
+is a charming person?"
+
+"Extremely charming!" said the Senator quickly. "And I should say quite
+truthful--in fact this discrepancy between her account and that of the
+Poulains has worried and perplexed me very much."
+
+"Do not let that worry you," said the other thoughtfully. "If this young
+lady, your friend, be telling the truth, it is very probable that the
+Poulains began to lie in the hope of avoiding trouble for themselves:
+having lied they found themselves obliged to stick to their story. You see
+just now our hotel-keepers are coining gold, and they do not like this very
+pleasant occupation of theirs interrupted, for even the best of reasons. If
+this gentleman left the hotel the same night that he arrived there--as I
+can see you yourself are inclined to believe, Monsieur le Senateur--then
+you may be sure that the hotel people, even if they did see him for a few
+moments, would not care to admit that they had done so. I therefore advise
+that we put them and their account of what took place out of our minds.
+From what you tell me, you have already done what I may call the
+usual things?"
+
+"Yes," said Senator Burton frankly. "My son and I have done everything
+which common sense could suggest to us. Thus we at once gave a description
+of the missing man to the police station of the quarter where both the
+Hotel Saint Ange and Mr. Dampier's studio are situated. But, owing
+doubtless to the fact that all your officials are just now very busy and
+very overworked, we did not get quite as much attention paid to the case as
+I should have liked. I do not feel quite sure even now that the missing man
+did not meet with a street accident."
+
+"I can ascertain that for you in a moment."
+
+Again the Prefect pressed a pedal. A panel, and this time a different panel
+from the first, slid back, and again the secretary appeared.
+
+Monsieur Beaucourt said a brief word or two, and a few moments later a
+tabulated list, written in round-hand, lay before him.
+
+"Here are all the accidents which have occurred in Paris during the last
+ninety hours."
+
+He ran his eyes down the list; and then, rising, handed the sheets to
+Senator Burton.
+
+"I think this disposes of the idea that an accident may have befallen your
+friend in the streets," said the Prefect briefly.
+
+And the Senator, handing back the list, acknowledged that this was so.
+
+"May I ask if you know much of the habits and way of life of this vanished
+bridegroom?" asked the Prefect thoughtfully. "I understand he belongs to
+the British Colony here."
+
+"Mr. Dampier was not my friend," said the Senator hurriedly. "It is Mrs.
+Dampier--"
+
+"Ah, yes--I understand--the three weeks' bride? It is she you know. Well,
+Monsieur le Senateur, the best thing you and I can do is to look at the
+artist's dossier. That is quite likely to provide us with a useful clue."
+
+The Senator felt a thrill of anticipatory interest. All his life he had
+heard of the dossiers kept by the Paris police, of how every dweller in the
+great city, however famous, however obscure, had a record in which the most
+intimate details of their lives were set down in black and white. Somehow
+he had never quite believed in these French police dossiers.
+
+"Surely you are not likely to have a dossier of Mr. Dampier?" he exclaimed,
+"he is a British subject, and, as far as I know, a perfectly
+respectable man."
+
+The Prefect smiled. "The mere fact that he is an English subject living in
+Paris entitles him to a dossier. In fact everybody who is anybody in any
+kind of society, from that frequented by the Apaches to that of the
+Faubourg Saint Germain, has a dossier. And from what you tell me this
+artist, who won a Salon medal, and who has already had a distinguished
+career as a painter, is certainly 'somebody.' Now, please tell me exactly
+the way to spell his surname and his Christian name. English names are so
+perplexing."
+
+Very clearly the Senator spelt out--first the word "John" and then the word
+"Dampier."
+
+And as, under his dictation, the Prefect of Police wrote the two
+distinctive names of the missing man, there came a look of frowning
+perplexity and indecision over his face.
+
+"It's an odd thing," he muttered, "but I seem to have heard that name quite
+lately, and in some strange connection! Now what could it have been? As you
+probably know, Monsieur le Senateur, there is a French form of that name,
+Dampierre. But no--it is that John which puzzles me--I am quite sure that I
+have heard the name 'John Dampier' quite recently."
+
+"Isn't it likely," suggested the Senator, "that the man's disappearance has
+been reported to you? My son and I have done everything in our power to
+make the fact known, and Mr. Dampier's name and particulars as to his
+appearance have been at the Morgue since yesterday."
+
+"Well, that's possible, of course. Just now my poor head has to hold far
+more than it was ever meant to do. The presence of so many royal personages
+in Paris always means extra trouble for me--especially when they are here
+'incognito.' By the way, it would amuse, perhaps shock you, to see the
+dossiers of some of these Princes and Grand Dukes! But these are, of
+course, kept very secret. Meanwhile, I must not forget Mr. John Dampier."
+
+This time the Prefect did not ring his bell. Instead he blew down a tube.
+"You would scarcely believe it," he said, looking up suddenly, "but these
+tubes have only just been installed! I had a regular battle over the matter
+with the Treasury. But now that the battle is won, I forget half the time
+that the tube is there! Picot? Please send me the dossier of an
+artist-painter called John Dampier," he spelt the names. "English subject;
+living in Impasse des Nonnes. I have an impression that we have had that
+name before us during the last week or so--Have you any recollection
+of it?"
+
+He put the tube to his ear.
+
+And then the American Senator, looking at the Paris Prefect of Police, was
+struck by a sudden change which came over the listener's face. There
+gathered on Monsieur Beaucourt's features a look of quick surprise,
+followed--yes, unmistakably--by a frown of dismay.
+
+Putting his free hand over the tube, he withdrew it from his ear and
+applied it to his lips. "Yes, yes," he said rapidly, "enough, enough! I
+quite understand. It is, as you say, very natural that I should have
+forgotten."
+
+And then he looked quickly across at the Senator. "You are right, Monsieur
+le Senateur: Mr. Dampier's name was put before me only yesterday as that of
+an Englishman who had disappeared from his hotel. But I took him to be a
+passing visitor. You know quite a number of the tourists brought by the
+Exhibition disappear, sometimes for two or three days--sometimes--well, for
+ever! That, of course, means they have left Paris suddenly, having got into
+what the English call a 'scrape.' In such a case a man generally thinks it
+better to go home--wiser if sadder than when he came."
+
+There followed a pause.
+
+"Well, Monsieur le Senateur," said the Prefect, rising from his chair. "You
+may rest assured that I will do everything that is in my power to find
+your friend."
+
+"But the dossier?" exclaimed Senator Burton. "I thought, Monsieur le
+Prefet, that I was to see Mr. Dampier's dossier?"
+
+"Oh, to be sure--yes! I beg your pardon."
+
+Again he whistled down the tube. "Picot?" he exclaimed, "I still require
+that dossier! Why am I kept waiting in this way?"
+
+He listened for a few moments to what his invisible subordinate had to say,
+and then again he spoke down the funnel, and with a certain pettish
+impatience. "The last entry is of no importance--understand me--no
+importance at all! The gentleman for whose benefit I require the dossier
+already knows of this Mr. Dampier's disappearance."
+
+A moment later a clerk knocked at the door, and appeared with a blue
+envelope which he laid with a deep bow on the Prefect's table.
+
+It was not a very large envelope, and yet Senator Burton was surprised at
+its size, and at the number of slips of paper the Prefect of Police
+withdrew from it.
+
+"I do not suppose, Monsieur le Senateur, that you have ever seen one of our
+dossiers--in fact I may tell you that very few people outside this building
+ever do see one. By the way, a great deal of nonsense is talked about them.
+Roughly speaking, a dossier is not a history of the individual in question;
+it simply records what is being said of him. For instance, the day that I
+became Prefect of Police my dossier was brought to me--"
+
+He smiled wearily.
+
+"Your dossier?" repeated the Senator in amazement.
+
+"Yes, my dossier. I have had it bound, and I keep it as a curiosity.
+Everything that had ever been written about me in the days when I was a
+Member of the Chamber of Deputies is there. And what really made me feel
+angry was the fact that I had been confused with more than one of my
+namesakes, in fact certain misdeeds that these worthy folk had committed
+were actually registered in my dossier!"
+
+He stopped speaking for a moment, and took up the blue envelope.
+
+"But now let us consider this Mr. John Dampier. You will see that he bears
+the number '16909,' and that his envelope is blue. Had this gentleman ever
+had anything to do with the police, were he, to put it plainly, of the
+criminal class, this envelope would be yellow. As for the white envelopes,
+they, Monsieur le Senateur, have to deal with a very different sort of
+individual. We class them briefly under the general word 'Morals.'"
+
+As he spoke the Prefect was looking swiftly through the Dampier dossier,
+and not till he had glanced at every item did he hand the envelope to his
+American visitor.
+
+Senator Burton could not but admire the intelligent way the dossier had
+been prepared, and kept up to date.
+
+On the top sheet were carefully gummed various entries from the
+biographical dictionaries in which mention was made of John Dampier and his
+career. There followed a eulogistic newspaper article containing an account
+of the picture which had won the artist his Medaille d'Honneur at the Salon
+two years before. Then came a piece of foolscap headed "General remarks,"
+and here were written the following words:--"Lives quietly; is popular with
+his fellow artists; has few debts; does not frequent the British Colony."
+
+The Senator looked up quickly. "Well, there is not much to learn from
+this!" he said. And then, "I notice, Monsieur le Prefet, that there was
+another entry which has been removed."
+
+"Yes," said the Prefect. "That last entry was only added the day before
+yesterday, and told of Monsieur Dampier's disappearance. It is being
+written up now, Monsieur le Senateur, with a note explaining your kind
+interest in him, and telling of your visit to-day."
+
+Senator Burton rose from his chair. He could not have told exactly why, but
+he had the impression that his courteous host had suddenly become anxious
+to get rid of him.
+
+But this impression was evidently erroneous. Even after they had cordially
+shaken hands, the Prefect of Police seemed in no hurry to let him go.
+
+"One moment, Monsieur le Senateur?" he looked earnestly into the American's
+frank face. "I feel bound to tell you that I am convinced there is more in
+this mysterious disappearance than appears on the surface. I fear--I
+greatly fear--that this Mr. Dampier has vanished of his own free will," he
+spoke with evident reluctance, "and that his poor young wife will never see
+him again. As I think I said before, the public, especially the vulgar,
+ignorant public, credit us with powers we are far from possessing. It is
+possible that this gentleman does not care for the trammels of married
+life, and that his bride, however charming she may be, has disappointed
+him. Such cases are commoner than you might think possible, especially
+among English and American people. You, in your country, if you will
+forgive my saying so, marry with such reckless haste; and that often means
+repenting at bitter leisure." The Prefect's voice lowered, a look of real
+distress came over his face. "Ah! what tales I could tell you--what fearful
+domestic tragedies have been confided to me here, within these four walls!
+No doubt for an artist this Mr. John Dampier was a very good fellow--what
+in England they call 'respectable enough.' But still, think what painters
+are like! Think of how Bohemian, how careless is their life, compared with
+that of the man who has a regular occupation--" Monsieur de Beaucourt shook
+his head gloomily--"In most of these stories of sudden disappearance there
+is no crime, as the relations are so apt to think there is. No, Monsieur le
+Senateur, there is simply--a woman! Sometimes it is a new friend--but far
+oftener it is an old friend."
+
+There was a pause. "God forbid," said the Prefect suddenly, "that I should
+accuse this unfortunate man of anything heinous! But--but, Monsieur le
+Senateur? You must have learnt through our Press, through those of our
+newspapers which delight in dragging family scandals to light, the amazing
+story of Count Breville."
+
+The Senator was impressed, in spite of himself, by the other's manner.
+
+"I don't remember the name," he said thoughtfully.
+
+"Count Breville," said the Prefect slowly, "was a man of deservedly high
+reputation, in fact one of the pillars of the Royalist party. He had a wife
+who adored him, a large family whom he adored, and they all lived an
+idyllic country life. Well, one day the Count's coat, his hat, his
+pocket-book (which was known to have been full of bank-notes, but which was
+now empty) were found on the parapet of a bridge near his chateau. It was
+given out--it was believed that a dastardly crime had been committed. And
+then, by a mere accident, it was brought to my notice--for there was
+nothing in the Count's dossier which could have led me to suspect such a
+thing--that a charming governess who had been in the employment of his
+Countess for some four or five years had suddenly left to join her family
+in the New World, and that her travelling companion was strangely like her
+late employer!"
+
+"Yes," said Senator Burton uncomfortably, "I think I do remember something
+of that story now."
+
+"All the world was let into the secret," said the Prefect regretfully, "for
+the family had confided, from the first, in the Press. They thought--what
+did they not think, poor, foolish people? Among other things they actually
+believed that the Count had been murdered for political reasons. But no,
+the explanation was far more simple. That high-minded man, that Christian
+gentleman, this father of charming children whom he apparently adored, had
+gone off under a false name, leaving everything that was dear to him,
+including his large fortune, to throw in his lot with the governess!"
+
+The Prefect came closer to Senator Burton. He even lowered his voice. "I
+had the Countess here, Monsieur le Senateur, in this room. Oh, what a
+touching, what a moving interview! The poor woman was only anxious to have
+back her husband with no questions asked, with no cruel reminders. And now
+he is back--a broken man. But had he been an artist, Monsieur le Senateur,
+would the Count have been traced? Of course not! Would he have returned?
+No, indeed! The Prefect of Police can do many things, Monsieur le Senateur,
+but as I said just now, he cannot force an unwilling husband back to his
+wife, especially if that husband has already crossed the frontier. Come,
+Monsieur le Senateur, confess that some such explanation of Mr. Dampier's
+disappearance has already occurred to you?"
+
+"Well," said Senator Burton slowly, "I confess that some such thought has
+crossed my mind. But in that case what a tragic fate for the poor
+young wife!"
+
+"Bah! Do you know the saying:--'Widowhood is the Marshal's baton every
+woman carries in her knapsack!'"
+
+Senator Burton could not help smiling. Then he grew very grave. "But Mrs.
+Dampier, in the case you suppose, would not be a widow, Monsieur le Prefet:
+she would be neither maid, wife, nor widow."
+
+The Prefect looked surprised. "Ah yes! The English divorce laws are very
+conservative. But I suppose in the end such a marriage would be annulled?"
+
+"I suppose so," said Senator Burton indifferently.
+
+"I wish I could help you more," said the Prefect solicitously. He really
+wished he could, for he liked his kindly visitor. "Can you suggest anything
+that we could do to help you?"
+
+"Yes," said the Senator frankly. "My son, Monsieur le Prefet, has not the
+same trust in the hotel-keeper, Poulain, that I feel. Neither, I am bound
+to tell you, has Mrs. Dampier. I think it would be a relief to the poor
+young lady, if the hotel could be searched for some trace of Mr. Dampier's
+sojourn there. You see Mrs. Dampier is convinced--or seems to be--that her
+husband spent a night there."
+
+"Nothing is easier than to have the place searched," said the Prefect
+quickly. "I will arrange for it to be done to-morrow morning at eleven.
+Perhaps you, Monsieur le Senateur, will inform the hotel people that a
+Perquisition is about to take place."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+As he walked away from the Prefecture of Police, Senator Burton told
+himself that the French were certainly a curiously casual people.
+
+How strange that the Prefect should have asked him to break the news of
+what was to happen at eleven o'clock the next morning to the Poulains! In
+America--and he supposed in England also--the hotel-keeper would have
+received a formal notification of the fact that his house was about to be
+searched, or, in the case that foul play was suspected, no warning at all.
+But here, in Paris, it was thought enough to entrust a stranger with a
+message concerning so serious a matter.
+
+Of everything that had happened in connection with this extraordinary
+Dampier affair, perhaps this having to tell the Poulains that their hotel
+was to be searched was the most disagreeable and painful thing of all to
+their American friend and kindly client.
+
+The Senator was now very sorry, that, in deference to his son's wish, he
+had made such a suggestion.
+
+On his return to the hotel he was surprised to find a woman he had never
+seen before installed in Madame Poulain's kitchen. Still, the presence of
+the stranger brought a sense of reprieve.
+
+He, Senator Angus Burton, the distinguished politician whom most of those
+of his fellow-countrymen whose opinion mattered would have said to be a
+particularly fearless man, dreaded the task of telling Madame Poulain that
+a Perquisition was about to take place in her house.
+
+He lifted his hat. "Is Madame Poulain out?"
+
+"She won't be long, monsieur; she and her husband have had to absent
+themselves for a little hour."
+
+"Are they both out?" asked the Senator. He had never in his long knowledge
+of the Hotel Saint Ange known such a thing to happen--that both the
+Poulains should be out together.
+
+"Yes, monsieur. They have had to take that nephew of theirs, young Jules,
+off to the station. They are sending him to the country. He's in a sad
+state--he does nothing but cry, poor lad! I suppose he's in love--I've
+known it take young men that way." The woman smiled, smiled as a certain
+type of person usually does smile when giving disagreeable or unpleasant
+news. "It is very awkward for the Poulains to lose the lad just now, for
+they are very busy. I have no doubt--" she tossed her head--"that Jules has
+been working too hard; the Poulains are foolish not to have more help from
+outside. I came in just to oblige Madame Poulain while she and her husband
+accompanied Jules to the station. But I also am busy. I have my own work to
+attend to just as much as anybody else; and my three children are all
+working at the Exhibition."
+
+The Senator left the eager gossip, and began walking round the courtyard.
+He felt quite wretched. Jules, at no time a very intelligent lad, had
+evidently been terrified out of his wits by the questionings and the
+cross-questionings to which he had been subjected.
+
+And then--and then--no doubt Gerald was in a measure also responsible for
+the lad's state! Senator Burton had been very much annoyed when his son had
+told him of what had happened the night before--of how he had accused the
+Poulains' nephew of lying--of knowing something of the Dampier affair....
+
+He was just about to go upstairs when he saw Monsieur and Madame Poulain
+emerging from the porte cochere. They both looked tired, hot, and
+dispirited.
+
+He walked forward to meet them.
+
+"I am very sorry to hear this news about Jules," he began quickly. "I hope
+you are not really anxious about him?"
+
+Madame Poulain stared at him fixedly, reproachfully. "It is all this
+affair," she said with a heavy sigh. "If it had only been the police, our
+own police, we should not have minded, Monsieur le Senateur--we are honest
+people--we have nothing to fear from the police," she lifted her head
+proudly. "But when it came to that impudent young man--"
+
+For a moment the Senator was at a loss--then he suddenly remembered:--"You
+mean the gentleman attached to the British Consulate?" he said
+uncomfortably. And as she nodded her head, "But surely it was quite
+reasonable that he should come and ask those questions. You must remember
+that both Mr. and Mrs. Dampier are English people. They have a right to the
+protection and help of their Consulate."
+
+"I do not say to the contrary, monsieur. I am only telling you the truth,
+namely that that English lawyer--for lawyer I suppose he was--terrified
+Jules. And had it not been that I and my husband are conscious of--of our
+innocence, Monsieur le Senateur, he would have terrified us also. Then your
+son attacked Jules too. Surely the matter might have been left to the
+police--our own excellent police."
+
+"I am glad you feel as you do about the police," said the Senator
+earnestly, "for as a matter of fact the Prefect of Police, whom I have just
+been consulting about Mr. Dampier's disappearance, suggests that the Hotel
+Saint Ange be searched."
+
+"Searched?" exclaimed Monsieur Poulain, staring at the Senator.
+
+"Searched?" shrieked Madame Poulain indignantly.
+
+"Yes," said Senator Burton quietly, and trying to speak as if a police
+Perquisition of a respectable hotel was the most ordinary thing in the
+world. "They are sending their men at eleven to-morrow morning. Let me add
+that they and Mrs. Dampier are most eager to study your convenience in
+every way. They would doubtless choose another time should eleven o'clock
+be inconvenient to you."
+
+Madame Poulain was now speechless with indignation, and yes, with surprise.
+When at last she did speak, her voice trembled with pain and anger.
+
+"To think," she said, turning to her husband, and taking for the moment no
+notice of her American client--"to think that you and I, Poulain, after
+having lived here for twenty-one years and a half, should have our hotel
+searched by the police--as if it were the resort of brigands!" She turned
+to the Senator, and quietly, not without a measure of dignity, went
+on:--"And to think that it is you, Monsieur le Senateur, who we have always
+thought one of our best patrons, who have brought this indignity upon us!"
+
+"I am very, very sorry for all the trouble you are having about this
+affair," said Senator Burton earnestly. "And Madame Poulain? I want to
+assure you how entirely I have always believed your statement concerning
+this strange business."
+
+"If that is so then why all this--this trouble, Monsieur le Senateur?"
+Husband and wife spoke simultaneously.
+
+"I wonder," exclaimed the Senator, "that you can ask me such a question! I
+quite admit that the first twenty-four hours I knew nothing of this
+unfortunate young woman whose cause I championed. But now, Madame Poulain,
+I have learnt that all she told me of herself is true. Remember she has
+never faltered in the statement that she came here accompanied by her
+husband. I, as you know," he lowered his voice, "suppose that in so
+thinking she is suffering from a delusion. But you cannot expect my view to
+be shared by those who know her well and who are strangers to you. As I
+told you only this morning, we hope that towards the end of this week Mrs.
+Dampier's lawyer will arrive from England."
+
+"But what will happen then?" cried Madame Poulain, throwing up her hands
+with an excited, passionate gesture. "When will this persecution come to an
+end? We have done everything we could; we have submitted to odious
+interrogatories, first from one and then from the other--and now our hotel
+is to be searched! None of our other clients, and remember the hotel is
+full, Monsieur le Senateur, have a suspicion of what is going on, but any
+moment the affair may become public, and then--then our hotel might empty
+in a day! Oh, Monsieur le Senateur"--she clasped her hands together--"If
+you refuse to think of us, think of our child, think of poor little
+Virginie!"
+
+"Come, come, Madame Poulain!"
+
+The Senator turned to the good woman's husband, but Poulain's usually
+placid face bore a look of lowering rage. The mention of his idolised
+daughter had roused his distress as well as anger.
+
+"Now, Poulain, do tell your wife that there is really nothing to worry
+about. The police speak of you both in the very highest terms! As to the
+search that will take place to-morrow, it is the merest formality."
+
+"I hope, monsieur, that you will do us the honour of being present," said
+Madame Poulain quickly. "We have nothing to hide, and we should far prefer
+you to be there."
+
+"If such is your wish I will certainly be present," said Senator Burton
+gravely.
+
+And then, as he walked away to the escalier d'honneur, he told himself that
+on the whole the poor Poulains had taken his disagreeable piece of news
+very well. Gerald was not showing his usual sense over this business: he
+had let his sympathies run away with him. But the Senator loved his son all
+the better for his chivalrous interest in poor Mrs. Dampier. It wasn't
+every young man who would have put everything aside in the way of interest,
+of amusement, and of pleasure in such a city as Paris, for the sake of an
+entire stranger.
+
+As to Gerald's view of the Poulains, that again was natural. He didn't know
+these people with the same kindly knowledge the Senator and Daisy had of
+them. Gerald had been at college, and later working hard in the office of
+America's greatest living architect, at the time the Senator and his
+daughter had spent a whole winter at the Hotel Saint Ange.
+
+It was natural that the young man should take Mrs. Dampier's word instead
+of the hotel-keepers'. But even so, how extraordinary was the utter
+divergence between the two accounts of what had happened!
+
+For the hundredth time Senator Burton asked himself where the truth lay.
+
+A sad change had come over Nancy Dampier in the three long days. She could
+not sleep, and they had to force her to eat. The interrogatories to which
+she had had to submit, first from one and then from another, had worn her
+out. When going over her story with the Consular official, she had suddenly
+faltered, and putting her hand to her head with a bewildered gesture, "I
+can't remember," she had said, looking round piteously at the Senator, "I
+can't remember!"
+
+And he asked himself now whether those three words did not embody more of
+the truth than the poor girl would admit. Had she ever really remembered
+what had happened on that first evening of her arrival in Paris?
+
+Such were Senator Burton's disconnected and troubled thoughts as, leaving
+the perturbed hotel-keepers, he slowly went to join his children and
+their guest.
+
+To his relief, neither Daisy nor Nancy were in the salon, and his thoughts
+were pleasantly forced into another channel, for on the table lay a cable
+from some people called Hamworth, Mr. Hamworth was one of the Senator's
+oldest friends: also there was a pretty clever daughter who had always
+shown a rather special liking for Gerald....
+
+The Hamworths were arriving in Paris at ten the next morning, and they
+asked the Senator and his children to join them at lunch at Bignon's.
+
+Mingling with a natural pleasure at the thought of seeing old friends, and
+of getting away from all this painful business for a short time, was added
+a secret satisfaction at the thought that he would thus escape being
+present at the search of the Hotel Saint Ange.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+"I suppose we ought to start in about half an hour," said the Senator
+genially. They were sitting, he and Gerald, at breakfast.
+
+Madame Poulain, with the adaptability of her kind--the adaptability which
+makes the French innkeeper the best in the world, always served a real
+"American breakfast" in the Burtons' salon.
+
+As his son made no answer to his remark, he went on, "I should like to be
+at the station a few minutes before the Hamworths' train is due."
+
+Senator Burton was sorry, very, very sorry indeed, that there was still no
+news of the missing man, on this third morning of Dampier's disappearance.
+But he could not help feeling glad that poor little Mrs. Dampier had stayed
+in bed; thanks to that fact he and his children were having breakfast
+together, in the old, comfortable way.
+
+The Senator felt happier than he had felt for some time. What a comfort it
+would be, even to Gerald and to Daisy, to forget for a moment this strange,
+painful affair, and to spend three or four hours with old friends!
+
+Gerald looked up. "I'm not coming, father. You will have to make my
+apologies to the Hamworths. Of course I should have liked to see them. But
+Mrs. Dampier has asked me to be present at the search. Someone ought, of
+course, to be there to represent her." He jerked the words out with a touch
+of defiance in his voice.
+
+"I'm sorry she did that," said the Senator coldly. "And I think, Gerald,
+you should have consulted me before consenting to do so. You see, our
+position with regard to the Poulains is a delicate one--"
+
+"Delicate?" repeated Gerald quickly. "How do you mean, father?"
+
+"We have known these people a long while. It is fifteen years, Gerald,
+since I first came to this hotel with your dear mother. I have received
+nothing but kindness from Madame Poulain, and I am very, very sorry that
+she now associates us in her mind with this painful business."
+
+"All I can say is, sir, that I do not share your sorrow."
+
+The Senator looked up quickly. This was the first time--yes, the very first
+time that Gerald had ever spoken to him with that touch of sarcasm--some
+would have said impertinence--which sits so ill on the young, at any rate
+in the view of the old. Perhaps Gerald repented of his rude, hasty words,
+for it was in a very different tone that he went on:--
+
+"You see, father, I believe the whole of Mrs. Dampier's story, and you only
+believe a part. If I shared your view I should think very ill of her
+indeed. But you, father (I don't quite know how you do it) manage to like
+and respect her, and to believe the Poulains as well!"
+
+"Yes," said the Senator slowly, "that is so, Gerald. I believe that the
+Poulains are telling the truth, and that this poor young woman thinks she
+is telling the truth--two very different things, my boy, as you will find
+out by the time you know as much of human nature as I now do. When you have
+lived as long as I have lived in the world, you will know that many people
+have an extraordinary power of persuading themselves of that which
+is not--"
+
+"But why--" asked Gerald eagerly,--"why should Mrs. Dampier wish to prove
+that her husband accompanied her here if he did nothing of the kind?"
+
+And then just as he asked the question which the Senator would not have
+found it very easy to answer, Daisy came into the room.
+
+"I have persuaded Mrs. Dampier to stay in bed till the search is over.
+She's just worn out, poor little dear: I shall be glad when this Mr.
+Stephens has arrived--she evidently has the greatest faith in him."
+
+"I shall be glad too," said the Senator slowly: how glad he would be
+neither of his children knew or guessed. "And now, Daisy, I hope you won't
+be long in getting ready to start for the station. I should be sorry indeed
+if the Hamworths' train came in before we reached there."
+
+"Father! Surely you don't want me to leave Nancy this morning of all
+mornings? She ought not to be alone while the search is going on. She
+wanted to be actually present at it, didn't she, Gerald?"
+
+The young man nodded. "Yes, but Daisy and I persuaded her that that was not
+necessary, that I would be there for her. It seems that Mr. Dampier had a
+very large portmanteau with him. She is sure that the Poulains have got it
+hidden away."
+
+"She has told Gerald exactly what it is like," chimed in Daisy.
+
+The Senator looked from one to the other: he felt both helpless and
+indignant. "The Hamworths are among the oldest friends we have in the
+world," he exclaimed. "Surely one of you will come with me? I'm not asking
+you to leave Mrs. Dampier for long, Daisy."
+
+But Daisy shook her head decidedly. "I'd rather not, father--I don't feel
+as if I wanted to see the Hamworths at all just now. I'm sure that when you
+explain everything to them, they will understand."
+
+Utterly discomfited and disappointed, and feeling for the first time really
+angry with poor Nancy Dampier, Senator Burton took his departure for the
+station, alone.
+
+Perquisition?
+
+To the French imagination there is something terrifying in the very word.
+And this justifiable terror is a national tradition. To thousands of honest
+folk a Perquisition was an ever present fear through the old Regime, and
+this fear became acute terror in the Revolution. Then a search warrant
+meant almost certainly subsequent arrest, imprisonment, and death.
+
+Even nowadays every Frenchman is aware that at any moment, and sometimes on
+the most frivolous pretext, his house may be searched, his most private
+papers ransacked, and every member of his household submitted to a sharp,
+informal interrogation, while he stands helpless by, bearing the outrage
+with what grace he may.
+
+Gerald Burton, much as he now disliked and suspected Monsieur and Madame
+Poulain, could not but feel sorry for them when he saw the manner in which
+those hitherto respectable and self-respecting folk were treated by the
+Police Agent who, with two subordinates, had been entrusted with the task
+of searching the Hotel Saint Ange.
+
+The American was also surprised to see the eagerness with which the
+Poulains had welcomed his presence at their unpleasant ordeal.
+
+"Thank you for coming, Monsieur Gerald; but where is Monsieur le Senateur?"
+asked Madame Poulain feverishly. "He promised--he absolutely promised us
+that he would be here this morning!"
+
+"My father has had to go out," said Gerald courteously, "but I am here to
+represent both him and Mrs. Dampier."
+
+A heavy frown gathered over the landlady's face. "Ah!" she muttered, "it
+was a dark day for us when we allowed that lady to enter our hotel!"
+
+Gerald, putting a strong restraint on his tongue, remained silent, but a
+moment later, as if in answer to his feeling of exasperation and anger, he
+heard the Police Agent's voice raised in sarcastic wrath. "I must ask you
+to produce the plan before I begin my Perquisition."
+
+"But, monsieur," exclaimed the hotel-keeper piteously, "I cannot give you a
+plan of our hotel! How should we have such a thing? The house is said to be
+three hundred years old. We have even been told it should be classed as an
+Historical Monument!"
+
+"Every hotel-keeper is bound to have a plan of his hotel," said the Agent
+roughly. "And I shall report you for not complying with the law. If a plan
+of the Hotel Saint Ange did not exist, it was your duty to have one made at
+your own expense."
+
+"Bien, bien, monsieur! It shall be done," said Poulain resignedly.
+
+"To have a Perquisition without a plan is a farce!" said the man, this time
+addressing Gerald Burton. "An absolute farce! In such an old house as this
+there may be many secret hiding-places."
+
+"There are no secret hiding-places in our hotel," screamed Madame Poulain
+angrily. "We have no objection at all to being inspected in the greatest
+detail. But I must warn you, gentlemen, that your job will take some time
+to carry through."
+
+The Police Agent shrugged his shoulders disagreeably. "Come along," he said
+sharply. "Let us begin at once! We would like to start by seeing your own
+rooms, madame."
+
+Gerald Burton began to feel very uncomfortable. Under pleasanter, more
+normal circumstances he would have thoroughly enjoyed a long exhaustive
+inspection of a house which had probably been remodelled, early in the
+eighteenth century, on the site of a mediaeval building.
+
+For the first time since he had begun to study with a view to excelling in
+the profession he had himself chosen, he had forgotten his work--the work
+he so much enjoyed--for three whole days. This Perquisition brought some of
+the old interest back. As an architect he could not but be interested and
+stimulated by this intimate inspection of what had been a magnificent
+specimen of a French town mansion.
+
+When the search party reached the bed-chamber of the hotel-keeper and his
+wife Gerald Burton drew back, but Madame Poulain gave him a smart tap on
+the arm. "Go in, go in!" she said tartly, but he saw there were tears in
+her eyes. "We have nothing to hide, Monsieur Gerald! This is my room of
+memories; the room where our beloved Virginie was born. Little did I think
+it would ever be dishonoured by the presence of the police!"
+
+Gerald, thus objurgated, walked through into a large room, low-ceilinged as
+are all rooms situated on the entresol floor of a Paris house.
+
+Over the bed hung Madame Poulain's wedding wreath of artificial orange
+blossoms in a round glass case. Photographs of the beloved Virginie taken
+at various stages of her life, from infancy to girlhood, were the sole
+other adornment of the room, and formed an odd contrast to the delicately
+carved frames of the old dim mirrors let into grey panelled walls.
+
+"What have we here?" cried the Police Agent tapping one of the panels which
+formed the wall opposite the door and the fireplace.
+
+"It is a way through into our daughter's room," said Poulain sullenly, and
+opening what appeared to be a cupboard door.
+
+The American took an eager step forward.
+
+This must be the place in which, according to Nancy's account, John Dampier
+had stood concealed during that eventful moment when he, Gerald, and his
+sister Daisy, had stood looking into the tiny room.
+
+Yes, two or three people might well stand hidden in this deep recess, for
+the cupboard was almost as large as the smaller of the two apartments of
+which it formed the connecting link.
+
+The Police Agent, following young Burton, stepped down into Virginie's
+room:--his voice softened:--"A very charming room," he said, "this little
+nest of mademoiselle your daughter!"
+
+"We had to cut a window out of the wall," observed Madame Poulain, "When we
+first came here this was a blind closet where the aristocrats, it seems,
+used to powder their hair--silly creatures that they were! As if anyone
+would like to be white before their time!"
+
+"We had better go up this staircase," said the Police Agent, passing out of
+Mademoiselle Poulain's room.
+
+And the six of them all filed up the narrow staircase, glancing into many a
+curious, strange little apartment on the way.
+
+Every inch of space had been utilised in view of the business the
+Exhibition rush had brought the Poulains. Still, even on the upper floors,
+Gerald Burton noticed that there remained intact many beautiful suites of
+apartments now divided and let out as single rooms.
+
+Not a word had been said of the coming Perquisition to those staying in the
+hotel. But Madame Poulain, by some means best known to herself, had managed
+to get rid of them all for the morning. And it was well that she had done
+so, for in more than one case the Police Agent and his men lifted the lid
+of travelling trunks, unhesitatingly pulled out drawers, and flung open the
+doors of hanging cupboards.
+
+Gerald Burton was in turn amused, interested, and disgusted. The glimpses
+which this search revealed into other people's lives seemed dishonourable,
+and instinctively he withdrew his gaze and strove to see as little
+as possible.
+
+Having thoroughly examined all the street side of the Hotel Saint Ange, the
+three police emissaries started their investigations on the other side of
+the quadrangle, that which gave on the courtyard and on the garden.
+
+When the party came round to the rooms occupied by Senator Burton and his
+family, Madame Poulain came forward, and touched the Police Agent on the
+arm:--"The lady who imagines that we have made away with her husband is
+here," she whispered. "You had better knock at the door, and then walk
+straight in. She will not be pleased--perhaps she will scream--English
+people are so prudish when they are in bed! But never mind what she says or
+does: there is no reason why her room should not be searched as well as
+that of everybody else."
+
+But the woman's vengeful wish was to remain ungratified.
+
+Nancy Dampier had dressed, and with Daisy's help she had even made her bed.
+The Police Agent--Gerald Burton was deeply grateful to him for it--treated
+her with consideration and respect.
+
+"C'est bien! C'est bien! madame," he said, just glancing round the room,
+and making a quick sign to his men that their presence was not
+required there.
+
+At last the weary party, for by that time they were all very weary, reached
+the top floor of the Hotel Saint Ange.
+
+Here were rough garrets, oppressively hot on a day like this, but each and
+all obviously serving some absent client of the hotel as temporary
+dwelling-place.
+
+Madame Poulain looked quite exhausted. "I think," she said plaintively, "I
+will remain here, monsieur, at the end of the passage. You will find every
+door unlocked. Perhaps we ought to tell you that these rooms are not as a
+rule inhabited, or indeed used by us in any way. That must excuse their
+present condition. But in a season like this--well, dame! we could fill
+every cranny twice over!"
+
+Gerald and the three Frenchmen walked along the corridor, the latter
+flinging open door after door of the curious cell-like little bedrooms
+furnished for the most part with only an iron bed, a couple of chairs, and
+the usual walnut-wood wardrobe.
+
+"What's this?" asked one of the men sharply. "We find a door plastered up
+here, Monsieur Poulain."
+
+But it was Madame Poulain who came languidly forward from the end of the
+passage. "Yes," she said. "If you wish to see that room you will have to
+get a ladder and climb up from the outside. A young Breton priest died here
+last January from scarlet fever, monsieur--" she lowered her voice
+instinctively--"and the sanitary authorities forced us to block up the room
+in this way--most unfortunately for us."
+
+"It is strange," said the man, "that the seal of the sanitary authorities
+is not affixed to the door."
+
+"To tell you the truth," said Madame Poulain uncomfortably, "the seal was
+there, but I removed it. You see, monsieur, it would not have been
+pleasant, even when all danger of infection was gone, to say anything to
+our other clients about so sad an event."
+
+The man nodded his head, and went on.
+
+But the incident made a disagreeable impression on Gerald Burton. And when
+they all finally came down to the courtyard, the Police Agents being by
+this time on far better terms with Monsieur and Madame Poulain than they
+had been at the beginning--on such good terms indeed that they were more
+than willing to attack the refreshments the hotel-keeper had made ready for
+them--he drew the head Agent aside.
+
+"There was one thing," he said, "which rather troubled me--"
+
+The man looked at him attentively. "Yes, monsieur?" He realised that this
+young man, whom he took for an Englishman, had been present on behalf of
+the people at whose request the Perquisition had been ordered. He was
+therefore inclined to treat him with civility.
+
+"I mean that closed room on the top floor," said Gerald hesitatingly. "Is
+there no way of ascertaining whether Madame Poulain's story is
+true--whether, that is, the room was ever condemned by the sanitary
+authorities?"
+
+"Yes," said the Agent, "nothing is easier, monsieur, than to find that
+out."
+
+He took a note-book out of his pocket, tore out a sheet, and wrote a few
+lines on it. Then he called one of his subordinates to him and said a few
+words of which Gerald caught the sense. It was an order to go to the office
+of the sanitary inspector of the district and bring back an answer at once.
+
+In a quarter of an hour the man was back.
+
+"The answer is 'Yes,'" he said a little breathlessly, and he handed his
+chief a large sheet of paper, headed:
+
+    VILLE DE PARIS,
+    Sanitary Inspector's Department.
+
+    In answer to your question, I have to report that we did condemn a room
+    in the Hotel Saint Ange for cause of infectious disease.
+
+The Police Agent handed it to Gerald Burton. "I felt sure that in that
+matter," he observed, "Madame Poulain was telling the truth. But, of
+course, a Perquisition in a house of this kind is a mere farce, without a
+plan to guide us. Think of the strange winding passages along which we were
+led, of the blind rooms, of the deep cupboards into which we peeped! For
+all we can tell, several apartments may have entirely escaped our
+knowledge."
+
+"Do you make many of these Perquisitions?" asked Gerald curiously.
+
+"No, monsieur. We are very seldom asked to search a whole house. Almost
+always we have some indication as to the special room or rooms which are to
+be investigated. In fact since I became attached to the police, six years
+ago, this is the first time I have ever had to carry out a thorough
+Perquisition," he laughed a little ruefully, "and it makes one dry!"
+
+Gerald Burton took the hint. He put a twenty-franc piece into the man's
+hand. "For you and your men," he said. "Go and get a good lunch: I am sure
+you need it."
+
+The Police Agent thanked him cordially. "One word, monsieur? Perhaps I
+ought to tell you that we of the police are quite sure that the gentleman
+about whom you are anxious left this hotel--if indeed he was ever in it.
+The Poulains bear a very good character--better than that of many
+hotel-keepers of whom I could tell you--better than that of certain
+hotel-keepers who own grand international hotels the other side of the
+river. Of course I had to be rough with them at first--one has to keep up
+one's character, you know. But, monsieur? I was told confidentially that
+this Perquisition would probably lead to nothing, and, as you see, it has
+led to nothing."
+
+Gerald sighed, rather wearily, for he too was tired, he too would be glad
+of his luncheon. Yes, this search had been, as the Police Agent hinted,
+something of a farce after all, and he had led not only himself, but, what
+he regretted far more, poor Nancy Dampier down a blind alley.
+
+He found her waiting, feverishly eager and anxious to hear the result of
+the Perquisition. When the door of the salon opened, she got up and turned
+to him, a strained look on her face.
+
+"Well?" she said. "Well, Mr. Burton?"
+
+He shook his head despondently. "We found nothing, absolutely nothing which
+could connect your husband with any one of the rooms which we searched,
+Mrs. Dampier. If, after leaving you, he did spend the night in the Hotel
+Saint Ange, the Poulains have obliterated every trace of his presence."
+
+She gave a low cry of pain, of bitter disappointment, and suddenly sinking
+down into a chair, buried her head in her hands--"I can't bear it," she
+wailed. "I only want to know the truth, whatever the truth may be! Anything
+would be better than what I am going through now."
+
+Gerald Burton came and stood by the bowed figure. He became curiously pale
+with that clear, not unhealthy, pallor which is induced by exceptional
+intensity of feeling.
+
+"Mrs. Dampier?" he said, in a very low voice.
+
+She lifted her head and looked at him fixedly.
+
+"Everything that a man can do I will do to find your husband. If I fail to
+find him living I will find him dead."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+But it is far easier to form such a resolution and to make such a promise
+as that which Gerald Burton had made to Nancy Dampier than it is to
+carry it out.
+
+The officials of the Prefecture of Police grew well accustomed to the sight
+of the tall, good-looking young American coming and going in their midst,
+and they all showed a sympathetic interest in his quest. But though the
+police officials were lavish in kindly words, and in permits and passes
+which he found an open sesame to the various places where it was just
+conceivable that John Dampier, after having met with some kind of accident,
+might have been carried, they were apparently quite unable to elucidate the
+growing mystery of the English artist's disappearance.
+
+Early on the Friday morning Gerald Burton telephoned to Nancy Dampier's
+friend and lawyer the fact that they were still entirely without any clue
+to the whereabouts of the missing man. And, true to his word, Mr. Stephens
+arrived in Paris that same evening.
+
+He found his poor young client awaiting him in the company of the new
+friends to whom she owed so deep a debt of gratitude, and this lessened, to
+a certain extent, the awkwardness of their meeting. Even so, the shrewd,
+kindly Englishman felt much shocked and distressed by the change which had
+taken place in Nancy.
+
+Just a month ago he had seen her standing, most radiant as well as
+prettiest of brides, by her proud husband's side. Perhaps because she had
+had so lonely a girlhood there had been no tears at Nancy Tremain's
+wedding, and when he had put her in the carriage which was to be the first
+little stage of her honeymoon, she had whispered, "Mr. Stephens? I feel as
+if I was going home." And the lawyer had known all that the dear, to her
+till then unfamiliar, word--had meant to her.
+
+And now, here she was with strangers, wan, strained and unutterably
+weary-looking; as she stood, her hand clasped in his, looking, with dumb
+anguish, up into his face, Mr. Stephens felt a thrill of intense anger
+against John Dampier. For the present, at any rate, he refused to entertain
+the theory of crime or accident. But he kept his thoughts entirely
+to himself.
+
+The irruption of any human being into a small and, for any reason, closely
+welded together set of people produces much the same effect as does the
+addition of a new product to a chemical mixture. And the arrival of the
+English lawyer affected not only Nancy herself but, in varying ways,
+Senator Burton and his son.
+
+A very few moments spent in the Englishman's company brought to the
+American Senator an immense measure of relief. For one thing, he was
+sincerely glad to know that the poor young stranger's business was about to
+pass into capable and evidently most trustworthy hands: also a rapid
+interchange of words the first time they were left alone together put an
+end, and that for ever, to Senator Burton's uneasy suspicions--suspicions
+which had persisted to the end--as to Mrs. Dampier's account of herself.
+
+Whatever else was obscure in this strange story, it was now clear that
+Nancy had told nothing but the truth concerning her short, simple past
+life. And looking back the Senator found it difficult, as a man so often
+finds it difficult when he becomes wise after an event, to justify, even to
+himself, his former attitude of distrust.
+
+As to Gerald Burton, he felt a little jealousy of the lawyer. Till the
+coming of Mr. Stephens it was to him that Mrs. Dampier had instinctively
+turned in her distress and suspense; now she naturally consulted, and
+deferred to the advice of, the older man and older friend.
+
+But Mr. Stephens was not able to do more than had already been done. He
+listened to what all those about him had to say concerning John Dampier's
+disappearance, and he carefully went over the ground already covered by
+Senator Burton and his son. He, too, saw the British Consul; he, too, was
+granted a short but cordial interview with the Prefect of Police; but not
+even to the Senator did he advance any personal theory as to what could
+account for the extraordinary occurrence.
+
+Members of the legal profession are the same all the world over. If they
+are wise men and good lawyers, they keep their own counsel.
+
+Perhaps because he himself had a son who was Gerald's age, the English
+solicitor took, from the first, a very special interest in the young
+American architect. Soon they were on excellent terms with one
+another--indeed, it was with Gerald Burton that he found he had most to do.
+The young man naturally accompanied him to all those places where the
+presence of a first-rate interpreter was likely to be useful, and Gerald
+Burton also pursued a number of independent enquiries on his own account.
+
+But nothing was of any avail; they were baffled at every turn, and soon
+this search for a vanished man became, to one of the two now so strenuously
+engaged in it, the most sinister and disturbing of the many problems with
+which he had had to deal as a trusted family lawyer.
+
+The screen of memory bears many blurred and hazy impressions on its
+surface, but now and again some special dramatic happening remains fixed
+there in a series of sharply-etched pictures in which every line has its
+retrospective meaning and value.
+
+Such was to be the case with Mr. Stephens and the curious days he spent in
+Paris seeking for John Dampier. He was there a whole week, and every
+succeeding day was packed with anxious, exciting interviews and
+expeditions, each of which it was hoped might yield some sort of clue. But
+what remained indelibly fixed on the English lawyer's screen of memory were
+three or four at the time apparently insignificant conversations which in
+no case could have done much to solve the problem he had set himself
+to solve.
+
+The first of these was a short conversation, in the middle of that busy
+week, with Nancy Dampier.
+
+After the first interview in which she had told him her version of what had
+happened the night of her own and her husband's arrival in Paris, he had
+had very little talk with her, and at no time had he expressed any opinion
+as to what could have happened to John Dampier. But at last he felt it his
+duty to try and probe a little more than he had felt it at first possible
+to do into the question of a possible motive or motives.
+
+"I'm afraid," he began, "that there's very little more to do than has been
+already done. I mean, of course, for the present. And in your place, Nancy,
+I should come back to England, and wait there for any news that may
+reach you."
+
+As she shook her head very decidedly, he went on gravely:--"I know it is
+open to you to remain in Paris; but, my dear, I cannot believe that your
+husband is in Paris. If he were, we must by now, with the help of the
+French police--the most expert in the world, remember--have come across
+traces of him, and that whether he be dead or alive."
+
+But Nancy did not take the meaning he had hoped to convey by that last
+word. On the contrary:--
+
+"Do you think," she asked, and though her lips quivered she spoke very
+quietly, "that Jack is dead, Mr. Stephens? I know that Senator Burton's son
+has come to believe that he is."
+
+"No," said the English lawyer very seriously, "no, Nancy, I do not believe
+that your husband is dead. It is clear that had he been killed or injured
+that first morning in the Paris streets we should know it by now. The
+police assert, and I have no reason to doubt them, that they have made
+every kind of enquiry. No, they, like me, believe that your husband has
+left Paris."
+
+"Left Paris?" repeated Nancy in a bewildered tone.
+
+"Yes, my dear. As to his motive in doing so--I suppose--forgive me for
+asking you such a question--I suppose that you and he were on quite
+comfortable and--well, happy terms together?"
+
+Nancy looked at him amazed--and a look of great pain and indignation
+flashed into her face.
+
+"Why of course we were!" she faltered. "Absolutely--ideally happy! You
+didn't know Jack, Mr. Stephens; you were always prejudiced against him.
+Why, he's never said--I won't say an unkind word, but a cold or indifferent
+word since our first meeting. We never even had what is called"--again her
+lips quivered--'"a lovers' quarrel.'"
+
+"Forgive me," he said earnestly. "I had to ask you. The question as to what
+kind of relations you and he were on when you arrived in Paris has been
+raised by almost every human being whom I have seen in the last few days."
+
+"How horrible! How horrible!" murmured Nancy, hiding her face in her hands.
+
+Then she raised her head, and looked straight at the lawyer:--"Tell anyone
+that asks you that," she exclaimed, "that no woman was ever made happier by
+a man than my Jack made me. We were too happy. He said so that last
+evening--he said," she ended her sentence with a sob, "that his happiness
+made him afraid--"
+
+"Did he?" questioned Mr. Stephens thoughtfully. "That was an odd thing for
+him to say, Nancy."
+
+But she took no notice of the remark. Instead she, in her turn, asked a
+question:--"Do the police think that Jack may have left me of his own
+free will?"
+
+Mr. Stephens looked extremely uncomfortable. "Well, some of them have
+thought that it is a possibility which should be kept in view."
+
+"But you do not think so?" She looked at him searchingly.
+
+The lawyer's courage failed him.
+
+"No, of course not," he said hastily, and poor little Nancy believed him.
+
+"And now," he went on quickly, relieved indeed to escape from a painful and
+difficult subject, "I, myself, must go home on Saturday. Cannot I persuade
+you to come back to England with me? My wife would be delighted if you
+would come to us--and for as long as you like."
+
+She hesitated--"No, Mr. Stephens, you are very, very kind, but I would
+rather remain on in Paris for a while. Miss Burton has asked me to stay
+with them till they leave for America. Once they are gone, if I still have
+no news, I will do what you wish. I will come back to England."
+
+The second episode, if episode it can be called, which was to remain
+vividly present in the memory of the lawyer, took place on the fifth day of
+his stay in Paris.
+
+He and Gerald had exhausted what seemed every possible line of enquiry,
+when the latter put in plain words what, in deference to his father's wish,
+he had hitherto tried to conceal from Mr. Stephens--his suspicions of
+the Poulains.
+
+"I haven't said so to you before," he began abruptly, "but I feel quite
+sure that this Mr. John Dampier is dead."
+
+He spoke the serious words in low, impressive tones, and the words, the
+positive assertion, queerly disturbed Nancy's lawyer, and that though he
+did not in the least share in his companion's view. But still he felt
+disturbed, perhaps unreasonably so considering how very little he still
+knew of the speaker. He was indeed almost as disturbed as he would have
+been had it been his own son who had suddenly put forward a wrong and
+indeed an untenable proposition.
+
+He turned and faced Gerald Burton squarely.
+
+"I cannot agree with you," he spoke with considerable energy, "and I am
+sorry you have got such a notion in your mind. I am quite sure that John
+Dampier is alive. He may be in confinement somewhere, held to
+ransom--things of that sort have happened in Paris before now. But be that
+as it may, it is my firm conviction that we shall have news of him within a
+comparatively short time. Of course I cannot help seeing what you suspect,
+namely, that there has been foul play on the part of the Poulains. But no
+other human being holds this theory but yourself. Your father--you must
+forgive me for saying so--has known these people a great deal longer than
+you have, and he tells me he would stake everything on their substantial
+integrity. And the police speak very highly of them too. Besides, in this
+world one must look for a motive--indeed, one must always look for a
+motive. But in this case no one that we know--I repeat, Mr. Burton, no one
+that we know of--had any motive for injuring Mr. Dampier."
+
+Gerald Burton looked up quickly:--"You mean by that there may be someone
+whom we do not know of who may have had a motive for spiriting him away?"
+
+Mr. Stephens nodded curtly. He had not meant to say even so much as that.
+
+"I want you to tell me," went on the young American earnestly, "exactly
+what sort of a man this John Dampier is--or was?"
+
+The lawyer took off his spectacles; he began rubbing the glasses carefully.
+
+"Well," he said at last, "that isn't a question I find it easy to answer. I
+made a certain number of enquiries about him when he became engaged to Miss
+Tremain, and I am bound to tell you, Mr. Burton, that the answers, as far
+as they went, were quite satisfactory. The gentleman in whose house the two
+met--I mean poor Nancy and Dampier--had, and has, an extremely high
+opinion of him."
+
+"Mrs. Dampier once spoke to me as if she thought you did not like her
+husband?" Gerald Burton looked straight before him as he said the words he
+felt ashamed of uttering. And yet--and yet he did so want to know the truth
+as to John Dampier!
+
+Mr. Stephens looked mildly surprised. "I don't think I ever gave her any
+reason to suppose such a thing," he said hesitatingly. "Mr. Dampier was
+eager, as all men in love are eager, to hasten on the marriage. You see,
+Mr. Burton"--he paused, and Gerald looked up quickly:--
+
+"Yes, Mr. Stephens?"
+
+"Well, to put it plainly, John Dampier was madly in love"--the speaker
+thought his companion winced, and, rather sorry than glad at the success of
+his little ruse, he hurried on:--"that being so he naturally wished to be
+married at once. But an English marriage settlement--especially when the
+lady has the money, which was the case with Miss Tremain--cannot be drawn
+up in a few days. Nancy herself was willing to assent to everything he
+wished; in fact I had to point out to her that it is impossible to get
+engaged on Monday and married on Tuesday! I suppose she thought that
+because I very properly objected to some such scheme of theirs, I disliked
+John Dampier. This was a most unreasonable conclusion, Mr. Burton!"
+
+Gerald Burton felt disappointed. He did not believe that the English lawyer
+was answering truly. He did not stay to reflect that Mr. Stephens was not
+bound to answer indiscreet questions, and that when a young man asks an
+older man whether or no he dislikes someone, and that someone is a client,
+the question is certainly indiscreet.
+
+In a small way the painful mystery was further complicated by the attitude
+of Mere Bideau. Bribes and threats were alike unavailing to make the old
+Breton woman open her mouth. She was full of suspicion; she refused to
+answer the simplest questions put to her by either Mr. Stephens or
+Gerald Burton.
+
+And the lawyer felt a moment of sharp impatience, as business men are so
+often apt to feel in their dealings with women, when, in answer to his
+remark that Mere Bideau would be brought to her knees when she found her
+supplies cut off, Nancy, with tears running down her cheeks, cried out in
+protest:--"Oh, Mr. Stephens, don't say that! I would far rather go on
+paying the old woman for ever than that she should be brought, as you say,
+to her knees. She was such a good servant to Jack: he is--he was--so
+fond of her."
+
+But Mere Bideau's attitude greatly disconcerted and annoyed the Englishman.
+He wondered if the old woman knew more than she would admit; he even
+suspected her of knowing the whereabouts of her master; the more
+impenetrable became the mystery, the less Mr. Stephens believed Dampier
+to be dead.
+
+And then, finally, on the last day of his stay in Paris something happened
+which, to the lawyer's mind, confirmed his view that John Dampier, having
+vanished of his own free will, was living and well--though he hoped not
+happy--away from the great city which had been searched, or so the police
+assured the Englishman, with a thoroughness which had never been surpassed
+if indeed it had ever been equalled.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+With Mr. Stephens' morning coffee there appeared an envelope bearing his
+name and a French stamp, as well of course as the address of the obscure
+little hotel where the Burtons had found him a room.
+
+The lawyer looked down at the envelope with great surprise. The address was
+written in a round, copybook hand, and it was clear his name must have been
+copied out of an English law list.
+
+Who in Paris could be writing to him--who, for the matter of that, knew
+where he was staying, apart from his own family and his London office?
+
+He broke the seal and saw that the sheet of notepaper he took from the
+envelope was headed "Prefecture de Police." Hitherto the police had
+addressed all their communications to the Hotel Saint Ange.
+
+The letter ran as follows:
+
+    Dear Sir,
+    I am requested by the official who has the Dampier affair in hand to
+    ask you if you will come here this afternoon at three o'clock. As I
+    shall be present and can act as interpreter, it will not be necessary
+    for you to be accompanied as you were before.
+
+    Yours faithfully,
+    Ivan Baroff.
+
+What an extraordinary thing! Up to the present time Mr. Stephens had not
+communicated with a single police official able to speak colloquial
+English; it was that fact which had made him find Gerald Burton so
+invaluable an auxiliary. But this letter might have been written by an
+Englishman, though the signature showed it to be from a foreigner, and from
+a Pole, or possibly a Russian.
+
+Were the police at last on the trail of the missing man? Mr. Stephens'
+well-regulated heart began to beat quicker at the thought. But if so, how
+strange that the Prefect of Police had not communicated with the Hotel
+Saint Ange last night! Monsieur Beaucourt had promised that the smallest
+scrap of news should be at once transmitted to John Dampier's wife.
+
+Well, there was evidently nothing for it but to wait with what patience he
+could muster till the afternoon; and it was characteristic of Nancy's legal
+friend that he said nothing of his mysterious appointment to either the
+Burtons or to Mrs. Dampier. It was useless to raise hopes which might so
+easily be disappointed.
+
+Three o'clock found Mr. Stephens at the Prefecture of Police.
+
+"Ivan Baroff" turned out to be a polished and agreeable person who at once
+frankly explained that he belonged to the International Police. Indeed
+while shaking hands with his visitor he observed pleasantly, "This is not
+the kind of work with which I have, as a rule, anything to do, but my
+colleagues have asked me to see you, Mr. Stephens, because I have lived in
+England, and am familiar with your difficult language. I wish to entertain
+you on a rather delicate matter. I am sure I may count on your discretion,
+and, may I add, your sympathy?"
+
+The English lawyer looked straight at the suave-spoken detective. What the
+devil did the man mean? "Certainly," said he, "certainly you can count on
+my discretion, Monsieur Baroff, and--and my sympathy. I hope I am not
+unreasonable in hoping that at last the police have obtained some kind of
+due to Mr. Dampier's whereabouts."
+
+"No," said the other indifferently. "That I regret to tell you is not the
+case; they are, however, prosecuting their enquiries with the greatest
+zeal--of hat you may rest assured."
+
+"So I have been told again and again," Mr. Stephens spoke rather
+impatiently. "It seems strange--I think I may say so to you who are, like
+myself, a foreigner--it seems strange, I say, that the French police, who
+are supposed to be so extraordinarily clever, should have failed to find
+even a trace of this missing man. Mr. John Dampier can't have vanished from
+the face of the earth: dead or alive, he must be somewhere!"
+
+"There is of course no proof at all that Mr. Dampier ever arrived in
+Paris," observed the detective significantly.
+
+"No, there is no actual proof that he did so," replied the English
+solicitor frankly. "There I agree! But there is ample proof that he was
+coming to Paris. And, as I suppose you know, the Paris police have
+satisfied themselves that Mr. and Mrs. Dampier stayed both in Marseilles
+and in Lyons."
+
+"Yes, I am aware of that; as also--" he checked himself. "But what I have
+to say to you to-day, my dear sir, is only indirectly concerned with Mr.
+Dampier's disappearance. I am really here to ask if you cannot exert your
+influence with the Burton family, with the American Senator, that is, and
+more particularly with his son, to behave in a reasonable manner."
+
+"I don't quite understand what you mean."
+
+"Well, it is not so very easy to explain! All I can say is that young Mr.
+Burton is making himself very officious, and very disagreeable. He has
+adopted a profession which here, at the Prefecture of Police, we naturally
+detest"--the Russian smiled, but not at all pleasantly--"I mean that of the
+amateur detective! He is determined to find Mr. Dampier--or perhaps it
+would be more true to say"--he shrugged his shoulders--"that he wishes--the
+wish perhaps being, as you so cleverly say in England, father to the
+thought--to be quite convinced of that unfortunate gentleman's obliteration
+from life. He has brought himself to believe--but perhaps he has already
+told you what he thinks--?"
+
+He waited a moment.
+
+But the English lawyer made no sign of having understood what the other
+wished to imply. "They have all talked to me," he said mildly, "Senator
+Burton, Mr. Burton, Miss Burton; every conceivable possibility has been
+discussed by us."
+
+"Indeed? Well, with so many clever people all trying together it would be
+strange if not one hit upon the truth!" The detective spoke with
+good-natured sarcasm.
+
+"Perhaps we have hit upon it," said Mr. Stephens suddenly. "What do you
+think, Monsieur Baroff?"
+
+"I do not think at all!" he said pettishly. "I am far too absorbed in my
+own tiresome job--that of keeping my young Princes and Grand Dukes out of
+scrapes--to trouble about this peculiar affair. But to return to what I was
+saying. You are of course aware that Mr. Gerald Burton is convinced, and
+very foolishly convinced (for there is not an atom of proof, or of anything
+likely to lead to proof), that this Mr. Dampier was murdered, if not by the
+Poulains, then by some friend of theirs in the Hotel Saint Ange. The
+foolish fellow has as good as said so to more than one of our officials."
+
+"I know such is Mr. Burton's theory," answered Mr. Stephens frankly, "and
+it is one very difficult to shake. In fact I may tell you that I have
+already tried to make him see the folly of the notion, and how it is almost
+certainly far from the truth."
+
+"It is not only far from the truth, it is absolutely untrue," said the
+Russian impressively. "But what I now wish to convey to the young man is
+that should he be so ill-advised as to do what he is thinking of doing he
+will make it very disagreeable for the lady in whom he takes so strangely
+violent an interest--"
+
+"What exactly do you mean, Monsieur Baroff?"
+
+"This Mr. Gerald Burton is thinking of enlisting the help of the American
+newspaper men in Paris. He wishes them to raise the question in their
+journals."
+
+"I do not think he would do that without consulting his father or me," said
+Mr. Stephens quickly. He felt dismayed by the other's manner. Monsieur
+Baroff's tone had become menacing, almost discourteous.
+
+"Should this headstrong young man do anything of that kind," went on the
+detective, "he will put an end to the efforts we are making to find Mrs.
+Dampier's husband. In fact I think I may say that if the mystery is never
+solved, it will be thanks to his headstrong folly and belief in himself."
+
+With this the disagreeable interview came to an end, and though the English
+lawyer never confided the details of this curious conversation to any
+living soul, he did make an opportunity of conveying Ivan Baroff's warning
+to Gerald Burton.
+
+"Before leaving Paris," he said earnestly, "there is one thing I want to
+impress upon you, Mr. Burton. Do not let any newspaper people get hold of
+this story; I can imagine nothing that would more distress poor Mrs.
+Dampier. She would be exposed to very odious happenings if this
+disappearance of her husband were made, in any wide sense of the word,
+public. And then I need not tell you that the Paris Police have a very
+great dislike to press publicity; they are doing their very best--of that I
+am convinced--to probe the mystery."
+
+Gerald Burton hesitated. "I should have thought," he said, "that it would
+at least be worth while to offer a reward in all the Paris papers. I find
+that such rewards are often offered in England, Mr. Stephens."
+
+"Yes--they are. And very, very seldom with any good result," answered the
+lawyer drily. "In fact all the best minds concerned with the question of
+crime have a great dislike to the reward system. Not once in a hundred
+cases is it of any use. In fact it is only valuable when it may induce a
+criminal to turn 'King's evidence.' But in this case I pray you to believe
+me when I say that we are not seeking to discover the track of any
+criminal--" in his own mind he added the words, "unless we take John
+Dampier to be one!"
+
+It was on the morning of Mr. Stephens' departure from Paris, in fact when
+he and Senator Burton, who had gone to see him off, were actually in the
+station, walking up and down the Salle des Pas Perdus, that the lawyer
+uttered the words which finally made up the American Senator's mind
+for him.
+
+"You have been so more than good to Mrs. Dampier," the Englishman said
+earnestly, "that I do not feel it would be fair, Mr. Senator, to leave you
+in ignorance of my personal conviction concerning this painful affair."
+
+The American turned and looked at his companion. "Yes?" he said with
+suppressed eagerness. "Yes, Mr. Stephens, I shall be sincerely grateful for
+your honest opinion."
+
+They had all three--he and Daisy and Gerald--tried to make this Englishman
+say what he really thought, but with a courtesy that was sometimes grave,
+sometimes smiling, Mr. Stephens had eluded their surely legitimate
+curiosity.
+
+Even now the lawyer hesitated, but at last he spoke out what he believed to
+be the truth.
+
+"It is my honest opinion that this disappearance of Mr. Dampier is painful
+rather than mysterious. I believe that poor Nancy Tremain's bridegroom,
+actuated by some motive to which we may never have the clue, made up his
+mind to disappear. When faced with responsibilities for which they have no
+mind men before now have often disappeared, Mr. Senator. Lawyers and
+doctors, if their experience extend over a good many years, come across
+stories even more extraordinary than that which has been concerning
+us now!"
+
+"I take it," said Senator Burton slowly, "that you did not form a good
+impression of this Mr. Dampier?"
+
+The lawyer again hesitated, much as he had hesitated when asked the same
+question by young Burton, but this time he answered quite truthfully.
+
+"Well, no, I did not! True, he seemed entirely indifferent as to how the
+money of his future wife was settled; indeed I could not help feeling that
+he was culpably careless about the whole matter. But even so I had one or
+two very disagreeable interviews with him. You see, Senator Burton, the man
+was madly in love; he had persuaded poor Nancy to be married at once--and
+by at once I mean within a fortnight of their engagement. He seemed
+strangely afraid of losing her, and I keenly resented this feeling on his
+part, for a more loyal little soul doesn't live. She has quite a nice
+fortune, you know, and for my part I should have liked her to marry some
+honest country gentleman in her own country--not an artist living
+in Paris."
+
+"You don't attach much importance to love, Mr. Stephens?"
+
+The lawyer laughed. "Quite enough!" he exclaimed. "Love causes more trouble
+in the world than everything else put together--at any rate it does to
+members of my profession. But to return to poor Nancy. She's a fascinating
+little creature!" He shot a quick glance at Senator Burton, but the latter
+only said cordially:--
+
+"Yes, as fascinating as she's pretty!"
+
+"Well, she had plenty of chances of making a good marriage--but no one
+touched her heart till this big, ugly fellow came along. So of course I had
+to make the best of it!" He waited a moment and then went on. "I ought to
+tell you that at my suggestion Dampier took out a large insurance policy on
+his own life: I didn't think it right that he should bring, as it were,
+nothing into settlement, the more so that Nancy had insisted, on her side,
+that all her money should go to him at her death, and that whether they had
+any children or not! You know what women are?" he shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"If that be so," observed the Senator, "then money can have had nothing to
+do with his disappearance."
+
+"I'm not so sure of that! In fact I've been wondering uneasily during the
+last few days whether, owing to his being an artist, and to his having
+lived so much abroad, John Dampier could have been foolish enough to
+suppose that in the case of his disappearance the insurance money would be
+paid over to Mrs. Dampier. That, of course, would be one important reason
+why he should wish to obliterate himself as completely as he seems to have
+done. I need hardly tell you, Mr. Senator, that the Insurance Office would
+laugh in my face if I were to try and make them pay. Why, years will have
+to elapse before our courts would even consider the probability of death."
+
+"I now understand your view," said the Senator gravely. "But even if it be
+the true solution, it does not explain the inexplicable difference between
+Mrs. Dampier's statement and that of the Poulains--I mean, their statements
+as to what happened the night Mr. and Mrs. Dampier arrived in Paris."
+
+"No," said the lawyer reluctantly. "I admit that to me this is the one
+inexplicable part of the whole story. And I also confess that as to that
+one matter I find it impossible to make up my mind. If I had not known poor
+little Nancy all her life, I should believe, knowing what women are capable
+of doing if urged thereto by pride or pain--I should believe, I say, that
+she had made up this strange story to account for her husband's having left
+her! I could tell you more than one tale of a woman having deceived not
+only her lawyer, but, later, a judge and a jury, as to such a point of
+fact. But from what I know of Mrs. Dampier she would be quite incapable of
+inventing, or perhaps what is quite as much to the purpose, of keeping up
+such a deception."
+
+"From something my daughter said," observed Senator Burton, "I think you
+have been trying to persuade the poor little lady to go back to England?"
+
+"Yes, I tried to make her come back with me to-day. And I am bound to say
+that I succeeded better than I expected to do, for though she refuses to
+come now, she does intend to do so when you yourselves leave Paris, Mr.
+Senator. Fortunately she does not know what sort of a time she will come
+back to: I fear that most of her friends will feel exactly as I feel; they
+will not believe that John Dampier has disappeared save of his own free
+will--and some of them will suppose it their duty to tell her so!"
+
+"It is the view evidently held by the French police," observed the Senator.
+
+The English lawyer shrugged his shoulders. "Of course it is! The fact that
+Dampier had hardly any money on him disposes of any crime theory. A
+wonderful thing the Paris police system, Mr. Burton!"
+
+And the other cordially agreed; nothing could have been more courteous,
+more kind, more intelligent, than the behaviour of the high police
+officials, from the Prefect himself downwards, over the whole business.
+
+Mr. Stephens glanced up at the huge station clock. "I have only five
+minutes left," he said. "But I want to say again how much I appreciate your
+extraordinary kindness and goodness to my poor client. And, Mr. Senator?
+There's just one thing more I want to say to you--" For the first time the
+English lawyer looked awkward and ill at ease.
+
+"Why yes, Mr. Stephens! Pray say anything you like."
+
+"Well, my dear sir, I should like to give you a very sincere piece of
+advice." He hesitated. "If I were you I should go back to America as soon
+as possible. I feel this sad affair has thoroughly spoilt your visit to
+Paris; and speaking as a man who has children himself, I am sure it has not
+been well, either for Miss Daisy or for your son, to have become absorbed,
+as they could hardly help becoming, in this distressing business."
+
+The American felt slightly puzzled by the seriousness with which the other
+delivered this well-meant but wholly superfluous advice. What just exactly
+did the lawyer mean by these solemnly delivered words?
+
+"Why," said the Senator, "you're quite right, Mr. Stephens; it has been an
+ordeal, especially for my girl Daisy: she hasn't had air and exercise
+enough during this last fortnight, let alone change of thought and scene.
+But, as a matter of fact, I am settling about our passages to-day, on my
+way back to the hotel."
+
+"I am very glad to hear that!" exclaimed the other, with far more
+satisfaction and relief in his voice than seemed warranted. "And I presume
+that your son will find lots of work awaiting him on his return home?
+There's nothing like work to chase cobwebs from the brain or--or heart,
+Mr. Senator."
+
+"That's true: not that there are many cobwebs in my boy's brain, Mr.
+Stephens," he smiled broadly at the notion.
+
+"Messieurs! Mesdames! En voiture, s'il vous plait. En voiture--!"
+
+A few minutes later Mr. Stephens waved his hand from his railway carriage,
+and as he did so he wondered if he himself had ever been as obtuse a father
+as his new American friend seemed to be.
+
+As he walked away from the station Senator Burton made up his mind to go
+back on foot, taking the office of the Transatlantic Steamship Company on
+his way. And while he sauntered through the picturesque, lively streets of
+the Paris he loved with so familiar and appreciative an admiration, the
+American found his thoughts dwelling on the events of the last fortnight.
+
+Yes, it had been a strange, an extraordinary experience--one which he and
+his children would never forget, which they would often talk over in days
+to come. Poor little Nancy Dampier! His kind, fatherly heart went out to
+her with a good deal of affection, and yes, of esteem. She had behaved with
+wonderful courage and good sense--and with dignity too, when one remembered
+the extraordinary position in which she had been placed with regard to
+the Poulains.
+
+The Poulains? For the hundredth time he wondered where the truth really
+lay.... But he soon dismissed the difficult problem, for now he had reached
+the offices of the French Transatlantic Company. There the Senator's
+official rank caused him to be treated with very special civility; at once
+he was assured that three passages would be reserved for him on practically
+what boat he liked: he suggested the Lorraine, sailing in ten days time,
+and he had the satisfaction of seeing good cabins booked in his name.
+
+And as he walked away, slightly cheered, as men are apt to be, by the
+pleasant deference paid to his wishes, he told himself that before leaving
+Paris he must arrange for a cable to be at once dispatched should there
+come any news of the mysterious, and at once unknown and familiar, John
+Dampier. Mrs. Dampier would surely find his request a natural one, the more
+so that Daisy and Gerald would be just as eager to hear news as he himself
+would be. He had never known anything take so firm a hold of his son's and
+daughter's imaginations.
+
+On reaching the Hotel Saint Ange the Senator went over to Madame Poulain's
+kitchen; it was only right to give her the date of their departure as soon
+as possible.
+
+"Well," he said with a touch of regret in his voice, "we shall soon be
+going off now, Madame Poulain. Next Tuesday-week you will have to wish us
+bon voyage!"
+
+And instead of seeing the good woman's face cloud over, as it had always
+hitherto clouded over, when he had sought her out to say that their stay in
+Paris was drawing to a close, he saw a look of intense relief, of
+undisguised joy, flash into her dark expressive eyes, and that though she
+observed civilly, "Quel dommage, Monsieur le Senateur, that you cannot stay
+a little longer!"
+
+He moved away abruptly, feeling unreasonably mortified.
+
+But Senator Burton was a very just man; he prided himself on his fairness
+of outlook; and now he reminded himself quickly that their stay at the
+Hotel Saint Ange had not brought unmixed good fortune to the Poulains. It
+was natural that Madame Poulain should long to see the last of them--at any
+rate this time.
+
+He found Gerald alone, seated at a table, intent on a letter he was
+writing. Daisy, it seemed, had persuaded Mrs. Dampier to go out for a walk
+before luncheon.
+
+"Well, my boy, we shall have to make the best of the short time remaining
+to us in Paris. I have secured passages in the Lorraine, and so we now only
+have till Tuesday-week to see everything in Paris which this unhappy affair
+has prevented our seeing during the last fortnight."
+
+And then it was that the something happened, that the irreparable words
+were spoken, which suddenly and most rudely opened the Senator's eyes to a
+truth which the English lawyer had seen almost from the first moment of his
+stay in Paris.
+
+Gerald Burton started up. His face was curiously pale under its healthy
+tan, but the Senator noticed that his son's eyes were extraordinarily
+bright.
+
+"Father?" He leant across the round table. "I am not going home with you.
+In fact I am now writing to Mr. Webb to tell him that he must not expect me
+back at the office for the present: I will cable as soon as I can give
+him a date."
+
+"Not going home?" repeated Senator Burton. "What do you mean, Gerald? What
+is it that should keep you here after we have gone?" but a curious
+sensation of fear and dismay was already clutching at the older
+man's heart.
+
+"I am never going back--not till John Dampier is found. I have promised
+Mrs. Dampier to find him, and that whether he be alive or dead!"
+
+Even then the Senator tried not to understand. Even then he tried to tell
+himself that his son was only actuated by some chivalrous notion of keeping
+his word, in determining on a course which might seriously damage
+his career.
+
+He tried quiet expostulation: "Surely, Gerald, you are not serious in
+making such a decision? Mrs. Dampier, from what I know of her, would be.
+the last to exact from you the fulfilment of so--so unreasonable a promise.
+Why, you and I both know quite well that the Paris police, and also Mr.
+Stephens, are convinced that this man Dampier just left his wife of his own
+free will."
+
+"I know they think that! But it's a lie!" cried Gerald with blazing eyes.
+"An infamous lie! I should like to see Mr. Stephens dare suggest such a
+notion to John Dampier's wife. Not that she is his wife, father, for I'm
+sure the man is dead--and I believe--I hope that she's beginning to
+think so too!"
+
+"But if Dampier is dead, Gerald, then--" the Senator was beginning to lose
+patience, but he was anxious not to lose his temper too, not to make
+himself more unpleasant than he must do. "Surely you see yourself, my boy,
+that if the man is dead, there's nothing more for you to do here,
+in Paris?"
+
+"Father, there's everything! The day I make sure that John Dampier is dead
+will be the happiest day of my life." His voice had sunk low, he muttered
+the last words between his teeth; but alas! the Senator heard them all
+too clearly.
+
+"Gerald!" he said gravely. "Gerald? Am I to understand--"
+
+"Father--don't say anything you might be sorry for afterwards! Yes, you
+have guessed truly. I love Nancy! If the man is dead--and I trust to God he
+is--I hope to marry her some day. If--if you and Mr. Stephens are right--if
+he is still alive--well then--" he waited a moment, and that moment was the
+longest the Senator had ever known--"then, father, I promise you I will
+come home. But in that case I shall never, never marry anybody else. Daisy
+knows," went on the young man, unconsciously dealing his father another
+bitter blow. "Daisy knows--she guessed, and--she understands."
+
+"And does she approve?" asked the Senator sternly.
+
+"I don't know--I don't care!" cried Gerald fiercely. "I am not looking for
+anyone's approval. And, father?" His voice altered, it became what the
+other had never heard his son's voice be, suppliant:--"I have trusted you
+with my secret--but let it be from now as if I had not spoken. I beg of you
+not to discuss it with Daisy--I need not ask you not to speak of it to
+anybody else."
+
+The Senator nodded. He was too agitated, too horror-stricken to speak, and
+his agitation was not lessened by his son's final words.
+
+
+
+EPILOGUE
+
+I
+
+It is two years to a day since John Dampier disappeared, and it is only
+owing to one man's inflexible determination that the search for him has not
+been abandoned long ago.
+
+And now we meet Senator Burton far in body, if not in mind, from the place
+where we last met him.
+
+He is standing by an open window, gazing down on one of the fairest sights
+civilised nature has to offer--that of an old English garden filled with
+fragrant flowers which form scented boundaries of soft brilliant colour to
+wide lawns shaded by great cedar trees.
+
+But as he stands there in the early morning sunlight, for it is only six
+o'clock, he does not look in harmony with the tranquil beauty of the scene
+before him. There is a stern, troubled expression on his face, for he has
+just espied two figures walking side by side across the dewy grass; the one
+is his son Gerald, the other Nancy Dampier, still in the delicate and
+dangerous position of a woman who is neither wife, maid, nor widow.
+
+The Senator's whole expression has changed in the two years. He used to
+look a happy, contented man; now, especially when he is alone and his face
+is in repose, he has the disturbed, bewildered expression men's faces bear
+when Providence or Fate--call it which you will--has treated them in a way
+they feel to be unbearably unfair, as well as unexpected.
+
+And yet the majority of mankind would consider this American to be
+supremely blessed. The two children he loves so dearly are as fondly
+attached to him as ever they were; and there has also befallen him a piece
+of quite unexpected good fortune. A distant relation, from whom he had no
+expectations, has left him a fortune "as a token of admiration for his high
+integrity."
+
+Senator Burton is now a very rich man, and because Daisy fancied it would
+please her brother they have taken for the summer this historic English
+manor house, famed all the world over to those interested in mediaeval
+architecture, as Barwell Moat.
+
+Here he, Daisy, and Nancy Dampier have already been settled for a week;
+Gerald only joined them yesterday from Paris.
+
+Early though it is, the Senator has already been up and dressed over an
+hour; and he has spent the time unprofitably, in glancing over his diary of
+two years ago, in conning, that is, the record of that strange, exciting
+fortnight which so changed his own and his children's lives.
+
+He has read over with pain and distaste the brief words in which he
+chronicled that first chance meeting with Nancy Dampier. What excitement,
+what adventures, and yes, what bitter sorrow had that chance meeting under
+the porte cochere of the Hotel Saint Ange brought in its train! If only he
+and Daisy had started out an hour earlier on that June morning just two
+years ago how much they would have been spared.
+
+As for the fortune left to him, Senator Burton is now inclined to think
+that it has brought him less than no good. It has only provided Gerald with
+an excuse, which to an American father is no excuse, for neglecting his
+profession. Further, it has enabled the young man to spend money in a
+prodigal fashion over what even he now acknowledges to have been a hopeless
+quest, though even at the present moment detectives in every capital in
+Europe are watching for a clue which may afford some notion as to the
+whereabouts of John Dampier.
+
+John Dampier? Grim, relentless spectre who pursues them unceasingly, and
+from whose menacing, shadowy presence they are never free--from whom, so
+the Senator has now despairingly come to believe, they never, never will
+be free....
+
+He had stopped his diary abruptly on the evening of that now far-off day
+when his eyes had been so rudely opened to his son's state of mind and
+heart. But though he has no written record to guide him the Senator finds
+it only too easy, on this beautiful June morning, to go back, in dreary
+retrospective, over these two long years.
+
+Gerald had not found it possible to keep his rash vow; there had come a day
+when he had had to go back to America--indeed, he has been home three
+times. But those brief visits of his son to his own country brought the
+father no comfort, for each time Gerald left behind him in Europe not only
+his heart, but everything else that matters to a man--his interests, his
+longings, his hopes.
+
+Small wonder that in time Senator Burton and Daisy had also fallen into the
+way of spending nearly the whole of the Senator's spare time in Europe, and
+with Nancy Dampier.
+
+Nancy? The mind of the watcher by the window turns to her too, as he
+visions the slender, graceful figure now pacing slowly by his son's side.
+
+Is it unreasonable that, gradually withdrawing herself from her old
+friends, those friends who did not believe that Dampier had left her save
+of his own free will, Nancy should cling closer and closer to her new
+friends? No, not at all unreasonable, but, from the Senator's point of
+view, very unfortunate. Daisy and Nancy are now like sisters, and to the
+Senator himself she shows the loving deference, the affection of a
+daughter, but with regard to the all-important point of her relations to
+Gerald, none of them know the truth--indeed, it may be doubted if she knows
+it herself.
+
+But the situation gets more difficult, more strained every month, every
+week, almost every day. Senator Burton feels that the time has come when
+something must be done to end it--one way or the other--and the day before
+yesterday he sought out Mr. Stephens, now one of his closest friends and
+advisers, in order that they might confer together on the matter. As he
+stands there looking down at the two figures walking across the dewy grass,
+he remembers with a sense of boding fear the conversation with
+Nancy's lawyer.
+
+"There's nothing to be done, my poor friend, nothing at all! Our English
+marriage laws are perfectly clear, and though this is a very, very hard
+case, I for my part have no wish to see them altered."
+
+And the Senator had answered with heat, "I cannot follow you there at all!
+The law which ties a living woman to a man who may be dead, nay, probably
+is dead, is a monstrous law."
+
+And Mr. Stephens had answered very quietly, "What if John Dampier be
+alive?"
+
+"And is this all I can tell my poor son?"
+
+And then it was that Mr. Stephens, looking at him doubtfully, had answered,
+"Well no, for there is a way out. It is not a good way--I doubt if it is a
+right way--but still it is a way. It is open to poor little Nancy to go to
+America, to become naturalized there, and then to divorce her husband, in
+one of your States, for desertion. The divorce so obtained would be no
+divorce in England, but many Englishmen and Englishwomen have taken that
+course as a last resort--" He had waited a moment, and then added, "I
+doubt, however, very, very much if Nancy would consent to do such a thing,
+even if she reciprocates--which is by no means sure--your
+son's--er--feeling for her."
+
+"Feeling?" Senator Burton's voice had broken, and then he had cried out
+fiercely, "Why use such an ambiguous word, when we both know that Gerald is
+killing himself for love of her--and giving up the finest career ever
+opened to a man? If Mrs. Dampier does not reciprocate what you choose to
+call his 'feeling' for bet, then she is the coldest and most ungrateful
+of women!"
+
+"I don't think she is either the one or the other," had observed Mr.
+Stephens mildly; and he had added under his breath, "It would be the better
+for her if she were--Believe me the only way to force her to consider the
+expedient I have suggested--" he had hesitated as if rather ashamed of what
+he was about to say, "would be for Gerald to tell her the search for Mr.
+Dampier must now end--and that the time has come when he must go back to
+America--and work."
+
+Small wonder that Senator Burton found it hard to sleep last night, small
+wonder he has risen so early. He knows that his son is going to speak to
+Nancy, to tell her what Mr. Stephens has suggested she should do, and he
+suspects that now, at this very moment, the decisive conversation may be
+taking place.
+
+II
+
+Though unconscious that anxious, yearning eyes are following them, both
+Nancy Dampier and Gerald Burton feel an instinctive desire to get away from
+the house, and as far as may be from possible eavesdroppers. They walk
+across the stretch of lawn which separates the moat from the gardens in a
+constrained silence, she following rather than guiding her companion.
+
+But as if this charming old-world plesaunce were quite familiar to him,
+Gerald goes straight on, down a grass path ending in what appears to be a
+high impenetrable wall of yew, and Nancy, surprised, then sees that a
+narrow, shaft-like way leads straight through the green leafy depths.
+
+"Why, Gerald?" she says a little nervously--they have long ago abandoned
+any more formal mode of address, though between them there stands ever the
+spectre of poor John Dampier, as present to one of the two, and he the man,
+as if the menacing shadow were in very truth a tangible presence. "Why,
+Gerald, where does this lead? Have you ever been here before?"
+
+And for the first time since they met the night before, the young man
+smiles. "I thought I'd like to see an English sunrise, Nancy, so I've been
+up a long time. I found a rose garden through here, and I thought it would
+be a quiet place for our talk."
+
+It is strangely dark and still under the dense evergreen arch of the
+slanting way carved through the yew hedge; Nancy can only grope her way
+along. Turning round, Gerald holds out his strong hands, and taking hers in
+what seems so cool, so impersonal a grasp, he draws her after him. And
+Nancy flushes in the half darkness; it is the first time that she and
+Gerald Burton have ever been alone together as they are alone now, and that
+though they have met so very, very often in the last two years.
+
+Nancy is at once glad and sorry when he suddenly loosens his grasp of her
+hands. The shadowed way terminates in a narrow wrought-iron gate; and
+beyond the gate is the rose garden of Barwell Moat, a tangle of exquisite
+colouring, jealously guarded and hidden away from those to whom the more
+familiar beauties of the place are free.
+
+It is one of the oldest of English roseries, planned by some Elizabethan
+dame who loved solitude rather than the sun. And if the roses bloom a
+little less freely in this quiet, still enclosure than they would do in
+greater light and wilder air, this gives the rosery, in these hot June
+days, a touch of austere and more fragile beauty than that to be seen
+beyond its enlacing yews.
+
+A hundred years after the Elizabethan lady had designed the rosery of
+Barwell Moat a Jacobean dame had added to her rose garden a fountain--one
+brought maybe from Italy or France, for the fat stone Cupids now shaking
+slender jets of water from their rose-leaved cornucopias are full of a
+roguish, Southern grace.
+
+When they have passed through into this fragrant, enchanted looking
+retreat, Nancy cries out in real delight: "What an exquisite and lovely
+place! How strange that Daisy and I never found it!"
+
+And then, as Gerald remains silent, she looks, for the first time this
+morning, straight up into his face, and her heart is filled with a sudden
+overwhelming sensation of suspense--and yes, fear, for there is the
+strangest expression on the young man's countenance, indeed it is full of
+deep, of violent emotion--emotion his companion finds contagious.
+
+She tells herself that at last he has brought news. That if he did not tell
+her so last night it was because he wished her to have one more night of
+peace--of late poor Nancy's nights have become very peaceful.
+
+John Dampier? There was a time--it now seems long, long ago--when Nancy
+would have given not only her life but her very soul to have known that her
+husband was safe, that he would come back to her. But now? Alas! Alas! Now
+she realises with an agonised feeling of horror, of self-loathing, that she
+no longer wishes to hear Gerald Burton say that he has kept his word--that
+he has found Dampier.
+
+She prays God that nothing of what she is feeling shows in her face; and
+Gerald is far too moved, far too doubtful as to what he is to say to her,
+and as to the answer she will make to him, to see that she looks in any way
+different from what she always does look in his eyes--the most beautiful as
+well as the most loved and worshipped of human creatures.
+
+"Tell me!" she gasps. "Tell me, Gerald? What is it you want to say to me?
+Don't keep me in suspense--" and then, as he is still dumb, she adds with a
+cry, "Have you come to tell me that at last you have found Jack?"
+
+And he pulls himself together with a mighty effort. Nancy's words have
+rudely dispelled the hopes with which his heart has been filled ever since
+his father came to his room last night and told him what Mr. Stephens had
+suggested as a possible way out of the present, intolerable situation.
+
+"No," he says sombrely, "no, Nancy, I have brought you no good news, and I
+am beginning to fear I never shall."
+
+And he does not see even now that the long quivering sigh which escapes
+from her pale lips is a sigh of unutterable--if of pained and
+shamed--relief.
+
+But what is this he is now saying, in a voice which is so unsteady, so
+oddly unlike his own?
+
+"I think--God forgive me for thinking so if I am wrong--that I have always
+been right, Nancy, that your husband is dead--that he was killed two years
+ago, the night he disappeared--"
+
+She bends her head. Yes, she too believes that, though there was a time
+when she fought, with desperate strength, against the belief.
+
+He goes on breathlessly, hoarsely, aware that he is making what Mr.
+Stephens would call a bad job of it all: "I am now beginning to doubt
+whether we shall ever discover the truth as to what did happen. His body
+may still lie concealed somewhere in the Hotel Saint Ange, and if that is
+so, there's but small chance indeed that we shall ever, ever learn
+the truth."
+
+And again she bends her head.
+
+"I fear the time is come, Nancy, when the search must be given up."
+
+He utters the fateful words very quietly, very gently, but even so she
+feels a pang of startled fear. Does that mean--yes, of course it must mean,
+that Gerald is going away, back to America?
+
+A feeling of dreadful desolation fills her heart. "Yes," she says in a low
+tone, "I think you are right. I think the search should be given up."
+
+She would like to utter words of thanks, the conventional words of
+gratitude she has uttered innumerable times in the last two years--but now
+they stick in her throat.
+
+Tears smart into her eyes, stifled sobs burst from her lips.
+
+And Gerald again misunderstands--misunderstands her tears, the sobs which
+tear and shake her slender body. But he is only too familiar with the
+feeling which now grips him--the feeling that he must rush forward and take
+her in his arms. It has never gripped him quite as strongly as it does now;
+and so he steps abruptly back, and puts more of the stone rim of the
+fountain between himself and that forlorn little figure.
+
+"Nancy?" he cries. "I was a brute to say that. Of course I will go on! Of
+course we won't give up hope! It's natural that I should sometimes become
+disheartened."
+
+He is telling himself resolutely that never, never will he propose to her
+the plan his father revealed to him last night. How little either his
+father or Mr. Stephens had understood the relation between himself and
+Nancy if they supposed that he, of all men, could make to her such a
+suggestion.
+
+And then he suddenly sees in Nancy's sensitive face, in her large blue eyes
+that unconscious beckoning, calling look every lover longs to see in the
+face of his beloved....
+
+They each instinctively move towards the other, and in a flash Nancy is in
+his arms and he is holding her strained to his heart, while his lips seek,
+find, cling to her sweet, tremulous mouth.
+
+But the moment of rapture, of almost unendurable bliss is short indeed, for
+suddenly he feels her shrinking from him, and though for yet another moment
+he holds her against her will, the struggle soon ends, and he releases her,
+feeling what he has never yet felt when with her, that is, bewildered,
+hurt, and yes, angry.
+
+And then, when she sees that new alien glance of anger in eyes which have
+never looked at her but kindly, Nancy feels a dreadful pang of pain, as
+well as of shamed distress. She creeps up nearer to him, and puts her hand
+imploringly on his arm--that arm which a moment ago held her so closely to
+him, but which now hangs, apparently nerveless, by his side.
+
+"Gerald!" she whispers imploringly. "Don't be angry with me," and her voice
+drops still lower as she adds piteously, "You see, I knew we were doing
+wrong. I--I felt wicked."
+
+And then, as he still makes no answer, she grows more keenly distressed.
+"Gerald?" she says again. "You may kiss me if you like." And as he only
+looks down at her, taking no advantage of the reluctant permission, she
+falters out the ill-chosen words, "Don't you know how grateful I am
+to you?"
+
+And then, stung past endurance, he turns on her savagely:--"Does that mean
+that I have bought the right to kiss you?"
+
+But as, at this, she bursts into bitter tears, he again takes her in his
+arms, and he does kiss her, violently, passionately, hungrily. He is only a
+man after all.
+
+But alas! These other kisses leave behind them a bitter taste. They lack
+the wild, exquisite flavour of the first.
+
+At last he tells her, haltingly, slowly, of Mr. Stephens' suggestion, but
+carefully as he chooses his words he feels her shrinking, wincing at the
+images they conjure up; and he tells himself with impatient self-reproach
+that he has been too quick, too abrupt--that he ought to have allowed the
+notion to sink into her mind slowly, that he should have made Daisy, or
+even his father, be his ambassador.
+
+"I couldn't do that!" she whispers at last, and he sees that she has turned
+very white. "I don't think I could ever do that! Think how awful it would
+be if--if after I had done such a thing I found that poor Jack was not
+dead? Some time ago--I have never told you of this--some friend, meaning to
+be kind, sent me a cutting from a paper telling of a foreigner who had been
+taken up for mad in Italy, and confined in a lunatic asylum for years and
+years! You don't know how that story haunted me. It haunted me for weeks.
+You wouldn't like me to do anything I thought wrong, Gerald?"
+
+"No," he says moodily. "No, Nancy--I will never ask you to do anything you
+think wrong." He adds with an effort, "I told my father last night that I
+doubted if you would ever consent to such a thing."
+
+And then she asks an imprudent question:--"And what did he say then?" she
+says in a troubled, unhappy voice.
+
+"D'you really want to know what he said?"
+
+She creeps a little nearer to him, she even takes his hand. "Yes, Gerald.
+Tell me."
+
+"He said that if you wouldn't consent to do some such thing, why then I
+should be doing wrong to stay in Europe. He said--I little knew how true it
+was--that soon you would learn that I loved you, and that then--that then
+the situation would become intolerable."
+
+"Intolerable?" she repeats in a low, strained tone. "Oh no, not
+intolerable, Gerald! Surely you don't feel that?"
+
+And this time it is Gerald who winces, who draws back; but suddenly his
+heart fills up, brims over with a great, an unselfish tenderness--for
+Nancy, gazing up at him, looks disappointed as a child, not a woman, looks,
+when disappointed of a caress; and so he puts his arms round her and kisses
+her very gently, very softly, in what he tells himself is a kind, brotherly
+fashion. "You know I'll do just whatever you wish," he murmurs.
+
+And contentedly she nestles against him. "Oh, Gerald," she whispers back,
+"how good you are to me! Can't we always be reasonable--like this?"
+
+And he smiles, a little wryly. "Why, yes," he says, "of course we can! And
+now, Nancy, it's surely breakfast time. Let's go back to the house."
+
+And Nancy, perhaps a little surprised, a little taken aback at his sudden,
+cheerful acceptance of her point of view, follows him through the dark
+passage cut in the yew hedge. She supposes--perhaps she even hopes--that
+before they emerge into the sun light he will turn and again kiss her in
+the reasonable, tender way he did just now.
+
+But Gerald does not even turn round and grasp her two hands as he did
+before. He leaves her to grope her way behind him as best she can, and as
+they walk across the lawn he talks to her in a more cheerful, indifferent
+way than he has ever done before. Once they come close up to the house,
+however, he falls into a deep silence.
+
+III
+
+It is by the merest chance that they stay in that afternoon, for it has
+been a long, a wretched day for them all.
+
+Senator Burton and his daughter are consumed with anxiety, with a desire to
+know what has taken place, but all they can see is that Gerald and Nancy
+both look restless, miserable, and ill at ease with one another. Daisy
+further suspects that Nancy is avoiding Gerald, and the suspicion makes her
+feel anxious and uncomfortable.
+
+As for the Senator, he begins to feel that he hates this beautiful old
+house and its lovely gardens; he has never seen Gerald look as unhappy
+anywhere as he looks here.
+
+At last he seeks his son out, and, in a sense, forces his confidence.
+"Well, my boy?"
+
+"Well, father, she doesn't feel she can do it! She thinks that Dampier may
+be alive after all. If you don't mind I'd rather not talk about her
+just now."
+
+And then the Senator tells himself, for the hundredth time in the last two
+years, that they have now come to the breaking point--that if Nancy will
+not take the only reasonable course open to her, then that Gerald must be
+nerved to make, as men have so often had to make, the great renouncement.
+To go on as he is now doing is not only wrong as regards himself, it is
+wrong as regards his sister Daisy.
+
+There is a man in America who loves Daisy--a man too of whom the Senator
+approves as much as he can of anyone who is anxious to take his daughter
+from him. And Daisy, were her heart only at leisure, might respond; but
+alas! her heart is not at leisure, it is wholly absorbed in the affairs of
+her brother and of her friend.
+
+At last the high ritual of English afternoon tea brings them out all
+together on the lawn in front of the house.
+
+Deferentially consulted by the solemn-faced, suave-mannered butler, who
+seems as much part of Barwell Moat as do the gabled dormer windows, Daisy
+Burton decides that tea is to be set out wherever it generally is set out
+by the owners of the house. Weightily she is informed that "her ladyship"
+has tea served sometimes in that part of the garden which is called the
+rosery, sometimes on the front lawn, and the butler adds the cryptic
+information, "according as to whether her ladyship desires to see
+visitors or not."
+
+Daisy does not quite see what difference the fact of tea being served in
+one place or another can make to apocryphal visitors, so, with what
+cheerfulness she can muster, she asks the others which they would prefer.
+And at once, a little to her surprise, Nancy and Gerald answer
+simultaneously, "Oh, let us have tea on the lawn, not--not in the rosery!"
+
+And it is there, in front of the house, that within a very few minutes they
+are all gathered together, and for the first time that day Senator Burton's
+heart lightens a little.
+
+He is amused at the sight of those three men--the butler and his two
+footmen satellites--gravely making their elaborate preparations. Chairs are
+brought out, piles of cushions are flung about in bounteous profusion, even
+two hammocks are slung up--all in an incredibly short space of time: and
+the American tenant of Barwell Moat tells himself that the scene before him
+might be taken from one of the stories of his favourite British novelist,
+good old Anthony Trollope.
+
+Ah me! How happy they all might be this afternoon were it not for the ever
+present unspoken hopes and fears which fill their hearts!
+
+Daisy sits down behind the tea-table; and the cloud lifts a little from
+Gerald's stern, set face; the three young people even laugh and joke a
+little together.
+
+The Senator glances at Nancy Dampier; she is looking very lovely this
+afternoon, but her face is flushed, her manner is restless, agitated, she
+looks what he has never seen her look till to-day, thoroughly ill at ease,
+and yet, yes, certainly less listless, more alive than she looked
+yesterday--before Gerald's arrival.
+
+What strange creatures women are! The Senator does not exactly disapprove
+of Nancy's decision, but he regrets it bitterly. If only she would throw in
+her lot with Gerald--come to America, her mind made up never to return to
+Europe again, why then even now they might all be happy.
+
+But her face, soft though it be in repose, is not that of a weak woman; it
+is that of one who, thinking she knows what should be her duty, will be
+faithful to it; and it is also the face of a woman reserved in the
+expression of her feelings. Senator Burton cannot make up his mind whether
+Nancy realises Gerald's measureless, generous devotion. Is she even aware
+of all that he has sacrificed for her? Daisy says yes--Daisy declares that
+Nancy "cares" for Gerald--but then Daisy herself is open-hearted and
+generous like her brother.
+
+And while these painful thoughts, these half-formed questions and answers,
+weave in and out through Senator Burton's brain, there suddenly falls a
+loud grinding sound on his ears, and a motor-car sweeps into view.
+
+Now, at last, Daisy Burton understands the butler's cryptic remark! Here,
+in front of the house, escape from visitors is, of course, impossible. She
+feels a pang of annoyance at her own stupidity for not having understood,
+but there is no help for it--and very soon three people, a middle-aged lady
+and two gentlemen, are advancing over the green sward.
+
+The Senator and his daughter rise, and walk forward to meet them. Gerald
+and Nancy remain behind. Indeed the young man hardly sees the strangers; he
+is only conscious of a deep feeling of relief that the solicitous eyes of
+his father and sister are withdrawn from him and Nancy.
+
+Since this morning he has been in a strange state of alternating rapture
+and despair. He feels as if he and Nancy, having just found one another,
+are now doomed to part. Ever since he held her in his arms he has ached
+with loneliness and with thwarted longing; during the whole of this long
+day Nancy has eluded him; not for a single moment have they been alone
+together. And now all his good resolutions--the resolutions which stood him
+in such good stead in that dark, leafy tunnel--have vanished. He now faces
+the fact that they cannot hope, when once more alone and heart to heart, to
+be what Nancy calls "reasonable."...
+
+Suddenly he comes back to the drab realities of every-day life. His father
+is introducing him to the visitors--first to the lady: "Mrs. Arbuthnot--my
+son, Gerald Burton. Mrs. Dampier--Mrs. Arbuthnot." And then to the two men,
+Mr. Arbuthnot and a Mr. Dallas.
+
+There is a quick interchange of talk. The newcomers are explaining who and
+what they are. Mr. Robert Arbuthnot is a retired Anglo-Indian official, and
+he and his wife have now lived for two years in the dower house which forms
+part of the Barwell Moat estate.
+
+"I should not have called quite so soon had it not been that our friend,
+Mr. Dallas, is only staying with us for two or three days, and he is most
+anxious to meet you, Mr. Senator. Mr. Dallas is one of the Officers of
+Health for the Port of London. He read some years ago"--she turns smilingly
+to the gentleman in question--"a very interesting pamphlet with which you
+seem to have been in some way concerned, about the Port of New York."
+
+The Senator is flattered to find how well Mr. Dallas remembers that old
+report of which he was one of the signatories. For a moment he forgets his
+troubles; and the younger people--Mrs. Arbuthnot also--remain silent while
+these three men, who have each had a considerable experience of great
+affairs, begin talking of the problems which face those who have vast
+masses of human beings to consider and legislate for.
+
+Mr. Dallas talks the most; he is one of those cheerful, eager Englishmen
+who like the sound of their own voices: he is also one of those fortunate
+people who take an intense interest in the work they are set to do. In Mr.
+Dallas's ears there is no pleasanter sounding word than the word
+"sanitation."
+
+"Ah," he says, turning smilingly to the Senator, "how I envy my New York
+colleagues! They have plenary powers. They are real autocrats!"
+
+"They would be but for our press," answers the Senator. "I wonder if you
+heard anything of the scrape Dr. Cranebrook got into last year?"
+
+"Of course I did! I heard all about it, and I felt very sorry for him. But
+our London press is getting almost as bad! Government by newspaper--" he
+shakes his head expressively. "And my friend Arbuthnot tells me that it's
+becoming really serious in India; there the native press is getting more
+and more power. Ah well! They do those things better in France."
+
+And then Mrs. Arbuthnot's voice is heard at last. "My husband and Mr.
+Dallas have only just come back from Paris, Miss Burton. Mr. Dallas went
+over on business, and my husband accompanied him. They had a most
+interesting time: they spent a whole day at the Prefecture of Police with
+the Prefect himself--"
+
+She stops speaking, and wonders a little why a sudden silence has fallen
+over the whole group of these pleasant Americans--for she takes Nancy to be
+an American too.
+
+But the sudden silence--so deep, so absolute that it reminds Mrs. Arbuthnot
+of the old saying that when such a stillness falls on any company someone
+must be walking over their graves--is suddenly broken.
+
+Mr. Dallas jumps to his feet. He is one of those men who never like sitting
+still very long. "May I have another lump of sugar, Miss Burton? We were
+speaking of Paris,--talk of muzzling the press, they know how to muzzle
+their press in grim earnest in Paris! Talk of suppressing the truth, they
+don't even begin to tell the truth there. The Tsar of Russia as an autocrat
+isn't in it with the Paris Prefect of Police!"
+
+And two of his listeners say drearily to themselves that Mr. Dallas is a
+very ignorant man after all. He is evidently one of the many foolish people
+who believe the French police omnipotent.
+
+But the Englishman goes happily on, quite unconscious that he is treading
+on what has become forbidden ground in the Burton family circle. "The
+present man's name is Beaucourt, a very pleasant fellow! He told me some
+astounding stories. I wonder if you'd like to hear the one which struck
+me most?"
+
+He looks round, pleased at their attention, at the silence which has again
+fallen on them all, and which he naturally takes for consent.
+
+Eagerly he begins: "It was two years ago, at the height of their Exhibition
+season, and of course Paris was crammed--every house full, from cellar to
+attic! Monsieur Beaucourt tells me that there were more than five hundred
+thousand strangers in the city for whose safety, and incidentally for whose
+health, he was responsible!"
+
+He waits a moment, that thought naturally impresses him more than it does
+his audience.
+
+"Well, into that gay maelstrom there suddenly arrived a couple of young
+foreigners. They were well-to-do, and what impressed the little story
+particularly on Monsieur Beaucourt's mind was the fact that they were on
+their honeymoon--you know how sentimental the French are!"
+
+Mr. Dallas looks around. They are all gazing at him with upturned
+faces--never had he a more polite, a more attentive circle of listeners.
+There is, however, one exception: his old friend, Mr. Arbuthnot, puts his
+hand up to conceal a yawn; he has heard the story before.
+
+"Where was I? Oh, yes. Well, these young people--Monsieur Beaucourt thinks
+they were Americans--had gone to Italy for their honeymoon, and they were
+ending up in Paris. They arrived late at night--I think form
+Marseilles--and most providentially they were put on different floors in
+the hotel they had chosen in the Latin Quarter. Well, that very night--"
+
+Mr. Dallas looks round him triumphantly. He does not exactly smile, for
+what he is going to say is really rather dreadful, but he has the eager,
+pleased look which all good story-tellers have when they have come to the
+point of their story.
+
+"I don't believe that one man in a million would guess what happened!" He
+looks round him again, and has time to note complacently that the son of
+his host, who has risen, and whose hands grip the back of the chair from
+which he has risen, is staring, fascinated, across at him.
+
+"A very, very strange and terrible thing befell this young couple. That
+first night of their stay in Paris, between two and three the bridegroom
+developed plague! Monsieur Beaucourt tells me that the poor fellow behaved
+with the greatest presence of mind; although he cannot of course have known
+what exactly was the matter with him, he gave orders that his wife was not
+to be disturbed, and that the hotel people were to send for a doctor at
+once. Luckily there was a medical man living in the same street; he leapt
+on the dreadful truth, sent for an ambulance, and within less than half an
+hour of the poor fellow's seizure he was whisked away to the nearest public
+hospital, where he died five hours later."
+
+Mr. Dallas waits a moment, he is a little disappointed that no one speaks,
+and he hurries on:--
+
+"And now comes the point of my story! Monsieur Beaucourt assures me that
+the fact was kept absolutely secret. He told me that had it leaked out it
+might have half emptied Paris. French people have a perfect terror of what
+they call 'la Peste.' But not a whisper of the truth got about, and that
+though a considerable number of people had to know, including many of the
+officials connected with the Prefecture of Police. The Prefect showed me
+the poor fellow's watch and bunch of seals, the only things, of course,
+that they were able to keep; he really spoke very nicely, very movingly
+about it--"
+
+And then, at last, the speaker stops abruptly. He has seen his host's son
+reel a little, sway as does a man who is drunk, and then fall heavily to
+the ground.
+
+It is hours later. The sun has long set. Gerald opens his eyes; and then he
+shuts them again, for he wants to go on dreaming. He is vaguely aware that
+he is lying in the magnificent Jacobean four-post bed which he had been far
+too miserable, too agitated to notice when his father had brought him up
+the night before. But now the restful beauty of the spacious room, the
+fantastic old coloured maps lining the walls, affect him agreeably, soothe
+his tired mind and brain.
+
+During that dreamy moment of half-waking he has seen in the shadowed room,
+for the lights are heavily shaded, the figures of his father and of Daisy;
+he now hears his father's whisper:--"The doctor says he is only suffering
+from shock, but that when he wakes he must be kept very quiet."
+
+And Daisy's clear, low voice, "Oh, yes, father. When he opens his eyes
+perhaps we'd better leave him with Nancy."
+
+Nancy? Then Nancy really is here, close to him, sitting on a low chair by
+the side of the bed. And when he opened his eyes just now she really had
+bent her dear head forward and laid her soft lips on his hand. It was no
+dream--no dream--
+
+And then there comes over him an overwhelming rush of mingled feelings and
+emotions. He tries to remember what it was that had happened this
+afternoon--he sees the active, restless figure of the Englishman dancing
+queerly up and down as it had seemed to dance just before he, Gerald, fell,
+and he feels again the horrible wish to laugh which had seized him when
+that dancing figure had said something about Beaucourt having spoken
+"very nicely--"
+
+"Curse Beaucourt! Such a fiend is only fit for the lowest depths of Hell."
+
+Again he opens his eyes. Did he say the ugly words aloud? He thinks not, he
+hopes not, for Daisy only takes their father's hand in hers and leads him
+from the room.
+
+"Nancy?" he says, trying to turn towards her. "Do we know the truth now? Is
+my search at an end?"
+
+"Yes," she whispers. "We know the truth now--my dearest. Your search is at
+an end."
+
+And as she gets up and bends over him, he feels her tears dropping on his
+face.
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+BOOKS BY MRS. BELLOC LOWNDES
+
+PUBLISHED BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
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+MARY PECHELL                 net, $1.30
+THE CHINK IN THE ARMOUR      net, $1.30
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+
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+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE END OF HER HONEYMOON ***
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The End of Her Honeymoon, by Marie Belloc Lowndes
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+Title: The End of Her Honeymoon
+
+Author: Marie Belloc Lowndes
+
+Release Date: January, 2006  [EBook #9635]
+[This file was first posted on October 11, 2003]
+
+Edition: 10
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+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE END OF HER HONEYMOON ***
+
+
+
+
+E-text prepared by Suzanne Shell, David Kline, and Project Gutenberg
+Distributed Proofreaders
+
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+
+
+
+
+
+The End of Her Honeymoon
+
+By
+
+Mrs. Belloc Lowndes
+
+Author of "The Uttermost Farthing," "The Chink in the Armour," etc., etc.
+
+1913
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+"Cocher? l'Hôtel Saint Ange, Rue Saint Ange!"
+
+The voice of John Dampier, Nancy's three-weeks bridegroom, rang out
+strongly, joyously, on this the last evening of their honeymoon. And before
+the lightly hung open carriage had time to move, Dampier added something
+quickly, at which both he and the driver laughed in unison.
+
+Nancy crept nearer to her husband. It was tiresome that she knew so little
+French.
+
+"I'm telling the man we're not in any hurry, and that he can take us round
+by the Boulevards. I won't have you seeing Paris from an ugly angle the
+first time--darling!"
+
+"But Jack? It's nearly midnight! Surely there'll be nothing to see on the
+Boulevards now?"
+
+"Won't there? You wait and see--Paris never goes to sleep!"
+
+And then--Nancy remembered it long, long afterwards--something very odd and
+disconcerting happened in the big station yard of the Gare de Lyon. The
+horse stopped--stopped dead. If it hadn't been that the bridegroom's arm
+enclosed her slender, rounded waist, the bride might have been thrown out.
+
+The cabman stood up in his seat and gave his horse a vicious blow across
+the back.
+
+"Oh, Jack!" Nancy shrank and hid her face in her husband's arm. "Don't let
+him do that! I can't bear it!"
+
+Dampier shouted out something roughly, angrily, and the man jumped off the
+box, and taking hold of the rein gave it a sharp pull. He led his unwilling
+horse through the big iron gates, and then the little open carriage rolled
+on smoothly.
+
+How enchanting to be driving under the stars in the city which hails in
+every artist--Jack Dampier was an artist--a beloved son!
+
+In the clear June atmosphere, under the great arc-lamps which seemed
+suspended in the mild lambent air, the branches of the trees lining the
+Boulevards showed brightly, delicately green; and the tints of the dresses
+worn by the women walking up and down outside the cafés and still
+brilliantly lighted shops mingled luminously, as on a magic palette.
+
+Nancy withdrew herself gently from her husband's arm. It seemed to her that
+every one in that merry, slowly moving crowd on either side must see that
+he was holding her to him. She was a shy, sensitive little creature, this
+three-weeks-old bride, whose honeymoon was now about to merge into happy
+every-day life.
+
+Dampier divined something of what she was feeling. He put out his hand and
+clasped hers. "Silly sweetheart," he whispered. "All these merry,
+chattering people are far too full of themselves to be thinking of us!"
+
+As she made no answer, bewildered, a little oppressed by the brilliance,
+the strangeness of everything about them, he added a little anxiously,
+"Darling, are you tired? Would you rather go straight to the hotel?"
+
+But pressing closer to him, Nancy shook her head. "No, no, Jack! I'm not a
+bit tired. It was you who were tired to-day, not I!"
+
+"I didn't feel well in the train, 'tis true. But now that I'm in Paris I
+could stay out all night! I suppose you've never read George Moore's
+description of this very drive we're taking, little girl?"
+
+And again Nancy shook her head, and smiled in the darkness. In the world
+where she had lived her short life, in the comfortable, unimaginative world
+in which Nancy Tremain, the delightfully pretty, fairly well-dowered,
+orphan, had drifted about since she had been "grown-up," no one had ever
+heard of George Moore.
+
+Strange, even in some ways amazing, their marriage--hers and Jack
+Dampier's--had been! He, the clever, devil-may-care artist, unconventional
+in all his ways, very much a Bohemian, knowing little of his native
+country, England, for he had lived all his youth and working life in
+France--and she, in everything, save an instinctive love of beauty, which,
+oddly yet naturally enough, only betrayed itself in her dress, the
+exact opposite!
+
+A commission from an English country gentleman who had fancied a portrait
+shown by Dampier in the Salon, had brought the artist, rather reluctantly,
+across the Channel, and an accident--sometimes it made them both shiver to
+realise how slight an accident--had led to their first and
+decisive meeting.
+
+Nancy Tremain had been brought over to tea, one cold, snowy afternoon, at
+the house where Dampier was painting. She had been dressed all in grey, and
+the graceful velvet gown and furry cap-like toque had made her look, in his
+eyes, like an exquisite Eighteenth Century pastel.
+
+One glance--so Dampier had often since assured her and she never grew tired
+of hearing it--had been enough. They had scarcely spoken the one to the
+other, but he had found out her name, and, writing, cajoled her into seeing
+him again. Very soon he had captured her in the good old way, as women--or
+so men like to think--prefer to be wooed, by right of conquest.
+
+There had been no one to say them nay, no one to comment unkindly over so
+strange and sudden a betrothal. On the contrary, Nancy's considerable
+circle of acquaintances had smilingly approved.
+
+All the world loves a masterful lover, and Nancy Tremain was far too
+pretty, far too singular and charming, to become engaged in the course of
+nature to some commonplace young man. This big, ugly, clever, amusing
+artist was just the contrast which was needed for romance.
+
+And he seemed by his own account to be making a very good income, too! Yet,
+artists being such eccentric, extravagant fellows, doubtless Nancy's modest
+little fortune would come in useful--so those about them argued carelessly.
+
+Then one of her acquaintances, a thought more good-natured than the rest,
+arranged that lovely, happy Nancy should be married from a pleasant country
+house, in a dear little country church. Braving superstition, the wedding
+took place in the last week of May, and bride and bridegroom had gone to
+Italy--though, to be sure, it was rather late for Italy--for three
+happy weeks.
+
+Now they were about to settle down in Dampier's Paris studio.
+
+Unluckily it was an Exhibition Year, one of those years, that is, which,
+hateful as they may be to your true Parisian, pour steady streams of gold
+into the pockets of fortunate hotel and shop keepers, and which bring a
+great many foreigners to Paris who otherwise might never have come. Quite a
+number of such comfortable English folk were now looking forward to going
+and seeing Nancy Dampier in her new home--of which the very address was
+quaint and unusual, for Dampier's studio was situated Impasse des Nonnes.
+
+They were now speeding under and across the vast embracing shadow of the
+Opera House. And again Dampier slipped his arm round his young wife. It
+seemed to this happy man as if Paris to-night had put on her gala dress to
+welcome him, devout lover and maker of beauty, back to her bosom.
+
+"Isn't it pleasant to think," he whispered, "that Paris is the more
+beautiful because you now are in it and of it, Nancy?"
+
+And Nancy smiled, well pleased at the fantastic compliment.
+
+She pressed more closely to him.
+
+"I wish--I wish--" and then she stopped, for she was unselfish, shy of
+expressing her wishes, but that made Dampier ever the more eager to hear,
+and, if possible, to gratify them.
+
+"What is it that you wish, dear heart?" he asked.
+
+"I wish, Jack, that we were going straight home to the studio now--instead
+of to an hotel."
+
+"We'll get in very soon," he answered quickly. "Believe me, darling, you
+wouldn't like going in before everything is ready for you. Mère Bideau has
+her good points, but she could never make the place look as I want it to
+look when you first see it. I'll get up early to-morrow morning and go and
+see to it all. I wouldn't for the world you saw our home as it must look
+now--the poor little living rooms dusty and shabby, and our boxes sitting
+sadly in the middle of the studio itself!"
+
+They had sent their heavy luggage on from England, and for the honeymoon
+Nancy had contented herself with one modest little trunk, while Dampier had
+taken the large portmanteau which had been the useful wedding present of
+the new friend and patron in whose house he had first seen his wife.
+
+Swiftly they shot through the triple arch which leads from the Rue de
+Rivoli to the Carousel. How splendid and solitary was the vast dimly-lit
+space. "I like this," whispered Nancy dreamily, gazing up at the dark,
+star-powdered sky.
+
+And then Dampier turned and caught her, this time unresisting, yielding
+joyfully, to his breast. "Nancy?" he murmured thickly. "Nancy? I'm afraid!"
+
+"Afraid?" she repeated wonderingly.
+
+"Yes, horribly afraid! Pray, my pure angel, pray that the gods may indulge
+their cruel sport elsewhere. I haven't always been happy, Nancy."
+
+And she clung to him, full of vague, unsubstantial fears. "Don't talk like
+that," she murmured. "It--it isn't right to make fun of such things."
+
+"Make fun? Good God!" was all he said.
+
+And then his mood changed. They were now being shaken across the huge,
+uneven paving stones of the quays, and so on to a bridge. "I never really
+feel at home in Paris till I've crossed the Seine," he cried joyously.
+"Cheer up, darling, we shall soon be at the Hôtel Saint Ange!"
+
+"Have you ever stayed in the Hôtel Saint Ange?" she said, with a touch of
+curiosity in her voice.
+
+"I used to know a fellow who lived there," he said carelessly. "But what
+made me pick it out was the fact that it's such a queer, beautiful old
+house, and with a delightful garden. Also we shall meet no English there."
+
+"Don't you like English people?" she asked, a little protestingly.
+
+And Dampier laughed. "I like them everywhere but in Paris," he said: and
+then, "But you won't be quite lonely, little lady, for a good many
+Americans go to the Hôtel Saint Ange. And for such a funny reason--"
+
+"What reason?"
+
+"It was there that Edgar Allan Poe stayed when he was in Paris."
+
+Their carriage was now engaged in threading narrow, shadowed thoroughfares
+which wound through what might have been a city of the dead. From midnight
+till cock-crow old-world Paris sleeps, and the windows of the high houses
+on either side of the deserted streets through which they were now driving
+were all closely shuttered.
+
+"Here we have the ceremonious, the well-bred, the tactful Paris of other
+days," exclaimed Dampier whimsically. "This Paris understands without any
+words that what we now want is to be quiet, and by ourselves, little girl!"
+
+A gas lamp, burning feebly in a corner wine shop, lit up his exultant face
+for a flashing moment.
+
+"You don't look well, Jack," Nancy said suddenly. "It was awfully hot in
+Lyons this morning--"
+
+"We stayed just a thought too long in that carpet warehouse," he said
+gaily,--"And then--and then that prayer carpet, which might have belonged
+to Ali Baba of Ispahan, has made me feel ill with envy ever since! But joy!
+Here we are at last!"
+
+After emerging into a square of which one side was formed by an old Gothic
+church, they had engaged in a dark and narrow street the further end of
+which was bastioned by one of the flying buttresses of the church they had
+just passed.
+
+The cab drew up with a jerk. "C'est ici, monsieur."
+
+The man had drawn up before a broad oak porte cochère which, sunk far back
+into a thick wall, was now inhospitably shut.
+
+"They go to bed betimes this side of the river!" exclaimed Dampier
+ruefully.
+
+Nancy felt a little troubled. The hotel people knew they were coming, for
+Jack had written from Marseilles: it was odd no one had sat up for them.
+
+But their driver gave the wrought-iron bell-handle a mighty pull, and after
+what seemed to the two travellers a very long pause the great doors swung
+slowly back on their hinges, while a hearty voice called out, "C'est vous,
+Monsieur Gerald? C'est vous, mademoiselle?"
+
+And Dampier shouted back in French, "It's Mr. and Mrs. Dampier. Surely you
+expect us? I wrote from Marseilles three days ago!"
+
+He helped his wife out of the cab, and they passed through into the broad,
+vaulted passage which connected the street with the courtyard of the hotel.
+By the dim light afforded by an old-fashioned hanging lamp Nancy Dampier
+saw that three people had answered the bell; they were a middle-aged man
+(evidently mine host), his stout better half, and a youth who rubbed his
+eyes as if sleepy, and who stared at the newcomers with a dull,
+ruminating stare.
+
+As is generally the case in a French hotel, it was Madame who took command.
+She poured forth a torrent of eager, excited words, and at last Dampier
+turned to his wife:--"They got my letter, but of course had no address to
+which they could answer, and--and it's rather a bore, darling--but they
+don't seem to have any rooms vacant."
+
+But even as he spoke the fat, cheerful-looking Frenchwoman put her hand on
+the young Englishman's arm. She had seen the smart-looking box of the
+bride, the handsome crocodile skin bag of the bridegroom, and again she
+burst forth, uttering again and again the word "arranger."
+
+Dampier turned once more, this time much relieved, to his wife: "Madame
+Poulain (that's her name, it seems) thinks she can manage to put us up all
+right to-night, if we don't mind two very small rooms--unluckily not on the
+same floor. But some people are going away to-morrow and then she'll have
+free some charming rooms overlooking the garden."
+
+He took a ten-franc piece out of his pocket as he spoke, and handed it to
+the gratified cabman:--"It doesn't seem too much for a drive through
+fairyland"--he said aside to his wife.
+
+And Nancy nodded contentedly. It pleased her that her Jack should be
+generous--the more that she had found out in the last three weeks that if
+generous, he was by no means a spendthrift. He had longed to buy a couple
+of Persian prayer carpets in that queer little warehouse where a French
+friend of his had taken them in Lyons, but he had resisted the
+temptation--nobly.
+
+Meanwhile Madame Poulain was talking, talking, talking--emphasising all she
+said with quick, eager gestures.
+
+"They are going to put you in their own daughter's room, darling. She's
+luckily away just now. So I think you will be all right. I, it seems, must
+put up with a garret!"
+
+"Oh, must you be far away from me?" she asked a little plaintively.
+
+"Only for to-night, only till to-morrow, sweetheart."
+
+And then they all began going up a winding staircase which started flush
+from the wall to the left.
+
+First came Madame Poulain, carrying a candle, then Monsieur Poulain with
+his new English clients, and, last of all, the loutish lad carrying Nancy's
+trunk. They had but a little way to go up the shallow slippery stairs, for
+when they reached the first tiny landing Madame Poulain opened a curious,
+narrow slit of a door which seemed, when shut, to be actually part of the
+finely panelled walls.
+
+"Here's my daughter's room," said the landlady proudly. "It is very
+comfortable and charming."
+
+"What an extraordinary little room!" whispered Nancy.
+
+And Dampier, looking round him with a good deal of curiosity, agreed.
+
+In the days when the Hôtel Saint Ange belonged to the great soldier whose
+name it still bears, this strange little apartment had surely been, so the
+English artist told himself, a powdering closet. Even now the only outside
+light and air came from a small square window which had evidently only
+recently been cut through the thick wall. In front of this aperture
+fluttered a bright pink curtain.
+
+Covering three of the walls as well as the low ceiling, was a paper
+simulating white satin powdered with rose-buds, and the bed, draped with
+virginal muslin curtains, was a child's rather than a woman's bed.
+
+"What's that?" asked Dampier suddenly. "A cupboard?"
+
+He had noticed that wide double doors, painted in the pale brownish grey
+called grisaille, formed the further side of the tiny apartment.
+
+Madame Poulain, turning a key, revealed a large roomy space now fitted up
+as a cupboard. "It's a way through into our bedroom, monsieur," she said
+smiling. "We could not of course allow our daughter to be far from
+ourselves."
+
+And Dampier nodded. He knew the ways of French people and sympathised with
+those ways.
+
+He stepped up into the cupboard, curious to see if this too had been a
+powdering closet, and if that were so if the old panelling and
+ornamentation had remained in their original condition.
+
+Thus for a moment was Dampier concealed from those in the room. And during
+that moment there came the sound of footsteps on the staircase, followed by
+the sudden appearance on the landing outside the open door of the curious
+little apartment of two tall figures--a girl in a lace opera cloak, and a
+young man in evening dress.
+
+Nancy Dampier, gazing at them, a little surprised at the abrupt apparition,
+told herself that they must be brother and sister, so striking was their
+resemblance to one another.
+
+"We found the porte cochère open, Madame Poulain, so we just came straight
+in. Good night!"
+
+The young lady spoke excellent French, but as she swept on up the staircase
+out of sight there came a quick low interchange of English words between
+herself and the man with her.
+
+"Daisy? Did you notice that beautiful young woman? A regular stunner! She
+must be that daughter the Poulains are always talking about."
+
+And then "Daisy's" answer floated down. "Yes, I noticed her--she is
+certainly very pretty. But do be careful, Gerald, I expect she knows a
+little English--"
+
+Dampier stepped down out of the cupboard.
+
+"That American cub ought to be put in his place!" he muttered heatedly.
+
+Nancy turned her face away to hide a little smile. Jack was so funny! He
+delighted in her beauty--he was always telling her so, and yet it annoyed
+him if other people thought her pretty too. This young American had looked
+at her quite pleasantly, quite respectfully; he hadn't meant to be
+offensive--of that Nancy felt sure.
+
+"I suppose you have a good many Americans this year?" went on Dampier in
+French, turning to Monsieur Poulain.
+
+"No, monsieur, no. Our clientèle is mostly French. We have only this young
+lady, her brother, and their father, monsieur. The father is a Senator in
+his own country--Senator Burton. They are very charming people, and have
+stayed with us often before. All our other guests are French. We have never
+had such a splendid season: and all because of the Exhibition!"
+
+"I'm glad you are doing well," said Dampier courteously. "But for my
+part"--he shrugged his shoulders--"I'm too much of a Parisian to like the
+Exhibition."
+
+Then he turned to Nancy: "Well, you'll be quite safe, my darling. Monsieur
+and Madame Poulain are only just through here, so you needn't feel lonely."
+
+And then there came a chorus of bonsoirs from host, from hostess, and from
+the lad who now stood waiting with the Englishman's large portmanteau
+hitched up on his shoulder.
+
+Dampier bent and kissed his wife very tenderly: then he followed Monsieur
+Poulain and the latter's nephew up the stairs, while Madame Poulain stayed
+behind and helped Mrs. Dampier to unpack the few things she required for
+the night.
+
+And Nancy, though she felt just a little bewildered to find herself alone
+in this strange house, was yet amused and cheered by the older woman's
+lively chatter, and that although she only understood one word in ten.
+
+Madame Poulain talked of her daughter, Virginie, now in the country well
+away from the holiday crowds brought by the Exhibition, and also of her
+nephew, Jules, the lad who had carried up the luggage, and who knew--so
+Madame Poulain went to some pains to make Nancy understand--a
+little English.
+
+Late though it was, the worthy woman did not seem in any hurry to go away,
+but at last came the kindly words which even Nancy, slight as was her
+knowledge of French, understood: "Bonsoir, madame. Dormez bien."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+Nancy Dampier sat up in bed.
+
+Through the curtain covering the square aperture in the wall which did duty
+for a window the strong morning light streamed in, casting a pink glow over
+the peculiar little room.
+
+She drew the pearl-circled watch, which had been one of Jack's first gifts
+to her, from under the big, square pillow.
+
+It was already half-past nine. How very tiresome and strange that she
+should have overslept herself on this, her first morning in Paris! And
+yet--and yet not so very strange after all, for her night had been
+curiously and disagreeably disturbed.
+
+At first she had slept the deep, dreamless sleep of happy youth, and then,
+in a moment, she had suddenly sat up, wide awake.
+
+The murmur of talking had roused her--of eager, low talking in the room
+which lay the other side of the deep cupboard. When the murmur had at last
+ceased she had dozed off, only to be waked again by the sound of the porte
+cochère swinging back on its huge hinges.
+
+It was evidently quite true--as Jack had said--that Paris never goes to
+sleep.
+
+Jack had declared he would get up and go over to the studio early, so there
+was nothing for it but to get up, and wait patiently till he came back.
+Nancy knew that her husband wouldn't like her to venture out into the
+streets alone. He was extraordinarily careful of her--careful and
+thoughtful for her comfort.
+
+What an angel he was--her great strong, clever Jack!
+
+A girl who goes about by herself as much as Nancy Tremain had gone about
+alone during the three years which had elapsed betwixt her leaving school
+and her marriage, obtains a considerable knowledge of men, and not of the
+nicest kind of men. But Jack was an angel--she repeated the rather absurdly
+incongruous word to herself with a very tender feeling in her heart. He
+always treated her not only as if she were something beautiful and rare,
+but something fragile, to be respected as well as adored....
+
+He had left her so little during the last three weeks that she had never
+had time to think about him as she was thinking of him now; "counting up
+her mercies," as an old-fashioned lady she had known as a child was wont to
+advise those about her to do.
+
+At last she looked round her for a bell. No, there was nothing of the sort
+in the tiny room. But Nancy Dampier had already learned to do without all
+sorts of things which she had regarded as absolute necessities of life when
+she was Nancy Tremain. In some of the humbler Italian inns in which she and
+Jack had been so happy, the people had never even heard of a bell!
+
+She jumped out of bed, put on her pretty, pale blue dressing-gown--it was a
+fancy of Jack's that she should wear a great deal of pale blue and
+white--and then she opened the door a little way.
+
+"Madame!" she called out gaily. "Madame Poulain?" and wondered whether her
+French would run to the words "hot water"--yes, she thought it would. "Eau
+chaude"--that was hot water.
+
+But there came no answering cry, and again, this time rather impatiently,
+she called out, "Madame Poulain?"
+
+And then the shuffling sounds of heavy footsteps made Nancy shoot back from
+the open door.
+
+"Yuss?" muttered a hoarse voice.
+
+This surely must be the loutish-looking youth who, so Nancy suddenly
+remembered, knew a little English.
+
+"I want some hot water," she called out through the door. "And will you
+please ask your aunt to come here for a moment?"
+
+"Yuss," he said, in that queer hoarse voice, and shuffled downstairs again.
+And there followed, floating up from below, one of those quick, gabbling
+interchanges of French words which Nancy, try as she might, could not
+understand.
+
+She got into bed again. Perhaps after all it would be better to allow them
+to bring up her "little breakfast" in the foreign fashion. She would still
+be in plenty of time for Jack. Once in the studio he would be in no hurry,
+or so she feared, to come back--especially if on his way out he had opened
+her door and seen how soundly she was sleeping.
+
+She waited some time, and then, as no one came, grew what she so seldom
+was, impatient and annoyed. What an odd hotel, and what dilatory,
+disagreeable ways! But just as she was thinking of getting up again she
+heard a hesitating knock.
+
+It was Madame Poulain, and suddenly Nancy--though unobservant as is youth,
+and especially happy youth--noticed that mine hostess looked far less well
+in the daytime than by candle-light.
+
+Madame Poulain's stout, sallow face was pale, her cheeks puffy; there were
+rings round the black eyes which had sparkled so brightly the night before.
+But then she too must have had a disturbed night.
+
+In her halting French Mrs. Dampier explained that she would like coffee and
+rolls, and then some hot water.
+
+"C'est bien, mademoiselle!"
+
+And Nancy blushed rosy-red. "Mademoiselle?" How odd to hear herself so
+addressed! But Madame Poulain did not give her time to say anything, even
+if she had wished to do so, for, before Mrs. Dampier could speak again, the
+hotel-keeper had shut the door and gone downstairs.
+
+And then, after a long, long wait, far longer than Nancy had ever been made
+to wait in any of the foreign hotels in which she and her husband had
+stayed during the last three weeks, Madame Poulain reappeared, bearing a
+tray in her large, powerful hands.
+
+She put the tray down on the bed, and she was already making her way
+quickly, silently to the door, when Nancy called out urgently, "Madame?
+Madame Poulain! Has my husband gone out!"
+
+And then she checked herself, and tried to convey the same question in her
+difficult French--"Mon mari?" she said haltingly. "Mon mari?"
+
+But Madame Poulain only shook her head, and hurried out of the room,
+leaving the young Englishwoman oddly discomfited and surprised.
+
+It was evidently true what Jack had said--that tiresome Exhibition had
+turned everything in Paris, especially the hotels, topsy-turvy. Madame
+Poulain was cross and tired, run off her feet, maybe; her manner, too,
+quite different now from what it had been the night before.
+
+Nancy Dampier got up and dressed. She put on a pale blue linen gown which
+Jack admired, and a blue straw hat trimmed with grey wings which Jack said
+made her look like Mercury.
+
+She told herself that there could be no reason why she shouldn't venture
+out of her room and go downstairs, where there must surely be some kind of
+public sitting-room.
+
+Suddenly remembering the young American's interchange of words with his
+sister, she wondered, smiling to herself, if she would ever see them again.
+How cross the young man's idle words had made Jack! Dear, jealous Jack, who
+hated it so when people stared at her as foreigners have a trick of
+staring. It made Nancy happy to know that people thought her pretty, nay
+beautiful, for it would have been dreadful for Jack, an artist, to marry an
+ugly woman....
+
+Locking her box she went out onto the shallow staircase, down the few steps
+which led straight under the big arch of the porte cochère. It was thrown
+hospitably open on to the narrow street now full of movement, colour, and
+sound. But in vivid contrast to the moving panorama presented by the busy,
+lane-like thoroughfare outside, was the spacious, stone-paved courtyard of
+the hotel, made gay with orange trees in huge green tubs. Almost opposite
+the porte cochère was another arch through which she could see a glimpse of
+the cool, shady garden Jack remembered.
+
+Yes, it was a strangely picturesque and charming old house, this Hôtel
+Saint Ange; but even so Nancy felt a little lost, a little strange,
+standing there under the porte cochère. Then she saw that painted up on a
+glass door just opposite the stairs leading to her room was the word
+"Bureau": it was doubtless there that Jack had left word when he would
+be back.
+
+She went across and opened the door, but to her surprise there was no one
+in the little office; she hadn't, however, long to wait, for Madame
+Poulain's nephew suddenly appeared from the courtyard.
+
+He had on an apron; there was a broom in his hand, and as he came towards
+her, walking very, very slowly, there came over Nancy Dampier, she could
+not have told you why, a touch of repulsion from the slovenly youth.
+
+"I wish to know," she said, "whether my husband left any message for me?"
+
+But the young man shook his head. He shuffled first on one foot and then on
+the other, looking miserably awkward. It was plain that he did not know
+more than a word or two of English.
+
+"I am sure," she said, speaking slowly and very distinctly, "that my
+husband left some kind of message with your uncle or aunt. Will you please
+ask one of them to speak to me?"
+
+He nodded. "Si, mademoiselle" and walked quickly away, back into the
+courtyard.
+
+"Mademoiselle" again! What an extraordinary hotel, and what bad manners
+these people had! And yet again and again Jack had compared English and
+French hotels--always to the disadvantage of the former.
+
+Long minutes went by, and Nancy began to feel vexed and angry. Then there
+fell on her listening ears a phrase uttered very clearly in Madame
+Poulain's resonant voice: "C'est ton tour maintenant! Vas-y, mon ami!"
+
+And before she had time to try and puzzle out the sense of the words, she
+saw Monsieur Poulain's portly figure emerge from the left side of the
+courtyard, and then--when he caught sight of the slim, blue-clad figure
+standing under his porte cochère--beat a hasty retreat.
+
+Nancy's sense of discomfort and indignation grew. What did these people
+mean by treating her like this? She longed with a painful, almost a sick
+longing for her husband's return. It must be very nearly eleven o'clock.
+Why did he stay away so long?
+
+A painful, choking feeling--one she had very, very seldom experienced
+during the course of her short, prosperous life, came into her throat.
+
+Angrily she dashed away two tears from her eyes.
+
+This was a horrid hotel! The Poulains were hateful people! Jack had made a
+mistake--how could he have brought her to such a place? She would tell him
+when he came back that he must take her away now, at once, to some
+ordinary, nice hotel, where the people knew English, and where they treated
+their guests with ordinary civility.
+
+And then there shot through Nancy Dampier a feeling of quick relief, for,
+walking across the courtyard, evidently on their way out, came a
+pleasant-looking elderly gentleman, accompanied by the girl whom Nancy had
+seen for a brief moment standing on the landing close to her bedroom door
+the night before.
+
+These were English people? No, American of course! But that was quite as
+good, for they, thank heaven! spoke English. She could ask them to be her
+interpreters with those extraordinary Poulains. Jack wouldn't mind her
+doing that. Why, he might have left quite an important message for her!
+
+She took a step forward, and the strangers stopped. The old
+gentleman--Nancy called him in her own mind an old gentleman, though
+Senator Burton was by no means old in his own estimation or in that of his
+contemporaries--smiled a very pleasant, genial smile.
+
+Nancy Dampier made a charming vision as she stood under the arch of the
+porte cochère, her slender, blue-clad figure silhouetted against the dark
+background by the street outside, and the colour coming and going in
+her face.
+
+"May I speak to you a moment?" she said shyly.
+
+"Why certainly."
+
+The American took off his hat, and stood looking down at her kindly. "My
+name is Burton, Senator Burton, at your service! What can I do for you?".
+
+The simple little question brought back all Nancy's usual happy confidence.
+How silly she had been just now to feel so distressed.
+
+"I'm Mrs. Dampier, and I can't make the hotel people understand what I
+say," she explained. "I mean Monsieur and Madame Poulain--and the nephew--I
+think his name is Jules--though he is supposed to speak English, is so
+very stupid."
+
+"Yes, indeed he is!" chimed in the girl whom her brother had called
+"Daisy." "I've long ago given up trying to make that boy understand
+anything, even in French. But they do work him most awfully hard, you know;
+they have women in each day to help with the cleaning, but that poor lad
+does everything else--everything, that is, that the Poulains don't do
+themselves."
+
+"What is it that you can't make them understand?" asked Senator Burton
+indulgently. "Tell us what it is you want to ask them?"
+
+"I only wish to know at what time my husband went out, and whether he left
+any message for me," answered Nancy rather shamefacedly. "You see the hotel
+is so full that they put us on different floors, and I haven't seen him
+this morning."
+
+"I'll find that out for you at once. I expect Madame Poulain is in her
+kitchen just now."
+
+The Senator turned and went back into the courtyard, leaving his daughter
+and the young Englishwoman alone together.
+
+"The Poulains seem such odd, queer people," said Nancy hesitatingly.
+
+"D'you think so? We've always found them all right," said the girl,
+smiling. "Of course they're dreadfully busy just now because of the
+Exhibition. The hotel is full of French people, and they give Madame
+Poulain a great deal of trouble. But she doesn't grudge it, for she and her
+husband are simply coining money! They're determined that their daughter
+shall have a splendid dowry!" She waited a moment, and then repeated, "Oh,
+yes, the Poulains are very good sort of people. They're very kindly and
+good-natured."
+
+To this remark Nancy made no answer. She thought the Poulains both rude and
+disagreeable, but she had no wish to speak ill of them to this nice girl.
+How lucky it was that these kind Americans had come to her rescue! Though
+still feeling indignant and uncomfortable with regard to the way in which
+she had been treated by the hotel-keeper and his wife, she felt quite happy
+again now.
+
+Senator Burton was away for what seemed, not only to Mrs. Dampier, but also
+to his daughter, a considerable time. But at last they saw him coming
+slowly towards them. His eyes were bent on the ground; he seemed to be
+thinking, deeply.
+
+Nancy Dampier took a step forward. "Well?" she said eagerly, and then a
+little shyly she uttered his name, "Well, Mr. Burton? What do they say? Did
+my husband leave any message?"
+
+"No, he doesn't seem to have done that." And then the Senator looked down
+searchingly into the young Englishwoman's face. It was a very lovely face,
+and just now the look of appeal, of surprise, in the blue eyes added a
+touch of pathetic charm. He thought of the old expression, "Beauty in
+distress."
+
+His daughter broke in: "Why, Mrs. Dampier, do come upstairs and wait in our
+sitting-room," she said cordially. "I'll come with you, for we were only
+going out for a little stroll, weren't we, father?"
+
+Nancy Dampier hesitated. She did not notice that the American Senator
+omitted to endorse his daughter's invitation; she hesitated for a very
+different reason: "You're very kind; but if I do that I shall have to tell
+Madame Poulain, for it would give my husband a dreadful fright if he came
+in and found I had left my room and disappeared"--she blushed and smiled
+very prettily.
+
+And again Senator Burton looked searchingly down into the lovely, flushed
+little face; but the deep-blue, guileless-looking eyes met his questioning
+gaze very frankly. He said slowly, "Very well, I will go and tell Madame
+Poulain that you will be waiting up in our sitting-room,
+Mrs.--ah--Dampier."
+
+He went out across the courtyard again, and once more he seemed, at any
+rate to his daughter, to stay away longer than was needed for the delivery
+of so simple a message.
+
+Growing impatient, Miss Burton took Nancy Dampier across the sunlit
+courtyard to the wide old oak staircase, the escalier d'honneur, as it was
+still called in the hotel, down which the Marquis de Saint Ange had
+clattered when starting for Fontenoy.
+
+When they were half-way up the Senator joined them, and a few moments later
+when they had reached the second landing, he put a key in the lock of a
+finely carved door, then he stood back, courteously, to allow his
+daughter's guest to walk through into the small lobby which led to the
+delightful suite of rooms which the Burtons always occupied during their
+frequent visits to Paris.
+
+Nancy uttered an exclamation of delight as she passed through into the
+high-pitched, stately salon, whose windows overlooked one of those leafy
+gardens which are still the pride of old Paris. "This is delightful!" she
+exclaimed. "Who would ever have thought that they had such rooms as this in
+the Hôtel Saint Ange!"
+
+"There are several of these suites," said Daisy Burton pleasantly. "In
+fact, a good many French provincial people come up here, year after year,
+for the winter."
+
+While Mrs. Dampier and his daughter were exchanging these few words the
+Senator remained silent. Then--"Is your brother gone out?" he
+said abruptly.
+
+"Yes, father. He went out about half an hour ago. But he said he'd be back
+in ample time to take us out to luncheon. He thought we might like to go to
+Foyot's to-day."
+
+"So we will. Daisy, my dear--?" He stopped short, and his daughter looked
+at him, surprised.
+
+"Yes, father?"
+
+"I'm afraid I must ask you to leave me with this young lady for a few
+moments. I have something to say to her which I think it would be as well
+that I should say alone."
+
+Nancy got up from the chair on which she had already seated herself, and
+fear flashed into her face. "What is it?" she cried apprehensively. "You're
+not going to tell me that anything's happened to Jack!"
+
+"No, no," said the Senator quickly, but even as he uttered the two short,
+reassuring little words he averted his eyes from Mrs. Dampier's questioning
+anxious eyes.
+
+His daughter left the room.
+
+"What is it?" said Nancy again, trying to smile. "What is it, Mr. Burton?"
+
+And then the Senator, motioning her to a chair, sat down too.
+
+"The Poulains," he said gravely--he was telling himself that he had never
+come across so accomplished an actress as this young Englishwoman was
+proving herself to be--"the Poulains," he repeated very distinctly,
+"declare that you arrived here last night alone. They say that they did not
+know, as a matter of fact, that you were married. You do not seem to have
+even given them your name."
+
+Nancy stared at him for a moment. Then, "There must be some extraordinary
+mistake," she said quietly. "The Poulains must have thought you meant
+someone else. My husband and I arrived, of course together, late last
+night. At first Madame Poulain said she couldn't take us in as the hotel
+was full. But at last she said that they could give us two small rooms.
+They knew our name was Dampier, for Jack wrote to them from Marseilles. He
+and I were only married three weeks ago: this is the end of our honeymoon.
+My husband, who is an artist, is now at his studio. We're going to move
+there in a day or two."
+
+She spoke quite simply and straightforwardly, and the Senator felt oddly
+relieved by her words.
+
+He tried to remember exactly what had happened, what exactly the Poulains
+had said, when he had gone into the big roomy kitchen which lay to the left
+of the courtyard.
+
+He had certainly been quite clear. That is, he had explained, in his very
+good French, to Madame Poulain, that he came to inquire, on behalf of a
+young English lady, whether her husband, a gentleman named Dampier, had
+left any message for her. And Madame Poulain, coming across to him in a
+rather mysterious manner, had said in a low voice that she feared the young
+lady was toquée--i. e., not quite all right in her head--as, saving
+Monsieur le Sénateur's presence, English ladies so often were! At great
+length she had gone on to explain that the young lady in question had
+arrived very late the night before, and that seeing that she was so young
+and pretty, and also that she knew so very little French, they had allowed
+her, rather than turn her out, to occupy their own daughter's room, a room
+they had never, never, under any circumstances, allowed a client to sleep
+in before.
+
+Then Madame Poulain had gone out and called Monsieur Poulain; and the
+worthy man had confirmed, in every particular, what his wife had just
+said--that is, he had explained how they had been knocked up late last
+night by a loud ringing at the porte cochère; how they had gone out to the
+door, and there, seized with pity for this pretty young English lady, who
+apparently knew so very, very little French, they had allowed her to occupy
+their daughter's room....
+
+Finally, the good Poulains, separately and in unison, had begged the
+Senator to try and find out something about their curious guest, as she
+apparently knew too little French to make herself intelligible.
+
+Now that he heard Nancy's quiet assertion, the Senator felt sure there had
+been a mistake. The Poulains had evidently confused pretty Mrs. Dampier
+with some wandering British spinster.
+
+"Let me go down with you now," she said eagerly. "The truth is--I know
+you'll think me foolish--but I'm afraid of the Poulains! They've behaved so
+oddly and so rudely to me this morning. I liked them very much last night."
+
+"Yes," he said cordially. "We'll go right down now; and my girl, Daisy, can
+come too."
+
+When his daughter came into the room, "There's been some mistake," said
+Senator Burton briefly. "It's my fault, I expect. I can't have made it
+clear to Madame Poulain whom I meant. She has confused Mrs. Dampier with
+some English lady who turned up here alone late last night."
+
+"But we turned up late last night," said Nancy quickly. "Very, very late;
+long after midnight."
+
+"Still, my brother and I came in after you," said Daisy Burton suddenly.
+And then she smiled and reddened. Mrs. Dampier must certainly have
+overheard Gerald's remark.
+
+"It was an awful job getting a cab after that play, father, and it must
+have been nearly one o'clock when we got in. As we felt sure this side of
+the house was shut up we went up that queer little back staircase, and so
+past the open door of Mrs. Dampier's room," she explained.
+
+To the Senator's surprise, Mrs. Dampier also grew red; indeed, she blushed
+crimson from forehead to chin.
+
+"My brother thought you were French," went on Daisy, a little awkwardly.
+"In fact, we both thought you must be Madame Poulain's daughter. We knew
+that was Virginie's room, and we've always been hearing of that girl ever
+since we first came to stay in Paris. She used to be at a convent school,
+and she's with her grandmother in the country just now, to be out of the
+Exhibition rush. The Poulains simply worship her."
+
+The Senator looked very thoughtful as he walked downstairs behind the two
+girls. The mystery was thickening in a very disagreeable way. Both
+hotel-keepers had stated positively that the "demoiselle anglaise," as they
+called her, had slept in their daughter's room....
+
+But what was this the lady who called herself Mrs. Dampier saying?
+
+"My husband and I realised you thought I was Mademoiselle Poulain," said
+Nancy, and she also spoke with a touch of awkwardness.
+
+Senator Burton put out his right hand and laid it, rather heavily, on his
+daughter's shoulder.
+
+She stopped and turned round. "Yes, father?"
+
+"Then I suppose you also saw Mr. Dampier, Daisy?"
+
+Eagerly he hoped for confirmation of the charming stranger's story. But--
+
+"No," she said reluctantly. "We only saw Mrs. Dampier and the Poulains,
+father--they were all in the room together. You see, we were outside on the
+dark staircase, and just stopped for a minute on the landing to say
+good-night to the Poulains, and to tell them that we had come in."
+
+"I suppose, Mrs. Dampier, that by then your husband had already gone to his
+room?" But in spite of his efforts to make his voice cordial the Senator
+failed to do so.
+
+"No, he hadn't gone upstairs then." Nancy waited a moment, puzzled, then
+she exclaimed, "I remember now! Jack had just stepped up into a big
+cupboard which forms one side of the little room. He came out again just as
+Miss Burton and--and your son had gone on upstairs." Again she reddened
+uncomfortably, wondering if this nice, kind girl had heard Jack's
+unflattering epithets concerning "the young American cub." But no, Jack's
+voice, if angry, had been low.
+
+When they were at the bottom of the staircase the Senator turned to his
+daughter.
+
+"Daisy," he said quietly, "I think it will be best for this lady to see
+Madame Poulain with me alone." And as his daughter showed no sign of having
+understood, he said again, with a touch of severity in his voice: "Daisy, I
+desire you to go upstairs."
+
+"You'll bring Mrs. Dampier up again, father?"
+
+He hesitated--and then he said, "Yes, should she wish it, I will do so."
+
+And Daisy Burton turned away, up the stairs again, very reluctantly. Her
+indulgent father was not given to interfere with even the most casual of
+her friendships, and she already felt as if this attractive young
+Englishwoman was to be her friend.
+
+Madame Poulain came slowly across the courtyard, and the Senator was struck
+by her look of ill-health, of languor. Clearly the worthy woman was
+overtaxing her strength. It was foolish of the Poulains not to have more
+help in, but French people were like that!
+
+Senator Burton knew that these good folks were trying to amass as large a
+dowry as possible for their adored only child. Virginie was now of
+marriageable age, and the Poulains had already selected in their own minds
+the man they wished to see their son-in-law. He was owner of an hotel at
+Chantilly, and as he was young, healthy, and reputed kind and
+good-tempered, he had the right to expect a good dowry with his future
+wife. The fact that this was an Exhibition Year was a great stroke of luck
+for the Poulains. It almost certainly meant that their beloved Virginie
+would soon be settled close to them in charming salubrious Chantilly....
+
+The proprietress of the Hôtel Saint Ange now stood close to Senator Burton
+and his companion. Her voluble tongue was stilled for once: she was
+twisting a corner of her blue check apron round and round in her strong,
+sinewy-looking fingers.
+
+"Well, Madame Poulain," the American spoke very gravely, "there has
+evidently been some strange misunderstanding. This lady asserts most
+positively that she arrived here last night accompanied by her husband,
+Mr. Dampier."
+
+A look of--was it anger or pain?--came over Madame Poulain's face. She
+shook her head decidedly. "I have already told monsieur," she said quickly,
+"that this lady arrived here last night alone. I know nothing of her
+husband: I did not even know she was married. To tell you the truth,
+monsieur, we ought to have made her fill in the usual form. But it was so
+late that we put off the formality till to-day. I now regret very much that
+we did so."
+
+The Senator looked questioningly at Nancy Dampier. She had become from red
+very white. "Do you understand what she says?" he asked slowly,
+impassively.
+
+"Yes--I understand. But she is not telling the truth."
+
+The Senator hesitated. "I have known Madame Poulain a long time," he said.
+
+"Yes--and you've only known me a few minutes."
+
+Nancy Dampier felt as though she were living through a horrible
+nightmare--horrible and at the same time absurd. But she made a great
+effort to remain calm, and to prove herself a sensible woman. So she added
+quietly: "I can't tell--I can't in the least guess--why this woman is
+telling such a strange, silly untruth. It is easy to prove the truth of
+what I say, Mr. Burton. My husband's name is John Dampier. He is an artist,
+and has a studio here in Paris."
+
+"Do you know the address of your husband's studio, Mrs. Dampier?"
+
+"Of course I do." The question stung her, this time past endurance. "I
+think I had better have a cab and drive there straight," she said stiffly.
+"Please forgive me for having given you so much trouble. I'll manage all
+right by myself now."
+
+Every vestige of colour had receded from her face. There was a frightened,
+hunted expression in her blue eyes, and the Senator felt a sudden thrill of
+concern, of pity. What did it all mean? Why should this poor girl--she
+looked even younger than his daughter--pretend that she had come here
+accompanied, if, after all, she had not done so?
+
+Madame Poulain was still looking at them fixedly, and there was no very
+pleasant expression on her face.
+
+"Well," she said at last, "that comes of being too good-natured, Monsieur
+le Sénateur. I never heard of such a thing! What does mademoiselle accuse
+us of? Does she think we made away with her friend? She may have arrived
+with a man--as to that I say nothing--but I assert most positively that in
+that case he left her before she actually came into the Hôtel Saint Ange."
+
+"Will you please ask her to call me a cab?" said Nancy trembling.
+
+And he transmitted the request; adding kindly in English, "Of course I am
+coming with you as far as your husband's studio. I expect we shall find
+that Mr. Dampier went there last night. The Poulains have forgotten that he
+came with you: you see they are very tired and overworked just now--"
+
+But Nancy shook her head. It was impossible that the Poulains should have
+forgotten Jack.
+
+Madame Poulain went a step nearer to Senator Burton and muttered something,
+hurriedly. He hesitated.
+
+"Mais si, Monsieur le Sénateur."
+
+And very reluctantly he transmitted the woman's disagreeable message. "She
+thinks that perhaps as you are going to your husband's rooms, you had
+better take your trunk with you, Mrs. Dampier."
+
+Nancy assented, almost eagerly. "Yes, do ask her to have my trunk brought
+down! I would far rather not come back here." She was still quite collected
+and quiet in her manner. "But, Mr. Burton, hadn't I better pay? Especially
+if they persist in saying I came alone?" she smiled, a tearful little
+smile. It still seemed so--so absurd.
+
+She took out her purse. "I haven't much money, for you see Jack always pays
+everything. But I've got an English sovereign, and I can always draw a
+cheque. I have my own money."
+
+And the Senator grew more and more bewildered. It was clear that this girl
+was either speaking the truth, or else that she was a most wonderful
+actress. But, as every man who has reached the Senator's age is ruefully
+aware, very young women can act on occasion in ordinary every day life, as
+no professional actress of genius ever did or ever will do on a stage.
+
+Madame Poulain went off briskly, and when she came back a few moments
+later, there was a look of relief, almost of joy, on her face. "The cab is
+here," she exclaimed, "and Jules has brought down madame's trunk."
+
+Nancy looked at the speaker quickly. Then she was "madame" again? Well,
+that was something.
+
+"Three francs--that will quite satisfy us," said Madame Poulain, handing
+over the change for her English sovereign. It was a gold napoleon and a
+two-franc piece. For the first time directly addressing Mrs. Dampier,
+"There has evidently been a mistake," she said civilly. "No doubt monsieur
+left madame at the door, and went off to his studio last night. I expect
+madame will find monsieur there, quite safe and sound."
+
+Senator Burton, well as he believed himself to be acquainted with his
+landlady, would have been very much taken aback had he visioned what
+followed his own and Mrs. Dampier's departure from the Hôtel Saint Ange.
+
+Madame Poulain remained at the door of the porte cochère till the open
+carriage turned the corner of the narrow street. Then she looked at
+her nephew.
+
+"How much did she give you?" she asked roughly. And the young man
+reluctantly opened a grimy hand and showed a two franc piece.
+
+She snatched it from him, and motioned him back imperiously towards the
+courtyard.
+
+After he had gone quite out of sight she walked quickly up the little
+street till she came to a low, leather-bound door which gave access to the
+church whose fine buttress bestowed such distinction on the otherwise
+rather sordid Rue Saint Ange. Pushing open the door she passed through into
+the dimly-lit side aisle where stood the Lady Altar.
+
+This old church held many memories for Madame Poulain. It was here that
+Virginie had been christened, here that there had taken place the funeral
+service of the baby son she never mentioned and still bitterly mourned, and
+it was there, before the High Altar, to the right of which she now stood,
+that she hoped to see her beloved daughter stand ere long a happy bride.
+
+She looked round her for a moment, bewildered by the sudden change from the
+bright sunlit street to the shadowed aisle. Then she suddenly espied what
+she had come to seek. Close to where she stood an alms-box clamped to the
+stone wall had written upon it the familiar legend, "Pour les Pauvres."
+
+Madame Poulain took a step forward, then dropped the three francs Nancy
+Dampier had just paid her, and the two francs she had extracted from
+Jules's reluctant hand, into the alms-box.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+That the cabman was evidently familiar with the odd address, "Impasse des
+Nonnes," brought a measure of relief to Senator Burton's mind, and as he
+turned and gazed into the candid eyes of the girl sitting by his side he
+was ashamed of his vague suspicions.
+
+The little carriage bowled swiftly across the great square behind which
+wound the Rue Saint Ange, up one of the steep, picturesque streets which
+lead from thence to the Luxembourg Gardens.
+
+When they had gone some considerable way round the gay and stately
+pleasance so dear to the poets and students of all nations, they suddenly
+turned into the quaintest, quietest thoroughfare imaginable, carved out of
+one of those old convent gardens which till lately were among the most
+beautiful and characteristic features of the "Quartier."
+
+An architect, who happened also to be an artist, had set up in this remote
+and peaceful oasis his household gods, adding on this, his own domain, a
+few studios with living rooms attached.
+
+A broad, sanded path ran between the low picturesque buildings, and so the
+carriage was obliged to draw up at the entrance to the Impasse.
+
+Senator Burton looked up at the cabman: "Better not take off the lady's
+trunk just yet," he said quickly in French, and though Nancy Dampier made
+no demur, she looked surprised.
+
+They began walking up the shaded path, for above the low walls on either
+side sprang flowering shrubs and trees.
+
+"What a charming place!" exclaimed the Senator, smiling down at her. "How
+fond you and your husband must be of it!"
+
+But his companion shook her head. "I've never been here," she said slowly.
+"You see this is my first visit to Paris. Though I ought not to call it a
+visit, for Paris is to be my home now," and she smiled at last, happy in
+the belief that in a few moments she would see Jack.
+
+She was a little troubled at the thought that Jack would be disappointed at
+her coming here in this way, with a stranger. But surely after she had
+explained the extraordinary occurrence of the morning he would understand?
+
+They were now opposite No. 3. It was a curious, mosque-like building, with
+the domed roof of what must be the studio, in the centre. Boldly inscribed
+on a marble slab set above the door was the name, "John Dampier."
+
+Before the bell had well stopped ringing, a sturdy apple-faced old woman,
+wearing the Breton dress Jack so much admired, stood before them.
+
+Nancy of course knew her at once for Mère Bideau.
+
+A pleasant smile lit up the gnarled face, and Nancy remembered what Jack
+had so often said as to Mère Bideau's clever way of dealing with visitors,
+especially with possible art patrons.
+
+Mrs. Dampier looked very kindly at the old woman who had been so good and
+so faithful a servant to her Jack, and who, she hoped, would also serve her
+well and faithfully.
+
+Before the Senator had time to speak, Mère Bideau, shaking her head,
+observed respectfully, "Mr. Dampier is not yet arrived. But if you,
+monsieur, and you, madame, will give yourselves the trouble of coming back
+this afternoon he will certainly be here, for I am expecting him
+any moment--"
+
+"Do you mean that Mr. Dampier has not been here at all this morning?"
+enquired the Senator.
+
+"No, monsieur, but as I have just had the honour of informing you, my
+master is to arrive to-day without fail. Everything is ready for him and
+for his lady. I had a letter from Mr. Dampier the day before yesterday."
+She waited a moment, and then added, "Won't monsieur come in and wait? Mr.
+Dampier would indeed be sorry to miss monsieur!"
+
+So far so good. Senator Burton eagerly acknowledged to himself that here
+was confirmation--as much confirmation as any reasonable man could
+expect--of Mrs. Dampier's story.
+
+This respectable old woman was evidently expecting her master and his bride
+to-day--of that there could now be no doubt.
+
+"I beg of you to enter," said Mère Bideau again. "Monsieur and madame may
+like to visit the studio? I do not say that it is very tidy--but my
+master's beautiful paintings are not affected by untidiness--" and she
+smiled ingratiatingly.
+
+This important-looking gentleman, whom her shrewd Parisian eyes and ears
+had already told her was an American, might be an important picture-buyer;
+in any case, he was evidently gravely disappointed at not finding Mr.
+Dampier at home.
+
+"My master may arrive any moment," she said again; "and though I've had to
+put all the luggage he sent on some time ago, in the studio--well, monsieur
+and madame will excuse that!"
+
+She stood aside to allow the strangers to step through into the little
+passage.
+
+The Senator turned to Nancy: "Hadn't we better go in and wait?" he asked.
+"You must remember that if Mr. Dampier has gone to the hotel they will
+certainly tell him we are here."
+
+"No," said Nancy in a low voice, "I would rather not go in--now. My husband
+doesn't want me to see the place until he has got it ready for me." Her
+lips quivered. "But oh, Mr. Burton, where can Jack be? What can he be
+doing?" She put her hands together with a helpless, childish gesture of
+distress. Then, making an effort over herself, she said in a more composed
+voice, "But I should like you to go in and just see some of Jack's
+pictures."
+
+With a smiling face Mère Bideau preceded the Senator down a sunny corridor
+into the large studio. It was circular in shape, lighted by a skylight, and
+contained a few pieces of fine old furniture, now incongruously allied to a
+number of unopened packing-cases and trunks.
+
+Mère Bideau went on talking volubly. She was evidently both fond and proud
+of her master. Suddenly she waved her lean arm towards a large, ambitious
+painting showing a typical family group of French bourgeois sitting in
+an arbour.
+
+"This is what won Mr. Dampier his first Salon medal," she explained. "But
+his work has much improved since then, as monsieur can see for himself!"
+and she uncovered an unframed easel portrait. It was a really interesting,
+distinguished presentment of a man. "Is not this excellent?" exclaimed Mère
+Bideau eagerly. "What expression, what strength in the mouth, in the eyes!"
+
+Senator Burton, had the circumstances been other, would perhaps have smiled
+at the old woman's enthusiasm, and at her intelligent criticism. But now he
+simply nodded his head gravely. "Yes, that is a very good portrait," he
+said absently. "And--and--where are the living rooms?"
+
+"This way, monsieur!" Then, with some surprise, "Would monsieur care to see
+the appartement? Then I presume monsieur is a friend of my master."
+
+But the Senator shook his head quickly. "No, no, I don't want to see the
+rooms," he said. "I was only curious to know if Mr. Dampier actually
+lived here."
+
+As there was a suite of living rooms attached to the studio, why had the
+Dampiers gone to an hotel?
+
+"Yes, monsieur, there are three beautiful bedrooms, also a bath-room, and a
+room which was not used by us, but which my master is going to turn into a
+little salon for his lady. As for their meals--" she shrugged her
+shoulders--"they will have to be served as heretofore in the studio." Then,
+"Does monsieur know the new Madame Dampier?" enquired Mère Bideau a trifle
+anxiously.
+
+"Yes," he answered uncomfortably. "Yes, I do know her."
+
+"And if monsieur will excuse the question, is she a nice lady? It will make
+a great difference to me--"
+
+"Yes, yes--she is very charming, very pretty."
+
+He could not bring himself to inform the good woman that the lady who had
+come with him, and who was now waiting outside the house, claimed to be
+Mrs. Dampier. It would be too--too unpleasant if it turned out to be--well,
+a mistake!
+
+The Senator was telling himself ruefully that though there was now ample
+evidence of the existence of John Dampier, there was not evidence at all as
+yet that the artist had ever been at the Hôtel Saint Ange: still less that
+the young Englishwoman who had just now refused to accompany him into the
+studio was John Dampier's wife. However, that fact, as she had herself
+pointed out rather piteously, could very soon be put to the proof.
+
+Slowly Senator Burton left the studio and made his way into the open air,
+where Nancy was waiting for him.
+
+"Well?" he said questioningly. "Well, Mrs. Dampier, what is it that you
+would like to do now?"
+
+"I don't know what I ought to do," said Nancy helplessly. She had again
+become very pale and she looked bewildered, as well as distressed. "You see
+I felt so sure that we should find Jack here!"
+
+"The only thing I can suggest your doing," the American spoke kindly, if a
+little coldly, "is to come back with me to the Hôtel Saint Ange. It is
+probable that we shall find Mr. Dampier there, waiting for you. A dozen
+things may have happened to him, none of which need give you any cause for
+anxiety." He pulled out his watch. "Hum! It's close on twelve--yes, the
+only thing to do is to go back to the hotel. It's almost certain we shall
+find him there--" it was on his lips to add, "if he really did come with
+you last night," but he checked himself in time.
+
+"But Mr. Burton? Suppose Jack is not there?"
+
+"If he doesn't return within the next two or three hours, then I will
+consult with my son, who, young though he be, has a very good head on his
+shoulders, as to what will be the best step for you to take. But don't
+let's meet trouble half-way! I have little doubt that we shall find Mr.
+Dampier waiting for you, vowing vengeance against the bold man who has
+eloped, even with the best of motives, with his wife!" he smiled, and poor
+Nancy gave a quivering smile in return.
+
+"I should so much have preferred not to go back to that hotel," she said,
+in a low voice. "I do hope Jack won't make me stay on there for the next
+two or three days."
+
+And with the remembrance of what she had considered to be the gross insult
+put upon her by Madame Poulain, Nancy Dampier reddened deeply, while her
+new friend felt more and more bewildered and puzzled.
+
+On the one hand Senator Burton had the testimony of three trustworthy
+persons that the young Englishwoman had arrived alone at the hotel the
+night before; and against this positive testimony there was nothing but her
+bare word.
+
+Very, very reluctantly, he felt compelled to believe the Poulains' version
+of what had happened. He could think of no motive--in fact there was no
+motive--which could prompt a false assertion on their part.
+
+As they were driving back, each silent, each full of painful misgivings,
+the kindly American began to wonder whether he had not met with that, if
+rare yet undoubted, condition known as entire loss of memory.
+
+If, as Madame Poulain had suggested, Mr. Dampier had left his wife just
+before their arrival at the hotel, was it not conceivable that by some kind
+of kink in Mrs. Dampier's brain--the kind of kink which brings men and
+women to entertain, when otherwise sane, certain strange delusions--she had
+imagined the story she now told with so much circumstantial detail and
+clearness?
+
+When they were nearing the hotel, Nancy put her hand nervously on her
+companion's arm.
+
+"Mr. Burton," she whispered, "I'm horribly afraid of the Poulains! I keep
+thinking of such dreadful things."
+
+"Now look here, Mrs. Dampier--" Senator Burton turned, and looking down
+into her agitated face, spoke gently and kindly--"though I quite admit to
+you these people's conduct must seem inexplicable, I feel sure you are
+wronging the Poulains. They are very worthy, respectable folk--I've known
+them long enough to vouch for that fact. This extraordinary
+misunderstanding, this mistake--for it must be either a misunderstanding or
+a mistake on some one's part--will soon be cleared up, so much is certain:
+till then I beg you not to treat them as enemies."
+
+And yet even Senator Burton felt taken aback when he saw the undisguised
+annoyance, the keen irritation with which their return to the Hôtel Saint
+Ange was greeted by the woman to whom he had just given so good a
+certificate of character.
+
+Madame Poulain was standing on the street side of the open porte cochère,
+as the carriage drove down the narrow street, and the American was
+astonished to see the change which came over her face.
+
+An angry, vindictive, even a cruel expression swept over it, and instead of
+waiting to greet them as the carriage drew up at the door she turned
+abruptly away, and shuffled out of sight.
+
+"Wait a moment," he said, as the fiacre drew up, "don't get out of the
+carriage yet, Mrs. Dampier--"
+
+And meekly Nancy obeyed him.
+
+The Senator hurried through into the courtyard. Much would he have given,
+and he was a careful man, to have seen the image he had formed of Jack
+Dampier standing on the sun-flecked flagstones. But the broad space
+stretching before him was empty, deserted; during the daylight hours of
+each day the Exhibition drew every one away much as a honey cask might have
+done a hive of bees.
+
+Madame Poulain did not come out of her kitchen as was her usual hospitable
+wont when she heard footsteps echoing under the vaulted porte cochère, and
+so her American guest had to go across, and walk right into her
+special domain.
+
+"We did not find the gentleman at his studio," he said shortly, "and I
+presume, Madame Poulain, that he has not yet been here?"
+
+She shook her head sullenly, and then, with none of her usual suavity,
+exclaimed, "I do not think, Monsieur le Sénateur, that you should have
+brought that demoiselle back here!"
+
+She gave him so odd--some would have said, so insolent a look, that the
+Senator realised for the first time what he was to realise yet further in
+connection with this strange business, namely, that the many who go through
+life refusing to act the part of good Samaritans have at any rate excellent
+reasons for their abstention.
+
+It was disagreeably dear that Madame Poulain thought him a foolish old man
+who had been caught by an adventuress's pretty face....
+
+To their joint relief Monsieur Poulain came strolling into his wife's
+kitchen.
+
+"I've been telling Monsieur le Sénateur," exclaimed Madame Poulain, "that
+we do not wish to have anything more to do with that young person who
+asserts that she arrived here with a man last night. Monsieur le Sénateur
+has too good a heart: he is being deceived."
+
+The hotel-keeper looked awkwardly, deprecatingly, at his valued American
+client. "Paris is so full of queer people just now," he muttered. "They
+keep mostly to the other side of the river, to the Opera quarter, but we
+are troubled with them here too, during an Exhibition Year!"
+
+"There is nothing at all queer about this poor young lady," said Senator
+Burton sharply--somehow the cruel insinuation roused him to chivalrous
+defence. But soon he changed his tone, "Now look here, my good friends"--he
+glanced from the husband to the wife--"surely you have both heard of people
+who have suddenly lost their memory, even to the knowledge of who they were
+and where they came from? Now I fear--I very much fear--that something of
+the kind has happened to this Mrs. Dampier! I am as sure that she is not
+consciously telling a lie as I am that you are telling me the truth. For
+one thing, I have ascertained that this lady's statement as to Mr. John
+Dampier having a studio in Paris, where he was expected this morning, is
+true. As to who she is herself that question can and will be soon set at
+rest. Meanwhile my daughter and myself"--and then he hesitated, for, well
+as he knew French, Senator Burton did not quite know how to convey his
+meaning, namely, that they, he and his daughter, meant to see her through.
+"My daughter and myself," he repeated firmly, "are going to do the best we
+can to help her."
+
+Madame Poulain opened her lips--then she shut them tight again. She longed
+to tell "Monsieur le Sénateur" that in that case she and Poulain must have
+the regret of asking him to leave their hotel.
+
+But she did not dare to do this.
+
+Her husband broke in conciliatingly: "No doubt it is as Monsieur le
+Sénateur says," he observed; "the demoiselle is what we said she was only
+this morning--" and then he uttered the word which in French means so much
+and so little--the word "toquée."
+
+There came another interruption. "Here come Mademoiselle Daisy and Monsieur
+Gerald!" exclaimed Madame Poulain in a relieved tone.
+
+The Senator's son and daughter had just emerged across the courtyard, from
+the vestibule where ended the escalier d'honneur. There was a look of keen,
+alert interest and curiosity on Gerald Burton's fine, intelligent face. He
+was talking eagerly to his sister, and Madame Poulain told herself that
+surely these two young people could not wish their stay in Paris to be
+complicated by this--this unfortunate business--for so the Frenchwoman in
+her own secret heart designated the mysterious affair which was causing her
+and her worthy husband so much unnecessary trouble.
+
+Some little trouble, so she admitted to herself, they had expected to have,
+but they had not thought it would take this very strange and
+tiresome shape.
+
+But the hotel-keeper was destined to be bitterly disappointed in her hope
+that Daisy and Gerald Burton would try and dissuade their father from
+having anything more to do with Mrs. Dampier.
+
+"Well, father?" the two fresh voices rang out, and the Senator smiled back
+well pleased. He was one of those fortunate fathers who are on terms of
+full confidence and friendship as well as affection with their children.
+Indeed Senator Burton was specially blessed; Daisy was devoted to her
+father, and Gerald had never given him a moment of real unease: the young
+man had done well at college, and now seemed likely to become one of the
+most distinguished and successful exponents of that branch of
+art--architecture--modern America has made specially her own.
+
+"Well?" said the Senator, "well, Daisy, I suppose you have told your
+brother about this odd affair?"
+
+As his daughter nodded, he went on:--"As for me, I have unfortunately
+nothing to tell. We found the studio, and everything was exactly as this
+poor young lady said it would be--with the one paramount exception that her
+husband was not there! And though his housekeeper seems to be expecting Mr.
+Dampier every moment, she has had no news of him since he wrote, some days
+ago, saying he would arrive this morning. It certainly is a very
+inexplicable business--" he looked helplessly from one good-looking,
+intelligent young face to the other.
+
+"But where is Mrs. Dampier now?" asked Daisy eagerly. "I do think you might
+have told me before you took her away, father. I would have loved to have
+said good-bye to her. I do like her so much!"
+
+"You won't have far to go to see her. Mrs. Dampier's at the door, sitting
+in a carriage," said her father drily. "I had to bring her back here: I
+didn't know what else to do."
+
+"Why, of course, father, you did quite right!"
+
+And Gerald Burton chimed in, "Yes, of course you were right to do that,
+father."
+
+Senator Burton smiled a little ruefully at his children's unquestioning
+approval. He himself was by no means sure that he had done "quite right."
+
+They walked, the three of them, across to the porte-cochère.
+
+Nancy Dampier was now sitting crouched up in a corner of the fiacre; a
+handkerchief was pressed to her face, and she was trying, not very
+successfully, to stifle her sobs of nervous fear and distress.
+
+With an eager, impulsive gesture the American girl leapt up the step of the
+little open carriage. "Don't cry," she whispered soothingly. "It will all
+come right soon! Why, I expect your husband just went out to see a friend
+and got kept somehow. If it wasn't for those stupid Poulains' mistake about
+last night you wouldn't feel really worried, now would you?"
+
+Nancy dabbed her eyes. She felt ashamed of being caught crying by these
+kind people. "I know I'm being silly!" she gasped. "You must forgive me!
+It's quite true I shouldn't feel as worried as I feel now if it wasn't for
+the Poulains--their saying, I mean, that they've never seen my husband.
+That's what upset me. It all seems so strange and--and horrid. My sense
+tells me it's quite probable Jack has gone in to see some friend, and was
+kept somehow."
+
+"And now," said Daisy Burton persuasively, "you must come upstairs with us,
+and we'll get Madame Poulain to send us up a nice déjeuner to our
+sitting-room."
+
+And so the Senator found part of his new problem solved for him. Daisy, so
+much was dear, had determined to befriend--and that to the uttermost--this
+unfortunate young Englishwoman.
+
+But now there arose another most disagreeable complication.
+
+Madame Poulain had strolled out, her arms akimbo, to see what was going on.
+And, as if she had guessed the purport of Miss Burton's words, she walked
+forward, and speaking this time respectfully, even suavely, to "Monsieur le
+Sénateur," observed, "My husband and I regret very greatly that we cannot
+ask this lady to stay on in our hotel. We have no vacant room--no room
+at all!"
+
+And then it was that Gerald Burton, who had stood apart from the
+discussion, saying nothing, simply looking intently, sympathetically at his
+sister and Mrs. Dampier--took a hand in the now complicated little
+human game.
+
+"Father!" he exclaimed, speaking in low, sharp tones. "Of course Mrs.
+Dampier must stay on here with us till her husband comes back! If by some
+extraordinary chance he isn't back by to-night she can have my room--I
+shall easily find some place outside." And as his father looked at him a
+little doubtfully he went on:--"Will you explain to Madame Poulain what
+we've settled? I can't trust myself to speak to the woman! She's behaving
+in the most unkind, brutal way to this poor little lady."
+
+He went on between his teeth, "The Poulains have got some game on in
+connection with this thing. I wish I could guess what it is."
+
+And the Senator, much disliking his task, did speak to Madame Poulain. "I
+am arranging for Mrs. Dampier to stay with us, as our guest, till her
+husband's--hem--arrival. My son will find a room outside, so you need not
+disturb yourself about the matter. Kindly send for Jules, and have her
+trunk carried up to our apartments."
+
+And Madame Poulain, after an uncomfortably long pause, turned and silently
+obeyed the Senator's behest.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+The afternoon wore itself away, and to two out of the four people who spent
+it together in the pleasant salon of the Burtons' suite of rooms the hours,
+nay the very minutes, dragged as they had never dragged before.
+
+Looking back to that first day of distress and bewilderment, Nancy later
+sometimes asked herself what would have happened, what she would have done,
+had she lacked the protection, the kindness--and what with Daisy Burton
+almost at once became the warm affection--of this American family?
+
+Daisy and Gerald Burton not only made her feel that they understood, and,
+in a measure, shared in her distress, but they also helped her to bear her
+anguish and suspense.
+
+Although she was not aware of it very different was the mental attitude of
+their father.
+
+Senator Burton was one of those public men of whom modern America has a
+right to be proud. He was a hard worker--chairman of one Senate committee
+and a member of four others; he had never been a brilliant debater, but his
+more brilliant colleagues respected his sense of logic and force of
+character. He had always been unyielding in his convictions, absolutely
+independent in his views, a man to whom many of his fellow-countrymen would
+have turned in any kind of trouble or perplexity sure of clear and
+honest counsel.
+
+And yet now, as to this simple matter, the Senator, try as he might, could
+not make up his mind. Nothing, in his long life, had puzzled him as he was
+puzzled now. No happening, connected with another human being, had ever so
+filled him with the discomfort born of uncertainty.
+
+But the object of his--well, yes, his suspicions, was evidently quite
+unconscious of the mingled feelings with which he regarded her, and he was
+half ashamed of the ease with which he concealed his trouble both from his
+children and from their new friend.
+
+Nancy Dampier was far too ill at ease herself to give any thought as to how
+others regarded her. She had now become dreadfully anxious, dreadfully
+troubled about Jack.
+
+Much of her time was spent standing at a window of the corridor which
+formed a portion of the Burtons' "appartement." This corridor overlooked
+the square, sunny courtyard below; but during that first dreary afternoon
+of suspense and waiting the Hôtel Saint Ange might have been an enchanted
+palace of sleep. Not a creature came in or out through the porte
+cochère--with one insignificant exception: two workmen, dressed in
+picturesque blue smocks, clattered across the big white stones, the one
+swinging a pail of quaking lime in his hand, and whistling gaily as
+he went.
+
+When a carriage stopped, or seemed to stop, in the street which lay beyond
+the other side of the quadrangular group of buildings, then Nancy's heart
+would leap, and she would lean out, dangerously far over the grey bar of
+the window; but the beloved, and now familiar figure of her husband never
+followed on the sound, as she hoped against hope, it would do.
+
+At last, when the long afternoon was drawing to a close, Senator Burton
+went down and had another long conversation with the Poulains.
+
+The hotel-keeper and his wife by now had changed their tone; they were
+quite respectful, even sympathetic:
+
+"Of course it is possible," observed Madame Poulain hesitatingly, "that
+this young lady, as you yourself suggested this morning, Monsieur le
+Sénateur, is suffering from loss of memory, and that she has imagined her
+arrival here with this artist gentleman. But if so, what a strange thing to
+fancy about oneself! Is it not more likely--I say it with all respect,
+Monsieur le Sénateur--that for some reason unknown to us she is acting
+a part?"
+
+And with a heavy heart "Monsieur le Sénateur" had to admit that Madame
+Poulain's view might be the correct one. Nancy's charm of manner, even her
+fragile and delicate beauty, told against her in the kindly but shrewd
+American's mind. True, Mrs. Dampier--if indeed she were Mrs. Dampier--did
+not look like an adventuress: but then does any adventuress look like an
+adventuress till she is found to be one?
+
+The Frenchwoman suggested yet another theory. "I have been asking myself,"
+she said, smiling a little wryly, "another question. Is it not possible
+that this young lady and her husband had a quarrel? Such incidents do
+occur, even during honeymoons. If the two had a little quarrel he may have
+left her at our door--just to punish her, Monsieur le Sénateur. He would
+know she was safe in our respectable hotel. Your sex, if I may say so,
+Monsieur le Sénateur, is sometimes very unkind, very unfeeling, in their
+dealings with mine."
+
+Monsieur Poulain, who had said nothing, here intervened. "How you do run
+on," he said crossly. "You talk too much, my wife. We haven't to account
+for what has happened!"
+
+But Senator Burton had been struck by Madame Poulain's notion. Men, and if
+all the Senator had heard was true, especially Englishmen, do behave very
+strangely sometimes to their women-folk. It was an Englishman who conceived
+the character of Petruchio. He remembered Mrs. Dampier's flushed face, the
+shy, embarrassed manner with which she had come forward to meet him that
+morning. She had seemed rather unnecessarily distressed at not being able
+to make the hotel people understand her: she had evidently been much
+disappointed that her husband had not left a message for her.
+
+"My son thinks it possible that Mr. Dampier may have met with an accident
+on his way to the studio."
+
+A long questioning look flashed from Madame Poulain to her husband, but
+Poulain was a cautious soul, and he gave his wife no lead.
+
+"Well," she said at last, "of course that could be ascertained," and the
+Senator with satisfaction told himself that she was at last taking a proper
+part in what had become his trouble, "but I cannot help thinking, Monsieur
+le Sénateur, that we might give this naughty husband a little longer--at
+any rate till to-morrow--to come back to the fold."
+
+And the Senator, perplexed and disturbed, told himself that after all this
+might be good advice.
+
+But when he again went upstairs and joined the young people, he found that
+this was not at all a plan to which any one of the three was likely to
+consent. In fact as he came into the sitting-room where Nancy Dampier was
+now restlessly walking up and down, he noticed that his son's hat and his
+son's stick were already in his son's hands.
+
+"I think I ought to go off, father, to the local Commissaire of Police.
+There's one in every Paris district," said Gerald Burton abruptly. "Mrs.
+Dampier is convinced that her husband did go out this morning, even if the
+Poulains did not see him doing so; and she and I think it possible, in
+fact, we are afraid, that he may have met with an accident on his way to
+the studio."
+
+As he saw by his father's face that this theory did not commend itself to
+the Senator, the young man went on quickly:--"At any rate my doing this can
+do no harm. I might just inform the Commissaire that a gentleman has been
+missing since this morning from the Hôtel Saint Ange, and that the only
+theory we can form which can account for his absence is that he may have
+met with an accident. Mrs. Dampier has kindly provided me with a
+description of her husband, and she has told me what she thinks he might
+have been wearing."
+
+Nancy stopped her restless pacing. "If only the Poulains would allow me to
+see where Jack slept last night!" she cried, bursting into tears. "But oh,
+everything is made so much more difficult by their extraordinary assertion
+that he never came here at all! You see he had quite a large portmanteau
+with him, and I can't possibly tell which of his suits he put on
+this morning."
+
+And the Senator looking down into her flushed, tearful face, wondered
+whether she were indeed telling the truth--and most painfully he doubted,
+doubted very much.
+
+But when Gerald Burton came back at the end of two hours, after a long and
+weary struggle with French officialdom, all he could report was that to the
+best of the Commissaire's belief no Englishman had met with an accident
+that day. There had been three street accidents yesterday in which
+foreigners had been concerned, but none, most positively none, to-day. He
+admitted, however, that all his reports were not yet in.
+
+Paris, from the human point of view, swells to monstrous proportions when
+it becomes the background of a great International World's Fair. And the
+police, unlike the great majority of those in the vast hive where they keep
+order, have nothing to gain in exchange for the manifold discomforts an
+Exhibition brings in its train.
+
+At last, worn out by the mingled agitations and emotions of the day, Nancy
+went to bed.
+
+The Senator, Gerald and Daisy Burton waited up some time longer. It was a
+comfort to the father to be able to feel that at last he was alone for a
+while with his children. To them at least he could unburden his perplexed
+and now burdened mind.
+
+"I suppose it didn't occur to you, Gerald, to go to this Mr. Dampier's
+studio?"
+
+He looked enquiringly at his son.
+
+Gerald Burton was sitting at the table from which Mrs. Dampier had just
+risen. He looked, if a trifle weary, yet full of eager energy and life--a
+fine specimen of strong, confident young manhood--a son of whom any father
+might well be fond and proud.
+
+The Senator had great confidence in Gerald's sense and judgment.
+
+"Yes indeed, father, I went there first. Not only did I go to the studio,
+but from the Commissaire's office I visited many of the infirmaries and
+hospitals of the Quarter. You see, I didn't trust the Commissaire; I don't
+think he really knew whether there had been any street accidents or not. In
+fact at the end of our talk he admitted as much himself."
+
+"And at Mr. Dampier's studio?" queried the Senator. "What did you find
+there? Didn't the old housekeeper seem surprised at her master's
+prolonged absence?"
+
+"Yes, father, she did indeed. I could see that she was beginning to feel
+very much annoyed and put out about it."
+
+"Did she tell you," asked the Senator hesitatingly, "what sort of man this
+Mr. Dampier is?"
+
+"She spoke very well of him," said young Burton, with a touch of reluctance
+in his voice, "but she admitted that he was a casual sort of fellow."
+
+Gerald's sister looked up. She broke in, rather eagerly, "What sort of a
+man do you suppose Mr. Dampier to be, Gerald?"
+
+He shrugged his shoulders, rather ill-temperedly. He, too, was tired, after
+the long day of waiting and suspense. "How can I possibly tell, Daisy? I
+must say it's rather like a woman to ask such a question! From something
+Mrs. Dampier said, I gather he is a plain-looking chap."
+
+And then Daisy laughed heartily, for the first time that day. "Why, she
+adores him!" she cried, "she can't have told you that."
+
+"Indeed she did! But you weren't there when I made her describe him
+carefully to me. I had to ask her, for it was important that I should have
+some sort of notion what the fellow is like."
+
+He took out his note-book. "I'll tell you what I wrote down, practically
+from her dictation. 'A tall man--taller than the average Englishman. A
+loosely-hung fellow; (he doesn't care for any kind of sport, I gather).
+Thirty five years of age; (seems a bit old to have married a girl--she
+won't be twenty till next month). He has big, strongly-marked features, and
+a good deal of fair hair. Always wears an old fashioned repeater watch and
+bunch of seals. Was probably wearing this morning a light grey tweed suit
+and a straw hat.'" Gerald looked up and turned to his sister, "If you call
+that the description of a good-looking man, well, all I can say is that I
+don't agree with you, Daisy!"
+
+"He's a very good artist," said the Senator mildly. "Did you go into his
+studio, Gerald?"
+
+"Yes, I did. And I can't say that I agree with you, father: I didn't care
+for any of the pictures I saw there."
+
+Gerald Burton spoke rather crossly. Both his father and sister felt
+surprised at his tone. He was generally very equable and good-tempered. But
+where any sort of art was concerned he naturally claimed to speak with
+authority.
+
+"Have you any theory, Gerald"--the Senator hesitated, "to account for the
+extraordinary discrepancy between the Poulains' story and what Mrs. Dampier
+asserts to be the case?"
+
+"Yes, father, I have a quite definite theory. I believe the Poulains are
+lying."
+
+The young man leant forward across the round table. He spoke very
+earnestly, but even as he spoke he lowered his voice, as if fearing to be
+overheard.
+
+Senator Burton glanced at the door. "You can speak quite openly," he said
+rather sharply. "You forget that there is the door of our appartement as
+well as a passage between this room and the staircase."
+
+"No, father, I don't forget that. But it would be quite easy for anyone to
+creep in. The Poulains have pass keys everywhere."
+
+"My dear boy, they don't understand English!"
+
+"Jules does, father. He knows far more English than he admits. At any rate
+he understands everything one says to him."
+
+Daisy broke in with a touch of impatience. "But with what object could the
+Poulains tell such a stupid and cruel untruth, one, too, which is sure to
+be found out very soon? If this Mr. Dampier did arrive here last night,
+well then, he did--if he didn't, he didn't!"
+
+"Yes, that's true," Gerald turned to his sister. "And though I've given a
+good deal of thought to it during the last few hours--I can't form any
+theory yet as to why the Poulains are lying. I only feel quite sure that
+they are."
+
+"It's a curious thing," observed the Senator musingly, "that neither of you
+saw this Mr. Dampier last night--curious, I mean, that he should have just
+stepped up into a cupboard, as Mrs. Dampier says he did, at the exact
+moment when you were outside the door."
+
+Neither of his children made any reply. That coincidence still troubled
+Daisy Burton.
+
+At last,--"I don't see that it's at all curious," exclaimed her brother
+hastily. "It's very unfortunate, of course, for if we had happened to see
+him the Poulains couldn't have told the tale they told you this morning."
+
+The Senator sighed. He was tired--tired of the long afternoon spent in
+doing nothing, and, to tell the truth, tired of the curious, inexplicable
+problem with which he had been battling since the morning.
+
+"Well, I say it with sincere regret, but I am inclined to believe the
+Poulains."
+
+"Father!" His son was looking at him with surprise and yes, indignation.
+
+"Yes, Gerald. I am, for the present, inclined not only to believe the
+Poulains' clear and consistent story, but to share Madame Poulain's view of
+the case--"
+
+"And what is her view?" asked Daisy eagerly.
+
+"Well, my dear, her view--the view, let me remind you, of a sensible woman
+who, I fancy, has seen a good deal of life--is that Mr. Dampier did
+accompany his wife here, as far as the hotel, that is. That then, as the
+result of what our good landlady calls a 'querelle d'amoureux,' he left
+her--knowing she would be quite safe of course in so respectable a place as
+the Hôtel Saint Ange."
+
+Daisy Burton only said one word--but that word was "Brute!" and her father
+saw that there was the light of battle in her eyes.
+
+"My dear," he said gently, "you forget that it was an Englishman who wrote
+'The Taming of the Shrew.'"
+
+"And yet American girls--of a sort--are quite eager to marry Englishmen!"
+
+The Senator quickly pursued his advantage. "Now is it likely that Madame
+Poulain would make such a suggestion if she were not telling the truth? Of
+course her view is that this Mr. Dampier will turn up, safe and sound, when
+he thinks he has sufficiently punished his poor little wife for her share
+in their 'lovers' quarrel.'"
+
+But at this Gerald Burton shook his head. "We know nothing of this man
+Dampier," he said, "but I would stake my life on Mrs. Dampier's
+truthfulness."
+
+The Senator rose from his chair. Gerald's attitude was generous; he would
+not have had him otherwise but still he felt irritated by his son's
+suspicion of the Poulains.
+
+"Well, it's getting late, and I suppose we ought all to go to bed now,
+especially as they begin moving about so early in this place. As for you,
+my boy, I hope you've secured a good room outside, eh?"
+
+Gerald Burton also got up. He smiled and shook his head.
+
+"No, father, I haven't found a place at all yet! The truth is I've been so
+tremendously taken up with this affair that I forgot all about having to
+find a room to-night."
+
+"Oh dear!" cried Daisy in dismay. "Won't you find it very difficult? They
+say Paris is absolutely full just now. Why, a lot of people who have never
+let before are letting out rooms just now--so Madame Poulain says."
+
+"Don't worry about me. I shall be all right," said Gerald quickly. "I
+suppose my things have been moved into your room, father?"
+
+Daisy nodded. "Yes, I saw to all that. In fact I did more--" she smiled;
+the brother and sister were very fond of one another. "I packed your bag
+for you, Ger."
+
+"Thanks," he said. And then going quickly round the table, he bent down and
+kissed her. "I'll be in early to-morrow morning," he said, nodding to
+his father.
+
+Then he went out.
+
+Daisy Burton felt surprised. Gerald was the best of brothers, but he didn't
+often kiss her good-night. There had been a strange touch of excitement, of
+emotion, in his manner to-night. It was natural that she herself should be
+moved by Nancy Dampier's distress. But Gerald? Gerald, who was generally
+speaking rather nonchalant, and very, very critical of women?
+
+"Gerald's tremendously excited about this thing," said Daisy thoughtfully.
+She was two years younger in years than her brother, but older, as young
+women are apt to be older, in all that counts in civilised life. "I've
+never seen him quite so--so keen about anything before."
+
+"I hope he will have got a comfortable room," said the Senator a little
+crossly. Then fondly he turned and took his daughter's hand. "Sleep well,
+my darling," he said. "You two have been very kind to that poor little
+soul. And I love you both for it. Whatever happens, kindness is
+never lost."
+
+"Why, what d'you mean, father?" she looked down at him troubled, rather
+disturbed by his words.
+
+"Well, Daisy, the truth is,"--he hesitated--"I can't make out whether this
+Mrs. Dampier is all she seems to be. And I want to prepare you for a
+possible disappointment, my dear. When I was a young man I once took a
+great fancy to someone who--well, who disappointed me cruelly--" he was
+speaking very gravely. "It just spoilt my ideal for a time--I mean my ideal
+of human nature. Now I don't want anything of that kind to happen to you or
+to our boy in connection with this--this young lady."
+
+"But, father? You know French people aren't as particular about telling the
+truth as are English people. I can't understand why you believe the
+Poulains' story--"
+
+"My dear, I don't know what to believe," he said thoughtfully.
+
+She was twenty-four years old, this grey-eyed, honest, straightforward girl
+of his; and yet Senator Burton, much as he loved her, knew very little as
+to her knowledge of life. Did Daisy know anything of the ugly side of human
+nature? Did she know, for instance, that there are men and women,
+especially women, who spend their lives preying on the honest, the
+chivalrous, and the kind?
+
+"The mystery is sure to be cleared up very soon," he said aloud. "If what
+our new friend says is true there must be as many people in England who
+know her to be what she says she is, as there are people in Paris who
+evidently know all about the artist, John Dampier."
+
+"Yes, that's true. But father?"
+
+"Yes, my dear."
+
+"I am quite sure Mrs. Dampier is telling the truth."
+
+Somehow the fact that Daisy was anxious to say that she disagreed with him
+stung the Senator.
+
+"Then what do you think of the Poulains?" he asked quietly--"the Poulains,
+whom you have known, my dear, ever since you were fifteen--on whose honesty
+and probity I personally would stake a good deal. What do you think
+about them?"
+
+Daisy began to look very troubled. "I don't know what to think," she
+faltered. "The truth is, father, I haven't thought very much of the
+Poulains in the matter. You see, Madame Poulain has not spoken to me about
+it at all. But you see that Gerald believes them to be lying."
+
+"Gerald," said the Senator rather sharply, "is still only a boy in many
+things, Daisy. And boys are apt, as you and I know, to take sides, to feel
+very positive about things. But you and I, my darling--well, we must try to
+be judicial--we must try to keep our heads, eh?"
+
+"Yes, father, yes--we must, indeed"; but even as she said the words she did
+not quite know what her father meant by "judicial."
+
+And Gerald Burton? For a while, perhaps for an hour, holding his heavy bag
+in his hand, he wandered about from hostelry to hostelry, only to be told
+everywhere that there was no room.
+
+Then, taking a sudden resolution, he went into a respectable little café
+which was still open, and where he and his father, in days gone by, had
+sometimes strolled in together when Daisy was going about with friends in
+Paris. There he asked permission to leave his bag. Even had he found a
+room, he could not have slept--so he assured himself. He was too excited,
+his brain was working too quickly.
+
+Talking busily, anxiously, argumentatively to himself as he went, he made
+his way to the river--to the broad, tree-lined quays which to your true
+lover of Paris contain the most enchanting and characteristic vistas of
+the city.
+
+Once there, his footsteps became slower. He thrust his hands into his
+pockets and walked along, with eyes bent on the ground.
+
+What manner of man could John Dampier be to leave his young wife--such a
+beautiful, trusting, confiding creature as was evidently this poor girl--in
+this cruel uncertainty? Was it conceivable that the man lived who could
+behave to this Mrs. Dampier with the unkindness Gerald's father had
+suggested--and that as the outcome of a trifling quarrel? No! Gerald
+Burton's generous nature revolted from such a notion.
+
+And yet--and yet his father thought it quite possible! To Gerald his
+father's views and his father's attitude to life meant a great deal more
+than he was wont to allow, either to that same kind indulgent father or to
+himself; and now he had to admit that the Senator did believe that what
+seemed so revolting to him, Gerald, was the most probable explanation of
+the mystery.
+
+The young man had stayed quite a while at the studio, listening to Mère
+Bideau's garrulous confidences. Now and again he had asked her a question,
+forced thereto by some obscure but none the less intense desire to know
+what Nancy Dampier's husband was like. And the old woman had acknowledged,
+in answer to a word from him, that her master was not a good-tempered man.
+
+"Monsieur" could be very cross, very disagreeable sometimes. But bah! were
+not all gentlemen like that?--so Mère Bideau had added with an easy laugh.
+
+On the whole, however--so much must be admitted--she had given Dampier a
+very good character. If quick-tempered, he was generous, considerate, and,
+above all, hard-working. But--but Mère Bideau had been very much surprised
+to hear "Monsieur" was going to be married--and to an Englishwoman, too!
+She, Mère Bideau, had always supposed he preferred Frenchwomen; in fact, he
+had told her so time and again. But bah! again; what won't a pretty face do
+with a man? So Mère Bideau had exclaimed 'twixt smile and sigh.
+
+Gerald Burton began walking more quickly, this time towards the west, along
+the quay which leads to the Chamber of Deputies.
+
+The wide thoroughfare was deserted save for an occasional straggler making
+his weary way home after a day spent in ministering to the wants and the
+pleasures of the strangers who now crowded the city....
+
+How wise he, Gerald Burton, was now showing himself to be in thus spending
+the short summer night out-of-doors, à la belle étoile, as the French so
+charmingly put it, instead of in some stuffy, perhaps not overclean,
+little room!
+
+But soon his mind swung back to the strange events of the past day!
+
+Already Nancy Dampier's personality held a strange, beckoning fascination
+for the young American. He hadn't met many English girls, for his father
+far preferred France to England, and it was to France they sped whenever
+they had time to do so. And Gerald Burton hadn't cared very much for the
+few English girls he had met. But Nancy was very, very different from the
+only two kinds of her fellow countrywomen with whom he had ever been
+acquainted--the kind, that is, who is closely chaperoned by vigilant mother
+or friend, and the kind who spends her life wandering about the world
+by herself.
+
+How brave, how gentle, how--how self-controlled Mrs. Dampier had been!
+While it was clear that she was terribly distressed, and all the more
+distressed by the Poulains' monstrous assertion that she had come alone to
+the Hôtel Saint Ange, yet how well she had behaved all that long day of
+waiting and suspense! How anxious she had been to spare the
+Burtons trouble.
+
+Not for a single moment had he, Gerald Burton, felt with her as he so often
+felt with women--awkward and self-conscious. Deep in his inmost heart he
+was aware that there were women and girls who thought him very
+good-looking; and far from pleasing him, the knowledge made him feel
+sometimes shy, sometimes even angry. He already ardently wished to protect,
+to help, to shelter Mrs. Dampier.
+
+Daisy had been out of the room for a moment, probably packing his bag, when
+he had come back tired and weary from his fruitless quest, and Mrs.
+Dampier, if keenly disappointed that he had no news, had yet thanked him
+very touchingly for the trifling trouble, or so it now seemed, that he had
+taken for her.
+
+"I don't know what I should have done if it hadn't been for your kind
+father, for your sister, and--and for you, Mr. Burton."
+
+He walked across the bridge leading to the Champs Elysées, paced round the
+Arc de Triomphe, and then strolled back to the deserted quays. He had no
+wish to go on to the Boulevards. It was Paris asleep, not Paris awake, with
+which Gerald Burton felt in close communion during that short summer night.
+
+And how short is a Paris summer night! Soon after he had seen the sun rise
+over an eastern bend of the river, the long, low buildings which line the
+Seine below the quays stirred into life, and he was able to enjoy a
+delicious, a refreshing plunge in the great swimming-bath which is among
+the luxuries Paris provides for those of her sons who are
+early-morning toilers.
+
+Six o'clock found Gerald Burton at the café where he had left his bag,
+ready for a cup of good coffee.
+
+The woman who served him--the waiters were still asleep--told him of a room
+likely to be disengaged the next night.
+
+The next night? But if Dampier were to come back this morning--as,
+according to one theory, he was very likely to do--then he, Gerald, would
+have no need of a room.
+
+Somehow that possibility was not as agreeable to him as it ought to have
+been. In theory Gerald Burton longed for this unknown man's return--for a
+happy solution, that is, of the strange mystery which had been cast, in so
+dramatic a fashion, athwart the Burtons' placid, normal life; but, scarce
+consciously to himself, the young American felt that Dampier's reappearance
+would end, and that rather tamely, an exciting and in some ways a very
+fascinating adventure.
+
+As he came up the Rue Saint Ange, he saw their landlord, a blue apron tied
+about his portly waist, busily brushing the pavement in front of the hotel
+with a yellow broom.
+
+"Well?" he said eagerly, "well, Monsieur Poulain, any news?"
+
+Poulain looked up at him and shook his head. "No, Monsieur Gerald," he said
+sullenly, "no news at all."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+Nancy Dampier sat up in bed.
+
+Long rays of bright sunlight filtering in between deep blue curtains showed
+her a large, lofty room, with panelled walls, and furniture covered with
+blue damask silk.
+
+It was more like an elegant boudoir in an old English country house than a
+bedroom, and for a moment she wondered, bewildered, where she could be.
+
+Then suddenly she remembered--remembered everything; and her heart filled,
+brimmed over, with seething pain and a sharp, overwhelming sensation
+of fear.
+
+Jack had gone: disappeared: vanished as if the earth had swallowed him up!
+And she, Nancy, was alone in a foreign city where she did not know a single
+soul, with the paramount exception of the American strangers who had come
+to her help in so kindly and so generous a fashion.
+
+She pushed her soft hair back from her forehead, and tried to recall, step
+by step, all that had happened yesterday.
+
+Two facts started out clearly--her almost painful gratitude to the Burtons
+and her shrinking terror of the Poulains, or rather of Madame Poulain, the
+woman who had looked fixedly into her face and lied.
+
+As to what had happened to Dampier, Nancy's imagination began to whisper
+things of unutterable dread. If her Jack had been possessed of a large sum
+of money she would have suspected the hotel people of having
+murdered him....
+
+But no, she and Jack had come to the end of the ample provision of gold and
+bank-notes with which they had started for Italy. As is the way with most
+prosperous newly-married folk, they had spent a good deal more on their
+short honeymoon than they had reckoned to do. He had said so the day before
+yesterday, in the train, when within an hour of Paris. Indeed he had added
+that one of the first things they must do the next day must be to call at
+the English bank where he kept an account.
+
+She now told herself that she had to face the possibility, nay the
+probability, that her husband had met with some serious accident on his way
+to the Impasse des Nonnes. Nancy knew that this had been Gerald Burton's
+theory, and of her three new kind friends it was Gerald Burton who
+impressed her with the greatest trust and confidence. He, unlike his
+father, had at once implicitly believed her version of what had taken place
+when she and Jack arrived at the Hôtel Saint Ange.
+
+The bedroom door opened, cautiously, quietly, and Daisy Burton came in
+carrying a tray in her pretty graceful hands.
+
+Poor Nancy! She felt confused, grateful, and a little awkward. She had not
+realised that her nervous dread of Madame Poulain would mean that this kind
+girl must wait on her.
+
+"I came in before, but you were sound asleep. Still, I thought I must wake
+you now, for father wants to know if you would mind him going to our
+Embassy about your husband? It's really my brother's idea. As you know,
+Gerald thinks it almost certain that Mr. Dampier met with some kind of
+accident yesterday morning, and he isn't a bit satisfied with the way the
+local Commissaire de Police answered his enquiries. Gerald thinks the only
+way to get attended to in Paris is to make people feel that you are
+important, and that they will get into trouble if they don't attend to you
+promptly!"
+
+Even as she was speaking Daisy Burton smiled rather nervously, for both she
+and Gerald had just gone through a very disagreeable half-hour with their
+generally docile and obedient father.
+
+The Senator did not wish to go to the American Embassy--at any rate not
+yet--about this strange business. He had pleaded with both his young people
+to wait, at any rate, till the afternoon: at any moment, so he pointed out,
+they might have news of the missing man: but Gerald was inexorable.
+
+"No, father, that's no use; if we do nothing we shan't get proper attention
+from the police officials till to-morrow. If you will only go and see Mr.
+Curtis about this business I promise to take all other trouble off
+your hands."
+
+And then the Senator had actually groaned--as if he minded trouble!
+
+"Mr. Curtis will do for you what he certainly wouldn't do for me, father.
+Daisy can go with you to the Embassy: I'll stay and look after Mrs.
+Dampier: she mustn't be left alone, exposed to the Poulains' insolence."
+
+And so the matter had been settled. But Senator Burton had made one
+stipulation:--
+
+"I won't go to the Embassy," he said firmly, "without hearing from Mrs.
+Dampier's own lips that such is her wish. And, Daisy? Gerald? Hearken to
+me--neither of you is to say anything to influence her in the matter, one
+way or the other."
+
+And so it was with a certain relief that Daisy Burton now heard her new
+friend say eagerly:
+
+"Why of course! I shall only be too grateful if your father will do
+anything he thinks may help me to find Jack. Oh, you don't know how
+bewildered and how frightened I feel!"
+
+And the other answered soothingly, "Yes, indeed I do know how you must
+feel. But I expect it will be all right soon. After all, Gerald
+said--"--she hesitated a moment, and then went on more firmly--"Gerald said
+that probably Mr. Dampier met with quite a slight accident, and that might
+be the reason why the tiresome Commissaire de Police knew nothing
+about it."
+
+"But if it was a slight accident," Nancy objected quickly, "Jack would have
+let me know at once! You don't know my husband: he would move heaven and
+earth to save me a minute's anxiety or trouble."
+
+"I am sure of that. But Gerald says that if Mr. Dampier did try and arrange
+for you to be sent a message at once, the message miscarried--"
+
+It was an hour later. The Senator had listened in silence while his young
+English guest had expressed in faltering, but seemingly very sincere,
+tones, her gratitude for his projected visit to the American Embassy. Nay,
+she had done more. Very earnestly Mrs. Dampier had begged Senator Burton
+and his daughter not to give themselves more trouble over her affairs than
+was absolutely necessary.
+
+And her youth, her beauty, her expression of pitiful distress had touched
+the Senator, though it had not shaken his belief in the Poulains' story. He
+did however assure her, very kindly and courteously, that he grudged no
+time spent in her service.
+
+And then, while Gerald Burton accompanied his father and his sister
+downstairs, Nancy Dampier was left alone for a few minutes with her own
+troubled and bewildered thoughts.
+
+She walked restlessly over to one of the high windows of the sitting-room,
+and looked down into the shady garden below. Then her eyes wandered over
+the picturesque grey and red roofs of the old Paris Jack Dampier loved
+so well.
+
+Somehow the cheerful, bright beauty of this June morning disturbed and even
+angered poor Nancy. She remembered with distaste, even with painful wonder,
+the sensations of pleasure, of amusement, of admiration with which she had
+first come through into this formal, harmoniously furnished salon, which
+was so unlike any hotel sitting-room she had ever seen before.
+
+But that had been yesterday morning--infinitely long ago.
+
+Now, each of the First Empire pieces of furniture seemed burnt into her
+brain: and the human faces of the dull gold sphinxes which jutted from each
+of the corners of the long, low settee seemed to grin at her maliciously.
+
+She felt unutterably forlorn and wretched. If only she could do something!
+She told herself, with a sensation of recoil and revolt, that she could
+never face another day of suspense and waiting spent as had been the whole
+of yesterday afternoon and evening.
+
+Going up to the brass-rimmed round table, she took up a book which was
+lying there. It was a guide to Paris, arranged on the alphabetical
+principle. Idly she began turning over the leaves, and then suddenly Nancy
+Dampier's cheeks, which had become so pale as to arouse Senator Burton's
+commiseration, became deeply flushed. She turned over the leaves of the
+guide-book with feverish haste, anxious to find what it was that she now
+sought there before the return of Gerald Burton.
+
+At last she came to the page marked M.
+
+Yes, there was what she at once longed and dreaded to find! And she had
+just read the last line of the paragraph when Gerald Burton came back
+into the room.
+
+Looking at him fixedly, she said quietly and in what he felt to be an
+unnaturally still voice, "Mr. Burton? There is a place in Paris called the
+Morgue. Do you not think that I ought to go there, to-day? It says in this
+guide-book that people who are killed in the streets of Paris are taken
+straight to the Morgue."
+
+The young American nodded gravely. The Commissary of Police had mentioned
+the Morgue, had in fact suggested that those who were seeking John Dampier
+would do well to go there within a day or two.
+
+Nancy went on:--"Could I go this morning? I would far rather go by myself,
+I mean without saying anything about it to either your father or to
+your sister."
+
+He answered quickly, but so gently, so kindly, that the tears sprang to her
+eyes, "Yes, I quite understand that. But of course you must allow me to go
+with you."
+
+And she answered, again in that quiet, unnaturally still voice, "Thank you.
+I shall be grateful if you will." Then after a moment, "Couldn't we start
+soon--I mean now?"
+
+"Why yes, certainly--if you wish it."
+
+Without saying anything further, she went to put on her hat.
+
+Gerald Burton's notions as to the Morgue were in a sense at once confused
+and clear. He had known of the place ever since he could read. He was aware
+that it was a building where all those who die a violent death are at once
+taken: he imagined it further to be a place where morbid curiosity drew
+daily many tourists. In fact in an old guide-book of which his father was
+fond he remembered that there ran a sentence:--
+
+    The Morgue is certainly one of the most curious and extraordinary
+    sights of Paris, but only those who are in the enjoyment of good nerves
+    are advised to visit it.
+
+As he waited for Mrs. Dampier the young man's face became very, very grave.
+Till now he had not envisaged the possibility that John Dampier, this
+unknown man across the current of whose life he, Gerald Burton, had been
+thrust in so strange and untoward a manner, might be dead.
+
+Sudden death--that dread possibility which is never far from any one of
+us--never haunts the mind of normal youth.
+
+But now there came to Gerald Burton a sudden overwhelming understanding of
+the transience not only of human life, but what means so much more to most
+sentient human beings, the transience of such measure of happiness as we
+poor mortals are allowed to enjoy.
+
+His imagination conjured up Nancy Dampier as he had first seen her standing
+in Virginie Poulain's little room. She had been a vision of lovely
+girlhood, and yes, far more than that--though he had not known it then--of
+radiant content.
+
+And now?
+
+His unspoken question was answered by Mrs. Dampier's return into the room.
+He looked at her searchingly. Yes, she was lovely--her beauty rather
+heightened than diminished, as is so often the case with a very young
+woman, by the ordeal she was going through, but all the glow and radiance
+were gone from her face.
+
+"I ought to have told you before," he said impulsively, "that--that among
+the men who were taken to the Morgue yesterday morning there was no one who
+in the least answered to the description you have given me of Mr.
+Dampier--so much the Commissary of Police was able to inform me most
+positively."
+
+And Nancy drew a long convulsive breath of relief.
+
+They went down to the courtyard, and across to the porte cochère. While
+they did so Gerald Burton was unpleasantly conscious that they were being
+watched; watched from behind the door which led into the garden, for there
+stood Jules, a broom as almost always in his hand: watched from the kitchen
+window, where Madame Poulain stood with arms akimbo: watched from behind
+the glass pane of the little office which was only occupied when Monsieur
+Poulain was engaged in the pleasant task of making out his profitable
+weekly bills.
+
+But not one of the three watchers came forward and offered to do them even
+the usual, trifling service of hailing a cab.
+
+The two passed out into the narrow street and walked till they came to the
+square where stood, at this still early hour of the morning, long rows of
+open carriages.
+
+"I think we'd better drive?" said Gerald Burton questioningly.
+
+And his companion answered quickly, "Oh yes! I should like to get there as
+quickly as possible." And then her pale face flushed a little. "Mr. Burton,
+will you kindly pay for me?"
+
+She put her purse, an absurd, delicately tinted little beaded purse which
+had been one of her wedding presents, into his hand.
+
+Gerald took it without demur. Had he been escorting an American girl, he
+would have insisted on being paymaster, but some sure instinct had already
+taught him how to treat Nancy Dampier--he realised she preferred not adding
+a material to the many immaterial obligations she now owed the
+Burton family.
+
+A quarter of an hour's quick driving brought them within sight of the low,
+menacing-looking building which is so curiously, in a sense so beautifully,
+situated on the left bank of the Seine, to the right of Notre Dame.
+
+"Mrs. Dampier? I beg you not to get out of the carriage till I come and
+fetch you," said Gerald earnestly, "there is no necessity for you to come
+into the Morgue unless--" he hesitated.
+
+"I know what you mean," she said quietly. "Unless you see someone there who
+might be Jack. Yes, Mr. Burton, I'll stay quietly in the carriage till you
+come and fetch me. It's very good of you to have thought of it."
+
+But when they drew up before the great closed door two or three of the
+incorrigible beggars who spend their days in the neighbourhood of the
+greater Paris churches, came eagerly forward.
+
+Here were a fine couple, a good-looking Englishman and his bride. True,
+they were about to be cheated out of their bit of fun, but they might be
+good for a small dole--so thought the shrewder of those idlers who seemed,
+as the carriage drew up, to spring out of the ground.
+
+One of them strolled up to Gerald. "M'sieur cannot go into the Morgue
+unless he has a permit," he said with a whine.
+
+Gerald shook the man off, and rang at the closed door. It seemed a long
+time before it was opened by a man dressed like a Paris workman, that is in
+a bright blue blouse and long baggy white trousers.
+
+"I want to view any bodies which were brought in yesterday. I fear I am a
+little early?"
+
+He slipped a five franc piece into the man's hand. But the silver key which
+unlocks so many closed doors in Paris only bought this time a civil answer.
+
+"Impossible, monsieur! I should lose my place. I could not do it for a
+thousand francs." And then in answer to the American's few words of
+surprise and discomfiture,--"Yes, it's quite true that we were open to the
+public till three years ago. But it's easier to get into the Elysée than it
+is to get into the Morgue, nowadays." He waited a moment, then he murmured
+under his breath, "Of course if monsieur cares to say that he is looking
+for someone who has disappeared, and if he will provide a description, the
+more commonplace the better, then--well, monsieur may be able to obtain a
+permit! At any rate monsieur has only to go along to the office where
+permits are issued to find that what I say is true. If only monsieur will
+bring me a permit I will gladly show monsieur everything there is to be
+seen." The man became enthusiastic. "Not only are there the bodies to see!
+We also possess relics of many great criminals; and as for our
+refrigerating machines--ah, monsieur, they are really in their way wonders!
+Well worth, as I have sometimes heard people say, coming all the way to
+Paris to see!"
+
+Sick at heart Gerald Burton turned away--not, however, before he had
+explained gravely that his wish in coming to the Morgue was not to gratify
+idle curiosity, but to seek a friend whose disappearance since the morning
+before was causing acute anxiety.
+
+The man looked at him doubtfully--somehow this young gentleman did not look
+as people generally look who come to the Morgue on serious business. The
+janitor was only too familiar with the signs--the air of excitement, of
+dejection, of suspense, the reddened eyelids.... But, "In that case I am
+sure to see monsieur again within a few minutes," he said politely.
+
+Nancy had stepped down from the carriage. "Well?" she said anxiously.
+"Well, won't he let you in?"
+
+"We shall have to get an order. The office is only just over there,
+opposite Notre Dame. Shall we dismiss the cab?"
+
+"Yes," she said. "I would far rather walk across." Still followed by a
+troop of ragged idlers, they hastened across the great space in front of
+Notre Dame and so to the office of the Morgue.
+
+At first the tired official whose not always easy duty it is to
+discriminate between the morbid sightseer and the anxious relative or
+friend, did not believe the American's story. He, too, evidently thought
+that Gerald and the latter's charming, daintily dressed companion were
+simply desirous of seeing every sight, however horrible, that Paris has to
+offer. But when he heard the name "Dampier," his manner suddenly changed.
+There came over his face a sincere look of pity and concern.
+
+"You made enquiries concerning this gentleman yesterday?" he observed, and
+Gerald Burton, rather surprised, though after all he need not have been,
+assented. Then the Commissary of Police had been to some trouble for him
+after all? He, Gerald, had done the man an injustice.
+
+"We have had five bodies already brought in this morning," said the clerk
+thoughtfully. "But I'm sure that none of them answers to the description we
+have had of madame's husband. Let me see--Monsieur Dampier is aged
+thirty-four--he is tall, dressed in a grey suit, or possibly a brown suit
+of clothes, with a shock of fair hair?"
+
+And again Gerald Burton was surprised how well the man remembered.
+
+The other went into another room and came back with a number of grey cards
+in his hand. He began to mumble over the descriptions, and suddenly Gerald
+stopped him.
+
+"That might be the person we are looking for!" he exclaimed. "I mean the
+description you've just read out--that of the Englishman?"
+
+"Oh no, monsieur! I assure you that the body here described is that of a
+quite young man." And as the American looked at him doubtfully, he added,
+"But still, if you wish to make absolutely sure I will make out a permit;
+and madame can stay here while you go across to the Morgue." Again he
+looked pityingly at Mrs. Dampier.
+
+Nancy shook her head. "Tell him I mean to go too," she said quietly.
+
+The man looked at her with an odd expression. "I should not myself care to
+take my wife or my sister to the Morgue, monsieur. Believe me her husband
+is not there. Do try and dissuade the poor lady." As he spoke he averted
+his eyes from Nancy's flushed face.
+
+Gerald Burton hesitated: it was really kind of this good fellow to feel so
+much for a stranger's distress.
+
+"Won't you stay here and let me go alone to that place? I think you can
+trust me. You see there is only one body there which in any way answers to
+the description."
+
+"Yes, I quite understand that, but I'd rather go too." Her lips quivered.
+"You see you've never seen Jack, Mr. Burton."
+
+"I'm afraid this lady is quite determined to go too," said the young
+American in a low voice; and without making any further objection, the
+Frenchman filled in a form and silently handed it to Gerald Burton.
+
+And then something happened which was perhaps more untoward and strange
+than Gerald realised.
+
+He and Mrs. Dampier were already well started across the great sunny space
+in front of Notre Dame, when suddenly he felt himself tapped on the
+shoulder by the man from whom they had just parted.
+
+"Monsieur, monsieur!" said the French official breathlessly, "I forgot a
+most important point. Visitors to the Morgue are not allowed to see all the
+bodies exposed in our mortuary. When the place was closed to the public we
+went from one extreme to the other. The man whose description you think
+approximates to that of the gentleman you are looking for is Number 4. Tell
+the guardian to show you Number 4."
+
+Then he turned on his heel, without awaiting the other's thanks; and as he
+walked away, the Frenchman said aloud, not once but many times, "Pauvre
+petite dame!" And then again and again, "Paume petite dame!"
+
+But his conscience was clear. He had done his very best to prevent that
+obstinate young American subjecting the "poor little lady" to the horrible
+ordeal she was about to go through. Once more he spoke aloud--"They have no
+imagination--none at all--these Yankees!" he muttered, shrugging his
+shoulders.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+The janitor of the Morgue, remembering Gerald Burton's five-franc piece,
+and perchance looking forward to another rond, was wreathed in smiles.
+
+Eagerly he welcomed the two strangers into the passage, and carefully he
+closed the great doors behind them.
+
+"A little minute," he said, smiling happily. "Only one little minute! The
+trifling formality of showing your permit to the gentleman in the office
+must be gone through, and then I myself will show monsieur and madame
+everything there is to be seen."
+
+"We do not wish to see everything," said Gerald Burton sharply. "We simply
+wish to see--" he hesitated--"body Number 4--" he lowered his voice, but
+Nancy understood enough French to know what it was that he said.
+
+With a blind, instinctive gesture she put out her hand, and Gerald Burton
+grasped it firmly, and for the first time a look of pity and of sympathy
+came across the janitor's face.
+
+Tiens! tiens! Then it was true after all? These young people (he now took
+them for a brother and sister) were here on business, not, as he had
+supposed, on pleasure.
+
+"Come in and wait here," he said gravely. "This is the doctors' room, but
+madame can sit here for a moment while the formalities are gone through."
+
+He flung open a door, and showed them into a curious, old-fashioned looking
+sitting-room, strangely unlike the waiting-room which would have been found
+attached, say, to an American or British mortuary.
+
+An ornate writing-table filled up one corner of the room, and, opposite the
+two windows, covering the whole of the blank wall, was a narrow glass case
+running from floor to ceiling.
+
+From this case young Burton quickly averted his eyes, for it was filled
+with wax models of heads which might have been modelled from the denizens
+of Dante's Inferno.
+
+"I'm afraid I must now leave you for a moment," he said gently; "sit over
+here, Mrs. Dampier, and look out on the river."
+
+And Nancy obeyed with dull submission. She gazed on the bright, moving
+panorama before her, aware, in a misty, indifferent way, that the view was
+beautiful, that Jack would have thought it so.
+
+This bend of the Seine is always laden with queer, picturesque craft, and
+just below the window by which she sat was moored a flat-bottomed barge
+which evidently served as dwelling place for a very happy little family.
+One end of the barge had been turned into a kind of garden, there was even
+a vine-covered arbour, under which two tiny children were now playing some
+absorbing game.
+
+And this glimpse of ordinary normal life gradually brought a feeling of
+peace, almost of comfort, to Nancy's sore heart. She wondered if she would
+ever be happy again--happy as those little children playing outside were
+happy, without a thought of care in the world: that had been the kind of
+simple, unquestioning happiness she too had thoughtlessly enjoyed till the
+last three days.
+
+When Gerald Burton came back he was glad rather than grieved to see that
+tears were running down her face.
+
+But a moment later, as they followed their guide down a humid, dark passage
+her tears stopped, and a look of pinched terror came into her eyes.
+
+Suddenly there fell on their ears loud, whirring, jarring sounds.
+
+"What's that?" cried Nancy in a loud voice. Her nerves were taut with
+suspense, quivering with fear of what she was about to see.
+
+And the janitor, as if he understood her question, turned round
+reassuringly. "Only our refrigerating machines, madame. We think them
+wonderfully quiet, considering. They whirr on night and day, they are never
+stilled. As for me--" he added jovially--"I would miss the noise very much.
+But as I lie in bed listening to the sound I know that all is well. It
+would be a very serious thing indeed for us if the machines stopped, even
+for ten minutes--" he shook his head mysteriously.
+
+Nancy breathed a little more easily. She had not understood what it was
+exactly that he had said, but his voice had sounded cheerful and kind: and
+she remained for a while ignorant of the meaning and object of the machines
+by which they passed quickly in a great room filled with moving wheels,
+and, even on this hot June day, full of icy breaths.
+
+As they came to the end of the engine-room their guide turned round and
+gave the young American a quick, warning look. "C'est ici," he said, under
+his breath. And Gerald stepped quickly in front of Mrs. Dampier.
+
+"Is what we are going to see very horrible?" he whispered hurriedly. "I
+wish this lady to be spared as far as may be from seeing anything
+especially painful."
+
+"As to horrible--well, it depends, monsieur, on what is thought horrible! A
+good many of my pensioners have been dangerous customers in their time--but
+now? Fortunately, monsieur, the dead cannot bite!" and he smiled at his own
+grim joke.
+
+Gerald Burton shuddered involuntarily, but as he and Nancy followed the man
+from the engine-room he gave a sigh of relief, for they had emerged into a
+wide, airy shed.
+
+The place looked like a workshop of sorts, for it was lined, on one side,
+with what looked like gigantic chests of drawers, painted black; while
+standing about on the stone pavement were long white deal packing cases.
+Over in a corner was a black box, of which the lid was loose.
+
+"You said Number 4, monsieur?" said the man in a business-like tone. "Well,
+I will get you out Number 4. Kindly stand just over there--not in the
+sunlight, that might prevent your seeing clearly." He added, speaking far
+more gently and kindly than he had yet done, "Madame must not be
+frightened. It will be all over in a moment."
+
+Gerald looked down at his companion. Her face seemed to have become quite
+small, like that of a child, but the pupils of her eyes had dilated: as she
+stared up at him fearfully he likened them, in his heart, to deep
+unfathomable pools.
+
+She came close up to him, and then, without stopping to think, simply
+following a natural instinct, he put his arm round her shoulder; so would
+he have done to his sister in a moment of similar distress.
+
+"Don't be too frightened," he whispered, "it will all be over very, very
+soon, Mrs. Dampier. Somehow I don't think you have anything to fear."
+
+"Please stand over in that corner," said the janitor, pointing towards the
+black box Gerald Burton had noticed when they had first come into the yard.
+"We have a poor lady in that box who was only brought in an hour ago! She
+was run over, killed by an omnibus--such a pity, for she is such a nice
+fresh-looking lady: not more than about thirty years of age. We expect her
+family any moment; they will know her by her wedding ring, and by a little
+locket with a child's hair in it."
+
+Even as he was speaking the man was opening a small, inconspicuous door,
+situated close to that which gave into the refrigerating-engine room.
+
+Gerald's arm slipped down from Nancy's shoulder. She had put out her hand
+gropingly, as a blind child might have done, and he was now holding the
+poor little hand tightly clasped in his firm grasp.
+
+There came a harsh rumbling sound, and then there was wheeled out into the
+open yard an inclined plane hitched up on huge iron wheels. To the inclined
+plane was bound a swathed, rigid figure.
+
+"Here is Number 4," said the man in a subdued tone. "I will uncover his
+face so that madame and monsieur may see if it is the gentleman for whom
+they are seeking."
+
+A strange tremor shot through Gerald Burton. He was shaken with a variety
+of sensations of which the predominant feeling was that of repulsion. Was
+he at last about to gaze at the dead face of the man who, with the one
+paramount exception of that same man's wife, had filled his mind and
+thoughts to the exclusion of all else since he had first heard the name of
+John Dampier? Was he now to make acquaintance with the stranger who had yet
+in so curious and sinister a way become his familiar?
+
+Nancy gently withdrew her hand from his: leaning slightly forward, she
+gazed at the swathed stark form which might possibly--so much she had told
+herself at once--be that of John Dampier.
+
+Very slowly the man drew off that portion of the sheet which covered the
+upper part of the body, and, as he did so, Gerald Burton heard the woman
+standing by his side utter a long, fluttering sigh of relief.
+
+Thank God it was not Jack--not her Jack!
+
+The fine, well-cut face was that of a man about Gerald Burton's own age.
+The features were stilled in the awful immobility of death: but for that
+immobility, the dead man lying there before them might have been asleep.
+
+"An Englishman," said the janitor thoughtfully, "or perchance an American?
+A finely built fellow, monsieur. A true athlete. Not a wound, not a touch!
+Just dropped dead yesterday afternoon in a public gymnasium."
+
+"How extraordinary it is," observed Gerald Burton in a low voice, "that he
+has not yet been claimed by his friends--"
+
+"Oh no, monsieur, not extraordinary at all! We in this country write to our
+children every day when we are separated from them--that is if we can
+afford the stamps. Not so English or American people. They think their
+children are sure to be all right. In about a fortnight we shall have
+enquiries for Number 4, hardly before then."
+
+"And by that time," said Gerald slowly, "I suppose the poor fellow will
+have been buried."
+
+"Oh no, monsieur--" the man laughed, as if the other's remark struck him as
+being really very funny. "Why, we keep some of them as long as fifteen
+months! Those drawers are full of them--" he pointed to the long black
+chests which lined one side of the shed. "Would monsieur like to see some
+of my pensioners? I have men, women, ay, and children too, cosily tucked
+away in there."
+
+A low exclamation of horror escaped from Nancy Dampier's lips. She turned
+ashily pale. At last she understood what it was the janitor was saying....
+
+The man looked at her with kindly concern. "Tiens!" he said, "isn't that
+strange? It happens again and again! People like madame come here--quite
+quiet, quite brave; and then, though overjoyed at not finding the person
+they came to seek--they suddenly shudder and turn pale; sometimes I have
+known them faint!"
+
+"Kindly let us out by the shortest and quickest way," said Gerald quickly.
+
+"Pardon, monsieur, the law exacts that Number 4 must remain in your
+presence for a quarter of an hour." The man shrugged his shoulders. "You
+see some people, especially ladies, are apt to think afterwards that they
+may have made a mistake: that their sight was at fault, and so on. That is
+why this tiresome regulation is now in force. I should like to oblige
+monsieur, but to do so would get me into trouble."
+
+He stopped speaking, and stood waiting, at attention.
+
+And then, as they stood there in silence, Gerald, looking beyond the still,
+swathed figure stretched out before him, allowed his eyes to rest on these
+black boxes, each containing one poor tenantless shell of humanity, from
+which the unquenchable spirit of man had been suddenly, violently expelled:
+and as he looked, he missed something that should have been there--the
+sign, the symbol, of the cross.
+
+A flood of memories came surging through his mind--memories of childish
+prayers learnt at his mother's knee, of certain revisions which time had
+brought to his first innocent, unquestioning faith. And with those memories
+came anger and a sense of humiliation. For there was nothing, absolutely
+nothing, to show that these boxes before him held what had once been the
+dwelling-place of that daily miracle, the sentient soul of man. These
+defenceless dead had been subjected to a last, continuous, intolerable
+insult; in their flesh he felt that his own humanity was degraded. Here was
+nothing to separate the human dead from the beasts of the field; these
+boxes would have looked the same had they held merely the bodies of animals
+prepared for the inquisitive, probing research of science.
+
+His young imagination, strung to the highest pitch, penetrated those
+shuttered receptacles and showed him on the face of each occupant that
+strange ironic smile with which the dead husk of man seems often to betray
+the full knowledge now possessed by the spirit which has fled. That riddle
+of existence, of which through the ages philosophers and kings had sought
+the key, was now an open book to all those who lay here in the still
+majesty of death. Yes, they could well afford to smile--to smile at the
+littleness which denied to their tenements of flesh the smallest symbol of
+belief that death was not the end of all.
+
+His companion had also marked the absence of any sign of the Christian's
+hope in this house of death, and through her mind there ran the confused
+recollection of holy words:--
+
+"It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption. It is sown in
+dishonour; it is raised in glory.
+
+"Behold, I shew you a mystery; we shall not all sleep....
+
+"O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?"
+
+Comfortable words! They seemed, merely by their flight through the tense
+ganglia of her brain, to break into the awful loneliness of these recent
+tabernacles of the spirit, and bestow on them the benison denied them in
+its pride by the human family from whose bosom they had been torn.
+
+Then swiftly her mind turned to the thought of those who were still
+watching and waiting, in that misery of suspense of which she now knew each
+pang. Every one--surely every one--of these dead who now surrounded
+her,--silent, solitary, had been loved--for love comes in some guise to all
+poor human creatures. Those mouths, cheeks, eyes, those rippling waves of
+woman's hair, had been kissed--ah, how often. The perishing flesh had been
+clasped heart to heart....
+
+There came over her soul a great rush of pity for those others, the vast
+and scattered company, mourning, mourning, and yet reaching out in wild
+hope and desire for their loved ones, whose bodies were all the while here.
+They did not know, yet hither came winging unerringly, like flights of
+homing doves, their myriad prayers, their passionate loving thoughts and
+wistful thirsty longing for one word, one kiss, one touch of the hand....
+Surely such thoughts and prayers sanctified this charnel-house.
+
+She herself was of that company--that company who were not sure. Some,
+doubtless, obstinate, refused to believe that death in any form had
+overtaken the missing; others feared to come here and look. She had not
+feared....
+
+The janitor spoke to her, and she started violently.
+
+"You are quite convinced, madame, that Number 4 is not he whom you seek?"
+
+These words, that question, evidently embodied a formula the man was bound
+to use.
+
+Mrs. Dampier bent her head.
+
+"You, monsieur, also have no doubt?"
+
+"None at all," said Gerald briefly.
+
+With a sudden movement the man put the sinister carriage in motion, but
+when he had got it close to the door of the mortuary, he stopped a
+moment:--"We have many compliments on our brancard," he said cheerfully.
+"It is very ingenious, is it not? You see the wheels are so large that a
+mere touch pushes it backwards and forwards. It is quite easy to wheel back
+into place again."
+
+Gerald Burton took out a five-franc piece. He left Nancy Dampier standing,
+an infinitely pathetic, forlorn little figure, in the sunlit portion of the
+yard, and approached the man.
+
+"We must go now," he said hurriedly. "I suppose it is quite easy to leave
+by the way we came in--through the engine-room?"
+
+"One moment, monsieur, one moment! Before showing you out I must put Number
+4 back with his other companions. There is no fear of his being lonely,
+poor man! We had five brought in this morning."
+
+They had not long to wait before the concierge joined them again.
+
+"Won't monsieur and madame stay and just see everything else there is to be
+seen?" he asked eagerly. "We have the most interesting relics of great
+criminals, notably of Troppman. Troppman was before my time, monsieur, but
+the day that his seven victims were publicly exposed there--" he pointed
+with his thumb to the inconspicuous door through which he had just wheeled
+Number 4--"ah, that was a red-letter day for the Morgue! Eighteen thousand
+people came to gaze on those seven bodies. And it was lucky, monsieur, that
+in those days we were open to the public, for it was the landlord of their
+hotel who recognised the poor creatures."
+
+He was now preceding his two visitors through the operating theatre where
+are held the post-mortems. From thence he led them into the hall where they
+had first gained admission. "Well, monsieur, if you really do not care to
+see our relics--?" He opened the great door through which so few living men
+and women ever pass.
+
+Gerald Burton and Nancy Dampier walked out into the sunlight, and the last
+thing they saw of the Morgue was the smiling face of the concierge--it was
+not often that he received ten francs for doing his simple duty.
+
+"Au plaisir de vous revoir, monsieur, madame: au plaisir de vous revoir!"
+he said gaily. And as the courteous old French mode of adieu fell upon
+their ears, Gerald Burton felt an awful sensation of horror, of oppression,
+yes and of dread, steal over him.
+
+Nancy Dampier, looking up at her companion, suddenly forgot herself. "Mr.
+Burton," she exclaimed, her voice full of concern, "I'm afraid this has
+made you feel ill? I oughtn't to have let you come here!" And it was she
+who in her clear, low voice told the cabman the address of the Hôtel
+Saint Ange.
+
+Gerald Burton muttered a word of half-angry excuse. He was keenly ashamed
+of what he took to be his lack of manliness.
+
+But during the weeks, aye and the months that followed he found himself
+constantly haunted by the gentle, ironic words of farewell uttered by the
+concierge of the Morgue: "Au plaisir de vous revoir, monsieur, madame: au
+plaisir de vous revoir!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+The American abroad has a touching faith, first, in the might and power of
+his country to redress all wrongs, and secondly, in the personal prestige
+of his Ambassador.
+
+As a rule this faith is justified by works, but in the special and very
+peculiar case of John Dampier, Senator Burton was destined to meet with
+disappointment.
+
+With keen vexation he learnt that the distinguished and genial individual
+who just then represented the great sister Republic in Paris, and on whom
+he himself had absolutely counted for advice and help, for they were old
+friends and allies, had taken sick leave for three months.
+
+Paris, during an Exhibition Year, seems mysteriously to lose the wonderful
+climate which a certain British Minister for Foreign Affairs once declared
+to be the only one that suited every diplomat's constitution!
+
+The Senator and his daughter drove on from the American Embassy to the
+American Consulate, and it was with a feeling of considerable satisfaction
+that they were shown by a courteous janitor into the pleasant, airy
+waiting-room where a large engraving of Christopher Columbus, and a huge
+photograph of the Washington Monument, welcome the wandering American.
+
+Even in this waiting-room there was an air of cheerful activity, a constant
+coming and going, which showed that whatever might be the case with the
+Embassy, the Consulate, at any rate, was very much alive.
+
+"Mr. Senator Burton? Glad to see you, sir! What can we do for you?" The
+words fell with a cheering, refreshing sound on the Senator's ears, though
+the speaker went on a trifle less cordially, "We are simply overwhelmed
+with business just now! You can imagine--but no, no one could imagine, the
+length, the breadth, the scope of what people think to be our duties in an
+Exhibition Year!"
+
+The distinguished visitor and his daughter were being shown into the
+Consul's own pleasant study. Now this spacious, comfortable apartment is
+hung with fine engravings of the White House and of the Capitol, and
+Senator Burton felt a thrill of yearning as well as of pride when he gazed
+at these familiar, stately buildings which looked so homelike and dear when
+seen amid alien surroundings.
+
+And as he sat down, and prepared to state his business, there suddenly came
+over this kindly American a curious feeling of misgiving, of self-rebuke.
+Had he remained at home in Washington, content with all his familiar duties
+and pleasures, he would never have been brought into this association with
+a strange, unpleasant life-story.
+
+But he soon shook off this feeling of misgiving, and as the curious tale he
+had to tell was being listened to, kindly and patiently, he felt glad
+indeed that he had at last found a fellow-countryman in whom to confide,
+and on whose advice he could rely.
+
+But when Senator Burton had finished speaking, the American Consul shook
+his head. "I only wish we could help you!" he exclaimed. "But we can do
+nothing where a British subject is concerned. We've quite enough to do
+looking after those of our own people who disappear in Paris! Would you be
+surprised to learn, Mr. Senator, that four of our countrymen have
+completely vanished within the last two days?" And as Daisy uttered a
+little exclamation of incredulous dismay, "Don't feel so badly about it, my
+dear young lady, I quite expect all four of them to turn up again, after
+having given us and their friends a great deal of useless,
+expensive worry."
+
+"What I really want," said the Senator earnestly, "is not your official
+assistance, but a word of practical advice. What is it this unfortunate
+young lady, Mrs. Dampier, ought to do? We've tried the Commissaire de
+Police of the quarter, and he's perfectly useless: in fact my son, who's
+seen him twice, doesn't believe a word he says."
+
+The Consul gave what Senator Burton felt to be a very French shrug of the
+shoulders.
+
+"That don't surprise me! As regards the lower branch of the service the
+police here is very understaffed. The only thing for you to do is to take
+this poor lady to the British Consulate. They are driven to death there,
+just as we are here, and they'll naturally snatch at any excuse to avoid an
+extra job. But of course if this Mrs. Dampier is, as you say, a British
+subject--well, they're bound to do something for her. But you may believe
+me when I say, Mr. Senator, that there's probably nothing really mysterious
+about the case. You may find this Mr. Dampier at the hotel when you return
+there. It may interest you to learn"--he hesitated, and glanced at his
+young countrywoman--"that among our countrymen who vanish, I mean in a
+temporary way, there are more married men than bachelors."
+
+And with that enigmatic pronouncement the genial Consul courteously and
+smilingly dismissed Senator Burton and his daughter.
+
+The same afternoon saw the Senator and Mrs. Dampier on their way to the
+British Consulate.
+
+The day before Nancy had been unwilling to leave the hotel for even the
+shortest space of time, now she seemed sunk into apathetic despair--and
+yet, as they drove along together, the Senator still doubted, still
+wondered in the depths of his heart, whether the lovely young woman now
+sitting silent by his side, was not making a fool of him, as she had
+certainly done of his two children.
+
+He caught himself again and again thinking of her as "Nancy;" already his
+daughter and she were on Christian-name terms with one another; and as for
+Gerald, he had put everything else aside to devote himself entirely to
+solving the mystery of John Dampier's disappearance.
+
+At last they reached the British Consulate, and the American could not help
+feeling a thrill of pride as he mentally compared the Office where he had
+been that morning and that which represented, in this shabby side street,
+the commercial might and weight of the British Empire.
+
+The waiting-room into which they were shown was a gloomy apartment looking
+on to an inner courtyard, and Senator Burton's card did not produce the
+magic effect it had done at the American Consulate; in fact he and his
+companion had to take their turn with a crowd of other people, and the time
+they were kept waiting seemed very long.
+
+At last, however, they were ushered into the study of the courteous Briton
+whose difficult and sometimes exasperating duty it is to look after the
+rights and interests of the motley world composed of those Englishmen and
+Englishwomen who make a short or long sojourn in Paris. Once they were in
+his presence nothing could have been kinder and more considerate than the
+British Consul's reception of the American Senator and his companion.
+
+In the Consular branch of the Diplomatic Service the post of Consul in the
+greater cities of the civilised world is almost invariably given to an
+ex-member of the Diplomatic Corps--to one, that is, who is a shrewd man of
+the world rather than a trained business official, and Senator Burton felt
+it to be a comfort indeed to deal with such a one rather than with an acute
+but probably conventionally-minded man of commercial experience.
+
+The Consul was moved by Mrs. Dampier's youth, her beauty, her evident, if
+subdued bewilderment and distress. She told her story very clearly and
+simply, but to the Senator's excited and yes, it must be admitted,
+suspicious fancy, she seemed to slur over, as of no importance, the
+extraordinary discrepancy between her own and the Poulains' account of what
+had happened on the night of her own and her husband's arrival in Paris.
+
+The Consul asked but few questions, but those were pertinent and to the
+point.
+
+"I am glad, Mrs. Dampier, that you did not come to me yesterday," he said
+at last, "for, thanks, as I understand, to this gentleman, you have done
+everything which I should have had to advise you to do."
+
+He then turned more particularly to his American visitor:--"I suppose you
+have now quite convinced yourself that no kind of street accident befell
+Mr. Dampier yesterday morning?"
+
+The Senator shook his head dubiously; there was a look of hesitation, of
+unease, on his face.
+
+"Perhaps it would be as well," said the Consul suavely, "for Mrs. Dampier
+to go and wait awhile in the next room. Then you and I, Mr. Senator, might
+go into the matter more thoroughly?"
+
+Unsuspiciously Nancy Dampier fell in with the plan.
+
+And then, at last, Senator Burton was able to open out his heart, and, as
+the British Consul listened to the American's version of all that had taken
+place, when he realised how entirely the story of this young lady, who
+called herself Mrs. Dampier, was uncorroborated, his face became graver
+and graver.
+
+"From the little opportunity I have had of judging, she impresses me as
+being a truthful woman," he said musingly. "Still, what I now know puts a
+very different complexion on the story as told me just now by her."
+
+"That is exactly what I feel," said the Senator sighing. "From something
+you said just now I gather that you have heard of this Mr. John Dampier?"
+
+"Why, yes, indeed I have--I know his name as being that of a distinguished
+English artist living in Paris; but he has never troubled me individually,
+and I can answer for it that he is very little known to our colony here. He
+evidently lives only amongst the French painters and their set--which means
+that to all intents and purposes he has become a Frenchman!" The Consul
+shrugged his shoulders--racial prejudice dies hard.
+
+He looked doubtfully at his visitor:--"You see, Mr. Senator, if this lady's
+tale is true, if the poor little woman is a three weeks' bride, Mr.
+Dampier's disappearance may mean a good many things, any one of which is
+bound to cause her pain and distress. I do not think it likely that there
+has been any kind of foul play. If, as Mrs. Dampier asserts, he had neither
+money nor jewels in his possession, we may dismiss that possibility from
+our minds."
+
+"If anything of that sort has happened--I mean, if there has been foul
+play," said Senator Burton firmly, "then I would stake my life that neither
+of the Poulains are in any way associated with it."
+
+"Quite so. Still, as Mrs. Dampier has appealed to me very properly for
+help, these hotel people--if they are as worthy as you believe them to
+be--will not mind consenting to an informal interrogatory from one of my
+clerks. I have here a sharp young fellow who knows English as well as he
+does French. I'll send him back with you. He can take down the Poulains'
+story, even cross-examine them in a friendly manner. Mrs. Dampier might
+also give him her version of what took place."
+
+Senator Burton uttered a hesitating assent. He knew only too well that the
+Poulains would greatly resent the proposed interrogatory.
+
+"One word more, Mr. Senator. If there is no news of this Mr. John Dampier
+by to-morrow, you must persuade Mrs. Dampier to write, or even to telegraph
+for her friends. For one thing, it isn't at all fair that all this trouble
+should fall on an entire stranger, on one not even her own countryman! I
+cannot help seeing, too, that you do not altogether believe in Mrs. Dampier
+and her story. You can't make up your mind--is not that so?"
+
+The American Senator nodded, rather shamefacedly.
+
+"I might advise you to go to the Préfecture de Police, nay, I might
+communicate with them myself, but I feel that in the interests of this
+young lady it would be better to go slow. Mr. Dampier may return as
+suddenly, as unexpectedly, as he went. And then he would not thank us, my
+dear sir, for having done anything to turn the Paris Police searchlight on
+his private life."
+
+The Consul got up and held out his hand. "For your sake, as well as for
+that of my countrywoman, I hope most sincerely that you will find Mr.
+Dampier safe and sound when you get back to the Hôtel Saint Ange. But if
+the mystery still endures to-morrow, then you really must persuade this
+poor young lady to send for one of her relatives--preferably, I need hardly
+say, a man."
+
+"At what time shall I expect your clerk?" asked Senator Burton. "I think I
+ought to prepare the Poulains."
+
+"No, there I think you're wrong! Far better let him go back with you now,
+and hear what they have to say. Let him also get a properly signed
+statement from Mrs. Dampier. Then he can come back here and type out his
+report and her statement for reference. That can do no harm, and may in the
+future be of value."
+
+He accompanied the American Senator to the door. "I wish I could help you
+more," he said cordially. "Believe me, I appreciate more than I can say
+your extraordinary kindness to my 'subject.' I shall, of course, be glad to
+know how you get on. But oh, if you knew how busy we are just now! When I
+think of how we are regarded--of how I read, only the other day, that a
+Consul is the sort of good fellow one likes to make comfortable in a nice
+little place--I wish the man who wrote that could have my 'nice little
+place' for a week, during an Exhibition Year! I think he would soon change
+his mind."
+
+Mrs. Dampier was not present at the, to Senator Burton, odious half-hour
+which followed their return to the Hôtel Saint Ange.
+
+At first the French hotel-keeper and his wife refused to say anything to
+the Consular official. Then, when they were finally persuaded to answer his
+questions, they did so as curtly and disagreeably as possible. Madame
+Poulain also made a great effort to prevent her nephew, young Jules, from
+being brought into the matter. But to her wrath and bitter consternation,
+he, as well as her husband and herself, was made to submit to a regular
+examination and cross-examination as to what had followed Mrs. Dampier's
+arrival at the Hôtel Saint Ange.
+
+"Why don't you send for the police?" she cried at last. "We should be only
+too glad to lay all the facts before them!"
+
+And as the young Frenchman, after his further interview with Nancy, was
+being speeded on his way by the Senator, "I'm blessed if I know what to
+believe!" he observed with a wink. "It's the queerest story I've ever come
+across; and as for the Poulains, it's the first time I've ever known French
+people to say they would like to see the police brought into their private
+affairs! One would swear that all the parties concerned were telling the
+truth, but I thought that boy, those people's nephew, did know something
+more than he said."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+The third morning brought no news of the missing man, and Senator Burton,
+noting Gerald's and Daisy's preoccupied, anxious faces, began to wonder if
+his life would ever flow in pleasant, normal channels again.
+
+The son and daughter whom he held so dear, whose habitual companionship was
+so agreeable to him, were now wholly absorbed in Mrs. Dampier and her
+affairs. They could think of nothing else, and, when they were alone with
+their father, they talked of nothing else.
+
+The Senator remembered with special soreness what had happened the
+afternoon before, just after he had dismissed the clerk of the British
+Consul. Feeling an eager wish to forget, as far as might be for a little
+while, the mysterious business in which they were all so untowardly
+concerned, he had suggested to Daisy that they might go and spend a quiet
+hour in the Art section of the Exhibition. But to his great discomfiture,
+his daughter had turned on him with a look of scorn, almost of contempt:
+
+"Father! Do you mean me to go out and leave poor little Nancy alone in her
+dreadful suspense and grief--just that I may enjoy myself?"
+
+And the Senator had felt ashamed of his selfishness. Yes, it had been most
+unfeeling of him to want to go and gaze on some of the few masterpieces
+American connoisseurs have left in Europe, while this tragedy--for he
+realised that whatever the truth might be it was a tragedy--was still
+in being.
+
+It was good to know that thanks to the British Consul's word of advice his
+way, to-day, was now clear. The time had come when he must advise Mrs.
+Dampier to send for some member of her family. Without giving his children
+an inkling of what he was about to say to their new friend, Senator Burton
+requested Nancy, in the presence of the two others, to come down into the
+garden of the Hôtel Saint Ange in order that they might discuss the
+situation.
+
+As they crossed the sun-flecked cheerful courtyard Nancy pressed
+unconsciously nearer her companion, and averted her eyes from the kitchen
+window where the hotel-keeper and his wife seemed to spend so much of their
+spare time, gazing forth on their domain, watching with uneasy suspicion
+all those who came and went from the Burtons' apartments.
+
+As the young Englishwoman passed through into the peaceful garden whose
+charm and old-world sweetness had been one of the lures which had drawn
+John Dampier to what was now to her a fatal place, she felt a sensation of
+terrible desolation come over her, the more so that she was now half
+conscious that Senator Burton, great as was his kindness, kept his judgment
+in suspense.
+
+They sat down on a wooden bench, and for awhile neither spoke. "Have you
+found out anything?" she asked at last in a low voice. "I think by your
+manner that you have found out something, Mr. Burton--something you don't
+wish to say to me before the two others?"
+
+He looked at her, surprised. "No," he said sincerely, "that is not so at
+all. I have found out nothing, Mrs. Dampier--would that I had! But I feel
+it only right to tell you that the moment has come when you should
+communicate with your friends. The British Consul told me that if we were
+still without news, still in suspense, this morning, he would strongly
+advise that you send for someone to join you in Paris. Surely you have some
+near relation who would come to you?"
+
+Nancy shook her head. "No. I daresay it may seem strange to you, Senator
+Burton, but I have no near relations at all. I was the only child of a
+father and mother who, in their turn, were only children. I have some very
+distant cousins, a tribe of acquaintances, a few very kind friends--" her
+lips quivered "but no one--no one of whom I feel I could ask that sort
+of favour."
+
+Senator Burton glanced at her in dismay. She looked very wan and fragile
+sitting there; whatever the truth, he could not but feel deeply sorry
+for her.
+
+Suddenly she turned to him, and an expression of relief came over her sad
+eyes and mouth. "There is someone, Mr. Burton, someone I ought to have
+thought of before! There is a certain Mr. Stephens who was my father's
+friend as well as his solicitor; and he has always managed all my money
+matters. I'll write and ask Mr. Stephens if he can come to me. He was more
+than kind at the time of my marriage, though I'm afraid that he and Jack
+didn't get on very well together."
+
+She looked up in Senator Burton's face with a bewildered, pleading look,
+and he suddenly realised how difficult a task such a letter would be to
+her, supposing, that is, that the story she told, the story in which even
+now the Senator only half believed--were true.
+
+"I'll go up and write the letter now," she said, and together they both
+went, once more, indoors.
+
+But Gerald Burton, when he heard of the proposed letter to Mrs. Dampier's
+lawyer, made an abrupt suggestion which both the Senator and Nancy welcomed
+with eagerness.
+
+"Why shouldn't we telephone to this Mr. Stephens?" he asked. "That would
+save a day, and it would be far easier to explain to him all that has
+happened by word of mouth than in a letter--" He turned to Nancy, and his
+voice unconsciously softened: "If you will trust me, I will explain the
+situation to your friend, Mrs. Dampier."
+
+The father and son's drive to the Central Paris-London-Telephone office was
+curiously silent, though both the older and the younger man felt full of
+unwonted excitement.
+
+"Now, at last, I am on the track of the truth!" such was the Senator's
+secret thought. But he would not have been very much surprised had no such
+name as that of Davies P. Stephens, Solicitor, 58 Lincoln's Inn Fields,
+appeared in the London Telephone Directory. But yes, there the name was,
+and Gerald showed it to his father with a gleam of triumph.
+
+"You will want patience--a good deal of patience," said the attendant
+mournfully.
+
+Gerald Burton smiled. He was quite used to long-distance telephoning at
+home. "All right!" he said cheerily. "I've plenty of patience!"
+
+But though the young man claimed to have plenty of patience he felt far too
+excited, far too strung up and full of suspense, for the due exercise of
+that difficult virtue.
+
+The real reason why he had suggested this telephone message, instead of a
+letter or a telegram, was that he longed for his father's suspicions to be
+set at rest.
+
+Gerald Burton resented keenly, far more keenly than did his sister, the
+Senator's lack of belief in Nancy Dampier's story. He himself would have
+staked his life on the truthfulness of this woman whom he had only known
+three days.
+
+At last the sharp, insistent note of the telephone bell rang out, and he
+stept up into the call-box.
+
+"Mr. Stephens' office?" He spoke questioningly: and after what seemed a
+long pause the answer came, muffled but audible. "Yes, yes! This is Mr.
+Stephens' office. Who is it wants us from Paris?" The question was put in a
+Cockney voice, and the London twang seemed exaggerated by its transmission
+over those miles and miles of wire by land, under the sea, and then by
+land again.
+
+"I want to speak to Mr. Stephens himself," said Gerald Burton very
+distinctly.
+
+"Mr. Stephens? Yes, he's here all right. I'll take a message."
+
+"Make him come himself."
+
+"Yes, he's here. Give me your message--" the words were again a little
+muffled.
+
+"I can't send a message. You must fetch him." Gerald Burton's stock of
+patience was giving way. Again there was an irritating pause, but it was
+broken at last.
+
+"Who is it? I can't fetch him if you won't say who you are."
+
+"I am speaking on behalf of Mrs. Dampier," said Gerald reluctantly. Somehow
+he hated uttering Nancy's name to this tiresome unknown.
+
+And then began an absurd interchange of words at cross purposes.
+
+"Mr. Larkspur?"
+
+"No," said Gerald. "Mrs. Dampier."
+
+"Yes," said the clerk. "Yes, I quite understand. L. for London--"
+
+Gerald lost his temper--"D. for damn!" he shouted, "Dampier."
+
+And then, at last, with a shrill laugh that sounded strange and eerie, the
+clerk repeated, "Dampier--Mr. John Dampier? Yes, sir. What can we do
+for you?"
+
+"Mrs. Dampier!"
+
+"Mrs. Dampier? Yes, sir. I'll fetch Mr. Stephens." The clerk's voice had
+altered; it had become respectful, politely enquiring.
+
+And at last with intense relief, Gerald Burton heard a low clear, incisive
+voice uttering the words: "Is that Mrs. Dampier herself speaking?"
+
+Instinctively Gerald's own voice lowered. "No, I am speaking for Mrs.
+Dampier."
+
+The English lawyer's voice hardened, or so it seemed to the young American.
+It became many degrees colder. "I beg your pardon, Mr. Dampier. Yes? What
+can I do for you?"
+
+And as Gerald, taken oddly aback by the unseen man's very natural mistake,
+did not answer for a moment or two:
+
+"Nothing wrong with Nancy, I hope?"
+
+The anxious question sounded very, very clear.
+
+"There is something very wrong with Mrs. Dampier--can you hear me clearly?"
+
+"Yes, yes What is wrong with her?"
+
+"Mrs. Dampier is in great trouble. Mr. Dampier has disappeared."
+
+The strange thing which had happened was told in those four words, but
+Gerald Burton naturally went on to explain, or rather to try to explain,
+the extraordinary situation which had arisen, to Nancy's lawyer and friend.
+
+Mr. Stephens did not waste any time in exclamations of surprise or pity.
+Once he had grasped the main facts, his words were few and to the point.
+
+"Tell Mrs. Dampier," he said, speaking very distinctly, "that if she has no
+news of her husband by Friday I will come myself to Paris. I cannot do so
+before. Meanwhile, I strongly advise that she, or preferably you for her,
+communicate with the police--try and see the Prefect of Police himself. I
+myself once obtained much courteous help from the Paris Prefect of Police."
+
+Gerald stept down from the stuffy, dark telephone box. He turned to the
+attendant:--"How much do I owe you?" he asked briefly.
+
+"A hundred and twenty francs, Monsieur," said the man suavely.
+
+The Senator drew near. "That was an expensive suggestion of yours, Gerald,"
+he observed smiling, as the other put down six gold pieces. And then he
+said, "Well?"
+
+"Well, father, there's not much to tell. This Mr. Stephens will come over
+on Friday if there's still no news of Mr. Dampier by then. He wants us to
+go to the Prefecture of Police. He says we ought to try and get at the
+Prefect of Police himself."
+
+There came a long pause: the two were walking along a crowded street.
+Suddenly Gerald stopped and turned to the Senator. "Father," he said
+impulsively, "I suppose that now, at last, you do believe Mrs.
+Dampier's story?"
+
+The young man spoke with a vehemence and depth of feeling which disturbed
+his father. What a good thing it was that this English lawyer was coming to
+relieve them all from a weight and anxiety which was becoming, to the
+Senator himself, if not to the two younger people, quite intolerable.
+
+"Well," he said at last, "I am of course glad to know that everything, so
+far, goes to prove that Mrs. Dampier's account of herself is true."
+
+"That being so, don't you think the Hôtel Saint Ange ought to be searched?"
+
+"Searched?" repeated Senator Burton slowly. "Searched for what?"
+
+"If I had charge of this business--I mean sole charge--the first thing I
+would do would be to have the Hôtel Saint Ange searched from top to
+bottom!" said Gerald vehemently.
+
+"Is that Mrs. Dampier's suggestion?"
+
+"No, father, it's mine. I had a talk with that boy Jules last night, and
+I'm convinced he's lying. There's another thing I should like to do. I
+should like to go to the office of the 'New York Herald' and enlist the
+editor's help. I would have done it long ago if this man Dampier had been
+an American."
+
+"And you would have done a very foolish thing, my boy." The Senator spoke
+with more dry decision than was his wont. "Come, come, Gerald, you and I
+mustn't quarrel over this affair! Let us think of the immediate thing to
+do." He put his hand on his son's arm.
+
+"Yes, father?"
+
+"I suppose that the first thing to do is to take this Mr. Stephens'
+advice?"
+
+"Why, of course, father! Will you, or shall I, go to the Prefecture of
+Police?"
+
+"Well, Gerald, I have bethought myself of that courteous President of the
+French Senate who wrote me such a pleasant note when we first arrived in
+Paris this time. No doubt he would give me a personal introduction to the
+Prefect of Police."
+
+"Why, father, that's a first rate idea! Hadn't you better go right now and
+get it?"
+
+"Yes, perhaps I had; and meanwhile you can tell the poor little woman that
+her friend will be here on Friday."
+
+"Yes, I will. And father? May I tell Daisy that now you agree with me about
+Mrs. Dampier--that you no longer believe the Poulains' story?"
+
+"No," said Senator Burton a little sternly. "You are to say nothing of the
+sort, Gerald. I have only known this girl three days--I have known the
+Poulains nine years. Of course it's a great relief to me to learn that Mrs.
+Dampier's account of herself is true--so far as you've been able to
+ascertain such a fact in a few minutes' conversation with an unknown man
+over the telephone--but that does not affect my good opinion of the
+Poulains."
+
+And on this the father and son parted, for the first time in their joint
+lives, seriously at odds the one with the other.
+
+"Give you an introduction to our Prefect of Police? Why, certainly!"
+
+The white-haired President of the French Senate looked curiously at the
+American gentleman who had sought him out at the early hour of
+eleven o'clock.
+
+"You will find Monsieur Beaucourt a charming man," he went on. "I hear
+nothing but good of the way he does his very difficult work. He is a type
+to whom you are used in America, my dear Senator, but whom we perhaps too
+often lack in France among those who govern us. Monsieur Beaucourt is a
+strong man--a man who takes his own line and sticks to it. I was told only
+the other day that crime had greatly diminished in our city since he became
+Prefect. He is thoroughly trusted by his subordinates, and you can imagine
+what that means when one remembers that our beautiful Paris is the resort
+of all the international rogues of Europe. And if they tease us by their
+presence at ordinary times, you can imagine what it is like during an
+Exhibition Year!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+In all French public offices there is a strange mingling of the sordid and
+of the magnificent.
+
+The Paris Prefecture of Police is a huge, quadrangular building, containing
+an infinity of bare, and to tell the truth, shabby, airless rooms; yet when
+Senator Burton had handed in his card and the note from the President of
+the French Senate, he was taken rapidly down a long corridor, and ushered
+into a splendid apartment, of which the walls were hung with red velvet,
+and which might have been a reception room in an Italian Palace rather than
+the study of a French police official.
+
+"Monsieur le Préfet will be back from déjeuner in a few minutes," said the
+man, softly closing the door.
+
+The Senator looked round him with a feeling of keen interest and curiosity.
+After the weary, baffling hours of fruitless effort in which he had spent
+the last three days, it was more than pleasant to find himself at the
+fountainhead of reliable information.
+
+Since the far-off days when, as a boy, he had been thrilled by the
+brilliant detective stories of which French writers, with the one
+outstanding exception of Poe, then had a monopoly, there had never faded
+from Senator Burton's mind that first vivid impression of the power, the
+might, the keen intelligence, and yes, of the unscrupulousness, of the
+Paris police.
+
+But now, having penetrated into the inner shrine of this awe-inspiring
+organism, he naturally preferred to think of the secret autocratic powers,
+and of the almost uncanny insight of those to whom he was about to make
+appeal. Surely they would soon probe the mystery of John Dampier's
+disappearance.
+
+The door opened suddenly, and the Paris Prefect of Police walked into the
+room. He was holding Senator Burton's card, and the letter of introduction
+with which that card had been accompanied, in his sinewy nervous
+looking hand.
+
+Bowing, smiling, apologising with more earnestness than was necessary for
+the few moments the American Senator had had to await his presence, the
+Prefect motioned his guest to a chair.
+
+"I am very pleased," he said in courtly tones, "to put myself at the
+disposal of a member of the American Senate. Ah, sir, your country is a
+wonderful country! In a sense, the parent of France--for was not America
+the first great nation to become a Republic?"
+
+Senator Burton bowed, a little awkwardly, in response to this flowery
+sentiment.
+
+He was telling himself that Monsieur Beaucourt was quite unlike the picture
+he had mentally formed, from youth upwards, of the Paris Prefect of Police.
+
+There was nothing formidable, nothing for the matter of that in the least
+awe-inspiring, about this tired, amiable-looking man. The Prefect was also
+lacking in the alert, authoritative manner which the layman all the world
+over is apt to associate with the word "police."
+
+Monsieur Beaucourt sat down behind his ornate buhl writing-table, and
+shooting out his right hand he pressed an electric bell.
+
+With startling suddenness, a panel disappeared noiselessly into the red
+velvet draped wall, and in the aperture so formed a good-looking young man
+stood smiling.
+
+"My secretary, Monsieur le Sénateur--my secretary, who is also my nephew."
+
+The Senator rose and bowed.
+
+"André? Please say that I am not to be disturbed till this gentleman's
+visit is concluded." The young man nodded: and then he withdrew as quickly,
+as silently, as he had appeared; and the panel slipped noiselessly back
+behind him.
+
+"And now tell me exactly what it is that you wish me to do for you," said
+the Prefect, with a weary sigh, which was, however, softened by a pleasant
+smile. "We are not as omnipotent as our enemies make us out to be, but
+still we can do a good deal, and we could do a good deal more were it not
+for the Press! Ah, Monsieur le Sénateur, that is the only thing I do not
+like about your great country. Your American Press sets so bad, so very
+bad, an example to our poor old world!"
+
+A thin streak of colour came into Monsieur Beaucourt's cheek, a gleam of
+anger sparkled in his grey eyes.
+
+"Yes, greatly owing to the bad example set in America, and of late in
+England too, quite a number of misguided people nowadays go to the Press
+before they come to us for redress! All too soon," he shook a warning
+finger, "they find they have entered a mouse-trap from which escape is
+impossible. They rattle at the bars--but no, they are caught fast! Once
+they have brought those indefatigable, those indiscreet reporters on the
+scene, it is too late to draw back. They find all their most private
+affairs dragged into the light of day, and even we can do very little for
+them then!"
+
+Senator Burton nodded gravely. He wished his son were there to hear these
+words.
+
+"And now let us return to our muttons," said the Prefect leaning forward.
+"I understand from the President of the Senate that you require my help in
+a rather delicate and mysterious matter."
+
+"I do not know that the matter is particularly delicate, though it is
+certainly mysterious," and then Senator Burton explained, in as few and
+clear words as possible, the business which had brought him there--the
+disappearance, three days before, of the English artist, John Dampier, and
+of the present sad plight of Dampier's wife.
+
+Monsieur Beaucourt threw himself back in his chair. His face lit up, it
+lost its expression of apathetic fatigue; and his first quick questions
+showed him a keen and clever cross-examiner.
+
+At once he seized on the real mystery, and that though the Senator had not
+made more of it than he could help. That was the discrepancy in the account
+given by the Poulains and by Mrs. Dampier respectively as to the lady's
+arrival at the hotel.
+
+But even Monsieur Beaucourt failed to elicit the fact that Senator Burton's
+acquaintance with Mrs. Dampier was of such short standing. He assumed that
+she was a friend of the Burton family, and the Senator allowed the
+assumption to go by default.
+
+"The story you have told me," the Prefect said at last, "is a very curious
+story, Monsieur le Sénateur. But here we come across stranger things every
+day. Still, certain details make the disappearance of this English
+gentleman rather stranger than usual. I gather that the vanished man's wife
+is a charming person?"
+
+"Extremely charming!" said the Senator quickly. "And I should say quite
+truthful--in fact this discrepancy between her account and that of the
+Poulains has worried and perplexed me very much."
+
+"Do not let that worry you," said the other thoughtfully. "If this young
+lady, your friend, be telling the truth, it is very probable that the
+Poulains began to lie in the hope of avoiding trouble for themselves:
+having lied they found themselves obliged to stick to their story. You see
+just now our hotel-keepers are coining gold, and they do not like this very
+pleasant occupation of theirs interrupted, for even the best of reasons. If
+this gentleman left the hotel the same night that he arrived there--as I
+can see you yourself are inclined to believe, Monsieur le Sénateur--then
+you may be sure that the hotel people, even if they did see him for a few
+moments, would not care to admit that they had done so. I therefore advise
+that we put them and their account of what took place out of our minds.
+From what you tell me, you have already done what I may call the
+usual things?"
+
+"Yes," said Senator Burton frankly. "My son and I have done everything
+which common sense could suggest to us. Thus we at once gave a description
+of the missing man to the police station of the quarter where both the
+Hôtel Saint Ange and Mr. Dampier's studio are situated. But, owing
+doubtless to the fact that all your officials are just now very busy and
+very overworked, we did not get quite as much attention paid to the case as
+I should have liked. I do not feel quite sure even now that the missing man
+did not meet with a street accident."
+
+"I can ascertain that for you in a moment."
+
+Again the Prefect pressed a pedal. A panel, and this time a different panel
+from the first, slid back, and again the secretary appeared.
+
+Monsieur Beaucourt said a brief word or two, and a few moments later a
+tabulated list, written in round-hand, lay before him.
+
+"Here are all the accidents which have occurred in Paris during the last
+ninety hours."
+
+He ran his eyes down the list; and then, rising, handed the sheets to
+Senator Burton.
+
+"I think this disposes of the idea that an accident may have befallen your
+friend in the streets," said the Prefect briefly.
+
+And the Senator, handing back the list, acknowledged that this was so.
+
+"May I ask if you know much of the habits and way of life of this vanished
+bridegroom?" asked the Prefect thoughtfully. "I understand he belongs to
+the British Colony here."
+
+"Mr. Dampier was not my friend," said the Senator hurriedly. "It is Mrs.
+Dampier--"
+
+"Ah, yes--I understand--the three weeks' bride? It is she you know. Well,
+Monsieur le Sénateur, the best thing you and I can do is to look at the
+artist's dossier. That is quite likely to provide us with a useful clue."
+
+The Senator felt a thrill of anticipatory interest. All his life he had
+heard of the dossiers kept by the Paris police, of how every dweller in the
+great city, however famous, however obscure, had a record in which the most
+intimate details of their lives were set down in black and white. Somehow
+he had never quite believed in these French police dossiers.
+
+"Surely you are not likely to have a dossier of Mr. Dampier?" he exclaimed,
+"he is a British subject, and, as far as I know, a perfectly
+respectable man."
+
+The Prefect smiled. "The mere fact that he is an English subject living in
+Paris entitles him to a dossier. In fact everybody who is anybody in any
+kind of society, from that frequented by the Apaches to that of the
+Faubourg Saint Germain, has a dossier. And from what you tell me this
+artist, who won a Salon medal, and who has already had a distinguished
+career as a painter, is certainly 'somebody.' Now, please tell me exactly
+the way to spell his surname and his Christian name. English names are so
+perplexing."
+
+Very clearly the Senator spelt out--first the word "John" and then the word
+"Dampier."
+
+And as, under his dictation, the Prefect of Police wrote the two
+distinctive names of the missing man, there came a look of frowning
+perplexity and indecision over his face.
+
+"It's an odd thing," he muttered, "but I seem to have heard that name quite
+lately, and in some strange connection! Now what could it have been? As you
+probably know, Monsieur le Sénateur, there is a French form of that name,
+Dampierre. But no--it is that John which puzzles me--I am quite sure that I
+have heard the name 'John Dampier' quite recently."
+
+"Isn't it likely," suggested the Senator, "that the man's disappearance has
+been reported to you? My son and I have done everything in our power to
+make the fact known, and Mr. Dampier's name and particulars as to his
+appearance have been at the Morgue since yesterday."
+
+"Well, that's possible, of course. Just now my poor head has to hold far
+more than it was ever meant to do. The presence of so many royal personages
+in Paris always means extra trouble for me--especially when they are here
+'incognito.' By the way, it would amuse, perhaps shock you, to see the
+dossiers of some of these Princes and Grand Dukes! But these are, of
+course, kept very secret. Meanwhile, I must not forget Mr. John Dampier."
+
+This time the Prefect did not ring his bell. Instead he blew down a tube.
+"You would scarcely believe it," he said, looking up suddenly, "but these
+tubes have only just been installed! I had a regular battle over the matter
+with the Treasury. But now that the battle is won, I forget half the time
+that the tube is there! Picot? Please send me the dossier of an
+artist-painter called John Dampier," he spelt the names. "English subject;
+living in Impasse des Nonnes. I have an impression that we have had that
+name before us during the last week or so--Have you any recollection
+of it?"
+
+He put the tube to his ear.
+
+And then the American Senator, looking at the Paris Prefect of Police, was
+struck by a sudden change which came over the listener's face. There
+gathered on Monsieur Beaucourt's features a look of quick surprise,
+followed--yes, unmistakably--by a frown of dismay.
+
+Putting his free hand over the tube, he withdrew it from his ear and
+applied it to his lips. "Yes, yes," he said rapidly, "enough, enough! I
+quite understand. It is, as you say, very natural that I should have
+forgotten."
+
+And then he looked quickly across at the Senator. "You are right, Monsieur
+le Sénateur: Mr. Dampier's name was put before me only yesterday as that of
+an Englishman who had disappeared from his hotel. But I took him to be a
+passing visitor. You know quite a number of the tourists brought by the
+Exhibition disappear, sometimes for two or three days--sometimes--well, for
+ever! That, of course, means they have left Paris suddenly, having got into
+what the English call a 'scrape.' In such a case a man generally thinks it
+better to go home--wiser if sadder than when he came."
+
+There followed a pause.
+
+"Well, Monsieur le Sénateur," said the Prefect, rising from his chair. "You
+may rest assured that I will do everything that is in my power to find
+your friend."
+
+"But the dossier?" exclaimed Senator Burton. "I thought, Monsieur le
+Préfet, that I was to see Mr. Dampier's dossier?"
+
+"Oh, to be sure--yes! I beg your pardon."
+
+Again he whistled down the tube. "Picot?" he exclaimed, "I still require
+that dossier! Why am I kept waiting in this way?"
+
+He listened for a few moments to what his invisible subordinate had to say,
+and then again he spoke down the funnel, and with a certain pettish
+impatience. "The last entry is of no importance--understand me--no
+importance at all! The gentleman for whose benefit I require the dossier
+already knows of this Mr. Dampier's disappearance."
+
+A moment later a clerk knocked at the door, and appeared with a blue
+envelope which he laid with a deep bow on the Prefect's table.
+
+It was not a very large envelope, and yet Senator Burton was surprised at
+its size, and at the number of slips of paper the Prefect of Police
+withdrew from it.
+
+"I do not suppose, Monsieur le Sénateur, that you have ever seen one of our
+dossiers--in fact I may tell you that very few people outside this building
+ever do see one. By the way, a great deal of nonsense is talked about them.
+Roughly speaking, a dossier is not a history of the individual in question;
+it simply records what is being said of him. For instance, the day that I
+became Prefect of Police my dossier was brought to me--"
+
+He smiled wearily.
+
+"Your dossier?" repeated the Senator in amazement.
+
+"Yes, my dossier. I have had it bound, and I keep it as a curiosity.
+Everything that had ever been written about me in the days when I was a
+Member of the Chamber of Deputies is there. And what really made me feel
+angry was the fact that I had been confused with more than one of my
+namesakes, in fact certain misdeeds that these worthy folk had committed
+were actually registered in my dossier!"
+
+He stopped speaking for a moment, and took up the blue envelope.
+
+"But now let us consider this Mr. John Dampier. You will see that he bears
+the number '16909,' and that his envelope is blue. Had this gentleman ever
+had anything to do with the police, were he, to put it plainly, of the
+criminal class, this envelope would be yellow. As for the white envelopes,
+they, Monsieur le Sénateur, have to deal with a very different sort of
+individual. We class them briefly under the general word 'Morals.'"
+
+As he spoke the Prefect was looking swiftly through the Dampier dossier,
+and not till he had glanced at every item did he hand the envelope to his
+American visitor.
+
+Senator Burton could not but admire the intelligent way the dossier had
+been prepared, and kept up to date.
+
+On the top sheet were carefully gummed various entries from the
+biographical dictionaries in which mention was made of John Dampier and his
+career. There followed a eulogistic newspaper article containing an account
+of the picture which had won the artist his Médaille d'Honneur at the Salon
+two years before. Then came a piece of foolscap headed "General remarks,"
+and here were written the following words:--"Lives quietly; is popular with
+his fellow artists; has few debts; does not frequent the British Colony."
+
+The Senator looked up quickly. "Well, there is not much to learn from
+this!" he said. And then, "I notice, Monsieur le Préfet, that there was
+another entry which has been removed."
+
+"Yes," said the Prefect. "That last entry was only added the day before
+yesterday, and told of Monsieur Dampier's disappearance. It is being
+written up now, Monsieur le Sénateur, with a note explaining your kind
+interest in him, and telling of your visit to-day."
+
+Senator Burton rose from his chair. He could not have told exactly why, but
+he had the impression that his courteous host had suddenly become anxious
+to get rid of him.
+
+But this impression was evidently erroneous. Even after they had cordially
+shaken hands, the Prefect of Police seemed in no hurry to let him go.
+
+"One moment, Monsieur le Sénateur?" he looked earnestly into the American's
+frank face. "I feel bound to tell you that I am convinced there is more in
+this mysterious disappearance than appears on the surface. I fear--I
+greatly fear--that this Mr. Dampier has vanished of his own free will," he
+spoke with evident reluctance, "and that his poor young wife will never see
+him again. As I think I said before, the public, especially the vulgar,
+ignorant public, credit us with powers we are far from possessing. It is
+possible that this gentleman does not care for the trammels of married
+life, and that his bride, however charming she may be, has disappointed
+him. Such cases are commoner than you might think possible, especially
+among English and American people. You, in your country, if you will
+forgive my saying so, marry with such reckless haste; and that often means
+repenting at bitter leisure." The Prefect's voice lowered, a look of real
+distress came over his face. "Ah! what tales I could tell you--what fearful
+domestic tragedies have been confided to me here, within these four walls!
+No doubt for an artist this Mr. John Dampier was a very good fellow--what
+in England they call 'respectable enough.' But still, think what painters
+are like! Think of how Bohemian, how careless is their life, compared with
+that of the man who has a regular occupation--" Monsieur de Beaucourt shook
+his head gloomily--"In most of these stories of sudden disappearance there
+is no crime, as the relations are so apt to think there is. No, Monsieur le
+Sénateur, there is simply--a woman! Sometimes it is a new friend--but far
+oftener it is an old friend."
+
+There was a pause. "God forbid," said the Prefect suddenly, "that I should
+accuse this unfortunate man of anything heinous! But--but, Monsieur le
+Sénateur? You must have learnt through our Press, through those of our
+newspapers which delight in dragging family scandals to light, the amazing
+story of Count Bréville."
+
+The Senator was impressed, in spite of himself, by the other's manner.
+
+"I don't remember the name," he said thoughtfully.
+
+"Count Bréville," said the Prefect slowly, "was a man of deservedly high
+reputation, in fact one of the pillars of the Royalist party. He had a wife
+who adored him, a large family whom he adored, and they all lived an
+idyllic country life. Well, one day the Count's coat, his hat, his
+pocket-book (which was known to have been full of bank-notes, but which was
+now empty) were found on the parapet of a bridge near his château. It was
+given out--it was believed that a dastardly crime had been committed. And
+then, by a mere accident, it was brought to my notice--for there was
+nothing in the Count's dossier which could have led me to suspect such a
+thing--that a charming governess who had been in the employment of his
+Countess for some four or five years had suddenly left to join her family
+in the New World, and that her travelling companion was strangely like her
+late employer!"
+
+"Yes," said Senator Burton uncomfortably, "I think I do remember something
+of that story now."
+
+"All the world was let into the secret," said the Prefect regretfully, "for
+the family had confided, from the first, in the Press. They thought--what
+did they not think, poor, foolish people? Among other things they actually
+believed that the Count had been murdered for political reasons. But no,
+the explanation was far more simple. That high-minded man, that Christian
+gentleman, this father of charming children whom he apparently adored, had
+gone off under a false name, leaving everything that was dear to him,
+including his large fortune, to throw in his lot with the governess!"
+
+The Prefect came closer to Senator Burton. He even lowered his voice. "I
+had the Countess here, Monsieur le Sénateur, in this room. Oh, what a
+touching, what a moving interview! The poor woman was only anxious to have
+back her husband with no questions asked, with no cruel reminders. And now
+he is back--a broken man. But had he been an artist, Monsieur le Sénateur,
+would the Count have been traced? Of course not! Would he have returned?
+No, indeed! The Prefect of Police can do many things, Monsieur le Sénateur,
+but as I said just now, he cannot force an unwilling husband back to his
+wife, especially if that husband has already crossed the frontier. Come,
+Monsieur le Sénateur, confess that some such explanation of Mr. Dampier's
+disappearance has already occurred to you?"
+
+"Well," said Senator Burton slowly, "I confess that some such thought has
+crossed my mind. But in that case what a tragic fate for the poor
+young wife!"
+
+"Bah! Do you know the saying:--'Widowhood is the Marshal's bâton every
+woman carries in her knapsack!'"
+
+Senator Burton could not help smiling. Then he grew very grave. "But Mrs.
+Dampier, in the case you suppose, would not be a widow, Monsieur le Préfet:
+she would be neither maid, wife, nor widow."
+
+The Prefect looked surprised. "Ah yes! The English divorce laws are very
+conservative. But I suppose in the end such a marriage would be annulled?"
+
+"I suppose so," said Senator Burton indifferently.
+
+"I wish I could help you more," said the Prefect solicitously. He really
+wished he could, for he liked his kindly visitor. "Can you suggest anything
+that we could do to help you?"
+
+"Yes," said the Senator frankly. "My son, Monsieur le Préfet, has not the
+same trust in the hotel-keeper, Poulain, that I feel. Neither, I am bound
+to tell you, has Mrs. Dampier. I think it would be a relief to the poor
+young lady, if the hotel could be searched for some trace of Mr. Dampier's
+sojourn there. You see Mrs. Dampier is convinced--or seems to be--that her
+husband spent a night there."
+
+"Nothing is easier than to have the place searched," said the Prefect
+quickly. "I will arrange for it to be done to-morrow morning at eleven.
+Perhaps you, Monsieur le Sénateur, will inform the hotel people that a
+Perquisition is about to take place."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+As he walked away from the Prefecture of Police, Senator Burton told
+himself that the French were certainly a curiously casual people.
+
+How strange that the Prefect should have asked him to break the news of
+what was to happen at eleven o'clock the next morning to the Poulains! In
+America--and he supposed in England also--the hotel-keeper would have
+received a formal notification of the fact that his house was about to be
+searched, or, in the case that foul play was suspected, no warning at all.
+But here, in Paris, it was thought enough to entrust a stranger with a
+message concerning so serious a matter.
+
+Of everything that had happened in connection with this extraordinary
+Dampier affair, perhaps this having to tell the Poulains that their hotel
+was to be searched was the most disagreeable and painful thing of all to
+their American friend and kindly client.
+
+The Senator was now very sorry, that, in deference to his son's wish, he
+had made such a suggestion.
+
+On his return to the hotel he was surprised to find a woman he had never
+seen before installed in Madame Poulain's kitchen. Still, the presence of
+the stranger brought a sense of reprieve.
+
+He, Senator Angus Burton, the distinguished politician whom most of those
+of his fellow-countrymen whose opinion mattered would have said to be a
+particularly fearless man, dreaded the task of telling Madame Poulain that
+a Perquisition was about to take place in her house.
+
+He lifted his hat. "Is Madame Poulain out?"
+
+"She won't be long, monsieur; she and her husband have had to absent
+themselves for a little hour."
+
+"Are they both out?" asked the Senator. He had never in his long knowledge
+of the Hôtel Saint Ange known such a thing to happen--that both the
+Poulains should be out together.
+
+"Yes, monsieur. They have had to take that nephew of theirs, young Jules,
+off to the station. They are sending him to the country. He's in a sad
+state--he does nothing but cry, poor lad! I suppose he's in love--I've
+known it take young men that way." The woman smiled, smiled as a certain
+type of person usually does smile when giving disagreeable or unpleasant
+news. "It is very awkward for the Poulains to lose the lad just now, for
+they are very busy. I have no doubt--" she tossed her head--"that Jules has
+been working too hard; the Poulains are foolish not to have more help from
+outside. I came in just to oblige Madame Poulain while she and her husband
+accompanied Jules to the station. But I also am busy. I have my own work to
+attend to just as much as anybody else; and my three children are all
+working at the Exhibition."
+
+The Senator left the eager gossip, and began walking round the courtyard.
+He felt quite wretched. Jules, at no time a very intelligent lad, had
+evidently been terrified out of his wits by the questionings and the
+cross-questionings to which he had been subjected.
+
+And then--and then--no doubt Gerald was in a measure also responsible for
+the lad's state! Senator Burton had been very much annoyed when his son had
+told him of what had happened the night before--of how he had accused the
+Poulains' nephew of lying--of knowing something of the Dampier affair....
+
+He was just about to go upstairs when he saw Monsieur and Madame Poulain
+emerging from the porte cochère. They both looked tired, hot, and
+dispirited.
+
+He walked forward to meet them.
+
+"I am very sorry to hear this news about Jules," he began quickly. "I hope
+you are not really anxious about him?"
+
+Madame Poulain stared at him fixedly, reproachfully. "It is all this
+affair," she said with a heavy sigh. "If it had only been the police, our
+own police, we should not have minded, Monsieur le Sénateur--we are honest
+people--we have nothing to fear from the police," she lifted her head
+proudly. "But when it came to that impudent young man--"
+
+For a moment the Senator was at a loss--then he suddenly remembered:--"You
+mean the gentleman attached to the British Consulate?" he said
+uncomfortably. And as she nodded her head, "But surely it was quite
+reasonable that he should come and ask those questions. You must remember
+that both Mr. and Mrs. Dampier are English people. They have a right to the
+protection and help of their Consulate."
+
+"I do not say to the contrary, monsieur. I am only telling you the truth,
+namely that that English lawyer--for lawyer I suppose he was--terrified
+Jules. And had it not been that I and my husband are conscious of--of our
+innocence, Monsieur le Sénateur, he would have terrified us also. Then your
+son attacked Jules too. Surely the matter might have been left to the
+police--our own excellent police."
+
+"I am glad you feel as you do about the police," said the Senator
+earnestly, "for as a matter of fact the Prefect of Police, whom I have just
+been consulting about Mr. Dampier's disappearance, suggests that the Hôtel
+Saint Ange be searched."
+
+"Searched?" exclaimed Monsieur Poulain, staring at the Senator.
+
+"Searched?" shrieked Madame Poulain indignantly.
+
+"Yes," said Senator Burton quietly, and trying to speak as if a police
+Perquisition of a respectable hotel was the most ordinary thing in the
+world. "They are sending their men at eleven to-morrow morning. Let me add
+that they and Mrs. Dampier are most eager to study your convenience in
+every way. They would doubtless choose another time should eleven o'clock
+be inconvenient to you."
+
+Madame Poulain was now speechless with indignation, and yes, with surprise.
+When at last she did speak, her voice trembled with pain and anger.
+
+"To think," she said, turning to her husband, and taking for the moment no
+notice of her American client--"to think that you and I, Poulain, after
+having lived here for twenty-one years and a half, should have our hotel
+searched by the police--as if it were the resort of brigands!" She turned
+to the Senator, and quietly, not without a measure of dignity, went
+on:--"And to think that it is you, Monsieur le Sénateur, who we have always
+thought one of our best patrons, who have brought this indignity upon us!"
+
+"I am very, very sorry for all the trouble you are having about this
+affair," said Senator Burton earnestly. "And Madame Poulain? I want to
+assure you how entirely I have always believed your statement concerning
+this strange business."
+
+"If that is so then why all this--this trouble, Monsieur le Sénateur?"
+Husband and wife spoke simultaneously.
+
+"I wonder," exclaimed the Senator, "that you can ask me such a question! I
+quite admit that the first twenty-four hours I knew nothing of this
+unfortunate young woman whose cause I championed. But now, Madame Poulain,
+I have learnt that all she told me of herself is true. Remember she has
+never faltered in the statement that she came here accompanied by her
+husband. I, as you know," he lowered his voice, "suppose that in so
+thinking she is suffering from a delusion. But you cannot expect my view to
+be shared by those who know her well and who are strangers to you. As I
+told you only this morning, we hope that towards the end of this week Mrs.
+Dampier's lawyer will arrive from England."
+
+"But what will happen then?" cried Madame Poulain, throwing up her hands
+with an excited, passionate gesture. "When will this persecution come to an
+end? We have done everything we could; we have submitted to odious
+interrogatories, first from one and then from the other--and now our hotel
+is to be searched! None of our other clients, and remember the hotel is
+full, Monsieur le Sénateur, have a suspicion of what is going on, but any
+moment the affair may become public, and then--then our hotel might empty
+in a day! Oh, Monsieur le Sénateur"--she clasped her hands together--"If
+you refuse to think of us, think of our child, think of poor little
+Virginie!"
+
+"Come, come, Madame Poulain!"
+
+The Senator turned to the good woman's husband, but Poulain's usually
+placid face bore a look of lowering rage. The mention of his idolised
+daughter had roused his distress as well as anger.
+
+"Now, Poulain, do tell your wife that there is really nothing to worry
+about. The police speak of you both in the very highest terms! As to the
+search that will take place to-morrow, it is the merest formality."
+
+"I hope, monsieur, that you will do us the honour of being present," said
+Madame Poulain quickly. "We have nothing to hide, and we should far prefer
+you to be there."
+
+"If such is your wish I will certainly be present," said Senator Burton
+gravely.
+
+And then, as he walked away to the escalier d'honneur, he told himself that
+on the whole the poor Poulains had taken his disagreeable piece of news
+very well. Gerald was not showing his usual sense over this business: he
+had let his sympathies run away with him. But the Senator loved his son all
+the better for his chivalrous interest in poor Mrs. Dampier. It wasn't
+every young man who would have put everything aside in the way of interest,
+of amusement, and of pleasure in such a city as Paris, for the sake of an
+entire stranger.
+
+As to Gerald's view of the Poulains, that again was natural. He didn't know
+these people with the same kindly knowledge the Senator and Daisy had of
+them. Gerald had been at college, and later working hard in the office of
+America's greatest living architect, at the time the Senator and his
+daughter had spent a whole winter at the Hôtel Saint Ange.
+
+It was natural that the young man should take Mrs. Dampier's word instead
+of the hotel-keepers'. But even so, how extraordinary was the utter
+divergence between the two accounts of what had happened!
+
+For the hundredth time Senator Burton asked himself where the truth lay.
+
+A sad change had come over Nancy Dampier in the three long days. She could
+not sleep, and they had to force her to eat. The interrogatories to which
+she had had to submit, first from one and then from another, had worn her
+out. When going over her story with the Consular official, she had suddenly
+faltered, and putting her hand to her head with a bewildered gesture, "I
+can't remember," she had said, looking round piteously at the Senator, "I
+can't remember!"
+
+And he asked himself now whether those three words did not embody more of
+the truth than the poor girl would admit. Had she ever really remembered
+what had happened on that first evening of her arrival in Paris?
+
+Such were Senator Burton's disconnected and troubled thoughts as, leaving
+the perturbed hotel-keepers, he slowly went to join his children and
+their guest.
+
+To his relief, neither Daisy nor Nancy were in the salon, and his thoughts
+were pleasantly forced into another channel, for on the table lay a cable
+from some people called Hamworth, Mr. Hamworth was one of the Senator's
+oldest friends: also there was a pretty clever daughter who had always
+shown a rather special liking for Gerald....
+
+The Hamworths were arriving in Paris at ten the next morning, and they
+asked the Senator and his children to join them at lunch at Bignon's.
+
+Mingling with a natural pleasure at the thought of seeing old friends, and
+of getting away from all this painful business for a short time, was added
+a secret satisfaction at the thought that he would thus escape being
+present at the search of the Hôtel Saint Ange.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+"I suppose we ought to start in about half an hour," said the Senator
+genially. They were sitting, he and Gerald, at breakfast.
+
+Madame Poulain, with the adaptability of her kind--the adaptability which
+makes the French innkeeper the best in the world, always served a real
+"American breakfast" in the Burtons' salon.
+
+As his son made no answer to his remark, he went on, "I should like to be
+at the station a few minutes before the Hamworths' train is due."
+
+Senator Burton was sorry, very, very sorry indeed, that there was still no
+news of the missing man, on this third morning of Dampier's disappearance.
+But he could not help feeling glad that poor little Mrs. Dampier had stayed
+in bed; thanks to that fact he and his children were having breakfast
+together, in the old, comfortable way.
+
+The Senator felt happier than he had felt for some time. What a comfort it
+would be, even to Gerald and to Daisy, to forget for a moment this strange,
+painful affair, and to spend three or four hours with old friends!
+
+Gerald looked up. "I'm not coming, father. You will have to make my
+apologies to the Hamworths. Of course I should have liked to see them. But
+Mrs. Dampier has asked me to be present at the search. Someone ought, of
+course, to be there to represent her." He jerked the words out with a touch
+of defiance in his voice.
+
+"I'm sorry she did that," said the Senator coldly. "And I think, Gerald,
+you should have consulted me before consenting to do so. You see, our
+position with regard to the Poulains is a delicate one--"
+
+"Delicate?" repeated Gerald quickly. "How do you mean, father?"
+
+"We have known these people a long while. It is fifteen years, Gerald,
+since I first came to this hotel with your dear mother. I have received
+nothing but kindness from Madame Poulain, and I am very, very sorry that
+she now associates us in her mind with this painful business."
+
+"All I can say is, sir, that I do not share your sorrow."
+
+The Senator looked up quickly. This was the first time--yes, the very first
+time that Gerald had ever spoken to him with that touch of sarcasm--some
+would have said impertinence--which sits so ill on the young, at any rate
+in the view of the old. Perhaps Gerald repented of his rude, hasty words,
+for it was in a very different tone that he went on:--
+
+"You see, father, I believe the whole of Mrs. Dampier's story, and you only
+believe a part. If I shared your view I should think very ill of her
+indeed. But you, father (I don't quite know how you do it) manage to like
+and respect her, and to believe the Poulains as well!"
+
+"Yes," said the Senator slowly, "that is so, Gerald. I believe that the
+Poulains are telling the truth, and that this poor young woman thinks she
+is telling the truth--two very different things, my boy, as you will find
+out by the time you know as much of human nature as I now do. When you have
+lived as long as I have lived in the world, you will know that many people
+have an extraordinary power of persuading themselves of that which
+is not--"
+
+"But why--" asked Gerald eagerly,--"why should Mrs. Dampier wish to prove
+that her husband accompanied her here if he did nothing of the kind?"
+
+And then just as he asked the question which the Senator would not have
+found it very easy to answer, Daisy came into the room.
+
+"I have persuaded Mrs. Dampier to stay in bed till the search is over.
+She's just worn out, poor little dear: I shall be glad when this Mr.
+Stephens has arrived--she evidently has the greatest faith in him."
+
+"I shall be glad too," said the Senator slowly: how glad he would be
+neither of his children knew or guessed. "And now, Daisy, I hope you won't
+be long in getting ready to start for the station. I should be sorry indeed
+if the Hamworths' train came in before we reached there."
+
+"Father! Surely you don't want me to leave Nancy this morning of all
+mornings? She ought not to be alone while the search is going on. She
+wanted to be actually present at it, didn't she, Gerald?"
+
+The young man nodded. "Yes, but Daisy and I persuaded her that that was not
+necessary, that I would be there for her. It seems that Mr. Dampier had a
+very large portmanteau with him. She is sure that the Poulains have got it
+hidden away."
+
+"She has told Gerald exactly what it is like," chimed in Daisy.
+
+The Senator looked from one to the other: he felt both helpless and
+indignant. "The Hamworths are among the oldest friends we have in the
+world," he exclaimed. "Surely one of you will come with me? I'm not asking
+you to leave Mrs. Dampier for long, Daisy."
+
+But Daisy shook her head decidedly. "I'd rather not, father--I don't feel
+as if I wanted to see the Hamworths at all just now. I'm sure that when you
+explain everything to them, they will understand."
+
+Utterly discomfited and disappointed, and feeling for the first time really
+angry with poor Nancy Dampier, Senator Burton took his departure for the
+station, alone.
+
+Perquisition?
+
+To the French imagination there is something terrifying in the very word.
+And this justifiable terror is a national tradition. To thousands of honest
+folk a Perquisition was an ever present fear through the old Régime, and
+this fear became acute terror in the Revolution. Then a search warrant
+meant almost certainly subsequent arrest, imprisonment, and death.
+
+Even nowadays every Frenchman is aware that at any moment, and sometimes on
+the most frivolous pretext, his house may be searched, his most private
+papers ransacked, and every member of his household submitted to a sharp,
+informal interrogation, while he stands helpless by, bearing the outrage
+with what grace he may.
+
+Gerald Burton, much as he now disliked and suspected Monsieur and Madame
+Poulain, could not but feel sorry for them when he saw the manner in which
+those hitherto respectable and self-respecting folk were treated by the
+Police Agent who, with two subordinates, had been entrusted with the task
+of searching the Hôtel Saint Ange.
+
+The American was also surprised to see the eagerness with which the
+Poulains had welcomed his presence at their unpleasant ordeal.
+
+"Thank you for coming, Monsieur Gerald; but where is Monsieur le Sénateur?"
+asked Madame Poulain feverishly. "He promised--he absolutely promised us
+that he would be here this morning!"
+
+"My father has had to go out," said Gerald courteously, "but I am here to
+represent both him and Mrs. Dampier."
+
+A heavy frown gathered over the landlady's face. "Ah!" she muttered, "it
+was a dark day for us when we allowed that lady to enter our hotel!"
+
+Gerald, putting a strong restraint on his tongue, remained silent, but a
+moment later, as if in answer to his feeling of exasperation and anger, he
+heard the Police Agent's voice raised in sarcastic wrath. "I must ask you
+to produce the plan before I begin my Perquisition."
+
+"But, monsieur," exclaimed the hotel-keeper piteously, "I cannot give you a
+plan of our hotel! How should we have such a thing? The house is said to be
+three hundred years old. We have even been told it should be classed as an
+Historical Monument!"
+
+"Every hotel-keeper is bound to have a plan of his hotel," said the Agent
+roughly. "And I shall report you for not complying with the law. If a plan
+of the Hôtel Saint Ange did not exist, it was your duty to have one made at
+your own expense."
+
+"Bien, bien, monsieur! It shall be done," said Poulain resignedly.
+
+"To have a Perquisition without a plan is a farce!" said the man, this time
+addressing Gerald Burton. "An absolute farce! In such an old house as this
+there may be many secret hiding-places."
+
+"There are no secret hiding-places in our hotel," screamed Madame Poulain
+angrily. "We have no objection at all to being inspected in the greatest
+detail. But I must warn you, gentlemen, that your job will take some time
+to carry through."
+
+The Police Agent shrugged his shoulders disagreeably. "Come along," he said
+sharply. "Let us begin at once! We would like to start by seeing your own
+rooms, madame."
+
+Gerald Burton began to feel very uncomfortable. Under pleasanter, more
+normal circumstances he would have thoroughly enjoyed a long exhaustive
+inspection of a house which had probably been remodelled, early in the
+eighteenth century, on the site of a mediaeval building.
+
+For the first time since he had begun to study with a view to excelling in
+the profession he had himself chosen, he had forgotten his work--the work
+he so much enjoyed--for three whole days. This Perquisition brought some of
+the old interest back. As an architect he could not but be interested and
+stimulated by this intimate inspection of what had been a magnificent
+specimen of a French town mansion.
+
+When the search party reached the bed-chamber of the hotel-keeper and his
+wife Gerald Burton drew back, but Madame Poulain gave him a smart tap on
+the arm. "Go in, go in!" she said tartly, but he saw there were tears in
+her eyes. "We have nothing to hide, Monsieur Gerald! This is my room of
+memories; the room where our beloved Virginie was born. Little did I think
+it would ever be dishonoured by the presence of the police!"
+
+Gerald, thus objurgated, walked through into a large room, low-ceilinged as
+are all rooms situated on the entresol floor of a Paris house.
+
+Over the bed hung Madame Poulain's wedding wreath of artificial orange
+blossoms in a round glass case. Photographs of the beloved Virginie taken
+at various stages of her life, from infancy to girlhood, were the sole
+other adornment of the room, and formed an odd contrast to the delicately
+carved frames of the old dim mirrors let into grey panelled walls.
+
+"What have we here?" cried the Police Agent tapping one of the panels which
+formed the wall opposite the door and the fireplace.
+
+"It is a way through into our daughter's room," said Poulain sullenly, and
+opening what appeared to be a cupboard door.
+
+The American took an eager step forward.
+
+This must be the place in which, according to Nancy's account, John Dampier
+had stood concealed during that eventful moment when he, Gerald, and his
+sister Daisy, had stood looking into the tiny room.
+
+Yes, two or three people might well stand hidden in this deep recess, for
+the cupboard was almost as large as the smaller of the two apartments of
+which it formed the connecting link.
+
+The Police Agent, following young Burton, stepped down into Virginie's
+room:--his voice softened:--"A very charming room," he said, "this little
+nest of mademoiselle your daughter!"
+
+"We had to cut a window out of the wall," observed Madame Poulain, "When we
+first came here this was a blind closet where the aristocrats, it seems,
+used to powder their hair--silly creatures that they were! As if anyone
+would like to be white before their time!"
+
+"We had better go up this staircase," said the Police Agent, passing out of
+Mademoiselle Poulain's room.
+
+And the six of them all filed up the narrow staircase, glancing into many a
+curious, strange little apartment on the way.
+
+Every inch of space had been utilised in view of the business the
+Exhibition rush had brought the Poulains. Still, even on the upper floors,
+Gerald Burton noticed that there remained intact many beautiful suites of
+apartments now divided and let out as single rooms.
+
+Not a word had been said of the coming Perquisition to those staying in the
+hotel. But Madame Poulain, by some means best known to herself, had managed
+to get rid of them all for the morning. And it was well that she had done
+so, for in more than one case the Police Agent and his men lifted the lid
+of travelling trunks, unhesitatingly pulled out drawers, and flung open the
+doors of hanging cupboards.
+
+Gerald Burton was in turn amused, interested, and disgusted. The glimpses
+which this search revealed into other people's lives seemed dishonourable,
+and instinctively he withdrew his gaze and strove to see as little
+as possible.
+
+Having thoroughly examined all the street side of the Hôtel Saint Ange, the
+three police emissaries started their investigations on the other side of
+the quadrangle, that which gave on the courtyard and on the garden.
+
+When the party came round to the rooms occupied by Senator Burton and his
+family, Madame Poulain came forward, and touched the Police Agent on the
+arm:--"The lady who imagines that we have made away with her husband is
+here," she whispered. "You had better knock at the door, and then walk
+straight in. She will not be pleased--perhaps she will scream--English
+people are so prudish when they are in bed! But never mind what she says or
+does: there is no reason why her room should not be searched as well as
+that of everybody else."
+
+But the woman's vengeful wish was to remain ungratified.
+
+Nancy Dampier had dressed, and with Daisy's help she had even made her bed.
+The Police Agent--Gerald Burton was deeply grateful to him for it--treated
+her with consideration and respect.
+
+"C'est bien! C'est bien! madame," he said, just glancing round the room,
+and making a quick sign to his men that their presence was not
+required there.
+
+At last the weary party, for by that time they were all very weary, reached
+the top floor of the Hôtel Saint Ange.
+
+Here were rough garrets, oppressively hot on a day like this, but each and
+all obviously serving some absent client of the hotel as temporary
+dwelling-place.
+
+Madame Poulain looked quite exhausted. "I think," she said plaintively, "I
+will remain here, monsieur, at the end of the passage. You will find every
+door unlocked. Perhaps we ought to tell you that these rooms are not as a
+rule inhabited, or indeed used by us in any way. That must excuse their
+present condition. But in a season like this--well, dame! we could fill
+every cranny twice over!"
+
+Gerald and the three Frenchmen walked along the corridor, the latter
+flinging open door after door of the curious cell-like little bedrooms
+furnished for the most part with only an iron bed, a couple of chairs, and
+the usual walnut-wood wardrobe.
+
+"What's this?" asked one of the men sharply. "We find a door plastered up
+here, Monsieur Poulain."
+
+But it was Madame Poulain who came languidly forward from the end of the
+passage. "Yes," she said. "If you wish to see that room you will have to
+get a ladder and climb up from the outside. A young Breton priest died here
+last January from scarlet fever, monsieur--" she lowered her voice
+instinctively--"and the sanitary authorities forced us to block up the room
+in this way--most unfortunately for us."
+
+"It is strange," said the man, "that the seal of the sanitary authorities
+is not affixed to the door."
+
+"To tell you the truth," said Madame Poulain uncomfortably, "the seal was
+there, but I removed it. You see, monsieur, it would not have been
+pleasant, even when all danger of infection was gone, to say anything to
+our other clients about so sad an event."
+
+The man nodded his head, and went on.
+
+But the incident made a disagreeable impression on Gerald Burton. And when
+they all finally came down to the courtyard, the Police Agents being by
+this time on far better terms with Monsieur and Madame Poulain than they
+had been at the beginning--on such good terms indeed that they were more
+than willing to attack the refreshments the hotel-keeper had made ready for
+them--he drew the head Agent aside.
+
+"There was one thing," he said, "which rather troubled me--"
+
+The man looked at him attentively. "Yes, monsieur?" He realised that this
+young man, whom he took for an Englishman, had been present on behalf of
+the people at whose request the Perquisition had been ordered. He was
+therefore inclined to treat him with civility.
+
+"I mean that closed room on the top floor," said Gerald hesitatingly. "Is
+there no way of ascertaining whether Madame Poulain's story is
+true--whether, that is, the room was ever condemned by the sanitary
+authorities?"
+
+"Yes," said the Agent, "nothing is easier, monsieur, than to find that
+out."
+
+He took a note-book out of his pocket, tore out a sheet, and wrote a few
+lines on it. Then he called one of his subordinates to him and said a few
+words of which Gerald caught the sense. It was an order to go to the office
+of the sanitary inspector of the district and bring back an answer at once.
+
+In a quarter of an hour the man was back.
+
+"The answer is 'Yes,'" he said a little breathlessly, and he handed his
+chief a large sheet of paper, headed:
+
+    VILLE DE PARIS,
+    Sanitary Inspector's Department.
+
+    In answer to your question, I have to report that we did condemn a room
+    in the Hôtel Saint Ange for cause of infectious disease.
+
+The Police Agent handed it to Gerald Burton. "I felt sure that in that
+matter," he observed, "Madame Poulain was telling the truth. But, of
+course, a Perquisition in a house of this kind is a mere farce, without a
+plan to guide us. Think of the strange winding passages along which we were
+led, of the blind rooms, of the deep cupboards into which we peeped! For
+all we can tell, several apartments may have entirely escaped our
+knowledge."
+
+"Do you make many of these Perquisitions?" asked Gerald curiously.
+
+"No, monsieur. We are very seldom asked to search a whole house. Almost
+always we have some indication as to the special room or rooms which are to
+be investigated. In fact since I became attached to the police, six years
+ago, this is the first time I have ever had to carry out a thorough
+Perquisition," he laughed a little ruefully, "and it makes one dry!"
+
+Gerald Burton took the hint. He put a twenty-franc piece into the man's
+hand. "For you and your men," he said. "Go and get a good lunch: I am sure
+you need it."
+
+The Police Agent thanked him cordially. "One word, monsieur? Perhaps I
+ought to tell you that we of the police are quite sure that the gentleman
+about whom you are anxious left this hotel--if indeed he was ever in it.
+The Poulains bear a very good character--better than that of many
+hotel-keepers of whom I could tell you--better than that of certain
+hotel-keepers who own grand international hotels the other side of the
+river. Of course I had to be rough with them at first--one has to keep up
+one's character, you know. But, monsieur? I was told confidentially that
+this Perquisition would probably lead to nothing, and, as you see, it has
+led to nothing."
+
+Gerald sighed, rather wearily, for he too was tired, he too would be glad
+of his luncheon. Yes, this search had been, as the Police Agent hinted,
+something of a farce after all, and he had led not only himself, but, what
+he regretted far more, poor Nancy Dampier down a blind alley.
+
+He found her waiting, feverishly eager and anxious to hear the result of
+the Perquisition. When the door of the salon opened, she got up and turned
+to him, a strained look on her face.
+
+"Well?" she said. "Well, Mr. Burton?"
+
+He shook his head despondently. "We found nothing, absolutely nothing which
+could connect your husband with any one of the rooms which we searched,
+Mrs. Dampier. If, after leaving you, he did spend the night in the Hôtel
+Saint Ange, the Poulains have obliterated every trace of his presence."
+
+She gave a low cry of pain, of bitter disappointment, and suddenly sinking
+down into a chair, buried her head in her hands--"I can't bear it," she
+wailed. "I only want to know the truth, whatever the truth may be! Anything
+would be better than what I am going through now."
+
+Gerald Burton came and stood by the bowed figure. He became curiously pale
+with that clear, not unhealthy, pallor which is induced by exceptional
+intensity of feeling.
+
+"Mrs. Dampier?" he said, in a very low voice.
+
+She lifted her head and looked at him fixedly.
+
+"Everything that a man can do I will do to find your husband. If I fail to
+find him living I will find him dead."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+But it is far easier to form such a resolution and to make such a promise
+as that which Gerald Burton had made to Nancy Dampier than it is to
+carry it out.
+
+The officials of the Prefecture of Police grew well accustomed to the sight
+of the tall, good-looking young American coming and going in their midst,
+and they all showed a sympathetic interest in his quest. But though the
+police officials were lavish in kindly words, and in permits and passes
+which he found an open sesame to the various places where it was just
+conceivable that John Dampier, after having met with some kind of accident,
+might have been carried, they were apparently quite unable to elucidate the
+growing mystery of the English artist's disappearance.
+
+Early on the Friday morning Gerald Burton telephoned to Nancy Dampier's
+friend and lawyer the fact that they were still entirely without any clue
+to the whereabouts of the missing man. And, true to his word, Mr. Stephens
+arrived in Paris that same evening.
+
+He found his poor young client awaiting him in the company of the new
+friends to whom she owed so deep a debt of gratitude, and this lessened, to
+a certain extent, the awkwardness of their meeting. Even so, the shrewd,
+kindly Englishman felt much shocked and distressed by the change which had
+taken place in Nancy.
+
+Just a month ago he had seen her standing, most radiant as well as
+prettiest of brides, by her proud husband's side. Perhaps because she had
+had so lonely a girlhood there had been no tears at Nancy Tremain's
+wedding, and when he had put her in the carriage which was to be the first
+little stage of her honeymoon, she had whispered, "Mr. Stephens? I feel as
+if I was going home." And the lawyer had known all that the dear, to her
+till then unfamiliar, word--had meant to her.
+
+And now, here she was with strangers, wan, strained and unutterably
+weary-looking; as she stood, her hand clasped in his, looking, with dumb
+anguish, up into his face, Mr. Stephens felt a thrill of intense anger
+against John Dampier. For the present, at any rate, he refused to entertain
+the theory of crime or accident. But he kept his thoughts entirely
+to himself.
+
+The irruption of any human being into a small and, for any reason, closely
+welded together set of people produces much the same effect as does the
+addition of a new product to a chemical mixture. And the arrival of the
+English lawyer affected not only Nancy herself but, in varying ways,
+Senator Burton and his son.
+
+A very few moments spent in the Englishman's company brought to the
+American Senator an immense measure of relief. For one thing, he was
+sincerely glad to know that the poor young stranger's business was about to
+pass into capable and evidently most trustworthy hands: also a rapid
+interchange of words the first time they were left alone together put an
+end, and that for ever, to Senator Burton's uneasy suspicions--suspicions
+which had persisted to the end--as to Mrs. Dampier's account of herself.
+
+Whatever else was obscure in this strange story, it was now clear that
+Nancy had told nothing but the truth concerning her short, simple past
+life. And looking back the Senator found it difficult, as a man so often
+finds it difficult when he becomes wise after an event, to justify, even to
+himself, his former attitude of distrust.
+
+As to Gerald Burton, he felt a little jealousy of the lawyer. Till the
+coming of Mr. Stephens it was to him that Mrs. Dampier had instinctively
+turned in her distress and suspense; now she naturally consulted, and
+deferred to the advice of, the older man and older friend.
+
+But Mr. Stephens was not able to do more than had already been done. He
+listened to what all those about him had to say concerning John Dampier's
+disappearance, and he carefully went over the ground already covered by
+Senator Burton and his son. He, too, saw the British Consul; he, too, was
+granted a short but cordial interview with the Prefect of Police; but not
+even to the Senator did he advance any personal theory as to what could
+account for the extraordinary occurrence.
+
+Members of the legal profession are the same all the world over. If they
+are wise men and good lawyers, they keep their own counsel.
+
+Perhaps because he himself had a son who was Gerald's age, the English
+solicitor took, from the first, a very special interest in the young
+American architect. Soon they were on excellent terms with one
+another--indeed, it was with Gerald Burton that he found he had most to do.
+The young man naturally accompanied him to all those places where the
+presence of a first-rate interpreter was likely to be useful, and Gerald
+Burton also pursued a number of independent enquiries on his own account.
+
+But nothing was of any avail; they were baffled at every turn, and soon
+this search for a vanished man became, to one of the two now so strenuously
+engaged in it, the most sinister and disturbing of the many problems with
+which he had had to deal as a trusted family lawyer.
+
+The screen of memory bears many blurred and hazy impressions on its
+surface, but now and again some special dramatic happening remains fixed
+there in a series of sharply-etched pictures in which every line has its
+retrospective meaning and value.
+
+Such was to be the case with Mr. Stephens and the curious days he spent in
+Paris seeking for John Dampier. He was there a whole week, and every
+succeeding day was packed with anxious, exciting interviews and
+expeditions, each of which it was hoped might yield some sort of clue. But
+what remained indelibly fixed on the English lawyer's screen of memory were
+three or four at the time apparently insignificant conversations which in
+no case could have done much to solve the problem he had set himself
+to solve.
+
+The first of these was a short conversation, in the middle of that busy
+week, with Nancy Dampier.
+
+After the first interview in which she had told him her version of what had
+happened the night of her own and her husband's arrival in Paris, he had
+had very little talk with her, and at no time had he expressed any opinion
+as to what could have happened to John Dampier. But at last he felt it his
+duty to try and probe a little more than he had felt it at first possible
+to do into the question of a possible motive or motives.
+
+"I'm afraid," he began, "that there's very little more to do than has been
+already done. I mean, of course, for the present. And in your place, Nancy,
+I should come back to England, and wait there for any news that may
+reach you."
+
+As she shook her head very decidedly, he went on gravely:--"I know it is
+open to you to remain in Paris; but, my dear, I cannot believe that your
+husband is in Paris. If he were, we must by now, with the help of the
+French police--the most expert in the world, remember--have come across
+traces of him, and that whether he be dead or alive."
+
+But Nancy did not take the meaning he had hoped to convey by that last
+word. On the contrary:--
+
+"Do you think," she asked, and though her lips quivered she spoke very
+quietly, "that Jack is dead, Mr. Stephens? I know that Senator Burton's son
+has come to believe that he is."
+
+"No," said the English lawyer very seriously, "no, Nancy, I do not believe
+that your husband is dead. It is clear that had he been killed or injured
+that first morning in the Paris streets we should know it by now. The
+police assert, and I have no reason to doubt them, that they have made
+every kind of enquiry. No, they, like me, believe that your husband has
+left Paris."
+
+"Left Paris?" repeated Nancy in a bewildered tone.
+
+"Yes, my dear. As to his motive in doing so--I suppose--forgive me for
+asking you such a question--I suppose that you and he were on quite
+comfortable and--well, happy terms together?"
+
+Nancy looked at him amazed--and a look of great pain and indignation
+flashed into her face.
+
+"Why of course we were!" she faltered. "Absolutely--ideally happy! You
+didn't know Jack, Mr. Stephens; you were always prejudiced against him.
+Why, he's never said--I won't say an unkind word, but a cold or indifferent
+word since our first meeting. We never even had what is called"--again her
+lips quivered--'"a lovers' quarrel.'"
+
+"Forgive me," he said earnestly. "I had to ask you. The question as to what
+kind of relations you and he were on when you arrived in Paris has been
+raised by almost every human being whom I have seen in the last few days."
+
+"How horrible! How horrible!" murmured Nancy, hiding her face in her hands.
+
+Then she raised her head, and looked straight at the lawyer:--"Tell anyone
+that asks you that," she exclaimed, "that no woman was ever made happier by
+a man than my Jack made me. We were too happy. He said so that last
+evening--he said," she ended her sentence with a sob, "that his happiness
+made him afraid--"
+
+"Did he?" questioned Mr. Stephens thoughtfully. "That was an odd thing for
+him to say, Nancy."
+
+But she took no notice of the remark. Instead she, in her turn, asked a
+question:--"Do the police think that Jack may have left me of his own
+free will?"
+
+Mr. Stephens looked extremely uncomfortable. "Well, some of them have
+thought that it is a possibility which should be kept in view."
+
+"But you do not think so?" She looked at him searchingly.
+
+The lawyer's courage failed him.
+
+"No, of course not," he said hastily, and poor little Nancy believed him.
+
+"And now," he went on quickly, relieved indeed to escape from a painful and
+difficult subject, "I, myself, must go home on Saturday. Cannot I persuade
+you to come back to England with me? My wife would be delighted if you
+would come to us--and for as long as you like."
+
+She hesitated--"No, Mr. Stephens, you are very, very kind, but I would
+rather remain on in Paris for a while. Miss Burton has asked me to stay
+with them till they leave for America. Once they are gone, if I still have
+no news, I will do what you wish. I will come back to England."
+
+The second episode, if episode it can be called, which was to remain
+vividly present in the memory of the lawyer, took place on the fifth day of
+his stay in Paris.
+
+He and Gerald had exhausted what seemed every possible line of enquiry,
+when the latter put in plain words what, in deference to his father's wish,
+he had hitherto tried to conceal from Mr. Stephens--his suspicions of
+the Poulains.
+
+"I haven't said so to you before," he began abruptly, "but I feel quite
+sure that this Mr. John Dampier is dead."
+
+He spoke the serious words in low, impressive tones, and the words, the
+positive assertion, queerly disturbed Nancy's lawyer, and that though he
+did not in the least share in his companion's view. But still he felt
+disturbed, perhaps unreasonably so considering how very little he still
+knew of the speaker. He was indeed almost as disturbed as he would have
+been had it been his own son who had suddenly put forward a wrong and
+indeed an untenable proposition.
+
+He turned and faced Gerald Burton squarely.
+
+"I cannot agree with you," he spoke with considerable energy, "and I am
+sorry you have got such a notion in your mind. I am quite sure that John
+Dampier is alive. He may be in confinement somewhere, held to
+ransom--things of that sort have happened in Paris before now. But be that
+as it may, it is my firm conviction that we shall have news of him within a
+comparatively short time. Of course I cannot help seeing what you suspect,
+namely, that there has been foul play on the part of the Poulains. But no
+other human being holds this theory but yourself. Your father--you must
+forgive me for saying so--has known these people a great deal longer than
+you have, and he tells me he would stake everything on their substantial
+integrity. And the police speak very highly of them too. Besides, in this
+world one must look for a motive--indeed, one must always look for a
+motive. But in this case no one that we know--I repeat, Mr. Burton, no one
+that we know of--had any motive for injuring Mr. Dampier."
+
+Gerald Burton looked up quickly:--"You mean by that there may be someone
+whom we do not know of who may have had a motive for spiriting him away?"
+
+Mr. Stephens nodded curtly. He had not meant to say even so much as that.
+
+"I want you to tell me," went on the young American earnestly, "exactly
+what sort of a man this John Dampier is--or was?"
+
+The lawyer took off his spectacles; he began rubbing the glasses carefully.
+
+"Well," he said at last, "that isn't a question I find it easy to answer. I
+made a certain number of enquiries about him when he became engaged to Miss
+Tremain, and I am bound to tell you, Mr. Burton, that the answers, as far
+as they went, were quite satisfactory. The gentleman in whose house the two
+met--I mean poor Nancy and Dampier--had, and has, an extremely high
+opinion of him."
+
+"Mrs. Dampier once spoke to me as if she thought you did not like her
+husband?" Gerald Burton looked straight before him as he said the words he
+felt ashamed of uttering. And yet--and yet he did so want to know the truth
+as to John Dampier!
+
+Mr. Stephens looked mildly surprised. "I don't think I ever gave her any
+reason to suppose such a thing," he said hesitatingly. "Mr. Dampier was
+eager, as all men in love are eager, to hasten on the marriage. You see,
+Mr. Burton"--he paused, and Gerald looked up quickly:--
+
+"Yes, Mr. Stephens?"
+
+"Well, to put it plainly, John Dampier was madly in love"--the speaker
+thought his companion winced, and, rather sorry than glad at the success of
+his little ruse, he hurried on:--"that being so he naturally wished to be
+married at once. But an English marriage settlement--especially when the
+lady has the money, which was the case with Miss Tremain--cannot be drawn
+up in a few days. Nancy herself was willing to assent to everything he
+wished; in fact I had to point out to her that it is impossible to get
+engaged on Monday and married on Tuesday! I suppose she thought that
+because I very properly objected to some such scheme of theirs, I disliked
+John Dampier. This was a most unreasonable conclusion, Mr. Burton!"
+
+Gerald Burton felt disappointed. He did not believe that the English lawyer
+was answering truly. He did not stay to reflect that Mr. Stephens was not
+bound to answer indiscreet questions, and that when a young man asks an
+older man whether or no he dislikes someone, and that someone is a client,
+the question is certainly indiscreet.
+
+In a small way the painful mystery was further complicated by the attitude
+of Mère Bideau. Bribes and threats were alike unavailing to make the old
+Breton woman open her mouth. She was full of suspicion; she refused to
+answer the simplest questions put to her by either Mr. Stephens or
+Gerald Burton.
+
+And the lawyer felt a moment of sharp impatience, as business men are so
+often apt to feel in their dealings with women, when, in answer to his
+remark that Mère Bideau would be brought to her knees when she found her
+supplies cut off, Nancy, with tears running down her cheeks, cried out in
+protest:--"Oh, Mr. Stephens, don't say that! I would far rather go on
+paying the old woman for ever than that she should be brought, as you say,
+to her knees. She was such a good servant to Jack: he is--he was--so
+fond of her."
+
+But Mère Bideau's attitude greatly disconcerted and annoyed the Englishman.
+He wondered if the old woman knew more than she would admit; he even
+suspected her of knowing the whereabouts of her master; the more
+impenetrable became the mystery, the less Mr. Stephens believed Dampier
+to be dead.
+
+And then, finally, on the last day of his stay in Paris something happened
+which, to the lawyer's mind, confirmed his view that John Dampier, having
+vanished of his own free will, was living and well--though he hoped not
+happy--away from the great city which had been searched, or so the police
+assured the Englishman, with a thoroughness which had never been surpassed
+if indeed it had ever been equalled.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+With Mr. Stephens' morning coffee there appeared an envelope bearing his
+name and a French stamp, as well of course as the address of the obscure
+little hotel where the Burtons had found him a room.
+
+The lawyer looked down at the envelope with great surprise. The address was
+written in a round, copybook hand, and it was clear his name must have been
+copied out of an English law list.
+
+Who in Paris could be writing to him--who, for the matter of that, knew
+where he was staying, apart from his own family and his London office?
+
+He broke the seal and saw that the sheet of notepaper he took from the
+envelope was headed "Préfecture de Police." Hitherto the police had
+addressed all their communications to the Hôtel Saint Ange.
+
+The letter ran as follows:
+
+    Dear Sir,
+    I am requested by the official who has the Dampier affair in hand to
+    ask you if you will come here this afternoon at three o'clock. As I
+    shall be present and can act as interpreter, it will not be necessary
+    for you to be accompanied as you were before.
+
+    Yours faithfully,
+    Ivan Baroff.
+
+What an extraordinary thing! Up to the present time Mr. Stephens had not
+communicated with a single police official able to speak colloquial
+English; it was that fact which had made him find Gerald Burton so
+invaluable an auxiliary. But this letter might have been written by an
+Englishman, though the signature showed it to be from a foreigner, and from
+a Pole, or possibly a Russian.
+
+Were the police at last on the trail of the missing man? Mr. Stephens'
+well-regulated heart began to beat quicker at the thought. But if so, how
+strange that the Prefect of Police had not communicated with the Hôtel
+Saint Ange last night! Monsieur Beaucourt had promised that the smallest
+scrap of news should be at once transmitted to John Dampier's wife.
+
+Well, there was evidently nothing for it but to wait with what patience he
+could muster till the afternoon; and it was characteristic of Nancy's legal
+friend that he said nothing of his mysterious appointment to either the
+Burtons or to Mrs. Dampier. It was useless to raise hopes which might so
+easily be disappointed.
+
+Three o'clock found Mr. Stephens at the Prefecture of Police.
+
+"Ivan Baroff" turned out to be a polished and agreeable person who at once
+frankly explained that he belonged to the International Police. Indeed
+while shaking hands with his visitor he observed pleasantly, "This is not
+the kind of work with which I have, as a rule, anything to do, but my
+colleagues have asked me to see you, Mr. Stephens, because I have lived in
+England, and am familiar with your difficult language. I wish to entertain
+you on a rather delicate matter. I am sure I may count on your discretion,
+and, may I add, your sympathy?"
+
+The English lawyer looked straight at the suave-spoken detective. What the
+devil did the man mean? "Certainly," said he, "certainly you can count on
+my discretion, Monsieur Baroff, and--and my sympathy. I hope I am not
+unreasonable in hoping that at last the police have obtained some kind of
+due to Mr. Dampier's whereabouts."
+
+"No," said the other indifferently. "That I regret to tell you is not the
+case; they are, however, prosecuting their enquiries with the greatest
+zeal--of hat you may rest assured."
+
+"So I have been told again and again," Mr. Stephens spoke rather
+impatiently. "It seems strange--I think I may say so to you who are, like
+myself, a foreigner--it seems strange, I say, that the French police, who
+are supposed to be so extraordinarily clever, should have failed to find
+even a trace of this missing man. Mr. John Dampier can't have vanished from
+the face of the earth: dead or alive, he must be somewhere!"
+
+"There is of course no proof at all that Mr. Dampier ever arrived in
+Paris," observed the detective significantly.
+
+"No, there is no actual proof that he did so," replied the English
+solicitor frankly. "There I agree! But there is ample proof that he was
+coming to Paris. And, as I suppose you know, the Paris police have
+satisfied themselves that Mr. and Mrs. Dampier stayed both in Marseilles
+and in Lyons."
+
+"Yes, I am aware of that; as also--" he checked himself. "But what I have
+to say to you to-day, my dear sir, is only indirectly concerned with Mr.
+Dampier's disappearance. I am really here to ask if you cannot exert your
+influence with the Burton family, with the American Senator, that is, and
+more particularly with his son, to behave in a reasonable manner."
+
+"I don't quite understand what you mean."
+
+"Well, it is not so very easy to explain! All I can say is that young Mr.
+Burton is making himself very officious, and very disagreeable. He has
+adopted a profession which here, at the Prefecture of Police, we naturally
+detest"--the Russian smiled, but not at all pleasantly--"I mean that of the
+amateur detective! He is determined to find Mr. Dampier--or perhaps it
+would be more true to say"--he shrugged his shoulders--"that he wishes--the
+wish perhaps being, as you so cleverly say in England, father to the
+thought--to be quite convinced of that unfortunate gentleman's obliteration
+from life. He has brought himself to believe--but perhaps he has already
+told you what he thinks--?"
+
+He waited a moment.
+
+But the English lawyer made no sign of having understood what the other
+wished to imply. "They have all talked to me," he said mildly, "Senator
+Burton, Mr. Burton, Miss Burton; every conceivable possibility has been
+discussed by us."
+
+"Indeed? Well, with so many clever people all trying together it would be
+strange if not one hit upon the truth!" The detective spoke with
+good-natured sarcasm.
+
+"Perhaps we have hit upon it," said Mr. Stephens suddenly. "What do you
+think, Monsieur Baroff?"
+
+"I do not think at all!" he said pettishly. "I am far too absorbed in my
+own tiresome job--that of keeping my young Princes and Grand Dukes out of
+scrapes--to trouble about this peculiar affair. But to return to what I was
+saying. You are of course aware that Mr. Gerald Burton is convinced, and
+very foolishly convinced (for there is not an atom of proof, or of anything
+likely to lead to proof), that this Mr. Dampier was murdered, if not by the
+Poulains, then by some friend of theirs in the Hôtel Saint Ange. The
+foolish fellow has as good as said so to more than one of our officials."
+
+"I know such is Mr. Burton's theory," answered Mr. Stephens frankly, "and
+it is one very difficult to shake. In fact I may tell you that I have
+already tried to make him see the folly of the notion, and how it is almost
+certainly far from the truth."
+
+"It is not only far from the truth, it is absolutely untrue," said the
+Russian impressively. "But what I now wish to convey to the young man is
+that should he be so ill-advised as to do what he is thinking of doing he
+will make it very disagreeable for the lady in whom he takes so strangely
+violent an interest--"
+
+"What exactly do you mean, Monsieur Baroff?"
+
+"This Mr. Gerald Burton is thinking of enlisting the help of the American
+newspaper men in Paris. He wishes them to raise the question in their
+journals."
+
+"I do not think he would do that without consulting his father or me," said
+Mr. Stephens quickly. He felt dismayed by the other's manner. Monsieur
+Baroff's tone had become menacing, almost discourteous.
+
+"Should this headstrong young man do anything of that kind," went on the
+detective, "he will put an end to the efforts we are making to find Mrs.
+Dampier's husband. In fact I think I may say that if the mystery is never
+solved, it will be thanks to his headstrong folly and belief in himself."
+
+With this the disagreeable interview came to an end, and though the English
+lawyer never confided the details of this curious conversation to any
+living soul, he did make an opportunity of conveying Ivan Baroff's warning
+to Gerald Burton.
+
+"Before leaving Paris," he said earnestly, "there is one thing I want to
+impress upon you, Mr. Burton. Do not let any newspaper people get hold of
+this story; I can imagine nothing that would more distress poor Mrs.
+Dampier. She would be exposed to very odious happenings if this
+disappearance of her husband were made, in any wide sense of the word,
+public. And then I need not tell you that the Paris Police have a very
+great dislike to press publicity; they are doing their very best--of that I
+am convinced--to probe the mystery."
+
+Gerald Burton hesitated. "I should have thought," he said, "that it would
+at least be worth while to offer a reward in all the Paris papers. I find
+that such rewards are often offered in England, Mr. Stephens."
+
+"Yes--they are. And very, very seldom with any good result," answered the
+lawyer drily. "In fact all the best minds concerned with the question of
+crime have a great dislike to the reward system. Not once in a hundred
+cases is it of any use. In fact it is only valuable when it may induce a
+criminal to turn 'King's evidence.' But in this case I pray you to believe
+me when I say that we are not seeking to discover the track of any
+criminal--" in his own mind he added the words, "unless we take John
+Dampier to be one!"
+
+It was on the morning of Mr. Stephens' departure from Paris, in fact when
+he and Senator Burton, who had gone to see him off, were actually in the
+station, walking up and down the Salle des Pas Perdus, that the lawyer
+uttered the words which finally made up the American Senator's mind
+for him.
+
+"You have been so more than good to Mrs. Dampier," the Englishman said
+earnestly, "that I do not feel it would be fair, Mr. Senator, to leave you
+in ignorance of my personal conviction concerning this painful affair."
+
+The American turned and looked at his companion. "Yes?" he said with
+suppressed eagerness. "Yes, Mr. Stephens, I shall be sincerely grateful for
+your honest opinion."
+
+They had all three--he and Daisy and Gerald--tried to make this Englishman
+say what he really thought, but with a courtesy that was sometimes grave,
+sometimes smiling, Mr. Stephens had eluded their surely legitimate
+curiosity.
+
+Even now the lawyer hesitated, but at last he spoke out what he believed to
+be the truth.
+
+"It is my honest opinion that this disappearance of Mr. Dampier is painful
+rather than mysterious. I believe that poor Nancy Tremain's bridegroom,
+actuated by some motive to which we may never have the clue, made up his
+mind to disappear. When faced with responsibilities for which they have no
+mind men before now have often disappeared, Mr. Senator. Lawyers and
+doctors, if their experience extend over a good many years, come across
+stories even more extraordinary than that which has been concerning
+us now!"
+
+"I take it," said Senator Burton slowly, "that you did not form a good
+impression of this Mr. Dampier?"
+
+The lawyer again hesitated, much as he had hesitated when asked the same
+question by young Burton, but this time he answered quite truthfully.
+
+"Well, no, I did not! True, he seemed entirely indifferent as to how the
+money of his future wife was settled; indeed I could not help feeling that
+he was culpably careless about the whole matter. But even so I had one or
+two very disagreeable interviews with him. You see, Senator Burton, the man
+was madly in love; he had persuaded poor Nancy to be married at once--and
+by at once I mean within a fortnight of their engagement. He seemed
+strangely afraid of losing her, and I keenly resented this feeling on his
+part, for a more loyal little soul doesn't live. She has quite a nice
+fortune, you know, and for my part I should have liked her to marry some
+honest country gentleman in her own country--not an artist living
+in Paris."
+
+"You don't attach much importance to love, Mr. Stephens?"
+
+The lawyer laughed. "Quite enough!" he exclaimed. "Love causes more trouble
+in the world than everything else put together--at any rate it does to
+members of my profession. But to return to poor Nancy. She's a fascinating
+little creature!" He shot a quick glance at Senator Burton, but the latter
+only said cordially:--
+
+"Yes, as fascinating as she's pretty!"
+
+"Well, she had plenty of chances of making a good marriage--but no one
+touched her heart till this big, ugly fellow came along. So of course I had
+to make the best of it!" He waited a moment and then went on. "I ought to
+tell you that at my suggestion Dampier took out a large insurance policy on
+his own life: I didn't think it right that he should bring, as it were,
+nothing into settlement, the more so that Nancy had insisted, on her side,
+that all her money should go to him at her death, and that whether they had
+any children or not! You know what women are?" he shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"If that be so," observed the Senator, "then money can have had nothing to
+do with his disappearance."
+
+"I'm not so sure of that! In fact I've been wondering uneasily during the
+last few days whether, owing to his being an artist, and to his having
+lived so much abroad, John Dampier could have been foolish enough to
+suppose that in the case of his disappearance the insurance money would be
+paid over to Mrs. Dampier. That, of course, would be one important reason
+why he should wish to obliterate himself as completely as he seems to have
+done. I need hardly tell you, Mr. Senator, that the Insurance Office would
+laugh in my face if I were to try and make them pay. Why, years will have
+to elapse before our courts would even consider the probability of death."
+
+"I now understand your view," said the Senator gravely. "But even if it be
+the true solution, it does not explain the inexplicable difference between
+Mrs. Dampier's statement and that of the Poulains--I mean, their statements
+as to what happened the night Mr. and Mrs. Dampier arrived in Paris."
+
+"No," said the lawyer reluctantly. "I admit that to me this is the one
+inexplicable part of the whole story. And I also confess that as to that
+one matter I find it impossible to make up my mind. If I had not known poor
+little Nancy all her life, I should believe, knowing what women are capable
+of doing if urged thereto by pride or pain--I should believe, I say, that
+she had made up this strange story to account for her husband's having left
+her! I could tell you more than one tale of a woman having deceived not
+only her lawyer, but, later, a judge and a jury, as to such a point of
+fact. But from what I know of Mrs. Dampier she would be quite incapable of
+inventing, or perhaps what is quite as much to the purpose, of keeping up
+such a deception."
+
+"From something my daughter said," observed Senator Burton, "I think you
+have been trying to persuade the poor little lady to go back to England?"
+
+"Yes, I tried to make her come back with me to-day. And I am bound to say
+that I succeeded better than I expected to do, for though she refuses to
+come now, she does intend to do so when you yourselves leave Paris, Mr.
+Senator. Fortunately she does not know what sort of a time she will come
+back to: I fear that most of her friends will feel exactly as I feel; they
+will not believe that John Dampier has disappeared save of his own free
+will--and some of them will suppose it their duty to tell her so!"
+
+"It is the view evidently held by the French police," observed the Senator.
+
+The English lawyer shrugged his shoulders. "Of course it is! The fact that
+Dampier had hardly any money on him disposes of any crime theory. A
+wonderful thing the Paris police system, Mr. Burton!"
+
+And the other cordially agreed; nothing could have been more courteous,
+more kind, more intelligent, than the behaviour of the high police
+officials, from the Prefect himself downwards, over the whole business.
+
+Mr. Stephens glanced up at the huge station clock. "I have only five
+minutes left," he said. "But I want to say again how much I appreciate your
+extraordinary kindness and goodness to my poor client. And, Mr. Senator?
+There's just one thing more I want to say to you--" For the first time the
+English lawyer looked awkward and ill at ease.
+
+"Why yes, Mr. Stephens! Pray say anything you like."
+
+"Well, my dear sir, I should like to give you a very sincere piece of
+advice." He hesitated. "If I were you I should go back to America as soon
+as possible. I feel this sad affair has thoroughly spoilt your visit to
+Paris; and speaking as a man who has children himself, I am sure it has not
+been well, either for Miss Daisy or for your son, to have become absorbed,
+as they could hardly help becoming, in this distressing business."
+
+The American felt slightly puzzled by the seriousness with which the other
+delivered this well-meant but wholly superfluous advice. What just exactly
+did the lawyer mean by these solemnly delivered words?
+
+"Why," said the Senator, "you're quite right, Mr. Stephens; it has been an
+ordeal, especially for my girl Daisy: she hasn't had air and exercise
+enough during this last fortnight, let alone change of thought and scene.
+But, as a matter of fact, I am settling about our passages to-day, on my
+way back to the hotel."
+
+"I am very glad to hear that!" exclaimed the other, with far more
+satisfaction and relief in his voice than seemed warranted. "And I presume
+that your son will find lots of work awaiting him on his return home?
+There's nothing like work to chase cobwebs from the brain or--or heart,
+Mr. Senator."
+
+"That's true: not that there are many cobwebs in my boy's brain, Mr.
+Stephens," he smiled broadly at the notion.
+
+"Messieurs! Mesdames! En voiture, s'il vous plait. En voiture--!"
+
+A few minutes later Mr. Stephens waved his hand from his railway carriage,
+and as he did so he wondered if he himself had ever been as obtuse a father
+as his new American friend seemed to be.
+
+As he walked away from the station Senator Burton made up his mind to go
+back on foot, taking the office of the Transatlantic Steamship Company on
+his way. And while he sauntered through the picturesque, lively streets of
+the Paris he loved with so familiar and appreciative an admiration, the
+American found his thoughts dwelling on the events of the last fortnight.
+
+Yes, it had been a strange, an extraordinary experience--one which he and
+his children would never forget, which they would often talk over in days
+to come. Poor little Nancy Dampier! His kind, fatherly heart went out to
+her with a good deal of affection, and yes, of esteem. She had behaved with
+wonderful courage and good sense--and with dignity too, when one remembered
+the extraordinary position in which she had been placed with regard to
+the Poulains.
+
+The Poulains? For the hundredth time he wondered where the truth really
+lay.... But he soon dismissed the difficult problem, for now he had reached
+the offices of the French Transatlantic Company. There the Senator's
+official rank caused him to be treated with very special civility; at once
+he was assured that three passages would be reserved for him on practically
+what boat he liked: he suggested the Lorraine, sailing in ten days time,
+and he had the satisfaction of seeing good cabins booked in his name.
+
+And as he walked away, slightly cheered, as men are apt to be, by the
+pleasant deference paid to his wishes, he told himself that before leaving
+Paris he must arrange for a cable to be at once dispatched should there
+come any news of the mysterious, and at once unknown and familiar, John
+Dampier. Mrs. Dampier would surely find his request a natural one, the more
+so that Daisy and Gerald would be just as eager to hear news as he himself
+would be. He had never known anything take so firm a hold of his son's and
+daughter's imaginations.
+
+On reaching the Hôtel Saint Ange the Senator went over to Madame Poulain's
+kitchen; it was only right to give her the date of their departure as soon
+as possible.
+
+"Well," he said with a touch of regret in his voice, "we shall soon be
+going off now, Madame Poulain. Next Tuesday-week you will have to wish us
+bon voyage!"
+
+And instead of seeing the good woman's face cloud over, as it had always
+hitherto clouded over, when he had sought her out to say that their stay in
+Paris was drawing to a close, he saw a look of intense relief, of
+undisguised joy, flash into her dark expressive eyes, and that though she
+observed civilly, "Quel dommage, Monsieur le Sénateur, that you cannot stay
+a little longer!"
+
+He moved away abruptly, feeling unreasonably mortified.
+
+But Senator Burton was a very just man; he prided himself on his fairness
+of outlook; and now he reminded himself quickly that their stay at the
+Hôtel Saint Ange had not brought unmixed good fortune to the Poulains. It
+was natural that Madame Poulain should long to see the last of them--at any
+rate this time.
+
+He found Gerald alone, seated at a table, intent on a letter he was
+writing. Daisy, it seemed, had persuaded Mrs. Dampier to go out for a walk
+before luncheon.
+
+"Well, my boy, we shall have to make the best of the short time remaining
+to us in Paris. I have secured passages in the Lorraine, and so we now only
+have till Tuesday-week to see everything in Paris which this unhappy affair
+has prevented our seeing during the last fortnight."
+
+And then it was that the something happened, that the irreparable words
+were spoken, which suddenly and most rudely opened the Senator's eyes to a
+truth which the English lawyer had seen almost from the first moment of his
+stay in Paris.
+
+Gerald Burton started up. His face was curiously pale under its healthy
+tan, but the Senator noticed that his son's eyes were extraordinarily
+bright.
+
+"Father?" He leant across the round table. "I am not going home with you.
+In fact I am now writing to Mr. Webb to tell him that he must not expect me
+back at the office for the present: I will cable as soon as I can give
+him a date."
+
+"Not going home?" repeated Senator Burton. "What do you mean, Gerald? What
+is it that should keep you here after we have gone?" but a curious
+sensation of fear and dismay was already clutching at the older
+man's heart.
+
+"I am never going back--not till John Dampier is found. I have promised
+Mrs. Dampier to find him, and that whether he be alive or dead!"
+
+Even then the Senator tried not to understand. Even then he tried to tell
+himself that his son was only actuated by some chivalrous notion of keeping
+his word, in determining on a course which might seriously damage
+his career.
+
+He tried quiet expostulation: "Surely, Gerald, you are not serious in
+making such a decision? Mrs. Dampier, from what I know of her, would be.
+the last to exact from you the fulfilment of so--so unreasonable a promise.
+Why, you and I both know quite well that the Paris police, and also Mr.
+Stephens, are convinced that this man Dampier just left his wife of his own
+free will."
+
+"I know they think that! But it's a lie!" cried Gerald with blazing eyes.
+"An infamous lie! I should like to see Mr. Stephens dare suggest such a
+notion to John Dampier's wife. Not that she is his wife, father, for I'm
+sure the man is dead--and I believe--I hope that she's beginning to
+think so too!"
+
+"But if Dampier is dead, Gerald, then--" the Senator was beginning to lose
+patience, but he was anxious not to lose his temper too, not to make
+himself more unpleasant than he must do. "Surely you see yourself, my boy,
+that if the man is dead, there's nothing more for you to do here,
+in Paris?"
+
+"Father, there's everything! The day I make sure that John Dampier is dead
+will be the happiest day of my life." His voice had sunk low, he muttered
+the last words between his teeth; but alas! the Senator heard them all
+too clearly.
+
+"Gerald!" he said gravely. "Gerald? Am I to understand--"
+
+"Father--don't say anything you might be sorry for afterwards! Yes, you
+have guessed truly. I love Nancy! If the man is dead--and I trust to God he
+is--I hope to marry her some day. If--if you and Mr. Stephens are right--if
+he is still alive--well then--" he waited a moment, and that moment was the
+longest the Senator had ever known--"then, father, I promise you I will
+come home. But in that case I shall never, never marry anybody else. Daisy
+knows," went on the young man, unconsciously dealing his father another
+bitter blow. "Daisy knows--she guessed, and--she understands."
+
+"And does she approve?" asked the Senator sternly.
+
+"I don't know--I don't care!" cried Gerald fiercely. "I am not looking for
+anyone's approval. And, father?" His voice altered, it became what the
+other had never heard his son's voice be, suppliant:--"I have trusted you
+with my secret--but let it be from now as if I had not spoken. I beg of you
+not to discuss it with Daisy--I need not ask you not to speak of it to
+anybody else."
+
+The Senator nodded. He was too agitated, too horror-stricken to speak, and
+his agitation was not lessened by his son's final words.
+
+
+
+EPILOGUE
+
+I
+
+It is two years to a day since John Dampier disappeared, and it is only
+owing to one man's inflexible determination that the search for him has not
+been abandoned long ago.
+
+And now we meet Senator Burton far in body, if not in mind, from the place
+where we last met him.
+
+He is standing by an open window, gazing down on one of the fairest sights
+civilised nature has to offer--that of an old English garden filled with
+fragrant flowers which form scented boundaries of soft brilliant colour to
+wide lawns shaded by great cedar trees.
+
+But as he stands there in the early morning sunlight, for it is only six
+o'clock, he does not look in harmony with the tranquil beauty of the scene
+before him. There is a stern, troubled expression on his face, for he has
+just espied two figures walking side by side across the dewy grass; the one
+is his son Gerald, the other Nancy Dampier, still in the delicate and
+dangerous position of a woman who is neither wife, maid, nor widow.
+
+The Senator's whole expression has changed in the two years. He used to
+look a happy, contented man; now, especially when he is alone and his face
+is in repose, he has the disturbed, bewildered expression men's faces bear
+when Providence or Fate--call it which you will--has treated them in a way
+they feel to be unbearably unfair, as well as unexpected.
+
+And yet the majority of mankind would consider this American to be
+supremely blessed. The two children he loves so dearly are as fondly
+attached to him as ever they were; and there has also befallen him a piece
+of quite unexpected good fortune. A distant relation, from whom he had no
+expectations, has left him a fortune "as a token of admiration for his high
+integrity."
+
+Senator Burton is now a very rich man, and because Daisy fancied it would
+please her brother they have taken for the summer this historic English
+manor house, famed all the world over to those interested in mediaeval
+architecture, as Barwell Moat.
+
+Here he, Daisy, and Nancy Dampier have already been settled for a week;
+Gerald only joined them yesterday from Paris.
+
+Early though it is, the Senator has already been up and dressed over an
+hour; and he has spent the time unprofitably, in glancing over his diary of
+two years ago, in conning, that is, the record of that strange, exciting
+fortnight which so changed his own and his children's lives.
+
+He has read over with pain and distaste the brief words in which he
+chronicled that first chance meeting with Nancy Dampier. What excitement,
+what adventures, and yes, what bitter sorrow had that chance meeting under
+the porte cochère of the Hôtel Saint Ange brought in its train! If only he
+and Daisy had started out an hour earlier on that June morning just two
+years ago how much they would have been spared.
+
+As for the fortune left to him, Senator Burton is now inclined to think
+that it has brought him less than no good. It has only provided Gerald with
+an excuse, which to an American father is no excuse, for neglecting his
+profession. Further, it has enabled the young man to spend money in a
+prodigal fashion over what even he now acknowledges to have been a hopeless
+quest, though even at the present moment detectives in every capital in
+Europe are watching for a clue which may afford some notion as to the
+whereabouts of John Dampier.
+
+John Dampier? Grim, relentless spectre who pursues them unceasingly, and
+from whose menacing, shadowy presence they are never free--from whom, so
+the Senator has now despairingly come to believe, they never, never will
+be free....
+
+He had stopped his diary abruptly on the evening of that now far-off day
+when his eyes had been so rudely opened to his son's state of mind and
+heart. But though he has no written record to guide him the Senator finds
+it only too easy, on this beautiful June morning, to go back, in dreary
+retrospective, over these two long years.
+
+Gerald had not found it possible to keep his rash vow; there had come a day
+when he had had to go back to America--indeed, he has been home three
+times. But those brief visits of his son to his own country brought the
+father no comfort, for each time Gerald left behind him in Europe not only
+his heart, but everything else that matters to a man--his interests, his
+longings, his hopes.
+
+Small wonder that in time Senator Burton and Daisy had also fallen into the
+way of spending nearly the whole of the Senator's spare time in Europe, and
+with Nancy Dampier.
+
+Nancy? The mind of the watcher by the window turns to her too, as he
+visions the slender, graceful figure now pacing slowly by his son's side.
+
+Is it unreasonable that, gradually withdrawing herself from her old
+friends, those friends who did not believe that Dampier had left her save
+of his own free will, Nancy should cling closer and closer to her new
+friends? No, not at all unreasonable, but, from the Senator's point of
+view, very unfortunate. Daisy and Nancy are now like sisters, and to the
+Senator himself she shows the loving deference, the affection of a
+daughter, but with regard to the all-important point of her relations to
+Gerald, none of them know the truth--indeed, it may be doubted if she knows
+it herself.
+
+But the situation gets more difficult, more strained every month, every
+week, almost every day. Senator Burton feels that the time has come when
+something must be done to end it--one way or the other--and the day before
+yesterday he sought out Mr. Stephens, now one of his closest friends and
+advisers, in order that they might confer together on the matter. As he
+stands there looking down at the two figures walking across the dewy grass,
+he remembers with a sense of boding fear the conversation with
+Nancy's lawyer.
+
+"There's nothing to be done, my poor friend, nothing at all! Our English
+marriage laws are perfectly clear, and though this is a very, very hard
+case, I for my part have no wish to see them altered."
+
+And the Senator had answered with heat, "I cannot follow you there at all!
+The law which ties a living woman to a man who may be dead, nay, probably
+is dead, is a monstrous law."
+
+And Mr. Stephens had answered very quietly, "What if John Dampier be
+alive?"
+
+"And is this all I can tell my poor son?"
+
+And then it was that Mr. Stephens, looking at him doubtfully, had answered,
+"Well no, for there is a way out. It is not a good way--I doubt if it is a
+right way--but still it is a way. It is open to poor little Nancy to go to
+America, to become naturalized there, and then to divorce her husband, in
+one of your States, for desertion. The divorce so obtained would be no
+divorce in England, but many Englishmen and Englishwomen have taken that
+course as a last resort--" He had waited a moment, and then added, "I
+doubt, however, very, very much if Nancy would consent to do such a thing,
+even if she reciprocates--which is by no means sure--your
+son's--er--feeling for her."
+
+"Feeling?" Senator Burton's voice had broken, and then he had cried out
+fiercely, "Why use such an ambiguous word, when we both know that Gerald is
+killing himself for love of her--and giving up the finest career ever
+opened to a man? If Mrs. Dampier does not reciprocate what you choose to
+call his 'feeling' for bet, then she is the coldest and most ungrateful
+of women!"
+
+"I don't think she is either the one or the other," had observed Mr.
+Stephens mildly; and he had added under his breath, "It would be the better
+for her if she were--Believe me the only way to force her to consider the
+expedient I have suggested--" he had hesitated as if rather ashamed of what
+he was about to say, "would be for Gerald to tell her the search for Mr.
+Dampier must now end--and that the time has come when he must go back to
+America--and work."
+
+Small wonder that Senator Burton found it hard to sleep last night, small
+wonder he has risen so early. He knows that his son is going to speak to
+Nancy, to tell her what Mr. Stephens has suggested she should do, and he
+suspects that now, at this very moment, the decisive conversation may be
+taking place.
+
+II
+
+Though unconscious that anxious, yearning eyes are following them, both
+Nancy Dampier and Gerald Burton feel an instinctive desire to get away from
+the house, and as far as may be from possible eavesdroppers. They walk
+across the stretch of lawn which separates the moat from the gardens in a
+constrained silence, she following rather than guiding her companion.
+
+But as if this charming old-world plesaunce were quite familiar to him,
+Gerald goes straight on, down a grass path ending in what appears to be a
+high impenetrable wall of yew, and Nancy, surprised, then sees that a
+narrow, shaft-like way leads straight through the green leafy depths.
+
+"Why, Gerald?" she says a little nervously--they have long ago abandoned
+any more formal mode of address, though between them there stands ever the
+spectre of poor John Dampier, as present to one of the two, and he the man,
+as if the menacing shadow were in very truth a tangible presence. "Why,
+Gerald, where does this lead? Have you ever been here before?"
+
+And for the first time since they met the night before, the young man
+smiles. "I thought I'd like to see an English sunrise, Nancy, so I've been
+up a long time. I found a rose garden through here, and I thought it would
+be a quiet place for our talk."
+
+It is strangely dark and still under the dense evergreen arch of the
+slanting way carved through the yew hedge; Nancy can only grope her way
+along. Turning round, Gerald holds out his strong hands, and taking hers in
+what seems so cool, so impersonal a grasp, he draws her after him. And
+Nancy flushes in the half darkness; it is the first time that she and
+Gerald Burton have ever been alone together as they are alone now, and that
+though they have met so very, very often in the last two years.
+
+Nancy is at once glad and sorry when he suddenly loosens his grasp of her
+hands. The shadowed way terminates in a narrow wrought-iron gate; and
+beyond the gate is the rose garden of Barwell Moat, a tangle of exquisite
+colouring, jealously guarded and hidden away from those to whom the more
+familiar beauties of the place are free.
+
+It is one of the oldest of English roseries, planned by some Elizabethan
+dame who loved solitude rather than the sun. And if the roses bloom a
+little less freely in this quiet, still enclosure than they would do in
+greater light and wilder air, this gives the rosery, in these hot June
+days, a touch of austere and more fragile beauty than that to be seen
+beyond its enlacing yews.
+
+A hundred years after the Elizabethan lady had designed the rosery of
+Barwell Moat a Jacobean dame had added to her rose garden a fountain--one
+brought maybe from Italy or France, for the fat stone Cupids now shaking
+slender jets of water from their rose-leaved cornucopias are full of a
+roguish, Southern grace.
+
+When they have passed through into this fragrant, enchanted looking
+retreat, Nancy cries out in real delight: "What an exquisite and lovely
+place! How strange that Daisy and I never found it!"
+
+And then, as Gerald remains silent, she looks, for the first time this
+morning, straight up into his face, and her heart is filled with a sudden
+overwhelming sensation of suspense--and yes, fear, for there is the
+strangest expression on the young man's countenance, indeed it is full of
+deep, of violent emotion--emotion his companion finds contagious.
+
+She tells herself that at last he has brought news. That if he did not tell
+her so last night it was because he wished her to have one more night of
+peace--of late poor Nancy's nights have become very peaceful.
+
+John Dampier? There was a time--it now seems long, long ago--when Nancy
+would have given not only her life but her very soul to have known that her
+husband was safe, that he would come back to her. But now? Alas! Alas! Now
+she realises with an agonised feeling of horror, of self-loathing, that she
+no longer wishes to hear Gerald Burton say that he has kept his word--that
+he has found Dampier.
+
+She prays God that nothing of what she is feeling shows in her face; and
+Gerald is far too moved, far too doubtful as to what he is to say to her,
+and as to the answer she will make to him, to see that she looks in any way
+different from what she always does look in his eyes--the most beautiful as
+well as the most loved and worshipped of human creatures.
+
+"Tell me!" she gasps. "Tell me, Gerald? What is it you want to say to me?
+Don't keep me in suspense--" and then, as he is still dumb, she adds with a
+cry, "Have you come to tell me that at last you have found Jack?"
+
+And he pulls himself together with a mighty effort. Nancy's words have
+rudely dispelled the hopes with which his heart has been filled ever since
+his father came to his room last night and told him what Mr. Stephens had
+suggested as a possible way out of the present, intolerable situation.
+
+"No," he says sombrely, "no, Nancy, I have brought you no good news, and I
+am beginning to fear I never shall."
+
+And he does not see even now that the long quivering sigh which escapes
+from her pale lips is a sigh of unutterable--if of pained and
+shamed--relief.
+
+But what is this he is now saying, in a voice which is so unsteady, so
+oddly unlike his own?
+
+"I think--God forgive me for thinking so if I am wrong--that I have always
+been right, Nancy, that your husband is dead--that he was killed two years
+ago, the night he disappeared--"
+
+She bends her head. Yes, she too believes that, though there was a time
+when she fought, with desperate strength, against the belief.
+
+He goes on breathlessly, hoarsely, aware that he is making what Mr.
+Stephens would call a bad job of it all: "I am now beginning to doubt
+whether we shall ever discover the truth as to what did happen. His body
+may still lie concealed somewhere in the Hôtel Saint Ange, and if that is
+so, there's but small chance indeed that we shall ever, ever learn
+the truth."
+
+And again she bends her head.
+
+"I fear the time is come, Nancy, when the search must be given up."
+
+He utters the fateful words very quietly, very gently, but even so she
+feels a pang of startled fear. Does that mean--yes, of course it must mean,
+that Gerald is going away, back to America?
+
+A feeling of dreadful desolation fills her heart. "Yes," she says in a low
+tone, "I think you are right. I think the search should be given up."
+
+She would like to utter words of thanks, the conventional words of
+gratitude she has uttered innumerable times in the last two years--but now
+they stick in her throat.
+
+Tears smart into her eyes, stifled sobs burst from her lips.
+
+And Gerald again misunderstands--misunderstands her tears, the sobs which
+tear and shake her slender body. But he is only too familiar with the
+feeling which now grips him--the feeling that he must rush forward and take
+her in his arms. It has never gripped him quite as strongly as it does now;
+and so he steps abruptly back, and puts more of the stone rim of the
+fountain between himself and that forlorn little figure.
+
+"Nancy?" he cries. "I was a brute to say that. Of course I will go on! Of
+course we won't give up hope! It's natural that I should sometimes become
+disheartened."
+
+He is telling himself resolutely that never, never will he propose to her
+the plan his father revealed to him last night. How little either his
+father or Mr. Stephens had understood the relation between himself and
+Nancy if they supposed that he, of all men, could make to her such a
+suggestion.
+
+And then he suddenly sees in Nancy's sensitive face, in her large blue eyes
+that unconscious beckoning, calling look every lover longs to see in the
+face of his beloved....
+
+They each instinctively move towards the other, and in a flash Nancy is in
+his arms and he is holding her strained to his heart, while his lips seek,
+find, cling to her sweet, tremulous mouth.
+
+But the moment of rapture, of almost unendurable bliss is short indeed, for
+suddenly he feels her shrinking from him, and though for yet another moment
+he holds her against her will, the struggle soon ends, and he releases her,
+feeling what he has never yet felt when with her, that is, bewildered,
+hurt, and yes, angry.
+
+And then, when she sees that new alien glance of anger in eyes which have
+never looked at her but kindly, Nancy feels a dreadful pang of pain, as
+well as of shamed distress. She creeps up nearer to him, and puts her hand
+imploringly on his arm--that arm which a moment ago held her so closely to
+him, but which now hangs, apparently nerveless, by his side.
+
+"Gerald!" she whispers imploringly. "Don't be angry with me," and her voice
+drops still lower as she adds piteously, "You see, I knew we were doing
+wrong. I--I felt wicked."
+
+And then, as he still makes no answer, she grows more keenly distressed.
+"Gerald?" she says again. "You may kiss me if you like." And as he only
+looks down at her, taking no advantage of the reluctant permission, she
+falters out the ill-chosen words, "Don't you know how grateful I am
+to you?"
+
+And then, stung past endurance, he turns on her savagely:--"Does that mean
+that I have bought the right to kiss you?"
+
+But as, at this, she bursts into bitter tears, he again takes her in his
+arms, and he does kiss her, violently, passionately, hungrily. He is only a
+man after all.
+
+But alas! These other kisses leave behind them a bitter taste. They lack
+the wild, exquisite flavour of the first.
+
+At last he tells her, haltingly, slowly, of Mr. Stephens' suggestion, but
+carefully as he chooses his words he feels her shrinking, wincing at the
+images they conjure up; and he tells himself with impatient self-reproach
+that he has been too quick, too abrupt--that he ought to have allowed the
+notion to sink into her mind slowly, that he should have made Daisy, or
+even his father, be his ambassador.
+
+"I couldn't do that!" she whispers at last, and he sees that she has turned
+very white. "I don't think I could ever do that! Think how awful it would
+be if--if after I had done such a thing I found that poor Jack was not
+dead? Some time ago--I have never told you of this--some friend, meaning to
+be kind, sent me a cutting from a paper telling of a foreigner who had been
+taken up for mad in Italy, and confined in a lunatic asylum for years and
+years! You don't know how that story haunted me. It haunted me for weeks.
+You wouldn't like me to do anything I thought wrong, Gerald?"
+
+"No," he says moodily. "No, Nancy--I will never ask you to do anything you
+think wrong." He adds with an effort, "I told my father last night that I
+doubted if you would ever consent to such a thing."
+
+And then she asks an imprudent question:--"And what did he say then?" she
+says in a troubled, unhappy voice.
+
+"D'you really want to know what he said?"
+
+She creeps a little nearer to him, she even takes his hand. "Yes, Gerald.
+Tell me."
+
+"He said that if you wouldn't consent to do some such thing, why then I
+should be doing wrong to stay in Europe. He said--I little knew how true it
+was--that soon you would learn that I loved you, and that then--that then
+the situation would become intolerable."
+
+"Intolerable?" she repeats in a low, strained tone. "Oh no, not
+intolerable, Gerald! Surely you don't feel that?"
+
+And this time it is Gerald who winces, who draws back; but suddenly his
+heart fills up, brims over with a great, an unselfish tenderness--for
+Nancy, gazing up at him, looks disappointed as a child, not a woman, looks,
+when disappointed of a caress; and so he puts his arms round her and kisses
+her very gently, very softly, in what he tells himself is a kind, brotherly
+fashion. "You know I'll do just whatever you wish," he murmurs.
+
+And contentedly she nestles against him. "Oh, Gerald," she whispers back,
+"how good you are to me! Can't we always be reasonable--like this?"
+
+And he smiles, a little wryly. "Why, yes," he says, "of course we can! And
+now, Nancy, it's surely breakfast time. Let's go back to the house."
+
+And Nancy, perhaps a little surprised, a little taken aback at his sudden,
+cheerful acceptance of her point of view, follows him through the dark
+passage cut in the yew hedge. She supposes--perhaps she even hopes--that
+before they emerge into the sun light he will turn and again kiss her in
+the reasonable, tender way he did just now.
+
+But Gerald does not even turn round and grasp her two hands as he did
+before. He leaves her to grope her way behind him as best she can, and as
+they walk across the lawn he talks to her in a more cheerful, indifferent
+way than he has ever done before. Once they come close up to the house,
+however, he falls into a deep silence.
+
+III
+
+It is by the merest chance that they stay in that afternoon, for it has
+been a long, a wretched day for them all.
+
+Senator Burton and his daughter are consumed with anxiety, with a desire to
+know what has taken place, but all they can see is that Gerald and Nancy
+both look restless, miserable, and ill at ease with one another. Daisy
+further suspects that Nancy is avoiding Gerald, and the suspicion makes her
+feel anxious and uncomfortable.
+
+As for the Senator, he begins to feel that he hates this beautiful old
+house and its lovely gardens; he has never seen Gerald look as unhappy
+anywhere as he looks here.
+
+At last he seeks his son out, and, in a sense, forces his confidence.
+"Well, my boy?"
+
+"Well, father, she doesn't feel she can do it! She thinks that Dampier may
+be alive after all. If you don't mind I'd rather not talk about her
+just now."
+
+And then the Senator tells himself, for the hundredth time in the last two
+years, that they have now come to the breaking point--that if Nancy will
+not take the only reasonable course open to her, then that Gerald must be
+nerved to make, as men have so often had to make, the great renouncement.
+To go on as he is now doing is not only wrong as regards himself, it is
+wrong as regards his sister Daisy.
+
+There is a man in America who loves Daisy--a man too of whom the Senator
+approves as much as he can of anyone who is anxious to take his daughter
+from him. And Daisy, were her heart only at leisure, might respond; but
+alas! her heart is not at leisure, it is wholly absorbed in the affairs of
+her brother and of her friend.
+
+At last the high ritual of English afternoon tea brings them out all
+together on the lawn in front of the house.
+
+Deferentially consulted by the solemn-faced, suave-mannered butler, who
+seems as much part of Barwell Moat as do the gabled dormer windows, Daisy
+Burton decides that tea is to be set out wherever it generally is set out
+by the owners of the house. Weightily she is informed that "her ladyship"
+has tea served sometimes in that part of the garden which is called the
+rosery, sometimes on the front lawn, and the butler adds the cryptic
+information, "according as to whether her ladyship desires to see
+visitors or not."
+
+Daisy does not quite see what difference the fact of tea being served in
+one place or another can make to apocryphal visitors, so, with what
+cheerfulness she can muster, she asks the others which they would prefer.
+And at once, a little to her surprise, Nancy and Gerald answer
+simultaneously, "Oh, let us have tea on the lawn, not--not in the rosery!"
+
+And it is there, in front of the house, that within a very few minutes they
+are all gathered together, and for the first time that day Senator Burton's
+heart lightens a little.
+
+He is amused at the sight of those three men--the butler and his two
+footmen satellites--gravely making their elaborate preparations. Chairs are
+brought out, piles of cushions are flung about in bounteous profusion, even
+two hammocks are slung up--all in an incredibly short space of time: and
+the American tenant of Barwell Moat tells himself that the scene before him
+might be taken from one of the stories of his favourite British novelist,
+good old Anthony Trollope.
+
+Ah me! How happy they all might be this afternoon were it not for the ever
+present unspoken hopes and fears which fill their hearts!
+
+Daisy sits down behind the tea-table; and the cloud lifts a little from
+Gerald's stern, set face; the three young people even laugh and joke a
+little together.
+
+The Senator glances at Nancy Dampier; she is looking very lovely this
+afternoon, but her face is flushed, her manner is restless, agitated, she
+looks what he has never seen her look till to-day, thoroughly ill at ease,
+and yet, yes, certainly less listless, more alive than she looked
+yesterday--before Gerald's arrival.
+
+What strange creatures women are! The Senator does not exactly disapprove
+of Nancy's decision, but he regrets it bitterly. If only she would throw in
+her lot with Gerald--come to America, her mind made up never to return to
+Europe again, why then even now they might all be happy.
+
+But her face, soft though it be in repose, is not that of a weak woman; it
+is that of one who, thinking she knows what should be her duty, will be
+faithful to it; and it is also the face of a woman reserved in the
+expression of her feelings. Senator Burton cannot make up his mind whether
+Nancy realises Gerald's measureless, generous devotion. Is she even aware
+of all that he has sacrificed for her? Daisy says yes--Daisy declares that
+Nancy "cares" for Gerald--but then Daisy herself is open-hearted and
+generous like her brother.
+
+And while these painful thoughts, these half-formed questions and answers,
+weave in and out through Senator Burton's brain, there suddenly falls a
+loud grinding sound on his ears, and a motor-car sweeps into view.
+
+Now, at last, Daisy Burton understands the butler's cryptic remark! Here,
+in front of the house, escape from visitors is, of course, impossible. She
+feels a pang of annoyance at her own stupidity for not having understood,
+but there is no help for it--and very soon three people, a middle-aged lady
+and two gentlemen, are advancing over the green sward.
+
+The Senator and his daughter rise, and walk forward to meet them. Gerald
+and Nancy remain behind. Indeed the young man hardly sees the strangers; he
+is only conscious of a deep feeling of relief that the solicitous eyes of
+his father and sister are withdrawn from him and Nancy.
+
+Since this morning he has been in a strange state of alternating rapture
+and despair. He feels as if he and Nancy, having just found one another,
+are now doomed to part. Ever since he held her in his arms he has ached
+with loneliness and with thwarted longing; during the whole of this long
+day Nancy has eluded him; not for a single moment have they been alone
+together. And now all his good resolutions--the resolutions which stood him
+in such good stead in that dark, leafy tunnel--have vanished. He now faces
+the fact that they cannot hope, when once more alone and heart to heart, to
+be what Nancy calls "reasonable."...
+
+Suddenly he comes back to the drab realities of every-day life. His father
+is introducing him to the visitors--first to the lady: "Mrs. Arbuthnot--my
+son, Gerald Burton. Mrs. Dampier--Mrs. Arbuthnot." And then to the two men,
+Mr. Arbuthnot and a Mr. Dallas.
+
+There is a quick interchange of talk. The newcomers are explaining who and
+what they are. Mr. Robert Arbuthnot is a retired Anglo-Indian official, and
+he and his wife have now lived for two years in the dower house which forms
+part of the Barwell Moat estate.
+
+"I should not have called quite so soon had it not been that our friend,
+Mr. Dallas, is only staying with us for two or three days, and he is most
+anxious to meet you, Mr. Senator. Mr. Dallas is one of the Officers of
+Health for the Port of London. He read some years ago"--she turns smilingly
+to the gentleman in question--"a very interesting pamphlet with which you
+seem to have been in some way concerned, about the Port of New York."
+
+The Senator is flattered to find how well Mr. Dallas remembers that old
+report of which he was one of the signatories. For a moment he forgets his
+troubles; and the younger people--Mrs. Arbuthnot also--remain silent while
+these three men, who have each had a considerable experience of great
+affairs, begin talking of the problems which face those who have vast
+masses of human beings to consider and legislate for.
+
+Mr. Dallas talks the most; he is one of those cheerful, eager Englishmen
+who like the sound of their own voices: he is also one of those fortunate
+people who take an intense interest in the work they are set to do. In Mr.
+Dallas's ears there is no pleasanter sounding word than the word
+"sanitation."
+
+"Ah," he says, turning smilingly to the Senator, "how I envy my New York
+colleagues! They have plenary powers. They are real autocrats!"
+
+"They would be but for our press," answers the Senator. "I wonder if you
+heard anything of the scrape Dr. Cranebrook got into last year?"
+
+"Of course I did! I heard all about it, and I felt very sorry for him. But
+our London press is getting almost as bad! Government by newspaper--" he
+shakes his head expressively. "And my friend Arbuthnot tells me that it's
+becoming really serious in India; there the native press is getting more
+and more power. Ah well! They do those things better in France."
+
+And then Mrs. Arbuthnot's voice is heard at last. "My husband and Mr.
+Dallas have only just come back from Paris, Miss Burton. Mr. Dallas went
+over on business, and my husband accompanied him. They had a most
+interesting time: they spent a whole day at the Prefecture of Police with
+the Prefect himself--"
+
+She stops speaking, and wonders a little why a sudden silence has fallen
+over the whole group of these pleasant Americans--for she takes Nancy to be
+an American too.
+
+But the sudden silence--so deep, so absolute that it reminds Mrs. Arbuthnot
+of the old saying that when such a stillness falls on any company someone
+must be walking over their graves--is suddenly broken.
+
+Mr. Dallas jumps to his feet. He is one of those men who never like sitting
+still very long. "May I have another lump of sugar, Miss Burton? We were
+speaking of Paris,--talk of muzzling the press, they know how to muzzle
+their press in grim earnest in Paris! Talk of suppressing the truth, they
+don't even begin to tell the truth there. The Tsar of Russia as an autocrat
+isn't in it with the Paris Prefect of Police!"
+
+And two of his listeners say drearily to themselves that Mr. Dallas is a
+very ignorant man after all. He is evidently one of the many foolish people
+who believe the French police omnipotent.
+
+But the Englishman goes happily on, quite unconscious that he is treading
+on what has become forbidden ground in the Burton family circle. "The
+present man's name is Beaucourt, a very pleasant fellow! He told me some
+astounding stories. I wonder if you'd like to hear the one which struck
+me most?"
+
+He looks round, pleased at their attention, at the silence which has again
+fallen on them all, and which he naturally takes for consent.
+
+Eagerly he begins: "It was two years ago, at the height of their Exhibition
+season, and of course Paris was crammed--every house full, from cellar to
+attic! Monsieur Beaucourt tells me that there were more than five hundred
+thousand strangers in the city for whose safety, and incidentally for whose
+health, he was responsible!"
+
+He waits a moment, that thought naturally impresses him more than it does
+his audience.
+
+"Well, into that gay maelstrom there suddenly arrived a couple of young
+foreigners. They were well-to-do, and what impressed the little story
+particularly on Monsieur Beaucourt's mind was the fact that they were on
+their honeymoon--you know how sentimental the French are!"
+
+Mr. Dallas looks around. They are all gazing at him with upturned
+faces--never had he a more polite, a more attentive circle of listeners.
+There is, however, one exception: his old friend, Mr. Arbuthnot, puts his
+hand up to conceal a yawn; he has heard the story before.
+
+"Where was I? Oh, yes. Well, these young people--Monsieur Beaucourt thinks
+they were Americans--had gone to Italy for their honeymoon, and they were
+ending up in Paris. They arrived late at night--I think form
+Marseilles--and most providentially they were put on different floors in
+the hotel they had chosen in the Latin Quarter. Well, that very night--"
+
+Mr. Dallas looks round him triumphantly. He does not exactly smile, for
+what he is going to say is really rather dreadful, but he has the eager,
+pleased look which all good story-tellers have when they have come to the
+point of their story.
+
+"I don't believe that one man in a million would guess what happened!" He
+looks round him again, and has time to note complacently that the son of
+his host, who has risen, and whose hands grip the back of the chair from
+which he has risen, is staring, fascinated, across at him.
+
+"A very, very strange and terrible thing befell this young couple. That
+first night of their stay in Paris, between two and three the bridegroom
+developed plague! Monsieur Beaucourt tells me that the poor fellow behaved
+with the greatest presence of mind; although he cannot of course have known
+what exactly was the matter with him, he gave orders that his wife was not
+to be disturbed, and that the hotel people were to send for a doctor at
+once. Luckily there was a medical man living in the same street; he leapt
+on the dreadful truth, sent for an ambulance, and within less than half an
+hour of the poor fellow's seizure he was whisked away to the nearest public
+hospital, where he died five hours later."
+
+Mr. Dallas waits a moment, he is a little disappointed that no one speaks,
+and he hurries on:--
+
+"And now comes the point of my story! Monsieur Beaucourt assures me that
+the fact was kept absolutely secret. He told me that had it leaked out it
+might have half emptied Paris. French people have a perfect terror of what
+they call 'la Peste.' But not a whisper of the truth got about, and that
+though a considerable number of people had to know, including many of the
+officials connected with the Prefecture of Police. The Prefect showed me
+the poor fellow's watch and bunch of seals, the only things, of course,
+that they were able to keep; he really spoke very nicely, very movingly
+about it--"
+
+And then, at last, the speaker stops abruptly. He has seen his host's son
+reel a little, sway as does a man who is drunk, and then fall heavily to
+the ground.
+
+It is hours later. The sun has long set. Gerald opens his eyes; and then he
+shuts them again, for he wants to go on dreaming. He is vaguely aware that
+he is lying in the magnificent Jacobean four-post bed which he had been far
+too miserable, too agitated to notice when his father had brought him up
+the night before. But now the restful beauty of the spacious room, the
+fantastic old coloured maps lining the walls, affect him agreeably, soothe
+his tired mind and brain.
+
+During that dreamy moment of half-waking he has seen in the shadowed room,
+for the lights are heavily shaded, the figures of his father and of Daisy;
+he now hears his father's whisper:--"The doctor says he is only suffering
+from shock, but that when he wakes he must be kept very quiet."
+
+And Daisy's clear, low voice, "Oh, yes, father. When he opens his eyes
+perhaps we'd better leave him with Nancy."
+
+Nancy? Then Nancy really is here, close to him, sitting on a low chair by
+the side of the bed. And when he opened his eyes just now she really had
+bent her dear head forward and laid her soft lips on his hand. It was no
+dream--no dream--
+
+And then there comes over him an overwhelming rush of mingled feelings and
+emotions. He tries to remember what it was that had happened this
+afternoon--he sees the active, restless figure of the Englishman dancing
+queerly up and down as it had seemed to dance just before he, Gerald, fell,
+and he feels again the horrible wish to laugh which had seized him when
+that dancing figure had said something about Beaucourt having spoken
+"very nicely--"
+
+"Curse Beaucourt! Such a fiend is only fit for the lowest depths of Hell."
+
+Again he opens his eyes. Did he say the ugly words aloud? He thinks not, he
+hopes not, for Daisy only takes their father's hand in hers and leads him
+from the room.
+
+"Nancy?" he says, trying to turn towards her. "Do we know the truth now? Is
+my search at an end?"
+
+"Yes," she whispers. "We know the truth now--my dearest. Your search is at
+an end."
+
+And as she gets up and bends over him, he feels her tears dropping on his
+face.
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+BOOKS BY MRS. BELLOC LOWNDES
+
+PUBLISHED BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
+
+THE LODGER                   net, $1.25
+THE END OF HER HONEYMOON     net, $1.25
+STUDIES IN LOVE AND TERROR   net, $1.30
+MARY PECHELL                 net, $1.30
+THE CHINK IN THE ARMOUR      net, $1.30
+JANE OGLANDER                net, $1.30
+
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE END OF HER HONEYMOON ***
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