"He knows I see you, that of course, but he firmly believes it is in his own service. He is just as anxious to know what you are doing as you are to observe him. By the way, have you heard anything of your other man?"
"Why should I tell you?"
"Oh, don't trouble; only if I could pass him on a bit of news either way it might lead him to show his hand. If Tiler is getting 'hot'—you know the old game—he might like to go after him. If Tiler is thrown out the Colonel will want to give help in the other direction."
"That's sound sense, I admit. But all I can tell you is we had a telegram from him an hour or two ago which doesn't look as if he was doing much good. It was sent from Lyons, a roundabout way of getting to Paris from here, and now he's going south! Of all the born idiots!"
"Poor devil! That's how he's made. It's not everyone who's a born detective, friend Falfani. It's lucky my lord has you at his elbow."
We parted excellent friends. The more I saw of l'Echelle the more I liked him. It was a pleasure to work with a man of such acute perceptions, and I told him so.
Nothing fresh occurred that night or the next day. I was never very far off my Colonel, and watched him continually but unobtrusively. I hope I know my business well enough for that.
I was rather struck by a change in his demeanour. It was very subtle, and everyone might have noticed it. He wore an air of preoccupation that spoke to me of an uneasy mind. He was unhappy about something; some doubt, some secret dread oppressed him, and more than once I thought he wished to keep out of sight and avoid my searching interrogative eyes.
"You're right," said l'Echelle. "He's down on his luck, and he don't want you to see it. He's dying for news that don't seem in a hurry to come. Half a dozen times to-day he's asked me to inquire if there's a telegram for him, and he haunts the hall porter's box continually in the hope of getting one. Have you heard any more from Tiler?"
"Yes, another mad telegram, this time from Marseilles. Fancy that! It will be Constantinople next or Grand Cairo or Timbuctoo. The folly of it!"