"We come face to face sometimes with unique experiences, which destroy precedent," Spencer answered. "This is one of them."
"And what," Duncombe asked, "do you advise me to do?"
"Always the same advice," Spencer answered. "Leave Paris to-day. Go straight back to Norfolk, read the newspapers, and await events."
"Well, I think that I shall do so," Duncombe answered slowly. "I have found out where Miss Poynton is, but she will not see me. I have made an enemy of my dearest friend, and I have, at any rate, interrupted your career and endangered your life. Yes, I will go back home."
"You may yet save your friend some—inconvenience," Spencer suggested. "Try to persuade him to go back with you."
"He will not listen to me," Duncombe answered. "He has brought an English detective with him, and he is as obstinate as a mule. For myself I leave at nine o'clock."
"You are well advised, exceedingly well advised," Spencer said. "Mind I do not take the responsibility of sending you away without serious reasons. I honestly believe that Miss Poynton is safe, whatever may have happened to her brother, and I believe that you will serve her best by your temporary absence."
Duncombe stood for a moment wrapped in thought. The last few months had aged him strangely. The strenuous days and nights of anxious thought had left their mark in deep lines upon his face. He looked out of the window of Spencer's room, and his eyes saw little of the busy street below. He was alone once more with this strange, terrified girl upon the hillside, with the wind in their faces, and making wild havoc in her hair. He was with her in different moods in the little room behind his library, when the natural joy of her young life had for the moment reasserted itself. He was with her at their parting. He saw half the fearful regret with which she had left his care and accepted the intervention of the Marquise. Stirring times these had been for a man of his quiet temperament, whom matters of sentiment and romance had passed lightly by, and whose passions had never before been touched by the finger of fire. And now he was going back to an empty life—a life at least empty of joy, save the hope of seeing her again. For good or for evil, the great thing had found its way into his life. His days of calm animal enjoyment were over. Sorrow or joy was to be his. He had passed into the shadows of the complex life.
He remembered where he was at last, and turned to Spencer.
"About yourself, Spencer," he said. "Have you seen a doctor?"