The spirit of adventure warmed Lavendale's blood that night. He ordered his dinner with unusual care, and he was delighted to find his guest sufficiently human to appreciate the delicacies he had chosen and the vintage of the champagne which he had selected. Their conversation was entirely general, almost formal. They had both lived for some time in Paris and found mutual acquaintances there. As they neared the conclusion of the meal she was summoned to the telephone. She was absent only for a short time but when she returned she began to collect her few trifles.
'The car passed through Slough,' she said, 'a quarter of an hour ago. I think perhaps we had better be moving.'
Lavendale signed his bill and they left the hotel together.
'Nothing else you think you ought to tell me, I suppose?' he remarked, as they crossed the narrow street. 'I am rather in the dark, you know. The idea is, isn't it, that Jules is coming up to get the formula from some hiding-place in his room? Where shall we be?'
'Wait,' she begged.
They climbed the stairs in silence—the girl had purposely avoided the lift. Arrived on the third floor, she passed the door of number thirty-two and knocked softly at the adjoining one. There was, for a moment, no answer. At the second summons, however, the door was cautiously opened. The untidy secretary admitted them. In her soiled black dress, shapeless and crumpled, with her fat, peevish face and dishevelled peroxidized hair, she was by no means an attractive object. She pointed half indignantly to where Mr. Somers-Keyne was lying upon the couch, gazing towards them in incapable silence with a fatuous smile upon his lips.
'If it's from you he gets the money for this sort of thing,' she said sharply, 'why, I wish you'd keep it, and that's straight. How are we to get on with our work or anything, with him in that condition?'
'Scondition'sh all right,' Mr. Somers-Keyne insisted, making a weak effort to rise.
Miss de Freyne frowned for a moment as she appreciated the situation. Then she waved him back.
'Don't try to get up, Mr. Somers-Keyne, she begged. 'We can manage without you. Lie down and rest for a little time.'