My first intention had been not to enter the place at all, but to return at once to Covent Garden. Some impulse, however, prompted me to glance round the room first. To my amazement Eve and her father were already seated at their usual table—Eve drawing off her gloves and her father with the wine list in his hand. I made my way toward them. I suppose my expression indicated a certain stupefaction, for directly I got there Eve began to laugh softly up into my face.
"We aren't ghosts!" she declared. "Did you think you were the only person who could leave the opera house in a hurry?"
"I saw you in the vestibule," I ventured. "I never saw you get away."
"No more did our friend Cullen," Mr. Parker remarked, smiling. "I really am beginning to feel sorry for that man. We were within a yard or two of him and he was watching us good and hard. I think he had an idea that Eve had a weakness for pearls."
"Oh, don't!" I exclaimed rather sharply. "Even in joke it isn't exactly wise, is it, with people passing all the time?"
"Joke!" Mr. Parker repeated. "Precious little joke about it, I can assure you. I dare say it looked simple enough to you, but it was really quite a complicated business. Never mind, Eve has her pearls—and that's the great thing."
Then he thrust his hand into his trousers pocket and, without the least attempt at concealment, produced and plumped upon the table in front of him the pearl necklace which only a few minutes before I had seen upon the neck of Lady Orstline.
"Look much better on Eve when they've been re-strung, won't they?" he observed. "Gee whiz! What lovely stones they are!"
"Put it away!" I gasped. "For Heaven's sake, put it away!"
"Why should I?" he asked coolly.