Kendricks smiled.
"No one can deny that I need a new coat," he said. "I told Pietro when things were slack that he could make me one, but he gets lots of orders now. See the little girl in the corner? She's going out—no, she's going to stay here; they've found her room at that table. I suppose you'd turn your nose up at her because she has a lot too much powder on her cheeks, and you don't like that lace collar around her neck. It isn't clean, I know, and the make-up on her face is clumsy. Must be uncomfortable, too, but she's done her best. She's been dancing at the Hippodrome this afternoon, probably rehearsing afterwards. She's got an hour now before she goes back to the evening performance. She's taking the eighteenpenny dinner, you see. She'll get a glass of chianti free with it. I am in luck to-night. I can tell you about nearly all these people. Her name is Bessie Hazell—Sarah Ann Jinks, very likely, but that's what she calls herself, anyway. She married an acrobat two years ago and they started doing quite well. Then he got a cough, had to give up work, the doctors all shook their heads at him, wanted to tell him it was consumption. Bless you, she wouldn't listen to it! She got him down to Bournemouth somehow and they patched him up. He came back and started again, caught cold, and had another bad spell. Still, she wouldn't have it that there was anything serious the matter with him! He'd be all right, she said, if it weren't for the climate, and every night she danced, mind—danced twice a day. She's quite clever, they say—might have done well if she'd only herself to think of and could spare a little of her money for lessons. Not she! She sent him to Davos, paid for it somehow. He's back again now. He can't go on the stage, but he's got a light job somewhere. I don't know that he's earning anything particular. They've got a baby to keep, but they do it all right between them. She isn't pleasant to look at, is she? What's that matter? She's a bit of real life, anyhow."
"Why didn't you bring me here before, Kendricks?" Julien asked.
The man leaned back and laughed.
"Ask yourself that question, not me," he replied. "You—Sir Julien Portel, caricatured as the best-dressed man in the House of Commons, member of the most fashionable clubs, brilliant debater, successful politician, future Prime Minister, and all that sort of twaddle. You were living too far up in the clouds, my friend, to come down here. You see, I am not offering you much sympathy, Julien. I don't think you need it. You were soaring up to the skies just because of your gifts and your position and your opportunities. You are down now. Well, you're thundering sorry for yourself. I don't know that I'm sorry for you. I'll tell you in ten years' time. By Jove, here's your sandy-headed little friend!"
The man, with the girl upon his arm, had entered the room and had taken seats at a table in the corner, for which, apparently, they had been waiting. Julien looked at them curiously.
"Why," he exclaimed suddenly, leaning across the table, "I remember him now! He's at the shop—I mean he's an Intelligence man."
Kendricks nodded.
"Just the sort of inconspicuous-looking person who could go anywhere without being noticed."
"I recollect him quite well," Julien continued. "It's not in my department, of course, but I remember being told he was a very useful little beggar."