At exactly ten-thirty on the appointed Thursday I approached the villa. It was close shuttered and wore a vacant, deserted look at which my heart sank. The gate was locked and the bell jangled noisily among deserted rose bushes.
“Curses!” I ground out between clenched teeth. “She was toying with me!”
A step on the gravel interrupted my bitter reflections. It was the old gardener.
“Madame est partie,” he announced, “et Monsieur aussi ... sur le yacht ... ce matin.”
A glance toward the bay confirmed his statement; the slim white shape of Wimpole’s yacht, the Undine, was no longer in sight.
“But did they leave no message?” I demanded.
He turned aside smiling.
“Un mot? Sais pas ... c’est-à-dire ... peut-être ...”
I saw what he was driving at. Damn the baksheesh hunting tribes!
“Here,” I said, thrusting a crisp bank-note through the bars. Seizing it he fumbled in his blouse and produced a large envelope which I clutched eagerly, tearing it open as the bearer disappeared into the depths of the garden. Beneath the now familiar crest, in a bold masculine handwriting, I read the simple words, “Meet me in the desert, S. W.”