She waved a charming hand in farewell, and turned to her companion, who was beginning to manifest symptoms of impatience. But Drummond, though he went into the hall outside, did not immediately leave the hotel. Instead, he buttonholed an exquisite being arrayed in gorgeous apparel, and led him to a point of vantage.
“You see that girl,” he remarked, “having tea with a man at the third table from the big palm? Now, can you tell me who the man is? I seem to know his face, but I can’t put a name to it.”
“That, sir,” murmured the exquisite being, with the faintest perceptible scorn of such ignorance, “is the Marquis of Laidley. His lordship is frequently here.”
“Laidley!” cried Hugh, in sudden excitement. “Laidley! The Duke of Lampshire’s son! You priceless old stuffed tomato—the plot thickens.”
Completely regardless of the scandalised horror on the exquisite being’s face, he smote him heavily in the stomach and stepped into Pall Mall. For clear before his memory had come three lines on the scrap of paper he had torn from the table at The Elms that first night, when he had grabbed the dazed millionaire from under Peterson’s nose.
earl necklace and the
are at present
chess of Lamp-
The Duchess of Lampshire’s pearls were world-famous; the Marquis of Laidley was apparently enjoying his tea. And between the two there seemed to be a connection rather too obvious to be missed.
III
“I’m glad you two fellows came down,” said Hugh thoughtfully, as he entered the sitting-room of his bungalow at Goring. Dinner was over, and stretched in three chairs were Peter Darrell, Algy Longworth, and Toby Sinclair. The air was thick with smoke, and two dogs lay curled up on the mat, asleep. “Did you know that a man came here this afternoon, Peter?”
Darrell yawned and stretched himself.