A Traitor's Wooing

by Headon Hill

As they met Louise was surprised to see the English gentleman stop and raise his hat to her. She had never before exchanged a word with him, or so much as given him a thought, though she knew him by sight as an occasional caller at the Maynards' house in London, and had since learned that he had a summer retreat at Ottermouth.

"Pardon me for addressing you without formal introduction," said Nugent with the deference he would have used to a duchess, "but interest in this terrible murder must be my excuse. I recognize you, of course, as Miss Maynard's confidential companion. Can you inform me if any later intelligence has been received at the Manor House? There was nothing but vague rumour in the air when I left after the afternoon party."

He had to a nicety struck the correct note for "drawing" Mademoiselle Louise. The winning smile, the doffed hat would have gone far; but the promotion from lady's maid to "companion" made her conquest an easy matter. Yet, coquette as she was, she delayed the intended surrender which in her folly she regarded as a victory. She promised herself the pleasure of looking important in this affable gentleman's eyes, but it was a situation that must be prolonged for proper enjoyment.

"But no, M'sieu," she replied. "It is not at the Manor House that you should inquire for news. They know nothing there, nor do they greatly care. How should they be distracted, my so kind friends, by a cr-rime which is to them but a bagatelle that has disturbed the pleasure of a summerre day? It is to the police in the town that you should apply."

Nugent's shoulders shrugged with Parisian eloquence. "I have already pursued inquiries in that quarter, but the police appear to be completely in the dark, except that they have verified the fact that the deceased had been staying at the Plume Hotel," he said, never forgetting for an instant to qualify the baldness of his statement with a respectfully admiring glance.

Mademoiselle's opportunity for dramatic effect had come. It would be far more interesting to startle this so polite "Milor" than to scarify the servants' hall at the Manor House, and she could do that later as well. To the winds with all caution! She must brave Aunt Sarah's wrath if the old lady took a harsh view of her conduct. The chance to pose was irresistible and she took the stage there and then.

"M'sieu has been premature," she said, heralding her bomb-shell with a flash of her fine eyes. "If he returns and puts his questions to the sergent-de-ville later in the evening he will doubtless be differently informed. For I, Louise Aubin, am now on my way to indicate to the authorities the assassin of that poor gentleman."

Travers Nugent's astonishment seemed to overwhelm him. He took a step back, eyed the girl with something like awe, and touched his lips with his tongue. "You are not serious?" he gasped. "Do you really mean that you witnessed the crime?"

The fair Louise lifted her hands in genuine horror. "Mon Dieu! Not so bad as that," she replied. "But it is all the same as if I had been there. It is the motive that I go to point out, and the name of the murderer that I go to give. I who speak to you was the motive, and the name is Pierre Legros. The scélérat is a seller of onions from a little French ship that is in the harbour of Exmouth."

And Mademoiselle Aubin proceeded to rattle off the history of her early courtship by Legros in her native village, and of his inopportune arrival while she was accepting the attentions of the "financial agent" from London. She volubly repeated her former lover's heated language to herself, and described the bloodthirsty threats he had used about his successful rival. His guilt was as clear as noonday, she avowed—as clear as if that dreadful thing M'sieu had suggested had been really true and she had seen the deed with her own eyes.