"I fancy, from your description--I fancy I know who the man was. If it is the man I am thinking of, the name is--Powers. He is, as you have said, a rather shady character, and I more than once warned my nephew against him. Such people are not good companions for a boy. Yes, I warned him."
"Powers," said Ste. Marie, "doesn't sound right to me, you know. I can't say the fellow's name myself, but I'm sure--that is, I think--it's not Powers."
"Oh yes," said Captain Stewart, with an elderly man's half-querulous certainty. "Yes, the name is Powers. I remember it well. And I remember--Yes, it was odd, was it not, your meeting him like that, just as you were talking of Arthur? You--oh, you didn't speak to him, you say? No, no, to be sure! You didn't recognize him at once. Yes, it was odd. Of course, the man could have had nothing to do with poor Arthur's disappearance. His only interest in the boy at any time would have been for what money Arthur might have, and he carried none, or almost none, away with him when he vanished. Eh, poor lad! Where can he be to-night, I wonder? It's a sad business, M. Ste. Marie--a sad business."
Captain Stewart fell into a sort of brooding silence, frowning down at the table before him, and twisting with his thin ringers the little liqueur glass and the coffee-cup which were there. Once or twice, Ste. Marie thought, the frown deepened and twisted into a sort of scowl, and the man's fingers twitched on the cloth of the table; but when at last the group at the other end of the board rose and began to move towards the door, Captain Stewart rose also and followed them. At the door he seemed to think of something, and touched Ste. Marie upon the arm.
"This--ah, Powers," he said, in a low tone--"this man whom you saw to-night! You said he was one of two occupants of a motor-car. Yes? Did you by any chance recognize the other?"
"Oh, the other was a young woman," said Ste. Marie. "No, I never saw her before. She was very handsome."
Captain Stewart said something under his breath and turned abruptly away. But an instant later he faced about once more, smiling. He said, in a man-of-the-world manner, which sat rather oddly upon him:
"Ah, well, we all have our little love-affairs. I dare say this shady fellow has his." And for some obscure reason Ste. Marie found the speech peculiarly offensive.
In the drawing-room he had opportunity for no more than a word with Miss Benham, for Hartley, enraged over his previous ill success, cut in ahead of him and manoeuvred that young lady into a corner, where he sat before her, turning a square and determined back to the world. Ste. Marie listlessly played bridge for a time, but his attention was not upon it, and he was glad when the others at the table settled their accounts and departed to look in at a dance somewhere. After that he talked for a little with Marian de Saulnes, whom he liked and who made no secret of adoring him. She complained loudly that he was in a vile temper, which was not true; he was only restless and distrait and wanted to be alone; and so, at last, he took his leave without waiting for Hartley.
Outside, in the street, he stood for a moment, hesitating, and an expectant fiacre drew up before the house, the cocher raising an interrogative whip. In the end Ste. Marie shook his head and turned away on foot. It was a still, sweet night of soft airs, and a moonless, starlit sky, and the man was very fond of walking in the dark. From the Etoile he walked down the Champs-Elysées, but presently turned toward the river. His eyes were upon the mellow stars, his feet upon the ladder thereunto. He found himself crossing the Pont des Invalides, and halted midway to rest and look. He laid his arms upon the bridge's parapet and turned his face outward. Against it bore a little gentle breeze that smelled of the purifying water below and of the night and of green things growing. Beneath him the river ran black as flowing ink, and across its troubled surface the many-colored lights of the many bridges glittered very beautifully, swirling arabesques of gold and crimson. The noises of the city--beat of hoofs upon wooden pavements, horn of train or motor-car, jingle of bell upon cab-horse--came here faintly and as if from a great distance. Above the dark trees of the Cours la Reine the sky glowed, softly golden, reflecting the million lights of Paris.