“The Countess called here this afternoon and left a note asking him to come to dinner either to-night or to-morrow night. She said you were not well, but that you would be down for the meal.”
“But she knew that I was at the Convalescent Home and that I am not coming back to La Solitude till next week!”
“That makes what she did appear very strange,” said M. Popeau slowly, and he began to feel very much alarmed and puzzled.
There was a curious pause. He took the girl’s hand.
“What is it?” he asked. “You frighten me! Though I am a man of mystery, I hate mysteries!”
“We must go up to La Solitude, now, at once!” she whispered, and he saw, he felt, that she was shaking all over.
“They are murderers, Monsieur Popeau! They killed Mr. Vissering—and I think they killed Mr. Ponting. They may be doing—something—to Angus now——”
“No, no! He is probably quite safe. But we will go and see now, this moment!”
He called out to a passing taxi on its way back to Nice.
“We shall be there very soon,” he said, and patted her hand. Somehow, his matter of fact manner comforted and steadied her as he said to the driver rapidly in French: “This is a hundred-francs’ job for you, my friend, and less than half an hour’s drive!”