"Very well. Will you pick me up in it at three at my hotel? We will drive down to the station and see the arrivals by that train. It may help us to get some idea of the person with whom we have to deal. That is always an advantage. Now I will leave you, for I have much to do. But I will look in upon M. Wethermill as I go down and tell him that there is as yet no news."
He took up his hat and stick, and stood for a moment staring out of the window. Then he roused himself from his reverie with a start.
"You look out upon Mont Revard, I see. I think M. Wethermill’s view over the garden and the town is the better one," he said, and went out of the room.
At three o’clock Ricardo called in his car, which was an open car of high power, at Hanaud’s hotel, and the two men went to the station. They waited outside the exit while the passengers gave up their tickets. Amongst them a middle-aged, short woman, of a plethoric tendency, attracted their notice. She was neatly but shabbily dressed in black; her gloves were darned, and she was obviously in a hurry. As she came out she asked a commissionaire:
"How far is it to the Hotel Majestic?"
The man told her the hotel was at the very top of the town, and the way was steep.
"But madame can go up in the omnibus of the hotel," he suggested. Madame, however, was in too much of a hurry. The omnibus would have to wait for luggage. She hailed a closed cab and drove off inside it.
"Now, if we go back in the car, we shall be all ready for her when she arrives," said Hanaud.
They passed the cab, indeed, a few yards up the steep hill which leads from the station. The cab was moving at a walk.
"She looks honest," said Hanaud, with a sigh of relief. "She is some good bourgeoise anxious to earn four thousand francs."