Then turning with a gracious smile towards another traveller seated at a neighbouring table, the princess thanked him for the slight service he had rendered her by passing her the menu card with a very polite bow.
Meantime Mr. Bigelow, seated not far from his wife, uttered a startled exclamation. He had just unfolded a French journal and rapidly cast his eye over it; indeed a number of the passengers in the restaurant car were similarly engaged, eagerly scanning the news columns of the morning papers.
No doubt during the voyage the news sheet that appeared on board every morning had contained sundry important items of information supplied by wireless, but detailed particulars were lacking, and for this reason it was a boon to the newly-arrived travellers to be put in possession of numberless piquant details of international events, and especially of the activities of the fashionable world of Paris, in which they were more particularly interested.
During the six days’ sea voyage, the world had not stood still; the usual incidents, the usual joys and sorrows, the usual anecdotes formed the staple of the record—and the usual crimes. But here was something of direst import; these tourists who for nearly a week had been more or less isolated on the high seas were startled to learn that on arrival they were to find Paris a prey to the most acute alarm, and that since leaving land a series of tragedies had occurred, the most mysterious and the most terrifying ever known. The newspapers of every shade of politics, of every sort and kind, were full of the dramatic incidents that so excited public opinion, and above all abounded in the latest particulars of the daring and dastardly assassination of the Minister of Justice that had happened a few days before.
But there was one item that more than any other roused the keenest curiosity among the occupants of the restaurant car. This was the announcement of the expected arrival in France of the American, Tom Bob, and the statement that the detective in question was on board the SS. Lorraine, due to reach Hâvre on the very morning of issue. This was naturally a highly exciting piece of news to the passengers who had travelled with him, many of whom, moreover, knew of the reputation the man enjoyed at police headquarters in New York.
“Is it possible?” laughed the Princess Sonia Danidoff, to whom her cavalier had just read the paragraph, “is it possible we have had Tom Bob with us on board?”
“But why not, Princess,” replied the multi-millionaire. “Surely Tom Bob might be aboard without the world being turned upside down or the Lorraine dressing ship in his honour.”
“But is it not strange,” Mrs. Bigelow asked the question, “that he never made himself known to us?”
“A detective,” observed Ascott, “is hardly likely to have his coming announced by ambassadors, and as a rule prefers his presence to be unremarked.”
The same traveller who a minute or two before had courteously passed the list enumerating all the various sorts of mineral waters to the Princess Danidoff now joined in with a word of approval of Ascott’s remark: