That very evening, after a cup of tea, he presented himself at the office of Rook near the Place du Gouvernement. As he came in he felt a little nervous. There were no tourists in the office, and a courteous clerk with a bright and searching eye at once took him in hand.
“What can we do for you, sir?”
“I am a stranger here,” began Mr. Greyne.
“Quite so, sir, quite so.”
The clerk twiddled his business-like thumbs, and looked inquiring.
“And being so,” Mr. Greyne went on, “it is naturally my wish to see as much of the town as possible; as much as possible, you understand.”
“You want a guide? Alphonso!”
Turning, he shouted to an inner room, from which in a moment emerged a short, stout, swarthy personage with a Jewish nose, a French head, an Arab eye with a squint in it, and a markedly Maltese expression.
“This is an excellent guide, sir,” said the clerk. “He speaks twenty-five languages.”
The stout man, who—as Mr Greyne now perceived—had on a Swiss suit of clothes, a panama hat, and a pair of German elastic-sided boots, confessed in pigeon English, interspersed occasionally with a word or two of something which Mr. Greyne took to be Chinese, that such was undoubtedly the case.