When his coffee was brought, he opened the paper and leaned back against the padded leather seat, pretending to read, but studying the room and everybody in it.
It was a café typical of almost any half dead provincial town in France—large, rather dimly lighted, shabbily furnished with marble-topped tables ranged around the walls and two ancient billiard tables occupying the center of the room.
In the corner near the door was the cashier's cage and desk; on the same side of the room, in the further corner, a swinging leather door, much battered, gave exit and entrance to the waiters as they went to or arrived from kitchen and cellar.
And one thing occurred to him immediately: the same kitchen, and perhaps the same cellar, had supplied both cabaret and café. Therefore, there must still be some passage of communication between the cabaret—which had been locked and sealed by the authorities—and the café which the police had decreed must remain open for the convenience of the public.
Deeply perturbed by what the waiter had said concerning the glimpse he had caught of somebody resembling Philippa, and made doubly anxious by Halkett's sinister remark in regard to the girl's knowledge of secrets which might send Wildresse before a platoon of execution, he studied the gloomy room from behind his newspaper, trying to come to some conclusion.
He did not believe that Wildresse and his companions had dared drive into Ausone by daylight with Philippa in the tonneau, either unconscious or resisting them.
If they had brought her to Ausone at all, they must have carried her by boat, landed at the foot of the cabaret garden, and smuggled the child into the house through the rear door giving on the river garden.
If they had brought her to Ausone at all, then, she must be at that moment somewhere within the walls of the double building forming the Café and Cabaret de Biribi. Otherwise, the grey touring car had never entered Ausone.
To make certain on that point he presently paid his reckoning, bowed to the cashier, and went leisurely out into the deserted square.
First of all he sauntered back to the town entrance, where the red-legged soldiers had taken over his cart and horse. Having been obliged to give particulars concerning himself, the soldiers were perfectly friendly. Inquiry they readily answered; such a touring car as he described had been halted and requisitioned by the guard about two hours before his own horse was stopped and appropriated. There were only two people in the car, both men.