They had a delightful luncheon together. Old Martha, who proved to be quite a passable cook, waited on them. There was some excellent Burgundy and a carafe of old brandy with the coffee. Nur-el-Din was in her most gracious and captivating mood. She had dropped all her arrogance of their last interview and seemed to lay herself out to please. She had a keen sense of humor and entertained Desmond vastly by her anecdotes of her stage career, some not a little risqué, but narrated with the greatest bonhomie.
But, strongly attracted as he was to the girl, Desmond did not let himself lose sight of his ultimate object. He let her run on as gaily as she might but steadily, relentlessly he swung the conversation round to her last engagement at the Palaceum. He wanted to see if she would make any reference to the murder at Seven Kings. If he could only bring in old Mackwayte’s name, he knew that the dancer must allude to the tragedy.
Then the unexpected happened. The girl introduced the old comedian’s name herself.
“The only pleasant memory I shall preserve of the Palaceum,” she said in French, “is my meeting with an old comrade of my youth. Imagine, I had not seen him for nearly twenty years. Monsieur Mackwayte, his name is, we used to call him Monsieur Arthur in the old days when I was the child acrobat of the Dupont Troupe. Such a charming fellow; and not a bit changed! He was doing a deputy turn at the Palaceum on the last night I appeared there! And he introduced me to his daughter! Une belle Anglaise! I shall hope to see my old friend again when I go back to London!”
Desmond stared at her. If this were acting, the most hardened criminal could not have carried it off better. He searched the girl’s face. It was frank and innocent. She ran on about Mackwayte in the old days, his kindliness to everyone, his pretty wife, without a shadow of an attempt to avoid an unpleasant topic. Desmond began to believe that not only did the girl have nothing to do with the tragedy but that actually she knew nothing about it.
“Did you see the newspapers yesterday?” he asked suddenly.
“My friend,” said Nur-el-Din, shaking her curls at him. “I never read your English papers. There is nothing but the war in them. And this war!”
She gave a little shudder and was silent.
At this moment old Martha, who had left them over their coffee and cigarettes, came into the room.
“There’s a gentleman called to see you, sir!” she said to Desmond.