“As you like.”
“Allons! Hop!” cried he, and seizing her round the waist danced through the masquers to the very far end of the Avenue.
“There is a sequestered spot round here,” he said.
They turned. The sequestered spot, a seat beneath a plane tree, with a lonesome arc-lamp shining full upon it, was occupied.
“It’s a pity!” said the fair unknown.
But Aristide said nothing. He stared. On the seat reposed an amorous couple. The lady wore a white domino and a black mask. The cavalier, whose arm was around the lady’s waist, wore a pig’s head, and a clown or Pierrot’s dress.
Aristide’s eyes fell upon the shoes. On one of them the pompon was missing.
The lady’s left hand tenderly patted the cardboard snout of her lover. The fierce light of the arc lamp caught the hand and revealed, on the fourth finger, a topaz ring, the topaz held in its place by two snakes’ heads.
Aristide stared for two seconds; it seemed to him two centuries. Then he turned simply, caught his partner again, and with a “Allons, Hop!” raced back to the middle of the throng. There, in the crush, he unceremoniously lost her, and sped like a maniac to the entrance gates. His friend the brigadier happened to be on duty. He unmasked himself, dragged the police agent aside, and breathless, half-hysterical, acquainted him with the astounding discovery.
“I was right, mon vieux! There at the end of the Avenue you will find them. The pig-headed prowler I saw, with my pompon missing from his shoe, and his bonne amie wearing the stolen ring. Ah! you police people with your tape-measures and your José Puégas! It is I, Aristide Pujol, who have to come to Perpignan to teach you your business!”