“Because the Paris police had warned her not to, in all probability.”
“Well——” he gasped. “If that story is really true, it is the grandest slice of luck we’ve ever had, Ewart,” he declared.
“How? What do you mean?”
“What I say,” was his brief answer. “I shall go back to London after breakfast. You’ll remain here, look after the girl and Madame Vernet. I don’t envy you the latter. She’s got yellow teeth, and is ugly enough to break a mirror,” he laughed.
“But why go to London?” I queried.
“For reasons best known to myself, Ewart,” he snapped; for he never approved of inquisitiveness when forming any plans.
Then for a long time he was silent, his resourceful brain active, plunged in thought.
“Well!” he exclaimed, “this is about the queerest affair that I’ve ever had on hand. I came out here to-day from London on one big thing, and in an hour or two I’m going back on another!”
Presently, just as we were ascending the hill from La Condamine, and within a few hundred yards of the big Hôtel de Paris garage, which was our destination, he turned to me and said—
“Look here, Ewart! we’ve got a big thing on here—bigger than either of us imagine. I wonder what the fellows will think when they hear of it? Now all you have to do is to be pleasant to the little girl—make her believe that you’re a bit gone on her, if you like.”