“I only hope he will come and see me, George,” he said. “But somehow, I don’t think he will! You know now what to do. Madame is alone at the Carlton and ready to accompany you. I’m sorry I can’t give you lunch, George, but I have two guests. I shall be anxious to know how you get on. Telephone to me in confidence after you’ve been to Ripley, won’t you? Good-by.”
And he passed across the hall and rejoined his two smartly dressed guests, crooks, like himself, I supposed.
CHAPTER XVII
THE SIGN OF NINETY-NINE
At half-past eight I called for Duperré’s wife at the hotel, and she came down wearing a plain, dark-brown motor coat with a small, close-fitting cap to match. She was, indeed, unusually dowdy in appearance.
“Well, George,” she exclaimed, as she sat behind me in the car and I drove down Pall Mall, “we’re going out on a little adventure, I understand. Do you know where we’re going?”
“Down to Ripley, on the Portsmouth Road,” I replied. “I have to meet a man named Houston at the Talbot Hotel. That’s all I know,” I answered.
“Yes,” she said. “I know Houston. We must be careful to-night—very careful.”