"Never, sir."
"Is he young or old?"
"Young, and looks like a gentleman."
"A foreigner?"
"No, an Englishman, sir," was my man's reply. "I dare say if we go along to Boscombe to-night, and watch the house, we might see him. He's up to no good, I believe."
I readily adopted Rayner's suggestion.
As soon as darkness fell, we took the tram eastward, and at length alighted at the end of a quiet road of comfortable red-brick villas, in one of which Lola was residing, a road which ran from the highway towards the sea.
Separating, I passed up the road, while my man waited at the corner. The house of my friends stood in its own small garden, a neat, artistic little red-and-white place with a long verandah in front and a pleasant garden full of dahlias. As I passed it I saw that many of the rooms were lit, and I was eager to go and ring at the door and meet Lola, after our long separation.
But I remembered I was there to watch and to ward off any danger that might threaten. Therefore I turned upon my heel, and finding a hedge, behind which lay some vacant land, I hid myself behind it and waited, wondering what had become of Rayner.
All was quiet, save for the rumble of electric trams passing along the main road to Bournemouth. From where I lurked, smoking a cigarette, I could hear a woman's sweet contralto voice singing gaily one of the latest songs of the Paris Café concerts, which ran—