“We shall see!” she exclaimed, with a merry little peal of laughter. Rising and stretching forth her hand, she added, “I must be going. I consign the certificate to your care, and if you want me you know my address. I shall remain in London till the matter is settled.”
The old man rose, and grasped the hand offered to him. Bidding her adieu, he again assured her that he would give his prompt attention to the business on hand, and, as his clerk entered at that moment, he ceremoniously bowed her out.
During the time Valérie had been in conversation with Mr Graham, a woman had been standing on the opposite side of the Strand, against the railings of the Law Courts, intently watching the persons emerging from Devereux Court. She was young and not bad-looking, but her wan face betrayed the pinch of poverty, and her dress, although rather shabby, was nevertheless fashionable. Her dark features were refined, and her bright eyes had an earnest, intense look in them as she stood in watchful expectancy.
After she had kept the narrow passage under observation for nearly an hour, the object of her diligent investigation suddenly came into view. It was Valérie, who, when she gained the thoroughfare, hesitated for a moment whether she should walk or take a cab to the Prince of Wales’ Club. Deciding upon the former course, as she wanted to call at a shop on the way, she turned and walked along the Strand in the direction of Charing Cross.
When the woman who had been waiting caught sight of her she gave vent to an imprecation, the fingers of her gloveless hands twitched nervously, and her sharp nails buried themselves in the flesh of her palms.
As she started to walk in the same direction she muttered aloud to herself, in mixed French and English—
“Then I was not mistaken. To think I have waited for so long, and I find you here! You little dream that I am here! Ah, you fancy you have been clever; that your secret is safe; that the police here in London will not know Valérie Dedieu! You have yet to discover your mistake. Ha, ha! what a tableau that will be when you and I are quits! Bien, for the present I will wait and ascertain what is going on.”
Throughout the whole length of the Strand the strange woman walked on the opposite pavement, always keeping Valérie in sight—a difficult task sometimes, owing to the crowded state of the thoroughfare. At a jeweller’s near Charing Cross, Mrs Trethowen stopped for a few minutes, then, resuming her walk, crossed Trafalgar Square, and went up the Haymarket to the Prince of Wales’ Club, calmly unconscious of the woman who was following and taking such intense interest in her movements.
Muttering to herself sentences in French, interspersed by many epithets and imprecations, she waited for Valérie’s reappearance, and then continued to follow her down the Haymarket and through St. James’s Park to her flat in Victoria Street.
She saw her enter the building, and, after allowing her a few moments to ascend the stairs, returned and ascertained the number of the suite.