The third evening after this occurrence I was again passing along Leicester Square at a somewhat late hour, but this time with all my eyes about me. Snow, which the wind blew sharply in one’s face, was falling fast, and the cold was intense. Except myself, and a tallish snow-wreathed figure—a woman apparently—not a living being was to be seen. This figure, which was standing still at the further side of the square, appeared to be awaiting me, and as I drew near it, threw back the hood of a cloak, and to my great surprise disclosed the features of a Madame Jaubert. This lady, some years before, had carried on, not very far from the spot where she now stood, a respectable millinery business. She was a widow with one child, a daughter of about seven years of age. Marie-Louise, as she was named, was one unfortunate day sent to Coventry Street on an errand with some money in her hand, and never returned. The inquiries set on foot proved utterly without effect: not the slightest intelligence of the fate of the child was obtained—and the grief and distraction of the bereaved mother resulted in temporary insanity. She was confined in a lunatic asylum for seven or eight months, and when pronounced convalescent, found herself homeless, and almost penniless, in the world. This sad story I had heard from one of the keepers of the asylum during her sojourn there. It was a subject she herself never, I was aware, touched upon; and she had no reason to suspect that I was in the slightest degree informed of this melancholy passage in her life. She, why, I know not, changed her name from that of Duquesne to the one she now bore—Jaubert; and for the last two or three years had supported a precarious existence by plausible begging-letters addressed to persons of credulous benevolence; for which offence she had frequently visited the police-courts at the instance of the secretary of the Mendicity Society, and it was there I had consequently made her acquaintance.
“Madame Jaubert!” I exclaimed with unfeigned surprise, “why, what on earth can you be waiting here for on such a night as this?”
“To see you!” was her curt reply.
“To see me! Depend upon it, then, you are knocking at the wrong door for not the first time in your life. The very little faith I ever had in professional widows, with twelve small children, all down in the measles, has long since vanished, and”——
“Nay,” she interrupted—she spoke English, by the way, like a native—“I’m not such a fool as to be trying the whimpering dodge upon you. It is a matter of business. You want to find Jem Martin?”
“Ay, truly; but what can you know of him? Surely you are not yet fallen so low as to be the associate or accomplice of burglars?”
“Neither yet, nor likely to be so,” replied the woman; “still I could tell you where to place your hand on James Martin, if I were but sure of the reward.”
“There can be no doubt about that,” I answered.
“Then follow me, and before ten minutes are past you will have secured your man.”
I did so—cautiously, suspiciously; for my adventure three evenings before had rendered me unusually circumspect and watchful. She led the way to the most crowded quarter of St. Giles’s, and when she had reached the entrance of a dark blind alley, called Hine’s Court, turned into it, and beckoned me to follow.