d myself down when I have been burning to
grip her by the wrists and tell her that all that a man could offer a
woman was hers. Selingman, this sounds like nonsense, I suppose."

"No," Selingman murmured, "not nonsense, but it doesn't sound like
Draconmeyer."

"Well, it's finished," Draconmeyer declared, with a great sigh of
content. "You know now. I enter upon the final stage. I had only one
fear. Jean Coulois has settled that for me. I wonder whether they know.
It seems peaceful enough. No! Look over there," he added, gripping his
companion's arm. "Peter, the concierge, is whispering with the others.
That is one of the managers there, out on the pavement, talking to
them."

Selingman pointed down the road towards Monaco.

"See!" he exclaimed. "There is a motor-car coming in a hurry. I fancy
that the alarm must have been given."

A grey, heavily-built car came along at a great pace and swung round in
front of the Hotel de Paris. The two men stood on the pavement and
watched. A tall, official-looking person, with black, upturned
moustache, in somber uniform and a peaked cap, descended.

"The Commissioner of Police," Selingman whispered, "and that is a doctor
who has just gone in. He has been found!"

They crossed the road to the hotel. The concierge removed his hat as
they turned to enter. To all appearances he was unchanged--fat, florid,
splendid. Draconmeyer stepped close to him.

"Has anything happened here, Peter?" he asked. "I saw the Commissioner
of Police arrive in a great hurry."

The man hesitated. It was obvious then that he was disturbed. He looked
to the right and to the left. Finally, with a sigh of resignation, he
seemed to make up his mind to tell the truth.

"It is the English gentleman, Sir Henry Hunterleys," he whispered. "He
has been found stabbed to death in his room."

"Dead?" Draconmeyer demanded, insistently.

"Stone dead, sir," the concierge replied. "He was stabbed by some one
who stole in through the bathroom--they say that he couldn't ever have
moved again. The Commissioner of Police is upstairs. The ambulance is
round at the back to take him off to the Mortuary."

Selingman suddenly seized the man by the arm. His eyes were fixed upon
the topmost step. Violet stood there, smiling down upon them. She was
wearing a black and white gown, and a black hat with white ospreys. It
was the hour of five o'clock tea and many people were passing in and
out. She came gracefully down the ste