ver, when
suddenly a number of workmen in blouses and peaked caps came trooping
out of a side street and obstructed her progress. She had Carissimo on
the lead, and she at once admitted to me that at first she never
thought of connecting this pushing and jostling rabble with any
possible theft. She held her ground for awhile, facing the crowd: for
a few moments she was right in the midst of it, and just then she felt
the dog straining at the lead. She turned round at once with the
intention of picking him up, when to her horror she saw that there was
only a bundle of something weighty at the end of the lead, and that
the dog had disappeared.

The whole incident occurred, the lovely creature declared, within the
space of thirty seconds; the next instant the crowd had scattered in
several directions, the men running and laughing as they went. Mme. la
Comtesse was left standing alone on the quay. Not a passer-by in
sight, and the only gendarme visible, a long way down the Quai, had
his back turned toward her. Nevertheless she ran and hied him, and
presently he turned and, realizing that something was amiss, he too
ran to meet her. He listened to her story, swore lustily, but shrugged
his shoulders in token that the tale did not surprise him and that but
little could be done. Nevertheless he at once summoned those of his
colleagues who were on duty in the neighbourhood, and one of them went
off immediately to notify the theft at the nearest commissariat of
police. After which they all proceeded to a comprehensive scouring of
the many tortuous sidestreets of the quartier; but, needless to say,
there was no sign of Carissimo or of his abductors.

That night my lovely client went home distracted.

The following evening, when, broken-hearted, she wandered down the
quays living over again the agonizing moments during which she lost
her pet, a workman in a blue blouse, with a peaked cap pulled well
over his eyes, lurched up against her and thrust into her hand the
missive which she had just shown me. He then disappeared into the
night, and she had only the vaguest possible recollection of his
appearance.

That, Sir, was the substance of the story which the lovely creature
told me in a voice oft choked with tears. I questioned her very
closely and in my most impressive professional manner as to the
identity of any one man among the crowd who might have attracted her
attention, but all that she could tell me was that she had a