assured me that that man
was indeed in the employ of Mr. Farewell.

I waited as patiently and inconspicuously as I could, and at ten
o'clock I saw that my man had obviously finished his work for the
morning and had finally come down the stairs ready to go home. I
followed him.

I will not speak of the long halt in the cabaret du Chien Noir, where
he spent an hour and a half in the company of his friends, playing
dominoes and drinking eau-de-vie whilst I had perforce to cool my
heels outside. Suffice it to say that I did follow him to his house
just behind the fish-market, and that half an hour later, tired out
but triumphant, having knocked at his door, I was admitted into the
squalid room which he occupied.

He surveyed me with obvious mistrust, but I soon reassured him.

"My friend Mr. Farewell has recommended you to me," I said with my
usual affability. "I was telling him just awhile ago that I needed a
man to look after my office in the Rue Daunou of a morning, and he
told me that in you I would find just the man I wanted."

"Hm!" grunted the fellow, very sullenly I thought. "I work for
Farewell in the mornings. Why should he recommend me to you? Am I not
giving satisfaction?"

"Perfect satisfaction," I rejoined urbanely; "that is just the point.
Mr. Farewell desires to do you a good turn seeing that I offered to
pay you twenty sous for your morning's work instead of the ten which
you are getting from him."

I saw his eyes glisten at mention of the twenty sous.

"I'd best go and tell him then that I am taking on your work," he
said; and his tone was no longer sullen now.

"Quite unnecessary," I rejoined. "I arranged everything with Mr.
Farewell before I came to you. He has already found someone else to do
his work, and I shall want you to be at my office by seven o'clock
to-morrow morning. And," I added, for I am always cautious and
judicious, and I now placed a piece of silver in his hand, "here are
the first twenty sous on account."

He took the money and promptly became very civil, even obsequious. He
not only accompanied me to the door, but all the way down the stairs,
and assured me all the time that he would do his best to give me
entire satisfaction.

I left my address with him, and sure enough, he turned up at the
office the next morning at seven o'clock precisely.

Theodore had had my orders to direct him in his work, and I was left
free to enact the second scene of the moving drama in whic