ques--too many
tourists."

As she spoke a taxi rattled up the street at a characteristic
break-neck speed, stopping abruptly at the shop next door, a dingy
jeweller's. From the taxi stepped a woman, young, smartly dressed.
She paid the fare, then stood looking somewhat uncertainly at the name
on the shop door.

"_C'est bien vingt-quatre, madame_," said the driver, as if to help her.

"_Oui--ca va bien_," she replied, but still hesitating.

Esther had turned at sound of her voice just in time to see her gather
her silver fox closer about her neck, clutch her red morocco _pochette_
against her chest and enter the shop. The taxi, with a little "cling"
of the meter, shot off down the hill. Esther touched her companion's
arm.

"That was Lady Clifford who went into that shop," she said.

Miss Paull dropped her tortoiseshell lorgnon.

"Was it? I didn't notice. Where? What shop?"

"This one, just here."

"Really! That's an odd, dirty little place for her to go into!"

She raised her lorgnon again and examined the printing on the door. It
was "_Abel Klement, achat de bijoux, anciens et modernes_." Then, not
content with this superficial inspection, she went close to the door
and, bending, gazed with frank curiosity into the interior. Lacking
her indifference to appearances, Esther made a pretence of looking into
the window.

"She's taking something in a small box out of her bag," announced the
Englishwoman after a deliberate scrutiny. "Ah, of course, some bit of
jewellery to be repaired. No, she's not opening the box, after all.
She's following the man out through the door at the back of the shop.
Now she's gone."

Satisfied that she could ascertain no more, Miss Paull turned away from
the door.

"Doesn't look at all her sort of shop," she remarked thoughtfully as
they pursued their way. "Such a dingy little second-rate place. And
why do you suppose she came up in a taxi instead of her own car?"

She appeared to ponder this question so deeply that Esther was amused
at what seemed to her a morbid desire to scent a mystery in an affair
which, no doubt, had the most ordinary explanation.

"Now _I_ should say," her companion added, confidentially, "that that
fashionable lady is up to something she doesn't want known. That is
_my_ conviction--you can take it or leave it."

CHAPTER V

"I say, have you got any matches anywhere?"

Esther jumped at the sudden sound of a man's voice close to he