cently the assassin of de Lorgnes;
before that the ex-chauffeur of the Chateau de Montalais."

"Albert Dupont?"

"As you say, it is not a name."

"The same?" Her old terror revived. "My God! what have I ever done to
that one that he should seek my life?"

"What had de Lorgnes?"

Her eyes turned away, she sat for a moment in silent thought, started
suddenly to speak but checked the words before one passed her lips,
and--as Lanyard saw quite plainly--hastened to substitute others.

"No: I do not understand at all! What do you think?"

Lanyard indicated a shrug with sufficient clearness, meaning to say,
she probably knew as much as if not more than he.

"But how did he get in? I had not one suspicion I was not alone until
that handkerchief----"

"Naturally."

"And you, my friend?"

"I saw him enter, and followed."

This was strictly within the truth: Lanyard had now no doubt Dupont and
the man who had reconnoitered from the service-door were one. But it
was no part of his mind to tell the whole truth to Liane. She might be
as grateful as she ought to be, but she was still ... Liane Delorme ...
a woman to be tested rather than trusted.

"I must tell you. But perhaps you knew there were agents de police in
the restaurant to-night?"

Liane's head described a negative; her violet eyes were limpid pools of
candour.

"I am so much a stranger in Paris," Lanyard pursued, "I would not know
them. But I thought you, perhaps----"

"No, no, my friend, I have nothing to do with the police, I know little
about them. Not only that, but I was so interested in our talk, and
then inexpressibly shocked, I paid attention to nothing else."

"I understand. Otherwise you must have noticed who followed me."

"You were followed?"

And she had found the effrontery to chide him for lack of faith in her!
He was in pain: for all that, the moment seemed amusing.

"We are followed, I assure you," Lanyard replied gravely. "One man or
two--I don't know how many--in a town-car."

"But you are sure?"

"All we could get was a hansom drawn by a snail. The automobile,
running without lights, went no faster, kept a certain distance behind
us all the way from the Place Pigalle to the apartment of Mademoiselle
Reneaux. What have you to say to that? Furthermore, when Mademoiselle
Reneaux had persuaded me to take refuge in her apartment--who knew what
they designed?--one man left the automobile as it passed her door and
stood on watch a