hours and hours. Hereafter she will get
weak at sight of the figure two, and things that go in twos, like
married people, she will hate."

"How easy to see that you are French, Colette," said Arthur, as a
compliment. She threw him a kiss from her pretty fingers, and gave a
sidelong look at Curran.

"There's a devil in her," Arthur thought.

"The will was very correct and very sound," resumed the detective. "No
hope in a contest if they thought of such a thing among the West ... the
Jones'. The heirs took pity on her, and gave her a lump for consolation.
She took it and cursed them for their kindness. Her rage was something
to see. She is going to use that lump, somewhere about twenty-five
thousand, I think, to find her accursed Tom. How do I know? That's part
of the prize for me if I catch up with Tom Jones within three years. And
I draw a salary and expenses all the time. You should have seen Mrs. Tom
the day I went to see her. Colette," with a smile for his wife, "your
worst trouble with a manager was a summer breeze to it. You're a
white-winged angel in your tempers compared with Mrs. Tom Jones. Her
language concerning the aunt and the vanished nephew was wonderful. I
tried to remember it, and I couldn't."

"I can see her, I can feel with her," cried La Belle Colette, jumping to
her feet, and rushing through a pantomime of fiendish rage, which made
the men laugh to exhaustion. As she sat down she said with emphasis,
"She must find him, and through you. I shall help, and so will our
friend Dillon. It's an outrage for any man to leave a woman in such a
scrape ... for a mere trifle."

"She has her consolations," said the detective; "but the devil in her is
not good-natured like the devil in you, Colette. She wants to get hold
of Tom and cut him in little bits for what he has made her suffer."

"Did you get out any plans?" said Arthur.

"One. Look for him between here and Boston. That's my wife's idea. Tom
Jones was not clever, but she says ... Say it yourself, my dear."

"Rage and disappointment, or any other strong feeling," said the woman
sharply, with strong puffs at her cigarette, "turns a fool into a wise
man for a minute. It would be just like this fool to have a brilliant
interval while he dreamed of murdering his clever wife. Then he hit upon
a scheme to cheat the detectives. It's easy, if you know how stupid they
are, except Dick. Tom Jones is here, on his own soil. He was not going
to run away with a