Vanderlyn looked surprised; his desolate eyes met the older man's hesitating glance quite squarely, but this time he remained silent.

The Prefect went on speaking, and his voice became more and more suave; he was certainly desirous of saving in every way his host's susceptibilities.

"The fact that I have taken the very unusual course of coming myself to see you, Mr. Vanderlyn, will prove to you the importance I attach to this interview. Indeed, I wish to be quite frank with you----"

Vanderlyn bent his head, and then he sat up, listening keenly while the other continued----

"This is not, I am convinced, an ordinary case of disappearance, and it is to us, and especially to me, disagreeably complicated by the fact that the lady is an English subject and that her husband is a well-known and highly thought of member of our English colony. This makes me the more anxious to avoid"--he hesitated, then firmly uttered the two words, "any scandal. It was suggested at the Prefecture to-day that it would be well to make a perquisition, not only in Mrs. Pargeter's own house, but also in the houses of some of her intimates. Mr. Pargeter, as you know, gave the police every possible facility. Nothing was found in the Villa Pargeter which could throw any light on Mrs. Pargeter's disappearance.

Now, Monsieur, before subjecting _you_ to such an unpleasant occurrence, I decided to approach you myself----"

Vanderlyn opened his lips, and then closed them again.

"I have come to ask you, Monsieur, one question, and I give you my word as an honest man that what you tell me shall be treated as confidential.

I ask you if you know more of this mysterious matter than you are apparently prepared to divulge? In a word--I beg you to tell me where Mrs. Pargeter is hiding at the present moment? I have no wish to disturb her retreat, but I beg you most earnestly to entrust me with the secret."

Again the speaker's eyes took a discreet journey round the plain, now shadow-filled room; his glance rested on the book-shelves which formed so important a part of its decorations, lingered doubtingly on a carved walnut chest set between two of the windows, peered through these same unshuttered windows on to the dark stone balconies, then, baffled, his eyes came back and fixed themselves on the American diplomatist's face.

A feeling of indescribable relief stole over Vanderlyn's wearied and yet alert senses. It was clear that the Prefect of Police knew nothing of the truth; the directness of his question proved it. Yet, even so, Vanderlyn felt that he must steer his way very warily.

"You are in error," he said at last, "for you credit me, Monsieur le Prefet, with a knowledge I do not possess."

"Ah!" said the other mildly, "that is most unfortunate!"

"May I, on my side, put to you a question to which I should be glad of an honest answer?" said Vanderlyn abruptly. "Are you now engaged in making a wide-spread enquiry among those who had the honour of this lady's acquaintance?"

"No, Monsieur,"--the Prefect's manner showed an eager desire to be quite frank,--"I am confining my personal enquiries to only two persons; that is, to a certain Madame de Lera, to whom you will remember Mrs. Pargeter was about to pay a visit at the moment she disappeared, and to yourself."

Vanderlyn made a sudden nervous movement, but he checked the words which rose to his lips, for the Prefect was again speaking, and this time with a certain excitement of manner.

"I am convinced that Mrs. Pargeter never intended to go to Madame de Lera, and that the proposed visit was a blind! The facts speak for themselves. Madame de Lera had taken only one servant to the country, and this servant, an old woman whom she has had with her many years, and whom she can entirely trust, had no idea that her mistress was expecting a visitor! I repeat--that no preparations for Mrs. Pargeter's arrival had been made at Marly-le-Roi. It is my belief--nay, my conviction--that Madame de Lera knows perfectly well where her friend is now concealed."

It was then that Vanderlyn committed what was perhaps the only mistake he was destined to commit during this difficult interview. "Has Madame de Lera made any such admission?" he asked quickly.

"No," answered the Prefect, looking at him thoughtfully, "Madame de Lera has made no admission; but then I have learned, through long experience, never to believe, where there is a friend in the case, what a lady tells me. Women of the world, my dear sir, are more loyal the one to the other than we men may choose to believe!"

"And men, Monsieur? Are they more disloyal?" Vanderlyn spoke quietly, indifferently, as if the question was of no moment.

"Men," said Monsieur le Prefet, dryly, "are as a rule quite as loyal, especially where they feel their honour is engaged. But with a man it is possible to reason; a woman, especially a good woman, follows the dictates of instinct,--in other words, of her heart."

"I notice, Monsieur le Prefet, that you eliminate the possibility of material accident having occurred to Mrs. Pargeter?"

"Let us distinguish!" exclaimed the older man quickly. "If, by accident, you mean, Mr. Vanderlyn, the type of mishap which might have occurred to this lady when she was walking or driving in our Paris streets, then I certainly eliminate the possibility of accident to Mrs. Pargeter. Within six hours of such a thing having occurred the facts would have been laid before me, and, as you know, two nights and two days have elapsed since her disappearance. If, on the other hand, we envisage the possibility of suicide, then are opened up a new series of possibilities."

The Prefect gave a piercing look at the American's worn and sorrow-laden face, but he did not find written there any involuntary answer to his mute interrogation.

"Some years ago," went on the great official, "a man well known in Paris society made up his mind to take his own life. He hired a cellar, locked the door, and then shot himself. Months went by before his disappearance was accounted for, and then the body was only discovered by an accident.

If Mrs. Pargeter has committed suicide, and if she, an intelligent woman, was determined that the fact should never be found out by her friends, then I admit our task becomes a very difficult one! But I do not believe," he continued, after a short silence, "that Mrs. Pargeter did this. I believe she is alive, and well. She was, by each account that has reached me, young, charming, and wealthy. She had a child whom she apparently adored. As for her relations with her husband----" the Prefect shrugged his shoulders, and again looked searchingly at Vanderlyn.

"Mr. Thomas Pargeter," he went on, smiling, "is not perhaps the perfect husband of whom every young girl dreams; but then no one is so foolish as to search for the perfect husband in the world to which your friend belongs! He is not exactly a _viveur_,--but he is, to use the slang of the day, essentially a _jouisseur_. Is not that so?" He added, with a rather twisted grin, "If every lady whose husband lives to enjoy himself were to commit suicide, there would be very few women left in our Paris world."

"I agree with you, Monsieur le Prefet, in thinking Mrs. Pargeter was the last woman in the world to commit suicide," said Vanderlyn brusquely, and then he got up.

There had come over him during the last few moments an inexplicable, instinctive feeling of dread,--that panting fear which besets the hunted creature. He was determined to bring to an end the interview. But the Prefect of Police had no intention of being disposed of so easily. He remained sitting where he was; and, placing his two fat hands firmly on his knees, sat looking at the American's tall figure. Slowly his eyes travelled up till they rested on his host's haggard face.

"Then I am to understand, Mr. Vanderlyn, that you are not in a position to give me any help? That is your last word?"

Vanderlyn suddenly determined to carry the war into the enemy's country.

"I can only repeat," he said, harshly, "what I said before, Monsieur le Prefet--namely, that you credit me with a knowledge which I do not possess. Further, that while, of course, I appreciate the kindly motive which has inspired your visit, I think I have a right to resent the suspicions which that visit indicates, I do not say on your part, but on that of your subordinates. I will not disguise from you my knowledge that for the last two days every step I have taken has been dogged; I suspect also, but of that I have no proof, that my servants, and the concierge of this house, have been questioned as to my movements, as to my daily life. I cannot help also suspecting--perhaps in this I am wrong--that the police are inclined to believe that Mrs. Pargeter--a woman, let me remind you, Monsieur le Prefet, of the highest and most unspotted character--is hiding here, in my chambers! You speak of having saved me from a perquisition,--a perquisition in the rooms of a diplomatist is a serious matter, Monsieur le Prefet, and I tell you quite frankly that I should have resisted such an outrage in every way in my power! But now, in the present very peculiar circ.u.mstances, I request,--nay, I demand,--that you should search my rooms. Every possible facility shall be afforded you." Vanderlyn's voice was shaking with undisguised anger,--aye, and disgust.

The Prefect of Police rose from his chair.

"I have no wish to subject you to any indignity," he said earnestly, "I absolutely accept your a.s.surance that Mrs. Pargeter is not in hiding here. I am aware, Mr. Vanderlyn, that Americans do not lie,"--an ironic smile wavered for a moment over his large mouth.

Vanderlyn's face remained impa.s.sive. "You, on your side, must forgive my heat," he said, quietly. Then he suddenly determined to play for a high stake. "May I ask you to satisfy my curiosity on one point? What made you first suspect such a thing? What led you to--to suppose----"

"----That you knew where this lady was; that she might--say, after a little misunderstanding with her husband--have taken refuge with you?

Well, yes, Mr. Vanderlyn, I admit that you have a right to ask me this, and it was because I feared you might lack the exquisite courtesy you have shown me, that I brought with me to-night a doc.u.ment which contains, in what I trust you will consider a discreet form, an answer to your delicate question."

Vanderlyn's visitor again sat down; he laid open on his knee the leather portfolio, and out of it he took a large sheet of foolscap, which, unfolding, he handed to Laurence Vanderlyn.

"This, Monsieur, is your _dossier_. If you can prove to me that it is incorrect in any particular, I will see that the error is rectified. We naturally take special care in compiling the _dossiers_ of foreign diplomatists, for experience has shown that these often become of great value, even after the gentlemen in question have left Paris for some other capital."

Vanderlyn reddened. He glanced over the odd-looking doc.u.ment with eager, curious eyes. A few words here and there were printed, but the rest of the _dossier_ was written in the round copying character which must be mastered by every French Government clerk hoping for promotion.

First came the American diplomatist's Christian name and surname, his place of birth, his probable age--right within two years,--a short epitome of his diplomatic career, a guess at his income, this item considerably under the right figure, and evidently based on his quiet way of living.

Then, under a printed heading "General Remarks," were written a few phrases in a handwriting very different from the rest--that is, in the small clear caligraphy of an educated Frenchman. Staring down at these, Vanderlyn felt shaken with anger and disgust, for these "General Remarks" concerned that part of his private life which every man believes to be hidden from his fellows:--

"Peu d'intimites d'hommes. Pas de femmes: par contre, une amitie amoureuse tres suivie avec Madame (Marguerite) Pargeter. Voir dossier Pargeter (Thomas)."

Amitie amoureuse? Friendship akin to love? The English language, so rich in synonyms, owns no exact equivalent for this French phrase, expressive though it be of a phase of human emotion as old as human nature itself.

Vanderlyn looked up. His eyes met squarely those of the other man.

"Your staff," he said, very quietly, "have served you well, Monsieur; my _dossier_ is, on the whole, extraordinarily correct. There is but one word which I would have altered, and which, indeed, I venture to beg you to correct without loss of time. The young man--he is evidently a young man--who wrote the summary to which you have drawn my attention, must have literary tastes, otherwise there is one word in this doc.u.ment which would not be there." Vanderlyn put his finger down firmly on the word "amoureuse." "My relations with Mrs. Pargeter were, it is true, those of close friendship, but I must ask you to accept my a.s.surance, Monsieur le Prefet, that they were not what the writer of this pa.s.sage evidently believed them to have been."

"I will make a note of the correction," said the Prefect, gravely, "and I must offer you my very sincere excuses for having troubled you to-night."

As Vanderlyn's late visitor drove home that night, he said to himself, indeed he said aloud to the walls of the shabby little carriage which had heard so many important secrets, "He knows whatever there is to be known--but, then, what is it that is to be known? Of what mystery am I now seeking the solution?"

IX.

As he heard the door shut on the Prefect of Police, Vanderlyn felt his nerve give way. There had come a moment during the conversation, when, as if urged by some malignant power outside himself, he had felt a sudden craving to take the old official into his confidence, and tell him the whole truth--so magnetic were the personality, the compelling will, of the man who had just left him.