sir.”
“You have been with her, I believe, for many years. You are doubtless much attached to her!”
“Indeed I am, sir!”
“You may have surmised, Duson, that she has left me. I desire to ensure your absolute fidelity, so I take you into my confidence to this extent. Your mistress is in the hands of those who have some power over her. Her absence is involuntary so far as she is concerned. It has been a great blow to me. I am prepared to run all risks to discover her whereabouts. It is late in my life for adventures, but it is very certain that adventures and dangers are before us. In accompanying me you will associate yourself with many risks. Therefore—”
Duson held up his hand.
“I beg, sir,” he exclaimed, “that you will not suggest for a moment my leaving your service on that account. I beg most humbly, sir, that you will not do me that injustice.”
Mr. Sabin paused. His eyes, like lightning, read the other’s face.
“It is settled then, Duson,” he said. “Kindly pay this cabman, and follow me as quickly as possible.”
Mr. Sabin passed across the marble hall, leaning heavily upon his stick. Yet for all his slow movements there was a new alertness in his eyes and bearing. He was once more taking keen note of everybody and everything about him. Only a few days ago she had been here.
He claimed his rooms at the office, and handed the keys to Duson, who by this time had rejoined him. At the moment of turning away he addressed an inquiry to the clerk behind the counter.
“Can you tell me if the Duchess of Souspennier is staying here?” he inquired.
The young man glanced up.
“Been here, I guess. Left on Tuesday.”
Mr. Sabin turned away. He did not speak again until Duson and he were alone in the sitting-room. Then he drew out a five dollar bill.
“Duson,” he said, “take this to the head luggage porter. Tell him to bring his departure book up here at once, and there is another waiting for him. You understand?”
“Certainly, sir!”
Mr. Sabin turned to enter his bed-chamber. His attention was attracted, however, by a letter lying flat upon the table. He took it up. It was addressed to Mr. Sabin.
“This is very clever,” he mused, hesitating for a moment before opening it. “I wired for rooms only a few hours ago—and I find a letter. It is the commencement.”
He tore open the envelope, and drew out a single half-sheet of note-paper. Across it was scrawled a single sentence only.
“Go back to Lenox.”
There was no signature, nor any date. The only noticeable thing about this brief communication was that it was written in yellow pencil of a peculiar shade. Mr. Sabin’s eyes glittered as he read.
“The yellow crayon!” he muttered.
Duson knocked softly at the door. Mr. Sabin thrust the letter and envelope into his breast coat pocket.
CHAPTER II
“This is the luggage porter, sir,” Duson announced. “He is prepared to answer any questions.”
The man took out his book. Mr. Sabin, who was sitting in an easy-chair, turned sideways towards him.
“The Duchess of Souspennier was staying here last week,” he said. “She left, I believe, on Thursday or Friday. Can you tell me whether her baggage went through your hands?”
The man set down his hat upon a vacant chair, and turned over the leaves of his book.
“Guess I can fix that for you,” he remarked, running his forefinger down one of the pages. “Here we are. The Duchess left on Friday, and we checked her baggage through to Lenox by the New York, New Haven & Hartford.”
Mr. Sabin nodded.
“Thank you,” he said. “She would probably take a carriage to the station. It will be worth another ten dollars to you if you can find me the man who drove her.”
“Well, we ought to manage that for you,” the man remarked encouragingly. “It was one of Steve Hassell’s carriages, I guess, unless the lady took a hansom.”
“Very good,” Mr. Sabin said. “See if you can find him. Keep my inquiries entirely to yourself. It will pay you.”
“That’s all right,” the man remarked. “Don’t you go to bed for half-an-hour, and I guess you’ll hear from me again.”
Duson busied himself in the bed-chamber, Mr. Sabin sat motionless in his easy chair. Soon there came a tap at the door. The porter reappeared ushering in a smart-looking young man, who carried a shiny coachman’s hat in his hand.
“Struck it right fust time,” the porter remarked cheerfully. “This is the man, sir.”
Mr. Sabin turned his head.
“You drove a lady from here to the New York, New Haven & Hartford Depot last Friday?” he asked.
“Well, not exactly, sir,” the man answered. “The Duchess took my cab, and the first address she gave was the New York, New Haven & Hartford Depot, but before we’d driven a hundred yards she pulled the check-string and ordered me to go to the Waldorf. She paid me there, and went into the hotel.”
“You have not seen her since?”
“No, sir!”
“You knew her by sight, you say. Was there anything special about her appearance?”
The man hesitated.
“She’d a pretty thick veil on, sir, but she raised it to pay me, and I should say she’d been crying. She was much paler, too, than last time I drove her.”
“When was that?” Mr. Sabin asked.
“In the spring, sir—with you, begging your pardon. You were at the Netherlands, and I drove you out several times.”
“You seem,” Mr. Sabin said, “to be a person with some powers of observation. It would pay you very well indeed if you would ascertain from any of your mates at the Waldorf when and with whom the lady in question left that hotel.”
“I’ll have a try, sir,” the man answered. “The Duchess was better known here, but some of them may have recognised her.”
“She had no luggage, I presume?” Mr. Sabin asked.
“Her dressing-case and jewel-case
