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for anything else. If it were not for the certainty I feel of this I should go mad,' said Catherine, with dry eyes and calm voice. 'But it could not be to anyone's interest to harm my darling, even if a woman whom Philippa in her innocence loved and believed in could have the heart to betray her to-anything bad. It could not. She is being hidden away in the hopes of a reward.'

'It seems the most probable explanation,' said David.

Can't the woman be arrested on suspicion?' said George angrily.

'Mr. Mills says she has given them no excuse whatever for arresting her.'

'She is a stranger and a foreigner. Isn't that excuse enough? ' growled George.

Catherine smiled wearily.

'He also thinks in our own interests it is better not. She gave them every information they asked concerning her last interview with Philippa, and never faltered nor contradicted herself. And she said that as she considered herself in charge of Philippa, she courted the fullest inquiry; and gave them the addresses of her last employers, and of her friend at the registry office, and begged them to search her room or her papers or do anything they chose. He warned her that she would be arrested if she made the slightest attempt to leave the house.'

'Just to put her on her guard, I suppose,' said George. 'Perhaps he only said it to frighten her. He is having her watched.'

'Suppose we ask to see her,' said George. It might be the simplest plan, since she knows she is suspected. We could threaten her with the law, and give her a chance of escaping punishment by an immediate confession.'

Catherine shook her head.

'It will be of no use.'

'How do you know that?' said David quickly.

'Because I went on my knees to her this morning,' said Catherine, in the same passionless even tones. If tears would have melted a stone, they would have melted her heart; but they did not. I went into her room where she lay asleep in the dawn— and I woke her, and I prayed her to tell me, and she answered that I was mad with grief, and pretended to be full of concern and pity; but it was no longer the real pity that I saw in her face that first night. She has hardened her heart.'

David looked at Catherine pitifully. Her gentle face was pinched and colourless, grown old in a single night with misery; her hazel eyes were unnaturally large, and though her manner was calm, it was only by an intense effort of self-control that that calm was sustained.

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Under his look of compassion her lip quivered suddenly.

Help me to find her,' she said, and put a soft, cold hand into his strong fingers.

'I'm going to,' he said briefly. 'Now you've given me full authority to act for you. But I like my information first hand. I should like to see Mme. Minart myself.'

'Yes.'

'Mr. Mills has given me the facts as he has collected them; let me collect my own.'

'Very well, send for whom you choose. If I go out meanwhile,' said Catherine,' will you not leave the house till I return? '

'I will not.'

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'Then I will go and see if Lady Sarah knows anything. She is very clever,' said Catherine, but I shall be very quickly back.' A polite message was sent to Mme. Minart, and she presently came very quietly into the room, bowed to both gentlemen, and accepted the chair that David offered.

Am I again to be cross-examined?' she said with a faint smile. If you please,' said David very courteously, 'but of course you will understand that we have no authority whatever to ask you questions. I am venturing to assume,' he looked keenly at her, 'that you are as anxious as we are ourselves that this matter should be cleared up, and the young lady found. We are sure you wish her no harm.'

'You do me justice, and you are the first to do so,' said Mme. Minart in a voice of emotion, and her dark, liquid eyes met his gaze. 'Will you believe me, Monsieur le Colonel, if I tell you that I love this child with all my heart, though I have known her so short a time; that I have never had any pupil to show me so much love, so much candour, so much generosity?'

'Indeed I believe you,' said David warmly, for the ring of sincerity in her beautiful voice was unmistakable. He held out his hand to her.

'I thank you, Monsieur. You are not then of those who would doubt me, like these stupid police, only because I am a stranger and a foreigner?

George pulled his moustacne and knew not where to look. 'Hang it all,' he thought uneasily, 'one would suppose she had been listening.'

But Mme. Minart was not of those who need to listen. A glance at the rubicund good-natured countenance of George, now darkened by his openly suspicious and hostile expression, enabled her to divine his sentiments.

She instantly ignored him, and appealed only to David's finer intelligence and quicker sympathies.

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'I have written down,' she said simply, the exact facts-the hours-all I can remember of my conversation with Philippato help the police. Here it is.'

She handed some notes across the table, inscribed in a minute exquisite French hand.

He read them carefully. Thank you. Was Philippa in good spirits?'

'More than good spirits-excited, delighted with the triumph of her début.'

'You went into her room?'

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As you will see written. I assisted her to bed. She said she was too sleepy to plait her hair as usual. I promised that she should not be called until ten o'clock unless she rang.'

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'What was the exact hour that her absence was discovered?' 'Between nine-thirty and ten Roper knocked at her door and found her room empty."

'But the policeman saw her out of doors soon after nine. So she must have left her room before nine.'

Obviously.'

'Did no one see her go downstairs? '

They say not.'

'You say that Lady Adelstane was, very naturally, overcome by the news which was taken to her at nine o'clock?'

'Lady Adelstane had an attack,' said Mme. Minart, in brief, expressive tones; 'to you I speak frankly-she had hysterics. The house was roused.'

'Who went to her?'

'Her maid was with her, and Mrs. Joliffe the housekeeper, but she was of no use-weeping and crying. Holland sent for Roper ; she would not send for me, because she was jealous, but I went.

The head-housemaid answered the bell, and the doctor was sent for.'

( Who went for the doctor?'

'No one went the butler telephoned.'

'Who went down to tell the butler ? '

'The housemaid.'

'What was Roper doing?'

Mme. Minart shrugged her shoulders.

'Rubbing Miladi's hands, holding the salts to her nose; bathing her head. The two maids held together. They would not let me help. I made suggestions and opened the windows.'

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Who remained in the room when the doctor came ? '

'Holland and Roper. I remained in the dressing-room with Mrs. Joliffe.'

'That was at ten o'clock ?'

'He was gone before ten o'clock.'

'And then Roper went upstairs to her young lady?'

'She went dowstairs first to fetch her young lady's cup of tea, and then up to her room.'

'Did you not think it strange Philippa should hear none of this commotion?"

'No; Philippa's room is on the floor above, and not over or anywhere near Miladi's room. It is shut off by a baize door from the front part of the house.'

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'Where is your room?
'Down the same passage.'

'And Roper's?

'Further down the same passage.'

'When Roper found Philippa's room empty what did she do?'

'She went to the breakfast-room, and, finding no one there, supposed Philippa had gone to Miladi while she was fetching the tea. She waited an hour outside Miladi's room till Holland came out, not daring to knock because the doctor had given a composing draught. Then she learnt that Philippa had not been near Miladi, and then she came to me. I was having my breakfast in the morning room as usual.'

'Had you not been anxious to know how Philippa would take the news of her cousin's death?'

'I had promised to leave her old nurse to tell her, and withdrawn myself from the affair. I thought she would come to me.

When it became evident she was not in the house, we thought she had heard the news and gone out to telegraph to her mother. At twelve Miladi sent for her, and we were obliged to say she could not be found. Miladi thought she had heard the news and gone home, and was very angry. But Pilkington sent a telegram to the station-master at Ilverton to know if Philippa had arrived, and the reply came that she had not. Miladi grew frightened and telegraphed to Lady Adelstane to come.'

'Thank you very much. And now tell us,' said David very simply, what do you think?'

'I?' said Mme. Minart, and a sudden colour flushed her olive chee's.

'I believe you could help us better than anyone, for you have been Philippa's friend and confidante during these past days that she has been away from her mother's care. If there was anything on her mind, you would know it.'

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'Was she in any scrape?' said George bluntly.
Mme. Minart scarcely deigned to glance at him.

Certainly not,' she said in disdain.

Was she-' David hesitated and coloured all over his bronzed face, the more deeply because he was aware that Mme. Minart was observing him. Had you any reason to think that she was

or fancied herself-in love?'

'Ah, Monsieur,' said Mme. Minart gently, 'would you have me betray a young girl's secret if that was so?'

'Nonsense, she's scarcely more than a child, and in any case her secret would be safe enough with us,' said George.

is something of that kind?'

6

Then there

She has not told me so,' said Mme. Minart coldly. David came to her side, and took her hand in his impulsive fashion.

'Madame,' he said, ' we are asking you to trust us. This child is very dear to us both, for her own sake, and her mother's. Do not, out of mistaken kindness, endeavour to keep back anything.'

"That is the only motive you would attribute to me, Monsieur ?' said Mme. Minart emotionally.

'I would not insult you-after the appeal you have made to us, your voluntary declaration of your affection for her-by supposing that any other motive save kindness to her, or to us, would influence you to keep back information which might help us to find her,' he said warmly.

VOL. XXV.-NO. 145, N.S.

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