The lady was her natural self—other than in name—on board the Olympic, and having no opportunity to alter her appearance, she had passed through the customs in the same character. Hence the ship’s staff and the customs officer had instantly recognised her photograph. But it was obvious that her impersonation of Mrs. Root must begin before she interviewed the Southampton police, and that accounted for the hesitation of Sergeant McAfee and the people in London in identifying her. She had therefore made herself up between passing through the customs at, say, eleven o’clock, and calling on the Sergeant at three. Where was she during those four hours?
He put himself in her place. Confronted with her problem, what would he have done?
Gone to a hotel, unquestionably. Taken a room in which to assume the disguise. Had Mrs. X engaged a bedroom in one of the Southampton hotels for that afternoon?
As he thought over the thing, further probabilities occurred to him. The lady would go up to her bedroom as one person and come down as another. Therefore, surely, the larger the hotel, the less chance of the transformation being observed. One of a crowd, she would go to the reception office and engage a room for a few hours’ rest, and pay for it then and there. Then, having accomplished the makeup, she would slip out, unobserved in the stream of passersby. Yes, French felt sure he was on the right track, and, with a fresh accession of energy, he jumped to his feet, knocked out his pipe, and left the building.
He called first at the South Western and made his inquiries. But here he drew blank. At the Dolphin he had no better luck, but at the Polygon he found what he wanted. After examining the records, the reception clerk there was able to recall the transaction. About midday an American lady had come in, and saying she wanted a few hours’ rest before catching the 5:26 to London, had engaged a bedroom on a quiet floor until that hour. She had registered, and French, on looking up the book, was delighted to find once more the handwriting of the lady of the cheques. It was true that on this occasion she figured as Mrs. Silas R. Clamm, of Hill Drive, Boston, Mass.; but knowing what he knew of her habits, French would have been surprised to have found a name he had seen before.
At first he was delighted at so striking a confirmation of his theory, but as he pursued his inquiries his satisfaction vanished, and once more depression and exasperation swept over him. For the reception clerk could not remember anything more than the mere fact of the letting of the room, and no one else in the building remembered the woman at all. With his usual pertinacity, he questioned all who might have come in contact with her, but from none of them did he receive the slightest help. That Mrs. X had made herself up at the hotel for her impersonation stunt was clear, but unfortunately it was equally clear that she had vanished from the building without leaving any trace.
The worst of the whole business was that he didn’t see what more he could do. The special clues upon which he had been building had failed him, and he felt there was now nothing for it but to fall back on the general one of the photographs. One of the portraits was excellently clear as to details, and he decided he would have an enlargement made of Mrs. X, and circulate it among the police in the hope that some member at some time might recognise the lady. Not a very hopeful method certainly, but all he had left.
He took an evening train from the West Station, and a couple of hours afterwards reached his home, a thoroughly tired and disgruntled man.
XIII
Mrs. French Takes a Notion
By the time Inspector French had finished supper and lit up a pipe of the special mixture he affected, he felt in considerably better form. He determined that instead of going early to bed, as he had intended while in the train, he would try to induce the long-suffering Mrs. French to listen to a statement of his problem, in the hope that light thereon would be vouchsafed to her, in which in due course he would participate.
Accordingly, when she had finished with the supper things he begged her to come and share his difficulties, and when she had taken her place in her accustomed armchair and had commenced her placid knitting, he took up the tale of his woes.
Slowly and in the fullest detail he told her all he had done from the time he was sent to Messrs. Williams & Davies, when he first heard of the mysterious Mrs. X, up to his series of visits of that day, concluding by expressing his belief that Mrs. X and Mrs. Ward were one and the same person, and explaining the difficulty he found himself up against in tracing her. She heard him without comment, and when he had finished asked what he proposed to do next.
“Why, that’s just it,” he exclaimed a trifle impatiently. “That’s the whole thing. If I was clear about that there would be no difficulty. What would you advise?”
She shook her head, and bending forward seemed to concentrate her whole attention on her knitting. This, French knew, did not indicate lack of interest in his story. It was just her way. He therefore waited more or less hopefully, and when after a few minutes she began to question him, his hopes were strengthened.
“You say that Mrs. Root and those steamer people thought the woman was English?”
“That’s so.”
“There were quite a lot of them thought she was English?”
“Why, yes,” French agreed. “There was Mrs. Root and the doctor and the purser and her dinner steward and at least four stewardesses. They were
