Loveday felt that she must be taken in hand at once.
“You are Miss Golding’s maid, I believe?” she said in a short, sharp tone.
“Yes, madame.” This in a slow, sullen one.
“Very well, Kindly unstrap that portmanteau and open my dressing-bag. I am glad you are to wait upon me while I am here. I don’t suppose you ever before in your life acted maid to a lady detective?”
“Never, madame.” This in a still more sullen tone than before.
“Ah, it will be a new experience to you, and I hope that it may be made a profitable one also. Tell me, are you saving up money to get married?”
Lena, on her knees unstrapping the portmanteau, started and looked up.
“How does madame know that?” she asked, Loveday pointed to the cameo ring on her third finger. “I only guessed at such a possibility,” she answered. “Well, now, Lena, I am going to make you an offer. I will give you fifty pounds—fifty, remember, in English gold—if you will procure for me certain information that I require in the prosecution of my work here.”
The sullen look on Lena’s face deepened.
“I am a servant of the house,” she answered, bending lower over the portmanteau; “I do not sell its secrets even for English gold.”
“But it is not the secrets of your master’s house I am wanting to buy—no, nor anybody else’s secrets; I only want you to procure for me certain information that I could easily have procured for myself if I had been a little sooner on the scene. And the information I want relates to no one inside the house, but someone outside of it—Mr. Gordon Cleeve.”
The sullen look on Lena’s face gave place to one of intense, unutterable relief.
“Mr. Gordon Cleeve!” she repeated. “Oh‑h, for fifty pounds, I will undertake to bring madame a good deal of information about him; I know some of the servants in Sir Gordon’s house. I know, too, the mother of Mr. Cleeve’s valet who has started with him on his journey round the world.”
“Good. So, then, it is a bargain. Now, Lena, tell me truly, is this Mr. Cleeve a great favourite with you?”
“With me! Ah, the good God forbid, madame! I never liked him; I used to say to Miss René when I brought her his flowers and his notes: ‘Have nothing to do with him, he is cruel—bad at heart.’ ”
“Ah, yes; I read all that in your face when I mentioned his name. Now what I want you first and foremost to do for me is to find out how this young man spent the last day that he was at Langford. I want you to bring me a report of his doings—as exact a report as possible—on the 18th of this month.”
“I will do my best, madame.”
“Very good. Now, there is something else. Would you be greatly surprised if I told you that the young man did not sail in the Buckingham from Brindisi as is generally supposed?”
“Madame! Inspector Ramsay said he had ascertained beyond a doubt that Mr. Cleeve went on board the Buckingham at Brindisi!”
“Ah, to go on board is one thing; to sail is another! Now, listen, Lena, very carefully to what I am going to say. I am expecting daily to receive some most important information respecting this gentleman’s movements, and I may want someone to set off at a minute’s notice for Paris, perhaps; or, perhaps, Florence or Naples, to verify that information: would you do this for me?—of course, I would supply you with money and full details as to your journey.”
A flush of pleasure passed over Lena’s face.
“Yes, madame,” she answered; “if you could get my master’s permission for me to go.”
“I will undertake to do so.” She pondered a moment, then added a little tentatively, and closely watching Lena’s face as she asked the question, “I suppose Miss Golding resembled her mother in appearance—I do not see any likeness between her portrait and her father.”
Lena’s sullenness and stateliness had vanished together now, and once upon the topic of her nursling she was the warmhearted, enthusiastic Italian woman once more. She became voluble in her description of her dear Miss René, her beauty, her fascinating ways, which she traced entirely to the Italian blood that flowed in her veins; and anecdote after anecdote she related of the happy time when they lived among the lakes and mountains of her native land.
The room grew dark and darker, while she gossiped apace, and presently the dressing-bell clanged through the house.
“Light the candles now,” said Loveday, rising from her seat beside the fire; “draw down the blinds and shut out that dreary autumn scene, it sets me shivering!”
It might well do so. The black clouds had fulfilled their threat, and rain was now dashing in torrents against the panes. A tall sycamore, immediately outside the window, creaked and groaned dismally in response to the wind that came whistling round the corner of the house, and between the swaying and all but leafless elms Loveday could catch a glimpse of the grey, winding trout stream, swollen now to its limits and threatening to overflow its banks.
Dinner that night was in keeping with the gloom that overhung the house within and without; although the telegram from Paris had seemed to let in a ray of hope, Mr. Golding was evidently afraid to put much trust in it.
“As Mrs. Greenhow says, ‘we have had so many disappointments,’ ” he said sadly, as he took his place at table. “So many false clues—false scents started. Ramsay has at once put himself in communication with the police at Boulogne and Calais, as well as at Dover and Folkestone. We can only pray
