of informing the lady what hotel you choose. You will there give a
fictitious name (let us say, George Sandford) and you will take a suite,
with a private sitting-room. That done, you will say that you are
expecting a lady to call upon you, and will see no one else. You will
wait till Mademoiselle de Renzie appears, which will certainly be as
soon as she can possibly manage; and when you and she are alone
together, sure that you're not being spied upon, you will put into her
hands a small packet which I shall give you before we part to-night."

"It sounds simple enough," said Ivor, "if that's all."

"It is all. Yet it may be anything but simple."

"Would you prefer to have me call at her house, and save her coming to a
hotel? I'd willingly do so if--"

"No. As I told you, should it be known that you and she meet, those who
are watching her at present ought not to suspect the real motive of the
meeting. So much the better for us: but we must think of her. After four
o'clock every afternoon, the young Frenchman she's engaged to is in the
habit of going to her house, and stopping until it's time for her to go
to work. He dines with her, but doesn't drive with her to the theatre,
as that would be rather too public for the present, until their
engagement's announced. He adores her, but is inconveniently jealous,
like most Latins. It's practically certain that he's heard your name
mentioned in connection with hers, when she was in London, and as a
Frenchman invariably fails to understand that a man can admire a
beautiful woman without being in love with her, your call at her house
might give Mademoiselle Maxine a _mauvais quart d'heure_."