"Then your idea is that the United States is not concerned in the
matter?" the Secretary asked.

"Not directly, yet it may be very much concerned in the result. We will
know more about it after Mr. Harleston has had his interview with the
lady."

"That's so!" the Secretary reflected. "We shall trust you, Harleston, to
find out something definite from her. Keep me advised if anything turns
up. It seems peculiar, and it may be only a personal matter and not an
_affaire d'état_. At all events, you've a pleasant interview before
you."

"Maybe I have--and maybe I haven't!" Harleston laughed--and he and
Carpenter went out, passing the French Ambassador in the anteroom.

Harleston went straight to Police Headquarters. The Chief was waiting
for him.

"I had Thompson, your cab driver, here," said Ranleigh, "and he tells a
somewhat unusual but apparently straight tale; moreover, he is a very
respectable negro, well known to the guards and the officers on duty
around Dupont Circle, and they regard him as entirely trustworthy. He
says that last evening about nine o'clock, when he was jogging down
Connecticut Avenue on his way home--he owns his rig--he was hailed by a
fare in evening dress, top coat, and hat, who directed him to drive west
on Massachusetts Avenue. In the neighbourhood of Twenty-second Street,
the fare signalled to stop and ordered him to come to the door. There he
asked him to hire the horse and cab until this morning, when they would
be returned to him at that point. Thompson naturally demurred; whereupon