from the street, but she saw us, and gave me a glance that I
shall be long in forgetting. That look was quite enough for me;
I knew Miss Raymond to be Mrs. Herbert; as for Mrs. Beaumont
she had quite gone out of my head. She went into the house,
and I watched it till four o'clock, when she came out, and then
I followed her. It was a long chase, and I had to be very
careful to keep a long way in the background, and yet not lose
sight of the woman. She took me down to the Strand, and then
to Westminster, and then up St. James's Street, and along
Piccadilly. I felt queerish when I saw her turn up Ashley
Street; the thought that Mrs. Herbert was Mrs. Beaumont came
into my mind, but it seemed too impossible to be true. I
waited at the corner, keeping my eye on her all the time, and I
took particular care to note the house at which she stopped.
It was the house with the gay curtains, the home of flowers, the
house out of which Crashaw came the night he hanged himself in
his garden. I was just going away with my discovery, when I
saw an empty carriage come round and draw up in front of the
house, and I came to the conclusion that Mrs. Herbert was going
out for a drive, and I was right. There, as it happened, I met
a man I know, and we stood talking together a little distance
from the carriage-way, to which I had my back. We had not been
there for ten minutes when my friend took off his hat, and I
glanced round and saw the lady I had been following all day.
'Who is that?' I said, and his answer was 'Mrs. Beaumont; lives
in Ashley Street.' Of course there could be no doubt after
that. I don't know whether she saw me, but I don't think she
did. I went home at once, and, on consideration, I thought that
I had a sufficiently good case with which to go to Clarke."