"In the rooms, I suppose? Not at the house of one of your
friends?"

"That is so," said Wethermill quietly. "A friend of mine who had
met her in Paris introduced me to her at my request."

Hanaud handed back the portrait and drew forward his chair nearer
to Wethermill. His face had grown friendly. He spoke with a tone
of respect.

"Monsieur, I know something of you. Our friend, Mr. Ricardo, told
me your history; I asked him for it when I saw you at his dinner.
You are of those about whom one does ask questions, and I know
that you are not a romantic boy, but who shall say that he is safe
from the appeal of beauty? I have seen women, monsieur, for whose
purity of soul I would myself have stood security, condemned for
complicity in brutal crimes on evidence that could not be
gainsaid; and I have known them turn foul-mouthed, and hideous to
look upon, the moment after their just sentence has been
pronounced." "No doubt, monsieur," said Wethermill, with perfect
quietude. "But Celia Harland is not one of those women."

"I do not now say that she is," said Hanaud. "But the Juge
d'lnstruction here has already sent to me to ask for my
assistance, and I refused. I replied that I was just a good
bourgeois enjoying his holiday. Still it is difficult quite to
forget one's profession. It was the Commissaire of Police who came
to me, and naturally I talked with him for a little while. The
case is dark, monsieur, I warn you."