"He is worthy of his employer," I replied.

Colonel Menendez bowed in his cavalierly fashion and Madame de Staemer
positively beamed upon me.

"You shall speak for him," said the Spaniard. "He was with me in Cuba,
but has no reputation in London. There are hotels that would snap him
up."

I looked at the speaker in surprise.

"Surely he is not leaving you?" I asked.

The Colonel exhibited a momentary embarrassment.

"No, no. No, no," he replied, waving his hand gracefully, "I was only
thinking that he--" there was a scarcely perceptible pause--"might wish
to better himself. You understand?"

I understood only too well; and recollecting the words spoken by Paul
Harley that afternoon, respecting the Colonel's will to live, I became
conscious of an uncomfortable sense of chill.

If I had doubted that in so speaking he had been contemplating his own
death, the behaviour of Madame de Staemer must have convinced me. Her
complexion was slightly but cleverly made up, with all the exquisite
art of the Parisienne, but even through the artificial bloom I saw her
cheeks blanch. Her face grew haggard and her eyes burned unnaturally.
She turned quickly aside to address Paul Harley, but I knew that the
significance of this slight episode had not escaped him.