nobody's secret to guard but your own, in saying whether or not you ever
knew a Madame or Mademoiselle Duval; and if you have some reason for not
getting me the information I am instructed to obtain, that is also a
reason for not troubling you further. And after all, old boy" (with a
familiar slap on Lebeau's stately shoulder), "after all, it is I who
would employ you; you don't employ me. And if you find out the lady, it
is you who would get the L100., not I."

M. Lebeau mechanically brushed, with a light movement of hand, the
shoulder which the Englishman had so pleasantly touched, drew himself and
chair some inches back, and said slowly,--

"Monsieur Lamb, let us talk as gentleman to gentleman. Put aside the
question of money altogether; I must first know why your employer wants
to hunt out this poor Louise Duval. It may be to her injury, and I would
do her none if you offered thousands where you offer pounds. I forestall
the condition of mutual confidence; I own that I have known her,--it is
many years ago; and, Monsieur Lamb, though a Frenchman very often injures
a woman from love, he is in a worse plight for bread and cheese than I am
if he injures her for money."

"Is he thinking of the duchess's jewels?" thought Graham. "Bravo, mon
vieux," he said aloud; "but as I don't know what my employer's motive in
his commission is, perhaps you can enlighten me. How could his inquiry
injure Louise Duval?"

"I cannot say; but you English have the power to divorce your wives.
Louise Duval may have married an Englishman, separated from him, and he
wants to know where he can find, in order to criminate and divorce her,
or it may be to insist on her return to him."