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It was my attempt to bring her to a more rational state of mind that caused us to review the dead man's career, and recapitulate the unpleasing incidents of the last interview. Of Captain Vauvenarde, no more. He has gone whither I am going. That his soul may rest in peace is my earnest prayer. But I do not wish to meet him.
I see him taking leave of Lola Brandt, and trotting magnificently out of the room bent on finding Captain Vauvenarde. He haunts my slumbers. I hope to goodness he will not take to haunting this delectable hotel. I wonder, after all, whether there is any method in his madness for mad he is, as mad as can be. Why does he come backwards and forwards between Algiers and Marseilles?
Even the stolid Saupiquet, dragged from Toulon, gave evidence as to the five-franc bribe and the debt of fifteen sous, and identified the horse Sultan by the crumpled photograph. Lola and I have been racked day after day with questions some, indeed, prompted by the suspicion that Vauvenarde might have met his death directly by our hand instead of that of Anastasius.
In a flash he struck a new gesture; he folded his arms and scowled. "I was with her. She was opening her inmost heart to me. She knows I am her champion. A servant came up announcing Monsieur Vauvenarde. She dismissed me. I have come to my patron and friend, the English statesman. Her husband is with her now." I smiled. "Madame Brandt told me that she had asked for an interview."
A man does not resign from his regiment and within a year or two disappear like a ghost from the ken of every one of his brother officers. I read the letter again. Did the severance of connection mean the casting out of a black sheep from their midst? I came to the conclusion that it did. They had washed their hands of Captain Vauvenarde, and desired to hear nothing of him in the future.
He laughed, suggested exercise, the Briton's panacea for all ills, and took me for a walk. I viewed our pursuit of Captain Vauvenarde in its right aspect that of a veritable Snark-Hunt of which I was the Bellman and the name "Lola" curled itself round my heart with the same grateful sensation of comfort as the warm China tea. After all, it was only as Lola that I thought of her.
When I told Agatha, she nearly fainted. No sooner had I moved into Barbara's Building and was preparing to begin my salaried duties than I received news which sent me off post haste to Berlin. And just as it was not I but Anastasius Papadopoulos who discovered Captain Vauvenarde, so, in this case, it was Dale who discovered Lola.
Eventually the poor little wretch was led away in custody, proud and smiling, entirely convinced that he was leading his captors to the arrest of Captain Vauvenarde. On the threshold he turned and bowed to us so low that the brim of his silk hat touched the floor. Then Lola's nerve gave way and she broke into a passion of awful weeping.
The weeks grew into months, during which, for the sake of a livelihood, she fulfilled her professional engagements in many other towns. At last, when she returned to Marseilles, it became apparent that Captain Vauvenarde had no intention whatever of acknowledging her openly as his wife. Hence many tears.
"It has always been a pleasure to me," said I very frigidly, "to place my services at the disposal of Madame Brandt." "Vauvenarde, Monsieur," he corrected with a smile. "And is Madame Vauvenarde equally satisfied with the reconciliation?" I asked. "I think Monsieur Vauvenarde is somewhat premature," said Lola, with a trembling lip. "There were conditions " "A mere question of protocol."
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