"The p-p-policemen! The p-p-policemen!" stammered Saint-Quintin. "There they are! They're examining the Rifle-Range!"

"And d'Estreicher is with them," observed the young girl.

"Oh, Dorothy, what have you done?"

"It's all the same to me," she said, wholly unmoved. "These people have a secret which perhaps belongs to me as much as to them. I wish to know it. Excitement, sensations, all that works in my favor."

"Nevertheless...."

"Pipe, Saint-Quentin. Today decides my future. Instead of trembling, rejoice ... a fox-trot, old chap!"

She threw an arm round his waist, and propping him up like a tailor's dummy with wobbly legs, she forced him to turn; climbing in at the window, Castor and Pollux, followed by Captain Montfaucon, started to dance round the couple, chanting the air of the Capucine, first in the drawing-room, then across the large hall. But a fresh failure of Saint-Quentin's legs dashed the spirits of the dancers.

Dorothy lost her temper.

"What's the matter with you now?" she cried, trying to raise him and keep him upright.

He stuttered:

"I'm afraid ... I'm afraid."

"But why on earth are you afraid? I've never seen you in such a funk. What are you afraid of?"

"The jewels...."

"Idiot! But you've thrown them into the clump!"

"No."

"You haven't?"

"No."

"But where are they then?"

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