‘Show Madame Humbert in,’ I said, emphasising the name. [Illustration: “My visitor started as she heard her name, and threw up her veil with a gesture of astonishment and indignation.”] The secretary, who understood what was required of him, went out, and immediately returned with the visitor. ‘Madame Humbert,’ he announced with as much confidence as if the great Thérèse had intrusted him with her card. On the previous night Madame Humbert had enjoyed the superiority over me, I confess it. This morning the tables were turned, and I had brought off the first _coup_. My visitor started as she heard her name, and threw up her veil with a gesture of astonishment and indignation combined. ‘Madame Humbert!’ I cried, pretending to be equally surprised. Then, as the secretary retired, I added--‘This publicity, is it quite prudent, my dear madame?’ Thérèse gave me a glance in which I read something like fear, as she dropped into a seat. ‘But I don’t understand, Monsieur V----. I don’t know how that young man learned who I was.’ I shrugged my shoulders. ‘It is the business of my staff to penetrate mysteries, madame. But you may depend on my secretary’s discretion. It will be awkward if the police have followed you here, however. If M. Rattache were to learn that we had been in communication, I might be obliged to withdraw from the case.’ Madame Humbert clasped her hands in agitation. Her demeanour was no longer that of the cold, masterful woman who had conversed with me in Baron Y----’s smoking-room. ‘Listen, monsieur! Is it possible that you do not guess the object of my visit?’ ‘Unless it is to give me further instructions on the subject of your affair, no.’ Thérèse wrung her hands. ‘It is to tell you, on the contrary, that everything is lost. At the very moment that we were talking together, a real robber, unknown to me, was rifling my safe of everything!’ ‘You are serious, madame, I suppose?’ ‘Serious!’ It is impossible to describe the tragedy in her voice and air. ‘I tell you, monsieur, that I left Baron Y----’s within an hour of speaking to you. I drove straight home, went to the safe, opened it, and found inside a button and a centime.’ ‘Really!’ Madame Humbert gazed at me desperately. ‘You do not believe me, perhaps, monsieur? Yet I swear to you as a Christian woman--I swear as a mother--that there were two hundred millions of francs in that safe when I came to dine at Baron Y----’s.’ ‘I have not the least doubt of it, madame.’ ‘Then what do you suspect?’ ‘It is clear to me that you have been robbed since.’ ‘By whom?’ ‘By some one in your confidence, perhaps. Some one to whom you had confided the guardianship of this fund, in which his Royal Highness the ---- of ---- is so much interested.’ Madame Humbert glared at me in anger. ‘You are mocking me,’ she cried fiercely. ‘I came here to ask if you would undertake the recovery of this money from the thief.’