"He is in London. I have never seen him and I must certainly do so."
"In London?" I cried, a dozen conflicting thoughts crowding and
crushing into my mind.
"... It is the reason that we leave London to-night."
Then he had shut the door on me and was gone. I had known him less than
two hours. I was a man accustomed to rule, whose whole life was spent in
giving orders, and I lay down on my bed like a lamb without a further
question. And, what is more, I did exactly as Mr. Danjuro had said. I
fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
At a little after eight Mr. Danjuro and myself sat at dinner at the
Restaurant Mille Colonnes. Most people know that expensive and luxurious
home of epicures, with Nicholas, its stout and arrogant proprietor, and
M. Dulac, its famous chef.
We sat in the south gallery, at the extreme end, against the wall. The
electric lights in the roof above us had been extinguished, and our
table was lighted by candles in red shades. Indeed, we sat in a sort of
darkness which must have made us almost invisible to the other diners,
most of whom sat in the longer arm of the gallery at right angles to our
own.
We, on the contrary, could see everything. We could look over the gilded
rail into the hall of the restaurant below, and every detail of the
gallery on our own level was clear and distinct, though there was such
a towering erection of flowers and ferns in the centre of our table that
it obscured what would otherwise have been a perfect view.
I wore a low, turned-down collar and a dark flannel suit. Danjuro, also,
had changed his clothes, and, in some real but indefinite way, his
appearance. He wore a flannel suit and a straw hat, and also a necktie
which I suddenly spotted as that of my old college, Christ Church,
Oxford. But the extraordinary thing about him was that he seemed fifteen
years younger.
He had promised to explain at the "Mille Colonnes." As we began upon the
salted prawns and the stuffed olives he did so.
"You are now Mr. Johns, an Oxford tutor, Sir John. I am a young Japanese
gentleman, my own name will serve, whom you are coaching. We are going
into the country with this disguise. It is one which will easily account
for your being in the company of an Asiatic gentleman, and which you
will have no difficulty in sustaining."
It was, indeed, a simple and excellent plan for avoiding undue
curiosity. I said so, and then: "Now perhaps you will tell me where we
are going. I have my ideas...."
"We are going west," he answered gravely. "To Cornwall."
My heart beat fast. It was what I wanted him to say. "To the home of
Helzephron?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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