Rolfe, with a Londoner's tolerance for foreign ignorance, painstakingly explained the difference. She looked so puzzled that he felt sure she did not understand him. But that, he reflected, was not his fault. "So you see, mademoiselle, my business with Mrs. Holymead is important, therefore I'll be obliged if you will tell me where I can find her," he said. "In what part of the country is she?" Mademoiselle Chiron looked distressed. "Really, monsieur, I cannot tell you. She is motoring, and I should have been with her but that I have _un gros rhume"_--she produced a tiny scrap of lace handkerchief and held it to her nose as though in support of her statement--"and she rings me on the telephone from different places and tells me the things she does need, and I do send them on to her." "Where does she ring you up from?" asked Rolfe, eyeing Mademoiselle Chiron's handkerchief intently. "From Brighton--from Eastbourne--wherever she stops." "What place was she stopping at when you heard from her last?" "Eastbourne, monsieur." "And when will she return here?" "That, monsieur, I do not know. To-night--to-morrow--next week--she does not tell me. If Monsieur will leave me a message I will see that she gets it, for it is always me she wants, and it is always me that talks to her. What shall I tell her when next she rings the telephone? If Monsieur will state his business I will tell Madame what he tells me. I am Madame's cousin by marriage--in me she has confidence." She spoke in a tone which invited confidence, but Rolfe was not prepared to go to the length of trusting the young woman he saw before him, despite her assurance that she was in the confidence of Mrs. Holymead. He rose to his feet with a keen glance at Mademoiselle Chiron's handkerchief, which she had rolled into a little ball in her hand. "I cannot disclose my business to you, mademoiselle," he said courteously. "I must see Mrs. Holymead personally, so I shall call again when she has returned." "But, monsieur, why will you not tell me?" she asked coaxingly. "You are a police agent? Have you therefore come to see Madame about the case?" Rolfe showed that he was taken aback by the direct question. "The case!" he stammered. "What case?" "Why, monsieur, what case should it be but that of which I have so often heard Madame speak? Le judge--the good friend of Monsieur and Madame Holymead, who was killed by the base assassin! Madame is disconsolate about his terrible end!" Mademoiselle Chiron here applied the handkerchief to her eyes on her own account. "Have you come to tell her that you have caught the wicked man who did assassinate him? Madame will be overjoyed!" "Why, hardly that," replied Rolfe, completely off his guard. "But we're on the track, mademoiselle--we're on the track." "And is it that you wanted me to tell Madame?" persisted Mademoiselle Chiron.