"Very well, sir," he answered. I sat back, hiding my face in a newspaper for fear of being recognised in that great highway of business, while he went along Austin Friars to endeavour to discover whose offices she had entered. Some ten minutes later he returned with the information that the lady had entered the office of a moneylender named Morrison. The thought occurred to me that she was perhaps still endeavouring to raise the loan for Prince Ferdinand. If so, however, why had she left the _Bath Hotel_ and endeavoured to conceal her identity under another name? After twenty minutes or so she came out rather flushed and excited, stood for a moment in hesitation upon the kerb, and then giving her cabman an address was driven off. I, of course, followed, but judge my astonishment when the cab pulled up in Old Broad Street and she alighted at Winchester House. After a few moments she found the brass plate bearing my name, and ascending to my office, for what purpose I knew not, and, fearing to reveal my presence in London, I could not ascertain. I sat there in the cab in full view of that row of windows, with their wire blinds bearing my name, an exile and a fugitive, wondering what might be the object of her visit. It was not, however, of long duration, but when she descended again she was accompanied by my secretary Gedge, who handed her into her cab and afterwards took his seat beside her. By his manner it was evident they were not strangers, and it became impressed upon me that, in those lost days of mine, I must have had considerable dealings with her and her princely employer. They drove to the Liverpool Street Railway-Station, where she dispatched a telegram; then they lunched at Crosby Hall. I feared, of courser to approach them sufficiently near to overhear their conversation, but I peered into the restaurant and saw them sitting at a table in earnest conversation, the subject of which was evidently myself. It was a wearisome task waiting for her in Bishopsgate Street, but I lunched in a neighbouring public-house off a glass of sherry and a biscuit, while my cabman partook gladly of the homely "half-pint" at my expense, until at length they both came forth. Gedge called her a cab, and then took leave of her, while I followed her back to the _Midland_, having successfully accomplished my first essay at watching her movements. CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT. TWO WORDS. For two days the woman I was watching did not go out. I learnt from the chambermaid who, like all her class, was amenable to half a sovereign in her palm, that she was unwell, suffering from a slight cold. Then I took the servant into my confidence, and told her that I was in the hotel in order to watch Mrs Slade's movements, giving her to understand that any assistance she rendered me would be well paid for.