The Washington herald., 1913-12-21

him. The diner in front of me was
the Mountaineering man; / should
i have recognized him at once had moi
evening dress wrought such a change
in him. That whispered sentence made
assurance doubly sure. The party with
whom l was dining had themselves
! been struck by the appearance of the
lady in the white frock, with the dia-
mond star in her hair and the pink
roses arranged so daintily in the cor
sage of her dress. There had been a
laughing discussion about who was the
nicest-looking person in the room
more than one opinion had supported
the claim of the lady with the dia-
mond star.
In the middle OF that dinner ! found
; myself all at once in a quandary,
owing to that very inconvenient gift
of mine. / recalled the whisper about
the lady III the mauve dress, and how
the very next day the body of a lady
so attired had been found on the
Brighton line Was the whispered al
fusion to the lady in the white dress
to have similar unpleasant sequel? If
there was fear of anything of the
kind, what was / to do?
My friends, noticing my distractions,
rallied me on my inattention.
Just then | saw some one advanc-
ing across the room whom / knew at
once in spite of the alteration which
evening dress made in hint was
the big, burly man in the red-brown
suit
The big man, not, apparently, ac-
knowledging the existence of the soli-
tary diner, passed his table, seemingly
by the mereSt chance, in the course OF
his passage toward another on the
other side of the room. With a NOR
way between the plate and his mouth,
/ former words:
white dress, star in her hair, pink
roses over left breast. Tonight"
The big man had passed, the morsel
of food had entered the diners mouth !;
nothing seemed to have happened, yet
| | was on the point of springing to my
feet and electrifying the gayly-dressed
crowd by crying, MURDER
More than once afterward | wished
I had done so. As a matter of fact,
1 did nothing at all.
| The lady in the white dress. with
her party, left early. l should have
| liked to give her some hint, some
warning-I did neither: | just let her
60 As she went across the room one
or two members of our party toasted
her under their breath. The solitary
diner took no heed OF her whatever.
l had been furtively watching him the
whole time, and he never once glanced
in her direction. So far as | saw,
1 l. ,L-1xI.I l., .t,an
he scarcely raised his eyes from the
table.
The following morning I travelled
by the early boat-train to Dover. When
the train had left the station l looked
| at my Telegraph. | read a good deal
of it; then, at the top of column on
one of the inside pages, | came upon
| paragraph headed: Mysterious af-
fair at the Embankment Hotel" Not
very long after midnight-in time, it
seemed, to reach the paper before it
went to press-the body of a young
woman had been found in the court
yard OF the hotel She was in her
night attire. She was recognized as
one of the guests who had been stay
ing in the hotel; she had either fallen
or been thrown out of her bedroom
window
What did that paragraph mean?
Could the woman who had been found
in her night attire in the courtyard
of the Embankment Hotel be the
| woman who had worn the white dress
and diamond star in her pretty brown
hair? There was nothing to show that
she was. There was nothing TO con-
meet that lightly-clothed body with the
| L Z IL II.
with a touch of the Mongol in his
face; vet | wondered if it were not
my duty to return at once to London
and tell my story. But, after all, it
was such a silly story: it amounted to
nothing; it proved nothing. Those peo-
pie were waiting for me in Paris.
So | went on 10 Paris, and, with
them, nearly round the world; and
can say, without eXaggeration, that
more than once that curious looking
gentleman's face seemed to have gone
with me.
More than two years elapsed. In
the summer of the third ] went to
Buxton, as 1 had gone to Brighton, for
rest. l was seated one morning in
the public gardens, with my thoughts
on the other side of the world, until
presently I became aware that under
the shade of tree on my left a man
was sitting alone. When l saw his
face my thoughts came back with a
rush; it was the man who had been on
the pier at Brighton, and at the En-
bankment Hotel, and who had Travelled
with me round the world He was
dressed in a cool gray suit; as at
Brighton, he had a flower in his but
tonhole.
Then the familiar comedy, which
believe l had rehearsed in my dreams,
began again. A man came down the
path from behind me, passing before
/ had seen his face, and under the
shady tree paused for an instant to
light a cigarette, and l saw the lips
of the man on the chair forming
words:
Gray dress, lace scarf, Panama
hat: five-fve train"
His lips framed those nine words
only; then the man with the cigarette
passed on, and 1 really do believe that
my heart stood still. l waited for the
action to continue-not very long. In
the distance l saw a big, burly person
threading his way among the people |
toward that shady tree, and l knew
what was coming. He did not pause
even for a single instant, he Just went
slowly by, within foot or the chair,
and the thin lips shaped themselves