g light, the velvet-black pupils
spread out, and pushed the iris back to a thin margin; and thus they
varied, from gray or brown, to that liquid night, which Amidon now saw
in them, as he stepped within the doorway, and looked so long on her,
as she sat like a model for the Queen of the Jungle, that under other
circumstances the gaze would have seemed rude. Some sense of this,
breaking through his bewilderment, made him bow.

"Madame le Claire?" said he.

"The same," said she. "How can I serve you, sir?"

The voice, a soft contralto, was the complement of the steady regard of
the eyes. As she spoke, she rose and stepped toward him, down from the
little dais to the rug. She rose, not with the effort which marks the
act in most, but lightly, as a flower rises from the touch of a breeze.
She was tall and lithe, and all the curves of her figure were long and
low--once more suggesting the soft strength of the tigress. But when
speech parted the lips, the smile which overspread her face won him.

"How can I serve you, my friend?" she repeated.

"I am in great trouble," said he.

"Yes," she purred.

"I saw your sign," he went on. "And I want you to tell me where I have
been since June, 1896--and who is Eugene Brassfield? Did I kill
him--or only rob him? And who is Elizabeth?"

She had stepped close to him now, as if to catch the scent of some
disturbing influence which might account for such incoherence; but
Amidon's breath was innocent of taint.

"Yes!" said she, "I think we shall be able to tell you all. But, are
you well?"

"I have had no breakfast," said he. "When I found that I had lost five
years--I forgot. And--once--I fainted. I'm not quite--well, I'm
afraid!"

Madame le Claire stepped to the wall and pushed a button. The turbaned
Sudanese reappeared at once.

"Aaron," said she, "tell Professor Blatherwick that Mr.--Mr.----"

"Amidon," said Florian hastily--"Amidon is my name."

"--Amidon will dine with us," Madame le Clair continued smoothly. "He
has some very interesting things for us to look into. And have dinner
served at once."

Aaron! and dinner! and Blatherwick! The delicious vulgarity of the
names was sweet music. For be it remembered that Florian was a banker,
and a man of position; and sandalwood, Sudanese, Bedouins and illusions
were ill for the green wound of his mystery--which, in all conscience,
was bad enough in and of itself! Some confidence in the realities of
thin