he packed up and
made for Monte Carlo, or some other expensive place popularly supposed
to be a "pleasure-resort." As a matter of fact, he did not understand
pleasure, or what it means.

Finding him in this pensive attitude in the moonlit garden by the sea,
you might guess that he was sentimentalising over his past. He was
doing nothing of the sort. He was watching a small greyish-white object
the moon revealed on the roof of the railway station below, just within
the parapet. He knew it to be a pigeon that had escaped, wounded, from
the sportsmen in the enclosure. Late that afternoon he had seen the
poor creature fluttering. He wondered that the officials (at Monte
Carlo they clean up everything) had not seen it before and removed it.
He watched it, curious to know if it were still alive. He had a fancy
at the back of his head--that if the small body fluttered again he would
go back to his rooms, fetch a revolver, and give the _coup de grace_.
And he smiled as he played with the fancy, foreseeing the rush of
agitated officials that a revolver-shot in the gardens would instantly
bring upon him. It would be great fun, explaining; but the offence no
doubt would be punishable. By what? Banishment, probably.

He turned for a moment at the sound of a footstep, and was aware of his
man Louis.

"A telegram, sir."

"Eh? Now who in the world--Matters hasn't burnt down Meriton, I hope?"

He opened the telegram and walked with it to the nearest of the electric
lamps; read it, and stood pondering.

"Louis, when does the new night-express leave for Paris?"

"In twenty-five minutes, sir."

"Then I've a mind to catch it. Put up a travelling-suit in my bag.
I can get out of these clothes in the train. You had better pack the
rest, pay the bill, and follow to-morrow."

"If you wish it, sir. But if I may suggest--"

"Yes?"

"In twenty minutes I can do all that easily, and book the
sleeping-berths too. I suggest, sir, you will find it more comfortable,
having me on the train."

"Admirable man--hurry up, then!"

The admirable man saluted respectfully and retired "hurt," as they say
in the cricket reports. He never hurried; it was part of the secret by
which he was always punctual. At the station he even found time to
suggest that his master might wish to send a telegram, and to dispatch
it.

This was on Sunday. They reached London late on Monday evening, and
there--Louis having telegraphed from Paris--S