es murmured together in quick, excited tones. They scented
that something really exciting, something that would perhaps lead to
promotion, was going to happen.

At last, as the carriage turned into a dark road, Count Paul suddenly
began to talk, at the very top of his voice.

"Speak, Mr. Chester, speak as loud as you can! Shout! Say anything that
you like! They may as well hear that we are coming--"

But Chester could not do what the other man so urgently asked him to do.
Not to save his life could he have opened his mouth and shouted as the
other was now doing.

"We are going to pay an evening call--what you in England call an evening
call! We are going to fetch our friend--our friend, Mrs. Bailey; she is
so charming, so delightful! We are going to fetch her because she has
been spending the evening with her friends, the Wachners. That old
she-devil--you remember her, surely? The woman who asked you concerning
your plans? It is she I fear--"

"_Je crois que c'est ici, Monsieur?_" the man turned round on his seat.
"I have done it in six minutes!"

The horse was suddenly brought up short opposite the white gate. Was this
where the Wachners lived? Chester stooped down. The place looked very
different now from what it had looked in the daylight.

The windows of the small, low house were closely shuttered, but where the
shutters met in one of the rooms glinted a straight line of light.

"We are in time. Thank God we are in time," said the Count, with a queer
break in his voice. "If we were not in time, there would be no light. The
house of the wicked ones would be in darkness."

And then, in French, he added, turning to the gendarmes:

"You had better all three stay in the garden, while my friend and I go up
to the house. If we are gone more than five minutes, then you follow us
up to the house and get in somehow!"

In varying accents were returned the composed answers, "_Oui, M'sieur._"

There came a check, for the little gate was locked. Each man helped
another over very quietly, and then the three gendarmes dispersed with
swift, noiseless steps, each seeking a point of vantage commanding the
house.

Chester and Paul de Virieu walked quickly up the path.

Suddenly a shaft of bright light pierced the moonlit darkness. The
shutters of the dining-room of the Chalet des Muguets had been unbarred,
and the window was thrown wide open.

"_Qui va la?_" the old military watchword, as the Frenchman remembered
with