III

DANGER SIGNALS

That evening, I called upon my friend--Mr. F. W. Wareham, of Wimbledon,
and Ethelburge House, Bishopsgate Street--and laid before him the legal
points. I afterwards arranged to see him on the following morning in
town, when I hoped to fix a meeting between him and M. Zola. My first
call on Thursday, July 21, was made to the Grosvenor Hotel, where I found
both the master and M. Desmoulin in a state of anxiety. M. Zola, for his
part, felt altogether out of his element. After the excitement of his
trial and his journey to England, and the novelty of finding himself
stranded in a strange city, a kind of reaction had set in and he was
extremely depressed.

M. Desmoulin on his side, having procured several morning newspapers, had
explored their columns to ascertain whether the ladies by whom the master
had been recognised in the street on the previous day, had by any chance
noised the circumstance abroad. However, the Press was still on the
Norway and Holland scents, and as yet not a paper so much as suggested M.
Zola's presence in England.

'There has hardly been time,' said Desmoulin to me, 'but there will
probably be something fresh this afternoon. Those actresses are certain
to tell people, and we shall have to make ourselves scarce.'

I tried to cheer and tranquillise both him and M. Zola, and then arranged
that Wareham should come to the hotel at 2 P.M. Meantime, said I,
whatever M. Desmoulin might do, it would be as well for M. Zola to remain
indoors. Several commissions were entrusted to me, and I went off,
promising to return about noon.

I betook myself first to Messrs. Chatto and Windus's in St. Martin's
Lane, where I arrived a few minutes before ten o'clock. Neither Mr.
Chatto nor his partner, Mr. Percy Spalding, had as yet arrived, and I
therefore had to wait a few minutes. When Mr. Spalding made his
appearance he greeted me with a smile, and while leading the way to his
private room exclaimed, 'So our friend Zola is in London!'

To describe my amazement is beyond my powers. I could only gasp, 'How do
you know that?'

'Why, my wife saw him yesterday in Buckingham Palace Road.'

I was confounded. For my part I had scarcely glanced at the ladies whom
Desmoulin had conjectured to be French actresses--simply because they
were young, prepossessing, and spoke French!--and certainly I should not
readily have recognised Mrs. Spalding, whom I had only met once