Audrey thought: 

“Is this what we’re going on?  I thought it was a big yacht.”  And she had a qualm.

And then a bell rang twice, extremely sweet and mellow, somewhere on the yacht.  And Audrey was touched by the beauty of its tone.

“Two bells.  Nine o’clock,” said Mr. Gilman.  “Will you come aboard?  I’ll show you the way.”  He tripped down the gangway like a boy.  Behind could be heard the sailors giving one another directions about the true method of handling luggage.

Audrey had met Madame Piriac by sheer hazard in a corset shop in the Rue de la Chaussee-d’Antin.  The fugitive from justice had been obliged, in the matter of wardrobe, to begin life again on her arrival trunkless in Paris, and the business of doing so was not disagreeable.  Madame Piriac had greeted her with most affectionate warmth.  One of her first suggestions had been that Audrey should accompany her on a short yachting trip projected by Mr. Gilman.  She had said that though the excellent Gilman was her uncle, and her adored uncle, he was not her real uncle, and that therefore, of course, she was incapable of going unaccompanied, though she would hate to disappoint the dear man.  As for Monsieur Piriac, the destiny of France was in his hands, and the moment being somewhat critical, he would not quit the Ministry of Foreign Affairs without leaving a fixed telegraphic address.

On the next day Mr. Gilman and Madame Piriac had called on Audrey at the Hotel du Danube, and the invitation became formal.  It was pressing and flattering.  Why refuse it?  Mr. Gilman was obviously prepared to be her slave.  She accepted, with enthusiasm.  And she said to herself that in doing so she was putting yet another spoke in the wheel of the British police.  Immediately afterwards she learnt that Musa also had been asked.  Madame Piriac informed her, in reply to a sort of protest, that Musa’s first concert was postponed by the concert agency until the autumn.  “I never heard of that!” Audrey had cried.  “And why should you have heard of it?  Have you not been in England?” Madame Piriac had answered, a little surprised at Audrey’s tone.  Whereupon Audrey had said naught.  The chief point was that Musa could take a holiday without detriment to his career.  Moreover, Mr. Gilman, who possessed everything, possessed a marvellous violin, which he would put at the disposal of Musa on the yacht if Musa’s own violin had not been found in the meantime.  The official story was that Musa’s violin had been mislaid or lost on the Metropolitain Railway, and the fact that he had been to England somehow did not transpire at all.