It was perhaps natural, however, that his employes should have been made to feel that he was more Hugo than ever.  For a month he worked as he had never worked before, and three thousand five hundred people, perspiring under his glance and under the sun of a London August, knew exactly the reason why.  The intense dramatic and sentimental interest surrounding Camilla Payne’s disappearance from Department 42 was the sole thing which atoned to the legionaries for the inconvenience of Hugo’s mistimed activity.

Then suddenly he fell limp; he perceived the uselessness of this attempt to forget in Sloane Street, and he decided to try the banks of a certain trout-stream on Dartmoor.  He knew that with all the sun-glare of that season, and the water doubtless running a great deal too fine, he would be as likely to catch trout on Dartmoor as on the Thames Embankment; but he determined to go, and he announced his determination, and the entire personnel, from the managers to the sweepers, murmured privily, ’Thank Heaven!’

The moment came for the illustrious departure.  His electric coupe stood at his private door, and his own luggage and Simon Shawn’s luggage—­for Simon never entrusted his master to other hands—­lay on the roof of the coupe.  Simon, anxiously looking at his watch, chatted with the driver.  Hugo had been stopped on emerging from the lift by the chief accountant concerning some technical question.  At length he came out into the street.

‘Shaving it close, aren’t we, Simon?’ he remarked, and sprang into the vehicle, and Simon banged the door and sprang on to the box, and they seemed to be actually off, much to the relief of Simon, who wanted a holiday badly.

But they were not actually off.  At that very instant, as the driver pulled his lever, Albert Shawn came frantically into the scene from somewhere, and signalled the driver to wait.  Simon cursed his brother.

‘Mr. Hugo,’ Albert whispered, as he put his head into the coupe.

‘Well, my lad?’

’I suppose you’ve heard?  They’ve turned up again at the flat.  Yes, this morning.’

‘Who have turned up again?’

’That’s the point, sir.  Some of ’em.  And there’s been a funeral ordered.’

’A funeral?  Whose funeral?  From us?

’Yes, sir; but whose—­that’s another point.  You see, I’ve just run along to let you know how far I’ve got.  Not that you gave me any instructions.  But when I heard of a funeral—­’

‘Is it a man’s or a woman’s?’ Hugo demanded, thinking to himself:  ’I must keep calm.  I must keep calm.’

‘Don’t know, sir.’

‘But surely the order-book—­’

’No order for coffin, sir.  Merely the cortege; day after to-morrow; parties making their own arrangements at cemetery.  Brompton.’

‘And did none of the porters see who arrived at the flat this morning?’

’None of ’em knows enough to be sure, sir.’