And the Breedes saw through him.  He must have confessed everything back at that table when he had felt so inscrutably buoyant.  Once in Paris they would have him arrested.  They might even have him put in irons before the ship landed.

And back in the steam-heated apartment lay that mutilated head, a sheer fabrication of papier-mache.  He wondered if Mrs. Cassidy had swept it out ... the head that had meant so much to him.  There was no hope any more.  If he were still free in Paris he would have one look at that tomb, and then ... well, he had had his day.

Two days later the little old steamer debarked many passengers in the harbour of Cherbourg, carelessly confiding them to a much littler and much older steamer that transported them to the actual land.  Among these were a feebly exploding father, a weak but faithful mother, and the swathed wrecks of the Demon and the flapper.

Then began a five-hour train-ride to the one-time capital of a famous upstart.  There was but little talk among the members of the party.  Bean kept grimly to himself because the only friendly member slept.  He studied her pale, drawn face.  She had indeed managed well, but his own downfall had thwarted her.  He was a nobody.  They were doubtless right in wanting to keep him from her.  Yet he would see that tomb, and at the earliest possible moment.

At eleven that night they reached the capital.  A dispiriting silence was maintained to the doors of a hotel.  The women drooped in chairs.  Breede acquainted the reception committee of a Paris hostelry with the party’s needs as to chambers.

Thereupon they discovered one of the party to be missing.  No one had seen him since entering.  They were excited by this, all but the flapper.

“I don’t blame him,” averred the flapper ...  “Tagging us!  You let him alone!  I shall perfectly not worry if he doesn’t come home all night.  Do you understand?  And when he does come—­”

“Not safe,” snapped Breede.  “King of Egypt, Napoleon ... not after money, just principle of thing.  Chap’s nutty—­talk’n’ like that!”

“Good night!” snapped the flapper in her turn.

XV

He had walked quickly away while porters were collecting the bags.  “Keep on the main street,” he thought, plunging ahead.  He did not change this plan until he discovered himself again at the door of that hotel he meant to leave.  It faced a circle, and he had traversed this.  He fled down a cross-street and again felt free.

For hours he walked the lighted avenues, or sat moodily on wayside benches, and at length, on a rustic seat screened by shrubbery in a little park, he dozed.

He awoke in the early light, stretched legs and arms luxuriously and again walked.  He saw it was five o’clock.  He was thrilled now by the morning beauty of the Corsican’s city, all gray and green in the flooding sun.  And the streets had filled with a voluble traffic that affected him pleasantly.  Every one seemed to speak gayly to every one.  Two cab-drivers exchanged swift incivilities, but in a quite perfunctory way, with evident good-will.