Wilson Barrett.  Then there was Clothilde, whose tragical story I have already unfolded; Lucy Crooks, who threw me over for this dear, amiable, wooden-headed stockjobbing Latimer; X, Y and Z—­but here, let me remark, I was the hunted—­mammas spread nets for me which by the grace of heaven and the ungraciousness of the damsels I escaped; and, lastly, my incomparable Eleanor Faversham.  Now, I thought, am I safe in harbour?  If ever a match could have been labelled “Pure heaven-made goods, warranted not to shrink”—­that was one.  But for this rupture there is an all-accounting reason.  For the others there was none.  I vow I went on falling in love until I grew absolutely sick and tired of the condition.  You see, the vocabulary of the pastime is so confoundedly limited.  One has to say to B what one has said to A; to C exactly what one has said to A and B; and when it comes to repeating to F the formularies one has uttered to A, B, C, D and E one grows almost hysterical with the boredom of it.  That was the delightful charm of Eleanor Faversham; she demanded no formularies or re-enactment of raptures.

The Annuaire Officiel de l’Armee Francaise has arrived.  It is a volume of nearly eighteen hundred pages, and being uncut both at top and bottom and at the side it is peculiarly serviceable as a work of reference.  I attacked it bravely, however, hacking my way into it, paperknife in hand.  But to my dismay, the more I hacked the less could I find of Captain Vauvenarde.  I sought him in the Alphabetical Repertory of Colonial Troops, in the list of officers hors cadre, in the lists of seniority, in the list of his regiment, wherever he was likely or unlikely to be.  There is no person in the French army by the name of Vauvenarde.

I went straight to Lola Brandt with the hideous volume and the unwelcome news.  Together we searched the pages.

“He must be here,” she said, with feminine disregard of fact.

“Are you quite certain you have got the name right?” I asked.

“Why, it is my own name!”

“So it is,” said I; “I was forgetting.  But how do you know he was in the army at all?”

He might have been an adventurer, a Captain of Kopenick of the day, who had poured a gallant but mendacious tale into her ears.

“I hardly ever saw him out of uniform.  He was quartered at Marseilles on special duty.  I knew some of his brother officers.”

“Then,” said I, “there are only two alternatives.  Either he has left the army or he is——­”

“Dead?” she whispered.

“Let us hope,” said I, “that he has left the army.”

“You must find out, Mr. de Gex,” she said in a low voice.  “I took it for granted that my husband was alive.  It’s horrible to think that he may be dead.  It alters everything, somehow.  Until I know, I shall be in a state of awful suspense.  You’ll make inquiries at once, won’t you?”

“Did you love your husband, Madame Brandt?” I asked.