“I did not wake Monsieur,” she said, “for he was tired.”

She gave me another dose of the medicine, made me drink two cups of coffee, and then I started out with all despatch for the House of the Lions.  As I turned into the Rue Chartres I saw ahead of me four horses, with their bridles bunched and held by a negro lad, waiting in the street.  Yes, they were in front of the house.  There it was, with its solid green gates between the lions, its yellow walls with the fringe of peeping magnolias and oranges, with its green-latticed gallery from which Monsieur Auguste had let himself down after stealing the miniature.  I knocked at the wicket, the same gardienne answered the call, smiled, led me through the cool, paved archway which held in its frame the green of the court beyond, and up the stairs with the quaint balustrade which I had mounted five years before to meet Philippe de St. Gre.  As I reached the gallery Madame la Vicomtesse, gowned in brown linen for riding, rose quickly from her chair and came forward to meet me.

“You have news?” I asked, as I took her hand.

“I have the kind of news I expected,” she answered, a smile tempering the gravity of her face; “Auguste is, as usual, in need of money.”

“Then you have found them,” I answered, my voice betraying my admiration for the feat.

Madame la Vicomtesse shrugged her shoulders slightly.

“I did nothing,” she said.  “From what you told me, I suspected that as soon as Auguste reached Louisiana he would have a strong desire to go away again.  This is undoubtedly what has happened.  In any event, I knew that he would want money, and that he would apply to a source which has hitherto never failed him.”

“Mademoiselle Antoinette!” I said.

“Precisely,” answered Madame la Vicomtesse.  “When I reached home last night I questioned Antoinette, and I discovered that by a singular chance a message from Auguste had already reached her.”

“Where is he?” I demanded.

“I do not know,” she replied.  “But he will be behind the hedge of the garden at Les Iles at eleven o’clock—­unless he has lost before then his love of money.”

“Which is to say—­”

“He will be there unless he is dead.  That is why I sent for you, Monsieur.”  She glanced at me.  “Sometimes it is convenient to have a man.”

I was astounded.  Then I smiled, the affair was so ridiculously simple.

“And Monsieur de St. Gre?” I asked.

“Has been gone for a week with Madame to visit the estimable Monsieur Poydras at Pointe Coupee.”  Madame la Vicomtesse, who had better use for her words than to waste them at such a time, left me, went to the balcony, and began to give the gardienne in the court below swift directions in French.  Then she turned to me again.

“Are you prepared to ride with Antoinette and me to Les Iles, Monsieur?” she asked.

“I am,” I answered.