‘Natalie! here I am.  Come here!  This way!’ She turned upon me in the greatest excitement.  ‘My maid!’ she cried.  ’She is looking for me.  She passed the window without seeing me.  Go, please, and bring her back.’  She continued pointing out of the door and beckoning me with her other hand.  There certainly was something about that woman’s tone which made one jump.  When she was giving orders you had no chance to think of anything else.  So I rushed out on my errand of mercy, and then rushed back again to ask what the maid looked like.

“‘In black,’ she answered, rising and blocking the door of the compartment.  ‘All in black, with a bonnet!’

“The train waited three minutes at Arles, and in that time I suppose I must have rushed up to over twenty women and asked, ’Are you Natalie?’ The only reason I wasn’t punched with an umbrella or handed over to the police was that they probably thought I was crazy.

“When I jumped back into the compartment the Princess was seated where I had left her, but her eyes were burning with happiness.  She placed her hand on my arm almost affectionately, and said, in a hysterical way, ’You are very kind to me.  I am so sorry to have troubled you.’

“I protested that every woman on the platform was dressed in black.

“‘Indeed, I am so sorry,’ she said, laughing; and she continued to laugh until she began to breathe so quickly that I thought she was going to faint.

“I can see now that the last part of that journey must have been a terrible half-hour for her.  She had the cigar-case safe enough, but she knew that she herself was not safe.  She understood if I were to open my bag, even at the last minute, and miss the case, I would know positively that she had taken it.  I had placed the diamonds in the bag at the very moment she entered the compartment, and no one but our two selves had occupied it since.  She knew that when we reached Marseilles she would either be twenty thousand pounds richer than when she left Paris, or that she would go to jail.  That was the situation as she must have read it, and I don’t envy her her state of mind during that last half-hour.  It must have been hell.

“I saw that something was wrong, and, in my innocence, I even wondered if possibly my cognac had not been a little too strong.  For she suddenly developed into a most brilliant conversationalist, and applauded and laughed at everything I said, and fired off questions at me like a machine-gun, so that I had no time to think of anything but of what she was saying.  Whenever I stirred, she stopped her chattering and leaned toward me, and watched me like a cat over a mouse-hole.  I wondered how I could have considered her an agreeable travelling-companion.  I thought I would have preferred to be locked in with a lunatic.  I don’t like to think how she would have acted if I had made a move to examine the bag, but as I had it safely strapped around me again, I did not open it, and I reached Marseilles alive.  As we drew into the station she shook hands with me and grinned at me like a Cheshire cat.