“If there were,” he said, with a little show of mock gallantry, “a very jealously-guarded secret might escape me.  I think you will be quite all right here,” he continued.  “It is an open thoroughfare, and I see two policemen at the corner.  Hassell, my chauffeur, too, is a reliable fellow.  We will be back within the hour.”

“We?” she repeated.

He indicated a man who had silently made his appearance during the conversation and was standing waiting on the sidewalk.

“Just a companion.  I do not advise you to wait.  If you insist —­au revoir!”

Lady Cynthia leaned back in a corner of the car.

Through half-closed eyes she watched the two men on their way down the crowded thoroughfare—­Sir Timothy tall, thin as a lath, yet with a certain elegance of bearing; the man at his side shorter, his hands thrust into the pockets of his coat, his manner one of subservience.  She wondered languidly as to their errand in this unsavoury neighbourhood.  Then she closed her eyes altogether and wondered about many things.

Sir Timothy and his companion walked along the crowded, squalid street without speech.  Presently they turned to the right and stopped in front of a public-house of some pretensions.

“This is the place?” Sir Timothy asked.

“Yes, sir!”

Both men entered.  Sir Timothy made his way to the counter, his companion to a table near, where he took a seat and ordered a drink.  Sir Timothy did the same.  He was wedged in between a heterogeneous crowd of shabby, depressed but apparently not ill-natured men and women.  A man in a flannel shirt and pair of shabby plaid trousers, which owed their precarious position to a pair of worn-out braces, turned a beery eye upon the newcomer.

“I’ll ’ave one with you, guvnor,” he said.

“You shall indeed,” Sir Timothy assented.

“Strike me lucky but I’ve touched first time!” the man exclaimed.  “I’ll ’ave a double tot of whisky,” he added, addressing the barman.  “Will it run to it, guvnor?”

“Certainly,” was the cordial reply, “and the same to your friends, if you will answer a question.”

“Troop up, lads,” the man shouted.  “We’ve a toff ’ere.  He ain’t a ’tec—­I know the cut of them.  Out with the question.”

“Serve every one who desires it with drinks,” Sir Timothy directed the barman.  “My question is easily answered.  Is this the place which a man whom I understand they call Billy the Tanner frequents?”

The question appeared to produce an almost uncomfortable sensation.  The enthusiasm for the free drinks, however, was only slightly damped, and a small forest of grimy hands was extended across the counter.

“Don’t you ask no questions about ’im, guvnor,” Sir Timothy’s immediate companion advised earnestly.  “He’d kill you as soon as look at you.  When Billy the Tanner’s in a quarrelsome mood, I’ve see ’im empty this place and the whole street, quicker than if a mad dog was loose.  ’E’s a fair and ’oly terror, ’e is.  ’E about killed ’is wife, three nights ago, but there ain’t a living soul as ’d dare to stand in the witness-box about it.”