asked, “to go to a place which would be terribly empty?”
“I think that would be marvellous,” Jeannine assented.
“It is a little matter which concerns Roger and me more,” Thornton said, looking across at his friend, “but before I leave, I should like to pay one more visit to that quaint place, the Hôtel du Soleil. I wonder whether you would care to risk it—go up there and demand lunch? They can’t do more than refuse us, and if they do, it won’t take us more than twenty minutes to get anywhere.”
“It is certainly an idea,” Roger admitted. “I don’t know what they’ll say to us. Sam, the barman, has practically warned me off the premises! And I’m perfectly certain, at times, at any rate, there are some queer goings-on there. I think perhaps it would be better if we went one day when Jeannine wasn’t with us.”
“Sunday seemed to me such a good day,” Thornton persisted, “because they must have customers for drinks, at any rate, and next Sunday I sha’n’t be here.”
“If you wish to go,” Jeannine said, “I do not mind in the least.”
“I must tell you,” Thornton explained. “Mr. Sloane and I have different ideas about the place. I’ve been there and found it a very ordinary sort of show. He has half an idea, I believe, that it’s a perfect hotbed of crime. I should like to disabuse his mind of that idea, but if either of you have the slightest objection, why, I’ll take you anywhere you like.”
“I think it is quite reasonable, what Mr. Thornton says,” Jeannine approved. “If you go to-day, and all is as it should be, you will not worry about the place any more. If I go too, there will be one more to watch.”
“That settles it,” Roger agreed. “We lunch at the Hôtel du Soleil. Do you mind calling back at the Paris for a moment?”
Thornton smiled.
“Ridiculous,” he murmured, “but I had the same idea.”
Roger descended from his room about a quarter of an hour later to find Thornton at the desk. The latter held out a letter which he had just written.
Major Thornton, Mr. Roger Sloane and Mademoiselle Jeannine are lunching at the Hôtel du Soleil just below the Corniche. As they have some suspicions about the place, Mr. Sloane would be obliged if the Direction will communicate with the police and send some gendarmes up to the place if they have not returned by four o’clock.
“I’m going to give this to the concierge,” Thornton explained, “tell him to keep it before him, and if we have not returned by five minutes to four, to open it and act according to its instructions.”
“It’s a perfectly sound idea,” Roger agreed, “but somehow or other, I think that two of us—I suppose that you went to your room for the same purpose as I did—will be perfectly well able to deal with anything that may happen.”
“In my profession,” Thornton remarked, as they went out to rejoin Jeannine, “we learn to leave nothing to chance.”
Roger was conscious of a genuine thrill of interest, if not of excitement, when he pushed open the door of the bar of the Hôtel du Soleil. It had changed in no respect since his last visit. Two young men, whose cycles were leaning against the wall outside, were drinking beer at one of the small tables. There was not another soul in the room except Sam, who greeted them a little surlily.
“It doesn’t seem a bit of good telling you fellows that we’re closed,” he remarked. “I have to serve you if you come in, and then I catch it from the Governor.”
“Don’t you worry, Sam,” Roger enjoined cheerily. “Now that the bad weather’s gone, you’ll have so many customers you won’t want to close. What about showing us the best you can do in the way of Dry Martinis?”
The man sighed and began to juggle with the bottles. He might have been just as anxious as he seemed to discourage clients, but he was too great an artist to mix a bad cocktail. They sipped them with genuine approval.
“What about a little lunch for the three of us in the restaurant?” Thornton suggested.
The shock did not seem to be so great as they had feared. Sam sighed resignedly and lifted the flap of the counter.
“There’s two or three staying in the hotel. There might be some sort of a meal. I’ll enquire.”
He disappeared down the passage. Thornton looked around the place carefully.
“Seems all right,” he observed.
“It certainly does,” Roger confessed.
Jeannine shook her head.
“It is a bad place,” she declared. “I don’t know why, but it is. I feel it all the time. When we have had lunch, if they give us any, I shall be glad to get away. I do not trust that barman.”
“Well, he’s rude enough to be honest at any rate,” Thornton remarked.
Sam returned in a moment or two, followed by a maître d’hôtel. The latter bowed to his prospective clients and displayed none of his companion’s churlishness.
“Very good luncheon just ready, lady and gentlemen,” he announced. “Trout, caught near here, or an omelette, if you wish. Baby lamb or chicken and fruit.”
“Ready now?” Thornton asked.
“Ready this moment.”
“We’ll come right along.”
They followed their guide along the passage and into a plainly decorated but sufficiently attractive-looking restaurant. Two men in golfing attire were already lunching, also a man and a woman. They took their places at a corner table.
“So far,” Thornton declared, as he took up the list and ordered some wine, “I don’t see why you two have the creeps about this place.”
“It isn’t creeps with me,” Roger protested. “I’ve told you just what actually happened, and we know for a fact, at any rate, that the beginning of that Nice drama took place here.”
The trout arrived without undue delay and was certainly excellent. The baby lamb which followed was equally good. A sweet omelette which the maître d’hôtel offered personally was excellent. No fault could be found with the wine.
“Could we take our coffee out in the garden?” Thornton enquired.
“Wherever Monsieur wishes.”
They looked about them with curiosity as they passed through the hall. There were several bags of golf clubs there and at least half a dozen fishing rods. They passed out into the garden, brilliant with flowers, and strolled along one of the paths.
“Tell me now,” Thornton begged, “do you see anything suspicious about the place?”
“Not a thing,” Roger admitted.
They explored the garden thoroughly, then they returned to their coffee, and the two men each drank a Fine. Afterwards they strolled around the garage. Through the windows, which were quite unprotected, they could see the lilac-coloured car of Monsieur Pierre Viotti and another slightly smaller Fiat. Jeannine looked at the former with a shiver.
“That man is here,” she declared.
They looked simultaneously towards the upper portion of the hotel. There were no particular signs of life about the place, but the shutters of every room were thrown open.
“Any one staying here?” Thornton asked the waiter, who had just appeared with the bill.
“Pretty well as many as we can take care of, sir,” the man replied. “We have three golfing gentlemen, a pêcheur and two artists. A fine day like this every one does not come back to lunch. If they wish, we pack it and they take it with them.”
“A very reasonable arrangement. Is Mr. Viotti here to-day?”