“No, not that, sir. But since then I’ve remembered what the young gentlemen”⁠—John and Lawrence were still the “young gentlemen” to Dorcas⁠—“call the ‘dressing-up box.’ It’s up in the front attic, sir. A great chest, full of old clothes and fancy dresses, and whatnot. And it came to me sudden like that there might be a green dress amongst them. So, if you’d tell the Belgian gentleman⁠—”

“I will tell him, Dorcas,” I promised.

“Thank you very much, sir. A very nice gentleman he is, sir. And quite a different class from them two detectives from London, what goes prying about, and asking questions. I don’t hold with foreigners as a rule, but from what the newspapers say I make out as how these brave Belges isn’t the ordinary run of foreigners, and certainly he’s a most polite spoken gentleman.”

Dear old Dorcas! As she stood there, with her honest face upturned to mine, I thought what a fine specimen she was of the old-fashioned servant that is so fast dying out.