Later, he drove back to Monte Carlo, dined there, and reached home once more at eleven o’clock. Hipolyte came out to meet him with a disturbed face.

“Ah! Monsieur le Comte has arrived. Monsieur le Comte did not telephone me, by any chance?”

The Comte shook his head.

“And yet at three o’clock I received a summons from Monsieur le Comte, to present myself to him at Nice, at the Negresco.”

“Really,” said the Comte; “and you went?”

“Certainly, Monsieur, but at the Negresco they knew nothing of Monsieur le Comte. He had not been there.”

“Ah,” said the Comte, “doubtless at that hour Marie was out doing her afternoon marketing?”

“That is so, Monsieur le Comte.”