Page:The Black Camel (IA blackcamel0000earl).djvu/124

“Yes—so I was forced back to my old couch under the palm trees. I walked out from town, and got to the beach———”

“At what time?”

“My dear sir,—you embarrass me. If you will take a stroll along Hotel Street, you will see my watch hanging in a certain window. I often go and look at it myself.”

“No matter. You got to the beach.”

“I did. It’s public, you know—this one out here. It belongs to everybody. I was surprised to see a light in the pavilion. Somebody’s rented the house, I thought. The curtain of that window was down, but it was flapping in the wind. I heard voices inside—a man’s and a woman’s—I wondered whether it was such a good place to sleep, after all.”

He paused. Charlie’s eyes were on Robert Fyfe. The actor was leaning forward with a fierce intensity, staring at the beach-comber, his hands clenched until the knuckles showed white.

“I just stood there,” Smith continued. “The curtain flopped about—and I got a good look at the man.”

“Ah, yes,” Charlie nodded. “What man?”

“Why, that fellow there,” Smith said. He pointed at Fyfe. “The chap with the red ribbon across his shirt-front. I haven’t seen one of those ribbons since the time when I was studying at Julien’s, in Paris, and our ambassador invited me round for dinner. It’s a fact. He came from my town—an old friend of my father———”

“No matter,” Charlie cut in. “You stood there, peeping beneath the curtain———”

“What do you mean?” cried the beach-comber. “Don’t judge a man by his clothes, please. I wasn’t