Thus, Dunningham, anxious, in his master’s interest, to allay my nervousness, which reacted disagreeably on Mr. Pulitzer, and to make me lower my voice.

I went up to the villa during the afternoon to look at the house and, if possible, to have a talk with some of the secretaries.

The villa lay on the Western slope of Cap Martin, a few hundred yards from the Villa Cyrnos, occupied by the Empress Eugenie.  Seen from the road there was nothing striking in its appearance, but seen from the other side it was delightful, recalling the drop scene of a theater.  Situated on a steep slope, embowered in trees, its broad stone veranda overhung a series of ornamental terraces decorated with palms, flowers, statuary, and fountains; and where these ended a jumble of rocks and stunted pines fell away abruptly to the blue water of the bay.

The house was large and well designed, but very simple in its furniture and decorations.  The upper rooms on the Western side commanded a superb view of the Bay of Monaco, and of the rugged hillsides above La Turbie, crowned with a vague outline of fortifications against the sky.

In a room at the top of the house I found one of the secretaries, an Englishman, Mr. George Craven, formerly in the Indian Civil Service in Rajputana.  He was engaged in auditing the accounts of the yacht, but he readily fell in with my suggestion that we should take a stroll.

“Right-ho!” he said.  “I’m sick of these beastly accounts.  But we must find out what J. P.’s doing first.”

It appeared that J. P. had motored over to Monte Carlo to hear a concert, and that he wasn’t expected back for an hour or more.  As we stopped in the entrance hall to get our hats I struck a match on the sole of my shoe, intending to light a cigarette.

“By Jove!  Don’t do that, for Heaven’s sake,” said Craven, “or there’ll be a frightful row when J. P. comes in.  He can’t stand cigarette smoke, and he’s got a sense of smell as keen as a setter’s.”

We went into the garden and followed a narrow path which led down to the waterside.  We talked about J. P. As a matter of fact, J. P. was the principal topic of conversation whenever two of his secretaries found themselves together.

Craven, however, had only been with J. P. for a few weeks, having been one of the batch sifted out of the six hundred who had answered the Times advertisement.  He was almost as much in the dark as I was in regard to the real J. P. that existed somewhere behind the mask which was always held out in front of every emotion, every thought, every intention.

The life was difficult, he found, and extremely laborious.  When it suited his book J. P. could be one of the most fascinating and entertaining of men, but when it didn’t, well, he wasn’t.  The truth was that you could never tell what he really thought at any moment; it made you feel as though you were blind and not he; you found yourself groping around all the time for a good lead and coming unexpectedly up against a stone wall.