Hearing from her legal adviser that the inquiry after the missing money was for a moment at a standstill, Lady Lydiard made one of those bold suggestions with which she was accustomed to startle her friends in cases of emergency.  She had heard favorable reports of the extraordinary ingenuity of the French police; and she now proposed sending to Paris for assistance, after first consulting her nephew, Mr. Felix Sweetsir.  “Felix knows Paris as well as he knows London,” she remarked.  “He is an idle man, and it is quite likely that he will relieve us of all trouble by taking the matter into his own hands.  In any case, he is sure to know who are the right people to address in our present necessity.  What do you say?”

Mr. Troy, in reply, expressed his doubts as to the wisdom of employing foreigners in a delicate investigation which required an accurate knowledge of English customs and English character.  Waiving this objection, he approved of the idea of consulting her Ladyship’s nephew.  “Mr. Sweetsir is a man of the world,” he said.  “In putting the case before him, we are sure to have it presented to us from a new point of view.”  Acting on this favorable expression of opinion, Lady Lydiard wrote to her nephew.  On the day after the visit to Miss Pink, the proposed council of three was held at Lady Lydiard’s house.

Felix, never punctual at keeping an appointment, was even later than usual on this occasion.  He made his apologies with his hand pressed upon his forehead, and his voice expressive of the languor and discouragement of a suffering man.

“The beastly English climate is telling on my nerves,” said Mr. Sweetsir—­“the horrid weight of the atmosphere, after the exhilarating air of Paris; the intolerable dirt and dullness of London, you know.  I was in bed, my dear aunt, when I received your letter.  You may imagine the completely demoralised?? state I was in, when I tell you of the effect which the news of the robbery produced on me.  I fell back on my pillow, as if I had been shot.  Your Ladyship should really be a little more careful in communicating these disagreeable surprises to a sensitively-organised man.  Never mind—­my valet is a perfect treasure; he brought me some drops of ether on a lump of sugar.  I said, ‘Alfred’ (his name is Alfred), ‘put me into my clothes!’ Alfred put me in.  I assure you it reminded me of my young days, when I was put into my first pair of trousers.  Has Alfred forgotten anything?  Have I got my braces on?  Have I come out in my shirt-sleeves?  Well, dear aunt;—­well, Mr. Troy!—­what can I say?  What can I do?”

Lady Lydiard, entirely without sympathy for nervous suffering, nodded to the lawyer.  “You tell him,” she said.

“I believe I speak for her Ladyship,” Mr. Troy began, “when I say that we should like to hear, in the first place, how the whole case strikes you, Mr. Sweetsir?”

“Tell it me all over again,” said Felix.

Patient Mr. Troy told it all over again—­and waited for the result.