“You needn’t disturb yourself.  Jenny ought to return before four o’clock, and one of my girls is waiting for her with orders to bring her here as soon as she comes in, without even letting her go up to her room.”

“We’ll wait for her then.”

M. Lecoq and his friend waited about a quarter of an hour, when Mme. Charman suddenly got up.

“I hear my girl’s step on the stairs,” said she.

“Listen to me,” answered M. Lecoq, “if it is she, manage to make Jenny think that it was you who sent for her; we will seem to have come in by the merest chance.”

Mme. Charman responded by a gesture of assents.  She was going towards the door when the detective detained her by the arm.

“One word more.  When you see me fairly engaged in conversation with her, please be so good as to go and overlook your work-people in the shops.  What I have to say will not interest you in the least.”

“I understand.”

“But no trickery, you know.  I know where the closet of your bedroom is, well enough to be sure that everything that is said here may be overheard in it.”

Mme. Charman’s emissary opened the door; there was a loud rustling of silks along the corridor; and Jenny appeared in all her glory.  She was no longer the fresh and pretty minx whom Hector had known—­ the provoking large-eyed Parisian demoiselle, with haughty head and petulant grace.  A single year had withered her, as a too hot summer does the roses, and had destroyed her fragile beauty beyond recall.  She was not twenty, and still it was hard to discern that she had been charming, and was yet young.  For she had grown old like vice; her worn features and hollow cheeks betrayed the dissipations of her life; her eyes had lost their long, languishing lids; her mouth had a pitiful expression of stupefaction; and absinthe had broken the clear tone of her voice.  She was richly dressed in a new robe, with a great deal of lace and a jaunty hat; yet she had a wretched expression; she was all besmeared with rouge and paint.

When she came in she seemed very angry.

“What an idea!” she cried, without taking the trouble to bow to anyone; “what sense is there in sending for me to come here in this way, almost by force, and by a very impudent young woman?”

Mme. Charman hastened to meet her old customer, embraced her in spite of herself, and pressed her to her heart.

“Why, don’t be so angry, dear—­I thought you would be delighted and overwhelm me with thanks.”

“I?  What for?”

“Because, my dear girl, I had a surprise in store for you.  Ah, I’m not ungrateful; you came here yesterday and settled your account with me, and to-day I mean to reward you for it.  Come, cheer up; you’re going to have a splendid chance, because just at this moment I happen to have a piece of exquisite velvet—­”

“A pretty thing to bring me here for!”