"This is quite like the old times of the Dreyfus case," said the Englishman.
"Dreyfus! But I will speak not of that. It is buried. We French are one people now, one and indivisible. Though of traitors, the villain Dreyfus was of the most horrible. Let us speak of _cet homme très sale_, Dawson. I do not know his plans. They will be shrewd, but without imagination, without flair. He will watch, with his eyes of a cat, the French and Belgian flying officers who come to London, but he will not discover their secrets. For he does not understand, this cold English Dawson, that secrets which endanger the neck are told only to women."
"Yet I have heard that he has a team of women--his harem, as it is called. I have never seen one of them."
"Bah! Englishwomen, of the large feet and the so protruding teeth! Who would tell of his precious secrets to them!"
"Oh, come, M. Froissart. We have as many pretty women in London as you have in Paris."
"It is possible, my friend. All things, the most improbable, are possible. But they conceal themselves most assiduously. I have not seen them, these so pretty Englishwomen."
"Well, well. You are a bit out of date as regards our women. But I don't want to argue. What is the game?"
Froissart leaned forward and spoke solemnly, forcibly.
"If the man Dawson is right, and there are German spies in the French and Belgian flying services, they will come to London to get their orders. And they will get them from women, depend upon it, my friend. From women who are of French education, who appear to be French, yet who are the deadly, the most dangerous, enemies of France. Let Dawson watch the men themselves; but watch you such women as I indicate--women who appear to be French and yet are not French. I will speak to the Chief, not to Dawson, but to the Great Chief of us all. You shall be dressed in the tenue of a French flying officer; you shall avoid French or Belgian officers who might ask questions the most embarrassing. You shall make the acquaintance of women who appear to be French, yet who are not French. Grip on to these, my friend, entertain them, make yourself of the most fascinating and agreeable, give to them attentions and love of the warmest. And when after two or three glasses of champagne you repose at ease with your arm about their waists, get you at their secrets. You are young, handsome, and your eye is bold. I give you a pleasant task--the deception of deceiving women. In my younger days what joy would I not have taken in it."