There was no more to be said. Wrayson rose to his feet a little abruptly.
"The air is stifling here," he said. "Let us go outside and take our coffee."
They found seats on the veranda, looking out upon the promenade. The Baron looked a little dubiously at the stream of people passing backwards and forwards.
"Are we not a little conspicuous?" he remarked.
"Does it really matter?" Wrayson asked. "It is only for this evening. I shall leave for London tomorrow, in any event. Besides, it is part of the bargain that we take coffee with these ladies. Here they are."
Wrayson introduced his friends with perfect gravity. Chairs were found, and coffee and liqueurs ordered. Wrayson contrived to sit on the outside, and next to his copper-haired friend.
"Now for our little talk," he said. "Will you have a cigarette? You'll find these all right."
She threw a sidelong glance at him and sighed. What an exceedingly earnest young man this was!
"Well," she said, "I know you'll give me no peace till I've told you. There may be nothing in it. That's for you to find out. I think myself there is. It was last Thursday night in the promenade at the Alhambra that I saw her!"
"I'm coming to that," she declared. "Let me tell you my own way. I was talking to a friend, and I overheard all that she said. She was quietly dressed, and she looked frightened; a poor, pale-faced little thing she was anyway, and she was walking up and down like a stage-doll, peering round corners and looking everywhere, as though she'd lost somebody. Presently she went up to one of the attendants, and I heard her ask him if he knew a Mr. Augustus Howard who came there often. The man shook his head, and then she tried to describe him. It was a bit flattering, but an idea jumped into my head all of a sudden that it was Barnes she was looking for."
"By Jove!" Wrayson muttered, under his breath. "Did you speak to her?"
"I waited till she was alone, and then I made her sit down with me and describe him all over again. By the time she'd finished, I was jolly well sure that it was Barnes she was after."
"Not I!" she answered. "I didn't want a scene there, and besides, it's your little show, not mine. I told her that I felt sure I recognized him, and that if she would be in the same place at nine o'clock a week from that night, I could send some one whom I thought would be able to tell her about her friend. That was last Thursday. You want to be just outside the refreshment-room at nine o'clock to-morrow night, and you can't mistake her. She looks as though she'd blown in from an A B C shop."