An old woman, with a face like a withered apple, and her eyes under the fringe of her black head-shawl shining like bright beads, had delivered the message. At the conclusion of his adventure with the Nine, he had made his way back to the hotel, and after a few words to the detective, had mounted to his bare little room, bathed, shaved, and descended to supper.
The meal was an unsocial one, for Smith, in an execrable temper over the miscarriage of his plans, glowered blackly through the scant courses, and at their close vanished promptly into his room.
Van Ingen lighted a cigarette, and sauntered out upon the narrow street. He meant to stroll toward the plaza, and have a look at the cathedral. As he stood for a moment in front of the hotel, uncertain of the direction, an old crone, such as haunt the steps of churches with trinkets and sacred relics for sale, hobbled up to him, scanned his face sharply, and dropped a courtesy.
"Señor Van Eenge?" she asked, in a clear soft whisper.
The young man fell back a pace in amazement. "Yes," he admitted curtly. On the instant he thought of Poltavo, and his hand went into his coat pocket. "But how did you know?"
She shook her head with a mysterious smile, and held out her hand. "From the señorita," she murmured.
But he took the missive, scenting a romance, and laughingly struck a match. It contained but a single pencilled line, written, evidently, in great agitation, for the characters were scarcely legible. The match burned down and scorched his fingers. He lit another unsteadily, and stared again, his face in the small circle of light pallid with excitement.
Doris, whom he had believed to be with Lady Dinsmore on the Riviera, in this desolate, wind-raked little Spanish town? What was the meaning of it? He turned to question the old crone, but she had slid noiselessly into the gloom whence she had come, and he was left standing before the hotel with only the scrap of white paper to show that the entire incident was not the wild imagining of an overwrought brain.
He bent his eyes to it again, and especially to the signature. There could be no mistake. That funny little D of Doris, with its childish curl at the end, he would know the world around. It smote him with a strong emotion and gave him a sense of reality. Doris, then, was actually near at hand, breathing the same warm night air, watching the same moon, high and pale, sailing across the sky.