For the first time the driver saw Philip's face clearly.
"Ah, you know me then? Who were those blackguards who employed you?"
"S'elp me, sir, I on'y know one of 'em. 'E's a Mr. Victor Grenier. I offen pick 'im up at the Gardenia. 'E said 'is pal was sweet on the young lydy an' wanted a put-up job ter 'elp 'er. That's all, guv'nor, on me life."
"You ought to be ashamed of yourself," was Philip's only comment.
He rejoined the girl, who was watching the retreating brougham.
"Now," he cried, pleasantly, "you can go home."
"Please drive me there. I will not deprive you of your cab."
So they drove away together, and the driver of the hansom, striving to free his vehicle from the broken trestles, paused to scratch his head.
"'E fairly bested the crowd," he growled, "an' got the girl as well. My eye, but she's a beauty."
Maida Crescent was little more than half a mile beyond the park.
Philip thought it due to the lady he had beguiled that she should know exactly how he came to interfere in her behalf. She listened in silence, and when she spoke, there was a suggestion of shy nervousness oddly at variance with her spirited action of a few minutes earlier.
"I cannot understand it at all," she said. "I am seldom out so late. My professional engagements are few and far between, I am sorry to say."
"Were you attending a rehearsal at the Regent's Hall?"
"A rehearsal for Monsieur Jowkacsy's concert?"
She volunteered no further information, but Philip was a persistent person.
"I do not remember another day in my life previously," he said, "when so many fortuitous events grouped themselves together in such a curious relationship. Even this adventure is a sequel to a prior incident. Just before I joined in the chase after you I had purchased some tickets for Jowkacsy's musicale. The strangest item of all is that I was practically walking away from the direction in which I live when my attention was drawn to the cabman's behavior."
"Good gracious!" she protested, "am I taking you out of your way? I thought you merely happened to be driving after us through the park."
She invited no confidences. She adhered strictly to the affair of the moment, and he had no option but to follow her cue.
"I do not think I have ever been in Regent's Park before."