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228 My interlocutor smiled.

"We are still at cross-purposes. I refer to the lady."

"Miss Pettigrew?" I exclaimed.

"Yes. She has been seen coming out of Agrasato's Native Curio-shop."

"God bless my soul!" I interrupted. "I was going into that place myself this afternoon. You might have caught me coming out!"

There doesn't seem to be any innocent thing that one can do in Jo'burg without being suspected for it.

"Ah! but she has been there more than once—and in rather doubtful circumstances. I may as well tell you—in confidence, Sir Eustace—that the place is suspected of being a well-known rendezvous used by the secret organization behind this revolution. That is why I should be glad to hear all that you can tell me about this lady. Where and how did you come to engage her?"

"She was lent to me," I replied coldly, "by your own Government."

He collapsed utterly.