Southerland jammed his hands in his pockets, smiling, or possibly sneering. "Just the same I'd like you to talk to my people."

"And tell them what?"

"What you told me . . . about Spangler and that dancer."

"When?"

"Whenever you like."

They began to walk again, moving slowly side by side. There was music from somewhere, a waltz reminiscent of that last night in Vienna. There were also beds of tangled roses and a certain kind of pale violet that Zelle had always loved . . .

"Did I mention that I saw her photograph?" Southerland said suddenly.

"Her photograph?" He was recalling that she had also loved orchids, the rarest hothouse variety.

"In the Sunday papers. And I must admit that she really is quite beautiful."

Dunbar shrugged, also jamming his hands in his pockets. "The photographs can be deceptive. She's not at all the same in person."

"Still, she must know how to use her looks. After all, she spent eight days with Spangler, eight very cozy days by the lake in Geneva."

Dunbar turned to him. "What are you talking about?"

"After she left you . . . eight days in Geneva. The innkeeper remembered them very well. Seems they particularly favored strolling at dawn."

There were no sounds except their heels on the gravel. The wind had died, leaving everything motionless: clumps of hollyhock, white ivy, and tulips—all dead still.

"Look, I can understand if you have certain personal considerations," Southerland said. "I mean, I do know how a woman can affect one's sense of proportion—"

"No, it's not like that at all."

"Then I can tell them? I can tell them you'll do it? Meet with them?"

Dunbar took a deep breath. "When?"

"How about tomorrow? Say, ten o'clock?"

"Yes, I suppose ten is all right."

"There's no need to worry, old boy. They're really very decent people, as you'll see . . ."

In the morning there were torn parts of her photographs all over his room, also pieces of broken bottles and traces of blood.

There were romantic, seductive overtones to Dunbar's first brush with the secret world. In the beginning, of course, he did not meet with Mansfield Cummings, but with an entertaining subordinate named Furnival-Jones. Talks began informally in one of the Richmond house anterooms, then continued in a shuttered library, a curious room with high, coffered ceilings and Chippendale fretwork. The light was low through green shades. There were etchings of naval encounters on the wall.