The White Lie

al journalists and Press-photographers, was but a nine d

ts, but all to no purpose. Therefore the public curiosity quickly died down, and within ten days or so the affair was forgotten amid the hundred and one other "sensations"

nt to the naval aviator qui

ut few, I expect, will recollect the actual facts, or if they do, they little dream of th

urder by some person unknown," a girl sat in her small, plainly-furnished bedroom on the top floor o

Jean

her chest rose and fell quickly, her dark eyes were filled with horror, and her lips were ashen grey. The light had faded from her pretty f

with red-plush seats along the white walls and small tables set before them-an urchin had passed, selling the "extr

paper, and hastily concealing it, had ascen

word, for the report was a rather full one. Afterwards she sat, the paper still i

Why-why was he killed on that evening? If he had not gone to M

sound of her own voice, so

nd started at sight of her o

riving to recall something, and in that position

s moved

at I met Dick? Ah! yes," she sighed; "I was foolish-mad-to dare to go to Mundesley that afternoon. If o

she rose, unlocked one of the small top drawers of the chest, and, taking th

in a similar manner to those pieces which had been handed for the coroner's inspection. Each half bore a numb

on it. Her brows narrowed, and in her eye

e listened, and to have consented to go across to Bremen. But no one knows, e

ply, she rose with sudden impulse and, crossing the room, took up a box of matches. Striking one, she applied

them from her

hat man who had been struck that cow

Her dark brows slowly narrowed, her white, even teeth were set, her small hands clenc

an with the dark, intense eyes-Ralph Ansell. And then the me

ken to her of love. Yet he had fascinated her, and in his presence she had found herself impelled by his cha

ed in her cheap little dressing-case with its electro-plated fittings. She remembered, too, the face of the stranger, the fat, sandy-haired German, whom she had met by appointment upon a flat country road a mil

ick, when she had met him one evening and dined with him at the Troc

ade up her mind never to do so. Yet he had persuaded her to meet him at Mundesley, and

sible that

t held her

that no other man should love her. What if Dick'

spicion sta

, gripping the coverlet in her nervous f

analysing her feelings as on

bby, bald-headed waiter, who had been for so many years in her father's service. At that moment Jean-who was employed in the daytime at the Maison Collette, the well-known milliner

ing, well-dressed young fellow whom she saw was very nervous and agitated

for her, until he summed up courage to speak to he

ay up Shaftesbury Avenue on the right-hand side. Far more French than English, in spite of his English name, he quickly introduced himself into the good graces of Jean's fath

ount of the English climate, had preferred to live with her mother in Paris, and for fully half the period had had h

at present engaged as modiste at the Maison Collette, where many of the "creatio

staurant, but ere long, in consequence of secret inquiries he had made of the hall porter of the flats in Shaftesbury Avenu

place in the middle of November. Even as Jean stood there, a fai

is downsta

descended to the rather dingy, old-fashioned drawing-room over the shop, where stood her lover alone

e, which she wore with a distinctly foreign chic, and as she entered, her pretty face was brig

nt till his lips touched hers. "You are earlier than you expected," she added in Fren

man with the strong, clean-shaven features and the large, round, penetrating

strong, manly, well-set-up type, the kind of level-headed, steady young man, with whom no father would hesitate to entrust his daughter's future. As he stood in his smart, blue serge

sion which obliterated any defects which she might have observed, and wh

head was resting upon his shoulder, while h

e had resumed her daily labours in the big, long workroom of the Jewish firm who traded under the name of the Maison Collette,

his eyes, she was describing her return to business, and how she regretted that t

no further need to go to business. You will be mine. Shall we go out

seedy old waiter, Pierre, and her father, an elderly, grey, sad-looking man, whose business in later years had, alas! sadly declined on account of the many restaurants which had s

French, and then, with Jean upon his arm,

eatres discharge their chattering crowds, the main thoroughfares of central London are usually quiet and half-deserted, and as the pair

day of all days in her life wh

bert had wondered. Indeed, a jeweller, whose habit it was to take his luncheon there each day, had noticed it up

r's conversation to notice that, in passing, a tall, grey-faced man, who wore a cr

several moments after them still walking with linked arms, unconscious of being remarked,

t day, had sat in the country schoolroom at North Walsham listening to the

r triumph-as he went on with crafty footsteps be