He urged them to
tell all they knew; it should be made worth their while; they no
longer owed allegiance to their late employer. He entreated them to
withhold nothing. Where and how had Lord Blackadder met Henriette?
What had he done with her? Where was she now?
We could get nothing out of these men; they refused to answer our
questions from sheer mulish obstinacy, as we thought at first, but we
saw at length that they did not understand us. What were we driving
at? They assured us they had seen no lady, nor had the unfortunate
peer accosted any one, or interfered with any one on his way between
the two hotels. He had come straight from the Villa Shereef to the
Hotel Atlas, racing down at a run, pausing nowhere, addressing no one
on the road.
If not Lord Blackadder, what then? What could have happened to
Henriette? Tangier was a wild place enough, but who would interfere
with an English woman in broad daylight accompanied by her servant, by
an escort, her attendant Moorish guide? Full of anxiety, Basil called
for a horse, and was about to ride off to institute a hue and cry,
when my sister appeared in person upon the scene.
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