"I do not think so, Monsieur."
"We shall see," I retorted. "Joseph, where is the railway station?"
Joseph pointed, accompanying his gesture with directions. Then he
offered to be my guide, but I refused his services and left him with
Innocentina, having bidden him call at my room in the hotel for
instructions later.
But the prophecy of Innocentina the Seeress was fulfilled. I could
learn nothing of the Boy or his movements, at the _gare_ of Chambery.
Several trains had gone out, bound for several destinations in
different directions, during the past three hours, and no one
answering the description I gave of the Boy had been seen to leave.
Sadder, but no wiser, I returned to the Hotel de France, and asked if
a youth of seventeen, "with large blue eyes, chestnut hair which
curled, a complexion tanned brown, a panama hat, and a suit of
navy-blue serge knickerbockers," had lunched there.
The answer was no. Such a yoking gentleman had not come to the hotel,
nor had he been noticed in the town, either with or without a young
woman and a couple of donkeys.
I had no more than finished my questionings and gone up to my room,
when Joseph arrived--a wistful, expectant Joseph, with a deep light of
excitement burning in his eyes.
"Any news?" I asked.
"No, Monsieur, except that in an hour Innocentina starts to walk on to
Les Echelles with her _anes_.
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