Madame Bailloux turned out, not to be the formidable dragon that Daisy had feared, but light-hearted and amusing. She set to teaching Daisy to speak French. She told Rose that the very thing to complete her recovery would be a gown made by the famous French couturier Paul Poiret. Paul Poiret, she said, despised the fashion for light colours. He damned them as “nuances of nymphs’ thighs, lilacs, swooning mauves, tender blue hortensias, niles, maizes, straws: all that was soft, washed-out and insipid.”Daisy’s romance with Becket had come to an abrupt halt. Harry was out frequently with Becket, travelling to and from police headquarters, hoping all the while that Rose’s attacker had been found.In the evening, Harry and Becket walked up and down outside the front of the hotel, watching the passers-by, looking all the while for anyone sinister. One evening a young man in a tweed jacket and knickerbockers and goggles cycled slowly past, staring at the hotel. Harry and Becket gave chase, halting the cyclist and demanding to know who he was.He told them rudely to mind their own business.
