William Le Queux (continued 4)

A great bitterness fell upon my heart. The woman whom I really loved had played me false; and yet, when I reflected, I could not help admitting that perhaps, after all, I deserved this punishment. I had wavered from her and gone back to my old love, it was true. But I loved Edith well and truly, whatever might have been the fascination of the smart, gesticulating, foreign beauty. She was mine in heart and mine alone.

All my belief in woman’s affection or devotion had, in that instant, been dispelled. The truth had fallen upon me as a crushing blow, which staggered me, wrecking all my hopes and plans for the future.

I tossed my things heedlessly into my bag, in readiness for early departure in the morning. I had been a fool, I knew. I was ever a fool where women were concerned. In the old days in Brussels my affection for Yolande had been strong and impetuous, burning with all the ardour of a first love; yet the awakening had come, and I had tardily discovered that she had played me false. And in Edith’s case, although I entertained towards her such a real and deep affection as a man only extends to a woman once in his lifetime, unfaithfulness had once again been my reward.

I flung away my cigar. My agony of heart was too acute to be accurately described in words. You, my reader, who may have experienced the sudden breaking of your most cherished idol, can only rightly understand the chagrin, the intense bitterness, the spiritual desolation of that night watch.

My candles were as nearly as possible burnt out. At length I took my hat, and, creeping noiselessly downstairs, passed through the dining-room, and let myself out by the window which Edith had entered. The first grey of dawn was spreading, and a sudden desire for fresh air had seized me. I felt stifled in that old room with its gloomy furniture and hangings. With the cool wind of early morning fanning my heated temples, I struck straight across the lawn in the direction taken by the mysterious lover. For some distance I traversed the boundary of the grounds, until I discovered a break in the oak fence, and, passing through it, found myself out upon the broad, undulating meadows which stretched away to the Beacon Hill and the tiny hamlet of Toftrees, noted for its ancient hall and quaint church steeple. Heedless of where my footsteps led me, I went straight on, my mind full of the discovery I had made, my heart overflowing. Away to my left, from behind the low dark hills, the sky became flushed with the crimson light of dawn; but all was still save the distant crowing of a cock and the howl of a dog in the far distance. Behind me the bell of Ryburgh church solemnly chimed the hour, followed by other bells at greater distances. Then all was quiet again save for the soft rustling of the trees. The morning air was delicious, with a sweet fragrance everywhere.

Suddenly, leaping a fence, I found myself upon the old coach-road that ran over the hills to Lynn, and continued along it without thought of distance or destination. I passed a carter with his team, and he wished me good-morning. His words aroused me, and I saw that I was nearing an unfamiliar village.

“What place is this?” I inquired.

“It’s Harpley, sir.”

I thanked him and went my way. I had never heard of the place before; but as I entered it the first rays of sunlight shot across the hills, and it certainly looked picturesque and typically English in the light of the dawn. I must have walked fully eight miles, and, being tired and thirsty, I noticed at the entrance of the village a small inn, upon which was the sign The Houghton Arms. The door stood open, and a burly man, evidently the landlord, was busy chopping wood in an outhouse at the side.

“Nice mornin’, sir,” he observed, looking up at me, probably astonished to see anyone who was not a labourer astir at such an early hour.

I returned his greeting, and inquired whether it was too early for a cup of tea and a rest.

“Not at all, sir,” he answered, laying down his axe and conducting me within.

The place, in common with all village hostelries, smelt strongly of the combined fumes of shag and stale beer. Village innkeepers have a habit of polishing their well-seasoned furniture with sour beer; hence the odour, which, to the patrons of such places, seems appetising. The perfume is to them as the hors d’oeuvre.

The man, having shown me into a little parlour behind the tap-room, called loudly to “Jenny,” who turned out to be his wife. After this I had not long to wait before a pot of tea and a couple of poached eggs were at my disposal.

They were a homely pair, these two, full of local chatter. Harpley, the man informed me, was nine and a half miles from Great Ryburgh, and I saw by his manner that he was much exercised in his mind to know whence I had come and the reason for my being about at such an hour. The rural busybody was extremely inquisitive, but I did not permit his bucolic diplomacy to triumph. While I drank the tea and ate the eggs the landlord stood leaning against the door-lintel with his arms folded, garrulously displaying his Norfolk brogue. He evidently regarded me as one of those summer visitors from London who stay at the farmhouses, where hypocrisy terms them “paying guests,” and I allowed him to adhere to his opinion. I learned from him that at six o’clock there was a train from Massingham station, half a mile away, which would convey me direct to Fakenham. This I resolved to take, for I could then return to Miss Foskett’s by a quarter to seven. A map of the county was hanging on the wall, and I had risen to look at the spot to which the landlord was pointing, when a footstep sounded in the narrow passage, and, turning, I caught sight of the dark figure of a man making his way out. The hat, the black overcoat, the figure, all were familiar. His head was turned away from me, so that I could not see his features, but in an instant I recognised him.

He was Edith’s mysterious lover!

Chapter Twenty.

From Downing Street to Paris.

I sprang quickly to the door, and looked down the passage out into the village street; but he had already made his exit. By the time I had reached the porch of the inn he was already striding quickly along the dusty highway. He turned to glance back, and I perceived that he was thin-faced, with high cheekbones and a small black beard. He was carrying his thick stick jauntily, and walking smartly, with an easy gait which at that moment struck me as being distinctly military.

“Who is that man?” I inquired eagerly of the landlord, who stood beside me, evidently surprised at my sudden rush towards the door.

“A stranger, sir. I don’t know who he is.”

“When did he arrive?”

“He came by the last train to Massingham last night, sir, and had a bed here. My missis, however, didn’t like the looks of ’im.”

“Why?”

“Well, I don’t exactly know. There was something about him a bit peculiar. Besides, he went out before one o’clock, and didn’t return till an hour ago. Then he went up, washed, had a cup o’ tea in his room, paid, and now he’s gone.”

“Rather peculiar behaviour, isn’t it?” I suggested, hoping to find some clue to his identity from what this man might tell me. “Did he have no luggage?”

“None. He seemed a bit down on his luck. His clothes were very shabby, and he evidently hadn’t had a clean collar for a week.”

Then the opinion I had formed of him—namely, that he was shabby genteel—was correct.

“You’re certain you’ve never seen him before?”

“Quite certain,” he replied.

At that moment his wife entered, and, addressing her, he said:

“We’re talking of that stranger who’s just gone, missus. His movements were a bit suspicious, weren’t they?”

“Yes. Why he should want to go out half the night wandering about the neighbourhood I can’t make out, unless he were a burglar or something o’ that sort,” the woman answered, adding: “I shouldn’t be at all surprised to hear that one of the houses about here has been broken into. Anyhow, we’d know him again among a thousand.”

“What kind of man was he?”

“Tall and dark, with a beard, and a pair of eyes that seemed to look you through. He spoke all right, but I’ve my doubts as to whether he wasn’t a foreigner.”

“A foreigner!” I echoed quickly, interested. “What made you suspect that?”

“I really can’t tell. I had a suspicion of it the first moment I saw him. He pronounced his ‘r’s’ rather curiously. His clothes seemed to be of foreign cut, and his boots, although worn out, were unusually long and narrow. I brushed ’em this morning, and saw on the tabs a foreign name. I think it was ‘Firenze,’ or something like that.”

I reflected for an instant. The word “Firenze” was Italian for Florence, the town where the boots had evidently been made. Therefore the mysterious stranger might be Italian.

“You didn’t actually detect anything foreign in his style of speaking?”

“He didn’t speak much. He seemed very glum and thoughtful. I sent him up some toast with his tea, but he hasn’t touched it.”

“He didn’t say where he was going?”

“Not a word. When he arrived he only explained that he had come by the last train from Lynn, and that he wanted a bed—that’s all. I should think by the look of him that he’s gone on tramp.”

My first impulse was to follow him; but on reflection I saw that by doing so I should in all probability lose my train, and to dog the fellow’s footsteps would, after all, be of no benefit now that I knew the truth of Edith’s perfidy. So I stood there chatting, discussing the stranger, and wondering who he could be.

“He’s up to no good, that I feel certain,” declared the landlord’s wife. “There’s something about him that aroused my suspicion at once last night. I can’t, however, explain what it was. But a man don’t prowl about all night to admire the moon.”

And thus I waited until it was time to catch the train; then, wishing the innkeeper and his wife good-morning, left them and strolled in the morning sunlight to the station, arriving at Fakenham shortly before seven. I took the short cut through Starmoor Wood to Ryburgh, and, finding Miss Foskett’s maid polishing the door-handle, entered and went upstairs.

Upon the toilet-table was a telegram, which the maid said had just arrived, and on opening it I found a message from the Foreign Office, which had been forwarded from the Club, asking me to call at the earliest possible moment, and to be prepared to return to my post by the afternoon service from Charing Cross. I knew what that implied. The Marquess desired me to bear a secret despatch to my Chief.

I washed, tidied myself after my dusty walk, strapped my bag, and with a feeling of regret that I was compelled to meet my false love again face to face before departure, I descended the stairs.

She was awaiting me, looking cool and fresh in her white gown, with a bunch of fresh roses she had plucked from the garden in her breast. She smiled gladly, and stretched forth her hand as though I were all the world to her. What admirable actresses some women are! Her affected sweetness that yesterday had so charmed me now sickened me. The scales had fallen from my eyes, and I was angry with myself that I had ever allowed myself to lose control of my feelings and love her. She was false—false! That one thought alone ran in my mind as she laughed merrily.

“Why, Gerald, wherever have you been? A telegram came for you by special messenger from Fakenham at half-past six, and when Ann knocked at your door she found you were out. And you went out by the dining-room window, too.”

“Yes,” I said, not without a touch of sarcasm, “I felt that I wanted fresh air, so I went for a stroll.”

“You are an early bird,” she answered. “Did you go far?”

“No, not very far. Only down the Lynn road a little way.”

“I always thought that you people in Paris never got up till your déjeuner at eleven?”

“I’m an exception,” I said shortly. “I prefer the morning air in the country to lying in bed.”

“And the telegram? Is it anything particular?”

“Yes,” I answered. “I must leave at once. I am summoned to Downing Street, and must leave London this afternoon.”

“What! return to Paris at once?”

“Yes,” I replied. “It is an order from the Chief. There’s a train to London at 9:50, I think. I must not fail to catch that.”

I had not kissed her, and I saw that she was somewhat puzzled by my coolness. Did the fact that I had let myself out by the dining-room window give her any clue to the reason why I had chosen that mode of egress?

“I thought you would remain here with us at least to-day,” she pouted. “That’s the worst of diplomacy. You never seem to know what you may do next.”

We were standing alone in the dining-room, where breakfast was already laid and the copper kettle was hissing above the spirit-lamp. As Aunt Hetty had not entered, it was upon the tip of my tongue to charge Edith with that clandestine meeting; yet if I did so, I reflected, a scene would certainly be created. Aunt Hetty would first be scandalised and afterwards wax indignant, while my departure would doubtless be fraught with considerable unpleasantness. Therefore I resolved to keep my anger within my heart, and on my return to Paris to write a letter of explanation to this smiling, bright-faced woman who had thus played me false.

“You cannot tell how wretched I am at the thought of your departure, Gerald,” she said, her dark eyes suddenly grave and serious. “Each time we part I always fear that we shall not meet again.”

I smiled, rather bitterly, I think, and uttered some weak platitude without appearing to be much interested. Then with a quick movement she took my hand, but next instant was compelled to drop it, for Miss Foskett entered suddenly, and, after an explanation of my unexpected call by telegram, we seated ourselves and breakfasted.

As the woman I had so dearly loved sat opposite me I saw that she was strangely nervous and agitated, and that she was eager to question me; but with feigned indifference I chatted and laughed with the punctilious old spinster until the boy brought round the pony-trap and it was time for me to depart for Fakenham, where I could join the express for London.

Edith drove me to the station, but, the boy being with us, she could say nothing confidential until we were walking together upon the platform. Then, looking at me in strange eagerness, she suddenly asked:

“Gerald, tell me why you are so cold towards me this morning? You were so different yesterday. Have I displeased you?”

“Yes,” I said in a hard voice, “you have.”

“How?” she gasped, laying her gloved hand upon my arm and stopping short.

I was silent. Should I tell her, or should I say nothing about my knowledge of her perfidy?

“Why do you not speak?” she urged. “Surely if I have caused you pain I ought to know the reason!”

“You know the reason,” I answered in a mechanical voice, regarding her coldly.

“No, I do not.”

“In this matter it is entirely unnecessary to lie to me, Edith,” I said; “I am aware of the truth.”

“The truth? What truth?”

“That you do not love me,” I said hoarsely.

At that instant the train rushed into the station, and my voice was almost drowned by the noise of the escaping steam. As I thought she deserved to suffer, I was not sorry for the interruption.

“Gerald!” she cried, gripping me by the hand, “what are you saying? What have I done?”

“It is enough,” I answered, my voice broken by emotion, which I could no longer suppress, for my heart was at that moment bursting with grief. “Good-bye;” and turning, I raised my hat and stepped into the empty compartment, in which a porter had placed my bag.

In an instant she was leaning in at the doorway, imploring me to tell her the truth. But I evaded her questions.

The guard came and closed the door.

“Gerald!” she cried, bursting into tears, “tell me why you treat me thus when I love you so dearly! It is cruel! You cannot guess how deeply I have suffered these two hours! Will you not kiss me once before you go?” and she raised her white face to the window with an imploring expression.

“No,” I said, “I cannot, Edith.”

“You refuse to kiss me this once—for the last time?” she wailed.

“Yes,” I answered in a strained voice. “If you desire to know the reason of this refusal you will discover it when you reflect upon your actions of last night.”

“What!” she gasped, pale to the lips. “You saw him!”

“Yes,” I answered gravely, “I saw him.”

Then the train moved off, leaving her standing there pale and rigid; and without further glance at the blanched but beautiful face which only twelve hours ago I had believed to be the open countenance of the purest and sweetest woman on earth, I flung myself back into the corner, plunged in my own bitter reflections. I had told her the ghastly truth, and we had parted. Edith Austin, whom I had hoped to make my wife, was lost to me for ever.

At midday I wearily ascended the great marble staircase at the Foreign Office, those stairs which every diplomatist in London climbs, and in the corridor met Boyd, one of the Marquess’s private secretaries, who informed me that a meeting of the Cabinet was being held, and that his lordship had left instructions that I was to wait until he returned, when he would give me a despatch to carry at once to Paris.

So, accompanied by Boyd and my friend Thorne, of the Treaty Department, I strolled along Parliament Street and lunched at the Ship, that old coffee-house frequented by Foreign Office and other officials. In the days before I received my appointment abroad I used to lunch there regularly, and as I entered I found many of my old colleagues at the tables.

After an hour I returned to Downing Street, and went up to the Foreign Secretary’s private room. He was seated at his great table at the farther end of the sombre, green-painted apartment, the windows of which looked down upon the silent courtyard, where the cooing pigeons strut undisturbed. Upon his grey, refined face was an intensely anxious look, and by the nervous manner in which he toyed with his quill as he acknowledged my salutation I knew that the subject discussed by the Cabinet had been a momentous one. The meeting had been specially and unexpectedly convened, and I had heard below that during its sitting several despatches had been exchanged over the private wire to Windsor, facts which in themselves were sufficient to show that some complication had arisen, and that the lines of British policy had been discussed and submitted to the Sovereign for approbation.

“You are returning to Paris this afternoon, Mr Ingram?” said the Marquess. “I am just writing a private despatch to Lord Barmouth, which must be placed in his hands at the earliest possible moment. The instructions contained in it are secret—you understand?”

“I shall deliver it, I hope, before eleven o’clock this evening,” I said.

“Good,” he answered approvingly; and while I walked to the window and looked out upon the courtyard, the great statesman continued tracing the cipher upon the large sheet of blue despatch-paper with his creaking quill. I glanced at a newspaper to while away the time, until presently one of the secretaries entered, prepared the taper and wax, and I watched the Marquess affix the five seals upon the envelope, impressing his own arms with the large old fob seal which he wore upon his watch-guard. He affixed the last seal, held the envelope for a few moments in order that the wax should set, then handed it to me, saying:

“Remember, Ingram, none of our friends across the Channel must be allowed to get sight of this. It is entirely confidential. Please ask Lord Barmouth to telephone me to-night an acknowledgment of its safe receipt.”

“Certainly,” I answered, placing it in my pocket. I then bowed, and wished the Minister good-day.

“Good-day,” he said, smiling pleasantly, “and a pleasant journey to you, Ingram.”

Then I withdrew, and drove in a cab to the club. Arrived there, I placed the despatch in my belt next my skin, and, taking my bag, went down to Charing Cross and caught the tidal train.

The journey was uneventful, the passage smooth, and about eleven o’clock that night I mounted the stairs of the Embassy in Paris, and went to his lordship’s private room. He was alone, enjoying a final cigar before turning in, and was surprised at my sudden return. I quickly explained the reason, and taking off my belt in his presence handed him the despatch.

Having assured himself that the seals were all intact, he broke them, and, taking it at once to the bureau, I got for him the key of the private cipher used only for the confidential despatches, written by the hand of the Prime Minister to the representatives abroad. Then, standing underneath the tall lamp, the Ambassador slowly deciphered it.

What he read caused him serious reflection, judging from the manner in which his countenance changed. Then, taking a match from his pocket, he crossed to the grate, lit the paper at the corner, and held it until it was all consumed.

The nature of that confidential communication none knew save the Cabinet in London and the Ambassador himself. That it was extremely important was certain, and I felt confident that some decision had been arrived at which would materially affect the European situation.

After telephoning an acknowledgment of the despatch to Downing Street, we returned together to the smoke-room, where I drank a whisky and soda, and then, lighting a cigar, left the Embassy and drove to my own rooms, wearied out after the journey.

At noon next day, when I went round to the Rue du Faubourg St. Honoré, Harding, the footman, met me in the hall, saying:

“His Excellency has just telephoned to you. He wishes to see you immediately.”

I went straight to his private room, and found him seated with Kaye, the lynx-eyed chief of the secret service.

The Ambassador’s face was pale as death, and his voice trembled as he hoarsely acknowledged my salutation.

“Ingram,” he said in a low tone, motioning me to close the door, “we have been betrayed!”

“Betrayed? How?” I gasped.

“A copy of the despatch you brought me last night reached the Quai d’Orsay at two o’clock this morning. Our secret agent there has handed a copy of it to Mr Kaye. The wording of the instructions, as sent to me by the Marquess, is exact. Here it is;” and he held towards me a sheet of that pale yellow paper used in the French Foreign Office, upon which a transcription of the despatch had been hurriedly traced in pencil.

I glanced at it, then stood speechless. The secret despatch had never left my possession. The theft was utterly incredible.

Chapter Twenty One.

The Sister Arts.

“But it is absolutely impossible that the despatch has been copied!” I cried, addressing His Excellency, when at last I found tongue. “I saw it written myself, and it never left my belt until I took it out here in your presence!”

“Well,” interposed Kaye grimly, turning to Lord Barmouth, “that it has really been copied is quite plain, for you have the copy in your hand. It was telegraphed to the Quai d’Orsay from Calais at half-past one o’clock this morning, and that copy reached my hands at four, half an hour after I had returned from Berlin. Our secret agent in the French Foreign Office happily lost no time in making us acquainted with our loss.”

“Fortunately for us,” remarked the Ambassador, pacing the floor from end to end. “Had we remained in ignorance that the secret of our policy was out, we might have found ourselves in a very awkward predicament. But how could the despatch possibly have been copied, when no other eyes have seen it except those of the Marquess and myself? The thing is incredible!”

“Ah! that’s the question,” observed Kaye. “The French system of espionage has very nearly approached perfection. Even though it be against our grain, as Englishmen, to employ spies ourselves, yet it is daily becoming more necessary. Every nation in the world has its elaborate secret service; therefore, England must not sleep and allow other nations to undermine her prestige.”

“I cannot imagine how it is possible that our enemies could have obtained sight of the despatch, even for an instant,” I said. “The only other person in the Chief’s room at Downing Street while he was writing was Boyd, who helped him seal it. I then took it, drove in a cab to the club, and there placed it in my belt beneath my clothes. It never left my person until, in the smoking-room here, I took it out and handed it to His Excellency.”

“The telegram was despatched from the maritime station at Calais by some person who signed his name as ‘Gaston.’ He is evidently known to our friends at the Quai d’Orsay.”

There was a brief and painful pause. Such a catastrophe staggered belief. Surely the spies of France did not use the Roentgen rays in order to read the letters carried on one’s person! It would almost appear as though they did.

“Fate seems entirely against us, Ingram,” observed Lord Barmouth, breaking the silence at last. “In every effort we are thwarted by these scoundrelly spies. Our most secret instructions leak out in a way that is absolutely unaccountable. Indeed, the position has now become so critical that I dread to contemplate the result. In the matter of Ceuta we had an illustration of the marvellous astuteness of our enemies, while to-day here is an example much more alarming. And further, we must send home a despatch acknowledging ourselves checkmated. Our position is an ignominious one—most ignominious,” he added vehemently.

“If I were at fault I would willingly bear any blame attaching to my actions,” I said in a tone of protest; “but as far as I am aware I am utterly blameless in this matter.”

“I do not seek to fix any culpability upon you, Ingram,” His Lordship hastened to assure me. “While serving under me you have always done your duty with a thoroughness and tact worthy of the British diplomatist. All I can say is that it is excessively unfortunate for us all, and for the nation at large. Those instructions there, as you will see, are of the highest importance at this juncture; but we are now quite unable to act because our secret intentions have become common property. They will probably be in the Figaro to-morrow.”

“The whole affair is at present a complete enigma,” observed Kaye, who, turning to me, added: “If you cannot give us any clue whatever, I can’t see what can be done.”

“I can give you absolutely no clue,” I answered, utterly bewildered by this amazing turn of events. “All I know is what I have just related.”

The chief of the secret service turned his eyes full upon me, and asked slowly:

“You have, for instance, held no further communication with Mademoiselle de Foville?” Mention of that name caused me to start. All came back to me—how that the Ambassador had suspected her, and Kaye himself had declared that she was a spy.

“She left Paris before I went to London. I have no idea of her whereabouts.”

“You do not suspect that she was in London at the same time as yourself?” he asked. “I mean, you saw nothing of her?”

“Absolutely nothing.”

“And on the several occasions when you called upon her in the Rue de Courcelles you gave her no idea of the policy which His Excellency was pursuing? I know you visited her several times, for, suspecting her, I had placed a watch upon her movements.”

“I told her absolutely nothing,” I answered, annoyed that this man should think fit to spy upon me.

“Strange,” he said thoughtfully. “Now that is really very strange, because her subsequent actions would appear to give colour to the theory that she learnt from you some secret which she was strenuously endeavouring to obtain.”

“I don’t quite follow you.”

“Well, I have ascertained that the French Ambassador in Berlin has been receiving full reports of the progress of our actions regarding Ceuta.”

“From her?” I asked quickly.

“Not exactly from her, but through her.”

“Then that woman is actually a spy!” cried His Excellency.

“Without the slightest doubt,” responded Kaye. “My inquiries in Berlin and Brussels have substantiated our suspicions. She is one of the smartest secret agents in Europe.”

“I know that she is a friend of Wolf’s, but what proof have you that she has any connection with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs?”

“I have obtained proof—absolute proof,” he answered.

“In what manner?”

“By inquiries I made in Berlin. She is well known in the Wilhelmstrasse. She was compelled to fly from Germany because it leaked out that she was a French spy.”

“Cannot you give me any further explanation?” I urged. “I am much interested, as she was once my intimate friend.”

“Yes,” interposed the Ambassador, “unfortunately so. It was once rumoured, Ingram, that you actually intended to marry her.”

“Or rather,” observed Kaye, “she intended, for her own purposes, to marry Mr Ingram, I think.”

I pursed my lips, but made no response. My reflections at that moment were bitter enough without these observations from my friends.

“But do you suspect that she has had a hand in our latest betrayal?” I inquired a few minutes later. “You have just alleged that she is in the French service. If so, it hardly seems credible that she would give her information to the French Ambassador in Berlin.”

“On that point I am not yet absolutely certain,” Kaye responded. “I am, however, quite convinced that the exposure of our plans regarding Ceuta filtered to the French through their Embassy in Berlin.”

“Then, contrary to supposition, de Hindenburg, the German Ambassador here, may be assisting France against us?” I said in surprise.

“It seems much like it. Our inquiries all tend towards that theory. The German Ambassador has of late had almost daily interviews with the Minister of Foreign Affairs. These are generally believed to be in connection with the Samoan difficulty or the Transvaal; but without doubt the chief subject of discussion has been the formation of a plan whereby to checkmate our policy towards Spain in the matter of Ceuta.”

“Well, up to the present they have done so,” the Ambassador admitted, turning sharply upon his heel from the window, out of which he had been gazing moodily. “We appear to be arriving at a most critical stage, for what with the constant Anglophobe feeling here, the vile attacks of the Paris Press, the disgusting caricatures of Her Majesty and her subjects, and the army of spies surrounding us on every side, honest, straightforward diplomacy—the diplomacy which should preserve the peace of Europe—is well-nigh impossible. In all my career in the service I never knew a blacker outlook than at this moment—never, never!”

“The complications that have arisen are due entirely to spies,” I remarked.

“They are due, it appears, mainly to your friend, Yolande de Foville,” he said in a harsh voice. “We have to thank that interesting young lady for rendering all our diplomacy in that direction abortive.”

“You had suspicion of her the other day?” I exclaimed. “What caused you to suspect her?”

“Drummond knew her in Brussels, and mentioned her.”

“As a secret agent?”

“Yes, as a secret agent. He warned me to be wary of her.”

“Well,” I said, “I, who knew her most intimately years ago, never suspected it for one single instant.”

“Ah, Ingram,” the Ambassador answered, a smile crossing his serious, hard-set face, “you were in love with her. A man in love never believes that his idol is of mere clay.”

A sigh escaped me. His words were indeed true. A thought of Edith flashed across my mind. The face of that woman who was false to me rose before my vision, but I swept it aside. All was over between us. Diplomacy and flirtation are sister arts, but diplomacy and love never run hand-in-hand. I had quaffed the cup of life, with all its infinite joys and agonies, in one intoxicating draught.

Kaye rose at last and departed, promising to leave no stone unturned in his efforts to discover how the contents of the secret despatch had been obtained by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; and then, at the Ambassador’s dictation, I wrote a despatch to London explaining to the Marquess the reason why his instructions could not be acted upon. Thus were we compelled to acknowledge our defeat.

Below, in the hall, I met Sibyl dressed smartly, ready to go out.

“What!” she exclaimed, laughing, “you are back again! Why, I thought you would be at least a week in London. Did you bring that lace for me?”

“Yes,” I answered, “I have it round at my rooms. I’ll send it you this afternoon.”

“Why are you back so soon?” she inquired, holding out her hand, so that I might button her glove. “Was London too hot?”

“The heat was insufferable. Besides, we have much to attend to just now.”

“Poor father!” she exclaimed, looking up at me. “He seems terribly worried. Tell me, Mr Ingram, what has happened? I feel sure that some catastrophe has taken place.”

“Oh, nothing,” I reassured her. “Your father is a little anxious regarding some negotiations, that is all.”

“But you will go to the Elysée to-night, won’t you?”

“To-night! What is it to-night?”

“Why, the grand ball,” she answered.

“Which means a new frock for you—eh?” I laughed.

“Of course,” she replied. “You will come, won’t you?”

“I fear I’m ever so much too tired for dancing,” I responded, feeling in no humour for the crowded gaiety of the President’s ball.

“But you must,” she declared—“to please me. I want you to dance with me.”

“Well,” I said with reluctance, “I suppose I dare not be so ungallant as to refuse you.”

“That’s good,” she laughed. “Now, as a reward, I’ll drive you down to the boulevard. The victoria is outside. Where will you go?”

I reflected a moment, then told her I was on my way to my chambers.

“Very well,” she replied, “I’ll drop you there. I have to go down to the Rue de la Paix.”

“To the couturière, of course?”

“Yes,” she said, with that merry twinkle in her dark eyes, “you’ve guessed it the first time. It’s a charming gown; but I know father will pull a wry face when he finds the bill on his table.”

“But you can stand any amount of wry faces as long as you get pretty dresses, can’t you?” I laughed, handing her into the carriage and taking a seat beside her.

Then she opened her sunshade and lolled back with an air of indolence and luxury as we drove along together.

Chapter Twenty Two.

Perfume and Politics.

Upon my table a letter was lying. The handwriting I recognised instantly as Edith’s, and not without a feeling of anger and impatience I tore it open in expectation. Long and rambling, it upbraided me for leaving her without a single reassuring word, and declared that my refusal to kiss her at parting had filled her heart with a bitter and uncontrollable grief. As I read, memories of those midnight hours, of my walk to that distant village, and of my meeting with that shabby lover crowded upon me, and the impassioned words she had written made no impression upon me. I had steeled my heart against her. She had played me false, and I could never forgive.

“I know I have been foolish, Gerald,” she wrote, “but you misjudge me because of an indiscretion. You believe that the man with whom you saw me last night was my lover; yet you left me without allowing me to make any explanation. Is this right? Is it just? You know how well I love you, and that without you my life is but a hopeless blank. Can you, knowing that I love you thus, believe me capable of such duplicity as you suspect? I feel that you cannot. I feel that when you come to consider calmly all the circumstances you will find in your own honest heart one grain of pity and sympathy for the one woman who loves you so dearly. Write to me, for I cannot live without a word from you, because I love no other man but you?”

I crushed the letter in my hand, then slowly tore it into fragments. I had no confidence in her protestations—none. My dream of love was over.

We often hear it remarked that those who are themselves perfectly true and artless are in this world the more easily and frequently deceived. I have always held this to be a commonplace fallacy, for we shall ever find that truth is as undeceived as it is undeceiving, and that those who are true to themselves and others may now and then be mistaken, or, in particular instances, duped by the intervention of some other affection or quality of the mind; but that they are generally free from illusion, and are seldom imposed upon in the long run by the show of things and by the superficies of any character.

There was a curious contradiction in Edith’s character, arising from the contrast between her natural disposition and the situation in which she was placed, which corroborated my doubts. Her simplicity of language, her admission of an “indiscretion,” the inflexible resolution with which she asserted her right, her soft resignation to unkindness and wrong, and her warmth of temper breaking through the meekness of a spirit subdued by a deep sense of religion,—all these qualities, opposed yet harmonising, helped to increase my distrust of her. To me that letter seemed full of a dexterous sophistry exerted in order to ward off my accusations. Her remorse was without repentance; it arose from the pang of a wounded conscience, the recoil of the violated feelings of nature, the torture of self-condemnation.

The fragments of the letter I tossed into the waste-paper basket, and, putting on my hat, went down to the Grand Café to idle away an hour among friends accustomed to make the place a rendezvous in the afternoon.

On entering, I found Deane sitting at a table alone, his carriage awaiting him at the door. He was having a hasty drink during his round of visits, and hailed me lustily.

“Sit down a moment, Ingram,” he cried. “I want to see you.”

“What about?” I inquired, lighting the cigarette he handed me.

“About that curious incident in the Rue de Courcelles—Mademoiselle de Foville’s strange attack.”

“Well, what of it?” I asked eagerly.

“Strangely enough a man, who proved to be an Englishman giving himself the name of Payne, was brought to the Hôtel Dieu three nights ago in what appeared to be a cataleptic state. He had, it seemed, been found by the police lying on the pavement in the Boulevard St. Germain, and was at first believed to be dead. Some letters in English being found upon him, I was called, and upon examination discovered exactly the same symptoms as those which mademoiselle your friend had displayed. I was enabled, therefore, to administer an antidote, and within twelve hours the man had sufficiently recovered to take his discharge. The case has excited the greatest possible interest at the hospital, for I had previously submitted a portion of the solution obtained from the envelope which mademoiselle had used to Professor Ferrari, of Florence, the greatest authority on toxicology in the world, and he had declared it to be an entirely unknown, but most potent, poison.”

“Who was the Englishman? Did he tell you nothing?”

“No. Unfortunately the hospital authorities allowed him to leave before I deemed it wise to question him. I read the letters found upon him, however; but they conveyed nothing, except that he had been recently living somewhere in the neighbourhood of Hackney.”

“Then you have no idea of the manner in which the poison was administered?” I said, disappointed.

“His right hand was rather swollen, from which I concluded that he had accidentally touched some object impregnated with the fatal compound.”

“You don’t know its composition yet?”

“No. Ferrari is trying to discover it, but at present has failed. The fact of a second person suffering from it is in itself very mysterious. I intended to call upon you this evening and tell you all about it.”

“The affair is extraordinary,” I admitted. “I wonder whether the same person who made the attempt upon Yolande’s life is responsible for the attempt upon the Englishman? What can be the motive?”

“Ah! that’s impossible to tell. All we know is that some unknown person in Paris has in his or her possession a deadly compound capable of producing catalepsy and subsequent death in a manner most swift and secret. In order to ascertain whether any other person is attacked in the same manner, I have sent letters to the Direction of all the hospitals in Paris explaining the case, and asking that if any similar cases are brought to them for treatment, I may be at once communicated with.”

“An excellent precaution,” I said. “By that means we shall be able to watch the progress of the mysterious criminal.”

“You have heard nothing from Mademoiselle Yolande?”

“Nothing,” I said.

“Hers was a curious case,” he remarked. “But the man Payne’s was equally strange. It appears that he made no statement to either police or hospital authorities before he left. He only said that he was walking along the boulevard and suddenly fell to the ground insensible.”

“You think he had some motive in preserving silence?” I inquired quickly.

“Yes, I feel sure of it. I only wish I could rediscover him. They were foolish to allow him to take his discharge before giving me an opportunity of concluding my investigations. It was simply owing to professional jealousy. English medical men are not liked in Paris hospitals. But I must be off,” he said, rising. “Good-bye.”

Then he went out, and, entering his carriage, drove away.

Volkouski, the Russian attaché, was sitting close by, and I crossed to him, greeting him merrily. He was a good fellow—a thorough cosmopolitan, who had been trained in the smartest school of diplomacy—namely, the Embassy in London, which is presided over by that prince among diplomatists, Monsieur de Staal. Whatever may be said regarding the relations between Russia and England as nations, it cannot be denied that in the European capitals the staffs of the embassies of both Powers are always on terms of real friendship. I make no excuse for repeating this. The mutual courtesy of the representatives of the two nations is not, as in the case of those of France, Germany, and Austria, mere diplomatic manoeuvring, but in most instances a sound understanding and a deep personal regard. England, Russia, and Italy have interests in common, hence their representatives fraternise, even though certain journals may create all sorts of absurd scares regarding what they are pleased to term the “aggressive policy of Russia.” This is a stock journalistic expression, as meaningless as it is absurd. We who are “in the know” at the embassies smile when we read those alarmist articles, purporting to give all sorts of wild plans, which exist only in the imagination of the leader-writer. There is, indeed, one London journal known in the Russian Embassies on the Continent as The Daily Abuser, because of its intensely Russophobe tone. Fortunately nobody takes it seriously.

I chatted with Volkouski, sipping a mazagran the while. He was, I found, full of projects for his leave. His chief had already left Paris, and he himself was going home to Moscow for a month. Every diplomatist on service abroad gets homesick after a time, and looks forward to his leave with the same pleasurable anticipation of the schoolboy going for his summer holidays. To escape from the shadow of a throne or the ceaseless chatter of an over-democratic Republic is always a happy moment for the wearied attaché or worried secretary of embassy. One longs for a respite from the glare and glitter of the official world of uniforms and Court etiquette, and looks forward to rambles in the country in flannels and without a collar, to lazy afternoons upon the river, or after-luncheon naps in a hammock beneath a tree. To the tired diplomatist, sick of formalities, and with the stifling dust of the ballroom over his heart, the expression “en campagne” conveys so very much.

Shortly before midnight I stepped from a fiacre and ascended the broad steps of the Elysée. Tired as I was of the ceaseless whirl of the City of Pleasure, it nevertheless amused me to fix the physiognomy of the great official fêtes. They are inevitably banales, of course; but there is always a piquancy of detail and of contrast that is interesting.

If one wishes to see what a mixed crowd is like, there is no better illustration than the flocks of guests at the Elysée balls. Ah! what a crowd it was that night! What dresses! What a public! I know, of course, that it can never be otherwise under the present democratic régime. One man, who came on foot and whose boots were muddy, forgot to turn down the tucked-up ends of his trousers. People were walking about with their hands in their pockets, jostling each other without a word of excuse. Many were touching the furniture, and feeling the curtains and tapestry with that sans-gêne which so disgusted Gambetta with his former friends. You could see that they were determined not to appear astonished at anything, and that, after all, they were at home in the Elysée. They were of the detestable breed of café politicians, of loud-voiced orators at party meetings, of successful carpet-baggers, who render the ideas of equality and fraternity at times insufferable.

Before the buffet these fellows displayed themselves as goujats—cads—plain and simple. They grabbed for sandwiches, for biscuits, for glasses of champagne across the shoulders of ladies in front of them, or even elbowed them aside to get to the front row—and stop there. In the smoking-room the boxes of cigars were gone in the twinkling of an eye. One man struck his match on the wall. With these odd guests about it is not surprising that the Budget writes off a certain sum every year for articles that have disappeared from the buffets.

Whew! the heat there was insufferable!

In my search for Sibyl I passed through the antechamber. The footmen wore new livery. I saw none of those restaurant waiters who used, in the time of ce pauvre Monsieur Faure, to be employed at twenty francs the evening, supper included. Yes, things had slightly improved, but the crush was terrific. I made my way to the Salon des Aides-de-Camp, that historic chamber where, in the armchairs still furnishing the room, on the night of the coup d’état, sat, a prey to mortal anxiety, Morny, Persigny, Saint Arnaud, Piétri, Rouher, King Jérôme, and the Prince President.

The Japanese military attaché, walking before me, mixed himself up somehow with his sabre, and fell. This contretemps was greeted, as at a theatre, with laughter. Someone cried, “Oh, la la!” as if the stumble were a very clever bit of clowning indeed. The unhappy Japanese looked as if he wished the floor would swallow him.

I struggled up and paid my respects to the President, who was standing in the centre of the salon. Smiling, affable, displaying a simplicity that was real and unaffected, and yet devoid of mere familiarity, his bow and hand-shake were perfect. He struck the right note. I was impressed, moreover, by his sense of proportion. A little more cordiality, and he would cease to be Chief of the State. A little more solemnity, and he would be stilted. It is a little hard to convey the distinction; but imagine, on the one hand, a host who wants to make you forget his official position, and on the other a President of the Republic who is determined to be a good host. For well-bred people there is always a well-defined shade of difference between these two; and the President was the latter.

While turning away I suddenly came face to face with Monsieur Mollard, the chef-adjoint of the Protocol, who greeted me affably and commenced to tell me the latest story of General de Galliffet, Minister of War.

“It is amusing,” he laughed. “You must hear it, M’sieur Ingram. The General arrived at his club, the Union, last night, and for some reason or another his former friends were more than usually cold in their treatment of him. After saying a bonjour to one and the other of them, and receiving a curt reply here and a snub there, the Minister of War realised this. But he took their coolness coolly. With his back to the fireplace he said quietly, by way of bringing home to his friends the absurdity of their attitude: ‘You may come near me. Je ne sens pas mauvais—I don’t smell bad. You see, there was no Cabinet to-day!’ Is it not excellent?”

I smiled. It was a purely French joke. Mollard was always full of droll stories. Every diplomatist in Paris knew him as the keeper of the Elysée traditions, as guardian of its unwritten law by inheritance, his father having been, under other presidencies, the official known as introducteur des ambassadeurs. When a question of precedence puzzled the plebeian bigwigs at the Quai d’Orsay—the Foreign Office—it was Monsieur Mollard who would run to the archives to look it up. Nature had not, however, endowed him with a demeanour befitting his office, for he wore his uniform as awkwardly as a middle-aged volunteer officer, and looked more like a clerk than a chamberlain. But when he spoke he dragged on the mute syllables as French actors are taught to do in delivering Racine. He put three “l’s” in “Excellence” and four “r’s” in “Protocol.” For the rest, he was a good fellow, much liked in the diplomatic circle, although many jokes had from time to time been played at his expense. Presently, after we had been talking for a few moments, I inquired whether he had seen Sibyl.

“Ah, no! I regret, m’sieur,” he answered. “But a lady who is sitting over in the Salon Diplomatique has just inquired of me whether you are present.”

“A lady? What is her name?”

“I know her by sight, but cannot recall her name,” he responded. “She is a grande dame, however.”

“Young or old?”

“Young. You will find her in the salon talking with Count Tornelli, the Italian Ambassador. You will easily recognise her. She is wearing a costume of black, trimmed with silver. She told me that she desired to speak with you particularly, and that I was to tell you of her presence.”

“But you don’t know her?” I laughed.

“Go and see,” he answered. “You probably know her;” and, smiling, he turned away.

My curiosity being aroused, I struggled through the throng until I reached the spot indicated. Only the diplomatic corps and distinguished guests were allowed there, and the other guests, huddled together before the open door, were pointing out well-known personages.

I looked in, and in a moment saw before me the striking figure in black and silver. No second glance was needed to recognise who she was. For a moment I stood in hesitation; then, with a sudden resolve, entered, and, walking straight up, bowed low before her.

Chapter Twenty Three.

Princess Léonie.

“Princess,” I said, “permit me to offer my félicitations on your return to Paris. This is indeed an unexpected pleasure.”

“Ah, M’sieur Ingram!” she cried in charming English, holding forth her white-gloved hand, “at last! I have been hunting for you all the evening. All Paris is here, and the crush is terrible. Yes, you see I am back again.”

The Italian Ambassador had risen, bowed, and turned to speak to another acquaintance; therefore, with her sanction, I dropped into his place.

“And are you pleased to return?” I inquired, glancing at her beautiful and refined face, which seemed to me just a trifle more careworn than when I had last met her eighteen months ago.

“Ah!” she answered, “I am always pleased to come back to France. I went to America for a few months, you know; thence to Vienna, and for nearly a year have been living at home.”

“At Rudolstadt?”

She nodded.

“Well,” I said, “it was really too bad of you to hide your existence from your friends in that manner. Everyone has been wondering for months what had become of you. Surely you found Rudolstadt very dull after life here?”

“I did,” she sighed, causing the magnificent diamonds at her throat to sparkle with a thousand fires. “But I have departed from my hermitage again, you see. Now, sit here and tell me all that has happened during my absence. Then if you are good, I will, as a reward, give you just one waltz.”

“Very well,” I laughed. “Remember that I shall hold you to your bargain;” and then I commenced to gossip about the movements of people she had known when, two years before, she had been the most admired woman in Paris.

The Princess Léonie-Rose-Eugénie von Leutenberg was, according to the Almanach de Gotha—that red, squat little volume so dreaded by the ladies—only thirty years of age, and was certainly extremely good-looking. Her pale, half-tragic beauty was sufficient to arrest attention anywhere. Her noble features were well-moulded and regular, her eyes of a clear grey, and her hair of flaxen fairness, while her bearing was ever that of a daughter of the greatest of the Austrian houses. Her goodness of heart, her gracefulness, her conversational esprit, and her genuine Parisian chic had rendered her popular everywhere; while, as with the Duchesse de Berri, one strong point of her beauty was her charming little foot, which two years ago had been declared to be the loveliest foot in France, or, in Paris, simply “Le pied de la Princesse.” Her shoes and hosiery were perfect marvels of fineness and neatness, and when she walked, or rather glided, along the Avenue des Acacias, the other promenaders formed long rows on each side to behold and admire le pied de la Princesse.

I had heard it declared, too, with mysterious smiles, how le pied de la Princesse had been seen more than once at the masked balls at the Opera, and many an amusing little story had gone the round, and many a piquant tale had been told of how the Princess had been recognised here and there by the extreme smallness of her foot. One was that for a wager she had disguised herself as a work-girl with a bandbox on her arm, and, attended by her valet, likewise disguised, appeared before the Hôtel de Ville awaiting an omnibus. The vehicle stopped, and the conductor exclaimed in an indifferent tone, “Entrez, mademoiselle,” without taking any further notice. Then, however, his wandering eye caught sight of a pair of tiny feet, and, looking into her face in surprise, he enthusiastically exclaimed: “Ah! ah! le pied de la Princesse!” and doffed his hat respectfully. The Princess lost her wager, but was in no little measure proud of the conquest which her foot had won over the plain omnibus-conductor.

Her life had been a somewhat tragic one. The only daughter of Prince Kinsky von Wchinitz und Tettau, the Seigneur of Wchinitz, in Bohemia, Léonie had, when scarcely out of her teens, been forced to marry the old Prince Othon von Leutenberg, a man forty years her senior. The marriage proved an exceedingly unhappy one, for he treated her brutally, and after five years of a wretched existence, during which she bore herself with great patience and forbearance, the Prince died of alcoholism in Berlin, and her release brought her into possession of an enormous fortune, together with the mansion of the Leutenbergs in the Frieung at Vienna, one of the finest in the Austrian capital, the castle and extensive estates in Schwazbourg-Rudolstadt, that had belonged to the family from feudal days, as well as the hôtel in the Avenue du Bois de Boulogne, and the beautiful Château de Chantoiseau, deep in the forest of Fontainebleau.

She was very charming, and there was an air of sadness in her beauty that made her the more interesting. We were friends of long standing. Indeed, I had known her in the days when I was junior attaché and fancied myself in love with every woman. I had admired her, and a firm friendship existed between us, although I think I can say honestly that I had never fallen in love with her. More than once, when those false and scandalous tales had been whispered about her—as they are whispered about every pretty woman in Paris—I had constituted myself her champion, and challenged her traducers to prove their words.

As we sat there chatting, watching the gaily uniformed corps diplomatique, and bowing ever and anon as some man or woman came up to congratulate her on her return to Paris, she told me of the dreariness of her life in the gloomy, ancestral Castle of Rudolstadt, and how, finding it unendurable at last, she had suddenly resolved to spend the remainder of the summer at Chantoiseau.

“I have been there already a fortnight, and everything is in order,” she said. “I am inviting quite a number of people. You must come also.”

“But I scarcely think it is possible for me to be absent from Paris just now,” I answered in hesitation.

“I will take no refusal,” she said decisively. “I will talk to Lord Barmouth to-night before I leave. Me never refuses me anything. Besides, in two hours you can always be at the Embassy. You will remember, the last time you were my guest, how easy you found the journey to and from Paris. Why, you often used to leave in the morning and return at night. No, you cannot refuse.”

“I must consult His Excellency before accepting,” I replied. “In the meantime, Princess, I thank you for your kind invitation.”

“Princess?” she exclaimed, raising her eyebrows. “Why not Léonie? I was Léonie to you always in the days gone by. Is there any reason why you should be so distant now? Unless—” and she paused.

“Unless what?” I inquired, looking at her swiftly.

“Unless you have a really serious affair of the heart,” she said.

“I have none,” I answered promptly, suppressing a sigh with difficulty.

“Then do not use my title. I hate my friends to call me Princess. Recollect that to you I am always Léonie.”

“Very well,” I laughed, for she was full of quaint caprice.

I had pleasant recollections of my last visit to the château, and hoped that if the theft of the instructions contained in the despatch I had brought from London produced no serious international complication, I should obtain leave to join her house-party, which was certain to be a smart and merry one.

She told me the names of some she had invited. Among those known to me were the Baroness de Chalencon, Count de Hindenburg, the German Ambassador, and his wife, and Count de Wolkenstein, Austrian Ambassador, as well as several other men and women of the smartest set in Paris.

“You will be a real benefactress,” I laughed. “Everyone here is stifled; while Dieppe is too crowded; Aix, with its eternal Villa des Fleurs, is insupportable; and both Royat and Vichy are full to overflowing.”

“Ah, mon cher Gerald!” cried the Princess, lifting her small hands, “it is your English tourists who have spoilt all our summer resorts. If one has no place of one’s own in which to spend the summer nowadays, one must herd with the holders of tourist tickets and hotel coupons.”

I admitted that what she said was in a great measure true. Society, as the grande dame knows it, is being expelled by the tourists from the places which until a year or two ago were expensive and exclusive. Even the Riviera is fast becoming a cheap winter resort, for Nice now deserves to be called the Margate of the Continent.

Having arranged that I should do my best to accept her invitation, our conversation drifted to politics, art, and the drama. She seemed in utter ignorance of recent events, except such as she had read about in the newspapers.

“I know nothing,” she laughed. “News reaches Rudolstadt tardily, and then only by the journals; and you know how unreliable they are. How I’ve longed time after time to spend an evening in Paris to hear all the gossip! It is charming, I assure you, to be back here again.”

“But for what reason did you shut yourself up for so long?” I asked. “It surely is not like you!”

She grew grave in an instant, and appeared to hesitate. Her lips closed tightly, and there was a hard expression at the corners of her well-shaped mouth.

“I had my reasons—strong ones.”

“What were they?”

“Well, I was tired of it all.”

“Léonie,” I said, looking at her seriously, “pray forgive me, but you do not intend to tell me the truth. You were tired of it years ago, when the Prince was alive.”

“That was so,” she answered, with a glance of triumph; “and I went home to my father and shut myself up at Wchinitz.”

“But you must have had some stronger motive in burying yourself again as you have recently done. You did not write to a soul, and no one knew where you were. You simply dropped out; and you had some reason for doing so, otherwise you would have told the truth to your most intimate friends.”

“You are annoyed that I should have left you without a word—eh?” she asked. “Well, I will apologise now.”

“No apology is necessary,” I answered. “It is only because we are such good friends that I venture to speak thus. I feel confident that you have sustained some great sorrow. You are, somehow, not the same as you were in Paris two years ago; now, tell me—”

“Ah! Do not talk of it!” she cried huskily, rising to her feet. “Let us drop the subject. Promise me, Gerald, not to mention it again, for I confess to you that it is too painful—much too painful. I promised you a waltz. Come, let us dance.”

Thus bidden, I rose, and she, twisting her skirts deftly in her hand, leaned lightly upon my arm as I conducted her to the great ballroom. A very few moments later we glided together into the whirling, dazzling crowd.

“You will not speak of that again, Gerald?” she urged in a hoarse whisper, looking earnestly up to my face, as her head came near my shoulder. “Promise me.”

“If it is your wish, Léonie,” I responded, puzzled, “I will ask no further question.”

Chapter Twenty Four.

In the Forest of Fontainebleau.

Sixty kilometres from Paris, just off that straight and noble highway that runs through the heart of the magnificent forest, and passes through the old-world town of Fontainebleau—where Napoleon signed his abdication—through the mediaeval, crumbling gates of Moret, and away far south to Lyons, rises the fine old Château of Chantoiseau. Half-way between the clean little village of By, standing in the midst of its well-kept vineyards, and the river-hamlet of Thomery, it occupies a commanding position on the summit of a cliff, where far below winds the Seine, on past Valvins and Samois, until it becomes lost like a silver thread among the dark woodlands in the direction of Paris.

The position of the splendid old place is superb. From its windows can be obtained a view of the great forest stretching away to the horizon on the left, while to the right is the valley of the Seine, and across the river spread the smiling vineyards with their white walls—the vineyards of Champagne. The house, a long, rambling place with circular towers, has been historical for many centuries. Once the property of Madame La Pompadour, in the days when the splendours of the Palace of Fontainebleau were world-renowned, a latter-day interest also attaches to it, inasmuch as it was the headquarters of the German Crown Prince during the advance of the Prussians upon Paris. Its grounds, sloping down, enclose part of the forest itself; therefore, during the blazing days of August one lives actually in the woods. The forest is an enormous one, and even to-day there still remain many parts unexplored, where the wolf and wild boar retreat in summer, and where even that most ubiquitous forester, the viper-hunter—the man whose profession it is to kill vipers and sell them at the local mairie—has never penetrated. In the whole of the great forest, however, no spot is more charming or more picturesque than that in which the château is situated. It is not a show-place, like Barbison or the Gorges de Franchard, but entirely rural and secluded—on the one side the open valley, on the other the dark forest, where in the tunnel-like alleys the trees meet overhead, and where the shady highroads to the painter colony at Marlotte and to Bois-le-Roi are perfect paradises for the cyclist.

Chantoiseau itself is not a village, not even a hamlet, only a big old-fashioned cottage in which the forest-guards live. Above it, on the high ground beyond, stands the fine old château. Many of those who read my story have driven or cycled in the forest, and many have no doubt given the great old place a passing glance before plunging deep into those leafy glades that lead to Fontainebleau. If when you have driven past you have inquired of your cocher, “Who lives there?” he has probably only shrugged his shoulders and replied: “Servants only. Madame la Princesse, alas! seldom comes,” and you have gone on your way, as many others have done, wondering why such a beautiful old place should be neglected by its owner.

One hot evening at sundown, about three weeks after the President’s ball, I strolled slowly beside the Princess down the hill, entering the forest by that well-kept cross-road which leads by the Carrefour de la Croix de Montmorin straight to the pretty village of Montigny on the Loing.

Contrary to expectation, no immediate result had accrued from the mysterious theft of the secret instructions to Lord Barmouth; hence I had obtained leave and accepted my hostess’s invitation, although I was compelled to spend two days each week at the Embassy, going up to Paris in the morning and returning by the six o’clock express from the Gare de Lyon. That some result of the exposure of our policy must certainly make itself felt we knew quite well, but at present the political atmosphere seemed clearer, and by the fact that several of the ambassadors had left Paris considerable confidence had been established. Yet in those sultry August days the war-cloud still hung over Europe and the representative of Her Majesty was compelled, as he ever is, to exercise the greatest tact and the utmost finesse in order to preserve peace with honour. Truly, the office of British Ambassador in Paris is no sinecure, for upon him rests much of the responsibility of England’s position in Europe and her prestige among nations, while to him is entrusted the difficult duty of negotiating amicably with a nation openly and avowedly hostile to British interests and British prosperity.

Those summer days, so sunny, happy, and pleasant, in the forest depths at Chantoiseau, were, nevertheless, perplexing ones for the rulers of Europe. The stifling air was the oppression before the storm. I had more than once chatted in the billiard-room with my fellow guests, the German and Austrian Ambassadors, and both had agreed that the outlook was serious, and that the storm-cloud was upon the political horizon.

But life at the château was full of enjoyment. The Princess, a born hostess, knew exactly whom to invite, and her house-parties were always congenial gatherings. There was riding, cycling, tennis, boating, billiards; indeed, something to suit all tastes, while she contented herself with looking on and seeing that all her guests enjoyed themselves.

A riding-party had gone over to Montigny, and after tea the Princess had suggested that I should accompany her for a stroll down into the forest to meet them. She was dressed simply in a washing-dress of pale blue linen, and wore a sailor-hat, so that with her fair hair bound tightly she presented quite an English appearance, save perhaps for her figure and gait, both of which were eminently foreign. The feet that all Paris had admired two years ago were encased in stout walking-boots, and she carried a light cane, walking with all the suppleness of youth.

Soon we left the full glory of the mellow sunset flooding the Seine valley, and entered the forest road where the high trees met and interlaced above, and where the golden light, filtering through the screen of foliage, illuminated here and there the deeper shadows, struck straight upon the brilliant green of the bracken, married with the greyness on the lichen-covered trunks, and kissed the leaves with golden lips. Birds were twittering farewells to the day, and here and there a red-brown squirrel, startled by our presence, darted from bough to bough with tail erect, while on each side of the road was a carpet of moss and wild-flowers. The sweet odour of the woods greeted our nostrils, and we inhaled it in a deep draught, for that gloomy shade was delightfully cool and refreshing after the blazing heat of the stifling day. As I had been compelled to attend to some official correspondence, I had not joined the riding-party. The Princess had given some half-dozen of us tea in the hall, and, while the others had gone off to play tennis, she and I had been left alone.

Suddenly, as we walked along in the coolness, she turned to me, saying in a tone of reproach:

“Gerald, you have hidden from me the true seriousness of the situation at your Embassy. Why?”

“Well,” I answered, facing her in surprise, “we do not generally discuss our fears, you know. Others might profit by the knowledge.”

“But surely you might have confided in me?” she said gravely.

“Then de Wolkenstein has told you?”

“He has told me nothing,” she answered. “But I am, nevertheless, aware of all that has come to pass. I know, too, that since my absence at Rudolstadt you have fallen in love.”

“Well?” I inquired.

She shrugged her well-formed shoulders as if to indicate that such a thing was beyond her comprehension.

“Is it a disaster, do you think?” I asked.

“You yourself should know that,” she replied in a strained tone. “It seems, however, that you do not exercise your usual discretion in your love-affairs.”

“What do you mean, Léonie?” I demanded quickly, halting and looking at her. Who, I wondered, had told her the truth? To which of my loves did she refer—the spy or the traitress?

“I mean exactly what I have said,” she answered quite calmly. “If you had confided in me I might perhaps have used my influence in preventing the inevitable.”

“The inevitable!” I echoed. “What is that?”

“A combination of the Powers against England,” she replied quickly. “As you know well enough, Gerald, I have facilities for learning much that is hidden from even your accredited representatives. Therefore, I tell you this, that at this moment there is a plan arranged to upset British diplomacy in all four capitals and to ruin British prestige. It is a bold plan, and I alone outside the conspirators am aware of it. If carried out, England must either declare war or lose her place as the first nation in the world. Recollect these words of mine, for I am not joking at this moment. To-day is the blackest that Europe has ever known.”

She had halted in the path, and spoke with an earnestness that held me bewildered.

“A conspiracy against us!” I gasped. “What is it? Tell me of it?”

“No,” she answered. “At present I cannot. Suffice it for you to know that I alone am aware of the truth, and that I alone, if I so desire, can thwart their plans and turn their own weapons against them.”

“You can?” I cried. “You will do it! Tell me the truth—for my sake. I have been foolish, I know, Léonie; but tell me. If it is really serious, no time must be lost.”

“Serious?” she echoed. “It is so serious that I doubt whether the present month will pass before war is declared.”

“By England?”

“Yes. Your country will be forced into a conflict which must prove disastrous. The plan is the most clever and most dastardly ever conceived by your enemies, and this time no diplomatic efforts will succeed in staving off the tragedy, depend upon it.”

“Are both Wolkenstein and de Hindenburg aware of the plot?”

“I presume so. I have watched carefully, but have, however, discovered nothing to lead me to believe that they understand how near Europe is to an armed conflict.”

“Then your information is not from Wolkenstein?”

“No, from a higher source.”

“From your Emperor?”

She nodded.

“Then this accounts for your sudden reappearance among us?” I said.

“You may put my presence down to that, if you wish,” she replied. “But promise me, on your word of honour, that you will not breathe a single word to a soul—not even to Lord Barmouth.”

“If you impose silence upon me, Léonie, it shall be as you wish. But you have just said that you can assist me. How?”

“I can do so—if I choose,” she responded thoughtfully, drawing the profile of a man’s face in the dust with the ferrule of her walking-stick.

“You speak strangely,” I said—“almost as though you do not intend to do me this service. Surely you will not withhold from me intelligence which might enable me to rescue my country from the machination of its enemies?”

“And why, pray, should I betray my own country in order to save yours?” she asked in a cold tone.

I was nonplussed. For a moment I could not reply. At last, however, I answered in a low, earnest tone:

“Because we are friends, Léonie.”

“Mere friendship does not warrant one turning traitor,” she replied.

“But Austria is not the prime mover of this conspiracy,” I said. “The rulers of another nation have formed the plot. Tell me which of the Powers is responsible?”

“No,” she answered with a slight hauteur. “As you have thought fit to preserve certain secrets from me, I shall keep this knowledge to myself.”

“What secrets have I withheld from you?” I inquired, dismayed.

“Secrets concerning your private affairs.”

I knew well that she referred to my passion for Yolande. For a moment I hesitated, until words rose to my lips and I answered:

“Surely my private affairs are of little interest to you! Why should I trouble you with them?”

“Because we are friends, are we not?” she said, looking straight into my face with those fine eyes which half Europe had admired when le pied de la Princesse had been the catchword of Paris.

“Most certainly, Léonie,” I agreed. “And I hope that our friendship will last always.”

“It cannot if you refuse to confide in me and sometimes to seek my advice.”

“But you, in your position, going hither and thither, with hosts of friends around you, can feel no real interest in my doings?” I protested.

“Friends!” she echoed in a voice of sarcasm. “Do you call these people friends? My guests at this moment are not friends. Because of my position—because I am popular, and it is considered chic to stay at Chantoiseau—because I have money, and am able to amuse them, they come to me, the men to bow over my hand, and the women to call me their ‘dear Princess.’ Bah! they are not friends. The diplomatic set come because it is a pleasant mode of passing a few weeks of summer, while still within hail of Paris; and the others—well, they are merely the entourage which every fashionable woman unconsciously gathers about her.”

“Then among them all you have no friend?” Again she turned her fine eyes upon me, and in a low but distinct tone declared:

“Only yourself, Gerald.”

“I hope, Léonie, that I shall always prove myself worthy of your friendship,” I answered, impressed by her sudden seriousness.

Her face had grown pale, and she had uttered those words with all possible earnestness.

Then we walked on together in the silence of the darkening gloom of the forest. The ruddy light of the dying day struggled through the foliage, the birds had ceased their song, and the stillness of night had already fallen. We were each full of our own thoughts, and neither uttered a word.

Suddenly she halted again, and, gripping my arm, looked up into my face. I started, for upon her pale countenance I saw a look of desperation such as I had never before seen there.

“Gerald!” she cried hoarsely, “why do you treat me like this? You cannot tell how I suffer, or you would have pity upon me! Surely you cannot disguise from yourself the truth, even though your coldness forces me to tell you with my own lips. You know well my position—that of a woman drifting here and there, open to the calumnies of my enemies and the scandalous tales invented by so-called friends; a woman who has borne great trials and who is still, alas! unhappy! Of my honesty you yourself shall judge. You have heard whispers regarding my doings—escapades they have been called—and possibly you have given them credence. If you have, I cannot help it. There are persons around us always who delight in besmirching a woman’s reputation, especially if she has the misfortune to be born of princely family. But I tell you that all the tales you have heard are false. I—”

Suddenly she covered her face with her hands; the words seemed to choke her, and she burst into tears.

“No, no, Léonie!” I said with deep sympathy, bending down to whisper in her ear and taking her hand in mine. “No one believes in those foul calumnies. Your honour is too well known.”

“You do not believe them—you will never believe them, will you?” she asked quickly through her tears.

“Of course not. I have denied them many times when they have been repeated to me.”

“Ah!” she cried, “I know you are always generous to a woman, Gerald.”

Then again a long silence fell between us. Presently, with a sudden impulse, she raised her tear-stained face to mine, and with a look of fierce desperation in her eyes implored:

“Gerald, will you not give me one single word? Will you still remain cold and indifferent?” As she said this, her breast rose and fell in agitation.

I drew back, wondering at her beseeching attitude.

“No, no!” she cried. “Do not put me from you, Gerald! I cannot bear it—indeed I can’t! You must have recognised the truth long ago—” and she paused. Then, lowering her voice until it was only a hoarse whisper, she added, “The truth that I love you!”

I looked at her in blank amazement, scarce knowing what to reply. I had admired her just as half Paris had admired her, but I certainly had never felt a spark of deep affection for her.

“Ah!” she went on, reading my heart in an instant, “you despise me for this confession. But I cannot help it. I love you, Gerald, as I have never before loved a man. In return for your love I can offer you nothing—nothing save one thing,” she added in a strange, mechanical voice, almost as though speaking to herself. “In return for your love I can save your country from the grievous peril in which it is now placed.”

She offered me her secret in return for my love! The thing was incomprehensible. I stood there dumbfounded.

“This is a moment of foolishness, Léonie. We are both at fault,” I said, as soon as I again found tongue. “Think of the difference in our stations—you a princess, and I a poor diplomatist! I am your friend, and hope to remain so always—but not your lover.”

“But I love you!” she cried fiercely, raising her blanched and pitiful face until her lips met mine. The passion of love was in her heart. “You may despise me, Gerald; you may cast me from you; you may hate me; but in the end you will love me just as intensely as I love you. To endeavour to escape me is useless. Since the die is cast, let us make the compact now, as I have already suggested. I have confessed to you openly. I am yours, and I implore of you to give me your love in return. You are mine, Gerald—mine only!”

Chapter Twenty Five.

England’s Enemies.

Late that night, after the Princess and most of her guests had retired, I entered the billiard-room to get my cigarette-case, which I had left there while playing pool earlier in the evening, and on opening the door found the two Ambassadors Wolkenstein and Hindenburg seated together in the long lounge-chairs in earnest conversation. They were speaking in German, and as I entered I overheard the words “in such a manner as to crush the English power on the sea.” They were uttered by the German representative, and were certainly ominous. It was apparent that both men were aware of the gigantic conspiracy of which the Princess had told me—the plot which aimed at the downfall of our nation. I could see, too, that my sudden entry had disconcerted them, for they both moved uneasily and glanced quickly at each other as though fearing I had overheard some part of what had passed between them. Then Wolkenstein with skilful tact cried in French:

“Ah, my dear Ingram! we thought we alone were the late birds to-night. Come here and chat;” and at the same time he pulled forward one of the long cane chairs, into which, thus bidden, I sank.

What, I wondered, had been the exchange of view’s between these two noted diplomatists? The faces of both were sphinx-like. Our talk at first dealt with nothing more important than the journey across the forest to Barbison which our hostess had arranged for the morrow. I knew, however, that the conversation held before my entrance had been about the European situation. Those men were England’s enemies. My impulse was to rise abruptly and leave them; but it is always the diplomatist’s duty to remain cool, and watch, even though he may be compelled to hobnob with the bitterest opponents of his native land. Therefore I remained, and, concealing my antipathy, lit a cigar and lay back in my chair, carelessly gossiping about the usual trivialities which form the subject of house-party chatter.

“The Princess looked rather pale to-night, I thought,” exclaimed Count de Hindenburg suddenly. “She seemed quite worried.”

“With a château full of guests the life of a hostess is not always devoid of care,” I remarked, blowing a cloud of smoke toward the ceiling.

I alone knew the reason of her paleness and anxiety, and was eager to ascertain what deductions these two shrewd men had made.

“To me,” observed the representative of the Emperor Francis Joseph, “it seemed as though the Princess had been shedding tears. Didn’t you notice that her eyes were just a trifle swollen?” and, turning to me, he added: “She scarcely spoke to you at dinner. Are you the culprit, Ingram?”

Both men laughed.

“Certainly not,” I denied. “Madame has a touch of nerves, I suppose—that’s all. Such a malady is common among women.”

“She looked quite worn out by fatigue,” declared Wolkenstein.

“Because she is never still a single moment in the day. Her thoughts are always for her guests—how to amuse them and to give them a pleasant time. It was the same two years ago,” I said.

“Remarkable woman—quite remarkable!” exclaimed de Hindenburg. “She had sufficient trouble with the rheumatic old Prince to turn any woman’s hair grey; but, on the contrary, she seems now to become younger every day. She’s still one of the prettiest women in Europe.”

“Everyone admits that, of course,” I said.

They exchanged glances, and I fancied that these looks were unusually significant. A flood of recollections of the sunset hour in the forest surged within my mind—how I had striven with firmness to release myself, and how I had been forced to turn away and leave the Princess. In that deep gloom, when the rosy afterglow was fading and the light within the leafy glade so dim that all objects were indistinct, I had seen her wild passion in all its magnificence. Her eyes had burned with the fierce, all-consuming fire of love, her cheeks were white and cold, and her words as reckless as they were passionate. She had charged me with entertaining affection for some other woman—a woman unworthy of my love, she had said with distinct meaning, as though she knew the duplicity of Yolande; and she had sworn an oath with clenched hands to compel me to reciprocate her passion.

The scene between us was one of unreason and of folly. She had been overwhelmed by the impulse of the moment, and I had bowed and left her, my heart full of conflicting emotions, my head reeling. She had suddenly twisted her soft arms about my neck and clung to me, whispering her love and declaring that I was cruel, cold, with a heart like adamant. But I had flung her off, and we had not met until two hours later, when I sat at her right hand at dinner, during which she had scarcely addressed a single word to me.

My companions had, of course, noticed this, and appeared to have cleverly guessed my refusal to accept the offer of the Princess. They little knew the terms upon which she had attempted to make a compact with me—that she was ready to betray them in return for my love.

I smoked on in silence and in wonder. The situation certainly presented a problem which I was utterly unable to solve. That the affections of such a woman as the Princess von Leutenberg were not to be trifled with I knew well, for women of her temperament are capable of anything when once they love with a fierce, uncontrollable, reckless passion such as she had seen fit to display that evening in the deep silence of the forest. Her proposition had, indeed, been a startling one. She had offered me the secret of the plot in return for my love!

With my two companions I chatted on until nearly two o’clock; then we separated, and I passed through the long oak corridors to my room. Upon the dressing-table I found a note lying. It was sealed with black wax, with the Leutenberg arms. I tore it open. It gave out an odour of fresh violets, and I saw instantly that the handwriting was Léonie’s.

“I have been foolish in my confession to you, Gerald,” she wrote in French. “But my heart was so full that I could conceal the truth no longer. I saw from your manner at dinner to-night that you despise me, and intend to hold me at a distance as an unwelcome woman who has flung herself into your arms. But I cannot help it. The misfortune—nay, the curse upon me—is that I love you. Would to Heaven that I did not! Because of you I have forgotten eatery thing—my duty to myself as a woman, my duty to my family as one of a noble house, my duty to my country, my duty to my Creator. When I left Paris long ago, I crossed the Atlantic, resolved to forget you; but all was in vain. I returned to Rudolstadt and shut myself up in retirement, striving to wean myself from the mad passion which had arisen within me. All, however, was futile, and at last I broke the bonds and returned to Paris. A month has gone by, and now I have told you the truth; I have confessed. To-morrow morning at eleven I shall walk alone through the forest, along the road that leads to By. My offer to you—an offer made, I admit, in desperation—still stands. If you accept it you will be enabled to save your country from her enemies, and we shall both find peace and happiness; if not, then the plot will be carried out, and at least one woman’s life will be wrecked—the solitary and unhappy woman who writes these lines and whose name is Léonie.”

She had written that letter calmly and coolly, for the handwriting showed no haste. Evidently she had penned it in the seclusion of her chamber, and Suzanne, her maid, had placed it upon my dressing-table.

I stood with the letter in my hand. My eyes caught my own reflection in the long silver-framed mirror, and I was struck by the haggard, anxious expression upon my own countenance. My personal appearance startled me.

Well I knew the character of this pale and beautiful woman whom all Paris had admired. The impression she gave everyone was that of perpetual and irreconcilable contrast. I had long ago recognised her high mental accomplishments, her unequalled grace, her woman’s wit and woman’s wiles, her almost irresistible allurements, her moments of classic grandeur, her storms of temper, her vivacity of imagination, her petulant caprice, her tenderness and her truth, her childish susceptibility to flattery, her magnificent spirit, and her princely pride. She had dazzled my faculties, perplexed my judgment, bewildered and bewitched my fancy. I was conscious of a kind of fascination against which my moral sense rebelled.

With all her perverseness, egotism, and caprice, she, nevertheless, I knew, mingled a capacity for warm affection and kindly feeling, or, rather, what one might call a constitutional good-nature, and was lavishly generous to her favourites and dependants. She was a Princess in every sense of the word, her right royal wilfulness and impatience often fathering the strangest caprice. There were actually moments when she seemed desirous of picking a quarrel with such immensities as time and space, and, with the air of a lioness at bay, regarded those who dared to remember what she chose to forget.

She had given me but little time to decide. To-morrow at eleven she would slip away from her guests and await me in that long, tunnel-like passage leading through the forest to the ancient town of Moret, at the confluence of the willow-lined Loing with the broad Seine. Its walls and gates, dating from the time of Charlemagne, still remain, and right in the heart of the little town stands the square old donjon keep, now ivy-grown and with its moat full of a profusion of sweet-smelling tea-roses.

I could save England if, in return for her secret, I gave her my love. Has any man ever found himself in similar perplexity?

Calmly I reasoned with myself, turning again to her letter, and feeling convinced that this sudden passion of hers was but a momentary caprice. No woman, if she were cool and reasonable, would have acted as she had done, for she must have recognised that the difference in our stations rendered marriage impossible.

My duty to my country was to learn the truth about this gigantic conspiracy; yet, at the same time, my duty towards myself and towards the Princess was to leave Chantoiseau at once and forget all that had occurred. Signs had not been wanting in Paris during the past few days to corroborate what she had told me regarding the conspiracy of certain Powers against the prestige of their hated rival England. There was a lull in diplomatic affairs that was ominous; a distinctly oppressive atmosphere which foreboded a storm.

Far into the night I sat thinking, trying to devise some plan by which I could obtain knowledge of her secret without committing myself. But I could find none—absolutely none.

At early morning, before the others were astir, I took a stroll down the hill to where the clear Seine wound beneath the chalk cliff. The larks were soaring high, filling the air with their song. The boatmen going down-stream shouted wittily to each other between their hands, and the bronzed villagers on their way to work in the vineyards chanted merrily the latest popular airs. Life is easy and prosperous among the peasantry around the Fontainebleau forest. In those clean white villages of the Department of Seine et Marne there is little, if any, poverty. I wandered through the pretty, flower-embowered village of Thomery, and, crossing the river by the long iron bridge, entered the smiling little hamlet of Champagne—a quaint and comely group of small cottages, where lived the vineyard-workers. This hamlet is famous for miles round because of a particularly venomous breed of vipers which infest the sun-kissed lands in its neighbourhood. Although only six o’clock, the prosperous little place was already busy, and as I wandered through the village, past the grey old church, and along the wide, well-kept road beside the river, I smiled to think that the name of that old-world place was known everywhere from Piccadilly to Peru, and was synonymous with wealth, luxury, and riotous living.

Heedless as to where I went, so deeply engaged was I in conflicting feelings and in trying to determine whether I should keep that appointment on the footpath to Moret, at last I found myself in Samoreau, where, crossing by the ferry, I returned to the forest, and at eight o’clock was back again, idling with several of the guests on the lawn in front of the château.