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diff --git a/old/13123.txt b/old/13123.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..90ff25d --- /dev/null +++ b/old/13123.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8533 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Great Prince Shan, by E. Phillips +Oppenheim + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Great Prince Shan + +Author: E. Phillips Oppenheim + +Release Date: August 6, 2004 [eBook #13123] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GREAT PRINCE SHAN*** + + +E-text prepared by Steven desJardins and Project Gutenberg Distributed +Proofreaders + + + +THE GREAT PRINCE SHAN + +by + +E. PHILLIPS OPPENHEIM + +1922 + + + + + + + +CHAPTER I + + +"A club for diplomats and gentlemen," Prince Karschoff remarked, looking +lazily through a little cloud of tobacco smoke around the spacious but +almost deserted card room. "The classification seems comprehensive +enough, yet it seems impossible to get even a decent rubber of bridge." + +Sir Daniel Harker, a many years retired plenipotentiary to one of the +smaller Powers, shrugged his shoulders. + +"Personally, I have come to the conclusion," he declared, "that the +_raison d'etre_ for the club seems to be passing. There is no diplomacy, +nowadays, and every man who pays his taxes is a gentleman. Kingley, you +are the youngest. Ransack the club and find a fourth." + +The Honourable Nigel Kingley smiled lazily from the depths of his +easy-chair. He was a young Englishman of normal type, long-limbed, +clean-shaven, with good features, a humorous mouth and keen grey eyes. + +"In actual years," he admitted, "I may have the advantage of you two, +but so far as regards the qualities of youth, Karschoff is the youngest +man here. Besides, no one could refuse him anything." + +"It is a subterfuge," the Prince objected, "but if I must go, I will go +presently. We will wait five minutes, in case Providence should be kind +to us." + +The three men relapsed into silence. They were seated in a comfortable +recess of the card room of the St. Philip's Club. The atmosphere of the +apartment seemed redolent with suggestions of faded splendour. There was +a faint perfume of Russian calf from the many rows of musty volumes +which still filled the stately bookcases. The oil paintings which hung +upon the walls belonged to a remote period. In a distant corner, four +other men were playing bridge, speechless and almost motionless, the +white faces of two of them like cameos under the electric light and +against the dark walls. There was no sound except the soft patter of the +cards and the subdued movements of a servant preparing another bridge +table by the side of the three men. Then the door of the room was +quietly opened and closed. A man of youthful middle-age, carefully +dressed, with a large, clean-shaven face, blue eyes, and fair hair +sprinkled with grey, came towards them. He was well set up, almost +anxiously ingratiating in manner. + +"You see now what Providence has sent," Sir Daniel Harker observed under +his breath. + +"It is enough to make an atheist of one, this!" the Prince muttered. + +"Any bridge?" the newcomer enquired, seating himself at the table and +shuffling one of the packs of cards. + +The three men rose to their feet with varying degrees of unwillingness. + +"Immelan is too good for us," Sir Daniel grumbled. "He always wins." + +"I am lucky," the newcomer admitted, "but I may be your partner; in +which case, you too will win." + +"If you are my partner," the Prince declared, "I shall play for five +pounds a hundred. I desire to gamble. London is beginning to weary me." + +"Mr. Kingley is a better player, though not so lucky," Immelan +acknowledged, with a little bow. + +"Never believe it, with all due respect to our young friend here," Sir +Daniel replied, as he cut a card. "Kingley plays like a man with brain +but without subtlety. In a duel between you two, I would back Immelan +every time." + +Kingley took his place at the table with a little gesture of +resignation. He looked across the table to where Immelan sat displaying +the card which he had just cut. The eyes of the two men met. A few +seconds of somewhat significant silence followed. Then Immelan gathered +up the cards. + +"I have the utmost respect for Mr. Kingley as an adversary," he said. + +The latter bowed a little ironically. + +"May you always preserve that sentiment! To-day, chance seems to have +made us partners. Your deal, Mr. Immelan." + +"What stakes?" the Prince enquired, settling himself down in his chair. + +"They are for you to name," Immelan declared. + +The Prince laughed shortly. + +"I believe you are as great a gambler at heart as I am," he observed. + +"With Mr. Kingley for my partner, and the game one of skill," was the +courteous reply, "I do not need to limit my stakes." + +A servant crossed the room, bringing a note upon a tray. He presented it +to Kingley, who opened and read it through without change of +countenance. When he had finished it, however, he laid his cards face +downwards upon the table. + +"Gentlemen," he said, "I owe you my most profound apologies. I am called +away at once on a matter of urgent business." + +"But this is most annoying," the Prince declared irritably. + +"Here comes my saviour," Kingley remarked, as another man entered the +card room. "Henderson will take my place. Glad I haven't to break you +up, after all. Henderson, will you play a rubber?" + +The newcomer assented. Nigel Kingley made his adieux and crossed the +room. Immelan watched him curiously. + +"What is our friend Kingley's profession?" he enquired. + +"He has no profession," Sir Daniel replied. "He has never come into +touch with the sordid needs of these money-grubbing days. He is the +nephew and heir of the Earl of Dorminster." + +Immelan looked away from the retreating figure. + +"Lord Dorminster," he murmured. "The same Lord Dorminster who was in the +Government many years ago?" + +"He was Foreign Secretary when I was Governor of Jamaica," Sir Daniel +answered. "A very brilliant man he was in those days." + +Immelan nodded thoughtfully. + +"I remember," he said. + +Nigel Kingley, on leaving the St. Philip's Club, was driven at once, in +the automobile which he found awaiting him, to a large corner house in +Belgrave Square, which he entered with the air of an habitue. The +waiting major-domo took him at once in charge and piloted him across the +hall. + +"His lordship is very much occupied, Mr. Nigel," he announced. "He is +not seeing any other callers. He left word, however, that you were to be +shown in the moment you arrived." + +"His lordship is quite well, I hope?" + +"Well in health, sir, but worried, and I don't wonder at it," the man +replied, speaking with the respectful freedom of an old servant. "I +never thought I'd live to see such times as these." + +A man in the early sixties, still good-looking, notwithstanding a +somewhat worn expression, looked up from his seat at the library table +on Kingley's entrance. He nodded, but waited until the door was closed +behind the retreating servant before he spoke. + +"Good of you to come, Nigel," he said. "Bring your chair up here." + +"Bad news?" the newcomer enquired. + +"Damnable!" + +There was a brief silence, during which Nigel, knowing his uncle's +humours, leaned back in his chair and waited. Upon the table was a +little pile of closely written manuscript, and by their side several +black-bound code books, upon which the "F.O.Private" still remained, +though almost obliterated with time. Lord Dorminster's occupation was +apparent. He was decoding a message of unusual length. Presently he +turned away from the table, however, and faced his nephew. His hands +travelled to his waistcoat pocket. He drew out a cigarette from a thin +gold case, lit it and began to smoke. Then he crossed his legs and +leaned a little farther back in his chair. + +"Nigel," he said, "we are living in strange times." + +"No one denies that, sir," was the grave assent. + +Lord Dorminster glanced at the calendar which stood upon the desk. + +"To-day," he continued, "is the twenty-third day of March, nineteen +hundred and thirty-four. Fifteen years ago that terrible Peace Treaty +was signed. Since then you know what the history of our country has +been. I am not blowing my own trumpet when I say that nearly every man +with true political insight has been cast adrift. At the present moment +the country is in the hands of a body of highly respectable and +well-meaning men who, as a parish council, might conduct the affairs of +Dorminster Town with unqualified success. As statesmen they do not +exist. It seems to me, Nigel, that you and I are going to see in reality +that spectre which terrified the world twenty years ago. We are going to +see the breaking up of a mighty empire." + +"Tell me what has happened or is going to happen," Nigel begged. + +"Well, for one thing," his uncle replied, "the Emperor of the East is +preparing for a visit to Europe. He will be here probably next month. +You know whom I mean, of course?" + +"Prince Shan!" Nigel exclaimed. + +"Prince Shan of China," Lord Dorminster assented. "His coming links up +many things which had been puzzling me. I tell you, Nigel, what happens +during Prince Shan's visit will probably decide the destinies of this +country, and yet I wouldn't mind betting you a thousand to one that +there isn't a single official of the Government who has the slightest +idea as to why he is coming, or that he is coming at all." + +"Do you know?" Nigel asked. + +"I can only surmise. Let us leave Prince Shan for the moment, Nigel. Now +listen. You go about a great deal. What do people say about +me--honestly, I mean? Speak with your face to the light." + +"They call you a faddist and a scaremonger," Nigel confessed, "yet there +are one or two, especially at the St. Philip's Club, diplomatists and +ambassadors whose place in the world has passed away, who think and +believe differently. You know, sir, that I am amongst them." + +Lord Dorminster nodded kindly. + +"Well," he said, "I fancy I am about to prove myself. Seven years ago, +it was," he went on reminiscently, "when the new National Party came +into supreme power. You know one of their first battle cries--'Down with +all secret treaties! Down with all secret diplomacy! Let nothing exist +but an honest commercial understanding between the different countries +of the world!' How Germany and Russia howled with joy! In place of an +English statesman with his country's broad interests at heart, we have +in Berlin and Petrograd half a dozen representatives of the great +industries, whose object, in their own words, is, I believe, to develop +friendly commercialism and a feeling of brotherhood between the nations. +Not only our ambassadors but our secret service were swept clean out of +existence. I remember going to Broadley, the day he was appointed +Foreign Minister, and I asked him a simple question. I asked him whether +he did not consider it his duty to keep his finger upon the pulses of +the other great nations, however friendly they might seem, to keep +himself assured that all these expressions of good will were honourable, +and that in the heart of the German nation that great craving for +revenge which is the natural heritage of the present generation had +really become dissipated. Broadley smiled at me. 'Lord Dorminster,' he +said, 'the chief cause of wars in the past has been suspicion. We look +upon espionage as a disgraceful practice. It is the people of Germany +with whom we are in touch now, not a military oligarchy, and the people +of Germany no more desire war than we do. Besides, there is the League +of Nations.' Those were Broadley's views then, and they are his views +to-day. You know what I did?" + +Nigel assented cautiously. + +"I suppose it is an open secret amongst a few of us," he observed. "You +have been running an unofficial secret service of your own." + +"Precisely! I have had a few agents at work for over a year, and when I +have finished decoding this last dispatch, I shall have evidence which +will prove beyond a doubt that we are on the threshold of terrible +events. The worst of it is--well, we have been found out." + +"What do you mean?" Nigel asked quickly. + +His uncle's sensitive lips quivered. + +"You knew Sidwell?" + +"Quite well." + +"Sidwell was found stabbed to the heart in a cafe in Petrograd, three +weeks ago," Lord Dorminster announced. "An official report of the +enquiry into his death informs his relatives that his death was due to a +quarrel with some Russian sailors over one of the women of the quarter +where he was found." + +"Horrible!" Nigel muttered. + +"Sidwell was one of those unnatural people, as you know," Lord +Dorminster went on, "who never touched wine or spirits and who hated +women. To continue. Atcheson was a friend of yours, wasn't he?" + +"Of course! He was at Eton with me. It was I who first brought him here +to dine. Don't tell me that anything has happened to Jim Atcheson!" + +"This dispatch is from him," Lord Dorminster replied, indicating the +pile of manuscript upon the table,--"a dispatch which came into my hands +in a most marvellous fashion. He died last week in a nursing home +in--well, let us say a foreign capital. The professor in charge of the +hospital sends a long report as to the unhappy disease from which he +suffered. As a matter of fact, he was poisoned." + +Nigel Kingley had been a soldier in his youth and he was a brave man. +Nevertheless, the horror of these things struck a cold chill to his +heart. He seemed suddenly to be looking into the faces of spectres, to +hear the birth of the winds of destruction. + +"That is all I have to say to you for the moment," his uncle concluded +gravely. "In an hour I shall have finished decoding this dispatch, and I +propose then to take you into my entire confidence. In the meantime, I +want you to go and talk for a few minutes to the cleverest woman in +England, the woman who, in the face of a whole army of policemen and +detectives, crossed the North Sea yesterday afternoon with this in her +pocket." + +"You don't mean Maggie?" Nigel exclaimed eagerly. + +His uncle nodded. + +"You will find her in the boudoir," he said. "I told her that you were +coming. In an hour's time, return here." + +Lord Dorminster rose to his feet as his nephew turned to depart. He laid +his hand upon the latter's shoulder, and Nigel always remembered the +grave kindliness of his tone and expression. + +"Nigel," he sighed, "I am afraid I shall be putting upon your shoulders +a terrible burden, but there is no one else to whom I can turn." + +"There is no one else to whom you ought to turn, sir," the young man +replied simply. "I shall be back in an hour." + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +Lady Maggie Trent, a stepdaughter of the Earl of Dorminster, was one of +those young women who had baffled description for some years before she +had commenced to take life seriously. She was neither fair nor dark, +petite nor tall. No one could ever have called her nondescript, or have +extolled any particular grace of form or feature. Her complexion had +defied the ravages of sun and wind and that moderate indulgence in +cigarettes and cocktails which the youth of her day affected. Her nose +was inclined to be retrousse, her mouth tender but impudent, her grey +eyes mostly veiled in expression but capable of wonderful changes. She +was curled up in a chair when Nigel entered, immersed in a fashion +paper. She held out her left hand, which he raised to his lips. + +"Well, Nigel, dear," she exclaimed, "what do you think of my new +profession?" + +"I hate it," he answered frankly. + +She sighed and laid down the fashion paper resignedly. + +"You always did object to a woman doing anything in the least useful. Do +you realise that if anything in the world can save this stupid old +country, I have done it?" + +"I realise that you've been running hideous risks," he replied. + +She looked at him petulantly. + +"What of it?" she demanded. "We all run risks when we do anything worth +while." + +"Not quite the sort that you have been facing." + +She smiled thoughtfully. + +"Do you know exactly where I have been?" she asked. + +"No idea," he confessed. "What my uncle has just told me was a complete +revelation, so far as I was concerned. I believed, with the rest of the +world, what the newspapers announced--that you were visiting Japan and +China, and afterwards the South Sea Islands, with the Wendercombes." + +She smiled. + +"Dad wanted to tell you," she said, "but it was I who made him promise +not to. I was afraid you would be disagreeable about it. We arranged it +all with the Wendercombes, but as a matter of fact I did not even start +with them. For the last eight months, I have been living part of the +time in Berlin and part of the time in a country house near the Black +Forest." + +"Alone?" + +"Not a bit of it! I have been governess to the two daughters of Herr +Essendorf." + +"Essendorf, the President of the German Republic?" + +Lady Maggie nodded. + +"He isn't a bit like his pictures. He is a huge fat man and he eats a +great deal too much. Oh, the horror of those meals!" she added, with a +little shudder. "Think of me, dear Nigel, who never eat more than an +omelette and some fruit for luncheon, compelled to sit down every day to +a _mittagessen_! I wonder I have any digestion left at all." + +"Do you mean that you were there under your own name?" he asked +incredulously. + +She shook her head. + +"I secured some perfectly good testimonials before I left," she said. +"They referred to a Miss Brown, the daughter of Prebendary Brown. I was +Miss Brown." + +"Great Heavens!" Nigel muttered under his breath. "You heard about +Atcheson?" + +She nodded. + +"Poor fellow, they got him all right. You talk about thrills, Nigel," +she went on. "Do you know that the last night before I left for my +vacation, I actually heard that fat old Essendorf chuckling with his +wife about how his clever police had laid an English spy by the heels, +and telling her, also, of the papers which they had discovered and +handed over. All the time the real dispatch, written by Atcheson when +he was dying, was sewn into my corsets. How's that for an exciting +situation?" + +"It's a man's job, anyhow," Nigel declared. + +She shrugged her shoulders and abandoned the personal side of the +subject. + +"Have you been in Germany lately, Nigel?" she enquired. + +"Not for many years," he answered. + +She stretched herself out upon the couch and lit a cigarette. + +"The Germany of before the war of course I can't remember," she said +pensively. "I imagine, however, that there was a sort of instinctive +jealous dislike towards England and everything English, simply because +England had had a long start in colonisation, commerce and all the rest +of it. But the feeling in Germany now, although it is marvellously +hidden, is something perfectly amazing. It absolutely vibrates wherever +you go. The silence makes it all the more menacing. Soon after I got to +Berlin, I bought a copy of the Treaty of Peace and read it. Nigel, was +it necessary to have been so bitterly cruel to a beaten enemy?" + +"Logically it would seem not," Nigel admitted. "Actually, we cannot put +ourselves back into the spirit of those days. You must remember that it +was an unprovoked war, a war engineered by Germany for the sheer +purposes of aggression. That is why a punitive spirit entered into our +subsequent negotiations." + +She nodded. + +"I expect history will tell us some day," she continued, "that we needed +a great statesman of the Beaconsfield type at the Peace table. However, +that is all ended. They sowed the seed at Versailles, and I think we are +going to reap the harvest." + +"After all," Nigel observed thoughtfully, "it is very difficult to see +what practical interference there could be with the peace of the world. +I can very well believe that the spirit is there, but when it comes to +hard facts--well, what can they do? England can never be invaded. The +war of 1914 proved that. Besides, Germany now has a representative on +the League of Nations. She is bound to toe the line with the rest." + +"It is not in Germany alone that we are disliked," Maggie reminded him. +"We seem somehow or other to have found our way into the bad books of +every country in Europe. Clumsy statesmanship is it, or what?" + +"I should attribute it," Nigel replied, "to the passing of our old +school of ambassadors. After all, ambassadors are born, not made, and +they should be--they very often were--men of rare tact and perceptions. +We have no one now to inform us of the prejudices and humours of the +nations. We often offend quite unwittingly, and we miss many +opportunities of a _rapprochement_. It is trade, trade, trade and +nothing else, the whole of the time, and the men whom we sent to the +different Courts to further our commercial interests are not the type to +keep us informed of the more subtle and intricate matters which +sometimes need adjustment between two countries." + +"That may be the explanation of all the bad feeling," Maggie admitted, +"and you may be right when you say that any practical move against us is +almost impossible. Dad doesn't think so, you know. He is terribly +exercised about the coming of Prince Shan." + +"I must get him to talk to me," Nigel said. "As a matter of fact, I +don't think that we need fear Asiatic intervention over here. Prince +Shan is too great a diplomatist to risk his country's new prosperity." + +"Prince Shan," Maggie declared, "is the one man in the world I am +longing to meet. He was at Oxford with you, wasn't he, Nigel?" + +"For one year only. He went from there to Harvard." + +"Tell me what he was like," she begged. + +"I have only a hazy recollection of him," Nigel confessed. "He was a +most brilliant scholar and a fine horseman. I can't remember whether he +did anything at games." + +"Good-looking?" + +"Extraordinarily so. He was very reserved, though, and even in those +days he was far more exclusive than our own royal princes. We all +thought him clever, but no one dreamed that he would become Asia's great +man. I'll tell you all that I can remember about him another time, +Maggie. I'm rather curious about that report of Atcheson's. Have you any +idea what it is about?" + +She shook her head. + +"None at all. It is in the old Foreign Office cipher and it looks like +gibberish. I only know that the first few lines he transcribed gave dad +the jumps." + +"I wonder if he has finished it by now." + +"He'll send for you when he has. How do you think I am looking, Nigel?" + +"Wonderful," he answered, rising to his feet and standing with his elbow +upon the mantelpiece, gazing down at her. "But then you _are_ wonderful, +aren't you, Maggie? You know I always thought so." + +She picked up a mirror from the little bag by her side and scrutinized +her features. + +"It can't be my face," she decided, turning towards him with a smile. "I +must have charm." + +"Your face is adorable," he declared. + +"Are you going to flirt with me?" she asked, with a faint smile at the +corners of her lips. "You always do it so well and so convincingly. And +I hate foreigners. They are terribly in earnest but there is no finesse +about them. You may kiss me just once, please, Nigel, the way I like." + +He held her for a moment in his arms, tenderly, but with a reserve to +which she was accustomed from him. Presently she thrust him away. Her +own colour had risen a little. + +"Delightful," she murmured. "Think of the wasted months! No one has +kissed me, Nigel, since we said good-bye." + +"Have you made up your mind to marry me yet?" he asked. + +"My dear," she answered, patting his hand, "do restrain your ardour. Do +you really want to marry me?" + +"Of course I do!" + +"You don't love me." + +"I am awfully fond of you," he assured her, "and I don't love any one +else." + +She shook her head. + +"It isn't enough, Nigel," she declared, "and, strange to say, it's +exactly how I feel about you." + +"I don't see why it shouldn't be enough," he argued. "Perhaps we have +too much common sense for these violent feelings." + +"It may be that," she admitted doubtfully. "On the other hand, don't +let's run any risk. I should hate to find an affinity, and all that sort +of thing, after marriage--divorce in these days is such shocking bad +form. Besides, honestly, Nigel, I don't feel frivolous enough to think +about marriage just now. I have the feeling that even while the clock is +ticking we are moving on to terrible things. I can't tell you quite what +it is. I carried my life in my hands during those last few days abroad. +I dare say this is the reaction." + +He smiled reassuringly. + +"After all, you are safe at home now, dear," he reminded her, "and I +really am very fond of you, Maggie." + +"And I'm quite absurdly fond of you, Nigel," she acknowledged. "It makes +me feel quite uncomfortable when I reflect that I shall probably have to +order you to make love to some one else before the week is out." + +"I shall do nothing of the sort," he declared firmly. "I am not good at +that sort of thing. And who is she, anyhow?" + +They were interrupted by a sudden knock at the door--not the discreet +tap of a well-bred domestic, but a flurried, almost an imperative +summons. Before either of them could reply, the door was opened and +Brookes, the elderly butler, presented himself upon the threshold. Even +before he spoke, it was clear that he brought alarming news. + +"Will you step down to the library at once, sir?" he begged, addressing +Nigel. + +"What is the matter, Brookes?" Maggie demanded anxiously. + +"I fear that his lordship is not well," the man replied. + +They all hurried out together. Brookes was evidently terribly perturbed +and went on talking half to himself without heeding their questions. + +"I thought at first that his lordship must have fainted," he said. "I +heard a queer noise, and when I went in, he had fallen forward across +the table. Parkins has rung for Doctor Wilcox." + +"What sort of a noise?" Nigel asked. + +"It sounded like a shot," the man faltered. + +They entered the library, Nigel leading the way. Lord Dorminster was +lying very much as Brookes had described him, but there was something +altogether unnatural in the collapse of his head and shoulders and his +motionless body. Nigel spoke to him, touched him gently, raised him at +last into a sitting position. Something on which his right hand seemed +to have been resting clattered on to the carpet. Nigel turned around and +waved Maggie back. + +"Don't come," he begged. + +"Is it a stroke?" she faltered. + +"I am afraid that he is dead," Nigel answered simply. + +They went out into the hall and waited there in shocked silence until +the doctor arrived. The latter's examination lasted only a few seconds. +Then he pointed to the telephone. + +"This is very terrible," he said. "I am afraid you had better ring up +Scotland Yard, Mr. Kingley. Lord Dorminster appears either to have shot +himself, as seems most probable," he added, glancing at the revolver +upon the carpet, "or to have been murdered." + +"It is incredible!" Nigel exclaimed. "He was the sanest possible man, +and the happiest, and he hadn't an enemy in the world." + +The physician pointed downwards to the revolver. Then he unfastened once +more the dead man's waistcoat, opened his shirt and indicated a small +blue mark just over his heart. + +"That is how he died," he said. "It must have been instantaneous." + +Time seemed to beat out its course in leaden seconds whilst they waited +for the superintendent from Scotland Yard. Nigel at first stood still +for some moments. From outside came the cheerful but muffled roar of the +London streets, the hooting of motor horns, the rumbling of wheels, the +measured footfall of the passing multitude. A boy went by, whistling; +another passed, calling hoarsely the news from the afternoon papers. A +muffin man rang his bell, a small boy clattered his stick against the +area bailing. The whole world marched on, unmoved and unnoticing. In +this sombre apartment alone tragedy reigned in sinister silence. On the +sofa, Lord Dorminster, who only half an hour ago had seemed to be in +the prime of life and health, lay dead. + +Nigel moved towards the writing-table and stood looking at it in wonder. +The code book still remained, but there was not the slightest sign of +any manuscript or paper of any sort. He even searched the drawers of the +desk without result. Every trace of Atcheson's dispatch and Lord +Dorminster's transcription of it had disappeared! + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +On a certain day some weeks after the adjourned inquest and funeral of +Lord Dorminster, Nigel obtained a long-sought-for interview with the +Right Honourable Mervin Brown, who had started life as a factory +inspector and was now Prime Minister of England. The great man received +his visitor with an air of good-natured tolerance. + +"Heard of you from Scotland Yard, haven't I, Lord Dorminster?" he said, +as he waved him to a seat. "I gather that you disagreed very strongly +with the open verdict which was returned at the inquest upon your +uncle?" + +"The verdict was absolutely at variance with the facts," Nigel declared. +"My uncle was murdered, and a secret report of certain doings on the +continent, which he was decoding at the time, was stolen." + +"The medical evidence scarcely bears out your statement," Mr. Mervin +Brown pointed out dryly, "nor have the police been able to discover how +any one could have obtained access to the room, or left it, without +leaving some trace of their visit behind. Further, there are no +indications of a robbery having been attempted." + +"I happen to know more than any one else about this matter," Nigel +urged,--"more, even, than I thought it advisable to mention at the +inquest--and I beg you to listen to me, Mr. Mervin Brown. I know that +you considered my uncle to be in some respects a crank, because he was +far-seeing enough to understand that under the seeming tranquillity +abroad there is a universal and deep-seated hatred of this country." + +"I look upon that statement as misleading and untrue," the Minister +declared. "Your late uncle belonged to that mischievous section of +foreign politicians who believed in secret treaties and secret service, +and who fostered a state of nervous unrest between countries otherwise +disposed to be friendly. We have turned over a new leaf, Lord +Dorminster. Our efforts are all directed towards developing an +international spirit of friendliness and trust." + +"Utopian but very short-sighted," Nigel commented. "If my uncle had +lived to finish decoding the report upon which he was engaged, I could +have offered you proof not only of the existence of the spirit I speak +of, but of certain practical schemes inimical to this country." + +"The papers you speak of have disappeared," Mr. Mervin Brown observed, +with a smile. + +"They were taken away by the person who murdered my uncle," Nigel +insisted. + +The Right Honourable gentleman nodded. + +"Well, you know my views about the affair," he said. "I may add that +they are confirmed by the police. I am in no way prejudiced, however, +and am willing to listen to anything you may have to say which will not +take you more than a quarter of an hour," he added, glancing at the +clock upon his table. + +"Here goes, then," Nigel began. "My uncle was a statesman of the old +school who had no faith in the Utopian programme of the present +Government of this country. When you abandoned any pretence of a +continental secret service, he at his own expense instituted a small one +of his own. He sent two men out to Germany and one to Russia. The one +sent to Russia was the man Sidwell, whose murder in a Petrograd cafe you +may have read of. Of the two sent to Germany, one has disappeared, and +the other died in hospital, without a doubt poisoned, a few days after +he had sent the report to England which was stolen from my uncle's desk. +That report was brought over by Lady Maggie Trent, Lord Dorminster's +stepdaughter, who was really the brains of the enterprise and under +another name was acting as governess to the children of Herr Essendorf, +President of the German Republic. Half an hour before his death, my +uncle was decoding this dispatch in his library. I saw him doing it, and +I saw the dispatch itself. He told me that so far as he had gone +already, it was full of information of the gravest import; that a +definite scheme was already being formulated against this country by an +absolutely unique and dangerous combination of enemies." + +"Those enemies being?" + +Nigel shook his head. + +"That I can only surmise," he replied. "My uncle had only commenced to +decode the dispatch when I last saw him." + +"Then I gather, Lord Dorminster," the Minister said, "that you connect +your uncle's death directly with the supposed theft of this document?" + +"Absolutely!" + +"And the conclusion you arrive at, then?" + +"Is an absolutely logical one," Nigel declared firmly. "I assert that +other countries are not falling into line with our lamentable abnegation +of all secret service defence, and that, in plain words, my uncle was +murdered by an agent of one of these countries, in order that the +dispatch which had come into his hands should not be decoded and passed +on to your Government." + +The Right Honourable gentleman smiled slightly. He was a man of some +natural politeness, but he found it hard to altogether conceal his +incredulity. + +"Well, Lord Dorminster," he promised, "I will consider all that you have +said. Is there anything more I can do for you?" + +"Yes!" Nigel replied boldly. "Induce the Cabinet to reestablish our +Intelligence Department and secret service, even on a lesser scale, and +don't rest until you have discovered exactly what it is they are +plotting against us somewhere on the continent." + +"To carry out your suggestions, Lord Dorminster," the Minister pointed +out, "would be to be guilty of an infringement of the spirit of the +League of Nations, the existence of which body is, we believe, a +practical assurance of our safety." + +Nigel rose to his feet. + +"As man to man, sir," he said, "I see you don't believe a word of what I +have been telling you." + +"As man to man," the other admitted pleasantly, as he touched the bell, +"I think you have been deceived." + + * * * * * + +Nigel, even as a prophet of woe, was a very human person and withal a +philosopher. He strolled along Piccadilly and turned into Bond Street, +thoroughly enjoying one of the first spring days of the season. Flower +sellers were busy at every corner; the sky was blue, with tiny flecks of +white clouds, there was even some dust stirred by the little puffs of +west wind. He exchanged greetings with a few acquaintances, lingered +here and there before the shop windows, and presently developed a fit of +contemplation engendered by the thoughts which were all the time at the +back of his mind. Bond Street was crowded with vehicles of all sorts, +from wonderfully upholstered automobiles to the resuscitated victoria. +The shop windows were laden with the treasures of the world, buyers were +plentiful, promenaders multitudinous. Every one seemed to be cheerful +but a little engrossed in the concrete act of living. Nigel almost ran +into Prince Karschoff, at the corner of Grafton Street. + +"Dreaming, my friend?" the latter asked quietly, as he laid his hand +upon Nigel's shoulder. + +"Guilty," Nigel confessed. "You are an observant man, Prince. Tell me +whether anything strikes you about the Bond Street of to-day, compared +with the Bond Street of, say, ten years ago?" + +The Russian glanced around him curiously. He himself was a somewhat +unusual figure in his distinctively cut morning coat, his carefully tied +cravat, his silk hat, black and white check trousers and faultless white +spats. + +"A certain decline of elegance," he murmured. "And is it my fancy or has +this country become a trifle Americanised as regards the headgear of its +men?" + +Nigel smiled. + +"I believe our thoughts are moving in the same groove," he said. "To me +there seems to be a different class of people here, as though the +denizens of West Kensington, suddenly enriched, had come to spend their +money in new quarters. Not only that, but there is a difference in the +wares set out in the shops, an absence of taste, if you can understand +what I mean, as though the shopkeepers themselves understood that they +were catering for a new class of people." + +"It is the triumph of your _bourgeoisie_," the Russian declared. "Your +aristocrat is no longer able to survive. _Noblesse oblige_ has no +significance to the shopman. He wants the fat cheques, and he caters for +the people who can write them. Let us pursue our reflections a little +farther and in a different direction, my friend," he added, glancing at +his watch. "Lunch with me at the Ritz, and we will see whether the +cookery, too, has been adapted to the new tastes." + +Nigel hesitated for a moment, a somewhat curious hesitation which he +many times afterwards remembered. + +"I am not very keen on restaurants for a week or two," he said +doubtfully. "Besides, I had half promised to be at the club." + +"Not to-day," Karschoff insisted. "To-day let us listen to the call of +the world. Woman is at her loveliest in the spring. The Ritz Restaurant +will look like a bouquet of flowers. Perhaps 'One for you and one for +me.' At any rate, one is sure of an omelette one can eat." + +The two men turned together towards Piccadilly. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +Luncheon at the Ritz was an almost unexpectedly pleasant meal. The two +men sat at a table near the door and exchanged greetings with many +acquaintances. Karschoff, who was in an unusually loquacious frame of +mind, pointed out many of the habitues of the place to his companion. + +"I am become a club and restaurant lounger in my old age," he declared, +a little bitterly. "Almost a boulevardier. Still, what else is there for +a man without a country to do?" + +"You know everybody," Nigel replied, without reference to his +companion's lament. "Tell me who the woman is who has just entered?" + +Karschoff glanced in the direction indicated, and for a moment his +somewhat saturnine expression changed. A smile played upon his lips, his +eyes seemed to rest upon the figure of the girl half turned away from +them with interest, almost with pleasure. She was of an unusual type, +tall and dark, dressed in black with the simplicity of a nun, with only +a little gleam of white at her throat. Her hair--so much of it as showed +under her flower-garlanded hat--was as black as jet, and yet, where she +stood in the full glare of the sunlight, the burnish of it was almost +wine-coloured. Her cheeks were pale, her expression thoughtful. Her +eyes, rather heavily lidded, were a deep shade of violet. Her mouth was +unexpectedly soft and red. + +"Ah, my friend, no wonder you ask!" Karschoff declared with enthusiasm. +"That is a woman whom you must know." + +"Tell me her name," Nigel persisted with growing impatience. + +"Her name," Karschoff replied, "is Naida Karetsky. She is the daughter +of the man who will probably be the next President of the Russian +Republic. You see, I can speak those words without a tremor. Her father +at present represents the shipping interests of Russia and England. He +is one of the authorised consuls." + +"Is he of the party?" + +Karschoff scrutinised the approaching figures through his eyeglass and +nodded. + +"Her father is the dark, broad-shouldered man with the square beard," he +indicated. "Immelan, as you can see, is the third. They are coming this +way. We will speak of them afterwards." + +Naida, with her father and Oscar Immelan, left some acquaintances with +whom they had been talking and, preceded by a _maitre d'hotel_, moved in +the direction of the two men. The girl recognised the Prince with a +charming little bow and was on the point of passing on when she +appeared to notice his companion. For a moment she hesitated. The +Prince, anticipating her desire to speak, rose at once to his feet. + +"Mademoiselle," he said, bending over her hand, "welcome back to +England! You bring with you the first sunshine we have seen for many +days." + +"Are you being meteorological or complimentary?" she asked, smiling. +"Will you present your companion? I have heard of Mr. Kingley." + +"With the utmost pleasure," the Prince replied. "Mr. Kingley, through +the unfortunate death of a relative, is now the Earl of +Dorminster--Mademoiselle Karetsky." + +Nigel, as he made his bow, was conscious of an expression of something +more than ordinary curiosity in the face of the girl who had herself +aroused his interest. + +"You are the son, then," she enquired, "of Lord Dorminster who died +about a month ago?" + +"His nephew," Nigel explained. "My uncle was unfortunately childless." + +"I met your uncle once in Paris," she said. "It will give me great +pleasure to make your better acquaintance. Will you and my dear friend +here," she added, turning to the Prince, "take coffee with us +afterwards? I shall then introduce you to my father. Oscar Immelan you +both know, of course." + +They murmured their delighted assent, and she passed on. Nigel watched +her until she took her place at the table. + +"Surely that girl is well-born?" he observed. "I have never seen a more +delightful carriage." + +"You are right," Karschoff told him. "Karetsky is a well-to-do man of +commerce, but her mother was a Baroness Kolchekoff, a distant relative +of my own. The Kolchekoffs lived on their estates, and as a matter of +fact we never met. Naida has gone over to the people, though, body and +soul." + +"She is extraordinarily beautiful," Nigel remarked. + +His companion was swinging his eyeglass back and forth by its cord. + +"Many men have thought so," he replied. "For myself, there is antagonism +in my blood against her. I wonder whether I have done well or ill in +making you two acquainted." + +Nigel felt a sudden desire to break through a certain seriousness which +had come over his own thoughts and which was reflected in the other's +tone. He shrugged his shoulders slightly and filled his glass with wine. + +"Every man in the world is the better," he propounded, "for adding to +the circle of his acquaintances a beautiful woman." + +"Sententious and a trifle inaccurate," the Prince objected, with a +sudden flash of his white teeth. "The beauty which is not for him has +been many a man's undoing. But seriously, my quarrel with Naida is one +of prejudice only. She is the confidante and the inspiration of +Matinsky, and though one realises, of course, that so long as there is a +Russian Republic there must be a Russian President, I suppose I should +scarcely be human if I did not hate him." + +"Surely," Nigel queried, "she must be very much his junior?" + +"Matinsky is forty-four," Karschoff said. "Naida is twenty-six or +twenty-seven. The disparity of years, you see, is not so great. +Matinsky, however, is married to an invalid wife, and concerning Naida I +have never heard one word of scandal. But this much is certain. Matinsky +has the blandest confidence in her judgment and discretion. She has +already been his unofficial ambassador in several capitals of Europe. I +am convinced that she is here with a purpose. But enough of my +country-people. We came here to be gay. Let us drink another bottle of +wine." + +The joy of living seemed for a moment to reassert itself in Karschoff's +face. His momentary fierceness, reminiscent of his Tartar ancestry, had +passed, but it had left a shadow behind. + +"At least one should be grateful," he conceded a moment later, "for the +distinction such a woman as Naida Karetsky brings into a room like this. +Our Bond Street lament finds its proof here. Except for their +clothes--so ill-worn, too, most of them--the women here remind one of +Blackpool, and their men of Huddersfield. I am inclined to wish that I +had taken you to Soho." + +Nigel shook his head. His eyes had strayed to a distant corner of the +room, where Naida and her two companions were seated. + +"We cannot escape anywhere," he declared, "from this overmastering wave +of mediocrity. A couple of generations and a little intermarriage may +put things right. A Chancellor of the Exchequer with genius, fifteen +years ago, might even have prevented it." + +"You can claim, at any rate, a bloodless and unapparent revolution," the +Prince observed. "You chivied your aristocracy of birth out of existence +with yellow papers, your aristocracy of mind with a devastating income +tax. This is the class whom you left to gorge,--the war profiteers. I +hope that whoever writes the history of these times will see that it is +properly illustrated." + +In the lounge, they had barely seated themselves before Naida, with her +father and Immelan, appeared. The little party at once joined up, and +Naida seated herself next to Nigel. She talked very slowly, but her +accent amounted to little more than a prolongation of certain syllables, +which had the effect of a rather musical drawl. Her father, after the +few words of introduction had been spoken, strolled away to speak to +some acquaintances, and Immelan and the Prince discussed with measured +politeness one of the commonplace subjects of the moment. Naida and her +companion became almost isolated. + +"I met your uncle once," Naida said, "at a dinner party in Paris. I +remember that he attracted me. He represented a class of Englishman of +whom I had met very few, the thinking aristocrat with a sense for +foreign affairs. It was some years ago, that. He remained outside +politics, did he not, until his death?" + +"Outside all practical politics," Nigel assented. "He had his interests, +though." + +She looked at him thoughtfully. + +"Have you inherited them?" she asked. + +He declined the challenge of her eyes. After all, she belonged to the +Russia whose growing strength was the greatest menace to European peace, +and whose attitude towards England was entirely uncertain. + +"My uncle and I were scarcely intimate," he said. "I was never really in +his confidence." + +"Not so much so as Lady Maggie Trent? She would be your cousin?" + +"It is not a relationship of blood," Nigel replied. "Lady Maggie was the +daughter of my uncle's second wife." + +"She is very charming," Naida murmured. + +"I find her delightful," Nigel agreed. + +"She is not only charming, but she has intelligence," Naida continued. +"I think that Lord Dorminster was very fond of her, that he trusted her +with many of his secrets." + +"Had he secrets?" Nigel asked. + +She remained for a moment very thoughtful, smoking a thin cigarette +through a long holder and watching the little rings of smoke. + +"You are right," she said at last. "I find your attitude the only +correct one. Did you know that Maggie was a friend of mine, Lord +Dorminster?" + +"I can very well believe it," he answered, "but I have never heard her +speak of you." + +"Ah! But she has been away for some months. You have not seen much of +her, perhaps, since her return?" + +"Very little," he acquiesced. "She only arrived in London just before my +uncle's death, and since then I have had to spend some time at +Dorminster." + +"As a matter of curiosity," Naida enquired, "when do you expect to see +her again?" + +"This afternoon, I hope," he replied,--"directly I leave here, in fact." + +"Then you will give her a little message for me, please?" + +"With great pleasure!" + +"Tell her from me--mind she understands this, if you please--that she +is not to leave England again until we have met." + +"Is this a warning?" he asked. + +She looked at him searchingly. + +"I wonder," she reflected, "how much of you is Lord Dorminster's +nephew." + +"And I, in my turn," he rejoined, with sudden boldness, "wonder how much +of you is Matinsky's envoy." + +She began to laugh softly. + +"We shall perhaps be friends, Lord Dorminster," she said. "I should like +to see more of you." + +"You will permit me to call upon you," he begged eagerly. + +"Will you come? We are at the Milan Court for a little time. My father +is trying to get a house. My sister is coming over to look after him. I +am unfortunately only a bird of passage." + +"Then I shall not run the risk of missing you," he declared. "I shall +call very soon." + +Immelan intervened,--grim, suspicious, a little disturbed. For some +reason or other, the meeting between these two young people seemed to +have made him uneasy. + +"Your father has desired me to present his excuses to Lord Dorminster," +he announced, "and to escort you back to the Milan. He has been +telephoned for from the Consulate." + +Naida rose to her feet with some apparent reluctance. + +"You will not delay your call too long, Lord Dorminster?" she enjoined, +as she gave him her hand. "I shall expect you the first afternoon you +are free." + +"I shall not delay giving myself the pleasure," he assured her. + +She nodded and made her adieux to the Prince. The two men stood together +and watched her depart with her companion. + +"Really, one gains much through being an onlooker," the Prince +reflected. "There go the spirit of Russia and the spirit of Germany. You +dabble in these things, my friend Dorminster. Can you guess what they +are met for--for whom they wait?" + +"I might guess," Nigel replied, "but I would rather be told." + +"They wait for the master spirit," Karschoff declared, taking his arm. +"They wait for the great Prince Shan." + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +Nigel and Maggie had tea together in the little room which the latter +had used as a boudoir. They were discussing the question of her future +residence there. + +"I am afraid," he declared, "that you will have to marry me." + +"It would have its advantages," she admitted thoughtfully. "I am really +so fond of you, Nigel. I should be married at St. Mary Abbot's, +Kensington, and have the Annersley children for bridesmaids. Don't you +think I should look sweet in old gold and orange blossoms?" + +"Don't tantalise me," he begged. + +"We really must decide upon something," she insisted. "I hate giving up +my rooms here, I should hate having my worthy aunt as resident duenna, +and I suppose it would be gloriously improper for us two to go on living +here if I didn't. Are you quite sure that you love me, Nigel?" + +"I am not quite so sure as I was this morning," he confessed, holding +out his cup for some more tea. "I met a perfectly adorable girl to-day +at luncheon at the Ritz. Such eyes, Maggie, and the slimmest, most +wonderful figure you ever saw!" + +"Who was the cat?" Maggie enquired with asperity. + +"She is Russian. Her name is Naida Karetsky. Karschoff introduced me." + +Maggie was suddenly serious. There was just a trace of the one +expression he had never before seen in her face--fear--lurking in her +eyes, even asserting itself in her tone. + +"Naida Karetsky?" she repeated. "Tell me exactly how you met her?" + +"She was lunching with her father and Oscar Immelan. She stopped to +speak to Karschoff and asked him to present me. Afterwards, she invited +us to take coffee in the lounge." + +"She went out of her way to make your acquaintance, then?" + +"Yes, I suppose she did." + +"You know who she is?" + +"The daughter of one of the Russian Consuls over here, I understood." + +"She is more than that," Maggie declared nervously. "She is the +inspiration of the President himself. She is the most vital force in +Russian politics. She is the woman whom I wanted you to know, to whom I +told you that I wished you to pay attentions. And now that you know her, +I am afraid." + +"Where did you meet her?" he asked curiously. + +"We were at school together in Paris. She was two years older than I, +but she stayed there until she was twenty. Afterwards we met in +Florence." + +Nigel was greatly interested. + +"Somehow or other, nothing that you can tell me about her surprises me," +he admitted. "She has the air of counting for great things in the world. +She is very beautiful, too." + +"She is beautiful enough," Maggie replied, "to have turned the head of +the great Paul Matinsky himself. They say that he would give his soul to +be free to marry her. As it is, she is the uncrowned Tsarina of Russia." + +Nigel frowned slightly. + +"Isn't that going rather a long way?" he objected. + +"Not when one remembers what manner of a man Matinsky is," Maggie +replied. "He may have his faults, but he is an absolute idealist so far +as regards his private life. There has never been a word of scandal +concerning him and Naida, nor will there ever be. But in his eyes, Naida +has that most wonderful gift of all,--she has vision. He once told a man +with whom I spoke in Berlin that Naida was the one person in the world +to whom a mistake was impossible. Nigel, did she give you any idea at +all what she was over here for?" + +"Not as yet," he replied, "but she has asked me to go and see her." + +"Did she seem interested in you personally, or was it because your name +is Dorminster?" + +Nigel sighed. + +"I hoped it was a personal interest, but I cannot tell. She asked me +whether I had inherited my uncle's hobby." + +"What did you tell her?" she asked eagerly. + +"Very little. She seemed sympathetic, but after all she is in the enemy +camp. She and Immelan seemed on particularly good terms." + +"Yet I don't believe that she is committed as yet," Maggie declared. +"She always used to speak so affectionately of England. Nigel, do you +think that I have vision?" + +"I am sure that you have," he answered. + +"Very well, then, I will tell you what I see," she continued. "I see +Naida Karetsky for Russia, Oscar Immelan for Germany, Austria and +Sweden, and Prince Shan for Asia--here--meeting in London--within the +next week or ten days, to take counsel together to decide whether the +things which are being plotted against us to-day shall be or shall not +be. Of Immelan we have no hope. He conceals it cleverly enough, but he +hates England with all the fervour of a zealot. Naida is unconvinced. +She is to be won. And Prince Shan--" + +"Well, what about him?" Nigel demanded, a little carried away by +Maggie's earnestness. + +She shook her head. + +"I don't know," she confessed. "If the stories one hears about him are +true, no man nor any woman could ever influence him. At least, though, +one could watch and hope." + +"Prince Shan is supposed to be coming to Paris, not to London," Nigel +remarked. + +"If he goes to Paris," Maggie said, "Naida and Immelan will go. So shall +we. If he comes here, it will be easier. Tell me, Nigel, did you see the +Prime Minister?" + +"I saw him," Nigel replied, "but without the slightest result. He is +clearly of the opinion that the open verdict was a merciful one. In +other words, he believes that it was a case of suicide." + +"How wicked!" Maggie exclaimed. + +"I suppose it is trying the ordinary Britisher a little high," Nigel +remarked, "to ask him to believe that he was murdered in cold blood, +here in the heart of London, by the secret service agent of a foreign +Power. The strangest part of it all is that it is true. To think that +those few pages of manuscript would have told us exactly what we have to +fear! Why, I actually had them in my hand." + +"And I in my corsets!" Maggie groaned. + +They were both silent for a moment. Then Nigel moved towards the door +and opened it. + +"Come downstairs into the library, will you, Maggie?" he begged. "Let us +go in for a little reconstruction." + +They found Brookes in the hall and took him with them. The blinds in +the room had never been raised, and there was still that nameless +atmosphere which lingers for long in an apartment which has become +associated with tragedy. Instinctively they all moved quietly and spoke +in hushed voices. Nigel sat in the chair where his uncle had been found +dead and made a mental effort to reconstruct the events which must have +immediately preceded the tragedy. + +"I know that this was all thrashed out at the inquest, Brookes," he +said, "but I want you to tell me once more. You see how far it is from +this table to the door. My uncle must have had abundant warning of any +one approaching. Was there no other way by which any one could have +entered the room?" + +"There was, your lordship," the man replied, "and I have regretted +several times since that I did not mention it at the inquest. The +cleaners were here on the morning of that day, and the window at the +farther end of the room was unfastened--I even believe that it was +open." + +Nigel rose and examined the window in question. It was almost flush with +the ground, and although there were iron railings separating it from the +street, a little gate opening from the area entrance made ingress not +only possible but easy. Nigel returned to his chair. + +"I can't understand this not having been mentioned at the inquest, +Brookes," he said. + +"I was waiting for the question to be asked, your lordship. It was +perfectly clear to every one there, if your lordship will excuse my +saying so, that both the coroner and the police seemed to have made up +their minds that it was a case of suicide." + +Nigel nodded. + +"I had the same idea with reference to the coroner, at any rate, +Brookes," he said. "So long as the verdict was returned in the form it +was, I am not sure that it was not better so." + +He dismissed the man with a little nod and sat turning over the code +books which still stood upon the table. + +"You and I, at any rate, Maggie, know the truth," he said, "and so long +as we can get no help from the proper quarters, I think that we should +do better to let the matter remain as it is. We don't want to direct +people's attention to us. We want to lull suspicion so far as we can, to +be free to watch the three." + +The telephone bell rang, and as Nigel moved his arm to take off the +receiver, he knocked over one of the black, morocco-bound code books, A +sheet of paper with a few words upon it came fluttering to the ground. +Maggie picked it up, glanced at it carelessly at first and then with +interest. + +"Nigel," she exclaimed, "you see whose handwriting this is? Could it be +part of the decoded dispatch?" + +The telephone enquiry had been unimportant. Nigel pushed the instrument +away. They both looked eagerly at the page of manuscript paper. It was +numbered "8" at the top, and the few words written upon it in Lord +Dorminster's writing were obviously the continuation of a paragraph: + + The name of the middle one, then, of the three secret cities, into + which at all costs some one must find his way, is Kroten, and the + telephone number which is all the clue I have been able to get, up + to the present, to the London end of the affair, is Mayfair 146. + +"This is just where he got to in the decoding!" Nigel declared. "I +wonder whether it's any use looking for the rest." + +They searched through every page of the heavy code books in vain. Then +they returned to their study of the single page. Nigel dragged down an +atlas and studied it. + +"Kroten," he muttered. "Here it is,--a small place about six hundred +miles from Petrograd, apparently the centre of a barren, swampy +district, population thirty thousand, birth rate declining, industries +nil. Cheerful sort of spot it seems!" + +"I have more luck than you!" Maggie cried, her finger tracing out a +line in the open telephone book. "Look!" + +Nigel glanced over her shoulder and read the entry to which she was +pointing: + +"_Immelan Oscar, 13 Clarges Street, W. Mayfair 146._" + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +Nigel played golf at Ranelagh, on the following Sunday morning, with +Jere Chalmers, a young American in the Diplomatic Service, who had just +arrived in London and brought a letter of introduction to him. They had +a pleasant game and strolled off from the eighteenth green to the +dressing rooms on the best of terms with each other. + +"Say, Dorminster," his young companion enjoined, "let's get through this +fixing-up business quickly. I've had a kind of feeling for a cocktail, +these last four holes, which I can't exactly put into words. Besides, I +want to have a word or two with you before the others come down." + +"I shan't be a minute," Nigel promised. "I'm going to change into +flannels after lunch--that is, if you don't mind playing a set or two at +tennis. My cousin-in-law Maggie Trent, whom you'll meet at luncheon, is +rather keen, and she doesn't care about golf." + +"I'm game for anything," the other agreed, lifting his head spluttering +from the basin. "Gee, that's good! Get a move on, there's a good fellow. +I have a fancy for just five minutes with you out on the lawn, with the +ice chinking in our glasses." + +Nigel finished smoothing his hair, and the two men strolled through the +hall, gave an order to a red-coated attendant, and found a secluded +table under a marvellous tree in the gardens on the other side. Chalmers +had become a little thoughtful. + +"Dorminster," he declared, "yours is a wonderful country." + +"Just how is it appealing to you at the moment?" Nigel enquired. + +"I'll try and tell you," was the meditative reply. "It's your +extraordinary insouciance. It seems to me, as a budding diplomat, that +you are running the most ghastly risks on earth." + +"In what direction?" + +The young American shrugged his shoulders. + +"Well, you've got a thoroughly democratic Government--not such a bad +Government, I should say, as things go. They've bled your _bourgeoisie_ +a bit, and serve 'em right, but with an empire to keep up you're losing +all touch upon international politics. Your ambassadors have been +exchanged for trade consuls, the whole of your secret service staff has +been disbanded, you place your entire faith on this sacred League of +Nations. Say, Dorminster, you're taking risks!" + +"You mustn't forget," Dorminster replied, "that it was your country who +started the League of Nations." + +"President Wilson did," Chalmers grunted. "You can't say that the +country ever backed him up. That's the worst of us on the other side--we +so seldom really get a common voice." + +"The League of Nations was a thundering good idea," Nigel declared, "but +it belongs to Utopia and not to this vulgar planet." + +"Just so," Chalmers rejoined, "and yet you are about the only nation who +ever took it into her bosom and suckled it. To be perfectly frank with +you, now, what other nation in the world is there, except yours, which +is obeying the conventions strictly? I tell you frankly, we keep our eye +on Japan, and we build a good many commercial ships which would astonish +you if you examined them thoroughly. Our National Guard, too, know a bit +more about soldiering than their grandfathers. You people, on the other +hand, seem to have become infatuated pacifists. I can't tell tales out +of school, but I don't like the way things are going on eastwards. Asia +means something different now that that amazing fellow, Prince Shan, has +made a great nation of China." + +"I am entirely in accord with you," Nigel agreed, "but what is one to do +about it? Our present Government has a big majority, trade at home and +abroad is prosperous, the income tax is down to a shilling in the pound +and looks like being wiped out altogether. Everybody is fat and happy." + +"Just as they were in 1914," Chalmers remarked significantly. + +"More so," Dorminster asserted. "In those days we had our alarmists. +Nowadays, they too seem to have gone to sleep. My uncle--" + +"Your uncle was an uncommonly shrewd man," Chalmers interrupted. "I was +going to talk about him." + +"After lunch," Nigel suggested, rising to his feet. "Here come my cousin +and some of her tennis friends. Karschoff is lunching with us, too. You +know him, don't you? Come along and I'll introduce you to the others." + +It was a very cheerful party who, after a few minutes under the trees, +strolled into luncheon and took their places at the round table reserved +for them at the end of the room. Maggie at once took possession of +Chalmers. + +"I have been so anxious to meet you, Mr. Chalmers," she said. "They tell +me that you represent the modern methods in American diplomacy, and that +therefore you have been made first secretary over the heads of half a +dozen of your seniors. How they must dislike you, and how clever you +must be!" + +"I don't know that I'm so much disliked," the young man answered, with a +twinkle in his eyes, "but I flatter myself that I have brought a new +note into diplomacy. I was always taught that there were thirty-seven +different ways of telling a lie, which is to state a diplomatic fact. I +have swept them all away. I tell the truth." + +"How daring," Maggie murmured, "and how wonderfully original! What +should you say, now, if I asked you if my nose wanted powdering?" + +"I should start by saying that the question was outside the sphere of my +activities," he decided. "I should then proceed to add, as a private +person, that a little dab on the left side would do it no harm." + +"I begin to believe," she confessed, "that all I have heard of you is +true." + +"Tell me exactly what you have heard," he begged. "Leave out everything +that isn't nice. I thrive on praise and good reports." + +"To begin with, then, that you are an extraordinarily shrewd young man," +she replied, "that you speak seven languages perfectly and know your way +about every capital of Europe, and that you have ideas of your own as to +what is going to happen during the next six or seven years." + +"You've been moving in well-informed circles," he admitted. "Now shall I +proceed to turn the tables upon you?" + +"You can't possibly know anything about me," she declared confidently. + +"I could tell you what I've discovered from personal observation," he +replied. + +"That sounds like compliments or candour," she murmured. "I'm terrified +of both." + +"Well, I guess I'm not out to frighten you," he assured her. "I'll keep +the secrets of my heart hidden--until after luncheon, at any rate---and +just ask you--how you enjoyed your stay in Berlin?" + +Maggie's manner changed. She lowered her voice. + +"In Berlin?" she repeated. + +"In the household of the erstwhile leather manufacturer, the present +President, Herr Essendorf. I hope you liked those fat children. They +always seemed to me loathsome little brats." + +"What do you know about my stay in Berlin?" she demanded. + +"Everything there is to be known," he answered. "To tell you the truth, +our people there were a trifle anxious about you. I was the little angel +watching from above." + +"You are, without a doubt," Maggie pronounced, "a most interesting young +man. We will talk together presently." + +"A hint which sends me back to my mutton," the young man observed. +"Dorminster," he added, turning to his host, "I heard the other day, on +very good authority, that you were thinking of writing a novel. If you +are, study the lady who has just entered. There is a type for you, an +intelligence which might baffle even your attempts at analysis." + +Naida, escorted by her father and Immelan, took her place at an +adjacent table. She bowed to Nigel and Karschoff before sitting down, +and her eyes travelled over the rest of the party with interest. Then +she recognised Maggie and waved her hand. + +"Immelan is a very constant admirer," Prince Karschoff remarked, a +little uneasily. + +"Is that her father?" Maggie asked. + +The Prince nodded. + +"He is one of the ambassadors of commerce from my country," he said. "In +place of diplomacy, he superintends the exchange of shipping cargoes and +talks freights. I suppose Immelan and he are all the time comparing +notes, but I scarcely see where my dear friend Naida comes in." + +"There is still the oldest interest in the world for her to fall back +upon," Chalmers murmured. "One hears that Immelan is devoted." + +"Scandalmonger!" the Prince declared severely. "Young man from the New +World," he proceeded, "get on with your lunch and drink your iced water. +Let the vision of those two remind you that it was your people who +foisted the League of Nations upon us, and be humble, even sorrowful, +when you view one of the sad results." + +"I can't be responsible, directly or indirectly, for a political +flirtation," Chalmers grumbled. "Besides, why should there be any +politics about it at all? Mademoiselle Karetsky is quite attractive +enough to turn the head even of a seasoned old boulevardier like you, +Prince." + +"That young man," Karschoff said deliberately, "will find himself before +long face to face with a blighted career. He has no respect for age, and +he is shockingly lacking in finesse. All the same, on one point I am +agreed. I don't think there is a man breathing who could resist Naida if +she wished to call him to her." + +The little party broke up presently and wandered out into the gardens. +They sat for a while upon the lawn, drinking their coffee and exchanging +greetings with acquaintances. In the distance, the orchestra was playing +soft music, with a fine regard for the atmosphere of the pleasant, +almost languorous spring afternoon. Everywhere were signs of +contentment, even gaiety, and here the alien streak of unfamiliar +newcomers was far less pronounced. When the time came for tennis, +Chalmers led the way with Maggie. As soon as they were out of hearing of +the others, she turned towards him a little abruptly. + +"Tell me exactly what you know about my stay in Berlin," she demanded. + +"Everything," he answered gravely. + +"You mean?" + +"I mean that the New World to-day has progressed where the Old World +seems to have been stricken with a terrible blindness. Our +secret-service system has never been better, and frankly I hear many +things which I don't like. I am going to talk to Lord Dorminster this +afternoon very seriously, but in the meantime I wanted to speak to you. +I heard a rumour that you thought of going back to Berlin." + +"I don't know how you heard it, but the rumour is not altogether +untrue," she admitted. "I have not yet made up my mind." + +"Don't go," he begged. + +"You think they really do know all about me?" + +"I know that they do. I don't mind telling you that you had the shave of +your life on the Dutch frontier last time, and I don't mind telling you, +also, that we had two of our men shadowing you. One of them acted on his +own initiative, or you would never have crossed the frontier." + +"I rather wondered why they let me out," she observed. "Perhaps you can +explain why Frau Essendorf keeps on writing to me under my pseudonym of +'Miss Brown' and to my reputed address in Lincolnshire, begging me to +return." + +"I could tell you that, too," he replied. "They want you back in +Berlin." + +"They really do know, then, that I brought over the dispatch from +Atcheson?" she asked. + +"They know it," he assured her. "They know, too, that it was chiefly a +wasted labour. Their London agents saw to that." + +"Perhaps," she suggested, "you know who their London agents are?" + +"Sooner or later in our conversation," he remarked, "we were bound to +arrive at a point--" + +"Come along and let us make up a set then," she intervened. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +Naida, deserted by her father, who had found a taxicab to take him back +to the purlieus of Piccadilly and auction bridge, sauntered along at the +back of the tennis nets until she arrived at the court where Nigel and +his party were playing. + +"I should like to watch this game for a few minutes," she told her +companion. "The men are such opposite types and yet both so +good-looking. And Lady Maggie fascinates me." + +Immelan fetched two chairs, and they settled down to watch the set. +Nigel, with his clean, well-knit figure, looked his best in spotless +white flannels. Chalmers, a more powerful and muscular type, also +presented a fine appearance. The play was fast and sometimes brilliant. +Nigel had Maggie for a partner, and Chalmers one of her friends, and the +set was as nearly equal as possible. Naida leaned forward in her chair, +following every stroke with interest. + +"I find this most fascinating," she murmured. "I hope that Lord +Dorminster and his cousin will win. Your sympathies, of course, are on +the other side." + +"You are right," Immelan assented. "My sympathies are on the other +side." + +There was a lull in the game for a moment or two. The sun was +troublesome, and the players were changing courts. Naida turned towards +her companion thoughtfully. + +"My friend," she said, glancing around as though to be sure that they +were not overheard, "there are times when you move me to wonder. In the +small things as well as the large, you are so unchanging. I think that +you would see an Englishman die, whether he were your friend or your +enemy, very much as you kick a poisonous snake out of your path." + +"It is quite true," was the calm reply. + +"But America was once your enemy," she continued, watching Chalmers' +powerful service. + +"With America we made peace," he explained. "With England, never. If you +would really appreciate and understand the reason for that undying +hatred which I and millions of my fellow countrymen feel, it will cost +you exactly one shilling. Go to any stationer's and buy a copy of the +Treaty of Versailles. Read it word by word and line by line. It is the +most brutal document that was ever printed. It will help you to +understand." + +She nodded slowly. + +"Paul always declared," she said, "that in those days England had no +statesmen--no one who could feel what lay beyond the day-by-day +horizon. When I think of that Treaty, my friend, I sympathise with you. +It is not a great thing to forge chains of hate for a beaten enemy." + +"If you realise this, are you not then our friend?" Immelan asked. + +She appeared for a few moments to be engrossed in the tennis. Her +companion, however, waited for her answer. + +"In a way," she acknowledged, "I find something magnificent in your +wonderfully conceived plans for vengeance, and in the spirit which has +evolved and kept them alive through all these years. Then, on the other +hand, I look at home, and I ask myself whether you do not make what they +would call over here a cat's-paw of my country." + +"Ours is the most natural and most beneficial of all possible +alliances," Immelan insisted. "Germany and Russia, hand in hand, can +dominate the world." + +"I am not sure that it is an equal bargain, though, which you seek to +drive with us," she said. "Germany aims, of course, at world power, but +you are still fettered by the terms of that Treaty. You cannot build a +great fleet of warships or aeroplanes; you cannot train great armies; you +cannot lay up for yourselves all the store that is necessary for a +successful war. So you bring your brains to Russia, and you ask us to do +these things; but Russia does not aim at world power. Russia seeks only +for a great era of self-development. She, too, has a mighty neighbour +at her gates. I am not sure that your bargain is a fair one." + +"It is the first time that I have heard you talk like this," Immelan +declared, with a little tremor in his tone. + +"I have been in England twice during the last few months," Naida said. +"You know very well at whose wish I came, I have been studying the +conditions here, studying the people so far as I can. I find them such a +kindly race. I find their present Government so unsuspicious, so +genuinely altruistic. After all, that Treaty belongs to an England that +has passed. The England of to-day would never go to war at all. They +believe here that they have solved the problem of perpetual peace." + +Immelan smiled a little bitterly. + +"Dear lady," he said, "if I lose your help, if you go back to Petrograd +and talk to Paul Matinsky as you are talking to me, do you know that you +will break the heart of a nation?" + +She shook her head. + +"Paul does not look upon me as infallible," she protested. "Besides, +there are other considerations. And now, please, we will talk of the +tennis. I do not know whether it is my fancy, but that man there to your +left, in grey, seems to me to be taking an interest in our conversation. +He cannot possibly overhear, and he has not glanced once in our +direction, yet I have an instinct for these things." + +Immelan glanced in the direction of the stranger,--a quiet-looking, +spare man dressed in a grey tweed suit, clean-shaven and of early +middle-age. There was nothing about his appearance to distinguish him +from a score or more of other loiterers. + +"You are quite right," her companion admitted. "One should not talk of +these things even where the birds may listen, but it is so difficult. As +for that man, he could not possibly hear, but there might be others. One +passes behind on the grass so noiselessly." + +They relapsed into silence. Naida, leaning a little forward, became once +more engrossed in the play. Her eyes were fixed upon Nigel. It was his +movements which she followed, his strokes which she usually applauded. +Immelan sat by her side and watched. + +"They are well matched," he remarked presently. + +"Mr. Chalmers has a wonderful service," she declared, "but Lord +Dorminster has more skill. Oh, bravo!" + +The set at that moment was finished by a backhanded return from Nigel, +which skimmed over the net at a great pace, completely out of reach of +the opposing couple. The players strolled across to the seats under the +trees. Naida smiled at Nigel, and he came over to her side. Once again +he was conscious of that peculiar sense of pleasure and well-being +which he felt in her company. + +"You play tennis very well, Lord Dorminster," she said. + +"I found inspiration," he answered. + +"In your partner?" + +"Maggie is always charming to play with. I was thinking of the +onlookers." + +"Mr. Immelan is very interested in tennis," she remarked, with a smile +which challenged him. + +"And you?" + +"Even more so." + +"Tell me about games in Russia," he begged, seating himself on the grass +by her side. + +"We have none," she replied. "I learnt my tennis at Cannes, where, +curiously enough, I saw you play three years ago." + +"You were there then?" he asked with interest. + +"For a few days only. We were motoring from Spain to Monte Carlo. Cannes +was very crowded, but you see I remembered." + +Her voice seemed to have some lingering charm in it, some curiously +potent suggestion of personal interest which stirred his pulses. He +looked up and met her eyes. For a moment the world of tennis fields, of +pleasant chatter and of holiday-makings, passed away. He rose abruptly +to his feet. This time he avoided looking at her. + +"You must come over and speak to Maggie," he begged. "Perhaps Mr. +Immelan will spare you for a few moments." + +Immelan bowed, sphinxlike but coldly furious. The two strolled away +together. + +When the next set was over, Naida, who had rejoined her companion, had +disappeared. On one of their vacated chairs was seated the quiet-looking +stranger in grey. Chalmers passed his arm through Nigel's and led him in +that direction. + +"I want you two to know each other," he said. "Jesson, this is Lord +Dorminster--Mr. Gilbert Jesson--Lord Dorminster." + +The two men shook hands, Nigel a little vaguely. He was at first unable +to place this newcomer. + +"Mr. Jesson," Chalmers explained, dropping his voice a little, "was a +highly privileged and very much valued member of our Intelligence +Department, until he resigned a few months ago. I think that if you +could spare an hour or two any time this evening, Dorminster, it would +interest you very much to know exactly the reason for Mr. Jesson's +resignation." + +"I should be very pleased indeed," Nigel replied. "Won't you both come +and dine in Belgrave Square to-night? I was going to ask you, anyhow, +Chalmers. Naida Karetsky has promised to come, and my cousin will be +hostess." + +"It will give me very great pleasure," Jesson acquiesced. "You will +understand," he added, "that the information which Mr. Chalmers has +just given you concerning myself is entirely confidential." + +Nigel nodded. + +"We three will have a little talk to ourselves afterwards," he +suggested. "At eight o'clock--Number 17, Belgrave Square." + +Jesson strolled away after a little desultory conversation. Chalmers +looked after him thoughtfully. + +"Harmless-looking chap, isn't he?" he observed. "Yet I'll let you in on +this, Dorminster: there isn't another living person who knows so much of +what is going on behind the scenes in Europe as that man." + +"Why has he chucked his job, then?" Nigel enquired. + +"He will tell you that to-night," was Chalmers' quiet reply. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +"I don't think I shall marry you, after all," Maggie announced that +evening, as she stood looking at herself in one of the gilded mirrors +with which the drawing-room at Belgrave Square was adorned. + +"Why not?" Nigel asked, with polite anxiety. + +"You are exhibiting symptoms of infidelity," she declared. "Your +flirtation with Naida this afternoon was most pronounced, and you went +out of your way to ask her to dine to-night." + +"I like that!" Nigel complained. "Supposing it were true, I should +simply be obeying orders. It was you who incited me to devote myself to +her." + +"The sacrifices we women make for the good of our country," Maggie +sighed. "However, you needn't have taken me quite so literally. Do you +admire her very much, Nigel?" + +He smiled. His manner, however, was not altogether free from +self-consciousness. + +"Of course I do," he admitted. "She's a perfectly wonderful person, +isn't she? Let's get out of this Victorian environment," he added, +looking around the huge apartment with its formal arrangement of +furniture and its atmosphere of prim but faded elegance. "We'll go into +the smaller room and tell Brookes to bring us some cocktails and +cigarettes. Chalmers won't expect to be received formally, and +Mademoiselle Karetsky will appreciate the cosmopolitan note of our +welcome." + +"We do look a little too domestic, don't we?" Maggie replied, as she +passed through the portiere which Nigel was holding up. "I'm not at all +sure that I ought to come and play hostess like this, without an aunt or +anything. I must think of my reputation. I may decide to marry Mr. +Chalmers, and Americans are very particular about that sort of thing." + +"From what I have seen of him, I should think that Chalmers would make +you an excellent husband," Nigel declared, as he rang the bell. "You +need a firm hand, and I should think he would be quite capable of using +it." + +"You take the matter far too calmly," she objected. "I can assure you +that I am getting peevish. I hate all Russian women with creamy +complexions and violet-coloured eyes." + +"They are wonderful eyes," Nigel declared, after he had given Brookes an +order. + +Maggie looked at him curiously. + +"Naida is for your betters, sir," she reminded him. "You must not forget +that she is to rule over Russia some day." + +"Just at present," Nigel observed, "Paul Matinsky has a perfectly good +wife of his own." + +"An invalid." + +"Invalids always live long." + +"Presidents and emperors can always get divorces," Maggie insisted, +"especially in this irreligious age." + +"Matinsky isn't that sort," Nigel said cheerfully. "Even an old gossip +like Karschoff calls him a purist, and you yourself have spoken of his +principles." + +Maggie shrugged her shoulders. + +"All right," she remarked. "If you are determined to rush into danger, I +suppose you must. There is just one more point to be considered, though. +I suppose you know that if you succeed any farther with Naida, you will +introduce a personal note into our coming struggle." + +"What do you mean?" Nigel demanded. + +"Why, Immelan, of course," she replied. "He's head over ears in love +with Naida. Any one can see that." + +Nigel laughed scornfully. + +"My dear child," he protested, "can you imagine a woman like Naida +thinking seriously of a fellow like Immelan?--a scheming, Teutonic +adventurer, without even the breeding of his class!" + +Maggie laughed softly for several moments. + +"My dear Nigel," she exclaimed, "what a luxury to get at the man of +you! I haven't seen your eyes flash like that for ages. The cocktails, +thank goodness! Shake one for me till it froths all the way up the +glass, please, and then give me a cigarette." + +Nigel obeyed orders, helped himself, and glanced at the clock as Brookes +left the room. + +"How nice of you to come half an hour early, Maggie!" he remarked. + +She made a little grimace. + +"The first time you have noticed it," she said dolefully. "Do you +realise, Nigel, that it is nearly a week since you proposed to me? Apart +from your penchant for Naida, don't you really want to marry me any +more?" + +He came across the room and stood looking down at her thoughtfully. She +was wearing a somewhat daringly fashioned black lace gown, which showed +a good deal of her white shoulders and neck. Her brown hair was simply +but artistically arranged. She was piquante, alluring, with a +provocative smile at the corners of her lips and a challenging gleam in +her eyes. The daintiness and femininity of her were enthralling. + +"You would make an adorable wife," he reflected. + +"For some one else?" + +"An unspeakable proposition," he assured her. + +"You're very nice-looking, Nigel," she murmured. + +"You're terribly attractive, Maggie!" + +"Then why is it," she sighed, "that we neither of us want to marry the +other?" + +"If a serious proposition would really be of interest to you," he +began,-- + +She made a little grimace. + +"You heard them coming," she interrupted. + +The three expected guests arrived almost together, bringing with them, +at any rate so far as Chalmers and Naida were concerned, an atmosphere +of light-heartedness which was later on to make the little dinner party +a complete success. Naida, too, was in black, a gown simpler than +Maggie's but full of distinction. She wore no jewellery except a +wonderful string of pearls. Her black hair was brushed straight back +from her forehead but drooped a little over her ears. She seemed to +bring with her a larger share of girlishness than any of them had +previously observed in her, as though she had made up her mind for this +one evening to cast herself adrift from the graver cares of life and to +indulge in the frivolities which after all were the heritage of her +youth. She sat at Nigel's right hand and plied him with questions as to +the lighter side of his life,--his favourite sport, books, and general +occupation. She gave evidences of humour which delighted everybody, and +Nigel, though he would at times have welcomed, and did his best to +initiate, an incursion into more serious subjects, found himself +compelled to admire the tact with which she continually foiled him. + +"It is a mistake," she declared once, "to believe that a woman is ever +serious unless she is forced to be. All our natural proclivities are +towards gaiety. We are really butterflies by instinct, and we are at our +best when we are natural. Don't you agree with me, Maggie?" + +"From the bottom of my heart," Maggie assented. "Nothing but conscience +ever induces me to pull a long face and turn my thoughts to serious +things. And I haven't a great deal of conscience." + +"So you see," Naida continued, smiling up at her host, "when you try to +get a woman to talk politics or sociology with you, you are brushing a +little of the down off her wings. We really want to be told--other +things." + +"I should imagine," he replied, "that my sex frequently indulged you." + +"Not so much as I should desire," she assured him. "I have somehow or +other acquired an undeserved reputation for brains. In Russia +especially, when I meet a stranger, they don't even look at my frock or +the way my hair is done. They plunge instead into a subject of which I +know nothing--philosophy or history, or international politics." + +"Do you know nothing of international politics?" Nigel asked. + +"A home thrust," she declared, laughing. "I suppose that is a subject +upon which I have some glimmerings of knowledge. Really not very much, +though, but then I have a theory about that. I think sometimes that the +clearest judgments are formed by some one who comes a little fresh to a +subject, some one who hasn't been dabbling in it half their lifetime and +acquired prejudices. Do you always provide strawberries for your guests, +Lord Dorminster? If so, I should like to come and live here." + +"If you will promise to come and live here," he replied, "I will provide +strawberries if I have to start a nursery garden in Jersey." + +"Maggie," Naida announced across the table, "Lord Dorminster has +proposed to me. The matter of strawberries has brought us together. I +don't think I shall accept him. There are no means of making him keep +his bargain." + +"He'd make an awfully good husband," Maggie declared. "If no one else +wants me, I shall probably marry him myself some day." + +Naida shook her head. + +"Lord Dorminster is more my type," she declared. "Besides, you have had +your chance if you really wanted him. I have a great friend in Russia +who prophesies that I shall never marry. That does not please me. I +think not to be married is the worst fate that can happen to any woman." + +"The remedy," Nigel told her, "is in your own hands." + +Jesson, quieter than the others, was still an interesting personality, +often intervening with a shrewd remark and listening to the sallies of +the others with a humorous gleam in his spectacle-shielded eyes. When at +last the girls left them for a time, Nigel led the way at once into the +library, where coffee and liqueurs were served. + +"I expect the others will find their way here in a few minutes," he +said, as the door closed behind Brookes and his satellite. "You had +something to say to me, Chalmers, about Mr. Jesson here." + +"All that I have to say is in the nature of a testimonial," the young +American replied. "Jesson was easily one of our best men in Europe. He +resigned a few months ago simply because he wants a job with you +fellows." + +"I don't quite understand," Nigel began. + +"Let me explain," Jesson begged. "I spent the last three years poking +about Europe, and so far as the United States is concerned, there's +nothing doing. My reports aren't worth much more than the paper they are +written on, and while I'm drawing my money from Washington, it's not my +business to collect information that affects other countries. That's why +I've sent in my resignation. There are great events brewing eastwards, +Lord Dorminster, and I want to take a hand in the game." + +"Do you want to work for us?" Nigel asked. + +"You're right," was the quiet reply. "I guess that's how I've figured it +out. You see, I'm one of those Americans who still consider themselves +half English. Next to the United States, Great Britain is the country +for me. I know what I'm talking about, Lord Dorminster, and I've come to +the conclusion that there's a lot of trouble in store for you people." + +"I'm pretty well convinced of that myself," Nigel agreed, "but you know +how things are with us. We have a democratic Government who have placed +their whole faith in the League of Nations, and who are absolutely and +entirely anti-militarist. On paper, the governments of Russia, Germany, +and most of the other countries of Europe, are of the same ilk. Some of +us--my uncle was one--who have studied history and who know something of +the science of international politics, realise perfectly well that no +Empire can be considered secure under such conditions. This country +swarms with foreign secret-service men. What they are planning against +us, Heaven knows!" + +"Heaven and Naida Karetsky," Chalmers intervened softly. + +"You believe that she is our enemy?" Nigel asked, with a look of trouble +in his eyes. + +"She is Immelan's friend," Chalmers reminded him. + +"There was a man named Atcheson," Jesson began quietly-- + +Nigel nodded. + +"He was one of the men my uncle sent out. The first one was stabbed in +Petrograd. Jim Atcheson was poisoned and died in Berlin." + +"There was rather a scare in a certain quarter about Atcheson," Jesson +observed. "He was supposed to have got a report through to the late Lord +Dorminster." + +"He got it through all right," Nigel replied. "My uncle was busy +decoding it, seated in this room, at that table, when he died." + +"His death was very sudden," Jesson ventured. + +"I have not the faintest doubt but that he was murdered," Nigel +declared. "The document upon which he was working disappeared entirely +except for one sheet." + +"You have that one sheet?" Jesson asked eagerly. + +Nigel produced it from his pocketbook, smoothed it cut, and laid it upon +the table. + +"There are two things worth noticing here," he pointed out. "The first +is that the actual name of a town in Russia is given, and a telephone +number in London. Kroten I have looked up on the map. It seems to be an +unimportant place in a very desolate region. The telephone number is +Oscar Immelan's." + +"That is interesting, though not surprising," Jesson declared. "Immelan, +as you of course know, is one of your enemies, one of those who are +working in this country for purposes of his own. But as regards Kroten, +may I ask where you obtained your information about the place?" + +Nigel dragged down the atlas and showed them the paragraph. Jesson read +it with a faint smile upon his lips. + +"I fancy," he remarked, "that this is a little out of date. I should +like, if you have no objection, to start for Kroten this week." + +"Good heavens! Why?" Nigel exclaimed. + +"I can scarcely answer that question," Jesson said. "I am like a man +with a puzzle board and a heap of loose pieces. Kroten is one of those +pieces, but I haven't commenced the fitting-in process yet. Here," he +said, "is as much as I can tell you about it. There are three cities, +situated in different countries in the world, which are each in their +way connected with the danger which is brewing for this country. I have +heard them described as the three secret cities. One is in Germany. I +have been there at the risk of my life, and I came away simply puzzled. +Kroten is the next, and of the third I have still to discover the +whereabouts. Are you willing, Lord Dorminster, to let me act for you +abroad? I require no salary or remuneration of any sort. I am a wealthy +man, and investigations of this kind are my one hobby. I shall not move +without your permission, although I recognise, of course, that your own +position is entirely an unofficial one. If you will trust me, however, I +promise that all my energies shall be devoted to the interests of this +country." + +Nigel held out his hand. + +"It is a pact," he decided. "Before you leave, I will give you the whole +of my uncle's brief correspondence with Sidwell. You may be able to +gather from it what he was after. Sidwell, you remember, was stabbed in +a cafe in the slums of Petrograd." + +"I remember quite well," Jesson admitted quietly. "I knew Sidwell. He +was a clever person in his way, but he relied too much upon disguises. I +fancy that I hear the voices of the ladies coming. I shall just have +time to tell you rather a curious coincidence." + +The two men waited eagerly. Jesson touched with his forefinger the sheet +of paper which he had been studying. + +"Sidwell," he concluded, "could not have been so far off the mark. The +man with whom he was spending the evening in that cafe was a mechanic +from Kroten." + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +Naida, early one afternoon, a few days after the dinner at Belgrave +Square, raised herself on one elbow from the sofa on which she was +resting, glanced at the roses and the card which the maid had presented +for her inspection, and waved them impatiently away. + +"The gentleman waits," the woman reminded her. + +Naida glanced out of the window across a dull and apparently uninviting +prospect of roofs and chimneys, to where in the background a faint line +of silver and a wheeling flock of sea gulls became dimly visible through +the branches of the distant trees. The window itself was flung wide +open, but the slowly moving air had little of freshness in it. Sparrows +twittered around the window-sill, and a little patch of green shone out +from the Embankment Gardens. The radiance of spring here found few +opportunities. + +"The gentleman waits," the serving woman repeated stolidly, speaking in +her native Russian. + +"You can show him up," her mistress replied a little wearily. + +Immelan entered, a few moments later, spruce and neat in a well-fitting +grey suit, and carrying a grey Homburg hat. He was redolent of soaps +and perfumes. His step was buoyant, almost jaunty, yet in his blue eyes, +as he bent over the hand of the woman upon whom he had come to call, +lurked something of the disquietude which, notwithstanding his most +strenuous efforts, was beginning to assert itself. + +"You make me very happy, my dear Naida," he began, "that you receive me +thus so informally. Your good father is smoking in the lounge. He bade +me come up." + +She beckoned him to a seat. + +"A thousand thanks for your flowers, my friend," she said. "Now tell me +why you are possessed to see me at this untimely hour. I always rest for +a time after luncheon, and I am only here because the sunshine filled my +room and made me restless." + +"There is a little matter of news," he announced slowly. "I thought it +might interest you. I hoped it would." + +She turned her head and looked at him. + +"News?" she repeated. "News from you means only one thing. Is it good or +bad?" + +"It is good," he replied, "because it saves me a long and tedious +journey, because it saves me also from a separation which I should have +found detestable." + +"Your journey to China, then, is abandoned?" + +"It is rendered unnecessary. Prince Shan has decided after all to +adhere to his original plan and come to Europe." + +"You are sure?" + +"I have an official intimation," he replied. "I may probably have to go +to Paris, but no farther. It is even possible that I might leave +to-night." + +She was genuinely interested. + +"There is no one in the whole world," she declared, "whom I have wanted +to meet so much as Prince Shan." + +"You will not be disappointed," he promised her. "There is no one like +him. When he enters the room, you know that you are in the presence of a +great man. The three of us together! Naida, we will remake the map of +the world." + +She frowned a little uneasily. + +"Do not take too much for granted, Oscar," she enjoined. "Remember that +I am here to watch and to report. It is not for me to make decisions." + +"Then for whom else?" he demanded. "Paul Matinsky himself wrote me that +you had his entire confidence--that you possessed full powers for +action. You will not be faint-hearted, Naida?" + +"I shall never be false to my convictions," she replied. + +There was a brief silence. He was not altogether satisfied, but he +judged the moment unpropitious for any further reference to the coming +of Prince Shan. + +"My plans, as you see, are changed," he said at last, "and for that +reason a promise which I made to myself will not now be kept." + +She rose to her feet a little uneasily, shook out her fluffy morning +gown, and retreated towards the door leading to the apartments beyond. +He watched her without movement. She picked up a pile of letters from a +table in the middle of the room, glanced at them, and threw them down. + +"It is as well," she warned him, "to keep all promises." + +"As for this one," he replied, "I have no responsibility save to myself. +I absolve myself. I give myself permission to speak. Your father is even +wishful that I should do so. I crave from you, Naida, the happiness +which only you can bring into my life. I ask you to become my wife." + +She looked at him without visible change of expression. Her lips, +however, were a little parted. The air of aloofness with which she moved +through the world seemed suddenly more marked. He would have been a +brave man, or one entirely without perceptions, who would have advanced +towards her at that moment. + +"That is quite impossible," she pronounced. + +"I do not admit it," he contended. "No, I will never admit that. The +fates brought us together. It will take something stronger than fate to +drive us apart. I had not meant to speak yet. I had meant to wait until +the great pact was sealed and the glory to come assured, but during +these last few days I have suffered. A strange fancy has come to me. I +seem to feel something between us, so I speak before it can grow. I +speak because without you life for me would be a thing not worth having. +You are my life and my soul. You will not send me away?" + +Naida was troubled but unhesitating. It was perhaps at that moment that +a hidden characteristic of her features showed itself. Her mouth, +sometimes almost too voluptuous in its softness, had straightened into a +firm line of scarlet. The deeper violet of her eyes had gone. So a woman +might have looked who watched suffering unmoved, the woman of the bull +or prize fight. + +"I am glad that you have spoken, Oscar," she said. "I know a thing now +which has been a source of doubt and anxiety to me. What you ask is +impossible. I do not love you. I shall never love you. A few days ago, I +asked myself the very question you have just asked me, and I could not +answer it. Now I know." + +Pain and anger struggled in his face. He was suffering, without a doubt, +but for a moment it seemed as though the anger would predominate. His +great shoulders heaved, his hands were clenched until the signet ring on +his left finger cut into the flesh, his eyes were like glittering points +of fire. + +"It is the old dream concerning Paul?" he demanded. + +"It has nothing to do with Paul," she assured him. "Concerning him I +will admit that I have had my weak moments. I think that those have +passed. It was such a wonderful dream," she went on reflectively, "the +dream of ruling the mightiest nation in the world, a nation that even +now, after many years of travail, is only just finding its way through +to the light. It seemed such a small thing that stood in the way. Since +then I have met Paul's wife. She does not understand, but at least she +loves." + +"She is a poor fool, no helpmate for any man," Immelan declared. "Yet it +is not his cause I plead, but mine. I, too, can minister to your +ambitions. Be my wife, and I swear to you that before five years have +passed I will be President of the German Republic. Germany is no strange +country to you," he went on passionately. "It is you who have helped in +the great _rapprochement_. At times when Paul has been difficult, you +have smoothed the way. I would not speak against your country, I would +not speak against anything which lies close to your heart, but let me +tell you that when the day of purification comes, the day when God gives +us leave to pour out the vials of vengeance, there will be no prouder, +no more glorious people than ours. Our triumph will be yours, Naida. You +yourself will help to cement the great alliance of these years." + +She shook her head. + +"I am a woman," she said simply. "Incidentally, I am a politician and +something of an altruist, but when it comes to marriage, I am a woman. I +do not love you, Oscar, and I will not marry you." + +There was a darker shade upon his face now. Unconsciously he had drawn a +little nearer to her. + +"Listen," he begged; "it is perhaps possible that I have not been +mistaken--that a certain change has crept up in you even within the last +few days? Tell me, is there any one else who has found his way into your +heart? No, I will not say heart! It could not be your heart in so short +a time. Into your fancy? Is there any one else, Naida, of whom you are +thinking?" + +"That is my concern, Oscar, and mine only," she answered haughtily. + +A weaker woman he would have bullied. His veins were filled with anger. +His tongue ached to spend itself. Naida's bearing cowed him. She +remained a dominating figure. The unnatural restraint imposed upon +himself, however, made his voice sound hard and unfamiliar. There were +little patches of white around his mouth; his teeth showed, when he +spoke, more than usual. + +"If there were any one else," he declared, "and that some one else +should chance to be an Englishman, I would find a new hell for him." + +"There is no one else," she answered calmly, "but if there ever should +be, Oscar Immelan, and if you ever interfered with him, either in this +country or any other, my arm would follow you around the world. Remember +that." + +She turned away for a moment, eager to gain a brief respite from his +darkening face. When she looked around, he was gone. She heard his +footsteps passing down the corridor, the bell ringing for the lift, the +clank of the gates as he stepped in. Once more she gazed out over the +uninspiring prospect. There was a little more sunshine upon the river; +more of the dusty chimney-pots seemed bathed in its silvery radiance. As +she stood there, she felt herself growing calmer. The tension passed +from her nerves. Her eyes grew soft again. Then an impulse came to her. +She stretched out her hand for the telephone book, turned over the pages +restlessly, looked through the "D's" until she found the name for which +she was searching. For a long time she hesitated. When at last she took +up the receiver and asked for a number, she was conscious of a slight +thrill, a sense of excitement which in moments of more complete +self-control would at least have served as a warning to her. + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +The curtain fell upon the first act of "Louise." The lights were turned +up, the tenseness relaxed, men made dives for their hats, and the +unmusical murmured the usual platitudes. Naida leaned forward from the +corner of her box to the man who was her sole companion. + +"Father," she said, "I am expecting a caller with whom I wish to +speak--Lord Dorminster. If he comes, will you leave us alone? And if any +one else should be here, please take them away." + +"More mysteries," her father muttered, not unkindly. "Who is this man +Dorminster?" + +Naida leaned back in her chair and fanned herself slowly. + +"No one I know very much about," she acknowledged. "I have selected him +in my mind, however as being a typical Englishman of his class. I wish +to talk to him, to appreciate his point of view. You know what Paul said +when he gave you the appointment and sent us over here: 'Find out for me +what sort of men these Englishmen are.'" + +"Matinsky should know," her father observed. "He was here twelve years +ago. He came over with the first commission which established regular +relations with the British Government." + +"No doubt," she said equably, "he was able to gauge the official +outlook, but this country, during the last ten years, has gone through +great vicissitudes. Besides, it is not only the official outlook in +which Paul is interested. He doesn't understand, and frankly I don't, +the position of what they call over here 'the man in the street.' You +see, he must be either a fool, or he must be grossly deceived." + +"So far as my dealings with him go, I should never call the Englishman a +fool," Karetsky confessed. + +"There are degrees and conditions of fools," his daughter declared +calmly. "A man with a perfectly acute brain may have simply idiotic +impulses towards credulity, and a credulous man is always a fool. +Anyhow, I know what Paul wants." + +There was a knock at the door. Karetsky opened it and stood aside to let +Nigel pass in. Naida held out her hand to the latter with a smile. + +"I am so glad that you have come," she said, raising her eyes for a +minute to his. "Father, you remember Lord Dorminster?" + +The two men exchanged a few commonplace remarks. Then Karetsky reached +for his hat. + +"Your arrival, Lord Dorminster," he observed, "leaves me free to make a +few calls myself. We shall, I trust, meet again." + +Nigel murmured a few courteous words and watched the retreating figure +with some curiosity. + +"Your father is very typical," he declared. "He reminds me of your +country itself. He is massive, has suggestions of undeveloped strength." + +"Add that he is a little ponderous," Naida said lightly, "slow to make +up his mind, but as obstinate as the Urals themselves, and you have +described him. Now tell me what you think of a young woman who rings you +up without the slightest encouragement and invites you to come to the +Opera purposely to visit her box." + +"I deny the absence of encouragement, and I am very grateful for the +opportunity of coming," Nigel answered. "And if I were to tell you all +that I think of you," he added, after a moment's pause, "it would take +me a great deal longer than this quarter of an hour's interval." + +These were their first few moments absolutely alone. Neither of them was +unduly emotional, neither wholly free from experience, yet they looked +and spoke and felt as though the coming of new things was at hand. The +atmosphere of music, still present, was a wonderful background to the +intensified sensations of which both were conscious. Naida had the +utmost difficulty in steadying her voice. + +"I wanted to talk to you seriously because you can help me very much if +you will," she began. "In a sense, I am over here upon a mission. Some +of us in Russia feel that your nation is imperfectly understood there. +We are bearing grudges against you which may not be wholly justified. +You see, to speak very plainly, we are under the constant influence of a +people which cherishes no feelings of friendship towards you." + +For a moment the personal element had disappeared. Nigel remembered who +his companion was and all that she stood for. He drew his chair a little +nearer to hers. + +"If you are looking for a typical Englishman," he said, "I fear that I +shall be a disappointment to you. The typical Englishman of to-day is +hiding his head in the sand. I am not disposed to do anything of the +sort. I recognise a great coming danger, and I am afraid of your +country." + +"The attitude of the official Englishman I know," she declared, a little +eagerly. "What I want to find out is whether there are many like +yourself, who are awake." + +"I am afraid that I am in the minority," he confessed. "I am trying to +carry on the work which my uncle commenced. I am trying to secure firm +and definite evidence of a certain plot which I believe to be brewing in +your country and in Germany." + +"Tell me exactly what you know," she begged. + +Nigel looked at her for several moments in silence. She was wearing a +Russian headdress, a low tiara of bound coils of pearls. A rope of +pearls hung from her neck. Her white net gown was trimmed with ermine. +At her first appearance in the front of the box she had created almost a +sensation among those to whom she was visible. In these darker shadows +the sensuous disturbance of which he had been conscious since his +entrance swept over him once more with overmastering power. + +"You are very beautiful," he said, a little abruptly. + +"I am glad you think so," she murmured, with a very sweet answering +light in her eyes, "but I am hoping that you have other things to tell +me." + +"You are the friend of Immelan," he reminded her. + +"To some extent, yes," she assented, "but I admit of no prejudices. The +greatest friend I have in the world is Paul Matinsky, and it is at his +wish that I am here. He is anxious above all things not to make a +mistake." + +"Your country is very much under the dominance of Germany," he ventured. + +"Very much, I admit, but not utterly so. You must remember that after +the cataclysm of 1917, Russia has been born again in travail and agony. +No hand was outstretched to help her, save that of Germany alone, for +her own sake ultimately, perhaps, but nevertheless with invaluable +results to Russia. We had vast resources which Germany exploited, +magnificent human material which Germany has educated and disciplined. +The two nations have grown together for their common interest. At the +same time, Paul Matinsky and very many others have always felt that +there is one of Germany's great ambitions in which Russia ought not +necessarily to become involved. I think--I hope that you understand me." + +"In plain words," Nigel said, "you refer to this projected plan of +isolating England." + +"In plain words, I do," she admitted. "Russia's intentions concerning +that are trembling in the balance. Germany is pressing her hard. Nothing +will be finally decided until I return to Petrograd. You see, I speak to +you quite openly, for I myself have had some experience of your present +statesmen. I believe if you were to repeat this conversation to any one +of them, if, even, you could open their eyes to what is happening, they +would only shrug their shoulders and say that they relied for their +protection on the League of Nations." + +"You are unhappily right," Nigel groaned, "yet one perseveres, and after +all there is an element of mystery about the whole affair. The French, +as you know, have not imitated our blind credulity. Their frontier would +seem to be impregnable, and the difficulties of invading England, even +from the air, are very much as they were during the last war. It was +these considerations which made my uncle persevere in his attempt at +secret-service work on the Continent. Everything depends upon our +knowing exactly what is in store for us." + +"And have you discovered that?" she enquired. + +He shook his head. + +"Everything that we have learnt so far has been of negative value," he +replied. "The German citizen army is large, but not threateningly so. So +far as we have been able to discover, they do not seem to have any +secret store of guns or ammunition. Their docks hold no secrets. Yet we +know that there is something brewing. Both the men upon whom my uncle +relied have been murdered." + +"But one of them succeeded in getting a dispatch through, did he not?" +she asked quietly. + +"Yes, he succeeded," Nigel acknowledged. "My uncle was murdered, +however, in the act of decoding it, and the dispatch itself was stolen." + +"You are very frank," she said. "I suppose I ought to feel flattered +that you treat me with so little reserve." + +"If you are a friend to Germany," he replied, "you probably know all +that I can tell you. If you are inclined towards friendship with us, +then it is as well that you should know everything." + +"That is reasonable," she admitted. "Now listen. This conversation can +only last a few minutes longer. It is true that Oscar Immelan is my +father's old friend and also mine, but my judgment in all matters which +relate to the welfare of my country is not influenced by that fact." + +"There was a report once," Nigel said, taking his courage into both +hands, "that you were engaged to be married to him." + +She looked him in the eyes. Against the whiteness of his skin, the +colour of her own seemed more wonderful than ever. + +"That is not true," she replied. "It will never be true." + +"I am glad," he declared fervently. + +There was a brief pause. Both seemed conscious of a renewal of that air +of disturbance which had reigned between them during their first few +moments alone. It was Naida who made an effort to restore their +conversation to its former tone. + +"If Germany has any scheme against this country," she said, "believe me, +it will not be so obvious as you seem to think. It will be a scheme +which can only be carried out with the assistance of other countries, +and that assistance is not yet wholly promised. I cannot betray to you +my knowledge of certain things," she went on, after a moment's +hesitation, "but I can at least give you this warning. It is not for his +health alone that Prince Shan is flying from China to Paris. If there is +a single member of your Government who has the least apprehension of +world politics, now is the time for action." + +"There is no one," Nigel answered gloomily. + +The box was suddenly invaded. Karetsky reappeared with several other +men. In the rear of the little procession came Immelan. His face +darkened as he recognised Nigel. Naida looked across at him with a +slight frown upon her forehead. + +"You have changed your mind?" she remarked. "I thought you were for +Paris to-night?" + +"A fortunate chance intervened," Immelan replied. + +"Fortunate?" + +Immelan watched Nigel's retreating figure with a menacing frown. + +"I find it so," he replied. "Our wonderful prima donna is in great voice +to-night--and I like to be prepared for all possible combinations." + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +Maggie came suddenly into the library at Belgrave Square, where Jesson, +Chalmers and Nigel were talking together. She carried in her hand a +note, which she handed to the latter. + +"Naida is a dear, after all," she declared. "There is one person at +least who does not wish to have me pass away in a German nursing home or +fall a victim to Frau Essendorf's cooking." + +Nigel read the note aloud. It consisted of only a sentence or two and +was dated from the Milan Court that morning: + + Maggie dear, this is just a line of advice from your friend. You + must not go back to Germany. + + Naida. + +"I fear," Maggie sighed, "that my little expedition is scotched, even if +I had been able to persuade you others to let me go. Every one seems to +have made up their mind that I shall not go to Germany. It will be such +a disappointment to those flaxen-haired atrocities, Gertrud and Bertha. +Their so-much-loved Miss Brown can never return to them again." + +"In any case, the game was scarcely worth the candle," Nigel observed. +"We have already all the evidence we require that some scheme inimical +to this country is being proposed and fostered by Immelan. Our next move +must be to find out the nature of this scheme--whether it be naval, +military, or political. I don't think Essendorf would be at all likely +to give away any more interesting information in the domestic circle." + +"What are we all going to do, then?" Maggie asked. + +"We are met here to discuss it," Nigel replied. "Jesson is off to Russia +this afternoon. I asked him to come round and have a few last words with +us, in case there was anything to suggest for us stay-at-homes." + +"We shall have to rely very largely upon luck," Jesson declared. "There +are three places, in any of which we might discover what we want to +know. One is Kroten, another is Paris, provided that Prince Shan really +goes there, and the third London." + +"London?" Maggie repeated. + +"There are two people in London," Jesson declared, "who know everything +we are seeking to discover. One is Immelan and the other Naida +Karetsky." + +"It seems to me," Maggie said, "that if that is so, the place for us is +where those two people are. What is the importance of Kroten, Mr. +Jesson?" + +"Kroten," Jesson replied, "is the second of what I have seen referred +to in a private diplomatic report, written in an enemy country, as the +three mystery cities of the world. The first one is in Germany, and I +have already explored it. I have information, but information which +without its sequel is valueless. Kroten is the second. Ten years ago it +was a town of eighteen thousand inhabitants. To-day there are at least +two hundred thousand people there, and it is growing all the time." + +"Say, how can a town of that size," Chalmers enquired, "be termed a +mystery city in any sense of the word? Travelling's free in Russia. I +guess any one that wanted could take a ticket to Kroten." + +"A good many do," Jesson assented calmly, "and some never come back. +America and Russia are on friendly terms, yet two men in my branch of +the service--good fellows they were, too--started out from Washington +for Kroten six months ago. Neither of them has been heard of since; +neither ever will be." + +"How's it done?" Chalmers asked curiously. + +"In the first place," Jesson explained, "the city itself stands at the +arm of the river, in a sort of cul-de-sac, with absolutely untraversable +mountains on three sides of it. All the roads have to come around the +plain and enter from eastwards. There is only one line of railway, so +that all the approaches into the city are easily guarded." + +"That's all right geographically, of course," Nigel admitted, "but what +earthly excuse can any one make for keeping tourists or travellers out +of the place if they want to go there?" + +"That is perhaps the most ingenious thing of all," Jesson replied. "You +know that Russia is now practically a tranquil country, but there are +certain bands of the extreme Bolshevistic faction who never gave in to +authority and who practically exist in the little-known places by means +of marauding expeditions. The mountains about Kroten are supposed to +have been infested by these nomadic companies. Whether the outrages set +down to them are really committed or not, I don't suppose any one knows, +but my point of view is that the presence of these people is absolutely +encouraged by the Government, to give them an excuse for the most +extraordinary precautions in issuing passports or allowing any one from +the outside world to pass into the city. If you get in, I understand you +are waited upon by the police within half an hour and have to tell them +the story of your past life and your future intentions. After that you +are allowed to go about on parole. If you get too inquisitive, you are +discovered to be in touch with the robber bands, and--well--that's an +end of you." + +"A nice, salubrious spot," Nigel murmured. + +"It sounds most interesting," Maggie declared. "I think a woman would +be less likely to cause suspicion," she added hopefully. + +"Utterly out of the question," Jesson pronounced. "Kroten is the one +place that must be left in my hands. I know more about the getting there +than any of you, and I know the tricks of changing my identity." + +"I should rather like to go with you," Nigel confessed. + +"Impossible!" was the brief reply. + +"Why?" + +Jesson smiled. + +"To be perfectly frank," he said, "because you are developing an +interest in the one person in the world who might give success over into +our hands. It is necessary for you to remain where you can encourage +that interest." + +Nigel was a little staggered. + +"My friendship with Mademoiselle Karetsky," he protested, "is scarcely +likely to influence her political views." + +"I am a somewhat close observer," Jesson continued. "You will not ask me +to believe that your conversation with mademoiselle in her box at the +Opera last night related all the time to--well, shall we say music?" + +"Nigel, you never told me you were at the Opera," Maggie intervened. +"What made you go?" + +"I think that it was a message from Mademoiselle Karetsky," Jesson +suggested quietly. + +Nigel smiled. + +"Upon my word, I think you're going to be a success, Jesson," he +declared. "Perhaps you can tell me what we did talk about?" + +"I believe I almost could," was the calm reply. "In any case, I think I +see the situation as it exists. Mademoiselle Karetsky is a wonderful +woman. She has a great, open mind. To a certain extent, of course, she +has seen things from the point of view of Paul Matinsky, Immelan, and +that little coterie of Russo-Germans who see a future for both countries +only in an alliance of the old-fashioned order. Matinsky, however, has +always had his doubts. That is why he sent over here the one person whom +he trusted. Presently she will make a report, and the whole issue will +remain with her. Immelan knows this and pays her ceaseless court. My +impression, however, is that his influence is waning. I believe that +to-day he is terrified at the bare reflection of how much Naida Karetsky +knows." + +"You believe that she does know exactly what is intended?" Nigel asked. + +"I am perfectly certain of it," Jesson replied. "If she could be induced +to tell us everything, my journey to Kroten might just as well be +abandoned. Yet somehow I do not think she will go so far as that. The +most that we can hope for is that she will advise Matinsky to reject +Immelan's proposals, and that she will perhaps bring some influence to +bear in the same direction upon Prince Shan." + +"I am inclined to agree with Jesson," Nigel pronounced, "inasmuch as I +believe that Mademoiselle Karetsky is disposed to change or modify her +views concerning us. You see, after all, this threatened blow against +England is purely a private affair of Germany's. There is really no +reason why Russia or any other country should be dragged into it. She is +the monkey pulling the chestnuts out of the fire for her most dangerous +rival." + +"Matinsky might be brought to think that way," Chalmers observed, "but +they say half the members of his Cabinet are under German influence." + +"If Matinsky believed that," Nigel declared, "he is quite strong enough +to clear them all out and make a fresh start." + +"In the meantime," Maggie interposed, "I should like to know in what way +you propose to use poor little me? I am not to go to Germany, the man +whom I at one time seriously thought of marrying is told off to engage +the attentions of another woman, Mr. Jesson here is going to Kroten, and +he doesn't show the slightest inclination to take me with him. Am I to +sit here and do nothing?" + +"There remains for you the third enterprise," Jesson replied, "one in +which, so far as I can see," he continued, with a smile, "you have not +the faintest chance of success." + +"Tell me what it is, at least?" she begged. + +"The conversion of Prince Shan." + +Maggie made a little grimace. + +"Aren't you trying me a little high?" she murmured. + +"Very high indeed," Jesson acknowledged. "Prince Shan, for all his +wonderful statesmanship and his grip upon world affairs, is reputed to +be almost an anchorite in his daily life. No woman has ever yet been +able to boast of having exercised the slightest influence over him. At +the same time, he is an extraordinarily human person, and success with +him would mean the end of your enemies." + +"It sounds a bit of a forlorn hope," Maggie remarked cheerfully, "but +I'll do my little best." + +"Prince Shan has abandoned his idea of landing at Paris," Jesson +continued. "He is coming direct to London. I have to thank Chalmers for +that information. Immelan will meet him directly he arrives, and their +first conversations will make history. Afterwards, if things go well, +Mademoiselle Karetsky will join the conference." + +"I fear," Maggie sighed, "that there will be difficulties in the way of +my establishing confidential relations with Prince Shan." + +"There will be difficulties," Jesson assented, "but the thing is not so +impossible as it would be in Paris. Prince Shan has a very fine house +in Curzon Street, which is kept in continual readiness for him. He will +probably entertain to some extent. You will without doubt have +opportunities of meeting him socially." + +Maggie glanced at herself in the glass. + +"A Chinaman!" she murmured. + +"I guess that doesn't mean what it did," Chalmers pointed out. "Prince +Shan is an aristocrat and a born ruler. He has every scrap of culture +that we know anything about and something from his thousand-year-old +family that we don't quite know how to put into words. Don't you worry +about Prince Shan, Lady Maggie. Ask Dorminster here what they called him +at Oxford." + +"The first gentleman of Asia," Nigel replied. "I think he deserves the +title." + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +On the morning following the conclave in Belgrave Square, the Right +Honourable Mervin Brown received two extremely distinguished visitors in +Downing Street. It was doubtful whether the Prime Minister was +altogether at his best. There was a certain amount of irritability +rankling beneath his customary air of bonhommie. He motioned his callers +to take chairs, however, and listened attentively to the few words of +introduction which his secretary thought necessary. + +"This is General Dumesnil, sir, of the French Staff, and Monsieur +Pouilly of the French Cabinet. They have called according to +appointment, on Government business." + +"Very glad to see you, gentlemen," was the Prime Minister's brisk +welcome. "Sorry I can't talk French to you. Politics, these last ten +years, haven't left us much time for the outside graces." + +Monsieur Pouilly at once took the floor. He was a thin, dark man with a +beautifully trimmed black beard, flashing black eyes, and thoughtful, +delicate features. He was attired in the frock coat and dark trousers of +diplomatic usage, and he appeared to somewhat resent the brown tweed +suit and soft collar of the man who was receiving him. + +"Mr. Mervin Brown," he began, "you will kindly look upon our visit as +official. We are envoys from Monsieur le President and the French +Government. General Dumesnil has accompanied me, in case our +conversation should turn upon military matters here or at the War +Office." + +The General saluted. The Prime Minister bowed a little awkwardly. + +"So far as I am concerned," the latter declared, "I will be perfectly +frank with you from the start. I know nothing whatever about military +affairs. My job is to govern this country, to make the most of its +resources, and to bring prosperity to its citizens from the English +Channel to the North Sea. We don't need soldiers and never shall, that I +can see. I am firmly convinced that the days of wars are over. The +government of every country in the world is getting into the hands of +the democracy, and the democracy don't want war and never did. If any of +the more quarrelsome folk on the continent get scrapping, well, my +conception of my duty is to keep out of it." + +Monsieur Pouilly restrained himself. To judge from his appearance, +however, it was not altogether an easy matter. + +"You belong, sir," he said, "to a type of statesman whose rise to power +in this country some of us have watched with a certain amount of +concern, for although it is not my mission here to-day to talk politics, +I am yet bound to remind you that you do not stand alone. The very +League of Nations upon which you rely imposes certain obligations upon +you, some actual, some understood. It is to discuss the situation +arising from your neglect to make the provisions called for in that +agreement that I am here to-day." + +Mr. Mervin Brown glanced at some figures which his secretary had laid +before him. + +"You complain, I presume, of the reduction of our standing army?" he +observed. + +"We complain of that," Monsieur Pouilly replied, "and we complain also +of the gradually decreasing interest shown by your Government in matters +of aeronautics, artillery, and naval construction. We learnt our lesson +in 1914. If trouble should come again, our country would once more be +the sufferer. You would no doubt do everything that was expected of you, +in time. Before you were ready, however, France would be ruined. You +entered into certain obligations under the League of Nations. My +Government begs to call your attention to the fact that you are not +fulfilling them." + +"It is my intention within the course of the next few months," Mervin +Brown declared, "to lay before the League of Nations a scheme for total +disarmament." + +Monsieur Pouilly was staggered. A little exclamation escaped the +General. + +"What about those nations," the latter enquired, "who were left outside +the League? What of Russia, for instance?" + +"Russia is a great and peaceful republic," Mervin Brown replied. "All +her efforts are devoted towards industrial development. No nation would +have less to gain by a return to militarism." + +"Pardon, monsieur, but how do you know anything about Russia?" Monsieur +Pouilly asked. "You have not a single secret service agent there, and +your ambassadors are ambassadors of commerce." + +"I know what every one else knows," Mervin Brown declared. "Our +commercial travellers are our secret service agents. They travel where +they please in Russia." + +"And Germany?" the General queried. + +"I defy you to say that there is the slightest indication of any +militarism in Germany," the Prime Minister insisted. "I was there myself +only a few months ago. The country is quiet and moving on now to a new +prosperity. I am absolutely and entirely convinced that the world has +nothing to fear from either Russia or Germany." + +"Have you any theory, sir," General Dumesnil enquired, "as to why Russia +refused to join the League of Nations?" + +"None whatever," was the genial acknowledgment. "Russia was left out at +the start through jealous statesmanship, and afterwards she preferred +her independence. I have every sympathy with her attitude." + +"One more question," the soldier begged. "Are you aware, sir, that since +Japan left the League of Nations on the excuse of her isolation, she has +been building aeroplanes and battleships on a new theory, instigated, if +you please, by China?" + +"And look at her last balance sheet as a result of it," was the prompt +retort. "If a nation chooses to make herself a bankrupt by building war +toys, no one in the world can help her. Legislation of that sort is +foolish and simply an incitement to revolution. Look at the difference +in our country. Our income tax is practically abolished, our industrial +troubles are over. Our credit never stood so high, the wealth of the +country was never so great. We are satisfied. A peaceful nation makes +for peace. The rattling of the sabre incites military disturbance. Do +not ask us, gentlemen, to train armies or build ships." + +"We ask you only to keep your covenant," Monsieur Pouilly pronounced +stiffly. + +"Who does keep it?" the Prime Minister demanded. "The world is governed +now by common sense and humanity. I look upon a war of aggression on the +part of any country as a sheer impossibility." + +"What about a war of revenge?" the General enquired quietly. + +"You can search Germany from end to end," Mervin Brown declared, "and +find no trace of any spirit of the sort. I am sorry if I am a +disappointment to you, gentlemen, but the present Government views your +attitude without sympathy. General Richardson is expecting a visit from +you this morning at the War Office, and he will give you any information +you desire. An appointment has also been made for you this afternoon at +the Admiralty. You are doing me the honour of dining with me here +to-morrow night to meet certain members of my Cabinet, and we will, if +you choose, discuss the matter further then. I have thought it best to +place my views clearly before you, however, at the outset of your visit +here." + +The Frenchmen rose a few minutes later and took their leave, +ceremoniously but with obvious discontent. The Prime Minister leaned +back in his chair and awaited his secretary's return with a +well-satisfied smile. In a few minutes the latter presented himself. + +"Well, Franklin," the great man said, "I've let them hear the truth for +once. Plain speaking, eh?" + +The young man bowed. + +"They certainly know your views, sir." + +The Minister glanced at his subordinate sharply. + +"What's the matter with you this morning, Franklin?" he demanded. + +"There is nothing the matter with me, thank you, sir," was the quiet +reply. + +"You're not going to tell me that you disapprove of my attitude?" + +"By no means, sir," the young man assured his Chief hastily,--"not +altogether, that is to say. At the same time, one wonders how far those +two men represent the feeling of France." + +His Chief shrugged his shoulders. + +"The military spirit is hard to kill," he said. "It is in the blood of +most Frenchmen. They are not big enough to understand that the world is +moving on to greater things. What did they say to you before they left?" + +"Nothing much, sir. The General just asked me whether I thought you +would soon be content to leave London unpoliced." + +"What rubbish! Any one else for me to see this morning?" + +"You promised to give Lord Dorminster ten minutes," the young man +reminded him. "He is in the anteroom now." + +The Prime Minister frowned. + +"Dorminster," he repeated. "He is a nephew of the man who was always +worrying the Government to reestablish the secret service. I remember he +came to see me the other day, declared that his uncle had been +murdered, and a secret dispatch from Germany stolen. I wonder he didn't +wind up with a report that the Chinese were on their way to seize +Ireland!" + +"It is the same man, sir." + +"Well, I suppose I'd better see him and get it over," his Chief declared +irritably. "If only one could make these people realize how far behind +the times they are!" + +Nigel was shown in, a few minutes later. Mr. Mervin Brown was gracious +but terse. + +"I haven't had the opportunity of congratulating you upon becoming one +of our hereditary legislators, Lord Dorminster, since you took your seat +in the House of Lords," he said. "Pray let me do so now. I hope that we +may count upon your support." + +"My support, sir," Nigel replied, "will be given to any Party which will +take the urgent necessary steps to protect this country against a great +danger." + +"God bless my soul!" the Prime Minister exclaimed. "Another of you!" + +"I can only guess who my predecessors were," Nigel continued, smiling, +"but I will frankly confess that the object of my visit is to beg you to +reestablish our secret service in Germany, Russia and China." + +"Nothing," the other declared, "would induce me to do anything of the +sort." + +"Are you aware," Nigel enquired, "that there is a considerable foreign +secret service at work in this country at the present moment?" + +"I am not aware of it, and I don't believe it," was the blunt retort. + +"I have absolute proof," Nigel insisted. "Not only that, but two +ex-secret service men whom my uncle sent out to Germany and Russia on +his own account were murdered there as soon as they began to get on the +track of certain things which had been kept secret. A report from one of +these men got through and was stolen from my uncle's library in Belgrave +Square on the day he was murdered. You will remember that I placed all +these facts before you on the occasion of a previous visit." + +Mervin Brown nodded. + +"Anything else?" he asked patiently. + +"You know that a special envoy from China is on his way here at the +present moment to meet Immelan?" + +"Oscar Immelan, the German Commissioner?" + +"The same," Nigel assented. + +"A most delightful fellow," the Prime Minister declared warmly, "and a +great friend to this country." + +"I must take the liberty of disagreeing with you," Nigel rejoined, +"because I know very well that he is our bitter enemy. Prince Shan, who +is on his way from China to meet him, is the envoy of the one country +outside Europe whom we might fear. We sit still and do nothing. We have +no means of knowing what may be plotted against us here in London. At +least a polite request might be sent to Prince Shan to ask him to pay +you a visit and disclose the nature of his conference with Immelan." + +"If he cares to come, we shall be glad to see him," Mervin Brown +replied, "but I for one shall not go out of my way to talk politics." + +"Do you know what politics are, sir?" Nigel asked, in a sudden fury. + +The Prime Minister's eyes flashed for a moment. He controlled himself, +however, and rang the bell. + +"I have an idea that I do," he answered. "A few millions of my fellow +countrymen believe the same thing, or I should not be here. I think that +you know what my principles are, Lord Dorminster. I am here to govern +this country for the benefit of the people. We don't want to govern any +one else's country, we don't want to meddle in any one else's affairs. +Least of all do we want to revert to the times when your uncle was a +young man, and every country in Europe was sitting with drawn sword, +trusting nobody, fearing everybody, living in a state of nerves, with +the roll of the drum always in their ears. The best preventative of war, +in my opinion, is not to believe in it. Good morning, Lord Dorminster." + +It was a dismissal against which there was no appeal. Nigel followed the +secretary from the room. + +"You found the Chief a little bit ratty this morning, I expect, Lord +Dorminster," the latter remarked. "We've had the French Mission here." + +"Mr. Mervin Brown has at least the virtue of knowing his own mind," +Nigel replied dryly. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +The automobile turned in through the great entrance gates of the South +London Aeronautic Terminus and commenced a slow ascent along the broad +asphalted road to what, a few years ago, had been esteemed a new wonder +of the world. Maggie rose to her feet with a little exclamation of +wonder. + +"Do you know I have never been here at night before?" she exclaimed. +"Isn't it wonderful!" + +"Marvellous!" Nigel replied. "It's the largest aeronautic station in the +world--bigger, they say, than all our railway termini put together. Look +at the flares, Maggie! No wonder the sky from the housetop at Belgrave +Square seems always to be on fire at night!" + +They were approaching now the first of the huge sheds which were +arranged in circular fashion around an immense stretch of perfectly +level asphalted ground. Every shed was as big as an ordinary railway +station, its arched opening framed with electric illuminations. Inside +could be seen the crowds of people waiting on the platforms; in many of +them, the engine of a great airship was already throbbing, waiting to +start. In the background was a huge wireless installation, and around, +at regular intervals, enormous pillars, on the top of which flares of +different-coloured fire were burning. The automobile came to a +standstill before a large electrically illuminated time chart. Nigel +alighted for a moment and spoke to one of the inspectors. + +"Which station for the _Black Dragon_, private ship from China?" he +enquired. + +The man glanced at the chart. + +"Number seven, on the other side," he replied. "You can drive around." + +"How is she for time?" + +"She crossed the North Sea punctually," he replied. "We should see her +violet lights in ten minutes. Mind the traffic as you pass number three. +The North ship from Norway is just in." + +Nigel addressed a word of caution to the chauffeur, and they drove on. +From the first shed they passed a stream of vehicles was pouring +out,--porters with luggage, jostling throngs of newly arrived passengers +on their way to the Electric Underground. They drove into number seven +shed, left the car, and walked to the end of the long platform. The +great arc of glass-covered roof above them was brilliantly illuminated, +throwing a queer downward light upon the long line of waiting porters, +the refreshment rooms, the kiosks and newspaper stalls. In the far end, +a huge airship, bound for the East, was already filling up. Maggie and +her companion stood for a few minutes gazing into the huge void of +space. + +"Tell me about Naida," the former begged, a little abruptly. + +"Naida is a wonderful woman," Nigel declared enthusiastically. "We +lunched at Ciro's. She wore a black and white muslin gown which arrived +this morning from Paris. Afterwards we went down to Ranelagh and sat +under the trees." + +"Throwing yourself thoroughly into your little job, aren't you!" Maggie +sniffed. + +"You'll have a chance to catch me up before long," he replied. "Naida +has promised that she will arrange a meeting with the Prince." + +"I wonder what Oscar Immelan will have to say about it," Maggie +reflected. + +"To tell you the truth," Nigel said hopefully, "I believe that Immelan +is losing ground. His whole scheme is too selfish. Of course, Naida +won't discuss these things with me in plain words, but she gives me a +hint now and then. Amongst her gifts, she has a marvellous sense of +justice and a hatred of any form of bribery. That is where I feel +convinced that she and Immelan will never come together. Immelan could +never see more than the selfish side, even of a world upheaval. Naida +searches everywhere for motive. She has the altruistic instinct. I +wonder no longer at Matinsky. She is a born ruler herself." + +"I'm glad you are getting along with her," Maggie remarked. "Look!" she +broke off, catching at his arm. "The violet lights!" + +High up in the sky outside, two violet specks of light suddenly rose and +fell like airballs. A crowd of mechanics appeared through subterranean +doors and stood about in the vast arena. Very soon the airship came into +sight, her cars brilliantly illuminated. She circled slowly round and +came noiselessly to the ground, and with the mechanics running by her +side, and her engines now scarcely audible, came slowly into the shed +and to a standstill by the side of the platform. Maggie and her +companion stood well in the background. + +"There he is," the latter whispered. + +Immelan, suddenly appeared as though from the bowels of the earth, was +shaking hands warmly with a tall, slender man who was one of the first +to descend from the airship. They talked rapidly together for a few +minutes. Then they disappeared, walking down towards the +luggage-clearing station. Maggie watched the retreating figures +earnestly. + +"He doesn't look in the least Chinese," she declared. + +"I told you he didn't," Nigel replied. "He was considered the +best-looking man of his year up at Oxford." + +Maggie was unusually silent on their way back. + +"It was perhaps scarcely worth our while, this little expedition of +ours," Maggie said thoughtfully. + +"You're not sorry that we came?" he asked. + +She shook her head. "I think not," she replied. + +"Why only 'think'?" + +She roused herself with an effort. + +"I don't know, Nigel," she confessed. "I can't imagine what is wrong +with me. I feel shivery--nervous--as though something were going to +happen." + +He looked at her curiously. This was a Maggie whom he scarcely +recognised. + +"Presentiments?" he asked. + +"Absurd, isn't it!" she replied, with a weak smile. "I'll get over it +directly. I don't think I am going to like Prince Shan, Nigel." + +"Well, you haven't been long making up your mind," he observed. "I +shouldn't have thought you had been able even to see his face." + +"I had a queer, lightning-like glimpse of it," she reflected. "To me it +seemed as though it were carved out of granite, and as though all that +was human about him were the mouth and the eyes. I wish he hadn't been +looking." + +"Are you flattering yourself that he will recognise you?" Nigel asked. + +"I know that he will," she answered simply. + + * * * * * + +In a corner of the white-and-gold restaurant at the Ritz on the +following evening, Prince Shan and Immelan dined tete-a-tete, Immelan in +the best of spirits, talking of the pleasant trifles of the world, +drinking champagne and pointing out notabilities; Prince Shan, his +features and expression unchanging, and his face as white as the +perfectly fitting shirt he wore. His clothes were fashionable and +distinctive, his black pearls unobtrusive but wonderful, his smoothly +brushed dark hair, his immaculate finger nails, his skilfully tied tie +all indicative of his close touch with western civilization. There was +nothing, in fact, except his sphinx-like expression, the slightly +unusual shape of his brilliant eyes, and his queer air of personal +detachment, to denote the Oriental. He drank water, he ate sparingly, he +preserved an almost unbroken silence, yet he had the air of one giving +courteous attention to everything which his companion said and finding +interest in it. Only once he asked a question. + +"You are well acquainted here, my host," he said. "You know the trio at +the table just behind the entrance--the attractive young lady with her +chaperon, and a gentleman who I rather fancy must be an old college +acquaintance whose name I have forgotten. Tell me some more about them +in their private capacity, and not as saviours of their country." + +Immelan frowned slightly as he glanced across the room. + +"There is not much to tell," he answered, without enthusiasm. "The young +lady is, as you know, Lady Maggie Trent. The older lady, with the white +hair, is, I believe, her aunt. The name of their escort is Lord +Dorminster. You would probably know him by the name of Kingley--he has +only just succeeded to the title." + +Prince Shan was looking straight across the room, his eyes travelling +over the heads of the many brilliant little groups of diners to rest +apparently upon an empty space in the white-and-gold walls. He had been +a great traveller, but always his first evening, when he came once more +into touch with a civilisation more meretricious but more poignant than +his own, resulted in this disturbing cloud of sensations. His +companion's voice sounded emptily in his ears. + +"They say that the young lady is engaged to Lord Dorminster. That is +only gossip, however." + +For the second time Prince Shan looked directly at the little group. His +eyes rested upon Maggie, simply dressed but wonderfully _soignee_, very +alluring, laughing up into the face of her escort. Their eyes did not +actually meet, but each was conscious of the other's regard. Once more +he felt the disturbance of the West. + +"If we should chance to come together naturally," he said, "it would +gratify me to make the acquaintance of Lady Maggie Trent." + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +The introduction which Prince Shan had requested came about very +naturally. The lounge of the hotel was more than usually crowded that +evening, and the table towards which an attentive _maitre d'hotel_ +conducted Immelan and his companion was next to the one reserved by +Nigel. The transference of a chair opened up conversation. Immelan was +bland and ingenuous as usual, introducing every one, glad, apparently, +to make one common party. Prince Shan remained by Maggie's side after +the introduction had been effected. A chair which Immelan schemed to +offer him elsewhere he calmly refused. + +"This is my first evening in London, Lady Maggie," he said. "I am +fortunate." + +"Why?" she asked. + +He looked at her meditatively. Then he accepted her unspoken invitation +and seated himself on the lounge by her side. + +"We who come from the self-contained countries of the world," he +explained, "and China is one of them, come always with the desire and +longing for new experiences, new sensations. My own appetite for these +is insatiable." + +"And am I a new sensation?" Maggie asked, glancing up at him innocently +enough, but with a faint gleam of mockery in her eyes. + +"You are," he answered placidly. "You reveal--or rather you suggest--the +things of which in my country we know nothing." + +"But I thought you were all so hyper-civilised over there," Maggie +observed. "Please tell me at once what it is that I possess which your +womenkind do not." + +"If I answered all that your question implies," he said, "I should make +use of speech too direct for the conventions of the world in which you +live. I would simply remind you that whereas we men in China may claim, +I think, to have reached the same standard of culture and civilisation +as Europeans, we have left our womenkind far behind in that respect. The +Chinese woman, even the noble lady, does not care for serious affairs. +The God of the Mountains, as they call him, made her a flower to pluck, +a beautiful plaything for her chosen mate. She remains primitive. That +is why, in time, man wearies of her, why the person of imagination looks +sometimes westward, finds a new joy and a strange new fascination in a +wholly different type of femininity." + +"But you have many European women now living in China," Maggie reminded +him,--"American women, too, and they are so much admired everywhere." + +"The Chinese, especially we of the nobility," Prince Shan replied, "are +born with racial prejudices. An individual may forgive an affront, a +nation never. The days of retaliation by force of arms may indeed have +passed, but the gentleman of China, even of these days, is not likely to +take to his heart the woman of America." + +"Dear me," Maggie murmured, "isn't it rather out of date to persevere in +these ancient feuds?" + +"Feeling of all sorts is out of date," he admitted patiently, "yet there +are some things which endure. I should be honoured by your friendship, +Lady Maggie." + +"This is very sudden," she laughed. "I am very flattered--but what does +it mean?" + +"Permission to call upon you--and your aunt," he added, glancing around +the little circle. + +"We shall be delighted," Maggie replied, "but you won't like my aunt. +She is a little deaf, and she has no sense of humour. She has come to +live with us because Lord Dorminster and I are not really related, +although we call ourselves cousins, and I should hate to leave Belgrave +Square. You shall take me out to tea to-morrow afternoon instead, if you +like." + +A smouldering fire burned for a moment in his eyes. + +"That will make me very happy," he said. "I shall attend you at four +o'clock." + +Thenceforward, conversation became general. Prince Shan, with the air +of one who has achieved his immediate object, left his place by Maggie's +side and talked with grave courtesy to her aunt. Presently the little +party broke up, bound, it seemed, for the same theatre. Nigel had become +a little serious. + +"Well, you've made a good start, Maggie," he remarked, leaning forward +in his place in the limousine. + +"Have I?" Maggie answered thoughtfully. "I wonder!" + +"I wish we could get at him in some different fashion," her companion +observed uneasily. + +"My dear man, I'm hardened to these enterprises," Maggie assured him. "I +even let the President of the German Republic hold my hand once when his +wife wasn't looking. Nothing came of it," she added, with a little sigh. +"These Germans are terribly sentimental when it doesn't cost them +anything. They've no idea of a fair exchange." + +"By a 'fair exchange' you mean," her aunt suggested, a little +censoriously, "that you expected him to barter his country's secrets for +a touch of your fingers?" + +"Or my lips, perhaps," Maggie added, with a little grimace. "Please +don't look so serious, Aunt. I'm not really in love with Prince Shan, +you know, and to-night I rather feel like marrying Nigel, if I can get +him back again. I like his waistcoat buttons, and the way he has tied +his tie." + +"Too late, my dear," Nigel warned her. "I give you formal notice. I +have transferred my affections." + +"That decides me," Maggie declared firmly. "I shall collect you back +again. I hate to lose an admirer." + +"The nonsense you young people talk!" Mrs. Bollington Smith observed, as +they reached the theatre. + +Chalmers joined them soon after they had reached their box. He sank into +the empty place by Maggie's side which Nigel had just vacated and leaned +forward confidentially. + +"So you've started the campaign," he whispered. + +"How do you know?" she enquired. + +"I was at the Ritz to-night," he told her, "at the far end of the room +with my Chief and two other men. We were behind you in the lounge +afterwards." + +"I was so engrossed," Maggie murmured. + +Chalmers paused for a moment to watch the performance. When he spoke +again, his voice, was, for him, unusually serious. + +"Young lady," he said, "I told you on our first meeting my idea of +diplomacy. Truth! No beating about the bush--just the plain, unvarnished +truth! I have conceived an affection for you." + +"Goodness gracious!" Maggie exclaimed softly. "Are you going to +propose?" + +"Nothing," he assured her, "is farther from my thoughts. Lest I should +be misunderstood, let me substitute the term 'affectionate interest' for +'affection.' I have felt uneasy ever since I saw Prince Shan watching +you across the restaurant to-night." + +"Did he really watch me?" Maggie asked complacently. + +"He not only watched you," Chalmers assured her, "but he thought about +you--and very little else." + +"Congratulate me, then," she replied. "I am on the way to success." + +Chalmers frowned. + +"I'm not quite so sure," he said. "You'll think I'm an illogical sort of +person, but I've changed my mind about your role in this little affair." + +"Why?" + +"Because I am afraid of Prince Shan," he answered deliberately. + +She looked at him from behind her fan. Her eyes sparkled with interest. +If there were any other feeling underneath, she showed no trace of it. + +"What a queer word for you to use!" + +He nodded. + +"I know it. I would back you, Lady Maggie, to hold your own against any +male creature breathing, of your own order and your own race, but Prince +Shan plays the game differently. He possesses every gift which women and +men both admire, but he hasn't our standards. Life for him means power. +A wish for him entails its fulfilment." + +"You are afraid," Maggie suggested, still with the laughter in her eyes, +"that he will trifle with my affections?" + +"Something like that," he admitted bluntly. "Prince Shan will be here +for a week--perhaps a fortnight. When he goes, he goes a very long +distance away." + +"I may decide to marry him," Maggie said. "One gets rather tired here of +the regular St. George's, Hanover Square, business, and all that comes +afterwards." + +"Dear Lady Maggie," Chalmers replied, "that is the trouble. Prince Shan +would never marry you." + +"Why not?" she asked simply. + +"First of all," Chalmers went on, after a moment's hesitation, "because +Prince Shan, broad-minded though he seems to be and is on all the great +questions of the world, still preserves something of what we should call +the superstition of his country and order. I believe, in his own mind, +he looks upon himself as being one of the few elect of the earth. He +travels, he is gracious everywhere, but though his manner is the +perfection of form, in his heart he is still aloof. He rides through the +clouds from Asia, and he leaves always something of himself over there +on the other side. Let me tell you this, Lady Maggie. I have never +forgotten it. He was at Harvard in my year, and so far as he unbent to +any one, he sometimes unbent to me. I asked him once whether he were +ever going to marry. He shook his head and sighed. 'I can never marry,' +he replied. 'Why not?' I asked him. 'Because there are no women of the +Shan line alive,' he answered. Later, he took pity on my bewilderment. +He let me understand. For two thousand years, no Shan has married, save +one of his own line. To ally himself with a princess of the royal house +of England would be a mesalliance which would disturb his ancestors in +their graves. Of course, this sounds to us very ridiculous, but to him +it isn't. It is part of the religion of his life." + +"You are not very encouraging, are you?" Maggie remarked. "Perhaps he +has changed since those days." + +Her companion shook his head. + +"I should say not," he replied, "the Prince is not of the order of those +who change." + +"Is it matrimony alone," she asked, "which he denies himself?" + +Chalmers glanced towards Mrs. Bollington Smith, whose eyes were closed. +Then he nodded towards the stage. + +"You see the woman who has just come upon the stage?" + +Maggie glanced downwards. A very wonderful little figure in white satin, +lithe and sinuous as a cat, Chinese in the subtlety of her looks, +European in her almost sinister over-civilisation, stood smiling +blandly at the applauding audience. + +"La Belle Nita," Maggie murmured. "I thought she was in Paris. Well, +what of her?" + +"She is reputed to be a protegee of Prince Shan. You see how she looks +up at his box." + +Maggie was conscious of a queer and almost incomprehensible stab at the +heart. She answered without hesitation or change of expression, however. + +"The Prince must be kind to a fellow countrywoman," she declared +indulgently. "You are talking terrible scandal." + +La Belle Nita danced wonderfully, sang like a linnet, danced again and +disappeared, notwithstanding the almost wild calls for an encore. With +the end of her turn came a selection from the orchestra and a general +emptying of the boxes. Presently Chalmers went in search of Nigel. A few +moments later there was a knock at the door. Maggie gripped the sides of +her chair tightly. She was moved almost to fury by the turmoil in which +she found herself. Her invitation to enter was almost inaudible. + +"I am deserted," Prince Shan explained, as he made his bow and took the +chair to which Maggie pointed. "My friend Immelan has left me to visit +acquaintances, and I chance to be unattended this evening. I trust that +I do not intrude." + +"You are very welcome here," Maggie replied. "Will you listen to the +orchestra, or talk to me?" + +"I will talk, if I may," he answered. "Lord Dorminster is not with +you?" + +"Nigel went to look up a friend whom he wants to bring to supper. He is +one of those people who seem to discover friends and acquaintances in +every quarter of the globe." + +"And to that fortunate chance," her visitor continued, dropping his +voice a little, "I owe the happiness of finding you alone." + +Maggie glanced towards her aunt, who was leaning back in her seat. + +"Aunt seems to be asleep, but she isn't," she declared. "She is really a +very efficient chaperon. Talk to me about China, please, and tell me +about your _Dragon_ airship. Is it true that you have silver baths, and +that Gauteron painted the walls of your dining salon?" + +"One is in the air five days on the way over," he answered +indifferently. "It is necessary that one's surroundings should be +agreeable. Perhaps some day I may have the honour of showing it to you. +In the darkness, and when she is docked, there is little to be seen." + +She looked at him curiously. + +"You knew that I was there, then?" + +"Yours was the first face I saw when I descended from the car," he told +her. "You stood apart, watching, and I wondered why. I knew, too, that +you would be at the Ritz to-night. That is why I came there. As a rule, +I do not dine in public." + +"How could you possibly know that I was going to be there?" Maggie asked +curiously. + +"I sent a gentleman of my suite to look through the names of those who +had booked tables," he answered. "It was very simple." + +"It was only a chance that the table was reserved in my name," she +reminded him. + +"It was chance which brought us together," he rejoined. "It is chance +under another name to which I trust in life." + +For the first time in her life, in her relations with the other sex, +Maggie felt a queer sensation which was almost fear. She felt herself +losing poise, her will governed, her whole self dominated. Unconsciously +she drew herself a little away. Her eyes travelled around the crowded +house and suddenly rested on the box which her visitor had just vacated. +Seated behind the curtains, but leaning slightly forward, her eyes fixed +intently upon Prince Shan, was La Belle Nita, a green opera cloak thrown +around her dancing costume, a curious, striking little figure in the +semi-obscurity. + +"You have some one waiting for you in your box," Maggie told him. + +He glanced across the auditorium and rose to his feet. She gave him +credit for the adroitness of mind which rejected the obvious +explanation of her presence there. + +"I must go," he said simply, "but I have many things which I desire to +say to you. You will not forget to-morrow afternoon?" + +"I shall not forget," she answered, in a low tone. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +There was a half reluctant admiration in Prince Shan's eyes as he sat +back in the dim recesses of his box and scrutinised his visitor. La +Belle Nita had learnt all that Paris and London could teach her. + +"You are very beautiful, Nita," he said. + +"Many men tell me so," she answered. + +"Life has gone well with you since we met last?" he asked reflectively. + +"The months have passed," she replied. + +"You have been faithful?" + +"Fidelity is of the soul." + +He paused, as though pondering over her answer. A famous French comedian +was holding the stage, and the house rocked with laughter. + +"You have the same apartment?" + +She pressed the clasp of a black velvet bag which rested on the edge of +the box, opened it, and passed him a key. + +"It is the same." + +He held the key in his fingers for a moment, but he had the air of a man +to whom the action had no significance. + +"You have enough money?" he asked. + +"I have saved a million francs," she told him. "I am waiting for my +lord to speak of things that matter. The woman in the box over +there--who is she?" + +"An English spy," he answered calmly. + +She lowered her eyes for a moment, as though to conceal the sudden soft +flash. + +"An English spy," she repeated. "My rival in espionage." + +"You have no rival, Nita," he replied, "and she is in the opposite +camp." + +Her two red lips were distorted into a pout. + +"Is it over, my task?" she asked. "I am weary of Paris. I love it over +here better. I am weary of French officers, of these solemn officials +who come to my room like guilty schoolboys, and who speak of themselves +and their importance with bated breath, as though their whisper would +rock the world. My master has enough information?" + +"More than enough," he assured her. "You have done your work +wonderfully." + +"Shall I now deal with her?" she continued, with a slight, eager +movement of her head towards the opposite box. + +He smiled. + +"She is harmless, she and her entourage," he replied. "Some stroke of +good fortune brought them word of the meeting between myself and +Immelan, and beyond that they guessed at its significance. They were at +the shed to watch my arrival. Now, with their mouths open, they sit and +wait for the information which they hope will drop in. They are very +ingenuous, these Anglo-Saxons, but they are not diplomats." + +She turned her head and looked across the auditorium. Maggie was talking +to a man whom Nigel had just brought in, and who was bending over her in +obvious admiration. Nita, with her wealth of cosmetics, her over-red +lips, stared curiously at this possible rival, with her clear skin, her +beautiful neck and shoulders, her hair dressed close to her head, her +air of quiet, almost singular distinction. + +"The young lady," she confessed, "wears her clothes well for an English +woman. She is _bien soignee_, but she looks a little difficult." + +His eyes followed the direction of hers, and her object was achieved. +She read correctly the light that gleamed in them. + +"I may come to-night?" she asked quietly. + +He shook his head. + +"Not again," he replied. + +A violinist now held the stage, a Pole newly come to London. La Belle +Nita closed her eyes. For a few minutes her sorrow seemed to throb to +the minor music to which she was listening. + +"For all my work, then," she said presently, "for the suffering and the +risk, there is to be nothing?" + +"Is it nothing for you to be invited to live in whatsoever manner you +choose?" he remonstrated. + +"It is little," she replied steadily. "There are a dozen who would do +this for me, who pray every day that they may do so. What are all these +things beside the love of my master?" + +He looked at her a little sadly, yet without any sign of real feeling. +To him she represented nothing more than a doll with brains, from whose +intelligence he had profited, but of whose beauty he was weary. + +"You know what our poet says, Nita," he reminded her. "'Love is like the +rustling of the wind in the almond trees before dawn.' We cannot command +it. It comes to us or leaves us without reason." + +She looked across the auditorium once more and spoke with her head +turned away from her companion. + +"There is no one in the East," she said, "because those who write me +weekly send news of my lord's doings. There is no one in the East, +because there they give the body who know nothing of the soul. And so my +Prince is safe amongst them. But here--these western women have other +gifts. Is that she, master of my life and soul?" + +"I met her this evening for the first time," he replied. + +She laughed drearily. + +"Eyes may meet in the street without speech, a glance may burn its way +into the soul. Once I thought that I might love again, because a +stranger smiled at me in the Bois, and he had grey eyes, and that look +about his mouth which a woman craves for. He passed on, and I forgot. +You see, my lord was still there.--So this is the woman." + +"Who knows?" he answered. + +Immelan came into the box a little abruptly. There was a cloud upon his +face which he did his best to conceal. Almost simultaneously, a +messenger from behind the scenes arrived for Nita. She rose to her feet +and wrapped her green cloak closely around her lissom figure. + +"In a quarter of an hour," she said, "I have to appear again. It is to +be good-night, then?" + +She raised her eyes to his, and for a moment the appeal which knows no +nationality shone out of their velvety depths. She stood before him +simply, like a slave who pleads. Not a muscle of Prince Shan's face +moved. + +"It is to be good-night, Nita," he answered calmly. + +Her head drooped, and she passed out. She had the air of a flower whose +petals have been bruised. Immelan looked after her curiously, almost +compassionately. + +"It is finished, then, with the little one, Prince?" he enquired. + +"It is finished," was the calm reply. + +Immelan stroked his short moustache thoughtfully. + +"Is it wise?" he ventured. "She has been faithful and assiduous. She +knows many things." + +Prince Shan's eyes were filled with mild wonder. + +"She has had some years of my occasional companionship," he said. "It is +surely as much as she could hope for or expect. We are not like you +Westerners, Immelan," he went on. "Our women are the creatures of our +will. We call them, or we send them away. They know that, and they are +prepared." + +"It seems a little brutal," Immelan muttered. + +"You prefer your method?" his companion asked. "Yet you practise deceit. +Your fancy wanders, and you lie about it. You lose your dignity, my +friend. No woman is worth a man's lie." + +Immelan was leaning back in his chair, gazing steadfastly across the +crowded theatre. + +"Your principles," he said, "are suited to your own womenkind. La Belle +Nita has become westernised. Are you sure that she accepts the situation +as she would if she dwelt with you in Pekin?" + +"I am her master," Prince Shan declared calmly. "I have made no promises +that I have not fulfilled." + +"The promise between a man and a woman is an unspoken one," Immelan +persisted. "You have not been in Europe for five months. All that time +she has awaited you." + +"Something else has happened," Prince Shan said deliberately. + +"Since your arrival in London?" + +"Since my arrival in London, since I stepped out of my ship last night." + +Immelan was frankly incredulous. + +"You mean Lady Maggie Trent?" + +"Certainly! I have always felt that some day or other my thoughts would +turn towards one of these strange, western women. That time has come. +Lady Maggie possesses those charms which come from the brain, yet which +appeal more deeply than any other to the subtle desires of the poet, the +man of letters and the philosopher. She is very wonderful, Immelan. I +thank you for your introduction." + +Immelan ceased to caress his moustache. He leaned back in his chair and +gazed at his companion. For many years he and the Prince had been +associates, yet at that moment he felt that he had not even begun to +understand him. + +"But you forget, Prince," he said, "that Lady Maggie and her friends are +in the opposite camp. When our agreement is concluded and known to the +world, she will look upon you as an enemy." + +"As yet," Prince Shan answered calmly, "our agreement is not concluded." + +Immelan's face darkened. Nothing but his awe of the man with whom he sat +prevented an expression of anger. + +"But, Prince," he expostulated, "apart from political considerations, +you cannot really imagine that anything would be possible between you +and Lady Maggie?" + +"Why not?" was the cool reply. + +"Lady Maggie is of the English nobility," Immelan pointed out. "Neither +she nor her friends would be in the least likely to consider anything in +the nature of a morganatic alliance." + +"It would not be necessary," Prince Shan declared. "It is in my mind to +offer her marriage." + +Immelan dropped the cigarette case which he had just drawn from his +pocket. He gazed at his companion in blank and unaffected astonishment. + +"Marriage?" he muttered. "You are not serious!" + +"I am entirely serious," the Prince insisted. "I can understand your +amazement, Immelan. When the idea first came into my mind, I tore at it +as I would at a weed. But we who have studied in the West have learnt +certain great truths which our own philosophers have sometimes missed. +All that is best of life and of death our own prophets have taught us. +From them we have learnt fortitude and chastity: devotion to our country +and singleness of purpose. Over here, though, one has also learnt +something. Nobility is of the soul. A Prince of the Shans must seek not +for the body but for the spirit of the woman who shall be his mate. If +their spirits meet on equal terms, then she may even share the throne of +his life." + +Immelan was speechless. There was something final and convincing in his +companion's measured words. His own protest, when at last he spoke, +sounded paltry. + +"But supposing it is true that she is already engaged to Lord +Dorminster?" + +Prince Shan smiled very quietly. + +"That," he said, "can easily be disposed of." + +"But do you seriously believe that you would be able to induce her to +return with you to Pekin?" Immelan persisted. + +At that moment it chanced that Maggie turned her head and looked across +at the two men. Prince Shan leaned a little forward to meet her gaze. +His face was expressionless. The lines of his mouth were calm and +restful, yet in his eyes there glowed for a single moment the fire of a +man who looks upon the thing he covets. + +"I seriously believe it," he answered under his breath. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +Maggie leaned back in her chair with a little sigh of content. The +scarlet-coated waiter had just removed their tea tray, a pleasant breeze +was rustling through the leaves of the trees under which she and Prince +Shan were seated. From the distance came the low strains of a military +band. Everywhere on the lawns and along the paths men and women were +promenading. + +"Confess that this is better than Rumpelmayer's or the Ritz," she +murmured lazily. + +"It is better," he admitted. "It is a very wonderful place." + +"You have nothing like it in China?" she asked him. + +"It would not be possible," he answered. "Democracy there is confined to +politics. In other respects, our class prejudices are far more rigid +than yours. But then I see a great change in this country since I was +here as a student." + +"You have lost your affection for it, perhaps?" she ventured, looking at +him through half-closed eyes. + +"On the contrary," he assured her, "my gratitude towards her was never +so great as at this moment. Your country has given me nothing I prize +so much, Lady Maggie, as my knowledge of you." + +She looked away from his very earnest eyes, and the light retort died +away upon her lips. The men and women whom she watched so steadfastly +seemed like puppets, the flowers artificial, the music unreal. Already +she was beginning to resent the influence which he was establishing over +her. The art of badinage in which she was so proficient stood her in no +stead. Words, even the power of light speech, had deserted her. + +"Tell me about the changes that you see," she asked. + +"Perhaps," he replied, after a moment's hesitation, "it is because I am +an occasional visitor that differences seem so marked to me, but look at +the tables there. That is the Duke of Illinton, is it not? At the next +table, the man in the strange clothes and uncomfortable hat--it seems to +me that I have seen him somewhere under different circumstances." + +Maggie nodded. + +"Life is a terrible hotchpotch nowadays," she admitted. "After the war, +our gentry and aristocracy who were not wealthy were taxed out of +existence. The profiteers, and the men who had made fortunes during the +war, took their place. It has made the country prosperous but less +picturesque." + +"You put things very clearly," he said. "To-day in England is certainly +the day of the shopkeeper's triumph. Wealth is a great thing, but it is +great only for what it leads to. I think your philosopher of the +streets, your new school of politicians, have alike forgotten that." + +"You have lost sympathy with England, have you not, Prince Shan?" Maggie +asked him. + +He turned towards her, a faint but kindly smile upon his lips, a light +in his eyes which she did not altogether understand. + +"Lady Maggie," he said quietly, "they tell me that you are interested in +the political side of my visit to this country." + +"Who tells you that?" she demanded. "What have I to do with politics?" + +"You have been gifted with great intelligence," he continued, "and you +are the confidante of your connection, Lord Dorminster. Lord Dorminster +is one of those few Englishmen who realise the ill direction of the +destinies of this country. You would like to help him in his present +very strenuous efforts to ascertain the truth as to certain movements +directed against the British Empire. That is so, is it not?" + +"In plain words, you are accusing me of being a spy." + +"Ah, no!" he protested gently. "No one can be a spy in one's own +country. You are within your rights as a patriot in seeking to discover +whatever may be useful knowledge to the English Government. That, I +fear, is one reason for your kindness to me, Lady Maggie. I trust that +it is not the only reason." + +She knew better than to make the mistake of denial. After all, it was an +absurdly unequal contest. + +"It is not the only reason," she assured him, a little tremulously. + +"I am glad. One word more upon this subject, and we speak of other +things. Please, Lady Maggie, do not stoop to be hopelessly obvious in +these efforts of yours. If I drop a pocketbook, believe me there will be +nothing in it to interest you. If I speak with Immelan or any other, +save in the secrecy of my chamber, there will be nothing which it will +be worth your while to overhear. If Lord Dorminster should decide to +adopt buccaneering expedients and kidnap me, the attempt would probably +fail; and if it succeeded, it would in the end profit you nothing. As +you say over here, for your sake, Lady Maggie, I will lay the cards upon +the table. I am discussing with Oscar Immelan, and indirectly with an +emissary from Russia, a certain scheme which, if carried out, would +certainly be harmful to this country. I shall decide for or against that +scheme entirely as it seems to me that it will be for the good or evil +of my own country. Nothing will change my purpose in that. In your heart +you know that nothing should change it. But I bring to the deliberations +upon which we are engaged a new sentiment towards your country, since I +have known you. Other things being equal, I shall decline the scheme for +your sake, Lady Maggie." + +There was a curious quivering at the corners of her mouth and a lump in +her throat. She was absolutely incapable of speech. His grave and +reasonable words seemed to fill her with a sense of importance. Her +little efforts and schemes seemed puny, almost laughable. + +"So you see," he continued, after a moment's pause, "that you have done +your work. You have done it very effectually. You have created a strong +sentiment in my mind in favour of this country, a sentiment which I did +not previously possess. There is no other way in which you could have +influenced the decision soon to be arrived at. In return for what I have +told you, Lady Maggie, I ask for no promise, but I beg you to forget the +role you played in Germany; not to attempt--you will not be +offended?--to influence events so far as I am concerned by any attempt +at spying upon my actions, or by treating me any other way than with +your whole confidence. I do not ask for any promise. I have said +something to you which has been on my mind. Now I shall ask you a +favour," he declared, rising to his feet. "You will walk with me through +the flower gardens yonder. If there is one thing I miss in this country +so much that the want of it makes me sometimes a little homesick," he +went on, as they moved away together, "it is the perfume of the flowers +in the morning and at night from the gardens of my summer palace. Next +time you honour me with an hour or so of your time, I shall ask you to +let me bring some pictures of my favourite home in China." + +Maggie walked dutifully by his side, answering his frequent questions +about flowers and shrubs, listening while he told her about his white +peacocks and the tame birds which were his own pets. Suddenly she broke +into a fit of laughter. She looked up into his grave face, her eyes +imploring him for sympathy. + +"I feel so like a precocious child," she exclaimed, "who has been put in +her place! No one has ever turned me inside out so skilfully, has made +me feel such an ignorant little donkey. Do you know, I half like you for +it, Prince Shan, and half detest you." + +He seemed suddenly to become younger, to meet her upon her own ground. + +"Please do not be angry," he begged. "Please do not think that I look +upon you at all as a little child. You have brought something into my +life for which I have searched and hoped, and I am deeply grateful to +you. Shall I--go on?" + +She caught at his wrist. + +"Please not," she begged breathlessly. "Be content with this moment." + +They had paused by the side of an arbour. She suddenly felt the +pressure of his fingers upon her hand. + +"I shall be content," he said, in a low tone, the passion of which +seemed to throw her senses into complete turmoil, "only when I have what +my heart desires. But I will wait." + +They walked almost into the midst of a little crowd of acquaintances. +Maggie was herself again immediately. She chattered away with Chalmers, +and led him off to see a wonderful yellow rose. He watched her +curiously. When they found themselves isolated at the end of the garden +path, he ignored for a moment their mission. + +"Any luck, Lady Maggie?" he asked. + +She looked up at him, and to his amazement her eyes were swimming. + +"I think that Prince Shan will be on our side," she replied. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +Monsieur Felix Senn, the distinguished Frenchman who had just acquitted +himself of the special mission which had brought him to London, was a +little loath to depart from the historical chamber in Downing Street. +Diplomatically, the interview was over. The Prime Minister, however, on +this occasion, was courteous, even affable. There seemed no reason for +his visitor to hurry away. + +"You will accept, I trust, sir," the latter begged, "this assurance of +my extreme regret at the present unfortunate condition of affairs. I am +one of those who threw his hat into the air on the boulevards in August, +1914, when the news came that your great country had decided to fulfil +her unwritten promises and in the cause of honour had declared war +against Germany. I have never forgotten that moment, sir, even in those +months and years of misunderstandings which followed the signing of the +Treaty of Peace. I was one of those who pointed always to the sacrifices +which Great Britain had made on our behalf, to her glorious deeds on +land and sea. I have always been a friend of your country, Mr. Mervin +Brown. That is why I think I was chosen to bring this dispatch." + +"You are very welcome," the Prime Minister assured him. "As for the +purpose of your mission, I assure you that I view it less seriously than +you do. Glance with me at the position for a moment. Notwithstanding the +era of peace which has sprung up all over the world, owing to the happy +influence of the League of Nations, France alone has decided to follow +still the path of militarism. Your last year's army estimates were +staggering. The number of men whom you keep out of your factories in +order that they may learn a useless drill and wear an unnecessary +uniform is, to the economist, simply scandalous. Look at the result. +Compare our imports and exports with yours. See the leaps and strides +with which we have improved our financial position during the last ten +years. We have not only recovered from the after effects of the war, but +we have reached a state of prosperity which we never previously +attained. You, on the other hand, are still groaning with enormous +taxes. You carry a burden which is self-imposed and unnecessary. You, of +all the nations, refuse to recognise the fact that the government of the +great countries of the world has passed into the hands of the democracy, +and that democracies will not tolerate war." + +"There I join issue with you, sir," the Frenchman replied. "These are +the obvious and expressed views of other European countries, yet month +by month come rumours of the training of great masses of troops, far in +excess of the numbers permitted by the League of Nations. There is all +the time a haze of secrecy over what is going on in certain parts of +Germany. And as for Russia, ostensibly the freest country in the world, +Tsarism in its worst days never imposed such despotic restrictions +concerning the coming and going of foreigners, in one particular +district, at any rate." + +"The Russian Government have certainly given us cause for complaint in +that direction," Mr. Mervin Brown admitted. "Strong representations are +being made to them at the present moment. On the other hand, the reason +for their attitude is easily enough understood. In the days when Russia +lay exhausted, foreigners took too much advantage of her, attained far +too close a grip upon her great natural resources. Russia has determined +that what she has left she will keep to herself. The attitude is +reasonable, although I am free to admit that she is carrying her +legislation against foreigners too far." + +"What about the number of men she has under arms every year?" Monsieur +Senn enquired. + +"Russia has always a possible danger to fear from China, the new +Colossus of Asia," the Prime Minister pointed out. "Even Russia herself +has not made such strides within the last fifteen years as China. The +secession of the Asiatic countries from the League of Nations demanded +certain precautions which Russia is justified in taking." + +The Frenchman had risen to his feet, but he still lingered. A tall man, +of commanding presence, with olive complexion, deep brown eyes, and +black hair lightly streaked with grey, Monsieur Felix Senn had been a +great figure in the war of 1914-1918 and had retained since a commanding +position in French politics. It had often been said that nothing but his +great friendship for England had prevented his gaining the highest +honours. His present mission, therefore, which was practically to end +the alliance between the two countries, was a peculiarly painful one to +him. + +"I must tell you before we part, Mr. Mervin Brown," he said gravely, +"that neither I nor many of my fellow countrymen share your optimism. +You seem to have inherited the timeworn theory that the War of 1914 was +entirely provoked by the junker class of Germans. That is not true. It +was a people's war, and the people have never forgotten what they were +pleased to consider the harsh terms of the Treaty of Peace. Then as +regards Russia, have you ever considered that Russia financially and +politically is more than half German? When Germany lost the war, she had +one great consolation--she acquired Russia. You have compared the +economic condition of France to-day with that of your country, sir. I +admit your commercial supremacy, but let me tell you this. I would not, +for the greatest boon the gods could offer me, see France in the same +helpless state as England is in to-day." + +The Prime Minister rose also to his feet. He wore an air of offended +dignity. + +"Monsieur Senn," he declared, "the spirit of militarism is in the blood +of your country. You cannot rid yourself of it in one generation or two. +But, believe me, no people's government at any time in the future, +whether it be English, Russian, German, or American, will ever dare to +suggest or even to dream of a war of aggression or revenge. If we are +comparatively unprotected, it is because we need no protection. We hear +the footfall of your marching millions, and we thank God that that sound +is represented in our country by the roar of machinery and the blaze of +furnaces." + +The Frenchman bowed and accepted the hand which the Prime Minister +offered him. + +"I present to you once more, sir," he said, "the compliments and +infinite regrets of Monsieur le President." + +A chapter of English history ended with the quiet passing of Monsieur +Senn into the sunlit street. The latter entered his waiting automobile +and drove at once to the French Embassy. The Ambassador listened in +silence to his report. + +"What about the Press?" was his only question. + +"Monsieur le President insists upon the truth being known," the emissary +announced. "France has pledged her word against secret treaties. +Besides, the honour of France must never afterwards be called in +question." + +The Ambassador sighed. He was new to his present post, but he had grown +grey in the service of his country. + +"It is the end of a one-sided arrangement," he declared. "It is +incredible that these people do not realise that it is against their own +country--against themselves--that this slowly fermenting hatred is being +brewed. The racial enmity between Germany and France is nothing compared +with the hate of antagonistic kinship between Germany and England. +However, France is the gainer by to-day's event. We have only our own +frontiers to watch." + +Monsieur Felix Senn wandered on to the St. Philip's Club, where he found +his old friend Prince Karschoff talking in a corner of the smoking room +with Nigel. They were both of them prepared for the news which he +presently communicated to them. Karschoff was bitter, Nigel silent. + +"Well said Carlyle that 'History is philosophy teaching by examples'," +the former expounded. "How the historian of the future will revel in +this epoch! What treatises he will write, what parallels he will draw! +See him point to the days when the aristocracy ruled England, and +England fought and flourished; then to the epoch when the _bourgeoisie_ +took their place, and with a mighty effort, met a great emergency and +flourished. And finally, in sympathy with the great European upheaval, +in sympathy with the great natural law of change, Labour ousts both, +single-eyed Labour, and down goes England, crumbling into the dust!--Let +us lunch, my friends. The cuisine is still good here." + +Nigel excused himself. + +"I am engaged," he said. "We may meet afterwards." + +"Something tells me, my dear Nigel," Karschoff declared, "that you are +bent on frivolity." + +"If to lunch with a woman is frivolous, I plead guilty," Nigel replied. + +Karschoff's face was suddenly grave. He seemed on the point of saying +something but checked himself and turned away with a little shrug of the +shoulders. + +"Each one to his taste," he murmured. "For my aperitif, a dash of +absinthe in my cocktail; for Dorminster here, the lure of a woman's +smile. Perhaps he gains. Who knows?" + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +Nigel waited for his luncheon companion in the crowded vestibule of +London's most famous club restaurant. He was to a certain extent out of +the picture among the crowd of this new generation of pleasure seekers, +on the faces of whom opulence and acquisitiveness had already laid its +branding hand. The Mecca alike of musical comedy and the Stock Exchange, +the place, however, still preserved a curious attraction for the foreign +element in London, so that when at last Naida appeared, she was +exchanging courtesies with an Italian Duchess on one side and a +celebrated Russian dancer on the other. Nigel led her at once to the +table which he had selected in the balcony. + +"I have obeyed your wishes to the letter," he said, "and I think that +you are right. Up here we are entirely alone, and, as you see, they have +had the sense to place the tables a long way apart. Am I to blame, I +wonder, for asking you to do so unconventional a thing as to lunch here +again alone with me?" + +She drew off her gloves and smiled across the table at him. Her plain, +tailor-made gown, with its high collar, was the last word in elegance. +The simplicity of her French hat was to prove the despair of a +well-known modiste seated downstairs, who made a sketch of it on the +menu and tried in vain to copy it. Even to Nigel's exacting taste she +was flawless. + +"Is it unconventional?" she asked carelessly. "I do not study those +things. I lunch or dine with a party, generally, because it happens so. +I lunch alone with you because it pleases me." + +"And for this material side of our entertainment?" he enquired, smiling, +as he handed her the menu card. + +"A grapefruit, a quail with white grapes, and some asparagus," she +replied promptly. "You see, in one respect I am an easy companion. I +know exactly what I want. A mixed vermouth, if you like, yes. And now, +tell me your news?" + +"There is news," he announced, "which the whole world will know of +before many hours are past. France has broken her pact with England." + +"It is my opinion," she said deliberately, "that France has been very +patient with you." + +"And mine," he acknowledged. "We have now to see what will become of a +fat and prosperous country with a semi-obsolete fleet and a comic opera +army." + +"Must we talk of serious things?" she asked softly. "I am weary of the +clanking wheels of life." + +He sighed. + +"And yet for you," he said, "they are not grinding out the fate of your +country." + +"Nevertheless, I too hear them all the time," she rejoined. "And I hate +them. They make one lose one's sense of proportion. After all, it is our +own individual and internal life which counts. I can understand Nero +fiddling while Rome burned, if he really had no power to call up fire +engines." + +"Are you an individualist?" he asked. + +"Not fundamentally," she replied, "but I am caught up in the throes of a +great reaction. I have been studying events, which it is quite true may +change the destinies of the world, so intently that I have almost +forgotten that, after all, the greatest thing in the world, my world, is +the happiness or ill-content of Naida Karetsky. It is really of more +importance to me to-day that my quail should be cooked as I like it than +that England has let go her last rope." + +"You are not an Englishwoman," he reminded her. + +"That is of minor importance. We are all so much immersed in great +affairs just now that we forget it is the small ones that count. I want +my luncheon to be perfect, I want you to seem as nice to me as I have +fancied you, and I want you to chase completely away the idea that you +are cultivating my acquaintance for interested motives." + +"That I can assure you from the bottom of my heart is not the case," he +replied. "Whatever other interests I may feel in you," he added, after +a moment's hesitation, "my first and foremost is a personal one." + +She looked at him with gratitude in her eyes for his understanding. + +"A woman in my position," she complained, "is out of place. A man ought +to come over and study your deservings or your undeservings and pore +over the problem of the future of Europe. I am a woman, and I am not big +enough. I am too physical. I have forgotten how to enjoy myself, and I +love pleasure. Now am I a revelation to you?" + +"You have always been that," he told her. "You are so truthful +yourself," he went on boldly, "that I shall run the risk of saying the +most banal thing in the world, just because it happens to be the truth. +I have felt for you since our first meeting what I have felt for no +other woman in the world." + +"I like that, and I am glad you said it," she declared lightly enough, +although her lips quivered for a moment. "And they have put exactly the +right quantity of Maraschino in my grapefruit. I feel that I am on the +way to happiness. I am going to enjoy my luncheon.--Tell me about +Maggie." + +"I saw her yesterday," he answered. "We have arranged for her to come +and live at Belgrave Square, after all." + +"My terrible altruism once more," she sighed. "I had meant not to speak +another serious word, and yet I must. Maggie is very clever, amazingly +clever, I sometimes think, but if she had the brains of all of her sex +rolled into one, she would still be facing now an impossible situation." + +"Just what do you mean?" he asked cautiously. + +"Maggie seems determined to measure her wits with those of Prince Shan," +she said. "Believe me, that is hopeless." + +She looked up at him and laughed softly. + +"Oh, my dear friend," she went on, "that wooden expression is wonderful. +You do not quite know where I stand, except--may I flatter myself?--as +regards your personal feelings for me. Am I for Immelan and his schemes, +or for your own foolish country? You do not know, so you make for +yourself a face of wood." + +"Where do you stand?" he asked bluntly. + +"Sufficiently devoted to your interests to beg you this," she replied. +"Do not let your little cousin think that she can deal with a man like +Prince Shan. There can be only one end to that." + +Nigel moved a little uneasily in his place. + +"Prince Shan is only an ordinary human being, after all," he protested. + +"That is just where you are mistaken," she declared. "Prince Shan is one +of the most extraordinary human beings who ever lived. He is one of the +most farseeing men in the world, and he is absolutely the most +powerful." + +"But China," Nigel began-- + +"His power extends far beyond China," she interrupted, "and there is no +brain in the world to match his to-day." + +"If he were a god wielding thunderbolts," Nigel observed, "he could +scarcely do much harm to Maggie here in London." + +"There was an artist once," she said reflectively, "who drew a +caricature of Prince Shan and sent it to the principal comic paper in +America. It was such a success that a little time later on he followed +it up with another, which included a line of Prince Shan's ancestors. +Within a month's time the artist was found murdered. Prince Shan was in +China at the time." + +"Are you suggesting that the artist was murdered through Prince Shan's +contrivance?" + +"Am I a fool?" she answered. "Do you not know that to speak +disrespectfully of the ancestors of a Chinaman is unforgivable? To all +appearances Prince Shan never moved from his wonderful palace in Pekin, +many thousands of miles away. Yet he lifted his little finger and the +man died." + +"Isn't this a little melodramatic?" Nigel murmured. + +"Melodrama is often nearer the truth than people think," she said. +"Shall I give you another instance? I know of several." + +"One more, then." + +"Prince Shan was in Paris two years ago, incognito," she continued. +"There was at the time a small but very fashionable restaurant in the +Bois, close to the Pre Catelan. He presented himself one night there for +dinner, accompanied, I believe, by La Belle Nita, the Chinese dancer who +is in London to-day. As you know, there is little in Prince Shan's +appearance to denote the Oriental, but for some reason or other the +proprietor refused him a table. Prince Shan made no scene. He left and +went elsewhere. Three nights later, the cafe was burnt to the ground, +and the proprietor was ruined." + +"Anything else?" Nigel asked. + +"Only one thing more," she replied. "I have known him slightly for +years. In Asia he ranks to all men as little less than a god. His +palaces are filled with priceless treasures. He has the finest +collection of jewels in the world. His wealth is simply inexhaustible. +His appearance you appreciate. Yet I have never seen him look at a woman +as he looked at your cousin the first time he met her. I was at the Ritz +with my father, and I watched. I know you think that I am being foolish. +I am not. I am a person with a very great deal of common sense, and I +tell you that Prince Shan has never desired a thing in life to which he +has not helped himself. Maggie is a clever child, but she cannot toss +knives with a conjuror." + +Nigel was impressed and a little worried. + +"It seems absurd to think that anything could happen to Maggie here in +London," he said, "after--" + +He paused abruptly. Naida smiled at him. + +"After her escape from Germany, I suppose you were going to say? You +see, I know all about it. There was no Prince Shan in Berlin." + +He shrugged his shoulders slightly. + +"Well," he admitted, "I don't quite bring myself to believe in your +terrible ogre, so I shall not worry. Tell me what news you have from +Russia?" + +"Political?" + +"Any news." + +She smiled. + +"I notice," she said, "that English people are changing their attitude +towards my country. A few years ago she seemed negligible to them. Now +they are beginning to have--shall I call them fears? Even my kind host, +I think, would like to know what is in Paul Matinsky's heart as he hears +the friends of Oscar Immelan plead their cause." + +"I admit it," he told her frankly. "I will go farther. I would give a +great deal to know what is in your own mind to-day concerning us and our +destiny. But these things are not for the moment. It was not to discuss +or even to think of them that I asked you here to-day." + +"Why did you invite me, then?" she asked, smiling. + +"Because I wanted the pleasure of having you opposite me," he +replied,--"because I wanted to know you better." + +"And are you progressing?" + +"Indifferently well," he acknowledged. "I seem to gain a little and +slide back again. You are not an easy person to know well." + +"Nothing that is worth having is easy," she answered, "and I can assure +you, when my friendship is once gained, it is a rare and steadfast +thing." + +"And your affection?" he ventured. + +Her eyes rested upon his for a moment and then suddenly drooped. A +little tinge of colour stole into her cheeks. For a moment she seemed to +have lost her admirable poise. + +"That is not easily disturbed," she told him quietly. "I think that I +must have an unfortunate temperament, there are so few people for whom I +really care." + +He took his courage into both hands. + +"I have heard it rumoured," he said, "that Matinsky is the only man who +has ever touched your heart." + +She shook her head. + +"That is not the truth. Paul Matinsky cares for me in his strange way, +and he has a curiously exaggerated appreciation of my brain. There have +been times," she went on, after a moment's hesitation, "when I myself +have been disturbed by fancies concerning him, but those times have +passed." + +"I am glad," he said quietly. + +His fingers, straying across the tablecloth, met hers. She did not +withdraw them. He clasped her hand, and it remained for a moment passive +in his. Then she withdrew it and leaned back in her chair. + +"Is that meant to introduce a more intimate note into our conversation?" +she asked, with a slight wrinkling of the forehead and the beginnings of +a smile upon her lips. + +"If I dared, I would answer 'yes'," he assured her. + +"They tell me," she continued pensively, "that Englishmen more than any +other men in the world have the flair for saying convincingly the things +which they do not mean." + +"In my case, that would not be true," he answered. "My trouble is that I +dare not say one half of what I feel." + +She looked across the table at him, and Nigel suddenly felt a great +weight of depression lifted from his heart. He forgot all about his +country's peril. Life and its possibilities seemed somehow all +different. He was carried away by a rare wave of emotion. + +"Naida!" he whispered. + +"Yes?" + +Her eyes were soft and expectant. Something of the gravity had gone from +her face. She was like a girl, suddenly young with new thoughts. + +"You know what I am going to say to you?" + +"Do not say it yet, please," she begged. "Somehow it seems to me that +the time has not come, though the thought of what may be in your heart +is wonderful. I want to dream about it first," she went on. "I want to +think." + +He laughed, a strange sound almost to his own ears, for Nigel, since his +uncle's death, had tasted the very depths of depression. + +"I obey," he agreed. "It is well to dally with the great things. +Meanwhile, they grow." + +She smiled across at him. + +"I hope that they may," she answered. "And you will ask me to lunch +again?" + +"Lunch or dine or walk or motor--whatever you will," he promised. + +She reflected for a moment and then laughed. She was drawing on her +gloves now, and Nigel was paying the bill. + +"There are some people who will not like this," she said. + +"And one," he declared, "for whom it is going to make life a Paradise." + +They passed out into the street and strolled leisurely westwards. As +they crossed Trafalgar Square, a stream of newsboys from the Strand were +spreading in all directions. Nigel and his companion seemed suddenly +surrounded by placards, all with the same headlines. They paused to +read: + + _TRIUMPH OF THE CHANCELLOR_ + _HUGE REDUCTION OF THE NATIONAL DEBT_ + _TOTAL ABOLITION OF THE INCOME TAX_ + +They walked on. Naida said nothing, although she shook her head a little +sorrowfully. Nigel glanced across the Square and down towards +Westminster. + +"They will shout themselves hoarse there this afternoon," he groaned. + +For the first time she betrayed her knowledge of coming events. + +"It is amazing," she whispered, "for the writing on the wall is already +there." + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +Seated in one of the first tier boxes at the Albert Hall, in the +gorgeous but obsolete uniform of a staff officer in the Russian Imperial +Forces, Prince Karschoff, with Nigel on one side and Maggie on the +other, gazed with keen interest at the brilliant scene below and around. +The greatest city the world has ever known seemed in those days to have +entered upon an orgy of extravagance unprecedented in history. Every box +and every yard of dancing space on the floor beneath was crowded with +men and women in wonderful fancy costumes, the women bedecked with +jewels which eager merchants had brought together from every market of +the world; even the men, in their silks and velvets and ruffles, +carrying out the dominant note of wealth. It was a ball given for +charity and under royal patronage. + +"All our friends seem to be here to-night," the Prince remarked, +glancing around. "I saw Naida with her father and the eternal Oscar +Immelan. Chalmers is here with an exceedingly gay party, and yonder sits +his Imperial Highness, looking very much the barbaric prince.--By the +by," he added, glancing towards Maggie, "I thought that he was not +coming?" + +Maggie, who seemed a little tired, nodded quietly. It was a week or ten +days later, and an early season was now in full swing. + +"He told me that he was not coming," she said. "I suppose the temptation +to wear that gorgeous raiment was too much for him." + +"Apropos of that, there is one curious thing to be noted here with +regard to clothes," the Prince continued. "Amongst the men, you find +Venetian Doges, Chancellors, gallants of every age, but scarcely a +single uniform. In a way, this seems typical of the passing of the +militarism of your country. You are beginning to remind me of Venice in +the Middle Ages. There is a new type of brain dominant here, fat instead +of muscle, a citizen aristocracy instead of the lean, clear-eyed, +athletic type." + +Maggie moved in her place a little irritably. + +"I am tired of warnings," she declared. "I wish some one could do +something." + +"It is impossible," the Prince pronounced solemnly. "Napoleon earned for +himself a greater claim to immortality when he christened the English a +nation of shopkeepers than when he won the Battle of Austerlitz. If the +Englishman of to-day saw his material prosperity slipping away from him, +then indeed he would be nervous and restless, ready to lean towards +every wind that blew, to listen to every disquieting rumour. To-day his +bank balance is prodigious, and all's well with the world.--How +wonderfully Prince Shan lives up to his part to-night!" + +They looked across towards the opposite box, whose single occupant, in +the bright green robes of a mandarin, sat looking down upon the gay +throng with an absolutely immovable expression. There was something +almost regal about his air of detachment, his solitude amidst such a gay +scene. + +"There is one of the strangest and most consistent figures in history," +Karschoff, who was in a talkative frame of mind, went on reflectively. +"I honestly believe that Prince Shan considers himself to be of +celestial descent, to carry in his person the honour of countless +generations of Manchus. He has no intimates. Even Immelan usually has to +seek an audience. What his pleasures may be, who knows?--because +everything that happens with him happens behind closed walls. To-night, +the door of his box is guarded as though he were more than royalty. No +one is allowed to enter unless he has special permission." + +"There is some one entering now," Maggie pointed out, "for the first +time. Watch!" + +La Belle Nita stood for a moment in the front of the box. She was +dressed in the gala costume of a Chinese lady, in a cherry-coloured robe +with wide sleeves, her hair, with its many jewelled ornaments, like a +black pool of night, her face ghastly white with a superabundance of +powder. Prince Shan turned his head slightly towards her, and though no +muscle of his face moved, it was obvious that her coming was unwelcome. +She began to talk. He listened with the face of a sphinx. Presently she +drew back into the shadows of the box. She had thrown herself into a +chair, and her face was hidden. + +"La Belle Nita has made a mistake," Maggie observed. "His Serene +Highness evidently had no wish to be disturbed." + +Karschoff's eyes rested upon the figure in green silk, and they were +filled with an unwilling admiration. + +"That man is magnificent," he declared. "Watch his face now that he is +speaking. Not a muscle moves, not a flash in his eyes, yet one has the +fancy that he is saying terrible things." + +It was obvious, a moment later, that La Belle Nita had left the box. +Maggie sprang up. Her colour was a little heightened. There was a rare +nervousness in her tone. + +"Let us walk around and find some of the others," she suggested, turning +to Nigel. "I want to dance." + +They all three passed out and mingled with the dancers. Maggie put on +her mask and deliberately glided into the crowd as though with the +intention of losing herself. It was not until she was underneath Prince +Shan's box and out of sight of its occupant that she paused. Her +thoughts were in a turmoil. His presence there, after his deliberate +assurance to her that he had no intention of coming, his calm and +unnoticing regard of her and every one else, seemed to confirm in every +way the wave of pessimism which she as well as Nigel was experiencing. +She had passed Immelan in the entrance, and there was something +ominously disturbing in his cool, triumphant smile. She pictured to +herself the agreement signed, some nameless terror already launched. She +remembered that Nigel had complained of Naida's inaccessibility during +the last few days. She herself had been surprised at Prince Shan's +apparent withdrawal, temporary though it might be, from the peculiar but +impressive position which he had taken up with regard to her. + +She stood back against the wall, in a dark corner, striving to collect +her thoughts, thankful for the brief respite from conversation. A man in +the costume of a monk, who had followed her across the room, touched her +on the shoulder. He spoke in a quiet, unfamiliar voice with a foreign +accent, + +"You are Lady Maggie Trent?" + +"Yes!" + +"Will you please go to box number fourteen, on the second tier? There is +some one there who waits for you." + +"Who is it?" she asked. + +The monk had glided away. Maggie, after a few minutes' reflection, +slipped out into the corridor, mounted one flight of stairs, and passed +along the semicircular balcony. The door of box number fourteen was +ajar. She pushed it gently open and glanced in. Seated so as to be out +of sight of the whole house was La Belle Nita. For a moment the two +looked at each other. Then the Chinese girl sprang to her feet, made a +quaint little bow, and, gliding around, closed the door behind her +visitor. + +"Sit down, please," she invited. "I will tell you things you may like to +hear." + +A sudden thought flashed into Maggie's mind. She began to see light. She +obeyed at once. The two women sat well back and out of sight of the +house. La Belle Nita held the handle of the door in her hand while she +spoke, as though to prevent any one entering. + +"I have an enemy who was once a friend," she said, "and I wish to do him +evil. He is not only my enemy, but he is yours. He is the enemy of all +you English people, because it is a great disaster which he plans to +bring upon you." + +"You speak of Prince Shan?" Maggie exclaimed. + +Even at the mention of his name, the girl shook. She looked around as +though fearing the shadows. She rattled the door to make sure that it +was closed. + +"For him whom you call Prince Shan I have worked many years, first of +all in Paris, now here. I was content with small reward. That reward he +now takes from me. It is my wish to betray him." + +"Why do you send for me?" Maggie asked. + +"Because you have been an English spy," was the quiet reply. "It may +surprise you that I know that, but I do know. I have been a spy for +Prince Shan in Paris. You were a spy for England in Berlin. You were a +spy for your country's sake; I was a spy for love. Now I betray for +hate." + +"Please go on." + +"Prince Shan came this time to Europe with two schemes in his mind," the +girl continued. "One concerned France. That one he has discarded. +Through me he learned of the military strength of France, her secret +resources, of her tireless watch upon the Rhine. So he listens to +Immelan, and Immelan and he together, oh, English lady, they have made a +wonderful plan!" + +"Are you going to tell me what it is?" Maggie asked, her eyes bright +with excitement. + +"I cannot tell you because I do not know," was the unwilling admission, +"but I will make it so that you can discover for yourself. A few hours +ago, the plan was submitted to Prince Shan. It lies in the third drawer +of an ebony cabinet, in the room on the left-hand side of the hall after +you have entered his house in Curzon Street." + +"But no one can enter it!" Maggie exclaimed. "The place is like a fort. +No stranger may pass the threshold even. The Prince has told me himself +that he receives no visitors." + +La Belle Nita smiled. From a pocket somewhere within the folds of her +flowing gown, she produced two small keys. + +"Listen," she said. "The house in Curzon Street has been called the +House of Silence. There are many servants there, but they come only from +beneath and when they are summoned. There is what no other person has +ever possessed--the key of the front door. There is also the key of the +cabinet. Prince Shan has ordered his automobile for two o'clock. It is +now barely midnight." + +The keys lay in the palm of Maggie's hand. Her heart had begun to beat +quickly. Somehow or other, she was conscious of a thrill of excitement +which she had never before experienced, even when she had sat back in +her corner of the railway carriage, watching for the frontier, knowing +that the wires were busy with her name, and that men who knew no mercy +were on her track. + +"If the servants should hear me?" she faltered. + +"You say only 'I await the Prince'," La Belle Nita murmured. "That key +never leaves his own person save for one in great favour. They will +believe that he gave it to you. You will be unmolested." + +A queer sensation suddenly assailed Maggie. She felt extraordinarily +primitive, ridiculously feminine. She looked at the girl opposite to +her, the girl whose body was draped in perfumed silks, whose face was +thick with rice powder, whose eyes were sad. She felt no pity. What +feeling she had, she did not care to analyse. + +"Is this your key?" she asked. + +"It was mine once, but its use has been forbidden to me," the girl +replied. "Prince Shan is a changed man. Something has come into his life +of which I know nothing, but as it has come, so must I go. I give you +your chance, lady, but already I weaken. Go quickly, if you go at all. +Please leave me, for I am very unhappy." + +Maggie stole quietly out and made her way through the jostling throng +back to her own box, which for the moment was empty. She slipped on her +cloak, and from the hidden spaces where she stood she looked across the +auditorium. The silent figure in green silk robes was still seated in +his place, his eyes following the movements of the dancers, his head a +little thrown back, a slight weariness in his face. He was still alone. +He still had the air of being alone because it was his desire. Once he +looked up towards the box in which she was, and Maggie, although she +knew she was invisible, shrank back against the wall. She set her teeth +hard and looked back through the slightly misty space. An unfamiliar +feeling for a moment almost choked her. She waited until she had +vanquished it, then adjusted her mask and left the box. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +From the moment when the taxicab drove away and left her in the deserted +street, Maggie was conscious of a strange sense of suppressed +excitement, something more poignant and mysterious, even, than the +circumstances of her adventure might account for. It was exciting +enough, in its way, to play the part of a marauding thief, to find +herself unexpectedly face to face with a possible solution of the great +problem of Prince Shan's intentions. But beneath all this there was +another feeling, more entirely metaphysical, which in a sense steadied +her nerves because it filled her with a strange impression that she had +lost her own identity, that she was playing somebody else's part in a +novel and thrilling drama. + +The street was empty when she inserted the little key in the front door. +There was not a soul there to see her step in as it swung open and then +softly, noiselessly, but without any conscious effort of hers, closed +again behind her. She held her breath and looked around. + +The hall was round, painted white and dimly lit by an overhead electric +globe. In the centre was a huge green vase filled with great branches of +some sort of blossoms. Not a picture hung upon the walls, nor was there +any hall stand, chest, closet for coats or hats, or any of the usual +furbishings of such a place. There were three rugs upon the polished +floor and nothing else except a yawning stairway and closed doors. +Whatever servants might be in attendance were evidently in a distant +part of the building. Not a sound was to be heard. Still without any +lack of courage, but oppressed with that curious sense of unreality, she +turned almost automatically towards the door on the left and opened it. +Again it closed behind her noiselessly. She realised that she was in one +of the principal reception rooms of the house, dimly lit as the hall +from a dome-shaped globe set into the ceiling. She moved a yard or two +across the threshold and stood looking about her. Here again there was +an almost singular absence of furniture. The walls were hung with +apple-green silk, richly embroidered. There were some rugs upon the +polished floor, a few quaintly carved chairs set with their backs +against the wall, and opposite to her the ebony cabinet of which La +Belle Nita had spoken. She moved towards it. Somehow or other, she found +herself with the other key in her hand, stooping down. She counted the +drawers--one, two three--fitted in the key, turned it, and realised with +a little start the presence in the drawer of a roll of parchment, tied +around with tape and sealed with a black seal. She laid her hand upon +it, but even at that moment she felt a shiver pass through her body. +There had been no sound in the room, which she could have sworn had been +empty when she entered it, yet she had now a conviction that she was not +alone. She turned slowly around, her lips parted, breathing quickly. +Standing in the middle of the room, a grim, commanding figure in his +flowing green robes, the dim light flashing upon the great diamonds in +his belt, stood Prince Shan. + +To Maggie at that moment came a great throbbing in her ears, a sense of +remoteness from this terrible happening, followed by an intense and +vital consciousness of danger. The man who had brought new things into +her life, the polished gentleman of the world, with his fascinating +brain and gentle courtesy, had gone. It was Prince Shan of China who +stood there. She felt the chill of his contempt and disapproval in her +heart. She had forfeited her high estate. She was a convicted thief,--an +adventuress! + +She gripped at the side of the cabinet. Her poise had gone. She had the +air of a trapped animal. + +"You!" she exclaimed. "How did you get here?" + +He answered her without change of expression. A sense of crisis seemed +to have made his tone more level, his face stony. + +"It is my house," he said. "I do not often leave it. I sat in my +sleeping chamber behind"--he pointed to the silken curtains through +which he had passed--"I heard your entrance and guessed with pain and +regret at your mission." + +"But a quarter of an hour ago you were at the ball!" + +"You are mistaken," he replied. "I do not attend such gatherings. I had +given you my word that I should not be there." + +"But I saw you," she persisted, "in that same costume!" + +"Surely not," he dissented. "The person whom you saw was a gentleman +from my suite, who wore the dress of an inferior mandarin. He is +sometimes supposed to resemble me. I should have believed that your +apprehension of such things would have informed you that no Prince of my +line would wear the garments of his order for a public show." + +Her fingers had left the drawer now. She stood upright, pale and +desperate. + +"That woman of your country, then--La Belle Nita--did she lie to me?" + +"How can I tell?" he answered coldly, "because I do not know what she +said." + +Maggie made an effort to test her position. + +"I came here as a thief," she confessed. "I am detected. What are your +intentions?" + +He moved very slowly a little closer to her. Maggie felt her sense of +excitement grow. + +"You came here as a thief," he repeated, "as a spy. Why did you not ask +me for the information you desired?" + +"Because you would not have told me," she replied, "at least you would +not have told me the truth." + +"For a price," he said, "the truth would have been yours for the asking. +For a different price it is yours now." + +Again without noticeable movement he seemed to have drawn nearer. The +edge of that cool ebony cabinet seemed to be burning her fingers. Try +however hard, she could not frame the question which had risen to her +lips. + +"The price," he continued, "is you--yourself. A few hours ago it was +your love I craved for. Now it is yourself." + +He was so near to her now that she faced the steady radiance of his +wonderful eyes, so near that she could trace the faint lines about his +mouth, the strong, stern immobility of his perfectly shaped, +olive-tinted features. + +"You are too wonderful," he went on, "to remain a daughter of the crude +West. I want to take you back with me to the land where life still moves +to poetry, to the land where one can live in a world unknown by these +struggling hordes. You shall live in a palace where the perfume of +flowers lingers always, with the sound of running water in your ears, a +palace from which all sordid things and all manner of ugliness are +banished because we alone have found the key to the garden of +happiness." + +He raised his hand, and it seemed as though unseen eyes watched them +from every quarter. The silken curtains through which he had issued were +drawn back by invisible hands, and the inner apartment was disclosed. +Its faint illumination was obscured with purple shades. There was a high +lacquer bedstead, with little ivory ladders on either side, a bedstead +hung with silks of black and purple and mauve. There was a huge couch, a +shrine opposite the bed, in which was a kneeling figure of black marble. +A faint odour, as though from thousand-year-old sachets, very faint +indeed and yet with its mead of intoxication, seemed to steal out from +the room, which had borrowed from its curious hangings, its marvellous +adornments, its strangely attuned atmosphere, all the mysticism of a +fabled world. + +"You have come," he said. "Will you stay?" The inertia seemed suddenly +to leave her limbs. She threw up her head as though gasping for air, +escaped, somehow or other, from the thrall of his eyes, and passed +across the smooth floor with flying footsteps. Her fingers seized the +handle of the door and turned it, only to find it held by some invisible +fastening. She shook it passionately. There was not even sound. She +turned back once more. Prince Shan had only slightly changed his +position. He stood upon the threshold of the inner room, and his arms +were outstretched in invitation. + +"Am I a prisoner?" she sobbed. + +"You came of your own free will," he replied. "You will stay for my +pleasure and for the joy of my being. As for these things," he went on, +moving slowly to the cabinet, picking up the pile of papers and throwing +them on one side contemptuously, "these are only one's amusements. I +pass my lighter hours with them. They interest me in the same manner as +a chess problem. We do not care, we in the mighty East, which of you +holds your head highest this side of Suez. All you western nations are +to us a peck of dust outside our palace gates. Listen, dear one. We can +leave, if you will, to-night, and top the clouds before sunrise. And I +promise you this," he went on, "when you pass from the greyness of these +sordid lands into the everlasting sunshine of the East, you will not +care any longer about these people who go about the world on all fours. +Day by day you will know what life and love mean. You will find the +cloying weight of material things pass from your brain and body, and the +joy of holy and wonderful living take their place." + +Her whole being was in a turmoil. She drew nearer to the papers upon the +table. She was now within a yard of Prince Shan himself. He made no +effort to intercept her, no movement of any sort to stop her. Only his +eyes never left her face, and she felt a madness which seemed to be +choking the life out of her, a pounding of her heart against her ribs, a +strange and wonderful joy, a joy in which there was no fear, a joy of +new things and new hopes. With the papers for which she had come only a +few yards away, she forgot them. She turned her head slowly. His arms +seemed to steal out from those long, silken sleeves. She suddenly felt +herself held in a wonderful embrace. + +"Dear lady of all my desires," he whispered in her ear, "you shall make +me happy and find the secret of happiness yourself in giving, in +suffering, in love." + +For a long and wonderful moment she lay in his arms. She felt the soft +burning of his kisses, the call of the room with its intoxicating, yet +strangely ascetic perfume, the room to which all the time he seemed to +be gently leading her. And then a flood of strange, alien recollections +and realisations seemed to bring her from a better place back to a +worse,--the sound of a passing taxicab, the distant booming of Big Ben, +sounds of the world outside, the actual day-by-day world, with its +day-by-day code of morals, the world in which she lived, and her +friends, and all that had made life for her. She drew away, and he +watched the change in her. + +"I want to go!" she cried. "Let me go!" + +"You are no prisoner," he assured her sadly. + +He clapped his hands. She had reached the door by now and found the +handle yield to her fingers. Outside in the hall, the front door stood +open, and a heavy rain was beating in on the white flags. She looked +around. She was in her own atmosphere here. Their eyes met, and his were +very sorrowful. + +"My servants are assembling," he said. "You will find a car at your +service." + +Even then she hesitated. There was a strange return of the wonderful +emotion of a few minutes ago. She hoped almost painfully that he would +call. Instead, he lifted the silk hangings and passed out of sight. +Somehow or other, she made her way down the hall. A butler stood upon +the steps, another servant was holding open the door of a limousine just +drawn up. She had no distinct recollection of giving any address. She +simply threw herself back amongst the cushions. It was not until they +were in Piccadilly that she suddenly remembered that she had left upon +the table the papers he had scornfully offered her. Then she began to +laugh. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + +It chanced that the box was empty when Maggie, with flying footsteps, +hastened down the corridor and pushed open the door. She sank into a +chair, her knees trembling, her senses still dazed. Deliberately, +although with hot and trembling fingers, she folded over and tore into +small pieces a programme of the dances, which she had picked up from an +adjoining chair. The action, insignificant though it was, seemed to +bring her back into touch with the real and actual world, the world of +music and wild gayety, of swiftly moving feet, of laughter and +languorous voices. For a brief space of time she had escaped, she had +wandered a little way into an unknown country, a country from whose +thrilling dangers she had emerged with a curious feeling that life would +never be altogether the same again. She glanced at the clock at the back +of the box. She had been absent from the Hall altogether only about an +hour and twenty minutes. There was still at least an hour before it +would be possible for her to plead weariness and escape. And opposite, +in the shadows of the distant box, the mock Prince Shan seemed always to +be gazing at her with that cryptic smile upon his lips. + +Presently the door was stealthily opened. A face as pale as death, with +black eyes like pieces of coal, was framed for a moment in the shadowed +slit. A little waft of familiar perfume stole in. La Belle Nita, her +flaming lips widely parted, as soon as she recognised the sole occupant +of the box, crept through the opening and closed the door again. + +"You are here?" she exclaimed incredulously. "Your courage failed you? +You did not go?" + +"I have been and returned," Maggie answered. "Now tell me what I have +done that you should have plotted this thing against me?" + +The girl sat on the edge of a chair and for a moment hummed the refrain +of a sad chant, as she rocked slowly backwards and forwards. + +"'What have you done?' the rose asked the butterfly. 'What have you +done?' the mimosa blossom asked the little blue bird, whose wings +fluttered amongst her leaves. 'You have taken love from me, love which +is the blossom of life.'" + +"It sounds very picturesque," Maggie said coldly, "but I do not follow +your allegory. What I want to know is why you lied to me, why you sent +me to that house to meet Prince Shan?" + +"How did I lie to you?" Nita demanded. "The papers you sought were +there. Were they not yours for the asking, or was the price too great?" + +"The papers were there, certainly," Maggie acquiesced, "but you knew +very well--" + +She stopped short. Slowly the Oriental idea of it all was beginning to +frame itself in her mind. She dimly understood the bewilderment in the +other's face. + +"The papers were there, and he, the most wonderful of all men, was +there," Nita murmured, "yet you leave him while the night is yet young, +you return here without them!" + +Maggie rose from her chair, moved to the side table and poured herself +out a glass of wine, which she drank hastily. Anything to escape from +the scornful wonder of those questioning eyes! + +"I did not go there," she said, "to make bargains with Prince Shan. I +believed as you wished me to believe, that he was here in that box. I +believed that I should have found the house empty, should have found +what I wanted and have escaped with it. Why did you do this thing? Why +did you send me on that errand when you knew that Prince Shan was +there?" + +"It was my desire that he should know that you are no different from +other women," was the calm reply. "I was a spy for him. You are a +spy--against him." + +"It was a deliberate plot, then!" Maggie exclaimed, trying to feel the +anger which she imparted to her tone. + +La Belle Nita suddenly laughed, softly and like a bird. + +"You very, very foolish Englishwoman," she said. "A hand leaned down +from Heaven, and you liked better to stay where you were, but I am +glad." + +"And why?" + +"Because I have been his slave," the girl continued. "At odd, strange +moments he has shown me a little love, he has let me creep into a small +corner of his heart. Now I am cast out, and there is no more life for me +because there is no more love, and there is no more love because, having +felt his, no other can come after. Here have I sat with all the tortures +of Hell burning in my blood because I knew that you and he were there +alone, because I was never sure that, after all, I was not doing my +lord's will. And now I know that I suffered in vain. You did not +understand." + +Maggie looked across at her visitor reflectively. She was beginning to +regain her poise. + +"Listen," she said, "did you seriously expect me to accept Prince Shan +as a lover?" + +The girl's eyes were round with wonder. + +"It would be your great good fortune," she murmured, "if he should offer +you so wonderful a thing." + +Maggie laughed,--persisted in her laugh, although it sounded a little +hard and the mirth a little forced. + +"I cannot reason with you," she declared, "because you would not +understand. If you love him so much, why not go back to him? You will +find him quite alone. I dare say you know the secrets of his lockless +doors and hordes of unseen servants." + +La Belle Nita rose to her feet. About her lips there flickered the +faintest smile. + +"Young English lady," she said, "I shall not go, because I am shut for +ever out of his heart. But listen; would you have me go?" + +For a moment Maggie's poise was gone again. A strange uncertainty was +once more upon her. She was terrified at her own feelings. The smile on +the other's lips deepened and then passed away. + +"Ah," she murmured, as with a little bow she turned towards the door, +"you are not all snow and ice, then! There is something of the woman in +you. He must have known that. I am better content." + +Alone in the box, Maggie was confronted once more with spectres. She +felt all the fear and the sweetness of this new awakening. The old +dangers and problems, the danger of life and death, the problem of her +well-ordered days, fell away from her as trifles. There was wilder music +in the world than any to which she had yet listened,--music which seemed +to be awakening vibrant melodies in her terrified heart. The curtain +which hung about the forbidden world had been suddenly lifted. Little +shivers of fear convulsed her. Her standards were confused, her whole +sense of values disturbed. Her primal virginity, left to itself because +it had never needed a guard, had suddenly become a questioning thing. +She sat there face to face with this new phase in her life. She was not +even conscious of the abrupt pause in the music, the agitated murmur of +voices, the sudden cessation of that rhythmical sweep of footsteps on +the floor below. + +The door of the box was once more opened. Naida, attired as a lady of +the Russian Court, entered, followed by Nigel. Both were obviously +disturbed. Nigel, who was in ordinary evening dress, carrying his +discarded mask in his hand, was paler than usual and exceedingly grave. +Naida's dark eyes, too, seemed filled with a sense of awesome things. +Almost at the same moment, Maggie realised for the first time that the +music had ceased, that there was a hush outside, curiously perceptible, +almost audible. + +"What has happened?" she asked breathlessly. + +Nigel had poured out a glass of wine and was holding it to Naida's lips. + +"Something very terrible," he said quietly. "Prince Shan was murdered in +his box there a few minutes ago." + +Maggie half rose to her feet. The walls seemed spinning round. Then she +looked across the great empty space. The still figure in the apple-green +coat had disappeared. + +"Prince Shan was murdered in that box," she repeated, "a few minutes +ago?" + +"Yes!" Nigel assented gravely. "He seems to have feared something of the +sort, for he had two servants on guard outside and announced that he +was not receiving visitors to-night. No one knows any particulars, but a +number of people in the auditorium saw him fall sideways from his chair. +When he was picked up, there was a small dagger through his heart." + +"Through Prince Shan's heart?" Maggie persisted wildly. + +"Yes!" + +Suddenly she began to laugh. It was a strange, hysterical ebullition of +feeling, frankly horrifying. Naida gazed at her with distended eyes. + +"Prince Shan has never been here!" Maggie explained brokenly. "He has +never left his house in Curzon Street! He is there now!" + +Nigel shook his head. + +"What is the matter with you, Maggie?" he demanded. "Every one has seen +Prince Shan here. You spoke of him yourself. He was in the box exactly +opposite." + +She shook her head. + +"That was one of his suite," she cried. "I know! I tell you I know!" she +went on, her voice rising a little. "Prince Shan is safe in his house in +Curzon Street." + +"How can you possibly know this, Maggie?" Naida intervened eagerly. + +"Because I left him there half an hour ago," was the tremulous reply. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + + +There is in the Anglo-Saxon temperament an almost feverish desire to +break away from any condition of strain, a sort of shamefaced impulse to +discard emotionalism. The strange hush which had lent a queer sensation +of unreality to all that was passing in the great building was without +any warning brought to an end. Whispers swelled into speech, and speech +into almost a roar of voices. Then the music struck up, although at +first there were few who cared to dance. There were many who, like +Maggie and her companions, silently left their places and hurried +homewards. + +In the limousine scarcely a word was spoken. Maggie leaned back in her +seat, her face dazed and expressionless. Opposite to her, Nigel sat with +set, grim face, looking with fixed stare out of the window at the +deserted streets. Of the three, Naida seemed more on the point of giving +way to emotion. They had passed Hyde Park Corner, however, before a word +was spoken. Then it was she who broke the silence. + +"Where do we go to first?" she demanded. + +"To the Milan Court," Nigel replied. + +"You are taking me home first, then?" + +"Yes!" + +She was silent for a moment. Then she leaned forward and touched the +window. + +"Pull that down, please," she directed. "I am stifling." + +He obeyed, and the rush of cold, wet air had a curiously quietening +effect upon the nerves of all of them. Raindrops hung from the leaves of +the lime trees and still glittered upon the windowpane. On the way +towards the river, the masses of cloud were tinged with purple, and +faintly burning stars shone out of unexpectedly clear patches of sky. +The night of storm was over, but the wind, dying away before the dawn, +seemed to bring with it all the sweetness of the cleansed places, to be +redolent even of the budding trees and shrubs,--the lilac bushes, +drooping with their weight of moisture, and the pink and white chestnut +blossoms, dashed to pieces by the rain but yielding up their lives with +sweetness. The streets, in that single hour between the hurrying +homewards of the belated reveller and the stolid tramp of the early +worker, were curiously empty and seemed to gain in their loneliness a +new dignity. Trafalgar Square, with the National Gallery in the +background, became almost classical; Whitehall the passageway for +heroes. + +"What does it all mean?" Naida asked, almost pathetically. + +It was Maggie who answered. Her tone was lifeless, but her manner +almost composed. + +"It means that the attempt to assassinate Prince Shan has failed," she +said. "Prince Shan told me himself that he had no intention of going to +the ball. He kept his word. The man who was murdered was one of his +suite." + +"But how do you know this?" Naida persisted. + +"You heard what I told you in the box," was the quiet reply. "I shall +explain--as much as I can explain--to Nigel when we get home. He can +tell you everything later on to-day at lunch-time, if you like." + +"It has been one of the strangest nights I ever remember," Naida +declared, after a brief pause. "Oscar Immelan, who was dining with us, +arrived half an hour late. I have never seen him in such a condition +before. He had the air of a broken man." + +"Have you any idea of what had happened?" Nigel asked. + +"Only this," Naida replied. "We saw Prince Shan last night. He spent +several hours with us. I may be wrong, but I came to the conclusion then +that he had at any rate modified his views about the whole situation +since his arrival in England." + +Again there was a brief silence. The minds of all three of them were +busy with the same thought. Prince Shan's word had been spoken and +Immelan's hopes dashed to the ground,--and within a few hours, this +murder! They nursed the thought, but no one put it into words. + +A sleepy-eyed porter opened the door of the car outside the Milan Court. +Naida gathered herself together with a little shiver. + +"I think that after to-night," she said quietly, "there need be no +secrets between any of us." + +Nigel held her hand in his. Their eyes met, and both of them were +conscious, in that moment, of closer personal relations, of the passing +of a certain sense of strain. She even smiled as she turned away. + +"To-morrow," she concluded, "there must be a great exchange of +confidences. I am lunching at Belgrave Square, if Maggie has not +forgotten, and I shall tell you then what I have written to Paul +Matinsky. I showed it to Prince Shan yesterday. Good night!" + +She patted Maggie's hand affectionately and flitted away. The revolving +doors closed behind her, and the car swung out once more into the +Strand, glided down the Mall, past Buckingham Palace, and stopped at +last before the great, lifeless house in Belgrave Square. Nigel opened +the front door with a latchkey and turned on the light. + +"You won't mind sparing me a few minutes?" he begged. + +"I suppose not," she answered, shivering. + +He led the way to the study. She threw off her cloak and sank into the +depths of one of the big easy-chairs. She looked very frail and rather +pathetic as she leaned her head against the chair back. Now that the +excitement was over, the strain of the emotion she had experienced +showed in the violet shadows under her eyes and in the droop of her +shoulders. + +"I am tired," she said plaintively. + +Nigel came over and sat on the arm of her chair. + +"Tell me what happened to-night, Maggie." + +"The little Chinese girl sent for me to go to her box," she explained. +"She told me where in Prince Shan's house were hidden the papers which +revealed the understanding between Immelan and himself. She gave me a +key of the house and a key of the cabinet. We could both see the man +whom I believed to be Prince Shan seated in his box. She assured me that +he would be there for the next two hours. I went to the house in Curzon +Street." + +"Well?" + +His monosyllable was sharp and incisive. His face was grey and anxious. +She herself remained lifeless. All that there was of emotion between +them seemed to have become vested in his searching eyes. + +"I found what I believe to have been the papers. They were in the +cabinet, just where she had told me. Then I turned around and found +Prince Shan watching me. He had been there all the time." + +"Go on, please." + +"At first he said little, but I knew that he was very angry. I have +never felt so ashamed in my life." + +"You must tell me the rest, please." + +She stirred uneasily in her chair. + +"It is very difficult," she confessed frankly. + +"Remember," he persisted, "that in a way, Maggie, I am your guardian. I +am responsible, too, for anything which may happen to you whilst you are +engaged in work for the good of our cause. You seem to have walked into +a trap. Did he threaten you, or what?" + +"There was nothing definite," she answered, "and yet--he made me +understand." + +"Made you understand what?" + +"His wishes," she replied, looking up coolly. "He offered me the +papers." + +"That damned Chinaman!" + +There was a cold light in her eyes which Nigel had met with before and +dreaded. + +"You forget yourself, Nigel," she said. "Prince Shan is a great +nobleman." + +"The rest? Tell me the rest," he demanded. + +"I am here," she reminded him. + +"And the papers?" + +"I came away without them." + +He turned, and, walking to the window, threw it open. The dawn had +become almost silvery, and the leaves of the overhanging trees were +rustling in the faintest of breezes. Presently he came back. + +"What exactly are your feelings for this man, Maggie?" he asked. + +For the first time he was struck with a certain pathos in her immobile +face. She looked up at him, and there was a gleam almost of fear in her +eyes. + +"I don't know, Nigel," she confessed. + +He moved restlessly about the room, seemed to notice for the first time +the whisky and soda set out upon the sideboard and the open box of +cigarettes. He helped himself and came back. + +"Did you read the papers?" he asked. + +She shook her head. + +"I had no chance." + +"You don't know for certain what they were about?" + +"I think I do," she replied. "I believe they contained the text of the +agreement between Immelan and Prince Shan. I believe they would have +shown us exactly what we have to fear." + +He stood there for a moment thoughtfully. + +"To-night," he said, "I find it difficult to concentrate upon these +things. Naida was extraordinarily hopeful. She has seen Prince Shan, and +between them I believe that they have decided to let Oscar Immelan's +scheme alone. Karschoff, too, has heard rumours. He is of the same +opinion. Somehow or other, though, I seem to have lost my sense of +perspective. A greater fear has come into my heart, Maggie." + +She rose to her feet and laid her hands upon his shoulders. + +"Nigel," she whispered, "I cannot answer you. I cannot say what you +would like me to say, although, on the other hand, there is no surety of +what you seem to fear. I am going to bed. I am very tired." + +A feeble shaft of sunlight stole into the room, flickered and passed +away, then suddenly reappeared. Nigel turned and opened the door, and +she passed out, curiously silent and absorbed. He looked after her, +perplexed and worried. Suddenly a strangely commonplace, yet--in the +silence of the house and the great hall--an almost dramatic sound +startled him. The front doorbell rang sharply. After a moment's +hesitation, he hurried to it himself. Karschoff stood upon the steps, +still in his evening clothes, his face a little drawn and haggard in the +bright light. + +"I could not resist coming in, Nigel," he said. "I saw the light in the +study from outside. Is there any definite news?" + +Nigel drew him inside. + +"There are indications," he replied cautiously, "that the present danger +is passing." + +Karschoff nodded. + +"I gathered so from Naida," he admitted. "Prince Shan, though, is the +pivot upon which the whole thing turns. You have heard nothing final +from him?" + +"Nothing! Tell me, was any one arrested at the Albert Hall?" + +"No one. The murdered man, as I suppose you have heard, was Sen Lu, one +of the Prince's secretaries." + +"The whole thing seems strange," Nigel remarked. "Do you suppose Prince +Shan knew that an attempt upon his life was likely to-night?" + +Karschoff shook his head doubtfully. + +"It is difficult to say. These Orientals contrive to surround themselves +with such an atmosphere of mystery. But from what I know of Prince +Shan," he went on, "I do not think that he is one to shirk danger--even +from the assassin's dagger." + +A milk cart drew up with a clatter outside. There was the sound of the +area gate being opened. Karschoff put on his hat. He looked Nigel in the +face. + +"Maggie," he began-- + +Nigel nodded understandingly as he threw open the front door. + +"I'll tell you about it to-morrow," he promised, "or rather later on +to-day. She's a little overwrought. Otherwise--there's nothing." + +Karschoff turned away with a sigh of relief. + +"I am glad," he said. "Prince Shan is the soul of honour according to +his own standard, but these Orientals--one never knows. I am glad, +Nigel." + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + + +In his spacious reception room, with its blue walls, the high vases of +flowers, the faint odour of incense, its indefinable ascetic charm, +Prince Shan sat in his high-backed chair whilst Li Wen, his trusted +secretary talked. Li Wen was very eloquent. His tone was never raised, +he never forgot that he was speaking to a being of a superior world. He +had a great deal to say, however, and he was eager to say it. Prince +Shan, as he listened, smoked a long cigarette in a yellow tube. He wore +a ring in which was set an uncut green stone on the fourth finger of his +left hand. Although the hour was barely nine o'clock, he was shaved and +dressed as though for a visit of ceremony. He listened to Li Wen gravely +and critically. + +"I am sorry about the little one," he said, looking through the cloud of +tobacco smoke up towards the ceiling. "Nita has been very useful. She +has been as faithful, too, as is possible for a woman." + +Li Wen bowed and waited. He knew better than to interrupt. + +"It was through the information which Nita brought me," his master went +on, "that I have been able to check the truth of Immelan's statement as +to the French dispositions and the _rapprochement_ with Italy. Nita has +served me very well indeed. What she has done in this matter, she has +done in a moment of caprice." + +"My lord," Li Wen ventured, "a woman is of no account in the plans of +the greatest. She is like a leaf blown hither or thither on the winds of +love or jealousy. She may be used, but she must be discarded." + +"It is a strange world, this western world," Prince Shan mused. "In our +own country, Li Wen, we plot or we fight, we build the great places, +climb to the lofty heights, and when we rest we pluck flowers, and women +are our flowers. But here, while one builds, the women are there; while +one climbs, the women are in the way. They jostle the thoughts, they +disturb the emotions, not only of the poet and the pleasure seeker, but +of the man who hews his way upwards to the goal he seeks. And it is very +deliberate, Li Wen. An Englishman eats and drinks in public and places +opposite him a flower he has plucked or hopes to pluck. He drugs himself +deliberately. Half the time when he should be soaring in his thoughts, +he descends of deliberate intent. Instead of his flower, he makes his +woman the partner of his grossness." + +"The master speaks," Li Wen murmured. "But what of the woman? She awaits +your pleasure." + +"I shall hear what she has to say," Prince Shan decided. + +Walking backwards as nimbly as a cat, his head drooped, his hands in +front of him, Li Wen left his master's presence. A moment later he +reappeared, ushering in La Belle Nita. Prince Shan waved him away. The +girl came slowly forward, pale and trembling, smouldering fires in her +narrow eyes. Not a muscle of Prince Shan's face moved. He watched her +approach in silence. She sank on to the floor by the side of his chair. + +"What is my master's will?" she asked. + +Prince Shan looked downwards at her, and she began to tremble again. +There was nothing threatening in his eyes, nothing menacing in his +expression. Nevertheless, she felt the chill of death. + +"You have done me many good and faithful services, Nita," he said. "What +evil spirit has put it into your brain that it would be a good thing to +deceive me?" + +Her scarlet lips opened and closed again. + +"How have I deceived?" she faltered. "I gave the keys to the woman with +the blue eyes, and I sent her to my lord. It was a hard thing to do +that, but I did it. Was there any risk of evil? My lord was here to deal +with her." + +"Why did you do this thing, Nita?" he asked. + +"My lord knows," she answered simply. "I did it to bring evil upon this +English woman whom he has preferred. I did it that he might understand. +It was my lord himself who told me that she was a spy. Now it is +proved." + +Prince Shan's fingers stole into the pocket of his coat. He held out a +crumpled sheet of paper, on which was written a single sentence. The +girl began to shiver. + +"You have been very anxious indeed, Nita," he said, "to bring evil upon +this woman. This is the message you sent to Immelan. Do you recognise +your words? Listen, these are your words: + +"'The greatest of all will desert you, if the Englishwoman whom he loves +is not speedily removed. Even to-night he may give papers into her hand, +and your secret will be known.'" + +The girl sat transfixed. She seemed to have lost all power of speech. + +"That is a copy of the message which you sent to Immelan," he told her +sternly. + +"It is the terrible Li Wen," she faltered. "He has the second sight. The +devil walks with him." + +"The devil is sometimes a useful confederate," her companion continued +equably. "You warned Immelan that it was in my mind to refuse his terms +and to open my heart to the Englishwoman, and you seduced Sen Lu to +carry your message. Yet your judgment was at fault. The hand of Immelan +was stretched out against me, and me alone. But for my knowledge of +these things, I might have sat in the place of Sen Lu, who rightly died +in my stead. What have you to say?" + +She rose to her feet. He made no movement, but his eyes watched her, and +the muscles of his body stiffened. He watched the white hand which stole +irresolutely towards the loose folds of her coat. + +"You ask me why I have done this," she cried, "but you already know. It +is because you have taken this woman with the blue eyes into your +heart." + +"If that were true," he answered, "of what concern is it to others? I am +Prince Shan." + +"You sent me here to breathe this cursed western atmosphere," she +moaned, "to drink in their thoughts and see with their eyes. I see and +know the folly of it all, but who can escape? Jealousy with us is a +disease. Over there one creeps away like a hurt animal because there is +nothing else. Here it is different. The Frenchwoman, the Englishwoman, +who loses her lover--she does not fold her hands. She strikes, she is a +wronged creature. I too have felt that." + +Her master sat for long in silence. + +"You are right," he pronounced. "I shall try to be just. You are a +person of small understanding. You have never made any effort to live +with your head in the clouds. Let that be so. The fault was mine." + +"I do not wish to live," she cried. + +He shrugged his shoulders. + +"Live or die--what does it matter?" he answered indifferently. "With +life there is pain, and with death there is none, but if you choose +life, remember this. The woman with the blue eyes, as you call her, has +become the star of my life. If harm should come to her, not only you, +but every one of your family and race, in whatsoever part of the world +they may be, will leave this life in agony." + +The girl stood and wondered. + +"My lord thinks so much of a plaything?" she murmured. + +Prince Shan frowned. His finely shaped, silky eyebrows almost met. She +covered her eyes and drooped her head. + +"We of the East," he said, "although we are the mightier race, progress +slowly, because the love of new things is not with us. Something of +western ways I have learned, and the love of woman. It is not for a +plaything I desire her whom we will not name. She shall sit by my side +and rule. I shall wed her with my brain as with my body. Our minds will +move together. We shall feel the same shivering pleasure when we rule +the world with great thoughts as when our bodies touch. I shall teach +her to know her soul, even as my own has been revealed to me." + +"No woman is worthy of this, my lord," the girl faltered. + +He waved his hand and she stole away. At the door he stopped her. + +"Do you go to life or death, Nita?" he asked. + +She looked at him with a great sorrow. + +"I am a worthless thing," she replied. "I go where my lord's words have +sent me." + +Li Wen reappeared presently for an appointed audience. He brought +messages. + +"Highness," he announced, "there is a code dispatch here from Ki-Chou. +An American gained entrance to the City last week. Yesterday he left by +aeroplane for India. He was overtaken and captured. It is feared, +however, that he has agents over the frontier, for no papers were found +upon him." + +"It was a great achievement," Prince Shan said thoughtfully. "No other +foreigner has ever passed into our secret city. Is there word as to how +he got there?" + +"He came as a Russian artificer from that city in Russia of which we do +not speak," Li Wen replied. "He brought letters, and his knowledge was +great." + +"His name?" the Prince asked. + +"Gilbert Jesson, Highness. His passport and papers refer to Washington, +but his message, if he sent one, is believed to have come to London." + +"The man must die," the Prince said calmly. "That, without doubt, he +expects. Yet the news is not serious. My heart has spoken for peace, Li +Wen." + +Li Wen bowed low. His master watched him curiously. + +"If I had asked it, Li Wen, where would your counsel have led?" + +"Towards peace, Highness. I do not trust Immelan. It is not in such a +manner that China's Empire shall spread. There are ancestors of mine who +would turn in their graves to find China in league with a western +Power." + +"You are a wise man, Li Wen," his master declared. "We hold the mastery +of the world. What shall we do with it?" + +"The mightiest sword is that which enforces peace," was the calm reply. +"Highness, the lady whom you were expecting waits in the anteroom." + +Prince Shan nodded. He welcomed Naida, who was ushered in a moment or +two later, with rather more than his usual grave and pleasant courtesy, +leading her himself to a chair. + +"I wondered," she confessed, "if I were ever to be allowed to see inside +your wonderful house." + +"It is my misfortune to be compelled to pay so brief a visit to this +country," he replied. "As a rule, it gives me great pleasure to open my +rooms three evenings and entertain those who care to come and see me." + +"I have heard of your entertainments," she said, smiling. "Prima donnas +sing. You rob the capitals of Europe to find your music. Then the great +Monsieur Auguste is lured from Paris to prepare your supper, and not a +lady leaves without some priceless jewel." + +"I entertain so seldom," he reminded her. "I fear that the fame of my +feasts has been exaggerated." + +"When do you leave, Prince?" she asked him. + +"Within a few days," he replied. + +"I come for your last word," she announced. "All that I have written to +Paul Matinsky you know." + +"The last word is not yet to be spoken," he said. "This, however, you +may tell Matinsky. The scheme of Oscar Immelan has been laid before me. +I have rejected it." + +"In what other way, then, would you use your power?" she asked. + +He made no answer. She watched him with a great and growing curiosity. + +"Prince," she said, "they tell me that you are a great student of +history." + +"I have read what is known of the history of most of the countries of +the world," he admitted. + +"There have been men," she persisted, "who have dealt in empires for the +price of a woman's smile." + +"Such men have loved," he said, "as I love." + +"Yet for you life has always been a great and lofty thing," she reminded +him. "You could not stand where you do if you had not realised the +beauty and wonder of sacrifice. Fate has given the peace of the world +into your keeping. You will not juggle with the trust?" + +He rose to his feet. A servant stood almost immediately at the open +door. + +"Fate and an American engineer," he remarked with a smile. "I thank you, +dear lady, for your visit. You will hear my news before I leave." + +She looked into his eyes for a moment. + +"It is a great decision," she said, "which rests with you!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + + +An hour or so later, Prince Shan left his house in Curzon Street and, +followed at a discreet distance by two members of his household, +strolled into the Park. It had pleased him that morning to conform +rigorously to the mode of dress adopted by the fashionable citizens of +the country which he was visiting. Few people, without the closest +observation, would have taken him for anything but a well-turned-out, +exceedingly handsome and distinguished-looking Englishman. He carried +himself with a faint air of aloofness, as though he moved amongst scenes +in which he had no actual concern, as though he were living, in thought +at any rate, in some other world. The morning was brilliantly sunny, and +both the promenade and the Row were crowded. Slightly hidden behind a +tree, he stood and watched. A gay crowd of promenaders passed along the +broad path, and the air was filled with the echo of laughter, the jargon +of the day, intimate references to a common world, invitations lightly +given and lightly accepted. It was Sunday morning, in a season when +colour was the craze of the moment, and the women who swept by seemed to +his rather mystical fancy like the flowers in some of the great open +spaces he knew so well, stirred into movement by a soft wind. They were +very beautiful, these western women; handsome, too, the men with whom +they talked and flirted. Always they had that air, however, of absolute +complacency, as though they felt nothing of the quest which lay like a +thread of torture amongst the nerves of Prince Shan's being. There was +no more distinguished figure among the men there than he himself, and +yet the sense of alienation grew in his heart as he watched. There were +many familiar faces, many to whom he could have spoken, no one who would +not have greeted him with interest, even with gratification. And yet he +had never been so deeply conscious of the gulf which lay between the +oriental fatalism of his life and ways and the placid self-assurance of +these westerners, so well-content with the earth upon which their feet +fell. He had judged with perfect accuracy the place which he held in +their thoughts and estimation. He was something of a curiosity, his +title half a joke, the splendour of his long race a thing unrealisable +by these scions of a more recent aristocracy. Yet supposing that this +new wonder had not come into his life, that Immelan had been a shade +more eloquent, had pleaded his cause upon a higher level, that Naida +Karetsky also had formed a different impression of the world which he +was studying so earnestly,--what a transformation he could have brought +upon this light-hearted and joyous scene! The scales had so nearly +balanced; at the bottom of his heart he was conscious of a certain faint +contempt for the almost bovine self-satisfaction of a nation without +eyes. Literature and painting, art in all its far-flung branches, even +science, were suffering in these days from a general and paralysing +inertia. Life which demanded no sacrifice of anybody was destructive of +everything in the nature of aspiration. Sport seemed to be the only +incentive to sobriety, the desire to live long in this fat land the only +brake upon an era of self-indulgence. He looked eastwards to where his +own millions were toiling, with his day-by-day maxims in their ears, and +it seemed to his elastic fancy that he was inhaling a long breath of +cooler and more vigorous life. + +The current of his reflections was broken. He had moved a little towards +the rails, and he was instantly aware of the girl cantering towards +him,--a slight, frail figure, she seemed, upon a great bay horse. She +wore a simple brown habit and bowler hat, and she sat her horse with +that complete lack of self-consciousness which is the heritage of a born +horsewoman. She was looking up at the sky as she cantered towards him, +with no thought of the crowds passing along the promenade. Yet, as she +drew nearer, she suddenly glanced down, and their eyes met. As though +obeying his unspoken wish, she reined in her horse and came close to the +rails behind which he stood for a moment bareheaded. There was the +faintest smile upon her lips. She was amazingly composed. She had asked +herself repeatedly, almost in terror, how they should meet when the time +came. Now that it had happened, it seemed the most natural thing in the +world. She was scarcely conscious even of embarrassment. + +"You are demonstrating to the world," she remarked, "that the reports of +your death this morning were exaggerated?" + +"I had forgotten the incident," he assured her calmly. + +His callousness was so unaffected that she shivered a little. + +"Yet this Sen Lu, this man for whom you were mistaken, was an intimate +member of your household, was he not?" + +"Sen Lu was a very good friend," Prince Shan answered. "He did his duty +for many years. If he knows now that his life was taken for mine, he is +happy to have made such atonement." + +She manoeuvred her horse a little to be nearer to him. + +"Why was Sen Lu murdered?" she asked. + +"There are those," he replied, "of whom I myself shall ask that question +before the day is over." + +"You have an idea, then?" she persisted. + +"If," he said, "you desire my whole confidence, it is yours." + +She sat looking between her horse's ears. + +"To tell you the truth," she confessed, "I do not know what I desire. +Your philosophy, I suppose, does not tolerate moods. I shall escape from +them some time, I expect, but just now I seem to have found my way into +a maze. The faces of these people don't even seem real to me, and as for +you, I am perfectly certain that you have never been in China in your +life." + +"Tell me the stimulant that is needed to raise you from your apathy," he +asked. "Will you find it in the rapid motion of your horse--a very noble +animal--in the joy of this morning's sunshine and breeze, or in the +toyland where these puppets move and walk?" he added, glancing down the +promenade. "Dear Lady Maggie, I beg permission to pay you a visit of +ceremony. Will you receive me this afternoon?" + +She knew then what it was that she had been hoping for. She looked down +at him and smiled. + +"At four o'clock," she invited. + +She nodded, touched her horse lightly with the whip, and cantered off. +Prince Shan found himself suddenly accosted by a dozen acquaintances, +all plying him with questions. He listened to them with an amused smile. + +"The whole affair is a very simple one," he said. "A member of my +household was assassinated last night. It was probably a plot against my +own life. Those things are more common with us, perhaps, than over +here." + +"Jolly country, China, I should think," one of the younger members of +the group remarked. "You can buy a man's conscience there for +ninepence." + +Prince Shan looked across at the speaker gravely. + +"The market value here," he observed, "seems a little higher, but the +supply greater." + +"_Touche_!" Karschoff laughed. "There is another point of view, too. The +further east you go, the less value life has. Westwards, it becomes an +absolute craze to preserve and coddle it, to drag it out to its +furthermost span. The American millionaire, for example, has a resident +physician attached to his household and is likely to spend the aftermath +of his life in a semi-drugged and comatose condition. And in the East, +who cares? If not to-day--to-morrow! Inevitability, which is the +nightmare of the West, is the philosophy of the East. By the by, +Prince," he added, "have you any theory as to last night's attempt?" + +"That is just the question," Prince Shan replied, "which two very +intelligent gentlemen from Scotland Yard asked me this morning. Theory? +Why should I have a theory?" + +"The attempt was without a doubt directed against you," Karschoff +observed. "Do you imagine that it was personal or political?" + +"How can I tell?" the Prince rejoined carelessly. "Why should any one +desire my death? These things are riddles. Ah! Here comes my friend +Immelan!" he went on. "Immelan, help us in this discussion. You are not +one of those who place the gift of life above all other things in the +world!" + +"My own or another's?" Immelan asked, with blunt cynicism. + +"I trust," was the bland reply, "that you are, as I have always esteemed +you, an altruist." + +"And why?" + +Prince Shan shrugged his shoulders. He was a very agreeable figure in +the centre of the little group of men, the hands which held his malacca +cane behind his back, the smile which parted his lips benign yet +cryptic. + +"Because," he explained, "it is a great thing to have more regard for +the lives of others than for one's own, and there are times," he added, +"when it is certainly one's own life which is in the more precarious +state." + +There was a little dispersal of the crowd, a chorus of congratulations +and farewells. Immelan and Prince Shan were left alone. The former +seemed to have turned paler. The sun was warm, and yet he shivered. + +"Just what do you mean by that, Prince?" he asked. + +"You shall walk with me to my house, and I will tell you," was the quiet +reply. + + + + +CHAPTER XXV + + +"I suppose," Immelan suggested, as the two men reached the house in +Curzon Street, "it would be useless to ask you to break your custom and +lunch with me at the Ritz or at the club?" + +His companion smiled deprecatingly. + +"I have adopted so many of your western customs," he said +apologetically. "To this lunching or dining in public, however, I shall +never accustom myself." + +Immelan laughed good-naturedly. The conversation of the two men on their +way from the Park had been without significance, and some part of his +earlier nervousness seemed to be leaving him. + +"We all have our foibles," he admitted. "One of mine is to have a pretty +woman opposite me when I lunch or dine, music somewhere in the distance, +a little sentiment, a little promise, perhaps." + +"It is not artistic," Prince Shan pronounced calmly. "It is not when the +wine mounts to the head, and the sense of feeding fills the body, that +men speak best of the things that lie near their hearts. Still, we will +let that pass. Each of us is made differently. There is another thing, +Immelan, which I have to say to you." + +They passed into the reception room, with its shining floor, its +marvellous rugs, its silken hangings, and its great vases of flowers. +Prince Shan led his companion into a recess, where the light failed to +penetrate so completely as into the rest of the apartment. A wide +settee, piled with cushions, protruded from the wall in semicircular +shape. In front of it was a round ebony table, upon which stood a great +yellow bowl filled with lilies. Prince Shan gave an order to one of the +servants who had followed them into the room and threw himself at full +length among the cushions, his head resting upon his hand, his face +turned towards his guest. + +"They will bring you the aperitif of which you are so fond," he said, +"also cigarettes. Mine, I know, are too strong for you." + +"They taste too much of opium," Immelan remarked. + +Prince Shan's eyes grew dreamy as he gazed through a little cloud of +odorous smoke. + +"There is opium in them," he admitted. "Believe me, they are very +wonderful, but I agree with you that they are not for the ordinary +person." + +The soft-footed butler presented a silver tray, upon which reposed a +glassful of amber liquid. Immelan took it, sipped it appreciatively, and +lit a cigarette. + +"Your man, Prince," he acknowledged, "mixes his vermouths wonderfully." + +"I am glad that what he does meets with your approval," was the +courteous reply. "He came to me from one of your royal palaces. I simply +told him that I wished my guests to have of the best." + +"Yet you never touch this sort of drink yourself," Immelan observed +curiously. + +The Prince shook his head. + +"Sometimes I take wine," he said. "That is generally at night. A few +evenings ago, for instance," he went on, with a reminiscent smile, "I +drank Chateau Yquem, smoked Egyptian cigarettes, ate some muscatel +grapes, and read 'Pippa Passes.' That was one of my banquets." + +"As a matter of fact," Immelan remarked thoughtfully, "you are far more +western in thought than in habit. The temperance of the East is in your +blood." + +"I find that my manner of life keeps the brain clear," Prince Shan said +slowly. "I can see the truth sometimes when it is not very apparent. I +saw the truth last night, Immelan, when I sent Sen Lu to die." + +Immelan's expression was indescribable. He sat with his mouth wide open. +The hand which held his glass shook. He stared across the bowl of lilies +to where his host was looking up through the smoke towards the ceiling. + +"Sen Lu was a traitor," the latter went on, "a very foolish man who with +one act of treachery wiped out the memory of a lifetime of devotion. In +the end he told the truth, and now he has paid his debt." + +"What do you mean?" Immelan demanded, in a voice which he attempted in +vain to control. "How was Sen Lu a traitor?" + +"Sen Lu," the Prince explained, "was in the pay of those who sought to +know more of my business than I chose to tell--who sought, indeed, to +anticipate my own judgment. When they gathered from him, and, alas! from +my sweet but frail little friend Nita, that the chances were against my +signing a certain covenant, they came to what, even now, seems to me a +strange decision. They decided that I must die. There I fail wholly to +follow the workings of your mind, Immelan. How was my death likely to +serve your purpose?" + +Immelan was absolutely speechless. Three times he opened his lips, only +to close them again. Some instinct seemed to tell him that his companion +had more to say. He sat there as though mesmerised. Meanwhile, the +Prince lit another cigarette. + +"A blunder, believe me, Immelan," he continued thoughtfully. "Death will +not lower over my path till my task is accomplished. I am young--many +years younger than you, Immelan--and the greatest physicians marvel at +my strength. Against the assassin's knife or bullet I am secure. You +have been brought up and lived, my terrified friend, in a country where +religion remains a shell and a husk, without comfort to any man. It is +not so with me, I live in the spirit as in the body, and my days will +last until the sun leans down and lights me to the world where those +dwell who have fulfilled their destiny." + +Immelan drained the contents of the glass which his unsteady hand was +holding. Then he rose to his feet. The veins on his forehead were +standing out, his blue eyes were filled with rage. + +"Blast Sen Lu!" he muttered. "The man was a double traitor!" + +"He has atoned," his companion said calmly. "He made his peace and he +went to his death. It seems very fitting that he should have received +the dagger which was meant for my heart. Now what about you, Oscar +Immelan?" + +Immelan laughed harshly. + +"If Sen Lu told you that I was in this plot against your life, he lied!" + +The Prince inclined his head urbanely. + +"Such a man as Sen Lu goes seldom to his death with a lie upon his +lips," he said. "Yet I confess that I am puzzled. Why should you plan +this thing, Immelan? You cannot know what is in my mind concerning your +covenant. I have not yet refused to sign it." + +"You have not refused to sign it," Immelan replied, "but you will +refuse." + +"Indeed?" the Prince murmured. + +"You are even now trifling with the secrets confided to you," Immelan +went on. "You know very well that the woman who came to you last night +is a spy whose whole time is spent in seeking to worm our secret from +you." + +"Your agents keep themselves well informed," was the calm comment. + +"Yours still have the advantage of us," Immelan answered bitterly. "Now +listen to me. I have heard it said of you--I have heard that you claim +yourself--that you have never told a falsehood. We have been allies. +Answer me this question. Have you parted with any of our secrets?" + +"Not one," the Prince assured him. "A certain lady visited this house +last night, not, as you seem to think, at my invitation, but on her own +initiative. She was not successful in her quest." + +"She would not pay the price, eh?" Immelan sneered. "By the gods of your +ancestors, Prince Shan, are there not women enough in the world for you +without bartering your honour, and the great future of your country, for +a blue-eyed jade of an Englishwoman?" + +The Prince sat slowly up. His appearance was ominous. His face had +become set as marble; there was a look in his eyes like the flashing of +a light upon black metal. He contemplated his visitor across the lilies. + +"A man so near to death, Immelan," he enjoined, "might choose his words +more carefully." + +Immelan laughed scornfully. + +"I am not to be bullied," he declared. "Your doors with their patent +locks have no fears for me. When you walk abroad, you are followed by +members of your household. When you come to my rooms, they attend you. I +am not a prince, but I, too, have a care for my skin. Three of my secret +service men never let me out of their sight. They are within call at +this moment." + +His host smiled. + +"This is very interesting," he said, "but you should know me better, +Immelan, than to imagine that mine are the clumsy methods of the dagger +or the bullet. The man whom I will to die--drinks with me." + +He pointed a long forefinger at the empty glass. Immelan gazed at it, +and the sweat stood out upon his forehead. + +"My God!" he muttered. "There was a queer taste! I thought that it was +aniseed!" + +"There was nothing in that glass," the Prince declared, "which the +greatest chemist who ever breathed could detect as poison, yet you will +die, my friend Immelan, without any doubt. Shall I tell you how? Would +you know in what manner the pains will come? No? But, my friend, you +disappoint me! You showed so much courage an hour ago. Listen. Feel for +a swelling just behind--Ah!" + +Immelan was already across the room. The Prince touched a bell, the +doors were opened. Ghastly pale, his head swimming, the tortured man +dashed out into the street. The Prince leaned back amongst his cushions, +untied a straw-fastened packet of his long cigarettes, lit one, and +closed his eyes. + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + + +Nigel was just arriving at Dorminster House when Maggie returned from +her ride. He assisted her to dismount and entered the house with her. + +"There is something here I should like to show you, Maggie," he said, as +he drew a dispatch from his pocket. "It was sent round to me half an +hour ago by Chalmers, from the American Embassy." + +"It's about Gilbert Jesson!" Maggie exclaimed, holding out her hand for +it. + +Nigel nodded. + +"There's a note inside, and an enclosure," he said. "You had better read +both." + +Maggie opened out the former: + + MY DEAR DORMINSTER, + + I am afraid there is rather bad news about Jesson. One of our + regular line of airships, running from San Francisco to + Vladivostok, has picked up a wireless which must have come from + somewhere in the South of China. They kept it for a few days, worse + luck, thinking it was only nonsense, as it was in code. Washington + got hold of it, however, and cabled it to us last night. I enclose + a copy, decoded. + + Sincerely yours, + + JERE CHALMERS. + +The copy was brief enough. Maggie felt her heart sink as she glanced +through the few lines: + + Report dispatched London. Fear escape impossible. Good-by. + + JESSON. + +"Horrible!" Maggie exclaimed, with a shiver. "I thought he was in +Russia." + +"So did we all," Nigel replied. "He must have come to the conclusion +that the key to the riddle he was trying to solve was in China, and gone +on there. Look here, Maggie," he continued, after a moment's hesitation, +"do you think anything could be done for Jesson with Prince Shan?" + +Maggie was silent. They were standing in a shaded corner of the hall, +but a fleck of sunshine shone in her hair. She was still a little out of +breath with the exercise, her cheeks full of healthy colour, her eyes +bright. She tapped her skirt with her riding whip. Nigel watched her a +little uneasily. + +"Prince Shan is calling here this afternoon," Maggie announced. "I hope +you don't mind." + +"What are you going to say to him?" Nigel asked bluntly. + +There was a short, tense silence. Even at the thought of the crisis +which she knew to be so close at hand, Maggie felt herself unnerved and +in dubious straits. + +"I do not know," she said at last. "For one thing, I do not know what he +wants." + +"What he wants seems perfectly plain to me," Nigel replied gravely. "He +wants you." + +Maggie made a desperate effort to regain the lightheartedness of a few +weeks ago. + +"If you believe that," she said, "your composure is most unflattering." + +There was a ring at the front doorbell, and a familiar voice was heard +outside. Maggie turned away to the staircase with a little sigh of +relief. + +"Naida!" she exclaimed. "I remember now I asked her for a quarter past +one instead of half-past. You must entertain her, Nigel. I'll change +into something quickly. And of course I'll speak to Prince Shan. We +mustn't lose a minute about that. I'll telephone from my room in a few +minutes, Naida. Nigel will look after you." + +Naida came down the hall, cool and exquisitely gowned in a creation of +shimmering white. Nigel led her into the rarely used drawing-room and +found a chair for her between the open window and the conservatory. At +first they exchanged but few words. The sense of her near presence +affected Nigel as nothing of the sort had ever done before. She for her +part seemed quite content with a silence which had in it many of the +essentials of eloquence. + +"If the history of these days is ever written by an irascible German +historian," Naida remarked at length, "he will probably declare that the +destinies of the world have been affected during this last month by an +outburst of primitivism. Do you know that I have written quite nice +things to Paul about you English people? Honest things, of course, but +still things which you helped me to discover. And Prince Shan, too. I +think that when he rode here through the clouds, he believed in his +heart that he was coming as a harbinger of woe." + +"You really think, then, that the crisis is past?" Nigel asked. + +She nodded. + +"I am almost sure of it. Prince Shan returns to China within the course +of the next few days." + +"We have lived so long," Nigel observed, "in dread of the unknown. I +wonder whether we shall ever understand the exact nature of the danger +with which we were faced." + +"It depends upon Prince Shan," she replied. "The terms were Immelan's, +but the method was his." + +"Do you believe," he asked a little abruptly, "that the attempt on +Prince Shan's life last night was made by Immelan?" + +There was a touch, perhaps, of her Muscovite ancestry in the cool +indifference with which she considered the matter. + +"I should think it most likely," she decided. "Prince Shan never changes +his mind, and I believe that he has decided against Immelan's scheme. +Immelan's only chance would be in Prince Shan's successor." + +"Why is China so necessary?" Nigel asked. + +She turned and smiled at her companion. + +"Alas!" she sighed, "we have reached an _impasse_. The great English +diplomat asks too many questions of the simple Russian girl." + +"It is unfortunate," he replied, in the same vein, "because I feel like +asking more." + +"As, for example?" + +"Whether you would be content to live for the rest of your life in any +other country except Russia." + +"A woman is content to live anywhere, under certain circumstances," she +murmured. + +Karschoff, discreetly announced, entered the room with flamboyant ease. + +"It is well to be young!" he exclaimed, as he bent over Naida's fingers. +"You look, my far-away but much beloved cousin, as though you had slept +peacefully through the night and spent the morning in this soft, sunlit +air, with perhaps, if one might suggest such a thing, an hour at a Bond +Street beauty parlour. Here am I with crow's-feet under my eyes and +ghosts walking by my side. Yet none the less," he added, as the door +opened and Maggie appeared, "looking forward to my luncheon and to hear +all the news." + +"There is no news," Naida declared, as the butler announced the service +of the meal. "We have reached the far end of the ways. The next +disclosures, if ever they are made, will come from others. At luncheon +we are going to talk of the English country, the seaside, the meadows, +and the quiet places. The time arrives when I weary, weary, of the +brazen ticking of the clock of fate." + +"I shall tell you," Nigel declared, "of a small country house I have in +Devonshire. There are rough grounds stretching down to the sea and +crawling up to the moors behind. My grandfather built it when he was +Chancellor of England, or rather he added to an old farmhouse. He called +it the House of Peace." + +"My father built a house very much in the same spirit," Naida told them. +"He called it after an old Turkish inscription, engraven on the front of +a villa in Stamboul--'The House of Thought and Flowers.'" + +Maggie smiled across the table approvingly. + +"I like the conversation," she said. "Naida and I are, after all, women +and sentimentalists. We claim a respite, an armistice--call it what you +will. Prince Karschoff, won't you tell me of the most beautiful house +you ever dwelt in?" + +"Always the house I am hoping to end my days in," he answered. "But let +me tell you about a villa I had in Cannes, fifteen years ago. People +used to speak of it as one of the world's treasures." + +When the two men were seated alone over their coffee, Nigel passed +Chalmers' note and the enclosure across to his companion. + +"You remember I told you about Chalmers' friend, Jesson, the secret +service man who came over to us?" he said. "Chalmers has just sent me +round this." + +Karschoff nodded and studied the message through his great horn-rimmed +eyeglass. + +"I thought that he was going to Russia for you," he said. + +"So he did. He must have gone on from there." + +"And the message comes from Southern China," Prince Karschoff reflected. + +Nigel was deep in thought. China, Russia, Germany! Prince Shan in +England, negotiating with Immelan! And behind, sinister, menacing, +mysterious--Japan! + +"Supposing," he propounded at last, "there really does exist a secret +treaty between China and Japan?" + +"If there is," Prince Karschoff observed, "one can easily understand +what Immelan has been at. Prince Shan can command the whole of Asia. I +know they are afraid of something of the sort in the States. An American +who was in the club yesterday told us they had spent over a hundred +millions on their west coast fortifications in the last two years." + +"One can understand, too, in that case," Nigel continued, "why Japan +left the League of Nations. That stunt of hers about being outside the +sphere of possible misunderstandings never sounded honest." + +"It was unfortunate," Prince Karschoff said, "that America was dominated +for those few months by an honest but impractical idealist. He had the +germ of an idea, but he thrust it on the world before even his own +country was ready for it. In time the nations would certainly have +elaborated something more workable." + +"You cannot keep a full-blooded man from clenching his fist if he's +insulted," Nigel pointed out, "and nations march along the same lines as +individuals. Its existence has never for a single moment weakened +Germany's hatred of England, and the stronger she grows, the more she +flaunts its conditions. France guards her frontiers, night and day, with +an army ten times larger than she is allowed. Russia has become the +country of mysteries, with something up her sleeve, beyond a doubt, and +there are cities in modern China into which no European dare penetrate. +Japan quite frankly maintains an immense army, the United States is +silently following suit--and God help us all if a war does come!" + +"You are right," Karschoff assented gloomily. "The last glamour of +romance has gone from fighting. There were remnants of it in the last +war, especially in Palestine and Egypt and when we first overran +Austria. To-day, science would settle the whole affair. The war would be +won in the laboratory, the engine room and the workshop. I doubt +whether any battleship could keep afloat for a week, and as to the +fighting in the air, if a hundred airships were in action, I do not +suppose that one of them would escape. Then they say that France has a +gun which could carry a shell from Amiens to London, and more mysterious +than all, China has something up her sleeve which no one has even a +glimmering of." + +"Except Jesson," Nigel muttered. + +"And Jesson's gleam of knowledge, or suspicion," Prince Karschoff +remarked, "seems to have brought him to the end of his days. Can +anything be done with Prince Shan about him, do you think?" + +"Only indirectly, I am afraid," Nigel replied. "Maggie is seeing him +this afternoon. As a matter of fact, I believe she telephoned to him +before luncheon, but I haven't heard anything yet. When a man goes out +on that sort of a job, he burns his boats. And Jesson isn't the first +who has turned eastwards, during the last few months. I heard only +yesterday that France has lost three of her best men in China--one who +went as a missionary and two as merchants. They've just disappeared +without a word of explanation." + +The telephone extension bell rang. Nigel walked over to the sideboard +and took down the receiver. + +"Is that Lord Dorminster?" a man's voice asked. + +"Speaking," Nigel replied. + +"I am David Franklin, private secretary to Mr. Mervin Brown," the voice +continued. "Mr. Mervin Brown would be exceedingly obliged if you would +come round to Downing Street to see him at once." + +"I will be there in ten minutes," Nigel promised. + +He laid down the receiver and turned to Karschoff. + +"The Prime Minister," he explained. + +"What does he want you for?" + +"I think," Nigel replied, "that the trouble cloud is about to burst." + + + + +CHAPTER XXVII + + +Mr. Mervin Brown on this occasion did not beat about the bush. His old +air of confident, almost smug self-satisfaction, had vanished. He +received Nigel with a new deference in his manner, without any further +sign of that good-natured tolerance accorded by a busy man to a kindly +crank. + +"Lord Dorminster," he began, "I have sent for you to renew a +conversation we had some little time since. I will be quite frank with +you. Certain circumstances have come to my notice which lead me to +believe that there may be more truth in some of the arguments you +brought forward than I was willing at the time to believe." + +"I must confess that I am relieved to hear you say so," Nigel replied. +"All the information which I have points to a crisis very near at hand." + +The Prime Minister leaned a little across the table. + +"The immediate reason for my sending for you," he explained, "is this. +My friend the American Ambassador has just sent me a copy of a wireless +dispatch which he has received from China from one of their former +agents. The report seems to have been sent to him for safety, but the +sender of it, of whose probity, by the by, the American Ambassador +pledges himself, appears to have been sent to China by you." + +"Jesson!" Nigel exclaimed. "I have heard of this already, sir, from a +friend in the American Embassy." + +"The dispatch," Mr. Mervin Brown went on, "is in some respects a little +vague, but it is, on the other hand, I frankly admit, disturbing. It +gives specific details as to definite military preparations on the part +of China and Russia, associated, presumably, with a third Power whose +name you will forgive my not mentioning. These preparations appear to +have been brought almost to completion in the strictest secrecy, but the +headquarters of the whole thing, very much to my surprise, I must +confess, seems to be in southern China." + +"In that case," Nigel pointed out, "if you will permit me to make a +suggestion, sir, you have a very simple course open to you." + +"Well?" + +"Send for Prince Shan." + +"Prince Shan," the Prime Minister replied, with knitted brows, "is not +over in this country officially. He has begged to be excused from +accepting or returning any diplomatic courtesies." + +"Nevertheless," Nigel persisted, "I should send for Prince Shan. If it +had not been," he went on slowly, "for the complete abolition of our +secret service system, you would probably have been informed before now +that Prince Shan has been having continual conferences in this country +with one of the most dangerous men who ever set foot on these +shores--Oscar Immelan." + +"Immelan has no official position in this country," the Prime Minister +objected. + +"A fact which makes him none the less dangerous," Nigel insisted. "He is +one of those free lances of diplomacy who have sprung up during the last +ten or fifteen years, the product of that spurious wave of altruism +which is responsible for the League of Nations. Immelan was one of the +first to see how his country might benefit by the new regime. It is he +who has been pulling the strings in Russia and China, and, I fear, +another country." + +"What I want to arrive at," Mr. Mervin Brown said, a little impatiently, +"is something definite." + +"Let me put it my own way," Nigel begged. "A very large section of our +present-day politicians--you, if I may say so, amongst them, Mr. Mervin +Brown--have believed this country safe against any military dangers, +because of the connections existing between your unions of working men +and similar bodies in Germany. This is a great fallacy for two reasons: +first because Germany has always intended to have some one else pull the +chestnuts out of the fire for her, and second because we cannot +internationalise labour. English and German workmen may come together +on matters affecting their craft and the conditions of their labour, but +at heart one remains a German and one an Englishman, with separate +interests and a separate outlook." + +"Well, at the end of it all," Mr. Mervin Brown said, "the bogey is war. +What sort of a war? An invasion of England is just as impossible to-day +as it was twenty years ago." + +Nigel nodded. + +"I cannot answer your question," he admitted. "I was looking to Jesson's +report to give us an idea as to that." + +"You shall see it to-morrow," Mr. Mervin Brown promised. "It is round at +the War Office at the present moment." + +"Without seeing it," Nigel went on, "I expect I can tell you one +startling feature of its contents. It suggested, did it not, that the +principal movers against us would be Russian and China and--a country +which you prefer just now not to mention?" + +"But that country is our ally!" Mr. Mervin Brown exclaimed. + +Nigel smiled a little sadly. + +"She has been," he admitted. "Still, if you had been _au fait_ with +diplomatic history thirty years ago, Mr. Mervin Brown, you would know +that she was on the point of ending her alliance with us and +establishing one with Germany. It was only owing to the genius of one +English statesman that at the last moment she almost reluctantly +renewed her alliance with us. She is in the same state of doubt +concerning our destiny to-day. She has seen our last two Governments +forget that we are an Imperial Power and endeavour to apply the +principles of sheer commercialism to the conduct of a great nation. She +may have opened her eyes a thousand years later than we did, but she is +awake enough now to know that this will not do. There is little enough +of generosity amongst the nations; none amongst the Orientals. I have a +conviction myself that there is a secret alliance between China and this +other Power, a secret and quite possibly an aggressive alliance." + +Mr. Mervin Brown sat for a few moments deep in thought. Somehow or other +his face had gained in dignity since the beginning of the conversation. +The nervous fear in his eyes had been replaced by a look of deep and +solemn anxiety. + +"If you are right, Lord Dorminster," he pronounced presently, "the world +has rolled backwards these last ten years, and we who have failed to +mark its retrogression may have a terrible responsibility thrust upon +us." + +"Politically, I am afraid I agree with you," Nigel replied. "Only the +idealist, and the prejudiced idealist, can ignore the primal elements in +human nature and believe that a few lofty sentiments can keep the +nations behind their frontiers. War is a terrible thing, but human life +itself is a terrible thing. Its principles are the same, and force will +never be restrained except by force. If the League of Nations had been +established upon a firmer and less selfish basis, it certainly might +have kept the peace for another thirty or forty years. As it is, I +believe that we are on the verge of a serious crisis." + +"War for us is an impossibility," Mr. Mervin Brown declared frankly, +"simply because we cannot fight. Our army consists of policemen; science +has defeated the battleship; and practically the same conditions exist +in the air." + +"You sent for me, I presume, to ask for my advice," Nigel said. "At any +rate, let me offer it. I have reason to believe that the negotiations +between Prince Shan and Oscar Immelan have not been entirely successful. +Send for Prince Shan and question him in a friendly fashion." + +"Will you be my ambassador?" the Prime Minister asked. + +Nigel hesitated for a moment. + +"If you wish it," he promised. "Prince Shan is in some respects a +strangely inaccessible person, but just at present he seems well +disposed towards my household." + +"Arrange, if you can," Mr. Mervin Brown begged, "to bring him here +to-morrow morning. I will try to have available a copy of the dispatch +from Jesson. It refers to matters which I trust Prince Shan will be able +to explain." + +Nigel lingered for a moment over his farewell. + +"If I might venture upon a suggestion, sir," he said, "do not forget +that Prince Shan is to all intents and purposes the autocrat of Asia. He +has taught the people of the world to remodel their ideas of China and +all that China stands for. And further than this, he is, according to +his principles, a man of the strictest honour. I would treat him, sir, +as a valued _confrere_ and equal." + +The Prime Minister smiled. + +"Don't look upon me as being too intensely parochial, Dorminster," he +said. "I know quite well that Prince Shan is a man of genius, and that +he is a representative of one of the world's greatest families. I am +only the servant of a great Power. He is a great Power in himself." + +"And believe me," Nigel concluded fervently, as he made his adieux, "the +greatest autocrat that ever breathed. If, when you exchange farewells +with him, he says--'There will be no war'--we are saved, at any rate for +the moment." + + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII + + +Maggie, very cool and neat, a vision of soft blue, a wealth of colouring +in the deep brown of her closely braided hair, her lips slightly parted +in a smile of welcome, felt, notwithstanding her apparent composure, a +strange disturbance of outlook and senses as Prince Shan was ushered +into her flower-bedecked little sitting room that afternoon. The unusual +formality of his entrance seemed somehow to suit the man and his manner. +He bowed low as soon as he had crossed the threshold and bowed again +over her fingers as she rose from her easy-chair. + +"It makes me very happy that you receive me like this," he told her +simply. "It makes it so much easier for me to say the things that are in +my heart." + +"Won't you sit down, please?" Maggie invited. "You are so tall, and I +hate to be completely dominated." + +He obeyed at once, but he continued to talk with grave and purposeful +seriousness. + +"I wish," he said, "to bring myself entirely into accord, for these few +minutes, with your western methods and customs. I address you, +therefore, Lady Maggie, with formal words, while I keep back in my +heart much that is struggling to express itself. I have come to ask you +to do me the great honour of becoming my wife." + +Maggie sat for a few moments speechless. The thing which she had half +dreaded and half longed for--the low timbre of his caressing voice--was +entirely absent. Yet, somehow or other, his simple, formal words were at +least as disturbing. He leaned towards her, a quiet, dignified figure, +anxious yet in a sense confident. He had the air of a man who has +offered to share a kingdom. + +"Your wife," Maggie repeated tremulously. + +"The thought is new to you, perhaps," he went on, with gentle tolerance. +"You have believed the stories people tell that in my youth I was vowed +to celibacy and the priesthood. That is not true. I have always been +free to marry, but although to-day we figure as a great progressive +nation, many of the thousand-year-old ideas of ancient China have dwelt +in my brain and still sit enshrined in my heart. The aristocracy of +China has passed through evil times. There is no princess of my own +country whom I could meet on equal terms. So, you see, although it +develops differently, there is something of the snobbishness of your +western countries reflected in our own ideas." + +"But I am not a princess," Maggie murmured. + +"You are the princess of my soul," he answered, lowering his eyes for a +moment almost reverently. "I cannot quite hope to make you understand, +but if I took for my wife a Chinese lady of unequal mundane rank, I +should commit a serious offence against those who watch me from the +other side of the grave, and to whom I am accountable for every action +of my life. A lady of another country is a different matter." + +"But I am an Englishwoman," Maggie said, "and I love my country. You +know what that means." + +"I know very well," he admitted. "I had not meant to speak of those +things until later, but, for your country's sake, what greater alliance +could you seek to-day than to become the wife of him who is destined to +be the Ruler of Asia?" + +Maggie caught hold of her courage. She looked into his eyes +unflinchingly, though she felt the hot colour rise into her cheeks. + +"You did not speak to me of these things, Prince Shan, when I came to +your house last night," she reminded him. + +His smile was full of composure. It was as though the truth which sat +enshrined in the man's soul lifted him above all the ordinary emotions +of fear of misunderstandings. + +"For those few minutes," he confessed, "I was very angry. It brings +great pain to a man to see the thing he loves droop her wings, flutter +down to earth, and walk the common highway. It is not for you, dear one, +to mingle with that crowd who scheme and cheat, hide and deceive, for +any reward in the world, whether it be money, fame, or the love of +country. You were not made for those things, and when I saw you there, +so utterly in my power, having deliberately taken your risk, I was +angry. For a single moment I meant that you should realise the danger of +the path you were treading. I think that I did make you realise it." + +Her eyes fell. He seemed to have established some compelling power over +her. He had met her thoughts before they were uttered, and answered even +her unspoken question. + +"I wish you didn't make life so much like a kindergarten," she +complained, with an almost pathetic smile at the corners of her lips. + +"It is a very different place," he rejoined fervently, "that I desire to +make of life for you. Listen, please. I have spoken to you first the +formal words which make all things possible between us, and now, if I +may, I let my heart speak. Somewhere not far from Pekin I have a palace, +where my lands slope to the river. For five months in the year my +gardens are starred with blue and yellow flowers, sweet-smelling as the +almond blossom, and there are little pagodas which look down on the blue +water, pagodas hung with creepers, not like your English evergreens, but +with blossoms, pink and waxen, which open as one looks at them and send +out sweet perfumes. When you are there with me, dear one, then I shall +speak to you in the language of my ancestors, which some day you will +understand, and you shall know that love has its cradle in the East, you +shall feel the flame of its birth, the furnace of its accomplishment. +Here my tongue moves slowly, yet I stoop my knee to you, I show you my +heart, and my lips tell you that I love. What that love is you shall +learn some day, if you have the will and the confidence and the soul. +Will you come back to China with me, Maggie?" + +She rested her fingers on his hand. + +"You are a magician," she confessed. "I am very English, and yet I want +to go." + +He stood for a moment looking into her eyes. Then he stooped down and +raised her hesitating fingers to his lips. + +"I believe that you will come," he said simply. "I believe that you will +ride over the clouds with me, back to the country of beautiful places. +So now I speak to you of serious things. Of money there shall be what +you wish, more than any woman even of your rank possesses in this +country. I shall give you, too, the sister of my great _Black Dragon_ so +that in five days, if you wish, you can pass from any of my palaces to +London. And further than that, behold!" + +He drew from his pocket a roll of papers. Maggie recognised it, and her +heart beat faster. Curiously enough, just then she scarcely thought of +its world importance. She remembered only those few moments of strange +thrills, the wonder at finding him in that room, as he stood watching +her, the horror and yet the thrill of his measured words. He laid the +papers upon the table. + +"Read them," he invited. "You will understand then the net that has been +closing around your country. You will understand the better if I tell +you this. China and Japan are one. It was my first triumph when +patriotism urged me into the field of politics. We have a single motto, +and upon that is based all that you may read there,--'_Europe for the +Europeans, Asia for us_.'" + +Maggie was conscious of a sudden sense of escape from her almost +mesmeric state. The change in his tone, his calm references to things +belonging to another and altogether different world, had dissolved a +situation against the charm of which she had found herself powerless, +even unwilling to struggle. Once more she was back in the world where +for the last two years had lain her chief interests. She took the papers +in her hand and began reading them quickly through. Every now and then a +little exclamation broke from her lips. + +"You will observe," her companion pointed out, looking over her +shoulder, "that on paper, at any rate, Japan is the great gainer. She +takes Australia, New Zealand and India. China absorbs Thibet and +reestablishes her empire of forty years ago. The arrangement is based +very largely on racial conditions. China is a self-centered country. We +have not the power of fusion of the Japanese. You will observe further, +as an interesting circumstance, that the American foothold in Asia +disappears as completely as the British." + +"But tell me," she demanded, "how are these things to be brought about, +and where does Immelan come in?" + +Prince Shan smiled. + +"Immelan's position," he explained, "is largely a sentimental one, yet +on the other hand he saves his country from what might be a grave +calamity. The commercial advantages he gains under this treaty might +seem to be inadequate, although in effect they are very considerable. +The point is this. He soothes his country of the pain which groans day +by day in her limbs. He gratifies her lust for vengeance against Great +Britain without plunging her into any desperate enterprise." + +"And France escapes," she murmured. + +"France escapes," he assented. "Rightly or wrongly, the whole of +Germany's post-war animosity was directed against England. She +considered herself deceived by certain British statesmen. She may have +been right or wrong. I myself find the evidence conflicting. At this +moment the matter does not concern us." + +"And is Great Britain, then," Maggie asked, "believed to be so helpless +that she can be stripped of the greater part of her possessions at the +will of China and Japan?" + +Prince Shan smiled. + +"Great Britain," he reminded her, "has taken the League of Nations to +her heart. It was a very dangerous thing to do." + +"Still," Maggie persisted, "there remains the great thing which you have +not told me. These proposals, I admit, would strike a blow at the heart +of the British Empire, but how are they to be carried into effect?" + +"If I had signed the agreement," he replied, "they could very easily +have been carried into effect. You have heard already, have you not, +through some of your agents, of the three secret cities? In the +eastern-most of them is the answer to your question." + +She smiled. + +"Is that a challenge to me to come out and discover for myself all that +I want to know?" + +"If you come," he answered, "you shall certainly know everything. There +is another little matter, too, which waits for your decision." + +"Tell me of it at once, please," she begged, with a sudden conviction of +his meaning. + +He obeyed without hesitation. + +"I spoke just now," he reminded her, "of the three secret cities. They +are secret because we have taken pains to keep them so. One is in +Germany, one in Russia, and one in China. A casual traveller could +discover little in the German one, and little more, perhaps, in the +Russian one. Enough to whet his curiosity, and no more. But in China +there is the whole secret at the mercy of a successful spy. A man named +Jesson, Lady Maggie--" + +"I telephoned you about him before luncheon to-day," she interrupted. + +"I had your message," he replied, "and the man is safe for the moment. +At the same time, Lady Maggie, let me remind you that this is a game the +rules of which are known the world over. Jesson has now in his +possession the secret on which I might build, if I chose, plans to +conquer the world. He knew the penalty if he was discovered, and he was +discovered. To spare his life is sentimentalism pure and simple, yet if +it is your will, so be it." + +"You are very good to me," she declared gratefully, "all the more good +because half the time I can see that you scarcely understand." + +"That I do not admit," he protested. "I understand even where I do not +sympathise. You make of life the greatest boon on earth. We of my race +and way of thinking are taught to take it up or lay it down, if not with +indifference, at any rate with a very large share of resignation. +However, Jesson's life is spared. From what I have heard of the man, I +imagine he will be very much surprised." + +She gave a little sigh of relief. + +"You have given me a great deal of your confidence," she said +thoughtfully. + +"Is it not clear," he answered, "why I have done so? I ask of you the +greatest boon a woman has to give. I do not seek to bribe, but if you +can give me the love that will make my life a dream of happiness, then +will it not be my duty to see that no shadow of misfortune shall come to +you or yours? China stands between Japan and Russia, and I am China." + +She gave him her hands. + +"You are very wonderful," she declared. "Remember that at a time like +this, it is not a woman's will alone that speaks. It is her soul which +lights the way. Prince Shan, I do not know." + +He smiled gravely. + +"I leave," he told her, "on Friday, soon after dawn." + +She found herself trembling. + +"It is a very short time," she faltered. + +They had both risen to their feet. He was close to her now, and she felt +herself caught up in a passionate wave of inertia, an absolute inability +to protest or resist. His arms were clasped around her lightly and with +exceeding gentleness. He leaned down. She found herself wondering, even +in that tumultuous moment, at the strange clearness of his complexion, +the whiteness of his firm, strong teeth, the soft brilliance of his +eyes, which caressed her even before his lips rested upon hers. + +"I think that you will come," he whispered. "I think that you will be +very happy." + + + + +CHAPTER XXIX + + +The great house in Curzon Street awoke, the following morning, to a +state of intense activity. Taxi-cabs and motor-cars were lined along the +street; a stream of callers came and went. That part of the +establishment of which little was seen by the casual caller, the rooms +where half a dozen secretaries conducted an immense correspondence, +presided over by Li Wen, was working overtime at full pressure. In his +reception room, Prince Shan saw a selected few of the callers, mostly +journalists and politicians, to whom Li Wen gave the entree. One visitor +even this most astute of secretaries found it hard to place. He took the +card in to his master, who glanced at it thoughtfully. + +"The Earl of Dorminster," he repeated. "I will see him." + +Nigel found himself received with courtesy, yet with a certain +aloofness. Prince Shan rose from his favourite chair of plain black oak +heaped with green silk cushions and held out his hand a little +tentatively. + +"You are very kind to visit me, Lord Dorminster," he said. "I trust that +you come to wish me fortune." + +"That," Nigel replied, "depends upon how you choose to seek it." + +"I am answered," was the prompt acknowledgment. "One thing in your +country I have at least learnt to appreciate, and that is your love of +candour. What is your errand with me to-day? Have you come to speak to +me as an ambassador from your cousin, or in any way on her behalf?" + +"My business has nothing to do with Lady Maggie," Nigel assured him +gravely. + +Prince Shan held out his hand. + +"Stop," he begged. "Do not explain your business. If it is a personal +request, it is granted. If, on the other hand, you seek my advice on +matters of grave importance, it is yours. Before other words are spoken, +however, I myself desire to address you on the subject of Lady Maggie +Trent." + +"As you please," Nigel answered. + +"It is not the custom of my country, or of my life," Prince Shan +continued, "to covet or steal the things which belong to another. If +fate has made me a thief, I am very sorry. I have proposed to Lady +Maggie that she accompany me back to China. It is my great desire that +she should become my wife." + +Nigel felt himself curiously tongue-tied. There was something in the +other's measured speech, so fateful, so assured, that it seemed almost +as though he were speaking of pre-ordained things. Much that had seemed +to him impossible and unnatural in such an idea disappeared from that +moment. + +"You tell me this," Nigel began-- + +"I announce it to you as the head of the family," Prince Shan +interrupted. + +"You tell it to me also," Nigel persisted, "because you have heard the +rumours which were at one time very prevalent--that Lady Maggie and I +were or were about to become engaged to be married." + +"I have heard such a rumour only very indirectly," Prince Shan +confessed, "and I cannot admit that it has made any difference in my +attitude. I think, in my land and yours, we have at least one common +convention. The woman who touches our heart is ours if we may win her. +Love is unalterably selfish. One must fight for one's own hand. And for +those who may suffer by our victory, we may have pity but no +consideration." + +"Am I to understand," Nigel asked bluntly, "that Lady Maggie has +consented to be your wife?" + +"Lady Maggie has given me no reply. I left her alone with her thoughts. +Every hour it is my hope to hear from her. She knows that I leave for +China early to-morrow." + +"So at the present moment you are in suspense." + +"I am in suspense," Prince Shan admitted, "and perhaps," he went on, +with one of his rare smiles, "it occurred to me that it would be in one +sense a relief to speak to a fellow man of the hopes and fears that are +in my heart. You are the one person to whom I could speak, Lord +Dorminster. You have not wished my suit well, but at least you have been +clear-sighted. I think it has never occurred to you that a prince of +China might venture to compete with a peer of England." + +"On the contrary," Nigel assented, "I have the greatest admiration for +the few living descendants of the world's oldest aristocracy. You have a +right to enter the lists, a right to win if you can." + +"And what do you think of my prospects, if I may ask such a delicate +question?" Prince Shan enquired. + +"I cannot estimate them," Nigel replied. "I only know that Maggie is +deeply interested." + +"I think," his companion continued softly, "that she will become my +Princess. You have never visited China, Lord Dorminster," he went on, +"so you have little idea, perhaps, as to the manner of our lives. Some +day I will hope to be your host, so until then, as I may not speak of my +own possessions, may I go just so far as this? Your cousin will be very +happy in China. This is a great country, but the very air you breathe is +cloyed with your national utilitarianism. Mine is a country of beautiful +thoughts, of beautiful places, of quiet-living and sedate people. I can +give your cousin every luxury of which the world has ever dreamed, +wrapped and enshrined in beauty. No person with a soul could be unhappy +in the places where she will dwell." + +"You are at least confident," Nigel remarked. + +"It is because I am convinced," was the calm rejoinder. "I shall take +your cousin's happiness into my keeping without one shadow of misgiving. +The last word, however, is with her. It remains to be seen whether her +courage is great enough to induce her to face such a complete change in +the manner of her life." + +"It will not be her lack of courage which will keep her in England," +Nigel declared. + +Prince Shan bowed, with a graceful little gesture of the hands. The +subject was finished. + +"I shall now, Lord Dorminster," he said, "take advantage of your kindly +presence here to speak to you on a very personal matter, only this time +it is you who are the central figure, and I who am the dummy." + +"I do not follow you," Nigel confessed, with a slight frown. + +"I speak in tones of apology," Prince Shan went on, "but you must +remember that I am one of reflective disposition; Nature has endowed me +with some of the gifts of my great ancestors, philosophers famed the +world over. It seems very clear to me that, if I had not come, from +sheer force of affectionate propinquity you would have married Lady +Maggie." + +Nigel's frown deepened. + +"Prince Shan!" he began. + +Again the outstretched hand seemed as though the fingers were pressed +against his mouth. He broke off abruptly in his protest. + +"You would have lived a contented life, because that is your province," +his companion continued. "You would have felt yourself happy because you +would have been a faithful husband. But the time would have come when +you would both have realised that you had missed the great things." + +"This is idle prophecy," Nigel observed, a little impatiently. "I came +to see you upon another matter." + +"Humour me," the Prince begged. "I am going to speak to you even more +intimately. I shall venture to do so because, after all, she is better +known to me than to you. I am going to tell you that of all the women in +the world, Naida Karetsky is the most likely to make you happy." + +Nigel drew himself up a little stiffly. + +"One does not discuss these things," he muttered. + +"May I call that a touch of insularity?" Prince Shan pleaded, "because +there is nothing else in the world so wonderful to discuss, in all +respect and reverence, as the women who have made us feel. One last +word, Lord Dorminster. The days of matrimonial alliances between the +reigning families of Europe have come to an end under the influence of a +different form of government, but there is a certain type of alliance, +the utility of which remains unimpaired. I venture to say that you could +not do your country a greater service, apart from any personal feelings +you might have, than by marrying Mademoiselle Karetsky. There, you see, +now I have finished. This is for your reflection, Lord Dorminster--just +the measured statement of one who wears at least the cloak of philosophy +by inheritance. Time passes. Your own reason for coming to see me has +not yet been expounded." + +"I have come to ask you to visit the Prime Minister before you leave +England," Nigel announced. + +Prince Shan changed his position slightly. His forehead was a little +wrinkled. He was silent for a moment. + +"If I pay more than a farewell visit of ceremony," he said, "that is to +say, if I speak with Mr. Mervin Brown on things that count, I must +anticipate a certain decision at which I have not yet wholly arrived." + +Nigel had a sudden inspiration. + +"You are seeking to bribe Maggie!" he exclaimed. + +"That is not true," was the dignified reply. + +"Then please explain," Nigel persisted. + +Prince Shan rose to his feet. He walked to the heavy silk curtains which +led into his own bedchamber, pushed them apart, and looked for a moment +at the familiar objects in the room. Then he came back, glancing on his +way at the ebony cabinet. + +"One does not repeat one's mistakes," he said slowly, "and although you +and I, Lord Dorminster, breathe the common air of the greater world, my +instinct tells me that of certain things which have passed between your +cousin and myself it is better that no mention ever be made. I wish to +tell you this, however. There is in existence a document, my signature +to which would, without a doubt, have a serious influence upon the +destinies of this country. That document, unsigned, would be one of my +marriage gifts to Lady Maggie--and as you know I have not yet had her +answer. However, if you wish it, I will go to the Prime Minister." + +Li Wen came silently in. He spoke to his master for a few minutes in +Chinese. A faint smile parted the latter's lips. + +"You can tell the person at the telephone that I will call within the +next few minutes," he directed. "You will not object," he added, turning +courteously to Nigel, "if I stop for a moment, on the way to Downing +Street, at a small private hospital? An acquaintance of mine lies sick +there and desires urgently to see me." + +"I am entirely at your service," Nigel assured him. + +Prince Shan, with many apologies, left Nigel alone in the car outside a +tall, grey house in John Street, and, preceded by the white-capped nurse +who had opened the door, climbed the stairs to the first floor of the +celebrated nursing home, where, after a moment's delay, he was shown +into a large and airy apartment. Immelan was in bed, looking very ill +indeed. He was pale, and his china-blue eyes, curiously protruding, were +filled with an expression of haunting fear. A puzzled doctor was +standing by the bedside. A nurse, who was smoothing the bedclothes, +glanced around at Prince Shan's entrance. The invalid started +convulsively, and, clutching the pillows with his right hand, turned +towards his visitor. + +"So you've come!" he exclaimed. "Stay where yon are! Don't go! +Doctor--nurse--leave us alone for a moment." + +The nurse went at once. The doctor hesitated. + +"My patient is a good deal exhausted," he said. "There are no dangerous +symptoms at present, but--" + +"I will promise not to distress him," Prince Shan interrupted. "I am +myself somewhat pressed for time, and it is probable that your patient +will insist upon speaking to me in private." + +The doctor followed the nurse from the room. Prince Shan stood looking +down upon the figure of quondam associate. There was a leaven of mild +wonder in his clear eyes, a faintly contemptuous smile about the corners +of his lips. + +"So you are afraid of death, my friend," he observed, "afraid of the +death you planned so skilfully for me." + +"It is a lie!" Immelan declared excitedly. "Sen Lu was never killed by +my orders. Listen! You have nothing against me. My death can do you no +good. It is you who have been at fault. You--Prince Shan--the great +diplomatist of the world--are gambling away your future and the future +of a mighty empire for a woman's sake. You have treated me badly enough. +Spare my life. Call in the doctor here and tell him what to do. He can +find nothing in my system. He is helpless." + +The smile upon the Prince's lips became vaguer, his expression more +bland and indeterminate. + +"My dear Immelan," he murmured, "you are without doubt delirious. +Compose yourself, I beg." + +A light that was almost tragic shone in the man's face. He sat up with a +sudden access of strength. + +"For the love of God, don't torture me!" he groaned. "The pains grow +worse, hour by hour. If I die, the whole world shall know by whose +hand." + +The expression on Prince Shan's face remained unchanged. In his eyes, +however, there was a little glint of something which seemed almost like +foreknowledge, + +"When you die," he pronounced calmly, "it will be by your own hand--not +mine." + +For some reason or other, Immelan accepted these measured words of +prophecy as a total reprieve. The relief in his face was almost piteous. +He seized his visitor's hand and would have fawned upon it. Prince Shan +withdrew himself a little farther from the bed. + +"Immelan," he said, "during my stay in England I have studied you and +your methods, I have listened to all you have had to say and to propose, +I have weighed the advantages and the disadvantages of the scheme you +have outlined to me, and I only arrived at my decision after the most +serious and unbiassed reflection. Your scheme itself was bold and almost +splendid, but, as you yourself well know at the back of your mind, it +would lay the seeds of a world tumult. I have studied history, Immelan, +perhaps a little more deeply than you, and I do not believe in +conquests. For the restoration to China of such lands as belong +geographically and rightly to the Chinese Empire, I have my own plans. +You, it seems to me, would make a cat's-paw of all Asia to gratify your +hatred of England." + +"A cat's-paw!" Immelan gasped. "Australia, New Zealand and India for +Japan, new lands for her teeming population; Thibet for you, all +Manchuria, and the control of the Siberian Railway!" + +"These are dazzling propositions," Prince Shan admitted, "and yet--what +about the other side of the Pacific?" + +"America would be powerless," Immelan insisted. + +"So you said before, in 1917," was the dry reminder. "I did not come +here, however, to talk world politics with you. Those things for the +moment are finished. I came in answer to your summons." + +Immelan raised himself a little in the bed. + +"You meant what you said?" he demanded, with hoarse anxiety. "There was +no poison? Swear that?" + +Prince Shan moved towards the door. His backward glance was coldly +contemptuous. + +"What I said, I meant," he replied. "Extract such comfort from it as you +may." + +He left the room, closing the door softly behind him. Immelan stared +after him, hollow-eyed and anxious. Already the cold fears were seizing +upon him once more. + +Prince Shan rejoined Nigel, and the two men drove off to Downing Street. +The former was silent for the first few minutes. Then he turned slightly +towards his companion. + +"The man Immelan is a coward," he declared. "It is he whom I have just +visited." + +Nigel shrugged his shoulders. + +"So many men are brave enough in a fight," he remarked, "who lose their +nerve on a sick bed." + +"Bravery in battle," Prince Shan pronounced, "is the lowest form of +courage. The blood is stirred by the excitement of slaughter as by +alcohol. With Immelan I shall have no more dealings." + +"Speaking politically as well as personally?" Nigel enquired. + +The other smiled. + +"I think I might go so far as to agree," he acquiesced, "but in a sense, +there are conditions. You shall hear what they are. I will speak before +you to the Prime Minister. See, up above is the sign of my departure." + +Out of a little bank of white, fleecy clouds which hung down, here and +there, from the blue sky, came the _Black Dragon_, her engines purring +softly, her movements slow and graceful. Both men watched her for a +moment in silence. + +"At six o'clock to-morrow morning I start," Prince Shan announced. "My +pilot tells me that the weather conditions are wonderful, all the way +from here to Pekin. We shall be there on Wednesday." + +"You travel alone?" Nigel enquired. + +"I have passengers," was the quiet reply. "I am taking the English +chaplain to your Church in Pekin." + +The eyes of the two men met. + +"It is an ingenious idea," Nigel admitted dryly. + +"I wish to be prepared," his companion answered. "It may be that he is +my only companion. In that case, I go back to a life lonelier than I +have ever dreamed of. It is on the knees of the gods. So far there has +come no word, but although I am not by nature an optimist, my +superstitions are on my side. All the way over on my last voyage, when I +lay in my berth, awake and we sailed over and through the clouds, my +star, my own particular star, seemed leaning always down towards me, and +for that reason I have faith." + +Nigel glanced at his companion curiously but without speech. The car +pulled up in Downing Street. The two men descended and found everything +made easy for them. In two minutes they were in the presence of the +Prime Minister. + + + + +CHAPTER XXX + + +Mr. Mervin Brown was at his best in the interview to which he had, as a +matter of fact, been looking forward with much trepidation. He received +Prince Shan courteously and reproached him for not having paid him an +earlier visit. To the latter's request that Nigel might be permitted to +be present at the discussion, he promptly acquiesced. + +"Lord Dorminster and I have already had some conversation," he said, +"bearing upon the matter about which I desire to talk to you." + +"I have found his lordship," Prince Shan declared, "one of the few +Englishmen who has any real apprehension of the trend of events outside +his own country." + +The Prime Minister plunged at once into the middle of things. + +"Our national faults are without doubt known to you, Prince Shan," he +said. "They include, amongst other things, an over-confidence in the +promises of others; too great belief, I fear, in the probity of our +friends. We paid a staggering price in 1914 for those qualities. Lord +Dorminster would have me believe that there is a still more terrible +price for us to pay in the future, unless we change our whole outlook, +abandon our belief in the League of Nations, and once more acknowledge +the supremacy of force." + +"Lord Dorminster is right," Prince Shan pronounced. "I have come here to +tell you so, Mr. Mervin Brown." + +"You come here as a friend of England?" the latter asked. + +"I come here as one who hesitates to become her enemy," was the measured +reply. "I will be perfectly frank with you, sir. I came to this country +to discuss a project which, with the acquiescence of China and Japan, +would have resulted in the humiliation of your country and the +gratification of Germany's eagerly desired revenge." + +"You believe in the existence of that sentiment, then?" the Prime +Minister enquired. + +"Any one short of a very insular Englishman," the Prince replied, "would +have realised it long ago. There is a great society in Germany, scarcely +even a secret society, pledged to wipe out the humiliations of the last +great war. Lord Dorminster tells me that you are to-day without a secret +service. For that reason you have remained in ignorance of the mines +beneath your feet. Germany has laid her plans well and carefully. Her +first and greatest weapon has been your sense of security. She has seen +you contemplate with an ill-advised smile of spurious satisfaction, +invincible France, regaining her wealth more slowly than you for the +simple reason that half the man power of the country is absorbed by her +military preparations. France is impregnable. A direct invasion of your +country is in all probability impossible. Those two facts have seemed to +you all-sufficient. That is where you have been, if I may say so, sir, +very short-sighted." + +"Germany has no power to transport troops in other directions," Mr. +Mervin Brown observed. + +Prince Shan smiled. + +"You have another enemy besides Germany," he pointed out, "a great +democracy who has never forgiven your lack of sympathy at her birth, +your attempts to repress by force a great upheaval, borne in agony and +shame, yet containing the germs of worthy things which your statesmen in +those days failed to discern. Russia has never forgiven. Russia stands +hand in hand with Germany." + +"But surely," the Prime Minister protested, "you speak in the language +of the past? The League of Nations still exists. Any directly predatory +expedition would bring the rest of the world to arms." + +Prince Shan shook his head. + +"One of the first necessities of a tribunal," he expounded, "is that +that tribunal should have the power to punish. You yourself are one of +the judges. You might find your culprit guilty. With what weapon will +you chastise him? The culprit has grown mightier than the judge." + +"America--" + +"America," Prince Shan interrupted, "can, when she chooses, strike a +weightier blow than any other nation on earth, but she will never again +proceed outside her own sphere of influence." + +"But she must protect her trade," the Prime Minister insisted. + +"She has no need to do so by force of arms. Take my own country, for +instance. We need American machinery, American goods, locomotives and +mining plants. America has no need to force these things upon us. We are +as anxious to buy as she is to sell." + +"I am to figure to myself, then," Mr. Mervin Brown reflected, "a +combination of Germany and Russia engaged in some scheme inimical to +Great Britain?" + +"There was such a scheme definitely arranged and planned," Prince Shan +assured him gravely. "If I had seen well to sign a certain paper, you +would have lost, before the end of this month, India, your great +treasure house, Australia and New Zealand, and eventually Egypt. You +would have been as powerless to prevent it as either of us three would +be if called upon unarmed to face the champion heavyweight boxer." + +"It is hard for me to credit the fact that officially Germany has any +knowledge of this scheme," the Prime Minister confessed. + +"Official Germany would probably deny it," Prince Shan answered dryly. +"Official Russia might do the same. Official China would follow suit, +but the real China, in my person, assures you of the truth of what I +have told you. You have never heard, I suppose, of the three secret +cities?" + +"I have heard stories about them which sounded like fairy tales," Mr. +Mervin Brown admitted grudgingly. + +"Nevertheless, they exist," Prince Shan continued, "and they exist for +the purpose of supplying means of offence for the expedition of which I +have spoken. There is one in Germany, one in Russia, and one in China. +The three between them have produced enough armoured airships of a new +design to conquer any country in the world." + +"Armoured airships?" Mr. Mervin Brown repeated. + +"Airships from which one fights on land as well as in the air," Prince +Shan explained. "On land they become moving fortresses. No shell has +ever been made which can destroy them. I should be revealing no secret +to you, because I believe I am right in saying, sir, that a model of +these amazing engines of destruction was first submitted to your +Government." + +"I remember something of the sort," the Prime Minister assented. "The +inventor himself was an American, I believe." + +"Precisely! I believe he told you in plain words that whoever possessed +his model might, if they chose, dominate the world." + +"But who wants to dominate the world by force?" Mr. Mervin Brown +demanded passionately. "We have passed into a new era, an era of peace +and the higher fellowship. It is waste of time, labour and money to +create these horrible instruments of destruction. The League of Nations +has decreed that they shall not be built." + +"Nevertheless," Prince Shan declared, with portentous gravity, "a +thousand of these engines of destruction are now ready in a certain city +of China. Each one of the three secret cities has done its quota of work +in the shape of providing parts. China alone has put them together. I +bought the secret, and I alone possess it. It rests with me whether the +world remains at peace or moves on to war." + +"You cannot hesitate, then?" Mr. Mervin Brown exclaimed anxiously. "You +yourself are an apostle of civilisation." + +Prince Shan smiled. + +"It is because we are strong," he said, "that we love peace. It is +because you are weak that you fear war. I am not here to teach you +statesmanship. It is not for me to point out to you the means by which +you can make your country safe and keep her people free. Call a meeting +of what remains of the League of Nations and compare your strength with +that of the nations who have crept outside and lie waiting. Then take +the advice of experts and set your house in order. You sacrifice +everything to-day to the god of commerce. Take a few men like Dorminster +here into your councils. You are not a nation of fools. Speak the truth +at the next meeting of the League of Nations and see that it is properly +reported. Help yourselves, and I will help you." + +"Will you come into my Cabinet, Lord Dorminster?" the Prime Minister +invited, turning to Nigel. + +"If you will recreate the post of Minister for War, I will do so with +pleasure," was the prompt reply. + +Prince Shan held out his hand. + +"There is great responsibility upon your shoulders, Mr. Mervin Brown," +he said. "You will never know how near you have been to disaster. Try +and wake up your nation gradually, if you can. Call together your +writers, your thinking men, your historians. Encourage the flagging +spirit of patriotism in your public schools and universities. Is this +presumption on my part that I give so much advice? If so, forgive me. +Truth that sits in the heart will sometimes demand to be heard." + +At the Prime Minister's request, Nigel remained behind. They both looked +at the door through which Prince Shan had passed. Mr. Mervin Brown +metaphorically pinched himself. He was still feeling a little dazed. + +"Is that man real flesh and blood?" he demanded. + +"He is as real and as near the truth," Nigel replied solemnly, "as the +things of which he has told us." + + + + +CHAPTER XXXI + + +That night, Nigel gave a dinner party on Maggie's account at the +fashionable London hotel of the moment. Invitations had been sent out by +telephone, by hurried notes, in one or two cases were delivered by word +of mouth. On the whole, the acceptances, considering the season was in +full swing, were a little remarkable. Every one was anxious to come, +because, as one of her girl friends put it, no one ever knew what Maggie +was going to be up to next. One of the few refusals came from Prince +Shan, and even he made use of compromise: + + _My dear Lord Dorminster, will you forgive me if in this instance I + do not break a custom to which I have perhaps a little too rigidly + adhered. The Prime Minister telephoned, a few minutes after we left + him, asking me to meet two of his colleagues from the Foreign + Office to-night, and I doubt whether our conference will have + concluded at the hour you name._ + + _However, if you will permit me, I will give myself the pleasure of + joining you later in the evening, to make my adieux to those of my + friends whom I am quite sure I shall find amongst your company._ + + _Sincerely yours_, + + SHAN. + +Maggie passed the note back with a little smile. She made no comment +whatever. Nigel watched her thoughtfully. + +"I have carried out your orders," he observed. "Everything has been +attended to, even to the colour of your table decorations. Now tell me +what it all means?" + +She looked him in the face quite frankly. + +"How can I?" she answered. "I do not know myself." + +"Is this by way of being a farewell party?" he persisted. + +"I do not know that," she assured him. "The only thing is that if I do +decide--to go--well, I shall have had a last glimpse of most of my +friends." + +"As your nearest male relative, in fact your guardian," Nigel went on, +with a touch of his old manner, "I feel myself deeply interested in your +present situation. If a little advice from one who is considerably your +senior would be acceptable--" + +"It wouldn't," Maggie interrupted quietly. "There are just two things in +life no girl accepts advice upon--the way she does her hair and the man +she means to marry. You see, both are decided by instinct. I shall know +before dawn to-morrow what I mean to do, but until then nothing that +anybody could say would make any difference. Besides, your mind ought to +be full of your own matrimonial affairs. I hear that Naida is talking +of going back to Russia next week." + +"My own affairs are less complex," Nigel replied. "I am going to ask +Naida to marry me--to-night if I have the opportunity." + +Maggie made a little grimace. + +"There goes my second string!" she exclaimed. "Nigel, you are horribly +callous. I have never been in the least sure that I haven't wanted to +marry you myself." + +Nigel lit a cigarette and pushed the box across to his companion. + +"I've frequently felt the same way," he confessed. "The trouble of it is +that when the really right person comes along, one hasn't any doubt +about it whatever. I should have made you a stodgy husband, Maggie." + +She sniffed. + +"I think that considering the way you've flirted with me," she declared, +"you ought at least to have given me the opportunity of refusing you." + +"If Naida refuses me," he began-- + +"And I decide that Asia is too far away," she interrupted-- + +"We may come together, after all," he said, with a resigned little sigh. + +"Glib tongue and empty heart," she quoted. "Nigel, I would never trust +you. I believe you're in love with Naida." + +"And I'm not quite so sure about you," he observed, watching the colour +rise quickly in her cheeks. "Off with you to dress, young woman. It's +past seven, and we must be there early. I still have the wine to order." + +The dinner party was in its way a complete success. Prince Karschoff was +there, benign and distinguished; Chalmers and one or two other young men +from the American Embassy. There was a sprinkling of Maggie's girl +friends, a leaven of the older world in Nigel's few intimates,--and +Naida, very pale but more beautiful than ever in a white velvet gown, +her hair brushed straight back, and with no jewellery save one long rope +of pearls. Nigel who in his capacity as host had found little time for +personal conversation during the service of dinner, deliberately led her +a little apart when they passed out into the lounge for coffee and to +watch the dancing. + +"My duties are over for a time," he said. "Do you realise that I have +not had a word with you alone since our luncheon at Ciro's?" + +"We have all been a little engrossed, have we not?" she murmured. "I +hope that you are satisfied with the way things have turned out." + +"Nothing shall induce me to talk politics or empire-saving to-night," he +declared, with a smile. "I have other things to say." + +"Tell me why you asked us all to dine so suddenly," she enquired. "I do +not know whether it is my fancy, but there seems to be an air of +celebration about. Is there any announcement to be made?" + +He shook his head. + +"None. The party was just a whim of Maggie's." + +They both looked across towards the ballroom, where she was dancing with +Chalmers. + +"Maggie is very beautiful to-night," Naida said. "I could scarcely +listen to my neighbour's conversation at dinner time for looking at her. +Yet she has the air all the time of living in a dream, as though +something had happened which had lifted her right away from us all. I +began to wonder," she added, "whether, after all, Oscar Immelan had not +told me the truth, and whether we should not be drinking her health and +yours before the evening was over." + +"You could scarcely believe that," he whispered, "if you have any memory +at all." + +There was a faint touch of pink in her cheeks, a tinge of colour as +delicate as the passing of a gleam of sunshine over a sea-glistening +shell. + +"But Englishmen are so unfaithful," she sighed. + +"Then I at least am an exception," Nigel answered swiftly. "The words +which you checked upon my lips the last time we were alone together +still live in my heart. I think, Naida, the time has come to say them." + +Their immediate neighbours had deserted them. He leaned a little +towards her. + +"You know so well that I love you, Naida," he said. "Will you be my +wife?" + +She looked up at him, half laughing, yet with tears in her eyes. With an +impulsive little gesture, she caught his hand in hers for a moment. + +"How horribly sure you must have felt of me," she complained, "to have +spoken here, with all these people around! Supposing I had told you that +my life's work lay amongst my own people, or that I had made up my mind +to marry Oscar Immelan, to console him for his great disappointment." + +"I shouldn't have believed you," he answered, smiling. + +"Conceit!" she exclaimed. + +He shook his head. + +"In a sense, of course, I am conceited," he replied. "I am the happiest +and proudest man here. I really think that after all we ought to turn it +into a celebration." + +The band was playing a waltz. Naida's head moved to the music, and +presently Nigel rose to his feet with a smile, and they passed into the +ballroom. Karschoff and Mrs. Bollington Smith watched them with +interest. + +"Naida is looking very wonderful to-night," the latter remarked. "And +Nigel, too; I wonder if there is anything between them." + +"The days of foreign alliances are past," Karschoff replied, "but a few +intermarriages might be very good for this country." + +"Are you serious?" she asked. + +"Absolutely! I would not suggest anything of the sort with Germany, but +with this new Russia, the Russia of which Naida Karetsky is a daughter, +why not? Although they will not have me back there, Russia is some day +going to lay down the law to Europe." + +"I wonder whether Maggie has any ideas of the sort in her mind," Mrs. +Bollington Smith observed. "She seems curiously abstracted to-night." + +Chalmers came grumblingly up to Mrs. Bollington Smith, with whom he was +an established favourite. + +"Lady Maggie is treating me disgracefully," he complained. "She will +scarcely dance at all. She goes around talking to every one as though it +were a sort of farewell party." + +"Perhaps it may be," Karschoff remarked quietly. + +"She isn't going away, is she?" Chalmers demanded. + +"Who knows?" the Prince replied. "Lady Maggie is one of those strange +people to whom one may look with every confidence for the unexpected." + +She herself came across to them, a few moments later. + +"Something tells me," she declared, "that you are talking about me." + +"You are always a very much discussed young lady," Karschoff rejoined, +with a little bow. + +She made a grimace and sank into a chair by her aunt. She talked on +lightly enough, but all the time with that slight suggestion of +superficiality which is a sign of strain. She glanced often towards the +entrance of the lounge, yet no one seemed less disturbed when at a few +minutes before eleven Prince Shan came quietly in. He made his way at +once to Mrs. Bollington Smith and bent over her fingers. + +"It is so kind of you and Lord Dorminster," he said, "to give me this +opportunity of saying good-by to a few friends." + +"You are leaving us so soon, Prince?" + +"To-morrow, soon after dawn," he replied, his eyes wandering around the +little circle. "I wish to be in Pekin, if possible, by Wednesday, so my +_Dragon_ must spread his wings indeed." + +He said a few words to almost everybody. Last of all he came to Maggie, +and no one heard what he said to her. There was no change in his face as +he bent low over her fingers, no sign of anything which might have +passed between them, as a few minutes later he turned to one side with +Nigel. Maggie held out her hand to Chalmers. The strain seemed to have +passed. Her lips were parted in a wonderful smile, her feet moved to the +music. + +"Come and dance," she invited. + +They moved a few steps away together, when Maggie came to an abrupt +standstill. The two stood for a moment as though transfixed, their eyes +upon the arched entrance which led from the restaurant into the lounge. +A man was standing there, looking around, a strange, menacing figure, a +man dressed in the garb of fashion but with the face of a savage, with +eyes which burned in his head like twin dots of fire, with drawn, hollow +cheeks and mouth a little open like a mad dog's. As his eyes fell upon +the group and he recognised them, a look of horrible satisfaction came +into his face. He began to approach quite deliberately. He seemed to +take in by slow degrees every one who stood there,--Maggie herself and +Chalmers, Naida, Nigel and Prince Shan. He moved forward. All the time +his right hand was behind him, concealed underneath the tails of his +dress coat. + +"Be careful!" Maggie cried out. "It is Oscar Immelan! He is mad!" + +Some of the party and many of the bystanders had shrunk away from the +menacing figure. Naida stepped out from among the little group of those +who were left. + +"Oscar," she said firmly, "what is the matter with you? You are not well +enough to be here." + +He came to a standstill. At close quarters his appearance was even more +terrible. Although by some means he had gotten into his evening clothes, +he was only partly shaven, and there were gashes in his face where the +hand which had held his razor had slipped. The pupils of his eyes were +distended, and the eyes themselves seemed to have shrunk back into their +sockets. His whole frame seemed to have suddenly lost vigour, even +substance. He had the air of a man in clothes too large for him. Even +his voice was shriller,--shriller and horrible with the slow and bestial +satisfaction of his words. + +"So here you are, the whole nest of you together, eh?" he exclaimed. +"Good! Very good indeed! Prince Shan, the poisoner! Dorminster, enjoying +your brief triumph, eh? And you, Naida Karetsky, traitress to your +country--deceiver--" + +"That will do, Immelan," Nigel interrupted sharply. "We are all here. +What do you want with us?" + +"That comes," Immelan replied. "Soon you shall all know why I have come! +Let me speak to my friend Shan for a moment. I carry your poison in my +veins, but there is a chance--just a chance," he added slowly, with a +horrible smile upon his lips, "that you may go first, after all." + +Nigel made a stealthy but rapid movement forward, drawing Naida gently +out of the way. Immelan was too quick, however. He swung around, showing +the revolver which he had been concealing behind him, and moved to one +side until his back was against one of the pillars. By this time, most +of the other occupants of the ballroom had either rushed screaming away +altogether, or were hiding, peering out in fascinated horror from the +different recesses. The chief maitre d'hotel bravely held his ground and +came to within a few paces of Immelan. + +"We can't have any brawling here," he said. "Put that revolver away." + +Immelan took no notice of the intervener, except that for a single +moment the muzzle yawned in the latter's face. The maitre d'hotel was a +brave man, but he had a wife and family, and after all, it was not his +affair. There were other men there to look after the ladies. He hurried +off to call for the police. Almost as he went, Prince Shan stepped into +the foreground. His voice was calm and expressionless. His eyes, in +which there shone no shadow of fear, were steadily fixed upon Immelan. +He spoke without flurry. + +"So you carry your own weapons to-night, Immelan," he said. "That at +least is more like a man. You seem to have a grievance against every +one. Start with me. What is it?" + +There were some of them who wondered why, at this juncture when he so +clearly dominated his assailant, Prince Shan, whose courage was superb +and whose _sang froid_ absolutely unshaken did not throw himself upon +this intruder and take his chance of bringing the matter to an end at +the moment when the man's nerve was undoubtedly shaken. Then they looked +towards the entrance, and they understood. Creeping towards the little +gathering came Li Wen and another of the Prince's suite, a younger and +even more active man. The two came on tiptoe, crouching and moving +warily, with the gleam of the tiger in their anxious eyes. Maggie caught +a warning glance from Nigel and looked away. + +"You are my murderer!" Immelan cried hoarsely. "It is through you I +suffer these pains! I am dying of your accursed poison!" + +"If that were true," Prince Shan replied, with the air of one willing to +discuss the subject impartially, "might I remind you of Sen Lu, who died +in my box at the Albert Hall? For whom was that dagger thrust meant, +Immelan? Not for the man whom you had bought to betray me, the only one +of my suite who has ever been tempted with gold. That dagger thrust was +meant for me, and the assassin was one of your creatures. So even if +your words were true, Immelan, and the poison which you imagine to be in +your body were planted there by me, are we less than quits?" + +Immelan's lie was unconvincing. + +"I know nothing of Sen Lu's death," he declared. "I employ no assassins. +When there is killing to be done, I can do it myself. I am here to-night +for that purpose. You have deserted me at the last moment, Prince +Shan--played me and my country false for the sake of the English woman +whom you think to carry back with you to China. And you," he added, +turning with a sudden furious glance at Naida, "you have deceived the +man who trusted you, the man who sent you here for one purpose, and one +purpose only. You have done your best to ruin my scheme. Not only that, +but you have given the love which was mine--mine, I say--to another--an +Englishman! I hate you all! That is why I, a dying man, have crawled +here to reap my little harvest of vengeance.--You, Naida--you shall be +first--" + +Naida was suddenly swung on one side, and the shot which rang out passed +through Nigel's coat sleeve, grazing his wrist,--the only shot that was +fired. Prince Shan, watching for his moment, as his two attendants threw +themselves upon the madman from behind, himself sprang forward, knocked +Immelan's right hand up with a terrible blow, and sent the revolver +crashing to the ground. It was a matter of a few seconds. Immelan, when +he felt himself seized, scarcely struggled. The courage of his madness +seemed to pass, the venom died out of his face, he shook like a man in +an ague. Prince Shan kicked the revolver on one side and looked +scornfully down upon him, now a nerveless wreck. + +"Immelan," he said, "it is a pity that you did not wait until to-morrow +morning. You would then have known the truth. You are no more poisoned +than I am. If you had been in China--well, who knows? In England there +is so much prejudice against the taking of a worthless life that as a +guest I subscribed to it and mixed a little orris-root tooth powder +with your vermouth." + +The man's eyes suddenly opened. He was feverishly, frantically anxious. + +"Tell me that again," he shrieked. "You mean it? Swear that you mean +it." + +Prince Shan's gesture as he turned away was one of supreme contempt. + +"A Shan," he said, "never needs to repeat." + +There was the bustle of arriving police, the story of a revolver which +had gone off by accident, a very puzzling contretemps expounded for +their benefit. The situation, and the participants in it, seemed to +dissolve with such facility that it was hard for any one to understand +what had actually happened. Prince Shan, with Maggie on his arm, was +talking to the leader of the orchestra, who had suddenly reappeared. The +former turned to his companion. + +"It is not my custom to dance," he said, "but the waltz that they were +beginning to play seemed to me to have a little of the lure of our own +music. Will you do me the honour?" + +They moved away to the music. Chalmers stood and watched them, with one +hand in his pocket and the other on Nigel's shoulder. He turned to +Naida, who was on the other side. + +"Nothing like a touch of melodrama for the emotions," he grumbled. "Look +at Lady Maggie! Her head might be touching the clouds, and I never saw +her eyes shine like that when she danced with me." + +"You don't dance as well as Prince Shan, old fellow," Nigel told him. + +"And the Prince sails for China at dawn," Naida murmured. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXII + + +Prince Shan stood in the tiny sitting room of his suite upon the _Black +Dragon_ and looked around him critically. The walls were of black oak, +with white inlaid plaques on which a great artist had traced little +fanciful figures,--a quaint Chinese landscape, a temple, a flower-hung +pagoda. There were hangings of soft, blue silk tapestry, brought from +one of his northern palaces. The cloth which covered the table was of +the finest silk. There were several bowls of flowers, a couch, and two +comfortable chairs. Through the open doors of the two bedchambers came a +faint glimpse of snow-white linen, a perfume reminiscent at once of +almond blossom, green tea, and crushed lavender, and in the little room +beyond glistened a silver bath. Already attired for the voyage, his +pilot stood on the threshold. + +"Is all well, your Highness?" he asked. + +"Everything is in order," Prince Shan replied. "Ching Su is a perfect +steward." + +"The reverend gentleman is in his room, your Highness," the pilot went +on. "All the supplies have arrived, and the crew are at their stations. +At what hour will it please your Highness to start?" + +Prince Shan looked through the open window, along the wooden platform, +out to the broad stretch of road which led to London. + +"I announced the hour of my departure as six o'clock," he replied. "I +cannot leave before in case of any farewell message. Is the woman of +whom I spoke to you here?" + +"She is in attendance, your Highness." + +"She understands that she will not be required unless my other passenger +should desire to accompany us?" + +"She understands perfectly, your Highness." + +Prince Shan stepped through his private exit on to the narrow wooden +platform. Already the mighty engines had started, purring softly but +deeply, like the deep-throated murmurings of a giant soon to break into +a roar. It was a light, silvery morning, with hidden sunshine +everywhere. On the other side of the vast amphitheatre of flat, +cinder-covered ground, the Downs crept upwards, rolling away to the +blue-capped summit of a distant range of hills. Northwards, the pall of +London darkened the horizon. An untidy medley of houses and factories +stretched almost to the gates of the vast air terminus. Listening +intently, one could catch the faint roar of the city's awakening +traffic, punctuated here and there by the shrill whistling of tugs in +the river, hidden from sight by a shroud of ghostly mist. The dock on +which Prince Shan stood was one apportioned to foreign royalty and +visitors of note. A hundred yards away, the Madrid boat was on the point +of starting, her whistles already blowing, and her engines commencing to +beat. Presently the great machinery which assisted her flight from the +ground commenced its sullen roar. There was a chorus of farewell shouts +and she glided up into the air, a long row of people waving farewells +from the windows. Prince Shan glanced at his watch,--twenty minutes to +six. He paced the wooden boards and looked again,--ten minutes to six. +Then he stopped suddenly. Along that gleaming stretch of private road +came a car, driven at a rapid pace. Prince Shan stood and watched it, +and as he watched, it seemed almost as though the hidden sun had caught +his face and transfigured it. He stood as might stand a man who feels +his feet upon the clouds. His lips trembled. There was no one there to +see--his attendants stood respectfully in the background--but in his +eyes was a rare moisture, and for a single moment a little choking at +his throat. The car turned in under the arched roof. Prince Shan's +servants, obeying his gesture, hurried forward and threw open the gates. +The heavily laden limousine came to a standstill. Three people +descended. Nigel and Naida lingered, watching the luggage being +unloaded. Maggie came forward alone. + +They met a few yards from the entrance to the platform. Prince Shan was +bare-headed, and Maggie, at least, saw those wonderful things in his +face. He bent down and took her hands in his. + +"Dear and sweet soul," he whispered, as his lips touched her fingers, +"may my God and yours grant that you shall find happiness!" + +Her own eyes were wet as she smiled up at him. + +"I have been so long making up my mind," she said, "and yet I knew all +the time. I am so glad--so happy that I have come. Think, too, how +wonderful a start! We leave the earth for the clouds." + +"It is a wonderful allegory," he answered, smiling. "We will take it +into our hearts, dear one. It rests within the power of every human +being to search for happiness and, in searching, to find it. I am +fortunate because I can take you to beautiful places. I can spell out +for you the secrets of a new art and a new beauty. We can walk in fairy +gardens. I can give you jewels such as Europe has never seen, but I can +give you, Maggie, nothing so strange and wonderful, even to me who know +myself, as the love which fills my heart." + +Her laugh was like music. + +"I am going to be so happy," she murmured. + +The other two approached and they all shook hands. They looked over the +amazing little rooms, watched the luggage stowed away in some marvellous +manner, saw the crew, every one at his station like a motionless figure. +Then a whistle was blown, and once more they all clasped hands. + +"Very soon," Prince Shan promised, as he and Maggie leaned from the +window of the car, "I shall send the _Black Dragon_ for you, Lord +Dorminster, and for the one other whom I think you may wish to bring. +Asia is not so far off, these days, and Maggie will love to see her +friends." + +Almost imperceptibly the giant airship floated away. + +"Watch, both of you," Maggie cried. "I am sending you down a farewell +present." She whispered to Prince Shan, who handed her something from +his pocket, smiled, and gave an order. The great ship passed in a +semicircle and hovered almost exactly above their heads. A little shower +of small scraps of paper came floating down. Nigel picked one up, +examined it, and understood. He waved his hat. + +"It is Maggie's farewell gift to England," he said, "the treaty which +Prince Shan never signed." + +They stood side by side, watching. With incredible speed, the _Black +Dragon_ passed into the clouds and out again. Then, as it roared away +eastwards, the sun suddenly disclosed itself. The airship mounted +towards it, shimmering and gleaming in every part. Naida passed her hand +a little shyly through her companion's arm. + +"Isn't that rather a wonderful way to depart in search of happiness?" +she murmured. + +He smiled down at her. + +"I do not think that we shall find the search very difficult, dear," he +said, "though our feet may remain upon the earth." + +Naida's lip quivered for a moment. Then she caught a glimpse of his face +and gave a little sigh of content. + +"There is heaven everywhere," she whispered. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GREAT PRINCE SHAN*** + + +******* This file should be named 13123.txt or 13123.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/1/3/1/2/13123 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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